Notes: I'm hoping to get this finished before xmas. It seems appropriate to have a xmas story done in time for it, so I'll do my best. It's tricky while the kids are home though since they're on the computer all the time.
Chapter Two: The Wolf, the Widow, and the Wardrobe - Part Two
"Do you really think they'll like it?" the Doctor asked Rose as they worked together on rewiring the randomizer controls. For the last few months, it had been taking them underwater every time they hit it, so it was time to fix it while they waited for their little surprise.
"They'll love it. We always had a wonderful time whenever we took Jamie there," Rose assured him.
They both turned quickly when they heard the floor squeak by the doorway.
"You were lying about the panthers," Lily accused.
"Famous last words," the Doctor countered.
"What are you doing up, sweetheart?" Rose asked the young girl.
"Why have you got a phone box in your room?" Lily asked, avoiding the topic of being out of bed.
"It's not a phone box, it's our wardrobe. I've just painted it to look like a phone box," the Doctor told her.
"Well, what are you doing?" Lily questioned, not entirely believing him.
"Rewiring," he replied quickly, not really wanting to lie, but definitely not able to tell her the complete truth.
"Why would you rewire a wardrobe?" she wondered.
"Have you seen the way he dresses?" Rose interrupted.
"Oi!" he protested.
"Who are you two? Really, who are you?" the girl asked.
Rose and the Doctor were distracted by an alarm going off beside them.
"Your brother, where is he?" the Doctor demanded worriedly.
"Still in bed, asleep," she whispered.
"Okay. Faulty, then," the Doctor said, tapping the little alarm against his hand, but it went off again as he watched it. "You're sure he's still in bed?"
They followed her back to her room and she cracked open the door to look inside. The three of them quietly went to Cyril's bunk. There appeared to be someone sleeping there, but as Rose and the Doctor were both parents and accomplished troublemakers, they knew that looks could be deceiving.
"See?" Lily whispered, gesturing to her apparently sleeping brother.
"Shush," he told her as he pulled back the covers to reveal a large teddy bear. "Oh, he's good. The old bear and duvet, eh? Classic."
"He definitely shouldn't be out there alone at night," Rose told her husband and they all dashed down the stairs.
Just as the trio made it to the sitting room, they saw Cyril's arm disappear into the large present box with a torch. The box was on its side, the lid tossed across the room and there was a faint glow coming from inside.
"Cyril!" the Doctor shouted as he dove, head-first into the box.
"What's happening? I hope," Lily began, but was struck dumb by the sight of the box. " What is that?"
"With me. Quickly, come on," the Doctor told her as he pulled her inside with him. "Stay here, love, in case he comes back."
The Doctor and Lily were standing in a snowy forest at night. There were large evergreen trees all around them and small footprints leading off in the snow.
"That's it. In you come. Brr, bit cold. Never mind. Cyril! Cyril!" he called after helping Lily through the portal. He searched around the area and discovered the open shell of what appeared to be a large, silver egg.
"Where are we?" Lily asked nervously.
"In a forest, in a box, in a sitting room. Pay attention. He's about twenty minutes ahead," he told her distractedly as he examined the inside of the egg.
"But we just saw him," she argued.
"Time moves differently across the dimensional planes. What do they teach you in schools these days?" he responded, indignant that she wouldn't understand what he considered to be basic fundamental knowledge.
"But I don't understand where we are," she told him nervously. Her mother had told them to stay away from him.
"We've gone through a dimensional portal... thingy," he said trying to simplify the situation for her.
"Well, what's that supposed to be? Where did it come from?" she asked wondering how such a thing could have ended up in their sitting room where her brother could stumble across it.
"It was a present, and it wasn't supposed to be opened till Christmas Day. Honestly, who opens their Christmas presents early?" he asked rhetorically as he shone his torch in her face and she smiled sheepishly. "Okay. Shut up. Everyone," he whispered and followed the footprints into the forest with Lily right behind him.
"I don't understand. Is this place real, or is it a fairyland?" Lily questioned, thinking this whole situation was like a story from a book.
"Fairyland? Oh, grow up, Lily. Fairyland looks completely different. Now, these are Cyril's footprints, and these are the ones he was following. Notice anything?" he asked her as the two of them studied the tracks in the snow.
"The other footprints are getting bigger," she replied, getting even more worried about her missing brother. The man's wife said that Cyril shouldn't be out here alone.
"Yes. Whatever your brother's following, it's growing," the Doctor realized.
"Well, we have to get after him," she shouted and ran in the direction of the footprints. She brushed the side of one of the trees. In response, the tree suddenly grew several silver baubles, hanging from what looked like ice. Lily stopped and stared at them fearfully.
