Fic: Seuls - Chapter 3
Title: Seuls
Author: mtemplar
Rating: Adult
Characters: The Doctor (Tenth), Rose Tyler
Disclaimer: I do not own 'Doctor Who' and am making no profit from this fanfiction.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Graphic Sex, Graphic Violence, Romance
Spoilers: Set mid Series 2
Author's Notes: This story follows the events in To Have And Not To Hold (first chapter of that story is here) and Not Here (the first chapter of that short follow-up is here). It is loosely based on the Fourth Doctor serial 'Image of the Fendahl', and contains elements from the 1996 TV movie and the novel 'The Taking of Planet 5'. Huge hugs to principia_coh for the amazing icon and banner!
Betas: Many, many thanks to platypus, brit_columbia and garpu!
Summary: The Doctor and Rose have been mysteriously diverted to the ice planet Seuls, located within the constellation of Canthares. It soon becomes apparent that things are not at all as they should be, and the newly-formed bond between them will be tested as the trap of an ancient enemy is sprung.
Previous Chapters: One Two
Crossposted to time_and_chips, dwfiction, Teaspoon and The Zero Room.
Chapter 3
Rose clutched at the ice, looking for a handhold, but there were none that her mitten-covered hands could grasp. With nothing to slow her, she alternately fell and slid feet-first through the frozen walls of the newly exposed crevasse. She could hear the Doctor frantically shouting her name, his voice ringing and reverberating in her ears. Snow and tiny ice crystals flew up in her face as she came to a sudden, jarring halt, landing awkwardly on her left side.
She cursed under her breath as she did a mental inventory of her body parts. After wiggling her fingers and toes, she tried to roll to a stand and immediately regretted doing so as white-hot pain shot through her left ankle. "Bloody hell," she muttered.
"Rose!"
"'M all right," she called to the surface above, her voice echoing oddly around her. "I've just twisted my ankle a bit."
"Thank goodness that's all you did," the Doctor's relieved voice called down to her. "Do you think you'd be able to pull yourself up?"
Rose craned her head up, taking in the Doctor's worried face high above her. The icy walls that surrounded her had a bluish, almost translucent tinge to them. While the spot where she had fallen in appeared to have a slight slope to it, likely saving her from more serious injury, the majority of the walls were ridiculously straight and glassy smooth. "I don't think so," she shouted. "I don't see anywhere to get a foothold - except up by you."
She watched as the Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver, holding it out and into the gap through which she'd fallen. There was a flare of blue light and an accompanying high-pitched whine as the Doctor surveyed the walls above her. "I'm afraid you're right," he called. "I don't think I'll be able to get you back up here without some rope - the one item I forgot to pack before we left. Will you be all right waiting a few minutes?"
"Yeah," she shouted, her voice wavering. "'M just a bit cold, is all." A moment later, she heard a rustling from above, followed by a soft thump beside her. Scooting over to investigate, she found the Doctor's topcoat. "What're you doing? You're gonna freeze!" she yelled, shivering.
"I'll be fine, Rose. I'm going to have to go back to the TARDIS to fetch some rope. It'll just take a few minutes and we'll have you safely back inside, cocoa in hand, in a jiff. Be right back!" he called down to her.
She waited until she could no longer hear the Doctor's trainers crunching across the ice above before shrugging into his abandoned coat, grateful for the extra warmth it provided. It was soft and smelled of him, as well as the soap he favored. She sighed, feeling oddly comforted even though the Doctor had gone. Snuggling in, Rose waited for his return.
***************
Rose wiggled her toes in her boots and rubbed her mitten-covered hands together, trying to ward off the cold. Surely the Doctor wouldn't be too much longer? He'd been behaving so strangely... had something happened? The clouds in the sky above her were becoming more dense, and the light was starting to fade. A clanging noise from above suddenly echoed through the cavern and she started. "Doctor?" she called. "Is that you?"
"Yep, I have to anchor the rope. It'll be just a minute."
"Are you ok?" she shouted up to him.
"'Course I'm ok. Why wouldn't I be?" he called back down, more clanging ringing through the cavern as he hammered at a stake to firmly anchor the rope to the ice above.
"Oh, I dunno - maybe that wasn't you going nutters on me before," Rose mumbled.
"What was that?"
"Nothing! Nothing," she said. "'S getting dark up there."
