Disclaimer: You know the drill. I don't own the show.
...and betrayal
(After S6 ep3)
-o0O0o-
"What's my name," the Doctor challenged.
The droning voice of the prosecutor stumbled in his monotone speech. Whispers filled the great hall made of polished metal, filled with a crowd Amy couldn't quite pin down because of the reflections. The three elderly people in lavish colorful robes stared down from their dais equally stunned by the audacity of him speaking.
"What's my name," the Doctor repeated again, trying to pace around on the podest all three of them stood on. Immediately a guard raised his weapons, and he stopped with a glare. "Careful, that's pointy. Well! What's my name. What's hers? Big nose over there?"
The court stayed silent.
"Thought as much. The People of Naar think a person who doesn't even know my name, is able to speak for me? That's new. How are they doing that? Telepathy? Good guesses, a feeling in your gut? Because boy, that one is bad with that. Our reasons to be here are completely different. Let me explain. That's what a court is about.."
"Explain? No. Everybody knows the words of a Time Lord are meaningless. Just their actions count. By these you will judged! And knowing your species, the conduit is clear."
Alook, the only one of the tree elders they knew by name, because he was the one leading the judgment, had a hard, raspy but clear voice for his age.
Amy protested.
"You can't judge somebody by the-"
"Silence!" Alook interrupted. "Aliens are not permitted to speak."
"I'm judged here, too! You expect me to stay-"
"I said silence!," Alook shouted. "Guard! Stun the female!"
"No!" Rory shoved himself between Amy and the man behind her. The Doctor's eyes grew wide, stumbling forward….
Ah!
Amy tried to move, but that asshole had a grip on her hair and it hurt. "Let me go!"
Oh god, there was something on her neck, something in her neck something cold and sharp and pressing and cutting and pushing forward into her and she….
"I blew up Gallifrey!"
Everybody froze.
The Doctor starred up at the dais, panting from the panic and pain it has caused him to splat those words.
"You judge people by their actions? Fine. Leave them alone. I blew up Gallifrey. I erased both Daleks and Time Lords alike. I ended it. The last great Time War is over. Because of me!"
Around them the seats erupted into mumbling. Astonishment, and fear and confusion.
The war was over?
And for a second Amy dared to hope, until she saw the glow in Alooks eyes.
"So you're not only a murderer, but a traitor, too."
"No…I-"
"You just confessed destroying your own planet, your own species."
The Doctor curled his fists, completely frozen. In telling them the truth he just made it worse.
They wanted him to die.
The decision was already made. All this was a farce.
From the second they had captured them, brought them here. The guard of their cell back then had known, because there was no other outcome.
Amy bit her lips. There was nothing they could do.
Nothing.
Rory tried to brush her arm with his hand but the guard shooed him back to this place.
"I can help you," the Doctor pressed through his teeth desperately. "I can. I'll fix this."
Alook shared a look with the two on his side. "How."
Was he honestly considering it? The Doctor blinked and opened and closed his mouth. "I need time and my-"
"TTC? To escape? No. Here we are again. Lies and lies. A creature like this needs to be erased permanently."
"Oh for time's sake, Listen to me!"
Alook narrowed his eyes. " Time, right. Fine."
He leaned back.
"You will proof to us your claims. You say you can help us. Show us how by helping yourself. Bind them on poles outside the shield once the next time storm will come!"
The crowd erupted into maniacal cheers.
-o0O0-
The Time Lord's fingers slid effortlessly over the many levers and buttons of the control panel.
Terusha knew that woman was one, because Kelliox had let her in. And she never did that.
Ma and Da had begged her and it was only because of the coming time storm that she had opened her doors for them.
She was not what she had expected.
But Kelliox wasn't either.
Kelliox didn't talk much and often repeated herself, but she always asked her if she needed help and reminded her not to cry when she accidently met Ma or Da in the corridors. And she warned her of time storms and told her when to go to bed.
Now, she followed that woman every step and stood currently next to her, saying things in a language Terusha had never heard.
The woman answered shortly and really rude, but Kelliox didn't stop talking to her. She never did, that's what she liked about her.
The Woman apparently not, because she suddenly whirled around, hissed something and the lights turned off.
And Kelliox disappeared.
Terusha flinched back from her hiding spot behind the entrance and pressed herself on the wall. Did she just...
No, the walls still hummed.
She didn't kill her, she just turned her of.
Terusha didn't know a War Travel Machine could be turned off. But of course, it made sense.
And that was a Time Lord. They had build those, they knew how to switch them off.
A real Time Lord, Kelliox's people.
And Kelliox promised they would come back. Ma had been right.
But also, one of the people who created that black hole.
Da had always checked every War Travel Machine they had entered and passed, because Time Lords were dangerous.
