"It's... stable."
"Of course it is." Morbius said, running her hands up and down her new neck, feeling the new flesh. Feeling anything after so long in that hellish isolation from the material form. "Did you expect anything less?"
"Given what you've said about the particulars about a body, I'm surprised."
"Your Company's progenation machines do good work, Mr. Bishop." Morbius said, standing once more, having changed into robes more fitting of her former station. Not quite the grand splendor of her home, but the silvery-gray color of the cloth was quite pleasing to her. "The lack of regenerations is a bit of a problem, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it."
"And this body will allow you to pilot your TARDIS?"
"Oh, yes." Morbius nodded. "I can feel it in this new body. She inherited that fact of our biology from her darling father. I suppose, when I am done here, I'll have to find him... after all, we are both Time Lords." She gave a deep laugh, but it suddenly stopped. "He... he doesn't know... he thinks I'm dead..." Her face fell, eyes filming over with unshed tears. "He thinks... he thinks I'm..."
"Morbius!"
"What?!" Morbius' head whipped back toward the taller man, rage in her eyes.
"Are you quite alright?" Bishop asked.
"I... yes. Yes, of course I am." Morbius said, not feeling her fist clench. "Have we gotten over the site of the mines?"
"Yes, we were about to open it up." Bishop said. "Provided what you said about the TARDIS and its defensive capabilities." Once more, Morbius laughed.
"It is the pinnacle of Time Lord technological development, Mr. Bishop." The Time Lord told him. "I would be greatly surprised if your weapons could even scratch it..."
"Captain, there's nothing I can do!"
"All hands, brace for impact!" Jones grabbed onto the nearest railing, had squeezing tight as he closed his eyes and awaited the inevitable. Suddenly, he heard the engines kicking back on. He opened his eyes. "What the-?"
"Captain, we've got control! And the tractor beam is off of us!"
"Get us out of range! Now!" Jones said. Dahh-Regg nodded, activating the thrusters and pushing them down and out of the way of the oncoming Cook... just barely. As the Cook continued to drift off, the captain stood there confused.
"What the hell happened?" Jones asked.
"That would be me." The voice of Andrew came through the PA system.
"Caitlinson? What did you-?" Jones asked.
"Captain Jones, listen! I disabled the tractor beam, but it won't last long. I tried to get the Cook, but I don't have their ship ident. You have to get out of here, get to the Shadow Proclamation."
"What? The Shadow Proclamation? Why?" Jones asked.
"The Company found a weapon on the planet. It's in the mines. They're going to use it... someone... someone has to stop them. Someo-" The communication was cut.
"Caitlinson? Caitlinson!"
"The line's been cut, Captain. From that end." Dahh-Regg said. "Where to now?"
"Bring us around, keep us out of tractor beam range." Jones said. "We're going after Caitlinson..."
"What about the Shadow Proclamation?"
"After we get our man. Not before." Jones said. "Look in the records under Slipstream... I have a plan."
"So... a little saboteur in our ship, eh?"
"What have you done to Jenny?" Andrew, having been dragged from the bridge, had taken a few punches to the stomach and the face before being dropped in front of Bishop... and Jenny. His question had been directed at Bishop, standing to Jenny's left. "Fix what you've done to her right now or-"
"I'm afraid, Mr. Caitlinson, that you are in no position to demand anything." Bishop said. "Your record has been impeccable up to this point. Why the change?"
"Why the change? Why the change?!" Andrew asked, trying to stand to his feet and once more getting a suckerpunch in the gut. He coughed out a bit.
"Yes. That is the question that I asked you." Bishop said.
"It matters not." Morbius said. She leaned over, making sure that she met Andrew's gaze. "The girl is gone. Your pitiful attempts to impress her are meaningless."
"What in the hell are you?" Andrew coughed out.
"I am called Morbius. There are some who call me the General, the Conqueror, the Monster. My favorite title, however... is the Warlord." Morbius' lips curled into a smirk. "And I shall bring war to all corners of creation. I will light a fire that will burn the universe to its core for what has been done to me."
"Done to you? What are you talking about?"
"This body... the body of this girl, this... Jenny..." Morbius explained. "It is the first true flesh I have inhabited in millennia. My original was destroyed... by my people. The Time Lords."
"The Time Lords..." Andrew echoed, having a thought. "Jenny's father... the Doctor. He's-"
"Yes." Morbius cut him off. "Yes, I will tend to the Doctor in due time. He is the reason I am in such a state as this."
"The Doctor..." Andrew coughed out.
"Yes, boy. The Doctor. Your grasp of multi-syllable words is comforting." Morbius flicked her eyes over toward Bishop. "Have him thrown ou-" She stopped, suddenly, her eye twitching. "No... no, he stays with us."
"Morbius, you-" Bishop began.
"Do as I say!" Morbius spat at him. "Cuff him and bring him along. The Doctor has his companions, I think I shall take on this one as well. Open up the mine."
"With pleasure..." Bishop said in a flat tone that implied heavily that it was anything but.
The blast was indeed visible to the crew of the Champlain, witnessing it cut through the space between itself and Milax Five below.
