I struggled with this chapter, especially with Vissa's words and attitude. I know she's been kind of all over the place, but she's got weaknesses, just like we all do. She doesn't quite trust them, and has always known that they don't quite trust her. At the same time, she wants to be businesslike, wants to protect her interests, but she wants their help and also is fearful. She doesn't quite understand the Doctor, and she knows it...
In any case, I hope this all feels organic, and not too jarring in any way. :-) Hopefully by the end of this chapter, you'll have no idea whatsoever what I'm talking about ;-).
Enjoy, and please review! :-D
ELEVEN
Martha swallowed hard, and managed to find her voice. "Vissa, I know what this looks like," she said, gesturing for calm with both hands. "But you've got it wrong."
"You lied to me," Vissa shot at her with narrowed eyes.
"No, I did not, I just told you what..." Martha trailed off. Suddenly, she felt a little sick. She did not want to let on what she was thinking, not to anyone in the room. So she finished the sentence in the least-incendiary way she knew how. "I just told you what I knew to be true."
The real truth was, I just told you what the Doctor told me.
Could it be? Had he been lying to her? How could it be possible that something that he had never seen before was not only manifesting in the holographic field from debris from inside his mind, but now also was closing in on the planet at a fairly high speed, presumably ready to pounce?
She did not for a moment believe that the Doctor could be in cahoots with a malevolent alien species, or that he would be involved in some plot to infiltrate the planet Prissentra somehow, only to usher in an insidious attack by a purple ship (at least not without telling her about it, and explaining the whys and hows, and making her understand what Prissentra had done to deserve it). But it was not outside the realm of possibility for him to be hiding something. In fact, she was sure that he hid things from her every day. And not just a long history of being a Time Lord, things about life and space and time that just never came up in conversation. He hid real things, things that he pointedly chose not to tell her, especially about people and relationships, death and disaster. She had come to accept it, and tried to tell herself that things she really needed to know would reveal themselves in due time.
But, it was still frustrating beyond frustrating. Case in point, yesterday. When she had asked him about the female figure in his holograms, he said he had no idea who it was. Fair enough, how could he, if it was subconscious fodder, the woman had no face, and the Doctor couldn't see her anyway? But when Martha had asked him if there was a particular woman who had been on his mind, he had become evasive and denied that there was anyone... a little too vehemently, in Martha's opinion. And she knew him well at this stage. That dodgy denial might as well have been explicit assent.
So, what was he hiding about the purple ship?
"Martha, what's going on?" he asked, while she was in contemplation.
She sighed. "You remember that purplish squid ship I told you about?"
"The one that keeps showing up in the holographic field when I'm plugged into the Tactile sessions?" he asked, his voice low, flat, knowing what was coming.
"Yes."
"It's orbiting the planet, isn't it?" he asked.
"Apparently," Martha said.
The Doctor cursed.
"Is there anything you'd like to tell us, Doctor?" Zefura asked, like a schoolteacher who's just caught a five-year-old pupil stealing paints.
"No!" the Doctor responded, with a touch of desperation in his voice. "There is not! I have no idea where that ship came from! It does seem to be embedded in my mind somehow, though I've never seen it before, but... suffice it to say, I'll need to find out more before I comment on that."
Zefura made a sound that indicated exasperation. "Come on, Doctor," she told him. "We will never let you off this planet alive, as long as this conflict exists. You will be in the line of fire with the rest of us, when the ship attacks. Unless you tell us the truth and how to stop it. It's no good denying what you know, unless you're on some sort of kamikaze mission."
At that, both Martha and the Doctor distinctly heard Vissa's breath hitch.
"I will absolutely help you stop it," he assured Zefura. "In fact, try and stop me helping you stop it!"
The other person in the room, Gruner, the environmental impact expert who had yet to speak, piped up. "To what end, Doctor?"
"What do you mean, to what end?" he asked. "From what Martha has told me, the image exists in my mind of this spaceship thing levelling a city. If there is a precedent for it, sometime in my past - I don't know, something I've repressed, maybe? - we should proceed as though it will happen again. Or rather, it's smart to prepare for the worst. Assume there will be destruction. There will be mayhem."
The Doctor thought that his rhetoric spoke for itself. But the three Prissentrans stared at him, waiting for him to finish.
After a long silence, Gruner said, "And?"
"And," said Martha. "What do you mean and? The Doctor works against things like destruction and mayhem, and disgusting ships that fly through over civilian cities and cause mayhem. You asked him here. You wanted his help to begin with - are you telling me you don't know what he's about?"
"Miss Jones, are you discounting the fact that there's a very real possibility that he's lied to you too?" asked Vissa.
"No," she admitted.
