chapter key:
normal text means right now
italicized text means flashbacks
italicized and underlined means emphasis
‧͙⁺˚*･༓༓･*˚⁺‧͙
"But, we're surrounded."
Rexhill, much like everyone else who didn't know the Doctor, could only see the surrounding without thinking further than that.
"Oh, he loves being surrounded." Ophelia bites back, standing up against the fireplace, arms crossed. "It means everyone is looking at him."
He smiles lightly then turned to the matron before him."Hazran, let's get going."
"Right then. Come on, you lot. Everybody down to the cellar."
Every person previously occupying the small room began to leave following Hazran's lead until four time travelers remained, two males facing down while their girl friends stood off to the side. One human look out wished he'd gotten to leave as well.
"Nardole, I want you to lead the evacuation."
"What?" The cyborg blanched at what's just been suggested, voice rising. Such thing had to be a joke. "No."
"There's another solar farm on floor 502. There should be enough livestock in the cryogenic chamber"
"You need me with you."
As he attempted to convince The Doctor of his usefulness, the man downloaded everything on the laptop into his sonic screwdriver and shut the lid.
"Thanks for all the software." He raised the sonic up to his eyes before turning around. "I will take it from here."
"Sir, with respect, I'm worried about your plan."
The clever bit. Ophelia's breath shortened as Nardole got into further confrontation with their time lord.
"Plan?" His walking stopped and a careful expression of disinterest got put on. "What plan?"
"I think as soon as this place is evacuated, you're going to blow the whole floor, killing as many Cybermen as you can."
"No." His assistant would've laughed because that expression had been used on Saint Luke's Dean one too many times. "No, course not. I won't do that until I've left."
"Liar!" Both walked until centered in the room again, notebook between them. "It can't be done remotely."
"You couldn't do it remotely."
The Doctor's voice rose in frustration and she got ready to step in.
"Neither could you. And more to the point, you are not sending me up there to babysit a load of smelly humans."
"Yeah?" His outburst gave them one small glimpse into the oncoming storm. "Well, I'm afraid that's exactly what I'm doing."
"Huh? This is me we're talking about. Me." The cyborg gestured to his own face as if it answered every question ever asked. He then off those familiar spectacles. "You know what I was like. If there's more than three people in a room, I start a black market." Glasses went back on. "Send me with them, I'll be selling their own spaceship back to them once a week. Please, I would rather stay down here and explode. You go and farm the humans."
Usually Ophelia Watson would've added her two cents to this conversation by now but panic began rising as one decision loomed closer. Nardole tried to walk away from his newest duty but his master didn't let him.
"Listen." The Doctor spoke firmly. "One of us has to stay down here and blow up a lot of silly tin men, and one of has to go up there and look after a lot of very scared people, day after day, for the rest of their lives, and keep them safe. Now the question is this, Nardole." He walked two steps closer to his friend. "Which one of us is stronger?"
The following pause felt charged with everyone's minds racing to crossroads, big life changing choice to be made right now. Lia's mind halted, like a movie's frame seconds before disaster hit, and she retuned to months ago when her body had been in a similar position back at Canassis Manor. One helper amongst tens, looking at men who thought of nothing but themselves. And here her eyes were fixed on someone who was willing to give up everything just so some humans would have a chance to live one day more.
"Damn."
"My condolences." Their leader nodded at his friend.
"I'm going to name a town after you." Nardole looked at him with mock anger, better that than they finding out he actually had feelings. "A really rubbish one."
"Oh, I'm counting on it."
"And probably a pig." He walked to where both girls had been weirdly silent, one seeing the other at their best mentally instead of these raggedy versions. "Young ladies, you're coming with me." They looked at each other in a way only best friends could. "No arguments. May I remind you I'm still empowered to kick your arse."
"You'd have to go back down there to that hospital and find it, then." Harsh but true words took his breath away.
"Look, Bill..."
"My arse got kicked a long time ago, and there's no going back." She told him in earnest before going to stand on the Doctor's left side. "All I've got left is returning the favour."
"You're going there too, aren't you?" He staged whispered to the remaining girl.
"Yeah." She tried to smile but it just looked watery.
"Can't you be persuaded to stay?"
Ophelia looked at him with love, remembering how they nearly hated each other not too long ago.
"No." Impulsively, her arms wrapped around his neck gently. His only stood frozen in shock. "Name a dog after me."
Just like it'd always been, both girls stood flanking their Doctor.
"Why are they allowed to explode?"
"Are you sure?" The time lord looked at Bill first, seeing her as she used to be: wide eyed and hopeful.
"You know I am."
"And what about you?" He turned to the right, where she always stood.
So many wild plans went through her mind: make a run for the TARDIS, try to hack into the collective Cyber mind to undermine them... None of them would be worth it if he wasn't there with her. What would be the point of unraveling the universe if the one who'd given it to you wasn't there? So instead of using words (because those would certainly fail), her left hand held his.
