Part Four
The Doctor stood gasping at the console, not really seeing the room he was stood in, but still reliving that imagine from Donna's mind. The pair of them locked together physically in an act of passion.
"You and me. It's only you and me," they had tenderly whispered to each other as they undulated and moved in synch.
He grimaced in disgust and pain. How could she do this to him?! HOW COULD SHE?!
How could the Duplicate, come to that matter? How could they even think to betray him like this?! Those were words meant for only him and Donna; not his Duplicate. They had taken his moment of pure happiness about the baby and turned it into something else. Something reviled.
The TARDIS softly bumped him, pulling him from his fug, and he later stepped out of the doors with renewed vigour.
~o~
A darken figure lay hunched over like a pile of rags. A description that wasn't very far from the truth. Its head rose up to reveal that this was a man encased in this gloomily lit room; had once been a man, a lifetime ago. He may look human but he didn't consider himself a man any longer. Instead, he was merely a prisoner, beaten, starved and tortured to within an inch of his life. This wasn't living, here in this dank cell. You could only barely exist in this godforsaken place. He didn't even have a name, despite briefly having one. Here he was "it" to the soldiers who guarded him closely. His crime was existing; in a world where alien DNA was forbidden.
Spotting his empty metal plate lying on the ground a few feet away, he reached out and found the energy to drag it nearer to his weakened body. Once there, he desperately licked it, hoping to find a morsel of food or some collected moisture to drink. Alas there was none.
No sound came from his lips. He'd long since stopped any such futile effort to attract any passing attention or placate his frazzled lonely nerves. All he could do now was conserve any remnants of his depleted energy and stubbornly battle on living just to spite them. He knew it irked them, and that knowledge gave him power. It wasn't much but it would do for now.
From out of nowhere a strong breeze whipped up, closely followed by a familiar sound.
It couldn't be! He must be hallucinating because this was impossible.
And yet he clearly wasn't, because milliseconds later the TARDIS materialised in the corner of the cell and a long unseen face peered out at him.
"There you are. What are doing down there on the floor? You'll catch your death of cold," the Doctor forced himself to cheerily declare as he stepped out. There were several cameras dotted around the cell to accessorise the décor. "Did you decorate this room? I don't like it."
The Duplicate Doctor pushed himself painful up into a sitting position. "Save yourself," he rasped out in warning. "The fashion police will be here any moment."
The Doctor crossed over to him and bent down to his eye level. "Oh no, we can't have that. Your dinner's getting cold. Come on, old boy, upsy-daisy." With ease, he lifted the frail form into his arms and then stood, striding towards the TARDIS.
There was a scream from outside the heavy cell doors. "Doctor?! Wait! Wait for me, Doctor. I'm here, it's me; I'm ready!"
"Rose?" the Doctor queried, gazing at the man in his arms with concern.
It was all the Duplicate Doctor could do to nod in return. So the Doctor kicked the TARDIS door shut behind him, ignoring the pleas from outside, carefully placed his doppelgänger down onto the pilot seat and set his beloved machine in motion. There were still frantic pummels on the door as they dematerialised and sped away from Pete's World.
After some minutes of pained silence, the Duplicate broke it when his depleted energy allowed it. "I take it you're that angry with me. Enough to come and drag me back personally."
"Oh, you got that, did you?" the Doctor hissed back.
"A little hard to miss. And you deliberately left Rose behind, again." He decided to change tactics when that didn't work to gain much of a response. "Any chance of a cup of tea? I'm gasping for one. With a biscuit, or a whole meal. Either would do."
"Fine! You can have tea," the Doctor bit, walking away from the console. "Anything else while I'm out there? My whole tin of biscuits, the contents of my larder, or my very hearts?"
"Look, I know we're supposed to be doing the whole family argument bit right now, but I really am dying of starvation here. I'm not kidding," the Duplicate pleaded. "Can we schedule it for when I've eaten and had some tea?"
The Doctor did no more than lifted him up again into his arms and carried him through to the kitchen. "Very well. Food, drink, sustenance, and then explanations," he promised. "Mainly from you!"
The Duplicate decided he could live with that. It was in his nature to survive at any cost. "How did you get there?" he asked as he sat watching the Doctor bustle about with the tea things.
"Through some cracks," the Doctor reluctantly supplied. "For one brief second they lined up, rippling back from a point in my future timeline, so I took the opportunity to collect you."
That sounded ominous. "Am I your prisoner?" the Duplicate quietly wondered. It seemed a logical step for the Doctor to take, given the circumstances of his release.
