Chapter Twenty-three: An Unusual Summons
Rose hummed a tune to herself as she used a large brush to cover her canvas in seashell pink. The Doctor had declared a day in that morning at breakfast, and she hadn't wasted any time getting her paints set up in her studio.
After travelling together for three months, their unique little group of four really felt like a family. Donna was exactly what she'd always wanted in an older sister—someone just a little bolder than she was, who could egg her on. She teased the Doctor like he was her little brother, never letting an opportunity to poke fun at him slide by.
And Jenny. Jenny soaked it all up, thriving under Donna's affectionate attention and the Doctor's doting. Like any young adult, she chafed when he tried too hard to keep her safe, and Rose had kept her promise to be the cool step-mum, listening when she needed to vent.
She sighed and tapped the handle of her brush against her cheek as she considered her next colour. After a moment, she dipped it in gold metallic paint and started painting a spiral of colour in the middle of the pale pink canvas.
A sharp telepathic prod caught her attention and nearly sent her paintbrush jerking across the canvas, ruining her painting. She gasped and put the brush back in the jar of water, then rubbed circles over her temple, trying to ease the lingering discomfort.
That wasn't the Doctor, or the TARDIS, she realised. For a second, she thought it had come from Jenny, but she dismissed the thought almost immediately. It hadn't felt anything like the connection she shared with her step-daughter.
And if it wasn't from the Doctor, Jenny, or the TARDIS…
She already had her paints put away and was wiping off her hands when the Doctor knocked on the door and pushed it open without invitation. That alone told her how serious this was; the Doctor only entered her studio uninvited in the case of an emergency.
"Do you have your psychic paper?" he asked without preamble, slapping his own against the palm of his hand.
Rose shook her head. "It's in our room." They left the studio and she shut the door firmly behind her. "Why? What's wrong, Doctor?"
He handed her his psychic paper as they walked the short distance to their room. Rose flipped it open and read the message, written in an unfamiliar hand.
I need your help at the Library. Please come as soon as you can.
Love you both.
In lieu of a signature, the message concluded with a complicated series of numbers and letters Rose immediately recognised as space-time coordinates.
The Doctor picked her psychic paper up off her vanity and read the message out loud. Rose looked at the paper in her hand, then at the Doctor.
"Is that what I felt in my head then?" she asked. "Someone sending us a message via psychic paper?"
The Doctor nodded. Rose handed him his paper back, then stripped out of her paint spattered clothes while he paced the length of the room. Then she slipped into the en-suite and listened to his explanation as she scrubbed paint off her face with a flannel.
"It's like psychic texting in a way," he said, and she could picture the way he punctuated the words with gestures to go with his rapid-fire delivery. "You can send a message from one piece of psychic paper to another, though it takes some training."
Rose pulled her hair up in a sleek ponytail, then went back into their room. He was on the other side of the room when she selected a pair of comfortable jeans and a pink top out of the wardrobe, and she was zipping up her jeans when he turned around and noticed she'd changed.
"What are you doing?" the Doctor said, finally noticing that she'd changed.
Rose rolled her eyes at him as she selected a pair of hot pink Chucks. "Getting ready to go?" she said, like it was obvious.
The Doctor tugged on his ear. "Ah. Of course."
Rose stopped lacing up her shoes to look at him incredulously. "I thought you'd be chomping at the bit, after a message like that."
The furrow between his brows tightened. "The coordinates are already set," he admitted. "But the last time we followed a message left on the psychic paper, you were possessed by Lady Cassandra."
Rose finished tying her shoes, then leaned back on the edge of the bed. She had mixed feelings about their first visit to New Earth. On one hand, it was their first trip after his regeneration, and she would always have fond memories of lying in the apple grass with him. On the other… Cassandra's invasion had left her with migraines that hadn't faded for a week.
On the other hand… "But the last time we followed a message on the psychic paper, it was from Jack," Rose pointed out. "Someone who knew us and was counting on us to help them out."
The Doctor pursed his lips, and Rose could feel the strength of his uncertainty. She stepped forward and adjusted the knot of his navy and maroon floral tie, making sure it lay just right over his burgundy shirt. It was a way of giving them both time—him time to think about what she'd said, and her time to find the right words to win him over.
Finally, she ran her hands down his chest and rested them on his waist. "We've got to go, Doctor. Someone who trusts us and is counting on us sent that message."
The Doctor ran his hand through his hair. Rose was right, but there was something about the whole situation that just felt… slightly off. Not like a trap, but…
A moment later, he felt Rose's soothing touch on the bond, calming him as much as possible. The Doctor relaxed into her touch, then took her hand and walked with her out of their room. "Come on. I told Jenny to get Donna; they should be waiting for us in the console room."
Jenny was sitting on the jump seat when they entered the room, her legs swinging and her fingers tapping on the leather seat. The Doctor tugged gently on her ponytail, then laughed when she jumped to her feet. As much as she looked like his fifth incarnation, she had all the manic energy he possessed in this body.
