A/N: I do not own anything relating to Doctor Who. I only own the ideas of my OC. Sorry if this chapter is shorter than my usual ones. This episode turned out a bit longer than expected so it's in 3 parts. Please let me know what you think. I love suggestions and opinions. :-)
Previously: "Failing. Open the rift. We're dying. Trapped in this form. Cannot sustain. Help us." The voice was twisted and had several tones to it. It sent shivers down my spine and made my stomach twist. The mass of voices seemed strained and sad. They sounded scared. The worry was slowly replaced by pity for whatever it was inhabiting the corpse. They cried out before the gas left the body and flew into the gas lamp. The body slumped over onto the floor. Rose and I quickly backed up until our backs hit the wall.
We had moved into the living room of the funeral home. The owner, Mister Sneed, and Charles sat in chairs in the room. The young girl, Gwyneth, was making herself busy pouring tea. The Doctor stood at the mantlepiece in the room. Rose and I stood in front of Sneed, near the Doctor. Rose was fuming, my upset with the man growing as she yelled at him.
"Firs of all you drug me, then you kidnap me, and don't think I didn't feel your hands having a quick wander, you dirty old man." She snapped at him.
"He did what?" I growled, having the urge to punch the man square in his nose.
"I won't be spoken to like this!" He cried back at her.
"Oh, you will! If you are lucky, that is all that will happen to you. You sick bastard." I moved to step closer to him but the Doctor grabbed my arm and pulled me back a bit. I huffed and pulled my arm out of his grasp, sending a wave of pain through my shoulder once again. Luckily the anger and adrenaline quickly numbed the pain.
"Then you stuck me in a room full of zombies! And if that ain't enough, you swan off and leave me to die! So come on, talk!" Rose continued to yell at the man.
"It's not my fault. It's this house. It always had a reputation. Haunted. But I never had much bother until a few months back, and then the stiffs," Sneed paused, seeing the disapproving looks everyone seemed to be giving him. "the er, dear departed started getting restless." He tried to explain.
"Tommyrot." Charles rebutted.
"You witnessed it. Can't keep the beggars down, sir. They walk. And it's the queerest thing, but they hang on to scraps." Sneed insisted. Gwyneth walked over to the Doctor and put a mug on the mantlepiece that he was leaning on.
"Two sugars, sir, just how you like it." She said timidly. She turned to me. "Are you sure you don' t want anything miss?" She asked.
"I'm sure. Thank you though." I had forgiven her actions when I had realized that she did whatever Sneed told her. She was terrified of him. I should have realized earlier that she wasn't to blame. She had seemed so afraid when we reached the funeral home. She nodded at me and continued on, back to the teapot. I turned to Sneed. "What do you mean they hang on to scraps?" I questioned.
"One old fellow who used to be a sexton almost walked into his own memorial service. Just like the old lady going to your performance, sir, just as she planned." He addressed Charles rather than myself.
"Morbid fancy." Charles retorted.
"Oh, Charles, you were there." The Doctor tried to reason with him.
"I saw nothing but an illusion." Charles was hanging onto what little rationality he could muster given the circumstances. At first I couldn't blame him. For most, when you see something strange and unexplainable, you try to rationalize it. You try to explain away any little thing that seems impossible as a trick of the eye or a hallucination from exhaustion. I seem to be one of the strange exceptions to this habit.
"If you're going to deny it, don't waste my time. Just shut up." The Doctor spat at Charles. I rounded on him.
"Stop being so rude." I muttered at him, keeping my voice low.
"We have more important things to deal with." He argued with me, his voice just as low as mine as if we were trying to keep our argument private.
"There are better ways to get your point across you idiot." I snapped. He rolled his eyes and turned back to Sneed.
"What about the gas?" He questioned, giving me a look as if to say 'see I can be nice'. I looked away from him, not willing to show him my annoyance.
"That's new, sir. Never seen anything like that." Sneed explained with much less attitude than before.
"Means it's getting stronger, the rift's getting wider and something's sneaking through." The Doctor explained, almost to himself. He seemed to do this quite a bit when he assumed that we wouldn't understand what he was talking about.
"What's the rift?" Rose questioned. I hoped that he would actually explain things in a way that would make sense to us instead of just assuming we couldn't possibly understand. I watched him carefully. He met my eyes before speaking.
"It's a weak point in time and space. A connection between this place and another." He tried to explain, without sounding rude. I was thankful. Maybe my nagging was getting through. "That's the cause of ghost stories, most of the time." Charles was now standing, looking incredulous and upset.
"That's how I got the house so cheap. Stories going back generations." Sneed explained. It seemed as though Charles had heard enough. He quickly walked out of the room, slamming the door behind him. I frowned sadly at the door before turning to Sneed.
