Part 11: Descent into the Dark Heaven

The group of unusual heroes exited from the Twilight portal into the Master's patchwork dimension. They had materialized onto the grounds surrounding a massive castle of mixed architecture. Parts of the Twilight Palace would start and stop, leading way to the Hylian build of Hyrule castle, as well as other bits of structure only two of the party recognized.

"Is that Buckingham Palace?" Clara asked.

"Oh, UNIT's not going to be happy about that." The Doctor said.

He pulled out his sonic screwdriver and scanned the front of the castle, while Link used the Hawkeye mask to search off into the distance.

"Doctor, I see a lot of Daleks out there."

"Yes, I imagine the Master probably pulled them all from the Twilight realm in order to get some unknowing security. Put them out there so that we can't stay out here very long." The Doctor replied.

"Because the moment we step inside the palace we're in his power." Midna pointed out.

"Most likely, though it won't be as complete as before." The Doctor said, viewing the readings from his sonic. "All these portals must require a lot of strength to pull off and the Tardis did drop him out in mid-dematerialization, so he's likely not at full strength. He might not even know that we're here yet and that leaves us with an opening…which is probably why he let Daleks inside the castle too."

"How can you tell?" Link asked.

"Well, my sonic tells me that there are lifeforms inside…and that there are also lifeforms disappearing inside. Which means that there is something inside killing a lot of them, which screams Dalek, or that there are Daleks and other things inside being killed by something worse. Either way is not looking promising."

"Going to guess that it's too much to hope that the Dalek's might kill the Master too?" Clara asked.

"Ganondorf was a master illusionist in his time." Zelda answered. "If the Master does indeed control the same power then it is unlikely the Daleks will recognize him as an enemy."

Clara sighed. "Well, at least it'll be a more satisfying win given that we have literally all odds sacked against us."

The Doctor smiled. "I've taught you well."

The five opened the main doors and entered.

…With Link then immediately throwing up his shield to protect them from the bombardment of arrows.

As they all hid behind the shield Zelda took a quick look to see who was firing at them.

"They're Bulblin archers! They're native to Hyrule and loyal only to their own, why are they firing at us?!"

"Well they likely got sucked into one of those portals and been chased around all day by the Daleks." The Doctor said. "I imagine they're scared, confused, and possibly a little cross, so not the most reasonable sort."

"You know, this shield isn't big enough for a conversation at the moment!" Midna yelled.

"Will somebody please do something?!" Link yelled, focused on keeping the arrows from hitting his friends.

Midna then leaped sideways from behind the shield and used her magic to conjure up the energy tentacles to impale the small Bulblin force.

"I used to do that using my hair while in imp form. Imagine how ridiculous that'd look now." She commented.

The Doctor walked angrily up to her. "They were scared! Acting out of panic! You didn't have to kill them!"

"Excuse me?!" Midna exclaimed. "These things attacked us first! Fear or not, they were trying to kill us just like the Cybermen and the Daleks!"

"But there's a difference between them. The Cybermen and Daleks have no thoughts other than conversion and extermination. They can't be reasoned with. These creatures maybe could but now they're dead!"

"Uh, Doctor? Midna?" Link said as he heard noise approaching.

Both ignored him. "How long did YOU spend in the Light World?" Midna asked. "Because even in my short stay there I saw just how reasonable these creatures are, given the towns they claimed and the hostages they took!"

"Guys?" Link said, hearing the noise that seemed very clearly to be enemies running towards the commotion they were causing.

Both remained too focused on their argument. "You never even gave these creatures a chance! They could have helped us even! Would you have allowed this to happen to your people? People who were just fighting out of fear?"

"Why you hypocritical, self-righteous, son of a b-!"

Link then threw his lantern into the doorway where the enemies were soon to come from, which shattered on impact, erupting the hall in flames and snapping the Doctor and Midna to attention.

"Ethical dilemma later! Run for our lives now!" Link yelled.

Deciding he was right, both put aside the issue ("Another time?" "Another time.") and joined with the group in running deeper into the castle.

