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Lucy was leaning over the control panel, head on her hands, fingers drumming against her chin. Her eyes darted here and there. She couldn't concentrate long enough on one thing. She couldn't focus. She, her sister and the Doctor were trying to think of a way to stop the Stratomorphs before they killed everyone in the country.
So far Lucy had thought of several ideas that were completely worthless, and most, downright stupid. If they could somehow get a giant dome to cover Great Britain, then the Stratomorphs would not be able to gain control over their weather. Never mind the fact that a giant dome did not exist and would never work, they would just go someplace else and kills thousands more.
They could find a way to get beamed onto the ship without getting turned into mist. This idea was the soundest, albeit most dangerous. But how on earth would they ever get on board? Without dying before they reached the door, that is.
They could call a meeting with the aliens and try to reason with them. So far in Lucy's traveling, she'd actually had to do little real fighting. Rarely had she ever used force, opting for the most part to use her brain and her surroundings. She knew that this would never work though. They wanted fuel and there were perfect resources right here. Why go anywhere else?
They could kill them all. Lucy didn't know how and she didn't like the idea. But more and more, she was beginning to figure that this was the only way to be rid of them and to ensure that more people didn't die because of them. But how right was it to kill in the name of saving life? Didn't that make her no better than them?
Lucy sighed gustily as she thought up useless, hare-brained ideas. No one had spoken in quite a long while. Juliet looked as if she had given up thinking altogether. She kept staring out the small windows, biting her lip and tiling her head like she and her twin always did. That worried, pained look never left her face. Lucy knew that Juliet was the least comfortable in this room. While she could travel the Earth and leap without looking, these were places she did not like to go. Juliet preferred trekking in India and South Africa to being chased by aliens and monsters on some planet she had never heard of. She preferred her own time period, having always lived quite in the present. Lucy knew that in the back of Juliet's mind that she could have been saved a lot of sleepless nights if the Doctor had never come into their lives. Lucy knew all this, but she also knew that her sister loved her, trusted her and respected her. The twins wanted each other's happiness above all. And Lucy felt selfish for putting her life with the Doctor before Juliet's peace of mind.
Lucy had to snap herself back to the matter at hand. Enough. Juliet has given you her blessing, she thought. Keep thinking about what you need to do to get the Stratomorphs out of the picture. Lucy, having finished mentally scolding herself, ran over her scattered plans in her head again. Rubbish, all rubbish. She let her eyes wander over to the Doctor. How magnificent he looked standing there, leaning with his back to the railing of the ship. His chin was resting between his thumb and forefinger, the elbow of that arm resting on the hand of his other. His dark eyes were hard, concentrating, constantly thinking. He had a better idea than she did, she just knew. It was in his blood, in everything he was. He was action and thought and pragmatism and spontaneity all rolled into one.
And speaking of pragmatism, Lucy was losing her mind. Aliens were hovering over her city and all she could think about was how nice the Doctor looked all brooding. She shook her head and stood up, stretching. She heard the cracks in her back that told her she'd been in one position for too long. She cracked her neck next and looked back over at her twin. Their eyes met and each echoed the look of resigned desperation in the other's face. How would they get out of this? What could they possibly do to help? They were miles above Earth, out of reach of the Stratomorphs who would be concentrated only on what was below.
Patrick Pascal was huddled in his living room with the rest of his family. His older sister was home from University. He looked over at Michelle, the sister who'd tormented him as a child. Their rivalries had been typical, but now he regretted them. What had he missed in those years of putting frogs in her bed, of trading her shampoo with paste? Did she regret freezing his underwear or "accidentally" throwing away all of his comic books? Their gazes locked and he knew she was thinking the same thing.
There was no reason to start thinking like this now. The people who'd disappeared had all been outside and it was somehow connected to the rain. Out of the corner of his eye, he'd seen a man walking down the street. When he turned to look at him fully, he was gone and there was a hazy mist floating up into the sky. Patrick had always been told that he was imaginative, that he was…creative. Now he wished that this was only a story he'd concocted in his head. He wished he could make it all go away.
Patrick's parents were sitting on the sofa with his sister. Regina and Harrold had been loving, wonderful parents. They'd guided him, encouraged him and kicked his arse into gear when he needed it. Why couldn't Patrick stop thinking things like this? He didn't know for sure that he was going to die. He was safe inside his house, away from the rain.