"Vagabond's tin! What in the stars?!" Dah-Regg exclaimed incredulously.
"Cut the chatter! Get into position!" Jones barked. "Long as that beam is going, we have an opening." He tapped a key on the communications controls. "Vortex, you have the transmat ready?"
"Ready to go, Cap'n."
"On my mark." Jones said. The Champlain swung around under Bishop's larger vessel, hiding within its own slipspace blindspot, the perfect angle to pull off a transmat beam undetected. "Mark!"
"Uh, Cap'n, we got a problem."
"What is it?" Jones yelled.
"Feedback loop! It's building up in the transmat beam!" Dah-Regg said, reading the displays at his station.
"Vortex! Close it up! Close it up right now!" Jones barked.
"I can't-" The man's voice was suddenly cut off by a massive explosion, one felt even on the bridge as the entirety of the Champlain was rocked.
"What in the hell was-?"
"They must have rigged Caitlinson's transponder!" Dah-Regg said, holding onto the station to stay steady as the ship was rocked. "Captain, we have to withdraw!"
"Get us upright first!" Jones yapped.
"The controls are dead! I...Captain, we've been deadlocked!" Dah-Regg slammed his hands against the controls in frustration. Jones felt his heart dropped. The beam of light from Bishop's vessel faded and the shield once more came up, trapping them all within. "...we're being hailed, Captain."
"Onscreen." Bishop appeared before their eyes on the screen once more.
"Mr. Jones... you have caused no end of trouble."
"Give me back my crew, you murderous, horn-rimmed wearing son of a-!" Jones spat.
"Mind your tone, sir. You are only adding to your list of infractions." Bishop said. "Prepare yourselves, gentlemen... one of the last sights you see will be of the Company's crowning glory..." The screen went dead there, Jones slamming his fist into the nearby wall as he exhaled his rage.
"Prick!" Jones snapped.
"Captain, they're pulling us into one of their docking bays." Dahh-Regg reported.
"No! Really?!" Jones nearly spat all over the Crespallion, but turned away before he could. "We're sitting ducks, then..." The remnants of the Champlain were being pulled onto Bishop's ship, a tractor beam pulling them in just as before. At the very least, this time, they weren't careening toward another ship...
"Stop. FIGHTING ME!" The girl was proving to be much more strong-willed than he had first anticipated. "You are nothing compared to me! Nothing!"
"Really? Because you look like I'm giving you a lot of trouble." Jenny said. The strain of their mental combat was clear on her as well. While she wasn't able to defeat him, neither was he able to break fully through her mental barriers. The perfect stalemate... from a child. To say he was infuriated would be a gross under-exaggeration.
"Submit to my authority...I already have control of your body. Now give me your mind, girl!" Morbius snapped.
"Like I'm going to give into someone like you." Jenny replied. "I don't think Dad would be too happy if I did that." Her stubborn resistance had revealed just the tiniest little thing, the smallest nick in her armor that he could exploit. A wound he could press upon, already glimpsed in those narrow corridors of her mind that he could peek into.
"Your father..." Morbius laughed lightly. "Your father does not even know you're alive."
"That's why I'm going to find him. Once I kick you out of here." Jenny said.
"Oh, but you haven't yet seen it, have you?" Morbius asked. "I told you that your father and I are both Time Lords. Did I not tell you what a TARDIS does?"
"It's a travel machine for-"
"Exploring the length, breadth, and depth of space and time, girl!" Morbius was laughing. As he did, the ghostly image of his face became... more solid, more defined, showing a visage that Jenny would find all too familiar. In fact, one that was like looking into a mirror...
"He-"
"Yes." Morbius laughed. "Yes, Jenny...your father could be literally anywhere in all of space and time. You will never find him..."
"I... I will..."
"Child, do you have any idea what the entirety of space and time is?" Morbius asked. "I'll show you what the entirety is." Her momentary doubt, just in that second, had allowed him to slip into that crack. And he dropped into her mind all that he knew of. Stars being born, stars dying. Life springing up on worlds across the cosmos and others in the billions and billions of years in the future as those worlds were laid waste in the grand show that was the universe. He showed her Gallifrey. The eons and eons of their civilization that all perished in fire and flames. At its very heart, that untempered schism... the burning heart at the very center of Time Lord society. "Look into the light, Jenny... look at that. The raw power of space and time..."
"It's... it's..." Jenny's eyes were aglow as she gazed at it. The birthright of any Time Lord. After a moment, though, she screamed and turned away and it was at that moment that Morbius struck. In the mindscape he had created, he cast the broken pieces of the Capitol dome upon Jenny. She screamed and those screams were deafened as she was buried in mounds upon mounds of rubble, raining down upon her until she had vanished completely beneath all of it.
"The end." Morbius smiled, fully cemented into his... or rather her... new body.
"Morbius, we are above the site." Bishop said. "Ready to move on your orders." Morbius walked over to Andrew, snatching the young man up by his throat and looking at him.
 |
| Image credit to Mr. Borsch (found via Google) |
"The girl is gone. Only Morbius remains..." The Time Lady declared. "Prepare for our descent, Mr. Bishop. Mark this day. For this is the day that Morbius rises!"
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