Chapter 7- The Long game P.1
"So It's 200000, It's a spaceship- No, wait a minute, space station, and- go and try that gate over there- off you go." The Doctor whispered to Jackie as they stepped out of the TARDIS after Jackie made sure Adam didn't step out of the TARDIS until they told him to, which made Rose wonder what she was doing. Jackie nodded moving towards the TARDIS door to open it to let Adam out.
"200000?" Jackie asked turning to the Doctor to make sure she got it right.
"200000." The Doctor said nodding.
"Right." Jackie said rubbing her hands together and nodding to Rose to let Adam come out.
"Adam? Out you come." Rose said opening the door for Adam before moving over towards the Doctor still wondering when her mum was doing.
"Oh, my god." Adam said looking and sounding like he was going to faint.
"Don't worry. You'll get used to it." Rose said smirking from beside the Doctor wondering if this was how he felt when he took her to see the Earth explode.
"Where are we?" Adam asked looking around him.
"Good question. Let's see. So, um- judging by the architecture, I'd say we're around the year 200000." Jackie said acting as if she knew what she was talking about making the Doctor laugh.
"What she doing?" Rose asked quietly so that only the Doctor could hear her.
"Looks like she's trying to impress Adam with her 'knowledge'." The Doctor said smirking, he was enjoying this. Jackie's plan to get his Rose and Adam together was failing.
"Uh-huh." Adam said still trying to wrap his brain around everything that was happening.
"But why?" Rose asked the Doctor
"Good question, why don't you ask her." The Doctor asked smirking, knowing that Jackie had been trying to get Rose and Adam together without any of them knowing and this was just another part of her plan.
"If you listen-" Jackie started and Adam listen intently to the sounds around him.
"Right. Yeah." Adam said.
"Shouldn't we stop her?" Rose asked.
"Oh let her have her fun, not like it's gonna hurt anyone." The Doctor said knowing that Rose was never going to get with Adam.
"Engines- we're on some sort of space station. Yeah, definitely a space station. It's a bit warm in here- they could turn the heating down. Tell you what- let's try that gate, come on. Here we go." Jackie said leading Adam to the gate the Doctor had pointed out early. Rose and the Doctor followed behind them with Rose wiping sweat off her brow, which worried the Doctor because it shouldn't be this hot here. "And this is-" Jackie started but stopped when she saw the Earth, but it didn't look like the Earth. She looked over at Rose and the Doctor begging him for help with her eyes.
"Yes?" The Doctor asked innocently.
"I'll let the Doctor describe it." Jackie said and Adam looked over to Rose and the Doctor who was smirking at Jackie.
"Oh, but you were doing so well." The Doctor taunted and Jackie glared at him and the gulped afraid that he would be slapped. "The Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire." The Doctor said walking up to Jackie and Adam with Rose following closely behind him. "And there it is, planet Earth, at its height. Covered with megacities, five moons- population 96 billion. The hub of a galactic domain, stretching across a million planets, a million species- with mankind right in the middle." He said and Adam finally fainted, the Doctor looked over to Rose with a smirk. "And he's your boyfriend." He said teasing her.
"No he's not." Rose instantly said which pleased the Doctor.
~Seven~
"Come on, Adam, open your mind." Leading Adam and Jackie by the shoulders through the room they first landed in after Adam had woken up from his fainting spell, with Rose right next to him. "You're gonna like this fantastic period of history. The human race at it's most intelligent- culture, art, politics. This era has got fine food good manners-" The Doctor said being interrupted by a loud horn and horde of rude people pushing them this way and that. He felt Rose grab on to his elbow in an attempt to stay with him as the crowd of people tried to separate them, and the Doctor bit back to urge to growl at that. Why did the universe seem to want to try to separate them, the universe is the one that gave him Rose so why was it trying to separate her from him, and didn't it realize that no mater what it did to try to separate them they would always find away back to each other.
"Out of the way!" A someone yelled at them as the person pushed pasted them and the Doctor lead them to a less crowded place, it was still very much crowded, but now no one was pushing past them. They watched as a vender set up shop and everyone began lining up to the vender. They stood there watching as the vender quickly took orders and just as quickly got them out, Jackie quickly maneuvered around people to see what type of food the vender was setting.
