A/N so so sorry it took me so long to get back at this. I didn't really have any spare time for ff lately and I was thinking of letting this go (as it didn't get that much response, too) but I hate to leave things unfinished. Also, this new season isn't the best so it made me want to go back to familiar characters.
Also I haven't updated in months but this is really really long.
25 - Who are you?
The crowd rushing down the stairs and out of the dancehall forced Zoe to get out, and she only managed to stop outside the gate, looking around for Tim Latimer.
Just as her eyes met him, she heard the Doctor's voice. He was directing the people outside, Joan on his side.
"Mr. Hicks, go to the village", he said, "Get everyone out". He turned to Tim. "Latimer, get back to the school. Tell the headmaster-".
The boy shivered as the teacher raised his hand to push him.
"Don't touch me! You're as bad as them!", he screamed, running off.
John Smith saw Zoe, and his relieved look quickly turned to confusion as she harshly confronted him.
"Doctor! Where's Martha?".
He tried to speak, but it looked like words couldn't come. Zoe shook her head in dismay and turned to follow the boy, but he grabbed her arm, gently, as looking for balance. Joan, on his side, was speechless, looking as confused as him, but Zoe was too scared and angry to keep her act up, and stopped controlling her words.
"Now what?", she cried, struggling for him to let her go. She managed to get her arm free and frowned, again. "I can't believe you left her behind!"
"Jane...", he started, but she was already leaving.
"God, you're rubbish as a human", she mumbled, gathering her long and delicate dress to run.
"What... What did she just say?" he asked Joan.
She was about to answer, unsure about what she really heard, when Martha appeared out of the dance hall door. Zoe was already away and keeping her eyes on Latimer, but couldn't hold back a smile as she heard her voice, safe and yelling.
"Don't just stand there, move!" she loudly screamed, as she ran towards them. "God, you're rubbish as a human! Come on!".
Back inside the school, Zoe watched in silence as the terrified John Smith gathered the boys to set up the defence. She couldn't help but think there must have been another way, that these boys, although unaware, were already looking forward to WWI and it wasn't their destiny to die inside their own school, at the hands of aliens.
She focused on finding Timothy Latimer, who wasn't among the boys taking orders from. As she ran through the rooms upstairs, she caught a glimpse of the Doctor, peering on the outside as the principal and the secretary tried to reason with the aliens.
"Jane..." he started, as she approached him to look at the yard through the paneled window. "What... what do I do?" he tried to ask her, but she couldn't find the words. She walked closer and gently put a hand over his shoulder.
"I wish I knew", she answered, warily. Sadly she knew that only the Doctor could help them, but the man John Smith was still refusing to accept the truth.
"War is coming", Baines said before shooting at the innocent and unprepared Mr. Phillips.
A shocked shiver ran through John Smith's body and he turned to Zoe. But she was already running again. "There's no time to lose, John", she said, sadly, as he followed her to go downstairs and hear from the principal. Zoe felt sorry for leaving him while the struggle in his head was so hard, but she had to find Timothy Latimer and she knew the boy was still in the school.
"Jane!" She heard calling from behind. Joan Redfern was now wearing her uniform and approaching the stairs. "We're not doctors", she started, stressing the last word, "but we're still their nurses. These boys need us". It was almost a clear order, and Zoe could sense that the woman was disappointed in her. She had been a good friend to her, and to leave her right now, without chance of an explanation, was just horrible. Yet she had to.
"I'm sorry, Matron. There's something more important". She could feel how bad that sounded even as she said it, and the look on Joan's face only confirmed it. What possibly could be more important than the boys? Was that really the girl she had been theaching and befriending?
"Ja-", the woman said, confused. "Jane... I don't even know who you are". She said at last, as Zoe ran away. I'm so so sorry, Joan, you really don't know.
The search upstairs was however useless as the boy was nowhere to be seen. She hid behind a curtain when she heard footsteps and she realized the little girl from the Family, the Daughter, was inside the school. She ran back downstairs, only to bump into the Doctor as he gave instructions to the boys.
"Jane, it's not safe". She could see the pain in his eyes, how he was confused and scared and still trying to put up a brave act. But the man John Smith wasn't the Doctor, and as much as he could put an effort in saving them, Zoe just knew it wouldn't be enough. The violence and coldness with which the Family and their scarecrows army had killed people - at the dance, outside the schoolgates, and right in front of their eyes - left little room for hope, even if they weren't attacking the school yet. Frustrated, Zoe left out a sigh, holding his shoulders as to scold him.
