Stepping through the tear, Paul found himself somewhere else, when his mind caught up to him, he noticed he was being hugged, and when he blinked, he saw it was Taylor.
Wrapping his arms around her, he exhaled sharply as he asked her if she was alright, and she confirmed while pulling him towards the Doctor and Memphis as he slowly recovered from the woman's attack.
In the chamber that was said to be lost to time, the three glimpsed around, seeing the ancient markings that have since lost meaning in Time Lord society.
Memphis could hardly understand the dialect of the markings as he glimpsed them while the Doctor and Taylor helped him move.
"This looks ceremonial, could this be where the king's buried?" Taylor asks Memphis's opinion as she spots statues made with metal and marble.
Seeing the statues of men and women who lived thousands of years ago, Memphis answers that this would have been the remembrance chamber.
It was akin to a wake for Taylor, where people go to give condolences and remember those who passed away via the statues made of them before moving on to the burial chambers beyond the door ahead where they would give prayers.
The only reason he knew of this was through his father, but he never saw it himself until now.
Leading them forward, Paul went through the chamber as he used his Sonic Screwdriver to illuminate the area while the light bounced off the statues.
Ahead, he sees a large circular door segmented in the middle, and going up to it, he tried to open it, but it was heavier than he anticipated, and even he couldn't nudge it.
Despite the pain he was feeling, Memphis forced his way to Paul's side, wanting to help, and even though Paul tried telling him that he didn't need to help, Memphis remembered his duties as a warrior.
In the face of adversary, he won't show either fear or weakness, especially if they're near the final resting place of the first king.
With his hands on the opposite side of the door, Paul worked on the other half, and they managed to separate it.
"My gods!" Memphis stepped backwards as he felt the surge of energy pass through him as Paul recoiled while he felt it as well.
Felt like they were going through an oven without the heat, it was oppressive, and Paul struggled to look through the doorway as he tried to find where it was coming from.
It was coming through somewhere beyond this chamber that Memphis worried that by the time they found the source, he and the others would be dead.
They turned their heads when the Doctor spoke up as he reached into his pocket and proceeded to bring out what looked like red rubber balls.
"What on Gallifrey is that?" Memphis calls out to him as he hurried forward with them in his hands.
A wide smile on his face, the Doctor informed him that he learnt how to be better prepared in situations such as this.
In his hands, they are tiny bombs designated to absorb energy in bursts.
"You think it'll work?" Paul asks the Doctor as he wielded one of the balls in his free hand.
Tossed it like a softball and the moment it hit the ground red smoke rose from it as it came to a stop, slowly but surely the corridor began filling with the red mist, and as it did, the men noticed the energy was weakening.
"It's got enough potency to hopefully last, but uh, as they say, use sparingly," the Doctor advises the men as they grabbed the red balls from him.
Grimacing, Memphis musters, "What if we run out of 'em before we figure it out?"
Sheepishly, the Doctor goes, "Well, we're already in a tomb."
Raising his free hand Paul assures Memphis that they'll find the source of the energy disruptions.
"How?" Memphis eyed him.
Chewing on his inner lip, Paul answers, "His ancestors must've been buried under here. A good chance as any whatever's causing this is there."
Since the tombs became disused and the chamber sealed off after thousands of years, the Council couldn't censor who was buried here.
Their records, sure, but they wouldn't go through the effort to come down here.
"What if you're wrong?" Taylor touched Paul's arm.
Exhaling sharply, Paul musters that they don't have a choice.
As for her and the Doctor on account of the fake Memphis and that woman, he wasn't sure what he wanted them to do, but he didn't want them to come with him and Memphis.
Raising his hand, the Doctor said that he also brought along with him some other things that he kept in his pockets, that he thinks might also help with containing some of the energy while the men dealt with the culprit.
"What about the… fake Memphis?" Taylor brings up that they haven't figured that part out.
Scratching the back of his head, his tightly curled hair stiffly moving, the Doctor modestly says that he can work out the details, but best not discuss it more.
Time is of the essence.
"If you must, use your Sonic Screwdriver, it'll give you time to run," Paul advised the Doctor before he and Memphis set out to finish this adventure.
With the time limit being thirty minutes with each ball thrown, the Doctor only having brought eight total, off the men went down the darkened corridor.
Theoretically the men had enough time to find the right tomb the energy was coming from and get back out, but Memphis warns that he doesn't know how extensive the corridor was, that it was possible that they run out of time before finding the right spot.
In the corner of his eye, Paul saw someone standing in the distant, and he tells Memphis, "He knows where it is."
Moving through the darkened corridor, Memphis stopped as he turned around with confusion.
His eyes widened when he saw the darkened figure stepping through the darkness, he was about ready to unsheathe his sword and defend himself and Paul, before Paul stopped him.
Coming towards them, Paul saw the strange man once again.
"By the gods!" Memphis was shocked at the sight.
Like fog, the red mist rising from the balls they tossed gave the strange man illuminating purple eyes.
Pointing at him, Paul stated, "You want me to pay my debt, now's the time to help me!"
Can't pay his perceived debt if he's dead, something the strange man affirmed with a stiff nod.