"Oi, you, mate! Stop pushing." Someone yelled at her and she gave them her fiercest Jackie Tyler glare which caused them to flinch and back away from her.
"Fine cuisine?" Jackie asked turning to look at the Doctor.
"My watch must be wrong." The Doctor said looking at his watch confused. "No, it's fine. That's weird." The Doctor said now very confused and concerned for Rose's safety. The Doctor once again bit to growl, he wanted to trip to be a nice one for Rose after everything he had put her through, he had hoped that with this trip she could relax a little and not have to worry for her life.
"That's what comes of showing off. Your history's not as good as you thought it was." Jackie said smirking at him, obviously thinking she just made him look like an idiot in front of Rose.
"Mum!" Rose cried, shocked at what her mother had said, obviously the Doctor is wrong than it was the TARDIS that decided that they needed to be there for some reason that the Doctor will figure out.
"My history's perfect." The Doctor snapped glaring at Jackie, and his history was perfect, there was something here making it wrong and he was going to find out what it was because he could sense that it was dangerous.
"Well, obviously not." Jackie snapped back happily glaring right back at the Doctor. The glaring contest would have gone on forever if Rose didn't decided to step in between the Doctor and her mum, with her back up against the Doctor's chest.
"Mum stop it. There is obviously something wrong here." Rose said putting her hands on her hips.
"They're all human, what about the millions of planets, the millions of species. Where are they?" Adam asked bringing everyone's attention onto him.
"Good question," The Doctor still glaring at Jackie before what Adam asked registered in his mind and was shocked that it was actually, legitimately a really good question, a question that normally his Rose would be asking. "Actually, that is a good question. Adam, Jackie, you two must be starving." The Doctor said pushing the two closer to the vender, he needed to figure out what was going on here and he couldn't have these two slowing him down, of course his Rose was going to be with him because she could never slow him down and he didn't want her out of his sight after what happened with the Dalek.
"No, I'm just a bit time sick." Adam said
"I am a little hungry." Jackie said at the same time suspicious of what the Doctor was doing.
"Nah, you just need a bit of grub." The Doctor said to Adam before looking at the vender. "Oi, mate- how much is a cronk burger?" The Doctor asked.
"Two credits twenty, sweetheart, now join the queue." The vender said and the Doctor smiled at him.
"Money- we need money. Let's use a cashpoint." The Doctor said then quickly lead them to what looked like an ATM and soniced it. He then handed Adam what looked like a metal bar. "There you go, pocket money. Don't spend it all on sweets. Come on Rose." The Doctor said quickly crabbing Rose's hand and began to pull her away from Adam and Jackie who were still looking at the thing he handed Adam.
"How does it work?" Adam asked and the Doctor growled lowly and rolled his eyes causing Rose to look at him worriedly.
"Go and find out. Stop nagging me." He snapped at Adam before taking a deep breath and forcing a smile onto his face and took a step closer to Adam. "The thing is, Adam, time travel's like visiting Paris. You can't just read the guide book. You've got to throw yourself in. Eat the food, use the wrong verbs, get charged double and end up kissing complete strangers, or is that just me?" The Doctor said looking deep in though, the smile off his face causing Rose to laugh which caused the Doctor to smile lovingly at her. "Stop asking questions. Go on, do it." Adam took of and Jackie slowly followed him, "Off you go, then. Your first date." The Doctor said smirking at Jackie who turned around and glared at him.
"You're going to get a smack, you are." Jackie said and the Doctor stopped smirking and gulped truly afraid of her smacking him again. Once Jackie turned back around and continued following Adam the Doctor let out a breath he didn't know he was holding and began to lead her the opposite direction of Adam and Jackie. The found two women walking and talking and the Doctor walked right up to them.
"Uh, this is gonna sound daft, but can you tell me where we are?" The Doctor asked and one of the women, a dark skinned woman, looked at him like he was crazy before pointing at the wall.
"Floor 139. Could they write it any bigger?" The woman said.
