So, it wasn't until I was partway through writing this chapter that I came to realise that THIS EPISODE HAS A MASSIVE SCRIPT ERROR. Ahem. Yeah, so it turns out that one of the pirates (the Boatswain) just mysteriously disappears without explanation towards the end of the episode.
Because of this, I had to make a few adjustments to fix the mistake that the writer of this episode made and that Moffat apparently overlooked in his revision. (Does this mean Moffat should probably hire me to help him? Possibly.)
Anyway, thanks to everyone who has reviewed so far, your support is what keeps me going!
I am so excited to finally be getting back to the Series 6 plot (because oh boy do I have plans, or rather, the plans have already been subtly implemented for a while XD)! Enjoy!
Despite their worrying about their inability to keep away from each other, the Doctor and Aliya discovered something upon finally leaving the TARDIS (since they had committed themselves to leaving no surface of the ship uncompromised).
They had absolutely no desire to flout their relationship in front of others. It wasn't something they consciously decided, but when wandering around the bustling alien market that was their first excursion, they realised ten minutes in that they had just been going about their exploring as they always had.
"I guess it's because nothing's really changed," Aliya said to the Doctor, who nodded and seemed heavily relieved.
"Good, good," he replied, wringing his hands, "Because we tend to have worlds to save and I can't be thinking up plans to stop pesky Dalek invasions if I'm wanting to be kissing you."
"But why would we want to be kissing if we've got Daleks to stop?"
He blinked. "I have absolutely no idea. Hardly one of the sexier environments. Daleks are the opposite of sexy."
She laughed and let him grab her hand to drag her to another stall (the first real physical contact they had had since leaving the ship).
The entire thing wasn't particularly surprising when they mused more on it later, simply because Time Lord sexuality was so selective anyway that the disappearing of such urges when not in private made perfect sense.
"What's that noise?"
"Hm?" Aliya wasn't paying attention to anything but the thumb war they were currently having while sitting on his swing chair underneath the console. The chair didn't quite fit two people comfortably. Or rather, it wouldn't if the two people had issues with being squished together, which the two Time Lords didn't (quite the opposite).
His thumb trapped hers and she swore.
"There's a noise coming from the console," the Doctor told her, and she made a face.
"So? Can't we ignore it?" She was currently very content, with his left arm casually draped over her shoulder while his right thumb wrestled with hers. The idea of moving to check why the ship was causing a fuss did not sound particularly appealing.
The Doctor chuckled. "Sounds like a distress signal, so we probably better not."
Aliya sighed. "Fine. Come on then." They went up to the console platform and examined the scanner to find out more.
"Earth, 1699," he noted.
"Is that the middle of the ocean?"
"It'll be a ship, a ship that's gotten into trouble. Out there, they won't get any help."
She grinned. "On a normal day. But today they've got us."
He mirrored her grin and the two hurried to operate the TARDIS in near perfect sync (their background mental connection and periods of mental intimacy had done wonders for their silent teamwork). The ship landed on silent because Aliya got to the brakes before the Doctor could stop her, and they left the police box to find themselves in the mess deck of a ship.
"I've never been in this kind of ship," the former said, looking around with interest and not even minding the bilgewater at their feet that had immediately soaked her shoes. "You know, the wooden kind with sails and crates."
"First times are fun, aren't they?"
Aliya smirked. "Very," she agreed, not bothering to keep the innuendo from her voice, and the Doctor rolled his eyes - albeit with a small twitch of his lips - before just pointing to the ladder which would take them above deck. He climbed it and she followed, but when the hatch didn't budge they pounded on it until it flew open.
Five startled pirates stared back at them.
"Yo ho ho!" The Doctor said cheerily. When they continued to eye them with shock, he paused. "Or does nobody actually say that?"
It didn't take long for them to be dragged at gun and sword point into the Captain's cabin to be interrogated. Aliya couldn't blame them, because having two new people turn up on a ship in the middle of the ocean was bound to be alarming for humans of this calibre.
"What are you doing here?" The captain asked.
"We caught your signal," Aliya replied. "For help."
"We made no signal."
The Doctor intervened. "Our sensors picked you up. Ship in distress."
"Sensors?"
"Yes." When he saw the lack of comprehension on the pirate's faces, he frowned. "Okay, problem word. Seventeenth century." He visibly racked his brains for an alternate explanation. "My ship automatically, er, noticed-ish that your ship was having some bother."
The captain looked at him very sceptically. "That big blue crate?"
"That is more magic, Captain Avery," one of the other pirates insisted, "They're spirits. How else could they have found their way below decks?"
