The Doctor found himself falling into a different room, "Blimey, where am I now?" He brushed the dirt off his shoulders.
Right in front of him was a couple, passionately kissing and moaning on a couch. There was Charlotte, sitting down in front of them and watching.
"Oi, Charlotte, I believe you're too young to see this." The Doctor quickly covered the little girl's eyes.
Charlie entered the room with a gun in her hand, "Doctor, get out of the way!"
"Charlie, what the hell? Why are you holding a gun?" The Doctor picked up Charlotte.
Charlie aimed her gun at the woman. Whose hair was black as Charlie's, covered in a scandalous red dress, and kept laughing in between the kissing. Charlie had her in her sights and fired. The woman seemed completely unharmed and continued kissing. Charlie fired again. Still nothing. Charlie threw the gun aside and grabbed the woman by the hair, "You whore!"
The woman began screaming for dear life as Charlie kept insulting her.
"Do you know how much pain you caused? I never forgave you after what happened!" Charlie threw the woman on the ground and started beating her, "I wished you were the one that died, not him!" She cried.
"Charlie! Charlotte!" The Doctor pulled Charlie off the woman, "Charlotte Marcus, you look at me right now! What the bloody hell were you doing? Who is this woman?"
Charlie looked down and hesitated.
"Tell me!" The Doctor seemed furious.
"Diana Marcus. My mother." Charlie was crying. "She hurt me after…after…" Charlie was choking on her tears and couldn't say anything.
"Tell me, Charlotte." The Doctor wanted to know what was going on here so badly.
"Doctor, please don't be mad at her." Charlotte placed her tiny hand on his arm, "I hate her, too."
"Wha-? Your own mother?"
"Nobody's perfect, right, Chuckie?" The blood-covered man walked up to the group. He gazed at the woman, who was fixing herself and resumed making love to the man on the couch. "Ah, Diana. I don't know what was up with her. She was a beautiful woman, and I was so young."
"Wait, Charlie, are you saying that this man is-?"
"No! Get out of here!" Charlie shouted at the man.
"Fine. Ciao for now, Chuckie." The man chuckled as he disappeared once more.
"Come on, Doctor, I want to show you the best part." Charlotte tugged his arm and ran off.
"Charlotte!"
"Doctor, wait!" Charlie stopped him, "First of all, I didn't mean to push you into the pond. I just didn't want you to know what's going on. The man causing all of this, is like invading my privacy. You never tell me anything, only the fact that you're an alien and you're over 900 years old. This secret I'm hiding, it's really important to me. And what happened before affected the people I loved the most. For example, my mother."
"Charlie, do you want to tell me what's going on?" The Doctor put his hand on her shoulder.
"Part of me does, yet another doesn't. The majority is I wish everything was perfectly normal."
"What is normal, Charlotte?"
"My mom and…" Charlie turned around and found her mother, in a white ball gown, laughing and dancing with the blood-covered man. "Normal is something that isn't there. We just have to make the best of what we have so far." Charlie gave out a wry laugh, "See you on the other end, Doctor." Charlie disappeared from the Time Lord.
"Charlie!"
"Doctor, I'm waiting!" Charlotte called.
The Doctor chased after the little girl and found her in front of a vault, "A vault?"
"Not just any vault." The blood-covered man appeared once more, "The motherlode." He laughed, "If you can guess who I am, you can open the vault, and there you can find what making Miss Marcus tick like a time bomb."
"Wait!" Charlie ran up the Doctor. "Doctor, you don't have to do this. Just leave well enough alone."
"You're right! You don't have to do this, Doc, Charlotte does." The blood-covered man clapped his hands. "Charlotte, you can either let your friend find out what's wrong with you or you can go ahead and spoil it." He taunted her.
"Why are calling me Charlotte? You've always called me Chuckie." Charlie became
"Charlie, what does it matter? You hate being called Chuckie."
"Hate being called Chuckie?" The man laughed, "Oh, this is too good! You've loved being called Chuckie ever since you were a little kid."
"Charlotte, is this true?" The Doctor seemed to find out what was happening.
"No, he's lying!" Charlie rebuked.
"Lying? You looked up to me, Charlotte."
"No!" Charlie began to cry.
"Yes! I'd read to you every night and would always play with you when your mother wouldn't. And quit blaming your mother for everything that happened! I never hated her, I loved her, Charlotte. Charlotte," The man grabbed her hands and placed them on his face, "I've always loved you."