"Floor 139 of what?" Rose asked realizing what the Doctor was doing.
"Must have been a hell of a party." The first woman said glaring suspiciously at Rose and the Doctor.
"You're on Satellite Five." The second woman said.
"What's Satellite Five?" The Doctor asked.
"Come on, how could you get on board without knowing where you are?" The first woman asked now glaring at both of them.
"Look at us, we're stupid." The Doctor said with silly grin that has Rose smiling.
"Hang on, wait a minute- are you a test? Some sort of management test kind of thing?" The second woman asked.
"You've got us. Well done." The Doctor said pulling out his slightly psychic paper showing it to them.
"You're too clever for us." Rose added.
"We are warned about this in basic training. All workers have to be versed in company promotion." The second woman said.
"Right. Fire away, ask your questions. If it gets me to Floor 500, I'll do anything." The first woman said sounding less suspicious and more nervous now.
"Why? What happens on Floor 500?" Rose asked.
"The walls are made of gold. And you should know." The First woman said then lead them over to a wall full of tellies, each one showing a different news station. "So, this is what we do- latest new- standstorms on the new Venus archipelago. 200 dead. Glasgow water riots into their third day. Spacelane 77 closed by sunspot activity. And over on the Bad Wolf channel, the Face of Boe has just announced he's pregnant." She said.
"I get it- you broadcast the news." The Doctor said.
"We are the news. We're the journalists. We write it, package it, and sell it. 600 channels, all coming out of Satellite Five, broadcasting everywhere. Nothing happens in the whole Human Empire without it going through us." The first woman said with the second woman nodding every now and then.
"All staff are reminded that the canteen area is now operating self-cleaning tables. Thank you." An announcer said giving time for the Doctor to think of more questions, this was all wrong, this wasn't right. The Doctor was brought out of his thoughts by another loud steam whistle and everyone packing up and rushing around again.
"Oi, Mutt and Jeff!" The Doctor called to Jackie and Adam who surprisingly were only a few feet behind them, the Doctor noticed Rose's phone that he zapped and that she lent to her mother so she could stay in contact with her friends in Adam's hand.
"Over here." Rose said. Jackie and Adam quickly got up, the Doctor watched as Adam looked at the phone then looked around before slipping the phone into his pocket and make a mental note to watch him before he made his way over to Jackie, Rose, and the Doctor as they were lead into a white circular room with a chair in the middle of seven people.
"Now, everybody behave. We have a management inspection. How do you want it, by the book?" The first woman asked looking over towards the Doctor.
"Oh, right from scratch, thanks." The Doctor said confusing Jackie and Adam.
"Okay, so, ladies and gentlemen, multi-sex, undecided, or robot- My name is Cathica Santini Khadeni. That's Cathica with a 'C,' in case you want to write to Floor 500, praising me, and please do. Now please feel free to ask any questions. The process of news gathering must be open, honest, and beyond bias. That's company policy." Cathica said trying to remain professional yet eager to suck up to get her promotion. The Doctor looked around suspicious, this was the wrong technology for this time, it was too old they should have scraped this years ago, so why were they still using it.
"Actually, um, it's the law." The second woman said.
"Yes, thank you, Suki. Okay, keep it calm, don't show off for the quests- here we go." Cathica said sitting in the chair. "And...engage safety." Cathica said and the walls lit up shocking Adam, Jackie, and Rose. Cathica snapped her fingers and a little door opened up in her forehead showing her brain. "And 3, 2...and spike." She said as a blue electrical beam shot into her brain.
"Compressed information streaming into her. Reports from every city, every country, every planet, and they all get packaged inside her head. She become part of the software- her brain is the computer." The Doctor said.
"If it all goes through her, she must be a genius." Rose said.
"Nah, she wouldn't remember any of it. There's too much, her head would blow up. The brain's the processor. Soon as it closes, she forgets." The Doctor said slowly walking around the room.
"So, what about all these people 'round the edge?" Jackie asked.
"They've all got tiny little chips in their head,connecting them to her and they transmit 600 channels. Every single fact in the empire beams out of this place. Now that's what I call power." The Doctor said.
