Fic: Though Memory Imperfect (6/8)
Jan. 26th, 2013 03:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jedi_of_urthTitle: Though Memory Imperfect
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jedi_of_urth
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters/Pairings: The Doctor (John Smith), Rose Tyler (Anne Young), Martha Jones. Doctor/Rose (John/Anne)
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: ~39,000
Summary: HN/FoB AU, when Martha and John Smith arrive in 1913 they encounter the mysterious Anne Young, whose forgotten past is more important than any of them know.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who isn’t mine. And the basic idea of HN/FB isn’t either.
Author's Notes/Warnings: This story as bee a long LONG time coming, but I think I can finally call it finished. I’ll include more on that at the end of the story but I hope it came out alright after all that. Includes fictionalized amnesia, and obviously plot points borrowed” from the show. Thanks toturtle_goose for betaing
Past Chapters: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5
A mere few minutes ago, Rose had led a frightened John Smith down the corridor, she took him by the hand and lead him slowly to meet his fate. Now she and the Doctor raced down the hallway, still hand in hand, on their mission to stop the Family of parasites that threatened this place and possibly the whole world.
“What the blazes is going on out here?” the crisp voice of the Headmaster asked as his door flew open as they passed it.
The Doctor would have kept running but Rose pulled him up. If they didn’t stop now the Headmaster would follow them and they’d lead him into the mess with Jenny. Better to deal with him here. “Sorry sir,” she said as she turned halfway towards him.
“Explain yourself Smith,” the older man demanded. His eyes flicked towards Rose but most of his attention was on scowling at the Doctor.
“Oh right, that’s me isn’t it?” the Doctor laughed. “Well there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for this...” He’ trailed off, he’d picked up on Rose’s intent quickly enough, unfortunately it seemed even he couldn’t come up with a reasonable explanation for them running down the hallway so late.
“We just can’t tell you what it is,” Rose hurried to supply before the drop in conversation became noticeable. Ideally she would have said something that would raise less suspicion than the silence she prevented though.
The Headmaster’s scowl deepened, and now it also included Rose. “Run along Miss Young, though less literally, I need to speak to Professor Smith.” He stressed John’s title, and Rose could guess why and it made her scowl right back. The amnesiac servant and the eccentric professor was not going to be approved of, John and Anne had known that and never had the chance to push it very far, but as Rose and the Doctor they had stopped standing for that kind of disapproval ages ago.
The more violent side of her wished she hadn’t left the guns back in John’s room, but there were other ways to deal with the situation. She tried to adopt the more meek tones she would have used before she remembered things, “Don’t be angry sir, but we are in a bit of a hurry.”
“Yes, yes we are,” the Doctor supplied. “In fact we are in such a rush that we were probably a bit overexcited. No need to concern yourself, we’ll just be going now.”
As the Doctor turned away as if that would be enough, the Headmaster barked after him, “Smith, explain yourself.”
“About what exactly?” the Doctor asked. Rose laughed. She wasn’t sure if he was really confused or if he was angry about it, but it felt like old times either way. “Or was that a bit rude?”
She laughed again. “No more than he is!”
He smiled too. “Good point.”
“I dare say,” the Headmaster interjected. “You two had best explain yourselves.”
“Sorry sir, we were helping Mr. Steinhold on a project and got carried away.” She hoped the fact that she was still fighting back giggles didn’t hurt her story too badly.
The Headmaster glared at her but nodded slowly. “I’ll be having a word with Steinhold about your behavior Ms. Young. We do demand a certain level of decorum from our servants. And out staff,” he added turning his glare on the Doctor.
“Oi,” the Doctor started, but Rose squeezed his hand trying to keep him from making this a bigger scene when things finally seemed diffused enough that they could get back to business. “Right-o, we’ll talk later, have to be off now.”
The Headmaster still didn’t look completely convinced but this time as they walked away quickly he didn’t stop them. Once around the next corner they looked at each other and smiled, but some of the humor had gone out of it; they picked the pace up again for the last few yards to reach John’s room.
John’s. John would never come back here because John didn’t exist anymore. He was still here in the Doctor, but it was all very complicated and Rose still didn’t have time to sort it out. She was happy to have the Doctor back, but she knew later she would be sorry for what that meant for John Smith as she had known him recently.
Inside the room they found Richard leaning heavily on John’s desk still staring at the tied up Jenny and gripping a hip flask. “Richard?” Rose asked cautiously as she approached her friend. If Richard had been drinking she worried he might not be as helpful with whatever came next in this insanity, in the time she’d known him she’d never known his to drink much, especially alone.
“Anne...what’s going on exactly?” he asked slowly.
Rose bit her lip slightly, it wasn’t going to be easy to explain. “We’re time travelers. I’m from the future, he’s not even from this planet.”
“Rose was that necessary?” the Doctor asked as he knelt down to check on Jenny.
“Until you found me out in the woods I had been lost in another reality and maybe when all this is over we can figure out how I came back.”
“What happened here?” the Doctor blurted out. When Rose shot him a look he at least explained. “She’s unconscious, you weren’t supposed to make her unconscious.”
“I just gave her a drink to try and calm her down. Just a small drink and she passed out.”
As one Rose and the Doctor’s eyes lit up. “Really?” the Doctor asked. Richard nodded.
“Alcohol?” Rose asked with a new grin spreading across her face.
“Yes. Oh why didn’t I think of that before?”
Actually that was a pretty good question, but Rose would save it for later. “So what can we do with that? Knock them out and take them to the authorities?”
The Doctor smiled. “I knew Torchwood wouldn’t change you too much.”
She smiled back, but she knew it was a little sad. Mickey and her dad and all the other people she knew at Torchwood were still in the other world. “You can argue with me about the guns later, for right now we don’t know what we’re dealing with here.”
“Rose...” he started, looking upset at the reminder of the guns in the room that she would be taking once they left to do whatever they were going to do about this. But he shook his head and stopped himself, “Later.”
“Which is what I said.”
“Alright, alright. Alright, Richard ol’ boy, if you will help me get Jenny here to the chemistry lab Rose can get us more alcohol.” Then he paused and pursed his lips, “Where’s Martha by the way?”
~~~~~~~~~~
As soon as the Family had sensed that the Doctor was back they picked up their pace back to the school but now they were lurking in the bushes out front. Baines, or whoever he was now, still wasn’t anywhere to be seen and Martha feared he was already stalking the school looking for either the Doctor or Anne since they still though Anne was the Doctor.
