Hot. It was so impossibly hot. Everywhere she turned, she saw flames. She couldn't breathe; there was too much smoke. And then she saw them. Directly in front of her, a pair of dark, soulless eyes found hers. As suddenly as they had appeared they were gone and her world went black. A single voice, quiet and hurt, echoed through her mind, sending temptingly cold chills down her spine. "You lied to me..."

"Mum? Mum?" a significantly higher, frightened voice was what finally brought Nellie Lovett back to her senses. With a surprisingly strangled sounding gasp, she opened her eyes into slits, feeling excruciating pain pulse through her body at the foundational motion. She quickly gave up on sight and closed her eyes again; her vision had been blurry anyway. She had no idea where she was, or how she had ended up in this state. She was about to let herself drop back into unconsciousness when she registered the sound of quiet sobbing nearby.

"T- Toby," she murmured, barely audible, even to his keen young ears. Nevertheless, he was silenced.

"Yes! Yes, I'm 'ere, Mum! Are you alright?" he grabbed her hand and she yelped in pain. He withdrew quickly. "We've got to go, Mum! They're gonna find me, I killed him, we'll go somewhere far from here, somewhere they won't know, we can't stay in London, it isn't safe for us here..."

Hush, love, she wished the orphan boy knew how much she longed for silence. How much she longed for rest. Somehow, unbelievably and in the midst of her dear Toby's anxious ramblings, she managed to slip away for a while.

The next thing she knew, she was awake again. And the pain was even worse. Gritting her teeth and looking around, she realized she was alone. And that she was able to open her eyes. Nellie recognized from the decor that she was lying on the couch in the den of her house, just down the hallway from her meatpie shop. With an extreme amount of effort, she was able to prop herself up a little ways. On the table beside her was an open bottle of gin, half-full, and a glass of water. She was bandaged up from head to toe, tightly enough that she just barely had the freedom to wiggle her toes. How she longed to get to that gin...

"Toby!" she croaked. "Toby!" No good. Mrs. Lovett gave up and rested her head back on the cushion that had been delicately placed to support her neck, staring up at the ceiling.

It seemed to be quite a little while later before her adopted son showed up, but with no way for Nellie to keep track of time, it could have been mere minutes. "You're awake!" he gasped, forgetting whatever he had been doing and rushing to her side. "Can you speak, mum?"

She gave a short nod of her head. "Wot 'appened?" she questioned hoarsely.

"It was Sweeney Todd, Mum," Toby replied, his face growing serious. "Do you remember me tellin' you 'e was up to something? Well, down in the bakehouse, 'e was- they were- I saw- I- I dunno what I saw..." he took a moment to recollect his thoughts. "There... there was a finger in one of the pies... and shelves of... feet, I think they was... and a body, the Beadle, 'e fell from the ceiling! 'E... 'e was a cannibal, mum."

His words cut her deeper than Mr. Todd's silver-chased razor ever could. She was the one who went down to the bakehouse every day. She was the one who made the meatpies. It only seemed logical she might have had some part in the cannibalism. Yet Toby was still so naive. She had such a gentle heart for the lad, so how could she be guilty of something as unforgivable as baking people into pies? He didn't understand that a bad person could do good things. A cannibal could rescue an orphan, for example.

"I was hidin' in the grate when 'e came looking for me," he continued, unaware of her pain. "I- I saw him throw you into the fire, and I came as quick as I could-" Ah. That would explain her nightmares. "Not sure 'ow I got the door open-"

"Where's... Mr. T?"

There was a long pause. "He's dead." Another wave of silence. Maybe it hadn't sunk in that Mr. Todd, her tenant, her partner-in-crime, her... friend, was gone for good. Or maybe it was because her physical state of numbness had affected her emotions. Whatever the case, she didn't feel anything concerning the death of the demon barber. "I told 'em you was sick. You and Mr. Todd both," Toby was biting his lip nervously. "That should give us a little time to get out of 'ere."

Nellie had about a million other things to say, ask, and discuss with Toby, but with the amount of energy it took her to speak, nothing seemed worth it. "Gin," she croaked instead. Toby obediently brought the bottle to her lips, allowing her to drink as much as she wanted. She guessed it was burning her throat a bit, but whatever mild pain it caused was unnoticeable compared to what the rest of her body was going through. The boy set the gin back down on the counter when she had finished.

"I suppose they'll realize Judge Turpin's missin' by Wednesday. That's when 'e's due back in court."

"Wot day is it?"

"Sunday."

Mrs. Lovett nodded a bit, thinking this through. "We'll be gone by then, darling."

"Where will we go?" Toby's quiet plea gave away his desperation as he knelt down beside his guardian, his grey eyes glittering with tears that had not yet fallen.

Nellie gave him a small, sad smile as she felt the gin settle. "By the sea, love."

xxx