A/N: Here's part two! Start reading!
WE ARE NOT ALONE
"We've seen our share of ups and downs
Oh, how quickly life can turn around
In an instant
It feels so good to reunite
Within yourself and within your mind
Let's find peace there." – Creed: 'My Sacrifice' (Weathered [2001])
White guy's car
The Doctor sonics open the roof hatch of the car he had just jumped on and drops in on a man with very pale skin and wearing a white suit.
"Capsule open…" the computer announces, and the man jerks round in surprise, noticing the Doctor behind him.
"Who the hell are you?" He demands. The Doctor grimaces apologetically.
"Sorry, Motorway Foot Patrol. I'm doing a survey," He improvises. "How are you enjoying your motorway?" The Doctor proceeds to sonic open the car's trapdoor as the man responds to his question.
"Well, not very much," the pale man admits. "Junction Five's been closed for three years." The Doctor gets the hatch open successfully and sits down on the edge of it. He looks up at the pale man.
"Thank you. Your comments have been noted. Have a nice day!" The Doctor waits until there is a car directly underneath him and allows himself to drop down onto its roof. He repeats the same process as before with the pale guy's car.
Asian Girls' Car
"Capsule open…" the computer announces, to the bewilderment of the two passengers. They glance over when they see the Doctor suddenly drop in behind them. He doesn't waste time giving an explanation and promptly sonics open the trapdoor. "Capsule open…"
"Thank you for your cooperation. Your comments have been noted," the Doctor acknowledges, before reaching for a small blue headscarf. "Do you mind if I borrow this? It's not my colour but thank you very much!" He states as he ties it around his mouth and drops through the trapdoor and onto the roof of the next car underneath him.
Nudist's Car
"Capsule open…" The Doctor jumps in and promptly flushes in embarrassment when he sees the state of undress the two passengers were in.
"Ooh! Don't mind me!" He apologises hastily and quickly moves on.
With Katy
In the 'Fast Lane', Milo is attempting to exit the motorway via one of the Brooklyn turnoffs. But so far, he is not having much luck.
"Try again," Cheen urges her husband, and Milo obediently taps on 'Exit One' on the car's computer monitor.
"Brooklyn turnoff one, closed." The computer reports in.
"Try the next one," Cheen suggests.
"Brooklyn turnoff two, closed." The computer once again states, and both Cheen and Milo look at each other with worry.
"What do we do?" Cheen frets.
"We keep going 'round. We'll do the whole loop, and by the time we come back 'round, they'll be open." Milo suggests, and all three of them freeze when they hear a growl that sounded uncomfortably close, and the entire car shudders.
Katy glowers at both of them.
"You're still calling that air vents?" She gestures outside and Milo frowns defensively.
"What else could it be?" He counters, and the growls return, closer than ever.
Cheen pales dangerously.
"What the hell is that?" She panics, and Milo places a calming hand on his wife's shoulder, attempting to soothe her.
"It's just the hydraulics…" He sounded a bit unconvincing, and Katy couldn't help but roll her eyes at his stubborn refusal to accept that maybe, there was a reason why the 'Fast Lane' was unoccupied, and that maybe their friend Kate's theory about cars vanishing without a trace down here wasn't complete bullshit. The car shudders again and the growls continue to get louder and louder.
"Say what you like, but that sounds very much alive to me." Katy insists, and Milo glares at her impatiently; obviously fed up with her being 'Miss Doom and Gloom' and scaring his wife.
"It's all exhaust fumes out there!" He chides. "Nothing could breathe in that."
"Calling Car four six five diamond six. Repeat, calling Car four six five diamond six!" A frantic female's voice suddenly comes over the comms. Milo snatches up the microphone and responds.
"This is Car four six five diamond six. Who's that? Where are you?" He demands.
"I'm in the fast lane, about fifty yards behind." The woman responds. "Can you get back up? Can you get off the fast lane?"
"We only have permission to go down. We need the Brooklyn Flyover," Milo explains.
"It's closed. Go back up!" the woman reveals, sharply.
"We can't. We'll just go 'round," Milo argues.
The woman over the line makes a noise of frustration, as the girls who are accompanying her in the car scream in panic when their car is jostled once again by an unknown adversary.
"Don't you understand? They're closed. They're always closed!" She states, bluntly. "We're stuck down here, and there's something else out there in the fog. Can't you hear it?" There is a huge, very loud roar that makes Cheen shudder in horror, and Katy gulp nervously. Milo shakes his head, obviously in denial about what he is hearing.
