Last time on The Doctor's Girl:
"Why are we chasing it?" I asked him.
"It's mauve and dangerous. And about 30 seconds from the center of London." he explained. I saw an explosion below me and my grip loosened on the rope. I tried holding on even more but my hands were sweating so bad that I lost my grip and fell screaming. I was zooming feet first down the tunnel of blue light, screaming. The next moment, I fell and was caught by a man with brown hair and kind brown eyes.
"I've got you!" he told me as I coughed. "You're fine."
"Hello." I said breathless.
"Hello." he said looking me up and down.
"Jack Harkness." Jack said shaking the Doctor's hand. "I've been hearing all about you on the way over. It's 1941. The height of the London Blitz. And something else has fallen on London." I smiled and looked at my lap as he pressed a button and stepped to the roof lower themselves into the spaceship.
"He said it was a warship. He stole it. Parked it somewhere out there, somewhere a bomb's gonna fall on it - unless WE make him an offer." I told him.
""It was a con. I was conning you - that's what I am, I'm a con man."
"Don't let them touch you." The Doctor told us.
"What happens if they touch us?" I asked him.
"You're looking at it." he told me. They were all still chanting 'mummy' as they continued to back us against the wall.
The gas-mask people surrounded us in the hospital ward and the boys were in front of me pushing me to the back wall.
"Go to your room." The Doctor told them and they hesitated. "Go to your room!" he ordered them again and the gas-mask people clocked their heads to one side. I looked at Jack and saw him looking back at me before we looked back at the Doctor. "I mean it! I am very, very angry with you. I am very, VERY cross! Go - to - your - ROOM!" he said pointing violently in no particular direction, and miraculously, all the gas-mask people turned meekly away before climbing back into their beds. The Doctor sighed with relief. "I'm really glad that worked. Those would've been TERRIBLE last words." he said turning to me smiling. I hit his arm hard.
"That's just great!" I told him sarcastically sitting down by one of the beds, looking at the gas-mask people. Jack settled down in a chair behind a desk. "Why are they all wearing gas masks?" I asked the Doctor.
"They're not. Those masks are flesh and bone." Jack told me.
"How was your con supposed to work?" the Doctor asked him.
"Simple enough, really. Find some harmless piece of space-junk... let the nearest Time Agent track it back to Earth. Convince him it's valuable, name a price. When he's put 50% up front - oops! A German bomb falls on it, destroys it forever. He never gets to see what he's paid for. Never knows he's been had. I buy him a drink with his own money, and we discuss dumb luck. The perfect self-cleaning con." Jack told us.
"Yeah. Perfect." The Doctor mocked.
"The London Blitz is great for self-cleaners - Pompeii's nice if you want to make a vacation of it though, but you've got to set your alarm for volcano day." Jack said laughing at his own joke. I looked between the Doctor and Jack as Jack's laughter died away. "Getting a hint of disapproval."
"Take a look around the room. This is what your 'harmless piece of space-junk' did." The Doctor told him.
"It was a burnt-out medical transporter - it was empty." Jack told him. I glanced at the Doctor as he looked darkly at Jack and walked off.
"Ash." he called my name.
"We getting out of here?" I asked him.
"We're going upstairs." he told me and I followed him. I heard Jack get up and call after us.
"I even programmed the flight computer so it wouldn't land on anything living - I harmed no-one! I don't know what's happening here, but believe me - I had nothing to do with it." Jack told him.
"I'll tell you what's happening. You forgot to set your alarm clock. It's volcano day." The Doctor told him before a siren went off in the distance.
"What's that?" I asked him.
"The all-clear." Jack told us.
"I wish." The doctor told us leaving the ward with Jack and I on his trail. Eventually we lost him and ran down corridors looking for him.
"Mr Smith?" Jack called.
"Doctor?" I called as we ran past a flight of stairs.
"Have you got a blaster?" I heard the Doctor ask and we skidded to a halt and backtracked to the sound of his voice.
"Sure!" Jack said as we ran up the stairs to find ourselves outside a door.
"The night your space-junk landed, someone was hurt. This was where they were taken." The Doctor told Jack.
"What happened?" I asked him.
"Let's find out." The Doctor told me before turning to Jack. "Get it open." Jack grinned and pointed a gun at the door while the Doctor and I stood back.
"What's wrong with your sonic screwdriver?" I asked him.
"Nothing." he told me and I gave him a look. Jack's gun cut a perfectly square hold around the lock of the door and it squeaked open.
"Where can I get one of those?" I asked him.
"Sonic blaster, 51st century. Weapon Factories of Villengard?" The Doctor asked him.
"You've been to the factories?" Jack asked him. The Doctor took the gun from Jack and looked at it.
"Once." he told him.
"Well, they gone now. Destroyed. The main reactor went critical. Vapourized the lot." I looked to the Doctor knowing he must have had something to do with it.
"Like I said - once. There's a banana grove there, now. I like bananas. Bananas are good." The Doctor told him giving the blaster back. He smiled pleasantly at Jack and entered the room. I stopped at the door and admired the square hole.
"Nice blast pattern." I told him.
"Digital." he told me smirking.
