HAH! IT'S STILL SUNDAY HERE SO I MADE IT!
My foot is doing better :) I've been using a wheelchair all week and the disability bus on campus to get around.
"Red sky at night, sailor's delight. Red sky at morning, sailor take warning."
The three of them sat huddled together underneath a blanket near the bottom of the stairs leading to the second floor. Explosions filled the air around them and reminded Rose of her time in the London Blitz. Every so often the building rattled ominously and bits of dust fell from the ceiling, the two fluorescent lights in the hallway flickering. The building was eerily silent, most of the residents having already evacuated to the lower levels.
Elliot sat firmly between Rose and Martha where they could keep him warm in the frigid March air and shield him if anything happened. Every so often he would gasp or whimper but he otherwise remained silent as Martha flipped through his sketchbook. She was impressed, maybe even more than Rose had been, and complimented him every other page. He tried to make a response with the psychic paper but his thoughts were so jumped that it was difficult for him to focus enough to make a legible answer so he stopped trying.
"What's taking so long?" Rose fussed.
Martha sighed. "It's only been a few minutes."
Elliot gasped quietly and looked at the door to their flat. Rose frowned and wondered what was going on in there. He glanced up at Rose and she wondered if he'd realized where her thoughts were headed. He shook his head once then rested his head on her shoulder. She put her arms around him soothingly.
"Elliot, would it help if I told you a story?" she asked. "Something from our travels that you can focus on? Maybe pick up images from? There should be a pen in my bag if you want to draw."
Before the kid could respond, the door to the flat swung open. Rose straightened and she felt Martha stiffen. A man stepped out of the flat but whether it was John or the Doctor she couldn't tell. He looked around, spotting them on the stairs, and smiled in relief. He shut the door behind him and walked over to their huddle.
"Doctor?" Rose whispered, searching.
"Hello," he replied. She recognized the way the word rolled off his tongue and the tender look in his eyes as he tried to convince her once again of his identity. It was him. She smiled and tears formed in her eyes. She quickly blinked them away.
"I'm going to find them and put an end to this. Go inside the flat and wait for me to get back. Violet's still in there and she's gonna want to head to the hospital but don't let her out of the flat until the bombing stops."
Rose frowned at the mention of the other woman but nodded.
The Doctor shifted his gaze to Martha. He pulled the olfactory deceiver from his wrist and handed it to her.
"No! They'll smell you!"
"It's alright," he assured her. "I've got a little trick up my sleeve. It won't last long but it'll do." Martha frowned at him skeptically but accepted the deceiver and returned it to her wrist. "If you want to head to the hospital to help, by all means, go. They'll need an extra pair of hands after all this."
Martha nodded. "Welcome back."
He smiled then looked at the last member of the shivering trio who was watching him like a hawk. "Hello there, Elliot Hunter," he greeted as cheerfully as he could, drawing his name out and pronouncing it 'Hun-tah.' "I'm the Doctor. What do you say we muffle all that noise in your head, eh?"
Elliot's eyes widened hopefully and he nodded. The Doctor raised his hands. "All I'm gonna do is put a few shields up around your mind and dampen your telepathic field. Might feel a wee bit strange, like you're missing a limb, but I have to make them that strong or they might fall down before this is over."
He nodded once again. The Doctor pressed his fingers to his temples and the boy jumped in surprise. "Easy, it's alright. Just relax. Don't go poking around my mind; it's a bit of a mess in here right now."
Elliot slowly relaxed, his eyes falling shut, and he sighed. The two of them stayed frozen like that for about half a minute before their eyes opened simultaneously.
"There you are." The Doctor pulled his hands back. "Feel better?"
He nodded.
"Good. I'll remove them for you later and help you rebuild your natural ones."
The Doctor straightened up and Rose pushed the blanket from her shoulders and stood as well. "What are you going to do?" she asked.
He gazed at her for a long moment, eyes soft, and he placed his hands on either side of her face, leaning in to kiss her forehead. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and clung to him like she'd wanted to for months, sighing. He pressed his face into her hair and she heard him inhale slowly.
Pulling back, he tilted her chin up so he could see her face. "I'm going to make sure they can never hurt us again and then I'm going to make sure UNIT gets called in. They have a branch here in States and they can help clean up and contain. I'll be back as soon as I can." He brushed his thumb across the top of her cheek. "You can stop now," he murmured, touching just beneath her eye. "It's alright."
