"Mummy! Mummy!"
"Dumbo, do something!" Eva screamed, and the Doctor finally came to his senses, stepping forwards.
"Go to your room!" he said. "Go to your room!" he repeated, louder. "I mean it. I'm very, very angry with you. I'm very, very cross. Go. To. Your. Room!"
Slowly, the patients went back to their beds and Eva let out a breath she didn't know she was holding. She looked at Jack and Rose and saw equal amounts of surprise and relief on their faces.
"I'm really glad that worked," the Doctor breathed out. "Those would have been terrible last words." Eva let out a small laugh and the Doctor turned to look at her. "Are you okay?"
"Not in the least," Eva said. "But I'm a bit better now."
The Doctor held Eva's face in his hands, bringing her lips to his in a kiss, as if the feeling of him close to her would tell her what he couldn't say out loud, not with other people in the room.
I'm here. I'm watching over you. And I will fix this.
"Why are they all wearing gas masks?" Rose asked, falling into one of the chairs.
"They're not," Jack replied, copying her actions. "Those masks are flesh and bone."
"How was your con supposed to work?" the Doctor asked, looking away from Eva but still holding her close.
"Simple enough, really," Jack shrugged. "Find some harmless piece of space junk, let the nearest Time Agent track it back to Earth, convince him it's valuable, and name a price. When he's put 50% up-front, oops, a German bomb falls on it, destroys it forever. He never gets to see what he's paid for, never knows he's been had. I buy him a drink with his own money and we discuss dumb luck. The perfect, self-cleaning con."
"Yeah," the Doctor said sarcastically. "Perfect."
"The London Blitz is great for self-cleaners," Jack went on, not noticing the edge the Doctor's voice held. "Pompeii's nice if you want to make a vacation of it, though. But you've got to set your alarm for Volcano Day." He laughed at his own joke, looking up to see the Doctor and Rose glaring at him, and Eva smiling sadly. "Getting a hint of disapproval."
"Take a look around the room," the Doctor said. "This is what your piece of harmless space junk did."
"It was a burnt-out medical transporter," Jack protested. "It was empty."
"Rose!" the Doctor called, turning away from Jack and starting to head to the door, Eva's hand still in his.
"Are we getting out of here?" Rose asked hopefully.
"We're going upstairs," the Doctor said.
"I even programmed the flight computer so it wouldn't land on anything living!" Jack called after them. "I harmed no-one! I don't know what's happening, but I had nothing to do with it."
"I'll tell you what's happening," the Doctor bit out. "You forgot to set your alarm clock. It's Volcano Day!" he pulled Eva after him once more, and she pulled back. "What?"
"You're hurting me," she said quietly.
The Doctor's eyes widened and he immediately let go of her hand, swallowing hard as a second siren started.
"What's that?" Rose asked.
"The all clear," Eva explained.
"I wish," the Doctor muttered, looking at Jack with disapproval before going through the door.
Rose immediately followed, but Eva stayed back, reaching out a hand to Jack. "You coming?"
"You don't hate me?" he asked, surprised.
"Why would I hate you?" Eva asked.
"Your friends do," Jack muttered.
"Let me tell you something about myself," Eva said. "I know everything. Well, almost everything," she added with a small smile. "But I know more than I probably should, and definitely more than I can tell. But I can tell you this," she grabbed his hand and looked up at him, the former Time Agent towering a good five inches above her. "You're a good man, Jack. Better than you even realize."
"No I'm not," Jack said, shaking his head.
"Yes, you are," Eva informed him. "And I don't want to hear anything else on the mater. Now, are you coming, or are we gonna stay here forever?"
"I could think of a couple things I wouldn't mind doing if we stayed," Jack said suggestively, and Eva laughed.
"Oh, you're so going to regret all of this later."
EMH
Even though she knew where the Doctor was headed, she and Jack still ran after Rose, making sure the blonde was in sight at all times.
"Doctor?" Rose asked.
"Dumbo!" Eva called.
"Evie!" the Doctor called happily.
The trio turned back, retreating their steps until they could see the Doctor turning away from the door he was looking at.
"Where did you disappear to?" he asked, before his eyes fell on Jack, and the smile turned into a sneer. "What are you still doing here?"
