I'm glad that last chapter satisfied a lot of people. It was great fun to write – I really like it. I hope this one's as good. By the way, a few will look similar in idea, but I promise you there will be differences.
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They still had their arms around each other. Rose didn't know how much time had passed – surely only a few minutes. Still, as she rested her head against the Doctor and listened to the strong and steady double heartbeat, a thought pushed its way to the top of her mind: they weren't out of complete danger yet. What had the just walked into?
She turned her head to look at their present surroundings. Another white room. Well, she sure hadn't seen that before. This room had a doorway at the other side of it, with a fenced field vaguely visible beyond it. There appeared to be something Rose could only just see from her current position, so she squirmed out of the Doctor's embrace and cautiously peered out the doorway.
There was a field out there. The fenced off area in the centre was surrounded by four grey statues, each one about six foot and all different. One was a young guy, one had horns, one appeared to have thin wings and another was a thin woman with a stern face. They were clearly statues, though, not just standing still.
The Doctor had joined Rose at the door and was peering out with interest. "Any ideas?"
Rose nudged him with her computer. "How bout this?"
"Ah. True."
Round four. Combat Tournament. Choose attributes, fight in the ring with the opposition. Three fights: one each alone, then two against two. You must fight your own battle, and must do so with no outside help. Loss of one fight results in loss of the game. Fights are timed, and continue until death or unconsciousness is suffered, or the time runs out.
"Attributes?" asked Rose, looking at the Doctor questioningly. He was still staring at his screen, brow furrowed.
"Well, I think it means – those…" He turned, pointing to a table that had escaped Rose's sight. On top of it was a small, segmented container, filled with things that looked like jellybeans. Rose was willing to bet that was about as far from the truth as she could get. Next to the container was a chart, which the Doctor picked up and inspected.
"Ah," he said after a moment. "I think they give us different abilities."
"You mean like powers, yeah?" asked Rose, lightly scanning the list of beans and different features of each but not really reading them. So, they were being given superpowers? Why? So she asked the Doctor.
"What do you mean, why?"
"I mean why. Why would the Toymaker give us so much help if he's trying to kill us?"
The Doctor scratched the back of his neck. "My guess, which is the best we're going to get right now, is that those statue creatures out there are strong enough to kill us with a few seconds. That would be no fun for the Toymaker, now would it? So give us a fighting chance – literally – and watch the show."
"Right."
"Effects will last until the gaming threshold is crossed…" The Doctor murmured, reading from the top of the chart. "So we won't loose them half way through a fight. That's good…"
Rose rolled her eyes. "Except that fighting in the first place isn't good, is it?"
The Doctor didn't appear to be listening to her; he was studying the chart more closely, making indecisive noises. His hand hovered for a moment over one of the pills, before he picked up a different one, dark blue in colour. He turned to Rose, holding it up for her to see. "So, each one does three things. Each one gives marital arts and weaponry skills, but this particular little pill will also give me the ability of invisibility, which I have to say I've always wanted to play with." With that, and before Rose could reply, he promptly swallowed the pill.
"What does it taste like?" Rose asked out of curiosity.
"Nothing," the Doctor responded.
"What?"
"I'm serious – it tastes like nothing. Like water, you know? How you can't really say what it tastes like? It's like that."
"How do you feel?"
"Well, like me. Slightly stronger, like my body knows there are new things I can do…" he paused, then executed a complicated series of martial arts movements with his fists. His face broke into an amazed grin. "Oh, I like this…" Then he paused, grinned evilly at Rose and promptly vanished before her. Rose did a double take, turning, looking for where he had gone. There was a laugh, and then she felt something – or rather, someone – poke her lightly in the side.
"Oi! Quit that!" She was still looking for him, or for any sign of where he might be. The next time he poked her, she managed to grab his hand. There was a curse and he re-appeared, grinning at her and trying to look innocent.
"Your turn. Pick a pill!"
Rose scanned the list; occasionally flicking her eyes to the pill she was pondering the description of. What to chose? They obviously did work, but now she had to pick there was much to choose. What ability? Super speed? Healing (although she wasn't planning on getting hurt, thank you)? One allowed her to channel raw energy and use it as a weapon. It was a light green one that caught her eye and she swallowed it before the Doctor could see which it was.
"Aw, tell me!" Rose shook her head at him, and watched, grinning, as he complainingly made his way to the table and started to account for the pills to try and work out which was missing. Rose rolled her eyes, coming over to him and resting her head on top of his. She waited while the Doctor stopped suddenly, as realisation hit him. Rose was shorter than him, so she shouldn't be able to rest her head on his – that would mean she was taller. He turned and looked at her, now at his height, then looked down at where her feet were about four inches off the floor.
