Chapter Two: "Wilfred Mott"

"It all started on Christmas day," began the man - who, Rose had come to learn, was called Wilfred Mott. Wilf for short. He handed her a cup of something brown that Rose was choosing to think was tea. "Do you remember? Big star over London, I was laid up with Spanish flu. That's when it all went wrong."

"Wrong... how?" said Rose, taking a sip of the suspicious liquid and deciding that was probably enough. She set it down on the coffee table. Wilf's front room was an interesting one, like two worlds collided. Half dystopian battleground, half an old person's home. The walls were made of corrugated metal sheeting, with holes for windows cruelly cut out, and some clear plastic stuck over it trying (and failing) to keep the heat in. Meanwhile, the furniture had been plucked straight out of the 1970s, complete with tatty armchairs, tasteless curtains, and wooden tables.

"Well, where do I start? It's difficult to remember, sometimes. Everything happened, all at the once. And I mean everything. One minute the hospital was taken to the moon, the next it was back but everyone was dead. Then the planet was ruled by these witches who loved Shakespeare... then them Daleks were turning humans into robots, all sorts was going on. Even little people made of fat."

"And this happened over how long?"

"No no no, you don't see, do you? When I say everything happened at once, I don't just mean over a few days or weeks... I mean literally, it all happened that very night. Different versions of planet Earth, being flicked on and off like light switches."

It finally clicked. The Doctor dying underneath the Thames meant he couldn't be there to stop the invasions, so the aliens were successful. All of them. The version of this Earth in which she met Donna just so happened to be one that had stayed relatively normal. "So then what happened?" Rose asked, trying her luck with something that closely resembled a sandwich.

"They stepped in. The Shadow whatsit."

"Shadow Proclamation?"

"Yeah. The Shadow Proclamation. Saw that everything had gone wrong, so put the planet under quarantine. Martial law. Who'd have thought it, eh? We're being ruled by rhinos." Wilf laughed. Rose admired him, even in the darkest of times, he still saw the funny side of things. "That's why we've got curfews. If they catch you in the streets after 7 o'clock, they send you to a detention camp to keep you under control. No funny business. Rhinos don't have much of a sense of humour."

"But what about all the different timelines? The paradoxes, did they get fixed?"

"Oh, no. We're still stuck in this... limbo, you see. They've frozen us all in one second. Earth - the planet that time forgot. I don't call it 'hell' for nothing."

Rose took another sip of the tea. What would the Doctor do, she thought. Well, for starters... he'd help. Help anyone, help everyone. And he'd probably go looking for Donna too. Sort out whatever was going on with the thing on her back. "Wilf... you don't happen to know anyone called Donna, do you? Tall-ish, ginger hair, bit mouthy?"

"Donna? Yeah, that's my granddaughter. Why?"

Rose smiled. Bingo.

TO BE CONTINUED

Author's note: I appreciate that wasn't the most action-packed of chapters, and it was a bit on the short side, but I wanted to set up the world that Rose has found herself in, and I was desperate to get Wilf in the story ASAP. I love Wilf. As ever, thanks for reading!