Everyone was pretty beat up about hearing about The Doctor falling into the pit, and the fact that there was no way for Nova or Ida to come back up. Although, no one was more heartbroken about it than Rose and Tate. Zach hung up the com, and then he turned to face the others. "Danny, Toby, close down the feed links. Get the retrotropes online, then get to the rocket and strap yourselves in. We're leaving" Danny and Toby got to work.
Rose and Tate looked at each other. The both of them were thinking the same thing. If there was a chance for the two Time Lords to return, they weren't going to leave them behind. "We're not going" Rose announced.
"Rose, Tate, there's space for both of you"
"We're going to wait for The Doctor and Nova" Tate explained. He and Rose looked at each other again. "Just like they waited for us" The two companions joined hands.
"I'm sorry" Zach started sympathetically. "But he's dead, and there's no way for her to come back up"
Rose shook her head, obviously not wanting to hear what Zach was saying. "You don't know them. 'Cause he's not. I'm telling you, he's not"
"And then, Nova" Tate carried on from Rose. "She's relentless. She doesn't give up. She'd find a way to come back"
Rose spoke again. "And even if he was, and if she was stuck, how could we leave them all on their own, all the way down there? No, I'm going to stay"
"Me too" Tate agreed with an affirmative nod.
Zach knew that there was no way of changing their minds. "Then I apologise for this" But he also wasn't just going to leave them behind. "Danny, Toby? Make them secure"
Toby grabbed Rose, while Danny grabbed Tate. "No, no. No! No! No! Let me go!" Rose squealed.
"Get off us! We're not leaving!" Tate protested.
Zach injected Rose with something first, and then he injected Tate. The both of them passed out. " I have lost too many people. I am not leaving you two behind" Zach picked up Rose and carried her over his shoulders, while Toby and Danny dragged Tate along. "Let's get them on board"
They went into the next corridor, where a bunch of Ood lay on the floor. Toby saw one of them twitch. "Did that one just move?" He accused. It's eyes were still red.
"It's the telepathic field. It's reasserting itself" Danny said.
"Move it. Get to the rocket. Move!" Zach hastily ordered. They kept on moving, ignoring the twitching Ood.
______
The Doctor landed at the bottom of the pit. The faceplate of his space suit had shattered upon contact with the ground. He woke up and then stood. He gasped in realization, and then took off his helmet. "I'm breathing. Air cushion to support the fall" He turned on his com. "You can breath down here, Ida. Can you hear me, Ida? Supernova, can you hear me?"
The Doctor closed his eyes. He attempted to reach out to Nova telepathically.
Supernova, if you can hear me, I want you to know that I'm alright. I promise I'll make my way back to you, and then we can get out of here, and see Rose and Tate again. I love you, my Supernova.
______
Everyone was strapped in on the rocket. Rose and Tate were still passed out. "Dislocating B clamp. C Clamp. Raising blu-nitro to maximum. Toby, how's the Negapact feed line?" Zach asked.
"Clear. Ready to go, sir" Toby assured. "For God's sakes, get us out of here!"
Rose and Tate started to wake. Danny noticed. "Captain, I think we're going to have problem passengers"
"Keep an eye on them" Zach ordered.
"Wait" Rose quickly realized where they were. "We're not"
"It's all right, Rose. You and Tate are safe" Danny tried to ease.
That didn't work, because Rose and Tate were both trying to take off the safety restraints. "We're not going anywhere!" Rose objected.
"Get us out!" Tate demanded.
Zach ignored them as he announced lift off. "And lift off! Whoo!"
______
Ida and Nova looked up as they heard a rocket engine. "Seems as though they left" Ida said.
"Yeah" Nova replied weakly. "At least Rose and Tate are safe"
Little did they know that The Doctor could also hear the rocket engine from the pit. And his message to Nova had yet to come through.
______
So Rose and Tate were stuck on a rocket in flight, with no way of turning back to wait for their friends. Rose was eyeing a bolt gun within reach of her. She grabbed it, turned it on, and pointed it at Zach. "Take Tate and I back to the planet. Take us back!" Rose demanded.
"Or what?" Zach challenged.
"What do you think or what?" Tate retorted. "She'll shoot"
"He's right" Rose nodded. "I will. Wouldn't be the first gun I've shot" She thought back to the time she had to save Nova from Marilyn and Dr. Vick, who were trying to bring HYDRA back.
Zach turned to look at her. "Would you, though? Would you really? Is that what your Doctor and Nightingale would want?" Rose slumped back in her seat. "Sorry, but it's too late anyway. Take a look outside. We can't turn back. This is what the Doctor and Nightingale would have wanted. Isn't that right?" Rose and Tate peered outside the window. They peered at the black hole.
