A/N: You have no idea how long it took me to writ this chapter
Chapter twenty-four: Devil's Imagination
Leaving the crew to their work, the Doctor had helped Annamae walk to the habitation room they had first met the Ood in. Annamae was sat, resting back against the Doctor's chest and trying to reinforce her mind shields even more. If she was going to be any help to the Doctor then she needed to be able to focus on more than just defending her mind. Annamae needed to be able to move and think.
"I've trapped you here." The Doctor spoke softly to Rose who was leaning against his shoulder. He didn't speak loudly, not wanting to disrupt Annamae from her focus or rest since she needed the energy.
"No, don't worry about me." Rose tried to offer a reassuring smile, but she changed her mind about putting up a brave face when the station shook with the force of the storm of destroyed planets above them. "Okay, we're on a planet that shouldn't exist, under a black hole and no way out. Annamae is practically catatonic because of some old prisoner trying to break out. Yeah, I've changed my mind. Start worrying about me."
"We'll figure something out." The Doctor promised solemnly.
They fell into silence, with the Doctor glancing to the writing on the wall and trying to translate what was written. He knew that Annamae had gained some knowledge of the writing but he wasn't sure if she had been able to process that information yet since she had been dedicating time to reinforcing her shields. She was still resting, trying to reinforce her mental barriers so she could engage with the world around her.
Annamae opened her eyes when Ida drew their attention. She was stood by the entrance where the lever to control the ceiling shutters was.
"You might want to see this. Moment in history." She put the lever down and the shutters opened to reveal the black whole above. There was a cloud being drawn towards the black whole. "There. On the edge. That red cloud. That used to be the Scarlet System. Home to the Peluchi, a mighty civilisation spanning a billion years, disappearing forever. Their planets and suns consumed. Ladies and gentlemen, we have witnessed its passing." Ida went to close the shutters after a moment of silence but was stopped by the Doctor.
"Er, no, could you leave it open? Just for a bit. I won't go mad, I promise." The Doctor smiled charmingly.
"How would you know?" Ida challenged but conceded without any more argument. She turned to the young woman and guard who were also in the room having been eating whatever meal it was. "Scooti, check the lockdown. Jefferson, sign off the airlock seals for me"
Rose settled back in next to Annamae, having left to get something to eat at some point. She was staring up at the black whole thoughtfully. "I've seen films and things, yeah. They say black holes are like gateways to another universe."
"Not that one. It just eats." The Doctor responded with blunt sadness.
"Long way from home." Rose muttered, like this was only just setting in. Although they'd talked earlier about how they were trapped on this planet, how far they were from Earth – geographically and timewise – hadn't really settled in.
"Go that way, turn right, keep going for er, five hundred years, and you'll reach the Earth." The Doctor pointed out the glass-ceiling to the stars beyond the reach of the black whole.
"That's quite a bit further than we've gone before." Annamae rested her head on the Doctor's shoulder instead of the wall where it had been resting before.
"We don't even have signal." Rose showed her phone. "It's the first time we've gone out of range. Mind you, even if I could. What would I tell her?"
"We'll move back into signal range once we leave the black whole's reach. It's the black whole interfering with the signal." The Doctor explained.
"Do you think you'll be able to get the TARDIs back?" Rose asked hopefully.
"If they'll let me join the expedition down to the centre, then I might be able to find her. It depends on what the ground is like down there." The Doctor admitted unwillingly. "But as long as I know she's okay, then there's always hope."
"She's okay." Annamae confirmed softly but firmly. "I'm just glad you kept those shields up."
"Me to." The Doctor agreed. "Thank god for Jack and his technology fascination."
"Thank god you never throw anything away." Annamae returned with a light laugh.
Rose's phone rang, but she threw it away from her immediately after placing it near her ear.
"What is it? What's wrong?" The Doctor and Annamae questioned as one.
"It… there was a voice… it said 'he is awake. And then… earlier… the ood." Rose explained, wide eyed.
"The Ood?" The Doctor glanced over at the food hatch which was now close. "I suppose it's time we went and asked some questions."
The Doctor stood and then helped Annamae to her feet. She was still weak and leant against the Doctor, but she had strength enough to walk on her own and her eyes were more focused than they had been before.
"You okay?" The Doctor questioned with a frown.
"For now," Annamae reassured him with a smile. She could feel the pressure on her mind, but it wasn't as strong as before – like the being had focused its attention somewhere else. Her shields had been restored and specifically shaped to keep this being out, and with the physical contact from the Doctor she was being grounded.
The Doctor led the way through the base until they came to Ood Habitation where Danny was working at some kind of computer station and the ood were all sat on benches being overlooked by Danny. Annamae frowned at the way that the Ood had figuratively been put below the humans.
"Evening," The Doctor greeted brightly, helping Annamae take a seat on the steps facing Danny before sitting next to her.
"Only us," Rose continued, just as brightly.
"The mysterious trio," Danny returned with a smile that was a little tight. "How are you, then?" his eyes flickered to Annamae, "Settling in?"
"Yeah. Sorry, straight to business, the Ood how do they communicate? I mean, with each other." The Doctor questioned. Of course, he was aware that they were linked in with some kind of telepathic field since Annamae had been able to feel them, but he wasn't sure of the technicality of it.
"Oh, just empaths." Danny said dismissively. "There's a low-level telepathic field connecting them. Not that that does them much good. They're basically a herd race like cattle."
"This telepathic field, can it pick up messages?" The Doctor questioned without allowing his disapproval to show. Humans underestimated the powers of empaths and the intelligence of other beings.
"When I was having dinner, one of the Ood said something, well, odd." Rose explained why the Doctor was asking such a question.
"Hmm. An odd Ood." Danny said sarcastically.
"And then I got something else on my communication device." Rose continued, using the terms which they were more likely to use as opposed to 'phone'.
"Oh, be fair. We've got whole star systems burning up around us. There are all sorts of stray transmissions. Probably nothing." Danny said dismissively, but when the serious expressions on the Doctor and Annamae's face didn't change, he continued. "Look, if there was something wrong, it would show. We monitor the telepathic field. It's the only way to look after them. They're so stupid, they don't even tell us when they're ill."
"Monitor the field. That's this thing?" The Doctor tapped the screen next to where the number was reading basic 5.
"Yeah. But like I said, it's low-level telepathy. They only register basic five." Danny continued dismissively.
Since he had turned away from the screen, Danny didn't see the numbers begin raising, but the Doctor noticed. "Well, that's not basic five. Ten, twenty. They're gone up to basic thirty." The Doctor turned from the screen to look at the Ood, who all raised their heads.
Annamae stood and came to leaning on the railing looking down on the Ood.
"What does basic thirty mean?" Rose questioned.
"Well, it means that they're shouting, screaming inside their heads." Danny answered, clearly worried.
"Or something's shouting at them." The Doctor said darkly.
"But where is it coming from? What is it saying? What did it say to you?" Danny demanded to know.
"Something about the beast in the pit." Rose answered distractedly as she stared at the Ood. "And, he is awake." Rose answered.
"And you will worship him," The Ood spoke as one, causing Annamae to wince in pain as she felt a force on her mind. It wasn't directed at her, but she was in the peripherally of the telepathic beings reach as he took control of so many minds.
"What the hell?" Danny demanded while the Doctor straightened.
"He is awake." The Doctor repeated the phrase.
