Author's Note: We are now on my favorite 'episode'. I hope you enjoy it!

Chapter Twenty-Nine

The Silent House

Sometimes, Molly thought, the little things were even better than the adventures. The small day-to-day activities, the little gestures, the teasing comments. The way he held two different bowties to his throat so she could help him decide which looked better. When they went to the cinema room to watch a movie, she noticed he'd removed the poster with the words 'the Phoenix' plastered across it.

And now, once again sitting on the floor as he worked on some part of the TARDIS under the center console, she noted that the show had never shown him humming and singing to himself, almost subconsciously, as he worked, at least not that she could recall. She recognized a song from the 60s, and one from the 90s, but others were from probably from other planets or the future.

It was nice, to get to see all these little details of him, of his life on the TARDIS. Since the threat of leaving it all behind, she'd been paying closer attention and noticing more. She was getting to know him more and more as a person instead of a character the last two or three weeks (she wasn't sure), since the lab with the Weeping Angels. They'd spent more of that time in the TARDIS, since she hadn't felt up to accidentally running into another big threat quite yet. She knew he went on his own adventures while she slept.

That was why the TARDIS repairs. He'd said something about an accident involving an asteroid field and how he was surprised it hadn't woken her up. Molly reminded him that she slept even deeper than she'd used to these days.

She was back to her job that reminded her a bit of being a scrub nurse, holding a large pipe of some kind that seemed frayed at the end called a 'Octospanner', listening to him hum some unfamiliar song. In front of her was a game of solitaire she'd long since given up on, thanks to the Doctor continuously commenting on what she'd done wrong or missed every time she touched a card.

As nice as these little moments were, Molly was bored out of her mind. The time spent on the TARDIS had been lovely, but she was ready to get back to the adventures. She was mid-yawn when the Doctor suddenly gave a wordless exclamation, jumped up, and reached into his pocket.

Molly tossed the Octospanner aside and pulled herself back to her feet. "What is it? What's wrong?"

"Aha!" he cried, as he pulled out the psychic paper. He opened it, frowned, and then looked at Molly. Slowly, the frown was replaced by an excited grin. "Coordinates."

"Coordinates?" Molly asked. She moved around to look at the paper, though of course it was all nonsense to her. "How did someone send you coordinates on the psychic paper while we're in the middle of space?" It did remind her of an episode, but that seemed to be unique circumstances.

"We're actually more to the left, upper, back part of space," he corrected her. "And I have no idea. Want to find out?"

She smiled up at him. "What do you think?"

"Ha!" He rushed to the controls. Molly watched as he worked, and stepped up to an odd control she'd never seen him use before, that looked like a sort of maze to pull a metal peg through. She examined to keep her mind busy until they landed.

The Doctor rubbed his hands together, practically vibrating with excitement. He headed for the door, and Molly followed quickly behind him. She tried to think of where they could be – an alien planet? A moon somewhere? A military base? Another kind of lab? Space station? The past? So far in the future she couldn't comprehend it? Would there be giants, or land-walking squids, or living mountains made of gold?

"Could be anything out there," she said as he put his hand on the door.

"That's the best part," he replied, still grinning. "Ready?"

"Let's do it!"

He flung the doors open, to reveal –

"Oh. It's Earth." He said, frowning. He stuck a hand out and waved it around some. "2201."

"A little…anticlimactic."

She looked over to the Doctor to see him frowning. "I was hoping for something new. I've even been in this century a few times before."

Molly looked around. Blue sky, white clouds, one sun, birds flying overhead, a field of dead grass and a few straggly trees. She could hear the wind through the grass, the birds singing as they flew over a house. The oddest part was the house in front of them. "That doesn't seem right."

The Doctor examined the house, too. "Seems very, very wrong."