…

After a bit of running they finally stopped when they heard metallic clanging around the corner. Peeking around they saw a massive Bulblin, likely King Bulblin himself, engaging a Dalek in battle.

"EXTERMI-"

WHAM! As the Bulblin's massive blade struck the Dalek's side, sending it spinning. Due to the force field the Dalek was unharmed, so the Bulblin attacked again and brought the blade straight down into the Dalek, actually penetrating the dome. Though not far enough as the Dalek still lived and fired its beam at the Bulblin, killing it.

The force field slowly pushed the sword out of Dalek until it fell to the floor next to its owner, revealing the large gash in the Dalek's armor.

"EXTERIOR INTEGRITY COMPROMISED." It noted.

"You got that right." The Doctor said as he went up to the Dalek and stuck his screwdriver right into the gash. Before the Dalek could react the sonics rebounded throughout the inside of the armor until it finally lost consciousness.

"What happened to trying to reason with it?" Midna asked.

The Doctor, feeling he had that coming, said "This one isn't dead, just unconscious. Couldn't risk killing it or the other Daleks in the area would be alerted that there's something in this area that can kill Daleks. Something to which more Daleks would show up to and destroy."

Midna was about to comment when she and the others jumped back as the Dalek's armor opened up, revealing the grotesque creature within, its one eye closed.

"My sonic must have messed around with the armor enough to cause it to open." The Doctor explained. "I'll admit I'm surprised too. I've never been able to get it inside a closed Dalek before. The shear strength needed to force through a force field like that…"

They all looked over to the dead giant. Zelda knelt down to speak a Hylian prayer for him who would have been her enemy in any other circumstance. The Doctor and Midna looked at each other awkwardly.

"Link, um, could I borrow that Hawkeye thing of yours?" The Doctor asked. "I want to scan for a safe path."

Link tossed the mask over to him and the Doctor crept further down the corridor, prepared to run at a moment's notice.

The remaining group studied the strange creature now visible to them behind the Dalek's armor.

"This thing is ugly." Midna said, poking it to see if it would react. "I can see why it spends its life in a tin can."

Zelda held out her hand slowly to touch the creature and Link quickly grabbed it to stop her.

"What are you doing?" He asked.

"On occasion my Triforce gives me the ability to communicate telepathically." Zelda explained. "I'm led to understand it was how my ancestors could commutate with their champions. I want to try and use it to reach out to this creature's mind. If I can befriend it, perhaps we will have an ally in fighting the Master."

"I really don't think that's a good idea." Clara said. "From what the Doctor has told me, Daleks are not known for allying themselves with anyone, mainly because their go-to solution for any problem is "kill anything that isn't Dalek"."

"I understand. But I must still try. If the Daleks continue to block our paths then we will never reach the Master before time runs out. If we can at least get them to leave us alone, then we may yet succeed."

Link looked over to Clara and Midna. Both women showed that they also were unsure of Zelda's plan. It made sense, yes, but they knew little about the creature beyond that it wants all of them dead and that bit of information made this idea less than promising.

"Just be careful." Link said as he let go.

Zelda nodded to him and turned back to the Dalek. She placed her hand on the creature and closed her eyes.

She fell deeper and deeper into the Dalek's mind. Its defenses lowered as she disguised her presence as a warm, happy thought, one a mind would easily open up to.

The Doctor soon returned. "The Daleks have still got most of the castle surrounded, but I did notice a courtyard that seemed empty, so they may not have spread there yet, so we sho-what is she doing?"

"She's trying to telepathically connect with the Dalek in order to try and get them to leave us alone." Link explained.

The Doctor went wide-eyed and quickly rushed over to her.

"Zelda, you have to break the connection now!"

Zelda's head suddenly snapped back as she let out an agonizing scream, causing the others to come to her aid as well.

She removed her hand from the Dalek and fell to the floor, clutching her head as she spasmed violently.

"There's so much hate! Anger! It keeps going, why won't it stop?!" Zelda cried out.

"The Daleks have a shared intelligence network called the Pathweb! What you are connecting to isn't just one Dalek but all of them! You need to break the connect-urk!" The Doctor exclaimed when Zelda suddenly grabbed him by the neck with both hands.

