Oh, how are the Doctor and Rose going to respond? We'll find out. Written by Furyism.
Episode 10
A Sun Will Burn, Part I
"Do I have a twin I never knew about?"
Martha cringed. The Doctor and Rose were gobsmacked.
Great, this was all up to Martha then.
"I know, right?" she exclaimed, as though just as amazed as Akura at Rose's resemblance to her. "I mean really, what are the chances?" She glared at Rose and all but growled, "Really, what are the friggin' chances?"
The Doctor and Rose exchanged a thoroughly puzzled look and Martha plastered on a smile.
Akura plopped down in the seat across from Rose and opened her mouth to begin the interrogation.
"Honestly though, Akura, it's a bit rude just inviting ourselves on their date—"
"Martha, this woman looks just like me. I'm sure she's just as curious as I am. Or wait," Akura faced Rose and leaned forward. Rose flinched back. "Do you know who I am?"
"N-no, I don't, sorry."
The Doctor's head swiveled as he looked back and forth between them.
Akura thrust her hand across the table. "My name is Akura Kraft."
Martha wanted to crawl in a hole and die when Rose stared at the hand like it was a bomb that was seconds away form detonating.
Luckily, a waiter cleared his throat from behind Martha, attracting the startled attention of all four of them. Martha nudged Akura, who retracted her hand and slid over to make room. As Martha sat down, the waiter took Akura's order of burger and…fries. Martha had lost her appetite as soon as shed spotted the TARDIS, but to appease Akura she got some chips anyway. The waiter left and Akura turned to Rose expectantly.
"Well, I must say we're just as curious as you are, aren't we Rose?"
Rose nodded in agreement with the Doctor. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm…Rose Tyler." Now that Akura was sitting across from the Doctor, it would have been more awkward to shake hands, so Rose didn't even have to offer.
Akura was watched carefully by the other occupants of the table, but she showed nothing more than an honest interest Rose's identity, no recognition or malignance. The Doctor met Martha's frightened gaze, searching.
"So, Rose Tyler. Any relation to…Jaqueline Prentice? That's my mother. My dad was Peter Kraft."
Rose struggled not to show too much emotion on her face. "Er…no. My mum's name is J…Josephine. My dad is, er...Adam...Tyler."
Akura looked somewhat disappointed. The Doctor looked like he wanted to laugh, but was too confused to do so.
"Well, my…older brother could have…no, that wouldn't make sense, would it? No offense, but you look way too old for Ricky to have been your dad. How old are you?"
"Twenty-one. You?"
Akura grinned. "Twenty-two. Well, almost. My birthday's not until April, but I like the number twenty-two." She gasped. "Do you think we could be twins?"
"September," Rose lied quickly. Akura's face fell.
"Well, that's just as well. Ricky—he was thirty-four—and my parents…well, they died a few months back, along with my boyfriend. Car crash. They were on their way to visit me in London, where I met Martha a couple of years ago. I like to travel," Akura smiled grimly, "but I haven't really felt up to it since then."
The Doctor and Rose looked at Martha, who refused to either confirm or deny Akura's statement.
"I'm sorry," Rose offered compulsorily. Akura waved her off.
"Eh, Martha's been helping me." Akura smiled brightly at Martha, who had the fleeting thought that because she wasn't blinded by it, it wasn't real at all. "I stayed with her for a while until she suggested moving out here to get a new start. She had friends that lived here before, I think. Isn't that right?"
Martha nodded stiffly. She had needed to play along these last months with whatever Akura believed was the truth, even when she herself didn't know what that was. She was used to it by now.
"Yeah, they were travelers too. Settled down here for a while until they needed to get moving again. I haven't heard from them in years, but I thought this might be a nice place to…start over."
To her relief, the waiter returned just then with their drinks, refilling the Doctor's and Rose's iced teas and reassuring them that their food would only be a few minutes more.
"So, that accent," said Akura when he was gone. "Are you from London?"
"Yeah." Rose was now recovering from the shock of seeing what could be her future amnesiac self. "I'm visiting a friend of mine." She nudged the Doctor's shoulder with her own.
"Yeah?" Akura turned her head to appraise the Doctor. "So, what about you? Why did you move from London? Or are from somewhere else?"
"London," he agreed. Then he put on a new accent, "Born and raised in Scotland, though. I had some disagreements with my family and came to America to get away."
Akura was delighted. If Martha hadn't known any better, she may have even been convinced. Even Rose looked impressed.
"Pretty coincidental then, isn't it?" said Rose. "Us meeting here, no relation to each other…looking so much alike."
She gave a significant look to Martha, who again struggled not to reveal anything on her face.
"Very coincidental," agreed the Doctor.
"Coincidental," Martha muttered quietly.
"Well I, for one, do not believe in coincidences," said Akura. "I think sometimes things in the universe align just right, you know? Not fate, not destiny, just circumstances meeting up with other circumstances. Maybe it was meant to happen, but more likely it's this...cosmic build-up of the choices we make. Does that make sense? Sorry, philosophy's not exactly my area of expertise."
"No, I get what you mean," said Rose. "Completely. I mean, yeah, sometimes things just seem to good to be true, yeah? Or bad. Like, unbelievably bad. And it makes you want to believe that it was supposed to happen like that."
"Right? But it depends on choices."
"But then there's this: what if, no matter what, we were always going to make the same choices because of who we are. Then are we really choosing?"
Akura shook her head emphatically. "No, see, it's not like that. We change, you know? We're changing all the time. What we are one minute may not be what we are in the next, so we could make different choices than what our basic human nature says we will."
"There is no basic human nature," Rose argued promptly. "People are too different. And sure, we're changing, but what if they way we change is sort of predetermined, too? Like, we all start out with a unique soul that can and will change, but only a certain way?"
