(AN) Here are some more replies to reviews:
every-thing-is-black-and-white: Interesting word choice.
BrightWatcher: Thank you very much!
Tiakisu:Yes, she is very stubborn and disobedient. because of this, the Doctor has to pay even more attention to her to keep her out of trouble! Thanks for reviewing!
LovelyAmberLight: I try my best :)
The Animanga Girl (chapter 6): I definitely know that feeling!
Enjoy the latest chapter!
"What?" The Doctor exclaimed. He stepped away from Rose, staring at her incredulously. "This isn't an established event, that couldn' have-"
"Freeze!" someone yelled suddenly. Rose turned on the spot and stiffened, reflexively putting her hands up. A man stood in front of her, clearly one of the people from earlier who had been running around and killing the creatures outside of the bubble. A rag hung loosely around his chin, and much to Rose's alarm, his spear was pointed right at her.
"All of you, get out if the way! Except for the woman in the spacesuit!" he shouted crazedly.
Harriet Jones thankfully stood her ground, and the Doctor did just the opposite of what the man ordered, coming up in front of Rose and shielding her with his body.
"What do you want with her?!" the Doctor barked at the man. "I won't let you touch her!"
"Get out of the way!" the man repeated angrily, spit flying out of his mouth. "There's something on her back!"
At these words, Rose's blood ran cold. She looked up to see the Doctor's head turned as he glanced at her, a look of deep concern in his eyes. But in a second, the look was gone and he had turned back to the man.
"I said, I won't let you touch her! I-Rose!" The Doctor broke off mid-sentence as Rose stepped out from behind him, a look of resignation on her face. After doing this, she turned to him squarely, locking eyes with him.
"Doctor, what is on my back?" Rose asked firmly. "You noticed something too, back in the TARDIS."
The Doctor adopted a stubborn look. "There isn't anything, this man is a nutter," he said, all too quickly.
In response to this, Rose promptly stalked away from him, right towards the man with the spear clutched in his shaking hands. Obviously the Doctor was keeping something from her, but she couldn't let that keep her from figuring out what was going on. Just before he was about to reach him, however, a large hand grabbed her shoulder, jerking her back.
Rose turned unwillingly to the Doctor, taking in his tired eyes. It then struck her, the circumstance that this Doctor was in. He had lost her, back on the gamestation. Rose hated to be presumptuous about the Doctor's emotions, but the look on his face right now was agonized, and not all together there in that moment. Those eyes were pleading, sending her a silent message to not go near that man. It was then that Rose realized that she didn't want to do this. She didn't want to hurt him to satisfy her own curiosity.
"Please, Rose, we can talk about this later?" the Doctor endeared, a somewhat strained tone to his voice. Rose nodded, actively receiving the silent message he had sent her.
The Doctor didn't move his hand. And now his eyes were fixed, as they had been earlier, at a point right over her shoulder. "I mean it," he said, still not meeting her eyes."We'll talk about this later." Rose tried to ignore the chill that went down her spine at his words.
"You're not safe," the man called, as the Doctor lead Rose away. "If you had any sense, you'd get right back 'ere now." The Doctor's hand involuntarily clenched on Rose's shoulder.
"Doctor, what are you talking about?!" Harriet asked frantically when they reached her, her eyes jumping between him and Rose. "What's so significant about the date?"
The Doctor shook his head, ignoring her question. "Harriet Jones, what was the corporation that initiated the evacuation?" He asked instead.
Harriet stared at him blankly, her mouth hanging open like she was going to say something. However, before she did, a loud metallic beep emanated from her form. Initially, Rose was confused, seeing as these people didn't seem to be the type to have phones or other electronics on them. But then, as the sound repeated, Rose took in Harriet's slack features and stiff body. Harriet Jones has been rendered completely motionless, her blank eyes staring at nothing. Unbidden, the horrible truth settled on her shoulders.
Rose turned to the Doctor, who looked just as confused as she had a moment earlier.
"Doctor," Rose said, her voice frighteningly soft. "That noise, it came from her mouth."
The Doctor didn't turn to her, but his eyes widened, and he took a step backwards. He then silently gestured for Rose to do so as well, and Rose complied, her heart beating in her throat. Harriet Jones still stood stock still, her arms flat at her sides as her mouth hung open. The Doctor quietly rummaged through his dimensional pockets, drawing out the sonic screwdriver after a moment. He then stepped back towards Harriet, who emitted another beep just before the Doctor pointed the sonic at her. An involuntary panic filled Rose at the sight of him using the whirring instrument on her. She had known Harriet in the other universe. She would even go as far to say they were friends. And now there was something wrong, horribly wrong with her.
The Doctor flipped the sonic up, with a small 'ping' as the buzzing stopped. His expression was unreadable as he tucked it back into his pocket, and Rose shook her head, her whole body trembling with fear. She had seen that look on her Doctor's face many times before, and it was never good.
