Chapter Two: Signs of Trouble
Back in the bunker, the Doctor was worried – the most so that Hex had ever seen him. After spending a solid five minutes trying and failing to get any sort of response back from Ace (whose last words to them had been that a man appeared inside the TARDIS and killed five people), he had begun scrolling at an inhuman rate through data with his lips drawn tightly together, expression getting darker and darker as he went through it. Hex (and that captain woman too; Claire, her name was) were both hovering awkwardly to the side, not quite sure what to say. This definitely seemed like the sort of thing he wouldn't want to interrupt.
Finally, the Doctor snatched up his walkie-talkie and clicked the talk button down. "Ace? Are you there?" He released the button, and only static poured out in response. That grim expression got grimmer, and then he went digging in his seemingly-endless pockets. (Hex had once seen him remove an entire living pot-plant from their depths, which he now considered the baseline that any street magician would have to meet in order to actually impress him.)
The Doctor came up with something that resembled a wrench, but with a lot more fiddly bits and also a screen attached to it, and beckoned Hex over hurriedly. "Thermospanner," he explained (but not much), handing it to him. "You'll need to open that panel in the TARDIS."
"In the-? Hang about, you're sending me in there?" Hex stared at him in open disbelief. "After a guy just, just appeared out of nowhere and killed all those people?"
"She said he shot them, not killed," the Doctor corrected, and then shook his head. "I would go myself, but I have a suspicion who our mysterious appearing friend is, and if it's who I think, I will be far more use here than in the TARDIS."
"But-" Hex began to protest half-heartedly, but the Doctor cut him off, swinging around in his swivel chair to face him properly.
"You are a nurse, are you not?" he demanded, and at Hex's slight indication of assent, "five people, at the very least, have been shot. And that's not to mention Ace, who could be hurt, or worse. Do your duty, Staff Nurse Schofield."
Hex nodded – it hadn't taken much to convince him anyway, especially not with the words 'Ace' and 'hurt' in the same sentence – but he had one more thing to add. "What about the man?"
"We have to hope that he's lost interest in the TARDIS by now – whoever he is. For both your sake and everyone else's," the Doctor said. "But even if he's still there – if we don't do something soon, far more people will be hurt." And then his expression softened slightly from the dark storminess that he had been exuding up until now. "Hex – do be careful."
Hex, unused to the Doctor exhibiting any sort of Emotion™ towards him, ever, was completely thrown by this – Ace was usually the one on the receiving end of the heartfelt speeches and affectionate nose taps.
"'Careful' is just about the one thing you can count on me being," he said, trying for flippancy, and not adding the bit about the other two things you could frequently count on him being – 'far too late to do anything of use' and 'terrified', respectively.
"I'm serious." The Doctor, indeed, looked deadly serious. Maybe a bit anxious too, but if he was, he was hiding it well. "At the first sign of any trouble, run. Bring Ace with you if you can, but your own safety is priority."
"I –" Oh god, no more flippant remarks left – and that was more Ace's territory than his, anyway. What do you do when a centuries-old alien is apparently a lot more concerned about your wellbeing than you thought he was? "– yeah. I'll. I'll do that."
"Good." The Doctor eyed him once more, and then nodded. "Quickly, then – go."
Hex went.
The corridor where they had parked the TARDIS was only a short distance away, but when Hex arrived, it was jam-packed with the delegates that they had originally sent off with Ace for safety. And there were more than a few that were missing – the numbers had drastically diminished. They were all talking at once, too, looking terrified. He couldn't see Ace in the crowd, either.
"What happened?" he called as loud as he could, trying to attract their attention. "We heard there was a man in there. Is everybody all right?" He glanced sideways, saw a man whose elegantly tailored coat was speckled in blood, and his mouth twisted a bit without him consciously thinking about it. Stupid question, then. "Have any of you seen Ace – my friend, Ace? Short, brown hair, she was the one leading all of you into the Doctor's – into our safe-room? Have –"
"She got us out after he started shooting," a young Australian woman said, eyes wide. "S-some of us, they didn't make it, but-"
Hex started moving towards the TARDIS before she had even finished speaking, ignoring all previous instincts to Stay As Far Away As Possible From Situations That Could Potentially Lead To Painful Death. He had to fight his way through the crowd to get to those blue doors, although once they worked out what he was trying to do, they moved back to let him through.
The first time he tugged on the doors of the TARDIS, they just wouldn't open – sticking fast; not quite like they had been locked, but as if they were being held by a physical force. And then he tried again, and they swung open easily. He directly a quick warning towards everybody else to stay put and stick together, and then practically fell into the TARDIS, slamming the door behind him. And then his breath caught and his eyes widened.
