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Into the Dalek – Part Two
Previously
"Doctor" the Dalek repeated gratingly. The Doctor watched it warily, keeping Emily and Romana behind him. "How do you know who I am?" he asked it suspiciously; he'd regenerated, the Dalek shouldn't recognise him yet. "He doesn't. We promised him medical assistance" Morgan explained. The Dalek weakly twitched. "Are you my doctor?" it inquired.
"We found it floating in space" explained Journey; her uncle continued "We thought it was deactivated, so we tried to disassemble it".
"You didn't know about the creature inside" the Corsair guessed, and Journey shook her head. "Not till it started screaming" she admitted. The Dalek croaked out, "Help me", making the Doctor look at it with undisguised contempt. "Why would we do that? Why would any living creature want to help you?" he scoffed. The Dalek replied, "Daleks will die".
"Die all you like, not our problem".
"Daleks must be destroyed".
"Daleks must be de"- the Doctor stopped mockingly repeating the Dalek and stared at it in shock. "What did you just say?"
"All Daleks must die. I will destroy the Daleks. Destroy the Daleks. Destroy the Daleks!" it screeched, rattling. The TARDIS Family stared at it, and then at each other…this was not what they'd expected at all.
/
"A good Dalek?" repeated Clara, sipping at her coffee as she stood at the console. "There's no such thing" the Doctor replied immediately as he worked at the controls. I'm assuming you mean 'apart from Oswin, and Dalek Sec' Romana pointed out, the Doctor having told her about that Manhattan adventure quite a while ago. A deluded converted human and a Dalek-Human hybrid, doesn't count he replied.
"That's a bit inflexible. Not like you. I'd almost say prejudiced" Clara commented. The Doctor sighed, and amended "Fine, there's no such thing as a good pure Dalek. Do we pay you? We should give you a raise" he suggested as the TARDIS landed. Clara smirked. "You're not my boss, you're one of my hobbies" she replied as they left the TARDIS.
Journey was waiting for them. "That was quick" she remarked, sounding rather impressed. "This is Lieutenant Journey Blue, and Colonel Morgan" Romana introduced both Journey and her uncle to Clara. "Hi, nice to meet you" Clara said politely, and they both nodded respectfully. "I think he's probably her uncle, but I may have made that up to pass the time while they were talking. This is Clara, not our assistant. She's, err, some other word".
"I'm his carer".
"Yeah, my carer" he agreed, "She cares so I don't have to". Romana glanced at him, a bit perturbed by that. For a moment it sounded like he seriously wouldn't care if Clara did – but no, he was probably just joking. Except…this version of him didn't seem like the joking type…
They returned to the Dalek. "Doctor" it intoned, sounding more grating than usual. "Hello again" he greeted, facing it squarely. "Will you help me?" it inquired. The Doctor didn't reply. "Will you?" asked Clara, trying to read his expression. "A Dalek so damaged, it's turned good" he said, "Morality as malfunction. How do I resist?"
"Daleks must die! Daleks must die!"
"So, what do we do with a moral Dalek, then?" asked Clara, getting more curious by the minute. It was a bit inconvenient to be whisked away on an adventure when she was close to getting a date with a hot guy, but when it all came down to it she wouldn't miss this for the world. "We get into its head" the Doctor replied. "Mmm, how do you get into a Dalek's head?" she inquired, thinking he meant in a psychological way. He looked down at her. "That wasn't a metaphor".
/
Journey handed out bracelets as they stood around the nanoscaler. "These are nanocontrollers" she explained, "Once we're miniaturised, they take over the molecular compression. When the mission's over, hit the button" she instructed, making to hand one to the Corsair, but the Doctor stopped her. "Hey, spoilsport; why can't I come?" the Corsair asked with a frown. "Because you need to stay here with Emily" the Doctor replied, and Emily gaped at him. "Why can't I go? I could help!"
"You're not going inside a Dalek".
"You're letting mum go with you".
"Your mother can take care of herself, and I can't tell her what to do".
"I can take care of myself, and you can't tell me what to do either! Just cos you're my dad doesn't mean you're my boss".
"Actually, it does".
"And what if I refuse to stay behind?"
