Author's Note: Hi everyone. Sorry for slow update, but it's summer here and there's been lots to do. Also, there's been some sort of updating glitch, which is a bit annoying. Anyway, thanks very much to MayFairy, Theta'sWorstNightmare, kie1993, Imorgen, MountainLord-92, SawManiac211, KlinicallyInsane Koschei (x7), shouldreallygetanffacount, mericat, Bernice-Summerfield (x 3), Lexy Summers and Dryu (x 7) for all your kind reviews. Much, much appreciated!
Thanks also to MayFairy for listening to me complain, the other day, LOL! I officially dedicate this chapter to you!
CHAPTER EIGHT
"So how to we get past those men and get in there?" Amy asked in a low voice, eyeing the tall, beefy, armed-to-the-teeth guards with some concern.
"Simple," the Doctor said, reaching into his pocket as they approached the stairs leading up to the doorway. "We'll use my psychic paper. Tell them we're government officials or something."
"As long as I'm not Amy's eunuch this time," Rory grouched sourly, remembering the last time they had used the psychic paper, back in Venice.
"Why don't you just admit you loved being my eunuch?" Amy teased back, poking him playfully in the ribs.
Meanwhile, the Doctor was patting frantically at his pockets, pulling out any number of odd things and shoving them back in, but with no trace at all of the psychic paper. "Oh, no, no, no. It's gone! How can it be gone? How can it possibly, in any conceivable way at all, be gone?"
"Maybe you dropped it somewhere?" Amy suggested.
"I don't just drop things, Pond," the Doctor snapped.
"What now then?" Rory queried, watching the guards nervously. "Only, it looks like they've noticed us, Doctor, so you'd better come up with something fast."
"We'll try asking nicely," the Doctor answered, before marching confidently up the stairs towards the entrance.
"Asking NICELY?" Rory mouthed silently at Amy, an incredulous expression on his face. Somehow, it didn't strike him as the most workable plan the Time Lord had ever come up with. Amy merely shrugged and hurried up the stairs in the Doctor's wake, towing her reluctant husband behind her.
"Yes?" one of the guards spoke up, glaring at them in a forbidding manner. "Can I help you?"
"Hello, I'm the Doctor. I need to see Mr Saxon right away."
"Yeah, you and everyone else, mate," the guard smirked. "I wouldn't hold your breath." He was dark-haired and very good-looking, in a thuggish sort of way.
The Doctor disliked him immediately. "It's really not a good day to make me angry, you know," he said in a mild voice with a distinct undertone of steel. "As it happens, I'm UNIT's scientific advisor and it's very important that I speak to Mr Saxon as soon as possible."
"Is that right, Sir?" the guard drawled. "Well, then you won't mind showing me some ID, will you?"
"Not at all," the Doctor said, calmly offering him an identification card. The dark-haired man took it and glanced at it. Unfortunately, the Doctor had forgotten that, unlike Torchwood, UNIT did give out photographic ID cards to their operatives. The guard squinted closely at the picture, which showed a man in his fifties, with curly white hair and a big, pointy nose.
"This isn't you!" he exclaimed, eyeing the Doctor's youthful appearance with renewed suspicion.
The Doctor snatched the card back and pocketed it hurriedly. "Yes, well, it was taken quite a while ago, you know. The point is, UNIT have reason to believe that Mr Saxon could be in extreme danger."
"UNIT?" the second guard muttered to himself, staring in absorbed fascination at the Doctor and his two companions. "First Torchwood and now UNIT? What the hell is going on today?"
"Torchwood?" the Doctor said, his sharp ears picking up on the comment and rounding on the man abruptly. "You've seen someone from Torchwood here today?"
The guard, a big blonde man wearing sergeant's stripes, gave him a brief nod. "Not here. Back at Claridges, when Mr Saxon gave his speech earlier. She said she was there as an undercover observer."
"She didn't happen to be around five foot two with long ginger-ish hair, by any chance?"
