"You?"
Charlie couldn't think where from, but he recognised the girl standing in front of him. It felt like he knew her from some other lifetime.
Her name was Samara. Her pale skin shimmered with an ethereal light – a stark contrast to her malevolent black eyes; two dense neutron stars pulsating within a glittering body of constellations.
Samara's ethereal quality did not lessen the threat radiating from her. She somehow had a very physical weight, despite her ghostly appearance.
"Yes…" she hissed, pressing a finger playfully to her lips, projecting an expression of faux innocence.
Charlie could sense that Samara was far more dangerous, and far more frightening than any of the terrors he had encountered with the Doctor.
He knew she was evil. He felt it the moment he laid eyes on her. He reacted with such innate horror, as it conjured up the memories of a whole other reality – an afterlife, where she had destroyed him.
"Now, there is… one thing I don't understand," she spoke, strutting towards him, invading his personal space.
"Why is that your deepest, darkest nightmare? A mere… argument at a party?"
Charlie shook his head. He had no desire to explain anything to her, but he was too scared not to answer.
"I…"
"Tell me…" she whispered, her warm breath caressing his nose.
She touched his chin, and he flinched.
"Is it because he's… gay?" she sneered.
"No!" he whispered.
"The idea of which, is an abhorrence in your culture?" Samara simpered.
"No," Charlie's voice was small. He was a mouse at the mercy of a dozen hungry, prowling cats, struggling to make his tiny voice heard.
"I lost my friend," he spoke honestly. "I pushed him away. It was days before I spoke to him again. I avoided him at school. Ignored all his calls."
He hung his head. Bitter tears stung his cheeks, fuelled by fury and self-loathing. "I should have tried to understand, but I was too scared."
Charlie choked on the last of his words, and Samara took over.
"You're scared of your sexuality."
Charlie tried to argue, but instead drowned in Samara's laughter.
"Passion, temptation…" she licked her lips, "Giving in to lust when you know you really shouldn't. It's kinda my thing."
Samara stepped away, ascending back into the heavens, like an angel of darkness.
"You fear it. You fear your innermost desires. You fear to love. And I love your fear!" Samara roared, her unblinking black eyes wide with excitement.
She giggled, returning to his bubble of space in an instant. "Maybe I should have been a Samuel instead. Then you'd have stayed."
Charlie ground his teeth in infuriation – and shame, and tried to look away.
But there was nowhere else to look. He couldn't escape Samara's ghostly figure, or her wicked smile.
"Well done, by the way," she simpered, "Escaping that little reality I built for you. I'm very impressed. The Doctor would be so proud."
Charlie frowned.
"I gave you a reality where you could be together with your 'just friend' for the rest of existence. And you swapped it for this," she sang, gesturing at the emptiness around them. "Are you sure you made the right decision?"
"Gave...?" Charlie muttered, staring at the space where Nate had vanished, his brows furrowing. "You… made that world?"
"Oh yes!" Samara grinned. "A lot of things were because of me, as you'll soon discover."
Charlie shook his head, struggling to make sense of it. He understood that Samara was evil – powerful. She had made him a world where Nate was back in his life – but why?
"That dream was your ultimate desire. The one thing in the universe you want most – even if it meant reaching beyond death. Your infinite quest…"
A mocking grin.
"...To get your boyfriend back."
"He wasn't… He was just my friend," Charlie quickly mumbled.
"I don't care," Samara sighed. "You're boring me now. Booooooriiiiiiiing…"
Her interest was waning. Which meant her interest in keeping him alive was quickly dissipating. He had nothing left to lose. So he might as well ask…
"What is this place?" Charlie glanced around at the surrounding emptiness. "Where are we? Another dream?"
"No," Samara dismissed him, a hint of disappointment evident in her tone. "We're not anywhere."
"What?"
"Welcome to the Dark Place of the Inside," she declared grandly; her captivated, wide-eyed gaze snapped back to him.
Charlie stared back at her, his eyes dead. "Is that supposed to mean something?"
"Here, you are both existent, and non-existent, simultaneously."
"So I'm Schrödinger's cat?" he uttered acerbically.
Samara's playful gleam evaporated.
"Every molecule of your being is suspended in nothingness," she hissed, "There's no passage of time. We are both never and forever. There's no physical space – we are neither here nor there."
She whipped round, burning furiously, clawing at the air.
"It's torture!" Samara glared at him. "It's my prison."
She stepped back – just one step - and shrugged. "Was my prison. It's yours now."
Samara paused, took a breath, and started humming.
