A few months earlier-on an unknown planet similar to Earth
"How many times Annalise?! They will not remember you, no one will remember you. You're a nobody. You're NOTHING" A woman's commanding tones drifted out of a small office on the 3rd floor corridor of a building that closely resembled a hospital. This was Lord Leftusly's Institute for the Education of Wayward Young Children. It was a squat grey building that looked dark and dank, not somewhere extremely inviting at all.
"But they're my parents, of course they will remember me. How could they forget?" A small voice replied from the same office. Inside a middle aged woman was sat behind an oppressive wooden desk, in front of her sat Annalise, her head lowered towards the ground.
"This insolence will have to stop child." The woman leant across the table and grasped Annalise under the chin, yanking her head up roughly so she could look her in the eye. "No one will ever remember you. You are nothing. You are pathetic." She let go of her chin and wiped her hand on her skirt as if the young girl in front of her was dirty and disgusting. "Get out of my sight now! You're on restricted rations for this week."
Restricted, the girl thought to herself, restricted in this place meant nothing. Great, she wasn't sure she could cope with no food for another week. She had only just got off restricted rations a few days ago and she still felt weak. Her hands still shook and she couldn't stand up without her vision swimming. She sighed scolding herself for her inability to hold her tongue, but no matter how many times matron, or the other members of staff told her she was nobody, she just couldn't accept it, never mind believe it.
She trudged down the dark, dingy corridor to her room. As she pushed open the door she took in the one place she could call her own. Her room was small, barely enough room for a single mattress on the floor and a box for her few belongings. She sank down onto the mattress and pulled the box towards her. Inside was a small photo frame, a locket containing a small lock of blonde hair and a coin with a queen on one side. These were the only things that she had to remind her of her parents, if matron ever found them she'd be for it. Annalise had stolen them from her file on a trip to the matron's office a few years ago and had hidden them underneath her clothes since then. Although matron liked to make her life hell she very rarely searched the rooms and so Annalise's secret had been safe.
The photograph was of a young woman in a purple leather jacket with blonde hair blowing in her face, she was smiling, her tongue poking through her teeth as she looked towards the camera. Annalise wondered what it was like to feel that happy and carefree, it had been a long time since she had smiled or laughed in such a carefree manner.
Annalise jumped as she heard the sound of footsteps coming down the corridor, she hurriedly stuffed the items back underneath the clothes, kicked the box away from her and then curled up on the mattress trying to pretend to sleep.
The door was thrown open and a dark form filled the door.
"Oi, matron told me that you've been causing trouble again, you little rat." The shadow growled entering the room. The light from the small window in the room fell on the shadow, it was a man, and he was huge, almost as wide as he was tall with a face that looked like it had been hit with a spade. This was matron's guard dog, big and stupid he did whatever matron asked him. Annalise had nicknamed him Fluffy, not that she would ever tell him that to his face. He grabbed her shoulder and dragged her up out of the bed, he slammed her backwards into the wall and she cracked her head hard against the wall. As he let go of her shoulders she fell down, curling into the foetal position, as she did every time Fluffy began one of his beatings. Somewhere in the middle of it she passed out as she had done many times before.
When she woke up she was in the white walled sanatorium with matron standing over her. Her head ached and every bone in her body felt broken. This was the worst she had ever felt after one of Fluffy's visits and if matron hadn't been there Annalise would definitely have cried, but she didn't want to show weakness in front of the woman who was in charge of her main tormentor.
"Well, here we are again Annalise, see what happens when you don't listen?" Matron smirked as the girl in front of her grimaced in pain, furiously blinking back tears. "Bet you wish Mummy and Daddy were here now don't you. Unfortunate that they'd have no idea who you are really isn't it." Matron's voice was cold but her eyes betrayed alarm as she realised just how injured Annalise was. Although she liked to maintain some form of control through violence over her charges they were valuable and she didn't like them to be too badly damaged. No matter how much she hated the young girl lying in front of her she was one of the most valuable charges matron had. Matron remembered the day Annalise's 'parents' had come to the school like it was yesterday, she thought all her birthdays had come at once. As Annalise fell back into unconsciousness matron's thoughts drifted back to that day 15 and a bit years ago.
