Doctor Who Fan Fiction ❯ Rose and Nine The Inbetweens and backstories ❯ Chapter Six ( Chapter 6 )

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The Doctor and Rose stood, leaning against the console, arms and ankles crossed, grinning like idiots at the doors of the TARDIS.

`Doctor . . .? What're you doing standing inside a box?' they heard Adam call from outside. He popped his head around the door and stepped inside. `Rose?' he asked and then froze.

The Doctor unfolded his arms and pushed down the materialise/de-materialise lever which started the Time Rotor pumping.

Adam turned a full circle, his eyes, and mouth wide open. `Wha?' was all he managed to utter before his eyes rolled upwards and he collapsed onto the floor grating.

`Oh great,' the Doctor said sarcastically, rolling his eyes. `This one's worse than Ricky. What is it about you and your boyfriends?' he said, giving her a cheeky smile.

`I told you, he's not my . . .' Rose started to protest in a huff. `Mickey's my boyfriend . . . was my boyfriend . . . might still be my boyfriend.' She fell silent as the Doctor walked down the ramp.

`Well, whatever he is, he's useless.' He crouched down and pulled him up into a fireman's lift over his shoulders. Rose was surprised at how easily the Doctor lifted the unconscious Adam and slung him over his shoulder, he was stronger than he looked.

`I'll go and put him on a couch in the Medi-Bay, the TARDIS can keep an eye on him 'til he wakes up,' he said as he walked past the console.

He chuckled to himself. `There's a baby monitor in there, so we can hear him when he wakes up, but it'll be more like a boyfriend monitor,' he said teasingly.

`Shut up,' Rose said with a grin.

After putting Adam in the Medi-Bay, they made their way to the kitchen for a cup of tea and a bite to eat.

`So is that it now, with you and the Daleks, is it really over like you said?' Rose asked as she took a sip of her tea.

The Doctor had that far away stare in his eyes. `Yeah, it should be. The universe is a better and safer place without them, and I don't say that about many species.'

He had a sip of his tea, and hesitated before speaking again. `About back there . . . y'know, in the bunker . . . when I sealed the vault.'

Rose reached across the table and squeezed his hand. `Hey, remember what I said? I know it wasn't your fault; you did what had to be done.'

`I know, but . . .'

`And I meant every word of it y'know; I wouldn't have missed any of this for the world.'

There was something else that she wanted to ask the Doctor about when she was in the vault, but didn't know how to ask. The Dalek had threatened to kill her if he didn't open the door, and although she was terrified, she told the Doctor not to do it.

`What use are emotions if you will not save the woman you love?' it had asked. What did it mean by that? Was it just trying to goad him into opening the door, or was there something else?

They were interrupted by a gasp over the boyfriend monitor (sorry, the baby monitor). `Ugh . . . it was bigger inside!' they heard Adam exclaim as he regained consciousness.

`What kind of hospital room is this? NURSE, DOCTOR?' he called out.

`That'll be us he wants,' the Doctor said. `C'mon Nurse Tyler, let's tend to our patient.'

When they reached the Medi-Bay, Adam was sitting up on the medi-bed.

`Oh, thank God it's you,' he said. `What happened, which hospital am I in? I had this weird hallucination that your blue box had a large, alien looking room inside it.'

`Ah, that would be neurogenic shock, brought on by a disparity of sensory inputs and a failure to rationalise what you were seeing,' the Doctor told him.

Adam had the `dribble' expression on his face, and Rose giggled. `He's sayin' you fainted because you couldn't believe your eyes.'

`Fainted, how embarrassing is that?'

`Yeah, I've got to say that you're the first person who's fainted when they've walked through those doors,' the Doctor told him.

`D'ya remember when you told me that you thought the United Nations were keepin' everythin' quiet about aliens, and that they really exist?' Rose asked him.

`Yeah?'

`Well, come with me,' she said, grabbing his hand, pulling him off the medi-bed and heading for the console room.

`This is the room I thought I saw in your wooden box, Doctor.'

`Yeah,' Rose said, `and it's still there. You're inside an alien ship that's bigger on the inside.'

`No way, I don't believe it.'

Rose was laughing at the expression of disbelief on Adam's face. `Can we go somewhere so that we can show `im?' she asked the Doctor.

`Yeah, why not? I know just the place.' He went to the console and started up the Time Rotor.

Adam leant over and whispered in Rose's ear. `What's happening, what's that thing moving up and down?'

`Er, it's the ship's motor . . . er, we're sort of in flight,' she told him, trying to bluff her way through his questions. She didn't want him to think that she was just a clueless passenger.

She smiled at him and casually strolled around the console to stand next to the Doctor. `Hey,' she said in a stage whisper. `When we land, can you take me out first and tell me where we are?'

The Doctor looked down at her. `Eh?'

Rose casually nodded at Adam. `Y'know, so it looks like I'm a seasoned traveller an' all that.'