"I'm not sure how to stop it," she admitted. "It normally would've by now."
"You work on that and stay safe," he said and kissed her forehead again. "I'll be back."
He released her then and with one final look at Martha and Elliot, he spun around and jogged down the stairs. They listened to the sound of his footsteps receding before turning as one to face the flat door. Another set of explosions hit, one of them close enough that the whole building shuddered, but Elliot did not react beyond flinching from his own fear.
Martha helped him stand, keeping one hand on the blanket around her. Rose picked the backpack up and headed inside the flat. She set it down in the hall then went looking for their newest charge. She probably was the last person Violet wanted to see right now but she felt like she owed it to her to be civil. She checked both of the bedrooms and finally found her sitting in the bathtub, her head resting on wall.
Rose flipped the switch and Violet's eyes flicked over to her. The two women regarded each other in silence for a long minute as more tremors shook the building. Rose held out her hand but Violet simply looked at her. Feeling awkward, she lowered her hand and shuffled her feet nervously.
"He said to keep you safe until it's over," she blurted out.
"So he's—"
She nodded.
"Ah. Well, then. I suppose that's the end." Violet murmured. "…Keep me safe?"
"You're…you shouldn't leave until the bombing stops."
She smiled up at her wryly. "Is that what you are? A guard dog?"
"Guard wolf, I think."
A humorless laugh, "Of course."
Rose licked her lips and her eyes flicked to the mirror. Still golden. That wasn't surprising, she could still hear the TARDIS's song. "I'm gonna make some tea."
"Very British."
"Would you rather coffee? That's the American drink, ain't it?"
"I'll take the tea."
"Can Elliot have tea?"
"Why are you asking me?"
"You're a doctor. You know more about his condition than I do."
Violet pushed herself up and stepped out of the tub. Rose looked her up and down once and swallowed. They looked a lot alike. She hadn't noticed before. They could've been related.
"Just don't put too much sugar in it," Violet said.
Rose nodded and tried to smile, failed. "If—If I had stayed near him then he would never have… y'know. And you probably wouldn't have bothered."
"Yeah? Well, I'm glad you didn't. I wouldn't have traded it for anything."
"I'm sorry—"
She shook her head. "Don't. Just…don't."
Rose swallowed and left the room.
Violet remained in the bathroom for a few more minutes, sitting on the counter next to the sink. Bombs continued to drop around the city and occasionally one hit nearby and the building shuddered. After one such swell, she noticed the toothbrush holder had fallen between the sink and toilet and shattered. Acting on the sudden urge, she knelt slid off the counter and knelt down, carefully picking up the pieces and trying not to cut her hands.
Her sister would see this as a metaphor, somehow.
Liz. She hadn't thought of her sister all evening, not even when the bombs had begin to go off. She'd been so focused on what was going on with John that she hadn't even spared a thought towards Liz. Where was she tonight? Was she hurt? Was she looking for Violet?
Shaking her head, Violet dropped the last pieces of glass she could find into the trash and set the two toothbrushes on the counter. She pushed herself up and turned around.
Elliot stood in the hallway outside the door, staring. Always staring. The little boy who said nothing and saw everything. Psychic, they'd called him. Violet hadn't believed in such things for a long, long time and yet here one was, standing right in front of her. Who'd have thought such a sickly boy would hold such strength?
"You see what's inside my head?" she asked quietly.
He shrugged and looked down at the piece of paper he'd been holding all evening. Rose and Martha had seemed to be reading from it once or twice but every time she looked it was blank. Yet when he held it out to her now she saw that it was covered in words.
I can't control what I see
The words disappeared and new ones replaced them.
I just see
Violet stared as the words faded and decided that she didn't want to know how or why the paper was doing that.
I'm sorry
She laughed once bitterly. Was this how a widow felt at her husband's funeral? Forced to accept the many condolences of those who cared as if they would be enough? "Is everyone going to apologize to me now? You have nothing to be sorry for, Elliot."
Yes I do
Dr. Smith said I played matchmaker
You're a nice lady
I wanted you to be happy
Violet smiled and knelt in front of him. "You are the sweetest boy I think I've ever met." She reached out and adjusted the oversized sweatshirt on his shoulders, smoothing out the wrinkles. "Elliot… why did you come with Rose?"
