But building a TARDIS console out of bits from a hundred other models was harder than any of them realized.
Understanding that she would just get in the Doctor's way since she had no idea what any of the TARDIS remnants were, Alex had relegated herself to sitting on a piece of old TARDIS wall and watching the Doctor run all around the place like a toddler on a sugar-high. He seemed to be right in his element, rooting and sifting through piles of bits and bobs until he found the thing he wanted.
Idris was a few feet away, examining a piece of tech. Alex had tried to get her to sit down because of her rapidly decaying condition, but she had refused, citing she better help the Doctor with this complex task less he blow a temper tantrum, something the Doctor had, predictably, taken offense to.
Alex turned her head and watched the Doctor bend down and run along a line of junk. Evidently, he was looking for something specific. His brow furrowed as he went, ultimately coming to a stop next to Alex. "Eureka!" he cried, his eyes focused on the section of wall Alex was sitting on.
"What?" Alex said, glancing down at it.
The Doctor winced when he saw her. "Oh, Ally! You're sitting here. . ."
"It's fine," she assured him, shifting off the wall and into a standing position.
"Thanks, love." The Doctor reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a large chain coil and looped it around the top of the wall. Once that was accomplished, he grasped the free end of the chain and began pulling the wall behind him.
"Do you need any help?" Alex asked, watching as he slowly made his way over to Idris. That wall couldn't be very easy to move around.
"I'm fine!" he called back. He really didn't want her to do anything strenuous, just in case, Rassilon forbid, she had another attack.
Idris glanced at him. "Bond the tube directly into the tachyon diverter—"
"Yes, yes. I have actually rebuilt a TARDIS before, you know! I know what I'm doing!"
You're still rebuilding her, Alex thought, thinking of the numerous repairs to the console and circuitry she'd seen the Doctor make.
Idris seemed to be thinking the same thing for she said, "You're like a nine-year-old trying to rebuild a motorbike in his bedroom. And you never read the instructions."
"I always read the instructions!" the Doctor huffed.
"Manual in a supernova," Alex reminded him. She smiled innocently when the Doctor shot her a glare.
Idris nodded in agreement. "There's a sign on my front door. You have been walking past it for seven hundred years. What does it say?"
"That's not instructions!" the Doctor scoffed.
"There's an instruction at the bottom. What does it say?"
"Pull to open."
"Yes, and what do you do?"
"I push!" he growled, partly in irritation and partly from the strain it was causing him to lug a twelve-foot wall.
"Every single time," Idris grumbled. "Seven hundred years! Police box doors open out the way."
The Doctor threw down the chains and stalked over to Idris. His expression was black as a thundercloud. "I think I have earned the right to open my front doors any way I want!" he snapped.
Idris, not at all perturbed by his anger, merely stared at him. "Your front doors? Have you any idea how childish that sounds?"
The Doctor started to storm off. "You are not my mother," he grumbled over his shoulder.
"And you are not my child."
Alex started forwards, hoping that she could calm the Doctor down, when he suddenly spun around and started back towards Idris. "You know, since we're talking, with mouths, not really an opportunity that comes along very often, I just want to say, you know, you," he pointed at Idris, making her lean back, "have never been very reliable."
"And you have?" Idris said doubtfully.
"You didn't always take me where I wanted to go." He turned and started to walk away again, but Idris' next words stopped him dead in his tracks.
"No, but I always took you where you needed to go!" Out of the corner of her eye, she glanced at Alex.
There had been so many times over the last seven hundred years that she wanted to take her Thief to his Ally earlier than planned. After he left the Original Flower to stay with David on Earth, after the Piper and the Astrophysicist's minds were wiped of their memories of her Thief, after the Arrogant One was killed, after her Thief's violent regeneration into his sixth incarnation. . . So many horrible times where all she wanted to do was introduce her Thief to his Ally and watch the young woman effortlessly charm and cheer him up. But it wasn't to be. The timeline could possibly rupture and besides, no matter how tempted she might have been, she never would have risked her Thief's Ally being around at the same time as the Time Lords.
Unseen by the Doctor and Alex, Idris shivered. No, the pompous Time Lords never would have tolerated Alex. If they found out what she was. . .
Idris shook her head. No, she couldn't dwell on such horrible thoughts.
The Doctor, meanwhile, was dwelling on Idris' words. "You did," he murmured.
And it was true. The TARDIS had always taken him to places and times where he needed to sort out trouble, regardless of whether that was where he intended to go or not. And she led him places for his own good, too. He hadn't even wanted to go to Earth after the Time War, but she had spontaneously landed them there, right in London, where he'd learned about and began investigating the Nestene invasion, meeting Rose Tyler in the process. And now that he thought about it, he was sure it wasn't completely an accident that he was twelve years late the first time around with Amy. If he hadn't been late, he would have left with Amelia and never met Alex. That was something he would never change, no matter if it benefited Amy or not.
He smiled and whirled around. "Look at us, talking! Wouldn't it be amazing if we could always talk, even when you're stuck inside the box?"
"But you know I'm not constructed that way," Idris reminded him. "I exist across all space and time, and you talk and run around and bring home strays."
"Hey!" Alex snapped, light green eyes flashing.
"Sorry, I wasn't referring to you." But before she could go on, Idris' knees buckled and she lurched forwards, nearly toppling to the ground until the Doctor caught her.
"You okay?" he asked worriedly while Alex rushed over. She placed a hand on Idris' shoulder to help steady her.
Idris clutched her side. "Once of the kidneys has already failed." She shook her head. "It doesn't matter. We need to finish assembling the console."
"Using a console without a proper shell. . ." The Doctor trailed off and whistled.
Alex's brow furrowed. "That's not safe, is it?"
"This body has about eighteen minutes left to live," Idris informed her. "The universe we're in will reach absolute zero in three hours. Safe is relative."
The Doctor had already turned back to the wall. "Then we need to get a move on, eh, old girl?"
Idris gave him a small smile and bent down to resume gathering tech pieces, her hand still clutching her side. Alex decided to help her. She knelt beside Idris and sifted through technical pieces, laying aside whatever attracted her attention or looked important.
She had a pretty good pile going when the slicing in her chest started.
"AH!" Alex dropped a thermo coupling and placed her free hand over her heart. It was beating rapidly, too rapidly to be healthy. She gritted her teeth and shut her eyes, tears of pain already leaking out. It felt like someone was slicing into her chest with a knife, and not just any knife either; more like the sharpest one ever created.
