IT DOESN'T END THERE - PART 8
Chameleon Arch
The next thing the Doctor knew was the sound of Donna screaming. "Don-na!" The Doctor shrieked. He got onto his hands and knees but stopped himself short of leaping up as he realised what the sound of her screams meant. "I'm too late." In defeat he clasped his hands to his ears.
Her screams echoed around the TARDIS control room and the telepathic onslaught of her pain made him collapse back to the floor. "Donna-no-Donna!" He sobbed. Tears were streaming from his eyes and he could barely see.
"What's happening?" Angel One's voice shrieked overhead, "It didn't do this before!"
"The Chameleon Arch is designed to rewrite every cell in the body!" Henry's voice shouted.
"Well stop it before it kills her!" Angel One yelled back.
"No-wait!" The Doctor shouted at them and held his hand out, "there's a slim chance ...!" He leapt up to Donna's side just as finally the Chameleon Arch finished its job.
Donna collapsed and became a dead weight in his arms. He lowered her body to the floor. She was still and silent. He could barely see her through his own tears. So much pain; the memory of it echoed on in the normality of the TARDIS.
"Oh, Donna." He hugged her to him, letting out a sob. "I am so sorry."
"Is she alive, Doctor?"
The words somehow filtered into his mind and made him look up. He blinked fiercely at Angel One standing in front of him. Sobs choked his throat as he regarded the person with a head too full of emotion. "Angel One." He gritted fiercely, standing up, feeling the shake in his legs and ignoring it out of pure stubborn habit, "you might want to pay attention right now because I really mean this." He glowered angrily at all of them. "If I find any of you ever putting another innocent life at risk, and believe me I'll know it if you do," he added threateningly, "I will stop you." He growled, "Now get out."
Silently Angel One held out the TARDIS' key. The Doctor took it from her and watched her mutely gesture to her fellow land pirates. They all filed out of the TARDIS and with a familiar squeak and click of the external door, the Doctor was alone.
Gently stepping around Donna's prone form on the decking the Doctor put his hands to the console to steady himself from the echoing memory of Donna's screams. It was his fault this had happened.
Relying more on instinct than understanding the Doctor dematerialized the TARDIS and sent it into the time vortex and away from Farringham School for Boys.
The column lit up and the TARDIS dematerialized with a sober whooshing sound.
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