Story [Doctor Who] Twelve's Farewell Tour

Doctor Who: Twelve's Farewell Tour​

Characters: The Twelth Doctor, Caitlin "Kate" Todd
Premise: After Bill, and before he regenerates into his Thirteenth incarnation, the Doctor rewards the woman who helped him at the Confessional Dial' sea fort when he was trying to get back to Clara, resurrected NCIS agent, and part of I-Division (the BSPAWSID (**** **** Physics and Weird Situation Intervention Division)), Kate Todd, with trips on the TARDIS.

​

CONTENT

Drabbles - does what it says on the tin

Weathering the Storm - Starts two posts down, the Doctor and Kate board the Argonautica cruise liner (multi-chapter story)

​

The Argonautica​

 

DRABBLES

Archive​

"The Delirium Archive," pronounced the 12th Doctor as he re-visited the cathedral, waving one arm towards the high, stained-glass windows. "Last resting place of the Headless Monks."

Kate Todd grimaced as she followed the old fellow, glad to see him no longer in that old sea fort. "Knowing the Monks by reputation, Doctor, I would have thought that their last resting place would be a mine field."

The Doctor turned to smile down upon her. "Oh, Caitlin. Perhaps the Archives were built upon that minefield."

She looked away, thoughtfully. "If that were the case, I would expect more broken windows."

* * * *

You do NOT slap the Doctor​

Belted and wired into the empty Dalek shell, an increasingly nervous Clara called down to the Time Lady crumpled at her feet. "Missy? Missy?"

A pair of shoes stepped into her lowered field of vision, and the teacher looked up into the face of an unfamiliar brunette with steely eyes.

"Who are you?"

"Hi Clara. I'm Kate."

"Hi Kate. What-"

"I hear you slapped the Doctor."

"So?" Clara frowned, wondering how many times she'd done that. "He probably needed slapping."

Kate leaned in and pressed a discrete button on the Dalekanium carapace. "Rule One. You do NOT slap the Doctor."

​

Kate impresses on Clara, you do not slap the Doctor.​

* * * *

Rendezvous on the Amazon​

Kate pulled back on the acceleration handle, slowing the cigarette boat down in the river intersection, then looked left out of the slanted window towards the shore.

Sure enough, the Doctor was there, with the TARDIS a hundred yards or so, behind him.

The Doctor spotted her the same time as she saw him, and curiously, appeared to throw an arrow aside?

Had she taken that long, he had started whittling drokking arrows?

Hello, something's disturbed those birds, she thought.

Thick white geysers erupted on either side of her, bucketing slimy water across the bow from the right and left.

​

Kate Todd brings speedboat down the Amazon,
meeting the Doctor on shore.​

* * * *

TARDIS exploration​

Kate circled the beautifully polished wood panelling of the seven-sided time console.

It was much smaller than the one in the main control room. The Doctor would barely have to lean across this one, to reach the other sides.

As she moved inside the broken ring encircling the console, a distorted reflection of her tartan kilt, and long-sleeved white sweater, appeared along the gold metal tubing.

The Doctor had warned her that she would find places like this, smaller, or similarly-sized chambers with similar layouts to the control room that she was more familiar with, designed to his earlier tastes. (14/03/2019)

* * * *

 

Doctor Who: Weathering the Storm​

NSWFF Prompt: Weathering the Storm​

Characters: The Twelth Doctor, Caitlin "Kate" Todd
Premise: The Doctor and Kate attend festivities aboard the luxury cruise liner, Argonautica.
Source: The marine horror film, Deep Rising.

​

The Doctor and Kate, travelling on the TARDIS​

The Doctor gently swirled the antacid dissolving in the glass of water, as he elbowed aside a waterproof door, and joined Kate Todd on the starboard deck of the huge cruise liner, rain battering at him as he tried to find her black ebony ball gown against the night scene beyond the railings.

She had taken sick inside, and come out here for what passed for fresh air, although he figured she must be bedraggled in the storm.

He then spotted her bare shoulder blades and upper back, where the squared-off, spaghetti-strapped dress was, well, backless, and homed in on that.

"I found some Alka-Seltzer, Caitlin!" He yelled as he leaned into the wind, the tails of his black frock coat whipping around his hips.

Miracle of miracles, the woman heard him and turned round, leaning back on the wood-effect safety railing, the beaded detail covering her bust, glistening in some of the muted deck lighting.

The airborne water had done a number on her makeup, making her look like a disarranged panda with the thick rings of black around her eyes.

The Time Lord of course, did not notice, displaying the same lack of facial observation as he had when the forgotten Clara had been fishing for compliments on her Fashion-To-Woo-Danny-With, little black dresses.

He tottered over to join her at the railing, turning his back into the wind to shelter the glass between their two bodies, letting the fat sideways-travelling raindrops hit him between the shoulderblades. "You better drink this quick, before it gets diluted any further." He narrowed his eyes to minimise the amount of water streaming into them. Fortunately the eyebrows and worry lines were helping to divert the vertical rivers to the side.

"Thanks, Doctor!" Kate yelled, taking the slick glass off him, and putting one palm under the base to prevent it slipping from her grasp.

He did not answer, his mind distracted by the realisation that although he had forgotten about Clara, and everything about her, he remembered Danny alright, but with a tomboy-shaped gap in his memory where his previous but one companion had been, he was trying to remember what had made Cyberman Danny switch sides like an 'upgraded' Pussy Galore.

Surely he would have remembered if he had Venusian Aikido'ed the Cyberman onto the straw-strewn floor of a barn, and shagged him. That was really more Captain Jack's scene.

The rocking of the night-time ocean pushed the Doctor against the railing as Kate chugged the drink, and he looked down the side of the ship, and did a double-take.

"Where's the wake?" He asked.

"Wha-?"

He pointed down the side of the ship, careful not to get his sleeve in the lumpy carrot garnish she had chundered down the liner's flanks. "When a vessel moves through surface water, the frothy lines of disturbed water out to the sides and behind it, are called the wake." He explained carefully, glancing up to be sure that he had her attention. "No wake means the ship is not moving."

"So?"

"So we are non-stop to..." He hesitated for a second. "...to wherever this ship is supposed to be going to. It's not supposed to stop in mid-ocean."

