Lucy found herself in relative bliss, toasting a glass of bubbly with the Doctor on the planet, not the city, Barcelona. Their little holiday was in its third day now; both had agreed that after the little showdown on Rhea Gaia, they needed a break. The T.A.R.D.I.S. had indeed been working fine and Lucy had sighed in relief upon seeing Barcelona's gorgeous sunsets and lustrous beaches. She and the Doctor had sought out a tiny beach town and taken up residence there, for free since she and the Doctor were able to bring the inn-keeper such shiny trinkets. The particular bubbly they were enjoying had been collecting dust and from the taste of it, was a very good year.
Lucy was looking out at the waves with the purple, red, orange and pink sky above them. A soft wind was blowing her hair in front of her. Her bare toes were buried deep into the sand and she was glad for the light jacket she'd put on before walking out the door this evening. She looked over at the Doctor, somewhat comical sitting on the sand, also barefooted, but still in his suit. The brown one with the blue pinstripes; her favourite. He smiled at her briefly, lifting his glass to her and taking a drink. She mimicked his gesture and felt the cool tingle of champagne trickling down her throat.
"I could stay here forever, I could." Lucy said, as much to herself as to the Doctor. He only made a noncommittal noise and drank more champagne. "Oh, go on then. Endless beaches, good people, gorgeous skies, what more could you ask for?"
"Gallifrey had sunsets like these, only different because it had two suns, like on Rhea Gaia." The Doctor said suddenly. Lucy looked over at him, somewhat perplexed. He never talked about his home planet. "When the suns would touch the horizon, the trees, they were silver but they looked like they were on fire. And it had beaches too, brilliant ones. You would have loved them Lucy. You would have absolutely adored them." Lucy opened and closed her mouth a couple times.
"I'm sure I would have." Was all she managed to stammer out. The Doctor looked her straight in the eyes, all the while he had been looking out at the ocean. He nodded somewhat wistfully and Lucy thought, not for the first time, that she wished there was some place the two of them could step out of time. Maybe this place. It reminded him of his home, and was at the same time so wonderfully unlike her own. She sighed a bit herself, before taking another sip of her drink. She was listening to the gentle hum of the waves, the crash on the shore and then the steady ebb and pull back away from her. God, she wanted to sail. Maybe she'd ask the Doctor to take her out to sea. Just listen to that steady beat, the only thing one could count anymore, save his own heart. Listen to that metallic thrum and-
Metallic thrum? She thought suddenly. Lucy leaped up and whirled round. The T.A.R.D.I.S. was leaving! Without them! "Doctor!" she shouted. He got up too and they made a mad dash for the quickly fading blue box. Their bubbly glasses thudded onto the cushiony sand and would be left there, until the disappointed inn keeper found them the next morning. But that didn't matter to them as they had made it inside just as the ship was taking off, destination unknown.
The door to the blue box opened ever so slightly, two curious faces popping out. Lucy Blake and the Doctor were in a cupboard. "Of all the places to land…" the Doctor was muttering under his breath, "I always end up in storage." Lucy was peering round, investigating. She'd pried open the door to the closet and was waving the Doctor through. He followed her and found that they were on-
"Oh, brilliant, a space ship! Haven't been on one of these in a long time!" Lucy looked back and shook her head at him.
"If this is a proper space ship, I'll skip next time. What's with all the rubbish?" Indeed there seemed to be rubbish and refuse all around. The Doctor had already whipped out his sonic screw driver and was shining on this smoking heap of metal and that pile of scraps.
Lucy opened the only door available to her, where the knob was rusting off. In front of her was what looked like a furnace, long rows of cast iron cauldrons belching flame and smoke. A dank hallway would be their only means of travel and they'd be covered in soot, but it'd have to do.
