Chapter 2: Then There's a Pair of Me
The Doctor jerked awake on the ground outside the monastery and sat bolt upright. There was still lightning flashing through the sky above him, but the solar tsunami was now less of a threat. He popped up off the ground and started running back towards the nearest entrance to the monastery with the intention of checking on the others and reassuring himself that his friends had indeed survived.
"Cleaves!" he shouted, halfway down a spiral staircase, upon seeing the leader of the contractors wandering, dazed, across the courtyard below. "You're not in your harness!"
"Doctor..." she groaned out, sounding disoriented. "You were right."
He hurried over to her and gave her a quick once over to make sure that she wasn't seriously injured. "What happened?"
She stared off into space, then her face scrunched up in shame. "I abandoned my team," Cleaves realized, sounding disgusted with herself.
The Doctor patted her arm. "Then let's go get them," and with that, he grabbed her hand and led her back into the monastery to rejoin the others. She followed after him, still staring into space, looking lost and repentant.
"Cleaves," the Doctor prompted, drawing her focus back to him. "How long would you say we were out?"
"Not that long. Minutes. A few minutes?"
"Hmm. I'll hazard that we've been out a teensy bit longer..."
That caught her full attention. "Well, how long?"
The Doctor winced, shaking her hand nervously between them.
"Doctor?"
"An hour."
"What?!"
He shrugged apologetically.
"Oh! I feel like I've been roasted!" the dark-haired contractor -'Buzzer' apparently- exclaimed when Rory and Jimmy helped him down from his harness.
"No kidding! What was that?" the Scotsman agreed, helping his friend sit down on the stone floor while Rory checked him over.
"That was the solar tsunami," Rory informed them bitterly. "We shouldn't have been here for it. You're lucky that none of you were killed."
"Cheery, isn't he?" Jimmy remarked, but Rory ignored the jab, reminding himself that these people didn't know any better. He stilled, however, when he heard the frightened sob from behind him.
"Why?" the shaky voice lamented. Rory jumped up, already certain that none of the men had any serious injuries, and ran over to help the traumatized young woman.
"Jenifer! Hey. Alright..." he gently gripped her arms and turned her to face him.
"It h-hurt so much!" she stammered tearfully. "C-couldn't get out of m-my harness!"
"Hey. It's alright now. It's over," Rory reassured her, pulling her into a hug.
"I thought I was going to die!" she sobbed into his shoulder.
"Shhh..." Rory soothed. He cast his eyes towards the door when the Doctor ran into the room with Cleaves hot on his heels.
"Doctor," he acknowledged and Jenifer sniffed and wiped at her face as subtly as she could while she too turned to face the newcomers.
"Rory, is anyone hurt?" the Doctor queried, sliding to a stop in front of them.
"Nothing permanent, but..." Rory nodded slightly towards Jenifer. "We've all had a nasty shock."
"Yes, I-" The Doctor froze. "Where's-"
Before he could even finish asking, his question was answered by Amy dragging a half-conscious Koschei into the room.
"Koschei!" Rory shouted and darted over to help.
"What happened?"
"He got shocked by a big bolt of electricity... then the surge hit us," Amy explained.
A few of the others winced in sympathy.
"Well at least everyone's alive and accounted for," Greaves noted, trying to look on the bright side. Dicken nodded absently, grabbing a bottle of water and tossing it to Amy.
"Here you go, Mate," Rory murmured, while he and Amy tried to get Koschei to take a drink from the bottle.
"No loose ends," Greaves continued. As if in response to her hopeful comment, Dusty Springfield's 'You Don't Have to Say You Love Me' began to stream through the speaker system of its own accord.
"Jus' had to say it," Koschei's gravelly-sounding voice lamented, and for a brief second Rory looked ridiculously overjoyed. "Hug me and die," Koschei added preemptively and Rory's arms lowered in mild disappointment.
"My record..." Jimmy said, sounding as creeped out as they all felt.
"Who's doing that?" Buzzer wondered.
"Your gangers have gone walkabout," the Doctor observed.
"That's impossible!" Cleaves denied.
"Really?" Rory snapped, prompting a shaky smirk to stretch Koschei's pale lips.
"They're just machinery!" Cleaves ranted.
Amy's mouth formed a little 'oh', with disbelief flashing through her chocolate brown eyes as she regarded her husband. She was now getting contact embarrassment due to this woman's stubbornness.
"Cars don't drive themselves, cranes don't lift themselves-"
"Records don't play themselves," Amy interrupted in an unflattering impression of the other woman's voice. Cleaves looked like she was about to retort, but then the truth of Amy's statement hit her.
