Hey guys! Welcome back to the fifth chapter, keep the reviews, follows and favs coming this way they are much appreciated. The next update might take a little longer as I have work and exams to do, but hopefully it will take no longer than a week. But for now enjoy and continue on Lauren's adventure.

Chapter 5 The New Development and the Argument

It was a couple of minutes later when Courtney Woods arrived at the storeroom looking for paper towels. Lauren watched her go in before deciding to eavesdrop in on the conversation. She had nothing better to do, and she didn't want to go to classes.

Lauren quietly entered the storeroom, she saw the green glow come from the TARDIS and Courtney slowly make her way forward. Good, nobody seen her. Lauren darted along the wall keeping to the shadows.

"Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the most dangerous of them all?" the Doctor could be heard muttering from inside the TARDIS. The green light then stops.

"There's been a spillage in Geography, I need some paper towels," Courtney explained looking curiously at the box.

Lauren managed to find a small spot to hide in behind some clutter which kept her concealed just as the Doctor emerged from the ship looking annoyed. Unfortunately from her awkward crouched position she couldn't see anything unless she risked glancing over the top, but then the Doctor would see her. So, she just had to sit, wait and listen.

This was going to be a long day…

"Can't you read?" the Doctor bellowed.

"Course I can read. Read what?"

"The door. It says, keep out."

"No, it says, go away humans."

The Doctor checked the door sign, "Oh, so it does. Never lose your temper in the middle of a door sign."

The Doctor and Courtney had their banter for the next few minutes, until the Doctor told her rather bluntly to get lost. Clara enters as Courtney went to leave, thankfully neither seen Lauren in her hiding spot.

"Hello, miss. Love to the Squaddie."

"Sorry, what did you say?" Clara asks confused, Courtney smirked and walked out the door not answering. Clara turned and walked over to the Doctor, "What was she doing in here?"

"Paper towels. Now, I imagine you have many questions. Fire away. I won't answer any of them." Said the Doctor.

Lauren listened to the familiar dialogue, or actual conversation she should think, this was more than a story now, she mused. This was real life.

"What were they like?" asked Clara.

"What were who like?"

"The others before me. Did they let you get away with this kind of thing? This school is in danger."

"Well, it's lucky I'm here, then."

"From you."

"Me?"

"You wouldn't be here if there wasn't an alien threat nearby. Your strategy for dealing with it involves endangering this school."

"You don't know that." The Doctor scoffed.

"I don't know anything because you haven't told me anything, which means I wouldn't approve, which means you are endangering this school." Clara did have a point.

Lauren heard the Doctor activate his sonic screwdriver, showing Clara a green glowing globe.

"What's that?" Clara asked, not understanding what he was showing her.

"It's a scanner. I'm scanning. Why do I keep you around?" He said exasperated.

"Because the alternative would be developing a conscience of your own. Scanning for what?"

"Any alien technology in this vicinity should show up. I used to have a teacher exactly like you."

"You still do. Pay attention." Lauren silently giggled at her retort.

There was a pause as Clara studied what was the image of the Skovox Blitzer. "What the hell is it?"

"A Skovox Blitzer. One of the deadliest killing machines ever created. Probably homed in here because of artron emissions. You've had enough of them in this area over the years. There's enough explosive in its armoury to take out the whole planet."

"Then leave it alone." Clara began fearing for the school and children.

The Doctor tried to reason with her. "Sooner or later it will creep from its hidey-hole and some military idiot will try to attack it. The world is full of PE teachers."

Lauren heard a beeping noise, presumably coming from the scanner. Odd, that didn't happen in the show, the Doctor and Clara were meant to continue their conversation in the TARDIS if her memory served her correctly and she was normally very good at remembering things.

"What does that mean?" Clara asked.

Yes Doctor, do explain, Lauren thought.

"A new development has occurred." The Doctor didn't sound that surprised.

"What do you mean new development? Please don't tell me something worse is happening."

"I wouldn't say worse, more interesting perhaps. She appears non-threatening anyway."

"She? Doctor, explain." Clara booked no nonsense.

"Yes, she, well, all the evidences point to that it's her or something around her. There's a new student, Lauren Raven –"

"Wait, the new girl? She was in my class I know her. The one you helped just there, but what about her, what has she got to do with anything?"

"I am not sure. She's human anyway from the results of the scan, but she's not normal. You see here, all that wavy stuff, that's artron energy. Background radiation. She's full of it, like you and I are, the result of travelling through the time vortex."

WHAT?

"But Doctor, how can she be?"

"I don't know, but the TARDIS picked up the rift activity this morning, something new, that wasn't here before and this girl is involved somehow."