"And you will worship him." The Odd parroted back as one.
"Worship who?" The Doctor demanded. "Who's talking to you? Who is it?"
"They don't know his name." Annamae answered, her eyes distant as she focused on the mind of the Ood, not the being trying to control them. Her grip on the banister tightened as she did something she hadn't done in a very long time – she reached out to another telepathic being and formed a barrier. It wouldn't last long, but for now the Ood's telepathic field was free of the other's influence.
"Annamae?" The Doctor questioned in worry.
"He whispers to them in the dark," Annamae continued. "He wants to be free and we hold the key."
"How, how do we hold the key?" The Doctor questioned.
"I don't know," Annamae withdraw from the telepathic network before she could be overwhelmed. "But it's trying to manipulate us into acting."
"What was that?" Danny demanded to know.
"Annamae has low level telepathy, her minds been assaulted from the moment we arrived." The Doctor explained.
"I've put a shield up around the Ood's mind, but it's not going to hold for long, especially if whoever it is focuses his full attention on them. The Ood don't have a natural mental shield so they can't defend themselves or reinforce the barrier I've given them." Annamae tagged on, pointing to the screen which showed that the Ood where back at basic five.
It was at that moment that the base started shaking, alarms blared and a warning came through the computer. "Emergency hull breach. Emergency hull breach."
Danny immediately span to the computer. "Which section?" he demanded to know.
"Everyone, evacuate eleven to thirteen." Zach's came over the comms with the answer. "We're got a breach. The base is open. Repeat, the base is open!"
Danny took the lead, showing the way out, but Annamae stumbled holding onto the Doctor's arm as she was notified that one of the scientists wouldn't be able to make it to safety. The youngest person on the base besides Rose.
Their group made it to a secured room, where the rest of the crew seemed to be gathering except for Zach who was in the control room.
"Annamae?!" The Doctor caught her as her legs gave out on her.
"Succi." Annamae whispered the name so that only the Doctor could hear. "She didn't…"
"I'm sorry." The Doctor pulled her close in a hug as he took her weight until she was able to stand on her own once more. As the Computer announced that the breach was sealed the Doctor looked around the rest of the room. "Everyone all right? What happened? What was it?"
"Hull breach." Jefferson explained. "We were open to the elements. Another couple of minutes and we'd have been inspecting that black hole at close quarters."
"That wasn't a quake. What caused it?" The Doctor questioned.
"We're lost sections eleven to thirteen. Everyone all right?" Zach questioned through the comms.
"We're got everyone here except Scooti." Jefferson was the one to answer. "Scooti, report. Scooti Manista? That's an order. Report."
"It's alright, I've got her. Her bio chip is registering in habitation three." Zach interrupted before Jefferson worry could become more pronounced at the lack of answer. "Better go and check if she's not responding. She might be unconscious."
"Habitation three. Come on. I don't often say this, but I think we could all do with a drink. Come on." Jefferson led the way.
"What happened?" The Doctor questioned, offering a hand to Toby to help him to his feet without disturbing Annamae who had moved to lean against his side.
"I don't… I don't know. I was working and then I can't remember. All that noise. The room was falling apart. There was no air…"
"Come on." Rose grabbed Toby's arm and started dragging him after the others. "Come and have some protein one."
"Oh, you've gone native." The Doctor teased, guiding Annamae as they started walking.
"Oi, don't knock it. It's nice. Protein one, with just a dash of three." Rose clicked her tongue and smiled over her shoulder at them.
"You okay?" The Doctor questioned softly as he allowed the others to drift slightly ahead of them.
"Yeah, just… to much stimulation at ones." Annamae smiled grimly. "My physical strength is being zapped in favour of my mental strength."
"This battering of your mental strength is becoming a worryingly common occurrence despite the strength of your shields." The Doctor grumbled.
Since they were walking so slow, the Doctor and Annamae were the last to arrive at Habitation 3.
"I've checked Habitation four." Ida reported, stepping into the room having not been with the group who'd gathered before.
"There's no sign of her. The biochip says she's in the area." Jefferson growled angrily, looking over something on his wrist. "Have any of you seen Scooti?"
"No, no I don't think so." Tobi shook his head negatively.
"Zach? We've got a problem. Scootis' still missing." Jefferson reported.
"It says Habitation three." Zach sounded confused.
"Yeah, well, that's where I am, and I'm telling you she's not here."
"I've found her." The Doctor spoke with a grim softness as he looked up through the open shutters. Scooti's body seemed to have frozen with her hand raised as though she had been knocking on a door, and the pull of the black whole was slowly having her drift away from them.
"Oh, my god." Rose breathed in horror.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." The Doctor offered his condolences to those in the room who were staring in saddened horror.
"Captain." Jefferson pulled himself together and spoke softly to the one member of the crew who didn't know what was going on. "Report, Officer Scooti Manista PKD, deceased. Forty-three K two point one."
"She was twenty. Twenty years old." Ida shook her head in grief as she moved to close the shutters.
"For how should man die better than facing fearful odds? For the ashes of his father and the temples of his gods." Jefferson quoted Thomas Macaulay into the respectful silence as they observed the closing of the shutters.
They were quite for a moment, before the constant background noise stopped.
"It's stopped." Ida realised.
"What was that?" Rose questioned, not realising what it had that had stopped.
"The drill." The Doctor explained. With a new objective, everyone pushed their grief to the side and focused on the future.
"We've stopped drilling. We've made it. Point zero." Ida said excitedly before everyone sprung into action.
=^^= ='.'= =^^= ='.'=
=^^= ='.'= =^^= ='.'=
While the crew were running about getting ready to descend down the shaft that they had been drilling, I helped the Doctor get dressed in a bright orange space suit. I was silent as I made sure it was air tight and sat right on the Doctor's thin body. I wasn't particularly happy about the fact that he was wanted to travel to the centre of the asteroid they were sat on, because that was where I could feel the creature was, but I also knew he needed to find the TARDIS if there was any chance of reaching her. By going down, he knew that he would be able to interfere if they came across the creatures encase it tried to trick or harm Ida.
"Are you okay?" The Doctor asked softly, holding his helmet in his hands. As he reached up to gentle run his thumb over my cheek. "You look tired."
"This body isn't built to consistently maintain mental shields at these levels. I'm constantly drawing on my magic to keep the Being out, and the TARDIs has also erected her shields on full so I can't reach her properly. All I know is that she is alive. This whole planet – it feels of death and decay. Its very existence is against everything that is right with the laws of the universe and the feeling is battering against my resistances. There used to be something here, something light and whole but it's been corrupted and I can't reach it to draw strength. And there is something else, there are so many lives that are about to end and I can't do anything about it but they aren't settling like a human life should. I think it's the ood which we can't save, but there is also, I think at least one of the humans but I can't…" I shook my head angrily. Not being able to determine names when I could feel a death was very frustrating, especially since one of them was in flux which meant if I could make out who it was, I had a chance of saving them.
"If there is was another suit, I would say come with me." The Doctor frowned in concern. "Will you be okay without my grounding?"
"For a short while," I confirmed. "I might have to shut off my external sensing to keep up the shields, but that will leave me…"
"Like a drone, you'd be responding only to outside stimulus. And you still haven't explained your magic or sensing to Rose, so she wouldn't know what to do." The Doctor finished.
