Groggily, Theodore opened his icy blue eyes, the sharp pain subsided, but the spilled blood remained liquified due to the humidity of the underground, slowly, his eyes move, the pain of the handgun, a Colt 1911, give or take, mind's still groggy, but that's par course when someone gets pistol whipped.
He's in the lab Lila told him about, in one of the cells. There's no distinct peppery smell, so he didn't have to worry about exposure from the manchineel fumes.
"Oh good, you're awake," he heard Harold looking up at him, wearing sunglasses.
He hung him in chains, feet dangling and padlocked.
"Mm," Theodore blinked as he felt his mind recovering from the whiplash.
Shaking his head disappointedly, Harold goes, "I can't understand your types. I've given you an out, yet here you are, what on earth are you trying to prove?"
He couldn't understand why Theodore's back in the mansion despite him throwing the aloof giant out when he caught him and Lila in the original basement.
"Someone assaulted us with books, don't you think having them arrested for assault's a good idea?" Theodore pointed out that Harold did nothing for them when they were assaulted with books for an unknown assailant.
It's fortunate that Lila's nose wasn't broken, sore, but not broken, else Harold would've been in even worse trouble with him for his failure to act.
Gritting his teeth, Harold retorted, "I'm shocked you haven't gone to the authorities for that!"
Made it sound like he's making light of the accusations made against him and his father.
"But that's no reason for trespassing, so tell me, boy, why on earth are you here?" Harold leaned forward as he demanded to know why Theodore broke into the mansion and Theodore let him know.
"Your father kidnapped and murdered Irvine, didn't he?" Theodore narrowed his icy blue eyes as he asked, as he's unable to move his hands to point at Harold, they're tightly bound in the chains.
Exhaling sharply, Harold summed, "Risking your life for a lost cause, is that what you do, Doctor, no wonder he hired you!"
Theodore scoffed as he pointed out Douglas and Grace, but Harold stated that they knew of his expectations, their actions are their consequences.
"Like Irvine?" Theodore leered at him as Harold stared up with a displeased frown.
Exhaling sharply, Harold rubbed his eyes from underneath his sunglasses, before he sharply stated, "I have no qualms with you, but should you persist, I'll have to deal with you, too. I'm quite interested in your companion's absence, I find it difficult to believe that a woman could've carried both Douglas and Grace out of here, is there someone else you've brought into your little crusade?"
Theodore wouldn't tell him anything, causing him to scoff at Theodore's refusal.
"What did Douglas do to warrant your ire, did he really find your secret passages?" Theodore pointedly asked him, "what could've Grace done to deserve the injury?"
Starring at him, Harold stated flatly, "I warned him of my expectations and he failed to follow them. Simple as that. I told him not to drudge up the old days. As for Grace, as her employer, I am disappointed with her willingness to speak my business with those outside these walls. I warned her, Doctor."
The tone of his voice, it sounded like Harold was a schoolteacher disciplining two disobedient students, his tone didn't rise like a schoolteacher, however.
A hint of candidness in Harold's voice, Theodore caught on, instantly.
"How many did you kill?" Theodore decided to antagonize Harold by asking him while he checked his colt, brushing off the blood from the head wound he'd given Theodore.
Harold lowered his colt as he then asked his own, a bit with a dry, "Mine or his?"
Theodore scorned this as he replied with a sharp, "Yours."
Scoffing, Harold answered with a sneer as he looked at him, "I never tell my business with living people."
Harold wasn't in a chatty mood, his mind preoccupied with something else, that he wouldn't give Theodore the satisfaction.
Among them, Harold heard noises in the distance, an exasperated sigh as he shook his head, his hair stiffly moving.
"I'll deal with you when I'm through with him," Harold sighed as he turned away from Theodore, disappearing through the opened cell, before closing it tightly, the bars clanking rigidly in place.
Left alone, what Harold said drew Theodore's interest.
It wasn't Douglas, Lila rescued him.
Professor May?
No, Harold wouldn't lay a hand on him, the man didn't seem interested in the stories of the mansion like Douglas to chat with servants.
… Irvine's still alive?
"Lee," Theodore called out to her.
He heard back a concerned, "Teddi, what happened?"
Theodore summed his response, causing Lila to respond with a sarcastic, "Why of course, hiding my Teddi in the dungeon with the lab, how original!"
Not before cursing out Harold for the pistol whipping, but that's expected, and even though Theodore assured her that it wasn't anything serious, that it's already healing, she still wanted "a word" with Harold.
Theodore then asked Lila about Hammond and Grace and he's relieved what she said.
She tells him that Hammond, Douglas, and Grace are back in the town, they didn't see Al or the TARDIS, all they remember's that they went through a door, when their minds caught up to them, they're besieged by the nurses and doctors at the clinic.
A doctor's with Grace right, now, and so far from what's said, they found her in time.
Douglas's being treated for a broken rib and he's lively for someone who got beaten for hours.
Now, does Theodore need some help?
"Well, four heads are better than one, don't you think, dear Lee?" Theodore summed that while he thinks he's capable of escaping on his own, he couldn't exactly do everything, not to mention, they have the servants to worry about, should things get hairy.