They often said things they didn't mean and meant things they didn't say, Da had said.
Terusha did understand that, even if she herself had no Idea how someone could do that.
But they were different, Ma had said. You don't understand how a Meerocow thinks, even if it's able to talk with you though sign language. Except, they were hundredths time more clever than a Meerocow.
The people of Naar were the Meerocows to them.
So basically, do never talk to a Time Lord, leave it to the people who know what to say.
But, there was nobody else except Terusha to talk to her.
She took a deep breath and peeked around the corner.
The Time Lord had sat down on one of the chairs. Her thumb and forefinger rubbed the back of her nose, and she had closed her eyes.
Something was wrong with her right arm, she was holding it strangely.
She looked tired and ill and sad.
Terusha carefully took a step closer, into the control room.
The woman didn't react.
Her white dress was black and torn at the bottom, she was full of dust, her brown hair frizzled and a bundle with her stuff lay carelessly at her feet.
She needed help.
Terusha took another step, then opened her mouth and stopped.
How do you greet a Time Lord?
She remembered, it needed to be some exact words, and Ma had definitely taught her. Something with time and luck.
But why Time?
No, good time!
The Time Lord had heard her this time, she had straightened up and watched Terusha with full attention.
Surprisingly, it was not that much intimidating, more like she really wanted to know what Terusha had to say.
It was… nice.
Terusha licked her lips so they weren't that dry and then stuttered: "Luck and good times?"
"Luck and precious times to you as well," the Timelady nodded.
She had a gentle, warm voice.
"Precious, right."
The Time Lady just waited. Ok, maybe it was a bit intimidating. The silence became strange.
"So, Kelliox let you in, right."
"The TTC, yes."
"Can you.. can you bring her back?"
"The hologram? I am afraid not. It is just a …" she stopped and thought for a second. "Do you know, you sometimes dream of things that happened the last day?"
Terusha nodded, and the Time Lord continued. "It is like that for this TTC. It is powered down- it sleeps, and there some tiny bit of data left ghosting around in the inactive core matrix."
"And… you changed the dream and can't bring it back, because you would wake it," Terusha concluded unsure. The Time Lord nodded. "Exactly."
Terusha thought about that, and then about the Time Lady, who was really different from what her family had taught her.
"Ma said, Time Lords always talk too difficult words to know them most of the time. You don't."
"I could, but you would not understand. Or could you?"
Terusha shook her head and smiled. "Probably not."
The Time Lady continued to simply watch her.
Terusha liked her, even if her face seemed to made mostely out of stone.
"I'm Terusha, What's your name?"
Or wait, wasn't there something with names?
"I am known as the Storyteller."
"That's not a name."
"It is for me."
"No, you need a real name. That a job. Naresh, he's a Storyteller."
She sighted, a bit like Ma when Terusha was able to finally convince her of something. "Then… you may call me...call me Tella."
"That's a nice name, Tella."
Tella winced, and Terusha remembered she was injured. The Med bay was near the kitchen, but she needed help. "Do you know how Kelliox's medbay works? Because, I know where it is. I'll show you!"
Tella winced again, but nodded. "I would appreciate that, yes."
-o0O0o-
The Doctor suddenly sat up from his sprawled out position on the floor. "What's Kryos-15-O-7-9?"
Amy and Rory looked up from their game of nine men's morris they were playing.
In a fit of boredom the Doctor had carved the layout of all types of board games into the floor with a small piece of metal he found.
"What does Kryos-15-O-7-9 do," he repeated.
They didn't answer.
During the last four days they had become used to the Doctors ramblings.
And ramblings it had become. Caged without anything else to do, his hyperactivity had no other release than words, while he had completely retreated into his own mind.
"A TARDIS protocol. But I've never heard of it. And the code doesn't make sense, either. Kryos are the grounding sequences, so why keep them active at full energy and transform them, that's pure suicide. Kelliox Beningmeer, what the hell did you do. Where's Tella, if you need her."
"Doctor," Amy asked carefully.
He turned to them. "That's the key. That sequence."
"It was an order for her co-workers, " argued Rory, going through the message in his head again.
After hearing it every evening, he had memorized it by now.
"Was it," the Doctor asked. "I'm not sure about that. I don't know this protocol. I don't know many of them, never cared, but a Kryos sequence in that Situation they were in made no sense. Proceed as instructed. Activate TTC Protocol Kryos-15-O-7-9. This is an order for the people listening. For Naar. This sequence is the defensive. But why a TARDIS protocol."
-o0O0o-
Tella was standing at the consoles, again.
She had a habit of standing still for hours, staring into nothingness, and Terusha had more than once poked her fearfully. The Time Lord had immediately moved and didn't left her side for the rest of the day.
Terusha eyed her and stirred the pot over the small campfire in the entrance another time, then filled the soup in two bowls. "I made soup."
