Held in Trust: Chapter 22
Title: Held in Trust (22/?)
Characters/Pairings: Duplicate Tenth Doctor/Rose, alt!Donna, various Tylers and Motts, and several OCs
Rating: Teen
Series: Part of the Morris Minor 'Verse
Beta: platypus , defender of commas the world over
Summary: An Alt!Ten, Rose and Alt!Donna Adventure! Join our heroes as they investigate a mysterious man from the future, an apocalyptic death cult, and the wonders of the internal combustion engine. Romance, action, adventure, sci fi, occasional smut, Donna being awesome, as usual all par for the course.
A/N: Sequel to The One True Free Life. It's not entirely necessary to have read that, but if you're finding yourself at any point going, "Huh?" it's just probably something that was explained in that story.
Previous Chapters: Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | Chapter 18 | Chapter 19 | Chapter 20 | Chapter 21
"He's really not a Terran-born, is he?" Elpis turned her head towards Crede where they lay side-by-side on the rapidly heating ground. Crede was still looking off towards the North-east, where the Doctor had run to climb a rocky outcropping and get the lay of the land.
"He says he was born here. On Cassiel."
Elpis made a little sound of surprise. "But-"
Crede turned to look at her gravely. "I know: not possible."
"Is he... I mean, do you think he's a nutter?"
"Yeah," Crede answered, deadpan, then smiled.
"Then why are you still with him?"
He shrugged as best he could while lying down. "More exciting than doing laundry, don't you think?"
They were silent for a long time, watching clouds move across the burnt-orange sky.
"Time bends around him," Elpis finally said quietly, tentatively.
"You Campheline give me the creeps, do you know that?"
"It's true. Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it isn't there. Typical human," she spat dismissively.
"Then why did you ask if I thought he was mad if you think he's... special or something?"
Elpis stifled a little chuckle. "Can't he be both?"
They heard footfalls approaching, and Crede sat up to see the Doctor jogging towards them again.
"I trust him. I don't know why, but I do. And I think," he ventured earnestly, "I think you should, too."
"I never said I didn't."
"No, you didn't. But you just don't really seem like the trusting sort, is all."
Elpis squeaked her offence and rolled over to her side, to more directly confront him. "So you're saying that because I'm a labourer-because I'm a sixer-that you have to take me in hand and tell me who to trust and not trust? I don't think so. I'm not at the unit any more. I don't have to listen to you."
Crede let loose with an exaggerated, put-upon sigh. "I don't know why you have to get huffy at every little thing I say. It's not anything about sixers, and I never talk to your lot anyway, so how would I know how you are? Though, given the evidence, it's a good thing for it that I just stay in the laundry."
"Then what were you trying to say?"
Crede stubbornly refused to answer and looked quite pointedly back up at the sky.
"Oh, fine," Elpis said. "Good. That's good. Now's the part where you decide that the little Campheline is just too trying for your poor delicate sensibilities. I should just sit on a perch and sing and tell you how fantastic your timeline feels. Well, let me tell you, friend, your timeline feels like a big bag of hot rocks-"
Neither of them had paid any further attention to the Doctor's approach, and they both startled when he appeared and plopped down on the ground between them.
"Right," the Doctor chirped as soon as he'd sat down, completely ignoring the palpable tension in the air between Crede and Elpis. "We'll need to take cover-there's a fair bit of commotion back where we came from and I reckon they'll be starting a search."
Elpis nodded, a bit of grey plumage at her temple bobbing along, but then she solemnly met the Doctor's gaze and grew very still.
"You don't need to put yourselves out on my account. I can take care of myself."
"Nonsense," the Doctor scolded, looking offended that she'd even suggested such abandonment. "But if it makes you feel better, I think we're rather all on the same mission here. A partnership, if you will."
"Something's coming," Elpis said ominously.
"The temporal failsafe; the paradox..." Elpis and the Doctor whipped around to look incredulously at Crede. "Or something," he added, hedging.
The Doctor grinned. "Good lad! You were listening!"
"Yeah, I might be just an indenture, but I'm not deaf."
"Oi, steady on!" the Doctor protested, and the two glared at one another for a moment before the sound of Elpis's high laughter distracted them.
"You were saying, Doctor, about how we should perhaps not get ourselves caught? I don't fancy a fourth beating this week. Three was more than enough."
"Right, well, fortunately I know exactly where we are now. Of all the places on this planet I could have wound up, I've actually been here-specifically right here-before."
Crede nudged Elpis in the ribs at this and whispered, "Told you." Elpis answered only by wincing in pain.
The Doctor seemed to take no notice of their exchange. "When I was a kid, before I went off to school, we used to come here on holidays. I recognise that mountain range over there, the one that you said no one ever called anything . The mountains of Dark Reprisal. Yeah, I know, cheery name. A bit grim, my people." He took a deep breath and continued. "Anyway, about two miles east of here there are fissures, right in the ground. Narrow and nearly impossible to see until you fall in to one. A perfect place to hide, I'd say."
