Child of Earth

By Lumendea

Chapter Twenty-Four: Dark Minds: The Source Code

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.

…

UNIT soldiers were made of pretty stern stuff in Rose's experience, but she had to keep in mind that the Germans didn't have as colourful a record as the U.K. forces. The sight of the ship and confirmation that there was something just floating in the centre of Berlin was a lot for them to take in. Rose was certain it was only the knowledge that they were in the centre of Berlin that kept them from firing, but she also noted that the German officers seemed a bit more hesitant to use military force of arms. While they waited for a mobile command truck to arrive, Alistair answered numerous questions about the Bardonians.

"Doctor!" Someone called and Rose found herself looking around for any sign of the Doctor only to remember a moment later who they were supposed to be taking to.

A pair of plainly dressed men that Rose guessed were science department from the small computers they were clutching moved over to him. One of them turned the computer so Alistair could look at it and Rose almost burst out laughing when her future son pulled on a pair of glasses to read the screen. Apparently, while he was a bit more like her personality than the Doctor he'd still taken on plenty of his father's quirks. That was fair, she decided. After all, she couldn't quite see Athena or Astra doing the 'brainy specs' thing. Though… maybe Athena around Jack if he had similar feelings about the glasses as Rose did.

Turning her attention to the young woman who was sitting on a bench wrapped in a blanket with a medic kneeling in front of here, Rose took a moment to study her future daughter-in-law. She wondered if she have been feeling more protective of her son than she was, but couldn't quite find any such emotion directed towards Ella. It was possible that the part of her that knew she was Eve's daughter was just too pleased about their children marrying and having a child. Rose looked at Adam who was calmly sitting on the bench next to his mother with a wide happy smile on his face. He was beginning to nod off, leaning against his mother's arm and earning a soft look from the assembled medics.

Walking over, Rose still a bit of distance so she wouldn't disturb the medics.

"Anything else, ma'am?"

"No," Ella answered calmly. "I don't remember much. I was just looking around for the source of the telepathic field for the Doctor and then I woke up in the ship. They probably detected me and pulled me into the ship when I wandered too close. If they supercharged the entrance tractor beam they could have pulled me in even from a few feet away. That would have been enough of an energy surge in my brain to knock me out."

"You're very calm about this," the medic observed, his brow furrowing.

"I travel with the Doctor," Ella laughed good-naturedly.

The medic's eyes dropped to Adam and Rose could feel the judgement. She wondered if she'd face that in the future, travelling with the Doctor and their kids. It wasn't exactly a safe life and she wasn't sure how she'd react to that. Ella frowned in return and raised a sharp ginger eyebrow at the medic.

"I'm only half human and my son is a distinct one of a kind hybrid. He's safest bouncing around the universe in a TARDIS. They're almost impossible to track and the Doctor takes his safety very seriously," Ella explained in an almost icy voice.

"Uh of course, ma'am," the medic stuttered as he jumped to his feet. The others around him exchanged uncomfortable looks.

Moving over, Rose watched with a bit of satisfaction as the medics looked almost alarmed at her presence. Rose inwardly smiled a little as she nodded to them. For a moment they looked lost, but then thankfully the mobile command unit arrived. The large truck pulled partially up onto the pavement at the edge of the square and the medics all but retreated towards it. Rose glanced towards Alistair as he walked with a captain towards the command unit. He glanced her way and nodded with a small smile.

Exhaling softly, Rose looked back at Ella who was watching her with a slightly uncertain look. Adam rubbed his cheek into his mother's arm and looked up at Rose with sleepy eyes. She could understand that. It was getting late and she was beginning to feel a bit sleepy herself.

"I'm Ella," the bright redhead introduced herself carefully. Rose took note that she had only a tiny hint of an accent, mostly sounding like an American.

"So you're Eve's daughter?" Rose asked softly as she sat down the bench so Adam was between them.

"Ah, you know who I am then?" Ella questioned carefully, her eyes darting towards Alistair who was talking with a colonel and kept glancing their way.

"Yeah, I knew he wasn't… the Doctor," Rose explained softly.

Ella chuckled, the soft sweet sound easing Rose's nerves. "Yeah, that sounds about right. Good thing, though, he would have freaked out if you'd tried to kiss him like you do your husband."

"Time travel creates strange situations," Rose agreed with a chuckle of her own and a small shudder. That would have been very awkward to deal with.

"Very true," Ella sighed, wrapping her arm around Adam. "So you know who Adam is?"

"Yeah, didn't think I'd meet my grandson when I was only twenty-one," Rose replied softly mindful of the nearby UNIT personal.

