Chapter 1
All was silent in the frigid vault of space, stars hanging in burning stasis as supernovae flared and planets spun in lethargic tableaux. An energy both new and ancient flowed through the meandering interstellar currents of this place; one few could feel, but all were touched by. Its presence was invigorating, its omnipotence breathtaking... its magnitude terrifying. Yet there was a way to the universe which transcended such planes and forces - the slowly exhaled symphony of the stars and the spaces between them, shaping itself across the millennia, inaudible to all transient creatures. The inexorable turn of the universe was invisible to the minuscule, short-lived sentients enfolded in its black velvet embrace... save perhaps one.
This one particular sentient, however, was not really feeling the privilege. He supposed attempting repairs on the TARDIS's systems in the vicinity of what appeared to be a strange wormhole hadn't been the best idea he'd ever had... but then, neither had the whole situation with the giant warships which had led to the damage in the first place... everything had been completely under control, but before he knew it everyone had started turning into bloodthirsty koalas (honestly, whose idea was that?) and it had all gone downhill from there.
"I'm sorry, old girl, but can you get your act together?"
The only response to his abrasive words was a vibrating, resentful hum from the TARDIS console. The Doctor sighed in wordless apology as the faint residual light from her low-powered systems illuminated his face; old and deeply creased but nowhere near broken, a vitality almost unbefitting of his great age apparent in his shadowed eyes. He ran a long-fingered hand through his mass of springy grey hair. It was times like these when he wished he still had Clara with him... or at least he would, could he remember her in the slightest. His eyes darkened - if that were even possible with his sheer mass of overhanging eyebrow - as the memory, or rather the absence, of his latest and perhaps most complete loss clawed away at his concentration (he would have said it clawed at his hearts, but the human attachment to portraying the muscles responsible for pumping blood around the circulatory system as an emotional symbol had always gone rather over his head).
Nevertheless, the elderly Time Lord had more immediate problems. He trailed his hand gently down the console before him, feeling the pulsing energy of eternity encapsulated within the ancient ship.
He hadn't been wrong - since the TARDIS had veritably thrown herself through an inconvenient tear in space and time, eternity had felt different. Not flawed, or damaged, or tainted: simply skewed, as though the timestream were irrevocably changed. Either that, or the Doctor had somehow found himself in the wrong universe. Either way, the TARDIS was in trouble.
"What did that nasty wormhole do to you?" he muttered. The repetitive sound of the cloister bell hammered at the interior of his skull, drilling instinctive dread into the forefront of his thoughts.
"Shut up!" he yelled at the disconcerting alarm, not really expecting such an ephemeral entity as a sound to obey him. Still, there was no harm in trying. The only response from the ship was a soft, almost imperceptible pulse of light from the TARDIS console... before a deep hum resonated through the control room and the lights cut out altogether.
A moment of terror-charged silence, then...
The repetitive echo of the cloister bell started up again, reverberating through the darkness.
"No, no, no-" The Doctor made an impressively rapid circuit of the console, the shuffling slap of his footsteps loud in the unnatural silence. After an instant of frantic motion, his arms dropped to his sides and he stood, immobile in the ringing emptiness.
The TARDIS was not dead; he knew that much. Yet she seemed somehow incapable of functioning as she had been designed to... as though something was disrupting her. He didn't know what this proverbial spanner in the works signified, or where it came from - but he could guess as to its nature.
The Doctor was as attuned to the invisible ebb and flow of the universe as a being of his kind could be. He felt the turn of worlds and the transient flare of stars. As the lives of those who surrounded him surged forwards at the toppling crest of linear time, his simply stood as a deadweight in the current, impervious to time's cruelties - and to its kindnesses. He knew the universe... and now, he did not know it at all, because there was something here.
It was akin to a ringing at the edge of his hearing, or a flicker of shadow in the corner of his eye. It was imperceptible, yet to ignore its presence was impossible. It was an energy, infinite and all-pervading, spreading with effortless alacrity through past and future alike, moulding itself into the very basis for life, shaping the universe into flawless equilibrium. It was disconcerting, and more mystical than the Doctor could ever bring himself to believe, but its most disturbing characteristic was that, like Clara's memory, it was discernible only through its absence. He was not attuned to it in the slightest, and its existence only served to affirm what he knew with building certainty.
This universe was not his.
