Hey and welcome to part 2 of Forest of the dead, hope you enjoy. I do not own Doctor who as if I did I would force the 9th doctor to do more than one series. He doesn't seem to know just how awesome he was.
…...
Last time:
"Run!" the doctor exclaimed.
"Yup." I thought as we all ran after the doctor down another corridor.
"I really was a monster…"
…
Now:
We ended up running though a high level walk way and I tried my best to focus my gaze ahead of me and not on the wall made of glass to my right as we ran towards the entrance of the next skyscraper.
"Professor, go ahead. Find a safe spot" the Doctor said pausing to use his hands to guide every one along in a "hurry up" manner.
"It's a carnivorous swarm in a suit. You can't reason with it" River said stopping in her run to turn and yell at him.
"Five minutes" The Doctor said turning to her just as he used his hand to push me forward as I caught up to them. "And take Rachael with you."
"Doctor!" I yelled at him for ordering me around and went to stop to scold him when I felt a hand on my wrist.
"Other Dave, stay with him. Pull him out when he's too stupid to live. Come on Rachael!" River said as other Dave who had been the last one behind me caught up before tightening her hold and dragging me after her shouting as we ran, "Two minutes Doctor!"
As we ran I heard the distinct sound of doors being thrown open behind us.
We caught up with Anita and Mr Lux who were in a room similar to where we had been before. The odd pillar here and there surrounded by bookshelves and in a similar circle of light. The only distinctive difference was a metal like circle on the floor to this one.
Once we arrived River let go of my wrist to begin sonicing just like the Doctor had earlier only this time I knew she'd be reading more than shadows if where she had just soniced was anything to go by.
Whilst she was doing this Mr Lux, Anita and me were catching our breaths. I was also trying to ignore what I knew would be happening with the Doctor right now and how the group would be further depleted by the time he got back.
When I first arrived to this universe the ninth Doctor had been in too much of a state to really ask any questions and since arriving here we had been in constant danger to really focus on much but our survival.
River though seemed to know me so whilst we had some time to spare I decided to see if she knew some of the answers I sought.
"River…" I started off and she briefly glanced up at me before returning to her work making a quick noise to show she was listening whilst she focused on the reading of her sonic.
"You seem to know me so I kind of….well I guess thought maybe you could help me." I stammered out not really knowing how to start this conversation.
She paused in her work to shoot me a look that just spoke "spoilers" so I quickly intervened, "I'm not asking you to tell me my future!"
At this her face grew confused though her interest was obviously picked.
"I…I'm just so confused recently…" I started my shoulders sagging before I continued, "One minute I'm in bed, the next I'm in a crashing Tardis. I close my eyes and the next thing I know is I'm falling and I'm in the Library with the wrong Doctor hovering over me…" My words speeding up as I start to rant, something of a habit whenever I'm feeling emotional.
River at this point has turned fully towards me and is staring at me with a dawning understanding and I find myself even more worried by the slightly awed, slightly horrified, look on her face.
"You mean to say this is one of your first jumps?!" she says her voice coated with disbelief. "That means it's not just me…" she continues more to herself, "it's him to, you don't know him fully to do you. You can't do if you don't even know about jumping…"
"Jumping! What are you going on about? Is that what happened? I don't even know what that means; I only just met the Doctor!" I said feeling even more confused.
River put down her screw driver and put her hands on my shoulders trying to get me to calm down, "I know the Doctor in the future but I also know you. I never thought I'd see you this young but I've always known you. You're like the Tardis or his screwdriver, think of the Doctor and your one of the things I associate with…"
"But…but that doesn't…" I started to say but she cut me off.
"It's hard to explain, you never do really clarify it. You just sort of keep popping up all other the place through the time lines." She tried to clear it up for me but it didn't really help.
She must have seen the utterly lost expression on my face because the next thing I knew she was hugging me.
River Song, part Time Lady, raised to be a killer, who would die today, was hugging me.
"You'll find out eventually, don't worry about it." She tried to comfort me.
For a second I hugged her back. This woman, who had fought the silent and weeping angels, daughter to the girl who waited and the last centurion, wife to the Doctor had taken the time to comfort me…and I was going to let her die.
If I hugged her a little bit too hard she didn't say anything.
Pulling away I gave her a half smile which she returned, no thanks needed and as I glanced away to control my expression I noticed night was well and truly falling.
"You know…" she started whilst studying me, "It's so weird for me to see you like this, to have to comfort you. Though I see some things never change, still defiant of the Doctor even now" A wry smile formed on her lip, "It's just…I'm so used to you just bounding in all smiles and secrets. Now I know more than you…" at the end her voice seemed to trail of and she picked up her screw driver to resume her scans towards the shadows in the room.
"It's funny; I keep expecting your usual banter and activeness…then again I keep expecting the Doctor come back." River added sadly.
