So, I updated! Yay!
Unfortunately I wasn't at a computer where I was able to actually write for a while. And I was somewhat busy. But here is the chapter and I went into a lot of detail about...everything. I just kept rambling in this one so it turned out pretty long, when the only part essential to the plot was actually just a few lines from the Seer, Sam, Winnie, and the Doctor. And well...the little bit of spoiler at the top. But that's way far ahead. And then there's the little bit of Winnie's childhood and all because I love writing about her childhood with her little friends who I assume everyone has guessed the identities of.
...
The red-haired, older woman roared in agony as she glared at the man she once loved. She screamed obscenities, but he was fading, becoming more distant, drifting farther away. A faint voice said, You're running on energy, dear. You won't last long. Kill him and we'll let you die. Don't, and we'll make you suffer by living. Had she killed him? Or was she just going back to sleep?
Winifred was eight now. She was a little taller and a little more girlish, but she preferred her best friends from the age of four to her female friends at the Academy. Koschei, Theyta, and Winnie were out at the Yngsi estate. They'd finished their assignments and were now free to play out in the grass and climb the hills. They would explore. Winnie loved to have the boys think they were protecting her when they ventured farther than they were supposed to go because they would hop in front of her whenever they saw an animal and whisper worriedly, "Winnie! Get behind me!"
And of course, they'd end up pushing each other until Winnie pushed them because they both wanted to protect her better than the other.
"Winnie, this is farther than we've ever gone," Theyta warned tentatively, like he was unsure he should be questioning what she was doing. The awkward little fellow he was, Winnie wondered if he'd be a pushover or something when they were older. She kind of hoped he wasn't. That would be sad for him. But she wasn't going to make him stop doing what she told him to do either. That would be silly.
"Yeah, I know," Winnie said simply.
"Go be a wimp if you're scared, Theyta!" Koschei taunted. He earned an acidly sour glare from the other boy and a threatening shove from Winnie.
"Be nice!" she exclaimed, but giggled so he knew she wasn't really angry. His hard expression softened and he smiled at her. "Hey, why don't we race?"
"Further or back?" Theyta asked. Winnie giggled because he seemed worried that she was going to say further.
And that she did.
"No, we can't," he groaned. "I'll get in trouble, Win."
Winnie and Koschei looked at each other. Grins broke out across their little faces and they bit their tongues to resist the urge to tease Theyta. They always teased him; he was awkward and innocent and hated getting in trouble, an easy target for their loudmouthed taunting. Winnie didn't want to make him angry, though, or make him feel bad. And Koschei simply knew that if Theyta mocked him in front of Winnie as much as he mocked Theyta, he would punch him. But Theyta was nice. He didn't want to do that. Most of the time he laughed with them when they taunted him.
A noise from a patch of uncut, untended, tall red grass caught the little children's attention: a quick shuffling and they were all sent cowering away from the tall patch of grass together. Winnie looked up at the sky. The twin suns of Gallifrey were still up, sending light over her home, but eerie shadows in the dimming sunshine turned eerier. The lengthened and doubled, though not literally. Her mum had told he bedtime stories about double shadows. The Vashta Nerada, she said they were, and that they lived not in every shadow, but any shadow.
No, wait, that was Mrs. Torryg that told them that: "The Vashta Nerada, children, don't live in every shadow, but any shadow." Her soft, gentle voice made the creepiness of the sentence grow. Mrs. Torryg was a very good storyteller when she wanted to be. When she didn't, she was a terrible storyteller, using short, choppy, undetailed sentences that explained nothing and made Winnie want her to go away.
"What was that?" Koschei asked, and looked irritated by just how scared his voice sounded. Winnie took the boys' hands and they looked at each other behind her head as she stared fixatedly at the spot where they'd heard the noise. Neither boy was too interested in their fear anymore instead they were mouthing to each other: She's holding my hand! Well, she's holding mine, too! Nuh-uh, she's just holding yours 'cause she knows you're scared of everything!