The house was definitely the strangest thing about this. It was the same style as the house she lived in with the abusive foster parents, but smaller, and white. She thought the style was called Edwardian Colonial, or Georgian Colonial, or something like that. It was all straight lines, evenly-spaced windows, dark blue shutters. A tall, round pillar stood on either side of the front door, with arches over them, creating some cover. The stone walkway was lined with neatly squared bushes, and the space around the house was filled with dark green grass and trees full of vibrantly green leaves. The front of the house was lined with rose bushes, all the white flowers in full bloom. There was a short white brick wall around the house, with an iron gate where the bars swirled, forming patterns that looked like ivy.

She looked around at the field full of sun-burnt grass and dead trees. "It's like someone copy-and-pasted a house from a rich neighborhood into this field."

The Doctor stepped out of the TARDIS, and Molly followed, closing and then locking the door behind them – the first time she got to use the key she kept around her neck.

He scanned the area with the sonic, but the results didn't seem to satisfy him. "Something is making the sonic go a bit…haywire," he muttered, and looked back at the house. Something in his expression reminded her of how he looked at an enemy. "The results are jumping all over the place."

Molly frowned, and looked back at the house. It looked warm and inviting to her, but in an odd way. The house didn't make sense, and that should put her on edge, but all she wanted to do was go inside. She stepped forward and opened the gate. "May as well find out what's going on, then."

"Right," said the Doctor, tucking the sonic back into his pocket. "I'd very much like to know what's going on."

They began down the pathway together, and Molly breathed in the fresh air. It smelled of grass, and roses, and somehow also of wood polish. That part reminded her of the ballet studio she'd danced at as a child.

The door was painted the same blue as the shutters – a TARDIS blue – and had a golden knocker in the center. She looked over at the Doctor. "Do we knock?"

The Doctor reached out a hand and knocked firmly three times. After a minute, there was no answer. Molly spotted a lighted doorbell on the wall, and pressed it. A sound like church bells came from the inside, and a moment later, the door opened, revealing no one behind it.

Molly looked at the Doctor. "I should feel nervous about that."

"Do you?"

"No."

"Neither do I," he replied, and stepped inside.

Molly followed, and closed the door behind them. She turned and saw a simple entryway, white wood stairs that went up, had a landing, then turned and went up another way. A few archways leading to other rooms. This floor looked like white stone, but she could see more painted white wood flooring in other rooms. Above them was a hanging light, covered in frosted white glass. "Looks pretty ordinary," she said. "Smells like apple pie. Like they do for open houses."

"Yes," the Doctor agreed. "Ordinary. Except…"

"What?"

"Listen."

Molly closed her eyes to listen closely for a moment, but she didn't hear anything but the wind and the birds. "I don't know what I'm supposed to be hearing."

"Creaks. Shifting. Echoes. Scratching on the windows, or glass shaking from the wind. The sounds ordinary houses make." He turned slowly, looking at each wall. "But that's not what we're hearing. What we're hearing is the outside."

"Yeah," Molly said, and then she finally caught up to him. " Oh. The wind and birds sound just as loud in here as they did outside."

"Exactly."

Molly took a few steps forward to peer upstairs. All she could see was white carpet, and the edges of another set of stairs. The white wood used for those stairs and the sharp angles made her think of teeth. "It reminds me of…"

"Of what?"

She looked back to the Doctor. "A Venus flytrap. It smells good. It draws us in. But then…"

"It snaps closed and eats us." The Doctor almost sounded excited by the prospect. He took a couple steps forward and held up his hand for a high-five. "Top notch thinking."

She gave him the high-five. "Thanks," she laughed. It felt wrong. "We should be worried about the flytrap house."

"We should be," the Doctor agreed, and then he took a few more steps into the house. "We should want to leave."

Molly followed him further in. "Do you want to?"

"Not even a bit." He turned back towards the front door. "What I want to do move the TARDIS inside."

"Why?"

"Um…" He seemed uncertain for a moment, wringing his hands as his gaze shifted back and forth. "So it's closer to us. We can make a faster escape, if we need to."

Molly looked back at the door. She didn't want to leave the house, but she felt the TARDIS needed to be inside with them. "Okay. Let's move the TARDIS."

