for magicalskeptic: A trip to the ocean

[rude_not_ginger]

"You wanted an ocean, have I got an ocean for you."

The Doctor darted around the console and scooped his jacket up from where it hung on one of the TARDIS pillars. He absolutely loved this bit. The first trip to an alien world with someone who didn't even believe in other worlds until now. Very little was more exciting.

"Now! We've got breathable atmosphere, low radiation, and a beautiful summer day. The waters of the Greeio Malgoon are purple in the summer, which is when they're the warmest and the safest. I'd have taken you to them in the winter when they're blue, but the water's acid content gets a bit high and ends up spewing out strange creatures with eyes that shoot lasers. Green lasers, they disintegrate you without much warning. Very technicolor world, the Greeo Malgoon."

He shrugged. "Still! In the summer, peak of tourist season, it's the most brilliant place for a visit."

Comments

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"Oh, no."

It's about the time that he steps into the main room that he realizes exactly what they're up against. More monitors, this time with pictures of the same rooms from the board room and a long series of code.

"Psychic code," the Doctor says. "Built to try to scare away the tourists. Probably the same code they used during winter to protect their harvests. But moving it to the summertime, that didn't work out, did it? The code got greedy, it got clever. It took over. But why?"

A monitor in the middle of the room flickered to life. A frightened looking man with bright blue skin sat at a desk. It flickered with the power on the screens.

"If anyone has seen our daughter. Please. Please, help us. We think---" the screen flickered again "---and if it is the G.M. Secure Program, we will---"

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

Morgana is convinced that everything the Doctor just said is simply a series of words strung together. "I do not understand." Morgana hates not understanding, but whatever this science is, it is far above her, as she stares, uncomprehendingly at the code on the screen.

The shock at seeing a man whose skin is blue, is quickly overtaken by something much more universal. "Sir, I believe we know where your daughter is." It might sound ridiculous but 1) Morgana's never come in contact with a recorded message like that. All of the communication elsewhere was always live. 2) Hearing the desperation, she wants to alleviate it, even if it is the worst possible news.

Both of those things also overshadow any comment on him being such a vibrant blue.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

The Doctor didn't connect the man to the little girl at first, but Morgana's statement makes sense. The girl in the walls, the one hiding from the things she was afraid of.

"No, no, it's a recording," the Doctor says, patiently. "A visual copy of something he said once a long time ago." He points to the room behind the man, where the tables each have an adult sitting in them.

"Look where he is, Morgana. Look at the room."

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

Stepping a bit closer to the screen, Morgana recognizes the room now. "It's the hall, the one we were in earlier." Cue another realization. "All those people are dead."

And one more, "I asked where the servants were. He is one." The dynamic is obvious -- the people at the table, versus the man standing -- all signs of servitude. "And whatever it is they were doing to scare away the people killed his little girl."

There's a deep ache in Morgana's stomach in sympathy. It's something she's seen before, refused to shy away from -- the parents who lose a child due to a harsh winter, or sickness, which is all too common in Camelot but there is also a much more sinister reason to lose one's child. Morgana's just made the connection, "Over a year ago, the king executed a man -- my age, for sorcery. His mother came back and tried to kill Arthur in vengeance."

She looks back to the man on the screen and wonders how far he would go to find his child.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"And when they couldn't find her---" The Doctor tapped one of the keys and another display appeared.

"We're turning it off. Turning off the syste---" It shuttered and jerked. "T-T-Turning off the system. We can't have this happen, not to another family, not to---"

There was a scream, and the sound of gunfire. Then the screen went dark.

"This machine decided to fight back. Decided to take over the city." He shook his head. "It only did what it thought it needed to in order to protect itself."

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

While Morgana cannot understand the code, or most of the technology that is in the room, she can understand what she just witnessed on the screen, and, in truth, she feels a bit of relief that the father in question was not involved with the rest of the horrors.

"The machine? A machine is protecting itself that would mean it is alive, would it not? It is not like your ship," The logistics escape her but Morgana's realized, and not only from the Doctor waxing poetic about the TARDIS, but because of something, some feeling she had when she first went inside.

So, to Morgana a machine, if she learned anything from elsewhere, simply needs one thing. "Can we turn it off from here?" She looks around the shed, shining the light from her might-be-a-screwdriver on the console, as if it will somehow illuminate the off switch.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"Not quite," the Doctor explains. "This does everything based on a program. A written piece of code. If you tug on a string it may look like it's pulling something, but it's only doing it because you told it to. They programmed this to protect itself, scare people, and keep out intruders. And it did its job far too well."

He nods, and points to a large, red button on the side of the machine.

