A/N: Told you there would be a quick update! I'd really appreciate a review or two (make me think this is worth while and not terrible), so if you have time please comment! Also I still don't have a beta so I am doing by best to (a) be critical and keep the story interesting, and (b) have perfect spelling and grammar. If there are any problems with either of this, PM or review and I will try to fix them. Now on with the story...
Chapter Four:
Áine brought over the pot of steaming stew and set it directly on the table, followed quickly by some primitive bowls and spoons. Rose could feel the saliva gather in her mouth as the elderly lady spooned some of the food onto her plate. After everyone was served both Mac Gearailts bowed their head, clasped their hands a said a short prayer. Rose and the Doctor hastily followed suit.
Mr. Mac Gearailt popped his head up and unclasped his hands. "Right then! Enjoy," he said before digging into his own portion.
Rose quickly spooned the meat to her mouth, savouring the way the venison melted in her mouth. She made a noise of contentment. "This is delicious," she complimented with a bit of food still her mouth. She picked up what looked like a purple carrot and spooned it past her lips, perplexed by the colour but impressed by the flavour. She delicately pushed aside the parsnips, wrinkling her nose a bit before delightfully divulging in the beans and peas. After she had some food in her stomach and she wasn't as ravenous, Rose realized she must have been eating like a pig. She sat back and began to eat more like a lady, delicately bringing the food to her mouth in small bites. "Where do you get these vegetables?" She asked.
"Oh, we have a few farmers 'round here that do most o' the growin'. Them carrots an' parsnip are from our own little plot out back but the beans and peas are from Fearghus ó Ceallacháin up the road. The venison is from the forest o' course. The high lord that owns the shire lets each family take a few deer e'ery year, then we hunt the smaller game like hares an' squirrels an' hedgehog," Mr. Mac Gearailt said before he took a big bite. Rose was happy that she was eating deer, rather than hedgehog at the moment.
"Is the lord aware of the disappearances?" The Doctor asked.
"Well even if he was, I don't think he'd do much," said Mrs. Mac Gearailt said. "He keeps to his own, we keep to ours. He's pleasant for a highborn type, not like others I've 'eard of."
"But doesn't he care if his people go missing?" Rose asked, taken aback at her nonchalant attitude.
"As long as he gets his share of the produce every year, he don't much care what we do."
"So you two ar' in town lookin' into them disappearances, hm?" Áine changed the subject off of the lord that technically owned their land and house.
"Yes, we are very curious what could be causing it," the Doctor said, diplomatically.
"Mhm, very strange indeed."
The Mac Gearalit's were quiet eaters, and there was no more conversation throughout the rest of supper. All that could be heard was the occasional crackle from the fire and the scraping of spoons against the bowls.
"That was amazing," Rose commented, licking the spoon when she had finished her meal. The Doctor was copying her actions across the table, savouring the last bits of broth that clung to the pewter spoon. Though he didn't eat much, when he did eat it was impressive. She supposed the entire day walking had worked up an appetite in him as well.
"Thank ye kindly," Áine looked pleased, and her ruddy face darkened considerably in what Rose assumed was a blush. "It was just simple, nothin' like them fancy meals I am certain ye get in London."
"No, it was much better," the Doctor said and Áine beamed.
After the dishes were washed and everything was put away, which Rose insisted on helping with, Mr. Mac Gearalit let out a yawn. "Well I believe me an' the missus are goin' to be goin' to bed soon. Yer bed is the one over there," Mr. Mac Gearalit looked at Rose and gestured his head to the door on the left. "And yers is the other," he eyed the Doctor. His tone made it clear the separate bedrooms were a nonnegotiable fact.
"Yessir," the Doctor said seriously. "Goodnight Mr. and Mrs. Mac Gearalit, goodnight Miss. Tyler." He finished his sentence with a small wink to Rose behind the couple's back.
"I'll see yer in the mornin' a' the crack o' dawn. Got to get some work done," Mr. Mac Gearalit said as his marched up the creaky stairs behind his wife. Rose could hear them shuffling around overhead. She thought it would make it much harder to sneak out and see the woods as they planned, with the way sound echoed off the walls.
"So go to your bedroom and we can sneak out in, say, an hour?" The Doctor whispered conspiratorially. Rose thought that he sounded like a teenage boy planning to get up to no good.
"Think they'll have gone to sleep by then?"
"Yeah, they probably have been awake since 4:30 in the morning, so they'll nod off soon."
"Alright, I will see you then."
