The Zombieing of Chiswick by Canadian Whovian
Summary: They've bitten off more than they can chew- the zombies, that is, when they take on Donna and the Doctor. When Donna decides to go to Chiswick to visit her relatives, what should have been a normal and boring visit turns into mortal peril thanks to an unexplained zombie apocalypse.
Rating: Teen
Categories: Tenth Doctor
Characters: Donna Noble, The Doctor (10th), Wilfred Mott
Genres: Action/Adventure, Horror, Humor
Warnings: None
Challenges: None
Series: None
Published: 2015.04.08
Updated: 2015.04.21
Index
Chapter 1: Chapter 1
Chapter 2: Chapter 2
Chapter 3: Chapter 3
Chapter 1: Chapter 1
Donna Noble was a woman on a mission. There was one single, driving thought on her mind. Her red hair as fiery as her temper, Donna strode into the TARDIS console room with a sense of determination. For days she’d been trying to talk to the Doctor. He’d been so preoccupied fixing his TARDIS that whenever she’d attempted to bring up what was on her mind he didn’t hear her.
All of her previous attempts had failed and Donna was beginning to get the sense that he was purposely avoiding her. It must have been some bizarre alien trait because it seemed that the Doctor could anticipate what she was going to ask him before she could get the first few words out of her mouth.
Over the past three days she had resorted to ambushing the skinny Time Lord whenever possible to try and catch him off guard. Strangely, it seemed like he was always two steps ahead of her.
The first time was three days ago. It was morning and the two of them were sitting at the kitchen table having breakfast. Nothing huge, mostly just toast and jam.
“So, how did you sleep?” the Doctor asked, smiling, as he began the process of licking all the jam off of the toast before eating it. Donna was beginning to think that he liked the jam more than the toast.
“Well, after running for our lives trying to escape from the candy cane dwarfs, I was so exhausted I fell onto the bed and didn’t move the whole entire night. Slept like a baby.”
He licked off a sticky blob of jam that had oozed onto his finger. It wasn’t just one flavour of jam. It was six flavours and one of them was tomato. Just looking at him eating it was enough to make Donna want to puke.
“Yep, running for your life can definitely do that. I can’t sleep unless I there’s a possibility that I’m going to be in mortal peril at least five times before bed,” he said.
She took a bite of her toast. “You know, we never would have been in that situation if you hadn’t licked their candy canes,” she added.
“But they were good!” the Doctor insisted.
Donna shuddered slightly, remembering what the dwarves looked like. “But they were so creepy! With their red skin and white hair they looked a lot like Oompa Loompas!”
“Yeah, now that you mention it I suppose they did,” he nodded thoughtfully.
She took another bite of her toast. They ate for a few seconds in silence, giving her the time to muster up the courage to ask her question. It was nothing huge, but she knew he wouldn’t like it anyway.
“Doctor, I was thinking maybe it would be nice to take a break from traveling for a while. I’m feeling kind of homesick and I was wondering if maybe we could stop in and visit my mom and gramps for a few days.” Still staring at her plate, she waited for a reply and when she didn’t get one she looked up at the Doctor. “Did you hear me?”
Donna was shocked to see that the Time Lord managed to cram the remaining few slices of toast that was on his plate into his mouth all at once. Still chewing, he looked over at his companion and quickly mumbled a non-committal, unintelligible reply that sounded more like, “Mmhff gumff iffuff,” before dashing away at a speed so lightning fast that she would have missed him leave if she blinked. He left so fast that Donna stared at his plate, which was still wobbling and rattling on the table, expecting him to be where he was only half a second earlier, before she put a hand out to stop it.
Later that same day Donna decided to try a different tactic. The Doctor had left the table so fast in the morning that she knew the only other way she could get a straight answer out of him was to find a way to corner him and stop him from leaving. If he couldn’t leave then he couldn’t avoid the question. And then it came to her…
“Hey, Doctor!” Donna yelled over the sound of the water running as the Time Lord showered in the bathroom. She moved closer to the door and knocked on it with her knuckles. “You can’t get out of it now!” She smiled as she looked down at the pile of towels and clothes haphazardly piled high on the floor beside her. “I took all of your clothes and towels out of the bathroom! You’re trapped now! And guess what? I’m not giving ‘em back until you give me a straight answer, Spaceman!”
She heard him shut off the water and she leaned closer, putting her ear to the door, waiting for a reply. She couldn’t help the huge grin that was plastered on her face. She had him now. She knew she did. There was no possible way he could slip past her. He wouldn’t dare run out of the bathroom naked. He wasn’t brave enough to try.
“Doctor!” she called innocently from the other side of the door. Suddenly, the silence was broken by a series of strange sounds. There was a crinkling sound, followed by a few popping noises and then silence again.
“What’s going on in there?!”
She raised her hand to knock, her fingers inches away from rapping on the wooden surface, when it suddenly opened. Stunned, Donna stared at the Doctor in disbelief, her hand still raised in mid-knock with a shocked expression on her face.
To her surprise, the Doctor somehow managed to wrap himself up in the translucent shower curtain that was in the bathroom. A few of the hooks were still attached to it and it was soapy and wet. His hair was still dripping wet from the lack of a towel, but he didn’t seem to mind.
“Hello Donna,” he grinned widely, holding up the makeshift towel around his waist with one hand and giving her a small wave. “Now, what did you want to ask me?”
Her brain froze over. She couldn’t think. She was so shocked she wasn’t sure if she found the sight of the naked Time Lord embarrassing, horrifying, humorous, or a combination of all three. One thing was for sure. One of them was embarrassed and it wasn’t him even though it should’ve been.
“I…I…uh….um…”
“Well, it mustn’t be that important.”
He shifted slightly on his feet and motioned to the bathroom behind him with a jab of his thumb. Both of them pretended not to hear the plastic shower curtain make an uncomfortable squeaking sound as it chafed when he moved. The thin material, just barely obscuring his nakedness, didn’t leave much to the imagination. Not that Donna wanted to imagine. The moment was getting more awkward by the second.
“I saved you some hot water if you want to have a shower. Although…” he paused, turning to look back into the mess of what was left of the bathroom. The floor was slopping wet with water and suds. The shower rod only had a few hooks still left hanging on it.
Still… It could’ve been worse. At least there’d been a shower curtain for him to use.
“If I were you, I’d stick with a bath,” he added before walking down the hall, not even bothering to pick up any of the clothes or towels that were on the floor as he stubbornly tried to maintain whatever dignity he had left. Whatever dignity a thin shower curtain could afford him, that is.
The other day, Donna found the Time Lord in the library. He was sitting in his favourite chair: the large overstuffed leather one close to the fireplace. She knew that he liked his quiet time and hated to be interrupted when he was reading and relaxing, but she needed an answer to her question and she’d try anything to get it out of him.
“Doctor…” Donna started, as she walked over to where he was sitting. He was sitting with a book in his lap; glasses perched on his nose, reading Charles Dickens. The Doctor quickly glanced up from his leisurely reading and when he saw Donna making her way over to him, he flipped through the remaining 136 pages of the book, reading at break neck Time Lord speed and closed the book, having finished the story just as she stopped right in front of where he was sitting.
“I knew I’d find you in here!” she exclaimed.
“Yeah, I figured I’d catch up on some reading,” he commented lightly.
“Was it a good book?”
She didn’t want to immediately dive into her question because she knew that he’d try to avoid her. Over the past few days she’d been pestering him to come up with an answer and she didn’t want him to become completely infuriated with her. At the same time, Donna was becoming irritatingly annoyed with him so maybe he deserved to be pestered almost continuously. She wouldn’t stop until she got a reply out of him and, judging by how the Doctor kept on the defensive, he knew it.
