THE KEEPER // ELEVENTH DOCTOR

THE BEAST BELOW PT1

There was a country below us floating among the stars and somehow, it didn't phase me.

 It didn't shock me. Well, part of it did, the wonder of it, the innovation, but a large part of it felt unimpressive.

 My mind felt like the library that I worked in back in Leadworth. Just rows upon rows of knowledge that yearned to be opened. I myself felt like an untouched story, like someone, somewhere had written it but at some point had been left behind, neglected on a back shelf slowly consumed by dust.

The Doctor was excited to say the very least, there was a undeniable spark in his eyes, but as he was babbling on about the rules of travelling and our part in it being purely like a spectator, all I could think of was my own fleeting sense of identity.

 I felt like I was floating in the sky, just like the country below perhaps. Was I falling? It felt like I didn't know where I was, or who I was, but as I closed my eyes I could see everything around me so much more clearly, as if I hadn't closed my eyes at all. Who was I in this darkness? Who was I when all the lights switch back on, and the book gets read?

But then I realised I was actually falling, and I felt arms suddenly around me to stop me from landing harshly on the console ground.

My eyes opened wide in shock as I realised that I was now lying on the hard ground of the TARDIS in the arms of a concerned Doctor.

He remained silent but his eyes seemed to realise something, like it was clicking into place.

"Can you tell me what your name is?" He asks slowly, I hadn't hit my head, did I? Amy was looking at the scene in a mix of concern and confusion.

"Willow." I replied, I think that was my name? It seemed familiar on my lips. The Doctor let out an almost inaudible sigh. Did I say something wrong?

I went to get up from where my head was resting in the Doctor's crouched lap, did he catch me?

It wasn't unusual for me to faint, in fact it's been happening a lot recently.

"Are you okay Willow?"

"She's fine." The Doctor responded for me. "Or she will be, just give it time."

There was a flash on the monitor and the Doctor was quick to flurry up to it, his eyebrows scrunched together as he looked at me fleetingly. He shook his head quickly as if to relinquish a thought, before quickly changing the monitor's screen to the view outside of the TARDIS.

I hadn't realised we had stopped somewhere. I got up slowly and followed Amy to the monitor to see that we were on the ship we had seen earlier, only the screen remained focused on a crying girl sitting on her own. My hand touched the screen before I could give it permission, and I could almost feel her sadness like it was my own. She was mourning the loss of someone and no one was stopping to help her, that was until I saw the Doctor come into view. Both Amy and I looked around the TARDIS and then to one another before we both let out a laugh, how could we not realise that the Doctor had left?

Amy was almost giddy with excitement and wonder as she rushed outside in her nightgown. I watched from the monitor as the Doctor approaches her with the same level of enthusiasm.

"I'm in the future. Like hundreds of years in the future." She said exasperatedly before it dawned on her, "I've been dead for centuries."
"Oh, lovely. You're a cheery one. Never mind dead, look at this place. Isn't it wrong?"

They both glanced around the cityscape, nothing seeming to be out of place,
"What's wrong?"
"Come on, use your eyes. Notice everything. What's wrong with this picture?"
"Is it the bicycles? It's a bit unusual on a spaceship, bicycles."

"Says the girl in the nightie."
"Oh my God, I'm in my nightie." Talk about mortifying.
"Now, come on, look around you. Actually look. Life on a giant starship. Back to basics. Bicycles, washing lines, wind-up street lamps. But look closer. Secrets and shadows, lives led in fear. Society bent out of shape, on the brink of collapse. A police state. Excuse me." The Doctor takes a glass of water from the table and hurriedly places it on the floor, examining it and ignoring the man whose water it was.

He stands up and returns the glass sheepishly, "Sorry. Checking all the water in this area. There's an escaped fish. Where was I?" Escaped fish was the best excuse he could come up with?

"Why did you just do that with the water?"
"Don't know. I think a lot. It's hard to keep track. Now, the police state. Do you see it yet?"
"Where?"
"There." He points to the crying girl, bfore looking around hurriedly and back toward Amy, he points at her then himself as if counting before realising, "Wait, where's Willow?"

I chuckle from the control centre as I walk towards the door of the TARDIS, I swing the doors open just as The Doctor goes to open the doors.

"What are you doing in here? When there is a whole country to explore out there." I laughed at the Doctor before looking back towards the console and then back toward him. Something within me told me to stay inside the TARDIS, it was eerie.

"I um, I'm not feeling well after fainting. I think I might just stay put if that's okay?"

The Time Lord looks at me as if I were a puzzle in need of solving, a puzzle with a few pieces missing.

"Do you do that often?"

"What?"

"Faint?"

"Yeah she does." Amy interjects herself, "It's almost harder to keep her awake than to get her to sleep." She laughs. The man nods slowly, squinting his eyes in thought.

"I'll be fine in here, I just think I need to sit for a while, you two can go explore, I won't want to stop you."

"Are you sure?"

I turn the man around slowly and give him a little push with a laugh, "Yes of course, now Go, Amy wants to go see her first country on a spaceship." I wink at the Ginger as they both give me small smiles and start heading off toward the little girl. I close the TARDIS door and go back to the console. I run my hand over its beautiful system feeling her hum and hiss underneath me.

She really is the most beautiful machine in the universe.

Suddenly she lurched, as if ready to take off. The cloister bell was ringing and I hadn't ever touched the controls. Was she flying herself? But perhaps more importantly, where was she taking me thats so important that the Doctor couldn't come too?

~~~

DUN DUN DUNNNN

It's been like three months, damn time flies quickly, anyway I just felt like writing within the realm of Doctor Who so here we are!!!

Feel free to comment, I live for other people opinions!

Also fyi I just could not bring myself to write a proper 'Beast below' episode because not going to lie, I've read so much DW fan fiction that Im sick of this episode so much so don't hate me :). There will still be a little bit of this episode but mainly it will be a little ✨ self discovery journey ✨

ANY HOO, THANKS AND GOOD DAY,

THE AUTHOR XX