______
The Doctor ventured further into the pit. He shined his flashlight on the paintings that were on the wall. "The history of some big battle. Man against Beast. I don't know if you're getting this, Ida, Supernova. Hope so. Anyway, they defeated the Beast and imprisoned it" Something caught his eye when he spotted two bronze urns sitting on pedestals. The same scene was painted on the wall. "Or maybe that's the key" He touched one of the urns, causing them both to light up. "Or the gate, or the bars" He stood in between the two urns. An impossibly big horned creature wakes and looks at him. It was bound to the wall by chains around it's horns and limbs.
______
Rose and Tate strapped on their safety belts, succumbing to the situation they were in. Toby smiled and he began laughing. Danny saw him. "What's the joke?" He wondered.
"Just..." Toby started, still laughing. "We made it. We escaped. We actually did it"
"Not all of us" Rose reminded him.
"We're not out of it yet" Zach added. "We're still the first people in history to fly away from a black hole. Toby, read me the stats"
Toby glanced at the screen above him. "Gravity funnel holding, sir. Always holding"
______
The Doctor was now face-to-face with the Beast. "I accept that you exist. I don't have to accept what you are, but you're physical existence, I'll give you that. I don't understand. I was expected down here. I was given a safe landing and air. You need me for something. What for? Have I got to, I don't know, beg an audience? Or is there a ritual? Some sort of incantation or summons or spell? All these things I don't believe in, are they real? Speak to me! Tell me!"
The Doctor raised his eyebrows when the Beast wouldn't respond. "You won't talk. Or you can't talk. Oh, hold on, wait a minute, just let me. Oh! No. Yes! No. Think it through. You spoke before. I heard your voice. An intelligent voice. No, more than that. Brilliant. But, looking at you now, all I can see is Beast. The animal. Just the body. You're just the body, the physical form. What's happened to your mind, hmm? Where's it gone? Where's that intelligence? Oh, no"
______
Toby read off the stats again as they changed. "Stats at fifty three. Funnel stable at sixty six point five. Hull pressure constant. Smooth as we can, sir, all the way back home. Coordinates set for planet Earth" All that was followed by the slightest smirk. An almost devious smirk.
______
"You're imprisoned, long time ago. Before the universe, after, sideways, in between, doesn't matter. The prison is perfect. It's absolute, it's eternal. Oh, yes! Open the prison, the gravity field collapses. This planet falls into the black hole! You escape, you die. Brilliant! But that's just the body. The body is trapped, that's all. The devil is an idea. In all those civilisations, just an idea. But an idea is hard to kill. An idea could escape. The mind. The mind of the great Beast. The mind can escape! Oh, but that's it! You didn't give me air, your jailers did. They set this up all those years ago! They need me alive, because if you're escaping, then I've got to stop you"
The Doctor grabbed a rock. "If I destroy your prison, your body is destroyed. Your mind with it" He raised the rock to smash one of the urns, but stopped himself, and dropped the rock. "But then you're clever enough to use this whole system against me. If I destroy this planet, I destroy the gravity field. The rocket. The rocket loses protection and falls into the black hole. I have to sacrifice Rose. Sacrifice Tate. Sacrifice my...." The Doctor didn't even want to finish that sentence.
______
There was something that didn't make sense to Rose, and she was hoping it wouldn't make any sense to Tate either. There was something about the whole escaping on rocket thing that just seemed too.... easy. "Tate?" Rose called. He craned his head around to look at her. "Does any of this make sense to you?"
"What do you mean?" Tate asked.
"We escaped, but there's a thousand ways it could've killed us. It could've ripped out the air or, I don't know, burnt us, or anything. But it let us go. Why?"
Tate's eyes widened in realization. "Unless it wanted us to escape?"
"Hey Rose, Tate, do us a favour" Two said people looked at Toby. "Shut up. Almost there. We'll be beyond the reach of the black hole in forty, thirty nine"
______
"So, that's the trap. Or the test, or the final judgment, I don't know. But if I kill you, I kill her. Except that implies in this big grand scheme of Gods and Devils that she's just a victim. But I've seen a lot of this universe. I've seen fake gods and bad gods and demi-gods and would-be gods, and out of all that, out of that whole pantheon, if I believe in one thing, just one thing, I believe in her"
The Doctor picked up the rock from earlier and he smashed an urn.
______
The rocket began shaking. "What happened?" Danny asked. "What was that?"
"What's he doing? What is he doing?" Toby repeated.
"We've lost the funnel. Gravity collapse!" Zach explained.
"What does that mean?" Rose asked further.
"We can't escape. We're headed straight for the black hole!"
______
The Doctor smashed the second urn. "This is your freedom. Free to die. You're going into that black hole and I'm riding with you"
The Beast starting thrashing and growling. It let out a breath of fire. The Beast's skin started to crack, showing the glow of the fire within it.
______
Rose stared out the window. "It's the planet. The planet's moving. It's falling" She turned her head to look at Toby again, and jumped when she saw that his eyes were red and his face was covered in the symbols.
"I am the rage" Toby said.
