Author's Notes: This is not my normal fluffy chapter. Don't worry, when this arc is finished, there will be a strong dose of fluff before the story ends. Just a reminder, dialogue in italics is telepathic communication.
Standard Disclaimer: Are you tired of hearing that I don't own Doctor Who?
Chapter Six
Lost in her thoughts, imagining how it would feel to no longer have some of her most important memories, Rose almost failed to hear the locked door knob turn.
As the sound registered, Rose turned quickly away from the painting and toward the door, noting that the Doctor had placed himself between her and the unknown potential threat. She moved forward to stand at his side, and he took her hand without taking his eyes off the opening door.
"Alright, who's next?" came a male voice as a man came through, looking at a clipboard. He looked up, seeming surprised, but not alarmed, and the Doctor and Rose. "I'm sorry," he said insincerely, "but we don't interview couples together. We can take one of you, but the other will have to wait here."
Rose and the Doctor looked at each other and spoke quickly and silently.
"Let me go in, Doctor," said Rose. "We need to look further into this, yeah? And if they're taking memories from human minds, they might be able to tell that your mind isn't exactly human."
"That also means you are more likely be susceptible to whatever is doing the taking," retorted the Doctor. "It's safer for me because it is less likely I'll be compatible."
"Right now, they've shown no signs of being violent," Rose returned. "If they realize they are being set up or investigated or whatever it is we're doing, that might change."
The Doctor let her feel his reluctance and his worry, and she squeezed his hand more tightly for a moment.
"I've training and experience in working on my own, and I won't go beyond our communication range of my own free will, alright?" she said, sending reassurance. "We'll keep talking the whole time."
Before the conversation could get noticeably long, Rose spoke aloud to the man with the clipboard.
"I'll go in," she said, trying to mimic the excitement she thought would show based on how much people seemed to want to be a part of this experience. The man nodded and marked something on his paperwork, then indicated she should come into the room. Rose squeezed the Doctor's hand one more time before letting go and moving past the man and into the second room. She wasn't sure what she had been expecting, but the room was an entirely unremarkable office with a desk. One chair sat behind the desk and another in front of it. The man (Mark, she saw his name tag read) moved to sit behind the desk and gestured at the seat on the other side for Rose. She felt a moment of nerves as she remembered that the now-closed door between her and the Doctor had been deadlocked, but then she relaxed.
And she kept relaxing.
Realizing something was already wrong but unable to be actively worried about it, Rose sent the Doctor a message before she could stop caring.
"Doctor," she said, "there's some sort of truth serum and relaxation mixture being released in this room. I'll be able to block some of the effects because we trained against it, but you may want to start trying to find a way in here, just in case. Subtly, please. I've still got this under control."
"Rose," came the Doctor's reply, "I'm not comfortable with this at all. I'll try subtle, but if I feel anything amiss whatsoever, I'm coming in even if I have to go through a wall."
Rose chuckled at her image of the Doctor bursting through the wall. It was certainly something easier to picture out of Jack, and she didn't want to picture how dark the Doctor could get when he was angry or worried for her safety.
Mark, hearing her laugh, made another note on his clipboard and looked at Rose.
"Here's how the interview process works," said Mark, reciting what was clearly a familiar script. "First, I will ask you some questions. I will ask you to tell me about some memorable days, about events that might have a visual significance. If anything sounds like it will interest Mr. Lankerfrey, I will ask you to wait here while I retrieve him. Any questions?" he finished, not expecting her to be confused by the simple procedure.
"I have lots of questions," said Rose truthfully, and she took a moment to try to clear her mind a bit from the serum. "How many people do you interview a day?"
Mark tapped his pen on the desk impatiently.
"I interview approximately fifty people daily," he responded.
Rose wondered whether the serum worked on him, too, and spoke to the Doctor a moment, having to concentrate harder now not to speak out loud.
"Will the serum work on Mark, too, or should I assume what I hear is a lie?" she asked.
The Doctor felt a little bit further away than he had been previously, and Rose suspected he was exploring the building nearby, trying to find those alternate entrances, but he was still close enough to respond.
"He may have some resistance to it, as you do, and he may be able to resist some of the impulse to speak when asked a question," he replied. "However, as a result of the nature of that particular combination of drugs, it should be impossible for him to resist enough to tell an outright light. A partial lie, though, such as an omission of the whole truth or an intentionally misleading answer, is certainly within the realm of possibility."
