The Dread of Tomorrow and Yesterday – Chapter 14
Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who, if I did, then Jack Harkness would take me out for a drink every Friday night.
A/N: Well, here's another extra long chapter and the ending to The End of the World! Hope you like it!
Notes on Reviews:
IKhandoZatman: Yeah, I can't wait either. I'm kind of dreading Midnight (I got kind of scared when I was watching it) and I plan to do Let's Kill Hitler as the last part in like a four part chapter (The Rebel Flesh, The Almost People, A Good Man Goes To War, Let's Kill Hitler)
tooclosefortety: I'm glad you liked the chapter! I'm not a massive fan of Rose, she's not my be all and end all companion, but I like her, I can accept the fact that she has flaws and those flaws are a very human thing to have. Father's Day will be interesting, it will have equal Rhea being angry at Rose and equal Rhea being angry at the Doctor (because I feel like the Doctor should have known better than to take Rose back a second time, it wasn't as if she knew anything about time travel, I think that episode just shows how naive Rose is and how she wears her heart on her sleeve). But don't worry, Rhea will be angry at Rose in that episode as well. I agree with you about Midnight, I have a complex relationship with that episode as well. Rhea will definitely defend the Doctor in that episode, in fact, she'll get a bit violent as well, and she'll have her gun on her, so it'll definitely be interesting. Rose will not be in love with the Doctor, but she will be jealous of the attention that the Doctor gives Rhea. I'll be writing a jealous Rose in my Time Lady OC story (for which I'll post a snippet after I get 100 reviews for this story). I'm really glad you like the story so far. And just a question, you don't have to answer it if you don't want to, what country are you from?
lil'hawkeye3: Thank you so much! I'm blushing as we speak (or write?). I'm so happy that you think my story's a masterpiece in progress and that I'm a genius. I have read a lot of those stories. There are lot of ones where Rose stays on for Season 3. There is one, A Walk in the Dust by JunoInferno, which is a 10/Donna one that has Donna joining the Doctor and Rose at the end of The Runaway Bride, and has quite a bit of Rose bashing (which is not really my style, but it was fun to read). LizzeXX's Time Lady OC stories are amazing ones, I've read each of them like a gazillion times and have them saved on my phone as well. There are quite a few ones where a girl from our universe becomes the Doctor's companion instead of Rose (one of my future story ideas), which puts an interesting take on it, because the OC knows what's going to happen. I'm really glad you like Rhea. I just didn't want to make a young white OC like a lot of people, like Rose, Donna, River, Amy (I'm not trying to be racist, I just wanted a different kind of OC), I thought it would be interesting if I did another (or two) nationalities and how their view of the world would affect their travels with the Doctor. Especially considering religion, they never really bring up how religion plays a part in the whole universe travelling. And Rhea's heaps religious, that's why I can't wait to write The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit and The Unquiet Dead, so it'll give us a different view of those episodes in how Rhea deals with those events. She can recognise his faces because the Tenth Doctor showed her a picture of all of his previous faces and she met the Eleventh Doctor first. She's kind of accepted that regeneration is a part of the Doctor, and she shouldn't let that prejudice her against him. She likes him for him, and he hasn't really changed much other than the face. The core is still the Doctor. I'm not the first person to write something like this. There's AnaDona's Jumping Through Time, which was my inspiration, and DanniFielding's The Time Child, and Artemis Sherwood's Once Upon Another Time, but they all have the OC in question as a girl from our universe, who knows how the story's going to end. I thought it would be interesting to have the whole out of order timeline with the Doctor happen to someone from the Doctor Who universe and someone who doesn't know what's going to happen and she just has to take it as it comes.
Queenylime2: I feel very conflicted regarding Rose, in some episodes I can't stand her and in some episodes, I really do like her. I don't like how she reacted regarding Mickey and Jackie and Sarah Jane and I didn't like her in The Stolen Earth/Journey's End either. I have around the next four chapters written for this story, so it's not that hard to update every alternate day. I have stories on my alert list that haven't been updated in ages, but I can't bring myself to delete them, just in case. I will try not to abandon this story. It is my baby, the one story I feel the most proud of so far, but I start university in like a month, so I'm not sure whether I'll be able to update as frequently. I will try though.
curlyhairedfriendsr0x: I'm glad you like the way I characterised Rhea and the Doctor's relationship. At this point in time, Rhea isn't particular either way, she's only met Rose once, so she doesn't have specific feelings about her yet. Some times she'll like Rose, some times she'll want to rip her teeth out, but she'll be like that with everyone. I still believe that Rhea and Rose will be friends but jealousy will happen. I do think the Ninth Doctor is sexy, but I think he'd appeal to Rhea just a little more than the other two doctors. Rhea's 27 and she's mature, not to mention a bit broken because of her past, I think she finds a kindred spirit in the Ninth Doctor and that adds to his attractiveness for her.
beulah2013: Don't worry, Silence in the Library is coming up in the near future. But I plan to do Time of the Angels first, so that Rhea meets River first.
Virginia I: Thank you so much for your feedback. I am trying to put Rhea more into it, just a few scenes here and there where there is Doctor/Rhea interaction. I think the problem with OC stories is that you don't know where to find the balance. You want to do justice to the story but you want to make sure the OC plays a part in the chapters. Mostly, it will go according to the episodes but I will put a few scenes here and there with just Rhea, or Rhea and the Doctor, or Rhea and a companion. I haven't really watched a lot of Classic Who to accurately write it, so for now, I will really only be sticking to 9-11. Maybe once I've finished 9-11, I'll start on Classic Who, but not really in the near future.
LilGreenearth97: I am so glad you liked the chapter! Hopefully, I won't end up disappointing you. I am really glad you liked Rhea's reaction to the Doctor and Rose and I'm very happy that you liked the cover as well.
