Attack of the Sciuridae
DISCLAIMER: I do not, repeat not, own Doctor Who. *cries* I honestly don't really know who exactly owns all the copyrights to Doctor Who – possibly the BBC – but it's definitely not me!
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The Doctor and Rose bolted down the corridor.
"Doctor! ...Doctor, help! I can't keep up, they're –"
"Don't you dare fall behind, Rose! Don't you dare!"
"No, I –"
"I do not want a repeat performance –"
"It –"
"– of what happened in Van Statten's museum –"
"But I can't –"
"I've lost you too many times, Rose Tyler –"
"Argh!"
"– and that is so like you – in fact all women – you never listen to instructions, never! And that boyfriend of yours –"
"Doctor!"
"– if you people don't clean up your act you'll be left behind once too often –"
"Doctor!"
"– and so help me I'll –"
"DOCTOR!" This last remark was followed by a panicked – and frustrated – scream.
"– get myself a – oh, what is it now?! You humans –" He glanced over his shoulder and screeched to a halt.
Swarming over Rose's ankles was an army's worth of the very beings they had been running from. "I can't exactly sprint with these hanging on!" she gasped.
Brandishing his sonic screwdriver, the Doctor promptly proceeded to kick at the furry little menaces hugging Rose's ankles. Little brown aliens went flying down the hallway, each bouncing several times before fleeing in the direction that the Doctor and Rose had just come from.
Soon Rose's legs were again alien-free, and they raced on.
"Why couldn't you just have used your sonic screwdriver to get them off me?" Rose panted as the Doctor opened the next door with that very tool.
He said nothing and they raced down the next corridor.
"Really!" Rose exclaimed. They paused at the next doorway while the Doctor unlocked it. "Why not? You kicked me in the ankles more than once and it hurt!"
The door clicked open and he spun to face her. "I could have used the sonic screwdriver to disrupt their brainwaves and stun them, yes, but I didn't because quite honestly I enjoy kicking those furry little –" he cussed, speaking at about the speed of sound. "They're worse than the Daleks! I mean, the Daleks are at least worthy of fighting – these things are barely even intelligent enough to hold a weapon! And I'd really like to know where the hell they got their horrible little paws on those laser guns! Argh!"
Rose looked at him thoughtfully. "Have you ever considered a career as a professional motor-mouth?"
Suddenly they both whipped around – high-pitched chittering and the buzzing of laser guns burning through locks could be heard several corridors away.
"Actually I probably should've used my sonic screwdriver – kicking them will only have made them angry and now they've gone and fetched reinforcements. And they'll have weapons this time. Blimey!" He yanked Rose through the door and re-locked it with his sonic screwdriver.
"What now, then?" Rose sighed. The Doctor gave her a pointed look. She rolled her eyes in response. "Oh, right. Run."
Several doors and many hallways later, Rose asked, "Are we near the TARDIS yet?"
"What is it with you humans? 'Are we there yet?' What do you think this is, a holiday?"
"We didn't go this far on the way in! You're not lost, are you?"
"Of course I'm not lost! That way." The Doctor pointed to the right.
"Oh really? We're looking for the TARDIS, right? Well, there it is." Rose pointed to the left, where the TARDIS could be seen through the glass porthole on a door twenty metres down the hall.
Without another word the Doctor turned around and ran to the door. He pulled out his sonic screwdriver and started unlocking it, but abruptly the little blue sonic light faltered and went out. He swore. "I knew I should've charged the batteries before we came here! I knew it!"
"You mean to say that thing runs on batteries? Batteries?!?" Rose screeched. The sounds of pursuit were getting closer by the second. "What happened to alien technology? Surely your only weapon – and it's not even a weapon – should run on something that doesn't just run out at the very moment we need it most? Now we're going to be fried by a pack of s–"
"Why does the door have to be at that particular angle?" The Doctor was oblivious to Rose's ranting. "It's facing away from their direction so they can't just melt it with their lasers by accident –"
At that moment a whole platoon of the tiny creatures came around the corner. Almost all of them were armed, struggling to hold up laser pistols – regular for a human, but nearly twice their size – and despite their slightly ridiculous appearance, they were still potentially deadly.
"Doctor?!" Rose cried.
He looked around wildly, then his eyes lit up and he smashed his fist into the glass cabinet of trophies standing beside the door. He swiftly extracted a huge wooden trophy shield from the shards, the sort completely covered in little bronze plaques engraved with prize-winners' names. "Get behind me!" he shouted.
Rose scrambled to do as she was told. "What are you going to do with that?" she said as soon as she was sheltered behind him.
"What is this, Rose?"
"Um, a trophy shield?"
"Exactly. Now sh–"
The first laser gun went off, its red beam burning a hole in the wall metres from them.
"Hmmm, they can't aim very well. That's bad," the Doctor mused.
"Bad? How is that bad?"
The Doctor just rolled his eyes. "Oi! You over there! Yes, you, with the guns! Is that the best you can do? We're over here! Now give us your best shot!"
Suddenly the hallway was lit up by red laser rays, striking the ceiling, the walls – and rebounding off the little plaques on the trophy shield the Doctor held... right onto the locked door the TARDIS stood behind.
Discarding the shield, the Doctor threw himself at the door, his weight forcing it open. Dodging the lasers, Rose threw herself through the doorway and landed on top of the Doctor, her knee crunching into his stomach. He huffed, winded, and mouthed, "Open the TARDIS! Now!"
Rose fumbled with the keys, opened the TARDIS doors and helped the Doctor stumble inside. She slammed the doors shut just as they were assaulted with laser beams.
She leaned her back against the inside of the doors and slid to the floor with a sigh. This brought her to the same level as the Doctor, who was just getting his breath back.
They took one look at each other and burst out laughing.
"We just –" gasped Rose in between fits of mirth, "– nearly got killed – by a horde of – of squirrels!" She collapsed into another fit of giggles.
The Doctor roared with laughter, tears of amusement in his eyes. "God, I hate those squirrels."
Author's note: In case anybody was wondering, the term Sciuridae from the title is the scientific name for the squirrel family. XD Massive amounts of cookies to Noofle, who not only is just generally awesome but helped me with the idea for this story, and beta'd it. Thank you. You rock. ;D And so does anyone else who R&Rs! So review cuz you know you want to! :D