A/N: Lucky you! Another upload this quickly?! I figured I owed it to you to do more than one upload (since I've pretty much written out this entire story already).
I do not own Doctor Who. All I own is this story and my OC.
Please review, and no flaming will be tolerated. Many thanks :)
LITTLE WONDERS
"Let it slide.
Let your troubles fall behind you.
Let it shine.
Until you feel it all around you.
And I don't mind, if it's me you need to turn to.
We'll get by.
It's the heart that really matters in the end."
– Rob Thomas: 'Little Wonders' (Meet the Robinsons [2007])
A Staircase
Rose, Katy, Adam and DeMaggio eventually come across a staircase while running, and Rose nearly cries with relief.
"Stairs! That's more like it. It hasn't got legs. It's stuck!" Rose points out. Katy straightens up and pushes away from Rose who immediately protests. "Wait, what are you doing?"
"I think I'm okay for the moment. My head only hurts when the Dalek is really close to me." Katy reassures her sister. "Besides, you're gonna have a hard time pulling me up the stairs if we have to move quickly." She points out, and Rose nods reluctantly.
"Are you sure?" Rose asks, still deeply concerned about Katy. She really needed to get the Doctor to examine her to really make sure her sister was okay. Jackie would never let them go anywhere if anything happened to either of them and she heard about it.
"I'm sure. I'll let you know if anything changes." Katy smiles weakly at Rose, as she grabs a hold of the metal banister of the staircase to steady herself. She still didn't feel well, but she also didn't want to be a burden on her sister and possibly get herself or even her killed, just because she had a weird reaction towards the Dalek, that involved familiar, and yet unfamiliar flashbacks to plague her head.
"It's coming!" DeMaggio yells frantically, and Katy immediately feels the pain prickling in her head, which was a confirmation that the Dalek was getting closer, causing her to groan. Rose eyes her worriedly as they run a flight and look down on the Dalek.
"Great big alien death machine defeated by a flight of stairs." Adam taunts the Dalek, as it pauses on the bottom step and looks up at them. Katy threw a glare at him. Now was not the moment to taunt something that could shoot deadly beams at them. DeMaggio aims her gun at the Dalek, defensively.
"Now listen to me." She commands, in a low confident voice, enunciating every other word so the Dalek could understand very clearly what she was trying to say. "I demand that you return to your cage. If you want to negotiate then I can guarantee that Mister Van Statten will be willing to talk." Katy snorted through her pain at the idea that Van Statten would be willing to do anything even remotely compassionate for anybody. "I accept that we imprisoned you and maybe that was wrong, but people have died, and that stops right now. The killing stops. Have you got that?"
The Dalek just continues looking at DeMaggio, not saying a word.
"I demand that you surrender. Is that clear?" DeMaggio orders. A few moments pass, and it seems like the Dalek might actually listen to what DeMaggio is requesting. But then…
"ELEVATE." The Dalek hovers in mid-air and glides up the stairs.
"Oh, my God." Rose mutters in horror, quickly grabbing her sister's hand in anticipation of a long run ahead of them.
"Figures," Katy spoke up, wincing in pain. "Why did we think that would even work in the first place?" DeMaggio disengages the safety on her gun.
"Adam, get them out of here." She orders firmly.
"Come with us," Rose suggests instead. "You can't stop it."
"Someone's got to try." DeMaggio retorts bravely. "Now get out! Your sister doesn't look good anyway, you gotta get her out of here and to safety." The Dalek's eyepiece tilts in Katy's direction, as though curious about why she was in such pain. The brunette shudders, fighting to remain conscious because of the pain growing roots in her head. "Don't look back, just run!" DeMaggio immediately starts firing, as Rose and Adam stand either side of Katy and work together to get her up the stairs as fast as they could. But despite the closing range, DeMaggio doesn't hit the eyepiece.
The three of them hear DeMaggio cry out in agony as she is killed by the Dalek, but they don't dare stop running.
Van Statten's Office
The Doctor was pacing the length of Van Statten's office. He was frustrated, scared, and extremely worried for both Katy and Rose's safety. Especially when it appeared that there was something apparently going wrong for Katy, possibly relating to the Dalek, since according to Rose; it was the last thing Katy was within the same presence of when she started suffering the pain in her head. He needed to get to the bottom of what precisely that was.
But first, he needed to take care of that bloody Dalek.
