~revised~
Chapter XXXII
Mira
With the Ood approaching there wasn't much time to think about the meaning of their words. She was just about to make an attempt to break the influence on them as Jefferson suddenly yelled, "Open fire!" and pulled her behind him. Then he and the other security officer started firing at them. Not a moment later the three Ood were lying dead on the floor.
She spun around to Jefferson and almost yelled in an commanding voice, "The next time you wait with opening fire and, most of all, you don't shoot without an-"
Without an order, she had almost said. In the heat of the moment she had totally forgotten that she neither was in charge here nor were they in her own universe. He even had no idea that she would have been able to stop the Ood without killing them. So for him it must have looked like the last resort.
"Not without what?" Jefferson wanted to know in a cool and slightly distrusting tone.
"Order," she decided heading forward. "I'm sorry. I forgot that I'm not at home and not in command. But maybe you may consider the fact that I might be able to stop the Ood without killing them, so it would be great to warn me before you shoot them." She looked at him, but it was all to clear that he didn't believe her. The feeling of distrust she got from him was so strong that she hardly trusted herself.
"Why would you be in charge?" he finally asked, still sounding sceptically.
"Maybe because someone suffers from an inflated ego...", Rose murmured.
So much for Rose playing nice, she thought. Hadn't lasted very long.
Thankfully, Zach spared her the answer as he announced over the intercom, "We're stabilising...We've got orbit."
By now the shaking of the base had almost stopped. She could see how Rose was heading for the comm, but she had been closer to it, stepped over the bodies of the dead Ood, grabbed it and asked, "Doctor? Ida? Report!" There was no reply, only static over the speaker. "Doctor, can you hear me? Ida? Are you there?" she tried it again, her eyes still on the Ood. The Ood she had failed to save. She was still convinced of their innocence and she should have tried to free them sooner, no matter if this entity would have noticed the extend of her abilities or not.
"Open Door 25."
She lifted her head as the door opened and Jefferson raised his weapon, but it was only Danny.
"It's me! But they're coming," he yelled and slammed the door shut again.
"Close Door 25."
"It's the Ood. They've gone mad," he said, trying to catch his breath.
"How many of them?" Jefferson wanted to know.
"All of them! All fifty!"
"Oh fu-," she started, as Jefferson was approaching the door.
"Danny, out of the way," he said, and as Danny wasn't reacting, he simply pushed him out of the way.
"Jefferson, wait!" she said, "Do you really think you can just shoot fifty Oods? Kill them all?"
"They're armed! They're da-," Danny fell in, right as Jefferson started to open the door, obviously ignoring them both.
"It's the interface device. I don't know how, but they're using it as a weapon," Danny continued.
"Open door 25."
Just as the door swung open, they all could see the Ood on the other side – Ood with glowing red eyes. One of them immediately advanced and hold his communication device to the head of the security officer. She was dead almost instantly. As soon as her dead body had slumped to the floor, Jefferson was opening fire again. This time she agreed that this was their only option. No way she could free all of the Ood so quickly, and they were determined to kill them. At least the force possessing them was. Finally they managed to drive them back and closed the door again.
"Jefferson, what's happening, there?" Zach asked over the intercom.
"I've got very little ammunition, sir. How about you?" Jefferson replied.
"All I've got is a bolt gun. With uh... all of one bolt. I could take out a grand total of one Ood. Fat lot of good that is," Zach answered.
"Given the emergency...I recommend Strategy Nine," Jefferson said.
Strategy nine? She had no idea what that meant, but judging from Jefferson's voice it was something really bad. Some sort of ultimate solution.
"Strategy Nine agreed. Right, we need to get everyone together. Mira? What about Ida and the Doctor? Any word?" Zach asked, sounding defeated.
"No, not yet. You're sure the comm-link is still up?"
But before Zach could say anything, the voice of the Doctor came over the speaker, "No! Sorry, I'm fine. Still here!"
"Doctor!" Rose yelled and was instantly at her side, grabbing for the mic. She just managed to get it out of her reach in time. Not that she wasn't relieved to hear him too, but now there was no time for Rose's chatter.
"You could've said, you stupid-" Rose started, but she shushed her.
"What's going on down there? You're alright?" she asked.
"Yeah we´re alright. It's both of us, me and Ida. Hello! But the seal opened up. It's gone. All we've got left is this chasm."
"How deep is it?" Zach asked.
"Can't tell. It looks like it goes on forever."
"The pit is open," Rose repeated, "That's what the voice said."
