Doctor Who (2005)/Fallen London crossover: The Sweetville Match Factory
Author: 
merryghoul
Title: The Sweetville Match Factory
Rating: Mature
Word Count: 4865
Prompt/Chosen character: Winifred Gillyflower
Notes/Warnings: Fusion with Fallen London, and a rewrite of “The Crimson Horror.” Fic contains graphic violence (more in line with Fallen London canon) as well as the canonical abuse seen in “The Crimson Horror.”
Summary: A man in an unusual hue and a secret in his eye has turned up dead for good in Benthic College. Discover what has befallen this man, as well as the secrets behind a mysterious factory in Spite.
Link: Dreamwidth | AO3
Complete list of characters: Player character (Fallen London), Winifred Gillyflower, Ada Gillyflower, Mr Thursday, Eleventh Doctor, Clara Oswald
Disclaimer: I don’t usually do disclaimers, but I do read the fine print when it comes to Fallen London, and I like to add this statement to my FL-related work: “Fallen London is © 2018 and ™ Failbetter Games Limited: www.fallenlondon.com. This is an unofficial fan work.”
And, of course, I don’t own Doctor Who either-all rights belong to the original creators of various things within that universe.
But I came up with everything else.
The Implacable Detective, for once, shows up at your doorstep with an envelope. Maybe you’ve run into her before and acquired a business card from her. Maybe you campaigned for her in the Election of 1895. Maybe this is your first time meeting her. But she’s heard of you.
“I have a case to pass on to you,” she says. “I have to attend another case. But for a finder’s fee of ten Appalling Secrets, I’ll leave you a set of photographs I’ve just recently acquired. They’re said to belong to someone who has recently died, and it appears his death is permanent.” You know death is not always permanent in the Neath, so you know this is an unusual case indeed.
You pay the Implacable Detective the ten Appalling Secrets. She wishes you luck before she’s on her way.
You open up the envelope. Inside are photographs of the dead person, identified on the photographs as “Edmund Thursday.” Well, actually, it’s his eye. The person who photographed this knows about optography, a science regularly debunked in several of the Neath’s newspapers. You decide to view the photographs anyway. There is a reason why the Implacable Detective gave you these photographs.
In the photographs, you notice the skin around the dead man’s eye doesn’t look a human colour. It’s also glowing, as if something was radiating under the dead man’s skin. And, most strikingly of all, there’s an image of a man reflected in the eye. There is also a business card, but it’s not the Implacable Detective’s. It’s from a man calling himself “Mr Thursday.” He might be Edmund’s brother. You must talk to him! You go to Spite to find his small home there.
Mr Thursday offers you ruby tea. You accept, satisfied it’s not contaminated with a lethal poison or a eye-swallowing spider. “Thank you for agreeing to this meeting,” he says to you. “I'm told you are recommended by the Implacable Detective to investigate this matter. I heard about his death through a Constable on Ladybones Road. I managed to go to Concord Square to bribe this Constable before they sent Edmund’s body to the University. It was there that I was able to take photographs of my brother’s eyes and have his body sent to Benthic College.”
You interrupt Mr Thursday by asking about his interest in optography. “I find Künhe’s work fascinating,” he tells you. “I do believe rhodopsin can be used to solve crimes one day. But what was on my brother’s eyes...I honestly don’t think that was rhodopsin. It had to be something else. That image of the man was clear in my photograph. Usually optography doesn’t present clear images on photographs like that. I suspect it’s a chemical he was dunked in that produced the image. Benthic College has a vested interest in trying to discover what caused my brother’s death. They were all too happy to take his body off my hands.
“My brother was a reporter for a newspaper on Doubt Street,” Mr Thursday continues. “Did investigative work with a woman named Effie. They were investigating the Sweetville Match Factory. It’s recently opened up in Spite. I don’t know much about it; I apologise. There have been quite a few of these deaths from Sweetville, actually. They must be forgotten souls in London, with no family members that are easy to track down. No wonder who has been murdering these people have gotten away with it. The Constables recover most of the bodies from Sweetville and then bury them somewhere, which is odd. There obviously aren’t burial plots in the Neath. Maybe they live in an isolated Drownie colony at zee. Maybe Hell takes them at the Brass Embassy. I don’t know. They wouldn’t tell me anything further about the bodies. I only know I don’t want to end up like my brother.
“And the man in my brother’s eye? I’ve never seen him before. I don’t know if he murdered my brother or not. Maybe my leads will help you.”
You have your leads: the headquarters of the Constables in Concord Square or Benthic College. You elect to go to Benthic first because you don’t want to miss Edmund’s body before it’s turned into something else. Whether it’s because you used to teach at the college or you’ve elected to give the college a generous Endowment towards a Fellowship in Benthic College, you’re welcomed to the University with open arms.
At an observation room in Benthic, you see Edmund’s body stretched out on a table. You notice that his skin is a glowing crimson color and that his face is in a pained, horrified position. You look into Edmund’s eyes and see the face of the man Edmund might have seen before he died. “We’ve tested all the poisons of the Neath to discover what caused Edmund’s death,” a Inquisitive Research Assistant tells you. “We’ve tried Abominable Salts, poisoned venison, and even Cantigaster’s Poison. Nothing we tried lead to how this man turned crimson after his death, or how he managed to capture an image of a man in his eye. But isn’t Edmund’s body fascinating?” If anything, the Inquisitive Research Assistant confirmed Mr Thursday’s hypothesis that what turned Edmund crimson also captured an image of the mysterious man in Edmund’s eye.
You then head to Ladybones Road and Concord Square. You bribe a Constable with a Bottle of Broken Giant 1844, one of the better vintages of the Neath. They tell you one of their own goes through a special entrance into Mrs Plenty’s Carnival. This Constable, along with a dead body from Sweetville, goes through Heart’s Mirror. On the other side the Constable dumps the body in the river before returning to London. The practice was modelled after another one of their own hid bodies along this river. That Constable hasn’t returned to London, and the Constable is certain Effie’s body is lost. There would be no way for you to find Effie’s body even if you looked for her after your death. The Constable feels bad for you and gives you a few Cryptic Clues to where the Sweetville Match Factory might be located in Spite, based on some police reports he’s read. You thank the Constable, and, after making sure you have Kifers, you head to Sweetville.
