Prisms of No Color, Ch 4 by rose_of_pollux [Doctor Who, Ritenuto]
Title: Prisms of No Color, Chapter 4: Darkened Rolling Figures
Author: Crystal Rose of Pollux (rose_of_pollux)
Theme: 17; Ritenuto
Fandom: Doctor Who
Warnings: PG13
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine, and the story is.
Summary/Comments: Jamie gets another vision, and the Doctor searches for a solution to solve his problem.
Notes: N/A
Cross-posted to fanfiction.net, tumblr, and whofic.com
The air was soon filled with the sound of the approaching hovercrafts. Slowly, the Doctor peered out from behind their cover of rocks. A flash of lightning revealed nearly two dozen men dismounting from the vehicles, each holding a laser weapon; the glow from the crystals bathed them in a strange light, the majority of their imposing figures obscured by darkness.
The Doctor ducked back down, pulling Jamie and Zoe close to him.
“How many?” Jamie whispered.
“Too many,” the Doctor whispered back. “It’s going to take more than Venusian aikido to deal with all of them.”
Zoe shuddered.
“I don’t understand,” she whispered. “We didn’t do a single thing wrong; we just came here for a closer look. Why would someone attack us like that?”
“There was nothing in my diary about them being aggressive,” the Doctor whispered back. “I really can’t understand it, either.”
“Maybe we’re in a restricted area?” Jamie asked.
“Can’t be,” Zoe said. “We’d have seen signs or a fence…”
“Shh!” the Doctor said, holding them even closer as the men drew nearer.
They all fell silent, Jamie clinging to the Doctor’s arm as he usually did in situations like this. Getting attacked was nothing new; it was all part and parcel of traveling with the Doctor. But, usually, there was some reason as to why they would be attacked-especially if their attackers were human, as these were…
His thoughts began to fade, and suddenly, he was no longer thinking about the men surrounding them, but of the spot they were sitting in.
He saw a bolt of lightning… a crack of thunder… And the three of them running… running for their lives…
With a yelp, he tried to get up and run, but the Doctor’s arm was still locked around him. The Time Lord quietly chided him to be quiet.
“We need to get oot of here!” Jamie protested. “We need to run!”
“We can’t run; we’d never make it!” the Doctor hissed. “Now, shush; you’ll give us away!”
“But-”
“Quiet!”
But Jamie would not sit still; he fought against the Doctor’s hold.
“Jamie, for the final time… Oh, my word!”
He had glanced back at the Scot in frustration, only to see his eyes glowing brighter again, just as they had been upon his awakening-and his last vision.
Zoe let out a quiet gasp, and the Doctor now let Jamie go; the Scot moved to haul both the Doctor and Zoe to their feet. As they started running, the squad of men spotted them.
“There they are!” the one in the lead snarled. “Apprehend them at once and take them back to-”
His words were cut off as a bolt of lightning struck the spot behind the rocks were the trio had been only moments before. Thunder boomed, and Zoe cried out involuntarily, her ears ringing as the darkened figures began to rush towards them, stopping as the lightning strike shook them up.
“Keep going!” the Doctor ordered, his voice barely audible. “Run! Back to the TARDIS!”
The squad of men, also temporarily incapacitated by the proximity of the lightning strike, took a moment to realize that the trio had made progress with their escape. They ran for their hovercrafts, a few of the firing their lasers over the trio as warnings.
“Don’t look back!” the Doctor ordered, as he saw Zoe attempting to do so. “Keep going! And for pity’s sake-stay with me!”
Not willing to take any chances of getting separated, he grabbed on to his companions’ wrists, fleeing in his usual ungainly run. He changed their path several times, once even doubling back in the hopes of throwing their pursuers off of their trail.
Somehow, they managed to make it back to the TARDIS; the Doctor practically shoved them both inside before following and locking the doors.
“Are you both alright?!” he asked.
“I… I think so…” Zoe said, exhausted.
The Doctor looked to Jamie, who could only manage a nod. The Gallifreyan looked alarmed at the sweat pouring down the Scot’s face and quickly refilled the water canteen, handing it back to him.
“Drink up.”
Jamie nodded again, grateful for the cold water. Zoe got to her feet after making sure he was okay and stood beside the Doctor at the console.
“Are we leaving?” she asked.
The Doctor looked at the readings on the console, his face falling.