"I know," the Doctor replied as he tied a knot into an end of heavy cording. "It looks like there's a storm moving in. And the adrenaline isn't going to last forever," he added. "We'd best get you out of there sooner rather than later." Seemingly satisfied with the knot, he passed a good portion of rope through it, fashioning a lasso, before coiling the rope on itself and tossing it down to Rose. "There," he called. "Find the loop and pass it over your arms, and I'll pull you up."
Rose grabbed the rope, searching through it to find the loop. The Doctor's coat made moving her arms difficult, but she managed to pull the loop over her head, sliding it down to her waist and pulling on the remaining rope to tighten it.
"All right?" the Doctor called down to her.
"Yeah, I'm ready," she called back.
The excess rope was drawn up, and Rose gingerly walked over to the icy wall, favoring her left ankle. The white-hot pain had faded to a dull throb, and she was able to put weight on it without much difficulty. The loop tightened around her waist, and Rose tried to find any footholds in the wall that she could in order to prevent the Doctor from having to bear the brunt of her weight. After several minutes, she was back to the slope where she had initially slid, and her upward motion suddenly stopped. "Doctor?"
He poked his head over the top. "Shhhhhhh!" he admonished, keeping his face carefully blank while looking at something out of her range of vision. "Rose, listen carefully," he said quietly out of the corner of his mouth. "I've tied the slack up; you won't fall, but I need you to stay there for just a minute."
"Why?" she hissed. "What's going on?"
"We seem to have company. Just keep quiet."
Fuming, Rose began to creep up the remaining distance to the surface as the Doctor disappeared. The heavy, long coat over her parka made moving difficult, and her ankle was throbbing angrily. After finally reaching the top, she peered over the edge of the crevasse just in time to see a large, bear-like man in a thick coat running at the Doctor, swinging his arm in a punch that whistled as it cut through the chilly air. The Doctor ducked and darted around the man, his eyes widening as they met hers. After motioning for her to stay quiet, he returned his attention to their attacker.
"You will come with me," the large man intoned, his voice dull and lifeless.
"Hello, I'm the Doctor," the Doctor said cheerfully. "Sorry, but I didn't catch your name before you attacked me."
"You will come with me," the man repeated, somewhat impatiently this time.
"Oh, I don't think so," the Doctor responded, sounding mildly amused. "It sounds as though you've got something else in there with you already. Am I right?"
"You will come with me," the man repeated.
The Doctor straightened up a bit. "Is that the best you can do? 'You will come with me'? Blimey. Would it be too much to ask for some decent conversation instead of you just taking a swing at me? I'm doing my best, but it'd be extremely helpful to get something back from you, possessed or no."
The man's brow furrowed. "You will come," he said, after a moment of apparent confusion.
The Doctor spread his arms wide as Rose watched. "You're going to have to come and get me, you know," he said, a warning tone in his voice.
The man advanced on the Doctor, his fists raised. "You will come with me," he said dully.
"Oh, very well," the Doctor said, lowering his arms. "Let's get on with it then, shall we? I do have to get back to the TARDIS before the cocoa gets cold."
Without further ado, the man lunged forward, swinging his fist in the Doctor's direction. The Doctor quickly stepped to the side, and the man careened forward from his own momentum and crashed to the ground. After picking himself up, the man faced the Doctor and started throwing punches at him from all directions. The Doctor ducked and weaved, avoiding most of the blows until the man finally landed a punch squarely on the side of his face. The Doctor stumbled back with his hand at his cheek, dazed. Rose winced, preparing herself to rush out of her hiding place to keep the Doctor from being knocked into next week, but she didn't have to. Just as the man was advancing forward to strike him again, the Doctor stuck out a leg, sending his opponent sprawling. He dropped to the ice with a thud and the Doctor quickly got to his feet, touching a finger gingerly to the small bit of blood that had welled up at the corner of his mouth.
"Ow," he mumbled, rubbing at his mouth to wipe off the blood. He looked over to where Rose was crouching. "Stay right there."
"You're hurt," she cried. "Let me help you!"
He glanced over to where the man was beginning to pull himself up. "Could we talk about this later? I'm just a bit busy right now."
Rose looked past him and her eyes widened. "Look out!" She watched in horror as two additional hulking figures suddenly appeared out of the icy mist. One of them quickly moved to grab the Doctor from behind, pinning his arms to his sides and lifting him off the ground.
"Three against one? That's hardly fair," he yelled as he struggled to free himself as the other two men moved in, their fists raised.