"Then I'll render you unconscious and lock you inside the TARDIS. Do not play games with me, Emily. I am your father and you will do as you are told!" the Doctor thundered, glaring down at Emily. She glared right back for a moment, and then turned on her heel and walked off to stand by Flavia, sulking. The Corsair cleared his throat awkwardly. "I still don't see why I have to stay. Flavia will be here, she can keep an eye on Emily, along with Morgan here" he pointed out.
She's not armed the Doctor reminded him privately, before adding aloud "I don't trust him". Morgan overheard and rolled his eyes. "That's not insulting at all" he said sarcastically as he went to do more checks.
The Doctor, Romana, Clara, Journey and two other soldiers, Ross and Gretchen, were the ones who would enter the Dalek. "What are those ones for? We don't need armed baby-sitters" the Doctor protested, gesturing to himself and Romana. He ignored Emily's scoff; she'd get over this. "We're not baby-sitters" Gretchen replied indignantly. Her partner, Ross, explained "We're here to shoot you dead if you turn out to be Dalek spies".
"Well, that's a relief. I hate baby-sitters".
"Okay, listen up. Now, remember, do not hold your breath when the nanoscaler engages. You'll feel like you want to, but you must keep breathing normally during the miniaturisation process" Journey warned them all. Clara frowned questioningly. "Why?"
"Ever microwaved a lasagne without pricking the film on top?" the Doctor asked her, and she stared at him a moment before realising what he meant. "It explodes".
"Don't be lasagne".
They climbed inside the tube, civilians on one side, soldiers on the other. Morgan worked at the controls whilst the Corsair, Flavia and Emily stood by and watched. "Nanoscaler engaging in five, four, three, two…Nanoscaler engaging now" he announced. The computer intoned, "Nanoscaling in progress", as a beam of light passed back and forth along the tube repeatedly until it had shrunk to near microscopic size.
"Nanoscaling complete".
"Nanoscaling successful. Everyone okay in there?" Morgan called through the comm. The tube was carefully picked up with tweezers. "We made it" Journey replied, "Nobody popped". Clara looked out of the tube at the suddenly huge world outside, and laughed a bit in amazement. "Whoa. Ha. I can't believe this" she grinned. She'd always wondered what it would be like to shrink. "No, neither can I" the Doctor replied, although he wasn't talking about the shrinking. He'd probably done it before, after all.
The chamber was injected into the Dalek's eye-piece. A sort of film separated them from the rest of the Dalek; the Doctor touched it and the surface rippled. "We'll be following you all the way, Rescue One. Good luck all of you" Morgan said over the comm. The six of them pushed through the film and emerged into the length of the eye-stalk. "That was weird" Clara remarked.
"You've seen nothing yet".
"What are the lights?"
"They're visual impulses travelling towards the brain" Romana explained as they looked at the flashes of light moving in waves along the eyestalk. "Beautiful" Clara murmured, looking around in near awe. "Welcome to the most dangerous place in the universe" the Doctor declared. Outside, the computer monitored their progress through the Dalek. "Entering the cranial ledge now" Journey called over the comm.
They walked out into a ledge that ran around the dome of the Dalek. "Here" Journey pointed over the rail, and Clara looked over, her eyes widening. "Oh, my God" she murmured. Far below, a reddish blob with cables running down to it could be seen, pulsing slightly. Romana pulled a face. She didn't regret coming, she didn't want to have the Doctor running around in a Dalek on his own, but this was…downright creepy.
"It's amazing" said Clara, obviously not sharing Romana's thoughts. "It's huge" said Ross, but the Doctor shook his head. "No, Ross, we're tiny" he corrected. Clara asked him "So how big is it, that living part, compared to all of us, right now?"
"You see all those cables?"
"Yeah"
"They're not all cables".
"Does it know we're here?" wondered Ross. The Doctor pointed out, "It's what invited us in", before moving over to sets of vertical glowing rectangles, set around the inside of part of the ledge. "Now, this is the cortex vault, a supplementary electronic brain" he explained, "Memory banks, but more than that. This is what keeps the Dalek pure".