"Just press that and it'll---"

Without warning, the Doctor hears a click, and the floor suddenly drops out. He grips onto the side of the machine and reaches out a hand to try to catch Morgana.

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

This is the second time during this debacle Morgana's found herself without a floor beneath her.

The sensation is too quick to be frightening, and, for the smallest increment of time, she isn't scared as the Doctor manages to catch her arm but the grip never becomes secure.

Just as quickly, before she can grab onto his arm with her other hand, two things occur: the first, is that she drops her might-be-a-screwdriver. The second is that she slips from the Doctor's grasp.

There isn't time to register anything, other than she's falling. There isn't a scream, or anything much beyond a gasp, when she hits bottom. All that might be heard above is a loud splash.

For the second time, she finds herself frantically trying to swim to the surface but this time, the water surrounding her, when she risks opening her eyes, is a vibrant purple.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

He should be thinking about getting to the button. He should turn this entire place off before he goes anywhere else.

But he watches her fall and his first thought is to let go, too. But he'll be no good to her down there, wherever it is. It could be the ocean for all he knows.

"Morgana!" he calls, loudly. "Morgana!"

He can't wait. He lets go, hoping he can land somewhere near her.

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

Morgana's made it to the surface just as she watches the Doctor fall, but the force of his landing, only a few feet from her, causes her to go under again, for a second.

"Doctor?!" She shouts when she reaches the surface for a second time. She can't see him, but the light from the cave they're in -- the rock version of the white crystalline sand on the beach makes it easy to get a good view of the place.

Besides being cavernous, there are rock outcroppings along the walls -- one side with enough to almost call it a path. One way leads towards the open water -- Morgana can see it in the distance, and the other deeper into the cave.

None of this, at the moment, matters, as what she cannot see is what she wants to see most, the Doctor, who has yet to surface.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

The Doctor surfaces with a gasp. He's disoriented at first, and he looks back up to the shed, then out to the pathways. Nothing's ever simple, is it?

He gestures to her, then to back up above them. "Remember how I said stay close to me?!" he blurts out.

This is the Doctor's way of saying that he's glad she's all right.

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

The Doctor's ways of saying things do not always translate. "I was close to you!" She shouts. "I was right behind you! I could not have been any closer to you!" The delayed reaction of fear is now coming out in anger.

Because having arguments while treading water in a purple ocean makes perfect sense.

She's about to yell at him again, when something near an outcropping catches her eye, and she swims towards it, not bothering to explain herself to the man who must made it sound like the fall is her own fault. Once she gets a hold of it, she pulls herself out. The current is not strong, and there are a couple decent places to get a grip.

She fiddles with the object in her hand for a moment, but it is clear her might-be-a-screwdriver is no longer working and that makes her angrier. "You lost your grip," she says, peevishly, as she starts wringing out her skirts.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"Your hand was all sweaty!" he snaps back. Because acting like a child is the best act in a place like this. He swims over to where she's pulled herself out and does the same.

"We've got to get back there, shut the whole system down. Who knows what else it's planning to keep us from pushing that button!"

The darkness in this cave bothers him. So much could be lurking down here. So much he isn't really prepared for.

"Come on," he says. "Let's see what we've uncovered down here."

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

"There was nothing wrong with my hand." Morgana refuses to look at him, as her three layers of clothing hold a lot of water. "Your grip was the problem, not me." She wrings out one side of her overlay, and then the other, which would be easier if she took it off to do, but she's not going to.

If it looks like she moves the slightest bit farther away from him, it is because she does, and, there are times these two have the combined maturity level of 10. She wrings out her skirt in several places.

"Obviously, your own hold was the issue as you would be an idiot to have willfully let go to follow me down here." finally, she pulls up her skirt, as little as she can and still feel propriety is being acknowledged, a little to take a hold of her under-dress. It's white, and equally as full of water as the other layers. That also gets wrung out.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"Morgana, quiet," the Doctor says, holding up a hand. "Can you hear that?"

It was the sound of running water, something big running water. He looked back to make sure she was following, and then began to head out, to investigate the sound. Did they find the sewers? Were they under the city? How did they end up here? How did the computer get that sort of access?

"Be careful," he called back. "There could be more traps."

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

Morgana does not take kindly to being shushed, at any point, so all he gets for putting his hand up is, is it slapped back down. She rarely lashes out like this but he is frustrating, and she's refusing to admit she was frightened, so it comes out in other forms.

"It is water." She looks at the vast quantity of water, and gives him the dirtiest of looks. It might be implying that hearing water, in a cave full of water, would not be the most shocking of revelations.