Terrified, but knowing she had to do something, Rose shoved the loop of rope over her head, took a deep breath and jumped onto the back of the man who held the Doctor, throwing one arm over his massive shoulder and bashing him around the head with her free arm as hard as she could. The goon released the Doctor and tried to shake Rose loose while she hung on for dear life. He jerked quickly to one side and Rose was sent flying, pain exploding through her as she landed awkwardly in a heap on the ice.
She heard the Doctor make a sound she wouldn't have thought him capable of producing - an angry roar that made all three men halt in their tracks. She looked up, her eyes watering, in time to see the Doctor rushing the one who'd thrown her, but the other two men took advantage of his distraction to grab him by the arms, their grips like iron manacles. The third man struck him hard across the face and the Doctor stumbled and tried to pull free, but the men were too strong. After numerous blows were landed to his head, chest and abdomen, he crumpled to the ground, stunned.
"Bring him," the first man, their apparent leader, said.
Rose watched, wide-eyed, as the men hauled the Doctor to his feet, dragging him across the snow in the direction of the TARDIS. They seemed to have forgotten about her existence and were completely ignoring her - but why? She quickly hauled herself up, wincing in pain as she put weight on her left ankle. Spotting a metallic gleam in the snow where the Doctor had fallen, she quickly knelt to investigate, finding the Doctor's sonic screwdriver. Pocketing the device, she followed the Doctor's abductors as quickly as she could with her throbbing ankle, her vision severely hampered by the diminishing light. As they neared the TARDIS, she was startled to see that it'd been loaded onto the flatbed back of a bulky transport vehicle - and now the Doctor was being unceremoniously dumped into the back of the vehicle as well. Panicking, she hurried to catch up as the men got inside the cab, the pain in her ankle and the drag of the Doctor's long coat impeding her progress.
The transport vehicle started up with a roar, and began to move away, Rose following as the wind picked up and snow began to fall. Even though the vehicle was slow, Rose was unable to keep up and eventually the transport moved out of the range of her sight and hearing. Despairing, she pulled out the Doctor's screwdriver to illuminate the tracks of the vehicle and was horrified to see that the tracks were being filled in rapidly by the blowing snow. The skies grew darker as the storm worsened, and the temperature continued to drop.
As the enormity of her situation dawned on her, of being hopelessly lost on an inhospitable, freezing planet with both Doctor and TARDIS gone, Rose sank to her knees in despair, unable to stop her tears.
Author: mtemplar
Rating: Adult
Characters: The Doctor (Tenth), Rose Tyler
Disclaimer: I do not own 'Doctor Who' and am making no profit from this fanfiction.
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Graphic Sex, Graphic Violence, Romance
Spoilers: Set mid Series 2
Author's Notes: This story follows the events in To Have And Not To Hold (first chapter of that story is here) and Not Here (the first chapter of that short follow-up is here). It is loosely based on the Fourth Doctor serial 'Image of the Fendahl', and contains elements from the 1996 TV movie and the novel 'The Taking of Planet 5'. Huge hugs to principia_coh for the amazing icon and banner!
Betas: Many, many thanks to platypus, brit_columbia and garpu!
Summary: The Doctor and Rose have been mysteriously diverted to the ice planet Seuls, located within the constellation of Canthares. It soon becomes apparent that things are not at all as they should be, and the newly-formed bond between them will be tested as the trap of an ancient enemy is sprung.
Previous Chapters: One Two
Crossposted to time_and_chips, dwfiction, Teaspoon and The Zero Room.
Chapter 3
Rose clutched at the ice, looking for a handhold, but there were none that her mitten-covered hands could grasp. With nothing to slow her, she alternately fell and slid feet-first through the frozen walls of the newly exposed crevasse. She could hear the Doctor frantically shouting her name, his voice ringing and reverberating in her ears. Snow and tiny ice crystals flew up in her face as she came to a sudden, jarring halt, landing awkwardly on her left side.
She cursed under her breath as she did a mental inventory of her body parts. After wiggling her fingers and toes, she tried to roll to a stand and immediately regretted doing so as white-hot pain shot through her left ankle. "Bloody hell," she muttered.
"Rose!"
"'M all right," she called to the surface above, her voice echoing oddly around her. "I've just twisted my ankle a bit."
"Thank goodness that's all you did," the Doctor's relieved voice called down to her. "Do you think you'd be able to pull yourself up?"
Rose craned her head up, taking in the Doctor's worried face high above her. The icy walls that surrounded her had a bluish, almost translucent tinge to them. While the spot where she had fallen in appeared to have a slight slope to it, likely saving her from more serious injury, the majority of the walls were ridiculously straight and glassy smooth. "I don't think so," she shouted. "I don't see anywhere to get a foothold - except up by you."