"Yeah, well, I know. I need... well, we need, we all need you to come back, Doctor. Are you in there somewhere? Can you hear me?". Tears were starting to appear at the corner of her eyes. "Please?".
"Jane, I..." he was speechless, and even more scared now. He had sensed earlier that it wasn't just Martha talking nonsense, and now he knew for sure that Jane was somehow agreeing with her. "How can you think that I'm not real? When I kissed you, when I told you I loved you, was that a lie?". He asked her, with pleading eyes, his voice soft and deep.
A lie doesn't even begin to describe it, she thought, still looking around at the boys, searching for the blond head of Timothy Latimer. "No, it wasn't. Not to you, at least", she replied.
"But this Doctor, he sounds like some, some romantic lost prince. Would you rather that?". He looked so sad it was tearing Zoe apart to hold his gaze. "Am I not enough?".
"The Doctor... he's not a romantic lost prince. Or maybe he is. I don't care about romance, right now. He would know what to do", she said, turning suddenly, then on a second thought, facing him again. "And he knows- whatever, John, you know it too, those boys, they're children, and they already have a lot to fight for ahead of them. Even John Smith, this John Smith knows it's wrong to want them to fight, doesn't he?".
Even as his certainties fell apart and his feelings for the girl were shattered by her words, he knew he couldn't do much else. The Principal called for him from the other room.
"What choice do I have?", he asked her, although he wasn't really looking for an answer, and drawing her closer, he kissed her, desperately. Startled, she stood there for a second too late as he turned and walked quickly in the direction of the voice, and she caught a glimpse of Timothy Latimer running by.
"Ehi!", she called him, but he didn't stop. She ran after him until they were hiding in a corner upstairs.
"You know him, don't you?" he asked, a hint of fear in his voice. "Which one are you?"
"Timothy, just give me the watch, we need him", Zoe pleaded.
"No! How... how do I know you're not helping them?". She could see that altough suspicious he was willing to trust her and was resting on her to give him just enough prove.
"I-" she started, but he interrupted her.
"Did you hear that?". He was looking at the watch in his hands as if a voice was talking from it.
"Hear what?"
"Beware of what?" The boy asked to the watch, and Zoe turned around as he did, although she didn't hear anything. The little girl was standing at the end of the corridor, menacing.
"Keep away!" Latimer warned her, trying to gather up his bravery.
"Who are you?" the girl asked, her voice cold and unnatural.
"We saw you at the dance. You were with the Family. You're one of them", Zoe stated, instinctively pushing the boy behind her to protect him. She wasn't armed, but she was pretty sure she had faced more aliens than the boy.
"What are you hiding?" the girl asked, ignoring Zoe.
"Nothing", Tim replied, Zoe's hand nervously holding his shoulder as he tightened his grip on the watch.
"What have you got there?", the girl insisted.
"Nothing".
"Show me, little boy". It was as it Zoe wasn't even there, and she realized the Family must have some way of knowing that Tim was somehow hiding the Time Lord and not her.
"You", Zoe said, trying to sound menacing. Before she could say anything, Tim stepped out of her grasp, his hand holding the watch. Zoe didn't even have the time to stop him before she realized something bad was about to happen.
"I reckon whatever you are, you're still in the shape of a girl", Tim said. "How strong is she, do you think? Does she really want to see this?".
"No, stop!" Zoe said, uselessly, as he opened the watch and a flash of golden energy hit the girl. She had seen that light before, in the TARDIS, whenever she jumped. Was that the stuff Time Lords were made of, she asked herself, as she held Timothy's hand and closed the watch.
He quickly retracted the hand, still not trusting her enough to pass the device to her.
"What did you do? They can smell that energy! They'll come looking for you now!", she cried, "Let's get out of here, fast".
As the battle kept going on at the school, they ran through the woods. Her only idea was to get to the TARDIS. What she didn't know was the spaceship was already guarded by their enemies.