She needed someone who could hear the watch
"Weren't you scared?"
Elliot licked his lips and nodded. Yes
I'm scared of the Doctor but I still wanted to meet him
And he needed my help
I'd rather do something good and get hurt
Then just wait around to die
Like you all want me to
He stepped out of her grip, stuffing the paper into his pocket, and walked back down the hall to the kitchen. After a moment, she turned off the bathroom light followed him towards the only other lit room in the house.
When she arrived, Elliot was sitting in a chair looking apprehensively at the steaming beverage that had just been placed before him, Rose was at the counter stirring the contents of a mug with a tea spoon, and Martha was sitting calmly in the other chair with her mug in one hand and the other resting on the table. A second later the building shuddered from another explosion and her hand shot up, catching the wooden clock that had just fallen against the wall before it could hit her on the head. She lowered her mug to the table then twisted in her chair to replace the clock.
Violet was impressed and it must've shown on her face because Rose laughed quietly. "The TARDIS doesn't always fly smooth. We get knocked around worse than this on a daily basis."
Well, that explained Martha's reflexes.
She glanced at the sopping mass of now pale yellow fabric in the sink. "I guess that dress has seen it's last day."
Martha grimaced. "Sorry. You can keep the clothes you're wearing now. Just, um, rip off the labels and burn them or something. Those clothes won't be made for another four years."
Violet stared for a moment then shook her head. Time travel was insane.
Rose held out the mug she'd been stirring and Violet accepted it hesitantly. Her tea experiences had consisted of iced tea and the occasional pack of Lipton and she was expecting something like either of those. She couldn't have been more wrong. The liquid was warm and the taste of warm apples exploded across her tongue. And something else. Cinnamon? No, it was too minty to be cinnamon but not enough to be mint, either.
"What is this?"
Martha responded in a language that sounded like English but with an extra series of clicks and hums. Violet blinked rapidly and looked at the other occupants of the room. Rose didn't seem bothered by the strange words. Elliot, who had just decided the tea was safe to try, froze with the mug halfway to his mouth then eyed the drink like it might attack him.
"So it's…tea?" she asked slowly.
"From Barcelona," Rose confirmed. "The planet, not the city."
Violet nearly dropped the mug in alarm. "It's alien?!"
"Well, yeah. The tea around here is rubbish. We had to bring some out from the TARDIS." Martha took another drink. "You're not gonna grow a third arm or anything. It's completely safe."
Elliot shrugged his shoulders and took a swig. He swished it around his mouth, brow furrowed in indecision, then swallowed and smacked his lips. He licked his lips, nodded, and took another drink.
Violet looked at the deep red liquid in her cup then set it aside. She'd had enough extraterrestrial stuff for tonight, thank you very much.
"Wait," Rose murmured. "Do you hear that?"
Everyone froze, listening. The only sound in the room was the ticking from the clock and their slow breathing. Then Violet realized why it was so quiet. "They've stopped."
Another beat of silence, then…
"He did it!" Martha laughed loudly. "You know what this means, Rose? We're leaving!"
Rose raised her eyebrows, a grin tugging at her lips. Violet noticed that the glow in her eyes had dimmed considerably in the last few seconds. "If I didn't know any better, Martha, I'd say you were feelin' a bit stir crazy."
"I didn't sign up to hang around in 2003 America, that's for sure! I mean, no offense," she added to Elliot and Violet. "You lot are great, but if I wanted workdays and livin' in a flat then I'd have stayed home."
"Amen," Rose grumbled. She looked out the window over the sink. "The city's been devastated, though, hasn't it? …Y'know, it's funny. We ran here to hide so no one else would pay for my mistake but look how it's turned out."
"I don't see how that's funny." Violet countered flatly. She was, after all, one of those who had been hurt this night. She wasn't sure how she was still up on her feet and functioning, why she hadn't broken down crying yet. Maybe it just hadn't hit her yet? Maybe it was years of practice holding onto her head in a crisis? Her heart was aching and her stomach churned with anger but she felt strangely detached from it.
Rose turned her head. In proper lighting, without the unearthly glow shining from her eyes, she looked entirely human and eerily like Violet herself. They were roughly the same in height and stature, both blondes although hers didn't seem natural; they had similar eyes, and big lips. Except where Rose was hardened from her life, Violet was soft; where Violet was mature from a longer life, Rose was still youthful. They could've been related. Not sisters, but maybe cousins.
