LSATB
Chapter 6: The Nestene Consciousness
"Think of it, plastic, all over the world. Every artificial thing waiting to come alive," the Doctor panted a little, glancing around as she listed. "The shop window dummies, the phones, the wires, the cables..."
"The fake plants," John grinned a little, imaging shrubberies, well, shrubbing across London. The Doctor spared a hint of a real smile, a small barking laugh.
"Still, we've found the transmitter," she glanced behind them at the towering circle of the London Eye, gleaming over them. "The Consciousness must be somewhere underneath." John looked around and dashed over to the side of the wall, looking down at a manhole.
"What about down here?"
"Looks good to me," they both tumbled down the steps and John twisted open the manhole, pulling it aside to reveal clouds of red pushing out into the night air. They crept down the ladder into a metal hallway of heat and stink. It smelled like burning plastic. John wrinkled his nose but followed the Doctor tenaciously, making sure to keep her in sight.
They stepped onto a metal balcony, overlooking a pool of hot yellow and orange, like the sun had fallen into a hole. It smelled like it, too, John thought, staring at the pool.
"The Nestene Consciousness," the Doctor introduced John to the writhing lake of heat and lava-like plastic. "That's it, inside the vat, a living plastic creature."
"Well what're you gonna do? Tip in the anti-plastic and run?" John leaned over the balcony.
"Can't kill it," she replied shortly, walking over to the metal steps. "Gotta give it a chance." The creature mumbled and groaned to itself, as if sensing the presence of intruders. Which it probably could, not that the Doctor was telling John that.
"I seek audience with the Nestene Consciousness under peaceful contract," she paused. "According to convention 15 of the Shadow Proclamation." The creature rose up in a wave, hissing and groaning. "Thank you," John glanced at the Doctor. How did she understand that? Well, she seemed to be some sort of ambassador for this Shadow Proclamation people, so he assumed she'd know some languages.
"If I might have permission to approach?"
As the Doctor spoke, John crept around down the stairs some more, and caught a glimpse of frightened eyes. It was Mickey!
"Oh my…" he ran down the last of the steps, missing the Doctor's rolled eyes, and knelt near his shuddering friend. "It's me, Mickey," John whispered as she looked at the sweat covering Mickey's face and body. He must've been here for ages. "It's okay, it's alright!"
"That things down there… the liquid, John," Mickey pointed, eyes white around the dark of his pupils as he shivered and shuddered. "It can talk…"
"You're stinking!" John pulled back, trying to joke. "Doctor, they kept him alive!"
"Yeah that was always a possibility," she brushed them off, jumping down the steps hurriedly, not caring. "Keep him alive to maintain the copy."
"You knew that and you never said?"
"Can we keep the domestics outside, thank you?" she gave them both a disgusted look and continued down the steps. John sputtered a little, helping Mickey up before following the Doctor down the steps, intending to snarl back an answer at her, when the Doctor began to address the vat once more.
"Am I addressing the Consciousness?" she asked politely, far different from how she treated him and Mickey, John thought grumpily. "Thank you. If I might observe, you infiltrated this civilization by means of warped, shunt technology. So, may I suggest with the greatest respect that you shunt off?" John hid a smirk. So she treated other aliens no other way; she was just rude, it wasn't just them.
The glob of lava rose higher, blubbering in raspy tones that he was in no such way 'shunting off' as the Doctor so kindly put it. It was obvious without a translation the creature was objecting to the charges.
"Oh don't give me that," she scoffed angrily. "This's an invasion! Plain and simple, don't talk about constitutional rights." The lava pool writhed once more, growling and bubbling.
"I. Am. TALKING!" she shouted at the creature, stern strength in her voice and face as she held back a scowl. Why did no one ever listen to her? "This planet is just starting, these, stupid little people have only just learned how to walk…" John frowned. People had been upright for a very long time, thank you very much! Maybe she just liked to make fun at humans.
"But they're capable of so much more!" Was that a compliment? John bean to wonder if he could take anything she said seriously. "I'm asking on their behalf, please, just go…"
"Doctor!" John shouted worriedly as he spotted two plastic dummies creeping up on the Doctor and grabbing her by the arms. The Doctor struggled against their tight grips, throwing a look up at John that didn't say 'help me' but 'get out of here'. A dummy held her while the other pulled out the anti-plastic.
"That was just insurance!" she shouted desperately over the living plastic's furious cries of rage. "I wasn't gonna use it!" The dummy stumbled away backwards, holding out the tube as the other led the Doctor closer to the edge of the platform where the arm of orange and yellow contorted and wheezed and screamed at her.
"I wasn't attacking you, I'm here to help," the Doctor continued, pleading with the creature. "I'm not your enemy, I swear, I'm no'." The outreaching lava puddle only screeched more and the Doctor's face took on a more panicked look.
"What do you mean? No!" The TARDIS' blue form was shown from behind a sliding panel. "Oh no, honestly, no!" the plastic creature howled triumphantly. "Yes, that's my ship…" She looked back at the box in horror, then back at the creature. "That's not true! I should know - I was there! I fought in the war, it wasn't my fault!"
The creature squealed horribly once more.
"I couldn't save your world - I couldn't save any of them!" Her voice broke and trembled as she regained strength to talk, fighting against the pushing dummy behind her.
"What's it doing?" John shouted down to her, worried about the change of events. What was she on about? Saving worlds, not saving planets, what war? Was this the war she'd mentioned earlier?
"It's the TARDIS," the Doctor explained, her voice still weak and wet. "The Nestene's identified its superior technology; it's terrified! It's going to the final base. It's starting the invasion! Get out, John! Just leg it! Now!" John stared at the dummies, at the Doctor, at the Nestene Consciousness, at Mickey, still huddled on the floor and grabbing his leg. Blue lightning tore from the Consciousness and ripped its way up to the ceiling, glowing and sparking furiously as it burst open a tile in the ceiling.
"It's the activation signal!" the Doctor shouted frantically. "It's transmitting!"
"The end of the world," John murmured, wondering how everything plastic would come alive and tear down the inhabitants of the earth. Every plastic coated wire, every plastic things, destroying their former owners. Every shop window dummy coming alive to kill humans.