Kill the Moon: 3 Human Astronauts

"And that name!" the Doctor was grumbling as he puttered around the console, "What sort of name is that?"

"What, Pink?" Angel asked, amused, sitting in the rather comfy chair near the console, munching on a few fish fingers dipped in custard, just watching her Mate. Tailor was off somewhere in the TARDIS with MK9, drafting up some potential lesson plans for Clara that she thought the children might enjoy, she even had a few for some creative ways to teach certain maths for Mr. Pink…the current topic of their conversation.

Well, it wasn't actually a conversation but more the Doctor complaining about the man for...going on three hours now. It had become quite a common occurrence really, almost every day the Doctor would see something or hear something or think of something that reminded him of Danny Pink and he'd launch into a tirade about the man and his 'abysmal manners'…as though the Doctor was one to talk. It had gotten to the point where, whenever he'd start, Tailor would wander off and do some sort of project for the man, whether it was a funny set of math jokes or ideas for lessons, she'd even made a makeshift scrap book of the adventures they'd shared with Clara to help the man catch up to speed with everything. It was like she was trying to make up for how much her father disliked the man by showing how much SHE did like him. Well, like him in a general sense as a human important to her Aunt and not in any way as though she fancied him. He was a nice bloke, but not to her tastes, but that didn't mean she wanted her father to kill him because he mistakenly took her acceptance as fancy.

Angel herself would do her best to wind the Doctor down from his rant, bring up good points about the man that the Doctor could not dispute, try to bring him around to that same acceptance.

But the Doctor was nothing if not stubborn.

And, in truth, she found these little rants rather sweet.

He seemed to forget she could feel him, more than anyone, having a direct emotional bond with him. For as much as he wanted to appear as though he hated the man, and he had a plethora of reasons why he should…it had more to do with Clara than how Danny had reacted to them. Oh the Doctor was right furious with how insulting and shouty and disrespectful Danny had been to them, to his girls. He'd written a book about it actually. He was angry that the man hadn't apologized to them, not really, calming down and talking to Angel did not an apology make. And he was none too pleased with the man's past as a soldier either, for however hypocritical it might make him seem.

And yes, he used those points numerous times in his spewing, but somehow it always ended on Clara. What did she see in a man like that? Did he shout at her too? WHY would she ever want to be around someone so normal? And that trickled down to questions like, did he treat her with the respect he hadn't show them? What were his prospects if not being a soldier? Did he genuinely care for Clara or was he some Slitheen in disguise using her to get access to time travel?

That last one had made Angel laugh for a good half an hour when he'd had the 'epiphany' and turned to her, begging her to answer truthfully if she'd sensed that about Danny.

The Doctor had never been a big brother to a human before, not like she had been a big sister. Brother-in-law, maybe, in a vague sense of the word, through her attachments to his Companions. Clara was the first to come that close in his hearts and he was still trying to grasp the nuances of being her protective yet also irritating sibling, looking out for his sister and wanting the best for her. He seemed to have a firm belief that he needed to conduct a series of tests on Mr. Pink to ascertain if he was, in fact, worthy of Clara.

This, however, was dampened by the fact that he'd already decided no one was good enough for his sister.

"I think it's a rather colorful name," Angel remarked.

The Doctor made a face as though he'd sucked a lemon, "Pink? Really, though, what kind of name IS that?"

Angel shrugged, "What kind of name is Angel?"

She'd learned early on if she made some sort of comparison to herself or Tailor, it had the benefit of turning the conversation away from ranting and helped him ease away from his disappointment with Clara's life choices.

"A perfect one."

She smiled at his answer, "As is Doctor," she moved to get up from the seat, setting her small plate of crumbs to the armrest, heading over to him and taking his hand as he set the old box down in the storeroom of Coal Hill. They had been called in by Clara, something about a student, which made him think of teaching, which made him think of the teachers, which made him think of Mr. Pink and set him off about 'how could he even call himself a maths teacher when he hadn't even heard of recreational mathematics?!' She shook her head from that memory, it would be better to have him calm and in a better mood when they spoke with Clara, "And Clara seems to think Pink is a fine name as well. It is not our right to tell her what to think or feel."

The Doctor sighed, feeling all the frustration and tension leaving him just at the feel of Angel's hand in his, "But did it have to be a soldier?"

Angel reached out to touch his cheek with her other hand, stroking it lightly with her thumb. For some reason it was always a little surprising how different the different hims were. Oh his last few selves held so much guilt for the War, for the role they thought they played. But this him, it was like a contradiction of sorts. He was relieved and could finally look back on his life without that guilt and burden, that he had saved instead of slaughtered. She had seen how some of his thoughts drifted to herself, to how he finally felt a little more like he deserved an angel for a Mate. But he also seemed to have the feeling that other soldiers were not the same as him and all they wanted to do was obey orders and kill the enemy and destroy. It was like he had taken all that he had hated about himself and imposed it on others. He had finally learned that he truly had been the Doctor all through the war, not a soldier, not a warrior, but didn't seem to make the connection that other soldiers weren't just soldiers either.

He had hated what he thought he'd become so much, he couldn't seem to see why others might love soldiers, or those who had been them, at all.

He deserved love more now because he had never been a real soldier, had never killed his people the way he thought he had.

Well, she would just have to remind him why he had become a soldier in the first place, remind him why anyone usually became a soldier, to protect and to save others, to make the world a better place.

"Who else but a soldier could keep her safe?" she countered, "We both were soldiers at one point, she loves us. She loves Danny, Doctor."

"I just…I don't like him."

