Dr Who The Other Eden Part Two

by E J Lamprey

The Doctor has been playing the diplomat, while Donna has been enjoying the attentions of an outrageous flirt. However affairs take a dramatic turn. There's a desperate race to save her -an introduction to a bizarre race of creatures - and a new happy ending for her (that's for anyone who thought she got fobbed off in the old one)

DR WHO - THE OTHER EDEN – PART TWO

. ©E J Lamprey January 2013

The story so far : The Doctor has been playing the diplomat in events, while Donna has been thoroughly enjoying the attentions of an outrageous flirt. He's not only gorgeous and funny, he seems to practically read her mind. He probably can, at that, there are quite a few telepaths around in this half-familiar, half-alien community -

Not everyone approves of their laughing flirtation and she becomes the victim of a violently jealous rival, resulting in a terrifying kidnap. The desperate race to save her sends the Doctor and their new friends rushing across to the reptile-dominated mainland, and an introduction to a bizarre race of creatures ..

To avoid repetition it has been assumed that you, the reader, have read the first part of the story, which continues exactly where the first part ended, face to face with a dragon -

"Tell it to go away?" Donna suggested breathlessly, her eyes still fixed on the section of bench just visible below the fallen Roc. She could see one of Rory's boots protruding, black against the splintered wood.

"Don't think that'll do it, but it's certainly worth a try – OI!" he strode out towards the dragon which hopped back in surprise, nearly tripping over its own tail. "Thanks very much, don't suppose we could ask you to leave so we can get to our people, could we?" The dragon thrust its enormous head forward and in some indefinable way managed to look puzzled. "Okay." The Doctor shrugged and got out his screwdriver. "How do you feel about sonic whines?"

Donna saw the tool glow blue and felt a tickle in her ears, but the dragon was much more disturbed, shaking its head and backing away. Finally, with an almost reproachful look, it hauled itself into the air with a downrush of air that sent the Doctor staggering, flew straight up into the apricot patch of sky – and vanished.

…o0o…

The Doctor had to go up to the fallen Roc and start tugging fruitlessly at it by himself before the townspeople were prepared to believe it was safe to approach, but after that eight burly peacekeepers managed to half lift, half drag it off the mangled bench. The children were pulled out uninjured from underneath but Rory still lay spread-eagled, his face set in determination and his hands welded to the sturdy metal framework. A few pretty girls had pushed their way to the front and were sniffing in what Donna thought in irritation was an annoyingly fake way – one even had tears rolling glassily down her perfectly tinted cheeks.

The Doctor tapped Rory with interest, and told the nearest peacekeeper to fetch Mrs. B, who hurried up a few minutes later, steering very clear of the frozen Rocs.

"Oh, Rory" she sighed and touched his shoulder gently.

His whole body twitched as he said explosively "Oof! Bloody hell!" He turned his head slightly, saw the crowd standing round him, and relaxed. "Hey, Mrs. B. It worked, did it?"

"You were very brave. Foolhardy, but very brave, and I believe those children owe you their lives. It's safe now, all the bad birds have been dealt with." She flipped her hand to indicate the three timelocked Rocs and his eyes popped as he pulled himself into a sitting position on the wreck of the bench, tenderly exploring his ribs with his fingertips. The tearful brunette was backing away, her cheeks dry, and it was obvious that Rory hadn't even noticed her. It did make Donna aware that several of the people standing alertly by would be the local equivalent of newspapermen – which is why she was a little surprised when Mrs. B added quietly. "Oh, and Rory? Don't even THINK of asking if you can keep one, are we clear?"

"Understood." He drew a weary forearm across his forehead. "To be honest, I think I've gone off them a bit anyway."

Donna giggled, and got one or two odd looks and a sharp glance from Mrs. B. It took her a moment to realise that nobody else had heard the interchange and a moment longer to realise it had been telepathic!

CHAPTER NINE

"You're absolutely insane" Donna was still quivering with reaction. Now that Rory and she were finally alone, at a table in a café, she could let off a little tension. "How did you even know the timelock would work this far from the Device?"

"Well, I didn't." he confessed, and covered her hand with his own as she opened her mouth. "But it was the only thing I could think of in the time. I was pretty sure if I could get a good grip on the bench the Device would timelock me and then the Roc wouldn't be able to shift me out of the way. No biggie, you know, the Device likes me. I keep telling you that. I can't believe I missed seeing a dragon!"

"No biggie" she echoed sarcastically. "I've seen scarier. What I haven't seen before is someone I consider a friend deliberately trying to commit suicide." Her voice wobbled, and he squeezed her hand.

"Duchess, I'm sorry. I didn't have time to stop and think, you know. Next time I'll talk it over with you first."

"Don't be ridiculous. And don't call me duchess! I don't care what you do in future, you can fling yourself at every Roc on the island for all I care, just don't do it in front of me because it's very bad for my nerves." She buried her face in her coffee cup and concentrated hard on blinking back tears, only half aware that Rory had turned away and was speaking to the waiter. A few minutes later the waiter returned with a glass jug filled with pink liquid, several glasses and a platter of snacks. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her that breakfast had been not only a hurried meal but taken hours earlier.

"Tuck in" Rory's voice, for once, didn't have its usual hint of laughter but was oddly gentle. "I don't know about you but I'm absolutely starving. If the Doctor and Mrs. B don't get here soon we can get them another platter. And this is softberry juice with just a little splash from the local still – barely sixty percent proof, wouldn't hurt a baby."

"Oh my God" she had to laugh "it's barely two o'clock!"

"I've had a bad day" he said plaintively. "And now, darling duch – Donna – in return for this lavish spread, tell me again about the dragon? Every tiny detail?"

…o0o…

"This is EXACTLY what we needed" the Doctor pulled up a chair for Mrs. B and sat down gratefully himself "Mrs. B, this is Donna Noble, Donna, Mrs. B. Actually what I need first is a long glass of water or I'll drink that whole jug myself. All this talking has left my throat drier than a dragon's."

"Oh, no, don't start him off again" Donna groaned "while you and Mrs. B have been sorting out business with the town leaders I've had to describe that dragon about twenty times." She smiled at Mrs. B shyly. "You called it, you describe it next time."

"It was the Doctor's idea." Mrs. B demurred. "All I had to do was ask the Device to open a Portal in a dragon's path and make sure this end opened overhead. I think it did very well indeed, although I was a bit alarmed when I saw how big the dragon was. We're popular now, Doctor, but I don't think we would have been if you hadn't persuaded it to leave."

"Well" the Doctor drawled, helping himself to a ham cornet "they're pretty harmless. Their main sin is curiosity – oh, and they can't be trusted with shiny things. Gold, and jewels, you know – they're like magpies with anything that glitters. The fire is just for self-defense, like the phoenix, there's no heat in it. You could do worse than open the Portal a little wider during honey month to encourage dragons in."

"There are some dangerous animals that could come through if the Portal were bigger, I don't think the unicorns would like that." Mrs. B sipped at her juice and blinked. Donna hid a grin – she'd been coaxed into a glass while they were waiting and it was potent stuff. She took a second sip and put the glass down carefully. "I do think there could be a way of opening aerial portals whenever there are Rocs around but I'll have to work it through with the Device. I dread to think what this morning's exercise cost us in stored power."

"Doctor?" A tall elderly man had stopped at their table and the Doctor looked up, then scrambled to his feet.

"Good afternoon sir! Haven't seen you in a good while!"

"I didn't think I'd ever seen you." The older man smiled. "But it's true then, you are the same Doctor, you just look different." He looked down at the table and inclined his head to Mrs. B. "Mrs. Beaton, you've done us a great service today. And Rory Banks, of course, but I don't think I know you?" Donna held out her hand as the Doctor introduced the new arrival as Father Turner. It was only then that Donna noticed the discreet little dog-collar at his throat.

"I'm very pleased to meet you" he said as he half-bowed over her hand. "The Doctor was traveling alone when he was last here, but I remember you saying, Doctor, that you often had companions."

"Yes, when you asked me if I didn't find it lonely traveling alone." The Doctor remembered. "Won't you join us, sir?"

"I very much wish I could, I would love the chance to talk to our first visitors in thirty years. I'm joining people at another table, although I should be able to get away soon. I also wanted to take the chance to say to Mrs. Beaton that I now realise I am going to have to change my views on this Device of yours,. I hope to make a time fairly soon for us to sit together while you tell me more about it?"

As he bent courteously over her the Doctor and Rory exchanged glances and Rory, to Donna's surprise, did a tiny victory pump with his arm.

"Yeah, the Device will be able to do something special for you personally" the Doctor suddenly realised "Your collection of original ships logs and journals, the ones that can only be looked at when you're wearing gloves, in a sterile space? The Device can make those impermeable, absolutely indestructible. A hundred larvae couldn't nibble so much as a corner!"

"Well now." Father Turner's face lost its austerity "I never thought of that. That really would be a remarkable benefit. Can it really do that, Mrs. Beaton?"

"It really can." She looked annoyed with herself. "I wish I'd thought of that years ago!"

…o0o…

"What was that about?" Donna asked curiously when Father Turner had moved sedately and, she thought, rather reluctantly, on his way. The Doctor and Rory were grinning from ear to ear and even Mrs. B was smiling.

"That" Rory gestured with his head at the retreating cleric "was the head of do-gooders ecclesiastic. And as all the other do-gooders – medical, matriarchal, community, whatever – are all linked to ecclesiastic, that makes him effectively the head of all the do-gooders, and one of the most powerful people on the island. He's like the Archbishop of Canterbury, or the Pope, or the head Rabbi, or the big cheese of the Masons – whatever your leaning is, the head of your group answers to him. If we'd thought of his precious old documents as a way of getting him on our side ten years ago we'd not have been here today! What was he like thirty years ago, Doc?"

"Very ambitious" the Doctor smiled reminiscently. "In those days the – ah – big cheese was a rabbi, but Father Turner was already on the senior council. Great debater, if talk could ever have turned water into wine he would have been the man to do it. He saw me as his greatest challenge - the only way I could get away was to concede that in all my travels I'd never seen any proof that there WASN'T a God. He – and all the do-gooders – could twist anything into supporting their beliefs, so if he is prepared to publicly accept the Device as the incredibly useful tool it really is, your lives are about to become a whole lot easier."

"He just wants to talk about it" Mrs. B said warningly, then her lips twitched at Rory's indignant astonishment. "Don't look like that, Rory! You're quite right, it's a huge step forward. And there've been some other big concessions in the meeting we've just had. There'll be a regular contingent of peacekeepers coming through to spend time with the Device, and hopefully in the process we can identify a few more telepaths. There'll be a board of elected representatives to explore the Device's potential nationwide. And the more I think about it, the more I think the Device could winkle through dragons when we need them, to cover the whole country."

"I think dragons would be a great Roc deterrent". The Doctor said demurely. "Anyway, they were much maligned by myth. They don't require a diet of maidens, they only breathe fire when threatened and they only eat fish. A couple of times a month. They're very friendly and –" with a sly glance at Rory "far better fliers than Rocs, of course."

"Of course" Rory looked like a little boy at Christmas, then suddenly remembered "Bugger, they'll be under Portal protection, I won't be able to touch them."

"Well." The Doctor set his glass down with deliberation. "The Device does know how to bridge the divide when it's necessary. Like the additives Mrs. B uses so the unicorns can graze on this dimension's gorse without timelocking."

"Yes! Hey, yes!" But both Mrs. B and the Doctor were staring calmly at him, and Rory's brows drew together. "What?"

"There is a condition" the Doctor said gently. "Your little private shaft? You've been very careful, but too many things – clothing styles, Talkies – things you've said – it's obvious you've been visiting Earth regularly. You're very bright and very inventive anyway, but nobody has that many original ideas. Right now people are feeling quite friendly towards the Device but if they find out it is capable of moving even one person back and forth between worlds? I doubt it could ever blow over. And there are going to be a lot more visitors to Riddance in the future. You're going to have to choose one or the other – this Earth or the other." Rory's face flushed darkly and he stared from the Doctor to Mrs. B. The Doctor lifted his shoulders and spread his hands and Mrs. B gave a little shrug.

"I have suspected for a while, Rory." She said with what almost looked like sympathy. "I was careful never to ask the Device, because I didn't want to know for sure. But you must see that it is now over. As a recognition of all the many good things you brought back, and of all the good things you have done for Riddance, I didn't want to just close it and strand you here, you deserve to have the option."

…o0o…

"Well, that was rude of him." Donna said as Rory strode furiously away. "And how the hell do we get back to the TARDIS now?"

"With me, on the train, tomorrow?" Mrs. B suggested. "It should be quite interesting - they're putting on a VIP carriage and the head of the peacekeepers is coming too."

"In fact they can't really do enough right now, which is exactly as it should be." The Doctor said candidly. "They're been caught looking like fools and Mrs. B's oh so nicely not pointing out that if Riddance had been told about the extra Roc attacks the Device could have helped and the other towns wouldn't have lost so many people. As it is they were talking very meekly about setting up a national press release when we stopped for a late lunch. I tell you, Donna, that one little town has more oomph that the rest of the country, and it's just lovely to watch her pop it down their throats like medicine."

Mrs. B protested, laughing, even as she rose to her feet saying she was due back in the meeting. She looked interrogatively at the Doctor, who said half-heartedly that he couldn't really leave Donna on her own in the middle of a strange town, but then to her horror waved at Father Turner, who was rising from his table, and beckoned him across.

"God no." She tugged at his sleeve. "Doctor, if anything I'm anti-religious, please don't leave me with him!" But it was too late, Mrs. B was already explaining the situation and Father Turner was nodding gravely. He turned with a smile to her and took Mrs. B's empty chair. The Doctor tipped her a huge wicked wink and they were gone, leaving her to stare at her new companion, as appalled as if he wore the horns and tail of the other persuasion. It actually broke the ice, because his lips started to twitch and although he covered his mouth apologetically her horror, changing to offended indignation, was too much for him and he started to laugh.

"Yeah, well, what's so funny?" she asked belligerently, but it is very nearly impossible to be alarmed by somebody who is laughing at you and she could feel her hackles settling.

"Miss Noble, I honestly have to beg your pardon." His smile had unexpected charm. "I think somebody must have been telling you about our cannibal history. I promise you we don't eat visitors any more!"

"Cannibals? Get away!"

"Oh no, I do assure you. Back in – well, that's a little before our recorded history started, but we've estimated it at 1625. A ship of young female slaves on their way to a lifetime of prostitution was instead caught by the shaft and landed in the lagoon. There was a motley crew of ragged survivors scratching out an existence here, and they overran the ship and murdered the crew. They celebrated the arrival of women by making them cook the crew and having a giant feast but I promise you, to the best of my knowledge, that's the last time we've eaten visitors to our shores."

Despite herself, Donna was fascinated. "It's a long way to come, from murder and cannibalism to sitting in court today, in just a few hundred years?"