"Hang on, you said this Blitzer thing was attracted here because of all the artron energy right? But what if it could be her leading it here, whether she realizes it or not but what if she is a trap?" Clara asked.

Lauren wasn't believing what she was hearing. All of this, it was wrong.

"No, the Skovox Blitzer was here a while before she ever arrived. She's just like an extra slice of cake you didn't realize there was, and when you do, you take it."

"You don't think she's dangerous but in danger?"

"She's scared Clara. Right now, she's caught up in the crossfire, she's more of a target. I think we should give her the benefit of the doubt for now. Because I've got more important things to worry about, this Skovox Blitzer for a start."

The Doctor and Clara made their way into the TARDIS.

"So, your insanely dangerous plan is?" Clara asked before she closed the doors behind her, the rest of their conversation cut off then.

Leaving Lauren sat there in silence as she numbly progressed this new information. She didn't dare move from her spot and wouldn't until a long while after. Everything was too much for her in one day, so Lauren found her eyes growing heavy and her thoughts slow down. Her mind blissfully going blank as darkness engulfed her.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Lauren woke with a start. The first thing she became aware of was the numbness of her legs and the pain in her lower back. Such a stupid place to sleep, what was she thinking? She stretched her arms and hulled herself up off the ground, accidentally knocking a box with stuff over with her elbow.

Lauren shook the pins and needles from her legs as she looked around the now darkened storeroom. The TARDIS was gone! How long was she a sleep for? What did she miss?!

Lauren exited the storeroom trying to keep the unease in her chest down. It was night time. She was out for hours.

Damn, I must have been tired…

But never mind that, where did the Doctor go? A small part of her imagined he'd left for good. However that thought was quickly diminished.

Ok, its night time, so the Doctor should be out trying to lure the Skovox Blitzer into the empty hall of the school, and it will go wrong because Danny removes one of the devices, and Clara comes in and everything is revealed and no one is happy.

So, got to find the empty hall the Doctor set up as a trap.

Lauren set off in a sprint across the now silent, dark and empty playground. The cold air hitting her face and sending shivers down her body.

A few minutes later Clara comes calling, looking for the Doctor in the storeroom, having no luck she walks off in the same direction Lauren went. A few moments after her, Danny arrived and knocked on the doors calling for Mr Smith. Instead he found another gizmo now flashing red.

Xxxxxxxxxxx

Lauren really wished she checked where the location of the hall was. That was something she could have done but she didn't think then. She came to a panting stop in a corridor she knew she'd ran down once already. Ahh, trying to find your way in an unfamiliar school was always a struggle.

Then she heard the noise, the commotion.

She heard the sound of the Doctor running and the Blitzer scuttling around after him. Lauren suddenly saw the Blitzer blaze through the corridor next to her. Lauren pressed herself to the wall in fear, waiting until it was a good distance away before following, not wanting to be blown to pieces.

"Gangway! Not far now. Come on." The Doctor could be heard shouting. Lauren had to remember he was invisible with that watch.

"Nine stop parsing data pursue," the Blitzer said.

"Bingo."

"Target reacquired."

The Doctor entered the hall, turning off the invisibility watch. His smile faded as he saw the gizmos flashing red on the circle of chairs. "What? Red? Red. No. No, no, no, no, no, no, no!"

The Blitzer stormed into the hall, "Range one point four nine scan complete, problem, problem."

The Doctor began to panic, holding his arms out in a non-threatening gesture, "Listen. I'm unarmed. I'm peaceful. Don't you understand? I, I know that you shouldn't be on this planet but I can help you with that, I –"

Lauren suddenly burst into the hall at this moment, she looked to see the Doctor's shocked face and the Blitzer turn to her. Oh dear

"Nine stop query scan, temporal disruption detected," the Blitzer said pointing its guns at her.

Danny suddenly walked into the hall, "I want a word with you," the Blitzer turned to him.

"Problem solution destroy." Aiming at Danny.

"Get back you two!" the Doctor shouted.

The Blitzer started shooting as Danny ducked, throwing himself to the floor while Lauren darted across the floor towards the Doctor; he caught her outstretched hand and pushed her behind him. As Danny dropped to the floor he also dropped the chronodyne gizmo, which slid across reaching the ones on the chairs, they all turned flashing green.

Using his sonic screwdriver the Doctor activated the gizmos into creating a vortex within the circle of chairs. The vortex was golden orange, large and blowing strong winds around the hall, Lauren pressed herself to the ground trying to stay in one spot, the Blitzer however was being sucked towards it, as was Danny who was also too close.

"Temporal disrupt. Warning, warning. Temporal failure."

