Time Agent | ONC2024

6. London 1999 | TL GPX.54

(This chapter is dedicated to jinnis one of my oldest friends on Wattpad, and author of the delightful entry for the ONC2024, The Magic of Stories, featuring a blue cat.)

London 1999 | TL GPX.54

(Twenty years earlier)

Over half the population was awake, feverishly topping up their champagne glasses, watching with a mixture of excitement and trepidation as they counted down the last few hours to midnight.

The year was 1999 and the world was about to enter a new millennium.

A small group of doomsayers had gathered in Hyde Park, with banners claiming 'The End is Nigh!' and 'Repent!' and the churches were full, just in case they were right. There was no harm in being prepared.

Of more concern to the less religious, was a fear that the new-fangled computers which had taken the world by storm in the last decade, would fail. People said there was a glitch that would cause them all to stop—or perhaps reset to the year 1900 for some obscure reason—as soon as they ticked over to 01/01/2000, but in any event, it would plunge the world into chaos. There was a rush to withdraw cash from the banks and windup clocks and battery radios sold out in a matter of hours. To the mystification of many, there was also a near stampede to buy up rolls of toilet paper.

~

For Marie Brun, lying in hospital that night, it was all academic. She had sweated and panted through eight long hours with no end yet in sight. Weren't second babies supposed to be easier? Quicker? Jacques, her first, had taken ten hours to make his appearance and she feared Baby Deux was going to take the same.

Much as she loved her son, she hoped this one was going to be a girl, a little girl with curly dark brown hair and warm amber eyes, taking after her side of the family instead of her father's.

She wished Antoine was there with her, to hold her hand and whisper encouragement, but he had taken off at the first sign of her growing stomach. She groaned as another contraction rippled through. Where was Antoine? Even though he had pretty much deserted her and the baby, he'd promised to be there at the birth.

Bastard! She didn't need him. He probably would have been useless in any case.

A nurse came in to check her cervix.

"Coming along nicely," she smiled. "It's going to be a race between you and Madame Martin as to who will have the first baby of the new year!"

Marie squinted at the bedside clock. Was it still only 11:00 PM? At least another hour to go! She swore.

Further down the ward, Chantelle Martin was floating on a sea of pain relief. Thank heavens she had said 'Yes' immediately to the pain meds this time. No senseless attempt to tough it out. She smiled dreamily.

Downstairs in Emergency, a third woman was being guided into a wheelchair and rushed up to the ward. "It's coming now, I tell you! My baby is coming now!"

Neither doctors nor patients in the Maternity Ward had time to look at a clock as they ticked over to the first second of the New Year, not with three babies insisting on being born immediately. No one noticed the computer driven clocks freeze, then appear to skip backward a second or two, before righting themselves and moving forward as usual.

When the three attending nurses paid attention to the time, it was only to record the birth of three babies, each born at three seconds after midnight... exactly.

"Are you sure?"

"How amazing!"

"What are the chances?"

"It's a tie!"

"This year we have three babies to celebrate being the first born. First for the New Year and first for the new millennium!"

"We'll have to ask Marketing for two more of the special celebratory mugs! They each have to have one."

An exhausted Marie looked down at the curly head of her baby and smiled. He wasn't the girl she had hoped for, but he had the beautiful dark brown curls she had wanted and the eyes to match. He was gorgeous. Little Jean-Pierre.

Chantelle Martin roused from her drugged state sufficiently to cuddle the baby boy placed into her arms. His little head was covered in soft down and his eyes were shut as he suckled. She'd give him her father's name, perhaps that would reconcile Papa to his existence. Marcel Martin. It had a ring to it.

Further along the ward, Nicole Gallopin cradled her baby girl in her arms. She had only just made it to the hospital before being born. Henri bent to kiss his wife's forehead, and stroke a finger gently down the baby's cheek. "So beautiful!" he said, gazing with adoration.

Henri had left the car parked in a five-minute zone so he could go up with her. Neither of them spared a thought for the fine he was accruing.

"What do you think? Sophie or Claire?" asked Henri in a doting voice, mentioning the two top names on their baby list.

"Oh, Sophie, definitely. She looks like a Sophie." Nicole was certain. "Sophie Gallopin."

~

"So, what the hell was that?" demanded Sam Taylor, the scientist on duty at the Greenwich Royal Observatory that evening. He'd lost the coin toss for the roster, or won it, depending on one's point of view.

"What do you mean?" asked his assistant, who had been getting himself a cup of tea at the crucial time and missed the whole thing.

"The clocks stopped at midnight, then went backwards for a couple of seconds!"

The assistant looked at him strangely. "But that's impossible."

"Of course it is!" exclaimed Sam, impatiently. "But that's what happened."

"Are you sure? You didn't just blink for a moment?"

"No, I didn't just blink for a moment!" snarled Sam. What sort of idiot did Tom think he was?

Tom flushed an unbecoming pink. "Well, they're all going forward now."

Sam struggled to keep a lid on his temper. Yelling at Tom wasn't going to help. He needed to stay calm and professional about this. He took a deep breath.

"I'll just run a check on the equipment. The anomaly is bound to show up in the Observatory records."

But it didn't.