CHAPTER 67

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THE GAME BEGINS AGAIN

The Seventh Doctor and Alina quickly left the Bad Wolves' Headquarters and shut the door before Dracula could see inside. Then they stood there eagerly waiting for Dracula to show himself. So far they saw nothing but empty space, but they both knew that he was still around somewhere watching them from afar. They could both feel his eyes on them even as they stood there.

Suddenly Alina hissed as she sensed Dracula's presence rapidly approaching them. The Doctor now held out the flash drive that he hoped to fool him with as he too started to sense the vampire lord's overwhelming mental presence now.

Both of them watched with growing dread now as Dracula suddenly took shape right in front of them. He had regained his original form Alina realized instead of the one that he had regenerated into the last time that she saw him. It seemed as if he had gone completely back to basics since then.

"I see you're not a Time Lord anymore, Vlad. I can't say that I'm too broken up over that," Alina said.

"When I was reborn, I was reset back to my original self once more. I prefer it this way actually. I don't need the power of a Time Lord in order to defeat you and your new friends. I already possess all of the power that I ever needed to wipe you all out once and for all," Dracula boasted.

"If that's true, then why are you so intent on fixing the technology of the Great Vampires?" Alina asked.

Dracula smiled as he said, "I knew that you'd get my dear Osgood to break sooner or later. It doesn't matter though because I still hold the advantage. Your sister will die if you don't let me inside there right now. What is your answer, my sweet wife?"

He started to gingerly touch Alina's face and immediately had his hand broken at the wrist in the blink of an eye for his efforts. The Doctor winced in sympathy even as Dracula tried to keep from crying out loud from the pain.

"I'm not your wife anymore, Vlad. Don't ever forget that. I will give you the information that you want on how to repair the machines under your castle if you give me back my sister . . . unharmed and in one piece," Alina said firmly.

"You always did have such fire in your heart. I've missed that. Where is this knowledge that you claim to have?" Dracula asked.

"It's right here. We'll make it an even trade. Her sister for this," The Doctor said as he showed Dracula the empty flash drive in his hand.

"Really, Doctor? You'd really give up that information and let me endanger the humans of this world so easily?" Dracula asked skeptically.

"Maybe I'm just that confident that I can beat you even with this extra advantage on your side," The Doctor said with a mysterious smile on his face.

"Perhaps. It wouldn't be the first time that you've used questionable methods for your own purposes," Dracula said as he grabbed the flash drive out of the Doctor's hand.

To his complete surprise, however, all he got was a jelly baby for his trouble instead! The Doctor had used sleight of hand to switch the candy for the drive in an instant.

The Doctor smiled evilly as he said, "Who would have thought that you had such a sweet tooth, Vlad? All you had to do was ask, and I would have gladly given one of them to you."

"What is this, Time Lord? Stop playing games and give me the drive or the girl dies!" Dracula threatened.

"Then you'll die next if that happens," Alina warned.

The Doctor ignored her as he said, "Oh, no. This time we're not going to play things your way, Vlad. If you want the drive, then you'll have to do as I want for a change. You're right in your belief that I won't give up the information on this drive so easily. I want something else in exchange for it besides Stefania."

"What? What are you playing at?" Alina asked in surprise as she began to look at the Doctor suspiciously.

"Name your terms, Time Lord," Dracula said in an impatient voice.

The Doctor looked him straight in the eye with a grim look on his face as he said, "You didn't just come back to life again all by yourself despite what you might claim. Someone brought you back. Tell me who."

"I don't know what you're talking about, Doctor," Dracula said.

"Don't play games with me, Vlad Tepes. I know that your return at this time was no accident. You came back just as Fenric's plan to give this world to the vampires failed, and he was supposedly defeated and sent back to his own universe. I for one don't believe in coincidences," The Doctor said with an accusing stare.

Dracula smiled as he said, "You wish me to confirm what you already suspect. Is that it, Little Man?"

"If you want the information that you seek, then you will, yes," The Doctor said.

Dracula laughed as he said, "Yes, Time Lord, you're quite correct. The Fenric that was sent back wasn't the original as he claimed. Yes, he was the Master of the previous universe and sometimes used Fenric's name for his own purposes, but he was not the first one to use it. Is that what you wished to know?"

The Doctor nodded grimly as he said, "So he's still playing his little game even now, and you're a part of it. He's failed to give Earth over to the vampires twice now, and so he's brought you back to try again. He hopes that the third time is the charm."

Dracula smiled but said nothing as he patiently held out his hand for the drive.

