Dalek: A Time Lady!
The Doctor's hearts stopped and he looked up in shock at what Van Statten had just said. The other one? The other alien? There was another Time Lord in the building!? How had he not sensed it? He had to get out, find out.
"Nothing new here I can patent," Van Statten muttered.
"So that's your secret," the Doctor called, trying to get through to the man, he needed to find the other Time Lord! "You don't just collect this stuff, you scavenge it."
"This technology has been falling to Earth for centuries," Van Statten scoffed, "All it took was the right mind to use it properly. Oh, the advances I've made from alien junk, you have no idea, Doctor. Broadband? Roswell. Just last year my scientists cultivated bacteria from the Russian Crater, and do you know what they found?" the Doctor looked at him angrily, his mind already racing to what sort of torture they had inflicted on the other Time Lord, "The cure for the common cold. Kept it strictly within the laboratory of course, no need to get people excited. Why sell one cure when I can sell a thousand palliatives?" he smiled smugly.
"Do you know what a Dalek is, Van Statten? A Dalek is honest. It does what it was born to do for the survival of its species, that creature in your dungeon is better than you."
"In that case, I will be true to myself and continue," Van Statten replied, walking back to the scanner.
"But if I'm like the other alien. What difference will you find?"
Van Statten shrugged, "Well, for starters, I would assume your reproductive systems are quite different."
The Doctor's eyes, if possible, grew wider…it wasn't a Time Lord…it was a Time Lady!
He struggled more in his bonds, needing to get out, find her, he could only imagine what Van Statten had done to her given how he treated the Dalek, "Listen to me!" he shouted, "That thing downstairs is going to kill every last one of us!"
And if the Time Lady fell to Earth with the Dalek, it would know she was there, sucked right out of the War with it. She would be the first one the Dalek went after. He couldn't let that happen. He couldn't let it succeed. He couldn't be the last, not again, not now that there was another of his people. He just...couldn't...
"Nothing can escape the Cage," Van Statten waved him off, running the scanner again, watching as the Doctor writhed in pain.
"But it's woken up! It knows I'm here! It's gonna get out! Van Statten, I swear no one on this base is safe! No one on this planet!"
But the scan just continued to run…
~8~
Adam entered the room just outside the Cage followed by Rose, "Hold it right there!" one of the guards shouted.
Adam just flashed his ID, "Level 3 access. Special clearance from Mr. Van Statten," they walked past Simmons and entered the Cage, Rose staring intently at the Dalek within, "Don't get too close..." he warned as she started walking towards it.
She looked up, peering into its eyestalk, "Hello?" it just continued to stare, "Are you in pain? My name's Rose Tyler. I've got a friend, he can help. He's called the Doctor. What's your name?"
"Yes," it answered.
"What?" she frowned, concerned.
It raised its eyestalk to look at her, "I am in pain," it said wearily, "They tortured me. But still...they fear me. Do you fear me?"
"No," she shook her head lightly.
It lowered its eyestalk, "I am dying."
"No, we can help!"
"I welcome death. But I am glad...that before I die...I met a human who was not afraid."
Rose looked at it, overwhelmed with sadness and pity, "Isn't there anything I can do?"
"My race is dead. I shall die alone."
Rose blinked back the tears in her eyes before gently reaching out and placing her hand on the Dalek.
"Rose, no!" Adam shouted.
But he was too late.
The place where Rose had put her hand suddenly burned bright orange. She snatched her hand back, looking down at it and then up at the Dalek.
"Genetic material extrapolated, initiate cellular reconstruction!" it shouted, its voice growing stronger, angrier. It burst out of its chains, sparks flying around it.
Simmons ran in, "What the hell have you done?" he turned to the Dalek, one of his devices in hand as it pointed its sucker at him, "Whatcha gonna do? Sucker me to death?"
The Dalek proceeded to do just that, placing the sucker over Simmon's face and sucking his head, cracking his skull as Adam and Rose ran outside, "It's killing him!" Rose shouted at the guards, "Do something!"
"Condition red!" a guard called into the comm., shutting the door to the Cage and sealing it, "Repeat, condition red! This is not a drill!"
~8~
Van Statten looked up at the code red warning coming over the system, the lights flashing, the alarms blaring.
