The Stolen Earth Incident - Chapter Forty
The TARDIS
Clint handed the phone back to Donna, thanking her as together they headed back to the TARDIS’ control room.
She shrugged. “Not a problem. I know what it’s like when you have loved ones and they worry.” She smiled. “My Granddad was really glad to hear from me.”
“How does he handle it?” Clint asked. “You, travelling in time like you do?”
“He encouraged me to go, actually,” she said. “He met the Doctor first, a couple of Christmases ago. Only we didn’t know it was the same guy until after my little adventure with the Racnoss.”
He bumped her shoulder companionably. “You’re gonna need to finish telling that story.”
Clint really wanted to share about his own second-degree connection with the Time Lord, but he knew that, for this Doctor, it hadn’t happened yet. He didn’t dare say a thing because he really didn’t want to wreck timelines. The last thing he needed was to be blamed for some shit that got changed because he couldn’t keep his mouth shut.
The Doctor Double was leaning over the console when they arrived back onto the control room, a strange lash-up thing cradled in one arm as he poked and prodded several buttons on the console. He glanced up at them as they entered, and then went back to whatever the hell he was doing.
Clint might not have known the alien for long, but he could already tell the guy was a dismissive bastard. But then, he just seemed easily distracted a lot of the time. Once again it reminded him of what he’d seen and read about Tony Stark.
He had a sneaking suspicion that the Doctor and Stark would either hate each other’s guts or enter into one of the most epic bromances of all time.
“Alright,” Donna said, cutting into The Doctor Double’s work, “just what is that thing?”
He stopped what he was doing to explain, and he actually seemed a bit less manic than before. He held up the cobbled together whatever it was so they could get a better look at it. It almost resembled a gun, only with a flared front that resembled a very small satellite dish. It was about the length of Clint’s forearm, but bulky; wires ran through the exposed guts of the thing, like multi-coloured spaghetti twisted together on all sorts of random ways. There were two handgrips, one which must have been the trigger.
Clint wasn’t impressed, but if it did the job then who was he to judge?
Whatever that job was.
“It’s our only hope,” he answered. “A zed-neutrino biological catalyser.”
“That’s the same stuff from that reading you got from when the planets lined up,” Clint pointed out.
The Doctor Double grinned like Clint had done a really entertaining trick. “Exactly!
“Yeah, but what does it do?” Donna demanded. “Earth girl here, remember?”
“Davros said he built those Daleks out of himself,” the Doctor Double said, cocking one hip against the sharp-looking edge of the console, tucking the weird device back against his chest as if he was protecting it from them. “His genetic code runs through the entire race. If I can use this to lock the Crucible’s transmission onto Davros himself…” His voice faded out, and he looked at the pair of the expectantly, as if he was expecting them to finish his explanation for him.
“Then that zed-neutrino whatever will destroy Davros?’ Donna asked, looking puzzled.
Clint was just as confused. What would be aiming that beam thing do, even if it did bomb the shit out of Davros?
The answer hit him the moment Donna said, “It destroys the Daleks too?”
The grin the Doctor Double aimed in her direction was just a little bit scary. “Biggest backfire in history.”
“How close do you have to get to Davros for it to work?” Clint asked, his mind already turning over sightlines and possibilities.
“Fairly close,” the Doctor Double admitted.
“Then we’re gonna need to come up with some sort of plan to get close enough to use it, without getting blasted by every Dalek in the room.”
The Doctor Double frowned, obviously pensive. Then he grinned. “Guess I’ll just have to get a running start then.”
Yeah, like this sort of plan was ever going to work. “Or else you let someone else aim and shoot.”
It was apparent that the guy was going to argue, but Clint knew he was right. “We’ll need a distraction,” he pointed out before the Doctor Double could say anything, “and you showing up would be perfect, since I’m assuming they’re going to have your full Time Lord part as a prisoner still. Having a second Doctor crash the party is bound to freak a few people out.”
Okay, it seemed like the Doctor Double was considering Clint’s words which, given the bastard seemed a bit full of his own intelligence, was saying something. “Go on.”
“While they’re all busy with being distracted with you,” he continued, “someone else could have that gizmo and use it.”
“You’re thinking you could,” the Doctor Double said, sounding accusatory in a way that Clint just didn’t understand.
He shrugged. “I hate to toot my own horn, but I do happen to be a sharpshooter. If anyone has the best chance of hitting at what they aim at, it’s me.”
“He has a point,” Donna made her opinion known.
