Chapter Text
Traveling through six dimensions isn't always looking at good alien scenery or treating a couple of nineteen year old former slave girls to exotic refreshments. Sometimes things go, frankly, absolutely bollocks.
I had materialized the TARDIS with the intent to check out a particularly interesting alternate Earth, since it wasn't "Earth" at all but a planet like Earth with Human evolution and some very bizarre borrowings from Earth's biosphere. I'd come to see the sights, really. You know, the big statue of the bald kid, the golden arena.... yes, I'm talking about Republic City.
What, did you think the Multiverse only included space-faring science fiction cosmos'... cosmosoi... cosmoses.... whatever means more than one cosmos?
Anyway, some sight-seeing, maybe some of that Water Tribe cuisine even if I were no fan of green noodles, taking the girls to a Pro Bending match... just another stopover, right? Park the TARDIS, give Janias a little holo thing so no one asked why she was green, and off we go.
Well, it doesn't quite work out that way when you're turning into the Doctor.
The TARDIS had materialized inside a structure, a warehouse of some sort, and it was a quick jaunt from the storage area to the loading dock. I was in my usual suit. Janias was in a red and blue jacket and blue pants, Cami in pink sweater with light blue jeans. Their dressing room on the TARDIS now officially exceeded my own wardrobe by about four times the volume. I should have never introduced them to Old Navy.
We stepped into said loading dock, looking to see if it was abandoned or not. We found the loading dock occupied by fellows in masks with metal gloves. They had turned toward the door as I opened it, seeing the three of us at the entrance.
Upon seeing them I let out an exasperated sigh. The Equalists. "Not what I was expecting to see."
"Who are you?" A very young sounding voice shouted from the group. The voice's owner, a young man who was setting off alarms in my head as "rebel who's found a cause", emerged from them to face us. "How did you get into our stronghold?"
"Who, us? Just passing through," I replied. I could see the girls were tensing up to run. "Aren't you awfully young to be leading a rebellion?"
"The Bender tyranny has taken the rest of us, but they won't claim us!", the lad proclaimed. "We'll remain hidden, ready for when Amon returns!"
Well, that narrowed things down. This was after Amon's unmasking and the collapse of the Equalist Revolution. He was now resting peacefully at the bottom of the sea with his brother. Rather a sad family even if you account for the suffering he caused. Although I had to admit to some gratitude in not finding out if his bloodbending could lock out Janias' connection to the Force or affect my own Time Lord physiology. "Lad, you're aware Amon himself was a Waterbender, right?"
"Bender lies!"
Camilla giggled. I glanced at her. "Sorry, it's just.... 'Bender'? I'm guessing he's not talking about Jan and I, or men like us anyway."
Apparently the accent wasn't the only thing the Imperials had inherited from the British.
Going by some of the crowd I wondered if a few of them weren't as convinced as their leader, but a young man with energy could sway the less-convinced enough to pull them along, especially with the help of peer pressure. "I doubt every witness was a Bender," I pointed out. "But I'm guessing you're not the type to be easily dissuaded, are you Reg?"
Yes, I called him Reg. Something in the kid reminded me of Reg Shoe of Ankh-Morpork. Just without everything that made Reg such an endearing activist zombie policeman. Really, Reg Shoe is a rather swell dead guy when you get to know him. And I still owe him a few quid.
Long story.
"You're agents, sent to weaken our resolve!", the young man decided.
Janias cackled, amused. "Don't laugh at a political radical when they're being political and have you at a disadvantage," I warned her. "They don't particularly like it."
"He's cute for how naive and silly he is," Janias retorted.
"We won't be slaves anymore!"
I winced. Camilla and Janias shot him dark looks. "You have no bloody idea what you're on about," Camilla hissed.
"Okay everyone, please, let's calm down." I stepped forward, hands held up between them. "No need for this to become..."
"Long live Amon!" "Reg" brought up his shock glove.
"Oh please," I sighed. I pulled my sonic out of my pocket and briefly mused on the irony. In any other 1920s technological timeframe I'd be a bit more hard-pressed to deal with local weapons since pistols aren't as susceptible to interference by sonic screwdriver... at least until I figure out how to make it create that Sontaran anti-bullet field or something.
Electric gloves? Those I can handle.
A brief whir of sonics and there was popping and crackling as the gloves shorted out, victims of a short-lived feedback. "So, you lot realize you're the last vestige of a doomed revolution, yes? Without Amon you've got no way to take away Benders' powers - stop laughing Cami - and really, a dozen or so kids in a warehouse isn't going to topple the whole world. You kids need to walk away from this. Give time for things to change around here, and they will. And most importantly...."