"Ah well, we have a vivid and colourful history, and of course are almost unique in having newcomers forcefully added to our ranks on an involuntary basis. Luckily the women had a much respected shaman – a sangoma – with them. She must have been an extraordinary woman, because she took control of the chaos that was New Eden. She had absolute authority over her fellow slaves and they eventually had some influence over their men, so by the time the Williamson party arrived, about twenty years later, there was the nucleus of a settlement. That party included Reverend Nichols, and from that time we have written records, not only his but the journals of both Lady Williamson and the governess, which make for very lively reading. Lady Williamson was fortunately Dutch, because the islanders at that time were predominately Dutch and might have given a purely English group a less friendly arrival. We know, from the history Reverend Nichols left, that she was married to an English aristocrat, who had joined Admiral Somers in the colony he founded on Somers Island. She had returned to England when their third daughter was born so the children could be raised and schooled in England. However in 1651 England and Holland went to war and she decided to return to the colony, taking with her – very fortunately for us – everything she could think of to make life in the colony more comfortable – seeds, cuttings, fabrics, livestock. Her party included a governess for the children, and a chaplain, Reverend Nichols, as escort and chaperon. Lady Williamson believed to her dying day that her husband would find her so she never remarried. Instead she turned all her energies towards the colony which, with the influx of colonists and the invaluable crops she'd brought, began to thrive. She was ably supported by the Captain, who in course of time married the governess, and who made it very clear to the chaplain that there was to be no religious conflict in the tiny community. Reverend Nichols, to his credit, recognized how close the community still was to chaos and obeyed orders. His journals chart the fascinating progress of how he, and the sangoma, Magdalena, managed to reduce their completely differing beliefs down to core values, a common ground they could both feel comfortable with. He also supported the iron control the Captain maintained over his own crew, so Magdalena supported them in turn and brought most of the original inhabitants in line with the new. By the time the next ecclesiastic arrived the whole community had adopted the new order. I think it might be our luck again that he was a Rabbi, with a party of emigrating Jews who had been trying to reach the New World. He was a clever and above all pragmatic man and under his guidance – Magdalena died of old age shortly after his arrival, and Nichols was by then in his sixties – the ecclesiastics took the basics of the role they hold to this day. Reverend Nichols had started the first school with the Williamson's governess under Madalena's close supervision, and after her death the mothers of the community made it very clear that her beliefs were not to be phased out. I don't know if you've ever noticed that? The men of a community may observe faith, but it is women who keep it? But you're letting me do all the talking, when what I really wanted to do was listen to you! What can you tell me of your world, what's happened in – well, in your lifetime – that will startle and amaze me?"

"Um" Donna's mind went completely blank. "We went to the moon? Although some people believe that was a giant hoax. And there hasn't been any major wars, which I think is something of a record, there's been like sixty years of world peace apart from the Middle East – oh, and Korea, and Vietnam. Couple of alien invasions, apparently, but they were fought off, you'll have to get details from the Doctor. Um – there's TV now, and I-pods, and nylon – I'm sorry, I'm absolutely useless at this."

"Not at all." Father Turner said politely "It's our tradition to ask for knowledge. This very settlement got its name because we learned that New Amersterdam in America was taken by British troops, and renamed New York. That was in 1664 and we only learned it in 1669, but in a fervour of patriotism this settlement, with a lot of Dutch settlers, was instantly named New Amsterdam. However, I did know about the moon, and your TV – let's just go through the gossip, then. What is the state of religion?"

"Pretty sad, really." Donna said diffidently "Your bunch, anyway. The real passion is from Muslims, some take it so seriously they're prepared to kill themselves and anyone else standing nearby but to be honest I'd rather not talk about religion, I'm kind of allergic to it?"

"Trends and extremists have always been a feature of religion." Father Turner said understandingly. "I've been told of Moonies, and a rather alarming colony of people who committed suicide because they believed it was required of them. It horrified us that wars, even in the twentieth century, being waged in the name of God, or Allah, or Jehovah. There are fashions in religion as in anything else, Christianity as much as any. Remember the Crusades? Then things went quieter until the the sixteenth century with the rise of the Protestants, where people were burned and beheaded for being the 'wrong' religion. The passion of the Spanish Inquisition, the massacre of the Hugenots – and it all died down to a similar indifference. Here, religion is for the sake of the community. It's the peaceful core. We're never had so much as a shot fired in the name of any of the religions we know here, although – " he grinned suddenly, his face lighting up "there has been some lively debate! As teachers, we offer our students the different routes to enlightment, and as ecclesiastics we preach our own route to our followers, but at all times we respect that ours may not be the only way. But you're looking mulish, Miss Noble?"

"Donna, please, call me Donna. And yes, I am a bit, because you talk the talk but you don't seem tolerant of those who don't follow your ways? The whole Device thing, for an example right under our noses."

"That's a fair point. Now, how do I explain this to an outsider?" He scratched his chin and looked thoughtful, but Donna had a strong suspicion he was thoroughly enjoying himself. "Riddance - in those early days after Captain Spencer took control it was the wildest and most lawless of the original survivors who fled to the caves of Riddance. Riddance has always been rebellious. We don't make the mistake of forgetting our past. We know better than most that the savage is frighteningly close to the surface, that only a veneer of civilization stands between the man and the wolf. If you feed a man, and offer him guidance, he is civilized. Take away his food and his way of life and he is a dangerous animal. The men who snarled and fought over those slaves were animals – two men would literally fight to the death over a meal that was only large enough for one. From the dawn of modern humanity, society can only exist where there is either strong leadership, or where there is guidance. Riddance rejected the kind of guidance and community that the rest of us operate as a network. For the rest of us to learn Riddance contained a Device which commanded so much power – a Device being nominally controlled by (I hope she'll forgive me for this) a little old lady in a town with a history of violence and nonconformity – caused an uproar. In any other town, everything the Device did would have been discussed and agreed first. Riddance, once again, rebelled. I don't think you can blame us."

Donna shifted uncomfortably and spared a cross thought to the Doctor for leaving her to a man he himself had called a insistent debater. Father Turner was absolutely single-minded and she had to gather her thoughts to resist him.

"I think I would have given them the benefit of the doubt" she argued. "It's been a very long time since they split away, and those original rebels did take their women. You said yourself those women were the start of your own civilized history, if they did it here they would have done it there. Just being different isn't a crime."

The old priest laughed and called for another jug of juice – without alcohol, this time.

"You're a good listener, and a lively debater, Donna! But Magdalena represented that leadership, and she wasn't with them. You have to remember also that all those men, not just the runaways, still considered the women to be property. Negro slaves were new to the market - I think 1619 was the year the first Negro slaves were sent to Virginia - but the concept of slavery is nearly as old as civilization itself. As far as the crew were concerned, these were women who didn't look like any women they'd ever known, didn't talk like them, and who were already being transported as property. Over time, of course, the men engaged with their children and eventually bonded with their women, but even speech would have been fairly limited. If you were a good-looking teenage girl, and fell to the lot of a filthy, skinny and very likely toothless ruffian many years your senior, who had different hair, different skin, who spoke an incomprehensible language and raped you repeatedly, it would not be the lifelong romance of your dreams. The men who decamped to Riddance would have been the wildest and most rebellious of them all, but it wasn't only them. Over the centuries anyone who fell out with the authorities – or was on the run – has made their way to Riddance. The community has always had a rooted and violent objection to the status quo, which they saw as represented by the ecclesiastics. I will grant you that over time they got schools and the building of the railroad brought them into contact with the rest of us. Now they come to our universities, trade with our merchants, and marry into our communities. They have do-gooders and peacekeepers, but the free-thinking, fiercely independent people of Riddance are still regarded with both alarm and respect by the other Islanders. Riddance to this day has a reputation for wild and unruly behaviour, a disrespect for the rules the rest of us accept as essential to peaceful cohabitation. Don't judge us for being nervous - you haven't met everyone in Riddance. Mrs. B is exceptional, and young Rory comes from one of the most stable families."

"Okay." Donna recognized that she couldn't win an argument where she didn't have the facts – and the memory of Yin and Yang had flashed up as he talked about wild behavior - and attacked on another of Susannah's points. "But from their point of view you control jobs, and news, you do restrict people –"

"Well, yes. That was the Jewish influence, of course. A rabbi is very much at the heart of his community and every member will pass news on to him. He can also tell new members who they can speak to about finding a place to live, where to get the best prices when buying or selling, where to find medical assistance – the closeness of a Jewish community is one of its greatest strengths. You can see how that would eventually become a useful shortcut in a growing community? Knowing a man's reputation, assessing a child's potential, pooling information about the community for the use of the community, has obvious advantages for conformists. Unfortunately the only religious influence in Riddance, in the earlier days, would have been the fanatically religious who refused to join the existing tolerance, who fled there to set up their own churches. We're lucky, I think, that they never managed to gain a fervent following in Riddance. Unfortunately during their time of influence they alienated the townspeople even further against religion."

"Do you know, I remember being told about one of them when I was last here?" the Doctor interrupted cheerfully, swinging himself into a chair and looking from one to the other with his quick bright eyes. "Preached the good old-fashioned fire and brimstone and actually did get a bit of a following until he demanded that a woman caught cheating on her husband should be stoned. Then he started throwing stones at her himself to lead the way, without realizing how popular adultery, or at least the freedom to commit adultery, actually was. They hanged him on the spot, didn't they? A very robust reaction. Have you brought each other up to date?"

"I'm afraid I've done most of the talking" Father Turner blinked and smiled apologetically at him. "Donna is an invigorating companion and a very good listener, I hope I haven't been a bore."

"Oh well, Donna has great qualities but she isn't one of Nature's historians. I know how you like to keep up with things so I jotted down in a list during a particularly boring speech someone from New London was making –" he started to talk fluently, Father Turner proving himself at least as good a listener as he had called Donna, while she peered across at the list pinned under the Doctor's elbow which he'd written, for once, in recognizable English, obviously to hand over.

"Oi" she interrupted him "that one hasn't happened yet? The world-wide currency?"

"Are you sure?" He frowned down at the end of the list and she nodded emphatically.

"I couldn't tell you details on the others, but at least they're familiar. The world-wide currency isn't – even Europe isn't all on one currency yet."

"Well, it's not far off." He dismissed it and continued while Donna smiled to herself and addressed herself to the fruit juice again. Father Turner left shortly afterwards, clutching his list, with the Doctor grinning after him.

"So, did he sign you up for services?" he asked. "Was that hairy? I'm sorry, I half-thought Rory would have come back and rescued you by now but I did get back as soon as I could."

"Whatever. Actually it was quite interesting, although you're right, he could talk for England, no worries."

Donna was feeling edgy, especially now that the Doctor had reminded her of Rory's abrupt departure. It wasn't that he meant anything to her, of course he didn't – well, maybe as a friend, they had got on pretty well in the day – she blinked. She'd known Rory a day? It felt like a lifetime, she thought she'd identified all his good points and accepted all his bad points and now it turned out he'd been in her world before now – his little artless questions, his pretended interest in Earth, had been deliberate deceit. It nagged at her like a toothache, and she really wasn't all that interested in Father Turner and his merry band of ecclesiastics. "So what was that all about, that thing about Rory visiting Earth?"

"Well – he'd managed to talk the Device into it, which is quite a trick because artificial intelligence is immune to all arguments except pure logic. The thing is - and Donna, you have to keep this to yourself – the truth is the Device DID control the original shaft. There are Devices seeded on hundreds of planets capable of sustaining a carbon-based, oxygen-breathing life form – M-class planets, if you like. Some distant race, so far back they've been lost to history – and probably quite lonely, if you think about it – not only created the technology but located suitable planets, some of them thousands of light years apart. Then they died out without leaving a trace." He looked pensive, and she said intuitively

"They're on your to-do list."

"They are." His quick grin flashed out. "I've been keeping an eye out for years every time I've been in pre-history. Anyway, the original idea was that as each race reached the evolutionary stage where it could identify and activate its own Device, it could reach others at the same level. The Sea Lords have, but your Earth hasn't, so the traffic was one way. The Sea Lords should have shut it down once they realized, but – well, they glossed over that a bit. They were absolutely fascinated by the dolphins that had come through, adopting them as beloved family pets, and of course they never realized they were disrupting other lives. Ironically the people caught up in it could have gone back any time, if they'd just been able to enter this end at exactly the right angle, but they never realized that."

"Yes, but" Donna objected "I know the Device was originally in the lagoon but then it moved to the warehouse? How did it still control the shaft from there?"

"Like it brought in that dragon" the Doctor said patiently "It can open a link from anywhere to anywhere, it doesn't need to be the pot at one end of the rainbow. In all likelihood it was positioned in the lagoon just to draw enough energy to keep itself in a dormant state from any mammals in the water – and actually operating the link wouldn't have drawn a fraction of the power that establishing it did. If it hadn't been in water it would have been nearly impossible for the Sea Lords to reach it, although of course they built the lagoon to house it."

"They what?" Donna had a sudden vivid mental image of a school of cartoon octopus builders wearing hard hats and flourishing hammers and ladders. "Just what are we talking here, these Sea Lords? Mermaids?"

The Doctor choked on his fruit juice and needed one of her hefty slaps on his back. "Ouch, watch my ribs! No, nothing like. They're big – seven, eight feet long – with very big brains. Not completely unlike Beluga whales around the head, and they're mammals, of course. Quite developed hand-like flippers which are much longer and more dexterous than, say, a dolphin's. Their homes look a bit like castles in the water, and inside are pools with rock ledges and turtle shells, which they use like loungers."

"Fun for the turtles." Donna remarked dryly and he grinned at her.

"It is, really – a full-grown giant sea-turtle can have a shell ten feet across, and will live for sixty years, during which it is pampered and protected and fed lavishly to grow as big as possible. While they finally die, their bodies are scooped from their shells with great ceremony, for a great memorial feast. The shell is dried for a year and after that it becomes a Sea Lord's prize possession – they count their wealth in the quantity and quality of their shells. An inverted shell is smoother, warmer and more comfortable than rock – it floats like a boat, for when a Sea Lord wants to drift on the waves, and is big enough for two if he wants company. If there's danger from the air, it can be flipped over to become an armoured dome allowing the Sea Lord to breathe on the surface in complete safety as he swims for home." He smiled reminiscently. "Wafting across the ocean in a ten foot shell chatting idly with a Sea Lord was one of the more civilized experiences of my life."

"And these guys built the lagoon. With those not-so-stubby flippers?"

"Oh, no, telekinetically. They move things around mentally with those big, big brains. The best ones can move amazing weights, so they just move the rock around and wedge it into place. The lagoon, like their own homes, is ringed with rock for protection, has narrow channels for keeping the water circulating and fresh, and has a smoothed rock doorstep just high enough to keep out a hunter but easily jumped by a clever mammal. There are some fairly fearsome predators swimming around out there. Some of them are controlled by the Sea Lords but quite a lot are predators."

"Sharks" Donna offered helpfully "brought in by the shaft?"