"That's the air vents," He insists.
"Jehovah, what are you!? Some stupid kid?" The woman spat angrily. "Get out of here!" She orders, and Milo, Cheen, and Katy suddenly hear a big thump from the woman's end of the conversation.
"What was that?" Milo asked, urgently.
"I can't move!" The woman realises. "They've got us!"
"But what's happening?" Milo demanded.
"What's got you? What is it?" Katy suddenly pipes up, fearing the worst. The girls in the other car scream in terror.
"Hang on. It's here. Just drive, you idiots! Get out of here!" the woman orders one final time before there is silence, then static.
"Can you hear me? Hello!?" Milo calls out to the woman desperately. But gets no response. Katy feels sick.
"Just drive! Do what she said. Get us out of here!" She snaps at Milo, angrily.
"But where?" Milo questions, getting flustered.
"Just drive straight ahead. And fast!" Katy instructs, taking control of the situation, determined to do anything she could to remain alive as much as possible, so that the Doctor could come and hopefully save them before they too were killed, like they assume the poor woman and the girls had just been a few seconds ago. Cheen was getting tearful and starting to panic.
"What is it? What's out there? What is it?"
City Gent's Car
Meanwhile, the Doctor had finally managed to make it to the bottom layer of the massive traffic jam. He used his sonic for what he hoped would be the final time to jimmy open the hatch door, fighting the urge to cough through the makeshift face mask he had borrowed from the two Asian girls several cars ago.
"Capsule open…" the computer announces to the passenger who was a New New Yorker in a bowler hat and black and white pinstriped suit. He frowns in alarm when the Doctor suddenly drops into view from the roof of his car.
"Excuse me, is that legal?" The man laments sharply. The Doctor staggers a little and clings to the passenger seat for balance, as he attempts to explain himself to the man he had rudely interrupted.
"Sorry. Motorway Foot Patrol—Oh, whatever. Have you got any water?" the Doctor requests, wheezing a little after pulling down the face mask. The Man nods and turns towards a small water cooler that he had sitting behind him.
"Certainly," He grabs a paper cone and fills it with water, before handing it to the Doctor. "Never let it be said I've lost my manners." The Doctor takes the cone of water with a nod of thanks and drains it.
"Is this the last layer?" He asks.
"We're right at the bottom," the Man confirms with a slightly bemused frown. "Nothing below us but the fast lane." He explains, and the Doctor sags with relief and a look of hope passes his face.
"Can we drive down?" He requests, but the Man shakes his head, looking a bit regretful.
"There's only two of us. You need three to go down." He states and the Doctor looks defeated.
"Couldn't we just cheat?"
"Well, I'd love to, but it's an automated system. The wheel would lock." The Man sounded a bit resentful himself. The Doctor squats down to the trapdoor and proceeds to sonic it open.
"Then excuse me…" He manages to open up the floor hatch, alarming the Man who starts to think the worst.
"You can't jump. It's a thousand feet down!" He warns the Doctor, who just rolls his eyes.
"No, I just want to look." He explains, then freezes when he hears a muffled menacing growl just beneath the thick smog. The Man shudders, having obviously been hearing the same noise himself. "What's that noise?" the Doctor inquires.
"I try not to think about it," the Man admits. Then the Doctor's sharp eyes spot tiny pinpricks of lights just barely reflecting up from the blanket of smog.
"What are those lights? What's down there? I just need to see…" He aims his sonic towards the man's car computer. "There must be some sort of ventilation. If I could just transmit a pulse through this thing, maybe I could trip the system, give us a bit of breeze…" He fiddles around with some wires and connects a few together, causing a tiny spark which immediately sets off the car's ventilation system. "That's it!" He goes back to squat over the open floor hatch. "Might shift the fumes a bit, give us a good look."
"What are those shapes?" the Man ponders, now looking at the tiny pinpricks of light himself with a curious frown on his face. The Doctor starts getting a bad feeling about what this could potentially be.
"They're alive, that's for certain." He states, then instinctively jerks back in horror when some giant claws suddenly snap up at them when the exhaust fumes are cleared away so that the Doctor and the Man could get a proper look at what was underneath the car.
The Man's eyes widen.
"What the hell are they?"
"Macra." The Doctor reveals, grimly.
