amberfocus | Hunger Moon: Chapter Thirty-One

Banner by angelfireeast

Title: Hunger Moon (31/?)
Series: Better With You (Book 2)
Author:

amberfocus
Characters/Pairings: Alt!Nine/Rose Tyler, Jackie Tyler/Pete Tyler, Sarah Tyler, Kyle Tyler, Davin McBain, Mickey Smith/Suzie (Costello) Symmonds-Smith/Jake Symmonds, Toshiko Sato, Ianto Jones, Katie Harper/Owen Harper, Andy Davidson
Genre: Action/adventure, romance, alternate universe, fluff, angst, humor, smut
Rating: Adult, some chapters NC-17 with graphic sex
Betas:

amyo67
Summary: The psychic attacks of the Monoc'teru on the population of Pete's world sidetracks the Doctor and Rose's search for the spheres of Thessalameka, the second assignment on their quest to save the fabric of reality from unravelling forever. Set ten years post-Doomsday in a world where Journey's End never happened. Sequel to Wolf Moon http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/259862.html.

Previous chapters: http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/263134.html

Chapter Thirty-one: Separation Anxiety

“Okay, Sleeping Beauty, it’s time to wake up,” the Doctor said. He disconnected the tubes and wires that had been attached to Suzie Symmonds-Smith and extracted her from the machine she’d been inside. The woman floated free of the restraints, unfettered by the Zero Room’s lack of gravity. Carefully he pressed his fingers to her temples and encouraged her to wake from the induced sleep he’d put her in several days ago. He settled in for a bit of a wait, knowing it would take at least a half an hour for everything to fully wear off.

He was halfway through the complete works of William Shakespeare when her eyes opened slowly and she blinked up at him. As she got her bearings and realized where she was she said, “The babies?”

“That’s what we need to check. We’re out of range of the neural net now and you should no longer be feeling its effects. I just took the blocks out of your mind and took you off the medication a few hours ago. Been waiting for you to wake up ever since.”

“My throat hurts.”

“That’s from the breathing tube. I’ll get you some water in the infirmary and something to soothe it.” The Doctor reached out for her arm and tugged her over towards the door. He stepped across the threshold then reached for her legs. He helped her get her feet pointed in the direction of the floor and said, “Be careful. The return of gravity is going to mess with your balance for a bit.”

She nodded and he pulled her towards him. She stumbled against him as her feet touched the floor. “I feel so heavy.”

He steadied her for a long moment. “Think you can walk? The infirmary isn’t far, but I can carry you if need be.”

“I want to try to walk. Where are Jake and Mickey?” she asked as she put one foot in front of the other, leaning heavily against the Doctor, who slung an arm about her shoulders to keep her upright.

“Ianto had work for them to do. He called Rose away with them. I’m not sure what for. Guess we’ll find out when we get back to Earth.”

“We’re not on Earth?” she asked in surprise.

“No. I took Rose’s family to a safe place and we’re currently floating in space. Since the neural net can’t assert its influence outside the planet I figured it was safe enough to wake you up and see how you’re doing.”

They reached the infirmary and the Doctor helped Suzie up onto an exam table. The grogginess was wearing off and she had adjusted to the return of gravity. “How are you feeling?” he asked.

“Actually, I haven’t felt this good since before I got pregnant. You should patent that room and sell it on Earth. You’d make a fortune in the prenatal market,” Suzie told him.

“Humans would do things with the technology that shouldn’t be done,” he said ruefully. “I’m glad you’re doing better, but I need to bring you up to speed on what’s going on.”

“Has something happened?” Suzie asked giving him a sharp look. “Where are Mickey and Jake? And Rose for that matter? I’d have thought she’d be here. You two are usually joined at the,” she paused, smirking, “pelvis.”

