Redemption

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The idea for this just popped into my head whilst I was having a lie in. I haven't written that much angst and I don't know if I'm going to be any good at this so please bear with me, read it, then hit the review button at the bottom. Even it's just to say "You suck man" or "You freak" etc.

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Sarah…………Sarah-Jane……………Sarah………The insidious whisper winds deep into the recesses of her mind seeking her as she flees. Come out Sarah………Come out and plaaaaaaaay. The voice is gentle but mocking now. You can't escape Sarah………You're mine now……………Look, I've found you! Sarah sees him gliding across the dark water in the cave towards her; the wall is smooth, there is nowhere left to hide; nowhere to run. The terror rises in her blood; a tide she cannot fight. Loathing crawls up her spine as he reaches her. Her heart is beating so fast she thinks that it must burst………... Mine………He chuckles as he reaches up to touch her cheek; his touch is deceivingly gentle. Revulsion rises up through her body. He leans in to kiss her… She slaps his hand away and backs against the cave wall. "NEVER AGAIN!" She shrieks at him. "NEVER, NEVER, NEVER!"

Sarah-Jane woke with a start, the sheets tangled tightly around her legs; cold sweat running down her back. The same nightmare every night. She hears footfalls outside and her door opens a crack.

"You alright old girl?" Harry asks through the crack in the door.

"Just a nightmare. I'm fine. Sorry I woke you." Sarah replies.

"Sure you don't want to talk about it?" Harry asks gently.

"No I'm fine honestly. You get some sleep." She answers.

It has become a routine now. She'll wake them by screaming and crying out waking herself in the process. A few minutes later Harry or the Doctor or both will be either in the room or at her door asking if she's alright. She'll say she is and apologise for waking them. They'll leave and she'll get up knowing that if she tries to sleep the nightmares will return.

Harry leaves shutting the door behind him and Sarah untangles the sheets from around her legs and gets up. She walks across to her dresser the pain in her chest a tonne weight. It makes a change from usual. Usually she wakes up and is unable to feel anything. Doesn't even know whether or not she is alive; doesn't care either. Pulling out the chair she sits down. She knows the sensation of pain will fade away eventually even as she feels a single tear falling down her cheek. With that tear the pain becomes unbearable and several more streak down her cheeks. Her body shudders with sobs.

Her crying fit doesn't last long though the pain recedes back to wherever it normally hides. All it leaves behind is the feeling that she is filthy. She gets up and crosses the room to the bathroom. All she wants now is a hot shower. The semi-darkness of the room doesn't help as she enters the bathroom. She turns the light up full wincing as her eyes adjust to the harsh whiteness. It doesn't seem much brighter to her in the end though. Even the suns on the planets they visit don't cast much light anymore. She checks there is a towel in the cupboard. There is so she strips off her pyjamas and steps into the shower.

She turns the water on the shower on and turns the heat up to almost as high as she can stand it. She finds the soap and lathers herself before the water washes it away. She still feels unclean though. She scrubs at herself turning up the water temperature up so high it hurts; the water is almost one hundred degrees as high as it will go. Still she can feel the stain of him on her skin. She scrubs at her skin harder until the water swirling around her feet is crimson. When she gets out of the shower she can still feel his lingering touch. It makes her want to scream; throw up, scrub her raw burnt skin away completely, destroy the nerves so that she can no longer feel.

The towel is white is fluffy and soft but even so it hurts her raw skin. She puts it down and goes through the cupboards till she finds the dermal regenerator she stole from the medical bay. She runs it over her skin watching the layers renew and the burns vanish leaving shiny new pink skin. Deciding that she won't be able to sleep now; she dresses and goes back into her room.

She turns the light on and picks up a book. She sits against the side of the bed on the floor. She's not sure what it is but she needs a distraction; she can feel his presence in the back of her mind. She didn't tell the Doctor he still had a way of getting at her. She could tell he feels guilty enough that The Valeyard hurt her in the first place. She doesn't have the heart to make him feel worse than he does knowing that that's the man he'll become in his last regeneration if the worse case scenario happens.