With Katy
All hell was breaking loose. Milo struggles to weave in between something that was trying to grab at the car. Something hits it, causing both Cheen and Katy to scream in fright.
"Go faster!" Cheen yells desperately.
"I'm at top speed!" Milo insists, as he continues to weave through the grabbing claws of the previously revealed Macra. Simultaneously, Milo attempts to gain entry back up into the traffic jam above them.
"No access above…" The computer states.
"But this is an emergency!" Milo is bordering on hysterical at this point and makes an attempt to contact the Police for assistance. But like the Doctor back on Brannigan's car, all he gets is the automated voicemail.
"Thank you for your call. You have been placed on hold." Then Katy suddenly gets an idea, and grabs Milo's shoulder to grab his attention.
"Turn everything off," She instructs, and both Milo and Cheen look at her like she had finally lost her mind.
"You've got to be joking," Milo accuses, and Katy immediately explains her request.
"Listen! It's all fog out there, so how can they see us?" She questions. "Maybe it's the engines, the sound, or the heat, or the light. I don't know. Just turn everything off. They might not be able to find us." Katy theorises, with a little bit of confidence.
"What if you're wrong?" Milo challenges.
"It can't be worse than this!" Katy pointed out. "Just do it!" Milo reluctantly switches off the car ignition and it goes dark, and remarkably, everything outside goes quiet.
Cheen is amazed.
"They've stopped."
"Yeah, but they're still out there," He reminds them, although he appeared to relax a bit with relief that they, for the moment, were out of danger. Cheen looks at Katy in a bewilderment.
"How did you think of that?" She whispers.
"My friend Martha mentioned to me once when we were getting to know each other, that she had seen something like this on a film. That they apparently do it in submarines. I think she told me what happened next, but I can't remember what that was right this moment." Katy admits.
"Well, we'd better think of something, because we've lost the aircon." Milo reveals. "If we don't switch the engines back on, we won't be able to breathe."
"Brilliant. And how long have we got?" Katy asked.
"Eight minutes, maximum." Milo confirmed.
City Gent's Car
It turns out that Macra were in fact giant, dangerous alien snapping crabs. Something that the Doctor knew was a very, very bad thing to have hidden underneath thousands of hovercars trapped in an endless loop on an enclosed motorway.
"The Macra used to be the scourge of this galaxy," the Doctor explains, darkly. "Gas. They fed off gas, the filthier the better. They built up a small empire using humans as slaves and mining gas for food."
"They don't exactly look like empire builders to me," the man pointed out. The Doctor nods, understanding his confusion.
"Well, that was billions of years ago. Billions. They must have devolved down the years. Now they're just beasts. But they're still hungry and my girlfriend's down there." He stated, looking somewhat desperately. Both men start when something clangs on the roof of the car.
"Oh, it's like New Times Square in here, for goodness's sake!" the man complained, as the roof of his car was torn open like a sardine can, and a familiar figure drops in and stands at the Doctor's feet.
"I've invented a sport," the Doctor looked amused. Then the figure addresses him, sounding somewhat urgent.
"Doctor, you're a hard man to find," the figure laments. The Doctor instantly frowns when he notices that the figure was holding a gun in her hands.
"No guns. I'm not having guns!"
"I only brought this in case of pirates," the figure reassures him before coming straight to the point. "Doctor, you've got to come with me." She stresses, and the Doctor frowns at her curiously.
"Do I know you?"
"You haven't aged at all. Time has been less kind to me," the figure stated, and the Doctor scans her from head to foot, taking in what she was wearing, which was a grey nun's wimple … and the fact that she happened to be a cat-person. The penny drops and a sunny grin spread across his face.
"Novice Hame!" He rushes in to hug her, but immediately backs off when he remembers why he knew her. "No, hold on, get off!" He glares at her. "Last time we met, you were breeding humans for experimentation."
"I've sought forgiveness, Doctor, for so many years, under his guidance." Hame admitted, looking ashamed. "And if you come with me, I might finally be able to redeem myself."
"I'm not going anywhere!" the Doctor refuses. "You've got Macra living underneath this city. Macra! And if my girlfriend's still alive, she's stuck down there!" He points towards the trapdoor and the Macra hidden in the smog.
However, Hame looks insistent.
"You've got to come with me right now." But then the Doctor realises something and leaps at the opportunity.
