Child of Earth
By Lumendea
Chapter Fourteen: Reason to Celebrate: A Shadow
Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who or any of the spinoff material and I gain no income off of this story, just the satisfaction of playing with the characters.
….
Rose wouldn't have imagined that going less than a mile down an alley would be stressful, but Ceaflae's soft whimpers echoed off the brick buildings and she could just imagine the waking Torchwood forces following the sounds. It was Amelia who reacted best to it by reaching into the little pack Rose had made using her leather jacket and pulling out one of the energy packs from the Torchwood weapons.
They didn't stop moving, but despite the heels, Rose risked a glance back towards Ceaflae as Amelia handed her the power pack. The Arcateenian took the small black cartridge with a look of wide-eyed interest. Turning it over carefully, Ceaflae adjusted the section that would have attached to the weapons with her long glowing fingers. Rose saw a small spark jump onto Ceaflae's fingers and the alien smiled as she brought the cartridge up to her mouth.
Ceaflae slurped loudly at the end of the energy pack and Rose watched with fascination as small sparks of energy vanished into the Arcateenian's mouth in small little arcs of lightning. Ceaflae's colour improved and the soft noises instantly lessened while Amelia beamed at her own cleverness. Rose on the other hand almost walked past the back door that they wanted and into a lamp post.
She recovered quickly and only Sharon giggle, reassuring her that her blunder had mostly gone unnoticed. There was a small security camera up by the door that Rose set onto a loop with the sonic pen as she silently thanked Jack once again for teaching her that trick. Someday she really needed to sit down and write down all the settings on the sonic pen that she did know. Once she was satisfied with the camera, Rose deactivated the security system and unlocked the back door, wishing that she knew exactly where they were breaking into.
"If we get arrested Benton will bail us out right?" Shareen questioned softly behind her.
"Hopefully," Rose answered as she eased the door open and looked into the silent building.
There were low emergency lights on that cast only the faintest glow down the long corridor that led into the building. Opening the door the rest of the way, Rose stepped inside and waited for a moment to make sure that nothing else happened. This was going a little too well, but nothing went off and no lights flashed so she continued further into the building.
The lower floors of the office building were intact with completed walls and a tiled floor down in the corridor as they slipped in the back door. Rose turned around as the group strode in and shut it securely before re-engaging the lock. With luck, they had seen the last of Torchwood tonight, but a lingering fear at the back of her mind was still wondering just what had forced Ceaflae out of her teleport.
"Upstairs maybe," Shareen suggested as she pointed to the fire staircase. "There doesn't seem to be any equipment down here."
"They must be working their way up," Rory remarked as he pushed open the fire door.
It was completely dark without even any emergency lights on. The total darkness sent a shiver do Rose's spine, but within moments Rory had pulled out a small torch from one of his pockets and was shining it around. The others were turning on their mobile lights and using those to guide their way as they moved into the staircase.
They hadn't needed to be so worried. The moment Ceaflae was in the staircase behind Amelia her soft glow seemed to fill the whole space around her, illuminating the steps in a pale blue glow.
"Thank god," Amelia muttered. "I hate the dark."
"Really?" Sharon teased. "Raised by two adventures in time and space and afraid of the dark?"
"There are so very bad things that live in the dark," Amelia informed her softly. "Let's just leave it at that."
"Yeah but not on Earth," Sharon replied though there was a hint of worry in her voice.
"I'm not sure," Amelia told her before she picked up her speed to climb the stairs a bit faster.
Rose did her best to ignore that conversation, not wanting to think about what could make the bold as brass ginger frightened of something. Their voices echoed far too loudly in the staircase and by silent agreement, everyone fell silent. It was slow progress with Rose unlocking each of the doors and looking into each floor for signs of construction. Behind her the sounds of Ceaflae slurping at more energy from one of the cartridges made her want to laugh and tense up at the same time.
This was one of those moments that really reminded Rose of just how odd her life really was. Her time was split between trying to finish a degree that she wasn't actually going to stay on Earth and use, practising her violin to master inherited musical skills from another life, running into people from her own personal future and saving aliens from Torchwood. She held back a laugh and opened another door to find plastic sheeting spread out across the floor.
"Jackpot," Sharon breathed behind her and Rose nodded in agreement.
They walked down the corridor, the plastic shifting beneath them over the tiled floor until it gave way to a bare concrete floor. Workbenches were set up with piles of lumber near them and unfinished and open walls. Piping and wiring were half done on the right wall and barely started on the left with tools organised on the workbenches awaiting the return of the workers. But the prize was the large generator set up in the middle of the room.
The Arcateenian swept past all of them and headed for the generator. It fumbled with the device for only a moment as Rose followed it over. Then the generator kicked on and Ceaflae laid her body across it. A strange sound that her translator couldn't understand escaped her as small bolts of energy jumped off the generator and onto her form.