The Doctor and Idris spun around at her yell. "Ally!" the two cried. As the Doctor hurled his wall down and scrambled over, Idris lowered Alex to the ground. Alex promptly curled up into a tight fetal position, hoping that it would somehow lessen the pain in her chest. It didn't work.
The Doctor dove down next to her and placed a hand on her head while the other one withdrew his sonic screwdriver and ran it over her. He eagerly examined the results when they came up, only for a Gallifreyan swear word to fly out of his mouth. "NOTHING?!" He let out another curse. How could there be nothing? There was obviously something wrong with Alex. Anyone could see it!
"Doctor," Alex choked out through her gritted teeth. She stifled a sob, feeling the pain retract slightly, only to come back in what felt like a marginally stronger force. As if that wasn't enough, another strange feeling started up.
Her organs felt like they were shifting. It was a feeling Alex had long forgotten about, but now remembered with vivid clarity. She'd felt like this the day the Doctor rescued her and Amy from the Silence. She'd been strapped to that chair and had just assumed the weird sensation was a product of that. She hadn't felt like this since that day, so she never brought it up. She never thought it might be connected to her mysterious pain attacks.
Alex let out a strangled gasp. Invisible fingertips were touching her lungs, at first gently prodding, but then squeezing. The hands forced something around them, something that felt like a very thick rope. How am I not choking? Alex thought as she struggled to keep from panicking.
The invisible fingertips abruptly left her lungs and traveled to her heart. Alex could feel it beating frantically and she wondered whether she might be having a heart attack. She'd never heard invisible fingertips on the heart being a symptom but there was a first time for everything.
She shuddered and felt tears rolling down her cheeks. They were no longer tears of pain, she knew, but ones of fear. "Doc-Doctor," she sniveled, "th-there's. . ."
"Yes, love?" He ran a hand through her hair in the hopes that the familiar action might comfort her. "Yes, Ally, what is it?"
Alex struggled to get the words out. "There's something inside me. I-I can feel it, something touching my lungs, m-my. . ." Her body shook and when she spoke again, it was on a sob. "My heart!"
This new information in mind, the Doctor scanned her again. This time, he was somewhat prepared for the 'no illnesses/diseases found'. He blew a raspberry and muttered something uncomplimentary under his breath.
With nothing else to do, the Doctor put the sonic away and gathered Alex in his arms. He cradled her to him, taking great care not to touch her chest or any part of her upper body. Alex sank back against him and turned her head into the crook of his shoulder.
The Doctor felt his own eyes watering at the feeling of tears staining his shirt and seeping through the fabric to his skin. He inwardly cursed whatever was making his Ally's body tense and tighten with pain and causing her to cry. He gently rubbed her back, not sure what else he could do other than be beside her.
He looked at Idris. She was regarding Alex worriedly. "Please," he begged as Alex's hand gripped his jacket lapel. "Tell me you know what's wrong with her. Tell me how to stop her from going through this."
But Idris shook her head, apology written all over her face. "She's a fixed point," she reminded him. "The strongest one I've ever seen next to Captain Cheesecake."
Jack, presumably, the Doctor guessed. He sighed and nodded. He should have expected that. He'd been investigating Alex's timeline for a while, and he still couldn't see anything except a bright golden light that blinded him when he tried to get closer. It was rather disconcerting, especially since the TARDIS, the most powerful timeline reader in the universe, couldn't tell why Alex was a fixed point either.
A startling thought came to mind. Are Ally's attacks the reason why she's a fixed point? He stiffened, his arms tightening around the now limp Alex. She let out a squawk, but he barely heard her. That thought. . . It made a lot of sense and it didn't reassure his worries about Alex any.
"Doctor!" Alex pushed against his chest as she struggled to get out of his suddenly tight grasp. Shoving his arms away, she hauled herself to her feet. Idris quickly jumped up and placed a steady hand on her shoulder.
The Doctor bounced up as well. "Ally, please, sit down," he urged, maneuvering her over to a pile of rubbish that acted as a makeshift bench. He forced her down and once she was seated, kneeled before her.
"Doctor, why does this keep happening?" Alex sniffled, no longer bothering to try and hide her tears. Big fat teardrops dribbled down her cheek. The Doctor wiped them away with a handkerchief he found in his pocket.
He sighed and reached out to finger a few strands of her hair. "I don't know," he murmured, feeling a wave of self-hatred for not knowing wash through him. "But I will find out, I swear. In the meantime, just sit here and rest, okay?"
Alex sniffled again but nodded. "Alright," she agreed, absently fingering the Doctor's handkerchief as she did so. She reached up and wiped at her running mascara, only to wrinkle her nose in sudden disgust.
"What's wrong?" the Doctor asked anxiously.
"This smells like mothballs," Alex complained. She lowered the handkerchief to her lap and eyed it disdainfully. "Seriously, what do you keep in your pockets?"
The Doctor laughed heartily. She was alright. For now, at least. Still chuckling, he rose and pressed a kiss to the top of her head. "Stay," he gently ordered. He turned to look at Idris, who'd been silently observing them with a small smile on her face. "Watch her for me?" he asked.
Idris didn't even hesitate. "Don't I always?" She smiled and sat down beside Alex, the most precious thing in the universe to her Thief.
~The Pros and Cons of Silence~
A short while later, a structure that resembled a TARDIS control room had been mostly constructed. It consisted of three separate walls latched together with a roof overhang above the console. The console reminded Alex of a smaller version of the big TARDIS console, for it was cluttered like the original with various bits and bobs that didn't look as though they should be there, such as a whisk and a child's keyboard.
Let's hope this thing actually works, she thought as she slowly got to her feet and headed over to the makeshift contraption.
"You'll need to install the time rotor!" Idris called to the Doctor.
Alex glanced over her shoulder to see the Doctor dragging a large glass tube with red machinery inside it in their direction. "Do you need help?" she asked as he got closer.
The Doctor shook his head, instead picking the rotor up and lugging it over the rest of the way. Like hell was he going to make her lift something heavy while she was having painful seizures at random intervals, or whatever the hell they were. "How is this going to make it through the rift?" he wondered as he lowered the rotor into its slot in the center of the console.
"I'm covering that by praying," Alex quipped, though she was partially serious. Dear God, please don't let us die, she mentally begged.
The Doctor smirked at her as he pulled back to inspect his and Idris' handiwork. "Almost done . . . thrust diffuser . . . retro scope . . . blue thingy. . ."
"Do you ever wonder why I chose you all those years ago?" Idris suddenly asked him.
