Chapter LXXXIII
Mira
She looked back at him, then down at his extended hand. Her head was spinning, and not only because of the blow. She had this nasty feeling she got every time when she suddenly understood something – mostly really important things. That feeling when everything was falling into place, making her realise very clearly that she had just messed things up. No, she instantly corrected herself, not messed up. Screwed up big, big time. That was the reason why the Doctor – her Doctor, had wanted to leave so suddenly. But why had he come here in the first place?
When he slowly lowered his hand and the expression on his face changed to something slightly more serious it was definitely time for her to give him an answer.
Instead of taking his hand - as touching each other had gone wrong in an unintentionally intimate way – before, she rubbed the back of her head and winced as her fingers touched a rather big bump. Better not to risk anything.
"Mi-" she started and almost bit her tongue. "My name's Betty."
Why was he thinking they knew each other? If it was a later version of him, he'd better not dare to forget that he had ever known her. How much time would have to pass for him to forget her? Or something really bad had happened to his memories.
"Nice to meet you, Betty," he said, smiling at her again, interrupting her thoughts. Then he frowned, producing long lines on his forehead. "Sure that that's your name?"
How much did he know? Or, in other words, remember? Anyway, back to the problems at hand. Rather than him being his future regeneration it was more likely that, as the Doctor had been in such a hurry to leave, he had suddenly remembered being here before. So he must be a previous version. But then why was he thinking he knew her? Had she now become a part of his life ever since she had ran into his fourth regeneration? He had never really explained it to her. But, then again, they had met his fourth regeneration after him being this version, so how could he remember her if it hadn't happen for him yet?
To hell with time-travel.
"Yeah, pretty sure," she said, eyeing him suspiciously. "And no, don't think we know each other."
If anything she had to be really carefully now.
"Really? Never seen this daft old face before?" he replied, jiggling his earlobes with his index fingers.
"No, never," she said, trying to avoid his gaze again.
Before he could question her any further, she made her way past him and out of the small cell. May it be due to the blow to her head, to what had happened between them – her version of him and her - or to her overall rather fragile mental state, she couldn't bare lying right into his face.
She looked around herself. The room consisted of a handful cells, each about twenty-five square-foot large, lined up one on one wall, separated by solids walls, closed with doors made up of metal bars. The rest of the room was pretty empty, only a few metal lockers, a table and some stools stood on the naked concrete floor. The walls also were concrete, but as she touched it, it felt more like some concrete-plastic alloy as it was also used in her universe. She could hear how he got back to his feet as well behind her, but avoided turning around to face him. Instead she went over to the lockers, but they were all locked.
"How many of them are here?" she asked, noticing that the alarm had stopped.
It took a moment and then he replied with a counter question, "So, how did you end up here then?"
Something in his voice finally made her turn around to face him. He was leaning with his shoulder against the wall, his arms crossed, looking at her. His voice had sounded light-heartedly, and so was the expression he was trying to keep on his face. But something about his posture, the look in his deep eyes made her almost shiver. And it was not only the contrast between the tone in his voice and his overall appearance. He looked lost. Incredibly lost and lonely, and, despite his rather impressive frame, quite vulnerable. It struck her deeply to see him like this.
"With a space-ship?" she said, trying to sound as it was the most obvious thing ever.
"There's no space-ship," he replied instantly.
So it seemed the interrogation was not over yet. She tried to sence the guys who had captured her, but no one was near – yet.
"How would you know?" she said, trying to make up a good story.
"I scanned. There's no space-ship. Well, apart from theirs," he replied and looked around himself.
"Well, as I didn't walk here, there is. Not too sure though if it's still on the surface or back in orbit again. You should probably check your scanners."
"What?" he said indignantly. "My scanners are fine. So where are you coming from then?"
"Arkon," she said, as this answer was as good as any. And she certainly would not forget that name, as she would any made up one.
"There's no planet called Arkon."
