The Doctor was seething in the elevator, glaring at Van Statten and several guards. They had one of the most dangerous creatures in the universe down there and the man refused to see reason… "The metal's just battle armour. The real Dalek creature is inside."
"What does it look like?" the American asked, greed visible in his eyes.
"A nightmare," the Doctor bit out "It's a mutation. The Dalek race was genetically engineered. Every single emotion was removed except hate."
Van Statten raised an eyebrow "Genetically engineered. By whom?"
"By a genius, Van Statten," the Time Lord pointed out "By a man who was king of his own little world. You'd like him."
That was when Goddard stepped in "It's been on Earth for over fifty years. Sold at private auctions together with the other alien, moving from one collection to another. Why would it be a threat now?"
"Because I'm here," the Doctor sighed grimly, not giving another thought to the other alien for the moment. It wasn't as if they could be as dangerous as the Dalek. He would take care of it later "How did it get to Earth? Does anyone know?"
"The records say it came from the sky like a meteorite," Goddard explained "They fell to Earth on the Ascension Islands. Burnt in the crater for three days before anybody could get near them and all that time the Dalek was screaming. It must have gone insane."
The Doctor closed his eyes "It must have fallen through time. The only survivor."
"You talked about a war?" the woman questioned curiously.
"The Time War," the Time Lord nodded "The final battle between my people and the Dalek race."
Van Statten looked at the Doctor sharply "But you survived, too."
"Not by choice."
"That means that the Dalek and my little project aren't the only aliens on Earth," the rich American smirked "Doctor, there's you. The only one of your kind in existence."
After Van Statten said that, everything happened pretty quickly. They arrived on a floor where the Doctor was immediately grabbed and restrained. The Time Lord was standing shirtless in front of Van Statten, his arms chained to the ceiling.
"No, smiley," the man grinned, running a painful laser down the Doctor's body "Two heart?" he questioned disappointed "You're just like the other one then…"
The Doctor's head snapped up "The other one?" There was a Time Lord here? He wasn't the only one of his species anymore? Why couldn't he feel them in his head?
"My other specimen has two heart… Binary vascular system… Nothing I can patent here," Van Statten sighed in disappointment.
The Doctor subtly tested the chains but they held strong. He grimaced and glared at Van Statten in disgust "So that's your secret, then? You don't just collect this stuff, you scavenge it."
"This technology has been falling to Earth for centuries," Van Statten pointed out, sounding like a kid at Christmas "All it took was the right mind to use it properly. Oh, the advances I've made from alien junk. You have no idea, Doctor. Broadband? Roswell. Just last year my scientists cultivated bacteria from the Russian crater and do you know what we found? The cure for the common cold. Kept it strictly within the laboratory of course. No need to get people excited. Why sell one cure when I can sell a thousand palliatives?"
The Doctor barely held onto his rage. Not only had he found out that there was a Time Lord here, he also found a Dalek who had been treated horribly. In what state would his kin be? He had to get out of here. One way or another "Do you know what a Dalek is, Van Statten? A Dalek is honest. It does what it was born to do for the survival of its species. That creature in your dungeon is better than you."
"In that case…" Van Statten murmured "I'll be true to myself and continue." While he didn't need to do it, the man found a certain… enjoyment out of using his machine on humans. Especially when he was trying to get the other one to talk. Neither of the aliens in his possession had talked as much as this Doctor did. Actually, the smaller one didn't talk at all. It had also been quite a few months since he heard any sound from her. Only Simmons and a few guards were aware of this alien. If Goddard knew… Van Statten shuddered. He didn't want to fire the woman. She was good at what she was doing, so it would be a shame to fire her for standing up to the specimen.
"Listen to me," the Doctor shouted "That thing downstairs is going to kill every last one of us."
Van Statten scoffed "Nothing can escape the Cage." He blasted the Doctor with the laser again, enjoying the grunt… It wasn't quite enough though. The man wanted the alien to scream…
"But it's woken up," the Time Lord insisted "It knows I'm here. It's going to get out. Van Statten, I swear, no one on this base is safe. No one on this planet!" He screamed and his knees gave out for a short moment when the laser was once again run over his body.
Suddenly, an alarm started ringing through the room and a voice quickly followed "Condition Red! Condition Red! I repeat this is not a drill!"