Rose nodded. Out loud, she asked another question.
"How many people tell stories that interest Mr. Lankerfrey?" she asked.
"Three," responded Mark shortly.
"Just three a day?" asked Rose, surprised.
"Yes," said Mark, irritated. "Now, if we could begin?"
"Of course," said Rose. "You were the one who asked if I had any questions," she added, trying to imply that the chemicals were responsible for her nosiness without letting him know she was aware of their effect.
He settled down some.
"Alright, then. Tell me, then, about a memorable day in your life," he instructed, preparing to write as he did so.
Before Rose could decide on a safe memory to share, she found herself speaking.
"I was in a basement where I worked, right? And there were all these mannequins," she stopped herself, not wanting to explain further.
"Continue," he said, and she felt the odd sensation of knowing she should be panicking while entirely calm.
She felt the Doctor's presence in her mind.
"Let me help, Rose," he told her. "Repeat after me."
Rose did as she was told, realising the Doctor was giving her the truth in a way that revealed as little as possible.
"And they were creepy, and I thought they were moving," she said to Mike, using the words the Doctor supplied. "And then this man came, and he took my hand, and he told me to run, so I did."
"And why is this day important to you?" he asked, sounding bored.
"Because I met the Doctor," she replied before she could filter herself, "and he changed my life."
"And who is the Doctor?" asked Mark, continuing with his interview.
"A lord of time," she responded, and part of her brain noted that the drugs had taken full effect. The Doctor fed her a little bit more to say, but Rose was aware that she'd be unable to help her initial responses. "He's really good with time and has really great hair."
"Tell me about another day," instructed Mark, "one with more of a visual impact than a basement."
"The end of the world," replied Rose. "I saw the day the earth ended."
Mark paused in his writing and looked at her.
"I didn't see the actual end, though," she continued at the Doctor's prompting. "I saw a trampoline."
Mark was still looking at her speculatively.
"Wait here, please," he said, moving to exit through a second door Rose hadn't noticed.
"There's another door, Doctor," she sent. "He's leaving through it, but I'm still here." She giggled. "You're really still very foxy, Doctor, and I'm not wearing any knickers. Was hoping to get lucky on our date."
"Rose, I need you to try to concentrate," said the Doctor firmly. "I want you to focus on your inner space, and try to push out anything that shouldn't be there."
Rose tried to do as he said. It got a little easier as she continued, and a fraction of her focus returned.
"You're still close, Doctor, right?" she asked, wanting the reassurance.
"I'm just outside the room," came his immediate reply. "The door is deadlocked, but I did have a couple of items in my jacket, and I can use them to create an small explosive should it come to that. If I tell you to move, I need you to get away from the door you entered through."
Rose took a breath, jumping as the door across from her opened and just a crack. Through it came Mark's voice.
"I want you to think of the most emotional day of your life," he told her before shutting the door, and, as with his previous instructions, she complied before she could find a reason not to.
There was a bright flash of light that filled the whole room, and Rose's mind was filled with a blinding pain. She was vaguely aware of hearing the Doctor shout, but she was unable to move or respond. There was a ringing in her ears, and, on some level, she registered the fact that the door across from her was opening again.
"Come with me, please," instructed Mark. "Mr. Lankerfrey found your potential contributions to be interesting enough to warrant further explanation."
Rose got up from her seat and started slowly toward the man, who looked impatient but not surprised by her lethargy. As she finished crossing the room, there was a loud "boom" from behind her. Mark crouched, and Rose turned slowly, seeing the Doctor come through a newly-formed hole in the wall.
"Doctor," she told him, a tear running down her face as he quickly came to her and wrapped her in his arms, "I lost it."
"Come on," he said, assessing her speedily and then lifting her into his arms and moving quickly back out the hole he'd created. "We need to hide."
Rose buried her face in the crook of his neck, crying softly as he searched for a safe place in the building. After a long minute, she heard a door shut, and she looked around at what appeared to be a very dark closet.
"Don't speak out loud," the Doctor cautioned, still holding her tightly, protectively.
"I lost it, Doctor," she told him, "but I don't know what I lost."
