Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who.
Itself
Chapter Eight: The Switch
The Doctor worked almost too feverishly on the Raston Warrior Robot. It had been some time since it had been active; the metal was brittle to the touch, so much so that he had had little difficulty in removing the head. With some help from the sonic screwdriver, obviously, it was still an indestructible killing machine, after all.
He just tried not to think about Trey and Ona, or about those ominous rumbles that had rocked the station earlier. The Doctor had briefly considered going with Trey, but he knew that there would be nothing he could do out there. But there was plenty he could do in here, working to find out just what was going on.
The creature was silent behind him, like it was watching him work. He had managed - not without considerable effort, mind - to drag the Raston Warrior Robot into the main chamber so he would have more light to work with. He had severed the head and was now trying to find the power cells, which was difficult with all the wiring that trailed into the body. And he couldn't cut any of them in case they were vital - it was his first time cutting open a Raston Warrior Robot, after all.
"Ah!" he announced with a smile. The power cell. He pressed the sonic screwdriver against it, giving it a charge. A clang echoed from the entrance to the Palace, and the Doctor looked up, forgetting his work for the moment. He delicately put the robot head down and quietly stood up, leaving the screwdriver to continue charging the head.
"Doctor?"
He sighed, relieved.
"In here, Ona," he said, walking back to the Raston. "So Trey found you before…"
The words died in his throat as he saw Ona limping in, hand clutching her heavily bleeding side. He ran over and supported her as best he could.
"The missiles," she managed weakly, her voice catching in her throat. "Trey's… he's…"
"I know, I'm sorry. Don't talk," he soothed, taking her to the side of the room opposite the creature. She whimpered as he let her go, resting her against the wall. He delicately moved her hand aside and inspected the wound.
"Doctor?" she gasped. "What is that?"
"Doesn't matter, just ignore it."
"Ignore it? It's a big monster in a tank."
"Big monsters in tanks are notorious attention seekers, you need to ignore them at an early stage or you just spoil them, now shut up, there's shrapnel in your side." He sighed, rubbing his hand on his cheek. "There's nothing I can do for you here, I'll need to-"
Something clicked and hummed behind him, and the Doctor's gaze darted over his shoulder. It was the Raston Warrior Robot.
Ona's head shot up. "Did you hear that?"
"It's something I've been working on," he explained, eyes still on the robot, "it just finished charging now."
"What, you mean… that voice?"
She firmly had his attention now, and he stared at her. "What voice?"
"There was a voice, just now."
"Really? What did it say?"
"It said…" she swallowed. "It said 'Doctor'."
"It recognises me?" he asked, before jumping to his feet and striding over to the robot. "You recognise me?"
"It remembers your… biometrical signature?" Ona said, confused by the terminology.
"Really? It's changed a bit since you last saw me. Maybe you just recognise me as a Time Lord. But yes, it's me, the Doctor. Ona," he said, keeping his eyes on the robot, "I'll get you help as soon as possible, but first I need to find out as much as I can from this thing. And for whatever reason, it can only communicate with you, so I need you to be the interpreter."
She nodded almost instantly, her brave face making the Doctor regret this course of action.
"All right…" he said slowly, squatting down beside the Raston and addressing its head. "What happened? For that matter, what's happening now?"
There was a long pause, and the Doctor wondered for a moment if the power cell had died already. But then he saw Ona's face, saw her processing and taking in whatever it was the robot was communicating.
"It's not just using words… there are images, sounds…"
He nodded. "It's how they report on their activity - they download all of their knowledge and transmit it to every other Raston Warrior Robot. It's why they're - why they were - some of the most feared beings in the universe."
"If they download to other robots… then why can I hear it?"
Stumped but not wanting to show it, the Doctor sighed. "I don't know. What's it saying?"
"After you left them…" she frowned. "But that's not you."
"Look, trust me, I know what you're seeing, and I know it's strange, but that is me."
She nodded, accepting it remarkably quickly. "After you left them, they scanned their home planet for signs of life. They found children that… oh God, they were almost dead. They were in so much pain, but these robot things still…"
She took a moment and closed her eyes, taking a breath before continuing.
"They brought the children on board the space station to see if their species could live again… so they would be remembered. But then… they fought over what to do, and because…"
"Because what, Ona?"
"Because this one wanted to be in charge."
The Doctor scowled down at the head, muttering, "Was it worth it?"
Ona continued. "The space station crashed into the planet below."
"What?" the Doctor snapped, fear gripping him.
"It crashed into the planet."
"No, but… that's this planet. Your planet. This planet is… was the Raston home world…" He leapt to his feet and started pacing. "What else, Ona? What happened next?"