"What?" the Doctor asked her, his head snapping to the left. "What do you mean? You think I'm lying to you about this? How could you think that?"
"I don't think that, not really," she told him, putting her hand on his arm. "But it has occurred to me, Doctor. I mean... you've got to admit, this is pretty bizarre, what's going on. How is any of it possible, if you've told me the whole truth?"
He opened his mouth to answer, but nothing came out. He just looked hurt.
She lowered her voice to an intimate level, and leaned in close. "Listen, Doctor. If you've never seen this purple tentacled spaceship, then there is no way the image of it, such a precise image, exactly like the one on the screen in front of me, could be in your mind. The effect has no clear cause, and we need a cause; this is how logic works. But logic fails me, in this case. The only further logical explanation there could be, is... you're hiding something. But the idea that you're in on some plot to attack these people, that goes against everything I know about you, so again, I'm at a loss."
"Louder, please," Zefura trumpeted. "We'll not have you conspiring right under our noses!"
"They're not conspiring," Vissa said, surprisingly, defending them. "They're conferring. There's a difference."
"Martha, I swear to you, on my life, I have never seen that ship before," the Doctor said, grabbing her hand on his arm. "I need you to trust me." His voice sounded desperate and about to break, and his eyes grew a bit moist. No tears fell, but only because she heard him softly suck in his breath to martial his pain. She'd almost forgotten with all of this, the Doctor was still in a Welling. He would not be able to endure anything that he perceived as a betrayal on her part.
She couldn't help noticing that somehow, the silence in the room, like in the Tactile Room, had become palpable and oppressive. And with it, of course, the heat.
She moved her chair forward, leaned in near his ear, and whispered, "All right. I believe you, and we will work out what's going on. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I doubted you." She picked up his hand in hers and, without thinking, brought his fingers to her mouth. She kissed them softly, then let them back down again.
"Thank you, Martha," he whispered.
"Oh, for God's sake!" Zefura wailed.
"Shush," Vissa scolded. "Just give them a minute. I want to see what else happens."
A realisation was coming to the Doctor in that moment. Almost without letting any air through, almost simply mouthing the words, he whispered in Martha's ear, "I know why logic is failing. I know what's causing something I've never seen or touched to manifest as a hologram."
"You do?"
"Yes," he said.
"What?"
"Later."
From there, he stood up and clapped, very like himself. "So, ladies... and gentleman. Are you going to let me help you stop this thing from destroying your cities, or do I have to take the bull by the horns and go all cloak-and-dagger? Which, actually, might be fine because I'm quite good at that. And I cut a dashing figure while doing it, so it's really up to you."
There was silence while Zefura, Gruner and Vissa looked at each other.
"You can't be seriously considering giving him access to our defence systems," Zefura cried out, getting to her feet.
Vissa frowned contemplatively at the Doctor. "I am considering it. Mostly because I have a feeling he's going to get access to them, one way or the other. I think it might be easier just to let him in, rather than find him rooting about later. If he's going to commit some great act of sabotage, at least we can curtail it quickly and have it done with."
"Throw him in a cell - throw them both in a cell! Then, they won't interfere at all!" Zefura insisted.
"That might work," the Doctor conceded to her. "Might. But in the first place, I'm wicked clever, and there's every chance I'll be able to wriggle free, even without my eyesight working for me. And in the second place, well... there really is no second place."
"Yes there is. Zefura, I'm sorry, but you're the worst military strategist in history, if you're being attacked from the outside, and you throw the Doctor in a cell," Martha countered.
"Yeah, that," the Doctor agreed.
Vissa contemplated them both. Martha could see the struggle behind her eyes. She wanted to believe them, and, Martha reckoned, she basically did. She had spent quite a bit of time with the Doctor and Martha over the past few days, most of it was more quality time than Zefura, and others in the gallery had spent. Vissa was rather adept at reading people, and was more or less aware of the dynamic between the Time Lord and his companion. She understood the unrequited love on Martha's part, and the dependence, in spite of himself, on the Doctor's part. She had been watching them interact with one another, and something about their exchange here in this room had changed her mind from thinking they were somehow responsible for the purple ship. At this stage, it was Zefura holding her back, though not without valid reasons, granted.
Finally Vissa asked, "Doctor, do I have your word of honour that you will never betray us in any way?"
"You have my word that I will do everything in my power to help defend you against whatever threat is orbiting your planet," he corrected.
"He's hedging his words," Zefura pointed out.
"I am," he said. "Because I won't sacrifice my principles. I won't kill anyone. I won't put Martha in any undue danger, and I won't give her up. I won't put one living civilisation ahead of another, without a completely just cause, and unless there are absolutely no other options. You may see that as a betrayal, and I can't risk giving you my word on it. So I will simply promise to help you in any way that I, the Doctor, can."