"Yeah, that's her. Sexy little thing," the man answered, a small, nostalgic grin forming on his face as he mentally pictured Tejana. "Why, what's she got to do with this? What sort of danger is Mr Saxon in? Are there aliens after him or something?"
"Yeah, you could say that," the Doctor responded, keeping his face perfectly straight. "What happened to the girl? Where did she go?"
The sergeant shrugged. "Dunno. I was going to ask her out on a date, but she just disappeared into the crowd, before I could even get her phone number."
"Trust me, Sergeant, you should count yourself lucky - you'd never be able to handle her," the Doctor said wryly. "Now, this is very, very, extremely important. It could be a matter of life or death. I need you to tell Mr Saxon that the Doctor is here and wants to see him, right away! I'm guessing he'll be only too happy to see me. We're very old friends."
"Doctor," Rory cut in, tugging at the Time Lord's arm.
"Not now, Rory," the Doctor replied irritably, keeping his eyes fixed on the guard in front of him. "This nice man is just about to help us, aren't you, Sergeant?"
"No, really, Doctor...you have to look!"
With an impatient sigh, the Time Lord spun back to his companions and snapped, "Honestly, Rory, can't you see I'm trying to...?"
But both Rory and Amy were staring up at the ever-darkening horizon. The air was icy with expectation, their breath condensing before them into frigid misty clouds. There was no other sound, the entire world suddenly unnaturally silent, except for the high, eerie song of the wind, howling through the sky. The roiling black clouds were swelling obscenely, like a huge, pus-filled boil, the dark passageway in the centre growing wider and wider, as though something unimaginable was pushing its way through.
"Oh, Tejana," the Doctor whispered in horror, knowing his daughter must have somehow gone much too far, completely compromising the causal nexus. "What have you done?"
Even as he spoke, the whirling vortex ripped asunder, like a curtain tearing from top to bottom, and a huge creature appeared in a blaze of crimson light, hovering ominously above London, its dark, scaly wings flapping gently. It had a sleek, tricorne head, glittering red eyes, four long hooked arms and – embedded in the centre of its chest - a greedy, fanged mouth, its gaping jaws working in rhythm with the undulation of its wings. A curved tail shaped horribly like a scythe coiled behind it, blade-sharp and lethal. Panicked screams of terror echoed along the city streets, as the humans looked up to see the alien visitation descending on them and ran in fear.
"Jesus, Mary and Joseph! What in the name of God is it?" the Sergeant breathed.
"It's a Reaper!" the Doctor yelled. "Get inside, all of you...NOW!"
Without stopping to argue further, the Sergeant pushed frantically at the shiny, black-painted door, swinging it wide and rushing through it. The Doctor grabbed Amy and Rory by their arms and shoved them roughly in front of him, thrusting them through the doorway to safety, just as the Reaper began to swoop.
Looking back, the Time Lord saw that the dark-haired guard had ignored their retreat, confidently going down on one knee in a smooth, practised motion, his automatic weapon already in his hands.
"No!" the Doctor shouted. "Don't!"
But the sharp, staccato sound of gunfire sliced through the still air, as the guard stubbornly emptied round after round into the oncoming creature. The barrage of ammunition had no effect at all. The thing just kept on descending, absorbing the bullets into its rock-like skin as it came, the mouth in its chest yawning cavernously in primordial hunger. Its leathery wings swept wide and then closed around the still-firing guard, drawing him into an intimate embrace and sinking its stomach-fangs into his vulnerable neck. There was a terrible scream and a bright flash of pure white light. The Reaper's wings unfurled once more, revealing no trace of the soldier, and the creature rose again into the nightmare-coloured sky, searching for new victims.
Fresh scarlet flashes exploded from the Vortex gateway and more Reapers appeared, winging their way across the hellish horizon like giant vampire bats. The Doctor slammed the heavy door shut and leaned against it, closing out the blood-curdling sight.
The Sergeant was slumped against the wall, panting like a dog, his face twisted in fear. For a man who had previously been excited by the thought of aliens, he seemed to have gone off the idea remarkably quickly, the Doctor thought ironically.
