Complications
By the Plot Thinens
Chapter 37 -The Satan Pit
"Open fire!" Shouted Jefferson at the other guard in the room. The Ood were now too close for comfort and Jefferson and the guard out of fear of being over taken began shooting at the Ood until they all dropped to the ground.
"We're stabilizing... We've got orbit." Announced Zach on the overhead to his relief.
Rose on the other hand would feel no such relief until she could hear the Doctor's voice again. The Ood threat having been neutralized, for the moment, she ran as fast as she could back to the comm. and grabbed hold of the microphone.
"Doctor? Doctor, can you hear me? Doctor, Ida, are you there?" Shouted Rose into the comm.. She didn't receive an answer and she wished she could just pull him up so he would be safe in her sight. She waited in excruciating silence.
Meanwhile, Jefferson and his guard were on edge as the door that they had been trying to get through was now opening from the other side. Guns drawn they prepared to shoot.
"It's me! But they're coming." Shouted Danny as he came through the door with his hands up in the air.
"It's the Ood. They've gone mad." Continued Danny with what was left of his breath as he closed the door behind him.
"How many of them?" Question Jefferson in an irritated voice. Danny screeched that all fifty Ood had appeared to have gone mental.
"Danny, out of the way. Out of the way!" Ordered Jefferson as he push Danny aside and proceeded to open the door to Danny's absolute horror.
"But they're armed! It's the interface device. I don't know how, but they're using it as a weapon." Shouted Danny to the older man. Unfortunately for his young guard, Jefferson sealed her fate by ignoring Danny's warning. No sooner had Jefferson opened the door, did one of the many Ood waiting behind the door extend its interface device to the female guard's forehead. She only had time to scream as the Ood electrocuted her to death. Seemingly unaffected by what had happen to his comrade, Jefferson raised his gun and started shooting at the offending Ood.
"Jefferson, what's happening there?" Demanded Zach, from his increasingly helpless feeling position in the control room. He had barely escaped the Ood on the other side of his door when he had tried to leave to aid his comrades. He was now trapped and ordering a lock down to prevent the Ood from harming what remained of his crew.
"I've got very little ammunition, sir. How about you?" Jefferson asked his captain.
"All I've got is a bolt gun. With er, all of one bolt. I could take out a grand total of one Ood. Fat lot of good that is." Answered Zach quite irritated at the situation despite the fact that he probably should be more fearful than irritated right now. If he had to go down fighting soon, it would at least have been nice to have been better armed.
"Given the emergency…I recommend strategy nine." Suggested Jefferson to Zach of which he agreed that it would be the best course of action.
"Right, we need to get everyone together. Rose? What about Ida and the Doctor? Any word?" Asked Zach over the comm. about the situation with the two crew members down the rather deep hole. Rose was getting upset because she was getting the feeling that they would be ordered to leave the area soon and she certainly couldn't leave the Doctor behind to fend for himself. She had to save him somehow.
"I can't get a reply. Just nothing. I keep trying, but it's…" Answered Rose in a panicked voice.
"No, sorry, I'm fine. Still here." Assured the Doctor over the static. Rose let out a sigh of relief, he was okay. Rose felt a rush of irrational anger born of fear from the Doctor's late reply and snipped at him,
"You could've said, you stupid..." However before she could finish that curse, feedback was screaming in The Doctor's ears, but he had heard enough to guess what words she was about to choose,
"Whoa. Careful! What if the baby should hear." The Doctor then relayed that both he and Ida were fine, but, the seal they were investigating had opened up leading down into a dark deep chasm.
"How deep is it?" Questioned Zach from the control room.
"Can't tell. It looks like it goes down forever." Observed the Doctor or rather he couldn't observe anything. He hoped that there wouldn't be any more quakes as the Doctor had no desire to fall down that deep hole.
"The pit is open...That's what the voice said." Rose noted with fear on her voice. They should be cautious she thought. Zach did not find Rose's words comforting and with a equal level of anxiety he asked,
"But there's nothing. I mean...There's nothing coming out?"
"No, no. No sign of the Beast." Assured the Doctor in a condescending voice. He couldn't believe he was having to reassure that.
"It said Satan." Noted Rose in a voice filled with fear as a child would at the thought of the boogeyman under her bed.
"Come on, Rose. Keep it together." He encouraged her, but couldn't help sounding a bit scolding and patronizing.
