CHAPTER 6: At Death's Door

Paper. Books. Furniture. All of it was everywhere.

Standing in Joseph's destroyed office, Rory and Amy looked around for an indication - something, anything - that might suggest where to begin their search. But it was useless; the entire room was equally upended, broken. Flung about by a wild hand. Carnage was strewn from corner to corner, where one clump of debris looked about as helpful as the next.

"Well," said Rory, "Housekeeping's not going to like this."

Amy gave a light chuckle, and Rory smiled - partly from Amy's positive reaction, and partly from the sheer helplessness of the situation. What else could he do? An orderly office might point towards a frequently used item, or a lack of dust around an area where it was allowed to settle; clues that would lead to something of significance. But this… this was like looking for an extremely messy needle in an extremely messy haystack.

They stepped further into the room, casting out an occasional foot to toe over an ornament here, a stack of binder folders there. As they cleared the way forth, Amy spied what appeared to be a vertical wooden structure - almost some kind of barrier, about waist high and of decent thickness - towards the back of the room, sticking out from a floor of mess. She approached, bending down to excavate it from the surrounding debris, only to find that it was joined to a solid rectangular block at the base. A moment of confusion passed before Amy realised what she was looking at.

"Rory! Help me turn this over!"

He went to where she was standing. "Grab it there," she said, pointing to a position opposite her. "One, two, three!"

Together, they lifted the thing out of the rubble and, right way up, it revealed its true form: Joseph's upended, solid oak desk. Pushing it back upon its wide, sturdy base, the surface - thick and heavy - revealed a smattering of fist-sized indentations, cratered by splinters of wood. If the state of their surroundings didn't demonstrate it, here was clear evidence of the strength and the fury that this office once contained.

"Note to self," Rory said, running a finger into one of the heavy dents. "Stay out of this guy's way."

He looked at Amy, who greeted his gaze with fond eyes. "Thank you," she said simply, with a smile.

"For what?"

"For being you. In the middle of all this mess and danger, you're still you. And that means more to me than you'll ever know."

A bashful expression crossed Rory's face. "If there's one thing I can be, it's me."

"I'm glad," she said, moving towards him. "Because goodness knows there's more than enough of me right now."

Amy looked at Rory to gauge his reaction; his face fell ever so slightly, eyes suddenly elsewhere, as though they were avoiding direct contact. Seriousness overtook the lighthearted banter, and Amy's heart thumped cold. She repositioned herself so Rory couldn't help but look at her, and reached down to take a hand of his into her own.

"Rory," she said. "You do know which is the real me, don't you?"

It was the longest of pauses.

Seeking to escape her gaze, Rory glanced to his side, down to the desk… and something at its edge caught his attention. One of the fierce poundings on its surface had caused a drawer, once flush against the thickness of the wood, to protrude outwards at a jarring angle. "Look at this," he said.

He gave the drawer a firm pull, then another, and slowly worked it against the broken housing that compressed upon it from within. Eventually he managed to force it open, and he peered inside before fishing out its contents: a remote control, littered with buttons. Immediately, Amy recognised the device. "The first meeting," she said, snapping her fingers as she recalled that moment. "The TV!"

They both looked to the wall that housed the room's enormous video panel. Miraculously, it had escaped the brunt of Joseph's rage, sporting only a spiderweb crack in one corner, but appearing otherwise intact. Rory peered at the remote in his hands, held his breath, and pressed a button; sure enough, the panel came to life with a full-colour test pattern. "Shall we see if the cricket's on?" Rory joked.

"How about more of those surveillance tapes," said Amy. "Like the ones Joseph showed us earlier. Look around for a menu. Maybe there's some sort of archive here."

Rory inspected the buttons, eventually finding one marked with an appropriate icon. Pressing it produced an on-screen list of folders with a range of mundane and routine names.

