Painful ringing filled Romana’s head. The harsh sunlight made her eyes water after spending so long underground. Trying to figure out what had just happened she took in her surroundings. Grass poked her face making her realize she was laying on the ground. Lifting her head she looked at the open field that seemed to go on forever. A faint smell of flowers hanged in the air. What surprised her though was the silence once the ringing in her head stopped. This field was peacefully silent as if there was no invasion occurring. Her eyes widened in horror at this last thought and memories of the last day flooded back into her mind. Pictures of collapsing rocks and trying to contact the fleet stuck in her mind. But what image lingered the most was the smoke, coiling around her as if alive.
Romana cringed at even the thought of the smoke. She felt as if it had looked through her flesh and stared at her naked soul. I hope I never see it again she thought. She couldn’t thank the Doctor enough for getting her away from that thing. Quickly looking around she tried to find her saviour. He was not far away from her, no more than 10 meters away.
“Doctor! Are you ok?” The Doctor looked over at her and replied with a small wave. Romana got to her hooves and trotted over to him as he played with his sonic screwdriver.
“Where are we Doctor?”
“Somewhere far away from where we were,” he replied.
“You don’t know do you,” she bluntly said.
“I am here, I just don’t know where everything else is.” He had a smile on his face as if he was enjoying himself.
“Why are you so happy? My planet is still being attacked and you stand here smiling.” The Doctor didn’t stop smiling as he patted Romana on the head.
“Because I scanned that smoke before we left.” Romana looked indignantly at the Doctor and moved back to avoid being petted again.
“So you know what it is? You can stop them?” Romana felt hope that her world wasn’t lost but these were quickly dashed.
“No I don’t know what they are but I have some ideas. I’m smiling because it was bursting with void radiation.” Romana looked blankly up at him as if he was talking gibberish.
“Void radiation? What in blazes is that?”
“It’s stuff. Stuff that you pick up when you travel through the void and this was full of it. Must of come through recently, say about a day give or take a few hours.”
The Doctor knew this wouldn’t satisfy Romana’s curiosity but he didn’t want to tell her anymore. This thing has come through shortly after him and maybe even came with him. If it had come through then that’d mean there might be a way back to his own universe. I can just hope that she doesn’t figure out that it had come with me or any trust she has won't be there for long he thought.
“So you know where it is from?” she asked.
“Yes and if I know where it has been then we can know where it is going.”
“So what do we do?”
“We need to get onto one of their ships and by we I mean me,” the Doctor said to Romana. She felt glad to know she didn’t have to go back to face more of that smoke but she also felt the need to go. It was her duty to serve the ponies of Gallopfrey and she couldn’t just leave its fate to a stranger.
The Doctor pointed his screwdriver towards the sun while looking at Romana.
“You should run and hide, they’ll only look for me so you’ll be safe.” Green light reflected in his eyes and the buzzing sound he had grown to love filled his ears. Romana wanted more than anything to just run like he had said but her sense of duty kept her hooves sealed to the ground.
“Promise me Doctor that you’ll do anything in your power to save my planet,” she said with pleading in her eyes.
“I promise.”
***
The six smoke figures had no idea what to do. The Doctor was not the Doctor and yet he was. They did not like such uncertainty and they could not get the information they needed. While confused one heard the faintest of sounds.
We are picking up a signal from the planet.
It is more advanced than anything on the planet.
Could it be that we have a wrong Doctor?
Impossible he is here.
But his memories are wrong.
And no one else could send such a signal.
We shall send a ship to investigate.
A ship covered in smoke launched from the ship and they all watched it as it descended onto the world below.
***
The Doctor and Romana both stared into the yellow sky looking for anything. Romana noticed first that a small grey dot had appeared. By the look of it was heading down fast too their position. Glowing red hot from reentry a ship the size of a house seemed to not slow down. Romana hearts started to beat faster as it speed towards them. The Doctor placed a comforting hand on her back.
“It’ll be alright.”
With less than 1km to go before it hit the ground it looked as if it was slowing down. Still going at supersonic speed it made a complete stop just 10 meters from the ground. The sudden stop sent out a shockwave that pushed the two observers back a bit.
The Doctor heard the nervous pony next to him gasp at the sight of more of the black smoke. It raced towards them in seconds wrapping around their bodies and immobilizing them. The ship lowered itself until it was touching the ground. With his whole body feeling numb and refusing to do what he wanted the Doctor started walking towards the ships opening door. He managed to gain enough control to look back and see Romana frozen where she was standing.