“It was brilliant! I love Charles Dickens! The man’s a genius. He’s written so many good books: Oliver Twist, A Tale of Two Cities, A Christmas Carol! My personal favourite of course, is a Christmas Carol. Just finished reading it, in fact. Did I tell you I met Charles Dickens? It was in Cardiff. Of course, I didn’t mean to end up in Cardiff. Rose and I were planning on going somewhere else, but you know how the TARDIS can be sometimes! Anyway, I met him, the Gelth and a lovely woman named Gwyneth. It turns out…”
“Yeah, anyway,” Donna interrupted. If she didn’t stop him now she knew that he’d ramble on for hours at length about nothing. “I didn’t come in here to listen to you ramble on. I came to ask you a question.”
The Doctor abruptly stopped in mid sentence with his mouth hanging open. He felt a little hurt at the way she so rudely interrupted him, but he wasn’t about to let it get to him. The second that he knew what she was after his demeanor quickly changed from cheery and energetic to serious and evasive. The Time Lord took his brainy specs off and put them in his jacket pocket. He carefully set the first edition book on the end table beside him.
“Oh! Would you look at the time?” he stated as he pulled up his sleeve to look at his wrist where a watch should have been.
“It’s 2 p.m.”
“I am so tired,” he said, stretching his arms above his head, giving a fake, over dramatic yawn as he glanced up at Donna.
“And you don’t sleep.” She rolled her eyes.
“Exactly,” he winked as he got up. “That’s why I’m so tired. I haven’t slept in a few days.”
“But Doctor-” She turned to face him as he started to walk away.
“So tired!” He said as he left the room, leaving Donna fuming with anger over her missed chance.
*****
“Oh, you’re here!” the Doctor exclaimed in mild surprise as he met up with Donna in the hallway.
“Of course I’m here you big doofus! Where else would I be?!”
“Oh, I don’t know,” he replied, rubbing the back of his neck. “I haven’t seen you for a while. I kind of forgot you were here.”
“That’s because you keep avoiding me!”
“I haven’t been!” he said defensively, giving her his biggest puppy dog eyed pout, using his warm brown eyes to sway her. It always worked on the women. But Donna was different. She was like Kryptonite to his greatest weapon.
“Yeah right.”
“Honestly!” He tried again, giving her a heartwarming smile, full of charm, using his gorgeous eyes once more.
Damn! It wasn’t working!
Donna knew what he was trying to do and she wasn’t impressed. “Well then, how come every time I try to find you the hallways keep changing? I went to the bathroom earlier and almost dropped my drawers in your garden!”
“It’s not me,” he said seriously. “It’s the TARDIS. She doesn’t always like to obey the law of physics and spatial dimensions. She’s a sassy old girl!” he replied, clicking his tongue cheekily.
“Anyway, now that you’re here I’ve been thinking-”
“Oh, that reminds me!” He threw his hands up into the air, completely oblivious to his companion. “Milk! I forgot to get milk! Can’t have breakfast without it.”
Donna angrily pointed a finger at him, nearly poking him in the eye. “See, you are avoiding me!”
He shrugged. “I’m only popping out for a minute.”
“We’re in the middle of the Time Vortex!” Donna said exasperatedly.
“Exactly. I’m popping out for milk and it might take a while,” he explained as he turned to leave. He stopped in mid step and bounced on the balls of his feet before rushing back over to Donna. “Maybe I should get a cow. Then I won’t have to do a milk run as often.”
“Cow? Why don’t you get a cow that makes jam? At the rate you go through it I’m surprised you don’t pop out for things more often. I swear, it’s like you’re addicted to the stuff. You’re always on a sugar high.”
“Good idea. I don’t know why I didn’t think of that,” he replied before walking down the hall. He heard her calling from him and quickly increased his pace, determined to get away.
“But, Doctor, I-”
Donna went to follow after him. When she rounded the corner the Doctor had gone and the hallway had changed again. Now she found herself standing at a closet filled with balloon animals and confetti. It was a dead end. And she didn’t entirely blame the TARDIS for this one.
*****
This time Donna meant it. She wasn’t going to let the Doctor avoid her forever. She was going to tell him what was on her mind whether he liked it or not.
Lately, when the Doctor hadn’t been trying to avoid her, he had been in the console room doing some kind of maintenance work on the TARDIS. As Donna determinedly strolled into the console room she noted that today was no different. The skinny alien, with brainy specs on and sonic screwdriver held in his mouth, was knee deep in wires, bits of machinery, and dozens of feet of cabling trying to fix something.
Donna’s fast paced footsteps echoed on the metal grating before she abruptly halted right in front of him. He was so absorbed in his work that he didn’t even look up to see her. Brow furrowed in concentration, he took the sonic screwdriver and sonicked a couple of pieces of wiring together.
“Donna, can you pass me that wrench over there?” he asked as he vaguely gestured to the other side of the console without even looking.
“Yeah, sure, I’ll grab it for you.” She walked around to the other side of the console, picked up the heavy wrench and walked back over to the Time Lord, whose hand was outstretched expectantly. Instead of handing it to him she whacked him on the arm with it.
“Oi! What was that for?!” he demanded as he rubbed his arm and looked up at her in surprise.
“Oh, so now you pay attention to me!”
“Actually, Donna, that’s the wrong wrench. I need the other small one that was just beside it.”
She rolled her eyes, placed her hands on her hips, and glared at him. “Listen, Spaceman! I’ve been trying to talk to you for days and you’ve been avoiding me!”
“I’ve been busy!” He irritably replied as he sonicked a few other bits of cabling, springs, and wiring. “But now it’s done.”
“What’s done? Whatever it is, it better be bloody important!”
“It is.”
He quickly tidied up and replaced the metal grating that he pulled up off of the floor back into its original position. The Doctor stood up and guided her over to a series of buttons on the console.
“What did you do?”
“You’ll see,” he grinned as he hit a big blue button.
Curiously, Donna looked around waiting for something to change. There was no movement of the Time Rotor signaling that they were moving through time and space, no secret room or gadgets uncovered, no ninjas climbing down on ropes from the ceiling, no confetti, no nothing. Everything was exactly the same. She turned back to the Doctor, who was still grinning, and looked at him like he was crazy. “But everything’s the same. You didn’t change anything.”
“Yes, I did.” He patted the console lovingly. “Didn’t I, old girl?”
“Hello Doctor.” The voice was sexy and feminine, as sensuous and seductive as any man’s dream.
“Whoa!” Donna backed up a few steps in surprise, definitely not expecting it. “I was not expecting this!”
“Hello Donna,” the TARDIS greeted pleasantly.
She eyed the Doctor. “But how can it talk?”
“The TARDIS is alive. She’s sentient and she’s telepathic. She already gets inside your head. I just figured it’d be nice to hear her for a change.”
“I didn’t know you could do that! Where did you get that idea? That’s so Star Trek!”
“Actually, Donna, that’s exactly where I got the idea from. Good old Star Trek! The original’s great, but I prefer The Next Generation, myself.”
“So, what’s next? Those doors on Star Trek that open sideways and make that whooshing sound?” she added sarcastically. “Because that is so annoying.”
The Time Lord grinned goofily at her. “Did you know that Gene Roddenberry was from the future? How else do you think that he came up with all of that advanced technology?”
“And let me guess, next you’re going to tell me that Vulcans are real, right?”
“They’re not, but Klingons are.”
“You’re kidding!”
“Nope. In fact, I’ll have you know that I speak perfect Klingon.”
“You are such a nerd! But if you got the idea from Star Trek how come the TARDIS sounds so, well, sexy?”
The Doctor shrugged.
“You’ve been a naughty boy, haven’t you, Doctor?” The TARDIS commented.
The Doctor closed his eyes and chuckled slightly in a bemused way.
“What’s so funny?” asked Donna.
“Hmm… that tickles.”
“What does?”
“She’s just showing me-”
Donna quickly smacked the Time Lord on his sore arm to snap him out of it. “Right… Anyway, Doctor, as I was saying.” Rubbing his arm, he looked over at his companion, waiting for her to continue. “Chiswick: Gramps and Mom. Can we go?”