Kate used the side of the hand gripping the glass, to wipe water and wet hair out of her face, grimacing at the dark smear against the base of her thumb, obvious against her light skin. "What are you going to do, complain to the Better Business Bureau?"

He glared reprovingly down at her. "Don't be facetious, Caitlin."

"Sorry, Doctor."

"Now. What was this liner called again?"

"Hang on." She looked around, looking for one of those buoyant life rings that tended to be hung on vertical surfaces on ships and boats, pushing herself off the railing to lean against the rain and wind to step over to it, thanking the stars that the soles of her shiny patent leather stilettos were rubber, as it helped her stay on her feet on the slick decking. Hands on the wall to support herself, she looked over her shoulder to report, "It's the Argonautica, Doctor."

"Oh, for ****'s sake." He muttered after a moment's thought, glowering into the darkness with a heavy sigh.

"What was that?" Had she heard him swear?

He stepped over to her, closing a hand around her nearest bare arm, and pulling both of them into the doorway that he had emerged from, one side of them bathed in the warm light of the ship interior, while she shivered from the cold outside, crossing her arms over her chest.

"The engines are down!" He yelled.

Kate wanted to retort with something short, beginning with "No" and ending with "Sherlock", but she was a good girl, and this elder time traveller at times reminded her so much of her old boss at NCIS, the US' Naval Criminal Investigative Service, Special Agent Gibbs, that she feared a head slap.

"I normally have a rule about not leaving," He told her, "but tonight I'm considering downgrading it to just a guideline. We're in terrible danger if we do not get the engines working, and fast." He gestured into the darkness. "I'm heading to the bridge."

"They won't let you up there!"

"Let me worry about that. Your job is to stop anyone using the loos!"

Todd thought she had mis-heard, and leaned closer to him. "What was that?"

"Toilets! Water closets, little girls' and boys' rooms. Don't let anyone use them until I say it is safe!"

"How the hell am I supposed to do that?"

"You were Naval Criminal Investigative Service." He reminded, saying it in full, like he did with her first name. "Use your badge!" The Doctor released her arm and vanished into the darkness.

She turned to face the steps that would take her back into the cavernous, multi-tiered ballroom from which they had come. "You can just say NCIS."

There had been far too much raucous celebrating for her liking, with wealthy men in black tie, and their ladies in dark formal dresses like her own, while the smarmy white-uniformed Captain encouraged it.

She had gotten the impression that there was something about this particular voyage, but like with most sojourns in the TARDIS, neither she nor the Doctor really paid attention to the local details until there was danger and a reason to know.

Curly streamers in different colours came into view as she emerged on one of the upper levels that went around the abyss that had been the ballroom, stretching from up on balconies and down to the base, like the rappeling lines that US Navy Seals would use to descend quickly into the chaos.

Looking gingerly over the ornate, gold-leaf barrier, she could see down, expecting to see the circular dining tables, chairs, and an entertainment stage at its base, several levels below, milling with passengers whom, she gathered from the rising tumult of voices, had also gathered that the ship had stopped.

Argonautica casino​

The former Secret Service agent blinked and did a double take, the room down there having transformed drastically. Still, she had a job to do.

"And just how am I supposed to get them to listen to me, let alone do as I tell them?" She muttered aloud. She did not think that the chunky vortex manipulator, strapped to her wrist in heavy tan leather, would help. It had a speaker, but that was for personal use, and she had not been given a manual on its use, though to be fair, that was par for the course for most contemporary Earth tech as well.

Danny Hunter, a killed-in-action M.I.5 agent, and her fellow team member on I-Division, had said that he had been forced to look online to find how his washing machine was meant to work, after his cleaner had reset the controls, and gone without putting them back.

She didn't have her NCIS badge. She didn't think she needed it, and her sheer silk outfit was not blessed with pockets anyway.

THERE IS NO NEED TO WORRY, EVERYONE.

Kate pricked up her ears at the announcement, in the Captain's voice, ballroom speakers, rather than the public address that would have reached all parts of the ship.

MY OFFICERS ARE WORKING ON THE ISSUE. WE WILL BE UNDERWAY SOON.

Picking up her skirts so that the sodden material didn't trip her up, she sprinted for the stairs.

* * * *

The Argonautica Bridge

The Doctor pulled himself up the external metal railing that was slick with rainwater, whilst staying close to the wall to minimise how much of the deluge assaulting this part of the ship hit him directly.

Still, he was grateful to reach the curve-cornered rectangle of the hinged door with the porthole that showed the interior of the elaborate wheelhouse with several of the ships' officers huddled inside. A line of rectangular, slightly inversed windows, wrapped three sides of the bridge, front, starboard and port.

He pulled open the door, an entered from the starboard, right, side of the ship; the raucous noise of the wind attracting the attention of everyone inside, heads snapping round to look at him as he struggled to pull the door shut against the gusts that tried to thwart his efforts, then slammed it shut.

"Passengers are not allowed on the Bridge." The nearest officer advised sternly, his white short-sleeved uniform blouson and shorts, hardly suitable for the inclement weather.

"I'm not a passenger." The Doctor countered with equal curtness, as he stepped further inside and flapped the part of his coat below the front pockets, for all the difference that that would make. "Well, I am. Oh here, here's my authority." He pulled the wallet holding the blank white psychic paper, and snapped it open with a bit of a flourish, so that the crewperson could read it.

"W-A-S-P?" The man read with incredulous tones of disbelief. "World Aquanautic Security Patrol?"

"Yes. Captain Troy Tempest," the grey-haired Time Lord revelled in the iconic name, "codename, the Doctor. Now, where is your captain?"

To be continued...

 

...Continued.


"Wait, wait." The man chopped a hand at the air between them. "That's just nonsense."

"Well, I'm here aren't I? And-" He gestured out of the dark, rain-drenched windows, "-this is sort of aquatic." He advanced, pushing past the speaker into the cluster of silent crew concentrated between the black leather Captain's Chair, and the Helm and Sonar stations nearest the front windows. A myriad of screens around the place were showing chaotic flickering. "Now, where is the Captain?"

"He-he's not here." An officer, whose black-and-gold shoulder tabs suggested he was a Lieutenant, stammered, stepping back as the Doctor shouldered through to stand behind the man seated at the sonar station, fat headphones clasped over his ears. "Captain Atherton felt it more important to be down in the ballroom, calming the passengers."

"You have to get the engines going."

