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Entry tags:
- !location: planetside,
- !plot: send in the clones,
- daniel jackson,
- dustin brooks,
- eleventh doctor,
- gaignun kukai jr./rubedo,
- hana asakura,
- hit girl,
- howard bassem,
- ildraniath,
- jalith,
- kang,
- kanoe zouichi,
- kon-el,
- lash,
- lex luthor,
- lord zedd,
- lord zetta,
- nightwing,
- querl dox,
- rory williams,
- ruffnut thorston,
- sakura haruno,
- signum
Gently, but with undeniable will divesting myself of the holds that would hold me. (Pt. 5: Chances)
The plan was...well, it wasn't simple, but it sort of was.
While the CLF attacked multiple Clone Processing centers to distract the government, the group with the CLF would target one particular one in the region that'd once been New Jersey. The group with the government would offer their services in putting down their own people.
In the center, they'd split up into several groups. One would fight a fake fight, create a massive diversion, and blow up the room where the samples their DNA were being kept in the process. Another group would secure a teleporter pad. That team would teleport out other teams to steal a ship, steal some med tech to teleport to said ship, and steal a medical database. Another team would go to the main command center and hack into the government mainframe to down the sensornet around the planet so they could escape. And Nightwing himself would accompany the clones to upload the harvested memories to the Mother Brains, left unguarded because of the diversionary fighting, and make sure that was all they did.
Meanwhile, there'd be a standing order for all teams to avoid killing other crewmates, and avoid killing guards unless absolutely necessary.
It was a complicated plan. If a single part fouled up, they might find themselves dead, trapped, or worse. But if it worked, it'd work pretty spectacularly and leave them with medtech, a medical database, the clones helped, and possibly a grateful Council depending on how the fight went, because of the ones seemingly aiding the government.
In some worlds, things that were a million-to-one-chance (exactly a million-to-one) by their nature had to work. Let's hope this world is one of them, eh, mission crew?
[ooc: Only comment to threads if it says they are open here. All threads: OPEN. Characters may get injuries up to and including 7 on the Injury Scale (scroll to the bottom). Any higher, and they must ask permission of the plot-runners, just to make sure everyone isn't immobilized without enough people to help move them.]
While the CLF attacked multiple Clone Processing centers to distract the government, the group with the CLF would target one particular one in the region that'd once been New Jersey. The group with the government would offer their services in putting down their own people.
In the center, they'd split up into several groups. One would fight a fake fight, create a massive diversion, and blow up the room where the samples their DNA were being kept in the process. Another group would secure a teleporter pad. That team would teleport out other teams to steal a ship, steal some med tech to teleport to said ship, and steal a medical database. Another team would go to the main command center and hack into the government mainframe to down the sensornet around the planet so they could escape. And Nightwing himself would accompany the clones to upload the harvested memories to the Mother Brains, left unguarded because of the diversionary fighting, and make sure that was all they did.
Meanwhile, there'd be a standing order for all teams to avoid killing other crewmates, and avoid killing guards unless absolutely necessary.
It was a complicated plan. If a single part fouled up, they might find themselves dead, trapped, or worse. But if it worked, it'd work pretty spectacularly and leave them with medtech, a medical database, the clones helped, and possibly a grateful Council depending on how the fight went, because of the ones seemingly aiding the government.
In some worlds, things that were a million-to-one-chance (exactly a million-to-one) by their nature had to work. Let's hope this world is one of them, eh, mission crew?
[ooc: Only comment to threads if it says they are open here. All threads: OPEN. Characters may get injuries up to and including 7 on the Injury Scale (scroll to the bottom). Any higher, and they must ask permission of the plot-runners, just to make sure everyone isn't immobilized without enough people to help move them.]
Re: 2/2
"Just keep still. We're all friends, aren't we? Lovely thing to have, loads of friends and yes, that's a very impressive gun you've got there, I'm sure."
