A few days had passed since the Doctor and Aneres had left, and Rose was angry. No, furious. Possibly murderous if you caught her at the wrong moment. Eventually she decided to ask Rose about the woman that was also travelling with the Doctor, and immediately regretted it after a tidal wave of curses and screeches exploded from her daughter in response. Finally, Jackie had to speak up.
"Rose, are you sure he actually feels that way about you?" She slammed a mug on the counter.
"He wasn't leading me on Mum! He loves me, she's just manipulated him away from me," Rose smacked her hand on the countertop, "I'm sure that if I could just get her kicked off the Tardis, it would be fine! After all, he got rid of Adam and Jack, it shouldn't be hard for him to leave her too!"
Jackie turned to stare at her daughter, her brow creased with worry. "Rose, are you absolutely sure about that? From how it sounds, she was taken away from him and he was miserable before he found her and now he's happy again."
Rose looked ready to explode at her mother's words. "Don't you dare side with her Mum! The Doctor would never hurt me like that!"
Jackie shook her head and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Rose, I get that you love him, I really do, but the Doctor doesn't seem to realize that and if he does then he really fucked up by not telling you that he wasn't interested sooner."
"But he is interested in me! He loves me!" Rose screamed and pounded her fists on the table. At that point, Jackie had enough.
"Rose Marion Tyler, shut up!" Jackie stormed over until her face was mere inches from hers, "You are not entitled to his love. You are not entitled to traveling with him. You are most certainly not entitled to marrying him, and what's more is you are not a toddler!" Rose winced as her volume grew, "Stop throwing a strop and get over it!"
"You don't get it Mum, you just don't." And with that, Rose ran into her room and slammed the door shut.
TEotOS
The Tardis, however, was peaceful and almost idyllic as Aneres and the Doctor settled back into their lives as a complete couple in every sense of the word for the first time in centuries. They started eating every meal together, with breakfast always in bed and with a long cuddle beforehand. They shuffled around the Tardis and fixed anything that looked out of place for most of their mornings before lunch. Afterwards they would either relax in the library or find something fun to do on the ship until they needed dinner.
Of course, the both of them knew they couldn't keep this going for long. The Doctor had a companion waiting for him back on Earth and decided that after a week had passed since their run-in with the Wire that it was time to retrieve Rose. Aneres was none too pleased to say the least, but agreed in the spirit of compromise.
And so she decided she would pilot the Tardis to the Powell Estate, and the Doctor could go get her on his own. The journey ended up being very short, and ended with them landing four streets away from Rose's home.
"So, is this so that you don't have to see Jackie?" The Doctor asked from his place on the captain's chair. Aneres rolled her eyes and pulled her hair back to tie it into a ponytail.
"Yes and also because I don't fancy calling their neighbor's attention to the time machine that keeps landing in the living room," She flicked a couple switches to power down the Tardis for the moment, "I know that's not something you're worried about, but you really should be."
The Doctor grinned and moved to stand in front of her. "You can be really bossy sometimes, you know?"
Aneres chuckled and leaned in to give the Doctor a peck on the cheek. "Of course I know, I do it because if I don't you'll just run around like a toddler with scissors!"
"I will not!" His tone was positively outraged as his eyebrows shot up.
"Yes you will darling. Now, go get your companion. I'm sure she's quite cross with you after this past week," She murmured. The Doctor sighed and nodded before he grabbed his duster and made his way over to the Tardis doors.
"I'll be about fifteen, maybe twenty minutes?" Aneres gave him a thumbs up and blew him a kiss.
"Love you," She called out. The Doctor grinned and blew her his own kiss.
"Love you too," He replied before walking out the door and towards his companion and her irate mother.
TEotOS
Rose was still in her room when the doorbell rang, leaving Jackie to answer it despite every bone in her body telling her not to. She peered through the peephole and pinched the bridge of her nose as she fought the urge to lock the door and walk away. Finally she gave in to what she knew Rose wanted and opened the door to reveal the Doctor.
"Hey Jackie," He entered the house, "Rose? Rose, I'm back!" The Doctor shouted as he knocked on her bedroom door. Two seconds later, the disheveled blonde revealed herself and immediately wrapped her arms around him in a tight hug.
"Oh I missed you," Rose sighed with a smile. She didn't even notice the Doctor not hugging her back, she was so delighted to see him. Jackie noticed though.