"There are sharks, yes, but not Earth ones, those never made it out into open water because they can't jump. When I was last here I was actually offered shark steak, the locals fish from the lagoon – although never touching the dolphins, all sailors are intensely superstitious about dolphins. And albatrosses, come to think of it. They killed any sharks as fast as they could, to protect dolphins and occasional seals that might come back to the lagoon. Anyway, the Sea Lords built it to make it reassuringly safe for any intelligent sea life that swam into the shaft, and when it was all ready they positioned the Device and activated it. That's by the by – at some point Rory, who really is very clever and genuinely inventive, had guessed the Device's role or worked it out. He got the Device to open a little shaft to Earth which lets him go back and forth. Everything he saw on Earth came back as 'ideas'. They didn't always get developed the same way but he kept at the developers until each reached a usable level. He didn't mind that they didn't look the same – he probably realized it was better that they didn't – but they delivered the same end result. It's easy enough to shape the process if you know something CAN be done and HOW it should work. Anyway, so much for Rory – for New Earth's sake I hope he decides to stay here but he'll probably end up making his fortune in Hollywood." He finished the last of the softberry juice and leaned back in his chair, but Donna was still absorbing what he had just said, so after a moment he went on conversationally.

"As for us – as we speak the townspeople are planning to set up one of those lovely Rocs at a more statuesque angle, and tomorrow morning they'll load the other two on a goods carriage ready for the train. We're invited to go with Mrs. B, and the various town representatives, to deliver one to New London and one to New Geneva, as we steam our way round the island. They'll make decorative statues, don't you think? And be more persuasive than a court-full of judges. When we get back to Riddance we can get on our way again."

"Leave the Rocs as statues?" Donna was diverted, although she couldn't agree with the Doctor they'd be decorative. Nightmare city, more like, for any kids.

"Can you think of any quicker way of showing the immediate benefit of getting onboard with the Riddance Device? Once honey month is over and there are plenty of clickits to escort them off the premises, which I'm told should be pretty soon, they'll be restarted, although I got the strong impression that the peacekeepers were rather keen to keep them on display indefinitely."

Donna nodded. "I prefer them timelocked myself. So, two Rocs on the train, one staying here, I suppose that means Riddance goes without? Too risky to leave one anywhere near Rory?"

"Not at all!" the Doctor laughed aloud and pushed back his chair "You're forgetting the first attack? There'll be one among the unicorns, but as Riddance is already protected it has been promised to New Geneva. Anyway if Rory stays he's going to be more interested in dragons – one month of every year he's going to be the happiest man in the Other Eden. The Device is apparently confident it can generate a dragon saddle, if the dragons are willing, and I'm pretty sure they will be, they're as lively and curious as a barrel of monkeys. I think he'll get his ride. In fact, if the Rocs continue to be a real menace during honey month I wouldn't be surprised if the peacekeepers didn't take to dragonback to timelock Rocs before they even get close to the populated areas."

He stood and stretched, then offered her a friendly hand. "Are we finished here, have you eaten enough? Its nearly sundown and they were planning to erect the New Amsterdam Roc statue as soon as it was safe to be in the open – wanna go watch? There's going to be a big party in the arcade afterwards, and from what was said in the meeting we can sleep in the VIP carriage tonight – if you want to freshen up before the party we can go there straight after the Roc gets pulled into position." He laughed down at her as she hesitated. "Can't sit here forever, time we got going, lazybones!"

CHAPTER TEN

The crowd watching the hoisting and positioning of the Roc was silent and uneasy, flinching every time the giant bird was moved. The Doctor and peacekeepers made an effort to shout cheerily to each other as they manipulated the dead weight of the monster, which had been beak down on the ground, but the atmosphere was far from festive. Donna felt a shiver of dread herself at the creature's aggressive stance, wings high and back, neck well forward and eyes pinched to slits, until the Roc twitched forward under the handlers and she suddenly saw a different angle.

"Doctor!" She couldn't resist calling across "Will there be a competition to name them? You just have to call this one Sneezy!"

"Sneezy!" a boy near her cried out in delight. "Sneezy, mum! Look, he IS sneezing!" Laughter swept the crowd as the little joke spread.

"Nicely done" Rory said beside her, laughing, and she whirled to stare up at him.

"Rory! I thought you'd gone!"

"No, just marching up and down kicking stones and swearing" he said ruefully "But I couldn't just leave you stranded here, could I? So, we staying for the party or what?" He took her hand and squeezed it and she grinned at him.

"Rory, darling." A very pretty blonde with very long hair reaching to her hemline swayed up to them and kissed him lingeringly before turning a dazzling smile on Donna. "And you must be Donna! I've heard so much about you!"

"Really? I don't think I've heard anything about you." Donna looked at the limp, beautifully manicured hand extended and wondered what she was supposed to do. Kiss it? She brought her own hand up to brush fingertips.

"Donna, this is Lynne, she's also from Riddance" Rory sounded amused. "So, Lynne, come through for the hearing?"

"No, darling, I needed some clothes, you know I can't wear that stuff in Riddance. So ordinary." She looked fleetingly at Donna's new clothes then smiled sweetly. "They have lovely things here. Rory, darling, can I borrow you for a moment?"

"Do you know, I think I left my Talkie at the courthouse?" Donna stepped back "I'll just nip off and fetch it now." She walked away seething – bitch, bitch, bitch! She couldn't resist one glance back, and Lynne had moved to stand directly in front of Rory, her back to Donna. From behind she was so skinny she was just a waterfall of hair on long legs, like a female version of Cousin It.

Donna had stumped up the stairs as far as the portico of the courthouse before she remembered it was just an excuse, she had her mobile safely in her pocket and she paused, irresolute. With the sun down it was getting chilly and she could do with her coat, back in the Bug, but she didn't want to look as if she was playing gooseberry. She looked back down the long flight of stairs, screwing up her eyes. No sign of Rory and Lynne, but there were still eddies of people drifting towards the arcade, where even from here she could hear the sounds of the party starting up – give it a couple of minutes.

The closest bench was the mangled one, with the last Roc still tilted half over it. Between the giant reptile and the huge hedge that sailed behind it looked suitably private. Sighing, she perched gingerly on the least mangled bit of the bench, brought out her mobile and started to idly compose a text to a friend. 'Having a wonderful time' she murmured wryly to herself 'wish I wasn't here' – what sounded like soft footsteps interrupted her concentration and she looked up, half expecting to see Rory smiling down at her. No-one – she bent her head again, angry with herself. She knew Rory was at best a flirt, and had lied to her about Earth – well, alright, not told her, and asked her questions that implied he knew nothing about it - and had his pick of gorgeous Islanders, what the hell did she expect?

But the feeling she wasn't alone persisted, and she closed her mobile and slipped it back in her pocket. "Hello?" She turned her head to stare over her shoulder, then out of the corner of her eye caught a movement and her head snapped back. To her disbelief, the Roc stirred, then reared up and pecked fiercely at her. With a shriek she ducked under the savage saw-edged beak and it hopped awkwardly backwards, then made a leap at her. A grip like a vice closed round her chest and clamped down, and pain flared across her abdomen as the other gigantic talon ripped across her belly, then closed on her hips. "Doctor!" but her shriek was a painful wheeze, and there was no air left in her lungs … the Roc sprang skyward and the earth swam sickeningly below her as it circled once. Darkness was building like a wave and when it crashed, she would be dead – her last despairing thought was a frantic cry of 'RORY!' which echoed in her head as the wave curled – and broke over her.

…o0o…

"What was that about?" Rory stared down at Lynne, no longer amused. "What the hell do you want that makes you so rude to a visitor?"

"Oh, Rory" Lynne looked up meltingly through her lashes and put a supplicating hand on his chest. "You're not cross, are you? I thought I was rescuing you from that ghastly woman, let someone else take on entertaining her for a while."

"I didn't want rescuing" his black brows snapped together "and if I wanted to get away, I'm quite capable of doing it myself. When I need you, I'll let you know."

"Rory" her beautiful eyes filled with tears "do you really like her? But she isn't even pretty!" He didn't reply, just looked over her shoulder to where Donna was climbing the stairs to the courthouse, somehow looking a little lost and forlorn in the deserted park. Lynne tugged insistently at his shirtfront. "What is it, Rory? Are we over?"

"There's no we about it, Lynne. We've had fun together but you know it's nothing serious, I've always told you that. You know I see other women, I've never lied about that."

"No" Lynne gulped, and peeped up at him helplessly, but the indifference in his eyes spurred her to drop the beauty in distress role. "You don't usually pay them so much attention." She snapped crossly "You've never given ME one of your coats. And she's not exactly your usual type, is she? Not going to cause any traffic pile-ups?"

"At least she's not boring." Rory said cruelly and turned on his heel to stalk away. Women! He strode through the crowd towards the arcade where a bar had already been set up in the arcade and was serving drinks, ordered a glass of rough cider and retreated to the end of the bar, propping himself up on one elbow as he frowned at the crowd. People catching his eye nodded and lifted their glasses to him approvingly and his bad mood eased a bit – to the Doctor and Mrs. B he might be a naughty little boy caught in the wrong, and Lynne seemed to consider him her personal property, but to everyone else he was a bit of a hero. As for Donna – where the hell was Donna, anyway? From where he stood he could see the courtroom steps, which were deserted. Maybe she was back and with the Doctor – pushing clear of the throng around the bar he found the Doctor talking animatedly with Mrs. B and Judge Williams, but he broke off as Rory came up.

"Hello – Donna not with you? Where is she?"

"I was looking for her" he confessed "we got – separated. Last time I saw her she was going up to the courthouse."

"That'll be locked by now" the Judge said authoritatively "how long ago was that?"

"Well – fifteen minutes?"

"Long enough to realise it's locked, she should be back any minute." With a friendly nod she left them to set a determined course for the bar.

The Doctor frowned, and looked around in the crowd. "She should be back. Maybe she went to the Bug to get her coat?"

As Rory was about to answer his eyes opened wide in shock. "Donna?" he said aloud, and then, horrified, "DONNA?"

"I heard it too" Mrs. B caught at Rory's arm. "Rory, ask the Device to timelock her!" she looked at the Doctor. "She's hurt – badly hurt – and because she's not from Riddance the Device doesn't know her, it didn't automatically protect her."

"But what could have hurt her?" the Doctor was already running towards the park, even as the circling Roc answered his question, Donna dangling stiffly from its talons as it set off with steady beats of its wings toward the mainland.

"Doc!" Rory ran after him "Doc, you've got to get after her! The Device has timelocked her but once she's out of sight we might never find her! The TARDIS, that flies?"

"The TARDIS" the Doctor reminded him with admirable restraint "is thirty miles away. Are there no planes left? Does nothing here fly?"

"Fly?" Rory stopped short. "Yes, something flies! And I've still got the harness!" He took off towards where the Bug had been left, covering the distance in huge strides with the Doctor racing behind and Mrs. B a poor third. As the Doctor reached the Bug, Rory, who had already swarmed up its sides, straightened in the cockpit with a quick shout of relief, brandishing a tangle of leathery straps and plaited loops. "Found it! And I'll need these –" he snatched up a pair of binoculars and nearly fell down the Bug's sloping slides.

"And now?" the Doctor asked automatically, then made the mental leap. "Oh no – that's crazy!"

"Yes, but it could work. Doc, I'll need you to follow and rescue us?" He was already taking the steps two at a time to reach Sneezy, staring through timelocked angry eyes at the distant party. "Can you still see her?"

He was looping the odd strappings around Sneezy's legs, then feeding them up with practiced speed to buckle behind the huge neck. The Doctor tore his fascinated gaze away and screwed his eyes up to stare into the twilight.

"Yes! Going strong and flying almost exactly due east. You fell off last time, Rory!"

"I jumped off, because I didn't want to be carried to the mainland. This time I do, because this time you're going to fetch me, right?" Mrs. B had finally caught up with them as Rory replied, and stood expressionlessly watching as he stepped into the stirrups above the stumpy tail and swung himself up to catch at the two strong harness handles either side of the Roc's neck. The Doctor raised his brows at her and she nodded, which was good enough for him. If she felt this crazy enterprise had any hope of succeeding, then it might be Donna's only chance.

"Stand clear!" Rory tightened his grip with his left hand and pulled a short baton out of his pocket, which he tapped sharply on the Roc before stuffing it back and grabbing the right handle. The Roc shuddered from head to foot, made a half-hearted lunge at the Doctor, who jumped nimbly aside, and tried to look down its own back.

"Go, go, go!" Rory shouted and the giant creature sprang into the air with a shriek, swooped once over the arcade and started beating its way strongly to the mainland.

The first Roc had gone unnoticed in the half-light with the music playing, but Sneezy's re-animation and hoarse shriek raised a chorus of shouts and crashing of glass which echoed to where the Doctor and Mrs. B stood staring after them. Mrs. B broke the silence first.

"Doctor, can I help?"

"I hope so" he said frankly "Just for starters, can you drive this thing?"

"Good grief, no" Mrs. B shuddered, then added thoughtfully. "But I've been in it once, and I think I remember a few things he did."

"Me too" the Doctor's mischievous smile shot briefly through his anxiety. "Well, I'll drive, you remind me what to do!" They scrambled aboard, Mrs. B managing quite nimbly, and he wedged himself into the console and pressed the starter button. The Bug obediently roared to life and with the loss of several flattened shrubs but only one streetlight as it clumsily turned about – the Doctor, even through the tension, was obscurely proud of that – it was soon thundering back along the road they'd taken a few hours earlier. After one or two false tries the Doctor found the lights, which poured out in every direction, and managed to close the bubble, reducing the noise level.

Mrs. B, who'd been watching the Doctor with some anxiety as he familiarized himself with the controls, seemed to feel she could now risking distracting him. "What are you planning to do?"

"Well, the TARDIS has all sorts of tricks up its sleeve. And it knows Donna well, I'm rather counting on it being able to track her down, so as long as Rory's managed to find her we should be able to collect them both. I'm just a little concerned that with Donna timelocked the TARDIS may not be able to identify her. Can the Device help in any way you can think of?"

"The further the range the more it drains the Device to operate. However on the positive side, it's still well powered up from the summer rush." She caught his sidelong look and half-smiled. "People wanting to lose their winter padding in time for summer. They come from all over the country, the Centre is absolutely crammed with chubby people all spring. It knows Rory very well, it should be able to locate him for us."

…o0o…

Sneezy, after a couple of hair-raising barrel rolls and a power-dive, seemed to have decided to accept Rory's infuriating presence on his back and head for home before the last of the light went. The speed of their passage blew Rory's hair straight back and made his eyes water ferociously but by blinking constantly he could just see Donna's Roc several hundred yards ahead. As they neared the cliffs it started to drop down. Sneezy veered away, to the right, but Rory flung his weight to the left and directed his mind as clearly into the alien one as he could. Left, left, left – although he had no sense of being in communion with the creature, either the telepathic command or the weight shift worked, and Sneezy yawed back to the left.

