June 2018: re-edited since its original posting.
As yet un-beta'd.
Chapter 2 - New New Amsterdam
The morning had gone back to TARDIS-normal - definitely not any normal Martha was generally used to - after the now blue-suit-clad Doctor had swooped into the kitchen for the marmalade-covered toast that Rose had kept on the side of her plate.
The trio assembled in the console room, where the Doctor and Rose navigated the ship to their next destination.
"Here we are!" the Doctor announced, as the TARDIS finally stilled. "Not quite as exotic as some locations, but still, wildly impressive."
Martha shook her head at him. "Jus' don't promise it'll be peaceful, an' we might be able to have some fun, this time."
Rose laughed, as she zipped her jacket. "Which is it, then? Did ya want 'fun' or 'peaceful'?" she asked.
"You're so made for each other," Martha replied, as they all headed down the entry ramp to the doors.
"After you," said the Doctor, gesturing for Martha to lead the way.
The Doctor scanned the rest of the newspaper as Rose and Martha enjoyed the view on the ferry ride from Liberty Island over to Manhattan. The Hooverville disappearances seemed to be right up their alley, but still... the Doctor had been hoping. New New York might not have worked out, but somehow, somewhere in Old New York, he'd hoped to find the perfect spot for a proposal.
Maybe he still would. After they solved the case, saved the day... maybe the ferry could even fit the bill. That's romantic, right? Gliding across the bay; maybe it'd be close to sunset; cold, but he could keep her warm...
Or, maybe he should just give up, and take Rose someplace completely deserted to propose...
And Martha; poor Martha. Maybe he really should give up promising peaceful "make-up" trips, too. Oh, he wasn't about to stop showing off the TARDIS; but Martha might possibly have had a point about not jinxing it.
Rose moved along the ferry's railing, back to the Doctor's side. She laid her chin against his shoulder and wrapped her arms around his left, reading along. Whatever lay in store for them, in the shadow of the still-unfinished Empire State Building, the Doctor would be facing it in the best possible company.
Martha needed to make a list. Well, two lists. One would be of all the things that she'd gotten to see with Rose and the Doctor, traveling through time and space. The other would be of all the amazing things that she'd gotten to see with them that she could actually talk about!
She guessed the second would be the shorter of the two. But at least she could now add, "compare a New York subway ride to London's tube," as long as she didn't mention when she rode it.
The Doctor had given Martha and Rose what must have been the briefest orientation in the history of sightseeing, when they'd first reached the subway station. "So, New York City. Bronx is up, Battery's down. Hooverville's right in the center - being in Central Park and all. Mind the gap," he had counseled, as the subway train had pulled to a stop, before them.
This, however, visiting a sprawling Central Park shantytown? It might not be Shakespeare, but she was pretty sure this would have to stay on the first list.
"Watch out," Rose said, looking over at the next row of tents in Hooverville. A fight had broken out.
The Doctor, naturally, steered them towards the disturbance.
"That's enough!" shouted a man, coming to break up the fight. He turned to one of the two fighters. "Now, think real careful before you lie to me," he told him.
The fighter hung his head. "I'm starving, Solomon," he replied.
Solomon held out his hand, and the man obediently handed him a loaf of bread from inside his coat. Reminiscent of his Biblical namesake, Solomon broke the loaf in two, giving half to each of the other men. "We all starving. We all got families, somewhere," he sympathized. He raised his voice to address the surrounding Hooverville residents. "No stealing and no fighting! You know the rules! Thirteen years ago I fought in the Great War; a lot of us did. And the only reason we got through was because we stuck together."
The would-be thief, lowered his eyes again, nodding.
"No matter how bad things get, we still act like human beings," he reminded them. "It's all we got."
As the two fighters went their separate ways, the Doctor stepped forward. "I suppose that makes you the boss around here," he addressed Solomon.
Solomon looked the three of them over. "And, uh, who might you be?" he asked.
"He's the Doctor," Martha volunteered, "that's Rose, I'm Martha."
"A doctor? Huh," Solomon replied. "Well, we got, uh," he looked around, indicating some of the other men nearby, "stockbrokers, we got a lawyer, but you're the first doctor," he said, warming his hands by a cooking fire. "Neighborhood gets classier by the day."
Martha couldn't stand it. With the Empire State Building rising just blocks away, literally hundreds of people were stranded and starving. And what did the outside world care? Despite people going missing, the police didn't do a thing. Despite men, women, and children living hand-to-mouth, the rich only offered -
"A dollar a day? That's a slave wage," Solomon dismissed Mr. Diagoras' offer of clearing a collapsed sewer tunnel. "Men don't always come back up."
Unfortunately, that was just the cue the Doctor needed to take their Hooverville disappearances investigation below the city streets.
"New New York, he takes us to the slums," Martha said quietly to Rose, as they stepped back from the ladder leading down from the manhole cover. "Old New York, an' it's the sewers."