"I chose you," the Doctor countered. "You were unlocked."
"Of course I was. I wanted to see the universe, so I stole a Time Lord and I ran away. And you were the only one mad enough."
Alex raised an eyebrow at her. "So, you really don't mind his driving?"
Idris cast a mischievous look at the Doctor, almost a twin to the one Alex sometimes gave him. "Oh, I never said that."
The Doctor pointedly ignored the dig and the giggles that erupted from Alex at the comment. Instead, he beamed at the console. "Right! Perfect! Look at that! What could possibly go wrong?"
Alex groaned. "You had to jinx it, didn't you?" As if to prove her point, a piece that the Doctor had just stuck onto the console fell off.
"That's fine," he dismissed. "That always happens. Nope, wait, hang on!" He darted forward and picked up three red velvet ropes that one usually saw at movie theaters. He handed one off to Idris once she finished hanging a wire hanger from a hook while he took the other two for himself. They hung the ropes around the console, strapping all of them in.
"Right," the Doctor sighed. He stood at attention at the rotor, Alex standing on his right with Idris next to her. "Okay, let's go! Follow that TARDIS!" He pressed a button, the console powered up . . . then died. A few sparks shot off in various directions as further proof of the machine not working.
"Oh, come on!" the Doctor begged. He reached around to the other side of the console and typed in some commands. "There's rift energy everywhere, you can do it!" He pressed the same button. Still nothing. "Okay. . . Diverting all power to thrust. Let's be having ya!" He wound some kind of wheel, but that only caused a bunch of sparking. "Ah! No, no, no, no, no!"
"What's wrong?" Idris asked.
"It can't hold the charge. It can't even start! There's no power!" He looked over to see Idris examining herself in a mirror hanging off the rotor. She was currently pulling her bottom lip. Exasperated, the Doctor slapped a hand over the mirror. "Would you. . ." he scolded, before turning back to the console. "I've got nothing!"
Alex rolled her eyes at his ignorance. "I wouldn't say that. . ."
Idris nodded in agreement as the Doctor stared at Alex in confusion. "Oh, you idiot. You have what you've always had. You've got me." She kissed one of her fingers, her mouth and eyes glowing gold as she did so. She lightly pressed her finger to the rotor. The machinery inside immediately started moving up and down. A familiar wheezing noise rang out around them as a large gold circle surrounded the whole structure. And then they were gone.
Alex let out a little scream when she was thrown forwards onto the console as the makeshift TARDIS began following their TARDIS towards their universe. At least you're not traveling through the time vortex, the snippy part of Alex's mind reminded her. The Doctor had mentioned that traveling through the time vortex without protection was very dangerous, and more often than not, fatal.
"Whoo-hoo!" the Doctor cheered, not seeming to mind the bumpy and rocky flight. He looked over at Alex and saw that she was hanging on for dear life to some levers on the console with her feet planted on the bottom of it. "Hold on, Ally!"
"What do you think I'm doing?!" Alex yelled over the loud noise echoing out around them. It sounded a lot like a mighty wind, like something that would be perfectly at home in a hurricane.
"We've locked on to them!" Idris reported. "They'll have to lower the shields when I'm close enough to phase inside!"
"Can you get a message to Amy?" the Doctor asked. "The telepathic circuits are online!"
"Which one's Amy?! The pretty one?" Not waiting for an answer, Idris faced the mirror, closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them again. "Hello, pretty!" she called.
"What the hell is that?!" Rory exclaimed.
The Doctor managed to make his way over to look into the mirror. In it, he could see Rory clutching his head as the message played in his mind. "Don't worry!" he called to him. "Telepathic messaging!" He turned to Idris. "No, that's Rory."
"You have to go to the old control room," Idris directed as the Doctor moved out of the way to work another section of the console. "I'm putting the route in your head. When you get there, use the purple slider on the nearest panel to lower the shields."
The Doctor popped back to look into the mirror in disbelief. "The pretty one?!" he scoffed, before darting out of the way again.
"You're plenty handsome to me!" Alex called to him, making her voice loud so that Rory could also hear her and know that she was okay.
The Doctor preened at the compliment. "Thank you, Ally!"
"You have about twelve seconds before the room goes into phase with the invading matrix," Idris continued to Rory. "I'll send you the passkey when you get there. Good luck."
The Doctor frowned at her as she ended the connection. "How's he gonna be able to take down the shields anyway?"
"Yeah, House is probably in control of the control room!" Alex reminded her.
Idris just grinned at them. "I directed him to one of the old control rooms!"
"There aren't any control rooms," the Doctor challenged. "They were all deleted or remodeled."
"I archived them, for neatness. I've got about thirty now."
"But I've only changed the desktop, what, a dozen times now?"
"So far, yes."
"You can't archive something that hasn't happened yet!"
Alex laughed and smiled at Idris. "You and I can't!"
The Doctor shook his head, deciding to drop the matter. Instead, he focused all his efforts on piloting the makeshift TARDIS to the proper one that was just a small distance away. "Keep going!" he called to Idris. "You're doing it, you sexy thing!"
"See, you do call me that!" Idris cried. "Is it my name?"
"If it's okay with Ally!"
Alex smiled fondly at him, then at Idris. "You bet it's your name, gorgeous!"
The makeshift TARDIS thrashed and buckled. Alex shrieked, but that didn't concern Idris. "Whoo!" she whooped as they flew further and further after the TARDIS. Once she was done cheering, Idris placed her hand on the rotor to send another message to Rory.
"Crimson," she said to the mirror. "Eleven. Delight. Petrichor."
"Are we almost there?!" Alex yelled to the Doctor as the console slammed to the side, nearly sending Alex to the floor.
"Nearly!" he shouted back. "Hold on, Ally!" God help him if she fell off. He would lose it, he was sure.
Alex took his advice to heart. She gripped the console as hard as she could until her knuckles were white. She planted her feet tight against the ground, bending her body forward over the console. She then closed her eyes and prayed that this would be over soon without any incidents.
"They did it!" she heard Idris exclaim. "Shields down!" A moment later, Alex heard Idris speaking to Rory again. "We're coming through! Get out of the way or you'll be atomized!"
"Where are you coming through?" Rory asked.
"I don't know!" Before Rory could reply, Idris ended the message. "It's not going to hold!" she called to the Doctor. Right at that moment, the console started sparking, one spark flashing just an inch away from Alex's face, causing the American to bounce back up with a loud swear.
