I woke up this morning in my usual fashion, by the sound of overly loud sighs coming from the door of my bedroom (at least I wasn’t being poked this time). Sometimes it’s a real shame that the Doctor doesn’t need as much sleep as I do because I really think I could do with a proper lie in. But, there’s things to see, people to meet, civilisations to save so I got out of bed, had a shower, and then eat tea and toast in the galley. The Doctor dug in the cupboard for about ten minutes to find a jam that neither of us had had before (no small feat) and ended up with this sort of plumy grapefruit thing. It was delicious so we put it front and centre in the refrigerator so we wouldn’t forget to use it again. I should probably mention that we’ve done that at least sixteen times and now have a row of jams lined in the front of the refrigerator which make it rather hard to get to the milk. I decided to label them by taste so instead of writing ‘Hobroxl Fruit’ I wrote ‘Plumy Grapefruit’. We’re very orgainised now. Of course, in order to label them we had to taste them all, which meant sticking our fingers in, which the Doctor seemed to enjoy a little too much.
We contemplated then visiting Germberger’s Confits and Preserves which he promised was about as amazing as it sounds, but we’d been having an easy time of it lately, floating around visiting; not much trouble. So we decided to leave off Germberger’s for a bit and randomise, which is still one of my favourite things to do. Like I’ve said before, it could be anything out there. So the Doctor kicked (literally) off the handbrake, the TARDIS jerked throwing me across the room, and off we went.
When we landed I was still trying to disentangle myself from some sort of tubing against the far wall of the console room. I’m not one to complain, but the TARDIS really is not the smoothest ride. I’m not entirely sure who’s to blame, the pilot or the ship. But after about two minutes of trying to unstuck some sort of sticky from the leg of my jeans the Doctor finally came over to help.
“Blimey you know how to get yourself tangled,” he said and I just sort of glared for a moment before breaking into a laugh. Couldn’t quite help it really, it was funny. And luckily it wasn’t just me cause the Doctor couldn’t get off either, until he used the sonic to loosen the glue. Then we were off.
Two things were immediately apparent when we opened the door. One, due to a familiar hum that I didn’t think we’d heard in a while, we were on some sort of space station. And two, I was grossly under dressed. People and aliens were milling around the place in what could only be described as black tie. They were drinking bubbly orangey red drinks, talking to each other, and laughing. We’d clearly just crashed some sort of party. And a swanky one at that. The Doctor and I stared for a moment before we glanced at one another, grinned, and popped back into the TARDIS. I asked him where we were and his grinny response was ‘Does it matter?’
I wonder sometimes if all the clothes in the wardrobe belonged to other companions. People from my past and future who’d travelled with the Doctor before things happened to them. Either they got dropped off back at home or chose to stay somewhere else, or else… well things probably happened to some of them. I couldn’t quite imagine the wardrobe ever being empty, but there must have been a time, once at the beginning of the TARDIS’s existence where there wasn’t anything in there. But, now it’s filled with things I couldn’t even imagine. Back on the Powell Estate I never would have had any use for a nice dress or jewelry or beautiful shoes, I wouldn’t have anything to wear to that party going on outside. But someone, once had, because I found a knee length black dress that would have done Holly Golightly proud, then I went to my room and found the shoes that Ariella had once given me made from literal stardust. They were a sort of gold and shimmered in the light, like glitter only more fluid and more beautiful. Looking at myself in the mirror I felt sort of grown up, not to mention a bit posh. When I got to the console room the Doctor was already looking impatient tapping the balls of his trainer clad, black now as he was currently wearing the great tux of doom, feet against the base of the jumpseat.
“Bout time, ....Tyler...., where’d you get that outfit an asteroid bazaar?” he said but smiled and then appraised my new look. “Not bad,” he said then jumped off the jumpseat and took my hand tugging me towards the door. “You’ll fit right in.”
I allowed my hand to be tugged at because, well let’s face it, I’m used to it at this point. “Nice choice of suits, Doctor, does that mean we’ll be fighting off a hoard of mighty beasts in a moment?” I can’t remember if I explained before but I call his tuxedo the Great Tux of Doom because every time he wears it something bad happens. Now, I am not saying that bad things don’t happen when he’s got on his pinstripes but so far that hasn’t been a one hundred percent ratio. I mean, he wears that brown suit pretty much everyday. The tux however… well anyway, he does look pretty good in it.
So off we went to this party where we blended perfectly. No one seemed to pay the TARDIS any sort of attention in the corner in the room. It’s weird, sometimes people notice it and sometimes they just don’t. I would think it’s to do with perception filters and all but I really just don’t know. Anyway, right now it was just being ignored; perhaps it was the fabulous party. We mingled and met a couple of nice folks from a human colonised moon in a system call Balaxibran. I thought it sounded a bit like a grainy cereal. It seemed as though this was the year 746,539 and that this station was commissioned by the colony ....Paris...., where we had those brilliant crustaceans that time. So everyone was speaking French around us, though I couldn’t tell as the TARDIS was translating everything anyway, still knowing made it seem a bit posher. We drank orangey red fizzy drinks that were sort of like champagne except tasted way better and danced cause everyone else was. It seems this version of the Doctor has moves just as good at the last one. Maybe better.