That ruse couldn’t last very long now that the Doctor was actually back, they’d be able to tell the Doctor hadn’t come back as Anne but in Smith. And how had he come back? No one but Martha knew about the watch, not even him.
Although the scarecrows still kept watching Martha she had time to think while the possessed man and girl were prowling just off the school grounds, and nothing made sense. There had been no way to bring the Doctor back. And what was Anne’s part in all of this? Even before Martha’s lie the Family had been following the other woman; it didn’t make sense that it was just because of her relationship with Smith.
At least that trouble should be over. With the Doctor back, Anne’s part in this was over. Things would probably be awkward as hell when Martha and the Doctor left but Anne would have to understand that the man she had been with didn’t exist anymore. And it would be good to have the Doctor back; Martha was looking forward to that.
There was hope with the Doctor back, which was important to remember. He would find a way out of this and soon the two of them would be able to leave this place behind.
~~~~~~~~~~
The school had supplies of wine, but Rose’s first stop was going back to Richard’s room for his whiskey bottle. They knew that worked, so it would be foolish not to have it on hand. When she got there she found they had left the pocket watch behind in their hurry to leave earlier and she picked it up from the floor.
It wasn’t warm now, just cool metal like an ordinary pocket watch. Some part of her, she realized, had expected that John and the Doctor had changed places and that now it would be John in the watch reaching out to her. But that wouldn’t have worked anyway; it wasn’t a choice, one or the other, it one whole Doctor, the part of him that had made up John back inside him. The fragments of her that had made up Anne hadn’t gone anywhere, she’d only been made whole again.
She had to move some things around on the shelf to reach the whiskey bottle, and then just as she pulled it out she heard the doorknob turn behind her. She quickly crouched down to hide behind the great desk that dominated a good deal of this section of the room. Unless either the Doctor or Richard had decided to come this way it wasn’t likely to be anyone she wanted to see. Even if the extent of it was that the Headmaster had stopped knocking on teachers’ doors she really didn’t have the time to deal with another delay from him.
The footsteps that entered were slow and deliberate, not treading loudly but purposefully. When the intruder came next to the desk she could see a student’s shoes – though not shining the way the rules required, dirty as if the young man had been outside a good deal since he’d last cleaned his shoes.
Then, without warning the shoes disappeared and not a breath later came the sound of a person landing on top of the desk. Rose looked up and saw Jeremy Baines towering over her and looking down at her hiding place with the same alien look Jenny had worn when she had come looking for the Doctor. “No,” he said in a carefully modulated tone, “you aren’t the Doctor.”
“What?” she said, for a second forgetting other questions such as who and what he was now. “Of course I’m not.”
Baines’ lips twitched up into a smirk, and he pulled a gun just like Jenny’s. “Then I have no further use for you.”
“Wait,” Rose said quickly. “At least you could tell me why you think I am.” She also scrabbled to her feet as she said it and slid one hand behind her back to finger the alien gun she had stashed there.
“I see no reason to do that,” Baines said crisply. But then he cocked his head to the side as if listening to something beyond Rose’s hearing. “But why would she say you were?”
Rose’s stomach flipped. “Martha,” she said, knowing it was the only answer. “Where is she? What have you done with her?” And why the hell would she say that?
Baines centered himself and Rose could see his index finger ready to move so she darted to one side as she pulled out her own gun and aimed it at him. He still had a better position, standing above the floor meant that any cover she might have found would have been useless, but his legs would be an easy strike if she could manage to get close enough to do something with that. And the whiskey was still easy to pull off the shelf if she had the chance to knock him out that way.
For a moment the two of them stared at each other, their twin guns squarely aimed for a kill shot if either pulled the trigger. But it seemed they were both trained enough that it would be mutually assured destruction, and also to recognize it in each other. “Martha,” Rose tried again, “what have you done with her?”
“Nothing,” Baines said with his perpetual smirk. “Yet. Give us the Doctor and we’ll leave the rest of you useless humans alone.”
Rose rolled her eyes slightly, but not enough to take her gaze from Baines. “Care to try that again? I’ve heard that one a few times. Pretty much always from people with no intention of leaving anything alone.”
For a moment the smirk slipped a little, and when it came back it seemed more habit than as superior as he’d been. “I can find the Doctor without you. But you Miss Young, my Family could enjoy you a good deal as well. Perhaps I won’t kill you.” The gun didn’t move though, and Rose wasn’t stupid enough to fall for that trick.
The silence stretched on for another long moment. Rose could remember Baines as he had been; arrogant and rude perhaps, but hardly more than most teenage boys in her experience. He didn’t deserve this fate, Jenny didn’t either, or whoever else these people had taken. “You have Martha, we have Jenny, maybe we could arrange a trade,” she suggested.
“We want the Doctor,” was all Baines said in reply.
“You’re not getting him,” Rose said plainly, and readied her muscles again in case that provoked a response.
It did. “I hate to hear that,” the being that had been Baines said a second before he broke the standoff and fired at her. She’d been ready though and rolled out of the way, came up and aimed for his legs and fired. She didn’t hesitate or look to see what he might have hit, what mattered was that it wasn’t her.
The alien weapon was far more powerful that she’d expected and though she only hit him in the leg there seemed to be a small explosion as he fell off the desk. She ran back to the other side of the desk to see what had happened. One of his legs was almost completely gone below the mid-thigh and the other was bent at an unnatural angle. The gun had already fallen out of his hands but Rose kicked it further away so he wouldn’t get ideas.
Though he must have been in pain he didn’t cry out with it. Instead, as Rose bent to look at him, he was simply crying. She could just hear him whispering, “Paulina,” as he gasped for breath.
“Baines?” Rose asked. She had always dismissed Jenny’s rumor mongering about her own roommate, but now it seemed it was possible.
Baines locked eyes on Rose and she could see that he was only a frightened young boy. “Tell her...sorry...loved her.” Then his breathe caught and it was the invading alien who looked up at Rose. Even though the sneer was now completely absent it was an unmistakable change. He brought one of his arms up and reached for her throat, but Rose was able to avoid it easily. She ran for the whiskey bottle and quickly forced some down Baines’ throat until he fell unconscious.
