An idea I've been tossing around, may or may not be a decent shot at narrative, but you never know until you try, right? I spent a fair amount of time working out logistics that aren't apparent here, this being similar to a pilot, a prologue really, to test the waters, see if anyone digs it, that kind of deal. That said, disclaimer on Dr. Who, and the actors or characters, etc, etc. If I owned them, well you don't really want to know what I would do with them, do you? No, no I don't think you do. XD

Eventual Rosex10, but yes, others will appear, you could consider it AU, as people from Season 3/perhaps 4 have the potential to steamroll their way into this...this whatever it is. XD

Okay, on with it then .

Whiteout

Prologue

Footsteps padded into hearing range and the click of a well-made door echoed in the immediate room, almost a musical click, for all that it was metal on metal.

"And how are we today, young lady? Sleep well? Can't get along without a bit of good shut-eye, can we?" came the questions, asked by a resident professor, Mr. Smith. Born and bred a common man, Smith happened to have a stellar mind between his ears and that, perhaps, was what got him here in the first place, an observer, a surveyor, an asker of questions, and at best of times, a finder of answers. White, long, standard doctor's coat over a comfortable pin-striped suit, he never changed his look, but had never put much thought into it in the first place, so that was hardly a matter of focus for him. "Miss?" he looked down at her, running a hand through his browner than brown hair.

"Don't call me that," was the muffled response from folded arms and a buried head. Mr. Smith, not the least bit put off, frowned at the girl in front of him, curled so well into the corner, as if she'd been there all night. Perhaps she had. Brow furrowing even more, he knelt, eyes searching for the cause of the girl's distress.

"What?" he prompted, not unkindly and it was only his years of training in control of one's emotions that kept him from jumping back as the girl raised her face to stare straight at him, wide, almost accusatory eyes, a quivering bottom lip. "What?" he asked, more gently this time, which was saying something since Smith was rarely anything but gentle to begin with.

"I have a name," she said, plain as day. He moved closer to her, careful to keep a comfortable space of personal bubble quality between them.

"I know, you keep saying that," he said.

"It's true!" the girl retorted, anger bubbling up in her irises amidst fear and uncertainty.

"I know, I know," he replied, honest, if skeptical in a sympathetic way, "You do. I know you do." A questionable silence passed, the girl biting her lower lip as if in thought, the man sighing under his breath and tilting his head this way or that way at her. They could, just barely, make out the sound of footsteps in the hall through the glass windows, shoes on sterile white tile floors with fluorescent overheads and so on, they could hear it all.

"I have a name," the girl whispered, to herself this time, and buried her face in her arms again, shoulders shaking as she curled up as small as possible. "I have a name."

Smith debated his action as he closed the gap between himself and the girl. She was just another patient, most likely mad as a hatter and about as likely as to come out of it as a pig was to fly or the United States was to elect an intelligent man of office.

She was just some girl.

This, he told himself as he pulled her towards him, his grip only tightening when she struggled against him, nearly thrashing and clawing at him as he whispered into her hair, "It's alright," over and over. The mantra was effective or she tired herself out, but his arms were warm with her by the time her violent refusal broke into more shaking of her head, more salt water from her eyes, more pain as she made the 180 from repelling to clinging to him. Somehow, he didn't mind, and Mr. Smith managed to better situate his arms so that he nearly cradled the poor thing, his right hand running through her hair without much thought, meant only as a soothing motion. If he held her closer than a normal observing professor ought to, or ever would, it was because he felt sorry for her and nothing more.

"I have a name," she continued to say.

When it began to get to even him, Smith began to rub simple circles across her back with the palms of his hands, and he asked her the same question he asked her every single day he came to visit and observe, question and study.

And did he come every day, without fail.

"Hey there, can you look at me, just a second, okay?" he asked peaceably. "Just a second, okay?"

She looked up, eyes darting from his face to the hands that had moved from her back to her shoulders, back to his face, to the pulse in his throat, to the burning of his eyes, a burning that was so close to familiar it ached when she registered it, and so she settled for staring just past him, a blank wall her focus as he asked her:

"Who are you?"

The girl's yellow head of hair shook with a fierce vehemence.

"Come on, you can tell me," the professor insisted, just the slightest edge in his gaze, just the smallest bit of desire…and need. "Who are you? I won't tell anyone else." He swallowed a few meaningless promises after that but added with feeling, "You have been here for only two weeks, but I swear it is going to become a much, much longer time if you cannot tell me who you are. It is important that you remember." He let his hands drop off of her shoulders and he looked away briefly, blood pounding in his ears, questions rolling off each other's backs like waves in a storming sea.

He was close to the truth. He could feel it.

But this wasn't just about him. No, he told her the truth. The higher ups in the asylum were looking to make her stay permanent, indefinitely and, who could blame them, he admitted, what with no background on her and some of the things she'd been saying when she first showed up. Yet it couldn't happen. Smith fisted handfuls of his own hair in a repetitive motion, inhaling and exhaling to calm down, measured, even, steady. For some reason he couldn't quite put his finger on, he felt a higher degree of fear for this girl. He had the undeniable and somewhat ridiculous hunch that, if they were able to cement her stay, something bad could happen to her…would happen to her. Movement caused him to turn back to her, his entire expression softening to something very sad and very old as he watched her.

Shaking her head again, eyes scrunched shut, not that that stopped the tears, in between the sobs and the one-word defenses, the girl pressed her lips to her hands in a half prayer of one who was lost beyond finding.

"I don't know."

It was soft, but the professor heard it. He sighed.

It was always the same with her, the girl in pink.

Always the same answer, an answer that wasn't really an answer at all.

"I don't know who I am."

Thoughts/encouragement/ that sort of thing much appreciated!

-haku

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