This was a hard chapter to write, but it is out and i hope it is all right. I know, a filler chapter, but the next chapter will be more informative. All of this is set up necessary evil type stuff. Thanks for the love, I hpe you all like this.
The planet was n;t anything particularly beautiful, r special. At least not of what Martha could see. It was, actually quite a bit like Earth. She smiled to herself thinking of referring to it as an M class planet, but that was a reference from Star Trek, and she knew the Doctor usually huffed up a bit when comparisons to that show are made.
The cart sat between them as they stopped outside of the blue doors and took a brief look around. They were outside, it what looked like a countryside. A large and slightly curvacious meadow spilled out in front of them. The air smelled sweet, and Martha had the feeling the season had to be spring currently on Zybth.
"Consider ourself very fortunate Dr. Martha Jones. Not many people are allowed on this planet. They are more exclusive than a P. Diddy party."
"I'm sorry," she smiled. "Did you just reference P. Diddy?"
The Doctor shrugged. "I've been to a few of those parties. All in one night in fact. Had to dig for hours in that wardrobe to find a white suit. But," he grinned and brought his feet up. "Did find white chucks."
Martha shook her head and placed her hands on the cart. "Right, then. How do we find where the action is?"
"Oh, don't worry. This planet does not cotton out of towners. The action will find us soon enough."
"What do you mean?" But the Doctor nodded his head and Mrtha followed the motion. Far in the distance a band of shapes were making their way toward them The individuals seemed to be tall, a stark hue of yellow, and plumed in drab olive clothing. There were at least twenty of them, and at such a distance that Martha could not make put any distinguishable features among them. "I assume that's the welcoming committee."
"Martha, you are one of a handful of people that have ever visited this planet. And, I bet one of the first humans." he held his hands clasped in front of him and spoke lower. "Just remember to smile and don;t be too intimidationg."
"Me?" she said. "Intimidating? I am more concerned with how much should I trust Jack. Are they going to take us to their leader, or shoot on site."
"Well, we''ll know in a minute, won't we?" The Doctor answered, A wind had kicked up suddenly, the breeze blew his brown hair around his face and Martha could not help but to appreciate the view.
She saw them then. They arrived in a straight line, yellow creatures with oval shaped heads, long bodies and slender appendages. Martha would have called them spindly, but not to their faces. She plastered on a smile and tried not to think about Adric.
"Well, look at that, Martha. We get the full regalia."
"How'd they know we were here?" Martha asked, swiveling her head around in search of the CCTV cameras.
He turned and looked at her, "Oh now, that would be cheating Martha. Cameras are nothing more than a chepa parlor trick. The Zybtharens would not cheapen themselves with surveillance."
She shook her head and opened her mouth to ask how they knew, but the crowd was upon them. The shorter one in front, had his hand out in a greeting and his wide mouth crooked into a friendly smiled. "Ah, you must be the Doctor."
"I hope so, I'm wearing his shoes." the Doctor answered. He placed his hand upon Martha's arm "This is Dr. Martha Jones."
"Tellarian?" the man asked.
"Earth." Martha nodded, her hands clenched the cart tighter for support. Something about them their alieness in such an Earthen setting, made her dizzy.
"Ah, of course you are. I think there are quite a few people n this planet that will be very happy to se you. " He said to Martha. "Very interested indeed."
"Oh look at that, Martha Jones, celebrity." the Doctor laughed. "Well, ti suppose, before they start organizing parades and erecting statues, I think we should, I don;t know, maybe find out what's killing you lot off.
"Oh of course " The man, who still had not given his name, bowed and les the couple through the fields in the direction they had come.
"Still doubt jack?" The Doctor asked.
"Yes," Martha nodded. "But, at least this time he was right. "
"Keep your eyes open, Martha. Anything around here could be a clue as to the nature of this plague."
"You say that like you doubt it really is a plague."
"Oh, do I?" he sniffed. "Guess only time will tell, eh Martha?"
