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The Doctor, Danni, Rory and Brian were walked down a corridor by the two huge yellow robots who, if they had had faces, would have looked incredibly smug. Rory looked resigned on one side of the pair and Brian still looked out of his depth as Danni and the Doctor walked hand in hand, looking absolutely ecstatic that they had been captured.
"You're going straight on the naughty step!" one of the robots told them. Danni practically skipped on the spot at the voice; even that sounded the same as they did in her universe. It still took her by surprise how close everything seemed to be to what she already knew.
"What's the escape plan?" Brian whispered out of the side of his mouth to the Doctor as if it would help the robots not hear.
"Why do we want to escape?" the Doctor whispered in reply.
"They have us hostage."
"They're taking us somewhere. We might learn from it," Rory interjected and the Doctor grinned at him.
"Oh, you see?" He pinched Rory's cheek, despite the man's best efforts to get away. "So clever. I missed you, Rory!"
"Don't do that." Rory told him firmly.
"What if they kill us?" Brian asked.
"They wouldn't do that!" the Doctor replied confidently. He turned around and patted one of the robots on the chest. "You're not going to kill us, are you, Rusty?"
"Who are you calling Rusty?!" the other robot cried, outraged on his friend's behalf.
"Yeah, don't call him Rusty!" Danni added as well as she pointed to offended robot. "That one's Mitchell and-" She pointed to the other one. "-That one's Webb."
The Doctor looked at her, amused by her conviction over the names of two robots who were marching them to their owner. "'Mitchell and Webb'?" he repeated.
"What's wrong with that?" she challenged.
"Nothing, nothing," he promised, and for a moment it seemed like he wasn't going to continue. "Seems odd to name a pair of robots Mitchell and Webb, when they're actually quite rusty."
"You try being on this ship for two millennia, see how YOUR paintwork does!" Mitchell exclaimed.
"Don't listen to him, he's just being mean cause we captured him," Webb tried to calm it down. The Doctor watched them argue, completely amused by the two robots as Brian looked around, checking the corridor out when he saw something that made him turn around in amazement.
"Oh, my goodness..." he breathed. Danni, the Doctor and Rory turned around, Rory jolting backwards in shock.
"Whoa."
The Doctor and Danni grinned at the triceratops slowly approaching them, Danni taking the cue for the Doctor to not be scared at all. She remembered this episode rather well, after all, and all she remembered about the dinosaur was that it was absolutely adorable before it…
"Ooh. Herbivore," the Doctor explained to the older Williams. "Brian, don't panic. Triceratops. Ha! Beautiful." He bent down, slapped his hands on his thighs and opened his arms to coax it over like it was a dog.
"Shall I shoot it?" Webb asked.
"We're not supposed to shoot the creatures, stupid!" Mitchell scolded.
"Stop calling me stupid!"
The triceratops roared quietly as it began sniffing Brian, who was distinctly uncomfortable with the entire thing. "'Rargh' yourself!" the Doctor replied as he began stroking it's nose. "Hello, cutie-pie. Who's a lovely Tricey then, eh? Yes, you are. Yes, you are."
Danni joined him, marvelling at how she was actually petting a dinosaur. Another thing to add to the good that had come from her sudden new life change. "Oh you are so gorgeous, you are," she praised, but the triceratops was too preoccupied with Brian's trousers to really care about either of them. She turned to the Doctor. "We need a pet aboard the TARDIS, don't we?"
He nodded eagerly at her. "Just what I was thinking."
"What do I do?! What do I do?!" Brian repeated, panicking as the dinosaur continued to sniff him. "What's it doing?!"
"You don't have any vegetable matter in your trousers, do you, Brian?" the Doctor asked.
"Only my balls."
Danni snorted as Rory covered his face with his hand. The Doctor, on the other hand, took a moment to process what he'd said. "I'm sorry?"
"Golf balls." He pulled two from his pocket and the Doctor smiled in relief. "Grassy residue."