"Really, Doctor? Tell us something that we don't know."

The Doctor shrugged as he pointed down at the circular blue screen, where a lighter blue mass was visible, closing from two o'clock on a beeline for the centre of the scanner screen. Them, essentially. "What do you think that is? Captain Nemo and the crew of the Nautilus, finally making their move to reclaim the seas? No, your cruise liner is about to get U.O.S.M.A.'d by a giant cephalopod. Now I know that sounds like something that takes place in a wrestling octagon, but that is pure coincidence."

"U.O. what?"

"Unfairly One-Sided Mating Attempt. Pronounced 'you-osma', if you find stringing letters together, stressful." He added sarcastically, continuing, "And when it figures out that it is not going to be getting its end away, it will consider the ship to be food, and invade through every available orifice, and considering the main creature is a third of the ship's size, you are probably not going to appease it with a plate of entrées!"

"How do you know any of this?"

The Doctor glanced at the speaker's name plate, and leaned back at the verbal challenge. "Commander Tyler, is it? Well, I took a leaf out of my friend River's songbook, and Googled you. The-" The Time Lord paused to regard the Commander with a look of patronising pity. "- You-osma of the Argonautica is going to make the Crash of the Byzantium look like someone dropped a blancmange. Although the latter will be easier to say; so swings and roundabouts."

Tyler glanced towards the scanner scope, then back at the Doctor. "Well, we cannot start the engines anyway. We seem to have been locked out by an over-ride command."

"And who would have such a command?"

"Mister Canton, the ship's owner. Captain Atherton. The Chief Engineer-"

"Wasn't me." Someone, presumably the Chief Engineer, piped up from the back of the crowd, and now pushing his way through. He indicated the flickering blue and black screens around the wheelhouse. "We've lost control planes, rudders, all four engines, even communications. This level of disruption is only possible from the System Ops' room down on Deck Four."

The Doctor frowned. He had been angling to learn which console to aim his sonic screwdriver at for the quick win, but that didn't sound like it would be possible, or at least, not up here. "So what are you doing up here?"

"That contact is still coming, Sir." The man at Sonar, updated. "Five thousand metres down."

The engineer gestured to Tyler. "The Commander called me up here."

The Doctor nodded, looking towards the senior officer as well. "Commander? Your Chief Engineer and I are going down to Systems Operations. See what you can do to shut all vents accessible from outside the hull. I have a companion downstairs, Ms Caitlin Todd of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, who will try to stop people using the toilets. I'm assuming they flush directly into the ocean."

"Well, there's valves-" Tyler started.

"Four thousand metres."

* * * *

Ballroom

The hubbub from the ballroom had gotten noisier the further down she had gone, flying down the carpeted steps, and unwilling to use the lifts in case the engines being down, did something to the ship's electrical supply.

The crew were not exactly conserving energy with all the lights blazing inside the cruise liner.

She emerged on the bottom level to find the place heaving, and the dinner and dance area that she had departed earlier, swept away and replaced by the raucous, brightly coloured casino!

Female staff in matching silky red cheongsam dresses that flattered their figures, were manning the roulette and poker tables, or winding through the crowds with drinks orders, whilst their male counterparts in various Pacific Islander-style fashion, were putting on the entertainment, with several booming away on large bongo type drums.

Kate stared at this for a long moment, then looked around for a way to get to the entertainment stage where the drummers, and the now abandoned, microphone stand were.

She used the periphery of the room, muttering "sorry" several times to women who reacted to the shock of feeling her cold skin or sodden clothing on their flesh, to reach the stage, making it onto the first of the five wide steps, when the ballroom deck lurched violently, throwing her, and everyone else it seemed, off their feet!

She tumbled back onto the main floor, remembering to keep her chin on her chest to keep the back of her head from whacking the carpet, and quickly rolled into the lee of the step as guests in their finery toppled around her, were thrown across poker tables, smashed through glass panes, or plummeted from balconies above!

Screams and cries punctuated the air in a cacophony of panic and pain!

What the hell was that?! Todd wondered as she rolled onto all fours, and picked her way to the fallen mike stand, seeing it as the best way to calm everyone. We weren't even moving!

* * * *
Stairwell C

The Doctor had had a cautionary hand on the banister screwed to the wall side of the crew stairwell, which had saved him some damage, but still his knees and shins had tobogganed him down five of the un-carpeted steps, leaving him suspended by the hands until the Chief Engineer managed to hook an arm under his left elbow and left him safely back into a standing position.

"What the hell was that, Doctor?"

"Don't you listen?" The Time Lord glared, despite his gratitude for the help. "That's Sephy's idea of foreplay." He gestured down the endless-looking steps. "How close are we to System Operations?"

"Three more decks, Doctor. Then back along the central crew corridor to the centre of the ship. "

"Well, we better get a move on then!"

The two men hurried down the steps.

* * * *
Ballroom / Casino

Kate pushed the microphone away from her reflexively and jerked back at the high-pitched whine that she first got from the thing, then called on her previous high school experiences using the things. "Alright, nobody panic. I'm Special Agent Kate Todd of NCIS. The situation is under control, and the crew are working to remedy the situation. Try to stay calm, and help anyone near you that is hurt. Also, and this may sound strange, stay away from the bathrooms."

She looked up at the sound of running feet and a slammed door from the first level above the opposite end of the room, to the left of where she had entered, and stared directly at the door that had slammed shut, one of three. A toilet door.

"What did I literally just say?" The last word of her query was quieter than those before it, as she had stepped away from the mike stand, flitting through the centre of the room, dodging round and past shellshocked passengers and staff that were climbing to their feet, or helping groaning peers.


To be continued...

 

Central Corridor, Deck 4


"Getting. Jiggy?" The Doctor echoed to the engineer's comment following the heavy lurch on the ship, that set the white golf cart that they had found, careering across the black-floored corridor, and scraping the bulkhead on the left, before the officer steered the cart away.

A revolving flasher on a half-metre pole on the rear quarter, cast blue light across both walls as they motored down the hallway.

They had picked up an Andorran crewmember with an injured ankle, who was now sitting in the back seat, his head back on the cushioned rear seat, face contorted in pain, with his injured bare foot placed gingerly between the two front seats whilst the Doctor aimed his sonic screwdriver at the bruised appendage.

"Worry about the foot, Doctor."

