Title: It starts with Barcelona
Pairing: Ten/Rose
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rate: T
Story: AU version of "Doomsday": Rose stayed with the Doctor and they set up their new beginning. There's something different in Rose, something that she still doesn't understand. The Doctor does though and he'll try to help her. This time, he'll allow himself to be selfish. Only this time, because she's the reason. She's the main reason that keeps him going.
A/N: Hello, guys. I've decided it's time to try something new and that's the reason I've started watching "Doctor Who". Then, I found myself falling in love with Ten... and then in Ten/Rose relationship. Because they are unique and special. So, I've decided to write my own post-version of "Doomsday". Enjoy and I hope you like it. :)
Chapter Thirty-Seven: The Legacy of the Bad Wolf
"I've never seen him like this," Mel touched her brother's arm while they were staring at the Doctor. He was standing under the glass roof of the Library, looking up to the huge moon on the sunset sky. "We have to do something, Healer."
"I think I've done more than enough," the Healer was staring at his father as well. "If it wasn't for me we wouldn't have been stuck in here in the first place."
"Maybe we had to do it?" Mel said softly. "Remember what mother always tells us, there's a reason for everything."
"Yeah," the healer shook his head. "Whatever, we have to do something. How we could make him move? He's like this since we've got here."
"Doctor?" Mel called him. He looked at her, but his eyes were empty. It was as if he was miles away from here. "We have to do something. We can't just stand here."
"Right," the Doctor nodded. "But what exactly?"
"Well, for starters… we've got a clear spot. In, in, in!" The Healer looked around the survivors. "Right in the center, in the middle of the light, quickly! Don't let your shadows cross. Doctor…"
The Doctor looked at him and shook his head. "Yeah, yeah… I'm doing it." He started to check the shadows with his sonic screwdriver.
"There's no lights here. Sunset's coming, we can't stay long. Have you find a live one?" The Healer looked around, checking with his sonic screwdriver as well.
"Maybe, it's getting harder to tell." The Doctor trashed his sonic. "What's wrong with you?"
"We're gonna need a chicken leg. Who's got a chicken leg?" The Healer looked around and Mel threw him one. The Healer caught it in the air. "Thanks, Mel." He threw the leg in the shadow the Doctor was examining and it got stripped to the bone before it hit the floor. "Okay… we've got a hot one. Watch your feet."
"They won't attack until there's enough of them, but they've got our scent now, they're coming." The Doctor came closer to his son.
"That's amazing…" Jane exclaimed. "I've always thought that the Time Lords are only a stuff of legend and now I'm seeing three of them…"
"Some of them are not supposed to be here," the Doctor muttered.
"Wrong time, wrong place." Mel shrugged.
"It happens… sometimes." The Healer grinned.
"Excuse me!" Mr. Lux frowned. "Can we focus over the main problem here?"
"Sure, sure…" The Doctor gave him a look. "There's something that doesn't make sense here." He fiddled with his sonic.
"What's wrong?" Mel walked closer to her father.
"There's a signal, coming from somewhere, interfering with it."
"You can use the red settings," the Healer shrugged.
"It doesn't have a red setting." The Doctor frowned.
"Well, you could use the dampers." Mel suggested.
"It doesn't have dampers."
"Oops, it doesn't have yet?" Mel bit her lower lip. "Well, it will have someday." She showed him her sonic. "It's gonna look something like this."
"Brilliant!" The Doctor looked at Mel's sonic. "Did you make it?"
"With a little help," Mel shrugged. "You have to focus now! You've lost mum and you're angry, I understand! But you need to be less emotional, Doctor…"
"Less em—I'm not emotional!" The Doctor scoffed.
"Well, you are!" Mel put her hands on her waist. She reminded him of Rose right now. "There's are survivors in this room! My mum is still alive, because well… I am. That means that she's out there, somewhere! So, if you want to save them all, you have to think first!"
"What?!" The Doctor looked angry.
"Alright, Mel." The Healer put his hand on his sister's shoulder. "I think that's enough."
"I'm sorry," Mel stepped back. "I'll join the rest of the group now." She turned around and joined Mr. Lux and the others.
"Something tells me that I'd be so proud one day," the Doctor muttered with a small smile on his face. Then he turned back to his old energetic self. "Alright! Know what's interesting about my screwdriver? Very hard to interfere with, practically nothing's strong enough... Well, some hairdryers, but I'm working on that. So there is a very strong signal coming from somewhere, and it wasn't there before, so what's new, what's changed?" He looked around. "Come on! What's new? What's different?"