"All right, Dad, are you going to tell us where we're going?" She peered down at the coordinates he'd set before getting Rose. "It looks like the fifty-first century. Am I right?"
"What I want to know," Donna asked, "is what happened to the relaxing day we were supposed to be having. I was just getting ready to do my nails when Jenny pounded on my door and insisted that you had someplace to take us."
The Doctor looked at her, leaning against the ramp with her arms crossed over her chest and her eyebrows raised. He never could pull one over on Donna.
"I got an inkling that something might be going on here today instead," he explained as he threw the dematerialisation lever. "And I thought… there are plenty of days to rest, but this might be our only chance to go here."
"And where exactly is here?" she challenged.
The TARDIS' wheezing slowed as she landed, and despite his concerns over what might be waiting for them in the Library, the Doctor grinned at Donna. "Books," he said enthusiastically as he jogged around the console and grabbed his coat from where it was draped over a strut. "People never really stop loving books."
Rose opened the door, and they filed out of the TARDIS into a long gallery. Sunlight streamed into the room through clerestory windows, high in the walls. A few wooden book carts were near the ship, filled with books either on display, or waiting to be shelved.
The Doctor picked one up and thumbed through it quickly, then put it back on the cart and started walking across the room. "So, like Jenny said, this is the fifty-first century. By now you've got holovids, direct-to-brain downloads, fiction mist, but you need the smell. The smell of books, ladies. Deep breath."
Donna looked over at Rose and rolled her eyes, but the Doctor pushed open a thick wooden door before any of them could comment on his raptures over the smell of old paper. They stepped out of the dimly lit room they'd landed in and into an outdoor atrium at the top of a marble staircase.
"The Library. So big it doesn't need a name. Just a great big 'The.'"
"It's like a city," Donna marvelled as they walked past huge columns.
"It's a world," the Doctor corrected. "Literally, a world. The whole core of the planet is the index computer. Biggest hard drive ever."
"They installed a hard drive in a planet core?" Rose asked as they walked slowly down the flight of stairs, further into the sunlight.
"Yep!" The Doctor popped the p the way he did when he was excited about something. "It still amazes computer programmers—they don't know how it was done." He nodded out at the urban landscape when they reached a balcony. "And up here, every book ever written. Whole continents of Jeffrey Archer, Bridget Jones, Monty Python's Big Red Book. Brand new editions, specially printed."
They were quiet for a moment, taking in the sheer size of a library that occupied an entire planet. Clusters of skyscrapers were grouped together, connected by sky bridges. Running between the groups of buildings were rails that Rose assumed belonged to a train of some kind that would take you from one part of the planet to another.
On the side of the nearest building there was a huge electronic billboard, announcing it held books on xeno biology and art. A shiver of excitement coursed through her as she thought about all the incredible books on art she might find in the largest library in the universe.
Jenny broke the silence first. "It's beautiful."
The Doctor hummed. "Isn't it? We're near the equator, so"—He licked his finger and stuck it in the air—"this must be biographies!" he crowed. "I love biographies."
"I love reading about real people who actually lived," Jenny said excitedly.
The Doctor turned to his daughter, and Donna absently picked up a book that was resting on the balustrade. She flipped through the pages quickly and realised she could actually see the letters change shape as the TARDIS' translation circuit tried to keep up with how fast the pages were moving.
She stopped on a page two-thirds of the way through, but before she could read more than a line, the Doctor plucked the book from her fingers. "Oi! Spoilers."
"What?"
He snapped it shut and waved it at her. "These books are from your future. You don't want to read ahead. Spoil all the surprises. Like peeking at the end."
Jenny rolled her eyes. "Dad, we're currently three thousand years in the future from Donna's time. Keeping her from spoilers is like…"
A frown wrinkled her forehead, and Donna waited eagerly for the turn of phrase she'd come up with.
Jenny's expression cleared, and there was a hint of mischief in her smile. "Like closing the barn door after the horse has gotten out!" she stated victoriously.
Everyone laughed but the Doctor, and Rose took the book from the Doctor and handed it back to Donna. "I'm afraid she's got you there, Doctor." She crossed her arms over her chest and shook her head when he pouted. "It's the biography of an actor from the thirty-third century," she said, cutting off his sputtering. "It's not going to spoil anything if Donna reads it, aside from the fact that the notion of spoilers is ridiculous."
"I try to keep her away from major plot developments," the Doctor protested, though he tugged on his ear in a way Donna knew meant he was aware he'd been caught. "Which, to be honest, I seem to be very bad at," he added as he looked around at the empty staircase. "Because you know what? This is the biggest library in the universe. So where is everyone? It's silent."
"I thought libraries were supposed to be quiet," Rose pointed out as the Doctor jogged over to a nearby terminal and used the sonic screwdriver to delve through layers of information.
The Doctor looked up at her briefly as the computer ran the scan he'd started. "That's hardly even true in your time, love," he said absently before looking back at the computer. "No, near the end of the twentieth century, humans figured out that the most important thing was that people used the library, and that didn't happen if they enforced an unnatural silence."