"Alright, but like I said, I am not that kind of doctor." Glaring at the slightly sweaty foot stretched by his left elbow, the Time Lord played the device' blue glow over it, the swelling visibly deflating by the second. "You are lucky that your foot is not made of wood. This-" He waggled the screwdriver between his fingers. "-does not do wood."

"Per què seria de fusta? (Why would it be made of wood?)" The man groaned, putting a hand over his eyes.

"Només estic dient. (I'm just saying)."

The crewmember kept his eyes covered as he pleaded to his deities, the Doctor looking forward to see a shadowed area on the left wall maybe eighty metres ahead of them, and as they neared it, it resolved into an access corridor branching off this main one, and too small for them to drive into.

The golf cart was slowed and stopped in front of it, the Doctor and the engineer rocking forwards in their seats, then settling back into their seats. The officer climbed out first.

"Help me with him." The Time Lord suggested.

"We can leave him out here."

"Well, I am assuming System Ops is quite secure. If the creature breaks through, better that Senor Grouchy is with us, than out here on his own."

The engineer stood with his hands on his hips, between the vehicle and the alcove, which had three solid white steps to go up before you could enter the ante-hall. He looked from the Doctor to the crewmember, and back again.

"Oh, alright." He came round the back of the vehicle, level with Rodrigo, as he could see on the man's gold-tinted nameplate on his white shirt.

The Doctor came opposite him, on the man's other side. "Can you lift your foot free from between the seats, or do you need a hand?"

"A hand would be good, thanks." Rodrigo sat up, lifting his head to face forwards and regard his injured limb, as the Doctor leaned over the cart and cupped the man's calf to lift it out of the tight wedge where it had settled. Careful to keep the foot from banging into either seat, the Doctor moved it up and back, allowing the crewman to bend his leg.

"Don't put any weight on it, if you can help it."

Between them, the two got the hobbling casualty along the access corridor to a sealed grey door bearing a metal plate with "System Operations" and a crimson Celtic-looking symbol; the engineer freeing a hand to swipe his identity card through a reader on the wall, prompting the heavy door to slide aside.

Inside, once Rodrigo had been lowered into one of the black executive chairs, the Doctor looked round at the array of coloured display screens, most showing the same static and white noise as their counterparts on the Bridge, or large orange-and-yellow popups the width of their screens, reading 'OFFLINE', whilst above them, a side-on computer generated profile of the entire cruise liner was overlaid with a number of orange squares, clearly corresponding to systems that were down, and a large 'DISENGAGED' dominated the screen.

"Disengaged." The Doctor read, his lips thinning at the serious of the situation. "Thanks for the scoop."

"The ship is run by these computer discs here." The engineer prompted, crossing to the console fronting the screens, with black QWERTY keyboards in front of two of them. Tapping keys on the left-most keyboard, four disc-holders hummed vertically up into view.

The Time Lord waved his sonic screwdriver at the first of the silvery platters, then flicked it up so that he could observe the results. "Hardly anything on there. Just a script to over-write the systems being run from the disc."

"That cannot be." The Chief Engineer frowned. "There should be thousands of lines of code."

"Well, I don't know what to tell you, Scotty."

"Scotty? You trying to be funny, Captain Tempest?" The engineer ignored Rodrigo chuckling at his discomfort.

"Well, it's the name most associated with the role of Chief Engineers on this planet, and you haven't told me your actual name. I cannot keep thinking of you by your title. Feel free to correct me."

"Ed. Ed Union."

"Well, Ed." The Doctor flashed an insincere smile. "What time did the computers go down?"

"Twenty-One Twenty-Four (21:24), Zulu."

"And how long do you think the over-write program would have taken to do its business, once the software was installed."

"A matter of minutes. Maybe seconds." Ed glanced at the discs one by one, and even put a finger inside the centre hole of one and gently tugged it off its spindle to check both sides. "This isn't the original disc. They've been replaced." He backed off the console a step, overcome by the reality that was unfolding. "Someone did this!"

"E as cópias? The injured crewman enquired.

The Doctor's attention swung towards him, his entire top half following the direction change, and wagged an encouraging forefinger at the seated Andorran. "That is actually a good question." He turned back. "Ed, what about the backups? Were they wiped, over-written, or taken?"

Ed turned to a large grey metal cabinet fronted by two doors that squeaked as he twisted the plastic-fobbed key that was already in the lock, and open them to reveal sparse shelves showing various tied cables, and other accessories that could be used to affect repairs. A box held some five-and-a-quarter inch discs, there was a transparent plastic cylinder holding blank cd-roms, and a couple of music cases, one thin black one claiming to be Technotronic, and a thicker affair fronted with orange on a gold background, saying NOW That's What I Call Music! 37.

The officer frisbee'd the disc he was holding into the nearest waste paper basket, and retrieved the NOW CD case, opening it and showing it to discs nestled inside to the alleged W.A.S.P. operative. "Do you want to scan it with your device?" He did not question the sonic screwdriver's veracity for a second.

The Doctor obliged, his face creasing into a relieved smile as soon as he checked the results. "Oh, those look much better. Load them up, and we'll see what happens?"

Ed elbowed the cabinet shut and moved to the console, extracting the false discs and piling them on the worktop, and replacing them with the backup discs, in moments, the quartet were descending smoothly into their slots.

He sidestepped to the keyboard, and tapped a few keys. "Here's where the fun begins."

The Doctor looked on hopefully. His own Plan B that he had been thinking about in the background, had been to ask Caitlin to collect either a Dalek eyestalk, or Cyberman head, from the TARDIS, and use her wrist-worn vortex manipulator, the time travel method favoured by her DANL team, to go back along the current timeline to before the discs were changed, and leave one in here to observe what went down.

Those two items would then still be in here now, and he could check their visual records. However, he had concerns.

The eyestalk did not present any danger that he could think of, but even if the ex-NCIS agent compensated for the movement of the Argonautica, and did not materialise over the South China Sea itself, he was worried that the Cyberman head might fancy its chances and try to 'upgrade' her, and then expand its operation to include the ship and its passengers.

That'd be a kick in the teeth for the old cephalopod, but hardly an optimum outcome.

"Okay, here we go."

The Doctor re-focussed and followed the engineer's gaze. Four of the screens had cleared themselves of static and were blurring lines of scrolling computer code.