ROSTER

MAINTENANCE

BACKUPS

One, however, clearly stood out:

PRIVATE

Rory opened it and discovered a list of video files, ordered by date and each with varying run times. He selected the first one, the earliest, and the screen immediately changed - a burst of static preceded a glimpse of what appeared to be the tight confines of a space shuttle cockpit. The camera's view swung around to reveal Joseph Banks, a few years younger than the suave, slick Banks that had greeted the three of them, and as he aimed the camera to himself at arm's length, he gave a faint smile.

"Well, I'm alive," he said down the lens. "But after that rough landing, I don't want to take anything for granted. So from this point on, it's video diaries of the entire expedition. Uhh…" He searched for what to say next. "I'm off the grid, somewhere in the Nhire sector. I've landed on some backwater rock - absolutely nothing here. Red dust as far as the eye can see. I'll suit up and take a look outside. There's a scattering of white fragments not far from here, which seems as good a place to start as any. Wish me luck…"

"He documented the whole thing," Amy said. "From the moment he arrived."

Rory nodded. "I think we've found our info mine. Let's play the rest."

The recording cut to static, and Rory moved on to the next video in the list. The timeline seemed to skip ahead, for this time Joseph, once again aiming the camera at himself, looked drenched with sweat at he stood in near-total darkness. "I finally managed to break through," he said between heaving breaths, each word echoing off distant walls of rock. "It's a cavern. An absolutely enormous cavern. And look at this." He swung the camera around to reveal a slight shimmering in the distance; flickers of gold, crimson, aqua, and brilliant white light all cascading downwards in an endless flow of energy. "I've got to check it out."

Static. The next video. The same location, but total silence.

Joseph's gaze looked stunned, distant. He just stared down into the camera, not knowing what to say, not knowing how to say it. He swallowed. "I don't believe it," he said finally, simply. "The flow... it... Well…" And by way of explanation, Joseph turned the camera's view around to a lone figure standing in front of the mysterious energy stream.

A second Joseph.

It - he - looked wordlessly down the camera's barrel before giving an awkward wave, and the view whipped around once more to focus back to the original Joseph. "He's me. He's exactly me." He looked at his copy, and a touch of suspicion infiltrated his amazement. "And that's exactly why I'll need to watch him constantly."

Static. The next video.

Lit by harsh fluorescent light, Joseph sat back against the crammed walls of his ship. "It's been a week," he said to the camera. "No adverse signs or symptoms from the copy." He paused, then chuckled. "Honestly, after all this time, it's good to have someone to talk to. Even if he does know the punchlines to all my jokes. But more than that, this discovery - this success - is more than enough reason for me to establish a permanent residence here. I need a proper base of operations. Proper facilities. A way to research what I've found, and to work out ways to harness it." Joseph paused. "But I'm going to need some help. A lot of help…"

Static. The next video.

Exposed beams. Wires. Pipes. Welding torches sent a shower of sparks into the air as Joseph panned the camera across two, three, four, five people, each working on various aspects of construction. As one turned to wipe the sweat from his brow, and another lifted his welding mask, it was clear that not only had enough time passed for Joseph to ship materials and commence working them into the beginnings of an established building, but that Joseph had made more copies of himself.

"Many hands make light work," he said from behind the camera, sounding a little out of breath. "These extra copies have been a huge help. And it got me thinking - there's a way to use this. To market this. Humanity's always looking for the next source of cheap labour. If I can get one of those Ood things and undercut the current market… well, that'd just be the beginning."

Static. The next video.

From Joseph's dramatic change in age and appearance, it looked like years had passed between video entries. "They're growing," he said, licking dry lips. "There's good days and bad days, and lately it's been more of the bad ones. I've got some medical equipment lined up for the next shuttle, so as soon as I'm able I'll do a biopsy and see what I'm dealing with."

Static. The next video.

An extremely pale, sweaty Joseph addressed the camera. "It's getting worse. The pain, the nausea, the shortness of breath. And I'm afraid the lack of a dedicated medical team here limits my prospects. The mind is willing, but the body is… dying."

Static. The next video.