Clint thought the Doctor Double was going to argue, that he didn’t think that Clint could pull it off. His dark eyes pinned the archer as if he was trying to see into Clint’s soul, which he certainly hoped wasn’t the case because he honestly didn’t think it was all that clean, not after everything he’d done before finding himself on the side of the angels, so to speak. It was a work in progress, he still had a lot of red in his ledger, but that would never stop him from doing the right thing now that he had good reason to. He had friends now, and a form of family; a place of his own and enough self-respect to get through each day. Plus, he had Phil, and there were days when Clint had no idea just what he’d done to deserve Phil’s love and attention.
Finally, the Doctor Double nodded, one sharp gesture that was as adamant as a spoken word. “Let me show you how to use this. But we need to get moving soon, because I don’t think Davros will wait to use the zed-neutrino device again. He’s already recalling all the Daleks from the Earth.”
“Is this neutrino thingy going to destroy the planets once it’s used?” Donna asked.
“Yep. If what I believe is true, it won’t be needed after this one, final detonation. All of these worlds will cease to exist.”
“Then let’s get this show on the road.” Clint also felt that time was getting away from them, and while this might have been an actual time machine he had the notion that, in this instance, it wouldn’t much help them.
**********
Learning how to use the techno-bobble didn’t take Clint all that long, for which he was grateful. The Doctor Double actually seemed impressed with his ability to pick up the basics enough to work the thing, which made the archer feel undeniably proud of himself.
Then the Doctor Double took the TARDIS in for a landing.
Or whatever a sentient time machine did.
Clint could really feel the TARDIS’ gratitude, and he figured out just before it was show time that she was happy that he was going to be the one to pull the trigger. He didn’t know why, but he could guess from the files he’d read on the Doctor. If the rumours about the so-called Time War were true, then the Doctor wouldn’t have wanted to even contemplate yet another genocide…which was what the Doctor Double was doing by turning the zed-neutrino beam back on Davros, and then into the Daleks.
Had the Doctor Double gotten that ruthless streak from Clint, in that metacrisis thing? Because it certainly hadn’t come from Donna, and Clint could be a bastard when it came to completing a mission. He also wasn’t afraid to kill his target, even though the people he’d assassinated on behalf of SHIELD had deserved it, and would have escaped justice otherwise. Human traffickers, murderers, even other assassins…they’d all felt the bite of an arrow from a distance.
“You gonna be okay doing this?” Donna asked.
Clint glanced at her, smiling. “Yep. Don’t worry about me…you just stay out of the line of fire. I just met you, and I’d like to keep on knowing you a while longer.”
“You worry about yourself, because Davros and the Daleks are gonna be aiming at you the moment they realise you’re firing at them.”
“I’m really hoping seeing the Doctor Double will keep them occupied long enough to get a shot off.” A lot was riding on that, and Clint wasn’t ready to die yet.
He called it a win when Donna snorted at the term ‘Doctor Double’.
The grinding, whirring sound that the TARDIS made got louder, and then it was gone, a soft ping coming from the console. Clint took a deep breath, needing to centre himself, dropping into the familiar headspace that a good sniper needed to achieve before taking out his target.
“I’ll go out first,” the Doctor Double said. “Clint, you stay behind the closed section of the door and be ready to use that thing when I get Davros distracted. Donna…”
She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, yeah…stay in the TARDIS. I’m not an idiot, Spaceman point Two.”
Clint snickered at that nickname. It was better than Doctor Double. Maybe he’d use that one from now on.
Nah. That was Donna’s name for him. Clint would keep using the one he came up with.
He moved past the Doctor Double and took up his position just behind the right-hand door, knowing the human-Time Lord would go out the other side. He nodded when he was ready, the catalyser thing held up, finger on the activation button.
The Doctor Double took a deep breath and then strode down the slight ramp toward the doors. He acknowledged Clint’s nod, and then opened the door, stepping outside.
Donna, from the other side of the TARDIS door, held up the mirror like Clint had asked her to, so he could get a good look into the room beyond without having to show himself.
Clint was pretty proud of that idea.
In the polished glass, Clint watched as the Doctor Double made his way into the room beyond, which was a large space, mostly empty except for a large control board, two Daleks, Davros, and a bunch of other people including the original Doctor, Rose, and Jack. And how the hell did Martha get there? The last thing he’d heard, she’d been at her family’s house in London with her fiancé…
The older woman was Sarah Jane Smith; he recognised her from the sub-wave network. The last two - a man and another older woman - he didn’t know, but he thought the woman might have been related to Rose, from the resemblance he could see.
So…three hostiles, and seven hostages. He’d been in worse situations before.
Although all those times he’d been armed with more than a technical doohickey that wouldn’t really hurt anyone until after the Dalek’s doomsday weapon was switched on.
He let his mind settle on his target, and waited for his chance…