"You all right?" Rose asked once she saw the look of shock on Adam's face, he looked like he would either throw up or pass out again.
"I can see her brain." Adam said weakly.
"Do you want to get out?" Jackie asked, because god knows she did but she didn't want to be alone.
"No, no, this technology, it's- it's amazing." Adam said.
"This technology's wrong." The Doctor said catching everyone's attention.
"Trouble?" Rose asked.
"Oh, yeah." The Doctor said smiling causing Rose to smile, which confused both Jackie and Adam. If there was trouble why were they smiling? Suddenly Suki gasped and pulled her hands off the controls causing everything to turn off.
"Come off it, Suki, I wasn't even halfway, what was that for?" Cathica said Suki said holding her right hand like it was hurt.
"Sorry. Must have been a glitch." Suki said rubbing her right palm.
"Promotion." A voice announced and a screen appeared on one of the walls.
"Come on. This is it. Come on. Oh, my god, make it me. Come on say my name, Say my name. Say my name." Everyone heard Cathica mutter.
"Promotion for...Suki Macrae Centrell." The announcer said shocking everyone and pissing Cathica off. "Please proceed to Floor 500."
"I don't believe it. Floor 500." Suki whispered in awed shock.
"How the hell did you manage that? I'm above you." Cathica asked.
"I don't know. I just applied on the off-chance. And they said yes." Suki said.
"That's so not fair. I've been applying to Floor 500 for three years." Cathica said.
"What's Floor 500?" Jackie asked.
"The walls are made of Gold." Rose said.
~Seven~
"Cathica, I'm gonna miss you. Floor 500- thank you." Suki said to Rose and the Doctor with a huge smile as they stood in the main lobby, the Doctor instantly wrapped his arm around Rose's waist to steady her when she was bumped by some workers. He heard Jackie cleared her throat in a subtle way to tell him to remove his arm from Rose's waist, but he ignored it in favor to keep Rose balanced when she got bumped again.
"We didn't do any thing." The Doctor said giving Rose's waist a soft squeeze when he felt Jackie glare at him, he could almost hear her figuring up the ways to slap him where he would have that red hand print for the next three regenerations.
"Well, you're my lucky charm." Suki said with a giggle as she bounced on the balls of her feet.
"All right, I'll hug anyone." The Doctor said then quickly gave Suki a quick hug before turning and pulling Rose into a tight hug causing both Rose and Suki to laugh. Over Rose's shoulder he looked at Jackie before his eyes fell on to Adam who was standing a little a ways from them leaning against the wall looking ill. Jackie saw where he was looking and gave him a small nodded while still glaring at him before running towards Adam.
"Come on. It's not that bad." Jackie said softly to Adam as the Doctor finally let go of Rose.
"What, with the- the head thing?" Adam said still in shock.
"Yeah. Well, she's closed it now." Jackie said getting a little annoyed at Adam, he was suppose to be her way of getting Rose away from the Doctor since Mickey wasn't there.
"Yeah, but it- it's everything." Adam said gesturing to everything. "It freaks me out." He admitted in a whisper.
"Oh come off it, you're suppose to be trying to impress Rose so that she will fall for you and leave that Doctor fella." Jackie snapped as quietly as she could, no need for the Doctor to find out her plan and ruin it, though Adam was doing a fairly decent job of that himself.
"I just need to- If I could just...cool down, sort of acclimate." Adam said looking at her hopefully.
"How do you mean?" Jackie asked.
"Maybe I could just go sit on the observation deck. Would that be all right? Soak it in, you know, pretend I'm a citizen of the year 200000." Adam said as he looked down at his feet, almost as if he was ashamed, which Jackie felt he should be because he was ruining her plan.
"Do you want me to send Rose with you?" Jackie asked hoping he would say yes so that the two of them would finally have some alone time together.
"No, no, it's best if I be alone for awhile. You stick with them and try to keep the Doctor and Rose apart. I'll be on the deck." Adam said and Jackie sighed in annoyance. How the hell was she suppose to get Rose to fall for Adam if they never spent time together.