Warnings: Swearing, sexual innuendo…
Italics – Rhea's thoughts/Face of Boe speaking/The Doctor's thoughts
Platform – Platform One (the spaceship that the trio is on)
platform – a specific platform in a suite on the Platform
The End of the World: Disco Inferno
Suddenly, the entire Platform shuddered.
"That's not supposed to happen..." The Doctor looked rather pleased and curious.
Rhea groaned. And, here we go again.
The guests in the Manchester Suite were completely oblivious to the commotion, chatting to each other instead. The Moxx of Balhoon was talking to the Face of Boe.
" ...this is the Bad Wolf scenario..." The Doctor and Rhea heard the Moxx of Balhoon saying as they entered the suite.
"That wasn't a gravity pocket. I know gravity pockets and they don't feel like that." The Doctor explained to the two females as he fiddled with a control panel next to the door. Jabe approached them.
"What do you think, Rhea, Jabe? Listened to the engines, they pitched up about 30 hertz, is that dodgy or what?" The Doctor asked.
"It's the sound of metal, it doesn't make any sense to me." Jabe replied.
"Sabotage." Rhea murmured to the Doctor, who looked at her, agreeing silently.
"Where's the engine room?" The Doctor asked Jabe, turning to her.
"I don't know... but the maintenance duct is just behind our guest's suite, I could show you. And..." She gestured to Rhea. "…your wife."
Both Rhea and the Doctor stiffened, but for different reasons.
"She's not my wife." The Doctor said, shortly.
"Partner?"
"No…" The Doctor turned to look at Rhea, keeping his eyes on her face, looking for some sort of reaction from her, but her face was blank like always.
"Concubine?"
Rhea clenched her fists.
"Prostitute?"
Rhea swore under her breath. "No!" She cut in, quietly but meaningfully, utterly insulted by the assumptions that the tree lady had made. "Do you mind not calling me a whore, Poison Ivy?" Rhea hissed, anger flashing in her eyes.
Jabe frowned. "I'm sorry if I've insulted you…"
The Doctor ran his hand down her arm, provoking goosebumps, and gripped Rhea's hand, rubbing the fingers with his own. Rhea gave him a small smile. "I'm going to go talk to the Face of Boe." Rhea said, her mouth drawn into a tight smile, and walked off towards said alien.
"Tell you what, you two go and pollinate, I'm going to catch up with family. Quick word with Michael Jackson." Rose said, making her way over to Cassandra.
"Don't start a fight." The Doctor warned Rose and offered his arm to Jabe. "Maintenance duct, then?" He asked, with a smile on his face that didn't reach his eyes, hoping that he could get this mess sorted quickly so he could spend some time with Rhea.
Jabe looked back at Rhea, who had stopped and turned back to them. Rhea narrowed her eyes at the woman, flipping her hair behind her, a sudden possessiveness over the Doctor forcing her to clench her fists. She frowned, not understanding why she was so upset he was leaving with the Tree Lady and why he had given that look when Jabe had asked him if Rhea was his wife.
"Earth Death in 15 minutes. Earth Death in 15 minutes."
Before the Doctor and Jabe entered a maintenance corridor, several spiders scurry out of view.
"Who's in charge of Platform One?" The Doctor asked Jabe. "Is there a captain or what?"
"There's just the steward and the staff. All the rest is controlled by the metal man."
The Doctor frowned, remembering what Rhea had said before. "You mean the computer? But who controls that?"
"The Corporation. They move Platform One from one artistic event to another."
The Doctor fell silent, thinking it over. "But there's no one from the corporation on board." The Doctor said, slowly.
"They're not needed. This facility is purely automatic. It's the height of the alpha class. Nothing can go wrong."
"Unsinkable?" The Doctor snorted.
"If you like. The nautical metaphor is appropriate." Jabe agreed, with a smile on her face.
"You're telling me. I was on board another ship once. They said that was unsinkable... I ended up clinging to an iceberg, it wasn't half cold." He stopped for a moment. "So, what you're saying is, if we get in trouble there's no one to help us out?"
Jabe looked as though she had only realised this now. "I'm afraid not."
The Doctor grinned. "Fantastic." He said and started walking again.
Jabe frowned. "I don't understand. In what way is THAT fantastic?"
Rhea walked over to the Face of Boe, who was simply on his own, looking around at the other aliens. When he saw that she was approaching him, Rhea could see the beginnings of a soft smile on his face.
"Hi." She said, shyly, unsure of what to proceed.
Why so shy, beautiful?
A deep voice purred in her mind and Rhea's eyes widened, disconcerted momentarily when she heard the voice. She didn't think she'd ever be able to deal with a telepath without suspicion, especially after the Sontaran fiasco with the Doctor. "Whoa!" She made a sound of amazement. "Was that you?" Rhea whispered to the Face of Boe.
Yes, that was me. Unless, I am wrong, judging by your scepticism, this must be very early in your timeline then. This is the first time you have met me.
Rhea raised an eyebrow. "Does that mean that you've met me before?" She asked, carefully.
Spoilers.
Rhea groaned, throwing her hands up in the air, as she heard the most overused and hated word in her dictionary. It was everyone's, especially the Doctor's, way of keeping her mouth shut. "I hate that word, you know."
You shouldn't. You taught it to me.
Rhea adopted a flirty and mischievous smile on her face, masking her shock and worry. "Oh, honey, you should know, I am a very bad influence." She hummed.
The Doctor needs you, Rhea, and you need him.
And here we go again. She was sick of people attributing things to her relationship with the Doctor. "Why? I don't need anyone. Do I look like a girl who needs someone to protect her?" She said, shortly, stamping down the small part of her heart that cried out the affirmative.