To Martha's alarm, Akura paled with a stricken expression. "It can't be, though. People can choose to change, for better or worse."
Rose seemed to sense that she'd distressed her counterpart.
"No, of course," she said. "Of course we can choose to change. I'm not saying that we're limited to being certain things, I just mean that there has to be something unique about each and every one of us. An' that uniqueness, right, is what doesn't change; it sort of-guides us along, d'you know what I mean? Like even if we don't know exactly who we are, and no matter how we change, I'm still me, you're still...you, down at the bottom of it all, at the heart."
They both fell silent then, Rose out of the strangeness of having just philosophically argued with herself and Akura withdrawing to think.
The Doctor and Martha had been watching the exchange with bemusement and now exchanged weary gazes.
"Do I know you from somewhere?" the Doctor said suddenly, peering at Martha. "You look familiar."
"I don't think—"
"Hold on, hold on, you were the one that—"
"Doctor, I really don't think—"
"A-ha!"
Martha fought the urge to beat her head against the table. Rose nudged the Doctor, who loudly coughed to cover up his a-ha moment, causing Akura to stare at him incredulously.
"You aren't fooling anyone," she said flatly, and the Doctor stopped, looking put out. Rose covered her eyes with one hand, shaking her head.
Just then, the waiter appeared with Akura's and Martha's food. Martha went through the motions of preparing to eat but couldn't bring herself to put anything in her mouth for fear of sicking up.
"So," said Akura after taking a bite of her burger. "How do you two know each other?"
"He was my doctor a few years back," Martha blurted before the Doctor could say anything and bungle things up even more. "Yeah, I was in Denver on a, um, field trip. Broke my ankle hiking through the mountains. Really, I'm surprised he remembers me. He looked a lot different back then." She glared at him pointedly.
"Right," the Doctor confirmed, nodding. "Of course, I remember you, with your…ankle…all swollen and—what was your name again? Martha, right? Martha what?"
Martha glared murder at him, but put on the spot she didn't have a choice. What the hell was wrong with him? Surely he'd deduced that they were from his future, why would ask about it? Why hadn't he and Rose left already? Surely now that they'd talked with Akura, they could leave without making Akura suspicious of anything.
"Jones. I'm Martha Jones."
"Right, right. Pleased to meet you again, Martha, under much better circumstances, I'd say." He winked at Akura, showing that he'd listened. Akura smiled a little shyly, tongue sticking between her teeth. The Doctor blinked and looked at Rose before smiling back at Akura.
Rose had her eyes narrowed, like she was trying to remember Martha as well. Martha saw in her eyes when she pinpointed that moment in the alley, but Rose quickly controlled her expression so Akura wouldn't notice anything amiss. Martha wasn't sure if she'd be able to work Rose into her bullshit story, too.
Suddenly, Akura jumped, dropping a salty chip into a small pool of ketchup. She reached into her back pocket, bumping elbows with Martha, and pulled out her phone. Sure, Martha rolled her eyes, now the damn thing was taking messages.
With Akura distracted, Martha frantically gestured for the Doctor and Rose to take their leave. Rose just sat back and crossed her arms, stretching her legs out and forcing Martha to bring her own in close. The Doctor munched on a chip and grinned when Martha glared at him.
You have to leave, she mouthed emphatically.
Rose cleared her throat and used her head to gesture at Akura, who had put her phone down and was hastily scarfing the last half of her burger.
"Sorry," she said, "I'd really love to talk more, but I didn't expect to be running into…" she eyed Rose, "well, someone so beautiful, and I have plans I can't postpone."
Martha stared at her. What plans?
Sensing her gaze, Akura wiped her hands and mouth on a napkin before touching Martha's arm and leaning close to whisper, "Don't worry, I just promised Kitty and her mom that I'd help them move into their new apartment." She leaned back to look Martha in the eye. "You trust me, don't you?"
Martha wasn't sure she did, actually, but she didn't want to say that, in case she was pushed away again.
"It's not a matter of trust," said Martha quietly. "You practically said yourself my job is to protect you, remember?"
Akura smiled brightly and leaned forward one more time to say in Martha's ear, "I know." Then she gently pushed on Martha's arm and Martha reluctantly stood up to let her out. "We have to meet again sometime," she said to Rose. Rose smiled tightly and and nodded. "Get her number for me?" Akura asked Martha, touching her shoulder. Martha agreed, and Akura finally, blissfully, left.
As soon as the café door closed, Martha heaved a huge sigh of relief, closing her eyes. Then the Doctor coughed and her eyes shot open. She stood up and pulled Rose along with her.
"You two, come with me," Martha bit out. She tossed enough money to cover hers and Akura's food and barely gave Rose enough time to do the same. Then she yanked Rose along behind her as she marched out and down the street towards the TARDIS. The Doctor hurried to keep up.
She kept up a litany of curses under her breath as they walked, not giving either of them a chance to say a word. Ignoring the TARDIS that was standing far too conspicuously in the alley (Christ, what if Akura had seen it?), Martha pulled open the rusty shed door and ushered Rose and the Doctor inside. Then she pulled the key from around her neck and unlocked the door to her TARDIS, as she was growing fond of calling it.
The Doctor and Rose hesitated at the threshold before following Martha inside. They stared around at the darkened interior in shock.
"What happened?" whispered Rose, horrified.
Martha, who had taken a moment to greet the ship with a palm to the center console, spun around to face her, furious.