Donna's Roc had vanished. He wriggled a little further up Sneezy's neck to be able to look down past the enormous wings, and saw a nest below, wedged untidily between spurs of rock. Empty. There was another just beyond it, with a Roc in it that reared up in challenge as Sneezy soared reluctantly overhead – there were nests everywhere, some with eggs, some with hatchlings, and some with angry adults. Sneezy bellowed in answer to the challenges and tilted down into a dive, and Rory tensed as he caught the flash of Donna's red hair. Back, back, back – they were definitely linked, Sneezy turned on a wingtip and swooped back, ten feet above the nest. The hatchling in it completely ignored the aerial threat as it dug its beak under Donna's inert body and flipped her, her hair a rigid pennant.

Rory felt almost limp with relief – the Device really had done it, she was timelocked! Sneezy hovered, as interested as he was, and he kicked free of the stirrups and slithered back down the Roc's body to drop free and crash down into the nest. The hatchling gave a thin shriek of excitement at the arrival of more food and scrambled at him as he dug in his pocket for the restarter baton and thrust it at the new threat. The hatchling may have been a fraction of Sneezy's size, but was still bigger than a mouflon, able to do him serious damage. He sent a frantic instruction to the Device – don't timelock me, timelock the threat – and the hatchling stopped dead. Sneezy uttered a shriek of triumph and swooped back to attack its tormentor, but crashed into the rim of the nest as the Device activated again, and toppled inside, narrowly missing Rory as he pressed himself breathlessly back against the spiky perimeter. He sucked in air as the nest rocked violently, then swiftly unbuckled the harness to pull it free of the motionless grotesque before stumbling with some difficulty across the loosely woven branches underfoot towards Donna. Her face was frozen in a silent scream, one of her arms stuck out at a deeply unnatural angle and there was blood, far too much blood, over her body and legs. He didn't dare restart her but pulled her behind the dubious shelter of the only other thing in the nest, an uncracked egg as large as a boulder. As he flattened down behind her the owner of the nest soared back and sprang at the timelocked Sneezy in fury, lifting it enough in gigantic talons to send it tumbling down the mountain side, then turning back to the timelocked hatchling to nose at it anxiously. With a great cry it sprang to the edge of the nest and flew away but Rory knew that even if it believed the hatchling to be dead, with one unhatched egg in the nest it would be back. He straightened up cautiously to hurry round the perimeter of the nest, peering over the side to see if there was any easy escape. The only possible option was a deeply shadowed cleft in the nearest pinnacle of rock, and with as much speed as he dared he clambered out of the nest and, hugging the ground, scuttled towards it. As he had hoped it was a shallow cave, awkwardly shaped but narrow and deep enough to hide them from the Rocs.

Carrying Donna's inert body, strapped to his back with the Roc harness, was one of the most terrifying things he had ever done. Freezing every time a Roc flew overhead, he struggled out of the nest again and made a stumbling, breathless dash for the cave as soon as they were clear. They were lucky – even as he wedged her stiffened body at the back of the cave three or four Rocs flew over, one so close that water from its beak splashed down onto his protruding booted foot. They obviously drank in the evening before settling for the night, because from all the nearer nests he could now here the eldritch shrieks of the parent birds and the wheezing shrills of their young. He'd reanimated the hatchling with one last lunge as he cleared the nest rim, hoping to distract the possibly vengeful adult, and could hear its insistent cries, shortly joined by a cracking noise and then another, more piping voice. The adult swooped in with a violently writhing snake at least ten feet long, which satisfied the insistent demands of its young, and as the twilight deepened into darkness the nests fell quiet.

Rory checked Donna was securely wedged, strapped himself to a nub of rock so that if he did sleep he didn't roll out into the open, and stared up in the dark sky as stars pricked into sight, multiplying rapidly to fill the blackness in every direction. They even seemed to be reflecting back from the distant water, until he realized the pricks of redder light were campfires with one, in the middle, being built up until it was unmistakably a fire. It seemed to flicker as shadows passed back and forth in front of it and he shivered abruptly and envied them its warmth as the cold crept into his leather coat at cuffs and edges. He'd camped out a thousand times on the island – as often as not to brush off one of his more persistent admirers - and spent countless evenings just like this looking lazily down at the town's lights, or other flickering campfires, but normally with the solid comfort of the Bug waiting behind him, and his own fire to warm him. It was already midnight and would be light again in just a couple of hours, and frost was rare in honey month, but there was little chance of the Doctor appearing while it was dark. Maybe little chance of him appearing at all – Rory tried to think of something else, there was a random thought trying to surface and get his attention – something he should be noticing – he wrapped himself in the folds of his coat and wondered bleakly if the Doctor would ever be able to find them.

…o0o…

It seemed an eternity before the Bug finally scrambled into the glade past the fallen Roc, its floodlights causing a panicked crashing through the undergrowth as the blinded werewolves rushed to the friendlier shadows. The Doctor brought the Bug as close as he dared to the TARDIS and had the door open and more light flaring out before Mrs. B had even started her descent. With some difficulty she doused the lights of the Bug but couldn't find the controls for the bubble top to re-close it. With a shrug – what could happen to it, after all? – she slid awkwardly down the Bug's sides and into the light pouring through the TARDIS's open door. When she entered the impossible interior it was to find him almost dancing with impatience in front of one of the control room's many screens, heavy black spectacles crammed on his nose.

"Shut the door, if you would" he called over to her, and ran his hands impatiently over the controls. "Damn and blast and damn!" he rounded on her, his face anguished. "It can't pick up her life signs! She can't be dead, it isn't possible!"

"I'll try the Device." Mrs. B said calmly, and lifted her face slightly as though in deep thought. A moment passed – then she looked into his worried face and nodded. "The Device did timelock her, she was still alive. I can't reach Rory at all over such a distance but the Device thinks he's with Donna."

"Good man!" the Doctor said explosively "Lunatic, but nothing wrong with a little crazy when it works out!"

"He's always been a bit wild." Mrs. B took him literally. "Hyper-bright and that extraordinary appearance, of course, in a big family of, well, more ordinary people. He's attracted attention since he was a lad, but he only really went off the rails when his oldest brother was lost some years ago. He's always seemed to me like one of those dashing young pilots or soldiers who are so wonderfully brave and bold in war and never settle to anything in peacetime, spend their lives getting into trouble. At their best in a crisis. His grandmother, a great character, had just died as well, she'd always been a huge influence in his life. He never stopped searching for his brother, that may well be why he opened the shaft – or perhaps the Device did it to distract him. It's really quite fond of him, there aren't many telepaths and Rory is one of the best. Donna's one, of course, you know that, she's what we call a natural?"

"Donna is?" the Doctor was still poring over his control panel but at that he looked over, tilting his head in surprise.

"Oh yes. She caught an interchange between us after the Roc attacks, that's when I realized. And of course that was a telepathic call for help that alerted him when she was snatched. Doctor, I realise your TARDIS can't pick up Donna's signature because she's timelocked, but would it be able to identify static bio-signatures generally?"

"That" the Doctor said appreciatively "is a very brilliant idea. I think it could. Hold on a mo –" he did some poking and prodding, then shouted with success. "Aha! Coming through clear and strong, one timelocked Roc. Very nearly as clear and strong, two signatures not far away, which I believe would be Yin and Yang? And – that's odd –"

"What's odd?" Mrs. B had come up beside him and he pointed at a flickering signal.

"That. The intermittent signal. It's close, and it's not close. Do you know, I think that might be the missing boy, what's his name, Ian? Anyway, we'll come back to that. What we've got at a distance and in the right direction is a timelock signal!"

"More than one." Mrs. B pointed and he pushed his glasses back up his nose for a closer look.

"Ah. That complicates things."

"Not really" Mrs. B said thoughtfully "they're not that far apart. We can check them both."

"Mrs. B, I like the way you think." The Doctor said warmly, then frowned. "Do you really like being called Mrs. B?"

"It's better than Beulah, which is a name I never cared for." Mrs. B said firmly. Her face softened in memory. "My husband always called me Gunny – because of my initials, BB? I liked that."

"Gunny it is" the Doctor beamed at her. "Now hang on to something, because the TARDIS can be a little rocky on takeoff!"

CHAPTER ELEVEN

A shaft of lemony early morning sunshine stabbed at Rory's eyes and he woke with a start, the harness tugging painfully under his ribs and memory flooding back as he came fully awake. He groaned painfully and hauled himself to his feet gingerly, feeling the tally of bruises and aching muscles after the previous night's extraordinary ride as he stretched and, quietly, stamped his feet to get feeling back. Donna was still wedged at the back of the cave, looking if anything worse as the sunshine found her battered and bloodied state, and he shook his head anxiously. Where the hell was the bloody Doctor? Not that it made any difference to Donna, because she could stay in this state another hour, or another century, but the sooner he got her to help – and himself to a change of clothing, food and drink – the better he'd feel. He edged forward to the mouth of the cave and looked round but all was quiet. The hatchlings were wheezing and squabbling, but in a lazy way, and none of the nests had adults around.

He retired modestly behind a rocky jag and emerged feeling relieved but even more anxious for coffee and some form of breakfast. He did toy with the idea of using some nest material to start a beacon fire but as he didn't have any way of lighting it, and it was as likely to attract vigilant Rocs as the Doctor, gave up on the idea. If a Time Lord who traveled time and space couldn't track down his own companion they were in trouble, but it was too early to start to panic, and he wasn't a good enough telepath to pick up any echo of thought from the Device at this range, even though it had obviously been able to hear him the night before when he was fending off the hungry hatchling. His binoculars were still round his neck and with nothing else to pass the time he focused them on the distant smudge of green that marked the scrubby river he'd seen once before, and was soon completely absorbed in watching the creatures that came to drink.

He half expected to see tents, but apart from a clump of trees nothing broke the sandy scrub that extended beyond the brief green that fringed the water. At this distance it was hard to make out the details of the animals. Certainly there was nothing the size he'd half expected – no giant herbivores, or striding Tyrannosaurus Rex – quite a few that looked like the crocodiles he'd seen years before but upright, moving in quick jerky rushes, scattering smaller creatures that from this distance he fancied were about the size of mouflon – suddenly the air was filled with a gigantic whooshing noise, as though a whole herd of Rocs had sneaked up on him, and he convulsively jerked back into the scanty shelter of the cave.

"Hey!" A familiar voice he'd never thought to hear again called merrily "You all right there? Or could you fancy a lift?"

"Am I dead?" he poked his head out cautiously "Because I thought for sure you were, you bugger. Harry!"

His long-lost brother jumped down from the precariously-balanced TARDIS and they pounded each other on the back. "Look how big you got!" Harry held him at arm's length. "Took your time coming to get me, didn't you?"

"Had to wait for transport" his voice cracked as reality hit home. "Bloody hell, Harry! What the hell happened?"

"Same as your friend Donna, I'm guessing. You have got her here, right? Let's get her onto the TARDIS and get out of here, we can talk on board. One minute I'm grabbed by a hungry Roc and the next minute there's Gunny with a smudge of muck on her brow telling me to shake a leg and climb on board –" the two big men between them made nothing of lifting Donna clear of the cave and onto the TARDIS, although Harry winced at her injuries. Even as Mrs. B slammed the doors shut they could hear screeches of protest nearing and the TARDIS lost no time in lurching off its pinnacle and spinning away, knocking the brothers sprawling.

"Hey, Rory, you did it" the Doctor looked up briefly from his extraordinary console to beam at him. "Gunny, can you persuade them to stop throwing Donna all over the place so you can look her over? There's a couch just over there, under the stairs."

"Gunny?" Rory dusted himself down quickly and glanced at Harry, who grinned and jerked his head towards Mrs. B. They settled Donna as best they could on the couch and let Mrs. B chase them back to the control room, where the Doctor had got the TARDIS on an even keel. Rory got a grip on his brother's arm that made him complain.

"Shut up, you wimp." But Rory did loosen the grip. "I don't understand. Why didn't the Device tell us? I searched everywhere for you."

"Gunny asked it that." The Doctor answered for Harry. "It seems the Device – ah – didn't trust you not to go straight to the mainland and kill yourself in the search. You have to remember, there was no way of getting anyone back before the TARDIS. You'd have gone mad thinking of Harry helpless in a nest."

"I nearly went mad anyway." Rory said soberly, then jumped to his feet. "But you're back now, you bugger, and now we're nearly the same age, do you realise that? Oh, boy, the girls in the towns had better watch out now! Doc, we need to celebrate. What drink do you keep on board? If Gunny has good news about Donna it had better be champagne!" At that moment Mrs. B rejoined them and shook her head reprovingly.

"You don't mind me calling you Gunny, surely?" Rory wheedled and she choked back what might almost have been a laugh, then straightened her face again.

"I've had as good a look at Donna as I can without restarting her" she told the Doctor. "Her ribcage has been crushed, and I think both lungs are punctured. There's damage to three vertebrae, her abdomen is badly lacerated and her pelvis and right arm are broken." She let her face relax as she looked up into his worried one. "Nothing the Device can't put right, I promise you."

"Good! Now I hate to say this but the TARDIS can't dematerialize at this temperature, and can't fly straight for much longer either. We're going to have to put down again -"

Harry groaned and Mrs. B gave him a glance of scant sympathy.

"We've only put down once since we got you on board" she said primly "Think what a night the Doctor and I have had, leaving this poor ship panting while we crept round nests filled with murderous reptiles so we could look for you!"

"They found me at the bottom of the cliff" Harry told Rory, his eyes dancing "covered in seven years of the rubbish the Rocs chuck out of their nests. No danger at all."

"You can call it no danger if you like, but I wouldn't do it again in a hurry. Racing the dawn and digging through some of the most disgusting rubbish – including infant Roc pellets – with just the sonic screwdriver as a torch, doesn't rate as one of my favourite experiences, and your brother had to shower twice before we'd let him in the control room." The Doctor grinned at Rory. "But that aside, Rory, did you happen to spot any sheltered looking places where we can stop for a while?"

"Don't know about sheltered" he said thoughtfully "but I'd like a closer look at where those guys were camping near the river. If it hadn't been for Donna I'd have climbed down the cliff somehow and gone to join them – what?"

"GUYS camping by the river?" They were all staring at him, but it was Harry who said it. "What guys?"

"Well, the campfires – sheesh." He slapped hit his forehead. "It kept niggling at me, something that didn't look right – the campfires! Nobody should have risked attracting attention like that! But I did see fires – several small ones, around a bonfire."

"Can you show me where?" The Doctor stepped aside and gestured to a small screen Rory hadn't noticed before. "There, that's the river you can see there – where were the fires?"

Rory peered at the screen and tried to match it to his memory. "There were two big trees leaning towards each other – yes, there they are. Almost under that, or it looked that way from the cave."

"We'll stop under the trees, then." The Doctor decided, and the TARDIS lurched again, sounding strained. Several odd noises were now adding themselves to its usual cacophony and it was with a metallic sigh of almost palpable relief when, minutes later, it settled again and started to hiss. Rory ran to the door and peered out through the small windows.

"Wow, I never realized how much rain the cliffs turned back towards us, that's pretty harsh terrain! Doc, the door won't open?"

