One thousand, four hundred and ninety-two long hours; that's how long it had been since Rose had said goodbye to the Doctor. Just over sixty-two days since she last saw the man she loved and promised to spend the rest of her life traveling with. It had taken Rose a few weeks to settle into her new life in Pete's World as the Doctor so fondly named it. She was now working for her stepfather Pete in the Parallel world's TORCHWOOD. Not long after they had arrived in this new world, her mother, Jackie, and the parallel version of her father began a relationship with each other and now have a baby on the way. It didn't take long for Jackie to settle into this new world, it helped that her new dad was rich. Rose was happy that her mother had finally found someone to spend the rest of her life with after being alone for so many years. Rose, however found it hard to settle into this new life, partly because she was now back living with her mother. Although Rose was thankful that she had her mother and her oldest friend Mickey with her, and it helped that she got along with Pete; Rose struggled to accept her new life knowing that she would never explore new places with the Doctor.
Rose was currently on her lunch break sat in St James' Park, she was still noticing subtle differences between this world and her own back home. In this world, there was no royal family, there was a president who was in charge of the U.K. here. Not long after arriving, Rose and Jackie had been given history lessons to help learn about this world they would now be calling their own, and to help them blend into society. Rose had learned early on that there was a revolution after the death of Queen Victoria which led to this country now becoming a republic which is how they ended up with President Harriet Jones. It didn't take long for Rose to realise that all the previous presidents that had led the country were all previous prime ministers in Rose's world. The TORCHWOOD where she works was currently located in Downing Street and the new government now presides in Buckingham Palace.
As Rose continued to eat her lunch in a secluded part of the park where she would only be interrupted by the occasional jogger, she began to notice a group of statues not far from where she was sat. Rose could have sworn that the statues were not there when she had first sat down. Finishing her sandwich and throwing the rubbish into the nearest bin, she began to wonder over to where these mysterious statues were placed. Rose was already on edge over her current case she was working on at TORCHWOOD. Rose and her team were currently investigating missing persons cases throughout London. These cases were unusual as the TORCHWOOD team were registering high levels of temporal energy from where the person was last seen. A thought stopped Rose in her place, she suddenly remembered that a large number of cases were located in St James' Park. She couldn't believe how she didn't notice, she came to this park every day, surely, she should have noticed that fact.
Step by step Rose hesitantly walked towards the mysterious statues. As she reached the wall in front of the statues, Rose was able to see the stone figures more clearly. Climbing over the wall, Rose began to inspect the statues, all four were moulded into the shape of angels, all of which had their faces covered with their hands; they almost looked as if they were weeping. As Rose crept closer to the angel that was placed closest to her; she began to get an unnerving feeling in the pit of her stomach. That feeling in your stomach that tells you to run. Rose wasn't sure why but after traveling with the Doctor as long as she did, she knew to trust that feeling in the pit of her stomach and began to turn away from the statues and head back to the TORCHWOOD headquarters.
Turning away from the statue, Rose bent down to pick up her canvas messenger bag. As she walked away, she took one last look at the angels; shock going through her body as she saw that they had suddenly moved closer to her. That feeling once again reared up in the pit of Rose's stomach telling her to run as far and as fast as she could. Rose slowly blinked her eyes to ensure that she was truly seeing what she thought she was. As she opened her eyes once more, the angels had moved closer to her; the one closest now had its hand reaching out towards her. Its hands no longer covered its face and Rose could look into the blank eyes calling her to her death. Rose tried to look around without looking away from the angel to see if she could get someone's attention.
A feeling of dread sunk into Rose's stomach as she realised three things. The first being that there was no one around in the park where she was. The second was that Rose had finally solved the case she had been working on. Rose realised that these angel statues must be the ones behind all the disappearances. The third and most frightening of all was that Rose realised that she too will soon disappear. All of the cases have shown that after a person disappears there is no trace of them again. When Rose's eyes began to burn too much from the need to blink, she finally accepted her fate; that she may never see her family again. With one last blink, Rose closed her eyes and felt the wind rush around her before landing hard on the floor and passing out, not knowing where she was.
– Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf –
John Smith was once again sat at his desk scribbling in his journal, trying to commemorate his dream into words. John Smith and his maid Martha Jones had arrived at Farringham School For Boys two weeks ago having left the busy city of London for a quieter life in the countryside. Every night for the past week, John had been having strange dreams; strange, wonderful dreams. John dreams that he himself is some sort of adventurer, a daredevil with an eye for the pretty girls; the Doctor he is called in his dreams, but he doubts that is his real name. For the past week he has been imagining that he is in hiding from creatures from another world. Every morning when he wakes up, he has spent the first few moments writing all his magnificent dreams in his private journal.
Some mornings like today he wakes up with tears running down his face. One dream in particular seems to be a recurrence, most nights John dreams about one of the most beautiful girls he has ever seen. This mysterious blonde woman is often by his side, sharing adventures with the Doctor, but whenever he wakes, he can't seem to remember her name. This mysterious woman seems to disappear later on in his dreams, and he can't seem to find her. Many dreams like the one last night are of this mysterious girl walking away from him and no matter how hard he tries; he just can't seem to reach her. Sometimes he gets close enough to reach out and touch her but there is always an invisible wall between them, and he can't get through; then the image of her fades away and he breaks down into sobs. This is the point where John usually wakes up from his dream; and he feels like his heart has been ripped out of his chest.