"Maybe it's a Sunday," Donna suggested.
The Doctor was shaking his head before she finished the sentence. "No, I never land on Sundays. Sundays are boring."
"Maybe everyone is just being really quiet?" Jenny offered.
Rose was watching over his shoulder as the computer did the scan he'd requested, and she leaned forward to frown at the screen when the results popped up. According to the computer, they were the only ones on the whole planet.
"Except even if people were being quiet, you'd expect them to show up on a scan," she said, finally admitting that the Doctor's earlier unease might not have been unwarranted.
The Doctor did something with his sonic, and Rose could see the computer code spinning again in the background. A moment later, the terminal beeped with what sounded like an error message.
"Now that's interesting," he muttered.
"What?" Jenny and Donna asked in unison.
"Scanning for life forms. Limiting to basic humanoids—the target audience of the Library—apart from us, I get nothing. Zippo, nada. See?"
He pointed at the message on the screen that read, Filtered Humanoid Lifeforms Scan Complete: 4.
"Nobody home." He tapped repeatedly at a button on the keyboard. "But if I widen the parameters to any kind of life…"
The number changed to 1,000,000,000,000, with an error message.
"A million million," the Doctor read. "Gives up after that. A million million."
A shiver ran up Rose's back and she looked around at the seemingly empty planet. "So… there's something here we can't see," she said.
"That's the only logical answer," the Doctor agreed. His jaw twitched. "And not a sound. A million million life forms, and silence in the Library."
"But… where could they all be?" Jenny asked practically.
Donna nodded. "Yeah, where could a million million people hide? There's not… I mean, there's just books." She looked at the book in her hand, her eyes wide. "They can't be hiding in the books, can they? Or maybe they are they books. But books can't be alive."
She reached for the cover and opened it slowly.
"Welcome."
Donna jumped and dropped the book, then turned around. "That came from here," she said, pointing back up the stairs.
The Doctor nodded. "Yeah."
Normally, the whole sequence would have had a comic effect, but today, with the eerie feeling in the atmosphere as the question of a million million lifeforms lingered, no one laughed.
They retreated back to the room they'd parked in, and the Doctor led the way straight over to a large, round circulation desk. The top piece of a sculpture turned around to reveal a vaguely humanoid figure. Rose blinked as she looked at the very human face atop the stylised body.
"I am Courtesy Node seven one zero slash aqua. Please enjoy the Library and respect the personal access codes of all your fellow readers, regardless of species or hygiene taboo."
Donna took another step towards the Courtesy Node. "That face, it looks real."
"Yeah, don't worry about it," the Doctor said dismissively.
Rose looked up at him, instantly recognising the evasive look on his face. It is real, isn't it?
"Is it a hologram, Dad?" Jenny asked.
The Doctor nodded slightly at Rose, then looked back at Jenny and Donna. "No, but really, it's fine."
The Courtesy Node spoke again. "Additional. There follows a brief message from the Head Librarian for your urgent attention. It has been edited for tone and content by a Felman Lux Automated Decency Filter. Message follows: 'Run. For God's sake, run.'"
The words were chilling, spoken by a statue with absolutely no emotional affect in its voice.
"'Nowhere is safe. The Library has sealed itself, we can't—Oh, they're here.'" Several sounds that Rose easily recognised as grunts of pain followed, and then the Courtesy Node said, "Message ends. Please switch off your mobile comm. units for the comfort of other readers."
"So that's why we're here," the Doctor muttered. "Any other messages, same date stamp?" he asked the Courtesy Node.
"One additional message. This message carries a Felman Lux coherency warning of five zero eleven—"
The Doctor waved off the disclaimer. "Yeah, yeah, fine, fine, fine. Just play it."
"Message follows: 'Count the shadows. For God's sake, remember, if you want to live, count the shadows. Message ends.'"
That made less than no sense to Rose, and she would have brushed it off if genuine fear hadn't swelled up in the Doctor. He reached for her hand and pulled her close, while looking around the room that was half-shadow.
Jenny looked at them, her features pinched with fear and confusion. "Dad?"
The Doctor took a deep breath and nodded once. "Right, everyone," he said, his calm voice telling them more about how serious the situation was than any amount of shouting would have done. "Stay out of the shadows."
Then he spun around and strode out of there room, Rose's hand was still clasped tightly in his. Despite the fear in his voice, he didn't hesitate as they walked past the TARDIS. She could feel his curiosity—he still wanted to know who had sent them the message on the psychic paper and why.
Still, he was walking so fast she almost had to jog to keep up. He meant to wrap up that mystery as quickly as possible and get them off the planet. She kept quiet as they went through a door into a room that looked like what Rose expected of a library, with row after row of bookshelves.
Donna and Jenny caught up with them only a few metres into the room, and Donna planted herself directly in front of them. "All right you two, what's going on here? We had a perfectly relaxing day planned, and then suddenly we're taking a trip. And don't think I didn't hear you a moment ago, Doctor—'So, that's why we're here,' you said. So, out with it."
