One Warning

Alright! This is the continuation of the main Dsplash plot! I took a little break with the Chasing Shadows chronicle, but now it is time to bring you back up to speed after the cliffhanger. I'm super, super pleased to say that I got Inhonoredglory to pre read this before posting it and that she really enjoyed it. Hopefully you will too. It is, as other plots have been, somewhat intense, but when dealing with all-powerful foes, intensity is an occupational hazard. This focuses mostly on the Doctor, but the next Chronicle I am set to release (it just needs a little editing) will focus back on the HTTYD characters. Anyway, hope you'll let me know what you think of it!

Dimension Splash Chronicles

Event: One Warning

Pov: The Doctor

Time: Year 10.31 of Hiccup and Link’s existence in the game

     The Doctor rushed up to the door of the healing facility. With deft quickness he reached into his coat pocket, drew out his sonic screwdriver, and opened the door. His teeth were clenched in desperation as he rushed wildly down the smooth hallways, his coat flapping behind him. He reached a third door, but right as he was about to open it, the sirens went off and blue distress lights began to flash. The Doctor tried to open the door, but it would not budge. The sonic did nothing.

     “No, no, no! Deadlocked!” He kicked at the door and ran to the nearest computer panel. He scrambled the screen codes with his sonic and accessed the hospital’s security layouts. A map showed that the intruder was making his way very quickly to the heart of the facility and the central control room. The Doctor’s stomach sank as he saw the life signs going out in the rooms the monster moved through. This Gemnode... if that is truly what it was, was living up to Hiccup terrifying descriptions. But the Doctor had no time to pause. He accessed the security files for the room he was trapped in, found the defense turret controls, scrambled the security protocols, and activated the device. A powerful laser turret dropped from the roof, turned towards the door, and fired a brilliant red blast. Smoke billowed into the room as the door melted into slag, and the Doctor dove through the choking fumes, sprinting into the next hallway. He had seen the path his enemy was taking, and if he was fast he could cut him off.

     The Doctor’s frenzied sprint came to a faltering halt as he entered the next room. Strewn across the floor were bodies. Every imaginable life form from all over the galaxies came to this hospital to be healed. It was the ultimate haven, the unquestioned place of peace. Now it was covered in butchery. The victims looked as though they had been hit with powerful energy blasts. The Doctor paced slowly past, looking around in horror, his brow furrowing and his heart catching fire. He was angry, sick with fury. Then just as he turned to leave the room and continue his pursuit, his foot brushed against something small and soft. He glanced down, and his fury turned into unadulterated grief. His eyes glassed over as he knelt down. The limp body of an adipose was at his feet, it’s life taken from it for no reason other than cruelty. The Doctor went to touch it, but drew his hand back as if stung. 

     “I’m sorry... I’m so sorry...” He whispered. Then he looked up, his deep brown eyes burning again with wrath. “No more!” 

     The Time Lord dashed faster than he had before. Before it had been panic, mystery, a sick feeling of what might be happening. Now he knew what was happening, and he was going to stop it. He had set his sonic to track the invader’s energy signal, and now he knew he was close. The monster was in the next room, but without a moment of hesitation the Doctor hacked into the computer and used the turret to blast the door down. He rushed into the smoke filled room and stopped, his Sonic raised in front of him. The device whirred and shot its blue light out into the billows of thick black smoke. 

     “Stop!” the Time Lord yelled in desperation and fury.

     The Doctor’s gaze was fixed in front of him. He knew his enemy was in the smoke, his sonic’s sensors made that all too clear. Then out of the black-grey billows a shimmering light danced forth. It flecked onto all the walls in strange but beautiful amber tones. The Doctor, almost without knowing why, loosened his grip on his sonic. The smoke continued to clear, and as it did so the light of this strange creature grew brighter and brighter. The Doctor could now make out its form as it turned slowly to face him, cocking its head almost in curiosity. The smoked cleared completely, and the Doctor dropped his arm. His mouth fell open for one moment as he looked the creature over. It most certainly was a Gemnode... and it was beautiful. The Doctor’s breath was taken away. He had seen many displays of splendor in his travels, but in his hearts he knew that this creature left them all looking dull. Its form was mathematically perfect, elegant yet efficient, and from deep inside it’s glass-like chest a brilliant light dazzled in all directions. It’s body shifted in shades of color from red to amber to yellow... each color deep and rich yet at the same time blindingly bright. The Doctor was lost in wonder, but the creature clearly was not. It’s curiosity had turned into something very different. The Doctor suddenly could feel the arrogance seething off of the Gemnode into the very air he was breathing. Never before had an emotion felt so tangible.

