Travellers' Hearts {The Wattys 2017}

Chapter 12

The room around Kate was still blurry, but slowly regaining shape. Her head was spinning, not letting her grasp a clear thought, and it took her a few seconds to realise that she was on all fours on the carpet in Jackie Tyler's living room. In that moment, Kate doubted that she had felt sicker than that more than a few times in her whole life - not sick from travelling, but from what she had seen just seconds ago. Slowly, a shadow gained shape in front of her. 'Kate, what happened?', she could hear the distant voice of Rose. 'Come on, help me get her on the sofa', Kate heard the Doctor respond, and suddenly, four hands were helping her up and half carrying, half dragging her on a small couch nearby.

It took Kate less time than she would've guessed to regain complete consciousness. Maybe it was because she felt embarassed upon showing how weak she was; in any case, as soon as Rose and the Doctor had laid her down, she sat up straight again and started talking. 'Doctor, I've done it!', she exclaimed excitedly. 'I've found the Master, and I've brought him to a sealed-off pla-' 'Where did you bring him?', she was interrupted by the Doctor, who, to her surprise, could hardly look unhappier than right now. Kate pursed her lips and raised an eyebrow at him, but he looked away; the Doctor's face had gone pale and wore a sickly expression. Finally, Kate gave in. 'To Pan', she sighed, pulling a strand of hair from behind her ear. 'What's Pan?', asked Rose, who had been busy with brushing the shoe prints off her mother's carpet, and had only caught up a few words. Kate swallowed hard. All the sickness she had felt before seemed to crash back in a split of a second, hitting her stomach with a wave of pain. 'I'm sorry!', she panted; the Doctor's face had gotten sickly pale and grey-ish, his eyes looked at her in horror and faint disgust. 'What's Pan?!' Rose's voice grew more and more panicky with every second. 'It's not what, it's where', the Doctor finally answered, still not looking at them. 'And it's hell. Real hell. Pandemonium.'

'Real hell?!' Rose looked at the Doctor in disbelief. 'Are you trying to tell me that there's something like hell??' He nodded slowly. 'Yes, there is. I mean... No. It's a planet from legends and stuff - they say the devil lives there.' 'The devil?', Rose interrupted him. 'But there's no such thing, there can't be!' 'There is', the Doctor said, his voice low and serious, 'I saw it. It was when I was just a child - my friends and I crashed there with a prototype of the Tardis, and I swear, it was the devil, I saw it from the time machine.' Kate nodded in agreement, though Rose wasn't sure what she was agreeing to. 'And you left the Master... there?', he asked, his voice on the edge to breaking. Kate was pretty sure that he had intended to say 'in hell', and a wave of sorrow rushed through her body as she realised that he had been the only other Time Lord left back in the Doctor's and her universe before someone had, for to her unknown reasons, killed him. Slowly and truly sorry, Kate nodded. 'I didn't mean to go to Pan, but he was trying to escape and struggling to loosen my grip, and it hurt so much, I just sort of stumbled and landed there, and then he let go and then-' A sob interrupted her speech, and she wiped away a single tear that was rolling down her cheek. 'I saw it', she whispered quietly, 'and I was horrified, I remembered the terrible things it had done to so many, and I escaped.' She looked down, ashamed of her cowardly behaviour. The Doctor moved closer to her until he could wrap his arm around her back and carefully patted her back. 'Okay', he said. There were minutes of silence before anyone spoke again.

What broke the silence was a proposal that surprised both Rose and the Doctor. The proposal was made by Kate: 'I need to go back!', she suddenly informed them and jumped on her feet, leaving them flabbergasted. 'What do you mean by You'll go back? Kate, you can't! It's far too dangerous!' The Doctor rushed towards her and squeezed her arm tightly, but Kate freed herself in an energetic move. 'Doctor, this thing... I think it's the reason why Pan has suddenly reappeared after hundreds of years. When I landed there, I saw scattered glass, I -' She paused, giving him a piercing look. 'I think that thing escaped. Doctor, the Master, he's going to die if we don't go back!' The Doctor avoided her gaze. 'He should', he murmured, his eyes glassy. Rose grabbed his hand and laid one hand on his cheek. She turned his head to make him face her. 'Is it safe?', she whispered quietly. 'That... devil. If it escaped... Isn't that dangerous?' There was a moment of silence. The Doctor swallowed. 'It might be', he finally responded. Rose nodded, seeming strengthened by that. 'Then, we need to find it and defeat it. Because that's what you do, Doctor. You save worlds, you save civilisations. Isn't that what you would do?' Rose lifted her head and looked the Doctor in the eye. Everything about her was pleading, and it made him want to run away and never look back again, but he knew that that was exactly what he couldn't do. Because all his life, he had been running, and he was done. This once, he would face his destiny and save the Master. 'And should it turn out that he's planning to destroy the universe again, I will send him straight back to hell immediately afterwards!'

'Alright. Kate, you can take me there. Rose, you'll stay here, it's too dangerous!' 'I can't! Doctor, I won't leave you, I promised so long time ago!', Rose demurred definitely. 'Rose, I won't let you come! Kate, don't you dare take her with us!', he commanded Kate, who slowly shook her head. 'Doctor, you can't leave her here. She can stay in the Tardis, but we might need her.' Rose sighed in relief; she was glad that Kate was being honest with them. However, it was the Doctor who reminded her of the first time that she had travelled in the Tardis alone: 'We can't take the Tardis with us. I'm sorry. If that really is the worst thing we could possibly face, imagine what it could do with a time machine! No way!' Kate nodded, signaling that she understood. 'Okay, let's go! Take me by my hand', she told them. 'Rose, no!', the Doctor exclaimed again, but it was too late. 'I'm sorry', Kate murmured, before she tightened her grip.

To Pandemonia it be.