She let out a light laugh at that, "I never would have guessed that, thanks," she tilted her head as she looked into his eyes, thoughtful, "How about this? After we see what sort of crisis Clara's got for us, we invite her and Mr. Pink to a pub quiz?" she smiled, "Hermits United vs. Gingers United? We still have to get to that…" that earned a laugh from him, "We could invite the whole family!" she added as a suggestion, they had managed to swing around and see Sarah Jane and Skye, but things just seemed to keep coming up every time they tried to pop round by the others. Seeing him smile at the thought though, it gave her hope she might talk him into this, "We should get to know him before you start cursing his name."

He sighed, knowing she was right, "This really is a problem, you know."

"What is?"

He leaned into her touch, smiling softly down at her, "How I can never say no to you."

"Hmm," she hummed, her smile becoming more pleased, "I'm not complaining."

He laughed, leaning down to kiss her, he certainly wasn't complaining either, not when he had her in his arms, pulling her closer to deepen the kiss...

Though with the way the TARDIS groaned around them, the old girl very much WAS.

"Aunt Idris says to get a room," Tailor's voice rang out, an odd mix of amused and exasperated. If only this had been the first time she had walked in on her parents in some sort of innocently compromising position.

Honestly, with how in love they were, with how her father never seemed able to keep his hands off her mother, HOW did she still NOT have a little brother?!

"Oi!" the Doctor huffed up at the box as it made an odd almost drumming noise.

"She's laughing at you, my love," Angel told him with a light chuckle, "Oh, hush, Sissy," she called to the box, "I think, after all this time, we've earned a little snog in our snogging booth."

Tailor giggled, crouching down to pet MK9 as the little dog caught up to her, "I still can't believe Aunt Clara called it that."

"Yes, well, speaking of your Aunt, she's probably finishing up her classes now," the Doctor glanced at a clock set into the console that automatically adjusted to where they set down, "Best get on."

Tailor rolled her eyes at how 'thrilled' he sounded to have his snog with her mother interrupted just to go see Clara, but SHE, on the other hand, was quite excited to see her Aunt, as she was for all her family, "Well come on then," she cheered, bumping into her father playfully as she passed, she and MK9 heading for the door, "Andiamo!"

The Doctor let out a hearty laugh at that, over the last few trips they'd had they quickly discovered that where his past self had favored French, his daughter had gone with Italian.

~8~

Clara did not give them even a moment to greet her when they stepped out of the TARDIS and into the storeroom before she had started on them, or started in on the Doctor at least, "Courtney Woods. Doctor, she has gone crazy. She's uncontrollable. She took your psychic paper. She's been using it as fake ID."

"To get into museums?" the Doctor asked, not seeing a problem with that.

Tailor, however, snorted. She may not be human but she'd gotten enough of a sense off of Courtney last time to guess a museum was the LAST place the girl would go.

"No, no, no," Clara shook her head, "To buy White Lightning or alcopops or whatever."

"I don't think she's quite that rebellious, Clara," Angel reassured her.

"How did she even get a hold of it?" Clara looked to the psychic for an answer.

"My fault," Tailor winced at the realization, "I was showing her some things last time to make her feel better. The Psychic Paper, the sonic, the TARDIS manual mum and I are working on…"

"Better question," the Doctor cut in with a frown to Clara, "What…what is a Courtney Woods?"

Clara was NOT impressed, crossing her arms, most unamused, "She's one of my year tens. She was in the TARDIS when you got rid of the Blitzer."

"Nearly threw up," Tailor added.

"Oh, her," the Doctor nodded, now vaguely almost sort of recalling her, "Oh, that was ages ago."

"Look," Clara cut in, firm now, upset, "She says that you told her that she wasn't special."

"Oh, my love," Angel sighed, knowing he probably meant it to come across differently than it had. You're not special, you're extraordinary…but just forgot to say the rest of it. He sometimes forgot that other people couldn't read his mind the way she could.

"Rubbish," the Doctor scoffed, he could not recall ever saying that to a child, let alone a disruptive influence after his own hearts.

"She says that's what sent her off the rails," Clara argued, before taking a breath and trying to be more rational, "Doctor. I know, I know. But, you say something like that to somebody, it hurts. Especially if you're somebody of her age, especially if you're you. Doctor, it can affect her whole life."

Angel put a hand on the Doctor's arm to still him, turning to Clara, "She's in the hall?" she didn't need to ask, but it was more polite.

Clara nodded, crossing her arms and hoping Angel could fix this.

Angel walked over to the door to the hall, peering out as she opened it to see Courtney sitting cross-legged on the floor, "Well come on, sweetheart," she smiled down at the girl, "Want to take a trip?"

"Angel!" Clara called, that was NOT what she'd had in mind. Perhaps the psychic would reveal that Courtney would go on to be a surgeon or headmaster or something, seeing the girl being special in the future. A trip in the TARDIS was very far from that.

"Come on, Aunt Clara," Tailor moved to her side and bumped her hip, "Only the most special people in the Universe get a trip with Aunt Idris."

Clara, in a move far too similar to the Doctor's last self, opened her mouth and pointed at Tailor like she was going to argue, before sighing and pouting and letting her hand drop, unable to come up with one.

The Doctor just smirked as his girls one-upped his sister, "Come on, come on," he gave a mock long-suffering sigh, turning to head to the box, snapping his fingers to open the door as the women followed him in.

"Oh yes!" Courtney cheered as she hurried in before Miss Oswald could stop her, beaming as she looked around, "I was hoping you'd take me along again. Look!" she held up her wrists to show Tailor two bands wrapped around them, "I got these from the chemist just to be safe."