"Shall we?" the Doctor offered, gesturing towards the doorway.
Cleaves stared at the doorway in shock and slowly nodded.
"After you," the Doctor said to no one in particular and crossed over to stand in front of Koschei. Koschei instantly held both arms out to him.
"Up!" he demanded rather childishly.
Amy shook her head, ready to help him up herself, but the Doctor leaned forward to oblige him, ducking under the taller man's arm without a word. His two other companions watched incredulously as the Doctor silently walked Koschei out of the room, supporting most of his weight.
When they got to the break room the gangers had already fled, leaving a mess of half-finished activities in their wake. There were two thirds of a playing card fortress constructed atop the far end of the table. A number of used or partly filled mugs were sitting where they'd been abandoned. Koschei wandered over to the sofa on wobbly knees and nearly sat on the worn old novel that a ganger had forgotten, lying on its face on one of the cushions. He checked the spine.
"Gauche," he stated judgmentally, and hurled it over his shoulder without looking.
Rory caught it before it pegged Cleaves in the face and read the title for himself. "Lord of the Flies." He grimaced, apparently not a fan of it either. "Whose is it?"
"Erm..." Buzzer coughed and held out a hand for the rejected item, looking embarrassed.
"I don't believe this..." Cleaves said, looking over the evidence left behind by the gangers.
"It seems that the storm has animated your gangers," the Doctor observed, leaning down to look through the card fortress.
"They must've escaped out the back," Jimmy surmised and crossed the room to verify his theory.
"This is just like the Isle of Sheppey," Buzzer fretted, tucking his book into one of the pockets of his jumpsuit.
"They've ransacked, everything..." Cleaves said, continuing to take stock of the mess throughout the room.
"No. Not ransacked, searched," the Doctor corrected, taking a seat at the head of the table.
"They've gone through our stuff!" Dicken objected.
"No they've gone through their stuff. They're disoriented. They're searching for confirmation, trying to verify that their memories are real," the Doctor explained patiently.
"Their memories! You mean our memories!" Cleaves argued, they've taken our identities and wandered off with them."
"You did give them to your gangers, if you'll recall," Koschei pointed out, adding to himself more than to anyone else, "Oh, why am I even trying?"
"How dare you you! You weren't even man enough to stomach what we do here! Now all of a sudden you think that you're better than us?" Buzzer shot back.
"Oy! Back off!" Amy shouted, standing from where she'd just leaned against the arm of Koschei's couch.
"Don't waste your time, Dear," Koschei told her. Then his cool silver eyes met Buzzer's. "You went after my gender rather suddenly, didn't you? Are you, perhaps, feeling emasculated?"
Buzzer glowered down at him and began to take a step forward.
"Enough!" the Doctor ordered. "Apollo: I know that you're agitated, but you know better. Act your age." He turned his attention to the glowering contractor without acknowledging his friend's dismissive scoff. "Buzzer: this is a strain on all of us, but we need to stick together now. Dealing with Koschei can – admittedly – be difficult but it is for the good of all of us that we function as a team," he stared at the angry human until he backed down. "Good. Now, tell us about the Isle of Sheppey."
"That's just an old ghost story," Cleaves scoffed.
"Shut up," Amy huffed, reclaiming her perch by Koschei's head.
"A ganger got an electric shock, toddled off and murdered his own operator," Buzzer recounted. "I've seen the photos. This bloke's head was like-" he did a rather graphic gesture over his face.
"That's quite enough, thanks," Jenifer broke in making a yuck face.
"Even if that actually happened," Jimmy began reasonably.
"Which it didn't," Koschei interjected primly.
"Except that it did," Buzzer countered earning a scathing look from his interrupted coworker.
"Apart from the occurrences in your ridiculous tale, yes."
Buzzer opened his mouth to continue the dispute, but Jimmy raised his voice to repeat himself instead. "Even if it did, the gangers can't remain stable without an operator plugged in to guide them," he pointed out, "Can they, Boss?"
Everyone turned to look expectantly at Cleaves who was staring down at the floor.
"Boss?" Dicken questioned when she failed to answer.
"I guess we'll find out."
There was a heavy silence, broken by Jenifer's moan as she leaned over, grabbing her stomach.
"Jen?" Buzzer queried. She waved a dismissive hand.
"It's all right. I just... My stomach feels funny." She rocked forward again. "Excuse me. I think I need the washroom!" she called, dashing out of the break room.
"She shouldn't be alone," Cleaves objected.
"I'm on it," Rory said, dashing out of the room.
Jenifer jumped when Rory caught up with her outside the washroom.
