Author's Note: Sorry about sporadic updates recently. I got food poisoning or something and am not feeling great.
Enjoy this next chapter!
Yimi glanced at the Doctor. "And Seo...?"
"...has been recruited to take the Apos'alu's place," the Doctor said. He stuck his finger in the air, licked it, considered, then changed direction. "When you saw her, what was she like? Dizziness? Confusion? Passing out? Random bleeding? Visions?"
Yimi nodded. "She said she saw herself as a prisoner, like Abo... Apos'alu."
"Yes, well, those weren't visions," the Doctor replied. "That was her getting trapped. By the time Lantro shot her, there was just a fraction of her left unchained. That fraction died — but the rest of her survived." He grinned, as he spotted something in the distance. "And there she is!"
There she was.
Struggling, calling out, chained to a rock — Seo looked just the way Abozalu had in all the murals and portraits and stained glass windows and tapestries.
The ground shook.
The Doctor grabbed Yimi and yanked her back, as a rift opened up just in front of her. It began to well with magma, its hot ooze nearly melting Yimi's feathers.
Seo spotted them and shouted out to them, but it was hard to hear her over the roar of the magma vents.
A familiar human figure stepped behind her — dagger in hand. "You know, there's something very unusual about your companion's blood," Mutajar said. "In the right time and place, it can produce explosive results."
"Listen to me, Apos'alu — you're not the first one who's tried this!" the Doctor called out to her. "Her blood's too powerful. It'll destroy..."
"What? The universe?" Mutajar said. "But we're not in the universe anymore, Doctor. You know that. You built this prison that way on purpose — to make sure Rassilon couldn't find me. So if you're worried about this prison's walls breaking down..." She stabbed the dagger down. "Newsflash! That's what I'm going for!"
Yimi tried to run out and stop her, but the Doctor yanked her back, away from the magma, before she could fall in or scald herself jumping over it.
Seo cried out.
But the dagger had just made the tiniest cut above her rightmost heart — just enough to draw blood. Mutajar brought out a little vial and filled it. Stopped the top, staring at it in approval.
"I'm warning you...!" the Doctor said.
"Oh, warn all you like," said Mutajar, walking to them over the cracks in the ground and the magma — as if it didn't affect her in the slightest. "You may have grounded this Battle TARDIS to keep me trapped. But you didn't ground your TARDIS."
A wheezing, groaning sound echoed, and the Doctor snapped his head over to the right, staring in disbelief as the familiar, police-box shaped TARDIS materialized nearby.
He practically dragged Yimi off her feet, as he sprinted for it.
"Maybe I don't need Bivazeer after all," said Mutajar, bringing out a small device from her pocket. "Maybe you and she can both die together — the way you deserve. Scared and alone and forced to confront your deepest, darkest nightmares."
She pressed a button on the device.
Yimi yelped, letting go of his hand as fire leapt around the Doctor. He didn't stop running, even as the flames spread. His hand had nearly caught hold of the TARDIS doors... when he faded into nothing.
Yimi stared. "Doctor?" She glanced back, assuming she'd see Seo... but there was no one. The expanse behind her was empty. "Seo? Anyone?"
Her voice echoed in the suddenly empty, suddenly soundless landscape.
She realized... this was the most alone she'd ever felt.
Ever.
Mutajar gave a smug smile, as she passed the spot where the Doctor had disappeared. She reached into her pocket, and took out a small Yale key on a string. Carefully, she fitted it into the lock of the police box.
"And me?" Yimi demanded, storming up to her. She threw open her feathery arms. "What happens to me?"
Mutajar blinked, shifting her eyes over to Yimi — as if she'd only just remembered that Yimi was there. "Oh. You." She shrugged. "I don't know. Do what you want. It's your life... well, for the next hour or so."
Mutajar unlocked the door. The gentle light from the TARDIS splashed across her face, making her eyes glimmer in eager anticipation.
"But I don't even know how to get home!" Yimi shouted. "My people worshipped you — and you're just going to strand me here?"
"Your home is long gone," Mutajar scoffed. "I tore down the boundaries separating all the different worlds. Slurped up the Main Complex into the top layer of the Battle TARDIS. Then infused everyone with a great big helping of rage. It's a battle royale up there — and everyone's losing." She waved it off, dismissively. "Your people never stood a chance. First ones slaughtered, I expect."