"Squareness gun." I said smiling.
"Yeah." he told me.
"I like it." I told him walking into the room with the Doctor. The Doctor switched a light on and I was surprised by the room looking vandalized. The window was broken and there was stuff all over the floor.
"What d'you think?" the Doctor asked us as we looked around.
"SOMETHING got out of here..." Jack told him.
"Yeah. And?" the Doctor asked.
"Something powerful. Angry." Jack described.
"Powerful and angry." The Doctor repeated as Jack entered a room off to the side and I followed him. The floors and walls were covered with a child's drawings. There were a few toys on the floor and a little bed in the corner.
"A child? I suppose this explains 'mummy'." Jack said.
"How could a child do this?" I asked looking at the Doctor as he played a tape of something talking to a child.
"Do you know where you are?" the man asked.
"Are you my mummy?" the child asked.
"Are you aware of what's around you? Can you... see?" the man asked the child.
"Are you my mummy?" the child asked him again.
"What do you want? Do you know-" the man was interupted by the child.
"I want my mummy. Are you my mummy? I want my mummy! Are you my mummy?" the child continued asking as I looked at all the pictures. All of them were of a child's mother. "Are you my mummy? Mummy? Mummy?"
"Doctor, I've heard this voice before." I told him.
"Me too." the Doctor told me.
"Mummy?" the child called out.
"Always, "are you my mummy?". Like he doesn't know." Jack said.
"Mummy?" the child asked.
"Why doesn't he know?" I asked.
"Are you there, mummy? Mummy?" the child asked. "Mummy? Please, mummy? Mummy?" The Doctor was pacing around the room.
"Doctor?" I said, curious to his thoughts.
"Can you sense it?" the Doctor asked us.
"Sense what?" Jack asked him.
"Coming out of the walls, can you feel it?" the Doctor asked us.
"Mummy?" the child called once more. The Doctor stopped pacing to look at us.
"Funny little human brains, how do you get around in those things?" The Doctor asked us.
"When he's stressed, he likes to insult species." I told Jack.
"Ash, I'm thinking." the Doctor told me pacing.
"Cuts himself shaving, does half an hour in life forms he's cleverer than." I finished.
"There are these children living rough around the bomb site. They come out during air-raids looking for food." The Doctor told us.
"Mummy, please?" The child asked.
"Suppose they were there when this thing - whatever it was - landed?" the Doctor suggested.
"It was a med-ship. It was harmless." Jack told us.
"Yes, you keep saying. 'Harmless'. Suppose one of them was affected - altered?" The Doctor asked.
"Altered how?" I asked him.
"I'm here!" the child said as a noise kept sounding in the background.
"It's afraid. Terribly afraid, and powerful. It doesn't know it yet, but it will do." The Doctor said with a small laugh. "It's got the power of a god, and I just sent it to its room." The noise got louder in my ears. A loud crackling noise.
"Doctor..." I said, fear filling my entire being.
"I'm here. Can't you see me?" the child said.
"What's that noise?" I asked him.
"End of the tape. It ran out about 30 seconds ago." the Doctor said and my eyes widened.
"I'm here, now. Can't you see me?" the child asked.
"I sent it to it's room. THIS is its room." The Doctor said spinning around and we saw the child standing by the tape machine.
"Are you my mummy?" he asked cocking his head to one side, staring at me. "Mummy?"
"Doctor?" I asked as the child came towards us.
"Okay... on my signal... make for the door. NOW!" Jack violently produced a banana and pointed it threateningly at the child. I saw the Doctor grin and produce Jack's gun, blasting a square hole in the wall.
"Go! Now! Don't drop the banana!" the Doctor called to us.
"Why not?!" Jack asked jumping through the hole after me.
"Good source of potassium!" the Doctor called to us. We found ourselves in a corridor with the child approaching us from inside his room.
"Give me that!" Jack said taking his gun from the Doctor.
"Are you my mummy?" the child asked. Jack pointed the gun at the wall and it rebuilt itself, blocking the child out.
"Digital rewind." Jack said tossing the banana back to the Doctor. "Nice switch."
"It's from the Groves of Villengard. I thought it was appropriate." the Doctor told him.
"There's really a banana grove in the heart of Villengard and you did that?" Jack asked him.
"Bananas are good." The Doctor said simply. The wall we just ran through cracked.
"Doctor!" I said, scared.
"Come on!" the Doctor grabbed my hand and we rushed down a flight of stairs and down another corridor, before we encountered all the patients burst out of the ward calling 'mummy'. We hastily backtracked but we found the gas-mask people coming from the direction we were headed. We found ourselves back at the point where we started, where the child was breaking through the wall.
"It's keeping us here so it can get at us." the Doctor said, holding my hand tightly.
"It's controlling them?" Jack asked pointing his gun at the people.
"It IS them. It's every living thing in this hospital." The Doctor told us.
"Okay. This can function as a sonic blaster, a sonic cannon, and a triple-enfolded sonic disrupter. Doc, what you got?" Jack asked him. the Doctor pulled out of his pocket and waved it at the gas-mask people.
"A sonic, er... oh, never mind." the Doctor told him.
"What?" Jack asked him.