"Out you come, Doctor! There's a good boy! Come to the Family!", she heard the creepy voice of Baines calling. Protectively, she put her hands on Tim's skinny shoulders, holding him down behind some bushes, but keeping an eye on the familiar blue box surrounded by scarecrows. They couldn't spot the Doctor or Martha anywhere, and the pair didn't run into them as they escaped so she hadn't had the time to tell her friend that the watch was in safe hands. Trembling, she hoped they were safely hidden as well and that they weren't desperate enough to think showing up to the Family was a good idea.
"Come out, Doctor! Come to us!", the Family chanted, from the field. Tim shivered again under Zoe's firm hold.
"Did you hear?" he asked Zoe, frantic.
She sensed she wasn't referring to the Family. "What? Is it the watch?".
"Let's go", he instructed her. "It's time", he added, leading the girl through the bushes and into the woods, until they approached a small group of buildings outside the village, where Tim turned into a cottage front yard and knocked at the door.
"Wait, wh-", Zoe warned him, again placing her hand on his shoulder, but Martha opened the door. The look on her face, to Zoe, only said where the hell have you been.
"I brought you this", the kid said, fierce, showing her the watch.
The scene inside was unsettling. Zoe looked ashamed at Martha as she hopefully showed the watch to John Smith, and Joan, quietly sitting by, trying to make sense at how bad things were going. Zoe felt relieved that they were all safe for now, but she couldn't speak, paralized by the consequences of her actions on her friend and menthor of those months. And him, he was looking completely desperate and terrified now, studying her in confusion and disappointment. He was torn by fear, and betrayal was showing in his gaze whenever Zoe felt his eyes on her.
"Hold it", Martha pleaded.
"I won't", he stated, coldly.
"Please, just hold it", Zoe repeated.
"It told me to find you. It wants to be held", Tim added.
"You've had this watch all the time? Why didn't you return it?" Joan asked Tim.
"Because it was waiting, and because I was so scared of the Doctor", The boy replied.
"Why?" Joan insisted, as Martha and Zoe saw anxiety grow on John's face.
"Because I've seen him", the boy said, stepping ahead. "He's like fire, and ice, and rage. He's like the night and the storm in the heart of the sun-", he started.
John didn't want to hear that. "Stop it".
"He's ancient, and forever. He burns at the centre of time and he can see the turn of the universe", he kept going.
"Stop it. I said stop it!", John pleaded, looking at Joan, who he now felt was the only one on his side.
"And he's wonderful", Timothy concluded. Martha and Zoe had a hint of pride at that, but it didn't help their cause.
"I've still got the journal", Joan said.
"Those are just stories", John replied.
"Now we know that's not true. Perhaps there's something in here", she added. Zoe was staring at her in admiration, this woman put in front of such exotic and unimaginable events and yet trying to figure it out and to stand by her friend.
Suddenly the whole cottage was shaking, and they all went to look outside the windows.
"What the hell?" Martha exclaimed when they saw fireballs falling to the village a little way away.
"They're destroying the village", Zoe noted. We have to do something. Anything.
"The watch", John instructed.
"John, don't", Joan warned, tentitavely.
John draw back to the wall, staring at the mysterious object.
"Can you hear it?", Tim asked.
"I think he's asleep. Waiting to awaken", he answered.
"Why did he speak to me?".
"Oh, low level telepathic field, you were born with it. Just an extra synaptic engram causing-" startled, he caught a deep breath as a little relief appeared on Martha and Zoe's faces as they surprisingly recognized his voice. "-is that how he talks?".
"That's him. All you have to do is open it and he's back!", Martha smiled.
"You knew this all along and yet you watched while Jane... while Jane and I-", he complained.
"I didn't know how to stop you! And she should have known better, by the way", Martha interrupted him. "He gave me a list of things to watch out for, but that wasn't included".
Joan was still looking at the journal by the window, while Zoe felt shame as his eyes turned to her.
"Falling in love? that didn't even occur to him?".
"No", Martha replied, coldly.
"Then what sort of man is that? And now you expect me to die?". Panicking, he kept looking at Martha and Zoe, searching for answers, although Martha was the only one talking. Zoe couldn't help but think that, had herself been more careful, it would have been easier to talk John Smith into opening that damn watch once and for all.
"It was always going to end, though! The Doctor said the Family's got a limited lifespan, and that's why they need to consume a Time Lord. Otherwise, three months and they die". Martha was surely aware of how cold that sounded. "Like mayflies, he said".