"The, uh… the last Raston continued with the experiments. Radiation focused on the-"
"Focused on the brain, yes, I know about that. Why? What was the point? What did you gain?" he asked, staring down at the Raston head.
"They… the children… the radiation did something… gave them psychic abilities, telekinesis… they could warp reality… they could create reality."
The Doctor had stopped his pacing as Ona spoke, and by the time she was finished, he was staring at her, his hearts sinking. With a low hum, the last Raston Warrior Robot died, fading away.
"It's gone," Ona whispered, distractedly glancing from the robot to the Doctor before asking, "What does that mean, Doctor? They could create reality, what was it talking about?"
"It's happening again," he muttered, his voice thick.
"What is?" She was becoming frightened now, approaching hysterical. "Doctor, what is going on?"
"These… children. They have the power to create reality with their minds. The Raston Warrior Robot thought it would be the best way to recreate his species; using the minds of the last organic Rastons to create the new generation."
"Doctor…"
"Ona, I'm sorry. You have no idea how sorry I truly am. You were created from their minds. Your entire civilisation, the Nocs, the Diurs, all of it. You're not real."
Amy was feeling much better now, she had to say. There was still the occasional wave of dizziness that sent her grabbing the wall for support, but other than that, everything was peachy. So she was fine to act as a lookout while Shorn did… whatever he was doing in the abandoned storeroom.
Mas didn't seem to think she was up to the job, however, and was stood on the other side of the doorway, eyes on the opposite end of the corridor.
She wasn't really sure what the plan was. Shorn had collected hardware on the fly as they entered the military control building through the maintenance doors, using his old access codes - being an ex-security director had its benefits, she supposed. They were in the basement at the moment, though what could possibly be gained from here, she had no idea.
"Hey," she said slowly, closing her eyes in the hope it would help her think with a bit more clarity. "Isn't Shorn one of the survivors of the Noc expedition?"
"Yeah, that's him. He was locked up."
"He was? Why?"
Mas shrugged. "Ona knew, though. I'm guessing it had something to do with what she and the Doctor were doing here earlier."
Sighing, she shook her head. "He does tend to get people in trouble, that boy…" She frowned. "Hold on, he was locked up? So how did you get him out?"
With a smile that was eerily similar to the Doctor's 'I'm rather pleased with this handy doo-dad I just invented', Mas pulled one of the disc shaped teleporter devices from his pocket.
"I'm kind of an expert with these things. I can even create a chain of transmat jumps - lets you travel much further than just using one of them."
"Like what the Doctor did when we were in the prison?"
"Not… exactly. He told me that was time travel. My way is a bit more bulky and complicated; you need about ten transmat devices to make it work properly. But it's the same result, I suppose; it bounces you much further than just a single transmat device could."
"Oh," she said blankly. "Right."
"Can I ask you a question?"
"Okay."
"Ona and I… we overheard some of the interrogation…"
"Right…"
"And… I was just curious…"
"…about?"
"The Doctor has a wife?"
A little surprised at first, Amy finally managed a laugh. "Oh, that. Yeah, a woman called River Song. He won't admit it, but she's so his wife."
"He won't admit it?"
"It's a… complicated relationship."
Shorn rushed breathlessly out of the storage room. "It's done. We need to leave, now."
They started running, Shorn leading the way. Amy stumbled a few times as she ran, but mostly managed to keep up.
"Why, what's going to happen?" she asked, looking back at the room when she had the chance.
"Those tremors from before were caused by massive creatures moving beneath the surface; they're attracted by certain sonic frequencies. I've put a transmitter at the base of the building that will summon them, and they'll demolish it."
Amy stopped, but Shorn and Mas kept on going. "They'll what? What about the people?"
"It doesn't matter," Shorn said simply over his shoulder.
Mas looked back to Amy unsurely, and finally came to a halt himself. When he noticed neither of them were with him, Shorn turned.
"They don't matter. None of them do. Only you matter," he said, looking straight at her.
"What?" she scoffed. "Why?"
"Because you're real."
More than a little weirded out, Amy exchanged a worried look with Mas. "Yeah… well, anyway, I'm not too keen on letting all these people die."
Looking desperate now, Shorn rushed over to her, grabbing her wrists pleadingly. "You can't. Please. You're important, you're the only thing that's important. You can't die. Those things will be here in a matter of minutes."
As though to emphasise his point, the ground began to rumble ominously. The echoing sound of doors slamming emerged from down the corridor.
"They've tracked the sonic transmitter," Shorn muttered. "You have to go, they'll kill you!"
