Writers note: Hello lovely people! Firstly thank you so much for all the support and positive responses! Sorry its been so slow but I've been trying to get all the characters on board the Tardis. I may be having to much fun writing Jack...and I may have made him bipolar...but hey...artistic license right? ;) hope you guys keep to enjoy things!
Time wasn't concrete in the Tardis. I soon learned that what felt like an hour to me when I was alone in my room could very well have felt like six hours to Clara or four to Jack. But finally the Doctor told us we had reached our first real stop. The six of us stepped out of the tardis into a place bolstering with activity and sound. I fought the urge to cover my ears. I had never been a fan of dub-step but this was even worse, musical had "evolved" into successions of screaming sounds and crashes that didn't even match to a beat any longer. Clara and Mickey were both covering their ears. But the Doctor was smiling, Jack seemed apathetic, and Martha eyes had a gleam of determination and fasciation. That when the rest of my surrounding sunk in, if I thought the sound was going to be my biggest shock I was wrong. I had no idea what I was looking at. But it certainly wasn't human. It was shorter than I was and had a spiked head and was red. I looked and it for only and second and then immediately looked away. Don't stare. Try to look like you fit in, I told myself. I had always dreamed about adventures with aliens but I had just seen my first one other than the Doctor and I was about to pass out.
"A Zocci." Jack fell into step next to me and we follow the Doctor through a crowd of dancing aliens. I looked straight ahead, I didn't want to fall to the ground, I was lightheaded.
"What?" I managed to get out.
"The little red alien. His race, they are called the Zocci. Thought you would be interested in knowing." Jack informed me. Even through my nausea, I became even more confused. Jack had listened to be speech about knowledge, he knew I wanted to learn. Or perhaps he just was enjoying seeing the green hue on my face. Jack fell back behind me and Clara was soon walking beside me. She grabbed my hand. In most instances I would've instantly stolen it back. But the physical touch of another human was comforting, and this way I felt less likely to fall over every time I saw an alien. Thankfully she didn't say anything. She just kept a grip on me, like my mum had when I was a kid in the supermarket. Finally the Doctor led us to a empty table where we all sat. I focused my eyes on the candle on the center of the table.
"Are you alright?" The Doctor asked, concern in his voice. It bothered me.
"I'm fine. Why are we here?" I asked, impatient.
"To be seen." He replied, as if it were obvious, I looked at him blankly.
"People here are from all stretches of the galaxy. The have agents of time, and many people who want to kill me." The Doctor tried to clarify.
"So basically its a great place to take a child." Jack inserted. Drink in hand. The man always seemed to be drinking.
"Well Jack you could've stayed in the Tardis and babysat her if you would've liked." The Doctor replied. Jack snorted and drank.
"I'm not a child. I'm almost as old as my Mum was when she started traveling with you." I was getting sick of being called kid, or the child, or most of the time just not being referred to by my name.
"Rose Tyler came aboard the tardis after saving the world by destroying the Nestene Consciousness. She had a life full of experience in the real world. Chance, you've grown up in a lab with your little brilliant brain. In someways thats an advantage. But trust me when I say, you are a child. You look like your going to pass out in here just seeing other life-forms. The world is bigger than a textbook." The Doctor explained.
"You can be condescending now Doctor. But just remember that I exist because you messed up." I reminded him. His words had hurt me, even though he had called me smart he had still called me an idiot. He had called me shortsighted and naive. So I said the only thing I thought could hurt him.
"The fact that you believe you are a mistake is a shame" The Doctor said in a firm controlled voice. I knew the conversation was over. No one other than Jack had overheard the conversation, and even he didn't have anything to say. My head felt like it was going to explode, the so called music was so loud. I kept seeing different kinds of aliens and Jack kept telling me their names but it got to a point that my brain couldn't compute. I grabbed the glass in front of Jack and began to chug it. I couldn't tell who ripped it out of my hands first, Jack, the Doctor, Clara or Mickey. I was relatively sure though that Martha remained in her seat. I began to cough, my throat felt like it was on fire. I felt the strong urge to vomit. Jack stood up and scooped me out of my chair as if I weighed nothing, I was coughing now. I was amazed that chunks weren't coming out with it. Jack and the Doctor were arguing, I tried to listen to what they were saying through my disorientation.
"I know how to help her, I can do this." Jack insisted, the Doctor pried me from his arms and into his own.
"You've helped enough for one day Jack. Go back to your drinking." The Doctor sounded angry. I wanted to protest being carried, I wanted to protest going wherever the Doctor was taking me. But I wasn't able to do either because soon the spinning of the room stopped and became darkness.
I still felt out of it by the time I came around, but when I opened my eyes I found myself in a white room with Clara asleep next to me in a chair. I was hooked up to a machine that looked far more advanced than any medical equipment I had ever seen before. The burning sensation in my throat was gone and my stomach no longer felt like a volcano waiting to erupt.
"Clara?" I whispered. I felt almost scared to speak in a normal tone. Clara jolted awake.
"Chance! Your awake! The nurses said you would probably be out for a couple more hours!" Clara seemed slightly flustered, she looked at the time on the wall and then sighed, "Which was a couple of hours ago."