"EXTERMINATE THE DOCTOR! EXTERMINATE!" Zelda cried out as she started to squeeze. Her face in complete rage, tears rolling down her face as she did her best to resist.

Link and Clara both grabbed an arm and tried to pull her off him, but she wouldn't budge ("She's a lot stronger than she looks!" The Doctor somehow managed to get out).

Zelda's grip got tighter as the Doctor's eyes started to roll back. Link and Clara's desperation grew, as nothing they did could stop Zelda. Link feared if they didn't do something drastic soon she'd kill him. His mind raced.

…And then Midna sucker-punched Zelda as hard as she possibly could, knocking her out cold.

The three looked at each other and Zelda while the Doctor gasped for air. Midna scratched her head in embarrassment.

"I…uh…thought my magic would have been too lethal to stop her."

The Doctor coughed as he stabilized his breath. "Yes (cough)…thank you for that Midna (cough). Now then, the next time you lot feel the need to connect your minds with a genocidal monstrosity from another dimension, please run it by me first to get a second opinion (cough). Ok?"

Guiltily agreeing, Link picked up Zelda and carried her bridal style as they all walked on in rather awkward silence. Thankfully Zelda regained consciousness shortly after.

"Hey, Princess, you all right there?" Midna asked.

Zelda was a bit slow to answer. "Yeah…I (ow)…uh…why…why does my face hurt?"

Midna turned a bit reddish. "You, uh, went kinda nuts and tried to kill the Doctor so I had to punch you…really hard….sorry."

Regain her memories of the last few minutes, Zelda said "No, it's alright. I acted foolishly and you prevented others from suffering from my actions. It is I who should apologize to you, Doctor."

"Oh, don't worry about it. I've had plenty of friends try to kill me at some point or another. Always gets worked out in the end (except when I broke Donna's handbag. That took a bit longer)."

Zelda signaled Link that he could put her down. When she got to her feet she felt the swelling of her eye. "Well, I came here this day to battle, so it's not like I wasn't expecting injury today."

"I wasn't expecting the Hylian mind-meld. Today has one surprise after another." The Doctor said, sounding a bit more excited about it than he probably meant to.

"You still feeling any problems from that by the way?" Clara asked her.

"No. I don't think so anyway." Zelda said, clutching her pounding forehead. "I can still feel the Dalek Pathweb around us, but I feel no desire to connect to it again."

"Well if you start growing any metallic eyestalks, let us know." The Doctor said.

Zelda stopped in her tracks. "That can happen?!"

"Well it has happened once or twice, so just give us warning if you start feeling exterminatey." He responded.

Clara then wacked the Doctor on the head with her bag for his bedside manner, making Zelda feel slightly better.

…

The party moved quietly as they could, thankfully meeting little opposition along the way. This was due mainly to the Sonic Screwdriver allowing them to unlock passageways that the enemies had no access to.

As another lock hit the ground Link commented to the Doctor "I need to get one of those."

"I'll try and send you on for Christmas. How's that sound?"

"What's Christmas?"

"Oh right."

Finally they came to entrance of the strangely quiet courtyard. Empty, but still vacant, as it was full of vines, plants, statues, and broken columns.

As the party made their way quietly through the courtyard Link noted to himself that this section must have been pulled from the Doctor's world, as the décor, statues, and foliage was unfamiliar to the Hylian knight. As they kept moving forward Link felt began to feel unease caused by the statues, as the strange feeling of being watched was overtaking him. Why his thoughts of paranoia immediately jumped to the statues instead of the Master, Link couldn't say.

"Doctor, why does your world make their statues so unnerving?" Link asked.

"Link, you've fought giant monsters and a statue is scaring you?" Midna pointed out.

"What makes you think they're from my universe?" The Doctor asked, still focusing on leading the way.

"Well they don't have the right ears or body types to be Hylian or Twili, so I'm just assume they're meant to look human." Link explained.

"Well I suppose the Master could have sucked up a museum or something too from Earth." The Doctor said barely paying attention.

