#weird for a time traveller to say “Sarah Jane is gone now” like on that particular day for him yes but tomorrow he could be in 1973??

[loppytaffy]

The absolute most fanfic "everybody wins, everybody is happy, everyone gets found family, everyone says "I love you" back" ending ever. That you, RTD, we needed this.

[saiilorstars]

Next Stop Everywhere

Fandom: Doctor Who

Pairing: Female OC x 10th Doctor

(OC Face claim: Victoria Camacho)

// Story Masterlist // 

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Chapter 8: A Friend

Chapter summary: An alien masquerading as a friend nearly finishes off the world, just another casual trip for our travelling trio!

Author’s Note: Now before anyone comments on it, Rose using the name "Minerva" is done on purpose. It will be discussed in the next chapter!

"You would not believe the assignment I have," I groaned as I entered the apartment, "Oh..." I stopped when I saw the Doctor, Rose and Jackie sitting at the couch, "You're back again? Weird, you were just here last week," I threw my school bag on the floor,"I haven't even ate whatever the stuff was Mickey brought me. I don't care what he says, it doesn't look edible. Where is Mickey anyways?" I looked around, "Eating?" They remained quiet. "I just asked a question? Did he go home for clothes or...?" I waited but still I received no answered. I took a moment and studied their faces. "Wh-what happened?" My heart started picking up. "Doctor, don't tell me he's dead-"

"He's not," he assured, standing up, "He's perfectly fine and alive. In fact, I'd say he's pretty happy."

"Then where is he?" I asked, swallowing hard with a nerve-wrecking feel.

He sighed, reaching inside his coat and taking out an envelope. He handed it to me without a word. I looked at the envelope and him for a moment before taking it, knowing however happy Mickey apparently was, I wouldn't be.

Dear Minnie,

You're probably the only regret I have of staying here because I won't be able to say goodbye to you in person. I'll never give you a hug and a proper goodbye. And for that, I'm really sorry, please forgive me. I'll admit, this idea started out as an impulse but...then it became important for me to go through with it, because I really wanted to.

I'm in a parallel universe and I don't believe we'll ever talk to each other again, much less see each other. I am staying here by choice, and that's because I don't believe I have anything else in your world. Besides you, I'm pretty much on my own. Here, I have my grandmother whom I loved so much and had to bury in your world. But in this world, my new home, I still have her. And I know you'll understand me because of Isadora. If she had died in your world but you had the chance to stay in a world where she was alive, you would do it, right?

I know you'll be fine because you're with them. You're with Jackie and Rose and the Doctor. They'll take care of you or you'll take care of them. You don't need me. Just last week we spoke about Isadora and the rest, and my advice still stands. Talk to everyone, beginning with Rose and the Doctor. Tell them how you feel then go for the rest. Talk to them. I'm sure it'll do you good. I know it will.

Good bye my Minnie. I guess this Mickey has to find you in this world too. Wonder what you're like here? I hope you're not as stubborn too! Please take care of yourself, just like you always have. I'll miss you.

Love,

Mickey Smith.

I looked up, my tears hurriedly strolling down my face. I shook my head, as if denying this would help anyone.

The Doctor sighed, "Joy I'm so sorry-"

"No. That's not true...this isn't true," I started sniffling loudly, "Please tell me it's not! He can't be gone!"

"He chose to stay."

"Noo..." my voice cracked, "He just left...he was supposed to come back!"

"Joy we're really sorry," Rose stood up, "If he could've he would've returned to say goodbye but parallel universes are impossible to travel through."

"So I'm never gonna see him anymore? Possibly my best friend and he's gone now. Forever!" I threw the letter down and rushed to Rose's room, slamming the door and bursting into sobs.

The only person who knew every last detail about me was gone. And he'd never come back. If I thought I was alone before now it's really true. I wouldn't be able to talk to anyone now. Jackie was a fine woman, but she was like a mother. I needed a friend.

My best friend was gone. What would I do now?

~0~

"Joy, can I come in?" the Doctor was knocking on the door. With no answer, he slowly opened it. "I don't...I don't really have words for you..." he admitted, slowly approaching me by the bed and sitting down, "I wish I could comfort you but...there's nothing I could do to make you feel better and I'm sorry."

"Did he have fun?" I asked, keeping my head rested on a pillow. "Did you bring him to fantastic places?"

"Yeah, we had amazing times," he quickly said, sensing that'd make me feel knowing Mickey had had fun, "You saw how excited he was when we were going to leave."

I smiled, remembering it all, "Yeah..."

He sighed, "I'm sorry, Joy. I know how hard it is to say good bye to people you care about."

I looked at him, sitting up, "Thank you for bringing me the letter."

He smiled, handing me the letter I had thrown earlier. He took my hand, gripping it as he stared deeply into my eyes, even startling me with the sudden intense. "Joy, whenever you need me, you just call and I swear to you I will come. If it's four a.m and you need me, call and I will be here by 4:01. Do you understand?"

I blinked, replaying his words to make sure I had heard right, "But...why do you say that?"

"Huh?" He frowned, clearly not expecting that as a response.

But I mean really, after nearly a year of knowing him he'd never told me anything like that, much less given me that intense stare. "It's just out of character that's all..."

He sighed, seeming to struggle with something, "Before we left Mickey he said some words to me..."

My heart skipped a beat, my eyes wide as the thought of Mickey spilling everything to the Doctor came to mind. What if he had? No, no...the Doctor would have said something already...right?

"Joy, perhaps, I haven't been around very much but...you know I consider you my friend, right?"

I swallowed hard, gathering my courage for what would come next, "Doctor, what did Mickey tell you?"

He shook his head, faintly smiling, " It's not important. All you should know is that I'll be here when you need me. You and Rose are the two most important people in my life. My glimpse of happiness, I call both of you."

" You've never called me that..." I said quietly, looking down at my lap.

"...no, I guess I haven't," he said after a moment, as if realizing it as well. Good. "But you listen to me, Joy Souza, I care about you, I always have."

"R-Really?" My eyes watered up, never hearing so kind words from him like that.

"Oh Joy," he scooted closer, taking me into a hug.

I cried for Mickey and for his touching words. I supposed Mickey hadn't told him everything just something that'd get the Doctor's mind working towards the grand realization.

"And, sorry for being nosy but, we went through your bag and I happened to have found an assignment..." he began, pausing as I looked up, "...how about I help you with that?"

I knew exactly where he was going with this. A dim smile spread on my face, already accepting the offer. Right now, I just needed to get out of here.

~/~

"London 2012!" I exclaimed, walking excitedly down the streets, "30th Olympia!" I twirled around.

"Careful, you'll fall," the Doctor warned, "Tell us again why you wear heels to school?"

"Huh?" I immediately looked down and realized I was still in my school uniform, "Oh c'mon," I turned around to them, "You didn't even give me a chance to change."

"Well when I said 30th Olympia you didn't exactly give me the chance to tell you," he countered.

Rose laughed, "I like it. Wish they were that fashionable back when I was there."

"Hm," I crossed my arms, "I don't like this."

"Oh you look fine. We're in an amazing time, Joy," the Doctor walked up, "Forget about it."

"Yeah, you're in the brink of the Olympics," Rose joined us, linking arms.

"Exactly, I'm in London and in the middle of the streets during the Olympics...in my school uniform," I frowned.

"Oh just focus on your article will you?" The Doctor linked arms as well. "Make this the best damn article you've ever written."

Rose chuckled, "I still don't understand why'd you join the journalist club."

"Sarah Jane," I admitted, "She talks so much about it I figured I'd give it a try. And plus, this academy's got a well rounded club for it."

"No more public school?" She raised an eye brow.

"After the Krillitanes I said no. And thanks to the Doctor for pulling some strings, I got into an even better school."

"Least I could after blowing up your old one," he swayed his head.

"And I'm almost caught up now. I should be graduating by the end of the year."

"We'll be there front row," Rose nodded.

"You better be. I already reserved seats for you two and Jackie and Mick-" I stopped, my smile vanishing.

The two stared sadly at me, "You know, you're name's Joy, live up to it," the Doctor poked my arm.

"Yeah..."

"You know, fun fact, I was here for the last Olympics they had in London; Wembley 1948. I loved it so much," he began his rambles and I knew he was telling us this just so that I'd keep distracted.

Rose suddenly let go of my arm and stayed behind, looking at something. The Doctor didn't seem to notice as he continued leading us ahead.

"Now what was his name...?" He thought, "Mark...? John?...Maybe Mark? Legs like pipe cleaners but strong as a whippet."

I chuckled, "That's a good way to remember someone. I dread to think how you'll remember me," And truthfully I did. Would he even remember me?

"The annoying, clever girl who challenges me on everything I do and say," he teased.

I smiled, proudly, not accepting the tease, "Well, I don't know how clever I am but I do challenge you because you're wrong sometimes. And, if we're being descriptive, I'll remember you as the daft, ridiculous alien."

He stopped walking and thought about it for a moment, making me snigger at his expressions. "You don't really think I'm ridiculous, right?" He frowned.

'What if I do?" I crossed my arms, deciding to tease him for the moment.

"I wouldn't like it..." His gaze fell to the ground.

I slightly ducked and caught his gaze, "I also think you're a kind, funny man."

He smiled softly as I stood straight again, "Yeah?"

I nodded, "Yes."

"Well," he swayed his head as he pretended to think again, "That's okay I guess."

"Doctor? Minerva?" Rose cut in, and we glanced over to find her not so pleased.

"Is something wrong?" I asked.

I could have sworn she gave me a quick glare before reverting to a smile. "I just thought you should come and see this." She gestured to a paper on the wall as we approached her.

There was a flyer of missing children, with no leads on either case.

"What's taking them?" I asked, still reading through the information.

"Snatching children from a thoroughly ordinary street like this. Why's it so cold...?" the Doctor looked around, "Is something reducing the temperature...?""

"It says they all went missing this week. Why would a person do something like this?"

"What makes you think it's a person?" The Doctor challenged.

A door opened, not far from us, and a woman was seen throwing out her recycling bag in front of her house. I noticed she was giving looks all around, like she was afraid. She quickly returned back in her house and shut the door.

"It's got the whole street wise scared," I remarked, "What could get-" But I saw the Doctor had already left and Rose right behind him.

I rolled my eyes, "Kind, funny and forgetful man," I mumbled as I hurried to catch them.

We stopped by a front yard with a mini-soccer goal on it. The Doctor stuck out his hand in front himself then knelt down and moved his hand around the grass.

It seemed strange to me and so it prompted for me to ask about it, "What are you-"

"Sh," He held up a finger.

I rolled my eyes and looked around. I noticed Rose was helping some people move a car on the street.

The Doctor giggling brought my attention back to him. "Tickles!" He exclaimed.

I made a face, "What are you-"

"What's your game?" A man suddenly approached us, not very happily.

Must be his house...

The Doctor struggled to come up with an answer as he got up from the grass, "My...um...Snakes and Ladders? Quite good at...Squash. Reasonable," the man only grew more irritated and the Doctor more nervous, "I'm...being facetious, aren't I?"

I nodded, "Annoyingly."

"What the hell do you think you're doing on my property?" The angry man advanced towards the Doctor.

"Woah, there," I cut in between the two, "We should calm down."

"Move aside, girl," he put a hand on my arm.

"Try anything and you'll have to learn how to eat with your feet," I snapped, pushing his hand away.

"We're police officers!" The Doctor pulled me back, "And I've got a badge and...and a car."

"This one is an officer?" The man looked at me.

"She's in training!" The Doctor flashed his psychic paper to the man. "It was either that or hair dresser."

"I still could make you look like a fashion disaster," I remarked, trying to follow with the lie.

"What are you two doing?" Rose joined us with a few other people.

"Are you officers?" A woman beside her asked.

"The police have knocked on every door but there's no clues or leads," came another neighbor.

"Look, kids run off sometimes, alright?" The man snapped, "That's what they do-"

"Dale Hixon in your garden, playing with your Tommy and then..." one of the women began, "Right in front of me he vanished. Like he was never there to begin with! There's no need to look ant further than this street. It's right here amongst us."

The Doctor looked from one to another, not quite following, "Why don't we-"

"Why don't we start with him?" A new woman pointed at one of the men with us. "There's been all sorts like him in this street, day and night!"

The accused man looked indignant at such an idea, "I'm fixing things up for the Olympics!"

"Taking an awful long time about it," snapped the man from the garden.

"I'm of the opinion that all we've gotta do is just-" the Doctor tried again but the arguments continued.

"What you just said is slander!"

"I don't care! It just makes sense!"

"I really think we need to just-" the Doctor tried once more but in vain.

"I want an apology from her!" The man pointed to the woman.

"Stop picking on him!" another woman yelled, "And stop pretending none of this is real!"

"EVERYONE SHUT UP!" I screamed, making them all flinch, "Shut the hell up already!"

"Fingers on lips!" the Doctor yelled over me, "Now!" He placed his finger on his lips and prompted for all of us to do the same. Everyone slowly obeyed, even myself.

I sighed, "I feel like I'm a second gra-"

"Sh!" He gestured with his finger.

"But-"

"SH!"

I only made a small noise again before he did the same again. Eventually, he won and I was shut.

"Alright, in the last six days, three of your children have been stolen," the Doctor began, "Snatched out of thin air?"

"Erm...can I...?" One of the woman slowly removed her finger from her lips. When the Doctor nodded she went right ahead. "Look around you, this was a safe street 'til it came. It's not a person. I'll say it if no one else will. Maybe you're coppers or maybe you're not but I don't care. Can you please help us?"

And that was all we needed to hear before we quickly agreed.

The Doctor sent everyone home until further notice while he, Rose and I remained on the crabby man's front yard.

"Sorry you can't write your article," Rose said as the Doctor sniffed his way around the yard.

I shrugged, "It's alright."

"Now Joy, we'll help you with that article right after this," the Doctor called.

"Don't worry, I can always search it up on the internet...like a normal student would do."

It wasn't so much for the assignment I had joined the pair for the trip. I knew that if I was at home with Jackie, all I'd do was sulk over Mickey...like he was dead. And he wasn't. He was breathing and happy. I couldn't sulk over that. Yet, I miss him so much. I needed a distraction...

"Too bad you're not, though," the Doctor looked up. I mock glared. He stood straight and inhaled deeply, "Do you smell that? In the air?"

Rose and I sniffed the air and there was indeed something different in it.

"It smells like metal," I remarked.

The Doctor pointed, nodding. He walked past us towards the alleyway again, "So, Danny Edwards cycled in one end but never came out the other, " he explained and suddenly stopped walking, "There it is again!" He exclaimed, showing us the back of his hand, "Look at the hairs on the back of my manly hairy hand."

"There's that smell again," I made a face as I looked around, "Like a burnt fuse plug..."

"There's a residual energy in the spots where the kids vanishes. Whatever it was, it uses an awful lot of power to do this."

We continued walking down the streets. The Doctor started going ahead of Rose and I.

Rose suddenly turned for a cat. "Aren't you a beautiful boy?" She cooed, reaching down for it.

"Thanks! I'm experimenting with back-combing," The Doctor was quick to respond.

I giggled when he noticed Rose had meant the cat.

"Look Joy," Rose returned with the car in arms. I sneezed. "Isn't he beautiful?" I sneezed and I covered my mouth to sneeze again. "Are you okay?" She asked and the cat jumped off her arms.

"Yes-" I sneezed again.

Rose followed the cat towards a cardboard box, "Come here!"

I sneezed and sneezed, even making the Doctor turn. "Joy, what's the matter?" He walked over to me. He placed a hand over my shoulder but my continuous sneezing eventually shook it off.

"Doctor!" Rose called with an urgent tone.

I sneezed one final time again. The Doctor was in a struggle between who he should take care of first. With a hand, I motioned for him to go to Rose.

"Hold on, Joy," he said before running to Rose.

It's not like I needed him anyways; I was quite used to being on my own. And besides, I knew exactly things hadn't changed. I was on the trip for the assignment and distraction, not to be noticed...though it wouldn't hurt as usual.

