"Doctor Who: Powers of Ten" (Invite Only!)

[Varshanka]

Commander T'Ker - T.A.R.D.I.S. Bridge

He glanced her up and down, and seemed to process her diminished attire for the first time. "Okay. Right. Your dress code's a bit worse for, well, wear, ennit? Now. Leela, you'd've liked her, she didn't mind larking about in togs that weren't exactly coveralls, but just in case you'd rather don a more capacious garment, I've got a whole wardrobe you can pick from."

Pointing to the archway that led out into The TARDIS' deeper reaches, he pondered for a moment. "Now, take your first left, second right, third on the left, go straight ahead, under the stairs, past the bins, and fifth door on your left. Take your pick, but go easy on the scarves, I've a bit of a collection going. And, erm. Don't. Wander off. Rule number one. Go erm, frock yourself, and come straight back."

Whirling to face The Captain, The Doctor regarded Jack a little desperately, clawing his hand through his hair. "Jack. I don't suppose you've found anything remotely hopeful on your all-purpose gizmo?"

Jenny agreed with a faint smile. "Good news would be, well, good."

Looking up from the console Commander T’Ker glanced over at The Doctor, “Wouldn’t it be more logical to locate missing personnel before acquiring a new uniform?”

She did understand her uniform needed replacing, but it just didn’t seem – proper - to locate a new uniform, and one that fit, at this time. Looking back down at her console she added, “Energy signature increase. Probablity of a heavy weapons platform being erected.”

 

[Lunaramblings]

Jack was a new man. Well, not technically. Technically he was even older than The Doctor now. But, he was a new man in spirit. How many times? How many deaths? Never a thing. Not a glimpse. Not even the white light. But now. He had seen him. Had felt his embrace. He knew what he was here for. For this. For saving the world. And when that was done, when his time ended... Ianto would be there.

Jack toggled and pressed and mauled all sorts of buttons, switches, knobs and levers... not the first time he would be accused of those last too he would add... data flowed. He found the transmat device. He also registered the biological signals of the Judoon and the Sontarans. Both closing. But this... this was the TARDIS. It could be a swarm of Space Whales and the buggers would have a hard time leaving a dent. No, Jack ignored them. He thought for a moment of reconfiguring the Transmat. Teleporting in a whole slew of Weevils for the bastards to play with... but... no... The Doctor had a plan. He wouldn't let The Doctor down.

"Doctor, not much of use. A whole lot of friends that I think want more than tea, but not much else. So, when exactly did you upgrade to the Harem? Very Persian, or Utahan? I prefer Persian, nicer clothes." Jack was grinning like the devil himself. "You know Doc? It is great to be back. By the by, when did you get the pet? Thought you didn't care for cats? Thought you were more of a Robot Dog sorta bloke?"

 

[ChasNicollette]

Inside.

Looking up from the console Commander T’Ker glanced over at The Doctor, “Wouldn’t it be more logical to locate missing personnel before acquiring a new uniform?”

The Doctor smiled faintly. "Listening to reason, are we? At some point, we need to have a talk about that."

Propping his elbow up on The Console, he gazed across at The Commander with his chin in his palm. "Leela would have liked you, you would have liked her. This one time, one time, I asked her to dress up all Victorian so we could go see a show, she threw such a fit."

His eyes went half-lidded and he straightened away from The Console, eyes a bit unfocused. "We need to find Donna. That much is obvious. But. I don't know what to do next. It's like there's something in my head, still, something missing, preventing me from seeing the-- the whole of it. Could just be my head's too full of stuff. Need a bigger head. But it's like. It's like it's like. I got my memories restored but something's still missing. It's not materialising. It's like a wedding. (Why is it like a wedding?)"

He unfocused a bit more, stared to nowhere, hands in his pockets. "I'm rubbish at weddings."

Zip, snap, his mind returned to his head like it was on a rubber-band, his eyes refocused and he smiled at A'lex T'ker like it was a rubber-brand new day. "Still. I make it a policy to be always appropriately dressed for the saving of worlds, even if I need to raid an airing cupboard on the way to The Apocalypse. Thought you might like the same opportunity."

She did understand her uniform needed replacing, but it just didn’t seem – proper - to locate a new uniform, and one that fit, at this time. Looking back down at her console she added, “Energy signature increase. Probablity of a heavy weapons platform being erected.”

The Doctor's eyes narrowed a bit, and he strolled around The Console again to peer over her shoulder. "That's not Sontaran weaponry. No way that's--"

He actually made a face as though he were halfway impressed. "As heavy weapons platforms go, that's pret-ty heavy. Haven't seen anything that, erm... heavy... since The 401st Century... must have fallen through one of those pesky rifts or fissures or cascades... blimey."

The Doctor pursed his lips. "We should. Be fine. There's no way they can, erm. At least. Probably not. I should probably render The TARDIS asynchronous, perform a co-ordinate override--"

"Doctor, not much of use. A whole lot of friends that I think want more than tea, but not much else. So, when exactly did you upgrade to the Harem? Very Persian, or Utahan? I prefer Persian, nicer clothes."

The Doctor glanced up at Jack and stared at him blankly, blankly, for a long long moment. "Harem. Jack. What? I'll have you know The Commander and I have just met, and--"

And then he glanced at Jenny. And Jenny was staring right back at him, looking supremely uncomfortable.

"--no. Just. Just... no."

Jenny's jaw flexed and her eyes stared daggers that could sever atomic structures faster than Huon particles. "We're not--"

The Doctor stammered, gesturing between himself and her: "We're not."

Jenny held up her hands in definitive dismissal. "Not ever."

"We're strictly--"

"--I'm his--"

"--she's my--"

"That's a neg," Jenny confirmed.

"Yeah, neg," The Doctor nodded vividly. "Definitely neg."

Jack was grinning like the devil himself. "You know Doc? It is great to be back. By the by, when did you get the pet? Thought you didn't care for cats? Thought you were more of a Robot Dog sorta bloke?"

The Doctor glanced at the feline by Harkness' tattered boots. "It comes and goes, the liking of cats. Having been threatened by one wearing a nun's wimple, and then having spent a wee bit of time with a litter of wee Catkind-Human offspring... cats are capricious, I'm not allowed to change my mind?"

The Cat's tail lashed around Harkness' feet. "I resent that. We're not capricious, we just have a keen awareness of the fluidity of circumstances and are by very nature flexible enough to change with those circumstances. It's not cats are capricious. It's Time."

The Doctor arched an eyebrow. "If you say so. Anyhoodle, introductions, Captain Jack, this is...?"

He gestured to The Cat but fixed his gaze on Jenny, hoping she would provide a name.

Jenny smiled a lopsided smile. "Captain Jack."

The Doctor frowned. "Right, no, I said that part already, I said, 'Captain Jack, this is--'"

Jenny rolled her eyes and pointed at The Cat. "'Captain Jack.' The Cat's name is 'Captain Jack.'"

The Doctor blinked. Stared at The Cat. And then stared at Harkness.

"...oh."

The Cat seemed to smirk faintly, and gazed speculatively up at The Captain. "Me mum always told me I was named after me old man."

The Doctor paled a bit. "Oh. Really?"

 

[Varshanka]

A New Uniform

Watching, and listening, to the conversations occurring around her Commander T’Ker wasn’t sure if she wanted to know what was going on with felines and humans mating and producing offspring. Plus the heavy weapons platform, and the need to change clothes, and the potential of Jenny, whom she was sure was the Doctor’s offspring was maybe part of his.. female harem? A concubine perhaps?

Moving to the door that lead down the hall, Commander T’Ker quietly moved from the room. They needed private conversation time. At least it seemed that way. If she understood Human and Gallifreyian body language.

Moving through the halls she entered the biggest wardrobe in the history of everything, and began looking…

***

Pausing in her search for a new uniform she took a shower, an interesting location for one, inside the closet, but she wasn’t arguing. Plus she found a hand held map, thankfully – for it - she only had to hit it twice before it reset.

Walking back into the main control room, the C-in-C, the Bridge T’Pol stood in the doorway, the tight breeches clinging to her legs and ass, the short top making a tempting contrasting to her skin, the gentle swell of her skin hinting at pleasures unseen.

“Is this acceptable?” she asked. “There is another that fits, but I believe it would be more appropriate for desert conditions. Not the rather cool atmosphere you have here.”

 

[Lunaramblings]

Martha glared dismally at Hart, and then held out her hand to Nigel for a handshake. "Pleased to meet you, Nigel."

"Ah, Miss Jones. I have read your file. Originally hired to Unit, then attached to Torchwood. I must say, this is a bit of a rag-tag crew now isn't it?

"Yeah, wotcher," Mickey greeted the newcomer, with a chin-up nod, and then glanced back at Hart. "Miz Nibs is upstairs in the conference room, taking a phone call. Speaking uv wheels, tho-- how was she?"

"Mickey Smith. Yes, I have your file as well. Seems your credentials all come from the word of Jack Harkness and exploits that alledgedly occured in an alternate universe. Convenient that none of this can be verified isn't it?" Nigel didn't wait for a response he instead began to move further into the building.

Hart shrugged. "I've ridden in worse. But what was with that smell?"

Mickey stared at him, aghast. "You don't like the new car smell?"

"Right," Rhys nodded, hustled out of the conference room, grabbed a railing, called down to the floor of The Hub. "Oi! Mickey! We need a trace on this call, find out who's ringing us?"