The Doctor raised his chin in realisation and smiled. `Oh, I see, you want to impress Pretty Boy over there,' he whispered back.

`No,' she lied.

`Hmm, okay, no problem.'

`Thanks.'

The Doctor ran around the console, readying the TARDIS for landing. The Time Rotor stopped, and silence descended on the console room.

`Right then Adam, you wait here; while Rose and me go and check that it's safe out there. We've got a lot of experience in this sort of thing.' He smiled and winked at Rose.

They headed down the ramp and out of the doors.

`So, it's two hundred thousand, and it's a spaceship. No, wait a minute, space station, and er, go and try that gate over there. Off you go,' he said quickly.

`Two hundred thousand?' she queried.

`Two hundred thousand,' he confirmed with a smile and a waggle of his eyebrows.

`Right.' She turned and knocked on the door. `Adam? Out you come,' she called, opening the door.

`Oh, my God,' he said, his mouth falling open.

Rose grinned. `Don't worry, you'll get used to it.'

`Where are we?' he asked, looking around the futuristic environment.

`Good question. Let's see. So, er, judging by the architecture, I'd say we're around the year . . . two hundred thousand. And if you listen . . .'

`Yeah.'

`Engines. We're on some sort of space station. Yeah, definitely a space station. It's a bit warm in here. They could turn the heating down. Tell you what - let's try that gate. Come on!' She led them through a metal gate, up some steps and onto a large viewing platform that looked out into the vastness of space and a beautiful blue orb below. `Here we go! And this is . . . I'll let the Doctor describe it.'

`The Fourth great and bountiful Human Empire,' the Doctor started to lecture. `And there it is; planet Earth at its height. Covered with mega-cities, five moons, population ninety six billion. The hub of a galactic domain stretching across a million planets, a million species, with mankind right in the middle.'

This was all too much for Adam, who had another episode of neurogenic shock, brought on by a disparity of sensory inputs and a failure to rationalise what he was seeing, and promptly fainted.

`He's your boyfriend,' the Doctor said, in a matter of fact tone of voice.

Not anymore, she replied.

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Rose closed the door of the TARDIS and walked up the ramp to the console, the sound of the Time Rotor started as she stood beside the Doctor.

`Did you mean what you said back there?' she asked the Doctor, who was adjusting the controls.

`Mean what?'

`That you only take the best, and you'd got me?'

He turned and smiled at her. `I might have done, only you're not the best at choosing boyfriends, are you.'

She playfully slapped his arm. `I told you you'd get a smack, Adam wasn't my boyfriend.' She went quiet as she thought about her actual boyfriend and how she'd left him behind. `Is he going to be all right though, with that thing in his head?'

`Yeah, he'll just have to get used to wearing hats . . . or he could grow his hair long like a hippie,' he said with a laugh, and Rose laughed with him.

`So how was that trip then?' he asked her when they'd finished laughing. `Not too far in the future this time?'

`No, that was okay. Lots of humans, futuristic gadgets and stuff. Oh, and the planet's still there.'

He picked up on the “lots of humans” comment. She still wasn't confident with meeting aliens just yet. `Right, so let's try a trip back to your home town, say within a generation, y'know, your grandparent's era. I know, the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley, how does that sound?'

`That would be when? Early nineteen hundreds?

`Yeah, 1920s. Pop to the wardrobe and you can dress up again.'

`Brilliant. See ya later.' She bounced on her toes, turned on her heels, and headed for the clothing emporium.

Rose looked down at herself, wondering how daft she seemed. Did they really dress like this in the 1920s . . . thin cotton down to the calf? And in mint green? She had found a long, dark cloak with a hood, which she dumped across the TARDIS console.

The Doctor spared her a glance. He was tapping at some meter or other. Satisfied, he nodded and moved to the next control . . . which was covered by Rose's cloak. A brief frown and the Doctor moved on. Rose watched his fiercely intense eyes reflecting the light of the console as he focused on the next control. She liked the way he stood so still and so confident . . . yet any second she knew he might break into a broad grin.

Seeming to realise he was being watched, he looked up at her again. 'What?'

'Are we nearly there yet?' she said teasingly.

'You sound like a kid on an outing.'

'I am a kid on an outing. An outing back in time.' She couldn't help smiling at the prospect, and he grinned back.

'Yeah. Great, isn't it? It's 1924 out there. Or will be in a mo.' He tapped encouragingly on a control.

'And that's when this exhibition thing is?'

'The British Empire Exhibition, yeah. Got to get a bit of culture now and then.'

Rose laughed. 'Like a school trip. Tell me again . . . why do I want to see it?'

He blinked in feigned disbelief. 'Because your best mate's going.'

That made her grin. 'So why doesn't he have to dress up for it?'

He was shocked now, standing back from the console and gesturing at his own clothes. Leather jacket over a dark brown round-necked shirt, faded slacks and battered shoes. 'Excuse me,' he said, pointing. 'New shirt.'

