Becoming a Time Lady

Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or Torchwood. Also, I've recently decided that I don't like the character and place names I usually come up with, so I'm going to try this thing where I adapt names from other sources. For example, the character "Perine" in this chapter got his name from the character "Pirenne" from Foundation by Isaac Asimov. I don't own any of these other sources either.

Return to Messaline: Starlight

Messaline, shortly after the Doctor left:

"Isn't it beautiful?" Perine sighed breathily. Shalis glanced into the sky nervously, not quite seeing where her friend and machine-brother was coming from. Of course, they'd both been born in darkness and war, but even from the few minutes of conversation they'd managed to have in between battles, Shalis knew that Perine was the romantic one of them. He'd wanted to see the star's light long before there was any hope of ever being able to.

Now, because of the unexpected terraforming, they could walk on the surface and feel the warmth from Messaline's star. Even though most of the army – citizens, she reminded herself, the war is over and all the soldiers are citizens now – most everyone was still underground getting organized, but Perine had dragged her outside as soon as it was safe.

Not just outside, even. They'd left the Lost Temple and found themselves in the middle of what had once been assumed to be the abandoned city. Not abandoned, they knew now – just brand new and, as yet, empty. But the tall buildings had blocked their view and so Perine had run off to find somewhere more open, forcing Shalis to either follow him or be left alone. They'd weaved their way through the street for some time before finally reaching the end of the city. Laughing delightedly, Perine had again led the way, dashing into the field of bright green grass that had just started to grow on the once-barren ground.

"Yeah, it's great!" Shalis said quickly – and a little over-enthusiastically – when she realized that Perine was pointedly waiting for a response to his question. Actually, she didn't feel great. The natural light from the sky was so much different from what she was used to. It sort of felt...she searched for the right word... "Prickly," she murmured out loud by accident."

"What?"

"I just thought...doesn't it make your skin prickle? This light, I mean."

Perine frowned and held out his arms experimentally, with palms down. "Hmm...well, maybe. That doesn't seem right..."

"We should get back underground," Shalis said urgently. "Look! My skin's turning pink – I'm getting burned!" She sounded slightly whingy, even to herself.

Perine sighed in exasperation. "Fine, let's go back then. They'll notice we're missing soon, anyway."

By this point, Shalis was really not feeling well, or she'd have realized that her friend was not completely disappointed that the outside excursion he'd wanted so much hadn't lasted very long. And the excuse that they'd be missed was ridiculous – she wasn't even sure that a complete census of everyone existed, and even if it did, no one could've already gone through the whole thing to discover that two people weren't there. Not in the half hour since terraforming.

But Shalis didn't realize these things. She was more concerned with how cold she suddenly felt and how hot, by contrast, her skin felt to the touch as she drew her arms together to stop the shivering.

"Yeah, I think you're right," said Perine, sounding very far away. "We really should get..."

Shalis didn't hear any more. And she didn't even feel herself hit the ground.

On Messaline, several months later:

Sigma Theta materialized in a back alley of the city beneath which Jenny had been progenated. It wasn't likely, she thought, that there would be anyone there to see them arrive, but Jenny kept the invisibility shields on anyway and made sure to check out the windows before she and Jack left the ship.

"Huh," Jenny murmured with a slight chuckle as she stepped out.

"What?"

"I just realized. I've never actually been here," she answered, then smiled at his confusion. They began down the alley to the city proper while she explained. "On the surface of Planet Messaline. I was only ever underground, because it hadn't been terraformed. No one could go to the surface..." Jenny trailed off as they reached the main streets of the city, her mouth dropping open of its own accord.

"That terraforming, it did happen?" Jack asked quietly. "People can go on the surface now?"

"Yes," she breathed faintly. "Yes, I saw it."

"Then – where is everyone?"

The street they'd come out on was completely deserted. The sky, visible between buildings, was bright blue and the light from Messaline's star made the brand-new walls gleam, but there was no movement, no sound that they themselves did not make.

Jenny saw the tall spaceship silo where the colonists' ship had been housed (before she'd stolen it). It wasn't too far way. "Come on," she said, pointing it out. "Let's go there." There was no particular reason why there should be anyone there if there was no one here, but it was the last place she'd seen anyone and – if nothing else – it was a place she knew.

The fairly short trip was, at least for Jenny, a little bit eerie. These were streets she definitely didn't know – except that she already had a map of them in her head from the machine, so in some sense she knew every corner. Both that contradiction and seeing the city unnaturally devoid of life made her all the more eager to get somewhere familiar.

Jack and Jenny reached the silo about five minutes later. It was then, for the first time, that the silence of the city was broken. A loud screeching sound echoed up and down the boulevard. Jenny – as she clapped her hands to her ears – vaguely attached to the word "feedback" to the noise. It was feedback from something. It cut off suddenly to be replaced by one word.

"Jenny?"

Dropping her hands slowly, Jenny glanced at Jack. "Well, someone here knows who you are, anyway," he said and she nodded.