"I brought him with," Eva said before Jack could say anything. "You got a problem with that?"
"Yes," the Doctor replied.
"Too bad."
The Doctor sighed, looking at Eva for a moment before turning his eyes back to Jack. "Make yourself useful while you're here," he bit out. "You got a blaster?"
"Sure," Jack replied, quickly following the Doctor as the Time Lord broke into a run once more.
"The night your space junk landed, someone was hurt," the Doctor said, coming to a stop. "This is where they were taken."
"What happened?" Rose asked.
"Let's find out." The Doctor turned to Jack. "Get it open."
"What's wrong with your sonic screwdriver?" Rose asked quietly as Jack took out his blaster and aimed it at the door.
"Nothing," Eva replied with an eye roll as Jack made the lock disappear and the door opened up.
"Sonic blaster, 51st century," the Doctor stated. "Weapon factories of Villengard."
"You've been to the factories?" Jack asked, surprised.
"Once," the Doctor said shortly.
"They're gone now," the Captain said. "Main reactor went critical - vaporised the lot."
"Like he said," Eva said with an exasperated sigh. "Once."
"There's a banana grove there now," the Doctor said, smiling as he walked into the room. "I like bananas. Bananas are good."
"Nice blast pattern," Eva said, winking at Jack as she walked into the room.
"Digital," Jack supplied.
"Squareness gun," Rose stated.
"Yeah."
"I like it."
The blonde smiled, entering the room and staring in shock as Jack turned on the lights and the four saw the destruction in the room. Eva kept a distance from the Doctor, choosing to stay close to Jack instead. Judging from the annoyed stare in the Doctor's eyes, he didn't miss it.
"What do you think?" he asked.
"Something got out of here," Jack said.
"Yeah," the Doctor sighed. "And?"
"Something powerful," Jack added, going towards the entrance to the inner room. "Angry."
"Powerful and angry," the Doctor repeated, not sounding impressed in the least.
Jack and Rose looked into the room, looking at the drawings on the wall and the broken toys on the floor. Rose followed him inside, staring in an equal amount of shock as the captain before the duo turned to look at Eva and the Doctor.
"A child?"
"Jamie," Eva said. "He's Nancy's brother... just a couple of years younger than Ricky."
"Who?" Rose asked, confused. "And who? And who again?"
"I've been here a month and a half," Eva shrugged, trying not to make a big deal out of it and missing the way the Doctor cringed. "I've gotten to know people."
"I suppose this explains 'mummy'," Jack muttered as an afterthought.
"How could a child do this?" Rose asked, marking at the torn apart room and the broken glass window as the Doctor played with the controls of the recorder, making a tape play.
"Do you know where you are?" Dr. Constantine's voice asked, making Rose jump in surprise.
"Are you my mummy?" Jamie replied.
"Are you aware of what's around you?" Constantine went on. "Can you... see?"
"Are you my mummy?"
"What do you want? Do you know what –"
"I want my mummy! Are you my mummy? I want my mummy. Are you my mummy? Are you my mummy? Mummy? Mummy?"
"Doctor, I've heard this voice before," Rose muttered, scared.
"Me too," the Doctor muttered.
"Mummy?"
"Always, 'Are you my mummy?'" Rose said. "Like he doesn't know."
"Mummy."
"Why doesn't he know?" Rose asked.
"Are you there, Mummy? Mummy! Mummy? Please, Mummy? Mummy?"
"Doctor?" Rose asked when the Doctor remained silent.
"Can you sense it?" the Doctor asked.
"Sense what?"
"Coming out of the walls," the Doctor said. "Can you feel it?"
"Mummy?"
"Funny little human brains!" the Doctor called out. "How do you get around in those things?"
"When he's stressed, he likes to insult species," Rose explained to Jack.
"Rose, I'm thinking!"
"Cuts himself shaving, he does half an hour on life-forms he's cleverer than," she went on. "Right, Evie?"
"He walked into the doorframe once," Eva said, trying to hide her nervousness from knowing Jamie was currently in the room with them, and the tape was going to end at any moment. "I got a lecture on the ten worst engineering species in the universe."
