Guess who is having a promotion at work soon...
ME!
I'm starting to shadow in about two weeks and then I'll be fully into my management training which is pretty cool so I do apologise if the updates on my books slow down a bit, so far I am ahead in my writing so hopefully I keep that going.
I still don't know how I feel about this episode but we do get some funny Protector moments so at least we have that to enjoy I guess?
---
The Protector stood by a fireplace with the Doctor in a small living room. The man the Protector had almost bumped into, Sneed, the undertaker sat in his oversized chair as Rose walked back and forth, fire iron in hand as she snapped at the old man. "First of all you drug me, then you kidnap me," she hissed at him while the young woman who had tried to stop the Time Lords from entering the building poured tea into cups, "and don't think I didn't feel your hands having a quick wander, you dirty old man."
The Doctor smiled and the Protector elbowed him, giving him a disapproving look which he glared at in return. "I won't be spoken to like this!" Sneed exclaimed.
"Then you stuck me in a room full of zombies!" She continued as Sneed began to look up at her like a kicked little puppy. "And if that ain't enough, you swan off and leave me to die! So come on, talk!"
"It's not my fault." Sneed helplessly replied. "It's this house. It always had a reputation. Haunted. But I never had much bother until a few months back, and then the stiffs," Charles looked at him grimly, "the er, dear departed," Sneed corrected, "started getting restless."
"Tommyrot." Charles scoffed at the man.
Sneed shook his head. "You witnessed it. Can't keep the beggars down, sir. They walk. And it's the queerest thing, but they hang on to scraps."
The young woman walked up to the Doctor and the Protector, placing a cup onto the mantle piece. "Two sugars, sir, just how you like it."
The Doctor frowned slightly at her before he looked towards the Time Lady who also looked just as confused. "Do you know her?" She Telepathically asked him.
"Never met her before in my life."
"One old fellow who used to be a sexton almost walked into his own memorial service. Just like the old lady going to your performance, sir, just as she planned."
"Morbid fancy." Charles continued to dismiss what he saw.
"Oh, Charles," the Doctor rolled his eyes at the man, "you were there."
"I saw nothing but an illusion." He shook his head. "If you're going to deny it, don't waste my- Ow!" The Doctor glared at the Protector as she moved her hand away from the back of his head, having just slapped the back of it. "What was that for?!"
"Unnecessary rudeness towards Charles Dickens." The Time Lady casually replied.
The Doctor huffed, continuing to glare and now narrow his eyes at her as she looked to Sneed. "What about the gas?"
"That's new, ma'am." He nodded. "Never seen anything like that."
"Means it's getting stronger," the Doctor said, now looking at the Protector, still slightly glaring at her, "the rift's getting wider and something's sneaking through."
Rose looked between the Time Lords. "What's the rift?"
"A weak point in time and space." The Doctor stated. "A connection between this place and another. That's the cause of ghost stories, most of the time."
"That's how I got the house so cheap," Sneed explained. "Stories going back generations."
The Protector raised a brow as the door shut behind Charles who had left the room. The Doctor sighed, feeling the Time Lady's eyes burning into the back of his skull. "Fine." He grumbled into her head. "I'll go and apologise."
"Good boy." She snickered back at him, the Doctor whipped his head around, eyes shooting daggers at her before he left the room in search of Charles.
The Doctor raised a brow as he heard a scoff and Charles' voice. "Impossible." He followed the sound and watched as Charles walked into the chapel of rest. Charles removed the lid of the dead man's coffin and waved a hand in front of the man's face. The Doctor leaned against the door, silently watching while Charles looked under the coffin.
"Checking for strings?"
The man didn't even jump but glanced in the direction of the Time Lord. "Wires, perhaps." He hummed. "There must be some mechanism behind this fraud."
"Oh, come on, Charles." He sighed and leaned his head out the door, looking down the corridor before walking inside and up to the man. "All right, don't tell the Protector this but she was right. I shouldn't have told you to shut up. I'm sorry. But you've got one of the best minds in the world. You saw those gas creatures." "I cannot accept that."
"And what does the human body do when it decomposes?" The Doctor asked, shaking his head. "It breaks down and produces gas. Perfect home for these gas things. They can slip inside and use it as a vehicle, just like your driver and his coach."
"Stop it." Charles furiously shook his head. "Can it be that I have the world entirely wrong?"
"Not wrong. There's just more to learn."
"I've always railed against the fantasists." He smiled. "Oh, I loved an illusion as much as the next man, revelled in them, but that's exactly what they were, illusions." He explained. "The real world is something else. I dedicated myself to that. Injustices, the great social causes. I hoped that I was a force for good. Now you tell me that the real world is a realm of spectres and jack-o'-lanterns. In which case, have I wasted my brief span here, Doctor? Has it all been for nothing?"
The Protector stood in the pantry doorway, watching Rose and the maid, Gwyneth as she lit a gas lamp. "Please, miss, you shouldn't be helping." Gwyneth turned to Rose as she began to do the washing up. "It's not right."
