Dr. Anya Wood’s Personal Diary: The Mysterious Ghosts Of Times Long Gone
Dr. Anya Wood’s Personal Diary: The Mysterious Ghosts Of Times Long Gone
By Ros Sawyer.
PG-13.
Author’s Note: This and the following two Cambridge Chronicles were written last year but I will be writing follow up Diaries and Cambridge Chronicles.
Warnings: Hints of mystery ghosts doing the most unspeakable things, well, nearly. May be a bit triggery for rape-type of things, although not intended to come out that way.
A long time ago, in a world much like your own, something strange began to happen… but to tell you what would be getting too far ahead. Let’s start at the beginning shall we?
It had been a long and quiet night on the ward, the patients were all asleep, most of the staff had gone home and those who stayed only took hourly checks on the patients.
It was here, on this cold and windy night that everything the people at St. Agatha’s Hospital knew would change. It was here that the mysterious ghosts began to walk among us.
The first occurrence happened in a ward of sleeping people and as such was only recorded by the hospital’s CCTV cameras. The second took place not far away, inside UNIT headquarters.
It is there that I first met the team behind some of the most mysterious cases that the united nations have ever tried to solve. Just three people, but three of the most talented individuals I have ever met.
I think now would be as good a time as any to introduce them, they are, after all, the stars of the story.
The first gentleman went only by the name ‘Doctor’. Just that and nothing more. He was a mystery. Of course, I was to later discover that even his companions knew little about him.
The second gentleman, a military chap and no mistake, seemed all too guarded about his name and yet I was able to gain at least his rank, the Brigadier. I was to later learn that this gentleman, Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart, was one of UNIT’s finest. It came as no surprise, he was exactly what you would expect a military man to be.
They had with them just one woman. Young enough to still outsmart both the gentlemen, which she did on many occasions. She had a mystery about her that was different from the Doctor’s brand of mystique and yet it has stuck with me to this day. I was to learn that she, a scientist much like myself, had studied at Cambridge, was smart as a whip, and she took none to kindly to foolish people either. Yes, Doctor Elizabeth Shaw was nothing if not smart, although she seemed to still be somewhat unsure of herself, for what reason I can not tell you.
So, there I am, alone, faced with these three strange but fascinating people. What else can I do but let them in? They, after all, belong to UNIT just as much as I do. At least now I’m not alone.
I would normally have asked what they were doing there, but, given I had just seen a ghost, or what at the time I believed to be a ghost, I was in no mood to ask questions that had so clear an answer. It seemed foolish to just stand around and yet since now we were all following the Doctor’s lead… that was exactly what we did.
People had gone missing, at first, just people from the streets nearby, then staff and patients at the hospital and now, apparently, we had lost an entire platoon of men and women. This was not at all the normal procedure but then, we have never lost a platoon either before or since this single incident.
We knew we had to be weary, the ghosts seemed to pick people off who were alone. Of course, the platoon had been different, except they had been out on night manoeuvres. Blind for all intents and purposes.
Now we knew people were going missing nightly. Little did we realise how lucky we had been. How soon out luck would run out. The lights, already weak, flickered, then failed. We were alone in the darkness.
How to proceed? It seemed natural to seek one another with voices and hands, within moments the lights flickered back on to reveal one of our number was missing. Dr Shaw.
The Doctor proceeded to act somewhat irrationally, the Brigadier was far calmer and yet, neither seemed to know how to get her back… thankfully the ghosts were in the mood to tell us.
A note, in black biro, on the wall. Bring us The Master. Quite who the Master is… or was… I will never understand. He was clearly big trouble however. We had no way to reach Liz and it was obvious what needed to happen, the Brig and the Doctor needed to find this Master… and bring him back.
I have no idea quite what happened out there on the moors that evening, I know only that we were blessed with a swift find and capture and that we regained Dr. Shaw… Well, almost. It was clear she was only just holding herself together, incredibly brave and yet clearly hurting at the same time.
Normally I would not argue with someone in charge of a mission, I am, after all simply the scientist and the medical personnel. This time however I was not about the let the Doctor charge off and take Liz with him… it was bad enough we had been powerless to keep Liz safe the first time.
We had no quarrel with the ghosts but plainly they did with the Doctor, that alone was enough to cause what came next. I threw him out, I was not about to have him around as I tried to comfort Liz, and I wasn’t about to have the Brig breathing down my neck either.
