Masks
"What do we do?" Clara whispered.
"Well," the Doctor raised his eyebrows, "you don't want to eat, do you?"
"Hmm...slightly lost my appetite." She glanced at the crowd again. "How long before they notice that we're different?"
"Not long," Adelaide guessed.
"Anything we can do?"
"How long can you hold your breath?"
"We could just casually stroll out of here like we've changed our minds," Clara offered.
The Doctor nodded. "Happens all the time."
"Course it does." The three of them stood, but all of the other diners stood in unison. When they tried to take a step away from the table, the diners took a step towards them. "We could take another look at the menu." The entire room sat down again. "What are they?" Clara hissed to the Time Lords.
"We don't know," the Doctor shrugged. "But don't worry, because that's not the question. The question is...what is this restaurant?"
Clara nodded. "Okay, what is this restaurant."
"We don't know." The Doctor glanced down at the menu again, but a waiter walked over to them, clearly the same thing as the rest of the diners. "No sausages? Do you...and there's no pictures either. Do you have a children's menu?" The waiter held up his pencil, shining a green light from the end and scanning the Doctor since he was the one on the end. "Any specials?"
"Liver," the waiter said.
The Doctor made a face. "I don't like liver."
"Spleen. Brainstem. Eyes."
Clara grimaced. "Is there a lot of demand for those?"
"That's not what's on the menu," Adelaide said. "We are the menu."
"Lungs," the waiter continued. "Skin."
The Doctor stood. "Excuse me." He pulled off the waiter's face, revealing the metal beneath – clearly some type of a robot – and the small flame inside.
"Okay." Clara frowned. "Robot in a mask."
"It's a face," the Doctor said, looking at the mask he was holding.
"Yeah," Clara nodded, "it's very convincing."
The Doctor put it on Clara's face. "No, it's a face."
Clara's eyes widened as she realized what he meant, throwing it down. "Oh!"
"Yes," the waiter said.
"Yes, what?" Adelaide prompted.
"Yes, we have a children's menu."
Before any of them could move, metal bands shot out of the seat and wrapped around their arms and legs, trapping them in place. A second later, the bench started to lower. "You've got to admire their efficiency," the Doctor said, looking around.
"Is it okay if I don't?"
The bench landed with a thud into a large circular room, seeming to be made entirely of metal, with motionless people – likely robots – standing in alcoves. In the center of the room was a man sitting with his back towards them. "Hello?" the Doctor called. "Hello, are you the manager? I demand to speak to the manager."
Clara sighed. "This is not a real restaurant, is it?"
"First observation makes it an automated organ collection station for unknowing patrons," Adelaide said.
The Doctor nodded. "Sweeney Todd without the pies."
Clara struggled a bit in the restraints, looking around as she did so. "So where are we now?"
"Factually? An ancient spaceship, probably buried for centuries. Functionally? A larder."
That stilled Clara a bit. "So why hasn't somebody come for us?"
"We're alive," Adelaide said simply.
"We're alive in a larder?"
The Doctor shrugged. "Exactly. It's cheaper than freezing us."
"Okay." Clara shook her head.
The Doctor and Adelaide, without speaking about it, both attempted to reach something in their pockets, though somehow Adelaide reached it first. She angled her sonic pen at the Doctor and managed, after a bit more fiddling, to release his restraints. In quick succession, he used his own to free her and Clara. "You really should try sonic pens," Adelaide hissed, the three standing. "Much thinner."
"What's wrong with the screwdriver?" he frowned. "Is this like the bowtie where you think it's cool but you don't actually like it?"
Adelaide and Clara just stepped up to one of the closest robots. "Dormant," Adelaide mumbled.
"How do you know?"
"A hopeful guess." The two women stepped back, meeting up with the Doctor again.
"So, is it these guys that killed the dinosaur?"
The Doctor shrugged. "Well, if they're harvesting organs, a dinosaur would have some great stuff."
"Why would robots need organs? Burke and Hare from space?"
"No," he pointed at her, "but that's a good theory. Droids harvesting spare parts." He frowned. "That rings a bell."
"This time I have no idea," Adelaide shrugged when the Doctor looked at her. She'd encountered organ harvesters and robots, but never the two combined.