Sitting at his oak desk and sporting a few extra wrinkles, Joseph tenderly held a photo frame in his hands. Wordless moments passed as he just sat there, looking at it. Finally, he spoke - and when he did, it was barely a whisper.

"I honestly don't know how long these tumours are going to give me… so I've asked that she come here." He took a deep breath. "If not to say hello, then to say goodbye. In any case, I can't be without her any longer. The comms room is finally finished, so I sent her my coordinates via a secure channel."

And Joseph smiled. He smiled the biggest smile one could ever look to see from another person. He heaved a happy sigh.

"She said she's on her way. My fiancée is coming." He checked his watch, still smiling. "See you in three years, Annette."

Amy turned to Rory. "He has a fiancée? But he said—"

"He said he wasn't married. Didn't say anything about being engaged."

Amy didn't respond.

Static. The next video.

Joseph was once again at his desk, where the evident passage of time had allowed a number of feint bulges to form on his face. Clearly, he was growing sicker. But it was the presence of a second person - a non-Joseph person - that attracted the most attention. Joining him in the camera's frame was a woman: long, flowing red hair, and wearing a simple white dress.

"She's here!" Joseph said, ecstatic beyond belief. "She's here! I have my Annette! Say hi!"

The woman waved at the camera. "Hello!" she said cheerfully, giving Joseph a kiss on the cheek.

Rory looked at Amy. "Hey, she kind of looks like you."

Amy wrinkled her nose in response. "She does not! She's old!"

"Well, the hair part at least. Same colour, same length."

That much was true, and try as she might, Amy could not deny it. The similarity was remarkable, and through squinted eyes or an obscured angle, one could easily be mistaken for the other.

Same colour, same length.

"Amy. You're… dead."

Back in the communications room, the Doctor and Amy stood stone cold. Those words. Their message. Their tone of disbelief. But more than that - their speaker. Both of them had heard it before; that same, distinct quirk of random word repetition. There weren't many others who spoke that way, certainly none that the Doctor had encountered. And as he bent down to the microphone, he realised that could only mean one thing.

"Miranda?"

The speakers crackled, and the reply came through only in distorted fragments. "…all dead… …unusual life readings— … —anned the re— … —ow are you alive?"

The Doctor furiously tweaked the controls, trying to gain control of the fading signal. "Miranda? Stay with me - stay on this frequency!"

"…—RDIS. I'll find y—"

The crackling overtook the audio feed, drowning out any words that might have come through, then cut out to total silence. The signal was gone.

The Doctor thumped the panel in frustration, then whipped around to look Amy in the eye with a laser-focused stare. "That sounded like her, didn't it? That voice?"

Amy wrinkled her brow. "I guess?"

"Don't guess - guessing's the party game you play when people are getting dull." He gripped Amy by the shoulders. "You heard what I heard. You know that voice. Do you think it was her?"

She thought it over. "But I don't see how—"

"Neither do I!" The Doctor threw his hands in the air. "We saw her die, Amy. We saw her in pieces. That couldn't have been her, that shouldn't have been her. Except it was." He let his words hang in the room, in order to consider their full weight. "An impossible moment," he said in wonder.

Wonder, however, turned on its heel to seriousness as the Doctor regained his focus.

"We're leaving," he said firmly. "Now."

Static. The next video.

Joseph's happiness had now given way to something more melancholy. He sat at his desk, alone. "She wants me to go back with her," he said. "To leave all I've created here and return home. And any other day, I would. I love her. I want to be with her. But… but I don't think I can go. Not yet. An Ood came through on the last shuttle, so it's time to see if this idea of mine has any weight. There's still so much I want to do before I…"

Joseph sighed with a heavy heart. He couldn't finish.

Static. The next video.

"A resolution," Joseph said, leaning eagerly into the camera. "One that suits us both. Annette is leaving…" As Joseph spoke, she entered the left of the frame to stand at his side. "But she is also staying."

A second Annette appeared, this time from the right.

"You're kidding," said Rory. "He copied her too? Just so he could be with…" Air quotes punctuated his last word. "'Her'?"

