A/N I don't own the BBC or DW

Chapter 37: The Hungry Earth

"Behold," the Doctor proclaimed, swinging the TARDIS doors open dramatically, "Rio!"

Donna raised an eyebrow, peeking out from behind him at the dull scene. Some sort of graveyard. "You're quite sure about that?"

Rory walked out past the Doctor and spun in a circle, looking around. "Not really getting the sunshine, carnival vibe."

The Doctor followed him out, hopping up and down. With a little laugh, Amy and Rose also exited the ship, closing the doors behind them. The Doctor turned. "Does the ground feel funny? No? Just me then, alright." Then he froze. "Well that's weird."

"What's weird?" Rose asked, coming to stand beside him. Ignoring her, he ran around the little stone chapel and knelt, picking at something on the ground.

Amy sighed and crossed her arms. "Doctor, quit trying to distract us. It's freezing and I'm dressed for Rio!"

"Bluegrass," the Doctor said, standing up again. "Patches of it all around the graveyard." It only took a moment or so before he dropped the grass and his expression faded back from the confusion. He sat himself down on a tombstone, crossing his legs and lacing his fingers over his knees. "So. Earth, 2020-ish, ten years in your future. Wrong continent for Rio, I'll admit, but it's not a massive overshoot."

"Why are those people waving at us?" Amy asked, looking across the cemetery to where two people stood on a hill. She was right, they were waving.

The Doctor stood up and took out a little pair of binoculars, pulling them away a moment later, shocked. "It's you two!"

Rory frowned. "No, we're here. We can't be there if we're here."

"You can if that's you from a different time," Rose told him with a little grin. "I met myself once. As a baby."

The Doctor nodded. "You were a cute baby. But you two, oh, I imagine you've come back, ten years from now, to relive past glories. Humans are funny like that."

Amy blinked. "We're still together in ten years?"

Donna laughed. "Don't even try to act surprised; you knew you would be."

Amy blushed, but smiled all the same. "Let's go and talk to them," she said, lacing her fingers with Rory's. "Come on, how cool would it be to talk to future us?"

The Doctor winced. "Er, no, better not. Really better not. These things get complicated very quickly, and reapers and – oh look," he said, cutting himself off in his excitement. He was looking towards this big metal machine in the distance. "Big mining thing. Oh, I love a big mining thing." He turned to them with a grin. "See, way better than Rio. Rio doesn't have a big mining thing."

"We're going to go and have a look?" Donna asked, excited even though she was already bemoaning the absence of warmer clothes. It'd be fine for a bit.

The Doctor grinned at her, "Yes, Donna Noble, we are going to go and have a look! Come on!" He shouted, already bounding down the hill. With a little laugh, Donna and Rose were right behind him.

Rory turned to Amy with an exasperated little sigh. "If he can't even get us to Rio, how will he ever get us back home?"

Amy giggled. "Oh, none of that. Donna and Rose trust him, and so do I. And besides, you saw future us over there. It'll all work out fine," she promised, tugging on his hand. "Let's go!"

"Hang on!" he said, looking down at her hand. "What are you doing with that?"

"Engagement ring. I thought you liked me wearing it," Amy said with a smile, looking down at the ring on her finger.

He frowned. "Yeah, but you could lose it! Cost….umm a lot of money, that."

She made a little 'ooh' noise, still looking at the ring. After a moment, though, she sighed and took it off, placing it in his open palm. "Fine. Spoilsport."

He started to head back to the TARDIS, waving her on ahead. "Go on, I'll catch you up!" He walked inside the ship and placed the ring into the little red box before setting it back onto the console with a little smile. He allowed himself only a moment of daydreaming before he snapped back to reality and walked out of the TARDIS, turning to pull the doors shut. When he turned back around, he nearly jumped out of his skin at the woman standing behind him. Clutching at his heart, he smiled sheepishly. "Er, hi."

"That was quick," she said with a smile.

"Was it?"

"It's great that you came," she went on, oblivious to his confusion.