The Doctor, sweating with pain, looked up as well, "Release me if you want to live."
~8~
The Doctor, Van Statten, Goddard, and some guards ran out of the lift and into Van Statten's office. The Doctor spun and faced two of the guards, "Bring the second alien up here," they looked at Van Statten, who seemed about to argue, so the Doctor rounded on the man, "Trust me, if that thing gets out, two Time Lords are better than one!"
Van Statten nodded and the guards ran off.
The Doctor ran over to a monitor that linked down to just outside the Cage, "You've got to keep it in that cell."
"Doctor, it's all my fault," Rose walked up to the camera, having spotted him first.
"I've sealed the compartment," one of the guards stated, "It can't get out, that lock's got a billion combinations."
"The Dalek's a genius," he countered, "It can calculate a thousand billion combinations in one second flat."
Those in the room all turned to look at the door, watching as the Dalek did just that. The doors burst open, Rose and Adam moving into the hall as the two security guards before them took aim, "Open fire!" the main guard shouted.
"Don't shoot it, I want it unharmed!" Van Statten ordered.
"Rose, get out of there!" the Doctor called, but Rose just stood there, watching.
The Dalek advanced upon them, the bullets having no effect at all. The guard turned to his female partner, "De Maggio, take the civilians and get them out alive. That is your job, got that?"
"You, with me," she turned to Rose and Adam, leading them away as the Dalek approached the screen, smashing right through it, cutting off their visual.
"Abandoning the Cage, sir!" the guard called over the audio.
Goddard turned and quickly moved to one of the computers in the office, the Doctor and Van Statten moving to look over her shoulder, "We're losing power. It's draining the base. Oh, my God. It's raiding entire power supplies for the whole of Utah."
"It's downloading," the Doctor replied.
"Downloading what?" Van Statten frowned.
"Sir, the entire West Coast has gone down," Goddard reported.
"It's not just energy," the Doctor said, "That Dalek just absorbed the entire Internet. It knows everything."
"The Daleks survive in me!" they heard over the audio just before a beam was fired and things went to static.
"Sir, the cameras in the vault have gone down," Goddard added, trying to check the other visual feeds.
"We've only got emergency power, it's eaten everything else, you've got to kill it now!" the Doctor yelled.
"All guards to converge in the Metaltron cage, immediately," Goddard called into the comm..
~8~
De Maggio led Rose and Adam through another set of guards in a corridor, all in wait for the Dalek, "Civilians! Let them through!"
They ran past, out of sight, the guards turning their guns, ready again, when the guard from the Cage ran into view, "Cover the north wall. Red division, maintain suppressing fire along the perimeter. Blue Division hold…" before he could utter another command the Dalek shot him from behind, the guards immediately opened fire but the bullets seemed to melt before they even touched the metal casing.
The Dalek, though surrounded, simply fired its laser at the guards, killing them all, one by one.
~8~
"Tell them to stop shooting at it!" Van Statten turned to Goddard.
"It's killing them!" she argued.
"They're dispensable, that Dalek is unique," he leaned forward and grabbed the comm., "I don't want a scratch on its bodywork? Do you hear me? Do you hear me?"
The sound of gunshots faded into silence and they realized it was not because they were following his instructions.
Goddard sent a glare at Van Statten before pulling up a map of the base on the computer to track the Dalek, "That's us right below the surface, that's the Cage, and that's the Dalek," she showed the Doctor.
"This museum of yours...have you got any alien weapons?" he asked.
"Lots of them, but the trouble is...the Dalek's between us and them."
"We've got to keep that thing alive," Van Statten stated, "We could just seal the entire vault, trap it down there."
"Leaving everyone trapped with it?" the Doctor rounded on him, "Rose is down there. I won't let that happen. Have you got that?" Van Statten stood up but the Doctor turned back to the computer, pointing at a spot on the map, "It's got to go through this area. What's that?"
"Weapons testing," Goddard answered.
"Give guns to the lawyers, technicians, anyone, everyone. Only then have you got a chance of killing it," Goddard nodded and stood up about to let the Doctor take her place before the computer when the door suddenly burst open and one of the guards walked in, half-dragging, half-supporting someone beside him.
