Frankie sat there, stunned, like he’d just found out that, um … he had travelled back in time to Scotland in 1952.

He’d never been to Scotland. He’d never been to 1952 either.

‘So … why have we come here, exactly?’ he managed to say, pulling himself together.

His grandad was silent for a long time, looking out the window at the fields flashing by. ‘I sometimes feel like I’m losing my mind, lad,’ he admitted. ‘I forget things all the time.’

‘Like that time you rang our house because you couldn’t find your pants?’ offered Frankie, stifling a smirk.

Another time, Grandad famously had forgotten to put his jocks on when he went down to the shops. Apparently it was only when he got to the frozen food aisle that he realised something wasn’t right.

Grandad coughed. ‘I don’t remember that. Sometimes I forget little things, and sometimes big things.’

Frankie shrugged. ‘We can all be a bit forgetful at times. Last week I forgot I had a Maths test.’ This wasn’t strictly true – Frankie just hated studying for Maths tests. But it seemed like Grandad needed some backup.

‘Well, one day I woke up and I couldn’t remember Nanna’s name, and the doctor said it would probably get worse,’ Grandad said, trembling a little. ‘I thought if I went back in time, I could get my hand back and maybe my mind, too.’

Frankie had so many questions that he hardly knew where to start. ‘So you decided to build a time-machine?’

‘Well, actually – it’s been my labour of love for sixty-five years. I once saw a magician make his assistant disappear, and I thought if he could do that, then maybe I could disappear back to before the accident.’

‘And you built it in a suitcase because …?’

‘Makes it easy to carry!’ Grandad smiled briefly.

‘Also easy to steal,’ said Frankie, putting this metaphysical puzzle together. ‘That’s why no-one was ever allowed in your shed.’

‘Of course. If it got into the wrong grubby little hands, it could have been catastrophic.’

‘But it didn’t get into grubby little hands – it got into your old wrinkly hands, didn’t it?’ Frankie retorted. ‘Well, one wrinkly hand and a hook, anyway.’

‘I admit I’m still figuring out some of this time-travel business,’ Grandad said haughtily. ‘There’s a lot of mumbo jumbo about it that I still don’t fully understand.’

‘Well, the good news is that I do,’ announced Frankie, proud that all those hours spent watching Doctor Who and Back To The Future were about to pay off.

Grandad looked Frankie right in the eye, like he was trying to decide if he could trust him. Then, glancing around to make sure no-one was watching, Grandad opened the ruby suitcase a crack and removed a frayed notebook strapped inside the lid. He tapped it and looked at Frankie meaningfully. ‘Do you know what’s in this rule book?’

‘Um – rules?’ Frankie said uncertainly.

‘Exactly. Rules.’

‘How many are there?’ asked Frankie, eyeing the bulging notebook.

‘Look for yourself.’ Grandad handed it to Frankie and then added crankily, ‘But don’t leave any boogers on it. Kids always leave boogers on everything.’

‘Okaaaay,’ said Frankie, deciding this wasn’t the time to get into a generational argument about boogers. He opened the notebook and flicked through. There were pages and pages of complex mathematical sums and diagrams, but on the very last page was a neat list.

Some points were written in blue pen, some black pen, a couple in grey pencil – all in the same delicate cursive handwriting. Frankie began to read:

Important, must-follow rules and instructions for travelling with the Time Computer

‘Time Computer?’ Frankie asked, wrinkling his nose. ‘You call it a Time Computer?’

‘What’s wrong with that? It’s a computer and a time machine,’ Grandad shot back. ‘It describes it perfectly.’

‘You didn’t name the “orange” too, did you?’ Frankie said cheekily. ‘Nah, let’s call it … the Sonic Suitcase.’

‘But it doesn’t run on soundwaves, lad!’ said Grandad. ‘And it’s almost completely silent.’

Frankie groaned. Had the old man never even heard of Doctor Who? ‘Doesn’t matter. It’s a cool name.’

‘Whatever. Ye can call it Gary for all I care.’ Grandad’s Scottish accent seemed to be getting thicker by the minute.

Frankie smiled and read a page with the first instruction.

‘Wait, what force field?’ Frankie asked.

‘Am I going to have to explain every single thing to you?’ snapped Grandad.

‘Trust me, old man, I’ll be the one explaining things to you soon enough,’ Frankie said confidently.

Grandad sighed. ‘The protective force field surrounds the shed and temporarily protects anything or anyone from the effects of changed historical events. It’s so that we always have a place to return to safely.’

Something dawned on Frankie. ‘Is that why I’m still here, even though …?’ He couldn’t bring himself to say: even though Nanna Fish and my parents don’t exist anymore. ‘Is that why I haven’t become Max’s Fish-n-Chip shop? Because I was caught inside the force field when you went back the first time?’

‘I guess so,’ Grandad grunted.

‘But why wouldn’t you tell Nanna to get inside the force field to protect her?’

