Martha pushed open the door to Lazarus' office and turned on the lights. The Doctor and Kayla, the Time Lady with her hand on her stomach and the Time Lord with his arm around her as they followed the black woman. Martha knew where things were in the large building of Lazarus' Labs, so the couple trusted her to lead them to the correct place.
"This is his office?" the Doctor asked as he stared around the room. It was definitely not his taste in an office. There was a beautiful but grand wooden desk that seemed to almost glisten. Behind it were large, floor to window windows that showed the darken sky of nighttime London.
Martha nodded. "This is his office, all right," she agreed.
Kayla placed a hand on her stomach and looked around the office. "He really knows how to decorate a place," she commented with a slight frown. "But where is he?"
Martha shrugged, "Maybe we should go back and try re…" her voice trailing off, Martha started to intently walk over to the desk, her eyes firmly on the ground. "-ception," she finished.
Kayla started to walk over as well as Martha gasped loudly. Her own eyes widened at the sight of a pair of stately, black heels sticking out from behind the desk. Seeing this in his own mind, the Doctor hurried over and wrapped an arm around her, trying to comfort her as they joined Martha and stared at what appeared to be a dehydrated body, a skeleton really, of Lady Thaw, the woman that Kayla had threatened when the machine was going wrong.
"Is that Lady Thaw?" Martha asked in a choked voice.
The Doctor nodded. "Used to be. Now it's just a shell. Had all the life energy drained out. Like squeezing the juice out of an orange."
"Doctor," Kayla said in a soft voice. The Doctor instantly stopped talking and turned to kiss his Bonded.
"I'm sorry," he apologized.
Martha shook her head. "Lazarus," she all but growled.
"Probably," Kayla agreed. "Which means he's already started to change."
The Doctor frowned. "The DNA was fluctuating," he remembered. "The process must demand energy. This might not have been enough."
Kayla paled at the thought and practically turned into the Doctor's chest as she realized what he was saying. Martha's eyes widened. "So he might do this again?"
Nodding, the Doctor and Kayla started to go to the lifts and Martha followed. The trio stepped into the lifts and went down. Had they stayed in the office longer, they wouldn't have had to go down to the reception. But they didn't, which meant they missed Lazarus and Tish stepping out of the other elevator.
Having no way of knowing that Lazarus and Tish were upstairs in the office they had left, the Doctor, Kayla, and Martha looked around the classy party that was still going on. The trio walked through the crowd, Martha splitting off briefly to see if she could have any more luck than the Doctor and Kayla, who didn't split up.
"I can't see him," Martha informed them when she returned to the Doctor and Kayla.
Kayla kept looking around, her eyes scanning the crowds that seemed to be fading together into one face that wasn't Lazarus. Closing her eyes, she shook her head and turned to Martha. "Keep looking," she instructed.
The Doctor nodded. "He can't be far."
The two wandered off for a brief moment, just long enough for Martha's brother, Leo, to come over and talk to her. But then they returned to Martha just a moment before her mother did. "He was getting' cosy with Tish a couple of minutes ago." The Doctor and Kayla heard the black man said.
"With Tish?!" Martha cried out loudly, causing several people to titter around them.
Ignoring whatever conversation that she had come in on, Francine Jones, Martha's mother, turned to the Doctor and Kayla. "Ah, Doctor and Kayla," she greeted in a hard voice.
The two ignored her. "Where did they go?" Kayla asked urgently.
Leo frowned at the heavily pregnant woman. "Upstairs I think, why?" he asked with a shrug.
"Kayla-" Francine started, but the Doctor and Kayla ignored her. Instead, the Time Lord, ever rude and not ginger, grabbed Kayla's hand and gently pulled her with him up the stairs. His sudden movement, despite trying to keep his movements gentle to not jerk Kayla, knocked over Francine's drink. "I'm speaking to you two!" the woman cried out with rage as they hurried off.
Martha quickly followed after them but paused to snap back at her mother, "Not now, Mum!"
Hurrying back to Lazarus' office, Martha, the Doctor, and Kayla found it unsurprisingly empty.
"Where are they?" Martha snapped all the same.
