A/N: I'm back everyone! I know that this is a short chapter, but I have been getting out of a really bad writer's block, and a terribly busy schedule, so here is one chapter!
Chapter 36: Kerblam Part 2
Iris stood there with the Doctor by the reception as Twirly stated,
"Customers who selected these items also bought ear mufflers, pencil sharpeners, and cola bottles. Say yes now to order these three for the price of the cheapest two."
At that, the Doctor's eyes widened and she immediately looked towards Iris with puppy eyes, causing Iris to chuckle, before her face turned quickly blank, as she ground out, "No."
The Doctor's eyes fell, but she heard Iris tell her mentally, "Doctor, focus."
The Doctor could only nod, her blonde hair bobbing up and down with it, as Graham was snickering behind them, knowing what the Doctor was feeling around Iris. Twirly, being a little bot, merely stated,
"Thank you. I have stored your preferences. And remember, if you want it, Kerblaa…"
Everyone's eyes widened at the sudden loss of power, and the Doctor immediately frowned as she studied it and stated,
"It's out of juice. It needs a big recharge before I can access the code."
Graham replied with, "Maintenance store. There's everything there."
Charlie grimaced, which did not go unnoticed by everyone, causing him to clarify with,
"That's not a good idea."
Judy finally stepped up, a concerned look in her eyes as she said,
"Doctor, I've just had a notification that one of the workers from Packing has gone missing. Her GroupLoop's disappeared right off the System. Name of Kira Arlo?"
A panicked look finally settled into Charlie's features, as he exclaimed "What? Kira?"
Ryan and Yasmin shared a foreboding look as the former firmly said, "We have to find her."
Iris looked towards Judy, asking, "I thought you said the System didn't notify you when someone went missing."
Judy looked around before admitting, "Well, it didn't until now. It's like it's sending us a deliberate message."
Ryan forlornly stated, "It knows we're onto it."
Iris stepped away a moment, not too far, but enough to think things through. Why send them a message? Why bring the Doctor and the companions over her with such a message? What were the Kerblam men doing?
That was when Iris' eyes widened slightly, as she whispered out, "They want to show us something and help them."
The Doctor felt an idea pop up in Iris' mind, leading her to go over to the woman, with a curious look, not having heard Iris' whisper. But before she reached the woman, Iris walked quickly over to Judy, asking,
"Where was her signal last recorded?"
Judy looked at the message again, before hesitatingly saying, "Er… Dispatch."
Charlie looked even more panicked than ever as he said,
"That's not possible. No people are allowed down there."
The Doctor walked over as well, asking,
"Dispatch? Foundation levels, right? Where the power's drained down too."
Yasmin then asked, "How do we get to her?"
Judy shook her head as she said, "You can't. It's fully automated. There's not even a route down."
Yasmin looked at the group, frustrated, stating, "But she got down there somehow."
Ryan looked at Iris, noticing her brain seemed to moving, as he said,
"You get what you need from that robot. Yaz, Charlie, come with me. We'll find Kira."
Iris sent Ryan a nod, before thinking out loud with,
"The Kerblam man, or men… what if they were the ones asking for help?"
Graham looked at the younger Time Lady, and asked, "What? Aren't they the ones doing this?"
Iris looked up at him and said, "Yes, but why? What caused them to break through their codes, if they did, to come to the TARDIS through the Time Vortex to ask for help?"
The Doctor snapped and said with a look of excitement, "Something, or someone has been planning to potentially harm customers."
Iris nodded and said, "Make the robots look bad. Potentially do something with whatever is being delivered using the robots."
With that, Iris looked over to Judy, asking, "Is there any movement against the Kerblam men? Or robots of any sorts?"
Judy stuttered, before admitting, "Well, people protest that robots like Kerblam men are stealing their jobs. But I would never imagine anyone using them to hurt people. I mean, how could that possibly happen? Especially here? We make sure to screen everyone we hire."
Iris shook her head and said, "Easy to lie in screening for political opinions. The question, is, what are we going to do to stop both the Kerblam men from grabbing people's attention for help, and the person behind this all?"
The Doctor pointed towards the maintenance, store, and said, "Time to reactivate Twirly."
Once in the maintenance store, the Doctor was able to quickly charge him up, making him immediately state,
"Alert, you may also like to know we have a one-hour offer on cushions! Cushions liven up the grimmest workplace, like this one."
Iris raised an eyebrow at that, whilst the Doctor hurried talked to the little bot with a,
"Twirly, hi. I'm the Doctor, that's Iris, and this is Graham. The woman over there is Judy. And can you pause all sales protocols for a bit?"
Twirly blinked for a bit before asking, almost in an incredulous tone, "Even the upselling?"