Whatever Ella had been going to say was forgotten when she suddenly straightened up and looked past Rose into the street. Turning to look over her shoulder, Rose groaned softly at the sight of dozens of children and teenagers walking up the pavement slowly and almost robotically. Rose watched the children and teenagers slowly file into the square around the UNIT soldiers. The entire feel of the square suddenly changed and Rose looked around to see the lights of nearby buildings dimming as the world tried to ignore what was happening. Frowning deeply, Rose looked at one of the youngest kids. He couldn't have been more than seven and was dressed in pajamas with sneakers and a coat. Thankfully they all had seemed to still have the ability to put something on against the night chill.

Standing up, she fought the desire to move forward and instead made herself watch. UNIT personal lined up and Rose caught sight of Alistair moving forward. He moved into the crowd of children, kneeling down to look at one of them closely as they began to form a circle. Rose now recognised that the circle surrounded the playground and more importantly the ship. More and more of them kept coming in a tight group, slowly moving amongst the soldiers without any reaction.

"Easy," Ella breathed next to her, reaching out and grabbing her arm. "The telepathic field hasn't changed. They're still harvesting energy, not harming the children."

It didn't last long. The children just stood there blankly staring into the empty space that wasn't really empty. As suddenly as they appeared they all suddenly turned and began to walk away. A mobile phone slipped out of a pocket and fell to the ground as the first group of children began to disperse. Scooping it up, Rose looked around trying to find the child it belonged to the crush of kids. With a sigh, she gave up and looked down at the phone to see if she could find anything special. The small icon indicating at that the Wi-Fi was on flashed with a series of unusual symbols briefly appearing next to it. Her frown deepened and Rose went into the settings to check. Sure enough, the Wi-Fi source had a name that her translator didn't seem to know what to make of.

The screen flickered for a moment and the pain in Rose's head increased. Closing her eyes, Rose shook her head for a moment and tried to clear it. The dull feeling was still pounding in her head and Rose felt a nagging suspicion that something wasn't quite right. Alistair had been… hinting at something earlier, but she still felt like she was missing some important information.

"Don't stop them," Alistair called out over the square. "They'll be released from the control signal. Just take them home."

Sure enough, the eyes of the children were clearing slightly though they looked exhausted. Rose stepped forward to catch the shoulder of one of them when he almost collapsed. The team of medics was suddenly amongst them and the UNIT soldiers spread out to calm the kids down. A moment later Alistair was next to them with a stern expression on his face.

"We can't do anything more here tonight," he murmured as his eyes moved up into the air. "I need to think."

"Back to UNIT then?" Rose questioned, reaching over to squeeze her son's hand.

"Yeah, I want to check Ella out myself and you need some rest."

…...

The Science Department was very quiet, the UNIT staff watching with baited breath as Alistair linked the TARDIS scanners to the computers. The long coiling cables almost filled the floor and were a tripping hazard, but several of the staff risked walking near them to glance into the TARDIS. As he watched the screen flash with different maps of London and small dots appeared, Alistair seemed completely unbothered by them all. He crossed his arms in front of him and looked intently at the screen, reminding her more of the leather coat wearing Doctor than his next incarnation.

Rose was seated at a computer of her own at one of the smaller work tables. The mystery phone was next to her and Rose kept glancing at it with a hint of worry as she plugged the phone into the computer. Ella joined her a moment later and handed her a cup of tea.

"Not the best," Ella apologised softly as she sat down next to Rose.

"How's Adam?"

"Taking a nap," Ella whispered. "But he won't be gone long. Time Lords don't need much sleep."

"Even at that age?"

"Especially at that age," Ella grumbled as she took a long sip of her own tea. "You did warn me I suppose," Ella added fondly before she looked down at the phone. "What are you doing?"

"Just following a hunch," Rose replied calmly as the phone linked up and she accessed the files. "I noticed something a bit odd earlier."

"Ah," Ella said in a knowing voice. "Your great talent." She blinked when Rose turned to look at her. "Noticing the odd little detail."

"I try," Rose chuckled, that odd falling sense returning as it sank in that she was talking with the future daughter of one of her best friends and her own future daughter-in-law.

At first glance, the phone looked normal, the core basic applications and storage of the phone. There were a couple of random photos of a teenage boy in different places with a teenage girl amongst other things. Nothing looked strange and then the screen shifted for a moment. Just the tiniest bit, but Rose felt a flash of irritation across her head.

"Hold on a second," Rose hissed as she closed out the photos and opened another file. There were some strange symbols tacked onto the end of what looked like the saved Wi-Fi information for the phone. "This isn't-"

The screen flickered again and Rose darted her fingers across the keyboard. Everything froze and a strange series of code was suddenly clear in front of them. Next, to her, Ella made a small sound of surprise and Rose's lips curved into a satisfied smile.

"Got ya," Rose breathed. "I think I found it."

"Some kind of code," Ella announced with a chuckle. "Tacked onto the phone's WiFi system. That's how they're doing it."