“Out. Now. Both of you.”
“Dr. Shaw…”
“Will be perfectly fine, you need to find out just what these ghosts want from you…”
“Now listen here, I’m a doctor too you know…”
“Not that kind of Doctor, as you insist on pointing out… leave.”
Thankfully he saw sense after that and did indeed leave. It was only a shame that Liz would insist on worrying about him, although heaven only knew why, the man was crafty enough.
It took plenty of convincing to even get her to stay still long enough to be checked over. I had already seen to the slight graze on her cheekbone, a graze that only served to accentuate how strong she had been. Now, however, I was to find markings that would go unexplained until the Doctor returned, at the time all I knew was that she was in pain, too frightened to say a word about what happened, and likely to be at least a little sore for several weeks. The markings, although already healing, were deep enough to give pause to even the most composed of medical professionals.
Needless to say Liz had been extraordinarily lucky, although I could see why she still does not think so herself. She had been moments away from the kind of mental, physical and emotional abuse from which no woman could ever truly recover. The ghost leader, a male, had all but forced his talons into her skin, tearing it enough that even now you can still faintly see the damage it caused.
I was to find out, a full day later, just how close we had come to losing her. A day later and she would not have been just a shell of her former self, she would more than likely have been pregnant with the ghost’s child. Even now, the thought repulses me. No woman could ever deserve that fate. Certainly not Dr. Shaw, a kind and honest woman who seemed, even now, even in immense pain, determined to help the others fight off the ghosts.
I am writing this mere months later, the Doctor and the Brig have gone home, Liz, however is still with me. She needs the rest and frankly, I get the feeling she will never quite be able to stay alone in a room with men ever again.
Liz, when she is awake, is quite charming. Intelligent to a point but also able to relax and allow herself to smile, she has come on in leaps and bounds since that day, the fateful day we rescued her. She seemed almost too broken then to ever be put back together and yet, with just patience and a little love from the staff here in the medical bay, she is learning to trust again. She still talks about the men, her boys as she calls them, it seems she dislikes the Brig and some of his methods and yet she seems to also respect him, having met the man I can’t say I blame her.
The Doctor is a whole other story. Oh, Liz likes him well enough and she still trusts him with her life… but there is no real sparkle to her voice, or eyes, when she talks about him, although that spark lights any time she mentions the Brig. It seems almost as if she longs to befriend him, even if she never could do.
One of the many things we are taught to look out for in our lives is a chance to do something that may change not just our lives but those of us close to us, we did that the day we saved Liz and, I find myself hoping I do so every day that Liz spends with me.
It’s a joy to have Liz here, we talk often about science, sometimes even using the adjoining laboratory for experiments, we laugh, often when we either fail to have any kind of a result with our experiments, or in the case of the cola bottle and mints, we manage to coat both ourselves and the lab in sticky brown liquid. If I wasn’t so sure I was not her type, I believe I could easily have found my soul mate in Liz.
Well, that was eventful, I must remember not to leave this file open on the desk, especially when I know Liz is likely to move it. She found the file. I seem to have said or done, maybe even written, something that upset her… although she refuses to tell me what or even how I fix it. I hurt her. I actually hurt her… and although I’m not sure how I will do whatever it takes to fix this mess. I made it, it’s my job to fix it now.
I think I know what I did wrong. “If I wasn’t sure I was not her type”… the question is… have I offended her because I really am not her type… or have I possibly just lost the one chance at making us both truly happy? I shall have to try my luck. I can’t stand hearing her crying like she is.
Okay. So… I was right the second time. She did like me… like that. Question is, can she ever learn to trust me after I made such a basic mistake? At least she knows I would never talk about it… Not in public.
Well, that worked out rather well. It seems she does still want to take a chance on life with me. Thankfully her time with UNIT is near it’s end, perhaps now I can take her home with me, to Cambridge. It will at least be a fresh start for us. We can start anew, alone and well away from here. It will be good for us, I just know it.
I am glad this adventure is near it’s end… at least now when Liz returns to me we can go on alone. Now new Doctor to worry over, no Brigadier to drive us both insane. It will be good to take Liz back to Cambridge, I have a feeling she intends to come back to the University, who, thankfully, have a personal placement for me as an Army Scientist Training Manager. So, life here at HQ ends on a high and I have a feeling that life in Cambridge will be just as pleasant. If a little less overly crowded.