Mickey glanced up from staring aghast at John Hart and stared bewilderedly up at Rhys, holding up another clump of cables as if by way of demonstration. "Trace it? Wiv what?"

Rhys looked a little distressed at that. "I dunno, I dunno, she said, 'quick as yeh can.'"

"Yeah, 'course," Mickey gestured, feeling put-upon but still diving half-under the desk. "Captain, give us a 'and!"

Hart seemed unimpressed, and deadpanned in reply: "I don't do Windows."

Mickey stuck his head up from under the desk and glared at Hart in a particularly impressive fashion, this expression had stared down hundreds of Cybus Cybermen, and that was just for starters.

Hart grunted in a way that suggested he couldn't be bothered to fight about it, and then dropped down to help, his hands finding cables, charting connections, plug plug plug plug. "Here I thought I was just the hired muscle and test pilot, now I'm in The IT Department."

"You could always take it up wiv The Complaint Department," Mickey harrumphed, toggling a row of switches, a couple of monitors started to flicker to life.

"We have one of those?" John mused, intrigued.

Mickey glanced up at the second-floor conference room, silently implying Gwen.

Hart followed his gaze, hesitated for a moment, and then worked faster.

"All go around here, ennit?" Martha smiled tightly at Nigel, as if worried that he'd think they were just putting on a show for the man pulling the funding strings. "Have you, erm, talked to The Brigadier lately? I haven't seen him since he left for Peru, ah, again."

"As usual he is off on some "important business" in Peru. Perhaps one day he will deem us worthy of knowing just what is so important to take him from his duties to Queen and Country." Nigel obviously showed distaste for The Brigadier. "So, tell me what is it that you people are attempting to do here? There are those that feel this... organization... is a needed check and balance. I see this as little more than penance for the sins of misguided politicians. With all the resources of Unit, what exactly does Torchwood have to offer? It seems that the previous leader, Harkness, used this as a personal resource for reconnecting with this Doctor character. I assure you the days of free reign are at a close." Nigel seemed irritated. His face slightly flush. He regarded Martha with a mixture of condescension and agitation. His eyebrows raised slightly.

 

[Abraxas Winterlight]

Avalon, 3547 AD Science Base Phoenix

BOOM!

BOOM!

BOOM!

The blows against the walls were getting louder. Occasionally dust would shake loose as something in the ceilings shifted.

"How long have they been tapping at our chamber door Mr. Bishop?" I asked my second, Lord Marshal Adam Bishop, commander of the Royal Guard, and the closest person I had in this hell of a world to a friend.

"Few days M'Lord." I glared at him and only got a grin back. Damn the man and our history. No matter how often I tell him to call my Giles, he keeps on with the titles.

"It's a stalemate. We could go out there with heavy weapons and take them out, but with that many deaders out there we would get swarmed. We could flank them and draw off the deaders, but the Colossus would squash any small arms team, and with a Necrolord out there, I don't want to think what else might happen." My grim faced friend stated.

"So naturally you and Steele plan to go out there anyway and take out that Necrolord too." I said then sighed. "I could abdicate. Suit up and go out there myself. At least I'd get squished with the rest of the crazies."

"Sorry Sire, but you tried that and it didn't stick. Your staying king even if I have to nail your ass to that chair. Your the last, Giles, and for the plan to work your sometimes furry ass has to be in one piece and able to get us some help!"


"Technically I am not the...."

BOOM!!!!​

The entire facility rocked slightly something crashed against walls that were designed to withstand much more than colossus.

"What," I said, my golden eyes meeting Sam's blue ones, "the Hell was that??" I said, getting up off the floor.

"Bringing up scanners Your Majesty." The young guardsman beside me stated. She had a datapad out and was madly punching in commands, then went bone white and dropped it.

Royal Guard don't panic. They don't startle, and they damn well don't almost faint!

She looked at me and the naked fear was in her eyes. "It's a dragon m"lord."

A dragon.

When the Necrolords invaded, first it was the black rain over New Wales. people sicked, died, and then began rising and eating their friends, neighbors and family, who also rose and began the cycle again.

Within a month, over seventy million people had been killed, and the first Necrolord came through to rule the charnal house that Avalon had become.

Necrolords can't turn animals, they just die, but two unique species were on Avalon when humans colonized it over three hundred years ago. A giant race of primates the founders called Colossi, and a race of gigantic reptiles that roamed the vast oceans of the world, which were named Dragons. Both were sentient, and in a way, could be turned.

Colossi were huge brutes, used to batter their way through any obstacle. Incredibly tough, immensely strong, but purely brute force combatants. Heavy weapons could pierce their craniums, freeing them from the unliving hell they existed in.

Dragons were a whole other problem. Over fifty yards long, heavily muscled and armored. Also, the Necrolords 'improved' them. Chemically enhanced breath weapon. About a kiloton in power.

The walls wouldn't hold.

"Alright then, Sandy, you take the left arm while I get his right, and lets get his Highness down to the pit."

Hallways and people whizzed by as we made our way to the heart of the installation. Technicians and what few civilians we had rescued from the surrounding area merged with me while combat troops in black armor, the crimson wolf on their right shoulder. They had adopted it after my sister had sacrificed herself taking down the dragon, and the Necrolord riding it that had leveled New London.

Her wolf form was a red wolf. Her sacrifice had saved thousands.

It didn't take long to reach our destination. non-combatants were streaming into the pods. Fifty kilcks away, lifts would pick them up, taking them to the South pole installation. Necrolords can't handle cold, and zombies freeze solid. Not even a dragon could reach the southern polar cap.

If everything worked they could hold out until I got back.

I made my way to the tubes and over to a knot of black uniforms, and two suits of powered armor.

"It's time mate." Adam said in his growl.

"I know my friend." I replied back in almost a whisper.

I walked over and looked down into the capsule they were guarding. Inside, a rosy cheeked child slept. Her small hands clenching the blanket.

"Merlin, set condition omega seven."

"Acknowledged Sire. Confirm identity code." said the voice from above.

"Giles Archer Plantagent. Authorization Omega seven nine one one Gamma five Delta." I replied clearly.

"Confirmed Sire. Awaiting instructions." the computer replied.

"I, Giles Archer Plantagent do declare Elizabeth Nicolette Plantagent as my lawful heir, and declare Adam Caine Bishop as regent until she reaches her majority at sixteen years of age. Also, upload all historical and scientific data to all secondary sites and set drones to launch to all known inhabited systems. If we fail, then other may be warned and prevail because we gave light to this darkness that encompasses our land."


"Acknowledged." said the computer. My task her done, I looked down for possibly the last time at my daughters sleeping face.

Her amber eyes opened momentarily and looked into mine. My cub would have the power to protect herself, if she survived the hell our world had become.

I let the troopers do there job, and made my way over to the reason this facility was constructed.

"OK Dr. Radier. I'm ready. Beam me up." (I had no idea where that phrase came from but it made the doctor wince.

"Must you say that Sire?" he said, massaging his temple as he said it. "It really doesn't work like that you know.."

"Honestly, the last time you tried explaining it to me I got a headache, a noosebleed, and almost howled without my fur on." He winced again. "I have faith Doctor. Your device here will get us help years faster than the probes I just set to launch. Now, what do I do?"

"Grab your kit bag and stand on the platform." The building shook violently and an alarm started howling. "I would hurry, sire."

I looked one last time as my daughter left, on her way to safety with what remained of the planetary government of Avalon. Once I transported, the scientist would get in the last car and set the self destruct. Nobody else was getting out alive.

I shouldered my ruck, and stepped onto the silver platform. Already the hair on my arm was standing on end as the wild energies in the air coursed through my body. I looked one last time at the people around me, and stopped with my golden eyes meeting Dr. Radier's brown ones.

"Do it."

The building shook again, and the machinery started humming. The pitch built until it was painful to my enhanced ears. The with a crack pain encompassed my body, and I saw red, then nothing at all.

 

[ChasNicollette]

Down in The Underground.

Martha glared dismally at Hart, and then held out her hand to Nigel for a handshake. "Pleased to meet you, Nigel."

"Ah, Miss Jones. I have read your file. Originally hired to Unit, then attached to Torchwood. I must say, this is a bit of a rag-tag crew now isn't it?

Martha hesitated. "Yes, well. Needs must, right? And, really, it's Doctor Jones, and I'm married, so not quite with the 'miss.' If you don't mind, sir."

"Yeah, wotcher," Mickey greeted the newcomer, with a chin-up nod, sizing up the man in black, misliking the look on Martha's face and the bad taste he'd apparently left in her mouth.

"Mickey Smith. Yes, I have your file as well. Seems your credentials all come from the word of Jack Harkness and exploits that alledgedly occured in an alternate universe. Convenient that none of this can be verified isn't it?" Nigel didn't wait for a response he instead began to move further into the building.

Mickey narrowed his eyes at Tate's back, and flashed the back of Tate's head a vicious two-fingered salute, at which Hart smirked wickedly.

Grunting, Mickey shook his head, and then glanced back at Hart. "Miz Nibs is upstairs in the conference room, taking a phone call. Speaking uv wheels, tho-- how was she?"

Hart shrugged. "I've ridden in worse. But what was with that smell?"

Mickey stared at him, aghast. "You don't like the new car smell?"

"Right," Rhys nodded, hustled out of the conference room, grabbed a railing, called down to the floor of The Hub. "Oi! Mickey! We need a trace on this call, find out who's ringing us?"

Mickey glanced up from staring aghast at John Hart and stared bewilderedly up at Rhys, holding up another clump of cables as if by way of demonstration. "Trace it? Wiv what?"