"Okay, listen. Maybe your not half as good informed as you think you are. There's a planet called Arkon and there's a space-ship here somewhere."
"Okay," he just said lightly, smiled and rubbed his hands together as he walked past her, towards the cut-out in the wall which served as a door.
Well, fine, she thought and followed him. She knew very well that that was not the end of it, otherwise it wouldn't have been the Doctor. But there was nothing she could do for now, apart from getting out here as soon as possible, getting back to the TARIDS and silently listen to whatever dressing down her Doctor would give here about not listening to him in the first place. As much as she hated to admit it, she had made more than one mistake so far.
"So, you know how to get out of here?" she asked, walking slightly behind him through a long, empty corridor, trying to keep up with his fast steps.
"Yes."
"So are we leaving then?"
"No."
"Fine. And where are you about to go?"
"Children went missing," he finally explained, without turning his head to her. "I thought it's a good idea to look into it."
"And who are those guys?"
"Xandrians. Thugs, merchants, criminals. You name it."
"And what, for all planets, do they want here? How did they even found this system? Thought it's pretty remote."
"Well, you've found it too. Pretty far from Faron, isn't it?"
"Arkon," she corrected him, "And yes. Long way from home. We're scientists. Social sciences, that's why we came here. Pretty fascinating people, the Ayxeluriusians."
9th Doctor
He was racking his brain about where and when he had met her before. He was almost certain he had, but he could not even say why. It was as if he remembered her, even though he shouldn't be able to, for whatever reason. He was not even certain he had actually met her. Her face, her voice, was somehow familiar – too familiar to be only a product of his imagination. And her name certainly wasn't Betty – he had no idea what it was, but not Betty.
And she was lying to him. There was no planet called Arkon, and there definitely was no other space-ship in this system. Sure, they could have arrived within the last day or so, when he had been away from the TARDIS, but he doubted it. He would have located them, even outside the system.
"So, how many Xandrians are here?" her voice came from behind, slightly breathless by now.
"Quite a few."
"And where's the way out?"
"You wouldn't make it," he said shortly. Well, that was – at least partially – the truth. But he wanted to find out who she was, what she was hiding. At least as long as he was here, as long as she was here – that was all that mattered. After he had solved the situation here, he would be on his way, alone again. Searching for something else to distract him, someone else to save.
And he just got a lot closer to finding out what was going on here. At least now he knew it were the Xandrians, even though it still remained a mystery to him what they wanted with the Ayxeluriusian children.
"I think I can hear them in front of us," Betty hissed from behind, right as he was approaching a sharp left turn in the corridor.
He listened for a moment, but it was absolutely silent.
"No, you can't," he replied, turning around to her. She looked human, and even if she wasn't, it was highly unlikely she had a better hearing than him.
"They are in front of us," she repeated in a low voice, pretty much ignoring him. "I might say twenty yards, thirty at most?"
Suddenly, there was a loud bang around the corner, followed by an angry, "IDIOT!", causing his head to fling around.
Then, quite startled, he looked back at Betty again. No way she could have heard them prior to that.
"Betty?" he whispered, as he saw the absent look on her face. Here eyes were staring into space, and she didn't seem to hear him.
But there was no time to wonder what was wrong with her now – at the edge of his sight field he saw a huge, black, square thing flying around the corner. He turned his head and identified it as a massive locker, more like a safe. It was not really fast, but fast enough to make it hard to evade it – he reached for Betty's hand to pull her out of the way, but she had stepped aside, standing right in its flight path. But then, instead of hitting her, it suddenly came to a hold, seemingly ignoring the law of inertia. It stood still mid-air for maybe a second, then it turned around, accelerated, wavered a bit and, not quite making it around the corner, crashed into the wall, leaving a big hole before it fell to the floor.
"Why didn't you tell me they're psychic?" she whispered as she walked over to the safe to peer around the corner.
"They are?" he asked, slightly baffled.