"But there's nothing? I mean...," Zach wondered. "There's... NOTHING coming out?"
"No, no. No sign of 'the Beast'," the Doctor answered.
"Nothing that's visible to you or really nothing nothing?" she asked.
"Looks like really nothing nothing," he replied.
"It said 'Satan'," Rose said, her voice slightly shaking. Mira looked at her. Well, if that thing's intention had been to spread fear, it clearly had been successful.
"Come on, Rose. Keep it together," the Doctor said after a small pause.
"Is there no such thing?" Rose wanted to know.
But the Doctor didn't reply.
"There is no such thing," she eventually answered in his stead. "It's only a concept. Something we need to blame all things evil and cruel on so that we don't have to face them within ourselves. No matter what we believe in, God, Satan, or any other good and evil forces, they're only just a part of us. Naturally we find it easier to embrace our good sides than to face our bad ones."
Rose didn't reply but just looked at her. She really hoped that the girl would see what was going on, and unfortunately there was hardly time for detailed explanations about basic psychology right now.
"Ida? I recommend that you withdraw. Immediately," Zach finally decided.
"But... we've come all this way!" It was clear that Ida didn't agree.
"Okay, that was an order. WITH-DRAW. With that thing open, the whole planet's shifted. One more inch and we fall into the black hole. So this thing stops right now."
"But it's not much better up there with the Ood," Ida kept insisting.
"I'm initiating Strategy Nine, so I need the two of you back up top immediately, no arguing," Zach said, but there was no response. Most likely they had switched of the comm.
"Ida? IDA?" Zach yelled. Still no reply.
Doctor
"What do you think?"
The Doctor looked at Ida and answered, "I think they've an order."
"Yeah, but... what do YOU think?"
He walked closer to the pit, put one foot on the edge and looked down. It was good that Mira was up there, at least she wasn't about to freak out because some being was calling himself Satan or Devil. He hoped she would be able to keep order if things got worse.
"It said 'I am the temptation'," he finally answered.
"If... if there's something in there... why's it still hiding?"
"Maybe... we opened the prison but not the cell." He had wondered about that himself.
"We should go down. I'd go. What about you?"
"Oh! Oh, in a second, but then again..." It was tempting. More than that. But he wasn't here on his own. There was Rose, and Mira, and he had to find the TARDIS. He had a responsibility and couldn't act as he saw fit. Not like he had done on the clock-work ship. Yes, he had indeed thought about what Mira had thrown at him back then. Plus, he had no idea what Satan knew about him so far. Maybe... But why did it have to be so tempting?
"That is so human," he said and turned his head to Ida. "Where angels fear to tread. Even now, standing on the edge. It's that feeling you get. Yeah?" He was now looking down again. "Right at the back of your head. That impulse... that strange little impulse... that mad little voice saying "go on... go on... go on... go over, go on..." maybe it's relying on that. For once in my life... Officer Scott... I'm going to say...," he looked at her again, meeting her eyes. For a moment they didn't move. "Retreat." There it was. He sighed and pulled his foot back from the edge of the pit. "Now I know I'm getting old," he murmured, and then into the comm, "Rose, Mira, we're coming back."
Rose
"Best news I've heard all day!" she said excited as the Doctor had announced that they would come back. She was looking at the others, just in time to see how Jefferson released the safety catch on his gun and pointed it at Toby.
"What're you doing?" she asked and walked over to him. That couldn't be true, could it? They were not about to shoot at each other now?
"He's infected. He brought that thing on board. You saw it," he said, without lowering his gun.
"He's not infected," Mira said as she was also coming closer. Rose took a look at Toby. He was sitting in his corner, eyes wide with fear. Rose considered the situation for a moment. Mira was rather close to Jefferson right now. She wouldn't allow him to shoot, would she? Rose herself moved closer to Toby.
"Are you gonna start shooting your own people, now? Is that what you're gonna do? Is it? " she said to Jefferson.
"If necessary," Jefferson replied icily.
"Well then, you'll have to shoot me 'if necessary', so what's it gonna be?" she challenged him.
"Rose, don't!" Mira begged. Yeah, well, Mira obviously had been tasked with protecting her, but that didn't mean doing nothing at all for her. On the contrary, if she would get hurt, it would be Mira's fault.
She was kneeling next to Toby whilst Jefferson was still pointing his gun at him. "Look at his face. Whatever it was, it's gone. It passed into the Ood. You saw it happen. He's clean," she tried to convince him.
"Rose's right. He was possessed. Kill him and this entity will simply choose someone else next time," Mira said.