By Ros Sawyer.
PG-13.
Author’s Note: This and the following two Cambridge Chronicles were written last year but I will be writing follow up Diaries and Cambridge Chronicles.
Warnings: Hints of mystery ghosts doing the most unspeakable things, well, nearly. May be a bit triggery for rape-type of things, although not intended to come out that way.
A long time ago, in a world much like your own, something strange began to happen… but to tell you what would be getting too far ahead. Let’s start at the beginning shall we?
It had been a long and quiet night on the ward, the patients were all asleep, most of the staff had gone home and those who stayed only took hourly checks on the patients.
It was here, on this cold and windy night that everything the people at St. Agatha’s Hospital knew would change. It was here that the mysterious ghosts began to walk among us.
The first occurrence happened in a ward of sleeping people and as such was only recorded by the hospital’s CCTV cameras. The second took place not far away, inside UNIT headquarters.
It is there that I first met the team behind some of the most mysterious cases that the united nations have ever tried to solve. Just three people, but three of the most talented individuals I have ever met.
I think now would be as good a time as any to introduce them, they are, after all, the stars of the story.
The first gentleman went only by the name ‘Doctor’. Just that and nothing more. He was a mystery. Of course, I was to later discover that even his companions knew little about him.
The second gentleman, a military chap and no mistake, seemed all too guarded about his name and yet I was able to gain at least his rank, the Brigadier. I was to later learn that this gentleman, Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart, was one of UNIT’s finest. It came as no surprise, he was exactly what you would expect a military man to be.
They had with them just one woman. Young enough to still outsmart both the gentlemen, which she did on many occasions. She had a mystery about her that was different from the Doctor’s brand of mystique and yet it has stuck with me to this day. I was to learn that she, a scientist much like myself, had studied at Cambridge, was smart as a whip, and she took none to kindly to foolish people either. Yes, Doctor Elizabeth Shaw was nothing if not smart, although she seemed to still be somewhat unsure of herself, for what reason I can not tell you.
So, there I am, alone, faced with these three strange but fascinating people. What else can I do but let them in? They, after all, belong to UNIT just as much as I do. At least now I’m not alone.
I would normally have asked what they were doing there, but, given I had just seen a ghost, or what at the time I believed to be a ghost, I was in no mood to ask questions that had so clear an answer. It seemed foolish to just stand around and yet since now we were all following the Doctor’s lead… that was exactly what we did.
People had gone missing, at first, just people from the streets nearby, then staff and patients at the hospital and now, apparently, we had lost an entire platoon of men and women. This was not at all the normal procedure but then, we have never lost a platoon either before or since this single incident.
We knew we had to be weary, the ghosts seemed to pick people off who were alone. Of course, the platoon had been different, except they had been out on night manoeuvres. Blind for all intents and purposes.
Now we knew people were going missing nightly. Little did we realise how lucky we had been. How soon out luck would run out. The lights, already weak, flickered, then failed. We were alone in the darkness.
How to proceed? It seemed natural to seek one another with voices and hands, within moments the lights flickered back on to reveal one of our number was missing. Dr Shaw.
The Doctor proceeded to act somewhat irrationally, the Brigadier was far calmer and yet, neither seemed to know how to get her back… thankfully the ghosts were in the mood to tell us.
A note, in black biro, on the wall. Bring us The Master. Quite who the Master is… or was… I will never understand. He was clearly big trouble however. We had no way to reach Liz and it was obvious what needed to happen, the Brig and the Doctor needed to find this Master… and bring him back.
I have no idea quite what happened out there on the moors that evening, I know only that we were blessed with a swift find and capture and that we regained Dr. Shaw… Well, almost. It was clear she was only just holding herself together, incredibly brave and yet clearly hurting at the same time.
Normally I would not argue with someone in charge of a mission, I am, after all simply the scientist and the medical personnel. This time however I was not about the let the Doctor charge off and take Liz with him… it was bad enough we had been powerless to keep Liz safe the first time.
We had no quarrel with the ghosts but plainly they did with the Doctor, that alone was enough to cause what came next. I threw him out, I was not about to have him around as I tried to comfort Liz, and I wasn’t about to have the Brig breathing down my neck either.
“Out. Now. Both of you.”
