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eve11Main Post and Chapter Index
They needed a vehicle. They would never make it on foot; River knew that the Doctor understood that fact. He had to have a mental picture of the unforgiving landscape facing them. He had to remember the patrols and the desolation, both spanning twenty miles or more in every direction. But still, it hurt to turn him away from the TARDIS.
His face fell when she put a hand on his shoulder, halting his first tentative step across the barren plain and directing him back to the base. Worry lines creased his forehead, the pain of betrayal flashing across his features before he caught himself and buried the emotion. He shook his head as though he could free it that way from the pull of his ship on the horizon, scrubbed a hand over the ragged beard along his jaw, and murmured a distracted "yes, of course, of course," even though River hadn't said anything aloud.
And what could she say? She clenched her fists in useless anger, the action sending a burn up through the tendons in her injured shoulder. Around them, the landscape was quiet and still. The buildings were utterly vulnerable, and her study of the base layout had shown her where the explosive fuel was kept. She could torch the laboratories, raze them to nothing but pits in the ground. No one would be able to stop her.
Instead, she dug resolutely through the supply pack and thrust the pair of boots at the Doctor's chest. "Here, put these on," she said. He gave a startled grunt and clutched at them in surprise. She went back to rummaging more forcefully than necessary through the pack while he searched the leather folds and laces in his hands.
"Boots. Brilliant," he said tersely, sounding for all the world as if they were anything but. She looked over to where he was scuffing his toes into the dusty gravel. Aside from a mild breeze and the distant TARDIS, it was likely the clearest sensation he had of their immediate surroundings.
"Sweetie, you need them." She could hunt down Duvall and Ogden, she decided, and give them each one bullet--no, one small conical implant at the base of the neck, and send them into the silent dark. It was more than they deserved. But she just turned her attention to zipping up the pack and pointed out, "Your feet are scraped to hell and your toe is bleeding."
"Army boots, old girl, do you believe it?" He lodged this complaint at the northeast sky while seating himself carefully on the ground, still exploring the offending footwear with his fingers and grumbling. "Well, I don't like them at all. And what next? Mittens, I suppose . . ." Then he stopped and cocked his head, scowling over at River, who hastily and rather unnecessarily put a hand to her mouth to try and stifle the sound coming from it. "River, are you laughing?"
She cleared her throat. "Of course not," she said, but couldn't stop the smile that had hijacked her anger and somehow turned it neatly on its ear. "It's just nice to know some things never change."
"You could have brought--oi!" He cut off when she bounced a ball of rolled-up socks expertly off his forehead to land at his fingertips. He pointed accusingly in her direction before collecting them. "Stop launching things at me! I hate you."
"No you don't, dear." She shouldered the pack, leaving him to the task of pulling on the socks and boots and hastily knotting the laces by touch, and then she put a hand on his shoulder.
"No need to hover," he said petulantly, taking her hand and levering himself up. "I--"
The world suddenly contracted around them, and he swayed against her on watery legs. Cotton wool swamped her head, and River heard the Doctor let out a hiss of pain as she struggled to keep him upright.
Her temporal sense was limited, but this time she knew what to listen for in the timelines. For one agonizing second, River finally caught a glimpse of the time stream that the Doctor was trying to keep intact. He was right; it wasn't really a bubble at all. It was more like a ditch being furrowed down a sandy hillside. She felt the terrifying instability of more and more excluded events tumbling down from the flash point in space-time where the Doctor had diverted them, and she had no idea how anyone could stand against it. Even if they kept pushing forward on the path of least resistance, there was no way to avoid the eventual collapse. Fear seized her with the dawning realization, air stuck like concrete in her lungs until she couldn't draw a breath--and then, as quickly as it had come, the quarantine pressure relented.
The Doctor straightened before he could fall, his short breaths already calming.
"Are you all right?" River steadied herself and smoothed her thumb along the back of his hand. He gripped her fingers like a lifeline and brought his other hand up to her cheek, brushing trembling fingers across her brow. His face relaxed.
"Good for now, good as it gets." He blinked his eyes open and fixed his gaze on the sky beyond her shoulder, his face pensive. "She calms the timelines, like a temporal breakwater. But it's not . . ." The half-voiced thought trailed off. River couldn't tell if he realized he'd spoken it aloud. His hand fell as he tried to shrug off his sadness. "She can't feel me. So far away."
"We'll get there," River said. "I swear, I'll get you to her."
He didn't respond, and River wondered if he could tease out the meaning of a promise that wouldn't change the likelihood of anything. He took the crook of her elbow again, turning his back on the hills.
"Right. Transport. Best"--he balked when she took them a few steps back toward the truck in the loading bay--"best stay away from the laboratories. Too much activity. Collisions. Ripples."
River nodded, shivering at the ghost impression of the amassing temporal avalanche she'd felt. They turned around instead and set off west toward the lake bed and the logistics vehicles, skirting the edge of the supply airstrip across the flat, packed dirt in the eerie stillness.
Time crept up on them in fits and starts as they ran. Whenever River looked up, the sky was fractionally darker, and the clouds were frozen again in new configurations. Snatches of activity dotted the base; steam drifting up from the generator units, or the dim echo of a supply truck rumbling along tarmac. Twice more in their flight, River heard the Doctor's breath catch and felt his hand tighten against her shoulder as his temporal grasp on the quarantine weakened. Twice more, the likelihoods went haywire around them, trying to reintegrate the time streams into their natural order. River had to slow down and steady them both as strange, thick air pressed against her ears and caught cloyingly in her lungs. But though the barrier bent, the Doctor wouldn't let it break. She could feel how much it was costing him to maintain his hold, in the silent concentration that gripped his frame like a wound spring and the shuffle that dogged his steps more and more persistently.