What is more frustrating is how he gets back up and continues on as if nothing has happened. For Morgana, she was shocked 10 minutes before she was nearly drowned, so her system doesn't rebound as quickly. Neither does her mood. Thus, she's following, but at a distance from the Doctor. "I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself, even at a decent distance from yourself."

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

He looks down at his hand, then back at her. "Feel better?" he asks, irritated. "We've got to stop this, we don't have time to be bickering."

He leads the way through, following the sounds of the water.

"And I'll tell you something. That water isn't just the water here. It's going somewhere. And wherever it's going, we should probably go, too."

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

Not feeling the least bit guilty for slapping his hand (actually, slapping the Doctor, in general, is something Morgana will probably never feel guilty about), she says nothing about bickering. It is sensible to stop, but that does not mean she has to give him the satisfaction of agreeing with him.

So, what he gets is Morgana following along in relative silence. Every once in a while, she surreptitiously shakes her might-be-a-screwdriver, hoping to dislodge some water (perhaps it hit a rock on the way down, she doesn't know and she's not going to ask) to get it working again.

When she isn't fiddling with her broken gift, she's pulling her soaked skirts away from her. They're sticking to her and making it a little more difficult to move as freely as she'd like.

His current idea is also sensible, but, yet again, that does mean she has to tell him.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"Wherever the water leads, it probably leads us out," the Doctor says. "Well, we hope, anyway. Out, then back up, get to the city, shut this place down."

And if it doesn't, well, then he's going to have to figure something else out.

The end of the pathway becomes paved, and the walls are suddenly cobbled stone, like a system built and then neglected after many, many years.

"What have we here?" the Doctor asks. His voice echoes along the new tunnel.

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

The newness of the properly kitted out tunnel finally spurs her to speak again. (It is important to note Morgana is still annoyed with the Doctor, thank you very much.) "Camelot has tunnels such as this underneath it. It is said Uther keeps the last dragon in Albion there."

And the tunnel reminds her of the passageways because of how old they look. "We have only found the few skeletons, perhaps the tunnel was used to get the inhabitants to safety." She can hope. She shakes her might-be-a-screwdriver again, and for half a second, it's alive, before flickering out again.

She steps ahead of the Doctor, and in about a dozen strides, she's face to face with a door. She turns around, and realizes, there have to be a dozen doors in this tunnel. "We seem to have found access points to many places in the city." There is no way the doors can all lead to the same place.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"But which places?" he asks. "That's the question. Any place could be potentially a very, very wrong place to be."

He cautiously steps towards the door she's near and scans it quickly with his sonic. "No electric traps this time. But that doesn't mean there aren't any surprises waiting for us."

He cautiously reaches for the door handle and turns it open.

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

Finally, something Morgana instantaneously recognizes. It's not that she's familiar with all of the contents, but the organization, and the ones she does know, makes her smile a little in relief. Now this, this is something she can work with. She pockets her currently malfunctioning might-be-a-screwdriver.

Along the walls are a variety of weapons. She would not know about the guns, but the ropes and knives and "this is excellent in its craftsmanship." She's holding a sword that should look like it's too big for her to haul around, but it's like a broadsword, and she's well trained. She's testing it for balance.

"This place should equip us perfectly," The Doctor's aversion to weapons notwithstanding.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"We don't need any weapons," the Doctor says, firmly. "We're fighting shadows, not flesh and blood. And, really, if we were fighting that, we wouldn't want weapons anyway. Moral high ground, Morgana. We need to take it."

All the same, he crosses over to the guns and picks up a hook launcher. Near it is a bundle of rope, and he grabs that, too.

"Brilliant. Now we've got what we need to get out of this place. Get back up there before that computer starts getting any clever ideas."

[magicalskeptic.livejournal.com]

Well, the Doctor clearly does not understand her thinking, "Doctor, one important thing about the moral high ground is that it cannot be held if one is dead. We do not know for certain if the city is completely uninhabited."

She picks up another sword, this one smaller, and though not quite as finely balanced as the first one, it is far more suitable for her to carry, and the grip is a better size for her hand. Grabbing her own bundle of thick rope, she unrolls it on a table and uses the sword to cut a length. Using the sword to cut through (it is duller than she would like, but that is convenient, considering how she is planning to carry it). She ties a knot under the guard, and then uses the knot as a little bit of leverage to keep it slightly away from her body, and then ties the rope around her waist.

The Doctor may have found whatever he wants, but so has Morgana.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

The Doctor looks back at Morgana. He doesn't approve of the weapon, he doesn't approve of her carrying it, but he can't deny the things she says are true. And he doesn't want either of them to die today.

"Fine, but weapons come out when we have no other choice, do you understand?" he says, firmly. "And I mean to make it that we have a choice."

He holds up the launcher, then nods to the door.

"Allons-y."