"Well, then you'll just have to come back to me." I smiled, trying to project a confidence that I didn't have. I knew that he would survive and come back to me, I just didn't know if he would come back before I would have to effectively shut myself off in order to maintain my own mind against the Being which was trying to take control. If I was just dealing with one thing, I would be able to cope, but I wasn't. The feeling on this planet was just as bad as it had been when we were parallel earth, except this one wasn't trying to kill me.
"I always do." The Doctor promised, before heading out to badger the Captain into letting him join Ida in going down the shaft.
"Capsule established. All system functioning. The mineshaft is a go. Bring systems online now." Ida reported, looking over the reports on a computer by the mineshaft. Everyone was there, all of them scurrying about and talking, giving reports.
"Reporting as a volunteer for the expeditionary force." The Doctor informed Zack.
"Doctor, this is breaking every single protocol. We don't even know who you are." Zack gave him a look which gave the impression that this protest was more of something that was expected of him as opposed to something he actually agreed with.
"Yeah, but you trust me, don't you?" The Doctor gave that smile that seemed to inspire trust in other people. It was half 'I'm innocent trust me' and half 'I'm completely harmless'. "And you can't let Ida go down there on her own. Go on. look me in the eye. Yes, you do, I can see it. Trust."
"I should be going down." Zack frowned, clearing trying to come to another reason to deny the Doctor.
"The Captain doesn't lead the mission. He stays here, in charge." The Doctor disagreed. The only time a captain led an expedition was when there was someone else with seniority was left behind at the communications/centre base.
"Not much good at it, am I" Zack muttered in self-deprecation, clearly giving in to the Doctor and deciding to let him join Ida down the shaft. "Positions! We're going down in two. Everyone, positions! Mister Jefferson! I want maximum system enhancement."
"Oxygen, nitro balance, gravity." The Doctor did a quick check of the wrist monitor his was wearing, making sure that it matched the readings that Annamae had given him while she helped him into the suit. "It's ages since I wore one of these."
"That's because you've got superior biology to us humans." I smiled in amusement, kissing him lightly on the cheek before I helped secure the helmet. "You Time Lord's, very difficult to kill."
"I want that spacesuit back in one piece, you got that?" Rose threatened as she approached them.
"Yes, sir." The Doctor smirked, amused. When Rose spoke in such a way, channelling her mother, it always caused him amusement; even if she was doing it to hide how scared and worried she was.
"It's funny, because people back home think that space travel's going to be all whizzing about and teleports and anti-gravity, but it's not, is it? It's tough." Rose frowned.
"Space travel is like deep sea travel," I pulled Rose into a side hug. "When human's travel into the dark, we do so with wounder in our hearts. The danger, that's just an occupational hazard."
"I'll see you later." The Doctor promised.
"Not if I see you first." Rose returned.
The Doctor just smiled indulgently before joining Ida at the capsule lift that would take them down to the centre point of the drills. Danny left the launch point to escort the last of the Ood to their habitation area, while Zach headed to the control room to monitor the capsule's progress and keep communications open.
"Capsule active." Zach announced over the coms. "Counting down in ten, nine," Ida and the Doctor entered the capsule which Jefferson secured behind them. "eight, seven, six," I stood by the computer, which had a scanner showing where the capsule was and also as a communication point. "Five, four, three, two, one. Release."
I picked up the micro-phone and grabbed Rose's hand. She was biting her lip and starring at the screen in worry and I was sure that if she had the micro-phone she would allow her worry to lead her words instead of ensuring that only important things were reported. The capsule was lowered steadily down the steel cables.
It was only three minutes before Zack spoke over the comes once more. "You've gone beyond the oxygen field. You're on your own."
"Doctor, Ida, your insulation working properly?" I questioned. I trusted that the oxygen reports where correct, but there wasn't a way of monitoring the insulation in the suits to make sure that they didn't freeze to death now that they were outside of the oxygen field.
"We're fine, the suits are holding up." The Doctor reported.
"That's good. You keep an eye on it Doctor. Those aren't the suits from your Tardis." I warned.
"You should have some faith. Human engineering has gotten them quite far." The Doctor returned, amused.
"Humans cut corners without thinking about the consequences." I snorted.
"Annamae, stay off the comms." Zach sighed
"Not going to happen," I smirked, amused that he thought he could order me around. I wasn't under his command, and I didn't take orders well.
Suddenly the capsule dropped a few extra feet instead of the steady lowering that it had been doing before. The grip I had on the micro-phone dropped and I leant against the computer with my eyes clenched shut as I tried to fight off a sudden mental attack.
"Doctor? Doctor, are you all right? Annamae, what's wrong? What's happening?" Rose grabbed the micro-phone trying to establish that we were both okay. Her voice panicked, and I could feel her grip on my shoulder, trying to get my attention.
"Ida, report to me. Doctor?" I hear Zack demanding over the coms as I lowered myself to the floor trying to push back. The shield I had put up around the Ood crumbled like wet paper, and it was determined to get through to me as well.
"It's all right. We've made it. Getting out of the capsule now." The Doctor's reassuring voice came through the comms.
"Doctor there's something wrong with Annamae." Rose said urgently.
"What do you mean? What's happened to her?" The Doctor demanded to know.
"I don't know, she looks like she is in pain. And she's just sat on the floor, gripping at her hair." Rose reported unsurely. "She's not responding to me, my voice or my touch."
"Her breathing's stable, but her heart beat is a little bit fast." Jefferson reported, and I could feel him coming to crouch at my side so he could take my vitals.
"Is the comm open, can she hear me?" The Doctor questioned.
"The comm is open, no idea if she can hear you though. Not sure she can hear us." Jefferson answered.
"Do we need to get her to med bay?" Zach questioned.
"No, Med-bay won't do her any good. She needs grounding, and I am too far away." There was a clear and present scowl in the Doctor's voice as he said this.
"Grounding? Like when we were with Pete?" Rose questioned. "Can I help?"
"No, you don't have the telepathic ability to do it. Annamae, I know you're listening, so I need you to focus. Shut off the connection to the planet, you don't need to be aware of it anymore. I know it hurts, and you need the balance, but right now I need you. So, block it out." The Doctor spoke calmly and soothingly.
I frowned mentally at this. I didn't know if I could just shut off one of my mental connections without simple shutting them all down. In my past life, shutting off one or more avenue of mental stimulation was a terrible idea since it was difficult to reconnect that one avenue or function without it. Most people would use Occlumency to shut of their connection to their emotions, or ability to feel pain, and that led to an imbalance in thought or action, especially since they typically didn't want to reconnect with those emotions once they shut them off. But then, if I could shut off my connection to the planet and the time stream around me, the Doctor could help me reconnect later.
With this thought, I pulled myself deep into my mind and magic. It took longer than usual because I couldn't allow the mental shield to weaken or fall with it being under attack. Once I reached my magic – not my core – but the point where my mind connected with my core, I started separating the different threats within my mind. There was the one which allowed me to 'read' other beings, the one which connected me to death, the one which allowed me to 'feel' time, the one which connected me to my internal magic, and the one which connected to external magic, and finally the one which connected me to a planet.