"That's good isn't it?" Rory questioned with an odd look on his face. "I'm pretty sure generators aren't supposed to work like that."
"They don't," Rose agreed with a shake of her head. "But I think our friend is drawing the energy out regardless of its internal systems." She sighed and looked at the sonic pen. "Remind me to disable it when she leaves so it doesn't electrocute a worker tomorrow."
"Yeah that would be a good idea," Rory agreed with a small nervous laugh. "There are days that it hits me, you know?" Rory confessed to her softly. "And I just had one of those moments."
"Me too actually," Rose chuckled which earned her a look of surprise from Rory. "Hey, I'm human too remember."
Rory shifted at the statement but said nothing. Rose silently put his reaction in the 'evidence that something about me changed' column in her mind and turned her attention back to the issue at hand.
"Ceaflae," Rose called gently, mindful of the echo the unfinished room created. "May I take a look at your teleport?"
Ceaflae paused her happy coos and shifted off of the generator. Energy rippled over her form even after she'd moved away, but Ceaflae calmly reached down and unbuckled her belt-like teleporter. Instead of handing it to Rose, she crossed the room and set it down on the wooden workbench.
"If you can fix it I would be much appreciated," Ceaflae told her in her musical tones.
"Ceaflae do you know what forced you out of the teleport in the first place?" Rose questioned as she moved over to eye the unfamiliar piece of technology. "Was it Torchwood?"
"No," Ceaflae answered slowly with a distressed note to her tone. "Something… else. It was unfamiliar to me. It was like hitting an icy patch."
"In space?" Rose remarked with a frown. Space was a vacuum, without shielding like the TARDIS provided then it was always freezing.
"This was something else," Ceaflae insisted with a shudder. "Something tried to grab me. For a moment I couldn't see any stars, everything was dark and then my teleporter glitched. I woke up in a park, barely able to breathe. It hurt so much… there were humans and shouting. I grabbed a street light and drained the energy to survive. Those people… Torchwood came not long after."
"The humans who saw you must have called the police," Rose explained with a sigh. "Sorry about that. Anyway, you take care of yourself, I'll see if I can fix it and if I can't we'll go from there."
"I am grateful Star Knight," Ceaflae breathed as she moved away from the table. "This planet I lovely, so inspiring, but it is not safe for me to remain here."
"Agreed and with London being Torchwood territory it is best for everyone if you move on."
"But isn't Torchwood worried about the United Nations decision against holding aliens captive?" Sharon asked as she joined Rose at the table. "I mean wouldn't that be a problem for them?"
"Maybe, maybe not," Rose answered with a sigh. "I've talked to the Prime Minister about them, but she is a bit hesitant in giving up what is a major research and development organisation that work for Britain." Rose shook her head and added, "And Harriet revealed that Torchwood's funding largely comes from patents they control. They don't get much money from Britain at all. I think she's worried about Hartman going rogue if they put too much pressure on her."
"Oh lovely," Sharon grumbled. "Just what we need in London. Another Black Sun looking to take over the world."
"Black Sun in the mercenary group that works the Black Market," Rose reminded her. "Within their network is Eclipsed Sun, an elite group of collectors who are trying to take over the world. Connected, but I think technically separate."
"You have too many enemies," Sharon muttered as Rose turned over the device. "Well good luck with that."
"Thanks," Rose answered, not really paying attention anymore.
Examining what looked like a belt buckle, Rose felt a familiar little rush of giddiness. The metal was unfamiliar and shining brightly in the low light. Running her fingers over it slowly, Rose smiled as she found a tiny seam. She adjusted the sonic pen's setting and carefully opened the casing. Inside was a tiny crisscross of shimmering wires and a small blue pulsing power centre right at the heart of the device. In truth, it was quite beautiful and Rose was tempting to take a reference photo so she could paint it later.
Two wires had been partially burned out, but thanks to the sonic she'd managed some basic soldering to shorten them back to their working sections. It was tight, but the energy cell was humming more evenly now. Biting her bottom lip, Rose glanced at her friends and then back at the device.
"Uh anyone have a hair pin?" she questioned only to get surprised looks. "Oh don't look at me like that, I just need it to shift something and all the tools here are too big."
Shareen stepped forward and slipped a long hairpin out of her ponytail and handed it to Rose without only a quirk of an eyebrow. Rose accepted it with a smile and quickly slid it under a patch of wire to hold them up as she resealed another connection into the energy centre. The temperature in the room suddenly dropped making Rose look up sharply from the tiny device. She caught Amelia's eye as everyone shifted in surprise and looked around. Ceaflae whimpered and shrank away from the generator.