The Doctor led them back to the door, and headed outside. It surprised her. If this had been a movie, the door would have been locked behind them. They went down the path, and into the TARDIS. Molly watched as the Doctor stepped around the various tools and the cards on the floor to get to the controls.

"Short hops are difficult," he warned her. She grabbed onto the railing, and the Doctor ran around the console, doing his best to make the short hop smooth. Still, the TARDIS shook more than usual, as if it didn't want to go into the house. But finally, they materialized back inside, and Molly opened the door.

"Oh," she said, now facing a kitchen with white tiling, countertops of white marble, and copper pans hanging over an island.

The Doctor peeked out from around her. "We should've been back in the entry."

Molly stepped out. "Maybe the short hop made us miss it by a bit."

"Maybe…" But he sounded uncertain as he followed her out and shut the door. She watched as he went around the kitchen, opening and closing drawers and looking into cupboards. "This could be dangerous, you know." He turned back towards her. "Want to back out?"

"Are you kidding?" Molly laughed. "'Danger' is my middle name." She hoped he wouldn't ask her what her real middle name was.

"How funny, so's mine," he replied as he stuck his head into the cabinet under the sink. He stood up again. "Do me a favor and stick your head in there."

"Um. No, thanks."

"Why not?"

"I saw how ridiculous you looked doing it, and I'd rather keep some dignity."

"Oh, ha ha," he said dryly, rolling his eyes. "Just do it."

She sighed and took his place, while he moved around to the end of another counter. She knelt down and stuck her head into the empty cabinet. "There aren't any pipes."

"That's not all."

"What else?"

"Take a deep breath."

It was her turn to roll her eyes, but still, she did it. "Okay, now what?"

"Notice anything?"

"I'm guessing you're about to tell me what I'm not noticing."

"Come back out."

She sighed and moved back, but felt the thin strap of her top get caught on a nail. She reached up to free herself, but that small movement alone was enough to create a tear. She heard the ripping sound and groaned, then stood to see the damage. The spaghetti strap of her pale pink, corset-like crop top was torn, and she reached out a hand to hold the top up in place. She looked to the Doctor. "I hope that was worth me destroying this top and almost having a wardrobe malfunction."

He dropped the blank white papers he'd been holding back into the trash can and moved over to her. He observed the damage to her shirt, then reached into his pocket and dug around for a moment. "Ah!" he called out when he seemed to have finally gotten a grip on whatever it was he'd been looking for. He pulled his hand out and produced a safety-pin. "Hold still."

Molly followed his direction, holding her top in place though she knew it was tight enough to stay put even if she didn't. He reached for the broken strap, and his fingers felt like they'd just been out in cold winter air against her skin; though she thought she was getting used to his temperature, she still felt every small, accidental brush of his skin against her like the tingle of a cool breeze on a sunny day, or like the tingle of menthol. She watched as he carefully pushed the fabric of one side of the strap onto the needle, and noticed again his scent of herbal mint and clean wool, and now noticed a note of sweet honey. Something about that made her cheeks warm.

By then he'd threaded the other bit of fabric onto the needle, too, and he closed the pin. He stepped away, observing his work with a proud smile. "There! All better," he announced. He looked back to her face, a bit of confusion entering his eyes when Molly forgot to respond.

"Oh, uh…thanks," she said, looking down at her salvaged top. "I didn't want to have to go all the way back to my room to change." She didn't want to leave the house, even for a minute.

"Should be fine," the Doctor said. "Are you alright?"

Molly nodded. "Yeah. Just noticed that the jacket smells good."

"Does it?" the Doctor asked. He lifted an arm to smell his shoulder and turned to meet it, but continued turning in place for a moment as he tried to smell his jacket. Molly resisted laughing as he looked like a dog chasing his tail. "Smells like dust to me."

Dust. "Oh!" Molly turned back to the space under the sink. "It doesn't smell of anything. No dust, no mildew, nothing, not even the wood or sawdust. Like it's never been used, but wasn't recently built."