"Why?" Amy snapped, snatching her arms out of his grip. "What's so important about me?"
"You're real!"
"What, and everyone else isn't?"
"No!"
The guards were upon them now, and in the middle of the group was Mas' father, staring in horror at his son.
"Mas?"
The young man avoided his father's gaze. "Father, I-"
"What are you doing? You're here with Shorn and… this human thing?"
Shorn put himself between Amy and the guards while Mas struggled for his answer.
"Stay away, Shriner," he growled.
Amy put her hand up. "Um… maybe we could talk about this some other time, after we've evacuated the building, yeah?"
Two guards emerged from the room Shorn had set the transmitter in, the one on the left shaking his head.
"He's locked the controls, sir."
Furious, Shriner glared at Shorn. "Stop this, now."
"No."
"You're going to kill-"
"Nobody, Shriner! Nobody will die when this building collapses, because none of it is real. You would know that, if you hadn't failed us at the Palace!"
Everyone was silent for a moment, the distant rumbling building with every passing moment. In a reversal, Mas was now staring at Shriner while he struggled to match his son's gaze.
"Father? What does he mean?"
"He's insane, Mas, ignore him. I can't believe you're here with him in the first place!"
"He had courage, Shriner," Shorn said. "More than you when we opened the Palace."
Emboldened by the power of his words, Shorn looked to Mas. "We were attacked as soon as we cut it open. Pain in our heads, so severe. Most of us died, except three. Two of us struggled inside to find the source. One of us ran in fear."
At this point Shriner looked too despondent to say much of anything, and Shorn continued.
"There were three of them in orbs of light. Three children. We managed to kill two of them before the third…" His voice wavered, and he had to take a moment before he spoke again. "The third put ideas in our minds. Images, thoughts… the truth. The truth about us, about the Nocs and Diurs. And we left."
No-one seemed inclined to ask the obvious, so Amy threw in, "And the truth is…?"
"We're not real. We're the product of three children's imaginations. All of us. Everyone on this planet does not exist." He whirled on the spot to face Amy, intense brown eyes boring into hers. "Except for you, and your friend. You're real. That's why you need to survive. We're nothing."
A resounding bang filled the air, and Shorn's face dropped, his eyes wide. He collapsed onto Amy, who struggled to hold his weight, awkwardly dropping him to the floor. There was blood splattered on her front, but she barely registered it as she looked into Shorn's eyes and saw the light behind them wink out.
The rumbling was shaking the room now. Thin lines of dust wafted down from above, and cracks were beginning to show in the ground beneath them.
Looking up, she saw Shriner holding the smoking gun, as horrified with his own actions as Amy was. The weapon clattered to the floor, and Shriner looked helplessly to his son.
"Mas…"
Mouth clamped shut, Mas furiously shook his head and grabbed Amy's arm with one hand and pulled out a transmat with the other.
"Mas!"
Everything went white, and Amy's view of Shorn's body was replaced by blank concrete. Blinking stars away, she looked around the empty street, the sudden silence jarring.
"Where are we?"
"Far away from that building," Mas said, rifling around in his pockets and pulling out transmat devices from everywhere.
A low rumble thundered through the street, and a cloud of dust billowed out from somewhere deep within the city. Amy could make out the faint outline of the black slug thing that the Doctor had described, writhing its head about in the sky.
"You let them die," she said faintly, knowing her eyes were stinging with tears and not caring.
"It doesn't matter, Amy," Mas hissed back, latching the transmats onto his belt as he spoke. "What Shorn said… it was right, don't you see? Everyone who heard him say it… they knew. On some level, we all know. My mother died when I was six. Was she ever alive? Was my father?" He stopped working and gazed at the floor. "Am I real?"
"You saved my life. That's real, isn't it?"
He didn't reply, and just got back to work. She watched him clip on the last transmat and check they were all in place before she got to her feet.
"Where are you going?"
"To find my sister. My father may have failed us, but I love my sister, and she loves me. That has to be real. I've got to believe that. You can't imagine family." He took a breath and smiled at her, sad but determined. "Goodbye, Amy."
"No, wait-!" She lunged for him as he pressed the button, but he was gone in a flash of light.
Amy stared at the spot Mas had once occupied, and spotted, on the horizon, a collection of thin white streaks firing up into the sky.
"Missiles…"
They must have fired before the building went down. And there was that dizziness again. Amy rubbed her hands frantically through her hair while she tried to think. No-one would help her, and she wouldn't be able to get to Noc territory ahead of the missiles to warn the Doctor.