"It's here… this is the same cold as before," Ceaflae whispered, looking imploringly towards Rose.
Looking around, Rose tried to see the source of the sudden temperature drop. She started to shiver as goose bumps began appearing up her arms. A moment later Amelia stepped over to her and held out the emptied leather jacket as she set the last three cartridges on the worktable beside the teleport. With a quick nod, Rose pulled on her leather coat and stepped away from the table as her eyes scanned the corners of the room.
There didn't seem to be anything here, but Rose shuddered as she had the distinct sense that there was something watching them. She heard an odd noise outside of the window and turned towards the largest of the great panes of the glass. Rose eyed it uneasily. She already disliked that they might be seen from the outside, but it really sounded like something was moving around outside the window despite them being five stories up.
"Ceaflae," Rose called softly. "What do you remember about your teleporter failing?"
"Well… it's difficult. Teleports are very quick and you sort of just… sleep on longer trips," Ceaflae admitted in a low voice as she looked towards the window nervously.
"Try."
"Something jumped on me," Ceaflae told her uneasily. "There aren't many things that can do that, but I did pass the planet Geonot on my way here," Ceaflae said in a softer voice, sounding much more like she was talking to herself.
The window shattered in a crash of glass that flew out across the floor. Rose felt a large shard slide across the floor and hit the sole of her shoes. The lights flickered and everyone went completely still. Outside the broken window the wind seemed to howl and Ceaflae's glow dimmed. Then something large and black leapt into the room, talons collided with the concrete floor with a terrible scrape and a low rumbling filled the room.
It was a large black creature roughly humanoid in shape with two legs folded beneath it from its landing and long lanky arms, but it seemed to be made of black fire as wisps of dark… something surrounded its form. Then it slowly raised its head to face them and climbed to its feet bringing the thing up to its full seven-foot height. Dark violet eyes focused on Ceaflae and a menacing chuckle escaped it as it began to take a step forward.
"Identify yourself," Rose demanded as she recovered from her initial shock and shifted so she was in front of Ceaflae. Another wave of cold rushed over her and her teeth tried to chatter as she shivered. "I am Rose Tyler and you are on a Level Five Protected Status planet. Under Article 3 subsection 19 I demand that you identify yourself, species and purpose for presence on this planet."
Rose almost smirked in satisfaction as the things attention shifted to her with a hint of surprise flickering in the dark eyes. Keeping herself from shifting nervously, Rose met the alien's gaze despite it very much looking like something out of a cartoon or a Tim Burton film. It sniffed at the air and looked back at Ceaflae in the corner of its eye. Ceaflae whimpered behind Rose and she was struck by the desire to turn and check on the alien, but resisted. Instinct demanded that she didn't turn her back on this alien, it screamed predator to her.
"You smell like a wolf," the alien murmured as it turned its eyes back to Rose. "And you have open eyes."
Rose forced herself not to react to the wolf reference, she refused to be afraid of something connected to her and the Doctor like that.
"Under Article 3 subsection 19 I demand that you identify yourself, species and purpose for presence on this planet," Rose repeated.
"I'm just hungry," the alien replied as it tilted its head. "I'm not invading your little Level Five Planet." Its tone suddenly dropped to an icy purr, "I'll just have a light snack and be on my way."
"Energy vampire," Ceaflae whispered behind her in a fearful voice. "Run, we have to run!"
"Oh little Arcateenian," the alien breathed. "You no longer interest me. This city is full of energy, pulsing away and wasted in lights and those noisy machines." Then it smiled, spreading a mouth that was full of strange twisted teeth like little spires. "You're welcome to run."
Rose tensed as Ceaflae whispered, "Notivil. I'm sorry."
Then the Arcateenian darted out from behind her and grabbed the teleport from the table. Before Rose and the others could even move, Ceaflae wrapped it around her waist and vanished in a flash of light. Swallowing down a flash of fear and refusing to panic, Rose fought to keep her expression neutral as the alien in front of her chuckled.
"Leave my planet now," Rose ordered, drawing herself up to her full 5'5" height.
"No," the alien laughed. "I think I'll have a nice meal first."
It suddenly occurred to Rose that the others behind her wouldn't know what was going on. She hoped that Ceaflae's sudden departure would have put them on edge. A moment later the alien's body seemed to flare with the black wisps growing and surrounding it like a dark halo.
"I am the Nortivil and I will consume this world."
"Get off my planet," Rose insisted. "This is your last chance."
The Notivil leaned forward and opened its mouth again exposing its odd teeth. It sucked in a deep breath and the temperature began to drop and the lights flickered. Rose felt a bit faint and she suddenly remembered Ceaflae's words.
"Energy vampire," Rose gasped before she shouted, "Run!"