Inside My World
Disclaimer: I own nothing at all. None of the main characters. Zip. Nadda.
Rating: T
Characters: Eleventh Doctor, Susan F, Clara, Tenth Doctor, War Doctor.
Summary: One distress call and he was back within seconds. He always came back when she called for help.
A/N: Alternates between first person and third person chapters. I will say at the beginning of every chapter. Italics will be flashbacks but there will not be a lot of them.
The Return
Susan POV.
I don't know how it happened. One day I was planning my wedding and the next I was back in that little blue box, screaming at monsters and running from the monsters. For the love of Gallifrey, there was a lot more running than there used to be. He looked younger but he was older, all at the same time. I could see it in his eyes. He could see it in my eyes. A few years after I met David, I regenerated. A slightly older body. Before I looked like a human 16 year old but now I look like a young woman in a mid-20s body. That started it. My regeneration. The Daleks came back. For me. For my residual energy from the regeneration process. They did it to enslave the human race once again. They did it in a matter of days of their arrival. Once again the humans were in hiding. David, Tyler and people, who knew who I was, hid me well. Only a few knew I was an actual alien. Well, to them I was an alien. To me they were the aliens.
Six months after the return of the Daleks, they caught some of us. Most of the main resistance had been caught. That included me. I was trapped. David was trapped. As was Tyler. I need the old man back. I know he left for the best but I want him back. To these humans he is an old man but to me, he is wonderful. He is my grandfather.
I struggle against the cold, metal restraints. Trying to break free. I did this everyday fully knowing that I was stuck here until I was freed. On my left David lay on an identical table. He had given up breaking out from his restraints. He looked as if he had given up altogether. I don't blame him. No one came. No one would come for us. Only the Daleks. Why had they not changed us into robomen? Like they had with Tyler. We see him occasionally but I know he is not Tyler any more. He will no longer be Tyler.
"David?" I spoke quietly, not wanting to alert the Daleks.
"Susan." His voice breaking as he spoke my name. It hurt me to hear him like that. They had tortured us both for information. We didn't five them any but the Daleks knew we were important to the resistance. Especially when they discovered that I was from Gallifrey. "Are you all right, my darling?" He asked, turning his head to face me.
"I am. Still trying to get out. Not working though." I gave a small, but weak, chuckle. The Daleks kept us alive but we needed proper food and water. "We maybe captives but I am glad that we are still together."
"Me too." Giving me a small smile.
After being held captive for two weeks, we managed to escape from our restraints and our room. But David was recaptured within moments and was still with the Daleks. He told me to run and get help. I did. I ran as fast as I could. Before I did, I kissed him and promised that I would be back soon. That's when the blue box came back into my life. I sent out a distress signal to the mad man. He came without question.
"I don't care any more. We're putting all of our resources together and we are getting David back." These stupid men angered me. If this was Tyler instead of me, they would not be arguing back. We would be fighting to get David back that second. Not wasting our breath on arguments.
None of these men were in the original resistance. To be fair, they were prisoners last time. But now they wanted to fight. I can give them that. But I wanted David. He was our leader. I wanted our leader to be free more than defeating the Daleks. "Susan." Mark, one of the oldest men here, stepped forward and spoke up. "We want David back but he is in the middle of a Dalek force. We need to plan this properly."
Sighing heavily, I turned and stormed from the room. "This is ridiculous!" I just walked and walked. When I finally came to a stop, I found myself in mine and David's office. Well, it wasn't a real office. Just a room with a desk. We did all of our planning in here. When the Daleks returned, I tried to build a bomb, which could disarm them or destroy them. When we started, I found that we didn't have the right materials. We gave up. We did start planning our own wedding but we gave up on that too because we wanted to marry in the open air and not in the stuffy underground.
