A/N I forgot to put the outfit in the media box again! You can go look if you want to. Also, in case you were wondering, Jordyn and the Doctor ARE together now. I think I was clear on that, but this is just to make sure. I'm also going to have her and Rose discuss it later.
The Doctor used his sonic on the double doors and I jumped in, heading straight to work.
"We are so going to get in trouble. You're not allowed to touch the mainframe. You're going to get told off." Cathica stressed.
"Will someone tell her to shut it? I'm working here!" I exclaimed.
"You can't just vandalise the place. Someone's going to notice!"
"I'm in!" I had finally hacked into the system. All their information was mine now.
The Doctor ran over and peered over my shoulder at the screen.
"This is nothing to do with me. I'm going back to work."
"Go on, then. See you!" The Doctor waved goodbye.
"I can't just leave you, can I!"
"If you want to be useful, get them to turn the heating down. It's boiling. What's wrong with this place? Can't they do something about it?" I asked, attempting to find pipes and plumbing on the screen.
"I don't know. We keep asking. Something to do with the turbine."
"Something to do with the turbine." The Doctor mimicked, earning a slap from me.
"Well, I don't know!"
"Exactly. I give up on you, Cathica. Now, Jordyn. Look at Jordyn. Jordyn is asking the right kind of question."
"Oh, thanks?"
"Why is it so hot?"
"One minute you're worried about the Empire and the next it's the central heating!"
"Well, never underestimate plumbing. Plumbing's very important."
I pulled the monitor out as soon as I got the schematic up.
"Here we go. Satellite Five, pipes and plumbing. Look at the layout." I showed the layout to Cathica.
"This is ridiculous. You've got access to the computer's core. You can look at the archive, the news, the stock exchange and you're looking at pipes?"
"But there's something wrong." The Doctor told her.
"Why, what is it?" Rose asked and I showed her the monitor.
"The ventilation system. Cooling ducts, ice filters, all working flat out channelling massive amounts of heat down, all the way from the top." I told her.
"Floor five hundred." She said, and I nodded.
"Something up there is generating tons and tons of heat."
"Well, I don't know about you, but I feel like I'm missing out on a party. It's all going on upstairs. Fancy a trip?" Rose smirked.
"You can't. You need a key." Cathica told us.
"Keys are just codes, and I've got the codes right here. Here we go. Override two one five point nine." I told the others.
The monitor revealed the rest of the code: 215.9976/31.
"How come it's given you the code?" Cathica asked.
I looked up at the camera and smirked. "Someone up there likes me."
We headed to the lift.
"Come on. Come with us." Rose said to Cathica.
"No way."
"Bye!" The Doctor smiled and waved.
"Well, don't mention my name. When you get in trouble, just don't involve me." Finally, she left.
"That's her gone. Adam's given up. Looks like it's just the three of us." The Doctor said.
"Yeah."
"Good."
"Yep."
When the doors opened we were in a cold, dark room with damaged walls and broken furniture.
"The walls are not made of gold." The Doctor muttered, glancing around at the desolate area. "You two should go back downstairs."
"Tough." Rose and I replied.
We walked around, glancing at the rotted skeletons and ancient newsroom. Eventually, we stumbled upon a bright blonde bloke in a suit and tie, surrounded by workers, covered in frost, and typing away at various monitors.
"I started without you. This is fascinating. Satellite Five contains every piece of information within the Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire. Birth certificates, shopping habits, bank statements, but you two, you don't exist. Not a trace. No birth, no job, not the slightest kiss. How can you walk through the world and not leave a single footprint?" He questioned us.
Rose tapped my arm and pointed towards a girl seated at her own monitor, also covered in frost. Upon closer inspection, I saw Suki, mindlessly working.
"Suki!" Rose called, the two of us darting to her. "Suki? Hello? Can you hear me? Suki?"
"What have you done to her?" I asked the man.
"I think she's dead." The Doctor told us.
"She's working." I reasoned.
"They've all got chips in their head, and the chips keep going, like puppets." He spat.
"Oh! You're full of information. But it's only fair we get some information back, because apparently, you're no one. It's so rare not to know something. Who are you?" The man wondered.
"It doesn't matter, because we're off. Nice to meet you. Come on." The Doctor gestured for Rose and I to follow him, but it was too late.
Suki latched onto Rose and I, holding our arms in a death grip. Two other zombies held the Doctor in place, despite his consistent struggles. They wrapped handcuffs around us, wiring us in our spots.
"Tell me who you are." The man ordered, the smile fading from his face.
"Since that information's keeping us alive, I'm hardly going to say, am I." The Doctor replied.
"Well, perhaps my Editor in Chief can convince you otherwise."
"And who's that?"
