The Lion, The Witch, and The Doctor (3/3)
The third and final part of my Doctor Who/Narnia mash-up. I’m not sure if the science in this is actually correct, but I tried :)
Title: The Lion, The Witch, and The Doctor
Chapter: 3
Author: foreverwriting9
Pairing: Doctor/Martha
Spoilers: References The Shakespeare Code and it probably helps if you’ve read The Magician’s Nephew or The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, but it’s not necessary.
Rating: PG-PG13
Summary: The Doctor and Martha travel to a world called Arnian where the snow is plentiful and where strangeness abounds.
Word Count: 2,077
-
The Doctor made his way down the darker hallway that he had chosen to take. He figured that this was the hallway that would lead him to Jadis, and that was why he had sent Martha the other way. If Jadis could somehow change the makeup of people’s skin cells (at least that’s what the Doctor figured she was doing) then she was dangerous, and he didn’t want Martha anywhere near her.
As he continued down the hallway, a door farther down swung open, a small patch of light cutting through the darkness. With a grin the Doctor headed toward the open door and peeked around it. “Hello?”
-
Martha stared at the man...lion...thing standing in front of her. She gulped. “Hello.”
It let out a low growl.
C.S. Lewis peeped up from behind Martha. “Oh my God.”
Martha nodded in agreement. “Yeah, it’s a lion.”
“It’s King Nasla!”
“What?”
-
With a groan, the Doctor opened his eyes.
Everything had been going so well until he had entered what he was now sure was Jadis’ room. Upon entering the room he had noticed that another door was open. Curious, he had walked through it. The last thing he remembered was a sharp pain at the back of his head, then, black. Hindsight told him it had all been a trap.
Curiosity killed the cat, he thought wryly.
Adjusting his eyes to the bright light, for there was a lamp hanging right over him, he discovered where he was.
He was in a cubicle-sized glass room, and he was strapped to a table. He made a move to get his sonic screwdriver, then realized that: one, he had given the sonic screwdriver to Martha, and two, not only was he strapped to the table, but his arms were tied behind his back as well.
Sighing, he relaxed against his bonds and focused instead on his surroundings. The glass room was really a room within a room, and the Doctor noticed that the larger room actually contained more than one glass room as well. In each room, there were the same things: a table, like the one he was currently on, and some sort of sinister-looking machine.
It was then that the Doctor realized he wasn’t the only one down there. In the glass room next to his, there was a goat, but this goat walked on only two legs.
He squinted through the glass, trying to make sure he was seeing things correctly.
“Mr. Sutnum?” He queried.
The goat didn’t answer. The Doctor raised his voice. “Mr. Sutnum?”
“You’re wasting your breath, Doctor.”
He turned his head toward the voice. “Ah, Jadis I presume?”
She gave him a sinister smile. “You presume correctly.”
“May I ask how you knew who I was?”
“The trees, Doctor, the trees have ears.”
-
Martha sank down into one of the chairs in King Nasla’s room “If you wouldn’t mind, your Highness, could you tell us what happened to you?”
He sat down across from her and began to tell his story.
“Jadis became my advisor several years ago. I will admit, she was a pretty good advisor, if not a bit aggressive at times. But never did I think her capable of this.” Here he stopped and gestured to his lion’s head. “Anyway, one day, I was walking by her room and I heard a noise. Alarmed, I opened the door only to find her dragging one of my guards into her abysmal laboratory beneath her room. I must have cried out, because she suddenly turned on me angrily and struck me down. Next thing I knew, I woke up and had this.” Again he pointed to his head.
“If you’ve been here the whole time, why haven’t you done anything to stop Jadis?”
King Nasla shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “I couldn’t let anyone see me like this.”
“But if you’re a good king, no one will care what you look like.”
He let out a sharp laugh. “Maybe in storybooks that’s how it goes, but not here.”
C.S. Lewis broke in, “I think lions make excellent kings; they’re strong and noble, everything it takes to be a good ruler.”
“Hmm,” King Nasla pulled at part of his mane. “Do you really think so?”
C.S. Lewis nodded. “Your people will look to you as a symbol of courage and power.”
King Nasla smiled (if it could be called that, for really, a lion’s face was not made for smiling). “Let’s go find Jadis, it’s time I took back my throne.”
Martha returned his smile. “We have to find the Doctor first.” Her smiled faltered. “Wherever he is, Jadis probably is too.” And with that, Martha took off down the hallway to find the Doctor.
She rounded the corner and turned down the hallway the Doctor had gone down. “Doctor?”
He was nowhere to be seen.
It was then that she noticed the open door. She walked toward it. “Doctor?”
Martha entered the room, with C.S. Lewis and King Nasla trailing behind her. There was another open door inside the room. She turned anxiously to the King. “Your Highness, who’s room is this?”
He glanced around the room. “Jadis’”
She let out a sigh. “Oh, Doctor.”
“What are we going to do?” asked C.S. Lewis.
Martha turned. “Your Highness, stay out here and stand guard. Don’t let anyone in. Clive, come with me.”
-
The Doctor moved his leg experimentally, trying to get the feeling back in it. He gave up after a few tries. The ropes were just too tight.
“So, if you don’t mind my asking, why are you doing this?”
Jadis turned and faced him. “An excellent question, with only one answer: I have become too smart.”
“Sorry? You’ve become too smart?”
“I know words Doctor, far more than you do-”
“Not too many more.”
“The deplorable word.”
“Ah, yes. That.”
She paused, then said, “What use are words, Doctor, when you know the most powerful one of all?”