The makeshift TARDIS whipped and banged around, smoke spewing and sparks flying from the rotor. Suddenly, the structure halted. The unprepared occupants fell to the floor.
Alex landed on top of the Doctor. She burrowed her face in his chest to escape the smoke as it slowly cleared away. When she was sure it was gone, she looked up. Her brow furrowed. She was pretty sure they were on the TARDIS, but it was in a room she'd never seen before.
She glanced around, squinting through the remaining smoke. The room was dome-shaped with golden colored walls sporting several roundels, like the current console room. There were several large y-beam shaped coral struts, a theme that continued onto the console with the controls placed in-between blocks of coral. The floor consisted of a bunch of grating and there didn't seem to be any levels in this room, unlike the main control room. This control room was also darker and dimmer, although that could have been from House's manipulations.
"Doctor! Alex!" a familiar voice shouted, pulling Alex out of her inspection of the room. The time travelers turned their heads to see Amy and Rory standing just a little ways away, both looking incredibly relieved to see the couple.
Alex immediately rolled off the Doctor and stumbled to her feet, the Doctor doing the same behind her. "Amy! Rory!" she cried as she ran over to the pair. She gave Rory a tight hug while the Doctor did the same to Amy. Once the Doctor and Amy separated, Alex shot over to hug her other friend.
"Are you two okay?" she questioned, pulling back from Amy to examine her for any injuries. "You're not hurt, are you? House didn't do anything?"
"We're fine," Amy assured her, but the pained gleam in her eye told Alex that while the Ponds were fine physically, they had been messed with mentally by the sentient rock.
"You can tell me later," Alex told her, giving her a calm, reassuring smile.
Amy smiled back. She was glad beyond belief that her best friends were back and would get them out of this horrible mess.
"Oh, not good," Idris groaned as the Doctor tried to help her up. Seeing him struggle, Rory rushed over to assist. "Not good at all. How do you walk around in these things?"
"We're not quite there yet," the Doctor said as he and Rory helped her sit down. "Just hold on." He turned to Amy, knowing she would have questions, while Alex went over and knelt beside Idris. "Amy, this is . . . well . . . she's my TARDIS. Except she's a woman . . . she's a woman . . . and she's my TARDIS."
Amy stared at Idris in shock. "She's the TARDIS?!"
"And she's a woman. She's a woman, and she's the TARDIS."
Amy raised an eyebrow at him. "And how does Alex, your girlfriend, feel about this?"
"Alex is right here," Alex piped up, "and she is perfectly fine with it, thank you for the concern."
Idris slowly managed to get to her feet. "Hello," she greeted. "I'm . . . Sexy."
"Oh," the Doctor moaned as Amy and Rory gave him astonished looks. He pointed at them. "Shut up."
"Environment has been breached," a voice Alex recognized as House announced. "Nephew, kill them all."
"Nephew got on board?" Alex asked as the Ponds started looking around for the Ood.
"Yeah, but I don't see him now," Amy reported.
"Where is he?" Rory wondered.
Amy pointed to the makeshift TARDIS. "He was standing right where you materialized."
"Ah, well, he must have been redistributed," the Doctor surmised.
"Meaning what?"
"You're breathing him."
Amy, Rory, and Alex all wrinkled their noses and grimaced. "Oh, come on," Amy groaned, placing a hand over her mouth. Behind her, Rory covered his mouth with his jacket while Alex turned the collars on her jacket up and over her mouth and nose.
The Doctor merely sighed. "Another Ood I failed to save."
"Doctor. I did not expect you."
The Doctor clapped his hands and smirked. "Well, that's just me all over, isn't it?" he observed as he strode around the console. "Lovely old unexpected me."
"The big question is, now you're here, how to dispose of you? I could play with gravity. . ." At that moment, everyone fell to the floor. All of them clung to the grating until the manipulation suddenly stopped. Amy, Alex, and the Doctor sprang to their feet, the Doctor immediately grabbing Alex and pulling her over to him, while Idris promptly fell to the ground. Rory hastily knelt beside her.
Alex felt her heart sink at the sight of Idris rapidly deteriorating. But before she could call out to see what was going on, House started speaking again. "Or I could evacuate the air from this room and watch you choke."
Alex immediately felt the oxygen in the room getting sucked out. Her lungs started burning and she clutched her throat. The others were acting the same way, all frantically gasping for breath.
Thanking Rassilon for his respiratory bypass system, the Doctor managed to get out, "You really don't want to do that!" This exclamation caused the oxygen-sucking to stop and the air to seep back in. Alex breathed a sigh of relief and leaned back into the Doctor's touch as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders, a silent comfort.
"Why shouldn't I just kill you now?" House inquired.
"Because then I won't be able to help you," the Doctor replied. "Listen to your engines. Just listen to them. You don't have the thrust and you know it. Right now, I'm your only hope for getting out of your little bubble through the rift, and into my universe. And mine's the one with the food in it."
"Water. . ." Idris suddenly choked out. "Water. . ."
"You just have to promise not to kill us. That's all. Just promise."
Amy gaped at him. "You can't be serious!"
"Very serious," the Doctor confirmed. He tightened his arm around Alex. "I'm sure it's an entity of its word."
He's up to something, Alex thought. She knew the Doctor and she knew he was really good at coming up with plans and not letting on that he had thought of one until he judged that the moment was right. He's got a plan. I just know it!
"Doctor!" Rory called. "She's burning up. She's asking for water."
The Doctor and Alex quickly crossed the room. They knelt down beside her, Alex moving to rub Idris' arm reassuringly. "Hey. Hang in there, old girl," the Doctor murmured.
"It shouldn't be too much longer, gorgeous," Alex said softly.
"It'll be over soon."
Idris smiled up at them weakly. "I always liked it when you called me 'old girl'," she told the Doctor in a frail voice. Her eyes went to Alex. "And you with 'gorgeous'."
Alex chuckled. She was about to reply when House cut in. "You want me to give my word?" it asked. "Easy. I promise."
Liar, Alex thought.
"Fine, okay," the Doctor nodded. "I trust you." Not. "Just delete, oh . . . er . . . 30% of the TARDIS rooms. You'll free up enough thrust to make it through. Activate subroutine sigma nine."
"Why would you tell me this?"
The Doctor rose to his feet. "Because we want to get back to our universe as badly as you do. And I'm nice."
"Yes, I can delete rooms. . ." House mused, ". . .and I can also rid myself of vermin if I delete this room first! Thank you, Doctor. Very helpful. Goodbye, Time Lord. Goodbye, little humans. Goodbye, Idris!"