Rose walked into her room, pulling aside the woven curtain and stepping into a small space. There was a small single bed with a, as suspected, straw mattress. The bedding was nice enough for the time period, and the blanket had a distinctly homemade feel to it. There was a simple nightgown draped across the end of the bed. Judging by its size, Rose assumed it belonged to Áine. The only other thing in the room was a small simple table with a candle stick. Rose walked to the window and opened the shutters. The room had a view of the country side, and she could see the dark forest, standing ominously in the distance. She estimated that it was about 8:00, but she had never been as good at telling time from the sky as the Doctor. Figuring that she could get a small kip before the Doctor would be knocking on her window. It had been a long day, running through the forest all morning and wandering around the village all afternoon.
Rose walked to the bed, just a few small steps, and toed off the slippers before falling into bed. She was asleep before her head hit the mattress.
She woke up to an annoying tapping sound. She wrinkled her forehead in distaste, keeping her eyes firmly shut. The tapping continued, becoming more insistent. She rolled over and groaned.
"Rose," she heard a voice whisper. "Rose?"
She mumbled an incoherent, "What," into the mattress before opening her eyes a crack. She saw the blurry shape of the Doctor standing at the window. She opened her eyes all the way. He looked like an overgrown owl peering in through the window.
"You humans and your sleeping habits, it's ridiculous. Waste a good eight hours of the day closing your eyes."
Rose pushed herself off the bed and stepped onto the floor, all the while glowering at the Doctor. "It's normal to sleep, if you hadn't notices. We are on Earth. What do they say about Rome?"
"Yes but we have aliens to investigate!" The Doctor said brightly.
Rose sighed, realizing he was right. Again. She groped around for her slipped on the floor and, once they were found under the bed, put them on. She threw the head covering on the bed and smoothed out her hair which was sticking up at odd angles. No one would see her in the dark so there was no need to keep up proper appearances, she figured.
"Alright, move over," Rose said, putting her hands on the window still. The Doctor moved and she clambered somewhat gracefully out the window landing in the dirt behind the house. "I wish it was that easy to sneak out of Jackie's house when I was a kid, yeah?"
The Doctor looked at her and snorted a laugh. "I'm sure you managed."
The Doctor took Rose's hand and they started off down the meadow towards to woods, careful to stay off the main path and out of the sight line of windows. They jumped over a low stone wall and into a pasture where the sheep were grazing. A dog that was meant to be guarding the sheep from wolves and robbers trotted over to them The great Irish wolfhound approached cautiously and sniffed before deciding they weren't any trouble, though he followed their movements until the end of the rest of the walk was pleasant enough and Rose admired the spring flowers that had begun to pop up in the grass. However, the journey into the woods was much more difficult than the stroll in the field.
"I think a torch would be good right about now, yeah?" Rose said, tripping over a shrub for what felt like the hundredth time. She missed her trainers and jeans.
The Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver and held it out in front of him. It lit up a small patch just a few feet in front of them but Rose sighed in relief. It was better than nothing.
"So what are we looking for?" Rose asked
"Oh you know, the usual, clues and such."
"What kind of clues and such?" She asked contemptibly.
"Traces of particle energy, ectoplasmic goo, gamma radiation, the usual. Might even be some reverse polarity of the neutron flow," he seemed positively excited at the possibility.
Rose nodded, unsure of her ability to detect particle energy. "Right."
They continued on, deeper into the forest where the trees were packed tighter together and the canopy was so dense that the moonlight couldn't trickle through the leaves. Suddenly, the light from the Doctor's screwdriver fell on something that caught Rose's eye.
"What's that?" She asked, halting the Doctor with her arm and pointing to the dirt.
The Doctor squatted so the light shone on the forest floor, illuminating the clue.
It was a footprint of some kind. Rose thought 'footprint' rather than 'pawprint' because it had toes and a similar shape as a human foot, but it was definitely not human. The entire print was elongated so that the toes were as long at Rose's thumb and pinky finger and the entire print was as long as the doctor's forearm, but as thin as Rose's. The print was so clear that Rose could make out the imprint of long, thin bones which had sunk deeper in the mud. There was also an odd, familiar smell that clung to the area, but Rose couldn't put her finger on what it was.
"How does a ball of light leave a footprint?" Rose asked the Doctor.
"It doesn't." He was squinting at the mark in the ground. His hand was absentmindedly analyzing it with the sonic screwdriver, which was making whirring noises as he passed it over the print. "The screwdriver is telling me there are traces of alien energies. Definitely not human," he confirmed. "Though I don't know what it is." He sounded frustrated.
"We'll figure it out," Rose said, putting her hand on the Doctor's back. "We always do, yeah?"