"The Doctor is here, isn't he? He is coming back, right?" Anita broke in completely confused just about the same time I noticed the Doctor walking in to reach the top of a small set of wooden stairs, pausing at the top to listen in.
"You know when you see a photograph of someone you know, but it's from years before you knew them. and it's like they're not quite finished. They're not done yet. Well, yes, the Doctor's here. He came when I called, just like he always does. But not my Doctor. Now my Doctor, I've seen whole armies turn and run away. And he'd just swagger off back to his Tardis and open the doors with a snap of his fingers. The Doctor in the Tardis. Next stop, everywhere." River replied having turned to face Anita to better explain, her eyes glistening slightly.
"Spoilers. Nobody can open a Tardis by snapping their fingers. It doesn't work like that." The Doctor finally made his presence known, jumping down the stairs as all eyes turned to him.
"It does for the Doctor." River simply replied as he walked past her.
"I am the Doctor." He retorted turning back to her.
"Yeah. Some day." She simply said looking down. Her usual gusto depleted after the apparently draining conversation we had just had.
"How are you doing?" The Doctor changed subjects approaching Anita.
"Where's Other Dave?" River changed her attention to other things as she noticed he was missing.
"Not coming. Sorry." The Doctor replied not moving his attention from Anita. I noticed River and Mr Lux seemed to deflate and yet since I hadn't been there when it happened I found his death easier to deal with. It was just another scene in the show, not reality, it hadn't happened around me.
"Well, if they've taken him, why haven't they gotten me yet?" Anita asked
"I don't know. Maybe tinting your visor's making a difference" The Doctor murmured studying her two shadows.
"It's making a difference all right. No one's ever going to see my face again" Anita said drawing the Doctors gaze to her face, well where her face would be.
"Can I get you anything?" he asked sympathy lacing his words.
"Oh Doctor…always trying to help even when it's to late…"
"An old age would be nice. Anything you can do?" Anita half-heartedly said.
"I'm all over it." The Doctor replied going to turn away when Anita spoke out again only (surprisingly) to me, making his gaze flicker in my direction.
"Rachael. That's your name right? I know this may sound rude of me but is there anything you can do to make me feel better at least."
My face became baffled and I couldn't help but gulp, "Why was she asking me?"
She seemed to sense my confusion as she added, "I noticed it, Miss Evangelista, Donna, The Doctor, even River to some extent, I noticed how you interacted with them, comforted them. Somehow…you seemed to make them feel safe. I-I could really do with that sort of reassurance right now." She finished up.
I didn't know how to respond to that nor did I get to as the Doctor interrupted with "Safe"
"What?" Anita asked confused and irritated by the Doctor changing subjects.
"Safe. You don't say saved. Nobody says saved. You say safe. The data fragment! What did it say?" he suddenly raised his voice turning to face Mr Lux.
"Four thousand and twenty two people saved. No survivors." Mr Lux replied.
"Doctor?" River asked trying to understand what he was getting at.
"Nobody says saved. Nutters say saved. You say safe. You see, it didn't mean safe. It meant, it literally meant, saved!" The Doctor exclaimed as he paced, sorting his thoughts out and moving his hands around in order to better express himself.
He strode over to a computer and began to hack it as me and River watched from over his shoulder, Mr Lux from his side as the screen changed and the Doctor gestured to it.
"See, there it is, right there. A hundred years ago, massive power surge. All the teleports going at once. Soon as the Vashta Nerada hit their hatching cycle, they attack. Someone hits the alarm. The computer tries to teleport everyone out." He explained glancing at the bewildered Mr Lux.
"It tried to teleport four thousand twenty two people?" River asked looking more intently at the screen.
"It succeeded. Pulled them all out, but then what? Nowhere to send them. Nowhere safe in the whole library. Vashta Nerada growing in every shadow. Four thousand and twenty two people all beamed up and nowhere to go. They're stuck in the system, waiting to be sent, like emails. So what's a computer to do? What does a computer always do?" The Doctor questioned glancing at the three of us.
"It saved them." I responded the corner of my lips quirking at the genius of it.
The Doctor nodded before his finger shot in the air and he mouthed "Okay" before heading to a large polished table and started drawing on it.
"The library. A whole world of books, and right at the core, the biggest hard drive in history. The index to everything ever written, backup copies of every single book. The computer saved four thousand and twenty two people the only way a computer can. It saved them to the hard drive." He clarified to us whilst gesturing to his diagram.
Just then an alarm went off.
"What is it? What's wrong?" Mr Lux asked looking around as the Doctor headed back to the computer.
"Autodestruct enabled in twenty minutes." The computer informed us.
"What's maximum erasure?" River asked.
"In twenty minutes, this planet's going to crack like an egg." The Doctor replied looking at the screen.
