Started my daily ficlets to make the hiatus pass, then decided to keep going with a 2nd cycle, and then a 3rd, 4th, etc through 86th cycle. Now cycle 87!
IT'S THE FIFTH ANNIVERSARY CYCLE OF GLEEKATHON! - Five years! Five years! *insert flailing* Okay, not quite, but by the end of this cycle, it will have been five years of daily stories (sometimes twice a day! ... and for seven very frightening days a couple years back, three times a day!). It will also be the end of this crazy ride. I started thinking about ending gleekathon months ago, and I wanted to finish my ongoing series before that happened. It made it so I could finish out this fifth year, and it couldn't be any better that this cycle is actually ending on October 22nd 2014, which was the day it began, in 2009... Now here we go!
This story is an 'Element change' for The Class of 2012, a Doctor Who/Glee crossover series story originally posted from September 2 to October 3 2014.
"The Blood Of"
11th Doctor, (alternate) 12th Doctor, New Directions, the Lucas family (OC), Walter (OC)
Doctor Who/Glee crossover series
Element change: Gemma was unable to transport out.
"How did she get up there?"
"That thing on her arm. She used to that."
"I don't think she can use it to come down now…"
"Doctor!" Walter came to him. "Please, you have to get her down from there, something's wrong, she…" he looked back up when he saw the Doctor's face shift.
Gemma had moved. She'd moved, and she wasn't not crooked, but she was doing something, something they could almost feel was working. But seconds later, they couldn't even think about it.
Because seconds later she'd tilted sideways, and then she'd gone plummeting from the spire tower.
Some had screamed, others stared in shocked silence. There was nothing for them to do, no time. They were too far, she was coming too fast… The Doctor thought he saw her try and reach for her wrist, to the vortex manipulator, but the effort was in vain. A second later, there was a resonating crack, a crash, shouts of surprise.
Walter had taken off like an arrow, the Doctor behind him, the Glee Club trickling after. It still didn't feel like they were getting there fast enough. Cutting through the crowd as swiftly as they could, the Doctor tried to get ahead of Walter, to try and keep him back, but there was no use. When he got through, the other man had already found her.
XX
"Gemma, the vortex manipulator's been reactivating, I've already input…"
"It's already done, all of this."
"Yes…"
"Then you already know if you'll see me or not. You already knew I'd say yes, you've seen me do it."
"I did."
"So why not tell me? Right, rules, timelines…"
"Look at me, following rules, when did I start doing that?"
"Then you know if I make it out of this. No. Actually, don't tell me."
The Doctor lied. As skills went, it was one she had mastered long ago, but she didn't know that she had ever been so disgusted with herself for how well she could keep her face straight, when all it wanted to do was to fall apart.
This was it. This was the end. She knew that even if she waited a hundred years or a thousand, Gemma Lucas would never return to her. She had died on the Phisto Hub, before any of them could get to her.
She still remembered seeing them all as they marched back to the TARDIS. Walter had picked up the broken body, solemnly carrying her in such a way that they could have thought her sleeping if they hadn't seen the marks of her fall all over her. And those kids… those boys and girls of McKinley, who had followed her here on a mission to help their friend… Most of them were in tears. Those whose cheeks remained dry remained so by sheer force of will; the pain was etched deep in their faces. Puck pushed Artie's chair as they went, the other boy too stricken to do a thing. Sugar had fallen in at Rachel's side, taking her hand with no explanation, and no one had questioned it. Only the Doctor knew what had pushed her to do it, and it only made it harder to see, these two distant relatives, brought together by the one who'd just died.
Even as they'd been walking, Constance and the Contractor's message had been heard, and that was the last push they needed to just climb aboard the Doctor's ship and leave this place.
Leaving the kids back in Lima had been about as hard as it was bound to be. Even if he took them somewhere, anywhere, to take a few days and pull themselves together, on the most peaceful planet he could find, nothing would make this return any easier. Maybe being home would be the best thing for them.
Sugar had turned back and jumped into his arms, holding tight, after the others had all started off. "Please, come back sometime… Please," she begged. "If we never saw you again, I don't know…"
"You will, you'll see me again," he promised, caught off guard at first but eventually hugging her back. "We're not done, remember?"
Just how long it would be before he called on her though, he didn't know yet. They had another stop to make, and this one just might finish him off.
X
It was only seconds after the TARDIS had landed that the Doctor and Walter started to hear it, just outside… scratching. The Doctor opened the door, and sitting there was a large dog, staring up at him. "Hello," he crouched, scratching the dog's head. When she barked, he breathed out. "Hello, Paulie. I'm the Doctor. She gave a sad yelp, like she knew already her mistress was not coming back. "I'm so sorry."
