001: The Bold People of War Have Raised Their Swords [Holo]

[anoblesavage]

When Leela regained consciousness, she was no longer in the Inquisitor General’s room of pitiless machines and cruel technology. She did not know where she was, only that it was silent and cold and her head ached ferociously. For a moment, there was nothing to hear but her breathing

Comments

[ voice ]

[timedaughter]

Gallifrey? Are you a Time Lord?

[Holo]

[anoblesavage]

Leela tensed at the sound of an unfamiliar voice, though she knew that the speaker was not in the room with her. She had not heard the opening of a door and, besides, K-9 had not warned her.

Was her captor speaking to her at last?

"I am no Time Lord," she snapped, "I am Leela, warrior of the Sevateem. Why have you brought me here? What do you want?"

[ voice ]

[timedaughter]

Oh. [She sounds a tad disappointed, but not overly so, and it fades quickly.] Hello, Leela, I'm Jenny. I'm not the one who brought you here, I was brought here as well.

[Holo]

[anoblesavage]

"You are a prisoner as well?"

Her voice was unfamiliar, but there was nothing but honesty in it. Leela might have been blind and she certainly was not wise, but she could read people. Better than any Time Lord.

"I am Leela. What is this place? How am I speaking to you?"

[ voice ]

[timedaughter]

Unfortunately, yeah. But it's good to meet you, Leela. We're in Taxon, an underground city that's frankly more a prison cell, and we're speaking through tablets -- communicators that we're all assigned when we get here. Yours should be on a table in that room.

[Holo]

[anoblesavage]

"K-9? Where is this tablet?"

"On the pedestal to your left, Mistress."

It was a case of trial and error, but, with the help of both Jenny's and K-9's instructions, she managed to find the tablet. When she lifted it up, there was a soft metallic sound as the door slid open.

"A door?" She had been waiting - hoping - for that, but she did not trust it. There was no way of knowing what stood beyond. She was a savage, but she was not a fool. She would not rush in when so much was at stake. "What kind of prison allows the prisoners to walk around?"

[ voice ] --> [ visual ]

[timedaughter]

"Hang on a second, let me switch this to visual so you can see me." And she does so, and then Jenny's face is on the screen.

"The room you're in is just the arrival room. The prison is the city outside, which is inescapable, so far as we've been able to determine. Theoretically there has to be a way out, but we haven't figured it out yet. And we've tried. We really have." She pauses, and smiles. "Cute dog, by the way."

[Holo]

[anoblesavage]

"I am blind, Jenny," said Leela, with a smile that was almost sad, "I will never be able to see you."

In the months since her blindness, Leela had adapted to live as a warrior without sight. She did not think of it as a handicap. She refused to. But there were times - times like this, when she found herself in a strange and dangerous new place - when she missed her old eyes.

"I am a K-9 unit," the robotic dog explained.

"And he will help us find a way out of this cage."

[ useless visual ]

[timedaughter]

"Ah. I suppose tablet settings are a moot point then, long as it's not text." Jenny rolls with this new information, as she does most things. She isn't about to pity Leela for something Leela clearly does not pity herself for, and clearly gets along well enough without.

"You said you were on Gallifrey. Is your K-9 unit from there?" If any robotic dog has a hope in hell of helping them all out of Taxon, it's one built by Time Lords.

[Holo]

[anoblesavage]

"He is not from Gallifrey, but he lives there. We both do."

Or they had, once. Their Gallifrey - the true Gallifrey - was lost to them. They travelled through parallel universes to find a cure for the Dogma virus that raged across the planet. They would only be able to return home once they had found it.

"I was constructed by the Doctor Master. He made significant improvements on the original design by Professor Marius in order to ..."

"K-9, not now. What do you know of Gallifrey?"

[timedaughter]

Jenny clears her throat, wondering where to begin. She doesn't miss the significance of K-9's creator.

"My father is a Time Lord. He told me about Gallifrey soon after I was born. He told me it's...gone, now. Lost in a terrible war. I'm biologically Gallifreyan, but I wasn't born on Gallifrey, and I'm not a Time Lord. Probably never will be. My father's the last." It's obvious enough that she and Leela must be from different times, so she refrains from stating it.