5. The Bicx Command Spaceship.
Chloe was thinking of the Bicx Mining Spaceship that she could see out of the hotel room window. She has no interior plans of the spaceship, and just hopes that she doesn't materialise part way through a wall or a floor. Her own meagre regeneration capability may take time to sort that one out! That's time that she doesn't have. She knows the mining will continue once processing of the first batch of mined rocks is complete, so she can't afford to have much down-time!
Chloe's mother, Crystelle, had asked her father, Devyon, to re-develop regeneration using information in Gallifreyan Library records, and he had managed something similar to Gallifreyan regeneration (ref. 12). Family and friends had been the first to benefit, including Crystelle. Chloe had regeneration from birth and had not needed the extensive treatment to change her DNA.
Yet regeneration always took time, even the lesser body rebuilding regenerations. It took time to re-grow tissue, even if the simpler re-growths only took a few minutes.
Chloe finds herself on board the Bicx mining spaceship in a cargo bay - a massive place for storing precious elements mined from the visited planet.
Unfortunately, she's ten feet from the floor! She rolls over quickly as she lands on the floor.
A simple button press opens a nearby door, and she finds herself in a narrow, light grey corridor which has occasional emblems adorning the walls and floor displaying a red right-facing chevron with a white letter "B" overstruck. Immediately Chloe knows it's a Bicx mining spaceship. She had suspected it.
"Who are you?" a rough voice nearby demands from behind her.
Chloe turns around and is instantly grabbed by a burly Bicx miner, one of the staff on board the spaceship.
"Scum!" he says. It seems unlikely that she will get on well with the Bicx miner. He turns and drags Chloe towards a door clearly marked Air Lock.
"You can't space me!" Chloe cries out, struggling. It seems being ejected into the cruel environment of space is a logical next step for these Bicx. No nonsense is tolerated here. No questions asked either!
What would the Doctor do? Chloe thinks quickly as they near the air lock.
"Take me to your leader!" she blurts out quickly.
The burly Bicx miner stops and looks at her. "Doh! Spoilsport!" he says! .
It seems he was looking forward to watching Chloe struggle briefly in space before succumbing to her inevitable demise.
The Bicx miner trudges the other way along the corridor.
Hoping to alleviate the grip on her arm, Chloe forms a new strategy, deciding to take pity on this thug - he seems to have little else to entertain himself!
"You poor thing!" she says, hoping to provoke a response of some sort.
"You what?" The Bicx miner pauses. He has no idea what's happening, it makes no sense to him.
"You haven't got anything else here to entertain you," Chloe ventures. Maybe she can start a flicker of interest or hope in this poor miner.
"Humph," the miner retorts. "And you stopped even that!" He resumes his trudge along the corridor.
"It would only have been brief," Chloe says, hoping he might reduce his vice-like grip on her arm; the pain is growing rather than diminishing. "This way I entertain you for a little longer before I meet your leader?"
"Call this entertainment? Huh. I've a bet with my mate on the longest time a stowaway can last in space - if I chuck it out into space or my mate chucks it out." .
"Are you going to bet with your mate how long I'll last talking to your leader?" Chloe asks, changing track to try to appeal to his tragic, deviant humour. .
"Nah!" the miner says. "You won't last long enough for me to get back to chat with my mate!" .
Several corridors later, Chloe is dumped unceremoniously in front of the Bicx Captain. "Found her in a corridor, stowaway scum!" the Bicx miner says before he goes.
The Bicx Captain looks at Chloe. "I recognise you," he says coolly.
Chloe is alarmed. It's bad enough to be a stowaway in a Bicx mining spaceship, but to have some known history may make things much worse. .
Chloe takes a deep breath, clasps her hands and feels suddenly much more confident. Now is the time to challenge the Bicx Captain; it may be the only time she has! she thinks gloomily as she recovers her thoughts. She recalls being with the Doctor when he had challenged a Bicx officer. Maybe this is him. A Captain Throng, if it is.
"When I last saw you, you were challenged not to take what isn't yours," Chloe says. "You don't own the planet, so don't mine it!" A good challenge, she thinks while starting to plan her escape.
"Oh, but we do," Captain Throng says. A smile spreads across his face. Chloe is alarmed. .
"We took your companion's request into consideration," he says, referring to the Doctor. "What was his name? The something... We bought this planet for a pittance, but we bought it! We just waited for it to be doing badly financially, and we bought it!"
"Did you cause it to do badly financially?" Chloe asks, furious now.
"Might have," Captain Throng weasels. His smile broadens further. "And you aren't going anywhere to tell anyone! I've got you now! You're trapped and you won't leave this ship... apart from into the vacuum of space!" He laughs sonorously.
If Chloe hadn't had her Wristwatch Tardis she would have no chance here. She decides to challenge further before leaving while unobserved. As she challenges the Bicx Captain she paces around, aiming to be near the door at some point in the conversation.
"There are people still on the planet," Chloe challenges Captain Throng. "They are in danger while you are mining. There's also a population of the local fauna which needs to be considered. You must stop mining and start evacuating these beings."
"That isn't a population, it's just staff for one hotel," Captain Throng retorts. "There's no comparison. It isn't millions. No-one will miss them. No-one significant, anyway." .
Chloe is shocked at his attitude! "But they're still here, aren't they? Aren't you going to take them off?"
"No. Far too much bother," he says bombastically.
Chloe is shocked. She reaches a place near the door at that moment. Time for a last challenge.
"Then I'll stop you!"
Chloe takes the last stride to the door, flings it open, steps out into the corridor outside and pulls the door shut behind her.
Unobserved, she thinks of home and activates her Wristwatch Tardis...
What can Chloe do?
At home, Chloe goes to her mother's Tardis and asks about Bicx mining spaceship navigation controls.
A swathe of information embellishes the screen. She learns how to fly the Bicx spaceship. She can take her time and still return to the same moment she left Nolland, or the Bicx spaceship.
She also programs her Wristwatch Tardis with spacetime information about Planet Skelp.
Having acquired this knowledge, she thinks of the Bicx mining spaceship at the time when she first arrived on board and met the Bicx miner. She's hoping for a few minutes to set up the Navigation console before having to use it.
Knowing more about the internal layout of the spaceship now, she thinks of one of the remote Navigation terminals and activates her Wristwatch Tardis...
Arriving near the Navigation terminal she starts to activate it and gain control of the Bicx Mining Spaceship!
What does Chloe have in mind? What can she do?
A few minutes later a security alarm sounds. That'll be me leaving the Bicx Captain, she thinks.
Chloe faces the Navigation console and takes the spaceship out of low hover. She has been wondering how far away from Nolland she should take the spaceship, but however far away she goes, it will be able to get back shortly. In the meantime, maybe the Bicx Captain will start to heed her words - that she will stop them.
A short hop to a neighbouring star might keep them busy for a while. She arranges it, then deactivates the remote Navigation console, returning it to its previous state. She thinks of the hotel room on Nolland where she had last seen Simeon and Violet and activates her Wristwatch Tardis again...
How can Chloe help the Hotel staff and guests?