"No, it's not funny. It's horrible," Rose agreed. "I was the one who suggested we run to begin with and people died because of it. So I told him to go ahead with his other plan—this." She gestured to the room as if it represented their entire stay here. "I thought I would be the only one hurt."
Rose was so much like her. Not just physically, either. She had every reason to dislike Violet but except for when provoked, she hadn't lashed out at her or John. Now that the Doctor was…here…and she was calmer, she was kind. Sweet, even. She'd offered her tea—wasn't that some kind of sign of courtesy on the other side of the pond? Staring at the blonde woman across the kitchen, she struggled to figure out why it was bugging her so much. Why any similarities to Rose Tyler—the Bad Wolf, the woman who captured the Doctor's heart—could be a bad thing
It came to her out of nowhere, the very first conversation she'd had with John Smith nearly three months prior.
"What's your name?"
"Violet. Dr. Violet Lewis."
"Oh."
"Oh?"
"Sorry, it's just…you remind me of someone."
"Who?"
"I—I… just …someone…"
He hadn't seemed to know the answer to his own question. At the time she'd thought it was out of grief or embarrassment. Could it have really been that he honestly hadn't known? Had he not known because he couldn't remember her? But then that would mean—
Oh, no. God, no. No. No, no, no, no, no.
Now finally the tears were stinging her eyes. She covered her mouth with her hand and tried not to sob. She wouldn't cry in front of them. It was entirely their fault and not their fault at all. Rose was asking if she was alright and Martha stood up worriedly. She inhaled through her nose and blinked away the tears, straightening.
"Well, the bombs have stopped. It's over. I'm going to the hospital. There were a lot of doctors and nurses at that reception; I'm not sure how many actually made it away. Elliot, you're coming back with me."
Elliot shook his head immediately.
"I wasn't asking, I was telling you. You're coming back with me. I may not be your pediatrician but you are still in the care of the hospital and for a good reason. Your parents are going to be frantic if they make it to the hospital and you're not there. Martha, you should consider coming, too. They'll need all the help they can get."
"If I can," she answered.
Elliot waved that paper of his in her face. I can't leave without the Doctor
"Elliot Hunter," Violet warned.
He has to take off what he did to me
"What he did? What did he do to you?" she demanded. "What did he do to him?"
"'s jus mental shields," Rose spoke up from by the sink. "Protectin' his mind from telepathy. I've got 'em; Martha's got 'em."
"Sounds like your safer with them on, then." She told Elliot. "Is that thing yours? If not, set it down and get your sketchbook. We're going."
His mouth opened and if he could talk she knew he would've protested quite vehemently but another glare from her had him setting the paper on the table. Martha pulled his sketchbook from the backpack and handed to him and he, in turn, started to return the clothes they'd given him, but she stopped him.
Martha escorted them out.
Rose watched them go then picked up her cup and sipped at her tea, feeling guiltier than ever. She felt the TARDIS beginning to wake up and the ship sent her a wave of warm affection as her systems kicked back up. Not long after, the TARDIS hummed reassuringly before abruptly growing distant. It felt like part of her was being pulled and twisted and though it wasn't exactly painful, Rose cried out in shock at the sensation. Their connection didn't snap but it had been…stretched.
He's time traveled, she realized. That had to be it. More than once she'd remained behind while he'd relocated the TARDIS, before and after the business with the huon, but she'd never remained behind when time travel was involved.
She froze as that sank in. The Doctor had…left. He'd be back, of course, or else the TARDIS would've fussed. He was probably dealing with the Family away from Earth where they couldn't hurt anyone.
This is what it feels like to be away from the TARDIS. It was disturbing. She felt like a part of her had been pulled beyond her reach. Was she going to be like this for the rest of her life, unable to be in a different time than the TARDIS without feeling incomplete? She'd never be able leave the Doctor. Not that she ever planned to, mind, but if this was how it would always be then she couldn't. She'd never be able to live like this.
Rose gripped the table and took a deep, shuddering breath, and tried to compose herself. This was something she'd have to sort out later.
Martha came back not long after and removed Violet's dress from the sink. It absolutely reeked of bleach and her nose wrinkled as the smell smacked her in the face.