"It's sonic, okay? Let's leave it at that." The Doctor told him.
"Disrupter? Cannon? What?" Jack asked him.
"It's sonic! Totally sonic! I am sonic-ed up!" The Doctor said trying to get him to stop asking.
"A sonic WHAT?!" Jack yelled at him.
"SCREWDRIVER!" The Doctor shouted back at him. Jack spun around to face the Doctor the same moment the child finally managed to punch through the wall. He began to climb out through the hold and I grabbed Jack's wrist and made him point the sonic blaster to the floor.
"Going down!" I called out as I blasted a hole n the floor. We all fell into a messy heap on the floor below where we'd been standing. Jack hurriedly activated the digital rewind, closing the hole so we couldn't be followed. "Doctor, are you okay?" I asked him, helping him up.
"Could've used a warning!" he told me.
"A simple thank you will do." I told him as Jack got up and stared at the Doctor.
"Who has a sonic screwdriver?" Jack asked him.
"I do!" The Doctor told him.
"Light!" I said looking around.
"Who looks at a screwdriver and thinks "oohoo, this could be a little more sonic"?" Jack asked him.
"What, you've never been bored?" The Doctor asked him.
"There's gotta be a light switch!" I said looking for a light switch on the wall.
"Never had a long night? Never had a lot of cabinets to put up?" The Doctor asked him. I finally found a light switch and turned on the lights. We saw gas-mask people in the beds sit up and start calling for 'mummy'.
"Door." Jack said and we rushed to the door as the patients start getting out of bed. When we tried to open it we found it locked. Jack tried to blast it but his sonic blaster didn't work. "Damn it!" He said stepping back, allowing the Doctor to use his sonic screwdriver instead. He whacked the sonic blaster angrily. "It's the special features, they really drain the battery."
"The battery?!" I asked him shocked. The Doctor opened the door and we dashed through it. "That's so LAME." I told Jack as the Doctor slammed the door shut behind us and locked it with his screwdriver.
"I was gonna send for another one, but SOMEBODY'S gonna blow up the factory." Jack said looking pointedly at the Doctor.
"Oh, I know - first day I met him, he blew my job up. That's practically how he communicates." I told Jack laughing a bit.
"Okay, that door should hold it for a bit." the Doctor told us.
"The door?! The WALL didn't stop it!" Jack told him.
"Well, it's gotta FIND us first! Come on, we're not done yet! Assets, assets!" The Doctor said.
"Well, I've got a banana, and at a pinch you could put up some shelves." Jack said sitting in a chair.
"Window-" The Doctor said going to the window.
"Barred, sheer drop outside. Seven stories." Jack told him.
"And no other exits." I told them.
"Well, the assets conversation went in a flash, didn't it?" Jack told him. The Doctor turned and eyed him for a moment before turning to me.
"So, where'd you pick this one up, then?" He asked me.
"Doctor..." I said warning him slightly.
"She was hanging from a barrage balloon, I had an invisible spaceship. I never stood a CHANCE." Jack told him and I looked from one man to the other.
"Okay, one, we want to get out of here. Two, we CAN'T get out of here. Have I missed anything?" the Doctor as turning back to the window. I looked in Jack's direction and didn't see him.
"Yeah... Jack just disappeared." I said looking to the Doctor. The Doctor spun around to see Jack's empty chair next to me. The Doctor sat in the chair Jack had vacated and I walked to him and placed my hand on his shoulder.
"Okay, so he's vanished into thin air. Why is it the GREAT looking ones who do that?" I asked him. I saw the Doctor look up at me from his seat and gave me a look.
"I'm making an effort not to be insulted." he told me and I smiled slightly.
"I mean human men." I told him.
"Okay. Thanks. That REALLY helped." he told me sarcastically.
"Hey. I love you and nothing's going to change that." I told him and he smiled down at me. An old radio sprang to life and Jack's voice transmitted through it.
"Ashlee? Doctor? Can you hear me?" We both hurried over to the radio and the Doctor picked it up. "I'm back on my ship. Used the emergency teleport. Sorry I couldn't take you." The Doctor held the wire that had been ripped out of the radio. "It's security-keyed to my molecular structure. I'm working on it - hang in there."
"How're you speaking to us?" The Doctor asked him.
"Om-Com. I can call anything with a speaker grille." Jack told him.
"Now there's a coincidence." The Doctor said to himself.
"What is?" Jack asked him.
"The Child can Om-Com too." the Doctor told us.
"He can?" I asked him and he nodded at me.
"Anything with a speaker grille. Even the TARDIS phone." he said.
"What, you mean the Child can phone us?" I asked him.
"And I can hear you. Coming to find you. Coming to fiiiiind you." The child said in a sing song voice.
"Doctor, can you hear that?" Jack asked us.
"Loud and clear." the Doctor told him.
"I'll try to block out the signal. Least I can do." Jack told him.
"Coming to find you, mummy!" the child told us and I looked up at the Doctor to see him looking down at me.
"Remember this one, Ashlee?" Jack asked as Glenn Miller's Moonlight Serenade played through the radio. I looked from the Doctor to the radio then back to the man beside me to see him looking at me questioningly.