"What're you carrying those around for?" Rory asked. Tricey roared then linked Brian on the face, leaving a saliva trail all the way down. He groaned in disgust while the Doctor and Danni smiled as if he was their new family pet. "Aw, bless."
"Get it away from me!" Brian cried.
"Throw one," Danni told him.
"Really?" She nodded as he looked at her from the corner of his eye. "Is this what you want? Is it?" He waved the golf ball slightly and seeing the triceratops reaction to the ball chucked it down the hallway. The triceratops spun as quickly as it could and ran after it. The Doctor patted him on the back.
"And breathe out," he told the man, who did. He turned to the robots and clapped his hands together. "Right! Take us to your leader."
"Really?" Rory asked.
"Too good to resist," Danni replied and the Doctor kissed her knuckles with a grin before the continued down the corridor.
"I love that you're planning pets already," he whispered down to her.
"Well, we're stuck with each other, Spaceman," she replied. "Why not chuck a dinosaur into the mix?"
"If we have time to look after him," he replied suggestively and she quickly looked straight ahead, knowing without even looking that he was smirking at the bright red tint her whole face had taken on. What the hell was going on?
~0~0~0~
Mitchell and Webb escorted the small group to a much smaller ship in the centre of the larger ship around them. They were marched up to a gate made of criss-crossing bars of metal, covered in cobwebs like the rest of the ship, and the Doctor leant forward to try and get a better view of the rooms inside. Faint piano music floated in from the ship and the Doctor smiled at it.
"Love what you've done with the place down here," he called out to whoever was playing the music, almost sounding like he meant it.
"Let him in. Open the gate."
The command came from the man in the bed through the gates, who was laying just in vie, and one of the robots pressed a button on the wall, the gate opening. The Doctor stepped through first and the gate shut before anyone could follow. He spun, alarmed and stormed up to it, grabbing hold of the gate with both hands.
"Open it, now," he snarled at the robot. "Let Danni through."
Slightly startled, and a lot worried by his reaction, Danni quickly stepped forward and placed her hands on his. "It's fine," she told him and his gaze snapped back to her. The concern, and the anger, made her feel rather uneasy. She shot him a smile in hopes of calming him down. "It's fine. I'm fine."
It appeared that only the reassurance that she was okay was enough for him to calm down and head to the awful man who was waiting on the other side. She didn't remember that at all. She was sure, when it was just Rory and Brian, that he and Rory had parted knowing to be on alert but otherwise they'd be fine apart. Was it because she was still learning what to do?
"He's not interested in you," Mitchell taunted and Rory turned the robot, his own irritation spiking somewhat.
"Look, you need to learn some manners," he snapped.
"No, you need to learn some manners."
"No, you do!"
"No, you do, Mr Manners," Webb chimed in.
"You all do," Danni snapped, deciding that she wanted to hear more than some petty arguing. She stuck her head through the rather large gaps in the gate to see if she could hear the conversation on the other side. "Rory, stop pointing in Mitchell's face, and you two stop being mean to him. I'm trying to hear what's happening."
"You can't do that! You're not allowed to!" Mitchell whined.
"You said he wasn't interested in us, but we're interested in him and he didn't tell you we weren't allowed to be interested, so shhh!"
"How rude," Webb muttered.
"Can you hear anything?" Rory asked after a moment of silence and Danni shook her head, pulling back into the room. They were mumbling, how annoying. Maybe it was because it was made for television that everyone spoke more clearly.
"Not a thing. I know he's injured, one of the dinosaurs got his leg but I can't remember the specifics of the conversation," she explained. "This was pretty new when I got sent here, I only saw it a couple of times."
"Saw it?" Brian asked.
"Yeah. She's from a universe," Rory explained to his father. "So she knows the future. It's complicated."
"Oh of course," Brian exclaimed. "Why not? There's dinosaurs on a spaceship, and teleports. Why wouldn't there be other universes?"
