Well, I'm back! Happy holidays, everyone! I hope you've been able to relax and spend time with friends and family. :)
This chapter is a bit more exciting, I hope, and it will contain a twist at the end! OOoooooh )
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Doctor Who characters or plot points that I may or may not have "borrowed." I do, however, own Hero, so there! hahaha
Red light engulfed me for a moment as I stepped through the doorway, and the burned smell of heated iron assaulted my nose. A second later, the heavy metal door clanged shut behind me and the light dimmed a bit to a more comfortable level. Blinking, I took a step forward and then froze then I felt a strong updraft around my feet. I looked down.
I was standing on a narrow stone bridge which appeared to span over a vast and deep crack in the ground. The red light seemed to come from all around me, and a cold draft of air was rising up out of the endless pit beneath me. I shivered. Looking ahead I saw that the narrow bridge disappeared into a sort of mist. Behind me was a solid wall where the door had been, so I figured that the best way to go was forward. I bit my lip as I hesitantly slid one foot forward, hardly daring to breath. It wasn't that I was afraid of heights, exactly, but anyone would be nervous to cross such a small span of rock over some endless depth. Nothing terrible happened after my first step, so I felt a small amount of encouragement as I slowly moved forward, placing my hands out in front of me cautiously. Part of my felt like running across to wherever this bridge would take me; my mind was still haunted by what little I had seen of the Doctor on the screen and what he had said to me.
After several moments, I looked up from the stone floor of the bridge to get an idea of how far I'd gone. The mistiness still lay ahead, glowing a faint red as it reflected the weird light around me. Glancing back, hoping I'd gone at least ten feet or so, I was shocked to see that the bridge behind me was much, much farther than I had thought, and the wall where I had entered was no longer visible. I was now surrounded by red mist and light, the cold air beneath me making me shiver. My heart was thudding in my throat as I contemplated whether what I was seeing was a false image of some sort. If my eyes were telling the truth, I had walked not a few yards but more like 50 feet from my starting position. A quick flash of fear made me wonder whether I would ever reach the end or if I was just stuck in some sort of loop. A time loop, maybe...
Shuffling forward once more, I turned to face the front and tried to go a little faster this time. This slightly quicker pace went one for several more long minutes as I made myself stay focused on what was ahead and not what was behind. This vast cavern was eerily silent except for a faint sound of air moving and my own fast breathing.
I was looking down to keep my bearings when suddenly my outstretched hands brushed against something. Terrified, I whipped my head up and realized that I'd bumped into a door that was standing, completely free of any supports, on the bridge itself. It was blocking my way and looked oddly sinister as it stood surrounded by air and red light. I hesitantly pushed against it and was surprised when it opened at once without a sound. I stepped through and was rewarded only with a continuation of the same stone bridge disappearing into mist. I whirled around, frantic, and nearly screamed when the door swung shut suddenly of its own accord, trapping me yet again from behind. I stood very still, trying to calm myself, knowing that whatever was happening was part of a challenge to save the Doctor. As soon as I had this thought, however, I heard voices ahead of me in the mist. Startled, I turned ahead, squinting as I tried to make out any movement.
"H-hello?" I called, my shaky voice sounding thin and small in this vast space. There was no reply.
A second later, the voices started talking again, but I couldn't quite make out the words.
"Excuse me, what are you saying?" I called again, starting to move down the bridge again towards the sounds. Something about them sounded familiar, and I moved a little faster, my eyes still glued on the mist ahead in hopes of seeing something.
"Hero, have you finished your homework?" said a female voice some feet ahead of me, and I froze. My mother was speaking to me out of the red mist.
"Oh my god..." I muttered, shuffling forward a bit more, "Mom? Mom can you hear me?"
"I need you to bring me the silver polish, honey, it's polish day," My mother's voice sounded faint, almost like an echo. I still couldn't see anything, and I could feel a cold sweat breaking out on my forehead. This was seriously getting creepy.
"Oh, and bring daddy's silver watch while you're in there, okay?"
"Okay, Mama."
I gasped as I heard my own little-kid voice ahead in the mistiness.
"What the hell is going on?" I cried, feeling truly panicked now. I could remember the day we polished the silver together, the day before my eighth birthday, the day before I was given...
"Here you go, Mama, and here's Daddy's watch." I felt sick listening to my child self talking somewhere ahead of me. This was like a nightmare.
"Thanks. There's a lot to do today, look at how brown these plates are!"
"Mom..." I called again, inching forward, my hands trembling in front of me.
"Mama, can I play with it?"
"With what?"
"The watch, it's so pretty and I like all the flowers on it..."
"No, just set it here. You're not supposed to open it, remember?"
My child self sighed somewhere in the mist, and there was a clunking sound like something heavy and metal being set down on a wooden table.
"The polish smells funny."
All at once my nose detected an odd smell in the air, one that I recognized at once as silver polish. Silver polish. There was something ahead of me in the mist, now, something small and bright and floating.