"Those things..." he gasped.
"They're Reapers," the Doctor told him. "This building is stone and probably relatively old, as far as Earth buildings go, which may keep them out for a while. But not for long. They've come through the Time Vortex to find and correct a problem in the causal nexus – a problem which, I'm guessing, is currently located in Mr Saxon's office. So, unless you want those things out there to consume everything and everyone you've ever known, I suggest you get me up there, right now!"
"He's mine!" the Master gasped in disbelief. "You're carrying my son!"
Tejana gazed up at him, tears sparkling in her eyes, feeling the warmth of his hand on her belly, drinking in his expression of amazement and awe as he sensed the tiny spark of life that was his son, the baby reaching out to him within the psychic link, recognising and welcoming him as his father. In that one beautiful moment, selfish or not, she knew it had all been worth it. She would happily have traded everything she had ever had, just to see that transfixed, euphoric look on his face, the look she had never had the chance to experience back on Mnemosyne, because he had died before she could tell him about their child. Whatever else happened now, that look would stay in her hearts, a treasure she would hold for all eternity.
But then his gaze snapped back into focus and he pulled his hand away as though her skin had burned him.
"Correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know, we've never actually had sex," he said caustically. "So, unless I'm suddenly supposed to start believing in miracles, you're not from this time-line, are you?" Lightning-fast, his hand moved to grip the left side of her throat, just under her ear. His thumb brought her chin up hard, making her look him in the eye. Tejana couldn't help trembling at the strength in his fingers, knowing just how easy it would be for him to snap the slender column of her neck, if he chose to do so. "No wonder I've never seen you in this regeneration before. So how far in my future are you from, Tejana? And how the hell do you end up pregnant with my child?"
Overhead, glowing through the ornate stained-glass sky-light set in the ceiling, a succession of weird, scarlet flashes of light shimmered across the darkening sky like a slowly spreading pool of blood. But the two Time Lords were far too engrossed in each other to notice anything else.
"You know I can't tell you that, Koschei," she said pleadingly. "Please, you have to let me go. Who knows what damage I may have done to the causal nexus already, just by being here?"
"I'm the Master! I don't have to do anything," he snarled, his thumb digging into the soft, vulnerable skin of her throat, forcing her head back painfully. But then, as suddenly as he had grabbed her, he relaxed his iron grasp, cupping her chin softly instead, his narrowed brown eyes studying her curiously, almost wonderingly. "You keep calling me Koschei, as if it comes naturally to you, as if you do it all the time." His fingers stroked gently down her cheek and she closed her eyes, automatically nestling into his hand, both her hearts contracting at the poignancy of the familiar caress. "And look at you...after centuries of us being enemies, there's no hate for me left in you at all, is there? You actually welcome my touch. And you came here looking for me, intending to stand at the back of the crowd without being seen. Why, Tejana? If I had known you were pregnant with my son in the future, I would never have let you get away from me, no matter what happened. So why are you here alone, searching for me in an earlier time-line than your own?"
She didn't answer, her green eyes jewel-bright with unshed tears as she stared silently back at him, the anguish burning uncontrollably in her chest.
"Why, Tejana?" he shouted, tightening his hand on her again, threat written in every line of his body. "Tell me why!"
"Because you died!" she screamed back, unable to take it any more, bitter anger at him for leaving her unexpectedly swelling up through her sorrow. "You died, Koschei! I loved you and I never even had a chance to say goodbye. I never had a chance to tell you about our child. I never meant for any of this to happen, but I had to see you, just one more time!"
He stared at her in shock, as if she had just slapped him viciously across the face. What he would have said, she never knew, because at that moment, the door flew open with a bang.
The Master snapped his head around and glared furiously at the tall, lanky man with the floppy brown hair and bow-tie standing framed in the doorway.
"Well, hello, Doctor!" he sneered with a mocking grin.
Another Author's Note: Just in case anyone is wondering where the Doctor's psychic paper got to, the Master pinched it in "The Master's Rose." :)