She hated seeing him like this. She hated that they had no choice but to flee like wounded prey. And she hated that it was so early in his timeline. Even if he could see her or hear her, her Doctor, for whom she would crush planets and break time itself, would still look at her with suspicion and listen to her with mistrust, and there was nothing she could do about it. Nothing, except make absolutely sure that they escaped this prison, so that her past--and his future--wouldn't be rewritten here in the Nevada desert.
The thought shook her concentration, and River misjudged a step downward from gravel to dirt. It jarred the Doctor's balance and he stumbled away from her. She righted him and forced herself to take measured steps. They were running out of time. She hated that he couldn't run faster.
It was a relief when they reached the lots at the edge of the lake bed. The timelines were calmer here; she could feel the Doctor relax into exhaustion as she scouted the area for a good escape vehicle. Her first choice was an OH-6 scout class Cayuse perched invitingly on a secluded landing pad. But the Doctor had barely splayed his hands across the machine's blunt nose before he recoiled as if burned. "A helicopter? River!" he said, falling back against her and pushing her away from it.
"Trust me, I can fly it--" she started.
"Forgotten things," he hissed, and continued in short, slurred sentences. "To come with us in the bubble. No complicated past or--or future. Big ripple across the barrier, that," he pointed at the machine and grimaced, "will burst the whole thing by the time we're in the air."
No, it couldn't happen like that. She wouldn't let that happen. River reached for the pilot's side door. "I can fly it fast--"
"No helicopters!" he shouted, straightened, and set his feet, clamping a hand down on her bad arm with sudden strength. Startled, River yelped in pain and nearly struck him out of pure reflex, but he didn't seem to notice and he didn't let her go. She whirled around and looked up to find his expression deadly serious, his blind eyes staring straight at her, and not a hint of a tremor in his grip. When he sensed her attention, he relaxed his hold and said very precisely, "Three minutes. Maybe five. How far can you fly in five minutes? How hard do you want to crash?"
River stilled and studied his face. She felt his grip loosen even further and saw the first hints of weariness settling back across his frame. She spared one backward glance at the Cayuse. It really was a beautiful specimen.
"This plan is rubbish," she told him. The Doctor concentrated for a moment, then raised his eyebrows in agreement and beamed at her, as though she were a struggling student who'd finally caught up to the lesson of the day. She turned his hand palm up, tapping as she talked. "What do you need?"
He took her cheeks in both hands and kissed her forehead, seemingly rejuvenated, at least for the moment. "Find something old. Static. Easy to bring across. Buys more time." Then he let her go, focusing his concentration out across the base again. "Honestly, a helicopter," he muttered, turning to face the northeast hills. "Does anyone ever listen to me?"
"Whatever we end up with," River said with an enduring sigh, "you'd better not argue over who's driving."
The Doctor just raised a hand and pointed. "TARDIS," he said, then moved his arm in a slow arc back across the base. "Laboratory." His hand passed the low buildings in the distance. "If I remember . . . water tower?" he asked, and River wordlessly repositioned his arm slightly to the right to align his pointing finger with the landmark. "Thanks. And sorry," he added after a moment, still studying the landscape, but dropping his hand to find her injured shoulder. She didn't flinch as he brushed it with his fingers. "About your arm. It's hurt."
River stared at his profile, and at the black disc embedded in the back of his neck. "It'll heal," she said quietly.
He raised his hand up haltingly to the device, as if he could feel River's gaze on it. His fingers hovered over it briefly without touching, and then he took her good arm and oriented them both unerringly toward the rest of the logistics vehicles. "This way."
In the end, he directed them to a dirt-packed lot whose only claims to civilization were a chain link fence overgrown with weeds, and a barely latched gate with a sign reading AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY in rusting letters. River took the lead again as soon as she reluctantly discerned his target, an old Dodge M43 languishing in deep ruts at the lot's far edge. She guided him across the debris-strewn ground to place his hands on the rear door latch. His fingertips quested outward, tracing the subtle edges of the red cross painted over a white square, emblazoned over dull military green. "Ambulance," he remarked, pressing his cheek to the door. He gave a sad half-smile at some internal thought and then stood back and announced, "Hasn't moved in ages. Perfect."
Before River could point out the tactical inconsistencies in those two sentiments, the Doctor had felt his way past her over to the driver's side door, flung it open and added, "Love top secret bases, never lock anything. Give us a mo'!" before exploring the seat, step, and steering wheel, and carefully planning his foray into the cab. River visually checked the tires--all pressurized--then gathered a scrap of rebar from the ground litter and banged it against the fuel tank over the rear wheel to get a rough idea of the petrol level. Half a tank, she estimated. They'd get a better reading from the gauge on the dash after switching on the ignition, but starting it would surely test the quarantine boundary, and she didn't want the Doctor to try and bring it across if all it had were fumes to run on.
River tossed the rebar aside. This rust bucket was no Cayuse, for sure. It was a clunky dinosaur at the end of its line, but it would be good for a final forty miles. If the battery wasn't shot. If they could get it started and bring it across the barrier. If the whole rubbish plan didn't fall to pieces around them in the next thirty seconds, leaving them exposed and defenseless against the manhunt that was sure to follow as soon as Groom Lake realized its prisoners were nowhere near the laboratory examination room buried under its dry, dead soil.
"Come on!" the Doctor's voice came from where he'd disappeared up into the cab. When River came up to the driver's side door, she found him hunched in the seat at the wheel, his forehead nearly touching twelve-o-clock, his fingers tapping nervously at ten. "Allons-y River! No, no, no, that sounds awful, doesn't it? Don't answer that. I'm going to start the engine. Yes, best if I do it," he added at her unspoken argument. "It has a smooth future, but the transition across is still tricky." He stopped the tapping pattern and reached for her hand, guiding it to the same spot where his had been, and held her fingers there in place under his own. "So stay still, right there," he said, directing his speech at the dashboard, even though River was still standing outside the cab. “And think solid thoughts."
