A/N I don't own BBC or DW
Book of the Update: Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
Chapter 15
"Aye aye, got this old tub mended?" Wilf asked, walking into the room where Rose and the Doctor sat.
He wrinkled his nose and looked up, glasses sliding down a bit. "Just trying to fix the heating."
Wilf sat down on the other side of the Doctor, sighing as he looked out of the window. "Y'know, I've always dreamt of a view like that," he said quietly and Rose looked up to see for herself. It was beautiful. Out the window, the earth could be seen, all green and blue and white. It had sort of a glow around it – probably from the reflection of the sun's light – and swirls of white clouds danced across the surface, looking more like moving paint than anything else.
Wilf chuckled, slapping his things, "I'm an astronaut! There's dawn," he pointed, "Over England, look. Brand new day. My wife's buried down there." His face grew sad as he contemplated that and Rose longed to reach over and hug him, but didn't want to intrude on his private moment. "And now, I might never visit her again. Do you think he changed them, in their graves?" he asked, turning to look at the Doctor, who slowly lowered the piece of metal and wires he was fiddling with.
"I'm sorry," he whispered.
"No. Not your fault," Wilf denied, but the Doctor would have none of it.
"Isn't it?"
"Oh, 1948, I was over there. End of the mandate in Palestine. Private Mott. A skinny little idiot I was. Stood on this rooftop in the middle of a skirmish. Like a blizzard, all them bullets in the sky. The world had gone mad." He laughed a bit, rubbing his head. "Eh, sorry. You don't want to listen to an old man's tales, do you?"
The Doctor took of his specs and crossed his arms over his knees. "I'm older than you," he said quietly and Wilf smirked.
"Get away."
"I'm nine hundred and six," he told him and Wilf looked astonished.
"What, really though?"
"Yeah."
"Nine hundred years? We must look like insects to you."
The Doctor shook his head slightly, frowning. "No," he said, "I think you look like giants."
Wilf reached into his pocket and pulled something out. A handgun. "Listen….I….I want you to have this," he said, offering it to the Doctor. "I've kept it all this time and I thought-"
"No."
"No, but if you take it, if you could-"
"No." they were silent for a moment, and Rose slowly stood up as the Doctor began to speak again. She sensed this was more of a father figure – son conversation, so she walked a ways away to the other side of the room and sat there, fiddling with the case on her mobile. It was broken – again – the Doctor never seemed to be able to borrow it and bring it back in one piece. That was alright though. S'not like she had anyone to call.
"…You take this, Doctor, and save your life! You're the most wonderful man, and I don't want you to die!" Wilf said loudly, loud enough that Rose could hear, from across the room. And she heard the Doctor's response as well, though it was quiet.
"Never."
"A star fell from the sky," came a voice over some sort of intercom system in the ship. Rose looked up. "Don't you want to know where it came from? Because now it makes sense, Doctor. The whole of my life, my destiny…the star was a diamond. And a diamond is a white-point star." The Doctor stood up, taking heavy, frantic breaths as the Master continued, "And I have worked all night to sanctify that gift. Now the star is mine. I can increase the signal and use it as a lifeline. Do you get it now? Do you see? Keep watching, Doctor….this should be spectacular. Over and out."
Rose stood up and ran to the Doctor as soon as the intercom shut off. "Doctro, what's a white-point star?" she asked, at the same time Wilf said,
"What's he gone on about? What's that mean?"
The Doctor looked at them, some unknown emotion tattooed across his face. He was shaking and his eyes were red and panicked. "A white-point star is only found on one planet. Gallifrey." Rose's eyes widened as he continued, "Which means it's the Time Lords. The Time Lords are returning."
"Well, that's good, innit? I mean, that's your people," Wilf said, not understanding. The Doctor said nothing, but his hand lunged forward and he grabbed the gun off of Wilf's lap, staring at it for a moment, his jaw set. Then he stood up and walked swiftly out of the room, tucking the gun into his jacket as he did so.
Wilf looked at Rose. "I…I don't understand. Wouldn't he want them to come back? If they're his own people?"
She opened and closed her mouth a few times, unsure what exactly to say. "He would, yeah, but not…not like they were during the Time War. He don't talk about it much, but…from what he's told me, I figure the Time Lords changed during the war. Changed for the worse. Judging by his reaction, I'd say a lot worse."
"Oh. Oh my."
She helped him to his feet and they ran out of the room and onto the flight deck, where the Doctor and the cacti (Rose still hadn't managed to catch their names) were standing, frozen, as they listened to the noise coming through the intercom.
Beep beep beep beep.
Beep beep beep beep.
Beep beep beep beep.
"What's that?" asked the woman, and the man looked at some sort of scanner.
"Coming from earth," he said, "It's on every single wavelength."
Rose looked at the Doctor. His teeth were grit and his whole body was shaking again. His eyes were mad and he looked as though he would snap any moment. She stepped forward and took his hand, giving it a squeeze. He didn't look at her, but he squeezed her hand back and had stopped shaking, so she seemed to have helped him, just by being there. He pulled away a moment later, however, to grab a metal….thing and begin to work on it with the sonic.
"But you said your people were dead," Wilf said, ignoring Rose's face telling him to stop. "Past tense."
"Inside the Time War, when the whole was time-locked, like sealed inside a bubble. It's not a bubble, but just think of a bubble. Nothing can get in or out of the time-lock. Don't you see? Nothing can get in or get out, except something that was already there," he explained. The whole time he was talking, he had been fiddling with the metal thing and various other bits of the ship. He was now seated in the captain's chair and looking over the controls, sonic in hand.