"No, no, no, you're coming with me. We've got three passengers now." He stated, excitedly. However, Hame shakes her head sadly, but resolutely.
"I'm sorry, Doctor. But the situation is even worse than you can imagine." She grabs onto the Doctor's wrist, and his eyes widen in horror when he realises what Hame is about to do. "Transport!"
"Don't you dare! Don't you dare!" the Doctor growls.
But they beam away, leaving the man behind looking extremely confused.
The Senate
The Doctor finds himself sprawled next to Hame on a rubbish-strewn floor. Once the dizziness fades away, both of them pick themselves up off the floor.
"Oh! Rough teleport…" the Doctor groaned in pain. "Ow…" Then gets excited once again when he realises what he and Hame had just done to get here. "Wait! You can go straight back down and teleport people out, starting with Katy."
"I only had the power for one trip," Hame tells him regretfully. The Doctor was getting fed up with all the dead ends he continued coming across, and this time he lost his temper.
"Then get some more!" He yelled, then paused when he finally took notice of where he and Hame had teleported to. "Where are we?"
"High above, in the over-city." Hame answers.
"Good! Because you can tell the Senate of New New York I'd like a word," the Doctor stated sharply. "They have got thousands of people trapped on the motorway. Millions!" Hame just looks at him sadly.
"But you're inside the Senate, right now. May the Goddess Santori bless them." She presses a button on her teleport bracelet. It causes all the lights in the room to activate, revealing that the Senate is populated by rows and rows of skeletons. The Doctor's eyes widen in horror. "They died, Doctor. The city died." Hame reveals to him.
"How long's it been like this?" the Doctor questioned.
"Twenty-four years."
"All of them? Everyone? What happened?" the Doctor demanded. Hame goes over to a nearby skeleton which had been chained down spreadeagled on what looked like a medieval sacrificial alter. He follows her, looking deeply disturbed.
"A new chemical. A new mood. They called it Bliss," Hame bends down towards the skeleton's neck and pulls off a mood sticker with BLISS printed on it in large purple letters. She hands it over to the Doctor, who takes it gingerly between two fingers and examines it with disgust. "Everyone tried it. They couldn't stop." The Doctor drops the mood sticker and focuses in on Hame's story. "A virus mutated inside the compound and became airborne." She does a general sweep of the room with her hand.
"Everything perished. Even the virus, in the end. It killed the world in seven minutes flat. There was just enough time to close down the walkways and the flyovers, sealing off the under-city. Those people on the motorway aren't lost, Doctor. They were saved." Hame reveals.
"So the whole thing down there is running on automatic," the Doctor realises.
"There's not enough power to get them out," Hame throws another bombshell at the Doctor. "We did all we could to stop the system from choking."
"Who's we?" the Doctor frowns at her. "How did you survive?"
"He protected me," Hame stated with a bittersweet smile. "And he has waited for you, these long years." The Doctor was about to ask once again who the hell she was talking about when…
"Doctor…" An extremely familiar voice weakly calls out, and the Doctor's eyes widened and he ran towards the voice, and came across:
"The Face of Boe!" the Doctor exclaimed with shock. The giant face smiles happily at the Doctor.
"I knew you would come…"
"Back in the old days, I was made his nurse as penance for my sin." Hame walks over to stand beside the Face of Boe's tank, revealing her fate after the day she and the rest of the Sisters of Plenitude were arrested for their illegal human farm and unethical experimentations.
"Old friend, what happened to you?" the Doctor asked, gently.
"Failing…" the Face of Boe wheezed. Hame took over the explanation when she notices how much her patient was struggling.
"He protected me from the virus by shrouding me in his smoke. But with no one to maintain it, the City's power died. The under-city would have fallen into the sea."
"So he saved them," the Doctor concluded.
"The Face of Boe wired himself into the mainframe," Hame nodded, confirming what the Doctor had just figured out for himself. "He's giving his lifeforce just to keep things running."
"But there are planets out there. You could've called for help." The Doctor scolds them.
"The last act of the Senate was to declare New Earth unsafe," Hame stated, despairingly. "The automatic quarantine lasts for one hundred years."
"So the two of you stayed here, on your own for all these years." The Doctor was saddened.
"We had no choice," Hame insisted.
"Yes, you did." The Doctor corrects her, grimly.
"Save them, Doctor. Save them…" the Face of Boe begged weakly.