"What kind of stories?" I asked, genuinely intrigued.
"Echoes in the dark, queer songs in the air, and this feeling like a shadow passing over your soul. Mind you, truth be told, it's been good for business. Just what people expect from a gloomy old trade like mine." He explained, finally willing to address me. Gwyneth walked out the door opposite the one Charles had left through. I glanced at the Doctor who nodded. He followed Charles while Rose and I followed Gwyneth. We found her in the pantry, lighting a gas lamp. Rose walked over to the dishes.
"You wash, I'll dry." She smirked at me. I rolled my eyes at her but joined her nonetheless.
"Please, misses, you shouldn't be helping. It's not right." Gwyneth tried to protest.
"Don't worry about it. I owe it to you for being so rude earlier. I let my worry and anger get the best of me." I apologized, handing Rose another dish to dry. I had been wanting to apologize to Gwyneth for a while but hadn't had the opportunity. She smiled gratefully at me.
"It is alright miss. You don't need to help me though." She gestured toward the dishes that Rose and I were finishing.
"Don't be daft. Sneed works you to death. How much do you get paid?" Rose interjected.
"Eight pound a year, miss." Gwyneth smiled happily.
"How much?" Rose was dumbstruck at the low number. I tried to see if I remembered just how much was normal for the time period, but came out empty handed.
"I know. I would've been happy with six." Gwyneth smiled. Evidently it was a lot for the time for her profession. At least she was happy. That's what really matters right?
"So, did you go to school or what?" Rose questioned Gwyneth, who looked almost insulted by Rose's insinuation.
"Of course I did. What do you think I am, an urchin? I went every Sunday, nice and proper." Gwyneth announced proudly. I smiled at her. I kept trying to see if I could remember anything about 1860's history other than Charles' works. It seemed as if anything other than major historic events had been blocked out with any other memories from before I was 16. It was a little more than annoying.
"What, once a week?" Rose continued questioning Gwyneth.
"We did sums and everything. To be honest, I hated every second." She replied sheepishly, as if it were a horrible secret that she wasn't to tell anyone.
"Me too." Rose chuckled. I gave her a grin as she dried the last dish.
"I remember that all too well." I teased. "You used to ask me to pick you up during my lunches."
"Don't tell anyone, but one week, I didn't go and ran on the heath all on my own." Gwyneth giggled.
"I did plenty of that. Like Nix said, I used to go down to the shops with my mate Shareen. We used to go and look at boys." Rose giggled as well. I shook my head at her with a chuckle. I didn't want to encourage her leaving school, but a break every now and then wasn't too bad. Right? Gwyneth looked shocked at this.
"Well, I don't know much about that, miss." She looked down.
"Come on, times haven't changed that much. I bet you've done the same." Rose tried.
"I don't think so, miss." Gwyneth continued to look down. I figured it was frowned upon to be looking after others without courting them.
"Gwyneth, you can tell us. I bet you've got your eye on someone." Rose prodded once again. I watched carefully, hoping that Gwyneth wouldn't get upset by this.
"I suppose. There is one lad." She sheepishly admitted. "The butcher's boy. He comes by every Tuesday. Such a lovely smile on him." She smiled at the thought of this man. The smile warmed me.
"I've always loved a nice smile, the eyes are what get me though." I smiled at her.
"You always have had a fascination with peoples eyes." Rose chuckled at me. I looked at her. "Why is that? I mean, they're good to look at but you seem really interested in them."
"A persons eyes reveal quite a lot about them. You can see emotions, get an understanding of how they're feeling, see if they're being honest, and you get a true feeling of who they are." I shrugged. Rose seemed impressed by my detail of why I liked looking people in the eyes. "What about you?" I asked her.
"Good smile, nice bum." Rose giggled. I shook my head at her.
"Well, I have never heard the like." Gwyneth gasped.
"Ask the boy out." Rose suggested.
"Give him a cup of tea or something like that. It's a good start. It will get you two talking." I encouraged.
"I swear it is the strangest thing, miss. You've got all the clothes and the breeding, but you talk like some sort of wild thing." She addressed Rose. I bit my lip to hold in laughter. Rose just smiled.
"Maybe I am." She started.
"Oh, you definitely are." I added. Rose laughed before turning back to Gwyneth.
"Maybe that's a good thing. You need a bit more in your life than Mister Sneed." She finished.
"Oh, now that's not fair. He's not so bad, old Sneed. He was very kind to me to take me in because I lost my mum and dad to the flu when I was twelve." Gwyneth recounted sadly.
"Oh, I'm sorry." Rose apologized.
"I'm so sorry." I added.