Jenny nodded. "And you're really…" She hesitated and glanced from the Doctor to Donna and back again. "…worried, Dad," she added, settling on a less concerning word than "terrified."
The Doctor sighed, but handed Donna his psychic paper, and she flipped it open to read the message still visible there. "Someone asked for our help."
"I love you both?" Donna raised her eyebrows when she passed the paper back.
Rose bit her lip. From the moment she'd read the message, it had tugged at her. Someone was counting on them.
"I wish I could figure out who sent it," she mumbled. "Jack and Martha both have my mobile number, so they could just text. It's got to be…"
Her voice trailed off when she realised the Doctor was staring over her shoulder at the aisle behind her. Rose turned around, and her eyes widened when she realised the lights were going out, one row at a time.
The Doctor had had his suspicions when they listened to the last message, warning them to count the shadows. But it was only now, as he watched the lights go out plunging the Library deeper into darkness—creating more shadows—that he knew for sure what they'd stumbled upon. A planet that was seemingly empty, yet claimed to be teeming with life? A warning to count the shadows? And a message from a mysterious person, asking for help at the Library?
Vashta Nerada.
"What's happening?" Donna asked.
The Doctor pushed her and Jenny towards the light, then grabbed Rose's hand again. "Run!"
Ahead of them, Jenny's boots hit the floor with rhythmic thuds while Donna's ponytail trailed behind her. The Doctor felt his coat start to wrap around his legs and he used his free hand to tug it loose, so he wouldn't trip.
We need to find someplace safe, Rose said.
The Doctor grit his teeth together and nodded. He strained his eyes for some kind of exit. They turned a corner and finally, at the end of an aisle, there was a set of intricately carved wooden doors only twenty feet away from them. Everyone skidded to a halt right in front of the doors, but when the Doctor try to push them open, they wouldn't budge.
"Come on," he grunted, throwing his weight against the doors.
"What, is it locked?" Donna demanded, her voice shrill.
He shook his head and pushed harder on the stuck door. "Jammed. The wood's warped." The electrical fizz of lights going out got louder as the darkness and the shadows came closer, and despite his best efforts to stay calm, panic welled up inside him.
Jenny wrapped her arms around herself and looked back over her shoulders at the encroaching darkness. "Use your screwdriver, Dad!"
"I can't," he growled, rattling the doorknob. "It's wood."
"What, it doesn't do wood?" Donna snarled.
An idea struck the Doctor, and he pulled the sonic out of his pocket. "Hang on, hang on," he said as he pointed it at the crack between the doors. "I can vibrate the molecules, fry the bindings. I can shatterline the interface."
"Oh, get out of the way." Donna shoved him aside and kicked the door open.
All four of them piled into the room and slammed the doors shut behind them, then the Doctor grabbed a book off a nearby table and slid it into the handles as a rudimentary bar lock.
Once the immediate danger was over, he turned to get a look at their surroundings. The circular room with a rotunda was obviously a reading room, but he didn't have a chance to admire the tables lining the outer walls.
A security camera hovered in the middle of the rotunda, its lens pointed directly at them. The Doctor stuck his hands into his pockets and tried to smile like he hadn't been caught breaking down a door.
"Oh. Hello. Sorry to burst on you like this. Okay if we stop here for a bit?"
Rose blinked when the camera dropped to the floor like a rock. She and Jenny walked over to it, and Jenny nudged it with her foot.
"What is it?" she asked.
Rose bent over to pick it up. "It's a security camera," she explained as she turned it over in her hands. "But I think it switched itself off."
The Doctor held out his hand, and she tossed the camera to him. "Nice door skills, Donna," he said as he pointed the sonic screwdriver at the camera.
"Yeah, well, you know, boyfriends. Sometimes you need the element of surprise."
Rose recoiled. "What kind of men have you been dating?" she said before she could stop herself. "Sorry," she added a second later. "Not my business, but… Sorry."
Donna shrugged. "Nah, you're right."
Jenny looked like she wanted to ask questions, but Rose shook her head quickly. She could come up with half a dozen reasons why a woman would learn to kick down doors because of the men she dated, and none of them were good. If Donna wanted to elaborate more, she would—but they wouldn't harass her about it.
After a brief, awkward silence, Donna looked down at the Doctor, who was still messing with the security camera. "So," she said briskly. "Did we just run away from a power cut?"
Rose could sense the Doctor's immediate and unqualified negative, but he didn't dismiss the idea out loud. "Possibly," he allowed.
"Is it safe here?" Jenny asked, looking around the reading room uneasily.
"Of course we're safe," the Doctor said insouciantly. "There's a little shop."
All three women turned to look at the wall he'd tilted his head towards. There was a shop, and a sign pointing towards the entrance.
"Gotcha!" the Doctor crowed triumphantly, pulling their attention back to him.
"Ooo, I'm sorry," he said a moment later. He carefully set the security camera back down on the floor. "I really am. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." He looked up at Rose, Donna, and Jenny. "It's alive."
