Chapter 5

Van Statten broke the moment of speechless horror that followed the man's revelation. No longer shouting, instead he spoke carefully, trying to make sense of this new enemy: "So you know Dr. Shaw. Does she know that you booby-trapped what was the pinnacle of her career?"

After an exasperated pause that communicated his distaste for speaking to Van Statten, the man answered, "Not as such. She was, perhaps, not entirely informed. She knew there were risks, and concentrated her efforts on minimizing them -- with the containment field that you destroyed."

Rose said, "Yeah, but the containment didn't really do anything except hide this from the outside world, am I right? So why should I believe you when you say taking the next step will be so dangerous?"

"Because I'm telling you the truth. I knew that if this got too far out of my hands, I would want it destroyed."

"Not it. Her. It's a woman you've imprisoned, and now you'll add murder to that crime."

"But it's not a woman. It's not human. Despite its appearance, don't be fooled -- it's alien. And isn't that what Torchwood does? Make use of the alien for the benefit of humanity? That's all that is being done here. And don't tell me that Torchwood only confiscates technology, not living beings. You and I both know better."

"We're not like that anymore, not since the People's …"

"…Republic, yes, I've heard the propaganda. Your capacity for self-delusion is really quite astonishing, Rose. Now then, you have to decide if rescuing this creature is worth killing it."

"Ace, are you hearing this?"

"Yeah, every word." In the monitors, Rose could see Ace still standing face to face with the immobile "alien," if that's what the entrapped woman was. Ace asked, "Do you believe him? He could be making it up to get us to back off."

"I … I don't know why, but I don't think he's lying. We have to assume he's not, don't we?"

"Maybe we don't have to do anything right away. Maybe we can find a way to free her without killing her."

"Listen to her, Rose." It was him again.

"Shut up. And don't call me that."

Ace addressed the interloper for the first time: "You're wrong, you know -- it's not really down to Rose, in the end, is it? It's down to me -- me and her." She nodded toward the figure.

"Oh yes, I can see how you would grasp the nuances of the situation," he replied. "One of Van Statten's mindless hirelings. Let me guess: You've spent your life fleeing from a criminal background. Did Van Statten know? Tell me, did he hire you for knowledge of explosives?"

Ace ignored his needling. "Rose, tell Van Statten to order an evacuation of the base. This guy said we get a half hour. I reckon he wouldn't have let that slip if it wasn't true, if we didn't have the time."

"Are you sure about this?"

"No. I don't know what I'm going to do. But let's get this started, just in case."

Rose turned to Van Statten. "Give the evacuation order."

"Are you insane? Haven't you listened to what that guy is saying? You can't shut the project down. Look, I'm sure we can work something out. Figure out the damage this guy and Shaw have done…"

Pete stepped forward with the gun. "Maybe. In the meantime, order the evacuation."

Greatly disgruntled, Van Statten sat at the computer again, and under Pete's watchful eye, he tapped away, until they heard a wailing alarm in the corridors. Van Statten layered the din with his own voice over loudspeakers echoing through the base: "All personnel are to leave the base immediately. Everybody -- get out."

The alarm did not sound in the lab itself, nor in the inner room: Rose could hear it only faintly echoing across the line. It continued to blare as Van Statten stood aside again with a surly look at the Tylers.

Ace was now prowling, hunting for something. "There we go," she said, stopping and shoving aside a set of shelves. "I knew from guarding the front door that there had to be another way in, probably one only Van Statten and Dr. Shaw knew about."

"You'll find it won't open," the man's voice said. "Whatever Mickey can do to unlock it, I can re-lock it. I can keep that up for quite some time."

"Yeah. The thing is, you guessed right about me. Your computer locks? Nothing a good old-fashioned explosive won't beat."

"Such finesse."

"Whatever works."

"Face it," Rose said. "No matter what we do, whether we wait or not, you've lost."

"And you, Rose Tyler. You're as much of a disgrace. Utterly ignorant of the forces you're dealing with, and yet you go blundering in all the same."

"You're losing your temper. Try to accept your defeat with a little grace."

"Unlike you, I do not relish the destruction your delinquent friend is contemplating."

"No, you just coldly set the stage for it, didn't you?"

