THE DEATH OF MARTHA JONES

There was a staircase to the side of the stage area, and a simple archway at the top that led somewhere dark. It was an entrance to something behind where Martha was currently being held, tortured, and driven toward death. Colin decided not to think too hard about it – he was just going to walk through the arch, even though he knew it wouldn't work, and that wasn't particularly his objective anyhow.

"Oi," said the guard, reaching a hand out, stopping Colin short of the top step. "Name?"

"Name? Why?" Colin retorted. "I'm an official of this outfit just like you are. Let me pass."

"Can't do it," said the guard. "I have a roster, and I'm under strict orders to stick with it. If you want to get onto the platform at all, you'll have to state your name and purpose."

"My name happens to be Lin-co Hill-brown," Martha's cousin vamped. He was an extremely clever architect, but not experienced with the sort of skulking-about that would allow him to get past this guard. Fortunately, this particular time, he didn't need to be.

To Colin's surprise, the guard pressed a button on his goggles, saying he would check the roster, and he seemed to wait a moment, then said, "Sorry. You're not on it. You've got to go back the way you came."

"There must be some mistake," Colin said. "My name not being on the roster must be an oversight. I'm under orders to be near the prisoner when she expires."

"For what purpose?"

"To remove her."

"Captain Reakand will be in charge of that, according to the roster," said the guard. "What're you playing at?"

"Captain Reakand is ill," said Colin. "I'm to take his place. Good grief, man, are you even employed here?"

He was rather proud of this particular quick-thinking/grandstanding he'd done. He thought it was very "Doctor" of him.

"Captain Reakand is fit as a fiddle," said the guard. "I saw him five minutes ago!"

"I've been sent also to check on the roster for the Partitive Pass holders."

"There is no such roster, genius. I don't know what you think you're doing, but if I were you, I'd get gone before I call Captain Reakand himself and tell him there's a subordinate trying to get near official business, and also not following protocol. Go!"

Colin turned and walked back down the steps with as much dignity as he could. But his first concern was not his pride (or, the pride of whoever it was who normally wore this uniform), but rather, getting a bit of privacy.

He managed to find a small space between the arena wall and a bush where he could pull off his rubber helmet just for a few moments.

She can't suffer alone, the Doctor had said.

It was what was keeping Donna standing there amongst the crowd, watching, rather than averting her eyes.

Although, Martha seemed to have found some sort of equilibrium, some sort of coping mechanism that was causing her not to scream, nor show any outward signs of distress. A man with needles for fingers had just finished puncturing the skin of Martha's upper torso, and was now walking away looking a bit defeated because he hadn't succeeded in making Martha visibly miserable. Donna wondered if she'd finally been broken. The pain had grown so great, she'd lost her will to live or to feel, and was just waiting to die…

That didn't sound anything like the feisty Martha Jones she knew, but she reckoned the Martha she knew had never actually been tortured before. There had been threats, but no actual laying-on of hands, or sharp instruments or…

In any case, the crowd was growing irritated that she wasn't screaming or squirming anymore. They had never actually managed to get her to beg for it to stop, but they all seemed more or less content with the initial sounds of her abject fear and pain.

Now that she was silent, people in the crowd were saying things like, "Come on! Give us a shriek!" "Show some feeling – what's the matter with you?" "Give us what we came for, you filthy Time Lord accomplice!" "Make her scream, Judge! Do your worst until she can't take it!"

The whole tableau made Donna want to gag. But she didn't feel it would be right to hide from it all. And so, she watched, and waited… just a minute or two, though, and then her phone rang at her hip.

"Yeah?" she said, tearing the thing open anxiously.

"There's a roster for personnel allowed to be near the execution, but not for the Partitive Pass holders. Your way is clear."

"Okay," Donna said. "But looks like yours is a bit harder."

"Yes, but I did find out the name of the officer who's supposed to remove Martha's body," he said. "I can't believe I just said that so calmly."

"Good – you can use that. Don't stop trying."

"I'll get in," he promised.

"Just be careful."

"And you," he said, and with that, the line was cut. Donna shoved her phone back in her hip pocket, and extracted the psychic paper from the front pocket of her black hoodie. It was one of three things she'd been storing in there. One of the other items was a sonic screwdriver for emergencies, and the other item was in a flat packet, the key to getting Martha taken down off the wheel.

When she and Colin had first exited the TARDIS less than an hour ago, they had seen ticket-holders going down to a special area just below the front of the stage. She now knew what this was about, and disgusting as it was, it was going to save Martha's life.

Donna made her way through the crowd, and approached the guard standing watch at the special door for ticket-holders.

"Hello," he said. "Have you got a Partitive Pass?"

"Yes, I have," Donna said, and she showed him the psychic paper.

