Author's Note:
Ha ha! Another chapter! And about time too. I'm so sorry about the wait, guys, really I am, but I can't promise that it won't happen again. We're having... shall we say, personnel issues, at work right now so my workload has been increasing exponentially over the past few weeks. Unfortunately, I suspect the trend will continue for a while yet so my available writing time will be much less than I'd like for a while yet. Still, I will try my absolute best to get another chapter up in at least the next two/three weeks. I hate leaving you guys hanging because my coworkers are... less than reliable... (-_-)
As for this chapter, look! It's long... ish... :) And hopefully you'll all enjoy it! It was written and edited more quickly than usual just because of my extreme lack of time so hopefully the quality is still alright. As always, please let me know what you think, good, bad or otherwise. I live for the feedback, it really does make my day.
Oh, on that note, I'd like to give a HUGE thank you to everyone who has reviewed this story! You guys rock. You really do.
Happy Reading!
Chapter Twelve
Human Nature
The Starwhale's screaming was so intense, so painful and raw, that it nearly drove Wilfred to his knees and would have done if not for the smiling guards still holding him firmly in place. All this time, all these years this poor creature had been screaming like this and nobody heard.
The Queen doubled over at the sound, her hands flying up to cover her ears. "Stop it," she cried, and the Doctor obliged without a word, his sonic screwdriver rendering the whale mute once more. There was silence for a moment while all the humans in the room regained their bearings before the monarch spoke again, "Who did this?"
"We act on instructions from the highest authority," Hawthorne replied simply.
"I am the highest authority," the Queen ground out angrily, "The creature will be released, now." But no one moved. "I said now!" the dark skinned woman barked with all the authority of her position but still there was no response, "Is anyone listening to me?"
"Liz," said the Doctor calmly, stepping forward with her mask in hand, while Wilf took a moment to wonder just when the alien had managed to get on a first name basis with the Queen of all people, "Your mask."
"What about my mask?" Liz asked, as the Time Lord tossed the aforementioned item to her.
"Look at it," the alien urged, moving to stand in front of her, "It's old. At least two hundred years old, I'd say."
"Yeah?" the Queen sounded equal parts doubtful and confused, "It's an antique. So?"
The Doctor gave a sad smile. "Yeah, an antique made by craftsmen over two hundred years ago and perfectly sculpted to your face. They slowed your body clock, all right, but you're not fifty. Nearer three hundred. And it's been a long old reign."
"Wait," Wilf cut in suddenly, drawing the eyes of every person in the room to him for the first time, "Pardon me a minute but do you mean to tell me that this creature, this Starwhale, has been imprisoned and tortured for more than two hundred years!? What kind of bloody country is this?"
The Time Lord tossed him a pained looked but the monarch frowned. "Nah, it's ten years," she argued decisively, "I've been on this throne ten years."
"Ten years," the Doctor agreed sadly, turning his attention back to the woman before him, "The same ten years, over and over again, always leading you here." He snapped his fingers and led the group (minus Wilf, who was still held in place by his robed guards) off to one side of the dungeon where a simple wooden desk played host to a single computer screen and two buttons – identical to those Wilf has seen before – bearing the words Forget and Abdicate.
The group clustered around, Amy and Mandy's eyes were wide, the Time Lord was refusing eye contact with anyone, Liz looked horrified, Hawthorne was stoic as always and Wilfred... Well Wilfred was still being held next to the Starwhale's exposed brain, unsure of what to feel. Disgust was a good place to start, he was sure of that much, but after that...
"What have you done?" the Queen asked softly.
"Only what you have ordered," Hawthorne replied simply, and Wilf was struck by the sudden thought that perhaps part of his detachment was because of the number of time he'd already had this conversation and answered the very same questions, "We work for you, Ma'am. The Winders, the Smilers, all of us." And with that he reached out and flicked a switch on the computer screen, bringing it to life.
