Searching For a Friend
Featuring Marie Jones and Asla
On the planet of Korukia, Admiral Poldak rushed back to his TARDIS in horror. He had just been told that a Dalek armada was heading towards Korukia and he was desperate to escape. He didn't care about the local population because he was a Time Lord, fighting for the honour of Gallifrey. Gallifreyans should never interfere. Unless they were the Doctor. Or the Master. Or the Rani. Or the Monk. But apart from those and a few others, Gallifreyans never interfered in the affairs of others.
"HALT!" a familiar cyborg tank called from behind him: a Dalek had arrived. It was presumably a recon scout and it had its gunstick aimed at him. He pulled out his staser rifle and fired three bolts into its eyestalk. But that didn't work. The Dalek moved towards him and fired three energy beams into him, causing Poldak to collapse to the ground in pain. The Dalek stopped moving and looked down at him, feeling somewhat superior.
"YOU WILL HELP US." the Dalek then said, sounding as if in need of assistance.
"What did you just say?" Poldak wondered.
"THE DALEKS REQUIRE YOUR ASSISTANCE. THERE IS A THREAT THAT WISHES TO DESTROY THE TIME LORDS AND THE DALEKS FOR GOOD. WE MUST FORM AN ALLIANCE AND DEFEAT THIS THREAT."
"What is this threat?"
"THE DOCTOR."
Elsewhere on Korukia, the TARDIS materialised. Marie Jones then stepped out of it, followed by Asla. Marie was dressed in a white jumper and a black leather jacket with a pair of jeans while Asla wore a grey t-shirt and a brown leather jacket, with a vortex manipulator on her wrist and a blaster in each of her hands.
"Are you sure he's here?" Asla asked Marie, looking around the abandoned marketplace, "Doesn't look like a place where he would be."
"The TARDIS said that the Doctor was somewhere round here. We could be a bit early perhaps but he will definitely be here." Marie said, shutting the TARDIS door, "Shall we look around and see what we can find?"
"Well what else can we do? We've been doing it for about a month now without help from Ollistra. If she hadn't stolen my TARDIS to get the new Cyber Lord back to Gallifrey, we could have found the Doctor by now."
The two women walked off, continuing to talk about the last month they had spent travelling from planet to planet, looking for the Doctor.
Admiral Poldak had noticed the new arrivals. He recognised their faces from the Panopticon Archives and knew who they were. He decided to head over to them and see if they could help him in any way.
"Are you Marie Jones?" he asked Marie, "Or, to use your old name, the Doctor?"
"Yes I am. Are you with the Time Lords?" she asked him, annoyed about him using her old name.
"I am. My name is Admiral Poldak of the Temporal Battalion and I wish to know where the Doctor is."
"Why do you want to know?" Asla wondered, suspecting that something was going on, "He left us a month ago, relative time. We've been looking for him ever since but we've had no luck. If you want him, you've got a hard task on your hands."
"Marie, Asla, I have been contacted by the Daleks. They wish to form an alliance with the Time Lords as they believe that the Doctor is leading an army to end the Time War for good." Poldak explained, making Asla and Marie share a horrified look with one another.
"That isn't the Doctor." Asla protested, "I know that he wouldn't be like that."
"And how do you know that?" Marie wondered, "I used to be the Doctor and I was evil. I even killed-"
Marie paused, knowing that what she was about to say would be very complicated and confusing.
"Alright, I get your point." Asla admitted, "But my Doctor would never do something like that. I used to know a younger version of him and I would never imagine that version of him leading an army to slaughter his own people and his greatest enemy."
"But can we trust the Daleks?" Marie wondered, asking a question nobody had thought to ask yet.
After she had asked that question, three bronze Daleks materialised around them and aimed their gunsticks at the Time Lords, ready to fire.
"Is it true that you're looking for the Doctor?" Asla asked one of them, looking directly into its eyestalk.
"CORRECT. HE WILL LEAD AN ARMADA OF CYBERMEN TO END THE TIME WAR AND DESTROY THE DALEKS AND THE TIME LORDS. WE MUST EXTERMINATE HIM BEFORE HE HAS THE CHANCE." the Dalek replied, projecting an image of Korukia out of its eyestalk. The image showed a burning wasteland and one man strolling through the wasteland wielding a laser rifle. Marie and Asla recognised this man instantly as the man they had last seen a month ago.
It was the Doctor.
The image changed. It now showed the image of Gallifrey and the Citadel, except that the Citadel was in ruins. The glass dome surrounding it had been smashed and flames rose up from the destroyed towers that had once stood there proudly.