"You can levitate."
"Fly, actually," Rose said smugly, allowing herself to hover higher to prove the point. "Thought it might come in handy in a fight." She felt amazing – she could feel the limits she could now go to, feel the knowledge and skills that came with the martial arts.
"Riiight, the fights…" The Doctor walked outside, Rose following on the ground (as she thought maybe she shouldn't waste her strength) towards the fenced ring. The four statues were still solid; no signs of life in their stone eyes. The Doctor took one look at the still frozen states and turned back, towards a rack of weaponry that was standing alone by the edge of the ring.
Rose wasn't a big weaponry person, but even she was impressed by the mass of items and knew that Mickey would have gone nuts if he had been here. There were swords – everything from broadswords to elegant Japanese katana, a few bows and quivers of arrows, daggers, throwing stars, an evil looking curved sickle of some kind, spears, hooks, and a particularly nasty spiked chain. The Doctor was examining a katana, balancing the blade and slashing the air with it. "This will do me…" he murmured half to himself, and grinned at Rose.
"What should I pick?" She had no idea where the hell to start with all this, and the Doctor appeared to know what he was looking for.
"Whatever feels right. I've got a feeling that one will feel right, depending on our pills. I, for instance, would fight with a longer, straighter blade if I had the choice, but this one feels right."
Rose bit her lip and turned back to the weapons. She flicked her eyes over all of them, trying to pick out the one which felt right. God knows how these drugs worked or what was chemically going on inside her mind, but she knew what the Doctor meant as her eyes flicked past, quite literally, a sick. She picked it up – it was a heavy, thick, yet perfect weight in her hand. She manoeuvred it experimentally, the metal plated end obeying her command.
"That's a bō," said the Doctor, watching her with a smile. "It's a Japanese fighting stick."
"It's more than that," said Rose, leaning on it. "It's a lift off!" She demonstrated, pushing the stick into the ground and using it as a brace, swinging herself up into the air. "That's easier than trying to fly straight from the ground."
"Well, aren't you just a cat who got the cream?"
"I'm not the only one, Mr. Look-at-how-good-I-am-with-a-sword."
"Katana. And yes, I am."
"You are ready to begin?" murmured a scratchy voice for behind them. Startled, bother the Doctor and Rose turned sharply to face the horned man from the statues. He was tall, muscular, and dressed in a plain martial arts uniform, his face unreadable.
Without the Doctor and Rose noticing, the statue had come to life. The other three were still solid and unmoving, but this man was as real as either of them. The Doctor exchanged a glance with Rose. "Ah, yes, we are…"
"I am to fight you." Rose did a double take. She was meant to take on this horned martial arts mass? Uh-oh. "Come. We fight with in the ring."
She followed the horned guy, bō in hand, as the Doctor followed her (for once). He gave her a hug before she climbed into the ring, whispering in her ear, "Rose, you'll be fine. You're a fighter – just let your new talents tell you what to do. What you think you can do, you can."
"Like that time with Death to the Mantodeans, yeah? Now you might know how it feels!"
He grinned at the memory. "Yeah, but this time you're the controller and the controlled. Okay?"
Rose nodded. "So, what's the plan?"
"Outlast your opponent: stay awake and alive for the time limit. Only deal defensively, hit to concuss, not to kill."
"Right. That was kinda what I was thinking." She gave the Doctor a quick kiss on the cheek and turned to face her opponent. He had moved himself into a low defensive stance, and was staring at her with blank eyes. Rose was shaking as she raised the bō, willing her heart to stop pounding and her breath to steady. Out the corner of her eye, she caught a movement. Her computer screen was showing numbers – a countdown.
Ten seconds until they started. Ten seconds until this guys was gonna come at her swinging.
Three. Two. One.
And with a cry, the horned guy ran at her, arm pulled back, fist clenched. Rose warded off his first blow with a swipe from the bō, catching his arm. He growled, kicking out at her and giving a glancing blow to her shoulder. She had put him off balance with the bō and it didn't have as much power behind it as it could have. For that, she was lucky.
He came at her again, fists flying with impressive speed. Rose let herself go, and allowed the drugs to help her. She blocked most of the punches and managed to retaliate to put her opponent on his guard. He backed away, then ran at her, his motive to use his speed against her. Rose braced herself for impact, suddenly laughed at herself, and jumped at the right moment. She had forgotten what the pill had done for her.