"Here. Take it," The Doctor said with a frown.

"You may just regret giving me this one day, Doctor. Your arrogance in thinking that you can always defeat me no matter what may prove to be your undoing all too soon now," Dracula said.

Then he turned around to gesture to someone behind him to come forward. As soon as he did so, Stefania slowly moved towards them with dead eyes as though she were in a trance.

"What did you do to her?" Alina asked in alarm.

"I completely shut down her mind so that she couldn't be made to tell you any of my plans after I found out that Osgood had become compromised. I'm sure that you'll eventually find a way to help her though . . . hopefully. By then of course it will be far too late to stop me," Dracula said as he suddenly turned into mist and quickly left the area with an evil laugh.

"Monster!" Alina hissed as she briefly showed her fangs in anger.

Then a gentle look came over her face as she said to Stefania, "Stefania, can you hear me? If you can, I'm going to help you. I promise. Somehow in some way I'll bring you back. I'll never stop until I do."

Rose ventured outside now to join them along with the other Bad Wolves as she said to the Doctor, "Well, it looks like he fell for it, Doctor. He wasn't the only one that was fooled though. I honestly had no idea that there were two Fenrics and that ours wasn't the original. He completely pulled the wool over my eyes and that's not easy to do."

"He's a master chess player, Arkytior. He's had centuries of practice at sleight of hand and manipulation of every kind. He had you so focused on believing that the Master of the previous universe was him that you never even noticed who was really pulling the strings. I was sure that I felt his constant presence in this time zone though and when that young Time Lady contacted me and asked me to come here that only added to my suspicions. It wasn't until Dracula himself confirmed it just now though that I knew for sure that Fenric was far from gone," The Doctor said.

"Professor, I thought that we were about to have a long knock down drag out fight with that creep at last like he deserves. Why did you just let him go for?" Dorothy asked in a disappointed tone.

"I didn't. Believe me, Ace. He'll be back very soon now," The Doctor said with a smirk.

"What do you have planned, Spaceman?" Donna asked as she now knew that he was up to something devious.

"Spaceman?" The Doctor asked in confusion.

"It's what she calls you. You'll understand in the future, Doctor. So I take it that the drive that you gave him has a special surprise for him in it, yeah?" Rose asked with a grin.

"Oh, yes. You see that was no flash drive. It was actually . . ." The Doctor started to say.

Then he was interrupted by Dracula's sudden return as he materialized out of nowhere hissing in cold fury as he shouted, "What have you done to me?!"

As the vampire collapsed to one knee in front of him, the Doctor grinned as he said, "Well, it's just as I was telling my wife here, Vlad. That wasn't really a flash drive that I gave you at all. It was only made to look like one. As you've just discovered, it was actually a miniature bomb filled with thousands of tiny little needles which contained minute particles of garlic in them that were all propelled straight into your body when it exploded. The garlic should be coursing throughout your entire bloodstream by now weakening you more and more by the moment even as we speak. Fenric isn't the only one who can perform some misdirection."

"You won't get away with this. I will purge my system of this filth inside of it soon enough, and then I'll return and rip all of you apart," Dracula threatened as he started to leave once more.

"Oh, no you don't, scumbag! You're not going anywhere. It's time for some serious payback for putting us all through weeks of mental torture," Dorothy said in a furious voice.

She suddenly made several of the air molecules in front of Dracula all explode at once. This powerful attack instantly knocked him to the floor with such force that several of his bones could be heard cracking and breaking from the impact at once. The vampire howled in anger as he now struggled to get to his feet and fight back despite massive injuries all throughout his body.

"Do you honestly think that this will stop me? I'll heal from even these injuries in a matter of minutes, and then I'll tear your heart right out of your chest for that, girl!" Dracula threatened.

"I don't think so. If anyone's going to die today, it's definitely going to be you. Believe me when I say that I've had more than enough of people threatening me and my friends lately. I've had enough of it! Do you hear me? Enough!" Ileana said as she hurled herself at Dracula and bit his neck as she began to start draining his blood.

"Get away from me, you freak!" Dracula hissed in anger as he ripped her off of his neck and hurled her across the room with such force that the entire wall cracked that she landed against.

Lilith began to gesture at him as she said his name which caused his heart to seize up with pain now (even though it couldn't technically kill him since he was already dead) and distracted him so that Tori could move in closer to him. She opened her hands and started to expose him to pure sunlight which made him instantly start bursting into flames as he screamed in agony.

"That's it, girls! It's finally time for us to send Fang Boy back to the Great Beyond for good this time," Donna said.

