Abbey Who Chapter Six
"Mornin'" Amy greeted, "Sleep well?"
"Yeah, great. You?"
"Yep. I was unconscious. I feel like I never need to close my eyes again."
The Doctor came striding into the kitchen, adjusting his bowtie.
"Ah you're up already," he said to Abigail.
"Oh come on, just because I slept for fourteen hours yesterday doesn't mean I'm going to be up late every day."
"And the day before you slept for twelve," he pointed out.
"So? I didn't miss anything except helping you decide which brand of milk to get."
"Ah – but you also missed him having a mental breakdown when the shop didn't have any custard," Amy told her.
"I was going to make fish fingers – and there's no point in having fish fingers if you don't have any custard – and I wasn't going to go to another shop. That would be embarrassing. And I did not have a mental breakdown. I was just very surprised is all," The Doctor defended.
They both laughed but Abigail quickly shut her mouth, afraid of hurting his feelings.
"Come on," he said, ignoring Amy's lingering giggles, "Finish your cornflakes. We've got a universe to see."
"Can we finally go to a planet?" Amy asked.
"I suppose so. Yes. It's been a while since we've gone to a good ol' planet."
"I've never been to one besides the Earth," Amy reminded him.
"Yeah well I can't help that humans keep calling. And that we need milk . . . Why must it come from a cow? We'll go to a planet in the afternoon – for now, let's go somewhere else."
-x-
The Doctor strode quickly through the museum, possibly sensing Amy and I's annoyance.
"Wrong. Wrong. Bit right, mostly wrong. I love museums."
"Yeah, great. Can we go to a planet now? Big space ship, France hundreds of years in the future, Churchill's bunker, Shakespeare's first play...? You promised me a planet next. And frankly, I was disappointed you didn't let us talk to Shakespeare."
"Amy, this isn't any old asteroid. It's the Delerium Archive, final resting place of the headless monks, the biggest museum ever."
"You've got a time machine, what do you need museums for?"
"Wrong! Very wrong! Oooh, one of mine. . . Also one of mine."
He peered into a display case.
"Oh, I see. It's how you keep score."
The Doctor looked on to the next case, something catching his eye.
"Oh great, an old box." Amy did not seem amused.
"What is it?" Abigail enquired.
"It's from one of the old starliners. A home box."
"What's a home box?" Amy asked.
"Like a black box on a plane, except it homes. Anything happens to the ship, the home box flies home, with all the flight data."
"A flying box? That's nice. Can we go somewhere else now? Please. We could come back here another time…?" Abigail said eagerly.
"In a while. Be patient," he replied.
"Okay it's a home box. So? Does it matter? Visiting a new planet seems a bit more interesting, Doctor." Amy sounded as bored as Abigail felt. Usually she liked museums but when you had the possibilities that they had it was like going back to school after the summer holidays.
"The writing, the graffiti - Old High Gallifreyan. The lost language of the Time Lords." Okay, now Abigail was interested.
"There were days, there were many days, these words could burn stars and raise up empires, and topple Gods," he continued.
"What does it say?" Amy asked, seeming interested.
"Hello, sweetie."
"Hello, sweetie?" Abigail scoffed, "Well, that was worth our time. Now can we go?"
"Hold on just one minute," he whispered, withdrawing the sonic screwdriver from his jacket pocket.
He cautiously looked around for security before unlocking the case. A security alarm blared and there were guards running at them from the next room. The Doctor grabbed the home box and in a mad dash they made it back inside the TARDIS and he dematerialised faster than Abigail had d ever seen him do it before.
"What was the point of that?" she asked, "You know what it says."
"Yeah," Amy agreed, "Why are we doing this?"
"Cos someone on a space ship 12,000 years ago is trying to attract my attention. Let's see if we can get the security playback working…"
Slightly pixelated, black and white footage of a woman in a black dress and sunglasses with wild curly hair appeared on the monitor. She winked at the camera and it switched to view her from behind as she faced a door.
"The party's over, Doctor Song, yet still you're on board," a man observed.
Doctor Song turned to face him, the camera now on her face.
"Sorry, Alistair," she apologised, "I needed to see what was in your vault. Do you all know what's down there? Any of you? Because I'll tell you something. This ship won't reach its destination."
"Wait till she runs. Then make it look like an execution." So there were others there too…
"…slash, three, four, nine by ten."
The Doctor, Amy and Abigail exchanged looks.
" Zero, twelve, slash, acorn. Oh, and I could do with an air corridor," Doctor Song finished.
The Doctor began frantically typing on the keyboard.
"What was that, what did she say?" Amy asked him.
"Co-ordinates!" he answered.
As The Doctor fiddled with the machine Abigail looked back to the screen, "Like I said on the dance floor: you might want something to hang onto." For some reason she reminded her of what Amy might be like when she goes to work.
What Abigail guessed was a timer began to beep frantically and Doctor Song grinned cheekily. She blew a kiss and the door behind her blew open, Doctor Song floating away into space.
The Doctor ran to the doors and reached out, pulling Doctor Song in almost immediately, the two of them landing on the floor.
