Thanks for clicking the link to this story! For those of you who already read this, this one chapter was originally the first two. Anyway. Some background knowledge:
Doctor Who: About a year after Journey's End, but before The Next Doctor. Going by Netflix classifications, between 4x14 and 4x15. The Tenth Doctor will appear in Chapter 1 and beyond.
Supernatural: About a week after 3x12 Jus In Bello for the Winchesters, during 5x19 Hammer of the Gods for Gabriel. The actual time before Dean's deal comes due isn't mentioned, so I'm just going with three months. They're all going to appear in Chapter 2.
There will be more than one main OC. #2 comes in Chapter 3 (but Chapter 2 is extremely short, so it's not much after the Winchesters and Gabe).
If I put spoilers in for episodes beyond what I said, I will make it very obvious in the preceding author's note. *SPOILER ALERT* Finish all DW episodes up to The End of Time: Part 2. There's a reference to one of the episodes in that season (Netflix). See what I mean?
If there's a really obvious plot hole, it's intentional. I put at least four in this chapter. The Doctor is also slightly OOC, and the first main OC is sort of *cough* (extremely) cliché in her easy trust of the Doctor. I promise I'm going to have a good explanation towards the end.
T rating so I can put swear words in if I want. It probably won't be a large amount per chapter unless there's a good reason, though.
Not planning on any pairings.
KATE IS NOT A TIME LADY/LORD. No watch, either.
Disclaimer: If you see something you recognize, it's not mine. Unless I secretly turn out to be the secret fanfiction account of CW/BBC/anything else I feel like putting in. Sadly, I'm not. (sounds of sobbing in the distance). I only own my OCs and the situation the characters are placed in. Unless I do a rewrite of an episode. Or reference something like Harry Potter.
Sorry about this insanely long author's note. View below for story. vvvvvvvvvvvv Vs kind of look like down arrows, right? Okay, I'll stop talking now.
The ground lit up, prompted by yet another jet of light. I can't survive this, I can't I can't I can't-
I can't.
There's a good chance I'll die. But I'm okay with that. My body will never be found because the Time Lord, the only one who can possibly survive this, will bury me and everyone else traveling with him on an uninhabited planet far away from Earth. And I'm okay with that, too. Anyone found with even our soulless, empty shells will be murdered. Our enemies have gone through, are going through, will go through amazing lengths to kill and break us. And there are so many of them. Maybe it's best that we die.
The next beam didn't blast through the air or hit the alien, or the hunters, or the one who knew everything. My body glowed white, my skeleton turned charcoal black, but I didn't scream. There wasn't any time. I died.
This is the story of how I lived.
Kate Thomas
A little kid in an Iron Man shirt was screaming at his mom in front of the ice cream stand. Airports are annoying.
I should probably be doing the summer reading, but I really don't want to. That one book, A Fellowship of Bees? Extremely slow pace. I'm not exactly sure how I even got past page one. Doodling is kind of boring too, actually. And I'm still drawing a pepper shaker with random toilet and kitchen accessories. At least that's better than an annoying author.
The pepper shakers should kill her. No… not kill. That's not the right word. I'm thinking three syllables. Maybe four. Definitely four.
I've reached a level of boredom where I'm thinking about a catchphrase for Daleks.
Two hours before takeoff, and I still need to do the much-feared homework. I sighed internally as I set aside the piece of paper I had intended to be my bookmark. Of course, it could still be that too. The unnamed pepper shaker could just be extra decoration. It doesn't even really deserve the time I would spend thinking of a name. I'll probably just throw the sheet away when I finish the book. If not before. They have napkins on planes. No, wait, that's disgusting. I'm probably going to use the napkin sometime during the twelve-hour flight back to San Fran. Even though it's a terrible book, I still can't do that to it.
I pulled the book out of my carryon and opened it, the bookmark lying on the ground in front of me. I scanned the page I had been on last month, but I didn't even remember which character was the protagonist. Third person omniscient. It actually does work for sections of some books, but not exactly when the book in question has a boring subject anyway. Or if it's written entirely that way, unless the author is good. Which is not the case with ... Penelope Jones.
I'm probably going to have to start from the beginning again. Whoopdedoo. I sighed as I flipped back to chapter one.
Someone tapped my shoulder. I looked up to see a random guy that apparently liked brown a lot. "Can I help you?" I probably sounded annoyed, but honestly I couldn't be happier. The book really sucked.
He was staring at the bookmark. "Did you draw that?" Slightly confused, I nodded. "Do you know what it is?"
"Not really. I was bored, so I drew a pepper shaker."
