Chapter 1 - The Temperature Rises

The thing about airports, or space stations for that matter, was the anonymity. You could be anyone, or no-one. Smith. Alpha. Nemo. You could drift in or out without being noticed. After all, drifting in and out was exactly what everybody else was doing.

Airports had something that space stations lacked though. At least space stations like this one. Geographical ambiguity. Or more precisely, astronomical. Back in those old Earth One 20th century airports you could have been anywhere: India, France, Scotland, Australia. When you stepped out of those doors you could be anyone, do anything. They felt like neutral territory. The problem with 47th century space stations was all the glass. Aside from the galvanized metal and plastopolygold decoration, there were too many transparent surfaces. All you had to do was turn your head too far in any direction and you'd see you were in the Crab Nebula and the whole game was spoiled. Yes it was pretty, and swirly. Yes it inspired some very beautiful poetry. But where was the mystery, the intrigue?

To make matters worse, it was really hot in here.

"Customer announcement," a metallic, slighty Brummie accent clanged overhead, "we regret to inform you that due to essential maintenance works on the principal ventilation, we are using the emergency air supply. As this supply is not refrigerated, we are having to source alternative cooling strategies. We apologise for the inconvenience, and thank you for your understanding."

That explained it. Oh the joys of low grade recycled air.

Loosening his tie, the Doctor wandered over to the benches by Arrivals, sitting himself down to watch. People, as is usual in Arrivals, were arriving. From all over space people were coming home or beginning a new adventure. It felt good to see them. Parents and children. Siblings. Lovers. Friends. People reconnecting. Not just human, but Pacifist Chelonian, Hath and even some off-duty Judoon. In a life with so many goodbyes…well…it was nice to see a few hellos from time to time.

The only problem, he thought, as he watched the umpteenth couple snogging as if their lives depended on it, was that it got a bit samey. It felt, in the way it only could if you'd recently lost…well it felt a little bit like they were rubbing his nose in it.

This heat was getting unbearable, surely they should be doing something about it? He remembered seeing a stand for those refrigerated gel pots over in Departures, and headed back. He bought blue. He had a particular fondness for blue. Using the miniature spade he found in the top of the lid he scooped up a minute mouthful and plopped it onto his tongue. Disappointing. Half jelly, half ice pop, and not really as good as either. Refreshing, but then a dip in a polluted river could be refreshing on a cold day, it didn't mean you wanted one. He moved towards a group of people clustering around a vent, hands buried deep in his suit pockets, when it occurred to him that it wasn't just the heat that was getting to him.

"There's something in the air." He murmured, sniffing deeply. "An energy trace…Strange, but strangely familiar." He licked his lips, unaware that he was being stared at. "But where's it coming from?" He leant forward, sniffing at the vent. "Recycled…the vents aren't the source." He spun on his heels, searching the room, fixing on the point of origin. "Well, well, well." He muttered, heading over to the window.

***

The screenpapers these days were utterly incomprehensible.

MULDOON AND REVERENCE COMMENCE TALKS

Commander Poon Muldoon is to convene with The Mighty Reverence Glubula Gubul for urgent Peace talks regarding the Third Wave frequency regulations of Kofornil Alpha Sept...

How were you supposed to know what was going on when you didn't recognise any of the names? Must have been a regional thing. Stupid Crab Nebula. At the bottom of the page was an advert which, at the moment she looked at it, expanded to fill the whole page.

Get away from it all this Vacational Season!

She smirked. It might have been reading her mind. In fact…her eyes widened…it probably was.

"You again! I might have known."

The voice froze her to her seat. Her eyes fixed blankly to the screenpaper, unaware of its changing message.

Relive the memories in the Milky Way.

Her fingers gripped the paper so hard that it began to crackle angrily.

The voice continued, sitting down beside her. "Everywhere I go! Well not everywhere, but a significant enough portion of the time for it to be more than a co-incidence, you keep turning up! That cut's healed well by the way."

She didn't look at him, continued to stare at the fizzing paper. "Please go away." She muttered, fearfully. "Please just leave me alone before something happens."

"That's just it, isn't it?" The Doctor leant back in his seat, looking up at the ceiling. "Every time I run into you something seems to be going on."

Now she looked at him, her dark eyes flashing angrily. "Every time you see me? You mean every time I see you! Everywhere you are things go wrong and people get hurt! You seem to enjoy it."