The Doctor was torn between rolling his eyes and blushing. He decided to simply ignore her comment altogether. “I had to take Rose’s family somewhere safe. They were in danger on Earth and they were in danger on the TARDIS. Sarah seriously injured herself this morning. So we decided to take them out of the situation completely. We went forward in time to a resort on the moon with a very good hospital so that Pete can continue his recovery and get the physical therapy he needs and Sarah could heal properly.”

“The future?” Suzie asked. “You were serious about this being a time machine? Not just a space ship?”

“’Course I was,” he said.

“Thought you were putting us on.”

“I don’t joke about my ship. Anyway, I took us there to drop them off and when I came back to the 21st century and tried to land on Earth, the TARDIS bounced off a barrier. The Monoc’teru have erected some sort of force field against teleport technology. We can’t get back down to Earth,” he said.

Suzie frowned. “Can’t we just go back in time to before we left and land and then go forward in time to when we’re supposed to return?” she asked.

“No. We’re already a part of established events in this time line. If we mess with that we could cause serious damage to the proper outcome. We just have to figure out a way to disable the signal or get through it, that’s all.”

“Oh, that’s all?” she said. “Like it’s that easy.”

“Genius me,” he said. “Now, give me a bit of hush while I examine you and then when I’m done we can continue this.” She nodded, but the look on her face told him that this was a conversation that was definitely going to continue.

Several minutes later the Doctor looked up from his scanner and gave Suzie a reassuring smile. “The babies are doing just fine. They’ve completely recovered from the psychic onslaught that hit you all so hard.”

“Thank goodness,” Suzie said rubbing her stomach softly. “I was so worried when you told me what happened.”

“You’re doing okay, too, by the way,” he said, “but you need to understand that if we actually make it through this psychic force field and back onto Earth, you’ll likely need to return to the Zero Room. As long as that neural net is up and running, you’re at risk.”

“Then we just need to find a way to turn it back off while we’re up here,” she said. “As relaxed and refreshed as I feel right now, I really don’t want to have to sleep away another few weeks of my life.”

“Well, you wouldn’t necessarily have to be asleep. Or alone. That was more for the recovery from the damage that was done to you. If the signal is still on and you go in there and stay in there before we somehow make it back to Earth, you could at least keep some books in with you. It won’t nearly be so strict this time. Your husbands could both come in to visit you. You wouldn’t be able to have any electronics, anything a signal could piggyback its way in on, but you could have them.”

“Well, that’s something,” Suzie said looking relieved. “Jake’s probably going spare not being able to see me.”

“Mickey wasn’t very happy about it, either.”

“Really?” She seemed surprised. “He’s always so stoic.”

“Doesn’t mean he’s less attached.”

“He’s less dependent, I think, on the grouping. Jake seems…more fully…well, to use your terminology, bonded,” she mused.

The Doctor shifted uncomfortably. He knew for a fact that Jake actually was more fully bonded to Suzie, but it wasn’t something he felt she needed to know for the sake of their marriage. What he’d accidentally seen from the trio’s very loud emotional connections had been private.

Suzie continued on a moment later. “And books will be good. I don’t do well with boredom. I like to keep my mind occupied. And the best way of doing that right now is finding a solution to our problem before I have to be confined to quarters again.”

“Yes, it is. Tell me, Suzie from archives, do you have any special skills?”

“Depends on what you mean by special.” The slow smile Suzie gave him would have frightened a lesser man.

“Shouldn’t the Doctor have joined us by now?” Mickey asked. “Ianto said he’d send him along the minute he got back and it’s been hours since we left.”

Rose glared at him. “We can do it, Mickey. We don’t need his help. We do this all the time. He’s not the only alien expert on the planet, you know.”

“Not technically on the planet right now,” Jake chimed in.

“Not helping,” Rose grimaced.

“You have to admit his help would come in handy,” Mickey pressed on. “He is coming back, right?”

Rose whirled on him. “Of course he’s coming back!” she snapped. “I’m sure there was just a complication. You know how Mum is. Probably didn’t like the state of their rooms or something and threw a fit until the Doctor sorted things out.”