With Katy
The air in the car was getting thin and all three of them were struggling to keep it together. It was particularly difficult for Cheen who was breathing for two people. She looks over at her husband with worried eyes.
"How much air's left?" she asked.
"Two minutes," Milo responded, grimly.
However, Katy wasn't about to give in just yet. The Doctor was notorious for showing up at the last minute to save the day, and that was one of the things that she loved most about him; his determination to never give up or give in where he could make a difference.
"There's always the Doctor," Katy tells the hopeless couple. "My boyfriend. He might think of something yet." Both Cheen and Milo look at her doubtfully.
"Katy, no one's coming." Milo tells her, tiredly. However, Cheen does smile at her, appreciative of her optimism.
"He looked kind of nice," She acknowledged, and Katy grins happily.
"He's a bit more than that."
"How long have you been together?" Cheen asked, trying to distract them all from the fact that they were slowly suffocating to death.
"Three years. I first met him when he blew up my sister's job." Katy quickly elaborates when she sees the shocked expressions on Milo and Cheen's faces. "It's not what you think. He was working undercover, tracking down a dangerous suspect at the time. Blowing up my sister's job was just an unfortunate coincidence." She reassures them, thinking back to when the Ninth Doctor used a homemade bomb to blow up Harrods just to stop an army of Autons from attacking and killing innocent bystanders.
"Oh, so he's a cop?" Cheen questioned, and Katy flushes a little; uncomfortable about this elaborate story she had cooked up to hide the Doctor's true identity.
"No, not really. He's a bit of a freelancer…" She clears her throat.
"I never even asked. Where's home?" Cheen interrogates.
"A long way away. I've been travelling around for a long time with the Doctor. Sometimes it's dangerous and we barely make it out half the time. But the majority of the time, it's a whole new world just waiting to be discovered; a new mystery to solve and fun to be had. And I wouldn't trade it for anything." Katy stated, proudly.
"So, er, who is he, then, this Doctor?" Milo asks, a little awkwardly.
"Honestly? He's my everything." Katy states truthfully, not knowing that she had essentially just echoed the same thing the Doctor had told to Brannigan, Valerie, and Martha.
"But the only hope we have right now is in a complete stranger. That's not very comforting." Cheen tells Katy who acknowledges her point.
"You make a good point, but that's because you don't know him or seen the things he can do. Just trust me, both of you. You've got your faith; you've got your songs and your hymns. I've got the Doctor." Katy states, confidently.
This seems to bolster Milo's confidence.
"Right!" He turns the car back on.
"Systems back online…" The computer announces. Milo takes Cheen's hand and looks back at Katy; all three of them nervous about the potential outcome of this but determined nonetheless to try.
"Good luck!" He tells both girls.
"And you," Katy nodded. The car speeds up once again, weaving in and out of the Macra's snatching claws.
The Senate
The moment the Doctor realised what really was at stake, and that it was much more than just saving Katy, he immediately raced for the nearest computer and got it to start working. He immediately starts searching for the car that had kidnapped Katy. He yells out in triumph when he pinpoints her location.
"Car four six five diamond six. It still registers!" He states both in relief and triumph. "That's Katy. That's my girl, I knew she was brilliant!" The Doctor turns towards Hame for assistance. "Novice Hame, hold that in place." He indicates to piece of machinery, and Hame obeys without question. "Think, think, think, think. Take the residual energy, invert it, feed it through the electricity grid…"
"There isn't enough power," Hame warns him, but the Doctor flashes her a confident grin.
"Oh, you've got power. You've got me!" He reminds her. "I'm brilliant with computers, just you watch." The Doctor dashes over to a bunch of extension cords and wiring and starts tinkering with them using his sonic screwdriver, while Hame watches in bemusement. "Hame, every switch on that bank up to maximum." She flicks the switches. "I can't power up the city, but all the city needs is people."
"So what are you going to do?" Hame questioned.
"This!" the Doctor throws a big switch … and the lights promptly go out. His face falls in despair. "No, no, no, no, no, no, no!" He panics and moves to figure out what went wrong with his tinkering. "The transformers are blocked. The signal can't get through!"
"Doctor…" The Face of Boe pipes up.
"Yeah, hold on, not now!" the Doctor immediately shuts him down, still frantically looking for the problem. However, the Face of Boe has the solution.
"I give you my last…" He exhales a deep breath, which causes the power to come back to the computer. The Doctor is amazed, then worried when he sees the Face of Boe suddenly falter after his power donation.