A bright white light appeared out of nowhere. Alex shut her eyes, flinching away from it. She vaguely felt the Doctor tug her to him, but she was concentrating on the fact that she was about to die. Wonderful. Out of all the ways she had pictured herself dying (getting shot at by a Dalek, dying during Malohkeh's dissection on her), getting deleted by a sentient asteroid was not one of them.
A moment later, Alex was aware of the bright light fading away. She hesitantly opened her eyes. She expected to find herself . . . somewhere, only to find that she, the Doctor, Amy, Rory, and Idris were now all in the main control room.
"Yes, I mean, you could do that," the Doctor remarked behind her, "but it just won't work." He squeezed her shoulders gently and turned her around to face him. He gave her a quick smile and a wink before looking up at the ceiling. "Hardwired fail safe. Living things from rooms that are deleted are automatically deposited in the main control room. But thanks for the lift!"
"We are in your universe now, Doctor," House pointed out. "Why should it matter to me in which room you die? I can kill you just as easily here as anywhere. Fear me. I've killed hundreds of Time Lords."
"Fear me," the Doctor said lowly, his eyes and voice dark and dangerous. "I've killed all of them."
Alex was about to give him a smile of reassurance when she saw Rory shaking his head at Idris. He seemed to be saying something to her, but Alex was too far away to hear it. Just as she was trying to make it out, the Doctor surprised her by saying, "Yeah, you're right. You've completely won. Oh, you can kill us in oodles of inventive ways, but before you do kill us, allow me and my friends, Amy, Rory, and Alex, to congratulate you on being an absolutely worthy opponent."
Alex frowned at him but decided to go along with it. He had to have something up his sleeve . . . right?
"Congratulations," Amy said, giving the Doctor a confused look while she reluctantly clapped along with him.
Alex let out a little clap of her own. "Way to go?" she offered to the ceiling.
The Doctor glanced at Idris just in time to see her eyes close. "Yep, you've defeated us. Me, the lovely Alex, and our friends here, and last but definitely not least, the TARDIS matrix herself, a living consciousness you RIPPED out of this very control room and locked up into a human body. And look at her!"
Rory's head darted up, his eyes wide in alarm. "Doctor, she's stopped breathing."
"Enough," House commanded as Amy went to join Rory. "That is enough."
"No!" the Doctor snapped. Gently moving Alex out of his way, he stalked forwards. "It's never enough! You forced the TARDIS into a body so she'd burn out safely a very long way away from this control room. A flesh body can't hold the TARDIS matrix and live! Look at her body, House!"
"And you think I should mourn her?" House scoffed.
"No, I think you should be very, very careful about what you let back into this control room."
Right at that moment, Idris' mouth opened. Out came the same golden energy she'd used on the makeshift TARDIS. It slowly poured out of her mouth and floated in the air like cigarette smoke.
Alex's eyes widened, the dots in her brain connecting so that she saw the Doctor's plan. "You clever man," she beamed at him. She smirked victoriously at the ceiling. "You took her from her home!" she called up. "But now she's back and she's free!"
More golden energy poured out of Idris' hands and began streaming around the room, seeping into the walls and floor. "No!" House yelled in pain as the TARDIS matrix literally started forcing him out. "Doctor, stop this! Ah! Stop this now!"
Of course, the Doctor made no such attempt. "Look at my girl," he marveled, spinning around in a circle to take in the whole effect. "Look at her go. Bigger on the inside! You see, House?"
"Make her stop!"
"That's your problem."
"Ah!"
"Size of a planet. . ." Alex picked up, crossing over to the Doctor and allowing him to loop an arm around her waist.
". . .but inside you are just so small!" they finished together.
House moaned in agony. "Make it stop!"
"Finish him off, girl," the Doctor requested. He and Alex turned to the console, the lights around them fading as House was vanquished.
"No! Don't do this!" House begged. "Ah! Uh! No!"
The Doctor and Alex watched House's green light disappear, the gold TARDIS light fading along with it. The room was in total darkness now. The Doctor leaned against the console and pulled Alex back so that she was leaning against his chest. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her to him as he closed his eyes.
Idris was gone. It was over.
Or maybe not.
"Doctor? Ally?" a voice called out. The duo whirled around. To their complete surprise, they saw Idris standing on the stairs, her body surrounded by a golden glow. "It's so very dark in here."
The two stepped forwards, both smiling broadly. "We're here," the Doctor affirmed.
"I've been looking for a word. A big, complicated word, but so sad. I've found it now."
"What word?" Alex asked.
Idris smiled. "Alive," she whispered. "I'm alive."
"Alive isn't sad," the Doctor protested.
"It's sad when it's over. I'll always be here, but this is when we talked. And now even that has come to an end. There's something I didn't get to say to you."
The Doctor's eyes brimmed with unshed tears. He looked down, trying to keep himself in control. "Goodbye?" he guessed, his voice barely above a whisper.
"No. I just wanted to say . . . hello. Hello, Doctor. Hello, Ally. It's so very, very nice to meet you both." She bent her head down a little to look at Alex, who had been staring at her with her own unshed tears. "Ally, look after him. He needs you and you need him. Neither of you realize yet how important you are to each-other."
"Please," the Doctor begged, his tears threatening to spill over any second. "I don't want you to." Even though he had Alex, and he would never, ever trade her for someone else, this was the TARDIS. Like Alex had said, he'd known her longer. She had been there for him in the dark days when he didn't even know Alex. She was very important to him and now, here she was, fading away.
"Neither do I," Alex murmured, even though she knew it was going to happen whether they liked it or not. Idris was right; the TARDIS was not meant to be in a human body. While Idris had wondered whether all people were bigger on the inside, to a TARDIS matrix, a human body would be horribly small and constraining. It wouldn't be right for her to be cooped up in one just so they could all talk.
Idris leaned back, her eyes closing as the golden light became brighter and brighter around her, to the point where it was almost blinding. The TARDIS materialization engines rang out, but they weren't loud enough to prevent the Doctor and Alex from hearing Idris' final message. "Stay strong . . . both of you," she whispered.
Then she disappeared into thin air.
The lights switched back on, the control room looking for all intents and purposes like nothing extraordinary had happened. But something had. Amy and Rory held each-other as they watched Alex turn to face the Doctor, the latter sniffling slightly. Like magnets coming together, the couple's arms wrapped around each-other, crushing themselves to the other. Alex then rose on tiptoe and lightly kissed the Doctor on the lips before using the pads of her thumbs to gently wipe his escaped tears away.