You do. You need him. It's written in the stars. The Doctor and his Golden Girl. The Oncoming Storm and his Time Goddess.
Rhea snorted. "What kind of crappy title is that? Golden Girl?" She thought it sounded like some extremely lame superheroine. "Although, I kind of like Time Goddess." She smiled slowly and softly, then frowned. "The Oncoming Storm? Is that what people call the Doctor?"
Certain people.
"Man, you must be the king of no-straight-answers." Rhea said, exasperatedly. No, wait, that's the Doctor.
The Time Goddess is your title. It will be known throughout the stars in a matter of time. You have a long road ahead of you, Sunehri Adwani, there is much for you to see and much for you to do. Have faith, Beautiful Rhea, it will all work out the way it is supposed to.
Rhea swallowed hard at the extent of the conviction that laced the Face of Boe's voice in her mind. She didn't know why, just like the Doctor, she felt as though she could trust him. An incredibly dangerous risk, but she felt as though she had to take it. "Beautiful Rhea?" She asked, confused but a little touched. No one had ever given her a term of endearment like that, except for her parents. Now there was the Doctor with his 'golden girl' and now the Face of Boe with 'Beautiful Rhea'.
One day I will give you that name. You can trust me, Sunehri. I know how your heart has hardened over the ears. There will be a line of people who will melt the ice around your heart, if you don't mind my cliché. It's not a bad thing, Sunehri.
Rhea turned around to see Rose walking with Cassandra towards the viewing window. She groaned, inwardly, worried about what was going to happen. She turned back to the Face of Boe. "I'm sorry, I have to make sure that Rose doesn't murder Joan Rivers." She smiled, hearing the Face of Boe's laughter in her mind and quickly joined Rose and Cassandra.
"Soon, the sun will blossom into a red giant, and my home will die. That's where I used to live, when I was a little boy." Rhea choked a little when she heard this. Oh my god, she really is Amanda Lepore. "Down there. Mummy and Daddy had a little house built into the side of the Los Angeles Crevice." Cassandra sighed. "I had such fun."
Rhea frowned. "What happened to everyone else? I mean, the human race, where did they go?"
"They say Mankind has touched every star in the sky." Cassandra said, vaguely.
Rose stepped closer to Cassandra. "So, you're not the last human?"
Cassandra looked angry and prideful, which, in Rhea's opinion, was a dangerous combination. "I am the last PURE human. The others... mingled." She sounded disgusted with the thought. "Oh, they call themselves 'New Humans' and 'Proto-humans' and 'Digi-humans' even 'Human-ish' but you know what I call them?" Cassandra lowered her voice down to a whisper. "Mongrels." She hissed.
"Right. And you stayed behind?" Rose asked, sceptically.
"I kept myself pure." Cassandra asserted.
"They evolved so that they could survive, that's what humanity does, and that's what humanity is supposed to do. You just stayed back on your own and developed an over-inflated sense of your own importance and humanity." Rhea growled and then paused. "How many operations have you had, exactly, Cassandra?" Rhea asked, crossing her arms. A part of her felt sorry for the flap of skin she was currently talking to. To be left on your own for so long, while everyone else left and lived their life the way they were supposed to, she would have gone mad with loneliness. No wonder she attempted to preserve her own idea of what it meant to be 'human'.
"708. Next week, it's 709, I'm having my blood bleached. Is that why you wanted a word? You could be flatter, Rose. You've got a little bit of a chin poking out."
Rose looked taken aback and angry. "I'd rather die."
Cassandra misinterpreted the reason for Rose's refusal. "Honestly, it doesn't hurt-"
"No, I mean it. I'd rather die. It's better to die than live like you…a bitchy trampoline." Rhea smiled at Rose's words, knowing that she couldn't have put it better herself.
"Not to mention incredibly bad taste in makeup and eyeliner. You look like a futuristic version of Amanda Lepore mixed with an album cover for Michael Jackson. When you die, you should donate your body to Tupperware…if it still exists." Rhea said, looking over the two-dimensional 'human' with distaste.
Cassandra looked like a woman who was desperately trying to convince herself of her own importance and making sure it was covered up on her face. "Oh, well, what do you two know?"
Rhea bristled in anger. "I was born on that planet." She snarled. "My mother was born there and my father was born there. I grew up there, I lived there and I worked there. And that goes for Rose as well. Do you know what that means, Cassandra? That means that Rose and I are officially the last humans on this platform, because you are not human. I have no idea what you are, but I know that you've had everything nipped and tucked and flattened until everything was nicely photoshoped and auto-tuned. Anything that was human was thrown in the bin. You're just skin, Cassandra, a flat bitchy piece of skin with horrible taste in lipstick. Nice talking to ya."
Rhea watched as Rose walked off out of the suite, presumably going somewhere to cool off after their encounter with Cassandra. Rhea swallowed and ran her hands through her hair in agitation. She rested her body against a wall and just leaned back, closing her eyes, wondering why she had let herself lose control like that. She wasn't prone to outbursts of anger like that. She guessed that it was the stress of the time-travelling, coupled with the aftermath of the headaches and the fact that, in this time, her parents, her family, everything that she had known and loved was dead. She increased the rate of her breathing, making sure to keep conscious control over her breath at all times and keeping a constant rhythm. Her eyes snapped open and she saw the Adherents of the Repeated Meme walk out off the sliding doors that Rose had just left through.
The Doctor and Jabe were still making their way down the maintenance corridors, dodging large thick metal wires, the low ceiling forcing them to stoop slightly on their procession.
"So, tell me, Jabe. What's a tree like you doing in a place like this?" The Doctor asked, just making conversation.
