A/N: Thanks to BowtiesSouffles for reviewing!
Clara opened her eyes, slightly dazed. The world around her was blurry to begin with before slowing coming into view.
"Where the Hell am I?" She asked, completely confused. "I was just in the living room… Doctor?! What did you do?!"
"Language Clara! The kids!" The Doctor reminded her.
The landscape around her finally registered. There were leaves everywhere, and soft dirt beneath Clara's bare toes. The intense cawing of birds began to register in her ears. Clara looked around frantically.
"Doctor! Where are the kids!? How could we have lost them!?" Her heart rate sped up, her body wracking itself with nerves.
The Doctor pointed wordlessly up high. Clara followed his finger to the top of a high tree branch, where Em and Oliver were crouched it. They were dressed in tan explorer jackets and helmets, and seemed to be having a very in depth conversation with a tree frog.
"The patches I put on them… They're these sleep patch things. It put them in a dream state. We're really all in the living room…" The Doctor paused. "Basically, welcome to the imagination of a five and six year old Ms. Oswald. "
Clara beamed, taking a look around her once more, realizing just how colorful everything really was… The flowers blooming around her smelled suspiciously like cotton candy, and there were absolutely no insects. Each bird she saw flying overhead had majestic rainbow colored feathers, and adorable fluffy mice scurried across the tree trunks with little to fear.
"It's beautiful," She whispered quietly, realizing the Doctor had already run ahead to meet the children. She followed ecstatically, her chocolate colored hair billowing behind her in the warm wind.
"Shhh Clara," Em cried, as Clara approached her. "You have to be quiet! Mr. Tree Frog is telling us a very important story right now!" Clara nodded apologetically.
"I'm so sorry, please continue Mr. Tree Frog," She offered the frog a slight curtsy from the ground beneath the tree.
"You see what's covering the sky?" The frog said, his voice grave and urgent. The kids looked up, their round eyes processing the sight fast before looking back down.
"There's just leaves," They realized. "Leaves and pretty birds."
"The forest… It might lose it's pretty birds… All The color is being drained from it! All the beautiful flowers wilting away! You see, we need the sun to replenish our color supply, but the sun is being blocked out by the canopy of green leaves... That green will soon be all that's left."
Em and Oliver gasped in ultimate horror. "That's so sad Mr. Tree Frog!" Oliver cried.
"Good thing we're here!" Em exclaimed, shooting a grin at her brother. " Don't you worryy Mr. Tree Frog we can fix everything! All we have to do is figure out what is making the leaves grow so much!"
The frog told them they didn't have much time, and bid them farewell. The children hopped down from the tree to join Clara and The Doctor on the ground, ready to begin their expedition.
"I've scanned the area with my Sonic Screwdriver," The Doctor announced.
"What's that!?" Em wondered, pointing to the screwdriver illuminating with green light. The Doctor tossed it to her casually.
"It's a tool I use to help people," He explained casually. "It's vastly complicated and it told me that this forest is a circle. I'd say if we want to find out what's causing the leaves to grow in such a way that they're blocking out the color, than we should head to the edge of the forest and look from there."
"But that's just stupid," Em replied rudely, tossing the Sonic over her shoulder. She nudged her brother. "Right Ollie? 'Cause if we want to figure out how to stop the leaves from growing we need to figure out why. And why would someone want to enclose an entire rainforest?"
Em paused to catch her breath, thinking her own question over.
"To make a cage!" Oliver exclaimed with realization. Em nodded excitedly.
"Yes! Yes to catch the birds obviously! The beautiful rainbow birds! And the only animal who dares to eat the pretty kings and queens of the forest, is the evil, grumpy Alligator!" Em crossed her arms over her chest triumphantly.
"It's their imagination, we're never going to be of much use in here," The Doctor muttered to Clara.
"Bet you're not accustomed to that," She mused in reply.
"So where does the alligator live?" The Doctor questioned curiously, pointing in all different directions.
"Where do you think he lives, stupid?" Em insulted, combing her fingers through her long hair superiorly. The Doctor straightened his bow tie, slightly insulted. "You scanned this forest, you should know that there's only one river in it that crosses through the circle. He's obviously somewhere in there… Just biding his time… Waiting for the perfect moment to SNAP!" She snuck up behind her brother, grabbing by the shoulders suddenly as she finished her sentence. Olli squealed in surprise.
"Than what are we waiting for?" Clara said with a smile. "Let's catch us an alligator!"
The group followed Em's lead through the brambles, the forest growing darker and darker with each few steps they made.
"Clara wasn't your undershirt red?" The Doctor wondered, pointing to Clara's black undershirt. Clara looked down, puzzled.
"I swear it was," she agreed.
"Red is the first color of the rainbow," Oliver stated. "I guess it's the first to go."
Clara felt her feet turn cold, wrinkling her face at the sensation of water surrounding them.
"We've bit the river!" Em exclaimed. She stretched up to her tip toes, leaping upwards to grasp a branch hanging down from above. Using all her strength, her miniature muscles worked to pull herself upwards. "Grab on to my foot Oli!"
"Are you doing what you did on our last adventure Em!?" Oli groaned, grabbing her ankles obediently. Emily shrugged, sporting a teasing smirk.
"You'll live Oli- come on help me swing out!"
Oliver commenced swinging back and forth, and Em as well. Using the momentum accumulated, Emily propelled her arms arose the branch until they were hanging directly over the middle of the lake.
"Should we intervene Doctor?" Clara wondered, but The Doctor shook his head.
"They seem to know what they're doing. They've definitely played pretend before!
"Hey Clara!" Em called. "Grab that vine hanging by the tree! And tie it in like... A circle shape! And doctor, do the same with that other vine, but make a bigger circle!"