"So your job was to execute me?", he asked her. "And you? Just making fun of me?", he said turning to Zoe.
"People are dying out there", Martha trailed off. "They need him and we need him. I need him. Because you've got no idea of what he's like. I've only just met him, and it wasn't even that long ago. But he is everything-" she said, quickly, with pride. "He's just everything to me and... he doesn't even look at me, but I don't care, because I love him to bits. And I hope to God he won't remember me saying this" she closed.
Zoe watched in awe at her friend's surprising approach and again she felt she was the only useless person in the room. Joan was still studying the journal for help, and she was frozen. She couldn't say a word, she couldn't hold his gaze as her betrayal was more and more evident to John. She needed to do something, anything, but there was nothing she could even try.
"It's getting closer", Tim warned as an explosion sounded much louder than the others.
"I should have thought of it before. I can give them this. Just the watch. Then they can leave and I can stay as I am", he tried.
"You can't do that!" Martha cried.
"If they want the Doctor they can have him".
"He'll never let you do it", Zoe said, sadly, finally confronting him. She felt poorly for the man, willing to sacrifice everything just to stay human as he was, and she felt a sting to her heart at the thought of how much the Doctor himself sometimes seemed to hang around humans just to be relieved of his burdens.
"If they get what they want, then, then-". He was scared and felt betrayed and he was still holding on to his human feelings, his feeling for her, and it was clear by the way he looked into her eyes. Joan interrupted him.
"Then it all ends in destruction. I never read to the end, but those creatures would live forever to breed and conquer, for war, across the stars for every child", she said.
Desperate, he hugged Zoe. She let him cry into her shoulders for a moment, then turned up his chin and looked at him fondly. "If I could do this instead of you, then I would".
"He won't love you", he noted.
"That doesn't matter, it never did".
"Who are you?" he cried, again. "Why are you doing this to me? Is this all a joke to you people?".
"Martha, Jane, Timothy, would you leave us alone, please?" Joan asked gently, sensing both Martha and Zoe were putting him through too much too fast.
"It was real!" he kept on. "I wasn't. I really thought", he said to his friend, as the three exited the room, a shy look on Zoe's face.
Martha and Timothy sat on the bench just outside, in silence, but Zoe was uneasy, restless, walking back and forth on the cobblestone pavement. When she realized, just as Joan did, that she wasn't helping in the room and was invited outside she suddenly felt an urge, an instinctive need to act, to try and do something. The idea of just sitting there waiting was killing her.
"When he opened the watch before", she said to Martha, "there was a light. A golden light. Just like the light that scatters me around time and space".
"That's... oh, I don't really know", Martha blurted.
"Yeah, well, maybe there's something I can do", she said, suddenly running away.
"Wait, what? What are you doing? You're going to... Ugh!" she groaned, as Zoe failed to turn and answer, and hugged Tim as they kept their eyes on the fire devastating the village.
The head-tilting thing was seriously bothering her. She was on edge, on fire, acting on instinct and not rationalizing. Did it really matter what their faces and moves looked like when she was, with much chance, going to get killed?
"You travel with the Doctor", the Son said.
"She smells like time" Mother added.
For a second, Zoe had thought that maybe she really had a chance to stop them, that her mysterious mind would work the right triggers and point her to a solution she was unaware of, as she did with the gravity manipulator and the cybermen weapons. Yet walking into the Family spaceship at Cooper's field, her eyes didn't recognize anything, and she prepared herself to die at their laser guns. Time can be rewritten, she sadly repeated herself, didn't mean she could stop herself from getting the Doctor and Martha mad at her, it meant even if a future version of herself had met them, maybe she was going to die at that moment anyway, when Father hit her and fell to the ground.
"She's only a time traveler" Daughter stated, as they all sniffed loudly. "Not enough".
Zoe just kept staring at them with an angry face.
"You'll never get the Doctor. Me, this energy, that's the closest you'll get to him", she threathened them.
"He'll come to us". Son said, twisting his rigid smile again. "We'll blast them into dust, then fuse the dust into glass, then shatter them all over again". Zoe was disgusted by how much he was enjoying the destruction of the village.
The door swung open, and an unsteady Doctor walked in, as Zoe watched him, relieved.
