Author's Note: Next chapter. This is a really short missing scene from The Space Pirates that I was inspired to write after rose-of-pollux mentioned how much she loved certain photo sets on my blog. :) It takes place toward the end of Episode Two in that storyline.
I do not own Doctor Who or any of its characters.
Thank you to everyone who is reading/following/favoriting/reviewing this. It is always appreciated. :)
To the End
He had known that it was a long shot, even if he couldn't bring himself to admit it to Zoe at the time.
The Doctor shifted to sit up on his knees so he could stare forlornly at the tangle of wires and circuits in the wall next to him. She had been right, of course, that he might make a mistake in calibrating the magnetic field of this section and send them flying away from the rest of the station. However, it had also been a calculated risk. If he had succeeded, it would have been a simple matter to repeat the process with each section until they had reassembled it so they could get back to the TARDIS. Granted, they would have had to find a way to move from one section to the other, but the Doctor had been confident that he could manipulate the mechanisms that controlled the doors. Lock-picking was a skill that he had mastered out of necessity.
Now, there was no chance of escape. Their portion of the station was too far away from the rest of the pieces, making a second attempt futile. They were trapped with no possible means of reaching the TARDIS.
And the oxygen levels in this section were continuing to diminish.
The Doctor heard Jamie and Zoe gasping for air behind him. He knew enough about human physiology to be able to predict what would happen next. Soon, his companions would grow disoriented and drowsy. Eventually, they would fall unconscious and quietly slip away. The Doctor was aware that he would last longer than them, although this gave him no comfort since it meant that he would have to watch them suffocate.
He would have plenty of time to grieve before he finally succumbed along with them.
"Doctor?"
The Doctor hung his head at the sound of Zoe's voice behind him. What he could he say to her? She had wanted to see the universe and to learn to be more than an automaton who lived her life for data and equations. He had taken her away from everything she had known only to take her here to die.
He heard the sound of heavy footfalls moving closer to him and recognized them as Jamie's. Jamie, one of the bravest and most loyal people he had ever met and who was the first human he could consider his best friend. The Doctor had taken him from Scotland to protect him and to give him a new life amongst the entirety of time and space. Jamie had wanted to leave almost as soon as they had arrived, but the Doctor had refused to listen, his insatiable curiosity compelling him to stay. Now that curiosity would put a premature end to Jamie's life, a result the Doctor would curse himself for until the very last second.
"Doctor," Zoe repeated.
"I'm sorry, Zoe," the Doctor said in a low, mournful voice. "I'm afraid there's nothing else I can do."
"Och, don' give up Doctor," Jamie said with a nervous laugh. "Ye're tae clever for that. Ye'll think of something."
"Not this time, Jamie," the Doctor said, his eyes still fixed on the wires dangling from the exposed panel.
"Ye…ye mean there's no way out?" the piper asked. "We're trapped here."
The Doctor nodded, his entire body sagging down under the weight of that admission. He desperately wanted to tell them how sorry he truly was, but any apologize he could think of seemed trite in the face of the dire circumstances there were currently in. Even if he could find the words to convey his regret, he knew that he did not deserve any measure of forgiveness from them. Not that he expected it anyway.
No one spoke for several long moments. The silence compounded the sorrow the Doctor felt as he waited for the inevitable anger from his companions for his failure to get them out of this situation. He scooted over toward the edge of the platform up to the door in an attempt to isolate himself from them. The Doctor covered his face with his hands, his eyes burning with bitterness over what he had allowed to happen.
Suddenly, he felt a warm hand grasp his shoulder, causing him to gasp in surprise. He lifted his head and turned to see Jamie and Zoe standing behind him, the piper's hand squeezing his shoulder again.
"Come on, Doctor," the Scot said gently through heavy breaths. "We cannae wait any longer to use those tanks again."
"Yes," Zoe nodded. "You need to breathe too, Doctor. And we will be better able to conserve our oxygen if the three of us stay close together when we open the valve."
"Zoe…Jamie…," he muttered. "I…I'm so sorry…I…I should have…."
"Och, there's no point in any of that," Jamie interrupted. "Ye did the best ye could."
"But it's my fault that you ended up here in the first place!" the Doctor exclaimed. "If I had listened to you…if I had been more careful…."
"There was no way you could have known that this would happen, Doctor," Zoe insisted. "All the evidence indicated that it would have been better to avoid being imprisoned by those guards if at all possible. Not to mention the likelihood that it would have been disastrous if we had been caught up in whatever conflict befell the rest of the crew. You can only act upon the information available to you."
"Come on," Jamie repeated, holding out a hand to him. "Ye should nae be alone. Not now. Stay wit' us."
The Doctor stared at them in disbelief. There was no trace of anger or recriminations in their eyes or voices. Instead there was affection colored with concern. His hearts ached at the realization and he pondered just how fortunate he was to have known such dear friends even for the short time the three of them were together.
He clasped the piper's hand and let Jamie help him scoot over closer to him while Zoe moved to plop down on the floor next to him. Jamie sat down behind him and fell back against the railing of the platform while putting his arm around the Doctor's shoulders. The Time Lord lifted the tank and twisted the handle to let out a little of the air, all three of them taking in as many deep breaths as they could before he shut it again. Once he had sat it back down onto the floor, the Doctor slumped down against Jamie who responded by guiding him down into a reclining position, the Time Lord's head resting on the piper's chest.
"Jamie," he murmured.
"'Tis all right, Doctor," Jamie responded in similarly soft voice. "I know. And 'tis the same for me tae."
The Doctor reached up to pat Jamie's hand before closing his eyes to rest while he waited for the next suitable interval to release some more oxygen into the section. He couldn't see a way out of this situation, but he was grateful for Zoe and Jamie's company in these final moments.
They would be together to the end. And the Doctor was certain that he could think of no better epitaph for his existence than that.