Differences were quickly noticeable around the control room, with the 'DISENGAGED' and 'OFFLINE' error popups vanishing from one screen after, and several red and orange LEDs changing to green.

A black phone handset burred for attention, Union snatching it up and holding it to his ear, all three men able to hear the sound of cheering and applause. "Systems are coming back online, on the Bridge, Captain Tempest."

The Doctor leaned back and managed a smile. "Yes, I gathered that. Can I...?" He gestured to take the handset, even though the spiral of plastic cable anchoring it to the base unit, was already getting taut.

...To be continued.

 

Continued...

"Hold on, Captain Atherton. I am passing you to Captain Tempest. He wants to say something."

The Doctor stepped closer to take the phone, and exchanged positions with Union. "Yes, hello. Well, thank you, but your crewman Rodrigo that we picked up down here, helped as well. Now, we are not out of the woods yet. Remember that sea creature feeling us up?" He paused. "As soon as your satellite uplink becomes operational, please can you patch me through to UNIT. Yes, the United Nations Intelligence Taskforce. Why? Why do you think? We need recovery assets rolling in our direction as soon as possible. They will expedite things if they know that I am aboard. Yes, thank you. I shall await your call."

They exchanged places again as the engineer took the phone back. "Sir, someone changed out the discs down here. They did not touch the backups though, so we are loading them to get everything up and running. Yes sir."

"Well, hello there."

Ed looked over to see the Doctor leaning over to look at the radar monitor with its' clockwise fan of green light fanning round the screen, both his fists pressed onto the console that he was bowed over. "Hold on, Sir." He held the phone away from his ear and pressed the meaty part of his left hand over the microphone part. "What have you found?"

"We've got company. A trace on the surface, closing fast."

"Another of your sea monsters?"

The Doctor narrowed his eyes as he studied the bright blip as the radar sweep crossed over it. "No, I don't think so. Size and speed suggests a motor launch of some kind. I'd say our saboteur knocked out the radar deliberately. I don't think he, or she, wanted us to see that coming."

​

Kate, and the Doctor​

Ballroom

Kate was almost out of breath as she reached the second level above the ballroom via the steps, taking the carpeted stairs two at a time.

She had relaxed and let herself go a bit after being freed from the sea fort of the Doctor's Confessional Dial, and was not as fit as all that diving for skulls had made her.

She paused for breath at the top of the stairs, hugging the wall to let a couple of tuxedoed passengers rush past her, heading down, then pulled in a breath and proceeded to the short line of W.C. doors, thumping her fist on all three, waiting for the voice of irritation to come from inside one of them.

"Someone is in here!" A female voice called out from the burnished metal door nearest the stairwell.

Todd smiled to herself, although that was the easy part. "You need to come out of there now."

"You'll just have to wait your turn."

"It's not like that!" This is what prospective employers should ask applicants at interview instead of that lame 'sell me this pen' scenario. Persuade someone taking a comfort break, to come out before they are good and ready.

With the disaster that had just happened, pulling a fire alarm was not going to cut it.

"Listen, your life could be in danger if you stay in there." She tried, her face close to the metal door.

"Are you threatening me?"

Todd leaned back and stared at the door in surprise. "No!" She narrowed her eyes and moved closer again, silkily enquiring, "But what if I was?"

"Go away!"


Systems Operations

The Doctor bared his teeth as he leaned over the angled radar screen, realising that he was going to have to summon the TARDIS. That was the only way to protect the cruise liner, and he did not have the time to go to it himself. Unless...

He straightened and faced his companions. "Ed, Rodrigo, I am going to have to step outside. You two stay here and wait for the saboteur."

Ed's eyes widened. "The saboteur is coming here?"

"Of course! Or at least, I would imagine so." The Doctor waved an arm as he clarified. "He would have felt the engines re-awaken, just like we did, and possibly heard them too. First thing he or she will do, is come back here to see what is going on."

"Però no seria el més raonable fer-ho per barrejar-se amb els passatgers? (But wouldn't the sensible thing to do, be to mingle with the passengers?)"

"Indeed it would." The Time Lord acknowledged as he stepped past the seated man towards the door. "But I believe there is another imperative of which he would be aware." He pointed back at the spot on the radar screen, pinging and brightening as it intersected the slowly spinning fan of light. "I don't believe those sailors would have come all this way without being assured that the Argonautica would be dead in the water."

He did not want to expand that he felt the mystery boat to be carrying torpedoes, just in case, as now, the liner had the ability to get under way.

Swiping the sonic screwdriver down the card reader for the door, the Doctor was already stepping through the barrier as it slid open, moving quickly along the tight side corridor to the main one.

"But what about the UNIT call?" The engineer called after him.

"Your Captain can handle it. Have him tell them that the Doctor is on onboard. Also, you can give them the code phrase, 'Code Red Kraken'."

He stepped down onto the polished black floor of the arterial corridor, beside the jeep, and took his mobile phone, a small grey Samsung T100, out of his jacket pocket, flipping it open with his thumbnail to call Caitlin.

There were just four numbers on it, all for the more recent of his companions, Rose, Martha, Bill, and now the DANL agent who travelled with him.

"Caitlin, you there?"

"Doctor! Good to hear from you. One woman up here managed to get into a washroom before I could stop her."

"Never mind her now, Caitlin. I have managed to get the ship's systems running again, but she is still in serious trouble. I need you to do a site-to-site teleport to my location. Can you do that?"

"Do you still have your screwdriver with you?"

"Of course!"

"I'll lock onto it, and be there in a couple minutes."

The Doctor took the phone away from his ear and frowned at the colourful screen, then replaced it to the side of his face. "Two minutes? How are you getting here, jogging? Caitlin? Caitlin?" It was clear that the former NCIS agent had hung up, so he snapped the phone shut and slipped it back into his pocket to the faint sound of it dropping down on the crinkled paper of his bag of jelly babies.

Reminded of food, the Time Lord grinned wolfishly to himself at the memory of a younger incarnation of himself, holding off a new paradigm of armed Daleks with a biscuit treat.

"Alright, it's a Jammy Dodger, but I was promised tea." He chuckled to himself, and self-consciously glanced back up the empty corridor.


Toilet door, above Ballroom

There was the faint sound of a dropped toilet lid, then distressed sing-songy yammering in one of those Asian languages, Korean, Todd guessed.