"I thought you were the great expert, Doctor." Van Statten sneered. He had been watching the Doctor pacing up and down his office with deep curiosity. "If you're so impressive, then why not just reason with this Dalek? It must be willing to negotiate. There must be something it needs. Everything needs something."
"What's the nearest town?" The Doctor asks, not even bothering to look at him.
"Salt Lake City."
"Population?" the Doctor prompts.
"One million." Van Statten replied, wondering where the Doctor was going with all these questions, instead of answering his.
"All dead. If the Dalek gets out, it'll murder every living creature. That's all it needs." The Doctor explains, at the same time answering Van Statten's previous question. Van Statten raises an eyebrow.
"But why would it do that?"
"Because it honestly believes they should die." The Doctor replies bluntly. "Human beings are different, and anything different is wrong. It's the ultimate in racial cleansing and you, Van Statten, you've let it loose!" The Doctor finally turns to throw the fiercest glare he could muster at him, before turning to the wall mounted TV screen, observing Van Statten's army of guards preparing to take down the Dalek in the loading bay. "The Dalek's surrounded by a force field. The bullets are melting before they even hit home, but it's not indestructible." The Doctor attempts to grab the attention of the leader on screen, shouting into the speaker on Van Statten's desk.
"If you concentrate your fire, you might get through." He lends a helpful tip. "Aim for the dome, the head, the eyepiece. That's the weak spot." The Doctor urges. However the leader merely scoffs at the advice the Doctor gives him.
"Thank you, Doctor." He says insincerely. "But I think I know how to fight one single tin robot." He raises his gun. "Positions!"
The Loading Bay
The leader's men take cover behind various corners, packing cases, boxes and up on a catwalk with him. Rose, Katy and Adam run into view.
"Hold your fire!" the Leader barks out, before waving his hand at the three of them. "You three, get the hell out of there!" Rose, Katy and Adam run past a guard at the entrance, with Katy panting harder than usual, due to her unexplained malady complicating things. The Dalek glides into the room. It turns and zooms in on Rose's face first, then on Katy's.
The three escape out of the bay.
Outside the Loading Bay
"It was looking at me." Rose frowned in confusion, as they turned a corner, traveling down what seemed like endless concrete corridors; trying to get back to the Doctor and safety.
"Yeah, me too. Why is that?" Katy added, weakly, but just as confused as her sister. Adam scoffs at them.
"Yeah, it wants to slaughter us." He points out.
"But it was looking right at us." Katy insisted, stumbling a little and causing Rose to grab her around the middle before she could faceplant on the hard concrete floor and injure herself.
"You okay?"
"I'll live." Katy replied reassuringly, but impatiently, gently pushing her sister away and summoning her willpower to continue running, despite the pain growing roots in her head. Adam wasn't cottoning on to what the sisters were getting at when it came to a murderous, gun-happy alien hunting them down.
"So? It's just a sort of metal eye thing. It's looking all around." Adam insisted.
"You don't understand. It's like there's something inside, looking at us, like, like it knows me." Rose was visibly disturbed, as was Katy.
"And I didn't even touch the bloody thing." Katy mused, privately wondering if it had anything to do with the sudden unexplained pain she was experiencing, all due to learning of the Dalek's existence and its link with the 'memories' she was seeing in her head. Maybe, if she got out of this in one piece with Rose, she could ask the Doctor for an explanation; surely, he would know?
Van Statten's Office
The loading bay was on screen in Van Statten's office with the Doctor, Goddard and Van Statten watching for the Dalek's next move against this group of armed guards.
"We've got a vision." Goddard reports, looking puzzled.
"It wants us to see." The Doctor explains. He was pretty confident what the outcome was going to be, but there really wasn't anything he could do but watch these soldiers die unnecessary deaths.
"On my mark!" the Leader yells, and the guards aim their weapons at the stationary Dalek, waiting for further orders. "Open fire!" A hail of bullet fire is unleashed upon the Dalek. But it is having no effect. Once all the bullets are spent, the Dalek starts to rise straight up into the air. It zaps the fire alarm, and the sprinklers are set off. Once the concrete floor is covered with a layer of water, it fires downwards with its blue laser beam and electrocutes every wet person on the ground.