You know you’ve encountered the Sweetville Match Factory when you see a poster near the building reading “TONIGHT, CHAPEL of the SWEETVILLE MATCH FACTORY. In PERSON. Mrs Winifred Gillyflower on the Present Moral DECAY of London.” You enter Sweetville and are ushered into an auditorium.
You assume the person speaking is Mrs Gillyflower. She is standing by a screen. Her speech is about how the people of London have been corrupted by drink, prisoner’s honey, and devils. She sounds no different, than, say, the Dauntless Temperance Campaigner.
Mrs Gillyflower reveals the screen. Behind it is a scarred, blind young woman with brilliant red hair. Mrs Gillyflower introduces the woman as her daughter and claims she was blinded and disfigured by Cantigaster’s Poison by her father. The daughter walks around the stage with a cane. There’s one other person you have heard of, and may know, that’s also been crippled by Cantigaster’s Poison. But the Last Constable or the Cheery Man would’ve heard of the Gillyflowers by now, and they certainly would have told you about them.
Mrs Gillyflower claims there is a place across the Zee that is also called Sweetville. There, after a long journey and slumber, those who zail with Mrs Gillyflower will be spared the evils of London as London falls to Daniel's Dragon. You know this not to be true, not after seeing Edmund’s corpse and hearing about the whereabouts of Effie.
After the speech, Mrs Gillyflower starts playing on an organ a hymn not heard often in the Neath, “And did those feet in ancient time,” with a noticeable substitution of the island Mrs Gillyflower plans to zail to instead of anywhere on the Surface.
To “work” in the Sweetville Match Factory, and to become a member of the Sweetville...oh, you wouldn’t call it a “community.” More like a group of worker bees. Anyway, you have to sign up later in another room. There, you meet Mrs Gillyflower. “You wish to join us, my dear?” she asks you. You agree. “Oh, yes, dear. You'll do very nicely.”
You are loitering in the sign up room when you notice a stairwell. No one’s watching it, and you certainly aren’t aiming to be a part of Sweetville. You ascend the stairs.
The floor you find yourself on reminds you of an asylum. You hear chains rattling from a distance. You walk towards the door.
You peer into a panel at the bottom of the door. Behind it is the man who was in Edmund’s eye! And he obviously couldn’t have killed Edmund or Effie, seeing that he’s in chains.
The man reaches out to you from the panel. You get it, he’s alive, he’s alive. You have no idea why this man is alive, but Edmund and Effie aren’t. You have a feeling you should save him. He could prove useful against the Gillyflowers. You use your Intricate Kifers to free the man from his cell and his chains. To your surprise, even as he’s groaning, he grabs your hand and takes you off of the prison floor.
Mrs Gillyflower’s daughter starts to appear as she’s riding the lift to the prison floor. She does not seem to notice the red-skinned man and you as you leave the prison floor and she walks off the lift.
You and the red-skinned man move past windows. You see brief glimpses of boiling red liquid, of people screaming as their bodies are lowered into the liquid.
The red-skinned man claws at another door. You use your Intricate Kifers again so the red-skinned man can get into whatever’s behind the door. As the man enters the door, you see some Sweetville Match Factory employees walk towards you. You decide against charming them or attempting to punch them, fearing you might meet your end in one of those vats, and especially with an incapacitated ally. You duck out of sight as the employees walk past.
A strange buzzing noise and a green light can be seen and heard behind the door. You have no idea what’s causing these things to occur. After a few moments, the man re-emerges from the door looking human and fully clothed, as if he never was dipped in a Sweetville vat at all.
The man slides into the shadows with you. He says he is the Doctor. You ask if he is one of the Neath’s Doctors, some of the few that refuse to participate in the schemes of the Bazaar. He gives you a puzzled look. He says he’s not from London and, much like some of the other creatures in the Neath, he is an alien from space from a planet that sounds like a Scottish town on the Surface. (That Scottish town probably doesn’t exist on the Surface.) The device that rejuvenated his skin is called a “sonic screwdriver.” This puzzles you. Why on earth would you need sound to move screws?
The Doctor arrived in London in his spaceship, a device he calls the TARDIS. Supposedly it’s “bigger on the outside.” He came with a companion, Clara. The Doctor reassures you she’s human, and she’s not that particular someone you may have heard of from a work colleague who thought they were looking for a diamond the size of a cow.
The Doctor and his companion Clara arrived in the Neath by accident, as he was trying to get somewhere else. It was around the time the Constables started investigating the bodies coming out of the Sweetville Match Factory. Edmund and Effie were trying to attract the attention of the Constables, as Edmund and Effie had sensed something wrong with the Sweetville Match Factory long before the Doctor and Clara arrived in London. People would come in for sermons held by Mrs Gillyflower, preaching about the horrors of her daughter, Ada’s, disfigurement, and they’d never be seen again. And the Constables seemed not to care, believing those that went into the Sweetville Match Factory would turn back up in the Neath. Death is not permanent in the Neath, after all.
With the help of the Doctor and Clara, Edmund and Effie found some red-coloured bodies in a wagon belonging to the Constables. This shocked the Doctor and Clara, but not Edmund and Effie, who were used to the corruption of the Constables. The discovery of the wagon forced other Constables and Benthic College to investigate the bodies.
The case wasn’t closed yet. Edmund learned from various people at Benthic that Mrs Gillyflower was a brilliant chemist and engineer at Benthic when it first opened in the Neath. After she graduated, she disappeared from London. The assumption was she had a Zubmarine commissioned from Wolfstack Docks and that she left London for several years to zail the zees. No one knows when exactly she reappeared in London, and with a match factory to boot.
The Doctor, Clara, and Edmund visited one of the bodies after it was transported to Benthic. An image of Winifred appeared in one of the body’s eyes. The Doctor came up with the same conclusion Mr Thursday did: that the chemical Winifred was dunking her victims in was causing some sort of image capture in their eyes. The Doctor, however, was able to analyse the poison and determine it was some sort of venom. And you know this venom isn’t Cantigaster’s Poison. “Mrs Gillyflower convinces her ‘Pilgrims’ that they need to be preserved for The Day of Daniel's Dragon. Uh...what is ‘The Day of Daniel's Dragon?’” You tell him you have no clue about what exactly Daniel’s Dragon is.
