Right, here's the final part of The Satan Pit, so I'll be doing Love and Monsters tomorrow.
The Doctor woke up face down on the ground, the glass or rather Perspex of his helmet was broken, but he could still breathe. He groaned softly as he awoke. He gasped a breath and when he stood up, he discovered that the helmet was broken, he grabbed it with his gloved hand "I'm breathing." he said and he took the helmet off "Air cushion to support the fall. You can breathe down here, Ida. Can you hear me, Ida?"
--
They had gotten Rose secured into the rocket and were preparing to take off. "Dislocating B clamp, C clamp. Raising Blu-Nitro to maximum. Toby, how's the Negapact feed-line?" said Zach
"Clear, ready to go, sir." Toby answered
"Captain, I think we're gonna have a problem passenger." Danny said
"Keep an eye on her." he replied.
"It's all right, Rose." Danny said as she regained consciousness "We're safe."
"I'm not going anywhere!" she shouted "Get me out of this thing. Get me out!" The engine started
"And liftoff!" Zach shouted.
--
The Doctor stood up as he could hear the rocket leaving "The rocket." he said, knowing that his wife was on it, he'd rather that she went back to Earth with them than wait up there for him.
--
Rose spotted Zach's bolt gun and grabbed it "Take me back to the planet." she said pointing it at Zach "Take me back!"
"Or what?"
"Or, I'll shoot." He turned to face her
"Would you, though?" he asked "Would you really? Is that what your Doctor would want?" She put it down beside her and sat back "I'm sorry, but it's too late anyway." he told her "Take a look outside. We can't turn back. This is what the Doctor would have wanted. Isn't that right?"
--
The Doctor found some pictograms. "History of some big battle." he said "Man against Beast. I don't know if you're getting this, Ida. Hope so. Anyway, they defeated the Beast and imprisoned it." He looked around and spotted two jugs on plinths and two jugs drawn on the cave wall. "And maybe that's the key." He touched one and it glowed as did the other. "Or the gate or the bars." He stepped between them and heard a growling sound. He walked to the edge and came face to face with the Horned Beast. It was huge. It leaned towards him and he walked backwards a few steps.
--
Back on the ship, Toby was laughing and Danny wanted to know what was so funny "What's the joke?" he asked
"Just…" said Toby, trying to think of a believable reason "We made it. We escaped. We actually did it."
"Not all of us." Rose said thinking about Scooti, Mr Jefferson, Ida and her Husband
"We're not out of it yet." said Zach. "We're still the first people in history to fly away from a black hole Toby, read me the stats."
"Gravity funnel holding, sir." he answered "Oh, it's holding."
--
"I accept that you exist." the Doctor said as he looked at the Beast. "I don't have to accept what you are. But your physical existence, I give you that." The Beast growled "I don't understand. I was expected down here. I was given a safe landing and air. You need me for something. What for?" He didn't receive an answered "Have I got to… I don't know, beg an audience or…Is there a ritual? Some sort of incantation or summons or spell? All these things I don't believe in, are they real? Speak to me! Tell me!" he still didn't get an answer "You won't talk or you can't talk." he continued "Hold on, hold on. Wait a minute. Just let me…Oh!…No. Yes! No. Think it through. You spoke before, I heard your voice. An intelligent voice. No, more than that. Brilliant! But looking at you now, all I can see…is beast. The animal, just the body. You're just the body, the physical form. What's happened to your mind, hmm? Where's it gone? Where's that intelligence?" He looked up "Oh, no." he said realising just where the Devil was
--
"Stats at 53." Toby said "Funnel stable at 66.5. Hull pressure constant. Smooth as we can, sir. All the way back home. Coordinates set for planet Earth."
--
The Doctor looked at the drawings again "You were imprisoned a long time ago." he said "Before the universe, after, sideways, in between, it doesn't matter. The prison is perfect. It's absolute. It's eternal. Oh, yes! Open the prison, the gravity field collapses. This planet falls into the black hole. You escape, you die. Brilliant! But that's just the body. The body is trapped, that's all. The Devil is an idea. In all those civilisations, just an idea. But an idea is hard to kill. An idea can escape. The mind, the mind of the great Beast, the mind can escape. Oh, but that's it! You didn't give me air, your jailers did! They set this up all those years ago. The need me alive. Because if you're escaping, then I've got to stop you!" He picked up a rock "If I destroy your prison, your body is destroyed, your mind with it." He held up the rock as though to strike the jug, but realisation hit him and he dropped it "But then you're clever enough to use this whole system against me. If I destroy this planet, I destroy the gravity field. The rocket. The rocket loses protection, falls into the black hole….I have to sacrifice Rose." The Beast laughed.
--
Rose was sitting thinking about what had happened "It doesn't make sense." she said "We escaped, but there's a thousand ways it could have killed us. It could have ripped out the air or, I don't know, burnt us or anything. But it let us go. Why? Unless it wanted us to escape."