A blue light came from the wall, flashing over the three as it scanned the quickly before disappearing with a small beep. "What was that?" Rory asked.
"It was a scanner, checking to see if we're worth anything," Danni bit out. Suddenly seeing the robots, and meeting Tricey, and the Doctor's new gang felt sour. As they were scanned, the Doctor and everyone else was as well. The thought of it made her skin crawl.
"Worth anything?" he repeated. "We're not worth anything. Are we?"
"No, we're not."
"Injure the girl."
Before any of them could look surprised, including Danni as she had forgotten until that moment that they were going to shoot anyone, Webb shot Danni in the shoulder. With a cry of pain she fell to the floor against the wall.
"Fuck!" she screamed as the Doctor and Rory both rushed over to her.
The Doctor rattled the gate hard as Rory crouched down on the ground. "Open this right now," he commanded but the robots ignored him.
"I'm- I'm fine," she said, panting slightly. "It just bloody hurt." She glanced over at him, again surprised by the look on his face. "Been dissected, remember? This is fine."
"Are you sure?" he asked her lowly, and for a brief moment she saw the Doctor who would scare the Silence away. It scared her slightly.
"Promise," she replied. He stared at her for a moment longer before storming off. Rory helped her sit up a bit better before turning to the robots.
"I will take you apart cog by cog, and melt you down when all this is over," he promised.
"Oh, I'm so scared!" Mitchell said sarcastically before turning to Webb. "Actually, I might be. A little bit of oil just came out."
Rory ripped the hole in the top of Danni's dress slightly to relieve the pressure against the wound. "Stay still," He told her gently and she winced as he brushed against it. "It's just a burn, it's nothing serious."
"I'm just glad it was me," she told him before nodding over at Brian. "It was supposed to be your dad."
"Really?" Brian asked and she smiled brightly at him.
"Yeah. Don't worry though, it looks worse than it is."
Rory pulled out a small black pouch from his pocket, unzipping it. "What's that?" Brian asked as he joined the pair.
"Well, you carry a trowel, I carry a medpack," Rory explained. It's all about the pockets in our family." He pulled out a small white object. "This is an ice patch. It cools the skin."
"Never seen one of those," Brian stated.
"I look out for cool stuff wherever we go. Some people it's cars and hardware, for me it is nursing supplies."
Rory placed the patch on her shoulder as gently as he could, but she still whimpered slightly at the sharp pain. He then pulled out a syringe. "Now, painkiller," he continued to explain to the pair. "This won't hurt."
"Don't you lie to me Rory Pond," Danni scolded him lightly and he jabbed the needle into her shoulder.
"Sorry," he apologised, for both the pain and the lie. "It won't hurt from now on, though. All right. You're done." He pulled out a safety pin and handed it to her. "This might hold your dress together; I know you're fond of them."
She took it with a gentle smile. It was nice that he was a thoughtful in real life as he was on the TV show. Such a kind soul. "Thanks."
He nodded and stood back up. He blinked then smiled as he saw his dad watching him proudly. "S'all right. It's not everything I get to show off my awesome nursing skills." Rory's mobile started ringing and the robots looked around, confused. Danni pushed herself up, marvelling at how she could feel nothing at all in her shoulder anymore, as she moved to stand next to him. She knew what was going next and she didn't want to be taken by surprise by anything.
"What's that?" Mitchell asked.
"Your phone's ringing," Brian stated, just as confused. "In space!"
"You get used to it," Rory dismissed. He waved the phone at the robots.
"I have to take this. The wife. Hello, Mrs." He answered the phone, Danni standing on her tiptoes so she could hear the whole conversation.
"Where are you?" Amy asked.
"Still on board. Met some pterodactyls and some rusty robots, that I'm going to melt down," he bit out, the robots actually seeming to be slightly scared at his threat. If they could feel scared. Could they feel scared? Danni wasn't sure.
"Rory, this is a Silurian ship," Amy interrupted him. "And they've all gone. Every single one."