His face immediately turned from a brick wall to something that could almost be described as a holding back a smile. "Minus the whisk and plunger, th- it does kind of look like one, yeah." He paused, looking at the book I had mostly closed. "A Fellowship of Bees." I nodded again. "Is it good?"
I laughed. "Trust me, no. It's nothing like Harry Potter. Or anything else I like."
"Have you read the last one yet?"
"Oh my god, yes." Harry Potter ties for first place with Mortal Instruments. "Do you want to sit down?" I gestured to a seat next to me, somehow still empty twenty minutes before boarding. That's a bit weird.
"Yeah, why not." He started to sit down. "Just sort of…came here. Not really quite sure why. I don't have to be anywhere, though."
"Yeah, I probably should have asked that earlier." I looked down to put the bookmark on my page. "What's your favorite Hou– What are you doing?" He'd started waving a useless and frankly annoying buzzing blue flashlight in my face.
He put it away. "Just…a thing."
"Very specific." I'd started smiling. God, I'm never going to get back to that book. "Oh, I'm Kate. Thomas, as in Dean. Gryffindor's pretty cool."
"The Doctor."
"Okay, that is so not an actual name."
He sighed. "My parents were odd."
"I get that. Mine barely let me come here by myself, and I'm about to become a senior. High school, not college, though. I can sort of see their point. Never mind about the part I said they were different." I paused. "Guessing you don't like to be called The."
"The article is only when you're talking about me."
"Okay." We sort of stopped talking, staring into the distance. Not really exactly sure why. I mean, we literally just learned each other's names.
We were like that for about thirty seconds before the Doctor stood up abruptly. I looked up at his face to see it slightly panicked. "Doc-" I cut myself off. The sound of metal hitting carpet was coming straight from the tunnel.
His face turned grim as the first row became visible. "Yeah. Them. They're called-"
"Cybermen." Now I was standing too. Don't really remember that, but okay.
The Doctor started staring at me.
"What?"
"How did you know that?"
"Know what?" I literally have no idea what's going on right now.
"You said their name."
I gave him a blank face. "No, I didn't."
"Just now. You said they're called Cybermen."
"Maybe you misheard me?" I took a breath. "Weird name, though. Kind of too descriptive. Davros gave Daleks a cooler one."
"How do you know about him?" Who? "And what was that about not knowing what you were drawing earlier?"
He pulled me behind a pillar and began waving the buzzing flashlight in my face again.
I swatted it away, getting slightly angry now. "I don't!"
"You just said –"
"No, I didn't!" I took a deep breath, trying to stop the slightly hysterical tone. No idea why that happened, but I had to stop talking to him. "You know what? You're crazy. Bye."
I was lying.
I just met him, and I trust him more than people I've known for years.
I need to get away.
I went about a step before the Doctor grabbed my hand. "Kate, that's not exactly a good idea."
I began to turn around again. "Oh, yeah? And why –"
"Mommy!" The little boy in the Iron Man shirt had finished his tantrum about the ice cream.
I hadn't noticed that everyone had stopped talking.
There's no way this is actually a joke. Nobody would hijack a plane just for fun. They would probably get the death penalty after 9/11.
The little kid continued with "Why are those Iron Men gray?" His voice was easy to hear in the dead silence that surrounded the gate, except for the rhythmic, synchronized metallic stomping – that suddenly quieted.
The robot at the head of the line had reached the head of the tunnel. As it raised its arm, the Doctor let go of my hand and slowly put his flashlight thing in his pocket. Thank God for that. As he cautiously stepped from behind the pillar, the robot jerkily raised its right arm. "You…" – a gun slowly pushed itself out - "will…"
"It's been a while, hello!" The Doctor stepped out from behind the pillar. I followed (no what the hell am I doing there are guns why am doing this) as the mother picked up her son, evidently too terrified to run away. The rest of the robots had their guns trained on the people near the gate.
The robot started turning loudly and urgently, but slowly, to us. "You… are… the… Doc…tor." Even the voice was slower than it should have been. Cybermen do have more robotic voices than humans, but not normally comparable to snails. That's the one thing snails kept. Their speed, or lack of it.
"Yep, I am." He took the flashlight thing out of his pocket again. "Something wrong with your vocal synthesizer?" He made the annoying noise again. "Or maybe… it's your entire body." He buzzed the flashlight near his ear. "Sulfuric residue. Normally wouldn't be any problem to your systems, but my screwdriver's picking up some strange signals…." He started tapping the -.
That thing doesn't remotely resemble a screwdriver. No pointy ends. Whatever. I feel like calling it that now. Screwdriver. Actually, it would be pretty much useless as a flashlight.
The Doctor let out a laugh I was almost certain sounded a bit happy. "Sentient sulfur?" He was grinning. "That's brilliant!" Yeah, he was happy. Good for him. Exactly how often does he do this stuff?