I looked up to the sky and took a deep breath multiple times, "Stupid cats," I muttered. I could hear the Doctor rambling on to Rose about some iron residue but I couldn't make out the rest. My eyes felt watery and I knew it wouldn't stop unless I had my pills.

Too bad I was kind of far away from home.

"Alright, now what's wrong with you?" the Doctor returned.

"I'm fine now," I said with a scratchy voice.

"Are you sick?"

"It'll pass," I coughed, "Can we just get out of this spot, please? That would be a major help."

He nodded and led us down the street, "I sent Rose looking."

"What for?" I asked, rubbing my eyes.

"For anything, really. I don't know what we're dealing with."

"You know, that metal smell is kind of familiar..." I looked at him, "It's at the tip of my tongue but I can't say it."

"It'll come to you later. Are you feeling better now?"

I nodded, "Yeah, like I said, it'll pass. Although a glass of water could be some good use...and maybe a good distraction."

He chuckled, "I'm good at that!"

"I bet you are," I smiled, going ahead of him, "I think I'm smelling that scent again."

"I was talking to Rose about these little cakes, you know, cause I thought I saw some in the last street," he started to ramble as I sneezed more, "Did you ever hear have one of those little cakes with the crunchy ball bearings on top?"

I sneezed, and felt the scent getting stronger, "Actually..."

"No, but do you know those things?" He continued rambling and didn't listen. This was probably the first time he was talking to me about something he liked. That didn't happen too often. "Nobody else in this entire galaxy's ever even bothered to make edible ball bearings. Genius."

"Yes, but, I think-"

We heard a yell from our blonde companion and so we quickly rushed to go and help her. The Doctor arrived first and when I saw what she was being attacked by, I had to stop and process it.

"Stay still!" the Doctor instructed as he pointed his screwdriver at a ball of scribble. The ball stopped and dropped onto Rose's hands. "Are you okay?" He pulled her up.

"Yeah, cheers," Rose mumbled.

As they hugged, I stood watching with very much intrigue what Rose was holding in her hand. When they pulled back I quickly joined them and took the scribble ball from her.

"Hey!" She frowned but I ignored it and turned the ball over.

"I'll give you a fiver if you can tell me what the hell it is," the Doctor pointed, "Cause I haven't got the foggiest."

"Well, I can tell you you've just killed it," Rose shrugged.

"It was never living. Just animated by energy."

"And I assume it's the same one taking these people?" I asked, my eyes fixated on the ball.

"Correct."

"It's weird," I tilted my head, "I can tell you that this is familiar to me. But I don't know why," I looked up to them.

"Get out of here, you can't think it's familiar," Rose pointed at it, "It's not possible."

"I'm telling you!" I insisted, "It's like...I can't put my finger on it."

"You might be clever but not that much," she mumbled, making my eyes snap at her.

Had she really just said that? That was...rude. And I didn't see Cassandra anywhere which meant she wasn't possessed...

"Well, let's take this into the TARDIS then," the Doctor grabbed the ball and started walking, leaving us behind to have a sort of stare down.

"What?" She asked.

"You tell me," I said, my eyes half-wide as I turned away from her and followed the Doctor.

~0~

As the Doctor analyzed the ball, my mind racked itself for the word I was looking for to identify the similarity I had thought of between it.

"Get out of here!" the Doctor exclaimed as he read from the console's scanner.

"What it say?" Rose asked as he grabbed the ball again.

"Joy, by any chance, does this answer the word you were looking for?" He took out a pencil from his pocket and actually erased a part of the ball.

"Graphite!" I yelled immediately, pointing. "Same thing as a pencil!" I laughed excitedly and clapped my hands. "That's what I wanted to say!"

"You had it way before any of us," the Doctor smiled, handing me the ball to examine, "Maybe you should lead the trips."

"I would," I quickly approved the idea, "And I'll start by saying why make a scribble to attack people if that person or thing has enough power to create something much bigger and stronger? Thoughts, Doctor?" I glanced at him and smirked as he thought. Even Rose was thinking, although she still didn't seem happy and it was kind of getting to me honestly.

"I..." the Doctor said, clearly not having the answer, "Well..."

"It's like a child's drawing," I continued, turning the ball over, "When I made mistakes I'd scribble the heck out of the paper. I still do, actually."

"The girl," Rose suddenly said, her eyes widening.

"What girl?"

"Something about her gave me the creeps...even her own Mum looked scared of her," Rose continued, but to herself more than answering me.

"I don't know what has me more," the Doctor shook his head, "The fact that you figured this out before me," he pointed at me, "Or that you're actually deducting," he glanced to Rose.

"Actually, it's the fact I've done this more than once to you already," I leaned closer to him, smiling sweetly as he frowned at the revelation.

~0~

"Are you sure she'll let us in?" Rose asked as we approached the house of the little girl we had as suspect.

"Why wouldn't she?" the Doctor replied.

"Three strange people wanting to see someone's little girl? Yeah, I'd let them in," I said before knocking on the door.

For the first time, there was no response. The Doctor went ahead and knocked again, slightly louder than I had. A woman suddenly opened up.

"Hello! I'm the Doctor and this is Rose and Joy! Can we see your daughter?"

"No, you can't," the mother replied.

"Okay. Bye," the Doctor surprised me as he turned around and started walking away.

"...Why?" the mother suddenly questioned. The Doctor stopped and turned around. "Why do you want to see Chloe?"

"There's something interesting going on in this street and I just thought...well, we thought, she might like to give us a hand."

"Sorry to bother you," Rose caught on and began backing away.

"Yeah, we'll just let you get on with things...on your own. Bye again!" the Doctor waved.

"Wait!" the mother called, "Can you help her?" She looked so desperate now.

"Yes, I can."

"I'm Trish," the mother greeted as she brought us into the living room, "My daughter, Chloe, stays in her room most of the time. I try talking to her, but it's like speaking to a brick wall. She gives me nothing and just asks to be left alone."

"What about her dad?" I questioned.

"Died a year ago."

"I'm sorry," I said quickly said.

"You wouldn't be if you'd known him."

"Well let's go and say hi!" Rose exclaimed.

"I should check on her first..." Trish was hesitant, already backing for the staircase behind her, "She might be asleep."

"Why are you afraid of her?" the Doctor asked.

"I want you to know before you see her that she's really a great kid. Really, she is."

"I'm sure she is."

"She's never been in trouble at school and you should see her report from last year. All A's and B's."

"Can I use your loo?" Rose stood up. Trish nodded and Rose went off, giving us a slight nod as she walked for the stairs.

"She's in the choir!" Trish continued. "And she's singing in an old folks home. I just want you to know all these things because right now, she's not herself."

I heard some noises in the kitchen which drew me to go. I poked my head inside and saw a little girl by the fridge, which I assumed to be Chloe, "Hello," I waved. She turned around and drank from her glass. "I'm Joy Souza."

"I'm Chloe Webber."

"How are you doing?" I took a step forwards.

"I'm busy. I'm making something."

"I heard you draw some really neat things," I continued, hoping to make small talk, "You know, I draw too. I'd love to see your work...maybe even share ideas?"

"Joy?" the Doctor walked in with Trish.

"Just making a friend," I pointed to Chloe.

"Oh, hello there," he turned to her, "I'm the Doctor."

"Chloe Webber. I'm making something so I must go."

"Wait!" I exclaimed, "If you're drawing something, you wanna show us? We could give you pointers or something...?"

"They don't stop moaning," She suddenly said, looking straight ahead.

"Chloe..." Trish called.

"I try to help them but they don't stop moaning."

"Who don't?" the Doctor asked.

"We can be together," Chloe whispered.

"Sweetheart," Trish walked to her.

"Don't touch me Mum," Chloe snapped, making Trish freeze in her spot, "I'm busy," she spat then walked out.

"But I really wanted to see your drawings!" I called, rushing after her. "C'mon, Chloe!

"Doctor!" I heard Rose call from upstairs.

"Uh oh," I glanced back, "Doctor, Rose needs your help and fast!"

Like light speed, the Doctor went up the stairs with I, Chloe and Trish behind. We entered Chloe's bedroom and saw Rose staring to the closet.

"I'm coming to hurt you!" a roaring voice from the closet yelled.

The Doctor quickly shut the closet doors and turned to us.

"What was that?" I pointed.

"A drawing," Rose answered, "The face of a man."

"What face?" Trish went to reopen the doors.

"No!" Rose quickly barricaded the doors with her body, "Best not."

"What have you been drawing?" Trish demanded from Chloe.

"I drew him yesterday," Chloe replied, not seeming to be bothered by any of this.

"Who?"

"Dad."

Trish frowned, "But he's gone now. With all the lovely things in the world, why him?"

"I dream about him, staring at me."

"I thought we were putting him behind us. What's the matter with you?"

"We need to stay together."

Trish sighed, "Yes we do."

"No. Not you. Us," Chloe corrected, "We need to stay together and then it'll be alright."

"Trish, the drawings," Rose gestured to the wall covered with them, "Have you seen what drawings she can do?"

"Who gave you permission to come into her room? Get out of my house," Trish ordered, seeming angry.

"Tell us about the drawings, Chloe," the Doctor turned to us.

"I don't wanna hear any more of this."

"But that drawing of her dad," Rose insisted, "I heard a voice. He spoke."

"He's dead!" Trish snapped, "And those are kids pictures. Now get out!"

"Chloe has power. And she's using it to take children away. She's snatching them."

"Get out."

"Have you seen those drawings move?"

"I haven't seen anything."

"Yes you have," the Doctor slowly walked up to us, "Out of the corner of your eye."

"No," Trish stared him dead in the eye.

"You've dismissed it, because what choice do you have when you see something you can't possible explain? And if anyone mentions it, you get angry so it's never spoken of, ever ag-"

"She's a child," Trish reasoned.

"And you're terrified of her. But there's no one to turn to because who's gonna believe the things you see out of the corner of your eye? No one. Except me."

"Stop it!" I exclaimed, causing them to look at me. I knew my eyes were watery but I shook my head, hoping to get rid of them quick. "I don't like arguments in front of a child, okay? So either quit this and let us help, or take this down stairs away from Chloe," everyone remained quiet. I looked around, taking in a deep breath. "Now get out."

"Excuse me?" Trish raised an eye brow.

I glanced at her, my watery eyes making her shift uncomfortably. "I'm just gonna talk with her."

She sighed and nodded. My two companions however, did not seem very pleased.

"Joy, I don't think you do this," the Doctor said as Trish was walking out of the room.

"You don't get it. Neither does Rose. Only I do," I said quietly, rubbing one of my eyes.

"What's there to get?"

"Just go downstairs. I know what I'm doing," I snapped and gestured for the door. Chloe looked at me as the three walked out of the room. When Rose closed the door behind them I let out a big sigh. "Chloe..."

She walked towards her bed and sat down, "You're alone."

"I get it. I really do," I walked up to her, reaching for her desk chair and bringing it in front of her, "I know what it's like being afraid of a parent," I smiled faintly, holding up two fingers, "Try two," she stared at me with no response, "Mine never hit me though, I don't know about you..."

"I'm alone," She said, "But we can be together."

"Like...you don't have any friends?" I tried, "Because, I know how that I feels too. I don't really have much friends either...and the ones that I have right now, they don't even know my name," I sighed, "I had one best friend though, and he knew so me well, but..." I looked away, "He's gone now...so I feel alone again. Is that how you feel? Plain alone?"

"You are alone," she said, coldly, "Your people are gone."

'Yeah..." I faintly smiled, "...I have a lost some."

"We can be together."

"Yes, we can. Everyone can be," I agreed, "But, you have to tell me what's going on. I may not be much of a help but...one of the people I'm with...he can help you."

She pulled her legs up and crossed them. I believed that would be all I'd get out from her. Although I don't think I got much to start with. The door opened and I glanced to see the three coming back in.

"What did you do?" Trish quickly demanded.

"Nothing," I replied quietly, "Just talked."

"I think it's my turn," the Doctor walked to us.

I stood up and brought Chloe's desk chair back to her desk. I looked back and saw him placing his fingers on Chloe's temples. A few seconds later, she fell back on her bed with her eyes shut.

"I can't let him do this," Trish began walking to us.

I joined her and moved her back to where Rose was, "It's okay, just trust him."

"Now we can talk," the Doctor stood straight.

"I want Chloe. Wake her up. I want Chloe," Chloe was whispering but I didn't think it was her that was speaking.

"Who are you?" the Doctor asked.

"I want Chloe Webber!"

"What've you done?" Trish cried, frantically.

"What is it?" Rose asked.

"I'm speaking to you," the Doctor continued, walking around the bed, "The entity that is using this human child. I request parlez in compliance with the Shadow Proclamation."

"I don't care about shadows or parlez," snapped 'Chloe.'

"So what do you care about?" the Doctor asked.

"I want my friends."

"You're lonely, I know. Identify yourself."

"I am one of many. I travel with my brothers and sister. We take an endless journey. A thousand of your lifetimes. But now I am alone and I hate it. It's not fair and I hate it!"

"Name yourself!" the Doctor ordered.

"Isolus."

"Oh..." the Doctor breathed, "You're Isolus. Of course."

"Our journey began in the Deep Realms when we were a family," 'Chloe' began drawing on a paper beside her but not needing to open her eyes for it obviously.

"What's that?" I asked.

"The Isolus Mother, drifting in deep space. You see, she jettisons millions of fledgling spores; her children. The Isolus are empathic beings of intense emotion, but when they're cast off from their mother, their empathic link, their need for each other, is what sustains. They need to be together. They can't be alone." the Doctor looked to the drawing.

"Our journey is long," 'Chloe' continued.

"The Isolus children travel inside pods individually. They rid the heat and energy of solar tides. It takes thousands and thousands of years for them to grow up."

"Thousands of years just floating through space?" I raised an eye brow, "Don't they get bored?"

"We play," 'Chloe' answered my question.

"You just...play?"

"While they travel, they play games. They use their ionic power to literally create make-believe worlds in which to play."

"In flight entertainment," Rose remarked.

"Helps keep them happy. While they're happy, they can feed off each others love. Without it, they're lost."

"So they need love to survive," I smiled.

"One more thing we have in common," 'Chloe' spoke.

My smile faded, "Okay..."

"Why did you come to earth?" the Doctor inquired.

"We were too close," 'Chloe' began drawing on a new paper.

"That's a solar flare from your sun. Would've made a tidal wave of solar energy that scattered the Isolus pods," the Doctor studied the drawing.

"Only I fell to Earth. My brothers and sisters are left up there and I cannot reach them. So alone."

"Your pod crashed...where is it?" the Doctor asked.

"My pod was drawn to heat..." 'Chloe' answered, "And I was drawn to Chloe Webber. She was like me. Alone. She needed me and I her."

The Doctor stroked Chloe's head, "You empathized with her. You wanted to be with her because she was alone like you."

"I want my family. It's not fair."

"I understand," the Doctor nodded, "You wanna make a family but you can't stay in this child. It's wrong. You can't steal anymore friends for yourself."

"I am alone."

A sound from the wardrobe made us turn around, "I'm coming to hurt you," that same voice roared, "I'm coming."

"Trish, how do you calm her?" the Doctor asked rapidly as Chloe began jerking about. "When she has nightmares, what do you do?"

"I...I..." Trish hurried to her daughter, "I sing to her!"

"Then start singing!"

"Chloe...I'm coming," Chloe's dad warned, "Chloe...Chloe..."

Trish began singing to Chloe but the banging on the closet wouldn't stop. Slowly, it began to dissolve. Trish became in tears as she hugged her daughter. "He came to her because she was lonely..."

When everything became calm we left Chloe in her room, fast asleep. We walked downstairs to the living room where Trish began picking up every pencil lying about.

"I thought it was over..." She said, picking up a few pencils from the floor, "When Chloe's dad crashed the car, I thought we were free."

"Did you talk to her about it?" I asked.

"I didn't want to," Trish looked down.

"Trish, that's why Chloe feels so alone," I said, walking to where she stood, "If there's no one to speak to...you feel alone," I looked down, "No one to hear what you feel..."

"Her and the Isolus...two lonely kids who need each other. It's so desperate to be loved. It's used to a pretty big family," the Doctor said.