"It may interest you to know that this is not the Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire. In fact, it's not actually human at all. It's merely a place where humans happen to live."
There was a nasty growl and snarl in response to this.
"Yeah. Yeah, sorry. It's a place where humans are allowed to live by kind permission of my client."
He pointed up and revealed a disgusting lump hanging from the ceiling, with a very nasty set of teeth in a mouth at the end of a pseudopod.
"What is that?" Rose whispered.
"You mean that thing is in charge of Satellite Five?" The Doctor clarified.
"That thing, as you put it, is in charge of the human race. For almost a hundred years, mankind has been shaped and guided, his knowledge and ambition strictly controlled by it's broadcast news, edited by my superior, your master, and humanity's guiding light, the mighty Jagrafess of the Holy Hadrojassic Maxarodenfoe. I call him Max." The man laughed lightly.
"Create a climate of fear and it's easy to keep the borders closed. It's just a matter of emphasis. The right word in the right broadcast repeated often enough can destabilise an economy, invent an enemy, change a vote."
"So all the people on Earth are like, slaves." I told him.
"Well, now, there's an interesting point. Is a slave a slave if he doesn't know he's enslaved?"
"Yes." I replied.
"Oh. I was hoping for a philosophical debate. Is that all I'm going to get? Yes?"
"Yes." I nodded.
"You're no fun." He rolled his eyes.
"Let me out of these manacles. You'll find out how much fun I am."
"Oh, she's tough, isn't she?" He laughed. "But, come on. Isn't it a great system? You've got to admire it, just a little bit."
"You can't hide something on this scale. Somebody must have noticed." Rose reasoned.
"From time to time, someone, yes, but the computer chip system allows me to see inside their brains. I can see the smallest doubt and crush it." He smirked. "Then they just carry on, living the life, strutting about downstairs and all over the surface of the Earth like they're so individual, when of course, they're not. They're just cattle. In that respect, the Jagrafess hasn't changed a thing."
"Doctor, there's someone else here." I whispered. "I can feel it."
"Do we know them?"
I closed my eyes and focused. "Yes."
"Do you know who? Focus on familiar feelings."
I focused on the combination of emotions, and my eyes snapped open. "Cathica."
"Okay. Good. That's good."
"Rose, Cathica is here."
She nodded. "Got it."
"What about you?!" She called to the man. "You're not a Jagrabelly."
"Jagrafess." He corrected.
"Jagrafess. You're not a Jagrafess. You're human."
"Yeah, well, simply being human doesn't pay very well."
"But you couldn't have done this all on your own."
"No. I represent a consortium of banks. Money prefers a long-term investment. Also, the Jagrafess needed a little hand to install himself."
"No wonder, a creature that size. What's his life span?" The Doctor asked.
"Three thousand years." He replied happily.
"That's one hell of a metabolism generating all that heat. That's why Satellite Five's so hot. You pump it out of the creature, channel it downstairs. Jagrafess stays cool, it stays alive. Satellite Five is one great big life support system." The Doctor announced, making sure Cathica could hear.
"But that's why you're so dangerous. Knowledge is power, but you remain unknown. Who are you?"
He snapped his fingers and energy surged through the manacles, frying Rose and I. We screamed in pain.
"Leave them alone! I'm the Doctor, she's Jordyn Avery and she's Rose Tyler." He gestured to both of us in turn. "We're nothing, we're just wandering."
"Tell me who you are!" He demanded.
"I just said!"
"Yes, but who do you work for? Who sent you? Who knows about us? Who exactly-" He stopped, and the Jagrafess growled.
"Time Lord." He muttered.
"What?"
"Oh, yes. The last of the Time Lords in his travelling machine. Along with the last of the Empaths, lost and scared. " He smirked, resting his hand on my cheek, causing me to flinch. "Oh, with the little human girl from long ago."
"You don't know what you're talking about." The Doctor muttered, angrily.
"Time travel."
"Someone's been telling you lies."
"Young master Adam Mitchell?" He called up the image on a monitor. Adam was in the same chair we saw Cathica in, but the process was backwards, they were getting information from him.
"Oh my god! His head!" Rose cried.
"What the hell's he done? What the hell's he gone and done?" The Doctor almost shouted.
"They're reading his mind. He's telling them everything." I told him. "They've split open his brain and now they're taking everything they want."
"And through him, I know everything about you. Every piece of information in his head is now mine. And you have infinite knowledge, Doctor. The Human Empire is tiny compared to what you've seen in your T A R D I S. Tardis."
"Well, you'll never get your hands on it. I'll die first."
"Die all you like. I don't need you. I've got the key." On the screen, the Tardis key rose from Adam's pocket.
"You and your boyfriends!" The Doctor spat at Rose.
"Doctor!" I exclaimed, glaring at him.