“We couldn’t, even if we wanted to,” he said, flipping the dematerialization switch in vain. “It’s just as I feared-between the loss of time energy in the vortex and the intake of the water, the TARDIS can’t go.”
“Is it because of me?” Jamie asked, joining them now. “I mean… Have I made things worse? …If there’s anything I could do-”
“No, no, no,” the Doctor said, placing his hands on Jamie’s shoulders again. “The amount of time energy in your cells would not be able to have such an impact on the TARDIS. With you, my major concern is both the danger of dehydration and the dangers of foreseeing the future.”
“You never did explain why that was a bad thing,” Zoe said.
“If you give me a moment, I shall,” the Doctor promised. “But, right now, I wish to test a little theory I have that may solve both of Jamie’s problems in one go if I am correct in my reasoning.”
“Aye? What’s that?”
To Jamie and Zoe’s utter astonishment, the Doctor pulled a gun from one of his pockets. Jamie yelped and backed away as he pointed it at him.
“Doctor, you can’t!” Zoe shrieked.
“Oh, really-what do you think I am!?” the Gallifreyan exclaimed, rolling his eyes. “It’s a water pistol.”
“Oh…” Zoe said, looking embarrassed.
“Ye could’ve told me that before ye pointed that at me…” Jamie grumbled. “Hold on… Why are ye pointing that at me?”
“Because, as I said, I am testing a theory,” the Doctor explained. “It was your sudden collision with the crystals holding the time energy that caused some of it to displace the water your cells. With that in mind, it’s reasonable to suspect that a sudden shock of water may reverse the process.”
“Do you really think that will work?” Zoe asked.
“This is a learning experience for me, too, Zoe; I really don’t know what will work. But if there’s a chance that it might help Jamie, I am most certainly willing to try whatever idea seems feasible. Now then, Jamie, are you ready?”
“Do I even have a choice…?”
“Jamie, you said you would trust me,” the Doctor said, softly. “I’m admitting to you now that I don’t really know what I’m doing. But one thing I do know is that helping you is the most important thing right now-even more important than getting off of this planet. Are you willing to try this?”
Jamie nodded.
“Right, then. Here we go. Do try not to blink; I want to try this in your eyes, since that’s where the energy seems to be most concentrated…”
Zoe stood and watched as the Doctor fired the water pistol into each of the Scot’s eyes. He yelped again each time, and after rubbing the excess water out of them, grabbed for the Doctor’s mirror.
“Och, it didn’t work,” he said, seeing that his eyes were still glowing.
“Yes, I thought that sounded too easy…” the Doctor sighed. “Still, nothing ventured, nothing gained…”
“I don’t know,” Zoe said. “You seemed to have a good idea. But maybe it’s an all-or-nothing sort of thing in this case; the energy may be concentrated in Jamie’s eyes, but his other cells would be holding some of it, wouldn’t they?”
“Yes…” the Doctor agreed, his eyes narrowing as he came up with another idea. “Perhaps if we saturate as many of his cells with water as we can, that just might be what we need!”
“What do ye mean by saturate?” Jamie asked, not liking the sound of it.
“I mean stand right here and be patient. Zoe, follow me. And grab those buckets we were using earlier back when we were mopping up.”
“Oh, no…” Jamie groaned, as he watched them take the buckets. Sure enough, they returned with the buckets filled with water.
The TARDIS suddenly whirred in protest, prompting the Doctor to glance at the console and sigh in exasperation. He motioned for Zoe to wait, and he left the console room again, returning with a small, metal basin.
“Could you stand in that, please, Jamie?”
The Scot threw his hands up in the air in frustration, but obeyed, and then braced himself for the inevitable-
“On ‘three,’ then, Zoe?”
“Right.”
“One… two… three!”
Despite his best efforts to simply grin and bear it, an involuntary curse passed Jamie’s lips.
“We ought to wash his mouth out, too,” Zoe sniffed.
“Come now, Zoe; he has every right to be upset… I truly am sorry, Jamie. Let’s have a look, shall we?”
Jamie brushed the wet hair out of his eyes and glanced back at the Doctor. The Time Lord’s face fell slightly.
“No difference?” Jamie asked.
“None that I can see, I’m afraid. Well, so much for my theory…”
“No, I think your theory could still work,” Zoe said. “Two buckets of water can hardly be considered saturating his cells. For one thing, we’ve barely saturated any of them-he had his clothes on the whole time!”
