Collab between Scullywolf and Crazygirlne. Beta'd by Resile.


Rose blinked a few times as they walked into the sunlight on the way back to the flat, her hand still linked with the Doctor's.

"Let's go back to Jan's first," Rose suggested, feeling her head clear a bit. They had a plan, now, and she could focus on the tasks ahead of them. "We want to talk to more people, so we should stop by while they're all still there."

The Doctor nodded, smiling at her again, watching her a few seconds longer than she thought the situation warranted. "That's good thinking. Not that I relish another captivating conversation with that woman, mind, but there must have been half a dozen other ladies in the flat with her. The more people we can speak with who may have seen or heard something, the better we can piece together what their stories have in common, and that'll give us a better picture of what we're looking for."

There was a moment of silence before Rose spoke again. "I'm really okay, Doctor. You can stop looking at me like I'm gonna fall apart."

The Doctor used his free hand to rub the back of his neck.

"Some people would completely go to pieces in the face of far less than you've been through in the past 48 hours," he said carefully.

"I'm not some people, though, am I?" She was unsure whether she was more frustrated with the Doctor or with herself; she'd seen so much, and she usually handled it so well, but whenever it was personal, it was just so hard. She wouldn't think badly of a stranger for being worried about a family member, of course, but she traveled with the Doctor. She was supposed to be able to handle this. Being grouped in with everyone else, then, like she was nobody special… It hurt.

He squeezed her hand. "Definitely not."

She glanced at him and saw he wore a small smile, a warm look in his eyes, one she wasn't quite ready to put a name to, one that told her he meant what he said, that he didn't lump her together with others. He blinked and looked forward again, clearing his throat.

"Right. Erm, it's possible my behavior may have been interpreted as a bit rude when we we last spoke with Jan, so perhaps you ought to take the lead this time."

She made a sound that landed somewhere between a laugh and a snort. "Yeah, that might go over a bit better."

When they reached Jan's flat, Rose knocked, and women's muffled voices tried to escape the closed door. She looked down to where she and the Doctor still held hands, then she unwound her fingers, the Doctor holding on a moment longer before shoving his hands into his pockets.

"Don't need her distracted again by whether we're getting married anytime soon," she explained just before the door opened.

Jan frowned at the Doctor before turning to Rose. "Back again, are you? What is it, love?"

"Hullo, Jan," said Rose, smiling apologetically. "Sorry about earlier. Been a long day, what with the traveling. Do you mind if we come in, talk with everyone for a bit?"

"Sure!" she replied, face lighting up. "You don't usually visit anyone but Jackie while you're here. Can't wait for everyone in my flat to see you."

Jan turned and walked into the living room, leaving Rose to follow, the Doctor closing the door before joining the rest of them.

"Look who's here," gushed Jan, looking around at the five other women who were perched on various pieces of mismatched, floral furniture.

Everyone spoke at once, voices overlapping:

"Hello!"

"Well, if it isn't Rose and her Doctor!"

"Is your mother with you, then?"

"Hullo."

"Welcome home, love."

Rose smiled at each woman in turn, silently scrambling to remember a couple of their names in case she needed them.

"Mum's not here," she said, addressing the one who'd asked. "Actually, I was hoping I could ask, if that's alright… Did anyone else see me leave with her?"

"Does that mean it wasn't you who left with her?" asked the woman whose hair was dyed a very bright red, whose name Rose couldn't recall. "I told you, Janet, I said it, I said Jackie left with a bloke."

"It wasn't a bloke or Rose," a third woman, Alice maybe, chimed in. "She left with two women, and neither one of them was Rose."

"I'm telling you she left with Rose," insisted Jan, crossing her arms. The three women who weren't involved in the conversation remained silent, watching and listening, waiting for Rose to shed light on an argument they'd probably already heard. "She left with you, didn't she, Rose?"

"Well," she said, "I actually don't… When did you see her leave?" she directed toward Alice and the redhead.

"Friday," said Alice firmly, nodding. "A week before yesterday."

"That's right," confirmed the woman with red hair. "It was definitely Friday."

Jan crossed her arms. "The when isn't as important as who she left with, now is it? Rose, tell us now, she left with you, didn't she?"

"Well… that's not…" She glanced at the Doctor. He looked back at her, and she saw his hand twitch before he shoved both hands into his pockets once more, focusing his attention back on the women who continued to speak.

"Leave the poor girl alone," said Alice. "She clearly doesn't want to make you uncomfortable by telling you you're wrong."

"Who says I'm wrong?" said Jan, stepping forward so that Rose and the Doctor were left on the outskirts of the room.

"I do," said the redhead, standing from the sofa, staying far enough from Jan that Rose didn't think there would be a physical altercation. She was also fairly certain there wouldn't be a break in the argument any time soon.

"We're just gonna…" mumbled Rose, trailing off when none of the women paid her any attention. She looked back at the Doctor and gestured for the door. He nodded and moved toward it, opening the door quietly, closing it carefully after Rose had exited. "I'm gonna hear about that for years."

"At least we escaped, even if only just. Remind me to land the TARDIS inside Jackie's flat next time so we don't bump into any of them walking across the estate."