The Doctor made a face. "Well, er, I want to say multi-dimensional engineering, but since you had a problem with sensors, I won't go there. Look, I'm the Doctor, and this is Aliya. We're sailors, same as you. Ooo ar. Except for the gun thing. And the beardiness."
Avery did not seem amused or swayed in any way. "You're stowaways."
"We're not," Aliya tried to argue, but he shook his head.
"Only explanation. Eight days, we've been stranded here, becalmed. You must have stowed away before we sailed."
"Right, and the giant blue box has been hiding in plain sight too, has it?" She said sarcastically. "You realise your conclusion makes absolutely no sense?"
He pointedly ignored her, and when one of his men asked what was to be done with the newcomers, he made a comment about showing them hospitality.
Which, of course, turned out to be hospitality of a 'walking the plank' variety.
Aliya, being held by the tall black man who was apparently called Dancer, was forced to watch as the Doctor was made to stand on the plank and walk out towards the end. Meanwhile, the ship's crew were getting a decent enjoyment out of their sport if their odd laughter was anything to go by.
"I suppose laughing like that is in the job description," the Doctor said, over his shoulder so that they could all hear him, "Can you do the laugh? Check. Grab yourself a parrot, welcome aboard!"
Avery wasn't to be convinced, no matter how much Aliya had tried forcefully reasoning with him on their way from the cabin. "Stocks are low. Only one barrel of water remains. We don't need two more empty bellies to fill." He looked to Dancer. "Take the doxy below to the gallery, put her to work. She won't need much feeding."
"Oi!" Aliya protested as she was dragged away. "I don't know what that means, but I really don't like the way you said it!"
The Doctor and Avery continued to discuss the Doctor's imminent death as well as the ship's situation. But when Aliya was shoved down below deck, she immediately saw a few things that might help her get the Doctor out of, well, deep water.
With a tiny chuckle at her own pun, she pulled on the coat on the wall, and grabbed the triangular hat for good measure before arming herself with a sword. After all, if one was going to be a pirate, one had to do it properly.
When she got back up on deck and saw that the Doctor really was in need of her intervention, she gripped her weapon a fraction tighter.
"Put the gun down, right now," she said as she pointed the sword directly at Avery, who immediately did as he was told, while looking almost too nervous as he regarded her.
"Aliya, what are you doing?"
"I'd have thought it was fairly obvious."
"Put down the sword," Avery told her, still very apprehensive, "A sword could kill us all, woman."
"That is more or less the idea, even if it's far from my preference," Aliya replied, lifting an eyebrow, "Or did you think I was going to sit below deck while you drowned my friend?"
The other pirates then charged her, and she quickly realised that there was the problem that she had absolutely zero proficiency with a cutlass. Still, if she got lucky, she wouldn't need much considering that they currently had staffs. She slashed out at them, noting how they shied away from her blade more than made sense but not being able to understand why.
It only took a minute for her to nick someone, the man who had been holding her initially - Dancer. He stared at the cut with utter dismay.
"You have killed me," he said, lifting his eyes at her and making her lower the sword and shift uncomfortably.
"What are you on about?" She asked, frowning. "Last I checked you lot didn't drop dead from a tiny cut." It occurred to her that it might be a diversion tactic, so she tossed the sword to her other hand in preparation, only to fumble with it.
"One drop, that's all it takes," Avery told her, so solemn that she believed him instantly, "One drop of blood and she'll rise out of the ocean."
Aliya blinked and then hissed in pain when she realised her fumble with the sword had sliced open the hell of her palm. A small flow of blood trickled from the wound and when a black spot appeared in the centre of her palm she nearly jumped with surprise. A glance at Dancer's hand showed the same mark in the same location.
"What does this spot mean?" The Time Lady asked the captain of the ship. He regarded her and Dancer grimly.
"She can smell the blood on your skin. She's marked you for death."
"She?"
"A demon, out there in the ocean."
The Doctor clapped his hands together with great interest as well as masked concern. "Okay. Groovy. So not just pirates today. We've managed to bagsy a ship where there's a demon popping in. Very efficient. I mean, if something's going to kill you, it's nice that it drops you a note to remind you."
"Yeah, how fucking lovely," Aliya muttered, throwing the sword away before she could do any more damage.
Only I could try to conduct a rescue mission and manage to doom a stranger through ignorance and myself through sheer idiocy, she thought with great self exasperation, and to make it better, the cut really stings.
But then the song started, and most rational thoughts left her mind to be replaced by ones of a rather different sort.
The Doctor couldn't even bring himself to be surprised. Arriving on random scenes and instantly getting themselves into serious danger was something he and his companions had uncanny knacks for. Still, this 'marked for death by way of sea demon' thing with its black spot on the skin was rather more ominous than he might have preferred.