"For the last hour, " Tella confirmed absentminded.
"It's finished," Terusha pointed out. Sometimes you had to do that.
"Oh. Of course, thank you." She hurried over, ducked under the drying dress she had washed multiple times now to get the black out of the white and sat down on the sleeping matt.
Tella didn't eat much, but she always sat down with Terusha. She had explained that Time Lords didn't need that much to eat, and when they did, they ate a bit differently than the people from Naar. It was fun to show her how to use a spoon and a knife, and Tella had learned fast.
She still ate hesitantly, in fear of breaking rules which didn't exist, but she was getting better every meal.
"Can you fly one," Terusha asked.
She lowered her spoon. "Yes. But I will not."
"Why?"
"I promised somebody to never do it again. Besides, you need this one."
"It makes rescuing your friends easier."
"They are not my friends." But she hesitated, and Terusha smiled.
"Can you activate this one?"
"And turn it into a death trap over time? Your parents will not be amused when they return and your house tries to kill you."
"Oh, I was going to continue to travel to Putri."
Tella thought she was living here?
"I see. Do you have family there?"
"No. I don't even know where it is," she shyly added.
Tella blinked and tilted her head. "I beg your pardon?"
She never showed this much emotions on her face.
Afraid of the full rant Terusha felt coming, she quickly projected her parents map. "See? Here, those red dots are the War… the TTC's we have checked."
She pointed to the network of red connected dots filling the area. Then she waved at the blank area on the card. "Putri needs to be somewhere here."
"You are cartographers," Tella bent closer to the map. "You travel from functioning TTC to functioning TTC to map out what is left of your planet."
Terusha nodded. "Putri is the only city in this plain, if there are survivors, they definitely fled-"
"I know where they are," Tella interrupted.
"What?"
"I was walking seven hours after the time storm, coming from the direction of the pool. Which one is that?
"Here? So the TTC you searched shelter is that one. It's the only one functioning but crazy in that area so it's definitely this one."
"Excellent. They are in a four hour radius from that one. I was walking two hours in the one direction, they went maximal two hours in the opposite."
Terusha drew a circle. Only half of it was in the blank area. "That's so cool! Wait… Can you…"
"Scan that area with the TTC? Sure. As soon your parents returned, I will power it up."
Terusha closed her eyes and bite her lips. "They won't."
Tella sat down her bowl. "Oh dear," she whispered.
The silent, knowing voice was enough for Terusha to break and fling herself against the woman.
Why, why? Kelliox had left them in, why didn't she protected them from the time storm. If they were at least frozen in time, but no! And they had to be so stupid to take of their local time shields.
Tella stiffed with the sudden embrace and didn't return it, but she didn't protest either, so Terusha continued to sob and bury her head into her shoulders.
"The loop is about thirty-fife seconds", she whispered. "Thirty fife seconds. Please, power the War machine up."
"The… calculations will take some time, and there is a lot to consider, especially in this environment. But it is possible with a TTC."
Terusha flinched back. "Wait. You can…. You can free them?"
"Of course. That was what you asked of me, right? To power the TTC up to synchronize the time streams and end the loop."
What…? She… Tella could… She could save Ma and Da? She could… but that would mean controlling time….
Time...
Time… Lord….
Terusha stumbled backwards, her eyes fixed on the four-colored eyes of that incredibly dangerous creature before her.
She wasn't supposed to know, but she had listened on evening to the men of one village they had passed.
They said, the Time Lords had left Vaao intentionally to move in an ellipse and influence the gavial field of the black hole through escaping and being sucked in by it just to escape again. That the Time storms were intentionally.
But, Terusha had not believed them, because for that the Time Lords needed to be able to control time itself.
And nobody could do that.
Controlling Time. Controlling death.
Except Tella, obviously could.
"Terusha," Tella softly asked. Her eyes glinted with concern, but her face was an immovable mask as always.
Different, whispered Ma's voice in her head.
She gulped. "A-Actually, I wanted to ask, so we can activate Protocol Kryos-15-O-7-9?"
The Time Lord frowned. „Kyos… There is no such a thing. You mean Astra-15-O-7-9? Why would I wish to activate this? And how do you even know those ciphers."
Terusha gulped under the intense stare of those old, alien eyes and chewed her lip.
"Answer, please," the Time Lord commanded.
"Kelliox said that," Terusha quickly mumbled.
Tella's whole face softened. "I apologize, Terusha, for being so harsh. You do not need to be afraid of me. I am here to help. We did terrible things to your planet, and to you. But let me make it up to you. Let me show you, how these incredible accomplishments of my species are meant to be used. Please do not be afraid, there is no need to be, all right?"
Terusha nodded slowly.
Tella smiled warm, like she never had before in the last six days.
