Revelations
Agatha and Caroline returned to the sitting room and almost immediately the Doctor sent the rest of the guests out. They placed the case on a table, the four all standing around it, and the Doctor opened it carefully. It was full of lock-picking tools.
"Ooo. Someone came here tooled up." He touched one of the tools. "The sort of stuff a thief would use."
Agatha's eyes widened. "The Unicorn. He's here."
The Doctor looked up at them. "The Unicorn and the wasp."
The butler entered holding a tray of drinks. "Your drinks, ladies, Doctor."
"Very good, Greeves," the Doctor nodded and they each took their drinks.
Caroline took a drink before speaking. "What did you find during the scientific experiment?" he'd told her quietly as all the guests left that he'd tested the stinger.
"Vespiform string. Vespiforms have got hives in the Silfrax galaxy."
Agatha shook her head. "Again, you talk like Edward Lear."
He nodded. "But for some reason, this one's behaving like a character in one of your books."
"Come on Agatha." Donna turned to the woman. "What would Miss Marple do? She'd have overheard something vital by now, because the murderer thinks she's just a harmless old lady."
Agatha frowned. "Clever idea. Miss Marple? Who writes those?"
Donna paused. "Er, copyright Donna Noble. Add it to the list."
"Donna." Caroline turned at the Doctor's tone and watched his face contort in pain.
"Okay, we could split the copyright."
"No. Something's inhibiting my enzymes." There was a second before he doubled over. "Argh! I've been poisoned." Caroline rushed to his side as Agatha picked up the drink, sniffing it.
"Bitter almonds. It's cyanide. Sparkling Cyanide!"
"Kitchen," the Doctor managed to say, leaning on Caroline as she lifted him from the chair. "I need the kitchen."
Agatha ran in front of them both, pointing. "This way."
As they entered the room, the Doctor stumbled away from Caroline's hold, grabbing Davenport's jacket. "Ginger beer!"
"I beg your pardon?"
"I need ginger beer!"
"The gentleman's gone mad," one of the woman said as Caroline found the ginger beer, giving it to the Doctor to chug.
Agatha touched his arm. "I'm an expert in poisons. Doctor, there's no cure. It's fatal."
He spat out surplus ginger beer. "Not for me. I can stimulate the inhibited enzymes into reversal. Protein. I need protein!"
The trio of women began to search the counters. "Walnuts?" Donna turned with a bowl full of them.
"Brilliant." The Doctor filled his mouth with them and then attempted to continue speaking.
Caroline shook her head. Normally, she wouldn't have dared to speak now, but now the Doctor was in danger and she needed to help him in any way she could. "We can't understand you."
"How many words?" Donna tried. The Doctor held up a finger. "One. One word." He began to mime. "Shake. Milk shake. Milk? Milk? No, not milk? Shake, shake, shake. Cocktail shaker. What do you want? A Harvey Wallbanger?"
The Doctor managed to swallow enough to become coherent. "Harvey Wallbanger?"
"Well, I don't know!"
"How is Harvey Wallbanger one word?"
"What do you need, Doctor?" Caroline said.
"Salt. I was miming salt. It's salt. I need something salty."
Donna grabbed a bag. "What about this?"
"What is it?"
"Salt."
He shook his head. "No, too salty."
"Oh, that's too salty."
"What about this?" Agatha held out a jar.
"What's that?"
"Anchovies."
The Doctor downed the entire jar and attempted to mime again, though it was just as unsuccessful as the first time.
"What is it? What else? It's a song? 'Mammy'? I don't know. 'Camptown Races'?"
He finished swallowing. "Camptown Races?"
"Well, all right then, 'Towering Inferno'."
"It's a shock. Look, shock," he repeated the action. "I need a shock."
Agatha nodded. "Big shock coming up." She shoved Caroline, who was standing next to the Doctor at the moment, into the man's arms, and into a kiss.
Neither Time Lord nor human knew exactly what to do in that moment. They were both in pure shock, which was the goal of the action of course. But they held the kiss for longer than they both expected, faces burning red, before the Doctor stepped back and let smoke burst out of his mouth and him fall back against the counter. Caroline stumbled back, a hand on her chest, and they stared at each other.