"Respect for the Earth." Jabe said, simply.
The Doctor snorted, not completely buying it. "Oh, come on. Everyone on this platform's worth zillions."
"Well... perhaps it's a case of having to be seen at the right occasions." Jabe confessed.
"In case your share prices drop? I know you lot. You've got massive forests everywhere, roots everywhere, and there's always money in land."
"All the same. You respect the Earth as family. So many species evolved from that planet. Mankind is only one. I'm another. My ancestors were transplanted from the planet down below. And I'm a direct descendant of the tropical rainforest." She said, proudly.
The Doctor looked impressed and then pointed to a control panel.
"Excuse me." He pulled out his sonic screwdriver and started poking at the screen with it.
"And what about your ancestry, Doctor? Perhaps you could tell a story or two... perhaps a man only enjoys trouble when there's nothing else left..." Jabe didn't receive an answer. "I scanned you earlier. The metal machine had trouble identifying your species - refused to admit your existence." The Doctor pretended to be concentrating on the hacking the control panel but a flicker of pain passed across his face. "And even when it named you, I wouldn't believe it. But it was right." The Doctor stopped scanning, the memories overwhelming him. The deep sadness that he was feeling at the moment was reflected in his blue eyes.
"I know where you're from. Forgive me for intruding, but it's remarkable that you even exist. I just want to say... how sorry I am." Jabe murmured, her tone, awed, hushed and reverent. She put a comforting hand on his arm. The Doctor looked at her, his eyes full of tears and pain.
"But, you do have someone, don't you?" Jabe offered the Doctor a smile. "Your friend, the brunette one, not the blonde one, she helps you, doesn't she?"
The Doctor returned the gesture she had given him, placing his hand on her arm, smiling sadly, realising that he wasn't as alone as he thought he was. He would have Rhea, his wonderful, beautiful, fantastic Rhea, for a long time, if her jaunts were any indication. She was his constant, even if she didn't know or believe it sometimes. He quickly finished the scan and he and Jabe went through the door he had just opened.
They found themselves in the ventilation chamber of the Platform, huge fans circulating the air in the massive room. The Doctor looked down at Jabe.
"Is it me, or is it just a bit nippy?"
Rose walked down a corridor on her own after that disastrous meeting with Cassandra. She smiled when she thought of the way Rhea had handled the situation and her furious attack against Cassandra. She looked up and saw the Adherents of the Repeated Meme coming from the other end of the corridor. She smiled, a little unsurely, at them, but screamed in shock when the first one struck her down to the ground, where she lied unconscious as they dragged her away.
"Fair do's, though, that's a great bit of air conditioning. Sort of, nice and old fashioned. Bet they call it 'retro'." He scanned another control panel with his sonic screwdriver. "Gotcha." He exclaimed proudly.
The panel fell off and they recoiled as a spider scuttled out and scurried across the floor and up the wall. The Doctor and Jabe watched it with confusion and suspicion.
"What the hell's that?" The Doctor asked, his eyebrows scrunching together.
"Is it part of the 'retro'?" Jabe asked the Doctor.
"I don't think so. Hold on." The Doctor pointed the screwdriver at the spider, which halted on the wall. Jabe fired one of her roots at the spider, disabling it and knocking it down, falling into the Doctor's hands.
"Hey! Nice liana!" The Doctor praised, smiling.
"Thank you!" She said, shyly. "We're not supposed to show them in public."
"Don't worry, I won't tell anybody." The Doctor said, conspiratorially. He turned his attention back to the spider in his hands. "Now then. Who's been bringing the pets on board?" He said, analysing the spider.
"What does it do?" Jabe asked.
"Sabotage." The Doctor echoed Rhea's words from before, pride for his golden girl brimming inside of him. He thanked the universe for making sure Rhea was with him through everything. I have no idea what I'd do without her.
"Earth Death in 10 minutes."
"And the temperature's about to rocket. Come on." The Doctor said, hurrying from the ventilation chamber.
The aliens milled about in the Manchester Suite. Rhea was at the door of the suite, about to rush after Rose, when she heard Cassandra speak.
"The planet's end. Come gather! Come gather! Bid farewell to the cradle of civilization. Let us mourn her with a traditional ballad." Cassandra preened in a fawning tone.
Britney Spear's Toxic suddenly blasted out of the jukebox that Cassandra had brought with her as a gift. Rhea had the urge to scream in rage. Traditional ballad, my ass.
Rhea ran out of the suite and down the corridor until she came to a section of the thin strip of area, which was filled with smoke. She saw the staff, decked out in their black uniforms, coughing squeaky little coughs, which, under any other circumstances, Rhea might have considered cute.
She saw the Doctor and Jabe coming around the other end of the corridor to the same commotion and she ran over, skidding to a stop right in front of him. She threw her arms around his neck and hugged him hard, smiling happily when she felt him do the same. She felt him press a kiss to the top of her head and when she pulled back, she saw him grin down at her. Then he looked behind her and frowned.
"Where's Rose?" He asked her.
"She ran off. We had kind of an eventful encounter with 'The Last Human'." Rhea said the last three words kind of snarkily.
The Doctor groaned. "I told you not to get into a fight."
Rhea pouted. "I didn't." She grumbled. "She just pissed me off."
The Doctor pushed himself through the crowd of staffs and moved in front of the door that they were all crowded in front of.
"Come on! Get back!" The Doctor ordered. He moved his sonic screwdriver over another control panel on the wall.
"Sunfilter rising. Sunfilter rising." The computer's voice said.
Rhea gagged as the smell of burning flesh reached her nose and turned away, realising that the steward had deep-fried in there. She couldn't imagine the pain the man must have gone through. She could feel the blistering heat even from outside the doors.