"Hey, Rose, do us a favour." said Toby. "Shut up. Almost there. We're beyond the reach of the black hole in 40...39..."
--
"So, that's the trap or the test or the final judgement, I don't know." the Doctor said "But if I kill you , I kill her. Except, that implies in this big, grand scheme of gods and devils, that she is just a victim. But I've seen a lot of this universe. I've seen fake gods and bad gods and demigods and would-be gods, and out of all that, out of that whole pantheon, if I believe in one thing, just one thing, I believe in her." He smashed the jug things
--
The lights went out in the rocket and it started to shake "What happened?" Danny asked "What was that?"
"What's he doing?" Toby asked.
"We've lost the funnel!" Zach shouted "Gravity collapse!"
"What does that mean?" Rose asked
"We can't escape." Zach answered "We're heading straight for the black hole."
--
The Doctor had smashed the second one and turned to face The Beast "This is your freedom!" he shouted "Free to die! You're going into that black hole and I'm riding with you!"
--
"It's the planet." said Rose as she looked out of the window "The planet's moving. It's falling." she sat back down and looked at Toby, he was covered in that writing an his eyes were red
"I'm the rage and the bile and the ferocity." he said "I am the prince and the fool and the agony! I'm the sin and the fear and the darkness!"
"It's him!" Danny said
"Stay where you are." Zach said "The ship's not stable." He turned around "What is he?" he asked "What the hell is he?"
--
The Doctor stumbled backwards away from The Beast
--
"I shall never die!" the Beast said through Toby "The thought of me is forever. In the bleeding hearts of men, in their vanity and obsession and lust!" Rose grabbed the bolt gun "Nothing shall ever destroy me. Nothing." She aimed the bolt gun at the windscreen "Go to hell." she said and fired, blowing out the window. She then undid his seat belt and he flew out towards the black hole.
"Emergency shield!" Zach said and put it up. "We've still lost the gravity funnel. We can't escape the black hole."
"But we stopped him." Rose said "That's what the Doctor would have done."
"Some victory." Zach said "We're going in."
--
The Doctor started to walk away, stumbling as he did so.
--
"The planet's lost orbit. It's falling!"
--
The Doctor was running for some sort of safety when he tripped and fell, landing against something solid. He looked up and grinned when he saw the Tardis. He got in and went to get Ida. He grabbed her unconscious form and carried her into the Tardis, putting her somewhere safe, so she wouldn't get rattled around on their journey.
--
The passengers on the rocket watched as the planet disappeared from their radar. "The planet's gone." said Danny, pointing out the obvious. "I'm sorry."
"Accelerate." said Zach. "I did my best. But, hey, the first human beings to fall inside a black hole. How about that? History." They prepared themselves to enter the black hole, when the rocket suddenly stopped moving.
"What happened?" Rose asked
"We're turning." Zach said. "We're turning around. We're turning away!"
"Sorry about the hijack, Captain. This is the good ship Tardis."
--
The Doctor was standing in the control room talking to them over the radio "First things first, have you got a Rose Tyler on board?"
"I'm here! It's me! Oh, my God! Where are you?"
He grinned"I'm just towing you home." he said "Gravity- Schmavity. My people practically invented black holes. Well, in fact, they did. Couple of minutes, we'll be nice and safe. Oh, and Captain, can we do a swap? Say, if you give me Rose Tyler, I'll give you Ida Scott. How about that?"
"She's alive!"
"Yes. Thank you, God."
"Bit of oxygen starvation, but she should be all right." he answered "I couldn't save the Ood. I only had time for one trip. They went down with the planet." There was a beeping sound. "Ah! Entering clear space. End of the line. Mission closed."
--
The Doctor got Ida off the ship and back to the rocket, Rose entered the ship and stood at the door with a large smile on her face, the Doctor grinned back. She ran across to him and met him in the middle of the room and threw herself at him, he wrapped his arms tightly around her and swung her around. She pulled back and kissed him…
--
After Rose had finally let him go, he removed the orange suit and then contacted Zach "Zach, we'll be off now." he said "Have a good trip home. And the next time you get curious about something…Oh, what's the point? You'll just go blundering in. The human race!"
"But, Doctor, what did you find down there?"
Ida asked"That creature, what was it?"
"I don't know." he answered "Never did decipher that writing. But that's good. The day I know everything, I might as well stop."
"What do you think it was, really?" Rose asked
"I think we beat it." he answered "That's good enough for me."
"It said I was going to die in battle." she persisted
"Then it lied." he wrapped his arm around her, pulling her closer "Right! Onwards, upwards. Ida, see you again maybe."
"I hope so."
"And thanks, boys!" Rose added.
"Hang on though, Doctor, you never really said. You two, who are you?"
The Doctor looked at his wife. "Oh, the stuff of legend." He pulled the lever and took them into the time vortex.
Okay, that's The Satan Pit, there will be a filler chapter after this and I'll do that in the morning, before I start Love and Monsters, so I'm going to bed now, cause it's 25 to 3 in the morning. Night all
TTFN
Julie