Rhys looked a little distressed at that. "I dunno, I dunno, she said, 'quick as yeh can.'"

"Yeah, 'course," Mickey gestured, feeling put-upon but still diving half-under the desk. "Captain, give us a 'and!"

Hart seemed unimpressed, and deadpanned in reply: "I don't do Windows."

Mickey stuck his head up from under the desk and glared at Hart in a particularly impressive fashion, this expression had stared down hundreds of Cybus Cybermen, and that was just for starters.

Hart grunted in a way that suggested he couldn't be bothered to fight about it, and then dropped down to help, his hands finding cables, charting connections, plug plug plug plug. "Here I thought I was just the hired muscle and test pilot, now I'm in The IT Department."

"You could always take it up wiv The Complaint Department," Mickey harrumphed, toggling a row of switches, a couple of monitors started to flicker to life.

"We have one of those?" John mused, intrigued.

Mickey glanced up at the second-floor conference room, silently implying Gwen.

Hart followed his gaze, hesitated for a moment, and then worked faster.

"All go around here, ennit?" Martha smiled tightly at Nigel, as if worried that he'd think they were just putting on a show for the man pulling the funding strings. "Have you, erm, talked to The Brigadier lately? I haven't seen him since he left for Peru, ah, again."

"As usual he is off on some "important business" in Peru. Perhaps one day he will deem us worthy of knowing just what is so important to take him from his duties to Queen and Country." Nigel obviously showed distaste for The Brigadier.

This in and of itself took Martha utterly aback. She'd never heard anyone even whisper an impeachment against the character of "The Brig," let alone imply he was wasting The Crown's resources. "To be fair, sir, if you don't mind, UNIT is an international organisation; I myself was posted briefly in Manhattan. I'm sure whatever he's got up his sleeve has Geneva's best interests well and truly in mind. And, what's good for The Planet is by extension good for 'The Empire.'"

"So, tell me what is it that you people are attempting to do here? There are those that feel this... organization... is a needed check and balance. I see this as little more than penance for the sins of misguided politicians. With all the resources of Unit, what exactly does Torchwood have to offer? It seems that the previous leader, Harkness, used this as a personal resource for reconnecting with this Doctor character. I assure you the days of free reign are at a close." Nigel seemed irritated. His face slightly flush. He regarded Martha with a mixture of condescension and agitation. His eyebrows raised slightly.

Martha's eyes narrowed.

She could be respectful, all right. She'd even encouraged people to obey The Cult of Skaro when she thought it would keep them alive a little bit longer.

But for every time she'd smiled sweetly, stood still, looked pretty, there was a step she'd walked around the world in The Year That Never Was, facing down Toclafane and poverty and destruction to germinate The Doctor's telepathic apotheosis in the hearts and minds of the people. Martha Jones had been for The Doctor both John The Baptist and Johnny Appleseed in a post-apocalyptic landscape, and one does not walk a world like that and suffer fools gladly afterwards.

And it was that sort of darksome look which Doctor Martha Milligan-Jones gave Nigel Tate.

"What do we offer, sir?" she asked, bitterly, ironically: "Brains, brawn, guts, heart, and soul. What are we doing, sir?"

She smiled thinly. "We're watching your back. While UNIT's making all those life-and-death decisions beneath The Tower of London, we're making sure the rear entrance into our reality doesn't get besieged by all manner of spooks and beasts. We're keeping a lid on things that slither and yowl and go bump in the night, and we're doing it with not half the support and resources one might get from Geneva. We're rebuilding necessary world-saving things, things that Downing Street ordered destroyed to cover its collective arse with The 456, thank you very much for that."

Shaking her head, she poked a finger into Nigel's chest. "And you, posturing pompously, passing judgement, you had better remember that The Torchwood Institute's original charter specifically cites keeping an eye out for The Doctor as chief amongst its duties. Captain Harkness' undying vigil for The Last of The Time Lords benefited him personally, but it also went with his job."

She sneered at him. "I should just send you upstairs right now, and let Gwen hack you to bits, bits which I'd then dip in chocolate and feed to the pterodactyl. It's too bad I swore that Hippo-bluddy-cratic Oath."

Underneath the main terminal junction, Hart arched an eyebrow at Smith, and Smith was grinning his arse off.

"Okay," Hart muttergrunted, "I admit it, you've got good taste. Your sense of smell could use a little work, but, absolutely, good taste."

"Yes," Mickey Smith grinned his arse off, "yes I do."

The Hub door irised open, and Professor Malcolm Taylor scuttled in, carrying a stack of pizza boxes, the door winding shut behind him.

Setting the boxes down on a desk, enough to feed an army, or a bunch of UNIT engineers and a pregnant woman, he adjusted his spectacles with half-gloved fingers and squinted at Nigel.

"Oh," the Welshman hesitated, "hulloh. UNIT, erm, oversight, isn't it? I was just-- we were hungry-- I'll get right back to fixing The Rift Manipulator but--"

He smiled nervously. "I'm afraid I didn't bring enough pizza for you as well."

Martha harrumphed, holding up her palm towards Tate's face before striding off. "He can have mine. I've suddenly lost my appetite."

Mickey fist-bumped Captain Hart, still grinning his arse off.

Then Hart plugged in a last cable and the terminals over their head blinked to life. Mickey rolled out from under the desk and shot up by a keyboard, his fingers flying over the keys... "Right, then. Terminal's connected to the LAN, LAN's connected to British Telecom, foot bone's connected to the ankle-bone..."

Hart clambered up next to Smith and rubbed the back of his own head. "Really, the sooner you people develop Subwave technology, the happier I'll be. It's a wonder anyone finds anyone these days."

Mickey grunted, a cheery little grin adorning the corner of his lip. "Actually? Funny story."

 

[ChasNicollette]

Outside.

The TARDIS sat in the hallway, silent and waiting, heralding outwardly not one jot nor tittle of what went on inside its confines.

Outside, the knot of Sontarans so handily detangled by The Doctor's Daughter were picking themselves up and cohering anew, but even as they did so they came face to face with their other enemy.

The corridor in one direction seethed and teemed with Judoon.

The Judoon's Enforcers stood amidst their company, fearsome living weapons, nigh-unstoppable juggernauts.

But the Sontarans were wise enough to know their foes, and Field Major Shrowl brandished a remote control wand, sent off a signal, summoned reinforcements, and in moments the corridor in the other direction wrothe and roiled with Sontarans.

And with the reinforcement Sontarans came a heavy weapons platform, a portable cannon turret floating on antigrav pods, one of the temporal technologies that littered the present having been flung from the future, a device that The Sontarans had scavenged in order to further their goal of superior temporal displacement.

Physically, The Sontarans were outmatched by The Judoon. But this weapon, this weapon from the year 40,000, this would tip the scales.

An irresistible force faced an irresistible force.

And between them sat an immovable object.

Field Major Shrowl stared into the face of death.

He smiled. "Sontar-Ha."

 

[Lunaramblings]

"So, tell me what is it that you people are attempting to do here? There are those that feel this... organization... is a needed check and balance. I see this as little more than penance for the sins of misguided politicians. With all the resources of Unit, what exactly does Torchwood have to offer? It seems that the previous leader, Harkness, used this as a personal resource for reconnecting with this Doctor character. I assure you the days of free reign are at a close." Nigel seemed irritated. His face slightly flush. He regarded Martha with a mixture of condescension and agitation. His eyebrows raised slightly.

Martha's eyes narrowed.

She could be respectful, all right. She'd even encouraged people to obey The Cult of Skaro when she thought it would keep them alive a little bit longer.

But for every time she'd smiled sweetly, stood still, looked pretty, there was a step she'd walked around the world in The Year That Never Was, facing down Toclafane and poverty and destruction to germinate The Doctor's telepathic apotheosis in the hearts and minds of the people. Martha Jones had been for The Doctor both John The Baptist and Johnny Appleseed in a post-apocalyptic landscape, and one does not walk a world like that and suffer fools gladly afterwards.

And it was that sort of darksome look which Doctor Martha Milligan-Jones gave Nigel Tate.

"What do we offer, sir?" she asked, bitterly, ironically: "Brains, brawn, guts, heart, and soul. What are we doing, sir?"

She smiled thinly. "We're watching your back. While UNIT's making all those life-and-death decisions beneath The Tower of London, we're making sure the rear entrance into our reality doesn't get besieged by all manner of spooks and beasts. We're keeping a lid on things that slither and yowl and go bump in the night, and we're doing it with not half the support and resources one might get from Geneva. We're rebuilding necessary world-saving things, things that Downing Street ordered destroyed to cover its collective arse with The 456, thank you very much for that."

Shaking her head, she poked a finger into Nigel's chest. "And you, posturing pompously, passing judgement, you had better remember that The Torchwood Institute's original charter specifically cites keeping an eye out for The Doctor as chief amongst its duties. Captain Harkness' undying vigil for The Last of The Time Lords benefited him personally, but it also went with his job."

She sneered at him. "I should just send you upstairs right now, and let Gwen hack you to bits, bits which I'd then dip in chocolate and feed to the pterodactyl. It's too bad I swore that Hippo-bluddy-cratic Oath."

Underneath the main terminal junction, Hart arched an eyebrow at Smith, and Smith was grinning his arse off.

"Okay," Hart muttergrunted, "I admit it, you've got good taste. Your sense of smell could use a little work, but, absolutely, good taste."