The Doctor's head snapped up to see someone dressed in what had once been a white tunic and white pants, now grey with age and grime, a mane of long, black, dirty and knotted hair falling over their face, hiding them. There was a sort of metal band around the head as well. He half-jumped over the desk to get around it as he made his way towards the figure, the map and computer forgotten. He reached up, his hands moving through the hair to cup the face, turning it to look up at him, the hair falling away.
What he saw made his hearts clench in pain.
Staring back at him, face pale, dark bruises under her dark eyes from want of sleep, lips cracked dry, gaunt and worn, was a Time Lady.
She was breathing heavily, her body shaking as though it were terribly weak, which, judging by the treatment of the Dalek, he ventured she was. He frowned, unable to sense her presence in his mind as was a trait of their people.
His gaze travelled to the band around her head, "What's this?" he asked, ripping it off, but still the feel of her mind was like a fluttering of a feather, barely pressing against his own mind.
"Mental Dampener," Goddard replied quietly, though the Doctor could hear regret in her voice for the state of the woman, "Meant to block brainwaves from getting out."
"Why?"
"Her brainwaves were off the chart!" Van Statten shouted, "We had no idea what her abilities might be, and we weren't about to let her call for help."
The Doctor swallowed heavily at that, just barely resisting the urge to punch the man. The woman shuddered, seeming to try to swallow painfully, "Can you get her a glass of water?" he looked over at Goddard. She nodded, turning and ushering the guard out of the room, telling him to join the others as she stepped to a water fountain in the hall.
The Doctor took the girl as she was passed to him, supporting her as she stumbled, gently helping her over to a chair against the wall, positioning her down there. He knelt before her, reaching up to put his fingers on her temples, closing his eyes to check for any permanent damage while Van Statten watched them suspiciously.
~8~
Rose stopped short at the foot of a flight of stairs, looking up them thankfully, "Stairs! That's more like it!" she turned around as Adam and De Maggio reached her, "It hasn't got legs, it's stuck!"
"It's coming!" De Maggio shouted, "Get up!" they ran up the stairs, looking over the banister to watch the Dalek.
It stopped at the foot of the stairs, looking at them.
Adam breathed a small sigh of relief before calling down to it, mockingly, "Great big alien death machine. Defeated by a flight of stairs."
The Dalek's eyestalk turned to look up at them, seeing De Maggio still had her gun at him.
"Now, listen to me," the woman called down, "I demand that you return to your cage. If you want to negotiate, then I guarantee that Mr. Van Statten will be willing to talk. I accept that we imprisoned you and maybe that was wrong. But people have died, and that stops. Right now. The killing stops, have you got that?" no reply, "I demand that you surrender, is that clear?"
"El-e-vate," the Dalek called after a moment, starting to levitate in the air and float up the first few steps of the stairs.
"Oh my God," Rose breathed as it continued up, all of them stunned.
"Adam, get her out of here," De Maggio ordered.
"Come with us, you can't stop it!"
"Someone's got to try," she said, pushing them, "Now get out! Don't look back, just run!"
Adam and Rose ran up the rest of the stairs as the Dalek advanced, De Maggio shooting at it without success. The Dalek fired its laser at her just as Rose and Adam reached the corridor.
~8~
"I thought you were the great expert, Doctor," Van Statten sneered as the Doctor worked at the computer, casting concerned glances over at the Time Lady, who had curled up on her chair, sipping slowly at the water Goddard had gotten, the ginger sitting beside her, "I thought two of you were supposed to be better," he glared at the female alien, "She's not much help, is she?"
"And whose fault is that?" the Doctor shot a glare back at him, so tempted to punch him, again. As it was, he was just barely keeping his temper under control. The threat of the Dalek keeping him focused on the task at hand, at least for now. If Van Statten didn't stop with his comments, well, he couldn't be held accountable for his actions.
"If you're so impressive, then why not just reason with this Dalek? It must be willing to negotiate, there must be something it needs, everything needs something."
"What's the nearest town?" the Doctor asked out of nowhere.
"Salt Lake City."
"Population?"
"One million."
"…dead…" came the raspy whisper on the other side of the room. Both men looked up to see the Time Lady looking down, closing her eyes as though trying to collect herself.
"She's right," the Doctor nodded, eyeing her a moment longer before getting back to his work, "If the Dalek gets out, it'll murder every living creature, that's all it needs."
