It wasn't as if she'd left Amy behind on purpose.
She'd had a feeling that they were meant to pick her up and explain everything... with the Tardis. She'd seen the 21 year old Amy and her entire stomach had bottomed out. It had bottomed out even further when she'd hit the Doctor, but at least the important thing was that Amy was onboard the Tardis, and she still looked excited, though it was nowhere near as excited as she had on the television show.
Looking at her now, she wondered if she was still the same Amy. She wasn't the Girl Who Waited anymore (apparently now Witch Girl. She inwardly shook her head at the cruelty of children); she couldn't be. She hadn't waited for them. She'd endured the brunt of the schoolyard bullying without any hope that they would return.
She'd said the same thing on the television show that she had in real life, and Anna was surprised by how much of it had stayed the same. She wondered if that meant that Rory was still in her life... before her eyebrows raised and she realized that more had changed than she'd realized. Amy was wearing the ring. There it was, sitting plain as day, on her finger.
She suddenly remembered the Angels, the Byzantium, the fact that Amy hadn't been there and she'd had a chance to take Amy's place. The adventure where it had all gone wrong, but more to the point, Rory had to travel with them, and that wouldn't be possible now if Anna didn't do some gentle prodding.
She hadn't thought about it at the time because she was trying not to think too hard about what it meant that River was there... and, if she were being really honest, it was because there was a thrill in seeing a future Doctor, in knowing that she would have a future with him. She remembered the days where she'd thought he'd asked her to undo her saving of Gallifrey, and there had been some part of her that had been so thrilled that he still hadn't, that she was still there.
Course, then he had, but that was a mishap due to time.
She shook away the thoughts before she frowned, remembering suddenly that she'd no idea why they'd ended up with Rassilon in the first place, not to mention that he'd said something about being tortured.
She started to tell the Doctor that she needed a word with him but she stopped herself when he spoke.
"Well?" he asked. "Anything you want to say? Any passing remarks? I've heard them all."
She smiled at the look on his face. He loved this. This was one of his favorite parts, showing off the Tardis to new people, seeing them be amazed and awed by all of it.
"I'm in my nightie," Amy chose to respond.
He looked over at Anna and smiled before he quickly ran up the new steps. The console room was both old and new to her. She missed the old one, the one that included her armchair and the bookcase in the floor. She couldn't lie though; it was definitely nice to see that this hadn't changed, either. She resolved to go looking for the other console room, to say a private goodbye.
"Oh, don't worry," the Doctor continued, flipping this and that switch. "Plenty of clothes in the wardrobe." He made a delighted sound and she frowned and smiled, walking up to him to find that he was looking at the new sonic that had just popped up in the console. "Ooh, look, Anna, she's given me a new sonic! Haha, thanks dear."
She held her hand out. "Can I have the old one?"
It had been without thinking or reason. She didn't need the sonic. She didn't need a sonic. She was, in a word, amazing. Well, and all-powerful. It wasn't as if she needed a handheld device that could do even less than she could. She wasn't even getting a feeling about it, she just... wanted it.
"Sure," he said, surprising her, and he dug it out of his coat pocket before he put it into her outstretched palm. She smiled, clasping it in her hand.
"Thanks dear," she quickly parroted him, giving him a kiss on the cheek before she danced away, putting it in her pocket.
The Doctor got back to the situation at hand. "So, all of time and space, everything that ever happened or ever will. Where do you want to start?"
"When I was a kid, you said you were an all-powerful being. What does that mean, exactly?"
"No, no," the Doctor immediately objected, shaking his head. "No questions about Anna, that's not the deal."
Amy looked unimpressed. "There's a deal?"
"Yes, and it's this: no questions about Anna, no asking her to do impossible things, and if you do, you're off. Clear?"
She raised her eyebrows, looking at the Doctor. "Doctor, it's fine," she told him. She frowned. "Did you lay down these ground rules with-" she did quick calculations. "Donna?" she asked, realizing that's the only companion she'd actually traveled with.
"Didn't have to, she never asked questions about you. Well?" he asked Amy.
Amy held up her hands, turning around. "Fine," she said, leaning against the console. "Won't ask any questions about your wife or be interested at all about anything."
"Well, I didn't say that," he said.
She frowned, looking at the Doctor, before she realized she still wanted to have that conversation. Apparently, she'd also have to have a conversation about this, because she was just... confused? Why wouldn't they be allowed to ask questions?