"Here you go- take the Rose's TARDIS key, you know just in case it gets to be too much," Jackie said handing Adam Rose's TARDIS key that Rose lent to her, "You still have the phone yeah, call home, talk to your mum." Jackie said.
"Yeah, Like it's not weird in there." Adam muttered taking the TARDIS key from Jackie before slipping past her and walking to the observation deck. Jackie sighed and glared at the Doctor's back before squaring her shoulders and walking back over to Rose and the Doctor.
"Oh, my god, I've got to go." Sukie cried just as Jackie got back to them, "I can't keep them waiting. I'm sorry." Suki called as she grabbed her suitcase that had been sitting next to her and ran to the lift that had opened for her. "Say goodbye to Steve for me! Bye!" Suki yelled to them just at the lift doors closed.
"Good riddance." Cathica muttered turning to walk away.
"You're talking like you'll never see her again- she's only going upstairs." Rose said.
"We won't." Cathica said and Rose quickly looked to the Doctor who looked half worried and half confused. "Once you go to Floor 500 you never come back." Cathica said finally walking away. The Doctor quickly grabbed Rose's hand not wanting to get separated from her as he quickly followed Cathica through the crowd.
"Have you ever been up there?" The Doctor asked once they had caught up with her.
"Can't- you need a key for the lift, and you only get a key with promotion. No one gets to 500 except for the chosen few." Cathica said pushing her way back to her work room. "Look, they only give us 20 minutes maintenance- can't you give it a rest?" Cathica said sensing that the Doctor was about to continue questioning her about Floor 500.
"But you've never been to another floor, not even one floor down?" Rose asked.
"I went to Floor 16 when I first arrived. That's medical. That's where I got my head done, and then I- I came straight here. Satellite Five- you work, eat, and sleep on the same floor- and that's it, that's all." Cathica said nervously as she checked all the equipment in the room. "You're not management, are you?" Cathica asked glaring at the Doctor, Rose and Jackie.
"At last. She's clever." The Doctor said smirking.
"Yeah, well, what ever it is. Don't involve me. I don't know anything." Cathica said quickly hoping to get them out of her room before she got into trouble.
"Don't you even ask?" The Doctor asked.
"Well, why would I?" Cathica asked.
"You're a journalist." Rose snapped shocked that a journalist didn't even think to ask questions.
"Why's all the crew human?" The Doctor asked remembering Adam's question from earlier.
"What's that got to do with anything?" Cathica asked honestly confused.
"There's no aliens onboard...why?" The Doctor asked hopping to get her to start questioning things.
"I don't know. No real reason." Cathica said thinking of all the small, seemingly insignificant reasons why there were no aliens. "They're not banned or anything." She quickly added.
"Then where are they?" Rose asked.
"I suppose immigration's tightened up. It's had to, what with all the threats." Cathica said getting irritated.
"What threats?" The Doctor said.
"I don't know- all of them. Usual stuff. And the price of space warp doubled, so that kept the visitor away. Oh, and the government on traffic five's collapsed, so that lot stopped coming, you see. Just lots of little reasons, that's all." Cathica informed them as she continued checking the equipment.
"Adding up to one great big fact, and you didn't even notice." The Doctor said and Cathica stopped checking the equipment to glare at both Rose and the Doctor not liking what they were trying to say.
"Doctor, I think if there was any kind of conspiracy, Satellite Five would have seen it- we see everything." Cathica posted proudly.
"I can see better. This society's the wrong shape, even the technology." The Doctor said.
"It's cutting-edge." Cathica snapped.
"It's backwards! There's a great big door in your head. You should have chucked this out years ago." The Doctor said.
"So, what do you think's going on?" Jackie asked reminding the Doctor that he had someone other that Rose with him.
"It's not just this space station. It's the whole attitude. It's the way people think. The Great and Bountiful Human Empire's stunted- something's holding it back." The Doctor said.
"And how would you know?" Cathica asked defensively.
"Trust me. Humanity's been set back about 90 years. When did Satellite Five start broadcasting?" The Doctor asked.
"91 years ago." Cathica said slowy.
~TBC~