"Its fine." I assured her, still feeling blurry inside, not sure how that was even possible but I couldn't think of another way to describe it.
"They said you might still feel disoriented for a bit. What possessed you to do that?" Clara almost sounded like a half annoyed older sister, but the tone of concern was there as well.
"I was thirsty. I needed a drink." I named the reason, it sounded even stupider out loud.
"You understand that Jack has had hundreds of years to build up a tolerance to the substances in those drinks that can generally destroy organs in the human body? What you drank has a chemical in it that is designed to make you feel elated. Jack has drank the stuff so much that it hardly does anything to him anymore so he drinks an extremely increased amount. Having you drink it was extremely dangerous because it began to overload the sensory system of your brain, not to mention what the other ingredients started doing to your stomach." Clara explained what had happened to me. I felt so stupid. The Doctor was right. I was a child.
"But isn't Jack human?" I asked confused.
"Well he was once, I'm not sure what he is now. But he can't die whatever the case is, so he can drink that stuff to his hearts content. However with you they had to connect into your main context and put up fields to protect your brain, thats why you probably feel out of it, having people invade the insides of your head jumbles you up they said." I was to the point where I was just nodding, the information was interesting, but was slightly overwhelming.
"Where is everyone?" I inquired.
"Well after we got you here things got a bit interesting. They wanted to scan you to see who you were. When they did and it came up that you don't exist, and never had existed, things got a little hectic." Clara replied. At first I was confused, then I remembered, in this universe, there was no Rose Tyler, thus she couldn't have a daughter.
"What did they do?" I was honestly curious how alien health care worked.
"They saw you were in critical condition, so they took you in and did the procedure and then we were scolded for allowing you near such a dangerous substance." Clara paused to allowed me to process.
"That doesn't sound too hectic." I answered.
"Thats because I haven't finished. Once you were in the clear, they confronted us with your DNA, it had found matches in their system. The match of a deceased Rose Tyler. You were too old to have been born from after her date of death, they were unable to match the DNA of your Father, though they all suspect who he is. The Doctor was miraculously wiped off of computer systems a while back." Clara spoke smugly with the last remark.
"So what did they do?" I tried to keep the small amount of fear out of my voice.
"They ran tests. They found that you were healthier than the average human, that your brain responded faster and that your heart is slightly further over than it needs to be, meaning that there is room for another one next to it." Clara said the last part heavy with meaning.
"So they found nothing that they are going to make me into a lab rat though right?" I asked. Clara sighed at my lack of response.
"No. They said we were free to go now that you were in the system. The Doctor once we got here and they started running scans had to leave, he needs to remain off computer systems for as long as possible, but Jack is waiting outside. I may have gotten in an argument with him and we might not be speaking to each other." Clara quieted down as she finished.
"What happened?" I inquired as I took almost sticker type looking contraptions off my arms and got off the bed.
"Well...I got angry at him for having the the drink in the first place. I may have also given the Doctor an earful, why are you smiling like that?" Clara asked, I hadn't even noticed the smile that had grown on my face. I had to ask myself why myself.
"No one other than my parents before have told someone off for me before." I finally decided and spoke, Clara smiled back and ruffled my hair slightly, I was less dizzy now and we were walking toward the door. As we opened it Jack leapt up.
"You are possibly the stupidest person I know. And I've met a lot of people." Was the first thing I said.
"Thanks." I managed to mutter. Jack and Clara didn't talk. They just glared. I suddenly felt like a toy that two kids wanted.
"Are we good to go?" I asked.
"Yea." Jack grabbed my wrist and began to drag me, I resisted. Even though no one was in the hallway to see the embarrassing display I didn't want to be paraded like a disobedient child.
"Don't. Your not my Dad." I explained when Jack looked back expectantly. The hardness in Jacks eyes suddenly disappeared.
"Clara can you give us a moment?" Jack asked.
"Yeah right! After she drank your drink you think I'm going to-" Clara started to retaliate, but Jack cut her off.
"Leave." He sounded so authoritative that Clara just glared, pivoted with a stomp and marched a small distance away.
"I have a daughter you know. Her name was Melissa...or Alice...or whatever she wants to be called these days." Jack confided. The information was new.
"Your not close I gather?" I questioned. Jack half laughed.
"No. She hates me." Jack tried to say it casually.
"Why?" I knew there had to be a reason, no matter how unorthodox the reason may seem, a child always had a reason to hate their parent.
"Because I killed her son." The haunted look within Jacks eyes scared me more than the words he spoke.
"Oh." Was all I managed to get out. Jack stepped closer to me. I stood my ground he put his hands on my shoulders.
"Your Dad. He did everything I couldn't do. He raised you right. You love him don't you?" Jack asked, his voice cracked slightly. I nodded.
"You asked me why I came. Thats why. Everyone had there reasons to be here kid. Mines a chance of redemption. You still need a Dad. He sounds like a good guy." Jack released my shoulders, motioned to Clara and kept walking forward. I stood there, slightly stunned. Jack Harkness had told me what he was thinking. More over he had told me what he was feeling. I quickly jolted back into real life and followed him with Clara behind me.