The world was a very cold place, Tegan surmised as she suddenly saw light and landscape around her again. Not that it was very bright; it was night. But not a very dark one, there was the light of two moons overhead. Around them were high cliffs of a dark stone and they seemed to reach to eternity. There was no plant life that she could see...it was bleak and yet strangely beautiful.
She didn't have time to contemplate it; the Doctor pulled on her hand as he ran across the narrow canyon.
Tegan dragged her feet, realizing quite quickly that she was still in stocking feet.
"Doctor..."
"Quiet," he hissed over his shoulder, as he flew into a small crevice, dragging her with him. As he came to a rest, pressed against the rock wall, he turned andglanced around them. "They can hear better than most other creatures in the cosmos and can smell flesh and blood at more than a standard parscet."
"Who?" she pressed. "Doctor....what are we doing here? Where is here? "
He bent down and held a finger on his free hand up to his lips. "Shhh..." he whispered. Tegan stared at him in the moonlight. She could see his incisors; they were long.
"Doctor..." she breathed.
He shook his head. "Don't...not yet, Tegan." He glanced around again and turned towards a small natural path up the side of a cliff. She was pulled rapidly until they crested and she was faced with a forty foot drop. Another crevice presented itself and she was thrust into it and he backed in behind her.
She pressed against his back. "What is going on?"
He stared out, sweeping his gaze from one side to another. "We have to get to a place where we can man all the wickets, Tegan."
"Playing cricket again?"
"Cricket and life are very much the same," he answered. "I think we are safe for now." He turned and pointed towards the back of the small crevice. It tipped downward; it appeared to have a pocket below the surface.
The Doctor sighed and looked toward the ceiling. "I can see your curiosity is alive and well." He turned and gestured for her to sit. He began to pat hispockets searching for his pen torch. When it illuminated, he put it in her hand. "Check my mouth, Tegan, and tell me what you see."
She shone the light at his face as he opened his mouth. Her face contorted and she reached out to touch the sharp, long incisor teeth. He flinched as she touched them, as if they were full of nerve endings. Before she could answer him, he nodded, knowingly. "They have changed; I can feel it."
"They're long and pointy...like fangs," she shuddered.
"Brave heart, Tegan," he offered. He held out his hands and looked at his fingernails. "Glassy...transparent, as I suppose my skin will be in a few hours." He sighed. "I need you to confirm something else for me, if you would." He held out his arms, hands cupped in fists. "Take my pulses."
"What IS going on?" she pressed as she reached out to take his pulse. After a moment, she gasped and readjusted her fingers on his wrist, then on his otherwrist, finally, she reached, not gently, to push his sweater up and feel his chest on either side of his solar plexus. "No...there's no pulse...no beat...Doctor..." she cried. "On either of them."
Tegan shuddered and nearly wept. "Are you going to regenerate?" she whispered. "Are you dying?"
The Doctor pressed on her shoulders gently, easing her to a boulder behind them. As her legs bent and she collapsed against the rock, he slid to the ground in front of her, crosslegged. His blond hair reflected what little light there was in the cave. "No Tegan. Not here. Not on Alpha Omega. I will never regenerate here."
"But...you are dying...your hearts..." she began to rise, but her pressed against her until she sat again.
"Have stopped and will remain that way as long as we are here. You see, Tegan...I can't regenerate because I cannot be alive. I'm already dead."
The Doctor walked to the edge of the cliff and glanced around. The night was still, like a stagnant pool of water, he thought. Behind him, Tegan's breathing was still heightened; it betrayed her shock. He could hear her heart beating. He could smell her blood, hot in her veins. If he closed his eyes, he could probably hear the electronic shocks of her neurons.
"Dead?" Tegan said, disbelieving. "But you are walking around..."
"Undead, Tegan. I exist."
"Undead...as in...zombies and vampires and..." she stopped, hearing herself. With a violent shake of her head, she denied the possibility. "It can't...it's..." With a groan, she stopped and frowned at him. He could see the gentle wrinkling in her brow. "I take that back...where you are concerned, nothing is impossible."
"Thank you," he muttered.
"A vampire?"
"First try, Tegan. You are improving in your deductions."
"But...how...and why?"
"How is a question I don't think I want answered. The long story takes place in my ancient history. Vampires and Time Lords go way back, I'm afraid. We share almost 98% of our genes in common. And the bloodiest, dirtiest part of our history concerns a war we had with them. Rassilon led the war, we won, they cursed us to eternal sterility, and they were banished...here...to Alpha Omega. It appears that the White Guardian just tweaked the 2 percent of my genetics that were not in common and made me a vampire." He scratched his neck. "I would prefer not to know how to do that."
"Why?" Tegan croaked. "Why change you?"
"If I were to remain a Time Lord, I would be hunted for food. They would not think twice about killing me."
"But...will you always..."
"No. Rassilon altered the cosmos and created a small pocket universe off of the grand cosmos. This planet exists in its own universe. Once I leave here, through the fourth law of Rassilon, I will revert back to myself. So long as I am not here longer than a standard month, that is."
Tegan drew a deep breath. "And me? I mean won't they...the vampires...or whatever they are...hunt me? I love good food, Doctor, but only when I'm not it."
"Ah yes..." he lowered his head. "That, I think, will be our first situation to take care of."
"Pyrthia!"
The door to the room open, banging against the wall with almost indecent force. With a grunt, the woman lifted her head from where it had fallen forward. Her vision was blurred as a man, dressed in a light weight suit ran in.
"Umbra?!"
The woman shook her head.
"By the light, Umbra; have you no mind for what you need?"
Umbra continued to shake until the man returned to her side. She didn't need to reach out her hand; a small packet was attached to her arm and a straw was extended between her lips within seconds. When finished, the male shook his head and leaned back into the bank of electronics.