"Rose, why don't you go wash up and pack your bags?" The teenager nodded at her mum's suggestion and ran back into her room, the door closing loudly behind her. The Doctor looked over at Jackie with more than a little relief in his eyes.
"You really need to get it through to her that you're not interested," She said, her arms crossed across her chest.
"I've been trying Jackie, but I don't want to hurt her feelings. Besides, I would've thought you'd be on her side of all this." The Doctor raised an eyebrow at her and leaned against the wall.
"I am on her side, just not in the way she wants me to be," She paused to look the Doctor up and down, "She loves you so much and while I want her to be in love and be happy, it's only going to make her worse in the long run." The Doctor frowned.
"What do you mean Jackie?"
"The Rose that I've seen come home after traveling with you for a year? She's not the Rose I raised, not the one who had a near miss with an explosion at the shop," Jackie moved to stand in front of him, "She's turning into someone who can't bear to be around other people that aren't you, and that's bloody terrifying."
The Doctor nodded as she spoke, her words starting to make sense to him. "What do you think is the best thing for her?" He asked, truly sincere in asking her. Jackie's eyes widened in shock at his consideration.
"I mean personally I think she needs help. Professional help," She took a moment to look up at the ceiling in an attempt to calm herself down, "Lord knows I can't help her on my own with this."
"You're right," The Doctor winced as Jackie slugged him in the arm, "Not about not being able to help her, not about that. You're a great mum Jackie, but you're not a psychiatrist. Unfortunately, I'm not either and I don't know many that would be equipped to handle this."
"Well, you better get a crack on and find someone because she needs to stop this sooner rather than later," Jackie snapped. Rose's door opened a moment later, and the Doctor plastered a fake smile on while Jackie puttered off to the kitchen to grab something.
"I've got all my things," Rose said. The Doctor nodded and turned to the opening of the hallway that fed into the living room and kitchen.
"Well, we're off!" He shouted. Jackie returned with a mug of tea in her hands and walked over to hug Rose tightly.
"Have fun, love," She turned to the Doctor and nodded at him before walking away again.
"Well, what are we waiting for then, let's go!" Rose said while she beamed at the Doctor. He nodded with a small smile of his own and followed her out the door.
TEotOS
The Doctor and Rose arrived at the Tardis a few minutes later and were greeted by a loud humming sound emanating from the console. Aneres popped her head out from behind the rotor and flashed a fake smile at Rose.
"Welcome back," She sauntered over to the Doctor and gave him a quick peck on the lips, "The Tardis is getting annoyed, we'd better head out." Her fake smile turned to a smug grin as she breezed past Rose and started putting the Tardis back into the Time Vortex. The Doctor watched her with a small smile before looking back at Rose.
"How about you put your stuff away and we'll let you know when we've landed?" He suggested. Rose nodded once and narrowed her eyes at the Time Lady as she piloted them to who knows where. The Doctor frowned and walked away from her to stand next to Aneres and watch the monitors as they flew. Neither of them noticed the murderous glare Rose was giving her, nor the sting of betrayal behind the rage at the Doctor's dismissal, nor her departure to her own room.
TEotOS
Eventually the Tardis came to a stop inside an incredibly small space, and opened her doors to let Rose and the Doctor out first, followed by Aneres. The two Time Lords frowned at the weak groans the Tardis was making and reached out to pat her doors reassuringly.
"I don't know what's wrong though. She's sort of queasy," The Doctor paused and listened a little longer, "Indigestion, like she didn't want to land," He said. Aneres nodded at his assessment.
"Oh, if you think there's going to be trouble, we could always get back inside and go somewhere else," Rose joked.
"Nah, she's a tough old bird, we'll be fine," Aneres decided while giving the ship one last pat. Rose's smile fell as The Doctor ignored her and nodded at Aneres before he locked the doors.
"I think we've landed inside a cupboard," He turned to see a yellow wheel on the door, "Here we go." Aneres and the Doctor reached out and spun it until the door swung open to reveal a sort of canteen area.
A loud automated voice blasted over the intercom. "Open door 15."
"Some sort of base. Moon base, sea base, space base. They build these things out of kits," The Doctor murmured as he looked around. Aneres nodded and walked over to the panel of windows across from them.
"Close door 15," The intercom droned. Aneres peered out of the windows and scanned the outside with narrowed eyes.
"We need to work on our timing, seems like we've landed in the middle of a storm," She murmured. The Doctor stopped looking around to listen as gusts of wind rattled every inch of the base.