"All right. Now, please explain. How did Kelliox tell you this code and what does it supposed to mean. I do not know it, but then again, my husband was very adept at developing new protocols. Maybe you can tell me, and then we can make it work?"
"Okay."
-o0O0o-
As soon as the first alarm sounded they were brought out to the city.
The inhabitants had gathered along the way and silently watched.
Amy would have preferred them to loudly scream and mock them, instead of the silent judgment and bloodthirst in their eyes.
So this was how they died.
The projectors showing Kelliox's message every evening, now displayed the countdown to when the storm hit and how long it would rage.
In about nine minutes for 342 seconds -roughly 5 minutes.
They passed the gleaming gates, and there, parallel to the road were three wooden poles.
They would become a reminder, a display of power, forever frozen in time.
No, Amy had never imagined dying like this.
Tella had asked her once, and up to that point she had never even thought about how she ever wanted to die.
She still had no preference, up untill today.
Not like this.
Tella.
Probably a half rotting frozen figure as well.
Just because they hadn't listen.
The rope cut in her wrists and she cursed as they bound her to the pole.
Rory struggled as well but there was no point. They stared in each other's eyes, and Rory forced a smile.
At least they were together.
A low rumbling caught their attention and yes. There on the horizon was an all consuming brown wall, the only visible sign of the invisible shifts coming closer. She gulped, her eyes wandering to the two bizarre half skeletons cowering together in the dust on the other side of the road. Two people who didn't made it into the city a long time ago.
A signal, then the white shield flared up around the walls and turned invisible a second later. Her eyes wandered back to Rory. They really were outside.
This was the end. And she saw the same certainty in his eyes as well.
"Amy? Rory?",whispered the Doctor. They both turned their head to the side, away from the fast approaching wall of dust.
He smiled weakly, tried to say something and squeezed his eyes shut as the sand hit them with full force.
It hurt.
The wind alone felt like a slap, the sand hitting her felt like thousands of needles slicing her skin. She held her breath, to not to inhale more than necessary.
And then it was over, as abruptly as it started.
Do you even notice it when you're stuck in time?
The Doctor said the time shifts influenced the stuck people as well, sometimes releasing parts and capturing others instead.
Did that mean her head might be free again after maybe years of the rest of her body rotting away? Or maybe her head was free, no time had passed but she was stuck motionless to starve?
She took a careful breath. Slowly she started to wiggle her fingers, then her toes. Her legs, her neck, her torso.
She was fully able to move.
She opened her eyes.
There was still the road before her, the two bizarre half skeletons cowering together in the dust on the other side.
The view was clouded by settling dust but there were clear shapes in the distance.
She turned her head to the left. The Doctor had his fists balled, head thrown to the side and face grimaced. Rory, too, had his eyes squeezed shut but a comically resigned expression on his face.
His eyes shot open, when the Doctor released a high pitched whine.
"Am I dead? Highly different from what I expected, and I died already twelve times. No, no this is not death. No! No, I'm stuck. Oh, my arms, my legs! Are they still there? Is there nothing left beside my skeleton rooting on a pole before a city of idiots? Please no! I don't want to be a piece of décor? What year is it? How many centuries have I…? Oh!"
He finally opened his eyes and stared directly into Amy's. "Amy?"
He turned his head. "Rory?"
"How in the name of the Spirits are you still alive!"
Right. Alook.
She looked further than Rory and there, visible though the dust were the city gates, still open and save under the gleaming shield.
The city elder visibly fumed, then pushed one of the guards out of the shield. "Check them!"
Everybody gasped, but again, nothing happened.
The guard stumbled to his feet, a look of betrayal on his face.
"What Time Lord trickery is this!," Alook hissed.
"Just a personalized local time shield, with a span of 10ft. Actually, five of them."
There on the dusty road in her beautiful red velvet dress and her summer hat, not one grain of dust on her or one hair out of place and stoic as ever, stood Lady Storyteller.
-o0O0o-
Tella was alive.
She was alive and she saved them.
Amy wasn't able to hold back that giggle anymore. Tella was alive and well.
Rory thew his head back and shook his head in laughter, and the Doctor beamed prideful, while looking exited from Amy to Rory and back. "Tella!"
She nodded in greeting.
She was clearly examinating the whole picture of them being bound to the poles, then rose one eyebrow at the Doctor. His grin became forced and he shrunk visibly.
Yep, this time he didn't have any excuses or arguments against her scolding. Which never came.
Tella turned and walked closer to the gates, and only now Amy noticed the little girl following her very closely. She was pale and small, but clean and otherwise healthy- if the heavy backpack she was carrying was anything to go by.
The guard outside the gates primed his weapon, and Tella stopped.
"Luck and precious times," she greeted.
Amy could feel the fear radiating from the crowd.