“Still, it’s odd. He barely could stand to have you out of his sight, now all of a sudden—.”

“Mickey, will you just shut it, please?” Rose asked. “The Doctor will get here when he gets here, or if he doesn’t, then we’ll handle it. You getting soft? Now that the better man for the job is around again, don’t think you can hack it anymore?”

“Rose Marion Tyler, that was uncalled for!” Jake snapped. He put a staying hand on Mickey’s chest, as if holding back his husband. Mickey glared furiously at Rose.

Rose flushed hotly under the disapproval of her friend. She rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly. “Sorry, Mickey,” she said grudgingly. “I…being away from him is hard on me. Physically, mentally. I’ve been trying to reach his mind but he’s out of range. It’s like trying to grab something and it’s constantly an inch out of reach. Something is blocking it. The link isn’t shut down exactly but…it doesn’t feel complete either and that is very hard on me. I don’t mean to take it out on you.”

Mickey sighed. “I know. I don’t mean to be an arse. I know we can control our anger and rage but that signal is still making me irritable as hell.” He turned towards Jake, removing the man’s hand from his chest and giving it squeeze. “Why aren’t you being affected?”

“Oh, I’m being affected all right. I’m just better at keeping it under control. Besides, that sort of thing helps no one,” Jake said. “We about ready to go?”

“I think so.” She closed the lead lined box and picked it up, heading out to the jeep.

“Oh, bloody hell!” roared Sergeant Reed.

“What is it?” shouted Jake, but a moment later they could see what it was. The townsfolk, who had gathered by the perimeter fence and had been quietly observing, had suddenly gone berserk. The only unvaccinated people heretofore unaffected by the signal were now acting like everyone else in the country. They flung themselves at the fence trying to get at the people inside.

“What happened?” Rose asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Hold on,” said Luke Smith rushing to Rose’s side. He grabbed the box from out of her hands and opened it. A pulse of green, followed by a beam of blue, light shot out of it. The effect was instantaneous. The people at the gate began milling around in confusion at their bloodied hands and faces, not realizing what they’d even been doing seconds before until it washed over them in horror.

“It’s the orbs,” Maria said. “Somehow they’re responsible for the peace of this town.”

“The lead must be blocking their influence somehow,” Rose said. “I thought it would be best to block the radiation coming out of them, even though it’s not that much. I just don’t like taking chances with them when they keep pulsing like they started doing, but obviously we’re going to have to.”

“Do you think it’s just the lead stopping it?” Sergeant Reed asked. “Or is it possible that any enclosure would cause a problem?”

Luke frowned. “It was working when the one was still buried in the ground,” he said. “There’s a couple of wooden boxes in the tent that might work. It wouldn’t block the radiation but it wouldn’t block the protection either. I don’t think.”

“Let’s try it.” She followed Luke back into the tent, Mickey and Jake following along behind her. Luke laid out the two small boxes lined with soft, fluffy packing material. Rose held out the open lead lined box and Luke lifted an orb out. She took the other one, discarding the first metal box and secured the second orb in the wooden box. She stepped away from the table.

“How are they doing?” Rose called out to Sergeant Reed.

“They seem sane, but the radius of protection is shrinking.” His soldiers had corralled them in a holding area while Rose had tried to figure things out. She poked her head out of the tent and glanced at the perimeter fence.

“So the closer the orbs are together, the less of a calming effect they seem to have,” muttered Mickey, following her out.

“We ought to take one to the top of Scotland and the other to the bottom of England,” Jake said as he joined them. “Maybe we could get the whole country sorted out, block the signal they’re sending completely.”

“I don’t know if they’re that powerful,” Rose said. “We’ll ask the Doctor when he gets back.” Rose shot Mickey a look but the man held his tongue. She really hoped that their friendship was going to survive this adventure with its lack of verbal inhibitions. It had survived a lot, including their breakup and her running off with the other Doctor in the first place, but both of them speaking their minds all the time with no ability to censor what should not be said aloud could be the end of it. As irritated as she was at the man she would hate, hate, hate to lose her dearest, oldest friend.