"Right!" the Doctor said, snapping his fingers, then pointing behind him towards the trash can. "And there's no real rubbish in there. Just plain white pieces of paper."

Molly frowned. "So, it's like…like a set on a stage. A house that's made to look like people live in it, but…they don't."

"Could be, could be, yes," the Doctor agreed as he frowned. He spun around another moment, and then he was off and out the archway that led to the kitchen. Molly sighed and jogged after him.

"Do you have a plan?" she asked as she followed him into a hallway, simple and white with pictures on the wall of families and couples and pets, but no two photos had the same people or animals.

"No. Should I?" he asked, looking left, then right, then left again. He settled on heading towards the left.

"Weird, flytrap, dollhouse thing in the middle of nowhere whose address was sent to you via psychic paper in the middle of space-"

"I told you, it's more back, left-"

"-and you have no plan?"

"What plan could I have? What could I-" he stopped and frowned. Molly almost asked why, but then she heard it, too.

The ticking of a clock. The first real house sound the house had made. Molly looked around for the source of the sound. "I think it's coming from upstairs."

The Doctor nodded in agreement, and turned a few times before settling on heading back down the hall the other way. They came back to the foyer, and the Doctor started up the stairs, with Molly following behind him. The next floor turned out to be another landing, with the second staircase that had reminded Molly of teeth. They took that set of stairs, which led to another landing with another set. They went up again, to find yet another landing with a set of stairs, and still the clock was ticking on.

"This seems…wrong," Molly said.

"Very wrong," the Doctor agreed, but he continued up the stairs anyway.

Another two flights. Molly stopped and looked behind them. "How many floors did this house have?"

"Three, at most."

"How many floors have we gone past?"

"Five."

"That's not possible."

"No. It's not." The Doctor took the sonic out of his pocket again and scanned the area. He looked at the results, and frowned. "The results still aren't coming out clear."

"Any ideas as to why?"

"Yes."

"…and?"

"I'll get back to you."

Molly resisted rolling her eyes again. "I'm going to try to go back down," she said, and turned. The Doctor followed her.

When they reached the previous floor, instead of a plain landing, they found themselves in a library. The walls were lined with shelves, the shelves full of antique-looking books, most leather-bound with golden writing. There was a small area set aside for a loveseat and two chairs, and a hall stretched out behind the sitting area.

"I've changed my mind," she said, looking around. "'Danger' is no longer my middle name. I'm ready to leave." That longing to stay was now slowly being replaced with a cold unease creeping up the back of her neck.

"I think my middle name's 'confused' now," said the Doctor, his voice soft with a sort of wonder at the sudden appearance of a room. "I don't like it. Actually, I do like it, too much, and that worries me. I'd like to go back to the TARDIS and run a proper scan."

"… can we get back to the TARDIS?"

The Doctor glanced around the room, and sighed. "Another thing that confuses me."

Molly approached a shelf to skim the books, and found that the titles were all mixed up letters, not words.

She picked one up the held it out as she turned back to the Doctor, who was looking beneath the white loveseat by a white marble fireplace. "These books are all titled nonsense," she said, and then flipped through the book. "The inside, too. It's all gibberish."

The Doctor frowned up at her. "Like a prop."

Molly nodded, and turned and put the book back on the shelf. As she turned back, she spotted the tall white grandfather clock at the entrance to the hallway. "Over here," she said to the Doctor as she approached it.

The Doctor followed her, and then frowned at the face of the clock. He pulled out the golden pocket watch he had on by the chain, then looked at the face of his clock, then tucked the pocket watch back when he looked at the grandfather clock again. "The time is wrong."

"Not unusual," said Molly. Then the minute hand on the grandfather clock moved…backwards. "That is, though."

"Grandfather clocks don't tick, either," the Doctor added.

"It's all so very…white," Molly commented, turning her head to look around. "Like someone forgot to color it all in."

The Doctor glanced around, and then nodded. "There is definitely something fishy going on here…"

"Any chance I can convince you to share your theory with me?"

He glanced over at her. "Give me a few more minutes to finish formulating it."

