Author note: Hi everyone! I was completely inspired by a couple stories I've read lately. A shout out to "Searching For Realism" by ChangerOfNames and "The Weeping Nebula" by SunnyBambina. They are just the greatest stories I've read in so long, that I was inspired to try writing my own story. I've never done this before, so please be gentle, ha. I also don't have a beta, so I'm trying my best.
Summary: She wasn't sorry. Neither was he. In the end they could burn down the whole of the universe if they had to. The Doctor didn't know how she was possible, but just this once, just this once the universe owed him a little bit of happiness. TimetotOC
Prologue: The Beginning, And The End
It was the early 2000's- in an old derelict amusement park in America taken back by nature. It had been over a decade since the park ran, shutting down before the town was built around it. Completely devoid of any people, Earth was taking back the land, vines and trees spiraling up collapsed buildings and rides, snow piling up on the ground in heaps. Ice hung off broken roofs, and other than animal tracks leading into the area not a person was there.
Or rather, there was not supposed to be another living soul coming within forty acres of that deserted land that day.
The sound of a hooting owl in the trees accompanies a newly wed couple hiking towards the west area of the park. They had slipped through the old wire fence, their breaths steaming the air as they went to take pictures, their boots crunching in the deep snow.
"Over here," Margaret gushes, her bright pink hat standing out in the haze of white as she looks lovingly at the creepy decor. The twenty seven year woman points out a sign where the writing had bled off with age. "This will look great! Come here for a sec." She's wearing a thick black coat and designer boots, a city girl in the middle of the country, and her blond hair is pulled up into a pony tail. She hops over the old beaten path to find a good spot.
She pulls out her phone to take a quick snapshot, recording them as she spins around, and put her back to the sign as she strikes a pose.
"What about over there?" Her husband, Robert lifts up his camera that was around his neck to take a couple pictures. He's really into this, taking multiple pictures of the same thing and he excitedly pointed out the Ferris wheel in the distance. "Oh that would be perfect! Come on, we need to get there before we run out of sunlight."
They have been planning on doing a shoot- a creepy album for Halloween for months, and they wanted to check out the area before they came back in their costumes. They hurry over to the Ferris wheel, 'ooh-ing' and 'ah-ing' at the broken down state of everything. Margaret's path is clumsy, not used to the terrain as a city girl, while Robert didn't seem to notice.
"This will be great! Look at that. I mean it won't be hard to get a couple lights and a generator in here." he rattles on and on about the statistics as Margaret stepped over some fallen beams, and he points up at the half fallen structure. "If we stand over by the fallen part it will work out perfectly!"
"The fallen part? Seriously." She rolls her eyes but didn't get any closer. It didn't look safe to her. The metal was red with rust and vines were all over it, and let's not talk about the parts that were already on the ground.
"Come on!" he hedges on, waving her closer, "Just stand a little closer. It's not gonna fall. I need to get a reference shot, come on babe. Over there." he holds up the camera to his face, adjusting the focus as his wife gives him a look.
"No way, I'm not getting under that thing. It looks like it's about to collapse." she stresses, not taking another step.
"Ain't that the point? Come on. We're already here." he holds up the camera at an angle, trying to get the best visual, and he grumbles, "Just get in there. What's the point of coming here if 'ya won't take any pictures. It's got the whole creepy feel down to a point. Dude it's awesome."
She glares at him before rolling her eyes, stomping over to where he was gesturing in front of a Ferris wheel carriage that had fallen to the ground, a tree growing out of it. She huffs, standing there with her arms cross as he snaps away.
"I'm hungry." she says suddenly after a moment of silence, "We've been walking for two hours. I mean, do we have enough background shots already?"
Robert doesn't even look up, still messing with his camera. "Just wait a second."
Margaret doesn't move for another minute. When he didn't look up she turns around, inspecting the grounds. It really is creepy, the whole place. Like something out of a horror movie. There was no way anyone could pay her to come out here at night. But it wasn't until the sun hit the glass of a nearby both, the glare of light hitting just right off something metal that caught her attention. She blinks, the glare hurt and it didn't look normal, slightly rainbow-like and she turns towards it, confused.
"Um, hey…" she mumbles. "What was that?" She walked over to the booth as something glittered inside, walking over to the missing door. She leaned in as her husband kept playing with that damn thing. "Hey, Robby you see that?"
"One second."
She hesitates, the hair on the back of her neck standing up before she took a step inside the dark room, squinting.
For a moment Rob was standing there in silence, the only other sound that blasted owl in the tree as he scrolled through the settings.
"Oh my god! Robby!" Margaret's scream could be heard for miles and Rob jumped, "Robby! Rob Look! Oh my god!"
"What! What is it!" he yells, running over only to freeze with an audible gasp.
Inside the booth, deep within it's dead remains was a little girl who doesn't look disturbed by the cold. Her cheeks and nose were bright red, the angelic looking toddler sleeping soundly underneath the thick blanket. With her curly dark brown hair and olive skin, a small gold chain around her wrist, she looked around two. Her eyelash fluttered as she dreamed, wrapped up inside of a strange metal box she slept in. The box was black, obsidian to the point where it seemed to absorb all the surrounding light and glow. Carved into the box were strange designs neither adults had ever seen before, and as the child stayed curled in a ball with her thumb in her mouth, mostly hidden behind a rotting booth the two adults freaked out.
