taxonomites | 009: Hunting for the Hunter [Visual]

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009: Hunting for the Hunter [Visual]

It had been a long and difficult night, but, at nine o'clock the next morning, Martha opened her surgery as usual. Despite the relatively low numbers of prisoners, she always had more than enough patients to keep her occupied. She treated Extras for coughs and colds and broken limbs and stomach bugs. She gave the young Extras their childhood inoculations. And, now, she treated them for vampire bites.

They didn't have vampires in her world, but her time on the TARDIS and her experiences at UNIT had taught Martha to trust her instincts and, occasionally, to improvise when treating non human patients or extraterrestrial illnesses. (There were no medical text books available for her line of work. There were just a few determined individuals - like Martha, like Doctor Elizabeth Shaw at Cambridge, like the Torchwood team - who always tried to do the best for their patients, no matter who or what they were.) The marks on the neck of the Extra that Fitz had rescued were real bite marks. The attacker had left bruises as well as bloody holes, not just the twin pinpricks that you saw in horror movies.

The Extra that had taken a seat in front of her desk - marched there by an Extra that, if asked, Martha would have guessed to be a concerned partner - had the same sort of wound. Which meant that this wasn't an isolated incident.

She cleaned and dressed the wound, prescribing lots of rest and fluid for the patient. (And he was a patient, whether he was programmed to be one of not. In fact, the idea that the aliens were programming illnesses and injuries to give her something to do was physically sickening. But she had to treat them. Leaving them would have been barbaric.) Then she washed the blood off her hands and picked up her tablet.

"It looks like last night's attack wasn't an isolated incident," she informed the people of the city, "I had an Extra with exactly the same bite marks in here this morning."

After a brief pause to give them a chance to digest that information, she carried on.

"Which means we've got two options. Either the aliens have created a vampire Extra to keep us on our toes ... or it's one of us."

She wasn't keen on either option.

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Stepping in Helen scanned the office, seeing what was there, and how it was decorated - it could tell a lot about a person, their interests and experiences as well as the type of person they were. It was only a brief look, one not meant to be intrusive, before she settled her gaze on Martha and stepped further towards her.

"I take that expression to mean that this may not be quite so straightforward?" Or at least maybe not to Martha given that she didn't deal with vampires.

Martha had known enough vampires during her time in Taxon - she'd even considered Angel and his team to be friends - to know the importance of an invitation. She also knew that it wouldn't work.

"The surgery is public," Martha answered, "They don't need an invitation to get it. Besides, I was expecting you."

"I was referring to the photographs." Helen looked down at them once she'd reached Martha's desk, wondering what it was about this that could cause a frown - unless it was the details themselves. Vampires. That's exactly why she'd created the remedy for Nikola when his nature had been brought out. And now it was happening here.

"Oh." With one final glance at them, Martha pushed the photographs across her desk to give Helen a closer look. "What do you think? I'm not an expert, but I'd say they were pretty straightforward. They're definitely bite marks."

Now they had to find out who had inflicted them and how they could stop them from attacking again. It was only a matter of time before someone - an Extra or one of the prisoners - ended up dead.

Helen leaned over to look at them, finally picking them up and looking through them more closer, and studying them rather intensely. She was silent throughout the whole thing, and although these were indeed bite marks there was something a little troubling to it, although she had to remember that any creature here may differ from those of her world... and it seemed that this was one of those cases.

"They are bite marks, you're right on that." She continued examining them for a moment longer before lowering the pictures to look back to Martha. "Do you have anything to enlarge the pictures or put them on a screen?" If not these, and maybe even Martha, would be coming back to the Sanctuary with her - there was something bothering her about it.

"I can blow them up on the computer screen," said Martha, tapping a few keys to pull up the images. “I miss the equipment I had at UNIT.”

She’d had the sleekest and most impressively advanced equipment in the world at her disposal at UNIT.

“I have to work with the equipment that I found here when I arrived.”

She couldn't hatch anything as large as a computer.

"When this is done remind me to show you the Sanctuary." Helen gave her a smile; she trusted the young doctor, the extension of that invitation showed it enough.

Putting the photos back down Helen stepped back to Martha, leaning over to get a better look at the screen. "Can you enlarge the bite any further?" That was what was bothering her, or rather something on it.

"That sounds great," Martha replied, appreciating the invitation and, more importantly, the unspoken implications - of trust and of partnership - that went with it.

She enlarged the picture at Helen's request, giving her a curious look.

"Have you seen something?"