"Paulie, get back here, you know they said not in the attic…" an exasperated voice was heard, and the Doctor looked up only to be startled at the appearance of a young woman bearing a striking resemblance to the deceased they were bringing home. "Woah…" she blinked, taking in the TARDIS. "Is the Doctor here?" she asked.
"I'm the Doctor," he told her.
"Fine, the other one then, the woman," the Gemma lookalike clarified. The Doctor frowned, standing up.
"All the same," he assured her. "You're the sister, aren't you?"
"Ginny," she pointed to herself.
"Are your parents here, Ginny?"
"No, actually I got back here and there was no one, I'm not sure where they…" She stopped at the same time he'd heard it, from downstairs. The TARDIS, another. "What…" she looked to the blue box sitting there before running off down the stairs. The Doctor looked to Walter, who still sat there, next to the body wrapped in a blanket. Neither said nothing, and as the Doctor went to join the others downstairs, Walter was joined by Paulie the dog, who came and rested her head in his lap.
"… another TARDIS?" he could hear Sophie saying as he came down the stairs. For a moment he locked eyes with the woman standing just inside the doors to his… her ship. That was his successor alright; she shared his pain for what he was about to do. She shut the doors again, and this second TARDIS went away, leaving only him… and Gemma's unsuspecting family. "Doctor… You're here, too?"
"So there are two of them?" asked Ginny.
"No, they're the same," Julian told his daughter, though he couldn't tear his eyes from the man facing them in silence. He was trying to look them straight on, trying and failing. "What happened?" The longer he didn't speak, the easier it would be for them to put the pieces together, and though it had not been his intention, this was how they came to understand that their daughter was dead.
"You… You made us leave her," Sophie's voice rose, staring at the man; this couldn't be. "You said we had to go, that she knew what she was doing, but you were the one who knew, the other you. I know she comes after you, then that means you knew, all this time, you know, and you let her… You let…" she rushed at him, and she might have clocked him if Julian hadn't gotten a hold of her and pulled her back. The Doctor felt enough of an ache in his hearts that he might have let her do it. Sophie Perry had buried her mother not two years ago, and it had taken Gemma staying back at home with her to get her back on her feet. Who would help her rise now?
"Is… Is she here?" Ginny had approached the Doctor. There were tears running down her cheeks, but her father was comforting her mother, and she needed to know.
He had taken her up into the attic, to the TARDIS. There, Ginny Lucas was introduced to her late sister's boyfriend. Their meeting consisted of him hugging her and giving his condolences. She'd looked at the shape in the blanket, and what little hope she'd had left that this might have been some mistake withered away. She looked back to the Doctor, silently asking what had happened to her sister.
"She disabled a device that could torture thousands of people at the same time," Walter was the one to answer. "But something went wrong, and… she fell." Ginny looked back to blanket, pulling the corner back with a trembling hand.
The Doctor and Walter had debated it, but in the end they had worked together and they had cleaned her up, as best they could. It wouldn't change the end, but they didn't need to see her as the others had found her. Ginny touched her sister's cheek, already ashen and cold.
"You brought her back… Thank you," Ginny spoke, her voice small as she went on looking to her big sister. There was so much they should have had time to talk about, things she knew Gemma had been concerned about. Now she'd never get to tell her a thing, and all she could do was cry.
Walter had carried the body off the TARDIS, and Ginny had him lay her down on her old bed. They would have to find a way to deal with the remains somehow, without drumming up any suspicions. The Doctor would help. It was all he could do for her anymore.
As Julian had escorted his wife up the stairs to go and see Gemma, Ginny had followed them, leaving the Doctor and Walter out in the hall.
"Whatever you decide to do, Walter, if you want to return to Ohio…"
"No," he cut in. "I want to go with her," he declared, and when the Doctor frowned, thinking he meant he intended to go with Gemma, he bowed his head. "The other you, the woman. Gemma's Doctor. That's what we were going to do, that's what I should do. The world would have been better for having her. She's not there anymore, but I can try and keep going in her place. And… she always said you should never be alone," he looked back to the Doctor. "And you… her… she'll be alone now. So tell me how to find her, please."
The day Gemma Lucas was buried, Walter Reskin had looked up, as the mourners were walking away, and he saw it, the blue box, at the top of the hill. He walked toward it, seeing the woman sitting on a bench nearby.
"Hello again, Walter," she bowed her head. "Where should we start?"
THE END
A/N: This is a one-shot ficlet, which means that signing up for story alert will not bring you any alerts.
In the event of a sequel, the story will be separate from this one. And as chapter stories go, they are
always clearly indicated as such [ex: "Days 204-210" in the summary] Thank you!