"Why me?"
"Sorry?" the Doctor asked, Amy turning around.
She looked between the two of them. "Why was it my garden that you two landed in all those years ago?"
He furrowed his brow, glancing between Amy and Anna. "No... reason?" he said, shaking his head. "Tardis was looking for somewhere to land, your garden just happened to be the one that it picked."
"Is your ship alive?"
"Yes, okay with that?"
"Yeah, it's... fine," she said.
"Are you okay?" he asked. "Because this place, sometimes it can make people feel a bit... you know."
"I'm fine," she nodded, looking around with something like wonder in her eye, even if she were trying to conceal it from the people who'd abandoned her. "It's just... there's a whole world in here. How does it work?"
"Trans dimensional engineering," she quickly explained.
"That doesn't make sense," Amy pointed out.
"Well, I was going to say-" magic, she started to joke, before she quickly bit her lip, looking away. She cleared her throat, frowning as she looked away. "So, all of time and space," she said, looking up at her. "Where do you want to start?"
"All of time and space?" she asked, looking critical.
"Within reason, well, I say reason," the Doctor piped in.
"It's just," Amy finally cut in. "I just... sort of started to think you two were mad people with a box who made it a habit of abandoning seven year olds places with no hope of getting home again."
"You said you were nearly eight," he pointed out.
"I also already said that I was lying," she replied.
"Why did you lie?"
She shrugged, looking away. "You know kids. They think anybody older than them is a grown up. Fourteen was ancient to me back then."
"Well, point is, Amy, that we did get you back home, but also there's something you'd better understand about us, because it's important, and one day, your life may depend on it." By the time he'd finished talking, he was standing next to her. For the first time, Amy actually looked at him like somebody that was to be respected. "We are definitely mad people with a box."
Her face softened and the Doctor smiled and just like that, a friendship was born.
"Haha!" he said, turning back to the controls. "Goodbye Leadworth, hello... everything."
#####
Her mother's betrayal still sat on her tongue.
She'd lied to her, about everything. Not to Olivia, not to her mum. Just to her. Her mother had lied to her about everything, her entire life, and now, she was stuck in the mess she hadn't even created, being forced to... but what? What had her mother said, before she'd smiled and said, "Good luck," like it might actually make a difference?
She wasn't focused on that. She was terrifically angry. It had appeared she'd landed in a garbage dump... and it was wet. It wasn't just trash, it was some kind of liquid, all around her, not to mention the floor was squishy, and, oh yes, had she mentioned the smell?
"Motherfu-"
She stopped, frowning. She'd been trained all her life to attune her senses to the outside world. That had never been a problem for Livy (though she was the only one allowed to call her that), who things seemed to come effortlessly to. It was a problem for Alex because she was, well, not instantly great at everything-
"Is someone screaming?" she wondered, seconds before something dropped in front of her, splashing her with the garbage. "You have got to be-"
She realized a moment later that it was a person, and she immediately tried to scramble back.
That simply resulted in her slipping in the refuse and shouting out.
"'ello, 'ello, 'ello, a fellow protestor?" a voice came from in front of her, and she immediately backed up before she stood up, shaking, putting her hands up. She was against violence on principle, but she'd just been teleported who knew where with a bracelet that was meant to protect her. Anybody that tried to attack her would feel the wrath of her tiny fists, and it would not be pleasant. "No, it's all right," he quickly reassured her. She caught sight of his bowtie at the same moment that he spoke. "I'm the Doctor."
I've made you a bracelet. It'll keep you safe. It'll travel you around his timeline, out of order so they shouldn't be able to track you. He can't know who you are. If he finds out before he's meant to, a hole the size of the Earth and Earth's moon could open up and tear the universe to pieces.
Good luck.
She suddenly remembered what her mother had said. Standing in front of him, she realized why. He was young. Younger than she'd ever seen him, so young she'd only ever seen pictures of this face. Her and Livy had always laughed at the chin, even the bowtie, though Alex secretly though the bowtie was cool. Her mum had agreed.
Now, he was standing in front of her, having just walked off the pages of the dusty photo albums her and Livy hadn't dragged out in years, demanding stories.
Her jaw barely dropped at the sight of him, but he still took note of the motion, which she took note of. Of course he took note of it. Of course he did. He was him. He was the mothereffing Doctor.