Rose shook her head, ignoring her wish as she continued. "Don't be daft. Sneed works you to death. How much do you get paid?" "Eight pound a year, miss." Rose blinked before repeating herself.
"How much?"
"I know." Gwyneth nodded. "I would've been happy with six."
"So, did you go to school or what?"
"Of course I did." She slowly turned around, smiling at the silliness of Rose's question. "What do you think I am, an urchin? I went every Sunday, nice and proper." She nodded proudly.
"What," Rose looked at the Protector who just merely shrugged, keeping quiet. "Once a week?"
"We did sums and everything. To be honest, I hated every second."
The Time Lady smiled sadly thinking back to her time on Gallifrey and in the Academy, true she did hate it, she hated every second but at the same time, she adored it. She loved learning about Gallifrey's history and sneaking off to the library when she shouldn't with the Master who started that bad habit, more than often if she wasn't where she was supposed to be she was in the library, reading up on all of the off-limits books about different planets and species. It was one of the only things she and the Doctor had an agreement on at times during their school years, they'd never tell on where the other one was if they were in the library. It was theirs and the Master's spot.
"Me too," Rose replied in agreement.
"Don't tell anyone," Gwyneth said in a whisper as if she was even nervous about someone telling now, "but one week, I didn't go and ran on the heath all on my own." She laughed aloud.
"I did plenty of that." Rose smiled. "I used to go down the shops with my mate Shareen. We used to go and look at boys."
The Time Lady chuckled slightly, shaking her head.
"Well, I don't know much about that, miss," Gwyneth said, looking unsure and even slightly uncomfortable at Rose's words as she turned back to the sink to finish washing up.
"Come on, times haven't changed that much. I bet you've done the same."
"I don't think so, miss." She said over her shoulder as she placed a few of the cups on a shelf.
"Gwyneth, you can tell me. I bet you've got your eye on someone."
The woman slowly turned around, a small smile on her lips. "I suppose. There is one lad. The butcher's boy. He comes by every Tuesday. Such a lovely smile on him." She smiled at the thought.
"I like a nice smile. Good smile, nice bum." Gwyneth's smile disappeared in an instant as she looked at Rose, the Protector raised her eyebrows. Humans and Time Lords were very different indeed.
"Well, I have never heard the like," Gwyneth said in a disapproving tone.
Rose laughed at the woman. "Ask him out. Give him a cup of tea or something, that's a start."
"I swear it is the strangest thing, miss." Gwyneth shook her head, smiling at her. "You've got all the clothes and the breeding, but you talk like some sort of wild thing."
"Maybe I am." She shrugged. "Maybe that's a good thing. You need a bit more in your life than Mister Sneed."
"Oh, now that's not fair. He's not so bad, old Sneed. He was very kind to me to take me in because I lost my mum and dad to the flu when I was twelve." "Oh, I'm sorry." Rose apologised.
"Thank you, miss." Gwyneth nodded. "But I'll be with them again, one day, sitting with them in paradise. I shall be so blessed. They're waiting for me... Maybe your dad's up there waiting for you too, miss."
The Protector raised a brow as Rose looked at her before turning back to Gwyneth, a shocked look on her face.
"Maybe." She paused for a moment and frowned. "Who told you he was dead?"
"I don't know." Gwyneth looked at the Time Lady for a moment before she turned around, facing away from the blonde. "Must have been the Doctor or the Protector."
The Time Lady shook her head wordlessly, not that either of the humans saw as Rose replied: "My father died years back."
"But you've been thinking about him lately more than ever." The Protector looked between the two humans. It only made sense, she could go anywhere in time and space so of course she'd think about her father. The Time Lady quietly sighed, there was no way she'd let her see her father though, she couldn't the complications that could arise from allowing that. The carelessness and shame she'd have if she let that happen on her watch. She wouldn't be the Protector any more, to say the least, because the damage that could do to the universe would have a catastrophic effect.
"I suppose so." Rose looked at the ground for a moment in thought. "How do you know all this?"
Gwyneth turned back around to Rose. "Mister Sneed says I think too much. I'm all alone down here. I bet you've got dozens of servants, haven't you, miss?"
"No," Rose laughed. "No servants where I'm from."
"And you've come such a long way." She replied. The Protector raised s brow in curiosity as Rose tilted her head slightly at the young woman.
"What makes you think so?"
"You're from London." Gwyneth began to explain. "I've seen London in drawings, but never like that. All those people rushing about half naked, for shame." Rose swallowed hard. How the hell did Gwyneth know all this? The Doctor or the Protector hadn't said a word about anything to her. "And the noise, and the metal boxes racing past, and the birds in the sky, no, they're metal as well." Gwyneth frowned in concentration. "Metal birds with people in them. People are flying. And you, you've flown so far. Further than anyone. The things you've seen. The darkness, the big bad wolf." Gwyneth stumbled back, almost out of fear, the Time Lady narrowed her eyes at the young woman. What had she seen? "I'm sorry." Gwyneth apologised to Rose before looking at the Time Lady. "I'm sorry, miss."
"It's all right," Rose replied.
