It had been three days, and the dust storm still raged outside. It was clear that the men – who Sunshine had informed Alice were known as the Fabulous Killjoys – were getting restless. Alice knew that keeping regular boys cooped up for too long was a bad idea, and was quickly learning that criminally dangerous boys were much worse. Party had begun shooting holes in the kitchen wall out of sheer boredom, Jet seemed the calmest of them all, keeping himself busy by cleaning that, or cooking this. Kobra had moved in stages. First sulking, then throwing cans of food at people, before finally joining his brother in shooting the wall. It was Fun that seemed to be having the most trouble dealing with the confinement, however. Over the last couple of days, Alice had watched the other Killjoys, and particularly Sunshine, take time out of being bored to keep their friend occupied. It appeared that when he was left to his own devices for too long Fun Ghoul began to find new and interesting ways to break things. Coming out of the bathroom, she spotted Fun sitting at one of the tables, examining his gun in a way that Alice was sure he was going to break it... or shoot himself with it. Either scenario would undoubtedly be bad. Moving quickly, the girl sat down opposite him, easing the gun out of his hands.

"I'm sure it'll be over soon," she said kindly. Fun looked up at her, giving her a look that clearly showed she had yet to actually say something comforting. "And then you'll be able to go out and kill something?" She tried.

At this Fun laughed, though he was still agitated, if his incessant tapping was anything to go by. Alice opened her mouth to suggest that, if she were to give him his gun back, he could go and join the brothers in shooting the wall, when Kobra sat down heavily next to Fun. Apparently he'd gotten bored of shooting the wall, though Alice could still hear the sound of laser blasts, so clearly Party was still at it.

"Why has she got your gun?" Kobra growled, lifting his leg onto the table, pulling the edge of his pants up to examine something there.

Alice immediately dropped the gun down onto the table and pulled her hands back, figuring it was better to keep confrontations to a minimum. Though a very large part of her wanted very much to yell at Kobra until he got off his high bloody horse. But she didn't feel like being shot in the face, which she was aware was a very real possibility. As Kobra began to scratch at whatever was on his leg, Alice caught sight of something on his calf. A scar, though it looked like it had a very deliberate shape.

"BR?" she asked before she could stop herself.

It earned her a dark glare that made her sit back in her seat before Kobra stormed off. Alice sighed. One day she'd figure out the right thing to say that wouldn't make that man want to kill her. She glanced at Fun who was suppressing a grin. She raised an eyebrow at him, waiting for him to tell her what ever it was that had him bursting at the scenes.

"Okay, so remember how I was telling you about those chicks? And how Koby there had a wee run in?" Alice didn't remember that last part because Fun had been interrupted the last time he tried to tell this story, but she nodded anyway. "Yeah well, after a series of interesting events she - " Fun stopped as a can of kibble hit the window next to him. The glass didn't shatter, thankfully and the can bounced harmlessly back onto the table.

"Shut your god-damn face," Kobra could be heard growling before he disappeared back into the kitchen. Alice sighed, deciding it was probably better she never heard the end of that story. She stood up, giving Fun one last comforting smile.

"Try not to hurt anything," she said, ruffling his hair before moving over to the fire area where the Doctor was sitting. Fun Ghoul, Jet Star and Sunshine seemed to have taken to her quite well. She could see they still didn't quite trust her – with the exception of Sunshine – and that was understandable. If she'd been forced to live through the apocalypse, she wouldn't trust strangers either. But at least they weren't hostile. Hell, they were actually pretty friendly. Party tended to ignore her for the most part, focusing on hushed conversations with the Doctor. It was only Kobra that seemed to openly dislike her. Or maybe he just preferred to be open with his distrust.

"What are you doing?" she asked the Doctor who had his sonic screw driver out and was closely examining Sunshine's gun.