There was brief silence. Then, "Vissa, I would take the deal if I were you," Martha said. "After the emotional wringer you've put him through, he is still offering to help. As you said, he has been transparent with you since he's been here, and so have I - even when I didn't want to be. You were willing to trust a Time Lord with your terraforming equipment. Why not trust him to help save your planet?"
"And I'm sorry to bring this up," said the Doctor, feigning reserved reluctance. "But I'll probably need my vision back."
Gruner's voice cut across another brief period of silence. "Doctor, as an act of good faith, would you be willing to submit to one more Tactile session, before helping us to strategise?"
"What?" Vissa asked.
Gruner tapped a screen that lay on the table in front of him. The display lit up. "According to our environmental actuary, the percentage of the Forest of Solace and Solitude that we have currently in the data banks is not enough to replicate a terraformed piece of land sufficient for carrying out the quality-of-life goals that we have set forth. One more session would get us just barely to a point where... well, it would be difficult to grow a whole forest out of it, but it would be possible. As it stands today, at this moment..." he looked at the others and shook his head.
"So you're saying, you want me to give you more of my goods, to ensure your success, just in case I die trying to save your sorry arse, thereby not being able to give you anymore?" the Doctor asked, chewing on his words bitterly.
"In essence, he is," Zefura answered with a delighted grin. "What do you think of that, Doctor?" It was like she was deliberately trying to provoke him.
"And Doctor, if you don't die, and our building is still standing, then perhaps you will submit to further sessions," Gruner said. "And the replication process would become even easier. But if we stop right now, and the coming battle takes you out of the game, then... your visit here will have been in vain."
"Except for the fact that he's going to save lives!" Martha shouted, getting to her feet now.
"Touché, touché," Gruner conceded.
"What if the Doctor lives, but this building is levelled?" Martha asked.
"The data we've collected, and will collect, from the Doctor is stored in multiple locales around the planet," Vissa said. "As are the plans for the manifestation technology we appropriated from the Time Lords. We would be able to build another Birthing Room, but we would never be able to re-create the Forest of Solace and Solitude without sufficient data from a Time Lord. There is only one Time Lord, and at the moment, Gruner is telling us we don't have sufficient data."
"So, I do one more Tactile session, or you throw us in a cell? In which case, your city, possibly your planet might be destroyed? And me and Martha along with it? Unless, of course, we can outsmart your prison system and escape before we die?"
"It looks like those are the conditions," Vissa said, reluctantly.
"This is madness!" Zefura cried out in disbelief. "I am the military..."
"Zefura, you're at one extreme, and I am at the other. Gruner has offered a middle-ground. As Miss Jones says, we are an eminently reasonable people. Give me one good reason why compromise, when time is of the utmost essence, and disaster is looming, is wrong?"
After a long moment of tense standoff, "You trust him?" Zefura asked, eyes narrowed.
"As much as he trusts us," Vissa shrugged. "Face it, we don't know anything. We can either languish under the fire of some force we have no idea how to fight, or we can take a chance, and take a Time Lord at his word, and let him help."
"If you just do it," Gruner said to the Doctor, ignoring the argument between his colleagues. "We restore your sight, and give you access to our defence system - whatever access Vissa deems appropriate."
"You're forcing him to help you before allowing him to help you," Martha mused, with a mirthless laugh.
The Doctor frowned hard, and seemed to contemplate the options. "Martha, look at the screen. Do you see a display that says, Rate of Orbit?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"What does it say?"
"Er... eighteen-thousand miles per revolution, just like they said."
"Okay. How about Distance from Planet?"
"Four-hundred-ten-thousand miles," she answered, squinting at the screen. "And some change."
"How about Rate of Acceleration?"
"Zero."
"Okay, if they're not going to go any faster, or haven't been since this lot started tracking them, then that means they'll have to make, roughly, twenty-two, almost twenty-three, more revolutions before they reach the planet's atmosphere. Blimey, I guess we'd better be glad they're not in an aerodynamic pod. And their method of approach probably means that their ship is not protected by a Tistantine shell... unprotected craft burn up in most planetary atmospheres, unless they enter the sphere with extreme caution - usually slowly, and at an obtuse angle. Which means, we have just under twenty-three hours before they arrive. We'll call it twenty two... no, twenty-one, just to be safe."
"Which means, you could still do a full eight-hour session for us, and still have thirteen hours to strategise," Vissa said.
Zefura let out a hiss of exasperation.
"Fine," the Doctor said. "That's cutting it pretty close, considering the Welling that will come afterward and how slow and just... off I'm bound to be, so we'd better get started right now. Martha, are you in?"
"I'm in whatever you're in," she told him.
"Good, because I'm really going to need you."