"Yes," Mickey Smith grinned his arse off, "yes I do."

"I see you have the "brawn and guts" part down pat Mrs. Jones, but the brains part I am not so convinced of. Nigel's smile was smug and he was not the least put out. "Allow me to be clear. I have little patience for this. You people talk of watching our backs, but allow me to remind you that if your former leader were a man of true character, he would done what was needed by his country, and we would not have needed to initiate the protocols we did. Further, despite his eventual luck in dealing with the situation, he then abandoned his post. I would hope that this new formation is of better character, though given what I have thus far seen I am doubtful. We have you, ma'am, who has shown certain aspects of character just now that I am not so sure are fitting of your position, some kid that is apparently good with a wrench, who's only credentials come from a man Queen Victoria herself exiled from the realm and declared a threat to the empire, and the previously mentioned deserter. Then we have a time traveling con man and killer. We have a former police officer, whom apparently has anger issues, and has shown a staggering degree of self obsession hiring this man here who is what exactly? A former lorry driver? You think you lot deserve some sort of medal? Nigel laughs and shakes his head. "You lot are lucky to have anything at all. Don't you lecture me ma'am about loyalty, about doing what must be done."

The Hub door irised open, and Professor Malcolm Taylor scuttled in, carrying a stack of pizza boxes, the door winding shut behind him.

Setting the boxes down on a desk, enough to feed an army, or a bunch of UNIT engineers and a pregnant woman, he adjusted his spectacles with half-gloved fingers and squinted at Nigel.

"Oh," the Welshman hesitated, "hulloh. UNIT, erm, oversight, isn't it? I was just-- we were hungry-- I'll get right back to fixing The Rift Manipulator but--"

He smiled nervously. "I'm afraid I didn't bring enough pizza for you as well."

Martha harrumphed, holding up her palm towards Tate's face before striding off. "He can have mine. I've suddenly lost my appetite."

Nigel made his way very close to Malcolm Turner. Leaning closely, he smiled that same insincere smile, hatred still seeping thoroughly through his very being. "Well, I am glad to see our funds are well spent. Worry not... Professor... I never touch the stuff."

 

[Lunaramblings]

"Doctor, not much of use. A whole lot of friends that I think want more than tea, but not much else. So, when exactly did you upgrade to the Harem? Very Persian, or Utahan? I prefer Persian, nicer clothes."

The Doctor glanced up at Jack and stared at him blankly, blankly, for a long long moment. "Harem. Jack. What? I'll have you know The Commander and I have just met, and--"

And then he glanced at Jenny. And Jenny was staring right back at him, looking supremely uncomfortable.

"--no. Just. Just... no."

Jenny's jaw flexed and her eyes stared daggers that could sever atomic structures faster than Huon particles. "We're not--"

The Doctor stammered, gesturing between himself and her: "We're not."

Jenny held up her hands in definitive dismissal. "Not ever."

"We're strictly--"

"--I'm his--"

"--she's my--"

"That's a neg," Jenny confirmed.

"Yeah, neg," The Doctor nodded vividly. "Definitely neg."

Jack was grinning like the devil himself. "You know Doc? It is great to be back. By the by, when did you get the pet? Thought you didn't care for cats? Thought you were more of a Robot Dog sorta bloke?"

The Doctor glanced at the feline by Harkness' tattered boots. "It comes and goes, the liking of cats. Having been threatened by one wearing a nun's wimple, and then having spent a wee bit of time with a litter of wee Catkind-Human offspring... cats are capricious, I'm not allowed to change my mind?"

The Cat's tail lashed around Harkness' feet. "I resent that. We're not capricious, we just have a keen awareness of the fluidity of circumstances and are by very nature flexible enough to change with those circumstances. It's not cats are capricious. It's Time."

The Doctor arched an eyebrow. "If you say so. Anyhoodle, introductions, Captain Jack, this is...?"

He gestured to The Cat but fixed his gaze on Jenny, hoping she would provide a name.

Jenny smiled a lopsided smile. "Captain Jack."

The Doctor frowned. "Right, no, I said that part already, I said, 'Captain Jack, this is--'"

Jenny rolled her eyes and pointed at The Cat. "'Captain Jack.' The Cat's name is 'Captain Jack.'"

The Doctor blinked. Stared at The Cat. And then stared at Harkness.

"...oh."

Jack grinned slyly. "What? No... well... I don't think so... Not yet anyway. I mean, not that I have anything against cats, just... So! How about those Sontarans? Think we should be doing something?

The Cat seemed to smirk faintly, and gazed speculatively up at The Captain. "Me mum always told me I was named after me old man."

The Doctor paled a bit. "Oh. Really?"

Jack blushed, only slightly. "Well... so um..." Jack looks at the beautiful blonde. "Not that I am against exploring new avenues. I love experimenting. Don't you Doc?" Jack smiles at the Doctor.

 

[ChasNicollette]

Ten, Jen, and The Cat.

Jack grinned slyly. "What? No... well... I don't think so... Not yet anyway. I mean, not that I have anything against cats, just... So! How about those Sontarans? Think we should be doing something?

The Doctor shook his head mildly. "Even with their new toy, I've got the doors double-locked, I've got our defences to maximum, they try to get in here, they'll be bugs on a windscreen."

He paused, and narrowed his eyes, and ran his tongue over his teeth. "I'm, erm. 90% sure. (Seventy-five.)"

Jenny shook her head. "Our top priority should be getting Donna back. 'Leave no man behind' goes double for her. She's got family and friends that won't even know they miss her and that's... that's a KIA I won't have on my conscience."

Glancing across at The Doctor, she frowned. "She does have... family, right?"

"Mm," The Doctor murmured. "A grandfather. And her mum."

The Cat seemed to smirk faintly, and gazed speculatively up at The Captain. "Me mum always told me I was named after me old man."

The Doctor paled a bit. "Oh. Really?"

Jack blushed, only slightly. "Well... so um..." Jack looks at the beautiful blonde. "Not that I am against exploring new avenues. I love experimenting. Don't you Doc?" Jack smiles at the Doctor.

Jack the Cat began cleaning himself again, spreading the toes of his right rear paw and licking between them with a certain kind of ferocity, murmuring as he did so under his telepathic breath: "'Avenues.' More like you were exploring alleys, if I know me oul' mum."

The Doctor's eye twitched as his gaze danced from The Captain to his daughter. "No-one's 'experimenting' on her. Not ever. (Least of all you.) I'm not even going to let her breathe on certain trees in case they find it intimate."

Pleasantly surprised to discover that she found that faint blush of The Captain's rather delightful, like a rare treasure, Jenny then wheeled around to eye The Doctor with a certain scrutiny. "Excuse me? Wouldn't it be more my business than yours who I invite to explore my 'avenues?' I told you once, I'm not a child. And I told him, I'm no longer especially sold on taking orders."

The Doctor grimaced. "You're my responsibility."

Jenny shrugged. "You left me behind."

Clapping his palm over his face, The Doctor blew air hard through his teeth. "Well, yes, but you were dead. And you didn't-- you didn't regenerate. You didn't--"

He looked away, toggling a switch on the console. "Well. Obviously you did something."

Jenny smirked faintly. "I got shot. A little bit perforated. It hurt. And there were all these biological functions I knew nothing about... like the ability to survive without breathing for short periods, and a deathlike healing trance..."

The Doctor stopped. And stared to nowhere.

"Oh," he mumbled. "The shock of the bullet triggered your respiratory bypass system--"

Jenny nodded, her smirk broadening: "--which locked in a lungful of The Breath of Life--"

The Doctor clawed a hand through his hair, eyes bulging, jaw clenching: "--which was chockful of biological infusions, revitalising agents, vitamins and minerals and chemicals, and-and-and artron energy!"

Jenny smiled softly, gently. "Practically an overdose, really. Which almost killed me harder than the bullet did. But my body went into standby mode, a state resembling death, and when I'd processed enough of the energy I exhaled the remainder when my primary respiratory system kicked back on."

"Blimey," The Doctor mumbled. "Stone me. I'm old."

Jenny grinned. "Old and thick."

Returning his extended paw to his side, The Cat glanced half-lidded up at The Captain. "Apple didn't fall far from his tree, did it? I mean, didn't anyone tell you? She's his daughter."

 

[ChasNicollette]

Ten, Jen, and The Cat.

...there was silence after that last bit.

After The Cat dropped that bomb in the room.

Awkward silence. (Not that Captain Jack could be blamed for being a little bit stunned by the notion of Jenny's ancestry.)

And then Jenny opened her mouth, hesitating.

"So," she murmured. "Donna. Leaving aside the issue of our being forced to forget her. Why did she forget us?"

The Doctor didn't answer at first.

He kept his head down, kept flipping switches, kept glancing anew at that screen.

"Dad," Jenny narrowed her eyes as she moved around The Console, trying to keep up with him. "Why did the woman who named me forget I existed?"

"Not now," The Doctor shook his head briskly. "I have to concentrate. I can't navigate The TARDIS into established events, but if I can access the superluminal transmat array used by The Sontarans, reroute it through The Heart of The TARDIS, maybe I can... 'beam' her out of there before she's taken, maybe that's bending the rules, but I don't think they'll break--"

Jenny scowled. "You're still treating me like a child. Still!"

The Doctor's eyes were pits of darkness as he glared over the monitor at her. "There was an accident. A bidirectional... event. That grafted my... knowledge, my intellect, part of my biological code, part of-of-of my soul, if you can call it that, bonded it with Donna."

