The Doctor had reached the sixth floor bypassing the elevator and running for all he was worth up the stairs. He headed straight for Melody's apartment. He knocked loudly several times and shouted Melody's name through the door. He got no response. By then Dayle B had caught up with him.
She was out of breath. "Try the knob." she suggested. He did and found it locked.
They looked at each other. She shrugged. "Sonic that bitch." He obliged.
They entered Melody's living room to find it in utter disarray. A small mirror knocked off the wall, shattered. The coffee table had been set on end. A potted plant broken, soil everywhere. The Doctor felt the knot in his stomach grow larger. When they walked around the sofa, they found Melody herself lifeless on the floor.
"Oh my GOD!' Dayle B yelled. She immediately went to her neighbor and checked for a pulse.
The Doctor ran further into the apartment shouting for Dayle. He burst into the back bedroom and found nothing out of order. No sign of her at all. He was beside himself. If anything had happened to her...
"Doctor! She's coming around!" He headed back out to the living room and found Dayle B knelt on the floor helping Melody up to a sitting position. He crouched there in front of her, watched her eyelids flutter. She took a deep breath in and coughed.
The Doctor examined her arm, pointed to a raised purple welt. "It look like she's been stung. The effects can last several hours but she should be alright." He did a quick scan with his Sonic, saw her vitals were fairly stable.
"Melody..." he said softly. "Are you alright? What's happened?" He watched as her eyes came into focus on him.
A look of panic came over her. "Mrs. Anderson!" she croaked, coughing some more.
Dayle B looked from Melody to the Doctor in confusion. "Mrs. Anderson?"
Melody sat up a bit straighter at the sound of Dayle's voice. "Dayle! You're Ok! When I saw that... that creature grab you, I-I-I tried to hit it with my English Ivy plant. And that just made it mad and it... it zapped me with something. That's the last thing I remember." She put a hand to her head, confused.
The Doctor stood up, feeling numb. He paced. "Melody. The creature. Why was it here? When exactly did Aaron return?"
Melody still looked disoriented but her wits were returning quickly. "Aaron?" She gave an angry little laugh. "What's he got to do with anything? That bastard apparently cleaned out my bank account and ran off to Florida with some female mime he'd met while busking out on Euclid avenue."
The Doctor and Dayle B looked at each other, speechless at the news.
Melody held out her hand for help up. He and Dayle B both pulled her to her feet. She swayed a bit but made it to the sofa.
Dayle B was beyond confused. "Well who the fuck was the creature then!?"
"That's what I've been trying to tell you! It was Mrs. Anderson! She comes nearly every morning to give me knitting lessons. She was here as usual and we had our tea and watched a little Downton Abbey together. There was a knock at the door a-a-and it was Dayle and when she walked in..." Melody shook her head, clearly having trouble accepting what she'd witnessed. "When she walked in, Mrs. Anderson just changed. It was like her body melted away leaving behind a giant red cockroach thing. It was horrible!" She was shaking.
"Who is Mrs. Anderson?" The Doctor asked Dayle B, mystified.
"The old woman down the hall. With the cane. You and Dayle A were on the elevator with her the day you came back." Dayle B gasped, her hand to her mouth. "Arc must have taken her!"
Melody was looking at her oddly. "Dayle A? What is that supposed to mean."
The Doctor looked around the room, searching for any sign that Dayle, his Dayle had indeed been here this morning. He didn't want to believe it. He wanted to believe that perhaps she'd gone off on her own to investigate the things she'd mentioned. That Melody was somehow mistaken.
"Doctor what should we do? Does Arc have Dayle now?" Dayle B's voice was urgent. But something more urgent had caught the Doctor's attention.
He walked slowly to where the mirror was shattered near the apartment door. He knelt down among the reflective shards, some crunching beneath his shoes. He picked up his mobile phone with a shaking hand.
Dayle B groaned. "Oh shit. Is that your phone? That's what she called me from this morning."
"Who is she!?" Melody wondered, growing impatient with being left out of the loop.
He pressed a button, lighting up the now cracked screen. Dayle had been in the process of texting Dayle B. She'd never gotten to finish the message, let alone hit send."Arc is here tell..." was as far as she'd gotten.