"Detox," he said quietly, wiping his mouth of residue. "Oh my. I must do that more often." He froze, eyes wide. "I mean…the detox."
Caroline said nothing.
Agatha laughed. "Doctor, you are impossible. Who are you?"
The Doctor and Caroline didn't speak as they waited for dinner to arise. They avoided looking at each other because the moment they did both would blush slightly, regardless of the alien wasp threatening all of the humans. The kiss had done what it was meant to, of course, it had been the shock the Doctor had been looking for, but there were aftershocks.
Martha had warned Caroline about falling in love with the Doctor, and she hadn't thought about it before that moment. But ever since then she did. She thought of the brilliant Doctor and every bit of the universe he could show her. She thought about how he wanted her to soar and was willing to do anything he could to make her happy.
But it wasn't love. It was just friendship and embarrassment. That as all it would be.
Neither the Doctor or Caroline blamed Agatha for her actions. The woman was the closest to Caroline, it was the quickest option in the circumstance. She'd even apologized afterwards. But it didn't escape either time traveler's notice that Agatha gave them a knowing smile once she'd stepped away slightly.
The entire group sat around the table, all of the guests on one side, and the time travelers and Agatha on the other, with Roger at the far end of the table.
There was a storm outside and Caroline was sitting next to the Doctor.
"A terrible day for all of us," the Doctor said. "The Professor struck down, Miss Chandrakala taken cruelly from us, and yet we still take dinner."
Lady Eddison sighed, sipping a bit of her soup. "We are British, Doctor. What else must we do?"
"And then someone tried to poison me. Any of you had the chance to put cyanide in my drink." He smiled. "But it rather gave me an idea."
The reverend frowned. "And what would that be?"
"Well, poison." He lifted a spoonful as the rest of the guests stopped. "Drink up. I've laced the soup with pepper."
Hugh laughed, taking another bite. "Ah, I thought it was jolly spicy."
"But the active ingredient of pepper is piperine, traditionally used as an insecticide. So, anyone got the shivers?"
Thunder cracked outside and the windows were blown open, extinguishing all of the candles and plunging them into darkness.
"What the deuce is that?" Hugh asked.
The Doctor stood, holding out a hand. "Listen, listen, listen, listen."
There was a buzzing sound.
"No…no, it can't be," Lady Eddison said.
"Show yourself, demon!" Agatha stood.
"Nobody move. No, don't!" the Doctor pointed at Lady Eddison. "Stay where you are."
As though commanded, the Vespiform showed itself in a crash of lightning. "Out, out, out, out, out, out!" Everyone in the room panicked, guests running out and the Doctor grabbing Caroline's hand instinctually to do so. None of the guests actually managed to leave the room, except for the four of them and the butler. The Doctor let go of Caroline to grab a sword from the wall.
"Not you, Agatha. You've got a long, long life to live yet."
"Well, we know the butler didn't do it," Donna said.
"Then who did?" the Doctor opened the door to find everyone fallen at various points throughout the room.
Lady Eddison, in the newly returned light, touched her neck. "My jewelry. The Firestone, it's gone. Stolen."
"Roger," Davenport breathed, and everyone turned to see Roger lying face first in his soup with a knife in his back.
Lady Eddison clutched her mouth. "My son. My child."
|C-S|
The Doctor, Agatha, and Caroline were standing in the sitting room. The Time Lord stood beside the fireplace and the two women sat on the chairs. Donna entered, having been dealing with the emotions of the guests. Caroline would have been with her, but it was a bit too many people for that moment.
"That poor footman," Donna said quietly. "Roger's dead and he can't even mourn him. 1926? It's more like the dark ages."
"Did you inquire after the necklace?" Agatha asked.
She nodded. "Lady Eddison brought it back from India. It's worth thousands."
"This thing can sting, it can fly," the Doctor said quietly. "It could wipe us all out in seconds. Why is it playing this game?"
"Every murder is essentially the same. They are committed because somebody wants something."
The Doctor shook his head. "What does a Vespiform want?"