Of course, she knew him as da and, more recently, mum.
She raised her eyebrows, "I'm- I'm- Peyton," she told him. "Peyton Stewart."
That was her best friend's name. Dear god she hoped that she hadn't just ripped a hole in the fabric of the universe, but also, Peyton. She felt the pang of loss at the thought that she'd never see Peyton again, never again draw a sharpie murial on each other's skins, Alex using silver sharpie so that it would stand out against her dark skin while Peyton used black. The last one hadn't faded, the silly cartoon of her aunt still fading underneath her sleeve, the light bulb on top lit up. She quickly pulled her sleeve down further before she remembered her mother's other instructions, "He can know that you're traveling around his timeline, he'll eventually find out, he's him, he just can't know who you are."
This was the best solution that she could come up with? The all-powerful being Anna Monroe, forcing her daughter to lie to a younger version of her father? Why hadn't she just vanquished the angels back to another dimension? Why hadn't she just rescued her earlier? Why hadn't she told her the truth about who and what she was?
Most of all, why had she left her here, all on her own, stranded in the past?
She was ripped out of her melancholy and panicked thinking when da- the Doctor (that would be weird, she wasn't sure she could get used to that) spoke. "Mind the ginger," he said, holding his arms out. She frowned, though she realized a moment later why when she heard the yelling and the splat. She quickly squeezed her eyes and her mouth shut, putting her arms barely over her head. "Now, you said your name is Peyton?"
She raised her eyebrows. It hit her, in that moment, that this was her da, the man who'd tucked her in at night, the man who'd sang her songs and told her stories and protected her. And she would have to pretend like she didn't know him? Like she'd never met him, like he hadn't done any of those things?
Bitterness rose in a clump in her throat and she tried to clear it, even as she hated her mother, just a little bit for making her do this.
"Yeah, I-I did."
"How old are you, Peyton?"
"I'm-" she cleared her throat again, shaking her head. "15," she told him. The place was really starting to smell, though that could've been the situation finally hitting her.
He'd caught her out on a lie. She could see that in his eyes. Even with an entirely different body, she knew his face, knew his tells. She was in trouble, though she didn't know why.
"15, eh? Funny, that," he said. She was scouring her memories, trying to figure out where she'd gone wrong, but he was already moving on.
"Doctor? Who're you talking to? Where are we?"
"Peyton, Amy, Amy, Peyton. Six hundred feet down, twenty miles laterally, puts us at the heart of the ship. I'd say Lancashire."
She felt like she'd gotten whiplash. This wasn't her da, the parent she'd known all of her life; this was the Doctor, and he was in his element. Not only that, but da had never dismissed her. He would never dismiss her. And the Doctor had done it without a second thought.
The fire in her stomach burned a little brighter, fueled by her hatred of her mother.
"What's this then, a cave? Can't be a cave. Looks like a cave?"
"A cave?" she asked, without meaning to. She bit her lip before she instantly regretted it, dry heaving before she turned away.
"Okay?" he asked. She coughed before she nodded.
"It's a rubbish dump, and it's minging!" the apparent ginger Amy cried.
"Yes, but only food refuse," he corrected her. "Organic, coming through feeder tubes from all over the ship."
She stopped, completely, entirely, turning to look at him. "Feeder tubes?" she asked, her voice pitched up an octave higher.
"Yes, why?" he asked.
She swallowed. "What are they feeding?"
"I don't know, what do you suppose?" he asked, hands on his hips as he searched her. "Maybe you can shed some light-"
"No, hey, hold on," she said, and he stopped, raising his eyebrows. "Feeding tubes. If that's-that's where you guys just come from, then-then wouldn't that mean that this is where they send the food? As in-" she swallowed, looking down at the mawing darkness. "This is the creature that's being fed?" she looked back at him to see the look on his face. "Like-like this is a-"
Actual joy lit up his eyes. He looked at her, sheer delight on his face. In that moment, she did see her da, but he vanished a moment later when he heard Amy speaking.
"The floor's all squidgy, like a water bed."
"Okay, erm, yes, right, it's... not a floor," he tried, and she raised her eyebrows.
"It's a-"
"Yes, yes, Peyton, let's wait for Amy to catch up."