Back to the Doctor’s explanation of Winifred’s venom. He says it is organic, but he doesn’t know what creature caused the poison. Not only is the venom alien to your new alien friend, it’s alien to everyone in the Neath. This can’t be good.
And back to the Doctor and his companions, days ago. The four of them decided to investigate the Sweetville Match Factory. You tell the Doctor you know the four of them split up, and that Effie was also murdered on the orders of Winifred. “She didn’t stand a chance,” he tells you. “I’m always screwing up the lives of other people.” You don’t want to know what he means there, but you think it’s something ominous.
The Doctor and Clara, posing as a married couple, met Winifred before one of her sermons. Clara met Winifred and asked her why the Sweetville Match Factory wasn’t named after herself. Winifred replied that the Factory was named after a “Mr Sweet,” and this Mr Sweet was her “silent partner.”
Winifred opened a door. The Doctor and Clara walked in the door. The last thing they saw together was a couple having tea under a large bell jar, a sign reading “Your NEW LIFE at the SWEETVILLE MATCH FACTORY” beside said bell jar. She knew, unlike you, that they were spies.
Winifred dunked the Doctor with others in her venom, but he survived because his body is not like a human’s. He was supposed to be put on one of the Constables’ wagons, probably to disappear into the Stolen River, but Ada heard the Doctor grunting under a pile of the venom-coated bodies. The Doctor reached out for Ada, not knowing who she was. In return, Ada locked the Doctor up, intending to keep him as her pet. Ada did reveal something to the Doctor as she chained him up-that only Winifred was allowed to talk to this Mr Sweet. “No one knows who Mr Sweet is except Winifred. That’s just brilliant,” he tells you with a sarcastic intonation.
The Doctor last saw Edmund as he was dying from the venom. The Doctor tried to help Edmund, but it was too late. The venom kills and “preserves” its victims quickly. The Doctor was going to spend the rest of his life in his cell, not knowing Clara’s fate, until you came along.
“We’ve got to go before Mrs Gillyflower finds us,” the Doctor tells you. You ask about his Clara. “Yes, Clara! Got to find Clara.” You don’t ask why he momentarily forgot about Clara.
The Doctor describes Clara for you-petite woman, brown hair, a bonnet on her head. The two of you run down the halls of Sweetville, looking into doors and windows for Clara. During your search, you see people loading what appears to be a boat with crates of wine. You’ve never seen anyone in the Neath stock wine that looks like what’s going in this boat. And this boat’s odd, too-it looks nothing like the boats you see at Wolfstack Docks. You can’t dwell on this odd sight. You have to help the Doctor find Clara, so you move on.
The Doctor finds Clara near the same room where he first discovered the bell jar room. You grab a chair that’s in the room but outside the bell jar the Doctor gestures to and shatter the glass.
The shattering of the bell jar and the rescue of Clara attracts the attention of Winifred’s unpreserved Pilgrims. They swarm the room and block your way out. While the Doctor walks with Clara while she’s in her catatonic state, you thrash several Pilgrims around until there isn’t a conscious Pilgrim to block your exit.
You both take Clara back to the room the Doctor used his sonic screwdriver to restore his skin. The Doctor tells you she’s also been affected by Winifred’s venom, but enough to keep her conscious, but not able to move. He puts Clara in the room and zaps it with that blasted alien device. Soon after, you hear a new voice: “Doctor?” This new voice must be Clara’s voice.
Clara steps out of the room. The Doctor and you update her on what’s happened so far and what you know, while hiding from Winifred’s Pilgrims. In return, Clara says “I think I know who Mr Sweet is. Actually, he’s a what.”
In Clara’s catatonic state, she witnessed something on Winifred’s breast. She says it looks like a cooked European lobster, something you’ve only seen on some postcards from the Surface. But this lobster being had a rounded head and hollow-looking eyes. Clara says this thing is Mr Sweet.
The Doctor gasps. “That’s not a lobster, Clara. That’s a red leech. Thought they all died out billions of years ago on Earth. Then again, this isn’t the Earth we know. You can’t safely land on the surface. There might be red leeches crawling all over this place.” So not only are they not from London, they’re not from this Earth. How many worlds are there in space, anyway?
“The red leech,” the Doctor continues. “Lived around the time of the Silurians. Lizard-humans from our world,” the Doctor explains to you. “They got into their water supply and poisoned their water. Vastra told me that when I visited her one time.” (You assume Vastra is one of these Silurians.)
It hits you-the liquid in the bottles is the red leech venom Winifred mass-produced to immobilize and kill several citizens in London. It’s the same stuff that stunned Clara and turned the Doctor into an incoherent monster. Somehow Winifred is planning on killing off, at the very least, all of London for good with this venom. Exactly how you don’t know, but you know you must stop her before she sets out to destroy London. There is one thing bothering you, though-what loyalty does Winifred have to Mr Sweet? You leave that question unanswered as you tell the Doctor and Clara your findings.
Clara confirms your findings. She takes the Doctor and you to a place she saw when she was immobilized-a large room, where an airship is being loaded with bottles of red leech venom. You hide in shadows, away from the airship Pilgrims.
You, along with the Doctor and Clara, hear crying nearby. The three of you trace the crying to where the Doctor was imprisoned. There, near the Doctor’s old room, is Ada. The Doctor stoops down so she can sense him. You thought Ada was crying over the loss of the pet she didn’t bother to understand or release under her captivity. She’s not. In fact, the Doctor forgives Ada and asks why she’s crying. Ada has learned that she is not to be chosen to go to that made-up island at zee with the rest of the Pilgrims. “Do you know about Mr Sweet?” the Doctor asks her. Ada doesn’t know anything about him. It’s fair to say Ada doesn’t know anything about Winifred’s plans for London. The Doctor helps Ada up. Ada grabs her cane and comes along with Clara and you.
The Doctor asks Ada about the whereabouts of her mother. “I believe she is returning to the chapel,” Ada says. That is where you all go, back to the chapel.
Winifred walks towards all of you as you arrive in the chapel. “We meet again. Would you like tea? Chocolates? Glasses of Strangling Willow Absinthe?”
“No, thanks,” the Doctor says. “We've had a skinful already, as you might say.”
Winifred laughs. “Very funny.”
“We know about Mr Sweet,” the Doctor continues. “We know what you’re doing with the venom. And we’re going to stop you.”