The Doctor quickly took his sonic screwdriver out of his pocket and scanned the room. At the question look Martha sent him, he explained quickly, "Fluctuating DNA will give off an energy signature. I might be able to pick it up." Holding the screwdriver out at arm's length, he started to turn in a circle until the steady beeping that the screwdriver was emitting sped up.
"You got him," Kayla breathed.
Martha frowned. "Where?"
Holding up the screwdriver, the Doctor aimed the sonic advice directly at the ceiling, causing the brunette to grow. "Of course. They're on the roof," she grumbled.
Having hurried up the stairs that led to the roof of the labs, the Doctor, Martha, and Kayla watched as Martha's sister, Tish, studied the youthened Lazarus. The man himself was speaking a low voice with an expression of discomfort on his face. Seeing him crack his neck, the Doctor nodded to Martha to tell her that he was getting involved.
'Be careful,' Kayla warned through their mental link.
The Doctor nodded and slowly started forwards a bit as Lazarus recited, "There's always something to surprise you. 'Between the idea and the reality, between the motion and the act—'"
Seeing a chance, the Doctor smoothly cut the man off and finished, "'Falls the shadow.'"
Cracking his neck a bit, Lazarus turned towards the Doctor with a smirk on his face. "So the mysterious Doctor knows his Eliot. I'm impressed," he remarked.
Next to Lazarus, Tish frowned at her sister. "Martha, what are you doing here?"
"Tish, get away from him," Martha instructed firmly.
Tish crossed her arms. "What? Don't tell me what to do." She protested.
Kayla sighed and shook her head. "Lazarus, you've defied the laws of nature," she informed him.
The Doctor nodded. "I wouldn't have thought you had time for poetry," he agreed.
Lazarus just shrugged. "You were right, Doctor. One lifetime's been too short for me to do everything I'd like. How much more would I get done in two or three or four?"
"It doesn't work like that. Some people live more in 20 years than others do in 80. It's not the time that mattes; it's the person," the Doctor pointed out with a firm note in his voice.
"But if it's the right person, what a gift that would be," Lazarus pointed out with a smile.
Kayla shook her head. "It's a curse, that's all it is. Look at what you've done to yourself."
Lazarus glared at her. "Who are you two to judge me," he snapped.
Growing more and more worried about her sister and how close she was to Lazarus, Martha called out to Tish, "Over here, Tish."
Despite frowning deeply, Tish came over to Martha. "You have to spoil everything, don't you? Every time I find someone nice, you have to go and find fault," she protested. But behind her, Lazarus was starting to twitch uncontrollably. The Doctor quickly backed away and pulled Kayla behind him, instantly protecting his Bonded from the monster. Her eyes widening, Martha warned her sister, "Tish, he's a monster!"
Tish frowned faintly. "I know the age thing's a bit freaky, but it works for Catherine Zeta-Jones." Hearing the growling that Lazarus was admitting from behind her, Tish turned around and stared in horror along with the Doctor, Kayla, and Martha as Lazarus started to change.
Growling throughout the entire time, though the noise was becoming less and less human and more and more monster like, Lazarus started to transform. He seemed to change into what appeared to be a cross between a human skeleton and a scorpion, only he was a dark, blood red color.
"Run!" the Doctor yelled. Grabbing Kayla's hand, he started to run from off the roof and inside the labs. Behind them, Martha and Tish quickly followed, their heels clacking as they hurried inside the building. Turning to the door, the Doctor quickly soniced it to lock it.
"Are you okay?" Martha gasped out the question to her sister.
Tish stared at her sister with a wide-eyed expression. "I was gonna snog him," she breathed.
Suddenly, the monster that was once Lazarus started to bang on the door that they had locked. The noise alerted the security system and over the PA an announcement started. "Security breach. Security breach. Security beach."
Exchanging horrified looks, the Doctor quickly started to pull Kayla down the stairs along with him. Behind the couple, Martha and Tish hurried after them.
"What's happening?" Martha asked. Despite having helped with setting up the party, she didn't know everything about the labs, like Tish did as she worked for Lazarus.
Focusing on running down the stairs, it took a moment for Tish to respond, but she did. "Uh, an intrusion. It triggers a security lockdown. Kills most of the power. Stops the lifts. Seals the exits."