Van Statten leaned in. "McShane, just stop and think what you're doing. Let's talk it over, look at other options. I swear, I had no idea it had got this far and I want to fix it."

"I'm not negotiating with you. You knew exactly what was in this room. You just want to stop your base from becoming a pile of rubble. So, Rose, you're the alien expert. What would your friend say?"

"I think he would say … that this isn't living."

The man's voice returned with a warning: "Neither of you knows what you're --"

"You don't get a say in this either!" Ace said. She stopped in front of the captive, and her words became a plea: "I wish you could tell me. What should I do?"

Only the muffled sound of the continuing alarm could be heard. Ace reached out and put her hand on the woman's arm, searching the other's eyes, for permission, for absolution … until she sighed, evidently not finding what she had hoped for.

She had begun to turn away, when she was arrested by a choked, rusty voice.

"Dorothy…"

Ace grasped the woman's arm again, but she said no more. But it was enough for Ace.

"The evacuation is underway?"

"Yeah," Rose said.

"Good. Let's do this."

Her qualms dissipated, indecision flown, Ace began to move with purpose. She upended a long table, sending its contents clattering to the floor, and raised it on end to create a shield. Then she dashed out from behind it to the computer that Mickey had pointed out, crouched down in front of it, and after placing the small canister she produced from her pocket, she scurried back behind the table.

When the explosion came, the makeshift shield protected the two women from pelting pieces of the console, but not from the charges of energy that crackled across the cables to its source -- the woman, who convulsed and cried out in pain. The cables snapped off her as she fell to the floor.

Ace seized her, and pulled her away from the still sparking machinery. "I've got you. I've got you. You're free."

Rose stepped closer to the monitors. "How is she?"

"Her eyes are opening." Then in a gentle voice: "Can you hear me?"

Rose, Pete, even Van Statten -- maybe even the stranger listening in -- held their breath.

When the woman spoke for the second time, her voice was weak and dazed. She repeated the same name, the one that was inexplicable to Rose: "Dorothy?"

But it meant something to Ace. "Yeah, that's me."

She tried to sit up and look around, before slumping back to the floor. "Where's the doctor?"

At those words Rose's heart began a sudden thudding, while Ace, oblivious, said, "We'll get you a doctor. Okay? Stay with me. Don't … Oh God, Rose, she's dying. He was right. I killed her."

A light around the woman glowed, then faded.

"You haven't," Rose said. "You haven't. She's going to be all right."

"Did you see that?" Pete asked. "That glowing. What's happening?"

Tears of triumph threatened to choke Rose. "She's regenerating. That's the energy you were using, Mister Whoever-you-are. What that means is you were wrong. She's not going to die."

He did not answer. Was he still there?

Rose heard Ace's sharp intake of breath, and she could see light like veins flare through the woman's skin.

"Ace, get away!"

"I can't leave her like this!"

"No, don't leave her, just --"

This time there was an eruption of light and Ace yelped and stumbled back.

Rose was watching a scene from her memory, replayed with new actors: As Ace gaped in wonder, the woman changed, the blaze resolving into someone a little smaller, her hair still dark, but longer -- those were all the differences that Rose could tell from the monitor's view of the dark room.

When it was over, the woman did not speak or spring to life as the Doctor had. She lay still, as Ace crawled back over.

"It's a different person."

"No, she's the same," Rose assured Ace. "I've seen this before. 'A way of cheating death,' he called it. But you've got to get moving. Is she --"

The woman groaned and pushed herself into a sitting position. "That was … dreadful." She stood, swaying, and, as Ace scrambled to support her, the woman looked about, frowned, and added in a stronger voice, "We've got to get out of here."

"Yeah, uh, we're a bit locked in, but I can fix that." Ace positioned the woman next to a table for support, turned her attentions to the secret back door, laying another explosive. "Take cover!" she yelled, and pulled her charge behind the table shield again.

Another explosion, and the secret door swung off its hinges.

The woman was distracted but calm, studying the maze of cables and sparks that had once been her prison. "I don't think this is entirely stable."

"That's why we've got to go. The man who designed it said it's going to blow in -- what, about twenty minutes now?"

"Did he say that? I should give it forty minutes at least," she sniffed. "All the same, we should go, Dorothy. I can't stop it from here."

"Er, right. Since you know my name -- which is great -- do you mind telling me yours?"