Strange, there wasn't any difference between the Doctor and Tella: both were Time Lords, both were intimidating if they wished to.
Yes, Tella was unbound, and somehow appeared out of nowhere and was also able to place shields without being noticed….the same way she fled and survived nine days and two time storms.
Ok, that was a lot more impressive than their two attempts to escape and the Doctor carving boardgames in the floor out of boredom.
And she stopped the time storm's deadly force.
….She stopped the time shift!
She proofed she could control the storm!
"What do you want, Time Lord!"
"Due to the obvious reasons of my personal attendance at this so called execution, I am assuming this question is directed to the overall cause of our visit on…"
"Stop. Just stop," Alook interrupted. "Answer the question, no excesses, no tricks."
"How rude, "Tella mumbled, then glanced to the girl at her side.
"I want you to activate TTC Protocol Kryos-15-O-7-9. The file was already patched in the local shield control the moment you received the message from the Akythior."
"I knew it," the Doctor shouted. "I knew it! That Grounding Sequence was a command to the people of Naar, not to the mechanics!"
There was muttering in the crowd. Alook looked back at his people. "And why exactly should I do that."
"It makes a shield," the girl explained.
"Terusha," Tella positioned herself protectively between her and the surprised people, and took over the conversation again. Apparently they hadn't seen the girl before.
"It is a transformation sequence, actually. Even if it is filed under grounding, " Tella corrected.
"Yeah, for the deathtraps you left behind."
"Wait," the Doctor interrupted," those crashed TARDISes scattered all over the place are active?"
"Yes, please let me-"
"What the heck was Kelliox thinking!"
"I was just going to explain that," Tella reprimanded calmly and the Doctor shut his mouth.
"Thank you. Kryos- 15-"
"It makes a shield," Terusha repeated and stepped forward, clearly annoyed by the antics of everybody. This time Tella let her.
"A shield for the whole planet. The TTC's will turn into power generators. They will feed the shields from every city so they grew big enough to cover the whole planet. But every city has to activate the sequence or the TTC's won't connect to it and the shield won't work. Putri is the only city, who hasn't done it."
"There aren't any other cities left," the guard outside said. But he had lowered his weapon.
"Course there are. Anju, Jusheeli, Bhatkar, Maipur. I don't know all names, but there are fifteen. And they need the shield. Please."
She glanced to Tella. "And now there are Time Lords here who can even make the black hole stable."
"What, "the Doctor squeaked. "Ehm, I… Are you sure… I mean technically, Rassilon did, but… look-"
"We can," Tella stated resolutely.
"We… can?"
Tella took a glowing cube of maybe a fingers wide out of one of her pocked and twirled it between her fingers. "We can."
The Doctor stared at the shining thing, then nodded. "We can. How exactly can we?"
Tella paused. "Well, there is a reason, Kelliox did not wanted the high command to know about this. That is also why there is that grounding sequence."
The Doctor's eyes grew big. "No!"
"You are the mechanic."
"How are you able to stabilize that black hole." A woman shouted out of the crowd and encouraging shouts followed. Alook seemed to loose his grip.
Tella had proved that they could help.
"By using it as a power source to generate and feed the shields, " Tella explained matter-of-factly.
"It's possible to recalibrate the TARDISes on the floor into receptors for the emissions" the Doctor added. "Technically. If there is a grounding sequence, that also prepares the outer dimensional shell for it. What Kryos-15-O-7-9 probably does."
Tella nodded. "Every time storm will strengthen the shield, and due to the constant harvesting they will eventually stop because there is no buildup of the energy possible anymore."
"Like a pot you're poking a hole in so it won't overflow when you fill it with water."
Tella shoot him a disbelieving glance for that metaphor, then turned back to the stunned crowd. "But for that to happen, Kryos-15-O-7-9 needs to be activated on the complete planet."
Amy blinked. "You can… do that?"
A black hole as a power-source? That was huge.
"Doing it all the time. What do you think powered the TARDIS," the Doctor grinned.
"Eye of harmony," Rory supplied. Right, one of those cryptic words the Time Lords loved to use.
"Which is in its basics, and I mean absolute basics, a black hole rotating perfectly synchronized with a star," Tella explained without her gaze leaving Alook's.
Wow!
Alook stared right back. "And the Time Lords would never hand out the base of all of their technology like that."
"Lucky then there's no high council to prohibit it anymore."
Tella flinched at that and Alook noticed.
"How are you even able to live with him?"
Oh no.
The Doctor froze.
Amy and Rory shared a worried glance.
Alook had a terrifying talent to spot weaknesses.
He somehow had known the Doctor could talk himself out of stuff by impressing others and made sure he could barely speak a few words. And now he had attacked that one sour spot, the one breaking point in the Storytellers loyalty.