“I'm afraid Mr Sweet and I cannot allow that,” Winifred says, before unveiling Mr Sweet feeding on Winifred’s breast. Mr Sweet’s hollow eyes stare at you. Ada is lucky she can’t see him.
“Mr Sweet grew fat off of the excesses from Mutton Island,” Winifred continues as Mr Sweet returns to feeding on Winifred’s breast. “I found him during one of the Fruits of the Zee festivals. Mr Sweet’s needs are simple. In return, he gives me his nectar.”
The Doctor gives Winifred a lecture on the dangers of red leech venom. “I know, young man. Why else am I doing this? If we cannot go back to the Surface, I’d rather take everyone with me to the death we all deserve. We were never meant to live forever, but the Masters took that away from us. When the venom touches all of London, then, at least, we will find peace.”
Before anyone can catch her, Winifred makes her way back to the organ with Mr Sweet. Winifred pulls a lever; behind it is a control panel. Winifred presses several buttons. “Enough chatter. It’s almost time to rain down Mr Sweet's beneficence onto all of London, and maybe the Neath itself.”
Instead of attempting to stop the airship from launching over the Neath, the Doctor grabs a chair from somewhere in the chapel. “Tell us about Ada, Mrs Gillyflower.“
Winifred is baffled. “What?”
“Your daughter. You do remember your daughter? Tell us about your daughter.”
Yes, it’s a bid to distract Winifred, but it works. In return, you all learn Winifred blinded Ada, using her as a test subject to develop her particular strain of red leech venom. And all to create an anti-venom...for herself! If Winifred succeeds, the only people in London, at least, would be the Doctor and herself. So much for her speech on a final death for all.
Ada is understandably angry. She gets into an argument with Winifred. The argument turns violent, with Ada striking Winifred with her cane. Meanwhile, defying at least the logic you’ve seen in the Neath, Clara throws a chair at the airship controls. The Doctor strengthens its impact by aiming his sonic screwdriver at the chair. The airship controls are all but functional now.
In the midst of all this chaos, you grab a chair. You have a feeling you’ll need it soon. Winifred is up on her feet as Ada is sobbing. It seems like Winifred is apologizing to Ada...but you know she’d never apologize to Ada. Winifred pulls out a Ratwork Derringer to Ada’s head. “Please, Mama, I don’t want to go back down the river right now.” You have a feeling Winifred may have intentionally killed Ada multiple times. You can imagine how traumatic it would be to be killed over and over, and by your mother to boot. But you know the Doctor and Clara don’t know about death in the Neath well, and they’re used to total fatalities from wherever they both come from. Winifred walks out of the chapel with Ada and Mr Sweet, locking the door.
This was the moment you were anticipating using the chair for. You pick up the chair and shatter the door. All of you run through and split up, hoping to stop any sort of failsafe Winifred has with her plan.
You find Winifred and Ada hovering close to one of her red venom vats in the factory. She’s singing a hymn you don’t recognize. Something about labour and Pilgrims. The gun’s still next to Ada’s head. Winifred tries to shoot at you, but the Ratwork Derringer jams. It’s enough for Winifred to lose her balance. She nearly takes Ada and Mr Sweet with her as she falls onto the side of a vat. Her head cleanly separates from her body. She’s really most sincerely dead.
Mr Sweet uses his claws to get back onto the platform. You help Ada up. The first thing she does, after waiting long enough to hear Mr Sweet crawling on the platform, is smash Mr Sweet with her cane, killing him. “I’m sorry, Mama,” she says, “but enough is enough.”
Before Clara and the Doctor find Ada and you, you consider corralling the rest of the Pilgrims and have them sent to New Newgate Prison. Instead, you decide the safest thing is to burn the factory down. If the Pilgrims are in small pieces, she’ll never get her chance to attempt to destroy London. You tell your plan to Ada. “Innocent people will be killed. It’s for the best. But we should find the Doctor and Clara. They’re not from here, and they don’t deserve to die here.”
Ada and you go down to the factory floor and knock over candles. You find some dynamite and start a small (at least by Revolutionary standards) explosion. It’s enough to start building a fire. As the fire builds, the Doctor and Clara find you. He says he’s found his spaceship, and he wants to save Ada, Winifred, and you. You tell the Doctor your lie; he believes it.
The Doctor grabs Ada’s hand. Clara and you follow the Doctor around a few corners. He insists you run. The four of you reach a blue box, supposedly for police in the dimension the Doctor comes from, and enter it.
There’s a massive control panel in this box. You assume it’s the Doctor’s spaceship. The Doctor presses some controls on the panel. A strange noise comes from the box. You feel yourself flying a bit before the box stops.
Moments later, you step out of the box. All of you are outside the Sweetville Match Factory. You see people running and scrambling to put the fire out.
“Right,” the Doctor says, “I’ve got to drop you two off before Clara and I are off to London. Er, um, our London.” He turns to Clara. “We were headed for London, weren’t we?”
“Was there any particular reason?”
“No. No. Just thought you wanted to go to our London. You’re the boss.”
Clara gives the Doctor a skeptical look, raising her eyebrows. “Am I?”
The Doctor turns to Ada and you. “Now, Ada, I’d love to stay and help your London fight that fire near us, but...”
“You have places to go, dear monster. Things to do. I’ll be fine. I was fortunate to learn of the people of my London before Mama kept me locked up inside her factory. What I’ve learned is that several of us in our city have an Ambition.” Ada grabs your hand and turns to you. “I’m sure you have an Ambition.” She turns back to the Doctor. “And now I’m going to seek mine.”
“Good luck, Ada.” The Doctor also wishes you luck, addressing you by your preferred title. “You two will be just splendid.”
Clara and the Doctor walk back to their box and leave your London.
There are things you must do before you can close your case. You have to write your Case Notes and have them replicated for the Constables, the red venom scholars at Benthic College, the Implacable Detective, and Mr Thursday. You’ll be writing for days. But at least you have a new companion after all the hell you’ve been through.
***
You’ve gained 1 x The Chemist’s Daughter
The Chemist’s Daughter
Call her Ada. Nothing can erase the years of torment she suffered at her mother’s hand. But she’s ambitious, bright, and her cane packs a punch. Dangerous +8, Shadowy +6, Bizarre +1.