     “And you must be the Lord of Time.” The Gemnode’s harmonic voice translated itself into the Doctor’s thoughts.

     “And you must be a Gemnode... Please--”

     “There are few who can so readily recognize us. You are as clever as they say... or perhaps as foolish.” 

     “Please, you...” The Doctor paused, still in awe at the sheer beauty of the alien being floating a few feet in front of him. “You, you truly are beautiful. I mean that.” But then the Doctor’s countenance darkened. He remembered the bodies strewn across the ground, the stories Hiccup had told him of these creatures. “But if you don’t leave this facility, if you don’t stop this mindless slaughter, I swear there is nothing in this universe that will convince me not to destroy you here and on the spot.” The Gemnode seemed unmoved. The Doctor continued. “I want to negotiate, we can make a form of peace, but you must stop this, and this is my only warning.” The Doctor raised his sonic again. “You get one chance.”

     The Gemnode laughed. It was high, cruel, almost as if an insect had threatened a giant. “You would negotiate peace? What power do you have? What depth of knowledge? Tell me this: Where is the opposer of the purpose? I have no time for you, not yet at least. Did he come to or leave this world? Speak. Where is Hiccup?”

     “You’re looking for him, but you won’t get any information out of me... You’re killing these people? Why?” The Doctor was becoming more angry. His teeth were bare and his brow wet.

     “Because they helped him.”

     “What?”

     “Because they helped the opposer.”

     “No they didn’t! They are just patients! If anyone is to blame it’s--”

     “You. Yes, I thought as much. And the computer scans I’ve been pulling have confirmed my suspicions. He was here, and he was here because you brought him here, sheltered him, healed him. Your life is forfeit.”

     “Don’t play games with me. I’ve warned you, you will stop this now or I will stop you. I helped a wounded stranger who had been tortured for no fault of his own, and you are telling me that I have committed crime? You may think yourselves gods, but I’m here to tell you plainly, you are wrong. The Purpose is wrong, and you will stop the slaughter now.”

     The Gemnode laughed again. “You ignorant... you stupid little man. gods? No. Not yet at least. But of course you don’t believe in that sort of thing do you? You’ve seen the beginning and end of your universe, of your worlds, of so many worlds. But for all your traveling you are blind. Compared to me, Cylewl, you,” The Gemnode spoke a name the Doctor had guarded for so, so long. A name filled with hurt and loss. The Gemnode spoke the name of the Doctor. “you are a child. A fool. For six thousand years I have traveled the worlds. I was there when the universes began, blessed beyond all you could dream of, and you threaten me and act as if the loss of some worthless wads of carbon is a tragedy?” The Gemnode’s voice suddenly grew far more frightening, deep, angry. “Hiccup destroyed one of our own. He can be replaced, he’s a mere human, but Sardilic’s death can never be remedied. Anyone and everyone who aids that boy in any way will be destroyed, including you.”

     The Gemnode began to raise his hand towards the Doctor, his palm glowing with an energy buildup. “Right.” the Time Lord said. “I’ve warned you, but you will not listen, and if you will not change, then I will do what I must.” The Doctor activated his sonic, and the device made a high pitched shriek. “I’ve scanned you down to the molecular level, you are a crystalline substance, and a single wavelength could and will destroy you. Back down!” The Gemnode dropped his hand, but he began to move forward. “I’ve warned you.” The Gemnode kept moving forward. “Then I am sorry, I truly am, you have brought this on yourself, you and all your kind.” The Doctor sent out the sonic wave. Nothing happened. He tried again. Nothing.

     “Did you think I would come into this world without sonic shielding? Was that it? Was that the culmination of your threats and boasts? You who would destroy your own species for the sake of peace? You sicken me, and it will give me great pleasure to destroy you.”

     “Right, well...” The Doctor cocked his head, tried to hide his nervousness, and pointed his sonic up at the roof, “Bye then!” Two turrets dropped down and fired at the Gemnode. The Doctor rushed out of the door, but he could hear the turrets being ripped from the roof. Things were not going according to plan, but the Gemnode was after him now instead of the patients, so that was an advantage, and it was an advantage he prayed he could use. 