"Doctor, stop it. The murderer is as human as you or I."
The Doctor's eyes widened. "You're right. Ah, I've been so caught up with giant wasps that I've forgotten. You're the expert."
Agatha gave a shaky laugh. "I'm not. I told you. I'm just a purveyor of nonsense."
"No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Because plenty of people write detective stories, but yours are the best. And why? Why are you so good, Agatha Christie?" he stepped forward. "Because you understand. You've lived, you've fought, you've had your heart broken. You know things about people. Their passions, their hope, and despair, and anger. All of those tiny, huge things that can turn the most ordinary person into a killer. Just think, Agatha. If anyone can solve this, it's you."
It took Agatha a moment to nod.
|C-S|
They gathered the guests into the sitting room with all of them, the Doctor staying by the fireplace and Caroline and Donna standing to the side.
"I've called you here on this endless night because we have a murderer in our midst. And when it comes to detection, there's none finer. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you, Agatha Christie." The Doctor stepped back over to his companions, holding out a hand to Agatha, letting the author stand.
"This is a crooked house." Agatha began. "A house of secrets. To understand the situation, we must examine them all. Starting with you…Miss Redmond."
Robina started. "But I'm innocent, surely."
"You've never met these people, and these people have never met you. I think the real Robina Redmond never left London. You're impersonating her."
Robina laughed. "How silly. What proof do you have?"
"You said you'd been to the toilet."
Donna nodded. "Oh, I know this. If she was really posh, she'd say loo."
Agatha picked up the locksmith's case that she and Caroline had found. "Earlier today, Miss Attwater and I found this on the lawn, right beneath your bathroom window. You must have heard that Miss Noble and Miss Attwater were searching the bedrooms, so you panicked. You ran upstairs and disposed of the evidence."
"I've never seen that thing before in my life."
"What's inside it?" Lady Eddison frowned.
"The tools of your trade, Miss Redmond." Agatha opened the case to show the tools in question. "Or should I say, the Unicorn. You came to this house with one sole intention. To steal the Firestone."
"Oh, alright then," Robina said, her voice shifting to a cockney accent, presumably her real one. "It's a fair cop. Yes, I'm the bleeding Unicorn. Every so nice to meet you, I don't think. I took my chance in the dark and nabbed it." She drew the Firestone necklace from under her dress. "Go on then, you knobs. Arrest me. Sling me in jail." She threw the necklace to the Doctor.
Donna frowned. "So, is she the murderer?"
Robina grimaced. "Don't be so thick. I might be a thief, but, well, I ain't no killer."
Agatha nodded. "Quite. There are darker motives at work. And in examining this household, we come to you, Colonel." She turned to Hugh.
The man sighed, slamming his hand on the armrest of his wheelchair. "Damn it, woman. You with your perspicacity. You've rumbled me." He stood from the chair, and everyone in the room gasped.
"Hugh, you…you can walk!" Lady Eddison said, hand to her heart again. "But why?"
"My darling, how else could I be certain of keeping you by my side?" Hugh took his wife's hands.
"I don't understand."
"You're still a beautiful woman, Clemency. Sooner or later some chap will turn your head. I couldn't bear that. Staying in the chair was the only way I could be certain of keeping you. Confound it, Mrs. Christie, how did you discover the truth?"
Agatha shook her head. "Er, actually I had no idea. I was just going to say you're completely innocent."
"Oh. Oh."
"Sorry."
"Well…well, shall I sit down then?"
Agatha nodded. "I think you better had."
Donna pointed to the man. "So he's not the murderer."
"Indeed, not. To find the truth, let's return to this," Agatha held out her hand for the Firestone, and the Doctor handed it to her. "Far more than the Unicorn's object of desire. The Firestone has quite a history…Lady Eddison."
"I've done nothing!"
"You brought it back from India, did you not? Before you met the Colonel. You came home with malaria, and confined yourself to this house for six months, in a room that has been kept locked ever since, which I rather think means…"
Lady Eddison shook her head, near tears. "Stop, please."