The Doctor grimaced. "She became something new, something amazing, something brilliant."

He trailed off. "She became like you. Just like you. In one respect."

Jenny frowned. "...just like me?"

The Doctor lowered his head, his voice flattening as he murmured: "She became too much like me. Like you, she was too much like me, in the end. And like you, it would have gotten her killed."

Jenny opened her mouth to protest that she didn't die, maybe close enough, but still...

But The Doctor's gaze snapped up to lock onto hers, a darksome gaze as deep as the black holes his race had invented.

"This is the trouble," he growled, glancing from Jenny to Harkness and back again, the bitterness, the fury of a Time Lord who had found no Victoriousness even in defeat, "with surrounding myself with people I care about. Sooner or later, it always hurts to look at you. Jack's a fixed point in history, you're a reminder of my lost people, and Donna--"

He took a deep shuddery breath, and he wiped his face with his palm. "She got everything she ever wanted. Ever ever. And I had to take it away to save her."

Jenny blinked, this abrupt emotional roller coaster leaving her in the dust.

She reached out for him, she touched his shoulder.

"But when we get her back," she murmured. "You can fix her. You can fix anything."

The Doctor took a deep breath in through his nose, and blew the air out through his lips. "I think so. Yeah."

...he glanced up at the ceiling. "But it's going to hurt."

Jenny gazed at him long and quietly. "Hurt her, Dad? Or hurt you to look at her?"

But as he lowered his gaze to answer Jenny's question, T'Pol returned, and something... neglected... in The Doctor... something unavoidably chromosomally masculine... something caused him to stop and stare.

Walking back into the main control room, the C-in-C, the Bridge T’Pol stood in the doorway, the tight breeches clinging to her legs and ass, the short top making a tempting contrasting to her skin, the gentle swell of her skin hinting at pleasures unseen.

"Begging your pardon, mate," The Cat murmured, squinching its eyes at the demi-extraterrestrial clad in blue. "But it don't hurt to look at her, do it?"

"Erm," The Doctor hesitated. "Erm."

“Is this acceptable?” she asked. “There is another that fits, but I believe it would be more appropriate for desert conditions. Not the rather cool atmosphere you have here.”

"Right," he nodded, finding his footing, climbing back up to sensical speech. "I've a slightly lower body temperature than human normal, but I figure it's not nearly as cold as, you know, desert nights..."

And, distracted, thrown for a loop, something emerged through The Doctor's brainwaves that he'd forgotten to do. He glanced at The Console, and with one hand in his pocket he reached out and takked the switch for the coordinate override...

...outside, Field Major Shrowl saw The TARDIS starting to fade from sight, there amidst the hail of crimson energy beams, and he roared his disappointment, he roared his defiance, he roared his denial...

...he whirled to face the soldiers manning the heavy weapons platform and with a snarl he roared: "Pyrrhic victory be damned! Initiate 'scorched earth!' ACTIVATE THE CHRONOMAGNETIC PULSE!"

And a blue-armoured three-fingered hand lashed out, and tagged a key, flipped a switch.

Shrowl closed his eyes. And smiled. "Sontar-Ha."

And right there in that instant, in that immortal unending interminable instant, The Time Vortex tore open, it screamed, it yawned wide as a dragon's throat...

...and the ship was gone, it was gone, it was ripped from the skies, in white and gold and saffron and vermilion and aquamarine it vanished, it was gone...

Judoon and Sontarans, living and dead, and the entire monster mothership.

Gone.

The TARDIS wailed, it keened, sparks flew from every surface, fell from the top of the dome, The Doctor lost his footing, the whole TARDIS lurched, shuddered, groaned... the machine was skewing on its w-axis, body and soul...

...hurtling...

The Cat yowled at the top of his lungs, scrabbling for purchase on the grating as everything pitched left hard...

Jenny dove for The Cat and rolled and caught him, hugging him to her chest as she thudded hard against the railing and managed to stay conscious, just barely, just barely.

The Doctor strained and reached for an override, a different one, everything was stretching and straining throughout The TARDIS, The Cloister Bell was pounding, The Doctor was stretching and straining for that switch, trying desperately...

"EVERYONE," The Doctor bellowed frightfully, peremptorily, belatedly. "HANG ON!"

And then The TARDIS stopped.

Hard.

As though it had run into a wall and could run no further.

And everything went black.

********

END PROLOGUE

********​

 

[ChasNicollette]

The Hub.

"I see you have the "brawn and guts" part down pat Mrs. Jones, but the brains part I am not so convinced of. Nigel's smile was smug and he was not the least put out.

Martha frowned. Frowned hard. "Really, sir, it's 'Doct--'"

But Nigel Tate was less than interested in what Doctor Jones had to say.

"Allow me to be clear. I have little patience for this. You people talk of watching our backs, but allow me to remind you that if your former leader were a man of true character, he would done what was needed by his country, and we would not have needed to initiate the protocols we did. Further, despite his eventual luck in dealing with the situation, he then abandoned his post. I would hope that this new formation is of better character, though given what I have thus far seen I am doubtful. We have you, ma'am, who has shown certain aspects of character just now that I am not so sure are fitting of your position, some kid that is apparently good with a wrench, who's only credentials come from a man Queen Victoria herself exiled from the realm and declared a threat to the empire, and the previously mentioned deserter. Then we have a time traveling con man and killer. We have a former police officer, whom apparently has anger issues, and has shown a staggering degree of self obsession hiring this man here who is what exactly? A former lorry driver? You think you lot deserve some sort of medal? Nigel laughs and shakes his head.

"Rhys Williams," Martha began again, utterly slackjawed by the man's lack of regard, lack of respect, lack of interest, "has proven himself time and again, that he--"

But before Martha could pick up any kind of steam, Nigel shut her down again.

"You lot are lucky to have anything at all. Don't you lecture me ma'am about loyalty, about doing what must be done."

Martha literally took a step back.

And shook her head.

This was not a fantastic development. Not at all.

The Hub door irised open, and Professor Malcolm Taylor scuttled in, carrying a stack of pizza boxes, the door winding shut behind him.

Setting the boxes down on a desk, enough to feed an army, or a bunch of UNIT engineers and a pregnant woman, he adjusted his spectacles with half-gloved fingers and squinted at Nigel.

"Oh," the Welshman hesitated, "hulloh. UNIT, erm, oversight, isn't it? I was just-- we were hungry-- I'll get right back to fixing The Rift Manipulator but--"

He smiled nervously. "I'm afraid I didn't bring enough pizza for you as well."

Martha harrumphed, holding up her palm towards Tate's face before striding off. "He can have mine. I've suddenly lost my appetite."

Nigel made his way very close to Malcolm Turner. Leaning closely, he smiled that same insincere smile, hatred still seeping thoroughly through his very being. "Well, I am glad to see our funds are well spent. Worry not... Professor... I never touch the stuff."

"...oh," Malcolm nodded slowly. "Really? That's a shame. It's a culinary convergence of all four food groups, especially if you top it right, there's not another food like it in all The Universe. Quite efficient, really. (Mind you, my innards aren't as young as they used to be, I should really not overdo it on the cheese.)"

John Hart grimaced, walking over with his hands on his hips. "Your lips to God's ears, 'Perfesser.' I'm a man legendary for his excesses, but you people and your cheese. (It amazes me that some of you can still walk.)"

Malcolm laughed nervously. "Yes. Well."

He glanced down at the top pizza on the stack, and regarded John Hart with trepidation, like at any moment the Time Agent captain might draw a weapon and render him a footnote.

"This one's got a whole wheat crust, I think."

"Right," Hart nodded easily, tolerantly, ironically, utterly making fun of the quasi-insectoid little man. "That ought to sort it."

But he narrowed his eyes at Tate, a reiteration of his earlier physical threat gathering in his eyes like a storm. "Unfortunately, some problems aren't solved nearly so easily."

...upstairs, Gwen was holding her breath, listening to silence, she didn't want to miss the next word Wilfred said, if any--

But then the phone squealed in her ear, howling feedback, the screaming of the damned from the mouth of madness, she hurled the phone away and she clapped her hands to her ears and in that same instant, that same immortal unending interminable instant, on the floor of The Hub, The Rift came to thundering, frightening life.

...sparks were flying everywhere, Mickey stumbled backwards from his terminal, landed on his arse, staring bewilderedly up at the column that reached to the storeys-high ceiling...

Rhys dove back into the conference room, attempting to tend to his wife: "Gwen!"

Instantly, Malcolm Taylor was galvanized, he sprinted away from Nigel and Hart and he skidded to a halt beside The Rift Manipulator, still nascent, still coming together...

"There's been a major disruption to the fabric of Time," Malcolm pronounced, hitting switches amidst the sparks, frenetic, surprisingly fearless despite the roarings and thrumblings of The Rift, "relatively nearby to our spaciotemporal locus, it's driving The Rift-- it's driving her bonkers!"

Martha was back, back to business, she hauled Mickey to his feet, squinted at The Rift Manipulator... "Can you fix it? Can you get it shut again?"

Malcolm threw on a welding mask, grabbed some sort of tube-shaped device from a workbench. "Can I fix it? Can I fix it?"

Blue plasma vented from the tube, splattering all about The Manipulator's controls, and The Rift shuddered, and moaned, and fell silent.

Taylor yanked the mask off. "I can fix it."