"It's okay, you're fine. Don't worry," he assured her as he moved forward to admire the shiny things.
"Is that tree alive?" she asked timidly.
"Of course it's alive. It's a tree," he replied, sure that she just hadn't thought about the fact that plants are alive, even if they aren't usually sentient.
"But is it dangerous?" she questioned, approaching the tree again.
"Every rose has its thorns," he admitted.
"They're like Christmas tree decorations," she said with a smile as she looked at one of them more closely.
"Yeah. Naturally occurring Christmas trees. How cool is that?" he beamed, still proud of his idea of a present for the children, even if it wasn't working out exactly as planned.
"I don't understand," Lily told him.
"It's a big universe. Everything happens somewhere. Call it a coincidence. Call it an idea echoing among the stars. Personally, I call it a brilliant idea for a Christmas trip. Or it should've been," the Doctor paused in his explanation as he heard a whispering sound all around them on the breeze. "Do you know the difference between wind and trees talking to each other?"
"What?" she asked, becoming more nervous as she watched him grow concerned.
The Doctor stuck his index finger into his mouth and held it up to gauge the wind around them and found the air to be completely calm. "No wind. I've been here many times, but I've never heard the trees so active. Something's wrong. What are you doing? What are you up to?" he asked the trees around them. Looking closely at the silver ball on the tree, his reflection turned from one of himself to the image of a wooden face.
The Doctor switched his torch for his sonic screwdriver and took Lily's hand. It was bad enough with one missing child, he couldn't risk losing the other.
"I'm sorry, Lily, I really am, but there is something very wrong in this forest, and your brother's right in the middle of it."
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Back in the sitting room, Rose was waiting anxiously. She knew that the Christmas Tree planet in the Androzani System was generally quite safe, but a little boy definitely shouldn't be out there by himself at night. It was cold and he might get lost. They certainly didn't want him to end up with frostbite or something.
"Lily and Cyril Arwell, where are you?" Madge called as she stormed downstairs. She entered the sitting room and gaped at the open box on the floor.
"I can explain, Madge, I swear. It was just supposed to be a special surprise for them in the morning, but Cyril opened it early and wandered off. The Doctor and Lily have gone looking for him, but he'll be fine, I promise," Rose told her, knowing how she would feel if Jamie had disappeared and wasn't used to this kind of life with the Doctor.
"What do you mean, he wandered off?" she asked, still staring at the strange light coming from inside the box.
"I know it's hard to believe, but the box is a portal to a lovely place that the Doctor and I liked to take our son to when he was little. They've got Christmas trees there that grow their own decorations! It's a really lovely place, but a bit cold for a little boy to go and get himself lost in the middle of the night, so, hang on a minute," Rose told her and got a bit concerned when Madge got a determined look on her face and headed for the box.
"I'm not going to just sit here and wait," she protested.
"Alright, fine, I understand. Let's at least make sure that we're both dressed for the snow," Rose insisted.
Both wearing warm boots, hats, and gloves, Rose and Madge climbed through the portal and into the snowy forest to follow the others.
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"Why would you bring us to this place?" Lily asked, wondering why he thought this would be a good Christmas trip.
"It was supposed to be a treat. Rose and I used to take our son here all the time. This is one of the safest planets I know. There's never anything dangerous here," he assured her.
There was an ominous rumbling in the ground just then that made him comment, "There are sentences I should just keep away from." He thought to his wife, "There may be a slight complication, love."
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"I gathered that, yes. Madge decided that she needed to go looking for the children herself. I came with her to try and keep her as safe as possible out here," Rose thought back to him and felt his worry about her safety. She rolled her eyes at his usual overprotectiveness. Honestly, they'd been doing this sort of thing for centuries now.
"This tree farm is private property. You are trespassing," came the sound of an authoritative voice through the trees as bright lights began to shine nearby. Three people in futuristic, but very dirty, protective equipment approached them. One of them scanned the pair of women with his handheld device. All three of them had rather fierce looking guns pointed in their direction.
"Unarmed, sir," he reported to the other.
"What the hell are you doing here?" the one who was apparently in charge questioned harshly.
"No, wait, armed! No, unarmed. Sorry, sir. She's wearing wool, sir. The natural fabrics, they interfere with the..." he explained as his device continued beeping at him.
"Please say we can tell the difference between wool and side arms," he grumbled.
"We can tell the difference, sir," he responded obediently.
"Can we?" he asked, needing the truth.
"Not always, sir, no," the other admitted.
