Chapter One

Gene grumbled and swore at the insistent knocking at the door.

"Alright, alright, keep yer fist on," he mumbled, gripping the brandy bottle in one hand. He slouched to the front door and opened it to find a very distressed Robin outside.

"I'm alive?" he cried.

Gene stared at him; his hair was flopping all over the place, his skin covered in goosebumps from the cold and his eyes wide and confused.

"Well, come in, do take a seat, have you had a pleasant day? Oh, it's been marvellous," Gene mocked, "what sort of bloody greeting is that?"

Robin barely heard. He pushed in past Gene and tried to cool himself down a little.

"I'm alive," he said, this time as a statement rather than a question, "how the hell am I alive?" before Gene could reply he added, "and why didn't you tell me?"

"Thought you knew," Gene frowned.

"Knew?" cried Robin, "I've spent the last three days staring at a dead watch!"

"Well what did you think I was talking about, making the most of yer time with Simon while you were here?" Gene asked crossly.

"I thought you meant… I just thought you meant in general," cried Robin, "I thought I was dead, I thought you were talking about a permanent thing! You never said 'while you're here'!"

"Didn't think I needed to!" Gene told him indignantly.

Robin spun around, the nervous energy in his body taking control of his limbs.

"So what am I supposed to do now?" he cried, "how am I supposed to get home?"

"You've been here before, Batman," Gene reminded him, "You know it happens when and if it happens."

"Shit –" Robin spun around one more time and found himself gravitating towards the sofa. He sank down, shaking his head and covered his face with his fingers. He took a few deep breaths to calm down before he finally looked back at Gene.

"I had a message," he said quietly.

"Yeah, well you're not the only one and I'm not used to the bloody things so if you can get yer uniform and dog-repelling socks and be on yer way I'd like to spend some time alone with yer alcohol and me thoughts to work out what it's supposed to mean."

Robin didn't hear a word Gene said.

"Kim's pregnant," he said quietly.

That caught Gene's attention.

"Bloody hell," he looked up and scratched his head, "How did you manage that?"

Robin's expression reflected a mixture of annoyance and disbelief.

"That's not very nice!" he said a little pathetically, too tired to have a proper go at him.

"No offence Batman, I just thought you might have been sticking it in the wrong place for that to happen."

Robin only decided to let that one pass for the sheer fact that Gene was the one person who might understand what he was going through.

"Yeah, well," he began a little crossly, "we'd been trying. She's had miscarriages. It's been hard."

Gene felt a little guilty now. He sank down onto a matching chair and passed the brandy bottle to Robin.

"Here," he said, "you might need this more than me."

"Thanks," Robin said quietly. He took the bottle and drank from it quickly, wishing that the answers were hidden away inside it somehow. Eventually he placed the bottle down on the floor and looked back at Gene. "So what do I do?" he asked, "I have to get back. Now I know that I've still got a chance, I need to find my way out of here. I've got a baby on the way, and –" he frowned and stared at his hand, "and apparently a fiancée… even though no one actually had a chance to propose…"

"Well, it's better that way than falling down an 'ole before you pop the question," Gene told him. Robin had no idea what he was talking about so he politely ignored that comment. He looked at him, just hoping that he'd have something more substantial than an 'I don't know' to offer to his questions.

"How do I get back to her?"

Gene shook his head. It was never that simple.

"Sorry," he said, "No fire exit out of this place, Robin," then countered with his own question, "how do I make sense of messages that come from Teletubbies and the bloody Joy of Painting?"

Robin stared at him blankly, then he looked at the bottle in his hands to see how much Gene had actually consumed. Not very much apparently.

"What?"

Gene shook his head. He wasn't sure he was ready to expand upon it.

"Doesn't matter," he said, "suppose it's about time I had something to figure out of me own."

With that, two men fell silently, trying to understand the messages they'd received that night. Far away, two women were trying to work out the same questions from the other side of the line.