"Why?"
"Trying to throw the Family off our trail. Nothing kills scent like bleach."
Rose nodded and looked down at the remainder of the tea. She sighed and dumped it into the sink, setting the mug down. She was exhausted and more than a little nauseous. She couldn't believe it wasn't even eleven o'clock yet. She scrubbed her hands over her face and groaned quietly.
"You look like shit," Martha informed her plainly.
"I feel like shit." She lowered her hands and glanced at Martha. "You don't look much better."
"Yeah, well. What I night, eh?"
Rose closed her eyes. "What a night."
She gathered up the mugs from the table and set them in the sink then poured the remaining water out of the kettle and set it in the sink as well. She turned on the tap and squirted some soap onto the sponge. "Are you going to help?" she asked as she washed out the first mug.
"I don't know. I should, but… we're leaving, aren't we? Don't you think it'd just be better if everyone thought I was dead?"
"Maybe. I'd probably do that except, well, I need to find Aiden."
"Aiden? That bloke you work with?"
Rose nodded. "Natalie's like a mum to him and well, she's one of them, isn't she?"
"Yeah. She was the Mother and Marc was the Father. The other two were just…" she trailed off and swallowed. "They were just children. I'd never seen them before. The little girl she—she had on a backpack. I think she must've been headin' from school when she was… She couldn't have been older than eleven. And the boy maybe fourteen at best." Martha closed her eyes and inhaled slowly through her nose.
"They might still be alive, right?" Rose suggested hopefully.
Martha shook her head. "I asked. They're gone."
The Family wasn't stupid. They had to have known people would be less hesitant to kill the bodies if the original owners were dead. They had absolutely nothing to gain from lying. If they had, though, and Natalie, Marc, and the others were still alive somewhere in there, the Doctor would know and he'd save them. There was that. Regardless, this latest revelation was enough to drain the remainder of the strength from Rose's limbs. She dropped the sponge into the sink, wiped the soap off on her hands on her jeans, picked the psychic paper up from the table, and slumped out of the kitchen.
She headed for her room and stopped in the doorway, staring at the twin sized bed that she'd slept in for the last ten weeks. Not much longer. It wasn't bad since they'd had the luxury of almost unlimited money for furnishing their flat, but it wasn't like her bed on the TARDIS that she missed dearly. It also had only ever been hers. The Doctor had never shared it with her and that had been the cause for many restless nights in the beginning. She'd adapted to sleeping without him but she still longed for his comforting presence as she drifted into sleep at night and into wakefulness come morning.
Rose stayed in her room for the rest of the night. She heard Martha moving around the flat, finishing the dishes, and she turned on the telly at one point. The local newscasters were giving minute-by-minute updates about the situation, informing residents of help hotlines that had been opened, the address for the local blood bank and a list of the hospitals taking blood donations. She switched to CNN several times and the story reached them sometime around midnight. They were speculating that it was a terrorist attack. The National Guard was being called in, along with UNIT.
Drained in every sense of the word, her buzzing mind wasn't enough to keep her in wakefulness for much longer after that. Gradually, her heart rate and breathing slowed, and the noises from the telly stopped making sense…
Rose found herself trapped in a large cylinder of glass with everyone she loved and cared about standing in a circle around it, hands and feet bound. They stared at her, silently pleading her to save them. Then Natalie appeared, followed by Marc, a shaggy haired boy and a little girl with a purple backpack. Natalie and Marc moved around the circle of people and, one by one, killed them.
The children watched, laughing with glee while Rose screamed and banged on the glass.
The Doctor in his first body while it was in it's prime—a handsome young man with dark hair—was last to go. They killed him…and his next self immediately replaced him. They killed him and again he was replaced. Again and again, over and over, body after body. She watched the many faces of the man she loved staring at her sadly in the seconds before they were replaced. Then they came to her first doctor, big ears, short hair, and piercing blue eyes. She cried out, begging them to stop, to take her instead because she couldn't watch him die again—no.
Finally, her current Doctor was left. His eyes stared at her hungrily but instead of dying, he was transformed before her eyes into John Smith.
And then they let him go free.