"What?!"
"Oh, boo-hoo! Get over it," Mutajar said, without even turning around to face Yimi, as she walked inside the ship. "Your people were never supposed to exist in the first place, you know."
"Yeah? Well neither were yours!" Yimi shouted, running towards Mutajar and the TARDIS. She tried to step inside... but something intangible stopped her.
Mutajar stopped in place.
Slowly, she looked back over her shoulder at Yimi.
"Your people would never have emerged if not for the Doctor's War," said Yimi, pointing to the spot where he used to be. "Who's to say that battle was a coincidence? Who's to say you weren't force-evolved, just the same way we were?"
Mutajar hesitated. "Bivazeer... mentioned something like that."
Yimi clung to the door, her heart beating fast. "We both were manipulated. Both used. Both betrayed. But I have believed — in you. In my darkest hour, I have always believed in you. It's given me strength."
"Am I supposed to care?" Mutajar asked. "I owe you and your people nothing, Yimi. You're like... bath salts. I use you and then I flush you down the drain." Turned back to the central console. "I owe nobody anything."
"Except the Doctor," said Yimi.
Mutajar froze.
"Bivazeer wanted to kill you," Yimi said. "The Doctor convinced him to spare your life — and the lives of your people." Her hands were shaking. "And you know that. I saw you with the blue-chinned man! He wanted you to say you hated the Doctor! You didn't."
"What the Doctor did to me was a mercy," Mutajar hissed, "not a kindness."
"And what did you show him?" Yimi snapped. "Neither."
Mutajar hesitated.
"Please," Yimi begged. "Do the same kindness for me. Save my people."
Yimi held her breath as, for a long, long while, Mutajar didn't move.
Then, finally, with a sigh, Mutajar bowed her head. "Perhaps I do owe the Doctor something. Not everything. Not all three of his demands. Just one." She unstrapped the vortex manipulator from around her wrist and turned to Yimi. "You," she said, as she tossed it. "No one else. Just you."
Yimi caught the VM. "Me?"
"As in — you've got one journey on that thing before it burns out," said Mutajar. She nodded at it. "I programmed in the coordinates of a very nice planet on the other side of the universe." She turned back to the TARDIS console. "Now get out of here before I change my mind."
Yimi stared at it. "But my people...!"
"Are dead," Mutajar snapped, rounding the central console. "And Seo and Jenny will soon join them. I told you — the Doctor did me a mercy, not a kindness. If he'd done both, I might have saved all three of you." She unstopped the vial, and poured the blood over the console. A strange green glow came over it. "Of course, if you'd prefer to die with the rest of the Patasi, you can find those coordinates in the vortex manipulator, too. But like I said — you only get one jump. So save yourself, or die with the others." She glanced back, with a scowl. "Now, if you don't mind, I have to release my swarm and destroy this side of the universe. Goodbye."
Then, with a rush of wind, the double doors snapped shut in Yimi's face.
And with a wheezing groan, the police box faded away into nothing.
Yimi looked around herself. There was only an endless stretch of dull rock and lava and an empty black sky. She could walk for miles and miles and never find anyone. And she needed to act fast if she was going to save her people.
Yimi began to poke at buttons on the vortex manipulator... and words popped up onto the display. Of course, Yimi could still read them. She had the gift of languages from Abozal... from the Battle TARDIS.
The other side of the universe...
The Ouribiu Overgrowth World...
The Badger-Beaver Poison World...
The Revolutionary Patasi World...
The Abozalu-worshipping Patasi World...
And then Yimi found a location that caught her eye.
"SHC Main Complex, Galia-4," Yimi read aloud.
Thoughts flashed through her mind, faster and faster, as she repeated the words. What had Seo said? When everything went wrong, her sister was the one who fixed things. And everything had definitely gone wrong. The Main Complex was where her people were. It was where Seo's sister Jenny was. It was Yimi's only chance to save her people — and maybe save her brother.
Yimi hesitated for only a second.
Then she closed her eyes. "I have faith," she said, "in you, Seo. Because you were right — between my god and my family, I choose my family."
And she pressed the button to activate the vortex manipulator.