Then Clara finally entered, immediately shouting and running toward Danny to grab him, "No! No, no, no, no! Doctor, stop! Doctor!"

"Warning system failure. Abort. Abort." The Blitzer finally got sucked into the vortex. The Doctor quickly deactivated the vortex with a grunt, falling sideways slightly. The harsh winds stopped.

Lauren breathed a sigh of relief, shakily getting to her feet. The Doctor had immediately bounced onto his picking up the gizmo Danny had, looking furious.

Oh, heard we go. Time of argument and reveals, Lauren thought. Wondering how much she was going to affect this.

"Oh, oh, well done, PE, brilliant work," the Doctor said in a very sarcastic manner. "What's this? A chronodyne generator? I'll just deactivate that, shall I? I've got a swimming certificate so that qualifies me to meddle with higher technology. Never mind that some people are actually trying to save the planet. Oh, no. There's only room in my head for cross-country and the offside rule."

Lauren just stood there staring awkwardly her feet, hoping she wasn't going to be shouted at, the Doctor was fuming.

"Danny, what are you doing here?" Clara said upset.

Danny's mind was reeling over what he saw, "I was checking up on him. He's been up to something, fiddling with the electric, but what the?" he paused, looking uncertainly around him and to the Doctor, Clara and Lauren in front of him.

"No. What? Did you see that thing? Tell me you saw that thing. And there's a student here, she could have been hurt." Danny pointed to Lauren. "She is hurt!"

Lauren suddenly remembered she had blood down her shirt. To Danny this must look bad.

"No, no, it's okay. This has nothing to do with…this, I got kicked in the face with a football and fell," Lauren gestured to her nose and then the blood over her uniform.

Clara nodded, "It's true she wasn't hurt here, I seen her fall in the playground, and I saw the thing, yeah," She turned to the Doctor, now more interested in the problem at hand, "Doctor, are we safe? Is the planet safe? It's gone?"

The Doctor began to explain that it was gone for the moment however because of Danny moving the chronodyne generators, using his sonic, he measured that the vortex would open in three days. Three days to think of a new plan. Well less than three days Lauren knew.

Danny still wasn't coping with what he had just witnessed. He questioned Clara if she was from space, and Clara, who looked very much like she would rather have been sucked into the time vortex instead at this very moment, blurted out a very pathetic attempt to convince Danny none of this was real, but rather a play. Thankfully the three of them weren't paying any attention to Lauren anymore.

They just continued to argue and Lauren briefly considered stepping in when the Doctor didn't believe Danny was Clara's boyfriend and sort things out since she knew what was happening. However she quickly decided against it as Clara accidentally blurted out she loved Danny to the Doctor, which caused an awkward silence and a shocked looking Danny, and a hurt looking Doctor.

Yeah…Lauren was going to say out of this mess. Emotions are running high here…

As Danny wanted Clara to explain the Doctor to him, the Doctor decided to show him the TARDIS, and she too apparently, as Clara explained. "And it's bigger on the inside than the outside."

"Voila," the Doctor said opening the TARDIS doors. Danny leans in to take a look. "Come on Lauren, you too might as well have a look now."

And it was beautiful. She gasped at the sheer size within. She wanted to run inside and look at everything, every detail, every lever and button. It took all of her willpower not to. At this point Lauren zoned out of the rest of the conversation the others were having, she knew it already, she was content to just stare at the beloved ship.

And there it was again, that warm buzz flowing in her mind. Lauren felt giddy. She placed a hand on the wood of the door and she felt the vibrations under her palm, she giggled and Ian's words came into her head 'It's alive!'

Then the Doctor snapped the doors closed and she blinked, the spell broken.

The Doctor was still angry with everything and Clara quickly tried to get Danny out and home to explain everything properly.

"And when this is all over, you can finish the job." The Doctor said staring at Clara leaving.

"How do you mean?" Clara asked confused.

"Well, you've explained me to him. You haven't explained him to me."

They stared at one another for a moment, before Clara glanced at Lauren and back to the Doctor with a question in her eyes, the Doctor gave a curt nod – which seemed to answer her question as she nodded and left with Danny.

Lauren was impressed with their communication without words, even if she didn't know what they were thinking, but it was about her she presumed. She started walking down the stage and was hoping to go outside for a bit of fresh air, but the Doctor wasn't going to let her leave.

Lauren yelped as the Doctor grabbed the scruff of her collar. "Doctor! What are you doing, get off!" Lauren tried to swat his hand away but his grip remind firm. His fingers were really cold.

"You are staying with me, can't have you running around, I've enough trouble as it is," the Doctor said with gritted teeth. He then, rather roughly if you asked her, shoved her into the TARDIS.