"How are Daleks 'pure'?" Gretchen asked dubiously. "He means 'pure' as in 'completely Dalek'. The mutants are born hating everything that isn't Dalek – this just fuels the fire" explained Romana. The Doctor nodded and elucidated, "It extinguishes even the tiniest glimmer of kindness or compassion. Imagine the worst possible thing in the universe, then don't bother, because you're looking at it right now. This is evil refined as engineering".
"Doctor?" the Dalek called, seemingly from all around them. "Oh, hello, Rusty" the Doctor replied offhandedly, "You don't mind if I call you Rusty? We're going to need to come down there with you. Medical examination, and all that".
"What, with those tentacles and things?" asked Gretchen, looking rather disturbed. Romana didn't blame her. "How close do we have to get?" Journey asked the Doctor, who replied "Well, you know, we're never going to insert a thermometer from up here". Journey nodded to Ross, who turned and fired a harpoon into a higher beam above them. "No. No, no, no, no! Stop, stop, stop, you idiot!" the Doctor protested, but it was too late; Ross had already fired a second harpoon.
"We need a way down" Journey pointed out, "the only way"- the Doctor rounded on her and cut her off. "This is a Dalek, not a machine. It's a perfect analogue of a living being, and you just hurt it. So what's going to happen now?" he demanded. Clara paled as she figured it out. "Oh God" she gasped, and Romana put an arm around her, trying to offer a bit of comfort. "What? What is it?" asked Gretchen. Clara swallowed. "Antibodies?" she guessed.
"Dalek antibodies" the Doctor corrected. Little round objects zoomed into their presence, circling mostly around Ross. "Nobody move" the Doctor warned them, "Any attempt to help him, or attack those things, will identify you as a secondary source of infection. Stay still!" The antibodies opened to reveal blue 'eyes', much like the Dalek's eye, and surrounded Ross. "But the Dalek wants us in here. Why is it attacking?" asked Clara. Romana told her, "Nothing can control its antibodies".
"Ross, stay calm. We're going to get you out of this" Journey assured her fellow soldier. "Can you?" asked Clara, but Journey didn't reply. The Doctor held up a small pill. "Ross, swallow that" he said, tossing it to the young man. "What is it?" he asked. The Doctor smiled encouragingly. "Trust me" he said. Ross glanced at the antibodies and then swallowed the little pill. "Now what?" he asked – moments before the antibodies shot a painful beam at him and disintegrated him.
"Ross!" Journey cried out in horror as her friend and fellow soldier was reduced to dust. "Oh, my God. What's it doing?" asked Clara, as the antibody that had killed Ross sucked up the remains. "The hoovering" the Doctor replied as the little ball flew away, pulling out his sonic screwdriver. "Gotcha" he declared, checking the results. "What did you give him?" Clara inquired, wondering if perhaps the man had just been teleported at the last second or something, if he was maybe still alive.
"Oh, just a spare power cell, but I can track the radiation signature. I need to know where they dump the bodies" the Doctor explained. Romana felt guilty, like she should have tried to find out what her husband was planning, and then maybe she could have warned Ross and found another way to save him – but she hadn't, she'd…trusted the Doctor. But she should trust him…shouldn't she?
"I thought you were saving him!" Journey glared angrily at the Time Lord. "He was dead already" the Doctor replied coldly, "I was saving us. Follow me and run" he ordered, grabbing Romana's hand and jerking her out of her worried reverie. "Run!" Clara agreed, taking off after them. The rest of the anti-bodies followed the five of them at a distance, not firing for some reason.
The Doctor stopped at a hole in the ledge. "They've dumped him in here. Organic refuse disposal. We need to get in there" he announced. Clara was less than thrilled about the idea. "Why?" she asked, as Gretchen and Journey tried to hold the antibodies off. "Those antibodies won't give up until we're inside there. I'd rather go in alive than dead" the Doctor explained, nudging her towards the hole. Journey protested, "You don't know where it goes".
"Yes, I do. Away from here. Now in, in! In!" he said urgently. Clara jumped down the tube, followed by Romana. "I can hold them off" said Gretchen even as she and Journey backed up. "No, you can't" the Doctor insisted, waving his sonic at the antibodies to no effect. "Pull back. Down. Jump, everyone, jump" he ordered, ushering Journey and Gretchen down into the tube, before sliding down himself.