"Solid thoughts? Sweetie--"
"The timelines will be a bit . . . choppy. For a moment." With his far hand, the Doctor reached next to the wheel and gripped the ignition switch. His foot found the clutch and pressed it in. "Ready?"
Solid thoughts it was. River closed her eyes, steeling herself in the moment. Past and future existed as always, twining around them both, but what mattered the most was right here, right now. There was no room for doubt, and there was no point in fear or regret. There was only this present task, that would be completed with all certainty.
When she opened her eyes again, she found that was all the answer the Doctor needed. He had turned his head in her direction and was smiling at her. Exhausted, terrified, with every freedom he'd ever known at stake, he was still unable to keep the pure thrill of excitement from his next words.
"Here goes," he said, and turned the switch.
The truck sputtered and then rumbled to life, the vibrations humming through their fingers on the wheel, and then gaining momentum on a completely different plane and intensifying, temporal ripples rattling them both. The barrier stretched and wavered. The air shimmered, a mirage of deeper shadows shot through the twilight. Klaxons blared like tinny records in the distance, the sound cutting in and out, the echoing differentials of the two time streams pressing against them from all sides. The Doctor couldn't keep the signs of strain from his face, but he was otherwise calm. He murmured encouraging words at the dashboard, then clamped his hand even tighter around River's fingers and eased his other foot down on the acceleration pedal, revving the engine in neutral gear. The timelines surged, and--just when River was sure they'd made a horrible mistake and everything was going to come crashing down around them--the world smoothed out again, silent and still but for the now-very-present ambulance and its ancient, ponderous, wonderful engine, idling away in the dusk.
"Ha! Transport secured!" the Doctor exclaimed. He sat back, dropped his hands like dead weight from the wheel and nearly fell out of the cab before righting himself. "I don't suppose--" he said, catching his breath, but River cut him off.
"No. And no arguing," she said.
He waved a limp hand dismissively at her before sitting up with weary sigh and feeling his way over to the passenger side seat. River swung up into the cab with their gear, tossed the pack through the partition door to the back compartment, and then reached across her body to pull the door closed. Her left arm protested sharply when she grasped the steering wheel, and she lowered her grip, testing the give in the wheel against the strength in her right arm. It was tight but manageable.
The Doctor settled his shoulders gingerly against the seat and, finding nothing jarring the back of his neck, grimly strapped himself in. "I suppose I'll let you drive. Sweetie," he said through a frown. Then he gave her a ridiculous thumbs up gesture, and braced his hands conspicuously along the door and the edge of the seat.
"That's the best idea I've heard all day," River muttered. She wrestled the ambulance into gear, steered toward the rusted gate, and floored it.
THIS TAPE IS CLASSIFIED *TOP SECRET//BOARDWALK MISTLETOE//NOFORN*
PROPERTY OF UNITED STATES AIR FORCE
GROOM LAKE EXPERIMENTAL AIRCRAFT AND XENOTECH RESEARCH FACILITY
SECURITY CHECKPOINT E8-X435 NORTHEAST
RADIO TRANSMISSIONS TO MOBILE UNIT 279
PERSONS ON RECORD
CHAVEZ, SENIOR AIRMAN RICARDO J, DISPATCHER
DENNIS, AIRMAN PAUL E, PATROL DETAIL
SANDIA, AIRMAN MARK C, PATROL DETAIL
04 AUGUST 1969
20:37 HOURS
DENNIS: This is mobile unit two-seven-niner to base four-three-five, over.
CHAVEZ: Mobile unit two-seven-niner acknowledged. This is base four-three-five. Is that you again, Paulie? Over.
DENNIS: Yeah, Rico, 'course it's me. We've been hearing those damned sirens for over an hour. You're the one with the promotion. What the hell is going on? Over.
CHAVEZ: Nothing new here. Base is still on lockdown, all test flights grounded. There was some kind of electrical surge, over.
DENNIS: Electrical surge, sure. Think Houdini's at it again? It's been a while.
[There is a two second delay.]
CHAVEZ: I'm not authorized to discuss that on this channel.
DENNIS: Aw, come on, man! Give us something. We were supposed to end our shift at nineteen-hundred, and instead we're heading back in for another loop. The rain's already started, and Sandia's driving. I'm taking my life in my hands, here, over.
CHAVEZ: Command says the situation is contained and the patrols are just a precaution. Sorry, that's all I know, over.
[There is a three-second delay.]
DENNIS: Base four-three-five, Airman Sandia would like to officially log his opinion that Command is full of--
[The feed cuts off and then almost immediately comes back.]
SANDIA: --ck you, man, give me that! This is Sandia. Ignore him. Situation noted, over and--holy Christ! What--?
[Static interrupts the connection. There is what sounds like a loud crack of thunder and a deep rumbling on the tape.]
CHAVEZ: Two-seven-niner, come in? Paulie? Sandia?
[There is an eight-second delay before the connection clicks on again.]
DENNIS: -ree-five, this is unit two-seven-niner, do you read me, over?
CHAVEZ: Got you, Paulie. What the hell just happened, over?
DENNIS (laughs): Nothing, man. [There is static and the sound of a curse from Airman Sandia over the line.] We're in a ditch, over.
CHAVEZ: Two-seven-niner, repeat?
DENNIS: Sandia got spooked by some lightning and drove us right off the road. He thought it was headlights--
SANDIA (in background): It was headlights! Nearly swiped us! Didn't you see a truck--?
DENNIS (aside): No, man, there's no supply truck due--
SANDIA (in background): Not a supply truck!
[The radio cuts out.]
CHAVEZ: Two-seven-niner, repeat, you saw a truck? Over.
DENNIS: Negative. There's no sign of a truck anywhere. Just us in a ditch, in the rain. Over.