"Fall back! Fall back!" the Leader frantically shouts at his men. The Dalek shoots and kills him and the rest of his men with another set of strategic shots, then continues to hover in mid-air, water pouring down its shell, crying in the rain. The screen turns to black. Van Statten stares at the screen with a stunned look on his face, while Goddard and the Doctor look grim and angry at the unnecessary deaths.
"Perhaps it's time for a new strategy." Van Statten suggests. "Maybe we should consider abandoning this place."
"Except there's no power to the helipad, sir. We can't get out." Goddard reminds him using a brisk tone in her voice. The Doctor offers a different suggestion.
"You said we could seal the vault."
"It was designed to be a bunker in the event of nuclear war. Steel bulkheads." Van Statten explained. However Goddard shakes her head.
"There's not enough power, those bulkheads are massive." She argues. But the Doctor is insistent.
"We've got emergency power. We can re-route that to the bulkhead doors."
"We'd have to bypass the security codes." Goddard explains, doubtfully. "That would take a computer genius."
"Good thing you've got me, then." Van Statten grins, and the Doctor looks at him with raised eyebrows.
"You want to help?" He said, dubiously.
"I don't want to die, Doctor. Simple as that." Van Statten pointed out, very matter of fact. "And nobody knows this software better than me."
The footage of the saturated Loading Bay comes back onto screen, showing the Dalek back on wet, solid concrete ground, looking directly at the security camera. It seems to be waiting for something … or someone.
"Sir." Goddard grabs both Van Statten and the Doctor's attention, pointing towards the TV screen.
"I SHALL SPEAK ONLY TO THE DOCTOR." It declares in its loud computerised voice. The Doctor frowns suspiciously at the Dalek on screen.
"You're going to get rusty." He points out sardonically. The Dalek ignores the Doctor's comment.
"I FED OFF THE DNA OF ROSE TYLER." It tells the Doctor, whose eyes narrow dangerously. "EXTRAPOLATING THE BIOMASS OF A TIME TRAVELLER REGENERATED ME."
"What's your next trick?" The Doctor demands.
"I HAVE BEEN SEARCHING FOR THE DALEKS." It admits slowly.
"Yeah, I saw." The Doctor acknowledges. "Downloading the internet. What did you find?"
"I SCANNED YOUR SATELITES AND RADIO TELESCOPES."
"And?" the Doctor prodded, impatiently. The Dalek was silent for several minutes before responding.
"NOTHING. WHERE SHALL I GET MY ORDERS NOW?" It wondered, sounding helpless for once, and completely lost. It was, to the Doctor, something completely unheard of. It wasn't even funny either.
"You're just a soldier without commands." The Doctor states, emotionlessly.
"THEN I SHALL FOLLOW THE PRIMARY ORDER, THE DALEK INSTINCT TO DESTROY, TO CONQUER." It decides, frustrating the Doctor.
"What for? What's the point?" The Doctor raged, in frustration. "Don't you see it's all gone? Everything you were, everything you stood for."
"THEN WHAT SHOULD I DO?" The Dalek wondered, truly confused.
"All right, then. If you want orders, follow this one. Kill yourself." The Doctor suggested venomously.
"THE DALEKS MUST SURVIVE!" It protested, indignantly.
"The Daleks have failed!" the Doctor roared exasperatedly. "Why don't you finish the job and make the Daleks extinct. Rid the universe of your filth. Why don't you just DIE!" The Doctor suggested, on the brink of tears. The Dalek was silent, registering the Doctor's words calculatingly.
"YOU WOULD MAKE A GOOD DALEK." It observes truthfully, before the screen goes blank. A look of cold determination passes over the Doctor's face at that moment, and he turns his hard stare on Van Statten.
"Seal the vault." He orders, in a hard voice. Van Statten immediately gets to work.
"I can leech power off the ground defences, feed it to the bulkheads." He starts chuckling to himself, drawing the Doctor's disbelieving stare. "God, it's been years since I had to work this fast."
"Are you enjoying this?" The Doctor questioned him, appalled.
"Doctor," He turns towards Goddard, who was looking very concerned. "They're both still down there." She reminded him, referring to Katy and Rose.
Staircase
Running up the staircase wasn't exactly the most exhilarating experience for Katy, Rose or Adam; all of which were steadily growing tired, demotivated and clutching at various stitches or wheezing in painful lungful's of air. It was a particularly difficult situation for poor Katy, who was struggling, even though the Dalek wasn't directly on their tails, but still close enough for her to notice the pain in her head.