"Jenny!" The voice repeated, more urgently. Mechanical interference had rendered the speaker unrecognizable, so even if Jenny did know the person, she couldn't identify him – or for that matter, her; even the gender was impossible to distinguish.

"Yes?" she replied cautiously. "Who's there?"

"Jenny, you have to come inside!" When she hesitated, the voice added. "I mean now!"Quietly, Jack tapped her shoulder and gestured to a loudspeaker that was mounted to a nearby building. She nodded, realizing that was where the disembodied voice was coming from. "Oh, for -" It began, but cut off.

Seconds later, the door to the silo slid open and, to Jenny surprised, the soldier named Cline ran out. "Come on!" he cried, grabbing her hand. "We've got to get inside!"

"Please tell me the war isn't back on," Jenny muttered as she and Jack followed him. Once inside, Cline shut and barred the door with a crash. He relaxed, sighing with relief as a number of other people – both human and Hath – came out of various shelters only once the door was securely closed. Then Cline turned back to her and unexpectedly embraced her tightly.

Jenny hugged back, a bit perplexed, watching over his shoulder as Jack's expression turn to confusion. No, I know, this isn't exactly the reception I was prepared for, she thought. After flashing him a small, reassuring smile, she pulled away from Cline. "Good to see you, too?" she said, unable to keep the question completely out of her tone.

If Cline heard it, he gave no indication. "Jenny! Thank the Great One you're back!" he said fervently.

"'The Great One'?" she repeated, slightly taken aback but mostly amused. "You do know that was a myth, right?"

"Sure, but we've gotta swear on something," Cline answered with a half-shrug. "Might as well be Her. Some of the others swear by the Doctor, but that's mostly people who never had any direct interaction with him. Or have been progenated since and never met him at all."

A man with light brown, crew-cut hair spoke softly to Cline. "It's not long before noon, sir – the star will be directly above us in no more than a few minutes. We should move out."

As Cline nodded grimly, Jack voiced the question that had been on the tip of Jenny's tongue. "Why does it matter where the star is?"

Cline looked at him as though only then seeing him for the first time. After a short pause, he replied. "When the star is overhead, there won't be any shade in here." He pointed up and Jenny looked to see that the silo was open to the sky. "I'll explain on the way, but Gel's right – we have to go, and now." With that, they were hurried down the very passage that the Doctor had used to get to the spaceship in the first place.

"So, who're you?" Cline asked Jack.

"Captain Jack Harkness. And you?"

"Cline. Major, Generation six-six-seven-oh."

"What's going on, Cline?" Jenny asked, ignoring the brief introductions. "Not another war?" How the position of the planet's star would matter in a war, she wasn't sure, but anything was possible.

"No," he said with a grimace. "It's not a war. It's worse than that...it's...well, part of the problem is that we're not exactly sure what it is. A plague, or something. Up there." He glanced toward the city above them nervously.

Jenny frowned. "It there were any bacteria or viruses that could cause serious illness out there, then they should've shown up in the initial scans of the planet," she pointed out. "The terraforming would kill any that it could and if there were anything it didn't get, then the city would go into lockdown and everyone would be given immunity shots before being let out. There are protocols for this – how can there be a plague?"

Cline stared at her. "We had to dig through computer files for weeks before we learned about those procedures...and that was after it started. How did you know all that?" He didn't give her a chance to answer. "Anyway, as far as we can tell, it's caused by the light from Messaline's star, Lux, not a bacteria or virus. It's not even an illness, really. Doesn't seem to be contagious, at least."

"Great One be blessed for that," muttered one of the others.

"You're saying a lot about what this isn't. But what is it, Major?" Jack asked impatiently and Jenny didn't blame him. Cline was acting as though to speak of...whatever this was...was to make it more likely to happen to them; he was talking slowly and cautiously, even as the hurried along the tunnels. The explanation was, as a result, taking a lot longer than she would've wanted.

They came to the passage crisscrossed with lasers that Jenny had flipped through last time. No need for that now, but they did have to wait as someone typed in a password. In the pause, Cline answered the question. "Aging," he whispered. "All we really know is that if anyone stays in the star's light for too long, they start aging at an unnatural rate and soon die...of old age."

Perine was panicking as he helped Shalis stagger back to the city. She seemed mostly unconscious – able to put one foot in front of the other, but barely able and only with encouragement.

After what seemed like forever, they finally made it back. "Help!" Perine called as soon as they were back at what had so recently been the human army's base. "Please, help!" Shalis was out completely now and her weight dragged them both to the ground. Perine looked around frantically. Who was in charge now, since Cobb's arrest?

"What's wrong? What's happened?"

Perine vaguely recognized the man who'd appeared in front of him asking questions. "Major Cline! I don't know what happened, she just...I mean, I – well, we –" His words faded into incoherence and he started crying too hard to speak.

Cline called for someone to come care for Shalis, but during the war, medical ability had not been valued – it was easier to progenate new, healthy soldiers than to help the injured. There had never been any doctors among them, that Perine knew of (save the Doctor, of course, but he had gone) and not even any medics. There were a few people willing to try though and Cline himself sat down next to Perine. "Now, I need to know what happened to her," he said gently.