"Doctor," Rose breathed. "Oh, god, Doctor, what happened to her?!"
The Doctor turned to her, his eyes grim. "Rose, she's dead," he said plainly.
Rose suddenly felt very sick, and she clamped a hand over her mouth. Everything swam before her eyes, and she turned around, away from the Doctor and Harriet. Dimly, she could hear the Doctor's voice registering in the back of her head, but it was nothing but white noise to her at this point.
"This can't be-I," Rose suddenly choked out, interrupting whatever the Doctor had been saying,"-I knew, her, Doctor, in the other universe, she can't just be dead!" Her last word was nothing but a practically inaudible whimper. A moment after this exclamation she felt the Doctor coming up behind her, but before he could do so much as take her hand, Rose jerked away from him. She felt like everything was pressing in on her at once, and she was suffocating.
"Rose," the Doctor said gruffly, his voice cutting harshly into her ears. "Rose, this isn't her. Harriet Jones had been dead for a very long time. In fact, she was dead as soon as we first saw her in the main tent. Her corpse has now been inhabited by alien technology."
Rose expected this bluntness to hurt, to burn her frayed nerves, but if anything it had the opposite effect. With rationality came clarity, and she now felt herself capable of turning to Doctor, and calming her breathing. Despite the roughness of his last statement, his eyes held an unknown tenderness and concern, and before Rose could control herself, she ran to him, throwing her arms around him and burying her face in his shoulder. She felt the Doctor almost immediately return this gesture, pulling her close to him.
"She's been dead this whole time?" Rose whispered brokenly into his jacket.
"Yes, she has," the Doctor said calmly, his hands rubbing up and down her back. "It was the interface speaking."
"Are all of these people...like her...?"
"Yes, they are. Just like you, they would have succumbed to the dust at a much quicker rate than what they had. After they died, the technology was put inside of them."
"Interface re-booting." The Doctor and Rose broke apart as a robotic voice pierced through the air. The beeping had stopped, and now Harriet stared right at them.
"Interface initiation complete,"she continued, and the abruptly fell to the ground. The Doctor jerked towards her, hand scrambling for his screwdriver.
Harriet's eyes opened quite suddenly, almost in response to this motion. Her hand came up, clutching her head, and she slowly sat up. The Doctor and Rose were rendered incapable of doing anything but staring.
"I-I must have fainted," she said faintly, her voice back to normal. She glanced up at the two of them.
"You aren't fooling us," the Doctor said matter-of-factly.
Rose's reaction was slightly less civil. "What did you do to Harriet?!" she snarled.
For a moment, Harriet feigned a surprised look, but her features soon fell slack as she stared at the two of them.
"Target has now been acquired," she said flatly.
"What do you mean, target?" Rose asked.
Harriet paused for a moment, and then said three words that made Rose's blood run cold.
"The bad wolf."
Once more, everything seemed to swim before Rose's eyes. Those words had haunted during the entirety of her journey with her first Doctor, and had ultimately resulted in his death. How they could have possibly followed her here was beyond her.
"What do you mean?" a foreign voice asked. It took Rose a second to process the words as her own.
"The bad wolf," Harriet repeated, her empty, unfocused eyes staring unnervingly at her face.
"What happened to all of the people?" the Doctor interjected. "The people on the ships, who aren't here." Rose glanced at him. He Had blatantly changed the subject, but Rose could see the same look in her eyes that she was sure had inhabited hers just a moment earlier.
Harriet turned to him. "Unnecessary barriers were eliminated."
Rose had a horrible sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach at this statement, but she couldn't help but denying the truth. "What do you mean by that?"
"They're all dead," the Doctor answered hollowly. "God, Rose, they've all been killed.
"No..." Rose breathed, turning to him. She shook her head at him, trying to say something, anything, but her throat was dry.
"Incorrect," Harriet Jones said blandly. The Doctor and Rose turned to her unanimously.
"What then?" asked the Doctor, fear in his eyes.
Harriet stared at him, unflinching. "They never existed to begin with."
Before the Doctor and Rose could respond to this alarming statement, Harriet turned to Rose. "Initiate teleportation process," she called out, her eyes glowing an odd red.
"Run!" the Doctor shouted, and he grabbed Rose's hand. Initially they turned right on the spot, but from behind them approached the man from earlier with the spear. His eyes now glowed a menacing red as well. So they ran off to the right, in the direction of the TARDIS.
"What does she mean, the people of Earth never existed to begin with?!" Rose exclaimed as the two of them charged down a narrow alley between tents.
"I don't know," the Doctor said briefly as they swerved around a corner. "But something's wrong. None of these things were supposed to happen." He jerked Rose to the side, and she narrowly dodged one of the people staggering towards her.