"But why would it do that?!" Van Statten cried, furious, none too happy with being contradicted and argued with by two aliens.
"Because it honestly believes they should die. Human beings are different, and anything different is wrong. It's the ultimate in racial cleansing and you, Van Statten, you've let it loose!"
A visual suddenly came up on the computer of the weapons testing area, soldiers positioning themselves.
The Doctor leaned over to the comm., "The Dalek's surrounded by a force field. The bullets are melting before they even hit home but it's not indestructible. If you concentrate your fire, you might get through. Aim for the dome, the head, the eyepiece. That's the weak spot."
"Thank you, Doctor," one of the commanders called back, scoffing, "But I think I know how to fight one single tin robot. Positions!" he gave the signal and the soldiers readied their guns. A few moments later Rose and Adam ran in, right into the middle of the area, "Hold your fire! You two, get the hell out of there!" they ran past the guards, making it to an outside door as the Dalek slowly came into view.
The Doctor watched from another side camera as Rose and Adam stopped to watch the Dalek before Adam pulled her away, off screen, the Dalek advancing.
"On my mark..." the commander began as the Dalek looked up at the soldiers, "Open fire!"
They all started shooting at the Dalek, but, like before, the bullets had no effect.
"We've got visual?" Goddard asked, walking over from her position sitting beside the Time Lady to see.
Those who worked for Van Statten, those who had actually seen the other alien, the woman, had been very uneasy about her treatment there. She looked far too human for them to be comfortable with using the same methods on her as the Dalek. She'd been chained up and scanned, barely fed once a day since she arrived. She had little to no human contact except for the occasional lab assistant who checked the readings of her Dampener. It was one of the reasons Van Statten had been so keen to get the Dalek taken care of, they wouldn't have the excuse of wanting to focus on the metal alien first.
"It wants us to see," the Doctor replied, glaring at the screen as the Dalek looked right into the camera.
It slowly started to levitate into the air until it was hovering near the ceiling. It shot at the fire alarm, causing the sprinklers to rain down on the guards. The bullets kept coming but the Dalek paid them no mind, just aiming its laser at a man whose feet were firmly placed on the ground and firing. The rest of the team on the floor fell like flies, the laser electrocuting them all in one go. The only ones left were the commander and another man on the scaffolding.
"Fall back!" the commander shouted, "Fall back!"
The Dalek simply exterminated them both with another electrifying shot of the laser, this time bouncing off the metal.
The office filled with silence as the Doctor blinked, watching the scene in heavy shock.
"Perhaps it's time for a new strategy, maybe we should consider abandoning this place," Van Statten muttered, stunned, giving in.
"Except there's no power to the helipad, sir," Goddard reminded him angrily, "We can't get out."
"You said you could seal the vault," the Doctor recalled, getting up.
"It was designed to be a bunker," Van Statten nodded, going to the computer, "In the event of nuclear war, steel bulkheads…"
"There's not enough power, those bulkheads are massive," Goddard turned to the Doctor.
"We've got emergency power, we can reroute that to the bulkhead doors," the Doctor argued.
"We'd have to bypass the security codes, that would take a computer genius!"
"Good thing you've got me then," Van Statten replied.
"You want to help?" the Doctor scoffed at him, glancing at the Time Lady. She had put her feet back on the ground, no longer curled up, but now she was hunched over, her hands gently rubbing her head as her brainwaves slowly got used to not being suppressed once more.
"I don't want to die, Doctor, simple as that. Nobody knows this software better than me."
A screen on the wall suddenly flashed on, the Dalek standing in the middle of the open area.
"Sir..." Goddard called, noticing it first. The Doctor and Van Statten looked up to see it.
"I shall speak only to the Doctor," the Dalek stated.
The Doctor slowly straightened, glancing at Goddard with an infinitesimal nod in the Time Lady's direction, before he fixed his gaze on the Dalek, "You're gonna get rusty," the Doctor commented as Goddard slowly made her way around the desk to stand in front of the woman, blocking her just incase the Dalek could see that end of the room.
"I fed off the DNA of Rose Tyler. Extrapolating the biomass of a time traveler regenerated me."
"What's your next trick?"
"I have been searching for the Daleks."
