DOCTOR WHO: Arising -- A Nova Sue Prequel (Part 1.5)

Chapter 6: Lost River

It has been three days since River was revealed to be a Flesh avatar, just like her mother before her, and so far the Doctor has not had any luck in finding the real River, and at this point he is beginning to lose hope. Where could River possibly be?

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After yet another uncontrollable nightmare, River woke up, thankfully, back in her husband's bedroom, except this time there was something disturbingly different about it. Seeing a strange white glow at the corner of her eye, she looked toward the wall on the opposite side of the room, directly across from the bed, and saw the smirking face of her former guardian and tormentor, Madame Kovarian.

"Not long now, sweetie..." the witch sniggered at her just as her face was covered by what appeared to be a hatch sliding shut, plunging the room in darkness once more. River screamed in horror.

"River?" the soothing sound of her husband's voice whispered from her side, having seemingly woken up from her scream. "What's wrong?" He flipped over on his side to face his wife fully and gently wrapped a comforting arm around her to calm her.

"On the wall!" she exclaimed, still in panic, and pointed to the place where she saw Kovarian's twisted smirk. "She was there! I saw her!"

"Saw who?" the Doctor frowned at the wall, clearly seeing nothing.

"Kovarian!" River admitted without thinking, feeling shudders wracking her entire body. "She was looking at me through a hatch of some sort! It was right there on the wall before it closed! She could be in the TARDIS! How did she get in the TARDIS?" She never thought she'd see her former guardian ever again after her mother allegedly killed her in the aborted '5:02' timeline, and she'd be damned if she ever saw her again. Then again, that was an aborted timeline; who's to say she somehow survived when the original timeline was restored?

"Okay, River, calm down," her husband said as he slowly got out of bed and grabbed his sonic screwdriver from off the nightstand. "Let me go check." Not that there was anything to check, he thought, since at this point he knew what was really going on. These hallucinations had happened years ago, back when Amy was experiencing the same thing as a Flesh avatar; of course, he expected the same thing—or at least something similar—to happen to River as well now that she was revealed to be a Flesh avatar herself.

"No, I should go check," she insisted as she attempted to get out of bed as well. "I have my gun." She reached for said gun from off the nightstand on her side of the bed, knowing it would be much more useful than a screwdriver.

No surprise, the Doctor wasn't going to let her. "It's alright, River," he said as he put his hand up in a 'stop' motion for her to stay where she was. "Don't get up. I doubt Kovarian is really here, but let me check anyway, just to be sure." Deep down, he knew for a fact that Kovarian wasn't on board the TARDIS at all, but to ease River's worries (as well as keep up appearances, since she still wasn't aware that she wasn't in her real body), he decided to go anyway. "I'll just peek outside and into the next room over," he said as he walked to the bedroom door, sonic gripped tightly in hand. "I'll only be a minute."

"That's what Mother said before she was attacked in the kitchen," River pointed out nervously. "Please, my love, I don't want the same thing happening to you...or worse..."

"I'll be alright," he said, shaking his head before changing his mind. "In fact, it might be easier to just scan the TARDIS here with the sonic. I'll do that instead." He then used his sonic to scan the room as well as the rest of the space/time-machine, using his left hand instead of his right hand, which River thought was strange, as she knew his current incarnation to be right-handed. Once the scan was complete, her husband checked the results and said, "Scan complete. There's no one else on board but us. You can stop worrying now, River."