"You said it was a security camera," Donna protested.
He pushed himself back to his feet and twirled his sonic screwdriver once before sliding it into his coat pocket. "It is. It's an alive one."
Messages kept scrolling across the screen, this time warning that others were coming.
"Others?" Jenny said. "What's it mean, others?"
Donna waited for the Doctor or Rose to answer, but they were silent. Well, I've had enough silence in the Library. She looked around and spotted another one of those Courtesy Nodes.
"Excuse me," she said as she strode towards it. "What does it mean, others?"
The Doctor snorted. "That's barely more than a Speak Your Weight machine; it can't help you."
Donna looked back at him and raised her eyebrows. "So why's it got a face?" she challenged.
She didn't expect the answer she received.
"This flesh aspect was donated by Mark Chambers on the occasion of his death," the Courtesy Node said calmly.
Donna looked back at the Doctor, who was rubbing at the back of his neck like he'd been hoping she wouldn't figure that out. "It's a real face?"
The Courtesy Node decided to answer that question, too. "It has been actualised individually for you from the many facial aspects saved to our extensive flesh banks. Please enjoy."
"It chose me a dead face it thought I'd like?" Donna screeched. She looked back at the Doctor and Rose, who had walked over to her and both wore slightly sheepish expressions. "That statue's got a real dead person's face on it."
"It's the fifty-first century," the Doctor explained. "That's basically like donating a park bench."
"It's donating a face!" Donna shot back, pointing to her own face and backing away from the creepy statue.
A small hand grabbed her wrist and yanked Donna a few feet back and to the left. Donna glared at Jenny. "I can move on my own, thanks."
The Doctor shook his head and pointed to where Donna had been standing. "The shadow. Look."
Donna looked at it, then back at the Doctor. "What about it?"
Rose looked around the reading room. "Count the shadows."
"One," Donna snarked. "There, counted it. One shadow."
"No, Donna," Jenny said quietly. "What's casting it?"
Donna looked down at the triangular shadow on the floor, then slowly raised her eyes to the ceiling, hoping to see something that would explain the presence of the shadow.
There was nothing.
The Doctor shuddered at how close they'd come to losing Donna.
An electrical hum distracted him, the same sound they'd heard earlier. He turned his head slowly to look down the corridor that led to the reading room. The lights were flickering and going out, just like they had in the stacks.
"The power must be going," Donna said, though he could tell in her voice that she didn't really believe that.
The Doctor shook his head. "This place runs on fission cells. They'll out burn the sun." The Vashta Nerada were turning off the lights because living shadows could hide more easily in the dark.
"All right then, love, why is it dark?" Rose asked calmly.
He took her hand, then pulled Jenny closer and motioned for Donna to circle in as well. "It's not dark," he said, his voice hoarse with anger and fear.
Donna tapped on his arm, and he looked over at her. She pointed to the floor, where the triangular shadow had been just a few moments ago. "That shadow. It's gone."
The Doctor's throat went dry. Rose shuddered in his arms, and he tried to get his fear under control instead of projecting the full force of it to her. "We need to get back to the TARDIS," he said, surprised by how even his voice sounded.
The drive to get home to safety thrummed inside him, in time with his heart beats. Whoever had called for them would just have to manage on their own. They were already running out of time to make it out of the Library alive.
"Why?" asked Jenny.
"Because that shadow hasn't gone." The Doctor swallowed. "It's moved."
The Courtesy Node went crazy then, repeating the same message over and over. "Reminder. The Library has been breached. Others are coming. Reminder. The Library has been breached. Others are coming. Reminder. The Library has been breached."
Rose stared at the Courtesy Node and rubbed the Doctor's back, trying to calm him down. He hadn't been this frightened since they'd run into the Weeping Angels with Martha, and his panic was interfering with his ability to communicate.
Calm down, love, she urged. Just talk to us and tell us what's going on.
The Doctor took a deep breath, but before he could get another word out, an explosion blew open the double doors on the opposite side of the room. Six people in spacesuits stepped into the room. The glass on the suits was tinted black, hiding their faces, but then the leader reached up and adjusted the filter.
Rose stared at the woman's heart-shaped face. Wide hazel eyes looked back at her beneath furrowed brows, and Rose suddenly knew—this was the person who'd called them. The fact that she'd never met the woman before in her life added a sudden complexity to the day that she hadn't counted on.
Time travel. She sighed and rubbed her temple.
The tall stranger looked at her, then at the Doctor, Donna, and Jenny. She seemed to take a deep breath before turning back to her crew.
"Pop your helmets, everyone." She took her own helmet off and shook out her long, brown ponytail. "We've got breathers."
"How do you know they're not androids?" one of her team challenged, though everyone did as she ordered and took their helmets off.
The woman held Rose's gaze steadily. "Because. I know them."
The Doctor seemed not to hear that announcement. He stepped away from Rose, his hands clenched into fists. "Get out," he ordered, his voice tense.