The Doctor stood back up with a new resolute expression on his face. "Right," he said, smiling. "I do love a good mystery."
They continued in the woods, keeping their eyes on the forest floor looking for more prints or anything else that could hint towards the identity of the monster lurking in the dark. The moon was high in the sky, Rose noted, when she caught a glance through the leaves above her head. They must have been searching for hours. Her feet were tired, again. The slippers she was wearing were not built for hiking on rough terrain. Rose was thankful that it was dry, otherwise she would have had to explain why there was mud caked on her new shoes. Her hem of the dress kept catching on twigs and bushes, making walking more cumbersome. She eventually lagged behind the Doctor, far enough away that she could still see the light but not close enough to seek the comforting touch of his hand.
She looked up after stumbling and saw that he had gone so far ahead, his light was no longer visible. She was alone in the dark woods. "Doctor?" She asked shrilly, when she realized how far she was from him. As she moved quicker, she caught the light from the sonic screwdriver, more than a few feet away from her. It was moving further away from Rose. She followed the bobbing light, rushing to keep up. "Doctor!" She said more loudly, breaking into a run to catch up. The blue light began moving faster as well. "Stop running!" She struggled to run without falling.
She ran through the dense trees for five minutes, dodging branches and jumping over shrubs, attempting to catch up with her Doctor. She only paused for a second when her hem snagged on a twig, and she worked quickly to untangle herself. Curiously enough the Doctor's light paused with her. "This isn't funny, you know," Rose called to him. "Just let me catch up!" When she managed herself free, she began to run again. The light blinked out and she ran into something hard and solid, bouncing off and falling on her bum.
"Oh there you are Rose. Thought you might have gone back," the Doctor said mildly.
She picked herself off the ground, brushing away dirt and leaves from her dress. "Why did you decide to take a bloody run in the forest?" She said fiercely.
"I've been walking the whole time. Just stopped here when I found something interesting."
Rose forgot her anger and looked around the Doctor to see what his sonic was shining on. The corpse of an animal lay in a small clearing. It was large and hoofed, but half eaten making it difficult to discern what species it belonged to. She noted the simple leather harness around what was left of the animal's face.
"Horse?" She guessed.
"Too small, looks like a donkey, or a mule. Could be an ass, but I can't be sure." The Doctor said conversationally, leaving Rose to figure out the difference. "I believe this was Mr. Reid's animal that his wife said he took to the neighbouring village. Looks like it never got there."
"Do you think that thing that left the footprint ate it?" Rose gulped. It looked like it had been devoured cruelly.
"No, this is probably a wolf pack. It looks like it wandered for a few days before they killed it," he tapped his sonic as if it was proof to back up his story. Rose just nodded. "So the question is, what kills or kidnaps humans but not donkeys?" He hummed to himself. "See it's not doing this out of hunger. A donkey would be much tastier and put up less of a fight. And it would go unnoticed," he added.
Rose could tell he was thinking aloud, and didn't think she'd add anything to his train of thought. She didn't bother piping in to add anything. She did however let out a large yawn that she failed to stifle. The Doctor glanced over at her, and raised an eyebrow.
"Right, it's late and the human needs sleep. We will go back and get some rest and start anew tomorrow."
"I'd like that," Rose said sleepily. She could feel her eyes willing themselves to close. The adrenaline rush from losing the Doctor was fading and leaving a lull in her brain. Everything felt sort of fuzzy. She realized that she had been awake for more than 18 hours and doing strenuous exercise for half of that.
They made their way out of the forest, and Rose trusted the Doctor's sense of direction. She didn't bother to question it at least, either because she trusted him or she was just too tired. Probably both. Her tired feet were dragging and the Doctor had his arm around her waist, supporting his tired companion. When they reached the edge of the forest, Rose glanced back. Her eyes might have been closed and she was dreaming, or it could have been a sleep-deprived hallucination but she swore she saw a blue light, flickering hopefully in the dark. When she blinked, it was gone, leaving her wondering if it had been her imagination or not.
Back at the house, the Doctor helped Rose through the window before she tumbled into bed, not bothering to take off her shoes or dress. Her eyes closed and she snuggled against the straw mattress. She was shocked at how comfortable it was and thought about replacing hers at home while she drifted off into sleep.
Hmm, maybe things aren't always what they seem? I am going to be exploring this in Chapter 6. The next chapter will feature another disappearance and a few more clues. Thank for reading, and please review!
Also, regarding that bit of technobabble, I am not a scientist so I have no idea what any of it means and I took most of it straight from Doctor Who, which belongs to BBC. ~ Hayley.