The Doctor frowned down at them, not sure why she was showing them, "Vortex manipulators?"

"Dad," Tailor huffed, "Do they look anything like Uncle Jack's?"

No, no they did not, not even close.

"Scanners indicate magnets," MK9 offered as he rolled up to the group, Courtney grinning widely and rushing to pet the metal dog she'd only gotten to glimpse last time.

"For travel sickness," Courtney added, seeming very proud of that.

Angel gave a light laugh, "Very good thinking. Sissy does NOT like people being sick in her."

"You call your spaceship a sissy?" Courtney eyed her oddly.

"No," Angel shook her head gently, "She talks and I understand her. She sees me like a sister and so I return the favor."

"You're related to your spaceship?" that seemed even MORE weird to her, but then again…aliens.

"You keep those on," the Doctor pointed at Courtney, "No being sick in our TARDIS."

"She's not going to need those," Clara told them.

But the Doctor shook his head, "It's a rule."

"No, I mean, she's not going to be doing any travelling," she turned to Angel, "Thank you for the thought, but if the Doctor would just…just tell her?"

"Tell her what?" he asked.

"Tell her that she's special!" Clara nearly ground out, getting frustrated with him. This was a bit unlike him though, he was usually a little kinder with kids around. Not by much, but some.

"Have you gone bananas?"

"Do you really think I'm not special?" Courtney cut in with a frown, sounding genuinely hurt, "You can't just take me away like that. It's like you kicked a big hole in in the side of my life. You really think it? I'm nothing? I'm not special?"

The Doctor looked over to his Mate and Daughter for help, earning a wink of reassurance from Angel, "How about being the first woman on the moon?" she offered.

"But I thought she was…" Tailor began, a small frown on her face, but her father cut her off, keeping her from saying too much.

Telling Courtney what her future was wouldn't mean much if she thought they were just saying things to make her feel better. Showing her, giving her that special moment first would show her she was special to begin with.

The Doctor snapped his fingers and pointed at Angel before turning to Courtney, "Is that special enough for you?"

Courtney grinned, "Yeah, alright."

"Ok," he nodded, moving to the console where Angel and Tailor were already getting the coordinates going, "Now we can do something interesting."

He pulled the final lever to set the box flying through space and time, studiously ignoring Clara's shouts as he did so.

~8~

"Sorry about that," Angel was saying into the comms. of the spacesuits they had all donned as they stepped out of the TARDIS and into a cargo bay of some sort, Mk9 insisting on trundling out first to scan the area for danger to his Mistress. She had thought it was quite adorable how protective the dog was of her daughter and allowed it even though she hadn't sensed anything of alarm past the doors, but, then again, "Sissy wasn't keen on landing on the moon," she continued, the exact reason why it was best to let MK9 have his moment, for the old girl to not want to land somewhere meant something certainly was up and she couldn't see everything, "Best not to fight her and let her land where she wants."

"And where is that?" Clara asked as she looked around at the room they had entered. It was a rather cramped sort of storage area, filled with cylindrical objects everywhere, some in racks, other scattered about. There were a few with a US flag on them, others with writing she couldn't make out.

"Scanners indicate storeroom of a space shuttle," MK9 determined.

"On a recycled space shuttle," the Doctor corrected, his arm slung around Tailor's shoulder, "Care to give it a guess, sweetheart?"

Tailor eyed the room carefully, looking for anything that might help narrow it down, before offering, "2049?" she looked at her father who nodded with a proud grin.

"Affirmative!" MK9 wagged his tail, proud of his Mistress.

"And how'd you figure that?" the Doctor continued to quiz.

"That," she pointed to one of objects around them, "It's a prototype version of the Bennett oscillator, which was first introduced just before 2050."

"Correctamundo!" the Doctor cheered, before grimacing, "Terrible word. Why do I keep using it?"

"Another question," Angel cut in with a frown as she looked at the floor beneath her feet, "Why aren't we floating about more?"

"Is it safe to take these things off?" Courtney huffed, her face scrunched up in her helmet, "This thing is squeezing my brain."

"Oxygen levels normal for human life," MK9 reported.

The Doctor nodded, pulling his helmet off, as did Angel and Tailor, the humans hesitating a moment longer before doing so as well.

Clara moved closer to one of the cylinders, squinting at the odd writing on them, "What are they?"

"About a hundred nuclear bombs," the Doctor answered with a frown, moving to look at them as well, MK9 following him closely in case his skills were needed.

But Angel reached out to grab his arm, stopping him, "We need to hold on, all of you," she looked around, moving to usher Tailor and Courtney towards a wall where cargo nets were draped, "MK9," she called to the dog, "Magnetize," she ordered, recalling one of the upgrades Tailor had given the dog, the robot quickly shifting so it latched onto the floor more firmly, "The rest of you, grab on and don't let go…"

"Why…" Clara began to ask...when an alarm sounded.

The Doctor moved to the window, peering out at the moon, seeing the celestial object growing larger and larger at a speed not even HE was comfortable with, "We're about to crash into the moon!" he added to Angel's warning, hurrying over to the nets and making sure everyone was secure, "Hold on! Hold on!"

Clara let out a groan, hissing under her breath at the Doctor, "Why didn't you just tell her you didn't mean it?" she lamented. They would have never been in this situation, where one of her kids was now in danger, to begin with. If anything happened to Courtney, she would never forgive the Time Lords, she would never forgive herself either for not doing more to stop this happening.

It was one thing when it was just HER on an adventure, it was her life, her choice, she was an adult and capable of making her own decisions. Courtney was a child, prone to wandering and disobeying the rules and rushing about without thought.