Not that he was one for letting on that he might be worried. Because he wasn't. Much.
An eerie yet undeniably beautiful wordless song surrounded them. The melody was soft and floated through the air in a way that would have been enjoyable in any other setting or circumstance.
"Quickly now, block the sound," one of the pirates said to Dancer and Aliya.
"Why?" The latter asked.
"The creature," Avery told her, "She charms all her victims with that song."
"That sort of thing might work on humans, but I find it unlikely that any 'demon', provided one actually exists, can get into my-" Aliya's hotheaded response abruptly trailed off, causing the Doctor to glance at her suspiciously. "Oh. That's quite lovely, isn't it?"
Uh oh, the Doctor thought as she and Dancer started giggling. As one other pirate remarked that the music was working, the woman on board had taken several steps until she was in front of the Doctor and holding onto his coat lapels.
"You are so beautiful," she told him. The words in themselves weren't particularly odd, but the way her eyes were unfocused most definitely was, "Do you like my clothes? I think I look great as a pirate. Hey, hey - cuddle me, shipmate."
"Aliya, I want you to focus on what I'm saying to you, okay? There's something messing with your head-"
"This whole thing is just brilliant!" She exclaimed, beaming at him with manic energy. "I mean, these brilliant pirates, their brilliant beards...I'd love a beard, you know that? What do you think, next regeneration, a beard? It could be about time I changed biological sex, you know, I'd be pretty curious to see what it's like to have a-"
The Doctor, completely lost as to what else to do, grasped her shoulder firmly with one hand and covered her mouth with the other.
Avery had just watched the whole thing without a lack of surprise. "The music turns them into fools," he told him.
"I gathered," the Doctor said mildly, rather alarmed. Aliya made a noise against his hand that sounded like 'ooooo', and he followed her gaze to the shimmering white light that was rising in the water. A feminine figure flew out, soaring through the air with an unnatural grace, and landed on deck. Or rather, hovered ever so slightly above it. She was a celestial beauty with a round face and long dark hair, dressed in a pale gown.
When he saw Dancer immediately try to go towards what appeared to be a Siren of sorts, the Doctor pulled Aliya in the opposite direction and removed his hand from her mouth to more firmly secure her by the arms. Sure enough she began resisting a few moments later.
Dancer reached the Siren and upon touching her, exploded into a cloud of soot.
"I want to touch her," Aliya whined, staring at the Siren with glassy eyes, "I need to, Doctor, more than I've ever needed anything!"
"Sorry," the Doctor told the Siren firmly, "She's spoken for."
The Siren turned a vivid red and her entire face twisted into a monstrous snarl. A blast of energy sent the two Time Lords hurtling back and landing on the wood of the deck with a bone rattling thump.
"Everyone into the hold!" The Doctor managed to cough out. "Now!" He got to his feet and dragged Aliya along with him, ignoring her protests that got more slanderous towards him by the second. The group of six hurried to get down into the hold, where half a foot of bilgewater felt welcome in comparison to what awaited them outside. "Avery, what is that thing?"
"The legend. The siren," Avery replied, "Many a merchant ship laden with treasure has fallen prey to her. She's been hunting us ever since we were becalmed, picking off the injured."
"Like a shark. A shark can smell blood," one of his crew agreed.
"Okay," the Doctor considered, "Just like a shark, in a dress. And singing. And green? A green singing shark in an evening gown."
Avery shot him a dark look. "The ship is cursed!"
"Yeah, right. Cursed is big with humans. It means bad things are happening but you can't be bothered to find an explanation."
"Why treasure?" Aliya asked. She frowned so deeply it was almost comical. "She doesn't need treasure. She is a treasure. I should tell her that, shouldn't I? That I think she's the most beautiful thing she's ever seen?"
"I thought I was the most beautiful thing you've ever seen?"
The blonde snorted. "Yeah, right, with your non-existent eyebrows? Dream on, Mr Chin."
The Doctor reminded himself that he would be able to tease her mercilessly for this later, and the thought kept him from growing disheartened by her petty insults.
"That thing of yours is really a ship?" Avery asked the Doctor.
"Well, it's not propelled by the wind."
"Show me." The captain pulled out his gun and pointed it square at the man in the bowtie. "Weigh anchor. Make it sail."
The Time Lord sighed. "And the gun's back. You're big on the gun thing, aren't you. Freud would say you're compensating. Ever met Freud? No?" Struck by a sudden tiredness and thoughts of his last encounter with Freud, he let his head fall back as he longingly breathed, "Comfy sofa."
"Leave the cursed woman, Captain-"
"That's not happening," the Doctor flatly told the man who had spoken.
"Spoilsport," Aliya accused, kicking him in the shin.