"I dunno, nothing? It's getting dark." Kyle shrugged.
"It's a screwdriver, it works in the dark." The Doctor scoffed. "Get your little brain to work, Kyle!"
"He likes to insult species when he's thinking," Mel muttered. "I guess that hasn't changed, at all."
The Doctor looked up to the darkening sky over the doom and noticed the moon. "Moon rise… Tell me about the moon. What's there?"
"It's not real." Mr. Lux looked at him. "It was built as part of the Library. It's just a doctor moon."
"Explain?" The Doctor looked at him with interest.
"A virus checker. It supports and maintains the main computer at the core of the planet." Mr. Lux answered.
The Doctor turned on the sonic. "Well, still active, it's signalling, look. Someone somewhere in this Library is alive and communicating with the moon, or, possibly alive and drying their hair. No, the signal's definitely coming from the moon. I'm blocking it, but it's trying to break through..." Suddenly Rose's blurry image appeared in the Library.
"Doctor!" She screamed.
"Rose!" The Doctor shouted, but the image faded. "Hold on, hold on! I'm trying to find the wavelength. Ah, I'm being blocked."
"Mel?" Kyle's scared voice echoed in the room.
"Just a moment," Mel mumbled.
"It's important," Kyle insisted. "I have two shadows."
"What?" Mel turned around and everybody followed her. "Okay. Helmets on, everyone. Kyle, I'll get yours." She went for the helmet and walked back to Kyle.
"I'm gonna end up like Dave, right?"
"Just keep it together, okay?" Mel tried to smile and put on the helmet to Kyle.
"Oh, I'm doing it. I'm only crying." Kyle sniffed. "I'm about to die, it's not an overreaction."
"Just hang on," the Doctor said. He soniced the helmet to make the visor dark.
"Damn, they're fast!" Mel muttered.
"Oh, no. I just tinted her visor. Maybe they'll think they're already in there, leave her alone." The Doctor tried to sound hopeful.
"D'you think they can be fooled like that?" Mel didn't look so convinced.
"Maybe. I don't know." The Doctor rubbed the back of his head. "It's a swarm, it's not like we can chat."
"But, can you still see in there?" Jane asked taking a step closer to them.
"Just… stay back!" The Doctor scoffed. "Mel?"
"Yes, Doctor?" She walked closer to him. "What is it?"
"Remind me how many survivors were here?"
"With you… six. Why?"
"Then why I can see seven people here?" The Doctor lowered his voice.
As the six of them turned around, they saw another figure in spacesuit standing in the background. Then Dave's voice echoed. "Hey! Who turned down the lights?"
"Run!" The Doctor shouted.
They ran out the room, with skeleton Dave chasing them. His voice kept echoing after them. The group ran through a corridor connecting two high buildings.
The Doctor stopped all of a sudden, grabbing Mel's arm. "Go ahead! Find a safe spot!"
"It's a carnivorous swarm in a suit, you can't reason with it." The Healer shouted.
"Five minutes," the Doctor looked at his son.
"Fine!" Mel and the Healer scoffed. Then Mel looked up at the Doctor. "If you're not there with us, we're coming back to find you."
"I don't doubt that," the Doctor winked at her. Then he watched how the group ran out the corridor. He sighed and turned around to face the skeleton Dave.
"Hey! Who turned out the lights?" Dave's voice echoed.
"You hear that? Those words? That is the very last thought of the man who wore that suit before you climbed inside it and stripped his flesh. That's a man's soul trapped inside a neural relay, going round and round forever. Now, if you don't have the decency to let him go, how about this? Use him. Talk to me. It's easy, neural relay. Just point and think. Use him, talk to me." The Doctor moved close to him.
"Hey! Who turned out the lights?" Dave's voice echoed again.
"The Vashta Nerada live on all the worlds in this system, but you hunt in forests. What are you doing in a library? You came to the Library to hunt, why? Just tell me why?" The Doctor spoke slowly.
"We… did not." Dave's voice changed. Now it was Vashta Nerada speaking.
"Oh, hello." The Doctor lowered his voice.
"We did not."
"Take it easy, you'll get the hang of it. Did not what?"
"We… did not… come… here." Vashta Nerada spoke through Dave.
"No, you came here. Why?" The Doctor insisted.
"We come from here," the voice answered.
"From here?"
"We hatched here."
"But… you hatch from trees, from spores in trees." The Doctor frowned with confusion.
"These are our forests."
"There's no forest here," the Doctor shook his head.