Now this was getting out of hand thought the Doctor as his large brain worked at super speed. Sometimes human superstitions were cute. Black cats are bad luck if they cross your path, don't break a mirror, its seven years bad luck, Chimney Sweeps are good luck, and 'Good luck' kisses, but this was not the time for that. Surely his Rose didn't believe after all the glorious sight she'd seen that the physical incarnation of Satan, the fallen angel of one of the many human's Gods, was on this rock. The Doctor loved celebrating human religious festivals, but more from an anthropological standpoint, not a religious one. Humans, he observed got very careless when they were scared of forces they felt beyond their power or comprehension. He did not need Rose making mistakes over irrational fears born of primitive human beliefs. He, of course, would never say something so degrading of human belief systems to Rose, but like it or not, he did not share her same religious beliefs, nothing personal.
On that thought, he wondered if Rose was going to want to raise their child to have some of those human religious beliefs...great the domestics of parents not having identical or at least compatible faiths. That would be an interesting topic of conversation down the road. It wasn't like he had a problem with Rose telling their daughter, what she personally believed in. He just hoped that she would let her form her own opinions. The Doctor would certainly teach her how the universe worked, but his faith was in science. Hopefully, a happy middle could be found it that subject ever came up. Anyway, they had more important things to do right now, and why was he wasting time thinking about something that won't even matter if they can't get off this deathtrap alive. His thoughts were interrupted when Rose asked him, very seriously,
"Is there no such thing? Doctor... Doctor, tell me there's no such thing." She knew it was somewhat childish, but Rose was very afraid. She had been raised to fear Satan. A force so powerful and evil, no human being could fight against it without divine aid. The Doctor was so much older than her, had seen so many more things, had seen all of time, he knew so much. She needed him to say there was no such thing. Just a word from him would empty out the dread filling her soul. If he could assure her that it was just some strange alien life form playing a cruel trick on them. If it was an alien then it was alive like her, on the same plain like her, could be dealt with and defeated just like any menace they had faced in the past. She needed to know that was all they were up against and not the same Satan she had been warned ever since she could remember wanted her soul and to torture it for all of time. And right now she was feeling very scared and very tortured.
The Doctor said nothing. How did he answer a question like that? It wasn't his place to confirm or deny her belief system. And he didn't know what they were up against. He didn't have long to think on that one as Zach was already recommending Ida and the Doctor to withdraw immediately. Ida was frustrated and disappointed, she understood the order, but she was so close to learning so much. had so many questions and it was very human of her to seek answers for them.
"But, we've come all this way." She protested, to which Zach sighed,
"Okay, That was an order. Withdraw. When that thing opened, the whole planet's shifted. One more inch and we fall into the black hole. So this thing stops right now."
"But it's not much better up there with the Ood." Argued Ida to her commander.
"I'm initiating strategy Nine, so I need the two of you back up top immediately, no ar..." Zach, ordered, but Ida turned off the comms., much to the Doctor's surprise. He was growing even more worried now and very anxious to get back to his wife.
"What do you think?" Ida questioned the Doctor as the two looked over to the pit.
"I think they've an order." Stated the Doctor.
"Yeah, but what do you think?" Ida inquired of the Doctor. He seemed so knowledgeable and she wanted his opinion as a fellow scientist on the matter as the two peered down the pitch black pit.
"It said, I am the temptation." And finding out what was at the bottom of that pit and how far it went down was very tempting indeed.
"Well, if there's something in there, why is it still hiding?" Challenged Ida.
"Maybe we opened the prison but not the cell." Mused the Doctor to his companion.
"We should go down. I'd go. What about you?" The woman suggested, she wanted to know more than anything. The temptation was to great and the Doctor felt it as well.
"Oh. Oh, in a second, but then again, that is so human. Where angels fear to tread. Even now, standing on the edge. It's that feeling you get, eh? Right at the back of your head. That impulse. That strange little impulse. That mad little voice saying, go on. Go on. Go on. Go over. Go on. Maybe it's relying on that." Declared the Doctor in an almost 'campfire story' voice. He then paused for a moment to consider the risks,
"For once in my life, Officer Scott, I'm going to say retreat. Oh, now I know I'm getting old. Rose, we're coming back." Announced the Doctor over his head comm.. He was not willing to risk his family, their future together or these humans over his curiosity…maybe he was becoming a responsible family man after all. Well... 900 plus years, guess he should start maturing by now. He did have a wife and child to think of.