"Ow!"
Something latched onto the leg of one of the men. A leech.
"Everyone out of the water!" The Doctor yelled, yanking Aliya up with him onto a barrel even though she was already bleeding. The others scrambled, but it wasn't enough to save the man who had already been attacked by the leech. The siren appeared just as the Doctor claimed that no curse was getting through three solid inches of timber.
They continued onto the mess deck regardless.
"How did she get in?"
The Doctor had worked it out. "Bilge water. She's using water like a portal, a door. She can materialise through a single drop. We need to go somewhere with no water."
Aliya giggled. "Well, we're in the middle of the ocean, so good luck with that. Except not really good luck because I want her to find us. I mean, her eyes, they're like pools of molten diamond."
He sighed with exasperation and ignored her.
"The magazine," Avery said suddenly.
"Eh?" Aliya gave him a funny look. "What? Pirate Weekly or something? 50 ways to make your ship the shiniest on the high seas? Blackbeard - reveals all on page 16?" When all the men just stared at her with bemused expressions, she shrugged. "What? That's what you humans have on your dumb magazines, isn't it?"
"He means the armoury, where the gunpowder is stored."
"It's as dry as a bone," Avery said, nodding.
After a small disagreement about who was in charge, they made their way to the door of the magazine, only to find that one of the keys had been stolen. They went through the unlocked door into a small room full of barrels.
"Barricade the door," Avery instructed his men, "Careful of that lantern. Every barrel is full of powder."
The Doctor glanced around curiously. "Who's been sleeping in my gun room?"
Then came the unmistakable sound of a cough. It took Avery all of one second to march to a barrel and pull out a boy with shaggy sandy hair. The man shook him and let him fall down by the barrel.
"You fool! You fool, boy! What are you doing here?"
"Who is he?" The Doctor asked him. "What, he's not one of the crew?"
Avery sighed. "No. He's my son." He turned his glower back to the boy. "What in God's name possessed you, boy? Your mother will be searching for you." The boy glanced down and his pointed silence said everything it needed to. Avery's expression fell. "When?"
"Last winter," the boy said quietly, "Fever. She told me all about you. How you were a Captain in the Navy. An honourable man, she said. How I'd be proud to know you." He brightened slightly. "I've come to join your crew."
"I don't want you here."
"You can't send me back. It's too late. We're a hundred miles from home."
"It's dangerous here," Avery told him forcefully, "There is a monster aboard. She leaves a mark on men's skin."
The boy faltered. "The black spot?" He lifted and opened his hand to show one identical to Aliya's. As the adults exchanged wary looks, he coughed again.
After a rather lengthy debate, it was decided that the Doctor and Avery would go to fetch the TARDIS, while the two remaining members of the crew as well as Aliya and the boy (who was apparently named Toby) would remain in the magazine and keep themselves barricaded in once the others left.
Aliya was simply glad to have her sense returned to her, even if it had conveniently been just after the Doctor had left. The previous ten or fifteen minutes were a complete blur, which she couldn't stand. She was just about to sit down next to Toby when they realised that the door was being unbarricaded.
"What are you doing?" She asked cautiously.
"We're not staying here to mollycoddle the boy," one of the men said, "The Captain's gone soft. Time for us to leave." He turned to his comrade. "Get what treasure you can. I'll meet you in the row boat."
Toby grabbed the nearest cutlass and pointed it at him. "You're going to remain at your post," he said with an attempt at authority that was admirable but not quite convincing enough.
"I am not playing games with you, boy," the boatswain said darkly, "You put that down."
"One more step and I'll use this, you blaggard."
"You don't know how to fight with a cutlass, boy."
Toby smirked. "Don't need to, do I?" He lunged and hit home just well enough to draw blood. Sure enough, the black spot appeared a moment later.
"No," the injured man said, defeated. "You little swabber!"
Aliya crossed her arms and didn't bother to try to look sympathetic. "Well, it looks like you're in the same boat as us now-" She cringed at her accidental pun, "And you should probably stay in here."
"You scurvy ape!" When the gun came out, Aliya jumped with alarm.
"Don't shoot, you moron, we're surrounded by explosives!" She scolded. "Do you want to blow us all up?"
That was when the man called Mulligan swiped the keys from his shipmate's belt in one swift movement. When asked what he was doing, he just scarpered from their sight.
"No honour among humans of this sort," Aliya said, watching the newly injured man that remained with them start rebuilding the barricade he had previously been restoring. She and Toby moved to sit down by the barrel again. "Now, Toby, I'm Aliya." She held out her hand. He shook it solemnly like a true gentlemen and gave her a nod.
"How did you get the spot?" He asked.