15 years ago-The Institute
"Weeeelll" said a sheepish male voice, "it's not 18th century Venice." The matron looked up from her paperwork as the voice drifted in through her open office window.
"You're making a habit of this, getting us lost." A female voice replied, happy but with a slight hint of annoyance. Matron couldn't hear the rest of the conversation as the two individuals walked away from the window but she became excited. The school hadn't had new visitors in months and the current stock of children was becoming low.
The Lord Leftusly's Institute for the Education of Wayward Young Children claimed to be a place of education, supposedly taking in unwanted or abandoned children and providing them with an education in order to further their chances in life. In reality, however, the institute was far from this. Yes they educated children, but not in order to further their chances, the institute educated children to be fighters. The children were then sold to visiting armies, as cheap slave soldiers or to guilds to be assassins, or thieves depending on their talents. These jobs were badly paid and carried a high risk of death, but people were willing to pay extortionate amounts in order not to do it themselves, this was where the institute profited.
Many of the children in the services of the institute were abandoned; however, this didn't satisfy the institute's need for profit. Some of the children came from accidental visitors to the institute. These visitors were drugged and specific DNA implanted to give the most valuable offspring. After the birth their memories were wiped and they left feeling as if they had just visited for a day rather than 9 months. This gave the institute access to children who were never going to be missed, never going to be reclaimed and that allowed them to be as cruel as they wished in the training methods they used.
The head of this institute was matron. She was a hard looking woman, with extremely human features (one of her ancestors had been human), and so she lacked the large protruding forehead of her species. Her eyes were steely grey without a hint of compassion or kindness and her skin was weathered and tough. Nobody knew how old she was; it seemed as if she had been at the institute forever. Matron ran a brutal regime in the institute; children who were brought in underwent strict rationing, tough lessons and violent punishments in order to train them to become warriors. There was no love in the institute, no consoling hugs and no kind words. It was an extremely horrible life for the children who existed there.
Matron didn't carry out any punishments herself, she didn't like to get her hands dirty. These were carried out by her right hand man, Jordullian. He had a large protruding forehead and was massive, he was almost as wide as he was tall and he had a temper to match his size. Matron liked him because he used his fists first and asked questions later. On this particular day, Jordullian was busy disciplining two boys for crying during training when matron came bursting into the room.
"Visitors" she hissed, "we've got visitors!" Jordullian grunted, threw the boy he was holding to the floor and followed matron out of the room and towards the front door. They reached the entrance just as the visitors began to knock. Matron spread the doors wide and with a large grin she took in the appearance of the visitors. One was a tall dark haired man, in a brown pinstripe suit, trainers and a dark brown long coat, he had a stupidly large grin on his face. Matron wasn't interested in him however, unless he was of a useful species she didn't need him. She was more interested in his companion. This girl was young, possibly 19 or 20, with blonde hair and hazel eyes; she wore a purple leather jacket that definitely didn't originate on the same planet as the institute. The matron smiled even more at this, foreign children tended to fetch far higher prices at auction, they also were often easier to break, the differences between them and the other children made it easy to play on their loneliness.
"Welcome to Lord Leftusly's Institute for the Education of Wayward Young Children" said matron, "please come in." She stepped backward and beckoned them in, not missing the glance that the girl gave the gentleman. The corridors echoed as matron rapidly walked down the corridor and up the stairs to her office, the two strangers followed, the gentleman humming slightly as he walked. Once in her office matron sat behind her desk and gestured to two chairs opposite her. The two strangers sat, the man leaning forward, the girl looking towards him for guidance.
"I am matron here" matron began, "may I enquire into who you are?"
"Well, I'm the Doctor and this is Rose" the man stated, as if it was something he had said thousands of times before.
"Ah, lovely" matron smiled, "that should make form filling much easier." The Doctors eyebrows rose in surprise but before he could speak matron had signalled to Jordullian who was stood behind the door. The large man knocked the Doctor out with a single blow to the head.
"What are you doing?!" Rose exclaimed as the Doctor fell to the floor. The matron merely smiled as Jordullian clamped the rag over her mouth and nose, Rose could just detect the chemical tang on the rag before her eyes became heavy and she drifted into a deep sleep.