The elephant in the room they couldn't get rid of and thus had chosen to ignore it for the sake of all of their sanity.
"How can you live with the man who took everything from you. Your friends, your house,your home. Aren't you despising yourself for this every singe day. To know, he destroyed your planet?"
"And now he is trying to save yours."
Alook blinked. The Doctor flashed a disbelieving, weak smile.
"You don't demand justice for everything he did?"
"I do,"Tella answered calmy.
"Then why are you trying to save him."
"You misunderstood. Being frozen in a shifted time field is not nearly the punishment he deserves."
"Tella," the Doctor protested.
She ignored him and continued. "The people of Naar have neither the capacity nor the right of sentencing him to anything. He wasn't even part of the war when the time poisoning of the 74 Systems happened."
"Oh That's how you call it. Should we be honored that the destruction of our life's at least has a fancy name?"
"With respect, honorable elder. You are missing the point."
"I ignore it. I don't need to hear the lies you're telling yourself and try to convince others of."
"She's not lying," Terusha protested.
"Oh my dear child. I don't know what she did to you, to follow her this blindly but…."
"She did nothing. She even killed Kelliox. But, she can control time, honorable elder."
Tella's hand clenched her necklace.
Amy blinked. Killed Kelliox? Kelliox was already dead. What the…?
The other elder next to Alook was more interested in the third thing the little girl had said.
"Have you seen it."
"No. But she promised to end the loop capturing my parents. And she powered up a TTC."
Alook snorted, and the elders next to him sighted disappointed.
"Everybody can power up a war travel machine."
"Uh, nope," the Doctor corrected. "And you wonder why they go on a crazy murder spree?"
He exchanged a knowing look with Tella. "I honestly respect Kelliox's optimism in dealing with whatever species he did. Even if he constantly overestimated all of them. But then, every genius needs slower brains to challenge himself."
Tella's lips twitched and both Amy and Rory stared disbelievingly at them.
Time Lords.
"That wasn't nice," Terusha promptly scolded.
"We do not try to be nice, Terusha," Tella answered.
"Not when people are to feed up with their own prejudices, and too set in their ways and just. Won't. Listen", the Doctor added, "Not even to their own. This child, this brave wonderful child. Look at her. She traveled all this way, through all the dangers out there. She lost her parents, but now she's here. Standing before this city. Full of hope, bringing you hope. Ignore that she came with that stuffy old Time Lord over there. Ignore us all here for a moment. You proofed already how good you are with that. There is another one. A brave little girl, telling you, that you are not alone. That the time war did not take everything. There are other cities out there. Other people. That your planet can be saved. And you wish to throw this away because of a grudge and the need to proof yourself right? She needs your help."
"Proof that you still are the people of Naar, that the Time Lords and the Daleks and all the others didn't destroy you. That you overcame them, by staying true to yourself. Accomplishing what we were never able of," urged Tella on.
"She's right," somebody shouted, and others started to mutter in approval.
Alook turned. "No-"
"Yes," interrupted the second elder. "It's enough, Alook. For years we watched you closing the gates as soon as a storm hits, abandoning - betraying- anybody still outside, and we followed your judgment because it was fair. We survive, we always do, and those not strong and fast enough are not fit for this planet and its cruel reality. We accepted this, we couldn't change it. But now we can. There is a messenger out there, I don't care it's a little girl. It's another life. Not survival, but a life, Alook. Don't you see?"
"I see the web of lies they spin. They lure you into a new life, but is it save, is it free? We trusted the Time Lords, we died for them and fought for them. And look were we are now. Do we even know this girl is truly Naar? Not just one of their puppets, not just a time axis remnant?"
"Please, you are getting ridiculous," Tella interrupted the downright mad ravings.
"Am I? Am I? They did it before!"
"Alook, you are speaking in madness-" the third elder tried to calm down but Alook ignored him.
"Madness? No, apparently I am the only left with enough sanity to realize what is going on here!"
"I see,"Tella answered thoughtfully, then removed a bracelet previously hidden under her sleeve and raised it in the air so everybody could see it.
"This is one of the five personalized local time shields I am currently using to disrupt the 'time storm', as you call it. It projects a sphere with a diameter of about 10ft. We modified them into multiplying their diameter with every additional projector added into their connection. This is why the tree of them are still in one time zone. They can be controlled via every single device. So," Tella hold the projector right before her, "proof yourself worthy of the leadership of this town. That there's more than anger, that they can rely on you noticing things and choosing the right decisions. Defy the Time Lord, and take it, Alook."
Amy could barely suppress her panic. "Te- Lad Storyteller, what are you doing!"
"Finish this," she blankly answered.
"Not like this," shot the Doctor back. He sounded sad, not like he was soon going to turn into a living statue. What?