"What are you doing here? Do you understand what is about to happen in this forest?" the leader demanded of the women, trying to ignore the incompetence of his subordinate.
"I was just..." Madge began.
"We got here a bit earlier than we had planned," Rose started to explain.
"Sir, I think they're time travellers," the female worker interrupted as she ran a different scanner over them.
"We're sure it's not her cardigan?" he snapped at her.
"Who are you? It was Christmas," Madge questioned and began to cry.
"What did you mean? What's about to happen in the forest?" Rose asked them worriedly.
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The Doctor and Lily kept arguing about the nature and safety of this trip until they finally came upon a tall tower where the footprints in the snow ended. They hesitantly went inside and were faced with the form of a large wooden King sitting on a throne. There was a staircase leading up the tower all around them and they presumed that Cyril must have climbed it.
"Interesting," the Doctor commented as he studied the figure.
"What's that? Is that a statue? What is it? It's like a King," Lily questioned.
"A King, possibly, but not a statue. Look at the floor," he prompted so that she would notice the large footprints that they had been following leading directly to this thing. "This is what Cyril was following. The growing thing. Hatched from a bauble on a tree. Grew to this size in less than an hour, I'd say. Impressive. And so is this building. Yes. It's grown, see. This building, it isn't a building. It's a group of trees grown in the shape of a building. Disguised as a building. Ooo, clever. I love. Clever, clever old forest. So, a forest grows a building. Why would it do that, Lily?" the Doctor rambled as he took in all of the information around him. This was certainly a mystery.
"I don't know," she replied indignantly.
"Why is there honey in a honey trap?" he prompted, sure that she was more clever than she gave herself credit for.
"Because it's a trap?" she suggested.
"Exactly. Thing about people, we can never resist a door," he told her.
"So this is a trap. What, we've just walked straight into a trap?" she asked, afraid that something would jump out at them suddenly.
"A people trap. Question is, why does a forest need people?" he wondered.
"We should go. We have to get out of here," she said, staring at the wooden king as she backed towards the door.
"Except?" the Doctor reminded her why they came to begin with.
"Except Cyril was here," she realized.
The Doctor offered his hand, which she took gratefully. She was scared, but she could be brave for her brother's sake. "So let's find Cyril," he told her as he led her up the stairs.
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"Ma'am, please stop crying. I can't interrogate you while you're crying. This is a military engagement! There's no crying in military engagements. Corporal Ven Garr, are you?" the leader argued as Madge continued to bawl dramatically.
The man that had scanned them originally had also started crying and responded, "I'm fine, sir."
"What is wrong with you?" the leader questioned in disgust.
"I have mother issues, sir. It's all on file. It won't affect the performance of my duties," Ven Garr responded and tried to calm himself in the face of a crying woman.
Rose was frustrated that they wouldn't answer her question about what was supposed to be happening here soon, but Madge's crying seemed to be winning them peaceful points, so she just patted the other woman on the shoulder soothingly and let the tears work their magic.
"Er, sir. Er, with regret, I'm going to have to lower my gun," the female officer reported.
"Why?" their leader questioned.
"She is a crying, unarmed female civilian. I'm thinking of the visual," she replied.
"Nobody's looking," he argued incredulously.
"Doesn't mean there's no visual," she told him.
"That's exactly what nobody's looking means. It means there's no visual," he insisted.
"I'm sorry, sir. It's under control. Do you want me to shoot them, sir?" Ven Garr asked once he had calmed himself.
"Oh, this visual's deteriorating, sir," the woman groaned.
"Shut up!" he shouted. The woman put her gun on the ground and stepped back from it. "What are you doing?" her superior questioned angrily.
"I am respecting her as a woman, sir," she replied.
The man rolled his eyes and acquiesced, hoping they might get some sensible answers from the trespassers if they could get the woman to stop bawling. "Okay, we're putting our guns on the ground. Okay? Happy now? We're stepping away from our guns. Now can we interrogate you? We're from Androzani Major. The year is 5345, and we mean you no harm. Where are you from?" he asked placatingly as he and Van Garr also placed their weapons on the ground and stepped back from them.
"England, 1941. And there's a war on," Madge replied as she pulled a revolver out of her pocket and aimed it at them, her crocodile tears disappearing.
"Madge! What are you doing?" Rose shrieked.
"Crying's ever so useful, isn't it?" she said with a teary smile.
"If you say so. But there's nothing you could say that would convince me you'd ever use that gun," the leading officer challenged.
"Oh really? Well, I'm looking for my children," Madge countered and the man's eyes went wide.
