The only distinguishable noise was the hum of the TARDIS. The silence wasn't particularly enjoyable for anyone.
Rose had joined them again when she had felt the TARDIS moving. She didn't look into any of their eyes, considering.
The Doctor, even though immensely annoyed, decided not to show it any more than he had to, so they could at least semi-amicably go back to their time and city and then he could leave and never have to see them again. That was the dream, anyways. London, 2012. He was at least glad he wouldn't have to deal with these rogues again. He just had to avoid London for a few decades, which was very doable.
They landed, and Rose immediately went for the door. She, unlike someone else, understood that she simply had no right to be here and that she had vastly overstayed her welcome.
She opened the door and froze.
The Doctor raised an eyebrow at both of them.
"Um." She chuckled, refraining from making any personal comments about his driving. "Not an expert, but I don't think London has purple grass and a green sky."
"Parallel world," Corin joked. "You never know."
The Doctor walked over to them, opening the door completely and staring out at the landscape. It was indeed a different planet, with dark purple grass as far as you could see. The slightly green, almost blue sky held two suns and a visible moon.
It was not London. It wasn't even Earth. Not even close, in fact.
Slightly humiliated, he went back to the console to check the coordinates. They looked fine. He blinked at it. He didn't understand what had gone wrong.
"Close the doors," he commanded. When she did, he put them back in the vortex to try again.
London, Earth, the solar system. This time a few metres to the right, just in case.
He rushed to the doors again. The purple landscape stared back. "What the…"
Corin smirked. "Want me to try?"
"Don't even think about it." He folded his arms. "It should be right. I don't understand. This should be London, 2012."
"Well, it's… not," Rose gave.
The Doctor grinned back bitterly. "Yeah, thanks. I can see that."
Corin went back over to the console. As the other two stared out to the planet, he checked the readings. "Doctor," he called, cringing a bit, "Do you recognise the planet?"
"Yeah. It's in the Sebutar system, it's a small planet called Tynya." He turned back to Corin. "You don't?"
He merely shrugged. Looking at the readings, it seemed like a safe enough planet. The gravity was a bit odd, but they could get used to it quickly. "Maybe the TARDIS wants us here," he said. "Any life?"
The Doctor looked at Rose walking out. "What are you doing?"
She shrugged. "Might as well." Truth be told, she was rather happy about the TARDIS' meddling. She could have at least one small adventure, or at least a sight of an alien planet. It was a small gift, but she'd take it with both hands. She thanked the TARDIS as she went through the grass. It felt a bit sticky, which was weird. She ran a hand through it. Her hand now smelled like an odd mix of oil and battery acid.
The Doctor walked back to the console and started inspecting it. He took out his sonic.
Corin stared back at Rose, who was barely still in their point of view. "She's gonna get away."
"Don't care." He opened up one of the sides and looked in further at the wires and other bobs. He frowned at it, muttering something under his breath. He could never have what he wanted, he supposed. Now stuck with these two—frankly, insane—people. Humans .
Even though one of them was technically part of his own species, and weirdly him but not really.
That half Time Lord went out of the TARDIS, after Rose. He caught up rather quickly. "Don't go too far, we don't know what's here."
She crouched down to inspect the ground. "If it was dangerous, he wouldn't have let us out."
He looked up at a few rather small cyan-coloured people, approaching them with spears. "Are you sure about that?"
"He's still the Doctor, you know. More so than you are." She stood up from the flower she was inspecting. "He wouldn't just—"
She stopped talking when she noticed the spear that was a few centimetres away from her face.
Corin smirked at her, like being proven right was more significant than that they were being threatened. It checked out, she supposed.
She stared back blankly at the three people before them, raising her hands in surrender. Their long brown hair was braided at their sides, a few of those flowers she saw in their hair. At least they had some sense of fashion. Cold-blooded killers wouldn't have a sense of fashion, right?
She expected them to say something, but they didn't. They only motioned at them to follow. Not having much of a choice, they did.
The Doctor, from the TARDIS, watched them leave. He shook his head and sighed before entering the TARDIS again.
