Doctor Who - 03 - The August Sky

.13.Debts of the Universe

Martha leapt up from behind a computer's keyboard in the workstation area. That sound! The TARDIS was materializing inside the Hub, not so far from the Rift Manipulator hidden underneath its water sculpture. Without much thinking Martha pushed back from the desktop and dashed out to meet the blue police box, switching from nothingness to existence in a rather confined space, only slightly less cluttered than the rest of the dilapidated hall.

Familiar squeak of the door, and an equally familiar head appeared in the gap. The Doctor's face, illuminated by amber and green light spilling out from the TARDIS, seemed immaterial, translucent like a countenance of a ghost. His wide-opened eyes quickly scanned the Hub.

"Doctor?"

"No! No – no – no – no – no – no – no!"

He slammed the door shut. Martha halted, instantly full of premonitions. Traditionally, such behaviour boded no good.

"Doctor?!"

The TARDIS began to hum and flicker, gradually disappearing from the Hub's time and space.

"Doctor?!"

The box dissolved in the air. Martha stood still for a while gasping quickly, expression of shock and worry on her face. For a brief moment she seemed to be on the verge of tears, but she only clenched her teeth and turned to Ianto. With the same alarmed expression, he was shifting his gaze from the space where the TARDIS had dematerialised a second ago, to the row of computer screens, and back again.

"O...kay..." said Gwen, leaning over the railing of the upper floor. "That was a brief visit, wasn't it?"

"Record-breaking," Jack confirmed, stepping out of his office and halting next to her. He adjusted his braces and slid both hands into his pockets. "Twenty seconds, more or less?"

"He promised he'd pop in." Mickey Smith crouched over the debris of mugs lying about in puddles of tea and coffee. He had dropped the tray when the TARDIS had appeared in the Hub.

"It... was quite weird behaviour," Gwen noticed. "Right?"

"Record-breaking." Jack rocked on balls of his feet.

"Eerm... well, no, don't exaggerate," said Mickey, picking up hot tea-bags from the puddle and arranging them on the tray. "You should have seen him straight after the regeneration. Now that was weird."

Ianto twitched suddenly, understanding dawning in his eyes. Pointing towards one of the screens, he turned to Jack, and said quickly:

"The Freezer!"

"Donna!" Martha picked up, running already. "Jack! It's Donna!"

Behind her back she could hear Gwen's voice and a clatter of Harkness, Mickey and Ianto's shoes. She did not stop, though, until she saw the TARDIS, materialised at a thirty degree angle, several inches above the floor, partially inside the Freezer's wall.

"Oh, my God!"

The Doctor was just rushing out of the box. In his arms he was carrying a monstrous tangle of wires, cables and small, flickering devices – organic-looking entrails of the TARDIS. He did not stop to say hello to Martha (just as he had not stopped to say goodbye earlier). It seemed that he did not even notice her. Something slid out of his arms as he ran, and went clattering across the stone floor. Martha pressed both hands to her lips, trying to suppress a scream. She knew this device. This horrible thing.

A Chameleon Arch. A metal circlet, able to transform the biological signature of a body. An ultimate camouflage device.

"Doctor!" Jack narrowly missed Martha in the doorway; he grabbed her by her shoulders and unceremoniously moved her aside. For a second there, Martha's feet lost contact with the floor. Ianto followed Jack closely, mixed emotions written clearly on his expressive face – in the Doctor's company there was always a shadow of anxiety, maybe even jealousy, present in his eyes. Mickey Smith wrapped his arm around Martha and helped her regain her footing.