Rose sat bolt upright in her bed with a gasp. Her eyes flicked around the room before slamming shut. The flat was silent; Martha must've gone to bed long ago. With tears dripping out of her eyes, Rose crawled underneath her duvet, pressed her face into her pillow, and sobbed until her chest hurt. When her tears dried up and her body was too tired to shake, she shivered and tried to take deep breaths. Failed.
She still felt like part of her was beyond her reach. The TARDIS hadn't retuned yet.
She hovered in the gray area between awake and sleeping for a long time afterwards. She must've fallen to sleep at some point because the next thing she knew, the world beyond her eyelids was painfully bright. From outside the flat, she could hear the sounds of loud vehicles and horns honking and a few distant sirens. Day One of recovery for Bridgeton, Kentucky had begun.
She shifted, stretching her legs, and realized for the first time that someone was sitting at her waist. Her eyes flew open. For a moment she thought it was John Smith looking down at her but then she recognized the blue suit and the tender smile on his face and knew he was the Doctor. At the exact same moment she realized she felt normal, the strained feeling from last night had gone.
Rose stared at him and after half a minute of silence his smile slipped into a nervous frown. He swallowed.
"Rose, we have a problem," he said gravely. Her eyes widened. "My sideburns are gone."
Rose stared at him for three full seconds before she reached up and smacked his arm. "Git," she growled. "I thought you were serious."
The Doctor cringed away from her but he was smiling. "Oh, but I am! My sideburns, Rose! He shaved them off! Gone completely, look." He turned his head from side to side to prove his point. "It's rubbish, that's what it is. But, don't worry, I checked and the mole is still in place."
She laughed quietly and he did too and when their laughter was dying off, she lunged upwards. She flung her arms around his shoulders and his yelp of surprise was muffled by her lips. He recovered quickly, cupping her cheek with one hand and sliding the other behind her back. He eased her down onto her pillow, propping himself up on his arm, and kissed her sweetly.
"I missed you, I missed you, I missed you," she whispered in between kisses and slid her fingers through his hair, and he responded with a quiet rumbling sound in his throat. He tilted her head with one hand, changing the angel so he could deepen the kiss, and it was her turn to groan softly.
It was wonderful. It was everything she'd missed and what she'd been longing for.
It was over far too quickly.
The Doctor jumped in surprise, pulling back, and looked out Rose's open door. Rose lay there, stunned and breathless, until she gathered herself enough to follow his gaze. Martha's door was open but she didn't see her anywhere.
He sat up and sighed, running his hand through his hair. "I know you're there."
A moment later, Martha poked her head out of her room and made an apologetic face. "Sorry. I thought I heard you two talking…I didn't realize you were… Sorry."
The three of them stared at each other for a moment and then the Doctor smiled, holding out his arms and invitation. A grin blossomed on Martha's face and she bolted into the room. He stood up to meet her for a hug and swung her back and forth before setting her down. Rose laughed, sitting up. Martha squeezed him tightly.
"Oh, it's good to have you back! It wasn't the same without you and I don't just mean the staying in one place part."
He chuckled. "Good to be back. I knew you two would manage." He held the hug for a moment longer then let her go. "Nice flat. I wasn't sure if you'd find a place here or stay in the TARDIS so I had her leave out the essential rooms."
"Speakin' of which—" Rose swung her legs out from under the duvet "—why was there a karaoke bar?"
The Doctor grinned and winked before moving on. "UNIT's arrived. I need to go meet with them and I'd like you two to come with me. You both created fake personas, right? Martha James? Clever, that."
Martha frowned. "How did you know?"
He tapped his head. "When the watch was opened the final time, my consciousness emerged to reclaim my body. That triggered the sequence to restore my biology to normal, and in the process, John's persona and memories were assimilated into my own."
"So you…remember?" she asked.
"Everything?" Rose whispered.
He looked between them. "Yes and no. If I wanted to I could recall every single memory, yes, but to be honest, I—I haven't. I only skimmed to find the most important things in the beginning. I…saw you weren't there, Rose, and I'm not sure if I want to remember everything."
He sounded hurt and Rose lowered her gaze, ashamed. He had expected her to be there.
"Well," Martha cut in quickly. "We've got all our essentials packed. We should take them to the TARDIS first."
"I did that last night while you were asleep. Haven't stopped by John's flat yet but I'll need to do that before heading to the hospital. There're some things I need to take care of."
"Violet?" Rose guessed flatly.