Rose had to improvise a means of restraining him in case he regained consciousness, not that he was likely to go anywhere, but the life-form that had taken Baines over might find other ways to make trouble if he came around. She rolled him up in some of the bedclothes, which would double as restraining Baines’ injured legs so there might be a chance of saving the boy from dying of his wounds if he could somehow survive the alien that had possessed him.
As she finished tying him up, Rose thought about the fact that even if Baines survived this, World War One was just around the corner. Well, with at least one missing leg he wasn’t going to see combat so maybe it was a silver lining.
If he survived.
If any of them survived the night.
With one last look at the unconscious boy Rose grabbed the whiskey bottle and left the room. It was getting well into the evening now and most people; students, servants, and teachers, had retired to their rooms by now so Rose was able to make her way to the liquor cabinet with no one the wiser. There she found a few bottles of scotch as well as the wine, so she grabbed a couple of each figuring they might want options to work with when turning alcohol into a weapon.
Sneaking to the science lab was more difficult, so she decided not to try. Trying to sneak around would probably draw more attention than walking openly down the hallways. She passed a small group of students who were clustered in the hall but they didn’t stop her, even to ask where she had gotten the liquor.
“What I wouldn’t give for the sonic screwdriver,” the Doctor was saying when Rose entered the lab. He was running wildly around the room in his completely manic way and Rose had to smile. She had missed him so much, and she had barely even had a chance to really talk to him yet. In her imagination their reunion always happened with racing into each other’s arms and having all the time in the world to spend catching up and then usually ending up in bed together.
It had happened in all the wrong order, but she was still happy that she was here with him.
Rose set the bottles down next to Richard who was standing over Jenny’s body, and the Doctor looked over at her and smiled too. For a short second they just smiled at each other and then there was a loud, screeching noise from outside the school.
“Oh, there it is,” the Doctor said ruefully. “How exactly did they get a hold of my screwdriver?”
~~~~~~~~~~
Martha didn’t think the scarecrows were watching her terribly closely. It was hard to tell, but it was dark and they had to watch her and their surroundings so she slowly reached her hand into her pocket and felt for the sonic screwdriver. She didn’t know how to work very many functions on it, but hopefully if it was necessary she could convince someone she knew more.
The last thing the Doctor had used it for was to fine tune the chameleon arch before he’d used it to change. Whatever setting that was probably wouldn’t be much help in this situation, so she fidgeted with the device a bit and hoped whatever she set it to could do some good.
Suddenly the girl appeared again out of the bushes. This time she trained a gun on Martha and Martha froze. She was in a far too vulnerable position to try her crazy idea at this point. “You lied,” the girl said. “The girl was never the Doctor.”
“You’re right,” Martha replied. It was all she trusted herself to say.
“And she nearly killed Brother of Mine.”
“I’m sorry,” Martha said instinctively, although she wasn’t sure that she was sorry at all.
“I should kill you.” It was a simple statement, as if she had commented on the fact that it was night time or had peas for dinner. It simply was; no feeling behind it at all. Even though her brother had been nearly killed it was a cold calculation in her voice rather than anger.
There was nothing to lose, Martha whipped the sonic screwdriver out as she rose to her knees and leveled the screwdriver like a weapon. But just as she did a scarecrow punched her in the arm forcing her to drop the screwdriver. It was a deeper voice, the father of the Family, which spoke then, “We won’t kill her just yet, Daughter of Mine, but the other one will pay for what she did to Son of Mine.”
In some ways Martha’s ruse had succeeded she realized, it had diverted the Family’s attention from the Doctor for a time. It wasn’t fair to Anne, it never had been, but it would buy the Doctor time and that was the important thing.
Then the father picked up the sonic screwdriver from where it had fallen and Martha’s stomach dropped again. It might not actually be a weapon, but there were plenty of things it could do that she’d rather these people didn’t figure out. “Well, what does this do?” he asked but didn’t wait for a response from Martha before he pointed at her and pressed the main button.
What it did was start making noise; a shrill whining sound that grew louder and louder even after he stopped pressing the button until the noise practically erupted out into the night. Martha’s ears were ringing as the noise faded but she couldn’t help smiling. That ought to give the Doctor an idea where she was at least.
The Family, having taken over human bodies, was disoriented by the sound too, but then the man started shouting orders at the scarecrows that Martha couldn’t hear and she wondered if they could heal faster than humans. She tried to remember if that had been on the Doctor’s list of instructions but she was pretty sure it hadn’t been. It wouldn’t be the first important thing he’d left out of that message.
~~~~~~~~~~
Rose could hear more and more people moving around throughout the school so she nudged Richard. “Think you could go and try to keep everyone calm?” she asked.
To her surprise, he laughed. “And how do you suggest I do that exactly?” he asked as he chuckled.
She laughed a little too, it was true that Richard was probably not the best candidate for this, but he was also the only one. The Doctor had to work on their alcohol weapons and no one was going to listen to Rose. “Okay; Doctor, do you actually need us here?”
The Doctor was grabbing every container he could find but he looked up in shock. “Rose...” he started The lab was not meant to be used at night and the light of the moon and the few lamps couldn’t fully illuminate the room; but even in the dim light she could see the fear in his eyes.
“I know, but someone has to.”
He nodded in resignation and Rose turned back to Richard. “Let’s go.”
The Doctor watched them leave out of the corner of his eye, trying not to think about the fact that he kept separating himself from Rose though they had just found each other again. Things were more than a little awkward considering all that had happened prior to their real reunion but he still would have rather kept her safely where he could see her and preferably no further away than their hands could reach. But she was right that the school population needed to be kept under control so nobody got hurt with whatever plan the Family had.
So he stayed behind and continued mixing the drinks Rose had brought with some hastily prepared additives. He smelled at it to see if the mixture was right, added the last of the whiskey and decided it was ready. At which point he started drawing the liquid into the syringes that were part of the standard equipment in the chemistry lab.
They wouldn’t need very many he figured, these families were usually no more than six people and he didn’t think this one was even that large. But they might need to keep them sedated for a while until he could figure out how to deal with them beyond putting them to sleep for a time.
As if on cue the possessed maid started to stir. That gave them about twenty minutes on the dose Steinhold had given her, should be a bit longer with what he’d brewed up, but still not enough to haul the unconscious Family...wherever; he’d figure that out when the time came.
