CHAPTER 19
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An alarm went off and pierced the otherwise quiet night air at UNIT HQ. Martha Jones was there working late as usual and immediately ran in the direction of the noise to see what the problem was.
Several UNIT soldiers met up with her along the way, and they all came upon a broken door leading to the detention area holding dangerous alien prisoners. Martha had a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach as she went through the blasted doorway. She soon saw that all of the prisoners were still there except one. The door to one cell had been blasted upon, and Lilith was missing from it!
"Great. Just wonderful! How in the world did this happen?" Martha asked no one in particular.
Mother Doomfinger, who was still in her cell, said, "She was taken away by the black garbed man. He called himself the Shadow."
She had a special inhibitor bracelet on her arm made from Gallifreyan technology that prevented her from using her powers. The UNIT soldiers still trained their weapons on her though just in case.
"The Shadow? What kind of name is that?" Martha asked slightly amused.
"That's the name that he gave. He said that he was freeing her in the name of his master, and that he was called the Shadow," Mother Doomfinger said.
"Why didn't he take you too?" Martha asked curiously.
"I don't know. Lilith asked him to free me as well, but he refused. He said that he only wanted her. He promised to set her free once her deal with him was done, and then she could free me then if she wished," Mother Doomfinger said.
"Why are you telling me all of this?" Martha asked suspiciously.
"I fear for Lilith's life. She did not go of her own free will but was forced into servitude by the Shadow. I fear that he will kill her after she has done whatever it is that he wanted her to do," Mother Doomfinger said.
"What makes you think that I care what happens to her?" Martha asked.
"The Wolf choses her allies well. She only picks those who have a heart as pure as her own. You are a good woman, Martha Jones, and a doctor. You do care despite the fact that she tried to destroy your world," Mother Doomfinger said.
Martha knew that she had her there. It was in her nature to help rather than to stand by and do nothing.
"I'll do what I can. Is that everything that you know about this Shadow?" Martha asked.
"No. He also mentioned that he was coming for the Wolf. That he was going to destroy her in the name of his master," Mother Doomfinger answered.
"Who is his master?" Martha asked.
"I don't know, but I felt great darkness within him. His master must be one of the great powers of the universe. Perhaps the Wolf will know," Mother Doomfinger said.
"Thank you. I'll do what I can to help Lilith if she is in any danger. If she's up to something instead, then I'll be the first one in line to stop her," Martha promised.
Mother Doomfinger could only shake her head once Martha had left. She would never understand these humans and their willingness to help even those who would destroy them, but she was eager as always to exploit it for her own purposes. She was truly worried about Lilith's safety around such an evil creature. She could feel that his power stemmed from a source of great darkness, a caretaker of the darkness perhaps. The creature itself seemed to only be at home in the dark, even shying away from what little lights that had been on in the area at night as if the light itself pained him.
Meanwhile back on the Planet of the Cheetah People, Dorothy was trying to calm Amanda down as the Cheetah People kept circling the fire that she had created for them that had so far been keeping them back. It was lucky for them that Ace had used the lightning quick speed that she still had from the time that she had almost been transformed into a Cheetah Person herself to surprise the Cheetah Woman who had grabbed Amanda with an incredibly fast punch to the jaw that knocked her out before she even knew that it was coming.
"They're going to eat us any minute now. There's more and more of them approaching all of the time," Amanda said in a nervous voice.
"They will try to attack soon when there are enough of them. Right now, they're too afraid that we'll use the fire on them to do anything more than stare at us," Dorothy said.
"Thank you," Amanda said.
"Thanks for what?" Dorothy asked.
"I want to thank you for being honest with me. No one's ever been this honest with me before. Even Katherine would be telling me how everything was going to be alright if she were here," Amanda said.
"I don't believe in that. Maybe I'm wrong to think that way, but I believe in always telling people what's what no matter how hard it might be for them to hear it. It's probably because of the way that the Professor lied to me and manipulated me in the past. He did it for what he thought were good reasons I think, but I still didn't like it," Dorothy said.
"The Professor?" Amanda asked.
"That's what I call him. His name is the Doctor. He was my friend and my mentor back when I was still just a kid. He's a very good man despite what I just told you about him. He just needed Rose with him to keep his dark side in check I think," Dorothy said.
"I met Rose. She was very nice to me, and I liked her. Is she his wife then?" Amanda asked curiously.
"Yeah, she is. She's great, isn't she? Everybody loves Rose. Well, almost everybody. There are a few people who are just rotten to the core that don't like her, but they don't really count. She's also the only one besides the Doctor and River Song who knows his real name too despite what Donna tried to pull on me. I know enough about Time Lords to know that they only tell their real name to the person that they marry. Not even someone with a copy of their memories will know their real name. It's something that comes from inside of them from the moment that they look into the Vortex. It wouldn't be found in their memories but inside of their very essence. At least that's the way that Rose once described it to me," Dorothy said.
"You babble a lot," Amanda said laughing.
