PROLOGUE
Everywhere is white. An impenetrable absence of visual stimuli that stretches as far as the eye can't see.
This is unsettling, at the very least, but before any nascent fear can develop into full-blown panic…
A sound intrudes. It is soft, at first, just hovering on the edge of audibility.
But at least it is something. Proof that this apparent non-place has some form of substance or existence. The volume builds gradually, but levels off still far below that at which any clues to its origin can be gleaned. Yet it is soothingly repetitive, an undeniable presence permeating the void. A low background hum of ambient Techno? Perhaps. A mechanical heartbeat? Maybe.
"Ace?"
The voice intrudes gently into an almost insufferably pleasant sensation of floating drowsiness, and the first reaction is to tell it to go away – but then the implications register.
A voice?
A name?
Whatever this means, surely it must require some investigation… some thought? But the all-encompassing embrace of the subliminal susurrations seems to deny any necessity for action, or reaction.
You are safe. You are safe. You are safe. You are safe. You are safe. It says.
It reassures without words. This is good. This is right. This is the way things are meant to be, and there is nothing at all to worry about…
"Can you hear me, Ace?"
The voice returns, and this time there is a nagging familiarity in the softly accented burr. This not good. This is not right. This is something that should be denied – but it is too late.
Dorothy realises that she is Dorothy, and… She doesn't belong here.
"Professor? Am I dreaming?" Even as she embodies these words inside her head, Dorothy accepts the undeniable truth of them. She hasn't gone by that infantile nickname for such a long time, and hasn't seen The Doctor for even longer. She cannot see him now, she cannot see anything – just the white void. It must be a dream. But perhaps now she is on the verge of waking up? Maybe unpleasant spectres from the past are rising to haunt her, as she is dragged inexorably back towards the waking world.
Dorothy has been Dorothy for so long now, who else but her 'Professor' would call her…
"Ace? Can you hear me, Ace? Please tell me you can hear me! Come back to me, Ace!" There is an edge of panic to the accent now, an urgency that doesn't seem appropriate for a dream conversation. Dorothy is hauntingly aware of her body as well, even though nothing really seems to exist outside of her own mind… but the frown of confusion she can feel creasing her forehead is difficult to dismiss.
"Doctor?" She asks into the blankness, almost surprised at hearing her own voice so clearly. "Is that you?"
A flood of relief fills the reply. "Oh, Ace! I'm so glad that you're back! I was afraid that… Well, never mind that, just relax and take deep…"
"Back from where?' Dorothy interrupts in alarm. An inchoate panic has suddenly gripped her, but she still can't move. Even more frightening is the suspicion that…
Maybe this isn't a dream after all.
'Where am I? What's happening? I can hear you, but I can't see you!" The tsunami of automatic questions sweeps the protesting Dorothy back…
Back to the bad days, when only the Professor could make things right… even when he was in the wrong.
"Don't worry, Ace.' The voice is warmer now, closer, and Dorothy can hear the words left unsaid in the way his hand gently strokes her forehead. ('I'm here now, Ace. Everything will be alright. Trust me.')
'We're back in the Tardis.
'In fact, more specifically, we are in The Zero Room!'
Dorothy assumes that she must, indeed, be 'alright'. The oh-so-familiar sprightly spring has returned to his clipped delivery once more. However, she can feel herself tense up instinctively, in primal 'fight or flight' response, as the Doctor's voice becomes excessively casual.
'I can assure you, Ace, that there is absolutely nothing wrong with your eyes…"
"Then why can't I see anything? And what is this?"
"Ah! Well, the not seeing – that's merely temporary!
'…And this? – why, this is the best place to be!' His voice speeds up in that way Dorothy remembers so well, from times when he was frantically trying to make up an excuse, any excuse, on the spot. 'You see…' He evades, with practiced ease, 'I needed to put you into a trance.
'To aid recovery…
'And The Zero Room is the perfect environment for that sort of thing!"
Only one word of this answer makes an immediate impression. "Recovery? Recovery from what? What's happened to me, Professor?" (Unbelievable! Now I even sound like Ace!)
Not for the first time, Dorothy is struck by the notion that she has spent more time with the Doctor than she has actually been alive. She knows his mannerisms, his expressions, and his vocal inflections… She knows them well enough to see him without needing her vision. She is also familiar enough with his Machiavellian manipulations, his deceits and betrayals, to allow a filter of distrust to colour this picture.
"Oh! No, no, no!' The Doctor protests quickly, projecting a self-deprecating note of humour into his voice. He is leaning back into a chair and clasping his hands, shaking them in negation. (The seat cover squeaks, and she hears the rasp of dry flesh on flesh.)
'I didn't mean it like that, Ace!'
He leans forward again, resting his arms on his knees and laughing at himself. (She can feel his breath against her cheek. She can smell peppermint and… cinnamon?)
'Bad use of words.
'Sorry."
There is a pause. A reluctant, hesitant, silence.
Dorothy can read so much into that silence. He is gazing at her thoughtfully, pensively. Perhaps he is tapping two fingers against his lips, or maybe nibbling absently on a thumbnail. She just lays there patiently – she is a grown woman now, she doesn't need to be Ace anymore – until she hears him sigh.
Then, (Dorothy can see this so clearly!) he looks away from her comatose form, eyes filled with sadness and regret, and admits. "I meant that I need to recover something from you, Ace.
'I need you to remember something for me."
This doesn't sound good.
Dorothy tries to deflect him by sounding aggressively indignant. Just like Ace would have done, back in the day. "Oh yeah? So you reckon my memory is so bad that you had to put me into a trance to recover it, right, Professor?"