Static. The next video.

This time, Joseph's face was gripped with concern. "The Ood idea is a complete failure," he said grimly. "The original specimen was taken down to the energy flow, exposed to it, and produced copies. But as soon as the copies were shifted from the flow to here, they went… they went bad. Violently bad." He wiped his brow. "It took eighteen of me to get them out of the airlock; I lost five in the process. As to why it happened, all I've got at the moment are theories. It could be that the duplication process doesn't fully support Ood biology, and introduces an infection among the copies. Or it could be a faulty Ood. Or it could be that all copies, regardless of species, are infected. Which means my staff. Which means… Annette."

Static. The next video.

For the longest time, Joseph just cried. Huge, heaving sobs wracked his entire body, with flowing streams of tears cutting into his wrinkled face. In between breaths, he finally managed to speak. "I had to do it," he cried. "I didn't know which one was her. They both said the same thing, they both looked the same… but I couldn't risk sending the copy back home by mistake. If there's an infection, it needs to stay here, not exposed to a larger population. I didn't know which was which. Each insisted they were the real one. They fought, they tried to head for the ship. I had to… I had to… kill both of them."

With those words, Joseph completely lost it. He cradled his head in folded arms, and howled in anguish. Amy and Rory could only look at the vision open-mouthed. "That poor man," said Amy. "Unthinkable."

Rory didn't know how to respond. Joseph's raw emotion seemed to take the grit off the man that caused his teeth to grind with each obvious move he - well, his copy - made on Amy. "Sympathy for a murderer?" he finally asked.

"Look at him," she said. "Like he had a choice."

Joseph's sobs filled the room. "Go to the next one," pleaded Amy. "It's too much."

Static. The next video.

He looked like a broken man. Physically and emotionally. His face weathered with wrinkles, Joseph talked to the camera stony-faced, his voice containing no emotion. "A day of revelations," he said bitterly, "and a day of setbacks. The Ood produced a fresh batch, but this time instead of keeping it at the flow I sent it to the surface along with the copies. I guess I wanted to see it face to face - the face of constant failure. I… well, there's no polite way to say this. I snapped. I lost it. I took a crowbar and I beat that Ood to death. And then, almost immediately, the new batch turned, just like all the others. They went bad when the original Ood died. Perhaps infection's got nothing to do with it… yet it still doesn't explain why they were turning bad earlier. It still doesn't explain why mine haven't. Yet there's no denying the cause and effect between host death and the change in copy behaviour." He shook his head. "It's a discovery that comes too late for Annette, but one that's key to ensuring the survival of this base and my staff. I need to make some arrangements. First and foremost, however, I'll be needing a fresh Ood."

Static. The next video. And Joseph looked even worse.

His neck swollen, his skin pale and drenched with a sheen of sweat, Joseph struggled to talk to the camera. "I can't take more than a few steps before needing to find somewhere to sit." He gave a sick chuckle. "Had to install a gas chamber to get rid of the bad batches; there's so many of them, and I'm running out of me. Seemed like a more efficient way to deal with them than the airlock. Humane, too, if that's even an appropriate word to use at this point. I don't know. I don't know anything anymore."

Static. The next video.

Now an old man, Joseph sat propped up with giant pillows on a hospital bed, surrounded by machines emitting various beeps and tones. A plastic tube ran into his nose. His greying hair was patchy. He didn't seem to acknowledge the camera. "Effective immediately," he wheezed, "and until further notice, I'm transferring all day-to-day duties to my original copied self. He's still as strong as I was on the day of creation, and throughout the years, he's not aged one bit." He gave a derisive chuckle. "In lieu of an heir, what better way to carry on my legacy than with myself?"

Joseph coughed violently, and a single tear rolled down his cheek. "God, I miss her. I miss her every single day. Why couldn't things be different? We could have gotten married, we could have had the rest of our lives together. Why couldn't she…" He trailed off as the tears overtook his senses. No more words were coming.

Rory looked at Amy in disbelief. "That's why he wanted to copy you? To be the bride he never had?"