"So it's gonna keep pulling kids in," Rose shook her head.

I felt sad for the little creature. Maybe in a way, we were the same. But just like I got my help, so would it.

"We need to find that pod," I announced.

"But it crashed," Rose said, "Isn't it destroyed?"

"It's been sucking in all the heat it can," the Doctor reminded, "Hopefully that should keep it in a fit state to launch."

"Then let's go!" I exclaimed, rushing for the doors.

"It must be close. It should have a weak energy signature that the TARDIS can trace. Once we find it, we can stop the Isolus," the Doctor looked around the streets, "Let's get to work!" he rushed off.

"C'mon, Rose!" I pulled her away as she had gotten distracted with something.

We caught up with the Doctor and entered the TARDIS. As he worked, Rose and I fiddled around the console, not really having any other purpose for the moment. But, while she stood across from me around the console, I kept trying to think of a reason as to why she was suddenly so different around me. But I couldn't think of anything! I don't consider myself a white dove but I hadn't been rude or anything...

"You know, Joy, I'm impressed you knew the Isolus was lonely before it even said anything," the Doctor said as he worked, bringing me out of my thoughts, "Almost like you knew what it felt."

"Funny..." I said quietly, ignoring his eyes that were on me and silently questioning the reason.

"I knew it was lonely too. But, that's normal. I know what it's like to travel a long way on your own. But...you?"

"Well...that's...that's just coincidence."

"Is it?" he eyed me as he walked to the chair beside the console. Rose joined him and helped him with whatever he was building in his hands.

"Yes..."

"You know what I find very interesting?"

"What?"

"The way you ordered us out of Chloe's room like you owned the place. Impressed, don't get me wrong. But the way you looked at us...like we were doing something ungodly."

'I just don't like arguments in front of children."

""Did you have that around as a kid?" He asked.

"...no," I said quietly, "I've seen it but...no."

He didn't believe me, that was obvious but he let the subject go, "Well, hopefully with this thing, we can get the Isolus back home."

"If you ask me it sounds more like a tantrum," Rose shook her head.

"You were a kid, Rose." I reminded, faintly smiling.

"Yes! And I know what kids can be like. Right little...terrors."

The Doctor stood up and walked to the console, "Gum, please," he held out his hand to Rose.

She spit her gum into his hand which he then used on the device. "I've got cousins, and they can't have their on way. That's being part of a family."

"What about trying to understand them?" the Doctor asked, sticking the gum into the device.

"Easy for you to say," Rose walked to the chair, "You don't have kids."

"I was a dad once," he replied absently.

Rose dropped to the seat, eyes wide. "What did you say?"

I admit, I had to stop and process that one too. Of course, it didn't bother me as much as it did to Rose. I moved beside him and peered down at the device.

"I think we're here!" the Doctor exclaimed, "Now then, this Isolus doesn't want to conquer or destroy the world."

"It's just lonely and wants to get back home," I smiled.

"There's a lot of things you need to get across this universe," He continued, "Warp drive...wormhole refactors..."

I looked around and realized the idiot had missed a blinking, flashing screen. I pointed to it but he kept rambling on.

"You know the thing you need most of all? You need a hand to hold," he glanced over and saw my hand which he took into his with a big smile.

I giggled and pointed to the screen, "No, I meant look over there, you idiot."

"Oh..." He looked down to the screen, "It's the pod!"

"Is it in the street?"

"Yes!" he grabbed the device and ran to the doors.

I looked back at Rose, going to tell her we should follow but instead found her directly glaring at me. She stood up and marched up to me, thinking she'd probably do something but then pushed past me towards the doors. I turned around and watched her leave. I sighed and threw my head back, looking up to the ceiling, "You're alive," I gestured to the TARDIS, 'Can you tell me what I did?" There was a faint wheezing sound, causing me to chuckle, "Now if only I could understand you," I headed for the doors.

"So it's about two inches across. Dull grey, like a gulls egg. Very light," the Doctor was explaining when I had caught up.

"So the pods travel from sun to sun using heat?" I questioned, moving ahead of him. "And that's why it was attracted to a heated part around here?"

"Wouldn't that mean the pod needed just heat then?" Rose added, closely following me for some reason.

There was a crash behind and when we turned we saw the Doctor's device broken into pieces on the ground. What's worse, the Doctor had vanished!

"Doctor?" Rose called.

"Rose," I tugged on her arm, my finger pointing to the now-vanished TARDIS ahead.

"Oh no..." she whispered, "Brat tantrum," she muttered then dashed to the Webber's home.

We pounded on the door like our lives depended on it. Trish opened but didn't get a word out before Rose pushed past her to the stairs.

"It's okay! I've taken all the pencils off her!" Trish called after her.

"I don't think you did," I said, following Rose.

Rose burst into Chloe's room and ran to her desk, snatching Chloe's newest drawing.

"Leave me alone!" the Isolus now demanded, "I want to be with Chloe Webber! I love Chloe Webber!"

"You have to bring him back!" I exclaimed.

"No."

Rose let the paper go and grabbed Chloe's shoulders, "Don't you realize what you've done!?" She yelled, "He was the only one who could help you, now bring him back!"

"I love Chloe Webber."

"I know," Rose sighed, "I know..." She looked down to the paper and picked it up, "Doctor, if you can hear me, I'm gonna get you out of there. I'll find the pod," she looked up at us, "Don't leave her alone. I'm gonna go find the pod." she rushed out.

I sighed, looking at Chloe, "He was gonna help you."

"I could draw your people. Make you be together again."

"Can you just stop?" My voice broke, "No matter what you say or do will bring back my best friend or my family. Everyone's mad at me and I don't want to see them. So please, have pity on me and just stop," I walked out as well, close to tears again.

I sniffled quietly, wanting so bad to be alone myself. But I had to go and help Rose. I walked out and saw her speaking to one of the road workers. She was picking at the newly fixed pavement so I knew she was finding the pod.

"I found it!" She exclaimed, looking up, "Joy I found it!" I smiled as she rushed back, "Look," she held up her hands.

"That's great! C'mon!" I pulled her back inside.

"Trish! We've found it!" Rose exclaimed, "I don't know what to do with it but maybe the Isolus will just hop on board." Trish sat on the couch. "Hang on, I said not to leave her alone!" Rose's eyes widened.

My God. Em...what's going on here?

The TV suddenly became audible to our ears.

The worker Rose had taken the axe from came marching into the house. "I don't care if you've got Snow White and the Seven Dwarves buried under there, you don't go digging up-"

"Shut up Kel, and look!" Rose yelled and pointed at the TV.

The crowd has vanish! They're gone...everyone. Thousands of people have just gone. Uh...right in front of my eyes. But this is impossible!

"That stadium won't be enough," I shook my head, "The Isolus has four billion brothers and sisters. We're in trouble."

"Chloe!" Rose yelled, running for the stairs, "Chloe!"

We rushed up and found the door unable to open. "Chloe open up!" I pounded on the door. "We have your ship! We can send you home!"

"Chloe!?" Trish joined in.

"Back up you two," Rose instructed then with her axe, crashed down the door. She stuck her hand in the hole of the door and opened it for us.

As soon as we got inside, Chloe's 'Dad' was yelling from the closet. Chloe was busy drawing what looked like the planet on her wall!

"We've gotta stop her!" I pointed.

"If you stop Chloe Webber I will let him out," the Isolus warned as the closet doors rattled, "I cannot be alone. It's not fair."

"Look!" Rose held out her hands with the pod, "I've got your pod!"

"The pod is dead."

"It only needs heat!"

"It needs more than heat."

"It needs love," I whispered, "Doesn't it?"

Because when someone is or feels alone...all you need is love to remind you that you are never alone. Platonic or not, you need it.

"I don't..." Rose looked around, desperately, "I don't know..."

"But I do," I snatched the pod from her hands, "Because I understand," I looked at everyone for a moment. "And while I'm gone, you might want to check the drawings."

"Why?" Rose asked.

"Because I think they just moved," I nodded then rushed out. I looked around the street and saw a crowd at the end. "The torch was the symbol of hope, fortitude, courage...and love," I recited Sarah Jane's story, recalling the short story she had given to me as an example before taking the school's assignment, 'And that's exactly what I'm looking for." I smiled, dashing towards the crowd. I pushed myself towards the front of the crowd but was stopped by a policeman. "I've gotta get closer!"

"No way," he shook his head.

I groaned, "Moron!" He gave me a dirty look but I didn't care. The pod chirped in my hands and so I backed out from the crowd and turned my back on them. "You felt it, didn't you?" I asked it, bringing it closer to my mouth. "I understand you. Believe me. And here's my help: Feel the love," I whispered then threw the pod into the air. When I saw it rush to the torch, I jumped up and down in excitement. "Yes!"

One by one I saw all the children that had gone missing materialize on the street.

"Now then, where would that alien be?" I looked around, remembering where he had disappeared but not finding him. "But everything came back to life...all the drawings..." I started blinking rapidly with realization, "Hold up..." I turned around, "Everything came to life. Oh my god..." I ran back to the Webber's home as the thought of the closet returned to my head. I arrived but found the door shut. "Rose! Trish! Chloe!" I pounded on the door.

"The door is stuck!" Rose shouted, pounding on the door. "Where's the Doctor?"

"Uh..." I looked around, "He's not here..."

"WHAT?"

"Not important right now, sorry," I looked for another way in. I could hear Chloe's dad advancing to them.

"Help us!" Trish yelled, "Please!"

"It's not real!" I yelled, "Rose, tell them it's not real! It's just because they're so afraid of him! Rose!"

And she did. I could hear but I could also hear Chloe's Dad and he sounded much closer. Suddenly, I heard singing...? They were singing!

"Keep singing!" I yelled.

Boy I could really use Rose's axe right now.

When everything died down, the door finally opened and out came Rose.

"Are you okay?" I asked but her only answer was a silent nod.

She walked past me and into the streets, to which I assume she would be looking for the Doctor in. While we didn't work together, we had both went looking for the Doctor only to come up with nothing. We returned to the Webber's in defeat, hoping he'd be there instead.

"Nothing?" Trish asked when we returned.

I shook my head and took a seat on the couch, "Kinda hoping he'd turn up here..."

She smiled and turned the television on where the Olympics were being broadcasting again. Everyone had returned to the stadium and it was as if nothing had happened.

"Eighty thousand people, so where's the Doctor?" Rose whispered, "I need him."

I looked at her and saw she was almost going to cry, only adding to the tension we felt.

"Chloe?" I sighed, turning to her, "You think I can borrow a pen and a paper? I have to do some school work," she stood up and went for the things.

The torch bearer seems to be in a bit of trouble. We did see a flash of lightening earlier which seemed to strike him...um, maybe he's injured...he's definitely in trouble.

Definitely. He just collapsed.

Chloe returned with a pen and a journal. I smiled, taking it into my hands, "Thank you," I looked back to the TV as I placed the journal on my lap, "Guess I better get started."

Does this mean that Olympic Dream is dead?

"Joy, look," Chloe pointed. I looked up and saw the Doctor on the TV screen running with the torch in hand,"It's him!"

There's a mystery man, he's picked up the flame...we've no idea who he is...he's carrying the flame, yes! He's carrying the flame and no one wants to stop him!"

It's more than a flame now, Bob. It's more than heat and light.

"It's hope, courage and love," I smiled and looked down, beginning to write.

~0~

It was night by the time I had finished the article. The people were out in the streets, celebrating, including Rose who had been dragged out by Trish and Chloe. Once I had properly finished, I left the Webber's house and hurried into the streets to go find the TARDIS and type it up. Of course, at the whiff of a dessert, I had to stop and find its source. I found a table and saw it was filled with small cupcakes.

"Oh..." I said, taking a deep inhalation of their scents.

"You can have one," a woman said, coming up behind the table.

"Don't mind if I do," I grinned and took one of them off the table. I turned and began walking again, getting ready to take a big bite out of my dessert when I saw the Doctor across the street. "Hey!" I called, making him turn around. "You are in so much trouble you ridiculous alien!"

"Annoying, clever girl," he strolled right up.

I mock-glared for a minute before holding out my cupcake, "I might be those things but I listen to you."

Hopefully he'd start doing it as well...

He became ecstatic with it and took it right off my hand, "Top banana!"

I nodded, "Yup!" He took a big bite out of it, causing me to chuckle, "Do you like it?"

"Mm. I can't stress this enough. Ball bearings you can eat - masterpiece!" He exclaimed.

"Ridiculous, banana-loving alien."

"You have got to stop that," he mock glared and took another bite.

"Stop what?" I asked innocently.

"That," he pointed.

"I have done nothing except bring you your cupcake, so quiet." I said, pointing right back.

"What's that?" He looked down to my paper I held.

"It's my article," I waved the paper, "See?"

He took it from me and read it, "This is brilliant!"

I chuckled, "You think so? I wrote it in the heap of the moment!"

"You're an excellent writer, Joy!"

"Thanks, I dabble, I dabble."

"Do you also dabble in saving the world?"

"What?" I raised an eye brow.

"I know what you did. Once again, I owe you a thanks," he smiled.

"Thank you for bringing me here. Believe it or not, it actually did help me," I said quietly, "I hope Mickey lives a good life."

He nodded, "And he hopes the same for you," I swallowed, my eyes slightly becoming teary, "Oh, none of that," he pulled me for a hug which I immediately retreated to.

It reminded me of our last hug before he had taken Mickey along. He never did ask me what made me cry. But for that one split moment, I didn't think he was doing it to ignore me...he did it to avoid more pain. For once, he thought of me and did something to help. It wasn't the kind of help where he saves my life, but one that a friend would do...

"I'm gonna miss him," I sniffled and pulled back, "But I know he's going to be so happy and that makes me happy." I saw Rose coming up from across the street and looking directly at us. Wanting no problems, I backed away from him.

"What are you doing?" He frowned.

"Um...Rose," I pointed past him, "She's been kinda worried."

"Oh..." He glanced over his shoulder and she immediately smiled.

"I'm gonna go back to the TARDIS," I announced, "Have fun."

"Oh, Joy, wait," he grabbed my arm and pulled me back, "It's a night for celebration."

I looked at him then at Rose who's smile was faltering. Finally donning on me, I smiled, "I think I'll be better in the TARDIS," he didn't seem convinced as I released myself from his grasp, "I'll just wait over there," I turned around and walked towards the direction Rose was coming from, ignoring her glares, "Oh, Joy, you're such an idiot," I said to myself as I walked farther away.

She was jealous.

~0~

I was just about to open the TARDIS doors when Chloe came around and leaned against it with a smile, "Hey!"

I smiled and desisted from the doors, "Hello, feeling better now?"

She nodded, "I remember what you said back there...in my room."

"I said a lot of things, Chloe. Gonna have to be more specific."

"You said you were alone...like me."

It took a lot in me not to stop smiling for her sake, "But you're not. You're gonna make friends and be the great little girl you are!"

"What about you?"

"What about me?"

"You said you didn't have friends."

"Well, I have two," I corrected, but then I remembered Rose and thought I should reconsider the amount now.

"But they don't know you."

I sighed, "Maybe one day they will..."

"What's your name?"

"Joy."

"No, I want to be your friend. What's your name?" She grabbed my hand and looked up at me.

I smiled softly, touched by her gesture, "...Minerva."

She smiled back and gave my hand a small squeeze, "Thank you, Minerva."

[sheliesshattered]

Upon This Rock Will I Break Myself,     Until It Shows Me Your Beloved Face

It started with the tune the Doctor had strummed out in that American diner, but of course it didn’t stop there. The gap in his memory was too large to be contained by one song, his grief too complex for a simple progression of chords. The ache he felt for something lost and just out of reach poured through his guitar and out the TARDIS’s amps, reverberating against the walls, muffled here by books, reflected there by metal, until the sound surrounded him. Consumed him. And still the anguish persisted.

His memory faded until there was nothing left but the grief and the music, even the waitress and the story he’d told her reduced to vague impressions, but the pain only compounded. As that ache continued to grow, so did the music, adding up to reams of songs, all sharing a melody, a single theme tying one to the next, that lilting tune he’d first discovered in that diner that was in Nevada but should have been in Utah. Maybe some of them become songs, the waitress had said, in a voice he no longer remembered. Those chords felt like the closest thing to memory he had left, the nearest thing to truth in the shattered shambles of his life.