There was a loud crash on the ceiling. Everyone looked up. I saw the metal roof begin to rip and curl inward. A voice echoed over a bullhorn. "This is Chief Bei-Fong of the Republic City Police! You are under arrest!"
I winced. All I wanted was to see Aang's statue and enjoy some local cuisine. Now I was going to have a lady who could move and alter metal with her freaking mind after me.
"And that's our cue to find another rest spot," I said to the girls. "Back to the TARDIS!"
We went for the door while, behind us, Metalbender police descended on the now-defenseless Equalists. I suppose I could have taken credit for it and used that to my advantage. I doubt it would have worked that well though. Lin struck me as the "arrest them all and let the magistrates sort them out type". And it was not a good time to be a suspected Equalist in Republic City.
We had gotten to the door when a Metalbender dropped behind us. "Halt!", I heard him shout. Brought his arm up, ready to ensnare us undoubtedly. I turned and sent off a quick burst with my sonic, an energy charge that magnetized the metal strongly enough that it would stick within his suit.
We made it to the TARDIS door when the far door flew open. And I mean flew. As in a gust of wind forcing it open. More like a miniature tornado, actually. A female voice demanded, "Alright Equalists, give yourselves up! It's over!"
You get one guess who it was. Only one.
Have you guessed? Good.
I do not lie when I say that the arrival of Avatar Korra, a young and headstrong teenager who was clearly and understandably convinced we were all Equalists, was not yet the worst part of that day. It was just very close.
Korra was in her usual attire. Blue sleeveless Water Tribe-theme top, arm bands, and darker blue trousers. Contrast to my navy blue trousers and jacket and lighter blue button-down shirt. I suppose the color theme was fairly close. There was nothing to it, of course, since my original desire to wear a purple jacket was overwhelmed by my desire to not look like I was a can of facepaint away from laughing a lot and plotting elaborate traps to kill Batman.
"This is the last time I try to visit this bloody city," I swore.
"Don't move!" She assumed a stance that I figured was in preparation for Earthbending. Most likely to trap us by pulling said element up from under the structure. Or just to throw rocks at us. We should feel lucky she wasn't already trying to punch us in the face with fireballs, undoubtedly known to her as "Plan A".
I had an advantage over my older namesake, however. Namely, I had a Companion who could fight metaphysical fire with metaphysical fire. So to speak.
Janias reached out with the Force, throwing a solid and entirely invisible blast of energy that staggered the other girl. She'd recover quickly but it did buy us the seconds we needed to get back into the TARDIS. "Some world you decided to visit," Janias said, smirking. "I've never seen the Force used that way before."
"It's not the Force," I replied, already hitting dials to shift the TARDIS out. "Well, it is the Force, but it's not.... it's all metaphysical stuff centered around life energy or something. Very complicated." I pulled on the lever to shift us out.
As I did so, there was a loud thump on the door of the TARDIS.
I heard that sound and was gripped by concern. "Oh no no, don't tell me..."
The TARDIS shifted violently under us, forcing me to hold onto the lever to prevent from falling over. Camilla would have hit the floor if Janias hadn't caught her and righted her, keeping one arm on a rail. I looked at readings to confirm my suspicion. "Of all the... that pigheaded stubborn...!"
"Doctor, what's happening?!", Camilla asked.
"Korra grabbed the TARDIS as it de-materialized!," I replied. "She's pulling us off course! I've got to take us back out of the Time Vortex before it kills her!" I quickly pushed the lever.
Normally the TARDIS just re-materializes in a stationary position. But this was an emergency shift. That meant it wasn't coming out of the Time Vortex into a stable coordinate but flying out. The TARDIS now had, in three-dimensional terms, velocity.
In other words, we were speeding through the air in a blue box, not the most aerodynamic of shapes, with the TARDIS's systems a little haywire on account of having a metaphysical super-being in a human form hanging onto the outside of it.
The next ten seconds involved a lot of shouting. Janias and Camilla hauled Korra inside - rather easy when she was almost frozen in place by the shock of vortex exposure - and I was busy trying to decelerate the TARDIS and land her.
"We've got her!", Janias shouted.
"Good! Now hold on to something!", I replied.
I don't suppose I need to state that I literally had no experience in flying the TARDIS through three dimensions at this point? It's a rather important fact on why, well, we crashed.
Through a wall.
Into a building.
It was going to be one of those days.
