genes_world_backup | (no subject)

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(no subject)

Who: Molly Drake, open
When: Seconds after her arrival in 1984
Where: Ground floor of the Fenchurch East police station
What: When she reached for the door is was 2019, but when she walked through the doorway it suddenly became 1984
Rating/Warnings: Mind!bend fun, language (maybe?)

It took her a full fifteen seconds to realize that something was wrong. She was so intent on getting upstairs and not being late that she didn't notice that the tiles on the floor were old black and white, rather then the beige of her world. She didn't notice that the desk Sergeant was unfamiliar and wearing the wrong uniform, or that the steps were plain wood instead of carpeting. It wasn't until she reached the top of the stairs and found that the office she shared with three others was filled with chemicals and had a 'janitor' sign nailed to it that she stopped and looked around.

"Bloody hell. I've been here a year; anytime you want to stop the hazing and grow up I'd be happy."

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"Easy there, princess. Was only asking." Gene unfolded his arms and reached for his packet of cigarettes, drawing one from the packet with his teeth. He lit up and took a long drag.

He exhaled smoke slowly. "You just might bump into her around here, that's all."

"That's. Not. Funny." Molly was seeing red as she spun in a half circle and started to walk away.

"Wasn't supposed to be..." Gene rolled his shoulders, before looking at his watch. "She's probably already 'ere by now. No doubt tidying my office. Bloody woman."

She stopped. Turned. Glared at him as hard as she'd ever glared at anyone. "Alex Drake is dead. She has been for ten years, ever since a bastard put a bullet in her brain."

Oh yeah. Alex was dead wasn't she? They all were. Well, that would make this conversation a whole lot easier... How was he supposed to explain this to a girl with a worse temper than Alex when he didn't even understand it completely himself.

"Her brain is just fine. She's just fine. Bloody annoying most the time, but fine."

Molly reached for her mobile, deciding that the man before her wasn't CID at all, but some sort of escaped mental patient. It wasn't there. "Where's my bloody phone?"

"You can use my phone if you need to make a call. More privacy in my office." He wasn't exactly sure who she planned on calling, but really it was none of his business.

He paused at the top of the stairs, leaning on the railing. "Oi, is Bollyknickers in yet?"

The desk Sergeant paused the phone call they were involved with, covering the mouthpiece. "No, Guv."

"Right... well, send her up to my office when she arrives. Tell her it's important." He turned his attention back to Molly. "Right then, you coming?"

"What is it?" Alex strode into CID, high heels clicking on the floor, and a travel mug of coffee in her own hand. "I've got a meeting in about five minutes, but Geoff was adamant that you said it was important?"

Her gaze briefly slid over Molly and she nodded briefly in acknowledgment -- solidarity between women on the force (was this the new Shaz?) -- before turning impatiently back to Gene.

Molly froze with her hand on the phone. She looked the same. Oh, her hair was sorter, her makeup and clothing more colorful then the neutrals and professional styles her mum had favored in her childhood. But her face looked exactly as it had on her twelfth birthday. The day she'd been shot. The day she'd stopped being a person and become a memory.

"I..." Molly dove for the dust bin, releasing the meager contents of her stomach all over old papers and empty bottles.

The childish, immature, unable to cope with emotions part of Gene wanted to flee and get the hell away from the situation - possibly hide in the Quattro until later. But he couldn't. He couldn't abandon Bolls right now.

He closed the door to his office, drawing the blinds closed - not really wanting th rest of CID to get a free show. Some things should remain private. And then he moved to get a bottle of scotch and some glasses, he had a feeling drinks would be needed.

"Alex... this seems to be our new recruit. PC Molly Drake." He'd give her a few minutes to absorb that bit of information.

Alex had looked away from the girl until the sound of vomiting, at least. Carefully, gently, she held the girl's hair back as she threw up -- remembering her college days all too vividly.

"Are you alright?" she asked gently, and gave Gene a bit of a look for the scotch. "I think she needs water more than--"

And then he spoke, and --

It wasn't possible.

"No," Alex pronounced. "No, it can't be."

The last time anyone had held her hair like that while she was sick it had been the same gentle but strong hands. She'd been eleven, and home from school with a twenty-four hour bug.

"It can't be," she echoed her mum as she stood and backed away, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

"This is a dream." But had she ever had a dream this real? She could smell the stale cigarette smoke and taste the vomit in her mouth. "Maybe a hallucination. Someone could have slipped something into my coffee, yeah?"

If Gene Hunt had a pound for every time someone referred to him or this world as a dream or a figment of their imagination he would be very rich. Even if it was semi-true. He poured the three scotches and slid one along the desk towards Molly. "I think you'll find this is very real, love."

And then he turned his attention to Alex, reaching out to brush some stray hair behind her ear. "Want me to give you two some time alone?"

"Don't you dare," she hissed to Gene, regarding the young woman more shrewdly. "Don't you dare."

The higher ups had to be kidding. Alex's plate was quite full enough guardian angel-ing for Gene...

Molly wasn't one for hard alcohol very often, but a combination of overwhelming emotions and the foul taste lingering in her mouth had her reaching for the scotch and downing half of it. She didn't miss the was the Guv touched her mum's hair, though. Or the fact that the other woman didn't want to be left alone for me.