"Best news I've heard all day." Smiled Rose as she spoke into the communicator even though she knew the Doctor couldn't see her. The Doctor was coming back safe and sound.
Her peace of mind was startled however when Jefferson suddenly pointed his rifle at Toby who was lying on the floor staring down the barrel. Rose was horrified!
"What're you doing?" She demanded an answer of the cold hearted man.
"He's infected. He brought that thing on board. You saw it." Accused Jefferson. That was the man's logic, kill everything that's he saw as a threat to him.
"Are you going to start shooting your own people now, Is that what you're going to do? Is it?" Interrogated Rose. Looking up from the petrified man, Jefferson answered, that he would do it if necessary.
"Well then, you'll have to shoot a pregnant woman if necessary, so what's it going to be? Look at his face. Whatever it was, is gone. It passed into the Ood. You saw it happen. He's clean." Rose declared pleading for reason and sanity to prevail.
"Any sign of trouble, I'll shoot him." Snapped Jefferson before lowering his gun and walking away.
The danger to poor Toby's life seemingly gone, for now, Rose reached down to help the man up.
"Are you all right?" Asked Rose, her eyes having all the comfort and sympathy she could muster in the situation.
"Yeah. I don't know." Answered Toby, definitely out of sorts. Rose inquired if he could remember anything from his possession.
"Just, it was so angry. It was fury and rage and death. It was him. It was the devil." Whimpered Toby, Rose gave the terrified man a compassionate hug and encouraged the man to follow her.
The Doctor and Ida had now returned to the capsule and hopefully in a few minutes they would be topside. The Doctor wanted Rose by his side ASAP.
"What's strategy nine?" Questioned the Doctor of Ida.
"Open the airlocks. We'll be safe inside the lock down. The Ood will get thrown out into the vacuum." Explained Ida, matter of factly. The Doctor was horrified by this plan or that there was even an official strategy for such a thing made by these humans. With a hiss he replied,
"So we're going back to a slaughter?"
"The devil's work." Answered Ida, dismissively. How appropriate a statement thought the Doctor as they piled in.
"Okay, we're in. Bring us up." Ordered Ida to her crewmates operating the lift above them. Ida was clearly still upset by the setback, or rather complete halt to the research end of this expedition.
Rose on the other hand, couldn't help but beam, the Doctor was coming back. In a few minutes, they would share a victory hug.
"Ascension in three, two, one." Announced Jefferson as he was at the lift controls, but then the power went out and they were all cast into darkness. Everyone felt the feeling of being both alone and not alone in the darkness with something monstrous. That feeling that something was crawling around you, just out of reach, but you knew it could grab you and there was nothing you could do about it. Then, a voice, a terrible, awful voice, that raises the heckles on skin, that made one's blood run cold, began to speak,
"This is the darkness. This is my domain." If that wasn't creepy enough nearby monitors began to flicker with images of the Ood on them staring at the camera with unfeeling eyes.
"You little things that live in the light, clinging to your feeble suns which die in the end only the darkness remains..." Droned the evil voice, to which Zach whispered over the comm.,
"That's not the Ood. Something's talking through them." A fact that brought no one comfort as the Doctor and all the humans listened on. Only Zach dared at that moment to interrupt the voice, as he ordered,
"This is Captain Zachary Cross Flane of Sanctuary Base Six, representing the Torchwood archive. You will identify yourself."
"You know my name." The voice answered simply as if Zach were playing dumb at knowing its identity. It had no more need to identity itself as all who thought and breathed knew it.
"What do you want?" Demanded Zach of the voice, but it seemed not to care for the question as it began to say,
"You will die here. All of you. This planet is your grave." That statement wasn't what it wanted, it was what it stated would simply happen regardless.
"It's him. It's him. It's him." sobbed Toby.
The doctor was not impressed. He had seen so many cultures, religions, gods, civilizations, they all had their evil whatever that was to be feared. There were too many to choose from.
"If you are the Beast, then answer me this. Which one, hmm? Cos the universe has been busy since you've been gone. There's more religions than there are planets in the sky. The Archiphets, Orkology, Christianity, Pash Pash, New Judaism, San Klah, Church of the Tin Vagabond. Which devil are you?" Inquired the Doctor in a voice equally unimpressed and looking for clarity.