"Hame, look after him!" He orders, and Hame immediately abandons what she was doing and goes to the Face of Boe's side. "Don't you go dying on me, you big old face. You've got to see this. The open road." He flicks a few more switches, which activates the roof covering the motorway. "HA!"
Brannigan's Car
The clanging sounds of the motorway roof opening up grab the attention of every driver on the motorway, including Brannigan, Valerie, and Martha.
"What in Jehovah was that?" Brannigan blurts out in alarm. Valerie and Martha peer out of the windscreen and exclaim in astonishment.
"It's coming from above!" Valerie realises.
"This has got to be the Doctor's handiwork!" Martha exclaimed, triumphantly.
"What is it? What's happening?!" Brannigan demands, before light shines in through the open roof hatch and all three of them shield their eyes. "By all the cats in the kingdom!" The roof over the motorway starts opening up.
"What is it?" Valerie asks as the daylight continues filtering through. "What is it?"
"It's the sun! Oh, my God! It's the sun!" Martha confirms.
"Oh, Brannigan. Children, it's the sunlight!" Valerie tells her husband and her children, who start mewling at the warmth that they could feel soaking into their fur.
"Sorry, no Sally Calypso." All heads snap towards the computer monitor as an image of the Doctor's face appears on screen. "She was just a hologram. My name's the Doctor."
"He's a magician," Brannigan praises.
"And this is an order. Everyone drive up. Right now!" The Doctor instructs, firmly. Brannigan looks at both Valerie and Martha with incredulity.
"Is he serious?"
"I've opened the roof of the motorway," The Doctor needlessly explains. "Come on. Throttle those engines. Drive up. All of you. The whole under-city. Drive up, drive up, drive up! Fast!"
"Here we go!" Brannigan wastes no time and puts the pedal to the metal.
The Doctor continues talking.
"We've got to clear that Fast Lane. Drive up and get out of the way."
With Katy
Even though the roof of the motorway was opening up, Milo, Cheen, and Katy were still in mortal danger; having just narrowly escaped being captured earlier by a Macra's claw. All three of them were still reeling from the shock. The Doctor directs his attention on them.
"Oi! Car four six five diamond six. Katy! Drive up!" the Doctor orders, urgently.
"That's the Doctor!" Katy exclaims excitedly.
"We can't go up! We'll hit the layer!" Milo stated, and Katy just barely manages to stop herself from hitting him upside the head, due to her relief and excitement at seeing her boyfriend's face again.
"Just do as he says! Go up!"
"You've got access above. Now go!" the Doctor reassures them, and Milo immediately steers the car up and out of the reach of the hungry Macra. Immediately, they see the bright sunlight overhead.
"It's daylight. Oh, my God, that's the sky. The real sky!" Cheen exclaims with happy tears.
"He did it! I told you, he did it!" Katy cheers enthusiastically as Cheen and Milo exchange a relieved, loving kiss.
The Senate
While the Doctor is busy making sure that everyone, including Katy, made it out of the motorway alive; Hame is attending to the ailing Face of Boe.
"Did I tell you, Doctor? You're not half bad, sir. You're not bad at all! Oh, YEE-HAH!" Brannigan crows triumphantly, and the Doctor chuckles appreciatively.
"You keep driving, Brannigan. All the way up. Because it's here, just waiting for you. The City of New New York, and it's yours. And don't forget I want both Martha Jones and that coat back." The Doctor requested.
"I reckon that's a fair bargain, sir!" Brannigan agrees.
"I'm on my way!" Martha promises him.
"And Car four six five diamond six, I've sent you a flight path. Come to the Senate," the Doctor instructs, and his hearts leap into his throat when Katy immediately responds back.
"Can't wait to see you, Doctor!" Katy stated, sincerely.
"You have no idea how happy that makes me, love." The Doctor acknowledges.
"Doctor!" He looks back at the alarm in Hame's voice and sees that a big crack is spreading across the Face of Boe's tank.
A few minutes later, both Brannigan and Cheen and Milo's car arrive at the doorstep of the Senate, and both Martha and Katy emerge from both cars.
"Thank you!" Katy shouts back at Cheen and Milo as they fly off.