But she was sure as hell going to try. Turning towards the Noc territory, Amy started running as fast as her shaky legs could take her.
She had to make sure the Doctor was okay. He was all she had.
The Doctor stared at the creature in front of him, desperately wanting to see its' natural form, to see what the Rastons had done, if only so he could see if there was any way to fix it.
"Doctor, what do you mean I'm not real?" Ona whispered, clearly questioning the sanity of the enquiry even as she said it.
"I mean, this creature, it… imagined you. Your entire civilisation. Three children with massive telekinetic and psychic abilities, giving them the ability to shape any reality they wanted. That's where the Daleks and the Ood and this blue mist creature came from. Using their fears and making them manifest to try and frighten us away."
"What do you mean?"
He turned on the spot and walked over to her, slipping down against the wall to squat beside her. "A long time ago, there were humans here, in this space station, and the Rastons took their memories and kept them on these computers. That's what provided the children with the information they needed. Not just to create a civilisation, but a society. But the computers degraded over time. The information became corrupted, files went missing… you knew a giraffe, but not chocolate cake."
"So we're… built from human memories?"
"And some of the Raston Warrior Robot's experiences as well, I suppose. That's probably where the sonic technology came from."
Ona was grasping for answers now, for anything that would disprove him. "But… what about the different territories? The Nocs and the Diurs? Why bother?"
"I don't know," the Doctor replied thoughtfully, staring at the children. "There are disputes and wars all through humanity's history, maybe it's taken from that."
"No."
"What?"
"I said no. I'm real. I remember my life. When I was thirteen I fell and broke my arm. Why would I have those kinds of details in my life?"
"The mind is a magnificent thing, Ona. Most forms of life in the universe only use a fraction of their brain for thinking. Imagine three minds using their full potential, only to have that magnified tenfold. Combine that with the imagination of a child, and… anything's possible."
Ona looked at him with what could only be described as disdain. "You sound pleased by this."
"It's amazing," he marvelled. "Don't you think? Because you are real, Ona, that's the magnificence of it. You have a life, Mas has a life, your father has a life, his father had a life… all of you, living, breathing, striving, failing, loving, hating, fighting, laughing people. Just because you know where you're from, doesn't make you any less real."
"But I'm not from that!" she shouted, suddenly heaving herself to her feet. She cried out in pain and anguish as she stumbled toward the children. "I don't believe it! I'm not some imaginary thing! Trey died, and it hurts more than anything! Don't tell me that's imaginary!"
The Doctor ran up beside her, though he didn't try to stop her.
"You will stop," the voice said, though it had less conviction now.
"No, you will stop!" Ona screamed, her rage forcing her through the pain and tears. "You will stop hiding and show me what you really are!"
The Doctor stared with his mouth slightly open, waiting for something to happen in the silence that followed. And then, suddenly, like it had never been there at all, the creature in the tank blinked out of existence.
There were three children, naked and thin and grey. The eyes were sealed shut, the mouth hanging open. And two of them were dead.
"They're…" Ona spoke breathlessly, her voice barely making a noise. "They're children. They're really children. They… oh, God…" her hand went up to her mouth as more tears came. "…they're so young…"
Kneeling down, the Doctor nodded. "No more than five years old."
The two children were lying on black pedestals, framing the only surviving child who hovered between them in an orb of green energy.
"That's why the cities have been disappearing. Your civilisation was created by three children, and now there's only one trying to sustain everything. Its' mind is fractured. The Nocs, the Diurs… they represent the good and bad impulses of the brain. Light and dark. Diurnal and Nocturnal."
There was a readout at the base of the pedestal, and the Doctor glanced at it, though he already knew what he would find.
"Such a strain… it's killing it."
"It's dying?"
The Doctor nodded. "And in so much pain. That's what my psychic paper picked up, what's giving me a headache… it's screaming. Dying, and so afraid." And then he had one of those moments where different thoughts came together and crystallised in his head, though there was no thrill to it today.
"But not for itself… oh, it's afraid for you, for the people of this planet. Because when it dies… you die. Its' mind is failing, that's why your people are becoming more and more afraid as time goes on. And as it becomes weaker and weaker, your people will become worse. They'll be driven insane with fear. Irrational, uncontrollable, primal fear."
Something thundered in the distance, and the Doctor whirled around. "Missiles. If those hit the ship…"
"But they're not real, not of it is!"
"Tell that to the shrapnel in your side," he shot back. "Everything these children have created is real, and those missiles could definitely kill them. And even if they're not killed instantly, the death will be even more painful, the mind even more erratic as it fades away… and your people disappear screaming."
"What are you going to do?"
