Chapter 2

"EMMA PETROVA! GRAB YOUR COAT!" The doctor flung the door open and ran into Emma's room where she sat reading her latest book.

"Why?" She closed her thumb in the book. Emma wore a pink and black striped long-sleeved shirt that went just below her waist and black pants that hugged her ankles. "I am not allowed to leave until med time."

"Live on the edge, Emma!" The doctor pulled her to her feet. "Where is your coat?"

"I don't have a coat." Emma looked down to her feet, rubbing her grey converse together. "Never really did."

"North Alaska, without a coat?!" The doctor's voice squeaked. "Nonsense." He slid his Brown hero coat off and handed it to Emma. He spun around and examined the room

Emma slid the coat on it look much bigger on her than it did on him, but it was to be expected. Emma felt something heavy in the inside upper left coat pocket. She pulled the thing out of his coat pocket. It was a sort of short metal thing that Emma couldn't recognize.

"What is this?" She held out her findings.

"Oh." The doctor's eyes widened. "That," he took the Sonic out of her hand, "Is my torch."

"Doesn't look like a torch at all." Emma looked intently at the sonic.

"Oh well, off we go." the doctor shoved his Sonic Screwdriver into his pocket and carried on out the door, grasping Emma's arm so she would follow him.

He led her out the door and into a snow covered makeshift courtyard. There was only one bench next to a birdbath with ice providing a sort of outer shell to it. The trees that Emma would sit in the fall and watch decay had lost all of their leaves and had icicles hanging from them.

"Only a bit further." The doctor stole a glance to Emma who was watching the trees with glittering eyes, this made him smile.

The Doctor led her to a clearing surrounded by snow drifts and dead trees, in the heart of the forest. In the middle there were two chairs, rusted from the years of exposure to rain and snow. On one of the chairs lay a blanket, put there by the doctor to make sure Emma didn't freeze.

He picked up the blanket and draped it over Emma's shoulders. "Have a seat." Emma did as she was told and sat in one of the rusted chairs, her eyes still glittering at the view of the winter landscape. The doctor took a seat beside her and leaned back letting his arms rest on the chair.

"The thing I love most about winter is the unintentional beauty of forgotten places." Emma caressed the snow on the arm of the chair. "Things as simple as water form the most magnificent things.

"Indeed they do." The doctor looked at her. She looked lost in the beauty of everything. Her hair waved behind her like a river of maroon. Her eyes, sparkling from the reflection of the snow, looked more brilliant to him in this moment then they had yesterday. "Emma, why were you committed?"

"Wouldn't you know that?" Emma did not meet his eyes; she already knew what they looked like. They would be filled with the same sadness that everyone looked at her with. Within her life time she had meet different doctors, all with hopes of helping everyone, but when they saw her they thought of her as a prisoner to her own made up thoughts.

"I would rather find out for myself then read some file."

"Files don't lie, people do." Emma leaned back and pulled the blanket on her shoulders to her chest. "You will also find that some people in this place are compulsive liars."

"But you are not." The doctor narrowed his eyes at her. "You seem to be very truthful."

"Wouldn't that be the best quality in a liar?" Emma skirted around the question.

"Yes, but-" Emma cut him off.

"So, I could be the best liar or a very truthful person; can you tell which is true?" Emma looked at him, eyebrow raised. She sighed, "I was admitted because when I was young I created a faux reality and my mother thought I would be better off in a place that could handle me."

"You were abandoned? "The doctor's voice became sympathetic.

"I think that is self-explanatory." Emma faced forward at the trees

"What treatment are they giving you?"

"Psychiatric and Electroshock." Emma sighed, "Did you even glance at the file?"

"Electroshock therapy for a creative mind?" The doctors held back his anger cause by the thought of Emma being strapped to a chair and have to suffer the way she did. He had heard of such treatment in 50's asylums but in the 21st century by a doctor who claimed to be an expert in the human mind, made him wonder if the doctor is part Dalek.

"Not many people could say that my mind is creative, Doctor." Emma stretched her hands like cat claws, "In fact I think you are the only one to ever say that to me."

"Nonsense, you're brilliant." The doctor regained his usually exited tone, "You look lovely, as well."

Emma blushed. She had never been told that, ever. Between being surrounded by people with enough sedatives in their system to almost put them in a coma and her daily therapy session she had never really been spoken to like she was someone's peer. But to be called lovely, it made her feel guilty for being so curt with him earlier in the conversation.

"Well, let's get you in from the cold before you catch a chill." The doctor stood up and pulled Emma to her feet. "Before we go back, may I ask you something personal?"

"Of course." Emma felt very small with him towering over her.

"Do you like it here?" The doctor regained his serious voice.

"It is all I have ever known." Emma looked into his boyish brown eyes.

Sensing that this was the only answer he was going to get he swung to the side of her and interlaced his arm with hers. "Allons-y, Madam Petrova."