"But I don't know, really!" Perine cried. He explained what had happened as best he could, but was sure that he'd left out something important or mixed things up in such a way that the Major wouldn't be able to understand anything.

When Cline decided that he probably knew as much as Perine could tell him, he stood again and went to check on Shalis, Perine following closely. "Shalis?" he cried, horrified, as he saw her again. In the few minutes that it had taken to tell the story, she had gone from looking rather sick to looking fifty years older. Her skin, which had been slightly pink, was now a much darker tan and wrinkly. He cautiously reached out to touch her arm and found that she felt horribly rough and leathery. "She's so thin," he whispered.

"She's drying out, but she won't take water," one of the women who'd come to look after her told Cline. "And she's losing weight rapidly. I don't..." She spread her hands wide, looking helpless. "I don't think she's going to live much longer. How – how did this happen?"

Cline had spent the rest of their trip describing their first encounter with this condition. The base camp turned out to be the theatre, just like when the Doctor had been here. "We've stayed here because it's one of the easiest places to keep dark," Cline explained. "The windows aren't very big and they were made to be covered during plays. All the light can be kept outside, keeping us safe."

"Knowing that one victim of this...'condition' spent an hour on the surface is not enough information to assume that it's cause by the starlight," Jack pointed out.

"No," Cline admitted. "But we definitely knew it came from the surface, even then. Before Shalis and Perine returned, we'd sent out scouts before moving to the city entirely. Just a precaution, left over from starting out in the midst of a war. None of them ever came back. When we got control of the camera system, we managed to find some of their bodies. There was no doubt that it was exactly the same thing.

"At first, we thought there was something wrong with the atmosphere and tried making everything air tight, but that was a bit useless – there have been venting systems to the surface since the city was built. There was never anything wrong with breathing up there, even before terraforming. When people in front of windows started having the same problem, it became pretty obvious. They all said the light felt prickly, just like Shalis had. And we've got conclusive evidence otherwise, too..."

Jenny and Jack waited for him to continue, but he glanced at the man he'd called Gel. "Uh, after the theory that this was caused be Lux was put forward...I decided to go outside that night."

"Without permission," interjected Cline. "There'd been orders that no one was to go outside for any reason. He left a suicide note."

"It wasn't suicide. It was an experiment," Gel told him, sounding affronted. "I went out just after starset and stayed until just before dawn. Hours, I stayed out there, but nothing affected me. Because it was night and Lux was hidden."

"The note?" Jenny asked.

"To let us know what happened," Cline said. "In case he didn't come back. But, I mean, he did come back. And that was weeks ago now and he's still fine. It's gotta be Lux, right?"

Jack was unconvinced. "This Perine spent just as much time on the surface as Shalis, but she got it and he didn't. Maybe it doesn't affect everyone. Maybe Gel could live on outside during the day and it wouldn't make a difference."

"It doesn't affect everyone in the same way, sure," agreed Cline. "Some die in minutes, some hours. Some don't start the aging process until long after noticing the prickle. Perine didn't get off easy though. He's been afflicted for nearly a month now."

"You mean, he's still alive?" Jenny inquired. "He's sick, but alive?"

"Can we see him?" Jack added.

They were led to the far corner of the room, as far from the covered windows as possible. "It might help to keep him over here," Cline told them. "He's the only one to survive this long. Could be the location – which we never thought to try before – or it could just be him."

The man on the cot lay half-hidden in shadows, but even so, Jenny could tell that his hair was pure white and his face was so covered by wrinkles that it was difficult to make out facial features. She glanced at Jack, who was appraising Perine calculatingly. "Jenny," he murmured. "Would you mind if I talked to him alone for a few minutes?"

She was slightly confused by the request, but shook her head – no, she wouldn't mind – and turned back to Cline. "Do you think you can help?" He asked her worriedly. "I mean, you said you were going off to...save the universe or something..."

"The universe?" She smiled. "Haven't quite got there yet. But...well, I don't know if I – " a brief pause as she shot a quick look towards Jack " – if we can help here, but we can certainly try."

A/N: (The following paragraphs include information that have been released about this year's Doctor Who Christmas Special. If you, like me, consider such information to be spoilers, don't read them.)

Ok, this chapter was supposed to be a bit longer than than it is, but there is something that I need to address. As you probably know, Matt Smith is confirmed to be leaving Doctor Who on Christmas; they will be revealing the next actor, um, tomorrow. I very much dislike this. I don't want to know who the next Doctor will be - I don't want to know until Matt Smith regenerates into him. So, I've made it a personal challenge to keep myself from spoilers until then. This will probably be unsuccessful (my friends have predicted that I'll last three days at the most). Oh well, I can still try.

Anyway, I request that, if you happen to read this just after seeing the announcement and are excitedly wanting to mention it in a review...well, please don't? You can mention how excited you are, I just don't want a name. Thank you!

And do, please, review!