Unto the Universe

Chapter Thirty: The Sacred Flame: Fallen in the Shadow

By Lumendea

Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who or any spinoff material, and I gain no income from this story, just the satisfaction of playing with the characters.

….

The Master indulged in a smile as the Doctor slipped back into the den of the witches. It was pleasant to see his old friend run. But also a relief. The Master shuddered as soon as the Doctor was out of sight. The drums in his head were louder than ever since the Monk had grabbed his human form and opened the watch. He was grateful to be restored, but he loathed being reunited with the Monk under such circumstances. The Monk had always been a renegade, ever since the Deca scattered after the Academy, but they'd never been on the same wavelength as it was.

Now the Monk was under the thumb of Eternals, and their plans were a mystery. And Gallifrey was gone. The drums echoed in his empty head, empty save the Monk and the Doctor. The Rani was likely still out there somewhere, hidden as another species like he'd been or knowing her brilliance, tucked away in a pocket universe of her own creation. But for now, it was just the three of them.

"What is the Eternals' interest in the girl?" the Master asked.

"She is a threat to them that they want destroyed," the Monk answered.

"So, you've said. But why is she a threat? She's human, you said."

"Our job is to serve," the Monk reminded him, narrowing dark eyes on the Master. "That is how we will survive."

The Master held back a growl but indulged himself in a glare. This girl was important, but they wouldn't tell him why. That only made him want to know more about her. But he'd seen no photographs or recordings of her. It was hard to imagine the Doctor taking up with a human, or perhaps he should have expected it. With Gallifrey gone, it had only been a matter of time before he crawled back to his precious apes. And now, he was more vulnerable than ever. That thought didn't fill the Master with as much glee as he'd hoped.

He stepped further away from the dark shadow spreading across Karn as ahead of them; a barrier appeared and blocked off the entrance. The Master almost laughed. The Doctor was a fool and truly had lost his senses if he was relying on the power of the witches to protect him and his pet.

…

The Doctor opened the TARDIS with a quick turn of his key and moved to the scanner. Jack was right behind him, lingering in the doorway as a deafening roar shook the mountain. Grabbing the screen, the Doctor was relieved to see that the TARDIS had started a scan. The Time Storm was raging, and it was only a matter of time before the Eternals pulled something else through. The creature already on Karn was all but bursting with rift energy, and the Doctor could only assume that was how it had been imprisoned.

He didn't have time to wonder which rift had held it before the TARDIS zoomed in on the life signs of his fellow Time Lords. They had shifted to the side, away from the beast and the Time Storm. He couldn't be sure if they were getting out of the way of the creature or preparing to do something else.

Why were the Eternals even bothering with the Monk and the Master? Was this creature of theirs too weak or perhaps incapable of grabbing Rose? Was that what they were there for? If so, then the Eternals needed to be careful. The Master wasn't known for his loyalty.

But he needed to stop the Time Storm. It was already large and showing no signs of slowing down. He'd need to build a machine to stop it, and there was no time. The Doctor searched his memory for anything he already had constructed that could help him. Time storms were only natural on Gallifrey, and this was one of the worst he'd ever seen. The Eternals were in total control of it.

"Doctor?" Jack called. "Any plans yet?"

The Doctor didn't answer. Jack's whole body tensed at that. Even on the Game Station, the Doctor had acted like he had a plan, even knowing that it would be incomplete. Jack wasn't angry about that. Hard to be angry about a man throwing everything he had at a problem. But now they had a new problem.

Then the cavern shuddered. Jack leaned out of the TARDIS and looked around. The dramatic flame was burning lower now, and the room was getting colder. He eyed the elegantly decorated walls and carvings, trying to see if anything else was changing. Then the TARDIS began to groan, and the lights around them flickered. Jack looked back to the Doctor, finding a look of shock and fear on his face.

"Doctor, what's happening?" Jack demanded.

"It's the TARDIS!" The Doctor grabbed the screen again. "Her-her life is being drained away!" He looked towards the door. "What is that thing?"

"You don't know?" Jack asked. He was pale now.

"No," the Doctor admitted. The humming of the TARDIS was growing weaker. "Likely an Old One." The words were bitter on his tongue. "Supposedly, survivors of the prior universe who aren't affected by the Laws of the Universe like the rest of us are." The Doctor grit his teeth as the console started beeping. "Anything in its shadow is being drained. The TARDIS and the Sacred Flame. Ohila was right; it is life."

"That makes no sense," Jack said. He frowned and looked at the door. The Doctor saw the moment that Jack made a stupid decision. "I come back to life."

"Jack, this isn't the time to test that."