"It's Toby. Zach, do something"
"And the bile and the ferocity"
"Just do something!"
"I am the Prince and the Fall and the enemy. I am the sin and the fear and the darkness"
"It's him! It's him! It's him!" Danny shouted.
"Stay where you are. The ship's not stable!" Zach instructed. Toby breathed out fire. "What is he? What the hell is he?"
"I shall never die. The thought of me is forever. In the bleeding hearts of men, in their vanity and obsession and lust" Toby said. Rose loosened her safety belt (but never unfastened it), and reached for the bolt gun. "Nothing shall ever destroy me. Nothing!"
Tate noticed that Rose had the gun pointed at the front screen. He smirked knowingly. "Yeah, might to rethink that" He then ducked out of the way.
"Go to hell!" Rose said, before firing the gun, taking out the front screen. Tate then quickly reached over and unfastened Toby's safety belt. Toby was still roaring as he got sucked out into space and towards the black hole.
"Emergency shield!" Zach announced. A metal shutter sealed the hole, but the rocket was still falling. "We've still lost the gravity funnel. We can't escape the black hole"
"But we stopped him" Rose said. "That's what the Doctor and Nova would've done"
"Some victory. We're going in"
"The planet's lost orbit. It's falling!" Danny shouted.
______
Back on the planet, all the Ood were starting to wake up. They became aware of what was happening. Ida passed out, her head falling down onto Nova's lap.
"Ida" Nova said her name softly. She was beginning to feel lightheaded, and immediately knew that it was from the lack of oxygen. It was the reason why Ida passed out. "It's okay, Ida..." Nova gripped onto the woman's hand. "I'm here. I'm..."
Just as Nova was about to pass out, she heard the familiar whirring sound and the blue box she loved so much came into view. Nova couldn't help but smile. "Doctor... I knew you'd come back"
______
The screen Danny was staring at beeped a few times and then went blank. "The planet's gone. I'm sorry" He said.
"Accelerate. I did my best" Zach said. "But hey! The first human beings to fall inside a black hole. How about that? History"
Rose closed her eyes, anticipating the inevitable. Tate reached around and grabbed her hand. The gesture made Rose feel a little bit better. She gave his hand a squeeze. Then, suddenly, the shaking came to a stop. Rose's eyes shot open and she looked around. "What happened?" She asked.
"We're turning" Zach answered, confused as to how they were. "We're turning around. We're turning away!"
"Sorry about the hijack, Captain" The Doctor's voice broke through. "This is the good ship TARDIS. Now, first thing's first. Have you got a Rose Tyler and Tate Peltzer on board?"
"We're here!" Rose cheered, raising a hand in the air. It was the hand that was holding Tate's so his went up as well. "It's us! Oh, my God. Where are you?"
"And is Nova there with you?" Tate asked.
"I'm right here, Tate" Nova's voice also broke through. Tate let out a sigh of relief, knowing that his two best friends were both okay. "We're just towing you home. Gravity schmavity. Our people practically invented black holes"
"Well, in fact, they did" The Doctor added. "In a couple of minutes, we'll be nice and safe. Oh, and Captain? Can we do a swap? Say, if you give us Rose Tyler and Tate Peltzer, we'll give you Ida Scott? How about that?"
"A two for one deal" Nova joked. "You might call it"
"She's alive" Zach cheered.
"Yes" Danny gasped, head in his hands. "Thank God"
"Bit of oxygen starvation, but she should be all right" The Doctor assured. "I couldn't save the Ood. I only had time for one trip. They went down with the planet. Ah! Entering clear space. End of the line. Mission closed"
______
Some time had passed before Rose and Tate entered the TARDIS. The Time Lords smiled at their friends. Rose and Tate ran up to the two of them, and they all shared a great big group hug. Once the hug was over, and The Doctor and Nova were back in their normal clothes, The Doctor contacted Zach again. "Zach? We'll be off, now. Have a good trip home. And the next time you get curious about something. Oh, what's the point. You'll just go blundering in. The human race"
"But Doctor, what did you find down there? That creature, what was it?" Ida wondered.
"I don't know. Never did decipher that writing. But that's good, Day I know everything? Might as well stop"
"What do you think it was, really?" Rose asked.
"I think we beat it. That's good enough for me"
"Me too" Nova agreed with a nod.
"It said I was going to die in battle" Rose brought up.
"And it said I was going to mourn her. That I would be forced to leave her behind" Tate added on.
"Then it lied" The Doctor assured them both. "Right, onwards, upwards. Ida? See you again, maybe"
"I hope so" Ida returned the sentiment.
"And thanks, boys!" Rose shouted.
"Hang on though, Doctor, Nightingale. You never really said. You four, who are you?" Ida asked.
"Oh," The Doctor started. The TARDIS team all looked at each other. "The stuff of legend" With that, The Doctor pulled a lever and the TARDIS whirred, meaning that they were on the way to their next adventure.