Held In Time || Doctor Who

3 || A path to beginnings

"-chelle? Michelle?" A familiar Estuary English accent calls, gripping the beige trenchcoat a similar way I had done so earlier, "where did you go?"

I blink. Once, twice, three times before I snap back into reality and widen my eyes at him, the man who had saved my life countless times. No. Just the once, in the asylum. Asylum.

"Michelle, look at me," he cups my face, moving a hand to my temple, examining something.

Rose swallows from behind him and I squeeze my eyes shut, "its Torchwood," I tell him, not wanting to look at him when I say this, "I've been kept in a Torchwood facility. How is any of this real?"

I feel a small breeze, like someone moving, and hear his voice, dangerously low, "Rose. Where did you take her? Where did you go?"

She stammers but only slightly, "Um, just 'round the corner over there. We walked past a few offices but nothing much - she froze up so I brought her here. Is she alright?"

He sighs and I peel my eyelids back a bit, catching a glimpse of his worried look, "I was hoping to wait to do this later, preferably in the TARDIS.. Michelle you recognised me - us, and you even knew that I was The Doctor. How?"

"You shouldn't exist," I breathe, shaking my head, "you don't exist. You're just a television show, a stupid television show that kept my imagination going in the cell."

The.. the Doctor furrows his brow and presses two fingers to my temples, one on each side, "okay. Okay, I won't do anything without your permission but I basically need to access some sort of memory, spark of one anyway. I need to see what you see, feel what you feel, if only for just a second. Is that alright?"

I nod, choking back an exclamation. He does as he said he would, closing his eyes in concentration. Deep concentration, looking like a trance.

In this moment, I take the time to examine him. Properly. His spikey hair that always defies gravity and the way his eyes narrow when he's concentrated - like now, I suppose - and how he looks at you. Stares at you like you're the only one in the room, like you actually matter. The way, when you make some funny remark or have done something to impress him, he grins. Grins like you're a genius - like you mean the world to him.

I scoff at myself internally. There's no way I'm thinking this at a fictional character. There's no way he's 'The Doctor' or something. That'd be impossible. It's just a television show that I used to watch..that was somehow not wiped from my memories.

A thought strikes through me, leaving me stunned. He said something about going through my mind - memories - right? Surely he can't know what I'm thinking of now. If he did, I think I might die. That is, of course, if I'm not already dead.

I study him for one last second before his eyes fly open, looking around before landing on me. I hold in a breath, unsure if it is wise for me to move, and I do my best not to cower. The man, 'Doctor', he tilts his head to the side and frowns.

"They wiped your memories," He concludes, still staring, "they wiped them and left you with a single clip of surgery. Why?" He holds up a finger, stopping some invisible force, "no. Yes. No. Yes! Ah, and they failed - failed mostly, ish. They tried but couldn't wipe me. Me, and the rest of that lot." He swirls his hand in a circular movement, as if anyone could tell what he is on about.

He leans over and digs a hand into the pocket of the trenchcoat, not minding at all how close he got. As fast as he came, he moves back and props a rectangular frame of glasses ontop of his nose.

"But you knew me before. How?" He's not even paying attention to what he's saying now, his eyes fixated on mine, like they hold some sort of secret or code for him to crack, "and boy did they want to scare you. Conscious during surgery? No normal human wouldn't be left scarred.."

"Er, Doctor? Don't think you're helping.." Rose calls back to him.

He sucks in air through his teeth, taking the glasses off and moving backwards, "right, right. Sorry, bit carried away there.."

He sticks his hand out, grinning like a mad-man. Perhaps he is, "long overdue but.. hello Michelle Solace, I'm the Doctor. Like the one in your, er, programme. Except, more real."

I gape at him, bewildered. For as long as I could remember I dreamt of him and his daft blue box to take me away, some safe haven where I could help people whilst travelling. All at once. I dreamt that with that, I could do anything. Even be free, free from the prison. Free from the dreadful nights and the poor conditions.

"I.. um.." my eyes flicker down to my own hand then back up to his, "I don't.. oh god, I must be mental for this," I decide, putting my hand in his uneasily.

'The doctor' winks, a natural habit for him it seems, and looks back to Rose who spits out a comment, "we all are for joining the likes of him," she says, jerking her thumb with a laugh.

"Okay.. Doctor," I begin, tasting the word as if it were foreign to me, "that's so weird.. never get used to that - so, now what?"

I feel myself begin to relax, more at ease and less.. less trapped inside my own head. I think if I had been left in there longer.. maybe it would be so much harder. I look at the Doctor and Rose Tyler, solemn in thought and curious in sight. Maybe if I let myself believe then life would be more bearable. Doesn't mean I'm not gonna go around poking for answers, though.

He shoots me a comforting smile, "well! Well, well, well.. that is the question, isn't it? First.." I watch as his eyes linger at my wrist, the one tattooed mercilessly with a number. A number is all I am; zero twenty-five, "first we figure out their big project."

I finish his thought, "what I was involved in, my number. Why there are others like me. More than twenty-five rooms.."

He nods grimly but says nothing else about the subject, like he doesn't want to reopen the wound. The wound that hasn't even healed, I want to remind him. Remind them both, that even though I may seem fine now I'm still in a place where I was imprisoned for weeks. And I'd only just been let out.

Rose chimes in after what felt like a decade to me, "so.. where do we go?"