Molly wanted to sigh, but instead she nodded. She knew he would share in his own time, and that there was probably a reason he was holding off explaining it to her. Instead of continuing to pester him about it, as she was tempted to, Molly headed down the nearby hallway, also completely white, this time with art on the wall – or what was meant to be art, she supposed. She could see the paint on the canvas, but it was white on white.

She passed by a mirror, and saw herself walking a little behind in the reflection. She took a step back to look into it, and she saw the side of her head before her reflection turned to face her. She frowned, and she watched as her face went from confusion to a deep frown. She shifted left, and a millisecond later, her image shifted left. The same to the right. She raised her hand and waved, and again, the image moved a little behind her.

This was becoming genuinely frightening. "This mirror is lagging," she said, and then turned to drag the Doctor over so he could see for himself. She found herself facing a wall, where the hall had been a second ago.

"Okay…" she whispered. "Horror movie scary now." She knocked on the wall. "Doctor?!" Nothing. She tried again, and still nothing.

She turned back towards the hall, and found another staircase facing her instead. "What would a horror movie character do right now?" She asked herself. "Whatever it is, I need to do the opposite."

A horror movie character would go up the stairs. Molly stepped forward and looked around the staircase, but there were no doors, and it was up against a wall. Where there'd been a hall, there was now only a wall. There was no other direction she could go. She could stay where she was and wait for the Doctor to find her, but in a house like this there didn't seem to be much chance of that. Her best bet was exploring and investigating and seeing if she could find a way out, or preferably, back to the TARDIS.

"Great. Now I get to be the stupid girl running up the staircase." At least there wasn't a slasher chasing her.

Hopefully.

Molly began up the stairs, and came face to face with another white painting. Something there seemed off to her, but she wasn't sure what it was yet. There was so much about this that wasn't right, she wasn't sure why this moment in particular felt wrong.

There was one hall going to her right – a short hall that seemed to lead to a sitting room at the end – and another to her left. This one was long. Too long. It seemed to extend out for miles.

Against her better judgement, Molly began down the hall that was too long. Her footsteps echoed on the walls as she stepped up to the first door in the hall. It was locked. She tried the one straight across from it, and it was also locked. A few steps later, she tried the next set. Then the next. None of them opened.

After a few minutes, she realized why the hall seemed so long. As she walked, the lamps hanging above and the doors became smaller and smaller. This seemed familiar, like something she'd seen in a scary movie once, or maybe read about online. She reached the end of the hall, and found herself facing a set of small double doors. These actually opened for her, and behind

Molly began back the way she came, deciding to try the other hall. The sitting room at the end had been replaced by a wall. She turned around, and hoped one of the doors in the falsely long hall would actually open somehow, and that it actually led somewhere, and she wasn't trapped in this relatively small space.

She tried the first door she found, and was relieved when it opened, only to be disappointed by a white brick wall. The next door was the same. But the next opened up to what looked like a ballroom. The ceiling was a mirror, and she noticed her image was lagging in it, too. The white wood floor below her feet gleamed as though it had just been shined. A fireplace held a roaring fire, but as she approached, it put out no heat.

"This is so stupid," she whispered to herself, and then did it anyway, sticking a finger in the flames. She felt the flames lick her finger, like she did when she'd run a finger through the flame of a candle so fast it couldn't burn her, but still, no heat.

She stood and wandered to another part of the ballroom, which held what seemed to be a large cabinet but actually was a vinyl record player. A black record spun circles, but there was no sound. She found a knob for the volume, and turned it up, and was almost surprised when it played music as it normally should. The song was familiar, but she couldn't place it. " You don't have to say you love me, just be close at hand. You don't have to stay forever, I will understand. Believe me, believe me, I can't help but love you…" The singer's voice echoed in the room.

There was another set of double doors behind her, these in some sort of design made of stained glass, but again they were all stained white. She set a hand on the handle, and then frowned.

Double doors. What had been behind the other set? She couldn't remember. But when she turned to go back and check, the door she had come in was replaced by a wall that didn't match the painted wall around it. It was more beige than pure white.