"I'll tell you what happened!" Martha all but shouted. "You two are going to get us all bleeding killed! First it was Dumbo," she pointed an accusing finger at the Doctor, who looked properly offended, "and then you come back, and not only do you come back, but you just sit there all dumb and shocked and innocent and IN THE PAST the one day Akurainsists on going to the bleedin' Corner. Do have any idea how much danger you've put us all in? God damn you, everything was going fine!"
Far from out of steam but hopelessly out of breath, Martha stopped and stood there panting and wishing her glare could melt the both of them on the spot.
"Where am I? Future me, I mean." The Doctor asked as though Martha were not in the process of giving them a good eye-thrashing.
Martha's eye twitched. "I think you're at the flat," she lied. "The one we're all sharing because I can't let the two of you out of my sight without the world falling apart."
"Why's that, then?" Rose spoke up. "How come I can't remember who I am?"
Martha merely replied with a sharp glare.
"Oh, come on, cat's out of the bag," said the Doctor. "Although, I never understood that saying. What does that even mean, to let the cat out of the bag? What was it doing in there in the first place? Wouldn't it suffocate?"
"Don't be stupid," Martha snapped. "I'm not exactly new to this, I'll have you know. I tell either of you anything, bad things happen. You already know too much, I think. Anyway, how do you change your face like that? A couple weeks ago you were…different."
"I regenerated."
"I'm gonna die, Martha. I can't…I might regenerate, or something; I don't want to change, I can't…"
Martha frowned at the memory of Rose's terrified voice.
"What's that?"
"It's sort of a Time Lord's way of cheating death. When I die, every cell in my body changes, making me a new person. New face, new Doctor, same memories."
Well, this was new. Is that what happened to Rose on Omega? Did she die and change? But no, that couldn't be right; Rose was still Rose, she hadn't changed a bit, except for her hair.
"You were so rude that night," said Rose suddenly. "I just remembered when we were at the diner; what the hell were you hassling her for, anyway?"
"Oi, she had psychic paper! And a key to the TARDIS!"
"Yeah, this one, obviously! God, you're so daft, you couldn't just leave her be—"
"Hey!" Martha interrupted before the Doctor could retort. She'd gathered that this one was more talkative but just as rude and insulting as the one with the leather jacket. Come to think of leather jackets, wasn't that rather Rose's style, now? Was that where she'd gotten it from? Or could that be a coincidence? Recalling what Akura had said about coincidence, Martha felt another urge to rip out her own hair.
Rose and the Doctor ignored her, though. Martha tried again to get their attention, but they were debating the finer points of what was and was not justifiably rude. Rolling her eyes, she reached into her jacket and pulled out the sonic screwdriver. Changing it to a setting Rose had shown her once to take care of a nasty infestation of poisonous bats when they were trapped in the vast Caverns of Leonis, she flicked the switch and a piercing buzz cut through the air.
They winced and covered their ears, as expected, then stared in disbelief at the glowing yellow probe in her hand. Satisfied, if a little deaf now herself, she tucked it back into her jacket.
"Why was it yellow?" Rose demanded.
Martha was puzzled, but decided not to dwell on it; she needed to make them leave.
"Anyway, you have get out of here. The longer you stay, the more dangerous it is."
"Nah, I don't think that really matters. Well, it might be dangerous to be here, but staying might not be. Well, I say it might not be-"
"Doctor, what year did you say it was?"
"2059. No, wait—it has to be at least 2065. Oh! Hang on, no, it might not be, er…Martha?"
Martha rolled her eyes.
"It's December 2069." Rose exchanged another look with the Doctor. "Why? Is that important?"
"How much longer were you planning on staying?"
"Erm…about a week or so."
Rose breathed a sigh of relief. "Should we tell her?"
"Sure, I like telling people things about the future. It's a bit like poking a sleeping dragon. Fun and games until the part where you burst into flame."
"That was not my fault."
"No? My mistake, it must have been some other evil, pink and yellow…beast that said, 'Ooh, look, a sleeping dragon. I've never fought a dragon before. I wonder what it feels like to get torched; let's wake it up and make it play with us for a while.'"
"Shut up, I did not say that. I thought it was fake."
"Well, it was just a robot. Mind you, it was just a robot that lit a fire right under our—"
"All right, I'm sorry. How many times do I have to say it? You'd think it would be easy to get over that—"
"You weren't the one that lost a perfectly good jacket—"
"No, I just climbed on top of the thing and used my flaming shoe to melt its eyes—"
"But then you only had the one shoe and you were running so slow—"
"Still faster than you. Anyway, Martha just said she's not going to be here much longer. It's nothing like the dragon-robot-thing."
"But she knows people that are going to be here next year, Rose, and that's what matters."
"Well, we ended it, didn't we? I mean, it didn't go on for more than a few months, anyway."
"But people died, Rose. Would you want to know that your friends could possibly die in the future when there is nothing you can do about it?"
"Yes!"
"Okay, fine, but do you think Martha would want to know?"
"Yes!" Martha finally shouted, pleased to affirm her own existence in the universe.
The Doctor stared at her, gobsmacked.
"Well…you can't."
Martha rolled her eyes.
"That's too bad since I already figured it out. Let me guess, there's gonna be another world war before the end of this year."
Rose and the Doctor were silent. Martha's eyes went wide.
"Oh my God, I'm right?"
"Well..."
Martha cursed.
"Why?" she demanded. "What the hell starts it?"
Rose shrugged. "We're not really sure, actually."
"The violence broke out around Lupus Nocens somewhere around the end of December, but no one knows what caused it. The town was vaporized by nuclear attack in January."
"SOMEone knows," Rose disagreed as Martha flinched at the news of nuclear vaporization next month. "But everyone blames each other for it and the real story never came out. Anything from giant wolves to murderous robots could have been the ones to actually start the war."
"Probably the one about the wolves," muttered Martha.