A smile played on the corners of the woman's mouth, and Rose wondered if she really knew them. Because if she did, wouldn't she recognise that he was about thirty seconds from an outburst?
Unless she's never seen him in a dangerous situation like this. Suddenly wanting to shield the young woman from what was to come, Rose reached out and put her hand on the Doctor's arm. "Doctor."
He took a deep breath and blew it out slowly, but the tension in his back didn't ease and his jaw was still twitching. "We're leaving, and you should too. Get back in your rocket and fly away."
"Who is this?" A man stepped forward and glared at the woman. "You said we were the only expedition. I paid for exclusives."
Her smirk deepened and she looked down at the shorter man, meeting his gaze steadily. "They're part of my team."
Rose felt the ripple of shock that washed through the Doctor when he heard those words, and she realised he hadn't seen the recognition on the woman's face and put the pieces together.
The man sighed, but he nodded. "It would have been nice if you'd informed me more people would be meeting us here. And I really would love to know how they got through the protections around the planet. But…" He gestured to a pretty young woman standing off to the side. "Miss Evangelista, I want to see the contracts."
The Doctor watched the party with growing incredulity. Had he not been clear enough in his recommendation that they all leave? Why were they standing here talking?
The stranger looked up at him, her helmet tucked under her arm."You came through the north door, yeah? How was that, much damage?"
He put his hands on his hips and looked down at this person who was delaying everyone's escape. "Please, just leave. I'm asking you seriously and properly, just l—"
The man's words sank in suddenly, and the Doctor broke off in mid-thought to look back at him, then at the rest of the group—all young, likely graduate students working as interns. He looked at the woman who claimed to know them, and judged her to be just a few years older. Their advisor.
He sighed and rocked back on his heels. "Hang on. Did you say expedition?"
The balding man nodded. "My expedition. I funded it."
The Doctor groaned and looked back at the woman. "Oh, you're not, are you? Tell me you're not archaeologists."
She pressed her lips together, finally making an effort to hide her smirk. "Got a problem with archaeologists?"
He snorted. "I'm a time traveller. I point and laugh at archaeologists."
"Ah. Doctor Melody Pond, archaeologist." She wasn't even bothering to hide her smirk now.
Rose stepped forward and shook the other woman's hand. "I think it's time for introductions," she said. "You might know us, but we don't know your team." She smiled at the black woman standing behind Doctor Pond—she was the one who'd asked if they were androids. "I'm Rose, this is the Doctor, our daughter Jenny, and our friend Donna. What's your name?"
The woman blinked. "Anita."
"Right," the Doctor interrupted. "We could do introductions, or we could leave. I vote for leaving." He leaned forward, resting his weight on the balls of his feet as he looked into Doctor Pond's eyes. "And as you leave, you need to set up a quarantine beacon. Code wall the planet, the whole planet. Nobody comes here, not ever again. Not one living thing, not here, not ever."
Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Jenny grab Anita's arm as she wandered past, towards the shadowy edge of the room. "Stay out of the shadows, Anita," she warned.
The Doctor nodded. "That's right. Not a foot, not a finger in the shadows till you're safely back in your ship. Goes for all of you. Stay in the light."
Melody Pond blinked up at him, and something in the indulgent expression on her face irritated the Doctor even more. Does she think I'm joking?
"Find a nice, bright spot and just stand," he ordered. "If you understand me, look very, very scared." The archaeology team looked more befuddled than scared, and he shook his head. "No, bit more scared than that." Frowns deepened, and they shifted their weight from one foot to the other. The Doctor shrugged. "Okay, do for now."
For the first time, Doctor Pond hesitated, licking her lips and looking at Rose. "Rose?"
Rose nodded. "He's serious, Doctor Pond. He still hasn't told us exactly what's on this planet, but it's swarming with something, and whatever it is, it's bad. We need to get out of here."
"Oh, I'm not going anywhere." The man paying for the expedition put his helmet under his arm and scowled at them. "My family has waited one hundred years to come back and check on the Library."
The Doctor raised his eyebrows. His family owned the Library? Which made him something-something Lux, as in the Felman Lux coherency warning.
The Doctor ground his teeth together, then looked away from the arrogant Mr. Lux to a younger black man standing uncertainly on the edge of the group. "You. Who are you?"
"Um, Dave."
He grabbed Dave by the shoulder and pushed him, none-too-gently, back to the door the group had entered through. "Okay, Dave."
"Oh, well, Other Dave," Dave added before the Doctor could finish his sentence. He stopped and pointed back at the last person needing to be introduced. "Because that's Proper Dave, the pilot. He was the first Dave, so when we—"
"Other Dave," the Doctor interrupted, then pulled him the last few feet to the door. He pointed down the corridor. "The way you came, does it look the same as before?"
"Yeah," Other Dave said, then he looked properly and shook his head. "Oh, it's a bit darker."
"How much darker?" the Doctor prodded.
The kinks of Other Dave's tightly curled hair cast shadows on the door behind him as he pointed towards the darkened stacks. "Oh, like I could see where we came through just like a moment ago. I can't now."