The young woman’s name had been Jenny he thought as he knelt over her, Jenny Hatlend. He – well, Smith – hadn’t actually known her but now that he had his own mind back names were easier to recall than it had been with a small human mind. Now her eyes were open and an alien being was looking at him. “I presume I am addressing your Family,” he said calmly. He wasn’t half as calm as he sounded, but it was better to seem like he was in control of everything.
She nodded and struggled against the knots that kept her bound. “Good, then give them a message. I gave you the chance live out your lives in peace, but you came anyway. You have one final chance, return the people you have captured and leave Earth forever.”
It was probably risky, but with the general commotion throughout the school he figured he could get away with un-gagging her to see what she had to say. She attempted to bite his hand as he removed the wet handkerchief from her mouth, but he pulled away quickly. “Answer me now,” he commanded. There was steel in his voice that he hadn’t realized he was going to display.
The girl who had been Jenny spat at him. “We will have you, and the girl who tried to destroy Son of Mine.”
He almost involuntarily glanced towards the door, it didn’t take much to guess it had been Rose; she had certainly seemed shaken when she arrived and had obviously wanted to stay busy. But she hadn’t told him, and he wished she had.
“Fine, if that’s your answer, tell them I had better not see them.”
“They have your friend,” she said before he could return the gag to her mouth, grateful they weren’t still using a balled up sock. “And they have the forces to attack this school and kill every soul if they have to in order to capture you.”
His eyes locked with hers and he said the only thing that seemed natural for him to say. Common words that hadn’t fit so well in his mouth since Canary Warf, but now they had come back to him with Rose. “Bring it on.”
~~~~~~~~~~
Two of the scarecrows roughly pushed Martha through the forest while who knew how many others roamed around the school grounds. From the number clustered around Martha and the Family members out here, there could have been a small army. On the other hand if they were actually keeping the majority of the scarecrows close to the Family members it wasn’t nearly so intimidating a force. But how did these beings think?
When they reached the front of the school, the man stepped out into the smooth lawn. “Doctor!” he yelled as loudly as he could and his voice carried in the cold night air. “Doctor! Come out here!”
Martha saw a stream of light expand across to lawn as the main door opened a small amount. “Just a minute, I’m busy,” the Doctor shouted back.
It was really him. There had always a slight difference in his elocution that marked the difference between Smith and the Doctor and Martha could hear it reversed in his voice now. A different edge, a slight change of accent, and the sarcastic tone that cut to her core. She wanted to run to him and be certain with her other senses but for now sound would have to do.
“Give yourself up Doctor!” the man continued to shout. “And give up the blond girl. She will answer for her crimes.”
A few yards in front of the man a green beam hit the ground and caused a small explosion. “I didn’t have to miss,” Anne’s voice said clearly.
Now Martha was really confused. Who was Anne exactly? Somewhere in the last twelve hours she’d gone from being a meek early twentieth century servant girl with amnesia to someone confidently armed with obviously alien weapons. But she seemed to be on their side rather than the Family’s. Martha had clearly missed a good deal by leaving to look for Anne herself.
What’s more, she wasn’t just on Smith’s side now, but the Doctor’s. It was a traitorous thought that crossed Martha’s mind, but she had been counting on Anne being someone they left behind when they left, but if she wasn’t really part of this world, what would happen?
Two figures stepped out of the door, the tall one was obviously the Doctor and the short one probably Anne. Silhouetted against the light from inside Martha could see Anne holding a large gun or gun-like-weapon at the ready, scanning the surroundings for dangers. The two of them moved part way out into the open area and then stopped. “Alright, I hear you have my friend,” the Doctor called, though he didn’t have to shout as loudly now.
“Wife of Mine? Son of Mine? You have captured them, you have tried to kill Son of Mine.”
“Yeah, sorry about that,” Anne said with a note of sarcasm not far from the Doctor’s, though he would never be so flippant about that. “Self-defense, you know. And I didn’t kill him.”
“Doctor!” Martha managed to shout before one of the scarecrows forcefully clamped a hand over her mouth.
She thought the Doctor seemed to be scanning the trees for her, and Anne might have been doing the same, but it was hard to tell through so much interference caused by moving scarecrows. “You see,” the Doctor continued talking, “we have a bit of a problem here. I can’t let you hurt anyone else and my friend here is not going to let you hurt me.”
Martha’s hearing was still her primary sense for knowing what was happening, and she could swear she heard fondness in the Doctor’s voice when he mentioned Anne. Just great, Martha thought, that is the last thing I need.
“I could kill her right now,” the man said, drawing Martha’s attention back to him as he had leveled his own weapon on the pair that stood unprotected in the middle of the school grounds.
“And you see I just can’t allow that,” the Doctor said calmly, as if he was the one with an army at his back and not staring one down. Knowing the Doctor he might actually believe that, but Martha wished she could see some evidence of a plan in action.
Martha barely heard the little girl moving in the bushes in front of her and couldn’t warn anyone, but evidently Anne noticed it anyway and steadied her aim to where the child was partially hidden not far from Martha. “There’s another one,” she said, barely loud enough for Martha to hear.
The Doctor nodded. “Are there any more, or just the four of you? And seeing as we’ve already captured two of you I really suggest you take me up on my offer.”
“You really should,” Anne added. “We don’t want to hurt anyone, but we can and will if we have to.”
We, that word jumped out for Martha. Anne and the Doctor were a unit already, a pair, a we. How could that happen?
“We will have your life energy Doctor, you can’t stop us.”
“Yes, well,” the Doctor drawled, preparing one of his customary insights. “That fact of the matter is I’ve been posing as a history teacher of late and I always did have a flair for science. And one thing you should never ever do, and I mean never ever, is force me to put those two things together.
In the blink of an eye the Doctor pulled a blowgun out of his pocket and blew a shot at the man, then quickly turned to the girl’s hiding spot and fired several to make sure he got her. Martha saw the girl fall over, unconscious, but she didn’t see the stray dart that came at her.
She didn’t fall over unconscious, but she did feel woozy as she heard footsteps racing towards her. “It’s alright Martha,” the Doctor’s voice said. “Come on Rose, let’s get her back inside. The potion was meant for the Family but it also had to work off of human physiology.”
“Rose?” Martha said. Her mind was slower than normal but she was certain she had heard him use the name of the woman whose ghost she’d been living with for months to address Anne who had appeared next to him now.
“Oh right. Rose Tyler, Martha Jones,” he introduced them. “Martha Jones, I’d like you to meet Rose Tyler.”