She could not have been more offended by that if she tried. Her da had never told her to slow down in her life, and she'd never imagine that he'd say those words to her.
For a moment, she longed to home, curled up on her couch, watching crap TV with Livy or drawing on Peyton or thinking about what her next art project was going to be. She wanted to run through the halls of the university where she'd grown up, bursting in on lectures unnoticed and unseen, hearing about the adults talking about things she couldn't begin to understand before she found da's classroom and sat in a corner where she was unseen by everyone except for him. He caught her eye, smiled and winked at her, before he continued with his lecture as if nothing had happened, even though both of them knew where she was.
He'd always seen her.
Yet, there he was, standing a meter away, and he had no idea who she was.
It was enough to make her want to cry, but she felt something at the exact moment, a warm feeling in her chest. She frowned, looking down.
I'm here.
It was Livy. It was like she could feel her twin sister in her chest, her very essence imbedded there. It was different than their normal twin telepathy (though it wasn't literal telepathy, not in the strictest sense). For a moment, she could've sworn that Livy was actually talking to her, telling her that she was there and would be with her for the rest of this stupid journey.
"We're in a mouth?" Amy cried, interrupting her thought process.
"Yes, yes, yes. But, on the plus side, roomy."
"How do we get out?"
"Hopefully through the front door," she replied, numb, because that's where she'd fallen, numb, she was in a numb place and this was not the time to be disassociating, Alex, think!
"What-"
"How big is this beastie?" the Doctor asked, completely ignoring her. "It's gorgeous. Blimey, if this is just the mouth, I'd love to see the stomach."
She facepalmed and once again regretted it. She had to fight every instinct in her that said she should sit down where she was and accept it. This was where she lived, now. This was her life.
Oh god, this was her life.
She started to panic, trying to focus on taking deep breaths, but there was no air, it was like she was swallowing garbage every time she took a mouthful of air, it was too hot, she couldn't breathe-
Mother, please- she tried to mentally call for her, for the first time in her life.
But, there was nothing there. There was no one there. She was simply on her own.
"Hey, hey, it's okay."
She didn't know the voice, but she knew the cadence. Her da. He was there. He was there, and he- She looked up and saw the bowtie and she felt herself grow a little bit more panicked, but she looked up into his eyes. They were the same eyes. Even after he'd turned into mum, they were still the same eyes.
She clung to them like she'd never clung to anything, searching him, desperate for him to do what he did best and to make it better.
"I'm going to do my very best to get us out of here, but that means that I need you to stay calm and stay focused. Just imagine yourself back home, all of this over and done with. Can you do that for me? Imagine yourself with your mum and dad-"
"Mother and mum," she quickly corrected him, out of habit.
"Right, sorry, mother and mum, then. Any siblings?"
She nodded, numbly, before she remembered mother's words.
Right then, she couldn't have given a flying crap what her mother wanted. She was tempted to tell him right then and there the truth about everything, but that same feeling from before, Livy's presence, cautioned her against it, and so she simply nodded.
"Okay, good. Big family, big house?"
"Flat," she told him.
"Ah, I see," he said, knowingly, and she frowned, wondering what she'd done. "Well, then, imagine yourself back home, all of this just a distant memory."
All of this would never be a distant memory. She would never again be sitting on the couch with mother or mum, texting Peyton and coming up with the clever idea to a self-portrait for art class but use Livy as the subject as a way to make a statement about how mirrors are everywhere.
But right then, none of that mattered. For a moment, she allowed herself to picture it, even closing her eyes to do it, Livy on the couch with her, sitting at Peyton's feet as Peyton drew something intricate on her shoulder, mother and mum making something in the kitchen, laughing. For a moment, she imagined that she was back there, none of this happened, the angels never grabbing her and holding her hostage and feeding off of her time energy, never feeling any of that pain or sadness or hopelessness that it would never get better.
For one single moment, she was back home, and she was okay.
Then, she opened her eyes, and it wasn't her da comforting his scared daughter, it was the Doctor comforting a scared stranger, like she were anybody else when she was anything but.
He searched her eyes, asking, "Good?"
She nodded.
He nodded as well, smiling. "Good," he said. He clapped his hands on her arms before he turned away, back to Amy. She let out a breath, looking around and for a way out. This was her life, she may as well get used to it (god, she hated her mother, she hated her). "Okay, so, big question of the hour, how are we getting out of the mouth of this gorgeous beastie, without activating the swallow reflex?"