He glanced away and ran a hand through his messy brown hair, making it even messier. “Oh, Donna, I don’t know.”
“Why not?”
“It’s just...” He sighed. “I don’t do well with mothers and I definitely don’t do domestic. Let’s just say I have a history of being slapped and I know that Sylvia doesn’t exactly like me.”
“Oi! I’ll slap you if we don’t go! Besides, I don’t mean forever, just a day or two. You don’t even need to be in the house the whole time. I’m sure Gramps will love to show you his new telescope.”
He nodded. “Yeah, I suppose you’re right. I do love spending time with Wilfred.”
“Doctor,” the TARDIS interrupted. “I must warn you that Chiswick has a high concentration of zomb-”
“That’s enough of that,” Donna said, hitting the button to silence the TARDIS’s disturbingly sexy voice.
“But Donna-” he started, but her glare shut him up. His arm was still throbbing from where she hit him twice and he didn’t want to add a slap to it as well. “So, Chiswick then?” he said as he fiddled with various buttons and knobs, laying in the coordinates, before releasing the handbrake and sending the TARDIS flying through the Time Vortex. Minutes later, the TARDIS landed.
“Come on, then!” he called to Donna as he grabbed his coat and threw it on. “Chiswick it is!”
Donna followed after him. “Okay, but try not to act too bored around them. Actually, I think it’ll be nice not having to run for our lives for a change. It’ll be just a nice simple family visit.”
“Yep.” He held the door open for her. “And the sooner we get there, the sooner we can leave.”
Donna chuckled slightly and shook her head, smacking him playfully. “Let’s go already!”
“Allons-y!” he replied as he let her past him before exiting and closing the TARDIS door behind him.
Suddenly, the empty console room lit up in mauve, the universal emergency colour. On the computer screen at the console a series of crudely drawn cartoon stick men pictures flashed on the monitor showing zombies attacking and eating people before repeating and beginning again in a continuous cycle.
Trouble was brewing in Chiswick! Dun-dun-dun!
Back to index
Chapter 2: Chapter 2
When they stepped out of the TARDIS the Doctor locked the door for good measure. Even though the ship had a perception filter that stopped most people from noticing it he still locked it anyway, more out of habit than anything else.
The TARDIS was parked right across the street from the Noble household. Thankfully, it was only a little ways walk to get to the house. The summer air was unusually cold this time of year. The sky was cloudy and overcast as they started walking.
“Ah! Smell that air!” the Doctor exclaimed enthusiastically as he took a deep breath and looked at his companion. “Smells like rain, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah,” Donna replied with less enthusiasm. She could feel the cold breeze through her sweater and pulled it tighter around her body to keep the chill off. She wasn’t sure if she was imagining it or not, but she could have sworn that she felt the first few drops of rain beginning to fall on her head. “And I want to get inside before I get soaked.”
The Doctor turned and faced Donna, walking backwards. “Oh, Come on, Donna! It’s just rain. I love the rain, especially thunderstorms! I could stand outside and watch it rain all day. There’s nothing like a good thunderstorm!”
“You’re just saying that because you don’t want to go inside and visit.”
The Doctor didn’t reply. He turned around and they kept walking in silence until he stopped suddenly in front of the red head.
“Now what is it?” she asked, turning to face him.
He looked up and down both sides of the street with a puzzled expression on his face before glancing at Donna. “Is it just me or is it really dead outside?”
Donna took a look around and noticed how deserted and empty the street was. Almost every single house had a car parked in the driveway as if people were still at home. A few doors over, on the left side of the Noble house, a few bikes lay on their side in the grass completely abandoned by their owners. Another house had a lawnmower out on the front lawn as if someone was going to cut the grass but then thought better of it.
Donna seemed a bit unnerved by this; however, since traveling with the Doctor she had seen a lot of strange and unexplained things that normally involved aliens attacking and the two of them running for their lives. As strange as it was to see no people whatsoever and everything abandoned on the lawns, it didn’t seem that unusual after all.
“It’s always dead outside on the weekend, Doctor.” She looked at the Time Lord.
“But school’s out. People aren’t working. There should be someone around.”
It's fine, Doctor, trust me.” She could see a few drops of rain falling from the sky and hitting the pavement with a soft pattering. Great, she was already getting wet.
“Where is everyone?”
Donna sighed. “I think that maybe you’re trying to see something out of the ordinary when there’s nothing really wrong. I told you, weekends are normally quiet around here. And plus, it’s raining, and anyone with half a brain in their head would be inside already. Let’s go! I don’t want to get drenched!”
She grabbed the protesting Time Lord by the arm and pulled him along with her towards the house. They were halfway across the street when she heard a strange noise.
Wait! Doctor, do you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
The Doctor stopped and glanced at Donna, raising a curious eyebrow.
“That noise. It… It almost sounds like groaning.”
“Oh that! I thought that was your stomach growling,” the Doctor replied.
The groaning noise got louder until it sounded like it was coming from all sides, surrounding and closing in on them, some unseen inescapable horror beyond imagination, until they suddenly emerged, coming out of nowhere from between houses and behind cars, quickly swarming the once deserted area.
“Zombies! Brilliant!” the Doctor exclaimed happily. “I’ve never seen them before.”
“Doctor, they’re surrounding us. We have to get to the house and make sure that Mom and Gramps are okay.” Donna was starting to worry. Dozens of zombies were between them and the houses across the street, making it nearly impossible for them to get to the house without being eaten.
The Doctor took a few steps toward the nearest zombie, eager to get a closer look. “Oh! Look at you! You are beautiful!”
“Doctor, what are you doing? Get back here!”
“Don’t worry. I’m just taking a closer look. It’s fine.” He poked the nearest zombie on its bloody arm and tasted it. It didn’t taste fresh. It tasted days old and smelled horribly rotten like decaying flesh. He wrinkled his nose at the offending taste and smell.
The zombie seemed to perk up at being touched and made a grab for the Time Lord, but the Doctor jumped back just in time, narrowly avoiding getting scratched.
“Doctor, get back here.”
The zombie moaned differently, a louder moan that signaled the other zombies. More zombies came out from behind and off to the sides of the TARDIS, while the ones near the houses across the street converged towards them, craving the taste of fresh meat. Donna was cut off from the TARDIS. And the Doctor, who was even further away, was cut off from both of them by zombies that surrounded him on all sides.
“Hang on. I’m coming!” the Doctor shouted back to Donna. He dived out of the way by sliding between a zombie’s legs and ran straight back to Donna.
Donna was only a few feet away from the safety of the blue box, but the TARDIS was locked. She couldn’t get in and the zombies were coming closer and closer towards her. She saw the Doctor rush past the zombies and slide between one of the zombie’s legs before she lost sight of him in the crowd and feared the worst.
“Doctor! Are you okay?!”
She wanted to go after him and save him but there were so many zombies that she lost sight of him until she saw a flash of a tan coat on her right and ran towards it, bravely risking her life to save the Time Lord. She kicked and punched her way into the ravenous crowd, trying to keep the zombies at bay, but there were too many. In a few short seconds she was surrounded on all sides with the groaning undead herd clawing at her arms and legs, trying to bite her. She could feel them tearing at her clothing. One of them grabbed her shoulder and she whirled around ready to fight it off when she realized it was the Doctor.
“Come on!” he urged, taking Donna’s hand and leading her to the TARDIS. He unlocked the door and pushed her inside before stepping in behind her, closing the door at the last second, and locking it. Both of them leaned against the door and took a moment to catch their breath.
“What just happened?” Donna asked breathlessly. “Where did they come from?”
“Well, at first I thought they were people dressed up for a comic convention, but they definitely taste a little too ripe for that. They are people and they are dead, but we need to figure out where they came from and how to stop them.”
The Doctor started walking towards the console but Donna stopped him.
“What about Gramps and Mom? We have to make sure they’re alright first.”