I reached out to the one connecting me to the planet and began forming a shield around it. I couldn't cut the connection, that would be extremely damaging to my mind, but I could insulate it from myself until I couldn't feel it without concentrating. The other signals drowning it out. Once I finished insulating this strand, I moved on to insulating the one which connected me to external magic as well. Feeling the corrupt magic that was permeating the planet wasn't helping me focus my own magic into defence of the mind since it wanted to reach out and purge what had been corrupted.
Once everything was as insulated as I could make it, I returned my conscious in time to hear the Doctor complaining about something.
"No turning back? That's almost as bad as nothing can possibly go wrong, or this is going to be the best Christmas Walford's ever had?" The Doctor complained.
"Doctor, stop rambling before you truly jinx yourself." I muttered, forcing myself up.
"Annamae!" The Doctor and Rose both explained happily.
"Doctor, we need you back here. The Ood, he has the ood." I ignored their happiness at my mobility in order to inform them of the information I had discovered when I felt their shield fall. As though to proof my point, Danny joined the com conversation.
"Captain, sir. There's something happening with the Ood." His voice sounded scared.
"Danny, leave the habitation area, and lock the door behind you. Get to here, as quickly as you can. Doctor…" I took the com from Rose so that I could make sure I was heard clearly despite the strain in my voice.
"We're on our way back." The Doctor promised.
"But we're barely seen anything." Ida argued.
"Sir, the ood. Their telepathic field is at basic 100." Danny reported.
"Danny, the ood are they moving?" Zach requested information.
"No, sir." Danny admitted.
"Keep watching them." Zach decided. "And you, Jefferson? Keep a guard on the Ood."
"Officer at arms!" Jefferson ordered the woman who was stood in the background.
"No, just confine them all to the habitation area. You can lock the doors, right?" I questioned, a frown on my face at the fact that they didn't seem to think twice about killing these sentient beings.
"We're coming up," The Doctor interrupted before anyone could respond to my question.
"No. We've got it under control. You continue exploring, you said you were close to the signal? We don't have the power to do multiple trips, so it's likely that whatever you find is all we're going to get." Zach disagreed with the Doctor's decision.
"Annamae?" the Doctor questioned after a pause.
"I… think we've got it under control for now. But don't go far from the capsule." I decided, accepting that these people had spent years of their lives trying to discover what was causing this planet to be suspended around a black whole and they deserved to at least try and get some answers so that they could say that the loss of life was worth it.
"Alright, but you let me know the moment something changes." He ordered.
"Of course."
"Annamae, are you okay now?" Rose questioned, turning her wide eyes on me.
"For now. But I might need the Doctor's help. This planet isn't good for my health." I smiled grimly.
"Why does this keep happening to you? What was the Doctor talking about earlier? What did he me, stop your connection?" Rose demanded.
"That, is a very long story and now isn't the time to tell it. Let's just say that my brain isn't the same as it used to be." I offered her a smile, one of wry amusement.
"We've found something." The Doctor announced. "It looks like metal. Like some sort of seal. I've got a nasty feeling the world might be trapdoor. Not a good word, trapdoor. Never met a trapdoor I liked."
"The only good trapdoor is an escape hatch," I smirked in amusement.
We had fallen into a couple of troublesome situations because they had stood on a trapdoor which they hadn't noticed, or an enemy had got behind them because they had come up in a trapdoor. Escape hatches are different, they were a means of getting to safety even though they could work on the same principle if they were really unlucky. They'd made the distinction between a trapdoor and an escape hatch after an argument with Jack. Although, now I was thinking about it, Rose hadn't been there for that argument. She had been held captive by soldiers who had wanted them to lead them into the enemy camp, which they hadn't known the location of.
"This is definitely no escape hatch." The Doctor muttered.
"There are etchings, symbols, around the edge." Ida informed them.
"Do you think it opens?" Zack questioned.
"That's what trapdoors tend to do." The Doctor returned sarcastically.
"Trapdoor doesn't do it justice." Ida ignored the Doctor's sarcasm in order to give them a better description since pictures weren't coming through. "It's massive, Zack. About thirty feet in diameter."
"The symbols, are they like the ones that were written on the wall?" I questioned.
"All the writing seems belong to the same language, which I still can't translate. Annamae, did you make progress with that?" The Doctor questioned.
"Yes, I, I can translate the writings in full. But…" I grimaced at the headache that formed. "Not without putting myself in a coma. I've blocked off the knowledge because it was too much to process on top of everything else."
"Toby, what about you? Did you get anywhere with decoding it?" Zach questioned.
Rose leaned away from the computer and turned to the man who was curled into a ball, too far away to hear the coms.
"Toby, they need to know that lettering. Does it make any sort of sense?" Rose questioned.
"I know what it says" Toby answered.
At the same time, a sudden spike in anger and aggression had me stumbling back and away, only to be caught and steady by Jefferson. Toby was dead, why hadn't I noticed that before? He'd been so close to us for a while now, and yet it wasn't until that moment that I realised he was dead and that his body was being processed, even if there was an element of the man's original consciousness remaining and being manipulated to demonstrate what the humans would expect to be normal behaviours for Toby.
"Then tell them." Rose prompted not seeming to notice anything wrong with Toby.
"When did you work that out?" Jefferson question suspiciously, carefully shifting his hold on my struggling form. I needed to focus and push through, I needed to warn them; but I was barely able to focus past the oppressed presence pushing down and trying to overwhelm me enough to be aware of what was happening.
Toby raised his head, revealing that his eyes had turned red and that his skin was covered in thick black symbols. "These are the words of the Beasts." He spoke with a deep, duelled tone. "And he has woken. He is the heart that beasts in the darkness. He is the blood that will never cease. And now he will rise."
"Officer, stand down." Jefferson carefully leaned my unresponsive form against a convenient wall, so he could point his gun at Toby. "Stand down."
"What is it? What's he done? What's happening? Rose, Annamae, what's going on?" The Doctor demanded to know, clearly hearing what was happening through the open comm but not being able to deduce what their words meant beyond something had gone wrong.
"Jefferson? Report. Report!" Zach's demanded for information.
"Officer, as Commander of Security, I order you to stand down and be confined. Immediately." There was definitely worry in Jefferson's voice, I noticed as I sunk to the floor, the walls support not enough with the weakness in my legs. The Being was trying to take me over, I realised when the pressure became stronger. Whatever it needed Toby for, it seemed to have decided I was a better option.
"He's come out in those symbols all over his face. They're all over him." Rose explained, the worry not even trying to be kept out of her voice. "And, Annamae's collapsed. She's also bleeding out of her nose and ears."
At this knowledge, I struggled to open my eyes. I needed Rose to know that I was still conscious, but my eyelids were heavy. The Being was trying to zap my strength so that I was forced unconscious, which would make me easier to take over. Well, he was smart. I thought grimly, sending a surge of magic through my body, which had the same effect of sending a jet of caffeine through me, allowing me to open my eyes.
"Mister Jefferson. Tell me, sir. Did your wife ever forgive you?" Toby questioned with a sinister smile.
"Stay out of his head," I growled, forcing myself up and stumbling to Jefferson.
"Do you truly think you can stop me?" Toby questioned, shooting an amused smile at my form.
"Officer, you stand down and be confined." Jefferson demanded once more.
"Or what?" Toby tilted his head, observing the gun without concern.
"Or under the strictures of Condition Red, I am authorised to shoot you." Jefferson spoke with a stern confidence he didn't really feel. Despite what was happening, Toby was someone he knew on a personal level, which was why he was hesitating in shooting something with Toby's face.