The Doctor held up his hands as Rory's clone held him at gun point. Unlike his own clone, he wasn't willing to use his abilities on Rory II here. Instead he focused on keeping himself looking positively non-threatening, at the same time keeping an eye -- make that two eyes -- on Rory I and the Other Doctor's progress. If you could call it that. He didn't like the look of that blood starting to trickle from Rory's nose, but the Other Doctor only looked at it as if it was all rather interesting.
Like Rory was just another funny little human.
Perhaps the Other Doctor saw both Rorys that way. Fragile little humans who couldn't even comprehend what it was like to be a Time Lord. It did cross his fledgling mind to wonder why the Doctor (Doctor A? He was keen on being Doctor B) bothered with so many of this particular species.
"I am the Doctor, Rory Pond," the Other Doctor said insistently. Perhaps too insistently. "‘Hello’. Marvelous word, isn't it? I think it's marvelous. Hello!" He rolled it around his tongue, working it around his teeth and then remembering right, space teeth according to Amy Pond. He liked having space teeth. Best teeth in the universe and he got to have the privilege of being grown with them! The other Doctor snuck a glance at Rory II and noticed he had a startling lack of space teeth. If anything, he thought he had an even beakier nose than Rory I, which...wasn't really something to aim for when you thought about it.
He laced his long fingers in front of him just like the original Doctor. He even fidgeted, like a professor lost in his own dusty library. The old man who had grown past the point of simply being old. The Other Doctor's thoughts were scattered all over the place even as he sifted through Rory's mind, almost as an afterthought. Him, a child! He supposed this human liked being a dad so much he was collecting his own little family.
"You and your strays," the Other Doctor sighed, with the faintest of fond undertones. Maybe even a little envious. It wasn't clear if he was talking to the Doctor or Rory.
He wasn’t quite sure what to make of all the memories. He knew who Amy Pond was. After all, he had the Doctor’s memories. Or most of them, anyway, even if he sensed not of all of them were there. Missing bits and pieces. Amelia Pond with the Fish Fingers and Custard and a big old crack that he wasn’t quite sure had anything to do with the Ohm problem. Maybe. The Other Doctor thought he knew what love was. It wasn’t as…inclusive as Rory’s human definition. Not just a little group. Not just immediate family. Those memories, actually, were some of the stronger ones he had. All his friends across time and space. The Other Doctor looked thoughtful, chewing on the corner of his mouth.
Re: 2/2
Rory shook his head. "No. No you're not." His head ached, and he pushed on that, pushed that at the Time Lord in front of him. Pushed the Doctor's care in handling his badly shattered mind, the caution the Doctor had taken so as not to hurt him. The blood stream seemed, if anything, to be getting wider. His mind could comprehend a lot of time, but this was all of it all at once. Too much, too fast, too alien for his brain to handle.
Actions, he repeated. Over and over and over again. The Doctor's face when he was dying, the pain and panic and frustrated helplessness. The strength it took to care what happened to people when they were nothing but a speck in the universe. Nothing but a candle flame, easily extinguished.
His legs shook and his hands were trembling, but he didn't reach for his sword or his gun. Knew he couldn't. It felt like his brain was being turned into jelly.
"It's the best word. But it's not the only one." He swallowed back the bile that wanted to rise in his throat, shaking his head. Knowing it wouldn't help but trying it anyway.
He thought of Molly, of his little girl and how much he loved her and how much he didn't want to die here and never see her again. Of how uncertain this entire thing had been. Of how much he missed Amy, of how much he wanted to go home and touch her, just to reassure himself that she was real. "Is that why you brought him?" He lifted a shaking hand to indicate his clone. This Doctor wasn't his child, he didn't want him to be. A super powered toddler with no respect for how breakable the world was, and no apparent interest in learning. "He's nine hundred, I'm twice that. Everyone is a child. Don't get huffy because you're in the single digits still, I didn't have a thing to do with that." Donna. Abigale. Who was Abigale? What was she doing in there? Jamie again, Victoria, Susan, Sarah Jane, his Sarah Jane, a rather odd looking dog...An impossible planet that wasn't any longer, even before the Ohm. He couldn't tell if the other Doctor just wanted to prove he knew them or was actually missing them. Either way it was like forcing a river through a bloody balloon.