Suddenly, the rain intensified and howling winds lapped at the house. A monsoon could have been introduced to London for all the water that was rising so quickly outside. So quickly in fact, that water was seeping in under the crack of the front door. The wind roared outside and sounded as if it had turned into a monster that would burst through the walls at any moment.
The wind didn't burst through the walls. It crashed the ceiling in, shingles and other hardware falling heavy around the Pascal family. They all huddled closer together, Patrick moving from the armchair to cling to his sister and mother. He grasped his father's hand over their backs. The wind continued roaring and then the rain came pouring into their open house.
Patrick wondered what he had been so scared about. This rain was warm, even if it was pounding down on him quite severely. His skin even felt tingly and prickly, indeed, he felt as though he was being lit from within. He was sure his face had relaxed now from that scrunched mask of terror it had been. Looking at his family, he saw that they were serene as well. The last thing Patrick Pascal thought before he floated up into the sky as atoms in mist, was that he was do glad to have his family together like this.
Lucy and Juliet Blake were pressed against the windows of the T.A.R.D.I.S. Through them they could see that the Stratomorphs were beaming people up more and more frequently. A golden haze surrounded the ship before being sucked into it. The haze was always quickly replaced by another ethereal cloud.
"Doctor, they're accelerating!" Lucy cried to him. He came over to stand behind them, worry plastered all over his face.
"Oh, Doctor, what are we going to do?" Juliet pleaded, once again placing her hand around her throat.
He was shaking his head when he started and pulled something from his pocket. He was looking down at the psychic paper with growing curiosity. Lucy's own eyes widened and she waited, barely breathing, for him to tell her what was happening now.
He stared for a long while at the paper, expressions ranging from confusion to anger, from doubt to hope, from suspicion to excitement. He then looked up at Lucy and he smiled. "Well, we don't need to worry about getting their attention. They know we're here." He exclaimed triumphantly. Lucy did not see how this was cause for celebration. She looked over at Juliet and knew that she concurred. The Doctor was looking from one to the other, each time hoping to see a flicker of hope. He got no such reward.
"Oh, don't you see? They've asked us to come on board to negotiate. They know who I am and-"
"And what?" Lucy asked, face solemn. "And they promise not to hurt us? They promise they won't zap us into dust just as soon as we let our guard down? They swear they won't cause any harm to the T.A.R.D.I.S. or to anyone else down on Earth until we're through? I'm sorry, Doctor, I don't trust them. Not as far as I can throw them." Juliet was nodding her agreement and the Doctor looked exasperated.
"Well does either of you have a better plan?" he queried, a single eyebrow raised. Lucy bit her lip. She was not about to share her giant dome idea with him.
"Fine." She said resignedly. "We'll go. We'll negotiate." The Doctor grinned that cheeky crooked grin of his at her and arranged for the T.A.R.D.I.S. to fly on board the Stratomorph's ship.
Lucy and Juliet were still quite reticent about the whole thing. Neither of them really wanted to walk out onto that alien ship. Both of them wanted to act like they were six years old and plant themselves on the ground, throwing a fit until the Doctor dragged them bodily from the T.A.R.D.I.S. Both of them knew better than to do that.
The ship was not as stark as Lucy would have imagined. Strange tentacle beings, like jellyfish, floated in the air, translucent bodies reflecting the floodlights all round them. The lighting was all soft pastels, the furniture padded and upholstered. The Stratomorphs themselves were something to behold.
They were all quite different. Some looked quite like fish, their bluish grey skin more like scales than anything else. These had large yellow eyes and even openings on their necks that looked somewhat like gills. Some were like rocks and ice. Their skin and hair were white and grey and silver, their eyes black and hard. They seemed as if they'd be made of stone. Some were mere waifs of beings. Their long grey hair whipped about them constantly though there was no breeze. They seemed to shimmer and disappear in certain lights. They're eyes were almost always closed and Lucy had yet to get a good enough look to tell what colour they were. Each and every being, however, was clothed in a robe of either white or grey. It took Lucy a moment, but she realised that they all resembled weather patterns and traits. None of them seemed hostile, the icy ones a bit cold and indifferent, yes, but nonetheless unassuming. One being strode toward them, one of the rain/fish like creatures. He seemed as though he would be male, the features sterner, harder. He approached them with open arms and was actually smiling at them. Lucy and Juliet were behind the Doctor and on either side of him. They both stood up as tall as they could, for every one of these people was quite towering. The Doctor himself had his chest back, his fists clenched and his jaw set. Lucy loved this pose in him. He looked so lordly, so…Time Lordly.
