Fic: Solid Skies, Chapter 1/?
Jun. 7th, 2009 06:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
veldeiaSolid Skies
by Veldeia
Series: Sequel to Hollow World
Fandom: Doctor Who
Warnings: WIP
Characters/Pairings: 10th Doctor, Martha Jones, OCs. Gen.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: If you've seen it on TV, it isn't mine.
Summary: After surviving one big cave, the Doctor, Martha and a caving team from the Sixties find themselves in even more trouble on a planet full of caves.
1. City of Lights, Upper North Entrance
"So, how do we get down there?" Martha asked, gazing at the magnificent view before them: the mind-bogglingly huge cave chamber, and on its floor, hundreds of feet below the platform they stood on, the city with its countless lights, in more colours than she could name. "I really hope it doesn't include free fall, crawling, climbing, squeezing through tight places, or wading in ice-cold water." Her right wrist still ached in memory of the adventures they'd had in a cave on Earth.
"We could just take the lift," Jess told her, nodding backwards at a door in the smooth rock wall right next to where the TARDIS stood. Martha had completely missed it earlier. "But I recommend the scenic route," Jess gestured to their left, where the parapet in front of them went on for several more feet, and then dipped down, apparently forming one edge of a stairway.
Short, sinewy and pale, with close-cropped white hair and light yellow eyes, Jess was a Khiandrian - a native of the planet they currently stood on, a world where all the inhabitants lived in a vast network of caves beneath the barren surface. She had been in self-imposed exile on Earth for twenty years, from the 1940's to the 60's, but now, after they'd survived a nerve-racking trip through Lechuguilla Cave in New Mexico, the Doctor and Martha had brought her back home with her human boyfriend and the two other members of their caving team.
"I vote for the scenic route," Joseph, the stocky cave photographer spoke up.
"Oh yeah, me too," agreed Grant, the grey-haired geologist, the stern leader of the caving party.
"What are we waiting for, then?" the Doctor exclaimed, already heading for the stairs in brisk steps.
Brian, Jess's boyfriend, a rather handsome school teacher in his thirties, stopped him with a question. "Doctor, wait - what about the petromites?"
The Doctor came to a quick halt and spun around. "It always comes down to that, doesn't it? What about the petromites. But they're home now - we could just open the doors and let them loose. This is their natural environment, after all." He raised his eyebrows at Jess. "What do you think?"
The petromites were another species native to the planet, a species of termite-like insects, which ate rock, and built beautiful crystal castles for their queens. Some had stowed away with Jess when she had run away from the planet as a teenager, and if Martha and the Doctor hadn't run into them on Earth and brought them here, they might have caused major mayhem there. Martha had assumed the problem was entirely sorted now that they'd brought the petromites back home.
"Um, no, I don't think that would be a good idea," Jess replied. "That's the population of an entire nest we have there. We don't know how many petromites are already in this area, whether the ones we brought could join an existing nest or if they'd need to start building from scratch, and anyway, they'll need a caretaker, and there are rules and regulations to follow, so..."
"So, they'll have to wait in the TARDIS until we've contacted the local authorities," the Doctor said, looking slightly taken aback. "What if they get hungry in the meantime?"
"I already told you they're too puzzled by your ship to touch it, didn't I? Besides, if they find themselves stuck in a hostile environment - like without food - they'll go into hibernation. They can survive for long periods almost anywhere. That's one of the reasons why they're so good at spreading to other planets."
"All right, then. A little hibernation never did anyone any harm. More like the opposite. I'm living and concussion-free proof of that!" the Doctor declared, with a wide grin. "Now that's settled, let's go see the sights!"
He lead the way to the stairs and down. Martha followed him, and the cavers came behind her. The stone steps were so steep that she had to keep looking at her feet, but she did catch a few more glimpses of the city. She felt like she could stare at it for hours, and everyone else seemed to be feeling the same way. The Doctor was staring at the view so intently that Martha was amazed he didn't trip on his feet and fall on his nose. Joseph and Grant kept pointing out details to each other, both about the city and the vast cavern, which looked natural, although Martha figured the Khiandrians must've made it bigger, somehow.
