The Dreamer Who Changed

6

I slam my fist as hard as I can into Lulu's stomach. She doubles over in pain, and I kick her to the floor. I take her keys from the beltloop on the back of her pants. I unlock the door, then dash out of the room to find the Doctor. The main room is still dark like it was about ten minutes ago. "Doctor! Doctor, where are you?" I shout.

I hear a door opens across from me. A person rams into me, and fall to the ground. "Doctor? Doctor, is that you?"

"Yes! Thank god, Kathryn, I found you," he replies. He helps me up. We run to the TARDIS doors. "No! Daniel! Where is he?"

The sound of a door knob being jiggled hits my ears. I follow the sound until my hand rests on a doorknob. It must be locked from the inside, and he doesn't have a key! I bend down, and slide my key under the door slot. The knob suddenly turns, and Daniel walks out, only to explode into white goo, for the third time that day. I roll my eyes. "Oh, c'mon!" I groan.

I stomp back into the TARDIS. I press first dot. The Doctor clicks a button, the TARDIS lands, same old, same old. I open the left door slightly to check if there are any lights. Luckily, there are. I motion for the Doctor to follow me. I open the door fully. Not a single life-form in sight. Weird. "Doctor? Why no Zygons?"

"There's a pattern."

"What?"

"There's a pattern. Our first location was the fifth, but there were three Zygons. Second was the twelfth, but then, only ten Zygons. Third, eighth, but six Zygons. Whichever location you choose, you subtract two, and you have the number of aliens! This is Dot #1. 1 minus 2 is -1. You can't have negative things. Thus, no Zygons. Simple as that," the Doctor explains.

I realize something. "So, if there are no guards...is there even a Daniel?" I ask.

"No. No, I suppose not," the Doctor answers. "Although, the right thing to do would be to see if he is. No man left behind, am I right?"

"Yeah," I mumble. I sonic the room with my own personal screwdriver. Nothing. "That settles it. Back to the time machine!"

We return to the TARDIS. The Doctor reasons: "Due to the discovered pattern, we should choose the location we know will have the least amount of Zygons, which would be Three. Three minus two is one. One Zygon. But, I mean, no pressure, right?"

I swat his arm. "Stop that!" He gestures to the screen. "Ugh. Fine, let's see. How about Three? Choose Three."

He types in the coordinates, and the TARDIS lands a moment later. I pop my out out the door again. Daniel stands in front of the far wall. "Toss me your screwdriver!" He throws it to me. I catch it. "Stay in the TARDIS," I demand. I grimace. "I got this."

I step out, and close the doors behind me. I walk up to Daniel. "You, my friend, are fooling no one. Normalize." Instantly, Daniel turns into a Zygon. "Great. Now that that's over, let's get down to business." I hold the two sonic screwdrivers in front of me. I press both triggers, and a horrible, higher-than-the-highest-possible-note buzz fills the entire room. The Zygon kneels to the floor, holding his hands to his ears in agony. I kick him to the floor, and whip open the door behind him. Daniel sits in a chair. "Sorry, honey," I apologize. I sonic him. Naturally, a white mess replaces him on the chair.

I dash back to the TARDIS. "Wrong Daniel!" I inform the Doctor. "Let's try Four."

A minute of wheezing and whining later, the TARDIS parks. The Doctor and I walk out of the time machine. We're outside of my house. I raise an eyebrow. Why would they hide Daniel by my house. I take the Doctor's hand. "Our backyard is a jungle. If there's anywhere you wanna hide someone, my backyard is it. The grass is almost 7 feet tall, I swear."

"Let's go, then!" We sprint into my house. I slide open our back door, and we enter the backyard. I close the door behind us. "Well, I see now you weren't exaggerating," the Doctor grumbles. He looks around. "Small backyard. Where do you think Daniel is?"

A bad feeling creeps up on me. My eyes widen, and I stiff up. "Doctor...don't turn around. If you do, you'll be shot," I warn him. "Just look in the corner of your eye."

My eyes move to both corners. With my peripheral vision, I can just make out lumberjack-like men. Both brown-haired and heavily bearded, both wearing flannel long-sleeves, jeans, and boots. The only thing un-lumberjack-like is the gun both of them are holding. "Congratulations, Doctor. Kathryn. You've found your friend for real. But now you have to die," the man directly behind me threatens.

That's when everything goes wrong.

The back door slides open, and my brother of all people, steps out. He looks at me. "Kate? Who are these people? Why are they holding guns?"

I smile. "Wesley, go back into the house, and stay there. Don't do anything!" I say.

"No! Tell me who these people are!"

"Wesley! Back in thee house, now!" I demand.

"Don't yell at me!" he snaps.

The man behind the Doctor growls, "Who is this child?"

"Pay attention! He's my brother!" I explain. "Wesley! If you go back into the house, I'll do your chores for a week."

"Month!"

I roll my eyes. "Fine! A month!"

Suddenly, I hear a gun being cocked. I look back to find Lumberjack #2's gun being pointed at my brother's head. I spin around, snatch Lumberjack #1's gun. I hold it to his head. "Either one of you hurt my brother? You won't live to see tomorrow."

The Doctor puts his hands up. "Hold up, all of you! No one will be using any guns!"

I break away from the small square of chaos. I walk over to my brother. "Bad things are about to happen. You need to stay inside." I attempt to push him in the house, but he doesn't budge. "Come on!"

The gun in Lumberjack #2's hand clicks. It's about to fire! "Enough of this!" he roars. His finger rests on the trigger.

"Wesley!" I scream. The gun goes off, and I push him to the ground right as the bullet goes through my body.