Molly walked through the double doors, and now found herself in an empty room. Or, she thought it was an empty room with nothing but some recessed lighting in the floor, until she looked up.

There was a long dining table with a white tablecloth, a white rose centerpiece, silver and china place settings, even tall white candles in silver holders. Tall-backed chairs with plush cushions surrounded it. On the wall was a china cabinet filled with porcelain teapots and cups. But the beige carpet under the table ran along the wall, and standing there, horizontally, was a white statue. She thought it might have been the statue of Venus that was in some French museum.

The perfect image of an elegant dining room – just on the ceiling, as though the room was reversed like she could do to an image on her phone, or like a misprinted page.

"I hate this Dr. Seuss, Stephen King, House of Leaves, bullshit place," Molly muttered to herself. She turned to head out the next door when something gleaming on the floor met her eye. She bent to pick it up. An open safety pin.

She looked down at her top, and sure enough, the safety pin was missing. It must have come off without her noticing. She repined the strap together, and then moved on.

More stairs in an empty hall. She started up and

The office was large, like a CEO at some Fortune 500 company. A desk, yes, chairs, yes, but also a sitting area with a fireplace, a little library, a bar, a spiral staircase – wait.

She'd started up the stairs. And now she was in an office. She turned and saw the stairs behind her, and stepped back out into the hall. Left, a table with a vase up against the wall. Right,

She ran up the spiral staircase, and found another little library. She ran through the door, then down the hall, and was met by another set of stairs, going down this time. She paused to catch her breath.

Why was she running? And her arm was stinging.

Molly looked at the inside of her left arm, and found three scratches on it. What could have caused that? How hadn't she noticed? They weren't deep, just barely abrasions. Her skin turned red from marks easily, though. Her mom had blamed it on being a redhead, somehow.

She reached for her arm to pull at the skin and see if there was any blood at all, and she saw it – the safety pin, open again, in her hand. She looked at her top again, and the safety pin there was gone.

"What the actual…" she muttered to herself. She pinned the strap again, and took a step towards the stairs,

When she walked into the room, she was out of breath. But finally, there were colors around her. All around the –

"Shut the fuck up!" she screamed. She turned away from the art studio and ran out of the room. She found herself at the stairs again. She counted them. Eight in front of her, then a large landing with a window that didn't let in any sunlight, then they turned again and she couldn't see, but there was probably another eight, or around there.

"Okay." Molly set a foot on the lower stair. "One." Another step. "Two." She was at the top of the stairs. She turned to

She was back in the art studio, again out of breath, leaning against the door with her arms as though trying to hold it closed. She gave a scream of frustration, and a bit of fear, if she was being honest with herself. What was happening? She was appearing places and doing things she couldn't remember. She kept running and holding doors closed and she didn't know why. Sighing, she leaned her head against the wall of the door. Her heart was thundering. She needed to calm down. She closed her eyes, and took a few deep breaths. She opened them, and saw red out of the corner of her eye.

There were another three marks on her arm. Four lines, one across them, another line beside it.

A deep, black pit began to form in her stomach.

She pinned her strap back together, and began searching the art studio, tossing aside canvases with lines and dots of color as though they were modern art but gave the feeling of being generated by an AI. She threw aside paints and water clouded with paint, brushes, colored pencils, crayons – and then found it. A black marker. She opened the lid and tested it on her arm, tracing the previous marks. It worked.

There was no other door in the room, but there were windows, windows that again let in no light. She threw open the thin blue curtains. One had a white brick wall. The other led to some sort of gaming room, with a pool table and a circular table covered in green felt with cards dealt out. Perfect.

Molly climbed through the window, and looked around. Another fireplace with no heat. Green velvet chairs. It was like someone had finally remembered that most houses had color in them. She turned around slowly, and saw nothing. She looked to the ceiling

She was on her knees on the floor. With a gasp, she looked at her arm, and then fought back the urge to vomit. Her vision blurred, and she felt as though the room had gone from vaguely cool to below freezing.