The Doctor fought back his panic. The shadows were closing in on them, and before too much longer, every escape route would be closed off. He backed away from the door and stared purposely at Other Dave.
"Seal up this door. We'll find another way out."
"We're not looking for a way out," the snappish older man insisted. "Miss Evangelista?"
The pretty young woman stepped forward with a stack of papers in her hands. "I'm Mr. Lux's personal everything." She handed the papers to the Doctor, Rose, Jenny, and Donna. "You need to sign these contracts agreeing that your individual experiences inside the library are the intellectual property of the Felman Lux Corporation."
"Oh, that's nice, isn't it?" Rose winked up at him, and the Doctor felt the tiniest bit of his tension ease.
Jenny and Donna both made similar sounds of assent, all of them looking at the Doctor. On his nod, the four of them tore the contracts in two and tossed the ripped paper onto the floor.
Mr. Lux pointed at them. "My family built this library. I have rights."
"I'm not interested in your rights," the Doctor snarled. "Something came to this library and killed everything in it. Killed a whole world." He sucked in a breath through his nose. "The only thing I'm interested in is getting my family home safely. I suggest you do the same."
Melody Pond bit her lip. "Surely whatever killed those people is long-dead."
The Doctor looked up at the ceiling and rubbed his hands over his face. "Rose told you there was a swarm. What if they're not dead? What if, whatever they are, they've been living and breeding on this planet for one hundred years?"
Mr. Lux's annoyed voice interrupted his rapid questions. "What are you doing?"
The Doctor looked across the room to where Mr. Lux was confronting Other Dave, waving a torch like a club.
Other Dave had a caulk gun pressed to the door jamb, and he looked from Mr. Lux to the Doctor. "He said seal the door."
"You're taking orders from him?" Mr. Lux demanded.
The Doctor smiled darkly and snuck up behind Mr. Lux "Spooky, isn't it?" he murmured as he snagged the torch out of Mr. Lux's hand and shone it into the dark corners of the room.
Rose watched him as he inspected the room. His back was rigid, though that was partially concealed by the heavy coat draped over his shoulders. But it was the fear she could almost taste that made her want to grab her family and run straight back to the TARDIS. The Doctor knew what was here, and they were all in terrible danger.
"You want to know what's here?" he asked, then answered his rhetorical question. "I'll tell you. Almost every species in the universe has an irrational fear of the dark. But they're wrong, because it's not irrational. It's Vashta Nerada."
Vashta Nerada.
Even without knowing what they were, the name sent a shiver down Rose's back. As she watched the Doctor as he stood on the edge of the light, shining the torch into the darkness, she paid attention to his thoughts, and the shiver became a shudder.
Carnivorous shadows. Shadows that eat.
Jenny crossed the room to stand with her father, peering into the darkness with him, but Donna stood alone beneath the centre of the rotunda. "What's Vashta Nerada?" she asked.
"It's what's in the dark," the Doctor said, his quiet, tense voice matching the ominous words. "It's what's always in the dark."
Rose spun around, looking at the archaeology team who were all staring at the Doctor. "Lights!" she demanded. "The shadows are dangerous, so let's fill this room with light."
The Doctor nodded and tossed the torch to Mr. Lux as he strode back to the centre of the light. "Exactly right, Rose," he said as he shrugged out of his coat and draped it over the circulation desk. "Form a circle. Safe area. Big as you can, lights pointing out."
Melody nodded at her team. "Oi. Do as he says."
"You're not listening to this man?" Mr. Lux demanded.
Rose clenched her fists and took a few deep breaths; less than ten minutes in the presence of Mr. Lux, and already her patience was at its limit.
Melody rolled her eyes. "Obviously," she said, with just a hint of an accent Rose couldn't quite make out. She rattled off directions to the rest of her team quickly, delegating with the air of experience. "Anita, unpack the lights. Donna and Jenny can help. Other Dave, make sure the door's secure, then help them if they aren't done. Mr. Lux, put your helmet back on—block the visor. Proper Dave, find an active terminal. I want you to access the library database. See what you can find about what happened here a hundred years ago."
She took a breath and looked at the Doctor and Rose before ducking behind the circulation desk. "And if I could talk to the two of you, over here?"
The Doctor and Rose exchanged a look before nodding and following Melody. Rose couldn't help noticing that they were conveniently out of earshot of the rest of the group, as long as they kept their voices down.
"Doctor Pond, why am I the only one wearing my helmet?" Mr. Lux asked wearily.
"I don't fancy you," she said blithely.
Rose swallowed a laugh at the impish expression on the mysterious young woman's face. It had nothing to do with who she fancied—Doctor Pond was just tired of seeing Mr. Lux's condescending expression every time she looked up. Rose didn't blame her, but sadly, once he realised it wasn't necessary, Mr. Lux removed his helmet.
The Doctor paused just before stepping behind the desk. "Don't let your shadows cross," he ordered. "Seriously, don't even let them touch. Any of them could be infected."
"How can a shadow be infected?" Other Dave asked.
