This is novel 4 out of 5 in the order of: Unusual Circumstances, Nasty Surprises, Interrogating Answers, Time Heals and The Day of Destruction. This follows directly from the ending of Interrogating Answers.
Prologue
The Island
To begin with there is nothing but darkness and a chill that tickles against Amelia Lustworve's skin. She is aware of the sound of the wind blowing lightly against the panes of glass windows, but once her vision comes into focus, she finds herself in the living room to her family's cottage. Light shines brightly in her face as she sits on her knees in front of the fireplace, poking at the burning logs with an iron poker. Despite the damp smell around her, the roaring fire somewhat eases Amelia's troubled mind as she tries to take in the grey stone fireplace and the dusty grey floorboards she is kneeling upon.
The golden clock on the mantelpiece ticks away loudly like a beating metronome, but it only leaves shivers down Amelia's spine. It is mid-afternoon in early October but the salty sea air of the Island makes it feel closer to December.
Amelia continues to poke at the fire and listens carefully to the sounds around the cottage, hoping that her father will not wake up.
Their cottage was once filled with happiness and joy ten years ago but after the sudden and unexpected death of her mother, the cottage never saw another day of happiness. Then it was only five years ago that everything on the Island had changed. The Black Lighthouse came alive and flashed five times for the first time since anyone can remember. The unknown Black Lighthouse that no one dared to enter suddenly sparked to life, and it only created fear on the Island. Her father never recovered from the battle that occurred against unfathomable creatures from different worlds. Nor did more than half of the civilians on the Island. The Day of Destruction had begun for the fifth time and despite everyone's hope, it did not end the Battle of the Cytracik.
Now at fifteen years old, Amelia is caring for her weak father and she cannot wish for anything more than for her father to recover.
But the only thing that really haunts Amelia's mind is knowing that it is the next five year anniversary and the Black Lighthouse is bound to come alive again. Tomorrow will be the tenth year of Day of Destruction and Amelia only hopes that it will be the last.
Suddenly Amelia jumps to her feet in fear at the sound of a chair scraping across the floorboards behind her. However she is only to find her father, Ellis Lustworve, leaning one hand heavily against one of the wooden chairs by their dining table and a glass in his other hand as he tries to make his way towards the kitchen sink. Although her father is only in his early forties, he has aged greatly in the past five years. His eyes are always empty and his pale face is hollow. His once brown hair has already started to turn grey and his beard is the same. His hand clutching onto the glass, shakes as he takes more slow steps forward.
"Dad, let me do that for you!" Amelia pleads as she rushes across the room towards her father.
Ellis looks over at her with his eyes and shakes his head before continuing to walk towards the sink.
Amelia sighs. "Dad, you need to rest, you're not strong enough to do anything."
"I am capable of pouring myself a glass of water, Amelia." Her father croaks.
"You mustn't put so much strain on your body otherwise you'll never recover." Amelia stands by the dining table, watching her father helplessly.
Her father shakes his head once more and shouts. "I can handle this myself!" But just as he says so, his shaking hand drops the glass and it smashes against the dusty floorboards. Both Amelia and her father remain silent for a short while.
Silently, Amelia takes hold of her father's arm and directs him to his armchair opposite the fireplace. He sinks down uneasily and leans back in the seat, closing his eyes and letting out a loud deflated sigh. Amelia quickly pours another glass of water for him and places it on the small round coffee table by his armchair. Ellis opens one eye to look at the glass of water beside him that is siting next to the picture frame of his wife.
Amelia settles down by her father's feet as she pulls off his socks and replaces them with new thicker ones.
"Dad," Amelia begins in a quiet voice. "You do know that tomorrow is the next fifth year anniversary of the Black Lighthouse? It is the tenth race."
Ellis looks down at his daughter.
"And it's the Day of Destruction also." Amelia timidly looks away from her father, trying her hardest to avoid his eye.
"And am I going to have a reminder of this every five years?" Ellis asks in a deep voice. "These stupid races happen every year and it's always the fifth year that something serious happens because of that lighthouse," Ellis closes his eyes at the memories. "Heat Miles gains nothing from this other than humiliation for the last battle five years ago. They force their civilians to volunteer into the slaughter house, making them believe they are being heroes for it."
Ellis used to work alongside Heat Miles when Amelia was only little. He worked with them for as long as she could remember but after her mother died, they did very little for compensation. Amelia knew that her father never liked Heat Miles, the government of this Island and more often then not, he would tell her things she never knew. Like now, she didn't know that the Day of Destruction is only a way for Heat Miles to get back at them.
