Red ⋆ Doctor Who

Chapter Fifty-four

Cherry can never bring herself to ask the interface how long she has been stuck in two streams for. She fears if she finds out it's anywhere near as long as it has felt like, she will lose hope in the Doctor and Rory coming to save her. Her faith is wearing thin. But, she reminds herself that the Doctor always saves her. Always. He came back after saving the world from Prisoner Zero. He followed her blindly into the Star Whale's mouth. He's saved her from the grasps of Weeping Angels, fish vampires, Silurian's. He came back after being unwritten from time. He saved her from Demon's Run, from the Doll's House. One time stream is nothing. He will be there for her, no matter how long it takes. She knows he will. Some days it's just harder to believe that than others.

The compressed time helps. Cherry doesn't know if it's the affect of being a time traveller, or if it's purely because she's locked away in a room with no concept of time, but she still feels as though it was only yesterday the Doctor was painting her nails. So delicately and precisely, just for her. Only moments ago was she straightening his bow tie whilst he ranted about Twitter and Rory complained about how underwhelming the room in which they landed was. She feels like she's just given birth recently. Like she should still have her little baby in her arms. Perfect little Melody. She can still remember the pain of losing her. The shock of finding out Mels has been her daughter the whole time. It's like no time has passed at all. And yet, she knows it's been years. It has to have been.

Cherry is a fast painter, and with no breaks to eat or sleep, she made even more progress than she would usually. But there is no way she could've covered every single inch of the art studio in detailed artwork if it has only been a few weeks, or months. It feels like longer than when she was trapped in Demon's Run. It's not quite the same, because she's completely isolated here with nobody to talk to but a robotic interface and herself, but compared to the time she spent on that asteroid, it feels like decades have passed. She knows it can't have been decades though, because she still hasn't aged and she still feels the same as she did before. If it had been decades, she would know.

She keeps herself occupied, though. Switching through every available image, the window can project for her, hiding from handbots in the air vents, sleeping whenever she can force herself to. She tries out every median of art she can, using all the available supplies now that she has run out of paint. It's the only way she stays sane. She's never relied on art so much. It's the first time she has done any since her link to her Ganger was severed. She missed it more than she realised.

She tries to look at the positives. This brief stay at Twostreams has certainly helped her develop her art skill, so that's nice... and her hair has had a chance to grow back out. It's longer than ever, reaching all the way past her bum, although she'll probably have to cut some of the split ends off when she does get saved. Reuniting with the Doctor will be nice, at least. Once she's gotten rid of any traces of that plague... she's forgotten the name now it's been so long. Something seven... it's not important. She just cannot wait to see him again. To hug him again, to have him touch her, and hold her waist or her face and kiss her forehead, or her lips. She misses his eyes. His hair. His voice. She even misses the things she sometimes found a little irritating, like the way he used to leave his clothes strewn across the floor, or didn't seem to understand why he couldn't wear his shoes in bed. She misses how smart he is, and how incredibly stupid he can be.