“Oh, yes. Yes, that’s quite true. Jamie…”
He trailed off at the utterly indignant look on the Scot’s face.
“Er, yes. Perhaps you’d better take a shower, Jamie.”
“Oh. Aye, I’ll… I’ll do that.”
He stepped out of the basin with as much dignity as he could salvage and headed down the corridor adjoining the console room.
“And while you’re in there, try using soap,” Zoe called after him.
“How about ye try closing your mouth once in a while, eh?!”
“That’s quite enough!” the Doctor chided them. “We’re all on the same side here, after all!”
He sighed as he began to mop up Jamie’s trail of footprints.
“Just because he’s from the 18th century doesn’t mean he has to hold on to their hygiene habits,” Zoe said, grabbing a second mop to help him.
“You’re not giving him enough credit,” the Doctor said. “He’s had to make several adjustments since leaving his time-and you weren’t here to witness most of them! And he is, at least, taking daily showers now.”
“Which are useless if he’s not using soap!”
“Why is this bothering you all of a sudden?”
“Oh, it’s not the soap that’s bothering me,” she admitted. “It’s this whole mess. I’m worried about those men-and why we were attacked by them. But then there’s Jamie, and… I’m so worried about him.”
“I thought as much,” the Gallifreyan said. “So am I. You know the real reason I’m insisting on his drinking all that water?”
“No. Why?”
“If he gets too dehydrated, his cells might become unstable with the time energy in them-and break down.”
“Oh, Doctor!”
“Yes, I know.”
“You should tell him! His life is depending on this! Oh, you know how he is; he’s liable to try going on as long as he can without water just to prove his own endurance, or some other foolish reason!”
“And I fully intend to tell him,” the Doctor promised. “I’m just waiting for the right chance. He has plenty to worry about now as it is; you heard him-he thinks he’s making the situation worse.”
“Is he?”
“Of course not! What I said is true-his problem has no bearing on the problems in the Vortex.”
“Well, that’s good to know, at any rate,” Zoe sighed. “I guess that means that things couldn’t possibly get any worse, right?”
A loud hammering on the TARDIS doors cause them both to stare in that direction; angry shouting and laser fire were also audible, and the Doctor winced.
“Zoe, my dear, I wish you hadn’t said that…”
Author: Crystal Rose of Pollux (rose_of_pollux)
Theme: 17; Ritenuto
Fandom: Doctor Who
Warnings: PG13
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine, and the story is.
Summary/Comments: Jamie gets another vision, and the Doctor searches for a solution to solve his problem.
Notes: N/A
Cross-posted to fanfiction.net, tumblr, and whofic.com
The air was soon filled with the sound of the approaching hovercrafts. Slowly, the Doctor peered out from behind their cover of rocks. A flash of lightning revealed nearly two dozen men dismounting from the vehicles, each holding a laser weapon; the glow from the crystals bathed them in a strange light, the majority of their imposing figures obscured by darkness.
The Doctor ducked back down, pulling Jamie and Zoe close to him.
“How many?” Jamie whispered.
“Too many,” the Doctor whispered back. “It’s going to take more than Venusian aikido to deal with all of them.”
Zoe shuddered.
“I don’t understand,” she whispered. “We didn’t do a single thing wrong; we just came here for a closer look. Why would someone attack us like that?”
“There was nothing in my diary about them being aggressive,” the Doctor whispered back. “I really can’t understand it, either.”
“Maybe we’re in a restricted area?” Jamie asked.
“Can’t be,” Zoe said. “We’d have seen signs or a fence…”
“Shh!” the Doctor said, holding them even closer as the men drew nearer.
They all fell silent, Jamie clinging to the Doctor’s arm as he usually did in situations like this. Getting attacked was nothing new; it was all part and parcel of traveling with the Doctor. But, usually, there was some reason as to why they would be attacked-especially if their attackers were human, as these were…
His thoughts began to fade, and suddenly, he was no longer thinking about the men surrounding them, but of the spot they were sitting in.
He saw a bolt of lightning… a crack of thunder… And the three of them running… running for their lives…
With a yelp, he tried to get up and run, but the Doctor’s arm was still locked around him. The Time Lord quietly chided him to be quiet.
“We need to get oot of here!” Jamie protested. “We need to run!”
“We can’t run; we’d never make it!” the Doctor hissed. “Now, shush; you’ll give us away!”