Amy and Rory smiled a little, but stayed quiet, allowing the Doctor and Alex to have one uninterrupted moment.
~The Pros and Cons of Silence~
A little while later, the Doctor was in his harness (not a swing, as Alex seemed to be obsessed on calling it) under the console, his goggles on as he made some modifications to the TARDIS circuitry. Wires dangled all around him. One wire a few inches away from him actually went off, sparks shooting perilously close to the Doctor's face.
"How's it going under there?" Rory asked, walking down the steps after hearing the spark go off. Amy and Alex were seated on the glass floor above, watching the Doctor through that.
"Just putting a firewall around the matrix," the Doctor told him. "Almost done."
"Are you going to make her talk again?" Amy inquired, half-joking, half-serious.
He shook his head. "I can't."
"Why not?" Rory wondered.
Alex rolled her eyes and laughed a little. "It's 'spacey-wacey' isn't it?" she guessed. It was pretty easy to deduce. The Doctor had a fondness for dumbing down complex scientific explanations with nonsense words like 'spacey-wacey' and 'wibbly-wobbly'.
"Well, actually, it's because the Time Lords discovered that if you take an eleventh dimensional matrix and fold it into a mechanical, then—" But he was cut off when Rory crossed two wires. The wires let off a huge spark that caused the Doctor to flinch back. "Yes, it's spacey-wacey!" he snapped, pulling his goggles off to glare at Rory.
"Sorry," Rory said sheepishly. Above him, Amy and Alex stood and walked down the stairs. Amy took a seat next to Rory while Alex sat on the lowest step, closer to the Doctor. "At the end, she was talking. She kept repeating something. I don't know what it meant."
"What did she say?" Alex asked him while the Doctor stood to examine the crossed wires.
"'The only water in the forest is the river'. She said we'd need to know that someday. It doesn't make sense, does it?"
"Not yet," the Doctor remarked. He looked up to see a downcast expression cross Rory's face. "You okay?"
Rory shook his head. "No. I watched her die."
"Rory, she wasn't meant to survive in a human body," Alex said gently. She reached up and patted his hand. "She would've died no matter what you did."
"I know. I shouldn't let it get to me, but it still does. I'm a nurse."
"Letting it get to you," the Doctor repeated. "You know what that's called? Being alive. Best thing there is. Being alive, right now, is all that counts." He sat back down in his harness and studied the circuitry. "Nearly finished. Two more minutes and then we're off. The Eye of Orion's restful, if you like restful. I can never really get the hang of restful." But he was starting to. He could slow down, if Alex asked him. "What do you think, dear? Where shall we take Ally and the kids this time?"
Amy shook her head at being called a 'kid' by him, albeit fondly. "Look at you pair. It's always you and her, isn't it? Long after the rest of us have gone."
Alex smirked. "A boy and his box, off to see the universe."
"The two of you say that as if it's a bad thing," the Doctor observed. "But honestly, it's the best thing in the universe." Another spark went off, though by this point no one was really fazed. "Uh, the House deleted all the bedrooms. I should probably make you all new bedrooms. You'd like that, wouldn't you?"
Without even looking, Alex could tell what Amy and Rory were doing. The two whispered for a moment before turning to the Doctor. "Okay, er, Doctor, this time could we lose the bunk-beds?" Amy requested.
"No, bunk-beds are cool! A bed with a ladder! You can't beat that." The Ponds just gave him identical flat looks. The Doctor sighed. Maybe Amy and Rory wouldn't be intimate for a while. He still didn't want to risk provoking whatever was wrong with Amy through . . . strenuous activities. "It's your room," he conceded. "Out those stairs, keep walking till you find it. Off you pop."
Taking this to mean her as well, Alex bounced up and hurried up the stairs. She came to a stop, however, when she heard Rory ask, "Doctor, do you have a room?" But before the Doctor could answer, if he even would, Amy pulled him away and towards the stairs, grabbing Alex with her free hand and tugging her along as well.
That's a good question though, she thought as she pulled away from Amy in the corridor her bedroom had been in prior to its deletion. The Doctor always slept in her room whenever invited. Not once had he ever shown her his room. Though for all Alex knew, he slept in the library or in a hammock strung up under the console. I could definitely see him doing that, she thought wryly, gigging at the image of the Doctor reclining in a hammock in the darkened control room, reading some kind of mathematical textbook.
Still snickering to herself, Alex surveyed the corridor. Amy and Rory had already gone off down the hallway, and she could distantly hear them oohing and aahing over the return of their original four-poster bed. Now she just had to find her new room.
She abruptly felt a pushing sensation at her back, the force driving her forwards to a white door on the left-hand side of the hall. The door was in the exact location of her old bedroom door. Oddly enough, this door even looked identical to the previous one, right down to the black scuff mark in the bottom left-hand corner, caused by Alex kicking the door open when the lock mysteriously stuck one day.
Feeling the force gently increase at her back, Alex opened the door. She stepped inside, expecting to see a newly designed room, only to be shocked by what was really there.
It was her old room. Same dark purple walls with intricate black stenciling, same simple gray carpet, same cluttered bookshelves, same everything.
Alex stepped further into the room, taking everything in. The TARDIS had certainly put no expense on detail. Everything looked exactly how she had left it this morning. Her closet light was still on, a pair of jeans was still lying on one of the black leather club chairs from where she'd been trying to figure out what to wear hours earlier, and her bed still had a purple blanket lying on it from where she'd gotten chilly the night before and had asked the time machine for something to warm her up.
Alex smiled and gently patted the wall. "Thanks, Gorgeous," she murmured, grinning when she felt the wall vibrate underneath her fingertips. "Though you certainly didn't have to go to such trouble getting everything exactly right."
"She didn't," the Doctor's voice spoke from behind her.
Alex jumped and whirled around. So caught up in looking over her room and thanking the TARDIS, she hadn't even detected him walking up. "Thanks for scaring me!" she teased, seeing him smirk at the fact he'd managed to surprise her. Alex leaned against the wall and mirrored his own stance of him leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed. "And what do you mean 'she didn't'?"
The Doctor glanced at the ceiling. "Apparently," he began as he absently ran a hand over the doorframe, "the TARDIS, before being pulled out and put into Idris, managed to hide your room from the schematics, same as the old control room. She protected your room from being deleted by House."