Five. Ten. Fifteen. Twenty. Twenty-five. Thirty. Thirty-five. Forty. Two. Forty-two. She'd run out of space. She turned her arm over, and felt sick all over again. There, on her skin, in her messy handwriting: LOOK UP.

She closed her eyes, took a steadying breath, and tilted her head up.

And then she was looking down at her arm again. The disorientation made her sway a moment before she could really look at the writing. She'd added a word, that person she was whenever she could see them: DON'T.

DON'T

LOOK UP

Some wild part of her mind told her that maybe, maybe, if she was determined enough, she would be able to remember seeing them. She focused her eyes, focused her mind, took in as many details of the room as she could to make her mind used to absorbing information, then looked up again.

Her arm now read:

DON'T

LOOK UP

YOU DUMB BITCH

Well, the message was definitely from her, and she would definitely listen. She would also get out of this room as fast as she could. She spotted another door, this one a glass revolving one. It was far too late to question the odd additions to the house, and she got to her feet and launched herself at the door, half-expecting to be electrocuted on the way. But she slammed against the handle, and spun it around. She found herself in a large, empty space, with a high ceiling with painted clouds. She heard an odd screeching sound, and looked across the room to find the source. Another revolving door was moving. She held her breath and took a step back. No weapons. She had nothing. All she could do was run backwards, towards the horde. Maybe she could stab one in it's not-eye with the safety pin, though the needle was way too small for that.

But out came the Doctor. "Molly!" he shouted as soon as she saw her.

"Doctor!" She shouted in relief, and ran for him. He met her in the middle of the room and wrapped his arms around her just as she reached out to do the same to him.

"You're alright!" the Doctor exclaimed. "I thought maybe the house had eaten you."

"It's probably worse than that," she breathed.

"Worse? Are you alright?" He pulled away suddenly and checked her face for injuries. "You look alright."

"I am, but-"

He spun around and pointed at the door he'd come from. "I think we should go back that way. There are stairs that seem to lead to a basement of some kind, and it's the first time the sonic has had any real readings. Oh! Right. I should mention. The house isn't really here."

Molly glanced around at the walls, and stamped a foot on the floor. "Feels real, even if it doesn't look real."

"It's not. It's all a projected image, sort of like a massive hologram. I think it's likely a perception filter."

Molly looked back at the revolving door behind her, towards all the other strange rooms she'd seen. "A perception filter can do all this?"

"I've never seen it before, but a perception filter can do almost anything," he commented. He pulled the sonic out to show it to her. "The sonic was getting strange readings because there was nothing here to find – nothing above ground anyway – and I kept trying to force it to read the house. But the house isn't real, it doesn't exist, so it couldn't get a reading. After we were separated, I found stairs leading down, and the further down I got the more of an electrical buzz I could hear. Eventually the sonic detected some sort of massive energy wave, and I think it's the perception filter putting out an enormous amount of power in order to produce the house. Why it's here at all I don't know, or why we were invited, or rather, I was invited, I'm not sure how many people know you're with me and have the ability to do this, River maybe, or Captain Jack, but neither of them would do this. I guess there's also Martha and Mickey, with UNIT, but nothing on Earth has this amount of power, so actually, leave Jack out of it, too. And have you noticed that the rooms seem put together by someone who hasn't ever seen a real house before? Like a child's drawing, too. Or like, uh-"

"Silence!" Molly finally interjected as the Doctor took a breath.

The Doctor seemed stunned for a moment, but then he nodded, putting the sonic away. "Right. Rambling. Sorry."

"No," said Molly firmly. "I mean, it's the Silence." She held up her arm as evidence.

She watched the Doctor's eyes widen. He reached for her arm to look at it, as though he thought he might be seeing it incorrectly, or that he hoped he was seeing it incorrectly. As he turned her arm back and forth, showing the marks and the writing, she thought she felt a tremor in his hands.

