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In The Windmills Of Her Mind
Chapter Nine
The feeling was like darkness. Sheer black, terrifyingly empty darkness and the only thing she had in this void of her mind was a faint flicker of light. It blossomed as she remembered her name, as words fell into place and as meanings fell into words it grew. Then she would close her eyes, squeezing them so tightly shut that the darkness from her lids became crimson spirals filled with tiny stars. She squeezed them shut and tried to force herself to remember – as she did this the light flickered – sometimes it faltered and fell into the yearning chasm of the darkness and other times it reached tall and dropped her into painful memories, memories that were slowly unravelling and memories that would never fade. Rose whimpered as they began to soar through her - her limbs aching with fear, yet she fell like a lost lamb all alone in the wilderness of her mind
She could feel the flames licking at her skin, eating her and tainting her as she walked forwards. She was finally free. The ropes no longer hugged her wrists; there were no more needles in her neck and most of all the pain had faded into whatever she had become. She was finally free – of all the chains that held her, the ropes and the pain, the emotion and the fear, the crying and the feelings – they were all gone. Finally she was void of everything. Just a shell – nothing more.
Methodically she propelled her shell forwards through the fire and past the door. She could no longer hear the screams of the burning guards rattling around her head, she couldn't smell the scorching flesh and she couldn't see the blackened bodies. As she walked through a merciless path of destruction she could hear nothing, nothing except for what had become the norm for her – the hollow ringing in her ears – she couldn't hear his screams.
The Doctor could see his veins clearly now. They stuck out of his hands thick and ropey like a hangman's noose. The skin that covered his hands was paper thin, it was white and wafer life – it scarcely guarded his body. Not that he needed protection – all was lost. He was cut, bruised, bleeding, battered and broken. He had nothing left to lose for they'd already taken her. They'd taken his Rose and now he had nothing to live for. Nothing except for the promise of the news of her death. That would just kill him – it would destroy him, cell by cell, atom by atom and particle by particle until he was truly lost.
He clenched his fists, his fingers trembling in reaction to another poison that was being pumped into his body. So he closed his eyes and saw her in his mind, felt her with his imagination and loved her with his heart. He dreamt of his Rose despite what would come – despite the knowledge that on waking she was really gone. This was the only time he could hide, really hide, within his mind.
Rose spent most days in the garden, except for when it rained – then she'd sit next to the window with her scared skin pressed against the cold panes of glass that protected her from the wetness. Some days she just didn't care, she longed to stand in the rain as it beat heavily down on her skin marking her with the comfort of its wetness. She longed to stand outside as the thunder roared and the lightning crackled and just let the rain was it all away. All the pain, all the blood, all the scars, all the tears, all the hurt and all the loss. She longed for it all to dissolve into the earth how her body would do one day long after this moment. She longed for it all to disappear but she knew it never could. It was a memory, a burden, it was a piece of her and would taint her mind forever more.
Rose pressed her fist to the glass and longed for herself to dissolved into the ground – but however much she wept she never would.
When the rain stopped, Rose went outside again. She paced the wet grass bare foot feeling the fresh drops of rain squeezed between her toes as the hem of her cotton hospital gown became dark with stains. She paced the grounds leaning heavily on her crutches until she found herself in the visitor's playground; she ran her hand across the rain soaked slide ignoring the reflection of the hollow girl. Rose found herself beside a sand pit, her toes sinking deeply into the sand, soon to be followed by her hands. As her fingers ran through the golden sand she felt a thousand tiny grains of time pass through her fingers. Then she knew. It hit her mind more clearly than the sun in the sky; she clutched her head as the events rolled through her mind – an unstoppable force. There was nothing she could do but watch and listen as everything pieced itself together. For better for worse. All would be known.