Disclaimer: I want the Doctor! Let me out of here! Hey, you! Yeah, you! Let me out. What do you mean they said I was dangerous?
Ch. 7:
Donna walked in the front door to be greeted by her mother's voice.
"And what time is this?" she called.
"How old am I?" Donna called back, rolling her eyes.
Sylvia came out into the front hall.
"Not old enough to use a phone." She shot back.
Donna ignored her and made a cup of tea, sitting down at the table while her mother bustled around the kitchen.
"I thought you were only moving back for a couple of weeks." She said. "Look at you, I mean you're never gonna find a flat, not while you're on the dole. And it's no god sitting there, dressed up, looking like you're jop hunting, you've got to do something! It's not like the 1980's, no one's unemployed these days except you! How long did that job with Health and Safety last? Two days, and then you walk out. 'I have other plans', well I've not seen them. And it's no good sitting there dreaming, no one's gonna come along with a magic wand and make your life all better."
"Where is Granddad?" Donna interrupted.
"Where do you think he is?" Sylvia asked. "Up the hill! He's always up the hill!"
Donna walked up the hill towards Wilf, who was sitting in a tin shed.
"Aye, aye." He called. "Here comes trouble. Ha."
"Permission to board ship, sir?" Donna called.
"Permission granted." He replied. "Was she nagging you?"
"Ha ha." Donna said. "Big time."
Wilf sat down on a folding chair in front of his telescope.
"Brought you a thermos." Donna told him.
"Oh, ta." He replied, taking it from her happily.
"You seen anything?" Donna asked.
"Yeah, I've got Venus." He told her. "There with an apparent magnitude of minus 3.5. At least that's what it says in my little book."
Donna pulled out a tarp and sat down next to him.
"Here," he said. "Come and see, come on, here you go."
Donna looked into the telescope and saw the planet of the goddess of love.
"Right?" Wilf said. "That's the only planet in the Solar System named after a woman."
"Good for her." Donna replied. "How far away is that?"
"Oh, it's about 26 million miles." Wilf told her. "But we'll get there one day. In a hundred years time we'll be striding out amongst the stars. Jiggling about with all them aliens. Just you wait."
"You really believe in all that stuff, don't you?" Donna asked him.
"It's all over the place these days." Wilf told her. "If I wait here long enough…"
"I don't suppose you've seen a little blue box?" Donna asked him.
"Is that slang for something?" he asked.
"No, I mean it." She told him, laughing. "If you ever see a little blue box flying up there in the sky, you shout for me, Gramps. Oh, you just shout."
"You know, I don't understand half the things you say these days." Wilf told her.
"Nor me." She agreed.
"Well, fair dues." He told her. "You've had a funny old time of it lately. There was poor old what's his name, Lance, bless him…and that barmy old Christmas. I wish you would tell us what really happened."
"I know." Donna said. "It's just…the things I've seen. Sometimes I think I'm going mad. I mean even tonight, I was in a…doesn't matter."
"Well you're not yourself, I'll give you that." Wilf said. "You just…you seem to be drifting, sweetheart."
"I'm not drifting." She told him. "I'm waiting."
"What for?" he asked.
"The right man." She answered.
"Oh, ho, ho!" he laughed. "Same old story! A man! Haha."
"No." she told him, chuckling. "I don't mean like that. But, he's real. I've seen him. I've met him, just once. And then…I let him fly away."
"Well there you are." He said. "Go and find him!"
"I've tired." She told him. "He's nowhere."
"Oi, not like you to give up." He said. "You know, remember when you were about six years old, your mother said no holiday this year. So off you toddled, all on your own and you got on a bus to Strathclyde! Hah! We had the police after you and everything! Ha, where's she gone then? Where's that girl, hey?"
"You're right." Donna said. "'Cause he's still out there, somewhere. Him and Lily. And I'll find them Gramps, even if I have to wait a hundred years. I'll find him."
They sat there in silence, just looking up at the stars.
The Doctor stood in the control room studying the Adipose pendent under a magnifying glass.