"Hyox," the man next to them spoke, what Martha thought was a complete nonsense, until the Doctor answered the utterance.
"Good to meet you, Hyox. Nice place youhe group stopped at a large tree, whic have here."
The spindly creature pulled his ovular face into what Martha assumed was a smile. "We like it, yes." The group came to a halt in front of the largest tree that Martha had ever seen, and she was the only one surprised when the base swiveled open to reveal stairs.
"Gonna yell at them for nto warning you." The Doctor smiled as he followed her down the stairs.
"Nope, I am, however, making a mental list of things to nag you about later."
"Oh, good, something to look forward to."
The Zybtharans did their work underground. Hyox explained that this was as not to mar the beauty of the plante. The Zybtharans could live above ground, play in the sun, and not worry about damaging the scenic beauty of their world. Long, well lit tunnels spanned the underworld. It had an earthy smell tht reminded Martha of her mother's garden. The Doctor smiled the whole time as they made their way via the moving walkways. "This is amazing. Absolutely amazing. Isn't this amazing Martha?" He gushed, but did not stop long enough for her to answer. "All of this underground. Motion. Marvelous way of thinking, innit? Doing all the dirty business underground, leaving nature above to just =be...natural. This is absolutely amazing."
"Reminds me of the time I had a six hour layover in O'Hare Airport." Martha grumped. The place did, for some reason, remind her of an airport, without the planes, and security checks.
The Doctor ignored her, he fired technical questions at Hyox who answered them quickly nd in great detail. Martha feared she would fall asleep on her feet, moving at twenty miles an hour.
"The medical arena is over here." Hyox led them through a set of doors that dipped further down into the depths of the planet. "We have been keeping the infected remains here, we thought it would be best to keep them in an area not accessed by anyone except medical staff."
It was finally Martha's world. As they moved down the elevator into the=further reaches of the planet, Matrtha fired off directions. "I'll need to set up right away. I would like autopsy at least three of the victims. "
"We have done that, Doctor Jones, our best people found nothing irregular in their genetic make up, nor anything that would point to a reason for their sudden deaths."
It was the Doctor who spoke up. "Well, Martha here is good at finding things. Plus,we brought all of this equipment with us." he patted the cart in front of him. "I would hate for it all to go to waste."
Hyox nodded. "As you wish. We did ask for help"
"Right then, I also need a lab, access to all of your previous findings, and the medical files on the victims. Plus, if they are free, I would need to talk to the families and the other medical staff."
"Of course, whatever you need. We are desperate to end this."
XXXXXXXXX
A day later left them no close to figuring anything out. Martha had performed three autopsies back to back. Watching her work, the Doctor again noted that feeling that Martha Jones was a force to be reckoned with. He wondered if she knew what she was capable of, what her true potential was. He stood next to her, as her assistant. She ordered cultures, tests, and performed most of them herself. While she worked on the autopsies, he meticulously went over the reports.
"Nothing." Martha announced with her head resting on her folded arms in front of her. They sat at the table in the small set of rooms that the Zybtharans had offered them. The rooms were adjacent to the labs, a blessing since neither one was ever out of them longer than three hours.
The first night, as Martha hovered over the second autopsy, the Doctor tried to get her to take a nap. Martha responded by ignoring him while continuing her examinations. He never tried after that.
"How can there be nothing?" she asked imploringly. "It doesn't make sense." She didn;t say the words that they both were feeling, but never verbalized. She missed Adric. The first two or three days she managed to keep busy, keeping him off of her mind, mostly. But, by the time things became redundant, the tests were all coming the same negative over and over, the autopsies revealing nothing, Martha was ready to admit defeat, throw her hands in the air, and rush back to Lagos.
But, she knew she would never do it, and the Doctor knew she would never forgive herself for doing it. It was a fragile balance, not wanting to give up, but not wanting to be without her son, either.