Rose and the Doctor peered at Martha speculatively.
"You know, Akuro means 'evil wolf' in Japanese."
"Yeah, and the town is called Lupus Nocens, and that café down the street is Bad Wolf Corner, there's a club not too far from our flat called Wolf Den, the school mascot is a wolf, and the local radio station is called 'The Howling.' The whole universe has gone mad with this 'bad wolf' thing. What of it?"
The other two exchanged a very significant glance that filled Martha with burning frustration.
"Well?!"
"Where else have you seen the message?"
Ha! So it was a message.
"Where haven't I, more like," Martha muttered. "It's everywhere, and it's the worst here, and this damn machine," she kicked the console out of spite, "knows it!" The TARDIS thrummed as best it could in protest, but it was barely existent since it was running off emergency power. Martha huffed. "I wish Rose had told me what it meant," she said, mostly to herself. "But maybe she couldn't see it."
"She saw it," said the Doctor. "How could she not? But that's behind us, it's over, it happened, it's done. Haven't seen anything remotely wolf-like since 1879."
Martha gave him a scathing look, and his smile faded.
"Sorry. But seriously, it probably means nothing."
Martha wondered why she kept looking to the Doctor for answers. She didn't even know the man…alien. So she looked at Rose instead.
"Is he right? Does it really mean nothing?"
Rose opened her mouth to reply, then shut it. The Doctor nudged her subtly with his shoulder, but she crossed her arms and looked down and to the side. The Doctor huffed.
"Of course it's nothing," he said. "Right? Has to be."
"Did we never tell you about Satellite Five?" Rose asked Martha.
Martha frowned, wracking her brain. Satellite Five, Satellite Five…
"No. I guess it never came up."
"Well, Rose and I are always for moving on, living in the future, not the past—well, sometimes in the past, but not ours; you know how it goes."
Martha returned her gaze to Rose. She studied the blonde for the first time since her panicked run into the Corner. This past Rose held herself a little differently, a bit more slouched, more fidgety, more self-conscious, deferent and almost clinging to the Doctor. Even in the gloom of the half-dead TARDIS, her big doe eyes seemed brighter and browner, no unearthly gold flecks or haunted pain or anger. Like the universe was a great big joke and only she and the Doctor were privy to its humor. She still had that strong, defiant tilt in her chin, but she was wearing too much makeup and her lips seemed to always be on the verge of a smile that was too bright, too genuine for her to even be the same person that Martha knew. This Rose was free and hopeful and happy, but she was limited by both her innocence and her dependence on the Doctor. She seemed so young.
Martha hadn't realized that she'd spoken that last sentences out loud until Rose protested, "Oi, I can't be much younger than you!"
And she wasn't, Martha knew. But that hadn't been what she'd meant, anyway.
"I meant…" her voice trailed off. "You changed so much, didn't you." It wasn't a question, and to Martha's horror, her eyes were beginning to sting. She quckly blinked the tears away.
Rose seemed a bit perturbed, and Martha forced herself to think on other things.
The Doctor was reluctant to talk about Satellite Five, whatever that was, but if it had a connection to Bad Wolf, then Martha needed to learn about it or she might not be able to protect Akura from whatever came next.
"Why are you so eager for us to leave, anyway?" the Doctor's eyes were shrewd as he watched Martha watch Rose. She wondered what he saw, whether he'd guessed that she knew his companion far better than she knew him. "Obviously we're hiding from something, but what could be so dangerous that Rose and I would have to wipe our memories? I mean, I'm assuming that mine got wiped as well, if hers did. And why are you the one left protecting us?"
Martha refused to answer. "Tell me about Satellite Five," she said instead.
The Doctor frowned. "No."
"What if I need to know?"
"You don't."
"Hold on, though, Doctor," Rose interrupted. "Something's still not making sense."
"What? What are you talking about, what isn't?"
"Well, Martha said that you were somewhere around here, sharing a flat with her and—and Akura, right? But then why didn't Akura recognize you?"
"Different face," said Martha quickly, trying to cover her tracks. "I didn't recognize him either, but since he was with you, I just assumed—"
"No, you didn't," Rose contradicted. "You knew who both of us were right away, I saw you look at him first when you came marching up to our table, like you were surprised to see him there, but you knew who he was. What are you playing at?" The blonde was getting angry now, more closely resembling the Rose that Martha was used to.
"Tell me about Satellite Five," Martha insisted, trying to change the subject.
"I'm not here, am I?" The Doctor stepped closer. "Are you trying to steal the TARDIS? Maybe I wiped Rose's memory to protect her and ran because you were an enemy."
Martha scoffed. "You'd never run off without her." She knew he would run off in a heartbeat, though. Running was essential to this kind of life.
The Doctor got a funny look on his face.
"And neither would you, hm? You said to Akura that it was your job to protect her, and you weren't lying about that. Which can only mean that I'm not here…because something happened to me." Rose gasped, covering her mouth with both hands. "Something happened to me and now Rose is in hiding because of it."
Martha stared at him. A snort escaped her before she could stop it, then her lips twitched, until finally she was doubled over with laughter. She wiped a tear from her eye and looked up to acknowledge their bemused expressions but a fit of giggles corrupted her again.
Regaining her composure, she smiled patronizingly at the Doctor, "You are so full of it, aren't you? Really, you are. Your Lordship." She snorted again and tried to not start chuckling. "You are just so…arrogant. It's amazing, truly, it is. I had no idea anyone's ego could get so huge."
Nonplussed, the Doctor looked to Rose for help, who shrugged.