She opened her other hand to show him the deep cut with its large smudge of blood around it. "It was really impressive, actually, I tried to be competent with a sword and injured myself."
That made Toby smile a little with faint amusement. "I'm probably lucky I didn't do the same. Forgive me for asking, Miss, but why are your clothes so funny? I've never seen a woman not in a dress before."
Aliya laughed. "I'm from very far away."
He examined her more closely, frowning in a way that only served to make him more endearing. "Is that why your hair's so short too?"
They went on to have a lengthy discussion about the fashion of their respective times and places, with some choice editing on Aliya's side of things so as to not completely alarm the boy. Meanwhile, he absently polished the medallion his father had given him before going off with the Doctor.
Then, without warning, there was pounding on the door along with frantic shouting from the other side from the Doctor and Avery.
"Aliya! Open the door!"
"Toby! Open the door!"
When they finally got into the room, the Doctor lurched forward to grab the medallion from Toby. Problem was, the Siren was already starting to leap from it, so he threw it to the opposite side of the room from Aliya and Toby. Rather unfortunately, that was where the boatswain was standing, and the Siren dissolved him to ash in a second. The Doctor dove for the medallion and breathed all over it before the Siren could get any ideas about taking the other two marked people in the room.
Once it was completely fogged up, he relaxed and gave them all a thumbs up, though sobered slightly when he glanced at the pile of ashes that had been the boatswain. Then he proceeded to fill them in on the developments of the situation. Which was that the TARDIS was gone (to which Aliya exclaimed "WHAT?!") and that the Siren didn't come through water, but reflection.
So, after a small detour to smash all the reflective surfaces in the captain's cabin, the group took up in the magazine for the night. Avery went up on deck for what they guessed were stargazing reasons or a need for solitude, leaving the Doctor and Aliya sitting up against the wooden wall by the barrels, alone but for Toby sleeping nearby.
"So, should I be concerned that you're leaving me for a stroppy homicidal mermaid?" The Doctor asked his friend, who made a face.
"Oh god, what did I say?"
He let his fingertips brush her temple (instead of risking injury with a forehead ram) and linger there until he knew she had received all of his memories of her when she was loopy.
"Oh no," Aliya said, leaning back against the wall and thinking she couldn't remember the last time she had been so mortified, "Some of that was just - no. Wow. No."
"So you don't want to change biological sex for your next regeneration so you can get a beard?" He asked slyly, and she whacked him, which only made him grin infuriatingly at her.
"I'm not exactly against the idea, but I do quite like being female, thank you."
"Now, about her extraordinary beauty-"
Aliya didn't let him get any further. She leaned in and pressed a quick kiss to his chin in silent apology for her insult towards it. "You know I didn't mean that."
"Yes," he admitted, "Doesn't mean it wasn't...annoying."
"Not funny?"
"Maybe a little, but not really when there's also a constant danger of you dying at the hand of the creature you're mooning over." He let his hand fall into hers where they rested on their outstretched legs. "This might be a surprise to you, but I'd probably be quite put out if you were to die here."
"So, only probably, and just here specifically, or-ow!" Aliya's question cut off when his elbow connected with her ribs. "Okay, touchy. I'll try not to get killed by the decidedly ugly evil mermaid that's outside, alright?"
He rolled his eyes, but she could see his smile. "I need to talk to Avery," he said almost reluctantly.
"And I'll stay here because where else would I go with this on my hand?"
The Doctor grabbed her injured hand as opposed to the hand with spot which she had been referring to. His touch was extraordinarily gentle as the pads of his fingers traced over the cut that was just covered in dried blood. She winced a little all the same. "Does it hurt?"
"A little, but that's just because I'm a bit pathetic. It stings."
He gave it a fleeting kiss before getting to his feet, bidding her farewell, and leaving the room with a promise to return soon.
After giving a sound piece of wisdom to Avery that he could only hope would be taken to heart, the Doctor was glad when the storm finally hit them and they could get Toby and Aliya on deck without endangering them.
"To the rigging, you dogs!" Avery bellowed, and the Doctor and Aliya did their best to comply. "Let go the sails! Avast ye! Put the brunt into the slack of the clews."
"Is this some form of English they didn't teach us?" Aliya asked the Doctor. She had to yell at the top of her lungs to be heard over the thunder and wind.
"I think calling it English is a stretch!" He replied, hanging off a rope precariously. "But I've got to get to the wheel to try to steer this thing!" He left her alone to try and follow Avery's difficult instructions.
"Toby! Find my coat, my compass is inside it, boy. Heave ho, you bilge rats!"
