The Girl Who Could Never Leave (Doctor Who fanfic.)

Chapter 17: Future Windows and a Letter

I watched through a window as Rose- apparently I am still hungover- entered a room with Reinette. A piano sat in the corner, looking slightly neglected. "Madame de Pompadour. Please, don't scream or anything. We haven't got a lot of time. I've come to warn you that they'll be here in five years." Reinette had just turned 32 when the strange girl walked into her bedroom.

"Five years?"

Rose nodded. "Some time after your thirty seventh birthday. I er, I can't give you an exact date. It's a bit random. But they're coming. It's going to happen. In a way, for us, it's already happening. I'm sorry, it's hard to explain. The Doctor does this better."

'Should have sent me.'

"Then be exact, and I will be attentive."

"There isn't time."

"There are five years."

"For you. I haven't got five minutes."

"Then also be concise."

Rose pondered her next words for a moment befofe beginning, "Er, there's, say, a vessel, a ship, a sort of sky ship, and it's full of, well, you. Different bits of your life in different rooms, all jumbled up. I told you it was complicated. Sorry."

"There is a vessel in your world where the days of my life are pressed together like the chapters of a book, so that he may step from one to the other without increase of age while I, weary traveller, must always take the slower path."

"He was right about you."

"So, in five years these creatures will return. What can be done?"

"The Doctor says keep them talking. They're kind of programmed to respond to you now. You won't be able to stop them, but you might be able to delay them a bit."

"Until?"

"Until the Doctor can get there."

'Or me!'

"He's coming, then?"

"He promises."

"But he cannot make his promises in person?"

"He'll be there when you need him. That's the way it's got to be."

"It's the way it's always been. The monsters and the Doctor. It seems you cannot have one without the other."

"Tell me about it. The thing is, you weren't supposed to have either. Those creatures are messing with history. None of this was ever supposed to happen to you."

"Supposed to happen? What does that mean? It happened, child, and I would not have it any other way. One may tolerate a world of demons for the sake of an angel." Groaning with impatience I ran a hand through my hair before jumping through the time window, emerging through a tapestry.

"Rose! The time window where she's thirty seven. We found it. Right under our noses." I finished with a smirk. "Sorry." I said, holding back Reinette as she attempted to go through the window. "You can't go through there."

"The Doctor would have our heads." Rose smiled.

"I would like to see him try." I grinned to the girl.

A woman's shriek was heard through the window.

"What was that?" Reinette gasped.

"The time window. The Doctor fixed an audio link." I responded, trying to get Rose to catch on that she shouldn't say much more and we needed to go.

"Those screams. Is that my future?" I bit my lip with worry and nodded.

"Yeah. I'm sorry." Rose answered.