Vastra was in her bed. She woke with a start. How did she get here? Where was Jenny?
"Madame," Parker greeted her.
"Mr. Parker," Madame addressed her driver urgently, "What happened?"
"You fell asleep. It's been a week."
"A week!" She gasped. Her mind went to Jenny, who had been in the asylum for such a long period of time.
"Perhaps, it was something you ate?"
Vastra considered this. The last thing she ate was Mr. Flint. Something must have assumed she would eat him and put Adenosine in his system, knowing how it would affect her. The chemical could induce a state of hibernation. Something was intentionally interfering with her search and rescue mission.
"I need caffeine," she stated, "lots of it".
"I'll make you some coffee," offered the driver. It was beyond his job description, but he knew his employer was missing her maid at the moment.
"Thank you, Mr. Parker".
The Silurian, in a hurry, chugged the coffee in the carriage as Parker drove her to New Bedlam Asylum. The carriage stopped abruptly.
"You better get out and look at this, Ma'am," stated a nervous Mr. Parker.
She exited the carriage to find they were very near the asylum, but they were surrounded by the Tongs Gang. "Why do these blokes keep showing up at the most inconvenient of times?" asked the irritated Silurian as she drew both of her katanas.
"I don't have time for this today!" she yelled at the men. There must have been close to twenty of them. They stepped closer to her brandishing their own weapons. Some had guns, some had swords. She ducked as one of them threw a knife.
The men opened their mouths to speak in unison, "When the Child of Time is broken, The Old Sleeper is awoken!"
Vastra didn't have the patience for riddles and rhymes. She twisted her body while twirling her katanas. She tried to ensure to knock away any guns. For one of the men, this meant his hand was sliced off. He ran away screaming as the Silurian's blades met other swords. The lizard woman was quick. She successfully knocked out or incapacitated many of the men in under a minute. Only about four were left, and they appeared to have superhuman strength and skill. It took the green lady a few more minutes to kill three of them. Then there was only one left. She stabbed the last man in the gut and twisted her sword viciously so as to ensure the man felt intense pain. He repeated the ominous couplet, "When the Child of Time is broken, The Old Sleeper is awoken!"
Vastra decapitated man, then wondered about the rhyme. The Child of Time could very well be Jenny. Broken? She worried about what that could mean. She reentered her carriage to hurry to the asylum. Old Sleeper, who could that be? Well, she thought, it could be herself. She had slumbered for sixty-five million years beneath Earth's crust. But she had been awake for nearly a decade.
When she arrived at the entrance of the asylum, she burst in. She asked the nearest nurse where to find Jenny. The nurse was reluctant to give her the requested information, so the Silurian had to threaten her with a sword. The nurse muttered something about Solitary Confinement and pointed in a general direction. Vastra knocked her out and stole the keys.
~.~.~.~.~
Two men entered Jenny's isolated padded room again. This time they took off her straitjacket. Her arms were so sore she couldn't attack them. They offered her food. She was hungry. She still didn't know how long she had been at the asylum; how long it had been since she had last eaten. It took a while for circulation to return to her aching and numb arms. Her hands were clumsy as she ate the medicated meal. The food was bland. She didn't know it had also been laced with a hallucinogenic. She felt anxious. Next she started hearing voices: people telling her to run, people telling her to fight. Then it was like she was experiencing everything from both of her incarnations all at once.
She was a soldier and a match girl; an adventurer and a maid. She was being chased by monsters, then by a Chinese gang. She was a starving street urchin, then a savior of worlds. She began seeing things too. One moment Donna Noble was there, giving her the name Jenny. Then Madame Vastra giving her a job, and a new purpose. Then her father, the Doctor, calling her an echo. She was just an echo of the Time Lords, not a true Gallifreyan. Then her uncle was there. He was beating her, and thrusting into her. She screamed. There were Hath aliens surrounding her. Then the Tongs, molesting her. Her commander was aiming a gun at her father. Then a large Chinese man was aiming a pistol at Madame Vastra. She jumped in front of both bullets. Everything was confusing and overwhelming. What was real? Jenny was frightened as she reacted to her hallucinations.
The doctors would come and take her for more treatments in the chair. Then nurses would force her to take cold baths. They continued to feed her the hallucinogenic. They bled her. They wouldn't let her sleep. No, now they gave her drugs to keep her awake rather than force her to go unconscious. She was wearing the straightjacket whenever she wasn't eating. She was chained to the wall when she wasn't at her treatments. She was alone. Always alone.
Finally Madame Vastra opened the door to the padded cell. She saw Jenny curled in a fetal position on the ground rocking herself back and forth. She wasn't blinking. It looked like she was in a catatonic state. "Jenny," the Silurian addressed her softly.
Jenny briefly glanced at the lizard women, then muttered, "Yer not here, yer not real". She turned and whispered something to another hallucination.
"Oh, Jenny," what have they done to her, wondered the lizard. "I am real," Vastra assured her, "And I'm going to get you out of here". She assisted Jenny to a standing position, then used the stolen keys to release the chains. Next she helped the girl get out of the straitjacket. Jenny stretched, yelping with discomfort. She then let her arms lay at her sides as circulation returned again. The process was agonizing.