"It might be the best time to test it," Jack said. "If nothing else, maybe I can keep it busy. Give you and the TARDIS time to think of another solution." The screen beeped, and the TARDIS shuddered. Jack looked at the ceiling fearfully and reached for the door. "I'd kiss you again, but I don't think there's time. See you in Hell."

"If this thing eats life, then I'm an all-you-can-eat buffet."

"Jack! We don't know-"

"Stay back," Jack snapped. "Just stay back, Doctor!"

Jack slipped out of the TARDIS before the Doctor could stop him. Not that the Doctor had offered another solution. They still didn't know why he couldn't die. Jack hoped that he wasn't wrong about this. He'd never gone to fulfill his part of Rose's past, so he'd better be right. Anything else put Rose at risk, and that- that wasn't an option.

He raced for the staircase, moving before he remembered that it had been sealed. A curse escaped him, but then the whole complex shuddered again. A crash up ahead, oddly enough, filled him with hope. He saw the red shimmer of the barrier and kept running towards the entry. Another crash made the rock crumble. Holding out his hand, Jack pushed on the barrier. It shuddered.

"Come on," Jack growled. "Okay, Karn, if you can hear me. Let me through."

"Jack!" the Doctor was right behind. "What are you thinking?"

"This thing feeds on life energy, right?"

"Maybe, we don't know that for sure."

"Doc, I can't die," Jack said carefully. The barrier was shimmering, and the color was dimming. More of the rocky barrier was dissolving at the creature's assault. "If nothing else, I can keep it occupied. Give you time to move the TARDIS and hopefully come up with a plan."

The cavern shuddered. The colours of the barrier were fading fast. Jack spun back to the Doctor. "You need to get back to the TARDIS. Once that barrier goes, who knows how strong the life drain will be. You need to move the TARDIS." The Doctor wanted to argue; Jack saw the Doctor's jaw tightening. "I can't die," Jack said with more calm than he felt. "Go, please."

Then the Doctor nodded. His blue eyes were sharp and angry, on Jack's behalf, he realized with a start. It almost made him smile. The Doctor took off down the stairs, and Jack breathed a little easier. Honestly, the Time Lord was a fool for following him up here. He watched the barrier flicker, urging it to hold on a little longer. Below, the sound of the TARDIS dematerializing made Jack's knees weak. At least the Old Girl had been able to get out. If she died, the Doctor would have been a wreck. And he would have been sad too, even if she knew him as the Dying One. The barrier shuddered, and then it was gone, releasing a blast of icy air on Jack's face as the surface of the Karn was once again exposed.

Pain hit him all at once. With the barrier gone, there was nothing holding back the creature's power. A scream ripped from Jack's throat as he forced himself forward. The shadow covered his body, and his legs gave. He forced his eyes up to stare at the massive creature. It growled and loomed over him as the agony ripped at his chest. Another scream escaped Jack, and his body spasmed.

….

The Doctor's legs were weak by the time he made it back to the TARDIS. Jack wasn't wrong. The defenses of the Sisterhood were holding the effect at bay, but it wouldn't last long. He sparred a thought for the Sacred Flame, but there was no way to remove it from the creature's path. At least, he knew that the flame outside was only the surface manifestation.

He set the controls in record time. The TARDIS was humming softly, weakly beneath his hands. "Come on, Old Girl," he shouted. "Time to run!"

The TARDIS struggled. The Doctor was about to open the grating to get to the lower sections, desperate to find any way to boost the ship's power when the TARDIS's hum increased. He glanced at the scanner. The flame outside was burning brighter than before. Leaning near the scanner, the Doctor had only a moment to wonder what was happening before the scanner went dark and the TARDIS took flight.

They landed a moment later, and the Doctor rushed to the door. He and the TARDIS were to the side of Jack and Abaddon, close enough to see what was happening but not in the shadow. Horror swallowed the Doctor as soon as he took in the situation. His companion, Jack, was crumbled over backwards in the shadow of the creature, screaming as golden light flared across Jack's body.

He started to move closer before catching sight of the Monk and the Master not far away. They were perched on a rocky outcropping. The Master was wringing his hands gleefully while the Monk looked uneasy. Then the light around Jack changed. It grew stronger, becoming beams racing up to the creature. Abaddon roared, its head reeling back as the golden light shimmered across its flesh. The Doctor stayed out of the dark shadow, watching at the strange beast stumbled back as if trying to pull away from Jack. But the light kept pouring out of Jack, rushing up. Jack's screaming grew louder. Abaddon growled and kept trying to back away, but the light coiled around it, holding it in place.

"What is happening!?" the Master shouted. His eyes were still bright with interest and glee.