"No!" Dracula screamed as he summoned up a powerful gust of wind that instantly sent both Lilith and Tori flying away from him.

He now took advantage of this momentary respite as he started to run for his life through the UNIT base at incredible speed. As he went along, he scattered all of the soldiers in his path around like rag dolls as they tried to stop him.

"We've got to stop him before he leaves the base. We might never get another chance to catch him if he does," Donna said as the Wolves raced after him.

As Dracula fled, he suddenly found himself face to face with his own doppleganger who attacked him and sank his fangs into his neck just as Ileana had earlier. Using every bit of his remaining strength, he managed to pull this false version of himself away from him and ripped its heart out causing it to instantly turn to dust.

"Hey! That was in no way necessary. You really are a vicious little psychopath aren't you?" Michelle berated him as she suddenly appeared out of nowhere and started gesturing at him while her eyes turned opaque.

Dracula looked at his body to discover parts of it were already disappearing while Michelle started to send it to the Mirror Verse. He knew that he had to stop her quickly before she trapped him there for good so he immediately sank his fangs into her neck and started to drain her of her blood at a rapid pace which quickly caused her to collapse into unconsciousness on the floor.

He now smiled as this new infusion of blood made him feel somewhat better, and he started towards the entrance of the base with renewed speed once more. Before he could get much farther however, he was stopped by Victoria and Kallista who both appeared out of nowhere and instantly blocked his path.

"This is the end of the line for you, Count. After what you just did to Michelle, there's no way that we're letting you out of here in one piece now," Emmy said as she and Calliope joined the other two women.

Dracula could see that there was no way that he was going to get through the four powerful women in his current weakened state so he started to turn around and retreat. That soon proved to not be an option however as Rose, Dorothy, Donna, and the Doctor were now all directly behind him and blocking that direction for him as well.

He knew that it was only a matter of time before the Wolves' final trap was sprung on him and he was caught and finally destroyed once and for all. He had to think quickly so that he could escape to return another day when he had fully recovered.

Suddenly he saw the perfect means of escape as he turned to mist and flowed right through his would-be attackers as he headed straight for Joan Redfern!

Dracula smiled in triumph as he reformed his body directly behind Joan and grabbed her from behind. He held his fangs at her throat now as he smiled maliciously at the others.

"Let me leave or I'll drain her dry on the spot. I'll easily kill her before any of you can ever reach me in time to stop me," Dracula threatened.

"No! Leave her alone!" John screamed in terror.

Rose could instantly see that Joan's death could easily become a fixed point in time so she hesitated to intervene. Time was still in flux for the moment, and she couldn't risk Joan's life on the chance that she might kill Dracula before he killed her. She could alter a fixed point but doing so was always a risky move as she risked creating yet another dark version of herself as a result that would be an even worse menace than Dracula was right now.

"You're not getting out of here, Fang Boy. I promise you that," Donna said in a defiant voice.

"Oh, I think that the hesitation in everyone's eyes speaks volumes about my chances of getting out of here alive now, Donna Noble," Dracula said in a smug tone.

"Does it? I wouldn't be so sure about that, Fang Puss," Donna said as she became filled with anger for what the vampire had done to Lilith and Michelle.

He had hurt both of them badly and after Donna had just promised to be Lilith's mother and protect her! She wasn't about to stand by and let him get away with that either.

Suddenly as if a floodgate had just been opened, power flowed out of Donna's mind just as it had before and to his surprise Dracula found himself being suddenly ripped away from Joan and suspended in mid-air. As Dracula was caught completely by surprise and momentarily distracted while he hovered several feet above the floor, a sharpened metal spike was hurled through his back and straight through his heart from behind.

Dracula screamed in massive agony and then began to start instantly crumbling apart as Katherine stepped in front of him with a fierce look in her eyes. He looked at her in shock and surprise as she held his accusing gaze without wavering.

"You're not the same person that you were long ago when we were children, Vlad. You're a monster and it's long past time that someone stopped you for good. I always knew in the end that it would somehow wind up being me that sent you to your final rest. Sleep well, brother," Katherine said in a sad voice.

Dracula hissed at her in anger at first and then he began to smile and finally said, "Thank you."

Then he crumbled into dust as Katherine turned away from him in sorrow. She knew what he had meant at the end. She had finally set him free from his eternal bloodlust at last. At least she hoped that she had anyway.

"I'm sorry," Alina said to a grieving Katherine.

"I'm sorry for what he did to your sister. I hope that she'll be okay," Katherine said as Alina embraced her.