Behind them, there was a large bang and the Doctor and Kayla hurried up. "He must be breaking through that door."
"Come on, we've got more stairs!" Kayla called back to the two black women.
Hurrying down the stairs even more, the door that led from the roof crashed open, causing the Doctor and Kayla to hurry up even more.
"He's inside!" Martha warned loudly but needlessly.
The Doctor growled to himself. "We haven't got much time!" the Doctor yelled back at them.
Hurrying down the stairs, they burst into the reception which was a mass of confusion due to the alarm that was still going on.
"Is there another way out of here, Tish?" Kayla asked urgently, her voice slightly weaker than usual.
Tish shook her head. "There's an exit in the corner, but it'll be locked now."
Taking out the sonic screwdriver, the Doctor threw it to Martha, who caught it with minimal fumbling. "Martha, setting 54. Hurry," the Doctor ordered. Nodding quickly, Martha ran off to the door with Tish following to help out.
Grabbing Kayla's hand, the Doctor pulled her as gently but quickly as he could to the stage where the machine that Lazarus had transformed in sat. Staring out at the crowd, the Doctor caught his breath for a moment. "Listen to me! Your people are in serious danger! You need to get out of here right now!"
A woman dressed in a fine outfit scoffed loudly. "Don't be ridiculous. The biggest danger here is choking on an olive."
Before Kayla could retort on behalf of the Doctor, as her glaring screamed that she would, the glass that surrounded the labs shattered onto the floor. Lazarus, still in the monster form, appeared on the landing above the lobby before he jumped down onto the floor. Everyone screamed in horror at the sight and the partiers scattered and ran for the exits.
Thankfully, Martha and Tish were able to get the door open with the sonic screwdriver, and over the screaming Kayla could just make out Martha's familiar voice yelling, "Over here! This way! Everyone downstairs now! Hurry!"
Turning away from the crowd to try and get Lazarus back, Kayla let out a strangled gasp as she saw the monster close in on the woman who had scoffed at the Doctor before. Hearing her, the Doctor turned to see what she was staring at and growled. "No! Get away from her!"
Ignoring her, Lazarus sucked the woman dry, as he had done to Lady Thaw. Kayla turned away and swallowed hard. Rubbing her back, the Doctor suddenly cursed in Gallifreyan and yelled to Lazarus once more. "Lazarus! Leave them alone!" Kayla turned to see the monster started to close in on Francine and Leo, the latter barely coming to as he seemed to have been knocked out in some way
Hearing his yell, Martha hurried over to her brother and mother and with a bit of work, she helped them to safety. The Doctor breathed a sigh of relief and yelled up at the monster. "What's the point if you can't control it? The mutation's too strong. Killing those people won't help you. You're a fool, a vain old man who thought he could defy Nature. Only Nature got her own back, didn't she? You're a joke, Lazarus! A footnote in the history of failure!"
Seeing Lazarus' face twist into pure rage, the Doctor grabbed Kayla's hand the two ran from the monster. They ran from the lobby and up through the hallways of the building. They ran so hard that Kayla felt her breath turn into slight wheezes. Sending a worried look to his Bonded, the Doctor pulled open a door that led to a service hall and made sure that Kayla hurried in before he followed and closed the door behind them. Despite this, Lazarus ended up behind them as the couple crept through the room filled with pipes.
"It's no good, Doctor. You can't stop me," Lazarus hissed.
"Is that the same arrogance you had when you swore nothing had gone wrong with your device?" the Doctor called back, a smile forming as he heard his voice echo to the point that Lazarus would never be able to track them using it.
"The arrogance is yours. You can't stand in the way of progress," Lazarus retorted.
Kayla shook her head and placed a hand on her stomach. "You've been feeding on innocent people! That's progress to you? That's delusional!"
If Kayla had been able to see the monster, she would have seen it roll his eyes. "It is a necessary sacrifice."
"That's not a decision you're allowed to make!" Kayla yelled back at the monster.
Suddenly, the lights, which had been off all along and therefore allowed the couple to stay relatively hidden from Lazarus, turned. For a moment, the Doctor and Kayla didn't move, didn't breathe. They just stood there, hand in hand, until Lazarus called out, "Peek-a-boo."