"And a perfect place to hide something," Crede added.
"Yes, quite. Good thinking," the Doctor replied breezily, and Crede shot him a look. "By which I mean to say: Of course that's good thinking, as you are so terribly clever."
In the following silence, they began to hear shouting, coming from the direction of the work unit.
"Can we go now, clever boys? " Elpis pleaded sharply.
***
They made their way nervously to a low ridge of rock, following the Doctor's lead-which Crede did easily, though small Elpis had to jog. Remaining in the lee of the ridge and in shadow, they felt less exposed and slowed their pace to allow Elpis to catch her breath.
"So did you come all the way to thirty-two just to run off with little old me?" she asked, running her hand along the red sandstone veined with purplish crystals.
"Just a happy coincidence," the Doctor said.
"We were coming to find out who it was from your unit that went missing recently," Crede clarified.
"Someone named Gliese, possibly?" the Doctor queried.
"Gliese? No, no one with that name. But..." She trailed off, while the Doctor and Crede nearly tripped over their own feet with curiosity.
"But...?" the Doctor prompted.
"Well, there was Tane and Amaia," she said, clearly expecting the words to carry heavy meaning for them.
Crede made a sour face. "Tane and Amaia; that supposed to mean something to us?"
"You never heard about that? Where are you from, the other side of the planet?" she asked incredulously.
"Clearly we haven't," said Crede, who then looked at the Doctor.
"Don't look at me, I'm an off-worlder."
"I'd have thought everyone-or at least everyone on Cassiel-would know about that," Elpis said.
"Are you actually going to say what 'that' is?" Crede huffed.
"Tane was an indenture at thirty-two. Kitchen staff. Popular consensus is that he was always a bit off, but not in a bad way. He was maybe 15 years into his indenture, clean record from what I was told. Mind you, it's not like I'm really in the loop, but things do get around. Amaia was a labourer-a Zeruseb, newly impressed from the way she acted, a bit haughty and above-it-all."
At that, Crede snorted.
"What?" Elpis asked, sincerely. Crede held his peace and even made an effort to wipe the smirk from his face. "Anyway, Tane and Amaia, they... well, apparently they fell in love or some such daft thing. They should have asked me, I could have told them where their timelines would wind up by following that course of action. Stupid. But if you tried telling that girl anything, she'd just wind up implying that she was somehow different from the rest of us. She was in my team for a little while, and to be honest no one could really stand her. No one but Tane, apparently."
"And where did their timelines wind up?" the Doctor asked steadily.
"I say they were stupid and she was insufferable, but nobody deserves what happened to Amaia. Or Tane, really. They had started to meet, secretly, around the unit and sometimes outside it. I think all the labourers knew about it, but we wouldn't say anything to implicate one of our own, even if she did act a bit of the princess.Tane's lot, well, I don't know if it was them either. But someone snitched and they were discovered. Caught in the act, in a supply room."Elpis visibly shuddered and Crede and the Doctor wore solemn faces, both knowing how this story would end now.
"She was executed," the Doctor offered after Elpis seemed unable to continue.
"Not just executed," she sighed. "Tortured, raped, beaten, made an example of, and then executed. Tane was forced to watch, and then he was arrested and sent to a penal satellite. I suppose he's still there, probably mad as the proverbial box of Keppas from what he had to see."
They walked without speaking for a few hundred more yards, Crede now feeling bad for having been sarky with her earlier. He'd been around his own unit for a few executions of unruly labourers, and it was always done publicly and in the most gruesome way possible. It took him a long time after to recover, and Elpis was doubtless still having nightmares over it if this scandal had taken place at all recently.
"And this all happened maybe four standard months ago?" the Doctor finally ventured, mirroring Crede's own thoughts.
"I suppose so. It's not like I keep track of these things in those sorts of terms, but that sounds about right. Did you hear about it too, wherever you're from?"
"In a manner of speaking," the Doctor said mysteriously. "And I have to ask because it is sort of incumbent upon me to fill in all available blanks, but would this penal satellite that Tane was sent to perhaps be fitted with escape pods?"
Elpis and Crede looked at one another and shrugged in unison.
"I'd imagine so," Crede said. "I don't remember much from my nursery station, but we had escape drills sometimes where we'd have to go line up at the hatches for the pods. I guess a penal satellite would at least have enough pods for the staff, though probably sod the prisoners. Why?" Right after he asked, he himself realised why. "Do you think that Tane..."
Elpis also had a light of realisation in her grey eyes. "He's escaped? Come back to exact his revenge or something dramatic like that?"
The Doctor pursed his lips and mused to himself before answering. "Something dramatic like that, yeah."