A little boy popped his heard out from behind her, nearly giving Rory a heart attack again. "Bit retro, isn't it?" he asked, nodding to the TARDIS. "What is it, portable crime lab?"

Rory blinked, looking around at the spaceship. "Yeah, something like that." Might as well play along.

"Ambrose Northover," the woman said, holding out a hand. Still confused but ever polite, he shook it. "I was the one who called. I run the meals on wheels for the whole valley. This is my son, Elliot," she added, gesturing to the little boy, who'd worked his way over to the TARDIS and was examining the exterior.

He turned his face to look at Rory and cocked his head to one side. "Where's your uniform?"

Ambrose frowned. "Don't be cheeky, Elliot. He's plain clothes. CID, is it? Anyway, it's over here," she continued, not waiting for Rory to confirm that he was CID. Which he wasn't.

He nodded and started to follow her. "Um, yeah. Okay."

She led him over to an open grave, stopping beside it. Rory repressed a shudder and looked inside, relieved when he saw that it was empty. "It's a family plot, see," Ambrose told him, "My aunt Gladys died six years ago. Her husband, Alun, died a few weeks back. He lived in the house two doors down. There's not many of us left up here now."

"Mum," Elliot said with a little scoff, "he doesn't care about that. Tell him about the dead bodies!"

She shook her head a bit as if to clear it. "Right. Yes, well they always wanted to be buried in the same plot, together. But when we went to bury Uncle Alun, Gladys wasn't there. Gone. Body, coffin, everything."

Rory blinked. "What?"

"The mad thing is, on the surface, the grave was untouched. No signs of it having been messed with."

Rory took a step back, trying and failing to look nonchalant about it. "I'm sorry, I don't understand."

"Nobody has touched the grave since my aunt was buried," Ambrose said, looking him right in the eye, "But when they dug it open, the body was gone. How is that possible?"

DOCTOR WHO

"Who are you? What're you doing here? And what are you wearing?" the questions came at them rapid-fire the moment they stepped into the storeroom. Surprisingly, they all came from the mouth of one woman, standing with her arms crossed beside a large machine.

Amy glared at the Doctor. "We dressed for Rio," she grumbled, grinning a bit when she had to dodge a smack he sent her way.

"Ministry of Drills, Earth and Science. New Ministry, quite big, just merged," the Doctor said vaguely, pulling out the psychic paper and briefly waving it in front of the woman's face. "It's lot of responsibility on our shoulders. Don't like to talk about it," he continued, stowing the psychic paper and walking around to look over her shoulder at the screen. "What're you doing?"

"None of your business," the woman snapped, nudging him aside.

Rose stepped forward and placed a hand on his arm to pull him back a bit. "Sorry about that," she apologized to the woman, who looked more than a little peeved. "He's just a bit stressed, what with –"

"Where are you getting these readings?" the Doctor asked, cutting Rose off. Rose rolled her eyes and released his arm, knowing he wasn't going to give up.

"Under the soil," the woman said curtly, walking over to grab a large metal cylinder from some boxes nearby.

"The drill's up and running again," said a male voice, walking in through the door. He stopped short when he saw them. "What's going on? Who are these people?"

"Amy," Amy said, pointing to herself, "Rose, Donna, and the Doctor. And we were just about to leave, right, Doctor?" the last part was said with special emphasis to said Time Lord, who was currently crouched beside a large patch of dirt where the concrete had broken.

"Why've you got a patch of earth in the middle of your floor?" he asked, running the dirt through his fingers.

"We don't know," the woman admitted, her brows moving together. "It just appeared there overnight."

"And now you're just going to keep drilling?" Donna asked incredulously, "What if it's some endangered kind of giant mole or something?"

The woman looked at her, raising an eyebrow. "Giant mole?"

Donna crossed her arms defiantly. "Maybe."

"Nicely figured, Donna," the Doctor said, standing and walking to the screen again. "But no. Look at your screens – I'm sorry what was your name?"

"Nasreen Chaudhry," she said, standing a little taller.