Winnie yanked their hands lightly and they moved forward with her. Her eyes narrowed as she peered into the grass. Silence fell over them. Nothing but the natural sounds of Gallifrey filled their ears as they waited for something to happen. Fear and anticipation played through Theyta's mind; Koschei felt fearful but excited, much like Theyta; and Winnie was alight with adrenaline and anxiousness. She was probably the most daring of the three at the best of times. At the worst, she was a cowering little girl who was protected by her two bodyguards who were also her best friends.
Out from the grass popped nothing more than bones.
Winnie screamed at the top of her lungs and ran from the scene as quick as she could, abandoning Theyta and Koschei's hands. They stumbled blindly after her, just as horrified as she. Racing to save themselves and Winnie. Theyta ran faster than Koschei. He tripped and let out a scared shriek, having fallen in the shadows. Fearful that Vashta Nerada were in this shadow, he tried to get up but fell again.
Theyta looked back and his eyes widened. Winnie was panting far ahead of them in the light, waiting, and oblivious to the fact that Koschei had fallen. So if Winnie wasn't going to race into the shadow to save him that meant he had to, didn't it? He decided in a fraction of a second to go after him. He turned, looked at his destination, put his head down, and sprinted as fast as his tiny little ungraceful legs would carry him.
He fell against Koschei, tripping over him, but got up fast. He held out his hand to his friend, yanked him up, and darted from the shadows at his pace; ready to pick him up again. They finally caught up to Winnie and panted until they caught their breaths, all eyes back on the place they'd ran from. Winnie hugged them both tightly and pulled them into the forced group hug, and they sat limp in her arms, just wanting to go back home now that the fear had passed.
"Let's go back to—" Winnie started, but both boys shook their heads, worrying what she would say would be Let's go back to that place.
"I'm going to Theyta's," Koschei announced. Winnie bit her lip and was about to ask if she could come when he added, "You and Theyta went to the city together the other day without me so I'm going to go to his house to make up for it if that's okay."
"Uh…okay," Winnie said.
She went home that night all alone and told her mother and father of their discovery, but they said it was probably just an animal. Winnie shrugged, not really caring about that anymore. She had to stretch the truth when she told her parents of her adventure because she didn't want to get in trouble or get her friends in trouble, even if she was angry and frustrated with them, for venturing farther than they were allowed to go.
Her mother and father said they were stupid for not wanting to spend time with her. Winnie nodded, putting on a fake smile, and went to her room that she shared with one of her four sisters. She knew her parents just wanted her to feel better and really had nothing to say and no solution for the situation with Koschei and Theyta.
Winnie had five siblings in total. There were her sisters: Marielle, age 4; Donna, age 10, and the sibling she was closest to; Elise, age 16; and Josalie, age 25. She also had a brother. He was her parents firstborn, named Jonah and aged 30. He had been on the reckless side in his first incarnation and was already on his second. He was very smart. But Winnie didn't care for Jonah. He wasn't fun. Josalie was fun, and she was almost his age.
The Bell parents didn't care for long, long names like most Time Lords had. They gave their children humanlike names because they liked them. Winnie liked her name, but once when they were little, really little, Koschei had asked her, "Why do you have a boy's name?" and she had gotten angry and had to explain that even though her name had "fred" at the end, it was still a girl's name. Then he asked her, "Well, why don't you have a long name? My full name is—" and he said his entire long name.
"Because my mummy and daddy say my siblings and I am all specialer than you." She crossed her four-year-old arms stubbornly and looked around at the Yngsi house. They were supposed to be playing at the time. Their parents, who were all friends, were talking together about stuff neither child cared about in the other room. Winnie's mother said another little boy might join too. And that was when Winnie and Koschei met. Theyta didn't show up. Koschei already knew Theyta. They had been babysat together and had played together since they were only months old. Koschei introduced her to Theyta later on.