Yet Amelia wants to do something that she knows her fathers has wanted to do for many years. She wants to defy Heat Miles. To stop the Day of Destruction and to put an end to the Battle of the Cytracik for once and for all.
Amelia hesitates for a moment. "I just feel like something needs to be done to save this," She then looks up at her father. "Sending out ten volunteers once a year to run into the woods and fight what's in there really isn't going to do much more help. You know that, dad. You volunteered the last time the Black Lighthouse came alive."
Ellis' leg twitches violently in fear and Amelia springs away, narrowly avoiding being kicked. Ellis suddenly jumps out of the armchair, his words coming out in a frantic manner as he remembers the battle in the woods. The battle in an attempt to destroy the Cytracik. He was fighting alone against the creatures there and even his bow and arrows were not enough to fight against their powers.
"Dad, calm down!" Amelia pleads as she takes a step closer to her father.
"There is no way I'm letting you volunteer to go into the woods, Amelia! I lost your mother ten years ago because of it and I can't lose you!" Ellis warns.
"But we're going to lose each other if at least something isn't done!"
"You're not fighting!" Ellis passes Amelia and storms over to the fireplace. He rests both his hands heavily on the mantelpiece as he looks down at the golden clock that continues to beat like a metronome. The light of the fire reflects in his watery eyes.
"As a community, we don't have the strength or the power to rid everything that's lurking in those woods. But maybe if we destroyed the Black Lighthouse, we might be able to save ourselves. The Battle of the Cytracik would be over and we would never have to go through another Day of Destruction. That carnival that's currently on could turn into a yearly holiday and we'll know we're safe." Amelia wrings her hands as she watches her father expectantly.
Ellis is silent for a long while as he continues to look down at the clock, but eventually he smirks and chuckles quietly to himself. He pushes away from the fireplace and turns to his daughter who is watching him with hope in her eyes. She has far too much naïve hope for a fifteen year old.
"I love you, Amelia," Ellis says as he cups her face with one hand. "But I can't afford to lose you either way." He bends down and plants a firm kiss on her forehead.
There is a blank space in Amelia's memory between that moment to when she finds herself watching her father sleep in his bed as she sits in the wooden chair at the end of his bedroom. She sits at a slight tilt in the chair. Her arms are folded tightly across her chest and she counts the seconds between Ellis' breathing. He is fast asleep yet he looks restless.
Amelia remains in the chair all afternoon and only leaves the house once it is twilight.
There is nothing more disturbing to April Hollerford than seeing the beach, the harsh waves of the sea and the Black Lighthouse at a different angle to what she is used to.
The whole scene is far below her and she feels so distant from everything she knows, yet sitting down on the grass on top of the cliff over-looking the beach does not make April feel any safer. She has briefly lived in the mind of a young fifteen year old girl called Amelia who desperately wants to help her father recover and to stop the Black Lighthouse, but now April's nightmare has suddenly taken her back to her own mind and body.
Yet only this time it is not daylight and she isn't standing down on the slimy rocks at the bottom of the cliff, watching her own body double as she looks out across the beach towards the Black Lighthouse. This time her nightmare has jumped from the life of Amelia Lustworve back to herself, sitting on top of the cliff and looking down at the beach. It is twilight and there is a thin fog that hangs in the air.
April's body double is nowhere in sight.
As the wind continues to blow harshly and the waves lap up the shore, April slowly looks down at her bare arms. The icy coldness really biting away at her heart as she looks at the nearly faded scars all up her left wrist. The scars that she created herself using razor blades and any other sharp objects she could find in the house as she lived in constant fear and depression under the threat of Bruce Fey, who once was a family friend before he was killed during the Battle of the Cytracik. It was only a shape shifter that had taunted her but it was the threatening look on Bruce's face as he attacked her. Her right wrist is clean of any scars that once were there. The skin was completely burnt away after the explosion of Battersea Power Station in the parallel world, and now a new layer of skin is there.
But that was all in the parallel world.
And for the first time since April's parent's died when her nightmare first started to occur, it has suddenly changed, and everything about April's appearance in her nightmare also changed in accordance to her life.
Over two years have passed since April first fell through the dustbin, landing in wartime London and running away with a man who called himself the Doctor. But that made no effect to her nightmare. It is only what happened to April and April alone and makes the smallest changes in her unconscious state.