Hovering above her opponent as he crashed into the fence (which appeared to be surprisingly strong), Rose looked at her computer screen. It had a countdown on it, so Rose had an idea of the length of the bouts. They seemed to be fifteen minutes. Surely she could wait to out up here?
She looked down – her opponent had picked himself up and was glaring up at her. She hovered higher, unnerved by his look, and felt her heart sink as she came into contact with an invisible barrier. Uh-oh. Her opponent ran at her from the edge of the ring, and leaped in the middle – high enough to catch her ankle. He pulled her down with him, sending her bō flying. Rose thanked her lucky stars that adventures with the Doctor had allowed her to put mind over matter and accept the drugs and what they could do, for she was saved from the ground by catching herself midair.
Weapon gone, it was down to hand-to-hand combat. Rose had no idea she could move this fast at all – and was secretly pleased and horrified when she managed to land a solid kick against her opponent's chest. He crashed to the ground momentarily, but was back up in a few seconds. Then he was back up, the attack on her unrelenting, but she was tiring and he wasn't. She jumped into the air above him for a breather. She had to tuck her legs in whenever he jumped, but other than that wasn't troubled.
He timed stated there was only a few more minutes. Rose was pleased – her muscles were burning, her skill still perfect but the power behind her strikes beginning to slip. It wasn't long in reality, but she didn't think she'd last a few more minutes – it was a long time in a fight like this. Making up her mind, Rose swooped over the head of her horned opponent and grabbed the bō. She swung it quickly, into the base of his skull. He sank like a stone, the metal plated end of the bō disconnecting him from his consciousness. A moment later he was momentarily stone again, before crumbling into dust.
Rose felt a little guilty, as she wearily wandered back to the fence and into the Doctor's arms. "Not bad, Hippolyta. Well done."
"Hippolyta?" Rose murmured.
"Amazonian queen. Quite a fighter."
There was a cracking noise as the winged statue came to life. The Doctor looked up, towards his opponent, and pulled a face. "Ah. Well, this won't exactly be fun."
He leapt lightly over the fence and waved merrily at Rose as the seven-ish foot winged demon stood opposite him. Rose watched the countdown on her screen reach zero and the Doctor's fight began.
He had the katana drawn, held in a defensive position as the demon ran at him. Using the flat of the blade rather than the sharpened edge, the Doctor managed to block most of the punches with the sword. The demon was stronger, and taller than him. But he was visible. The Doctor faded out of existence – and couldn't help grinning as the demon stopped, unsure of where his quarry had gone. The Doctor crept around the back of his opponent, raising the sword to bring the pommel down for a knock out.
The demon seemed to sense something was wrong, and swung around, punching and kicking at the air. The Doctor was forced to duck hurriedly, backing out of the frenzied range of the demon before he got himself clocked. This wasn't going to be that easy. And he was beginning to tire, amazingly. Not much, not so much to cause a problem – but on the edge of his stamina, he could feel something. The invisibility was taking a toll.
He crept away from the demon and let visibility return. He had one chance to get a knockout hit in, or it was the outlast tactic. He raised the sword to deliver it, but the peripheral vision of the demon gave a warning and the Doctor found himself tacked to the ground, the sword skidding away Hollywood-style, as he heard Rose cry out from outside the ring. The demon scrambled up, ready to deliver a hard, low kick to his prone opponent, but the Doctor managed to roll out of the way – just in time. It became, just like it had with Rose's fight, hand-to-hand.
The Doctor didn't like hand-to-hand, didn't like fighting at all for that matter. But needs must, and this just needed to be enough to outlast this demon guy. He didn't have a chance to look at the timer – a lapse like that could cost him. Instead, he trusted to luck that it wasn't long and began to block the punches and kicks that were being thrown at him.
This guy was strong. The effort of blocking the attacks was enough to drive the Doctor back, and he was fast running out of room. But, if he could change his angle slightly…there. The Doctor was now being backed towards his discarded katana. He gave up some more ground, grinning slightly as his heal hit the blade. He tried to keep his mind on his hands and their blocks, but at the same time gently felt back with his foot and managed to flick the blade up, back into his hand.
He grimaced as he caught the blade, but it was enough to swing the hilt into the side of the demon's head. The demon howled, raised a hand to its head and backed off. The Doctor had quietly hoped it might have been enough to knock the demon out – no such luck. Now he was facing an angry demon. Not good.