"Oh my god!" Rob shrieks, dropping his camera from numb fingers, frozen in horror.
The little girl jerks, bleary grayish brown eyes fluttering open to look at them, and it spurred the couple to move, both of them managing to fit into the awful smelling room.
"Robby!" she said breathlessly, not knowing what to do with her hands.
"Call someone! I mean, we've got to call someone right?" Rob rambles in panic, moving forward quickly he unzips his jacket as the girl made eye contact with him, her thumb still in her mouth as she sat up. "Hey there. Hey hey." He cooed, terrified. The little girl looked confused, her brows scrunching up as the adults continued to panic. her dark red dress was bunched up, so thin. There was no way it was protecting her from the elements.
Margaret hastily took out her phone, dialing the police. She was uttering 'oh my god' over and over as they picked up, "Hello! Oh my god yea, hello we're in the woods and we found a baby!" she screamed into the phone, her hands shaking. "Like a living baby! We're in the Brokenly Park, oh my god!" she quickly rattled off the needed information to the person on the other side of the line.
"There's bears out here! Coyotes!" Rob thought suddenly, pale; he was going to throw up. His anxiety skyrocketing as the little girl began to babble, nothing she was saying in English. Oh god, was she foreign too? What was he going to do?! "Um, hello? Hola? Um, oh god. Margaret I think she's Russian or something! This is fuckin' sick."
The little girl didn't look bothered by the fusing adults, crawling closer to the man as he wraps her in his coat, hastily picking her up even as he was petrified.
Instead she hums. A beautiful and haunting tune.
Robert was terrified. No he was absolutely horrified. He carried the little girl out of there, leaving behind the box and blanket as he kept her wrapped in his coat. "We need to make it back to the car, where it's warm. Oh my god." they make eye contact, Margaret already on the verge of crying.
"Excuse me."
They both jump in fright, screaming.
"Don't panic. Hello," The blond woman, her hair cut short and professional and her hands up in a passive gesture, wearing a long coat she was standing down the pathway they had come from. She wasn't wearing any weapons. Unlike everyone around her.
Everyone around her, that were also in hazmat suits. With giant guns.
"Oh my god!" they spin around, yelling as a dozens of men and women in military gear, in hazmat suits come from all sides, ten or so men with assault rifles in every direction.
"Are you her mom!" Margaret screeched.
"Margaret seriously?!" Rob yells in aspiration at his wife, holding the little girl as tight as possible.
"No, sorry," The woman holds a device up to her face, "Robert and Margaret Harren? I'm sorry, but you've been exposed to an Alien disease. The three of you have to be quarantined. You're coming with us. We would like to talk to you at headquarters in London, if you don't mind." her voice was kind, even as her orders held no leeway.
"Do you know how she got here, oh my god," Margaret sounds panicked as Robert backs up, "Wait... What do you mean quarantined?! In London! That doesn't make sense!" Robert was too afraid to drop the kid but he also desperately wanted to put his hands up, so he settled on just lifting one high into the air, shifting the little girl on his hip, the toddler still wrapped up in his jacket. They were surrounded by army military looking men, just look at the guns, Rob felt like he was going to have a panic attack. "I'm on the phone with the police right now!" she screeched.
"No, no." the man standing behind the woman spoke up, his voice muffled by his white suit. "That's been taken care of. Mr and Ms Harren we need you to come with us." He barks, far less nice then the first woman. And the blond woman gave him a side eye.
"Oh my god are we under arrest!?"
"Can we see some identification." Robert says weakly, holding his one free hand up above his head. He was shaking slightly. The woman, Kate, took something out, a badge neither of them had seen before.
"We are UNIT. And my Name is Kate Stewart, and I'm going to ask that you hand over Jane Smith and come with us." she looked pretty important, this woman to Robert. The way she holding herself made her look in charge.
"What the hell is UNIT?!" Their screaming overlap each other, "I've like, never heard of that branch of government! You could have just made that up!" a group of men come up from behind them and they are led forward, towards the exit of the park as they keep yelling. "Is that a British accent? Are you British what the hell is going on? Can British people even arrest Americans in America?!"
They could only stare in disbelief as they saw the military vehicles waiting for them up front.
"You're not the police are you? Or like, like normal people. Oh my god," Margaret croaks, looking over at Robert in terror. "Oh my god Robby we're gonna disappear." she said weakly, her voice shaking.
Robert holds the little girl closer. She had a hand around Robert's neck, snuggling closer to his chest as she kept her face pressed against him. She wasn't saying anything, but that might have to do with the thumb perpetually in her mouth.
Stepping closer, a man in hazmat gear holds up a wool blanket, clearly wanting Rober to hand him the little girl.
"Look." he turns his head to glare at the men, leading them forward and stares at their guns, before jerking back from them. "There ain't no freakin' way I'm handing this kid off to some shady people like you. You can all go fu-"
"And that is why you're coming with us." The man spoke up again, "We've got confirmation from the President, we've got a helicopter in route."
"The president?" Margaret says snidely, using sarcasm to help hide the fear. "Which president?"
"We've got a visual!" There was another woman, wearing a long colorful scarf that stood by the entrance of the park, she was the only other person not in a hazmat suit. She was standing right outside the broken down fence, looking up into the sky, before taking a puff of her asthma inhaler.
Just then the sound of a military helicopter coming closer made both civilians freeze, the little girl looking up into the sky as the two adults had horror on their faces.