"What about those straws and stalactites up there, in the ceiling, Jess?" Grant asked. "They've got to be pretty big. What if one of them grows so heavy that it breaks and falls?"
"That won't happen," Jess assured him. "There are force fields to prevent that sort of thing. If one should fall, it would be pulverised and just rain on the city as fine dust."
"Should I know what a 'force field' is?" Joseph said.
"Oh, your people won't invent those in many, many years," the Doctor told him.
The descent was a long one. Martha wondered how many hundred stairs there were - she hadn't been keeping count. The stairway was carved from the rock face itself. Every now and then, there was a small landing, and the stairs changed direction, forming a wide zigzag pattern in the cliff side. The last landing, however, was bigger than the rest, and the last flight of stairs was wide and massive, at a right angle to the rock face. It rather reminded Martha of the stairs in front of a museum or a temple, making the final approach particularly impressive.
Where level ground began, so did the city. There were some edifices in the cliff side itself, including, by the looks of them, a gift shop and several cafés and restaurants. Martha couldn't even imagine what sort of food they would eat down here. Not far from the wall stood the first buildings. They came in all sizes and shapes, from tall pillars, like artificial stalagmites, to strange crystal clusters, like the khirindals in petromite nests. There were some perfectly unremarkable, rectangular houses as well, which could've been from anywhere on Earth.
"It's so... different!" Brian breathed. He was holding Jess's hand.
"This is probably the most familiar-looking place you'll see on the planet," Jess told him. "There aren't many cities that are built like this, all out in the open."
"Oh," he said, surprised. "There's so much I don't know about your home! I want to learn everything. Where do we begin?"
"Actually, we should tend to the official matters first - and before anything else, I need to contact my family. My uncle used to live here, at a walking distance from where we are. Let's see if I can still remember the place, and if he's still there."
Jess guided them to a street between low buildings, which Martha took for a residential area, with both detached and row houses. Some of the houses had gardens, with intricate displays of stones and crystals and strange cave formations, as well as alien plants, mosses and lichens. From a close distance, she noticed the buildings had less windows than those on Earth usually had, and there was no glass in them. Maybe they used force fields - or maybe there really was nothing. They were deep underground, after all. The weather must be very stable.
There were people about, of course, adults working in the gardens or walking on the streets, minding their own business, and children playing. They all resembled Jess, almost all of them shorter than Martha and very pale. Their hair colour varied from white and grey to different light browns, their eyes from blues and greens to yellow, purple and red, although it was hard to tell the exact shades, when the lights were multicoloured and a little too dim for human eyes.
Two things about the Khiandrian crowd drew Martha's attention. First of all, many of the adults, and some of the children, seemed to be wearing a badge - a small, round button, around two inches in diameter. Most of them were black, a good number were grey, and she spotted a few white ones, too. No text, no picture, just plain buttons of a single colour. Her first, alarming thought was that it was some sort of a segregation thing, but no matter how she looked, she couldn't see anything in common with the people wearing a certain colour.
The second thing she realised was, the Khiandrians were staring at the humans and the Doctor, every bit as curious and wide-eyed as they were. Some children even stopped and pointed fingers at them. She spotted frowns and scowls, too, and some adults turned their heads and hurried away, as if making an effort to ignore them.
"They don't get a lot of... foreigners here, do they?" Joseph asked.
"No, but they do, actually," Jess answered. "This is weird. The City of Lights is one of the biggest tourist attractions on the planet, all off-worlders come here."
The Doctor, who had been waving at a group of children eyeing him suspiciously and whispering to each other, froze on the spot. He let his hand fall, his goofy grin giving way to a frown, and turned to look at Jess. "Or, they used to come here. What year was it when you left?"
"4358, in our years. Don't know about Earth years."
"And you were gone for twenty Earth years. That would mean it's around the early 4380's now... Hmm."