"Consider it a date!" Lila disappeared from his head, leaving him alone in the cell, held up by uncomfortably tight chains, he worried more about chaffing than he did the chains.
His icy blue eyes caught movement on the side of the cell and a familiar voice, abet in a poorly acted west county accent, "Prisoner 655321, it's time for the o' Ludovico!"
The cell opened and Lila snuck inside, holding the Sonic Screwdriver, Theodore elated seeing her as she used it to get him out of the twisted chains, letting him to do the rest.
Softly falling to the ground, Theodore rubbed his wrists, before pulling Lila into a warm embrace, a kiss on the nose, before taking the Sonic Screwdriver from her, and they fled out of the cell.
"Where's Al?" Theodore asks her as they went around the corner, avoiding the torches, keeping to the darkness.
Lila tells him that Al's working on a plan on ensuring Professor May and the servants are out of the mansion, because if there's one thing he knows, that if Harold feels that he has no options left, he'll do something insidious.
"Authorities?" Theodore asks her as they hunkered near the corner of the lab.
Lila responded that Hammond's taking care of that, but it's going to take time, the rain hasn't let up, and there's concerns about lighting strikes.
Now?
"A couple of towns over north of us got hit by lighting something fierce, a church caught fire, they think it's coming down here," Lila summed that there's belief that a severe lighting storm's coming down from the north in minutes' time, that's already got some hits in, and it's strong enough to slugger them.
Hence, Al's working on getting everyone from the mansion out, he thinks they're at risk since the mansion's built on the tallest hill.
The radars aboard the TARDIS indicated that the storm's got a strong bolt of lighting on standby and it's a guessing game when it's unleashing it, but Al suspects that with timing, it's the mansion that gets the bolt.
No clue what part of the mansion's getting it, Al's trying to run numbers, but it's still a guessing game.
He thinks Theodore and Lila are fine-ish, since they're below ground, but should his calculations be right, the lighting that hasn't struck, yet, can send shards of wood to the bottom of the hill like spears.
If it causes a fire, which is a possibility, there's a risk that the compromised mansion's concaving inward from the weight of the construction and the integrity of the older additions, but Al remained optimistic-ish.
He promised he'll think of something.
For now, do what they can, he'll come up with the rest.
He's pulling all stops because of the unpredictable nature of this storm.
"Our lot in life!" Theodore exhales sharply as he maneuvered with Lila, avoiding the torches as they're trying to find their way around the lab.
Hard to do when there's a gunshot just above their heads that made them fall to the ground, taking cover.
"Ah, there she is!" Harold held the colt firmly in his hand as he stared down at them while they covered their heads, Theodore forcing Lila close to him as he used himself as a shield.
Looking up, the two see Harold as he pointed his colt at them, anger hidden behind his sunglasses.
With his colt, Harold forced them up from the ground, with their arms up, and forced them to walk.
He forced them down the hall that Lila and Douglas used, but found the sealed exit at the end that forced them to turn back.
Marched into a previously unoccupied cell, Theodore's icy blue eyes fell to another chained individual, pinprick eyes staring at him and Lila.
The darkness made it hard to see clearly, but Theodore sees subtle movements as Harold explained to them, "If it will please you, he killed Irvine, not me!"
Slowly, the figure's head moved towards Theodore and Lila, tilting its head, before Harold said, "He's been quite a menace recently, for a spell, I'd thought he sent for you, personally!"
The chains clanked as someone slowly moved around, scratching noises coming from them, Harold illuminating the cell with a torch, sending jolts down Theodore and Lila's spines as they see…
A moving… mechanical… corpse…
Lila likened it to the Terminator with the rotting flesh and gangly remnants of its legs!
There's no lower jaw, not even a tongue hanging, broken top teeth, yellowed, and blackened, exposed rib cage, tattered clothing rotting away, the skin a sickly color, a decomposing smell faintly wafting from it.
Distinctly, the eyes, there weren't eyes, instead two reddened pinprick dots that slowly moved. The face looked, gaunt, a pale color, flesh missing where the lips were, no nose to speak of, a chunk of flesh missing from the top of its head, stringy platinum hair, barely moving as its matted from grime.
Right arm completely devoid of skin, exposed rotting flesh with no bones underneath it, the hand had some flesh on it, but there's noticeable damages done to it.
Left arm was mostly intact, the auburn sleeve, stained, rotting, the hand with expose fingertips.
As it pulled up with its arms, Lila sees the tattered remains of the white dress shirt before spotting something dangling in the torn lapel, a rusted pin, caked in grime.
No organs that Lila sees, they rotted away, if there's anything left it calcified, turning black as the night, stuck against the skeletal remnants.
"What… the… hell… is this?" Lila braved herself as she had to ask Harold as her chestnut eyes deadlocked with the moving corpse, restrained by the chains.
Nonchalantly, Harold gave a response, in a fashion that sounded like this wasn't just a moving nightmare, "I've tried everything, but he's just so stubborn."