Though Wilfred himself couldn't see the screen from his position, he recognized the Queen's voice as the presentation started. "If you are watching this – if I am watching this – then I have found my way to the Tower Of London," she began, "The creature you are looking at is called a Starwhale. Once, there were millions of them. They lived in the depths of space and, according to legend, guided the early space travellers through the asteroid belts. This one, as far as we are aware, is the last of its kind. And what we have done to it breaks my heart. The Earth was burning. Our sun had turned on us and every other nation had fled to the skies. Our children screamed as the skies grew hotter. And then it came, like a miracle. The last of the Star Whales. We trapped it, we built our ship around it, and we rode on its back to safety. If you wish our voyage to continue, then you must press the Forget button. Be again the heart of this nation, untainted. If not, press the other button. Your reign will end, the Star Whale will be released, and our ship will disintegrate. I hope I keep the strength to make the right decision."
The right decision? The disgust Wilf had felt earlier bubbled to the surface once more and he struggled against his captors for a moment if only to burn off some of the anger which had come with it. How could voting for the continuing torture of any living thing be the right decision?
"I voted for this," said Amy softly from behind the desk, her voice shaking slightly as she looked to the Doctor for support, "Why would I do that?"
"Because you knew if we stayed here, I'd be faced with an impossible choice," came the alien's reply, his voice laced with anger he was obviously trying to control, "Humanity or the alien. You took it upon yourself to save me from that. And that was wrong. You don't ever decide what I need to know."
"I don't even remember doing it!" the redhead defended herself, staring at the man who had been her imaginary friend all through her childhood desperately.
"You did it," the Time Lord snapped, his anger breaking free somewhat, "That's what counts."
"I'm – I'm sorry..."
"Oh, I don't care," the Doctor turned and walked away from her and Wilf caught a glimpse of the dark, stormy expression on his face as he approached the Starwhale's brain once more, "When I'm done here, you're going home."
The elderly human felt his heart sink at the words and the heartbroken expression on the young redhead's face. "Doctor!" he said sharply, but his reprimand when seemingly unnoticed.
There was a brief moment of silence before Amy's expression changed, her eyes narrowing and as she held her head slightly higher. "Why?" she demanded sharply, glaring at the Doctor and marching towards him, "Because I made a mistake? One mistake? I don't even remember doing it. Doctor!"
"Yeah, I know," the Time Lord replied, refusing to look up from controls with which he was fiddling, "You're only human."
Liz, who had approached the pair slowly during the argument, chose that moment to speak up. "What are you doing?"
The Doctor heaved a sigh. "The worst thing I'll ever do," he replied even as he continued working, and still, Wilf noted, he was avoiding eye contact, "I'm going to pass a massive electrical charge through the Star Whale's brain. Should knock out all its higher functions, leave it a vegetable. The ship will still fly, but the whale won't feel it."
"That'll be like killing it," said Amy softly.
The alien winced visibly and at long last looked up at his companion. "Look," he said roughly, his voice boarding on desperate, "Three options. One, I let the Star Whale continue in unendurable agony for hundreds more years. Two, I kill everyone on this ship. Three, I murder a beautiful, innocent creature as painlessly as I can. And then I find a new name, because I won't be the Doctor anymore..."
"Doctor..." Wilf began softly, though what he could possibly say to ease his friend's obvious distress he didn't know. He never got the chance to come up with something, however, for the Queen chose that moment to cut across him.
"There must be something we can do, some other way."
The Time Lord shook his head and squeezed his eyes shut for a moment. "Nobody talk to me," he said, his voice angrier than it had been at any point so far and rising in volume with each word, "Nobody human has anything to say to me today!" He was shouting by the end, the pain in his eyes so raw that Wilfred couldn't help but wonder if there was more to the Doctor's anger than just the fate of the Starwhale...