"I gotta work on my cardio." Katy wheezes just as Rose's phone rings in the pocket of her jeans, and she gropes around and tugs it free, answering it.
"This isn't the best time." Rose wheezes, clutching the phone with one hand to her ear, while maintaining a supporting grip on Katy's upper arm with the other.
"Where are you?" The Doctor asks, urgently. Rose glances around for any clues to where they were and spots L49 stencilled in royal blue on the concrete wall.
"Level forty-nine." Rose replies back.
"You've got to keep moving. The vaults being sealed off up at level forty-six." The Doctor informs her, and Rose looks stricken.
"Can't you stop them closing?" She begs, urging her sister and Adam to run faster in the same moment.
"I'm the one who's closing them. I can't wait and can't help you." The Doctor stresses, sounding harassed and very worried. "Now for God's sake, run!" He yells.
Unknown to them all, the Dalek is closing in, having made it to level fifty-one.
Van Statten's Office
The Doctor was standing behind Van Statten's shoulder as the billionaire expertly types in commands into the computer, trying to harness more power to the bulkheads so they could seal in the Dalek.
"Done it." Van Statten announces triumphantly. "We've got power to the bulkheads."
"The Dalek's right behind them." Goddard states, and the Doctor reiterates this to Rose over the phone.
"We're nearly there. Give us two seconds." She begs frantically as she half-guides, half-drags Katy along with her to make sure they both get there in one piece and away from the Dalek. Adam, the faster runner of the three of them, was lengths ahead of them.
"Doctor, I can't sustain the power. The whole system is failing." Van Statten warns. The Doctor hesitates. "Doctor, you've got to close the bulkheads." Van Statten insists, and the Doctor reluctantly makes a decision.
"I'm sorry." He says to Rose and Katy and hits the Enter key on the keyboard. A klaxon sounds and the bulkhead starts to lower. Adam sees this and shouts back at Rose and Katy, who were still running as fast as they could towards him, urgently.
"Come on!" Adam reaches the bulkhead and rolls under it with eighteen inches to spare.
"The vault is sealed." Van Statten announces. The Doctor yells down the line at Rose, desperate to see if she and Katy made it.
"Rose, where are you? Did you and Katy make it?" The Doctor asks desperately. There was silence for a few minutes, then the Doctor hears the sound of quiet weeping, and his hearts take a plummet in his chest.
"Sorry, we were a bit slow." Rose apologises to the Doctor, trying to comfort a frightened, weakened Katy in an embrace. The Dalek comes gliding around the corner, and both girls eye it with resigned dread. "See you then, Doctor. It wasn't your fault. Remember that, okay? It wasn't your fault." Tears fall from Katy's eyes as she buries her head into her sister's shoulder, bracing herself for imminent death. "And do you know what? We wouldn't have missed it for the world."
"EXTERMINATE!" The Doctor hears the Dalek shriek over the line, before the familiar dreaded sound of the Dalek's weapon discharging with a loud ZAP!
The Doctor hangs up the phone and let's his arm fall limply to the side, almost dropping the phone in the process. His eyes were shiny with unshed tears.
"I killed them." He says brokenly.
"I'm sorry." Van Statten acknowledged with genuine guilt on his face. The Doctor continues talking, as though the other man hadn't even started talking.
"I said I'd protect them. They were only here because of me, and you're sorry?" the Doctor turns and gives Van Statten a hateful glare. "I could've killed that Dalek in its cell, but you stopped me."
"It was the prize of my collection!" Van Statten protested, defensively.
"Your collection?" the Doctor sneered. "But was it worth it? Worth all those men's deaths? Worth Rose? Worth Katy? Let me tell you something, Van Statten. Mankind goes into space to explore, to be part of something greater."
"Exactly! I wanted to touch the stars!" Van Statten stated his innocence, but the Doctor wasn't interested in hearing sob stories about the types of dreams he might've had as a child to travel amongst the stars. He was done listening.
"You just want to drag the stars down and stick them underground, underneath tons of sand and dirt, and label them." The Doctor said, scornfully. "You're about as far from the stars as you can get. And you took them down with you." A tear finally detaches and trails down his face. "They were nineteen years old."