Martha’s last conscious thought before she passed out was that she had to already be dreaming.
Author:
jedi_of_urthFandom: Doctor Who
Characters/Pairings: The Doctor (John Smith), Rose Tyler (Anne Young), Martha Jones. Doctor/Rose (John/Anne)
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: ~39,000
Summary: HN/FoB AU, when Martha and John Smith arrive in 1913 they encounter the mysterious Anne Young, whose forgotten past is more important than any of them know.
Disclaimer: Doctor Who isn’t mine. And the basic idea of HN/FB isn’t either.
Author's Notes/Warnings: This story as bee a long LONG time coming, but I think I can finally call it finished. I’ll include more on that at the end of the story but I hope it came out alright after all that. Includes fictionalized amnesia, and obviously plot points borrowed” from the show. Thanks to
turtle_goose for betaingPast Chapters: Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5
A mere few minutes ago, Rose had led a frightened John Smith down the corridor, she took him by the hand and lead him slowly to meet his fate. Now she and the Doctor raced down the hallway, still hand in hand, on their mission to stop the Family of parasites that threatened this place and possibly the whole world.
“What the blazes is going on out here?” the crisp voice of the Headmaster asked as his door flew open as they passed it.
The Doctor would have kept running but Rose pulled him up. If they didn’t stop now the Headmaster would follow them and they’d lead him into the mess with Jenny. Better to deal with him here. “Sorry sir,” she said as she turned halfway towards him.
“Explain yourself Smith,” the older man demanded. His eyes flicked towards Rose but most of his attention was on scowling at the Doctor.
“Oh right, that’s me isn’t it?” the Doctor laughed. “Well there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for this...” He’ trailed off, he’d picked up on Rose’s intent quickly enough, unfortunately it seemed even he couldn’t come up with a reasonable explanation for them running down the hallway so late.
“We just can’t tell you what it is,” Rose hurried to supply before the drop in conversation became noticeable. Ideally she would have said something that would raise less suspicion than the silence she prevented though.
The Headmaster’s scowl deepened, and now it also included Rose. “Run along Miss Young, though less literally, I need to speak to Professor Smith.” He stressed John’s title, and Rose could guess why and it made her scowl right back. The amnesiac servant and the eccentric professor was not going to be approved of, John and Anne had known that and never had the chance to push it very far, but as Rose and the Doctor they had stopped standing for that kind of disapproval ages ago.
The more violent side of her wished she hadn’t left the guns back in John’s room, but there were other ways to deal with the situation. She tried to adopt the more meek tones she would have used before she remembered things, “Don’t be angry sir, but we are in a bit of a hurry.”
“Yes, yes we are,” the Doctor supplied. “In fact we are in such a rush that we were probably a bit overexcited. No need to concern yourself, we’ll just be going now.”
As the Doctor turned away as if that would be enough, the Headmaster barked after him, “Smith, explain yourself.”
“About what exactly?” the Doctor asked. Rose laughed. She wasn’t sure if he was really confused or if he was angry about it, but it felt like old times either way. “Or was that a bit rude?”
She laughed again. “No more than he is!”
He smiled too. “Good point.”
“I dare say,” the Headmaster interjected. “You two had best explain yourselves.”
“Sorry sir, we were helping Mr. Steinhold on a project and got carried away.” She hoped the fact that she was still fighting back giggles didn’t hurt her story too badly.
The Headmaster glared at her but nodded slowly. “I’ll be having a word with Steinhold about your behavior Ms. Young. We do demand a certain level of decorum from our servants. And out staff,” he added turning his glare on the Doctor.
“Oi,” the Doctor started, but Rose squeezed his hand trying to keep him from making this a bigger scene when things finally seemed diffused enough that they could get back to business. “Right-o, we’ll talk later, have to be off now.”
The Headmaster still didn’t look completely convinced but this time as they walked away quickly he didn’t stop them. Once around the next corner they looked at each other and smiled, but some of the humor had gone out of it; they picked the pace up again for the last few yards to reach John’s room.
John’s. John would never come back here because John didn’t exist anymore. He was still here in the Doctor, but it was all very complicated and Rose still didn’t have time to sort it out. She was happy to have the Doctor back, but she knew later she would be sorry for what that meant for John Smith as she had known him recently.
Inside the room they found Richard leaning heavily on John’s desk still staring at the tied up Jenny and gripping a hip flask. “Richard?” Rose asked cautiously as she approached her friend. If Richard had been drinking she worried he might not be as helpful with whatever came next in this insanity, in the time she’d known him she’d never known his to drink much, especially alone.
“Anne...what’s going on exactly?” he asked slowly.
Rose bit her lip slightly, it wasn’t going to be easy to explain. “We’re time travelers. I’m from the future, he’s not even from this planet.”
“Rose was that necessary?” the Doctor asked as he knelt down to check on Jenny.
“Until you found me out in the woods I had been lost in another reality and maybe when all this is over we can figure out how I came back.”
“What happened here?” the Doctor blurted out. When Rose shot him a look he at least explained. “She’s unconscious, you weren’t supposed to make her unconscious.”
“I just gave her a drink to try and calm her down. Just a small drink and she passed out.”
As one Rose and the Doctor’s eyes lit up. “Really?” the Doctor asked. Richard nodded.
“Alcohol?” Rose asked with a new grin spreading across her face.
“Yes. Oh why didn’t I think of that before?”
Actually that was a pretty good question, but Rose would save it for later. “So what can we do with that? Knock them out and take them to the authorities?”
The Doctor smiled. “I knew Torchwood wouldn’t change you too much.”
She smiled back, but she knew it was a little sad. Mickey and her dad and all the other people she knew at Torchwood were still in the other world. “You can argue with me about the guns later, for right now we don’t know what we’re dealing with here.”
“Rose...” he started, looking upset at the reminder of the guns in the room that she would be taking once they left to do whatever they were going to do about this. But he shook his head and stopped himself, “Later.”
“Which is what I said.”
“Alright, alright. Alright, Richard ol’ boy, if you will help me get Jenny here to the chemistry lab Rose can get us more alcohol.” Then he paused and pursed his lips, “Where’s Martha by the way?”
~~~~~~~~~~
As soon as the Family had sensed that the Doctor was back they picked up their pace back to the school but now they were lurking in the bushes out front. Baines, or whoever he was now, still wasn’t anywhere to be seen and Martha feared he was already stalking the school looking for either the Doctor or Anne since they still though Anne was the Doctor.