"I can't help it. Ever since I was a little girl, my mam said I had the sight. She told me to hide it."
"It's getting stronger isn't it?" The Protector finally cut in, Rose and Gwyneth looked towards her, the Time Lady now casually leaning against a wall. "As the days go on it's getting harder and harder to ignore it."
"Yes ma'am." She nodded. "Every night, voices in my head."
"It's because you grew up on top of the rift." She pushed herself off of the wall and walked towards the young woman, her arms crossed as she nodded at Gwyneth. "You're part of it. You're the key Gwyneth." She softly smiled at the young woman who shifted uncomfortably under the Time Lady's gaze.
"I've tried to make sense of it. Consulted with spiritualists, table rappers, all sorts."
"Well, that should help." The Doctor cut in, standing in the doorway.
"How long have you been there?" The Time Lady questioned telepathically, not even looking at him or even jumping like the two humans after he spoke. She just shook her head slightly at his dramatics of sneaking up. He got that from the Master, she couldn't say much either though. Of course, given the opportunity she would and could be very dramatic, she was a Time Lady after all.
"Long enough." Was all he replied before speaking aloud. "You can show us what to do."
"What to do where sir?" She asked.
"We're going to have a seance." He stated.
×××
The Protector found herself sitting on a chair in the middle of Sneed's living room, in a circle with the others, all the other furniture not needed up against the walls as Gwyneth began to explain to them.
"This is how Madam Mortlock summons those from the Land of Mists, down in big town." She held her hands out to the Doctor who sat on one of her sides, the Protector on the other with Rose beside her followed by Charles, Sneed and then the Doctor. "Come, we must all join hands."
Charles shook his head going to stand up. "I can't take part in this."
"Humbug." The Doctor scoffed and stood up and encouragingly pushed the man back into his chair. "Come on, open mind."
"This is precisely the sort of cheap mummery I strive to unmask. Seances? Nothing but luminous tambourines and a squeeze box concealed between the knees. This girl knows nothing."
"Now, don't antagonise her." The Doctor huffed. "I love a happy medium."
The Protector rolled her eyes. as Rose replied: "I can't believe you just said that."
The Doctor raised a brow as Charles didn't stand up or question him again. "Now, Gwyneth, reach out."
"Speak to us," Gwyneth said, her head back as she spoke, eyes wide open. "Are you there? Spirits, come. Speak to us that we may relieve your burden."
The Protector looked around curiously as quiet whispering began to echo through the room. "Can you hear that?" Rose asked, the Time Lady silently nodded.
"Nothing can happen." Charles scoffed, and the Protector rolled her eyes, how was he still denying it, even now? "This is sheer folly."
"Look at her," Rose told him, nodding over to Gwyneth whose eyes were closed now and her head back.
"I see them. I feel them." She told them.
The group watched as tendrils of blue gas floated above Gwyneth's head.
"What's it saying?" Rose questioned.
"They can't get through the rift. Gwyneth, it's not controlling you, you're controlling it." The Doctor told her. "Now, look deep. Allow them through."
"I can't!" She cried.
"Yes, you can. Just believe it. I have faith in you, Gwyneth. Make the link."
"Yes." The blue gas formed into the shape of two people, they floated behind Gwyneth. Sneed gasped at the sight, his eyes wide. "Great God! Spirits from the other side." "The other side of the universe actually." The Protector replied.
The two people spoke in children's voices. "Pity us. Pity the Gelth. There is so little time. Help us!" The Time Lady frowned. "How can we help? What do you want us to do?"
"The rift. Take the girl to the rift. Make the bridge."
"What for?" The Doctor asked.
"We are so very few. The last of our kind. We face extinction."
"Why," the Protector frowned, "what happened?"
"Once we had a physical form like you, but then the war came." The Time Lady swallowed hard guessing which war they were talking about as the Doctor asked: "What war?"
"The Time War. The whole universe convulsed. The Time War raged. Invisible to smaller species but devastating to higher forms. Our bodies wasted away. We're trapped in this gaseous state."
"So that's why you need the corpses."
"We want to stand tall, to feel the sunlight, to live again. We need a physical form, and your dead are abandoned. They're going to waste. Give them to us." "But we can't." Rose cut in.
"Why not?" The Doctor asked.
"It's not..." Rose tried to explain before pausing. "I mean, it's not-"
"Not decent?" The Doctor cut in. "Not polite? It could save their lives."
"I know why you don't agree Rose but it could save a whole species from going extinct." The Protector added using a much more gentle voice than the Doctor's own sharp tone.
"Open the rift." The Gelth began to chant. "Let the Gelth through. We're dying. Help us. Pity the Gelth." The Gelth in the form of the blue gas went back into the lamps after their plea and Gwyneth collapsed across the table.
"Gwyneth?" Rose stood. The Protector placed two fingers on her neck and nodded feeling a steadying heartbeat.
"She's just resting, talking to the Gelth just tired her a bit."
"All true," Charles muttered.
"Are you okay?" Rose asked, looking at the man who was blankly staring in front of him.
"It's all true."