An unmistakeable stillness seeped upwards into the soles of his feet, and he came to understand that, somewhere in the last few moments of frenetic activity, the TARDIS had landed. When or where exactly she had landed, he had no way of telling... well... save one.
With a muffled grumble, the old Time Lord strode across the shadowed floor, flung open the TARDIS doors with a resounding slam and shouted:
"What did you do to my ship?!"
The words reverberated outwards, ricocheting within what the Doctor saw to be a contorted knot of trees and undergrowth. The TARDIS appeared to have landed in some kind of jungle, coming to rest in what just about passed for a small and rather unimpressive clearing. The atmosphere of the tangled forest seemed breathable, thankfully; the air tasted of dirt and sickly-sweet decay, a rotting humidity which clung immediately to the skin. Through the few spaces not occupied by snaking alien undergrowth, he could see the land ahead drop suddenly into a crumbling precipice, leaving only air steaming gently in its wake. And, hanging in that very air, was the strange energy which had disrupted the TARDIS, somehow even more potent than before.
The Doctor was about to perform a sharp 180 degree turn, because inhospitable jungle worlds really didn't agree with him… and attempting impossible repairs on the TARDIS for a few days or centuries suddenly didn't seem like such a terrible idea... when he felt the unmistakeable, cold pressure of a gun barrel dig against his spine.
Oh, wonderful. A trigger-happy imbecile. Why is it that whatever universe I get thrown into, there are always trigger-happy imbeciles?
The elderly Time Lord was about to turn and berate his attacker for their poor lifestyle choices, when a voice issued from behind him.
"Request: Desist your screeching, meatbag."
For a heartsbeat, the words morphed themselves into the baritone rasp of a Dalek - but the illusion dispelled itself as quickly as it came. This voice, while robotic, was far too emotive. And… meatbag? The Doctor had many names, and would have many more: The Oncoming Storm, the Beast, the Valeyard… but The Meatbag was certainly a new one.
"I have desisted." He spun on one heel, gesturing aggressively towards his face. "Look at me - I'm desisting!"
"Mocking appeasement: Very well, grey one."
Grey one? There's another one for the list.
The source of the voice, he now saw, appeared to be some kind of droid - tall, humanoid and a deep rust-red in colour, clutching a large rifle of unfamiliar design, its orange photoreceptors glowing with joyful menace. A nickname for the metal creature sprung into his mind… one he had already used to refer to a malfunctioning Dalek, no less. Ah, well, he decided, a little recycling has never gone amiss.
"You there. Rusty," he called - which was hardly necessary, but it gave him a very satisfying feeling of control over the situation - "Why are you loitering? Stop loitering. I don't appreciate loiterers near my ship."
Rusty looked suitably affronted.
"Protestation: Why, wrinkled one, I am doing nothing of the sort! I am simply debating whether the act of blasting your sloshy, water-filled self into several hundred pieces would be detrimental to my mission."
"The Doctor was unsure whether to laugh, run or give an impassioned speech on the merits of pacifism. Whoever programmed this droid certainly seemed to have had a unique sense of humour.
"That would be a very bad idea," he stalled. "You see, if you were to shoot me, I would just keep on regenerating. I can assure you it would become really quite boring."
"Wistful reply: Oh, if only that were true. Rekillability is a feature I have always longed for someone to program into you meatbags… it is a personal fantasy of mine... but no, it is too good to be true. The galaxy always seems determined to deny me the simple pleasure of engaging in indiscriminate slaughter."
"How terrible for you," muttered the Doctor, the ground's appetising concoction of mud and decaying plant life sucking at the soles of his shoes as he backed gradually away; as fun as this little chat had been, he had much better things to do than engage in conversation with a homicidal droid. "Now, I'll just be getting back to my ship…"
"Correction: Negative, meatbag." There was something close to glee in the mechanical tone of the killing machine's voice as it continued. "Clarification: I am going to thoroughly enjoy blasting you to pieces."
Well, that wasn't good.
It was only the Time Lord's wealth of experience with being shot at over the centuries which led him to throw himself aside almost before the droid had finished speaking, an action which saved him from a quick fourteenth regeneration as Rusty unleashed a precise burst of red, glowing energy bolts. The shots whipped past the Doctor's head, blasting a smouldering crater into a nearby tree. Drawing on reflexes a being of his age shouldn't rightfully have, he grasped a ridged, vine-entangled branch and pulled himself behind the heavy barrier of a tree's trunk.