“Okay. What do you have in mind?” the Time Lord asked, looking at his companion.
“I’m tired of running. It’s time for us to fight back. I don’t care how many there are out there. I’ll stop them all by myself if I have to. No one messes with me and gets away with it. Let’s show those zombies who’s boss!”
The Doctor grinned widely, admiring his companion’s strength. “Donna Noble, you are brilliant.”
*****
“What’s the plan?” Donna asked curiously.
They were in the kitchen. She was watching the Doctor frantically pulling open drawers and cupboard and tossing items onto the floor in search of something.
“What are you looking for?”
The Doctor was crouched halfway inside of a deep cupboard, still searching for what he needed. He called back to Donna, yelling loudly to be heard over the clatter of banging pots and pans.
“We can’t just run over there. There are too many zombies. We need weapons to fend them off with. I’ve got just the thing. It’s in here somewhere but I can’t quite remember where I put it.”
Donna knew the perfect weapon to use. She had come across it the other day in one of the bedroom closets. Knowing exactly where it was, she quickly left the kitchen and returned minutes later holding a cricket bat just as the Time Lord emerged from the deep cupboard.
“So, what do you think? Which one should I use?” the Doctor asked seriously, holding up one item in each hand for Donna to decide.
When Donna saw what the Doctor was holding she burst out laughing. “Are you serious? I can’t tell if you’re thinking of unclogging a toilet or baking a cake.”
“What’s wrong with them?”
The Doctor gave Donna a confused look and glanced at his choices. In one hand he was holding a whisk, the other a plunger.
“Don’t they remind you of anything, Doctor? Something that looks like a salt and pepper shaker?”
“Alright, plunger it is.” He tossed the whisk behind him and stepped over the mess of kitchen utensils covering the floor to get to Donna. “How’d you make out? Have you got anything better?”
“Just a little something,” Donna replied, showing the Time Lord the cricket bat she found. “It was in the closet beside this weird sweater that had a stalk of celery on it. Now that is a fashion disaster, but not nearly as bad as the multicoloured catastrophe beside it. I wonder how many clowns died to make that horrible outfit.”
“What did you think of the scarf?” he asked, feeling slightly embarrassed and deflated at how she was attacking his fashion sense.
“I liked it.”
“Anyway, moving on…” the Doctor said, changing the subject to avoid any more embarrassment as they made their way out of the kitchen and back to the console room.
As they made their way towards the doors the moaning and groaning of the zombies got louder. There had to be way more of them outside than before. Donna wasn’t too worried. She could handle herself. She was more worried about the Doctor and wished that he would’ve picked a better weapon to defend himself with. The idea of him fighting off the undead with a plunger was absolutely ridiculous.
The Doctor unlocked the door and hesitated with his hand on the door handle. Donna looked a little uneasy and he didn’t blame her. It wasn’t every day that zombies appeared in Chiswick.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
Donna ran her hand along the wood of the cricket bat and swung the heavy weapon a few times, getting a feel for it. It was perfect. “You better believe it. Those zombies aren’t going to know what hit them.”
“You’re right.” The Time Lord nodded. “If your swing is as good as your slap you’ll be able to knock a few heads off.”
“Oi! Watch it, Spaceman! I might just be aiming for you next.”
“Fair enough.” He rubbed his arm slightly, vividly remembering the stinging pain of her slap from a few days ago. The bruise on his arm was shaped like her handprint. He was almost starting to feel sorry for the zombies.
He gripped the plunger tightly in his hand and took a deep breath to steady himself before he opened the door.
It was worse than before. Much worse. There had to be at least 40 or 50 of them shuffling around since they’d last been outside. The second he and Donna stepped out onto the street the zombies sensed them and turned at the same time to come after them.
Zombies came at them from behind and Donna noticed just in time. She wound up and swung the cricket bat as hard as she could and hit the zombie right in the chest, but it didn’t stop reaching for her.
“Doctor!” she hollered, continuing to hit the zombie on the same spot. “It’s not working!”
“Aim for the head.”
Donna whacked the zombie on the head as hard as she could. Its skull exploded, sending bits of decayed brain and skull flying everywhere in a spectacular mess. Bits of zombie gunk were in her hair, her clothes and her shoes. It was absolutely disgusting. She hoped she could get her sweater dry-cleaned. There was no way she was sticking her messy clothes in the washing machine after this.
Once she got over the trauma of her clothes being ruined she easily got into the swing of things and finished off a few other zombies around her. It wasn’t too hard. She was better at it then she thought. She heard a girly shriek come from behind her and whirled around, ready to fend off more of the undead.
“What’s wrong?”
“AH! My hair! It’s in my hair!” he cried miserably. He’d spent two hours on his hair in the morning and now it was covered in zombie gunk. He moaned and tried to brush the gunk out with his hand but only succeeded in spreading it further into his hair. He was so preoccupied that he didn’t even realize another zombie was coming up behind him until its brains exploded and even more goo splattered all over the back of his precious coat. The shock snapped him out of it and he kept going, attacking zombies and trying to get closer to the house.
“You should have picked something instead of a plunger,” Donna said. “Like a golf club or something. Even the whisk would probably work better than that.”
“I don’t golf.”
The Doctor used the handle of the plunger and poked a zombie in the eye, squishing the eyeball, popping it like a grape and destroying the brain. This time zombie eyeball juice splattered him in the face and he wiped it off with his hand. Another one came at him and he stuck the rubber end of the plunger on its face and punched it in the head. There were so many zombies it was getting harder and harder for him to find Donna in the crowd. Between the two of them they’d taken out at least a dozen of the undead, but it seemed like for every zombie they killed two more took its place. They couldn’t keep this pace up forever. Every second that went by was another that Donna’s mom and Wilfred were in danger. If anything happened to them he’d never forgive himself. He couldn’t let anything happen to them.
He glanced over at the house and assessed their situation. The front of the house was swarmed with zombies, making it nearly impossible to make it past them and get inside. They’d have to get in another way. A safer way.
“I’ve got it!” the Doctor exclaimed loud enough to make Donna jump.
“AH! What is it?”
“Follow me.”
“I hope you know what you’re doing.”
Donna followed behind the Time Lord, wondering what he was planning. As the two of them cleared a path between the crowd of zombies to get by, she could just make out a bit of a fence straight ahead of them. Apparently the Doctor was taking the scenic route through the neighbours’ backyard. She wasn’t sure if it was safer that way or not, but hopefully there’d be fewer zombies.
The Doctor got to the fence and grinned smugly at the red head. He held the plunger over his shoulder and bounced energetically on the balls of his feet. “See? I do know what I’m doing. We’ll go through the neighbours’ backyard, hop over the fence, and go in through the back door. It’s perfectly easy. Can you fight off the zombies long enough for me to open the gate?”
“Alright. Make it quick before all of them notice we’re over here.”
The Doctor tugged on the gate and tugged harder when he realized it wasn’t opening. “Uh oh.”
“What do you mean ‘Uh oh’?” Donna asked, feeling her temper rising.
The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck with his hand and chuckled nervously. “It’s locked.”
“It’s locked? Well then, unlock it. Just use your sonic thingy. Press the button and whirl it around like you always do and it should be fine.”
“Yeah… About that…”
“What’s wrong?”
The Time Lord pulled the sonic screwdriver out of his pocket and tossed it up in the air before catching it. “It doesn’t do wood.”
“What do you mean?!”
“It doesn’t work on wood. I’ve been meaning to fix it, really, but-”
The look on Donna’s face shut him up. He didn’t think it was possible for someone to get so red in the face but Donna’s face was turning redder than her hair. He was starting to worry that she’d pop a vein or something. It was really freaky.
“It doesn’t work on wood? It has over 200 settings-”
“263 actually, but who’s counting?” He grinned but the smile quickly fell from his face.