"Yeah, I saw," he rolled his eyes, "Downloading the Internet," he walked around the table to stand before the screen, "What did you find?"
"I scanned your satellites and radio telescopes…"
"And?" he shook his head, waiting for the inevitable point and realization.
"Nothing," it stated, before its voice rose, sounding somewhat...scared, "Where shall I get my orders now?"
"You're just a soldier without commands."
"Then I shall follow the primary order, the Dalek instinct to destroy! To conquer!"
"What for?" he asked, exasperated, "What's the point?" there was silence a moment, "Don't you see? It's all gone. Everything you were, everything you stood for."
"Then what should I do?"
"Alright then," he nodded slowly, "If you want orders...follow this one: kill yourself."
"The Daleks must survive!"
"The Daleks have failed. Why don't you finish the job and make the Daleks extinct? Rid the Universe of your filth, why don't you just die?!" he shouted with a passionate hatred.
The Dalek was silent for a moment, "You would make a good Dalek."
And then the screen went blank as the Doctor stared, dumbstruck.
"No…" came a whisper from the side of the room. The Doctor looked over at the Time Lady sitting there, looking up at him with such understanding in her eyes, "You wouldn't."
He blinked, sending her the smallest of nods, before turning to Van Statten, "Seal the vaults."
Van Statten nodded, getting to work as the Doctor joined him, both of them typing away at the computers, "I can leech power off the ground defenses, feed it to the bulkheads," Van Statten told him before smiling, "It's been years since I had to work this fast."
"Are you enjoying this?" the Doctor frowned at him.
"Doctor," Goddard leaned over, "She's still down there."
He nodded, pulling out his sonic and flashing the comm. to connect to Rose's phone.
"This isn't the best time," she answered.
"Where are you?" he asked.
"Level 49," Rose panted, sounding like she was running up the stairs.
"You've got to keep moving. The vault's being sealed off, bulkhead Level 46."
"Can't you stop them closing?"
"I'm the one who's closing them. I can't wait and I can't help you. Now for God's sake, run."
"Done it," Van Statten called, "We've got power to the bulkheads."
"The Dalek's right behind them," Goddard reported from her spot observing the Dalek's tracker.
"We're nearly there," Rose gasped, "Give us two seconds."
"Doctor, I can't sustain the power," Van Statten shook his head, "The whole system is failing," the Doctor looked up at him, seeing the red areas of the computer, the power, fading in and out, "Doctor, you've got to close the bulkheads."
The Doctor paused, staring at the key that would close down the bulkhead, trying to muster the strength.
A hand suddenly appeared on his shoulder.
He looked up to see the Time Lady had stood and come beside him, silently offering what little strength she had left for him to do this. As he looked up at her, a reminder of his people, of their loss, of every bit of damage the Daleks could do…
He found it.
"I'm sorry," he breathed to Rose, hitting the key.
The bulkhead began to close.
A/N: We don't have the Time Lady doing much here, I know, but she HAS been locked up for decades, she wouldn't be in the best condition to start with. But she IS getting her strength back. We got just a hint of her personality here, I'm really going to be trying to make her different from the Professor and Evy. There will definitely be more of her personality coming out in the next chapter...along with a tiny hint of how she's 'different' and 'special,' because I believe anyone paired with the Doctor must have some sort of extraordinary quality to them :)
I'm also going to be doing something a little different with this series than my Lunar Cycle or Academic Series. In the Lunar Cycle I gave small 'next time' teasers at the end of a chapter, but this story, I'm going to, after the first episode is finished, give you what I'm calling a pyramid, which will be my 'top three,' or the three episodes I'm really looking forward to posting either because of something that happens in them that I love or that I think might shock you or that I feel is important to Angel's story. Along with that I'll give my 'paired pick' which is which 2-parter episode I'm eager to post. And finally my 'solo selection' which is actually going to be the episode I wasn't much of a fan of so you have fair warning about it. So keep an eye out at the end of my next chapter for my 'pyramid' :)
As for the cover, that will be up either late tomorrow or with my 4th chapter :) I'm currently debating between three actresses to put in the cover. I thought I had it, but then I saw two more and was like, hmmm...maybe THEY would be closer to how I picture her, so I just want to make sure I have her perfect first :)