He had to revert to quick movements (an advantage of being smaller than what he was fighting – he was faster) each flick of the blade causing pain to his opponent. The pain was really unnecessary, and the Doctor found himself apologising automatically. Sweat was beginning to get in his eyes, and he was breathing hard. Surely there couldn't be much more, surely the time was almost-
The demon froze, turning back to stone, before crumbling to dust. The Doctor wiped the sweat from his forehead with his sleeve as Rose vaulted the fence (with the help of her bō) and barrelled into him. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. We have company."
Rose turned to look at what he was staring at, but as she heard a quite cracking noise it became clear. The young man and the woman had become animated and were standing, waiting for them. The Doctor exchanged a look with Rose. She could see he was tired but determined, he could see she was scared but strong. Their timers showed ten seconds.
"Will you be okay?" The Doctor asked Rose, who pulled a mixture of a concerned and patronising face at him. "Don't look at me like that – you look like Jackie."
"I'm not the one who just fought. Come on."
Together, always together, they turned to face their two opponents – the thin, stern woman, and the young guy. This wasn't going to be easy, no way. Rode and the Doctor had just enough time to raise their weapons before both their opponents ran at them, full tilt. Rose was met by the young guy who immediately tried to get in under her guard. He did, a few times, but the were just glancing blows and Rose slowly began to drive him back with the bō. The Doctor had been met by the woman, who had a concealed blade and the two of them were going at each other with force.
He had just come out of a fight – he would last, but not long. Already he could feel his stamina and strength beginning to waver. There needed to be an easy way out of this. And there was – but it would make him tired faster. Anything to catch his breath. He vanished, achieved a decent yet not really injurious blow to the woman, and gave one to the guy as well.
Rose smiled briefly as he reappeared before her. "Okay?"
"Yeah, I think. How much time do we have? Thirteen minutes," he said, answering his own question. "Right. We have thirteen minutes – and we have company, too."
The two opposition had raised themselves – both looked angry. Rose raised the bō, the Doctor next to her. Rose was back into warding off the fists, and feet, of the young guy, trying to keep her mind on the game. Beside her, the Doctor was fighting, but there was a cry and Rose heard something metal land on the ground. She chanced a look while dodging a blow – the Doctor was weapon-less, his katana near her.
The Doctor didn't have much of a choice – when that blade fell, he had to catch it to save himself. That was going to hurt – but cut hands would be better than a cut neck. He didn't have a chance, though – he was suddenly pulled upwards and off the ground by Rose, using her momentum to pull him up with her. Even though she couldn't hold him and she put him back down fast, it had been enough and got him out of harms way. She then started to duel with the sword-wielding woman. The Doctor looked around and saw the young guy was trying to dig something out of his eyes. Sand – good move, Rose.
The Doctor ran and picked up his katana, giving the young guy a solid crack on the head and watching as he fell, turned to stone, and then crumbled. Only one to go, then. One who was soundly beating Rose.
Rose was still holding her ground, granted, but not for long. The force of this woman's slashes were jarring her arms whenever she used the bō to block. She had already been dealt a few light scratches, and in the end she used her flight to try and avoid a particularly complicated sword move. The woman threw her sword at Rose, who avoided it, watching as it clattered to the ground.
The woman was being driven back by an unseen foe. Rose watched as the Doctor drove the woman back, who was unable to fight back as her fists hit thin air. The Doctor yelled to Rose to throw the sword away, but his voice gave away where he was and the woman dealt him a hard punch to his shoulder. The impact forced him back into visibility. Rose had managed to remove the sword though, and threw it out of the boundaries.
Rose looked around, searching for a way out. She called to the Doctor, told him to regain his invisibility and trust her. Without so much as a look, he did as she said, and Rose flew about the woman's head, prodding, hitting lightly, but staying out of her range. The woman snarled and tried to drag her down like before, and Rose, it appeared to the invisible Doctor let her do just that – but the reason was evident. She was pulled down to the ground and smiled as the woman drew back a punch – then tuned to stone.
The Doctor reappeared, tired, smiling. "Nice."
"How's the shoulder?"
"Ah, it'll be fine. What about you?"
Rose shrugged. "A few shallow cuts, nothing major."
The familiar white door had appeared. They walked towards it, arms around each other and weapons in hand, into the unknown of the Toymaker's next game.
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Ohh, that was a little (okay, a lot) longer than intended. I hope it was okay and not too boring or clichéd. Thank you so much for all the continued support this story is getting!
And yes, the line 'together, always together' is also used in Romeo and Juliet. I'm a complete sap, yes, I know, but I wanted to use it again.