"Doctor?" The clone him was scowling. "Should I shoot him?"
Re: 2/2
He fixed his fellow clone with a look that said he personally wasn't looking for the dull solution and it might, just might, be in Rory II's best interest not to go shooting things just yet. This Doctor wasn't quite as willing to pull back psychically as the original, after all, and he was suspecting he could do a lot worse if he put his mind to it, literally. The Other Doctor squinted at Rory. The human was telling the truth -- or at least he believed it, honestly believed it -- and he knew from his own scraps of memories that he remembered being rather fond of humans. Loads of human friends. Plenty of hello's to go around. So many he didn't even know what to do with it! Or thought he didn't. Still working it out. He'd get back to them on that.
It was when Rory showed him he understood what it was like to be a speck, to be alone, that convinced the Other Doctor to draw back.
The invading psychic probes withdrew as he stiffened, mouth pursing.
For being a fragile, primitive human...well. It was surprising Rory could understand what it felt like. Speck in the universe indeed!
"Right, yes. We ought to Do Something about you two, I imagine," the Other Doctor said, fidgeting with his hands. In his opinion, it would be loads more interesting to travel the universe with his original instead of doing the boring alternative and kill these two. Didn't seem like it'd be much fun.
In fact, it left a strangely bad taste in his mouth. Possibly bleed through from the memories of his original.
An explosion went off quite close to them, showering them with dust and then a spray of water, as one of the water mains was shattered by a direct hit and began to gush into the air. The Doctor ducked his head, still holding his hands up where Rory II could see him. Not exactly the most brilliant place to have a standoff, the Doctor sneaking a glance at Rory. The human was still bleeding freely from his nose, but he managed to keep his feet under him and that right there was always a good sign.
Like he said, Rory Williams had his own inner strength.
Now for their clones to decide just what it was they wanted to do...before the battle raging around them decided for them.
Re: 2/2
The other Rory shifted, looking unhappy and confused. "They taught me how to fight, Doctor..." There was a hesitance there, he was only human. No memories but what he'd been given. He only knew that he should follow this man, as impossible as that seemed. "...if we're not going to shoot them, what would you rather we do with them?"
Rory shifted on his feet, trying to regain some of the lost stability. "Doctor..." So, had he convinced the other Doctor? Or was he just bracing for round two?
The explosions were getting closer. Soon they wouldn't have much of an option, just a lot of need to dodge. "We need to get clear of here, they're not looking where they're dropping those things. They kill us they win, they kill you they don't care. They can just make more."
Re: 2/2
Like he said, going along with the kill order was the dull, expected thing. Not quite his style. He exchanged looks with his original, who still had his hands up in the I Surrender position. He'd been good at that too, come to think of it.
He was about to say more when another explosion went off, fire and chunks of masonry jetting into the air.
"Rory I has a point," the Other Doctor said briskly. He made a motion to straighten his bowtie, remembered it was missing, pulled a disappointed face and then dropped his hands. He turned toward Rory and himself. "You show us where the teleporters are and get us off planet. I'd rather not have to go through this all again. Repeats, etc, not a fan of it."
The Doctor started to lower his hands. Not quite the outcome he'd been expecting, but it was better than being shot and he could run with not being shot. Not being shot was good. Better in Rory's case!
Re: 2/2
His shoulders and hands were shaking, eyes half closed as he tried to keep an eye on them. This wasn't his day. Or his week. Or really any of their week.
"Yeah, Thanks....I think." He glanced at the Doctor, frowning ever so slightly, questioning. "I don't know if Stacy will let them join up or not, what do you think?"
The Clone Rory scowled, but slowly lowered his gun, feeling foolish and a little out of sorts. "Where do we plan on going, Doctor?" He wouldn't be left behind. That much he was certain of. He wanted fairly badly to live. He wanted to stay with the Doctor.