"Seriously, though, what about the mouth?" she asked him.
"Well, possible," he agreed. "It's being fed through surgically implanted feeder tubes, though, so the normal entrance is probably closed for business."
"We could try, though," Amy objected, and Alex's eyes widened before she shouted.
It was too late, though. Amy had already moved, even as the Doctor (she hated her mother, she hated her mother) shouted as well. "No, stop, don't move!"
But, it definitely was too late when she felt the mouth vibrating.
"Mothereffer, what part-"
"Mothereffer?" the Doctor (she. hated. her. mother) asked.
"-of do not activate the swallow reflex said to move?"
"What?"
"Peyton's right."
Her hearts broke into a thousand pieces, her hatred for her mother intensifying. She wondered if she'd ever hear her da say her name again... And then she realized that might be an issue because she were about to die in the mouth of whatever this thing was.
Well, strictly speaking, die in the stomach of whatever this thing was. Other people would probably be worried about the stomach acid, but she was smart and knew that the fumes from the stomach would choke her to death first. Or the heat would kill her. Either way, she was about to die a painful death.
Seriously, mother? She asked. You're really about to let me die like this?!
"The swallow reflex has started."
"What're you doing?" Amy and Alex asked at the same time, seeing the green tip of what she assumed to be this version's sonic. How many times had she gotten in trouble for always finding it where her da had hid it? It wasn't her fault he'd never hidden it well enough, especially when her and Livy was so good at finding where they'd been hidden. Livy was always better at it, though. The only thing that Alex was better at than Livy was art, and that perhaps was a moot point, now.
"I'm vibrating the chemo-receptors."
"You're doing what?" she shouted, at the same time that Amy asked, "Chemo-what?" slipping on the floor as she tried to stand up for the third time. She wasn't the brightest bulb, since Alex had accepted that the floor was, in fact, where she lived now.
"Hitting the eject button," he informed them.
"D-" she started, swallowing the a. "Doctor, this is not- the stomach acid-"
"Better than being in the belly of the beast!" he shouted.
"No, hold on, how does a mouth have an eject button?"
"Think about it!" the Doctor shouted.
She accepted it, rolling over so that she was sitting up, curling up into a ball as best as she could without dunking her head under the food refuse. Oh, how she missed the days when she was just covered in food refuse. She was about to be covered in literal vomit (although, they were inside a mouth and that was pretty cool. She wondered idly what it was).
"Right, then. This isn't going to be big on dignity. Geronimo!"
#####
"This sucks. This forking sucks."
"Forking?" he questioned her. "No, come on, why aren't you working?" he whined.
"Oh, I don't know, maybe because you covered that thing-"
"The sonic," he corrected her.
"Whatever," she shot back at him. "Maybe cause you covered it in vomit?"
"Hey, cheer up! We're still alive."
"Is your friend?"
"What, Amy?" he quickly scanned her, almost disinterested, before he deemed her to be okay. "Fine, good. What was on the video?"
She frowned, wiping off the sick as much as she could before she called it a lost cause, standing up and taking off her shirt before she shook hit it against the wall, wringing it out as best as she could. "What video?"
"The one that played right before you hit protest. The one you were protesting. The one you were voting over."
She frowned, looking back at him. "What're you on about?"
"I'm on about the fact that you voted on whatever it is that the people of Starship U.K. voted on before you were ejected into whatever beastie that was that we just escaped, rather brilliantly- is your shirt off?" he frowned, looking back at her and turning away from whatever it was that he was looking at. He stopped, his eyes caught on something, and she frowned before she looked down at her arm. "What is that?" he asked her.
She raised her eyebrows, quickly putting her shirt back on. "Nothing. What is this place?" she asked him.
He searched her with a look that made her go cold. It was the most intense look anybody had or would fix on her, she was sure and she surely hoped. It was like nothing else existed, just the two of them, and she was, well, in the wrong of something.
It passed and she'd never felt such an intense relief. "An overspill pipe, at a guess."
She frowned. "Overspill?" she asked. "Like if they feed it too much?"