But really, if anyone thought we were going to get out of these evening without trouble then you don’t know us very well. Everything was well and good until the band took the stage at around ..23:40.. and it became evident that we were ringing in the Human Empire’s New Year. I thought that was a bit funny since we’d just done New Years, but that’s what happens sometimes in time and space. The band, who were a mix of races, some human and some sort of… well they had trunks like elephants and a kind of bunny ears, also something else that looked human but was completely red and gold, was pretty good really and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves until about five minutes till midnight and all the power went down. And I don’t just mean all the power in the room, I mean all the power in the whole space station; everything just sort of went off. There weren’t any lights but it also meant that doors wouldn’t open, save for the apparent manual override, and probably worse off the artificial atmosphere was siphoning off into the ether. Which meant that pretty soon everyone in this room was going to die. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t all that worried. The TARDIS was just over in the corner and I was sure that the Doctor would have some sort of brilliant plan like he always has, but when I looked at him he had a sort of stony expression on his face.
“C’mon,” he said taking my arm by the wrist and pulling me towards the TARDIS. Everyone was screaming and pounding on the walls and carrying on in the fashion you’d expect when you realise you’re about to die. We went over to the TARDIS, opened the door, and went inside. The Doctor went immediately over to the console and started pressing buttons.
“Alright then, what’s the plan?” I asked, twisting my hair around my hand and smiling. “What brilliant way are we saving the day this time?”
The Doctor didn’t look at me for a long time, long enough that I started to get a bit worried. When he finally did look at me it was with one of the saddest expressions I’d ever seen. “Rose, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry but we can’t.”
I wrinkled up my brow, “What do you mean we can’t?” I didn’t understand, this was what we did. We found people in trouble and we helped them. We fixed things, the Doctor fixed things.
“Do you remember when I took you to see your father and you saved him? The whole world broke apart trying to correct it. Some things are in flux, those things I can change, those things aren’t meant to happen. Other things happen, must happen, and have to happen. I can’t interfere. We can’t interfere. That space station, Le Bon Temps III, is the third of its kind. They keep getting bigger and more luxurious and more and more unstable. Thousands of people vie for spaces on them, invitations to their parties, rooms in their hotels. People get greedy; stop caring about the work put into the stations. This changes all that. The power goes off, they can’t get the doors open, and they will die. All of them, except three. Two oxygen starved humans and one Zzerfed. They get the doors open just in time to save themselves. They’ll go back to their homes and they’ll tell the story. Because of that sanctions are put in place, checks and balances. People realise they can’t just build and build and build until things get out of hand. Because of this tragedy things get better. This has to happen. It would be like if we’d landed on the Titanic, its history, Rose, and it has to be.”
I stood there for a moment, not entirely sure what to say. I understood, I did, but it wasn’t fair. All those people we had just met and danced with and shared stories and orangey red fizzy drinks, they were all going to die and there wasn’t anything I could do about it. “All of them,” I finally said.
He looked very sad for a moment and then nodded, “All but three.”
I could tell that there were tears threatening behind my eyes and I could tell that he could tell, but I couldn’t help trying to be brave. I turned and looked out the TARDIS window, people were still rushing about, pushing each other, pushing at doors, opening up side panels to try and jerry rig them open. There wasn’t as much screaming as people seemed to realise they needed to preserve their energy. Some were praying, others were crying in corners having already given up. I couldn’t look away, just pressed my nose against the window until the Doctor came over and put his hand on my shoulder.
“Come on, Rose,” he said and guided me over towards the console where I sat in the jumpseat. He pressed some buttons and spun us back out into space. I told him I wanted to watch, so we stood by the door for a moment with them open and watched as one small ship broke away from the space station into freedom. I couldn’t tell, but I thought by now the space station was probably silent. After awhile I turned and walked to my room, where I took off my shoes, changed my dress into pajamas, curled up in bed, and cried. It wasn’t long before I heard the Doctor from the doorway. “Rose, I’m sorry. I should have asked, I didn’t know.”
I knew that. But it was hard, it would never not be hard. There are so many brilliant things about travelling with the Doctor sometimes it’s easy to forget the terrible things. The things I have seen. The people I’ve met who have died. I forget sometimes because it’s easier than remembering. I sat up and nodded and I think he knew I didn’t blame him, couldn’t really ever blame him. He came over and gave me a hug and I cried into his lapel for a long time until I eventually drifted off into sleep.
Until next time.