"Well your sculptors do eerily good work. They're so lifelike I keep feeling like we're being watched."

That's when the Doctor stopped dead in his tracks, causing the other members of the crammed-in party to tumble into each other. He looked around quickly in every direction, slowly showing that he had come to a sudden terrible realization.

"Oh…this just got a lot worse."

The others were confused. "Doctor, what is it?" Zelda asked.

"Everyone! Stand back-to-back, now!" He said hurriedly.

"Why?" Midna asked.

"Now!"

The five gathered quickly, standing back-to-back, leaving no room between them.

"No matter what you do, do not blink and do not look away from the statues!"

"Doctor, what's going on? What are they?" Link asked, as out of the corner of his eye he could have sworn he saw one of the statues move its head.

"I said don't look away!" The Doctor said, turning Link back to his respective direction. "These aren't statues, they're Weeping Angels!"

These words meant little to Link, Midna, and Zelda, though Clara remembered the Doctor telling her about these creatures before.

"Why are they here?!" She asked him, making sure not to look away from the statues she faced.

"They must have been attracted to all the energy being given off by the portals. Such big holes in time and space, how could they resist?"

"Could somebody explain what the hell a Weeping Angel is?" Midna said, only following the Doctor's orders because of how spooked he and Clara were.

"The Weeping Angels are predators from our universe. The ultimate predators." The doctor explained. "Quantum-locked statues when you see them, lightning fast when you don't.

"Predators?" Zelda focused on. "Predators of what specifically?"

"Everyone. They feed on time energy, which every living creature has. They just have to touch you and they'll send you back in time enough to point where they can feed on your time energy."

"That sounds bad." Link commented.

"Oh it gets worse." The Doctor said.

"Of course it does."

"You see, the Angels are bad enough on their own, but now they and their prey are in a pocket universe comprised three different universes, two of which's space-time laws are quite different from what they're usually working with. So instead of sending you back through a great big ball of wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff they're sending you back through three big balls of wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff barely existing simultaneously, which is basically the equivalent of a space-time buzz-saw."

They got the idea.

"Least it explains why there were no Daleks here. They wouldn't have registered the Angels until it was too late."

"I'm not going to lose sleep over them." Midna said.

The Doctor nodded in agreement. "Now, we can still easily make it out of this, we just have to work together. Just keep walking until we get out of here. We've got enough eyes so that they can't surprise us. Just don't separate and don't blink."

They all understood and began to slowly make their way through the courtyard, with the Doctor leading the way and Link, with his sword and shield out, taking up the rear.

The occasional eyelid had to close of course, and every time had to shut their eyes for just a second, they'd open them to find a few more of the Angels that had advanced upon them. Thankfully the peripheral vision of the other members was just enough to keep the Angels from advancing too far.

As they continued to walk, Midna asked "Link, you wouldn't happen to still have that crusher ball, would you?"

Link understood she was just trying to lighten the mood and was quite grateful for it. "No, sorry. Afraid my pockets aren't as big as they once were."

"How you people survive without shadow storage, I'll never know." She kid him.

The Doctor got in on it a little too. "Ah, don't worry about it. In my experience trying to smash them just makes them angry."

"Well, we certainly wouldn't want to make the creatures that exist only to kill us to get upset, now would we?" Clara asked rhetorically.

"Yes, I imagine they'd consider it quite rude." Zelda said, nearly causing everyone to laugh. In a high stress environment, even the smallest bit of lightness is appreciated.

After a few more minutes the Doctor finally said "We're almost out." Causing everyone to breathe a bit easier. "Just a little bit further. Once we get past those doors, we should be able to-"

"EXTERMINATE!"

"OH COME ON!" The Doctor yelled as Link's shield intercepted the incoming blast.

For where the party had entered the courtyard emerged several Daleks, each moving towards the group, oblivious to the danger that surrounded them.

As Link's shield continued to take hits, Clara asked the Doctor "How did they find us?!"

"I don't think they were looking for us." He said, trying to use his sonic to weaken some of the Daleks' firepower while simultaneously keeping watch on the Angels in front of him. "They probably came here to investigate whatever it was that took out the units they set here!"