"No," the Doctor shook his head. "It makes no sense at all." the frustration was inevitable. Three days ago, there had been another death. A male, out of the clear blue, and not far from their makeshift labs. Martha and the Doctor had both gone to the scene, and were surprised at the Zybtharans willingness to allow them full access with no questions asked. Their openness spoke of the desperation of the situation.
There was nothing on site, the man, still young in his twenties, had simply passed out dead while he was at work. Thee was no connection to the other deaths, no correlation based on anything ingested nor consumed. The deaths were only happening in a localized area, that was the only thing they had to go on. The rest of the continents on the planet were free of the disease.
"Maybe its just a blip in their natural genetic code. " Martha suggested as she rubbed her eyes. Maybe its just an anomaly in their evolution. Darwinism in reverse."
"You really don;t believe that." the Doctor offered with a shake of his head.
"No," she admitted, "But, you don;t think its a plague, either. What could it be?"
The Doctor shrugged. "Maybe it is a plague."
"You really don't believe that, do you?" she asked him back.
He shook his head and it was his turn to sigh and rub his eyes. "What are we missing?" The Doctor jumped up from his seat, nearly upturning his coffee. "I need to go back to the TARDIS." he shouted suddenly.
"What, what is it?"
"I want to scan the area, something in all of this isn't adding up. We have been looking at the small picture too long. I think there is more to this than a few simple deaths."
"There is nothing simple about these deaths. "
The Doctor nodded, "Either way, I will let you know."on a whim, he leaned over a nd kissed her quickly on the cheek. He left before she could protest.
XXXXXXXXXX
He didn't really think he would find anything. It was more a need for solitude and missing his oldest friend that lead him back to the TARDIS. He followed the path he had memorized that first day and easily made his way back to the sentient shit.
He rubbed her side as he entered, smiled at her warm greeting and made himself comfortable around the console. It was going to be a simple scan, a reading of the planet's life systems, weather patterns, radio signals; basically everything. He knew it would take some time, she was an old ship. He and Martha had spent a week checking the medical end of things, but like any good fractal, one had to pull back to make sense of the smaller picture by looking at the bigger one.
He plugged in the commands and sighed. It was odd how empty the ship felt with everyone gone. He could not deny that the everyone he was thinking of was narrowed down to two people. One very small, and the other very nearly hated him. They had recently began to get on each other's nerves. Small things, in small ways. The language was angry, but the truths were all simple and honest. They both missed Adric, and trying to save the universe was nothing in comparison to holding their own.
The Doctor sighed, refusing to slip into any sort of self flagellation when there was work to be done. He watched as the TARDIS performed her initial scans and wondered if there was time for a cup of tea.
There was, there was always time for a cuppa.
By the time he had made it back to the console room, Martha's tea cup full of Earl Grey, He looked at the screen to track the progress. He knew it was a big request, and he could feel her groan from the strain of the scans. "I know old, girl, take your time. Its not as if lives are depending on it."
She groaned louder as if to remark on his cheek. "Ten hours?" he fumed after reading the progress line. "Well, I suppose if that is the best you can do."
The Doctor considered holing up for a the time in the TARDIS, doing some repairs, but he knew Martha was waiting, and the last thing he wanted to do was make her wait. He set up the information to be sent to his link in the labs and left.
XXXXXXXXXX
She had decided to not consider the kiss. It was a little thing, probably done on a whim A distraction from the chaos they had mired themselves into. Martha set about to perform another test when a junior technician she had been working with all week came into the labs in a rush.
"Dr. Jones, " the technician named Joygen huffed, the girl was young, as Martha had learned over the week, most of the workers here were. But, when you only had 67 years of life, it was good to get an early start on things.
"What is it?" Martha asked impatiently, "Has there been another death?"
Joygen shook her head. "NO, I have been sent to fetch you."
"Fetch me?" Martha smiled. "For what?"
"The First King has requested you come and give a report of findings so far."
"I didn't know there would be a meeting with anyone high up." Martha shook her head. "There is really nothing to report."