"Good luck up there," he scoffed. "The bitch isn't even making noise anymore. Stupid cow… too daft even to know she's in pain."

"Don't worry," Donna said, forcing down the rage she felt at this man's comments. "I'll get something out of her."

"Yeah," he shrugged. He gestured to an area under the stage and said, "Wait there. Someone will be along to take you up onto the platform. That is, if she doesn't die before then."

"Let's hope eh?"

"Hey, maybe the Judge will let you deal the final blow!" the man said, and then he laughed, and turned back to his post, facing the bloodthirsty spectators.

Donna's temper flared, but she took a deep breath and held it in check, waiting for an unknowing rubber-clad guard to appear, and give her access to her friend.

As far as she could tell, the man with the needle fingers was the last Partitive Pass holder to have a go at Martha. Now, it was just the so-called Judge on the platform, attacking her again with a flame-thrower to the abdomen (seemed to be his weapon of choice), and trying to get a rise out of her.

"Her skin is blistering!" he announced to the crowd. "The fragile human has skin bubbling against the heat!"

The crowd was pleased by this, but the cheers were nowhere near as loud as when Martha herself made the sounds of agony.

Donna could hear the flame-thrower, and could see it somewhat through the slats of the stage. He heard the Judge scream at her, "React! Show your pain, you filthy fornicator! Colluder with Time Lords! You lowlife, worm of a human!"

Martha gave no reaction, and the Judge gave a cry of despair.

Someone appeared through a door and led Donna to a short staircase that went up onto the stage.

"Have at her," he said.

Donna walked forward and made eye-contact with the Judge.

Something in the uniforms of the guards of this planet… it was eerie. The inability to see their eyes, the large goggles, the blackness, the uniformity, the sharpness of the mouth. It was almost like the officials here walked around in wetsuits with sleek, black, inscrutable Death's Heads. Even when the Doctor and Colin were wearing the ensemble, two men whom she knew relatively well, it had been difficult to take, and a bit frightening.

And something in the way that this Judge gazed at her…

He knows. He knows I'm her friend, that I'm here to rescue her. He knows I'm with the Doctor. He knows…

"Hello, madam," he said.

"Hello," she said back.

"I regret to say, our prisoner is not being cooperative," the Judge said. "And her Time Lord companion is insisting on taking the spineless approach. He has not appeared, so as not to allow her to endure her slow death alone, and we are of the belief that he himself must be dead by now."

"Well…" Donna said, uneasily. "That's good riddance, eh?"

The crowd laughed, and a few cheered. This was a popular opinion amongst this audience. Donna relaxed a little, for now satisfied that the Judge thought her to be just another holder of a Partitive Pass, another life form with a grudge, who wanted to stick it to the Doctor by inflicting pain on his most adored companion.

"You are fortunate to be here for the grand finale," said the Judge. "If you wish to go down in history as the individual to have ended the life of Martha Jones, the Doctor's accomplice, guilty of numerous crimes, on behalf of the great Congress of Sercaton… so be it. If you do not wish, then by all means, prolong the agony, and I shall deal the death blow when you are finished."

As he said this, he touched one of the sledgehammers on the table nearby.

Donna's stomach hit the floor, and any relaxation or confidence she'd gained now left her. Either she had to make this look really, really good, and get Martha on board with it, or her friend would be murdered as soon as Donna was done with her.

No pressure.

"I'll finish her off," Donna said. "I've got what it takes."

She positioned herself in front of Martha. To her surprise, Martha no longer seemed catatonic; apparently she'd heard Donna's voice, and was now paying attention.

Donna affected a tone of mockery and judgement. "The Doctor, were he alive, he'd know you're here, suffering," she said. "And he'd know I'm here! And what I am about to do to you!"

She desperately hoped that Martha was interpreting this as, he knows of the plan and has agreed to it.

The crowd laughed, presumably at the cowardice of the Time Lord, who was not there to die alongside his "love."

She continued in the sarcastic, mocking tone. "Oh, don't worry, love. If he could be here, he would be, but what with all of the surrounding danger, you know, he just decided to leave you to the fates. And I'm sure if he were here, he would say how much he dearly loves you."

Again the crowd laughed, though some of them booed, and/or made sounds of disgust.

"The Judge here has given me leave to kill you," Donna said. "How lucky I feel to have come at the right time!"

Very, very subtly, she saw Martha blink in recognition, and nod imperceptibly. She, too, was grateful that Donna had come when she had.

"I'm going to drown you," she said, still pretending to taunt Martha. "That is, if you'll agree to die. The last twenty minutes or so, it seems you've been too stupid even to know you're in pain – will you even find enough sense to die when you should?"

"I'll die," Martha whimpered. "I want to die. Please."