"Oh, don't worry. It's just me," Rory assured her and did a little awkward wave. "Hi. It's just... It's not the best idea to split up from the group right now. So...'
"Right."
"That's the Doctor's first rule actually: don't wander off," he rambled, uncertain. "I'll just wait for you out here, yeah? Make sure everything's okay?"
Jenifer nodded. "Thanks," and went over to the sink to splash water on her face. She stared at her reflection, feeling like she was staring at a stranger, then leapt back with a startled cry when it suddenly shifted to the basic, nearly featureless visage of a half-formed ganger.
"Jenifer?" Rory called, turning to peek into the room in concern.
"It's nothing. I just thought..." Jenifer shook her head, her reflection was perfectly normal. "My mind's playing tricks, I guess."
Rory nodded and retreated. As soon as she was unobserved again Jenifer darted to the sink and wretched, coughing up mouthfuls of thick, white gunge into the basin, before retreating, panicked into one of the toilet stalls behind her.
"What the!" Rory jumped at the loud slam from behind him and peeked back into the room to find Jenifer gone. "Er, Jenifer! What's wrong? Jenifer?" There was only silence. Rory hesitated, then crept cautiously into the room. "Jenifer? What's going on? We should really be heading back." He glanced down at the pool of Flesh sitting in the sink. "Jen?"
A fist punched out through the middle stall's door and hit him in the face with enough force to concuss a human man. Rory on the other hand, had already adapted to his openly inhuman lifestyle.
"Ow!" he exclaimed, rubbing at his bruised jaw. Then he shuffled back against the sink when the ganger's head swooped out on her elongated neck, shouting "I want to live! Why won't you just let us live!"
"Okay," Rory said and promptly fled the room.
Back in the break room, the contractors were all gathered around the table discussing their next course of action. Amy and the Doctor were only half-listening while they prepared a lunch out of some left overs from the refrigerator, and Koschei appeared to be taking a nap.
"We need to protect ourselves," Jimmy noted.
"Why?" the Doctor commented, pulling some lasagne out of the microwave unit. "Are you particularly violent?"
"Me? No," Jimmy denied.
"Then why would the other Jimmy be?"
"How can you lot eat at a time like this?" Cleaves asked, walking over to join Amy and the Doctor at the counter.
"Oh, this is for Apollo," Amy replied with a shrug, picking up the finished plate that she had organized and carrying it away towards the aforementioned recipient.
"Tell me, Cleaves. You said that you were only out for a few minutes when it was actually over an hour," the Doctor prompted, leaning an arm against the top of the microwave unit.
"Yes. So?" Cleaves shrugged. "I got it wrong. What does that matter?"
"Don't worry about it. It isn't your fault, like I said, they're disoriented." He turned and called to Amy as if still in the same sentence. "Amy, Koschei, when you get a minute we need to verify who all was in the harnesses."
"Okay. I'm pretty sure that Jimmy and Buzzer were. Rory mentioned helping them out of their harnesses," Amy recalled.
"Dicken too," Koschei added. "He had a burn on his arm from one of the straps that ignited."
"Okay. Jenifer?"
Amy shrugged. "You'll have to check with Rory."
"Will do. Here you are, Cleaves," the Doctor continued, rapid-fire, and handed over the plate of pasta that he had just pulled out of the microwave.
Cleaves just stood there holding it for a moment, while he eyed her like an intriguing experiment, and arched her eyebrows at him as if to say 'Now what?'
"It's hot," the Doctor informed her and she gasped in pain and dropped it.
"Trans-matter is a little rubbery. Your nerve endings aren't quite fused properly," the Doctor observed, stepping closer to inspect her burn. She pulled away from him and retreated.
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"It's okay."
Cleaves stared down at her hand, then looked imploringly up at the Doctor. "Why didn't I feel that?"
"Weren't you listening? You haven't stabilized," Koschei called impatiently, and Amy swatted the back of his head.
"No, no. Stop it. You're just toying with my mind! Just STOP IT!" Cleaves turned away to go huddle in the corner.
"Way to go, Mate," Buzzer sarcastically commended; Koschei flipped him off.
The Doctor carefully followed after Cleaves, coaxing her gently "Cleaves, you don't have to hide. You're all right. You can trust me," and reached out to rest a comforting hand on her shoulder. "I'm the Doctor."
Cleaves turned on him. Her face reverted to a nearly featureless, translucent visage and she hissed.
"Easy. Just relax," the Doctor whispered and she settled down again.
"Where is she?!" Buzzer demanded, reaching for one of the knives that the other gangers had left on the table, but Jimmy grabbed his wrist and held him back. "What have you done with her, you thing?!"