“Dr. Shaw…”
“Will be perfectly fine, you need to find out just what these ghosts want from you…”
“Now listen here, I’m a doctor too you know…”
“Not that kind of Doctor, as you insist on pointing out… leave.”
Thankfully he saw sense after that and did indeed leave. It was only a shame that Liz would insist on worrying about him, although heaven only knew why, the man was crafty enough.
It took plenty of convincing to even get her to stay still long enough to be checked over. I had already seen to the slight graze on her cheekbone, a graze that only served to accentuate how strong she had been. Now, however, I was to find markings that would go unexplained until the Doctor returned, at the time all I knew was that she was in pain, too frightened to say a word about what happened, and likely to be at least a little sore for several weeks. The markings, although already healing, were deep enough to give pause to even the most composed of medical professionals.
Needless to say Liz had been extraordinarily lucky, although I could see why she still does not think so herself. She had been moments away from the kind of mental, physical and emotional abuse from which no woman could ever truly recover. The ghost leader, a male, had all but forced his talons into her skin, tearing it enough that even now you can still faintly see the damage it caused.
I was to find out, a full day later, just how close we had come to losing her. A day later and she would not have been just a shell of her former self, she would more than likely have been pregnant with the ghost’s child. Even now, the thought repulses me. No woman could ever deserve that fate. Certainly not Dr. Shaw, a kind and honest woman who seemed, even now, even in immense pain, determined to help the others fight off the ghosts.
I am writing this mere months later, the Doctor and the Brig have gone home, Liz, however is still with me. She needs the rest and frankly, I get the feeling she will never quite be able to stay alone in a room with men ever again.
Liz, when she is awake, is quite charming. Intelligent to a point but also able to relax and allow herself to smile, she has come on in leaps and bounds since that day, the fateful day we rescued her. She seemed almost too broken then to ever be put back together and yet, with just patience and a little love from the staff here in the medical bay, she is learning to trust again. She still talks about the men, her boys as she calls them, it seems she dislikes the Brig and some of his methods and yet she seems to also respect him, having met the man I can’t say I blame her.
The Doctor is a whole other story. Oh, Liz likes him well enough and she still trusts him with her life… but there is no real sparkle to her voice, or eyes, when she talks about him, although that spark lights any time she mentions the Brig. It seems almost as if she longs to befriend him, even if she never could do.
One of the many things we are taught to look out for in our lives is a chance to do something that may change not just our lives but those of us close to us, we did that the day we saved Liz and, I find myself hoping I do so every day that Liz spends with me.
It’s a joy to have Liz here, we talk often about science, sometimes even using the adjoining laboratory for experiments, we laugh, often when we either fail to have any kind of a result with our experiments, or in the case of the cola bottle and mints, we manage to coat both ourselves and the lab in sticky brown liquid. If I wasn’t so sure I was not her type, I believe I could easily have found my soul mate in Liz.
Well, that was eventful, I must remember not to leave this file open on the desk, especially when I know Liz is likely to move it. She found the file. I seem to have said or done, maybe even written, something that upset her… although she refuses to tell me what or even how I fix it. I hurt her. I actually hurt her… and although I’m not sure how I will do whatever it takes to fix this mess. I made it, it’s my job to fix it now.
I think I know what I did wrong. “If I wasn’t sure I was not her type”… the question is… have I offended her because I really am not her type… or have I possibly just lost the one chance at making us both truly happy? I shall have to try my luck. I can’t stand hearing her crying like she is.
Okay. So… I was right the second time. She did like me… like that. Question is, can she ever learn to trust me after I made such a basic mistake? At least she knows I would never talk about it… Not in public.
Well, that worked out rather well. It seems she does still want to take a chance on life with me. Thankfully her time with UNIT is near it’s end, perhaps now I can take her home with me, to Cambridge. It will at least be a fresh start for us. We can start anew, alone and well away from here. It will be good for us, I just know it.
I am glad this adventure is near it’s end… at least now when Liz returns to me we can go on alone. Now new Doctor to worry over, no Brigadier to drive us both insane. It will be good to take Liz back to Cambridge, I have a feeling she intends to come back to the University, who, thankfully, have a personal placement for me as an Army Scientist Training Manager. So, life here at HQ ends on a high and I have a feeling that life in Cambridge will be just as pleasant. If a little less overly crowded.