"Doctor?" Amy said.
The Doctor didn't reply, he looked at Doctor Song with a surprised look still on his face, "River?" he asked. Was River her name? For a school play once Abigail played a character called River. Well, actually she was a river and just had to move gently in the breeze with a big blue blanket to hold onto and cover herself with. River Song. It sounded like a superhero's name.
The Doctor and River hopped up from the floor.
"Follow that ship," she ordered.
"They've gone into warp drive, we're losing them! Stay close!" River ordered.
"I'm trying!"
"Use the stabilisers."
"There aren't any stabilisers!"
"The blue switches!"
"The blue ones don't do anything! They're just . . . blue."
"Yes, they're blue. They're the blue stabilisers."
River flicked the switches and the TARDIS grew quiet. "See?" she smiled.
"Yeah well, it's just boring now, isn't it? They're boringers. Just blue boringers," The Doctor complained.
"Doctor, how come she can fly the TARDIS?" Amy whispered.
"You call that flying the TARDIS?" The Doctor said, making sure River could hear him, "Ha!"
He flopped onto the chair and started sulking. Abigail exaggerated a pout, "Aw, is someone else playing with your toy, Doctor?" He gave a stern look at first, then proceeded to hide a smirk.
"Okay, I've mapped the probability vectors, done a fold-back on the temporal isometry, charted the ship to its destination, and parked us right alongside," River said proudly.
"Parked us? We haven't landed," The Doctor argued.
"Of course we've landed. I just landed her."
"But it didn't make the noise…"
"What noise?"
"You know, the..." The Doctor made a wheezing sound as an impression of the TARDIS.
"It's not supposed to make that noise. You leave the brakes on."
His eyes flickered to me for a fraction of a second.
"Yeah, well, it's a brilliant noise. I love that noise. Come along, Pond, Abbey, let's have a look."
"No, wait! Environment checks," River reminded him.
"Oh, yes, sorry! Quite right. Environment checks," he stuck his head out the door, "Nice out."
Ignoring him, River called out the environment from the monitor, "We're somewhere in the Garn Belt. There's an atmosphere. Early indications suggest-"
"We're on Alfalfa Metraxis, the seventh planet of the Dundra System. Oxygen-rich atmosphere, toxins in the soft band, 11-hour day, and..." he popped his head out the door again, "chances of rain later."
"He thinks he's so hot when he does that," River told the other girls.
The Doctor joined us at the console and sat down again.
"How come you can fly the TARDIS?" Amy asked River.
"Oh, I had lessons from the very best."
"Well . . . yeah," The Doctor said smugly.
"It's a shame you were busy that day…" she said, wiping the look off his face.
She picked up her shoes and changed subject, "Right then, why did they land here?"
"They didn't land," The Doctor answered as she was heading for the door.
"Sorry?"
"You should've checked the home box - it crashed."
River stepped outside and The Doctor shut the door before hurrying back to the console.
"Explain. Who is that and how did she do that museum thing?" Amy demanded.
"It's a long story and I don't know most of it. Off we go."
"What are you doing?"
"Leaving. She's got where she wants to go, let's go where we want to go."
"Are you basically running away?"
"Yep."
"Why?" Amy and Abigail both asked.
"'Cause she's the future. My future."
Abigail didn't recognise her from the wall, but maybe that's why The Doctor didn't know her. Whichever one of them took the pictures couldn't take pictures of her because it would change the past mystery surrounding her. She'd forced him into having a conversation about paradoxes with her after he briefly mentioned some wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff and Abigail just had to repeat "What?" over and over again until he explained. It was surprisingly easy to get out of him.
"Can you run away from that?"
"I can run away from anything I like. Time is not the boss of me."
"So are you the boss of time then?" Abigail asked.
"Kind of -"
"Hang on, is that a planet out there?" Amy cut in.
"Yes, of course it's a planet."
"You promised me a planet," Amy reminded him excitedly, "Five minutes?"
"Okay. Five minutes."
"Yes," Amy and Abigail rejoiced, hurrying out of the TARDIS.
"But that's all! 'Cause I'm telling you now, that woman is not dragging me into anything!"
"Aren't you going to introduce us?"
"Amy Pond, Abbey Solomon - Professor River Song."
"I'm going to be a Professor some day, am I?"
The Doctor winced.
"How exciting," she chuckled, "Spoilers."
The Doctor and her have that catch-phrase in common. She could even be mocking him.
"Yeah, but who is she and how did she do that? She just left you a note in a museum," Amy whispered to The Doctor. He just walked away.
"Two things always guaranteed to show up in a museum: The Home Box of category four starliner and, sooner or later: him. It's how he keeps score," River answered for him.
"I know," Amy laughed.
"It's hilarious isn't it?"
The Doctor came back and laughed sarcastically, "I'm nobody's taxi service."
"I'm not gonna be there to catch you every time you feel like jumping out of a space ship," he told River.