"We danced to this song on his spaceship." I told him. The Doctor nodded but his face showed that he didn't like the fact that I was so close to Jack when he wasn't there. He walked over to the window and began using his sonic screwdriver on the concrete next to the bars. I sat in the chair both men had sat in and began to shuffle around in it, bored. I spun the chair to face the door before going to back to the face the Doctor.
"What you doing?" I asked him.
"Trying to set up a resignation pattern in the concrete. Loosen the bars." he told me.
"You don't think he's coming back, do you?" I asked him.
"Wouldn't bet my life." he told me.
"Why don't you trust him?" I asked him.
"Why do you?" he asked turning to me.
"Saved my life. Bloke-wise, that's up there with flossing." I told him. The Doctor never answered me and looked back at the window. "I trust him 'cos he's like you. Except with dating and dancing." I told him and he shook his head at me. "What?"
"You just assume I'm..." The Doctor didn't finish his sentence.
"What?" I asked him, wanting him to correct me.
"You just assume that I don't... dance." The Doctor said sounding vulnerable.
"What, are you telling me you DO... dance?" I asked him grinning. I knew what he really meant and what he was saying. He was talking about dancing but also dating.
"Nine hundred years old, me. I've been around a bit. I think you can assume that at some point I've DANCED." he told me and I grinned even more.
"You?!" I asked him.
"Problem?" he asked me.
"Doesn't the universe implode or something if you... dance?" I asked him cocking my head to the side a bit.
"Well, I've got the moves but I wouldn't want to boast." he told me and my grin widened. I stopped shuffling around in my chair and got up. I walked to the radio and turned up the music looking at the Doctor. He turned to look at me and I walked up to him, slowly, flirting a bit. He looked determinedly back to the wall as I held out my hand to him.
"You've got the moves?" I asked him. and he looked back at me. "Show me your moves." I told him.
"Ash, I'm trying to resonate concrete." he reminded me.
"Jack'll be back, he'll get us out. So come on - the world doesn't end 'cos the Doctor dances." I told him not lowering my hand. He snapped off his sonic screwdriver, replaced it in his jacket and stepped away from the window towards me, an odd expression on his face. He stood in front of me for a moment and took my hands in his and I stared up at him. He turned my hands over and looked at me.
"Barrage balloon?" he asked me and I looked at him confused.
"What?" I asked him as he turned my hands over.
"You were hanging from a barrage balloon." he reminded me.
"Oh... yeah. About two minutes after you left me. Thousands of feet above London - middle of a German air-raid - Union Jack ALL over my chest." I told him and he raised his eyebrows at me.
"I've traveled with a lot of people, but you're setting new records for jeopardy-friendly." he told me.
"What can I say? I like playing the damsel in distress and having a white knight save me." I joked with him as he was examining my hands. "Is this you dancing? 'Cos I've got notes." I told him going back to our last conversation.
"Hanging from a rope a thousand feet above London. Not a cut, not a bruise." he said showing me my hands.
"Yeah, I know. Captain Jack fixed me up..." I told him looking from my hands to him.
"Oh, we're calling him 'Captain Jack' now, are we?" He asked me.
"Well, his name's Jack and he's a captain..." I said dropping off my sentence.
"He's not really a captain, Ash." he told me, smiling in a self-satisfied way.
"D'you know what I think? I think you're experiencing Captain envy." I said and he half nodded, not denying anything. He takes my hand and we began to dance. "You'll find your feet at the end of your legs. You may care to move them." I told him.
"If ever he was a captain, he's been defrocked." he told me as we stood close together.
"Yeah? Shame I missed that." I told him, smiling.
"Actually, I quit. Nobody takes my frock." Jack said. I turned and looked around and saw we were in his spaceship. We quickly separated from each other and continued looking around.
"Most people notice when they've been teleported. You guys are so sweet. Sorry about the delay. I had to take the nav-com offline to override the teleport security." Jack told us.
"You can spend ten minutes overriding your own protocols? Maybe you should remember whose ship it is." The Doctor told him.
"Oh, I do. She was GORGEOUS." Jack told him and I smiled at him. "Like I told her - be back in five minutes." Jack ducked into a compartment underneath the console as the Doctor looked around.
"This is a Chula ship." the Doctor said.
"Yeah, just like that medical transporter. Only, this one IS dangerous." Jack called up to us. The Doctor snapped his fingers and his hand was instantly surrounded by lights.
"They're what fixed my hands up! Jack called 'em, um..." I struggled to remember the word.
"Nanobots? Nanogenes." The Doctor offered words.
"Nanogenes, yeah." I told him.
"Sub-atomic robots. There's millions of them in here, see? Burned my hand on the console when we landed - all better now. They activate when the bulk head's sealed. Check you out for damage, fix any physical flaws." The Doctor told me and I beamed at him. The Doctor banished the nanogenes with a wave of his hand and turned to Jack who came back up. "Take us to the crash site. I need to see your space junk."
"As soon as I get the nav-com back online." Jack told him like he was being nagged and the Doctor looked mildly annoyed with him. "Make yourself comfortable. Carry on with whatever it was you were doing." he said gesturing to the two of us.
