youplumâ  &  rosetylerdwrpâ  &  talktotenâ
It was a favour for Jackie Tyler.Â
Investigating, that was. The favour was what had brought them there, under the cover of the night, standing around a dead body in a room lit only by the stars. The floorboards were still sticky with her blood. The Doctorâs hand found the switch and the roomâs single, flickering light buzzed to life, accompanied by a gasp from Jackie or Rose or both as they finally saw her body, pale and lifeless, eyes unfocused and unseeing. A gunshot wound to the head. There was fear in her eyes, and the Doctor closed his own, jaw working â he was absorbing this fact, this death, this human being. Her hand was still outstretched, in some last desperate attempt at something she never managed, nor ever would.
  Gone.
   And Jackie was right. It had not been a suicide.Â
He squatted by her body, and for a moment it looked like he might say something â but then he reached out into the too-still, too-quiet air and slid Bethâs eyelids closed with the sense of somehow finishing something that had â until this point â been left undone. âElizabeth Mable,â he said. Searched her face, looking for something, absorbing it, memorising it. This had not been all she was, she had not always been a body lying on a floor in an apartment at Powell Estate. She still was not.
From this angle, it almost looked like she was sleeping. âIâm sorry.â And the way he looked up at them, it was clear these words were not only for her.Â
At last, the Doctor dragged his eyes away, pushing himself upright to stand in the unassuming room. Bethâs apartment had either been ransacked or it had been untidy, to begin with; clothes were strewn about, pieces of crumpled-up paper littered the floor, a letter from her lawyer was still stuck to the fridge, something about her seeking compensation from Harrodâs for its brief killer-store-dummy stage. She had been staring at her living roomâs window, perhaps for one last sunrise, but the Doctor still stepped towards it; he ran his hand along the wall, beside it without a word. Thinking.Â
      âWhat do they think happened?â
  THE BLONDE could hardly process a thing. The only right move she could do was
call the man ( that she hated to admit ) could do things right. Give her friend justice
and the peace she deserves. Jackieâs heart ached. Beth had been her friend since her
and Pete moved into the estate when Rose was just a baby. Sheâd done everything she
could to help and be there for her. Beth didnât deserve this. And she had a feeling of guilt
that maybe she had something to do with it. Hopefully not.Â
  THE POLICE were so damn sure sheâd off herself. Beth would never. With how lucky
she was at bingo and how many people loved her. It couldnât have all been a lie. Hands
over her eyes, the distraught mother sobbed quietly, consumed by the grief. She couldnât
even look at her. Standing alongside her daughter, (more so leaning on her. for moral and
physical support.) in the eerily lit room of the flat just a few floors down.
â Oh, Rose. What am I gonna do without Beth ? â
  HER VOICE HOARSE from all the non-stop crying. Tears spilling down her face,Â
Jackie sniffled, wiping at her eyes and nose, swallowing at a dry throat before
 giving her head a shake,Â
  â Well--The only thing they could think of was that her brother
 just lost his job. And thatâs just silly. Itâs nothing to off yourself over.Â
           How could they be so stupid ?  â