The young woman went on. "It's how we do things, here, everything has to be accounted forl. Its been a week and we usually expect results by then."
Martha sighed. "Dont we all. Look, I have to look at a few cultures first, can we make the meeting for say, an hour from now?"
"Now." Joyge answered in a tone that Martha understood was no wavering from.
"Why now?" Martha asked. Joygen did not answer, Martha threw her hands up. "All right, lead on MacDuff."
XXXXXXXXXX
He strolled into the labs expecting to see her hunched over a microscope, or elbow deep in Zybtharan body parts. What he did not expect, was to find both the labs and their room empty. His first assumption was that there was another body that had appeared, someone else had died in the two hours he had been gone.
The Doctor perched himself upon the stool that Martha normally used and waited for her. In the time he measured cultures, fiddled with equipment she normally would not let him touch, and found himself wishing she was there to yell at him.
He left the labs and began to walk around the vast underground complex. The inhabitants of the planet had built intricate pathways throughout their planet. The use of underground work and passageways left the pair with a disconnect in seeing how the Zybtharans lived. He decided it was time to take a walk on top of the planet.
XXXXXXXXXX
She was lead to a room that held three white metal plaques on the floor. Martha had seen Star Trek enough times to know a teleportation system when she stumbled across one. Joygen had escorted her to the room, but they were joined outside the labs by ten other yellow spindly people dressed in that same olive drab. For the fist five minutes, she assumed they were he escort to the royal family. But, when Martha asked whether they should wait until the Doctor returned, the small contingent became agitated and more forceful.
"Right, " she nodded when one offered her a full view of what could only be a weapon, strapped to their side. "Guess I get to meet the king. "
She wasn;t worried. Not in the sense that she thought the Doctor would come and save her at any time. That was irrelevant, for the Zybtharans could, in fact, shoot her at any time as well. The idea that the Doctor was in danger worried her more than anything. He was prone to doing stupid things, it was his nature. Not that he didn't always come out of it, but the worry that plagued her was what would be the collateral damage on this, and if she were part and parcel of the next great sadness the Doctor would tell to his next companion.
She sighed as they filed into the room and wondered when this whole thing had gone pear shaped? Had it been a setup from the get, and what would be waiting for her at the other end of the transport.
As the trasport shot her body over space in a trillion tiny particles, Martha wished hse had hit Jack harder.
XXXXXXXXXX
The sun was of the usual life sustaining variety. There was nothing fantastic nor fantastical about it. HE followed a browned path through a small wood that led past the giant tree they had first encountered. The Zybtha was a lot like Earth, which, he supposed, accounted for the locals fascination with their planetary double. Small differences were mostly limited to size of the planets organic systems, mostly due to the larger size of their planet in comparison to Earth.
He finally came upon a smattering of houses, the kind that were more traditional to the planet. Large, bulbous dwellings that seemed would have been carved out of the side of mountains. They typically lived in areas together of family importance. The Doctor knew all of this not from previous visits, he had met many of them over the years, and their existence was near legendary.
"Hello," he waved to a group of what had to be children. They were kicking a ball in the center of the road, it reminded the Doctor of the last time he was in London.
The three small children eyed him suspiciously for only a minute before scattering down the road toward the houses. They even left their ball in the road.
"Well, now I know how Casper feels." the Doctor shrugged. He understood that, children should not talk to strangers, something he planned to never instill into Adric. It was a rubbish idea, better to teach children to get out of situations rather than make them petrified of every situation they come in contact with.
But, the again, the universe was a strangely dangerous place.
He dug his hands deeper into his pockets and began to whistle a tune as he walked. Martha would surely be concerned about where he had gotten off to, perhaps he should return to the labs. Just as he had talked himself into turning around, he heard them. A cacophony of screams that cae from the direction he had been walking toward. He wanted to get back to finish the cultures Martha had started, her really did. But, when had he ever run from screams?