The Doctor paused, turning to look at her. "When was that?"
"Er..." Eva paused, trying to remember. It was right after everything that happened with House, which meant... "Spoilers."
The Doctor sighed before moving on.
"There are these children," he said. "Eva spent some time with them. Living rough, round the bomb sites. They come out during air raids looking for food."
"Mummy, please?"
"Suppose they were there when this thing, whatever it was, landed," the Doctor went on.
"It was a med-ship," Jack called out. "It was harmless!"
"You keep saying harmless," the Doctor muttered, sending him a nasty look. "Suppose one of them was affected, altered. Am I close?"
"Jamie," Eva nodded.
"Altered how?" Rose questioned.
"I'm here!" the voice in the background said and Eva swallowed hard, noticing the ticking noise in the background.
"It's afraid, terribly afraid," the Doctor said. "And powerful... it doesn't know it yet. But it will do." He laughed half-heartedly. "It's got the power of a god and I just sent it to its room!"
"Doctor..." Rose said worriedly.
"I'm here! Can't you see me?"
"What's that noise?"
"End of the tape," Eva said, swallowing hard. "It ran out about 30 seconds ago. You sent him to his room," she told the Doctor.
"This is its room!" the Doctor said in understanding, and the four turned around to see Jamie standing behind them.
"Are you my mummy? Mummy?"
"Doctor?"
"Okay," Jack said slowly. "On my signal, make for the door..."
"Mummy?"
"Now!"
Jack pulled out a banana from his holster, aiming it at Jamie and the Doctor smiled, taking out Jack's blaster and aiming it at the wall and creating a hole for them to go through.
"Go, now," he ordered. "Don't drop the banana!"
"Why not?"
"Good source of potassium!"
"Give me that!" Jack said as soon as they were all out, taking his blaster and bringing the wall back to place. "Digital rewind," he explained before tossing the banana to the Doctor. "Nice switch."
"It's from the groves of Villengard," the Doctor said, waving the banana at him. "Thought it was appropriate."
"There's really a banana grove in the heart in Villengard?" Jack asked.
"Yup," Eva replied.
"And he did that?"
"Bananas are good," the Doctor said, eyeing the close distance between Eva and Jack worriedly before grabbing Eva's arm and pulling her closer, making sure not to accidently hurt her.
He stroked her face lightly, searching for any cuts or bruises before kissing the top of her head. From the corner of her eye, Eva could see Jack rolling his eyes and Rose pretending to puke, before a crash was heard and a crack appeared in the wall they just passed through.
"Doctor!" Rose called out.
"Come on!" the Doctor replied, grabbing Eva's hand and running away.
They turned into a corridor, only to see patients coming their way and turn away. Going into another corridor, a door opened to reveal more patients after them, and as they ran from these, they found themselves back where they started.
"Mummy!"
"It's keeping us here till it can get at us!" the Doctor said.
"It's controlling them?" Jack asked.
"It is them," The Doctor replied. "It's every living thing in this hospital."
"Okay," Jack nodded. "This can function as a sonic blaster, a sonic cannon and it's a triple-enfolded sonic disruptor. Doc, what you got?"
"I've got a sonic, uh..." the Doctor took out his sonic screwdriver and swallowed hard. "Never mind."
"What?" Jack asked.
"It's sonic, Okay?" the Doctor asked. "Let's leave it at that."
"Disruptor, cannon, what?"
"It's sonic, totally sonic, I am sonic-ed up!"
"A sonic what?"
"Screwdriver!"
Jack paused, looking back at the Doctor with shock and Rose huffed, grabbing his blaster and aiming it at the floor.
"Going down!" she and Eva called as the blonde activated it and the floor disappeared from underneath their feet, making them fall down to the room below. Jack aimed his gun up, closing the hole in the ceiling before letting out a shaky breath.
"Doctor, are you okay?" Rose asked.
"Could've used a warning," the Doctor muttered. "Evie?"
"I'm fine," Eva said, watching in the dimmed lights as a cut on her arm healed itself before the rest even noticed.
"Oh, the gratitude!" Rose muttered.
"Who has a sonic screwdriver?" Jack asked, dumbstruck.
"I do!" the Doctor called back.