Re: 2/2
He didn't bother to explain exactly what this hypothetical "they" said in the first place, instead sharing one of those borderline creepy hivemind looks with his clone. The Other Doctor peered at him, mouth turned down in a slight frown as he started to extend a psychic probe at him out of habit -- the Doctor sighed and batted it away -- and then the clone nodded. Fine by him! He just wanted the life the real Doctor had, except it'd be loads better with another him around.
The Other Doctor clapped a hand around Rory II as the original Doctor did the same to his Rory. Well. Rory I. He didn't exactly own Rory, after all, and Rory was his own human!
"Better find some cover!" The Doctor said, as if the threat of shrapnel and/or explosion right to the face was about as scary as tripping during your morning walk. "Seeing as neither of you fancies killing us, we'll have to find someplace safe and try to sneak around to the teleporters. See if we can get those sorted. Shouldn't be two difficult with the two of us"
He wasn't quite sure what the two Rory's could do. They weren't very jiggery-pokery inclined but two thousand odd years of experience and he could probably hold off any other clones trying to stop them. So there was that. Who knew Rory Williams would turn out to be an ex-Roman? (He didn't. An old man like him and he hadn't seen that one coming at all). The Doctor ushered for the others to follow him down one side of the edge of the main battle, his clone bringing up the rear.
Re: 2/2
It really was creepy, either the clone was picking up more of the memories via that thing he did with the mental fingers and the headaches, or the Doctor simply oozed experience to the point that any being left in close contact with him would eventually become as mad as he was.
Now that was a scary thought.
The clone glanced at the other Doctor, confused. He hadn't been programed with any of Rory's memories, no pretty ginger to galvanize him into being anything, no nursing ability, simply the skills of a soldier, dressed in a different suit. But he wanted, oh he wanted. He wasn't sure what he wanted, but he knew he did. Desperately. And the other Doctor was offering it and he knew that if he stayed with him, he'd get it.
Whatever 'it' was.
Complicated thing, existence.
There was no 'ex' to Rory's status as a Roman, really. More Roman plus than anything else. War wasn't something he was a stranger to any longer. "How exactly are we going to prevent cover from being blown off of us, Doctor?" But he followed, used to at least obeying the Doctor's orders. Not listening seemed to give people a bad case of the dead.
Re: 2/2
Or at least he thought so at any rate.
He knew Rory II wasn't talking to him. The Other Doctor, most likely because Rory II had been programmed to follow the nearest clone voice of authority and if there was anyone who was good at sounding like he knew what he was doing, it was the Doctor -- even a clone of him. The Other Doctor looked up at the question, which was so very, very human that you could almost mistake Rory II for an Original if he wasn't wearing the quite frankly rather drab clothes of a clone (honestly, it was so drab as to be offensive! The Other Doctor found himself looking at his own duplicate's clothes with envy. Lucky, lucky man).
The Other Doctor was more than happy to answer even if he was still wishing he could have a proper bowtie. Or a hat. Or even a cravat! Anything but what he had on now.
"Old fashioned looking where you're going!" the Other Doctor shouted over an explosion behind them, as if it was that easy. "You worry too much about the specific hows and whys," he added in a stung tone of voice. "
The Doctor leading the little group smiled to himself. Couldn't have said it better himself, only he just had right there! Good man. Good learning man. He hoped he'd turn out to be good. So far he had. Mostly. Still had some rough edges. Right, the escape! The Doctor led them under one of the few undamaged structures so far -- a rather sturdy pedestrian bridge, the Doctor holding up his hand as he peered around the corner. There were a group of clones and their Originals fighting around the other side. If he was by himself, he thought he could sneak in, but with two Rorys and his own clone, those odds werre slashed in half.
"I think the teleporters are that way," the Doctor whispered to Rory. Now he understood Rory could literally be a one man, ex-Roman army (or ex-ex and back to Roman, in Rory II's case) but there were simply too many clones there and that wasn't even counting all the powered ones running about the place.
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"Might be easier to go through a building, if the Sonic can get us in? The fighting seems to be contained to the streets, at least for the moment. Give us more cover too, only thing we'd have to worry about is a bomb or one of the powered getting body slammed through it." He paused. "Or looters, but I don't think they'll bother us much."