"Look, I'll tell you that you've got it all wrong, but only because it's embarrassing to think that my Rose is in hiding because of you. I won't tell you anything more than that, though. Please understand that this is your future we're talking about, hell, living in right now, and unless you're going to tell me about whatever Satellite Five is and what it has to do with Bad Wolf, then you need to leave. Right now."
"There's nothing to it," the Doctor protested. "Any-any remains of Bad Wolf that might be lying around...well, that's just coincidence."
Martha leveled a flat stare at him. He flushed.
Rose, however, no longer seemed to gravitate toward the Doctor. She was thinking, and coming to some conclusion that Martha couldn't see until Rose opened her mouth.
"Do you know what a Dalek is?"
"Rose, no—"
"Doctor, shut up. She deserves to know, all right?" The Doctor clamped his mouth shut, plopping himself down on the tan seat. Rose nodded with satisfaction and leaned up against the console with Martha. "So, do you?"
"Yes."
"Right, so you know how nasty they are. Well, their Emperor—"
"Emperor?!" Martha gasped. Rose glared. "Sorry. Continue."
"Their Emperor was building a huge army by luring humans from Earth onto Satellite Five, a massive space station where humans played game shows where their lives literally depended on the outcome. The Daleks used transmat beams to transport the competitors onto a Dalek ship, where they were…converted. There were millions of them."
Rose paused. Martha was picturing the Daleks she'd seen in New York, multiplied by a million. She shuddered. Being struck by lightning was not fun, but she'd do it over and over if it meant keeping those wretched things out of existence.
"The Doctor, Jack, and I…sorry, do you know who Jack is?" Martha thought of the Face of Boe and nodded silently. "Anyway, we were taken from the TARDIS and forced to compete in the shows. We escaped and found the people who ran the shows and tried to stop it. Then the Daleks revealed themselves and the Doctor tried to rig up a delta wave transmitter to kill them all. Trouble was, the delta wave wasn't just going to kill the Daleks, it was going to kill everything. So he…" she stopped and glared at the Doctor, who looked more smug than remorseful.
"He sent you away," Martha guessed.
"Tricked me, more like. Anyway, I had to get back, but I didn't think it could be done, since I can't fly the TARDIS." Yet, Martha thought with amusement. "Then I saw the message—Bad Wolf—scattered all over the estate, and I knew I had to do something and I knew that there had to be a way. So I had Mickey, my boyfriend," Martha rose an eyebrow at this tidbit, "use a big yellow truck hooked up to the console to open up the heart of the TARDIS."
"The heart of the TARDIS?" Martha questioned. "What is that?"
"A window into the time vortex," said the Doctor. He was reclining with his hands laced behind his head, but he didn't look relaxed. "It is a direct connection to the fabric of space and time, really sort of an anomaly in the space-time continuum. It's where the TARDIS gets its power. A Slitheen was once regressed to an egg when she looked into the heart because she wished for a clean slate. Rose, though…" his voice trailed off in awe.
Martha didn't know what a Slitheen was, but she figured that this heart was pretty freaking powerful.
"When I looked into it, I…well, I don't exactly remember what happened, but the heart gave me complete control over all of space and time."
Martha's eyebrows shot towards her hairline.
"Yeah, I know. I used it to make the TARDIS bring me back to Satellite Five. The energy of the time vortex was running through my head…and I turned the Daleks to dust with a wave of my hand."
Martha's jaw dropped a little. Holy bleeding hell.
"That wasn't it, though. The words Bad Wolf had been following us around since I started traveling with the Doctor, and it was important to bringing me back to him in time to save his life. While I still had the power, I scattered the words across time and space as a message. A warning, of sorts."
"How come you're not still all…y'know…god-like?"
"Oh, the Doctor took it out of me because it was killing me. No one's meant to have that much power, and it was burning me up. Even the Doctor, after he took it…he was forced to regenerate."
"Ohh."
Well. This was definitely interesting. It certainly made Martha re-think every odd, eerily supernatural thing that Rose had ever done. That incident in Bethlam Hospital with Shakespeare was the first thing that came to mind. She remembered how the Carrionite had claimed that one touch would cause death, but when she touched Rose, Rose seemed to explode with that blinding golden aura of light. Then there was that unnatural sickness that the Doctor himself had to help Martha cure…
It was troublesome. The Rose that was standing in front of her was almost positively one hundred percent human. Had looking into the heart of the TARDIS started the process of mutating Rose's DNA? At this point in her timeline, had Rose shown any signs of changing into something inhuman? At Royal Hope, Rose had seemed honestly surprised that the Judoon's scanners labeled her as non human.
Was this why Rose had never told her anything, because she genuinely didn't know the answers?
"So, with the message being here…"
"It can't mean anything," the Doctor insisted yet again. "Satellite Five is done, it's over."
Martha looked at him thoughtfully. What had happened at Satellite Five would never be over, Martha thought. It had changed Rose's life permanently, changed her into something else. She didn't know it yet, perhaps, but one day her DNA would mutate into something else. The Doctor was wrong. It was never over.
But she couldn't very well tell him that, could she?
"What confuses me is that I never mentioned it to you before. I mean, think about it, you said it's been everywhere. I would have noticed that."
Martha thought so, too, but it was awkward talking to Rose about her future self, so she tried to move the conversation along.
"It doesn't really matter right now why you never told me. What worries me is that it seems your all-powerful self decided to warn us about something here, in this town, and I don't know what it is. Considering everything going on right now…God, if they find us…"
"The Family!" The Doctor shouted, jumping to his feet. Rose jumped, bumping into Martha. "Of course! It makes perfect sense now. If the Family felt that there was even a shadow of an echo of a sliver of a trace of Huon particles or time vortex energy in Rose, they would go after her, and the best, really sort of the only way to beat them is to let them starve to death, so Rose would have to hide, which meeeeansss," he darted around the console to other side, where the Chameleon Arch was still lowered, hiding in the shadows. He looked daunted by the confirmation of his theory. "The Chameleon Arch. That would certainly account for the identity crisis. Where's the watch?"