He shook his head though, sadly. "I've welded the controls, thereby welding The Rift, but. It's a temporary measure at best. I'll have to start from scratch on The Manipulator, see if I can't get more than a stopgap measure preventing that level of flux resurgence..."

"Well done," came Gwen's voice from above, she was holding her head with one hand, leaning on a railing with the other, Rhys keeping a fearful watchful eye on her. "Find out what that was, and if there'll be more of them. Aftershocks, isn't it?"

Taylor nodded, adjusting his spectacles. "I'll do my best, ma'am."

Gwen's eyes darted to Mickey. "Smith. I lost that caller. Tell me yeh tracked him."

Mickey nodded, he waved smoke away from the keyboard, but the monitor remained intact. "Yeah. Used what was left uv The Subwave Network ter trace 'im. It seemed to know 'im, seemed to recognise 'im, it chased 'im down so fast. 'Mott, Wilfred,' in Chiswick, Greater London. I wasn't able ter retask satellites ter 'is mobile's position, and 'e wasn't anywhere near the CCTV, but I've got an address."

Gwen nodded. "London. That's, what, 2 hours forty, if yeh take The M4?"

"Faster," Mickey pointed out, "if you don't mind the speed limit, and you're driving somefhing wiv a little 'orsepower."

"Lights and sirens the whole way," Hart suggested, with a tiny hint of relish.

Gwen nodded. "Do it. Go. We're all this poor ould bloke has. Jones, go with them, there might be a medical concern. Accident and Emergency..."

Martha nodded easily, but just on the off-chance: "That'll leave you a little understaffed."

Gwen took this under advisement. "I've got Rhys and Malcolm and The Greyhounds. And I'll ring Andy. Besides which, it's not like I've forgotten how to hold a bluddy gun. I'll be fine, yeh lot. Just go."

The three of them nodded, and turned to head for the garage...

"In the meantime, Mister Tate," Gwen narrowed her eyes at the man in black, strutting like an emperor penguin with a Napoleon complex, "we two need to have words, unless I miss my guess?"

 

[Abraxas Winterlight]

Giles: Planet Unknown, Year Unknown

I knew I was awake when I realized I could not smell death in the air. The stink of the teeming dead had been so prevalent for so long I had grown numb to it. I slowly pushed myself up from the sand I had been lying in, and stood, swaying momentarily until I got my balance back.

I looked down at my hands and arms. They were itching as red skin was fading to pink, and new hair growing. The same thing that killed of the bacteria that had turned my world into a eternal tomb healed me at an incredible rate.

I took stock of myself. I was not damaged, but my clothes, gear, and even the signet ring on my finger were gone. The teleportation process would have probably killed a normal man. Me, it left naked but basically unharmed.

I slowly turned looking at my surroundings. The sky was a dark indigo color, broken with a riot of flashing and crackling lightning, not unlike Gods dueling in the heavens. Occasional spears of errant energy would shoot down, blasting a crater of twisted glass out of the unforgiving sand.

In the distance forms swirled in the maelstrom above me. I could not make out what kind of bioform they were, but I could tell two things. They were not vehicles, but biological creatures, and they were huge. Hopefully they would stay content to patrol the skies far away from me.

Continuing my sweep I noticed what may have been a mountain, or maybe some insane dwelling carved out of the stone in the distance. Flashes of blue-white lightning revealed caves pocketing the mound, like empty eye sockets of a giant with a hundred eyes.

Continuing to turn I saw something that made my blood stop in my veins, and a low growl emerge from my chest.

Standing forlorn and alone was a small rectangular structure. It was tilted into a small crater, shards of melted sand frozen up around it like a wave. Tendrils of fused glass exploded out from the scorched box. A single light was atop it, and the door was open, the lock scorched .

It left me feeling like I was looking upon an opened tomb, and all the evils of the worlds nestled within, waiting and hungry.


I knew this structure. I knew of the being that traveled within it. Destroyer and savior. Friend and foe. Nothing was certain where it was involved. Friend and enemy of the Empire that predated me.

And instinctively, I felt that it had the power to destroy me. Something inside me, buried deep within the beast inside bared it's teeth and could not decide to go for the throat or to run until it's lungs burst.

Growling more deeply now, I could feel the change creeping up on me. Sweat was popping out upon my brow as my body temperature rose. My muscles started to stretch and the tear, and the pain of my bones beginning to lengthen broke me out of the trance I had been in.

I had not control like this since my sister had been lost to me.

I closed my eyes and fought the beast. My human mind stalked the wildness inside me, blocking it's path, caging it, keeping it inside. I would not let it loose to run or hunt.

I was a man!

Finally, body aching and sweat rolling off of me, I found my calm again. I looked at the silent device, beckoning me like the sweetest water, tainted with the smell of spoiled meat.

Friend or foe, it may get me out of here, get help for me people. Friend or foe, I had to know if I had the courage to face a fear that was on the instinctual level.

I was a man. I would do what I had to.

Moving over to the door, I prepared to tread into the unknown, every hair on my neck standing straight up and that growl back in my throat.

I opened the door when behind me three cracks of sound exploded, much louder than the thunder that had been shattering the silent desert.

I turned, crouched and beheld a sight that defied belief. Skidding along the sand was another box, twin to this one but with a wild blue light shining atop it and throwing sand as it dug a furrow, to come to a drunken upright landing.

I stood looking at the new visitor to the blowing sands, then started walking to it. Maybe this one would have answers. It felt... alive.

 

[ChasNicollette]

********
DOCTOR WHO: POWERS OF TEN
EPISODE 1:
"The Dream/Time Echelon."
********

 

[Varshanka]

What? Where? Why? How? Who...

Slowly the Vulcan shifted her weight, maneuvering to hands and knees, a green slash on her forehead. Shaking her head to clear the fog, T’Pol reached up, grasping the edge of the console, her hand resting on a smear of blood that matched the mark on her head.

Pulling herself upright she looked around in the dim gloom, a few lights were on, probably emergency lighting, but it was better than nothing. Looking around she tried to focus on who was where, and which way was up.

 

[ChasNicollette]

...guess Who's coming to dinner?

A dark-skinned hand touched a key, and a screen switched viewpoints, showing the wind-whipped wasteland on which two blue boxes stood, and between them walked a man upright who could not be alive.

"Hnh," he grunted, the man who stood at that terminal and gazed at that screen. "Not a standard reading."

"A 'standard reading,'" a female voice replied, dripping with irony and dubiousness, and the man looked up to regard the slender, muscular woman with the ebon-dark straight hair. "Here. Tell me something, O Fearless Leader, has anything, any one thing, ever read standard since our arses landed here?"

He shrugged at her, scritching his bearded chin, and half-lowered his lids. "My apologies, Doctor Baker, call it a conditioned response."

His accent was British. Hers was Australian.

She moved over to peer at his station, scowling as she regarded the screen. "Another one. Our lucky day."

"Mm," her "fearless leader" grunted again. "If it is the same day."

The dark-haired woman frowned slightly. "You think it's here on a rescue mission."

"I don't think anything comes here on purpose," he shook his head. "But, all the same, fortune favours the prepared."

He touched another key, and a whine sounded as intercoms opened.

"All personnel," he declared, leaning over the console as he proclaimed, "we are to be expecting company. Roll out the welcome mats, if you'd be so good. Big John, Molly, head for The Catacombs. Professor, please wrap up what you're doing and meet myself and Lenore at the command-tier cave mouth, we'll likely be needing your expertise. Doctor Anderson, you're to set a few more places at your table just in case."

He smiled a grim little half-hearted smile. "Time to do what we do, people."

He didn't wait for the acknowledgements. He knew they were moving.

"Lenore" tossed her "fearless leader" a gun, which he caught effortlessly from the air.

"Shall we?" she wondered, eyebrow cocked.

He racked the gun and proceeded in the direction of the command-tier cave mouth.

"Let's shall."

 

[Lunaramblings]

Jack had smashed into the terminal hard. He was unconscious for a short time. And when he came to he was more confused.

"Doc, ladies... Son? Everyone okay?" Jack was to his feet and takking keys not waiting for a response. "What the hell was that?"

 

[ChasNicollette]

Jen, The Cat, and Ten.

The TARDIS was wounded. Cables dangled, smoke billowed, The Time Rotor was cracked and The Console was bereft of light. The only thing still displaying any sign of life was the monitor, and this was all pixels and electronic snow and the sort of universal base code to which only Time Lords are privy.

Jenny's head hurt. Her face hurt. Her cervical spine hurt way down to her lumbar and her fingers hurt her toes hurt her spun-gold flaxen hair hurt.

Not to mention there were claws digging into her skin from a very frightened cat.

And then there was movement, the pointy-haired woman who bled green, she was up, Harkness was getting his pins under him and already trying to get technological bearings.

Jenny managed to shove herself just that much further towards consciousness, out of hypnagogia and into waking, she could hear The Cat's voice in her head.

"Oi, Jen," he muttered. "Not that I dun appreciate the rescue. But you're bluddy strong and my ribs have their limits."

"Yeah," she mumbled, sluggishly, and lowered the arm that had hugged The Cat to her stomach.

Writhing, the cat bounded away. "(Strewth.)"

"Doc, ladies... Son? Everyone okay?" Jack was to his feet and takking keys not waiting for a response. "What the hell was that?"

"Damned if I know," Jenny groaned, holding her head and pulling herself up by the railing, regarding the Vulcan with the emerald gash on her forehead. "(Commander, are you copasetic?) ...I've dealt with explosives in my day, but that was on a whole different level. (Dad?)"