"And you are so wrong," she corrected him, "There's one survivor. There's a thing in the belly of that ship that can't ever die," she informed, "Now he's listening," River laughed, sensing she had The Doctor's full attention.
"You lot in orbit yet? Yeah, I saw it land. I'm at the crash site. Try and home in on my signal," she said into her electronic device.
"Doctor, can you sonic me? I need to boost the signal so we can use it as a beacon," she requested, holding up the device.
"Ooh, Doctor. You soniced her," Amy giggled.
"We have a minute. Shall we?" River called, opening her diary, "Where were we up to? Have we done the Bone Meadows?"
"What's the book?" Amy asked.
"Stay away from it."
"What is it though?"
"Her diary."
"Our diary," River rectified.
"Her past, my . . . future. Time travel. We keep meeting in the wrong order."
"So…kind of like us? Just more mixed up?" Abigail supposed.
"Like us," he repeated.
"Wait – what are you talking about?" Amy queried.
"Long story. Talk about it later…maybe," he said quickly, looking back to River for her to continue.
But before she could, four swirling columns materialised to reveal four soldiers, one of which approached River.
"You promised me an army, Doctor Song," he complained.
"No. I promised you the equivalent of an army. This is the Doctor."
The Doctor gave a casual salute and shook his hand.
"Father Octavian, sir. Bishop, second class. 20 clerics at my command," he introduced himself, "The troops are already in the drop ship and landing shortly. Doctor Song was helping us with a covert investigation. Has Doctor Song explained what we're dealing with?"
"Doctor, what do you know of the Weeping Angels?" River asked. The Doctor tensed and faced her.
Angels? I thought it was the extra-terrestrial, not the biblical creatures we dealt with, Abigail thought.
"Well, that's good isn't it? I mean angels are good . . . right?" she questioned.
"These are not your typical angels…" The Doctor said seriously.
-x-
"So, whatever a Weeping Angel is, it's really bad, yeah?" Amy guessed, swinging her feet as she sat on the desk.
"Now that's interesting..." The Doctor observed to himself.
"You're still here. Which part of 'Wait in the TARDIS till I tell you it's safe' was so confusing?" he asked them. Before they could reply he turned to Abigail, "I'm surprised you stopped doing what I told you so early."
"Ooh, are you all Mr Grumpy Face today?" Amy said with a pout.
"A Weeping Angel, Amy, is the deadliest, most powerful, most malevolent life form evolution has ever produced, and one is trapped inside that wreckage and I'm supposed to climb in with a screwdriver and a torch-and assuming I survive the radiation, and the whole ship doesn't blow up in my face-do something clever which I haven't actually thought of yet. That's my day, that's what I'm up to. Any questions?" It didn't give Amy any perspective of priorities at the moment.
"Is River Song your wife?" Abigail had been wondering that too, she was just glad she didn't have to be the one to ask.
"Yes. You're right. I am definitely Mr Grumpy Face today." That didn't end where Abigail was expecting it to, but perhaps he didn't know the answer to Amy's last question.
-x-
Abigail sat up straight, eyes wide open. Whenever she closed them for more than a second she saw them again. The Angels. It wasn't like Amy's case, the image of the angel wasn't in her eye, but the dark reminded her of them. It would be a long time before she could sleep with the lights off again.
Was The Doctor back yet? He was dropping Amy home for a while. Abigail asked if he was taking her home too but he'd just shook his head and said she "should get some sleep. It's been a … tense day."
He was right. The Daleks, Prisoner Zero, all of those things she could deal with, but the Weeping Angels were just statues. Things you see every day and think nothing of. But to imagine, that on a quiet day at the park on her own, if there hadn't been one or two extra people wandering about, she could be dead by now. They're just hiding away on various planets, any statue could be an angel. Blink and you're dead. It would have been impossible for her to survive if she was on her own in that room like Amy, Abigail believed. She wasn't nearly as strong or smart as Amy was. And River too, she was definitely brilliant. Something weird had happened when she'd touched Abigail on the shoulder though, it was like an electric shock, we'd both pulled away immediately and Abigail asked if some dust or chemical here was used in carpets. River shook her head and laughed.
Abigail climbed out of bed and decided to go to the library to take her mind off things.
It was empty, as usual. She'd never actually gotten around to reading any of the books here, She'd been too distracted just looking at them all. The library was vast and amazing, it was impossible to not be distracted for at least the first handful of times. Eventually, after probably an hour of walking around aimlessly, she chose a book and sat down on one of the long couches tucked away in a corner.
-x-
"Thought I'd find you here!" The Doctor said brightly.
Abigail forced her eyes open but only managed halfway before giving up and keeping them shut. "How long have I been asleep?" she asked. She didn't know why, he couldn't have known.
"Well, I dunno. I found you here about six hours ago so … you've been asleep longer than that."
"Did you give me this blanket?" she guessed.
"Yeah. Didn't want you to catch a cold, did I? Now come on, we're picking up another passenger."
I hope you liked this chapter. I'd really love to hear your thoughts, theories and comments as it motivates me and I'm going to need a lot of that with school starting in just a matter of days.