"We were talking about dancing!" the Doctor said innocently.
"It didn't look like talking." Jack told him.
"Didn't feel like dancing." I told him and he looked at me naively. It was a new look for him.
I was sitting and talking with Jack as he worked. Jack had been sitting in the pilot seat and had been telling me how he turned into a con man with the Doctor behind me.
"So, you used to BE a Time Agent - now you're trying to con them?" I asked him making sure I understood his tale.
"If it makes me sound any better, it's not for the money." he told me.
"For what?" I asked him.
"Woke up one day when I was working for them - found they'd stolen two years of my memories. I'd like them back." he told me.
"They stole your memories?" I asked, sorrow filling my eyes.
"Two years of my life. No idea what I did. Your friend over there doesn't trust me. And for all I know... he's right not to." Jack told me and I looked at the Doctor before looking back at Jack smiling. The computer the bleeped. "Okay, we're good to go. Crash site?" Jack asked as the Doctor joined us.
The Doctor, Jack and I walked over the rail station near the bombsite and we peered over the barbed wire.
"There it is." Jack said. "Ay, they've got Algy on duty. Must be important."
"We've gotta get past." the Doctor told us.
"The words 'distract the guard' head in my general direction?" I asked them.
"I don't think that'd be such a good idea." Jack told me.
"Don't worry... I can handle it." I told him thinking he was worried about me.
"I've got to know Algy quite well since I've been in town. Trust me. You're not his type. I'll distract him." Jack said walking away. "Don't wait up." and like that he was gone. I looked at the Doctor and he grinned at me.
"Relax, he's a 51st century guy. He's just a bit more flexible when it comes to dancing." he told me and I gave him a look.
"HOW flexible?" I asked him.
"Well, by his time, you lot have spread out across half the galaxy." he told me.
"Meaning?" I asked him again.
"So many species, so little time..." The Doctor said grinning.
"What, that's what we do when we get out there? That's our mission? We seek new life, and..." I couldn't get the word out of my mouth.
"Dance." The Doctor sniggered at me as we watched Jack do his work. We watched as Algy coughed and fell to his knees before Jack. Jack moved back and we watched as his face transformed into a gas mask. The Doctor and I hurried over as did the other soldiers.
"Stay back!" The Doctor called to them.
"You men! Stay away!" Jack ordered them. When we got to Jack Algy was lying on the floor, lifeless and I stared at him in shock.
"The effect's become air-borne. Accelerating." The Doctor said looking around.
"What's keeping US safe?" I asked him.
"Nothing." He told me.
"That's just great." I said as we heard the air-raid siren sound.
"Ah, here they come again." Jack said looking at the sky.
Great, that's all we need. Wait, didn't you say a bomb was gonna land... HERE?" I asked him getting scared again. Jack nodded and I heard someone singing very lightly.
"Never mind about that. If the contaminants air-borne now, there's hours left." The Doctor told us.
"For what?" Jack asked him.
"'Til nothing. 'Til forever. For the entire human race. And can anyone else hear singing?" he asked us and we went towards the source of the song. We found a shed where the girl's voice was coming from.
"Rock-a-by baby, on the tree tops, when the wind blows the cradle will rock. When the bough breaks the cradle will fall, and down will come baby, cradle and all." We opened the door, making it creak, we peaked our heads in and saw a girl sitting at a table with a gas-mask person laying his head on the table. The girl turned her head sharply to us and the Doctor motioned for her to continue singing and she did. "Rock-a-by baby..." she moved her hand showing she was cuffed to the table. "... on the tree tops, when the wind blows the cradle will rock..." The Doctor approached her, taking his sonic screwdriver out of his jacket pocket. He flicked it on and began to unlock the cuffs as Jack and I watched from the doorway. The cuffs snapped open and Nancy stood. They both came towards the door and we all ran to the crash site.
"Hello, my name is Ashlee. What's yours?" I asked her.
"Nancy." she told me as the boys uncovered the Chula med-ship while Nancy and I stood back watching them.
"You see? Just an ambulance." Jack told us.
"That's an ambulance?" Nancy asked him.
"It's hard to explain, it's... it's from another world." I told her putting my arm around her shoulders.
"They've been trying to get in." Jack said messing with some controls.
"Of COURSE they have." The Doctor told him as Jack began to enter a code. "They think they've got their hands on Hitler's latest secret weapon. What're you doing?"
"Well, the sooner you see this thing is empty, the sooner you'll see I had nothing to do with it." Jack told him. The controls then exploded with sparks and we all jumped back as an alarm went off. "Didn't happen last time."
"It hadn't crashed last time. They're the emergency protocols." The Doctor told him.
"Doctor, what IS that?" I asked him as I watched a red light flash. After a while I saw the gates start to shake. "Doctor!"
"Captain, secure those gates!" The Doctor told him.
"Why?" Jack asked him.
"Just do it!" The Doctor ordered and Jack obeyed then the Doctor turned towards Nancy. "Nancy, how'd you get in here?"
"I cut the wire." she told him.
"Show Ashlee." he said tossing me his sonic. "Setting two thousand four hundred and twenty eight D."