"Lucy, come here, you need to see this." came the Doctor's awed voice. Lucy shut the door and walked briskly to the Doctor, staring out the window she hadn't noticed before. She came to stand beside him and instantly clapped a hand to her mouth at what she saw. The Doctor put his arm round her, half smiling at her amazed expression. Lucy was looking at the most brilliant meteor shower in the most brilliant sky she had ever seen. She could see planets everywhere, one with rings, one so close they seemed to share an atmosphere and several others twinkling brightly. Tiny beams of lights were cascading in all directions, thousands of burning masses. But the best part was the sky. It was all rusted gold and burnt orange, brilliant yellow and deep blood red and even traces of purple threaded in between. She'd thought the sunsets on the planet Barcelona had been gorgeous. That looked like utter filth compared to this.
"Doctor, is that what it was like on Gallifrey? All that raw power and those colours. Different planets in the sky, oh, I'd never even been able to imagine!" The Doctor smiled. It was like the very first time she'd ever seen him smile, and like that moment, it took years off his face. His deep brown eyes twinkled and Lucy felt her heart skip a beat. She had to close her mouth shut to keep herself from sighing. How pathetic was she.
"Sometimes." He answered. "Gallifrey has different planets in its view, had of course. And there weren't meteorite showers every day. But the sky is about the same. All that raw power, just like you said. One day I'll take you to the Medusa Cascade, close to where Gallifrey was. You've seen the images of the Hubble Space Telescope, yes? Imagine that but in high definition, like on the telly. It'll be just you and me, it will."
Lucy smiled to herself, biting her lip already in anticipation. Wherever they were right now could wait. She wanted to go to the Medusa Cascade. The Doctor had practically promised her a date. She knew she shouldn't think of it like that, but…
"Well, Doctor, I'm tearing myself away from this view now, while I still can. Come on, something new awaits outside." Lucy couldn't know how right she was when she opened the door she thought would lead to the furnace room and instead found something totally different.
Instead of billowing smoke and sparks, Lucy found what looked to her like a control panel. In the centre of the room was a tall pillar and around it, a dais not unlike the T.A.R.D.I.S.' Buttons and knobs beeped and flashed briefly. It seemed as if someone had just left. A light had been left on and the Doctor saw Lucy's bewildered face. "What's wrong then, Lucy? I'm sore whoever runs this place will come along in no time. Not to worry."
"No, but, but that was the only door in that room. And this is a different room than what I saw. It's completely different, it's changed? Oh my god, where are we?"
At that moment the door on the opposite side of the room came open and two people spilled inside. One was a man, about the Doctor's height, but stocky and grizzled. The other, a woman, ebony skinned and hard featured. "Finally!" the man exclaimed. "I thought we'd never get back here."
"Yeah well it was bound to happen sometime, wasn't it?" the woman half snarled. She looked round at the two clueless strangers and hit her friend on the shoulder. He turned round as well and his mouth fell open.
"No." he said, "No, it can't be. How could they possibly be here?"
"Well don't ask me, but they obviously are up to no good." The woman griped and she starting pulling what Lucy was sure was a weapon out of her belt.
"Oh, no, no, no, no, no." The Doctor said, he and Lucy raising up their arms in peace. "We came here by accident, my ship was pulled here. Now, to save time, I'm the Doctor and this is Lucy Blake. And who, might I ask are you?" The woman looked irritated at being addressed so on her own ship. Or Lucy assumed it was her ship.
The man grinned however and stuck out his hand for them. "I'm James McElroy and this is Trina Barton. Welcome to the Intrepid, Doctor, Lucy Blake." Lucy smiled. She couldn't help herself in this man's presence. He was infectious. His comradeship with this Trina Barton person would be comical if it weren't so archetypical. "Anyway, I don't care how you got on here, but you did and that's all that mattered. It can be done. The cycle can be interrupted, Trina and that means we can go home."
The Doctor frowned, finally lowering his arms. "What do you mean, "the cycle?" Exactly how far from home are you?"
"We're from Earth." James offered, "I'm guessing you're off-worlders. Anyway, we got sent out here, on what was apparently a wild-goose-chase, as the old saying goes. Me and Trina sorta ticked off the wrong people and they sent us on a special mission to get us out of their hair. Looks like we found out too much about what Torchwood was up to and they panicked."