The Doctor glanced over at the man sitting in the middle of the room, whom they could now see had only half of his face covered in a 'mask'. "Captain, my captain."
Clara stepped closer to the Time Lords. "Can he see us?"
"Dormant," Adelaide said, the Doctor stepping up to study the robot closer.
"Hoping?"
"Yes."
"Oh, look," the Doctor nodded to the wire extending out of the man. "He's recharging. He's asleep. Doesn't even know we're here."
"Are you sure?"
"Sure. Not sure. One or the other."
Clara sighed. "Okay. So, half-man, half-robot. A cyborg, yeah."
"Hands," Adelaide said, nodding to them.
"What about them?"
"Look at them," the Doctor prompted.
"I'm looking!"
"They don't match," Adelaide cut in, reminded of the Time Lords time with House. "The hands do not belong to the same body."
Clara frowned. "I don't understand."
"Well, I don't blame you," the Doctor shrugged. "See this, this is not your normal cyborg. This isn't a man turning himself into a robot. This is a robot turning himself to a man, piece by piece."
Clara nodded. "That's what the restaurant's for."
"Well, it would need a constant supply of spare parts. You can tan skin, but organs rot." He peered closer at the metal on the robot. "Some of that metalwork looks Roman. Wonder how long it's been around, how much of the original is even left." He leaned closer. "The eyeballs look very fresh, though."
The robot jerked its arms, making the group jump back. There was the sound of clockwork moving. "Is it awake?" Clara hissed.
"It's waking up," Adelaide reasoned. "We should leave."
The trio backed up, slowly moving to go through the door behind them. Clara and Adelaide got a bit of the way into the corridor, but the Doctor turned to look back at the original room, frowning at it. "I've seen this before. I'm missing something..."
The two women paused. "Doctor," Adelaide hissed.
"It's the brand new head, rebooting."
"Come on," Clara ran back to grab the Doctor.
"I've seen this before."
The human shoved him towards the door and Adelaide. "Oh, hurry up. Get out." She'd just managed to shove him through the doorway when the robot lifted a hand, making the door shut between them. "Doctor," Clara said as the Doctor started to attempt to sonic the door, Adelaide joining in. "Quickly." They could only manage to open the door a short way, not nearly enough for Clara to slide through.
The robot began to stand and the Doctor, shaking his head, took Adelaide's hand. "Sorry, too slow. There's no point in them catching us all."
"Well, give me a sonic."
But not even Adelaide moved. "Sorry, Clara." She and the Doctor stepped back, vanishing down the corridor.
"Doctor?" Clara hissed, looking for him. "Adelaide?" Behind her, she could hear the robot standing, moving over to where the three of them had arrived. She rushed to an empty alcove as it began to search for them, standing as still as she possibly could. Other of the robots started to move too, looking at her, but the half-face man came directly for her.
She stopped breathing.
The robots started to move towards the doorway and Clara forced herself to imitate their way of walking, moving as quickly as she dared after where the Time Lords had gone, hoping that she'd find some empty corridor because she really, really needed to breathe.
But it was lined with robots, extending as far as she could see.
And Clara couldn't hold her breath anymore.
She fell to her knees, breathing deeply, and felt her vision go blurry.
"Bring her," the robot's voice was faded, and Clara could vaguely feel people lifting and carrying her.
She remembered Coal Hill, remembered the first day, remembered the students who refused to do as she said. Remembered that push just to do it, just to prove them wrong, to prove she was strong and smart and worth their respect.
She woke up on the floor, lying in front of the half-face man in the main room again. "Where are the other ones?" the man asked, seated again. "There were others. Where are they? Where are the others? You will tell us, or you will be destroyed."
"What did you say?"
"You will tell us."
"Yeah, I know." Clara nodded. "Or what?"
"You will die."
Clara forced herself to stand. "Go on, then. Do it. I'm not going to answer any of your questions, so you have to do it. You have to kill me. Threats don't work unless you deliver."
"You will tell us where the other ones are."
She shook her head. "Nope."
"You will be destroyed."