Oh god, this was going to be a nightmare, wasn't it?

Her frantic thoughts were cut off when the entire room shook, the shuttle they were stowing away on did just as the Doctor said and crashed right into the moon's surface. Given the grinding noises sounding over the alarm, it was quite clear that there had been no landing gear, that the shuttle was just skidding across the surface until it finally came to a halt.

The entire group of travelers froze, waiting a moment to make sure the shuttle was still, before releasing the nets and standing straight again…just as the doors opened and three individuals, one woman and two men, in what appeared to be older-fashioned NASA suits entered.

Tailor bit her lip to keep from laughing at their flabbergasted expressions when they saw one robotic dog, four girls, and one man standing before them where people should NOT have been standing. It was always so fun to surprise people that way, though she couldn't help but wonder what excuse her father would use this time to explain their random appearance on a sealed and contained craft.

"Who the hell do you think you are?" the woman in the lead of the trio demanded, someone who could only be the leader. It always seemed that the one most startled by their arrival was the one who would get in the most trouble for them being there.

"Language," Angel commented in a light warning, "There are children present."

As though it wasn't bad enough to have five random people appear, two of them were children.

That seemed to jolt the Doctor into action, his largest concern coming to the forefront of his mind as he strode forward, "Why have you got all these nuclear bombs?" if he didn't like guns around is girls, bombs were even worse.

The woman however, just glared back at him, moving a hand to her hip as though about to pull a gun on them, "I'm not going to give you another chance."

The Doctor snorted, seeming on the verge of laughing but kept it in, to the amusement of his daughter. Tailor made a small hand gesture to MK9 to stand down, the dog trundling up to her side, a laser at the ready to protect her, though she shook her head at the dog. They were safe, she was sure of it, not only would her mother have sensed that particular danger and brought up the Vortex, but her father's reaction sealed it. He would have had a MUCH different one if the trio before them actually DID have weapons.

Instead, the Doctor just turned to the woman, to her two goons, "Well, you're just going to have to shoot us, then. Shoot the little girl first."

"What?" Courtney demanded.

"Rude, my love," Angel sighed, moving over to Courtney, "No one is getting shot," she whispered to the girl reassuringly.

"But he said…"

"Watch," Angel murmured, giving her a wink and turning to watch the Doctor handle the situation as she rested her hand on Courtney's shoulder in comfort.

"She doesn't want to stand there watching us getting shot, does she?" the Doctor continued, speaking still to the threatening humans, "She'll be terrified. Girl first, then her teacher, and then me. You'll have to get me first because if you harm my Mate or my child, there will be even more hell to pay than there is for you just threatening them. Though, fair warning, you'll end up spending a lot of time shooting me because I will keep on regenerating. In fact, I'm not entirely sure that I won't keep on regenerating forever."

Tailor eyed her father oddly as he had started to do a little odd dance of sorts mid-rant, taking slow steps backwards and forwards before it evolved into a series of little hops.

"Do I want to know what he's doing?" Clara whispered to Tailor.

"Gravity test," Tailor answered, recalling how both her parents had remarked on the gravity being off.

"So, it'll be very time-consuming and messy, and rather wasteful of your energy and our time," the Doctor kept on, "Because, I can almost guarantee that you won't even be able to land a shot on any of us."

"You think I won't shoot you where you stand?" the woman demanded, her hand more firmly on her hip though she didn't pull her weapon yet.

"I think if you even tried, my Mate…" he gestured at Angel.

"Angel," she added, "Nice to meet you, Ms. Lundvik."

"How…" the woman began, startled.

But the Doctor cut in, "Would see it coming, the psychic."

"Thief," Angel joked back.

"She would see it and she'd create this clever little shield using the power of the Time Vortex, complicated stuff, not going to waste my time explaining THAT. The point is, just try and hurt any of us, and, if I don't stop you first, my lovely Mate will, and neither of us do very well when you threaten our daughter, do we sweetheart?"

Tailor had to nod at that, "Hello," she added, giving them a wave "Tailor, their daughter, in case it wasn't obvious. Oh!" she realized something, "And this is my dog, MK9, and my Aunt Clara and her student, Courtney."

"Greetings!" MK9's ears and tails moved.

"Hi?" Clara's greeting sounded more like a question than anything, looking between the Time Lords, a bit more lost than she normally was.

"Are you really going to shoot us?" Courtney asked.

"Shhh," the Doctor put a finger in front of his lips, before spinning to face the trio of human astronauts, "Basically, it boils down to the fact that we might just possibly be able to help you because I am the Doctor and we are super-intelligent alien beings who fly in time and space. Are you going to shoot us?"

Tailor shook her head at that. Of course her father wanted to get to the end of his speech to ask that question.

The blonde woman, Lundvik, looked between them, considering his words, her gaze flickering to Angel as she smiled almost knowingly at her. The girl HAD known her name without introduction, and she seemed far too calm with the threat against her group…perhaps she really WAS psychic, and if she was, then perhaps that force, the vortex or whatever it was called, was real too. If she was truly as powerful as this Doctor bloke seemed to think, she didn't want to set the woman off.

And, if she was being honest, any help they could get right now would be something to jump on.

"No," she finally decided, lowering her hand from her hip.

The Doctor smiled, "Good. Why have you got all these nuclear bombs? No, no, no. Easier question," he reached into his pocket and pulled out a yo-yo, holding it up to the woman, 'What's wrong with my yo-yo?" he flicked it and brought it back.

Clara sighed, not seeing anything wrong with it, "Doctor, it goes up and down."