"Torchwood?" the Doctor's interest was piqued now. James and Trina only nodded.
"Does the cycle have anything to do with the rooms moving?" Lucy asked. James looked at her and gave her that grin again.
"She's a clever one, isn't she? You're right, Lucy, the cycle is the rooms changing round. It's totally random. Sometimes a whole day will go by without a shift and sometimes it'll be every few minutes. There's no order and no way to predict it."
"What exactly is this mission that Torchwood sent you on?" The Doctor asked, walking round the control panel room now. This time, it was Trina who spoke.
"We were to go to the Andromeda Galaxy and find this dust, it's called Life Matter. No one knows what exactly it does, but Torchwood is after it, and to keep us silent about it, they let us have a hand in it. Well, we found the bloody dust, and put it in a storage closet. Trouble is, we haven't been able to find the closet. This was about a week ago. "
"But we just came from the storage cupboard! Doctor, did you notice anything that looked like, like Life Matter, is that what it is?" The Doctor was shaking his head.
"No, I didn't. I was preoccupied with the T.A.R.D.I.S., it keeps doing things like this."
"Doctor, maybe it was the Life Matter. Maybe that's what pulled us here. Didn't you tell me that sometimes life sort of…interferes with what's already going on? Not like fate, not really, just guidelines that are more persistent?" The Doctor almost smiled at Lucy, but instead said,
"Oh, that's perfect! It's the Life Matter that pulled us here, into the very cupboard where it was stored! Trina, James, you said you know nothing about it. How much is nothing?"
James looked sheepish and said, "Well, there are rumours. Supposedly, the Life Matter is telepathic and can communicate with people at will, but only if it so chooses. You can't ask it any questions, it can just tell you what it wants to. And it can't lie." The Doctor and Lucy looked at each other, glances that held both fear and wonder.
"This is the main control room, yes?" the Doctor said, thinking, running his hands through his hair, making it stand up in all directions. James nodded and Trina said,
"Yeah. We wanted to come here to see if we could somehow stop the rooms from moving, but we have no idea how. We think we can stop this room from moving, but not all the others. And besides, we have no way of actually stopping it." James and Trina looked somewhat hopeless. Lucy's and the Doctor's faces, however, were nothing short of jubilant. Trina was looking at them like they were mad and then Lucy laughed as the Doctor pulled out his sonic screw driver.
"Lucky for you, James McElroy and Trina Barton, I have a sonic screwdriver. Now, this little handy gadget is good for many things. It's best at opening doors, and- and this is a big and, locking things." Lucy bit her lip, trying not to look like she was mocking James and Trina. The Doctor trained the screw driver on the heart of the control panel and the metallic buzzing told her all was in working order. In a matter of seconds, the panel gave one surge and then went completely dim.
"You've killed it! You've killed the Intrepid, now we'll never get home!" wailed James.
"No, no, don't be silly, I'd never do a thing like that. I did just what you and Trina said. Locked this room so that only the other rooms can move. There are two doors in this chamber and I say we start opening these doors. We only need two people which means that two of us can sit back and make tea. I love good pot of tea." Lucy rolled her eyes at James who laughed and headed for the doors he and Trina had come through. When neither Trina nor the Doctor made to walk, Lucy took I upon herself to try the other door, the one she and the Doctor had come through.
Lucy found the laundry room first, just a single washer and dryer tumbling away. "I've got the boiler room!" called James.
"Nothing over here!" Lucy shouted back to him. Next Lucy found a stateroom, and James and office.
Then Lucy found the boiler room again and James just a long hallway. Lucy wondered how many rooms this ship could possibly have after she and James had opened their doors ten times apiece. Finally, "I've got it!" Lucy screamed in triumph and joy. James, the Doctor and Trina came rushing over into the cupboard. The space was limited as the T.A.R.D.I.S. was taking up a lot of room.