"There's something wrong here," he muttered, smiling pleasantly at the little girl as he handed her back her gun. "I mean other than little girls carrying guns," he added. "This technology... the lasers... it's only 2019, these shouldn't be here." Alice raised an eyebrow at him. "Something's accelerating their technology. Couple that with the fact that the big evil corporation knows who I am and you get...?"

Of course, he was testing her again. At least this time the answer was blatantly obvious. She really hated it when she got the answer wrong and he looked at her like she was a total idiot. "Alien involvement?"

"Exactly!" he said, and while she heard the pride in his voice his face still held a look of concern. "Which means I need to get involved as soon as possible."

Moving closer to the Doctor, Alice rested her head on his shoulder and stared at the ground in front of her thoughtfully for a long moment before asking, "was their alien involvement in the fires?"

The Doctor froze, and for a long while said nothing. He had so wished aliens had been involved, or anything to allow him to interfere, to stop them from happening. But the fires were a fixed point in time, and without it having been alien... there was nothing he could do. "No."

Alice nodded, knowing that was why he couldn't have done anything, but there was still one thing that bugged her. "Then why pick me up? You said it yourself, you can never take me home. And I can't very well spend forever with you." She knew she would end up leaving him sooner or later. Everyone did. Not that she knew where she would go.

"I had... I had to save someone," he said, like he was repeating something he'd heard a long time ago. Alice nodded again, before moving to the other side of the fire, curling up with Sunshine and forcing herself to sleep.

0o0o0o0o

"Thank Fucking God!"

Alice awoke with a start to the sound of jubilant yelling, and had to squint her eyes as bright sunlight shone through the windows. So the sandstorm had abated. Looking around, Alice realised the glee was Fun Ghoul's as he ran outside and shot at nothing in particular. She smiled, relieved that they were no longer cooped up inside. This also meant that they would be able to get to the bottom of whatever was going on, and then move on. Though over the past few days, Alice had grown rather attached to the little girl. Sunshine really suited her name. And she knew it would be sad to say goodbye. Sitting up and rubbing her eyes, Alice looked around and realised she had been the only one still asleep. Jet and Sunshine had joined Fun outside in the dust free air, and the Doctor was huddled in a corner with Party and Kobra, probably discussing some sort of plan to get into BL/ind. Alice chose to go outside and join the others, figuring she would be not quite welcome at the discussion table. Closing the door behind her, Alice smiled as Sunshine ran over to her and grabbed her hand, pulling her further into the sunlight. It was ridiculously bright. And ridiculously warm. She couldn't understand how they all put up with wearing such long sleeves and thick jackets until the wind picked up slightly and sand blew painfully across her arm. Ah.

"Um, Alice?"

Alice looked up to see Fun and Jet both drawing their guns and looking at something off in the distance. She followed their gaze and saw a cloud of dust moving towards them, and thought it odd they'd be drawing their guns to fight off another storm. It wasn't until she heard the sound of an engine that she realised it must be somebody coming towards them, and clearly not somebody they wanted to see."Get Party," Fun said, it was an order and normally Alice would have waited until he'd said please, but this seemed important. So instead, she immediately did as she was told.

"Sorry to interrupt the manly conversation you three must be having" she said as she poked her head in the door. All three of them gave her a look that said it had better be important. "But apparently there's something you should see out here."

Reluctantly, the men got out of their seats and made their way outside. By now whoever was coming was much closer and Alice could see it was a woman riding a motorbike. For some reason this surprised her, the only women she had heard of since coming here was the Crash Queens, and they hadn't sounded like the type to visit. Especially not alone. Party and Kobra both raised their guns, though the Doctor simply rolled his eyes. It took no time at all for the woman to skid to a halt in front of them, two guns raised. Though she was clearly out numbered, she didn't seem concerned at all.

"Did ya miss me, sweetie?" she asked, her attention directed at Kobra. He growled in return and Alice raised an eyebrow, wondering what in the hell was going on.

"What the fuck are you doing here, Baby," he said darkly. "This here is Killjoy territory, and we're about as friendly as you."