“I hate them,” Rose muttered.

“What?” asked Mickey.

“The Monoc’teru. I hate them. They have us tearing at each other and I hate them for it,” she replied.

“Rose, we’ll be okay,” Mickey said.

Even after all this time he could still read her so well. Maybe because of all this time. “We just keep saying stuff,” she said. “Stuff we’d never say out loud normally.”

“We’ll be okay,” Mickey repeated. “We’ve been through worse, Rose.”

Rose wasn’t so sure, but she tried to accept his reassurance and turn her mind back to the matters at hand. “Do we have a big enough truck to evacuate some of these villagers with?” she asked.

“Evacuate?” Sergeant Reed asked in surprise.

“We have to take these orbs back to Torchwood,” Rose said. “When we take them away, these people are going to revert to the insanity that’s sweeping the rest of the nation. We can’t leave them like this. Not when they know what’s going to happen. Not if we can get them out.”

“Rose is right,” Mickey concurred.

“There’s the bus,” Maria suggested.

“Bus?” asked Jake, turning sharply towards the young woman.

“Yeah. It’s on the back fence. It was converted for Dr. Sullivan’s living quarters. The tents weren’t enough protection from the elements for his health, so we brought in a converted bus. If we strip it of its furnishings there should be enough room for fifty people to stand if we pack them in,” she said.

“We have one troop mover,” said one of the UNIT men standing with Sergeant Reed. “There’s only ten military. We could fit in another forty.”

“All right,” Reed acquiesced. “You guys get to work stripping the bus. We’ll go and talk to the townsfolk.”

“Let me call Ianto and let him know what’s going on,” Rose said. She flipped open her mobile and after getting past Domina McAvoy, soon had Ianto on the phone.

“I hate to rain on your parade,” he said, “But unless you have a place to house all these people safely in Cardiff, what good is moving them here going to do?”

“The orbs stabilize the area around us. It’s big enough to protect a town. We can certainly protect the area around Torchwood with it. It’s just a question of finding a place for them to stay. We can maybe bring 80 people with us,” Rose said.

There was silence on the other end of the phone for a moment. “Let me ask Domina what we have.” There was muffled talking and then Ianto’s voice returned strong and clear again. “There’s a warehouse we own that’s currently empty. It’s big enough to house a few hundred people.”

“That’s fine. And if you can scrape up food, emergency supplies, clothing, bedding, that sort of thing…” Ianto sighed heavily. “We can’t just leave them!” Rose insisted.

“I know. I just…you saw what it’s like out there, Rose. I don’t want to risk any of my operatives.”

“Well, maybe we should just wait until we get back, see how far the protection from the orbs will stretch. We might be able to get supplies in safely then,” she suggested.

“That would probably be best. Oh, and Andy and Katie did bring in that man who survived the attack from a sphere without it taking control of his mind. He’ll be here to question when you get back,” he said.

“Okay. We’ll be there as soon as we can. Oh, and Ianto?” she asked.

“Yeah?”

“Have you heard from the Doctor?” she asked.

“You mean he isn’t there? I figured he’d go straight on from dropping off your family.” Ianto’s voice was heavy with surprise.

“Me, too. Only he hasn’t done.”

“I’m sure he’s fine, Rose,” Ianto said.

“Yeah, yeah, of course he is.” She rang off with Ianto, a heavy feeling in her chest as she did so. She wasn’t sure at all. That was the problem. She searched frantically for even a hint of their link. For the first time since the bonding she couldn’t feel him at all. And it terrified her.

Ch. 32: http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/316544.html

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

othermewriter.livejournal.com

Awww poor Rose! I LOVE this story and I can't imagine things to be much easier for the doctor on the other side of that nothing either. Please post again soon.

From:

Not Rose-Colored Glasses

Hunger Moon: Chapter Thirty-One

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