She watched as the Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver, holding it out and into the gap through which she'd fallen. There was a flare of blue light and an accompanying high-pitched whine as the Doctor surveyed the walls above her. "I'm afraid you're right," he called. "I don't think I'll be able to get you back up here without some rope - the one item I forgot to pack before we left. Will you be all right waiting a few minutes?"
"Yeah," she shouted, her voice wavering. "'M just a bit cold, is all." A moment later, she heard a rustling from above, followed by a soft thump beside her. Scooting over to investigate, she found the Doctor's topcoat. "What're you doing? You're gonna freeze!" she yelled, shivering.
"I'll be fine, Rose. I'm going to have to go back to the TARDIS to fetch some rope. It'll just take a few minutes and we'll have you safely back inside, cocoa in hand, in a jiff. Be right back!" he called down to her.
She waited until she could no longer hear the Doctor's trainers crunching across the ice above before shrugging into his abandoned coat, grateful for the extra warmth it provided. It was soft and smelled of him, as well as the soap he favored. She sighed, feeling oddly comforted even though the Doctor had gone. Snuggling in, Rose waited for his return.
***************
Rose wiggled her toes in her boots and rubbed her mitten-covered hands together, trying to ward off the cold. Surely the Doctor wouldn't be too much longer? He'd been behaving so strangely... had something happened? The clouds in the sky above her were becoming more dense, and the light was starting to fade. A clanging noise from above suddenly echoed through the cavern and she started. "Doctor?" she called. "Is that you?"
"Yep, I have to anchor the rope. It'll be just a minute."
"Are you ok?" she shouted up to him.
"'Course I'm ok. Why wouldn't I be?" he called back down, more clanging ringing through the cavern as he hammered at a stake to firmly anchor the rope to the ice above.
"Oh, I dunno - maybe that wasn't you going nutters on me before," Rose mumbled.
"What was that?"
"Nothing! Nothing," she said. "'S getting dark up there."
"I know," the Doctor replied as he tied a knot into an end of heavy cording. "It looks like there's a storm moving in. And the adrenaline isn't going to last forever," he added. "We'd best get you out of there sooner rather than later." Seemingly satisfied with the knot, he passed a good portion of rope through it, fashioning a lasso, before coiling the rope on itself and tossing it down to Rose. "There," he called. "Find the loop and pass it over your arms, and I'll pull you up."
Rose grabbed the rope, searching through it to find the loop. The Doctor's coat made moving her arms difficult, but she managed to pull the loop over her head, sliding it down to her waist and pulling on the remaining rope to tighten it.
"All right?" the Doctor called down to her.
"Yeah, I'm ready," she called back.
The excess rope was drawn up, and Rose gingerly walked over to the icy wall, favoring her left ankle. The white-hot pain had faded to a dull throb, and she was able to put weight on it without much difficulty. The loop tightened around her waist, and Rose tried to find any footholds in the wall that she could in order to prevent the Doctor from having to bear the brunt of her weight. After several minutes, she was back to the slope where she had initially slid, and her upward motion suddenly stopped. "Doctor?"
He poked his head over the top. "Shhhhhhh!" he admonished, keeping his face carefully blank while looking at something out of her range of vision. "Rose, listen carefully," he said quietly out of the corner of his mouth. "I've tied the slack up; you won't fall, but I need you to stay there for just a minute."
"Why?" she hissed. "What's going on?"
"We seem to have company. Just keep quiet."
Fuming, Rose began to creep up the remaining distance to the surface as the Doctor disappeared. The heavy, long coat over her parka made moving difficult, and her ankle was throbbing angrily. After finally reaching the top, she peered over the edge of the crevasse just in time to see a large, bear-like man in a thick coat running at the Doctor, swinging his arm in a punch that whistled as it cut through the chilly air. The Doctor ducked and darted around the man, his eyes widening as they met hers. After motioning for her to stay quiet, he returned his attention to their attacker.
"You will come with me," the large man intoned, his voice dull and lifeless.
"Hello, I'm the Doctor," the Doctor said cheerfully. "Sorry, but I didn't catch your name before you attacked me."
"You will come with me," the man repeated, somewhat impatiently this time.
"Oh, I don't think so," the Doctor responded, sounding mildly amused. "It sounds as though you've got something else in there with you already. Am I right?"
"You will come with me," the man repeated.