The dungeon wall was frigid against his back but Wilfred found himself welcoming the cold. It fit perfectly with the block of ice he seemed to have swallowed. The anger in the Doctor's face was unnerving, frightening even, and the old human had been wholly unsuccessful in his attempts to engage his friend in any kind of conversation which might talk him 'round. He'd told the group at large of his promise to the creature, willed the Time Lord to think of another solution and been received a few choice words about his species for his trouble. Heaving a sigh and shifting so that he was sitting more comfortably against the wall, the elderly man had to admit that as much as he hated the thought, there didn't seem to be anything else they could do.
To his right, Amy mirrored his action, sighing in her own right. "We can't let him do this, Wilf," she said softly, "We can't let him go through with it."
"I know," the old man replied just as softly, "I just don't know what else we can suggest."
"He's so angry..." Mandy spoke up from Wilfred's other side, gazing towards the alien with slightly fearful eyes.
The two companions followed her gaze. The Doctor's fury was evident in every one of his movements as he worked on the machine which controlled the energy pulse, from in the tension in his shoulders, to the pinched look of his face, to the steely look in his eyes... The child was right. The Time Lord was so angry, and Wilf thought he could understand why.
"He's the last of his kind too, Mandy," he explained gently, still watching the alien work sadly, "He identifies with the Starwhale... And he can't save it..."
The trio lapsed into silence, still leaning against the wall, until Amy turned to face her fellow companion.
"What happened to the other Time Lords?" she asked abruptly, "The Doctor said there was a bad day..."
"I don't know," Wilfred sighed, and, catching the redhead's disbelieving look he added, "I really don't, Amy. All I know is there was a war, a terrible war, and everyone lost." And that was the truth. He didn't know anything more than that, not really. There were things he suspected, sure, from comments made by the Doctor himself as well as the other Time Lords at the Naismith mansion he supposed that the reason the Doctor was the Time War's lone survivor was because it was he who pulled the trigger, so to speak, but he didn't know for certain and it wasn't his secret to tell even if he did.
Amy, however, seemed content with his explanation and went back to studying their Time Lord's movements. "And if he'd had children..." she said softly after a moment.
"They'd have died in the war, along with everyone else," the old man replied sadly, the very thought of it making his heart ache. He couldn't imagine losing his beautiful girls in such a way...
Just then the door to the dungeon swung open and three children entered, their arms laden with the same unrecognizable technology as those they had seen earlier.
"Timmy!" Mandy cried out suddenly, jumping up and running towards small boy with curly auburn hair and a vacant expression on his face, "You made it, you're okay." But the boy – Timmy – didn't respond and the girl frowned, "It's me, Mandy."
But Timmy continued to ignore her, staring instead over Mandy's shoulder with a horrified expression on his face at the Starwhale's swaying tentacle which the Doctor had freed earlier. Wilf felt his heart skip a beat as the hooked claw at the tentacle's end paused just above the girl's shoulder and he'd just opened his mouth to shout out a warning when, instead of swiping violently at her as it had at he and Amy, it reached down and tapped the child gently on the shoulder. Mandy turned around and, with the compassion only found in children, began stroking the tentacle gently. Wilf stared at the exchange in disbelief.
"Oh!" Amy jumped to her feet without warning, nearly giving Wilf a heart attack in the process, "Of course! You're a bloody genius, Wilf!"
With elderly man blinked. "I am?" he asked doubtfully. He had half a mind to ask exactly what he had done that was so brilliant but the redhead had already rushed off across the room.
"Doctor, stop. Whatever you're doing, stop it now!" she shouted as she hurried past him and grabbed an unsuspecting Liz by the wrist, "Sorry, Your Majesty. Going to need a hand." And with that she tugged the dark skinned woman over the voting buttons.
"Amy, no!" the Doctor cried, running towards them but he was too late, Amy had already forced the Queen's hand down on the Abdicate button. "No!"
There was a deafening roar as the Starwhale chose that moment to be silent no more. And with the roar came a set of tremors and shakes so violent that it sent every occupant of the room tumbling to the floor and caused the sound of panic to break out on the floor above.