"What?" I asked him.
"Reattaches barbed wire. Go!" he said and we tore off to reconnect the barbed wire. When we got to the wire Nancy held the wire she cut together and I turned on the screwdriver to the wire, reattaching it. We moved to the next one up.
"Who are you? Who are any of you?" Nancy asked me as we worked.
"You'd never believe me if I told ya." I told her.
"You just told me that was an ambulance from another world. There are people running around with gas-mask heads calling for their mummies, and the sky's full of Germans dropping bombs on me. Tell me. Do you think there's anything left I couldn't believe?" She asked me and I looked at her, understanding what she was saying.
"We're time travelers from the future." I told her.
"Mad, you are." she told me.
"We have a time travel machine - seriously!" I told her, trying to make her believe me.
"It's not that. All right - you've got a time travel machine. I believe ya. Believe anything, me." she told me looking up to the sky. "But what future?" she asked as explosions happened in mid-air. Plains soared around us, dropping bombs everywhere.
"Nancy, this isn't the end. I know how it looks. But it's not the end of the world or anything..." I told her.
"How can you say that? LOOK at it." She told me.
"Listen to me. My family was BORN in this city. My entire family is from here, in like, 50 years time." I told her.
"From here?" she asked me and I smiled at her.
"We're a Londoner. From your future." I told her.
"But... but you're not..." she said breaking off.
"What?" I asked her.
"German." she said.
"Nancy, the Germans don't come here. They don't win." I told her and she looked at me confused. "Don't tell anyone I told you so, but do you know what? YOU win." I told her.
"We win?" she asked me, hope in her voice. I nodded to her smiling and she laughed.
"Come on!" I told her and after we finished our work we jumped to our feet and headed back to the Doctor and Jack. Jack opened the hatch of the med-ship as we drew closer.
"It's empty. Look at it." Jack told the Doctor as we joined them.
"What do you expect in a Chula medical transporter? Bandages? Cough drops? Rose?" he asked me.
"I dunno." I told him.
"Yes, you do." he said holding up his hand.
"Nanogenes!" I said getting his clue.
"It wasn't empty, Captain. There was enough nanogenes in there to rebuild a species." the Doctor told Jack. Jack's face paled understanding what the Doctor was saying.
"Oh, God." Jack said.
"Getting it now, are we? When the ship crashes, the nanogenes escape. Billions upon billions of them, ready to fix all the cuts and bruises in the whole world. But what they find first is a dead child, probably killed earlier that night and wearing a gas-mask." The Doctor told him.
"And they brought him back to life? They can DO that?" I asked him.
"What's life? Life's easy. A quirk of matter. Nature's way of keeping meat fresh. Nothing to a nanogene. One problem, though - these nanogenes - they're not like the ones on your ship. This lot have never seen a human being before. Don't know what a human being's supposed to look like. All they've got to go on is one little body, and there's not a lot left. But they carry right on. They do what they're programmed to do, they patch it up. Can't tell what's gas-mask and what's skull, but they do their best. Then off they fly - off they go, work to be done. 'Cos you see NOW they THINK they know what people should look like and it's time to fix all the rest. And they won't ever stop. They won't ever, ever stop. The entire Human Race is gonna be torn down and rebuilt in the form of one terrified child looking for its mother, and NOTHING in the world can stop it!" The Doctor told us, his voice had risen almost shouting at at us.
"I didn't know." Jack told him and the Doctor fixed him with a cold stare for a few seconds before going back to examining the med-ship. I watched the Doctor work with his sonic on the med-ship and saw Nancy move back a little.
"Rose?" I heard Nancy call to me, scared. I rushed to her side and followed her gaze to see the gas-mask people stumbling toward us over the rail-track. they were quite a distance away, but still to close for comfort. I ran back to the med-ship and looked again at the flashing red light on the control panel.
"It's bringing the gas-mask people here, isn't it?" I asked the Doctor.
"The ship thinks it's under attack. It's calling up the troops. Standard protocol." he told me.
"But... the gas-mask people aren't troops..." I reminded him.
"They are now. This is a battle-field ambulance. The nanogenes don't just fix you up - they get you ready for the front line. Equip you, program you." The Doctor told me.
"That's why the Child's so strong. Why it could do that phoning thing." I said, understanding a bit more now.
"It's a fully equipped Chula warrior, yes. All that weapons tech in the hands of a hysterical four year old - looking for his mummy. And now there's an army of them." The Doctor told me as the gas-mask people surrounded the fence. The four of us looked around nervously.
"Why don't they attack?" Jack asked him.
"Good little soldiers. Waiting for their commander." The Doctor told him.
"The child?" Jack asked him.
"Jamie." Nancy told Jack.
"What?" Jack asked her.
"Not 'the child'. Jamie." Nancy told him, glaring at him as the Doctor and I looked at her.
"So, how long until the bomb falls?" I asked Jack.
"Any second." he told me.
"What's the matter, Captain? Bit close to the volcano for you?" the Doctor asked him.
"He's just a little boy." Nancy said and I put my arm around her shoulders trying to comfort her.
"I know." I know I told her.