"Guess who'll that be then," Rose said under her breath, before she could help herself. Well, wasn't impossible, was it? Mira should be the ideal target for this thing, being all psychic. How much did Mira know about this entity anyway? A lot, enough to make herself suspicious, maybe it had been in her head already.
It took Jefferson a moment of consideration, then he finally said, "Any sign of trouble... I'll shoot him," and moved away.
"Are you all right?" she asked Toby, although it was obvious that he wasn't.
"Yeah... I...," he replied, sounding close to tears, "Dunno."
"Can you remember anything?"
"Just... it was so angry. It was... fury and rage... death...," he answered, and finally, after glancing around the room, he met her eyes. "It was him. It was the devil."
"Come here," she said before she drew him into a comforting hug.
Doctor
The Doctor was walking back to the capsule, Ida next to him. "What's strategy nine?" he asked.
"Open the airlocks... we'll be safe inside the lock down... the Ood will get thrown out into the vacuum," she replied.
"So we're going back to a slaughter?" Meanwhile, they had reached the capsule. That couldn't be true, could it? Humans. Would they ever learn? No matter how far they've come, what they've archived, they seemed to resort always to things like that.
"The devil's work," Ida replied. She didn't seem to like it as well, but she obviously had no saying in it.
Mira
"Okay, we're in. Bring us up," she heard Ida say over the comm.
"Ascension in...," Jefferson said, operating the controls of the capsule, "Three... two... one."
Suddenly the lights went out and the mechanism of the capsule failed. It almost was as if the power in the whole base was failing, but the communication still seemed to work.
"This is the Darkness. This is my domain," she heard a voice in the dark. It was coming over the comm, and a moment later the display on the screen changed to Ood Habitation. The Ood were standing together, obviously serving the entity once again.
"You little things that live in the light... clinging to your feeble Suns...," it said through the Oods, "... which die in the..."
"That's not the Ood. Something's talking through them," Zach said.
"That's true. There is some entity, using the Ood, using Toby and probably others. No need for panic. It is only an alien life fo-" she said, but got interrupted by the Ood before she could finish the sentence.
"Only the Darkness remains."
"This is Captain Zachary Cross Flane of Sanctuary Base Six representing the Torchwood archive. You will identify yourself," Zach demanded.
"You know my name."
"What do you want?" Zach asked.
"You will die here. All of you. This planet is your grave."
"It's him. It's him. It's him...," Toby said, sitting on the floor trembling. She honestly hoped he wouldn't lose it entirely.
"If you are the Beast, then answer me this: which one? Hmm? 'Cos the universe has been busy since you've been gone," the Doctor said over the intercom. "There's more religions than there are planets in the sky. The Archivits... Pordonity, Christianity... Pash-Pash, New Judaism... Sanclar... Church of the Tin Vagabond - which devil are you?"
"All of them."
"Well, that's not really an answer," she murmured.
"What, then you're the truth behind the myth?" the Doctor said.
"This one knows me - as I know him. The killer of his own kind."
What!? Killer of his own kind? What had this entity just said? Was this just a wild accusation or had it been in the Doctor's head as well? But the Doctor chose to ignore it.
"How did you end up on this rock?" he asked instead.
"The disciples of the Light rose up against me. And chained me in the pit for all eternity."
"When was this?"
"Before time."
"What does THAT mean?!"
"Before time."
"What does 'before time' MEAN?"
"Before light and time and space and matter. Before the cataclysm. Before this universe was created."
"That's impossible. No life could have existed back then."
"Is that your religion?"
"It's a belief."
"You know nothing. All of you. So small."
"Well, isn't that the point about beliefs? Not knowing something, so being forced to believe? To trust?" she said, loud enough to be picked up by the comm. "Would you even be here without beliefs? If we would just know that there is no such thing as Satan? Maybe you're not the truth behind the myth. Maybe the myth is the base of your existence?" If this thing was up for mind games, it could have them. She had argued with other beings before, beings that would have been called gods in earlier times, beings older than mankind. But, she had to admit, that one was good. Putting up quite a show with all the lights out and taking over the Ood. Besides that, humans always tended to get frightened if someone could probably read their thoughts. And they were frightened. Properly frightened. They were trying to hold themselves together, but some were only a step away from panicking.
"The lost one. So brave," the entity said, obviously addressing her now. "Or is it only desperation? You know where those two things – bravery and despair – lead you once, don't you? You, destroyer of the stars."
She stopped dead in her tracks for a second and felt how her heart skipped a beat.
Destroyer of the stars.