"Don't tell me you actually know my planet's entire history!" Jess cried out.
"I won't, because I don't. Your people haven't exactly been talkative about it. Especially not about the crisis of the Four-Three-Eighties. There was one, I know that much. What it was about, I have no idea. Maybe it was about us! I hope not, though - but if it was, well, nothing we can do about that," the Doctor said, with a shrug.
Whichever the case, the group was much more subdued as they walked on, trying not to pay attention to the gaping locals. They crossed what looked like a major street, with many people, lots of brightly lit edifices, and two sets of tracks for little trains or trams, which seemed to be hovering several inches above the ground. No cars anywhere, just public transportation, by the looks of it.
After another ten minutes of walking through smaller streets and alleys, they stopped in front of a small two-storey house. It looked exactly like a huge boulder with a door and a few randomly placed holes for windows.
"Dear uncle T'ig," Jess said fondly, the "t" at the beginning sounding more like a sneeze than anything else. "We are lucky, he's still here."
Martha wondered how Jess could be so sure about that. She couldn't see a name plate, or anything like that. Come to think of it, she hadn't even seen any signposts along the way. Maybe the Khiandrians could tell by smell or sound, or some little detail that foreigners wouldn't know to look for.
Jess stepped closer to the door, gave it a single knock, and called out, "T'ig? It's me."
The door slid open, revealing a very confused-looking Khiandrian. He was the same height as Jess, but considerably rounder, and clearly many decades older, with a wrinkly face and a crouched posture. His eyes were yellow like hers, and his hair was shoulder-length and grey. Martha noted he didn't seem to be wearing one of the buttons.
"Bless me! My dear little Jez!" T'ig beamed at Jess, and pulled her into a hug. It was only after he'd let go of her that he seemed to take in the rest of them. He froze for a beat - and panicked. "Oh, dear!" he cried out, pulled Jess in by the hand, and gestured urgently at everyone else to follow, muttering, "Come on, come on, quickly, now, don't just stand there! Oh, hurry up, before someone sees you!"
2. Amber Pass 8R
by Veldeia
Series: Sequel to Hollow World
Fandom: Doctor Who
Warnings: WIP
Characters/Pairings: 10th Doctor, Martha Jones, OCs. Gen.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: If you've seen it on TV, it isn't mine.
Summary: After surviving one big cave, the Doctor, Martha and a caving team from the Sixties find themselves in even more trouble on a planet full of caves.
1. City of Lights, Upper North Entrance
"So, how do we get down there?" Martha asked, gazing at the magnificent view before them: the mind-bogglingly huge cave chamber, and on its floor, hundreds of feet below the platform they stood on, the city with its countless lights, in more colours than she could name. "I really hope it doesn't include free fall, crawling, climbing, squeezing through tight places, or wading in ice-cold water." Her right wrist still ached in memory of the adventures they'd had in a cave on Earth.
"We could just take the lift," Jess told her, nodding backwards at a door in the smooth rock wall right next to where the TARDIS stood. Martha had completely missed it earlier. "But I recommend the scenic route," Jess gestured to their left, where the parapet in front of them went on for several more feet, and then dipped down, apparently forming one edge of a stairway.
Short, sinewy and pale, with close-cropped white hair and light yellow eyes, Jess was a Khiandrian - a native of the planet they currently stood on, a world where all the inhabitants lived in a vast network of caves beneath the barren surface. She had been in self-imposed exile on Earth for twenty years, from the 1940's to the 60's, but now, after they'd survived a nerve-racking trip through Lechuguilla Cave in New Mexico, the Doctor and Martha had brought her back home with her human boyfriend and the two other members of their caving team.
"I vote for the scenic route," Joseph, the stocky cave photographer spoke up.
"Oh yeah, me too," agreed Grant, the grey-haired geologist, the stern leader of the caving party.
"What are we waiting for, then?" the Doctor exclaimed, already heading for the stairs in brisk steps.