"Bingo!" he pointed at her, before grimacing at that word too, it was almost worse than correctamundo.

"The gravity is off," Tailor nodded, "We should have been floating about before we landed, and bouncing more now because there is a little more gravity when on a planetary body, even one as small as the moon. But we're not."

"What is the matter with the moon?" the Doctor turned to the trio.

"Nobody knows," Lundvik answered.

"Do you know what's wrong with the moon?" Clara looked at the Time Lords.

Tailor shrugged when her parents didn't answer, "It's increased in mass," she said, giving the simplest explanation for the change in gravity, "The more mass, the greater the gravity."

"But how?" Lunkvik shook her head, "It's not like the moon can put on weight."

...slithering and skittering black masses crawled about within a fissure...

'...I didn't expect to survive anyway...'

...a grey sphere hung against a blue backdrop, breaking apart like an egg...

Angel looked away with a small frown, confused at what she had seen for it truly made no sense to her. Usually she could at least gleam something of importance or something that made sense for where they were or how the adventure was going.

"Actually, it can" the Doctor cut in, glancing at Angel, seeing the vision in her mind, though he was more disturbed than confused, "Gravity bombs, axis alignment systems, planet shellers…"

"So it's alien," Lundvik rationalized.

Angel frowned deeply, "That can't be good for everyone on Earth," she murmured, looking out the window at the blue planet hanging in the black of space, "It would raise the tides, wouldn't it?" she looked at the Doctor.

He nodded grimly, "So high that they will drown whole cities."

"Yeah," Lundvik turned solemn, serious, clearly that scenario had already occurred.

"So what are you doing about it?" Tailor asked the woman.

Lundvik just turned and moved over to the wall, taking a case from it that reminded them all far too much of when people had been trying to blow up the planet the Cybermen had taken over via amusement park.

"You can't be serious," Tailor gaped at the woman. What was it with humans and their need to blow things up? Honestly, she thought her father was the worst when it came to that, with her Uncle Jack being a close second, but perhaps it was a far wider problem than she'd realized.

"That's what you do with aliens, isn't it?" the woman countered, "Blow them up?"

Clara couldn't help but glance at the three aliens in the room uneasily at that.

~8~

With helmets secure, the group of humans and Time Lords stepped out of the airlock of the shuttle and onto the surface of the moon, though with a little creative placement on the Time Lords' part, Courtney was the first one. Angel glanced over at the Doctor to see him smiling at how excited the girl was.

"Wow!" Courtney gasped, "Wow! One small thing for a thing. One enormous thing for a thingy thing."

"So much for history," Lundvik grumbled.

"One small step for man," Tailor corrected, MK9 rolling along beside her, "One giant leap for mankind."

"Yeah, that!" Courtney laughed.

Angel reached out and took the Doctor's hand as his smile began to fade with those famous words. She didn't need to be psychic or his Mate with a link to his mind to know where his thoughts had gone. They had been there when the words were first spoken, when they were first broadcast to all of humanity and into the future. They were part of a small number of people who knew there was more to that line than anyone would remember. She knew he was thinking about the Silence, about their command to the humans to kill them all on sight, about how HE had been the one to put that in on the suggestion of River Song, how he had done it with a smile and a laugh.

He had truly fallen so far from the man he had always tried to be, from the man who Angel loved, when River Song had been around. To have lived since the war believing he had committed genocide against his own people, and to work so hard to save other species from experiencing the same. And then to go ahead and urge humans to commit it in a way where they would have no choice in it.

He was, even now, still trying to pull himself out of the darkness he had spiraled into during his amnesia with River trying her damnedest to influence him. Angel, bless her, was just as much a light in the darkness as she had always been and he felt like, each day, he grew farther and farther away from that man and into one who his Mate and daughter could be proud of.

He would never forgive himself for all those mistakes he made, he would never forgive River either.

'The Silence fled,' Angel reminded him in his mind, as always trying to make him feel better (he often found that ironic given HE was the Doctor, the one who was meant to do that), 'They have learned to stay far away from any humans outside the Church. They won't put themselves in danger and the humans will never have to kill them.'

'I still can't believe I ever went along with that,' he returned, desperately wishing he wasn't wearing a helmet so he could press a kiss to her hands in gentle thanks, 'I can't believe I became that man again.'

'You were never him,' she reassured him, knowing he was thinking of the man he'd been during the war, the incarnation he'd always denied, a man willing to commit such devastation, 'You could never be him unless someone else was pulling the strings.'

For one brief moment, the Doctor felt a wave of sympathy for the Master, as odd as it was to think on. A puppet on strings with someone else pulling them. The High Council had done just that, turned the Master into their puppet when they put that drumming in his head, driving him insane, to where he just wanted the pain to stop. He could feel a similarity to the man now that he looked back on how he had been during that dark period of amnesia. Someone else had played with is mind, his memories, removed such a key part of them as to alter who he intrinsically was for he had no doubt that knowing Angel, being around her, loving her, had changed him. Someone else had manipulated him, used everything they knew about him, and about Angel, to guide him down a path he would never have gone down. He had fallen into the Silence's trap, had fallen into River's clutches, and allowed himself to be swayed by others till he was doing things that made him sick to think back on.

'Good thing I have a guardian angel to watch over me now,' he smiled at her, 'No one will be getting any strings on me. I'd rather be wrapped around your little finger than anyone else's.'

Well, her and Tailor's, those were the only two he could stomach in this body.

Perhaps that was a lingering emotion from his last self?