Martha's hand instinctively flinched toward the front right pocket of her jeans to cover it protectively. The Doctor's eyes followed the movement.
"Doctor? What's the Chameleon Arch? Who are the Family? What Family?"
"Let me see it," the Doctor coaxed. Martha took a step back and shook her head firmly, pressing her hand against her jeans. "I promise not to touch it," he said, "I just want to see it."
Reluctantly, Martha pulled out the intricately engraved fob watch and held it out for the Doctor to examine. He reached into his coat pocket and took out a pair of glasses that looked rather dashing on him, and peered closely at the watch in the dim green light emitting from the console. True to his word, he didn't try to touch it, which was just as well since Martha would have decked him if he had. This was her Rose Tyler that she held in her hands, and she wouldn't let anyone take her away.
He did lean close enough to take a great big whiff of the watch though, and then cocked his head to the side like a dog listening for something in the distance. Rose moved closer and to Martha's astonishment copied the Doctor's actions, closing her eyes and frowning in concentration. Unnerved, Martha snatched the watch from under their noses and put back in her pocket. They both jerked back and shook their heads as if waking from a daze.
"Did you hear that?" asked Rose.
"Yes," the Doctor sounded distant. "That was…interesting. Very, very interesting."
"But what was it? It sounded so familiar…"
"I don't know. I've never heard anything like it before. Tell you what though, that howl at the end, that was so…"
"Chilling?"
"Oh, freezing. Terrifying. Like freefalling into a neverending pit."
"Got much experience with that, have you?" Martha worked her way into their dazed back-and-forth, annoyed that she hadn't heard whatever they had.
"Yes, actually. Long story. Fun, though. Sort of. Well, thrilling anyway."
"Not exactly the words I would've used," muttered Rose.
"Sure it was," said the Doctor, throwing an arm around Rose's shoulders. "Remember what it felt like when the rocket started turning around? Sort of like, like, like, like…"
"Escaping a black hole?"
"That's it!"
There was a part of Martha that was intensely curious about the legend behind their banter, but Rose changed the subject before she could venture to ask.
"So…why hasn't the world ended?" Rose posed the question so casually she might as well have been asking what was for supper.
"I expect that it hasn't ended because this was supposed to happen this way."
"What d'you mean?"
"Well, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy, innit? Look at it this way: if you hadn't seen this watch right now, and if I never explained to you what the Chameleon Arch is or how to deal with the Family of Blood, then in the future you wouldn't be able to use the Arch to keep the Family from finding you. Of course, I would never explain what the Chameleon Arch is in the first place if it wasn't clear that you have to use it in the future. Even better, I never would have figured out that you needed to use the Arch if you hadn't told Martha about Satellite Five, which explains why she didn't know about it before; if she had, then you wouldn't have told her right now."
"So what you're saying is," Martha interjected crossly, "it's a good thing you didn't listen to me right from the off and get the hell out of here when I told you to."
The Doctor looked at Martha with a grin. "Pretty much, yeah."
Martha sighed in exasperation and rubbed her temples, mumbling under her breath about time traveling and headaches and too many freakin' secrets being kept from her by Rose. She eyed the switches on the console that would activate the message Rose had left behind, the one that looked like it had been made the same day they went to "old" New York.
"Did I tell you anything in advance, then?" Rose asked Martha as though reading her mind.
Rose, Martha observed, apparently understood that it wasn't necessary for the Doctor to tell her everything she needed to know right this second, since she wasn't asking him questions. No, she knew their time with Martha was limited.
It was somewhat intriguing to Martha that now that the Doctor and his genius alien brain had figured out what was really going on, it was obvious that the Doctor wasn't around at all in Martha's timeline, yet neither of them said anything about it. Perhaps they were happier living in denial. Perhaps Rose had lied when she'd said that she would want to know if she was going to lose a friend and there was nothing she could do to stop it. It pained Martha to think that either of them could have seen their separation coming in advance.
"Not really. I mean, you don't know exactly when it's going to happen, right? So you wouldn't know when to tell me anything."
"But if we were running from this Family, how did I have time to explain everything to you before the Chameleon Arch wiped my memories or whatever it does?"
Martha bit her tongue and forced her eyes to remain steady on Rose and not stray to the console screen. Rose seemed to accept her silence as a matter of course, and nodded to the Doctor.
"We should get going then, yeah? In case we alert the Family?"
"Oh, it's too late for that," remarked the Doctor blandly. "The TARDIS was quite careless bringing you here, I think, since we come here all the time for chips. But maybe that was the point."
He may as well have dumped ice cold water over Martha's head.
"What? What do you mean? Have they found us? Answer me!"
"Hard to say, really, but I doubt that my TARDIS has gone unnoticed."
Martha was so infuriated she couldn't speak. If it wouldn't create an irreversible paradox, she could kill him right now, she was so angry.
Rose was doing a great job of not panicking, though.
"But Doctor, isn't that a bad thing?"
"It's terrible," the Doctor nodded emphatically. "Horrible. No good. Very bad. …Wait, hold on—"
"Doctor!"
"Right, sorry, but it's not our problem, Rose. It's Martha's now."
"But—but—but that's our future!"
"And our future," he mimicked Rose, "is in Martha's hands. No pressure, by the way."
"Right," said Martha faintly, feeling woozy. Wasn't she supposed to be in a state of frantic emergency right now?
The Doctor was pulling Rose out the TARDIS door, but looked over his shoulder at Martha when she called out to him.