"Glad we're indoors, then," Rose commented as she listened with the Doctor. Aneres turned around to face the two of them with pursed lips.
"We should take a look around, God knows what's going on here." The Doctor nodded and walked over to take her hand in his and lead her to a nearby door with the number sixteen on it. They cranked it open and walked through, the intercom once again narrating their action, with Rose close behind and sporting a magnificent expression of disgust.
"Human design. You've got a thing about kits. This place was put together like a flat pack wardrobe, only bigger. And easier," The Doctor mentioned as they walked down a corridor. Aneres let out a quiet giggle.
"Don't tell me you're still traumatized from the cabinet I made you build from Ikea?" The Doctor shuddered at his wife's words.
"I will never understand why they picked pictographs for the instructions," He grumbled, releasing Aneres' hand to turn another door handle. She followed him inside and looked around the new room, whose walls were embossed with a large number three.
"Oh, it's a sanctuary base," The Doctor said. Aneres nodded while running her fingers across a table as she wandered about the room.
"It must be for Deep Space exploration, which means we're a very very long way out," The Time Lady explained. The Doctor nodded and held up a finger to his ear.
"Someone's drilling, that must be what the people who built this came for," He added. The Time Lords were soon distracted by Rose, however.
"Welcome to hell," Rose breathed out. The Doctor and Aneres rounded on her, disapproval marring their features.
"Oh, it's not that bad," The Doctor replied. Rose shook her head and pointed past him and Aneres at the wall behind them.
"No, over there." Aneres turned and blinked at the sight of 'Welcome to hell' painted in a rather large font on the wall with a long passage of alien writing just beneath it. She frowned as the markings didn't shift into English and walked over to kneel in front of it. The Doctor followed suit and brought a hand up to trace the writing.
"Hold on, what does that say?" Aneres and Rose shrugged, "That's weird, it won't translate." Both women grew even more troubled at his words and leaned in slightly closer.
"But I thought the Tardis translated everything, writing as well. We should see English," Aneres shook her head at Rose's words.
"Not always, which means this writing," She paused to let her fingers rest on a few of the marks, "Is incredibly old."
"No, impossibly old. Which means we need to find out who's in charge," The Doctor stood up as he spoke and darted over to the next door, "We've gone beyond the reach of the Tardis' knowledge. Not a good move. And if someone's lucky enough-"
Aneres gasped as several creatures appeared on the other side of the door and stared at the Doctor. They had tentacles where she would normally find a nose and mouth and a long tube that protruded from them to connect to a white ball that each of them held.
"Oh! Right. Hello. Sorry. I was just saying, er, nice base," The Doctor stammered out with a startled smile. Aneres shook her head and took a careful step forward.
"Doctor, be careful," She warned. The Doctor started to reply but was cut off as all of the creatures spoke in unison.
"We must feed," They chanted, the orbs in her hands glowing brighter as they spoke. Aneres blinked for a second, completely stunned while Rose let out a cross between a groan and a squeak that would have made her chuckle under normal circumstances. The Doctor, however, seemed to lose all of his brain capacity in that moment.
"You've got to what?" Aneres pinched the bridge of her nose and stormed over to pull him away from the door.
"I swear, for all of your fast reflexes you can be thick sometimes," She muttered as she pushed her Tether behind her. He scoffed but allowed her as the aliens began advancing on the three of them.
"We must feed," The aliens repeated. Aneres tensed and grabbed a nearby stool to hold out in front of her.
"Yeah. I think they mean us," Rose whispered while tucking herself behind the Doctor, her fingers coming up to clasp his arm tightly. The Time Lord winced and unwrapped her fingers carefully as he inched away from the aliens, his free hand on his Tether's shoulder.
"Love, I don't want to hurt you by accident," Aneres rolled her shoulder out of his grasp and held the stool up a little higher, "Stand back."
The Doctor frowned and did as she bid despite every fiber of his being telling him absolutely not, not after the Wire, never again, he couldn't let her go. He was distracted though as the aliens filed into the room and extended their orbs towards Aneres. She snarled and jabbed the stool forwards as they continued chanting.
"We must feed. We must feed. We must feed. We must feed," The Time Lady looked to each side as more of the aliens flooded the room from other doors. She cursed mentally and grabbed another stool to pass to the Doctor who took it gingerly while also pulling out his sonic screwdriver.