"But how many can you kill?" he questioned, opening his mouth. The symbols left him in an inky cloud. Two strands of the cloud entered the two ood who were in the room with us, while I felt the others take control of the ood who were with Danny. Toby's body crumbled like his strings had been cut.
"We are the legion of the Beast" The Odd spoke as one, their voices echoing across the coms and not just being heard in the room. Which prompted panic from Zach and the Doctor who couldn't see what was happening.
"Rose? What is it, Rose? I'm going back up." The Doctor shouted over the coms.
"Report! Report!" Zach demanded. "Jefferson, report. Someone, report!"
"The Legion shall be many, and the Legion shall be few." The Ood continued speaking as one.
"It's the Ood." Rose reported shakily into the coms.
Taking the initiative from Rose, Jefferson turned his gun on the Ood who were advancing with red eyes. "Sir, we have contamination in the livestock."
"He's possessing them. You… you need to get away from them… immediately." I forced myself to talk, sacrificing physical strength in order to speak. I was now a liability in case they attacked, but they needed information and Jefferson was a solider, already prepared to attack, so my physical safety wasn't completely compromised.
"Doctor, Annamae say's they're possessed." Rose reported.
"They won't listen to us."
"Can Annamae stop them? Can she break the connection?" the Doctor questioned.
"Not strength enough. Field compromised." I answered tightly, eyeing the Ood. "Jefferson, I'm sorry, but you need to take them down. And secure the other Ood in a locked area."
"He has woven himself in the fabric of your life since the dawn of time. Some may call him Abaddon. Some may call him Kroptor. Some may call him Satan or Lucifer."
"Captain, it's the Ood. They're out of control!" Danny's panicked voice suddenly joined the conversation.
"Or the Bringer of Despair, the Deathless Prince, the Bringer of Night." I gasped in pain at the feeling one of the guards falling. "These are the words that shall set him free."
"Danny, get out of there! Lock the Ood down!" Jefferson relayed my order through the comms. "Guards, arm yourselves."
"I shall become manifest. I shall walk in might. My legions shall swarm across the worlds!" with these last words the entire planet started trembling as the force holding it in suspension weakened just slightly.
"We're moving!" it was Zach's time to panicky report over the coms. "The whole thing's moving. The planet is moving."
"Danny! Danny are you clear? Report?" Jefferson demanded to know.
"I am the sin and the temptation and the desire. I am the pain and the loss and the…"
"The gravity field. It's going! We're losing orbit! We're going to fall into the black hole!" Zach continued briefing them over the coms even though they were slightly more worried about the threat directly in front of them.
"I have been imprisoned for eternity. But no more. The Pit is open. And I am free!"
"Open fire!" Jefferson finally gave the order, when it became clear that the Ood were definitely not standing down and were a direct threat to their health and life.
My eyes closed as their lives ended. Sixteen Ood, three guards, dying all within moments of each other. As the last of the Ood fell, the planet stopped shifting. There was a moment of silence.
"We're stabilising." Zach laughed in relief over the coms. "We've got orbit."
"Doctor? Doctor, can you hear me? Doctor, Ida, are you there?" Rose moved back to the coms now that the threat was past. I could hear Jefferson's footsteps moving in my direction, but I had used to much strength to early and was now suffering for it. The magic adrenaline trick couldn't be used again for another ten minutes without damaging my brain. Before Jefferson could reach me, the door started opening so he turned back to it.
"It's me!" Danny exclaimed panicked as he slipped into the room and closed the door behind him. "But they're coming."
"Secure the door," Jefferson ordered. "Danny, how many?"
"All fifty. They've gone mad. They killed the guard I was with." Danny answered, panicked.
"What happened to lockdown? I told you to lock them in." Jefferson growled angrily, moving to the door and activating the locking mechanism that meant it couldn't be opened from the outside – effectively sealing them in with no way out.
"They're armed!" Danny snapped back. "It's the interface device. I don't know how, but they're using it as a weapon."
"Jefferson, what's happening there?" Zach asked.
"I've got very little ammunition, sir. And one down. How about you?" Jefferson asked.
"All I've got is a bolt gun. With er, all of one bolt. I could take out a grand total of one Ood. Fat lot of good that is." Zach muttered sarcastically.
"Given the emergency I recommend strategy nine." Jefferson proposed, motioning the guard to watch the door while he moved to check on me. I felt him checking my pulse and breathing, but still hadn't marshalled the strength to respond in any way. Damn that beast to hell! I couldn't protect Rose if I couldn't move.
"Agreed. Right, we need to get everyone together. Who is down, can you move them? What about Ida and the Doctor? Any word?" Zach started pulling his shit together to get a plan in motion.
"I can't get a reply. Just nothing. I keep trying, but it's..." Rose started reporting, panicked, but was cut off by static as the Doctor' came on the line.
"No, sorry. I'm fine. Still here."
"You could've said, you stupid…" Rose's insulted was cut off with a loud screech because she'd gotten too loud on the coms.
"Whoa. Careful!" The Doctor cautioned. "Anyway, it's both of us. Me and Ida. How's Annamae?"
"Unresponsive. She warned us the Ood were possessed and we needed to lock them down, and then… nothing. She's breathing, with a stable heart beat." Jefferson reported. "Is this like the last time she went down?"
"No, this is different and much worse." I could practically see the Doctor running his hand through is hair. "Just, don't move her unless you absolutely have to. She used strength she didn't have to give you a warning and now she's recovering. She needs time to recover either physical or mental strength, either way, moving her could completely destroy any progress she is making to either of those."
"How do we help her? Is there any medication, or something?" Jefferson asked.
"Only my TARDIS shielding can help her now." The Doctor sighed. "Not even I can ground her if she's retreated completely. Did she stop moving complete before or after the planet shifted?"
"I'm not sure. She collapsed before the planet shifted, but didn't completely stop responding until after. We were a bit busy at the time, so I can't give you an exact moment." Jefferson grunted. "And I'm pretty sure her heart beat is lower than it was before."
"Yeah, that's normal. I think her collapse happened because the barrier separating her from the thing attacking her, the trap door, is open. All we've got left is a chasm." The Doctor moved away from my health in order to report what was happening with him.
"Normal!" Jefferson muttered. "Danny, you stay with her, monitor her health." Jefferson ordered before moving to join Rose at the consol.
"How deep is it?" Zach questioned, excepting the subject change. Like the Doctor said there was nothing they could do for me.
"Can't tell. It looks like it goes down forever."
"The pit is open." Rose muttered. "That's what the voice said."
"But there's nothing. I mean, there's nothing coming out?" Zach questioned.
"Nothing, physically." The Doctor muttered.
"It said Satan." Rose muttered.
At those words, I realised how this was going to go. The beast was going to play on their basic fears and worries, try and get them panicked and not thinking straight so that it could take advantage. At the minute, its mind was free to control the Ood and the body of Toby, but it had an agenda to be acting now – and that agender involved causing them to stop thinking. The Doctor wouldn't let panic take him, but he was too far down to really do anything about it if everyone else started panicking. Which meant, he needed me to help control them and keep the calm – he needed me to be strong enough to fight this!
