Beta: Miral-Romanov

Chapter 1

Veneration

Music.

It was faint, a crackling, gritty old sound that was barely audible over the painful ringing in his ears, and it vaguely registered in the Doctor's head that it was a Glen Miller song. He tried jerking his hand up to knock the needle off of the record, but he discovered his hands were bound to something long, smooth and decidedly armrest-like. The Doctor lifted his head, wincing at the pain in his neck from having it bowed for too long, and opened his eyes, blinking haze from his vision, and the confusion made him frown at his surroundings. He was in a darkened room so dimly lit that he could barely see— had it been a human in his position, the room would be completely pitch-black to them. The wavering old song seemed to be playing from an intercom or a speaker, since he couldn't see a phonograph or a record player, and the room was bare of anything save for a couple of dust balls in the corners. He gave his arm another fruitless tug, looking down and noticing his hands were bound with deadlock shackles to a silver, iron chair.

Concern filled him when he realised he couldn't remember being abducted; the last thing he remembered was being in the TARDIS with Clara. Clara was missing as well, so he could only assume that she'd been abducted as well and was somewhere else in the vicinity. Either that, or she'd been lucky and was still in the TARDIS, although at this point it would be foolish to hope for the latter.

"Hey," the Doctor said loudly, wincing when the sound reverberated through the empty room and made his head hurt. Pushing his own discomfort aside, he drew in a deep breath and shouted, "HEY! WHERE AM I? WHERE HAVE YOU TAKEN CLARA?" There was no answer, at least not that he could hear over the ringing in his ear. He shook his head like a dog trying to dry off in an effort to get the ringing to stop, before continuing to shout. "WHO ARE YOU? LET ME OUT OF HERE AT ONCE!"

Once again, nobody answered. Letting out an annoyed growl, the Doctor struggled with his shackles in an attempt to pry the screws loose. After a full ten minutes of fighting against his bindings he started to become horribly aware that these shackles seemed to be custom made for him. Which meant that whoever or whatever had abducted him hadn't done it by accident, so if he had any chance of escaping he'd have to be particularly creative. He tried to rock the chair in an effort to maybe push it over and knock open one of the shackles, but the chair wouldn't budge. He craned his neck over the armrest, only to curse loudly in chiming Gallifreyan when he realised his abductor had also bolted the chair to the floor.

Lovely.

The Doctor twisted his body around and wriggled in his seat, trying to feel if his sonic was still in his pocket, but his abductor seemed to have thought of that as well, since he couldn't feel anything in his pockets. Granted, they were bigger on the inside like most things he owned, but he'd still had a fair amount of emergency items in his pockets that could have been useful in his escape. He cursed again, taking another look around the room to see if he could spot any doors or anything that could help him. As he'd noticed earlier, the room was completely bare, but there was a steel door to his left that was also deadlocked.

"LET ME OUT OF HERE AT ONCE!" he shouted again, thrashing in his chair and glaring at the walls as if they could see him.

A faint hissing sound started up in the room, making him whip his head around and stupidly expect to see a snake slithering towards him. He couldn't see anything at all, which greatly worried him, so he opened his mouth to yell some more. Yet when he took another deep breath, his chest seared with pain, his joints seized up and a bitter scent like powdered medicine clogged his nose. His eyes went wide as he struggled to breathe, but whenever he managed to draw in breath the pain seemed to only get worse. His respiratory bypass did absolutely nothing to aid him, almost as though it were nonexistent, and just as his throat closed and he was surely about to pass out, he felt fingers press against his lips and something shoved down his throat. As it passed over his tongue, his fogged and near unconscious mind vaguely registered that it was chocolate of all things before his swallowing reflex kicked in. The pain in his chest and the asphyxia waned away at once, making him gasp for breath.

"Well that was eventful!" said a cheery voice right in front of his face.

Panting heavily, he blinked the tears from his eyes and, upon discovering that the dim lights had brightened considerably, took in the grinning man in front of him. The Doctor recognised him as an Ophelia Omicronian, with pale white skin and equally white hair that reached his shoulders. He was slender and wearing a spiked breastplate from the early Omicronian era, and his eyes were an almost disturbing, coal-black colour that clashed horribly with his babyish, rounded cheeks and crazily delighted expression.

"What—" The Doctor gasped for another breath, coughing for a brief moment. "What the hell was that?!"

"Aerosolised aspirin!" the Omicronian beamed, clapping his hands and bouncing a little as though the very thought was as wonderful as the thought of Christmas. "Isn't it brilliant?"

Aerosolised aspirin. That explained why his respiratory bypass failed at once, and why chocolate had stopped his symptoms, although it was far from brilliant. "Who are you?" the Doctor demanded, glaring at him and giving his shackles a rattle. "Where have you taken Clara and why am I here?"

"Well, which question do you wish to be answered first?" he said lightly, must to the Doctor's astonishment and annoyance.

"ANY OF THEM!" the Doctor shouted, trying to pitch himself forward in the chair.

"Well then," the alien said, looking falsely affronted. Placing a dramatic hand on his breastplate, he said with air, "My name is Beratt." The name made a light go off in the back of the Doctor's mind, and Beratt seemed to notice and giggled happily. "Ooh, so you remember me?"

"Not really," the Doctor said, scowling at him.