"Rose!" The blonde looked up at Aneres' shout, "Grab a bloody chair and help us!"
Rose glared at Aneres and snagged a nearby chair to hold out in front of her, albeit rather limply. The aliens continued advancing and eventually cornered the trio against a wall at the other end of the room. Aneres moved to swing but the Doctor held her back, praying they could find a way out of this.
"We must feed. We must feed. We must feed. We must feed. We must feed. We must feed. We must feed. We must feed. We must feed. We must feed. We must feed," Aneres frowned as one of the aliens tapped its globe, "You, if you are hungry."
She cocked her head to the side as the Doctor leaned past her to address the alien. "Sorry?"
"We apologise. Electromagnetics have interfered with speech systems. Would you like some refreshment?" Aneres shared a look with the Doctor who started to lower the stool in his hand as well as the sonic screwdriver. She followed suit a moment later while Rose tightened her grip and glared at the aliens.
"That would-" Before Aneres could finish speaking, Door 18 opened and several humans rushed in with guns in hand. She turned to face them and raised her eyebrows at the sheer shock on all of their faces.
"What the hell? How did?" The man at the front of the group walked over to the trio, parting the sea of aliens in his wake. "Captain, you're not going to believe this. We've got people. Out of nowhere. I mean, real people. I mean two living people, just standing here right in front of me."
The Doctor and Aneres shared a glance, completely and utterly confused as another man replied from a comm system. "Don't be stupid, that's impossible."
The man standing in front of the two Time Lords and humans shook his head and spoke again. "I suggest telling them that."
Rose took that moment to speak up as she leaned around the Doctor to get a better look at the man. "But you're a sort of space base. You must have visitors now and then. It can't be that impossible."
"Apparently it is," Aneres commented to the Doctor mentally as the man raised his eyebrows at Rose incredulously.
"You're telling me you don't know where you are?" He demanded as he took another step closer to them.
"No idea. More fun that way," The Doctor replied with a grin. Aneres rolled her eyes and hit him on the chest, smirking when he released a soft "ow". She turned her attention back to the human in front of her as a woman spoke over his comm system.
"Stand by, everyone. Buckle down. We have incoming. And it's a big one. Quake point five on its way," She ordered. The man cursed under his breath before running to another door.
"Through here, now. Quickly, come on! Move!" The three travelers followed him out the door and winced as various conduits and sheets of metal crashed together above them while they ran down the corridor. Their guide kept shouting over his shoulder at them, "Move it! Come on! Keep moving. Come on! Quickly! Move it!"
Eventually they reached another door and burst through it into a massive control room with several other humans inside. Humans that seemed far too preoccupied with their arrival when someone considered the storm they were currently bracing themselves for. The black man closest to the control panel spoke first.
"Oh, my God. You meant it." A cheery woman a few steps away from him grinned at the trio of newcomers.
"People! Look at that, real people!" She exclaimed in awe. The Doctor looked at his Tether confusedly before holding his hands up in a very small gesture of excitement.
"That's us. Hooray!" He replied. Aneres shook her head at his clear misunderstanding of their awe and raised her hand in a wave.
"Yep, we're real. Flesh, blood, hair, nails, the whole shebang," She commented with a false smile. Rose nodded emphatically behind her.
"Yeah, definitely real. My name's Rose. Rose Tyler. And, and this is the Doctor."
"And I'm Aneres," Rose glared at the Time Lady, "Who are all of you?" Aneres raised her eyebrows as another man spoke up yet ignored her question.
"Come on the oxygen must be offline. We're hallucinating," He checked the readings and gaped before looking back up at them, "They can't be. No, they're real."
"Come on, we're in the middle of an alert! Danny, strap up," The black man gestured to the man who just spoke, Danny, "The quake's coming in! Impact in thirty seconds! Sorry you two, whoever you are. Just hold on, tight."
Aneres nodded and ran over to a line of conduits under the control panel to wrap her arms around them. She looked up as the Doctor followed her example while Rose looked around the room frantically.
"Hold on to what?" She shrieked. The black man rolled his eyes and glared at her.
"Anything. I don't care. Just hold on. Ood, are we fixed?" He looked over at another of the tentacled aliens from earlier who nodded and replied.
"Your kindness in this emergency is much appreciated."
"What's this planet called, anyway?" The Doctor shouted from under the control panel. Aneres winced as another rumble shook the floor and another woman replied.