Without waiting for her verdict on the shirt, he turned to the scanner. The picture was dark, too dark to see anything at first. Then the blackness softened into shapes as the contrast and brightness adjusted.

'We could try infrared,' the Doctor muttered. 'But I don't think there's much heat out there.'

Rose could dimly make out some of the shapes now . . . ironwork and wooden planks; an old bedstead and a pile of buckets. 'It's cold and we're in a scrapyard.'

The Doctor shrugged, 'I like scrapyards. Never know what you might find.' He stared past the console, remembering his first trip to London with his granddaughter. It had been Foreman's Scrap Merchants at 76 Totter's Lane.

He checked another reading. 'You'll need that cloak,' he said, as if noticing it for the first time. The doors opened, and a faint trace of mist wafted in from the yard.

'Reckon we'll meet anyone famous?' Rose wondered.

'In October 1924?'

'They did have famous people then, right?'

His voice floated back from the misty outside. 'No television, but yeah they did.'

Rose hurried after him, into the excitement of the unknown.

The air was cold with a smell of damp and smog. Rose pulled the cloak tight about her and ran over to the Doctor. He was inspecting a large wooden gate, his sonic screwdriver poised over the lock, glowing busily.

'Breaking and exiting?' Rose suggested. Her breath misted the air as she spoke.

The Doctor did not look up. 'Someone's in trouble - can't you hear?'

Now that he said it, she could. In among the noise of the city . . . the clatter of distant wheels on cobbles, the far off sounds of people shouting and calling, the melancholy hoot of a boat on the Thames . . . Over and above that she could hear the muffled cries of someone in pain, or fear.

The sonic screwdriver hummed, and the lock clicked open. The Doctor was already kicking at the heavy gate,

sending it flying back as he hurtled through.

Fifty feet away, startled in the pale glow of a street lamp, a man was fighting for his life. His assailant was forcing him backwards, its hands round the man's neck as it bore down on him. A dark shape behind the struggling figures . . . all silhouette and no detail. The vague notion of a third figure disappearing back into the shadows.

The Doctor crashed shoulder-first into the attacker. Hold broken, the figure stepped back. The Doctor collapsed, clutching his shoulder, then pulled himself back to his feet. The attacker paused in the deepest shadows, deciding whether to take on the Doctor as well as its first victim.

'Doctor!' Rose ran towards them. Her appearance seemed to decide it, and the dark figure turned and marched stiffly away. Watching the figure, trying to make out some feature in the dim light,

Rose caught her foot on the kerb and went sprawling. She put out her hands to save herself, feeling the rough surface of the pavement cutting into them, rubbing away the skin. She came to rest in an undignified heap close to the man who had been attacked.

He was lying gasping on the ground, rubbing at his throat. He was wearing white gloves, but now they were stained and dirty. The Doctor leaned over and loosened the man's collar. 'Has he gone?' he asked without looking at Rose.

'Yeah. I scared him off.' She got to her feet, shrugging the cloak back over her shoulders and examining her hands . . . grazed, sore and covered in mud. Typical.

'I'm glad someone did.' The Doctor straightened up and rubbed his shoulder again. 'It was like running into a brick wall.'

Rose stooped to help the man on the ground. He was breathing more easily now and struggling to sit up.

'Thank you,' he croaked. 'I'm obliged.'

'You're alive,' the Doctor said. He put his hand under the man's elbow and helped him up.

'Who was that?' Rose asked. 'Why did he attack you?'

'I have no idea, miss. I heard a noise, saw lights. I came to see what it was and . . .' He shrugged, still rubbing at his neck.

'Here, let's see.' The Doctor led him a few steps down the pavement so they were directly under the street light. He gestured for the man to raise his head. 'It's all right, I'm a doctor.'

'Just not a medical one,' Rose pointed out, earning a glare. 'So, is he OK?'

'Dickson, miss.'

'Mr Dickson will be fine,' the Doctor said. 'Lucky we got here when we did, though. Where do you live?'

'I am in service, sir, at the house over there.' Dickson pointed to a large town house further down the street. Rose could see that the side door was open and light was spilling out down the steps.

'Then let's get you back there.' The Doctor stepped away, looking Dickson up and down. He frowned and reached for the man's hand, lifted it gently in his own to examine it in the light. Apparently satisfied, he smiled, let the hand go, gestured for Dickson to lead the way. He took Dickson's arm to help him.

'What is it?' Rose asked quietly.

'You keep your gloves clean, Mr Dickson?'

'Of course, sir.' He still sounded hoarse, his voice scraping in his throat. 'Why?'

'Just they're a bit grubby now, after your little adventure. Another mystery.'

'To go with "who?" and "why?",' Rose said.

'To go with the fact that the marks on Mr Dickson's neck look like they were made by a metal implement, not fingers,' the Doctor said. 'And that his gloves are stained with oil.'

From the darkest part of the shadowy evening, two figures watched the Doctor and Rose help Dickson back to the house. One of them gave a sigh of disappointment. The other had no breath with which to sigh.