"Was the steward in there?" Jabe asked, concerned, not able to tell yet.
The Doctor grimaced, noticing the same thing that Rhea had. "You can smell him. Hold on… there's another sun filter program to descend."
Rose heard 'Toxic' playing as she slowly woke up, rubbing her eyes in weariness.
"Sunfilter descending. Sunfilter descending." The computer's voice said.
Rose shot up in alarm as the Sunfilter on the window descended, sending streams of hot yellow light into the room, which had been previously cool. She ran to the door and banged on it frantically.
"Let me out!" She shouted.
"Sunfilter descending."
The Doctor and Rhea ran down the corridor.
"Let me out! Let me out!"
The Doctor and Rhea arrived outside the door to attempt to make the Sunfilter rise again.
"Anyone in there?" Rhea asked, terrified.
"Let me out!" Rose shouted, frantically.
The Doctor looked up from the panel he was currently disabling. "Oh, well, it would be you!" The Doctor said, dryly.
"Open the door!" Rose yelled from inside the viewing gallery. The whole room started to smoke from the intense heat and Rose could feel it seeping into her clothes.
"Sunfilter descending. Sunfilter descending."
The display on the control panel showed ''Sunfilter Rising' and the Doctor looked up, expectantly.
"Sunfilter rising. Sunfilter rising."
The Doctor looked pleased with himself and Rhea and Rose sighed with relief.
"Sunfilter rising... Sunfilter descending."
Rhea swore and the Doctor cursed. "This is just what we need. The computer's getting clever." The Doctor muttered.
"Will you two stop mucking about?" Rose shouted.
"I'm not mucking about, it's fighting back!" The Doctor retorted.
"Open the door!"
"Hang on!"
"Rose, listen to me, go down the steps and hide behind the wall, it's the lowest point in the room. You'll be safe there until we can get the door open." Rhea instructed the blonde girl.
"The lock's melted!" Rose yelled when she touched the door, scalding herself.
Rose ran down the stairs and flattened herself to the floor in front of the platform.
"Sunfilter descending. Sunfilter descending."
The Doctor jabbed his screwdriver right inside the wires.
"Sunfilter rising. Sunfilter rising."
Panting, Rose ran back to the door. However, the Doctor or Rhea couldn't open it.
"The whole thing's jammed. We can't open the doors. Stay there! Don't move!" The Doctor ordered Rose.
"Where're am I gonna go?! Ipswich?!" Rose shouted in a frightened sort of sarcasm.
"Earth Death in 5 minutes."
The Doctor and Rhea ran back to the Manchester suite.
"The metal machine confirms. The spider devices have infiltrated the whole of platform one." Jabe told them, looking at her scanner.
"How's that possible? Our private rooms are protected by a code wall. Moisturize me, moisturize me." Cassandra demanded.
The Doctor took the destabilised spider out of Jabe's hands, holding it in one hand while addressing the rest of the guests.
"Summon the steward!" The Moxx of Balhoon suggested.
"I'm sorry, but the steward is dead." Rhea informed all of them.
There was a gasp of shock from everyone in the vicinity, everyone realising what sort of position they were in. Closed off from anyone and everyone with no help whatsoever.
"Who killed him?" The Moxx of Balhoon asked.
"This whole event was sponsored by the Face of Boe! He invited us! Talk to the face! Talk to the face!" Cassandra encouraged while the Face of Boe shook his head, helplessly.
Rhea growled, a fierce protectiveness over the alien, who had told her so much today, rising in her. "Watch it, you plastic trampoline!"
"Easy way of finding out. Someone bought a little pet on board." The Doctor showed all of them the spider. "Let's send him back to Master."
He placed the spider on the floor. The spider scuttled along to Cassandra and looked up at her. Cassandra looked shifty for a moment, something that Rhea noticed with a dark frown, however, the spider moved onto the feet of the Adherents of the Repeated Meme.
"The Adherents of the Repeated Meme. J'accuse!" Cassandra shouted.
The Doctor rolled his eyes. "That's all very well, and really kind of obvious, but if you stop and think about it..." He said, walking up to the Adherents of the Repeated Meme. One of the black-robed aliens tried to strike him but the Doctor caught its arm just in time and ripped it off in a display of strength that Rhea's eyes widening with shock.
"A Repeated Meme is just an idea. And that's all they are. An idea." The Doctor finished.
He ripped a wire out of the arm and all of the Adherents of the Repeated Meme crumpled into a mass of black cloaks. Everyone gasped, while Cassandra rolled her eyes.
"Remote controlled Droids. Nice little cover for the real troublemaker. Go on, Jimbo!" The Doctor said, nudging the spider with his boot-covered foot. "Go home!"
The spider ambled back over to Cassandra.
"I bet you were the school swot and never got kissed." Cassandra grumbled.
The Doctor simply raised his eyebrows.
"At arms!" Cassandra ordered her men in white. The two bodyguards with canisters on either side of her raised their sprayers.
"What are you going to do, moisturize me?" The Doctor asked, mockingly.
"Did you seriously just sass her?" Rhea whispered to the Doctor, impressed.
"With acid." Cassandra replied. Rhea's eyes widened and she grabbed the back of the Doctor's leather jacket and pulled him back, putting distance between the men in white and the Doctor and moving so that she was standing right next to him instead of behind him. "Oh, too late anyway. My spiders have control of the mainframe. Oh, you all carried them as gifts, tax free, past every code wall. I'm not just as pretty face."
"I knew she was a bitch." Rhea muttered.
"Sabotaging a ship while you're still inside it? How stupid's that?" The Doctor snorted.
"I'd hoped to manufacture a hostage situation with myself as one of the victims. The compensation would have been enormous."