The Doctor sat down carefully, still holding her, Rose cuddled in his lap and against his chest as he stroked her hair.
"I can try to find out," he said, and she felt his mental presence merging with hers as soon as she nodded her consent. "I can't try very long," he told her. "We need to be on guard right now, but…"
He stopped, and Rose tensed when she felt his mental walls go up as he withdrew.
"Doctor," she said, feeling a little more herself at what felt like a mental equivalent of a bucket of cold water being poured on her, "what is it? What's wrong? What did they take?"
She felt him take a breath before he answered.
"I can't tell what they took," he said. "Whatever it is they used, it seems to have created something like scar tissue, except that I believe I'll be able to repair it, over time. I won't be able to restore what they took without the equipment they used and the memory they took. In the meantime, the scar tissue, it means I have no access to your memories."
She took a deep breath of her own.
"Okay, then, so we just need to get the painting and the equipment, and we need to return as many memories to people as we can and ensure that they aren't able to do this again," she said, and she was proud of the steadiness in her mental tone as she did.
The Doctor held her close without saying a word, his body tense, and Rose knew that the look on his face would be terrifying if she could see it, all blank face and flashing eyes and Oncoming Storm.
O~O~O~O~O~O
After they waited what felt like days, though the Doctor assured Rose it had only been twenty-four minutes and thirty-eight seconds, the couple cautiously exited the closet, and Rose was surprised to see they were only across the hallway from the waiting room, the closet door designed to blend in with the wall, possibly for janitorial purposes. Nobody appeared to be around, and the Doctor silently told her that he suspected the building would have gone into lockdown, their minimal employees posted near the exits. Still, the two moved slowly and quietly into the waiting room, then into the office through the open door next to a gaping hole.
Rose nodded toward the second door, wishing she was armed despite the Doctor's objections to most weapons. They moved to the side of the door and listened.
"I don't hear anything," said Rose, and she moved to slowly open the unlatched door.
The room on the other side was empty, with two other closed doors. Rose and the Doctor moved fully into the room and looked around. There appeared to be a button on the wall nearest the door to the office-type room. The Doctor activated the sonic screwdriver toward the button briefly.
"The device is still here," he said, moving to be sure each of the three doors to the room was closed, locking them securely using the sonic before he returned to the button.
The Doctor spoke in a low voice as he worked, and Rose, after a quick look around the empty room turned up nothing of interest, watched him quietly. She felt like herself, but with something missing. The feeling reminded her a bit of the gaping hole when a tooth was gone. There was no pain, just a hole. Searching her memories to try to figure out what was taken didn't seem to be helping at all.
The Doctor removed the panel covering the button, revealing about a square foot of circuitry. He put on his glasses and studied the connections.
"I have to work carefully," he explained. "If I trigger the wrong connection, it could destroy the device, and we may not be able to restore the memories."
He continued to work, speaking quietly to her from time-to-time, working as quickly as he could, trying to minimize their chances of being caught. There was a small click.
"Aha," he said, pulling open the circuit board, revealing a device about the size of a large television remote. "They were amplifying the technology in this," he explained as he carefully removed it from the wall.
"So now we just need the paintings to return memories, right? Will the person need to be there? What if we can't find who belongs to a painting?" she asked.
"The device in conjunction with the painting should be sufficient, I hope," said the Doctor, studying the object in question. "I will need some time to analyse the origins and methods before I can say for certain."
Rose looked around the room again and noticed that something had changed; a compartment on the wall on the other side of the door from the button had opened slightly. Rose took the few steps to the wall and pulled the compartment open, then stood, staring.
The Doctor came to stand behind her, and she could feel the tension he was radiating, even though she could tell he was trying not to project.
In the compartment was a canvas, the paint looking freshly dried.
The painting was of a windblown beach. On it stood a blonde woman in a blue jacket, hair flying, looking between two identical men in pinstriped suits, one suit brown and one blue. The men stared at each other with some unnamed emotion, and the blonde woman seemed torn between hope and desperation, love and frustration.
"Bad Wolf Bay," said the Doctor quietly. "I'll get it back for you, Rose."
Rose stared at the painting, reaching out to touch the frame.
"When was this?" she asked, turning to face her Doctor in time to see his face fall.
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britgirlatheart: I'm sorry for the cliffhangers. I'm so, so sorry.