"All of them." The voice answered plainly.
"What, then you're the truth behind the myth?" The Doctor asked in a patronizing voice, if this was the case it would clear up quite a bit. Perhaps the voice felt that it was losing control of the conversation or that this Doctor was trying to steal away the atmosphere of fear it was creating, so it replied,
"This one knows me as I know him. The killer of his own kind." The Doctor was surprised at the statement, but not shaken, it was a game of minds or chess and he was not to be caught blinking.
"How did you end up on this rock?" Inquired the Doctor as to how a 'supposedly' 'oh so powerful' being got stranded on a rock floating above a black hole in the middle of nowhere.
"The Disciples of the Light rose up against me and chained me in the pit for all eternity." Stated the voice to which the Doctor made the inquiry as to when that obviously bad day for it was?
"Before time." The voice declared. Now this did catch the Doctor off guard. Perhaps he did not hear right or did not get the meaning.
"What does that mean?" The Time Lord asked in a affronted if not confused voice.
"Before time." It stated again.
"What does before time mean?" The Time Lord snapped back, that made no sense. There was always time, there was never not time.
"Before light and time and space and matter. Before the cataclysm. Before this universe was created." Explained the voice.
"That's impossible. No life could have existed back then." Stated the Doctor as if it were the most obvious thing ever said.
"Is that your religion?" Asked the voice of the Doctor. Now that statement did take the Doctor aback. He had never considered any of his unquestionable knowledge as a religion. What he had learnt of the time, space, and the universe, growing up in a Time Lord society, it was just thought as science fact to him. Things observed and presented with evidence to their likeliness as the best answer. But when one thought of it, everything was theory, as example, things that humans took for scientific fact, he had watched disproven and changed by humans over there scientific development. Time Lord sciences and theory was the most advanced, but could he, someone who only understands time, understand a before time? The idea of such a thing never had even crossed his mind. All he could answer in response was,
"It's a belief." Now having the silence that it wanted again the voice continued,
"You know nothing. All of you, so small. The Captain, so scared of command. The soldier, haunted by the eyes of his wife." Jefferson looked visibly shaken by the statement the voice had made. And yet the voice continued, in Ida, Danny and Toby's direction,
"The scientist, still running from Daddy. The little boy who lied. The virgin." And then lastly its attention fell on Rose.
"And the lost girl, so far away from home. The valiant child who will die in battle so very soon." Its words struck Rose to her core and in a panic she asked the Doctor over the comm.,
"Doctor, what does that mean?" The Doctor was unnerved by the fear on Rose's voice almost as much as he had been unnerved by the voice's verbal attack on Rose. He hated it for what it was doing to Rose. He swore that the second he got back up he would make it pay, devil be damned. He would protect his Rose. TARDIS or no TARDIS he would provide his wife and child with the best life in this century that his Time Lord resourcefulness could muster and no bogeyman voice was going to keep him from doing that. But the Doctor could see what the voice was doing, oh he could see. It was trying to unnerve these humans to the point where they would be easy prey to pick off, running scared into walls and falling over themselves to get away from they knew not what. He had to bring sanity back to the situation. They were not doomed and anything this creature said was nothing that they could not face off against with a clear head.
"Rose, Love, don't listen." The Doctor told Rose, trying to get her to focus on his voice and reason instead of the toxic environment of fear this voice was creating.
"What does it mean?" Cried Rose again to the Doctor. Clearly Rose was frightened by her death prophecy. It was everything she feared, the unknown end, leaving her family behind, leaving the Doctor alone, the worry of failing as a mother, or ending up like her father and leaving her daughter half orphaned. What if she died before she gave birth? Battles were gruesome, she didn't want to die in one. She didn't want the Doctor to lose another person he loved in a war. She didn't want to leave the Doctor the duty of telling her mother of her death. All this floated in her head until she couldn't think beyond the fear.
"You will die and I will live." The voice answered as the image of the Ood on the monitors was replaced by a roaring horned beast that terrified all who saw it. That certainly didn't help to calm down Rose or any other human for that matter.
"What the hell was that?" Screeched Danny as he stared at one of the monitors.
"I had that thing inside my head." Blubbered Toby.