"Amy, what have you done?" the Doctor moaned.
"Nothing at all," the redhead replied, "Am I right?"
And she was, for the shaking was already fading away and the ship and its occupants had begun righting themselves and dusting themselves off.
"We've increased speed," said Hawthorne in a voice of disbelief as he stared at a nearby computer screen.
"Yeah," said Amy as though it was the most obvious thing in the world, "Well, you've stopped torturing the pilot. Got to help."
Liz was staring around in awe. "It's still here," she whispered, staring down at the still exposed brain, "I don't understand."
Amy shook her head, a small smile on her face. "The Star Whale didn't come like a miracle all those years ago," she began gently, and suddenly Wilf understood.
"It volunteered," he said softly, "Oh blimey, it volunteered..."
"Exactly," Amy nodded, looking around at the other adults in the room, "You didn't have to trap it or torture it. That was all just you. It came because it couldn't stand to watch your children cry. What if you were really old, and really kind and alone? Your whole race dead. No future. What couldn't you do then?" She paused and turned to face the Doctor, staring at him until he finally met her eyes, "If you were that old, and that kind," she continued softly, "And the very last of your kind, you couldn't just stand there and watch children cry."
Silence followed her speech, a silence filled with such a range of emotions that Wilf could not even begin to decipher them all. Liz and Hawthorne stood together, gazing down at the exposed brain with a horrified sort of regret etched on both their faces, Mandy and the other children were smiling and laughing, content with the whale's newfound happiness and their own continuing safety, Amy was radiating pride and the Doctor, the Doctor looked lost... He stood alone for a moment, his arms hanging listlessly by his sides and his hair falling into his eyes, before turning and making his way silently out of the room. He was so subtle about it that if Wilfred had not been watching him out of the corner of his eye he wouldn't even have noticed his absence. As it was, the old man did notice and caught his fellow companion's eyes before hurrying after the Time Lord.
Finding the Doctor proved to be much harder than Wilfred had originally anticipated. Starship UK was a large ship and the alien had a bit of a head start. Still, after running around for a bit, the old human finally found himself successful in his quest. The Doctor was standing silently on a deserted observation deck, staring out at the same stars he shown them from the TARDIS door before they'd ever set foot on the metal country below with his arms folded tightly across his chest.
The elderly man sighed gently. It was obvious that his friend wanted nothing more than to be left alone but years of being a parent told Wilf that what the Time Lord wanted was not what he needed right now so he approached him from behind, coming to a halt next to the taller man. "Do you know them all?" he asked, as a means of announcing his presence, as he gestured out the massive window before them, "The stars, I mean, and the constellations."
The alien nodded. "Yeah. Only, not all of them are stars. There's planets out there too, and moons..." he ducked his head before turning to face his companion, "I'm fine, Wilf..." He paused for a moment and frowned. "Actually fine," he added, "Not fine as in not fine at all. Donna thought that's what fine meant to Time Lords, but it's not. I'm really, actually fine..."
Wilfred smiled slightly. "That's good to hear," he said gently. And it was. Sure he didn't believe the Doctor's claims for a second but the way he'd said them, as though he was trying to convince himself more than anyone else, gave the old human hope that if he just waited his friend might give him a hint as to what was really going on.
The Doctor, for his part, blinked, looking briefly surprised that his words were being taken at face value before covering for it quickly by looking back out the massive window before them. Silence fell over them like some kind of blanket, effectively smothering any further conversation. A few times the Time Lord looked as though he might say something but nothing ever came of the looks other than a slightly frustrated expression from the taller man and more silence.
After a few minutes Wilf took pity on him and cleared his throat. "How long has it been for you?" he asked softly, drawing the alien's confused gaze, "Since the Master," he clarified, watching as his friend's face darkened and he turned away again. "It's been months for me," he prodded gently, "But it can't have been near that long for you..."