Iris nodded and said, "Even the upselling."
The Doctor noticed the slightly downcast look Twirly gave them, and said hurriedly,
"You've just had a nap of about 200 years, so your offers are out of date anyway."
Twirly looked even more upset, if that was possible, as he said, "Without upselling, my only purpose is delivery."
Graham sighed and added, "We don't need you to do that either, mate."
Twirly whirled on them with, "The future is very confusing for my protocols. I serve Kerblam, and Kerblam serves the people."
That piece of information caught Iris' attention even more, as Judy explained,
"Which is why we need your help. These are my Kerblam credentials, my own executive read-code. We need you to carry out a task which may fundamentally save Kerblam."
That was when Twirly remained dejected as he said, "I am only a delivery bot."
Graham groaned as he said, "See, now you've made it nervous."
The Doctor shook her head and said, "Don't panic, Twirly. You can do this. It's possible that Kerblam has been compromised. I'm going to patch you into the System. I need you to look far and wide, past new upgrades and firewalls and security patches, into the base code that only you can recognize, and then you can tell us what's going on and deliver the information to us."
Iris watched as Twirly blinked once, which signaled his comprehension, as he said, "Retrieve and deliver. I understand."
With that, the Doctor mumbled something, which went unnoticed by the rest of the group as she connected something to the computer terminal. Sparks flew up and Iris grew alarmed as Twirly yelled out,
"Help me, help me, help me!"
Iris ran over and unplugged Twirly from the system, but his voice changed to the System's as he repeated the two words continuously. The Doctor then grew confused as she asked Iris, "What happened?"
Iris shook her head and said, "I don't know, but it sounds like the System is asking for help."
That was when the System stated, "Not Twirly speaking. The System. Kerblam. Help me, Doctor. Help me. Help me, Doctor. Help me."
Iris' eyes widened, along with everyone else, as The Doctor said, "Oh! The System sent the message. It printed the slip. It sent it out."
Graham looked confused as he asked, "But why would the System need help?"
While the Doctor started asking Twirly questions, Iris said, "Because something is threatening how Kerblam works, and that…"
But she couldn't finish as the System in Twirly stated, "Help required in Dispatch. Help in Dispatch. Urgent help."
Graham paled significantly, worry for Ryan and Yasmin immediately rose, as he said "Doc, they've all just gone down there."
With that, Iris said, "We need to head down there."
The Doctor looked over at the Delivery Bot, eyeing it as she mumbled, "These delivery bots, they've got teleport circuits. We don't have to go on the conveyor down to Dispatch. If I can hijack their circuit for one moment…"
Iris and the group watched as the Doctor sonicked one of the nearby Delivery Bots, when Slade appeared out of nowhere and threatened them with his gun-like weapons, stating,
"Move away from the delivery bot."
Iris raised both of her hands to appear less-threatening, as she responded back in a stern voice,
"No, Slade, don't."
But it was too late, as all five of them vanished and appeared into the foundation level. Iris immediately tackled Slade and the Doctor took the weapon away from the man. Iris stood up whilst the Doctor commented towards Slade,
"Very bad manners to point guns at people. I've never warmed to you. So, tell us what you've done."
Iris added on, "We saw the list, the names of the victims you've targeted."
Slade shook his head, confused, as he confessed, "What? I'm not targeting people. I'm recording the missing."
Everyone paused, as Iris asked, "Then who is making them disappear?"
But before anyone could answer that, Graham looked ill as he said,
"Hey Doc, Iris, come and have a look at this."
Both Time Ladies peered into the concrete tank, as they listened to Graham say,
"Some kind of goo and GroupLoops. Why are there in there?"
Iris whispered, "Someone must have found what was going on by accident, and whoever is responsible for these missing people, must have pushed them into this when the System tried to drag people here for help."
That was when they saw the Doctor walk over to a railing, before exclaiming in shock, when Iris followed and tensed immediately at the sight of several Delivery Bots all holding parcels. Graham whispered forlornly, "Looks like an army."
Iris nodded and said, "It is an army."
Slade joined them and informed the group with,
"Complaints have been coming in about delayed deliveries. This must be why. Everything's stuck here. Nothing's going out. What's happened?"
The Doctor answered, "They're being held back. Oh, the power drains. Vast teleportation hardware, with huge reserves of power building up. What if the power's been drained to be stored for one huge simultaneous teleport? All these deliveries, all at once."
Iris whispered out, "Like we thought, someone is intending to use them to send a message about bots by using them."
With that, all of them went down to look at what the parcels held, and the Doctor stated,
"Deadly bubble wrap. Totally innocuous, apart from when it's intercepted here and weaponized. Sheets of tiny little bombs, ready to explode and kill. Every parcel a death-trap. The workers aren't the targets. It's the customers."