Rhea rolled her eyes. "Figures, five billion years later, and the only thing on a human's mind is money."
"Do you think it's cheap, looking like this? Flatness costs a fortune. I am The Last Human, Doctor. Me. Not that freaky little slut of yours." Cassandra hissed, eyeing Rhea with poorly-concealed disgust.
Rhea swore loudly and darkly, taking a step forward in anger. She heard the Doctor growl loudly at the insult next to her. "What did you just call me?" Rhea asked, quietly and dangerously. The men in white raised their sprayers threateningly, but Rhea was relaxed, the only sign of tension was her hands clenched into fists.
"Arrest her!" The Moxx of Balhoon shouted.
"Oh, shut it, pixie." Cassandra retorted. "I've still got my final option."
"Earth Death in 3 minutes."
"And here it comes. You're just as useful dead, all of you. I have shares in your rival companies and they'll triple in price as soon as you're dead. My spiders are primed and ready to destroy the safety systems. How did that old Earth song go? 'Burn, baby, burn'"
"Then you'll burn with us, baby." Rhea hissed.
"Oh, I'm so sorry. I know the use of teleportation is strictly forbidden, but... I'm such a naughty thing. Spiders," Cassandra ordered. "Activate."
There was a series of explosions around the ship, the resulting impact knocking quite a few of the guests to the ground. However, both the Doctor and Rhea just stood there, completely unaffected.
"Force fields gone with the planet about to explode. At least it'll be quick. Just like my fifth husband." She giggled. "Oh, shame on me. Buh-bye, darlings! Buh-bye, my darlings..." And she and her bodyguards teleported off the platform.
"Heat levels rising." The computer's voice said.
"Reset the computer!" The Moxx of Balhoon pleaded.
"Only the steward would know how." Jabe remarked.
"No. We can do it by hand. There must be a system restore switch. Jabe, Rhea, come on." The Doctor said.
Rhea stopped them. "Jabe can't come with us. She's made of wood. She'll burn when the heat levels rise." Rhea insisted.
The Doctor nodded at her and turned to Jabe. "You should stay here. We'll go down to the ventilation room. Keep things under control here." The Doctor grabbed Rhea's hand and they rushed out of the Manchester suite. "You lot, just chill!" The Doctor called back the crowd over his shoulder.
"So not the time for puns, biker boy." Rhea muttered.
"Earth Death in 2 minutes. Earth Death in 2 minutes."
Rhea and the Doctor ran down the maintenance corridor towards the ventilation chamber.
"Heat levels - critical. Heat levels - critical." The computerised voice intoned.
They reached the ventilation chamber and Rhea just stared in awe at the enormous fans that turned a full circle every few seconds.
"Oh. And guess where the switch is." The Doctor said. Rhea groaned as she saw that the switch was on the other side of chamber, across the fans.
"Heat levels - rising. Heat levels - rising."
The Doctor pulled down the lever that was located on the side and the fans slowed down, enough so that someone could move past them.
"External temperature - five thousand degrees."
As soon as the Doctor let go of the lever, the lever jumped back to its original position and the fans started to speed up again. As the Doctor looked hopelessly at the fans, wondering what he was supposed to do now, Rhea reached over and pulled down the lever herself, holding it perpendicular to the wall and maintaining a force on it.
"You can't. The heat's going to vent through this place." The Doctor growled.
"I know." Rhea said, lightly.
"Rhea, your hands will burn when the temperature increases. The lever's made of metal." The Doctor argued.
Rhea's lips formed into a smirk, drawing attention to the redness and the fullness of her lipstick-stained lips, which the Doctor noticed thoroughly at this inopportune moment in time. Why does she have to be so tempting?
"Then stop wasting time, Time Lord." She purred his title in out in a way that sent a shiver down his spine. She was the only woman in the universe who could have this sort of effect on him. He grinned at her, even greater pride and adoration for this wonderful woman growing in him, and he ran back to the fans.
"Heat levels - hazardous."
The Doctor dodged the first fan as it came down in an arc and ran underneath it. He looked anxiously up at the next one.
Rhea gripped onto the handle as tight as she could, placing as much force on it as possible. She ignored the growing ache in her arms, the sweat dripping down from her hair and the uncomfortable heat emanating from the metal and her hands. She looked down to see her hands trembling slightly, but she pressed down even harder, taking sharp breaths and keeping her face blank.
"Do you mind hurrying up?" Rhea shouted at the Doctor, looking at him, seeing that he had only passed the first fan.
"Oi!" The Doctor's voice came over the noise of the fans. "I'd like to see you try this!"
Rhea snorted. "I'd do it quicker than you."
The Doctor rolled his eyes, still standing before the second fan. He looked back at Rhea, noticing her sweating heavily and the red blotchy spots appearing on her hands from the burning metal. He looked up at her face, staring at her blank expression.
Rhea took no heed of the smell of burning flesh that assaulted her, realising that the coppery, metal tang in the air was the result of her own skin blistering and peeling off. She gripped the lever tighter as she felt her hands start to slip, aching to remove themselves from the blazing heat, due to her reflexes. She ignored the sharp pain in her palms and turned her attention back to the Doctor, trying to gauge how long it would take him to reset the computer, hoping that it was sooner rather than later.
"Heat levels - critical. Heat levels - critical."
The Doctor dodged underneath the second fan. He stood in front of the third and last fan, hesitating slightly.
"Planet explodes in 10... 9..."
The Doctor closed his eyes. Everything grew quiet for him.
"8... 7... 6... 5... 4..."
He stepped, calmly, through the fan. He smiled widely when he realised he had made, every part of his body intact. Good thing, it wouldn't do well for me to regenerate so quickly again. He dashed to the switch, pulling it down sharply.
