Deep in the bowels of the Discovery, down within the lowest depths of the decks, a flash appeared out of nowhere.
Once the light vanished, the large and fearsome form of Admiral Ironwood was left behind. He stood menacingly with the hairs on his face furled in fury. Within the room were endless lines of soldiers held within stasis pods, just waiting to be awakened and begin the war.
Ironwood ignored all of them. His eyes locked on a weapons rack stationed at the end of the room. He strode with confident power and grabbed one of the guns forcefully. He caressed and cradled it with that wicked grin spread once again across his face.
'You deaths await. Starting with that blasted Time
* * *
Content with the adjustments she'd made, the Huntress did one more quick check. To the ordinary human eye, it was just two teleport capsules sat atop one another.
She had her sonic screwdriver held firmly in her right hand whilst her left hand was occupied with the mobile phone held at her ear, still connected to Will.
'Alright, right hand out and eyes closed. Keep calm and... Incoming!'
She used the sonic and the capsules disappeared.
Aboard the Fortress, Will was still in the makeshift storage room with his arm now extended out and his eyes closed. He wait and even scrunched his face with anxiety until he felt a slight pressure in the palm of his hand.
He quickly flung his eyelids open and saw an orange capsule thing now sat there. Just one. Will picked it up with two fingers and observed it closely, examining every angle.
'I know I seem panicked and all, but this seems kinda extreme' he half answer and half observed as he looked over every speck of the capsule. It was smaller than expected.
'Don't you dare swallow it! It'll kill you!'
Will immediately extended his arm out as far away as possible without dropping the object. From intrigue to hate in moment. He couldn't hide his eye rolling annoyance this time, as demonstrated by his eye rolling.
'Thanks for the head up. Could have been a little late, you know?'
'It's a teleportation device used by the Sea Devils. I've used my sonic to implant co-ordinates to the Discovery's bridge. I can remote activate it from here'
'Sea Devils? No, forget that! Why the bloody hell did I come aboard this blasted ship then! Everything I have done here is pointless!' he can't help but shout in frustration.
'You were planning to stop the invasion force with a shield device on board. Plans change. Anyway, you ready to go?'
'Ye...'
Mid-answer, the door forcefully swung open and a soldier stepped over the doorway, entering the room and looking at Will. In a swift yet gliding movement, the armoured Sea Devil drew its weapon.
The moment its fired, Will dived to the right just in time to avoid the shot. His shoulder jolted and shuddered in pain upon impact with the floor. Luckily, he hadn't let go of the phone or capsule, much to his bodies painful dismay.
'A soldiers found me!'
The Huntress used her sonic, but nothing happened. She fiddled with it and attempted numerous times which also failed. She grew frantic and panic ridden.
'No, no, no, no! Not now!'
Meanwhile, Will took his chance to make the soldier slip over by kicking his lower leg. Will had noticed before the shot that he was standing in a thick puddle of water, the slippery kind. Thank you, Atwood.
Will ran around the soldier and started running away, hoping to escape long enough to be transported aboard the Discovery.
'Better quicken that pace, he'll be on my tail any minute now!' he hastened at her.
'I can't get a lock, the distance is too much! You need to buy me some time!'
She rushes to one of the disassembled consoles and starts hooking cables to her sonic. Will continues to sprint through the ship, hearing the clunk of the heavy boots on the ground with loud splashes behind him.
'I bet Gray's barely breaking a sweat right now' Will says to himself, trying to distract himself from his approaching peril.
* * *
'AARRGGHH!!!!' screams Gray as he is clutched upside down to the rope in between the Discovery and the Salvation.
He can feel his grip endlessly slipping from the spray of the river water below followed by the cold sweat he broke out in before he finally started the terrifying climb.
'Don't stop now! Your nearly halfway there now!' Kate coached from the Discovery. That's all she'd been doing since she told him he'd have to climb across. Constant pushing and coaching.
She rubbed her temple as she watched Gray. The headache she had now was becoming unbearable. In all of the adventures she'd experienced with the Doctor, this was somehow the most perilous for her. Bear in mind, she had already fallen out a plane, negotiated peace between zygons on earth and dealt with an invasion of killer cubes.
Then we have Gray hanging from the rope, feeling his heart nearly beat out of his chest even time he shuffled an inch towards the Discovery. He positioned his body to climb up the rope so every time he tilted his head backwards, all he saw was the distant figure of Kate, upside down.
'Just tell me I'm halfway! Least it'd make me feel better!' he screamed back, continuing to edge forward bit by bit.
Kate shook her head in frustration, 'Fine! Your really close now! Keep going!'
As the two shouted back and forth, neither one felt nor noticed the rope. As Gray jolted it and made it move, the end attached to the Salvation was slipping. The knot on the hook was coming loose, unravelling quicker each time.
Kate leaned over the railing as Gray grew nearer. His sobs of fear were getting louder each minute. Gray on the other hand felt nothing but dread and terror. His hands were burning from his constant tight grip on the rope, his legs kept shaking as they threatened to lose all strength and to make things even worse, his vision was blurring. Must be from hanging his head upside down to see his progress. Big mistake.
There was roughly thirty feet of distance left for Gray to travel. Gray was finally smiling again, safety was in reach.
Kate thought about reaching out and pulling him the rest of the way. Unfortunately, she wouldn't get that kind of break as a moment after that very thought, the rope fell on the Salvations end and all she saw was Gray start to fall, still holding tightly onto the rope. She could have sworn she heard a scream from behind her but was too focused on the calamity occurring before her.
As Gray swung down and hit the side of the ship, the pressure on the rope was too much. It unravelled from her end and started to drop.