"Of course not, Ace!
'As if!
He is responding as expected, following her lead. Playing the game. But then the façade crumbles, ever so slightly.
'Well… perhaps…
'Maybe…
'Sort of…
Dorothy knows that his next words are the truth, because she can feel a deep chill spread, as her rapidly freezing heart begins pumping ice throughout her body.
"Actually, it's a little bit more complicated than that, Ace…
'You see… some time ago I, well…
'I sort of hid some of your memories from you."
The chill spreads further.
Little Dotty, all scared and alone. Lots of noise, and flashing lights. The hospital has no beds left in the children's unit, so she has been rushed to the geriatric ward. A needle is stuck into the back of her hand, secured with a sticking plaster, and a red plastic bag attached to a metal stand is placed beside her bed. It is all very frightening… But Dotty feels so weak, so out of touch with her own body, that she can only cry silent tears as the scary people surround her.
A friendly face, with smiling eyes and a gentle voice, explains. "We only have one blood heating unit for the entire ward, dear, so this will feel a little cold. Be brave! Your Mummy will be here soon!"
The numbness arrives then, as blood straight from the chiller cabinet enters the back of her hand. With aching slowness, icy tendrils begin to creep up Dotty's arm...
The chill spreads even further, only to be burnt away in an instant by a surge of unreasoning, uncompromising, anger.
"You did what?"
Dorothy's anguished cry is laced with shocked disbelief, and an accusation of betrayal. If she could, she would rip the source of the ice in her veins from her arm… but that is just a distant memory.
Right here, right now, she is unable to move. But the Doctor squirms.
"It was for your own good, Ace! I promise you that!'
She can see his abject sense of guilt in the tone of his voice, the wheedling desperation to justify something that he knows, deep down, is unforgivable.
'I wouldn't have done it otherwise! I was only thinking of your wellbeing. I was trying to protect you!' He claims urgently, begging for forgiveness that he knows he doesn't deserve.
Dorothy waits, marshalling her anger, as her Professor fidgets on his chair and then, reluctantly, admits…
'However…
'Circumstances have changed. I think that you are strong enough to face the truth now."
The overbearing, condescending, hypocritical arrogance of this man – who isn't even a man in the parochial sense in which Dorothy has been indoctrinated since birth – simply takes her breath away.
"Strong enough?' She whispers incredulously. Then, deeply annoyed by her own weakness, she screams, 'Strong enough for what, 'Professor'? What did you make me forget?"
"Umm…'
The mumbled reply is so hesitant, so uncertain, that Dorothy begins to suspect that he may not be her Professor after all.
'Well, I don't really know that bit. Not the specific details, anyway.'
The next pause is almost painful.
In Dorothy's head, a lost little man wrings his hands desperately, shaking his head in denial of what he feels that he must say next.
The words emerge quietly, unwillingly, as if he doesn't even want to admit them to himself.
'Something happened to you, Ace, after you left me that first time… Back on Heaven.
'Something bad, I think.
'I'm not too sure, you see, because I wasn't actually there at the time.
'That's really the whole point of this little exercise.
'You are a different woman now, Ace. In fact, you are probably the strongest person I know, otherwise I wouldn't have ris…
'I mean, I wouldn't ask you to do this…
(Hesitant. Cautious… Apologetic?) 'May I proceed, Ace?"
"Wait!" The vehemence in her own voice startles Dorothy, and she has to stop to analyse her conflicting emotions before she can begin to process these disturbing revelations.
She sees herself throttling the scrawny neck of an insufferably conceited and superior alien monster. She is screaming, "What have you done to me you BASTARD!" Spittle flying into his face as he desperately tries to break free from her grip.
But all that she actually hears is. "What are you gonna do to me, Doctor? Just dump a load of memories into my head, or what?" Her voice sounds oddly distant and unconcerned.
"No, Ace.' He sighs. Her mental picture of him removes his hat and gazes thoughtfully into its interior, as if it somehow contains all the answers. He sighs again, despondently, quietly. 'Events will unfold as you experienced them when they actually happened…
'Before I took them from you…'
He twirls the hat around a finger, then allows it to roll down his arm, until he can bounce it off an elbow to land back on his head. He tries on a cheeky grin, but it doesn't seem to fit anymore.
'Almost as if you were reliving that time over again.' The words are now reluctant, but he rallies with… 'Think of it as a story, Ace. One that you just happened to take part in… If that helps...'
The hesitation, the uncertainty, is back in his voice. There is also a disturbingly pleading quality, as if his request is desperately important, but he doesn't want to make her do anything against her will. (It is far too late for that, of course, but is he even capable of understanding?)
'Ace?" He asks quietly, 'Do I have your permission? May I restore your memories?"
As if it was that simple! As if the realisation that he has stolen who knows how many years from her means no more than…
No more than putting a bookmark in a page, to show where you had last stopped reading the story…
He is so alien.
How could she ever have loved him?
But then Dorothy realises that none of that actually matters. Not anymore. Whatever reasons the Professor may present for his abuse of her 'inaliable' rights as an individual, he is also offering her the chance to relive that part of her life which he has stolen from her. No matter how traumatic, no matter how unpleasant those memories – Dorothy wants to know.
"Okay.' She agrees, sounding much calmer than she actually feels. 'Do it.
'But we will be having serious words about this when it is all…
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Note: I confidently predict that this will only be updated sporadically, as and when I need a break from 'The Best Shopping Centre in The Universe.'