"Destroy me, then. And if you don't, then I'm not going to believe a single threat you make from now on. Of course, if I'm dead, then I can't tell you where the other ones went then. You need to keep this place down here a secret, don't you?" She shrugged. "Never start with your final sanction. You've got nowhere to go but backwards."
Before the half-face man spoke each time, she could hear the whirring of his clockwork. "Humans feel pain."
"Bigger threat to smaller threat. See what I mean? Backwards."
"The information can be extracted by means of your suffering."
She frowned. "Are you trying to scare me? Well, cos I'm already bloody terrified of dying. And I'll endure a lot of pain for a very long time before I give up the information that's keeping me alive. How long have you got?" The half-face man stood. "All you can offer me is my life. What you can't do is threaten it. You can negotiate." The robot removed his right hand, attaching it to his jacket. "Okay, okay, okay, okay, yes, yes, yes, I'm crying and it's just because I am very frightened of you. If you know anything about human beings, that means you...you're in a lot of trouble."
A flamethrower burst out of the robot's wrist and he pointed it at her. "We will not negotiate."
"You don't have a choice. I tell you what. I'll answer your questions if you answer mine."
"We will not answer questions."
"We'll take turns. I'll go first. Why did you kill the dinosaur?"
"We will not answer questions."
"Why'd you kill the dinosaur?"
"We will not answer questions!"
"Then you might as well kill me," Clara nodded, "because I'm not talking again till you do."
The clockwork extended for a few seconds longer than normal and then the half-face man lowered the flamethrower. "Within the optic nerve of the dinosaur is a material of use to our computer systems."
She raised her eyebrows. "You burned a whole dinosaur for a spare part?" Then she paused, thinking it through. "No, no, hang on. You know what's in a dinosaur's optic nerve, which means you've seen them before."
"Where are the other ones?"
"How long have you been rebuilding yourselves? Look at the state of you." She looked him up and down. "Is there any real you left? What's the point?"
The half-face man looked down. "We will reach the promised land."
"The what?" she frowned. "The promised land? What's that?"
"Where are the other ones?"
"I don't know. But I know where they will be. Where they will always be. If the Doctor is still the Doctor and Adelaide is Adelaide, they will have my back." She reached out behind her, reaching for either Time Lord, wishing she was right. "I'm right, aren't I? Go on. Please, please, go on, say I'm right."
She nearly gasped when someone grabbed her hand, pulling her behind them. It was the Doctor, with Adelaide by his side. "Ah," the Doctor grinned. "Hello, hello, rubbish robots from the dawn of time! Thank you for all the gratuitous information. Five foot one and crying," he pointed at Clara, finishing his lap around the room. "You never stood a chance. Stop it." He pushed the half-face man's arm down, sticking his sonic in the outlet and making the lights go out. "This is your power source. And feeble though it is, I can use it to blow this whole room if I see one thing I don't like. And that includes karaoke and mime, so take no chances."
Adelaide moved over to stand by the Doctor again. "For the record, Clara, you are quite impressive when running on adrenaline."
"And you" the Doctor pointed at the half-face man "were out of your depth, sir. Never try and control a control freak. Trust me, I know."
"I am not a control freak," Adelaide and Clara said in unison, though Clara said it a bit snappier.
The Doctor just raised his eyebrows. "Yes, ma'ams."
"Why are you here?" the half-face man sneered at the Time Lords.
"Why did you invite us? The message, in the paper. That was you, wasn't it?" his eyes widened, glancing at Adelaide before snatching his sonic back. "I hate being wrong in public."
"And yet it happens so often," Adelaide mumbled. "Clara, what word did they give you?"
"What?"
"They would never send you here without a word."
Clara shook her head. "I don't want to say it."
The Doctor grinned. "We've guessed it already." Clara touched the top button on her dress, making it glow blue. "Geronimo," the pair of them said in unison.
Vastra and Jenny dropped from the ceiling via long pieces of fabric, pulling out their swords as their landed. "Remain still," Vastra ordered, "and lay down your weapons in the name of the British Empire!" With that, Strax fell from the ceiling, landing flat on his face. "Strax!"
"Sorry," he mumbled, pushing himself up.