Very slowly, the Doctor and Kayla looked up at the ceiling to see Lazarus, in all his monster glory, staring down at them with a smirk on his face. "Oh no," Kayla breathed.
Nodding, the Doctor grabbed Kayla's hand and the two tore from the room.
Running from the monster, the Doctor and Kayla ended up in the labs of the Lazarus' building. Fiddling with the battery of a light fixture until the wires were exposed, the Doctor nodded to Kayla who started to turn on all the gas jets with a cloth pressed against her nose for good measure.
'He's coming. Get down!' At the sudden warning from the Doctor through their mental link, Kayla ducked under a table that was directly next to the one the Doctor went under. Briefly, their eyes met, but before either one could safely move to the other, Lazarus entered the labs.
"More hide-and-seek, Doctor and the lovely Kayla? How disappointing. Why don't you two come out and face me?" he mocked while moving through the labs slowly.
Hearing the plan in his head, Kayla empathetically shook her head. 'I have to,' the Doctor protested. 'And when I run, you run.
Before Kayla had any time to protest, the Doctor got out from under the table and snapped at Lazarus, "Have you looked in the mirror lately?" he smirked almost evilly. "Why would I wanna face that, hmm?"
Making sure that Kayla met his eyes, he started for the door. Hearing the feet behind him, he glanced back briefly to see Kayla charging after him. "Come on then!" Kayla snapped as she grabbed his arm and pulled him with her. For being as heavily pregnant as she was, she was still able to move fast enough that she and the Doctor were able to clear the room and the Time Lord was able to blow it up with Lazarus still in the room as he had planned.
Still running, the Doctor and Kayla hurried down the hallway when suddenly the Doctor exhaled heavily as he literally ran into Martha, who had been running down the hallway towards them.
"Martha!" Kayla greeted a bit breathlessly.
Martha sent her a frown. "You shouldn't be running," she protested.
The Doctor sighed. "We wouldn't be if there wasn't a monster chasing us," he snapped.
Martha's eyes widened and she suddenly held out the sonic screwdriver for the Doctor to take. "I thought you might need it."
The Doctor and Kayla exchanged looks but Kayla took the screwdriver. "How did you-"
"I heard the explosion. Guessed it was him," She explained with a jerk of her head in the Doctor's directions.
The Doctor huffed. "I blasted Lazarus," he explained.
Martha's brow arched. "Did you kill him?"
There was a loud clattering noise that caused the Doctor to grab Kayla's hand firmly and Kayla to curse under her breath. "I think he just annoyed him," Kayla pointed out.
"Run!" the Doctor shouted. The couple hurried down the hallway that Martha had been running down and the black woman quickly followed. They ended up inside the reception hall once more. "What now? We've just gone 'round in a circle!"
Lazarus suddenly burst into the room, causing the few people left behind to scream in horror. The Doctor and Kayla dashed towards the powered-down device that Lazarus had changed in. Martha quickly followed. Somehow, with the Doctor kneeling on the floor and Martha and Kayla pressed together like sardines, the three of them were barely able to fit.
"Are we hiding?" Martha hissed.
Kayla shook her head, as the Doctor was on the ground and unable to really talk. "No he knows we're in here. But he made this machine. He won't destroy it, not even to get to us."
"But we're trapped!" Martha protested.
Kayla bit her lip and then nodded. "That's a bit of a problem," she agreed.
Martha frowned. "You mean you don't have a plan?"
Kayla sighed. "It wasn't my idea," she muttered, which made the Doctor huff loudly somewhere by the two women's knees. "But evidently, the plan was to get inside."
"Then what?" Martha pushed.
"Well, then the Doctor will come up with another idea."
Martha just shook her head. "In your own time, then," she replied sarcastically.
There was suddenly a lot of shuffling at their knees which caused Martha and Kayla to look down at the Doctor, who was having a great deal of trouble getting something, probably his sonic screwdriver, out of his pocket.
"Hey!" Martha protested, growing annoyed at the feeling of the Doctor's hand whacking her leg every few seconds.