"We need help." I stood in the room and stared at the damp wall. I subconsciously rubbed the back of my neck. I felt something cold touch my fingers. My necklace. I never told David that I went back for the key. I wanted a little bit of home with me. I never told David as he wanted me to let go of my previous life altogether. Not forget but to let go. I pulled the key from around my neck and held it tightly. The grooves digging into the flesh of my hand. I didn't care. I needed to feel it again. I needed to feel pain again. To tell me that everything was real. The pain gave me hope. It gave me hope that the grumpy old man would came back and help me. To help us all. I was about to pull out the communicator device. I had begun making it when I escaped from the Daleks. I stopped myself from making the call.
If I called him back, what would happen then? He would take me away from here. He would make me leave David behind just because there was a threat on my life. The Daleks would always threaten Earth if they knew I was here. I would have to leave. But I didn't want to leave. I looked down at my key. "I could hide," speaking to myself as I stare at the silver object in my hand. I remember my father teaching me a way to hide my identity. It was hiding in plain sight, he called it. He taught me how to do it with a few pieces of jewellery. I could do it with a key. I knew I could.
I had been all around the base and found the right tools and materials to make my device. The others shouted at me as I pushed past them. But their shouts were ignored by me. I told the others what I was doing. But I told them that I was hiding my identity from the Daleks. Sort of true. I loved the mad man, who would be coming, but I didn't want to leave David. For three straight days and two nights I worked to the device working. I didn't even sleep. I tested it on the others and it worked. I should work on the Daleks and on my grandfather. The Doctor. He was no longer my grandfather as long as I wore this key around my neck. I walked the long walk to a higher underground station. I had gone to a deserted part of London to send the message. I brought the communicator to my lips. I knew I was taking a big risk in sending this message. But the Daleks feared the man I was about to call for. I had tuned the communicator device to the key of the TARDIS so it would directly go to him in the TARDIS.
A deep breath, "this is Earth, in the 22nd Century. I send a distress signal out to the Doctor. Please help us. The Daleks have returned. We need you." I need you, I thought to myself as I paused to take a breath. "Please hurry. We have lost hope since our leader, David Campbell, was captured. Please help." I cut off communications quickly and ran out of there. I had to get out of there as quick as I could. We were using the sewers and underground routes as our way of getting from one side of London to the other. We had abandoned the higher underground routes as the Daleks could detect our movements if we were higher up. I did make it safely back to base. As soon as I walked through the base doors, there had been a sighting of a blue box.
My Lord! He looked so young. He wasn't the old man I used to know. Of course our people could regenerate. But I never expected him to look as he did. Dark, floppy hair, piercing blue eyes, a rather large chin and so much energy. My grandfather. My Doctor was in an old body and could sometimes barely move but this one would not keep still. "So, who is the one who called me?" His eyes scanning around the room. Looking for someone in particular. He was looking for me. I could see it in his eyes. He focused on every woman in the room.
I stepped forward. "I did. Catherine Jones." I held out my hand and he shook it briefly. "We are desperate, Doctor. They came back all too soon. We don't know what to do. David and Tyler were the one who made the plans and we followed them. They made a back up plan. To call you if anything went wrong."
"What about Susan?" He asked eagerly. "Susan Foreman?" My device had worked. He could not tell that I was from Gallifrey. He looked around me and the room, hoping to find the real me.
"Susan left moments after the Daleks' arrival. No one knows where but she just vanished." I had to keep up the lie and hoped he believed me.
He looked disappointed. "Oh right." I wanted to tell him the truth but I knew he would not let me stay any more. "No matter. Let us get to the bottom of this. The Daleks returned. They just returned? Out of the blue?" His eyes focused on me. I thought he had seen through my cloaking key.
"Yes." I nodded. "We don't understand. We thought they would stay away for good." Pretending to be human was harder than I thought. I had to pretend that I didn't know much about my people's greatest enemy. I found it had to not shout out and tell him who I really was. I loved my grandfather with all my heart but I wanted to remain with David more.