"Are you alright? What's happening in there?" She called through the door.

"I'm sitting on the toilet lid, and something is trying to come up underneath me!"

Kate grimaced to herself in horror, and lifted her vortex manipulator to programme two site-to-site teleports. "Right, pull in your feet, and tell me how much room there is between your knees and the door."

"What does that matter?!"

"Goddammit, how much room between you and the door?!" Kate felt like she, this closed door, and woman inside, were her entire universe. She had tuned out whatever the heck was going on down in the ballroom, with the injuries and chaos. She didn't even know if there was anyone up on the second level with her.

"Four feet!"

"Roomy." Todd tapped in that last parameter. She understood that the device had safety protocols to stop her materialising within doors, walls, or people, but she didn't want to test that out. "I'm coming in."

She activated the wrist device.

Everything went white and silent around her, and as the glare faded, she found herself half-facing the burnished grey metal of the bathroom cubicle, and instantly turned to face the seated, screaming woman, who was dressed very similarly to herself in a silky flowing dark chocolate gown, leaning away from her in a shock that wasn't helped by something under her bouncing her a couple of inches.

"Don't get up."

"Naega chyeoda boji-? (Do I look-?)"

Kate jumped onto her lap sideways, facing the mirror and sink to the woman's right, and put her right arm round her neck to anchor them together.

"-Hey!" The passenger protested.

"Hang on a sec', this is going to be okay." Whatever was trying to emerge through the pipes, re-doubled its efforts, easily bouncing both girls up, though not enough to dislodge them.

The cubicle around them faded as white light engulfed her again.


To be continued...

 

...Continued


The Doctor frowned over at a barely detectable high-pitched sound, that rapidly increased in volume and pitch to a feminine (or masculine, if during a freak willy and staple-gun accident) shriek, as Caitlin and another female materialised beyond the white jeep, and promptly sprawled out of his field of view.

The former NCIS agent was rolling off her companion by time the Time Lord had reached her. He reached down to take the arm that she offered him, and pulled her up off the floor. "Bit of a screamer isn't she?" He observed as the rescued guest brought her hands up to her face and mouth, and shrieked up at them.

"And with good reason, Doctor." Kate looked from him to the Korean woman, then realising that he had more immediate concerns than helping the passenger up, bent over to do so herself, only to have the elderly Time Lord wrap an arm round her waist to bring her back up to him.

"No time for that, I'm afraid. I need to activate Emergency Program One." His free hand activated the sonic screwdriver, it's tip glowing green as he held it before them, activating the TARDIS' own emergency teleport, which was keyed to Kate, his current companion.

In a few seconds, Kate found herself back in the TARDIS, standing between the six-sided flight console, and the main double doors behind them; the Doctor releasing her, then approaching the console ahead of them.

The control room was surrounded by horizontal metal railings, that turned into diagonal ones either going up metal steps to a second balcony tier that overlooked the control room, or went down to openings that led into other parts of the TARDIS.

Instead of trailing after him, Kate peeled off and grabbed a dry outfit that I-5 had provided, that had been hung over the railing near to where they had teleported in, and clattered up the steps to where her host had placed an antique haupeng, which was basically three hinged wooden panels, a bit taller than her, that she could change behind, without going all the way to her cabin.

According to the Doctor, who had placed it up there for her to use, it dated from the Chinese Han Dynasty, and the name translated to "painted folding screen", which pretty much matched what it said on the tin, in her view, for the shiny black lacquer was painted with an ornate dragon in lots of striking colours.

"Where are we going?" She asked as she did an impression of a teapot to enable her to access the hidden side zip under an armpit, and then the one underneath for the internal corset, allowing her to push the straps off her shoulders and gently push the damp and cold outfit gently down past her hips, and step out of it, hanging it up over the top of the screen.

"We are not going anywhere yet. I need to extend the TARDIS' shield to protect the Argonautica. But I will need to know how big she is."

The I-Division agent had piled some things behind the haupeng already, and grabbed up a luxuriously thick tan bath towel to quickly wipe herself down with, doing her front and arms, then bending over, wiped her legs up from the ankles, up to and under the white half slip that she had worn underneath to stop the earlier gown clinging to her legs.

Her replacement outfit was a lined floral ivory-and-black sleeveless scuba dress that she pulled over her head, and put her arms up through, rolling and pulling it down so that the hem brushed her kneecaps , and relishing the warm, drier material hugging her core. Her damp hair had made the neckline and top part cold as she pulled it down, but she knew her body warmth would take care of that in the next few moments.
She pulled her tresses out and laid them on her shoulders, gave them a deft towelling so that she did not get a cold later; leaning her head side-to-side as she ran a handy hairbrush through them to make herself more presentable.

Stepping out from behind the screens, admiring the large monochrome blossoms extending across her chest, and wiggling her hips to eliminate any lingering creases as she tugged the outfit down some more, she continued the conversation: "Alright Doctor, fill me in." She paused guiltily, recognising her unwitting double entendre, but her travelling companion did not seem to have noticed! This could be interesting, at some more suitable time. "Protect her against what?"

"There is a giant sea monster-"

"Sea monster?" Todd echoed, then a moment later, shrugged to herself. What did she expect? Nothing was simple around this man.

"-hugging the ship's bow below the waterline, that I tried to get the ship clear off by restarting the engines, but I was not able to do so in time. I informed the bridge that they had to keep all hatches and valves closed to stop any part of the creature getting inside, but the fact that your screamer friend got threatened whilst hiding in the loo, suggests that they were unsuccessful." He looked over to where he assumed she would be standing, then after a second's hesitation, swept his gaze over the control room till he spied her near the top of the stairs opposite him.

He beckoned her down, while Kate in turn, pointed behind the divider. "Remind me to put that in the dryer before it starts to smell."

"Put what in?" He enquired with a frown, still waving her down.

"That wet gown, Doctor? I've just changed out of it."

"Have you?"

She shook her head, descending the steps and rounding the console to join him.
He took the sometimes male malaise of missing the obvious to new depths. The 1990S Gianni Versace long black bias cut, that she would never be able to afford as an NCIS investigator, and this Roman Originals' ivory floral placement dress, looked nothing alike! They were universes apart!