"I am walking though these wastelands for nine days straight, with a headache worse than regeneration sickness, dislocated my shoulder, nearly ruined one of my favorite dresses and had to kill a TTC. The hologram of my dead husband is following me everywhere, the time zones of this place are desorientaitingly out of place and I stumbled over at least thirty-nine gallifreyan foot soldiers, all following me with their eyes, pleading and dead and killed by the very own thing they thought to control. My patience is currently running to thin to properly educate them on their misplaced behavior which- giving their stubbornness- would probably take at least two more days, and regarding the fact I never wished to come here in the first place, are forty-two hours too long spent on this planet. Or do you have an actual plan besides talking and improvising? No. Well then, with your permission, please?"
Only Tella could rant like this in this calm, deadpan voice.
"It's still wrong. " The Doctor stared at Alook with pitifully eyes. And Amy knew she was missing something. She glanced at Rory who frowned in that adorable confused stupid face, trying to find out what was going on, too.
Tella straightened, stretched out her hand with the projector challengingly, and then… started to count down from fifteen?
"T- Storyteller, no," the Doctor started to wiggle with his bonds. "Please. Just because we cant find another way, doesn't mean this is the way! We can change their mind!"
"Which is what I'm doing. Come on now, honorable elder."
Something in Alook visibly snapped.
"You know what? It will be a pleasure!" He narrowed his eyes, judging the distance.
The Solider pushed out by him, was standing barely four, maybe five feet away from the gate. A simple step was all.
That solider was definitely out of the city's shield, and there had been no problem for him.
So the chances were high that Tella's shield actually reached the big one.
High, but not definite.
"Alook, no! Ignore her! Stop and think, please."
The Doctor's eyes were wide, pleading in a way that sent shivers down Amy's neck. This was a trap. There was a trick there, a test, something they missed.
"Ten," Tella deadpanned.
Alook growled, took a step forward and hesitated.
"Yes. Please. Stop," the Doctor urged. "You are better than that. I believe this, please. You can prove her wrong."
"Nine. Eight. Seven."
Tella counted merciless. Seconds, Amy realized. Probably exact ones.
Alook glance back at the silent crowd then back to the solider, took a breath and leapt.
One step, two steps.
But not a third.
By the horror on his face he felt it.
His foot stopping in midair, and then the rest of his body and his face, his robes fanning out behind him in an invisible wind, frozen in time.
The two shields didn't reach each other. Not anymore at least.
The Doctor screamed.
Cries of terror shook the city and Rory cursed.
Terusha sobbed and shielded her face with her hands. Amy winced but couldn't turn her head away.
Tella, Lady Storyteller had just killed somebody.
No, this wasn't happening.
That wasn't true!
But the Storyteller stood there, still presenting the projector, still gauging the now frozen form of the city elder, still counting.
"Four. Three. Two. One."
And the sirens went off.
Everybody broke from their stupor, mesmerized by the gruesome scene, just to look up to the holograms, which flashed green twice and then the shields flared white before collapsing.
The holograms which visibly for everyone had been counting down the time until the storm ended, if one cared to look at them.
Fifteen seconds of patience, a simple look over his shoulder, and maybe a breath to calm and think clearly and responsible, and Alook would have had survived.
Tella nodded to herself, pushed a button on the projector and a sphere resembling a soap bubble in colors and form was shortly visible around them, also barely containing the solider, than it disappeared in a flicker.
The elder who had first spoken against Alook took one careful step, then another.
The solider standing outside, just mere feet away from the Time Lady realized what he was doing and swiftly walked up to Tella.
His hands were shaking and he clutched his weapon with white knuckles, but it was aimed to the floor.
He starred fearfully into Tella's eyes, but still stretched out his right, too stubborn to back down.
And with an elegant curtsy Tella dropped the projector in his hand.
-o0O0o-
"OK, everybody ready? Kids all hands behind their backs? Initiating contact in three. Two. One. Geronimo."
The TARDIS awoke with a loud humming and then shifted her form into a long elegant tower, just like the ones Putri was made of.
And then a loud crackle sounded, followed by the longest thunder Amy ever heard.
And the sky started to glow, turning into an darker azure and lighten up the whole planet.
"Here we go," The Doctor cheered and clapped his hands exited, voice nearly drowning in the cheering and screams of the Naar around him, oohing and aahing and pointing at the sky and the transformed TARDIS.
It took them tree days to visit all uncharted TARDISes in the region and activate Kelliox's sequence in them.
Tella had chosen to retreat into the TARDIS, their TARDIS, the blue box, exhausted and fed up with the situation.
The People took to the Doctor better, anyway.
They weren't vengeful. They surprisingly easily accepted the outcome of Tella's deadly little test, proving that Alook had been unsuited to lead them into a new future. But she still left an impression.