"Lights?" Rose asked, starting to search for a switch.
"Who looks at a screwdriver and thinks, 'Oh, this could be a little more sonic?'"
"What, you've never been bored?" the Doctor asked.
"There's gotta be a light switch," Rose said.
"Never had a long night? Never had a lot of cabinets to put up?"
Rose, who finally found the light switch, turned it on. All around them, patients sat up in their beds.
"Mummy!"
"Door!"
"Mummy? Mummy? Mummy?"
"Damn it!" Jack called as his gun failed to work. "It's the special features, they drain the battery," he explained.
"The battery?" Rose asked as the Doctor opened the door using his screwdriver. "It's so lame!"
"At least it works on wood," Eva commented as she walked through the door, missing the annoyed look on the Doctor's face.
"I was going to send for another one," Jack said, making sure the windows were closed. "But somebody's gotta blow up the factory."
"I know," Rose chuckled. "First day I met him, he blew my job up."
The two turned to look at Eva, and the time jumper shrugged.
"Blew up the spaceship of the man who tried to kidnap me?" she offered.
"That's how he communicates," Rose concluded.
"Okay, that door should hold it for a bit," the Doctor said, desperate to change the topic of conversation.
"The door?" jack asked. "The wall didn't stop it!"
"It's got to find us first!" the Doctor retorted. "Come on. Assets!"
"Well, I've got a banana and in a pinch you could put up some shelves," Jack retorted. "Evie?"
"General knowledge of the city and the future," she said. "Nothing we can actually use."
"Will you ever stop surprising me?" Jack questioned, shaking his head.
"I'm pretty sure we switch roles at some point," Eva told him.
"Window?" the Doctor asked.
"Barred," Jack said.
"Sheer drop outside," Eva added.
"Seven storeys."
"And no other exits," Rose said.
"Well, the assets conversation went in a flash, didn't it?" Jack summarized, sitting down.
The Doctor chuckled lightly before nodding at Rose. "So where'd you pick this one up, then?"
"Doctor!"
"She was hanging from a barrage balloon, I had an invisible space ship," Jack replied, smiling. "I never stood a chance. You?"
"Oi!"
"Well, she usually picks me up," the Doctor retorted, smiling at Eva.
"Do I?" she said, surprised. "Good to know."
"Okay!" the Doctor called out. "One, we've gotta get out of here. Two, we can't get out of here. Have I missed anything?"
"Yeah," Rose said, shocked. "Jack just disappeared."
"Of course he did," the Doctor sighed, sitting down. "Why would he stay?"
"Do you really think so little of him?" Eva asked.
"Yes."
"Okay," Rose said slowly, desperate to stop the duo from fighting. "So he vanished into thin air. Why is it always the great-looking ones who do that?"
"I'm making an effort not to be insulted," the Doctor muttered.
"I mean... men."
"Okay, thanks," the Doctor said sarcastically. "That really helped."
"Rose? Doctor? Evie?" the radio turned to life, carrying Jack's voice through. "Can you hear me? I'm back on my ship... used the emergency teleport. Sorry I couldn't take you," he added as the Doctor looked at the cables of the radio, seeing they weren't connected to anything. "It's security-keyed to my molecular structure. I'm working on it."
"How are you speaking to us?" the Doctor questioned.
"Om-Com," Jack replied. "I can call anything with a speaker grill."
"Now there's a coincidence," the Doctor said.
"What is?"
"The Child can Om-Com too."
"It can?" Rose asked, surprised.
"Anything with a speaker grill," Eva said. "Radio, PA systems... Even the TARDIS phone."
"What, you mean the Child can phone us?"
"And I can hear you. Coming to find you. Coming to find you!"
"Doctor, can you hear that?" Jack asked.
"Loud and clear," the Doctor replied darkly.
"I'll try to block out the signal," Jack said. "Least I can do."
"Coming to find you, Mummy."
"Remember this one, Rose?" the captain asked, and Moonlight Serenade started playing through the speakers.
"Our song," Rose explained, in response to the Doctor's raised brow.
"Always liked that song," Eva commented, sitting down with a smile.
Once again, she missed the Doctor's annoyed look as she closed her eyes and enjoyed the music.