"I've told you before," Jenny told him. "Take the stairs."
"Oh, look," the Doctor grinned. "The cavalry."
"I burned an ancient, beautiful creature for one inch of optic nerve," the half-face man sneered, advancing on the Doctor. "What do you think you can accomplish, little man?"
"What do you? Vastra?"
Vastra stepped between them and the robot, forcing him back with her sword. "The establishment upstairs has been disabled with maximum prejudice, and the authorities summoned."
"Hang on," Clara frowned, "she called the police? We never do that. We should start."
"Though perhaps stay away from outer-space police," Adelaide mumbled, though she didn't disagree with Clara.
"You see?" the Doctor ignored both of them. "Destroy us if you will, they're still going to close your restaurant." He frowned. "That was going to sound better."
"Then we will destroy you!" the other robots activated, stepping out of their alcoves with weapons of their own.
"No, you won't," Adelaide tried. "You're logical, you have restraint. You killed to survive. You're not a murderer."
"He's not a what?" Clara shook her head. "This is a slaughterhouse."
"And how does that make it different from any other restaurant?" the Doctor shrugged. "You weren't vegetarian the last time I checked."
Adelaide held a hand up to the half-faced man. "This is over. Why would you kill us?"
"To find the promised land."
The Doctor scoffed. "You're millions of years old. It's time you knew, there isn't one."
"I am in search of paradise."
"Yeah, well, me too." The Doctor nodded. "I'm not going to make it either."
The half-face man made to strike the Doctor, but Adelaide pulled him back just in time. That didn't seem to stop the man, as he just turned and made his way over to the booth they'd descended in. "I will leave in the escape capsule. Destroy where necessary."
"Escape capsule?" Vastra frowned. "This ship is millions of years old. It'll never fly."
"It has been repaired."
"With what?"
"You."
"Defensive positions, everyone!" Strax ordered. The trio surrounded the time travelers, protecting them as the robots encircled them all.
"Doctor!" Clara called, pointing. "He's getting away!"
The Time Lords, using their sonics, managed to force a hole through the robots, darting through them towards the booth the half-face man was in, the man rising already.
"Your friends are intelligent," the robot said. "They'll know better than to follow me."
The Time Lords just managed to grab onto the bottom of the bench before it got too high for them.
|C-S|
The half-face man encountered some policemen when he arrived, but he managed to get them to leave the restaurant empty. The Time Lords, once they were certain the man had moved away, climbed up via a hatch they'd discovered in the bottom. The half-face man didn't seem to notice their arrival until the Doctor made a sound while he poured two glasses of whiskey.
"What are you doing?"
"I've got the horrible feeling we're going to have to kill you," the Doctor said. "We thought you might appreciate a drink first. I know I would." The half-face man flicked a lever on his control panel, making a grinding sound. "Fifty-first century, right?"
"Time traveling spaceship crashed in the past," Adelaide said. "Attempting to get home."
"I go to the promised land," the half-face man told them.
"So you keep saying." The Doctor knocked back his drink. "Okay, so your restaurant is made out of your old ship. But you're wasting your time. It can't ever fly." He picked up a flower from the table, messing with it.
"The escape pod is viable."
"How?" the Doctor frowned. "You can't patch up a spaceship with human remains." He paused. "You know, this really is ringing a bell." The entire room started to shake as it actually worked. "Okay, that's clever. How are you powering it?"
"Skin." The room shook even more and, when the Time Lords looked out the window, they could see they were now flying.
The Doctor, looking around the room, spotted a fuse box. He stepped over, pulling one out. "SS Marie Antoinette," he muttered. "Out of control repair droids cannibalizing human beings. I know this is familiar, but I just can't seem to place it."
"How would you kill me?"
"Sister ship of the Madame De Pompadour," the Doctor read, seemingly a bit distracted. "No, not getting it." He smelled the flower he'd found.
"How would you kill me?"
"Why don't you have a drink first?" Adelaide offered, nodding at the single one still beside her. "It's human."
"I am not human."
"Neither are we." Adelaide stepped backward until she was looking down through the doorway, seeing where they were floating above. The Doctor joined her. "What do you think of the view?" Adelaide asked, considering it herself. They were flying over a cathedral.