John had just finished a sketch of a rose on the opposite page from his entry of last night's dream; he wasn't sure why, but the flower just seemed right. It felt so right that he started to write the phrase, 'a perfect rose' next to the image and began another sketch of the flower just below as he heard a knock at the door. "Come in," he called to the unknown person outside his room. John looks up as his maid, Martha, entered carrying his breakfast tray into the room.
"Pardon me, Mister Smith. You're not dressed yet," Martha apologised as she turned her back to him. John looked down to realise that he was currently sat at his desk in his nightwear, he was in such a rush to write down his dream he hadn't bothered to even grab his robe. "I can come back later," she offered as John hurried to put on his dressing gown which was draped over the end of his bed.
"No, it's all right, it's all right" John told her as he tied the rope around his dressing gown securing it to his waist. "Put it down" he gestured towards his desk as he hurried to move the journal, he was previously writing in. "I was er. Sorry, sorry. Sometimes I have these extraordinary dreams" he tried to explain, he desperately wanted to share his dreams with someone. He knew that he would be able to confide in his oldest housemaid who had followed him to Frarringham, leaving all her family behind. John knew that his young house maid had a not-so-secret crush on him, and sometimes used it to his advantage like getting the nicest breakfast in the morning. He knew he should be ashamed of this, leading the poor girl on; knowing that he had no romantic feelings towards her at all. His heart belongs to the nameless girl in his dreams.
"What about, sir?" Martha asked getting John's attention as she placed the tray on the table as he asked and drew back the curtains.
"I dream I'm this adventurer. This daredevil, a madman" he explained as he began to eat the breakfast the young maid had brought him. He smiled as he saw that he had another banana on his tray; they were his favourite but never asked for them as he knew they were hard to get hold of in England. He didn't dare ask Martha how she was able to get them for fear she would no longer bring them to him. "The Doctor, I'm called" he continued explaining his dream. "And the other night I dreamt that you were there, as my companion" John smiled as he took a bite of his favourite fruit.
"A teacher and a housemaid, sir?" she said in disbelief with a slight longing in her voice as she began to pour him a cup of tea. "That's impossible."
"I'm a man from another world, though" he protested trying to get her to understand the types of whimsical dreams he has.
"Well, it can't be true because there's no such thing" Martha tried to make him believe in fear that the Doctor was breaking his way back through.
"This thing. The watch is –" John began as he stood up and walked towards his fireplace, picking up the ornate pocket watch from the mantlepiece for a moment before putting it backdown. "Ah, it's funny how dreams slip away" he muttered as he began to forget what his dream had been about. "But I do remember one thing; it all took place in the future. In the Year of Our Lord 2007" he mused in disbelief.
"I can prove that wrong for you, sir. Here's the morning paper" Martha said as she picked up the morning paper from his tray and showed him todays date. "It's Monday, November 10th, 1913, and you're completely human, sir. As human as they come," she stated confidently with a sad undertone that John couldn't understand why.
"Mmm, that's me" he mused with a smile. "Completely human."
– Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf – Bad Wolf –
Martha breathed a sigh of relief as she left John Smith's room. She still didn't believe what was happening, she kept thinking each morning she would wake up the Doctor would pop into her room and apologise for playing a horrible practical joke on her. She knew that wasn't the case and that this would be her new life for the next three months. Martha just couldn't believe her luck; she was currently stuck in 1913 as a maid babysitting a human Doctor who still wouldn't look twice at her. She had decided to use these months to get the human Doctor to fall in love with her so that when he wakes up, he will realise that she was there the whole time. Someone who understands, to a degree, what scientific thing the Doctor was talking about, and she would be someone who could hold his hand through all the tough parts on their adventures together.
Martha spent the rest of the morning with a smile on her face after hearing John tell her he has dreams about her; about them together. It wasn't in the way she was hoping but he still dreamt about her. The one thing that brought an even bigger smile to her face was that this human version of the Doctor never seemed to mention anything about his previous friend who used to travel with him. Martha still remembered the hurt look on the Doctor's face when she had asked him about his previous travelling companion. She wasn't able to find out much information about her; the only things he had told her were that she was called Rose and they were friends. The way he talked about her; anyone would think that she was the most perfect person to ever walk the Earth; but Martha knew better. Martha knew that Rose was not perfect, she did one of the most stupid things you could ever do when you travelled with the Doctor; she left him. Martha could see that the Doctor must have loved her but, in the end, she left him all alone. Now it was her chance to get the Doctor to see that he can love again; for Martha would never leave him.
Martha spent the rest of the morning carrying on with the rest of her duties as she continued to think of ways to get John to fall in love with her. Not long after lunch had been served to teachers and students in the lunch hall; the school became alive with chatter as a mysterious girl had shown up in one of the nearby farms with no memory. This filled Martha with dread and worry for fear that the family had already found them, and she would need to open the watch. Later that afternoon, Martha would do everything in her power to find out as much about this mysterious woman as she could to protect the Doctor at all costs.