Terusha however seemed unfazed, spending whatever time the old Time Lady allowed in her company.
So it was surprising to see both of them out here.
Tella marched straight up to the Doctor, while Terusha got lost in the new bright sky.
She held out the small white cube, she had played with before, back when she explained the plan to Alook and the city.
"Can you feed this into the submatrix, so it can be transferred planet wide."
"What's that."
"Just an algorithm I worked the last five days on. You took care of the mechanical side, I dabbled a bit on the temporal things. I have a promise to keep."
Her eyes glanced back at Terusha.
The Doctors jaw went slack. "No. Way!"
"With the right hardware."
He nodded dumbfounded, then led her inside the TARDIS.
What could Tella do, that left the Doctor in a state like that?
Amy snuck up to the entrance, then stuck her head inside. It looked different but all the same.
There was the hexagon in the middle with the moving column, it was white and metallic, not organic but other than that, it was definitely a TARDIS like Amy knew.
And there was of course the familiar sight of the Doctor buried in electronic parts while Tella worked on the consoles.
"What're you doing?"
"My job," said Tella, before shooting something in Gallifreyan to the Doctor who promptly answered in the same language.
"You're not teaching."
Tella actually rolled her eyes at that and smiled, but stayed concentrated on the circles.
"Gotcha!" The Doctors head reappeared from under the console. "Let's see if this works."
"This is going to feel weird," Tella warned before typing in a sequence and the next second Amys stomach dropped, while a weird tingling crawled up her skin and then a invisible force punched her organs sideward.
She took a step to not lose her balance and gasped. "What was that."
"I will tell you after we found out if it worked. Come along," and with that she rushed outside.
"Doctor," Amy asked confused, but he merely grinned at her and was gone, too.
Amy warily followed and came to the fascinating sight of Tella fighting of hugs from three or four Naar.
What?
She grinned, searching the crowd of celebrating people around them for her husband.
Somebody had brought food and drinks and there was a guy playing some flute like instrument and Alook lent heavily on a chair wildly discussing….
Alook? What?
She looked back to the gates were indeed the looming frozen figure of the elder was missing.
As well as the covering half-skeletons. No, they were still there, but collapsed.
And that hovering bird high above the city was gone, as well.
Did they…. No.
Really?
Time Lord. Lord of time.
"Did you just repaired time," she blurted out.
"Transferred the splits into one overall Time Zone, yes. And no, it was not as easy as it looked."
Tella politely bowed out of another hug and stepped next to her, staring out into the barren landscape filled with silver towers instead of crashed ships and their debris.
Amy shook her head. "You repaired time. "
"If you say so," she sighted resigned but with that sparkle in her eyes.
Amy's eyes followed her gaze. The sight was so different and yet the same, but so much more alive. They had saved the whole planet, recovered it and gave it new life. It was different and the same and yet so much more than anything the Doctor had ever done before. And then a realization hit her.
"There's nothing the two of you can't do together, right? You're unstoppable."
"Hardly. Perhaps when he chooses to concentrate and not behave himself like a foolish timetodd. Unstoppable is a great word, even for a Time Lord."
"But, you two are not any Time Lords."
"I suppose," Tella whispered after a long pause, thoughtfully watching something way out of Amy's vision.
AN: Hey!
Can you believe that it actually took all those months since February where the first part of this storyline was posted to write this? That confrontation between Alook, the Doctor and Tella was a monster and probably the most rewritten scene I've ever done. Ok and there was a long time I was terribly ill, but it still wont excuse an six month hiatus...
Anyway. The eleventh arc is herby done, the chapters from now on will follow the chronological order. And we hit the overall 100k word count with all 25 Chapters, meaning in the same time you could've read a normal novel. Thank you for choosing this fic instead. Wow.
Fun fact: Tella can't read maps very well. She is able to listen to the song of the universe to locate herself and stuff. Who needs maps if they can do that.
I had a message complaining that Kelliox is always described with male pronouns and called husband. That's because most of the stuff happening in this fic is with him in his seventh regeneration, the only male beside his second. If it's with another, she will be properly gendered, too, just like in this shot.
Something that came up as well is my sparse use of the term Time Lady instead of Lord. Tella will explain to Bill later, but Time Lord in the gallifreyan language is a gender neutral term. Only the human ( English etc.) translation gendered it. If you look close you will notice in this fic, that all humans use the term Time Lady for Tella, while aliens who know of the context, label her as Time Lord. Tella doesn't care about it, by the way.
I'm still flashed about the support this gets, even with all the odds working against it. Thank you guys so much for staying with me in this chaotic time, I truly hope the story is everything you wish from it and nothing you expect.
As always sorry about the typos and the grammar mistakes. It's hard to find a beta willingly to to correct a behemoth like this.
Greetings
alkatie
KD21092019
