Upon finishing series 6, I caved and finally decided to write about young Melody. This will be a 3-shot about her early life. Fair warning to all, there are spoilers for series 6.

Part 1: Escape

There were more words. Every night more words appeared, always the same message:

GET OUT, LEAVE NOW.

Carved into the walls, the ceilings, painted on every surface in huge, ominous letters:

GET OUT, LEAVE NOW.

She couldn't remember the first time she had seen those words. All she knew was that more kept coming. And she couldn't leave.

It was always the same, the warnings came, her memories failed, she cried with all her mind for someone, anyone to help her and no one came. And she would still be there the next morning for it all to start again.

But there was something different about tonight. The dreams had been less horrific, more solid in her mind.

Lightning flashed outside the window, illuminating a fading GET OUT warning. But she was not afraid this time.

She didn't understand it but she knew that she knew it. They were coming, the people in her dreams: the man in the black suit, the woman with fiery-hair. The people who could help her. The people who knew him.

The man who had many faces but never died. The one in every one of her dreams. The man who could end her suffering. The man who must die.

Why did he have to die? Why did she have to raise a gun on him? He could open her suit. The poison would be administered discreetly, intimately… He could set her free. He wouldn't even know he was doomed until it was too late… He had saved her. He was clever. She'd need a back-up plan, maybe three… He had smiled at her and spoken with her when no one else could. The deathblow had to be dealt twice or he wouldn't die….

Suddenly she was standing inside the long dormitory room. On the wall in front of her was a painted warning: LEAVE ME ALONE. The paint was still running down the wall.

Her heart should have been racing in fear. But the suit would not allow that. Why couldn't she remember coming here? Writing those words?

She wanted to cry. To scream. All she wanted was to curl up and cry but they wouldn't even let her do that. She did nothing unless they allowed her too. Her handlers. The ones that locked her inside the suit. The ones that ripped out her mind and forced their own thoughts in.

The suit began to walk. This was a path she knew well. But it was too early wasn't it? The night had barely begun…

She reached the familiar door. It was open this time. It was never open. It stayed shut unless she was entering or leaving.

The suit took her inside and the woman with fiery hair turned to face her. She was in the room. The Memory room it was called. A place of pain and suffering. A place where the dreams grew unbearable, so much so that she hardly remembered any of them. This place the suit took her every night.

The woman backed up against the bureau. "Who are you?" She asked. "I don't understand so just tell me who you are!"

The suit stopped. It allowed her to raise her visor and let the woman see her. She tried to speak, but the suit wouldn't let her. The red-haired woman's expression softened as she took in her face and the bullet wound she had caused in the helmet.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to shoot you. I'm glad I missed." The suit began to walk again. "But you killed the Doctor. Or you… you're gonna kill him." Was that the man? The one who she had to find?

"But who are you?" The woman asked. "Just please tell me cause, I don't understand!" The woman pleaded.

"Please help me!" Her voice ripped free from the suit's control. "Help me! Please."

How was her voice free? The suit could not be disobeyed. She could barely think what she wanted let alone speak. But she was speaking. She was in control of the suit!

The woman's gaze shifted behind her and a terrified look crossed her face. There was a strange noise. A noise she had heard before… the noise that always came before the pain, how could she ever have forgotten it? She had to escape… The woman screamed.

She was running from that room. Running. Running on her own two legs.

As the realization hit her, she stumbled and almost fell flat on her face. She was free. She leaned heavily on the wall, drawing breath after breath. Her heart was racing. She was in control.

Slowly, she raised her right arm. Then her left. There was no resistance. No pain. No other in her mind.

How had she gotten out of the suit?

The sound of hurried footsteps set her heart racing again. She ducked behind the corner, into the shadows. She consciously breathed more quietly; oh she would never stop loving this, being in control, making her own decisions. The footsteps retreated down the corridor. Then there was pounding on a door and a man shouting.

He was trying to get into the Memory room. Her heart seized up in fear. What was he going to do when he didn't find her there?

More shouts, more footsteps. The newcomers thundered up the stairs, heading for the Memory room. They were looking for her. They would take her back, tie her down and hook her up to that thing again.

Lightning flashed outside, throwing her shadowy corner into sharp relief. She didn't have much time before they'd start searching the corridors for her. She had no way of getting out, little chance of surviving if she ran away. She tried not to cry.

What was she going to do? Where could she go?

"Melody…" She froze at the voice, fear seizing her. She tried to crawl further into the shadows but the lightning quickly destroyed them. They were coming. They would restrain her mind, torture her…

But all her fear was forgotten as not a person but a swirling cloud of golden mist drifted into view along the corridor. She stared at it, completely intrigued. The cloud stopped right in front of her face, right at eye level, twisting and falling in on itself. She stared as the golden threads of light swirled in endlessly complex patterns. She wanted nothing more than to reach out to touch them, trace them with her fingers, feel them sing in her mind…

The voice that spoke from the heart of the cloud once again made her freeze but not in fear this time. "You have been strong Melody Pond. But for what is to come, I need you to also be brave and clever."

The golden mist began to drift slowly down the dark corridor, away from the Memory room. Its soft, gentle light illuminated the walls.

"Follow me child… I know a place…"

She took a step after the mist. "Who are you?" She asked.

"You will be safe from them there…"

"But who are you?"

The golden mist did not respond with words. Instead, it touched her mind. Ordinarily, any such touch would have sent her reeling backwards, internally screaming and rebelling, trying to keep her mind safe. But this was not an ordinary touch. It was soft, reassuring. Comforting. Almost… motherly. It did not try to intrude; it did not force her to submit.

It was an odd feeling. But a good one. She had no idea who or what this mist was. But she trusted it.

So little Melody followed the golden mist into the dark and the rain away from the place of nightmares walking unsteadily on her own legs for the first time in years.

High in the window, a creature no one could remember watched silently.