"Doctor, what did it mean?" Questioned a petrified Rose again. The fear on her voice made the Time Lord's hearts ache and he wanted to hold her. She was just repeating it again and again, too scared to move or think, just like a deer in the headlights, unable to move past terror. Fear was now at toxic levels as everyone panicked at what to do next. The voice was playing with them, being a movie monster and provided the special effects to scare its human audience, and the Doctor saw this clearly.
"What do we do? Jefferson?" Howl Danny at Jefferson who asked Zach what the situation was on the strategy nine plan, over his comm. Danny was just pacing back and forth in a fright.
"The planet, the orbit, the black hole. Everything's true." Cried out Toby as Jefferson and Zach bantered back and forth trying to get some plan underway.
"Doctor, how did it know all of that?" Wailed Rose, the Doctor could barely hear his wife over the many other human voices, He told them all to stop, but nothing seemed to be getting through to them.
"Everyone just stop." Growled the Doctor who finally grabbed the over head comm. microphone from the capsule and sent feedback through the comm. The loud noise got everyone's attention and shut everyone up. The Doctor had his quiet and a chance to talk some reason into the humans.
"You want voices in the dark? Then listen to mine. That thing is playing on very basic fears. Darkness, childhood nightmares, all that stuff." Barked the Doctor in a manner not too unlike his ninth incarnation. He'd had about all the crap he could take from his voice. Scary movie amateur hour was over and it was time for sanity to reign.
"But that's how the devil works." Whined Danny to which the Doctor snipped back,
"Or a good psychologist." Noted the Doctor. He did not see this as a battle between men and demons, no. To the Doctor it was a battle of minds between him and a very clever, but very vicious, twisted mind. And the Time Lord would not let it use his human companions and wife as pawns. They were worthy players in this game of chess too, now he just had to convince them of it. Get them to see past the fear and rise to the challenge.
"Yeah, but how did it know about my father?" Questioned Ida still unnerved by the specific detail about her life. The Doctor was not impressed by the voice knowing that, he knew several species that could read minds and pick out details from even the slightest susceptible mind. But a suggestion of there being a mind reading aliens about them wasn't going to calm this lot. Reason and using their heads was. He needed to inspire them, to uplift them. In his most Doctory voice he began his speech of encouragement,
"Okay, but what makes his version of the truth any better than mine, hmm? Cos I'll tell you what I can see. Humans. Brilliant humans. Humans who travel all the way across space, flying in a tiny little rocket right into the orbit of a Black hole, just for the sake of discovery. That's amazing! Do you hear me? Amazing, all of you. The Captain, his Officer, his elders, his juniors, his friends. All with one advantage. The Beast is alone. We are not. If we can use that to fight against him..." Then as if to rain on his parade, a loud BANG! was heard interrupting the Time lord's speech. The cable to the capsule had sheared and was falling down into the shaft.
"The cable's snapped!" Shouted Ida.
"Get out!" Yelled the Doctor as they threw themselves to the ground away from the capsule as miles of steel cable arrived at the bottom at speeds fast enough to split a man in two.
Rose was aghast at what had just happened. She gripped at the comm. as if it were the Doctor's hand slipping from her grasp as she shouted into it,
"Doctor, we lost the cable! Doctor, are you all right? Doctor! Doctor? Doctor, can you hear me? Say something. Are you there?" Rose hated not knowing if the Doctor was okay. She wishes that she could speak with her daughter. Surely, she would be able to tell if her father was all right. She was kicking herself, why had she not linked her mind with the Doctor earlier? 'Because you weren't ready yet and you shouldn't have to feel forced!' Rose felt not the words but the tone and mood from she knew not where. She was confused, sad, scared, and 'damn it' she needed a plan.
"Comms are down. I've still got life signs, but we've lost the capsule. There's no way out. They're stuck down there." Mourned Zach. He'd lost two more crew members and their deaths would be sad, cold, and there wasn't a damn thing he could do to save them from their approaching deaths.
"How much air have we got?" Asked the Doctor as he surveyed the wreck that was once the capsule in front of them. They were now stuck down here with only what he assumed was a limited supply of air.
"Sixty minutes. Fifty five." Stated Ida grimly. 'Fantastic.' said a voice in the back of the Doctor's very large head.
Author's Note: ...So close to smexy time, next chapter, I swear.