"No. This is probably the secondary fleet. If anything happened to the first, they would step in unless something else drew them here." His eyes searched the room. "Anyway," rubbing his hands together and finally straightening his bow tie. "Clara, are you coming?" I looked to his latest companion. I stopped myself from scoffing. She looked younger than I did.
"Bloody hell," I muttered and walked away. "We don't need any more lives at risk." Turning around to face them all. "Doctor, you were called as we know that you are one of the few people who knows how to defeat the Daleks."
He gave me a broad smile. "Quite right." In all his energy, he did a 360 degree turn and smiled widely. "Where are they being held captive?"
"Westminster Abbey." Will, one of the senior resistance member, spoke up. "Heavily guarded since we attempted to free the prisoners a few days ago."
"Right," the Doctor spoke up and was still smiling broadly. "How do you travel across the city?"
"Like any normal Londoner in the old days. The tube. Well, we walk along the tracks." Karl, the oldest member of the group, spoke up. "It's how Catherine was able to send you a distress call. She went to a safe place, far from the Daleks, and sent the message."
He turned to face me. "You can take me there. The less there are of us, the easier it will be to free those who are captured." My heart pounded furiously in my chest as he stared at me. I have no idea what he was doing. I began to think that he knew who I really was. I hope not. I was not going anywhere. "We'll leave as soon as we can. Do you have any weapons?"
"Of course." I nodded and smiled slightly at him. Nervousness filling me. "They are not the best but they work."
"Get as many as you can." He placed a hand on my shoulder before he turned away, examining the junk we had on the large table. It was just junk. I had examined it and it was useless. Even more knowledge, I could not make use of it. But the Doctor could probably make some use of the stuff.
I was about to walk away when his companion came up to me. "I'll come with you." She gave me a sweet and genuine smile. She seemed nice. We walked in silence through the tunnels. Weaving our way passed the refugees and the chairs, which were in the tunnels. After a few moments, she spoke, "I'm Clara."
"Catherine" Giving her a smile as we walked. "I'm sorry I'm so quiet. Not very talkative today." We smiled at each other. "How long have you been with the Doctor?"
"I don't know. Started a few years ago but he drops me home every so often." She smiled as we turned into the junk room. Well, that's what I called it. There was junk in there but it was useful junk. Stuff we could fashion into weapons. I watched Clara out of the corner of my eye as I put a pile of weapons together. She was just walking around the room, taking in every detail. The silence was deafening. "Does your family know where you are?"
"No." She shook her head but she was still smiling. "Friends of mine do. Well, two kids I look after." Picking up an old gun, which has no bullets in it.
"That's good."
"What about your family? Are they here?"
I shook my head. "No. They went missing during the first Dalek invasion and I haven't seen them since. I don't think they survived." Shrugging my shoulders a little. "David found me after the Daleks were defeated. I found a whole new family in the resistance." I gave her small smile as I handed her a couple of guns and put the other guns on my back.
We were about to walk out when she stopped me. "Who is Susan?" She asked curiously.
Here came more lies. I hated lying but it was for the best. "She was David's partner. The two of them were the first to set up the resistance when the Daleks returned. But she soon ran away. Nobody knows why. She just did." I shrugged my shoulders and pushed the weapons further onto my shoulder. "Come on. The sooner we defeat these Daleks, the better it is for all of us." I leaned back again the table. "I'm so tired. I haven't been this tired in a long time." Which was true. The last tie I was this tired was on Gallifrey when I was a small girl. Time travel does that to you. You could visit a thousand planets in less than a day. Now, I was normal. I liked it that way but not without David. I felt so lost.
Clara jumped onto the table next to me. "Did you meet the Doctor before? You seemed to recognise him when he walked through the door."
I laughed and shook my head. Here were more lies. "I was in hiding during the last invasion. When I became friends with Susan, she would tell us all about the Doctor. That is probably why it looked like I recognised him." Smiling at her as I stood up straight. "Come on. We need to get moving."