She returned his look with one of outrage. "No! The old man wanted his bride! His copies—"

"—are the exact same person he is. Same memories, same feelings. And the moment you stepped up with your red hair and flirty eyes, Joseph's first copy was all over you before you could say 'substitute-ginger-matrimony'."

Rory's words stung into Amy. They hurt. Yet even as she worked through their barbs, she couldn't deny their implication. Of course she noticed Joseph's attention. And, yes, of course, she returned it. What person doesn't want to be desired by another? But here, in this situation - that man, those motives…

"Oh my god," she gaped. "I'm a substitute ginger."

A moment passed before she regained her senses, and promptly dealt a hefty slap to Rory's arm. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"Well, I was—"

Static. The video display cut to a new scene: a high angle looking downwards onto clean, polished steel floors, housed lighting, support beams, girders, robot arms… the array almost looked like the assembly floor of a car factory, filled with various machines and machines all working together. And towards the back of the room, flanked by steel columns set into exposed rock, they could see a shimmering multicoloured stream - the energy flow itself. Evidentially, the entire cavern had undergone significant renovations and upgrades over the years. Here, it looked remarkably streamlined.

"Is this the next video?" asked Amy.

"There's no more," said Rory. "That was the last one. This is live footage."

They looked again, examining the stillness of the scene and recalling how the location was presented to them upon arrival. The meshed walkways had been removed altogether, now incorporating a series of conveyer belts that continued through beyond the edge of the frame. The cavern seemed to have been totally refitted, restructured. Rebuilt to an automated design, requiring not a single human to be present for its operation.

But Rory spotted something. "Look at that," he said as he pointed to the screen. Leaning in, they saw a simple cage dangling on a chain, hanging just to the side of the energy flow and containing a lone humanoid figure behind its bars. Its distant location obscured its details, but they both squinted in further for a closer look.

Sudden movement. A violent, dark shadow entered the frame, moving its limbs with frightening speed. Rory and Amy pulled back in surprise - it was Joseph's primary copy. It - no longer human enough to be considered a 'he' - rushed about the room, sniffing the air. Assessing its surroundings. It looked towards the dangling cage, then turned to look directly at the camera. It growled, then raced towards it, rapidly filling the frame with its torn, rage-filled body, then with its snarling face. Two savage eyes stared down the lens, and a raised fist was visible for only a split second before it was brought forth in a thundering smash. The video feed severed, and the monitor cut to the test pattern.

Rory turned to Amy. "He's down there right now. He's at the energy flow. And the moment he steps into it, he's going to produce more copies."

"More copies of an already savage self," Amy said. "This place is going to be overrun. I think I see now why this planet only had bones and dust before Mr Smooth showed up."

"I knew it," said a voice.

Rory and Amy turned around to see the Doctor and the other Amy standing at the destroyed office door.

"Knew what?" asked Rory.

"How long have you been standing there?" said the Amy standing beside him.

"Long enough to see a good portion of those videos. Long enough to join the dots on why Joseph's Ood always fail."

"What do you mean?" asked Rory. "Joseph said he was still no closer to finding the cause."

The Doctor nodded. "Yes. He did say that. But he didn't realise the answer was staring him in the face - right before he smashed it in."

"I don't follow," said Rory.

"Think about it. Think about the process of duplication. A life form is exposed to the energy flow. Copies are produced. The copies are sent to the surface. The copies then degrade."

"Right, when the host life form dies."

The Doctor clapped his hands. "But not only when the host life form dies!" He grinned, and looked among the three, waiting for penny to drop so they could join him in his knowledge.

It didn't. They didn't. And his face fell into a look of disappointment.

"The energy flow? Its location? Oh, you lot. It's not just about keeping the source alive - that's only part of it. Copies need to be kept within range, too! That Ood is kept down in that cave, but its copies are shipped away, to this base. A not insignificant distance separates them, making the psychic link lose its strength."

"Except for that time when Joseph brought the original Ood up to the surface," an Amy noted. "The source remained with the copies - until he killed it."

