Recap: "See I got us out of here easy! A little bit too easy..." He said, trailing off at the end.
Suddenly something black came springing out of the shadows, tackling the Doctor to the ground.
"Doctor!" I shouted, sprinting towards him.
I screamed as I went flying to the ground.
~oOo~
I struggled to see the creature on top of me, but my vision was blurring. All I saw was a vague black creature, like the fake soldiers we had seen earlier. I felt slight pain in my arms, realizing the creature had slashed me again.
"Doctor!" I screamed.
"Alice! Whatever you do, don't...fall asleep! They...have...venom...in their...claws to make you...pass out!" I heard the Doctor slur, "Just... keep...fighting them!".
I struggled against the Xylima's strong grip, but my body was growing weaker. Every muscle was relaxing for sleep. My eyelids felt heavy, as if someone was pulling them shut. I felt just as dazed as I did the first time I got attacked.
"Doctor!" I yelped, sounding weak and groggy. There was no answer. I craned my neck over to where the Doctor was lying limply on the ground, unconcious. The creature attacking him had gone.
I rolled my eyes and sighed, "Oh, great. Now I'm left to figure out how to get us out of this.".
My hearing was shorting out, as if it were a broken record on a turntable. The effects of the scratch only continued to worsen, but I slowly managed to reach out my hand, getting an idea. In the Doctor's limp, outstretched hand, lay his sonic screwdriver. I had seen him use it before; it could be used for almost anything.
I strained every bone in my fingertips, reaching as far as I could towards it. I could hear the little time I had to get out of here ticking away in my ears. It looked as if there were a thousand screwdrivers, all whirling in circles. I feebly grabbed the one I assumed was real, when I felt the Doctor roll over onto my hand, crushing it.
I opened my mouth in a silent scream of agony, eyes crossing momentarily, before yanking my hand out, sonic screwdriver clasped tightly inside, drawing my hand back to my body. I gathered all the strength I had left to point the sonic to the ceiling above, hearing it satisfyingly start to crack.
The creature looked up, distracted by the cracking sounds. I took this chance to wriggle out from underneath its grip, just in time as a part of the ceiling gave way, crushing the creature under its weight. It exploded into black dust.
"Now what?" I slurred, stumbling over my own feet. I hadn't thought about how I'd get both me and the unconcious Doctor out of here.
I reluctantly grabbed the Doctor's hands and dragged him across the ground, groaning. He was covered in blackened scratch marks, and I assumed I was, too.
"Just...a little...longer..." I breathed, groggy with sleep. "You're most likely the smartest man in the universe, saving universes on a daily basis, but you're also the heaviest!" I sighed exasperatedly, as if I expected him to answer.
After what seemed like hours, I finally dragged my way into the light. My ears rung and my head spun as I collapsed to the ground, feeling sleep catch up to me. My eyes fluttered closed.
~oOo~
"Alice!" I heard my mom shout from the hallway.
"Not now, mom!" I shouted back, breathing in my book.
"Alice!!!" My mom said louder.
"Not now-" I began to shout, but trailed off as I saw my mom walk into my room, tears rolling down her cheeks.
"Mom...What's wrong?" I asked softly.
"They've found me. We need to get out of here. You need to get out of here," Mom replied, shaky with tears.
"Who? Who's found you?" I put down my book and sat up.
Mom opened her mouth to say something when I heard a crash in the kitchen. She started to hypervenalate, whispering, "They're here!". My eyes widened.
"M-mom...w-what's going on?!" I said scaredly. I jumped as I heard my dad scream from the kitchen, and then silence,
"Dad!" I shouted, sprinting into the kitchen. I screamed in terror, tears flooding down my cheeks as I saw my dad laying limply on the tiled floor, blood pouring from his throat to form a pool on the ground.
"Daddy!" I sobbed, hugging his cold body.
"We have to go," My mom cried, grabbing my hand and dragging me away from him.
We ran down the hallway, toward the door, when I spotted something beeping on the ground. I picked it up, studying it. It looked like a small cube of gold with a digital timer on it. I gasped and dropped it, assuming that it was some sort of explosive. The time read 10 seconds in bright red.
"Oh my God..." I murmured, grabbing my Mom's hand and running away from it as fast as I could. I turned around, realizing there was no chance of us getting away.
3...2...
My mom sheilded me with her body, clasping my hand so tight it went numb.
1
I felt everything explode from around me, so loud it felt as if it were in my head. I was blown back against the wall, feeling my entire body make a horrible popping noise. I fell to the floor, pain erupting throughout my body. Tears strolled down my face.
I felt someone weakly grab my hand.
"Mom...It hurts...It hurts so much..." I cried, I tried to turn over to look at her, but I couldn't move.
I finally managed to weakly turn my head, breaking into a sob as I saw her. She was bleeding from several spots on her face that were so deep I could see bone. Burns covered every inch of her body. The only thing I recognized was her bright green eyes, identical to mine, staring at me with so much pain but with so much happiness at the same time.
Mom slowly drew a shaky finger to her lips. "Shhh..." She managed, smiling. She weakly stroked my hair. The fire around us was slowly enclosing; we were going to die.
"I love you, mom," I cried. My vision was blurring and my ears were ringing from the explosion.
She curled her dry, cracking lips into a feeble smile, "I love you, too.".
Her eyes gently closed, and the delicate rising and falling of her chest stopped.
I closed my teary eyes, preparing myself for the fire. Suddenly a hand grabbed mine, dragging me out into the fresh air. I vaguely saw the shadow of a person before everything went black.
~o0o~
"....." I heard someone faintly talking in my head.
"A..ce!" I heard it again, a bit clearer this time, "Al.ce!".
My eyes slowly opened, my vision slowly adjusting. "Alice!" I heard the Doctor's voice say from beside me.
"Oh good, you're awake. You know, in the little amount of time I have known you, you sure do pass out quite a bit," Doctor sighed in relief.
I sat up, feeling sick to my stomach, and staggered over to a bush, where I lost the little bit of the food I had left in me. We appeared to be in a small park in the city, abandoned for the most part, a few people reading newspapers on nearby benches being the exception.
"Resisting the venom can result in nausea," Doctor explained from behind me.
"Of course it can," I muttered sarcastically, exhausted.
"How did you do that?" Doctor asked.
"Do what?".
"Get us out of there, all by yourself?"
"Painfully," I smiled. Doctor raised his eyebrow, before grinning as well.
"You're crying," Doctor frowned, furrowing his eyebrows.
"Huh?" I asked bringing my hand up to my cheeks. I felt the moisture of a teardrop on my fingertips.
"Oh, I'm sorry, I guess I didn't notice-"
"You were crying when you woke up, too. You...you were dreaming about something," Doctor cut me off.
I avoided his eyes.
"I...don't remember," I lied flatly.
"The Xylima...they feed off of bad memories...nightmares...that's why they make you fall asleep. That's when your subconscious emerges. You get scratched enough, you're...uhh..." Doctor drew a line over his throat with his finger, wincing.
"Fantastic," I grumbled sarcastically.
"So, shall we?" Doctor asked after a while, holding out his hand to help me up.
"Shall we...what?" I asked, taking it.
"I think we should get to know each other better. I saw a restaurant down the street," Doctor said cheerily.
"What about...all that?" I replied, gesturing to the dark tunnels.
"We need to rest! We'll come up with a plan over a quick meal," Doctor said with a wave of his hand.
I stared after him in disbelief.