"Ohh, fascinating." He said to the empty room. "Seems to be a bio-flip digital stitch, specifically for…"
"Doctor?" he heard Lily call weakly from the door.
He turned to find her in her pajamas, looking worse for wear.
"What's wrong?" he asked as he walked quickly to her side.
"I don't feel good." She said softly.
He picked her up and brought her to the jump seat. He set her down gently.
"You're having a bad day." He told her. "We knew this might happen. It'll pass."
"Doesn't mean I don't feel like crap now." she said.
"I know." He said, smoothing her hair. "Do you want to go back to Jack?"
She shook her head and leaned forward to wrap her arms around his neck. He wrapped his arms around her as she buried her face in his neck. She seemed so small.
"It's going to be alright." He told her softly. "I'll take care of you."
"I know." She replied.
He twisted so he was sitting on the jump seat next to her and held her until she went back to sleep.
Donna walked out and to the car with her mother trailing her in a dressing gown and hair curlers.
"It's my turn for the car." She told Donna. "What you need it for?"
Donna ignored her and got in, quickly starting it and pulling out.
"A quick getaway." She muttered.
She drove to an alley a few blocks from Adipose and parked the car.
"Go." Lily told him, standing in the door of the TARDIS, a cup of coffee in her hands. "I'm fine, I just had a bad night. I will stay here and rest, with both you and Jack, because I know you called him last night, just a phone call away. And if you need me, I will be ready to bail your ass out of the fire."
"Are you sure you don-"
"If you don't get out of here right this minute, I will pour this cup of coffee over your head, am I understood?" she told him.
He held up his hands and backed away.
"Watch out for the-"
He backed right into the parked car behind him.
"Car." Lily finished. "Please go away before you make me cry."
He smiled and turned and walked away.
Donna walked to the front of the building, through the revolving door, through the call center. She waved at the man from yesterday.
"Morning." she called.
She walked straight into the bathroom, went in the stall and sat down, looking at her watch.
The Doctor walked to the back of the building again and opened the fire exit. He walked down a corridor to a storage closet and used the sonic screwdriver to lock himself in.
Well, he said silently, this is boring.
Didn't think this plan out very well, did we? Lily asked him.
The day passed and nine o'clock became six o'clock.
The Doctor unlocked the door and walked out.
Donna stood up and stretched. She opened the stall door and walked, when her phone began to ring. She quickly ducked back in and answered it.
"Not now!" she whispered.
"I need the car!" Sylvia told her. "Where are you?"
"I can't." Donna told her. "I'm busy."
"Why are you whispering?" she asked.
"I'm in church." Donna told her, saying the first thing that came to mind.
"What are you doing in church?" Sylvia asked.
"Praying!" she replied
"Bit late for that, madam." Her mother told her.
"What's she in church for?" Wilf called.
"Hush you. Go up the hill!" Sylvia told him. "But I need the car." She said, returning her attention to Donna. "I'm going out with Susette. She's asked all the Wednesday girls. Apparently she's been on those Adipose pills. She says looks marvelous."
The door of the bathroom opened and Donna quickly hung up.
"We know you're in here, so why don't you make this nice and easy and show yourself?" Miss Foster called.
Donna quickly pulled up her legs.
"I'm waiting." Foster called. "I warn you, I'm not a patient woman. Now, out you come."
Donna didn't move.
"Right." Foster said. "We'll do it the hard way. Get her!"
Foster's bodyguards began kicking in the doors. Donna flinched with every door as they got closer. Then they stopped.
"There you are." Foster said.
"I've been through the records, Foster, and all your results have been faked." Donna heard.
She identified the voice as a woman from the lecture the day before. Penny, she thought her name was.
"There's something about those pills you're not telling us." Penny continued.
"Oh, I think I'll be conducting this interview, Penny." Foster said.
They left and Donna waited a moment before following them.
The Doctor made his way to the roof and to a window cleaner's cradle.
Are you sure that thing is safe? Lily asked him.
Humans use it all the time. He replied.
Yeah, but you've said it yourself, humans are thick. She told him. Can't you just go listen through a door?