"Did the Doctor do this?" Asla asked the Dalek.
"YES. HE WILL DO IT IN HIS FUTURE." the Dalek replied.
"We need to stop him then."
The image faded away and Marie nodded, agreeing with a Dalek for the first time in her life.
The Dalek then turned its focus towards Marie, projecting a strange blue wave up and down her. The Daleks then moved towards Marie, blocking her off from Asla and Poldak.
"YOU ARE THE DOCTOR!" the Dalek leader cried, "YOU WILL BE EXTERMINATED AND THE UNIVERSE SHALL BE SAVED!"
"No, you don't understand." Marie argued, "I'm not the Doctor."
"YOUR DNA MATCHES THE DOCTOR'S DNA. YOU ARE THE DOCTOR AND YOU MUST BE STOPPED."
Marie held up her hands to her face, hoping that the Daleks wouldn't fire at her.
Suddenly, a tall blue police box flashed into existence and knocked the Daleks away, making them clatter to the floor. The police box landed nearby with a whump and one of the doors opened. A young woman then stepped out who had short black hair and who was wearing a grey jumpsuit. She wielded a powerful laser blaster, which was aimed directly at Poldak.
"Who are you?" Asla wondered, "And why are you aiming the gun at him?"
"I'm Teena, the last of the house of Moontriff. I was lucky to be saved from the battle of Tybrisk and ever since I've been helping people." Teena explained, just as another, more familiar figure stepped out. He had long brown hair, a black jacket, a red waistcoat and a light blue shirt, all accompanied by a pair of beige trousers and brown leather boots. But Asla and Marie recognised the new arrival immediately.
The Doctor had returned.
He headed over to them and smiled happily, remembering who they were. He did look a little different from when they had last seen him though.
"Asla? Marie? What are you doing here?" he asked them, pleased to see his old friends again.
"We wanted to find you after you hurried off." Asla said, angered by him, "Why did you hurry off?"
"Asla, I needed to correct history and I needed a TARDIS. But don't worry, everything's been returned to its present state. I even managed to prevent the Cyber Lord from becoming the President of the United States."
"Are you sure? And apparently the Daleks said you were going to lead an armada of Cybermen into battle, blowing up the Time Lords and the Daleks."
"What?!"
Asla told him about what the Dalek had said and he frowned.
"Doctor, don't unleash hell upon us." Poldak suddenly said, aiming a staser at the Doctor, "I will save Gallifrey from your wrath."
He fired at the Doctor but Teena dived towards the Doctor, shoving him to the floor and taking the shot. The Doctor and Asla looked at one another, held hands and ran away from Poldak, not stopping to look at Teena.
When they reached the TARDIS, Asla swung open the door and they both rushed in. The Doctor shut the door behind him and dashed to the console, activating the dematerialisation control in time.
"It's been a long time since I've been here." he said with a smile, as the TARDIS wheezed and howled away, "How are things with you? Where did Ollistra go with the Cyber Lord?"
"I'm fine. Ollistra took Marie's TARDIS and brought the Cyber Lord to Gallifrey, so that she could be reprogrammed. The Cyber Lord, I mean. Not Ollistra."
"I see."
The TARDIS then began to bleep and wail loudly and the Doctor examined the scanner. He saw a series of co-ordinates flash up onto the scanner and activated the materialisation control.
"Where are we landing?" Asla asked, as the TARDIS began to wheeze and howl once more.
"Somewhere new and somewhere different." the Doctor replied, heading deeper into the TARDIS and yelling, "But first I need a change of clothes! These really don't suit me!"
Poldak looked at Marie grimly and fired two shots at her in anger. Poldak then walked off, back to his TARDIS, and didn't bother to watch Marie stagger into Ollistra's TARDIS. She laughed at how the Doctor had made sure it looked like a police box. She entered the TARDIS and staggered to the console, activating the dematerialisation control.
"I think I need a break from this." she said, groaning in pain as the regeneration process began, "The Time War can cope with one Doctor. I doubt the battlefield will want me back. I just hope that the next one will be as good as I was."
She leant back and regenerated. Golden energy flowed out of her head and hands, reforming her young head with short brown hair into an old man's head with ginger-grey hair and intelligent eyes. He looked around the TARDIS and noticed that the scanner screen showed the next destination as Earth. He clung on to the console with all his strength as minute explosions occurred everywhere.
"Well then," he exclaimed, "here we go again!"
THE END