Heaven's Light ✿ The Doctor [2]

27- Family of Blood (pt. 2)

Joan leads to a seemingly abandoned cottage, "Here we are. It should be empty." Joan tells them breathlessly as she holds her side, "Oh, it's a long time since I've run that far."

"But who lives here?" Avery inquires.

"If I'm right, no one." Joan makes her way into the cottage with the others following behind. Joan opens the door, calling in, "Hello?" It is dark inside and the table is laid for tea, "No one home. We should be safe here."

"Whose house is it, though?" Avery wonders.

Joan looks hesitant to answer, but she finally does, "The Cartwrights. That little girl at the school, she's Lucy Cartwright, or she's taken Lucy Cartwright's form. If she came home this afternoon and if the parents tried to stop their little girl, then... they were vanished." Joan touches the teapot, "Stone cold. How easily I accept these ideas."

John stumbles further into the room, sitting down heavily with a look of despair on his face before turning to the ladies and telling them tearfully, "I must go to them, before anyone else dies."

"You can't." Joan protests, sitting opposite of John before turning her attention to the younger girl, "Avery, there must be something we can do."

The hopeful look John gives her just about breaks her heart as she answers honestly, "Not without the watch or the Tardis."

His face twists into one of anger as he shouts at her, "You're this Doctor's companion, can't you help? What exactly do you do for him? Why does he need you?"

Avery gulps, her heart clenching painfully as she answers softly, "Because he's lonely."

His face falls fully, tears burning his eyes as he asks her, "And that's what you want me to become?"

"I–" There's a knock at the door, making Avery turn to look at it sharply.

"What if it's them?" Joan asks worriedly.

"I'm not an expert, but I don't think scarecrows knock." Avery responds before turning to open the door cautiously.

Her eyes widen when she finds Tim standing in front of her, "I brought you this." He holds up the watch.

"Thank you." She tells him, taking the watch before letting him in and Tim closes the door behind him. Avery turns to John with a serious expression, making the man stand nervously. She holds the watch out to him, "Hold it."

"I won't."

Avery's eyes sharpen with irritation for a moment before she takes a deep breath and pleads, "Please, just hold it."

"It told me to find you. It wants to be held." Tim assures John.

"You've had this watch all this time? Why didn't you return it?" Joan inquires.

"Because it was waiting." Tim answered, "And because I was so scared of the Doctor."

"Why?" Joan asked him, looking at Avery curiously as she held the watch a little closer to her, like if she held it tight enough the Doctor would be beside her.

"Because I've seen him." Tim admitted and Avery could swear she heard the whisper of songs coming from the watch. She had to blink and focus on Tim's words, pushing the songs away, "He's like fire and ice and rage. He's like the night and the storm in the heart of the sun."

"Stop it." John ordered.

"He's ancient and forever, he burns at the center of time and he can see the turn of the universe."

"Stop it! I said stop it."

"And he's wonderful." Avery breathed in deeply, smiling softly in agreement, eyes burning with tears as memories of her Doctor flit through her mind. All of those smiles and embraces and talks being what had kept her going over the last two months.