The crowd loved this, but Donna knew what it was: Martha's tacit agreement to whatever it was they had planned for her. She was showing an enormous amount of trust in Donna, but ultimately, of course, in the Doctor.

"If you're still alive, Doctor," the Judge said, his voice booming over the tannoy. "I hope you heard that. Your beloved is begging for death, and you've done nothing but hide from the situation! You coward! At the very least, I thought you were a man with his own twisted sense of honour. Apparently I was wrong. Martha Jones is about to drown, and you're… where?"

"Donna's here," Martha said to the Doctor, as they danced.

"Pay attention," he said. "If they're annoyed that you're not responding to any of the tortures anymore, at least this will get the crowd riled again, and give Donna something to work with."

Martha put her attention on the exterior for a few minutes, and danced with the Doctor…

"She says she's going to drown me," Martha said.

"She's going to give you a beta blocker," he said.

"What?" she asked, almost panicked. Almost. "But I've already got some sort of drug in me, keeping my heartrate down… and didn't you recalibrate the maximum heartrate for the planet anyway?"

"Yes," he said. "It will be dangerous. With the combination of drugs, your heartrate and blood pressure will drop to almost nothing. Your heart might stop. But if they can get you out of there in a hurry, I can fix you. I need you to be with me physically in order to do it, though. I can't save you from the inside like this… I wish I could."

"Okay," she said.

"Okay?" he asked. "You're willing to risk it?"

"It's all we've got," she said. "If Donna doesn't convince these people she's killed me, then the Judge will break all my bones with the sledgehammer, finishing with my skull."

"I'll stay with you as long as I can," he said. "But your consciousness will be flimsy. You might…"

"… die for a while?"

"I'm sorry."

"It's all right. I trust you."

On the outside, to Donna, she said, "I'll die. I want to die. Please."

Officers came to the stage with barrels of water. One of the officers, Donna noticed, was a bit shorter, a bit broader than the others. He stopped momentarily and stared at Martha, just long enough that Donna noticed, and then he clenched his fists, looked at Donna, and turned away.

Colin's found a way in!

"Are you ready for the death of Martha Jones, abettor and co-conspirator against Sercaton along with the Doctor, the Last of the Time Lords, destroyer of worlds, and monumental coward?" cried the Judge.

The crowd yelled with delight.

Donna used this moment to prepare the pill inside her pocket.

She rounded on Martha, and grabbed her jaw roughly. "Get ready, girlie!" she hissed. "This isn't going to be pleasant!"

As she did this, she clandestinely put the pill in Martha's mouth, and then accepted two tumblers from one of the guards, as another one put a large barrel of water in front of her.

She dipped the tumblers into the water, one after another, and began relentlessly pouring water over Martha's face… down her throat into her nose. She tried to give her a second or two to breathe, and/or to pour it in a spot where it might seem like she was obstructing Martha's air, but was not… and the crowd went wild. They chanted for Martha's death. They egged on the "torturer" Donna, and spat horrible slurs at the prisoner.

For a bit, Martha choked, coughed, gurgled… some of it was fake, some of it real. But after a minute or two, her face grew pale, and she seemed to lose consciousness.

Donna reckoned the blocker had taken effect. It was terrifying, watching all of the colour drain from her friend's face, and watching Martha effectively die…

Would she have been better off drowning?

No. With the blocker, she can remain very slightly clinging to life, and appear dead to anyone who examines here rudimentarily, without equipment...

This is the way it has to be. Keep your mettle, Donna. Pretend you're happy she's dead! Do it!

Donna continually reassured herself that she'd done the only thing she could, and that Martha had accepted the risk, that the Doctor had agreed to it…

Yet the fact that her friend was now deathly pale with virtually no heartbeat, hanging on a breaking wheel because of a drug she had forced down her throat, it was all Donna could do not to be sick right there.

The crowd clapped and chanted and cheered while Martha's limp form was taken down off the wheel. The Judge stood by smugly and watched as two guards untied her, and one took her in his arms, cradling her like a baby, and walked offstage with her.

The only consolation Donna felt was knowing that the "guard" who now had her, was her cousin, and de-facto big brother.

Now, to get out of here, and back to the TARDIS in a hurry so she doesn't actually die.

She allowed the Judge to hold up her hand while the crowd cheered her, then she shook his hand reluctantly, and walked offstage, trying to find Colin.

"We have another treat for you," the Judge said to the crowd. "The Doctor's TARDIS has been located, and we will broadcast its execution for you, as well – right here in the arena! Don't go anywhere – the spectacle is not over!"

Indeed, the spectacle is not quite over - I have three more chapters for you!

Don't be so annihilated by this chapter that you forget to leave a review ;-)… I need to hear from you! It will make my week!

Thank you for reading.