"I do not think of it."
"I don't think of it," the Doctor corrected. "I don't. Droids and apostrophes," he shook his head, "I could write a book." He considered the man again. "Except you are barely a droid anymore. There's more human in you than machine. So, tell us, what do you think of the view?"
The half-faced man, after a moment of thought, joined them in the doorway as they approached Westminster. "It is beautiful."
"No, it isn't. It's just far away. Everything looks too small. I prefer it down there." The Doctor nodded at it. "Everything is huge. Everything is so important. Every detail, every moment, ever life clung to."
"How could you kill me?" the half-face man asked again.
"For the same reason you're asking that question," Adelaide said quietly. "Because you don't really want to carry on."
They were all quiet for a moment. "What'll happen to the other droids when you die?" the Doctor asked. "You're the control node, aren't you? Presumably they'll deactivate."
"I will not die," the half-face man insisted. "I will reach the promised land."
"There isn't any promised land. This is just...it's a superstition that you have picked up from all the humanity you've stuffed inside yourself."
"I am not dead."
"You are a broom," the Doctor told him. "Question. You take a broom, you replace the handle, and then later you replace the brush, and you do that over and over again. Is it still the same broom? Answer: no, of course, it isn't. But you can still sweep the floor." The Doctor frowned. "Which is not strictly relevant, skip that last part. You've replaced every piece of yourself, mechanical and organic, time and time again. There's not a trace of the original you left. You probably can't even remember where you got that face from." He held up a silver plate, letting the half-face man see his reflection.
The robot took it, studying himself, before dropping it. "It cannot end."
"It has to," Adelaide told him. "You know it does. And there's only one way out." She nodded towards the doorway they were standing at.
"Self-destruction is against my basic program."
"And murder is against mine."
Adelaide said nothing.
The men, staring at each other, surged together. Adelaide just managed to step out of the way before she was dragged into the conflict. They fought together, both attempting to throw the other out of the doorway, until the Doctor managed to get the half-face man trapped against one of the sides. "You are stronger than you look."
"And I'm hoping you are too. This is over. Are you capable of admitting that?"
"Do you have it in you to murder me?" the half-face man sneered.
"Those people down there...they're never small to me. Don't make assumptions about how far I will go to protect them, because I've already come a very long way. And, unlike you, I don't expect to reach the promised land." After a second, the two men released each other, moving to opposite sides of the doorway.
"You realize," Adelaide said, standing between them, the three forming a small triangle, "one of you is lying about your basic programming."
"Yes," the half-face man said.
"And we all know who that is."
|C-S|
Adelaide was the only one standing by the console when Clara stepped into the TARDIS, the ship finally having finished repairing itself after the rather nasty crash into Victorian London. The Doctor, meanwhile, was reclining in a new chair at an upper level of the console.
"You've redecorated," Clara commented.
"Yes," Adelaide nodded.
"I don't like it."
The Doctor shrugged. "Not completely entirely convinced myself. I think there should be more round things on the walls. I used to have lots of round things. I wonder where I put them." He stood, making his way down to join Clara and Adelaide, though he was looking at the human specifically. "I'm the Doctor. I've lived for over two thousand years, and not all of them were good. I've made many mistakes, and it's about time that I did something about that." He glanced at Adelaide then.
"Do you expect me to give a similar introduction?" Adelaide said, raising her eyebrows. The pair of them, after the Doctor had changed and she'd found a jacket – for she'd quite liked having the long Victorian coat, though this one was looked a bit closer to a leather one like Clara fancied - looked quite the pair again. They were both in dark colors, with her in dark green and black and him dark blue and red. "Are you alright, Clara?"
The human nodded, but Adelaide didn't seem to fully believe her. The Doctor, however, set the TARDIS flying. "What do you think?"
Clara, after looking the Doctor up and down, pulled Adelaide's sonic - the woman had dropped it at some point - from her pocket, messing with it before handing it to her. "Who put that advert in the paper?"
"Who gave you our number? A long time ago, remember? You were given the number of a computer helpline, and you ended up phoning the TARDIS – not Adelaide's, who's number we normally give. Who gave you that number?"
