Disclaimer: For once, I don't care that these aren't mine! The BBC can keep them, just as long as they let me write FanFic!
I. LOVE. This. Chapter. And the next chapter. No, really, I love them. I just hope you do too.
NTMR:
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Chapter 13: Not Quite A Peaceful Dinner (Part 2)
Kate emerged from the taxi, hastily checking her watch as she thrust the money at the taxi driver and walked quickly towards the door of the restaurant. Amongst the bushes, the form of a young girl could be made out, watching intensely as the car rolled away. Faint laughter and music could be heard from within the large restaurant, and the girl could hear only the distant grumblings of the woman as she fumbled in her purse for her security pass.
She saw as Kate reached her hand into the bag, and pull it back again as if scolded. She turned away from the security guard and pulled out a small, golden object. Her face was bathed in the glow, but she seemed frightened by the object. Suddenly, a gust of wind lifted the teenager's hair around her face, and a whisper sounded out through the dark evening.
"Danger…" the voice said, and Helena looked around instinctively for a source to the sound. Kate seemed immersed in the item, but looked up for a second to see the figure hiding in the bushes. Helena breathed in sharply through her nose. She could sense him. She could smell the Time Lord.
Slipping the now still object into her pocket, she backed away to the door, pulled out her security pass, and stumbled through the door and into the building.
When Kate was let in, Helena stood from her position and crept around the building to the staff entrance. Glancing around expertly, she pushed brambles and branches out of the way and slipped into the ajar door. To her left, steam was clouding wildly in the kitchen, but through a hatch to her right, she could see the events unfolding in the main restaurant area.
Helena spotted several men and women standing by a table overflowing with drinks, and glared conspicuously at the man she recognised as John Smith, standing far back in the line to the table.
Glancing casually over the room, she watched as her target, Kate, staggered into the room nervously, her mind elsewhere. She started towards a table where Rose and Jake were talking seriously, then seemed to wince and head for the opposite side of the room instead. As she walked, she knocked into a dark skinned, dark haired woman, who was making her way towards Rose's table. Muttering an apology, she briskly walked out towards the door leading to the bathrooms.
Kate disregarded the event, and her eyes scanned over the room until they feel upon a boy. Jamie was hidden well, in the far corner of the room where no one would think to look. He crouched on a chair behind some drapes, covered by the material, but able to oversee all the activity in the hall.
Helena suddenly sensed a calling, and ducked far out of sight as a warm green glow bathed her face.
"Good news, children." came Jeffrey's voice in her mind. "We have found the Doctor. It is the John Smith man."
"He is disguised, somehow." Suzie's harsh voice sounded. "What is his location?"
"He is present at the Torchwood dinner. So is the watch lady." Jamie's voice sounded, clearer than the previous two voices. Now Helena spoke up.
"I shall retrieve the watch." she spoke telepathically, and stood up as the green light subsided.
Helena stood proudly and followed the corridor around until she could just make out Kate's head as the woman ducked behind a crate.
"Coward." Helena whispered sharply.
- - - - - - -
Kate had entered the restaurant timidly after hearing the words of warning from the watch. Deciding she should inform Rose, who was unofficially in charge of alien artefacts, she had headed over to the woman's table, but a sense of foreboding had come over her, and she had hurried off out of the room instead. As she forced herself towards the toilets, however, a secretary she recognised from Torchwood had bumped into her accidentally. With the watch in her hand and worry on her mind, she hadn't realised what was happening, but moments later she found herself in daylight. Beams of sunlight shone down on her from the sky - strangely clear of zeppelins. Martha, in jeans and a red jacket, had come flying past her, knocking into her as she had just done.
"Martha?" Kate asked uneasily, before a flash of white light enveloped her and she was dragged back to the restaurant. Staring meekly at Martha, she muttered an apology and almost ran out of the room.
- - - - - - -
Martha didn't notice as Kate crashed into her. She had already turned away when, moments later, the woman stuttered "Sorry" and ran out of the room. Overlooking this, she walked hurriedly to the table she was aiming for.