"I…" He walked past Ona and to the terminal, working the sonic screwdriver. His voice wouldn't extend past his lips. "I have to… I'm going to send a charge through the stasis pod. Kill the child instantly. Painlessly."
She rushed over, standing beside him. "But… my people will disappear."
"I know."
"But you said we were real, that-"
"I KNOW!" The Doctor looked into her raw, red eyes, tears pricking his vision. "It's one or the other, Ona. I have to choose between letting that child live on in hideous pain and eventually die a slow, terrified death, all the while passing that fear on to every man, woman and child on the planet… or I give it a quick death and wipe out an entire civilisation."
Another rumble, this one much closer. The terminal beeped.
"It's ready," he whispered. "It's ready, it's ready, it's ready, just do it," he chanted, pressing his head against the screen. "All I need to do is press this button and it's done. Just one push."
The Doctor looked at Ona, staring into her eyes. "This is what he was talking about. I met someone, Ona. Someone who told me I was going to do something terrible today. An entire civilisation, just blinking out of existence. All because of me. Do I have the right to do this? There was a time when I thought I did, and I ended up dead because of it…"
She stared right back, silent. Then she moved, limping over to the child. "Can it understand me?"
With a considerable effort, the Doctor pushed off from the wall and walked over.
"I don't know. You're a part of it. It might respond to you more than me."
Ona nodded, and looked up at the child, staring at its closed eyes. "Show me your pain."
The Doctor put a hand on her arm. "Ona-"
"I need to know," she said gently, shrugging his hand away. "Show me."
It did.
Ona screamed, collapsing to her knees. The Doctor knelt down beside her, though it was a futile gesture. Her hands gripped her head as she rolled into a ball on the floor.
"Stop it," he commanded, getting to his feet and glaring down at the child. "She can't take this kind of pain, you're killing her! Stop it now!"
And it did.
The screaming stopped, but she didn't move. She just stared straight ahead with blank eyes as the Doctor knelt down beside her.
"Ona?" he asked gently.
The ship rumbled again from another missile. The next one would probably hit them.
Ona blinked. "I know what to do."
"What?"
"I know how to save us, Doctor. Us, and the child."
His hearts skipped two beats. "You do? What is it?"
"It showed me. In my mind, now. Help me to the terminal."
Hope fuelling him, the Doctor lifted her to her feet and assisted her across the chamber to the terminal.
"All right," he said, a breathless smile on his face. "What do I need to do?"
"Nothing," Ona said. She turned to him and smiled, her bottom lip quivering. "You're a wonderful man, Doctor. Don't ever think that this was your fault."
She pressed the button, and there was a flash of electrical energy. The Doctor lunged for her hand to stop her.
But she was gone. The child was dead. The missiles were silent. Even the lights planted by the expedition all those years ago were gone. All that imagination. All that life… just winking out of existence.
"No, no, no, no, no, NO, NO!"
He lashed out with his leg, smashing it against the wall again and again until he was breathing heavy, his foot throbbing.
Everything gone. So much potential and happiness and joy and love and… life. Gone in an instant.
Shoulders suddenly feeling very heavy, the Doctor flicked on the sonic screwdriver and directed it towards the exit. There was bound to be a very confused Amy Pond where the Diur city had once been.
He stopped as he passed the child. Frowning, he moved over to the dead body and leant in close.
A breath. It was breathing.
"You're breathing," he told the child, as if it didn't know. He took some readings with the screwdriver. "How? That should have killed you… complete brain death, unless…"
One final piece of the puzzle slipped into place, compounding the Doctor's sadness.
"…unless something was keeping you alive. An anchor."
Like a man on death row, the Doctor walked out of the space station and into the open air. It looked much the same as before, except the sky was just that little bit brighter. No longer the nightmarish storm clouds that came from a child's dark emotions.
In the distance, standing in the mud and staring at him, flickering in and out of existence, was the reason the child was still alive. The reason the Doctor knew about any of this. The reason Xon had hated him so much.
The Doctor hopped down from the space station and slowly walked over to him.
"Hello, Mas."
(A/N: Even though this is a sequel/prequel to my other story 'Dominoes', I hope this chapter - and the next, come to think of it - wasn't too confusing for anyone who hasn't read that story. Hopefully I made it clear enough.
Of course, you should read that story and leave glowing reviews for every chapter. J
And yes, I'm aware of the similarities with the Doctor's moral conundrum in 'The Beast Below' - I'd had this planned out well before that episode aired, though, and, of course, the obvious difference here is that there isn't any convenient answer waiting to be discovered.
But anyway, enough of my blah. Reviews please!)