"Welcome, friends. We are so glad that you accepted our plea to come here and negotiate about all this." He looked now at the twins, turning benignly from one to the other. "I can understand how hard it has been for you, hearing about people going missing. You must be quite angry with us. But you must understand, my dears, that we would not be here unless we had absolutely no other choice. No other planet is as teeming with life as this one. And you are all so young, so ripe. The fuel that your species has provided us will last us such a long time. Isn't that nice? We won't be back for hundreds of years and then you both will be dead by then."
Juliet launched herself at the man, held back just in time by the Doctor. He had his arms wrapped round her waist as she strained and kicked and bared her teeth at the horrible creature before her. Lucy herself was quite livid. To say all those terrible things while smiling at them, treating them as if they were children!
The creature chuckled and actually went to pat Juliet on the head. When she made as if to bite him, he withdrew his hand. He looked over at Lucy and his smile grew wider.
"Oh yes, so young, the lot of you. But, my dear, perhaps I was too quick, too rash when I included you in with your sister and the rest of the human race. Because you are older in some ways than most. And you have come through so much…."
"Let me guess." Lucy interjected. "You're about to tell me how I'm built to withstand, to survive. Well if that's true, then I'll use all that power to stop you."
The creature laughed to himself again, some of the other Stratomorphs joining in. In an instant, the man changed. His blue gray skin was replaced by ice white hardness. His eyes were frigid black and his smile had been swapped for a twisted sneer. Lucy knew that the "morph" part of "Stratomorph" did not only mean changing weather. The aliens themselves changed how they looked and acted. They projected their moods and wishes onto the canvases below them.
The air sizzled and popped with cracking electric energy. A storm was brewing. "Arrogant human, yes you are all the same. Think you can change the world, do you? Think you can stop the Stratomorphs? Well, where hundreds of others have failed, we will take the humans and defeat the Doctor! Yes, Doctor, we know all about you. We know about your words and your deeds. We know that Earth is your favourite planet. So here are our terms. Here is the negotiation. We will leave the Earth alone and not absorb another human right now."
The Doctor's lip was curling. Something bad was about to happen. They'd spoken of defeating him. How could they do that if they turned tail?
"Yes, Doctor, no questions asked, we will go now…if….if you give us a different source of fuel."
"And what would that be?"
"Give us the heart of the T.A.R.D.I.S."
The Doctor's face fell. Lucy looked worried, but she didn't exactly know what the Heart was.
"You don't even know what you're talking about. You don't know how the Heart works. Absorbing its energy brings great power, yes. But it also brings death."
"We know what we ask for, Doctor, and we will have one or the other. So what will it be, your favourite planet, or your beloved ship? Your love or your life?"
This was not the first time the Doctor had to make such a horrible choice. A500 had asked him to choose between Lucy and Coryn, had told him he must condemn one of them to die. This was the same, only magnified by a billion.
"You so willingly brought your T.A.R.D.I.S. here, Doctor. Do you really want the destruction of yet another planet, yet another genocide on your conscience?" Now that was just plain unfair. Take the thing that he hated most about himself, the thing he'd been running from all these years and just throw it in his face. Open the wounds and pour salt in them. He bristled and shuddered as he stood there, debating. If he lost the T.A.R.D.I.S., he lost everything. If he lost the Earth, he lost everything. Or maybe not. Lucy and Juliet were right here with him-no, he couldn't even begin to think like that. He would never sacrifice those lives for his own wishes.
But how would he ever help anyone again if the T.A.R.D.I.S. was gone?
Just then, some commotion from within his beloved ship. Captain Jack Harkness rushed out from the doors, holding something that looked like a capsule. Inside it swirled golden orange energy, bursting with knowledge and power. If Lucy had to take one guess, she'd bet it was the heart of the T.A.R.D.I.S.
"Stratomorphs! I have the heart of the T.A.R.D.I.S. condensed here in an Energy Neutralizing Capsule. If I release it, or tell you how to release it, you have your fuel. You can leave the Earth in peace." Dozens of pairs of eyes stared at the seemingly young captain. How the hell had he gotten here, Lucy wondered?
The Doctor held out his hand, eyes burning towards Jack. "What on Earth have you done? The T.A.R.D.I.S. is dead forever if you give that to them. They'll only kill us."
"But they won't kill everyone else on Earth, Doctor." The two shared a poignant look and then both looked at Lucy and Lucy knew that some understanding passed between them, some unspoken plan. How she would like to be included right about now. "Jack, I'll kill you if I have to." Lucy started at the Doctor's words, but knew that it must be part of their plan. The leader of the Stratomorphs had sheer, twisted rapture on his face.