Alex blinked. She knew that the TARDIS had always liked her, proven even more after this little adventure, but she hadn't thought the time machine would go to such lengths to protect her belongings. "Oh," she said in surprise. "Did she save any of the other rooms?"
"Not Amy and Rory's bedroom – and don't tell them about this or I'll have to deal with Pond yelling at me – but the control rooms she archived and a few others as well."
Alex wondered if the other rooms possibly included his room as well. But before she could try and tactfully ask – even though there didn't really seem to be a tactful way to ask that – the Doctor pushed off the doorframe and moved towards her. He gently maneuvered her back against the wall and put his hands her shoulders, effectively trapping her. Not that she minded.
Alex's heart started pounding faster than a salsa beat, a feeling that used to both thrill and worry her a year ago, but now just gave her incredible pleasure. Now that she was properly with the Doctor, she couldn't understand how she could have been so nervous about these sensations. They were so incredible and thrilling and like nothing she had ever experienced with anyone else before.
She smirked up at him, taking in his appearance. Much to her delight, he had ditched his tweed jacket a while back, now clad in only his shirt, the sleeves partially rolled up, his black trousers, boots, red suspenders, and matching bowtie. He always looked so casual and sexy when he wasn't completely done up in his regular outfit, at least in Alex's opinion. She couldn't help but wonder if he felt that same way about her in one of her various outfits. I'll have to check on that sometime.
For now though, she ran a hand up his arm, feeling his skin, even through a layer of cotton, crackle and pop with energy at her touch. "Have I ever told you that you look really hot in just your shirtsleeves?" she murmured.
The Doctor smirked down at her, his eyes growing dark in his want for her. "No," he replied in an identical low voice. "But I'm certainly glad you did. I should go like this more often."
Alex giggled. "No, you might not want to do that. Then I'd be jumping on you all the time."
"Still failing to see the bad side of it, Ally."
Alex giggled a little more, her eyes turning from chocolate brown to light green. "How about you save it for the TARDIS then? Less risk of us getting arrested for public indecency."
"Deal." Then, unable to resist her any longer, he bent down and placed his lips upon hers. Somewhat impatiently, he pried them open with his tongue. Alex groaned and eagerly opened her mouth all the way, her eyes fluttering shut in bliss as he dove inside. The Doctor's hands traveled down to her waist, his fingers digging into her hips as he pulled her closer to him, almost to where their bodies completely melded together.
For a few minutes they continued kissing like this, pausing only for a few seconds here and there to allow Alex a chance to catch her breath. Eventually though, the Doctor pulled away, albeit not very far. His forehead rested against Alex's, and he subtly inhaled the scents of her Chanel No. 5 perfume and sweet pea and violet body wash. He had to make sure to properly remember these scents for when she was gone. He never spoke about it, the elephant in the room that was their relationship, but it was there, and they both knew it. But they ignored it, determined to avoid that obstacle for as long as possible.
But it won't be long enough, a negative voice in the back of his mind spoke. He immediately crushed it. No. He'd promised himself he wouldn't dwell on those thoughts. Not when he finally had her and his every sense had to be focused on not losing her anytime soon.
Pushing these thoughts to the very back part of his mind, the Doctor raised his head so he could look down at Alex. He had come here with a purpose, not just to get a quick snog (though he'd be lying if he said that hadn't been part of it). "How are you feeling?" he asked.
Alex sighed and slumped back against the wall, allowing the back of her head to hit it. She'd known this was coming. "Fine, for now," she replied. Her eyes turned a dull shade of copper as they flicked down to the floor. She couldn't help but feel slightly self-conscious about her strange affliction. People like her didn't get weird body pains. Then again, she reminded herself, people like me don't normally travel in time machines and fall in love with aliens either.
"Think you're up for a trip?" the Doctor wondered. He placed a finger under her chin and tilted her head up so she could look him in the eye. "A nice, calm, relaxing one, mind you, nothing dangerous."
Alex arched a skeptical eyebrow, but they both knew she wouldn't say no. "No more scans?" she checked, a little surprised that he wasn't whisking her off to the med-bay.
The Doctor shook his head. "I've already contacted a friend of mine about letting me use some equipment to scan you and Amy. I'm just waiting for him to get back to me." He scowled. "And he says I'm awful about not answering my phone."
Alex giggled. "Well, what do you have in mind?"
He grinned and grabbed her hand. "Come and see."
He led her all the way back to the control room. Instead of stopping to pilot the controls though, the Doctor led her off the platform and over to the doors. Wordlessly, he pushed one open and nodded for her to go ahead.
Alex stepped outside and immediately began looking around in wonder. They appeared to be on Earth, in a nice, quiet part of the English countryside. Green hills stretched out as far as she could see with bare trees planted all along them. Rocks cluttered the hills as well, but instead of being detrimental to the landscape, they actually served to make it look more picturesque. The sky was a calm blue-gray, not a cloud to be seen. It reminded Alex of Earth after a thunderstorm, when everything was calm and relaxed again after such violent weather-patterns.
"What do you think, Ally?" the Doctor asked from behind her.
"It's beautiful," Alex murmured. She stepped a little further out. "It reminds me of Earth after a thunderstorm. . . It's just so calm and tranquil."
"It's the high bombardment of positive ions." The Doctor put his hands in his pockets and stared out at the terrain. "The Eye of Orion is well-known for them. It's the most tranquil place in the universe."
Alex turned to look at him in surprise. "We're not on Earth?"
"Millions of light-years away actually and in the 27th century, too. I would have made it 21st, but my past incarnations came here quite a bit during that time, and I don't want to risk running into them."
"Afraid I'll start flirting with one?" Alex teased.
"No . . . not until now." The Doctor gave her a purposefully serious expression as she giggled impishly. "Meet another one of me and suddenly trouble will arise, the last thing you need . . . plus they could decide they want you all for themselves and create a massive paradox."
"Well, it looks like we're the only ones here, so we don't have to worry about that happening." She smirked. "Not that it would," she added as she got on tiptoe to press a kiss to his cheek.
The Doctor smiled down at her, relishing her words. He knew his past selves would be just as enchanted with Alex as he was right now. She probably thought he was joking about a past self trying to steal her away from him, but he wasn't. He could seriously see something like that happening. Alex was different from all his companions and brought out feelings in him he hadn't been capable of in a long time. He was sure none of his past selves would stand a chance at trying to resist her.
"So why did you bring me here?"
"Isn't it obvious? To relax. It'll do you good. Just the two of us right here, no trouble, relaxing. Relaxing is cool."