"Raise shields!" He shouted.
"…1"
The Doctor walked back through the fans and came to where Rhea was still standing. When he approached her, she slowly took her hands off the fans, wincing at the pain of some of her skin ripping off and glaring at the bloodstains on the lever. The Doctor held her arms, turning her hands so that her scorched palms were facing him instead. Even through the touch of his cool fingers soothed the burns on her hands. He leaned down and pressed a kiss to both palms, trying to find a patch of skin that was less burnt than the others. Rhea was touched by the display of affection from a man like this. She took it differently to the way her blue-suited man and her bow-tie boy showed their affection for her. When they kissed her forehead or held her hand, it showed they cared a lot for her and it was obvious, they did often. But this man, in front of her, she thought he wasn't the type to show overly explicit displays of affection. She relished in the fact that she could obtain that kind of contact from this reserved and protective man. She smiled slowly.
"Beautiful, broken skin." The Doctor murmured to himself, not intending for Rhea to hear him. He held her hands up higher, observing the burns more carefully. He pulled out his sonic screwdriver with one hand, the other still holding her hands, and ran the blue light over the singed flesh. Rhea hummed when she saw the device hover above her palms, the cool blue light actually soothing the skin. The Doctor turned it off, putting it back in his leather jacket. "There's a dermal regenerator in the TARDIS. We'll put your hands in there."
"Now?" Rhea asked, looking up at him.
"No, there's still something I have to do." The Doctor said, a dark and stormy expression passing and settling across his face. He started walking back towards the Manchester suite, to all of the guests, leading Rhea back with a hand on the small of her back since he couldn't hold her hand without causing her pain.
"What are you going to do?" Rhea asked, half terrified and half intrigued. The intrigue came from her own need to know what buttons pushed this Doctor too far and from her own inner bloodlust that demanded retribution from the thing that had almost obliterated all the people on this spaceship.
The Doctor stared at her, his eyes sending her a wrathful and determined look. "She burnt you, I'll burn her."
The Doctor and Rhea walked back into the observation gallery, briskly. Rhea stared at the aliens sitting around, some were wounded and some were dead. Rhea joined Rose, whose hair was damp and stuck to her forehead and she had lost her pink jumper, clad in a grey shirt and jeans.
"You all right?" Rose asked her, worried something may have happened to either of them while they were in the ventilation chamber.
Rhea simply gave her a wry smile and showed the girl her blistered and burnt palms, while the Doctor paced around the suite, glancing at them both but not saying a word.
"You all right?" Rose repeated to the Doctor, a little nervous with the way he was acting.
"Yeah, I'm fine." The Doctor growled, his agitation showing that he was clearly not "all right". I'm full of ideas, I'm bristling with them. Idea number one - teleportation through five thousand degrees needs some kind of feed. Idea number two - this feed must be hidden nearby." He said, without pausing once. He strode over to the ostrich egg that Cassandra had brought as a gift, broke it against the pedestal it was sitting on and the teleportation fell to the floor. The Doctor picked it up. "Idea number three - if you're as clever as me, then a teleportation feed can be reversed." He twisted a notch on the feed and Cassandra appeared before them, apparently in the middle of gloating.
"Ah, you should have seen their little alien faces." Cassandra was saying before she noticed exactly where she was. "Oh." She said, lamely.
"The Last Human." The Doctor snarled.
"So. You passed my little test. Bravo. This makes you eligible to join the err... the human club." Cassandra said quickly, evidently flustered by the change of events.
Rhea stepped forwards so that she was standing beside the Doctor. "People have died, Cassandra. You murdered them." She said, coldly, her hands trembling in anger at her sides.
"That depends on your definition of 'people'. And that's enough of a technicality to keep your lawyers dizzy for centuries. Take me to court then, Doctor! And watch me smile, and cry, and flutter..." She said, arrogantly.
"And creak?" The Doctor asked, raising an eyebrow.
"And what?" Cassandra looked confused.
"Creak!" Rhea said, slowly. "You're creaking."
They watched as Cassandra's skin began to tighten and make sounds, like extremely thin leather was stretched. Her eyes slowly turned red and bloodshot, and her skin became paler and paler.
"What?" Cassandra shouted, panicking. "Ah! Ah! I'm drying out! Oh, sweet heavens! Moisturize me! Moisturize me! Where are my surgeons? My lovely boys! It's too hot!" At this point in her terror, she was covered in red blotches.
"You raised the temperature." The Doctor explained.
"Have pity! Moisturize me! Oh, Doctor!" Cassandra said, pathetically and terrified.
"Help her." Rose whispered to them, shaken.
But the Doctor's face remained black and frozen. "Everything has its time and everything dies." He intoned.
"I'm... too... young!" Cassandra screamed, her skin shrivelling up.
She exploded on the spot, skin ripping and flying in all directions. Rhea ducked a particular large and bloody piece and watched the Doctor's expression, which was completely cold and not remotely fazed by the gore at all. He led Rhea out of the room.
He pulled Rhea into the med bay on the TARDIS, pushing her down into a seat and pulled the dermal regenerator over to them, slipping her hands underneath. They waited a for around five minutes before the Doctor switched the machine off and pulled her hands out, checking her hands over. The skin, which had been a mix of red and black dried blood, skin peeling off and many blisters, had looked like it had just been under a tanning booth for a little too long, almost like a mild sunburn. Rhea relaxed when she stopped feeling the constant pain coming from the wounds. She held her hands up, turned them over and examined them closely.
"You know, I'm good with burns, but that does wonders." Rhea said, casually.
The Doctor tensed for a second, thinking about a burn in particular, but then smirked and led her back to the console room and out of the TARDIS.