"The glitz an' glamor's not always what it's cracked up to be," Rose consoled, wiping her hands on her jeans and switching on her torch. "I should tell you 'bout our first date -"
"And when do we get our dollar?" asked Frank. The young man was the only Hooverville volunteer besides Solomon, himself, to join their expedition.
"When you come back up," Mr. Diagoras answered, simply
"And if we don't come back up?" the Doctor just had to suggest.
"Then I got no one to pay," Mr. Diagoras told him, without a hint of concern.
"Don't worry," Solomon told him. "We'll be back."
"Let's hope so," Martha breathed, aiming her own torch down Tunnel 2-7-3, as directed.
Rose stepped carefully through the sewers, with the rest of the small group. She was grateful for the low-heeled boots she'd chosen to wear this time; the Doctor's Converses must be soaked through, she thought.
Mr. Diagoras had told them they'd find the collapse after half a mile. So far, Rose couldn't see any signs of any such thing.
"Whoa!" called the Doctor, bringing the group to a halt.
Rose shone her torch on the spot where the Doctor was staring. "What is it?" she asked. A greenish blob of something was lying on the ground, faintly glowing.
"Is it radioactive or somethin'?" asked Martha, coming up from behind as the Doctor crouched down beside it.
Rose caught a whiff of the odor - "Oh. Oh, that's awful," she nearly gagged.
The Doctor pulled out his brainy specs, set down his lantern, then reached for the blob.
Martha sighed, "An' you've got to pick it up."
Rose just hoped against hope that he would at least refrain from licking it.
He sniffed it, instead. "Shine your torch through it?" he asked Rose.
She crouched beside him to comply. "You've gotta admit that's worse than pear," Rose whispered accusingly.
"No-ope!" he replied lightly, while examining the slimy jellyfish-cabbage hybrid.
"'S it alive?" Rose asked.
"Not anymore," he answered. "Composite organic matter... Martha, medical opinion?"
"It's not human. I know that," she answered.
"No, it's not," the Doctor agreed. "And I'll tell you something else," he said, getting to his feet and looking around at the tunnel. "We must be at least half a mile in, and I didn't see any signs of a collapse, do you?" he asked the group at large.
"How long we been walkin'?" Rose asked, standing beside him.
"Fifteen minutes," the Doctor answered. "Sixteen," he corrected, then more quietly, "thirty-six seconds."
"At least three-quarters of a mile, prob'ly?" Rose estimated, giving him the grin she knew he was fishing for. "An' all clear, far as I can see, 'cept for Blob," she said, nodding to the glowing, green, glop in the Doctor's hands.
"So why did Mr. Diagoras send us down here?" the Doctor asked.
"Well, where are we, now, then?" asked Martha. "What's up above?"
"Well..." the Doctor considered, "We're right underneath Midtown Manhattan."
Solomon spoke up, "Do we go on?"
"I'm game," the Doctor replied, sliding Blob into the pocket of his trench coat to bend and retrieve his own lantern.
"Oh, no, you didn't," Rose moaned, shaking her head when the Doctor offered her his goo-covered hand.
"On we go, then," he announced with a shrug, leading the way along the tunnel.
After another four minutes, twenty-two seconds, the tunnel the Doctor had been following more or less straight southwest from the park came to an unlabeled junction.
"Still no collapse," Rose observed.
"No," the Doctor agreed, taking the left-hand turning. It only led to another, unexpected turn.
"An' come to think of it," Rose said, "he didn't exactly give us any tunnel clearing or repair equipment - not that I'm not thankful for the light load."
"I don't think tunnel collapses are what Mr. Diagoras actually had in mind," he agreed, quietly. "Solomon?" he called, "I think it's time you took these two back," he said, indicating Frank and Martha. He really didn't think Martha would appreciate another abduction, and this labyrinth would be the perfect place to enact one. "We'll be much quicker on our own."
Before Solomon or the others could reply, a strange wail, or squeal, sounded from somewhere within the adjacent sewer tunnels.
"Where's it comin' from?" Frank asked, "Sounds like there's more than one of 'em."
"Doctor?" called Martha. Her torchlight weakly illuminated a figure huddled in the tunnel ahead.
Despite the Doctor's warnings for the others to stay back, Rose followed closely behind him as he approached the corner. She gasped as their torches shone on the creature's pig-like face.
Solomon called from where the others were gathered, "Is that, uh, some sort of carnival mask?"
"No, it's real," the Doctor answered gently.
"Is it..." Rose began, searching for the right words, "natural?" she asked. If the Doctor told her there was a planet full of pig-men, she'd believe him in a heartbeat, but -
"No," he answered simply. "I'm sorry," he told the pig-man. "Now listen to me. I promise, we can help. Who did this to you?"
The creature didn't make any move to answer.
Rose asked, "Are you alone? D'ya wanna come with us?"
"He's not alone," Martha replied.
Rose and the Doctor stood, as a group of the pig-men appeared from around the corner of the tunnel.
The Doctor backed Rose towards the others. "Well then," he said, extending his hand to Rose, once more.
She took it, this time, despite the residual gooiness.
"Run!"
To be continued...