"Now, don't be stupid. It hasn't got a name. How could it have a name?" Her eyes widened at the complete confusion covering the Time Lords' faces, "You really don't know, do you?"
Aneres didn't have time to reply as a moment later the black man shouted, "And impact!"
The Time Lady yelped as the entire base vibrated and jerked around roughly, the metal crashing against her hips and legs roughly as she held onto the conduits. The Doctor winced as a similar feeling went through him, it really didn't help to be so skinny in situations like this. Thankfully, the sensation was short lived and the vibrations subsided after about five or seven seconds. The Doctor slowly emerged from under the console and looked around the room.
"Oh, well, that wasn't so bad," He commented. A moment later, he winced as several consoles combusted and sent showers of sparks and flames onto the floor of the room. Aneres shook her head as she stood and watched the humans extinguish the fires.
"You just had to jinx it," She whispered, smiling at her Tether fondly. He grinned back and pressed a kiss to her hair.
"All the more reason to have you here to help," The Doctor whispered. Aneres' smile turned coy.
"I'll do more than 'help' once we get back to the Tardis." The Doctor blushed a deep red and forced himself to take a deep breath as Rose ran over from her place under a table. He watched as the humans started running around and checking each other over.
"Okay, that's it. Everyone all right? Speak to me, Ida." The older woman, Ida, looked up at the black man and gave a thumbs up.
"Yeah, yeah!"
"Danny?" Danny held his hand up so it was visible to the man.
"Fine."
"Toby?" A skinny blonde man stood up, his eyes darting nervously around the room before making eye contact with Aneres. She barely spared him a glance as she scanned the rest of the room, but most certainly felt his eyes on her.
"Yeah, fine."
"Scooti?" The cheery woman from before piped up.
"No damage," Her chirping voice grated on Aneres' ears but she did her best to ignore it. The Doctor leaned in to whisper in her ear as they continued taking roll.
"Why do I get the feeling we're somewhere very, very-"
"Very bad?" Aneres finished as she looked up at him. "You're not alone. If I didn't know any better I would say this place does seem to be a hell of some sort given their reactions to our questions."
The Doctor nodded and pulled her close so he could rest his chin on the top of her head. He took a deep breath, just absorbing the scent of his Tether as he tuned back into the humans' conversation.
"The surface caved in," The black man pulled up a schematic of the base, "I deflected it onto storage five through eight. We've lost them completely. Toby, go and check the rocket link."
"That's not my department," Aneres scoffed at Toby's reply and the sheer petulance it carried. She had never been one to tolerate such an irritating behavior from others, but it seemed she was going to have to if they stayed on the base any longer.
"Just do as I say, yeah?" Their leader snapped, watching as Toby glared at them before leaving.
"Oxygen holding. Internal gravity fifty six point six. We should be okay," Ida spoke up as she analyzed some readings on a monitor.
"Never mind the earthquake, that's, that's one hell of a storm. What is that, a hurricane?" Rose interrupted, completely terrified and once again acting out. Aneres looked over at Scooti as she replied.
"You'd need an atmosphere for a hurricane. There's no air out there. It's a complete vacuum."
"If that's true," The Doctor's eyes widened as he listened to his Tether, "then what on Earth is shaking the roof?"
"You're not joking. You really don't know," The trio shook their heads at Ida, glad someone was finally understanding their predicament, "Well introductions. F Y I, as they said in the olden days. I'm Ida Scott, science officer," She pointed at the black man, "Zachary Cross Flane, acting Captain, sir. You've met Mister Jefferson, he's Head of Security. Danny Bartock, Ethics committee."
Aneres looked at each of them as Ida introduced them, only pausing on Danny as he added, "Not as boring as it sounds."
"And that man who just left, that was Toby Zed, Archaeology, and this is Scooti Manista, Trainee maintenance," Ida continued as she walked over to a lever, "And this? This is home."
The ceiling creaked as Ida pulled down the lever that forced several metal panels to separate. Zach looked over at their new arrivals pityingly.
"Brace yourselves. The sight of it sends some people mad." The Doctor led Aneres to the center of the room as the panels fully separated to reveal something utterly horrifying. Sitting in the sky, directly above them, was a black hole.
Aneres surveyed the bright white disc with it's black center in awe, a smile coming to her face as she stared at it. Swirls of red and gray drifted over to it, signals of the destruction it caused. Painful, yet still somewhat beautiful in its own way she supposed.