Level 46 Bulkhead Door
There was no pain, except for what she was already experiencing in her head because of that bloody Dalek's presence; that was the first thing that Katy noticed. She had expected to experience painful muscle spasms and a burning sensation, typical symptoms of major electric shock. But no, there was nothing. She opened her eyes, registering Rose protectively curled around her, with her eyes squeezed tightly shut and glanced over her sister's shoulder to see the Dalek standing there motionlessly, just observing them.
"Rose?" Katy whispered, confused but still very afraid. Rose pulled away and looked over at the Dalek frowning.
"Go on then, kill us." Rose prompted, and when the Dalek still doesn't take the chance, she pushes Katy behind her, shielding her weakened sister, bravely. "Why're you doing this?" She demanded, suspiciously.
" I AM ARMED. I WILL KILL. IT IS MY PURPOSE." The Dalek shrieked, flailing its arms about in obvious frustration when it appeared unable to follow through with its task.
"They're all dead because of you." Rose accused angrily.
"THEY ARE DEAD BECAUSE OF US." It corrected Rose, who looked taken aback, then outraged that it was laying blame at her feet, when it was its actions that caused those deaths.
"And now what? What're you waiting for?" Katy asked weakly, moving out from behind Rose, despite her sister strongly objecting, and the pain rearing its head again. The Dalek just looked at her.
"I feel your fear." He eventually reveals to them, and Rose snorts at the observation.
"What do you expect?" She stated, flatly. "You've been killing people all around us, were you expecting us to feel excited and happy?"
"DALEKS DO NOT FEAR. MUST NOT FEAR." It shrieked angrily, also sounding frightened and confused at the same time. It retaliates by shooting at either side of the bulkhead door, making the sisters duck, cover and quiver with fear.
"Rose, don't make it angry." Katy winced, clutching at Rose's bicep.
"Nails! Nails!" Rose hissed underneath her breath, when Katy unintentionally dug her fingernails into her arm in her fear.
"Sorry," Katy apologised, before focusing on the Dalek who was having a temper tantrum, and still shooting out of control in the process. It stopped and seemed to glare at Rose accusingly.
"YOU GAVE ME LIFE. WHAT ELSE HAVE YOU GIVEN ME?" It screamed in anguish. "I AM CONTAMINATED!"
"What do we do now?" Katy muttered, worriedly.
Van Statten's Office
The Doctor was still despairing about the 'loss' of his companions when Adam barrels into the office; out of breath, sweaty and looking extremely concerned. Almost immediately, the Doctor pounces on the poor kid with fury in his blue eyes.
"You were quick on your feet, leaving Rose and Katy behind." He sneered, angrily. But Adam was quick to defend himself and hit back verbally.
"I'm not the one who sealed the vault!" He retorted hotly.
The screen turns itself on, revealing the Dalek standing in front of Rose, who was shielding a very pale and sickly Katy. Both girls were scared and very confused about why they hadn't been killed outright by the Dalek, who had been shrieking at them that Rose had contaminated it somehow.
"OPEN THE BULKHEAD OR ROSE AND KATY TYLER DIES!" The Dalek demands. The Doctor stares at the screen with a look of elation and relief.
"You're alive!" The Doctor blurted out, with relief. Rose and Katy smile awkwardly and wave to the security camera.
"Can't get rid of us." Rose joked, squeezing Katy's hand comfortingly. The Doctor eyed Katy with deep concern; she really did not look well at all, and it made him all the more determined to finish this once and for all, so he could examine her.
"I thought you both were dead." The Doctor stated, but before either Rose or Katy could respond, the Dalek interrupted.
"OPEN THE BULKHEAD!" It demanded.
"No, don't do it!" Katy shouted, risking being killed outright by the Dalek. But instead, the Dalek decided to taunt the Doctor.
"WHAT USE ARE EMOTIONS IF YOU WILL NOT SAVE THE WOMAN YOU LOVE?"
If the Dalek had the ability to smirk it could. It could sense several emotions from his hostages: confusion, curiosity, anger, embarrassment. But to its surprise it could also sense love for the Doctor too, although it was stronger for one of the girls than the other. Meanwhile, the Doctor had frozen where he stood the moment the Dalek declared this, staring at the screen with a blank expression on his face. His eyes flickered between Rose and Katy, before he finally came to a decision.
"I got them killed once. I can't do it again." The Doctor stated in anguish before pressing a button and the bulkhead rises. The Dalek immediately starts leading the sisters through, and the screen cuts to black. Van Statten glares at the Doctor.