Only a few minutes later, they arrived at a small village. It looked adorable. All the people being smaller, their houses were mini-sized to them. A few large fires were burning all over the place, with people sitting around it, working on something in their hands. Rose thought it was cloth. Corin didn't notice. He was looking at the houses' roofs, instead. Despite the village seeming a bit primitive, the roofs were fortified by some odd metal. He glared at that while they continued down the village, going towards what he thought must be the centre.
At the centre, there was another cyan person. This one had a red slash around it. They were the only one who had such a contrasting colouring. It was a bit surprising to see it.
They continued to bring them further in some badly lit house, that was more a holding cell than a house. That's because it was a holding cell, Corin realised an embarrassing amount of time later.
It was weird. Despite the number of people (a good few hundred), there was not a single word to be heard. The cracking of leaves and the fire, that odd noise that the cloth made, marching and clanking, but not a single voice spoke. It was eerie. He didn't like it.
All civilisations had some form of communication, he reasoned. It couldn't just not have one. He observed them through the small window, hoping to see some sort of sign language, or sound through repetition, but… nothing.
How in the world did they communicate?
His head felt heavy as if something was wrong. He just couldn't figure it out, and it was frustrating. Usually, he'd have it figured out just like that, but now, he was stuck on the simplest of things. He couldn't figure out why the roofs needed fortification, and the language was beyond him. Yet, it felt like it shouldn't be. That was something he should be able to figure out, but he just couldn't because his head was stuck .
He drummed his fingers on the seat below him. It made an odd, if even more irritating sound. But he needed to be doing something, and he wasn't about to start doing jumping jacks. Well, why not, actually? He couldn't even tell you a single good reason for not doing so. Maybe that's what he should do.
Rose slapped his hand.
His brain shortcutted. Well, actually, not just his brain. He stopped functioning for a moment, frozen, unable to process a single thought or action.
She stared at him, a bit guilty, but obviously irritated.
He blinked. "Blimey."
Alright. He went back to the window and tried to figure out what was going on. They were small. Agile, probably. More made to hide than to fight. Hiding required being quiet.
What better communication than one that couldn't even be heard? Staring at them, they definitely communicated in some way, because their faces reacted to information. Some of them laughed, even if it was quiet. And the emotions were consequences of communication, not the communication itself.
"They're telepathic," he reasoned.
So, why didn't he hear them? He thought about it for a second. And then another one. Well, maybe they just had shields, right? As a telepathically advanced race, they would have developed absolutely mental (pun not intended) shields. Yet, there was a moment, a small, almost insignificant moment when those three had stared at them, silently. As if reaching out. Sure, Time Lords didn't just go around making telepathic connections with anyone, but that's because they had another way of communicating. They obviously didn't. It was their main way.
He sat back down—more like fell—heavily in his seat and put his head in his hands.
…Oh.
He thought he hadn't felt the TARDIS in the same way as before, quiet, because he thought either that she simply didn't want to, or because it had been a parallel one. But no, he just couldn't feel her as well.
He could feel Rose's gaze on him. He didn't perceive a lot from the outside world for a few minutes, but that, he felt.
And she wouldn't ask. Because she didn't care.
He almost wanted to laugh about everything, because his entire world was crumbling by the second, and if he didn't start laughing soon, he'd cry. And he wasn't sure when he'd stop.
The door opened. He didn't raise his head.
"Delivery," the Doctor called, "I'm here for a pick-up of two idiots?..."
Corin rolled his eyes and looked up, and was a bit surprised by the anger on his face. With his playful jab, he thought he didn't seem to mind too much, but his face told a different story. He got up. "How'd you—"
"C'mon," he cut him off, motioning them with a hand. "Gotta get these two girls home before their curfew."
Corin stared blankly at him. He used to be this guy?
"I'm an adult, y'know," Rose retorted, putting a hand on her hip.
"Well," he said, cheerfully, "Then, maybe act like one." He booped her nose in a burst of energy. "Come along."
He left the 'house' without looking back. Corin almost wanted to stay back out of spite. Looking at Rose, it seemed she thought the same thing. But after a second, that fierce rebellion softened into guilt, and she moved to follow him.
Yeah, that's fair.
Back outside, the Doctor was ahead of them, standing next to the red-slashed alien. He was nodding at him, but he couldn't see them talking. Corin grit his teeth. He knew he was (likely) not rubbing it in his face on purpose, but he couldn't help but feel that slap of inferiority. If he could just talk to them in the first place, this wouldn't have happened. Rose didn't seem to care too much about the whole ordeal. Her mind seemed somewhere else, so he just let her be.