Clara. Maybe the melody was the shape of her smile, or the sway in her step, the spark of adventure in her eye, or her courage and kindness. Was that some edge of true memory there, or was it just that all those dear to him were kind and courageous? He’d lost companions before, people he’d loved, mourned them for years, and yet never felt this kind of hole. Never felt the need for a neural block, either.

Eventually the console room became too small for the size of the music, the speakers not able to sufficiently convey the depth of his feelings. So he donned his ‘space hobo’ look — who had called it that originally? the song was his only answer — and went looking for larger venues, bigger sound systems. Jammed with a few old friends, made a few more, but always the Clara shaped hole, always the melody just under his breath, like something he didn’t quite get to say before the neural block went into effect. Like something he never meant to stop saying.

He played the large festivals. The classics on Earth, naturally, and then followed humanity through the ages, through the star systems across the galaxy, as they found new and bigger and louder ways to experience music. He was an opening act, sometimes, or just the weird vagrant at sound check. He’d show up, connect his guitar, and strum out those chords, make the air quake with the shape of what he’d lost.

So of course he attracted a following eventually. He was late enough in the human civilization that time travel wasn’t so strange an idea anymore, and the single tune carrying across the planets and star systems, across centuries... Well, there’d always been a romantic streak in the human race, part of what he liked about them. And for some, that melody was the ultimate expression.

He’d done such a job erasing all knowledge of the Doctor from every database in the universe, back when River’s life had depended on it, that he’d forgotten what it was to be known, what it was to show up somewhere and see the spark of recognition on someone’s face. It took him ages to stop searching those faces for one that would fit the Clara shaped hole. They came for the music, for the romance and mystery and longing of it, not for him. They invented names for him, backstories of a tragic lost love that he could neither confirm nor deny. They defined him through the music, through the lilting chords that were meant to be her, not him. None of them truly knew the Doctor. None of them even knew that name.

The fan groups, then, were a mild annoyance, but not much of a surprise. The TARDIS and his guitar were strictly off limits, and he didn’t sign anything, and beyond that he didn’t much care for the milling crowd of familiar-ish faces that started to pop up along his stops through the galaxy, half of them with vortex manipulators strapped to their wrists. The opening acts had given way to featured performances, solo ‘tours’ retroactively dubbed thus by human time travellers who could pop back to a favourite event at their leisure.

Once upon a time he’d travelled like that, gone wherever the whim had taken him, a mad man and his blue box off to see the universe. He’d given it up after Amy and Rory, right around the time the hole in his memory started. All the faces before this one he could remember clearly, but sometime during his last face, the gap he called Clara began. A stationary life on Trenzalore slowly faded in somewhere around his 1300th birthday, and even that time was littered with holes. Through it all, he’d been convinced he was going to die there. He shouldn’t have regenerated again, it shouldn’t have been possible, and yet he remembered glimpses of it. He remembered taking off the bowtie for the last time, he remembered being incredibly sad to say goodbye.

It all just disappears, doesn't it? Everything you are, gone in a moment, like breath on a mirror.

He remembered Clara being there with him, but not her face or her eyes or her smile, not what she’d said or done. He remembered the sensation of the First Face settling in, so much stronger at the beginning of a new regeneration cycle, and she was seared to his hearts still, with everything but the memory of who she was. He thought Kidneys! might have been the first word he’d said to her, though he couldn’t imagine why.

It covered more than a thousand years, that Clara shaped hole. But sometimes an amp would produce a particular type of feedback, and it would feel like the gaps were peppered throughout his memory, back and back and back to his childhood, like this mystery woman had tiptoed through his life, leaving little footprints his mind tried desperately to forget. And sometimes a chord would reverberate against the backs of his teeth, and his body would suddenly be convinced that the gap was not a thousand years, but four and a half billion years.

He thought of losing her, tried to imagine their last day together, and his mind strayed to the stars going out, to the heat-death of the universe. I watched as time ran out, moment by moment, until nothing remained. No time. No space. Just me.

It was sad. And it was beautiful. And it is over.

Nothing’s sad ‘til it’s over. Then everything is.

Sad, or over, he wondered, and went in search of a venue the size of a planet, speakers that could drown out the disembodied voices drifting anchorless in his mind. He made his guitar sing and the air quake and the crowds roar, and still he ached. The size of it was too overwhelming, the scale of what he’d lost, not just the person but the time itself, almost half his lifetime, pieces of himself he couldn’t get back without breaking free of the neural block.

There were ways to cheat it, he knew, to short circuit the artificial amnesia put in place by Time Lord technology — and how was that even possible? where had he been? — tactics practiced in official espionage circles as well as by TARDIS operators and paranoid Academy students. He had, at one point or another, been all three, so he knew the sidesteps of logic one could take to subvert the programming, the more drastic measures that could be taken to disable it. If something could be remembered it could be brought back, all of it, and the neural block would cease to function.

But it had to have been put there for a purpose, hadn’t it? If the size of the forgetting was this overwhelming, how overpowering must the experience have been? What must it have been like, to know this woman who had to be torn from his mind so completely he could only identify his feelings for her by what was left behind? What had he done to try to save her to justify this large of a wipe?

Stopping by familiar stomping grounds to buy guitar strings, he checked in on Donna Noble. He kept his distance, only too aware of the harm he could cause her if he sparked her memory. But she looked well, happy, brash as ever, and he smiled to himself, imagining the two of them knocking around together now, hollering over each other, only ever speaking in acerbic endearments.

Oh, don’t worry, daft old man, I’m not going anywhere.

He missed her with a more manageable hurt, an echo of the Clara. He wondered if Donna ever felt this kind of sourceless longing, ever dreamed of someone she could almost remember, as he did. He hoped not. She seemed happy, and what else could he ask for, for his companions, for the people he loved? Amy had said she and Rory had lived a long and happy life together — fifty years, if tombstones were to be believed. River had repeatedly emphasised what each and every line of their relationship meant to her, Martha and Rose had each married for love and gone on to do great things, even Sarah Jane had eventually forgiven him for dropping her off in the wrong place, and she, too, had lived a happy and impactful life.

He had lost companions, yes, and so many more during the Time War, but against all the good he had wrought, all his long years of trying to help where he could, what had he done to deserve this? Couldn’t he, just for once, get to keep someone? After all this time, after everything I've done, don't you think the universe owes me this?

But a thousand years, off and on his entire life, four and a half billion years, what would you call that if not ‘keeping’ someone, he argued with himself. They’d had their time, and apparently he had been so unwilling to give Clara up, it had to be taken from him by force, ripped out at the root. Everything’s got to end sometime. Otherwise nothing would ever get started.

No. Stop it. You're saying goodbye. Don't say goodbye!

Everything ends. —Except you.

He suspected one of the contextless voices in his head was hers, but he had no way of knowing which. Not without breaking the neural block. So he buried himself in the music, let the chords speak where she could not.

He was mid-performance on an enormous stage on an artificial moon called Woodstock when he realised he’d once again locked eyes with one of a pair of brunettes who fit vaguely into his time travelling fans folder, into that group of pseudo-familiar people who seemed to always show up these days, no matter when or where he played. Two young women — though it was impossible to tell, really, he was visiting a century where everyone looked perpetually twenty-seven — short and thus often nearest the stage, nearly mistakable for sisters, though their noses set them apart. One with light eyes and the other with wide brown eyes, their honeyed depths calling to him out of the crowd.

The Doctor didn't make a habit of studying humans' facial expressions, but he found himself cataloguing all her little tells: the exact angle of her eyebrows, the set of her jaw, the slight sheen in her eyes. As soon as he realised he was doing it, he looked away, dropped his gaze and broke the connection. He pulled on his sonic-sunglasses, grinning at the crowd's roar of approval as he turned his attention to the particularly complex bridge of the current version of the Clara song. He could feel the woman’s gaze on him still, like a waver in gravity, and had to grit his teeth to keep from looking back at her.

Who the woman was hardly mattered, much less the precise shade of heartbreak in her eyes. He was sure, if he were to look around at the other faces in the audience, that he'd find many such expressions. It was the music, the way they experienced it and the stories they wove to explain it, nothing to do with him. He had watched the crowd plenty in the past, he’d seen how the music affected them, and then promptly forgotten each and every one of their faces. He would forget this one, too — in fact, the brunette’s face was already gone from his memory, it was that inconsequential.

The Clara melody flowed smoothly into something slower and softer, longing made audible, and he heard the audience sigh along with the music. He looked up at them again, watching it ripple outwards through the crowd, the echo of what he had lost flickering across thousands of faces in a microsecond. And still too small, still only a shadow of his grief.

Unconsciously his gaze was drawn to her again, over the heads of the handful of people that separated them. He truly had forgotten her face in those moments when he looked away, but there, there in her brown eyes, he saw it now. It set her apart from the rest of the crowd, the depth of longing held in her eyes, outweighing all the rest put together. And he wondered, in the fleeting moment their gazes met and held, if she was the only one who understood what the melody really meant, who might understand the carved-out pain inside him, the ache that not even the music could accurately convey.

But she dropped her gaze, a tear streaking down her cheek, and the moment was lost. Strangely desperate to hold onto the connection just a little longer, he reflected it back to her again the only way he could, through the music. The crowd roared along with the unexpected crescendo, but when he looked up next, she was gone, her face already fading from his memory.

Don’t run. Stay with me.

It tore out of him then, the Clara song, raw and aching and new all over again, the tune morphing beneath his fingertips as he played. The audience surged but he was deaf to them, a being of pure longing, his entire existence suspended between the pulsing soundwaves of the music. It felt real, suddenly, in a way it hadn’t even when he’d first woken up disoriented in Nevada. Clara was gone, and she was never, ever coming back. No matter how far he travelled, or how he called out to her in his music, or longed for her in silence, she was never going to come back to him.

And you'll still be gone. Whatever I do, you still won't be there.

Look how far I went for fear of losing you.

She'll die on you, you know. She'll blow away like smoke.

He blew out an amp, to the audience’s immense satisfaction, then disconnected his guitar and walked off stage without looking back, breath ragged and hearts aching.

He’d parked the TARDIS a good distance from the stage, experience having taught him that there was more safety and anonymity in quietly slipping off to the edges of the crowd than in trying to keep the TARDIS close at hand. Without the music to identify him, he was just an old man with a guitar case, hardly notable, rarely recognised. He was more grateful for it today than most. The last thing he needed was a run-in with his fan club. All he wanted was to be alone with his grief.

Look at you, with your eyes, and your never giving up, and your anger, and your kindness. One day, the memory of that will hurt so much that I won't be able to breathe, and I'll do what I always do. I'll get in my box and I'll run and I'll run, in case all the pain ever catches up. And every place I go, it will be there.

He almost didn’t see her there, leaning against a tree trunk ahead of him, the woman with the wide brown eyes and the face he’d forgotten so easily, but something drew his gaze to her while he was still far enough away that she hadn’t noticed him yet. She was staring at the TARDIS with a kind of sad affection on her face. The Doctor paused in his tracks, taking a moment to consider her without her eyes on him, as the music started up again on the distant stage.

She looked human enough, no flicker or glimmer of a holographic shell, but there was something distinctly other about her, something that set her apart from the hordes of humans that followed him through time and space. Her clothing fit into the sort of non-descript style that many time travellers preferred, nothing to link her to any particular era, and both her shoes and her hair were practical, but she didn’t appear to be wearing a vortex manipulator.

It was clear she’d been crying, and as she gazed at the TARDIS, another tear slipped down her cheek. When she reached up to brush it away, she seemed to notice him from the corner of her eye and turned to look at him more properly, her expression still mired in grief.

Feeling caught out, the Doctor resumed walking towards the TARDIS, offering the strange woman a tentative half-smile as he drew near. Emotions rippled across her face too quickly for him to name, landing on a muffled determination. She pushed away from the tree and wrapped her arms around herself, something about her body language telling him she meant to speak even before she opened her mouth.

“You’re him, aren’t you?” she asked. “From the stage?”

It had to be rhetorical, since she clearly already knew the answer, but he stopped a few feet from the TARDIS and faced her. “Yeah, guilty as charged.”

“That was quite a performance you gave.”

He attempted something like a smile. “You didn’t even stay for the grand finale.”

“Oh, I heard it well enough from here,” she replied softly, and he wondered again at her red-rimmed eyes.

“What’s your name?” he asked her, glancing at her and noting the precise tilt of her nose.

She hesitated half a moment. “Oswin,” she finally said, smiling slightly as she did. It didn’t reach her eyes. It's a smile but you're sad. It's confusing. It's like two emotions at once. It's like you're malfunctioning.

Oswin. Odd name. Odder still for him to be disappointed in it.

“Nice to meet you, Oswin,” he said, feeling like he was reciting some long-ago lesson on polite manners, drilled into him by a woman he could no longer remember. “Come to these sorts of things often?”

She smiled softly and looked down at her feet. “I have made a bit of a habit out of it, if we’re being honest. It’s hard to stay away.”

“And your friend?” he asked, without really knowing why. “The blue-eyed one?”

“Ash,” Oswin confirmed, nodding. “It’s not really her thing. She humours me, lets me drag her along, but I think she’s mostly here to make sure I stay out of trouble.”

“Do you?”

She grinned at that, and it looked genuine. “Not usually.”

“Me, either,” he said, smiling back at her.

“Oh, I can just imagine.”

Talking with her had only increased his sense that there was something distinctly strange about this woman. He fiddled with the sonicglasses, debating putting them on and running an inconspicuous diagnostic on her.

Somehow she seemed to know exactly what he was thinking and said, “Yeah, I wouldn’t look too closely at either Ash or I. We’re both HIPOAT.”

“Hip-oat?”

“Humans In Possession Of Alien Technology,” she clarified, shooting him a sidelong look. “Thought you’d’ve known that one.”

“I’m not overly familiar with this century’s lingo,” he said, smirking at her and lifting the guitar case as evidence. “I’m just passing through.”

“Ah yes, the Eternal Traveller,” she said ruefully, invoking one of the names the pudding brains had given him. “It’s quite a path you cut through the centuries, you know.”

He shrugged. “That’s the nature of time travel. Scar tissue is always the price.”

“Scars for you or for the universe?” she asked.

“Is there a difference?”

She smiled sadly and shook her head, brown hair just barely brushing her shoulders. “Most of us make it through life with only person-sized scars.”

“But not you,” he murmured, thinking back on the way her eyes had seemed to mimic his grief, while the Clara song had echoed around them.

Oswin shrugged stiffly, not meeting his gaze. “It’s as true for me as for anyone.”

Doctor, you are not the only person who ever lost someone. It's the story of everybody. Get over it. Beat it. Break free.

“Can I ask you a personal question?” he blurted out before he could think better of it.

She eyed him suspiciously. “I suppose.”

“Are you, by any chance, bio-looped?”

For a fraction of a second she looked terrified, but a fake anger quickly covered over. “Oi!” she said, hitting his arm lightly. “What did I say about HIPOAT? Don’t look too closely!”

“Sorry, sorry, couldn’t help but notice.”

“Of course not,” she sighed, sounding resigned.

“A bit like Cinderella, with the clock paused at eleven-fifty-nine, isn’t it?” he asked.

Eleven’s hour is over now, the clock is striking twelve’s...

She smiled, but it was sad. “Something like that, yeah.”

“So what is it? An age-trigger, maybe? Go out and see the universe, have your adventures, then make it back like no time has passed at all, your supper still warm?” She was watching him with something he thought might be affection in her brown eyes, so he continued on, his tone teasing, lighter than he’d felt in ages. “Are you running from an impending marriage? I had a friend who did that once. Oh, or a prison sentence? Had another friend who did that — well, she took the sentence, but kept slipping out. Come to think of it, the two of them were related, maybe the running away was genetic...”

She was grinning at his antics, but her eyes were still sad. “No, no, nothing as exciting as that! Though I wonder, sometimes, at your friends.” She considered him for a long moment. “And who are you travelling with these days? Any other exciting friends recently?”