"Just-", he started, and his voice made Zoe turn to not-relieved-mode as she realized he was still John Smith, as a boom rocked the ship and he fell lurching against a column of switches. "Just stop the bombardment. That's all I'm asking. I'll do anything you want, just, just stop."
"Say please", Son teased.
"Please", he replied. Zoe watched in shock, her arm hurting where Father hit her. What could they do now, if no one, not even Joan had managed to talk him into opening the watch and get the Doctor back?
Mother activated a control and stopped. "Wait a minute", she sniffed. "Still human".
"Now I can't, I can't pretend to understand, not for a second", he said, his gaze quickly diverting from the Family to Zoe and back. "But I want you to know I'm innocent in all this. He made me John Smith. It's not like I had any control over it", he added, losing his balance again against a pillar with switches.
"He didn't just make himself human. He made himself an idiot", Mother commented. "Same thing, isn't it?" Son laughed.
"I don't care about this Doctor and your family. I just want you to go. So I've made my choice. You can have him. Just take it, please! Take him away!". He cried, holding out the watch.
Zoe gasped as Son took hold of the watch, with one hand, staring at the engravings in awe, while grabbing John's lapels with the other. "At last", the creepy kid said. "Don't think that saved your life", he said, pushing him away.
"No!" Zoe cried, as the man fell over the wall again, landing on her side. "What did you do?". He looked at her, and Zoe felt something different, although she couldn't put her finger on it.
"Family of Mine, now we shall live the lives of a Time Lord", Son declared, opening the watch. Zoe closed her eyes as she heard them sniff loudly. But there was no golden light.
"It's empty!" Son said.
"Where's it gone?" John asked, panic in his tone.
"You tell me!", Son angrily replied, tossing the watch at him.
And just then, with a move that surprised everyone, but especially Zoe, John Smith was gone, and back was the Doctor, she knew it even before he spoke, as his arm stretched out to catch the watch in mid-air without looking.
"Oh", he started, lifting up, stretching the word in his own peculiar way, twisting the fob watch in his hands. "I think the explanation might be you've been fooled by a simple olfactory misdirection. Little bit like ventriloquism of the nose, it's an elementary trick in certain parts of the galaxy - but it has got to be said-", he started explaining, and despite how much Zoe had discovered he was good at kissing, she realized she was more turned on by his voice, his familiar rambling, him pulling out his glasses. "-I don't like the looks of that hydroconometer", he added. "It seems to be indicating you've got energy feedback all the way through the retrostabilisers feeding back into the primary heat converters", he told them, tapping on the pillar at the center of the room.
"Oh. Because if there's one thing you shouldn't have done", he kept on, twirling around the room as the Family became increasingly scared, "You shouldn't have let me press all those buttons".
He was back! Zoe was now really relieved, and she didn't care now about him being mad at her, or Martha feeling betrayed and disappointed, she was just genuinely happy to have the smug Doctor back, giving the Family his typical condescending explanation of how this was going to end bad for them.
"But", stressing the vowel, he kept talking, as he stretched an arm in Zoe's direction, helping her up without looking. "In fairness", he continued, turning with her in the door's direction, "I will give you one word of advice. Run".
They ran out in the field as the spaceship exploded.
"Doctor", Zoe started, when they were just far enough to not get caught in the blast.
"Why did you do that for?" he said, turning to her, a cold expression in his old eyes.
"I... I was just trying to buy us some time, I thought-".
"I'm not talking about you throwing yourself into their hands", he cut her off. "That was... that was really brave". He waved his hand in the air, as if to place them on her shoulders and then changing his mind, cautiously. "Weeeell. We'll talk later. I got to go".
In silence, Zoe watched him turn to the Family, his shadow hovering over them in the field, as the four laid down in the grass protecting themselves from the fires. She caught a glimpse on his angry gaze and she saw it, the fury, the oncoming storm. She realized then why he flew, why he had to run and hide from those enemies: he was being kind to them.
Martha didn't say a word to her for however long it took the Doctor to deal with the Family of blood, and the Doctor himself didn't have to speak when walking into the TARDIS, where the girls were waiting: Zoe knew by the look on his face she had to go with him and pay a last visit in 1913.
She had changed into usual clothes, and this time she took an effort in not resulting too futuristic and scare Joan more than necessary. She zipped her hoodie closed and walked outside in the morning mist, behind him, silently. Her Chuck Taylors and skinny jeans weren't warm enough for the weather, but she was shivering for other reasons.