The Doctor straightened up a bit. "Is that the best you can do? 'You will come with me'? Blimey. Would it be too much to ask for some decent conversation instead of you just taking a swing at me? I'm doing my best, but it'd be extremely helpful to get something back from you, possessed or no."
The man's brow furrowed. "You will come," he said, after a moment of apparent confusion.
The Doctor spread his arms wide as Rose watched. "You're going to have to come and get me, you know," he said, a warning tone in his voice.
The man advanced on the Doctor, his fists raised. "You will come with me," he said dully.
"Oh, very well," the Doctor said, lowering his arms. "Let's get on with it then, shall we? I do have to get back to the TARDIS before the cocoa gets cold."
Without further ado, the man lunged forward, swinging his fist in the Doctor's direction. The Doctor quickly stepped to the side, and the man careened forward from his own momentum and crashed to the ground. After picking himself up, the man faced the Doctor and started throwing punches at him from all directions. The Doctor ducked and weaved, avoiding most of the blows until the man finally landed a punch squarely on the side of his face. The Doctor stumbled back with his hand at his cheek, dazed. Rose winced, preparing herself to rush out of her hiding place to keep the Doctor from being knocked into next week, but she didn't have to. Just as the man was advancing forward to strike him again, the Doctor stuck out a leg, sending his opponent sprawling. He dropped to the ice with a thud and the Doctor quickly got to his feet, touching a finger gingerly to the small bit of blood that had welled up at the corner of his mouth.
"Ow," he mumbled, rubbing at his mouth to wipe off the blood. He looked over to where Rose was crouching. "Stay right there."
"You're hurt," she cried. "Let me help you!"
He glanced over to where the man was beginning to pull himself up. "Could we talk about this later? I'm just a bit busy right now."
Rose looked past him and her eyes widened. "Look out!" She watched in horror as two additional hulking figures suddenly appeared out of the icy mist. One of them quickly moved to grab the Doctor from behind, pinning his arms to his sides and lifting him off the ground.
"Three against one? That's hardly fair," he yelled as he struggled to free himself as the other two men moved in, their fists raised.
Terrified, but knowing she had to do something, Rose shoved the loop of rope over her head, took a deep breath and jumped onto the back of the man who held the Doctor, throwing one arm over his massive shoulder and bashing him around the head with her free arm as hard as she could. The goon released the Doctor and tried to shake Rose loose while she hung on for dear life. He jerked quickly to one side and Rose was sent flying, pain exploding through her as she landed awkwardly in a heap on the ice.
She heard the Doctor make a sound she wouldn't have thought him capable of producing - an angry roar that made all three men halt in their tracks. She looked up, her eyes watering, in time to see the Doctor rushing the one who'd thrown her, but the other two men took advantage of his distraction to grab him by the arms, their grips like iron manacles. The third man struck him hard across the face and the Doctor stumbled and tried to pull free, but the men were too strong. After numerous blows were landed to his head, chest and abdomen, he crumpled to the ground, stunned.
"Bring him," the first man, their apparent leader, said.
Rose watched, wide-eyed, as the men hauled the Doctor to his feet, dragging him across the snow in the direction of the TARDIS. They seemed to have forgotten about her existence and were completely ignoring her - but why? She quickly hauled herself up, wincing in pain as she put weight on her left ankle. Spotting a metallic gleam in the snow where the Doctor had fallen, she quickly knelt to investigate, finding the Doctor's sonic screwdriver. Pocketing the device, she followed the Doctor's abductors as quickly as she could with her throbbing ankle, her vision severely hampered by the diminishing light. As they neared the TARDIS, she was startled to see that it'd been loaded onto the flatbed back of a bulky transport vehicle - and now the Doctor was being unceremoniously dumped into the back of the vehicle as well. Panicking, she hurried to catch up as the men got inside the cab, the pain in her ankle and the drag of the Doctor's long coat impeding her progress.
The transport vehicle started up with a roar, and began to move away, Rose following as the wind picked up and snow began to fall. Even though the vehicle was slow, Rose was unable to keep up and eventually the transport moved out of the range of her sight and hearing. Despairing, she pulled out the Doctor's screwdriver to illuminate the tracks of the vehicle and was horrified to see that the tracks were being filled in rapidly by the blowing snow. The skies grew darker as the storm worsened, and the temperature continued to drop.
As the enormity of her situation dawned on her, of being hopelessly lost on an inhospitable, freezing planet with both Doctor and TARDIS gone, Rose sank to her knees in despair, unable to stop her tears.