You're going to be alone now, and you're very bad at that.

He looked away, fiddled with the lock of the guitar case. “Nah, just me and the guitar, lately. I’ve got loads of good memories to keep me company, though,” he added, glancing back up at her.

Her eyebrows had drawn together, but he couldn’t quite name the emotion on her face. “Do you?” she asked, voice serious, gaze searching.

“Well, I’m older than I look, did a lot of travelling before I embarked on my musical career.”

“I’ve done a fair bit of that myself, now,” she replied. “I’ve seen so much, sometimes it’s hard to keep track. Hard to remember it all.”

I will not forget one line of this, not one day. I swear.

Her statement felt loaded, though he wasn’t sure she meant it to be. She couldn’t really know about the Clara shaped hole, of course — and besides, memories formed while bio-looped were notoriously finicky. Plenty of races had figured out how to bio-loop a living creature, but only the Time Lords had really perfected the memory side of that sort of technology. She was surely just referring to her own issues with missing memories, not his.

“Still,” he said after just a beat too long, “there are moments that stand out.”

“‘You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again,’” she quoted to him, looking up at the stars that blazed above them, her arms wrapped around her middle again.

The pieces clicked together in his head almost audibly. “Ah, so it’s terminal, then?” he asked before he could stop himself.

She looked away sharply, but it didn’t hide the sheen of tears in her eyes. “Everything ends,” she said, shrugging.

Except you.

“I’m sorry,” he said, and realised he meant it.

“Why?” she asked, swallowing back tears. “It’s not your fault.”

I did this, do you hear me? I did this. This is my fault.

“One last hurrah, then,” he said, and Oswin hiccupped beside him. “I’m honoured that you’d include so many of my performances in your itinerary.”

She snorted damply, her large dark eyes again fixed on the stars overhead as though that would keep her tears from falling. “You’re one of the Wonders of the Universe,” she teased him, her tears barely held at bay. “There’s hardly a time travellers’ guidebook out there that doesn’t list your concert series as a do-not-miss.”

“Which ones don’t? I’ll send a sternly-worded letter to their publishers,” he said, and won the genuine laugh he’d hoped for.

“Buy you a drink?” he asked as her laughter died away.

What do you say to lunch, followed by breakfast? Because we're time travellers and that's how we roll. Then cocktails with Moses!

She returned her gaze from the sight above them and turned to him. For half a second she looked unspeakably sad, but then she was smiling over it, through it. And there's that smile again. I don't even know how you do that.

“I don’t think they’ve got ‘round to building a concessions stand on this moon yet, much less a decent pub,” she said, shaking her head.

“Oh.” He really wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting.

“Not to worry, you daft old man,” she said, smiling fondly and blinking back her tears. “My ship is parked just behind that hill there. Fully equipped kitchen, though I think lemonade might be the strongest thing we have on tap. My treat.”

“You’re sure your friend won’t mind?”

Oswin shook her head. “Nah, Ash wanted to stay for the next act, so the place will be ours for a bit. Come on, it’s not far,” she said, then turned and led the way, past the TARDIS and over the hill she’d indicated.

They paused at the top of the rise, and she pointed to the structure below them, blockier than he would have expected. “There,” she said. “What’d I tell you? Not far.” Something about her body language made him think she was gathering her courage for something, and he knew distantly that should put him on guard, but he followed after her anyway.

“Your ship is a diner?” he asked in confusion as they neared.

“Sometimes,” she answered coyly, shooting him a small smile as she unlocked the flimsy-looking door.

It was all too familiar, ringing too many bells in his mind that sounded far too much like the TARDIS’s Cloister Bell, but he couldn’t have stopped himself from following her through the door if he’d tried. You’d go to hell if she asked. And she would.

The interior of her ship looked as much like an anachronistic American diner as the exterior did, like something pulled directly out of his patchy memory, and the radio was playing a soft jazz tune that he almost recognised. He should leave, the Doctor knew, turn around and walk away and forget this strange woman with her inexplicable ship and her sad eyes. But when had he ever done the smart thing, the safe thing? When had he ever turned his back on a mystery? You are the only mystery worth solving. 

“Lemonade, then?” she called over her shoulder as she headed towards the kitchen tucked behind the bar. “Or I make a mean chocolate shake.”

Do you want to go and get some coffee, or chips, or something? Or chips and coffee?

“Chips and coffee?” he suggested, before he could think better of it.

She shot him a guarded look from behind the counter but nodded. “I can do that.”

“So this thing actually flies, then?” he asked, sitting down at the bar and settling the guitar case at his feet.

“When I can convince her to do,” Oswin said ruefully as she worked. “Got a mind of her own sometimes, you know how it is.”

He did know, which was exactly the problem. It was like watching a galaxy come into focus down the barrel of a telescope, the longer he sat there. He knew this sort of ship, knew precisely the sort of negotiating Oswin would have to do to fly it.

But more than that, he was certain he’d seen it before, sat at this bar with this same strange woman across from him. The memory was hazy now, formed too soon after the neural block to really stick, but as the smells of chips and coffee filled the brightly decorated room, he was sure he’d done this all before. He fiddled with his sonicglasses, debating using them to try to bolster his scattered memories.

Oswin passed him his coffee across the bar, then scooped up her own and a basket of freshly cooked chips and made her way out from behind the counter and over to a vinyl-upholstered booth, tilting her head at him to indicate that he should join her. He sat across from her and took an experimental sip of his coffee. As he suspected it contained at least six sugars and a dash of heavy cream, just to his liking. She hadn’t even asked him about his preferences.

She hadn’t needed to ask.

“Who are you?” he blurted out before he could stop himself.

She glanced up at him over the rim of her coffee cup, eyes wide with surprise, then shrugged stiffly. “I’m no one. Just me, just Oswin. A traveller passing through, like you.”

He glared at her, immediately certain she was lying — as certain as he was that he had been here before, with her. There was something she was deliberately not telling him, something obvious he was missing. Something that wasn’t adding up. “Why is it I can read your emotions better than my own, but when I look away, I can’t remember your face?”

She dropped her gaze and shrugged again, overplaying her casualness. “Perception filter.”

The Doctor bit down on the urge to tell her that that’s not how perception filters work; he suspected she already knew that, anyway. “Neural block,” he countered instead.

She jerked her gaze back up to his, brown eyes wide.

“Sonic,” he went on, indicating his glasses on the tabletop. “TARDIS,” he said with a glance around the diner. “Bio-loop,” he added with a significant nod towards her. “Oh, I’m sorry, are we not just naming off out-of-place bits of Time Lord tech?” he asked acerbically.

She looked shaken but said, “HIPOAT, I told you—”

“No one has Time Lord technology!”

“You do!”

“Because I’m—!” He cut himself off, staring at her. “Who are you?”

She watched him in disbelief for a long moment, panic growing behind her brown eyes. “The Hybrid,” she choked out finally, another lie. “I’m the Hybrid. There’s an old Gallifreyan prophecy—”

“No!”

“—about the end of the universe. Yes there is!”

“I know the prophecy!” he snapped. “But you aren’t the Hybrid, that’s not possible!”

“I assure you I am!”

“Then why are you here, instead of out there, destroying the universe?”

That brought her up short, and she stared back at him, aghast. “It’s balanced on a knife’s edge, Doctor, it always has been!”

Doctor.

She realised her mistake before he could call her out on it, her mouth forming a little o of horror. He hadn’t told her his name, she hadn’t asked for it. But the moment it tumbled out into the air between them, he was certain, certain he had heard her say it a hundred times before — a thousand times, four and a half billion times.

There's one thing I know about her. Just one thing. If I met her again, I would absolutely know.

“Clara,” he named her, and to his disappointment and relief, his memories did not come rushing back to him.

She stared up at him with those big, sad eyes, tears beginning to slip silently down her face. The face the neural block would steal from him again the moment he turned his back on her. The source of the ache in his hearts, the meaning behind the chords, the black hole his entire universe had come to orbit. Clara.

“I tried to stay away,” she said, sniffling and swiping at her tears. “You didn’t make it easy.”

If you love me in any way, you’ll come back.

“I wasn’t trying to find you,” he told her honestly. “I didn’t realise it was an option.”

She searched his face for a long moment, Clara, this person shaped like the absence in his life. “It’s still there, isn’t it?” she asked. “The neural block? You don’t actually know me.”

I’d know you anywhere.

“Oh, I know you, my Clara,” he said, smiling at her with a bitter twist. “I know your shadow, I know the negative you left behind. What do you think the music’s about?”

She closed her eyes, and tears slipped from beneath her lashes. “Ash said we should keep our distance, that I was being stupid. But I— I had to see you.”

“I could break it, you know,” he said, and waited for her to look at him again before continuing. “The neural block. There are techniques to sidestep it, short it out.”

“But you haven’t,” she said. “All this time and you haven’t broken it.”

“I didn’t know what was at stake, why I had to forget you in the first place.”

“The Hybrid prophecy,” she told him, holding his gaze with nothing but absolute honesty in her eyes this time. “We were going to unravel the Web of Time. Something had to be done.”

“Time seems to be healing itself. It always does.”

“Because we did something to stop it unravelling. We did this.”

“Somehow I don’t think this is what we intended,” the Doctor said. “What good is forgetting if our feelings for each other haven’t changed?”

Clara flinched, closed her eyes and shook her head. “‘The Hybrid will break a billion billion hearts to heal its own.’ That’s what’s at stake here, Doctor. We were going to destroy the universe to chase one more moment of happiness.”

“So, what, we’re not allowed any happiness? Not even the memory of happiness?”

“It’s too dangerous. Even this— Ash was right, I’m being stupid, and the fate of the universe hangs in the balance. I should’ve stayed away.” She looked up at him, her eyes inflating with tears in a way he almost, almost remembered. “You can’t break the neural block. It has to stay.”

He couldn’t lose her again. He wouldn’t. “I insist upon my past. I am entitled to that. It’s mine,” he said.

Clara shook her head, tears flowing down her face. “Your past means the destruction of the universe, the death of everything that has ever or will ever live!”

“Tomorrow is promised to no one—”

“Don’t throw my own words back in my face!” she snapped, bringing him up short. “I know I messed up! I didn’t mean for this to happen, Doctor, really I didn’t.”

What did you do?

What else? What else do you think I did? I reversed the polarity. Push that button, Doctor, and the neural block will go off in your own face.

He sighed and shook his head. “I know you didn’t. I know you wouldn’t have hurt me deliberately. I remember you well enough to know that, at least.” Do you think I care for you so little that betraying me would make a difference?

Clara clutched at her coffee cup, to keep herself from reaching out to grasp his hand, he thought. “I’m sorry I hurt you at all,” she murmured. “If there was any other way, Doctor...”

“So what do we do now?”

She smiled at him tremulously, bravely. Let me be brave. “You are going to drink your coffee and eat your chips. And then you’re going to fly away from here, fly away and forget me, let time get back to healing. You’re going to find someone new, someone to travel with properly, run off and see the universe like you used to do. And someday — I don’t know when, but someday — Ash will find you, and tell you it’s safe to break the neural block. And then you can have all your happy yesterdays back.”

“Because you’ll be gone,” he said, hearing what she wasn’t saying. You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again.

She took a shaky breath and sighed it out. “Yes.”

“That isn’t what I want,” he told her bluntly. Please, I don't want this.

“The universe doesn’t care what we want, Doctor. Sometimes the only choices you have are bad ones, but you still have to choose.”

“We could make the other choice,” he suggested, pain lancing through him at the thought of giving her up again.

“And risk the damage we might do to the universe? Break a billion billion hearts to heal our own?”

“Time hasn’t unravelled. We’re all still here, you, me, and the universe. We don’t have to say goodbye. So how about we just don't? Why don't we just fly away somewhere, together?” he said, echoing the anchorless voice from his scattered, shattered memories.

“Oh, that'd be great, wouldn't it?” she whispered back, like an ancient call and answer.

This is as brave as I know how to be. I know it's going to hurt you, but, please, be a little proud of me.

She was doing this to save everyone else, he realised, and him most of all. Putting on a brave face, making the hard choice, so he wouldn’t have to do. Would she never be done saving him, this impossible woman? “You're right,” he murmured, knowing he’d said it before. “You're always, always right.”

“I am so sorry, Doctor,” she said softly.

“This is right,” he said, hoping to reassure her even though this felt anything but right. “I accept it.”

Tears fell down her face unchecked. He thought about asking her to smile for him one last time, but—

How could I smile?

It's okay. Don't you worry. I'll remember it.

“Goodbye, my Clara,” he said instead, as he climbed to his feet. “Live well.”

He gathered up his sonicglasses and his guitar case and left without looking back, the sound of her quiet sobs following him all the way out into the starlight. He didn’t stop when he hit the fresh air, just kept putting one foot in front of the other, up the steep hill they’d descended together. Already Clara’s face was fading from his mind’s eye, but he clung to the memory of her bravery, her sacrifice to save him. To save the universe.

I will die, and no one else, here or anywhere, will suffer.

What about me?

If there was something I could do about that, I would. I guess we're both just going to have to be brave.

His TARDIS came into view all too soon, before the neural block had had a chance to steal away the details of their conversation. There was a woman leaned against the corner of it, one ankle crossed over the other in an exaggerated show of nonchalance. The Doctor recognised her, and quickly enough to feel bitter about it: Ash, Clara’s travelling companion.

“What the hell do you want?” he demanded as he approached.

“I suppose you don’t remember me, either?” she asked.

He paused, considering how much to tell her, then said, “Clara called you Ash.”

“So that’s a no, then.”

“Should I remember you?”

“You saved my life,” she said. “A very long time ago now. I was called Ashildr in those days. I stopped using that name eons ago, but Clara insisted. She told me once that it was your fear of losing her that made you save me, despite worrying about the ripples it would cause.”

There's nothing I can't do. Nothing. But I'm not supposed to. Ripples, tidal waves, rules.

“More of a tidal wave than a ripple, I think,” he said.

“And yet the universe is still standing. Your splashing about hasn’t brought the whole system down, and I’ve been in a hell of a lot of places I shouldn’t have been over the years.” Ash shrugged. “The universe adjusts. It gets over it. One extra immortal here or there isn’t enough to tear reality apart.”

“What’s your point?” he demanded irritably.

“My point is, Doctor, that the Hybrid prophecy is shit. ‘Break a billion billion hearts to heal its own.’” She snorted. “That could be the title of this little rock tour of yours. Maybe that’s all the prophecy meant in the first place: ‘Heaven help the idiot who separates Clara and the Doctor, for she shall have to endure vicarious heartbreak for centuries on end.’ I should have known it was really about me all along.” She sighed and leveled a serious look at him. “My point is that you already know the answer, but you’ve let Clara convince you that you’re wrong. She has wiggle room. Infinite wiggle room, and you’re treating that like it means nothing.”

“You think I should break the neural block,” he surmised. “And what, exactly, makes you qualified to make that sort of assessment?”

“Of the two of us, you’re the ‘Time Lord,’” she said, and he could nearly hear the quotes around the name, “but I am older than you,” she went on, smiling snidely. “I’ve travelled a lot, seen more than a few things. Wonderful things, monstrous things. Do you know what I haven’t seen? Any evidence that Clara’s continued existence is unravelling the Web of Time. Or any sign that the Time Lords are tracking her, or mean to force her to go back to Gallifrey and be re-inserted into her timeline so that she can die a death that, no matter how you look at it, has already happened. The universe isn’t collapsing in on itself, there’ve been no paradoxes that the Temporal Powers have had to rush to fix.

“There’s just you. And her. Being idiots,” she continued, enunciating the words sharply. “Everywhere she goes, her guilt and her grief and her need to ‘honour your memory’ drive her to interfere in the affairs of mortals. Save a life here, a civilisation there. Ripples, tidal waves, a whole goddamned ocean. And your path through spacetime can literally be purchased printed onto the back of a concert tshirt. If the Time Lords were worried, if they wanted to stop you, they would have done by now. If the universe was going unravel or implode or whatever the hell, it would have done by now.

