Treena had never felt more scared in her life and this fear, together with an hour of running and fighting for her life had made her feel like a child again instead of the confident woman she'd been before today. She wanted to run to her mother and hide but she doubted there was anything left of her home now.
Fire and smoke filled the sky as more ships unleashed their weapons, destroying every bit of land they could find. Treena had climbed onto the roof to escape the smog, but she was out in the open and every moment she stopped to catch her breath made her vulnerable; at any moment she could be shot at.
Her feet slapped against the stones as she ran, jumping from rooftop to rooftop in an effort to get to the edge of town where there might be a chance of escaping. If she could cross the border and get to the wealthier towns, there might be hope of the soldiers coming to their aid. Their planet, Alcoron, was small and overpopulated so many were left to fend for themselves, living in the backlands and the sandy deserts whilst the more wealthy and skilled of their race lived in the central kingdom, where walls and weapons kept them safe. There would be military men and blacksmiths and lords skilled in combat; Trenna would beg them all to help her.
A blast suddenly caught her just as she was leaping onto the next roof, the force of it causing her to lose her footing and she fell backwards. Treena was too afraid to scream, knowing that her head would meet the ground at any moment.
In the next instance, however, she felt a pain in her arm as her hand was grabbed and pulled upwards, then two strong arms were holding her. When her rescuer had settled her back down onto solid ground, Treena finally opened her eyes and looked up to see a man with grey hair and stormy eyes staring down at her, his suit covered in muck and dust. His hands were gripping her so tightly it was as if he was afraid she'd evaporate, and it was only when he shook her that she realised he was speaking.
"...we've got to run, we're an easy target up here and those ships aren't going to stop bombing anytime soon." Though a moment ago she'd been flying along the rooftops without any thought, Treena was now frozen to the spot and was too afraid to move. Her near fall had shaken her so much that she now heard and felt everything going on around her that she'd managed to block out whilst she'd made her escape. The screaming broke every piece of her heart and the stench of death and blood made her want to throw up. The man shook her again before she could.
"Listen to me, you might be afraid, but think of how afraid you'll be if they catch you! You just have to run, I'm right here with you."
"I c-can't...I can't breathe." The smog was on her now, seeping into her lungs and making her eyes tear up. Treena tried to pull away from the man so that she could run and find somewhere small to hide, but he wouldn't let her go. Instead, he pulled them both down so that they were crouched out of sight and lifted her chin until they were making eye contact. The intensity of his gaze stopped all noise and chaos; suddenly all Treena could focus on was his voice.
"For five minutes I need you to believe that everything will be alright. After that, you can scream and shout, but for five minutes I want you to be brave, to trust me and to do as I say. Do you understand?" The words were spoken quietly but insistently; after that Treena knew this man would be the one to save her life.
Willing herself to keep calm and be brave, Treena kept hold of his hand and let the man pull her along the roof and over each ledge. He would catch her every time she tripped and in five minutes, just like he'd promised, they were climbing down from the last building on the edge of town. The border to the central kingdom was right in front of them but it wasn't that which stopped Treena in her tracks, it was the noise of the kingdom's spaceships flying overhead. The military had already arrived to help.
Treena watched as their superior ships shot down the enemy's but she couldn't find it in her to be relieved. Her home was destroyed and half of the people she knew were laying dead in the streets. The kingdom had come to help them because they couldn't risk the enemy moving on to destroy their lands, not because they cared about those who lived in poverty. They had sent fighters to be victorious in shooting down enemy ships but no medics or transportation for the villagers.
"Tomorrow the people of the kingdom will cheer for their soldiers and call them heroes because they stopped an attack before it destroyed their home. No one will know about our home. The bodies will be buried in the desert without gravestones and no one will ever know what happened to them. If you're not born in the kingdom, then you're invisible. Our dead will drift into the dust that they lived in."
It was the words her father had spoken in the previous attack, before this one. She'd asked him why the kingdom didn't protect them and that was what he told her. As Treena repeated those words she felt a hand on her shoulder; she had almost forgotten about the man who'd saved her.
He was looking towards the ships with anger and sorrow in his eyes, a look which didn't appear new to him. It was as if he was reliving something he'd experienced many times before.
"Those ships are stolen Snidral ships, piloted by robots instead of Snidrals. Your King of the kingdom wants his people to think that this is a Snidral attack so that he can then launch an attack on their planet, which has enough wealth and resources to make Alcoron the mightiest planet in the galaxy."
Treena withdrew her hand in shock. "You mean this is a planned attack to that our lord can attack an innocent race and become even richer?! We have to stop this, we have to tell someone!"
The man looked at her and shook his head, "there's nothing to be done. These are events that are fixed points in time; nothing here can be changed." The man stuck his hands in his pockets as if this was a casual conversation about the weather, then to her absolute horror, he began to walk away. Moments ago, Treena had believed this man was her hero and now he was leaving her in the middle of a war zone.
A stone was by her foot. Treena grabbed it and flung it at the man, satisfied when it hit him in the shoulder. "You absolute COWARD! I'm not walking away from my people or anyone else's, no matter what you say. If you want to leave, then don't come back. I'll stop the King myself." With that, she ran towards the border, determined to find medics and supplies to help rescue those still trapped in the battlefield.
.
The Doctor watched as the girl ran off and smiled sadly. It had been the TARDIS who'd brought him here and he hadn't known why until he'd saved the girl from falling off the roof. All it took was one look at the star-shaped birthmark by her right eye and he instantly knew who she was -Treena Balekly, the leader of a rebellion that stopped a genocide and exposed their King as the manipulative, murdering pirate that he was. The Treena Balekly he'd saved was a lot younger, at least five years away from becoming the heroine he knew her to be, but the events that were happening right now would help her on her path. He'd taken her to the edge of the border where she could see the destruction of her home, told her what was really going on and then had let her go.
The Doctor had helped Treena to be brave, and in a few years, an entire species would be saved because the young girl believed all life should be seen as important.
This encounter with him would push her in the right direction, it was his Timelord instinct that helped him know this and, although he felt guilt at not being able to help her friends and family, The Doctor knew it wasn't his place to be the hero this time. He began to walk towards the TARDIS and, once he'd stepped inside and closed the doors behind him, he went straight to the library where he had an old history book on Alcoron events.
Treena had ten chapters dedicated to her, telling the story of how she'd saved an entire race. After the rebels had won, Treena had given a speech to the kingdom and that speech was preserved in the book that The Doctor now held. He smiled as he read what she had said.
"All it takes is five minutes of you believing that everything will be alright. If you can keep on going for five minutes, and then five minutes after that, then you can keep on going until you've changed the world."