He pointed the sonic back at her, the lighted green tip flashing at her. "Exactly," he agreed. "Or, if it, say, throws up three unsuspecting travelers, who then are required to forget whatever it is that they've seen. Well, two of the travelers need to forget whatever they've seen, anyway. I'm guessing you're a long way from home, Peyton." She crossed her arms over her chest, feeling distinctly uncomfortable and wondering how, exactly, he knew. That was a useless question, wasn't it? He always knew. Apparently, so did mother. Apparently, she'd never trusted her with this information, even if she'd trusted everyone else that was close to her. Da looked back at her. "Am I right?" he asked.
She looked down before she nodded. "Yeah," she said, the word sounding as tiny as she felt.
"Honesty. That's good. It'll make this easier in the long run."
She was about to object, looking up at him and telling him that she hadn't kept anything from him, he simply hadn't asked. Amy chose that exact moment to come to.
#####
So, they'd met the queen. That was a thing.
Oh, sure, she knew her parents knew the monarchy, but it was one thing to know the stories and another to hear about it from said monarchy herself.
Said monarchy herself was marching bravely ahead, but Alex was distracted from her when she saw the... What were they? They looked like the back of scorpions stingers. Livy would know, she thought, glumly. Livy was good at the science stuff, especially classifying every and any kind of living creature. She couldn't believe how badly she missed her sister, that yawning ache opening up inside of her. Livy's presence did not come up to greet her like an old friend.
Jerk, she thought.
"Oh, yeah. There's these things."
She spoke when she finally noticed that both her and the Doctor had stopped to look at them.
"Any ideas?" she asked.
The Doctor was more willing to stick his head through to see them. She, however, was content to rest her face between the bars. She frowned. They looked like they were... living things. A part of the creature? She frowned, taking a step back. Bars. She frowned even further. A prison? But why? Why would they trap a creature like that? How? She calculated the size of the beast based on the size of the mouth, and it would've been big enough to be the same size as a city. So why...
She frowned, looking over at Da for the answer, like she always did. What she got was the Doctor, looking downright furious. She looked down, trying to ignore the smell that was coming off of her.
"Doctor, I saw one of these up top. There was a hole in the road, like it had burst through, like a root."
"Exactly like a root," he agreed with her. "It's all one creature, the same one we were inside, reaching out. It must be growing through the mechanisms of the ship."
But... if that were the case...
But why? Why trap an entire creature, why do this, what was the point? Maybe the creature had simply... glommed onto it, attached itself beneath because it wanted an easy ride (they were in space. She'd known it the moment that she couldn't feel the turn of the Earth. She might not have been as attuned to the universe as the rest of her family, but she was time lord enough that she instantly felt the loss of her home planet. Her entire life had been shattered in an instant, and that was thanks to her mother. She couldn't focus on this now. Not when there was a mystery about why this creature was here. The Doctor would know. He did know, judging by the look on his face). Wouldn't the 'roots' disrupt the engines, though? How was this ship flying, if that was the case?
"Hold on-" she started, realizing she couldn't feel engines beneath her feet, now that she'd been attuned to everything else a little better.
But, Liz X ignored that. "What, like an infestation?" she guessed wrong. "Someone's helping it. Feeding it."
The feeder tubes.
"Feeding my subjects to it. Come on. Got to keep moving."
"But..." she started, frowning. Because the feeder tubes had been surgically implanted. Which would've meant it hadn't glommed on, it would've meant that they had been placed there on purpose.
Horror rolled through her, and she wanted to literally be sick.
The ship didn't have an engine. The creature was growing into the ship. The ship was the size of a small city.
What if-
But, no. No, humanity was horrible, but not this horrible. Not so horrible that they'd attach a living creature to be their replacement engine.
"Doctor?" Amy asked.
She looked up, the nausea overrunning her. By the look on the Doctor's face, she knew. Humanity was that horrible. "Oh, Amy. We should never have come here."
"It's the engine, isn't it?"
She couldn't help herself. She was lightheaded and she couldn't feel the Earth beneath her feet or Livy in any sense and she just wanted to go home. Frac this, she just wanted to be home.
He looked back at her with that same look as he had in the overspill pipe. It didn't go away this time, and she barely took a step back, afraid, for the first time in her life, of her own father.
"Go on, Amy, we'll catch up."
"Are you-"
"Go on."
Amy glanced back and forth between them, uncertainly. She took another step back for good measure, though he spoke in a low voice before Amy had disappeared completely from sight.
"What's the engine?" he asked her.
"The creature," she said, swallowing against her dry mouth.
