Chapter 9

"OK, I'll ask," TK ventured when no one else spoke as the Doctor paced back and forth before the frightened gorphin. "What exactly are Koronkights?"

"They're - they're these parasitic beings, but they're not quite parasites -" His thoughts were moving too fast for his mind. Pressing his fingers through his hair, eyes clamped shut, he tried to keep up with whirring mind. "The last I heard of them they were still following the guidelines set down by a collective, Honourable Coalition," he said quickly. "The Coalition was a group of leaders - there was a Time Lord leader among them - koronkights had threatened the Time Lords so there was a representative of Gallifrey. Together, the Coalition set down a collective agreement reached by the races. It was an agreement to help the races keep out of each other's way - last I knew the koronkights were still following it's rules!"

"What were the rules?" Kalimata asked, having sat down against the massive pipe in the center of the room.

"There were thousands of rules," the Doctor said, the words slipping from his mouth, nearly out of control. "There were thousands, but basically - the rules barred the Koronkights from invading the planets of the races in the coalition and kept them restricted to the fringe planets around their sun, the ones that didn't want to be in the coalition, the war-like planets."

"And what did they do to those planets that had endangered the Time Lords?" TK asked carefully.

"Koronkights don't reproduce," the Doctor said, his words moving at a faster and faster pace. "They are incapable of reproducing sexually or asexually -"

"So, they don't reproduce as humans do," Kalimata interrupted, "or as bacteria, protists - whatever, do?"

"Right," the Doctor said hurriedly. "They - oh...they infect!" He hissed, knotting his hands before him as his pace grew quicker and quicker. "They infect other beings, very gradually taking over their bodies, rewriting the biology of the creature, reforming them into a new member of the species! That's what they're doing here!" He punched the air, jumping and spinning to face TK. "They're here to spread! They're using the gorphins to spread and to refine the Elanian to power machines to create the parts for their ships which the gorphins are manually putting together, ships which will also be powered by refined Elanian! That's what they're doing! Before the coalition stepped in, their species was a threat to their galaxy, to the universe, but the coalition was able to put a stop to that. The coalition - well...the coalition is no longer functioning, and they've finally realized that there is no one to reinforce the laws." He turned, snapping his fingers as the gears in his mind continued to tick. He turned his attention back to Anfelah. "They ran tests and did surveys because their very nature of taking over the biology of other species means that it is necessary for them to learn how best to do so, how best to turn the species into servants - how best to use the species own culture against them. They are anthropologists because they need to know everything they can about the species they are going to destroy before they are able to destroy them."

"They sound like a nasty case of the flu," Viv muttered.

"They are," the Doctor bit out, turning his eyes upward. "And they're all right up there..."

"Are we going to wipe them out?" TK prodded.

"No," the Doctor said, crunching up his nose with distaste at the idea. "We're going to make them leave, is all."

"You realize that may mean wiping them out," Kalimata said.

"Let's leave genocide as a last resource," the Doctor bit out, moving back towards the stairs. "Thank you for all your help, Anfelah!" He said over his shoulder to the gorphin. "I promise - we'll sort this thing out!"


As they climbed the stairs, the Doctor's voice dropped to a whisper. "They've been taking gorphins and using them to reproduce," the Doctor said quietly as they crept up the stairs. "But there still can't be many here. If they've broken the laws, it must have been because their numbers were dwindling. They always were something of a cowardly race...they never wanted to break the laws for fear of extinction. That's what drives them. Fear of extinction."

"Isn't that what drives most species?" Kalimata asked softly.

"Fear of extinction isn't a conscious fear," the Doctor said. "It's buried away in instinct. Most evolved species have bread out the majority of those instincts, which threaten to lead them backwards as far as evolution goes - that's a different thing, entirely, though. For koronkights, fear of extinction isn't subconscious. It is conscious."

Giving a little shrug in the dark, Kalimata, TK, and Viv continued up the stairs. When they reached the top, the Doctor gently pushed open the door, peering in.

A glow settled over the room, eerie and slightly pulsing.

Stepping into the pale blue-green pulse of the glow, the Doctor frowned around the room. The glow was flowing from massive beakers, filled with florescent liquid and mutating bodies. Most of the bodies were halfway between gorphin and koronkight. Some were further along, others had barely begun to change.

"Well, this is different," the Doctor murmured as he strode carefully down the line of beakers. They towered over him, were so thick none of the humanoids could wrap their arms around them. Tubes were crammed down the throats and noses of each body floating in the thick, glowing liquid, wires stuck in everywhere.

Staring up at the beakers with wide eyes, Viv held towards the back of the group, her body tense, her hands poised and ready.

The Doctor glanced over his shoulder at Viv as the others passed him in their curiosity. He gave her a little squint of a curious frown as he watched her eyes reflect the glow of the beakers, her feet move slowly over the ground, not picking up enough to make the sound of footfalls.

"Reminded of something?" He asked softly, abruptly after a moment.

The sound of his voice startled her. She jumped, shaking her head, flexing her hands as she opened her eyes, shooting him a burning glare. "Are you?"

His eyes flickered towards a nearby mutating body. It looking like nothing that should live: the thick skin and thin, soft fur of the gorphin body wrinkling, peeling and flaking away. The big bat ears were disintegrating in the liquid, leaving only bits of cartilage left, which would soon, too, fall away. The slug-shaped paws were curling in on themselves, looking disease-ridden, riddled with grotesque, wart-like lumps. The tail had curled against the belly and seemed to be rotting into the flesh, melding.

Swallowing, closing his eyes and shaking his head, he shook away the grim thought of grotesque biological tests performed by Daleks.

Turning his back on Viv, he continued to catch up with the others, leaving her to follow at her own stop-motion pace.

"So where are these things?" TK asked as he approached.

"Close by," he murmured softly as he bypassed them, moving towards the faint door at the end of the long hall.