"I'm so sorry. But you had fallen pregnant in India. Unmarried and ashamed, you hurried back to England with your confidante, a young maid later to become housekeeper, Miss Chandrakala."
"Clemency, is this true?"
Lady Eddison clutched her mouth. "My poor baby. I had to give him away. The shame of it."
"But you never said a word!"
"I had no choice. Imagine the scandal. The family name. I'm British. I carry on."
Caroline leaned forwards, glancing at the Doctor before speaking. "It wasn't an ordinary pregnancy." After so long with the Doctor, she was understanding things, putting things about aliens together in a way she wouldn't have done before. She always noticed things, always studied and saw, but now she had experience with aliens.
Lady Eddison turned to her in shock. "How can you know that?"
The Doctor stepped forward, taking over for Caroline, knowing that even that sentence was difficult, even if she was getting better as time went on. "Excuse me Agatha, this is my territory." He took Agatha's place before the fireplace. "But when you heard that buzzing sound in the dining room, you said, it can't be. why did you say that?"
"You'd never believe it."
"The Doctor has opened my mind to believe many things," Agatha said, and the two companions nodded.
"It was forty years ago, in the heat of Delhi, late one night," she began, her voice shaking. "I was alone, and that's when I saw it. A dazzling light in the sky. The next day, he came to the house. Christopher, the most handsome man I'd ever seen. Our love blazed like a wildfire. I held nothing back. And in return he showed me the incredible truth about himself. He'd made himself human, to learn about us. This was his true shape. I loved him so much, it didn't matter. But he was stolen from me. 1885, the year of the great monsoon. The river Jumna rose and broke its banks. He was taken at the flood. But Christopher left me a parting gift. A jewel like no other. I wore it always. Part of me never forgot. I kept it close, always."
Robina didn't wait long before speaking again. "Just like a man. Flashes his family jewels and you end up with a bun in the oven."
"A 'poor little child'," Agatha quoted the dead housekeeper. "Forty years ago, Miss Chandrakala took that newborn babe to an orphanage. But Professor Peach worked it out. He found the birth certificate."
"Oh, that's maiden," Donna said. "Maiden name."
Agatha nodded. "Precisely."
"So she killed him?"
Lady Eddison gasped. "I did not."
"Miss Chandrakala feared that the Professor had unearthed your secret. She was coming to warn you."
"So she killed her."
"I did not!" Lady Eddison repeated.
"Lady Eddison is innocent. Because at this point, Doctor," Agatha gestured to the Doctor again.
The Time Lord nodded. "Thank you. At this point, when we consider the lies and the secrets, and the key to these events, then we have to consider it was you, Donna Noble."
Donna leaned back. "What? Who did I kill?"
"No, but you said it all along. The vital clue. This whole thing is being acted out like a murder mystery, which means it was you, Agatha Christie."
"I beg your pardon, sir?"
"So she killed them?"
"No. But she wrote. She wrote those brilliant, clever books. And who's her greatest admirer? The Doctor turned. "The moving finger points at you, Lady Eddison."
The woman was crying again, burying her face in her hands. "Leave me alone!"
"So she did kill them."
"No." The Doctor knelt before Lady Eddison, reaching her eye level. "But just think. Last Thursday night, what were you doing?"
Lady Eddison managed to control herself enough to answer. "I was…I was in the library. I was reading my favorite Agatha Christie, thinking about her plots, and how clever she must be. How is that relevant?"
"Just think. What else happened on Thursday night?" the Doctor turned to look at the reverend.
"I'm sorry?"
He glanced at Caroline, and she swallowed. "You said, on the lawn, that boys broke into your church. Last Thursday."
The reverend nodded, puffing his chest slightly. "That's correct. They did. I discovered the two of them. Thieves in the night. I was most perturbed. But I apprehended them."
The Doctor frowned. "Really? A man of God against two strong lads? A man in his forties? Or, should I say forty years exactly?"
Lady Eddison gasped. "Oh my God."
"Lady Eddison, your child, how old would he be now?"
"Forty. He's forty."
The Doctor nodded at the reverend. "Your child has come home."
The reverend laughed. "Oh, this is poppycock."