"Sorry, sorry, sorry," the Doctor apologized. Finally, he got the screwdriver out and grinned at it. "Here we are."
Martha frowned down at the Time Lord. "What're you gonna do with that?"
Kayla sighed, hearing the answer in her head. "Improvise."
Popping open the panel on the floor, the Doctor started to fiddle around with the wiring inside of it. "I still don't understand where that thing came from. Is it alien?"
The Doctor seemed to want to shake his head, but the space prevented him from it, so instead he answered, "No, for once it's strictly human in origin."
Even Kayla frowned at that. "How can it be human? It's way to advance for its time."
The Doctor shrugged lightly at this. "The energy field in this thing must have reactivated them. And it looks like the dormant genes in Lazarus' DNA are becoming dominant."
"So it's a throwback," Martha pointed out.
Kayla blinked at her. "Very good," she praised.
From the floor of the machine, the Doctor nodded. "Some option that evolution rejected for you millions of years ago, but the potential is still there. Locked away in your genes, forgotten about until Lazarus unlocked it by mistake."
"Like Pandora's box," Kayla elaborated lightly.
"Exactly," the Doctor agreed, though his voice trailed off a bit at the end.
"Doctor…" Kayla said warningly, "You do realize I can see inside your head."
The Doctor swallowed hard. "Right," he said in a high-pitch voice. "I was just looking at your shoes…"
Kayla rolled her eyes while Martha seemed to choke briefly as she realized what the conversation the Doctor and Kayla were having was about. "Right," Kayla muttered.
Going back to his work, the trio all froze when a blue light filled the machine.
"Doctor, Kayla, what's happening?" Martha asked in a low voice.
Kayla was the one who answered. "He's turned the machine on."
Martha swallowed hard. "That's not good, is it?"
The Doctor groaned softly on the floor. "Well, I was hoping it was gonna take him a little bit longer to work that out."
The machine started to spin.
Kayla started to back against the wall and placed both hands over her stomach as if that would be able to protect the baby. Martha sent her a worried look. "I don't want to hurry you, but—"
The Doctor practically growled. "I know, I know. Nearly done," he all but snapped. He was truly trying to keep a level tone of voice because it wasn't Martha's fault, but they were still in danger and that meant he was very, very angry.
Martha swallowed hard and looked over at Kayla, knowing that speaking to the Doctor was next to impossible when he got like that. "Are you going to be okay?" she asked in a soft voice.
Kayla nodded, though her paler face showed the lie in her nonverbal answer. "We're not going to end up like him," she said in a surprisingly firm voice.
The Doctor nodded. "I'm trying to set the capsule to reflect energy rather than receive it." Grabbing a wire, he grunted and groaned, "Just one more!" the wire snapping, the energy field that had building up in the machine and around the Doctor, Kayla, and Martha exited the machine and instead went out.
Kayla pushed open the door and stumbled out of the dreadful machine. The Doctor was right behind her and Martha followed. Instantly, the Doctor wrapped his arms around her and supported her while Martha leaned lightly against the machine.
"I thought we were gonna go through the blender then," Martha gasped.
The Doctor gently nuzzled Kayla's cheek and kissed her lightly on the lips. "Next time," Kayla breathed, "if you're going to reverse the polarity again, don't take so long."
The Doctor laughed lightly. "I promise, I'll shorten the time."
Martha started to walk over to Lazarus' form and, after a brief moment where the Doctor and Kayla just looked at each other, the couple walked over and joined the black woman to look down at Lazarus' body, naked and still.
"Oh God. He seems so…human again. It's kind of pitiful."
"'This is the way the world ends, not with a bang, but with a whimper,'" Kayla recited. The Doctor looked over at her with slight surprise on his face. "What? I know Elliot too."
Medical services were already there by the time the Doctor, Martha, and Kayla exited the building. They had been lucky. Had they lingered inside longer, the trio would have been forced to give statements to the EMTs. But Kayla, and therefore the Doctor, had been very eager to leave the building, so they had ended up sitting on the steps that led up to the labs and just watched as the EMT's went in and then came out with their body bag clearly full and on a gurney.