“But-”
“Quiet!”
But Jamie would not sit still; he fought against the Doctor’s hold.
“Jamie, for the final time… Oh, my word!”
He had glanced back at the Scot in frustration, only to see his eyes glowing brighter again, just as they had been upon his awakening-and his last vision.
Zoe let out a quiet gasp, and the Doctor now let Jamie go; the Scot moved to haul both the Doctor and Zoe to their feet. As they started running, the squad of men spotted them.
“There they are!” the one in the lead snarled. “Apprehend them at once and take them back to-”
His words were cut off as a bolt of lightning struck the spot behind the rocks were the trio had been only moments before. Thunder boomed, and Zoe cried out involuntarily, her ears ringing as the darkened figures began to rush towards them, stopping as the lightning strike shook them up.
“Keep going!” the Doctor ordered, his voice barely audible. “Run! Back to the TARDIS!”
The squad of men, also temporarily incapacitated by the proximity of the lightning strike, took a moment to realize that the trio had made progress with their escape. They ran for their hovercrafts, a few of the firing their lasers over the trio as warnings.
“Don’t look back!” the Doctor ordered, as he saw Zoe attempting to do so. “Keep going! And for pity’s sake-stay with me!”
Not willing to take any chances of getting separated, he grabbed on to his companions’ wrists, fleeing in his usual ungainly run. He changed their path several times, once even doubling back in the hopes of throwing their pursuers off of their trail.
Somehow, they managed to make it back to the TARDIS; the Doctor practically shoved them both inside before following and locking the doors.
“Are you both alright?!” he asked.
“I… I think so…” Zoe said, exhausted.
The Doctor looked to Jamie, who could only manage a nod. The Gallifreyan looked alarmed at the sweat pouring down the Scot’s face and quickly refilled the water canteen, handing it back to him.
“Drink up.”
Jamie nodded again, grateful for the cold water. Zoe got to her feet after making sure he was okay and stood beside the Doctor at the console.
“Are we leaving?” she asked.
The Doctor looked at the readings on the console, his face falling.
“We couldn’t, even if we wanted to,” he said, flipping the dematerialization switch in vain. “It’s just as I feared-between the loss of time energy in the vortex and the intake of the water, the TARDIS can’t go.”
“Is it because of me?” Jamie asked, joining them now. “I mean… Have I made things worse? …If there’s anything I could do-”
“No, no, no,” the Doctor said, placing his hands on Jamie’s shoulders again. “The amount of time energy in your cells would not be able to have such an impact on the TARDIS. With you, my major concern is both the danger of dehydration and the dangers of foreseeing the future.”
“You never did explain why that was a bad thing,” Zoe said.
“If you give me a moment, I shall,” the Doctor promised. “But, right now, I wish to test a little theory I have that may solve both of Jamie’s problems in one go if I am correct in my reasoning.”
“Aye? What’s that?”
To Jamie and Zoe’s utter astonishment, the Doctor pulled a gun from one of his pockets. Jamie yelped and backed away as he pointed it at him.
“Doctor, you can’t!” Zoe shrieked.
“Oh, really-what do you think I am!?” the Gallifreyan exclaimed, rolling his eyes. “It’s a water pistol.”
“Oh…” Zoe said, looking embarrassed.
“Ye could’ve told me that before ye pointed that at me…” Jamie grumbled. “Hold on… Why are ye pointing that at me?”
“Because, as I said, I am testing a theory,” the Doctor explained. “It was your sudden collision with the crystals holding the time energy that caused some of it to displace the water your cells. With that in mind, it’s reasonable to suspect that a sudden shock of water may reverse the process.”
“Do you really think that will work?” Zoe asked.
“This is a learning experience for me, too, Zoe; I really don’t know what will work. But if there’s a chance that it might help Jamie, I am most certainly willing to try whatever idea seems feasible. Now then, Jamie, are you ready?”
“Do I even have a choice…?”
“Jamie, you said you would trust me,” the Doctor said, softly. “I’m admitting to you now that I don’t really know what I’m doing. But one thing I do know is that helping you is the most important thing right now-even more important than getting off of this planet. Are you willing to try this?”
Jamie nodded.
“Right, then. Here we go. Do try not to blink; I want to try this in your eyes, since that’s where the energy seems to be most concentrated…”
Zoe stood and watched as the Doctor fired the water pistol into each of the Scot’s eyes. He yelped again each time, and after rubbing the excess water out of them, grabbed for the Doctor’s mirror.
