In Plain Sight |7| The Ascension

Chapter Two: The Witch's Familiar

"Consider the Doctor."

Colour streaked past her eyes, faster than she could make out. A sort of orangey-brown and then, below it, deep, warm blue. The kind you got on a summer's day when there wasn't a cloud in the sky and she could feel, actually feel, the sheer size of the world around her. The kind where the sky kissed the sea and blended at the horizon, so close and so connected she couldn't tell where one ended and the other began.

"The Doctor trapped..."

It had looked like that in Brighton.

"The Doctor alone..."

Belatedly, she realised what she was looking at: the upside down world spinning around her—really quite nauseatingly, actually. Except it wasn't the world that was spinning, it was her, and it wasn't upside down, either. That was her, too. Up above, rope bound her ankles, dangling her in the air. And as her movement slowed, she began to pick out details around her: huge, hulking structures that must have been rock formations; and there was the distant, blurring image of a city far away; and that dark, purplish figure that was much closer, that must have been—

"You all right there, dear?"

Flossie's eyes widened; she turned as best she could, trying to find Missy again as the rope twisted and spun. "Where are we?" she demanded. "How did we—"

"Hush now, Mummy's talking. Okay, I'm going to tell you a story of the Doctor. It's a classic. On the run, no TARDIS. No friends, no Angel, no help. In other words, the Doctor happy. It was a long time ago. Doesn't matter which face he was wearing—they're all the Doctor to me. So, let's give it to the eyebrows."

"But the Daleks—"

Missy rolled her eyes. "Yes, I'm coming to that."

"Shouldn't we be... erm..." Flossie grimaced. "I don't want to say dead, but...?"

"Hush! He's travelling by teleporter. Unfortunately, his teleporter is out of power. Also unfortunate: he's being stalked by, ooh, say about fifty android assassins? I may be rounding up." She touched the end of something thin in her lap and yelped; squinting, Flossie managed to pick it out. A small, pointed stick. "Fifty invisible, indestructible android assassins, all exclusively programmed to kill him."

"Why are you sharpening that stick?" Flossie asked warily.

"Well, I've no idea how long we're going to be stuck out here. Might have to go hunting."

"So why am I tied up?"

Missy met her gaze with a dangerous smile—the kind that reminded you just how many lives she had claimed, just how many times she had almost succeeded in tearing the world apart. And then she said, quite innocently, "In case there's nothing to hunt." As Flossie's eyes widened, she continued on with her story. "The Doctor, then.

"Surrounded, outnumbered, outgunned... and freeze. Nanoseconds to live. Four, I'd say, being generous. Now, my question is this. How did he survive?" Flossie was silent; Missy got to her feet and prodded her sharply, making her sway slightly on the rope. "Come on, Flossie! You know him. Consider the Doctor."

Flossie swallowed, her eyes flickering upward—or downward, of course, depending on your perspective—as she tried to figure it out. Something told her, after all, that her life depended on it. But how could she know? She'd only just reunited with the man, for God's sake, and even that had only been for... what? Half an hour? Before that, it had been years since she'd last laid eyes on him.

And yet... Well, it was strange, really. She'd never seen this new face of his before, she was quite sure of that. If it hadn't been for the others recognising him, she never would have known it was him... except for one thing.