They'll never be looking for me this way. He told her as he got in.
I still say it's a bad plan. Lily said.
What else is new? He asked.
He lowered it to the window of Foster's office and quickly ducked as she entered, her bodyguards dragging Penny after them.
"This is ridiculous." Penny protested.
"Sit there." Foster told her.
"I'm phoning my editor." Penny told her, ignoring the order.
"I said sit." Foster told her.
One of the bodyguards pushed her into the chair while the other tied her up.
"You can't tie me up." Penny told her. "What sort of a country do you think this is?"
"Oh, it's a beautifully fat country." Foster replied. "And believe me, I've traveled a long way to find obesity on this scale."
"So come on then, Miss Foster." Penny said. "Those pills, what are they?"
Donna sneaked up to the door and listened.
"Well, you might just as well have a scoop, since you'll never see it printed." Foster told Penny. "This," she lifted up a capsule, "is the spark of life."
"And what's that supposed to mean?" Penny demanded.
"Officially, the capsule attracts all the fat cells and flushes them away." Foster told her. "Well, it certainly attracts them, that part's true. But it binds the fat together and galvanizes it to form a body."
"Well, what d'you mean 'a body'?" Penny asked.
"I am surprised you never asked about my name." Foster told her. "I chose it well. Foster, as in foster mother. And these,"
She reached into her desk and pulled out one of the white little beings.
"Are my children." She concluded.
"You're kidding me." Penny said. "What the hell is that?"
Donna rose up to look through the window.
The Doctor did the same.
"Adipose." Foster said. "It's called an Adipose. Made out of living fat. Stripped from ordinary human…"
The Doctor looked across the room and Donna did too.
Oh. My. God. Lily said.
'Donna?' the Doctor mouthed.
'Doctor!' Donna mouthed back.
I love her. I love her. I love her. I love her. Lily chanted in his head.
'But…what? Wha…what?' the Doctor said silently.
'OH MY GOD!' Donna exclaimed, just as silently.
'But…how?' he asked.
'It's me!' she said.
'Well, I can see that!' he replied.
'Oh, this is brilliant!' she exclaimed.
'But…what are you doing there?' he asked.
'I was looking for you!' she told him.
'What for?' he demanded.
Donna began to mime.
'I, came here, trouble, read about it, internet, I thought, trouble=you! And this place is weird! Pills! So I hid, back there. Crept along, heard this lot, looked, you! Cause they…'
Both she and the Doctor realized Foster had stopped talking.
"Are we interrupting you?" she asked them loudly.
'Run!' the Doctor mouthed.
"Get her!" Foster ordered.
The Doctor pointed the sonic screwdriver at the door, locking it, before using it to elevate the cradle back to the roof.
"And him!" Foster yelled.
Donna ran quickly up the stairs.
The Doctor got to the roof and quickly ran down the stairs.
Halfway down, he ran into Donna and grabbed her in a tight hug.
"Oh my God!" she said. "I don't believe it! You've even got the same suit!"
She pulled away.
"Don't you ever change?" she asked, aghast.
"Yeah, thanks Donna." The Doctor told her. "Not right now."
"But where's Lily?" Donna asked.
"Back in the TARDIS." He told her with a smile. "She's yelling at me to tell you she says hello and that she'll see you soon."
"How?" Donna asked.
"Mental Bond." He explained, looking down the stairs.
"Hi Lily!" she said waving in his face.
"Oh dear lord." He moaned as Lily laughed.
He looked back down and saw the guards coming.
"Just like old times!" he said, grabbing her hand and dragging her along.
A/N: Second chapter of Partners of Crime. Thank god the Doctor and Donna are together, because I don't think I could've taken much more of trying to write them apart. That is damn hard. Any hoo, let me know what you think. Also I would like to go back to the time when I was getting like six reviews a chapter instead of two. Not that I'm not appreciative of the two, I'm just kinda a review whore. They say the first step to recovering is admitting you have a problem. So, my name is Abbey and I'm a review addict. I am 0 days sober and I don't plan on changing that.
Abbey
