Chapter 2
Their shoes clicked against the metal floor, echoing low, groaning noises throughout the corridor. Something was wrong here; Clara just couldn't put her finger on what it was. Something so basic she couldn't even think of what it was...
"The gravity's been tampered with to hold everything down."
The Doctor voiced her thoughts for her. Clara's eyebrows furrowed in concentration as she gazed around the cold hall and followed the Doctor to the right as they met a fork in the road. He was a step or two ahead of her,facing forward, not a hint of a spring in his step. Suddenly another question rose in Clara's mind. "How can we hear each other?"
The Doctor pointed simply at the oxygen mask that covered half of his face. It was clear and made of some kind of strong plastic or futuristic glass, and it seemed much more complex than the one's they had back in the 21st century. "Special mask; works more like a space helmet. Blocks the water from your ears, too."
At this, Clara raised a hand to her ear and felt the device stretching around her head, covering her ears. She hadn't really been paying attention to anything when they had first come down here, she had been so focused on the Doctor.
They kept up their brisk pace down the corridors, finding nothing different in each hallway except a few details in the walls. Clara jogged up to the Doctor's side and forced her legs to move twice as fast. "Hey."
Quickly, she reached her hand over to the Doctor's swinging arm and grasped it gently, slowing him down to a stop. As he turned down face her, she gave him her biggest and kindest eyes. "Are you ok?"
"I'm fine, Clara. What about you? You're eyes are bigger than I've ever seen them; you should get that checked out."
The Doctor turned and started down the corridor, but Clara held firmly onto his arm. Slowly, he stopped and turned back to her, letting out a sigh and stared at the wall beside her. Clara was having none of it.
"Listen; I know you're upset right now, but you need to calm down. Please,"
Clara took his hands in hers and looked into his eyes. Slowly, his eyes shifted to met her gaze. "Be a Doctor. Not a warrior; not some kind of Oncoming Storm. Just be a Doctor."
They held their gazes for another moment before the Doctor replied, in a quiet, low voice. "I'll try."
They shared a tiny smile and set off down the corridor together, keeping one hand connected with the other's. The Doctor was finally walking at a pace that Clara could keep up with comfortably. Her legs thanked him profusely.
As they approached a corner, the sound of voices entered their ears, shocking their bodies. Clara tightened her grasp on the Doctor's hand as they rounded the curve. He responded with a reassuring squeeze from his hand to hers.
"Ah; here they are now."
In front of the Doctor and Clara stood two dark blue-green people dressed in long robes. They looked like monks, only with cat-like whiskers and gills on their necks. The one was looking them over with a smile on his face. The other seemed anxious, and took a few steps towards the travelers as soon as they came in sight.
The Doctor raised an eyebrow at the closest stranger. "You must be the Lobods."
The Lobod put an arm around Clara, urging her and the Doctor to walk with him. "And you must be the two strangers that the Frodiles sent. Come; I will take you to Wels Alowana, our leader. He is very anxious to meet you."
Clara and the Doctor let go of each other's hands as the Lobod ushered them hastily to a door on the left side of the next corridor and gestured for them to enter without him. He then dashed off to the other Lobod and began a frantic, whispered conversation. Clara and the Doctor stepped into the room before they could hear anything that was being said.
Wels Alowana sat criss-crossed on a mat that lay on the floor, facing a large painting that looked over the small room. The room was empty besides a desk and a flat screen on the wall above it. The floors and walls in here looked wooden, but felt like metal. Clara almost voiced her admiration for the work put into it, but the Doctor's steely voice cut into her thoughts. He wasn't wasting any time today.
"Wels Alowana?"
The Lobod leader replied, without turning around, "You must be the travelers. General Salam told us you had come here."
The Doctor took a step closer to the small man. "Yes, we talked to the General. Are you aware of what he's planned on doing?"
Wels sighed and looked to the floor. "Yes; he communicated with us just moments before you arrived."
Wes stood slowly and turned to the Doctor and Clara. His eyes showed his sadness; his whiskers even seemed to be dropping. Clara took a few steps towards him. "We're here to help."