Jack the Cat bounded up onto The Console as if expectant that Harkness should pet him.

"You called me 'son,'" he noted with gleeful satisfaction which had apparently ameliorated his panic. "Does that mean I should start calling you 'Old Man?' Better that than 'That Seppo Digger,' I suhpose."

Holding her head, Jenny peered around the fallen cables and the settling dust for her shotgun, she'd lost track of it while diving for The Cat. "Dad?"

And then she saw him, or at least, a foot of him.

...she saw a red Chuck Taylor poking out from underneath a clump of clammy cables.

"Dad!"

 

[Abraxas Winterlight]

Giles

I had been standing about twenty meters away from the blue box for what seemed like hours, but most likely was less than ten minutes. The ground around it was no longer steaming, and nobody had come out yet. There was ancient writings on the box, old words that I had forgotten how to read. The writing told me that I was correct in my assumption. It was His machine.

I needed answers. I needed help. He was known as a destroyer, but sometimes, only sometimes, he brought hope too.

The legends were vague, and with all legends, I had to believe there was a grain of truth in them.

I walked up to the door and slammed my fist into it three times, the booming echo of my knocks rolling out across the wasteland.

 

[Varshanka]

Commander T'Ker - T.A.R.D.I.S. Bridge

Once she had her own bearing The Commander looked around checking the room, and crew, for more damage. Everyone was up and moving apparently.

Except…

Spotting the familiar footwear she lurched to the side and grabbed his legs, pulling him from underneath the console, extricating him from the tangle of wires with a snapping spark. Wires ripped free as he was reluctantly released by the heart of the tangled web.

Grabbing his shirt she ripped it open, pressing her delicate heart to his chest. A set of soft curls tickled her ear as she listened, the unusual rhythm of his double heart beating against her ear.

Sitting up she arched an eyebrow, wondering if perhaps she should open his breeches as well, they were rather tight on him.

But that wouldn’t be proper.

“Adric, Romana, what’s our status? K-9 link with the Tardis and get me a position report.”

 

[ChasNicollette]

Jen, The Cat, and Ten, with Lunaramblings' Captain Jack Harkness.

"Doc, ladies... Son? Everyone okay?" Jack was to his feet and takking keys not waiting for a response. "What the hell was that?"

"Damned if I know," Jenny groaned, holding her head and pulling herself up by the railing, regarding the Vulcan with the emerald gash on her forehead. "(Commander, are you copasetic?) ...I've dealt with explosives in my day, but that was on a whole different level. (Dad?)"

Jack the Cat bounded up onto The Console as if expectant that Harkness should pet him.

"You called me 'son,'" he noted with gleeful satisfaction which had apparently ameliorated his panic. "Does that mean I should start calling you 'Old Man?' Better that than 'That Seppo Digger,' I suhpose."

"'Seppo,'" Jack harrumphed, as he alternated between flipping switches on The TARDIS' Console and nudging keys on his own Time Agent wrist-strap. Neither seemed especially responsive. "Short for 'septic tank,' which is rhyming slang for 'Yank.' I've fought in two World Wars, 'son,' and that's not counting my passing through as a tourist. You honestly think I've never run up against Aussie digger slang?"

The Cat suddenly became a lot less smug. "'Old Man' it is, then."

Harkness smirked, shaking his head as he put his hands on his hips and stared down the small orange quadruped. "Thing is, I bet you're about as Australian as I am American, am I right?"

The Cat's tail twitched, rattlesnake quick, and then subsided. "Actually, me original feline ancestors are British. There was an incident during The London 2012 Olympics involving an orange cat, and me bloodline's genetic structure never was quite the same after that. But regional accents got all muddled after The Human Empires started..."

Harkness nodded sagely. "That they did. That they did."

Holding her head, Jenny peered around the fallen cables and the settling dust for her shotgun, she'd lost track of it while diving for The Cat. "Dad?"

And then she saw him, or at least, a foot of him.

...she saw a red Chuck Taylor poking out from underneath a clump of clammy cables.

"Dad!"

But the Vulcan commander was already moving...

Spotting the familiar footwear she lurched to the side and grabbed his legs, pulling him from underneath the console, extricating him from the tangle of wires with a snapping spark. Wires ripped free as he was reluctantly released by the heart of the tangled web.

Grabbing his shirt she ripped it open, pressing her delicate ear to his chest. A set of soft curls tickled her ear as she listened, the unusual rhythm of his double heart beating against her ear.

Sitting up she arched an eyebrow...

“Adric, Romana, what’s our status? K-9 link with the Tardis and get me a position report.”

Jenny was holding her head and staring horrified at her father, she was hauling herself along the railing towards her fallen progenitor when T'Ker's barking of orders brought her up short.

"Wait, who?" she actually glanced around at this, as if she were expecting to find someone in the room that she'd missed: "Who are you talking to?"

"Previous Companions of The Doctor," Harkness declared, watching T'Ker through narrowed eyes, "according to UNIT casefiles which I've had occasion to 'borrow.' I guess Spockette's encounter with The Doctor has left her identity in a state of flux? That can't be good."

"Too right it's not good," The Cat snarled: "Did she just call me canine?"

********​

It was several years ago along The Doctor's own timeline, at least as years were measured on Earth. He had regenerated into his tenth body only a short time previously, and there had been adventures with Sycorax and Faces of Boe and cats in nun's wimples and Mad Dogs and Scotsmen...

It was a clear and windy day atop Cadillac Mountain on Mount Desert Island in the Acadia region of Maine in The United States of America. It was 7 August, AD 2010-- a Saturday, 'coz he liked Saturdays --and down at ground level the sun was hot and the air was muggy but up here the wind whipped about something fierce, cooling and penetrating, almost cleansing.

The Doctor wore his brown pinstriped suit and his coat flapped in the wind.

Before him, gazing out at the stunning blues of sky and sea and the verdant hues of the woods below and the paler greens of the lichen and grasses that clung to the rocks under her feet, stood Rose Marion Tyler. The wind whipped the pale gold of her hair about so that, occasionally, all that could be seen of her face was a flaxen curtain.

She stood there for a moment, doing that thing she did, facing away from him, where her fingers curled around the ends of her sleeves and she hung onto them as though for dear life, her arms straight out and down to her sides. She bounced a bit on her toes as she stood there, and The Doctor imagined that, behind that wind-tossed hair, Rose might be biting her lower lip in anticipation of something...

She stood there for a moment, and he watched her.

And then she turned, and her fingers pushed the hair away from her eyes, and she gazed at him bewilderedly. "So?"

He smirked at her. "So, what?"

Turning to face him more fully, pushing a little bit against the wind as she walked towards him, as various visitors to the summit milled about with their cameras, a number of overseas tourists chatting animatedly with each other in Chinese, Rose eyed him intently, curiously. "So, why are we here? 2010, is this some big turning point? I get a front row seat of a proper, uncoveruppable alien first contact? Some sort of beautiful astronomical event that'll spread from one side of the sky to the other?"

The Doctor mused, making a big show of running down 2010 for her like he'd run down 1979. "Erm, 2010, let's see, everyone's talking about a movie called Inception, well, everyone except Leonard Maltin, Heroes has come and gone-- I rather liked that show, the invisible bloke was good, but I really didn't like that they had him working with Eric Roberts."

Rose narrowed her eyes, her teasing tones taking on a hint of personal girl-hood crush insult. "Oi, 'ang on. What's wrong wiv Eric Roberts?"

The Doctor's expression became dismal, but progressed to playful lecturing as he spoke. "I just don't fancy him as a supervillain, never you mind. More to the point, Rose Tyler, what's wrong with this? This beautiful blue sky, pristine oceans, a quaint little touristy town off near the shoreline down there, and all these brilliant beautiful people drinking in the sight of it? What's wrong with that?"

Rose frowned at him faintly, reluctantly admitting: "Well. Nuffing, I suppose. But it's just... it's just..."

The Doctor watched her carefully. "It's just, what, exactly?"

Rose squinted at The Doctor, watching him, she knew he was setting something up, here, she knew he had some sort of moral to this story but it was only just now dawning on her what... "...ordinary."

The Doctor had his hands in his pockets and his coat flapped a bit madly in the breeze. "What's ordinary, really? A blue sky? I could take you to a hundred planets where the sky is puce, a funny little colour between lavender and pink, could take you to a hundred hundred planets where the sky is a boiling red. Green trees, are green trees ordinary? The trees of your planet will evolve into one of the kindest, warmest races in The Universe, one of The Higher Species, you've met them yourself, how could these trees be ordinary?"

Rose frowned, there it was, a hint of what he was getting at, just the merest dearest barest hint.

The Doctor glanced briefly up at the sky, and his eyes, intent, penetrating, searching, returned to Rose's face. "I could go anywhere, anywhen in The Universe, any space any time, and yet I keep coming back here, to this silly little globe. Why is that, do you wonder?"

Rose's voice was quiet. "Yeah. Let's say I do wonder."

The Doctor moved closer to her, almost within breathing distance. "Because there is nothing. Ordinary. About this. Maybe for you blue skies and whitecapped waves are old hat. But oh, Rose Tyler, I just keep coming back. Because there never was a sky so blue. There never was a world so teeming with life, with potential, with possibility, there never was a world so teeming with... actuality."

Rose held her breath, for a moment, and for a moment had an awareness, a palpable awareness of the thrashing of wings, of Time's Winged Chariot, a terrible unshakable unslakable sense of Time Running Out. She waited. With bated breath.