CHAVEZ: Hell, Sandia, you're a menace! Paulie, do you need assistance? Over.
DENNIS: Negative, base. I'll drive; he can push. Over and out.
*END OF CLASSIFIED MATERIAL*
It was a tense, bumpy nine miles across the scrub basin east of the airstrip before they hit the foothills and then the steep northeastern pass. Atop the ridge, still miles from the base perimeter, the gravel road narrowed to a single checkpoint--a small parking lot lined with mobile patrol units, and a guard station with a flimsy gate arm drawn down across the access road. It was designed more for bureaucracy than security. River went around it easily enough, but less than a mile later, the Doctor suddenly cried out an aborted warning and grabbed hold of the steering wheel, turning them frantically aside. She had no time to ask what the hell he was doing before the effects of the quarantine swamped them again, signaling an impending collision in more ways than one. When it finally relented, River fought the truck's momentum and careened them back onto the gravel. Pain shot through her bad arm, nausea and light-headedness lingered, but she didn't dare stop. She chanced a quick glance at the Doctor; he had let go of the wheel but was still nearly doubled over in the seat, his fingers clawing at his hair and his breathing ragged.
"Patrol," he slurred. It was the first he'd spoken since giving her the driver's seat. "Near miss--"
But he couldn't finish the thought. The ambulance jolted over the uneven road and he hissed out a breath, casting his hands out in blind panic before bracing them against the dash and the door. River tenuously shifted her grip and tried to reach out to him, but he just inhaled sharply and shied away from her when she touched his wrist. He growled something that sounded like "eyes front, keep going," at her, and then fell silent again.
River set her jaw and concentrated on the road, counting the seconds between the Doctor's hitching breaths.
There was little she could do to make it easier on him. They abandoned the access road for some overgrown tire tracks as soon as they hit open desert, and it seemed to help quell the likelihood of collisions across the deteriorating quarantine barrier. The Doctor let out an unsteady sigh of relief, short-lived as River put on speed along the jarring escape route. She jammed her foot down on the acceleration pedal, urging the old ambulance up past thirty miles per hour despite its groaning in protest. She aimed a creative curse at the bucket of bolts and was surprised to hear a short laugh from the passenger seat. She hadn't realized the Doctor was still paying attention to anything other than fighting his exhaustion.
River doubted he could understand much, but just knowing that any part of her words got through to him was enough. She forced the tremor out of her voice and started a one-sided conversation. How did they get themselves into these messes? And how brilliant was it that they could always escape? She always loved that part, and well, she said suggestively, all the parts that came afterward. Not that she was going to give away any spoilers, so don't bother asking. Anyway, the TARDIS was just beyond the next ridge, the one that rose up from the darkening horizon right in front of them, getting closer by the minute.
The world flew by in static twilight, tall brush sweeping into the front grill in a shush of sound over the noise from the engine. The miles fell away and River kept talking. Nearly twenty minutes passed before the Doctor said anything in return.
"There will be some . . . afterimages." He struggled with the word. "A crash like this--it stirs up temporal echoes."
"We're clear across the valley, now," River said, but he didn't seem to notice.
"Past events. Old--old paradoxes in personal timelines," he said. "Worse for us, inside the bubble."
Her hands tightened against the steering wheel. "Don't say that. It's not going to happen yet."
"Worse for me, without the TARDIS. Dialed up past eleven and I can't turn it off. Time sense like . . . eyes forced open to stare at a blast." He was trying to keep even breaths, to speak clearly through his fatigue, but the words were getting away from him. River looked over and saw his eyes shut tightly and his hands white-knuckled in their grip on the seat. "I might . . . I might not remember where I am. Might try to find her--"
"Hold on just a little longer, my love." The wind gusted, the sky darkened, and the ground scrolling beneath them was suddenly damp with rain. "We're nearly there."
He barked a short laugh at her obvious lie. "You're telling me we're close. We're not. I won't make it, I--"
He cut off as they rattled into the first set of gullies that led up into the next line of hills. River arced them to the left, skirting the foothills and heading toward the interstate highway that snaked its way over the ridge, not far north of their position.
"Please," she said. A loud, low rumble set the ambulance shuddering. It was thunder; it was only thunder from the coming storm, that was all. She ground the acceleration pedal to the floorboards and growled a curse. "Why can't this useless scrap heap move any faster! Please, I . . . I promised--"
It was perhaps a mile to the interstate. And from there, it was another fifteen miles on the open road to the lake where Amy and Rory waited with the TARDIS.
"Sorry. River." The Doctor reached for her arm, talking in short gasps. "Stop. We have to stop! Now, River, before we crash! Listen! Stop now! Why--?"
Events stuttered and surged like a squall, forcing River to fight for control of the ambulance as it veered nearly onto its side. Head pounding, shoulder screaming in pain, she jammed on the brakes, screeching the truck to a crooked halt across the shallow culvert they'd been following. The Doctor groaned at the sudden stop and then sat bolt upright, staring at her as their world shrank against time's renewed pull. The engine sparked; she couldn't turn it off with the thunder shuddering so violently through everything in exactly the way that thunder never could. Lightning flickered, casting shadows everywhere.
The Doctor held tightly to her arm--not seeing, not hearing, but feeling the rush of the oncoming tide on a level she couldn't possibly comprehend.
"Why do you know how to fly a vintage Earth helicopter from nineteen-sixty-nine?" he asked, sounding rather put out.
"Oh, Sweetie." She smoothed her free hand across his cheek. "So many spoilers."
His expression softened, and he almost smiled. She felt the last of his strength leave his fingertips. "Spoilers," he echoed, letting his head fall back against the seat.
The storm broke. The temporal wave crashed around them, dragging air and sound and light away with it, and the bubble finally burst.
