River of Time Ch 7: Plans Are Rubbish
Rose and the Doctor in the brown suit snuck around giant boulders and various ancient buildings that weren't quite old enough to be part of the nearby ruins on their way to the Sontaran ship. Rose would wave the three people they'd brought with them forward whenever it was safe to do so.
They were one rock wall ahead of the group when a small group of Sontaran warriors wearing their helmets came by. She lifted her fist up to the other group, which had been about to start moving. The lead of the second group, a tall woman named Hannah who River had recommended, stopped suddenly and the two mechanics behind her crashed into her, nearly knocking the tall, thin woman over.
Rose felt the Doctor's exasperation through their link and agreed with him. Hannah glared at the other two and pushed them back behind the wall as the Sontarans passed at a near run. There were more explosions, but this close to the ship, there wasn't much fighting
A couple of minutes later and deep into Sontaran held territory, they stopped and waited for the signal. It didn't take long. One of the armour clad humanoids stiffened up suddenly and barked orders that they couldn't hear. Most of the rest of the members of the warrior race that were left with the ship took off, yelling, "Sontar-Ha!"
"Well, that's our cue," one of the others said and went to leave their hiding place to go and do what they had come for. Rose and Hannah both grabbed an arm and pulled him back down before he could be seen.
"We've still got four Sontarans," Hannah hissed at the man.
"You'll just get yourself killed if you run out like that. 'Sa battle out there," Rose added.
"Stay here and down," the Doctor told them before he slowly stood up to look over the half fallen stone wall they were hiding behind. He grabbed Rose's hand and repeated his order to the others before pulling her along.
As soon as they got out from behind the wall, she could see what the much taller Doctor and Hannah had seen over the wall. One of the Sontaran soldiers stood guard just outside of the ship. His scan of the area was slow, and they managed to get behind a shoulder high boulder that was close before the soldier turned around.
Rose looked back at where they had left the other three people and saw Hannah watching from behind the wall. While she had an eye on everything, she was mostly waiting for signals from Rose. Rose raised her hand to her throat and made a slicing motion, indicating danger, then followed it up by balling up her fist and holding it up head height with the palm facing outward, in the universal hold your position gesture.
Hanna replied with a simple thumbs up. Message received. As Rose was trying to see what the Sontaran was doing without being seen, she caught the Doctor staring at her.
"What?" she wondered. She would have been fine with the staring, but they had something important to do and he was looking at her like a puzzle again. Rose could practically feel the Doctor calculating. She'd managed to go a whole month-ish without being poked and prodded at and she just knew that streak was over with from the way he was looking at her.
"Since when do you know military hand signals?" he asked after a second. She was sure he was going to say something completely different.
"Learned it in training," she explained quickly. She then pointedly glanced over at the ship, reminding him about the Sontaran without words. She didn't like to discuss her time away from him any more than she had to. It had been ten months since she'd come back, and this was the first time that particular part of her training had come in handy.
"Right," the Doctor responded shortly. "And we're off."
They ran hand in hand as quietly as they could to the side of the ship, just out of the Sontaran's sight.
"You know how to knock out a Sontaran, right?" the Doctor asked as they hid.
"Um, no, no I don't," she replied. "Only other time I've met 'em, I didn't get close."
"There's a vent on the back of his neck. Just smack it," he explained. She nodded and glanced out past the ship to see the Sontaran diligently making his sweep. She moved out, trying to stay behind the armored figure. Really, for a race that had spent so long fighting, their armor gave them very little in the way of a visual range. She didn't get very far when she heard him speaking.
"Mine turtles and control them remotely. The enemy would never see it coming!" he exclaimed animatedly.
Rose smiled at the ridiculous image that created: a turtle with plastic explosives strapped to its back with that control disk the Queevils used on her. She realized that the scheming soldier was going to see her if she didn't get a move on, so she rushed forward and slapped the tube she could see sticking out of the back of the armor before she could be stopped. It hurt quite a bit. The tube dug into her hand and she knew she'd have a bruise later on.