‘I forgot, OK?’ Grandad yelled defensively. ‘That’s enough questions for one day –’

But Frankie had begun piecing all the fragments of Grandad’s story together. And there was one missing. ‘Grandad … how did you get your hand back exactly?’

The old man closed his eyes and swallowed hard. ‘Here’s the thing, boy,’ he said. ‘The Big Race of 1952 was the point where everything went wrong for me. Where on the final corner, I drove me beloved number 42 motorcar into the wall in a horrific crash, which spared me life but cost me my hand. So I went back and made sure I won. I beat me rival and arch-nemesis Clancy Fairplay once and for all. And I saved me hand.’

Frankie was confused. ‘But why did that make Nanna disappear?’

Grandad shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘Do ye not know how I met yer nanna?’

Frankie shrugged. ‘It was in a hospital or something, wasn’t it?’ The details of the romance between his grandparents had never held much interest for him.

Grandad nodded. ‘Aye, that’s right. I was in hospital after I lost me hand, and Nurse Hopley cared for me.’

‘Nurse Hopley?’ Frankie replied, confused at this new name. ‘Who the hell is Nurse Hopley?’ ‘Watch your mouth,’ said Alfie. ‘That’s my wife you’re talking about.’

‘Of course! She’s Nanna Fish!’ Frankie exclaimed, smacking his forehead. ‘So if you don’t lose your hand, you don’t meet Nurse Hopley, then Dad isn’t born and if Dad isn’t born … I won’t be born either.’

Frankie went very still for a moment, as all this sunk in. Clearly, his grandad had made a rookie time-traveller’s mistake. One with terrible consequences. And suddenly Frankie was angry. REALLY angry.

‘Grandad – you broke the number one rule of time travel,’ Frankie hissed furiously. ‘You don’t fix things from the past. Mistakes and accidents have to remain mistakes and accidents, otherwise they become bigger mistakes and bigger accidents.’

Frankie gulped. He couldn’t believe his grandad hadn’t known that!

Grandad’s shoulders slumped. ‘I’m sorry, boy,’ he muttered.

But Frankie barely heard him. Something the old man had said was nagging him. The protective force field surrounds the shed and …

‘… Temporarily protects anything or anyone,’ Frankie echoed. ‘Grandad? Any idea how long the force field lasts?’

‘None at all,’ Grandad confessed.

So I’m probably on borrowed time, thought Frankie grimly. Then he sat up straight. Did this have anything to do with Grandad’s comments about his face?

Frankie peered into the window of the train, trying to catch a glimpse of his reflection.

It was difficult to make out much, but his eyes looked basically the same. Perhaps his cheeks were a little puffier than normal, but that could have been a side effect of time travel.

When he turned back, Grandad was looking into the Sonic Suitcase with a worried expression. ‘What’s wrong?’ asked Frankie, feeling queasy. ‘We need to move quickly,’ Grandad said. ‘The battery is already down to seventy-two per cent, and we need at least seventeen per cent to get us all the way home to 2017.’

Frankie raised an eyebrow. ‘You didn’t bring the charger with you?’

‘Well,’ Grandad muttered, ‘it doesn’t have a charger as such. It only charges at the bench.’

‘The bench?’ Frankie shot back, incredulous.

‘The charging bench in the shed,’ said Grandad, as if it were obvious.

‘That’s crazy,’ said Frankie. ‘Why wouldn’t you just have a charger and a power point?’

‘And what?’ Grandad replied. ‘Plug it into a power point in Ancient Greece? Find an adaptor in the Garden of Eden?’

‘I guess not …’ Frankie said reluctantly. ‘OK, fine, so we need to keep an eye on the battery.’ Then he shivered. ‘You know, this isn’t just about us, Grandad,’ he said, his voice rising above the rattling of the train. ‘This affects the whole Fish family. Nanna, Dad, Mum, Lou …’

‘Aye, yer right,’ said Alfie, biting his lip. He looked a lot older and far less confident than Frankie had ever seen him before. ‘But listen, I have a plan. I can just not win that race, lose my hand and make everything right.’

Frankie sat back in his seat, the full magnitude of the situation horribly clear to him. His family had vanished, and he was in danger of disappearing at any moment, too. And his grandad’s plan to fix things was definitely a long shot.

It was enough to reduce anyone to tears, and sure enough, a lump began forming in the back of Frankie’s throat.

But as the train’s horn bellowed out into the Scottish hills, something shifted inside him. A feeling that maybe he could be … responsible, for a change. Save the day, even.

Frankie swallowed down the lump and slapped his hands on his knees. ‘OK, Grandad,’ he said firmly. ‘Let’s do this. Let’s save the Fish family.’

Grandad looked at him strangely, with something almost like … respect. ‘Right you are, Francis.’

‘Frankie,’ said his grandson. ‘My friends call me Frankie.’