So tired were the Doctor and Kayla that they hardly look up at the sound of heels clattering towards them. But Martha did. Her breath caught in her throat as she saw the worried face of her sister, Tish, as she headed towards her with her mother and her brother behind her.
"She's here. Oh, she's all right," Tish breathed as soon as she spotted her sister. Martha got up and the two hugged tightly.
Seeing Martha's mother and feeling that it was only right to introduce himself, the Doctor popped to his feet and then helped Kayla up as well. "Ah, Mrs. Jones, we still haven't finished out chat," he greeted.
He was not expecting a stinging slap to be delivered to his face, nor was he expecting Francine Jones to hiss venomously, "I would slap you too but I don't slap pregnant woman. But both of you keep away from my daughter."
Having turned around to gape at her mother when she heard the slap, Martha gasped, "Mum, what are you doing?"
The Doctor, however, held his cheek lightly. Turning to Kayla, he kissed her cheek. She just shook her head. "All mothers. Every time," she remarked, and then kissed him softly on the lips. "Except for this mother."
It seemed that Francine was not done and turned to her daughter. "He's dangerous and so is she! I've been told things!"
Martha shook her head. "What are you talking about?"
Francine took her daughter by her shoulders and spoke to her intently. "Look around you! Nothing but death and destruction!"
"That isn't their fault! He saved us, and so did she. They saved all of us!" Martha protested while firmly getting herself out of Francine's grip.
"It was Tish who invited everyone to this thing in the first place. I'd say technically, it's her fault," Leo joked lightly. Rolling her eyes, Tish elbowed her brother in the side.
In the distance, there was loud and sudden crash that did not sound good in the slightest. The Doctor and Kayla exchanged looks and started quickly towards the noise. The Doctor paused briefly to look at Martha, who nodded. She started to go after him, but Francine grabbed her arm. "Leave them," she begged.
Shaking her head, Martha moved herself out of her mother's grip and hurried after the Doctor. "Martha?" Tish called after her while taking a step forwards.
"Not you, too?"
Tish looked back at her grief-stricken mother. "Sorry," she apologized and then she was off to join Martha, who had just arrived next to the Doctor and Kayla, who were surveying the ambulance, but the doors were open and the medics who had been inside were husks like Lady Thaw had been.
"Lazarus, back from the dead," the Doctor stated, and then shook his head. "Should've known, really." Taking out his sonic screwdriver, he started to search for Lazarus as he had done in the office before.
Kayla looked over at him, her hand on her stomach. "Where is he?"
The Doctor pointed the beeping sonic towards the large church. "That way. The church."
"Cathedral. It's Southwark Cathedral. He told me," Tish corrected in a soft voice.
Having walked into Southwark Cathedral, something which Kayla was not happy about and the Doctor ended up carrying her shoes in one hand and pointing the sonic screwdriver ahead of him as he led a progression of his Bonded, Martha, and Tish behind him.
"Do you think he's in here?" Martha asked in a low voice.
"If you were looking for sanctuary, where would you go?" Kayla replied.
The foursome moved through the empty cathedral and to the open space behind the alter underneath the bell tower. Suddenly, the Doctor put his sonic screwdriver down and moved himself in front of Kayla as his eyes rested on Lazarus, who was gasping with the red blanket from the ambulance wrapped around him.
"I came here before. A lifetime ago. I thought I was going to die then. In fact, I was sure of it. I sat there, just a child…the sound of planes and bombs outside," the man panted.
Kayla swallowed hard as she recognized what he was talking about. "The Blitz," she said in a hard voice.
"You've read about it?" Lazarus asked.
Kayla shook her head. "I was there, and so was my father."
"And I was as well," the Doctor put in while taking Kayla's hand and squeezing it lightly to reassure her. Jack was still a touchy subject for them, as Kayla still missed him and the Doctor…the Doctor had his own sins about Jack he was planning on never sharing with his Bonded.
"You're both too young," Lazarus scoffed.
The Doctor grinned, though it was a dark one. "So are you."
Lazarus started to laugh, but this mirth was short lived as he gasped in obvious pain as he started to fight against the mutation. "In the morning, the fires had died, and I was still alive. I swore I'd never face death like that again," he explained in a weaker voice.