**
Part 6 | Interlude III
They needed a vehicle. They would never make it on foot; River knew that the Doctor understood that fact. He had to have a mental picture of the unforgiving landscape facing them. He had to remember the patrols and the desolation, both spanning twenty miles or more in every direction. But still, it hurt to turn him away from the TARDIS.
His face fell when she put a hand on his shoulder, halting his first tentative step across the barren plain and directing him back to the base. Worry lines creased his forehead, the pain of betrayal flashing across his features before he caught himself and buried the emotion. He shook his head as though he could free it that way from the pull of his ship on the horizon, scrubbed a hand over the ragged beard along his jaw, and murmured a distracted "yes, of course, of course," even though River hadn't said anything aloud.
And what could she say? She clenched her fists in useless anger, the action sending a burn up through the tendons in her injured shoulder. Around them, the landscape was quiet and still. The buildings were utterly vulnerable, and her study of the base layout had shown her where the explosive fuel was kept. She could torch the laboratories, raze them to nothing but pits in the ground. No one would be able to stop her.
Instead, she dug resolutely through the supply pack and thrust the pair of boots at the Doctor's chest. "Here, put these on," she said. He gave a startled grunt and clutched at them in surprise. She went back to rummaging more forcefully than necessary through the pack while he searched the leather folds and laces in his hands.
"Boots. Brilliant," he said tersely, sounding for all the world as if they were anything but. She looked over to where he was scuffing his toes into the dusty gravel. Aside from a mild breeze and the distant TARDIS, it was likely the clearest sensation he had of their immediate surroundings.
"Sweetie, you need them." She could hunt down Duvall and Ogden, she decided, and give them each one bullet--no, one small conical implant at the base of the neck, and send them into the silent dark. It was more than they deserved. But she just turned her attention to zipping up the pack and pointed out, "Your feet are scraped to hell and your toe is bleeding."
"Army boots, old girl, do you believe it?" He lodged this complaint at the northeast sky while seating himself carefully on the ground, still exploring the offending footwear with his fingers and grumbling. "Well, I don't like them at all. And what next? Mittens, I suppose . . ." Then he stopped and cocked his head, scowling over at River, who hastily and rather unnecessarily put a hand to her mouth to try and stifle the sound coming from it. "River, are you laughing?"
She cleared her throat. "Of course not," she said, but couldn't stop the smile that had hijacked her anger and somehow turned it neatly on its ear. "It's just nice to know some things never change."
"You could have brought--oi!" He cut off when she bounced a ball of rolled-up socks expertly off his forehead to land at his fingertips. He pointed accusingly in her direction before collecting them. "Stop launching things at me! I hate you."
"No you don't, dear." She shouldered the pack, leaving him to the task of pulling on the socks and boots and hastily knotting the laces by touch, and then she put a hand on his shoulder.
"No need to hover," he said petulantly, taking her hand and levering himself up. "I--"
The world suddenly contracted around them, and he swayed against her on watery legs. Cotton wool swamped her head, and River heard the Doctor let out a hiss of pain as she struggled to keep him upright.
Her temporal sense was limited, but this time she knew what to listen for in the timelines. For one agonizing second, River finally caught a glimpse of the time stream that the Doctor was trying to keep intact. He was right; it wasn't really a bubble at all. It was more like a ditch being furrowed down a sandy hillside. She felt the terrifying instability of more and more excluded events tumbling down from the flash point in space-time where the Doctor had diverted them, and she had no idea how anyone could stand against it. Even if they kept pushing forward on the path of least resistance, there was no way to avoid the eventual collapse. Fear seized her with the dawning realization, air stuck like concrete in her lungs until she couldn't draw a breath--and then, as quickly as it had come, the quarantine pressure relented.
The Doctor straightened before he could fall, his short breaths already calming.
"Are you all right?" River steadied herself and smoothed her thumb along the back of his hand. He gripped her fingers like a lifeline and brought his other hand up to her cheek, brushing trembling fingers across her brow. His face relaxed.
"Good for now, good as it gets." He blinked his eyes open and fixed his gaze on the sky beyond her shoulder, his face pensive. "She calms the timelines, like a temporal breakwater. But it's not . . ." The half-voiced thought trailed off. River couldn't tell if he realized he'd spoken it aloud. His hand fell as he tried to shrug off his sadness. "She can't feel me. So far away."
"We'll get there," River said. "I swear, I'll get you to her."
He didn't respond, and River wondered if he could tease out the meaning of a promise that wouldn't change the likelihood of anything. He took the crook of her elbow again, turning his back on the hills.
"Right. Transport. Best"--he balked when she took them a few steps back toward the truck in the loading bay--"best stay away from the laboratories. Too much activity. Collisions. Ripples."
River nodded, shivering at the ghost impression of the amassing temporal avalanche she'd felt. They turned around instead and set off west toward the lake bed and the logistics vehicles, skirting the edge of the supply airstrip across the flat, packed dirt in the eerie stillness.
Time crept up on them in fits and starts as they ran. Whenever River looked up, the sky was fractionally darker, and the clouds were frozen again in new configurations. Snatches of activity dotted the base; steam drifting up from the generator units, or the dim echo of a supply truck rumbling along tarmac. Twice more in their flight, River heard the Doctor's breath catch and felt his hand tighten against her shoulder as his temporal grasp on the quarantine weakened. Twice more, the likelihoods went haywire around them, trying to reintegrate the time streams into their natural order. River had to slow down and steady them both as strange, thick air pressed against her ears and caught cloyingly in her lungs. But though the barrier bent, the Doctor wouldn't let it break. She could feel how much it was costing him to maintain his hold, in the silent concentration that gripped his frame like a wound spring and the shuffle that dogged his steps more and more persistently.
She hated seeing him like this. She hated that they had no choice but to flee like wounded prey. And she hated that it was so early in his timeline. Even if he could see her or hear her, her Doctor, for whom she would crush planets and break time itself, would still look at her with suspicion and listen to her with mistrust, and there was nothing she could do about it. Nothing, except make absolutely sure that they escaped this prison, so that her past--and his future--wouldn't be rewritten here in the Nevada desert.