"It doesn't in dangerous situations until I've had a look." The Doctor spoke absently, peering into his thermal monitor. "And this doesn't look too good. The monitor shows eleven natives within about thirty yards, and a lot more – a LOT more – about a hundred yards away. Look for yourself – they're upright, but they seem to have short heavy tails – definitely not homo erectus, but we'd have guessed that anyway. One or two are carrying heavy spears but I'm guessing the others will either be carrying smaller weapons or be exceptionally talented fighters. The TARDIS is virtually indestructible, so we're safe in here. At worst, we sit here for half an hour, until the TARDIS has cooled down, then we fly back – and I don't mean fly the way we've been flying, I mean the TARDIS does a space jump." He looked up from the monitor, frowning, then started to laugh at their disgusted expressions.

"I don't believe that's how you travel through space and time, peering cautiously out the windows!" Rory looked thoroughly rebellious and the Doctor pulled a face at him.

"It's normally Donna sounding the cautious note, not me – but seriously, there are chances I might take on my own which just aren't an option. If anything happened to Gunny, for instance, the Device might never forgive me, and where would Donna be then?"

"If I'm not to go out, do I at least get to look?" Mrs. B barely waited for his nod before darting to the door and opening it. She stood briefly in silence and, even as they started toward her, closed the door with great care.

"Well?" Harry said eagerly and she pursed her lips and turned to the Doctor.

"Doctor, you'll know what a crocodile looks like?" He nodded, surprised, and she nodded back. "Well, the – ah – individual standing outside is almost completely unlike a crocodile."

They all crowded to the door and the doctor hung out, holding the frame. "Hmmm. I see what you mean."

…o0o…

The creature standing a few yards away was leaning negligently against a tree. With one clawed hand he was picking his teeth, his yellow eyes, with black slitted pupils, lazily meeting their stares, green-scaled from head to foot, with no form of clothing. His legs and arms were longer, and more in proportion to his body, than a crocodile's, but his body, tail and snout were shorter. The Doctor pulled himself back inside and closed the door again.

"Pretty fellow, but he doesn't look aggressive – yet. I vote we give it a go – but Gunny definitely stays inside. With Donna."

"But I'm the most experienced telepath of us all, I'll be able to pick up hostility the fastest, and anyway it should be you staying behind, no-one else can fly the TARDIS." Mrs. B objected, but not quite as energetically as before. The very alien, and not entirely friendly, appearance of the bipedal reptile had obviously cooled some of her enthusiasm.

"We'll need your telepathy." The Doctor agreed. "But I'm the only one who can speak their language."

"What, that – that werecroc? We don't even know they have one?" Rory stared at him. "How do you know you can speak it?"

"Werecroc is good" the Doctor said appreciatively. "But they're not your werewolves. They not only travel in groups, they make fire, so they have at least some civilization and that means at least basic communication. And if they have a language the TARDIS will be able to understand it and it does an instantaneous translation. So if we're going out at all, I have to go out first. As for telepathy - assuming we can get talking, Rory, do you think you'll be able to pick up enough telepathically to follow what's going on?"

"Pretty sure – I can follow concepts in other languages." Rory nodded eagerly, and looked at his brother. "Harry isn't a telepath, but he's definitely an empath. When I was a kid I'd try to put things in his head and he generally reacted."

"Yeah?" Harry looked blankly from one to the other, then thought about it. "Okay, I'll buy that. I do generally pick up subtext. So how do we play it?"

"Well – if they're friendly, or at least not openly hostile, no problem. But – well, they're reptiles, with bloody big teeth, so there's at least a chance they aren't vegetarian missionaries. Gunny, although I'm not from Riddance, would the Device timelock me if necessary?"

She communed with the Device, then nodded. "Apparently you've been inside it – it knows you well enough. So if they attack, you mean, you'll survive it?"

"More than that, I hope – and our lives could rely on your specific skills, which is why I need you safely inside, or at least no further than the doorway. You'll be monitoring. Not so much to timelock us if there's an attack, but to unlock us remotely, and so quickly they won't realise we're not in control of our own protection, is that possible?"

"I've got my unlocker." Rory reminded him. "As long as I can reach you guys I'll be able to do it. It'll be less of a drain on the Device."

"Up your sleeve, then – yes, like that, just protruding, so it won't be visible, so it should look like you're just helping us up. Don't commit yourselves to leaving the TARDIS if it looks dangerous – I won't step away from the door unless I feel confident. Okay?"

"Okay." They all looked keyed-up and tense, and the Doctor grinned at them nostalgically. He never lost the thrill himself, and it intensified when he shared it with companions, the heady mix of fear, anticipation and excitement!

They opened the door again and the werecroc swiveled one eye inquisitively toward them. The Doctor took a deep breath and stepped out and the werecroc straightened and barked out a single word which to the Riddance contingent sounded like "Blot!"

The Doctor stopped and smiled ingratiatingly. The werecroc's eyes narrowed suspiciously and it peeled back its lips to bare some fairly alarming teeth. The Doctor closed his lips hastily over his own teeth, and the werecroc waved a hand in a very deliberate movement.

"Ah" the Doctor murmured. It wasn't uncommon to meet races with a rich and comprehensive sign language and just a few spoken words for emphasis and warning, and he relaxed as much as he could, allowing the TARDIS to direct his own movements. The words that formed in his head were we come in peace and his hands, directed by the TARDIS, smoothly moved against each other. The werecroc cocked its head and gestured for him to come forward. Harry and Rory moved out behind him, leaving Gunny nervously hovering in the doorway.

You speak the werecroc gestured in some surprise. He tapped his chest and said aloud, "Gra" before continuing in sign language I am the leader here. How are you called? This was not the restrained hand gestures of the deaf, but full body language, including even the creature's heavy short tail which just touched to the ground, and the Doctor had some difficulty with his reply. He could hear Rory smother an involuntary laugh as he thrust his rear out and could only hope he'd understood not to smile or at least not show his teeth.

I am called the Doctor. I am a traveler of many places. These are friends.

Gra nodded and smacked his tail loudly against the back of his legs, the sound traveling further than any shout could. It was obviously a signal, but the Doctor remained absolutely relaxed as the werecroc turned his attention back to them.

We have eaten animals like you in the past Gra gestured conversationally. We didn't realise they were intelligent – he paused and his lower jaw sagged briefly in what the TARDIS translated as a smile – although we were puzzled by their wrappings. The Rocs brought them to us but they were always dead or dying. Your companions need not be so afraid. We do not readily eat intelligent creatures..

The sound of a stamp on the ground brought all three men's heads jerking round, and they realized two more of the werecrocs had come up quietly. The one that had stamped lifted his muzzle and shook it angrily. These two do not speak and they didn't understand your promise. Just being in those wrappings doesn't make them intelligent.

Be still. I have made my decision. Gra's movements were stilted with anger, but the second snarled and darted at Harry, who fell like a tree. The werecroc howled and clutched at his jaw, then delicately plucked out an enormous broken tooth between his stubby claws, swiveling one eye to look at it in horror. In the sudden stillness Rory bent smoothly over Harry and helped him back to his feet, and they took up their original positions behind the Doctor, both expressionlessly looking at Gra.

Kill him. Gra gestured, and the third werecroc whirled and sank his fist into the injured werecroc's belly. Stricken, the second folded convulsively onto a gnarled elbow aimed with deadly speed and accuracy at his throat. He fell, twitched once, and was still. It was hard to read expression in a reptile's face, but Gra briefly radiated an unmistakable satisfaction before he swiveled his eyes back at the Doctor. Where are you from?

Don't the Rocs tell you?

The Rocs don't talk. They fly across the land and across the water and they bring creatures from the land and the water for us to eat. They have never brought us creatures that are harder than rock or that travel in a flying - cave.

The Doctor shrugged. I am from beyond the stars in the night sky.

Gra blinked for the first time, and considered it before cocking his head to look directly at the Banks brothers. That fool spoke true - they are not the same as you. Two hearts beat in your chest – I hear them. And your companions don't speak.

The Doctor looked over his shoulder and said mildly "He thinks you are unintelligent, so if you can pick up enough to start reacting it would be a good thing." He looked back at Gra. "We speak in sound, because of the way we are fashioned. They are silent only from respect, I have told them they can be more open. They are strong and brave men, who flew here on wild Rocs. They are from this world but they have learned the way to become rock at will.

Wild Rocs? The werecroc managed in some subtle way to seem impressed and out of the corner of his eye the Doctor saw Rory – unsmiling – settle his shoulders and lift his hands, closing them as if on imaginary reins. Fortunately it didn't seem to have any alternative meaning, although Gra did look momentarily taken aback. "Only our best and strongest can do that. Most of our mounts are raised from eggs. So, you still say you came in peace?

We did, and we do. We have no quarrel with you, and seek none.

The werecroc tapped his chest again. I have a thousand hunters at my back. We were making for the cliffs to capture more Rocs, and to ride them across the water to the island of the soft mammals. Now you tell me they are able to make themselves inedible and I saw the truth in you as you said it. I saw that mammal turn to rock even as that fool's teeth closed on him. The fish in the water have learned to travel always with protectors against our Rocs. We are a great nomadic people, and we have always traveled this land, but every year there are more people and less food. Our people will soon be starving. What do you, Doc-tor from the sky, suggest for us?

The Doctor, who was beginning to feel a bit like a puppet and to find the swaying, weaving, shifting and waving of the conversation quite tiring, was prompted to lift his foot and put it down with emphasis. Keep away from the island. It is guarded and you will lose your hunters and then your people will be both hungry and in danger from the other predators in this land. There are other people, in other worlds, who might welcome a people as strong and quick as you as protectors. It would be dangerous, but you could make a life – have homes, settle, raise young. There would be food.

Gra rocked back pensively on his heavy tail, then gestured again. This is our world. As a race, we would never leave. But we are many, too many for the world to support - the young and strong, the best fighters, could go, that would leave us enough food to live on and when they come back, the next generation could go. Would your people be interested in that?

They're not my people – many look as different from you and me as we look to each other. But intelligent creatures work together in dangerous worlds for the greater good, and the strong are always welcome. I will find out.

I will wait to hear from you – Doc-tor. I am sorry we shan't be eating soft mammals soon – you are delicious. But perhaps, in time, you will be better for us than food. He ducked his ugly head at the Doctor, glanced again at the Banks brothers and Gunny in the doorway, and turned away, his werecrocs turning obediently with him.

"Back up to the TARDIS, but look relaxed about it." The Doctor said conversationally. "We have to get back immediately and warn everyone."

"Warn them?" Rory rotated his stiff neck with some relief as he moved towards the door with studied nonchalance. "I got the distinct impression with all that dancing you guys were doing that the danger was over?"

"Did you?" the Doctor, last one in, closed the door with a last cheerful wave, then cast aside the relaxed calm of his movements to dash to the console. "Harry, pull on that lever there, by your left hand, and Rory, hold this knob steady, just the way I've set it – jump to it, no time to waste! Those are hunters, and their entire conversation is built on body language. He knew I was telling the truth and he also knew it wasn't the entire truth, and as fast as we're moving now, that's how fast they're going for their Rocs to make an instant attack." He was having to shout over the racket the TARDIS was making as it dematerialized. "Hold that bloody knob, Rory, we're slipping through time as well as space and if you let it turn at all we could lose hours. I've set it so we should arrive back just minutes after Gunny and I left Riddance, that'll give us eight more hours at least to prepare the island."

Rory tightened his grip until his knuckles whitened. "So, the Rocs – they do ride them, I got that right? I wasn't the first."

"First human" the Doctor spared him a quick grin. "And you rode a wild one, that really impressed Gra."

"Mad werecroc meets mad human." Harry shook his head. "What's the plan, Doc, you can't cram everyone on the island into the Device in time and its protection is only on the people it's touched – or has that changed, Gunny?"

"No, that's still the way it works." Mrs. B was still pale from the tense encounter, but she was frowning, her mind racing. "I can't really see – oh, just a minute, you want me to brief the Device to timelock any of them if they set foot on the island?"

"Not even foot" he said apologetically "those Rocs can swoop, remember. Can it put up a sort of force field dome? Or bring through lots of dragons to swirl around overhead?" She blinked, shocked at the very thought. "Doctor, do you have any idea what kind of a drain that would be? It couldn't do more than – well, a few hours. And the dragon idea – oh no, they'd be very destructive."

"Or – " Rory said slowly, thinking aloud. "Instead of a dome, how about a – a kind of net? Loosely spaced tendrils of energy? I mean, you offered that Gra thing a kind of future, right, Doc? It wouldn't risk that with a serious full-on attack. From the impression I got of him, I'd guess he'd send a few hunters on a snatch attack, just to test the truth of what you said, and be all innocence if it failed. So the Device wouldn't be pouring out energy against a whole army, just a few guerillas, and if the tendrils picked them up they could knit together to stop it –"

"Nice thinking, bro" Harry said admiringly. "If it could do it, of course?"

"Well - " Gunny sank into the half-suspended look she got when communing with the Device, then nodded to them. "It could do that – coast to coast. But only for a couple of days! Any longer and we'd need a flood of volunteers donating their stored fat."

"Only needs to be a couple of days" Rory suddenly remembered. "The clickits will be hatching any day now, and they'll see off any Roc automatically, whether it has a rider or not!"

There was a gentle bump as the TARDIS rematerialized and the Doctor waved to them to release their tasks. "That's us, right outside the Centre. Gunny, after you? And Rory – okay, you got her" as he saw Rory had already gently lifted Donna's broken body.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Donna drew breath for another scream, then realized the face bending over hers wasn't the hideous Roc but the welcome familiarity of the Doctor and let her breath out in a sigh instead.

"Oh, Doctor. I had the worst dream!"

"It wasn't a dream, but you're safe now" he beamed down at her and she gave him a puzzled look which she then turned on her surroundings. She was lying on a gurney in a half-familiar small room almost entirely made of panels of burnished metal or glass, flooded with soft light although there seemed to be no one direct source.

"It MUST have been a dream" she lifted her right arm and twiddled her fingers "I heard my arm breaking, Doctor. And the pain was – it was like a giant wave. But there's nothing now. Where am I?"

"You're in the Device, and it's put you back together. Like Humpty Dumpty couldn't be." He perched lightly on the edge of the gurney. "One of the Rocs was restarted – which is something we've still got to investigate – and it flew straight back to the mainland, taking you as supper for its hatchlings. Rory flew after you on Sneezy while Gunny and I came back to Riddance for the TARDIS."

"Oh" Donny picked apart the brief statement and tried to fit it into her own memories. Rory – bitchy Lynne – composing the text in the twilight – the terror of the attack – she was as disoriented by her sudden safety as she had been by the Roc's unexpected return to life. "Who's Gunny?" seemed to be an important question and the Doctor threw his head back and gave one of his rare laughs

"That's my girl. Always master of the bigger picture! Listen, you going to get up or just lie here all day? The Device has rather a lot to get on with right now."