"What does that mean?!" Aliya cried. Before she could get an answer, however, Toby returned with the coat. A large jewelled crown rolled out of it onto the deck of the ship. They all stared it for a moment. Then the Siren sprang from the shiny reflection, up into the air but then down back onto the deck. She reached for Toby, who stretched his hand out to her with dazed eyes.
"Don't let her take you!" Avery warned his son. But while he protested, his son was touched by the Siren and disappeared before his eyes. "No!"
The Doctor hurried to throw the crown overboard and the Siren disappeared from sight. He glanced back at Aliya, who was standing further up the deck and smiled at him to reassure him that she was alright. He turned on Avery.
"You couldn't give up the gold, could you?" He yelled. "That's why you turned pirate. Your commission, your wife, your son. Just how much is that treasure worth to you, man?!" People whose greed put their family in danger were the types that he looked upon with the most disgust. But not only that, he felt incredibly pity for how misguided this man in front of him was.
The only consolation, or perhaps it made it worse, was that Avery finally seemed to realise his mistake, if the horror and grief in the man's eyes was anything to go by.
A shrill cry from behind them had them turning just in time to see a loose spar swinging and knocking Aliya off the side of the ship and into the churning water. The Doctor felt his hearts stop for a whole second before he rushed to the railing to try and see her. An Olympic swimmer would struggle in a storm like this, he thought hopelessly, she hasn't got a chance.
"Aliya!" He yelled. It was pointless, and he knew deep down he would get no reply. But as the truth of the situation set in, a grim determination filled him. One that had to be employed quickly or it would be for nothing. He turned to Avery. "She's drowning. Neither of us can go in after her because we'll drown too. There's only one thing that can save her." He opened the barrel of fresh water and the Siren flew out of it. "She's drowning!" He told it desperately. "Save her!"
The Siren dived into the sea while the two men left on the ship watched.
"What have you done?" Avery asked. "How is that any better than drowning? At least drowning is natural."
"Because that thing isn't a ravenous hunter," the Doctor said, hoping with all his hearts that he wasn't wrong, "It's intelligent. We can reason with it. And maybe, just maybe, they're still alive somewhere. We have to follow."
"Are you mad?"
"If we ever want to see them again, we have to let the Siren take us. We'll prick our fingers. Both of us. Yeah?"
Avery sighed. "Aye."
"Aye."
The Doctor pricked Avery's finger and then his. The small beads of blood had the spots and Siren appearing in seconds. The two men reached out to her and let her take them. The world glowed white until they saw nothing at all.
When they woke, they were on a metal floor of somewhere that felt incredibly different but actually wasn't. It didn't take too long for the Doctor to work out that they were on a spaceship stuck in a temporal rift, that two ships were occupying the same space in different dimensions and were crossing over due to reflection gateways.
He and Avery continued through the ship, noting the dead alien crew and working out that it had been this ship's distress signal that the TARDIS had picked up, not The Fancy's. The crew had been killed by an airborne human virus that had come through the portal.
Finally they came into a room of bright white, where a multitude beds were suspended and holding various occupants.
"McGrath!" Avery exclaimed with great surprise as he eyed the man nearest him. "He's one of my men."
"Still breathing," the Doctor noticed, feeling a weight beginning to lift off his shoulders already.
"My entire crew is here. Toby!" The pirate captain ran towards his son.
The Doctor, meanwhile, had other concerns. "My girls!" He exclaimed happily, running towards the Aliya because it was unlikely the blue box in the corner required his immediately assistance. Aliya was apparently asleep or unconscious on her bed, dressed in a white hospital shift probably because her clothes would have only served to make her sick due to being soaking wet.
"We have to get them out of here," Avery said, and the Doctor moved to Toby's bedside.
"Wait. His fever's gone. Look at him. She's keeping him alive. His brain is still active, but all its cellular activity is suspended. It's not a curse, it's a tissue sample." He frowned at how none of his previous theories explained any of it. "Why get samples from people you're about to kill?"
That was when Aliya woke up and the machines monitoring her started beeping.
"She's coming," the Doctor said, so he and Avery hid behind a bank of monitors while the Siren emerged, went to Aliya's side while singing to her, and watched as she fell back to sleep. "Anaesthetic."
"What?"
"The music, the song," the Doctor explained, moving out from behind the monitors, "So she anaesthetises people and puts their body into stasis." The Siren went to Toby then, and Avery stepped forward with his gun pointed at the glowing woman. "Avery, no!"
Unfortunately, the captain shot anyway and the Siren turned on them with her red glow and snarl. She began to pursue Avery, but then the Doctor sneezed and she changed direction, now apparently deeming him a better target. To make everything even better, she had created a pillar of fire between her hands.
