A/N: This chapter is terrible, but it's quite short.
Actually, I think it raises more questions than it answers, but they'll all be solved in the next chapter.

DId I mention that I don't own Doctor Who, or did everyone just assume that? I thought so.
Enjoy the confusion.

xxx xxx

"Rrose."

Rose paused at the sound. Was it her name, or just a frog croaking? She turned.

A few yards behind her, Kermk and Pg had stopped. They stared at her, big down-turned smiles on their poke-marked faces.

"What?" Rose demanded.

It was late afternoon, five or six o' clock. Behind them, back in the direction of Ilium Neocort, the sun settled into an ocean of yellow sky. A few feathery cirrus clouds drifted above the mountains.

"Nik vig." Kermk rumbled. He pointed to the ground.

For hours, the Rax brothers had been making a gallant yet vain attempt to be understood by Rose. They seemed to possess the extremely misguided, but all-too-common belief that if they spoke loudly and repeated themselves, she would eventually get it.

"What?" Rose repeated. She looked at the ground. There was nothing especially spectacular about it; it was just the same craggy black rock as the rest of the mountain side, "So what?"

What she really would have like to see was some flat ground. The constant downwards slope of the land made her feel as though she was the one on the angle, or like her brain was gradually being plastered against the front of her skull.

"Nik vig." Kermk croaked.

He squatted on the ground, his sagging belly like a half-full water canteen bloated out over his thighs. Pg crouched down beside him, shrugging out of his travel pack as he did so. Both Rax looked up at her expectantly.

"You want to stop here?" Rose wondered. She followed Kermk's motion of pointing to the ground.

The older Rax brother nodded vigorously. "Vig." He croaked.

"Why?" Rose saw no reason for them to stop. There was at least an hour of day light left. The way she saw it, the more distance they covered each day, the more chance they had of catching up with the traders.

Pg and Kermk exchanged a glance. With the Rax version of a dopey smile, Pg gestured towards the retreating sun, and covered his eyes with his hand. He waved his free hand, as if trying to erase the sun from the sky.

Rose stared at him, baffled. Were they afraid of the sun? Not for the first time since they'd left the colony, Rose wished the Doctor was there to translate. She wondered dimly how he was doing.

"I don't understand." She said, palms up in a helpless gesture, "Why don't we keep moving?"

Kermk's tongue across his thick lips. He rose silently to his feet, and moved closer to her. "Nik vig." He croaked softly. With one hand on her shoulder, Kermk forced Rose to sit.

The power of his thick arms was immense. Muscle coiled like entwined pythons, flexing beneath his baggy skin.

"Okay, okay. We'll stop." Rose got the point. She wasn't going to argue with an alien that could squeeze her 'til she burst.

Kermk flashed her a quick smile, and hurried off to make camp. They had passed the snow line half an hour earlier, and the ground was soft in places. The older Rax first dug a hole in this soft earth, using only his hands. A foot below the surface, he struck the permafrost, that part of the ground that is always frozen, no matter the time of year.

"Good to travel with a female, eh?" Pg grinned at Kermk.

"It's strange," the older Rax replied, widening the hole, "She smells nice, although she is very ugly. Such small hands, eh?"

Pg chuckled. It was a deep, throaty sound, very similar to an evening frog call. Rose had heard it often enough now to distinguish it from conversation, and she glanced suspiciously over at the Rax brothers. Nine times out of ten, they appeared to be laughing at her.

"And smooth skin," Pg rolled his dark watery eyes, "Very ugly. But what a female, eh? Pity there's not more like her around at wet season."

"I see why the Curator didn't want to let her go." Kermk agreed. After much debating about the translation of the Doctor's title, the brothers had come to the agreement that it meant 'curator'. In any Raxacoricotallapatorius society, this was one of the most highly regarded professions, so the translation was adequate.

The hole was finally completed. Rose regarded the camp site gloomily. There was no shelter, only barren rocks, and odd clumps of long, dead grass. They were on the rough, unforgiving part of the land where the melting mountain slopes met the tundra before giving way to the steppes, still miles above the tree line.

"Get that fire going, Pg. Your female looks cold." Kermk laughed. He looked over at Rose, who glared back at him.

"She's smiling. She's always smiling." Pg commented, glancing up at her, "It's nice to see a female who smiles so much. I think Domo Barter will want to buy this one, even without the male."

Rose glared at Kermk a moment longer, than shook her head. What were those morons talking about now?

"I don't know." The older Rax wrenched a clump of dried grass from between a crack in the rocks, and tossed it into the fire pit. "She seems very attached to the Curator. I think that maybe she wouldn't want to be traded without him."

Pg grinned. "I don't think she has much choice. If Domo Barter wants to trade for her, it doesn't matter what she wants. I know what Big Barter said, about us not trading her at all, but I think he really just wants us to get the best deal. You know?"

"Maybe." Kermk gave a non-committal eye-roll, "Or maybe you should just keep you mouth shut, eh? How about that? Eh? Shut up and start the fire."

The brothers were quiet for a while. After a few minutes, flames licked up out of the fire pit, and Rose shuffled over. Kermk hurried off to search for any dry vegetation they could use to keep the fire burning, and Rose was left with Pg grinning at her inanely.

"Hi," he rolled his eyes in an amicable sort of way, "How's the trip been for you so far?"

Rose stared at him blankly. A minute later, when he still hadn't quit grinning at her, she frowned.

"You like me, don't you?" Pg smiled, "That's okay. I understand. And don't worry, I won't tell your male."

