Chapter II
That night Rose and the Doctor sat down on separate bunks of a child's bunk bed on the second floor of the house that Rick and company had put them into. Carol sat downstairs on the front porch with a shotgun to make sure they didn't try to escape. The Doctor was fidgeting and trying to come up with a plan to get his sonic screwdriver back from Rick and get himself and Rose back safely to the TARDIS. Rose meanwhile had other things on her mind. "Doctor." she called up softly from the bottom bunk. "Yes, what is it Rose?" asked the Doctor. "Doctor, I don't want to live in this world in a few years." Rose said. "You don't have to." the Doctor assured her. "But what if I stop traveling with you, what if someday. . .you get tired of me?" Rose asked shifting into a forlorn voice. "Oh Rose, don't say that." the Doctor said in a comforting tone. "That's not what I meant at all; you know alternate reality, that's all this is." the Doctor continued, his speech returning to his usual playful cadence. "How do you know for sure?" Rose asked him. "I don't. Well, not until I can get back to the TARDIS and scan the space-time continuity for any errors that would alert us that we are in a reality apart from the one we know." the Doctor confessed. "Then this might be my future, my mum's, Doctor we have to do something to stop this from happening." Rose implored the Doctor. "Rose, Rose, Rose, you know we can't go willy nilly altering the course of events, this could be a fixed point for all we know." the Doctor replied, hesitant to get involved in a timeline he knew nothing about. "But, Doctor that is what we do. We're always meddling with people's timelines, trying to produce a better outcome; sometimes we can, sometimes we can't but we at least have to try. Even if this isn't my world these people deserve better." Rose implored the Doctor. "I know Rose, I know. As much as I would like to merrily be on my way a part of me wants to help them." the Doctor confessed. It was in his nature to help people but for some reason this time it just felt like a little more than he was up for. This world, it felt wrong, the people in it were all wrong; something told him that if he interfered it would only make things worse. Call it a Time Lord's intuition, or perhaps just a Time Lord's overactive nerves. "Alright then, say we go back and stop this whole situation from happening. That's all well and good except in order to do that I will need to get my sonic back and we both have to get back to the TARDIS. That wouldn't be a problem if not for the three dozen or so angry gun toting humans out there between us and that corrugated steel wall holding us in here." the Doctor stated. "We'll have to earn their trust, it might take days, even weeks to prove ourselves to them but sooner or later they'll let us go out on our own. When that happens we go back to the TARDIS, fix all this zombie mess and we jet off to London and these people go on with their lives completely zombie free with everyone they lost being alive and well again." Rose explained. "Aha that is clever, so clever I already came up with it myself; oh no well I didn't but if I wanted to take the long way around that's how I would do it. Being a time traveler I prefer direct routes, shortcuts and the like but you, you silly little humans, the long way is how you do things. A perspective like that is boring, but it is brilliant nonetheless." the Doctor rambled on and on excitedly. "Well then Rose I hope you're prepared for a month or two of roughing it." the Doctor exclaimed.
Meanwhile, downstairs Carol had overheard everything the Doctor and Rose had said. They had not exactly been quiet in their discussion. Most of it seemed like nonsense to begin with but the two of them seemed to be quite into it. She made a mental note concerning this conversation but did nothing except sit at her post and wait for the sun to come up.