Oblivious, the Doctor guided her by the hand to one of the angled keyboards and screens to the left of his own panel. "Search the database. Type in, 'Ocean Liner comma Argonautica." He pressed a button, which turned the small rectangular screen on, the display flickering at first, then showing a waiting cursor flashing against a grey background.

"Alright." She agreed, though unsure how successful this was going to be. The man travelled the furthest reaches of time and space; would this database really have the details for every ocean-going vessel on every world that had seas. And from him specifying that she had to type 'ocean', at least suggested that this thing had other sorts of liners as well, including space ones.

Fortunately, the keyboard was a QWERTY one, so she made short work of the request, and in a moment, it was flashing through multiple blueprints and deck-plans for multiple ships that were in the A-range.

The selection slowed, then stopped to offer her a choice between two side view picture drawings of the multi-decked vessel that they were on, and a clearly wooden ship with oars and a sail, that would not have looked out of place in Jason and the Argonau-...oh.

She gestured to the wrong ship. "How is that an ocean liner? We specified-"

"Caitlin?" The Doctor queried from his side of the flight console.

"Sorry, Doctor." She pressed a finger to the correct image, and was relieved that that worked as planned, and she did not have to keep holding down [shift] and an arrow key to nudge the cursor towards her choice. "Okay, I can give you length, beam and draught."

Her original partner at NCIS, Tony DiNozzo, had mentored her in the meanings of beam (width of the hull at its' widest part), and draught (distance from the waterline down to the very bottom of the keel or hull), when she had been learning about the navy's aircraft carriers.

"Good girl. Right, length please."

"Metres or feet?"

The Doctor hesitated as he peered at his own screen. "It's been set to feet, so give us that, please."

"One thousand, one hundred, and forty-two feet."

She heard the sound of his fingers tapping at his own keyboard, and waited for his next request.

"Okay, that's in. Beam."

Kate glanced at her screen, through the morass of statistics, then looked again to verify her findings. "Okay, we have two. One hundred and thirty-five feet at the waterline, and a hundred and sixty feet maximum."

"Okay, that makes sense." The Doctor acknowledged, as he tapped in the numbers.

"It does?"

"Think about the shape of most boats and ships. Much bigger up top, to accommodate people and infrastructure, than the bit lower down that cuts through the water, which is only as wide as necessary."

"To minimise resistance." She caught on.

"Precisely. Okay, give us the draught, please."

"Twenty-eight feet, Doctor." Todd looked over to him. "So, what now?"

"Well, we are complicated by that creature having penetrated the ship. I would rather the TARDIS' shield push all of it out, rather than slice off any appendages, as we don't know if they can operate autonomously." He moved for her forearm, grabbing it firmly and raising it so that he could see her vortex manipulator. "I need you to check on the ballroom, as the history files indicate that the creature eventually made its stand there when Captain Finnegan tried to kill it." He looked from the device into Kate's earnest face. "Can you scan for life forms with this?"

"I don't know. We didn't get a manual, and I-5 didn't tell us much."

Not saying anything, the Time Lord took out his sonic screwdriver from his coat's inside pocket, flipped it over his fingers and aimed it down at the wrist device, the screwdriver's nub glowing green as it whined for a few seconds.

A see-through V of yellow holographic light sprang up from the watch face, with black writing on it. "There's the manual." Stowing his screwdriver, the Doctor pressed a forefinger to the holo and flipped up, the view scrolling down the list, and the sentences disappearing several rows above where he had pressed, about eye-level with the former NCIS agent.

The Doctor peered intently at the bolder lettering, whilst she tried to follow what he had done, and was doing now.

"Okay, let me have a go." She used her free hand to brush against the intangible light display, and found herself also able to move the text up and down. Now she focussed on what the letters and words were saying, noting that the bold headings were in alphabetical order. "Doctor, activate the shield. Don't delay protecting the Argonautica while I work out how to do this. Don't sweat the small stuff."

He left her and stepped back to his side of the console. "Always thought that was a strange thing to say." He wrapped fingers round a lever that on another famous vessel, would have activated the hyperdrive, and pushed forwards on them, checking a monitor screen that showed a three-dimensional representation of the cruise liner, with a semi-liquid representation of an energy wave expanding out from the tiny dark blue block deep inside it - obviously the TARDIS - to the tapered bow at the front, the flat stern at the back, up towards the decks and superstructure, and down towards the bilges and the keel below the waterline.

Peering at the manual, Kate noted and memorised the instructions for scanning a life form. "Okay, got it. How do I cancel the manual."

The Doctor aimed the sonic in her general direction, and let it glow and whine for a second or two, the holograph shrinking back into the manipulator.

"Thanks." She tapped the minute keys around the two semi-circular blue screens on the device, calculating her trip up to the ballroom. "On the way."

White light obscured her surroundings again, then faded, dropping her into one of the balconies overlooking the wrecked casino, where a cacophony of voices, of a volume level that you would find at a well-attended science fiction convention, rose up from the floor below.

Kate looked around the level she was on, checking to see where the bathroom that she had teleported the woman from, was up here, then glanced to what she could see of the lower balconies, but couldn't see it.

She leaned over the polished wood barrier, no sign of any sea monsters down there, and passengers and entertainment staff seemed to have calmed down now, and were helping and treating each other, which was good news.

The Doctor called for an update as she nipped into the nearest bathroom to check how her face looked, and was staring at the bedraggled panda that she had gotten a glimpse of whilst sitting on that Korean passenger's lap while in the process of teleporting.

"Caitlin, anything?"

She raised her wrist to speak into the vortex manipulator as she stood before the mirror, and used the free fingers on her other hand to corral a fistful of white tissue squares from the slit of a burnished metal dispenser. "No sign of the creature up here, Doctor. At least not yet." She thought again about that other toilet. "I'm going to check that bathroom where something tried to come up the u-bend."

"Okay, but no heroics, Caitlin. Just like with administering first aid, your own safety is paramount."

"Understood." Turning from the mirror to peer down into the open toilet next to her knees, addressing the calm water at the bottom of the metal bowl. "One gurgle from you, and I am sooo outta here."

Although she was just going to be in here for a minute or two, just to be on the safe side, she kneed the lid down and sat on that to face the mirror, moistening some of the tissue with her tongue, and starting to wipe around her eyes and finally clear some of that slimy mess up.

To be continued...