“263 settings and you can’t use it to unlock a wooden fence gate. Next you’re going to tell me that you can’t put up shelves. Don’t answer that,” she added as the Doctor opened his mouth to speak.
“Right. Okay.” He nodded to himself and put his screwdriver back into his jacket pocket. “Don’t worry. I have a plan. I’ve got it covered. Stay here and I’ll be back before you can say Raxacoricofallapatorius.” He stepped back, took a running start, and gracefully cleared the gate-
Only to collide into a metal garbage can on the other side of the fence.
The crash signaled more zombies to where they were and within seconds Donna was surrounded by them. She took a practice swing and adjusted her grip on the cricket bat. The party was just getting started and she was ready for more.
“Bring it on!” she yelled.
She saw a zombie that was wearing a Spaceballs t shirt and jabbed it with the end of the cricket bat. It toppled over into the one behind it, sending at least six other zombies toppling like dominoes. Sure she was tired and worried about her mom and Gramps but she had to admit it was a lot of fun. She hadn’t won any medals for sports when she was a kid in school, but it there was ever a medal for killing zombies she’d probably get it now.
A couple of minutes dragged by and she still hadn’t heard or seen the Doctor. She could handle herself but she wasn’t sure about the Time Lord. He really should have picked something else besides a plunger. It didn’t matter where they went: a planet full of Ood, a library full of Vashta Nerada, or saving Agatha Christie from a giant wasp, the Doctor was always a trouble magnet.
To the zombies he might as well have been wearing a large flashing neon sign that said, ‘Eat my brains, I don’t need them’. If he didn’t come back soon she was going to have to find him. If the zombies didn’t kill him she was going to for making her worry. She couldn’t save the world alone. She didn’t know how to stop a zombie apocalypse. She was just a temp.
The Doctor groaned heavily. He’d landed head first into the garbage can before it fell to the ground leaving half of his body sticking out of it. The bags tore and loose bits of garbage were thrown everywhere. It wasn’t just glass bottles, cans and food packaging. He extracted himself from the garbage can and got to his feet. His shoes made a nasty squelching sound on the grass and he realized that he’d found where the diapers he’d smelled had got to. The smell was so ripe it made his eyes water and he was trying not to gag was he wiped his shoes clean on the grass. He was covered in bits of food, paper, plastic and… well… he didn’t want to think about what else there could be. The squeak of the gate opening got his attention and he saw Donna trying hard to keep a straight face as she walked into the backyard and closed the gate behind her.
The first thing Donna saw when she walked into the backyard was the Doctor covered in putrid filth. It was everywhere, all over him and the ground almost as if a bomb had gone off. She instantly took in his disheveled appearance in a glance with the skill of a woman who faithfully read the weekly fashion magazines and tabloids. The Doctor’s new look easily rose to the top of Joan Rivers’ worst dressed list.
The Doctor’s converse was covered in brown poo up to his ankles. A multicoloured smear of what might have once been ice cream, juice, lettuce and meat covered his suit and the sleeves of his coat. A banana peel and bits of newspaper were stuck in his hair and his face was covered in zombie goo. She was trying hard not to laugh but the expression on his face was priceless. She burst out laughing so hard that it hurt and her eyes started watering.
“Ha ha ha!”
The Doctor crossed his arms, feeling himself go red in the face. “It’s- It’s not funny!” he whined.
“Yes,” Donna said between fits of laughter. She thought she was going to pee herself she was laughing so hard. “Yes it is! Were… were you trying to dumpster dive or is this a new look?”
“Just- Just stop. Just stop it,” he said, trying not to get caught up in Donna’s contagious laughter. His cheeks were bright red and his face was burning with embarrassment. He was trying desperately hard not to smile and laugh but he couldn’t help himself. It was a little funny.
“Where… Ha ha! Where’s your plunger?”
She wiped a tear from the corner of her eye. She couldn’t stop laughing even though it was starting to get painful. The banana peel was killing her. All he needed was a cherry on top. She saw the Doctor bend down to look for the plunger in the mess and laughed harder when she noticed where it was.
“Plunger butt!” She yanked the plunger off of his butt. It made a hilarious popping sound as it came free.
The Doctor’s eyes bulged in surprise. He slapped his hands on his butt and whirled around to face Donna, who handed him the plunger which he took without a word. Thankfully Donna’s laughter was dying down enough for him to get a word in. He shook his head and ruffled his hair with his hands to try and get as much of the garbage out of his hair as he could.
“How did you get in here? The gate is locked.”
“No. It’s not locked, just stuck. I just had to jiggle the latch back and forth a few times and it opened really easily,” Donna replied.
“But I did jiggle it. It wasn’t working.”
“You didn’t try hard enough.”
“Maybe.”
“Well, lead the way, Spaceman. Let’s get to the house.”
“Right.” The Doctor nodded and swung the plunger over his shoulder. He went up to the side of the fence and cautiously peered over, looking for stray garbage cans that were out for blood, but thankfully the coast was clear. “Okay. We’re good. The coast is clear.” He easily hopped the fence, followed an instant later by the fiery red head. He admired Donna. She was never afraid to get her hands dirty.
The two of them looked at each other and chuckled, clearly having fun despite the danger. It’d take more than an unexplained zombie apocalypse to ruin their day. They were inseparable, the best of friends until the end. They were going to stay together as long as they could and make the most out of whatever came their way. Zombies? Ha! They’d taken on worse and survived. This was no different, just another day at the park.
Donna tried the latch on the patio door while the Doctor had her back in case of an imminent zombie attack. Things were looking good, unless ninja zombies somehow appeared. Then they were all screwed.
“It won’t open. It’s locked.”
“Did you try jiggling it?” the Time Lord offered smugly.
“Of course I tried jiggling it!” The curtains were closed. She couldn’t see anything. “Mom! Gramps! It’s Donna and the Doctor. Can you open the door? It’s locked!” She banged on the glass door with her fists, becoming increasingly worried.
“Here.” The Doctor gently nudged Donna out of the way. “Let me try.”
“Hurry!” the red head urged.
He tried jiggling the lock but it was no good. It wouldn’t open. A loud crashing sound got both of their attention and they looked over to see that the fence had buckled under the sheer weight of the amount of peckish zombies. The moaning and groaning became louder than ever. All of the banging on the glass door must have advertised their whereabouts to the undead. Moments later several zombies had broken into the backyard.
Cue the music.
The Doctor hit a zombie with the handle of his plunger and gasped in surprise when its head came clean off and fell to the ground.
“Look, Donna. No hands!” He kicked the head with his feet a few times before he used his knee to toss it up into the air and headed the head over to Donna, who caught it and threw it like a bowling ball, knocking over a few zombies.
“Strike.” Donna said happily.
While Donna continued to fend off the undead, the Doctor got to work unlocking the patio door. He pulled his screwdriver from his jacket pocket and aimed it at the lock. The sonic buzzed and a few seconds later the lock clicked.
“Now we’re in business.” He whistled to get Donna’s attention and held the door open for her as she ducked inside. He felt a hand on his shoulder and glanced back to see a zombie reaching for him, its milky white dead eyes looking right at him. Its putrid stench was-
Oh wait… That was him.
“Sorry. Can’t stay and chat,” he said. The Time Lord pulled himself free and jumped into the house, landing hard on the kitchen floor with a thud just as Donna closed the door.
Back to index
Chapter 3: Chapter 3
“That was close.”
“Yeah,” the Doctor replied breathlessly. He looked at the window where the zombies were banging on the glass with their hands and snarling until Donna pulled the curtains closed and helped him to his feet. He’d landed hard enough on the floor to bang his arm. It didn’t hurt that much but it would probably turn into a bruise later. The sound of creaking stairs got his attention and he frantically searched the kitchen for the plunger that had fallen out of his hand when he landed on the floor. He heard Donna whistle and he looked over at his companion just as she tossed the plunger at him. He caught it and was ready for action once more.
