As the Doctor and Amy finally approach us River takes out a blue book that look a little like the design of the Tardis. I remain next to her as River asks: "Where are we up to? Have we done the Bone Meadows?" I try to look at the writing in the book but she pulls it away out of my sight causing me to crease my eyebrows, now very curious of the little blue book.
"Don't touch it." The Doctor warns me as he smirks a little at me.
"Why not?" I ask him.
"Because it's her diary." The Doctor says gesturing to River.
"Our diary." She corrects him smiling up to me.
"Her past, my future. Time travel. We keep meeting in the wrong order." The Doctor explains to us.
"And now it's your future too." She says to me, grinning. I look at her confused.
"My future?"
"Well you're my best friend, you're name is written in the book almost as much as the Doctor." She tells me, this makes me smile a little. We all turn suddenly to face four men as the appear. One approaches s and speaks directly to River.
"You promised me an army, Doctor Song." The man says.
"No, I promised you the equivalent of an army. This is the Doctor." River gestures to the Doctor. He solutes and I snort at how ridiculous he looks.
"Father Octavian, Sir. Bishop, second class. Twenty clerics at my command. The troops are already in the drop ship and landing shortly. Doctor Song was helping us with a covert investigation. Has Doctor Song explained what we're dealing with?" Octavian says, seeming to recognise who the Doctor was.
"Doctor, what do you know of the Weeping Angels?" He looks to River as she says this and then to me nervously, at least I think that's what his look meant.
We get taken to a camp where Octavian shows s around; River wandered off somewhere and once again I'd started to follow, wanting to get to know my new best friend, but the Doctor once again pulled me after him and Amy, stopping me from following River. I'd feigned sulking at first hoping he'd give in and let me go find River, but let it go once I realised he wanted me to stay with him and Amy. "The Angel, as far as we know, is still trapped in the ship. Our mission is to get inside and neutralise it. We can't get through up top, we'd be too close to the drives. According to this, behind the cliff face there's a network of catacombs leading right up to the temple. We can blow through the base of the cliffs, get into the entrance chamber, then make our way up." Father Octavian blabs on as I trail behind the Doctor next to Amy.
"Oh, good." The Doctor mutters as I don't pay any attention to either of the two men speaking as I look around wondering what a Weeping Angel is; whatever it is it's dangerous, because the Doctor's letting people call him sir.
"Good, sir?" See. He never lets people call him sir.
"Catacombs. Probably dark ones. Dark catacombs. Great." I couldn't tell if he was being sarcastic and I look to Amy for some kind of confirmation, she looks just as confused though.
"Technically, I think it's called a maze of the dead." Octavian tells him.
"You can stop any time you like." The Doctor says quietly. Someone calls Father Octavian as the Doctor says this and he excuses himself, leaving us at a table whilst the Doctor fiddles with something.
"You're letting people call you sir. You never do that. So, whatever a Weeping Angel is, it's really bad, yeah?" Amy asks as I sit myself on top of the table, glad someone else noticed the change in the Doctor's mood.
"Now that's interesting." He says as if he's seen something and as we both lean in to look at what he's found he turns to me and says. "You're still here. Which part of wait in the Tardis till I tell you it's safe was so confusing?"
"Just the part where you wanted us to wait in the Tardis." I retort smiling at him as he rolls his eyes.
"Ooo, you are all Mister Grumpy Face today." Amy coos at him. The Doctor turns to her as I look at what he was fiddling with as I listen.
"A Weeping Angel, Amy, is the deadliest, most powerful, most malevolent life form evolution has ever produced, and right now, Miss I Don't Understand Instructions," The Doctor turns to me and I snort at the pathetic nickname, "one of them is trapped inside that wreckage and I'm supposed to climb in after it with a screwdriver and a torch, and assuming I survive the radiation long enough and assuming the whole ship doesn't explode in my face, do something incredibly clever which I haven't actually thought of yet. That's my day. That's what I'm up to. Any questions?"
"Is River Song your wife?" I turn to my sister as she asks this, wanting and not wanting to know the answer. "Because she's someone from your future, and the way she talks to you, I've never seen anyone do that. She's kind of like, you know, heel, boy. She's Mrs Doctor from the future, isn't she? Is she going to be your wife one day?" I feel my chest clench and I find myself scolding my brain for doing so, why did that upset me?