The Sontaran crumpled to the ground in a heap and Rose turned back to where the Doctor had been behind her, only to see that he wasn't there. Instead, three more armored figures stood off to her side, just inside the ship, with their weapons trained on her. She immediately held up her hands.
"Hello, boys," she greeted. "I-uh, can explain."
"You will die, Rutan scum," one of the Sontarans claimed. Rose felt a spike of anger just before she saw the Doctor coming up behind the short soldiers. His face was a mask, showing nothing.
"Oh, I'm not Rutan," she replied. "I was here with the archae-"
"Likely story, shapeshifter," another Sontaran interrupted. "You will die for the glory of the Sontaran empire-"
He barely finished the words before he dropped to the ground. The Doctor quickly smacked the second one before he realized what had happened. He wasn't quick enough to get the third one, though, and that last one turned really quickly to shoot whoever had attacked them.
Rose darted forward to take advantage of the opening and hit the tube, but not very well. It was enough to drop the Sontaran, though.
"Damn, that hurt," she complained and noticed that the Doctor held the mallet from the console in his hand. "Oi! How comes you get a mallet? And how'd you get in there?"
"It was Sontarans," he replied. "Grabbed it on my way out." He rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "Sorry. Didn't think to grab something else." The Sontaran that Rose had hit quickly started moving, and the Doctor leaned down to give his vent a proper smack with the mallet. "As for how I got in, there's more than one way on a Sontaran ship. Alright, then, let's get this fixed so we can get them out of here."
Rose stepped out so that she could see where the others were hidden and raised her arm in the air. She made a big circle with it quickly, pointed inside the ship, and stepped back inside. Several seconds later, Hannah and the two mechanics ran into the ship, the older man was huffing and muttering about how he should have gone to the city.
During this, she felt a sudden spike in fear that wasn't coming from anyone around her. "Doctor, everything okay?" she wondered. The Doctor in the other ship replied instantly, to her relief.
The actual mission only took about ten minutes. The mechanics immediately went to work on the life support system, where the problem was coming from. The Sontarans had been halfway finished when they were interrupted and it took a bit to figure out what they had been doing.
The Doctor went to work creating the signals that would bring the soldiers back to the ship.
Hannah dragged the body of the Sontaran that Rose had knocked out at first into the ship and put him with the others, who were all disarmed. She then took up the sentinel post.
Rose helped the mechanics with the life support until all of the work left to be done was inside a small hole and there was no room to help, then she went to the Doctor, who had moved to setting up the ship's controls so that he could make it leave on its own once the Sontarans were on board. They'd never leave voluntarily.
By the time they were finished, the Sontarans were waking up. They overheard one of them threatening Hannah with acid.
XxXxXxXx
The Doctor and River were almost to the Rutan ship when the distraction started. They dropped and flattened themselves against a waist high wall as a group of Rutans in various shapes went by.
"I bloody hate going up against shape shifters," River grumbled when they passed. "Although, changing does keep things fresh, doesn't it, Doc?" she teased.
"How the hell would I know?" he asked.
Behind him, David snickered. "Yeah, I can see that," he said. "Never get bored."
"Oh, just shift you two," the Doctor admonished them.
"You've got the Nestene and their swappable heads, shape changers, Time Lords and regeneration-" River poked as they moved closer.
"Can it, Curls," the Doctor growled and River laughed softly before they had to get to business.
There were only a couple of Rutans guarding their ship. River walked right up to one and it turned its weapon toward her.
"Identify," it ordered. The other Rutan came over to investigate the disturbance. It was a shame there wasn't another great way into the ship from where he was, or the Doctor would have taken the opportunity to slip past while River distracted them.
"Professor River Song, and you are?" she asked flirtatiously. The Doctor was strongly reminded of Jack at that moment.
"You are not Rutan. You will not pass," it declared.