Rose looked up from the table when she felt someone standing behind her. Her entire body sank with dread when she saw the person standing by her table.
"Please, don't." Rose willed Martha. "Not again." She didn't know if she could still confront John after another explanation from this woman.
"He's different from any other man you've ever met, right?" Martha walked round to stand in front of Rose.
"Yes." Rose whispered, hoping that Martha would leave, but eager to find out the truth.
"And sometimes he says these strange things, like people and places you've never heard of, yeah?" Martha continued. Rose swallowed her anxiousness and braced herself. "But it's deeper than that. Sometimes when you look in his eyes you know - you just know that there's something else in there. Something hidden. Right behind the eyes, something hidden away. In the dark."
Rose almost laughed at the irony. Here was this Martha woman, presumably the Doctor's latest companion, attempting to explain the Doctor to the one person who knew him best. She was about to speak up when she backed out.
"I don't know what you mean." Rose shrugged, avoiding the woman's eyes as she sat down at the chair next to Rose's.
"Yes, you do." Martha insisted. "I don't mean to be rude, but the awful thing is… it doesn't even matter what you think." Rose felt her heart sink. "But you're nice. And you're lucky. And I just wanted to say sorry for what I'm about to do."
Now Rose looked up, straight into Martha's eyes and saw her regret. The sadness, the loneliness in her colleague's face was clear.
"What do you -"
"Oh, now really, Martha." John interrupted, placing the two glasses of beer on the table and placing his hand on his hip. "This getting out of hand; I must insist that you leave."
He didn't notice Martha pulling something out of her suit pocket. He only looked down when he saw Rose's tearful eyes staring at Martha's hands.
"D'you know what this is?" she asked calmly, lifting the sonic screwdriver a few inches into the air. "Name it. Go on, name it."
"John?" Rose breathed, trying not to let her emotion sound in her voice. "What is it, John?"
John pulled the item out of Martha's hands and caressed it with his fingers, running the long, coarse body of the object through his hands with wonder.
"You're not John Smith." Martha told him, and Rose felt her heart beat again. "You're called the Doctor." John didn't look up from the object, continuing to run it through his fingers as if that would explain what it was. Rose stared into his eyes as he frowned, mentally begging and pleading with him to remember who he was as her heartbeat steadily increased. "The man in your journal, he's real." Martha was saying, almost excitedly. "He's you."
Now, John looked up. "Now, Martha," he began, but Rose stood up and he silenced.
"John." she began pointedly. "Listen to her."
John's eyes widened. "What? But, Rose, you can't - you can't think - I mean, look at this thing!" he threw the sonic screwdriver onto the table with disgust. Rose felt her eyes prickle with tears.
"But you know it, John." she said firmly, through gritted teeth. "You know what it is." Her vision blurred slightly, but she instinctively blinked back the oncoming tears.
"I do not, I honestly do -"
"You do." Martha spoke softly.
"John, your journal." Rose pleaded him, begging him to remember and be the man she needed. "You wrote about it. Your 'magic wand'. Remember?"
"Look, whether or not I wrote about some silly little object is - is neither here nor there." John said, backing away. Rose looked around and noticed several tables glancing their way, but didn't care. "Rose, you - you can't believe this?"
Rose looked down at the table. The moment had finally come. She heard Martha talking, trying to convince John of who he really was, but all she could hear was her own heartbeat pounding against her chest.
"…and I know you know what it is, so who are you kidding?!" Martha was saying, as her frustrated voice faded back into Rose's mind. "John, listen to me. You - are - the - Doc-tor." she spelled out for him, and as John furrowed his eyebrows and looked helplessly to Rose, she knew this was her moment. She looked up, into his hollow brown eyes, and prayed he would forgive her someday, and that she would forgive herself for losing him.
"It's true."
-freaks out- Woohoo! What's going to happen next?? And what's Rose on about?? I already know! Haha! Review please!