“So stop being an idiot, Doctor. Go back to Clara. Spend the rest of your immortal lives together. Just stop making me wallow in your combined angst, because frankly? I’m over it. And so is the universe.” With that, she pushed off the corner of the TARDIS and sauntered away, back towards the stage and the distant music.

The Doctor stood for a long moment, watching her go. He should leave, like Clara said. Get in his TARDIS and fly away and let the neural block take every last moment of this day. Maybe Ashildr was right, maybe she wasn’t, but he knew if he gave himself the chance to really consider it, he’d never be able to stop himself from returning to Clara, against her wishes and better judgement.

He sighed and turned away, resting his forehead against the TARDIS. Let me be brave, let me be brave. Unprompted, the door opened, swinging inwards and inviting him home. He forced his feet to move, each step carrying him further from the woman he loved but could not remember, further from the future he wanted but could not claim. The TARDIS interior was as it had been, but felt large and cavernous now, with the almost-memory of Clara’s voice still clinging to the insides of his ears.

He walked in and closed the door. Set down the guitar case. Braced his arms against the console. All he had to do was go. All he had to do was send the TARDIS into the vortex and give the neural block enough time to finish erasing the events of the day from his memory. All he had to do was leave Clara behind.

‘You are being an idiot,’ the TARDIS whirled at him telepathically.

“When am I not?” he asked out loud, with no one else to hear him but his dear old girl. I am an idiot with a box and a screwdriver. Just passing through, helping out, learning.

‘Don’t be an idiot,’ the TARDIS replied sternly. ‘Be a Thief.’

“As easy as that?” he said, huffing out a bitter laugh.

‘The door is open for you,’ the rotors wheezed, ‘as mine was. Go. Steal an immortal and run away.’

“I can’t,” he said, squeezing his eyes shut and trying to hold to his resolve. “Clara’s right, there’s too much at risk.” You're willing to risk all of time and space because you miss her. One wonders what the pair of you will get up to next.

The TARDIS huffed, irritated with him. ‘Have I not always shown you the path you need to take?’ the sentient ship demanded. ‘Perhaps not the safest path, but the right path?’

The Doctor sighed shakily. “Yes.”

‘Then don’t argue. Go to her.’

Behind him, the doors swung open of their own accord, and above him the lights dimmed, the rotor stilling into silence. He knew a dismissal when he saw one. There was no hope of heading off into the vortex now, not when the TARDIS had so clearly expressed her opinion on the matter. He supposed he could stay right where he was, wait for the neural block to kick in and steal even his desire to go back to the woman in the diner. But even the thought had the silent presence of the TARDIS balking inside his head, urging him more forcefully out the door.

And really, how many more times did he need to be told? Ashildr was right, the universe wasn’t unravelling, the Time Lords weren’t hunting for them. The TARDIS ought to have been the last word on the subject, with her pan-dimensional view of time and space, and her utter loyalty to him. But still he hesitated.

It was what he wanted, unquestionably, the knowledge that he could fill the Clara shaped hole in his life pulling at him like a magnet. But it was selfish, and reckless, and everything Clara had argued against. I'm scared and I'm alone. Alone, and very, very scared.

I guess we're both just going to have to be brave.

That was her voice in his head, his Clara, though the memory of why she’d said those words still eluded him. He could have that back, the memory of that day and every other, he could have her back, he could stop breaking himself against the wall of the neural block and just live.

Tell her that you're in love with her and that you always have been. Tell her there is no point wasting time, because things happen and then it's too late. Tell her I wish someone had given me that advice.

The Doctor was out the door before he could change his mind again, tripping on his own feet, retracing his path over the hill with his mind a single blur of Clara Clara Clara, set to the melody he hadn’t stopped hearing since the day he lost her.

Her TARDIS was still there, and he knew the woman he would find inside would be Clara, but he had forgotten her face, her eyes, her voice. Already their conversation was beginning to fade, but he held to it fiercely, refusing to give in to the neural block. Never again, he would never forget her again.

The diner’s door was locked, of course, but he rested his palm against it and reached out to the consciousness of the foreign TARDIS, asking for entry by projecting his emotion and intention. I used to know a trick, back when I was young and telepathic...

Beneath his hand, the lock clicked open and the door swung inwards, communicating back a feeling something like relief and approval. He stepped inside, immediately spotting the brunette woman sitting alone at the bar, hunched over her coffee cup and crying openly. She heard the door, and sniffed loudly, hiding her tear-stained face with a hand to her forehead.

“I’m really not in the mood, Ash,” she said, not looking at him.

“She’s not here,” the Doctor replied, watching as Clara jerked her head up, her gaze instantly finding his. And how could he have forgotten her, the colour of her eyes, the wave in her hair, the slope of her nose? How had the neural block ever managed to steal something so vital and precious from him?

“Don’t run,” he said, as she watched him with eyes like galaxies colliding. “Stay with me.”

“Doctor,” Clara said in warning.

“No, please, just, just listen. I think we need to reconsider this.” He approached her carefully and slid onto the barstool next to hers, almost afraid she would bolt before he could make his case. “I got a bit of a talking to,” he said, offering her a lopsided smile. “First from your travelling companion, then mine.”

“I thought you said you weren’t— oh, the TARDIS, of course. What did she have to say? No, wait, back up, what did Ash say to you?”

“That both she and the universe are over living with our combined heartbreak. And she made some excellent arguments about how the universe isn’t unravelling, that I couldn’t help but agree with—”

“Because they were your arguments in the first place,” Clara huffed, unable to keep the fondness out of her brown eyes.

“And several good points about how the Time Lords could have intervened ages ago, if they’d a mind to do. She said we have wiggle room, but that we’re being idiots, and she’s sick of having to put up with it.”

“You believe her?” Clara asked, watching him closely. “Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy Ash’s company, but she does have a history of being a bit self-serving at times.”

“I think she’s right about the Time Lords, and the Web of Time, yes.” He searched her face for a moment then added, “And the idiot thing. I think we are definitely being idiots.”

“What if she’s wrong? We can’t eliminate the threat we pose to the universe just by wishing it away, Doctor.”

“If there is a threat to the universe, it’s the same whether we’re together or not. So I vote ‘together.’ How about you?”

She looked up at him with those huge eyes of hers. “As easy as that?” she asked, the same he had asked of the TARDIS.

He smiled softly at her. “The TARDIS also told me I was being an idiot, insisted I come find you. She reminded me that she’s always shown me the path I needed, and I shouldn’t start doubting her now.”

Clara flicked her gaze to his face and away again, chewing on her bottom lip, and something cold settled into the pit of his stomach.

“If this isn’t what you want,” he said carefully. “If I’m not what you want, we can split the difference. I’ll reclaim my memories and we can go our separate ways. I won’t bother you, you don’t owe me anything.”

“Of course it’s what I want, you daft old man,” she said immediately, and his hearts flipped over. “I’ve just convinced myself for so long that there was no possibility of this, no hope for us, that it’s difficult to accept that we could have this, that the universe could let us have this.” She looked back up at him again, brown eyes pleading. “You really can break the neural block?”

“Easily,” he said, and held out his hand for hers in silent question. Please, don’t even argue.

Clara placed her small hand in his, her eyes never leaving his face, and he gently pulled her to her feet, stood in front of her, his hearts pounding against his ribs.

“There are lots of ways to break the neural block,” he said. “Sidesteps of logic, brute force, electric shock, regeneration, probably. They’ve all got their downsides. But the cleanest way? Fill in the gap with no jagged edges, no fuzzy spots? Telepathic transference from someone who hasn’t forgotten.”

She took a deep breath. “Well, you’re the touch-telepath,” she said, gazing up at him. “And I don’t think I could ever forget you.”

He smiled down at her, his Clara, saving him once again. Would it even be possible for him to love her more than he did in this moment, even once he remembered everything he’d forgotten? He needn’t wait any longer to find out, he realised. Cradling her face in his hands and opening up the telepathic barriers on his consciousness, he leaned down and kissed her.

The Clara song in his mind swelled, shifted, took on a new harmony that somehow seemed as though it had been there all along. He could feel it racing through his brain, feel the neural block start to give way, as Clara wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back like their world was ending, like the universe was beginning all over again.

Not everything ends. Not love. Not always.

If you love me, in any way, you’ll come back.

Everything you’re going to say, I already know.

I had a duty of care.

People like me and you, we should say things to one another.

“Clara,” he breathed when they finally broke apart, pressing his forehead to hers. “It’s all back. My memories, they’re all back where they ought to be.”

He paused as it suddenly hit him what memory he didn’t have. He had no other memory of her lips on his. Hugs, yes, the rare kiss to the cheek, but never like this. “Uh,” he said eloquently, floundering and starting to pull away. “I didn’t mean for that to be a first. Sorry.”

She tightened her arms around him and laughed through her tears, and didn’t sound sad at all. “We’ve had a lot of bad timing, the two of us. The first kiss was always going to be under strange circumstances. Just don’t let it be the last.”

The Doctor wasn’t sure if he leaned down or if Clara reached up, but her lips were pressed to his again, soft and warm and real. He gave himself over to it, to this new reality of the two of them, together. She beamed up at him when they broke apart, and he realised he’d been wrong: it was possible for him to love her even more, now that he remembered.

“The TARDIS is just outside,” he said, knowing she knew but unable to keep from echoing the newly-fresh memory of their last Christmas together. Please, don’t even argue.

She huffed out a little laugh, and he knew without needing to reach for the telepathy that she was reliving the same shared memory. “This time I think I’ll take a moment to pack,” she told him, smiling broadly, the tracks of dried tears crinkling around her dimple. “I don’t think I’ll be coming back, this time.”

“Running away with a spaceman in a box. Anything could happen to you.”

“That’s what I’m counting on,” she said, then pushed up on her toes and kissed him, as the music in his head faded away to one last, resonating note.

(Also available on AO3, under the same username and title.)

[unrenderedfuture]

I have a prompt! Basically, 4 gets sick, but is being SUPER stubborn. Sarah Jane basically ends up having to drag him into the medbay. Cue the two of them being awkward in love, and Harry just being... awkward. Thanks, and keep up the amazingness!

@dearsarahjane @lady-sci-fi

Okay so I went overboard and also didn't know how to end it so I apologize for the ending but I wrote a little fic.

Sarah Jane was not an idiot.

She had been traveling with The Doctor and Harry nearly a month and knew,m the curly haired Timelord was lying to her face. Not to mention doing a terrible job at it.

He was nearly shaking and was shivering in his four layers (that being undershirt, shirt, vest, scarf) of clothing. He was paler than usual and his eyes seemed dull and expressionless in his face.

“Now, really I am fine…” he said holding back a cough.

“Doctor your voice is hoarse and your shivering.” Sarah Jane said softly to him as she held a hand to his forehead. He seemed to blush almost and gently brought her hand away.

“Im fine just a little…er humans call it? A cold?” He asked reaching for the English dictionary on the library bookshelf.

“No…no books, look at me hmm? Harry can you look him over?” Sarah asked turning towards her companion who was reading on galactic medicine.

“Oh? A cold you say?” He asked standing to find a book on Gallifreyan medicine. The Doctor sneered at him, not wanting to discuss even his favorite anatomy with The Imbecile at that time.

“No need Harry, I only want to sit with a book and read to take my mind away from my simple normal cold.” He said before sneezing, something Sarah wasn’t sure she had ever seen him do before.

“Doctor..” Sarah asked.

“Now don’t whine at me. I hardly need you humans fussing over me!” He growled before coughing painfully again. Sarah Jane was silent and Harry braced himself knowing he had gone too far.

Sarah Jane pouted and stamped her foot in anger and fear for him.  Harry seemed terrified of her fiery spirit as it took hold.

“DAMMIT DOCTOR DO I LOOK STUPID TO YOU??” Sarah Jane shouted at him. Even the TARDIS was silent as the grown human man and Timelord looked up at her. He looked down in shame knowing he was mean in his comments.

“COME ON. WE’RE GOING…NOW!” Sarah said to him helping the Timelord up. He obliged and slowly followed her.

“YOU TOO HARRY!” She barked at the medical doctor who immediately stood and followed her obediently.

Her two boys wandered with her into the infirmary where the TARDIS was already up and buzzing with medical instruments and items to help diagnose her pilot.

“Sit...” Sarah said to The Doctor, who in much better lighting seemed worse. His poor nose and cheeks were a reddish pink and he groaned under the heavy TARDIS lights.

“Harry is there anything to help us here?” Sarah asked. Harry looked around the room and into his book. The Doctor sighed and rolled his eyes.

“The scanner on top of the left cabinet with the glory red bit on it Harry, turn it on and point towards me.” The Doctor said trying not to scowl under the infirmary lights as he used his scarf to shield his eyes.

“Oh thank you.” Harry said with a sheepish smile.

He did as he was told and the machine beeped and vibrated in his hand.

“What does it say?” Sarah Jane asked worried about him even though she was trying to hide it.

“It seems to say Martian flu?” Harry asked. The Doctor groaned.

“I thought I had my flu shot already…How did I get it again this year?” He whined sounding very much like a teenage boy who didn’t get enough sleep.

“What is the cure?” Sarah Jane asked still worried.

“Hmm, well scrolling down it says lots of fluids, rest, and chicken noodle soup.” Harry said with a smile.

“Hmm, I think the TARDIS has a kitchen around here somewhere. Doctor where’s your bedroom so we can get you some rest?” Sarah said immediately determined to let her Doctor feel better. She headed down the hall and opened a door that was mysteriously unlocked.

“NO! Sarah we are not going in their!” The Doctor shouted as Sarah stepped inside his room.

“Oh my.” Sarah said softly when she opened the bedroom. It was not at all what she expected. She had expected it to be full of tinkering tools and toys he liked to scatter everywhere but instead found it...nice?

It was clearly an alien design with a circular blue bed and dark walls, but it was calming and peaceful like the expansion of space. It was tidy and besides some socks and a pair of boxers next to his hamper it was spotless. Sarah turned and found a wall with what seemed to be dozens of faces. The TARDIS hummed happily lighting up artificial stars on the wall.

Her picture was there along with Harry’s and the brigadiers and she understood. These were the people he had traveled with.

“Doctor...this is...beautiful...”Sarah said softly as the grouchy and tired Timelord went into his closet to change.

“It’s not supposed to be an open door exhibit but a certain ship doesn’t want me to be alone apparently even though I’m Fine.” He growled.

“I’ll get some tea and soup going yeah?” Harry asked wanting to leave and go as far away as possible from the grumpy Timelord.

“Okay Harry...” Sarah Jane said softly looking at the faces. The largest frame was of a young girl with short nearly black hair and an adorable smile. There was circular gallifreyan that appeared next to it that Sarah didn’t understand. The closet door opened and The Doctor was in gold and TARDIS blue pjs with his scarf safely looped around him. He climbed into bed snapping Sarah out of her awestruck view of the photo gallery and focused back on her sick companion.

She tucked him in and pulled a fleece blanket over his to keep him warm and cozy.

“There you are, nice and cozy.” Sarah said happily.

“Yes. I feel like a...er dumpling all wrapped up.” He said growing sleepier and sleepier. Sarah smiles feeling better that he was safe and felt comfortable around her and Harry to sleep. She ran fingers through his soft curls making him relax and further fall into his dreams. After about five minutes she realized she had lulled him to sleep. Harry brought in some soup and smiled seeing their alien friend had fallen asleep.

It was weird to see him so still and quiet. They sat with their bowls and silently watched over him as he began to heal with their help.

[timeagainreviews]

5 Moments when Doctor Who SUCKED

Imagine, if you will for a moment, that you are a brand new Doctor Who fan. You don’t even know to call yourself a Whovian yet. You get on a few facebook groups, see a few YouTube videos and discover, much to your dismay, that Doctor Who is, in fact, ruined now. Woe is you who set path down a trail leading toward mediocrity, and eventually utter devastation. I ask you to picture yourself in this manner because I want you to realise that only a person new to Doctor Who would believe such drivel. Everyone else saying this seems to have rose tinted glasses. The rest of us all know that Doctor Who is a show that sometimes requires forgiveness.