The scene inside the TARDIS was that of a complete bloodbath – there were bodies thrown left and right, seven of them that he could see from where he was, all expressing various states of horror and terror on their faces. The one thing that they all had in common – circular holes, burnt through some vital organ.
"Oh my god!" he couldn't help saying aloud. The TARDIS seemed to agree with him – the lights on its console were flashing erratically, without any real pattern to them, and there was a faint noise from deep within its corridors that seemed to indicate some sort of alarm going off.
On the console, he noticed the walkie-talkie that Ace had brought with her, still switched on and emitting static. He picked it up, and pressed the talk button down. "Doctor?"
"Yes, I'm here. What's going on?" The response was so instantaneous that Hex could easily imagine the Doctor having waited anxiously for any sign of communications from his own walkie-talkie.
"I got to the TARDIS," he said, taking a step back towards the doors. Usually the TARDIS, especially the console room, felt warm and homely, but at the moment he couldn't picture a place he would want to be in less right now. "There's – Ace evacuated most of the occupants outside, apparently, but..."
"What is it, Hex?"
"They're dead," Hex whispered, staring around the console room. There was blood splattered on the floor and on the walls and he knew that if he walked around the other side of the console there would be more bodies that he hadn't seen yet, and just. This was really. Super bad. He had already chalked the situation up high on his extensive mental list of 'Worst Adventures', and it wasn't even over yet. "Whoever that guy was, he really went to town in here. There – there's bodies everywhere, Doctor, I – I just... how?" His voice cracked slightly. "I don't understand, how did he get in here? Why would he-?"
"Mister Hex." The Doctor's voice was sharp and urgent, cutting through Hex's panic. Although to be perfectly honest, it sounded as if he was doing some panicking of his own. "Ace. Have you seen Ace?"
"Have I-? – oh god." Upon seeing the bodies and blood, the reason he had been sent to the TARDIS into the first place – to check if Ace was okay – had completely vanished from his mind. Clutching the walkie-talkie in one hand, he pushed off from where he had been steadying himself at the wall of the TARDIS, and stumbled to the other side of the console. "Oh no, oh no –" Feverishly, he scanned the bodies. Shot to the head, shot to the heart, shot to the head and heart – but all of them ambassadors, and none of them with braided hair or the red leather jacket that she had been wearing when they had first arrived. He thumbed the talk button again. "It's all right, thank god – she's not one of them."
"That's all well and good, but where is she?"
"I... I don't know." Hex spun, turning towards the doorway leading to the rest of the TARDIS. "McShane!" he yelled, raising his voice so it echoed down the hallways. "Ace! Are you there?"
There was no response at all, but the TARDIS console flashed white to get his attention, and then began blinking furious, angry red. Hex was thinking that meant 'no', but he wasn't really sure. The TARDIS didn't really tend to communicate in such a direct manner.
Walkie-talkie again, right. He held down the button, and said, "nobody's here. It's like she's just disappeared."
The Doctor hummed in the introspective sort of way he tended to do when he was distracted. "That doesn't make any sense," he muttered indistinctly, apparently talking to himself, "but it's not as if-" and here he broke off abruptly, and then said, very softly but very clearly indeed, "oh no." Then, louder, "Hex, what did you just say?"
Hex blinked, confused. "I said, 'it's like she just disappeared', I think?"
"No, no, no, not that." Hex could easily picture the Doctor doing that annoyed, dismissive hand flap he did whenever somebody completely missed the point. "Before that. What did you say before that?"
Hex frowned, trying to remember five seconds ago. It was harder than one might think to do so. "...'no-one's here'?" He was still facing the door into the rest of the TARDIS, and raised an eyebrow in confusion at nowhere in particular.
A sharp intake of breath from the Doctor. "Hex, get out of there. Now!"
Hex didn't even bother to ask questions, not with that tone of voice. He went straight for the door, and his anxiety increased about tenfold when he realized that the door wasn't opening. "It's locked."
"The TARDIS? From the inside? That's-"
"Not good?" Hex grimaced. "Yeah, I'm sorta getting that impression. Isn't there some sort of button I can press?"
"Yes," said the Doctor. "It's round, yellow-ish – you should've seen us use it before."
"Right – right, okay, got it." Hex swivelled around to the TARDIS console, and stopped short.
There was a man sitting on the edge of it, swinging his legs back and forth, and licking an oversized, multicolored lollipop. His comically long, equally multicolored scarf was trailing off towards the ground, and he was eyeing Hex with the sort of delight that one usually reserves for the lunch that they have been waiting to eat all day. "Leaving so soon?" he asked.