Helen nodded. "There." She made a circle with her finger around the area in question.

"It's typically believed that a bite from a Vampire is that of two puncture marks, side by side." But there's a way to her phrasing that indicates that the belief isn't quite all that. "This appears to be that on first appearance, however on closer inspection it isn't." There are punctures of a 'typical' bite but there's also further bruising - teeth shaped.

"There are people here from a lot of different worlds," Martha pointed out, examining the area that Helen had drawn her attention to. “They might not be stereotypical vampires, but that doesn’t mean they’re not vampires.”

A pause.

“At the moment, all we’ve got are a lot of guesses and no facts.”

"I never said that it wasn't a vampire, in fact I actually do believe it is." The bite of a vampire on her world was similar to this but far from what legend would have you believe, and she'd learned all about the differences when she'd arrived.

"Do you know which vampire?" asked Martha, eager for answers and even more eager to make sure that nobody else was attacked. (If they didn't put a stop to it, someone else would. And they might not be as friendly about it. There was a lot of bad feeling when it came to vampires in Taxon and the last thing they needed was an angry mob.)

"I have yet to meet one, or at least one that has revealed themselves." As unfortunate as that was, and Vampires were... sneaky.

"Angel and Godric used to keep track of the others," she said, with a hint of sorrow in her voice. They hadn't been friends, as such, but they'd been allies and she'd had a great deal of trust and respect for the two vampires. "I'm not sure how many are in the city now. A lot of people have come and gone over the last few months."

"And sadly they're no longer here to tell us." As it went - typical. "Do you happen to know any of them that remain?" Although how that would help? Unless they could convince them to provide them with a bite sample? And even then what if there was another that they had yet to know of.

"Only one," she said, "Her name is Drusilla. But I don’t think she’d be hiding if she was responsible.”

From what she'd seen of the vampire - and from what she'd heard from Fitz, who the creature had taken a bit of a fancy to - Drusilla wasn't the short of person to bother with secrets.

"If there are other vampires out there, they're staying hidden. And, given how prejudiced people can be, I don't blame them."

"It also gives them an advantage in situations such as these - anyone that we speak with could be a vampire or have done this." Although she'd like to believe enough in her judgement that Martha hadn't done this.

"I've only ever yet found one way to detect vampires." Although it registered her as a vampire, also. "Although whether it would work on each vampire here? It's hard to say." And it wasn't something that she wished to meddle with, either.

Something in Helen's tone suggested that she wasn't overly fond of the method, but, with two injuries already recorded and probably even more left untreated, it was only a matter of time until someone was killed.

"I don't think we've got much choice," she said, seriously. "It's worth a try. What is it?"

"A map, actually." If you didn't think that her world was odd as it was, you may now.

"The technology is advanced and within it is an in built defence - one to protect the technology against vampires, to keep the location of the city it holds within it secret." Helen paused, just briefly. "There is one problem, however. That protection also comes attached with a self destruct to it. Removing the vampiric presence from the sensors deactivates it."

And then came another pause, and a slightly uncertain look. "I can't actually activate the map without setting that off." Without the protection that Nikola had created, something that she would need to recreate first. Thankfully she had the plans for it, anyway.

It was strange, but Martha worked for an organisation that dealt with alien threats and had a research and design department largely based around making use of salvaged alien technology. She took the information in her stride.

"We can't even be sure this sort of vampire will be picked up by it. I'm not sure we've got enough evidence to justify activating a self destruct sequence."

Although the real question was how much damage the mechanism could cause.

Helen had expected some question as to why Helen herself was unable to use the map without setting it off but she was a little thankful that Martha said nothing - it was a story for another time.

"We can't, although with a vampire here? It would be helpful to at least try something, to see if it was possible." Even with as risky as it was.

Edited 2012-01-19 20:13 (UTC)

There could have been any number of reasons for Helen's inability to use the map without activating it, but that was a story for another day. They had other concerns at the moment. Martha trusted Helen, regardless of what secrets she was keeping to herself.

"If you give me instructions, I should be able to use it. It's better than nothing."

And, at the moment, nothing was all they really had.

"Sadly it's not quite so simple." Or it was but Helen was a little protective - she trusted Martha but she didn't simply wish to give the map away, not with what it was, with what it meant.

"There are components needed to activate the map. It's holographic." The sensors in it activated themselves but turning the map off afterwards? Less simple - it couldn't simply be shut up.

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009: Hunting for the Hunter [Visual]

[ location: martha's office ]

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