House Call

Chapter 12

Location: a cell

Amy could not believe that she was trapped so easily by a bunch of vines controlled by a demented space ship. And now, she had to figure out a way to break out, save the Doctor and find her stupid husband before that—that thing did anything else.

However, first things first, she had to get Rose off her back. "Hey! Could you get up already?"

"Oh, sorry. That slidie thing was a surprise."

Rose then got up from the floor over Amy's back and helped the redhead get to her feet. The two women brushed off their hands and saw they were inside a prison cell made up of stone walls and bars on the opposite side. Handfuls of hay were scattered about and a torchlight the outer passageway.

"Great, now we're stuck and the Doctor needs us," whined Amy.

The redhead then moved to test the bars and gave them a shake. They rattled a bit, but there were strong. There was a door and lock on the bars, but Amy couldn't get it to budge. Frustrated, she banged the bars with her open palms and turned on her heel to face Rose and cross her arms over her chest and narrowed her brow intensely.

Out loud to herself, she said, "Ok, think…think, what would the Doctor do? What would he do?"

Rose smiled and said, "You must really like him."

Amy looked up at the blonde and said, "Yeah, he's my best mate."

Rose grinned at the familiar words and sighed before standing next to Amy and reached out to lean against the bars and examine it experimentally. She ran her tongue across the edge of her teeth and said, "Hey, he was my best mate too once, but that's in the past now."

Amy frowned and stated, "Was? I thought Joe was like the Doctor. He's your new best mate now."

Rose laughed and straightened up to stand next to Amy and replied, "Joe and the Doctor…they're different. He's a different man, he's changed, but the parts that count stays the same. You don't know what's it like for him. Having seen worlds come and go, always changing, always living and dying—its like a song that never ends and starts anew. They call him the Lonely God, the Oncoming Storm, but those people have got it all wrong. He only seems like that because he changes you."

She had never heard anybody talk about the Doctor like that. It sounded like she really knew him, but not like she just knew what he was about or what he did.

And with confidence, Amy said, "You love him."

"No, I love Joe."

Amy was not convinced. She moved away from the bars to face her and said, "Yeah, but you just said how much the Doctor changes you. How they're different, but the important parts stay the same."

Rose shook her head. "No Amy, the Doctor didn't choose me. Joe is the one that wants me. He's the man I love. He's the one I'm gonna marry."

Shocked, the redhead exclaimed, "Wait, you and him are—are together? Like that?"

Rose giggled and replied, "Yeah, we're like that, but we've got more important things to do than chat about that." The blonde than pulled out her very own sonic screwdriver from her pocket and mischievous grinned. "The Doctor's not the only one with a sonic."

Curious, Amy asked, "Where'd you get that?"

"I—I borrowed it from Joe. It's his first prototype."

In reaction, Amy was deeply surprised. She grinned playfully and said, "Oh, I know what you did. You nicked it, didn't you? You stole it from him."

"It's not like he was gonna miss it."

Rose shook her head and began messing with the settlings and aiming at the lock on the bars. She switched the settlings a couple of times before trying it again. She then gave up and aimed the sonic at the hinges and weakened their structure before standing back and pocketing the tool back into her jeans. She drew in a deep breath and karate kicked the door. The metal door went flying and landed on the passageway floor.

Rose grinned and tucked her tucked a strain of her blonde hair behind her ear and said, "Well, nothing like the direct approach, alright."

Amy stared at the broken door in amazement and exclaimed, "Brilliant!" Then, with a smile the two women beamed and grabbed each other's hand and took off into the unknown. They had their men to save.

XXX

Meanwhile, in yet another prison cell stood Rory Williams. The lone male-nurse looked around and tried to open the metal door on the bars, but nothing happened which was a minor set back. He wasn't sure how he'd be able to escape without any help and without any friends. He was all alone and it was really creepy.