It had not escaped him that he was shorter with humans in this body, a bit ruder, wanting a little less to do with them and their pudding brains. Perhaps it was because another human had been able to get so close to him, to pull him away from his Mate so much that this was his mind's way of protecting itself. Keep the humans at a distance so that the only room in his life was for his girls. If he was bothered by humans, River would never be able to get as close as she had in the past.

It hurt, sometimes, when he said something to Clara especially, when he saw that flash of hurt across her face. He didn't want to hurt her, she truly was like a sister to him, he looked out for her, but part of him just wanted to be left alone with his Mate and daughter, part of him just didn't care so long as he wasn't hurting his girls.

He was working on it though, because humans WERE exceptional, he knew he believed it, had always believed it, and didn't deserve to be belittled. He knew his girls were more openly affectionate for the humans, especially given most of their 'family' were humans, even more so now that there was an ocean of Ponds out there. He wanted to be able to appreciate them, it was just...hard.

"Come on," Lundvik's voice broke through his pondering thoughts, and he looked over to see the woman leading them towards a modular sort of settlement they could see settled in a nearby crater.

Angel glanced back behind them at the utterly wrecked shuttle they had stepped out of, a light frown on her face at the thought that they were just leaving so many weapons back there. Something about this wasn't sitting right with her. If they had brought all those weapons to the moon to stop some sort of alien, wouldn't they need to bring it WITH them? Weren't they worried about the alien reaching the weapons first? They couldn't possibly mean to leave them there so they could get far enough away to blow up the moon…

Right?

The more she thought on that, the more the unease grew, the larger the pit in her stomach became.

'No one is blowing up anything,' the Doctor promised in her mind, squeezing her hand, though she could see he too had the same worries about abandoning the craft, 'Except maybe that,' he added as an afterthought, nodding his head over to where Courtney had her mobile out and was taking a number of photos of everything around her.

"There was a mining survey, Mexicans," Lundvik was explaining as they approached the settlement, "Something happened up here. Nobody knows what. That's when the trouble began back on Earth. High tide everywhere at once. The greatest natural disaster in history…" she trailed off as they made it around the building towards the airlock, only to find it wide open.

Clara frowned as she stepped towards it, seeing something hanging near the corner of it, "Cobwebs?"

Lundvik seemed to take that as proof something was truly wrong and turned to one of her men, "Henry, go back and prime the bombs."

"Er, is there any instructions?" the man hesitated.

Tailor frowned at that, "You came here with bombs you don't even know how to operate?" she asked them, "Did you happen to steal that shuttle?"

How could any mission to the moon be headed by people who didn't know what they were doing unless this wasn't an authorized mission? Either that or the situation on Earth was truly so bad as to be a desperate state.

Lundvik ignored her, focusing on her partner, "There's a switch on each of them. The light goes red."

That didn't seem to comfort the man, "They won't go off?"

"No, not till I fiddle with this thing," Lundvik showed him the case that had been attached to her since she pulled it off the wall.

"…ok," Henry sighed, reluctantly turning and heading back toward the shuttle.

"Shall we?" Lundvik looked at the rest of them, before starting to head to the airlock.

The Doctor just watched the poor man go before turning to Lundvik, "Is that the best you could get?"

The woman scoffed, "Second-hand space shuttle, third-hand astronauts."

That did nothing to ease the tension the Time Lords were feeling, but there was little option but to follow the woman into the settlement if they wanted to find out what was happening to the moon.

~8~

"Are there supposed to be this many cobwebs?" Tailor had to ask the further they made it into the tunnel that opened into the shuttle from the airlock, tugging one off and moving it onto MK9's nose to scan it just in case, "Wouldn't the door create a vacuum?"

"If the gravity is off, it must be countering that," Angel murmured, frowning at one as she reached out to touch it with her glove, before she shuddered and pulled back, "The four people who were here, why do you think they aren't anymore?"

Lundvik was about to ask how she knew it was four people for the settlement, but shook her head, the girl really was turning out to be an actual psychic. She realized, then, that the girl hadn't asked what had killed them, if she WAS psychic, she might already know, she was asking what had made THEM think it too. She sighed, "The Minera Luna San Pedro. It was privately financed. They were doing a mineral survey up here."

"Didn't answer her question," the Doctor pointed out, "Did they send messages? Mayday? SOS?"

"Pretty much all the satellites had been whacked out of orbit," the other man that had come with Lundvik answered, "They managed to send back some screams."

"Wait," Tailor frowned, looking between the man and her mother, "If you thought they weren't here anymore, then you didn't come here with bombs to rescue them."

"Er…no."

"They disappeared ten years ago," Lundvik added.

The Doctor frowned deeply at that, "Nobody came?"

"There was no shuttle!"

"YOU had one."

"It was in a museum," the woman informed him, "They'd cut the back off it so kids could ride in it. We'd stopped going into space. Nobody cared. Not until…"

"Hey!" Courtney called out with a huff as Angel tugged her back from what looked like a mass of webs spun like an enormous cocoon.

"Tailor," Angel turned instead to her daughter, "Why don't you and Courtney go to the controls and see if you can't get power back."

Tailor frowned at her mother, at the faint tone of something other than suggestion in her voice, "What don't you want us to see?"

"Your daughter," the Doctor mumbled as he moved beside his Mate, "Psychic."

Angel, however, shook her head, "Your daughter this time, perceptive."

"HIM?" Clara nearly snorted at that, in this body 'perceptive' and 'Doctor' were not two words she'd put together.

But Courtney was having none of the banter, "You don't want me to see something? What is it? Why can't I see it? Is it an alien? Is there some sort of alien in there? Can I see?!"