The tension was killing her. She wanted to call out for her mom and gramps but the Doctor shushed her. They didn’t know who was in the house. The power was out. All of the lights were off and the cloudy afternoon sky didn’t let much light into the house, making it hard to see. From what she could tell the kitchen looked normal. Nothing was out of place or broken and there was nothing to suggest that anything zombie related had happened, but they couldn’t be too careful. The kitchen was only one room of the house and they hadn’t checked the rest of it yet. Zombies could be upstairs for all she knew.
The creaking grew louder and she glanced anxiously at the Doctor again. He moved to the entrance of the kitchen and hid off to the side, ready to attack whatever came at them. She decided to do the same. The creaking grew louder as whoever or whatever was in the house came closer. She held her breath, hoping it wasn’t another zombie. It was so close that she could smell the disgusting stench of-
Oh yeah. That was the Doctor. She didn’t see how he’d ever get that smell out of his clothes again. He stank worse than the zombies and they were dead or undead… or whatever they were.
The floor creaked right at the entrance to the kitchen and the Doctor swung the plunger as hard as he could, getting the zombie right in the head with the rubber end. It groaned and stumbled into the room. He wound up for another hit when he realized it was Donna’s grandpa.
“Wilfred! Are you okay?” He rushed over to him to make sure he wasn’t hurt. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to hit you. I thought you were a zombie.”
“Doctor, it’s you! I thought you were one of those things from outside. If you’re here then that means-”
“Gramps!” Donna dropped her cricket bat and embraced him in a tight hug. “I’ve missed you so much.”
“I’ve missed you too, sweetheart. I’m so glad you’re alright. I’ve been worried about you.”
“I’m fine.” Donna frowned as her grandpa let go. “Where’s Mom? Is she here? Is she okay?”
“Your mother went to a friend’s house. Don’t worry she’s safe. I told her to stay there until things are cleared up here.”
“That’s a relief,” Donna said. “I’ve been so worried about you and her.”
“It’ll take more than this to stop me.” Wilfred proudly showed the Time Lord and Donna the tennis racket he was using to defend himself with.
Donna shot a smug look at the Doctor, who rolled his eyes and went to the kitchen door.
The Time Lord pulled back the curtain long enough to glance outside then started pacing in front of the other two. “They’re still out there waiting but it doesn’t look like they’re trying to break through the door yet. How’s it looking from the front of the house, Wilfred?”
“The front door’s barricaded with furniture. Nothing can get in. I was going to do the backdoor when you two showed up.”
Wilfred walked towards the kitchen table, ready to push it up against the backdoor when Donna and the Doctor did it for him.
“There. That should hold them off for now until we can think of a plan,” the Doctor said as he went back to pacing while absentmindedly swinging his plunger around. “Wilfred, what do you know about the zombies? Has there been anything on the news?”
“Well, before the TV and the power went out they said that it hasn’t been that widespread. It hasn’t gone beyond London. It’s mostly just around here in Chiswick and a couple other areas in the city.”
“That’s good. That means that it hasn’t spread to the rest of the country or the world yet. I think we can assume that we’re in the early stages and what’s happening here in Chiswick is most likely ground zero for whatever’s been causing this.”
“But what is causing this? Why here? Why now? What’s so special about Chiswick?” Donna asked.
The Doctor sighed heavily. “There’s something we’re missing, but what?”
“The bees are disappearing.”
“No. That wouldn’t explain this.”
“Would you two like anything to drink? I can put the kettle on,” Wilfred said.
Donna smiled. “That’d be lovely, Gramps, thanks.”
Wilfred grabbed the tea kettle from the cupboard, filled it up with water from the kitchen tap, and set it on the stove. He got out the sugar and went to the fridge to get the milk when he remembered something.
“That reminds me. Your mother’s on this new healthy eating lifestyle thing. Believe it or not she’s cleaned out the pantry of all my snacks and replaced them with all these low fat, fake sugar things. She says she’s looking out for my health but I think she’s trying to kill me with that stuff.” He chuckled softly and reached into the back of the cupboard beside the stove and pulled out a tin cookie container. “Thankfully I’ve learned to be resourceful in my old age.” He opened the tin, pulled out a packet of cookies, and placed them on the counter.
“Wilfred, you are a lifesaver. Tea’s not the same unless there are biscuits to go with it,” the Doctor said happily.
“Doctor, I completely agree. There’s no sense living if you can’t enjoy yourself now and then.”
Donna went to the fridge and helped Wilf out by getting the milk for the tea. While she was looking inside the fridge she saw that her gramps was right. The shelves were full of leafy green vegetables and lots of fruit that would probably scare the Doctor more than the zombies outside. Just as she was about to close the fridge something caught her eye and she took a closer look.
“Where did you get these?”
She pulled out a container of eggs and stared curiously at them. Instead of being plain white or brown they were white with blue speckles on them. She’d never seen anything like them.
“Sylvia got them at the farmers’ market a couple of days ago. They don’t look like chicken eggs but she says they are.”
“Can I see those?” the Doctor asked Donna, who held them out so he could grab one.
“What is it?” she asked, putting the rest of the eggs back in the fridge and grabbing the milk.
“I don’t know yet.”
He held one of the eggs and put on his glasses to take a closer look, turning the egg over in his hand and feeling the surface of its shell.
The tea kettle whistled and Wilfred went over to the stove and turned it off. Donna got down the cups while he brought the kettle over and set it on the counter.
“Speaking of strange things, you should’ve seen it, Donna. The other night I was looking through my telescope up on the hill that I always go to and I saw a blue moon. It must’ve been some kind of eclipse or something but it looked beautiful. I wish you could’ve been here to see it. You would have loved it.”
“Blue moon? I’ve never heard of there ever being a blue moon. What do you think, Doctor?”
The Doctor was still examining the egg in his hand. The shell felt thicker than usual and had more of a rough texture. He licked the egg to get a better idea of why it was different.
“Ew! That’s disgusting!” Donna said. She wished she wouldn’t have been looking.
“It tastes different than other eggs.” He ran a hand through his disgustingly dirty hair and ruffled it, trying to think.
“Only you would know that,” Donna replied, pulling a face.
“It’s true. I- Oh!” The Doctor’s eyes widened. He stared at the egg he was holding, on the verge of a breakthrough. “That’s it. I’ve been so thick! I’ve been so stupid! It all makes sense. Why didn’t I see it earlier?”
“What is it?” Wilfred asked curiously.
“I know what’s causing the zombies. Wilfred, where did these eggs come from?”
“Um, the farmers’ market, I think.”
“The farmers’ market. And they were bought around the same time as the eclipse, right?”
“The day after the eclipse.”
“But what does that have to do with anything?” Donna added, looking back and forth between the two of them. “What do eggs have to do with zombies?”
The Doctor tossed the egg to Donna, who barely caught it, and started pacing energetically back and forth as he explained. “The blue moon must’ve given off some kind of energy that affected the chickens and caused the eggs to mutate.”
Wilfred watched the Time Lord pace across the kitchen. “Why wouldn’t this be happening all over the world? Why only here, Doctor?”
“Because the odds of something like this happening are astronomically impossible. It must have something to do with the species of chicken and, if the eggs are from the farmers’ market, they’re probably free range and organic, which means the chickens were probably outside at just the right time under the right conditions to be mutated by the energy from the moon.”
“But that’s crazy!” Donna exclaimed in disbelief, staring at the egg she was holding. Too creeped out to hold it anymore, she put it in the fridge with the others. “Mutated chickens?”
“Mutation is a natural part of life. It happens all the time in every species,” the Doctor explained.
“And this type of eggs are only sold at the farmers’ market in Chiswick,” Wilfred added. “They’re grown on a local farm not too far from here.”
The Time Lord nodded. “Exactly. It makes perfect sense. People eat the mutated eggs and turn into zombies.”
“How do we stop the zombies?” Donna asked.