Vastra came to the front of Jenny. The girl gasped with surprise, like she was seeing the Silurian for the first time. She leaned close to Vastra, as though seeking an embrace. Vastra gently put her arms around the girl. She was not used to such intimate gestures, but understood it could offer some comfort to the clearly traumatized girl. She smiled unexpectedly as she felt the warmth of the mammal against her own body. Vastra found she felt a tremendous relief at finding her... employee, mentee, assistant, friend? What was their relationship?
Jenny then whispered directly in Vastra's ear, seemingly fearful that others may hear, "I think ya shouldn't be here, Ma'am". The lizard looked puzzled. Jenny continued, "I think they may be after ya, Old Sleeper".
The girl then turned, responding to another phantasm. She backed away from the Silurian with a face full of fear and put her arms in front of her as though trying to push something away. Her eyes were distant. "No…no…no… please, I don' wan' another treatment," she whined, pleading with an invisible figure.
Had Jenny deciphered their little rhyme, wondered Vastra, did she know that she was the Child of Time? At the moment it didn't matter. Right now she had to get the girl to safety and see what she could do about mending her mind.
"Jenny," Vastra tried to get Jenny's attention again. She regarded the spot where Jenny was looking. "There is no one there". It was truly heartbreaking for lizard woman to see the child in such a state. She really cared deeply for her, and it went beyond any sense of responsibility she held for the girl or to the Doctor.
Jenny glanced at her Silurian employer, then back at the spot where she was seeing the doctors who would take her to the electric chair. "I don' know what's real," Jenny admitted quietly through her rapid breathing. "Everythin'… everythin' is happenin' all at once." The girl's eyes shifted between her various phantasms.
"I know," affirmed Vastra softly, hoping to provide reassurance. She reached toward the girl's matted hair, trying to stroke Jenny's head comfortingly. Jenny backed away from the touch. "I'm going to help you, but we need to get of here. Are you ready to run?"
Jenny nodded and made a lopsided grin. "Always!"
She bolted though the door that Vastra had opened. The lizard woman followed. They sprinted toward the exit of the building. In the entryway though, they were stopped by a legion of lunatics blocking the door. They were all entranced. They all had that blank look in their eyes. "Move!" Vastra demanded loudly, trying to get to the door. She knew these people were innocents in whatever scheme was going on here. She was reluctant to draw her sword, however, the patients wouldn't budge.
"The Child of Time is broken!" they recited together.
"No…" Vastra denied, "I'm going to fix her!"
"Too late!" yelled the mob, "The Old Sleeper is awakening!"
"I've been awake for many years," responded the lizard woman.
"Ridiculous reptile," stated the man in a long lab coat and black top hat. Vastra and Jenny turned to face him. "You are not the Old Sleeper," he scoffed.
"I was slumbering with my people beneath the crust for sixty-five million years".
"The Old Sleeper is far more ancient than that." Stated the mysterious man. "Would you like to hear the complete prophesy?"
Vastra regarded him angrily. There was not an obvious way out of it at the moment.
The man raised his arms as though conducting a choir. At his cue the lunatics chanted;
"The demon gods from long before
Trapped here in Terran myth and lore
Seek freedom in eternity
Vastness is their serenity
Blazing in electric embers
An anomaly remembers
When the Child of Time is broken
The Old Sleeper is awoken
Hence begins the Elders' spawning
Cosmos' silent shadow dawning".
The man smiled contently, as though listening to the most pleasant of music.
"The demon gods of legend- the ones from before this universe started. You wish to waken their slumbering king, initiating their reproduction cycle, and the create a darker cosmos," Vastra interpreted the poem.
"One correction," the man grinned menacingly, "By breaking your 'pet', I will have woken their slumbering king! Welcome to the new era of Azathoth!"
At the spoken name, perhaps more of a title, of the ineffable primal elder god, the brainwashed mob fell to the ground, prostrating themselves in worship.
"They are taking out all that was, see? I'm feeling a little fuzzy," stated Jenny.
"Oh, no," the Silurian remarked. It appears that rhyming in apes is a sign of insanity, assumed the lizard woman.
"Where is your enthuzimuzzy?" Jenny pointed accusingly at Madame Vastra.
And now she is making up words, thought Vastra, that can't be a good indication.
"Rhyming can be a lot of fun. I think it may be time to run, before their lord turns off the Sun!"
"Good plan, Jenny," affirmed Madame Vastra.
"It's too late for your little date, the Demons rise to find their mate!" warned the lab coat wearing man, before falling into a fit of maniacal laughter.
"Let us return to Paternoster Row, before we freeze in the memory snow".
Memory snow? What is that, wondered Vastra. Were these the ramblings of a lunatic? "Yes, Jenny, let's go." The lizard walked to the door, stepping over the still prostrating patients in front of it. She opened the door with her stolen keys. She gently guided Jenny outside. When free, the girl began to run. Vastra attempted to call her to come to the carriage. She was unsuccessful. So Vastra ran with Jenny, as Parker in the carriage followed them. To the surprise of the Silurian, despite all the physical strain and mental damage that had happened to Jenny, the girl sprinted all the way to Paternoster Row, before collapsing wordlessly on the drawing room sofa.
~.~.~.~.~
A/N: Enthuzimuzzy is apparently a real Victorian slang term according to a list I found on the internet. Attributed to "Braham the Terror, whoever that is". Don't know how much I trust this list, but the word "enthuzimuzzy" was way too much fun not to use! Also, yes, I am using Lovecraftian ideas and demonic deities.