Giving a nod to Kayla, which she returned, the Doctor moved away from his pregnant Bonded and started to walk around Lazarus slowly. Very directly, he looked up at the bell tower and then looked down at Lazarus.
"So defenseless. I would arm myself, fight back, defeat it," Lazarus explained, his back tensing as he tried to hold back the transformation.
The Doctor frowned, the reason why Lazarus was telling this story dawning on him. "That's what you were trying to do today."
Lazarus shook his head almost violently. "That's what I did today," he corrected.
Practically feeling Kayla tense as if he was right next to her, the Doctor mentally ordered her not to speak and instead said the words the Time Lady was itching to say. "What about the other people who died?"
"They were nothing. I changed the course of history."
The Doctor glared at Lazarus, a sick feeling growing in his stomach at the words he had said. "Any of them might have done, too. You think history's only made with equations? Facing death is part of being human. You can't change that."
"No, Doctor. Avoiding death. That's being human. It's our strongest impulse, to cling to life with every fiber of being. I'm doing what everyone before me has tried to do. I've simply been more…successful," and then, as if to deny what he had just said, Lazarus groaned painfully as his body tried to change once more.
The Doctor arched an eyebrow at Lazarus. "Look at yourself! You're mutating! You've no control over it! You call that a success?"
Lazarus bit his lip, trying not to groan. "I call it progress. I'm more now that I was. More than just an ordinary human."
"There's no such thing as an ordinary human," the Doctor pointed out.
'He's going to change in any minute,' Kayla warned through the mental link, her eyes firmly fixed on the twitching man.
The Doctor looked over at her. 'I know. I need to get him up bell tower somehow.'
'Up the bell tower?' Kayla asked, her eyes flicking up at the tower. She bit her lip at the height of it. If the Doctor were to fall, then…she shivered at the darker thoughts invading her head.
"You're so sentimental, Doctor. Maybe you are older than you look," Lazarus said suddenly.
"I'm old enough to know that a longer life isn't always a better one. In the end, you just get tired. Tired of the struggle. Tired of losing everyone that matters to you. Tried of watching everything turn to dust." His voice growing softer as he spoke, the Doctor squatted down next to the mutating man. "If you live long enough, Lazarus, the only certainty left is that you end up alone."
"That's a price worth paying," the man replied.
The Time Lord shook his head. "Is it?" he asked simply. "Because once you have someone…someone you love, you will never be able to live without them."
'You won't have to, Doctor,' Kayla vowed. 'I am your Bonded. My place is by your side.'
The Doctor beamed at this, but the smile quickly slid off his face when Lazarus bit out, "I will feed soon."
"I'm not gonna let that happen," the Doctor stated instantly, a hard note growing in his voice as his mind went to the very pregnant Bonded right behind him.
Lazarus smirked up at him. "You've not been able to stop me so far."
Suddenly, Martha moved up so that she was behind Lazarus. "Leave him, Lazarus! He's old and bitter. Thought you had a taste for fresher meat."
"Martha, no!" Kayla called out, her eyes widening in horror.
Lazarus snarled at Martha. "Why not just take the slow pregnant one?" he murmured.
Martha snorted. "She's just as old and bitter. Trust me, it's me you want."
Assessing this for a moment, Lazarus snarled louder than before. His body tensing, he started to run after Martha, who had wisely started to flee. Not one to leave her sister behind, Tish ran after her sister. The two women led Lazarus to the stairs and started to sprint up them. They could not pause, for behind them an unearthly scream sounded that signaled that Lazarus was no longer human.
Trying to figure out where their progress was, the Doctor and Kayla peered up at the tower. Finally, Kayla yelled up, "Martha! Where are you?!"
After a second that felt like an eternity, Martha peered out of an archway on the upper level. "Kayla! Doctor!"
"Take him to the top, the very top of the bell tower, d'you hear me?!" the Doctor yelled up at Martha.
Martha nodded. "Up to the top!" There was a pause where she looked down the corridor she had been running down and then she looked back down at the Time Lord and Lady. "Then what?" Before they could reply, Martha disappeared to presumably keep running from Lazarus.