"These are our forests," Vashta Nerada repeated.
"You're not in a forest, you're in a library. There are no trees in a…" realization dawning on him, "library. Books. You came in the books. Microspores in a million million books. Oh, look at that." He looked out to the endless city of bookshelves. "The forests of the Vashta Nerada, pulped and printed and bound. A million million books, hatching shadows." Then he looked back at the skeleton Dave. The Vashta Nerada had stopped talking through him and now, he took a step closer to the Doctor. The Doctor sighed. "Thing about me, I'm stupid, I talk too much, always babbling on, this gob doesn't stop for anything. Wanna know the only reason I'm still alive? Always stay near the door."
He turned around, running away from the skeleton Dave. He closed the door that led to that corridor and locked it with his sonic screwdriver. Then he ran again, trying to find the others. It didn't take him too long. They were gathered in another section of the Library, not that far away. He stood at the balcony, just looking at them. The Healer and Mel were standing closer to him. They were talking quietly about something, but he could hear their conversation.
"I wonder if he could open his TARDIS with a snap of his fingers yet?" The Healer was saying. "We used to have so much fun with that when I was a kid. Mum was trying to teach me doing the same, but I guess the TARDIS was answering only to him."
"Spoilers!" The Doctor shook his head and took their attention. "Nobody can open a TARDIS by snapping their fingers. It doesn't work like that!"
"It does… for you." The Healer shrugged.
"Well, it doesn't… now." The Doctor shrugged and came closer to them. He looked at Kyle. "How are you doing?"
"Still around," Kyle answered him.
The Doctor looked down and saw that Kyle still had two shadows. "Well, maybe it's the visor tricking them. Can I get you anything?"
"An old age will be good," Kyle chuckled bitterly.
"I'm working on it," the Doctor nodded.
"Doctor… just promise me that you'll do anything to keep us safe." Kyle spoke again. "If not me… the others. I think everyone deserve to go home."
"Safe…" The Doctor trailed off all of a sudden.
"What?" Kyle asked.
"Safe! You don't say saved, nobody says saved, you say safe. The data fragment! What did it say?" The Doctor turned to Mr. Lux.
""4,022 people saved. No survivors."" Mr. Lux answered him.
"Doctor?" Mel looked at him with confusion.
"Nobody says saved, nutters say saved, you say safe. But you see, it didn't mean safe, it meant... it literally meant... saved!" The Doctor ran his finger through his hair frantically. He ran to the information terminal. "See, there it is, right there! A hundred years ago, massive power surge, all the teleports going at once. Soon as the Vashta Nerada hit their hatching cycle, they attack. Someone hits the alarm, the computer tries to teleport everyone out."
"What? It tried to teleport 4,022 people?" Mel walked closer to him.
"Succeeded, pulled 'em all out, but then what? Nowhere to send them, nowhere safe in the whole Library, Vashta Nerada growing in every shadow. 4,022 people all beamed up and nowhere to go. They're stuck in the system, waiting to be sent, like emails. So what's a computer to do? What does a computer always do?" The Doctor looked excited.
Mel grinned, finally understanding. "It saved them!"
"The Library, a whole world of books, and right at the core, the biggest hard drive in history. The index to everything ever written, backup copies of every single book. The computer saved 4,022 people the only way a computer can. It saved them to the hard drive." The Doctor kept working on the terminal until an alarm echoed in the Library.
"What is it? What's wrong?"
"Autodestruct enabled in 20 minutes." A machine voice echoed.
"What's maximum erasure?" The Healer looked at the Doctor.
"20 minutes, this planet's gonna crack like an egg." The Doctor looked at him.
"No! No, it's all right!" Mr. Lux walked to them. "The doctor moon will stop it. It's programmed to protect CAL."
Just then the screen of the information terminal went blank. The Doctor shouted, "No, no, no, no!" He kept pushing buttons, but nothing worked.
"All Library systems are permanently offline. Sorry for any inconvenience. Shortly..." The metallic voice echoed again.
"We need to stop this!" Mr. Lux looked panicked now. "We've got to save CAL!"
"What is it?" The Doctor turned around angrily. "What's CAL?"
"We need to get to the main computer and… I'll show you!" Mr. Lux answered.
"But.. it's at the core of the planet." The Doctor told him.
"Well, then… what are we waiting for?" Mel turned around, sonicing the symbol on the floor at the center of the room. It opened up and everybody gasped, including her. "Wow! A gravity platform!"
"Oh I'll be so proud of you one day." The Doctor grinned.
