Chapter Two

As soon as the Doctor flung the TARDIS doors open, smoke began to pour in. "Oh, I didn't think about that," the Doctor coughed. He whipped a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to Clara, who was also having difficulty breathing. The hall that they stepped into was blackened by smoke, the only light was red emergency lights that gave the corridor a very eerie glow. In the distance, people were shouting over the sound of a blaring siren.

"What are we going to do?" Clara said in a muffled voice through the handkerchief.

"Not a clue! Help, I suppose." The Doctor raised his sonic screwdriver towards the ceiling, the green tip contrasting with the smoky red. A moment later, the sirens silenced. "Ah, that's better."

"I can't hardly see where we are going," Clara hacked as they blindly walked down the corridor.

"Yeah, still working on that," replied the Doctor as he fiddled with the sonic screwdriver. He adjusted the setting and pointed it up to a vent in the ceiling. As it went off, the smoke slowly began to recede into the vent. "There, that should help a little-" the Doctor stopped abruptly with a grunt and suddenly collapsed to the ground.

"Doctor!"

"Stay where you are!" shouted a deep voice from behind. There were three soldiers with long rifles behind them, one with his weapon trained at Clara's forehead, another with the butt of the gun facing outward where he had just struck the Doctor. "Who are you two?"

"We were here to help!" Clara snapped, raising her hands, eyes crossed slightly as she stared down the tip of the rifle.

"Right, you two look more like the ones who sabotaged this place to me," one of the soldiers said thickly.

"What's going on down here?" Through the clearing smoke, another figure briskly approached. A woman dressed in a similar uniform as the soldiers, but slightly more decorated.

"Ma'am, we found these two down here. They aren't personnel, my guess is they're the ones who brought the bomb here."

The woman sighed. "We still aren't even sure if it was bomb. Put that gun down already, she's not going to hurt you, obviously."

Clara breathed a small sigh of relief as the rifle was lowered. "You certainly hit the wrong one of the two of us, seeing as I'm the one who takes taekwondo…" she muttered, glancing down at the Doctor, who was still unconscious.

"Take them to the brig, we'll deal with them after we get the damage under control."

One of the soldiers roughly grabbed Clara's arm and began to lead her away. She cast a quick glance over her shoulder and saw the other two hoisting the Doctor up, his arms draped over their shoulders and his feet dragging. He groaned a little as his head fell forward.

"Look, we're here to help, I swear!" Clara pleaded with the woman, who was now marching ahead of them. "And you're going to have one very pissed off Timelord when he wakes up!"

The woman stopped dead in her tracks and whipped around. "What did you say?"

"Pissed off Timelord!"

"By the stars…" the woman whispered as blood drained from her face. "Is...is that the Doctor?"

"You know him?"

"But..but he can't be…" The woman's eyes fell somewhere behind Clara, far down the hall. Clara turned and saw that as more of the smoke cleared, the TARDIS was becoming more visible. "Oh dear...that is him, isn't it?"

"Yee-up."

"Let her go," the woman ordered to the soldier holding Clara. "My apologies...we-...I'm Colonel Artis, the head of the Voxholian side of this facility. I had no idea-...is that really the Doctor?"

"He's regenerated," Clara explained, looking back at him.

"I see that. I always knew Timelords could do that but I've never seen it for myself. Please, come with me."

They continued down the corridor and turned down another, where several more personnel were running back and forth with extinguishers and injured. "So what happened here?" Clara asked. Now that the smoke was gone, she could get a better look of the place. It was very plain and basic. A few windows in this hall showed the lunar landscape outside, along with a glow from the the Voxholi planet surface.

"Bomb," said the soldier next to Clara.

"We think," Artis snapped back, "but it may have been a malfunction with the light show."

"Oh, come on, it had to have been-"

"That's enough, Hedrick! We can't go pointing fingers just yet."

The soldier, Hedrick, heaved a sigh as they continued on. Behind them, there was a loud groan. Clara turned Doctor slowly raising his head as the soldiers still held him up. She ran back to him and lightly touched the side of his face as he came round. "Doctor, can you hear me?"

"Shut up...oh, my head…"

"Doctor?"

He blearily opened his eyes. "What's happening…?" The soldiers carefully released his arms as he gained his footing.

Not wanting to cause more fuss, Clara responded with, "Um, an accident." She could see the soldier who had hit him drop his shoulders in relief.

He blinked a couple of times and saw who was standing behind Clara. "Colonel Artis, lovely to see you again."

"Doctor," Atris greeted. "What are you doing here?"

"Well, you know me. I'm drawn to beautiful light shows and massive explosions," he shrugged, rubbing the back of his head. "Is everyone here alright?"

"We don't know casualties yet, but we have several unaccounted for." She looked back to the three soldiers. "You three, back to damage control."

Hedrick cast a look to the two strangers. "What about these two, ma'am?"

"They're friends," Atris told him sternly, "and will be continued to be treated as such. Now move, that's an order." She turned back to Clara and the Doctor. "My office is just up here," she said as they began walking again. "I'll fill you in there and see what you can do to help us, perhaps. The circumstances here have been odd enough lately...and now this. You couldn't have shown up at a better time."

The Doctor was about to respond with a quip when he stumbled into Clara's side. She reached out an arm to steady him. "You okay?" she asked.

"I've been hit over the head, do you think I'm okay?" he growled. "Yes, yes...let's keep moving, I'll be fine."

Eventually they made it into the office of Colonel Artis. It was large but oddly very empty, as if it were rarely used. Plaques and medals were scattered along the side wall, along with a giant painting of what Clara guessed to be Voxholi. Artis sat herself at her desk, while Clara helped the Doctor into a chair on the opposite side. "So...what's happening here, Colonel?" the Doctor asked.

Artis sighed and placed her hands on the glass desk in a professional manner. "Tensions here have been high with the Belarans."

"Have they now?" the Doctor inquired, sitting up a bit more.

"I'm trying to keep the other soldiers and personnel cool about it...otherwise they'll all be wanting to start another war," Artis said wearily. "However, I am quite certain that the explosion that happened here today was a bomb and that the Belarans are in fact to blame."

/A/N/

I tried to hold off on the action for a bit longer but I couldn't help myself. More to come soon! What sticky plot have the Doctor and Clara found themselves in this time, eh?