Graham stated, Kerblam's trying to kill their own customers? That's the worst business plan I've ever heard."
But before Iris could comment on that statement, Yasmin's voice rang out from behind them as the girl said,
"Doctor, we've found you!"
Ryan joined in, running towards them as he said, "Kira's dead, and Charlie had something to do with it."
Judy exclaimed for the first time in shock as Charlie mumbled, "Not Kira. It wasn't meant for her. The System took her. It's been fighting back against me."
With that Charlie, held up a circular device, which Iris seemed to recognize as a trigger mechanism as she grabbed it from the man immediately. Judy looked at the younger man in disbelief as she asked him,
"You've been killing other workers?"
Charlie's facial features changed into an almost angry one, as he hissed, "I needed test subjects to be sure the detonation force would work in such a small concentration."
Iris' hearts beat faster in disbelief as Judy exclaimed what they were all thinking,
"What?! Charlie, how do you know all this stuff?"
That was when Charlie gave off an eerie laughter, as he confessed,
"I liked on my application. Gave you a sob story, so you'd let me in, and you bought it. I've studied cybernetics, explosives, teleportation. I have worked for this."
Judy could only say, "I don't understand" with a look of despair, as Iris stepped up towards Charlie and said,
"You made a huge mistake. There were better ways to approach this matter than hurting people. You have become a murderer in the process of fighting for your own rights. How does this make you look any better than the robots who have resisted you to save those lives?"
Charlie laughed emotionlessly as he said, "Imperfect technology, without a conscience. Machines malfunction, that's what they do."
Graham growled in anger, which was a first for Iris, as he always seemed to be more sarcastic than emotional, but this older man seemed to have been angered enough, as he said,
"No, mate, that's what you're doing. Seriously malfunctioning."
Charlie yelled back, "I'm not your mate!"
The Doctor joined in with, "Except Kerblam's System does have a conscience. It's been fighting you, Charlie. It knew it and sent a message across the galaxy, begging for help. That TeamMate in Slade's office, it was coming for you. And then Kira. It took her, knowing how you felt about her, to show you how it would feel. Because how you feel right now about Kira is how all those families and friends will feel if your plan goes off."
Charlie remained adamant with his opinion as he stated, "I don't care."
Iris shook her head and stated, "I think you do. I think you came here with a plan, but you didn't expect to fall in love. But that's what happens. Use that love, Charlie, learn from that and accept your trial and take responsibility of what you've done."
Charlie shook his head and said, "No! No.
If that's the price to change how everyone on Kandoka sees technology, then it is worth it, for the cause."
The Doctor's eyes turned cold, though her face was calm, which was more familiar to Iris than for the Doctor's companions, as she said, "this isn't a cause. You're not an activist. This is cold-blooded murder."
Charlie yelled out, derailing even more with, "We can't let the systems take control!"
Iris shook her head as she continued what the Doctor was thinking with,
"The systems aren't the problem, Charlie. It's how people use and exploit the system, like you have done. Step down, Charlie, and we can talk this out, right Judy?"
Judy jumped a little at being called out, but she quickly nodded and stated, "Yes. We'd love to hear from you and improve on this."
Her voice shook, but Charlie hesitated for a second, before tackling Iris, catching her off her guard, where he managed to activate his device during their struggle, and Iris gasped as she tried to wrestle Charlie off of her, whilst the Doctor ran to pull Charlie off of Iris.
They managed to do it, but both Time Ladies struggled to keep Charlie still as the Doctor yelled out, "Someone grab that controller!"
Ryan came up to grab it, but Charlie managed to toss it, and stomp on it, effectively destroying the only thing that could have stopped the delivery bots. Everyone but Charlie looked around them in shock as their hearts beat rapidly in fear, as they stated,
"Mass delivery procedures initiating."
Iris tried to think of something quickly, but couldn't think of anything, but as the Doctor was panicking, not helping Iris' already panicked state, an idea popped into both Time Ladies' heads, and Iris quickly pulled off the head of one Delivery Bot and brought it to the Doctor, knowing that the Doctor already knew what she was thinking through their bond. The Doctor nodded in thanks and quickly pulled Twirly from Graham's arms.
She looked to it and said, "Twirly, I need your help."
Twirly woke up and said, "Safe mode off. Hello again. Customers with your current medical symptoms browed blood pressure medication."
The Doctor ignored it and stated, "This is important. I've linked you into the new System, to all the delivery bots, and I have a request."
The Delivery bots around them all simultaneously asked, "How may we help?"
The Doctor maintained her focus towards Twirly as she said,
"Change of delivery address for every order about to teleport. New address, right here, this hangar, right where we're standing. I want every Kerblam man to deliver to themselves."