"Oh, you will." Mel winked at him and the Healer chuckled.
They all stepped on the platform and it started to descend. Just as they reached the core of the planet, the computer warned them that they have 15 minutes left.
"The Data Core! 4,000 living minds, trapped inside it." The Doctor looked around.
"Yeah, well they won't be living much longer, we're running out of time." The Healer joined him when he walked to a monitor near him.
Suddenly, they could hear a girl's cry for help from the computer terminal. It was calling them over and over again.
"What's that?" Kyle asked.
"Was that… a child?" Mel looked at the Doctor.
"Computer's in sleep mode." He pushed keys. 'I can't wake it up. I'm trying." As he fiddled with the keys, the girl's cry was getting louder and louder.
"Doctor?" Mel called him, looking at a monitor. "These readings!"
"I know, you'd think it was… dreaming…" The Doctor mumbled.
"It is dreaming...of a normal life, and a lovely Dad, and of every book ever written." Mr. Lux spoke all of a sudden.
"But computers don't dream," Kyle said.
"Help me. Please help me!" The girl's voice was coming from the terminal.
"No, but the little girls do." Mr. Lux pushed a lever to open a door, and they all run to the next room. A Node turned and it was head to them - it was wearing a Girl's face, pleading for help.
"Oh, my God!" Mel put her hand on her lips.
"It's the girl we saw in the computer earlier," Kyle gasped.
"She's not in the computer," Mr. Lux lowered his voice. "In a way, she's the computer. The main command node. This is CAL."
"CAL is a child?" The Doctor muttered. "A child hooked up to a mainframe? Why didn't you tell me this earlier? I needed to know this!" He looked angry.
"Because she's family!" Mr. Lux scoffed. "CAL... Charlotte Abigail Lux. My grandfather's youngest daughter. She was dying, so he built her a library, and put her living mind inside, with a moon to watch over her, and all of human history to pass the time, any era to live in, any book to read. She loved books more than anything. He gave her them all. He asked only that she be left in peace. A secret, not a freak show."
"So… you were protecting her? All the time?" The Doctor lowered his voice.
"This is only half a life, of course. But it's forever." Mr. Lux smiled with sadness.
"And then… the shadows came…" The Doctor muttered again.
"Shadows. I have to… I have to save. Have to save…" The girl's voice echoed in the small room.
"And she saved them." The Doctor looked at the Node. "She saved everyone in the Library, folded them into her dreams and kept them safe."
"Why didn't she tell us?" Kyle asked.
"Because she's forgotten. She's got over 4,000 living minds chatting away inside her head, it must be like... being... well, me." The Doctor shrugged.
"What do we do now?" Mel looked at him.
"Autodestruct in ten minutes." The computer's voice reminded them.
"Easy!" The Doctor rushed to the control table, pulling out the cables. "We beam all the people out of the data core, the computer will reset and stop the countdown. Difficult, Charlotte doesn't have enough memory space left to make the transfer. Easy! I'll hook myself up to the computer and she can borrow my memory space!"
"Dificult!" Mel rushed to him. "It'll kill you stone dead!"
"Yeah, it's easy to criticize." The Doctor didn't even look at her.
"It'll burn out both your hearts and don't think you'll regenerate!" Mel shouted. "Healer, tell him!"
"I'll try hardest not to die. Honestly, it's my main thing." The Doctor rushed to the monitor near him.
"Doctor!" Mel shouted.
"I'm right and this works! Shut up. Now listen, you and Luxy-boy, back up to the main Library. Prime any data cells you can find for maximum download, and before you say anything else, Professor, can I just mention in passing as your air, shut up! Healer, help your sister!" The Doctor looked at them both.
"I hate you sometimes!" Mel scoffed and the Healer just shook his head.
"I think I know." The Doctor mumbled, kept working.
"C'mon!" Mel turned around. "Everybody with me! Kyle, you stay here with him. It's… safer in that way."
Then the group left the small control room. The Doctor worked frantically at the computer terminal.
"What about Vashta Nerada?" Kyle asked all of a sudden.
"These are their forests. I'm gonna seal Charlotte inside her little world, take everybody else away. The shadows can swarm to their hearts' content." The Doctor didn't even look at her.
"So… they're just gonna go?"
"The best offer they're gonna get."
"You're gonna make 'em an offer?"