"Enjoy it? Look here I'm the one trying to save everyone." He replied angrily, the air thick with the rising heat, stale. "And anyway, if I remember rightly the only person laughing on that boat was you!"

"What boat?" He watched her tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, her eyes flashing with fear and anger. "You're mental, and I just want you to leave me alone before I end up being the one that gets hurt!"

As the Doctor opened his mouth to speak he was interrupted by a strange noise. A man pushing a cleaning trolley had stumbled, hand at his throat. The Doctor sprang to his feet. "He's choking!" He shouted, turning back to look at the girl. "Get some help!" But the girl wasn't looking at him any more, she was looking to her left. He followed her eyes, and saw suddenly, as she did, that the man was not alone. Throughout the Terminal, people were stopping, coughing and spluttering, hyperventilating, collapsing. The girl got to her feet.

"What the hell is happening?" She rounded on the Doctor, panting. "What did you do?"

"What did I do?" The Doctor replied angrily. "Why aren't you choking like everyone else?"

The speakers clanged into life. "Customer announcement. We regret to inform you that our emergency air supply has failed, and that we are unable to reconnect our primary source because of its being currently under maintenance. We apologise for the resulting lack of oxygen to those who require it, and to those who do not require it, we apologise for the inconvenience of stepping over your fellow...err…ex-passengers. Thank you for your understanding."

"Fantastic!" The Doctor shouted at the speakers. "Bloody fantastic! They're all going to die and you thank them for their understanding?" He looked down at the man, shaking his head. He turned to see the girl moving slowly towards the Departure gate. He followed. "Don't think you're getting away from me young lady!" He grabbed her arm. "How the hell are you still breathing?" He pulled her round to face him, and was shocked as she nearly fell onto him. He watched, stunned, as she gasped for breath, sinking to her knees, eyes going out of focus.

"No!" He gripped her shoulders tightly. "No not you! You're not getting away like that!" But it was too late, her dead weight dragged them both to the floor, her face passing whiteness to a point where it was almost blue, her pupils dilating. Around him the oxygen independent life forms moved horrorstruck as their human companions lay dying, helpless to help lovers and friends. He had something they didn't however. He looked down at her, her innocent pale face and blueing lips. "Come on respiratory bypass." Tilting her head back and pinching her nose he sealed his lips over her own. If he could only keep her alive for as long as it took them to restore the air supply. Forcing his bypass to work overtime he converted stores of redundant compounds to release their oxygen which he forced out through his screaming lungs in five deep breaths. "Come on!" He shouted, at himself or her he wasn't sure as he threw off his jacket, one hand scrabbling to find her pulse. Nothing. Feeling her ribcage through her top, which if he'd had time to observe, he'd have noticed was decidedly similar to that being worn by the cleaning man, he placed his hands on top on each other over her heart and began to compress. "One. Two. Three. Four." All the way through to twenty before he returned to give her more oxygen. Minutes passed. Eventually he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"It's over, sir. Let her rest. The air isn't coming back." The words came from a tall, vivid green shelled Chelonian, surrounded by a group of smaller followers.

"No! I have to know, she can't just." Gently, clawed hands lifted him to his feet. "I'm the Doctor! I have to save her!" He struggled to remove himself from their grip. "I have to know what she is! She's not human!"

"Whatever she is," the Chelonian said, quietly, "she has died like one."

Suddenly, at their feet the girl began to cough, heaving deep breaths into her lungs as her eyes opened.

"I told you." The Doctor said, hiding his own shock. "Didn't I tell you?"

The girl scrambled into a sitting position, looking up at him in terror before turning her eyes to something touching her leg, the body of a middle-aged woman. She screamed, jumping to her feet, seeing the corpses littering the floor, stared at by the handful of people still standing. "What have you done?" She grabbed the Doctor by the collar as he was released by the Chelonian and his assistants. "What did you do?"

The lead Chelonian spoke. "As the Great Turtle is my witness, my lady, this being has saved your life. Even I, who have witnessed the miraculous gifts of our mighty shelled Creator, must confess myself astonished."

She stared at the long-limbed reptile, dumb-founded, panting in fear and panic. "What do you mean?"

The Doctor rolled his eyes. "There's no oxygen in the air. You can stop pretending to breathe."

She laughed sarcastically, paused, tried not breathing, and then laughed again. "You're mental." She said, and then turned on her tail and ran.

"Oh no you don't!" The Doctor hared after her.