This entry was originally posted at https://merryghoul.dreamwidth.org/373067.html. Comments on either site are fine.
merryghoul
Title: The Sweetville Match Factory
Rating: Mature
Word Count: 4865
Prompt/Chosen character: Winifred Gillyflower
Notes/Warnings: Fusion with Fallen London, and a rewrite of “The Crimson Horror.” Fic contains graphic violence (more in line with Fallen London canon) as well as the canonical abuse seen in “The Crimson Horror.”
Summary: A man in an unusual hue and a secret in his eye has turned up dead for good in Benthic College. Discover what has befallen this man, as well as the secrets behind a mysterious factory in Spite.
Link: Dreamwidth | AO3
Complete list of characters: Player character (Fallen London), Winifred Gillyflower, Ada Gillyflower, Mr Thursday, Eleventh Doctor, Clara Oswald
Disclaimer: I don’t usually do disclaimers, but I do read the fine print when it comes to Fallen London, and I like to add this statement to my FL-related work: “Fallen London is © 2018 and ™ Failbetter Games Limited: www.fallenlondon.com. This is an unofficial fan work.”
And, of course, I don’t own Doctor Who either-all rights belong to the original creators of various things within that universe.
But I came up with everything else.
The Implacable Detective, for once, shows up at your doorstep with an envelope. Maybe you’ve run into her before and acquired a business card from her. Maybe you campaigned for her in the Election of 1895. Maybe this is your first time meeting her. But she’s heard of you.
“I have a case to pass on to you,” she says. “I have to attend another case. But for a finder’s fee of ten Appalling Secrets, I’ll leave you a set of photographs I’ve just recently acquired. They’re said to belong to someone who has recently died, and it appears his death is permanent.” You know death is not always permanent in the Neath, so you know this is an unusual case indeed.
You pay the Implacable Detective the ten Appalling Secrets. She wishes you luck before she’s on her way.
You open up the envelope. Inside are photographs of the dead person, identified on the photographs as “Edmund Thursday.” Well, actually, it’s his eye. The person who photographed this knows about optography, a science regularly debunked in several of the Neath’s newspapers. You decide to view the photographs anyway. There is a reason why the Implacable Detective gave you these photographs.
In the photographs, you notice the skin around the dead man’s eye doesn’t look a human colour. It’s also glowing, as if something was radiating under the dead man’s skin. And, most strikingly of all, there’s an image of a man reflected in the eye. There is also a business card, but it’s not the Implacable Detective’s. It’s from a man calling himself “Mr Thursday.” He might be Edmund’s brother. You must talk to him! You go to Spite to find his small home there.
Mr Thursday offers you ruby tea. You accept, satisfied it’s not contaminated with a lethal poison or a eye-swallowing spider. “Thank you for agreeing to this meeting,” he says to you. “I'm told you are recommended by the Implacable Detective to investigate this matter. I heard about his death through a Constable on Ladybones Road. I managed to go to Concord Square to bribe this Constable before they sent Edmund’s body to the University. It was there that I was able to take photographs of my brother’s eyes and have his body sent to Benthic College.”
You interrupt Mr Thursday by asking about his interest in optography. “I find Künhe’s work fascinating,” he tells you. “I do believe rhodopsin can be used to solve crimes one day. But what was on my brother’s eyes...I honestly don’t think that was rhodopsin. It had to be something else. That image of the man was clear in my photograph. Usually optography doesn’t present clear images on photographs like that. I suspect it’s a chemical he was dunked in that produced the image. Benthic College has a vested interest in trying to discover what caused my brother’s death. They were all too happy to take his body off my hands.
“My brother was a reporter for a newspaper on Doubt Street,” Mr Thursday continues. “Did investigative work with a woman named Effie. They were investigating the Sweetville Match Factory. It’s recently opened up in Spite. I don’t know much about it; I apologise. There have been quite a few of these deaths from Sweetville, actually. They must be forgotten souls in London, with no family members that are easy to track down. No wonder who has been murdering these people have gotten away with it. The Constables recover most of the bodies from Sweetville and then bury them somewhere, which is odd. There obviously aren’t burial plots in the Neath. Maybe they live in an isolated Drownie colony at zee. Maybe Hell takes them at the Brass Embassy. I don’t know. They wouldn’t tell me anything further about the bodies. I only know I don’t want to end up like my brother.
“And the man in my brother’s eye? I’ve never seen him before. I don’t know if he murdered my brother or not. Maybe my leads will help you.”
You have your leads: the headquarters of the Constables in Concord Square or Benthic College. You elect to go to Benthic first because you don’t want to miss Edmund’s body before it’s turned into something else. Whether it’s because you used to teach at the college or you’ve elected to give the college a generous Endowment towards a Fellowship in Benthic College, you’re welcomed to the University with open arms.
At an observation room in Benthic, you see Edmund’s body stretched out on a table. You notice that his skin is a glowing crimson color and that his face is in a pained, horrified position. You look into Edmund’s eyes and see the face of the man Edmund might have seen before he died. “We’ve tested all the poisons of the Neath to discover what caused Edmund’s death,” a Inquisitive Research Assistant tells you. “We’ve tried Abominable Salts, poisoned venison, and even Cantigaster’s Poison. Nothing we tried lead to how this man turned crimson after his death, or how he managed to capture an image of a man in his eye. But isn’t Edmund’s body fascinating?” If anything, the Inquisitive Research Assistant confirmed Mr Thursday’s hypothesis that what turned Edmund crimson also captured an image of the mysterious man in Edmund’s eye.
You then head to Ladybones Road and Concord Square. You bribe a Constable with a Bottle of Broken Giant 1844, one of the better vintages of the Neath. They tell you one of their own goes through a special entrance into Mrs Plenty’s Carnival. This Constable, along with a dead body from Sweetville, goes through Heart’s Mirror. On the other side the Constable dumps the body in the river before returning to London. The practice was modelled after another one of their own hid bodies along this river. That Constable hasn’t returned to London, and the Constable is certain Effie’s body is lost. There would be no way for you to find Effie’s body even if you looked for her after your death. The Constable feels bad for you and gives you a few Cryptic Clues to where the Sweetville Match Factory might be located in Spite, based on some police reports he’s read. You thank the Constable, and, after making sure you have Kifers, you head to Sweetville.