"I do, don't I? I definitely hung around Time Lords way too much when I was young," Dorothy said with a giggle.
The Cheetah People were now gathering in huge numbers, and Dorothy knew that they were about to attack soon. She didn't want to have to do this because she knew that many if not all of them had been changed into Cheetah People against their will by the gene altering virus that was all over this world. It was the same virus that even now would be trying to change them into Cheetah People if Dorothy were not keeping it at bay with her Vortex powers.
"Give us the child, sister, so that we may raise her as our own. We need new blood," one of the Cheetah People finally said.
"Oh, so you finally recognize me as someone who was almost one of you once then?" Dorothy asked with a slight grin.
"You have a piece of this planet within you just like all of us do. Once you have been one of us in the past, you are always one of us. We are the same, you and I. We are both connected to this world," the Cheetah Person said.
"That's true. The difference between us is that I don't let that connection rule over me like you do. I have a will of my own," Dorothy said.
"We need new recruits, sister. We must have new blood to protect ourselves from the renegades in our midst who seek to overturn and change the old ways. The ones who serve the man of the shadows," the Cheetah Person said.
"Man of the shadows?" Dorothy asked intrigued.
"Yes, he is always enveloped in darkness. He fears the light and cannot come out in the daytime. This creature has great power which he has used to corrupt many of us into his service. That is why we must have new recruits and more meat. We are being diminished moment by moment by the evil among us, sister," the Cheetah Person said.
"The one of you who originally stole Amanda said that she was to be food. Now you're saying that you want her as a recruit against a so called creature of great darkness. Which is it?" Dorothy asked, skeptical of this whole story.
The one who captured the girl was one of his not ours. Both factions are raiding the Earth now. We do it out of necessity to replace what we have lost. They do it in order to attack the humans that the Wolf loves and protects. They do it to mock her," the Cheetah Person said.
"This is all about Rose," Dorothy realized.
"No, this is really all about the creature who corrupts our planet attempting to resurrect his dark master. The Wolf would stand in his way if she knew of his existence therefore his new servants hate her as much as he does," the Cheetah Person explained.
"What does corrupting your people have to do with resurrecting his master?" Amanda asked.
"We don't know just yet. We believe that he is gathering an army with which to attack the Earth and the Wolf with. Our people are just the start. He is using us because of our ability to teleport to other worlds, and the fact that we can turn other people into beings like ourselves. We also believe that he is doing this in order to accomplish something else. What that is, we have no idea," the Cheetah Person said.
"That's very interesting. Thanks for telling us all of that," Donna said as she suddenly appeared beside Dorothy and Amanda.
The Cheetah People all began to snarl at Donna in fear just as the rest of the Bad Wolves also appeared from behind some rocks. They too had heard this entire conversation between Dorothy and the Cheetah Person.
"So there's someone stirring them up then? I wondered why they were suddenly attacking the Earth again out of the blue like this," Donna said.
"Why Perivale though? Why come there again?" Dorothy asked.
They hadn't noticed that the sun had started to go down, and that night was falling due to being so absorbed in what was going on. They also didn't notice the approach of the other band of Cheetah People until it was too late.
The other Cheetahs quickly surrounded all of them, and then a figure in a black robe with the top part of a skull on his head emerged from in front of them as their leader.
"We came to Perivale to attract your attention of course, Dorothy. We wanted to trick you into coming here where we could finally seize you. How fitting that my master should be reborn through you, Dorothy McShane! The Bad Wolf's greatest enemy will be reborn in the body of her greatest student. I, the Shadow, will make sure of it," the Shadow said with an evil echoing laugh.
"You'll have to go through us first," Donna said.
"Hey, I'm no slouch. I can take care of myself. I appreciate the offer to help though," Dorothy said.
"You will soon be mine, Dorothy. It is inevitable. Why resist it?" the Shadow said.
"Maybe I'm resisting because I don't like being made into a pawn by horribly dressed giant scumbags?" Dorothy said with fire in her voice.
The Shadow's corrupted Cheetah People then got ready to face off against the uncorrupted Cheetahs with the Bad Wolves and Dorothy caught in the middle.
"It's going to be one of those days, isn't it?" Ileana asked with a groan.
"I don't know. I think that I might actually enjoy it," Abraham said.
"You would," Ileana teased her husband.
"You're all just a little bit crazy, aren't you?" Amanda observed.
"You haven't seen anything yet, kid. If we can make it through this fight, I'm going to show you a dictionary. You'll find a picture of us next to the word crazy in it," Donna joked.
"No, I think that you'll find a picture of them instead, Donna. They're the ones that are crazy to ever think that they could get away with messing around with me," Dorothy said ominously as she began to glow with energy.
Next: The Shadow vs. Dorothy. The Bad Wolves and the Cheetah People vs. the Shadow's corrupted Cheetahs. Plus hints as to just who the Shadow's master is anyway for those of you unfamiliar with the Armageddon Factor episode of classic Doctor Who.