/
With a splash, they landed in some sickly green, foul smelling liquid gunk. "Urgh" Clara pulled a face, gagging, "what is this stuff?"
"People" replied the Doctor, "The Daleks need protein. Occasionally, they harvest from their victims. This is a feeding tube" he explained, completely unaffected by the fact that they were standing in liquidised corpses. Romana, on the other hand, felt rather sick. It's a really good thing Flavia opted out she thought, imagining how the neat Time Lady would react to this.
"Is Ross here?" asked Journey, and the Doctor nodded, "Yeah. Top layer, if you want to say a few words". Angered, she suddenly shoved him against the wall. "A man has just died. You will not talk like that" she spat at him. He pushed her away easily. "A lot of people have died. Everything in here is dead, and do you know why that's good?"
"There is nothing good about that".
"Nothing is alive in here, so logically this is the weakest spot in the Dalek's internal security. Nobody guards the dead. Mortuaries and larders, always the easiest to break out of" the Doctor remarked, searching around, "Oh, I've lived a life. Tell Uncle Stupid that we're in…Ah ha! A bolt hole" he grinned, using the sonic to unscrew an actual large bolt from out of the wall. Clara looked at Journey, who was fuming. "He'll get us out of here" she told the woman gently, "The difficult part is not killing him before he can".
The Doctor and Romana managed to get the bolt out. "Bolt hole. Actually, a hole for a bolt. Does nobody get that?" he asked. Clara and Romana shared a long suffering look. "Also, there's the puns" added Clara. The Doctor gestured for them to hurry up and crawl through the tunnel. "Watch it, decontamination tubes are hot" he warned.
On the way through the narrow tube, Journey spoke into her comm. "Rescue One to Mission Control".
"This is Blue, Rescue One. Report".
"The Dalek has an internal defence mechanism. We've lost Ross".
"What kind of defence mechanism? That thing knows you're in there to help it".
"Yeah, well, who knows? It's a Dalek. We're going to continue the mission" Journey said firmly, before crawling onwards. Behind her, the Doctor glanced over his shoulder and asked "Are you two alright back there? It's a bit narrow, isn't it?" Clara let out an audible huff. "Any remarks about my hips will not be appreciated" she warned.
"Ach, your hips are fine. You're built like a man" he replied. Clara rolled her eyes in irritation. "Thanks" she muttered. Am I built like a man? Romana asked him, and he chuckled in her mind. Of course not, you're built just right he answered, and she smiled. It soon faded however, as she hesitantly asked, Doctor, about Ross…
"We've reached the end, but there's a grate in the way" Journey announced. The Doctor scrambled forward, pulling out his sonic and handing it to her. "Hold the button down and point" he instructed. Romana sighed as he raised mental barriers, apparently not wanting to talk about Ross, and what he'd done…she supposed she couldn't blame him, but she'd felt his emotions when Ross had died, and he hadn't felt sad or guilty at all. He'd been…almost emotionless.
They scrambled out of the tube into the power unit. "What's that noise? Are you wearing a Geiger counter?" the Doctor asked Gretchen, who nodded and showed it to them. "Standard battle equipment. That's just low level radiation" she explained. The meter was actually slightly higher than 'low level'. "But stronger down here, for some reason. Gimme" the Doctor insisted, practically snatching the counter out of Gretchen's hands.
Emily called them over the comm. "Um, Lieutenant? Are my mum and dad okay?" she asked Journey, who handed her comm to Romana. "Hello, Emily. We're fine, your dad says hi" she told her daughter, as the Doctor distractedly waved and gave a thumbs-up. "Come back soon, okay? I'm bored" said Emily. There was a click, and Romana wordlessly handed the comm back to Journey.
The Doctor moved the circuit board around, sweeping it over the large circuit boards surrounding them, and declared "I've got it. I know what's wrong with Rusty".
"Okay, that's good" Clara nodded, "…is that good?"
"Well, you know how I said this was the most dangerous place in the universe?" the Doctor asked her, and she nodded. "I was wrong. It's way more dangerous than that".