"Katy!" She spins 'round and grunts underneath the weight of an overjoyed and relieved Martha, who was carrying the Doctor's trench coat over her arm, and who had barreled straight into the 'younger' girl in her haste to wrap her up in a hug. "Oh, my God! You're safe! The Doctor will be so relieved to see you!"
"I'm just grateful that I'm alive. You do not want to know what was down there in the Fast Lane…" She stresses to Martha, who looks concerned.
"I don't think I want to know," She admits. The two of them link hands and rush into the Senate, determined to reunite with the Doctor. But they instantly froze when they see all the skeletons lying around the room.
"Oh, my God. What happened here?" Martha mumbles, in horror.
"Doctor?" Katy calls out.
"Over here!" He calls out from another room, and both Katy and Martha run in that direction.
"The Face of Boe!" Katy blurted out in shock when she sees the disembodied face outside of his tank. She runs over and crouches down in front of him, and gently reaches out to touch his cheek.
"It's nice to see you again, Katy…" The Face of Boe groans and smiles weakly at her.
"What's that?" Martha looks cautiously at the Face of Boe, and the Doctor smiles encouragingly at her.
"It's the Face of Boe. It's alright. Come and say hello. And this is Hame." He introduces Novice Hame to Martha who nods politely at the cat-nun. "She's a cat. Don't worry. He's the one that saved you, not me." The Doctor gives all the credit to the Face of Boe.
"My lord gave his life to save the city, and now he's dying." Hame explains tearfully, and the Doctor is quick to deny this.
"No, don't say that. Not old Boe. Plenty of life left." But Katy could tell that the Doctor was choosing to be in denial, because the Face of Boe's death would mean just another friend that he was losing that was linked to his past.
The Doctor hated endings.
"It's good to breathe the air once more…" The Face of Boe admitted.
"Who is he?" Martha questions.
"I don't even know," the Doctor admitted. "Legend says the Face of Boe has lived for billions of years. Isn't that right? And you're not about to give up now." He tells his friend sternly.
"Everything has its time, Doctor." Katy reminds him, earning a mild glare from the Doctor, and the Face of Boe chuckles.
"You know she's right, old friend. As do you. Better than most…" The Face of Boe defends Katy.
The legend says more," Hame pipes up; reminding them the Doctor and Katy that their friend had something that he had promised to tell them the last time they had seen him.
"Don't! There's no need for that." The Doctor immediately shuts down, but Hame pays him no attention and continues explaining.
"It says that the Face of Boe will speak his final secret to two travellers."
"Yeah, but not yet. Who needs secrets, eh?" the Doctor stressed. Katy looked at him with sympathy. She wasn't exactly fond of endings either, but she also knew nothing can last forever. Eventually, even she and the Doctor must become footnotes in history.
The Doctor avoided her gaze.
"I have seen so much. Perhaps too much." The Face of Boe stated wearily. "I am the last of my kind, as you both are the last of your kind." He reminds the couple. Martha eyes the Doctor and Katy questioningly, but neither of them could bring themselves to care right now. The truth was bound to come out sooner or later.
Tears spring to Katy's eyes.
"That's why we have to survive. The three of us." The Doctor begged, close to tears himself.
"Don't go…" Katy whispers.
"I must. But know this, Time Couple. You are not alone."
The Face of Boe breathes his last and closes his eyes. Hame begins to weep, while the Doctor lowers his head in his grief and Katy leans in and gently kisses the Face of Boe's cheek. By the time she gets to her feet, Katy is sobbing and she turns away. Martha immediately comes over and embraces her, and the Doctor is quick to join the hug, kissing the top of Katy's head in comfort.
Pharmacy Town
The Doctor leads the way back to the Tardis, with Martha following behind him, and Katy trailing behind in the rear. He is happy that the store vendors had taken his little threat seriously, as every single hut was closed down and bordered up.
"All closed down," the Doctor stated approvingly.
"Happy?" Martha joked.
"Happy happy." The Doctor grinned, a little half-heartedly. "New New York can start again. And they've got Novice Hame. Just what every city needs. Cats in charge." He sighed heavily, before turning on his heel and continuing to walk. "Come on, time we were off."
"But what did he mean, the Face of Boe? You're not alone?"
"I don't know," the Doctor admits, a little bit puzzled himself.
"And why did he include Katy in that too?" Martha looks back at Katy who looks at Martha then at the Doctor and sighed too.
"He included me, because I'm an alien too." Katy reveals, and Martha's eyes widen in surprise.