To Chapter 23
Characters/Pairings: Duplicate Tenth Doctor/Rose, alt!Donna, various Tylers and Motts, and several OCs
Rating: Teen
Series: Part of the Morris Minor 'Verse
Beta: platypus , defender of commas the world over
Summary: An Alt!Ten, Rose and Alt!Donna Adventure! Join our heroes as they investigate a mysterious man from the future, an apocalyptic death cult, and the wonders of the internal combustion engine. Romance, action, adventure, sci fi, occasional smut, Donna being awesome, as usual all par for the course.
A/N: Sequel to The One True Free Life. It's not entirely necessary to have read that, but if you're finding yourself at any point going, "Huh?" it's just probably something that was explained in that story.
Previous Chapters: Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | Chapter 18 | Chapter 19 | Chapter 20 | Chapter 21
"He's really not a Terran-born, is he?" Elpis turned her head towards Crede where they lay side-by-side on the rapidly heating ground. Crede was still looking off towards the North-east, where the Doctor had run to climb a rocky outcropping and get the lay of the land.
"He says he was born here. On Cassiel."
Elpis made a little sound of surprise. "But-"
Crede turned to look at her gravely. "I know: not possible."
"Is he... I mean, do you think he's a nutter?"
"Yeah," Crede answered, deadpan, then smiled.
"Then why are you still with him?"
He shrugged as best he could while lying down. "More exciting than doing laundry, don't you think?"
They were silent for a long time, watching clouds move across the burnt-orange sky.
"Time bends around him," Elpis finally said quietly, tentatively.
"You Campheline give me the creeps, do you know that?"
"It's true. Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it isn't there. Typical human," she spat dismissively.
"Then why did you ask if I thought he was mad if you think he's... special or something?"
Elpis stifled a little chuckle. "Can't he be both?"
They heard footfalls approaching, and Crede sat up to see the Doctor jogging towards them again.
"I trust him. I don't know why, but I do. And I think," he ventured earnestly, "I think you should, too."
"I never said I didn't."
"No, you didn't. But you just don't really seem like the trusting sort, is all."
Elpis squeaked her offence and rolled over to her side, to more directly confront him. "So you're saying that because I'm a labourer-because I'm a sixer-that you have to take me in hand and tell me who to trust and not trust? I don't think so. I'm not at the unit any more. I don't have to listen to you."
Crede let loose with an exaggerated, put-upon sigh. "I don't know why you have to get huffy at every little thing I say. It's not anything about sixers, and I never talk to your lot anyway, so how would I know how you are? Though, given the evidence, it's a good thing for it that I just stay in the laundry."
"Then what were you trying to say?"
Crede stubbornly refused to answer and looked quite pointedly back up at the sky.
"Oh, fine," Elpis said. "Good. That's good. Now's the part where you decide that the little Campheline is just too trying for your poor delicate sensibilities. I should just sit on a perch and sing and tell you how fantastic your timeline feels. Well, let me tell you, friend, your timeline feels like a big bag of hot rocks-"
Neither of them had paid any further attention to the Doctor's approach, and they both startled when he appeared and plopped down on the ground between them.
"Right," the Doctor chirped as soon as he'd sat down, completely ignoring the palpable tension in the air between Crede and Elpis. "We'll need to take cover-there's a fair bit of commotion back where we came from and I reckon they'll be starting a search."
Elpis nodded, a bit of grey plumage at her temple bobbing along, but then she solemnly met the Doctor's gaze and grew very still.
"You don't need to put yourselves out on my account. I can take care of myself."
"Nonsense," the Doctor scolded, looking offended that she'd even suggested such abandonment. "But if it makes you feel better, I think we're rather all on the same mission here. A partnership, if you will."
"Something's coming," Elpis said ominously.
"The temporal failsafe; the paradox..." Elpis and the Doctor whipped around to look incredulously at Crede. "Or something," he added, hedging.
The Doctor grinned. "Good lad! You were listening!"
"Yeah, I might be just an indenture, but I'm not deaf."
"Oi, steady on!" the Doctor protested, and the two glared at one another for a moment before the sound of Elpis's high laughter distracted them.
"You were saying, Doctor, about how we should perhaps not get ourselves caught? I don't fancy a fourth beating this week. Three was more than enough."
"Right, well, fortunately I know exactly where we are now. Of all the places on this planet I could have wound up, I've actually been here-specifically right here-before."
Crede nudged Elpis in the ribs at this and whispered, "Told you." Elpis answered only by wincing in pain.
The Doctor seemed to take no notice of their exchange. "When I was a kid, before I went off to school, we used to come here on holidays. I recognise that mountain range over there, the one that you said no one ever called anything . The mountains of Dark Reprisal. Yeah, I know, cheery name. A bit grim, my people." He took a deep breath and continued. "Anyway, about two miles east of here there are fissures, right in the ground. Narrow and nearly impossible to see until you fall in to one. A perfect place to hide, I'd say."