Fiery eyes were turned in his direction. "You will do as you're told, this time," the Doctor sternly demanded.
"It wasn't my fault, the whole thing with Rose," the Duplicate Doctor defended himself. "They were waiting for us as soon as we stepped off the zeppelin in London. I was dragged away for infringing some alien law or other; no idea what."
"Was Rose okay?" the Doctor instantly worried.
The Duplicate shook his head. "No, from what I can tell. She got the stars to come back in the sky for them, but she brought me into their world. An alien. A big no no."
"What do you mean?" the Doctor tersely queried, placing a steaming hot mug of tea in front of him on the kitchen table, closely followed by a packet of biscuits.
"I'll er… need help opening that," the Duplicate requested with some embarrassment. He then held up his broken hands in explanation. "I can probably palm the mug but my dexterity is limited."
In answer, the Doctor ripped open the packet, and then stood up to rummage through the nearby cupboards until he found a straw. It was a large, pink, rollercoaster of a type of crazy straw; and he threw into the mug of tea with disgust. "Try that," he suggested, and then felt his anger subside as he saw his duplicate wrestle with getting a biscuit into his mouth by bending down and almost hoovering it closer. Reaching out, he lifted a biscuit to the man's mouth, and held it there while he nibbled at its edges.
"Thanks," the Duplicate gratefully acknowledged his help. "Sorry about being a pain."
"It's all fine," the Doctor dismissed. "Once you've finished your tea I'll take you to the infirmary and start your healing process. Did they hurt Rose?"
"Yes, they were horrible to me, thanks for asking," the Duplicate sarcastically answered, anger firing across his face. "She got let off after a month, but she had to work as a prison guard after that. Torchwood wouldn't be allowed to re-employ her for another year. So she got off quite lightly in the end."
"It doesn't sound as if she did," the Doctor mumbled.
"I assure you she did!" the Duplicate insisted. "I repeatedly told them that it had been MY idea to return with her, not hers. It was my fault she had to look after me; I am to blame."
"You certainly are," the Doctor couldn't resist remarking.
An indignant pout appeared on the Duplicate's face. "What do you mean? It certainly was not bloody my fault! Nothing to do with me. In fact, it had been your idea from the very start, so don't try to deny it, Spaceman."
The Doctor visibly paled. "Don't say that. Don't use that name."
"Why not?"
"Because you haven't earned the right."
"No, I'm just the backup man, aren't I?" the Duplicate grumbled. "The substitute. The understudy, while you ponce about lording it over all of us."
"You don't understand," the Doctor argued, biting down on his grief. "As soon as we left you, Donna…"
"She died. Yes, I know," the Duplicate sadly finished for him. "I felt it happen." He drew in a deep sob, trying to control his spiralling emotions. "I tried to prevent it, and it still went and happened. What went wrong?"
Should he tell the truth? "Donna isn't dead," the Doctor murmured. "But I had to break the bond with her, leaving her alone with her mother."
"How could you!" the Duplicate gasped out in horror. "She didn't want that."
"Precisely." The Doctor then paused dramatically, knowing that a low level of hate was starting to be aimed at him. "That's why I'm taking you to her."
The hate was instantly replaced with surprise. "What?! Why? What are you planning? You're taking me to Chiswick? What good would that do, if you've done what I suspected and removed us from her mind?"
This was the part the Doctor had been waiting for and he was going to enjoy it with a great deal of relish. Standing, he gripped the Duplicate Doctor by the throat and pulled him up into a standing position. Gritting his teeth, he spat out his words, enjoying their effect as he stared into his doppelgänger's face. "I will see you account for your misdemeanours, whatever your name is. You think you've had it rough up until now? Just you wait until you see Donna. THEN you'll have some explaining to do to her mother."
Trying to control his emotions, the Duplicate answered as calmly as he could manage, "The name's Mark. I chose 'Mark Noble' as my name." He blinked a few times. "What do I have to explain to Sylvia?"
"Hitting the Mark. It's got a whole new ring to it," the Doctor cruelly joked. "What's Sylvia got to do with it, you ask?" Waiting for a faint nod in reply, he goaded him still further. "You get to tell her how you got her daughter pregnant."
As Mark squeaked "What?" in shock, the Doctor let go of his tight hold on him, and let him fall, boneless, onto the kitchen chair beneath him.
"I'd love to know too, but seeing Sylvia Noble knock you into next Tuesday will be almost worth it," the Doctor jibed. "But before all that, I get to have you as my patient and at my mercy."
"Oh shit," Mark weakly muttered.