"Fire. That's new," he said nervously, backing away, "What does fire do? Burn? Yes. Destroy? What else? Sterilise! I sneezed. I've brought germs in." He hurriedly blew his nose on a handkerchief and then threw it away from him. The Siren sent the fire at the offending item and it was blasted into ashes. His brain continued to race. "Anaesthetic, tissue sample, screen, sterile working conditions. Ignore all my previous theories!" Avery shot him a look that said 'are you serious?'. "She's not a killer, she's a doctor!"
The Siren turned her neutral green again.
"This is an automated sick bay. It's teleporting everyone on board. The crew are dead, and so the sick bay has had nothing to do. It's been looking after humanity whilst it's been idle. Look at her. A virtual doctor able to sterilise a whole room."
"She won't let us take them," Avery said.
"She's keeping them alive, but she doesn't know how to heal them," the Doctor said, nodding.
"...Toby is my boy. Aliya is your…" Avery frowned. "Your what, exactly?"
That could be a problem, the Doctor said, I can't think of a way to prove to her who I am to Aliya, that I'll look after. Is there even a word for what I am to Aliya? Nothing comes to mind.
"Um, well...it's complicated," he murmured, to himself as much as Avery, "There isn't - I don't-" He stared at Aliya's sleeping form, trying to think of a way to communicate their relationship to the Siren. He took her hand and wove his fingers between hers before holding the joined hands up so that the action was very visible. "I'm her best friend," he told the virtual doctor who was watching them intently, "I'm the person who will always keep her safe, who would run into a burning building if she was inside. I would have dived into the ocean after her if I thought it would have helped her." He tore his gaze from Aliya to the Siren. "Please. Let me save her. As long as I have breath in my body, she is not dying."
The glowing green doctor eyed their joined hands and the force with which the man in the bowtie was clutching his companion's hand. Then she held her hand out and a glowing ring surrounded her hand.
"What is that?" Avery asked.
"A consent form. I have to take responsibility for whatever happens to Aliya," the Doctor said, and swallowed before putting his free hand into the circle. It glowed brighter for a moment before the Siren disappeared. "Thank you."
He turned off the life support, but Aliya's body seized the moment he did, so he quickly turned it back on.
"If you move her, she'll die," Avery said solemnly.
The Doctor ignored him and held Aliya's face in his hands. "Aliya? Aliya, I need you to wake up, come on." She stirred and opened her eyes to stare at him before confusion filled her expression.
"Doctor? Where am I? I was in the water..."
"You're in a hospital. On life support. Leaving means you'll be back to drowning."
She bit her lip. "Alright. So what's the plan?"
"I've resuscitated you once, I'll do it again," he promised, "Piece of cake." His hand came down to take hers again.
"Okay," Aliya said simply. The calm trust in her voice - regardless of the fear underneath - was both a relief and a stab to his hearts. Although he was confident in his ability to save her this time around, the faith she had in him was worrying. What if one day the trust she had in him got her killed? Even he failed sometimes.
No. Not her. I won't fail her again, not ever.
He turned to Avery quickly. "We have to send this ship back to space. Imagine if the Siren got ashore. She would have to process every injured human."
"What about Toby?"
The Doctor sighed deeply, sadness flickering in him. "I'm sorry. Typhoid fever. Once he returns it's only a matter of time."
"What if I stay with him, here? The Siren will look after him," Avery said, earnestly, "I can't go back to England. And what home does he have now, if not with me?"
The Time Lord smiled. "Do you think that you can fly this thing?"
Avery smiled back. "Just point me to the atom accelerator." The reference to their prior conversation and how he had worked out the TARDIS surprisingly easily made the Doctor chuckle and clap Avery on the shoulder.
With that sorted, he returned to Aliya's side.
"Ready?"
"Here we go again," she joked, but it was a weak one and they both knew it. He gave her hand one last squeeze, took a deep breath, and switched off the life support. Immediately she started choking and he hoisted her into his arms so that he could carry her into the TARDIS.
There wasn't time to get Aliya to the med bay. He laid her on the floor right inside the door and knelt beside her. With a sense of deja vu, remembering with a bitterness how he done it on the shore of the Aquian ocean, he began the chest compressions, but this time twenty on each heart. Once that was done, he bent down and locked his lips overs hers to deliver two powerful breaths. When he received no reaction, he began the compressions again.
"Come on, come on, Aliya," he said desperately, "Not here, not today, not ever, okay? I said you'd never die while I'm breathing and I plan to be doing so for centuries to come."
Even when he did another set and breathed into her for the third and fourth times, there was no response. So, with panic starting to set in, he kept going. Because if she had been going to regenerate, the signs would have begun by now, which meant his options were either that she was going to come around or she was going to die for real.