They knocked, but the door was open when they walked into the cottage.
"Is it done?", Joan asked; she was looking outside the window and clearly wasn't ready to look at them.
"It's done", the Doctor replied.
"The police and the army are at the school, the parents have come to take the boys home. I should go, they'll have so many questions, I'm not sure what to say", she said, turning, and startled, she looked away. "Oh, you look the same. Goodness, you must forgive my rudeness... I find it difficult to look at you, Doctor. I must call you Doctor. Where is he? John Smith?".
"He's in here, somewhere". He replied.
"Like a story. Could you change back?".
"Yes". His voice was low and cold, and Zoe was mortified just looking at the exchange. She didn't know how Joan managed to get him to turn, but she did. That woman saved him, she saved all of them, and in return he was being more icy than usual.
"Will you?".
"No". However obvious, his flat answer bothered her.
"I see. Well then, he was braver than you in the end, that ordinary man. You chose to change, he chose to die".
"Come with us", he said, surprising Zoe.
"I'm sorry?".
"Travel with us", he insisted.
"As a... companion? With you and Martha and... gosh, I don't even know what your name is", she said, sadly, turning to Zoe.
"I'm Zoe", she said, feeling stupid even in just pronouncing the words.
"That's not fair. What must I look like to you, Doctor? I must seem so very small, someone to make fun of".
"That's not true", Zoe said, feeling so guilty and sorry for the lonely woman. "We could start again. We could try, and I'll be honest. The things you'll see", she tried to smile.
"I was not talking to you. Did you enjoy it? Act like someone else, taking him just because you could? I thought you were my friend. I was happy for you!", Joan added, and Zoe felt again how much she had hurt her.
"I can't", Joan said, turning to the Doctor.
"Please, come with us", he pleaded, again.
"I can't".
"Why not?".
"John Smith is dead, and Jane Richards didn't even exist, and they were my friends. And you two look like them".
"Please, Joan", Zoe was shy to speak now, aware that everyone in the room had reason to be mad at her.
"Answer me this, both of you. Just one question, that's all. If the Doctor had never visited us, if he'd never chosen this place... on a whim", she replied, emphasising the last word, as both Zoe and the Doctor felt the guilt rise up as they understood what she was going to ask. "Would anybody here have died?".
As they failed to answer, she nodded at the door, holding the journal. "You can go".
He didn't say a word on the way back either, but Zoe knew she was the one supposed to talk. As soon as she hesitantly called him, though, his train of words started spinning out of control.
"Doctor... I... uhm", she spoke following the urge to apologize, to say something, but thoughts weren't turning into words.
He stopped and turned to look at her.
"I... I just wanted to say I'm sorry for what I've... I mean, how I've, er-"
"Well, Zoe, what, what? What were you thinking? Do you think that was funny? That we were on holiday? In one of your films?".
"No, no, Doctor, I-". He sounded so frustrated she couldn't argue. And although he didn't mention Martha, the way she had reacted at seeing them together, and what she said the night before in the cottage, that was stinging into Zoe's heart more than the thought of being superficial in the Doctor's opinion.
"You... ugh! That was low, even for you. You... you even made up a brother!".
"I didn't!", she then replied on an instinct, gathering her strenght. He stopped, surprised by the sudden change.
"You always said you didn't have a family", he noted.
"My brother was my family. He wasn't even my biological brother, but still - he died in Iraq. We changed seven different foster families together. I just don't like to talk about it- I didn't make him up!", she answered, upset.
At this, he calmed down, but he wasn't completely satisfied with the answer.
"Zoe, what were you thinking?", he repeated, softly, this time. "The... well, the... uhm, flirting, the lies, and... Martha, Martha is your friend, isn't she? You were not acting like yourself".
She sighed loudly, looking at him, straight into his eyes, holding his inquisitive piercing gaze.
"It's like you were a completely different person".
A shiver ran down her spine, and although neither said it out loud, they both were thinking of the same name: Chloe.
A/N. Ok so it took me forever also because this episode was really tricky. I'm not leaving you with a major cliff-hanger because I don't honestly know when the next update will be. Hopefully soon - now that I'm back on this, inspiration will come. X