      The Doctor blazed down the hall at top speed. He tried to glance over his shoulder, and every time he did he saw the hazy orange glow of the Gemnode trickling up the walls. The Doctor began to quickly shut the doors behind him using his sonic screwdriver before turning and belting down the seemingly endless corridors. At last he found what he was looking for. The Doctor rushed into the main control room filled with flickering computer screens. He closed the door behind him and rushed up to the desk. Two security guards were lying dead on the floor, and the Doctor frowned angrily at the sight. How the Gemnode had managed to already kill them he did not know. He pointed his sonic at the displays and the flickering soon stopped. A humming sound came from the mainframe of the computer and the systems came back online. “Now we’re getting somewhere!”

     The Doctor glanced behind him and then hit a large green button. A small microphone ejected from the desk in front of him and he grabbed it. “Hello! Hello!” The speakers along the walls of the entire facility echoed the Doctor’s voice. “Listen, the hospital is under attack, if you can hear me get out. Start evacuation immediately!” The Doctor dropped the mike tapped some keys on the computer in front of him. He soon found the security camera feeds, and with them he pinpointed the Gemnode’s position. It had hardly moved from where he left it, and its hand was buried in a socket in the wall. “No you don’t.” The Doctor said. The creature was trying to hack the system. The Doctor locked every security system in the building onto the Gemnode’s signature. Instantly turrets began dropping from the roof all around Cylewl. They fired on him with blazing violet and red beams, filling the room with fire and smoke. Next an EMP wave was blasted across the room. A gravity pulse from the roof then crushed everything in the room, flattening even the smoke and the ceiling turrets to the floor. The Doctor looked at the screen, breathing heavily. The hospital was well armed, it had to be, but now that the room was clear, there was no sign of the Gemnode.

     Then the orange light filled the room. The Doctor twirled around to see Cylewl materialize behind him. In a flash the Gemnode threw its hands forward and the Doctor was slammed against the wall. Cylewl was creating some kind of compression field which held the Doctor sprawling in its invisible grasp. The time for conversation was apparently over, for Cylewl said absolutely nothing. He turned to the computer the Doctor had been using, pressed dozens of keys with blinding speed, and then pulled a large lever. The Doctor looked on the monitors with shock. “No! You’ve reversed the proton shield. Anything that flies out of here will--” The Doctor stopped and watched in horror as the monitors displayed evacuation ships blasting into pieces as they tried to escape the doomed facility. Each one that contacted the all encompassing proton shield was destroyed instantly. The proton shield was the ultimate way of keeping enemies out, but the Gemnode had reversed it into an inescapable way of keeping victims in. The Doctor breathed in and out furiously his eyes darting around, trying to find a way to move. His sonic had fallen from his hand and he was still pinned against the wall. He shouted out at his unmoved enemy. “Stop! Why? What is the point!?” 

      The Gemnode pulled another lever, and sirens blared throughout the hospital. All the lights turned red, and the displays before the Doctor’s eyes clearly read: SELF DESTRUCT SEQUENCE ACTIVATED. “No, no! You can’t!”

     “Don’t worry, the planet is next.” The Gemnode turned toward the Doctor, dropping him to the floor. The Doctor grasped the sonic, pointed it towards the computer, and with a massive flash of sparks the displays all burst apart and the red lights stopped flashing. “A brave effort, but perhaps you didn’t here me.” Cylewl began to glow, rising higher into the air. The light inside of him became blinding, and suddenly the Doctor felt himself and everything in the room being pulled towards him. Bits of broken computer, parts of the wall, the two dead security guards, everything began sliding towards the Gemnode. The Doctor tried to grasp a cord hanging from the wall, but soon he was floating horizontally in the air as the pull of the Gemnode increased. Walls began the crack, the ceiling buckled, and now the Doctor was completely blinded by the light. He felt the cord he was grasping snap, and soon after it he heard the walls and ceiling give way. In a storm of debris the Doctor flew into the Gemnode. Their was a sucking feeling, a flash, a painful stinging, and the the Doctor found himself splayed out on the concrete landing pad outside of the hospital. The Doctor still could not see, but he could hear, and what he heard was the crumbling, crashing, exploding sound of the hospital collapsing behind him. He grimaced in sadness and anger, and he blinked hard to try and see through the tears that were still streaming in his eyes from the blinding glow. He pushed his palms firmly against the ground and tried to raise himself to his feet, but he could only make it to his knees.

     Then the Doctor’s vision, though blurry, let him see a hazy blue box in front of him. It was the TARDIS. He stumbled forward, reaching for the key in his pocket. But then the cruel voice of Cylewl echoed out from behind him. “Keep walking. That is exactly where I need you.” The Doctor turned and faced the floating figure. “This planet is doomed. The gravity well I just teleported you out of will consume this world in less than a day, and there is nothing you can do to stop it. But, your death will come before the death of this hunk of rock.” The Doctor looked unflinching into the Gemnode’s burning eyes. “I am going to destroy you and the one thing that made you special, your TARDIS. You will burn together, and Hiccup will soon join you.” 