"He's just a little boy who wants his mummy." Nancy said putting her head on my shoulder.
"I know. There isn't a little boy born who wouldn't tear the world apart to save his mummy. And this little boy can." The Doctor told her.
"So what're we gonna DO?" I asked him.
"I don't know." he told me and I sighed and looked down at Nancy to see tears in her eyes.
"It's my fault." she told us.
"No, sweetheart. It's not your fault." I told her.
"It is. It's all my fault." she said.
"How can it be your-" The Doctor started asked her gently but he broke off. I held her to me more as we looked at the gas-mask people positioned behind the fence calling for their mummies - and I saw the Doctor turn back to Nancy and me. Nancy was sobbing uncontrollably into my shoulder as he stared at us.
"Nancy, what age are you? Twenty? Twenty-one? Older than you look, yes?" the Doctor asked her and I looked at him confused as a bomb landed nearby.
"Doctor - that bomb. We've got seconds." Jack said as another bomb landed.
"You can teleport us out." I said.
"Not you guys. The nav-com's back online. Gonna take too long to override the protocols." Jack told me.
"So it's volcano day. Do what you've got to do." The Doctor told him, his eyes fixed on Nancy.
"Jack?" I said looking at him feeling betrayed. He looked at me with sorrow in his eyes before teleporting himself out.
"How old were you five years ago? Fifteen? Sixteen? Old enough to give birth, anyway." The Doctor said and I looked down at the girl I was holding. Nancy, still sobbing, glanced up at him and then away again, as though ashamed. "He's not your brother, is he?" Nancy shook her head. "A teenage single mother in 1941. So you hid. You lied." she nodded again, tears streaming down her face. "You even lied to him." The gates swung open and the child stood in the forefront of an army of gas-mask people, ready to charge.
"Are you my mummy?"
"He's gonna keep asking, Nancy. He's never gonna stop. Tell him." the Doctor told her and she looked at her son as the gas mask people began to walk forward. "Nancy... the future of the human race is in your hands. Trust me... and tell him." she sniffed, still tearful, as the child approached us.
"Are you my mummy?" Nancy got out from under my arm and started walking forward then stopped. The Doctor gave Nancy a gentle push and she moved forward. I moved to stand next to the Doctor and held his hand.
"Are you my mummy? Are you my mummy?"
"Yes." she whispered before continuing stronger. "Yes. I AM your mummy." she faced him and he walked forward slowly.
"Mummy?" he asked her.
"I'm here." she told him.
"Are you my mummy?" he asked again.
"I'm here." she said.
"Are you my mummy?"
"Yes." she whispered again.
"He doesn't understand. There's not enough of him left." the Doctor told me.
"I am your mummy. I will always be your mummy. I'm so sorry." she told him and she took him into her arms. The nanogenes surrounded them, making both of them glow with a golden light. "I am so, so sorry."
"What's happening?" I asked the Doctor watching Nancy and Jamie. "Doctor, it's changing her, we should-" I said trying to go to Nancy but he held me back.
"Shh!" he stared intently at the two of them surrounded by the nanoges. "Come on, please. Come on, you CLEVER little nanogenes - figure it out! The mother. She's the mother! There's gotta be enough information, figure it out!" The Doctor begged.
"What's happening?" I asked him.
"See? Recognizing the same DNA." The Doctor told me pointing to the nanogenes. Nancy fell away from her child to the ground as the nanogenes disappeared. The Doctor and I rushed over and I helped Nancy up as the Doctor stared down at the child. "Oh, come on. Give me a day like this. Give me this one." He reached out to the gas-mask and removed it, revealing a perfectly ordinary, very sweet little boy underneath. Nancy stared in delight as the Doctor laughed ecstatically. He lifted the little boy into the air, swinging him around as I laughed. "Ah-ha-ha! Welcome back! Twenty years 'til pop music - you're gonna love it." with that said he hugged the little boy laughing.
"What happened?" Nancy asked the Doctor in wonder.
"The nanogenes recognised the superior information - the parent DNA. They didn't change YOU because YOU changed them! Haha!" The Doctor said plonking Jamie down in front of his mother. "Mother knows best!"
"Don't let
Mum hear you say that." I told him and he laughed at me pulling me close to him.
"Jamie...!" Nancy said tearfully before a bomb landed nearby.
"Doctor, that bomb..." I said bringing his attention to it.
"Taken care of it." he told me.
"How?" I asked him.
"Psychology!" he told me gesturing to the mother and son in front of us. I looked up and saw the bomb coming down to us fast and was suddenly snatched out of the air by a blue force field. Jack suddenly appeared hovering in the tunnel of light calling down to us.
"Doctor!" Jack called.
"Good lad!" the Doctor told him.
"The bomb's already commenced detonation. I've put it in stasis but it won't last long." Jack told him.
"Change of plan - don't need the bomb. Can you get rid of it? Safely as you can?" The Doctor asked him.
"Ashlee?" he called to me.
"Yeah?" I called up to him.
"Goodbye." he said disappearing. I looked at where he had been confused. Why was he saying goodbye? He then reappeared. "By the way - love the tee-shirt." he said grinning and I returned it. He disappeared again then his ship zoomed off into the night sky. The Doctor walked forward a few paces away from the three of us, staring intently at his hands. He then summoned the nanogenes and the fluttered around his hands.