"Joseph said the energy flow was like a prism," the Doctor continued, "but really, it's like a transmitter. Think of a radio signal being broadcast - one source reaches many radios. But move too far away from the signal… and you get static."

"And that's what's happening here?" asked Rory.

"Obviously! Not only do you need a live host link, but you need it to be within range. Without either, it's as good as dead. That's why the Ood copies were going baddy-smashy: Joseph only knew that the original Ood needed to be kept alive. He didn't have any clue about proximity."

"That's all great," said the Amy standing beside the Doctor, "and I'm glad we've helped a dead billionaire with his problem, but what about Joseph's main clone? He's down at the energy flow right now, ready to make a whole new army of himself."

"Seems I misjudged that lone wolf," the Doctor said. "His will is strong. Perhaps him being granted the role of the leader trained his mind to be stronger. He's keeping a tighter grip. Perhaps there's still some semblance of intelligence. The way he looked up at the camera, the way he destroyed it, it's like he doesn't want anyone to see what he's going to do." The Doctor paused. "It's like he has a plan."

The Doctor halted mid-thought when the entire room suddenly fell into near total darkness. All ambient noise instantly stopped, replaced by a cavernous, hollow silence. A few wordless seconds passed before a heavy click sounded from somewhere within the walls, and slowly, as some offsite generator gained momentum, a dull red light gradually filled the emergency bulbs overhead, casting the room and its occupants in an flat, eerie hue.

"Hmm…" said the Doctor.

Both Amys looked equally alarmed. "What happened?" they asked in unison.

As quietly as he could, the Doctor tiptoed towards the exposed office door. He spoke slowly, cautiously. "Power's been cut." Poking his head out into the hallway, he saw the same red light stretched out from wall to wall, end to end. "Base-wide, by the looks of it. Emergency lights are making sure we don't bump our heads, but…"

A pause.

"But what?" asked Rory.

The Doctor didn't respond, and as the three approached him he walked a few steps further, out into the red hallway and to one of the many doors that lined its lengths. His face, an expression of concern, turned into instant alarm when he noticed the door's latch.

The handle. It was flicked upwards.

He whipped his head around, left and right, and scanned the rest. Upwards. Upwards. All of them. Terrified, he looked back at Rory and the two Amys. "The electric doors - they're all offline. Every single one is open by default."

Rory's eyes widened. "Even the one to the original Joseph's room?"

"It's a door, it has a latch, it's open. The Josephgaggle in there is free to roam. It's only a matter of time before they…" The Doctor trailed off, not allowing himself to finish that sentence. He pursed his lips. "Come on."

He beckoned the three to his side, and together they hugged the walls of the corridor, creeping along its lengths and controlling the sound of every footstep. The red light bathed the entire facility, making every turn, every hallway, resemble a photographer's darkroom. And it was in that atmosphere where, in the distance, something couldn't help but stand out: a vertical slice of white light was beaming out from an ajar door, with a bulky, heavy steel door positioned right beside it.

The Doctor approached the light and immediately recognised where he was. "This…" He looked at it carefully, and gave the lit door a push with an extended finger. The mechanism, powered down, allowed it to slide open fluidly, and the Doctor poked his head into the room to verify its contents.

"The control room to the gas chamber. And through there," —he pointed to the steel door— "the TARDIS."

An Amy craned her neck to inspect the open room, but the obvious lighting difference caused her to bite her lip with suspicion. "It's fully powered," she noted. "As though someone wanted to drive us here, to this specific spot."

"Yes," the Doctor said simply.

"And you're okay with that."

"No."

"But you're going in anyway."

And by way of an answer, the Doctor stepped into the control booth, leaving the others little option but to follow.

Inside, it looked like the memories of the once-pristine base. A narrow room with spotless white walls and floors was lit from above by a brilliant light. Directly opposite was what logic should class as a control panel, but only a handful of switches were present to offer any sort of control. Four simple buttons were housed in an otherwise blank deck, with a fifth, larger one situated right below. Its form, however - big, red and ominous - was an obvious display of its function, and a clear reminder of the room's purpose.