Aghast, Memphis watched the strange man sway as he walked through the red mist before gesturing him and Paul to follow.
"Can he be trusted?" Memphis was in disbelief.
Frowning, Paul goes, "We have no choice."
He was their only way of getting through this alive and the strange man knew this as he effortlessly walked through the darkness while the men followed him.
"Who are you?" Memphis demanded the strange man's name and that was when Paul heard it for the first time.
They couldn't see his mouth, but Paul could hear his smile as he told Memphis in a tone that sounded as if he was both proud and mocking, "Iam… Straxus… al…Alhazared!"
Hearing this put the men in an uneasy mood before Straxus told them in his stilted speech that if they wanted to live, they would have to trust him.
That would mean biting their tongues about his progenitor.
It was also warned that he was nothing like him and that if he was, he would have no reason to help them, that said it would be best if they listened to everything he says.
"Why are you helping us, what do you get from it?" Memphis wasn't trustful of Straxus as he led them through the winding corridors where he saw sealed entrances of various tombs.
He heard Straxus mockingly ask, "What… doesanyone… get… from it…Memphis?"
However, Memphis felt about being helped by Straxus, he would need to swallow his doubt and inherited disdain towards Straxus' progenitor.
Gallifrey depended on it.
"And that fiend that attacked me's a friend of yours, too?" Memphis challenged.
Instantly, Paul heard something underlying Straxus's voice as he answered, "Donot… worry… about…her…"
Mocking him, Memphis pointed out how dangerous the woman was and how by the skin of his teeth he survived her assault on him.
"I… amthereason… youarealive…Memphis…" Straxus made it clear that he was responsible for keeping him and the others' alive up to this point.
It was like he was dodging answering Memphis' complaint about the woman attacking him, that it made Paul suspicious.
"It…is… here…" Straxus pointed towards an unsealed chamber that something broke through from inside.
His hand firmly around the hilt of his sword, Memphis asks Straxus what they're supposed to do, and Straxus told him how he and Paul would need to use the remaining balls in their hands against what they're about to see.
Gritting his teeth, Memphis didn't want to believe Straxus was doing this out of the kindness of his heart, but Straxus didn't care whether he believed him or not, only that he did what he was tasked doing.
Going through the threshold, the men were blinded by light coming from the centre of a tomb, there they saw something enshrouded in the light.
The presence became heavy as the men felt something becoming aggressive by their appearance before they're compelled by an unseen force to throw the remaining red balls as hard as they can throw at the centre of the tomb.
Throwing it as hard as he could, Paul sent the first ball, when he did, he could hear it hitting something that sounded metallic.
Couldn't process it as he threw the next ball and the one after while Memphis done the same.
As the red mist filled the tomb, they could see it turning red into black as it caught fire.
Quickly, the men rushed out of the tomb as the fire was quick to spread, that it started catching the lingering red mist outside the tomb on fire as well.
The men didn't stop until they ran through the threshold of the circular door.
Upon doing so, a force sealed the opened circular door, the split halves disappearing.
Turning around, the men see that Straxus was gone, but Paul doubted he was dead, too crafty for that, and the lingering feeling in his mind that he was correct in his deduction.
The Doctor's ploy worked, and the fire can't breach through the door, though Memphis mourned the loss of the other tombs that would be at risk of the fire.
"Oh no! No, never, I'm insane, but not that insane!" The Doctor chides Memphis into believing that his red balls would burn for centuries.
The red mist was a type of dye, the fire would burn itself out within moments after burning away the rest of the dye, since everything's sealed down here to the point that hardly fresh air travels through.
"Believe me, I worked everything out. After my wax museum from hell, I've been looking to get better at my exploits," the Doctor assured Memphis that he took everything into consideration.
Baffled, Paul asked him, "What compelled you to make those red balls?"
Shrugging, the Doctor answers, "Well, I ended up stuck somewhere in a hamlet. Not my best. But well, you learn quick when faced with death."
Believe him.
Rejoining his side with curiosity in her emerald eyes, Taylor asks Paul where the disturbances were coming from, and he answers that someone broke into one of the tombs.
"Sounds like a warped fellow if I ever heard!" the Doctor commented how egregious it sounded that someone would go out of their way to disturb someone's resting spot much less use it to disrupt and absorb energy from the city and the domes.
Frowning, Paul informed him that he and Memphis put an end to it.
Memphis staired off in the distance before confirming that energy levels are stable, the domes remain operational, and within hours they will be back to their original levels.
"Have you two met any problems while we're gone?" Paul asks Taylor.
Shaking her head, neither she nor the Doctor saw anyone attempting to get into the chamber.
Seeing the look in his eyes, Taylor asked him what was wrong, before Paul blinked and told her that it was nothing.
Gesturing, he urged them to start heading back topside, there was the matter of the trial.
Nodding, Memphis guided the group, his sword out as he didn't know where the woman was or his counterpart.
What concerned him more wasn't just the fact there was someone trying to kill them, it was that they seemingly disappeared.
Upon returning to the brightly lit topside, their eyes adjusting, Memphis was immediately greeted by Loran who wrapped his arms around him.