That ruse couldn’t last very long now that the Doctor was actually back, they’d be able to tell the Doctor hadn’t come back as Anne but in Smith. And how had he come back? No one but Martha knew about the watch, not even him.
Although the scarecrows still kept watching Martha she had time to think while the possessed man and girl were prowling just off the school grounds, and nothing made sense. There had been no way to bring the Doctor back. And what was Anne’s part in all of this? Even before Martha’s lie the Family had been following the other woman; it didn’t make sense that it was just because of her relationship with Smith.
At least that trouble should be over. With the Doctor back, Anne’s part in this was over. Things would probably be awkward as hell when Martha and the Doctor left but Anne would have to understand that the man she had been with didn’t exist anymore. And it would be good to have the Doctor back; Martha was looking forward to that.
There was hope with the Doctor back, which was important to remember. He would find a way out of this and soon the two of them would be able to leave this place behind.
~~~~~~~~~~
The school had supplies of wine, but Rose’s first stop was going back to Richard’s room for his whiskey bottle. They knew that worked, so it would be foolish not to have it on hand. When she got there she found they had left the pocket watch behind in their hurry to leave earlier and she picked it up from the floor.
It wasn’t warm now, just cool metal like an ordinary pocket watch. Some part of her, she realized, had expected that John and the Doctor had changed places and that now it would be John in the watch reaching out to her. But that wouldn’t have worked anyway; it wasn’t a choice, one or the other, it one whole Doctor, the part of him that had made up John back inside him. The fragments of her that had made up Anne hadn’t gone anywhere, she’d only been made whole again.
She had to move some things around on the shelf to reach the whiskey bottle, and then just as she pulled it out she heard the doorknob turn behind her. She quickly crouched down to hide behind the great desk that dominated a good deal of this section of the room. Unless either the Doctor or Richard had decided to come this way it wasn’t likely to be anyone she wanted to see. Even if the extent of it was that the Headmaster had stopped knocking on teachers’ doors she really didn’t have the time to deal with another delay from him.
The footsteps that entered were slow and deliberate, not treading loudly but purposefully. When the intruder came next to the desk she could see a student’s shoes – though not shining the way the rules required, dirty as if the young man had been outside a good deal since he’d last cleaned his shoes.
Then, without warning the shoes disappeared and not a breath later came the sound of a person landing on top of the desk. Rose looked up and saw Jeremy Baines towering over her and looking down at her hiding place with the same alien look Jenny had worn when she had come looking for the Doctor. “No,” he said in a carefully modulated tone, “you aren’t the Doctor.”
“What?” she said, for a second forgetting other questions such as who and what he was now. “Of course I’m not.”
Baines’ lips twitched up into a smirk, and he pulled a gun just like Jenny’s. “Then I have no further use for you.”
“Wait,” Rose said quickly. “At least you could tell me why you think I am.” She also scrabbled to her feet as she said it and slid one hand behind her back to finger the alien gun she had stashed there.
“I see no reason to do that,” Baines said crisply. But then he cocked his head to the side as if listening to something beyond Rose’s hearing. “But why would she say you were?”
Rose’s stomach flipped. “Martha,” she said, knowing it was the only answer. “Where is she? What have you done with her?” And why the hell would she say that?
Baines centered himself and Rose could see his index finger ready to move so she darted to one side as she pulled out her own gun and aimed it at him. He still had a better position, standing above the floor meant that any cover she might have found would have been useless, but his legs would be an easy strike if she could manage to get close enough to do something with that. And the whiskey was still easy to pull off the shelf if she had the chance to knock him out that way.
For a moment the two of them stared at each other, their twin guns squarely aimed for a kill shot if either pulled the trigger. But it seemed they were both trained enough that it would be mutually assured destruction, and also to recognize it in each other. “Martha,” Rose tried again, “what have you done with her?”
“Nothing,” Baines said with his perpetual smirk. “Yet. Give us the Doctor and we’ll leave the rest of you useless humans alone.”
Rose rolled her eyes slightly, but not enough to take her gaze from Baines. “Care to try that again? I’ve heard that one a few times. Pretty much always from people with no intention of leaving anything alone.”
For a moment the smirk slipped a little, and when it came back it seemed more habit than as superior as he’d been. “I can find the Doctor without you. But you Miss Young, my Family could enjoy you a good deal as well. Perhaps I won’t kill you.” The gun didn’t move though, and Rose wasn’t stupid enough to fall for that trick.
The silence stretched on for another long moment. Rose could remember Baines as he had been; arrogant and rude perhaps, but hardly more than most teenage boys in her experience. He didn’t deserve this fate, Jenny didn’t either, or whoever else these people had taken. “You have Martha, we have Jenny, maybe we could arrange a trade,” she suggested.
“We want the Doctor,” was all Baines said in reply.
“You’re not getting him,” Rose said plainly, and readied her muscles again in case that provoked a response.
It did. “I hate to hear that,” the being that had been Baines said a second before he broke the standoff and fired at her. She’d been ready though and rolled out of the way, came up and aimed for his legs and fired. She didn’t hesitate or look to see what he might have hit, what mattered was that it wasn’t her.
The alien weapon was far more powerful that she’d expected and though she only hit him in the leg there seemed to be a small explosion as he fell off the desk. She ran back to the other side of the desk to see what had happened. One of his legs was almost completely gone below the mid-thigh and the other was bent at an unnatural angle. The gun had already fallen out of his hands but Rose kicked it further away so he wouldn’t get ideas.
Though he must have been in pain he didn’t cry out with it. Instead, as Rose bent to look at him, he was simply crying. She could just hear him whispering, “Paulina,” as he gasped for breath.
“Baines?” Rose asked. She had always dismissed Jenny’s rumor mongering about her own roommate, but now it seemed it was possible.
Baines locked eyes on Rose and she could see that he was only a frightened young boy. “Tell her...sorry...loved her.” Then his breathe caught and it was the invading alien who looked up at Rose. Even though the sneer was now completely absent it was an unmistakable change. He brought one of his arms up and reached for her throat, but Rose was able to avoid it easily. She ran for the whiskey bottle and quickly forced some down Baines’ throat until he fell unconscious.