They walked toward her Mum's flat, hands brushing but not joining. Rose opened the still-unlocked door and walked in, looking around more carefully this time. The living room looked to be in its normal state. Nothing was knocked over, nothing was broken. There was a little bit of clutter here and there, but nothing that seemed to be outside of normal limits.

"Nothing to indicate a struggle of any kind," commented the Doctor, "and there don't appear to be any signs of forced entry. Not to say it's impossible to enter forcibly without damaging anything, but no obvious signs of it, that's generally a good thing."

Rose nodded absently.

"The television is off. Between that and the door being locked, she probably did leave of her own free will, Rose."

"Either that or they wanted it to look like she did," said Rose. "If they made people think her leaving was normal, makes sense they wouldn't want obvious things out of place, yeah?" She paused, looking at the Doctor, who ran a hand through his hair. "Don't mean to be all negative. Just feel like something went wrong here. Can't picture Mum leaving with an alien on purpose, either."

"She might not have known it was an alien, though. Or that they were. Those ladies couldn't seem to agree on how many people they saw with her."

Rose moved to the kitchen, again looking for any signs that her mother had been forcibly taken, seeing nothing amiss. She checked the bathroom and her mother's room, looking for Jackie's mobile in the usual places while she was at it, before collapsing on her old bed, throwing herself down face first. She felt the Doctor sit next to her.

"Rose…"

"I'm still fine," she said, then turned her head toward him so that she could speak without her blankets in the way. "We know she's gone, but not why, who with, where… I was sure we'd find something here to tell us."

"We do know when she left, now," he said. "Also, chances are she wasn't hurt even if she did go without wanting to, since there's no blood, nothing broken in the flat."

Rose took a deep breath and sat up, leaning against him.

"Still feel like something's wrong."

The Doctor lightly put his arm around her shoulders, and Rose hid her face in his chest. This wasn't something normal for them, their hugs usually being reserved for reunions and unexpected excitement, but right now, Rose was willing to accept the comfort if he was willing to give it.

They sat that way in silence for a few minutes until the Doctor finally spoke.

"You know," he said, "it's been a long time since you've had anything to eat or drink. Might help."

"Yeah, alright," said Rose, tired. She stood and walked into the kitchen, then stopped. There was something out of place in the living room, after all. She turned around, walking past the Doctor, who opened his mouth to speak. She spoke first as she rushed across the room to a lamp on a side table.

"Here!" she said, gesturing to a teacup that sat next to it. "She didn't leave on her own, I knew it."

The Doctor joined her, brow furrowed.

"You...got that from a teacup?"

"It's not the teacup," she answered. "It's where it is. Mum hates when people put cups here! She says she can't reach the lamp without breaking 'em, and she doesn't have enough to spare. Mickey used to put them there sometimes, just to get her worked up, and she would yell so loud that Mrs. Murphy would come knocking. Anyway, she wouldn't put one there, and she wouldn't let anyone else do it, either. She definitely wouldn't leave the flat with one sitting there, not unless it was an emergency, but if it was an emergency, she wouldn't have made sure the telly was off or the door was locked, would she?"

She felt charged, excited to have figured something out, to have found some clue. When the Doctor beamed at her, she smiled in return.

"Look at you! Rose Tyler, private eye!"

"So does that make you my assistant, then?" she asked.

Then her face fell.

"But that means… That means she probably isn't okay." She looked at the teacup, staring, wishing it could speak.

"Rose, look at me," said the Doctor, calm and firm. She tore her eyes from the cup, blinking at his close proximity.

"I still don't think she was injured," he told her, "and I am quite brilliant. Genius, even." He gave her a small smile. "We'll find her."

Rose looked away from him, unable to handle the understanding she saw, not without breaking down, and she couldn't do that right now. Her mother had probably been taken, and they needed to figure out where and by whom. As she averted her eyes, she caught sight of another cup.

"Doctor, this isn't her cup," she said, gesturing toward the cup by the lamp. "That one is." She pointed at another teacup, set neatly near where her mother usually sat. She met his eyes again. "That means this cup belonged to whoever took her, yeah? Could we get, I dunno, DNA off it? See it all the time in films."

The Doctor grinned at her again.

"Yes, that is absolutely a thing we can do. We'll take this cup back to the TARDIS laboratory and run it through the DNA sequencer. That will at least give us a species result, and if we're very lucky, it'll be a species with a known gathering place, which would in turn give us a possible location. But even if we aren't so lucky, it's more information than we started with. You are brilliant!"

"Do we need to use gloves and put it in a baggie or anything?" she asked. The Doctor shook his head.

"I can preserve the sample with the sonic." He pulled the device from his pocket. "Unfortunate that I haven't added genetic testing capabilities to it yet. Might come in handy from time to time." He aimed it at the teacup, the distinctive whirr emitting, then put the sonic screwdriver back in his pocket, the teacup quickly finding its way to another pocket. "It'll be safe in there."

Rose looked around one more time, but she saw nothing else unusual. There were a couple more cups in various places around the flat, but there was no real way to tell whether they'd been there for longer than her mother had been missing.

"Okay then, Doctor," she said, moving toward the door. "Let's go find my mum."