"And a perfect place to hide something," Crede added.
"Yes, quite. Good thinking," the Doctor replied breezily, and Crede shot him a look. "By which I mean to say: Of course that's good thinking, as you are so terribly clever."
In the following silence, they began to hear shouting, coming from the direction of the work unit.
"Can we go now, clever boys? " Elpis pleaded sharply.
***
They made their way nervously to a low ridge of rock, following the Doctor's lead-which Crede did easily, though small Elpis had to jog. Remaining in the lee of the ridge and in shadow, they felt less exposed and slowed their pace to allow Elpis to catch her breath.
"So did you come all the way to thirty-two just to run off with little old me?" she asked, running her hand along the red sandstone veined with purplish crystals.
"Just a happy coincidence," the Doctor said.
"We were coming to find out who it was from your unit that went missing recently," Crede clarified.
"Someone named Gliese, possibly?" the Doctor queried.
"Gliese? No, no one with that name. But..." She trailed off, while the Doctor and Crede nearly tripped over their own feet with curiosity.
"But...?" the Doctor prompted.
"Well, there was Tane and Amaia," she said, clearly expecting the words to carry heavy meaning for them.
Crede made a sour face. "Tane and Amaia; that supposed to mean something to us?"
"You never heard about that? Where are you from, the other side of the planet?" she asked incredulously.
"Clearly we haven't," said Crede, who then looked at the Doctor.
"Don't look at me, I'm an off-worlder."
"I'd have thought everyone-or at least everyone on Cassiel-would know about that," Elpis said.
"Are you actually going to say what 'that' is?" Crede huffed.
"Tane was an indenture at thirty-two. Kitchen staff. Popular consensus is that he was always a bit off, but not in a bad way. He was maybe 15 years into his indenture, clean record from what I was told. Mind you, it's not like I'm really in the loop, but things do get around. Amaia was a labourer-a Zeruseb, newly impressed from the way she acted, a bit haughty and above-it-all."
At that, Crede snorted.
"What?" Elpis asked, sincerely. Crede held his peace and even made an effort to wipe the smirk from his face. "Anyway, Tane and Amaia, they... well, apparently they fell in love or some such daft thing. They should have asked me, I could have told them where their timelines would wind up by following that course of action. Stupid. But if you tried telling that girl anything, she'd just wind up implying that she was somehow different from the rest of us. She was in my team for a little while, and to be honest no one could really stand her. No one but Tane, apparently."
"And where did their timelines wind up?" the Doctor asked steadily.
"I say they were stupid and she was insufferable, but nobody deserves what happened to Amaia. Or Tane, really. They had started to meet, secretly, around the unit and sometimes outside it. I think all the labourers knew about it, but we wouldn't say anything to implicate one of our own, even if she did act a bit of the princess.Tane's lot, well, I don't know if it was them either. But someone snitched and they were discovered. Caught in the act, in a supply room."Elpis visibly shuddered and Crede and the Doctor wore solemn faces, both knowing how this story would end now.
"She was executed," the Doctor offered after Elpis seemed unable to continue.
"Not just executed," she sighed. "Tortured, raped, beaten, made an example of, and then executed. Tane was forced to watch, and then he was arrested and sent to a penal satellite. I suppose he's still there, probably mad as the proverbial box of Keppas from what he had to see."
They walked without speaking for a few hundred more yards, Crede now feeling bad for having been sarky with her earlier. He'd been around his own unit for a few executions of unruly labourers, and it was always done publicly and in the most gruesome way possible. It took him a long time after to recover, and Elpis was doubtless still having nightmares over it if this scandal had taken place at all recently.
"And this all happened maybe four standard months ago?" the Doctor finally ventured, mirroring Crede's own thoughts.
"I suppose so. It's not like I keep track of these things in those sorts of terms, but that sounds about right. Did you hear about it too, wherever you're from?"
"In a manner of speaking," the Doctor said mysteriously. "And I have to ask because it is sort of incumbent upon me to fill in all available blanks, but would this penal satellite that Tane was sent to perhaps be fitted with escape pods?"
Elpis and Crede looked at one another and shrugged in unison.
"I'd imagine so," Crede said. "I don't remember much from my nursery station, but we had escape drills sometimes where we'd have to go line up at the hatches for the pods. I guess a penal satellite would at least have enough pods for the staff, though probably sod the prisoners. Why?" Right after he asked, he himself realised why. "Do you think that Tane..."
Elpis also had a light of realisation in her grey eyes. "He's escaped? Come back to exact his revenge or something dramatic like that?"
The Doctor pursed his lips and mused to himself before answering. "Something dramatic like that, yeah."
To Chapter 23