The thought shook her concentration, and River misjudged a step downward from gravel to dirt. It jarred the Doctor's balance and he stumbled away from her. She righted him and forced herself to take measured steps. They were running out of time. She hated that he couldn't run faster.
It was a relief when they reached the lots at the edge of the lake bed. The timelines were calmer here; she could feel the Doctor relax into exhaustion as she scouted the area for a good escape vehicle. Her first choice was an OH-6 scout class Cayuse perched invitingly on a secluded landing pad. But the Doctor had barely splayed his hands across the machine's blunt nose before he recoiled as if burned. "A helicopter? River!" he said, falling back against her and pushing her away from it.
"Trust me, I can fly it--" she started.
"Forgotten things," he hissed, and continued in short, slurred sentences. "To come with us in the bubble. No complicated past or--or future. Big ripple across the barrier, that," he pointed at the machine and grimaced, "will burst the whole thing by the time we're in the air."
No, it couldn't happen like that. She wouldn't let that happen. River reached for the pilot's side door. "I can fly it fast--"
"No helicopters!" he shouted, straightened, and set his feet, clamping a hand down on her bad arm with sudden strength. Startled, River yelped in pain and nearly struck him out of pure reflex, but he didn't seem to notice and he didn't let her go. She whirled around and looked up to find his expression deadly serious, his blind eyes staring straight at her, and not a hint of a tremor in his grip. When he sensed her attention, he relaxed his hold and said very precisely, "Three minutes. Maybe five. How far can you fly in five minutes? How hard do you want to crash?"
River stilled and studied his face. She felt his grip loosen even further and saw the first hints of weariness settling back across his frame. She spared one backward glance at the Cayuse. It really was a beautiful specimen.
"This plan is rubbish," she told him. The Doctor concentrated for a moment, then raised his eyebrows in agreement and beamed at her, as though she were a struggling student who'd finally caught up to the lesson of the day. She turned his hand palm up, tapping as she talked. "What do you need?"
He took her cheeks in both hands and kissed her forehead, seemingly rejuvenated, at least for the moment. "Find something old. Static. Easy to bring across. Buys more time." Then he let her go, focusing his concentration out across the base again. "Honestly, a helicopter," he muttered, turning to face the northeast hills. "Does anyone ever listen to me?"
"Whatever we end up with," River said with an enduring sigh, "you'd better not argue over who's driving."
The Doctor just raised a hand and pointed. "TARDIS," he said, then moved his arm in a slow arc back across the base. "Laboratory." His hand passed the low buildings in the distance. "If I remember . . . water tower?" he asked, and River wordlessly repositioned his arm slightly to the right to align his pointing finger with the landmark. "Thanks. And sorry," he added after a moment, still studying the landscape, but dropping his hand to find her injured shoulder. She didn't flinch as he brushed it with his fingers. "About your arm. It's hurt."
River stared at his profile, and at the black disc embedded in the back of his neck. "It'll heal," she said quietly.
He raised his hand up haltingly to the device, as if he could feel River's gaze on it. His fingers hovered over it briefly without touching, and then he took her good arm and oriented them both unerringly toward the rest of the logistics vehicles. "This way."
In the end, he directed them to a dirt-packed lot whose only claims to civilization were a chain link fence overgrown with weeds, and a barely latched gate with a sign reading AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY in rusting letters. River took the lead again as soon as she reluctantly discerned his target, an old Dodge M43 languishing in deep ruts at the lot's far edge. She guided him across the debris-strewn ground to place his hands on the rear door latch. His fingertips quested outward, tracing the subtle edges of the red cross painted over a white square, emblazoned over dull military green. "Ambulance," he remarked, pressing his cheek to the door. He gave a sad half-smile at some internal thought and then stood back and announced, "Hasn't moved in ages. Perfect."
Before River could point out the tactical inconsistencies in those two sentiments, the Doctor had felt his way past her over to the driver's side door, flung it open and added, "Love top secret bases, never lock anything. Give us a mo'!" before exploring the seat, step, and steering wheel, and carefully planning his foray into the cab. River visually checked the tires--all pressurized--then gathered a scrap of rebar from the ground litter and banged it against the fuel tank over the rear wheel to get a rough idea of the petrol level. Half a tank, she estimated. They'd get a better reading from the gauge on the dash after switching on the ignition, but starting it would surely test the quarantine boundary, and she didn't want the Doctor to try and bring it across if all it had were fumes to run on.
River tossed the rebar aside. This rust bucket was no Cayuse, for sure. It was a clunky dinosaur at the end of its line, but it would be good for a final forty miles. If the battery wasn't shot. If they could get it started and bring it across the barrier. If the whole rubbish plan didn't fall to pieces around them in the next thirty seconds, leaving them exposed and defenseless against the manhunt that was sure to follow as soon as Groom Lake realized its prisoners were nowhere near the laboratory examination room buried under its dry, dead soil.
"Come on!" the Doctor's voice came from where he'd disappeared up into the cab. When River came up to the driver's side door, she found him hunched in the seat at the wheel, his forehead nearly touching twelve-o-clock, his fingers tapping nervously at ten. "Allons-y River! No, no, no, that sounds awful, doesn't it? Don't answer that. I'm going to start the engine. Yes, best if I do it," he added at her unspoken argument. "It has a smooth future, but the transition across is still tricky." He stopped the tapping pattern and reached for her hand, guiding it to the same spot where his had been, and held her fingers there in place under his own. "So stay still, right there," he said, directing his speech at the dashboard, even though River was still standing outside the cab. “And think solid thoughts."