"Release me if you want to live," the Doctor spoke up, remarkably calm considering the Dalek was probably about to kill all of them. They hurried to the office they had been in before, viewing the scene in the Cage on a large wall TV "You've got to keep it in that cell."
Rose turned to the monitor, tears in her voice "Doctor, it's all my fault."
"I've sealed the compartment," the guard explained, throwing an annoyed glance at the blonde "It can't get out. That lock's got a billion combinations."
The Doctor frowned at the screen "A Dalek is a genius. It can calculate a thousand billion combinations in one second flat." He watched as the Dalek slowly breached the Cage and turned to Van Statten "Bring the second alien here."
"Why would I?" the man questioned.
"Because if they die then you don't have to worry about the Dalek," the Doctor spat "Because I will hunt you down and kill you."
Goddard looked at her boss, a look of thinly veiled disgust on her face. She turned to the guards at the door "Get the other one up here. Hurry!"
They nodded and jogged off, towards the second cell. Every guard had heard stories about the other alien but almost no one had ever seen her. Some said that she was horribly disfigured or even a monster. What they saw though, shocked them to the core. There, in the cell was a little girl, no older than six or seven with tangled light brown hair. Her short dress was a faded – almost grey – white. Martins, the younger of the two men stepped forward cautiously "Hey, are you alright?" The child didn't react, just kept staring at her hands blankly "Oh, God," he breathed, looking at his colleague who looked equally as sick. How could Van Statten do something like this? Torturing a metal pepper pot was one thing but this? This was a child…
"Come on," Curtis sighed, kneeling down by the small child. He carefully reached out, making sure not to look threatening. It didn't work. The girl flinched once he touched her but didn't struggle. She was so light… Now that he had her in his arms, he saw a metal ring around her head and stunning greenish blue eyes.
The two guards hurried back to their boss' office with their precious cargo in tow. Once they were there, Martins opened the door, holing it open for Curtis to walk through. They saw the strange man look up, an angry look in his eyes.
The Doctor whirled around, glaring at Van Statten harshly "A child? You kept a child locked up in a Cage?"
"It's alien," the man cried out, stumbling back several steps.
"She is a child, no matter the species." The guard who had carried the little one had carefully placed her on a chair, stepping back to the door "Are you alright, little one?" When she didn't reply, he tried again, this time in the language of his people "Are you alright?"
The girl's head snapped up, revealing the silver band to the Doctor who hissed in annoyance. Mental dampeners? They put mental dampeners on her? It was no wonder that he couldn't feel her… "You – speak?" she croaked hoarsely, staring up at him with wide eyes.
"Yes. Are you hurt? What's your name?" the Doctor questioned. His thoughts were whirling around in his mind, the Dalek forgotten for the moment. A Time Tot… The man had locked up and tortured a Time Tot. Oh, he better be glad that the Doctor was the only one left. And even so, he might not survive this encounter… It was a crime to hurt a child on Gallifrey as they were so precious.
The girl shrugged and shook her head. She couldn't remember her name at all. Had she ever had one? The memories of her life before all of the hurt were vague and blurry. She only remembered the Dalek. How it had taken her to this planet…
"How old are you?" the Doctor tried again.
The Time Tot tilted her head lightly "I – I don't know… I think I was five when the Dalek took me here…"
"Five?" the Doctor inquired. That would make her fifty-five years old now. It would fit… Until their fifth birthday Time Tots matured like humans but after that, they would age a year every twenty-five. She looked to be around seven, maybe a bit younger due to the mistreatment she experienced.
"She talks?" Van Statten called out from behind the Time Lord "What language is that?"
"None of your business now, is it?" the Doctor snapped "You will pay for this. She's just a child…"
Goddard glared at her boss before kneeling down next to the girl, a glass of water in her hand "Here." The woman held it out, waiting for the girl to take it. When she didn't, Goddard looked up at the Doctor, sadness in her eyes "Can you get her to drink it?"
"It's just water, little one. Try and drink a bit… I have to deal with this situation first and then we'll get you checked out. Deal?"
The girl nodded lightly and reached out a shaking had to grab the glass. It almost slipped through her weak fingers when Goddard was about to let go, so the older woman held onto it, helping the girl as much as she could.
"I thought you were the great expert, Doctor," Van Statten sneered "If you're so impressive, then why not just reason with this Dalek? It must be willing to negotiate. There must be something it needs. Everything needs something."