"No. No, it's all right. The Doctor Moon will stop it. It's programmed to protect Cal." Mr Lux tried to reassure us just as the screen went blank.
"No, no, no, no, no, no, no!" The Doctor yelled out.
"All library systems are permanently offline. Sorry for any inconvenience. Shortly…" The computer slurred off.
"We need to stop this. We've got to save Cal." Mr Lux started to panic again.
"We need to get to the core of the planet then." I spoke up earning a look from the Doctor and a surprised one from Mr Lux.
"Well, then. Let's go." River said pointing her screwdriver at the metal circle in the middle of the floor, opening it.
"Gravity platform." She explained.
"I bet I like you." The Doctor said impressed.
"Oh, you do." She replied cheekily before the five of us stepped on going straight down.
It was one of the most amazing things ever! Despite the danger I couldn't help but marvel at it as we shot down the blue light, shooting a smile at the Doctor which he returned.
Arriving at the Data core we looked up at the globe pulsing with orange energy looking a bit like a miniature sun.
"The data core. Over four thousand living minds trapped inside it." The Doctor said as he gazed up at it.
"Yeah, well, they won't be living much longer. We're running out of time." River said as we all followed the Doctor over to an access temiminal.
"Help me. Please, help me" Came the sound of a little girl over the computer.
"Cal…" I muttered as Doctor tried to wake the computer up from sleep mode.
"Doctor, these readings" River said from the screen she was looking at.
"I know. You'd think it was dreaming" The Doctor said raising an eye brow.
"It is dreaming, of a normal life, and a lovely Dad, and of every book ever written." Mr Lux said whilst removing his gloves before opening a glass cabinet to some switches.
"Computers don't dream" Anita retorted.
"No, but little girls do." He told us then pulled a breaker which opened a set of doors which he proceeded to go through the rest of us following.
We stopped just behind Mr Lux as he stared at the node which turned towards us with a face of a little girl.
"Please help me. Please help me" the familiar looking node girl cried.
"Oh my God" River gasped.
"It's the little girl. The girl we saw in the computer" Anita said what everyone was thinking.
"She's not in the computer. In a way, she is the computer. The main command node. This is Cal" Mr Lux corrected.
"Cal is a child? A child hooked up to a mainframe? Why didn't you tell me this? I needed to know this!" The Doctor said staring accusingly at Mr Lux.
"Because she's family!" Mr Lux shouted at the Doctor before turning back to Cal. "Cal. Charlotte Abigail Lux. My grandfather's youngest daughter. She was dying, so he built her a library and put her living mind inside, with a moon to watch over her, and all of human history to pass the time. Any era to live in, any book to read. She loved books more than anything, and he gave her them all. He asked only that she be left in peace. A secret, not a freak show." He continued more softly.
"So you weren't protecting a patent, you were protecting her." The Doctor said looking at Cal before glancing at Mr Lux seemingly seeing him in a different light.
"Then the shadows came." I cut in with a slight frown as I stared at Cal. This amazing little girl who tried despite the odds.
"The shadows. I have to. I have to save. Have to save" Cal Node murmured.
"And she saved them. She saved everyone in the library. Folded them into her dreams and kept them safe." The Doctor said looking at Cal with a slightly awed, slightly empathetic look.
She tried and although she didn't quite win she still managed to protect them.
"Then why didn't she tell us?" Anita spoke up.
"Because she's forgotten. She's got over four thousand living minds chatting away inside her head. It must be like being, well, me." The Doctor sounded more concerned about the child now and so understanding.
"So what do we do?" River cut in just as the computer announced the Auto destruct in ten minutes.
"Easy! We beam all the people out of the data core. The computer will reset and stop the countdown. Difficult. Charlotte doesn't have enough memory space left to make the transfer. Easy! I'll hook myself up to the computer. She can borrow my memory space." The Doctor said whilst running over to a keyboard and pulling out some wires.
"Doctor…" I somewhat brokenly said.
He shot me a quick look before saying, "Don't worry."
"It'll burn out both your hearts and don't think you'll regenerate" River interjected also concerned.
"I'll try my hardest not to die. Honestly, it's my main thing" The Doctor retorted whilst sonicing at the wires.
"Doctor!" River snapped at him, emotion dripping from her words.
"I'm right, this works. Shut up. Now listen. You take Rachael and Luxy boy, back up to the main library. Prime any data cells you can find for maximum download, and before you say anything else, Professor, can I just mention in passing as you're here, shut up."
"Oh! I hate you sometimes" River scolded grabbing my hand and running over to Anita.
"I know!" I heard the Doctor grunt as River exclaimed, "Mister Lux, with us. Anita, if he dies, I'll kill him!" before dragging me off with her to the main library.
"Why were people keep dragging me everywhere! It's like they expect me to get into trouble" I thought trying to distract myself from the fact Anita would be bones the next time we saw her.