I nearly ran forward, teetering around on the bridge, nearly stumbling, until I stood right in the front of the floating object. My father's silver watch. My watch.
I had left it at home, my parent's home, before I'd left for college four years ago. I'd locked it in my jewelry box, I'd eventually lost the key. My silver, flowered watch, the one I'd gotten as a birthday present when I turned eight, the gift from my mother that my father had left for me when he'd gotten sick a few years before. The watch was floating in the air in front of me, rotating slowly, its carved silver designs still intricate and delicate like I'd remembered.
I couldn't breath as I gazed at it.
Slowly my left hand raised almost in spite of itself and moved towards the floating watch. I continued to hold my breath until one fingertip brushed, ever so lightly, across the silver surface.
I immediately unfroze.
"What the hell are you playing at?" I yelled, grasping the watch firmly and taking in into my palm, "Did you... did you sneak into my mom's house and steal this? Are you crazy?" I was shouting to the walls, the mist, the invisible depths beneath me, my heart thundering in my chest as my fingers closed around the heavy watch, "What sort of messed up game is this?" My voice faltered, and I caught my breath, hot tears of emotion and fear prickling in my eyes. I glanced down at the watch, half-enclosed in my fist, and swallowed with difficulty.
"Hero..."
With a faint scream I clutched at my head, the watch still clutched safely in my head, the Doctor's voice pounding through my mind. A second later I found myself kneeling on the cold stone of the bridge, eyes squeezed shut, trying to maintain some sort of mental balance. His voice in my head was like being handed some huge and heavy without any preparation; I felt like my mind was about to topple over.
"Hero, I need you to trust me."
I gasped, trying to open my eyes, trying to say something aloud, but my body had lost a will of its own and swayed dangerously near to the edge of the bridge.
"Please, this has never been more important, and it will change your life, but you have got to get up and trust me." The Doctor's voice in my head was calm, yet I could feel ripples of earnest anxiety coming from his words. With an enormous effort I opened my eyes, still clutching at the sides of my head, stumbling to my feet, the press of the silver pocket watch marking my palm as I squeezed.
"Doctor..." I mumbled, feeling like a powerful wind was crashing through my mind, knowing that in a few moments I would be swept over the edge of an even deeper pit in my own consciousness, "I can't... I can't move..." My voice cracked and failed as I teetered forward. The cold air rising around me blew harder, whipping my body around, tearing at me like someone was trying to toss me into the deep crevasse below.
"Hero, listen to me, you're going to fall unless you do exactly what I say. If you fall, you'll die, do you understand? You must do what I say. Hero..." I was aware that cold tears were streaming from my eyes, though I couldn't remember how or why they had gotten there. My head felt like it was about to explode. An extra strong gust of wind knocked me to the ground and I scrambled for a handhold on the smooth stone.
"Doctor, what do I do?" I cried, looking with wide eyes down into the pit that was trying to blow me into itself, "I'll do it, just tell me!"
"Open the watch," he replied, "Open it as quick as you can!"
"But..." I felt like a small child again, pleading with my mother, "but I was never supposed to do that! It's fragile! It'll... it'll break..." I lowered my eyes to the object clutched in my hand, opening my fingers, taking hold of the latch in spite of myself. In doing this I lost whatever hold I had on the bridge and I teetered towards the edge as the icy air shoved at me ruthlessly, swirling my hair into my face.
"Please! Do it! I can't just lie here and watch you die! Everything will be alright, everything will make sense to you, I promise!"
Just as I began to topple over into the crevasse, I pulled at the watch, swinging it open, hearing a sharp crack as the hinges snapped apart, heard my own cry of fear as I fell fell fell over the edge, my eyes blinded by a huge explosion of light coming from the shattered watch in my hands, as every cell in my body convulsed and everything faded into blackness.
The man was standing next to my mother, my real mother, and there were tears in her eyes. I had to look up a long way to see their faces, I was small and they were so much bigger and more important than me. My mother continued to cry, and the man reached out a hand to comfort her. She was nodding now, not looking down at me even when I began to cry, too. I wasn't sure why I was crying, but everything in the world seemed so sad that I couldn't bear it. The man bent down to me, picking me up in his arms, and I looked at my weeping mother and tried to still my own tears.
"She won't remember any of it, I promise," the man told my mother, resting a gentle hand on my head, "and the TARDIS will take care of the rest. You know what I have to do, this is a way for her to get away from all of it. And there's only one chance."
"We have to take it, then," she managed, and she briefly looked at me with stricken eyes.
"It'll be okay, mom," I said, reaching out a small hand towards her.
"She's sure it'll work out," the man said, patting me gently.
"How... how do you know?" my mother asked, reaching out to touch my fingers.
"Because I speak baby" the man replied, "You know that, I speak every language."
Hooray for shocking plot twists! Hope it wasn't too wild for you, please review! More to come very soon :)