Just in time, Kate managed to grab hold of the end tightly in her hands and steady it with her feet and legs anchored down using the railing. She felt the rope slipping a centimetre at a time through her fingers and tried to counteract it, but it was no good. She simply wasn't strong enough.
'What are you waiting for!? Climb up already!' she yelled in pain, looking down to where Gray would be but not daring to physically move her head. Any lose of concentration would assure the loss of her grip along with Gray.
Gray was fuelled by desperation, clutching to the wet rope which became more and more slippery from the rivers spray. He was never good at climbing at vertical rope. He'd always managed to slip when he was perhaps halfway. Sometimes his grip just slipped, or he was simply too tired. Thank god for fear, adrenaline and the will to live.
He made great climbing progress now he knew his time was by the second. Every tug on the rope however was becoming more agonising for Kate.
She had already been dragged at great speed, thrown into a metal elevator wall, restrained and dumped forcefully into a mud-infested tunnel. Add in all the running, panic and pain into one great disadvantage and add it as well. That was the state of Kate right now, the some woman holding a grown man's life by a rope secured solely by her own two hands. A rope which was slipping faster.
'Hurry!' Kate shouted in urgency. She gritted her teeth and forced her body down more to hold herself in place. Last thing she wanted was to keep hold of a rope but get thrown overboard with it.
Gray was seconds from being dropped, but as he looked up he was so close. Just a few more powerful pulls and he'd make it.
Three.
Two.
One.
His arm reached as far as he could physically make it. Contact.
'Gotcha!' Kate exclaimed, her right arm held down and wrapped around it was Gray's arm. Gray used his other arm to grab the railing and start hoisting himself up onto the ship.
Without even realising it, Kate had already let go of the rope. She finally looked down and saw her other hand was empty. As she looked, she couldn't help but smile a wide and relieved smile as he let her body relax.
Rolling over the top of the railing, Gray let his body just drop onto the deck. It hurt the back of his head and his back but he didn't care. He was alive and more to the point, on board the Discovery.
In exhaustion, Kate's legs wobbled to the point of giving out. She allowed her body to relax further and sit down. After that whole ordeal, it was the least she deserved.
'How...' Kate finally spoke in a buff, struggling to catch her breath. 'How on earth do they do it, I wonder?'
Gray narrowed his stare and looked over at Kate, puzzled. 'Do what? Not fall? What?'
'Companions, Gray. How do Time Lord's companions manage this all the time?'
Gray relaxed his head back and let himself smile whilst observing the clouds above. A moment of no worries and calm.
'Ask yourself, Kate. Looks like your one now' Gray answer gaily. All Kate could do was lay back near Gray, look up at the sky and laugh herself. After all this time, now she knows the extent of those little things she was missing. And though she was in pain and there was still an earth-level threat occurring all around her, she couldn't help but enjoy herself.
Cassie watched from a distance, smiling herself as she watched them laugh. She arrived right when Gray rolling onto deck.
'Maybe there is something beyond the aliens and pain...' she whispered to
* * *
'Ah, yes! That's the ticket!' exclaimed the Huntress gleefully as she pulled out her sonic from the bowels of a stripped console. It had an endless supply of wired attached to it and its glow changed between a purple and a teal.
'Sorry... promise its just for a little while'
She started patting her pockets frantically and found nothing. She then started searching around the console she was working on and couldn't find what she was looking for.
'Uh-oh. Hold on, Will! Almost there!' she shouted as loud as she could, hoping her voice would be picked up by the missing phone.
* * *
'Almost isn't close enough!' Will angerly yelled back into his phone, not knowing that the Huntress wouldn't even here his protest.
He'd managed to barricade himself in another room with a more old-fashioned door. He used multiple chairs to lock the doors turn handle in place. The soldier on the other side had started using force to try and knock the whole thing down. Unlikely as it was, it sounded like it may do just that.
The room he was in seemed to be someone's quarters. Single berth, a bit more spacious too.
Will looked around to distract himself from the terrifying noise coming from the weakening door and spotted what he was looking for. On the bedside table was a phone frame. He recognised someone in it almost instantly.
'Atwood...' he sadly spoke as he studied the photo of her and a young boy.
Feeling it under his fingers, Will looked at the capsule again. It seemed so hollow and empty to look at. How was something as simple and dull as this such a high-tech piece of equipment. I mean, a teleport?
Suddenly, the banging stopped. Silence fell upon the room. Already trapped with nothing else to do, Will allowed himself to slowly approach the door again. It stayed silent and remained so, even when his hand rested itself on the metal door.
All he felt was the slight vibration from the ships movement.
With his curiosity rising, he let his ear rest on the door. Perhaps he'd hear the direction of the soldier he prayed was leaving.
No. It wasn't leaving.
His whole head was met by sudden heat.
Will jumped back a yelped uncontrollably. They were going to melt through the door.
'Huntress!' he shouted, closing his eyes to block out everything around him. Was this truly it?
'What?' came the calm voice of a familiar female.
Will flew his eyes open and couldn't believe it. He never even felt the capsule's mass disappear to nothing in his hand or felt the sudden flash of nausea which now washed over him violently.
'Thank you.'
He collapsed in a cold sweat into the rotten sea water. The Huntress manage to catch his head and torso before them impacted with the ground.
She laid him down gently and sighed, shaking her head at him. 'You are a strange one, Will Mayweather. Question is, what path will you choose when it comes to your future I wonder?'
As she took a moment to ponder on her words, she heard a familiar sound. The gushing of water, rising before her into the height and shape of a human body.
Her express turned dark and he eyes lifted up to the forms face which was forming out of sight.
She smiled. 'I wondered how long it would be before you showed up.'