The Always More (Doctor Who Fanfiction)

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fourteen
Irene

About an hour earlier...

This is what I wake up to hear:

"... unacceptable behavior! We are not here to seduce the men, and devour the women!"

I was waking up up slowly and calmly, but I startle awake the rest of the way at this.

"But it works. And we don't kill all of them. Alexander Hamilton wasn't any trouble last summer at all," objected another sharp voice. "And we didn't touch his wife!"

I blink. Alexander Who-now?

"Because you weren't able. Her blood would have been poured if your Mira could have gotten her hands on her."

"Her name is Maria, mother!"

"In this world, her name could be anything she wants. In ours, her name is Mira."

I am laying on a slab of wood, with a thin blanket stretched across my body. My feet are sticking out from under the edge of it. The rest of the room is so dark that I cannot determine its size. A honey-like light stains the floor in distinct rays originating at the crack under the door. It looks strangely unnatural. I sit up and swing my feet onto the floor. They nearly freeze against the floor, but I force myself to stand. Where did my shoes go? I feel around for Mr. Smith's sonic screwdriver, and find nothing.

I creep up to the door, pausing to mentally freak when one of the floorboards groans under my weight. I swallow hard. My mouth tastes like sour milk. The talking continues. I peer through a crack in the door. My head feels like it has been put through a blender. Escape is now the top priority.

A new voice (gruffer, but unmistakable female) speaks the the arguing pair. "What are we going to do with her, then?"

I am not sure I want to hear the answer to this.

"Kill her," says the younger woman says. Silence. "You're not suggesting that we let her go? Mother? She's seen too much!"

"She's a child."

"She's a woman!" She exclaims.

"Barely more than a girl."

For once, my small stature and soft complexion have come into some other use besides patronizing me. I hear a shuffling of skirts, and back away. My legs are shaking so I can barely hold myself upright.

I think, "Don't fall, don't fall, don't you dare fall," as I retreat into the all-encompassing darkness of the room. I stubbornly refuse to tear my eyes away from that door. Like there is any way to see anything else in this room. I keep a hand stretched out behind me to make sure that I don't make any notice running into a wall. Each shallow breath sounds far louder than is probably natural. I hope to find a window to slip out of.

Instead, I find another horizontal slab of wood that feels like it is the same as the one that I woke up on. I begin to feel my way around it. Of all the things that inky darkness can swallow up, why doesn't it gulp down the darkness, too? I squeeze my eyes shut, and strain my ears. Both my hands are shaking so hard that a string of taps sound when I touch anything.

I feel familiar surface under my fingertips, but I can't pinpoint what it is. I realize too late that my fingers are sliding into the grasp of someone else's convulsing hand. That sensation was cold skin.

A squeak escapes my lungs, and I wheel backwards. I bump into another board. I don't stick around to figure out if there's another body on that one, or if any of the bodies are alive. I slide into the first corner I find, and sit down in it. My hand feels slick. I cross my fingers hoping that it isn't blood. I hear the door opening, and bury my hand in the folds of my dress. In the dim light filtering across the room, I see that I am hidden in a crevice between a wall and what looks like it could either be a wardrobe or a China cabinet if it has a glass front.