The Delivery bots immediately responded back, almost as if they had been waiting for that order, with,
"Delivery orders accepted."
Iris quickly led everyone back up to the railing, so that they were out of the blast radius. With that, Iris continued on with, "We want every Kerblam man to open the order they've just delivered to themselves, making sure they do what everybody does with bubble wrap."
Everybody yelled out for Charlie to follow them, but the man looked dejected at the whole set of events as the bots, started to say,
"Opening delivery. Activating bubble wrap."
Graham, looked back to the Doctor, who was still yelling for Charlie, as he said,
"Doc, get us out of here."
The Doctor sighed, but quickly sonicked them out of the room via the still detached bot's head, letting them teleport away from the room before the explosion.
Upon arriving at Reception, Iris sighed and put her hands on her knees, feeling her hearts trying to slow down. Everyone solemnly remained quiet, when Iris stood back up and stated,
"Well, I'm sorry about everything that happened today."
Slade, who had been quiet since their encounter earlier, shook his head and said, "We will have to explain what happened here, but… thank you. Really."
Judy nodded alongside the man, as the man said,
"We're suspending all operations for a month, pending review and while the TeamMates are rebuilding Dispatch."
Judy then followed it up with, "All our workers have been given two weeks' plaid leave, free return shuttle transport. And I'm going to propose that Kerblam becomes a People-led company in the future. Majority organics. People, I mean. We're always looking for good workers to join our management team."
Iris laughed and said, "Sorry, but all of us are already hired."
Judy looked at them puzzled, as Iris merely smirked and said, "By the universe."
And with that, she turned, her coat billowing out behind her in a dramatic fashion, causing the Doctor to chuckle before running after the other Time Lady, after yelling out cheerfully, "Bye!"
The companions merely shook their heads and entered the TARDIS after the duo. Upon entering, they heard the Doctor ask,
"So, another adventure with the gang?"
Iris eyed the companions, who looked at her, and then smiled, a slightly sad look in her eyes as she looked back to the Doctor,
"Doctor, I have a date with Ianto waiting."
The companions noticed the Doctor look a little sad before covering it, though it didn't go unnoticed by Iris. Yasmin then looked over at Iris, and said,
"You can always join us you know?"
Iris shook her head and said, "I'd love to, but I have a feeling that I should go back to my own time. The Doctor in the past, we need to keep going. And if I'm gone all the time, who is to say that the I would have the adventures she remembers?"
The group had a look of understanding and Iris said, "I also have a date with my boyfriend, that I need to go back to, so I really kinda have to go back to my own time as well. Who knows? Maybe we will meet again."
Everyone nodded, and then, Yasmin turned to the Doctor, asking,
"Doctor, can I make a request?"
The Doctor glanced at Iris, who smiled and nodded, then said to Yas, "Always."
Yasmin smiled sadly and said, "If Dan hadn't have switched scanners, it would have been me in that test room. He saved my life. I want to take this to his daughter. Tell her how much he loved it."
With that, she showed them the pendant, and she continued morosely with, "How much he loved her."
The Doctor nodded and agreed, smiling back at Yasmin, with almost a proud look, as she said, "It's the least we can do."
And as the Doctor flicked buttons to set coordinates, they all heard plastic rustle. They tensed and looked over at Graham, who blushed a little as he got caught with the bubble wrap from earlier.
Ryan grimaced and said, "Put it down. It's Kerblam bubble wrap."
The Doctor them smirked over at Graham, asking, "You sure you want to pop that?"
Graham looked down, and then sighed, shaking his head and setting the bubble wrap back onto the Kerblam box from their earlier package, and joined the group around the console."
Eventually, Iris exited the TARDIS at Cardiff, by Torchwood, where she parted ways in a happy manner with the companions. The Doctor hugged Iris tightly, and Iris smiled a little sadly as she patted the Doctor on her back in a comforting way. Through their bond, Iris told the Doctor,
"Don't worry. We will see each other again. I know it!"
The Doctor sniffled a little, and said, "Until then, I guess."
Iris nodded and stepped towards the Hub entrance, where Ianto stood waiting for her, smiling a little. They both intertwined their fingers and watched the TARDIS fade away, heading towards another adventure.
Once the TARDIS had completely dematerialized, Iris turned to give a light kiss to Ianto, and smiled, as he studied her new hairstyle, and commented,
"I like it. Although the coat?"
Iris shrugged and said, "I thought I would pull a Doctor."
Ianto chuckled and said, "Date then, before the Doctor comes back to steal you?"
Iris gave him a bright laugh, which he treasured, as they walked off to go spend some time on their own.