“Och, it didn’t work,” he said, seeing that his eyes were still glowing.
“Yes, I thought that sounded too easy…” the Doctor sighed. “Still, nothing ventured, nothing gained…”
“I don’t know,” Zoe said. “You seemed to have a good idea. But maybe it’s an all-or-nothing sort of thing in this case; the energy may be concentrated in Jamie’s eyes, but his other cells would be holding some of it, wouldn’t they?”
“Yes…” the Doctor agreed, his eyes narrowing as he came up with another idea. “Perhaps if we saturate as many of his cells with water as we can, that just might be what we need!”
“What do ye mean by saturate?” Jamie asked, not liking the sound of it.
“I mean stand right here and be patient. Zoe, follow me. And grab those buckets we were using earlier back when we were mopping up.”
“Oh, no…” Jamie groaned, as he watched them take the buckets. Sure enough, they returned with the buckets filled with water.
The TARDIS suddenly whirred in protest, prompting the Doctor to glance at the console and sigh in exasperation. He motioned for Zoe to wait, and he left the console room again, returning with a small, metal basin.
“Could you stand in that, please, Jamie?”
The Scot threw his hands up in the air in frustration, but obeyed, and then braced himself for the inevitable-
“On ‘three,’ then, Zoe?”
“Right.”
“One… two… three!”
Despite his best efforts to simply grin and bear it, an involuntary curse passed Jamie’s lips.
“We ought to wash his mouth out, too,” Zoe sniffed.
“Come now, Zoe; he has every right to be upset… I truly am sorry, Jamie. Let’s have a look, shall we?”
Jamie brushed the wet hair out of his eyes and glanced back at the Doctor. The Time Lord’s face fell slightly.
“No difference?” Jamie asked.
“None that I can see, I’m afraid. Well, so much for my theory…”
“No, I think your theory could still work,” Zoe said. “Two buckets of water can hardly be considered saturating his cells. For one thing, we’ve barely saturated any of them-he had his clothes on the whole time!”
“Oh, yes. Yes, that’s quite true. Jamie…”
He trailed off at the utterly indignant look on the Scot’s face.
“Er, yes. Perhaps you’d better take a shower, Jamie.”
“Oh. Aye, I’ll… I’ll do that.”
He stepped out of the basin with as much dignity as he could salvage and headed down the corridor adjoining the console room.
“And while you’re in there, try using soap,” Zoe called after him.
“How about ye try closing your mouth once in a while, eh?!”
“That’s quite enough!” the Doctor chided them. “We’re all on the same side here, after all!”
He sighed as he began to mop up Jamie’s trail of footprints.
“Just because he’s from the 18th century doesn’t mean he has to hold on to their hygiene habits,” Zoe said, grabbing a second mop to help him.
“You’re not giving him enough credit,” the Doctor said. “He’s had to make several adjustments since leaving his time-and you weren’t here to witness most of them! And he is, at least, taking daily showers now.”
“Which are useless if he’s not using soap!”
“Why is this bothering you all of a sudden?”
“Oh, it’s not the soap that’s bothering me,” she admitted. “It’s this whole mess. I’m worried about those men-and why we were attacked by them. But then there’s Jamie, and… I’m so worried about him.”
“I thought as much,” the Gallifreyan said. “So am I. You know the real reason I’m insisting on his drinking all that water?”
“No. Why?”
“If he gets too dehydrated, his cells might become unstable with the time energy in them-and break down.”
“Oh, Doctor!”
“Yes, I know.”
“You should tell him! His life is depending on this! Oh, you know how he is; he’s liable to try going on as long as he can without water just to prove his own endurance, or some other foolish reason!”
“And I fully intend to tell him,” the Doctor promised. “I’m just waiting for the right chance. He has plenty to worry about now as it is; you heard him-he thinks he’s making the situation worse.”
“Is he?”
“Of course not! What I said is true-his problem has no bearing on the problems in the Vortex.”
“Well, that’s good to know, at any rate,” Zoe sighed. “I guess that means that things couldn’t possibly get any worse, right?”
A loud hammering on the TARDIS doors cause them both to stare in that direction; angry shouting and laser fire were also audible, and the Doctor winced.
“Zoe, my dear, I wish you hadn’t said that…”