The view of the beach looks almost alien from a different angle. Of course everything is still the same as before, but April cannot get how strange it is to be witnessing everything on the beach at a completely different angle to what she is used to.
April scans the beach and the horizon and timidly glances over towards the Black Lighthouse that is closer to her than it was before. Still sitting cross legged in the grass, she finds herself turning around to look what's behind. There is nothing other than a very large stretch of flat grassland. April is curious to see where the large field she is sitting in would take her, if anywhere, and if there would be an end to it, but no matter how many times she tries to encourage herself to stand up, her legs make no effort to move.
April continues to look out at the stretch of grassland behind her before slowly turning back around to look at the beach. But as she turns, her attention is suddenly caught by a scarecrow that is suddenly stood in the middle of the grassland.
April is sure that the scarecrow was not there moments before but that is the last of her concerns. It is just standing there with nothing to support it, looking out to the Black Lighthouse. There aren't even any birds in the sky that needs scaring off.
April starts to care a lot less about the scarecrow when she suddenly feels the stabbing pain through her chest as air around her grows colder. She has never felt this cold in her nightmare before. Her limbs feel numb yet she can do nothing to keep warm. She has suddenly lost feeling in her whole body as she stares down at the beach.
There is nothing she can do.
The Black Lighthouse flashes for the first time and Amelia Lustworve steadily walks along the slippery rocks at the bottom of the cliff. April remains frozen as she watches this fifteen year old girl slowly walk across the beach, her eyes fixed upon the Black Lighthouse.
Amelia looks a little older for her age and her unkempt blonde hair blows in the wind. A brown cloak is wrapped around her shoulders, but April can see a reflection of a knife in one hand. Her other hand is clasped tightly.
When the Black Lighthouse flashes for the second time, April really starts to feel the excruciating pain that is killing her from inside. Whatever it is, April knows that she cannot let Amelia go inside the Black Lighthouse. April attempts to scream as loud as she can but she has lost her voice.
Amelia continues to walk across the beach, completely oblivious to the frantic and fearful April sitting on top of the cliff.
It is almost as if April has blinked and Amelia is already opening the gate in the stone wall. The Black Lighthouse flashes again and again and flashes for the fifth time once Amelia is close enough.
The pain inside April's chest is unbearable, but there is nothing she can do about it. It is too late for Amelia because whatever is in the Black Lighthouse, it has already grabbed onto her and is pulling her inside.
The pain only grows worse and the vision of the beach starts to blur ever so slightly. There are voices shouting and screaming in a frenzy that rings out around her. The screams are more panicked than before and the sound of the battle seems harsher.
There is no welcoming to the Day of Destruction, nor is there a call for Maxwell Hollerford.
April finds herself shaking from the cold air attacking her as well as the excruciating pain inside her chest. The view of the beach starts to tilt sideways and April suddenly feels the blades of grass tickle the side of her face. She curls herself into a ball, shaking as she stares fearfully out to the twilight horizon.
She wishes for nothing more than for everything around her to stop.
Life in the Tardis has suddenly turned into one complicated, panicked mess as the Doctor, Rose and Terry start to frantically run around the ship, trying to help April as much as they can. Her horrifying screams started to ring out around the Tardis only a few hours after they had left the parallel world and landed back in their own universe.
They are back on solid ground. On Earth. But April is no longer there with them.
Terry frantically rinses different flannels in a bucket filled with cold water as she tries to cool April's burning skin, but April's body will not stop moving. She tosses and turns frantically in her bed, her body getting tangled up in the sheets. Her face is in distress and her scowl seems more prominent than ever as she is caught up in her own nightmare. Terry rinses the flannel again and holds it lightly to April's forehead. April is evidently in a lot of pain, but no one knows what to do to help her.
April suddenly falls still for a brief moment, only letting out a small whimper, but it isn't long before she lets out another horrifying cry. She rolls to her side, gripping onto the edge of her pillow and screams out. Her body trembles vigorously as she does so. Sweat pours down her skin, soaking her bed sheets.
Terry wishes that she can rid April from her nightmare but she knows that April has to wake herself up. If Terry, the Doctor or Rose force April to wake up themselves, they will kill her. It is down to April to wake up by herself. But Terry finds herself gritting her teeth in anger. April has been with them for over two years now. Why has she not mentioned anything about her nightmare to them? They all knew that April refused to sleep most often than not and they only assumed that she suffered from insomnia. But neither of them knew that she has been suffering from this nightmare of the Black Lighthouse. This is what the Cytracik gave her after her father, Declan Hollerford managed to open it during the Battle of the Cytracik.
