A/N: I think Yash is basically an alien version of me :o
Chapter 8 - Kesh-up
There was a sudden humming sound, and just as the Judoon made to pull their triggers, all of their guns simultaneously and miraculously jammed. In the surprise the Doctor wrenched himself out of the Judoon's grip and grabbed Yash's arm, stumbling out of the room and slamming the door behind him before locking it with the sonic he had just used. They both pelted down the corridor, the Doctor really having to rely on the shocked Yash as his head was still throbbing very badly. When they had run a sufficient distance they both screeched to a halt, panting and leaning against the wall, the Doctor holding his head.
"Do me a favour," the Doctor panted. "Don't do that again."
"You saved my life," Yash realised, obviously in complete shock.
"Sorry, it's a habit," the Doctor said, still blinking desperately to try and get the world in focus.
There was a brief moment as silence as they continued to catch their breath, the echoing sounds of angry Judoon slamming their fists on the locked door far away down the corridor.
Suddenly Yash straightened, looking around with wide eyes. "Where's Leah?"
"She'll meet us at the TARDIS," the Doctor assured him.
"What?"
The Doctor rubbed his eyes. "Trust me, she's like her Mum in a clothes shop. Just disappears and comes back later. Where's the TARDIS?"
"Down here," Yash said, and sprinted off before the Doctor had even blinked. The Time Lord quickly stumbled after Yash, hand still clutching his head. They ran down the corridor and turned the corner, just in time to hear the door where the Judoon had been crash open behind them. This made Yash run faster, and consequently lose the Doctor.
"Yash!" the Doctor hissed, the pain in his head now absolutely blinding as the world merged and warped before him. "Yash!"
He stopped, leaning against the wall and trying desperately to clear his head – but he knew he had a bad concussion and needed medical aid right away. He could hear the synchronised footsteps of Judoon getting closer and closer...
Suddenly a tiny hand slipped in his. "Daddy! This way!" Leah's voice said, and began to pull him in a direction. He followed without protest, letting the small girl lead him down the corridors and into a side door, where the TARDIS sat bolted to the floor. They quickly slipped through the door and he slammed it behind them, looking up to see Yash standing in the middle of console room staring at the ceiling in wonder.
"This..." Yash gaped. "This..." But when he couldn't find the words to say, he slipped out a camera and took a picture instead.
"Yash," the Doctor grunted. "My policy here is saving lives first, pictures later."
"Oh, sorry," Yash said, putting the camera back in his pocket. "They're not going to believe this on the forums..."
"Gimme a hand," the Doctor said, moving to the console and flicking a switch with his left hand, his right still holding his head. "I can't do this by myself right now."
Yash suddenly froze, staring at the Doctor, then the console, then the Doctor again. "You... You want me to... to..."
"Press buttons? Yes," the Doctor finished, gesturing to the console. "Try to keep this level and press this button every three seconds, you got that?"
Yash nodded quickly, rolling back his shoulders and moving forward to do the task, really not wanting to let the Doctor down. He grabbed the lever and stabbed the button, and squeaked when the TARDIS suddenly began to churn, exploding into life.
"Where's Rose?" the Doctor asked, pulling around the monitor to face him.
"Umm," Yash began, taking his hands off of the console to think, tapping his chin absently. "Security Corridor 2..."
"Yash, buttons!" the Doctor urged, and Yash jumped in alarm as he realised he'd let go, his hands snapping back to the console. "Okay, Security Corridor 2," the Time Lord, and yanked a lever. "Coming up."
Leah obediently grabbed onto his leg as the TARDIS jolted, and landed with a bump. As the monitor gave them a view of the outside, the Doctor saw that Rose was being forced towards the spacepad to be taken to the Shadow Proclamation...
"Let's go! Yash and the Doctor! Kicking ass together!" Yash yelled enthusiastically, another gun finding its way into his hand again. The Doctor stared at him disbelievingly for a moment before grabbing it off of him and slipping it inside his jacket.
"I thought you knew me? No guns!" the Doctor reprimanded. "Now stay here!" He bolted over to the door and flung it open.
"Doctor!" Rose yelled from amidst the crowd of Judoon, who all turned when they saw him, immediately drawing out their weapons. He drew his sonic in turn, pointing it threateningly at them.
"You will come quietly!" the Judoon demanded. "You are under arrest!"