Brian, Jess's boyfriend, a rather handsome school teacher in his thirties, stopped him with a question. "Doctor, wait - what about the petromites?"
The Doctor came to a quick halt and spun around. "It always comes down to that, doesn't it? What about the petromites. But they're home now - we could just open the doors and let them loose. This is their natural environment, after all." He raised his eyebrows at Jess. "What do you think?"
The petromites were another species native to the planet, a species of termite-like insects, which ate rock, and built beautiful crystal castles for their queens. Some had stowed away with Jess when she had run away from the planet as a teenager, and if Martha and the Doctor hadn't run into them on Earth and brought them here, they might have caused major mayhem there. Martha had assumed the problem was entirely sorted now that they'd brought the petromites back home.
"Um, no, I don't think that would be a good idea," Jess replied. "That's the population of an entire nest we have there. We don't know how many petromites are already in this area, whether the ones we brought could join an existing nest or if they'd need to start building from scratch, and anyway, they'll need a caretaker, and there are rules and regulations to follow, so..."
"So, they'll have to wait in the TARDIS until we've contacted the local authorities," the Doctor said, looking slightly taken aback. "What if they get hungry in the meantime?"
"I already told you they're too puzzled by your ship to touch it, didn't I? Besides, if they find themselves stuck in a hostile environment - like without food - they'll go into hibernation. They can survive for long periods almost anywhere. That's one of the reasons why they're so good at spreading to other planets."
"All right, then. A little hibernation never did anyone any harm. More like the opposite. I'm living and concussion-free proof of that!" the Doctor declared, with a wide grin. "Now that's settled, let's go see the sights!"
He lead the way to the stairs and down. Martha followed him, and the cavers came behind her. The stone steps were so steep that she had to keep looking at her feet, but she did catch a few more glimpses of the city. She felt like she could stare at it for hours, and everyone else seemed to be feeling the same way. The Doctor was staring at the view so intently that Martha was amazed he didn't trip on his feet and fall on his nose. Joseph and Grant kept pointing out details to each other, both about the city and the vast cavern, which looked natural, although Martha figured the Khiandrians must've made it bigger, somehow.
"What about those straws and stalactites up there, in the ceiling, Jess?" Grant asked. "They've got to be pretty big. What if one of them grows so heavy that it breaks and falls?"
"That won't happen," Jess assured him. "There are force fields to prevent that sort of thing. If one should fall, it would be pulverised and just rain on the city as fine dust."
"Should I know what a 'force field' is?" Joseph said.
"Oh, your people won't invent those in many, many years," the Doctor told him.
The descent was a long one. Martha wondered how many hundred stairs there were - she hadn't been keeping count. The stairway was carved from the rock face itself. Every now and then, there was a small landing, and the stairs changed direction, forming a wide zigzag pattern in the cliff side. The last landing, however, was bigger than the rest, and the last flight of stairs was wide and massive, at a right angle to the rock face. It rather reminded Martha of the stairs in front of a museum or a temple, making the final approach particularly impressive.
Where level ground began, so did the city. There were some edifices in the cliff side itself, including, by the looks of them, a gift shop and several cafés and restaurants. Martha couldn't even imagine what sort of food they would eat down here. Not far from the wall stood the first buildings. They came in all sizes and shapes, from tall pillars, like artificial stalagmites, to strange crystal clusters, like the khirindals in petromite nests. There were some perfectly unremarkable, rectangular houses as well, which could've been from anywhere on Earth.
"It's so... different!" Brian breathed. He was holding Jess's hand.
"This is probably the most familiar-looking place you'll see on the planet," Jess told him. "There aren't many cities that are built like this, all out in the open."
"Oh," he said, surprised. "There's so much I don't know about your home! I want to learn everything. Where do we begin?"
"Actually, we should tend to the official matters first - and before anything else, I need to contact my family. My uncle used to live here, at a walking distance from where we are. Let's see if I can still remember the place, and if he's still there."