"What do we do now, you bleeding heart. What the hell do we do?" He demanded.
"Kill it when it gets here." Adam stated, like the solution to their problem was actually that simple and rather quite obvious. If only he knew how completely useless bullets were against Daleks.
"All the guns are useless, and the alien weapons are in the vault." Goddard states, matter of fact.
Okay, now he knows.
"Only the catalogued ones." Adam points out, trying to be helpful.
Adam's Workshop
Adam leads the Doctor to his workshop and over to a bunch of uncatalogued alien artifacts that he was yet to examine for Van Statten. The Doctor doesn't hesitate to pick up item after item to evaluate its usefulness.
"Broken." He tosses aside the object and reaches for another one. "Broken." It gets the same treatment as the previous object did, and the Doctor picks up an oddly shaped object and gives it a once over. "Hairdryer." He tosses it aside and continues sorting through the collection.
"Mister Van Statten tends to dispose of his staff, and when he does, he wipes their memory." Adam explains to a barely listening Doctor. "I kept this stuff in case I needed to fight my way out one day."
"What, you in a fight?" the Doctor eyes Adam sceptically. "I'd like to see that."
"I could do." Adam says, defensively. The Doctor snorts, not remotely impressed by this kid that apparently Rose was interested in.
"What're you going to do, throw you're A-Levels at 'em?" The Doctor mocked him, before spotting what he was looking for and picking up with a triumphant smirk on his face. "Oh, yes." He holds up a rather intimidating alien gun and cocks it, which makes a loud metallic noise. "Lock and load."
The lift outside Van Statten's Office
The Dalek, Rose and Katy exit the lift when it arrives on the floor containing Van Statten's office, and the doors open with a loud ding!
"I'm begging you, don't kill them." Rose was pleading with the Dalek. "You didn't kill us." The Dalek swivels its large head around to look at Rose.
"BUT WHY NOT?" It questions. "WHY ARE YOU ALIVE? MY FUNCTION IS TO KILL." It sounded disgusted with itself that it couldn't perform, what it believed to be a simple, instinctive order. "WHAT AM I? WHAT AM I?" Van Statten and Goddard come running out the office, only to stop dead in their tracks when they see the Dalek, with Rose and Katy as its hostages. Rose raises a hand to stop them from coming any closer.
"Don't move. Don't do anything." Rose advises. "It's beginning to question itself." The Dalek focused upon Van Statten.
"VAN STATTEN. YOU TORTURED ME. WHY?" It demanded, harshly.
"I wanted to help you," Van Statten improvised his answer, hoping the creature wouldn't call his bluff and kill him with its laser. "I just, I don't know. I was trying to help." He laughs nervously. "I thought if we could get through to you, if we could mend you. I wanted you better." The Dalek starts advancing upon the billionaire who immediately started backing up out of fear. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry! I swear, I just wanted you to talk!" Van Statten is backed up against the wall by the angry Dalek.
"THEN HEAR ME TALK NOW. EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!" It shrieks, making Van Statten cringe against the wall. However, Rose immediately comes to his rescue.
"Don't do it! Don't kill him! You don't have to do this anymore." Rose explains, drawing its attention away from Van Statten. "There must be something else, not just killing." She tried to appeal to its newly found conscience. "What else is there?"
"What do you want?" Katy asks the Dalek, still looking at it with mistrust.
"I WANT FREEDOM." The Dalek declares.
Level 1
The Dalek, Rose and Katy head back into the lift once again and takes it to level one, where the Dalek blasts a large hole in the roof, allowing a shaft of sunlight to stream down straight onto its eyepiece. Katy lets go of Rose's hand and walks towards the shaft to reach out and touch the rays with her hand.
"You're out," she tells the Dalek, turning towards it and observing it curiously. "You made it. I never thought I'd feel the sunlight again." Katy mused, smiling and basking in the warmth of the sunlight touching her skin.
"How does it feel?" the Dalek asks, for once not shouting menacingly, and to the surprise of Katy, opens its middle and dome sections to reveal its true form behind the battle armour: a one-eyed mutant, that strongly reminded Katy of a slimy one-eyed octopus with a large brain. Rose goes around to Katy's side, where she had a better vantage point and stares wide eyed at the alien. It blinks in the sunlight and holds out a tendril. Both girls were a combination of fascinated and repulsed by what they were seeing.