"Corin," the Doctor called. It being the only vocal sound, it ripped through the silence. Suddenly everyone was staring at him, but he didn't seem to care. "Come here."
Corin walked up to him reluctantly. "Yeah?"
"You any good with the… domestics ?" the Doctor asked him like it was a taboo subject.
He made a face. "What in the world is that supposed to mean?"
"You wanna be useful with the Albaines situation?"
"The what—?"
The Doctor blinked at him. "What, you don't know?"
Corin looked away.
"Oh. I thought you were just ignoring me." He tapped his temple twice. "I'm sure you've figured it out."
Yeah, he figured it out all right.
"There's a group that's telepathic and one that's not," the Doctor explained, "They can't communicate properly, and if they don't manage to settle this, it could turn out into a full-blown war. Since I'm both, I could meditate. Thought you could come along but guess not." He understood that it wasn't a subject he should joke about, so he didn't. He nodded solemnly at him, showing an odd amount of sympathy, and walked off with—what he supposed was—the leader.
Corin felt even worse. Miserable, even. He just had to stand back and wait, unable to help. He wondered what part of him was even still Time Lord. He hadn't spontaneously erupted into flames yet, so his brain had to have some sense of superior capacity to humans, but he had been forgetting quite a few memories. No regeneration, no telepathy, and a dwindling memory.
It was pathetic.
He knew it'd take him a while to settle in his humanity. He was a bit surprised he was still standing and thinking semi-normally, considering he hadn't had a single night of good sleep yet. At least that seemed to be a bit better than most humans, because they started hallucinating after 2-3 days of no sleep—and he was fine.
Mostly.
Being back on the TARDIS, though, he'd be able to sleep a bit better.
He blinked. He looked back, and Rose was standing next to the Doctor, occasionally talking with him. He went back to sit down. He was so tired. They'd fix it.
And they did. All it took was a little convincing that people who were, to them, mute, were also people and didn't deserve to be butchered on sight (even if they were delicious). Cue, Rose. The Doctor, being telepathic, could communicate with them, but Rose couldn't. (Technically, she could've, but they didn't know that yet.)
And the Doctor used Rose's humanity to show that the other race was also just people, like them, who happened to communicate in a different way. They warmed up to it after a while, so now the Doctor and Rose went out to go to the other race, Albaines. Neither of them thought about asking Corin along.
Corin was still minding his business.
The Doctor and Rose found them surprisingly quickly, as they were out scouting. They got brought to their camp after they explained that they were just travellers on their way, lost. Once inside, they looked for someone who looked like the leader and went to talk to them to explain the situation.
It went well. It was rather easy, which Rose found a nice contrast to her first trip, watching her planet die.
Well, to be fair, the Doctor hadn't chosen this place. Who knows what he would have chosen as a first trip?
Civil war avoided, both of the leaders met up, and with the help of the Doctor, managed to create a peace treaty.
Then Rose saw Corin, partly wanted to leave him behind, and then told the Doctor to go get him. He refused. They bickered about it for a while before mutually deciding to ignore him until he came back to his senses. (He had been zoned out the entire time they were there. It was now nightfall. This concerned neither of them.)
Finally, Rose couldn't take it anymore, went over to him and kicked his shin lightly. He snapped out of it, staring at her and then at the Doctor, before getting up and dusting himself off.
The Doctor stared at him, with what they both understood as icy. Corin pretended not to understand why he was looking at him like that. As the trio got together again, on their way to the TARDIS, the Doctor spoke up. "Something's wrong with her navigational system."
He turned to them both, looking them in the eyes, pretending to be nonchalant but having an obvious disdain underneath. "This has happened before. Long time ago. Thing is, it means we're virtually stuck until by chance, we land on a planet where I can get the parts to fix it."
"We're stuck?" Rose repeated.
"We're stuck," he agreed. "And I'm not just going to leave you in the middle of nowhere, as much as I want to. But you're probably never going to get home—to Earth—again."
Rose slowed down slightly, taking in this information.
The Doctor put his hands in his pockets as they approached the TARDIS. "Which means things are going to change around here."