All wars brought looters. They'd done a fair bit of looting themselves. But looters had a live and let live mentality, and they had no real interest in taking anything. No reason to start a fight.
The clone looked at the Doctor II, then back at the originals, and then at the battle field they had just left. "...yeah, right. Worry too much. I can see that."
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"Right, the sonic." The Doctor patted himself down.
Paused.
Patted himself down a few more times, the realization settling. Oops. Big big oops! After getting kidnapped, freed, shot at and then running into his clone and his new sharing attitude, the Doctor somehow, somewhen had...lost his sonic. Maybe now wasn't the time to say that "again" to the Rorys here. Double the Rorys problem meant double the worrying and one Rory Worry was quite enough in his opinion. The Doctor's jaw worked for a brief second as he straightened and then decided they all had to keep calm, whatever happened and wherever his sonic had turned up to, and so there was really no point telling the truth here. Not even a little smidgen of truth.
"Actually, I don't need the sonic," the Doctor lied through his teeth. His clone fixed him with a puzzled stare over Rory's shoulder. "Did you see those sensor towers when we came in? Give us right away if I use it!"
The Other Doctor started to open his mouth to point out that those "sensor towers" were really just decorative Galilean pylons when the Doctor ran over him.
"So no, no sonics today, Rorys. And Doctor."
The Other Doctor frowned and lowered his finger. Odd man, the Doctor. Technically himself, only it was an older himself and so maybe it wasn't quite the same. He had no qualms about being what he was. He wasn't sure what Rory II thought about himself or being next to his Original. Granted, he could always do a bit of a psychic snoop and --
"What's that sound?" The Other Doctor asked. He was cut off at the sudden high pitched shriek as something came screaming through the smoke-choked air at them, blazing fire and shrapnel and a general desire to kill something today and it might as well be them.
The clone reacted without even thinking, pushing Rory I and the Doctor our of the way. For the first time since they'd met, he'd gone completely quiet psychically as he focused on trying to save the human. His human. Their human? It didn't even matter. He fell heavily on top of Rory I as they were showered with shrapnel.
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So for whatever reason, the Doctor didn't have the Sonic. What had he done with it? He was ignoring the little part of his brain that insisted that the Sonic was obviously in Amy's top pocket in the Pandorica.
The clone look over his shoulder, looking like he might protest the naming, but then fell silent again, trying to figure our what his Doctor might be referring to.
Rory jerked, startled and exhaling sharply as he hit and his head bounced off the ground, something cracked, and he was fairly certain it might be his ribs. "Doctor!"
Well, there was certainly something ironic about this, wasn't there? He'd died for the Doctor very similarly, hadn't he? Once.
He tried to push the cloned Doctor off of him, worried and needing to asses his physical condition. That had been a rocket of some sort. Had to have been. Even the Doctor couldn't absorb that sort of damage. He'd need to act fast or the cloned Doctor--
The clone reacted less calmly, none of the experience, none of the training to handle this sort of thing, voice raw with panic. "Doctor!" He even managed a proper shout, though not the shrieks of some of his predecessor.
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He thought he would've liked at least a little armor. It occurred to him he was going to miss his kidneys very very soon.
Looking up, almost startled, the Other Doctor tried to meet Rory I's eyes. He opened his mouth as if he intended to say something like "oh dear" or "bit of a mess, isn't it?" but all that came out was a surprised grunt. The blood drained from his face. He couldn't quite make up his mind if he wanted to keep trying to push Rory I away or just sag against him.
Apparently neither of those was attractive.
The Other Doctor coughed and gagged and then there it was: glowing regeneration energy bubbling up as he choked on it. Maybe it hadn't just been his kidneys. Never could tell with how shrapnel liked to bounce around! The regeneration energy swirled and frothed as he trembled on top of Rory I, his hands starting to glow gold like a furnace lighting from the inside out. He fixed the human with a baffled look as he clutched at him.