"Solid thoughts? Sweetie--"
"The timelines will be a bit . . . choppy. For a moment." With his far hand, the Doctor reached next to the wheel and gripped the ignition switch. His foot found the clutch and pressed it in. "Ready?"
Solid thoughts it was. River closed her eyes, steeling herself in the moment. Past and future existed as always, twining around them both, but what mattered the most was right here, right now. There was no room for doubt, and there was no point in fear or regret. There was only this present task, that would be completed with all certainty.
When she opened her eyes again, she found that was all the answer the Doctor needed. He had turned his head in her direction and was smiling at her. Exhausted, terrified, with every freedom he'd ever known at stake, he was still unable to keep the pure thrill of excitement from his next words.
"Here goes," he said, and turned the switch.
The truck sputtered and then rumbled to life, the vibrations humming through their fingers on the wheel, and then gaining momentum on a completely different plane and intensifying, temporal ripples rattling them both. The barrier stretched and wavered. The air shimmered, a mirage of deeper shadows shot through the twilight. Klaxons blared like tinny records in the distance, the sound cutting in and out, the echoing differentials of the two time streams pressing against them from all sides. The Doctor couldn't keep the signs of strain from his face, but he was otherwise calm. He murmured encouraging words at the dashboard, then clamped his hand even tighter around River's fingers and eased his other foot down on the acceleration pedal, revving the engine in neutral gear. The timelines surged, and--just when River was sure they'd made a horrible mistake and everything was going to come crashing down around them--the world smoothed out again, silent and still but for the now-very-present ambulance and its ancient, ponderous, wonderful engine, idling away in the dusk.
"Ha! Transport secured!" the Doctor exclaimed. He sat back, dropped his hands like dead weight from the wheel and nearly fell out of the cab before righting himself. "I don't suppose--" he said, catching his breath, but River cut him off.
"No. And no arguing," she said.
He waved a limp hand dismissively at her before sitting up with weary sigh and feeling his way over to the passenger side seat. River swung up into the cab with their gear, tossed the pack through the partition door to the back compartment, and then reached across her body to pull the door closed. Her left arm protested sharply when she grasped the steering wheel, and she lowered her grip, testing the give in the wheel against the strength in her right arm. It was tight but manageable.
The Doctor settled his shoulders gingerly against the seat and, finding nothing jarring the back of his neck, grimly strapped himself in. "I suppose I'll let you drive. Sweetie," he said through a frown. Then he gave her a ridiculous thumbs up gesture, and braced his hands conspicuously along the door and the edge of the seat.
"That's the best idea I've heard all day," River muttered. She wrestled the ambulance into gear, steered toward the rusted gate, and floored it.
THIS TAPE IS CLASSIFIED *TOP SECRET//BOARDWALK MISTLETOE//NOFORN*
PROPERTY OF UNITED STATES AIR FORCE
GROOM LAKE EXPERIMENTAL AIRCRAFT AND XENOTECH RESEARCH FACILITY
SECURITY CHECKPOINT E8-X435 NORTHEAST
RADIO TRANSMISSIONS TO MOBILE UNIT 279
PERSONS ON RECORD
CHAVEZ, SENIOR AIRMAN RICARDO J, DISPATCHER
DENNIS, AIRMAN PAUL E, PATROL DETAIL
SANDIA, AIRMAN MARK C, PATROL DETAIL
04 AUGUST 1969
20:37 HOURS
DENNIS: This is mobile unit two-seven-niner to base four-three-five, over.
CHAVEZ: Mobile unit two-seven-niner acknowledged. This is base four-three-five. Is that you again, Paulie? Over.
DENNIS: Yeah, Rico, 'course it's me. We've been hearing those damned sirens for over an hour. You're the one with the promotion. What the hell is going on? Over.
CHAVEZ: Nothing new here. Base is still on lockdown, all test flights grounded. There was some kind of electrical surge, over.
DENNIS: Electrical surge, sure. Think Houdini's at it again? It's been a while.
[There is a two second delay.]
CHAVEZ: I'm not authorized to discuss that on this channel.
DENNIS: Aw, come on, man! Give us something. We were supposed to end our shift at nineteen-hundred, and instead we're heading back in for another loop. The rain's already started, and Sandia's driving. I'm taking my life in my hands, here, over.
CHAVEZ: Command says the situation is contained and the patrols are just a precaution. Sorry, that's all I know, over.
[There is a three-second delay.]
DENNIS: Base four-three-five, Airman Sandia would like to officially log his opinion that Command is full of--
[The feed cuts off and then almost immediately comes back.]
SANDIA: --ck you, man, give me that! This is Sandia. Ignore him. Situation noted, over and--holy Christ! What--?
[Static interrupts the connection. There is what sounds like a loud crack of thunder and a deep rumbling on the tape.]
CHAVEZ: Two-seven-niner, come in? Paulie? Sandia?
[There is an eight-second delay before the connection clicks on again.]
DENNIS: -ree-five, this is unit two-seven-niner, do you read me, over?
CHAVEZ: Got you, Paulie. What the hell just happened, over?
DENNIS (laughs): Nothing, man. [There is static and the sound of a curse from Airman Sandia over the line.] We're in a ditch, over.
CHAVEZ: Two-seven-niner, repeat?
DENNIS: Sandia got spooked by some lightning and drove us right off the road. He thought it was headlights--
SANDIA (in background): It was headlights! Nearly swiped us! Didn't you see a truck--?
DENNIS (aside): No, man, there's no supply truck due--
SANDIA (in background): Not a supply truck!
[The radio cuts out.]
CHAVEZ: Two-seven-niner, repeat, you saw a truck? Over.
DENNIS: Negative. There's no sign of a truck anywhere. Just us in a ditch, in the rain. Over.
CHAVEZ: Hell, Sandia, you're a menace! Paulie, do you need assistance? Over.
DENNIS: Negative, base. I'll drive; he can push. Over and out.