Rose it her lip, deliberating over whether she should say her next words. But she eventually spoke. "Doctor, they said they were searching for the bad wolf."
His hand tightened around hers. "I know." They rounded another corner.
In front of them now stood at least twenty people, all with the glowing eyes. Both Rose and the Doctor froze on the spot at this sight.
"If the target will approach us now," one of them called in a deadpan.
The Doctor tugged on her hand. "C'mon, let's go." He started running, but before Rose could join him she stumbled, and he lost his grip on her hand. The crowd of people suddenly surged for her, and before the Doctor could get his bearings someone had slammed a hand down on her shoulder.
"Doctor!" Rose cried from the ground. She searched for him, frantically amongst the legs of the people that thronged around her. People were crowding in from all sides and it was beyond overwhelming. Along with that, a device of some sort had been clamped on her shoulder. It was circular in shape, and flashed a bright red. "Doctor, help!"
From the corner of her eye she saw someone bursting through the crowd, and the pressure of a hand grabbing her wrist. Rose was hoisted up and pulled away from these people, from the clamor.
In a moments notice the Doctor was there, right in front of her, and he had the sonic out, and was intently scanning the thing on her arm. After running the device up and down her arm, he tried to yank it off, but it wouldn't budge.
"Doctor, what is it?" Rose asked, voice shaking. "What is that thing?!"
The Doctor looked her up and down, helplessly. "I don't know what-" he then froze mid sentence, staring at her with a horrified look on his face.
"Doctor, what?!" Rose cried.
"Rose, they're already taking you. But I need you to know that I will come for you, I-ROSE!" As the Doctor said these words, everything was fading around Rose. The Doctor's terrified face was becoming nothing but a blur. His exclamation of her name was the last thing she heard before everything went black.
"ROSE!" The Doctor yelled again. But it was no use; he was shouting at thin air. Every last person in front of them had teleported away, taking Rose with them. She had faded before his very eyes, thanks to the teleportation device planted on her shoulder.
The Doctor gave a shout of rage, frantically digging his fingers into his scalp. He had already lost her once, and now fate had determined that he lose her again. He had positively no idea where his Rose was or what was being done to her, and it was entirely his fault.
Suddenly, the sound of footsteps came up behind him, and the Doctor turned swiftly, rage coursing though every vein of his body. Someone had to answer for this. Anyone. He had lost Rose, and someone, anyone besides him had to be made accountable.
It was Harriet Jones. In all technicality, it was her corpse, inhabited by alien technology. Or so the Doctor thought.
"We would like to thank you for cooperating," she stated flatly.
"Who's 'we'?!" the Doctor said bitterly.
"The Torchwood Institute," she replied, and the Doctor stepped back from her. So it was those horrible, ruthless people who were responsible for all of this. He should have known. If he had known, his Rose would be safe. The Doctor visibly sagged, and cursed himself infinitely for his stupidity.
Harriet pulled something out of her pocket as he seethed. It was one of the red teleportation devices, identical to the one that had been put on Rose. Harriet placed it on her own shoulder, and with a press, it began rhythmically beeping and flashing. Before the Doctor's very eyes, Harriet began to fade, becoming more transparent with every second.
"Wait!" the Doctor suddenly, instinctively, called. He couldn't just leave, not without making her answer his questions.
"What?" She asked flatly.
"Rose said she knew you, in the other universe. What are you doing here?" The Doctor asked. It was a stupid question, and he knew it before he had even finished. There was always a high possibility that one might have a parallel equivalent in another universe. But for some reason, he had just asked the question. In an odd way, it had felt right.
For the first time since her true nature had been revealed, Harriet Jones face showed the slightest hint of emotion on her face. Bemusement. She was looking at him like he was the silliest creature she had ever encountered.
"Because I was what was in Rose Tyler's head," Harriet Jones said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "That's why I am here."
This could only mean one thing. She had advanced holographic technology inside of her to appear as different people in order to suit personal taste a circumstance. But that meant that whoever this was, she hadn't been Harriet Jones. She had never been Harriet Jones.
"They never existed to begin with."
But then a thought struck the Doctor. "If you turned into Harriet Jones for Rose Tyler, then why did I still see you as her when we were alone? By default, you should have switched to someone that I know."
Harriet Jones raised a nearly transparent eyebrow, and before the Doctor knew what was happening, Rose Tyler stood before him. Beautiful Rose, rendered somehow inhuman by her slack holographic features. The Doctor's breath caught in his throat at the sight of her.
In a second however, Rose was gone, only to be replaced by Harriet once more.
"Oh, Doctor," she said, her form almost completely gone. "Why should whatever is in your ridiculous little head matter in this universe?"
And on that note, she vanished.