"Okay, the sulfur's sentient. Not a huge deal." I looked at the Doctor. "Maybe focus on the homicidal Cyberman from Victorian London?"
He frowned at me. "Why'd you say it's from Victorian London?"
"Didn't." I looked at his face again. "Like I said, Cyberman. Gun. Maybe we can talk about this later?" He was about to object. "Later."
The Doctor dropped it. Thank you.
"Sub…ject… des…ig…nat…"
"Seriously, is there any way you can fix the problem with your voice?" The Doctor furrowed his brows at me.
"What? A snail could easily leave it in the dust."
"…ed… as… ir…" I rolled my eyes. "…re…le…vent." The Cyberman pointed the gun back at the crowd, towards an older guy in a suit.
Who began to run half a second before the gun fired.
There was an explosion of noise as the other Cybermen did the same.
And another as thirty bodies crumpled to the floor.
The Cybermen began marching again.
Kate Thomas
I darted away. Go straight. I need to find the TARDIS. Left. The Doctor was following me. Good. Right. "Burst of huon energy should stop their mechanics from functioning!" I yelled behind me. Right. It's not really the human controlling the suit; it's the suit controlling the human. Either way, the suits are too heavy for any humanoid to move in them. Left. Not enough air inside the helmet, either. Disabling the suit should do it. I stopped running.
Ow. What the hell? That shouldn't have been enough sound to give me a headache. Oh my god. The sound. I don't remember how I got here. Everyone there got killed, and I just ran away? Did I run? I'm breathing hard, I probably ran.
Footsteps came up from behind me. Not clanging ones, thankfully. I turned to my right, where the footsteps had stopped. The Doctor was sonicing the locked Employees Only door. He burst in and went inside to see… apparently, a blue wooden box. Random.
The Doctor pulled a key out of the front of his suit and unlocked the box. Or not random. He went inside without any explanation. I opened the door behind him, expecting to see a wall three feet away. That didn't happen. More like twenty than three. Good. No, not good. I've still got a headache. It should be pretty much over by now.
Whatever. I walked into the box/room.
The Doctor was standing at the base of the weird glowing pillar – console – at the center, fiddling with buttons. He purposefully walked to another section and pressed more that activated huon particle dispersal over the radius of one mile. "Mind saying what you're doing? Sorry, I suck with technology."
"Trying to activate a system that will wipe out their mechanics." His voice was set and the coldest I'd ever heard come out of anyone's mouth. He reached for a lever. "Pull this and they'll hopefully drop dead."
"Perfect." Images from the gate flashed in front of my eyes. "Do it now before they kill anyone else."
He nodded and yanked it. Immediately, a golden shock wave released and pulsed through the console. It passed through the walls of the TARDIS cleanly, without breaking anything. As the wave parted around me, the screaming I hadn't even realized was outside stopped.
The Doctor turned away from the console and walked out the door, back into the main body of the airport. I stayed and called my parents. Unless the Cybermen shot out the cameras, people would know about something like this. They already didn't want me here, and they're probably never going to let me out of the house again, but they still need to know I'm not dead. If they're even awake. It's what, four a.m. back in California? I'll probably get the answering machine. They still prefer the house phone over their cells. Can't imagine why, though.
"Hello." Yep. Answering machine. "You have reached 1 (650) 412-8306." They seriously need to shorten this automated thing. "Please leave a message after – " A crackle of static cut it off. "This number is no longer available. Please confirm that this is the number you want to call and try again."
I checked my phone. Yeah, right number. I opened settings and was trying to figure out the problem when the Doctor came back in, apparently satisfied that the Cybermen were gone but sad about all the dead people. I'd probably punch those Cybermen if I wouldn't break my hand doing it. Or if it had any point. They wouldn't exactly be able to feel it anyway.
The Doctor glanced at my phone. "What's wrong with it?"
"I was trying to call my parents when my phone stopped working."
He pulled the screwdriver out again and buzzed it at my phone. "No. This end doesn't have any problems..."
"You said this end," I said flatly.
He pulled up the last call made and listened to the last half second. I didn't want to know what was causing that expression. "The other must have been smashed."
They're dead.
Ending might be a little bit of an overreaction….or maybe not. It's Kate. She's weird.
If you liked this chapter, please review and follow. If you don't have an account or you don't feel like signing in, it would mean a lot to me if you would review. Even if it's to tell me that my logic doesn't make sense or I'm a terrible writer (though if you think that, please tell me why so this can improve). It'll mean that people are actually reading this and I will probably smile.
Chapter Word Count: 2,337.
Overall Word Count: 2,337.