Donna knew something was wrong the moment Winnie collapsed on her bed with an exasperated huff. "What's wrong?" She grinned. "Boy problems?"
"Boys are stupid," Winnie muttered angrily, glaring at the floor and pretending that she had smashed Koschei and Theyta's faces onto it so that was what she was staring at. "Koschei told me I couldn't come to Theyta's house tonight all because he's a big wimp and he tripped and I didn't know and Theyta did and—"
"Hey, hey, slow down," Donna said, rolling her eyes. "Why didn't you push him or something?"
"Because." Winnie crossed her arms again. "I'm tired."
"I'm not," Donna replied.
That was one of the things that Winnie hated most about sharing a room with her older sister. When she was tired, Donna didn't have to go to sleep. Winnie had to sleep in her brightly lit room. But when Donna was tired and Winnie wasn't, Winnie still had to try to sleep, and if she made any noise Donna would get angry or tell their parents and their parents would tell her not to wake her sister up. And sometimes she would get in trouble for that. So she hated it sometimes. She hated her sister sometimes. Hated her, hated her so much right now, just like she hated her friends.
"I'm going to sleep and I want the lights off!" Winnie exclaimed angrily. She couldn't wait until she was older like her mum and dad so she wouldn't be as tired as she was when she was eight. Then she would be able to stay up for days instead of just maybe one day at a time. Better yet, she wouldn't have to share a room with Donna; she'd have her own TARDIS. And then she'd tell Koschei and Theyta they couldn't have a ride on her TARDIS because they didn't let her spend the night at Theyta's one night.
She knew initiation for the Time Lord Academy was coming. But her parents had turned out nice and her siblings had turned out just as annoying as they had been before initiation, so she saw no reason to be scared. She would be okay. Her friends would be okay. It was just looking into the Untempered Schism, seeing all of time before her and watching it pass and fold and break and bend. That's what Donna described it as. Elise, who was a bit of a pessimist, said it was hell on drugs. Or something. Winnie didn't listen to Elise when she was being grumpy. All she knew was she wasn't really scared.
Not for her own sake. Not for Theyta's. And not for Koschei's.
The Doctor frowned and halted the pair of them. "There's someone else in here."
She paused, blinked, and frowned. "I take it that no one else is supposed to be here?"
Winnie took two short steps forward and stopped next to the Doctor, close enough that if she so much as moved her hand a centimeter they would be holding hands. She felt that he could protect her better than Sam, but she felt that Sam would protect her quicker than the Doctor.
Sam was a teenage human whose mind revolved around silly things and not always focused on the importance of its body's actions. Sam obviously fancied Winnie—she knew that. She could tell. And she'd always been fond of the fact that she had a higher sense of telepathy than most Time Lords and, when close enough, she could hear the whispers of thoughts. When merely touching, she could roam through people's minds. When trying hard enough, she could sometimes open doors hard to be opened in stubborn, guided people's heads. It was in her nature to be nosy because of this fact.
So anyway, Sam fancied Winnie. He liked her. She knew he'd be the quickest to dart to a danger and get himself killed for her but she wasn't a killer; she wouldn't allow him to be stupid when the nature of what was lurking where it wasn't supposed to be was unknown. Until she knew if whatever it was would harm Sam or not, she would stick by the Doctor, the other Time Lord.
And then she sensed it too. Just as she had begun to believe that he had not sensed a Time Lord in his TARDIS for long enough that he was just sensing her, she felt and smelled that particular Gallifreyan air around them, around her, around the Doctor, and around a third person hidden somewhere in the room or near the room. The scent itself was the strongest part and she was surprised she had just now noticed it. The scent was close. She felt like a hunter. Hunting was boring though. It took too much patience, patience she did not possess.
She looked behind at Sam. He had a high-tech rifle in his hands.