Jess guided them to a street between low buildings, which Martha took for a residential area, with both detached and row houses. Some of the houses had gardens, with intricate displays of stones and crystals and strange cave formations, as well as alien plants, mosses and lichens. From a close distance, she noticed the buildings had less windows than those on Earth usually had, and there was no glass in them. Maybe they used force fields - or maybe there really was nothing. They were deep underground, after all. The weather must be very stable.
There were people about, of course, adults working in the gardens or walking on the streets, minding their own business, and children playing. They all resembled Jess, almost all of them shorter than Martha and very pale. Their hair colour varied from white and grey to different light browns, their eyes from blues and greens to yellow, purple and red, although it was hard to tell the exact shades, when the lights were multicoloured and a little too dim for human eyes.
Two things about the Khiandrian crowd drew Martha's attention. First of all, many of the adults, and some of the children, seemed to be wearing a badge - a small, round button, around two inches in diameter. Most of them were black, a good number were grey, and she spotted a few white ones, too. No text, no picture, just plain buttons of a single colour. Her first, alarming thought was that it was some sort of a segregation thing, but no matter how she looked, she couldn't see anything in common with the people wearing a certain colour.
The second thing she realised was, the Khiandrians were staring at the humans and the Doctor, every bit as curious and wide-eyed as they were. Some children even stopped and pointed fingers at them. She spotted frowns and scowls, too, and some adults turned their heads and hurried away, as if making an effort to ignore them.
"They don't get a lot of... foreigners here, do they?" Joseph asked.
"No, but they do, actually," Jess answered. "This is weird. The City of Lights is one of the biggest tourist attractions on the planet, all off-worlders come here."
The Doctor, who had been waving at a group of children eyeing him suspiciously and whispering to each other, froze on the spot. He let his hand fall, his goofy grin giving way to a frown, and turned to look at Jess. "Or, they used to come here. What year was it when you left?"
"4358, in our years. Don't know about Earth years."
"And you were gone for twenty Earth years. That would mean it's around the early 4380's now... Hmm."
"Don't tell me you actually know my planet's entire history!" Jess cried out.
"I won't, because I don't. Your people haven't exactly been talkative about it. Especially not about the crisis of the Four-Three-Eighties. There was one, I know that much. What it was about, I have no idea. Maybe it was about us! I hope not, though - but if it was, well, nothing we can do about that," the Doctor said, with a shrug.
Whichever the case, the group was much more subdued as they walked on, trying not to pay attention to the gaping locals. They crossed what looked like a major street, with many people, lots of brightly lit edifices, and two sets of tracks for little trains or trams, which seemed to be hovering several inches above the ground. No cars anywhere, just public transportation, by the looks of it.
After another ten minutes of walking through smaller streets and alleys, they stopped in front of a small two-storey house. It looked exactly like a huge boulder with a door and a few randomly placed holes for windows.
"Dear uncle T'ig," Jess said fondly, the "t" at the beginning sounding more like a sneeze than anything else. "We are lucky, he's still here."
Martha wondered how Jess could be so sure about that. She couldn't see a name plate, or anything like that. Come to think of it, she hadn't even seen any signposts along the way. Maybe the Khiandrians could tell by smell or sound, or some little detail that foreigners wouldn't know to look for.
Jess stepped closer to the door, gave it a single knock, and called out, "T'ig? It's me."
The door slid open, revealing a very confused-looking Khiandrian. He was the same height as Jess, but considerably rounder, and clearly many decades older, with a wrinkly face and a crouched posture. His eyes were yellow like hers, and his hair was shoulder-length and grey. Martha noted he didn't seem to be wearing one of the buttons.
"Bless me! My dear little Jez!" T'ig beamed at Jess, and pulled her into a hug. It was only after he'd let go of her that he seemed to take in the rest of them. He froze for a beat - and panicked. "Oh, dear!" he cried out, pulled Jess in by the hand, and gestured urgently at everyone else to follow, muttering, "Come on, come on, quickly, now, don't just stand there! Oh, hurry up, before someone sees you!"
2. Amber Pass 8R