The Doctor stood perfectly still for a full second before he somehow pulled a grin out of nowhere and affixed it to his face. "Oh, twelve hours give or take," he said in a voice of forced cheer, "But never mind that, look at all those stars," he gestured excessively towards the window and all but danced towards it, "And planets and worlds. We could visit any of them, Wilf, we could visit all of them! Just say the word and off we go!"
The elderly man felt his heart break for his friend, trying so hard to put on a happy face as he desperately fought to change the subject, but he couldn't go along with him. Not this time. "Twelve hours, eh?" he said in what he hoped was an acceptably casual voice, "Really? See, now I thought it would have had to have been a wee bit longer than that, what with you being fine now, and all..." He let his voice trail off and watched as the effect of his words played out before him.
The Time Lord turned away from his once more, the grin falling from his face as he closed his eyes, a look of pain taking its place. He folded his arms tightly across his chest once more and stood like that in silence for a moment before swallowing roughly. "Wilf..." he began, his voice surprisingly steady, "What does that have to do with what I said to Amy? That's why you're here, isn't it? To ask me to apologize..."
Wilfred sighed softly. This attempted subject change was more subtle, but it was an attempted subject change all the same. Still, he could work with it. "I'm here, Doctor, because I think Donna's right. You may say that you're fine, but you're really not. And I don't pretend to know what's goin' on in your head, or anything like that, but I'd really like to, if you'd tell me." He moved slowly a few steps forward, positioning himself so that he was standing facing the Time Lord and forcing him to meet his eye, "What about this thing with the Starwhale made you so angry?" he asked, unwilling to beat around the bush any longer, "Because you're right, I do think you need to apologize to Amy. She's just a kid, she made a mistake, and it wasn't enough to make you that angry, was it? What else is going on?"
More silence followed the old man's words as the alien took a few deep breaths before at long last turning to face his companion. "I just burned my own race, Wilf," he said softly, "Condemned my own people to Hell for the second time so that humanity might live. And then this," he spun around erratically, waving his hands at the interior of the ship, "This is what they do with that life! They capture an innocent creature and torture it for their own gain for hundreds of years and every five years the adults on this ship are told all about it and chose to do nothing. Worse than that, they chose to forget, like the Starwhale wasn't even there..." The Time Lord's voice trailed off and his movements stilled until he was facing the window with his arms curled protectively around his chest once more. "This is what I killed my people for..."
"Human nature..." Wilf shook his head sadly, "We're capable of incredible kindness and compassion and hope and faith and love but also incredible cruelty and selfishness. We're human, Doctor..."
The Doctor released a shaky sigh. "I know," he nodded, before drawing in a sharp breath and shaking his head. "Sorry, sorry," he said, forcing his voice to turn cheerful once more, "Enough of that. We should be leaving before they plan celebrations in our honour or something equally as horrifying."
The elderly human smiled in spite of himself and finally allowed his friend the subject change. "Yes, celebrations sound terrible," he teased.
"Don't they?" the Time Lord agreed seriously, before dashing off towards the door, "Well c'mon then!"
But the old man didn't move, staring instead at the alien with one eyebrow raised. There was still one thing that needed to be addressed...
"Oh..." the Doctor groaned childishly, "You still want me to apologize to Amy, don't you?"
Wilfred smiled. "Shall I fetch her for you?" he asked, "Send her in here?"
The Doctor shifted uncomfortably. "Yeah," he said at last, "Best do that... I suppose I was a bit hard on her..."
"A bit," Wilf agreed, making his way past the Time Lord and out into the hustle and bustle of Starship UK once more, "But she'll forgive you, I'm sure."
"Wilf."
The alien's voice made him paused only a few steps outside the door and he poked his head back inside curiously to see his friend looking, if possible, even more uncomfortable than before. Chuckling softly, the old man shook his head and offered the taller man a smile. "You're welcome, Doctor," he said gently, before the Time Lord had a chance to speak, "Anytime."