Then there was the Doctor. She didn't fancy him; he didn't fancy her. She felt a particular admiration for him, a feeling that he was more than just another Time Lord, that he should be idolized. And she would not hide the fact that he was her idol, and not just for the greatness he achieved and the worlds he saved and the way he repeatedly made it out alive, without even so much as regenerating, after confrontation amongst confrontation with the vicious Time Lords on the other side, not the humans' side.
The side of Gallifrey, her home, her true home. Where her sisters and her brother were. Where her parents were. The red grass, the lights of the Capitol…
Those thoughts made her hearts ache so she set them aside and instead thought of the true reason why she idolized the Doctor: he was infamous in the best of ways. Hated and loved and feared and yet so fearful and vulnerable upon a simple glance, he was a god. Winnie wasn't religious so she didn't believe in God or any particular other force like gods and goddesses or whatever one might believe in. But she did believe that the Doctor attained certain godliness.
The Doctor. Something flickered in the back of her mind. The Doctor. Hmm.
"Come out, come out wherever you are," Sam called.
As the words left his mouth, Winnie witnessed a woman, dressed in a tight black shirt and dark skinny jeans, as well as a stylish pair of black shoes, jumped down from above them, landing in a catlike fashion: a graceful landing on her feet that Winnie thought had to be rehearsed continually somewhere else, like this had been planned. She didn't like that. The woman had a dark look in her unnaturally white eyes.
The white eyes, admittedly, did creep Winnie out. But she knew that sometimes Time Lords had white eyes or eyes that leaned toward purple or red or some mawkish, unusual shade of green. A deadliness and manipulative ambience that permeated the air stronger than the Time Lord scent around the nameless woman rested deepest in her eyes, encompassing her entirely, making the whiteness of her eyes become the new color of the devil or one of its demons.
"A bit hasty, are we?" the woman said was a sickly sweet grin.
"Intruder alert, I guess," Sam said weakly.
Almost at the same time, Winnie whispered to the Doctor lightheartedly, quietly enough that the woman couldn't hear but just loudly enough that Sam could, "There's another Time Lord in your TARDIS…if you didn't know."
And as she had extended her telepathic field a little but wasn't quite focusing, only hoping the woman was within her small range but knowing she wasn't, she heard a whisper of Sam thinking about her: Oh, great—she's like a Time Lord version of me. I wonder how the Doctor will handle two of me around.
She hadn't always at the strong telepathy; it came and went. Only half the time she had it. She was in her sixth incarnation at age nine hundred eighty-three, and out of those six incarnations only three of them had the abnormally heightened telepathy. She knew it wasn't really possible to gain telekinesis, but every time she regenerated and found she had heightened telepathy, she was always disappointed by the fact that it didn't come with its other mind partner, telekinesis. How cool would that be, though? she always thought.
"Sam, put the bloody gun down!" the Doctor exclaimed, noticing he had drawn his high-tech rifle. She could practically see the wheels turning in his head because of their closeness. Who is she? What is she here for? How did she get in? What does she want? Does she work for the Time Lords? These questions and more swirled through his head. Draped over the spinning head, she noticed suddenly, was that thick mop of brown. She hadn't noticed the way his head drifted over his forehead before, and decided that it made his silly face with the too-big ears and the too-large forehead and chin almost close to handsome.
But he was the Doctor. The unattainable Doctor. No matter how much she idolized him, that would be far too much to handle.
No one seemed to be asking the most basic of questions and now Winnie was dying to know, so she asked, "Who are you?"
And the woman responded not with her name but with: "You don't know me?" She threw on a face of mock offense. "Well, I know you quite well, Runner."
The name and the implications behind it felt like a slap in the face to Winnie. She had done bad things under that name and discarded it because of those things. But she stood her ground: tall, defiant, glaring angrily right into the woman's white eyes with her own average, muddy brown ones. The eyes that upon first glance looked twenty-one. The eyes that upon further inspection revealed nine hundred eighty-three years of stories behind them.
She was a woman with age-old eyes.