"Lukan," she breathed in return, her mouth working at the straw. Quickly, a deep orange liquid flowed through the medium into her mouth.
"You can't always miss your feedings," his voice was heavy, bordering on angry. "I won't always be here."
"We won't always be here, Lukan," Umbra growled in return. As she played with the straw between her teeth, her pointed incisors became noticeable. "Our shift here will be over within the next day. And then we will be back with the families."
She inhaled the liquid. "And real food."
"It's just not the same...this..." Lukan picked up the packet and squeezed it to move the liquid around. "...packaged concoction..."
"It has the needed protein..."
Lukan frowned and put it down. "But as bad as it tastes, you can't miss your feedings, Umbra. Any weaker and you would have had to be carried out of here."
Umbra shrugged. "I got busy."
"Did you. That doesn't surprise me in the least."
"Quiet," she hissed as she eased the straw from between her lips. With a sigh, she turned and waved her hand toward the large view window next to them. "I got sidetracked. Just look at that. I don't know about you. But that's probably the only thing on this planet that would make me miss dinner."
Lukan moved to the window and glanced outward. The machine below glinted in the moonlight and took up an immense amount of space. After a moment, there was an incredibly bright short burst of light from within it. Lukan nodded, his eyes widening slightly. "That it does, Umbra."
"No."
The Doctor had turned and glanced back at Tegan. She leaned into the stone wall and was shaking her head slowly. Her arms were wrapped tightly around her middle.
"Tegan."
"I don't...I won't...be a vampire...or whatever it is...you are now. And don't..." she bit out and then lowered her voice. "Don't do that, please..."
He sighed and shook his head. Tegan could see him make a massive effort to change his voice. "I don't know..."
She had shrugged. "And how long...until I'm dinner for you, do you think?" she asked pointedly. "When you do that with your voice, I can hardly make myself stay where I am."
The Doctor nodded harshly. "I'm..." he cleared his throat. "I'm aware of that. Apparently I missed the snack tray when it was passed round. I do feel rather hungry."
With a wince, she edged out to the ridge overlooking the open canyon below. "I can tell." The Doctor reached out and hesitantly laid his hand on her elbow. Tegan reacted by flinching.
He sighed and shook his head. "Tegan, you must still trust me. You must."
That conversation had been hours before in the relative safety of the small cave they had found. When he had felt stabilized, he had led her via the slim walkway down the side of the mountain and into the canyon below. He had listened for her steps behind him and heard them melding with her single strong heartbeat. Normally, he would be aware of her sounds, of the soft rhythm of her breathing.
But now, he was well aware of her heat, the heat of her blood. And it was making him hungry, bone achingly, powerfully hungry.
"How much further do you plan to go?"
He slowed and glanced upward. His feet felt heavy as he continued to move. Among the several things vying for presence in his mind, not the least of which was the stellar placement of the planet and climatic conditions. It was a bimoon planet, but it did still have a sun. The diurnal pattern was short, like a night in the severe northern hemisphere of Tegan's planet, and the exact opposite of Gallifrey.
"Well, Tegan..."
She called tiredly from behind him. "Look...you might be the son of Satan now, but I do remember a few things about Vampires and I don't want you fried prematurely. Don't we have to find you cover before daybreak?"
"Not all Vampires will be affected by light," he called back. He lifted an eyebrow as Tegan seemed to quicken her steps to draw even with him. "Yes, well...all vampires are affected to a certain extent by direct sunlight, but only the very young ones and the very old ones, I think, are affected by any sort of light."
"And what are you?"
"That," he replied with a sigh. "Is a very astute question to which I don't have an answer, Tegan. But better safe then sorry...we'll look for shelter." He glanced skyward again and shook his head. "I do wish I had paid better attention to Ancient Gallifreyan history while in class. It would make this whole situation much easier to handle...and direction easier to anticipate."
Tegan shook her head. "And I should have checked the tire before I left for work that day...would have never ended up in the TARDIS." She ignored his slightly sour look. "No use in crying over spilled milk...and I still don't want you fried. Does it look like the sun is about to come up? And where are we going...?"
"To a village or city," he muttered. "And yes, it does look like the sun is going to come up soon. Good heavens, Tegan...you have no shoes..."
With a sour glance around, Tegan nodded to a crevice up on the side of the cliff and then glanced up. "Doc...it is getting light. Come on..."
She began to scale the side of the cliff, following a small walkway and climbing when she had to. He followed her, his pale hands like white ghosts. They passed a portion where the top of the cliff was lower than the rest. He grabbed at her arm to stop her and nodded across the expanse. "Tegan...lights."
The lights were barely there, like a mirage across a desert. He could see trees lining the way and mused that Tegan would probably think them skeletons. The sky was very dim, as though the star for this system was threatening to suddenly clip on at any moment. His eyes scanned the horizon and slowly made its way back to the settlement, if that indeed was what it was. The lights were dimmer than he expected, distance and air quality accounted for in the reckoning. However, he had detected a slight change in his senses: auditory, olfactory, and there had been changes to his visual cortex. What he was seeing was a dimly lit settlement, he was sure. But why they needed light in the first place...his infrared vision was outstanding. He assumed theirs was as well...after all, they were of the same species now. It was interesting.
With squinted eyes, she peered into the distance. "That's too far to make tonight. Cripes, how can you see that far?"
"I don't quite know, Tegan. A difference in my visual cortex of some sort, but I agree about the distance," he stated. He glanced at her. In the coming light of the day, she appeared flushed, but he thought it might be a slight overlay of his infrared with his visual. Or...he thought with a sigh...he was seeing her blood in her veins. With a worrying look he glanced at the sky. "In the cave, Tegan."
She sighed and nearly tumbled in with him following quickly.