"You mean? You're a Time Lord too?" Martha stated, and the Doctor smirked a little as Katy walked closer to where Martha and he were standing.
"The technical term is 'Time Lady'" Katy corrects Martha, who frowns in confusion.
"But how's that possible. I mean, you only have one heart. I know, because I heard it for myself."
"It's because of this," Katy holds up her heart locket for Martha to see. "Everything that makes me a Time Lady, is safely locked away here. It's bigger on the inside." She grins, and Martha still looks confused.
"You've lost me completely," Martha admits, and the Doctor wades in to help explain.
"Essentially, once upon a time, Katy used what is called a Chameleon Arch, a piece of Time Lord technology. It rewrites our biology; literally changes every single cell in our bodies and turns us into a different species. In Katy's case, it made her human." He explained.
"But if you rewrite every cell in your body, doesn't that hurt?" Martha looked horrified, and Katy flinches when holding her necklace causes her to briefly flash back to long ago, when she was still on Gallifrey minutes before it was destroyed. She recalls screaming in absolute exquisite pain, before blacking out and eventually waking up, cradled in the arms of Jackie Tyler, with Peter Tyler gazing down at her over his wife's shoulder.
She shudders, and she looks over at the Doctor, who was watching her reaction with empathy.
"Yes." Katy mumbles.
"Why would you do that to yourself?" Martha asked.
"I don't believe it was my idea. But best I could think of, it was for my safety…" Katy was vague. "Remember, my memories have been sealed away in here. I don't completely remember everything." She blamed it on the locket.
"Well, did the Face of Boe mean that you've both got me? Is that what he meant?" Martha returned to her other question.
"I don't think so. Sorry," the Doctor shrugged carelessly.
"Then what?" Martha was getting a little frustrated.
"Does it matter?" the Doctor deliberately sidestepped the question. "Back to the Tardis, off we go." He heads off in the direction of the alleyway the Tardis was parked in, and Katy quickly follows. However, Martha grabs a nearby discarded folding chair, straightens it up and sits down, arms and legs crossed.
"Okay, are you staying?" the Doctor asked, a bit exasperatedly.
"Till you both talk to me properly, yes." Martha was stubborn. The Doctor studies Martha apathetically, while Katy walks closer and stands stoically beside him; deciding to let him handle this one himself. "He said last of your kind. What does that mean?" Martha demands, sternly.
"It really doesn't matter." the Doctor insisted, stonily.
"Ugh! You don't talk! You never say. Why not?" Martha exclaimed, and suddenly the sounds of a choir singing surrounds them.
"Fast falls the eventide…"
"It's the city," Martha realises.
"The darkness deepens…"
"They're singing." Katy observes, and the Doctor looks over at her. The cold frown on his face fading when he realises that he could've lost Katy today, making what the Face of Boe claim, to be very untrue.
"Lord, with me abide. When other helpers fail…"
The Doctor sighs and goes over to another discarded folding chair and straightens it up. He takes a seat and pulls Katy down to sit on his lap too. He needed all the comfort and the only link to his lost planet he could get while he admitted the truth to Martha.
"I lied to you," He confesses to Martha, who looked at him in shock. "Because I liked it. I could pretend. Just for a bit, I could imagine they were still alive, underneath a burnt orange sky." The Doctor draws in a shaky breath, resting his forehead on the back of Katy's shoulder, before pushing himself to continue. "I'm not just a Time Lord, and Katy is not just a Time Lady. We're the last of the Time Lords. The Face of Boe was wrong. There's no one else."
"What happened?" Martha whispered, looking like she was regretting pushing for him to tell the truth.
"Swift to its close ebbs out life's little day…"
"There was a war. A Time War. The last Great Time War. Our people fought a race called the Daleks, for the sake of all creation. And they lost. They lost. Everyone lost. They're all gone now. My family, Katy's family, our friends, even that sky." Katy squeezes the Doctor's hand in comfort, and he returns it gratefully.
"Oh, you should have seen it, that old planet. The second sun would rise in the south, and the mountains would shine. The leaves on the trees were silver, and when they caught the light every morning, it looked like a forest on fire. When the autumn came, the breeze would blow through the branches like a song…"
"The darkness deepens. Lord, with me abide…" The Choir continues singing, while Martha and Katy hang onto the Doctor's words reverently.
A/N: Thanks for reading! TTFN, and please review if you so desire :)