"Think they'll focus on the Angels if we tell them it was them?"

"EXTERMINATE THE DOCTOR!"

"I don't think it'll make much difference."

Midna tried to fight from behind Link but the Daleks' hides were too thick for her magic to break through. Clara and Zelda had little they could do as well, as arrows certainly were not enough to harm the metallic monsters. The best they could do was to continue to keep watch on the Angels, but even then the blinding lights of the Daleks' beams allowed them to continue to advance. The Daleks paid little attention to them, as they were more focused on the being who are living as opposed to the ones that are only sometimes living.

As the assault continued and desperation grew, Link called out to Midna. "Midna! In my satchel! The Clawshots!"

Midna reached into his satchel and pulled them both out, though unsure what he wanted her to do with them.

From behind the shield Link quick nudged his head to point high behind him. Midna looked in the direction Link had pointed towards. Above the doors the party had been heading towards there was a stained glass window, and though she could barely make it out, Midna saw the large chandelier behind it.

"Good thinking, Link!" She exclaimed. Pointing towards the window she fired the first Clawshot and shattered it. The path now clear she fired again, the Clawshot latching onto the chandelier.

"Zelda! Clara! Grab onto the Doctor! Doctor, take this!" She ordered them as she handed the Doctor the Clawshot.

As the two women clung to him, the Doctor asked "Midna, are you sure this will WOOOORRRRRRRRRKKKKKK!" He exclaimed as he and the girl were quickly pulled upwards through the broken window. Even the Daleks had to look up in befuddlement of what just happened.

Midna's logic: if it can support Link and the iron boots, then it can handle those three lightweights.

Midna fired the second Clawshot and latched onto the chandelier. "Ready?" She asked Link as she grabbed onto him.

Link nodded.

Midna activated the Clawshot and the two shot upwards towards the window.

…But they did not make it to the window, as one of the Daleks shot and broke the chain, causing them to start falling.

As the two watched each other fall it was like the world was in slow motion. And it was only because of that and adrenaline that Link managed what he did next.

He grabbed Midna by the arm in mid-fall and with his remaining strength, managed to toss her up just enough so that the others could catch her and pull her through the window.

"Link!" She cried out as she watched his body hit the ground hard. He was not dead, though the shock of the fall certainly didn't do him any good.

Unable to get up, the best Link could do was to curl up behind his shield as half the Daleks fired upon him. The other half focused on the window, forcing the others to seek shelter on the upper floor.

"We can't just leave him!" Midna protested.

"We're not!" The Doctor said as he tried to find a way for them back downstairs.

…

Link cowered behind his shield, no other options available to him. The fall seemed to have broken his leg and he couldn't stand. The Master Sword was held tightly in his hand but the Daleks were too far away for him to use it. They kept firing on him, like he was a stain they wanted removed, knowing he'd give out eventually. The strain of holding back the Daleks' firepower was too much and his arms would give out any minute.

And then there were the Angels. The ones behind him were of no concern for the Daleks could see them and would never blink. But Link could see them slowly approaching from the sides and even from behind the Daleks. The Doctor was right, they were fast, as they moved several feet forward in the split-seconds Link had to use the look between them all. The Daleks still paid no attention to them, their focus on the knight they had pinned down. And though they were unaware of it, if they didn't get him, the Angels would. Link couldn't fight them all.

But perhaps he could still beat them. At least one of them.

It took Link a moment to work up the nerve for what he was going to do. What he had to do.

"I'm sorry, Midna."

Link clamped his eyes shut.

…

The group made their way downstairs back to the doors that would have lead them out of the courtyard. Doors which they found by following the loud noise caused by the Dalek firepower. So loud it was in fact that they couldn't help but notice when it abruptly ended.

Midna burst open the doors, not thinking or caring about the consequences.

And on the other side she found only Weeping Angels, several huddled around the empty spaces that used to contain their prey.

"LINK!"

…

It would seem Doctor Who rules apply even in a crossover fanfiction, namely that every character you love dies tragically.

…Ha.