"It's just water," he told her, "You can beat it, come on. Give me something, please!"
The Doctor gave her several breaths once the third lot of compressions were done, but still nothing happened. He fell back to sit on his heels and stared at her still, cold body. In a horrific daze, he let his hand come to his mouth as he realised the abysmal chances of her waking up.
"No," he whispered, shaking his head. "You can't. Please."
Tears had gathered in his eyes and they fell freely and burned salty tracks down his cheeks. Meanwhile, his hands clutched her arm. For ten seconds he just stared and felt himself cry at the loss that had in no way truly sunk in yet.
Then she started spluttering and coughing up water. It was the most beautiful thing he had ever heard or seen.
"Aliya?" His voice was strangely hoarse when he spoke.
The blonde coughed several more times, very harshly, and opened her eyes just as the Doctor pulled her to him and crushed her to him as tightly as was physically possible.
Aliya woke to more water coming out of her mouth than she could ever want. After coughing it all up and vaguely hearing the Doctor say her name, she managed to open her eyes. Of course, that was when she found herself in a hug that literally felt like it was going to crush her bones because it was so forceful.
"Doctor," she choked, "I can't breathe." Which was somewhat ironic, under the circumstances. But when he finally let her go she realised that he was crying. "Hey." Her hand came up to touch his face, which was stained with tears. "You did it."
"I thought I lost you," he said in Gallifreyan, his throat sounding constricted. "I thought I failed."
"You didn't, I'm here," she whispered, shifting from her awkward twisted bonus of being half on the floor, "I'm here." Now she was kneeling opposite him.
"I thought I was alone again. That you trusted me and I let you down."
"No, never."
"Are you okay?" His switch to English didn't phase her, and she was quick to nod. "Are you sure?"
"I'm fine, just cold."
That was when the Doctor kissed her. Which in itself wasn't surprising, but the intensity and sheer force behind it was. Aliya couldn't be sure he had ever quite kissed her the way he was now. His hands had yanked her onto his lap and then seized her face to snog her senseless.
"Doctor," she gasped when she was momentarily released, "What-"
"I just need-" he murmured, his eyes dark and full of urgency, "Please let me-"
Before he could finish she pressed her lips to his. It only took one second for him to take charge and pull her legs to wrap around his waist so that he could stand and take them up the stairs. They hadn't even made it ten metres before suddenly they were dropping to the ground. The corridor floor was cold and smooth against Aliya's back.
"What are you-"
"Shut up," the Doctor said, pinning her wrists above her head, "You almost died today. Please, just shut up." As he kissed her again and pressed her body into the floor with his, Aliya found she finally understood what he was doing, and was thankful that she did.
He had an opportunity to take control after feeling utterly helpless when faced with her near drowning. And he needed to take it. Since he knew she wasn't against the idea, he was completely and utterly in charge right now.
His urgent kiss left her low on oxygen as he paused to rip the flimsy hospital shift from her body, leaving her completely nude while he was still fully clothed. He stared down at her.
"You're going to do everything I say," he told her firmly, and she just nodded. For once, yes, she thought, and made sure he could see just how much the idea affected her, given his tendency to worry. It was important that he got to indulge on this particular need when she was so willing to help him with it.
She lifted her head as much as she physically could to try to kiss him, and when he kissed back his teeth grazed across her lower lip before biting it. He began discarding his clothing with the hand that wasn't busy keeping her wrists in place.
His words rung in her head. I thought I had lost you. I thought I had failed. When her mouth wasn't otherwise occupied, she found herself murmuring the response she had given him, over and over to make sure it had truly sunk in.
I'm here.
So this episode is actually a fairly terrible example of how the Doctor and Aliya are going to be during adventures from now on. They will be so low on PDA that a lot of people aren't going to realise they're even together!
Part of the reason I want to do this is because I've read some OC fics that are really popular but just seem straight up bad to me because the Doctor and the OC can't keep their hands off each other in the middle of adventures for more than two seconds? (And/or constantly proclaim the OC to be the most beautiful thing in existence/love of the Doctor's life to anyone they meet.) And that is potentially the most OOC thing you can do for the Doctor, so I wanted to stay WELL away from that.
Also, the appeal of Daliya for me is that it is so strongly founded on their friendship, so I have always held onto the idea that even when this all finally happened, that they would still very much just go about their business as normal because not a lot has actually changed.
Sorry for the ramble, it just felt necessary to share.
Next chapter will feature the Torchwood team finding out about Daliya, and I promise that it's going to be hilarious, because you know, the Torchwood team (Hart's innuendos, Marion's disgust/apathy, Jack's approval, etc).
Anyway, feedback is appreciated, and I love you all,
-MayFairy :)