"If you loved me, why did you do all this to hurt me, Daddy?" Tears were rolling down Charlie's face.
"Daddy? I knew it, this man is your father." The Doctor said.
"Chuckie duck, I never meant to hurt you. I thought it would be time to tell the Doctor what was really going on."
"Tell me what? Charlie, what is going on? I've about had it with the twists and turns."
"Fine. I'll tell you what's going on. If you'll send us back to the TARDIS." Charlie looked at her father.
"Of course, honey." The man hugged his daughter one last time and sent her away. "Doctor, you take care of my little girl."
"Of course, sir."
"Goodbye, Chuckie duck."
"Bye, Daddy." A tear rolled down her eye as she closed her eyes.
Charlie and the Doctor woke up, back in the TARDIS. "Doctor? Doctor?" Charlie shook him to see if he was okay.
"I'm all right, Charlotte!" The Doctor got up, "Charlotte, do you want to tell me something?"
Charlie looked down and found her new hairpin, shattered in pieces, "My pin." She bent down and picked up one of the pieces.
"Let me see that." The Doctor got out his screwdriver and scanned it, "Charlie, this is a Memory Pin. If a person wears it, then the wearer and the people around them in a ten mile radius will be affected by the wearer's troubled mind."
"So, all that stuff we went through, wasn't real?"
"No. It was your mind telling you that you had something that you needed to get off your chest. Your father, or your subconscious, telling you had to tell me what was happening sooner or later. Now, Miss Marcus, is there something you'd like to tell me?"
"Yeah." Charlie nodded, "Come on, I want to show you something."
Charlie pulled out old photos from her backpack and showed them to the Doctor, telling him about her favorite memories and places. "Oh, here's a good one." She pulled out a picture and gave it to him. It was the blood-covered man, only not covered in blood, he looked like a normal human being. He was sitting under the oak tree at the park, with little Charlotte in his lap, reading a book to her.
"Your father, he's not covered in blood, I like it." The Doctor nodded as Charlie chuckled, "Tell me about him."
"His name was Bradley Marcus, my dad. We were as thick as thieves. He was a lawyer, a very smart one. I wanted just like him when I grew up."
"What happened to your father?"
"He died when I was eight. He was really sick. My mother cheated on him while he was in the hospital with his partner. After he died, she got married to him, and now they are living in Aspen. I'm living alone in my tiny apartment. I didn't want anything to do with them, I was still upset that she betrayed my dad when he was really sick. That was the time I needed her the most."
"Sick?"
"That's the thing I really need to tell you. My dad died from Sheldon Vexler's disease. It's when your blood is just too much and your veins just rupture, causing to bleed internally and out of every orifice."
"Explains him being covered in blood."
"Yeah. About three ago, they discovered that Sheldon Vexler's can be genetically passed."
The Doctor put down the picture and looked at Charlie, "You mean-?"
"There's about a 50% I might have it." Charlie pulled the envelope from before from her bag, "When we first met, I wasn't feeling well. So, after you left, I decided to go and get myself tested." Charlie handed him the envelope, "Those are the test results I got back. I didn't look at them, I didn't want to open them. I'm not going to worry about my life like some mouse hiding in its hole. So, if you want, you can go ahead and look. I'm not." She sighed, "That's it! Screw the restaurant, I'm going to go make me a sandwich. I'm starving!" Charlie got up and headed for the kitchen.
The Doctor was left alone, with the envelope in his hand, wondering what to do.
Charlie sat down in the kitchen, biting into the PB&J sandwich she made where the Doctor approached her, "Hey." She wiped some jelly off the corner of her mouth.
"I looked at your results." The Doctor sat down next to her.
"And?" She was nervous.
"You're going to be fine." The Doctor put his arm around Charlie and hugged her, "Ooh, what is that? PB&J?" He snatched the sandwich from her and took a bite.
"Hey, that's mine!" Charlie reached for her sandwich.
"I have to say, Charlotte, this is a bloody good sandwich, but not as good as the ones I make." He bragged.
"Get back here with my sandwich!" Charlie chased him for her sandwich.
Back near the console, scattered among the pictures of Charlie's childhood, was a letter.
Dear Charlotte C. Marcus,
Your test results for Sheldon Vexler's disease came back: POSITIVE.