You know you’ve encountered the Sweetville Match Factory when you see a poster near the building reading “TONIGHT, CHAPEL of the SWEETVILLE MATCH FACTORY. In PERSON. Mrs Winifred Gillyflower on the Present Moral DECAY of London.” You enter Sweetville and are ushered into an auditorium.
You assume the person speaking is Mrs Gillyflower. She is standing by a screen. Her speech is about how the people of London have been corrupted by drink, prisoner’s honey, and devils. She sounds no different, than, say, the Dauntless Temperance Campaigner.
Mrs Gillyflower reveals the screen. Behind it is a scarred, blind young woman with brilliant red hair. Mrs Gillyflower introduces the woman as her daughter and claims she was blinded and disfigured by Cantigaster’s Poison by her father. The daughter walks around the stage with a cane. There’s one other person you have heard of, and may know, that’s also been crippled by Cantigaster’s Poison. But the Last Constable or the Cheery Man would’ve heard of the Gillyflowers by now, and they certainly would have told you about them.
Mrs Gillyflower claims there is a place across the Zee that is also called Sweetville. There, after a long journey and slumber, those who zail with Mrs Gillyflower will be spared the evils of London as London falls to Daniel's Dragon. You know this not to be true, not after seeing Edmund’s corpse and hearing about the whereabouts of Effie.
After the speech, Mrs Gillyflower starts playing on an organ a hymn not heard often in the Neath, “And did those feet in ancient time,” with a noticeable substitution of the island Mrs Gillyflower plans to zail to instead of anywhere on the Surface.
To “work” in the Sweetville Match Factory, and to become a member of the Sweetville...oh, you wouldn’t call it a “community.” More like a group of worker bees. Anyway, you have to sign up later in another room. There, you meet Mrs Gillyflower. “You wish to join us, my dear?” she asks you. You agree. “Oh, yes, dear. You'll do very nicely.”
You are loitering in the sign up room when you notice a stairwell. No one’s watching it, and you certainly aren’t aiming to be a part of Sweetville. You ascend the stairs.
The floor you find yourself on reminds you of an asylum. You hear chains rattling from a distance. You walk towards the door.
You peer into a panel at the bottom of the door. Behind it is the man who was in Edmund’s eye! And he obviously couldn’t have killed Edmund or Effie, seeing that he’s in chains.
The man reaches out to you from the panel. You get it, he’s alive, he’s alive. You have no idea why this man is alive, but Edmund and Effie aren’t. You have a feeling you should save him. He could prove useful against the Gillyflowers. You use your Intricate Kifers to free the man from his cell and his chains. To your surprise, even as he’s groaning, he grabs your hand and takes you off of the prison floor.
Mrs Gillyflower’s daughter starts to appear as she’s riding the lift to the prison floor. She does not seem to notice the red-skinned man and you as you leave the prison floor and she walks off the lift.
You and the red-skinned man move past windows. You see brief glimpses of boiling red liquid, of people screaming as their bodies are lowered into the liquid.
The red-skinned man claws at another door. You use your Intricate Kifers again so the red-skinned man can get into whatever’s behind the door. As the man enters the door, you see some Sweetville Match Factory employees walk towards you. You decide against charming them or attempting to punch them, fearing you might meet your end in one of those vats, and especially with an incapacitated ally. You duck out of sight as the employees walk past.
A strange buzzing noise and a green light can be seen and heard behind the door. You have no idea what’s causing these things to occur. After a few moments, the man re-emerges from the door looking human and fully clothed, as if he never was dipped in a Sweetville vat at all.
The man slides into the shadows with you. He says he is the Doctor. You ask if he is one of the Neath’s Doctors, some of the few that refuse to participate in the schemes of the Bazaar. He gives you a puzzled look. He says he’s not from London and, much like some of the other creatures in the Neath, he is an alien from space from a planet that sounds like a Scottish town on the Surface. (That Scottish town probably doesn’t exist on the Surface.) The device that rejuvenated his skin is called a “sonic screwdriver.” This puzzles you. Why on earth would you need sound to move screws?
The Doctor arrived in London in his spaceship, a device he calls the TARDIS. Supposedly it’s “bigger on the outside.” He came with a companion, Clara. The Doctor reassures you she’s human, and she’s not that particular someone you may have heard of from a work colleague who thought they were looking for a diamond the size of a cow.
The Doctor and his companion Clara arrived in the Neath by accident, as he was trying to get somewhere else. It was around the time the Constables started investigating the bodies coming out of the Sweetville Match Factory. Edmund and Effie were trying to attract the attention of the Constables, as Edmund and Effie had sensed something wrong with the Sweetville Match Factory long before the Doctor and Clara arrived in London. People would come in for sermons held by Mrs Gillyflower, preaching about the horrors of her daughter, Ada’s, disfigurement, and they’d never be seen again. And the Constables seemed not to care, believing those that went into the Sweetville Match Factory would turn back up in the Neath. Death is not permanent in the Neath, after all.
With the help of the Doctor and Clara, Edmund and Effie found some red-coloured bodies in a wagon belonging to the Constables. This shocked the Doctor and Clara, but not Edmund and Effie, who were used to the corruption of the Constables. The discovery of the wagon forced other Constables and Benthic College to investigate the bodies.
The case wasn’t closed yet. Edmund learned from various people at Benthic that Mrs Gillyflower was a brilliant chemist and engineer at Benthic when it first opened in the Neath. After she graduated, she disappeared from London. The assumption was she had a Zubmarine commissioned from Wolfstack Docks and that she left London for several years to zail the zees. No one knows when exactly she reappeared in London, and with a match factory to boot.
The Doctor, Clara, and Edmund visited one of the bodies after it was transported to Benthic. An image of Winifred appeared in one of the body’s eyes. The Doctor came up with the same conclusion Mr Thursday did: that the chemical Winifred was dunking her victims in was causing some sort of image capture in their eyes. The Doctor, however, was able to analyse the poison and determine it was some sort of venom. And you know this venom isn’t Cantigaster’s Poison. “Mrs Gillyflower convinces her ‘Pilgrims’ that they need to be preserved for The Day of Daniel's Dragon. Uh...what is ‘The Day of Daniel's Dragon?’” You tell him you have no clue about what exactly Daniel’s Dragon is.