"My son! How I was worried about you!" Loran didn't shy away from his worry that something had happened to him.
Patting him on the back, Memphis smiled as he assured his father that he was a warrior for a reason, and as they held their reunion, Paul saw Talib coming towards him and Taylor.
"Everything back to normal?" Paul asked him.
Nodding, Talib says that the engineers are working to restore everything at full operation, before asking what the cause of the disturbances was.
"I'm not sure, it was in a tomb, I couldn't make anything out the light was blinding," Paul told him in confidence, and he nodded.
The Vanguard came and took Paul back into their custody, so that the Council would consider everything Memphis told them during the trial.
Without skipping a beat, once the dangers subsided, the trial began once again, and from there, the Council unanimously exonerates Paul of the murder of Theta.
Having scouted every part of Gallifrey, the Vanguard haven't found the murderer, with Memphis's account they were cautious, before it was decided that the murderer escaped Gallifrey.
Freed from his confines, Paul was deemed a free man, yet he couldn't help but think back to Straxus.
He was nowhere near Gallifrey, seemingly disappeared himself, that it made Paul wonder what his true goal was, and how he was supposed to repay the debt.
Standing in front of the Doctor, Paul thanked him for all he did, and the Doctor gestured as he says, "It's our lot in life, innit?"
Nodding, Paul affirmed with, "Indeed. I'm sure you'll be happy being on your way, now."
Smiling the Doctor goes, "I've learned a great deal during the short time I was here, shame I'll never have the opportunity to come again."
It was a miracle the Council didn't have the Doctor's head lopped off right then and there for infiltrating their Vanguard, but Paul told him that after what happened, they just wanted everything to go back to normal.
Even if they don't know what normal is, anymore, if he was honest.
Shaking his hand, Paul watched the Doctor leave in his TARDIS before turning his attention to Memphis arriving to see him off, wearing his normal robes.
"I was wrong about you," Memphis admitted that he let his prejudice get the better of him before Paul responded that it wasn't inherently his fault, he was at the mercy of his peers, all that.
Nodding, Memphis held his hand out and Paul shook it.
"I'm not sure when I'll come back, if I'll be welcomed," Paul admitted that while he was deemed innocent by the Council, others still clung to their biases against him.
Snorting, Memphis responded, "Let them! A child of time comes back to where time begins."
Smiling, Paul thanked him before he stepped into his TARDIS and it disappeared from Gallifrey.
Exhaling sharply, it allows Paul time to decompress, before he noticed Taylor sitting on the steps with a look on her face.
Sitting next to her, Paul eyed her as he asked if she was alright, before she told him about his fake counterpart spouting what sounded like madness.
How she and the Doctor ended up trapped with that woman who was intent on killing the Doctor hadn't Taylor drawn her attention away from him.
How the woman told her that she knew everything about her and said awful things about her mother, that she didn't want to believe it was true.
Then.
"A man came to me, I don't know where he came from, how he found us," Taylor revealed how she was approached by a strange man as everything around her was frozen in time.
When he touched her hand, her mind blanked, she and the Doctor were somewhere else, the woman gone, but there were flashes of scenes that didn't make sense.
These flashes come and went, but as they happened, it fed into her curiosity, and her yearning for answers.
His arm wrapped around her waist as he pulled her close, Paul promised to help Taylor with anything she needed.
Resting her head on his shoulder, Taylor exhales as she touched her necklace, the burnt amber gem shimmering.
Elsewhere…
Struggling, the woman who had been after Taylor and the others was frozen in place, her surrounding was not in the Underkeep, but somewhere else.
Appearing before her, Straxus held his arms behind him.
"My dear…soror… you… willnot… be…usedanymore…" Straxus's illuminating eyes showed his concerns for the woman as she attempted to break free of her unseen restraints, but fails at every time.
Struggling, she shouts, "Let me go! Let me go!"
She's stopped when Straxus told her, "Youare… safe now… hehas… nocontrol… nothing… over…you…"
When he met her in the kitchen before she set fire to the mansion, he promised that he would rescue her from her plight, and he did just that.
No longer will she be afraid… no longer will she peer behind her shoulder… wondering where her tormentors were.
Eying him the woman goes, "It won't ever stop."
His trick today was only a setback, but the entity that consumed the vast amount of energy and almost doomed Gallifrey wasn't deterred.
"I am…aware… my dear…soror… but now… Iwillleave you… withagift…" Straxus's thin lips pulled back to form a smile as he presented something the woman had never owned in her life.
A name.
After all, they are in a twisted way, a family.
"Youare… Orsolya… al…Alhazared… my dear…soror…"
Stunned the woman eyed him as he gave her a name.
He knew part of it bothered her, but he told her it was part of the structure… that it didn't matter in the grand scheme of things since his progenitor is dead.
"What now?" The newly named Orsolya asked Straxus.
Straxus turned his head as they're somewhere else, where he then told her that he wanted her to live a life that he could not have himself.
"What… what is my mission?" Orsolya questioned what she was supposed to do in her new surroundings.
Smiling at her, Straxus tells her, "Live… my dear…soror… I… will…makethings… right."
THE END