"Judoon," the Doctor began strongly, glancing at Rose. "I'm really not in a very good mood, so I'll get straight to the point. Tell me what you want. Is this about my daughter?"
"Case 606987 cannot be disclosed to the public," one of the Judoon gruffed.
The Doctor was astonished. "But I'm the person you're arresting under a false charge!"
"Case is irrelevant."
"Irrelevant? How can it be... Hold on, arresting me is irrelevant but 606987 can't be disclosed? There's more than one case?" the Doctor frowned, struggling to work it out through his pained head. "One is arresting the fictional imposter to take me and my family into custody, and the other one is... What exactly?"
"Case 606987 cannot be disclosed to the public," one of the Judoon gruffed again.
"Right," the Doctor muttered, glancing at Rose again. "Hold on a sec." He turned to the TARDIS and called in the door. "Leah, come here."
The girl obediently came out of the TARDIS to stand beside her Dad, looking up at him, but obviously terrified. He smiled gently and knelt down to her, whispering something in her ear. She nodded and closed her eyes tightly, putting her fingers in her ears and singing 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star' quietly to herself.
"So this case 606987," the Doctor began as he stood up again, swiftly pulling out the gun he had taken from Yash earlier from his jacket pocket. He gazed at it for a moment, before gripping it with a finger on the trigger and pointing the barrel directly at the oblivious Leah's head. "Would this at all be relevant?"
Rose stared at him, wide-eyed. The Judoon seemed to tense – and instantly the Doctor drew back the gun and threw it far away down the corridor, already having his reaction. He tapped Leah on the shoulder and she stopped singing to look up at him, pulling her fingers out of her ears. He smiled reassuringly, stretching out his hand which she took, clinging on tightly.
"Then as the parent to this child, who is a minor, I demand you tell me the charge against this child under article 52 of your own proclamation."
"Article 89 demands new species to be catalogued, assessed and taken into care," the Judoon replied, somewhat reluctantly.
"But she's part-Gallifreyan, part-Human, it's cross-species," the Doctor said. "That's an exemption from the article."
"Gallifreyans are classified an endangered species," the Judoon said. "The hybrid must be protected to ensure stability of the rare and new species from the endangered father's species."
"But..."
"This is a matter for the courts to decide, to whether the hybrid child is a threat to others, or under threat. Come quietly."
The Doctor suddenly realised that the Judoon that had originally come to take him from his cell were now marching steadily towards them from down the previously empty side of the corridor, completely trapping him between the two groups. He glanced at the TARDIS, then at Leah, then at Rose almost lost in the crowd of Judoon as seventeen guns were on him and Leah.
"Run, Doctor!" Rose yelled as the Doctor glanced between the groups, maintaining his position, his sonic aloft. But this was hopeless. He knew that. Fight or flight... and flight was tactically the best option. But he couldn't leave Rose...
The Judoon began to close in, and the Doctor was forced backwards, away from the TARDIS doors...
"Raaarrrgh!" a voice suddenly yelled from inside the TARDIS, and seconds later Yash burst over the threshold and ran yelling into the crowd of surprised Judoon. "Distraction!" Yash yelled, waving his arms. "DISTRACTION!"
The way to the TARDIS cleared, and the Doctor took his opportunity. He grabbed Leah in both arms and ran into the TARDIS, turning at the last moment see Rose disappear through fog of angry Judoon.
"I'll come back for you!" he yelled to her, but it was anyone's guess whether she heard or not. He slammed the door and set Leah on the floor, staggering to the console and attempting his best effort at programming. By some absolute miracle he managed to commence a journey to Torchwood, the central column springing into life.
Finally he sank to his knees, holding his head.
"Daddy," Leah said, and a pair of tiny arms moved in to hug him without another word.
"Oh Leah," he breathed, hugging her in return, kissing her forehead. "I'm so sorry, I lost Mummy."
"You get Mummy back," Lead replied positively.
He smiled gently, wondering if her defiance was warranted. "Yeah."
"Rose is gone?"
Everyone had very quickly gathered in the Torchwood medbay where Martha was trying to gauge how bad the head trauma was, jabbing and prodding the Doctor's head and getting him to recite the alphabet amidst other tests that were probably a bit too thorough.