*That's a black hole," Rose breathed out. Her hands came up to cover her mouth as she looked up at it, torn between awe and complete terror.
"But that's impossible," The Doctor said as he pulled away from Aneres to stare at Zach. The Captain merely shrugged.
"I did warn you."
"We're standing under a black hole."
"Indeed we are," Aneres looked over at Ida, "And somehow in orbit around said black hole."
"Yep," Ida nodded at the Time Lady. She sighed and looked back up, her previous admiration beginning to morph into fear.
"But we can't be," The Doctor stated. His mind had already started racing with implications at Aneres' words. Implications in regards to her safety, his own, and even Rose's if he really thought about it. The Doctor shook his head and tried to remind himself to think about his companion, despite the evident danger he had managed to submerge himself and Aneres in.
"You can see for yourself. We're in orbit," Ida replied with a gesture at the collapsing star.
"But we can't be," The Doctor repeated, desperately hoping that if he said it enough times he could find an alternate explanation and Aneres would be safe. After all, it was hard to stay safe around the impossible.
"This lump of rock is suspended in perpetual geostationary orbit around that black hole without falling in. Discuss," Ida snapped back. The Doctor took a deep breath and looked back up at the glass.
"And that's bad, yeah?" The Time Lord's almost didn't acknowledge Rose's question, but the Doctor found himself rambling anyways. It distracted him from the very very real possibility of life threatening danger to spout facts and theorems. Always had.
"Bad doesn't cover it. A black hole's a dead star. It collapses in on itself, in and in and in until the matter's so dense and tight it starts to pull everything else in too. Nothing in the universe can escape it. Light, gravity, time. Everything just gets pulled inside and crushed."
"And that's why he's about to have an aneurysm," Aneres joked. The Doctor took a deep inhale of her scent again, knowing humor was her own coping mechanism and trying to look past it.
"So, they can't be in orbit. We should be pulled right in," Rose murmured. She felt herself starting to go numb at that realization.
"We should be dead," The Doctor whispered. Aneres flinched and clutched his hands tightly in hers.
"And yet here we are, beyond the laws of physics. Welcome on board," Ida commented with just a bit of a sarcastic drawl towards the end. Normally, Aneres would appreciate such a tone and the person that used it. However, finding out you had very little chance of surviving a very real situation was a bit of a damper in this case.
"But if there's no atmosphere out there, what's that?" Rose asked as she pointed upwards.
"Stars breaking up. Gas clouds. We have whole solar systems being ripped apart above our heads, before falling into that thing." Rose looked close to tears or a panic attack at Ida's explanation.
"So, a bit worse than a storm, then."
"Just a bit."
"Just a bit, yeah." Rose was unable to take her eyes away from the sight above her for several minutes. She only looked away when she realized Aneres and the Doctor had moved away from her to speak in hushed tones at a table. Every fear melted away to be replaced by a white hot fury, a fury that only grew as she witnessed the Doctor press a tender kiss to Aneres' temple.
Before Rose could walk over to interrupt, Toby returned as sullen as when he left. Zach looked over at him expectantly.
"The rocket link's fine," Toby replied as he took a seat. Zach pulled up a hologram moments later of the system their planet and black hole resided in and beckoned the crew and trio of travelers over.
"That's the black hole, officially designated K three seven Gen five," He explained while pointing at part of the diagram.
"In the scriptures of the Falltino, this planet is called Kroptor, the bitter pill. And the black hole is supposed to be a mighty demon. It was tricked into devouring the planet, only to spit it out, because it was poison," Ida added.
"The bitter pill. I like that," Rose commented, glaring at Aneres. The Time Lady was her own personal bitter pill, a pill she would rather crush than force herself to endure. Aneres sent her a wink and smirked, much to Rose's frustration.
"We are so far out. Lost in the drifts of the universe," The Doctor turned back to face the crew, "How did you even get here?!"
"We flew in. You see, this planet's generating a gravity field. We don't know how. We've no idea," Zach pulled up more of the diagram, "But it's kept in constant balance against the black hole. And the field extends out there as a funnel. A distinct gravity funnel, reaching out into clear space. That was our way in."
"You found a gravity funnell next to a black hole and just, what, flew in?" Aneres demanded with wide eyes and furrowed brows.
"By rights, the ship should have been torn apart. We lost the Captain, which is what put me in charge," Zach admitted. Ida reached over and patted his back gently.