"Today, we are the headlines. We can rewrite history. We could prevent mankind from ever developing." He gloated.
"And no one's going to stop you because you've bred a human race that doesn't bother to ask questions. Stupid little slaves, believing every lie. They'll just trot right into the slaughterhouse if they're told it's made of gold."
"Cathica is gone, but not far." I whispered, and the Doctor nodded.
The monitors started flashing. Cathica knew enough to take down the government, and that was exactly what she was doing.
"What's happening? Someone's disengaged the safety. Who's that?"
Cathica's image appeared on the monitor.
"It's Cathica." Rose smiled.
"And she's thinking." I told her.
"She's using what she knows." The Doctor agreed.
"Terminate her access." He ordered.
"Everything I told her about Satellite Five. The pipes, the filters, she's reversing it. Look at that." We looked up to see the icicles on the ceiling beginning to melt. "It's getting hot."
The man pulled Suki back to him. "I said, terminate. Burn out her mind."
The consoles started exploding and their dead operators collapsed. Rose managed to escape her manacles and started to help me out of mine.
"She's venting the heat up here. The Jagrafess needs to stay cool and now it's sitting on top of a volcano." The Doctor laughed.
"Yes, I'm trying, sir, but I don't know how she did it. It's impossible. A member of staff with an idea." The man explained to the Jagrafess.
He took Suki's seat and I escaped my manacles, then both of us turned to the Doctor. Rose took his sonic screwdriver out of his pocket and attempted to figure out how to use it.
"What do I do?" She asked.
"Flick the switch! Oh, just hand it to me." I grabbed the sonic and helped the Doctor out.
"Oi, mate, want to bank on a certainty? Massive heat in a massive body, massive bang. See you in the headlines!" The Doctor grabbed my hand and we took off running to the lift.
We found Cathica, and the Doctor clicked his fingers, closing her portal. We all walked back to the lift, heading back down to floor 139. When we arrived, everyone was helping out the injured.
"We're just going to go. I hate tidying up. Too many questions. You'll manage." The Doctor told Cathica.
"You'll have to stay and explain it. No one's going to believe me."
"Oh, they might start believing a lot of things now. The human race should accelerate. All back to normal."
"What about your friend?" She wondered.
"He's not my friend."
"Now, don't." Rose told him.
We walked back to the Tardis, where Adam was already waiting.
"I'm all right now. Much better. And I've got the key. Look, it's. It all worked out for the best, didn't it? You know, it's not actually my fault, because you were in charge."
The Doctor shoved Adam into the Tardis, Rose and I followed. The Doctor held Adam by the neck as he started the Tardis.
It was completely silent, except for the sounds of the Tardis. No one dare say a word. None of us had ever seen him this angry when it was close to home.
Finally, we arrived at our location. None of us knew where we were. The Doctor pulled Adam with him and opened the doors, shoving him out. Rose and I ran out after them.
"It's my house. I'm home! Oh, my God, I'm home! Blimey. I thought you were going to chuck me out of an airlock."
"Is there something else you want to tell me?" The Doctor glared at Adam.
"No. What do you mean?"
The Doctor picked up his answering machine. "The archive of Satellite Five. One second of that message could've changed the world." The Doctor soniced the phone, and it exploded, erasing the message forever. "That's it then, see you."
"How do you mean, see you?"
"As in goodbye."
"But what about me? You can't just go. I've got my head. I've got a chip type two. My head opens."
"What, like this?" The Doctor clicked his fingers.
"Don't." He closed it.
"Don't do what?" The Doctor laughed, clicking his fingers again.
"Stop it!" He closed it again.
"All right now, Doctor, that's enough. Stop it." Rose told him.
"Thank you."
Rose clicked her fingers.
"Oi!" He closed it.
"Sorry, couldn't resist."
I clicked my fingers.
"All right, that's enough!" He closed it one last time.
"Sorry, the others had their fun, I couldn't just stand and watch." I laughed.
"The whole of history could have changed because of you." The Doctor told him.
"I just wanted to help."
"You were helping yourself."
"And I'm sorry. I've said I'm sorry, and I am, I really am, but you can't just leave me like this."
"Yes, I can. 'Cause if you show that head to anyone, they'll dissect you in seconds. You'll have to live a very quiet life. Keep out of trouble. Be average, unseen. Good luck."
"But I want to come with you."
"I only take the best. I've got Jordyn and Rose, and I don't need someone ruining that."
The Doctor headed inside and I went in after him.
"That was rough." I told him.
"There's three things in this universe I won't let anybody have; you, Rose, and this Tardis. When any of those are threatened, I do whatever I need to."
"Okay, then. That did hurt him, though. A lot."
"Not my problem."
Just then, Rose walked in, and the Doctor took us to our next destination.