The Doctor looked over at Angel, not sure what to do, but all she could do was shrug. If they tried to send Courtney away, the girl would sneak back. No one needed to be psychic to know that.

He sighed and moved over to the mass of webs, pulling out the sonic from a pocket of his suit and running it straight down, peeling back a side to reveal a spacesuit hanging in it.

"I think I'm gonna be sick now," Courtney wheezed out, already catching on to what that meant. Despite what she was sure Miss Oswald felt, she actually DID pay attention in class, she knew what a cocoon was and she also knew that some spiders wrapped their prey up in something similar. And if it's been ten years…no way the person in the suit was still alive.

"Oh, my God," Clara breathed at the sight of it, "Please, tell me there wasn't anyone inside that thing."

The Doctor was grim as he scanned it with his sonic, "I could, but it wouldn't make it true."

Lundvik's other partner turned green at that, quickly backing away, "I'll get some power back on."

"Come on," Clara shook herself out of the shock and reached out for Courtney, pulling the girl into her arms a bit, "Now, Courtney, come here. Don't look. You alright?"

"I'm ok," Courtney said softly.

Clara glanced over at where the Doctor and Angel were working on cutting what could only be a corpse down, MK9 firing his little laser near the base of the cocoon to help cut it, and turned back to Courtney, "Hey. Look. Look at me. Look. It's alright if you're not."

"I'm fine," Courtney insisted, taking a deep breath and turning to watch the Time Lords, "What did it?"

Tailor stepped closer to her mother as the Doctor crouched down to examine it with MK9 scanning, Angel putting an arm around her shoulders, knowing her thoughts had likely gone to another empty spacesuit she'd been forced into as a child. It was reassuring just having her mother's touch on her shoulders, to know that would never be her fate again, her parents would never, ever allow it.

"Maybe something trying to find out how you're put together," the Doctor suggested, "Or maybe how you tasted."

Tailor nudged her father with her foot, giving him a shake of the head when he looked at her, telling him that was probably not the best thing to say to a child already a bit freaked out.

"Do we have guns?" Courtney looked to Lundvik, knowing the woman had seemed about to pull one on them earlier.

"Not unless you brought some," the woman told her, her bluff called.

The Doctor looked up when the room began to power back on, lights and an air system kicking in, "Save the air," he told them, standing to take his helmet off as the others followed suit. He moved over to an old computer console, trying to get it to power up as well, but it seemed truly dead…until a gentle hand poked a button, a spark of gold jumping off it and into the console, giving it just the boost it needed to flicker on. He looked up at Angel as she gave him a wink and leaned in to kiss her quickly for her help.

He quickly brought up any records, any survey material he could, "They didn't find anything," he glanced over at Lundvik and her partner, "The Mexicans. They didn't find any minerals on the moon at all. Nada."

"What about this?" Tailor called from a table, holding up one of a number of photographs that had been scattered across it, "Lines of tectonic stress," she told her father as he joined her.

Angel frowned, looking to the side as he moved over to their daughter, a niggling in the back of her mind she couldn't quite place, a sense of unease growing but also feeling...distant, as though it wasn't centered in this room...

"That's the Mare Fecunditatis," Lundvik pointed out as she too walked over, "It's been there since the Apollo days. It's always been there."

"No, no, no," the Doctor shook his head, pointing out the discrepancies, "These are much, much bigger. Sea of Tranquility. Sea of Nectar. Sea of Ingenuity. Sea of Crises…"

"Meaning?" Clara shook her head, not seeing the point.

The Doctor glanced up as the lights flickered, "Meaning, Clara, that the moon, this little planetoid that's been tagging along beside you for a hundred million years, which gives you light at night and seas to sail on, is in the process of falling to bits."

Angel gasped as a cold feeling shot through her, looking around at the others in the room, all looking at the pictures, before she quickly tugged her helmet back on and disappeared in a flash of gold, moments before a bang went off and the entire room began to shake…

~8~

Poor old Henry hadn't even made it back to the shuttle before he was knocked to the ground by a fierce shaking beneath his feet. He would have said it was an earthquake, but they weren't on earth and despite how ill prepared he felt he was for this mission, even he knew the moon didn't have the core required for a quake like this to happen. He paused after the shaking stilled, making sure it was safe before he pushed himself back to his feet. He pulled his comm. from his belt and lifted it, trying to get in touch with the others to make sure they were alright.

"Hello, Captain?" he called, "Captain? Captain?"

He hesitated, looking between the shuttle and the direction the others had gone, debating what to do, when he heard a scuttling sound, almost a chirping. He frowned, turning in that direction and spotting a slit in the ground. He lifted his torch, aiming it at the slit for a moment, before jerking back with a gasp, staggering away as something launched out of it right for him.

"No!" he cried, squeezing his eyes shut, throwing his arms up to try and protect himself as a bright light flickered behind his eyelids…only for nothing to hit him. He hesitated a moment, before lowering his arms and peeking an eye open to see that one woman, the kind woman who had introduced herself as Angel, standing in front of him in her spacesuit, a hand held out, a golden wall shimmering before her…with small black things the size of a small dog launching themselves at it, trying to break through.

"What…" he breathed.

"Henry," Angel spoke over the comm., holding out her other hand to him, "Take my hand."

He was not about to wait till she asked twice before he was scrambling to his feet and grabbing hold of her. If she was creating that gold thing that saved him, he'd do anything she asked.

A moment later it was as though the wall curved backwards towards them, swirling around them before it flared brighter, making him squeeze his eyes shut...

~8~

The small group within the settlement slowly got to their feet as the shaking subsided, the old base managing to hold up with not too much damage.