"Get out of the way." They turn and see the Doctor brandishing a very large, intimidating alien gun right at the vulnerable Dalek. "Katy, Rose, get out of the way now!" The Doctor demands harshly. Rose stared at him, looking outraged that he would be so low as to shoot an obviously troubled and confused alien. Katy however, just looked at the Doctor with a solemn look, before looking back at the Dalek. She was barely noticing the headache the Dalek was giving her, and she did feel absolutely atrocious, and it was taking all she had not to give in.
"No. I won't let you do this." Rose stated firmly.
"That thing killed hundreds of people." The Doctor insists, still not lowering his gun. Rose's frown deepens.
"It's not the one pointing a gun at my very sick sister." She snaps, disapprovingly. The Doctor falters a little when he learns this about Katy but recovers and continues aiming. He was sure he could make them see sense.
"I've got to do this. I've got to end it." The Doctor was adamant. "The Daleks destroyed my home, my people. I've got nothing left." He said, desperately. Rose stepped around Katy, who was watching the Doctor cautiously.
"Look at it." Rose turns and indicates for the Doctor to look at what the Dalek was doing. The Doctor doesn't lower his gun but does what Rose suggests and frowns in confusion.
"What's it doing?"
"It's the sunlight, that's all it wants." Katy explains, quietly.
"But it can't." the Doctor was thrown by this new information.
"Well, clearly it can." Katy threw him an annoyed glare. Rose puts a calming hand on her sister's arm. She had nearly forgotten how crabby Katy got when she wasn't feeling well.
"It couldn't kill Van Statten, it couldn't kill us." Rose revealed. "It's changing." Then she too levels him with a condemning glare, not liking how the Doctor was behaving right now. "What about you, Doctor? What the hell are you changing into?" Seeing the angry, disapproving looks on his companions faces, the Doctor hesitates, before eventually giving in and lowering the gun.
"I couldn't. I wasn't." He stammers, sounding broken. "They're all dead."
"Why do we survive?" the Dalek ponders, drawing the Doctor's attention away from Katy and Rose.
"I don't know." He admits.
"I am the last of the Daleks." The Dalek states sounding very resigned. The Doctor takes a proper look at the creature, and realises exactly what is happening to it, and cringes.
"You're not even that. Rose did more than regenerate you. You've absorbed her DNA." He explains to the Dalek, looking horrified. "You're mutating."
"Into what?"
"Something new. I'm sorry." The Doctor was genuinely sympathetic. Rose and Katy looked confused about why the Doctor seemed horrified that the Dalek was mutating into something new.
"Isn't that better?" Katy questions.
"Not for a Dalek." The Doctor reveals.
"I can feel so many ideas. So much darkness." The Dalek rasps, sounding appalled. "Rose," she wonders over and gives the alien her full attention. "Give me orders. Order me to die."
"I can't do that." Rose protests, looking horrified by the request made by the Dalek.
"This is not life. This is sickness." The Dalek insists, accusingly. "I shall not be like you. ORDER MY DESTRUCTION! OBEY! OBEY! OBEY!" It shouts at her, causing Rose to tear up at the fact that she had to basically tell an alien to commit suicide. Eventually, she swallows hard and steps forward to fulfill the Dalek's request.
"Do it." She orders it, weakly. The Dalek pauses, studying Rose and the obvious sadness on her face.
"Are you frightened, Rose Tyler?" It asks.
"Yeah." Rose replies. The Dalek swivels its eye at Katy who has a hard time looking it in the eye.
"Are you, Katy Tyler?" It also asks her, and Katy shudders and hugs herself for comfort.
"I always have been." Katy confirmed. The Dalek seemed to accept this answer, without feeling any sort of remorse.
"So am I." It declares. "EXTERMINATE!"
The Dalek shuts its eye, and Rose comes over and pulls Katy away as it closes up its armour again then rises into the air. The balls on its lower body float away from it and fans out around it creating a forcefield, then it implodes safely. Instant relief overcomes Katy, and it appeared to be the permission her body needed to give into the pain she was still feeling. Her eyes roll back into her head, and she faints, alarming Rose who grabs Katy's body before it could hit the concrete floor.
"Katy!" Rose exclaims, and the Doctor rushes forward; cupping Katy's cheeks and smoothing back her bangs from her hot and sweaty face. "What's going on, Doctor?" Rose demands, worriedly.