"Yes! Well, maybe they're just really strong, but I highly doubt that. Looks more like telekinesis to me."
With that said, she went around the corner and he hurried to follow her.
"Betty, wait," he said, trying to grab her sleeve to pull her behind him. He had no idea what had just happened, but obviously she was psychic herself, as clearly she was responsible for the safe crashing into the wall. Anyway, this turned out to be quite dangerous, and no place to be for a social scientist.
"Don't worry, I have it all under control," she said and walked on without turning around.
He had no other choice but to follow her, and after a few yards the corridor ended at an open door. He saw the two Xandrians who had guarded her earlier, but something was weird.
They were hanging in the air, almost a yard above the ground, swearing, fidgeting and floundering around. He saw that the woman finally managed to get hold of a rather big gun she was carrying on her back, but as soon as she had pulled it out of its holster, it got ripped out of her hands and smashed against the wall. When it reached the ground only pieces were left, demonstrating once more the pure force behind the telekinetic powers at work here.
"Betty, I think you can let them down now," he said quietly as they had entered the room.
"I'm not doing anything, it's them. They wanted to lift us up. Oh, and smash us against the wall. Well, at least he. She not so much," she said, her eyes still locked on the two Xandrians. "They have to stop attacking us, then-"
Before she could finish the sentence, the two plump figures fell down and landed with a nasty sound on their bums.
"It wasn't me!" she said defensively – obviously she had seen him shaking his head at her.
Meanwhile the two Xandrians had gotten back to their feed, eyeing them suspiciously.
"What do you want?" the woman finally spat at them.
"Safety inspection," he said with a wide grin. "I noticed your generator blew up, so I need to make sure your facility here is all secure. We don't want that to happen again, do we? Oh, and sorry for the safe. And the wall. And the weapon. My assistant is sometimes a bit overly enthusiastic."
"Safety inspection?" the woman yelled and grew even redder in her face.
She fumbled in her jacket, but he had his Sonic Screwdriver in his hand before she had readied the small gun she had been hiding. With a click and a buzzing sound the energy cell was dead. She looked down at the useless gun in her hand and now he was seriously worried she would explode any moment. But that didn't happen – instead she jumped over to the wall with an incredible speed for her shape, and pressed a big, red button. A klaxon went of, much louder than the last one.
"Lock-down in progress," a poorly modulated computer voice announced.
Not good. But thankfully the door behind them had been a normal door, not an automated hatch.
He grabbed Betty's hand – this time successfully – and said, "Run!"
Mira
She had felt the sudden outburst of psychic energy some time before the safe had come flying around the corner. And yes, it probably would have been better to just try to run away and pretend not to know what was going on, but they were quite powerful – and certainly not into giving up too easy. And telekinesis wasn't the only thing they could do. She had felt them trying to read her mind, and in return she had been able to make out their next plans – unfortunately not much more than that so no hint about the missing children. Why they were psychic all of a sudden, as they clearly hadn't been before, remained a mystery to her.
Right now she tried to keep up with the Doctor, his strangely familiar and yet different hand in hers. It was bigger, not as slender as her Doctor's, matching his overall broader frame – and yet his skin was just as soft and cool. But it was not so much the shape of his hand, but the contact itself making it feel so familiar.
"Come, in here!" he yelled, stopped suddenly – something which seemed to be pretty constant with his regenerations – and pulled her into a small room, slamming the door shut behind her.
She wondered once more what lock-down was supposed to mean with nothing really locked, but probably it was only the doors leading in and out this impressively sized facility. But before she could wonder any more about it, she heard voices getting closer from outside. She looked around for something to block the door with, for it opened to the inside of this room. A large desk stood in the middle of it, which seemed to be weirdly out of place.
"Help me!" she said after she had tried to move the heavy piece of furniture.
"Just use your telekinesis, would you?" he said without looking at her. His interest lay on another door at the opposite side, leading out of the room. That one actually looked more like an automated security door.