Dayle B was trying her best to explain a second Dayle to Melody without much luck. He had all but tuned them out at this point, his pulses pounding inside his head, his jaw clenching. The Doctor was enraged.
But it was nothing compared to what he felt when he noticed the mostly dried blood he was standing in. There was a puddle about the size of a fist. There were also small drops of blood on the phone...and on the door frame...and on the carpet leading out into the hallway.
He turned slowly and looked at the two women. They stopped talking immediately when they saw his ice cold expression. "Show me to Mrs. Anderson's apartment." he demanded sharply.
Mrs. Anderson's Apartment, Moments Later
"What's happened to this place?" Melody whispered, looking around incredulously. She'd followed the Doctor and Dayle B through the door after he'd gained entry with the Sonic.
The apartment was sparsely lit, most of the light bulbs apparently removed. Vegetation had somehow overtaken the apartment which was dank as a cave. Alien vines and fronds climbed the walls and ceiling. The furniture was covered with some type of unspeakable organic matter. Thick strands of red pulsating material ran from ceiling to floor in some areas. The smell was nothing nice either.
"This is fucking disgusting." Dayle B said distastefully, covering her nose with the top of her scrub shirt.
The Doctor pointed the Sonic Screwdriver around what once was a living room, scanning. The results told him it had been in this condition for a full three years. Which meant Arc had come directly here and had taken over Mrs. Anderson's life upon entering this universe.
"You two hang back." His voice was grim. "I'm going to check the bedroom. There's no telling what I might find there."
He opened the door and found the room in much the same condition as the rest of the old woman's home. Only, back in the bedroom, the Doctor also spotted a large, red shape in a dark corner. The Doctor used his Sonic as a torch and discovered that it was a body print containment receptacle.
He ran toward it, removed several layers of red sludge and managed to tear the top cover off. The old woman was curled up unconscious inside. She'd been there, immobile for three years, being kept alive by the pod's life support system. He lifted her out gently, laid her down on the floor and scanned her with the Sonic. About then Dayle B's patience had run out and she ran back to join him, Melody following at a distance.
"Dammit!" Dayle B groaned. "Is she dead?" She fell to her knees and touched her motionless neighbor's arm gently.
The Doctor shook his head. "No. But I've no idea what sort of condition she's in either. Mentally I mean. I don't know what sort of level of awareness she's had this whole time. It's quite possible the last thing she remembers is three years ago."
Mrs. Anderson's eyes suddenly flew open. She blinked and looked around the dim room. She sat up without any help and gazed in confusion at the faces surrounding her.
"Holy crap!" The old woman rasped, rubbing the back of her neck. "I had this crazy dream some big red rubbery monster covered in suckers broke into my apartment." She narrowed her eyes at the Doctor. "What on earth is the electric guy doing here?"
Dayle B and Melody helped Mrs. Anderson up while the Doctor further searched the bedroom. Normally Zygons kept a large super computer at their base. They used organic technology and their ships and computers were partially biological. But from River, he knew that Arc had made it to this universe with only a portable one. If it had survived the crash, Arc had likely taken it with him when he'd taken Dayle... He clenched his teeth and tears came to his eyes at the thought of her being hurt. He wiped his hand over his face and turned to face the women.
"Right, Dayle B, take Mrs. Anderson back to your apartment and check her over. Get her tea, something to eat. Make sure she's warm. You know, the whole nursey thing." He rubbed his hands together frenetically. "Before I go, I will need you to give me your mother's address. I have a strange feeling about that other Focusing Amplifier."
Dayle B fixed him with a withering stare. "If you think I'm just going to stay behind and play nursemaid, you haven't learned a damn thing about me." She crossed her arms, raised her eyebrows. "Jesse and I will both be coming with you."
The Doctor gestured helplessly.
"And I'm coming too." Melody stated firmly. She crossed her arms as well.
The Doctor looked over at Melody then. She was trying so hard to look brave in the face of all this strangeness. He smiled faintly. He had a whole new respect for her. Vapid she may be but she had put herself in harm's way trying to protect Dayle.
"Ok, you" he said, gesturing to Dayle B, "get Mrs. Anderson to your apartment. Make her comfortable and then you and Jesse meet us out at the TARDIS."
He walked over and took Melody by the hand. "Come along Pond."