"I don't know." He admits, truthfully. "Let's get her back to the TARDIS. I'll examine her there." He relieves Rose of her burden by effortlessly scooping Katy's unconscious body into his arms and heading straight for the lift with Rose jogging right behind him.
Their business at Van Statten's alien museum was over.
Time to be moving on.
Museum
Outside the TARDIS
The Doctor and Rose hurry along back to the TARDIS, with Katy still unconscious and being carried protectively and carefully by the Doctor to be examined. Both Rose and the Doctor sag with relief when they clap eyes on the royal blue spaceship.
"A little piece of home. Better than nothing." The Doctor admits, shrugging like he didn't really care. But Rose knew for a fact that this adventure had really hit him hard, and that he was actually lying through his teeth: it really did matter that the TARDIS was his only link to his former home.
"Is that the end of it, the Time War?" Rose asks, trying to be tactful.
"I'm the only one left." The Doctor confirmed. "I win. How about that?" He stated, unenthusiastically. But Rose wasn't one to lose hope that something good might happen for the Doctor in the future.
"The Dalek survived. Maybe some of your people did too." Rose pointed out, trying to be optimistic.
"I'd know. In here." The Doctor indicates to his head by giving it a quick jerk, since his arms were currently full of Katy. He readjusts her weight in his arms, accidentally jostling her heart locket out of its hiding place. The Doctor's intelligent eyes zero in on the piece of jewellery, and frowns curiously. "Feels like there's no one…" He trails off. For some reason, Katy's necklace looked oddly familiar to him. "Where'd Katy get her necklace?" The Doctor questions Rose, who looks over and sees the silver locket glinting in the overhead florescent lights.
"Dunno. It's one of our family mysteries." Rose explains. "Mum tells us that Katy was found with it at the hospital where I was born." The Doctor's eyes widen a little at this interesting fact about Katy. "That's why Mum and Dad adopted her, Katy was abandoned and in need of a good home." Rose continued talking, unaware of the Doctor's shock. "Good thing they did too. I'm glad I have Katy as a sister." She grinned and smoothed back her sister's hair affectionately from her face, before producing her TARDIS key from the chain around her neck and unlocking the door.
"Well then, good thing we're not going anywhere." Rose indicated to Katy and herself as the Doctor's permanent companions.
"Yeah." The Doctor agreed, absently. Adam suddenly comes running up to them looking, anxious.
"We'd better get out. Van Statten's disappeared. They're closing down the base." He tells them. "Goddard says they're going to fill it full of cement, like it never existed."
"About time." Rose snorts, dismissively.
"I'll have to go back home." Adam frets, looking disappointed at that fact.
"Better hurry up then," The Doctor dismisses him. "Next flight to Heathrow leaves at fifteen hundred hours." He states, shifting Katy into the crook of one of his arms and looking at his wristwatch for the right time. Rose nudges him with her elbow as she pushes open the TARDIS doors.
"Adam was saying that all his life he wanted to see the stars." She explains, hinting not very subtly at the Doctor who rolls his eyes.
"Tell him to go and stand outside, then."
"He's all on his own, Doctor, and he did help." Rose reminded him.
"He left the both of you down there." The Doctor stated incredulously, annoyed that Rose was still pushing the point.
"So did you." Rose retorted. Adam had been looking between them, watching them argue like he was spectating at a tennis match.
"What're you talking about? We've got to leave." He reminds them, frantically. The Doctor lets out a reluctant sigh.
"Plus, he's a bit pretty." He mockingly teases Rose, who rolls her eyes.
"I hadn't noticed."
"On your own head." The Doctor warns her, before shoving open the door with his foot and carrying Katy inside, on his way to the TARDIS's infirmary. Rose quickly follows him, leaving the door open ajar. Adam just looks at them, mystified.
"What're you doing? She said cement. She wasn't joking. We're going to get sealed in." Adam shouts at them from outside the door, facing in the direction of the lifts to get himself out of the base. Frustrated, Adam storms over to the TARDIS door and pushes it in. "Doctor? What're you doing standing inside a box?" He walks inside when he doesn't get an answer. "Rose?"
The TARDIS closes the door behind him, and she dematerialises away.
A/N: Uh oh, what's up with Katy? Well, obviously I know. But I can't wait to share the answer with you lot. Hope you've enjoyed this chapter update. Stay tuned for the next one.
TTFN :)