"Who said I wanted to pass?" she asked as the Doctor walked up to her. He heard David coming up behind him and hoped the green haired man wouldn't do something stupid.
"Hi, hello," he greeted jovially. "I'm the Doctor-"
As soon as he identified himself, both Rutans swung their weapons at him and David Lopi shoved him down to the ground just as two blasts were let loose. River dispatched both of them quickly with her blaster. As the jellyfish-like beings fell to the ground, the Doctor bounded back up and turned on River. "What the hell was that?" he asked. "You didn't need to kill them!"
"Oh, use your time senses. Common senses while you're at it too, Doctor. They were about to kill you! How many innocent people have they killed? How many more would they if you left them alive?" She retorted. "Out of both of you, this you was always the one that understood that the most. Now we've got work to do." She turned and walked off into the ship. "David, you're on watch!" she called back.
"Yes, Ma'am," he replied.
"Doctor, everything okay?" Rose wondered. She must have felt him.
"Yeah, all good," he replied quickly before he stalked after River into the bowels of the ship. "Now, hold on-"
Suddenly, River Song turned around and pushed him up against the wall.
XxXxXxXx
The last time she had seen them, Doc had taken her to the side to talk to her just before she was to leave. He told her that when she was sent to Liemma, she needed to come find their younger selves on Asgard first and gave her the coordinates. "And thank you, for what you're going to do. My younger self won't thank you for it at the time."
"Any hints?" she wondered, knowing that he probably wouldn't be able to tell her much.
"It took years for me to truly accept my mortality, but what you did, what you will do, helped me see a good part of it. Granted, you scared the living daylights out of me, but it was helpful in the long run."
At that point, the Doctor came up and gave her those odd air kisses he was so fond of doing with his friends in that regeneration, and Rose hugged her. Her long black strands of curly hair tickled River's nose.
"See ya later...Pondlet," her aunt teased, taking the Mickey out on her over the Doctor's latest nickname for her.
So, when the Doctor, angry at her for the way she helped save his life, came stalking after her, she turned around quickly and shoved him up against the wall with the intention of scaring him enough so he'd shut up.
"You're too young to understand this now-"
"Young!" he protested.
"Yes, young. You've still got some ways to go before you truly understand." She put her hand over his lone heart. "Feel that? You just almost died. And you're not quasi immortal anymore. No more regeneration. Your heart's beating wildly, adrenaline's rushing through your system and you can't decide whether you want to be afraid or laugh. It's exhilarating, isn't it? It's why people jump out of planes and ski and other dangerous things. You're alive. You're alive in a way that the other Doctor, Jack, Rose, and...others aren't."
"What's that got to do with the way you-"
"Everything," she argued. "It's got everything to do with it. You're still alive. Stay alive for as long as you can. You are much, much more important than a bunch of beings who's sole purpose is destruction."
"I am not worth killing over," he told her.
"Well, we're just going to have to disagree on that, aren't we? Now, I'm not familiar with Rutan ships, let's get this done," she changed the subject.
Their task was relatively simple: basically set up a dummy signal and a remote drive and as soon as the Rutan Host had returned to the ship, make it take off. Some stragglers on both sides would probably be left behind, but they wouldn't have backup or any of the really dangerous weapons or numbers.
Neither of them said much as they worked, just what they needed to say to get things done. River kept reminding herself that the Doctor was still angry and she really needed to be careful of what she said.
"Okay, I've mapped out the departure path and set the controls for immediate acceleration as soon as they've broken the atmosphere. All I need is the signal frequency and we'll be able to get out of here. Where are you at?" River announced.
The Doctor hit two buttons with a flourish, and proclaimed, "All done!" He then looked over her work, nodded, pulled out his sonic, and used it to quickly set the frequency she'd needed. "Okay, let's vamoose."
"Vamoose?" she asked.
"Yeah, I don't like it either," he agreed.
"Guys, we have a problem," David Lopi called.
They both instantly ran to where he was, only to see a group of Rutans bearing down on them.