Alina only nodded in response but said nothing. She would find a way to return Stefania to normal sometime soon, and she wouldn't let anything stand in her way until she did.

"It's over. It's finally over," Lilith said with a smile as she slowly got to her feet.

"Are you alright?" Donna asked her in concern.

"I'll be fine. Carrionites heal a lot faster than humans or even Time Lords do. You don't blame yourself do you? You shouldn't. There was nothing that you could have done to stop it," Lilith said with a reassuring smile.

"I just promised to be your new mother," Donna said as she looked at the baby in her belly in despair.

"It wasn't your fault. It was nobody's fault. Who knew that he would get out of the trap that Tori and I put him in like that? I thought for sure that a living star would kill him in no time," Lilith said.

"I know what you're saying but that doesn't make me feel any better about it, Lilith. If I can't even protect you, how can I protect her?" Donna said as she looked down at the baby in her belly.

"You'll do just fine, Mother Noble. I know you will," Lilith said smiling at her.

"Mother Noble?" Donna asked with a small smile of amusement.

"You don't like it. It's how Carrionites address our mothers. I could call you Mother Donna instead but that sounds silly to me somehow," Lilith said.

"You could just call me Donna you know," Donna suggested.

"No, that would be disrespectful, Mother. If it bothers you, I could just not call you by any name but Mother from now on," Lilith said with a worried look.

"It's okay, Lilith. We'll work it all out later. Don't worry about it," Donna said as she wrapped her arms around her and was grateful that the Carrionite seemed to be looking stronger now.

She kissed her forehead as she said, "I'm glad that you're alright, Lilith."

As Lilith smiled with contentment, Michelle said, "Hey, doesn't anyone care that I almost got drained dry of blood over here? Or is Lilith your only concern now, Mother Noble?"

"You? What about me? He almost broke my back throwing me against the wall like that," Ileana said with a groan.

"You're a vampire. You'll get over it, Mother Van Helsing," Michelle teased her with a weak smile.

"Don't worry, Michelle. I'll have a full transfusion ready for you in no time," Martha told her as she prepared her to be taken to the base's medical bay in a few minutes.

"Thanks, Martha. I'm glad that at least someone here still cares whether I live or die or not," Michelle said with a smile as she continued to make light of the situation in order to try to cheer the obviously upset Donna up.

"For once I'm glad that I have an Auton body so that I wasn't injured," Tori said.

"I'm glad of that too so that I don't have to hear yet another person whining," Donna said with a frown.

While Donna glared at Ileana and Michelle who both laughed, John had his arms wrapped tightly around Joan and refused to let her go as she said, "I'm alright, John. He never even touched me with his fangs. I'm okay."

"I'm so sorry, Joan. I should have done something to protect you. I should have kept you safe," John said disregarding her words.

"I'm fine," Joan said again.

"That's it. We're going to just have a nice ordinary life after this. I'll never put you in a dangerous situation like this ever again I promise," John said.

"Blimey. I never thought I'd ever hear any version of the Doctor actually wanting to settle down and be domestic," Rose said in surprise.

"Of course I would . . . for the right woman," The Doctor said as he looked at her pointedly.

Rose smiled as she said, "I appreciate that but I'd go bonkers if I stayed in one time and place for too long, Doctor. I'm too much like you and I always have been. Aren't you glad of that?"

"I certainly am, my dear. I certainly am," The Doctor said with a smile as he kissed her.

"Here we go again," Dorothy said with a sigh.

Even as the day seemed to have a happy ending (for everyone but Katherine and Alina anyway) at last, the true Fenric watched all of this from a place of safety nearby as he silently fumed at his loss here today. The Doctor had removed yet another piece from the board, and this time it was a major one. It was no matter though.

The game was still far from finished. He had plenty of moves still to come.

"The game continues, Time Lord, just as it always will until you finally die forever. The Game of Fenric never ends until that day. Soon, all too soon now, I will move the next piece on the board," Fenric said.

Meanwhile as he sat on top of his TARDIS in a meditative state while it floated through space, the Twelfth Doctor stared ahead with a grim smile on his face as he said, "I look forward to it."

Next: Donna starts to look further into the nature and extent of her new powers and Alina tries to find a way to help Stefania even as a new storyline starts up in the next chapter. The game of Fenric has started once again, and a new chess piece has been added to his team to replace Dracula. Who will it be and what threat will they pose to the Wolves? Plus it seems that a Wolf is about to return to the fold once more even as others leave as the team's roster changes once again. This particular person couldn't have returned a moment too soon either.