The Doctor narrowed his eyes at the man. He was really starting to piss him off, not only because of the Time Tot, no… Because he was being completely unreasonable and many of his men had died already "What's the nearest town?"
"Salt Lake City."
"Population?" the Doctor asked.
Van Statten frowned at the odd question "One million."
"All dead," the Time Lord pointed out "If the Dalek gets out, it'll murder every living creature. That's all it needs."
Van Statten's eyes widened "But why would it do that?"
"Because it honestly believes they should die. Human beings are different and anything different is wrong." The Doctor looked at the small Tot and smiled when he saw her napping on the chair. Oh, he didn't doubt that she was aware of who and what was going on around her but the girl was just too cute "It's the ultimate in racial cleansing and you, Van Statten, you've let it loose! The Dalek is surrounded by a force field. The bullets are melting before they even hit home but it's not indestructible." The Time Lord turned to look at the monitor which wasn't showing anything at the moment "If you concentrate your fire, you might get through. Aim for the dome, the head, the eyepiece. That's the weak spot."
"Thank you, Doctor, but I think I know how to fight one single tin robot. Positions!" The men took cover behind various corners, packing cases and up on a catwalk. It was then that Rose and the boy – Adam – ran into view "Hold your fire. You two, get the hell out of there." The Dalek entered, looking around. Suddenly, the picture returned in the office, making the three adults stand up straighter.
"We've got vision," Goddard remarked from her place close to the little girl.
The Doctor nodded grimly "It wants us to see." The hail of bullets seemed to not affect the Dalek at all. It just started to rise straight up into the air. It zapped the fire alarm and the sprinklers were set off. Once the concrete floor was completely covered with a layer of water, it fired down and electrocuted every person on the ground.
"Fall back," the Commander shouted "Fall back." The Dalek fired another shot, this time killing all of the other men who were still on the walkway.
Van Statten was silent for a moment, staring at the screen in horror "Perhaps it's time for a new strategy. Maybe we should consider abandoning this place."
"Except there's no power to the helipad, sir," Goddard pointed out "We can't get out."
"Then we could seal the vault," the Doctor spoke up. He really didn't want the Dalek anywhere near the humans or the Tot. Of course, she was more important. The Time Lord could barely wait until he could get her into the Tardis for a checkup… The mental dampeners were going to hurt to remove… Depending on how long she had been wearing them, they could even lead to a seizure until the brainwaves calmed down again. Hopefully, they could avoid that though.
Van Statten blinked "It was designed to be a bunker in the event of nuclear war. Steel bulkheads."
"There's not enough power," Goddard said again "Those bulkheads are massive."
"We've got emergency power," the Doctor pointed out "We can re-route that to the bulkhead doors."
Goddard shook her head "We'd have to bypass the security codes. That would take a computer genius."
"Good thing you've got me, then," Van Statten called out.
The Doctor turned to him with a raised eyebrow "You want to help?"
"I don't want to die, Doctor," the man declared "Simple as that. And nobody knows this software better than me."
Goddard cleared her throat "Sir." She pointed to the monitor.
The Dalek was back on the ground by now "I shall speak only to the Doctor."
"You're going to get rusty," the Time Lord called out.
"I fed off the DNA of Rose Tyler. Extrapolating the biomass of a time traveler regenerated me."
The Doctor scoffed "What's your next trick?"
"I have been searching for the Daleks… I scanned your satellites and radio telescopes. Nothing. Where shall I get my orders now?"
The Time Lord smirked lightly "You're just a soldier without commands."
"Then I shall follow the Primary Order, the Dalek instinct to destroy, to conquer."
"What for?" the Doctor demanded "What's the point? Don't you see it's all gone? Everything you were, everything you stood for."
"Then what should I do?" the Dalek questioned sullenly.
The Doctor thought for a moment. It was worth a try, wasn't it? "Alright, then. If you want orders, follow this one. Kill yourself."
"The Daleks must survive," the Dalek cried out.
"The Daleks have failed," the Doctor spat "Why don't you finish the job and make the Daleks extinct. Rid the universe of your filth. Why don't you just die?"
The pepper pot looked at the camera for a moment "You would make a good Dalek." Then the screen went black.
The Doctor stared at his reflection emotionlessly "Seal the Vault."
"I can leech power off the ground defenses, feed it to the bulkhead. God, it's been years since I had to work this fast," Van Statten grinned gleefully.