"Then you give me no choice, Doctor." Jack lunged forward, around the Doctor who leapt for him and missed. He watched in horror (mock horror?) as Jack turned the capsule and aimed it at…Lucy? She gasped and could only stare as white-orange energy sailed toward her. She had no idea what would happen when it hit.
She felt the air rush out of her lungs and her skull felt like it was cracking apart. But wait, she hadn't absorbed the heart of the T.A.R.D.I.S. No, Juliet had shoved her out of the way at the last minute, shoved her right to the floor. Lucy stared up at her twin, tears in her eyes. Such understanding and wisdom had settled in her sister's face. She turned slowly, as if possessed and faced the Stratomorphs. They were all gathered in front of her, like children at assembly. She tilted her head up and closed her eyes.
Juliet Blake knew what she had to do. Behind her, she heard the Doctor gathering Jack, Lucy and himself into his ship. Lucy was not going quietly and so Juliet used her new found powers to make it happen. The heart of the T.A.R.D.I.S. bestowed one with the gift to grant her own wishes. So Lucy and the others were shut safely inside the blue box. The Stratomorphs were preparing to leave, were staring in abject fear of her power. The whole ship was creaking around them like it would fall apart. That was Juliet. She'd break the ship if they didn't turn round, leave now and never return. They knew all this and were complying. She felt strong hands on her, pulling her into the T.A.R.D.I.S. This energy was consuming her and she knew she was going to die.
Jack Harkness was busy trying to absorb the Heart back out of Juliet. It would kill her. He couldn't die. That had been his reasoning all along. Well, he'd planned for Lucy to take the heart, hadn't counted on her sister shoving her out of the way. The Doctor hadn't been happy about the whole thing, but knew that they had no other choice. His mouth on Juliet's, like he was giving her CPR, or kissing her, Jack drew out the Heart. He could feel the energy passing to him, like fire going down his throat. It was already burning him up. He saw Juliet's eyes open before his world went black.
Lucy was still wiping tears from her eyes when Jack came back to life. "Didn't you know I can't die, Lucy?" he chided her.
"Of course I did. I'm crying because you almost got my sister killed!"
"And I'm crying because you meant to have all that heaped on my sister!" Juliet supplied. The Doctor just chortled. The twins were being over-dramatic on purpose.
"Juliet, why did you shove me out of the way?"
"Twin, I'd have done anything to help you, to save you. You're so busy saving the world all the time, someone's got to look after you. Besides, the Doctor said that no one knows exactly what the heart does. And, and people do keep talking about how you can survive and how you're going to change. I thought that maybe this was it. That either, this would be the thing that would kill you, or change you, or both, or whatever's supposed to happen. And I thought I'd stop it." Lucy stared open-mouthed at her sister. Dear lord, what if she was right? Had Lucy been destined to absorb the heart of the T.A.R.D.I.S.? To be changed that way?
"The heart wouldn't have changed you, Lucy, it would have killed you if we'd let it alone. That's why Jack planned all along to absorb it back out, die, and then come back to life." The Doctor gave Lucy a fixed stare. He was pleading with her silently to not be angry with him, to forgive him for gambling with the circumstances like that. She couldn't leave him out to dry.
Lucy rose from the floor, and though her head was still pounding and her back was surely covered in bruises and her ribs were on fire, she threw herself at the Doctor, enveloping him a tight hug. He hugged her back, careful not to squeeze her too hard. Jack and Juliet stared at them for a while and when they finally let each other go, Lucy went back to her sister to hug her.
Whatever was supposed to happen, hadn't happened, or did happen, they still had each other. The Stratomorphs were gone and the rain had cleared. The T.A.R.D.I.S, its heart back inside it, was content to orbit the Earth for a while. Juliet put the kettle on and they all gathered round the console, on the floor like children.
"Wait a second, Jack." The Doctor suddenly spouted.
"Where the hell did you come from, how did you get into the T.A.R.D.I.S.?" Captain Jack looked sheepish and said,
"Got another short-range teleport from Torchwood. I used it to get to the Stratomorph's ship and then you showed up. I listened to everything everyone said and it just occurred to me. Take the choice away from you, make the Stratomorphs think they've won." Jack looked quite pleased with himself. Lucy and Juliet bit back smiles as the Doctor frowned at him.
"Remind me to tell Torchwood to never let you within a hundred meters of anyone who knows how or where to get a short-range teleport."