"What're you doing?" I asked him.
"Software patch. Gonna email the upgrade. You want moves, Ash? I'll give you moves." he told me then he threw the nanogenes away from him, towards the gas-masked people who were still milling around on the train track. The Doctor gave his widest grin as the people fell to the floor, the nanogenes surrounding them. "Everybody lives, Ash. Just this once. Everybody lives!" he said and I grinned widely at him as the gas-mask people got to their feet - except they were no longer gas-mask people. They were restored to normal human being. The Doctor bound over to a man in a white lab coat. I watched him talk with him while standing next to Nancy who was holding her son close to her. The Doctor bound back to us with a large grin on his face. He came up to me and hugged me tightly before kissing me lightly. He then jumped on top of the Chula med-ship and looked out to the group.
"Right, you lot! Lots to do! Beat the Germans, save the world - don't forget the Welfare State!" he told them and I saw the man in the lab coat smile before he and everyone else walked away including Nancy and Jamie. The Doctor bent down over the controls and he began to speak to me. "Setting this to self-destruct, soon as everybody's clear. History says there was an explosion here. Who am I to argue with history?"
"Usually the first in line." I told him grinning. He look at me and grinned back.
The Doctor and I entered the TARDIS, the Doctor still chatting away happily.
"The nanogenes will clean up the mess and switch themselves off - because I just told them to. Nancy and Jamie will go to Doctor Constantine for help - ditto - all in all, all things considered - fantastic!" he said and I smiled at his enthusiasm.
"Look at you, beaming away like you're Father Christmas!" I said.
"Who says I'm not, family-together-every-year?" he told me and I was shocked.
"What?!" I asked him.
"And everybody lives, Ash! Everybody lives! I need more days like this." he said dancing around the console.
"Doctor..." I said thinking of everyone.
"Go on, ask me anything. I'm on FIRE!" he said grinning.
"What about Jack?" I asked him. His smile faded and he carried on working as though he didn't want to answer me. "Why'd he say goodbye?" I asked him and received no answer. The Doctor stared intently at the console. "We can't just let him die." I told him walking up to him. He looked me in the eye and sighed.
"Alright, you win." he told me and pressed some buttons on the console. He started some music and held his out for me. I smiled and took it and we danced awkwardly as the TARDIS took us to Jack. We stopped and the Doctor opened the doors of the TARDIS and I watched as Jack spun around.
"Well, hurry up then!" I called out to him and the Doctor turned me so I couldn't look at him. I heard him leap to his feet and dashed into the TARDIS as we continued to waltz to Moonlight Serenade. He'd been dancing to badly that I was trying to teach him what I knew. "Right, and turn..." The Doctor spun me and got my arm twisted at my back. "Okay, okay, try and spin me again, but this time - don't get my arm up my back!" I told him and looked at me sheepishly. "No extra points for a half-nelson."
"I'm SURE I used to know this stuff." He told me looking put out. "Close the door, will you. Your ship's about to blow up - there's gonna be a draft." he told Jack as I grinned and leaned against one of the pillars. The Doctor flicked a switch and the engines started up. "Welcome to the TARDIS."
"Much bigger on the inside..." Jack said looking around.
"You'd better be." The Doctor told him and I walked to him.
"I think what the Doctor's TRYING to say is... you may cut in." I said grinning and taking his hand so we could dance again.
"Ash! I've just remembered!" The Doctor said and I turned to him.
"What?" I asked him. He pressed a button and In The Mood blared out of the speakers. Lights flashed all around the room and I grinned at him as the Doctor moved toward Jack and I in time to the music, clicking his fingers.
"I can dance!" he told me grinning.
"Actually, Doctor... I thought Jack might like this dance." I told him.
"I'm sure he would, Ash. I'm absolutely certain. But who with?" he asked me and I laughed then hopped up the steps to take the Doctor's hands in mine. It would seem as though he'd been pretending not to know how to dance before when we'd gone to get Jack. He spun my perfectly as Jacked watched us dance around the console. The Doctor suddenly threw me backwards over his arm, earning a whoop of delight from me. He pulled me up and kissed me deeply before I put my head onto his shoulder, giggling like a school girl.
Next time on The Doctor's Girl:
"And I was having such a nice day." he said holding up the paper and showing us a headline. New Mayor, New Cardiff and above it was a picture of Margaret with her hand up, trying to block her face. My smile fell off my face as I stared at the paper.
"According to intelligence, the target is the last surviving member of the Slitheen family, a criminal sect from the planet Raxacoricofallapatorious, masquerading as a human being, zipped inside a skin suit." Jack said.
"And it just so happens to be right on top of the rift." the Doctor said looking at the model.
If this power station went into meltdown, the entire planet would go schwwwupboom!" Jack said making a motion with his hand showing an explosion. A street light smashed and people shrieked and I ran off to the TARDIS. When I got to the Millennium Square I saw lightening shooting out of the top of the TARDIS into the sky. My eyes widened and I flinched as the ground rumbled beneath me.