"Very funny," she replied, pushing the desk with all her strength. "I would if I could!" she yelled at him, making him turn around at last. "I'm not telekinetic. Or how ever you call it. I just mirrored it. But I can't-"
He had finally laid a hand on the desk as well and pulled, causing her to almost fall over because she was still leaning against it. In no time the desk was blocking the door, additionally he had locked it with his Sonic.
"Will keep them out," he said and walked over to the other door again, scanning it.
"Deadlock sealed," he murmured. "Might take a while to figure out the combination, so keep an eye on the door, will you?"
"Sure," she replied, walking through the small room. It must be some sort of storage space, and as she went through the shelves she even found a gun. Just the right size for her hands, and from the looks of it some sort of energy weapon – the crystal she could see in the barrel was most likely for focusing light-waves.
Meanwhile everything was quiet at the door, it seemed as if they had run past it, at least for now. The Doctor was still trying to figure out the combination at the number-pad. If that was an electronically sealed door, and it was not a cell of some sort behind it – in which case, most likely useless for them anyway, it must have a fail-save. And most likely in case of power loss or destruction of the console it would unlock automatically, because it needed power to stay locked. At least that was logical, and most of the doors and bulkheads she had come by worked like that. Only cell-doors, airlocks and stuff like that tended to remain locked after a loss of power, for obvious reasons.
"Would you step aside?" she asked.
"Why?" he replied without looking.
"Just do it, would you?"
Finally he turned his head and jumped aside the next moment. She hadn't even had the gun raised but well, it wasn't on her to complain.
"Betty, don't you-"
The rest of his sentence was drowned out as the console exploded with a small flash and a cloud of black smoke. And there it was – a distinct clicking sound as the door unlocked and flung open a few inches.
He looked back and forth between her and the door, without saying anything.
"See?" she finally said as the silence slowly but surely became hard to bear.
"Put that thing away!"
"Why?"
"Put it away!" he said again and, walked over to her and looked down at her with a grim look on his face, blue eyes glaring at her.
After a few moments she lowered her gaze and put the gun back on the shelve where she had found it. No use in arguing with him about a weapon. Not now, not without knowing what had already happened for him and how long ago. With her Doctor she would have, and most likely kept the weapon, but not with him.
"What did you say earlier?" he said behind her, with a completely different voice as just a moment ago. "You mirrored them?"
"Yes?"
"That's fantastic!" he said and as she turned around she saw the wide smile on his face. And for a moment it even seemed as if it reached his eyes. "Don't think I have ever seen something like that before. Let's see what's behind that door. Keep behind me. And no more shooting!"
"No more shooting," she said and followed him.
She was pretty sure that no one was in front of them; at least she couldn't sense anyone. The door led to a short corridor which ended with another – normal – door. The Doctor flung it open and stood still, blocking it pretty much completely.
"Well, that's unexpected," he said.
"What?" she said and tried to see past him. "You're standing in the way!"
He didn't answer but took a few steps into the next room. Then she could see for herself. It was a rather big room, and a fully equipped laboratory. She took a quick look up to the ceiling, but instead of bodies hanging there it was only neon lights. And the laboratory itself did look nothing like the ones the Daleks had had on Earth. Nevertheless, it was rather high-tech, not ragged and filthy as the Xandrians had looked like. Long tables with equipment were lined up the walls, as well as a few tables with straps on them. It wasn't too hard to guess what they were for. She started to walk over to one of them, but then stopped as she saw something on the floor. She picked it up and suddenly regretted that she hadn't knocked the two Xandrians out when she had had the chance.
"Doctor," she said quietly, and this time he turned around to her at her first attempt.
The expression on his face darkened as he saw the tuft of soft, white, long fur she was holding between her fingers.
heroherondaletotherescue, bored411, MiaEther, OneWhoReadsToMuch, E-man-dy-S, angelaDickson18: Thanks for reviewing :-)