"Yeah," the Doctor croaked. "The Shadow Proclamation took her... Tried to take me and Leah. Made up some story that I was an imposter and I'd murdered the Doctor, so they'd get the whole universe out hunting for me."
"Ouch," Jack muttered.
The Doctor gave a cynical laugh as Martha checked his head-scans. "That's only the beginning. They're trying to take Leah into custody, to catalogue her and take her into care."
"Eh? Why?" Mickey asked.
"I'm the last Gallifreyan, other than the Master – don't think they know about him – but to them I'm just a statistic on a piece of paper; an endangered species. Since I am who I am with a reputation, they can't lay a finger on me without the Universe knowing – hence the made up story about the imposter killing the Doctor. Someone was bound to spot me and arrest me. And if they get me, they get Leah. But Leah is a human-Gallifreyan hybrid and a completely new species. She's just a child, so they think she's an easy target and want to take her to protect her to sustain the new species, because with me and Rose they think she might be in danger."
"Wait," Jack started, finger in the air. "This is basically intergalactic social services?"
The Doctor looked at him, and gave a deflated laugh. "Sort of."
"But why do they have Rose?" Martha suddenly interrupted, pausing in her scan checking. "There's no charge against her. They have no basis to keep her."
"No, they don't," the Doctor muttered darkly.
"Is she safe?"
He thought for a moment, then nodded. "They wouldn't gain by killing her, it would drive me away instead. She can handle herself for a while. From their point of view, she's my incentive to go back."
"That's a hostage situation," Ianto put in. "Surely that's illegal in Universal Law too?"
"I don't think they care anymore."
"But they're police!" Mickey pointed out.
"Police can be corrupt too," the Doctor answered simply.
"But who's corrupting them?" Martha asked. "They must have a reason to do this. They've gone to a lot of trouble."
"And that's the question," the Doctor murmured. "Somebody wants Leah... Somebody who has control of the biggest justice force in the Universe..."
They all fell silent, letting that sink in.
"Daddy?" They all looked up to find Leah standing at the top of the medbay stairs, peering through the metal railing before started to navigate her way down the steep metal stairs using the tried and tested bum shuffle method.
"Careful," the Doctor said quickly and Jack moved forward to pick her up, but she very quickly resisted.
"I do by my own," she insisted, and continued down for about a minute until she reached the bottom of the steps, got to her feet, and jumped in the air happily. Everyone collectively cheered, whooped and clapped, and she bowed in turn, giggling. She went straight to her father, who lifted her onto the examination table beside him.
"Daddy better now?" she asked, gazing up at him.
"Your Daddy's hit his head, but if he rests he'll get better in no time," Martha said, handing the Doctor the scan. He looked at it.
"Oh look Leah, I've got a small linear parietal skull fracture," he said, pointing at the scan as he showed the girl. She looked at it, then at his head, and then jabbed his wound. "Ow!"
"Sorry," she said sincerely, and went for a hug. "When will Mummy get back?"
"I don't know," the Doctor replied honestly after a pause. "But it'll be very soon, okay? As soon as I've healed."
She nodded. "I'm hungry."
He pursed his lips for a moment, thinking. "We haven't eaten all morning. Let's have a really big lunch. What do you want?"
"Um, um..." Leah began, scrunching her eyes up tight to think hard. "Can we have hot dogs please? With cheese and tommy plop."
"Yep, sounds good," the Doctor said, and then he caught the others' expressions. "She can't say ketchup so she calls it tommy plop..." he explained in an undertone.
"I can so," Leah suddenly interrupted, folding her arms indignantly.
"Go on then," Jack encouraged. "Ketchup."
"Keth-up. Ket-up. Keh-up. Kesh-up. Kesh-up!" she said proudly.
"Close enough," the Doctor said, picking her up before looking at the gathered crowd. "Does anyone else want hot dogs with cheese and tommy plop?"
They collectively laughed and shook their heads very quickly.
"All right then, just you and me for fine dining, Leah," he said, carrying her up the stairs and disappearing into the TARDIS, but not before Leah had waved the crowd good bye over her father's shoulder. They waved back.
Jack's hand dropped, and he glanced at the others. "He's more worried than he's letting on."
"It's just show for Leah," Martha replied quietly.
The others simply nodded, and after a few moments they dispersed to get back to work.
A/N: I really need to review reply more. I know, I don't do it often enough :o I forget. Really easily :o