You still haven't really explained that part, Doctor, Rose pointed out.
He ran a hand through his hair. Let's see what Doctor Pond has to say, then I'll finish explaining the Vashta Nerada.
Donna watched the Doctor and Rose step off to the side with this strange woman while she and Jenny carried the lights Anita was unpacking to the middle of the room, setting them up in a circle. Doctor Pond's opening assertion that she knew them had seemed a little far-fetched, but there was something familiar in the way she interacted with her crew, and after paying attention, Donna had figured it out—she sounded like the Doctor, the way he stepped into a situation and automatically took charge.
Plus, there was the way she'd turned to Rose for verification of the Doctor's claim that they were in danger. That said a lot about how well she knew the couple.
"I know," Jenny murmured, keeping her voice low. "It's weird, isn't it—meeting someone supposedly from your future?"
"Excuse me, can I help?" Miss Evangelista asked before Donna could reply to Jenny.
Other Dave had just joined them, and the smirk that passed between him and Anita really got under Donna's skin.
"No, we're fine," Anita said.
The young personal assistant didn't give up. "I could just you know, hold things."
"No, really, we're okay," Other Dave insisted.
Miss Evangelista's shoulders slumped and she walked off, joining her boss who was doing something with a handheld device. Donna watched for a moment as she tried to get Mr. Lux to give her something to do, but he just held up his hand—dismissing her just like the others had.
Donna scowled and stood up so she could confront Other Dave and Anita. "Couldn't she help?" she said sharply.
Jenny looked up from the nearly-finished circle of light, a faint smile on her face, and the approval emboldened Donna. She'd had enough experience in her life of being treated like she was useless. But at least she'd never been treated like that by her co-workers, unlike Miss Evangelista.
Other Dave shook his head. "Trust me. I just spent four days on a ship with that woman. She's… er…"
Anita sighed and cut in. "Couldn't tell the difference between the escape pod and the bathroom. We had to go back for her." She and Other Dave exchanged another grin. "Twice."
Donna glared at the two, and they quickly looked away from her and went back to work getting the lights set up. Convinced she'd made it clear what she thought of their attitude, she looked for Miss Evangelista, hoping she could at least be of use making the other woman feel better, but Mr. Lux was talking to her.
Mr. Lux's personal everything, she thought cynically. If the young woman was really as useless as Anita and Other Dave claimed, then she must be there to be eye candy. Donna gritted her teeth together. Three thousand years in the future, and nothing had changed.
oOoOoOoOo
The Doctor shoved his hands into his coat pockets and glared at Doctor Melody Pond. "Is there a point to this little meeting?" he bit out. "Because there are ten people, including the three of us, whose lives depend on me figuring out a way to get us out of here. And I don't know if you've noticed, but the exits are being cut off one by one."
Rose nudged him with an elbow to the ribs, but he didn't apologise. Standing in the dimly lit reading room on a planet that had been overrun by Vashta Nerada was frankly terrifying, and the fact that no one but Rose really seemed to be taking his concerns seriously only made it worse.
Melody Pond didn't flinch in the face of his anger. She just smiled, a little sadly, and held up a wallet the Doctor immediately knew held a piece of psychic paper. "I just wanted to thank you for coming when I called."
"Oh, that was you?" the Doctor asked, even though he'd figured that out.
"Yes, that was me. Psychic paper is more reliable than super-charged mobile phones in certain parts of the universe." Melody pursed her lips and looked at them. "I suspected, when you made that crack about archaeologists, that I might have gotten you even earlier than I realised. You don't know who I am, do you?"
The Doctor and Rose exchanged a look. "Should we, Doctor Pond?" Rose asked.
Melody flinched at the title. "First of all, please call me Melody. Hearing you call me Doctor Pond is…" She shook her head. "It's just weird."
"All right, Melody," Rose agreed.
She was surprised when several of the tense lines around Melody's eyes and mouth disappeared. Melody slid her psychic paper back into her bag. "And yes. You'll know me, one day," she assured them. "And I know anyone could say that, especially since you mentioned upfront that you're time travellers—really, Doctor, you usually play that card a little closer to the vest."
"She's right, Doctor."
"Oi!" The Doctor felt his lower lip protrude slightly, but he didn't care if he was pouting. Rose was supposed to be on his side.
Melody winked at Rose. "You might be decades younger than when I know you, but I see not much has changed between now and then."
The Doctor blinked at the casual implication that Melody knew they didn't age, then shook his head quickly. "Yes, back to you knowing us in our future," he cut in. "How can we believe you, since, as you pointed out, anyone could say that?"
Melody sighed. "You gave us all a code word, said it was something you'd only ever tell your closest friends and family, so we could use it if we met you this far out of order. I never thought I'd have to use it." She clasped her hands in front of her, a picture that looked odd with the heavy gloves of her suit. "We've met a year or two out of order before, but never before you knew me…"
"What's the code word?" Rose asked.
Melody took a deep breath and lowered her voice before speaking the words with solemnity. "Bad Wolf."