"Yes, of course, and Elliot as well."
The Doctor was a legend among UNIT, even in America. It was immediately evident by the reverence in the eyes of the soldiers who escorted them to meet the Brigadier of the American branch of UNIT. At first the soldiers merely glanced at them or frowned in suspicion as they were led through the base that had been set up in the park where the Family's ship had landed. But then Rose heard someone say the word 'Doctor' and it spread like wildfire. By the time they reached the Brigadier they'd been saluted no less than twelve times.
Their escort saluted to the black woman in an officer's uniform. "Ma'am. The Doctor and his companions."
The Brigaider looked the Doctor up and down with narrowed eyes. "Thank you. Dismissed."
"Ma'am." The solider saluted again and left, glancing back at the Doctor one last time.
She put her hands on her hips and surveyed the three of them carefully. "You know, there's a lot of strange stories told about the Doctor in UNIT. Things he's created, enemies he destroyed, jokes he told, that he's responsible for the recruitment of no less than twelve officers in the last twenty years." Her voice was rough but not unpleasant. She walked towards the Doctor and looked him right in the eye. "One of the stories was that he could change bodies. I never believed it…but no one else could simply eliminate a group of hostile aliens like you did last night. Been a quiet three years without you, Doctor."
The Doctor met her stare mildly. "You know it's been longer than three years for me, of course."
"How long?"
"You know, to be quite honest, I'm not entirely sure," he admitted. "Time travel, you know how it is. I'd offer you a jelly baby but I don't have any on me."
She arched one eyebrow and appraised him one last time before switching her stare onto Rose and Martha. "New faces, I see."
"Ah, yes. Rose Tyler, Martha Jones, meet Brigadier General Adrienne Kramer."
"Hello," Rose said. Martha only smiled.
Kramer eyed them suspiciously. "Humans?"
"Yes, both of them Londoners. They've lived under false identities these last few weeks that need sorting," he hinted.
"So you've been here for some time? You didn't just swoop in and save the day?"
The Doctor hesitated. "No. Those aliens have been following us for some time. We've been trying to shake them. Coming here was our latest attempt at throwing them off. It wasn't supposed to end like this."
Kramer folded her arms and she glowered. "At least two million dollars worth of damage has been done to the city, Doctor. Bombs rained down from the sky for precisely thirty-two minutes. An army of shadow figures swarmed through the streets. Two children were using people and police cars as target practice. At least fifty people are missing, there are hundreds of wounded, and at least ninety people have been confirmed dead. You're going to have to do a lot better than that, Doctor, and you're going to do it now."
"Of course," he agreed. "Rose and Martha, in the meantime, can go with some of your people and get their fake identities removed from the systems, but they aren't to be detained or interrogated in any way, shape, or form."
"They will need to debriefed."
"No."
"Doctor, there are protocols—"
"That I could care less about. You want my assistance with this then you'll agree to my terms. If not, we'll be taking our leave. We'll sort our own affairs and leave you to clean up the mess without vital information. No detaining, no interrogating whatsoever."
Kramer and the Doctor stared each other down in silence for a long time and Rose wondered who was going to win. The Doctor was extremely stubborn when it came to her but Adrienne Kramer seemed like the type of woman who got what she wanted. Neither was willing to budge. But then the Doctor shifted, readjusting his body ever so slightly so that he suddenly appeared protective rather than determined. She couldn't see his expression but she knew his eyes had darkened and hardened into the glare of the Oncoming Storm. Kramer held his gaze for a few seconds longer then looked away.
"Very well," she surrendered. "But I must insist on UNIT escorts for the three of you outside of this base for the remainder of your stay."
"So long as they do not restrict us or attempt to enter the TARDIS uninvited then that's fine with me. Martha? Rose? Is that alright?" He asked without looking over his shoulder.
Martha's mouth twisted but she nodded. "Fine."
Rose simply nodded.
"Excellent." Kramer eyed the two young women again. "Doctor, you come with me, and we'll see about getting Miss Tyler and Miss Jones's identities dealt with."
Next chapter ties up the loose ends and then ONWARD TO EVEN MORE ANGST AND STUFF.
Annoying Nonny: Are you just tryin to fuck with me or are you really that dumb?
Everyone else, be sure to drop a review on your way out ^-^ I'm nearin 1200.