"Mistress!" MK9 squeaked as he trundled over to Tailor, scanning her quickly to see if she'd been injured while the Doctor helped her up.

"Is everyone ok?" Lundvik asked, looking around at those present, "Hod on, where's the other one?" she pointed at the Doctor and Tailor, knowing the missing person was more important to them.

Tailor glanced around, absently petting MK9 on the head in reassurance, "Mum does that sometimes."

Clara looked over at the Doctor, more concerned for his reaction, but he was standing there with his eyes closed, his hands clenched into fists. She knew he'd likely realized the exact moment Angel had disappeared, that he was probably reaching out to her in his mind right as they spoke, keeping an eye on her. She was just worried what he'd do when he finally returned to the present and opened his mouth. He really was not the best person to be around when Angel was even remotely in danger.

She tried to ignore the flush she felt recalling how Angel had compared the Doctor's fear for her with Danny's own fear for HER and what it meant.

So long as the Time Lord kept quiet, she was NOT going to jog him out of his thoughts.

"How did she…" Lundvik began to ask, when a high-pitched sound cut her off, followed quickly by a scuttling noise that was steadily growing louder.

"What the hell was that?" Courtney looked around, trying to see where the noise was coming from.

"Duke, is that you?" Lundvik turned to her second partner.

The man just gave her a look from where he was working on one of the control panels, "I don't sound anything like that."

"Can you try and get the lights back on?"

"That's what I'm doing," he grumbled.

"MK9?" Tailor glanced at the dog, "Any sound bytes in your data bank that sound like that?"

MK9's ears wagged, assessing the sound, "Negative, Mistress."

The Doctor opened his eyes, the sound of running claws, pitter-pattering of tips on the floor, growing too loud to ignore, "I think we've found your alien," he spoke, turning towards the sound of the noise to see a giant spider-like creature with red glowing around the knees come around a corner, speeding right for them.

"Get back!" Clara called out, pulling Courtney back as the spider launched itself at them…

Suddenly a bright light flared out in the middle of the room, and the next thing any of the humans knew, Angel and Henry were standing there, with a golden wall shimmering in the archway to the corridor, the spider-thing throwing itself at the wall, trying to get through but unable to do so.

Tailor laughed at the sight, "Mum also does that, too."

"Henry?" Lundvik shook her head, completely thrown.

"Angel!" the Doctor let out a breath of relief, thankful she was back. He knew why she'd gone, she'd felt Henry in danger and had gone to help him, he couldn't fault her that, but he did hate it (SO MUCH) when she just disappeared and he couldn't help her. But she was back now, and he needed to get them further to safety, "Door!" he shouted, turning to look for one, "We need a door. A door, a door!"

"Here!" Clara called, finding one, "Here! The door's locked."

"Dad, sonic!" Tailor held out her hand for him to toss it to her, being nearer the door than he was. He quickly did so, the girl getting it open. When her mother had appeared, she had sent a flare of energy out, both as a way to push the spider-thing further back but also to get the lights and power back on. The door unlocked and she began to urge Clara and Courtney through it, MK9 rolling after them.

"Right, you lot, go!" the Doctor shouted.

"Who made you the boss?" Lundvik demanded as he began to shove the humans in that direction.

"Fine, you say 'run,' then," he huffed, still shoving them past him. When it was just him and Angel, he reached out and took her hand, "Ready?"

She glanced over at him, nodding, "Always."

He grinned, squeezing her hand as she dropped the wall, the two of them turning to run to the door, dashing past it and rejoining the others in the next room. He let out a little laugh as the door closed behind them, trapping the spider on the other side, "Oh, there we go!" he cheered, "Safe and sound."

The words had only just left his mouth when Courtney screamed, a spider that was already in the room had launched itself right at her…

A/N: And we're back with Angel from the temporary pause to get Lyssa squared away :D We're going to have 3 chapters for Kill the Moon and then I'm going to be pausing the story again to get Menna and Aragorn of my Lord of the Rings story finished before coming back to Angel again ;)

I have to say, this episode was difficult for me to put together, with events that happen later and changes made to the previous episode, it's tricky, tricky, tricky lol. So many ways it could go, but also trying to make sure it all makes sense. I hope you'll all enjoy what's to come :)

Poor Doctor, trying to work out how to be a brother to a human when another boy comes round :) He's got a few things he still needs to work out about that, but I can say Clara does too. There's something going on in this episode, somewhat different than in the show, that will cause something of a revelation for her later. Whether that will lead to an appreciation or desertion of the Time Lords, we'll have to wait and see }:)

Also, just wanted to put a tiny note here because I'm SUPER excited but...I was checking my User Stats when I was updating my profile for words archived and I noticed...I've reached 5,000 on the Favorite Author's count! You guys! I love you all so, SO much, you have no idea how much it means to me. I legitimately started crying a little :')

Some notes on reviews...

I felt like Danny and the Doctor could have been really cool to see too :) In a way, they clash so much because they're quite similar in some ways. Having Angel there to diffuse the situation, I think helps Danny realize it's not JUST the Doctor, it's his 'wife' and daughter too and he's built a family and they love him so he can't be completely awful. It's sort of different with Proffy and Evy, despite them being 'wives' and having children with him, that they are of like mind to the Doctor and react similarly to how he would. Angel is the calm and her reaction sort of forces a different reaction from Danny. I'm very eager to see what Angel might be able to do in terms of helping them get along as the story goes on :)

Sarah Jane was a special treat to include so I'm very happy it was well received :) I've definitely got plans for some other nods to the past and surprises to come ;)