"Are you telling me or are you asking me?"
"Both," she said, weakly.
"And how would you know a thing like that? You aren't from here, and you couldn't have seen it from the outside, because you didn't know what it was that we were standing in when we first were there. Or is that another part of the story that involves why you've a faded drawing of my Tardis on your arm?"
She didn't know when he'd gotten so close to her, but she was desperate for space. Weirdly enough, it felt like her feet were glued to the floor.
"Who are you, Peyton Stewart? Why're you here?"
Alex would never admit to anyone what happened next.
She burst out crying.
She tried to put her palms over her eyes, but the smell grew closer and she immediately scrunched up her nose before she started crying harder. At that moment, she did sit down on the floor, accepting once more that this was now where she lived, that this was where she would always live, because it meant that she could forget what had happened and what it was that she was doing there.
"All right, all right, I'm sorry," he said, and she felt his hands on her arms, rubbing comfortingly up and down them. She would've thrown herself into his arms so that he could hug her, hold her, tell her that everything would be all right, but she couldn't bloody move. "Sh, it's okay, it's okay, it's all right. Just breathe, you're okay."
"I'm not," she contradicted him. "I'm not okay, I'm not, I'm not..."
"Okay, okay, sh, I've got you, I've got you, just breathe."
It could've been hours later that she finally was able to breathe, calming down, sniffling. When she looked up, she was surprised. Her da was sitting in front of her, that reassuring look that he always had in his eyes.
"All right?" he asked.
She sniffled, nodding. "Yeah," she said. "Sorry."
He shook his head, slipping back into Doctor mode. "Nah, it's fine. Bit of a good cry's not anything to be ashamed about." He slapped his knees once before he raised his eyebrows, nodding back. "Ready?" he asked.
She caught sight of the tentacles and she swallowed. "It is the engine though. Isn't it."
He sighed, and when she looked back at him, she caught the look in his eyes. "Yes, Peyton," he said, quietly. "I'm afraid that it is."
#####
The queen let them use a shower Alex'd seen on Auntie once, one that allowed the user to be cleaned without water. It was quick too, all of them done in five minutes. She'd hated the idea of that shower because she liked standing underneath the hot spray. She was thankful her parents had chosen the 21st century to settle down in for this reason (because she could definitely do without the racism and the misogyny, among other things, but she would withstand it.) A hot shower was one of her favorite things in the world.
She felt even less like herself after she'd stepped out, depressed because, even if the smell no longer clung to her like a second skin, it still hadn't helped much of anything.
"Okay?" he asked, and she barely shook her head, sitting down on the bed. "Well, honesty. That's good, at least. Hey." She looked up at him, raising her eyebrows, thankful that it had also magically cleaned her clothes, though that was the future for you. "It's all right. We'll sort this and I'll take you home."
"No," she said simply. "You won't."
He furrowed his brows in question, but she shook her head, looking away as she drew her knees up to her chest, making it very clear that she had no interest in continuing this conversation. Her da would've pressed but the Doctor had other things to do, and although she knew it was important, it made her wilt just a little bit more.
She tuned out most of the conversation, already knowing where it was going. She had no idea why he wasn't telling anyone about the answer, but she suspected it had something to do with him wanting them to figure it out on their own, as he always did. It made her wonder, sometimes, why he'd chosen to be the Doctor, when he was ever the perpetual teacher.
She didn't wonder this for long when the men came to take them away.
She never thought it could get worse, but boy oh boy, everything seriously went downhill from there.
#####
She woke up on Auntie with a migraine before she realized that she was waking up on Auntie.
"Oh, fu-"
"See that you're awake."
She startled, sitting up... Before all of her hope deflated hard when she saw the Doctor sitting in front of her, his bowtie and chin still securely on, even as she wished, more than anything, that they weren't.
She frowned. "Why-" she started, about to ask why they were on Auntie before she realized that would be problematic. "What's- what happened?"
He shrugged. "Depends. What do you remember?"
"Um..." Being escorted to the tower. A headache breaking out, and by headache, she meant her head splitting in literal two. She remembered blacking out. "There was... something was in pain. A big something. I-" she stopped, looking up at him, her eyes wide. Shite. Crap. Had she just blown a hole in the universe?