"Why can't you two just get it through your thick heads that I don't understand a word you say?" Rose huffed, "Not a single word. Alright?"

Pg leant back, contented. Life was good when he could attract roaming females of a different species. Huhn. All the girls would be after him come wet season, to be sure.

"Pg, you fat head!" Kermk yelled. He trundled back into camp carrying an armload of short, twisted branches, "Get off your lazy coccygeal gland and make the beds! Cook the dinner! Heat the stones! There's work to be done, you know!"

"Yeah, yeah. Keep your claws on." Pg licked his lips, "I'm getting to it."

"You can start by showing Rose how to make the beds. I tell you what, Pg, if I see you sitting around and gazing at trade items again, I'm going to throw you into the fire. Got it?"

"I got it!" the younger Rax exclaimed, "I'll do everything, okay? Relax, brother."

"I'll give you relax." Kermk grumbled, but he dropped the subject.

Once again, the camp was quiet. Pg placed his three-digit hands over Rose's muddy human ones, and very patiently showed her how to unroll and make the beds. The beds were simple, just layered rectangles of pliable skin, but they were warm, and light.

Rose had the unwelcome thought that it was sort of like being snuggled by a Sycorax. Ew.

"Hey, Kermk." Pg, Rax Casanova, said once the beds were made, and the fire was ready for cooking over.

The older Rax looked up from his travel pack. "What?"

"Do you uh, do you," he glanced at Rose, "Do you think she finds us attractive?"

xxx

The Doctor stumbled. He'd been walking for hours. Four hours. No, six hours. Ten hours. A long time, anyway. The stars spread out like spilled sugar across the midnight sky. The wind was chilly, and blew right through him. Cold, very cold.

He'd have to mention that to someone. Turn the air conditioning down, it's turning people into ice blocks. And these steps…!

"Cripes," he muttered, stumbling again. Whoever put all those steps there was damn inconsiderate. The Doctor had been walking down them for hours.

But he knew it wasn't much further. He'd heard voices before. The room must be close now.

To be honest, he didn't care much for the décor. Too many mountains, not enough walls. Not a sign or a information desk in sight.

"Christ!"

His foot slipped, and he toppled forwards, rolling head over heels down the stairs. So many stairs. His head hit the ground, but still he kept falling. He couldn't see now, couldn't hear his own screams.

At last, bruised and aching, he came to a stop. When his vision returned, he glanced around. Was this the hallway?

The Doctor staggered to his feet. His mouth tasted of blood.

"Hello?" he called, lurching forward.

There it was. There was the door.

He was making his way towards it, when a sharp, sudden pain gripped his chest. Oh no. Not when he was so close. The door was only feet away.

"Please." He said, voice soft and pleading. He just had to make it inside that door.

He reached out, and his hand groped empty air. The Doctor stared numbly at the scene in front of him. Then he collapsed.

A long time later, he thought he heard someone call his name. But he couldn't be sure.

xxx

He was walking through a field of white. Snow, perfect and untouched, draped the ground. In some places it was more than a foot deep. The sky was clear from horizon to horizon, and as pale as a shadow on ice.

Rising far over his head, in start contrast to the muted land and sky, were jagged black towers of rock. The sheer sides of the rock spires glistened like polished onyx.

"Why would anyone want to keep this a secret?" he wondered aloud.

He knew he didn't have long there. It would be half an hour at the longest before he was discovered. They monitored these things, they would know. So he had to hurry.

At the opposite end of the field, he found what he was looking for. A curve of bone, most likely a rib, rose nine foot out of the snow. The bone was as hard and white as diamond, but crusted with cartilage.

"Gymnophiona Ichthyophiidae Fossorius-Draconis." He sighed, looking wistfully at the rib, "So it is true."

Sixty feet away, another smaller rib was visible. It was true, then. Nothing could survive on Beta. Not even the desert worm.

The air above him wavered. He regarded it warily.

It was time to go.

xxx

"Rose?"

The Doctor yawned, and rubbed his eyes. Nothing like a good night's sleep to refresh a man. Or a time lord.

"Doctor?"

Rose's voice was shrill and panicked. It warbled strangely, maybe like she was running. The Doctor opened his eyes to a scene of utter chaos. He was in the middle of a small clearing, a fire pit smouldered a few yards away. Dense forest pressed in on every side, turning a dark night even darker.

"Stay down!" Rose screamed. She wasn't the only one running; the two Rax, Kermk and Pg, were scrambling blindly around the clearing, wielding fallen branches.

"How long was I asleep for?" the Doctor wondered to himself. The last thing he remembered clearly was running down the mountain side, searching for Rose. And then dreams, strange dreams.

"There!"

Rose screamed again. She thrust a finger at an apparent random spot in the forest. Kermk and Pg slid to a halt, their heads following the path of her finger.

"Problems?" the Doctor asked, getting to his feet. He stretched, keeping his attitude casual. He didn't want to spoil his good mood by acting all panicked and terrified.

"Yes, problems!" Rose cried, "You picked a bloody inconvenient time to wake up! Look!"

The Doctor looked.

Crashing through the forest, its head rising above the trees like a shark fin slicing through the ocean's surface, a huge, limbless dragon twisted towards them.

"Oh, I see." The Doctor grinned, "Problem."

xxx xxx

See? I told you it was terrible. I really just want to get the plot moving forward, and this is the best way to do it.

By the way, thank you to everyone who reviewed. I love you all!
I love you even if you don't review, but not as much. Tee hee.

Next Chapter; Uhm. Haven't named it yet. Oh well.