"Oh, right" she threw back the sheet covering her and recoiled in shock at the blood all over her clothes. "Doctor?"

"Yes, I'm afraid your clothes have had it. But don't worry, you're all fixed on the inside. Except that you might be a bit thinner."

"I didn't ask to be" she said darkly, standing up carefully but realizing she really did feel fine. Better than fine, better than in ages. "I don't mind" she added hastily, saying politely to the Device "thanks very much. Thanks."

There was a distinct touch of friendly warmth in her mind and she shot the Doctor a wild look. He grinned.

"Did it answer you?"

"Hello, yes! Sort of. Did you feel that too?"

"Oh, no. It's quite selective that way, but Gunny told me you're a natural. If you wanted to stay there's a job right here for you." He gave her a penetrating glance. "DO you want to stay?"

"Are you serious? Get me as far from those Rocs as you can – a couple of solar systems should do it. And really, who is Gunny? And where is Rory, from what you said I owe him a pretty big thank you?"

"Gunny is Mrs. B. I've brought some clothes for you from the TARDIS and there are very good shower facilities here in the Centre so get cleaned up and changed so we can go and find lunch. I'll bring you up to date with everything that's been happening since you were taken. Rory and his brother, and Gunny, have been rushing around organizing emergency safety measures, which is a long story, but they're now probably celebrating with the family – did he ever tell you his oldest brother vanished a few years ago? When we were chasing down your static bio signature we found Harry, also timelocked by a Roc attack, but safe and sound. I would imagine by now there's a pretty big party building up, we could probably cadge an invitation?"

There were times when the Doctor's teasing her about her grasp of events could be useful, and this was one of those times. "Lunch." She looked him straight in the eye "You definitely said something about lunch?"

…o0o…

"You're very quiet" the Doctor paused in his demolition of a dodo steak "Reaction getting to you?"

"I guess. That was quite a story I missed." She looked away from the understanding in his eyes and round the virtually deserted café. The Doctor had been quite right, half the town had gone to join the impromptu homecoming party at the family farm – or perhaps to hide in case the werecrocs got through the Device's protection - and the bazaar was eerily quiet.

"But the bit that I WAS involved in, what it comes down to, someone tried to kill me just for being friends with Rory, someone from here, and that's pretty scary. So no, I don't want to go to the party because I may not be so lucky next time. Can't we leave? We've found out about the unicorns, that was what we came for, and we sorted out Gunny and the town, and now we're not solving the problems any more, we're causing them?"

"You can't call it causing a problem when everyone else sees it as saving the island, Donna. It was the biggest stroke of luck in their history that Rory was there on the cliffs to see those fires." The Doctor put down his knife and fork. "You think it was deliberate? And someone from here?"

"Well, yeah – someone who just wanted, I don't know, Rocs to be free or something stupid, would have checked there wasn't anyone around first, right? Anyway, surely only people from Riddance – do-gooders from Riddance, and the teens – have restarters? They wouldn't exactly need them in the other towns." She couldn't resist adding "How's that for big picture, Doctor?"

"There they are!" A familiar voice boomed from the doorway and Rory came to sit beside Donna, pushing her a little further up the bench seat playfully. "We brought the party here, it was getting too much for the house and it would have been bloody ironic to lose guests to more Rocs. Because I for one don't plan to go after them. Duchess, I want you to meet my brother and some of my disreputable relatives. Don't hold them against me."

"I'm Harry – and I'm very glad you got abducted. No-one ever came looking when it was just for me!" Rory's brother was very like him, but his hair was tawny blonde instead of red and his laughing eyes brown instead of electric blue. They seemed close enough in age to be twins, despite the eight year real difference, and seemed to have all his brother's charm. Others were crowding round the table and Rory introduced his mother, who stared in surprise, then apologized.

"Oh, I'm sorry, you just look so much like – Sarah, darling, come over here and meet Donna. This is my daughter, Donna – Sarah, look at her. Who do you see?"

"You're very familiar" Sarah agreed "but –"

Rory offered helpfully "Imagine her with her hair piled on her head – add thirty or so years - "

"Bloody hell." Sarah's beautiful eyes sparkled "You're the image of Grand! We must be related!"

"Grand?" Donna looked bewildered and Sarah laughed.

"Rory didn't tell you?"

"I've been trying to chat her up." Rory explained patiently. "You don't start by telling a girl she looks like your grandmother, it doesn't go down well."

"It does if she knows the story of Grand." Sarah disagreed, and patted Donna's hand. "Honestly, Grand was one of our great love stories – we don't have a lot of great love stories, so we do make a fuss of the ones we've got. Everyone knows the story of Leona and Roderick – that's our Grandad. Tell her, Mom!"

"Darling, you tell her – you and Rory were always the ones the most fascinated by that old story! Donna, don't you let them bore you – and I want us to have a chance to talk properly, soon, okay?" She hugged Donna spontaneously and let herself be towed away by one of the guests.

Sarah perched comfortably on a chair. "It really is a fantastic resemblance, did you ever have a relative go missing? Grand was SO beautiful!"

"No missing relatives." Donna liked Sarah immediately. "Won't you tell me the story?"

"Oh, sure. There's a song and everything - shut up Rory, I know I can't sing, I wasn't going to try – our grandfather, on Mom's side, he was a naval pilot."

"She knows that" Rory interrupted helpfully and Sarah swatted at him.

"Okay, well, he found himself here and was told by everyone that there was no way back, and he just had to accept his old life was over and get on with his new life. He was as sick as a parrot about it but he tried, he settled in New London and he married again, started a family, joined a congregation, the whole bit. And then one day he was seized with this urge to go to the lagoon. He just left work, caught the train, took a runabout to the lagoon and was standing there staring at it, lost in his memories – and an island-hopping yacht suddenly appeared, with a beautiful woman on board. His original wife. And, big surprise, a daughter he didn't even know he had! The only person who ever came here on purpose, I mean, how romantic is that?"

"Pretty good." Donna agreed, hardly noticing that Rory had left the table and returned with more drinks for them. "How did she know where to find him?"

Sarah drank deeply and settled herself more comfortably. "Well of course she didn't, but when she was told he was missing she refused to believe he was dead. She's always been very – well, I'll say strong-minded. Once Grand set her sights on something no-one ever managed to talk her out of it, and she was convinced he was alive. The war ended three years after he was reporting missing and she flew straight to the Bermuda islands, chartered a small yacht – owned and crewed by a guy called Duncan Harris - and began to search every single island. After five months her money ran out and they were making their way back to Hamilton when a storm blew up out of nowhere and blew them off course. One minute they were bailing for their lives and the next they were in the lagoon with her long-lost husband staring at her in disbelief."

"And then it got a bit complicated." Rory mimicked Sarah's story-telling voice and she swatted at him good-humouredly.

"You are SUCH a cynic. I do think the whole story's romantic and I seem to remember a certain brother not a million miles away from me right now used to march around declaring that he wouldn't get married unless it was a great love against great odds. But yes, it did get complicated, because of course he had married that cold fish in New London, thinking he'd never see Grand again. Luckily she and Duncan Harris, the guy who owned the yacht, had also rather fallen for each other during all the months traipsing round tropical islands. She married him instead, and they moved here, to Riddance, with Mum and started their own family. Duncan always said it was the least she could do, after the way she'd disrupted his life!"

"But you saw a lot of your grandfather." Donna remembered back to Rory talking about him, and they both nodded.

"Mainly since Grand died. His wife wouldn't allow him to visit much before that." Sarah qualified. "I was only about six but I still remember her clearly. Harry –" she caught at her brother's arm as he passed "you must remember Grand better than any of us, you're the oldest?"

"Bellow like a foghorn, personality like a battering ram, heart like a –" he suddenly blinked at Donna, then shouted with laughter. "I THOUGHT there was something familiar about you! You're not really a battle-axe yet, that's what threw me – no, no, joking. We all absolutely adored Grand. She was a force of nature, though. Come on, you have to meet my uncle, he'll just flip –" and he towed her away.

Rory made one laughing attempt to claim her back but the party was growing by the minute and he was soon swept away in the crush. Harry saw her glancing back to where he stood smiling, head bent attentively over a pretty brunette, and shook his own head, briefly serious.

"He's a top brother" he said brutally "but he'd be a bloody awful boyfriend. I hadn't been back an hour before I could see that. You are much, much too good for him. Hey!" he laughed as another couple came up to them "Of course I remember you! Although back then you weren't a couple, you look good together! Have you met my Roc-sister, this is Donna?"

She finally managed to get away from him without having to be rude about it, and found her way back to the Doctor. "It's sundown, so it's safe for me to go back to the TARDIS" she said "I may have been timelocked overnight but I haven't actually slept and I'm really tired, I'll see you later, okay?"

"I'll come back with you" he offered at once and she tried to laugh, shaking her head.

"I'm safe now, remember? Device-protected? I just want to sleep. See you whenever."

Once back in the TARDIS, however, she couldn't relax. She was safe here, and that was a relief to her battered nerves, but she was far too strung-up to sleep and it was a relief when the door opened. "Doctor?"

"No." Rory stepped inside and closed the door quietly behind him. "It wasn't locked. I thought you were asleep?"

"So you came to – what? Visit me in my dreams?"

"No, duchess, although I wouldn't have minded waking up sleeping beauty with a kiss. Don't prickle at me. I came to talk to you about what happened, the restarting of the Roc."

"Was it Lynne?" she couldn't think of any tactful way of asking but anyway she knew, always had known, it didn't need his nod. He sat down next to her.

"I'm pretty sure it was. No, completely sure. What are you going to do about it? About her?"

"Well, you pretty much cancelled it out by timelocking me and then coming after me, didn't you? But I don't think you picked yourself the best girlfriend, Rory, someone who tries to kill everyone you spend time with could be a little hair-raising to live with."

"God, she's not my girlfriend!" He was horrified, then admitted reluctantly "All right, she's one of them. Or she used to be. Never again. The thing is, I don't know what to do. You're right, she can't go round attacking everyone I find interesting but she was scarily devious about it. The Device would never have let her hurt anyone directly, so she just restarted the Roc and let it do the hurting. In her defense, she probably just meant you to be timelocked forever on the mainland, like Harry would have been, but if you lay charges against her she'll end up in jail. If you don't, what will she do next time?"

"Why are you asking me, Rory?" Donna shot him a piercing glance. "Stop bloody rambling and come to the point, you didn't come here to muse over your homicidal girlfriend's shortcomings with me."

"No" he admitted, and grinned at her "You are so – direct. What you think is what you say, it's so refreshing."

"Yeah, about that" Donna said grimly. "No more looking in my mind, okay?"

"No, never! It doesn't work like that, you can't look into someone's thoughts unless they let you, but you, how can I put it, sometimes you think so loudly it might as well be out loud. Like now" he grinned "okay, okay, I'll get on with it. So – here's the thing – Lynne's come to the party. She's looking partly guilty but mainly smug and she doesn't know that you and I know that she did it, so if you come back with me we can – well, jealousy might make her try something more direct. And then she'll be timelocked."

"Leaving you minus a jealous girlfriend and no scandal." Donna got up. "That's pretty shabby, Rory. Anyway, if she has a restarter she's obviously a do-gooder, she'd be restarted almost immediately and I'm here to tell you that timelocked is no more than a heartbeat. Certainly won't leave her time to think things over, which jail will. We'll be gone from here today or tomorrow, it'll be better if you set up your sting with one of your local girlfriends. In the meantime I think you've better go?"

He stood too, but caught at her shoulders and turned her gently to face him. "You've got a pretty low opinion of me, haven't you?" he looked into her face "I don't run after women, you know. The only one I keep chasing after is you, and you keep pushing me away. I really can't help it that women like me, and okay I could ignore them, or be rude to them, but up to now I've found it easiest – and fun – to just date all of them. Safety in numbers. Harry was pretty unimpressed when I was catching him up to date with the last few years, and now you're disapproving as well, so maybe I have to re-think this. The point is I'm not looking at neutralizing a tiresome girlfriend. I'm trying to find the least public way of stopping her from going further along a dangerous path. She isn't a do-gooder as such. She had a restarter a few years ago in her werewolf patrol days and presumably never handed it back in. She's not even allowed to do community duty any more, because she's intense, and she frightens people – putting aside what she did, look at how malicious she was to you, just because I was enjoying your company? She's from a pretty wild family. Some of the Riddance families are a bit out there, but even her own family are sick of her because she's stirred up so much trouble between them. She's what my mother used to call me – an accident looking for a place to happen. But what she did to you wasn't an accident, it was deliberate, and it was pretty nasty. I think you and I have got pretty close, and I'm asking you as a friend for help, or at least for advice."

"Well –" Donna tore her eyes off his hypnotic blue ones with an effort and pulled gently free. "I suppose – you could ask the Doctor"

"Ask the Doctor what?" he said from behind them, and they both jumped. "Hello-hello-hello, what have you two been up to?"

"I didn't hear you come in" Donna said breathlessly, and he grinned at her teasingly. "We were talking about Lynne and how she set the Roc on me because she's jealous of Rory – can't the TARDIS do something with her memory?"

"Absolutely not" he was emphatic and Rory sagged slightly. "If it took away her memory of being obsessed with him, she'd either fall for him again, or get obsessed over someone else, it wouldn't help at all. I think you should speak to Gunny."

"Gunny?" Rory looked at him, surprised, and the Doctor nodded.

"You didn't hear me come in, and without trying to eavesdrop I did hear what you said about Lynne. When someone has out-of-kilter personality issues like that it can be a chemical imbalance in their brain – and from everything I've heard about the Device, that sort of thing is no problem for it."

Rory frowned. "Lynne's obsessed with her weight, she's been trying to get the Device to suck off a few more pounds for years. Gunny won't let her anywhere near it, she's way too thin already."

"Then she'll jump at the chance for a treatment." The Doctor said calmly. "And if there's any physical cause, problem solved. Wait, Rory, don't rush off, I came looking for you specifically. I've been talking to Gunny myself and she's agreed that if you are going to stay here – which I assume you are?" Rory nodded, his intense blue eyes fixed on the Doctor's. "Well, in that case we agreed you should have one more trip before the Device closes your little private shaft down. You'll have to keep it secret, but this time you can bring back stuff you've never been able to get before, because I'll say we collected it in the TARDIS as a reward to you for saving Donna's life. I've even got something specific to suggest -"

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

It was very peaceful in the cab, even the Bug's throaty roar was muted with the bubble locked in place, and Rory didn't seem in the mood to talk, although he smiled across at her frequently. They'd left the Doctor going back to the party to find Gunny and get Lynne's treatment organized, and Rory had begged Donna to go with him as his guide – there were things he'd seen on Earth he didn't understand and had never been able to ask anyone about – and particularly to help him find the dogs the Doctor had suggested he bring to the island. To be so close to achieving another of his dreams seemed to have robbed him of speech. When he did talk it was to speculate about the dragons but as Donna couldn't share his excitement at the thought of riding a gigantic winged beast which breathed fire they were mostly companionably silent for the drive up into the hills.