"They'd better take it, cos right now, I'm finding it very hard to make any kind of offer at all. You know what..." The Doctor stopped his work for a moment and looked at Kyle. "My children really liked Kyle. So am I. She was brave, even when she was crying and she never gave in. And you… just ate her." He soniced the spacesuit's visor to reveal a skeleton inside. "I'm gonna let that pass. Just as long as you let them pass."
"How long have you known?" The skeleton asked.
"I counted the shadows. You only have one now." He looked at the blinking neural replay. "She's nearly gone. Be kind."
"These are our forests. We are not kind." The skeleton voice answered.
"I'm giving you back your forests, but you're giving me back them… and Rose! You are letting them all go!" The Doctor walked back to the terminal. Shadows reached out from the skeleton towards him.
"These are our forests. They are our meat."
"Don't play with me!" The Doctor scoffed. "You've tried to kill someone I love! If I don't get her back, along with everybody else saved here, that's not a safe place to stand! I'm the Doctor and you're in the biggest library in the universe. Look me up!"
After a short pause, the shadows withdrew. "You have one day." Then the creature in the suit collapsed, just as the Healer and Mel rushed back in the room.
"Kyle!" Mel screamed.
"I'm sorry, she's been dead in awhile now." The Doctor didn't even look at them. "I told you to go!"
"Lux can manage without us, but you can't. I'm sorry, but I have to do it!" The Healer walked to him and without a word knocked him out.
When the Doctor woke up, he saw the Healer and Mel, wrapped up in wires and doing something with their sonics. He was handcuffed to a pillar a bit further.
"Two minutes," the computer voice announced.
"What are you doing?" The Doctor shouted. "That's my job!"
"No, you just can't see the bigger picture!" The Healer scoffed.
"Why am I handcuffed? Stop it now! I'd have a chance and you-"
"You wouldn't have a chance, but maybe we are." The Healer interrupted him. "I'm timing it for the end of the countdown, there'll be a blip in the command flow. That way it should improve our chances of a clean download."
"Please, don't!" The Doctor shouted.
"Autodestruct in one minute." The computer announced.
"Ready?" The Healer looked at his sister.
"Ready," she took his hand with a smile.
"No!" The Doctor desperately tried to reach them. "Stop it! Let me do it!"
"No!" The Healer looked at him. "If you die here, you're gonna change the future. Our future… dad." He looked at his sister. "Our mother would never be saved; my sister would never be born. This is how it has to happen? See the bigger picture, dad. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry… but we have to do it!"
"I can't watch you die… not you… not…" The Doctor shook his head and his eyes went wet.
"Autodestruct in ten…" The computer voice sounded again.
"Goodbye, dad." The Healer looked at him with a smile.
"…nine, eight, seven…"
"Goodbye, daddy…" Mel smiled at him as well. "We'll meet again."
"Please…" the Doctor whispered, helplessly watching his grown up children.
"…three, two, one…"
The Healer and Mel glowed, plunging together two cables and blinding white light hid them from the Doctor's view. When he was able to see again, they were gone. He rested his forehead on the metal surface. A lonely tear rolled down his face.
"Doctor?" Rose's voice echoed near him. "Doctor?"
He looked up, just to see her running towards him. She grabbed his sonic screwdriver from the floor and pointed it to his handcuffs. In the next moment he was free again. Then he wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly. Rose clung to him as well. She hid her face in the crook of his neck and he could feel her tears soaking through his skin.
They stood like that for a while. Then she asked him for the Healer and Mel. He simply shook his head and she started crying again. The Doctor simply wrapped his arm around her shoulders and led her out the room. They found Mr. Lux surrounded by people. He was laughing and smiling. They were saved. Now they could go back home.
The Doctor and Rose walked to the TARDIS. The Doctor just stopped and a small smile appeared on his lips. He snapped his fingers and indeed, the door opened. Rose wrapped her arm around his waist and gave him a light squeeze. Then she walked into the TARDIS, followed by him.
"Hello?" Suddenly the Healer's voice echoed in the ship.
"What?!" The Doctor's eyes widened.
"Just wanted to say a proper goodbye." Mel's voice echoed as well.
"I told you, we have the better chance," the Healer's voice sounded again.
"But-" Rose looked at the Doctor confused.
"We are children of the Bad Wolf and that's a great legacy," Mel chuckled over the speaker. "Anyhow, we should go now."
"Bye!" The Healer and Mel said in one voice and then everything went quiet again.
The Doctor just shook his head and looked at Rose. She was laughing. He smiled and soon his smile turned into laugh as well. He pushed few buttons and pulled down the lever while Rose went to see Pete. Soon the TARDIS left the Library on its way to save the Universe.