Back to the Doctor’s explanation of Winifred’s venom. He says it is organic, but he doesn’t know what creature caused the poison. Not only is the venom alien to your new alien friend, it’s alien to everyone in the Neath. This can’t be good.
And back to the Doctor and his companions, days ago. The four of them decided to investigate the Sweetville Match Factory. You tell the Doctor you know the four of them split up, and that Effie was also murdered on the orders of Winifred. “She didn’t stand a chance,” he tells you. “I’m always screwing up the lives of other people.” You don’t want to know what he means there, but you think it’s something ominous.
The Doctor and Clara, posing as a married couple, met Winifred before one of her sermons. Clara met Winifred and asked her why the Sweetville Match Factory wasn’t named after herself. Winifred replied that the Factory was named after a “Mr Sweet,” and this Mr Sweet was her “silent partner.”
Winifred opened a door. The Doctor and Clara walked in the door. The last thing they saw together was a couple having tea under a large bell jar, a sign reading “Your NEW LIFE at the SWEETVILLE MATCH FACTORY” beside said bell jar. She knew, unlike you, that they were spies.
Winifred dunked the Doctor with others in her venom, but he survived because his body is not like a human’s. He was supposed to be put on one of the Constables’ wagons, probably to disappear into the Stolen River, but Ada heard the Doctor grunting under a pile of the venom-coated bodies. The Doctor reached out for Ada, not knowing who she was. In return, Ada locked the Doctor up, intending to keep him as her pet. Ada did reveal something to the Doctor as she chained him up-that only Winifred was allowed to talk to this Mr Sweet. “No one knows who Mr Sweet is except Winifred. That’s just brilliant,” he tells you with a sarcastic intonation.
The Doctor last saw Edmund as he was dying from the venom. The Doctor tried to help Edmund, but it was too late. The venom kills and “preserves” its victims quickly. The Doctor was going to spend the rest of his life in his cell, not knowing Clara’s fate, until you came along.
“We’ve got to go before Mrs Gillyflower finds us,” the Doctor tells you. You ask about his Clara. “Yes, Clara! Got to find Clara.” You don’t ask why he momentarily forgot about Clara.
The Doctor describes Clara for you-petite woman, brown hair, a bonnet on her head. The two of you run down the halls of Sweetville, looking into doors and windows for Clara. During your search, you see people loading what appears to be a boat with crates of wine. You’ve never seen anyone in the Neath stock wine that looks like what’s going in this boat. And this boat’s odd, too-it looks nothing like the boats you see at Wolfstack Docks. You can’t dwell on this odd sight. You have to help the Doctor find Clara, so you move on.
The Doctor finds Clara near the same room where he first discovered the bell jar room. You grab a chair that’s in the room but outside the bell jar the Doctor gestures to and shatter the glass.
The shattering of the bell jar and the rescue of Clara attracts the attention of Winifred’s unpreserved Pilgrims. They swarm the room and block your way out. While the Doctor walks with Clara while she’s in her catatonic state, you thrash several Pilgrims around until there isn’t a conscious Pilgrim to block your exit.
You both take Clara back to the room the Doctor used his sonic screwdriver to restore his skin. The Doctor tells you she’s also been affected by Winifred’s venom, but enough to keep her conscious, but not able to move. He puts Clara in the room and zaps it with that blasted alien device. Soon after, you hear a new voice: “Doctor?” This new voice must be Clara’s voice.
Clara steps out of the room. The Doctor and you update her on what’s happened so far and what you know, while hiding from Winifred’s Pilgrims. In return, Clara says “I think I know who Mr Sweet is. Actually, he’s a what.”
In Clara’s catatonic state, she witnessed something on Winifred’s breast. She says it looks like a cooked European lobster, something you’ve only seen on some postcards from the Surface. But this lobster being had a rounded head and hollow-looking eyes. Clara says this thing is Mr Sweet.
The Doctor gasps. “That’s not a lobster, Clara. That’s a red leech. Thought they all died out billions of years ago on Earth. Then again, this isn’t the Earth we know. You can’t safely land on the surface. There might be red leeches crawling all over this place.” So not only are they not from London, they’re not from this Earth. How many worlds are there in space, anyway?
“The red leech,” the Doctor continues. “Lived around the time of the Silurians. Lizard-humans from our world,” the Doctor explains to you. “They got into their water supply and poisoned their water. Vastra told me that when I visited her one time.” (You assume Vastra is one of these Silurians.)
It hits you-the liquid in the bottles is the red leech venom Winifred mass-produced to immobilize and kill several citizens in London. It’s the same stuff that stunned Clara and turned the Doctor into an incoherent monster. Somehow Winifred is planning on killing off, at the very least, all of London for good with this venom. Exactly how you don’t know, but you know you must stop her before she sets out to destroy London. There is one thing bothering you, though-what loyalty does Winifred have to Mr Sweet? You leave that question unanswered as you tell the Doctor and Clara your findings.
Clara confirms your findings. She takes the Doctor and you to a place she saw when she was immobilized-a large room, where an airship is being loaded with bottles of red leech venom. You hide in shadows, away from the airship Pilgrims.
You, along with the Doctor and Clara, hear crying nearby. The three of you trace the crying to where the Doctor was imprisoned. There, near the Doctor’s old room, is Ada. The Doctor stoops down so she can sense him. You thought Ada was crying over the loss of the pet she didn’t bother to understand or release under her captivity. She’s not. In fact, the Doctor forgives Ada and asks why she’s crying. Ada has learned that she is not to be chosen to go to that made-up island at zee with the rest of the Pilgrims. “Do you know about Mr Sweet?” the Doctor asks her. Ada doesn’t know anything about him. It’s fair to say Ada doesn’t know anything about Winifred’s plans for London. The Doctor helps Ada up. Ada grabs her cane and comes along with Clara and you.
The Doctor asks Ada about the whereabouts of her mother. “I believe she is returning to the chapel,” Ada says. That is where you all go, back to the chapel.
Winifred walks towards all of you as you arrive in the chapel. “We meet again. Would you like tea? Chocolates? Glasses of Strangling Willow Absinthe?”
“No, thanks,” the Doctor says. “We've had a skinful already, as you might say.”
Winifred laughs. “Very funny.”
“We know about Mr Sweet,” the Doctor continues. “We know what you’re doing with the venom. And we’re going to stop you.”