Alex laughed at this statement, but she couldn't help agreeing with it. Her life with the Doctor was far from relaxing, and she knew that constantly running around and getting into trouble wouldn't help her get better any time soon. "Just us? No Ponds? Like a . . . date?"
"If you'd like," the Doctor nodded, trying to keep up a calm composure. Inwardly, he was jumping up and down at the thought of another proper date with Alex. He stepped back over to the TARDIS. "I'm just going to fetch a few things. Wait right there."
He returned about a minute later. His jacket was still off but he was now carrying a large picnic basket with a patchwork quilt tucked under one arm. He passed this last item to Alex. "Go find a spot, Ally," he directed, waving his free arm out in the direction of the landscape.
Alex walked a little ways away before settling on a small clearing. A few trees were clustered around the edge of the area, making the clearing almost circular. The ground was perfectly smooth, all the rocks a small distance away.
The Doctor settled in beside her. "I'm not sure what the TARDIS has packed for us," he admitted as he handed her the picnic basket. "But I'm sure something you'll like is in there."
Finding something Alex liked wasn't a problem. The problem would be trying to find something she didn't like. The bigger-on-the-inside basket contained many of Alex's favorite foods, including a piping hot plate of fried chicken, a bag of Dorito's, even an ice-cold carton of Milk and Cookies ice-cream. And the TARDIS hadn't neglected her Thief either; there was a package of fish sticks along with a container of custard.
"I certainly feel spoiled," Alex commented as she surveyed all the food she'd unpacked. And she was pretty sure this wasn't even all of it.
The Doctor laughed. "After today, are you really surprised?"
Alex shrugged. "Good point."
It took the two only about twenty minutes to go through a good quarter of the food. An exciting adventure plus running, Alex had discovered, made you ravenous. After they had sufficiently stuffed themselves, the two laid back on the blanket on their sides, facing each-other.
"This has been so nice," Alex gushed. She shifted closer to the Doctor, allowing him to wrap an arm around her waist. "This is just what I needed."
"No problem at all, Ally," the Doctor smiled. He reached up and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, this action allowing him to better see her now dark green eyes. "You should know by now I'd do anything for you, whether it's what you want or what you need."
"Except a cat?" Alex joked.
"Except that," he nodded sagely, but there was a twinkle in his eye.
Alex giggled and shifted even closer. She was about a horse-hair's distance away from him now. "So, whatever I want or whatever I need, right?"
The Doctor had a hunch on where she was going with this. "Right," he said slowly.
"And . . . would that extend to something I want, but also need?"
The Doctor's eyes began to darken. Now he knew exactly where she was going with this. "Yes."
Alex bit down on her lip, causing the Doctor's eyes to darken some more and his fingers to start digging into her hip possessively. "Then . . . will you kiss me?"
He was already moving forward to close the small distance between them. "Oh, yes."
The Doctor's tongue forcibly pried her mouth open. Alex made a purring sound in response as he dove into her, alternatively sucking her bottom lip and sweeping his tongue around her mouth. Her hands ran up his arms and to his neck, up to where his hair ended. She gripped strands of it, the unexpected sensation making the Doctor groan. His hand tightened on her hip, and he slung one of her legs over his.
Alex moaned, her eyes closing of their own accord. She tilted her head back as the Doctor's lips left hers and traveled down her neck. She let out a little moan as he sucked and nibbled his way down to her collarbone. His hands reached up to cradle her face while he nosed aside the charm on her sonic necklace in order to get to the hollow of her throat. Once there, he ran his tongue over and in the small space, sucking a few times for good measure.
Alex let out breathy gasps and moans as he went along. God, how could she have gone so long without this? This was amazing. Who knew that the Doctor was so skilled with his mouth? A small shudder went through her as she considered the other, more intimate ways the Doctor could use his mouth. . .
Just as she was getting lost in her fantasy, Alex felt a small pinprick of pain in the center of her chest. Her brow furrowed as she felt the pain disappear, only to come back once again a bit lower, now at the start of her torso.
She gasped, but not from what the Doctor was currently doing to the side of her neck. No! she thought, anxiety and worry automatically spreading through her entire body like the adrenaline rush she got when near the Doctor. Please, not here! Not now!
But it seemed no deity was listening for right at that moment, the pain in her torso intensified. Alex bit back a scream upon feeling the stabbing, slicing sensation. Her fingers clutched pieces of the blanket as the strain in her body steadily heightened.
Involuntarily, she let out a little whimper. The Doctor hummed, thinking it was her reacting to the sucking he was doing to the side of her neck, but then he felt her shake and heard her whimper some more. He lifted his head to see that her eyes were tightly shut, and she was biting down on her bottom lip so hard, blood was starting to appear.
"Ally?" He rose and ran his fingers through her hair. "Ally, what is it?"
"Pain," Alex choked out. She released her lip and opened her eyes to reveal water-rimmed honey-colored pupils.
The Doctor swore in Gallifreyan, but immediately sprang into action. He yanked his sonic out and ran it over Alex with one hand while the other busied itself smoothing out her hair in comfort. A moment later, the sonic beeped. Even though he knew by now what to expect, he still swore when he saw the results. Negative.
The Doctor hurled the sonic to the other side of the blanket and enveloped Alex into his arms. Alex buried her head into his chest and let out a muffled sob as the mysterious pain continued to wrack her body, making her shake and shudder. The Doctor rubbed her back. It was a poor way of comforting her, but for now it was all he could do.
Operative words being 'for now'. He was going to fix that. He narrowed his eyes at no one as Alex continued to cry. Right then and there, he made a solemn vow to himself. I'm going to get to the bottom of this right now, he thought. Even if it's the last thing I ever do.
~The Pros and Cons of Silence~
A/N: Damn! TWO attacks for Alex! She just can't catch a break, can she? :{
Next chapter will be an original one and will involve some very familiar faces. :)
Also, here's the translation guide for the companions Idris' internal monologue referenced and the reasons why I chose those nicknames:
The Original Flower - Susan Foreman (in some spinoff material, her Gallifreyan name is said to be Arkytior, which in Gallifreyan, means Rose).
The Piper - Jamie McCrimmon (because he was a piper in his clan).
The Astrophysicist - Zoe Heriot (she was an astrophysicist).
The Arrogant One - Adric (he could be rather arrogant at times, since he had a brilliant mathematical mind).
Notes on reviews. . .
NicoleR85 - Thank you! I hope you enjoyed this chapter! :)
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Sam Fraser - That's an idea. I'll keep it in mind, but no promises. :)
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