The beast fell, collapsing to the ground with a pitiful roar. In a flash of light, the body vanished and dissolved into dust. The Doctor exhaled even as his mind spun. His original theory that Jack carried the life energy left from the destroyed Daleks was looking very incorrect. He couldn't track how much life energy the demon had taken, but when combining it with Jack's deaths already and all the people Rose or Bad Wolf had restored on the Game Station and on Earth, the numbers didn't match up.

"What in Rassilon's name is he?" the Master shouted. His eyes were wide with a combination of shock and glee. "What have you been doing with your companions, Doctor?"

The Doctor ignored him, running out to Jack. He glanced up at the Master and the Monk, worried about how close they were. Behind them, the Time Storm was waging, and he could see the shapes of the Eternals within in. Touching Jack, the Doctor waited for him to wake up, but there was no response from the other man. He was cold and still.

…

The tunnel dove deeper into the planet and was rough with jagged rocks. The lit torches of the priestesses lit the way, but Rose noted a faint glow hung in the air. She couldn't see the source of it, and here and there, viney plants were growing across the path. They were deep now and far from even a glimpse of Karn's sun, and yet plants were growing. It was warm thanks to the rocky walls radiating heat.

Ohila had taken Rose's arm, guiding her with a gentle touch and the old Gallifreyan kept glancing in Rose's direction. Rose had the distinct sense that Ohila was waiting for something. What, Rose wasn't quite sure, but her heart was beating faster and faster.

"This path was cleared recently in relative time," Ohila said softly. "A representative of the Time Lords of Gallifrey came here with a Sister of the Fire. That was both centuries ago and mere weeks."

"What happened to the Sister?" Rose asked.

"The Time Lord killed her," Ohila answered. "Karn was under threat by the Daleks, and Rassilon wanted to be sure that they had control over the source of the Elixir of Life. We were fortunate that the Doctor was on the planet and stepped in to keep the Time Lords at bay. Though, Karn itself punished the Time Lord agent who sought to steal the source of the Sacred Flame."

"I'm glad the Doctor was here then," Rose replied.

"He was not. He was on board a ship that crashed, trying to convince the pilot to let him evacuate her. But she knew what the TARDIS was and refused to trust a Time Lord. They both died in the crash."

"And he regenerated?" Rose asked. Something about what Ohila was saying seemed wrong.

"No, he died. We pulled him from the wreckage. Using the Elixir, we were able to restore him for a brief time. I was trying to help him regenerate, but the power of the Sacred Fire reached out to him. It renewed his strength, and he left this planet as the Doctor he had arrived as. In all my years as High Priestess, I'd never seen anything like that before."

Rose knew exactly which Doctor she was referring to. His eighth self with his long brown curls that had been shortened when the Time War started. Her heart ached at the thought of him going through that, of his help being rejected and him dying alone. Rose swallowed back her emotions. He'd been- well, he hadn't been fine, but he'd been saved and had fought on to aid the universe. And the next time he'd been fatally injured, he'd regenerated into her first Doctor.

"We thought he needed to become a warrior," Ohila explained. She sounded wistful. "But in the end, it was the Doctor that the universe needed after all. A man prepared to apply triage to the cosmos."

Rose swallowed at the description, hating how accurate it was. She couldn't imagine her beloved Doctor as a warrior, not really. Needing to become that would have been worse than dying to him, even if the idea of his romantic and idealistic Eighth self fighting in the Time War hurt her deeply. Shaking her head, Rose focused her gaze on the tunnel ahead.

"What do we do when we reach the Heart?" Rose asked.

"Don't you know?" Maerva asked. She turned just enough to look back at Rose with a slight frown. Then she glanced to Ohila. "I thought-"

"Have faith, Maerva," Ohila said. "She knew enough to come with us."

Rose grimaced at those words. They were true. And she didn't like it. There was a pull towards this Heart of Karn, and she'd followed it. Rose had left the Doctor, though she suspected he preferred her moving deeper into the planet right now, and normally she hated to do that. Wandering off, sure, but this wasn't wandering off. This felt more like abandoning her boys.

But that big thing was about to happen. Rose felt it in her bones. A sharp pain made Rose stop, and she covered her heart.

"What is it?" Ohila asked. "Are you alright?"

"I- I don't know."

"High Priestess," one of the sisters said. "I can no longer sense the creature. It has been defeated."

"What of the Doctor?" Ohila asked the sisters. They all joined hands while Rose looked on. Ohila sighed in relief and looked back to Rose. "He lives still."

"What about Jack?" Rose asked.

Ohila hesitated, and that told Rose everything she needed to know. Swallowing her worry, Rose reminded herself that she was still here and Jack was part of her past. It was going to be okay. He was going to be okay. They had to keep going. Stepping past the sisters, Rose nodded to the tunnel ahead of them. Ohila nodded, and the sisters surrounded Rose, resuming their journey deeper into Karn.