"Yes, you're right." I look to him suddenly, not expecting that answer as I feel my chest clenching more. I'm just glad he can't see my face, as I look to him down heartened. It did make sense, she does act like a wife to him and I find myself becoming shocked as I realise I liked this man more than I thought I let on, so what he says next brings huge relief, but not completely. "I am definitely Mister Grumpy Face today." I look to the door of a drop ship to see River poking her head out.
"Doctor! Doctor?" She calls, I smile as I stand up and look to the Doctor. "Kenzie!" She yells and I look back to her as she beckons me to her, I smile and jog to where she's stood in combat clothes.
"What's up?" I ask and she gestures to the screen in the room, I stare at it transfixed by it.
"It's the final survivor." She tells me.
"A Weeping Angel?" I ask, looking at the winged figure, facing away with it hands covering its face, on the screen.
"What do you think?" River asks as the Doctor enters with Amy and Father Octavian. "It's from the security cameras in the Byzantium vault. I ripped it when I was on board. Sorry about the quality. It's four seconds. I've put it on loop."
"Yeah, it's an Angel. Hands covering its face." The Doctor says.
"You've encountered the Angels before." Father Octavian states.
"Once, on Earth, a long time ago. But those were scavengers, barely surviving." He tells us, I look to him as he stares at the looped video.
"But it's just a statue." Amy says.
"It's a statue when you see it." River tells Amy from beside me.
"Where did it come from?" The Doctor asks and I look to River, anticipating her answer.
"Oh, pulled from the ruins of Razbahan, end of last century. It's been in private hands ever since. Dormant all that time."
"There's a difference between dormant and patient." The Doctor says to all of us.
"So it's a statue when you see it? What happens if no one sees it?" I ask the two of them, River smirks at me, and I take it as a sign that I'm on the right tracks.
"The Weeping Angels can only move if they're unseen. So legend has it." She tells me.
"No, it's not legend, it's a quantum lock. In the sight of any living creature the Angels literally cease to exist. They're just stone. The ultimate defence mechanism." The Doctor explains to us.
"What, being stone?"
"Being stone until you turn your back." I tell her understanding it finally.
Amy and I stay stood in the drop ship as The Doctor, River and Octavian talk outside. "So what is it with you and all your connections?" Amy whispers to me as we watch the others talk. I look to her confused. "You know, you and River, you and the Doctor?"
"Me and the Doctor?" I ask nervously.
"Don't act all nervous about it, you already told me you have feelings for him at the war rooms." She smirks at rom.
"Do you think we could talk about this another time, please?" I plead with her. She sighs and nods as River calls her.
""Amy, come with me, I need yours and the Doctor's help!" She calls and Amy starts to follow them.
"What about me?!" I yell after them, offended that they got to go off somewhere and have fun, whilst I was stuck watching the same four second loop.
"Doctor won't let you, Sweetie; we'll be back in a bit!" She calls to me and I make sure as the Doctor turns around to face me that he sighs my sour glare as he turns back around. As I enter back into the room I look around already bored before I look up to the screen, to see the Angel's head is not in the same position I remember it to be in. I go back to the door, finding River, Amy and the Doctor crowded around a table.
"River! Did you have more than one clip of the Angel?" I call to her, she turns to face me.
"No, just the four seconds, Kenzie." She tells me. I nod slowly as I go back into the room and jump back a little as I see that it's moved again, only this time it's completely facing the camera. I approach the screen slowly and I lean on my knees as I look at it, not wanting to get too close. I look to the timing and see it's still in a loop of four seconds and as I look back to the Angel again, it's moved closer, causing me to jump. I hear a sound behind me like a door locking but I don't turn as I remember my own words 'stone until you turn your back', if I look away it'll just move again, but what can it do if it's not even in the same room as me? And on that thought I turn to grab the remote, glad that as I look back the Angel hadn't moved. I turn the screen off and sigh a little as I release a breath I didn't notice I was holding until it turns back on again by itself, I try again to switch it off, but it just switches right back on again. I go right up to the screen.