The Doctor joined her in the center of the room. Wes smiled painfully at them both. "Thank you for your kindness, but I don't know what we can do. We have no army; no defense against the Frodiles."
The Doctor allowed a small smirk to grow on his face. "An army isn't the only defense."
Briskly, he turned and walked to the table, sitting in the chair behind it, folding his hands on the desktop with schoolboy energy. "We just need to think."
Wels stepped to the opposite side of the table. "I've been meditating on it since we learned of his plan. There seems to be no solution."
The Doctor was undisturbed by Alowana's words. "There's always a solution."
Clara smiled to herself. The Doctor had listened to her. He was being true to his promise. He wasn't going to give up. He wasn't going to be cowardly. He was going to be a Doctor.
The Doctor stood up as quickly as he had sat down and danced around the table to Wels. "Come on! There's gotta be something that we haven't thought of yet. Do you have any maps of this place? Charts? Diagrams?"
Alowana nodded and went to the chairside of the desk, pulled out a few old, worn maps made of a thin kind of plastic, and placed them on top of the desk. The Doctor looked them over and spread them out, eyes flitting from one to another rapidly. The light in his eyes faded slightly, but he nodded his head. "Ok...ok. Time to do something clever."
As soon as they both leaned down to look at the drawings and writings in front of them, the screen behind the desk flipped on, fuzzy screen slowly coming into focus. Wels stood and ran around the table to look at the screen face to face as the image of General Salam slowly generated itself. He seemed even more unhappy than when the Doctor and Clara had last seen him.
"This is an urgent message to the Lobod tribe. Due to the recent attack from your tribe to the people of Frodilia, we have decided to forgo negotiations. You have one hour until the oxygen is taken from your buildings. Make peace with your gods."
Wels turned heartbrokenly to the Doctor, shaking his head. The Doctor's countenance held no more hope or joy. His eyebrows were furrowed and his tall frame hovered over the tiny Lobod. "Did you know about this?"
Alowana looked at the floor, head still shaking. "I have no idea what happened."
"Are you telling me the truth? This is very important! Are you lying to me?"
Noise came from the corridor, full of panic and fear. Clara slowly walked to the door and looked out the window. The Doctor was so focused on Wels that he didn't hear anything. He didn't even hear when the door opened and Clara was swept away in the crowd.
The Lobod leader looked into the Doctor's eyes. His whiskers seemed to be dropping again. "I have never told a lie in all of my life. We have no military. I promise you; we are peaceful."
The Doctor seemed satisfied with his response and turned away from him, letting his gaze wander around the room. His eyebrows raised as he looked at the door. "Where's Clara?"
He spun on the spot, looking at every inch of the tiny room. He turned back to Wels with rising fear in his eyes. "Did you see her leave?"
The screen buzzed and started forming a new image, this one darker and slightly harder to see than the other. The Doctor squinted as the picture came into focus, showing a Lobod, dressed in oddly militaristic uniforms. The Doctor looked at Wels curiously, but the leader seemed just as surprised as he was. Suddenly the Lobod's voice from the screen called the Doctor's attention back.
"We are the Lobod Resistance. We have been building a secret military for the past five years so that we can protect our families from the looming Frodile threat. We always planned on being used only as a last resort, and it seems that time has come. If you, our leader, do not wish to join us, then we implore you to think otherwise. We have in our custody three of the Governors of our people, and one of the strangers who came to help us."
The camera shifted to where Clara sat handcuffed beside three Lobods. The Doctor felt his breath leave him. "Clara!"
His companion sat up as much as she could and gazed into the camera, eyes wide with fear. "Doctor!"
The Timelord's eyes were lot with fury. "Clara, I'm so sorry. I should've been paying more attention."
"It's alright, Doctor. It's ok."
The camera turned back to the leader of the Resistance. "You have thirty minutes to join us or these people will go to the front line."
The screen flickered off, leaving the Doctor's steely blue eyes locked on the wall. His mind was working overtime; mouth open in and closing as he weighed his options and tried to think of what to do. Wels Alowana looked up at him with a pitiful, defeated gaze, but the Doctor wasn't about to back down. Inside, a storm was brewing. Maybe with Clara here, it could be calmed, but wig out here...the Oncoming Storm was back.