She had expected a lot of things, but not that it would come up with this. It had been so long ago. Way over thousand years by now. She had been so young back then. Not even fifty years old. Young and arrogant enough to touch forces that should have been left untouched by humans for all times. Arrogant enough to believe she was aware of the possible consequences. Arrogant enough to believe that they had considered everything and it couldn't possibly go horribly wrong. And it haunted her ever since, had become a part of her mere existence. It had marked her, changed her. Rose, Jefferson and Danny were looking at her, obviously not sure what to make of it.
"Go on. Is that all?" she decided to head for confrontation, her voice slightly shaky now. "Because you know, throwing baseless accusation at us only shows us how desperate you really are. Locked away for ages next to a black-hole, who wouldn't go mad?"
"You know that it is not baseless. But let the rest decide for themselves. The Captain, so scared of command. The soldier, haunted by the eyes of his wife. The scientist, still running from daddy. The little boy who lied... The virgin..."
Oh well, that must have been Danny and Toby, she thought after she had looked at them. And with that everyone in this base knew now that Satan was telling the truth about themselves. And thus about the others.
"And the girl, so insecure and so young, Now it's all falling apart for you. The valiant child who will die in battle so very soon."
"Doctor, what does it mean?" Rose asked, all colour gone from her face.
"Rose, don't listen," he replied quietly.
"What does it mean?" Rose insisted.
"Don't listen to him," she said. "'Satan' is psychic and obviously able to get into our minds. He's only playing with us. He wants to frighten us. Don't let him!"
"You will die... and I will live," the Oods announced, and she could have as well spared her words, as suddenly an image of a horned beast appeared on the screen. All around her gasped and stumbled backwards.
"What the hell was that?" Danny yelled in fear.
"I had that thing inside my head," Toby whined.
"Doctor, what did it mean?" Rose said, now on the verge of panicking.
"What do we do? Jefferson?" Now they were all talking over each other.
"Captain? What's the situation on Strategy Nine?" Jefferson was asking Zach over the comm.
"Zach, what do we do?"
"Everyone, listen!" she tried to stop them.
But no-one was listening to her. They were all yelling over each other in utter fear and confusion. For a split second she wondered that an alien life form, even when presenting itself as Satan, could have such an impact on a crew orbiting a black hole.
"Stop...," the Doctor was trying it now as well, unsuccessfully. They were ignoring him as well.
Suddenly the loud and shrill screech of an acoustic feedback came over the speaker. The talking stopped and for a moment it was completely silent. The waves of fear and panic that had come over her ceased slightly as they were trying to sort out where that noise had come from.
"If you want voices in the dark, then listen to mine; that thing is playing on very basic fears. Darkness - childhood nightmares, all that stuff," the Doctor said.
He had been right, she realised, that one of them had to stay up here. Were they the only two ones left thinking clearly?
"Thanks. At least one voice of reason," she said quietly.
"But that's how the devil works," Danny said.
"Yeah. And he knows that, and now we know it. So no need for panic and chaos, hm?" she said to him.
"She's right. Whatever that is, it's probably just a good psychologist," the Doctor added.
"But... how did it know about my father?" Ida asked.
"I said it. Probably it's telepathic. Can't help that know, but it also has nothing to do with being the Devil!" she told her.
"Yeah. Plus, what makes his version of the truth any better than mine?" the Doctor said. "Hmm? 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 into the orbit of a black hole! Just for the sake of discovery, that's amazing! Do you hear me? Amazing. All of you. The captain - his officer - his elder - his genius - his friends. All with one advantage. The Beast is alone. We are not. If we can use that to fight against him-"
Just as he had managed to ease the situation a bit, the cable suddenly snapped with a nasty sound. Faster than she would have ever expected it, it fell down the ten mile long shaft, vanishing, sending back up a cloud of dust.
"Doctor! We lost the cable! Doctor, are you all right?" she asked automatically whilst she was still trying to realise the implications of what just happened. "Doctor?" No cable. No way up for them. Not to mention the weight of such a long cable crashing down.
"Comms are down," Zach said. She slowly put the mic down. No need to try it any further then.
"I've still got life signs, but... we've lost the capsule," Zach added after a few moments.
She sighed. At least they were alive.
Rose had grabbed the mic in the meantime, "Say something - are you there?"
"The comm is down Rose, you've heard Zach."
"There's no way out," Zach said as if hardly being able to believe it. "They're stuck down there."
oXxgergiaxXo, 10th Squad 3rd Seat, Jadeo, bored411: Thanks for your reviews :-)