*END OF CLASSIFIED MATERIAL*
It was a tense, bumpy nine miles across the scrub basin east of the airstrip before they hit the foothills and then the steep northeastern pass. Atop the ridge, still miles from the base perimeter, the gravel road narrowed to a single checkpoint--a small parking lot lined with mobile patrol units, and a guard station with a flimsy gate arm drawn down across the access road. It was designed more for bureaucracy than security. River went around it easily enough, but less than a mile later, the Doctor suddenly cried out an aborted warning and grabbed hold of the steering wheel, turning them frantically aside. She had no time to ask what the hell he was doing before the effects of the quarantine swamped them again, signaling an impending collision in more ways than one. When it finally relented, River fought the truck's momentum and careened them back onto the gravel. Pain shot through her bad arm, nausea and light-headedness lingered, but she didn't dare stop. She chanced a quick glance at the Doctor; he had let go of the wheel but was still nearly doubled over in the seat, his fingers clawing at his hair and his breathing ragged.
"Patrol," he slurred. It was the first he'd spoken since giving her the driver's seat. "Near miss--"
But he couldn't finish the thought. The ambulance jolted over the uneven road and he hissed out a breath, casting his hands out in blind panic before bracing them against the dash and the door. River tenuously shifted her grip and tried to reach out to him, but he just inhaled sharply and shied away from her when she touched his wrist. He growled something that sounded like "eyes front, keep going," at her, and then fell silent again.
River set her jaw and concentrated on the road, counting the seconds between the Doctor's hitching breaths.
There was little she could do to make it easier on him. They abandoned the access road for some overgrown tire tracks as soon as they hit open desert, and it seemed to help quell the likelihood of collisions across the deteriorating quarantine barrier. The Doctor let out an unsteady sigh of relief, short-lived as River put on speed along the jarring escape route. She jammed her foot down on the acceleration pedal, urging the old ambulance up past thirty miles per hour despite its groaning in protest. She aimed a creative curse at the bucket of bolts and was surprised to hear a short laugh from the passenger seat. She hadn't realized the Doctor was still paying attention to anything other than fighting his exhaustion.
River doubted he could understand much, but just knowing that any part of her words got through to him was enough. She forced the tremor out of her voice and started a one-sided conversation. How did they get themselves into these messes? And how brilliant was it that they could always escape? She always loved that part, and well, she said suggestively, all the parts that came afterward. Not that she was going to give away any spoilers, so don't bother asking. Anyway, the TARDIS was just beyond the next ridge, the one that rose up from the darkening horizon right in front of them, getting closer by the minute.
The world flew by in static twilight, tall brush sweeping into the front grill in a shush of sound over the noise from the engine. The miles fell away and River kept talking. Nearly twenty minutes passed before the Doctor said anything in return.
"There will be some . . . afterimages." He struggled with the word. "A crash like this--it stirs up temporal echoes."
"We're clear across the valley, now," River said, but he didn't seem to notice.
"Past events. Old--old paradoxes in personal timelines," he said. "Worse for us, inside the bubble."
Her hands tightened against the steering wheel. "Don't say that. It's not going to happen yet."
"Worse for me, without the TARDIS. Dialed up past eleven and I can't turn it off. Time sense like . . . eyes forced open to stare at a blast." He was trying to keep even breaths, to speak clearly through his fatigue, but the words were getting away from him. River looked over and saw his eyes shut tightly and his hands white-knuckled in their grip on the seat. "I might . . . I might not remember where I am. Might try to find her--"
"Hold on just a little longer, my love." The wind gusted, the sky darkened, and the ground scrolling beneath them was suddenly damp with rain. "We're nearly there."
He barked a short laugh at her obvious lie. "You're telling me we're close. We're not. I won't make it, I--"
He cut off as they rattled into the first set of gullies that led up into the next line of hills. River arced them to the left, skirting the foothills and heading toward the interstate highway that snaked its way over the ridge, not far north of their position.
"Please," she said. A loud, low rumble set the ambulance shuddering. It was thunder; it was only thunder from the coming storm, that was all. She ground the acceleration pedal to the floorboards and growled a curse. "Why can't this useless scrap heap move any faster! Please, I . . . I promised--"
It was perhaps a mile to the interstate. And from there, it was another fifteen miles on the open road to the lake where Amy and Rory waited with the TARDIS.
"Sorry. River." The Doctor reached for her arm, talking in short gasps. "Stop. We have to stop! Now, River, before we crash! Listen! Stop now! Why--?"
Events stuttered and surged like a squall, forcing River to fight for control of the ambulance as it veered nearly onto its side. Head pounding, shoulder screaming in pain, she jammed on the brakes, screeching the truck to a crooked halt across the shallow culvert they'd been following. The Doctor groaned at the sudden stop and then sat bolt upright, staring at her as their world shrank against time's renewed pull. The engine sparked; she couldn't turn it off with the thunder shuddering so violently through everything in exactly the way that thunder never could. Lightning flickered, casting shadows everywhere.
The Doctor held tightly to her arm--not seeing, not hearing, but feeling the rush of the oncoming tide on a level she couldn't possibly comprehend.
"Why do you know how to fly a vintage Earth helicopter from nineteen-sixty-nine?" he asked, sounding rather put out.
"Oh, Sweetie." She smoothed her free hand across his cheek. "So many spoilers."
His expression softened, and he almost smiled. She felt the last of his strength leave his fingertips. "Spoilers," he echoed, letting his head fall back against the seat.
The storm broke. The temporal wave crashed around them, dragging air and sound and light away with it, and the bubble finally burst.
**
Part 6 | Interlude III
no subject
Date: 2015-11-04 05:51 am (UTC)Which is not to say he's infallible but also... well he is alien and ancient and doesn't necessarily have the same psychology as humans. I sometimes get frustrated at authors who forget that.