Rose had to improvise a means of restraining him in case he regained consciousness, not that he was likely to go anywhere, but the life-form that had taken Baines over might find other ways to make trouble if he came around. She rolled him up in some of the bedclothes, which would double as restraining Baines’ injured legs so there might be a chance of saving the boy from dying of his wounds if he could somehow survive the alien that had possessed him.
As she finished tying him up, Rose thought about the fact that even if Baines survived this, World War One was just around the corner. Well, with at least one missing leg he wasn’t going to see combat so maybe it was a silver lining.
If he survived.
If any of them survived the night.
With one last look at the unconscious boy Rose grabbed the whiskey bottle and left the room. It was getting well into the evening now and most people; students, servants, and teachers, had retired to their rooms by now so Rose was able to make her way to the liquor cabinet with no one the wiser. There she found a few bottles of scotch as well as the wine, so she grabbed a couple of each figuring they might want options to work with when turning alcohol into a weapon.
Sneaking to the science lab was more difficult, so she decided not to try. Trying to sneak around would probably draw more attention than walking openly down the hallways. She passed a small group of students who were clustered in the hall but they didn’t stop her, even to ask where she had gotten the liquor.
“What I wouldn’t give for the sonic screwdriver,” the Doctor was saying when Rose entered the lab. He was running wildly around the room in his completely manic way and Rose had to smile. She had missed him so much, and she had barely even had a chance to really talk to him yet. In her imagination their reunion always happened with racing into each other’s arms and having all the time in the world to spend catching up and then usually ending up in bed together.
It had happened in all the wrong order, but she was still happy that she was here with him.
Rose set the bottles down next to Richard who was standing over Jenny’s body, and the Doctor looked over at her and smiled too. For a short second they just smiled at each other and then there was a loud, screeching noise from outside the school.
“Oh, there it is,” the Doctor said ruefully. “How exactly did they get a hold of my screwdriver?”
~~~~~~~~~~
Martha didn’t think the scarecrows were watching her terribly closely. It was hard to tell, but it was dark and they had to watch her and their surroundings so she slowly reached her hand into her pocket and felt for the sonic screwdriver. She didn’t know how to work very many functions on it, but hopefully if it was necessary she could convince someone she knew more.
The last thing the Doctor had used it for was to fine tune the chameleon arch before he’d used it to change. Whatever setting that was probably wouldn’t be much help in this situation, so she fidgeted with the device a bit and hoped whatever she set it to could do some good.
Suddenly the girl appeared again out of the bushes. This time she trained a gun on Martha and Martha froze. She was in a far too vulnerable position to try her crazy idea at this point. “You lied,” the girl said. “The girl was never the Doctor.”
“You’re right,” Martha replied. It was all she trusted herself to say.
“And she nearly killed Brother of Mine.”
“I’m sorry,” Martha said instinctively, although she wasn’t sure that she was sorry at all.
“I should kill you.” It was a simple statement, as if she had commented on the fact that it was night time or had peas for dinner. It simply was; no feeling behind it at all. Even though her brother had been nearly killed it was a cold calculation in her voice rather than anger.
There was nothing to lose, Martha whipped the sonic screwdriver out as she rose to her knees and leveled the screwdriver like a weapon. But just as she did a scarecrow punched her in the arm forcing her to drop the screwdriver. It was a deeper voice, the father of the Family, which spoke then, “We won’t kill her just yet, Daughter of Mine, but the other one will pay for what she did to Son of Mine.”
In some ways Martha’s ruse had succeeded she realized, it had diverted the Family’s attention from the Doctor for a time. It wasn’t fair to Anne, it never had been, but it would buy the Doctor time and that was the important thing.
Then the father picked up the sonic screwdriver from where it had fallen and Martha’s stomach dropped again. It might not actually be a weapon, but there were plenty of things it could do that she’d rather these people didn’t figure out. “Well, what does this do?” he asked but didn’t wait for a response from Martha before he pointed at her and pressed the main button.
What it did was start making noise; a shrill whining sound that grew louder and louder even after he stopped pressing the button until the noise practically erupted out into the night. Martha’s ears were ringing as the noise faded but she couldn’t help smiling. That ought to give the Doctor an idea where she was at least.
The Family, having taken over human bodies, was disoriented by the sound too, but then the man started shouting orders at the scarecrows that Martha couldn’t hear and she wondered if they could heal faster than humans. She tried to remember if that had been on the Doctor’s list of instructions but she was pretty sure it hadn’t been. It wouldn’t be the first important thing he’d left out of that message.
~~~~~~~~~~
Rose could hear more and more people moving around throughout the school so she nudged Richard. “Think you could go and try to keep everyone calm?” she asked.
To her surprise, he laughed. “And how do you suggest I do that exactly?” he asked as he chuckled.
She laughed a little too, it was true that Richard was probably not the best candidate for this, but he was also the only one. The Doctor had to work on their alcohol weapons and no one was going to listen to Rose. “Okay; Doctor, do you actually need us here?”
The Doctor was grabbing every container he could find but he looked up in shock. “Rose...” he started The lab was not meant to be used at night and the light of the moon and the few lamps couldn’t fully illuminate the room; but even in the dim light she could see the fear in his eyes.
“I know, but someone has to.”
He nodded in resignation and Rose turned back to Richard. “Let’s go.”
The Doctor watched them leave out of the corner of his eye, trying not to think about the fact that he kept separating himself from Rose though they had just found each other again. Things were more than a little awkward considering all that had happened prior to their real reunion but he still would have rather kept her safely where he could see her and preferably no further away than their hands could reach. But she was right that the school population needed to be kept under control so nobody got hurt with whatever plan the Family had.
So he stayed behind and continued mixing the drinks Rose had brought with some hastily prepared additives. He smelled at it to see if the mixture was right, added the last of the whiskey and decided it was ready. At which point he started drawing the liquid into the syringes that were part of the standard equipment in the chemistry lab.
They wouldn’t need very many he figured, these families were usually no more than six people and he didn’t think this one was even that large. But they might need to keep them sedated for a while until he could figure out how to deal with them beyond putting them to sleep for a time.
As if on cue the possessed maid started to stir. That gave them about twenty minutes on the dose Steinhold had given her, should be a bit longer with what he’d brewed up, but still not enough to haul the unconscious Family...wherever; he’d figure that out when the time came.
The young woman’s name had been Jenny he thought as he knelt over her, Jenny Hatlend. He – well, Smith – hadn’t actually known her but now that he had his own mind back names were easier to recall than it had been with a small human mind. Now her eyes were open and an alien being was looking at him. “I presume I am addressing your Family,” he said calmly. He wasn’t half as calm as he sounded, but it was better to seem like he was in control of everything.