"Oh? You said you were taught by the Christian Fathers, meaning you were raised in an orphanage."
"My son." Lady Eddison turned to the reverend, reaching out. "Can it be?"
"You found those thieves, Reverend, and you got angry. A proper, deep anger, for the first time in your life, and it broke the genetic lock. You changed. You realized your inheritance. After all these years, you knew who you were. Oh, and then it all kicks off, because this isn't just a jewel." The Doctor picked up the Firestone. "It's a Vespiform telepathic recorder. It's part of you, your brain, your very essence. And when you activated, so did the Firestone.
"It beamed your full identity directly into your mind. And, at the same time, it absorbed the works of Agatha Christie directly from Lady Eddison. It all became part of you. The mechanics of those novels formed a template in your brain. You've killed, in this pattern, because that's what you think the world is. It turns out, we are in the middle of a murder mystery. One of yours, Dame Agatha."
Agatha frowned. "Dame?"
"Oh." The Doctor shook his head. "Sorry, not yet."
"So he killed them, yes?" Donna said. "Definitely?"
The Doctor nodded. "Yes."
The reverend laughed, trying to shake it off. "Well, this has certainly been a most entertaining evening. Really, you can't believe any of this surely, Lady Edizzon."
Everyone froze. "Lady who?" Caroline said quietly.
"Lady Edizzzzon."
The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Little bit of buzzing there, Vicar."
"Don't make me angry." The reverend stood from his chair, fists clenching.
"Why? What happens then?"
"Damn it! You humanzz, worshipping your tribal sky godzz. I am so much more! That night, the universe exploded in my mind! I wanted to take what wazz mine. And you, Agatha Christie, with your railway station bookstall romancezz, what'z to stop me killing you?"
"Oh my dear God. My child." Lady Eddison reached for her son again.
"What'zz to stop me killing you all?" the reverend transformed into the form of a wasp, the wasp Caroline and Donna had seen upstairs earlier in the day.
"Forgive me!"
"No, no, Clemency, come back," Hugh and the butler grabbed Lady Eddison to drag her out the door and away from her son. "Keep away. Keep away, my darling."
Agatha stood, taking the Firestone from the Doctor. "No. No more murder. If my imagination made you kill, then my imagination will find a way to stop you, foul creature." She turned and ran from the room.
It took another second for Caroline, the Doctor, and Donna to run after her.
The Vespiform followed all of them.
"Wait, now it's chasing us!" Donna shouted as they ran outside.
Agatha was already in a car and she drove past them, honking the horn. They moved to run towards it, but the Vespiform had already burst out of the door and Agatha wasn't stopping. "Over here!" she shouted. "Come and get me, Reverend!"
"Agatha, what are you doing?"
"If I started this, Doctor, then I must stop it!" Agatha floored it and drove off even faster.
Caroline grabbed the Doctor's arm and pulled him towards a nearby car. She may not know how to drive, but she knew that Donna did, and maybe even the Doctor. And she also knew that they needed to follow Agatha and the Vespiform. "Come on!"
The Doctor ended up to be the one driving.
"You said this is the night Agatha Christie loses her memory," Donna said to him.
The Time Lord shook his head. "Time is in flux, Donna." Caroline's breath caught. "For all we know, this is the night Agatha Christie loses her life and history gets changed."
Donna frowned. "But where's she going?"
Caroline saw the sign as they passed it, nearly going so fast that she couldn't read it properly. "The lake. She's going to the lake."
"What's she doing?"
They pulled up a few moments after Agatha, just as the woman was jumping out of her car and running towards the lake, Firestone high in her hand. "Here I am, the honey in the trap. Come to me, Vespiform."
"She's controlling it!"
"It's mind is based on her thought processes," the Doctor explained, all of them leaping from the car. "They're linked."
Agatha nodded. "Quite so, Doctor. If I die, then this creature might die with me."
They ran up to Agatha, the Doctor holding out a hand at the Vespiform. "Don't hurt her. You're not meant to be like this. You've got the wrong template in your mind."
Caroline shook her head. "It's not listening to you." As she spoke, Donna turned and grabbed the Firestone from Agatha, throwing it at the center of the lake.