Amy jumped up, her gaze flitting from Buzzer to the ganger and back again. "Doctor? What's happening?"
"She can't stabilize. The technology is still in its early stages, but she'll adjust in time."
"Not the point Doctor," Koschei corrected fondly, and reached up to touch Amy's arm. "I doubt that she's been harmed. This one didn't even seem to know that she was a duplicate."
"We are alive!" Cleaves' ganger growled at him. "We are living!" she screamed and pushed past the Doctor to run out of the room.
Everyone turned to shoot Koschei either incredulous or disapproving looks.
"What?"
"That wasn't very sympathetic," Dicken pointed out.
Koschei stared at him for a second, then started to laugh, growing louder and louder as he progressed. The Doctor shut his eyes in resignation and turned away to begin pacing.
"Why is that funny?" Jimmy challenged.
Koschei gasped and tried to get a hold of himself. "He thinks that I care," he managed to get out before he started laughing again.
Amy face-palmed. "I'm sorry. He does this sometimes. Just leave him to it and he'll return to sanity on his own."
"Oh, good," Jimmy remarked sarcastically.
Rory came running into the room. "Doctor!" he shouted, then did a double take when he noticed the manic Koschei cackling on the sofa. Koschei sobered. Rory shook his head as if to clear it, not ready to deal with that at present and addressed the Doctor. "Jenifer's a ganger."
"Two down, then," Koschei noted, and Amy swatted him again.
"We should search for the real ones-" Buzzer suggested.
"The original ones," the Doctor corrected.
"They might need help," Buzzer concluded, irritated by the interruption.
"He's right," Jimmy agreed "but we're going to need the acid suits if we want to get anywhere."
"Show me," the Doctor instructed, and the Scot nodded and led him out, with Buzzer following behind them.
"So, tell me. Why are you really here, Doctor?" Jimmy asked as he led the Timelord through the darkened halls.
"I'm here to help."
"Oh, don't bother Doc. You're no weatherman. You know too much!" Jimmy persisted, the volume of his voice rising with every word.
The Doctor shushed him. He was still busy thinking their perilous situation over.
"What's he talkin' about Doctor?" Buzzer joined in.
"I'm thinking," the Doctor stated distractedly. Jimmy grabbed him by the lapels and shoved him against a section of wall that was not yet tainted by the leaking acid.
"Stop mucking about! I heard you back there! You said 'the technology is still primitive'! A weatherman wouldn't even know about it! What are you here for?"
"I told you. I am here to help," the Doctor answered calmly. As earnest as he sounded, the Timelord still looked like he was feeling guilty about something.
"You're not here for us though, are you?" Buzzer accused.
"I am now," was the cryptic reply.
Jimmy looked like he was about to pursue that, but then they all looked up at the sound of someone walking past on the floor above them. The Doctor looked expectantly at Jimmy, and the other man released him so that they could run upstairs to investigate.
Back in the break room, Apollo, Dicken and Amy watched Rory pacing a hole in the stone floor while they waited.
"I should go," he stated, yet again.
"This makes it ten times that you've said that, Tin Man," Koschei informed him, sounding bored.
"That's exactly it. I understand what she must be going through!" Rory insisted.
"Do you?"
"What?" Dicken asked. It was clear that he had lost track of the conversation a while back but was doing his best to get back on track.
"I may not understand completely, but I'm close enough... I can help her!" Rory glanced uncertainly over at Dicken before looking pointedly down at Koschei. The flash of blue light from Rory's visual sensors gave the contractor a start, but the others ignored him.
"You're certain of that?" Koschei interrogated further.
"Yes!" Rory snapped.
"Then what are you going to do about it?"
The two stared at each other for a moment. Then with another, more determined flash of his sensors, Rory turned and strode out of the room.
"Who are you people?" Dicken wondered.
"Rory?" Amy called and ran over to the doorway to watch her husband's retreating back. "The Doctor said not to wander off!"
"He isn't wandering, Bhai. I'm fairly certain that he's got a destination in mind," Koschei amended. "Come back over here. You've left a patch of cold against my side."
"You're unbelievable!" Amy reproached.
"Indeed," he agreed, holding out an arm towards her. "Come on: cold patch."
When Rory finally caught up with Jenifer's traumatized ganger, she was sitting on the bench in one of the changing rooms, looking at an old photograph of a smiling girl.
"Jenifer?"