"Ah. That's right, you wouldn't recognize me. It's Romana."

Ace looked blank, but oddly enough, the woman seemed to expect recognition.

"From Gallifrey, the Doctor's friend … You don't know him either, do you? Interesting." She started over: "My name is Romana. Shall we go?" She swayed again, and Ace caught her arm.

Rose wanted to cry out: Tell her I know her friend. But sense told her it was not important just now. "What's outside the door, Ace? Is it a way out?"

Ace peered into the darkness. "It's a stairwell, going up, and that's good enough for me."

As Ace lent an arm of support to Romana, Rose asked, "Mickey, any way to plot where they're going?"

"Yeah, hold on, I'm looking."

"Or I could just tell them," Van Statten interjected.

Rose rounded on him. "You're going to help us now?"

"I heard that woman say she could stop this base from imploding. Let's get her up here now. Does she agree to help?"

"Yes" was the answer when Ace relayed the question to Romana.

"Okay, tell them where to go." As a quick afterthought, Rose added, "All the same, Mickey, keep looking and make sure he's directing them right."

Now it was Rose's turn to pace in the background with Pete. The inner room emptied, Ace and Romana were no longer visible on the monitors, only audible through Ace's headset.

"Who is that woman?" Pete asked his daughter. "You know her?"

"No. But obviously she knows the Doctor. And she's one of his people. I told you he changed -- that's how he did it."

"You said all his people were dead."

"He thought so. But all the Daleks were supposed to be dead, too."

She was interrupted by an outburst from Van Statten: "Look, you have got to move faster!"

"Maybe she'd be able to move faster if she hadn't been crippled by two years of imprisonment," Rose snapped.

He ignored her. "You got four more flights to go. When you get out, you'll be at the end of a wide corridor. It's long -- get to the end of it, there's a freight elevator. Take that to the lab floor. You know where you're going from there? You are an employee, after all. Though not for long."

"I don't think Ace is going to want to work here anymore," Pete said.

Van Statten scowled, drumming his fingers on the table and checking the monitors, where the tendrils of light that sparked across the machinery were growing brighter and more constant.

The three in the lab were startled by a pounding on the door.

"Rose! Rose, are you in there?"

"Who is it?"

"Kevin!"

She had forgotten about him, once it had become clear that he had not been the one obstructing Mickey. She unlocked the door and he stumbled in. "Why haven't you evacuated?"

"Dr. Shaw made me stay with her, in case I could help her restore the system. I wouldn't do that, but I figured I could keep an eye on her, or do what she said except do it wrong, sabotage her, you know?" Rose felt a twinge of guilt at blaming him for the computer problems. He continued, "But then she got a call. Just minutes ago. She said, 'I know where they're going,' and grabbed a guard and headed in. I followed, but then ran off to warn you."

"Show me where she's going. Dad, come on."

"What about Van Statten?"

"We don't need him anymore."

They tore off toward the freight elevator, with Kevin leading, but just barely -- he could not go fast enough for Rose. There was the anxious wait for the lift to arrive, then after boarding it, its excruciatingly slow descent …

Finally it jolted to a stop, and Rose hauled the door back. Ace and Romana were in view, lurching toward the lift. Romana was struggling, but at least there was no Dr. Shaw in sight.

"Nice to have a welcoming party!" Ace called out, grinning, as Pete ran up to assist them.

Back to the lift, the metal bars of the door were pulled shut, and they were on their way up again. Romana leaned back against the wall, closing her eyes. Getting a first good look, Rose saw that Van Statten and Dr. Shaw had dressed Romana in loose white clothing resembling medical scrubs, and she was barefoot. She was pale and haggard, her brown hair damp with sweat.

"How's she doing?" Rose whispered to Ace.

It was Romana who answered, without opening her eyes. "I'm fine. Just resting until I have to start running again."

"We're almost there," Ace said. "The lab isn't far -- that's where we're headed."

But when Pete pulled back the gate once more, they saw they were headed nowhere: Blocking their way was Dr. Shaw, accompanied by two guards pointing rifles at the lift's passengers.

"All the conspirators, caught in a box," Dr. Shaw said. "Don't try and go for that gun, Mr. Tyler. I don't want a bloodbath here. I just want to claim what's mine."