"Are you enjoying this?" the Doctor asked incredulously. He checked on the little one again and was pleased to see her eyes still closed. From the little he could feel from her, she was alright if a bit scared around the two humans… Van Statten especially.
Goddard cut in again "Doctor, she's still down there."
"Right," the Time Lord nodded, grabbing a phone from the desk. He quickly dialed Rose's number and waited for her to answer "Where are you?" He listened for a moment "You've got to keep moving. The vault's being sealed off up at level forty-six… I'm the one who's closing them. I can't wait and I can't help you. Now for God's sake, run."
"Done it," Van Statten exclaimed "We've got power to the bulkheads."
Goddard frowned at the computer worriedly "The Dalek's right behind them."
"Doctor, I can't sustain the power… The whole system is failing," Van Statten spoke up "Doctor, you've got to close the bulkheads."
"I'm sorry," the Time Lord whispered into the phone. He hit the enter key and the bulkheads started to lower.
"The vault is sealed," the American announced.
That started the Doctor into motion again "Rose, where are you? Rose, did you make it?" He listened for a bit before he lowered the phone in horror "I killed her."
"I'm sorry," Van Statten murmured.
"I said I'd protect her. She was only here because of me and you're sorry? I could've killed that Dalek in its cell but you stopped me," the Doctor ranted.
Van Statten held up his hands "It was the prize of my collection. Much better than… her."
"Your collection?" the Doctor spat "But was it worth it? Worth all those men's deaths? Worth Rose? Let me tell you something, Van Statten. Mankind goes into space to explore, to be part of something greater."
"Exactly," the man nodded "I wanted to touch the stars."
The Doctor shook his head "You just want to drag the stars down and stick them underground, underneath tons of sand and dirt and label them. You're about as far from the stars as you can get. And you took her down with you. She was nineteen years old." The Time Lord went over to the girl and knelt down next to her. He gently brushed her tangled hair out of her eyes and smiled when she looked up at him "How are you doing?"
"Scared," she admitted quietly. Her voice sounded a lot better after the glass of water she had earlier "Is the Dalek free now?"
"Yes," the Doctor murmured, pulling her into his arms when she started shaking "Don't worry. I will protect you."
The girl shook her head almost violently "The Dalek killed my mother. It was going to kill me, I think… Something happened and then I hurt. It was burning so badly… Who are you?"
"Oh, I'm sorry… I'm the Doctor," he replied with a small smile.
The girl frowned "Doctor? I – I think my parents talked about you before."
"What were their names?"
"I – I don't remember," she admitted quietly "There's lots of stuff that I don't remember now…"
It was then that Adam burst through the door. The Doctor stood up with the girl on his hip "You were quick on your feet, leaving Rose behind."
"I'm not the one who sealed the vault," the boy argued.
The Dalek appeared on the screen and the girl tugged at the Doctor's collar, pointing in that direction "Open the bulkhead or Rose Tyler dies…"
"You're alive," the Doctor sighed in relief.
Rose smiled shakily "Can't get rid of me."
"What use are emotions if you will not save the woman you love?" the Dalek demanded, making the Doctor frown. Since when do Daleks know anything about love? Also… he didn't love Rose. She was his companion… Sure, she was nice and compassionate but that was it.
"I killed her once," he sighed, looking down at the frightened girl apologetically "I'm sorry." He hit the key and the bulkhead opened, making the two trapped walk through.
Van Statten whirled to the Doctor "What do we do now, you bleeding heart. What the hell do we do?"
"Kill it when it gets here," Adam suggested.
Goddard sighed "All the guns are useless and the alien weapons are in the vault."
Adam smiled crookedly "Only the catalogued ones."
The Doctor jumped on the opportunity "I'll get her to safety first. Then we'll look for weapons." The Time Lord quickly made his way to where the Tardis was parked and set the Tot down in the console room "I need you to wait here for me. I promise it won't take long and then we'll look after you." The girl nodded quickly, settling back onto the captain's seat comfortably. The Doctor looked up at the console "Make sure she's okay. Maybe you could do something about her understanding English?" The Tardis gave an excited hum "Yeah, I know. I wouldn't have expected a Time Tot here in all places either… I have to go now though. Just… Take care of her." With that, the Time Lord hurried out of the door. He had a Dalek to kill and a world to save.