     The Doctor faced the Gemnode and tossed his hand towards the crumbling remains of the hospital. “You’ve done all this, you’ve doomed a planet, and you may have beaten me, but let’s face it... you’ve lost. Hiccup is out of your reach, he’s safe. No matter how many people you kill you can’t change that. And I’m proud to have helped him. Go ahead, try and kill me, but I’m still putting my money on that boy and his brother because they are going to stop you!” Cylewl cocked his head. What the Doctor said had annoyed him.

     “We may not be able to kill Hiccup personally, but believe me, Doctor, you have not saved him. He will soon find that returning home is not an easy thing. Sometimes...” The Gemnode paused, relishing the worried look in the Doctor’s eyes, “sometimes a homecoming hero finds that he’s not as popular as when he left.”

      With that Cylewl moved forward and touched the Doctor with the tip of his finger. He had moved more quickly than you could blink, and the Doctor could do nothing to avoid it. The touch of the Gemnode teleported the Doctor into the TARDIS itself. Then Cylewl created a cronon loop around the TARDIS. The lights around the Doctor died as the power of the TARDIS was drained. Cylewl raised his hand skyward, and the TARDIS shot up into the air. The Gemnode followed it. Within moments both the Gemnode and the TARDIS had left the planet’s atmosphere. Then Cylewl stopped, faced the planet’s sun, and with a throwing motion, sent the TARDIS hurtling towards it at unbelievable speed.

     Inside the TARDIS, the Doctor was desperately gripping his controls. What little power he had allowed the display to show him that he was flying toward the sun. He grimaced, thinking at lightning speed of some sort of plan that could save his life. The TARDIS would never recover enough power to fly and avoid the star. Then he saw it, the tiny, glimmering, green piece of Sardilic sitting in his scanner. If only he could move that object in a way that would rip the dimensional fabric, he might could escape. Now that he had a plan, the Doctor worked like a machine, furiously twisting levers and whacking buttons. He needed to get the shard outside of the TARDIS. He hoped that the shard wasn’t ripping the fabric now because it was inside the alternate dimensional bubble of the TARDIS, and thus wasn’t truly moving. “Come on!” The Doctor yelled, trying to get the exterior force field up. Then, with a spark and a flash, the shielding controls hummed back to life. The Doctor grabbed the shard, rushed stumbling to the door as the TARDIS continued to spin out of control. He was just moments from impact now. He opened the door and felt the blistering wave of heat hit him in spite of the shield. Crying out in pain, he held the shard in front of him and focused his mind on one thing: Hiccup.

     Cylewl watched in horror as a white gash appeared and enveloped the TARDIS. The Doctor had escaped, he had failed. The Gemnode started back, unable to believe what he had seen. Hiccup was not the only one jumping dimensions. The enemies of the Gemnodes now were wielding the Gemnodes’ own ultimate weapon. Worst of all, this enemy was no ordinary threat. The Gemnodes had feared the Doctor for years, never willing to attempt to abduct him. His intelligence was easily on level with their’s, as was his conviction. If Hiccup was gaining allies like this, then the Purpose was more threatened than ever.

     But then Cylewl stopped his panicked thoughts. If the Doctor had followed Hiccup, he too would meet an untimely end. The Gemnodes may not have been willing to follow Hiccup into his own world, but perhaps they would not need to. For now, at least they knew where Hiccup was, and if they knew where he was they were one step closer to either killing them themselves or watching someone else do it. 

-------------------------------

The Doctor’s TARDIS hit the ground with a crash. Everything was black. The Doctor picked himself up off the floor and groaned in pain. He’d taken a harsh beating. He stepped slowly towards the door, trying not to breath in too deeply as it hurt his lungs massively each time him did. He pulled the latch and eased the door open. He gazed outside and what he saw was quite startling. Outside of the TARDIS, dozens if not hundreds of dragons were prowling around in a dark cave. The TARDIS had landed in the dragon mound on Dragon Island and now it was surrounded by curious, hungry dragons. They moved forward slowly, their bulbous yellow eyes latched onto the Doctor and their pupils contracted into slits. Hundreds of guttural growls and hisses slithered through the air. The Doctor whirled around and latched the door behind him, placing his back against it as if to hold it closed. “This... is not exactly where I was hoping for.”