DOCTOR WHO:
ONE ANOTHER'S GRAVES
WRITTEN BY ZARIUS
Author's Note: An alternative presentation of the clip we got for "Spyfall Part One", minor spoilers.
Feedback is encouraged
C, the head of MI6, lead the four friends into the room, as he did so, The Doctor felt as if she were walking over someone's grave.
The woman lay motionless on the bed, life signs stable, but no sign of life to go with it.
The Doctor shivered ever so slightly, it did not go unnoticed.
"Something the matter Doc?" Graham asked.
The Doctor looked past his shoulder to check if someone was still there.
"For a minute, I just...thought that poor woman there was Yaz" The Doctor replied.
"She was found unconscious on the floor of an airplane washroom on a flight to Tokyo. She had made prearranged contact with an informant" explained C.
"What are you saying Doc? That Yaz and that agent all look alike?" Graham asked, not knowing whether or not to afford himself the luxury of offence. He knew The Doctor was an alien; perhaps she had no firm grasp of human filter.
"Oh don't be silly" The Doctor replied.
"Then what is it?" said Graham.
"With experience like mine, you never know what time or place you can wind up in, sometimes friends you know, recent or otherwise, can be with you even as you discover they're lost to forever. Imagine finding your own grave, or your own corpse. That's never a good feeling, but that's what you get when you sign up with me"
"How come you never warned us about this kind of thing before?" Graham asked.
"Because I've had a lot of luck lately, I've only been to my own grave once, and that's an aborted timeline now"
C handed The Doctor notes on the woman's condition.
"I am told this is your expertise, dealing with the impossible"
The Doctor looked at the notes; her face became one of even more puzzling concern.
"You're right, this is impossible, her DNA's been rewritten, every strand corrupted and rewritten, she doesn't even pass for human on the inside. She's just a shell"
"Is she gonna live Doc?" he said.
As proud as she was that Graham would choose the most humane of questions to ask, The Doctor knew the answer already, and it was most unfortunate news.
"There's nothing left of her to live, it's like she's been erased"
"I was afraid you'd say something like that...Doctor, the security of this entire planet is at stake, can we rely upon you?" C asked.
The Doctor gave him an unsure look; she wanted to glance back at Graham at this point, to see if he could give her a reassuring glance that assured her saying reliance upon her was the safe bet.
Instead what she got was the next best thing, a warm hand gently clasp her own, encouraging her to take action and speak.
She took one last look at the helpless rewritten woman, thinking back to how much she reminded her of Yaz, and how lucky she had been nothing so horrific had befallen her just yet.
She was relieved they hadn't yet come to the point where they were standing over one another's graves.