I suppose that we had some fortune on our side. The TARDIS remained upright and plowing through half the walls in the structure were enough to bring it to a stop.
The central console was still sparking a little as I pulled myself back to my feet. "Any landing you can walk away from," I muttered under my breath. I looked over to my Companions and our uninvited passenger who was just now starting to stir a little. I breathed a sigh of relief at the avoided catastrophe. I had significant doubt that her Avatar Spirit would find a new host on her world if she died in the Time Vortex... or anywhere else but her homeworld.
Her blue eyes darted around as she looked at each of us. She sat up, a hand on her head, and faced the TARDIS control. Her eyes widened at seeing it. "What's, where am I?" She looked up at the ceiling. "Where did you take me?!" Korra used her arms - rather muscled arms, mind you - to push her self backward and out the TARDIS door. She ended up staring at the ceiling of wherever we'd landed. A look of confusion crossed over her face. She looked back into the TARDIS. "It's..."
"It's bigger on the inside," Camilla explained with a smile. "Pocket dimension."
"Oi." I looked at her with mocking disapproval. "It takes all the fun out of it when one of us says it. She has to say it."
Cami made a sarcastic face in reply.
Korra was... well, a fish out of water. She looked out what I presumed to be a window in the building we'd crashed into. "But, we were just in Republic City. Where did you take me?"
"We took you, well... I don't know," I admitted. "I didn't see where we were when I had to take us out of the Time Vortex. I was too busy getting us back to normal space so that our tagalog" - I pointed toward her for emphasis - "didn't die from exposure. In case you missed that, you were the tagalong. When will you ever learn to show any kind of restraint?"
"Well, you were trying to escape!"
"I'm sorry, but I didn't feel like dealing with all that bother of being arrested for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. After I had nearly convinced the Equalists to give it up, by the way."
"Actually, I'm not sure you were quite that close to doing that," Camilla interjected.
I should have thanked Camilla. My ego needed a bit of deflation.
"Guess we'll never know." I kept my eyes on Korra, wanting to make sure the fear I saw welling within her didn't turn into outright panic. "I'm the Doctor, by the way. These are my traveling Companions Janias and Camilla. We travel through space and time in my TARDIS, that is, Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. Yes, it's bigger on the inside. And she can appear as quite a few things but I prefer the police box look. Personal choice."
"Who is this again?", Janias asked.
"I'm Korra, you know, the Avatar," Korra answered before I could give an introduction. She crossed her arms and looked fairly impatient. "So how do I get home?"
"Excuse me." I went back up to the console and checked something. "Hrm. System damage is repairing fairly well. I can probably move her through local space easily enough, but I want to let the engine repair fully before I try to return us to Republic City. Assuming I can keep Chief Bei Fong from trying to clap us in irons, it'd be nice to get to play tourist after all. I do so wanted to see Aang's statue and try some of those green noodles. Not really a fan of green noodles, but I'll try them. Just never ask me to try gag'h."
"You mean those awful Klingon worms we almost had to eat?", Camilla asked wiht a disgusted face.
"What's a Klingon?" Korra turned and faced Janias who had just turned off her holo-emitter, revealing her green pigmentation. "And... how did you turn green?"
"I just turned off the holographic emitter," she answered. "I'm not Human, I'm Mirialan. An alien, I mean. I used to be a Jedi." Janias smiled and stretched an arm around Cami's shoulders. "She's mine, by the way. Don't even think about it."
"So possessive my dear," Camilla giggled. She gave Janias a kiss on the lips.
Korra's eyes widened and her jaw hung open. It was a look of utter confusion, moreso than when she'd realized the TARDIS was bigger on the inside. Somehow I suspected Korra's upbringing didn't include more than a very basic introduction to the birds and the bees. Janias and Camilla saw the look on her face and laughed.
I suspect that the entire scene was very bad news for the Korra/Asami shippers back home. Well, presuming there isn't some alternate timeline out there where Korra and.... you know what? I'm not going to bring that up. Getting into fifth dimensional alternate paths is just too much of a bother.
"Moving on," I said aloud. "I'm afraid that for the next few hours, Avatar Korra, you're stuck with us."
"But... but..." Korra was still transfixed by my Companions. I don't blame her, they were rather lovely... and there I go, reaffirming my own orientation. And no, Korra/Asami shippers, that look of transfixtion was still pure confusion, not sudden realization of inner longings. I'm afraid that she's still on course for relationship disaster with "Commander Makotay". And this discussion is now over. I still have a disaster to describe.