That reminder was hammered home via the enormous pane of glass that took up the entire far wall, just above the control deck. The Doctor stared inwards: it looked into a larger room, the corners curving upward and leading the eye to dozens of tiny nozzles in the ceiling. Beneath them stood the TARDIS, majestic in the contrast of its royal blue against the spartan white, and now only a few precious feet from the Doctor's reach. And standing beside it…

Standing beside it was a lone Ood.

Calmly, innocently, it stood there, looking at the Doctor with a simple gaze. Bloodied handprints were splattered all over its outfit, creasing the normally crisp grey attire into a mottled mess. Clearly, it had been moved here by—

"Oh no," whispered the Doctor.

Rory heard a shuffling from outside the room. Curious, he stuck his head out and looked down the length of the red hallway - there, standing in the distance, and staring right back at him, was Joseph. The initial copy. Its clothes were tattered and its skin was scratched raw with claw marks, their depth and freshness evident from the blood on its hands. And even from his distant position, Rory could see that its mouth was showcasing a sinister, twisted leer. Almost one of cunning. It made no effort to move; it simply stood there, grinning. Waiting.

Knowing.

"Doctor, he's out there. The Joseph copy."

An Amy turned her head in confusion. "What about his friends?"

"It's just him. He's alone. Doctor?"

He didn't respond. The Doctor looked at the control panel, then at the Ood, then back at the panel. "No," he muttered to himself. "No-no-no-no-no-no…"

Bent right down to the panel, he squinted deep into every crevice of every switch he could find. He ran his finger over a button and put it to his tongue. He pressed his face to the pane of glass that looked into the chamber and peered up into every corner of the room - from left to right, top to bottom, desperately trying to inspect as much as the limited field of vision would allow. He pushed the glass, thumped against it, tested its thickness. He meticulously inspected every possible element in every possible way, all while keeping a cautious eye on that single red button.

The TARDIS.

The Ood.

The only way in.

"Can't you just sonic it open?" asked an Amy.

The Doctor's patience was wearing thin. "Hardwired failsafe mechanism, remember? Any attempt to force the door will cause deadly gas to release first as a precautionary measure. In case something from inside is attempting to get out. Full release and clear." He inhaled deeply, a feeble attempt to calm clearly jangled nerves. The other Amy, however, had already pieced together the situation.

"So the only way in is to…"

"Press the button."

Amy paused. "But that means you'll kill the—"

"Don't you think I know that?" the Doctor snapped, looking right at her. "Yes, the Ood will die. Gas will fill every inch of that room and a nice, innocent Ood who did absolutely nothing wrong will have its life taken against its will. But it's just one Ood, isn't it? What's one Ood? What's a dozen, a thousand? What gives anyone the right to decide what life is worth?" Fury growing, he pounded the glass with an angry fist, and shouted deep and loud. "What gives you the right, Joseph?"

Rory and the two Amys were taken aback, shocked by the outburst of raw Doctor emotion. Yet as much as they understood it, they didn't know how respond. They searched, and the Doctor heaved deep, angry breaths, forcing himself to calm down - to regain some level of control over his emotions. He looked among the three, then into the room at the Ood. True to Ood form, it returned the Doctor's gaze with a serene, benign expression, its head cocked slightly to one side. It blinked once, twice. "I hope I'm not causing you too much trouble," it said through its glowing translator sphere.

The Doctor grimaced through a whirlpool of emotion. His throat tightened, unable to respond. And even if he managed to scrape together a handful of words, what could he possibly say? He forced himself to look away; looking into those eyes was just too much.

Instead, he stared down at the control panel before him. At the circle of red.

The Doctor heaved the longest breath as his vision grew misty. He tried to blink away the tears. He couldn't.

"Forgive me," he whispered. "Please."

And he pushed the button.

CHAPTER SEVEN - THE FINAL CHAPTER - COMING SOON!