"This is insane. I'm asleep or drugged and my abandonment issues are on overdrive; heaven forbid I actually dream about a parent that wants me."

"You're... actually Molly Drake?" Alex finally found her tongue.

"Why would I pretend to be anyone other then I was?" Molly eyed the door; if she wasn't going to wake up soon she had to get out of here.

"Oi, mouthy tart miniature! Your mum did everything she could to try and get back to you, so don't you dare say she didn't want you!"

Yes, this is why you didn't let Gene Hunt handle delicate emotional situations. He wasn't very gentle about it.

"Gene," Alex scolded, turning to his desk and... yes, right there. There they were: Molly's papers. The room swum around Alex for a minute, and she handed them to him. "New recruit, Guv," she whispered, her heart just breaking.

Blinking back tears, she turned back to her daughter... who had grown up into such a beautiful young woman. What had happened to her, to bring her to this place so young? Part of Alex despaired even as she managed a smile. "Sweetheart, this might seem strange, but you're not dreaming. You've been... transfered here. Something you'll understand in time."

It was easier to deal with the Gov, who represented God only knows what in this dream. So she turned towards him, ignoring her mum when what she really wanted to do was throw her arms around her and be held, and told that everything was going to be alright. But this, despite what dream mum said, couldn't be real. And having even a moment of her mum would make waking up that much harder.

"My mum was there for me every single day until my twelfth birthday. I know it wasn't her choice to die, but she did. And maybe I haven't dealt with that completely, as evidenced by the fact that I'd imagine a mum that wants you of all people to be here, rather then be alone with me. And call me tart again and I'll kick your arse."

Gene moved to sit at his desk, glancing at the papers for a moment before downing his scotch in one go, quickly refilling his glass. Talk about a messy situation, the world really was a fucked up place.

"Maybe she wants me 'ere because I was the one to wipe away her tears when she couldn't get back to you, eh?" The man should really learn the art of keeping his damned mouth shut.

"You can't come back from being dead. Dead is just dead. The end. Sorry, you lose the game. They lower you into the ground and all that's left is a marble slab with your name on it and the people you left behind." She'd been there, the day they lowered the casket. Her and Evan, his hand on her shoulder. Heaven forbid her dad bothered to fly across the ocean to be there.

She still visited once a week, though she only brought flowers on holidays.

"It's complicated here, Mols," Alex explained weakly, laying her hand on the girl's arm and fighting the impulse to spell it all out and keep Molly safe (as safe as she could) from the trouble that could come her way. "But it will be alright."

Some people didn't even get a slab. People like Gene. He didn't say it outloud though. Really, how did you ever begin to explain what was going on here? It was so much easier when he didn't know the truth and he just thought people were crazy.

"Course it'll be alright." Gene took another sip of his scotch. "You stick with your mum and the Gene Genie, Molly, and you'll be fine."

"You're kidding me, right. The Gene Genie?" Molly rolled her eyes as she shrugged the hand off her arm. It was too real and made it harder to convince herself this was a dream.

"I need to wake up now. I don't have time to deal with this."

"She's going to have to work through it on her own," Alex mused, a proud smile pulling at her lips --

But then, oh!, it hit her: the only people, from what Gene had said and from what she'd seen with her own eyes, that fought the idea of this place being real were those who weren't quite dead. Sam, in his coma, and she, herself, fighting for life. A relieved bark of laughter worked out of her throat even as she blinked away tears.

"Gene, she's fighting it! That means -- you know what that means! Ohhh, thank God." Alex turned and cupped Molly's face in her hands, pressing a tender kiss to her forehead. "You keep fighting to wake up, Molly Anne Drake, and when you wake up, you tell that godfather of ours that I love him very much and that he's clearly done a wonderful job of raising you. And... that I'm sorry."

Gene decided not to point out the fact that both she and Sam had both ended up dying eventually. If hope was what Alex needed to cling to, to get through this, then hope she could have.

"Right, happy reunion over with? Let's do some police work then, shall we?" Throwing people into work so they can't focus on the craziness seemed to work well... to a degree at least.

"If I tell Evan that you spoke to me he'll think I need to start seeing a shrink again. He made me go for three years after you... you died." She allowed herself just a moment to breath in her mum's perfume before pulling away.

"This is the strangest dream I've ever had. Yeah, let's do some work."

"Right. Work."

Alex downed her scotch. "I have a meeting elsewhere. Got to fly." A kiss to Molly's cheek and one to Gene's, and she was out of the office and out of CID with her heels clicking and her mind reeling.

Gene knew better than to chase after Alex right now. She would work through things in her own time and in her own way. His door would be open if she needed it and his shoulder more than available.

He gave a sigh and turned his attention back to Molly, picking up her file to glance over it. "So, PC Drake... tell me about yourself? Tell me about your last department?"

Molly watched the empty doorway for a moment before turning back to Gene. "My one and only department has been Fenchurch East. I've been here - there - whatever - for just over a year."

She certainly wasn't going to tell him about her personal life.

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