We were on our way there when River surprised me by saying "You go on ahead Mr Lux we just need to check something."
He nodded hesitatingly before running off.
"Oh no…this meant it was getting near that time…wasn't there anything I could do…I know time streams and everything but did the Doctor have to suffer...and River…some how…I don't know when…she had snuck in and became something to me…I cared if she died now…wasn't there anythi…"
I was snapped out my thoughts by River's voice, "You have that face on again."
I looked up at her slightly taken a back, "Huh?"
"You know what the Doctor is going to do which means you know what I'm going to do." She paused before adding, "You have that face on you wear when you're up to no good."
I went to open my mouth but she cut me off, "And if your up to no good there's only one thing you can be thinking of and I can't let you" she said shaking her head and taking a step forward whilst I was to shocked to move.
"You and the Doctor both don't know me yet which means if you don't live those things would have never have happened…and I'm sorry…really I'm sorry…"
The next thing I knew her hand was coming down on my head and I felt my knee's weaken and my eyes close.
I was struggling to stay conscious. I felt some one (River probably) take my weight and start half dragging, half walking with me.
Next thing I heard was River's voice gasping Anita and I guessed she had spotted the skeleton, then I heard the Doctor apologising before saying, "I thought I told yo…Rachael!" he cried out probably when he notice River supporting me.
Next thing I knew was another pair of arms were taking me from River and I heard the sonic screw driver buzzing somewhere near me so I presumed it was the Doctor who was holding me. I was quietly surprised at his reaction since he had barely spoken to me since my initial arrival unless it was giving me an order.
"What happened?" he asked before saying "Shows external head injury how did that happe…" he was cut off at the same time I heard River murmur "Sorry" and a light thump sort of noise.
It was then the Doctor fell meaning I did to since he was the one holding me up. This was about the time my consciousness finally drifted away.
I came around to the voice of the computer, "Autodestruct in one minute."
Looking around I spotted River in a chair of sorts linked up to some machinery and messing with some sort of wires. I was sitting in front of the Doctor's outstretched arm which was handcuffed to a metal pole and leaning against his side as he watched River with a horror stricken face.
It was then I remembered what was going on and my semi awake state quickly switched to alert.
"River, NO!" I shouted and went to move forward only to find my own left hand handcuffed to the same bloody pole.
"There's nothing you can do." She said as her gaze switched to me and I saw the tears filling her eyes.
The Doctor who had been trying to reach for his sonic causing me to fall slightly sat back up a look of desperation on his face as he looked at me then back to River.
"I-I can do it!" I started of stutter but finished with conviction as I stared at her.
I felt the Doctor tense beside me, his gaze burning into me with disbelief as he let out a quiet but at this distance audible, "No…"
River simply shook her head sadly a watery smile on her face as she wryly said, "You really do never change…but you can't. You know you can't."
"I can try!" I cried out my own eyes becoming teary. If Cal a child could at least try to save all those people then why couldn't I...why couldn't I try to save just one…
"Then let me do it!" The Doctor broke in now looking at River again.
Once again River shook her head, muttering something about peas in a pod as she continued tweaking something on the device she was now clutching so very tightly in her hands.
"River, you know my name" the Doctor said his voice serious.
"Autodestruct in ten" the computer called out its warning.
"You whispered my name in my ear" the Doctor continued ignoring the countdown.
"Nine, eight, seven…" the computer started counting down whilst I choked slightly on my tears as River put the device on her head.
"There's only one reason I would ever tell anyone my name. There's only one time I could" the Doctor seemed determined to know this mystery.
River hushed him as the computer called out "Four, three…"
"Spoilers" she said throwing me a wink before giving the Doctor a grin despite her tears.
"Two, one" the computer called and the last I saw of River was her joining the two power cables together before being blinded by a white light.
I was vaguely aware of the Doctor turning into me and away from the light his right arm coming up and in front of my eyes to shield them from the intensity of the light.
"Doctor!" I gasped out as a wave of pain hit me in the head and if I hadn't already been sitting I got the feeling I might have collapsed
The Doctor seemed to automatically get what I was saying as he gasped out "No! Not now!" his voice still full of his previous emotion as his right hand went from my eyes to around my waist as he pulled me closer to him and I had to squeeze my eyes tighter in order to keep the light out.
"No, you can't go! Not now! No!" he demanded no one in particular but I was already feeling all weird again.
My arm was burning and my pounding head had nothing to do with the red spots I could see from behind my closed lids due to the light.
All of a sudden I felt that familiar rush of falling as the Doctors grip on me seemed to disappear…
…...
And there we have it the final chapter to the Library saga. So where will she end up next, hmmm I still don't know guess just have to wait and see. Big question is why is Rachael jumping well that won't be revealed until much later though I may hint at it. Anyways thanks for reading and all that hope you enjoyed this chapter.