"How—how am I supposed to do this?"
The Doctor hummed thoughtfully.
"Well… Out of curiosity, what did Rose say to you when she gave you that watch?" He covered Rose's ears with his hands, which obviously annoyed her although she made no effort to remove them.
Martha hesitated, but since the Doctor wouldn't be there… "She said—the last thing she said—I mean," she stomped her foot slightly and looked up at the high ceiling, frustrated at her inability to spit it out. "She told me she believed in me."
The Doctor grinned brilliantly, showing all his teeth, and took his hands away from Rose's head.
"There we go, then!"
Rose looked from the Doctor's insane grin to Martha, who had her hands in her jacket and was glaring at the Doctor's shining, dark eyes.
"I don't want to know," muttered Rose. She grabbed the Doctor's hand and pulled him outside.
When the door shut the behind them, the TARDIS felt cold and empty.
ΘΣ … ΘΣ … ΘΣ
The next five days were painfully normal.
Shortly after returning to school and her old group of friends, Akura had met Kitty Orman's half-brother, Isaac, who worked as a tour guide at a museum in Denver, which was only thirty minutes away from Lupus Nocens. Isaac was taking online classes at Brighton in the hopes of eventually becoming an astrophysicist; he spent much of his free time actively stargazing. Akura was deeply enamored with his boyish charm and optimistic fire, but Martha saw him as a threat.
Martha didn't meet him until the day after her talk with Rose and the Doctor.
"Martha," called Akura as she walked in the door, "I want you to meet someone!"
Isaac was extraordinarily plain. He was tall, thin, and sort of geeky-looking, with glasses, messy blonde hair, and a form-fitting t-shirt depicting a stick figure bashing its head into a keyboard.
Akura introduced him as just a friend, but Martha could tell that they wouldn't stay that way for long, judging mostly by the lingering looks they gave each other when they thought they could get away with it. Isaac was a decent enough fellow, but his mere existence drove Martha up the wall with irritation.
After all, Martha planned to open the watch in just over a week. Surely Rose would have no patience or time for someone like Isaac when she returned. Isaac, Martha thought, was the sort to enjoy the adventures of an ordinary life, with all the risks and thrills restricted therein, but would fall apart if forced to confront the enormity of the universe. Even if the man's character could withstand it, Martha didn't think Rose would want to have to look after more than one companion. And as childish as it sounded in her head, Martha was here first.
Besides, there was also Rose's message to consider. If the Doctor was right, and the Family had followed their TARDIS to Lupus Nocens, no one could be trusted. They could have killed anyone and used their body to get close to Akura. Martha had been in hiding long enough now that she considered herself nominally paranoid about everyone that showed even an inclination towards befriending Akura. If you can, keep me from getting too close to anyone, just in case.
Isaac's rather abrupt appearance was exactly the sort of thing Martha needed to watch out for. It didn't help that she and Akura were attempting to rekindle a friendship that had faded because the damn TARDIS couldn't construct a better background story than one that was ridiculously close enough to the truth to corrupt the poor human woman's brain. Martha tentatively offered a slightly negative opinion of Isaac once the man had gone back home, but since her arguments were weak, Akura dismissed them.
So for four days Martha endured Akura's excessive nattering about Isaac's great hair, and sparkling eyes, and sense of adventure, and amazing outlook on the world. The only reason Martha didn't panic was because she knew that Akura was still recovering from whatever Argen and his friends had done to her, which was such a double-bladed consideration she hated herself for it. But even Martha could not initiate physical contact without earning at least a flinch. And although Akura still spent every night out with her friends, she always came home before midnight, sober, and Martha knew she didn't spend much, if any, time alone with Isaac.
Still, the date she and Rose had agreed to open the watch was approaching slowly and Martha's nerves were stretched taut with the stress of it; her body felt like a tightly-strung bow just waiting to release an unseen arrow into the shadows.
She blamed stress for the row she had with Akura on Friday morning in the front hallway, probably close enough to the door for passing neighbors to hear them. Akura had declared that she wanted to try dancing with Isaac at the Wolf Den and it would be easier if Martha came along. Martha thought it was too soon, but Akura insisted that it was actually Doctor Marsch, her biweekly therapist, who had suggested the night out.
Martha didn't find the idea of sitting at the bar watching Akura dance with Isaac and probably a bunch of strangers very thrilling, and she didn't hesitate to say as much.
"Why?" Akura demanded. "I mean, don't you want to see me get better?"
That was a low blow and Akura seemed to realize this, for she averted her eyes from Martha's as soon as she said it. Martha took a moment to reply without saying something she'd regret.
"I don't think gyrating between Isaac Orman and a room full of hot and sweaty strangers is the way to do that." Okay, so the moment didn't last quite long enough, but she'd tried.
Akura clenched her jaw stubbornly, looking so much like Rose that Martha felt a sharp pang in the vicinity of her chest.
"I handled it just fine right after my detox, remember? What's so different now?"
The woman had a point, and Martha wasn't sure how to argue against it.
"It…it's a Friday," she said weakly. "It wasn't as busy then as it will be tonight."
Akura stared. Her eyes screamed, "Bullshit!" but instead of saying that aloud she sighed. "Why don't you like Isaac, Martha?" At Martha's surprise, she laughed bitterly. "Don't think I haven't noticed. I pay a lot more attention than you think I do."
Martha crossed her arms and replied evenly, "I don't trust him."
"You don't trust anyone."
"I trust you."
"No, you don't." Akura's eyes dared her to challenge the statement, and Martha naively took the bait.
"Yes, I do! If I didn't, d'you think I'd ever let you out of my sight? D'you think I'd let you go out every night with your friends? I don't trust them, but I trust you to do the right thing."