“I'm afraid Mr Sweet and I cannot allow that,” Winifred says, before unveiling Mr Sweet feeding on Winifred’s breast. Mr Sweet’s hollow eyes stare at you. Ada is lucky she can’t see him.
“Mr Sweet grew fat off of the excesses from Mutton Island,” Winifred continues as Mr Sweet returns to feeding on Winifred’s breast. “I found him during one of the Fruits of the Zee festivals. Mr Sweet’s needs are simple. In return, he gives me his nectar.”
The Doctor gives Winifred a lecture on the dangers of red leech venom. “I know, young man. Why else am I doing this? If we cannot go back to the Surface, I’d rather take everyone with me to the death we all deserve. We were never meant to live forever, but the Masters took that away from us. When the venom touches all of London, then, at least, we will find peace.”
Before anyone can catch her, Winifred makes her way back to the organ with Mr Sweet. Winifred pulls a lever; behind it is a control panel. Winifred presses several buttons. “Enough chatter. It’s almost time to rain down Mr Sweet's beneficence onto all of London, and maybe the Neath itself.”
Instead of attempting to stop the airship from launching over the Neath, the Doctor grabs a chair from somewhere in the chapel. “Tell us about Ada, Mrs Gillyflower.“
Winifred is baffled. “What?”
“Your daughter. You do remember your daughter? Tell us about your daughter.”
Yes, it’s a bid to distract Winifred, but it works. In return, you all learn Winifred blinded Ada, using her as a test subject to develop her particular strain of red leech venom. And all to create an anti-venom...for herself! If Winifred succeeds, the only people in London, at least, would be the Doctor and herself. So much for her speech on a final death for all.
Ada is understandably angry. She gets into an argument with Winifred. The argument turns violent, with Ada striking Winifred with her cane. Meanwhile, defying at least the logic you’ve seen in the Neath, Clara throws a chair at the airship controls. The Doctor strengthens its impact by aiming his sonic screwdriver at the chair. The airship controls are all but functional now.
In the midst of all this chaos, you grab a chair. You have a feeling you’ll need it soon. Winifred is up on her feet as Ada is sobbing. It seems like Winifred is apologizing to Ada...but you know she’d never apologize to Ada. Winifred pulls out a Ratwork Derringer to Ada’s head. “Please, Mama, I don’t want to go back down the river right now.” You have a feeling Winifred may have intentionally killed Ada multiple times. You can imagine how traumatic it would be to be killed over and over, and by your mother to boot. But you know the Doctor and Clara don’t know about death in the Neath well, and they’re used to total fatalities from wherever they both come from. Winifred walks out of the chapel with Ada and Mr Sweet, locking the door.
This was the moment you were anticipating using the chair for. You pick up the chair and shatter the door. All of you run through and split up, hoping to stop any sort of failsafe Winifred has with her plan.
You find Winifred and Ada hovering close to one of her red venom vats in the factory. She’s singing a hymn you don’t recognize. Something about labour and Pilgrims. The gun’s still next to Ada’s head. Winifred tries to shoot at you, but the Ratwork Derringer jams. It’s enough for Winifred to lose her balance. She nearly takes Ada and Mr Sweet with her as she falls onto the side of a vat. Her head cleanly separates from her body. She’s really most sincerely dead.
Mr Sweet uses his claws to get back onto the platform. You help Ada up. The first thing she does, after waiting long enough to hear Mr Sweet crawling on the platform, is smash Mr Sweet with her cane, killing him. “I’m sorry, Mama,” she says, “but enough is enough.”
Before Clara and the Doctor find Ada and you, you consider corralling the rest of the Pilgrims and have them sent to New Newgate Prison. Instead, you decide the safest thing is to burn the factory down. If the Pilgrims are in small pieces, she’ll never get her chance to attempt to destroy London. You tell your plan to Ada. “Innocent people will be killed. It’s for the best. But we should find the Doctor and Clara. They’re not from here, and they don’t deserve to die here.”
Ada and you go down to the factory floor and knock over candles. You find some dynamite and start a small (at least by Revolutionary standards) explosion. It’s enough to start building a fire. As the fire builds, the Doctor and Clara find you. He says he’s found his spaceship, and he wants to save Ada, Winifred, and you. You tell the Doctor your lie; he believes it.
The Doctor grabs Ada’s hand. Clara and you follow the Doctor around a few corners. He insists you run. The four of you reach a blue box, supposedly for police in the dimension the Doctor comes from, and enter it.
There’s a massive control panel in this box. You assume it’s the Doctor’s spaceship. The Doctor presses some controls on the panel. A strange noise comes from the box. You feel yourself flying a bit before the box stops.
Moments later, you step out of the box. All of you are outside the Sweetville Match Factory. You see people running and scrambling to put the fire out.
“Right,” the Doctor says, “I’ve got to drop you two off before Clara and I are off to London. Er, um, our London.” He turns to Clara. “We were headed for London, weren’t we?”
“Was there any particular reason?”
“No. No. Just thought you wanted to go to our London. You’re the boss.”
Clara gives the Doctor a skeptical look, raising her eyebrows. “Am I?”
The Doctor turns to Ada and you. “Now, Ada, I’d love to stay and help your London fight that fire near us, but...”
“You have places to go, dear monster. Things to do. I’ll be fine. I was fortunate to learn of the people of my London before Mama kept me locked up inside her factory. What I’ve learned is that several of us in our city have an Ambition.” Ada grabs your hand and turns to you. “I’m sure you have an Ambition.” She turns back to the Doctor. “And now I’m going to seek mine.”
“Good luck, Ada.” The Doctor also wishes you luck, addressing you by your preferred title. “You two will be just splendid.”
Clara and the Doctor walk back to their box and leave your London.
There are things you must do before you can close your case. You have to write your Case Notes and have them replicated for the Constables, the red venom scholars at Benthic College, the Implacable Detective, and Mr Thursday. You’ll be writing for days. But at least you have a new companion after all the hell you’ve been through.
***
You’ve gained 1 x The Chemist’s Daughter
The Chemist’s Daughter
Call her Ada. Nothing can erase the years of torment she suffered at her mother’s hand. But she’s ambitious, bright, and her cane packs a punch. Dangerous +8, Shadowy +6, Bizarre +1.
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