She tensed for a second at the sound of his voice but then just went back to staring at the photograph. "I got lost in the woods once, when I was a little girl. It was so cold and I was so scared," Jenifer recounted. "So, I imagined that there was another little girl. She was with me in the woods, and she was Jenifer too, but she was a tough Jenifer, a strong Jenifer." Her voice saddened as she said the last sentence, "She would lead me home." She moved the photograph aside to look at the hand mirror she'd placed it over and went silent, then hastily replaced the picture over her rejected reflection. "My name is Jenifer Lucas. I had toast for my breakfast, and wrote a letter to my mum. I'm not a factory part."
"I know," Rory began, stepping tentatively into the room. She turned to face him and Rory carefully suppressed his surprised reaction to her veiny, iridescent skin and ghostly blue eyes. "I also know how horrifying this must be for you..."
"I am Jenifer," she assured him, wild eyed, arguing against his imagined denial.
"I know."
"You're trying to trick me... You just want the real Jenifer. The human Jenifer! Like you!" Jenifer said distrustfully, backing away towards the cabinets.
"Well, no... I don't really have much of a preference toward humans to tell you the truth. Just my humans, but it would be good if you could help us find her, too," Rory admitted. "It's not safe here with the solar storm."
The ganger stared at him for a long time, slowly gaining a more natural, human appearance as she calmed down. "You really don't care, do you?" she realized.
"Not-" before Rory could even finish his sentence, he found himself with an armful of sobbing ganger. "Okay..." He hugged her back and tried his best to comfort her.
"Oh, what did they do to us, Rory?"
"Shh-Shh. It's alright. We'll figure this out. It's okay..." Rory murmured to her, wondering how in the world they were going to solve this one.
When they got to the storage room, Buzzer and Jimmy went straight to the cabinet that held the acid suits. The Doctor hung back to search more carefully for any trace of the fleeing gangers.
"They've taken them," Jimmy reported, yanking open the other cabinet. "They've taken all of them!"
"There's acid everywhere," Buzzer noted grimly. "Leaks all throughout the halls... Did you see the boss' eyes back there? I've never had a ganger look at me like that."
"You've never seen a ganger free before," the Doctor countered before the two humans could spiral into full on paranoia. "They need the suits as much as you do."
"They ain't us!" Buzzer argued.
"They're close enough to think like you. For better or for worse," the Doctor noted. "Let's try to be sensible. They feel threatened by you right now, if how quickly they all scattered is anything to go by. It would be best if we didn't encourage that fear. Speaking of..." and then the Doctor ran off without bothering to explain himself.
"Doctor!" Jimmy called down the stairs after him.
"Doing a thing! See you in the break room!" the Doctor's voice called back.
"The Doctor won't hurt you, I promise. He wants to help," Rory assured Jenifer as he led her into the break room.
"He might," Jenifer noted, ducking behind Rory when Dicken jumped out of his seat and pointed his weapon at her.
"Wait! Wait!" Rory shouted, holding out his arms so that he could shield her more effectively.
"It's a ganger!" Buzzer shouted as he and Jimmy came around the corner in the hall behind them.
"Rory!" Jenifer pleaded.
Amy glared at Dickon. "Don't you even think about shooting my husband!"
"Everybody calm down! Nobody is going to hurt anybody!" Rory demanded.
"I might bite somebody..." Koschei considered.
"Please don't," Jenifer requested, anxious about the effects of his not-quite-joking remark.
"Don't engage him," Dicken advised.
"Put it down," Amy ordered, sounding like a disappointed mother.
"But..." Dicken muttered, lowering his weapon, despite his uncertainty.
"What idiot decided to allow these people to bear arms?" Koschei thought aloud. "I shall find him and shoot him in the leg."
"She's not here to hurt anyone. She just wants to be allowed to live," Rory explained to the others ignoring his friend's griping.
"Give it here, Hot Shot," Amy prompted, holding out her hand. Dicken begrudgingly passed her his firearm. "Thank you."
Rory led Jenifer's ganger over to the table and pulled out a chair for her. "Well that's one accounted for..." he remarked to himself as Buzzer and Jimmy filed into the room after them. "What about- Oh, here they are."
"Hello again!" the Doctor greeted, leading the rest of the gangers into the break room. He glanced over and smiled at Rory and Jenifer's ganger. "Oh, good. You've made it! Only two of us left then. Now!" He plopped down into the chair that Rory had just pulled out at the head of the table, and slapped a random rhythm into the tabletop. "Let's all get to know each other a little bit better, shall we?"
A/N: Ok, guys. Thanks for reading this, and special thanks to GuesssWho. I hope that this was to your liking. Except for Cleaves maybe... man is she annoying. I kinda hate her. It's pretty bad. Anyway, I'm going to try to keep updating this at least every other week, so farewell, until next time... Please review.