Am I saying Doctor Who is a bad show? Not hardly. Much like pizza, Doctor Who is still pretty good, even when it sucks. I would venture to say that one of the things I love most about Doctor Who is how campy and silly it can be at times. Why is it then that so many people are turning their backs on a show that’s filled their lives with so much joy? I’m really trying to avoid the "because sexism," argument. But I can’t help but feel like if you were to switch the Doctor to a male, nobody would be calling the show "ruined." Furthermore, how do you even ruin something that has gone through so many changes throughout the years? Oh right, it’s the Doctor Who fandom. Where the only language allowed is hyperbolic.

Perhaps these fake geeks are mad because making the Doctor a woman takes away their ability to call her a Mary Sue. Especially when you consider the same character once burst out of a golden birdcage and floated to the ground in a wave of Jesus energy. That might mean they’d have to retroactively apply the title to every incarnation. Could the Doctor ever escape the distinction? Unnaturally talented, charismatic, good at everything he does, brilliantly smart. Or is it that these attributes only belong to men? We can believe Tom Baker’s Doctor is capable of walking into a burning furnace to save K9, but hell no, a woman can’t be the Doctor.

You have to face it, Doctor Who has had some terrible moments. Yet we continue to tune in because we forgive it. We forgive when Doctor Who is bad because of the moments when Doctor Who is wonderful. Which I know is how you would describe an abusive partner, but I’m gonna let it slide for a television series. Especially this series. Because unlike that dickhead who never texts you back, Doctor Who can change. If you don’t believe me, please peruse this list of five instances when Doctor Who was terrible.

1. The John Nathan-Turner era

My God, how could I not start with this? While there is no denying there are some wonderful moments in JNT's Doctor Who, it's easily my least favourite era of Doctor Who. And as much as I personally love Colin Baker, his Doctor got the lion's share of poor scripts and erroneous costume choices. Never has a man more game for a role, been dealt such a bad hand.

Introducing a Doctor that was cowardly, and even violent toward his companion, was seen as a bridge too far. While I understand the desire to try something new with the character, this wasn't the way to go about it. While the show begins to pick up around the end of McCoy's tenure, it's evident that this is more the influence of studio notes and the hard work of script editor Andrew Cartmel. I can't think of anyone less suited for the job of showrunner.

It seems that for a good nine years, Doctor Who had a madman at the helm, and not in that cute Matt Smith way. Dressing in flamboyant Hawaiian shirts, Nathan-Turner brought that same brash sensibility to the program. From Six's garish costume, to question mark lapels, to Mel's entire timeline, it's a big fat mess with him sitting in the middle. Add to all of this, the allegations of him being a predatory creep toward young male fans, and it's a surprise the show ever survived. Oh wait, it didn't.

2. Racism

Ok, maybe I should have started with this. While Doctor Who has taken efforts to address its racist past, it still happened. They drop a racist slur in "The Celestial Toymaker." Even the term "celestial," is used to mean "Chinese," in describing the titular character played by the very white Michael Gough, fully clad in Oriental silks. This tradition follows into "The Talons of Weng-Chiang," when Li H'sen Chang was played by John Bennett.

It's an uncomfortable miracle that they didn't allow Patrick Troughton to play the role of the Second Doctor in brownface. Not to say his era escaped the odd bit of racism. While Toberman in "Tomb of the Cybermen," gets a few heroic moments, he also gets none of the lines. Cast as mute manservant, we learn nothing about the inner workings of a black man who died so that white people may live.

Later, the show used characters like Ace to talk about racism. She shows disgust with a "No Coloureds," sign hanging in the boarding house she's staying in. When the evil Morgaine had her under mind control, it was calling her friend Ling Tai "yellow," and "slant-eyed," that she was able to snap out of it. Real Ace would never say such things. But even with that groundwork laid, the new series still struggles. From the Doctor being weirdly dismissive toward black people, to it taking nearly 50 years for the first black TV companion, Doctor Who is still grappling with its race issues. Yet you all kept watching.

3. Ace gets molested

This one is a bit of a lesser known infraction as it takes place in the books after the show had already been cancelled. Kicking off the Virgin Media "New Adventures," is 1991's "Timewyrm: Genesys," by John Peel. In it, the Doctor and Ace travel to ancient Mesopotamia, where they meet King Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh wastes no time going full blown creep, groping Ace and pawing at her like he was Joe Biden.

The Doctor's reaction to this is to tell Ace to just go with it, and that it's part of the culture. While I agree that, yes, Gilgamesh may not be the sophisticated modern man that hugs a bro and supports equal pay, the Doctor's reaction is some straight up bullshit. If you're going to go there, maybe try saying something with it other than "Women are men's property." This could have been a great opportunity for the Doctor to puff up and use Gilgamesh's own primitive mindset against him. "How dare you touch my woman!" the very tiny Doctor could say to the very tall man. It would have been a funny visual, mixed with the Doctor utilising male privilege in a way that helps his companion.

This is really an objection I have against most of John Peel's work. He writes women in that "she boobed boobily," manner. Much to my dismay, Peel is one of the sole writers of the Dalek books, so any time you want to enjoy a tale involving our enemies from Skaro, you have to also partake in his brand of women. I'm talking women being described as buxom babes with shoulder length blonde hair, voices like baby goddesses, and legs up to their neck. While on the other hand, we get men described as having a hat and probably some other features. I may be embellishing, but seriously, John Peel, your women suck. Yet it still spawned a rather large book series.

4. Minuet in Hell

Doctor Who has never been known to nail accents. Tegan is vaguely Australian. And Peri must have moved around a lot due to the fact that nothing about her American accent sounds like a regional dialect. That doesn't mean that Robert Jezek's Foghorn Leghorn meets the KFC Colonel performance as " Brigham Elisha Dashwood III," is any less painful. But bad accents aside, the biggest demon in this Big Finish audio is one of Doctor Who's oldest enemies- sexism!

While I understand that Charlotte Pollard may be a fan favourite among many Big Finish listeners, her character will forever be tainted for me, and it's all due to this story. In it, Charlotte, or Charley, gets literally human trafficked. They kidnap her, force her to wear lingerie in a very creepy and misguided attempt to add some sexiness to the story and force her to wait on rich businessmen at a casino.

Now, allow me to clarify, it's not the human trafficking that taints her in my eyes. People who get trafficked are victims, obviously. What bothers me is that neither Gary Russell or Alan W Lear thought to give her a single line of dialogue where she protests. She doesn't even complain a little. Sure, the Doctor often gains intel by getting captured, but this is ridiculous. Add this to the weird disjointed story, and "Minuet in Hell," easily serves as one of the lowest points in not just Big Finish history, but Doctor Who as a whole.

5. Sexism

(Image by Billy Darswed)

It makes the most sense that this is the last one on the list. Because let's be honest, it's a huge problem in the fandom. A lot of early Doctor Who audios and books smack of moments when it feels as though the writers never considered the existence of female fans. Women are often utilised as a means to make the Doctor look better, and for the baddies to look scarier. Mind you, it's not always been a pantheon of swooners and screamers. We got the occasional Sarah Jane, Leela, and Ace.

Even the strong women are long-suffering. Liz Shaw (and her real-life actress Caroline John) left the role of companion over sexism. Beginning her time on Doctor Who as UNIT's top scientific advisor, she was demoted to assistant, holding beakers for the male Doctor who stole her job. The Fourth Doctor acted similarly when telling Romana her qualifications had nothing on real life experience. The same excuse has been used for decades to keep educated women out of the workforce. "Come back when you've got some experience, sweetheart."

While Rose Tyler was a refreshingly real character with a family and life of her own, it doesn't mean that she wasn't horribly mismanaged. In "The Stolen Earth," we see a darker, more serious version of her character. The Rose we used to know is now fully devoted toward one mission and one mission only- getting her man back. It's as though her personality disappears and is fully dependent on having the Doctor in her life. She rises to greatness so that she might bask in his once more. Maybe it's romantic, but maybe it's bad writing.

If you were to ask me who my favourite Doctor Who writers are, I'd have to say Robert Holmes is up there, and he wrote "Talons of Weng-Chiang," a serial full of yellowface. I'd also say Russell T Davies, who wrote the aforementioned "Stolen Earth," and also saw it in his wisdom to turn Shirley Henderson's "Ursula," into a blowjob dispensing garden brick. Or even Steven Moffat who believes the Statue of Liberty could sneak around New York, undetected, and that nobody notices his predilection toward dominatrix women in stiletto heels.

In my review for "The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos," I quipped that Chris Chibnall had not yet written a truly great episode of Doctor Who. However, since "Resolution," I can no longer say such a thing. I may even go as far as to say it's one of the best Dalek episodes ever. It would seem then that, given enough time, he could become a great showrunner. And it seems that given enough time, any writer, yourself included, could one day write the latest "worst episode ever."

Every new era has had its stumbles. Not every Doctor gets it correct 100% of the time. Capaldi decided he was the kind of Doctor to exit through the window, a trait we never saw again. The Fifth Doctor decided to sleep his way through his first adventure. The Eighth Doctor was "human on his mother's side." And Ten took so long to regenerate that I'm beginning to think it was old age, and not radiation that did him in. If you can look at all of these stupid, stupid moments and still say you love Doctor Who, then maybe, just maybe, you can get over a bit of spotty writing, like you always have. Or is it still the female Doctor thing? Oh...

[ialwayscomewhenyoucall]

‘til Midnight

chapter 6/7

ao3 | ch 1 | ch 2 | ch 3 | ch 4 | ch 5

twelve x rose, Into the Dalek coda

*

“Only half an hour? How can there only be half an hour left?”

Thirty-four minutes, thirty-three seconds, thirty two, thirty one...

The Doctor looks pointedly at Rose, his eyes flicking to her well-kissed lips and unkempt hair. “We did spend rather a lot of time in the music room.”

Her cheeks flush; he can nearly see the memories play across her face. She touches her hair and makes a face. “I don’t suppose you’ve got anything handy to fix my hair.” She glances around the console room and shakes her head, absentmindedly using her fingers to attempt to tame the worst of the flyaway bits. “Just what I need, to jump back to Torchwood looking like I’ve been thoroughly snogged.”

“You have been thoroughly snogged,” says the Doctor, bounding up the steps to look at the books on one of his many bookshelves. “And you weren’t complaining before.”

“Of course I wasn’t! But no one else needs to know that!” Rose crosses her arms and shoots an exasperated look at the Doctor.

“Ah, here it is,” he says, grabbing a book and taking the steps two at a time to stand in front of her again. “This’ll help,” he says, thrusting the book into her hands.

“The Hobbit?” She looks at the book, then at him, then at the book again.

“Just open it,” he says, the corners of his mouth quirking up in an almost smile.

Rose opens the book, looks inside, and laughs. “I don’t know why I’m surprised. This is...it’s exactly like you.”

The book isn’t a real book, or if it once was it isn’t anymore; it’s hollow, and inside Rose finds a hairbrush, a few hair ties, a headband, a dozen or so bobby pins, and a barrette in the shape of a butterfly. They shouldn’t fit inside the book, of course, but like everything else the Doctor makes it’s bigger on the inside. Pulling out the brush to tidy up her hair she gasps.

“But this is--”

“Yours. Yes.” The Doctor’s voice is soft. “It’s all yours. I…” His eyes dart about, searching for words, or answers, or possibly a place to hide. “I kept everything of yours, Rose. It’s all here.” A smile flits across his face.

There are things he can’t explain, like how there are times he hurts so much he takes everything of hers and asks the TARDIS to hide it away, and it stays hidden for years. Or how he took a silk scarf she wore once when they were traveling and had it made into a bowtie. How all her books are on his shelves, but he rarely reads them because he’s too afraid to damage them; instead he found duplicate copies of each and reads those over and over, reveling in the notion that she once read those words too.

He can’t quite place the look she’s giving him--awe? love? exasperation?--but there are too many questions behind her eyes. To change the subject, or possibly as an excuse to touch her again, he takes the brush from her hand. She barely notices. “May I?” he asks, eyes flicking toward her hair. She only stares.

“I’m just going to brush your hair then.” And he does, all gentle, like he’s trying to keep a frightened bird from stumbling out of its nest. When all the tangles are gone and her hair is smooth again he stands in front of her, takes the trick book from her grip. Holding her hands in his and catching her eyes the same way he says, “Please don’t ask me, Rose. I’m not going to tell you about your future.” He almost slips, almost says our.

Another bit of him breaks.

For a moment she looks like she’s going to argue, but she surprises him yet again. She presses a soft kiss to his lips then says, “I know. An’...an’ I really don’t want to know. I think.” She laughs, a short, bright little laugh. “I don’t want to mess anything up. If I change anything, maybe you wouldn’t be here today...right?”

He hopes his voice is reassuring when he says, “Just live, Rose. It will all work out.” For you, he adds in his head.

Stop it. This is not helping. You have to say goodbye in twenty-seven minutes. Stop being morose.

“I have something for you.” Changing the subject has become his go-to today. He pushes a series of buttons on the console, flips a switch, and a cd, already in a case, pops out of a slot just in front of Rose. “Take it,” he says. “I had the TARDIS make it for you.”

She holds it in her hands, a smile crossing her face. When she doesn’t say anything, the Doctor says awkwardly, “I just thought...well, you seemed to like it, so I thought you might like to listen to it again…”

There are tears in her eyes when she looks up at him. “It’s perfect. Rose and The Doctor, There and Back Again. That’s so...that’s just us. I can’t believe I’ll be able to listen to it again. You were recording the whole time? Doctor, I don’t even know how to thank you for--”

“You’ve got cd players over in that universe, don’t you?” he interrupts, brushing aside her thanks. They both know he’d do anything for her. I’m burning up a sun just to say goodbye. “I could put it on your phone, or...” He shrugs.

“We’ve got cd players, Doctor. Although vinyl is making a comeback, whoever would have expected that? Speaking of my phone, though…” She digs through the inner pocket of her blue leather jacket and pulls out something that looks almost, but not quite, like an iphone. Where the apple would normally be there’s a silhouette of a leaf. In response to his quizzical look she says, “Yeah, no Apple in the other universe. We have Maple instead. Weird, isn’t it.”

“A bit.”

She grins. “It’s a pretty good phone, though. Takes great pictures. Which is exactly what I want right now.” She tucks herself under his arm and gazes up at him, holding the phone at arm’s length to take a selfie. “Don’t look at the phone, look at me. I love the way you look at me.”

He has no problem with that. He doesn’t want to stop looking at her.

Ever.

She snaps a few pictures, then flips through them to see how they look. “Oh, this is the one.” Leaning up against him, her back to his chest, she shows him the picture. They’re looking at each other like nothing else exists.

“Yes,” he says. His voice is hoarse, almost cracking. Before handing the phone back he makes a few swipes on the screen. When his own phone chirps from his pocket he winks.

“How did you do that?” Rose asks, genuinely surprised. “Our phones are from separate realities. They shouldn’t even connect!”

“Time Lord. Big brain. Very clever.”

She rolls her eyes. “Right. May I have my phone back please, Doctor Clever? I want to save that photo in my ‘special people’ folder. There’s an auto-backup to my computer. As soon as I get back to the other universe, anyway.”

A look of pain passes over her face, but she pulls it in so quickly he doesn’t mention it. Instead he hands her phone back and says, “May I see your pictures, then? Any others of me?”

She turns her face up to him and kisses him on the tip of his nose. “You think pretty highly of yourself.”

“Quite right, too.”

“Doctor!” She tries to glare, but she’s overcome by giggles. “New body, new voice, new accent. Very much the same Doctor.”

“That’s the way it works,” he says. She’s looking at her phone and doesn’t notice his sad smile.

“Alright,” she says, handing the phone back. “Go ahead. You may recognize a few faces.”

It starts with a family picture: Jackie, Pete, Rose, and a tiny baby with a head of spiky blond hair. “Oh, look at Tony!” he says. Rose gives him an odd look. Oh. Right. “I mean, Oh look, Jackie had her baby,” he deadpans. She rolls her eyes.

There are familiar faces: Mickey, Jack, Sarah Jane. That surprises him a bit--not that Rose counts her as a friend, but that she actually has a picture--until he notices the background and the angle. “I never knew you got the TARDIS to take pictures for you.” Rose shrugs. “She usually tells me she’s not a photographer, and makes me argue for awhile. She always did like you best.” She ducks her head and turns away but not before he sees her smile, obviously pleased with the compliment.