Though, to keep himself company he began talking to himself out loud and said, "Ok, think Rory, think! What would the Doctor do? What would the Doctor do? I have no idea what the Doctor would do."

Rory then started to pace. He rubbed his brow and tried to think. "Come on, your clever—you can be clever. What would that woman do? Rose. She said something before about assets. Something I could use."

He looked and spun around in place in a circle and noticed that on the floor were several old bones. Probably the bones of whomever occupied this cell before. It was a depressing thought, but Rory didn't want to die. He had to find Amy. He had to find his wife.

Rory bent down and picked up one of the bones and jammed it into the space between stone wall and the nearest bar. He wedged it in and began to try and bend the bar back with all his might so he could escape, but with one final twist of the bone, it snapped.

Exasperated, he saw that the bone had broken in two and the gap was still too small to squeeze through. He sighed and threw the two pieces on the floor and sat down on the damp hay.

"Great, just fantastic. I'm now going to rot here in this cell, while the Doctor is being held prisoner by a strange evil plant-woman-ship that eats people's brains. Why does this always happen to me?"

Yet, out of the nowhere the cell door opened by itself with a creaky squeak. Startled, Rory quickly rose to his feet and stepped out cautiously.

"Hello? Is—is somebody there?"

Rory scanned the corridor and saw that there wasn't anybody around. The door had just opened by itself and it just made things that much more creeper. Confused, he walked out and began his descent down the hall, but noticed a bizarre light shining through from under the crack from beneath another door.

Cautiously, he made sure again that he was alone and then reached out to turn the handle. The door opened and on the other side he saw a laboratory. There were weird tubes and oddly beating machines all over the place and the air was stale and musty like nobody had been inside the room for a while.

However, eventually Rory came across a body under a sheet that was lying over a metal table. It looked like the sort of thing he'd see in the hospital morgue. Yet, as he looked closer, he saw that the tubes were leading towards the thing under the sheet. It meant that the lab equipment was trying to keep the thing that was in here alive. It meant Sally wanted this thing alive and Rory wasn't sure he was ready to flee from more plants, but fearfully he pressed on and pulled the cloth away.

Rory revealed that the body under the sheet wasn't a plant. It was a girl—well, a woman. A woman that looked an awful lot like Sally, but she had brown hair instead of red. She was also unconscious and her vitals were being kept online through several life support systems connected to the machines. Though, based on Rory's medical experience, he realized that the woman wasn't just asleep. She was practically a vegetable and her skin was as cold as ice.

"Who are you?" he asked out loud.

"Rory!" shouted River as she entered the room. "What have you got?"

Rory was relieved to see River and Joe. He was glad they were all right, but he didn't see his wife. Concern, he asked, "River, where's Amy?"

"I don't know. After we fell down the chute I ended up in a cage with him."

However, Joe wasn't paying either River or Rory any attention. Instead, he was scanned the woman on the table with his sonic screwdriver and then tapped the controls on the medical equipment and said, "Ah, she seems to be in a state of temporal flux. Tricky thing that, but also a fantastic way to keep things fresh."

Puzzled, Rory said, "What do you mean?"

River also examined the medical readings and said, "Yeah, he's right. Temporal flux. It seems Rory that our patient is being shifted out of normal time and space so she doesn't ever age. She's being preserved for all time literally."

The male-nurse said, "But, why? Why would Sally or whatever her name is do that to this woman in the first place?"

Joe smiled and stated, "All very good questions, Rory Williams. There is something about her that's a bit off."

The leather-clad man then went towards the machines again to read the old data input and then after a moment something on one of the monitors caught his eye. He froze paralyzed in place and stared wide-eyed in shock at what he was seeing.

"No…no it can't be."

"What?" asked River. "What is it?"

Joe paused and gazed down at the strange brunette and caressed her forehead gently. In a sorrowful voice, he said, "I know who she is. She's Sally's pilot. She's a Time Lady. She's Loretta."

XXX

TBC

XXX

Forgive the delay, but life got in the way.

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