The screen flickered and unfroze as the code began to scroll down the screen. It was twisting and changing with the odd symbols making Rose's headache worse and worse. Ella was humming thoughtfully and Rose kept trying to watch the screen.

"Damn," Ella growled as the screen suddenly reverted to normal. "There it goes."

"But we've seen it now," Rose murmured. "It had become part of the Wi-Fi code. That can't be an accident."

"It's a piece of malware then," Ella explained in a slightly awed voice. "Spreading through local Wi-Fi connections. It runs in the background of the screen." Ella reached around Rose and hit a few keys and a normal looking desktop came up. "You can't see the code now, but it's still there running just below normal perception, but you're still seeing it."

"And that's making the kids telepathic?" Rose questioned in shock.

"Yeah, the code isn't normal. It's using the light of the computer and a subtle high pitched noise to… well, agitate the brain. In response, the brain shifts slightly in order to combat the agitation causing the subtle alternations that make the children more telepathic. They've had this in place for quite some time."

"How long?"

"A year… at least," Ella answered with a hint of unease.

"Could we interfere with the signal?" Rose questioned, leaning forward to look at the phone again. "The Bad Wolf virus?"

Ella's eyebrow shot up and her lips curved into a considering smile. She nodded carefully and looked back towards Rose. "It might," she agreed. "Do you have it with you?"

"Course," Rose chuckled as she adjusted her small black shoulder bag. She unzipped the smallest of the pockets and pulled out the small flash drive. Holding it up, Rose added, "I always have it near me. Just in case." Rose hummed softly and looked at Ella, "But the issue is that this won't stop the telepathic field now, it will just stop the conditioning of more people."

"How do you want to do this?" Ella questioned. "From what I understand the Bad Wolf virus is very nasty."

"I can alter it a bit," Rose offered as she plugged the flash drive in and bent her fingers. "Target it only at this code."

"How do we deliver it?" Ella asked as she leaned over to look at the screen as Rose brought the code up.

"We use Spock and the update systems for phone and computer operating systems," Rose answered with a smile.

She pulled out her own phone as Ella reached back and disconnected the computer's Ethernet cable. With a smile, Rose turned to look towards her son who was still leaning over one of the computers with a deep frown of his own.

"Found something," Rose called in a sing-song voice drawing his attention and earning her a curious expression.

Ella grinned and moved over to join Alistair. Rose only half listened to the explanation as she got Spock on the phone. Alistair stopped and looked up at her in surprise with wide eyes. "Wow," he breathed, sounding truly impressed. "That's…. that's inspired," Alistair breathed with a hint of disgust. "In a terrible way of course, but yes using tiny fluctuations in the blue light you could start poking at certain parts of the brain. In a young person, it would be even more effective. Then you finish up by broadcasting a low-level telepathic field."

"I'm going to have Spock do some alternations on the Bad Wolf coding," Rose offered with a smile. "Upload it into the phone update systems to overwrite their program."

"This won't deal with the immediate problem," Alistair observed as he stepped up next to her.

"No," Rose agreed with a nod of understanding. "But we can keep it from spreading any further."

Her future son smiled and pushed his 'brainy specs' further up his nose. "Well then, I better figure out how to stop them." He paused and glanced towards the TARDIS. "Get Spock to start that process and then you should probably get some rest."

Rose wanted to argue, but she caught sight of a clock in the corner of her eye and felt a rush of exhaustion hit her hard.

"It's three in the morning," Alistair told her gently. "You need to rest."

"But-"

"I promise we'll wake you if anything changes," Alistair assured her with a smile. "But you just solved one piece of the puzzle. Well done."

Rose could hear the silent 'Mum' and the affection in his voice. Too tired to argue, she managed a weak nod and a sigh as she tried not to think about the fact she was being sent to bed by her own future child. As Alistair led her into his TARDIS and the headache eased a little, Rose was struck by a sense that she had something she really needed to ask him about.

"Easy, Mum," Alistair whispered to her gently as he opened a door in the main corridor just off the control room. "It'll pass I promise."

"I'm… becoming telepathic aren't I?" Rose forced out with a small groan even as the world went a bit foggy.

"Yes. It's been building for a long time," Rose heard in reply as she was carefully pushed onto a soft bed. "It'll be a process, Mum, try not to worry."

"But I'm…" there was more that she wanted to say along with a feeling that she really should be freaking out more than she was. Instead, her head hit the pillow and a pair of fingertips moved over her forehead. The headache eased a little more. "What did you do?"

"Just reinforced the defences your mind is trying to rally," Alistair explained gently before he pulled off her trainers. "I didn't go into your mind. I promise."

Rose was grateful for that. Even her exhaustion wasn't enough to keep the flash of memory of what the Silver Lord had done at bay. The rush of panic passed as quickly as it had come and her heavy eyelids slid closed.