I had a last resort option – one that typically ended in death when used by a magical. I'd never had cause to use it in my past life, because I had a greater direct access to my magic, and what I was fighting was external – not internal like this. I was sure if I tried to externally use my magic, casting spells or doing healing, then I would be just as strong and powerful as before. I had started externally using my magic since joining the Doctor, but not often. The internal use I was being force to implement and improve was very different, and always required extreme mental focus and strength when I'd been surrounded by magic and only connected to death. This, with the other connections I now had, and the difference that this universe without active magic, made it much harder to do what used to be difficult.
Mental shields were delicate, they required careful focus and attention in order to form them. I kept having to improve my mental shields, lowering and bringing them up depending on the situation because of this. At full attrition a part of my mind had to focus on maintaining them, which meant my concentration was split. With everything else I was dealing with, I also had to improve my emotional control and shielding, which was just as delicate and required just as much focus. Continually sending my mental focus and my magic to maintaining these shields meant that I was drained.
In order to circumnavigate this mental focus and the delicate nature of maintaining these shields, the only option was to overpower it. An option that is typically only used by those with high magical reserves, and still only for ten minutes at a maximum if they want to live. In order to make it through this, I would need at least an hour, and I won't just be maintaining my mental resistance – but also my physical resistance which had been battered and damaged by the attacks and drainage. In order to last the hour, I wasn't just going to have to power my mental and physical strength, but also to continue sending healing magic through my body so I could remain alive and standing. That was going to drain my reserves – completely. If I didn't get to the Doctor, and the TARDIS in that time, then I'd be testing my ability to die and come back. I knew that, in my past life, when I died with low magic levels it took longer to come back, and this would put my magic levels at the lowest they have ever been. Which means, if I was coming back, it was going to take a while. Something I hadn't explained to the Doctor, which means he would think I wasn't coming back – a grief I didn't want him to suffer, but there was a chance that was going to be an option anyway. Rose… well I was going to have to tell her something, sometime.
Diving deep into my magic, I ignored the outer rings and fell direct into its centre. It took a moment to gather just under 50% of what I had; once it was collected, I sent it out with a blast into my system with two purposes.
With a deep breath, my eyes snapped open and I moved.
"All of you, so small. The Captain, so scared of command. The solider, haunted by the eyes of his wife. The scientist, still running from Daddy. The little boy who lied. The virgin. And the lost girl, so far away from home. The valiant child who will die in battle so very soon." The beast was taunting them, using the computer to communicate what he had managed to get from their heads.
"Oh, very clever," I took the speaker from Rose, startling everyone who hadn't realised that I was now mobile. Speaking now, startling everyone into silence by moving when everyone thought me unconscious stopped the panicked babble that was about to start from the manipulative words of the beast. "You've clearly been alone for far too long if you think humans are so easily manipulated by reading their minds and taking their fears."
"Annamae is right." The Doctor agreed immediately. "That thing is playing on very basic fears. Darkness, childhood nightmares, all that stuff."
"But that's how the devil works." Danny pointed out.
"Or a good psychologist. And this one has the benefit of being able to read your mind." The Doctor pointed out sarcastically.
"Doctor, what did it mean I was going to die? That's not something it can just read in my mind." Rose questioned.
"Fallacy." The Doctor snorted. "What makes his version of the truth any better than mine, hmm?" the Doctor questioned, deciding to give them something else to think about, something positive. "Cos I'll tell you what I can see. Humans. Brilliant humans. Humans who travel all the way across space, flying in a tiny little rocket right into the orbit of a black hole, just for the sake of discovery. That's amazing! Do you hear me? The Captain, his Officer, his elders, his juniors, his friends. All with one advantage. The East is alone. We are not. If we can use that to fight against him…"
"Doctor, get out of there." I snapped, my hand automatically reaching out to grab the cable with my magic – if only just for a moment. It was just long enough to give them time to get out of the capsule, and the time it took the cable to fall that distance gave them time to get away.
"Doctor! Doctor we lost the cable! Doctor, are you all right? Doctor!" Rose shouted.
"Comms are down." Zach reported.
"He's fine. Him and Ida. I can still feel them." I reported. "Now, I don't have much time. I'm mobile and talking for exactly one hour. So, we need a plan before that hour is up, otherwise you're going to be carrying a dead weight around."
"Can we get the Doctor and Ida back? Do we have another cable?" Rose questioned.
"No. There's no way out. They're stuck down there. With sixty minutes of oxygen if they're lucky." Zach reported grumble.
"Great, that makes three of us on a sixty-minute count down." I muttered. "Zach, can you get the coms back?"
Before Zach could answer, there was banging at the doors – both in person and echoing over the coms.
"Captain? Situation report?" Jefferson requested.
"It's the Ood." Zach explained after a long moment. "They're cutting through the door bolts. They're breaking in."
"Yeah, it's the same on door 25." Jefferson eyed the sparks as metal grated against metal on the hinges of the door.
"How long it's going to take?" Rose questioned.
"Well, it's only a basic frame, it should take ten minutes." There was another bolt cut. "Eight," Jefferson corrected himself.
"Well, that's another time limit we need to beat." I grumbled. "Zach, how long you got?"
"I've got a security frame. It might last a bit longer." Zach reported.
"Okay, so Zach what you got over there? Your console is completely centralised right, you control everything?" I leaned against the computer, using the support to give my body just a little more time.
"Yes, yes it does." Zach agreed, confused.
"Okay, we need power – specifically lights. You got any back-up generators, or secondary storages which were turned off when we lost power? Can you re-rout anything?" I questioned. As the captain, and the one who manned the console specifically, he would know the power sauce and computers inside out.
"They've gutted the generators. But we still have the rocket. That has independent supply which we could reroute. Mister Jefferson?" Zach directed his following orders to his officer. "Open the bypass conduits. Override the safety."
"Opening the bypass conduits, sir." Jefferson moved over to where several powerlines were fed into the drilling area.
"Channelling rocket feed in three, two, one. Power." Zach announced as the lights flickered and we went from dime red warning lights to full bright lights.
"Okay. Now we have power, we need to work on a way out because we don't have enough bullets to take down all the Ood. We need blue prints for the base; are there any back doors, air vents, maintenance tunnels… anything. Danny, use the computer. We need something to take the Ood down because I can't put a new shield around their minds without breaking my own shield down." I continued issuing orders as my mind ran through the possibilities.
"What about that strategy nine thing? Can we use that to stop the Ood?" Rose asked.
"Not enough power. It needs a hundred percent." Zach explained.
"What about Toby? Shouldn't he be doing something?" Rose questioned. "Or me?"
"Toby, the beast left an imprint in your head. Use that to translate the writing – we need anything you can give us about the pit. Rose, monitor Toby to make sure he stays with us – his eyes turn red, his speech pattern changes or anything, you let me or Jefferson know so we can take him down." I decided after a moment of indecision.
"And what will you be doing?" Danny questioned.
"Not dying. The more I do now, the less useful I'm going to be later. Like I said, you have me for one hour and it's a deteriorating time limit not a stable one." I smiled grimly.
"What is wrong with you, exactly?" Jefferson questions while he worked at the computer I was leaning on.
"At this very moment in time?" I returned, glancing over at Rose who was sat with Toby and working. Fortunately, Jefferson hadn't spoken loud enough to catch Rose's attention, although the worried glances she kept shooting in my direction suggested that the only reason she hadn't come over to talk with me herself was that she knew I wouldn't answer given the current situation.