“I’ve got just the thing.” The Doctor reached into his suit pockets and searched for what he needed. “It’s in here somewhere,” he muttered to himself.
Donna and Wilfred watched in amazement as the Time Lord emptied his pockets and put the contents on the kitchen counter. He pulled out a stethoscope, a solved rubix cube, a slinky, 3D glasses, a windup mouse, a yo-yo, Beatles tickets, a key fob, and at the very bottom, a glass bottle of milk.
“Here we go,” he said happily. He moved all the items away with a push of his sleeve to give him some counter space to work.
“That’s it?” Donna watched him place the bottle of milk on the counter. “There’s milk in the fridge if you need it.”
“This isn’t just any milk, Donna. It’s from a particular region of space. There’s another type of cow species that naturally makes chocolate milk too. It’s a good thing I went out for milk the other day, otherwise we wouldn’t have this.”
Donna snorted in disbelief and did air quotes with her fingers. “Space cows? Space milk?”
“Yep.”
“You are so weird.”
He gave her a grin and they both started laughing at how absurd it sounded.
“I thought you were pretending to get milk because you were avoiding me.”
“No. I was pretending to pretend to get milk.”
“Am I supposed to pretend to believe that?”
Donna came closer. The Doctor flinched slightly and braced himself for another slap when Wilfred intervened.
“Calm down, you two.” Wilfred said teasingly.
Donna wound up to slap the skinny Time Lord, pretending to hit him. Instead, a huge grin appeared on her face and she laughed out loud. “Plunger butt. You know I’m never going to let you live it down.”
The Doctor chuckled slightly and continued his explanation.
Donna cringed, expecting another longwinded explanation. Half the time she couldn’t understand what he was saying when he got like that. Just when he was about to start she stopped him, cutting him off.
“Anyway, as I was-”
“Wait. Doctor, I don’t speak Star Trek. Can you explain it for both of us?” She gestured to her gramps, who was standing beside her.
The Time Lord went back over to the fridge and rummaged around until he found a bottle of hot sauce. He poured a few drops of it into the milk and shook it to mix it together. The white space milk turned brown like the colour of chocolate milk. He dipped a finger in and tasted it.
Donna was grossed out by this more than the zombies. It couldn’t have been a more disgusting combination of if he tried. “What’s next,” she joked, “fish fingers and custard?”
The Doctor looked at Donna and cringed. “Ew! Not in this regeneration. Now that’s disgusting.” He grabbed the key fob off of the counter and pressed a button. Seconds later the familiar wheezing and grinding sound of the TARDIS could be heard and the big blue box materialized right in the middle of the kitchen. “There we go. That’s much better.”
Donna was so stunned she almost fell over. After everything they’d been through, all of the near misses with the zombies. All the times they were nearly eaten by the undead trying to get to the house when they could’ve just materialized the TARDIS inside the house- Her temper boiled over. “Doctor, couldn’t we have done that in the first place instead of; oh I don’t know, fighting the zombies?”
“No.” The Doctor said it simply as though it was the most obvious reason in the world. “I couldn’t find my keys before.”
“But that doesn’t-”
“I’ll save you the trouble of a big science-y Star Trek explanation,” he said, interrupting his companion as he grabbed the brown space milk off of the counter. “Don’t worry. Now that I have what I need to take care of the zombie problem it won’t take long to get this sorted out.”
“How exactly are you going to fix the problem?”
“Just trust me.”
The Doctor snapped his fingers and the TARDIS door opened. Light from the inside of the ship flooded out into the kitchen, illuminating the darkened room like a sign from the heavens. He started heading towards the TARDIS when he stopped and came back to Wilf and Donna. “Oh. I almost forgot something important.”
“What?” Donna was expecting some kind of important advice, but the Doctor didn’t say anything as he walked past her and went straight for the cup of tea sitting on the counter. He downed the steaming tea in one go and set the empty cup down in the sink.
“Never let a good cup of tea go to waste,” the Doctor said.
“Amen to that,” Wilfred agreed as he took a sip from his cup.
Donna sighed exasperatedly and rolled her eyes. “You two are ridiculous.”
“I’ll be back in a jiffy,” the Time Lord told them. He grabbed his plunger and walked back to the TARDIS.
“Be careful,” Donna urged. The Time Lord may have been a wacky doofus but he was her wacky doofus and best friend. She didn’t want to see him become zombie food.
The Doctor turned to Donna, walking the rest of the way to the TARDIS backwards. “I’ll be fine.” He winked at her before he clumsily tripped over his feet, fell backward and landed inside the ship with a thud just as the TARDIS closed her doors. Moments later the ship dematerialized with its usual wheezing and grinding sound.
“I’m just glad he that he didn’t spill the milk. It’ll be a miracle if he can sort this out without getting eaten.”
“I’m sure he’ll be fine, Donna.” Wilfred smiled and put a hand on her shoulder. “I don’t know what he’s doing but at least he does. I trust that man with my life.”
“Me too. I just worry about him sometimes, Gramps. He needs someone. I don’t think he can be on his own.”
“He doesn’t have to be. He’s got you, doesn’t he?”
“Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. I’m not leaving him. Fat chance of that. I plan on traveling with him forever.”
She grabbed her cup of tea and took a sip. She kept glancing over at where the TARDIS had been, wondering when her skinny Time Lord was going to come back, when she heard a loud banging noise and seconds later the glass backdoor shattered, causing the table to topple over onto its legs, righting itself.
Zombies started coming in the house. Taking the advice of the Doctor, she calmly finished the rest of her tea before chucking the empty cup at one of the zombies. It bounced off of its head and fell to the floor but surprisingly didn’t break.
Wilfred grabbed his tennis racket and Donna grabbed her cricket bat and the two of them started bashing as many zombies in the head as they could, sending brains and goo flying everywhere.
Just like before, for every zombie they killed two more seemed to take their place. Wilfred hit the zombies with his tennis racket, taking out just as many as Donna, until disaster struck and the zombie’s head poked a gaping hole in his tennis racket.
“Don’t worry, Gramps. I’m on it.” She gave him her cricket bat and scrambled to find another weapon. The pantry was on the other side of the kitchen past the table, hopelessly out of reach, so far away that it could’ve been on the other side of the moon for all the good it would do.
She walked across the table to avoid the zombies when a couple of them cut her off on the way to the pantry. Thinking fast, she jumped down from the table, whirled around, and reached for the stuff the Doctor left on the counter. She threw everything at them. The stethoscope, 3D glasses and windup mouse were useless but she threw them anyway. She came close to throwing the Beatles tickets but thought better of it. She threw the slinky and it just slinked off of one zombie and onto another before slinking its way along the kitchen floor. The zombies were coming closer and she threw the rubix cube. The corner of the cube delivered a lethal blow, cracking through the zombie’s skull, making the undead dead.
Donna let out a whoop of joy but the fight was far from over. A couple more zombies shuffled over to her and she grabbed the only remaining object: the yo-yo. After endless hours of practice when she was a kid, Donna was a pro. It was the perfect implement of destruction. She slipped the string onto her middle finger. It fit like a glove, making her wish she still had her matching yo-yo gloves. She did a few tricks with the yo-yo to test out her sick skills and was surprised how quickly it came back to her. She got one zombie in the head with the yo-yo and got the other one between the eyes.
“Yes!” she yelled triumphantly.
Donna glanced back to see how her grandpa was doing and saw that he was in trouble, taking on three of the undead at once. She grabbed the slinky and the rubix cube off of the floor and threw both of them at the zombies. The rubix cube missed but the slinky bounced off the wall and killed one of the other zombies, giving her the time she needed to distract the undead long enough to cross the room.
“Are you alright, Gramps?”
“I’m fine, sweetheart. Don’t worry about me. I’ll hold them off so you can get away.”
“No way. I’m not leaving you. I’m not letting you become lunch meat for these things. Come on, Doctor. Where are you? What’s taking so long?” She wondered where the Doctor was and if he was okay. Maybe he wasn’t back yet because he’d been turned into one of the undead.