The Vespiform dove for it instantly.
"How do you kill a wasp?" Donna said. "Drown it, just like his father."
"Donna, that thing couldn't help itself."
She shrugged. "Neither could I." The water bubbled slightly, signaling the Vespiform's death.
"Death comes at the end, and justice is served."
The Doctor nodded. "Murder at the vicar's rage."
Caroline frowned. "Bit of work." The Doctor smiled at her.
Agatha turned to face the Time Lord. "Just one mystery left, Doctor. Who exactly are you?" But just as she finished, Agatha doubled over in pain, the Doctor managing to catch her before she fell completely.
"Oh, it's the Firestone," he gasped. "It's part of the Vespiform's mind. It's dying and it's connected to Agatha."
The woman glowed purple for a moment and Caroline had the horrifying image of Jenny dying in her father's arms, before Agatha went unconscious. Still alive.
"He let her go," the Doctor said quietly. "Right at the end, the Vespiform chose to save someone's life."
Donna touched Caroline's shoulder as she spoke. "Is she all right, though?"
The Doctor nodded, eyes wide. "Of course. The amnesia. Wiped her mind of everything that happened. The wasp, the murders."
"And us. She'll forget about us."
"Yeah, but we've solved another riddle." He grinned. "The mystery of Agatha Christie. And tomorrow morning, her car gets found by the side of a lake. A few days later, she turns up at a hotel in Harrogate with no idea of what just happened."
|C-S|
The trio of time travelers stood beside the TARDIS, watching as Agatha walked slowly up the steps of the hotel history knew her to be found at.
"No one'll ever know," the Doctor said.
"Lady Eddison, the Colonel, and all the staff. What about them?"
He shrugged. "Shameful story. They'd never talk of it. Too British. While the Unicorn does a bunk back to London town. She can never even say she was there."
"What happens to Agatha?" Caroline asked. She knew the woman's story, at least a bit of it, but somehow it would feel more true, now, to hear a Time Lord that knew when events were fixed or in flux say it.
He grinned. "Oh, great life. Met another man, married again. Saw the world. Wrote and wrote and wrote."
Donna frowned. "She never thought her books were any good though. And she must have spent all those years wondering."
The Doctor turned and walked back into the TARDIS, holding the door open for his companions for a moment before walking up towards the console. "The thing is, I don't think she ever quite forgot." He squat by a grille on the ground by the console, pulling it up. "Great mind like that, some of the details kept bleeding through. All the stuff her imagination could use. Like, Miss Marple."
Donna sighed, shaking her head. "I should have made her sign a contract."
"And…where is it?" he pulled a chest from within the grille. "Where is it…hold on. Here we go. 'C'." Donna and Caroline crouched beside the Doctor as he opened the chest. "That is 'C' for Cybermen." He threw a large metal chest plate away. "'C' for Carrionites." A green globe that almost sounded like it had women screaming inside of it. Then a bust of Caesar. "And Christie, Agatha. Look at that." He held up the paperback book, handing it to Caroline.
It was an edition of 'Death in the Clouds' with a gigantic wasp on the cover. Caroline smiled. "She did remember."
The Doctor nodded. "Somewhere in the back of her mind, it all lingered. And that's not all. Look at the copyright page."
Caroline turned to it, reading quickly. "'Facsimile edition published in the year'…" her eyes widened and she looked up at the Doctor "'five billion!'"
He grinned. "People never stop reading them. She is the bestselling novelist of all time."
Donna sighed, standing. "But she never knew."
The Doctor and Caroline did the same, the human still holding onto the book. "Well, no one knows how they're going to be remembered. All we can do is hope for the best. Maybe that's what kept her writing." He rested his hands on the console. "Same thing keeps me travelling." He looked at both of them, Caroline and the Doctor managing not to blush that time. "Onwards?"
Donna nodded. "Onwards."
Caroline grinned. "Onwards."
A/N: The case has been solved! But, this time, it was not Donna who shocked the Doctor with a kiss, but Caroline...
Next, we have the Library; what will happen there?