They stepped down from the platform and joined Rose at her spot in front of the window, staring at the Earth burn with a very vulnerable and upset look on her face, oblivious to Rhea and the Doctor watching her. Rocks flew past the window, the remnants of a civilisation gone in the blink of an eye. Rose turned around when she heard the Doctor's footsteps as she came to stand beside her.
"The end of the Earth. It's gone. And we were too busy saving ourselves, no one saw it go." Rose murmured, tearfully. The Doctor and Rhea looked down at her. "All those years... all that history and no one was even looking. It's just..."
Rhea gripped Rose's hand, sharing her pain. The Doctor led them away from the window and back to the TARDIS.
"Come with me." He said.
Rose stepped out of the TARDIS, back in her own time, London 2005. She looked around at the crowds of people, parents walking a pram down the road, teenagers laughing. She saw everything in a new light, finally understanding the fleeting nature of everything she held dear. The Doctor and Rhea stood beside her.
"You think it'll last forever. People, and cars and concrete. But it won't. One day, it's all gone. Even the sky." The Doctor and Rhea looked up at the sky. The Doctor looked back down, staring off into nothing. "My planet's gone."
Both Rose and Rhea turned to look at him, even though the latter had already heard this story before. Rhea moved her hand slightly and gripped his own large hand in hers, turning her face into his arm.
"It's dead. It burned like the Earth. It's just rocks and dust. Before it's time." The Doctor murmured.
"What happened?" Rose asked, slowly.
"There was a war. And we lost." The Doctor said, simply, there was no better explanation.
"A war with who?" Rose continued.
The Doctor didn't answer, he just kept staring out into the distance.
Rose recovered. "What about your people?"
"I'm a Time Lord. I'm the last of the Time Lords." The Doctor corrected, wistfully. "They're all gone. I'm the only survivor. I'm left travelling with Rhea alone because there's no one else." The Doctor explained, lowly.
"I'm not going to leave you. You've got me." Rhea murmured, tenderly, drawing his attention. "And for a while, by the looks of things. You can't get rid of me that easily." She said, smiling a little towards the end, but her eyes burned with sincerity.
"And there's me…" Rose added, smiling hesitatingly.
Rhea gave her a grateful look.
The Doctor looked at Rose. "You've seen how dangerous it is. Do you want to go home?" He asked her, ready to be understanding if she made that decision.
Rose just looked at them both, not knowing what to say or what to do. "I don't know. I want..." She sniffed the air. "Oh! Can you smell chips?"
Rhea and the Doctor laughed. "Yeah!" They said, simultaneously.
"I want chips." Rose told them.
The Doctor smiled and Rhea smiled because the Doctor was smiling. "Us too." Rhea said.
"Right then, before you two get me back in that box, chips it is, and you can pay." Rose said, nodding at them both.
"No money." The Doctor shrugged.
Rhea laughed. "All I've got is American money. Sorry, blondie." Rhea said, sticking her tongue out of teeth, teasingly.
"What sort of friends are you? Come on then, tightwads, chips are on me." Rose said, smiling wide. "We've only got five billion years before the shops close..."
"Oh, that was lame." Rhea groaned and the other two laughed.
"So, wait, chips are French fries?" Rhea asked them both.
"Yeah, what are 'chips' in America?" Rose asked, curiously.
"Potato chips." Rhea answered.
"Those are called crisps here." Rose said.
Rhea moaned. "Oh, great, a language barrier in a country that speaks English!" She exclaimed.
The other two laughed at her again, starting to walk down the street, Rhea nuzzling her head against the Doctor's shoulder as their fingers entwined.
A/N: Well, there's the end of The End of the World! The first shot at Nine! Tell me how you think I went! I hope you liked the way I wrote the Ninth Doctor and Rhea's relationship. I thought they'd be a bit more serious than her relationship with the Tenth or the Eleventh. I also feel like this Doctor would be affectionate with Rhea because of everything that he's lost. For the Doctor, Rhea's a constant, and he kind of holds onto her. You may not have been able to see that too much in this one but in other episodes with the Ninth Doctor, I'll try and make it more evident. I think she's really interested in this Doctor, especially because she knows that this is the regeneration straight after the Time War. It speaks to the psychologist in her.
I also hope you didn't mind Rhea saying that the Doctor's got her. Back when I did Voyage of the Damned, the Doctor told Rhea that his planet burned and Rhea said she was sorry. I felt like she's in a point in their relationship that she's accepted what her life's going to be now, not that she won't get a bit angry sometimes, but she accepts what she has to do and it allows her to make that commitment to the Doctor, without sounding too needy or desperate. I always felt, in the original episode, that the Doctor wouldn't have really respected Rose's "there's me" comment at that point in his life.
I hope you liked the little insight into Rhea's own dark side. She does have one and it does pop out in a couple of episodes. The reasons for her dark side will be explored later on. I hope you liked Rose's relationship with the two. I decided that Rose and Rhea would be very good friends, but there will be some jealousy (not over the Doctor, though) but only in specific chapters. I hope you liked the protective!Doctor I wrote in this chapter and the confrontation between the Doctor, Rhea and Jabe at the beginning. I wonder why the Doctor got so tense when Jabe asked whether Rhea was his wife? And Rhea's chat with the Face of Boe. I am going with the idea that Jack's the Face of Boe. I hope you liked the couple of sneak previews that Rhea got about her and the Doctor's future relationship. Next chapter will be back to the Tenth Doctor, I just can't stay away from him for too long.
Explanations of References: Amanda Lepore was a transgender celebrity whose spent millions on plastic surgery and Joan Rivers is an American television personality whose had seven hundred and thirty-nine procedures, which is even more than Cassandra!
Anyway, Read and Review!