"I don't know what to say." In spite of himself, Nardole got emotional at seeing those who'd taught him how to care for people standing across from him. Even if less than two meters separated them, their paths would never cross again.
"You'll think of the right words later." Bill tried to comfort herself? Him? All of them?
"Doctor. Bill. Lia." He looked at the trio one last time, capturing every detail in his memory so they'd not be forgotten and turned to leave. Then turned back to tell them his final words. "You're wrong, you know. Quite wrong. I never will be able to find the words."
༓☾☽༓
No matter how often one tells themselves to be brave, it takes something happening to prove how true that is. As the electronic siren echoed again, lilting notes creating their macabre symphony, Ophelia breathed in deeply. In, panic all you want; out, steel your back and get this done. Looking around, she supposed there were worse ways to go than with those who'd managed their way into her heart.
"Oh, they love to advertise." The Doctor's back was turned to them. "We have to keep them away from the house till everyone's clear." He then turned to his girls. "We've got to buy them time."
How many times had he been in situations like this? They'd gone to stand between the trenches built in front of the farmhouse, one shoulder high pile of sand bags around the perimeter with a knee high one two meters apart, wooden spikes inserted in regular breaks with bags on the outer rim. His over two millennia long life was marked by facing heartbreak every so often, it'd be over soon he hoped.
"They'll attack on both sides." She said to trigger whatever parting would look like, her eyes fixed on the horizon, hand tightening around one of Nardole's Cyber-Killing guns.
"I'll take the back, yeah?" Bill's normal voice offered, trying her best to be a level of brave she didn't feel.
"Yeah." He looked at them, human-ish and cyber-ish, his girls. If the long line of companions had to end, then it couldn't have ended with better people. "This is it, I'm afraid. So, if there's anything we ought to be saying?"
Ophelia's lips parted but no words came out, every speech she'd imagined giving when time finally came turned to mush.
"I can't think of anything." Her best friend took notice of that shaken state, happy when her hand didn't shy away from the cyber one reaching for it. "Can you?"
His eyes unfocused for no more than two seconds, way too many things fighting their way out. That was the problem with not speaking words when they came to mind, instead pushing them to this mental folder called 'burn with fire'. When it came time to say them, you were left with nothing but vague feelings.
"No."
"But, hey er..." Bill's steps quickly backtracked to her friends. "You know how I'm usually all about women and, and kind of people my own age..."
"Yeah?" He watched curiously as both girls looked at each other, several what if's ringing around.
"Glad you knew that."
Watching the cyber form of their beloved Bill Potts walk away, it was easy to picture this had been just another day of lectures and they were parting for the night. Then electronic sirens burst their little bubble of fantasy.
"Without hope." The Doctor readied his sonic screwdriver. "Without witnesses." Ophelia squeezes his wrist, probably the most affection she'd be able to show without crying. "Without reward."
Telos!
They ran forward into cyber ranks, one deadly team.
Sealed you into your ice tombs!
It only took one aim of his screwdriver to make the ground explode in a series of explosions.
Voga!
Whatever didn't die with him went down pretty fast due to Lia's accurate shooting. One, two, three, way too many of those things went down.
They ducked behind trees.
Canary Wharf!
Someone once said that being brave is having grace under pressure and their movements showed that. Like an well synchronized dance team, both of them twirled around in the pretend forest, enacting deadly dance moves.
Planet 14!
Without looking over his shoulder, his sonic ended a couple more enemies.
Every single time, you lose.
She was so in awe of him, desperate to believe they'd be enough to save this ship then get out unscathed that motions became automatic while thinking about the future.
Even on the Moon.
His sonic had been aimed at the sky, and so Ophelia tried to push him out of the beam coming from a Cyberman's head piece but it was too late. Her body screamed in pain before becoming surprisingly calm.
For some time, her mind swam in a blank void of pain. Being shot by that, along with falling into the roof seemed to be enough to do the trick of killing Handmaiden Fifty-One. Though there was so much she'd wished to do, many planets and adventures, it seemed her life would finally end.
"Doctor. Doctor, let it go. Time enough."
The time lord looked at her, breath so fickle it didn't move his chest, before setting out one last explosion.
"Pity, no stars." His hand reached for hers, still warm. Regeneration energy shone briefly before being suppressed. "I hoped there'd be stars."
༓☾☽༓
Ophelia loved watching sunsets, she never missed one. Back at the manor it was unthinkable to have time for anything other than working, so when her life became her own, Lia vowed to do as many pointless things as possible. Her enjoying of heavenly events meant her Doctor was always there. Gallifrey, Kassilian IV, Alzarius, even Zakros, the TARDIS came up with a new one every night when neither of them could sleep. They would lay down to watch multiple suns go down to be replaced by stars.
"Doctor." Ophelia had a mischievous smile while being introduced to Saint Luke's staff as a TA.
"Doctor!" She laughed at him just after they'd turned away from a crumbling house.
"Doctor..."