He sees some people he doesn’t know, but recognizes in context: they are clearly from Torchwood in the other universe. He sees other faces from this universe, some of Rose’s childhood friends, maybe an aunt. And then…

The Doctor and Rose Tyler. As it should be.

The memories replay in his mind all the time, and he has many of these pictures in his own collection. But knowing she has them too, that they gaze upon the same…

Keep it together, Doctor.

Nineteen minutes, fifty-eight seconds, fifty-seven seconds, fifty-six seconds…

The two of them in the TARDIS, just after they’d left Cardiff and Charles Dickens behind. He’d made some excuse about needing to document the first time she’d dipped into the TARDIS’s wardrobe...but really he’d just wanted a picture of her in that dress.

The two of them dancing after they saved all the children--and everyone else--in 1940s London. Jack took that one. Even way back then they’d smiled at each other like no one else existed.

Him with a new suit--and a new face--in Jackie’s flat on Christmas.

The two of them arm in arm after the queen’s coronation, Rose all dressed in pink.

There are a whole series of snaps he doesn’t even remember her taking, all of him. Mostly of him grinning madly. Or making ridiculous faces. Or wearing those ridiculously unnecessary glasses.

She sidles up to him. “Ah,” she says. “I guess you can see how much I like the sexy specs.”

He makes a derisive noise. “You mean the ‘I am pretentious and will wear these glasses even though I don’t need them so I look even more so’ specs?”

“Very, very sexy,” she says, eyes fixed on the picture.

“I think they might be around here somewhere,” he says, taking a step toward the nearest corridor. The one step is all he’s allowed to take. Rose pulls him back and throws her arms around his neck, and in a breath both of them are lost in a long, drawn out kiss.

She looks up at him through her eyelashes. “You don’t need glasses to be sexy, Doctor,” she says, a bit breathless.

“Rose.”

It is an exhalation, a sob, a prayer. She is here, but he still wants what he cannot have.

A tear trickles down her cheek.

He pulls her close again, kissing the crown of her head. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to make you cry.”

She allows herself a minute to sob into his chest. Just a minute, no more, then she wipes away her tears and pulls herself together. “Sorry,” she says, her voice quavering just the slightest bit. “I was just thinkin’ about--”

“I know,” he says, the words catching in his throat. “Me too.”

They look at each other, unblinking, unable to look at anything else. Finally the Doctor says, “Can I look at the rest of the pictures, then?”

There are a few more of him, mostly the long and stripey him, and then one that stops him short.

Rose and a blond woman.

Rose and a woman with chin-length blond hair facing each other, hands clasped between them, completely in their own little world.

“Oh. Um, that’s just,” Rose says, trying to get the phone back from him, sounding very nervous. “That’s just, uh--”

“That’s me,” says the Doctor, with complete confidence. “Or, it will be. Someday.”

Rose gapes at him. “How could you possibly know that?” she says, disbelief thick in her voice.

“See the way she’s looking at you? That’s how I look at you. It’s in every single one of these pictures. And look how you’re looking at her. If that’s not me, I’m very, very jealous right now. But I’m not, because I know I’m right.”

Rose smiles at him, but it’s the saddest smile he’s ever seen on her face. “And now you know, Doctor.”

His eyebrows draw down. “Know what?”

“In a few minutes we have to say goodbye, but you know now you’ll get to see me again someday. One more time.”

**

@doctorroseprompts

[frolwriting]

Pyramids of Mars Part 1

Hey guys!  I am back with another chapter of Through Time and Space!  I just came back from Walker Stalker Con Nashville, and it was the most amazing experience.  I will be posting a video about it later talking about how it was working a con rather than just attending a con.  Anyways, I hope you enjoy the chapter!

Fandom: Doctor Who

Series: Through Time and Space

Episode: Pyramids of Mars

Pairing: Fourth Doctor x Kate

Warnings: Blood and Injury

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When I woke up, the first thing I saw was a scarf. There was a scarf in my face. That could only mean one regeneration. "Kate, are you okay?" That confirmed it. I was with the Fourth Doctor! I moved the scarf out of my face to find the Doctor kneeling down beside me.

"Yes, Doctor, I'm fine." I said sitting up. There was footsteps entering the console room. I looked over and saw Sarah Jane! I got up and ran to her. This is a huge honor right now.

"Woah! Hello, Kate!" She said hugging me back.

"Sorry, this is just the first time I have met you, but I've heard so much about you." She chuckled.

"Hopefully all good things." She said looking over to the Doctor.

"Oh, great things I can assure you." I said. That was when I noticed she was wearing an old-timey dress. I was still wearing the clothes I got from the bar a few adventures ago.

"I am very much underdressed."

"Come on, we'll go change that." We headed back into the Tardis dressing room. We went over to an area labeled Edwardian. I guess that's a time period. We looked through the massive amount of dresses till we found a gorgeous green colored dress. It was simple enough to not get in the way, but this dress was so pretty! Sarah helped me into it. We headed back to the console room to find the Doctor messing around on the console.

"We're ready." He turned to me.

"You look beautiful." He said as he came over and kissed me on the cheek. It made me blush. I'm still not used to this future wife thing, but I'm sure it won't take me much longer to get used to it. "Sarah, that dress you're wearing was worn by Victoria, she travelled with me for a time." She looked down at her dress.

"Well, as long as Albert didn't wear it." He didn't say anything but went back to messing with something on the console. "Oh, come on, Doctor. That's worth a smile, surely. What's the matter? You should be glad to be going home."

"The Earth isn't my home, Sarah. I'm a Time Lord."

"I know you're a Time Lord."

"You don't understand the implications. I'm not a human being. I walk in eternity."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means I've lived for something like seven hundred and fifty years. Kate has been with me 95% of that time." I smiled.

"Oh, you'll soon be middle aged."

"Yes! About time I found something better to do than run around after the Brigadier."

"Oh, come on. If you're tired of being UNIT's scientific advisor, you can always resign." That was when the Tardis went dark and started to tilt. The console explodes and the lights come back on. I looked up to see a weird skull thing in the air, but as quick as it popped up it disappeared.

"What was it?" I asked.

"The relative continuum stabilizer failed." The Doctor said messing with the console.

"No, not that. I think she means the thing that was hanging in the air." Sarah said.

"What thing?" The Doctor asked suddenly getting a bit nervous.

"There was a terrible face just for a second, then it was gone. You don't believe us, do you?" I asked.

"Nothing can enter the Tardis, Kate. You know that. Unless-"

"Unless what?" I asked.

"Mental projection of that force is beyond imagination, yet it might explain the stabilizer failure. Let's see. Was it at this end of the spectrum?" The Doctor asked showing us something on one of the monitors.

"No, Doctor, don't! Whatever it was, I know it was totally malevolent." Sarah said. That was when we landed.

"We've landed." The Doctor said.

"Where? Where have we landed?" Sarah asks. When we walk out of the Tardis doors, we find ourselves in a storage room filled with what looks like Egyptian things.

"We've materialized at the correct point in space, but obviously not in time. A temporal reverse? Some vast impulse of energy has drawn the Tardis off course." The Doctor says.

"You're saying this is in UNIT HQ, but years before I knew it?" Sarah asks.

"Yes."

"But it's so different. It can't be the same house." She says going over to a sarcophagus.

"It must be the old priory. The UNIT house was built on the site." The Doctor says looking at one of the boxes.

"The old priory was burnt down, wasn't it?"

"Something's very wrong."

"Doctor, I don't like it here." Sarah says scared.

"Something's going on contrary to the laws of the universe. I must find out what." I go to the door, but it's locked. "Why bother to lock an internal door?" The Doctor asks noticing I can't open the door.

"Maybe this wing of the house isn't in use. It smells musty enough." I say.

"That isn't all must, Kate. Some of it's mummy. French picklock. Never fails. Belonged to Marie Antoinette. Charming lady. lost her head, poor thing." There then came a noise that sounded like someone was unlocking the door from the other side. Me, the Doctor, and Sarah all hid. "Of course, it would make an ideal headquarters for some paramilitary organization. This room could easily be turned into a laboratory." The Doctor said not paying attention to the person who just came in. "Oh, hello." He said turning to the man.

"Who are you? How did you get in here?" The man asked.

"Through the window. I understood the property was for sale. No?"

"Ah, you're not fooling me, sir. You came with Doctor Warlock, didn't you?"

"Did we?" The Doctor asked.

"He asked you to scout round whilst he kept his nibs busy. Listen, if you're a friend of Doctor Warlock, sir, tell him to watch out."

"Watch out for what?" I asked.

"The Egyptian. There's no knowing what he might do. He's got the temper of the devil himself."

"Egyptian, eh? Is this where he keeps his relatives?"

"It's no joke, sir. He's only been here a few days. I wouldn't be staying, but, well, situations aren't easy to find at my age."

"What are you afraid of?" The Doctor asked.

"He locked this wing. He didn't know there was a second key. If he were to find me along here, let alone you two, he'd go stark raving mad, sir."

"I see. In that case, we'd better leave." The Doctor said as we started walking out of the room.

"Oh, not this way, sir. Better go the way you came. He might see you."

"As you wish." The Doctor said as we sorta started going back to the Tardis.

"And remember to tell Doctor Warlock what I said, sir."

"Don't worry. I'll remember." We went out of a window and walk around the place where we landed. We walked around for a while, and then headed back to the window. We heard the man we met before scream. The Doctor went through the window and took off his scarf. He threw his scarf around the attacker and pulled him to the ground.

"Come on, quick." I exclaimed. A man in a doctor's outfit came out of the window as the Doctor held the other man down. The Doctor let the guy go and climbed through the window. The Doctor and I helped who I assume is Doctor Warlock to the gardens of this place. The man was shot.

"It's no good. I can't go much further." Doctor Warlock said.

"You must. We're sitting ducks if we stay here." The Doctor said.

"Get to the lodge. Tell Laurence-"

"Laurence?" I asked.

"Marcus Scarman's brother. He lives there. Knows me." Warlock says as he collapses. Me and the Doctor gently put him down on the ground.

"He needs help, Sarah. You go on ahead, find the lodge." The Doctor says to Sarah.

"What about you two?" Sarah asks.

"We'll be fine."

"Okay." Sarah says as she runs up the steps of the garden and through the gate. The Doctor bends down and carries Warlock as we headed off. We walked without problem, but I thought I heard something behind us at one point. When I was about to tell the Doctor that, Sarah came back with another man who I assume is Laurence.

"Oh, my dear chap. Is he badly hurt?" Laurence asked running up to us.

"He'll be all right if we can staunch the bleeding." The Doctor says.

"We'd better get him back to the lodge."

"Doctor, listen. I saw a mummy. A walking mummy!" Sarah said.

"Mummies are embalmed, eviscerated corpses. They don't walk." The Doctor said.

"Doctor, I think I heard something behind us as we were walking." I said bringing up my fear.

"Never mind about that now." The Doctor said as he walked off with Laurence. I shook my head and followed behind them up to the Lodge. The Doctor puts Warlock on a couch. Sarah goes over and puts a blanket over him. Laurence had put his arm in a sling.

"Well, in view of what you've told me, I going to fetch the police." Laurence says as he starts heading out the door.

"No! This is much too grave a matter for the police, Mister Scarman." I say.

"Too grave?" He asked confused.

"Yes. They'd only hamper my investigation." The Doctor says.

"Your investigations?"

"Yes. Why do you think I'm here? Something's interfering with time, Mister Scarman, and time is my business."

"Who are you?"

"Well, I'm Sarah Jane Smith. I'm a journalist." Sarah states.

"Journalist? Who are your companions?"

"My companions? Oh, that's the Doctor and Kate. We travel in time, Mister Scarman. I'm really from 1980."

"That is utterly preposterous, Miss Smith."

"Yes, sorry."

"Interesting contraption." The Doctor says as he goes over to a device by a wall in the room.

"Kindly leave that alone, sir. That apparatus is delicately adjusted, and furthermore is a receiver containing highly dangerous electrical current." Laurence says as he goes over to the Doctor.

"Yes, so I see. What year is this?"

"What year?"

"It's a simple enough question, surely."

"Are you telling me you don't know what-"

"If I knew I wouldn't ask. Don't be obtuse, man."

"Nineteen hundred and eleven."

"Ah. Splendid. An excellent year. One of my favorites. Yes. I really must congratulate you, Mister Scarman."

"On what?"

"Inventing the radio telescope forty years early."

"That, sir, is a Marconiscope. Its purpose-"

"Is to receive radio emissions from the stars."

"How could you possibly know that?"

"Well, you see, Mister Scarman, I have the advantage of being slightly ahead of you. Sometimes behind you, but normally ahead of you."

"I see."

"I'm sure you don't, but it's very nice of you to try. Now, why don't you show me how this gadget works?"

"Do you mean you want me to-"

"Please. Just a little demonstration." Laurence flicks some switches and pulls down a lever. There was a cloud of smoke, but then the wheel starts to spin. "Amazing. That's really amazing." Laurence disconnects the device, but the wheel only goes faster and faster.

"I can't switch it off!" Laurence exclaims as he tries everything he can to get the wheel to stop. Then something explodes and the wheel stops.

"Oh, very impressive." Sarah says.

"It's never done that before." Laurence says a bit scared.

"Fascinating. A regular pattern repeated over and over again." The Doctor says as he looks at the machine intently.

"Like an SOS?" Sarah asks.

"I wonder. Where was your aerial tuned?"

"Mars. Why?"

"I just thought I'd verify the signal." The Doctor then pulls out a small radio and extends the antenna on it. He must have the bigger on the inside pockets like the Tenth Doctor.

"What's that you have, Doctor?" Laurence asks.

"Well, in principle it's exactly the same as the gadget you've invented, only less cumbersome. Yes, it is the same signal. Obviously automatic. Well, if it's a message, it shouldn't be difficult to decipher. They'd want to make it easy." The Doctor puts his radio down and stars writing something in a notebook.

"Who would?"

"Whoever transmitted it." I say.

"Now, let's see. This pattern recurs three times in one line. Let's call that E, the commonest letter in the language." There was a pause. "Beware Sutekh."

"Sutekh?" I ask.

"Better known to you as Set." My eyes widen.

"Of course, Egyptian mythology. Set or Sutekh was one of their gods. He was killed by Horus, god of light." Sarah says.

"Yes, but Egyptology and Mars?" Laurence asks.

"If I'm right, the world is facing the greatest peril in its history." The Doctor says as he starts walking out of the lodge.

"Hey, wait for us." Sarah says as we start walking after him.

"No. The forces that are being summoned into corporeal existence in that house are more powerful and more dangerous than anything even I have ever encountered. Stay here."

"What about me?" I ask. Sometimes the Doctor lets me go with him.

"You are to stay here." The Doctor says. I sighed. "I'll be fine. I don't want to put you in danger."

"I've an old hunting rifle that might come in useful." Laurence says.

"I never carry firearms." The Doctor says as he leaves.

"What I meant was that I should feel better if I could bring it." Me and Sarah are almost out the door by the time he says that. We aren't staying. When has companions ever stayed?

"Bring it." Sarah says as we leave. We walk back to the house avoiding the Doctor. We enter a hallway where the Doctor is looking through a crack in the door. He gestures us to go away, but we don't move. I hear a voice coming from the room that the Doctor is peering through, but I can't understand anything the voice is staying. When Scarman showed up, we walk over to the Doctor to watch. There was the man from earlier who the Doctor held down and another creature. The creature puts his hands on the first man's shoulders. That man started to scream as smoke started coming from his skin.

"Die. I bring Sutekh's gift of death to all humanity." Welp, there goes another human who thinks they'll get something for helping a creature who wants to take over the world. The creature then turns into a very pale man.

"Marcus!" Laurence yells. I guess that might be what Marcus looks like.

"Shush." The Doctor says.

"Take up the generator loops." That's when I notice there was also mummies in the room that start to move and pick up jars. "Place them in position at the compass points. Activate at ground strength." 'Marcus' says.