"But you're just a recording. You can't move." I say to it and I look down as I try to pull out the lead, but it won't come out. As I look up again, its face is right in the cameras face and I jump back with a gasp as it once again takes me by surprise. I back up to the door as I call out: "Doctor?" I reach the door and try to open it, but it won't turn and as I stand back up, looking at the screen the Angel now has its mouth open. "Doctor!" I say, a little more panicked. "Doctor!" I yell again as I try to open the door. I feel my throat tighten as I look back to see the virtual image of the Angel in the room I sink down onto the floor back against the door as I stare at this thing, once again finding it difficult to breathe. "Doctor!" I shout as loudly as I can. "Doctor! It's in the room!" I suddenly hear running footsteps from outside the room as I stand up at try the keypad by the door and look back to the Angel to find it a step closer.
"Mackenzie! Are you all right? What's happening?" The Doctor's voice shouts through the door. I find myself at a loss of words as my breathing worsens, this is not happening. "Mackenzie?" I still don't reply. I hear shoving against the door but nothing happens. I don't take my eyes off of the Angel as my eyes water from not blinking and also from the fear and oncoming panic attack.
"Panic attack." I hear River mutter from outside, how does she know about that?
"Kenz! Kenzie, breathe. What's going on?" I hear Amy ask. I do as she says and take a deep breath.
"The Angel is here. It's coming out of the television." I manage to say through my hyperventilation.
"Don't take your eyes off it. Keep looking. It can't move if you're looking, ok love?" The Doctor tells me and I find myself relaxing a little as he says the last bit. They continue talking as I watch the Angel.
"Oh my God." I mutter to myself quietly as I lean against the door for support and I find myself looking into the Angel's eyes and not being able to look away.
"Can you turn it off? The Screen?" The Doctor asks me.
"I tried." I mutter.
"Look, Mackenzie, you need to try again, love, ok?" He tells me quietly. "But don't take your eyes off the Angel."
"I'm not." I tell him slightly frustrated, I start to feel my breathing normalise as I find my emotions replaced with annoyance.
"Each time it moves, it'll move faster. Don't even blink." He tells me as I begin to walk to where I put the remote down.
"I'm not blinking. Have you ever tried not blinking?" As I close one eye and leave the other open, trying to relieve the burning as I search for the remote. Once I feel it, I grab it and turn the screen off again and growl as it just turns back on. "It just keeps switching back on."
"Yeah, it's the Angel." He informs me.
"But it's just a recording." I mutter but he still hears me.
"No, anything that takes the image of an Angel is an Angel. What are you doing?" I'm assuming he's talking to River or Amy.
"Doctor, what's it going to do to me?" I ask him.
"Just keep looking at it. Don't stop looking." He avoids my question.
"Just tell me." I order him, he doesn't say anything and I feel tears running down my face as I stare into its eyes and yell. "Tell me. Tell me!" There's a slight pause before the Doctor then says.
"Mackenzie, not the eyes. Look at the Angel but don't look at the eyes." I go cold as I force my eyes somewhere else, considering I'd been staring at its eyes every since it came out of the screen.
"Why?"
"The eyes are not the windows of the soul. They are the doors. Beware what may enter there." He says, but he was replying to River's question.
"What did you say?" I ask remembering something he'd said earlier, having heard what he told River perfectly well.
"Don't look at the eyes!"
"No, about images. What did you say about images?" I ask frantically as an idea pops into my head.
"Whatever holds the image of an Angel, is an Angel." River's voice says through the door. I point the remote to the screen noticing the blip.
"Ok, hold this. One, two, three, four." And as I say four I switch of the television and the Angel disappears and doesn't come back. I sigh out a breath of relief as I feel myself being hugged as I sink to the floor being held by my older sister.
"Don't do that again." She tells me and I nod as I bury my head into her chest as she pulls me closer.
"I froze it. There was a sort of blip on the tape and I froze it on the blip. It wasn't the image of an Angel any more. That was good, yeah? It was, wasn't it? That was pretty good." I tell them as I remain embraced by my sister. River comes over to me and crouches down in front of us.
"That was amazing." She says. The Doctor turns to look at the three of us.
"River, hug Mackenzie." The Doctor tells River.
"Why?" I ask he turns and smiles at me.
"Because I'm busy." He tells me. River hugs me close to her and laughs out.
"This is my own hug for Kenzie, you can hug her yourself." She tells the Doctor.
"I'm fine." I tell them.