"Get back!" The Doctor snapped as he pushed his way forward, herding Rory II out of range.
He tried to untangle his Rory out from under his clone: easier said than done when the Other Doctor was going into a full animal panic at what was technically his first death that wasn't a memory...and it was a hell of a lot scarier than he remembered. He winced as his clone tried to psychically grab onto to whatever he could, like a drowning man. There wasn't anything he himself could do to stop what was coming. He could, however, try to make it easier for him, the Doctor trying to pull Rory off from his clone and get closer to him at the same time so he could touch him through the glow. Odd, he hadn't made it a habit to see himself regenerate in the past and seeing it now, with his face, was going to be one of those things he'd remember for centuries to come.
"Get back, the two of you!" The Doctor reached for his clone. At this range, the hurt he could feel was almost like this solid thing, a mass of pain hanging in the air and really, it felt like he had to check he wasn't the one bleeding, it was that invasive. The clone batted his hand away. The Doctor reached again, trying to both reach his clone and also shield the two Rorys from the Other Doctor's psychic death throes.
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He reached up, settling a cautious hand to his shoulder, trying to offer what comfort he could in his current position. He needed to get to his kit, needed to try to help, but his kit was trapped under him and he could feel the cloned Doctor's blood staining his shirt, soaking through. It would be a little hard to escape, trapped as he was under the other man. "Trying, Doctor. Little difficult. After this, we need to talk about discrepancies in your medical file." If Time Lord's exploded when they died, seemed rather important to list getting out of range as something that might be necessary for treatment.
The Doctor looked something between panicked and calm, which told him the other Doctor likely wasn't dying. But that really was the only thing he was was reasonably sure of, that the cloned Time Lord might not be dying. What else he could be doing aside from that Rory had no idea.
The clone hovered, eyes wide with worry, obediently staying back a safe distance from whatever was happening to the clone Doctor. Whatever was happening, he didn't like it. His friend was in pain. The one person he felt properly connected to was in pain.
Pretend my image here is Ginger!Claudia Black :|
With his own clone pinning Rory to the ground, the Doctor couldn't pull him out in time. All he could do was try to shield the human and brace for impact.
The clone Doctor continued to bleed that glowing gold energy until he stiffened on Rory, his eyes unseeing as the regeneration kicked into that final stage. A final, trembling gasp.
The Clone Doctor exploded.
A blast of that gold light splashed outward, nearly knocking the Doctor flat onto his back as he tried to hold onto Rory. The wind hit him next, the Doctor squinting against the light as his Other Self's cells deteriorated so they could form into something...else. Bipedal, he could make out that much. One head (that was good!). He couldn't quite see the face, but from what he could see of the body, the Clone Doctor was still arched back in agony, his mouth a silent O. Another wave of regeneration energy flooded out with a shriek right through the air, sparks swirling and mixing with the ash already drifting down. The Doctor had to shield his eyes as the light grew too bright even for him.
And suddenly it was over.
The Doctor tried blinking the black spots away as the silence settled. Make that relative silence. True silence was the vacuum of space, not a battleground where they were lucky that it was so chaotic that an exploding Doctor didn't bring any more clones running. He supposed they were all busy. Lucky for them! He lowered his hand. The black spots faded. He stared, not quite gaping because Time Lords didn't gape, but coming dangerously close all the same, conventions be damned and okay, he was definitely gaping on second thought.
"I - I...wow," the Clone Doctor said intelligently. She blinked, fussed with her bloody shirt, which was now hanging over her like a tent, and then made as if to sweep the hair from her face. She caught sight of her ginger hair and froze. "Is this...?"
The Doctor nodded.
His clone peered at it critically and then suddenly burst into a great big smile, as if she'd won the best lottery in the universe. "Finally!" She turned and hugged the closest person (Rory) and then lunged from him to hug the Doctor before making a go at Rory II before he could think of getting away. She squeezed him, trying to lift her fellow clone off his feet and twirling him around. "I'm ginger, Rory! And squishy, but let's focus on the ginger part, shall we? Rory, your mouth is going to get stuck open like that."