Yes. We nearly got mistaken for Equalists and arrested, then we accidentally dragged Avatar Korra across six dimensions before crashlanding the TARDIS. And the worst part hadn't come yet.
Of course, it did a moment later. For that was when I heard a crashing sound from outside the TARDIS. That broke through the awkward moment of Korra discovering alternative lifestyles and my Companions' rather mischievous enjoyment of introducing their existence. I dashed by them and was the first out of the TARDIS. They followed me out and our eyes tracked doward the knocked down wall and...
People were coming in, smashing through old drywall and wood like it was paper. Their bodies took damage in the process but they didn't seem to care.
Probably because they were too dead to care.
"Oh, this is good," I muttered. "We just arrived in the middle of a zombie apocalypse."
There was a sudden second crash and a shower of plaster above us. More of them came jumping down. In the process, they cut us off from the TARDIS.
Remember we had no firearms. I had a sonic screwdriver. Sonic screwdrivers normally don't work on zombies. Cyborg zombies, sure. Normal ones re-animated by various metaphysical energies? Not something it's equipped to deal with.
I found myself wishing Janias has a lightsaber.
As it was, Janias and Korra went into action first. Janias threw a blow with the Force that knocked one down but barely staggered the others. Korra showed some understanding of our surroundings, going for Air instead of Fire and trying to knock them around with a flurry of air blasts. It didn't do much unfortunately; these were rather robust corpses. I was wracking my brain on where I'd heard of zombies being more powerful than normal. I'm really not much of a zombie setting expert, I confess.
One grabbed Janias as she was concentrating to throw them back. She twisted to try and get away, but it wasn't enough. The thing took her and threw her across the room, causing her to slam into the far wall with a scream of pain.
One reached for Korra. It took a fireball to the face for its trouble. The fire did at least seem to slow it down. Of course, some also hit the TARDIS, so my involuntary reaction was to shout, "Oi, watch the finish!"
"What are these things?!", Korra asked.
"What, you've never heard of the living dead?", I asked, dragging Cami with me as we went to help Janias. "Zombies, my dear Avatar. Reanimated corpses." I knelt down over Janias to scan her with the sonic screwdriver, but I could tell from how her arm was twisted that she'd had the shoulder broken, pretty much twisted out of its socket in fact.
Camilla almost pushed me out of the way. "Are you ready?", she asked Janias.
Janias gritted her teeth and nodded. She let out a brief cry when Camilla set her shoulder.
"Since when do you know how to do that?", I asked her.
"I've been a slave almost my whole life, Doctor. You learn how to take care of yourself and others," Camilla pointed out.
"Uh, they're not stopping!", Korra shouted, throwing fireballs at them. Unfortunately, fire was only slowing them down. None dropped.
Camilla pulled Janias to her feet. "In the pain you're in, I imagine calling on the Force is a bit out of the question," i remarked to her. "Okay everyone, time for our favorite past time."
"And what's that?", Korra asked.
"We run." Even before I said that my Companions had gone through the hole in the wall the TARDIS had made.
"But I hate runniiingggggg!" The word "Running" carried a bit from surprise at me grabbing Korra by the wrist and hand to drag her with me.
Credit to Korra where it's due. The girl knows the value of a tactical retreat and didn't fight me. If she had I know I'd never have been able to keep her from going back.
So we ran. We ran away from my TARDIS because I knew there was no way we could've gotten through the attackers from above without getting overwhelmed from behind. I had hoped to double back at some point, maybe get around them.
Instead, I ran into trouble.
I literally ran into trouble.
We collided at a corner near the stairs. Each of us let out an oof and fell away from the other. I hit the ground before I even had a chance to take in the basic physical appearance. Thin, plain, brown hair and brown eyes.
Other details demanded my attention to confirm identity, but before my brain could process them the biggest clue appeared in his hand. I looked behind me to see another of the walking dead coming from a far room.
In a few more seconds, Korra could have thrown fire at the thing. It wasn't a danger. She just wouldn't get the chance.
A single word sounded out through that hall.
"Fuego!"
A solid lance of red flame, almost tight enough to be a laser, came from the wooden object in the man's right hand. It speared the approaching corpse and blasted away the thing's hips and lower spine, making it impossible for the reanimated being to move.
"I've got to learn how to Firebend like that," I heard Korra gasp.
I was too busy staring at the figure. But not his eyes. I knew better. I knew not to stare into those brown eyes.
He looked at me warily. I spoke more quickly, though.
"Harry Dresden, Wizard for Hire." I extended a hand. "I'm the Doctor."
Like I said. I ran into trouble.