Alice was officially lost. The term of endearment seemed utterly out of place, given the current situation. It was clear just from looking at the pair that it was not love they felt for each other – or even like for that matter. She felt a chin on her shoulder and recognised Fun Ghoul's voice as he whispered, "Baby Ruthless... it's her name." He gave her a significant look before leaning away again, focusing his attention back on the dangerous female with the motorcycle.

Baby Ruthless? What was that supposed to... ohhhhh... BR... and suddenly everything made sense.

"As a matter of fact, I came here to warn you morons about the impending doom," the woman said, a false pout playing on her lips. "But if you're not gonna play nice, I don't see why I should."

It was clear Kobra didn't give a rat's ass about impending doom and was planning on shooting Miss Ruthless in the face, but Party quickly stopped him, lowering his own gun and cautiously stepping towards the woman. "What doom?"

"See, I knew you wouldn't already know," she said gleefully. "Our girl on the inside says a large group of Dracs will be heading this way. And by large group, I mean a fucking army. And I believe they want him." She pointed to the Doctor with her gun, and Alice swallowed hard.

"What do they want me for?" the Doctor asked, moving over to stand directly in front of Baby Ruthless, completely ignoring her guns or the fact that she looked like she could kill him just by glaring at him hard enough.

"Who knows?" she shrugged. "But they got your fancy box, and now they want you. And they know you're here, cause they saw these clowns make off with you."

Kobra threw his brother a significant look, and Party wisely chose to ignore him. "And you're warning us because? We've never exactly been friendly."

"Because Minx told me to come over here and try to convince you to just give the ginger up so we could avoid this. Failing that, I am to tell you that Minx is lining the girls up for a fight. They have to come through Zone 3 to get to here, so we'll hold as many of them off as we can."

"Why?" Party asked again. He knew it wasn't for any love of them, or the Doctor since they had never met him before.

"Because it's not exactly in our best interests for BL/ind to be running our backyard, is it?" she pointed out. "You we can deal with. We don't intend to be surrounded by Dracs and Exterminators. So just accept our fucking help and deal with the fact that you owe us... again."

Holstering her guns, Baby Ruthless kicked her bike into life and sped off before any of them could say anything else. Frustrated, Kobra fired a shot in her direction anyway, missing by mere inches. "I hate owing them," he whispered to his brother.

"Me too," Party agreed, heading back inside. "But we hardly have a choice, do we? If they don't help, we're all dead."

"Well," Kobra said, following Party through the door, the others behind him. "We wouldn't be in this mess if we hadn't brought them back here in the first place! This is what happens when we trust strangers!"

"I know!"

Everyone stopped moving, the chime of the door as it swung closed the only sound in the room for what felt like an eternity.

"I know," Party said again, calmer this time. "But we can't change what's already happened. We can only deal with what's in front of us." Kobra had his arms folded across his chest, but was now silent. Party closed his eyes and bowed his head as he thought, bright red hair covering most of his face. "We might be outnumbered, but we're smarter and stronger. We've got plenty of guns, we've got shelter and barricades. And most importantly, this is our turf." He glanced up, focusing on Alice and the Doctor. "We can give you guys guns, we can protect you until they're all dead or they give up."

"We don't need guns," the Doctor said firmly. "I'll just give myself up. They can take me in. It'll get me inside, won't it?"

"No," Party's tone clearly stated his word was final. "You'll be going in on our terms, not theirs. If you let them take control, they will kill you. Or they'll kill all of us anyway. We fight. Whether or not you want to."

The Doctor looked as if he wanted to argue, but under Party's steady gaze gave in. Knowing there was no arguing with the man.

"Good," Party said. "Now we don't have a lot of time. They'll be coming soon, and even with the Queens holding some of them off, others will get here pretty quickly." As if to prove him right, the sound of distant car engines could be heard. Cars full of Draculoids. "Every body gear up. This'll be one hell of a fight."