"In a nutshell." Jefferson confirmed.
"Well, I'm dying." I answered bluntly.
"So that time limit for carting around dead weight…"
"I literally meant dead weight." I confirmed. "I forced myself to wake up… but my body had shut down in an attempt at giving me the time I needed to gain the energy to survive. I no longer have that time, and with each passing second my muscles are eroding, and in time my organs will also shut down. My body will be immobile in forty minutes, my mind gone in fifty-three. Of course, there are factors which will make it worse."
I tried to give him as much information as I could, because when my body started shutting down, Jefferson was the sort of person to carry me to safety and he needed to know if I was a lost cause or not.
"Anything we can do to help?" Jefferson requested.
"The Doctor is the only person… the only one with a chance at saving me now." I smiled sadly. "As long as Rose gets out of here alive, it's worth it."
"You really love your sister," Jefferson realised.
"There's all sorts of viruses that could stop the Ood. Trouble is, we haven't got them on board." Danny suddenly shouted, slapping the computer he was working on.
"Well, that's handy, listing all the things we haven't got. We haven't got a swimming pool either. Or a Tesco's." Rose said sarcastically, leaving Toby to approach Danny instead.
The computer beeped, brining Danny's attention to what it said. "Oh, my God. It says yes. I can do it. Hypothetically, if you flip the monitor, broadcast a flare, it can disrupt the telepathy. Brainstorm!"
"Please tell me that is biologically linked to the Ood and not just the telepathic field. These days I officially class as telepathic, and I'm not strong enough to fight off a virus." I requested.
"Um… I'm not sure?" Danny scanned through the information. "The computer is linked to the Ood telepathic field, and so is the virus, which suggest a biological component."
"Okay, a guess is going to have to be good enough. Do what you need to make that happen." I ordered.
"We need to get to the central monitor, in Ood Habitation." Danny admitted.
"Anna!" Rose protested. "What if that attacks you?"
"Then I go down. My mind is more complicated – what kills the Ood will simple knock me out." I dismissed. "Jefferson, Zach, do we have an exit?"
"There's a network of maintenance tunnels running underneath the base. We should be able to gain access from here." Jefferson admitted.
"Maintenance shaft? This place was built by robots, so, do we have air?" I asked, doubting a positive answer.
"We're not so lucky."
"I can change that." Zach piped up. "I can manipulate the oxygen field from here. Create discrete pockets of atmosphere. If I control it manually, I can follow you through the network."
"Can you plot a route to Habitation? We need to be prepared to aerate each new section quickly, because the Ood will follow us down." I grimaced as my knees started folding, and sent a healing burst through my body. That happened quicker than I expected. "And, we need to work quickly. Those Ood need three more minutes to get through."
"Three minutes, you sure?" Danny questioned. "Because, this machine needs to download the virus."
"I'm positive. You have three minutes exactly to download the virus and get us in those tunnels." I confirmed, I was getting a wavering alert for the female guard – Jane. If they didn't get out of here in time, she was going to die because I couldn't prevent it in my physical state without sacrificing Jefferson and Danny – which would consequently see Rose and Zach dead.
Jefferson moved to the grate and started loosening it, preparing to lift it the moment he was given the clear by Zach. He also threw remote coms to everyone so they could talk with Zach and he could monitor their vital signs.
"Annamae, your vials…" Zach spoke directly to me instead of through the open system.
"I know... keep Jefferson apprised if I drop and no one else." I murmured softly.
"Okay, the first section is clear. You need to head left into the system." Zach announced.
"Danny!" Jefferson said urgently when the Ood took out the second to last bolt.
"Hold on! Just conforming." Danny did a little dance on the spot as he glanced nervously at the door – hoping that the virus would download quicker.
"Why the hell wasn't the system connected so you could access the virus from the habitation area?" I growled angrily. This was foolish of the construction and design people – you would think this far into the future, stupid mistakes like this would have been picked up on and corrected.
"Yeah!" Danny cheered, grabbing an orange disk and running to join the group around the grate in the floor. "Put that in the monitor and it's a bad time to be an Ood."
"We're coming back!" Rose said urgently, glancing between the two men. "Have you got that? We're coming back to this room and we're getting the Doctor out."
"Okay," Jefferson nodded his consent after glancing at me. "Jane, you take point. Danny you're next, then Miss Tyler and Toby. Anna you're in front of me."
They did as he ordered and dropped down into the maintenance tunnel. Just as I dropped down, I heard the last bolt give. Jefferson was quick to drop down and close the grate.
"God, it stinks. You all right?" Rose wrinkled her nose.
"Yeah, I'm laughing. Which way do we go?" Danny muttered.
"Just go straight ahead. Keep going till I say so." Zach directed.
Crawling through a small space with thin air was even harder than I'd expected it to be, draining strength I didn't have to spare.
"Not your best angle, Danny." Rose snarked.
"Oi, stop it." Danny complained.
"I don't know, could be worse." Toby muttered.
"Oi." Rose glanced under her arm to glare at Toby.
"If you would quit flirting with insults up front. I don't have the…" I stopped talking, leaning against the wall as I was forced to send a second healing pulse before we'd even been in the crawl space for two minutes.
"Wow, you okay?" Jefferson came to my side and supported my weight. It was a tight squeeze, the two of us side by side, but the physical contact with a human who was as emotionally stable as Jefferson helped, if only a little bit.
"Anna, Jefferson, you good? Anna's states just dropped." Zach questioned.
"I'm tanking faster than I expected." I muttered, having to be quite so Rose didn't hear.
"So, you don't have an hour." Zach clarified.
"Well, if we're being pedantic, I don't have forty-nine minutes. Or at least, not without making sacrifices. Zach, directions?"
"Straight on until you find junction seven point one. Keep breathing. I'm feeding you air. I've got you." Zach got the hint and dropped the conversation, although Jefferson stayed at my side.
"We're at seven point one, sir." Danny reported, coming to a stop as they reached a closed gate.
"Okay, I've got you. I'm just aerating the next section" Zach briefed them on the situation.
"Getting kind of cramped, sir. Can't you hurry up?" Danny whined.
"I'm working on half power, here." Zach reminded them.
"Well, do all the lights have to be active. Can you turn some of them off and use the extra power?" I questioned, leaning my head back against the wall as I took the moments pause to try and regroup. I'm going to start carrying oxygen masks in my pockets and heated jackets, and other useful stuff, like a medical kit, because I was frustrated with the impact on my health these journeys had taken. There was also the benefit it would have in helping other people when I encountered such situations, without revealing my magic.
"I'd have to go to each location to power down, and I'm a little bit trapped." Zach reminded them.
"Seriously, who designed these systems?" I demanded to know.
There was a clanging noise that echoed through the tunnels.
"What was that?" Danny demanded panicked.
"Captain, what was that noise?" Jefferson asked the only one of them in a position to do something about it.
"The junction in Habitation Five's been opened. It must be the Ood." Zach informed them. "They're in the tunnels."
"Well, open the gate." Danny ordered.
"Isn't there a section you can close off between us and them? Or, if we get through this gate can you close it immediately behind us?" I questioned.
"Maybe. If the power holds." Zach answered, clearly distracted as he lifted the gate.
"Where are the Ood? Are they close?" Rose questioned nervously, glancing back the way they came.
