More than words

Hope and Glory

Chapter 18 Hope and Glory

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I'm still standing for hope and glory

I'll be fighting for my love story
I'm still standing for hope and glory now
All the battles I lost and the battles I won
This'll be the one, this'll be the one, ohh
I'm still standing for hope and glory love
It's gonna be the one
(Yeah, it's gonna be the one, yeah)

~Måns Zelmerlöv

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"YOU BRING HER BACK! YOU BRING HER BACK, RIGHT NOW!"

Rory's voice echoed off the corridors in the TARDIS, laced with pain and sorrow.

The Doctor stood silent beside him, his head bowed and hands entwined. It took all Rose had not to raise her hands over her ears to ease the sound of the poor man's pleas for his wife.

She had known this was coming, she had known about it for several months, ever since they discovered she had been replaced with Flesh. Didn't make it any easier though, listening to Rory's cries and seeing the Doctor so... so downcast.

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Five years ago (TARDIS time) – an empty warehouse on the outskirts of London – March 2009

"For the honour of the Sontaran Empire, I challenge you sir." The Sontaran soldier in front of the Doctor pointed his blaster right at his chest.

"What's your name soldier?" The Doctor asked, seemingly unperturbed by the lethal weapon aimed at him.

"Commander Strax," The Sontaran answered. "Last remaining member of the Tenth Sontaran Battle Fleet."

"Tell me, Commander Strax," The Doctor said in a calm, almost nonchalant, voice. "Why didn't you die earlier today with the rest of the fleet?" The Doctor picked up a fallen chair off the empty warehouse floor, dusted it off, and sat down on it, one leg resting on the other. "Because I was there, you see. I was there today when you tried to poison the Earth and turn it into a breeding ground." He spat out, for the first time showing the slightest emotion. "I was the one who burned your ship."

"I was indisposed at the time, Sir," Commander Strax kept his gun level with the Doctor. "I was down on Earth when our ship blew up."

"Do you know the punishment for attacking a level five planet, Strax?" The Doctor pulled out his screwdriver and started flipping it in the air.

"Yes, Sir." Strax hesitated a bit but held his blaster stable.

"Then you should be terrified." The Doctor looked up at Strax, and the Commander seemed scared for the first time that evening.

"Doctor!" A female voice drifted in from the outside of the building. "Hurry up will you. Martha hasn't got all day!"

"I'm busy!" The Doctor snapped, not taking his eyes off of the now confused Sontaran.

"Oi, don't you be short with me." The voice was closer now, and the Doctor turned his head and saw the fiery red-headed woman standing by the door at the other side of the building.

"Donna," He groaned, dragging his hand through his already gravity defying hair in agitation. "I'm in the middle of a negotiation; you can't just barge in like that."

"Then deal with the potato and pick us up at my mother's," She said, sounding tired. "Martha deserves a goodbye."

"I know." He looked away from her. "I'll be there."