"Oh my god!" Hex exclaimed. (It wasn't even a conscious decision at this point. Maybe he should have started getting used to this sort of thing by now; started rolling with the punches. But somehow everything just kept on surprising him.) "You're – you're that guy! The one who shot all these people!"
"Did I?" The man twirled his lollipop once, twice, three times, and on the fourth revolution around it was gone, having vanished into thin air. "Nahh, can't have been. That doesn't sound like me at all! Although, now that you mention it... I did have this gun, earlier!" Just as quickly as the lollipop had vanished, there was now a futuristic looking laser device in his hands. "I'm really quite clumsy, you know. Maybe it just... went off by accident?"
His finger twitched on the trigger, and Hex had to duck to narrowly avoid losing part of his earlobe in the blast of energy that flew past him.
He tugged on the doors again, but to no avail, and then realized that the walkie-talkie was still in his hands, and still switched on. "Doctor! The guy from before! He's here and he's trying to kill me!" Another blast of laserfire nearly caught him in the shoulder, but he dodged – it was easier this time, almost like the man wasn't really trying.
"Get out of the TARDIS!" the Doctor replied instantly with that kind of high-pitched undertone to his voice that he tended to acquire when under stress. "He shouldn't be able to do anything once you're outside!"
"I told you, he's locked the doors somehow!" Hex replied, and then had to evacuate his position by the door rather hurriedly as the man leapt nimbly off the console and started advancing on him.
"Kids these days, always talking on their phones," the man said, tutting sadly. "I'm gonna have to confiscate that, y'know."
More laser fire, and this time he didn't quite manage to dodge quickly enough. His left hand was searing with pain now, white-hot, like his nerves were on fire. He nearly bit his own tongue, and almost dropped the walkie-talkie, but managed to catch it with the other hand, accidentally holding down the talk button in the process. "Ow! – oh my god, fuck, ow, ow, ow –"
"Hex!" the Doctor exclaimed, sounding horrified, but Hex was already diving through the door leading to the rest of the timeship and there was no time to respond to the Time Lord's frantic questions. He started running as fast as he could, choosing directions and pathways at random. It seemed like the TARDIS was helping him somewhat – the hallways didn't look like they did usually. There were a lot more branching paths and unmarked doors, making it all too easy to get lost in. Or hide in, as the case might have been.
Despite this, however, Hex could still hear the man's footsteps, clear as anything. It sounded like he was strolling through the corridors of the TARDIS at an exceedingly leisurely pace, and to top matters off, he was whistling. Springtime for Hitler, no less. It didn't seem to matter how fast Hex pushed himself, the sound of the man stalking him was always uncomfortably close behind.
Finally, Hex chose a door from the many that he was passing completely at random, and opened it, throwing himself inside. He listened at the door for a moment, but he couldn't hear the man anymore.
Satisfied that he was safe for the moment, he glanced around the room. It was a library, but not like the main TARDIS library, the one with lemon trees growing in-between the shelves and forgotten cups of tea and portraits of people he didn't recognise hanging on the walls. This one was smaller, brighter and seemed to contain primarily thousands of volumes of the same brand of encyclopaedia. And there were more than a few doors leading out – a bonus, just in case he needed to escape.
"I'm fine," he gasped into the walkie-talkie, leaning against a shelf. "Well – not fine, but I'm not dead." His hand was really hurting now, and he examined it with a grimace as he kept talking. "The guy – he shot me, shot my hand with this – laser thing? And it's –" Injured. Second degree burns, probably, it was already starting to swell. " – well, it's not good, either, but I'll survive. I ran into the corridors, and I'm in a library now, and might have lost him, but he's following me, and he's definitely not human and oh my god I'm gonna die."
He had to pause to take a few deep breaths here, although it was really more like hyperventilation.
"You are not," said the Doctor, rather firmly, "going to die."
"But I –" Hex stopped for a second – had he heard somebody outside? Or was that just his imagination playing tricks on him? He continued again, but this time in a softer tone. "Doctor, who is this guy?"
"His name is Nobody No-One," said the Doctor, speaking in a measured yet rather urgent tone of voice. "He's a Word Lord, a kind of... well, an alternate universe counterpart to my species. His universe runs on a set of completely different principles to that of our own – but the long and short of it is that he can affect reality, but only under certain circumstances."
"He-? ...what sort of circumstances?"
"He gains power by hearing any phrases with the words 'Nobody' and 'No-One'," the Doctor said. "Saying 'Nobody can turn off the sun' grants him the ability to turn on and off the sun at will, and if 'nobody knows where the treasure is hidden', he will know. Instantly."
Hex's eyes widened. "Oh no. So...?"
"So when I said that 'nobody could get into the TARDIS to hurt those people' earlier," said the Doctor grimly, "I rather think he took that as an explicit invitation to do exactly that."