"We probably don't have much time." Trina reminded them. "The rooms could move again at minute."
Lucy had no idea what the Life Matter would look like, or even whether or not it was contained. There
Weren't many places for it to hide though, and she though one of them must find it soon, before their
chance of escape was gone. Lucy squeezed herself in between the ship and the wall of the cupboard, as the only one that would fit.
Her hand scraped against something cylindrical. Closing her fist round it and pulling it up she could see-
"Is this it?" she asked. Lucy was holding a plastic container that was about fifteen centimeters long and
only three wide. James' and Trina's sort of awed silence confirmed her assumption. Lucy and the others gazed into it, gold particles, indeed like dust were floating about inside. They weren't really bouncing off each other, but it looked as though they were mingling. Like each little tiny particle was conscious. And perhaps they were, Lucy thought. James had said that they could speak telepathically. And then, deep in her head, in a voice that sounded like her own but was so different, "Lucy Blake. The universe has waited a long time for you. And soon, you will become a part of it in a way you never knew was possible." Lucy knew she didn't need to speak aloud and found herself thinking,
"What do you mean? What's going to happen to me?"
"Life as you know it will change forever. The Lucy Blake you have come to know yourself as will disappear forever. What you will decide to do with your future is up to you. You have been told by many people that you have a latent ability to survive. That you will overcome all, and that you will survive that which would crumble others. This is all true. You will have a many choices to make, Lucy, and not many wise people will envy you. We wish you luck, Lucy."
And before she could think another thing, the canister was being wrenched out of her hands. She'd had the sense that the Life Matter had finished speaking to her anyway and wouldn't answer any of the billion questions she had racing through her mind. Could she even ask the Doctor about any of this? It all seemed like it was meant just for her, but how could she keep all this to herself?
Lucy watched as Trina was carrying the Life Matter back across the threshold. She felt the ground under her churning and knew that the rooms were about to shift. The Doctor grabbed her hand and pulled across to the main room. At the same time, he trained the sonic screw driver on the floor panel connecting the main room to the cupboard. To his immense relief, it held. He wouldn't have to spend hours looking for his ship. They were close to a wall and he put his hand up against it, backing her up. He leaned down toward her and said, "The Life Matter spoke to you, didn't it?" Lucy only nodded, not sure what she could and couldn't say. She was sure that she was free to disclose as much or as little information as she wanted. But how could she even explain any of it?
"Listen, before you ask, I couldn't really make much sense of what it said, and I don't think you could either. All I know is, it talked about…about my survival. Wherever we go, Doctor, this follows us and I don't think I like it." From the look on the Doctor's face, he didn't like it either.
"It said I was going to change. That the person I know myself as would be gone. Am I going to die, Doctor?" she tried to keep the fear out of her voice, but knew that she couldn't. Not with him. He pulled her into a quick hug and kissed the top of her head. He then turned back to James and Trina and said,
"Are you two gonna be all right, getting back to Earth? I could give you a lift in my ship." He gestured toward the blue box which got a dubious look from Trina and an intrigued one from James.
"I think we'll be just fine, Doctor. And thanks for all your help, both of you. And don't worry; we'll make sure Torchwood knows that we'll deal with them if they have any ill will toward the life matter." The Doctor and Lucy nodded as the opened the door to their salvation. They stood on the threshold, saying a proper goodbye for once.
"Will we see you again?" James asked, looking pointedly at Lucy. She shook her head sadly and said,
"I don't think so, sorry. It's a crazy life we lead." And with that, they turned and shut the door on the Intrepid. Lucy was left with more questions than ever, but thought that they could wait a little while. In the back of her mind, she heard the Doctor saying something about the Medusa Cascade. Lucy smiled at him and tried not to think about the Life Matter. What would come would come, right?
At any rate, what the Doctor promised would be the most beautiful thing she would ever see was waiting for her. And whatever else was waiting for her, she could have this, and for a while at least, him.