She turns the first few pages but he has already got too far in to her mind the words blur and slip and she cannot focus on them.

Hello Sarah-Jane………Miss me?……The Valeyard whispers softly.

"No… Get out of my head." Sarah shuddered.

That's not very nice………I miss you………Your beautiful eyes…Your soft lips…The way y-

"STOP IT!" The memories are beginning to flood back however hard she tries to resist them. The way he charmed her; when they first landed in his complex and had no idea who he was. Then finding herself in one of his torture chambers looking at the man lying bleeding bruised and broken on the floor with The Valeyard standing over him. The gasp that gave her away. He turned around and caught her then while she'd been frozen in shock he'd sealed the door. Things had gone downhill from there. He'd held her at gunpoint and told the Doctor and Harry to leave or she was a dead woman. The despair that had coursed through her when the Tardis dematerialised without her knowing she was trapped now.

He had kept her at his side constantly then. He'd put a leather collar on her and attached a chain to it so she couldn't run away. She hated it. The chain she could deal with; but the collar was completely humiliating. Over the next few days she witnessed how truly cruel he was and any attraction she'd felt for him to start with had turned to pure loathing.

Then he'd started touching her. At first it was just to brush an errant strand of hair behind her ear when it got in the way of her eyes. Or he'd make a witness to some particularly heartrending act of cruelty and brush away her tears. He'd started commenting on her beauty stroking her cheek when he felt like it or playing with her hair. She tried not to like it, to tell herself, he was playing games with her. His gentleness toward her though was the only kind thing in this cruel harsh place where people were treated like disposable objects their usefulness wrung out of them before they died screaming……

One day he'd kissed her. His lips gentle against hers. Her heart had beat faster even as her mind screamed 'NO' She'd put her hands against his chest to push him away but somehow her fingers had ended up hooked in his shirt as she pulled him closer. When he'd broken away she'd had no idea what to do with herself whether to slap him or herself. She'd never been so confused. Then he'd moved on to…She forces herself to think of others things. She doesn't want to remember that. The tears begin to spill from her eyes, hot against her cold cheeks; the room is suddenly sub zero.

"You're a monster; haven't you done enough damage. Just leave me alone. I've had enough." Her voice is soft defeated.

……...Aww…...Have I broken your spirit?........Is your heart in pieces on the floor?......Where's that proud fierce plucky explorer gone?…………The voice is mockingly sympathetic now.

"I told you to leave me alone." Her reply is languid. She doesn't have the strength anymore to fight him.

……Then come home I promise to treat you well………You know the co-ordinates………All you have to do is punch them into the main control console………

"I'm not your creature." Sarah manages to inject some venom into her words.

……Who's creature are you then?........The Doctor's…………?

"I'm no-one's creature." She replies. "No-one's."

……You will be…… The arrogant sureness in his voice angers her.

She turns her mind towards the place his voice is coming from. When she finds him she does the mental equivalent of spitting in his face. Her hatred and contempt of him know no limits.

……….So you have got some fight left in you………Goodbye my love.........You will be mine.........

Just like that he's gone. Sarah leans her head back against the side of the mattress her hand resting on the book suddenly drained of all her energy.

"Who were you talking to?" Sarah starts at the Doctor's voice.

She is about to tell him that she was talking to herself when she sees the look on his face. She knows that he knows.

"Who's got inside your head? Who's tormenting you?" He's walking across the room now his voice gentle.

He sits down beside her and she looks at him. He's watching her expectantly.

"Sarah-Jane?" he takes her hands in his. His skin is cooler than hers and she shivers. Just like The Valeyard.

He notices and lets go of her hand with an apology. She shrugs it off but he's still waiting for an answer.

She averts her eyes. "The Valeyard."

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So what do you think? Good? Lame? Completely creepy and gross? Please press that lovely button and let me know.