He shrugged. “I couldn’t answer that.”
“Well, that is the reason I turned to science. But I fear I have become too brilliant at that too, for I’ve no doubt you have not the slightest clue how I change people.”
“Oh, but I do.”
Jadis raised her eyebrows at him. “Really?”
“You burn their skin, as far as you can without killing them, and then, I imagine, while their skin cells are going through mitosis to replace those damaged skin cells, you somehow exchange those cells with animal ones.”
“It seems I have met a formidable opponent.” The Doctor grinned at her. “Luckily you are tied to a table.”
His grin slipped as he was reminded of the fact that he was at her mercy, and that she didn’t actually have any. It was then that, from the corner of his eye, he saw movement.
-
Martha stood with C.S. Lewis on the stairs leading down to Jadis’ lab and watched as Jadis ranted on and on, throwing her hands up in the air every so often and continually giving the Doctor a smile that made Martha’s stomach roll in unexpected ways.
Finally, Jadis stopped her diatribe, and turned to the machine that was inside the glass box, her back to the Doctor. He turned his head toward Martha, smiled, and gave her one of his winks. This time Martha’s stomach rolled in a not-so-unpleasant way, and the look he gave her just before Jadis turned back around made her remember something he had said earlier.
She turned to C.S. Lewis. “The deplorable word!”
He looked at her as if she’d gone insane. “The what?”
“Deplorable word. Maybe if we take a syllable off it will decrease the word’s power.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You’re C.S. Lewis! You have to know it!”
He shrugged. “Sorry.”
“Think! We have to save the Doctor!”
-
The Doctor’s shoulder was cramping up, and he could feel the ropes restraining him beginning to chafe. The only current bright side to the situation was that he could still see Martha hiding in the shadows of the stairwell, and Jadis hadn’t seen her yet.
If anyone could think of a way to get him out it would be Martha.
He turned his head toward her while Jadis’ back was turned. She looked tired and distressed, but as soon as she saw the Doctor looking at her, she tried to hide it from him. He gave her a smile and a wink. Her eyes widened suddenly, and she turned to C.S. Lewis, talking frantically.
It was then that Jadis turned to face him.
“So Doctor, what kind of animal would you like to become?”
He eyed her. “You’re giving me a choice? How thoughtful of you.”
She gave him a sickening smile. “If you find it hard to choose I’ll simply pick for you.”
The Doctor set his jaw, Martha please hurry. “Well, if I had to choose…”
He trailed off, then turned to Jadis with a smile. “What animal would you choose?”
The question caught her off guard. She stood stock still for a few seconds, then shook her head. “To Hell with it.” She muttered, then walked over to the controls.
She never reached them.
Without warning, she dropped to the ground and proceeded to burn from the inside out, soon there was nothing left.
-
Martha threw open the glass door and ran over to the Doctor, using the sonic screwdriver to undo his bonds. Rubbing his wrists, the Doctor turned to Martha and wrapped her in a hug. “Thank you for not letting me get turned into an animal.”
She grinned into his shoulder. “Anytime.”
He took a step back and surveyed her. “How’d you do it?”
“The deplorable word, if you take syllables off of it its power is decreased.”
“Haha!” He cried, and flung his arms around her again, picking her up and spinning her around. “You are brilliant, Martha Jones! Have I ever told you that? Absolutely brilliant!”
-
“So what’re you going to do now, Clive?”
“Go home and write this all down in my journal.”
The Doctor held up his hand. “Do me a favor.”
“Anything Doctor.”
“Leave us out of it.” He said, gesturing between himself and Martha.
“But you deserve to be in it! You’re the main characters!”
The Doctor shook his head. “I don’t want to ruin a children’s book.”
“I never said it was going to be a children’s book.”
“But it’d make a great one, wouldn’t it? With magic and talking animals.”
C.S. Lewis looked thoughtful. “That does sound like an idea.”
The Doctor nodded to the wardrobe door. “Better go write it down then.”
C.S. Lewis smiled at him. “Thank you Doctor, Martha.” He said, bowing his head to both of them.
“Goodbye Clive.” Martha murmured with a small smile.
With one last parting glance, C.S. Lewis walked back through the wardrobe. As he disappeared from sight, the Doctor moved forward and closed the door.
“Oh my God.”
He turned. “What?”
“You gave C.S. Lewis the idea to write The Chronicles of Narnia.”
He gave her a lop-sided grin. “Maybe I did. Or maybe it was always in the back of his brain, just waiting to be recognized.”
She shook her head in disbelief. “I could’ve been in The Chronicles of Narnia.”
The Doctor held out his hand to her. “Let’s go have a look.”
-
Martha sank down into one of the chairs inside the TARDIS.
“Doctor, what are you looking for?”
He seemed to pop out of nowhere. “This.” He said, waving a boxed set of books at her.
She raised her eyebrows. “The Chronicles of Narnia?”
“Here.” He handed her The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. “Open it.”
She flipped it open to the dedication page. Just beneath the dedication to C.S. Lewis’ goddaughter, Lucy, it said, ‘With special thanks to my fellow travelers, the Doctor and Martha.’
Martha gaped at it. “Oh my God!”
He smiled. “I suppose he felt he had to put us in there somewhere.”
“This almost tops Shakespeare.”
“Almost?”
“Well, that was our first traveling experience together, nothing can top that.”
He felt both his hearts skip a beat. “Nothing?”
“Nothing.”
The Doctor grabbed hold of her hand and pulled her up off the chair, toward the Control Panel. “Good.” He murmured, keeping hold of her hand and sending the TARDIS back into the Vortex.