​

Research

What is that thing that ladies get changed behind? - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folding_screen

What Is Scuba Fabric - https://ecinewyork.com/blogs/news/what-is-scuba-fabric

Deep Rising was in 1998, any suitable ball gowns in the Versace' 1997 Collection? https://www.1stdibs.co.uk/fashion/c...gown-asymmetrical-beaded-detail/id-v_3846911/

 

Continuing. Not as long as I would like, but posting as I have clearly stalled.


There was a flash of something in her peripheral vision, about the same level as her eyeline, but it was close enough to her face that she saw most of the brief burst of white light in the bathroom mirror, and then the clatter as something hit the sink, captured her attention, Kate glancing down to see something sliding down the bowl, fortunately too large to fit in the open plug hole.

She peered at the almost rectangular emblem, a yellow border containing the word WASP, with a side-view of one of the titular winged bugs, underneath.

Her first thought was that this was from I-5, and her second was that he was either having a laugh, or insulting her.

"Wasp?" She echoed with a mix of incredulity and rising annoyance. "White Anglo-Saxon Prin-"

"No!" I-5's voice burst from her wrist device. "World Aquanautic Security Patrol. It's an ID badge to make you consistent with the Doctor's psychic paper. That was how he bluffed his way onto the bridge."

"Oh." Instantly mollified, Todd leaned back from the sink, plucking the badge out. It was made from an unfamiliar mix of enamel and tin. "But I already identified myself as NCIS."

"I'm sure you can make it work, Kate. I-5 out."

Despite the badge being one that she was unfamiliar with, having something more than a stage microphone to act as credentials, made her feel a bit better, and on firmer ground, and she found that it inspired her thought processes a bit.
She adjusted her position on the toilet lid for comfort, crossed her legs, and called the Doctor. "Can the shield that you put round the Argonautica, transmit heat?"

"I can set it to do that. Why?"

"You say the motor boat chasing us, is likely to be armed with torpedoes, and may try to stop us leaving the area."

"Yes, yes."

"Well, presumably they won't want to sink us, so the most damaging places to shoot, for instance, amidships, would not be their target."

"They would probably go for the props at the back." The Time Lord surmised, referring to the huge propeller or propellers at the cruise ships's stern, or rear end.

"Right." She agreed readily, getting into her stride. "So if they hit the back, and this creature of yours is at the front, getting the heat of the explosion to travel along the shield to the monster, would probably go a long way to getting it to let go."

"Good thinking, Caitlin." The Doctor sounded enthused with her idea, which brought a satisfied smile to her face. "What brought this on?"

"I-5 dropped off a WASP badge for me. Must have inspired me. He said that was what you used to identify yourself."

"Indeed, Caitlin. Does the badge have your real name on it?"

It was clutched in her left hand, being held up where she could see it. She turned it over. "No. Just the name and the picture of a wasp."

"Well, I called myself, Captain Troy Tempest. If you want to maintain a degree of anonimity, you can be Lieutenant Atlanta Shore. She was a Marineville operator in the show."

Kate frowned. "What show, Doctor?"

"Why, Stingray of co-"

She did not hear the rest of that sentence, due to a sudden audible gurgling sound from the unseen pipes above her, prompting her to spring off the toilet, click open the door look and slide out onto the carpeted balcony, pulling the door shut after her; going from the solitude of the bathroom, to the loud hubbub of conversation from the wrecked casino deck one or two floors below.

She quickstepped along the walkway, putting a couple of hundred metres between herself and the bathroom door, lest the source of those noises emerge from it. She wanted to give herself room and time to react, should it do so.

She probably had not finished fixing her makeup, but that thought was the last thing on her mind right now.

Todd put a hand on the smooth wooden railing, and looked over at the people below. There was no screaming or panic now, with the guests and staff trying to deal with the situation as best they could, helping one another, or stepping, dazed, through the broken glass or shattered furniture.

Dividing her attention between the bathroom door in the distance, and the casino that was now to her right as she turned round and leaned her right forearm on the railing, pushing her right hip into this side of the barrier, she leaned down to the microphone on the vortex manipulator. "Still there Doctor?"

"Why wouldn't I be? I am making the changes to the shield setting as we speak. Anything at the casino?"

Kate shook her head slightly, even though he would not see it. "Nothing visible, though there are some noises from the pipes, so I think there is some kind of activity around here."

To be continued...

 

First off, you’ve done a good job capturing the 12th Doctor’s gruff, somewhat oblivious to niceties behavior. It took me a little bit to recognize Todd, but then it’s been a long time since I saw the first season of NCIS.

It looks like you’ve stalled on the next part of the story. If you want some con-crit, click here:

Spoiler

I have a couple questions you don’t have to answer, and comments you don’t have to respond to or justify, just think about.

Do you have an outline of what the “big climax” of the story is going to be? In Doctor Who episodes like these it’s usually “Doc figures out some tech solution and blasts away with it.” Why is there a delay setting it off? What, plot-wise, is the reason why he’s not firing it off right away. Why is Todd back on the cruise ship right now?

As interesting as all the technical descriptions of things are, and as much as they show your research, they start to slow down the action.

The fact that she feels at-ease enough to take time to fix her makeup is also kind of dragging down the urgency of the situation.

If firing off this shield to protect the ship isn’t the climactic “solution to the problem” what is?

If the real climax to the story is “figuring out who disabled the engines and why?” Solve the squid issue quickly, then the rest of the story can become a “whodunnit”.

As for readability, I have the same tendency towards long run-on sentences as you do, it looks like. Having someone else read through it and help you sort some of those sentences would be helpful. Findswoman has been beta reading my stories.

I think going back and doing some editing on the story so far, tightening it up, aiming it towards a specific goal, would help you with writing the end. I know that’s what has helped me with a couple of my stories.

Figure out where you want the story to end up, and as you read over the story so far, ask “is this scene getting me to that end point?” “Is it explaining something that will be important later or gives the reader insight into a character’s decisions later?” If the answer is “no”, consider cutting it out.

I love the .gifs, very clever editing to put the characters together. It helps picture the two main characters interacting.

The descriptions of objects and people are well done, it gives a good head-picture of what things look like.

If you want to go over specific bits and get specific suggestions, let me know.



Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

Thank you for reviewing, and I am glad you liked the .gifs!

I will certainly review the make-up scene, see if I really need it; and I will get back to you regarding ideas on how to get this finished.

Thank you for the offer.

​