"Then why don't you want me to go to the Den tonight? Why didn't you get me Rose Tyler's number like I asked you to? Why are you always so worried about me? Why can't you just let me try to be happy with someone?"
Martha was thrown by Akura saying Rose's name so casually, so it took a second for her to respond. She'd been foolish to think that Akura would forget that incident so easily, but Martha had not heard her mention it since it happened.
"I don't want you to go to the Den because it's dangerous, Rose." Martha froze. Shit. "…Tyler had a family emergency to get to before she could give me her number and I forgot to tell you." She peered at Akura, who hadn't seemed to register anything amiss after Martha's recovery. She plowed on, "And I just think you should give these things time. Everybody has little bit of good and bad in them, and I don't want the bad to ever take advantage of you."
Akura narrowed her eyes. Martha saw something indefinable flash across them, something that made her stomach swoop oddly. She wondered for the first time just how similar this human really was to Rose, if she would catch her accidental slip—the first she'd had in these three months—and make the implausible connection. Akura opened her mouth but apparently changed her mind at the last second, because she shut it again and lunged forward to encompass Martha in a warm embrace.
When the other woman pulled back, Martha hoped she looked as confused as she felt, because her voice wasn't working. Akura smiled and Martha's heart stuttered.
"Thank you for caring," she said softly. With that, she spun on her heel and marched out the door, past a gawking little girl with a balloon, leaving Martha staring dumbly after her.
Hadn't they just been fighting? What the bleeding hell was that?
ΘΣ … ΘΣ … ΘΣ
With that morning, Martha had a really bad feeling about the rest of the day. She was tense and distracted through all of her classes, which she only went to in order to keep herself occupied, which wasn't working today. She saw Akura at lunch and incessantly roved her gaze over the masses, looking for potential threats. Twice she had to stop herself from marching over to their little group and punching the lights out of anyone that breached an imaginary three-foot bubble around Akura, although in both cases it had been Akura willingly reaching out to someone.
The whole thing had Martha severely frazzled.
That afternoon, Martha persuaded Akura to play a first-person shooter with her, during which Akura remarked that she had a friend that knew how to win without shooting anything. However, when Martha asked her to specify who, Akura didn't know.
Martha cooked the both of them a simple peppercorn steak because Akura would probably have burnt down the building if allowed. During the meal, Akura convinced Martha to go to the Wolf Den. How that happened, Martha wasn't entirely sure.
"It'll just be me, you, and Isaac, you know. No one else wanted to come; they're having a party in one of the frat houses tonight."
"Were you invited?"
"Yeah."
"And you declined?"
"Of course."
They finished the rest of the meal in silence. Since there weren't many dishes to clean up, they worked together by hand; Martha washed and Akura toweled them dry and put them away. It was soothing the way they never needed to say anything, they just did it. They worked well together.
When the last fork was tucked away in its drawer, Akura turned to Martha and smiled.
"Well, it's getting near dark now, we should get ready."
She left the kitchen and for the second time that day Martha stared after her in shock.
Martha did believe that she had just been quite effectively manipulated.
Sighing, Martha went to her bedroom to change out of her comfortable sweats and into a long-sleeved blouse and jeans. She made a little effort with her hair, taking it down so it hung straight, which she thought made her look prettier. A spritz of perfume and a bit of lip gloss later, and she was ready several minutes before Akura.
Martha waited at the end of the hallway near the door, checking her pockets to make sure she had everything. She slipped on a jacket and some gloves, wrapped a checkered black and gray scarf around her neck, and paced back and forth the short distance from the door to the hall. Her nerves had been tested all day long, and now she felt like she would snap with any sudden movements. She sighed again and pulled out the fob watch, staring at it intently.
Feeling stupid, she brought the watch close to her face and sniffed. Nothing. Not even a hint of metal. Tilting her head to one side so her ear was facing it, she listened intently.
It was a testament to how much she was straining her ears that the sound of Akura yelping indignantly made her jump and spin around just in time to catch Akura as she fell face-first. The watch fell to the ground on top of a separation of carpet that stuck up just enough, evidently, to trip eager young women. Blushing furiously, Akura leaned on Martha to straighten herself up. When she started to examine the watch that had fallen from Martha's grasp, however, Martha quickly pretended to be slightly off balance, pulling Akura away from the object. Unfortunately, she moved a bit too quickly and would have fallen over herself if Akura hadn't grabbed her arm and pulled her close. They laughed.
The door burst open and Martha instinctively moved in front of Akura.
"What's going on? Akura, are you okay?"
It was Isaac, who was a bit of breath. Martha and Akura stared at him. He flushed.
"I—I heard something."
Martha reluctantly stepped away from Akura.
"Just Akura being clumsy," she said. Akura swatted her shoulder.
"Shut up."
"Um, these are for you." Isaac held out two lilacs and Akura took them, kissing Isaac on the cheek. Martha, annoyed, couldn't tell if her blush was from her earlier embarrassment, their brief laughter, or sudden bashfulness in the face of Isaac's own shy charm.
"Thank you, Isaac. C'mon, let's go put these in water real quick. Make youself comfortable, Isaac." Akura dragged Martha into the kitchen, where they shared a giggle as they simply put the lilacs into a cup of water and set it aside.
Akura was dressed similarly to Martha, warm but stylish clothes that fit her well and accentuated her figure just right. She didn't have a scarf, but she did wear an adorable beanie over her glossy, nearly black curls.
When they left the apartment with Isaac, Martha felt lighter than she had before, but there was still a niggling worry in the back of her mind that weighed her down.
Hey guys! This is the LAST chapter that Furyism wrote. So now it moves on to my stuff.