Into the light.
Disclaimer, Don't own any characters, Kudos do. I'm just playing with their glorious creation.
Alex Drake lay swaddled in white, mummified and motionless on a metal-framed hospital bed. The glare of hospital lights had leeched all colour from her face leaving only the contours of her body to stain the sheets with their purple tinged shadows.
There but not there. Here but not here. People had called but she'd made no response.
While the monitor bleeped cheerful affirmation of her life she lost herself in dreams.
.
A light, as pure as sunshine, fills her mind and body, lifting her up and twirling her weightless in its rays. She dangles on the edge of consciousness, daring other colours to join her reverie. Slowly a smattering of red, emerald, and aquamarine drizzles into her space. Quiet as dust. Silken as water, drawing her into a space beyond the light. Her mind follows her gaze, watching passively as shapes form before her eyes. Her eyes narrow, finding focus on a man's cloak. It glows red on her face. Emerald leaves dance in her hair.
A stained glass window. Recognition. She lets herself drift in and out of its potent beams. She thinks she can make out the good Samaritan helping a man cross a river. Can he help her cross, is that why she's here?
She understands now that she's in a church. The knowledge gives her weight.
The floor speeds to greet her. She expects a crunch, pain, but there's none.
Her face meets black and white squares. Her hands smooth a ceramic checkerboard. She's back in Fenchurch CID, 1982. She stands. A giant walking on the ceiling.
She takes in the rows of pews, the pulpit.
Doors swing open behind her. Shaz and Chris in funeral black. Blank-eyed, determined. Then Ray, and Viv, also black suited, shuffling, awkward. They walk towards her. She smiles, waiting for their expressions to warm to her greeting, but they walk through her, making for seats at the front. She wants to cry out and shake the blankness from their eyes, to let them know she's there with them, but all she can do is watch.
Behind her other people, vaguely familiar but no-one she can name, enter the church. Their clothes churn the air.
A vicar appears at the lectern, grey and solemn. An organ starts playing. The chords resonate loudly in her head. She puts her hands over her ears in an attempt to block the vibrations.
Her once merry band of colleagues, nay friends, stand, respectful. Then again Shaz looks through her as four pole-bearers - policemen - slow march a coffin down the aisle.
It's my funeral, I'm watching my own funeral. Her knees weaken.
The vicar coughs. With the coffin settled respectfully on a table the policemen retreat to the furthermost pews.
This was it then. Goodbye 1982. Not even Luigi, or Gene to see her off. She feels dead but she still feels, what…? What does she feel? Disappointed, sad…?
The organ stops. She looks back at the doors, expectant, hopeful. Gene wouldn't miss her funeral, would he, unless they've arrested him for murder. Please no. She doesn't want to think of him locked in a cell. She finds in these last minutes she wants to see him, just one more time.
Her heart misses as the door pushes open, but it's not Gene. This person is small and slight. A girl in a black veil and skirt.
Molly.
Alex opens her mouth - no sound; lifts her feet to run, but cannot move. It can't be, where am I? Pain grips her throat as she watches Molly find a seat and bow her head. It's all wrong. Molly in this time is all wrong.
The vicar begins to speak. She wants to rush up to him and make him tell her what is going on. She's inches away as he churns the words in his mouth like wool, eyes blank.
'We are gathered here to celebrate the life of -
Behind her Shaz lets out a small gasp. Anticipation makes Alex tremble - no, not…
TBC
Sorry that was mean, but necessary.