The woman laughed and turned around, walking to the console. The Doctor looked down at Winnie and she looked up at him. Briefly they looked at each other, reading each other like fascinating tales told in fiction books. The kind of books that you just can't put down, they're so good, with so much action and fantasy and foreshadowing. Rage, pain, sadness, all plastered right there in the eyes.
Winnie decided that her eyes held the stories of a two-year-old compared to his. She was not a woman with age-old eyes. And no other man or woman could ever hold as much in their eyes as the man before her head. The Doctor, the most feared being other than Rassilon himself, was the man, the only man, with the age-old eyes. They did not hold a thousand years of stories. Impossibly they held much more than what he'd lived. Hundreds of thousands, millions, billions, all those years. Packed away in his eyes. Like the best book the universe will ever have to offer.
The woman turned back to Winnie and said finally, "I'm the Seer. Doctor, love, before you ask, I'm not going to tell you how I got in your TARDIS. And before any of you ask why, I came here to see how well your little resistance is going. Not too well, methinks?"
When no one responded, she continued to fiddle around with the console but touched no levers. She eyed it. She touched it. She smiled and looked at them slyly.
"You're the Doctor and the Runner, of course!" she said suddenly. "Ooh, the stories that will be told there." She grinned widely. "Oh, my. Oh, my, my, my, Runner. To go out so simply, all for nothing? I don't understand why. But I guess you will, one day soon."
Winnie had no clue what she was talking about but the way she said it scared her. Particularly the question. "To go out so simply"? What did that mean? Was she going to die soon? She fretfully feared the answer was yes but hoped more strongly and was most certain that the answer was no. The Seer had to be trying to simply crawl under their skin.
"But that day is the least of your worries now, huh?" She approached Winnie slowly.
Suddenly, to Winnie's relief, Sam burst out with, "What, I don't get mentioned by name?"
The Seer shot an acid look at him. "You're human. You don't get mentioned at all."
Winnie snapped, "I'm not called Runner anymore, Seer. Where have you been? You sound like an idiot not knowing." It was a pathetic retort. She knew it wouldn't make the Seer's skin crawl like the implicit darkness shooting from the Seer to Winnie as she said her old title made Winnie's skin crawl. But it was all that she could think of at that moment.
"Oh, I forgot. I'm not good enough for you." Winnie was pretty sure Sam rolled his eyes.
The Seer looked like she wanted to spit at Sam. "You're not. You're worthless gum on the bottom of my shoe." She turned to Winnie and her fake sweet smile was back. "And why is that? Oh, I remember…"
"Because it's stupid, that's why, and so are you, so shut up."
"Ooh, catfight," Sam muttered.
Please don't fight, please don't fight! the Doctor thought, still so close to her.
She got within inches of Winnie and whispered, "I. Know. What. You. Did." The first word was at normal volume, but with each word she lowered her voice. By the time she got to the last word, Winnie could barely hear her voice.
Her cheeks grew red with rage and shame. She didn't close her eyes and disappear into the dying man's eyes, or the terrified look in the framed woman's eyes. She instead saw it before her in the Seer and then her eyes reverted back to their evilness. She felt like she might cry. Always too emotional. Always uncontrollable. Sometimes the rush of anger or excitement was fun. But the sadness and guilt that was stronger than others' sadness and guilt? That sucked.
"So!" the Seer exclaimed, stepping away from Winnie and smiling at the Doctor. "You're cute sometimes, did you know that? Others—not so much. Too much chin, love. I'm staying here."
"Like hell," the Doctor said almost matter-of-factly. "Get out. Right now."
She giggled. "Aw, you think you're being authoritative, don't you? Poor thing."
"I say I shoot her right now," Sam suggested.
The Doctor looked back at him to make sure he'd put the gun away like he had told Sam to, and he had. Then he looked back at the Seer.
"Then I won't tell you where the bug is. And Rassilon will have tracked you by teatime."
The Doctor scowled but said, "I'll show you to your room."