"Thank you, misses. But I'll be with them again, one day, sitting with them in paradise. I shall be so blessed. They're waiting for me. Maybe your dad's up there waiting for you too, miss." Gwyneth addressed Rose. Both of our eyes widened at this. "And maybe you will meet your parents again miss." She addressed me this time. I felt my mouth go dry. As far as she knew, Rose was my sister. In fact, everyone except Rose and the Doctor believed she was my sister.
"Maybe. Er, who told you he was dead?" Rose asked suspiciously, giving me a questioning glance. I simply shook my head no, letting her know that it wasn't I who had told Gwyneth something. Gwyneth seemed shaken at this.
" I don't know. Must have been the Doctor." She tried to explain it away.
"Her father died years back. I don't believe the Doctor knows anything about it." I tried to gently explain to Gwyneth. "And I never said that Rose wasn't my sister."
"But she has been thinking about him lately more than ever. And you, you have so many unanswered questions about your family and existence." She seemed a little distant as she spoke to me.
"I suppose so. How do you know all this?" Rose asked carefully. She seemed more confused than worried. I, on the other hand, was concerned. I was worried for Gwyneth.
"Mister Sneed says I think too much. I'm all alone down here." She paused before changing the subject. "I bet you've got dozens of servants, haven't you , misses?" She asked Rose.
"No, no servants where we're from." Rose shook her head.
"And you've both come such a long way." She became distant once again.
"What makes you think so?" I asked her gently. She looked at us both with slightly glazed over eyes.
"You're from London. I've seen London in drawings, but never like that. All those people rushing about half naked, for shame. And the noise, and the metal boxes racing past, and the birds in the sky, no, they're metal as well. Metal birds with people in them. People are flying. And you two, you've flown so far. Further than anyone. The things you've seen. The darkness, the caged bird, and the big bad wolf. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, misses." She seemed more like herself now. The distant look was gone and her eyes had returned to normal. Still I wasn't reassured. For some reason the phrase 'the caged bird' echoed within me. My head started aching and my stomach turned. I tried to remain unfazed on the outside.
"It's alright." Rose comforted Gwyneth, giving me a questioning look. I gave a soft smile to tell her that I was fine.
"I can't help it. Ever since I was a little girl, my mam said I had the sight. She told me to hide it." Gwyneth sounded close to tears. I didn't know what to say to comfort her.
"But it's getting stronger, more powerful, is that right?" All three of us turned to see the Doctor standing in the doorway to the pantry. I was surprised that none of us had noticed him standing there.
"All the time, sir. Every night, voices in my head." She continued.
"You grew up on top of the rift. You're part of it. You're the key." He explained to her gently.
"I've tried to make sense of it, sir. Consulted with spiritualists, table rappers, all sorts." She sounded distressed.
"Well, that should help. You can show us what to do." He smiled at her. I raised an eyebrow at him.
"What to do where, sir?" She questioned, just as confused as me.
"We're going to have a séance." He smirked, gesturing for us to come out of the pantry. Rose and Gwyneth led the group. The Doctor and I held back a bit.
"Are you alright?" He asked me. Maybe the headache had caused me to pale a bit. Maybe he was just asking about my outbursts earlier in the evening. I wasn't sure.
"Something doesn't feel right. I don't really spook easily, but this doesn't settle well with me." I stopped walking as another surge of pain filled my head. I slowed my breathing.
"What's wrong?" He asked me nervously.
"Just a headache. I get them all the time. Nothing big." I waved him off as I dug through my bag for a bottle of pills. I poured two into my hand and swallowed them without water. "I'll be fine in a little while. We should join the others." I continued on, slightly unsteady on my feet. He grabbed my arm to help me.
"Why don't you sit this out? You don't look very well." He suggested, leading me into the sitting room we had been in before. "Do you want to go back to the Tardis?" He asked.
"No, no way. I'm not leaving you two here alone. I just need a couple minutes and I'll be fine." I shook my head, dreading the idea of leaving him and Rose alone. "Why are you being like this after our row earlier?" I asked, confused. When I argued with most people, they stayed mad at me for quite a while.
"It was only that, a row. It's not the first and I doubt it will be the last. We're both stubborn. Now, just sit and rest. We'll come get you when we're done. Please just sit." He urged as he helped me into a chair. I felt my energy draining so I gave in and nodded.
"Fine. But if you're not back in here in 20 minutes, I'm coming to find you." I gave him a steady look, telling him that I wasn't joking.
"Alright. We'll be back soon." He quickly left the room, closing the door gently behind him. I heard muffled voices from another room. Rose seemed worried at first before the Doctor reassured her. This headache was worse than most. I rarely felt so weak or tired. As the medicine kicked in, my eyes began to droop and darkness consumed me.