"Well, look at your screens, Nasreen. It's shifting when it shouldn't be shifting," the Doctor said, tapping away at the buttons below the screen.

The readings began to change and the man who'd come in earlier ran over, shouting, "Get away from there! That's specialized equipment!"

Amy, the only one who hadn't been caught up in looking at the screen, bent over the patch of earth. "Is it supposed to be steaming like that?" she asked, sounding suspicious. And, sure enough, the patch had begun to emit a thick white gas that swirled around like fog.

The Doctor ran over, muttering what was probably a curse under his breath. "Shouldn't be," he exclaimed, looking down at it. "It shouldn't be shifting!"

"What shouldn't?" Nasreen cried, shouting to get his attention. There was a loud rumbling noise and the ground beneath their feet started to waver. And then it was shaking. Then it was full-on moving. With a little yelp, Donna jumped back from the computer as sparks began to fly from it.

"The ground, the soil, the earth, moving!" the Doctor cried, his hands kneaded into his hair. Rose absently wondered if that actually helped him think any better. "But how? Why?"

"Is it an earthquake?" Amy shouted, her arms out to the sides to help her balance.

The Doctor frowned, running to the computer and to the steam and back again. "Doubt it. It's only happening right under this room!"

"Is it an alien thing?" Rose asked, wracking her brain to remember anything like this from Torchwood or UNIT. She was drawing a blank.

The Doctor shot up to a straight-backed standing position, snapping his fingers and pointing at her. "Yes! No! The ground, it's attacking. The ground is attacking us," he concluded, shouting over the noise said ground was creating.

There was another violent movement that sent Amy and Nasreen sprawling to the ground, everyone else only remaining upright by whatever they'd been clinging to. "That's not possible," Nasreen argued, even as she was knocked down by the attacking earth. Holes began to open up in the ground, the concrete caving in and falling to what was probably some deep, dark pit of Hell.

The Doctor waved his hand about. "Yes, well, a lot of things are possible that actually aren't possible," he called, his eyes flicking briefly to Rose. "The important thing in this situation is….um…"

"Maybe we ought to run?" Donna suggested loudly, a big sheet of metal crashing down on the other side of the room as she spoke.

"Yes! Running would be a great idea," the Doctor agreed, already moving his feet towards the door.

There was a horrible scream and they turned to see the older man with his foot stuck in one of the rapidly-appearing holes. "Tony!" Nasreen shrieked, her hands flying to her mouth.

Amy was only a few feet from him and reached out a hand to help him out, but stopped with a scream. In the blink of an eye, she was down, waist-deep in the earth. "Amy!" Rose cried, already running to her.

The Doctor grabbed her by the shoulders and bodily forced her back. "Stay here," he ordered, looking at all of them. Then he ran back to Amy, grabbing her hand with both of his and pulling, though it was obviously futile.

Nasreen ignored his order to stay put and ran to the man who she'd called Tony, latching onto his arms like her own life depended on it.

Half a moment more and Rose and Donna had joined her, pulling on Tony's arms. He was freed in no time at all, and Rose stepped over a few inches to pull on Amy, who was desperately clawing at the ground with her free hand. She was up to her mid-torso in the earth now. "Don't let me fall!" she pleaded, her body jerking unnaturally as she fought whatever was pulling her down. "It's grabbing my feet – it's pulling me!"

"I'm not going to let you go, Amy," the Doctor promised, his hands squeezing hers tightly.

"Stop struggling!" Rose told her desperately, "You'll only make it worse!"

"Turn off the drill," the Doctor yelled, looking back at Nasreen and Tony. "Shut down the drill!"

"Go on!" Donna hollered when they didn't move. "Now!"

"Just hang on, Amy, just hang on!"

A/N I'm so sorry but I haven't had time to write at ALL lately. I'm not even kidding; I'm busy from 5am to 10 pm and then I always seem to have a boatload of homework to do. This chapter is actually unfinished, but it's all I've got for you until I have time again. Which may not be until umm Christmas break? Sorry?