Charlie suddenly felt deeply uncomfortable; his insides turned cold.
Samara's eyes drifted shut, and she began to sway with the discordant sound.
What was she doing? Charlie found Samara's airy movements unsettling.
His neck twitched, and Samara's eyes flicked up to meet his.
She had stopped humming, but the noise was still there. Barely audible – he wasn't completely certain he could still hear it, but that hum was still in his head.
"You're not sure, are you?" Samara enquired, reading his thoughts.
"Who are you?" Charlie demanded. "What are you?"
"I am your nightmares!" she hissed, extending her arms in a regal manner, "I am of the Mara!"
"What's the Mara?"
"The most feared being in all the galaxies, once upon a time…"
Charlie nodded at her body. "Not exactly nightmarish, now, huh?" he challenged her.
She threw him a scathing look.
"Oh, Charlie, we've barely scratched the surface."
In an instant, she had grabbed him. Her hands curled around his throat. Her fingers seemed to slither and slide, moist against his skin.
An image of a giant serpent flashed at the forefront of his mind.
"That's you," Charlie realised. "You're-"
Charlie gasped, as Samara's fingers extended, like tendrils, and slithered into his ears. The vines pushed through his skull, exploring his mind.
"…the Mara…" he whimpered.
He pulled away from her hands – they were just hands. But the strangling sensation crawling around his brain was still there.
"You're inside my head," Charlie spluttered, in horror.
The Mara shrugged. "I'm in your head, you're in mine."
"You've been there for… all this time!"
She nodded.
"How did you get there?" Charlie demanded, prodding his temple. "How long have you been there?"
"Oh, dear…" the Mara mocked him.
"It was that first nightmare, wasn't it? The one with the Wraith? Is that how you invaded my mind? When it was… open to another dimension?"
The Mara's eyes glinted, as she scoffed at his naivety.
"No, I facilitated that little interaction."
Charlie shot her a puzzled look. "I don't understand?"
"Oh, sweetie," she laughed, "there's so much you don't understand."
She inclined her head, taking pity on him.
"Shall I explain?"
Without waiting for him to either accept or decline, the Mara continued.
"You were just a weak, pathetic, little child, crying his eyes out over some boy at school. Easy prey." The Mara stroked his jawline, her sensuousness making Charlie more and more uncomfortable by the second.
"I saw an opportunity to get a little action, and opened you right up. Lit you up like a beacon, so all those hungry, hungry Wraiths could get through."
"But I stopped them!" Charlie snapped. "I defeated them!"
"Oh, no," the Mara giggled. "No, no, no! Oh, you poor thing. You don't seriously think…"- she laughed –"that you did that?"
"But…?" Charlie's heart sank.
"No, I did," she uttered, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"You did?" Charlie uttered in disbelief.
"Of course! It got a little bit too close for comfort, I admit. They would have totally killed you."
Charlie frowned. "Then why didn't you let them?"
"Something else came up. Something… far more tempting," the Mara intoned.
"The Doctor?"
"Yes. I made a tactical decision when you ran into the Doctor. You see, he and I go way back. I've lost count of how many times we've destroyed one other."
Charlie struggled to recall his first encounter with the Doctor. It seemed so long ago, now.
"In that moment, an idea struck me. I thought: I can use him. Through the Doctor, I could have all of time and space."
The Mara stretched her arms out in an opulent gesture, reaching out into the darkness, and drawing out every syllable in grandeur.
"Why settle for your world when I can have every world? So I made sure you both survived that little incident with those Wraiths."
"But that was my idea," Charlie grunted.
"What was, sweetie?" She was making him feel like a child.
"It was my idea to use him," Charlie insisted, "Use the Doctor, and… I thought he could bring Nate back."
Charlie fought to understand everything. He was sure that he had made those decisions. How could those thoughts not have been his own?
The Mara frowned.
"You think the Doctor would do that for you? He wouldn't change time for you. You're not important."
"I know," Charlie muttered.
"The Arachnids. The Doctor pulled you into that one," the Mara explained, "You survived them because of me."
"But…?"
"I crushed that pathetic bug's bones when she tried to make a move on me."
"You… you did, didn't you?"
"You're welcome!" she sang.
Charlie was floundering. His memories were clouded, his thoughts muddled and chaotic. This didn't make sense.
"I got some really nice ideas from that, actually. Very scary!"
"I'm not scared of you," Charlie uttered, his voice wavering.
"No?"
"No," Charlie muttered defiantly.
The Mara tilted her head, unmoved. "We'll see about that."