Theodore's icy blue eyes widened as he sees the decaying corpse with a mechanic component underneath it withers and struggle as its been handicapped by Harold over the years as he grew violent towards it periodically.
"Irvine?" Lila squeaked as she grabbed Theodore's arm, he pulled her close to him as he stared in awe.
Shaking his head, Harold revealed with a sigh, "No, it's not Irvine."
But.
It was the one responsible for Irvine's tragic end.
"Wh-why… how the hell is this thing, alive?" Theodore asked Harold what sordid reason, what rhyme, he'd have willingly keeping something like it alive.
For a moment, there's sadness behind those sunglasses, as Harold tells him, "Despite everything he ever done to me, he's still my brother. My only family, left."
Everything his brother ever done to him, taking the things he loved away from him, it should've been enough for Harold to finally kill his brother, but despite it crossing his mind multiple times, Harold never pulled the trigger on it.
His brother was an abhorrent man, but he was still Harold's older brother.
It's enough context for Theodore and Lila to come to their own conclusions, Harold affirming them, causing a remark from Theodore, "And Irvine?"
Shaking his head as he exhaled sharply, Harold tells Theodore that it happened at the party he threw, Irvine got lured into the hidden passage by Gerald, by the time Harold found out, it was already too late.
His brother tried to do the same tricks when he was a complete man, stealing another's body, but Harold caught him and decimated those chances.
Irvine was already dead and Harold didn't know what to do, so he played the part well, of course Irvine's nephew wouldn't believe him.
Harold couldn't tell him the truth, if he did, well, he'd face similar ire, as Theodore and Lila surely realized, by now.
"How could you be any better?" Lila inquired how Harold thought about himself as he did the same thing as his brother, stealing bodies of unfortunate souls who lived in the mansion, and Harold stated that unlike his brother, he stole bodies from dying or recently deceased people.
Unlike his brother who forced himself onto unsuspecting victims who're alive and aware. The trauma from the forced integration causing issues that his brother suffered until Harold got his first body, allowing him to imprison his brother, ensuring that their childhood home remained under the Thornton banner.
"You do this?" Theodore looked towards Harold, trying not to break eye contact with the mechanical horror that smelled and looked of death.
Shaking his head, Harold bitterly stated, "He did it to himself. Had he done it only to himself, I wouldn't cared, but he had the gall to do it to me, too!"
His own brother, believe it or not, thought it'd be jolly good to experiment on himself, in a twisted attempt to reclaim what he'd lost, well he decided that Harold's a good subject to experiment on, too, leading to their twisted fates.
Suppose some good came out of it, Harold learnt enough tricks from Gerald, that he put them to good use.
Their eyes locked with Gerald, Theodore and Lila see that there's pleading behind his pinprick eyes, begging them, like the slip of paper Theodore found wedged in one of the thrown books stacked.
"He deserved it!" Harold bitterly told them, "he took her away from me, turned me into an abomination, what was I supposed to do?"
Harold still carried the bitterness of his brother taking away his only love, calling her nothing more than a common whore, using her in his experiments, destroyed her when she didn't produce the results he wanted, and to cause Harold pain of watching his love wither and die in front of him.
All because, when Gerald had his accident, he believed he would lose his coveted future as Lord Thornton, despite Harold insisting that he wouldn't take it, if it meant he couldn't marry his love.
It would've gone to their beloved little brother, Ramsey, though, as Theodore and Lila's aware, his fate sealed at the first hoarse cough.
However, his brother's impulsive nature prevailed.
"H-how?" Lila asked Harold how his brother learnt to do something like this in the 1700s, in a universe that didn't have anything impactful happening outside one Sabbek case, and Harold tells her that his brother got the idea from a merchant from Venice, if one could believe his brother's tall tales.
After Gerald's accident, he fell into a malady, wanting to walk normally again, prove to their father that he's capable being a lord, he sought medical care around the world, nothing took, and on a trip, met a merchant claiming he was from Venice, offering him a chance of a lifetime.
A book.
It's gone now, Harold doesn't know what happened to it, he didn't care to look for it when he gained control.
In this book, it gave Gerald the idea to turn himself into what Theodore and Lila see before them, withering on the ground.
That'd explain why Theodore couldn't read his mind, it'd be like trying to read a Cyberman's.
"And thus, the conclusion of my tale," Harold decided it was the end of that, cocking his colt, prepared to kill them both, since he told them everything.
Couldn't leave witnesses, now, can he?
Even if his story's improbable to the average individual, Harold suspected there's some weigh with Theodore and Lila.
As for the others, it wasn't the first time Harold disparaged accusations and attempted murder, his brother taught him, so.
Before Harold had the chance of shooting Theodore in the head, Gerald pulled enough strength to lunge at him, stabbing him through the heart with Lila's knife.
The shock's enough to stun Harold and enough time for Theodore and Lila to flee from the cell, running through the musty tunnel.
"Al, where is the storm, now?" Theodore called out to him while holding Lila's hand tightly as he guided them.
Al responded that the storm's a monster making headway, he's already evacuated the mansion, but there's a problem.
Why not?
"What, now?" Theodore exasperatedly groaned.