Clara shrugged. "The woman. The woman in the shop."
"Then there's a woman out there who's very keen that we stay together." The TARDIS landed with a jolt. "How do you feel on the subject?"
"Am I home?"
"If you want to be." Clara's mobile rang. "You'd better get that."
Clara frowned, but did as he recommended, seeing the number as Adelaide's but the woman, who was holding her phone so that Clara could see, was clearly not calling. "Hello?"
"It's me." Clara jumped slightly at the sound of the previous Doctor's voice. "I'm phoning you from Trenzalore."
She shook her head. "I don't..."
"From before I changed. I mean it's all still to happen for me. It's coming. Oh, it's a-coming. Not long now. I can...feel it."
"Why? Why would you do this?"
"Because I think it's going to be a whopper, and I think you might be scared, and I honestly don't know how much Adelaide will be able to help you."
"She did help," Clara said, making Adelaide smile.
"Good. So...what am I like? Please tell me I didn't get old. Anything but old. I was young...oh..." he groaned "is he grey?"
"Yes."
"Oh...why does Adelaide get to be ginger and I have to be grey?"
"Because she's better?" Clara laughed, making the past Doctor laugh too.
"Hey, Clara, please, for me, help him. Help her. Go on, and don't be afraid. Goodbye, Clara. Miss ya."
Clara waited a bit before lowering the phone, looking at the two Time Lords. And then she smiled. "Thank you."
"For what?"
"Phoning." Clara stepped forward, giving the Doctor a tight hug.
The man, however, looked a bit uncomfortable. "I...I don't think I'm a hugging person now."
Clara didn't step away. "I'm not sure you get a vote."
"Whatever you say."
Adelaide stepped past the pair of them, opening the TARDIS and glancing out. "I'm fairly certain this isn't where Clara lives, in case anyone's interested."
The pair stepped apart, joining Adelaide outside of the TARDIS. "Sorry," the Doctor said, looking around. "Sorry about that. We missed."
"Where are we?"
"Glasgow, I think."
"Ah," Clara nodded. "You'll fit right in." She put on the Doctor's new accent for a second. "Scottish."
"Right," the Doctor nodded, stepping closer to Adelaide again but not putting an arm around her. "Shall we...er...do you want to go and get some coffee, or chips, or something? Or chips and coffee?"
Clara smiled. "Coffee. Coffee would be great." She started to walk backward down the road. "You're buying!"
"We don't have any money."
"You're fetching, then."
"I'm not sure that I'm the fetching sort."
Clara just shrugged. "Yeah, still not sure you get a vote." She turned and kept walking but, before the Time Lords followed her, the Doctor looked at Adelaide.
"Do you really like it?"
"Your face?" He nodded. "We're Time Lords, Doctor. The outside doesn't really matter. The inside is what we focus on." She stepped closer, taking his hand. "May I just say, I'm very glad you're not a hugging person this regeneration. We'll fit better now."
He grinned and, somewhere out in the Universe, the stars sang.
|C-S|
The half-face man woke on the patio of a lush garden. There was a woman, dark-haired and Victorian-garbed, sitting on the edge of the fountain in the center. "Hello," she said, standing and making her way over to the chair beside the man. "I'm Missy. You made it. I hope my friends weren't too mean to you."
"Friends?"
"Now, did he push you out of that thing, or did you fall? Couldn't really tell. He can be very mean sometimes – so can she, so I've heard...those are some stories. Except," Missy smiled, "to me, of course, because he loves me so much. I do like his new accent, though," she considered it. "Think I might keep it."
The half-face man looked around him. "Where am I?"
"Where do you think you are? Look around you. You made it. The Promised Land. Paradise!" She stood, dancing around the fountain, spinning with her arms out wide. "Welcome to Heaven!"
A/N: Wonder what some of those stories about Adelaide could be...
Notes on reviews:
TheBlueRiver: I always get emotional whenever I think about a Doctor leaving. And glad you like the first chapter ;)
gossamermouse101: Goodbye, Raggedy Man
primus light bringer: These two will certainly have an interesting time with this new regeneration, especially in regards to what his new face represents...;)