Singapore -- Open
Wherever you were a moment before, your next step finds you in the midst of a well-manicured garden that descends in wide terraces down towards the sea. Though the darkened sky suggests it's well into the evening, the climate is tropical and warm, even into the earliest hours of the morning. Fortunately, ocean breezes prevent the heat from being
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In his encompassing relief to see her, the Doctor entirely forgets about his mulish refusal to call her by her preferred sobriquet, and in a flurry of patchwork coattails and hastily applied disapproval, he's striding across the courtyard to the rail where she's stationed.
'Days!' he's muttering under his breath, 'Days I've been looking for you, you wayward, foolhardy girl. And I suppose you've been adventuring all over the place in my absence- this is the Land of Fiction, you know, the rules you're accustomed to simply don't apply here! Do you even know? Do you have the slightest notion where you are? How dangerous it is? I have been here before, and my companions and I barely managed to escape; divide and conquer, that's how this place works.'
The subvocal muttering, at some point, has turned into a full-blown tirade, and when he finally runs himself silent, he's breathing rather heavily. He'd never say as much, of course, but it's a clear indicator of how very much he'd been worried about Charlotte, over the course of the time he's spent wandering around the Land of Fiction since that horribly familiar white mist had invaded his TARDIS and dissolved her around him, leaving him here. Because he had been worried, absurdly. It's not as if he's never been separated from companions before, and in regenerations far more prone to worry than this one. The first time he'd found himself in the Land of Fiction, in his second body, he'd fretted and fussed over finding Jamie and Zoe, but he hadn't been particularly fearful over the state he'd find them in when he did. Charlotte is perfectly capable of taking care of himself, just as they had been then, but all the same, he'd found himself unaccountably panicked.
He harrumphs, adjusting his cravat fussily. 'Honestly, I shouldn't have thought a girl like yourself would be quite so difficult to find.'
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She doesn't waste any time dashing to close the distance between them and throwing her arms around him. He's saying things, of course, and probably rather important things (at least to him), but she's entirely too overjoyed to see him to do anything else.
But some of his tirade has registered, at least, because once he's wound down she responds, voice soft, tears unbidden streaking down her cheeks.
"I just... I just was suddenly here. You and the TARDIS were nowhere to be found. I looked and looked--"
She cuts off abruptly, pulling away from him, a wary look on her face.
"How do I know that you're not some fiction, like everything else here? Just what I want to see?"
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Or, at least, that's the impression he gets until she pulls back, cheeks shining with tear tracks and expression untrusting. He's actually injured for a moment that she could think someone like him could ever be replicated by mere fiction (it's that, of course, and not the fact that she doesn't trust him; he doesn't trust her, after all), and he blinks at her for a moment, at a loss.
'Charley...' His voice is soft, the second syllable of her name drawn out in a descending murmur, the injured, sympathetic tone of someone who doesn't quite know how to do comfort correctly. 'As if I could ever be-' he laughs a little lamely, 'Of course I'm real! I- do you think they could really recreate me as fiction? If you don't believe me... ah, do you have anything sharp on you? A brooch, a pin?'
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She trails off, still wary, but there's something in his voice that's far too genuine to be a fairy tale. She fingers the brooch at her throat nervously, but says nothing more.
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'There!' It takes him half a second to realise that he might need to elaborate somewhat. 'Give me a poke with that. If indeed I am a creation of the Land of Fiction and its Master, I'll bleed finest India ink all over your frock. If all is as it should be...'
He trails off, for once seeing the value of brevity. Charlotte will see for herself that he's quite as real as she is, and this particular conversational detour will have no further use.
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She starts but doesn't quite manage to finish. She can't, she was going to say that she can't. But she's done rather more when the situation called for it, hasn't she? More tears, and less cheerful ones, come to her eyes at the thought. She reaches out, tentatively, to take his hand. It's cool to the touch and she feels the familiar staccato beat of his pulse as her fingertips trail over his wrist.
"Perhaps I'd rather just believe you."
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What he's absolutely not expecting is a fresh wave of tears, and something... well, something behind her eyes. Some memory or another, lurking unforgotten, despite her seeming lack of a past. His brows draw together, and awkwardly, he puts a hand on her shoulder, squeezing gently.
'I'm not about to force you to do anything you don't want to, but it was you who wanted proof of my identity. That is the easiest, and certainly the most irrevocable method I had on hand.'
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"I-- Of course. Of course not."
She nearly manages a cheerful tone by the end of that -- an attempt to convince herself all is well insomuch as anything else. With utmost care, she reaches out and pricks the tip of one of his fingers with the pin of her brooch. She studies the tiny bead of red blood for a moment before darting her eyes up to meet his.
"Though really... reason I know this to be a sign of reality is that you've told me so."
But her smile is now a bit more genuine, her tone more teasing than serious.
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Whatever the cause of her sudden, strange sadness, she seems to have put it behind her now, or at least made a gallant effort at doing so, and he responds in kind. Which is to say, he gives her a stern look that, much like Charley's serious tone, is mostly entirely disingenuous. 'And what, pray, would you have me do to prove myself? Fetch you the golden fleece of Colchis, the head of Medusa? Or perhaps a quest of less mythological proportions might be in order.'
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"And here I thought you were supposed to be the one with all the answers."
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'And here I am! With most, if not all, the answers. At least, if the answers you're looking for are ones related to how to get out of the Land of Fiction.'
Which is something he's keen to do. As intriguing as he finds the concept of the Land, he'd rather not spend any more time here than he absolutely has to. There is, after all, a real world out there in need of his attention. Although, it occurs to him, he probably ought to ask Charlotte before he goes charging off.
'Unless you... wanted to stay in Singapore for the time being, of course. I wasn't aware that the Land of Fiction had a Singapore, last I was here. Singapore... circa 1930, I'd hazard? Early 1930's, certainly. But then, I suppose, the stuff this place is made of is infinitely mutable.'
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But her voice is distant as Charley turns to look over the scene, a perfectly set Singapore New Years'. A burst of fireworks overhead bathe everyone in a blue light, giving the world a pale, ghostly hue. For a moment, it's all shades and spectres, and Charley shuts her eyes tightly against this vision of the past. When she opens them, the world around her is normal once more, in the dim light of the paper lanterns. She tilts her head to peer up at the Doctor.
"I think I've had rather enough of Singapore for one lifetime," she says, firmly.
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Still, he's not out to provoke her into an argument, not when he's just found her, so he doesn't dwell on the subject.
'The Land of Fiction,' he announces, 'is ruled over by a Master-- the Master of the Land of Fiction, the man responsible for bringing characters and creations to life here. Just as last time, I can only presume he's the one responsible for that particular stunt with the TARDIS, so the way to get back to the real world is to find him. Find the Master, and the past shall unfold before us as weary travellers back to the hearth and glowing windows of home. A quest! How very apt.'
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Quietly, she wonders if this is just where the world presumed she belonged, and being stuck in one place (much less this memory-ridden setting) isn't an idea she cares for. She looks up at the Doctor, her expression very near a pout.
"A quest? That sounds appropriately dramatic, at least."
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