"Oh," said Beratt, looking a bit put out. "Well, we have met before, you know. It was a long time ago for me— although I'm sure it's been ages for you. You, my friend, stopped me from planting an explosive charge in my planet's core and blowing it up." Memories flooded the forefront of his mind, from his seventh incarnation, and he gaped at the Omicronian, whose expression lit up again. "You remember now! Lovely, lovely…" With an exaggerated pointing motion, he said happily, "You were the only person smart enough to stop me, besides realising there was anything going on in the first place! All the other idiots on my godforsaken planet didn't even know I existed, let alone know I was planning to blow it up."

"Yes, yes, so what?" the Doctor said impatiently, rattling his shackles yet again. "What does all that having to do with you kidnapping me? Is this out of revenge?"

"Revenge, my dear Doctor?" Beratt laughed, patting him on the shoulder. "No, no, no, not at all! I don't want revenge— the resulting war that was caused after my plot was foiled was revenge enough." The Doctor gaped at him, wondering if he'd really caused the worst and only war on Ophelia Omicron by stopping Beratt, but the unstable alien continued, "You see, the Persei Government exiled me from the planet in the year 799/X, about three years before the start of the war, and I devoted the last sixteen years to learning absolutely everything I could about you, Doctor."

"Why?" the Doctor said in astonishment, looking Beratt up and down.

"Because I'm your biggest fan, of course!" Beratt said with glee, spreading out his arms as though expecting a standing ovation.

"My biggest fan," repeated the Doctor with irritation.

"Yep!"

"Honestly?"

"Yes," said Beratt with a brilliant grin.

"Are you insane?"

"Completely!" Beratt beamed. "Why?"

"You kidnapped me because you're my biggest fan?!" the Doctor snarled with fury. If looks could kill, Beratt would already been ashes in a jar, but he simply kept grinning. "What the hell do you expect us to do— have a bloody sleepover? Or is this a date? Is that why you've chosen Glen bloody Miller to play in the background— are you setting the mood?"

Beratt actually laughed, and the Doctor was uncertain if he'd heard the sarcasm or not. "Don't be silly! We're going to play a game, of course."

"A game," echoed the Doctor, slumping in his seat and scowling. "Lovely. What are we playing, Cluedo?"

"No," chuckled Beratt. "We aren't playing anything— your friends are!"

"My friends?"

"Yep!" He pulled out a shiny black remote and wiggled it slightly between his long fingers. "I've gathered some friends of yours to play a game I've cobbled together. Bit proud of it, actually," he added, looking pleased. "And the outcome can only end in something you'd undoubtedly like— a reunion with one of your friends!"

"What are you talking about?"

"Your friends, Doctor, your friends!" Beratt said impatiently. "I know you're probably a thousand years old or something and have had hundreds of friends, but you must remember some."

Sending the confused Doctor a stern look, Beratt pressed the button on the remote. A whirring, electronic sound echoed through the large room and a gigantic monitor lowered out of the ceiling and positioned itself less than a metre from the Doctor's visage, almost too close for comfort. The screen was black up until Beratt sent him yet another gleeful expression and pressed another button on the remote. This time the screen lit up at once with several different images from multiple video cameras— eleven of the images were that of empty, identical corridors, but the biggest one in the very centre was clearly footage of a room full of eleven different people, all unconscious and all lying spread-eagled on the floor as though they'd been tossed into the room with indifference.

"What is this?" the Doctor snapped, with a sideways glare in Beratt's direction.

"I told you—" began Beratt with exasperation.

"Yes, yes, they're my friends," the Doctor interrupted with annoyance.

"Look closely," Beratt insisted, unconcerned with his interruption and rudeness. "Don't you recognise any of them?"

The Doctor glared one final time at him before obediently leaning forward in his seat and scanning through the throng of unconscious people. Most of them were lying on their stomachs, face down and unrecognisable, but his hearts dropped into his stomach when he managed to distinguish Clara lying crookedly in the corner from the outfit she'd been wearing the last time he'd seen her. And, he realised with utter horror, the two people closest to her were none other than his old companions Peri Brown and Jamie McCrimmon.

"So you do recognise them!" Beratt said with delight. "Wonderful!"

"What is this?" the Doctor snarled, rounding on Beratt with a mixture of anger and horror in his expression. "You've kidnapped them?"

"Yep!"

"You took them from their timelines?!" the Doctor gaped, unable to believe that anybody could be so stupid and insane. "What the hell have you done?!"

"Well, my dear Doctor, it's really very simple!" Beratt beamed. "I've personally handpicked one companion from each and every one of your past incarnations. And I've brought them here to compete against each other and see who's worthiest of being your companion."

A/N: This is my first multi-chapter fic written outside of a series :) It is being written in honour of my utterly favourite companion, Rose Tyler, winning the RadioTimes Contest for Best Companion Ever (that, and it was just WONDERFUL to be there when she kicked River Song's butt :3 best day ever) except in this case it's just a few choice companions going up against one another instead of all of them. And before anybody asks, River will NOT be featured in this fic, despite her being one of the runners-up in the actual contest. This fic will feature a lot of violence and horror, so if it's not your cuppa read no further. Unfortunately the chapters for this are going to be very short; you'll see why later on. Hope you enjoyed!