At one point, apropos of nothing , she remembered Marie and did ask why Rory lived in Riddance, since it was obvious most of his scientist colleagues were in the bigger towns.

"I like Riddance" Rory gave her a surprised glance, and she told him about Marie's sarcastic comment, and Father Turner's attitude. "Oh, sure, there's a lot of that still about. I don't think there'll be as much in the future, eh? We were talking earlier about my grandfather – he was English and he settled in New London once he accepted he wasn't going to find a way back. He married a New Londoner, they still live there and my mother was visiting them when she met my father. He's not actually a Riddance man himself. She'd have moved to New London if he'd wanted, even if it meant leaving Grand behind – I've never known two people still more in love than my parents, they'd do anything for each other – but he liked Riddance. It's much less formal than the bigger towns, used to be a lot rougher but it's also more vigorous. Riddance people – You've a saying on Earth, they think outside the box? We kids were all pretty wild growing up but I think we might have been wild anywhere and Riddance was a good place to stretch yourself. Even my grandfather agreed, he'd have moved to be with us but his wife, you can imagine, went into palpitations at the thought. Even after Grand died. He did – and does - spend a lot of time with us after he retired, and their son comes through quite often, but she could never shake off her distrust of a town without ecclesiastics, we're lucky to see her once a year. All sorts of people, most of them pretty okay, and the worst of them now sorted out by the Device anyway. But even way back then my Dad saw potential in it – well, he was right, wasn't he? You met him, you know."

"I did? Tonight? I met your mother, but I don't remember meeting your father? " She couldn't think of anyone remotely like Rory that she'd met so far.

"Not tonight, he went through to New Amsterdam by train to get to the trial and Gunny asked him to stay on to represent Riddance at those meetings that are going on. You should have heard him shout when my mother called him on his Talkie with the news about Harry! But you met him when you first got here - Thomas Banks? He's senior councilor – sort of the mayor, if we had mayors."

She remembered Thomas clearly from that meeting in the Centre, but still couldn't see any resemblance apart from their size. "I take after my mother's side of the family" Rory remarked "Well, my father's height and breadth, but with my mother's colouring, although her hair's going grey now. They like you, you know – my family. Sarah and Harry think you're great. You'll have to meet them properly sometime."

"I'd like that" she said politely, and sighed inwardly. It would have been fun to remember the envious and resentful stares that had followed her when she was with Rory, and to think how much more envious and resentful they'd be at his invitation, but Lynne had taken all the bubbles out of that. She also seemed to have taken Rory out of flirtatious mode, the invitation had sounded genuinely a friendly one. At least Lynne hadn't managed to rob this adventure of its fun, the Rory who drove finally into a cave at the top of an alarmingly rocky slope was a small boy on a mission, tugging her hand insistently and laughing with excitement as he led her over to a motorbike propped against the wall.

"Here, helmet – and you'll need a jacket, it's always colder there –" he'd modified the bike by bolting a large metal box to the back, so when she squeezed on behind him they were pressed breathlessly close.

"I've never had a passenger" his teeth gleamed as he smiled over his shoulder "You feel lovely. Firm or squishy in all the right places."

"Rory –" she swatted his shoulder and he laughed, gunned the engine deafeningly in the enclosed space, and roared out of the cave mouth. Within seconds they were on a motorway under the orange flare of the lamps and the smell of Earth – specifically, of an English motorway, fumes, pollution, and damp – hit her forcefully. Here, it was about nine in the morning and Rory weaved the big bike skillfully through the tail end of the morning rush hour, swooping up eventually outside a giant supermarket.

"Hey." She took off her helmet and ran a distracted hand through her hair "This wasn't part of the plan?"

"Come ON" his eyes glinted wickedly "This is my last and best chance to take stuff back, remember? And don't tell me the Doctor didn't know, he fritzed the credit card Simon gave you, didn't he? He KNEW we were going to buy other stuff."

It was a very long day – all the longer for having continued without a break from the day before – but Donna did enjoy herself nonetheless. Rory was an exhilarating companion, and it was fun to be the guide for a change, answering his stream of questions. Whatever the Doctor had done to her card, it uncomplainingly provided cash from ATMs again and again and paid for the very odd assortment of things that slowly filled the bike's box. Two DVD mini-players and a series of cartoon DVDs – as Rory pointed out, films made imitating Earth life would just bewilder New Earthers, but kids everywhere loved good cartoons. Two camcorders, for the scientists to reverse-engineer. Top quality screwdrivers, screws of all sizes, spanners and an assortment of hand tools. A mile – Donna was convinced – of copper wire, which had to be slung on the side of the bike and made it list alarmingly. They stopped at an Internet café for a late lunch, where she finally tracked down exactly what they had ostensibly come for, as Rory sat pressed against her shoulder raptly watching her every move. Back on the bike, to call at three different addresses she had written down. She was so tired by then she barely blinked when Rory produced the Doctor's psychic paper to satisfy the people they were calling on, and sat dumbly, leaving him to do all the talking. Finally they made their last selection, and she yawned so widely she nearly dislocated her jaw when the last precious purchase had been timelocked and carefully embedded in the box.

"I've been awake for about thirty hours, I could sleep for a week" she groaned as he pulled into a petrol station "Why are we stopping AGAIN? And hey, why are you filling up? Not exactly going to be using the bike again, remember?"

"Boy scout" he smiled at her, the tired lines under his own eyes making her guess how she must be looking. "Be prepared. You never know, but I promise, no more unsanctioned trips, Scout's honour." He gave her the Scout's salute. "But who knows what tomorrow will bring?"

"Now you're a boy scout? Is this the longest you've spent over here?" She asked curiously and surprised a sheepish look on his face. "Rory! Tell Donna all!"

"Well … " he finished filling the tank and busied himself with the cap. "We have scouts back home, you know. But - oh come on, duchess, I've been here long enough to get the bike, find my way round the shops - I've got a sort of girlfriend here, she thinks I'm a kind of drifter, okay? She's got a brilliant dog." He added wistfully, and cast a proprietary look at the packed box. "I stay with her when I'm here, do odd jobs here and there for cash – this welfare state of yours, nobody's surprised at someone looking for cash work. I've been coming over a couple days a month for the last five years."

"Aren't you going to miss it? And her?" Donna was far too tired to be anything but sleepily detached and Rory looked relieved that she wasn't shouting.

"Yes, I will. A bit. The dog, anyway. But not to the point where I'd give up my world, there's nothing here comes close." He went into the shop to pay for his petrol and came back with a caffeine drink for Donna. "Don't want you falling asleep on the way back to the cave! Seriously, in my place, wouldn't you choose my world every time?"

"'Specially now there'll be dragons." Despite the drink Donna just wanted to lay her head on Rory's broad back and sink into slumber. She forced herself to lift her head as the bike buzzed confidently back along the motorway, and thought about Rory's question. "You know, you're right? I like the Other Eden – and my granddad would just go mad for it. If the time comes when I can't travel with the Doctor any longer I'm going to ask him to bring us, me and my granddad, and leave us with you guys." She was vaguely aware that her voice was slurring slightly but she didn't care, he prolly couldn't hear her anyway, just wanna get head down on Rory's nice back and sleep ….

…o0o…

"Donna? Donna!" she could hear the insistent voice boring its way through the blissful clouds of cotton wool wrapping her in warmth and comfort and she resented it violently. Just a few more minutes, just a few more –

"If you think I'm hoisting you up into the Bug you've got another think coming" the voice sounded amused. That wasn't her mother – confused, she opened her eyes and focused blearily on Rory.

"Come on sleepyhead" he grinned down at her "I was beginning to think I'd bought a sleeping potion rather than caffeine. You know I had to timelock you to stop you falling off the back of the bike? Even when I restarted you so I could get off, you didn't wake up. Hey! You back in the world of the living yet?"

She realized she was lying slumped on the bike, her cheek pillowed on her crossed arms, and that she was extremely uncomfortable. While she stretched hugely and yawned Rory told her he'd already unpacked the box into the Bug so if they could please just get going … "and don't forget" he reminded her "You and the Doctor brought all these things for us in the TARDIS."

"Whatever" she grumbled "Oh God, have I got to climb up there?"

"The seats go flat" he coaxed her, laughing "you can sleep all the way into town."

"Oh well, in that case –" somehow she forced her heavy limbs up the sides of the Bug and sprawled untidily into the first passenger seat. Rory bent over her to adjust it and she moaned with pleasure as she was eased into a lying position. Rory's face hung over hers.

"You're the only girl I've met who can still look good when you're this sleepy" he teased, but there was a note in his voice that made her suddenly more alert. Then his warm mouth was on hers and her arms of their own accord slid up round his neck. For a long timeless moment they clung together, kissing passionately, and then he shifted his position as though to lie beside her and she moved her hands to his chest to push him away.

"Back off, Casanova" she said breathlessly. "No! I'm a one-man girl and I like one-girl men, okay?"

He smiled lazily down at her and traced her lips with his finger. "For you, anything. Just say the word, duchess."

"I did. The word was no." For a moment longer he was still, and then he hauled himself to his feet and strapped himself into his console.

"The Doctor?" he busied himself at the controls, but shot her a querying look, brows raised. She shook her head and suddenly wanted to cry, but instead turned her back on him, trying to recapture of the comfort of the leveled seat. Five minutes ago she'd have given almost anything to be lying down, now she was fully awake and feeling desperately awkward.

"You still awake?" he asked gently and she groaned and rolled onto her back. "I didn't mean to upset you" his voice was still gentle. "It's just that – what you said, about wanting to live here –"

"You promised not to read my mind!" she mumbled, mortified. "And I didn't mean I wanted to come live with you."

"I get that now. And I didn't read your mind, you said it out loud. The thing is – " he was staring ahead, not looking at her "Every time a woman implies she wants to get serious, I just want to get away as far and as fast as I can. But when you said it I felt – I was glad. I wanted to get closer to you. That's the first time I've ever felt that, for anyone." He laughed, a little bitterly. "So I assumed you felt the same. I know you consider me a playboy, and I'll not deny I've messed around a lot – safety in numbers, like I said. But you – I don't know what it is about you, you're prickly as hell, but that laugh of yours, it's wonderful, you just light up. And – I'm going to sound like a broken record here – you're so direct. My family are direct, but most other people are one thing on the surface and another beneath it, you're the same all the way through. You can't imagine how rare it is for a telepath to find someone like that? I genuinely haven't stopped thinking about you since we met. I just wanted you to know that."

The Bug roared into life and lurched its way out of the cave into such a flood of sunshine, she put her arm over her eyes to block it out. There had actually been genuine hurt in his voice, and she liked him far too much to leave him hurting. This was Rory, who'd saved her life, who made her blush and giggle and feel sexy again, but who was also really good company, someone to be friend as well as lover, and if the circumstances had been different – but they weren't. Instead she had to say something to end this difficult turn they'd suddenly taken.

"It's just – thing is, Rory, I've got crap taste in men. Really crap. I'm not trying to insult you, you're not even my usual type, but it's got to the point where if I'm attracted to a man, I can almost guarantee he's a pig. The last time I fell for someone I found out on our wedding day he was just using me for his own ambition, he didn't care for me at all, he'd have let me die to get what he wanted. If it hadn't been for the Doctor I would have died, that's how the Doctor and I met. So I'm not looking right now – and if I was, I've got to say, it wouldn't be for a man with a girl in every town – God, even a girl in my own world! Traveling with the Doctor is all I want at this time." Please shut up, please shut up, she thought and when he didn't reply she tried to drift off, until he suddenly almost shouted her name.

"Oh my God, what?" she sat up abruptly, ready to do battle, and was gobsmacked to see an iridescent flash of colour shoot past the cab. "What?!" she gasped and he laughed with delight as thought nothing had ever for even a moment marred their friendship.

"Your first clickit! They're back!" Like a child, she pressed her face to the bubble and stared as two, three, four flashes went past. Suddenly one was hovering right outside, staring at her, wings beating furiously. The clickit's head was the size of a fist, and looked like nothing so much as a pug, its squashed ridiculous furry face somehow managing to look eager.

"I'm going to open the bubble?" Rory warned and she nodded, clutching at the grab rail. The bubble slid back and the clickit positively danced around them with delight, settling on her lap for a slightly alarming moment before dancing up to the others wheeling overhead. They really did click all the time, a steady ticking that rapidly moved to the back of her brain and became white noise, although by the time they were rumbling down Riddance's main street they were being escorted by at least fifty and sheer numbers made it a thrumming that almost seemed to quicken the heartbeat. Doors were thrown open and people rushed out, cheering, as the sunlight splintered into dancing glittering prisms shot from hundreds of wings. Rory waved furiously but pushed on through town and out towards the Portal. "Got to get to the TARDIS with this stuff before anyone sees it" he shouted across and she nodded and clung to the grab rails as the Bug bounced across cross-country.

"Oi, we're going the wrong way, the TARDIS is by the Centre now!" she suddenly remembered and he shook his head.

"You're forgetting – the TARDIS has been off-world pretending to be getting all this stuff? While you were grabbing your coat the Doctor told me he'd take off to go see the Gangions to talk to them about employing the werecrocs, and that he'd return to where you first landed, next to the hide. Apparently there's something about the Portal he wants to look into." Their escorting clickits occasionally left off their joyful escort to pounce on something at ground level, which they ate with evident enjoyment, wings aquiver.

"Larvae?" Donna, watching, pulled a face and he nodded back, laughing.

"Time to go larval collecting – that's honey month over, now its just slog, slog, slog for a whole year."

"Poor darling" she said sarcastically and ducked as he swatted at her. "Whoa, watch the road!"

"What road?" he retorted but kept both hands on the steering until they had pulled up with a noisy flourish beside the TARDIS. The Doctor came out beaming to greet them from the hide, a clickit clinging to his shoulder and rubbing itself against his cheek. His eyes did widen slightly as he swung himself up into the cab and he saw all their purchases but Rory had been right, he wasn't surprised.

"You've missed all the fun." He said instead. "We had our attack."

"What happened?" Rory asked sharply. "Damn! I thought for sure he'd do it within hours or not at all!"

"He did." The Doctor grinned at him reassuringly "Don't worry – the Device net worked, there were eight of them, on Rocs, and they swept in over the farmland round New London, about an hour after we left the mainland. It would have worked if we hadn't been able to shave time the way we did, but as it was they just crashed out of the sky. All that hard talking you and your helpers did on your Talkies paid off. The peacekeepers strapped the werecrocs onto the Rocs, waited until dusk, then restarted the Rocs so they would fly straight back to the mainland, all while we were partying. This morning the Rocs were back, briefly. They flew over high above the clickits and dropped the same werecrocs back on the same spot."

"All dead." Rory realized immediately. "Weren't they? Gra's way of apologizing?"

"Of distancing himself." The Doctor agreed "Yes, that's what we think."

"But why – why didn't the Device tell us?"