He smiled softly, but not gently. "It's okay," he said. "I know you're telepathic. I also know that you're fifteen years old, that your name isn't actually Peyton Stewart, and that the sonic and the Tardis won't let me scan you. Impressive feat, that," he told her. "Quite the technology to be able to do something like that, as well as the technology that makes it so I can't even feel a heartbeat when I put my hand to your chest. I mean, I only knew you weren't dead because I saw you breathing, so, not-Peyton Stewart. Do you want to tell me who you are and what the hell you're doing here?"
She raised her eyebrows. "I- I don't know how much-how much I'm allowed to tell you."
If she thought her father was scary, that was nothing compared to the person sitting in front of her right now. He wasn't being overtly threatening. He wasn't even doing anything besides asking questions. He was just... The Doctor. Very terrifying under the right circumstances.
Auntie brushed up against her mind. She felt the strain it put on her, and she intrinsically knew that it was the Auntie that was the Tardis before she was Auntie. It meant interacting with her was harder, because she knew she knew her, she just didn't always knew how she knew her.
Still, it had the intended effect of reminding her that this was da, even if he didn't know it, and he wouldn't ever hurt her. Plus, it calmed her down a little, and she was able to take a breath, clear her throat.
"I-I mean, I have- this bracelet, the bracelet, it-it apparently allows me to travel around your timeline." She stopped, looking down, frowning. "Never occurred to me that it would be strange that the first you I would be meeting would be someone who didn't know me." She put her head in her hands. "She could've given me that, at least."
"Who?"
She looked up at him hesitantly. "I don't think I'm supposed to tell you that."
He held his arms out. "So tell me what you know you can tell me."
She breathed a shaky breath. "So-so like I said, the-the bracelet allows me to travel your timeline, just-just out of order. It's- erm. ... For my safety?" she tried, gently feeling out time with her unhoned time senses. Da said those wouldn't come in for at least another decade, but she'd started to feel it a few years back, as well as the turn of the earth beneath her feet. She had a feeling Auntie had something to do with it, but she had never asked and it wasn't like Auntie could speak to her directly and explain these things. Time didn't feel like it was tearing, so she continued. "Somebody was-was after me, and-and this-this was the solu-solution." She swallowed before she let out another breath, steadying herself. "Erm. I'm not- I'm not supposed to tell you who I am? But I think- I think it's okay to say that I'm from-from your future, yours and-" she swallowed. It was strange. She could feel that saying her mother's name would've been bad for time, like something that was too hot pressing against the inside of her chest. She shook her head. "I don't think I'm supposed to tell you more than that."
He searched her for a lie. Normally when he did that, she tried to hide herself more so that he wouldn't find out that she'd played with his sonic or pressed a button on Auntie's console (Auntie always gave her permission). She fought her instincts, which were now old and useless, and sat up straighter, making herself appear as honest as possible. He sat back in his seat, searching her disinterestedly. "Was I consulted about this, about you being bound to my timeline, having to live with you out of order?"
"I-" she frowned, looking down at her lap. Her automatic answer had been yes. Why wouldn't mother tell mum what she was doing?
She swallowed again when she remembered that she didn't know her mother. She didn't know anything about her.
Maybe she never would.
"I don't know," she answered, honestly, looking up at him.
"So this wasn't a choice on your part."
"Absolutely not," she agreed. "If I'd had a choice about this, I would not be doing this."
"So... somebody forced you to do this," he tried, and she raised her eyebrows before she furrowed them.
"They were... They were doing it to save my life. I think..."
As much as she hated to admit it, some part of her knew that it was true. If an all-powerful being couldn't find another way, then maybe...
"There wasn't another way," she told him, quietly. "No matter how much I fracking hate this- and believe me, I do, I really... I really think that there wasn't another choice."
He searched her with that critical look again, and she barely squirmed on the bed that wasn't her bed. Apparently, he was satisfied, smiling.
"All right," he said, cordially. "Welcome aboard, I suppose."
She raised her eyebrows, relief spreading through her like a wildfire. "Real-really?"
He nodded, smiling slightly. "Yeah, really. Might as well, right?" He stood up, turning his back on her, and that was when she felt it.
It was like her stomach was plunging on a rollarcoaster, her entire body being pulled down.
"Seeing as you'll be with us for the forseeable future, I think-"
Her vision started to fuzz and then there was a pop, her whole body jerking with the motion...
And then she was out.