For a moment, the Doctor and Kayla exchanged looks. Kayla kissed him lightly and then the two hurried off to the large pipe organ that was, of course, in the cathedral. The Doctor pulled out the bench for Kayla and the two sat down on the bench.
"Hypersonic sound waves. Inspired," the Doctor said with a nudge to Kayla as he pulled out his sonic screwdriver. Kayla just grinned as the Doctor jammed the screwdriver into a slot in the organ. Together, the Doctor and Kayla started to pull out all the stops on the pipe organ.
Right when they were done pulling out all the stops, they heard screaming from above. The Doctor looked up only to hear one of the girls scream. Kayla inhaled sharply at the noise.
"I hope it's good acoustic in here," the Doctor breathed. Nodding to Kayla, who covered her ears, the Doctor started to pound on the organ…only for nothing to come out. There was more screaming up above and when the two looked up, they both saw Martha clinging to the edge of the top of the clock tower.
The Doctor started to play more and more frantically on the organ, but it just didn't work the way he needed it to. Growling in frustration, the Doctor took the sonic screwdriver back out of the organ and fiddled with it. "We need to turn this up to 11." Putting the device back into the slot, he started to play once more. This, time, thankfully, it worked.
Martha continued to hold on for dear life on the edge of the tower as the sound waves echoed up to the bell tower. Suddenly, Lazarus, now in human form, toppled over the edge of the bell tower and fell onto the ground.
Hearing the thud, the Doctor stopped playing and looked over at Lazarus. He was dead, and this time for real.
Breathing in relief, Kayla got up and started to try her best to get to the top of the bell tower, but the Doctor quickly wrapped his arms around her waist, stopping her from going. "Look!" he ordered sternly in her ear. Kayla looked up and let out a small, half-sob of relief at the sight of Martha getting pulled up by her sister.
Turning her around in his arms, the Doctor kissed her on the lips, the two just so grateful that they were okay, that they had survived.
After a moment, Kayla pulled back and whispered, "Lazarus."
The Doctor pouted. "What?"
"We need to check to see that he's still alive."
Huffing, which made Kayla smile involuntarily, pulled back and took the Doctor's hand. The two walked over, far too happy, and went over to look down at Lazarus' body. The Doctor knelt beside him briefly and closed his eyes. As if this action was a cue, Lazarus' body started to wither until it was his original age.
At the sound of Martha's familiar laugh and Tish's voice, the Doctor took Kayla's hand and the two hurried over to the stairs just in time for Martha to step off the last step. Martha beamed at the two and hugged both of them tightly, one after the other.
"I didn't know you two could play?" she laughed.
Kayla shrugged. "I'm better at playing the flute, piano is no different."
The Doctor also shrugged. "If you hang around with Beethoven, you're bound to pick a few things up."
Martha rolled her eyes, used to the Doctor casually mentioning famous names like Beethoven, but Tish wasn't so she looked over at her sister with wide eyes. Waving off her clear concern for the Doctor's mental state, Martha just joked, "Hmm, especially about playing loud."
As if he hadn't heard her, the Doctor leaned forwards a bit. "Sorry?" he asked.
The trio stood in front of the TARDIS, which was still parked in the corner of Martha's flat. The Doctor wrapped his arm around Kayla's waist and grinned at Martha. "Yet another thing that escalated," he noted.
Martha rolled her eyes. "Seems to be a habit with you two. We'll just have to take more care in the future," she paused slightly. "And the past, and whatever other time period we find ourselves in," she added.
"It's good fun, though," Kayla pointed out with a smile.
Martha nodded. "It is," she agreed. "It certainly is."
There was a slight pause, and then the Doctor beamed and opened the TARDIS door. "Alright then, back to the TARDIS."
Martha stepped into the TARDIS and then paused to look back at the Doctor and Kayla. "Back to the TARDIS," she whispered to herself.
And I'm back! I took the entire summer off writing and now I have enough of a buffer to come back for the school year! Whoo!
As usual, I will be updating this story every Saturday. Hopefully it won't be as late as this one is.
This chapter...I dislike The Lazarus Experiment so yay for it being over!
And review time:
NicoleR85: Thanks!
XxDontFearTheReaperxX: My dad's now fine, though my mom just had back surgery so that isn't fun.