"Of course Em!" Clara grabbed hold of a thick dark green vine. The doctor handed her a pocket knife from his pocket so she could shave a bit of the vine off to make parts of it thinner for a stronger knot. Soon, she had created a dog collar sized rope circle tied of with a knot. The Doctor followed her lead.
Emily began shaking her feet rapidly, her brother's grasp slipping along with his will to hold on. He went toppling down into the lake, a loud crashing sound following, ripples flowing through the icy water.
"AHHHH!" Oli screamed, the water freezing due to the lack of sun. His entire body felt numb. Working through the pain, he fumbled into his explorer vest, finding his desired small packet. Using all the strength he could muster, he ripped the packet open using his teeth, tasting iron and salt. The water around him began filling with dark clouds of red.
"Emily I felt it's tail! Emily get back here! Em!"
"Throw me the vines Clara!" Emily shouted, grasping the vines gratefully seconds after Clara heard her. Emily lept off the tree branch, ropes in hand.
Em gasped as her body came in contact with the rigid water. She could feel the scaly alligator approaching, lapping at their packet of animal blood. Wasting little time, she dove into the water, the alligators jaws snapping at her, narrowly missing her shoulder. She slid the vine lasso across his neck, trapping him.
"Doctor, Clara, each grab a vine and pull!" Oli instructed frantically, worried for the safety of his beloved sister.
The Doctor and Clara complied with little question, yanking at their end of the vines with full force. Droplets of water sprayed from the lake, Clara squeezing her eyes shut in defense. The kids emerged from the end of one vine, coughing and sputtering up water. Though their physical state looked rattled, emotionally, they radiated pride.
On the other vine, a very perturbed alligator hung from his neck. The Doctor, quick on his feet, yanked his vine a good eight feet away from Clara, separating the snapping alligator away from the two children.
"How are you making the leaves grow so much!?" Oli accused, letting go of the vine, landing on the ground with one foot, his other knee slapping the grass, accumulating dirt on his pants.
The alligator made strangled noises from his throat, his olive snout turning an even more unpleasant green.
"Lower him Clara! Lower him!" The Doctor shouted, worry coating his tone. Clara's smile flipped as she frantically pulled down the vine the alligator was hanging from, dodging the snaps of his toothy mouth. A tooth grazed her clothes arm, tearing the fabric of her sweater.
The alligator, still unable to escape, was visibly less troubled once his claws felt the soil. His throat was finally free of the strain of the rope; he could speak.
Em dropped down to the ground, joining Oli at Clara's side.
"What ever do you mean, the leaves?" The alligator inquired, his voice oozing slyness. As he spoke, The Doctor stopped in his tracks, puzzled. He thought for a moment, calculating what he had just seen.
"Children, Clara, I noticed something, I just... Look around, do you see that?"
"The orange has gone black," Clara realized, biting her lip, pointing to the birds flying overhead.
"And the yellow!" Em gasped.
"Not long now," the alligator sneered, his toothy grin becoming even more eerie as his green coloring faded to black. "Ha! You should see your faces, so terrified. But you're much much too late, you see, my plan has long been set in motion."
"What did you do!?" Em pestered. She looked up at the birds, frantically trying to gnaw their way out of the canopy of leaves, still rapidly growing into a thick netting .
"Oh nothing really, I just inserted a parasite into the bases of the trees. A parasite that I found at the very bottom of the lakes, a dying race, who feed on sunlight. The parasites have an enzyme inside them that causes an overgrowth of leaves, so they can sit atop them and collect all the sunlight for themselves! And these parasites, they're nearly invulnerable; fireproof, waterproof, all they need is sun. Meanwhile me and my brothers and sisters can feast here on the surface, on the trapped, powerless animals, our night vision finally coming to use!"
"Oh if only the ends tied up this neatly in reality," The Doctor mused with a smile. "If only all the foes I faced were complete idiots like you," he tapped the gators nose, aggravating the animal, who tried and failed to bite off his finger.
"The Doctor's right though!" Em realized. "You are an idiot!" She giggled. "Because you know what isn't fireproof?" Em grasped Oli's hand, catching a box The Doctor threw towards her.
"Leaves."
Em's foot hit the bark of a tree, using every muscle inside her to scale her way up the tree, bouncing up branches and swinging from vines. Oliver followed loosely behind at about a ten second delay.
In no time at all(because time works funnily in the imagination of a child) Clara and The Doctor had to crane their necks for Em and Oli to be in their line of vision.
Em reached the top and whipped a match out of the box, she struck it against the box and it lit on the first try. Her hand raised up, touching the match to the canopy of leaves, which caught flame immediately.
As the flames illuminated the leaves, disgusting grey worms were revealed to be resting on top of them. The worms wriggled in fear as they began the long journey down.
Emily and Oliver followed suit, climbing down with precision. Emily took out a phone from her explorer jacket.
"I have to alert the rainforest rangers," she said matter of factly. "They'll put out the fire once it finished it's job. And as for you Mr. Alligator, you're coming with us!" She pulled out a pair of handcuffs.
As Em spoke, Clara heard the growl of Oliver's stomach. The alligator was cuffed and ready to be carted off to jail. "Maybe this is a good place to leave things you guys? I think we could all use something to eat now, maybe it's time to stop imagining." She looked curiously at the Doctor, wondering how that was even possible.
"But we've been having so much fun Clara! I didn't know imagining could be this fun!" Em exclaimed.
"But I am a bit hungry," Oliver said, biting his lip in contemplation.
Bright lights amplified momentary pain within Clara's sleepy eyes, as she stretched them open. She saw The Doctor, very much awake, and Em and Oli still asleep on the living room floor.
A/N: Thanks for reading! Reviewers get a sneak peek of the nest chapter!