Rory looked down at Danni, frowning worriedly and she took the phone off him. "Amy, I'm going to give you to the Doctor," she told the other ginger. "Just tell him exactly what you have found out and he'll let you know what to do, okay?"
Without waiting for an answer, she walked up to the gate and held out her arm, seeing the Doctor helping the man sit up off of his bed. Great, he was better. The Doctor was going to hate this.
"Doctor?" she called over. He looked over at her voice and she waved the phone. "Amy."
"I need to take this," he told the man before walking over. He reached out to take the phone, but held onto her hand, stopping her for moving away. "Are you okay?" he asked lowly and she nodded.
"I'm fine. I have a brilliant nurse," she replied. "Amy will tell you everything you need to know."
He smiled at her, giving her hand another squeeze before walking off.
"I'm glad you don't call me a murse anymore," Rory told her and she frowned.
"Murse?" she repeated and he nodded. "I'll need to remember that."
His eyes widened in horror. "No, no, don't do that," he pleaded. "Just, just forget I said anything."
She shook her head. "Now I know how much it annoys you, I'll never forget," she told him and he sighed heavily.
The Doctor's face slowly fell as he listened to Amy on the other end of the phone. "Where are they now?" he asked. There was a brief pause from him where everyone fell silent. "I'll see you soon."
He walked over and held the phone out to Rory, who took it. "Be ready," he warned the trio quietly.
"What's wrong?" Rory asked Danni.
"This ship belongs to the Silurians," she explained solemnly. "But they're not here anymore. Every single one is gone."
"What did you do to the Silurians?" the Doctor asked the man as he .
"We ejected them," he replied simply, with no hint of remorse in his tone," The robots woke them from cryo-sleep a handful at a time, and jettisoned them from the airlocks. We must have left a trail of dust and bone."
The Doctor closed his eyes and shook his head; he had really hoped that it hadn't been the case. "Because you wanted the dinosaurs."
Everyone who knew the Doctor knew that when he was at his quietest he was at his angriest. He pursed his lips as he walked away from the man, trying to keep his cool. Danni reached out slightly, wanting nothing more than to give him some comfort but not being able to she began to bite her thumbnail instead.
"Their ship crossed my path. I sent out a distress signal. They let me board. But when I saw the cargo, things became more complex." He chuckled slightly, amused at his perceived victory.
"Piracy and then genocide."
"Very emotive words, Doctor,"
"Oh, I'm a very emotive man."
"The lizards wouldn't negotiate. I made them a generous offer," the man explained and the Doctor leant forward, glaring at him.
"The creatures on board this ship are not objects to be sold or traded," he snapped.
"I feel like you're judging me," the man taunted in reply. He knew he currently had the upperhand, it was horrid to watch.
"You said Roxborne Peninsula, so why are you heading to Earth? You're on the wrong course." When he didn't reply the Doctor smirked darkly. "Oh. You don't know how. Ha! Brilliant. You couldn't change the pre-programmed course. Without instructions, the ship defaulted, returned home. Oh, dear. The Silurians outwitted you, even after you'd massacred them. So now you're a prisoner on the ship that you hijacked." The Doctor looked around, his gaze landing on Danni just for a moment. She smiled reassuringly at him and he nodded before turning back to him.
"Not now you're here. You're going to help me to where I want to go, Doctor," the man told the Doctor.
"Little bit of news, Solomon. You're being targeted by missiles." Solomon stared at him, trying to gauge whether he was lying or not. "Get off this ship, while you still can."
"You think I believe that?" he called after the Doctor as he walked over to the gate, sick of being in the man's company a moment longer. "You just want them for yourself. You won't profit from me, Doctor."
"Don't ever judge me by your standards," he snarled before he opened the gates with his screwdriver, stepping through clapping his hands. "Well, don't just stand there, Rory!" He grabbed Danni by the hand and pulled her past the two robots. "Hey, he wants to see you."