"Just because something's 'ordinary,'" The Doctor murmured, his eyes tunneling into Rose's, "doesn't mean it can't be something... really brilliant."

Another moment hung between them, elongated and protracted...

...and then The Doctor turned away, his coat thrashing in the wind.

"That's so what. That's all."

Rose rolled her eyes and clapped her palm over those eyes and her shoulders surged into a seething shrug. "Blimey! You can't just come out and say anyfhing, can yeh? You have to say all these big, amazing, grand fhings and-- and at the end of it, you haven't said anyfhing! Nuffing at all."

The Doctor turned to face her, there in the whipping wind and the cool clear sun and sky atop Cadillac Mountain. Turned to gaze at her. Quietly and sombrely and brokenly.

And he opened his mouth to say something else.

And then a shrill squawking sound trilled through the wind-swept space between them.

And Rose tugged her mobile out of her pocket, and looked at the LCD.

And, with a sense of finality, she turned away from The Doctor and cupped her hand around the mouthpiece of the mobile. "'Ello, Mickey! Yeah, no, billions of light-years away, yeah, it's tremendous-- wait, slow down, slow down, say that bit about UFO sightings? Say it again, it's windy--"

The Doctor turned away again, eyes scrunched shut for a moment, and began to walk back to The TARDIS, where she was parked by the summit gift shop.

He'd say it later, he promised himself. Say it properly. None of that mucking about with fancy circumlocution. Next chance he got.

But then Rose was hanging up with Mickey the Idiot and was jogging after him and touching him on the shoulder, she seemed... ecstatic about something. The Tenth Doctor did not make a habit of walking in the minds of others but he could practically see it in her skin, she was so excited to have spoken to a bloke who didn't play mind games, didn't change his face-- "We have to go home. Mickey's found somefhing."

The Doctor, the walls of his universe closed-off, just grunted at this. "His arse with both hands?"

...but next, according to the memory, according to what The Doctor was remembering, Rose was supposed to snark at him, was supposed to praise Mickey for taking the initiative in making up 'X-Files fhings' to bring Rose home so Mickey could see her, implying that certain people had well and truly kicked things into touch...

Instead, Rose whipped The Doctor's tie aside, and ripped his shirt open, his buttons went flying, and she pressed her delicate ear to the whisp of chest hair and he stared at her, he boggled and goggled at her, "What? What?"

Rose stared at him, coolly, drawing back to scrutinise him, and declared, peremptorily: "Adric, Romana, what’s our status? K-9 link with the Tardis and get me a position report."

The Doctor stiffened, she shouldn't know those names, she couldn't know those names, those names, he'd never mentioned them, not any of them, not to her, not yet...

But then Rose got even more quiet. Even more ominous. Her eyes swelled up with darkness, and she murmured: "'He will knock four times.'"

Behind The Doctor, The TARDIS waited, standing there in the wind and on the stone and under the sky, and all of a sudden The TARDIS shook with a reverberating BOOM.

One knock.

BOOM.

Two.

The Doctor whirled, his dark eyes wide--

BOOM.

********​

--and on the third knock he sat up like a shot, completely disoriented, didn't know where he was, somehow he was wearing blue now and the interior of The Console Room was still echoing from the third knock, the knocking was real and The Doctor was panicked--

"Don't let him knock again!"

Captain Jack Harkness moved.

Like lightning, like molten lightning sliding down the sky, he moved... he blurred past Jenny, poor dear knocked-about Jenny who'd sacrificed a gentler landing for a snarky little Cat, he found her shotgun dangling from a grating and he caught this up, he caught it on his toe and tossed it to his hands and he was hauling open the door and leveling the shotgun, eyes down the sights at--

--a very healthy-looking, tall, muscular, humanoid male. With no clothes on.

Jack paused.

And arched an eyebrow.

(Behind Harkness somewhere The Cat hissed and yowled and vanished from sight with a paf!)

Harkness' aim with the shotgun never wavered from the newcomer's face and upper body. But he ran his tongue over his teeth with a modicum of not-unpleasant surprise.

"No," he decided. "I'm not knocking this at all. (Did someone order a kissogram? Because if not, I'm calling dibs!)"

 

[Abraxas Winterlight]

Giles

I knocked loudly, powerfully three times and as i drew my hand back to pound the final time the door swung open with great force and speed, and the barrel of an obvious weapon was put in my face.

I had two choices, take the weapon away from him, risking getting shot and definitely not making a new friend with this guy, or I could go along with this and see where it led. A gunshot wound was not fatal for me unless it took out my head, and a head is a hard target. We had learned that early on when the dead started rising.

I raised my hands and stared the man in his face (He smelled strange too. His scent screamed 'See ME!'.) "I am not here to fight, I am here seeking information, and help. This device is not unknown to me, nor it's owner."

I looked the man in his eyes, and saw his eyes widen at my golden ones. "Take me to The Doctor, the King of Avalon wishes a few words with him."

 

[ChasNicollette]

Lunar's Jack, Ten, Jen, and The Cat.

I raised my hands and stared the man in his face. "I am not here to fight, I am here seeking information, and help. This device is not unknown to me, nor it's owner."

"His reputation does tend to precede him," Harkness admitted, conversationally, from the other end of the photonic blunderbuss, pointedly not glancing down at His Majesty's nakedness but continuing to meet that amber-eyed gaze with his own bullshooter blues. "You must know how that feels, things preceding you everywhere?"

"Take me to The Doctor, the King of Avalon wishes a few words with him."

Jack hesitated. "'King?'"

Without glancing away from the newcomer, Harkness called to The Doctor: "Hey, Doc?"

The Doctor was holding his head and attempting to button up his shirt, he was completely askew, something was missing, the--

--The TARDIS was awfully quiet.

He shot to his feet, shoving his glasses on. "Oh, no, ohnonononono, oh you poor dear thing not again, I've killed you again, I-- you're perished, we must be outside of The Universe-- chronomagnetic pulse weapon, only thing that kept us from shattering on the wavefront was the co-ordinate override..."

His eyes flashed to the image translator on the monitor. "Displaying... zero co-ordinates? Oh, that's-- that's not good, that could be a number of places, zero co-ordinates, none of them good. (But the rest of you's dead in the water, how could the image translator be working unless--)"

Darting again, his gaze riveted on a particular switch, the one he'd been trying to reach when the pulse went off, and it was...

"Oh, well," The Doctor sighed, thudding his forehead on the top of the monitor, laughing faintly, brokenly. "There's a relief."

He glanced at A'Lex, smiling faintly. "The last time this happened, going beyond the dimensional barriers without setting up a transdimensional energy bridge first, The TARDIS came so close to dying, but a power cell managed to hang on, skin of its proverbial teeth. Since then, I've set it up so that I can isolate that cell and get it to recharge on its own, I just... I didn't think I hit that toggle in time. She'll be down for awhile, poor thing, but she's not all the way gone."

Captain Harkness waited, semi-patiently, almost apologising to the naked stranger with a roll of his eyes, and then, rinse and repeat, a little bit louder now: "Hey. Doc!"

The Doctor jumped, blinked, shook his head, looked at Harkness. "Oh, wait, you what?"

The Captain indicated the naked fellow outside with a jut of the gun-barrel. "The Emperor here wants to show you his new designer duds."

Adjusting his tie to cover up the gaps in his shirt that were missing buttons, The Doctor said a quick 'scuse me to A'Lex, jogged down the gangplank and up to the door and--

"Oh," he murmured. "'Ello."

He glanced away from the newcomer and at The Captain, his voice low and murmury. "Erm. The Emperor. Isn't wearing any clothes."

"No," Jack agreed, his voice taking on the same low, almost conspiratorial tone, "he isn't. And you figured that out--"

The Doctor nodded briskly, fidgetingly rubbing a finger up alongside his nose, under the rim of his glasses. "--empirically, yeah."

Jack smirked, kind of enjoying watching The Doctor get put on his back foot by all this. "Doctor, may I have the honour of announcing His Royal Highness, The King of Avalon. Your Majesty, The Last of The Time Lords: The Doctor."

"'Avalon,'" The Doctor mused, adjusting his glasses. "Which Avalon's that, then? The mythic original Avalon, or 'Avalon' that's called 'Arthur's World,' or, erm, 'Ave-a-long larf about where your trousers've gone?'"

Jenny, recovering somewhat, still holding her head, edged over to The Console next to A'Lex to peer out through the door.

"Ah." She turned a little red around the edges, but she didn't shy away as she smirked to herself, and attempted conversation with A'Lex. "So that's what a male looks like naked. (It's not as completely unattractive as my anatomical downloads make it seem. But it does make me wonder how humans survived without progenation machines.)"

...The Cat, meanwhile, reappeared by Jenny's feet, curled up into a puffed-up ball of nervous fury wedged as far under The Console as he could manage. "Is he gone?"

He sniffed at the air. "Strewth, he ain't gone."

Glancing fearfully at A'Lex and at Jenny, The Cat demanded: "Please don't let him eat me."

 

[Abraxas Winterlight]

Giles

"Avalon, Third planet of the Sturgis system. Populated by the crew of Starship United Kingdom when the star whale died there over two hundred years ago. I am the last of the Royal Line of England. I can prove it in a way that will leave no doubt, if you are the same doctor that encountered my ancestor, Queen Victoria, in the late eighteen hundreds." I stated, a growl in my throat.

I grew tired of this, and my temper was growing short. I needed to know where I was, and if He was involved, WHEN was just as important!