Disclaimer etc.: see Prologue.

I'm not entirely pleased with this chapter, but I hope it's not too crappy.

Thank you to people who have reviewed, I love you all. Enjoy!

Golden Death

5 - Jolting

They found the TARDIS nestled away in a little corner of Hell, the blue of her panels stark against the walls' gentle crimson glow. The Doctor grinned, feeling his feet settle onto the path that led back to 'normality'.

"Hey girl," he greeted, running his palm down the wooden panels. "Did you miss me?"

He felt her psychic rumble of joy at his return and the smile spread wider. "Take that as a yes then." He slapped the wood playfully, joyful, desperately. "Good to be back."

"Oh that's just great," the red being mumbled beside him, unaware of the tension within the Time Lord. "First he talks to thin air. Now he's talking to a box. Wha-hey."

The Doctor rummaged in his pocket and pulled out his TARDIS key. He brandished it before his red friend. "This is not just any old box," he lectured. "This is my box." He turned to the TARDIS, and then swung back again with a grin. "And it's not just a box."

"Oh yeah?"

"It's a blue box."

The red being rolled its eyes. "Oh boy."

>>>>>>>>>

Her footsteps were light along the tarmacked road; almost-dancing through the urban estate. She was right there, so close she could touch the milling crowds, but so far away that it hurt to imagine the distances. The vision was almost palpable, she could almost believe that she was actually there, actually stepping through the Powell Estate, the place she had once called home.

But she wasn't.

And if she didn't keep fighting, she never would be again. And that was a fact that was in sharp relief within her psyche.

She was disjointed, out of synchronisation with her limbs and body. The Angels controlled her corporeal form and had cast her off to her prison within the still-aflame Heaven.

Rose Tyler burned with it, but she waited. Waited for him.

She leaned against the invisible bars, trying to block out the tantalising images that the Angels were projecting into her mind. Her eyelids slid shut, and salty tears welled in the corners of her eyes.

"Doctor…" she whispered slowly, softly. "Doctor, please… Help me."

>>>>>>>>>

And somehow, somewhere, he heard.

He screwed his eyes shut; for one double pulse of his hearts. Two. Three.

You can hear her, the Wolf whispered in his ear.

Yes.

He turned and ran to the console. "I know where her body is," he said automatically, explaining to those he guided.

"Her body isn't with her mind," the red being said softly; half statement, half question.

"Yes." Levers, switches, dials. "We need her body. And then we can get her mind."

Where is she then? The Wolf chipped in its bit.

One big lever, yanked up. The TARDIS shook and they spun recklessly through the Vortex. "They took her body home."

>>>>>>>>>

Her eyes flew open, unseeing the pyre around her.

The Angels guided her body through the back streets of 21st century London, through her home. They touched things, climbed things, held things. And now they were heading somewhere.

maybe a little shock is required to fully integrate you into us, they mused softly. It started her that she could hear them.

"Shock?" she murmured in her prison a million years away. She shivered as she saw through her eyes, out-of-control.

maybe a little death by your hand. just a little. just so there is no going back. something to jolt you into us.

Rose wasn't stupid. Horror, and pain. And fear. "You can't mean…"

yes we can.

>>>>>>>>>

"Home? But why?" The red being moved up and leant against the console beside the Doctor.

His eyes were focused. "Rose will be fighting them," he murmured, more for his own benefit than his companion's. "They'll try to shock her into submission; it's the only way for them to keep total control of her."

"Shock her?"

How? The Wolf again.

The Doctor bit his lip gently, thinking, his brain working overtime to frantically figure it out. His fingers tapped a crazy tattoo on the console, shivering, shaking. Scared beyond belief.

A moment passed.

His fingers froze.

"Oh no…" he murmured, disbelieving. "They wouldn't…"

"Doctor?"

Doctor?

"Jackie!"

"Who?"

The Doctor slammed the heels of his hands into his eyes. "Jackie Tyler," he explained tersely. "Rose's mother."

"Oh."

But what are they going to do to Jackie?

"They're gonna kill her." He grabbed the TARDIS's phone, trusting her to dial it for him. "And I can't let that happen."

>>>>>>>>>

Her body stood in front of her mother's front door, and Rose screamed inside her cell. "Mum! No! Mum run!"

They cackled. she's not going to hear you rose tyler. you know that.

"Shut up!" she screamed. "Mum!"

Her hand was raised to knock. must be polite, the Angels murmured. before killing her, of course.

>>>>>>>>>

The phone rang in the flat, at the same time as a knock sounded at the door. Jackie Tyler sighed, and deliberated which to answer first.

The phone kept ringing, and the insistent buzzing was started to get on her nerves.

"I'll be right there!" she called to the door, and picked up the handset. "Hello?" she quizzed down the line.

"Hello," an Asian-accented voice started in a fast-paced jabber, "could I interest you in—"

Jackie hung up the phone with the faceless person still talking. " 'Could I interest you in double glazing?'," she mimicked, slightly viciously. "No! And if you call again, I'll give you a piece of my mind!"

She moved for the door. "And if this is some bloody salesman…!"

>>>>>>>>>

The Doctor cursed violently at the engaged tone that buzzed down at him. "Damn it all Jackie, get off the phone!"

The red being watched him with some trepidation.

With a stab of his finger he hit redial. "C'mon Jackie, please, pick-up," he pleaded. "Rose'll kill me if I let her kill you!"

>>>>>>>>>

Again, the phone buzzed behind her.

Jackie stopped and turned, never able to resist a ringing phone. She pulled the phone from its cradle and raised it to her ear. "Hello?"

>>>>>>>>>

The Doctor sagged against the TARDIS console. "Jackie, don't open the door!"

"And hello to you to!" Jackie's annoyed voice echoed down the line. "And where's my daughter now then?"

"Never mind," the Doctor replied, "just don't go outside!"

"And why not Mr-High-and-Mighty?"

"Because you will die."

There was a slight pause. "Oh."

The TARDIS shivered to a stop, and the Doctor bumped his hand against the console in congratulations.

"Are you here then?" Rose's mother questioned. "I just heard that machine of yours. Is Rose coming? Why are you calling instead of her?" And so on.

The Doctor rolled his eyes in exasperation. "Jackie, shut up," he ordered, vaguely surprised when she did. "Just stay put and do not open your door. I will be there in a second."

He slammed the phone down, and paused, looking at the TARDIS door with a mish-mash of emotions on his face.

"Doctor?" his crimson companion asked.

The Time Lord appeared to be weighing two things up in his mind. "Slapped by Jackie, killed by Rose, slapped by Jackie, killed by Rose…" He shook his head. "I dunno which is worse…"

"Doctor?"

He glanced over at it. "I'm about to get slapped."

"Really?"

"Uh huh."

And then they were running.

>>>>>>>>>

Something was happening to the door; golden tendrils curling around the edges, sinking into the walls and floors. Surging towards Jackie. She watched them, dumbstruck, almost paralyzed.

A latticework of gold threads traced their way over the wood of the door, cutting down, shredding the flimsy entranceway. The door teetered for a second; blocks of wood stacked one on top of the other.

And then they collapsed forward, scattering like arterial spray across the cheap carpet. Oddly prophetic.

"Well, I didn't open the door," Jackie murmured.

She hadn't, but something had.

And something stepped past the entranceway, lightly moving within the confines of the council flat.

"Rose!" Jackie gasped.

A curve of the lips; a deadly smile. "No."

>>>>>>>>>