Just when they thought they were making progress, a loud crashing noise came from the living room. The window had broken and more zombies came into the house. Within seconds Donna and Wilfred were trapped, completely surrounded on all sides. The undead were closing in on them, the moaning and groaning was almost deafening. Donna valiantly tried to fend them off until disaster struck again and her yo-yo string got all knotted, rendering the yo-yo completely useless. The only weapon they had left was the cricket bat but there were too many to fight off. She shrieked in surprise when one of the zombie’s hands momentarily got caught in her hair.
The putrid stench of death was overwhelming. She could feel dozens of cold, rotting hands reaching for her, touching her as they came closer and closer. Donna was never one to quit or give up. When backed into a corner she always tried to get out. But now, when she was literally backed into a corner, she couldn’t see a way out of it. All it took was one bite to become a zombie. One bite and they’d both become one of the disgusting, drooling, rotting corpses in front of her. One bite and it was all over.
“There’s too many of them!” she yelled over the moaning and groaning.
Wilfred desperately swung the cricket bat at as many zombies as he could. “Get away from her. Leave her alone. Take me instead!”
Both of them yelled as the zombies came closer, their snapping jaws mere inches from tearing into their flesh. Donna squeezed her eyes shut, preparing for the worst. She screamed when she felt a hand brush her arm and flinched away.
“No! No!”
“Donna! Donna, it’s okay. Look.”
Donna realized that Wilf was trying to get her attention. She dared to open her eyes and saw that the zombies quit moving. All at once their brains exploded, sending goo flying in every direction before they fell to the floor dead. Donna and Wilfred glanced at each other and stared at the zombies in stunned silence.
“What just happened?” Wilf asked.
“The Doctor happened,” she replied as she wiped the gunk off of her face with her hands.
As if on cue, they heard the wheezing and grinding sound and felt a gust of wind as the TARDIS materialized in the kitchen. The door of the big blue box opened and the Doctor stepped out holding his plunger.
“Did you miss me?”
“Doctor!” Donna cried, running towards the Time Lord and embracing him in tight a hug. “You did it!”
“I know.” He grinned happily at Wilf, who dropped the cricket bat and joined the hug.
“I knew you could do it,” Wilfred said, beaming with pride.
“Well… It wasn’t that hard,” he added, letting go of his two favourite humans. “Ouch! What was that for?!” He rubbed his arm where Donna slapped him.
“That’s for waiting until the last minute.” She hit him again. “That’s for making me worry.” She hit him even harder. “And that’s because I bloody love you!”
“Sorry. And thanks, I guess.” He tossed his plunger on the pile of dead zombies, no longer needing it.
Wilf did the same thing with his cricket bat. “So how did you do it? How did you stop the zombies?”
The Time Lord grinned at Donna, who knew they were in for a longwinded Star Trek explanation.
“Here we go again,” she moaned.
“It was easy. By altering the replication of the DNA I was able to change the mutation just enough to shorten its duration.”
“Huh?”
“Like an expiration date,” Wilfred added. He’d seen enough original Star Trek episodes back in the day to catch the gist of his explanation.
“Exactly. I just gave them a shelf life.”
“The zombies?” Donna asked.
“No. The eggs. And, well, ultimately the zombies too. The chickens drank the-” He air quoted Donna’s term with his fingers “- ‘space cow’ milk which gave the eggs a drastically short expiration date while leaving the chickens completely unharmed. The mutated eggs people ate that turned them into zombies expired and rotted out their brains just enough to explode and kill them. And the best part is that the uneaten eggs have spoiled too so there’s no risk of anyone accidentally eating them and turning into zombies. Problem solved.”
“I’m glad that’s over.”
“Me too,” Wilf agreed. “Now that that’s over I guess I should get this place cleaned up before Sylvia comes home.”
“Why don’t we help?” the Doctor offered.
*****
A couple of hours later the house was finally clean. The zombies were cleared out of the backyard and the house. The windows and fence still needed fixing but everything was swept and scrubbed as clean as it could be and in the end it didn’t look too bad.
“Well, I guess you two will be heading off then?” Wilfred asked as the three of them stood in the kitchen beside the TARDIS. Sylvia called when they were cleaning to say she was headed home. In a few minutes she’d be walking in the door. “I don’t blame you if you don’t want to stick around. I’m sure I’ll be getting an earful from your mother when she sees this place.”
Donna looked at the Time Lord’s filthy appearance, knowing she probably looked just as bad. “I think we’re going to clean ourselves up. It’s been a long day.”
“Very long,” the Doctor agreed. He was keen to get out of there before Sylvia showed up. He’d probably get blamed for something or everything and he didn’t want to get an earful or a slap either. His arms ached so bad from the repeated slaps that he didn’t think there was any unbruised skin left on them.
Donna hugged Wilf. “Don’t worry, Gramps. We’ll be back in a day or two to help out again. Won’t we, Doctor?” She shot him a dirty look, knowing exactly how much he was going to try and get out of it. She didn’t want to see him in just a shower curtain ever again.
“Of course. I promise we’ll be back to help.” The Doctor offered his hand but Wilfred pulled him into a hug.
“That sounds great,” Wilf said happily.
“We’ll see you soon, Gramps.” She took the cricket bat with her in case the Doctor still wanted it as a souvenir. He was weird that way, but maybe it could go back in the closet next to his celery sweater. She was going to have to bug him about that later too.
“Goodbye, Wilfred.”
“Take care.” Wilfred waved to them before they closed the door. He watched the TARDIS dematerialize right before his eyes until there was no trace the blue box had ever been there.
*****
Donna and the Doctor stood beside the console. The Time Lord was busy fiddling with buttons and knobs but she was too tired to care. Every muscle in her body ached and she was exhausted. Somehow the Doctor didn’t look nearly as tired as she did.
“That’s enough excitement for today. I am so tired.” Donna was so tired she felt like she could doze off standing up. She just started to close her eyes when an unexpected noise startled her.
“Hello, Doctor. Hello, Donna,” the TARDIS greeted pleasantly.
The sexy feminine voice of the TARDIS creeped her out. She didn’t have the patience for it right now. She hit the button on the console to silence the voice and glared furiously at the Time Lord.
“You know, after today I’ve had enough of Star Trek related stuff. Between the explanations and the creepy sexy talking TARDIS I need a break. I don’t want to see or hear anything Star Trek or zombie related for a long time. In fact, I think I’ll switch to Star Wars. The Millennium Falcon and lightsabers have always been cooler anyway.”
“Well actually, Tatooine does exist if that’s where you want to go next,” the Doctor said hopefully as he pressed a few more buttons. “I’ve always wanted to go to the Mos Eisley Cantina.”
“I don’t want to go there.”
“Well then, where do you want to go?”
“I know exactly where I want to go.” She was tired and sore and a sweaty stinking mess. Her clothes were ripped and torn, her sweater was ruined and she was covered in zombie gunk and brains. It covered her clothes and stuck to her shoes and hair. She’d never felt or smelled more disgusting in her life.
Donna thrust the cricket bat she was holding into the skinny Time Lord’s arms and started walking out of the room. She was going to take a shower and then a nice long hot bath. No- two baths. She was going to soak for hours until she felt like a human being again. She couldn’t wait to feel the warm water and smell the lavender bubble bath. She’d probably need two whole bottles to get rid of the stench. She smelled worse than a skunk, maybe even a Tauntaun. Thoughts of a warm comforting bath were the only thing on her mind as she made her way out of the console room. She didn’t even notice the changes the Doctor had made to the hallway until doors that had never been there before suddenly whooshed open like they did on Star Trek.
“Doctor!” Donna yelled furiously. She whirled around and saw the Time Lord keeping his distance, expecting another slap, and she was going to give him one. “That’s right, Spaceman!” she called after the Doctor as he ran past her. “You better run!”
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