~xXx~

2012, Sunday 8th January, just past midday

It was strange how the single noise, the lone gunshot, spoke right to their instincts and both Alex and Kim knew. They just knew. As they both ran towards the shop they each feared the loss of something; Kim of Robin, and Alex of her way home. Something told her inside that the bullet had been meant for her. It should have been her way back. As it was, she could only press forward, running awkwardly with her belly weighing her down towards the chaotic shop front to find out once and for all whether her instincts were correct.

She followed on behind Kim who strode way ahead, screaming Robin's name over and over again. Alex couldn't remember ever seeing her so scared. Kim held little fear when it came to her own safety but if someone important to her was at risk she couldn't keep a lid on those emotions. Alex tried to call to her, to tell her to stay calm and to slow down but she couldn't get her words out, and Kim wouldn't have listened anyway.

They'd only been running for a few seconds, and yet time had slowed down to a strange pace, making their dash feel like it had been going on for an hour. There was a screeching sound nearby, like car tyres. It had been getting closer but the alarm and the screaming had drowned it out somewhat. Just as Alex started to question it the vehicle finally came into plain sight, skidding and flailing across the road. What the hell was wrong? Had it blown a tyre or something? Or had the driver simply lost his nerve? Either way it only added to the shouting and screaming of the crowd as it tore along the road toward the store to pick up the raiders and any loot they'd bagged, but there was an obstacle in its path that was made of flesh and bone.

The moment the car struck Kim and her body skipped and skimmed across the bonnet before dropping to the floor Alex felt herself turn icy cold from head to toe. It was as though her hope died inside, all over again; her emotions torn between two things – her worry for her friend and the possibility that she'd just missed her second chance. Was the car meant to be for her? Was that how she was supposed to get back? She found herself panicking and crying out in anguish as she saw her path back to the nineties fading before her and two of her friends slipping away from her.

She came to a halt beside Kim and knelt by her side. Her eyes were closed and her body stock-still.

"Kim," she called her name again and again, "Kim, can you hear me? Come on, wake up, Kim –"

She was afraid to move her, scared of doing any more damage. She felt all of her knowledge and all of her logic fading away. She should have been able to stay calm but she felt awash with dread and panic.

The sound of sirens heading towards her was a welcome noise. She looked down at Kim, ran a comforting hand gently through the front of her blonde crop and prayed silently that one of those sirens belonged to an ambulance, but the sound of a screaming female voice pulled her attention away from Kim for a moment as someone cried from the shop front;

"Please, someone, help – there's a man who's been shot –"

For a moment Alex had almost forgotten about the gunshot and Robin. Her attention had been taken by Kim's plight; one definite, confirmed accident taking priority over a possibility that she hadn't seen for sure with her own eyes. She could see an ambulance parking just feet away and peered down at Kim.

"You'll be in safe hands now," she whispered, feeling guilty about leaving her but she needed to see for herself what had happened inside the shop. She got to her feet and ran to the door, peering inside to see Hayley and a random customer huddling over a body, all folded and crumpled on the ground. Although he was faced downward, blood seeping through the back of his shirt and pooling on the floor around him, Alex didn't need to see his features to know who it was. There was no question. She started to shake and tremble terribly as the gravity of the situation began to sink in; around her the two allies she had in the real world were hurt and dying, while her path home had been taken by the wrong people. She turned icy cold from head to toe. It was too hard to take it all in. It was too painful to think about.

"It was not supposed to be like this," she whispered as she stared on while paramedics rushed past her to tend to Robin's still and lifeless body, "this was my route home."

But fate held little regard for her plans that day. Its own were all-important and Alex's pleas had been left out of the equation.

"This isn't fair… none of this is fair…" she cried, "and I don't know how to make it better…"

Overwhelmed by anguish, she dropped to her knees in the doorway, shivering and shaking. She wanted to cry but she felt to numb. They had come so far and yet, ultimately, life had different plans for them. Where was there to go after this?

X

# …We're tied to the 90's

In the middle

I'm terribly frightened

I'm taking it fast

Taking it slow

There's thunder and lightning

It's terribly frightening

Lord knows

Where it goes

But I know

That if so

Well I want to tell you

We're tired of the 90's

We're tired of the 90's

But we're tied to the 90's

Tied to the 90's… #

- Tied to the 90s - Travis