"I don't know. I can't tell. I can't see them. The computer doesn't register Ood as proper life forms." Zach snapped back.
"Ten yards around the corner. Moving fast." I reported, closing my eyes to sense for the corrupted life forms.
"Open the gate!" Danny shouted just as the gate started moving. The moment there was enough space, Danny scurried under the gate with the others following him.
"Danny, turn left. Immediate left." Zach ordered.
"Did you manage to shut the door behind us?" I questioned, glancing back briefly to make sure Jefferson was following.
"No, the door was manually forced open before I could override safety measures. I don't know how many got through." Zach was clearly frustrated that he couldn't be there or help as he wished to. Being removed from them made it seem like he couldn't help in the same way as he could if he was with them.
"Danny, turn right. Go right! Go fast, Dan. They're going to catch up." Zach clearly hit something in frustration because there was a hallow bang over the com.
"I'll maintain defensive position." Jefferson came to a stop.
"You can't stop!" Rose came to a stop in order to protest while I shuffled back slightly to Jefferson.
"Miss Tyler, that's my job. You've got your task, now see to it." Jefferson ordered.
"You heard what he said, now shift." Toby forced Rose to move.
"You to, Anna, your sister needs you." Jefferson said grimly.
"Yeah, that isn't going to happen." I moved past Jefferson so I was between him and the Ood. "Twelve minutes," I muttered, placing my hand on the floor of the vent and focusing. Without any magic to interfere with my ability to manipulate the surroundings, I was able to thin the metal and pull it up into a wall. "They'll be able to break through that, but it will take time."
I slumped to the floor, struggling to move after that piece of external magic with so much being channelled internally.
"Wow, easy. Twelve minutes? What does that mean?" Jefferson helped me up and supported me in a half crawl through the ventilation.
"I'm down twelve minutes. Which leaves me with thirty-three," I explained, sending a healing pulse just as we crossed the gate.
"We're through." Jefferson informed Zach. "Close that gate."
"Closing." Zach confirmed, relief clear in his voice. Jefferson continued to shoulder a portion of my weight as we moved to catch up with the others, moving slower than them because of my condition. "Danny, you're approaching the last junction."
"Anna, Jefferson!" Rose breathed in relief when we reached them.
"Opening nine point two." Zach breathed.
"Lower nine point two! Hurry, Zach!" Rose shouted when they found Ood waiting for them on the other side of the gate. Ood that I was to week to sense.
"Back! Back! Back!" Danny shouted.
"We can't, there are Ood that way to." Jefferson disagreed.
"Up, go up." I ordered, looking to Rose who was the one crouched under the grate. Rose immediately looked up and pushed against the corner of the grate so that it would lift out of the floor.
"Come on." Rose jumped up, followed by Jane who then helped Jane and then me up. Jefferson was next, before Toby finally made it out. They didn't wait around, Jefferson supporting me as we ran towards Ood Habitation. Once we made it inside, Danny and Rose went to the computer while Jane and Jefferson took up defensive position – aimed at the door. I stumbled away from Jefferson and collapsed on the stairs.
While Danny was uploading the virus, Jefferson and Jane maintained suppressing fire in order to keep the Ood at bay. Slumped on the stairs, I just stopped, taking a moment to not push my muscles into movement they really didn't want to take. I felt it when the wave was sent out by the machine, but fortunately my mind was different enough that it didn't affect me.
"Anna? Annamae are you okay?" Rose was crouched in front of me, I observed with wary eyes when I opened them to see the Ood down.
"I'm fine. Let's… let's get moving." I forced myself up, one hand on the railing. "Zach, meet us in the drilling area."
"On my way." Zach agreed.
The walk back to the drilling area went quite quickly in comparison to the crawl through the ventilation shaft. I refused to lean on a person, instead using the wall as a guide and support. My time count was up, I was about to go down.
"Doctor, are you there?" Rose grabbed the comms immediately on reaching the drilling area. "Doctor, Ida, can you hear me?"
"The comms are still down. I can patch them through the central desk and boost the signal. Just give me a minute." Zach stepped up to the computer.
"Doctor, are you there? Doctor, Ida, can you hear me?" Rose asked again when she was given the go ahead. "Are you there, Doctor?"
"He's gone." Ida replied.
"What do you mean, he's gone?" Rose looked to me panicked when I came to stand next to her.
"He fell into the pit." Ida admitted. "And I don't know how deep it is. Miles and mile and miles."
"No, not miles." I disagreed.
"Anna?" Rose questioned, confused.
"The Doctor is alive; he is close to the TARDIs. I can… I can still feel him." I reached over and grasped Rose's shoulder. "He… he will be okay."
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"Anna!" Rose reached out to grab her sister's fallen form. She was stark white.
"Her time's up." Jefferson said grimly, checking his watch.
"But she had an hour." Rose looked up. "She said, she had an hour."
"She sacrificed twelve minutes for me." Jefferson said sadly, looking to his watch again. "She's got eight minutes until she dies."
"Dies!" Rose looked back at her sister, horrified. "I thought she only had an hour until she fell unconscious!"
"She said only the Doctor and the TARDIS could help her, but only if they made it on time." Jefferson explained.
"She's strong," Rose muttered. "She'll pull through. She always does."
"Zach? Jefferson? What's happening up there?" Ida demanded to know.
"We've lost Annamae." Zach took the com from Rose. "Ida? There's no way of reaching you. No cable. No back up. You're ten miles down. We can't get there."
"You should see this place, Zach." There was wonder in Ida's voice that came across despite the static of the coms. "It's beautiful. Well, I wanted to discover things, and here I am."
"We've got to abandon the base." Zach breathed after a long moment. "I'm declaring this mission unsafe. All we can do is make sure no one ever comes here again."
"But we'll never find out what it was."
"Well, maybe that's best." Zach admitted.
"Yeah." Ida agreed.
"Officer Scott…" Zach started but was stopped.
"It's all right. Just go. Good luck." Ida let him go without having to explain, or give reason.
"And you." Zach sighed, hanging up the com. "Danny, Toby, close down the feed links. Get the retrotropes online, then get to the rocket and strap yourselves in. Jefferson, you get Annamae on board, we might not be able to save her but we can give her a proper burial. We're leaving." Zach gave the orders, getting all the men to move into action, but Rose remained standing still.
"I'm not going." Rose looked up stubbornly.
"Rose, we have the space for you as well." Zach glanced to Jefferson who nodded his understanding. They weren't going to leave either of the Tyler's behind.
"No, I'm going to wait for the Doctor. Just like he waited for me." Rose shook her head rapidly.
"I'm sorry, but he's not going to make it." Zach said sadly.
"You don't know him. He'll get out, he always does. And, even if he couldn't, how could I leave him all on his own, all the way down there? No, I'm going to stay." Rose tried to say firmly but she was crying.
"Then I apologise for this. Your sister sacrificed her life to see you survive, I'm not leaving you behind. Danny, Jefferson? Make her secure." The two men grabbed Rose, ignoring her protests while Zach grabbed a tranquiliser and knocked her out. "We have lost too many people. Let's get her on board."
Zach carried Rose over his shoulder, while Jefferson picked up Annamae. Toby, Danny and Jane carried as many supplies as they could as they headed through the base and too the rocket. Since she wasn't dead yet, they secured Annamae in one of the sleeping areas that the rocket had for when they were on rotating shifts during the journey.