"The signal!" Rose cried, "Of course! Since he was a little kid!"
"If they can follow the signal, they can escape before they die."
"Well, big reunion, eh? We'll have a party!" Wilf cried, and Rose glared at him, seeing the visible pain this was putting her Doctor through.
"I'm sorry," she said softly, and the Doctor looked at her, pain etched into the lines in his skin. "I'm so sorry, Doctor."
"I choose to remember them the way they were, the Time Lords of old. But the war, the endless war, changed them, right to the core. You've both seen my enemies. The Time Lords are more dangerous than any of them."
"Time Lords? What lords? Anyone care to explain?!" the cactus woman cried in confusion, but everyone ignored her.
"Righ, yes, you," the Doctor said, pushing his emotions aside, "This is a salvage ship, yes? You were travelling the asteroid fields for junk!"
"Yeah, what about it?"
"So you've got asteroid lasers!" he cried victoriously, throwing his hands into the air and spinning around.
"Yeah, well they're all frazzled now," the man pointed out and the Doctor laughed.
"HA! Consider them unfrazzled. Now, you there, I'm gonna need you on navigation. And you, get in the laser pod. Wilfred!"
"Yeah?"
"Laser number two. This old soldier's got one more battle."
"This ship can't move; it's dead," the woman said pessimistically and Rose snapped.
"Can't you be positive for once in your life? Maybe he's got it worked out, huh?" she asked snidely, hands on her hips. The woman looked abashed, and rightfully so, when the Doctor snapped and pointed to Rose.
"Bingo! I fixed the heating," he pulled up a large switch, "I fixed the ship."
"But now they can see us!" The woman cried, being negative again.
"Yeah, they can!" Rose yelled, right in the woman's face. "And that's bloody fantastic, you know that?"
The Doctor grinned madly and took hold of the steering equipment. "Allons-y!" he cried, pulling the controls back, making the whole ship lurch forward, sending some of them crash to the floor. "Come on," the Doctor growled, the ship shaking as it got faster and faster. A golden light enveloped the whole place, streaming in through every window and porthole, so bright that Rose had to squint and look away. Fire. The ship was going so fast it had caught fire in the earth's atmosphere. "Come on," he said again, still pulling up on the controls.
"You are freaking, flipping mad!" cried the woman, pointing a finger at him.
Rose grinned. "I think he's brilliant!"
He smiled at her, not taking his eyes off of the window. "You two, do what I say! Lasers!"
"What for?" the man asked, yelling.
"Because of the missiles!" Rose yelled, "Obviously!"
"We're fighting off the entire planet right now!" The Doctor yelled, all his concentration on steering the ship.
Something beeped on the scanner and Rose looked down. "Incoming on the right! You two open fire!" They didn't, and the Doctor swung the ship around madly trying to avoid the missiles. "OPEN FIRE!" She yelled again as something exploded on the right side, making the ship list to the left a bit as she flew, and this time, they listened, opening fire on the remaining missiles headed for them.
"Woo!" Wilf cried in elation when he shot them down, "Oh, I wish Donna could see me now!"
"Don't worry, we'll tell her all about it!" Rose yelled back, laughing. She kept an eye on the scanner, and soon enough, more red blips appeared on the screen, not sixty yards from them. "There's a second round!" She counted them quickly, "Sixteen of them!" more red blips. "And another sixteen!"
"You, go to the rearguard lasers!" The Doctor yelled at the cactus woman and she rushed off toward the back of the ship, where Rose remembered there had been another laser, bigger than the others. He spun the controls and the ship swung around and Rose grabbed onto the back of the unused captain's chair behind the Doctor, trying not to fall to the ceiling now that the ship had gone upside down.
A single missile escaped the lasers and came straight toward the big window, smashing through the glass, but turning aside just at the right moment to not come in and kill them all. Rose gasped as she felt the pull of the wind outside, and the skin on her face began to ripple with the force of it. If she opened her mouth, her lips probably would've blown open like in a cartoon.
The Doctor hunched down, leaving his hands on the controls, higher than his body. "ROSE?" He shouted and she hunched down as well, following his lead.
"I'm here, Doctor!"
"Lock on navigation! England, the Naismith Mansion!" she heaved herself up against the wind, her lips flapping just as she imagined they would and lunged for the navigation controls, grabbing onto them and pulling herself across the short distance, barely keeping on her feet. She managed to get over to the computer and lock onto Naismith Mansion, England. "Destination?!" he asked, yelling against the roaring noise of the wind.
"Fifty klicks and closing!" she replied, also yelling. Klicks was the measurement used on the ship. Seemed to be about half a kilometer. "We've locked onto the house. Are we stopping?" though she didn't think they would be.
The Doctor didn't answer.
"Doctor! Doctor, you said we were gonna die," Wilf yelled, "But is that all of us? I won't stop you, sir, but is this it?"
The Doctor didn't answer. And he didn't stop.
They were coming up on the mansion now, so close that Rose could see inside the windows, and she thought they were going to crash, but the Doctor pulled up at the last possible second, letting the ship scrape the shingles off of the roof, but no closer. He released the controls and ran over to the hatch in the center of the room, yanking it up. He paused a moment, then looked up and grabbed Rose tightly, crashing his lips against hers roughly and whispering that he loved her into her ear and then he was gone.