She suddenly let go of Rory II, reaching up to touch her temples. The Doctor could feel the bleed of their shared memories: compared to before, it was only a trickle and he supposed a whole new body even he hadn't had yet probably had something to do with it. Or it could have nothing to do with it and the fact was nothing changed. They still needed to get to the teleporters and he wasn't too keen on staying around while the others could get injured. It wasn't as if the two Rorys could regenerate and get themselves smaller noses for convenience's sake.
Re: Pretend my image here is Ginger!Claudia Black :|
He thought he might need to remember this to make fun of the Doctor later. Glittery Time Lords.
That might be the concussion talking, but he rather liked the thought. He'd need to tell Amy the Doctor was made of explosive glitter.
He reflexively hugged her back, dimly registering that she was a her and that she was a ginger. He thought she looked quite a bit like Amy, but then he would always associate long red hair with Amy.
He gaped as that finally caught up with his rattled brain, peering at her like the world had gone completely mental and not bothering to get up, battle field or not, a Time Lord had just explosive glittered on him and turned into a ginger girl. He deserved a moment to process.
The clone looked more startled than anything else, returning the hug with a bit more care and letting her spin him, though he made not attempt to escape her grasp. He hadn't really been hugged before, that alone was a new experience, no memories of being hugged or getting affection, but he made a rather impressive go at it for a complete novice. His Doctor had turned into a girl, which despite not fitting with anything that had been programed into his head was a little alarming all on its own. He touched her bloody shirt, confused and concerned and worried, brow furrowed with the very human emotions. "Are you...I mean, you were bleeding. That's...wrong isn't it? How did you do that? Are you alright now?" The original Doctor might recognize the look from his own companion, a combination of worry, loyalty and ingrained protective nature that was normally reserved for one Ms. Amy Pond.
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She patted her shirt down, batted Rory II’s hand away (gently, because she was rather fond of her fellow clone) and then fussed with her gorgeous, amazingly ginger hair. Trying it on for size, apparently. Also possibly showing off for Rory II, because she felt a keen need to impress him with her – well, newness!. Did she even count as a clone anymore? She liked to think she didn’t. All she knew was she liked hugging and she thought Rory II could stand to have loads more hugs in the future too, once they weren’t getting shot and given she finally turned ginger, she didn’t fancy dying again and losing all that hard work. The Clone Doctor reached down to grab the other clone’s hand in hers as she turned to the Doctor.
“Names!” She instinctively flinched as an explosion sounded off close by, showering their little area with grit. Ash powered her hair as she gave it a shake. “But probably not the time, no? No. Funny things, names.”
“Very funny,” the Doctor agreed. “Getting blown up? Not quite as funny. Come on, Rorys. And Doctor!”
He herded them further away from the little patch of blood where his clone had died and gone ginger, the Other Doctor leading a winding path toward the teleporters. Now that his clone turned ginger, she seemed much more willing to help and he couldn’t blame her at all. If he woke up ginger, he’d write it down as one of Those Better Days. Remind him to explain all this to Rory when they weren’t in danger of getting a bomb or one of those powered clones falling on top of their heads. All in all, he thought Rory handled a regeneration literally on top of him extremely well.
The Doctor found himself feeling rather proud of Rory for being so magnificent.
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But he mostly kept his thoughts to himself. "We should try to stay out of sight, our side or any side is a bad idea to encounter right now, our side might shoot first and ask questions after, and the Government definitely will."
The Clone looked a bit startled and confused by the gesture, holding hands was another new one for him. But he didn't pull away, looking suitably impressed by the Doctor's primping. "Names?" He glanced between her and the other Doctor, deciding he preferred his to the long legged one with the funny hair. But he wasn't Rory, he knew that much. He might look and sound and talk like Rory, but he wasn't Rory. Rory had memories, feelings, family.
Things he had never had.
Rory had Amy Pond picking on him and inspiring him to be better, and he had only the Doctor, with her hand tight in his, and a battle field full of death.