The door to the bedroom clicks open and a distressed looking Doctor cautiously steps in. April's screams stop again and she continues to whimper. No words are exchanged between the Doctor and Terry but they look at each other knowing exactly what the other is thinking. The Doctor steps into the bedroom and Terry moves away from the bed April sleeps in. They pass each other and Terry leaves the room. The Doctor instantly turns to April who is still gripping onto her pillow. She trembles under the covers.
The Doctor looks down at her for a moment before touching her bare arm with the back of his fingers. He feels heat radiating off her yet her skin is stone cold. Something in her nightmare is killing her. Something in the Black Lighthouse.
The Doctor sighs and shakes his head slowly. "Oh, April," He whispers. "I wish you had told me about this sooner. " The Doctor then sits on the edge of the bed and pulls April into his side. She trembles against him and her heavy head falls against his chest. The Doctor holds onto her tightly as he rocks her forward and backwards.
"April, it's the Doctor," He says calmly in her ear. "I know that even in your nightmare you can hear me amongst all those other voices but I urge you to listen to me carefully," The Doctor shifts in his position as April jolts in her sleep. "You have to get out of your nightmare yourself and how you do that is up to you. I can't wake you up and neither can Rose or Terry. You have to wake up yourself." The Doctor looks down at April before pressing his forehead against the top of her head. He closes his eyes tightly and hesitates before he speaks again. However this time he does not verbalise his words. Instead he sends a silent message into April's mind. "I know you can do this, April, you just have to fight. This is what the Cytracik left you and it's up to you to get rid of it," He hesitates again. "And I'm sorry. I'm sorry for giving you false hope. I'm sorry I've lied to you this many times. And I'm sorry you fell in love with someone who is dead. But you always knew that you couldn't stay in that parallel world. I will clear off as much as I can as long as you help yourself."
The Doctor opens his eyes and looks down at April. She is still but her breathing is rapid and uneasy. He gently kisses her on top of her head before sliding off the bed. April falls back onto her pillow. Her scowl is still prominent and she still twitches in her sleep but she looks a little less in pain than before.
The Doctor leaves the bedroom, closing the door quietly behind him and slowly makes his way through the corridors back to the console room. Both Terry and Rose are standing by the console in silence. Terry is staring at the Doctor with her jet black eyes, whereas Rose is looking down at the console screen, watching the image of the Island and the Black Lighthouse. The image that April has been dreaming of and kept from them.
The Doctor goes to stand by Rose's side and switches off the screen.
Rose blinks and looks up at the Doctor. "How is she?"
"I'm sure she's had better nights." The Doctor replies. "There's nothing else we can do. I've done everything I can but she has to help herself."
Rose nods before looking down at the console again. "When Jack Gruntler first informed you of the Battle of the Cytracik and then Declan asked you to look after April, I don't think we quite anticipated the struggle of this adventure."
"Jack warned you that it would be your toughest challenge." Terry says as she walks towards them with her arms crossed.
"Yes but I think we both shrugged that statement off." Rose sighs heavily. "Why didn't she tell us?"
The Doctor shakes his head. "The Battle of the Cytracik might be over by now if she had told us sooner. But we can't change that. We just need to keep moving forward and be there for April."
"And you still have the Cytracik."
There is a pause of silence.
Terry looks from Rose to the Doctor. "These are dark times for the both of you. For all of us. But we're a team. Don't forget that."
The Doctor lifts his head. "And I think these dark times deserve a little bit more fun and laughter," The Doctor's voice is suddenly bright and cheerful as he walks around the circumference of the console. "Why don't we go somewhere in history we've never been to before?"
Rose and Terry exchange glances.
"Enlighten us then." Rose says, smiling as she leans against the console.
Terry folds her arms suspiciously. "You have something up your sleeve."
The Doctor smiles broadly before pulling down a leaver. The Tardis shudders and starts to make its usual groaning noise that seems like music to their ears, as they travel back in time. The Doctor dances around the console as he steers his ship through time. Rose and Terry grip onto the edge of the console, careful not to lose their balance.
For the first time in a long while, Rose starts laughing to herself and excitement runs through all her senses at the prospect of a new upcoming adventure.