"That's impossible," he whispered. All the chaotic energy and excitement from the mystery drained out of him, like the color was draining from his face. "They should be…"

"The crack in the universe," Molly whispered back. "It's back. So the Silence are back. And…and maybe set a trap for you."

He looked at her, a vague sort of panic in his eyes. A fear clung to the edges of his mouth, too, the fear she saw when she'd first arrived and told him the name of his show. The oldest question in the universe. The question people had tried to kill him to keep him from answering. To silence him.

The only way he'd escaped was by dying. Twice, though the first time he'd faked it. But he'd really died the second time. And now they were back. To kill him again.

His fingers were still trembling as he continued to hold on to her arm. There was nothing she could say to make this better, nothing she could do to make this go away. But she set a hand over one of his, and she hoped her eyes expressed the pain and fear she felt on his behalf. The comfort she wished there was a way to give him. But all she saw in his was desperation and his own pain and tears, though he was trying to bury it with his own concern for her.

"Right," the Doctor said. "Okay." But his voice cracked as he said the words, and she heard a tone in his voice similar to when he'd asked Clara if he really had to go to Trenzalore. And he still hadn't let go of her arm yet. "We'll just…leave. We'll leave, and we won't come back, and we'll…we'll run so far they won't find us again."

Her first thought was that running wasn't like the Doctor – except, of course, it was. He'd started running a long time ago, and he hadn't stopped yet. He'd avoided Lake Silencio for as long as he could. The only reason he'd gone to Trenzalore was to save his friends.

Of course he wanted to run. She did, too. And it would be the smart thing to do.

But she knew him too well, and felt a sad patience settle into her eyes as she waited.

He stared into her eyes like he was trying to look into her soul, and his jaw set and reset and reset, until finally he sighed. "Alright. Fine. You're right. I need to know what's happening. I need to know if they know why the crack has reappeared."

"Besides," she said, "We don't know how to get out of the house. We have to find the TARDIS. And maybe if we let them monologue for a little while, they'll give something away."

The smile on his lips was so faint it was like feeling one raindrop on a clear day – knowing it was there, but unable to be completely certain. "Smart. Always liked that about you."

She didn't like that he said it like he was preparing to say goodbye. Or eulogizing her. "We'll get out of this. You always do."

" Always…" he said distantly. "I wish that were true."

"You're here now, aren't you?"

The Doctor opened his mouth to respond, and then his eyes shifted slight to the right. "The door's spinning behind you."

Molly swallowed. "So…might be about forty or so Silence on their way in here."

"Yep," said the Doctor, slowly stepping backwards. He whispered, "I want to investigate before we start asking questions. I think the stairs down are probably our best option."

"Good thing they can't get through a revolving door in large numbers," she muttered.

"True. But it only takes…one…" He glanced behind her. "And there are about six already through."

"Look at me," she said. When his eyes shifted back to her, she added, "There are six Silent behind us. They're coming in. We should get down to the basement."

"Okay. Let's not waste time, then," he said, and turned. He didn't let go of her arm as he dragged her behind them, racing to the revolving door he'd come through. They sped through it as fast as it would allow, turned right, then veered left and began down a staircase that led into darkness.

A few steps in, Molly decided that the Doctor was right: it was definitely a basement. Cinder block walls, dim lamps hanging over them, and a few unfinished walls. But it was huge, as though it was a bomb shelter underneath a 50-million-dollar mansion rather than the little house they'd seen. They dodged around walls and a few times Molly stumbled over the cracked concrete floor. They spun around another wall, and then Molly crashed straight into the Doctor.

Her heart in her throat, she looked around to see what had made him stop so suddenly, raising her free hand to prepare to make more marks on her arm to count what must be another horde.

She saw past the Doctor, and felt the marker slip from her fingers.

Seated in front of them was the Doctor.

Author's Note: A great big 'thank you for the inspiration' to the Rose Red miniseries, the book House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski, the ARG Dionaea House by Eric Heisserer, the Winchester Mystery house, and some other sources I've definitely forgotten. I have a thing for 'weird house' horror.