"You're brilliant." She corrects me and I hug her a little tighter. We pull apart and stand up as River asks. "So it was here? That was the Angel?" Before he replies he walks up to me and embraces me too and I wrap my arms around his neck, breathing in his scent as it calms me; he pulls away too quickly in my opinion though, as he replies to River's question.
"That was a projection of the Angel. It's reaching out, getting a good look at us. It's no longer dormant." There's an explosion from outside which catches our a attention and the Doctor rushes to the door.
"Last one positive." A cleric says from outside.
"Doctor? We're through." Octavian's voice calls from outside, the Doctor looks back to us three.
"Okay, now it starts." He says as he runs out. I hadn't turned from the screen yet and as Amy and River go to follow I feel like something's in my eye.
"Coming?" River asks me, Amy already ahead.
"Yeah, coming. There's just something in my eye." I tell her as she exits and I itch my eye again before following after.
As we enter the Aplan Temple I look around me to find hundreds of statues surrounding us. I turn to the Doctor as he climbs down the rope ladder after me. "Do we have a gravity globe?" The Doctor asks. And Octavian calls for one of the clerics to get him a grav globe.
"Where are we? What is this?" Amy asks as the Doctor is passed a spherical objects.
"It's an Aplan Mortarium, sometimes called a Maze of the Dead." River answers.
"What's that?" I ask looking around me into the thick blackness.
"Well, if you happen to be a creature of living stone..." He kicks the gravity globe high into the air as it lights up the entire cavern revealing thousands of more statues. "The perfect hiding place." The Doctor finishes.
"I guess this makes it a bit trickier." Octavian says.
"A bit, yeah." The Doctor replies.
"A stone Angel on the loose amongst stone statues. A lot harder than I'd prayed for." Octavian tells us.
"A needle in a haystack." I recite the familiar and well known statement.
"A needle that looks like hay. A hay-like needle of death. A hay-alike needle of death in a haystack of, er, statues. No, yours was fine." He concludes as River smiles to me.
"Right. Check every single statue in this chamber. You know what you're looking for. Complete visual inspection. One question. How do we fight it?" Octavian orders his clerics before asking the Doctor.
"We find it, and hope." He says simply and takes my hand as he drags me after him Amy following behind us.
As we all climb up a narrow path I stop for a second as my eye starts to feel irritated and as I go to rub it again, it feels like dust or gravel falls out and I pull my hand away staring at it in confusion. "You all right?" River asks from behind me.
"Yeah, I'm fine. So, what's a Maze of the Dead?" I ask looking around me.
"Oh, it's not as bad as it sounds. It's just a labyrinth with dead people buried in the walls. Okay, that was fairly bad. Right give me your arm. This won't hurt a bit." She states as she takes out a big needle. As she ticks the thing in my arm I let out a sharp hiss.
"Ow." I say.
"There, you see. I lied. It's a viro-stabiliser. Stabilises your metabolism against radiation, drive burn, anything. You're going to need it when we get up to that ship." She says smiling.
"So what's he like? In the future, I mean. Because you know him in the future, don't you?" Amy asks as she walks over to us from the Doctor.
"The Doctor? Well, the Doctor's the Doctor." She says hesitantly.
"Oh. Well, that's very helpful. Mind if I write that down?" Amy replies mockingly.
"Yes, we are." River calls up to the Doctor.
"Sorry, what?" He asks looking to the three of us confused.
"Talking about you." River explains.
"I wasn't listening. I'm busy." He replies. I look to see him holding the portable computer and pretending to mess around on it and I swear it's upside down.
"River, isn't that the wrong way up?" I whisper to her so the Doctor won't hear, she nods smiling a little. "Might work better if it's the other way up, Doctor." I call to him. He pauses spinning it around.
"Yeah." He says simply, looking a tad embarrassed.
"You're so his wife." Amy says to River as she laughs. I feel my heart sink again, upset that this has been brought up again.
"Oh, Amy, Amy, Amy. This is the Doctor we're talking about. Do you really think it could be anything that simple?" She says and I swear I saw her glance to me momentarily, but I must have just imagined it as she looks towards the Doctor.
"Yep." Amy replies plainly.
"You're good. I'm not saying you're right, but you are very good." River says as she leads us up to the Doctor once again.