"You're doing a good job."
"Yeah, well, needs must."
"But if that gravity funnel closes, there's no way out," Danny pointed out, earning a playful grin from Scooti.
"We had fun speculating about that," She replied.
"Oh, yeah. That's the word. Fun," Danny muttered. The Doctor shook his head and moved closer to the diagram.
"But that field would take phenomenal amounts of power. I mean not just big, but off the scale!" He looked over at Zach and Ida while gesturing to the controls, "Can I?"
"Sure. Help yourself," Ida replied. Aneres watched as the Doctor worked, muttering numbers and theories under his breath like a crazed prisoner. She looked at the crew with a fresh stab of pity in her heart. Five minutes there and the Doctor was already panicking, how could those people cope?
TEotOS
After several more minutes of mumbling from the Doctor he looked back up and walked the crew through a more complicated part of the diagram. "There we go. Do you see? To generate that gravity field, and the funnel, you'd need a power source with an inverted self extrapolating reflex of six to the power of six every six seconds."
Aneres frowned at the repeating number. She felt an itch in the back of her mind as she thought about it. The Doctor and Rose's voices faded as she raked through her mind, trying to remember anything she could about repeating sixes. Other than it was impossible in this sort of situation. By the time she tuned back in, the Doctor was giving Zach a very tight hug.
"Oh, human beings. You are amazing! Ha! Thank you," The Doctor cheered. He blushed at Aneres' raised eyebrows but remained focused on Zach.
"Not at all," Zach replied slowly, his eyes filling with alarm as the Doctor's face darkened as quickly as it had lit up just moments ago.
*But apart from that, you're completely mad. You should pack your bags, get back in that ship and fly for your lives," He snapped, glaring at the humans and their occasional stupidity.
"You can talk. And how the hell did you get here?" Ida retorted, her arms crossed across her chest as she stared the Doctor down.
"Oh, we have a rather marvelous ship-" Aneres began.
"It's hard to explain, it just sort of appears wherever," The Doctor finished, beaming with pride at the thought of his beloved Tardis.
"We can show you, we parked down the corridor from er. Oh, what's it called? Habitation area-" Rose trailed off.
"Three," The Doctor and Aneres answered. Rose nodded.
"Three. Three." Zach frowned at them.
"Do you mean storage six?" He asked slowly. Aneres returned his frown, confused.
"It was a bit of a cupboard, yeah. Storage six. But you said. You said-" The Doctor froze as the air seemed to choke him mid-sentence. Aneres' eyes widened as she came to the same realization.
"You said storage five to eight," She whispered, horrified as she took off in a sprint with the Doctor not far behind.
"What is it? What's wrong?" Rose shouted as she tried to catch up to the Time Lords. Aneres barely registered her words, let alone replied as she forced herself through door after door while panic started clouding her mind.
"Open door 19. Close door 19," The comm system was quiet now, all Aneres and the Doctor could hear was their frantic breathing.
"Open the door! Come on!" the Doctor shouted as he and Aneres struggled to turn the handle on another door.
"Open door 17," They kept running, "Open door 15. Door 16 out of commission."
Aneres almost cried right then and there as she peered out a window and into a deep crevasse. The Doctor gasped for air and slammed his hands on the door violently.
"It can't be. It can't be!" He snarled, terror and anger bubbling in every vein and artery. Aneres' eyes didn't move from the sight that lived beyond the window as she struggled to accept what had happened.
"What's wrong? What is it? Doctor, the Tardis is in there. What's happened?" Rose demanded as she finally caught up.
"The Tardis is gone," The Doctor growled, barely containing his fury as the intercom kept repeating "Door 16 out of commission". He took a deep breath and pulled Aneres into a hug. "The earthquake. This section collapsed."
"But it's got to be out there somewhere," Rose shouted before rushing over to the small window in the door. The Doctor shook his head and tightened his grip on his Tether.
"Look down." And Rose did, she looked down on the oblivion to which they had lost the Tardis. She looked down, and she knew once again what fear felt like.
Hello everyone! Sorry for being gone for a month, we've had a lot of changes here at home along with our shelter in place order. One change I'm incredibly excited for is the newest addition to our family, our new cat! She's absolutely gorgeous and I have been enjoying all the time I get to spend with her as I do my schoolwork from home. Anyways, thank you for reading this chapter! Please review with questions, comments or concerns and I hope to get another chapter out soon!