"Why, so you could rush up there and tell the New Londoners what to do? They knew what to expect, you'd already briefed them about the protection, and everyone now knows the story of you flying after Donna. They just adapted it to fit the situation, and I think it was brilliant. And they did it on their own – with the Device's initial help. The Device was quite right not to tell us. Not our problem. They'd have phoned if they needed advice, and they didn't need any. Believe me, it's much better this way."

"How – hang on, how did Gra even restart his guerillas to be able to kill them?"

"That much the Device did tell Gunny. It set a light lock on them – enough that being touched by one of their own kind would restart them. It was very nearly pleased with itself about that. Not so happy that it sent them back to their deaths, but I guess that wasn't something it could influence, after all."

Donna swayed, and the Doctor caught her arm warningly.

"Donna, you're asleep on your feet! But listen, you need to go keep them talking inside the hide – John, and the sleeper's called Tony, I think – John's expecting you." He pushed at her gently. "If you can hold off falling asleep for half an hour, we can get this lot shifted."

He was as good as his word, he and Rory appeared in twenty minutes and interrupted John's interrogation, to Donna's enormous relief – she could feel her words starting to slur again.

"Right, John." The Doctor rubbed his hands together briskly. "Rory and I have just been talking through a plan for Ian's rescue, do you think you can get on that Talkie of yours and call up Pugs and Luke? As for you, Donna, you're off duty, go get some sleep, we'll catch up later."

…o0o…

She didn't even remember reaching her bed and slept like the dead for several hours. When she woke, wrapped in drowsiness, she was still fully dressed and dreamily rolled on her back. Strip off and go back to sleep? But no – the Doctor was going to try going through the Portal and he needed her there, she was pretty sure her role in his life was to keep him from doing anything too dangerous, when his own determination blinded him to obvious danger. She couldn't always stop him, but she had to be there to remind him.

Showering woke her up and she quickly pulled on jeans and her Rory coat, braiding her hair because it was kinked from her heavy sleep. It wasn't flattering but there was no guarantee Rory would be around anyway – or that it would be Rory the lover, rather than the teasing friend or the enthusiastic small boy. For a moment she felt his mouth on hers again, his arms tightening, and flushed at the memory of her initial reaction, angry with herself. She was a novelty – a girl from another world, one who didn't jump when he whistled, and that was all. She'd be every kind of fool to fall in love with a man she'd never see again!

It was full dark by the time she emerged from the TARDIS and she hesitated in the doorway, screwing her eyes up to peer for werewolves. The Doctor had obviously had a lookout watching out for her because she heard a shout from the hide. A moment later light flared out and then came bobbing towards her.

"Perfect timing!" he called approvingly. "Ready to go through the Portal?"

"At night? Are you CRAZY?" But now that he was beside her she could see his wasn't the only torch, there were at least two others and the backlit silhouettes of several people.

"Well, all the Portal creatures are nervous of light at night" his teeth flashed in his shadowed face "So we reckoned if we go in lit up like Blackpool it'll scare everything away so nothing will be left to timelock us? One of my better strokes of genius" he finished modestly. "Here, you don't need to be near the front, you can come in line between Luke and Rory. You don't have to come, of course?"

Donna felt laughter bubbling up. He really was crazy, but she wouldn't miss it for the world! She accepted a torch and what felt like a bundle of twigs and grinned at Luke, who was looking keyed up and excited. Rory gave a very schoolboyish tug on one of her plaits, then stepped back smartly, laughing as she raised her hand threateningly. She had to laugh back at him – he had an absolute genius for defusing any shyness between them!

The bright torchlight danced ahead of them as they made their way along a fairly well-defined path, some panicked crashing in the gorse proving that at least one animal was getting out of their way. As long as nothing was creeping up from behind – she shot an anxious look over her shoulder and realized the path behind them was nearly as brightly lit as ahead, there seemed to be light pouring from Rory's backpack . Reassured, she looked forward just in time to stop herself walking straight into Luke as they came to a halt. Ahead, two rather straggly trees had their highest branches woven to create an arch. Red ribbons had been knotted on other branches as a clear warning.

"Right, clip on your safety lines and light your flares" the Doctor said calmly, and lit his own bundle of twigs. Flames leapt up, sending shadows flying, and each of them held their flares to his until they ignited. "Just as we talked it through – Pugs first, turning hard right, then me two steps behind, then Luke, then Donna, okay? As you get inside, stick your flare in the ground a pace from the last flare, then use your torch. If you can't see him, we take two paces to the left. Stay together at all times. If the person in front of you gets timelocked, tap them with your restarter. Rory, you have to stay this side of the Portal. If there are no pulls on the rope we could all be timelocked, you'll have to haul us back. Donna, are you clipped onto the safety line? Don't worry, I doubt you'll need to go through, I'm counting on Ian being just a few paces inside. Everybody ready? Pugs, you're on!"

Pugs smiled weakly and started to walk forward, lowering his flare as he went under the trees. For a second he seemed to flicker, unless that was a trick of the torchlight - no, Donna realized, it really was a flicker, because the same thing happened with the Doctor – and with Luke – now she was only a step from the arch, Rory's comforting bulk behind –

"Found him!" Pugs, sounding surprisingly far away, yelled exuberantly "Coming back!" Rory and Donna backed away to make room and in seconds Luke and Pugs reappeared, managing between them to carry a tall thin youth who stared blankly through them in static wonder. They propped him up against the tree while Donna looked expectantly at the rustic arch.

"Where's the Doctor?" she asked sharply and Luke waved a hand back at the arch, all his attention on his timelocked friend.

"He's killing the flares" he said vaguely, and Donna felt a flicker of misgiving which became insistent when he didn't immediately reappear.

"Doctor?" she called, but there was no response other than to alert the jubilant others to his absence. She called louder and more insistently and his voice came back with that odd impression of distance she'd noticed before.

"Get Ian into the hide, Donna. I'll just be a moment."

"No you bloody don't!" and now she was shouting with that familiar stab of fear that came whenever he hovered on the brink of great risk. "If you don't come back this minute I'll come through to drag you back and if I'm eaten by a dragon, good luck telling my grandfather!"

"Blimey, what's all the fuss about?" He stepped through the Portal and shook his head at her, but his rueful smile acknowledged that she had tipped him back towards caution.

"Does she always tell you what to do?" Pugs looked as though his new hero was rapidly developing feet of clay but the Doctor laughed.

"Part of her job description" he said lightly "she has to remind me when I'm taking unnecessary risks. She doesn't have to shout, mind. I wouldn't be too sorry if she tried a cooing voice once in a while."

"You could shout, or coo, or give a little whistle, if it would keep me out of trouble." Rory said reflectively. "My, you can't believe how that took me back! Maybe that should be my next invention. A robot to shout at me when I'm about to get into trouble – I could call it the Grand Duchess? Unless I could talk you into taking the job on yourself?" His eyes were teasing and they all laughed, but his quick squeeze of her hand made her blush again.

Between them the four men had no problem carrying Ian back to the hide and soon had him stretched him out on one of the bunk beds. Pugs, with a flourish, tapped him with a restarter, then punched him in the solar plexus a little harder than a friendly greeting seemed to warrant.

"Pugs! Oof" Ian jerked double "What the hell are you guys doing here? Hey – I'm back in the hide?"

"Four bloody months later" Pugs, flushed, seemed tempted to punch him again. "You bugger, you've been missing for four months. Didn't bother to tell us you were going, did you? The peacekeepers wanted to close the Portal, with you on the other side! Hadn't been for the Doctor, you'd have probably stayed there for the rest of bloody time. You stupid moron!"

"Glad to see you again too" Ian swung his legs down to sit up on the bunk, then blinked round at the crowded hide. "Hey, Luke! Rory, you too? – and you – oh, you must be the Doctor?"

"Guilty as charged" the Doctor said cheerfully "and this is Donna."

"Hi" Ian nodded cheerfully, completely unfazed by his adventure, then his eyes widened. "What the hell is that?"

"Meet Angus" Rory bent and scooped the puppy out of the box where it had been scrabbling eagerly for attention. "He's a present from the Doctor and Donna. I saved her life, you know – you've been missing a lot of excitement. So Angus is a thank you to me, but they brought others, Riddance will have six in all, four bitches and two males including this little fella. He'll be a working dog, of course, when he grows up."

"A dog!" Ian breathed and Rory's eyes met Donna's over the delightedly squirming puppy. He'd been exactly the same when they reached the first animal shelter she'd located at the cyber café, one with a selection of puppies - absolutely bemused as the various puppies brought out for them to choose from scrambled and squabbled and squeaked at each other. They'd had to go to three in the end to avoid awkward questions – and eventual inbreeding - but from the moment the first puppies had been brought into the light he'd been gobsmacked. He'd have taken every one so it was Donna who'd picked out the ones she thought would be best suited to living on working farms. Even then he'd only reluctantly left the first roomful of puppies because they had two more to visit. When the last puppy – Angus – was to be stowed he'd cuddled it for quite ten minutes before finally reluctantly timelocking it and placing it gently in the bike's box. They grinned at each other at the shared memory and the last of her awkwardness with him faded away. This was just Rory, her buddy, a little boy at heart who just happened to be gobsmackingly gorgeous, which was hardly his fault.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

"So, that's it, adventure over." They had finally made all their goodbyes and waved for the last time at their new friends before closing the door. All were waving back vigorously apart from Angus, on a puppy harness, yapping and straining to get a closer look at the unicorns who were staring, fascinated, at him but keeping a safe distance. Donna talked briskly to banish the foolish tears pricking at her eyes. "Where to next? Oh, you'll have to come back to translate between the Gangions and those werecrocs, won't you?"

"Nope. The Gangions have their own translators, and they themselves look alarming enough to ensure the werecrocs will be awed into listening carefully. But we're not going far." He shot her one of his wildest grins "We can't leave New Earth yet, we've got one more call to make."

"We have?" she had never trusted that grin, it usually meant he was going to talk her into something against her better judgment. "Oh no, don't tell me. Not to the Sea Lords!"

"Down to Davy Jones' locker we go!" he chortled, starting the complicated pulling and pushing of levers which was his own private language with his beloved TARDIS. "Don't look like that, Donna, we have to go, it's a diplomatic visit. We've got to warn them that there'll be dragons trying to fish in the sea before too long!"

"Oh, that'll be easy to put across" she grumbled, "Hi, remember me, I'm the Doctor, we've persuaded your neighbours to start eating you? How do they lynch people down there?"

"Nonsense. You've got to watch that wild imagination of yours! Anything the dragons touch will be timelocked, so they will have to take it to the Portal guards to be treated with Gunny's additive before they can eat it. Anything that isn't a regular fish will be taken back to the lagoon and set free. It's just a courtesy call – and you'll love it, they're an astonishing race."

Actually she wasn't averse to visiting a water world – and if there was any chance she'd end up back here one day, when her travels were over, it wouldn't hurt to have useful contacts with the dominant mammals on the planet …..

She'd had one last private talk with Rory, holding each other's hands very tightly while his puppy worried at her sandal buckles, after he'd asked her again to stay and she'd promised that if she could, some day, come back, she would.

"I can't promise to wait unless you promise to come back." Rory was as serious as she had ever seen him. "But it will take someone incredibly special to take your place. I'm pretty sure I'll be here, and I'll be waiting, for a very long time. Okay?"

"Okay." And she resolved that somehow, when the right time came up, she'd try to tell the Doctor, who had lost so very many companions over the years, that although she didn't want to leave him, if she ever had to, this was where she wanted to be left –

AFTERWORD

Wilfred Mott grumbled his way to the door and threw it open with the intention of demanding what the hell time of morning the caller thought it was. However, when he realized the man leaning on the doorbell was very nearly as tall and broad as the doorway, and in biker leathers, with a huge bike at the bottom of the stairs, he settled for a semi-grumpy "What is it, then?"

"You Donna's grandfather?" The big man looked anxiously at him and as he nodded, thrust out a hand. "My name's Rory. Rory Banks. You don't know me, but we both know the Doctor?"

The older man stared at him, transfixed. He'd been getting really worried about Donna - although she hadn't got her memory back, and the Doctor had promised that she would never remember more than flashes of the extraordinary time they spent together, she was having vivid dreams which seemed to be linked to her adventures. Since her marriage had ended, amicably but quite definitely, she had been living in his house. She was his merry loving Donna still, but she was definitely subdued, and he couldn't get her to pick up the threads of her old life. It made him nervous that she might feel she couldn't leave him alone but she kept assuring him that wasn't it, she just needed a little time.

He knew that as far as she remembered, she'd spent a year of her life traveling as a secretarial assistant to a minor diplomat known as John Smith, nicknamed the Doctor, which ended after an accident left her with amnesia. She'd settled cheerfully back into her old life without any obvious regrets, fallen in love, married, and divorced without any sign that her adventures had changed her. Her mother's marriage and move to Canada had had far more impact on her conversation and thoughts than her year with "John Smith", but he knew her well enough to know that it wasn't her mother she was missing.

"Excuse me?" The biker was looking concerned. He had very blue, very intense eyes. "Donna is all right, isn't she? She does still live here?" He nodded and the big man's face eased into a half-grin.

"Then can I come in? I do know to be careful what I say about the Doctor. He just visited us, my world, and told me what had happened, how he'd had to leave her back here for her own safety, and about her memory. Even that she'd married but it hadn't worked out. Thing is, Donna made me a promise a while back, which she won't remember, but I had to see her, see if there's any chance she could still be interested. In making a new promise."

Wilfred Mott hesitated. More than once he'd heard her call out the name Rory in her sleep, but when he tried a little gentle daytime probing it was obvious that Rory wasn't someone she knew at work. At least once she'd almost screamed it, sounding terrified, but another time she'd been laughing. So which was it – did Rory frighten her, and what was this about a promise –

"Oh, all right" he decided, on the basis that he probably couldn't have closed the door on the big man anyway, if he decided to push his way in. "You'd better come in for a cuppa. Donna's still asleep. Lots of people are" he added a little tartly "at six in the morning."

"Sorry about that" Rory grinned at him unrepentantly "It took nearly four days of hard talking to get permission for this trip and do all the organizing. I couldn't bear to waste another minute."

"You won't be able to rush her" the older man warned him "you may remember her, but she's not going to remember you." He shuffled through to the kitchen and put the kettle on. Rory lounged against the counter, pulling down the zipper on his jacket as the warmth of the room made itself felt.

"The Doctor's pretty sure she'll remember her feelings, whatever they are. And don't worry, I already had to promise him if she runs screaming I'm to back off and call it a day. I'm head over heels in love with her but there was a fair amount of scary stuff going on when we met and she may have mixed emotions."

"In love, eh? With my Donna?" The older man grinned and pushed a cup of tea towards him. "Add your own milk and sugar. So, you want to take her off with you?"

"Both of you?" Rory sipped his tea, his eyes wicked over the lip over the cup. "She made it clear that was the deal, because you'd love my world and she'd have to come to keep you company."

"That's my Donna! Well, son, make yourself look pretty because I can hear her moving around upstairs, she'll be down here any minute!"

THE END

(The beginning?)

. ©E J Lamprey January 2013