She nodded and struggled against the knots that kept her bound. “Good, then give them a message. I gave you the chance live out your lives in peace, but you came anyway. You have one final chance, return the people you have captured and leave Earth forever.”
It was probably risky, but with the general commotion throughout the school he figured he could get away with un-gagging her to see what she had to say. She attempted to bite his hand as he removed the wet handkerchief from her mouth, but he pulled away quickly. “Answer me now,” he commanded. There was steel in his voice that he hadn’t realized he was going to display.
The girl who had been Jenny spat at him. “We will have you, and the girl who tried to destroy Son of Mine.”
He almost involuntarily glanced towards the door, it didn’t take much to guess it had been Rose; she had certainly seemed shaken when she arrived and had obviously wanted to stay busy. But she hadn’t told him, and he wished she had.
“Fine, if that’s your answer, tell them I had better not see them.”
“They have your friend,” she said before he could return the gag to her mouth, grateful they weren’t still using a balled up sock. “And they have the forces to attack this school and kill every soul if they have to in order to capture you.”
His eyes locked with hers and he said the only thing that seemed natural for him to say. Common words that hadn’t fit so well in his mouth since Canary Warf, but now they had come back to him with Rose. “Bring it on.”
~~~~~~~~~~
Two of the scarecrows roughly pushed Martha through the forest while who knew how many others roamed around the school grounds. From the number clustered around Martha and the Family members out here, there could have been a small army. On the other hand if they were actually keeping the majority of the scarecrows close to the Family members it wasn’t nearly so intimidating a force. But how did these beings think?
When they reached the front of the school, the man stepped out into the smooth lawn. “Doctor!” he yelled as loudly as he could and his voice carried in the cold night air. “Doctor! Come out here!”
Martha saw a stream of light expand across to lawn as the main door opened a small amount. “Just a minute, I’m busy,” the Doctor shouted back.
It was really him. There had always a slight difference in his elocution that marked the difference between Smith and the Doctor and Martha could hear it reversed in his voice now. A different edge, a slight change of accent, and the sarcastic tone that cut to her core. She wanted to run to him and be certain with her other senses but for now sound would have to do.
“Give yourself up Doctor!” the man continued to shout. “And give up the blond girl. She will answer for her crimes.”
A few yards in front of the man a green beam hit the ground and caused a small explosion. “I didn’t have to miss,” Anne’s voice said clearly.
Now Martha was really confused. Who was Anne exactly? Somewhere in the last twelve hours she’d gone from being a meek early twentieth century servant girl with amnesia to someone confidently armed with obviously alien weapons. But she seemed to be on their side rather than the Family’s. Martha had clearly missed a good deal by leaving to look for Anne herself.
What’s more, she wasn’t just on Smith’s side now, but the Doctor’s. It was a traitorous thought that crossed Martha’s mind, but she had been counting on Anne being someone they left behind when they left, but if she wasn’t really part of this world, what would happen?
Two figures stepped out of the door, the tall one was obviously the Doctor and the short one probably Anne. Silhouetted against the light from inside Martha could see Anne holding a large gun or gun-like-weapon at the ready, scanning the surroundings for dangers. The two of them moved part way out into the open area and then stopped. “Alright, I hear you have my friend,” the Doctor called, though he didn’t have to shout as loudly now.
“Wife of Mine? Son of Mine? You have captured them, you have tried to kill Son of Mine.”
“Yeah, sorry about that,” Anne said with a note of sarcasm not far from the Doctor’s, though he would never be so flippant about that. “Self-defense, you know. And I didn’t kill him.”
“Doctor!” Martha managed to shout before one of the scarecrows forcefully clamped a hand over her mouth.
She thought the Doctor seemed to be scanning the trees for her, and Anne might have been doing the same, but it was hard to tell through so much interference caused by moving scarecrows. “You see,” the Doctor continued talking, “we have a bit of a problem here. I can’t let you hurt anyone else and my friend here is not going to let you hurt me.”
Martha’s hearing was still her primary sense for knowing what was happening, and she could swear she heard fondness in the Doctor’s voice when he mentioned Anne. Just great, Martha thought, that is the last thing I need.
“I could kill her right now,” the man said, drawing Martha’s attention back to him as he had leveled his own weapon on the pair that stood unprotected in the middle of the school grounds.
“And you see I just can’t allow that,” the Doctor said calmly, as if he was the one with an army at his back and not staring one down. Knowing the Doctor he might actually believe that, but Martha wished she could see some evidence of a plan in action.
Martha barely heard the little girl moving in the bushes in front of her and couldn’t warn anyone, but evidently Anne noticed it anyway and steadied her aim to where the child was partially hidden not far from Martha. “There’s another one,” she said, barely loud enough for Martha to hear.
The Doctor nodded. “Are there any more, or just the four of you? And seeing as we’ve already captured two of you I really suggest you take me up on my offer.”
“You really should,” Anne added. “We don’t want to hurt anyone, but we can and will if we have to.”
We, that word jumped out for Martha. Anne and the Doctor were a unit already, a pair, a we. How could that happen?
“We will have your life energy Doctor, you can’t stop us.”
“Yes, well,” the Doctor drawled, preparing one of his customary insights. “That fact of the matter is I’ve been posing as a history teacher of late and I always did have a flair for science. And one thing you should never ever do, and I mean never ever, is force me to put those two things together.
In the blink of an eye the Doctor pulled a blowgun out of his pocket and blew a shot at the man, then quickly turned to the girl’s hiding spot and fired several to make sure he got her. Martha saw the girl fall over, unconscious, but she didn’t see the stray dart that came at her.
She didn’t fall over unconscious, but she did feel woozy as she heard footsteps racing towards her. “It’s alright Martha,” the Doctor’s voice said. “Come on Rose, let’s get her back inside. The potion was meant for the Family but it also had to work off of human physiology.”
“Rose?” Martha said. Her mind was slower than normal but she was certain she had heard him use the name of the woman whose ghost she’d been living with for months to address Anne who had appeared next to him now.
“Oh right. Rose Tyler, Martha Jones,” he introduced them. “Martha Jones, I’d like you to meet Rose Tyler.”
Martha’s last conscious thought before she passed out was that she had to already be dreaming.