“Doctor what is happening? What are they going to do to me?” The Doctor could hear the fear in her voice as the smoke twisted around her.
“Relax they only want me. They’ll leave you alone once they have me.” He stepped into the space ship and the door started closing behind him. Romana started to yell something at him but was cut off by the doors. He stood within the cramped space unable to move at all. Even his head no longer obeyed him. Hearing the sound of rockets he felt a rumbling sensation and knew that he was leaving Gallopfrey.
***
Doctor Whooves had no idea had passed since the six shadows had surrounded him. All he knew was that they weren’t here now. Now he just had to figure out where here was. Grey metal walls surrounded him in a room of 2 meters by 2 meters. The room was bare of anything except himself. Even a door was missing leading him to question how he had been put in it. What was most curious of all was the fact he could see - there was no visible light source within the room yet he could see every detail. Running his hooves across every surface he searched for a gap that would lead to a door but only found solid wall with no escape. He sighed to himself,
“This is just a right old mess.”
***
The Doctor waited as the ship made its ascent into the heavens, it wasn’t like he could do anything else at this point. The door slid open to reveal six humanoid figures made of smoke looking at him.
“Hello again, long time since we last met,” said the Doctor. One raised their hand and he felt himself walk forward outside of his transport ship. They circled around him and one that appeared slightly darker than the rest came up to him. It placed a hand on his forehead.
Sleep now, it said.
“I think not,” the Doctor looked directly at it and stepped forward. “I’m giving you this one chance to leave peacefully.”
Impossible. No one can resist us.
“Well clearly I’m not just anyone.”
Remaining completely calm he looked at the figures before him. They were clearly disturbed by what had happened and they seemed to be unable to hold a complete humanoid form anymore.
“So will you take my offer?”
We will never run from you Doctor and we will still take the planet Gallifey. The Doctor wasn’t even phased by this.
“That is where you are in fact wrong. You see you aren’t even close to Gallifey and you will never be.” The leader burst with anger and advanced up to the Doctor until it was directly infront of his nose.
All evidence points to the opposite Doctor! Your precious planet will fall and you will be destroyed. The voice was normally calm and even but now it fluctuated with anger and contempt at the him.
The Doctor felt a warm sensation within his coat causing him to fill with glee - everything was going to plan.
“Don’t you find it strange that as soon as you arrived at this planet you were so much stronger?” Even with no faces the six figures seemed to give him a blank look. The Doctor continued “This is another version of the planet you want in another universe and do you know what that means?”
What does it matter? We will just take this planet! By this point the warm spot had become searing within his jacket.
“It matters because you traveled through the void and absorbed the radiation energy within it. It’s what made you so powerful but it’ll be the end of you.”
A bright light shone through his jacket drawing everyone's attention. The Doctor put his hand in and bought out a white hot key. Letting out a small noise of pain he dropped it on the ground.
“Emergency protocol 58, after the TARDIS repairs itself and I’m not near it it’ll transport to the nearest key.” A slight gust of wind blew through the room without disturbing the smoke monsters. Slowly growing stronger the wind began to blow strong enough to make the Doctor stagger. A noise came from thin air, the sound of his trusty TARDIS. The air took a faint blue tinge before returning back to normal. Once again it took a darker blue and the outline of a box could be seen before disappearing. Repeating again each time the TARDIS reappeared it seemed more defined than the last time. Finally it became solid and fell silent sitting their with the bluest blue colour that the Doctor had come to love.
“Another fun little fact - my TARDIS recently exploded and destroyed an universe. Then it came through to this universe while still having a hole in reality in it.” The Doctor looked like he was enjoying himself as he knew that he was about to save another world.
What of it? You can’t do anything to harm us.
“Well let’s say that a TARDIS with a hole in it traveled through the void. Maybe just maybe if it survived it’d stay connected to the void.” The smoke creatures finally understood the Doctor’s train of thought.
But you’ll be dragged in with us. They desperately tried to get away from the TARDIS but the Doctor snapped his fingers.
The doors of the TARDIS flew open to reveal empty darkness. The smoke was helpless as it was dragged into the void and out of existence. The Doctor felt himself be dragged towards the TARDIS’s open door. The smoke creatures had been full of radiation energy so they were more attracted to the void so they were sucked in faster than the Doctor. Watching the last remaining smoke creature sucked in he snapped his fingers and the door shut close. He went flying into it and lost his breath as he crashed into the blue box.