Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who

Chapter 1

Nine Years Later: October 10th, 1910

Pale white sunlight peeped into the thick, royal blue curtains. Maddie yawned, feeling refreshed. Another dreamless night had passed. Could this be the end of it? she thought, rollinf onto her back and sitting up. The thought delighted her: no more psychiatrist. No more nightmares. No more panic attacks. She smiled, rubbing her cheek with her thumb.

Looking to her door, Maddie saw her open trunk.

"Oh! That's today," Maddie sighed, rolling her eyes. It had been a year since Maddie had last seen her elder brother, and she was excited to visit him, but they would be going to a school for boys. The rumors alone had nearly dissuaded her.

Maddie stretched, pulled her feet from the covers, and swung them off the bed. Staring in the mirror before she began to get ready, Maddie scrutinized her face. Her nose was small, gently pointed, and turned up at the end. She had never liked that part of her features, though her family claimed it was lovely.

Twenty minutes later, Maddie quietly crept down the stairs wearing a faded heather dress and tiptoed to the parlor, awaiting Doctor Creevins. This would hopefully be his last visit, though Maddie was rather fond of him. Someone rapped on the door and Maddie lost herself in memory, reliving the past nine years of her life.

After her fright in the barn, she had awakened to the news that the scarecrows were merely Ernest and his friends. After the discovery of Mr. Smith's verdict for Ernest, life had gone back to relatively normal. Then the nightmares began.

Though Maddie knew that scarecrows had been boys in costumes, she had woken from a nightmare a week later. They had continued nightly, hadn't been the kind where she had them, woke up, and forgot them. They had lingered, ominously, on her chest, making her feel ill. Always, there had been scarecrows, without boys inside, trying to reach her and get her, even make her one of them at times. At first, her parents had thought that it must be residual shock, but as it had continued, it had worsened. The dreams had started leaking into the daytime with hallucinations. The lifeless scarecrows in the fields had started making Maddie faint, or cry. When Maddie had refused to leave the house lest the scarecrows should "come after" her, Mr. and Mrs. Smith had decided it was time to move and contact a psychiatrist.

The Smiths had moved to London, which was miles away from their manor in the countryside, and had contacted a talented psychiatrist named Doctor Creevins. By the time he had scheduled his first appointment, Maddie had become physically ill with fear. He had assessed her condition and declared that, although Maddie had known the scarecrows from her original encounter were unreal, the terror from the event had caused severe trauma to her mind. Nightmares and fear were merely ways of expelling all the residual negative energy.

Maddie had spent seven years under the care of Doctor Creevins. He had taught her that her dreams were merely a figment of her imagination and that she had more control over then than she knew. That had been the turning point. Slowly, the dreams had become less frequent. Doctor Creevin's intervention had been a success.

As if in answer to Maddie's reverie, Doctor Creevins entered the parlor. His thick white beard and mustache brought attention to his hairless head. He dropped into the chair perpendicular to the sofa upon which Maddie was seated. He set his briefcase on the floor.

"I trust you are doing well?" he asked, leaning back and resting his elbows on the cushioned arms of the chair.

"Oh, yes." Maddie nodded. "All thanks to you."

"Don't be thanking me just yet," the man held up a hand as he set down his leather bag. "No dreams?"

"None."

"Well then, child," Creevins said. "I'd like to repeat the advice I gave to you some time ago. Dreams are only a figment of your imagination. You have more control over them than you know." He smiled and nodded, interlacing his fingers. "If you should ever need me, though I hope you will not, you know where to contact me."

"Thank you, Doctor."

"I wish you well on your journey." The doctor placed his velveteen top hat on his head as he left the house. He shook Maddie's father's hand and kissed mother's- who had both come to greet him. Maddie waited at the arched entry of the parlor. With a wink to Maddie, he slipped out the door and Maddie felt a rush of relief. She didn't need a psychiatrist anymore. With the help of Doctor Creevins, she had gone from terror-induced hermitism to being able to walk past one of them with only a little discomfort.

"Are you ready to leave?" Maddie's mother asked, tying on her hat. Maddie stifled a gasp. She had forgotten to finish packing.

"Just about," Maddie replied, running back up the stairs. Her trunk was closed and ready to be locked, but Maddie felt like she should bring one more thing. She opened a small box on her bookshelf and pulled from it two dolls. One was a primitive representation of herself with yarn for hair and a light lavender dress. Since auburn wasn't really a color in yarn, they had used orange. The other doll was a scarecrow, exactly like the one in her nightmares. Once she had recovered somewhat, the doctor had had her use this doll in her games, and eventually had her sleep with it, though it usually ended up on the floor by midnight. Maddie stowed the dolls in her trunk and locked it in time for one of the servants to retrieve it and carry it down the stairs.

The front door clicked shut behind the family and Maddie followed her parents into the automobile. A light drizzle of rain turned the air around them gray and set a new, unwelcome, melancholy tone.

Across the street, a chimney sweep circled a large blue box. From this distance, Maddie couldn't make out the white words on the top, so she ignore it and accepted the chauffer's hand into the back seat of the car.

The chauffer climbed behind the wheel and another servant turned the crack to start of the engine. The automobile puttered to life and jolted forward, flinging Maddie and her family into the seat in front of them.

Maddie glanced back at the box as they pulled away, just in time to see a tall man in a long tan coat step from the double blue doors. They rounded the corner, and the man and his box were lost from view. Though he had been some distance away, Maddie could have sworn he had looked straight at her.

The bustle of the city died down as they left and headed into the more open country. The dismal streets of London merged and melted into the golden fields and thick trees of Maddie's childhood. The sky remained the same color as her dress, though the rain had slowed to a stop. Looking out the window, Maddie saw every scarecrow. Her eyes were somehow magnetically drawn to each and every one of the hideous, solitary figures. Now that she wasn't terrified of them anymore, Maddie found it almost comical when the large, back birds settled proudly on the arms of the frozen sentries and cawed their cackling song.

A flash of black at the window sent Maddie cowering into the seat until she realized it was just another crow come to investigate. There was a sharp pecking at the top of the roof before the black fowl sailed erratically away.

Roses are red
Violets are blue
I wrote this in hopes that
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