His respite was momentary at best - just as his back collided with the tree, concentrated gouts of flame raced to circle it and he had no choice but to leap from cover, coat singed and hearts battering against his ribs from the unexpected exertion. Nevertheless, his antics with the tree had bought him a quarter-second, and that was all he needed. Adjusting the familiar weight of his sonic screwdriver in his palm, he extended his arm towards Rusty, who was already raising the rifle for another shot… One pulse, at the right frequency, right into its behaviour core… The Doctor's hands followed his mind's command in an instant, and something sparked silently within the droid's tall form, its photoreceptors dimming as its systems shut themselves down temporarily. A last stray bolt of energy thudded into a tree behind the Time Lord, tearing through his coat and several layers of skin at his shoulder on its way… a killing shot averted by Rusty's suddenly corrupted targeting systems as it completed its shutdown.
It always comes down to fighting, doesn't it? I mean, why bother with an intelligent solution when you can just bash things or shoot at them until you get your way?
Ignoring the searing surface wound - but feeling more than small amount of resentment towards the damage to his outfit - the Doctor moved to examine the droid as it stood motionless amongst the trailing vines of the jungle.
"You are a very rude robot, you know that?" he told it, pocketing his sonic screwdriver.
Taking its lack of response as a sign that it was fully powered down, he circled its segmented form thoughtfully as the alien noises of the jungle sifted through his ears. The murderous thing was clearly well-made, and it had a forceful, distinct personality which would be rare in mass-produced machines (it reminded him slightly of that violence-obsessed potato, whose name the Doctor couldn't really be bothered to recall, crossed with a Dalek) so it followed logically that it was somebody's - or something's - personal creation. Who would make a droid of this kind, and for what purpose, was a question the Doctor wasn't sure he wanted to consider.
Still, he had next to no information regarding the universe he was in, or the infuriating force which had disrupted his TARDIS, and the memory banks of machines were infinitely more reliable than those of... well... meatbags, as Rusty had so eloquently put it.
Coming to a decision, he approached the machine, peeled back a rust-red panel, and went to work.
Despite its manner, the droid was beautiful. Someone had evidently taken great care in constructing it, and some of its programming was downright ingenious... not to say that the Doctor was impressed with the evil creature, of course; he could have done better, of course, and some of those circuits... no wonder the thing was crazed!
Nevertheless, while the technology was recognisable, it, like everything else in this odd universe, appeared somehow subtly different to anything he had previously encountered. Thus, his ability to tamper with it was limited.
After what could have been anywhere from an hour to half an Earth day, the Doctor finally surrendered to the inevitable. Stepping back with a faint squelch from the ground underfoot, he turned to face Rusty.
"Wakey, wakey..." he muttered.
Light pooled in the droid's triangular photoreceptors as it straightened up, its head moving rapidly from side to side as it orientated itself, then finally coming to rest facing the Doctor. With unbelievable speed, its arms snapped upwards, its metal fingers tightening around the trigger of its rifle...
And nothing happened.
"Exclamation: What fresh hell is this?!"
The Doctor simply smiled, trying to convince himself he wasn't drawing amusement from the droid's horrified manner.
"Diagnostic: It appears my delicate programming has been brutalised, and I am now incapable of harming you. Wonderful."
"Correct." The Time Lord gave his best devious grin. "I bypassed the need for an external stimulus which was blocking access to your memory core - only in effect whilst you are talking to me, of course. I also programmed you to consider me a secondary master, and to afford me privileges as such. Which would explain why you can't exterminate me."
The droid, however, didn't entirely seem to be listening; it was too busy soliloquising on its misfortune and describing in graphic detail each agonising torture it would inflict on the Doctor once its programming was returned to normal. The Doctor in question was less than intimidated by its threats, but he wasn't used to being ignored.
"Have you developed a fault?" he demanded, cutting Rusty's speech short. "I have questions for you to answer."
"Sarcasm: Answering questions? Why, I can hardly wait. After all, it is my primary function."
"All right, all right." The Doctor's patience was approximately as long as his attention span, and it really wasn't proving to be long enough. Honestly, who programs a droid for sarcasm? Once again, he decided not to consider the question. Instead, he began his interrogation. "First of all, why did you attack me?"
The droid was visibly struggling, its loyalty to its master making it reluctant to divulge its secrets to a potentially hostile stranger. However, the Doctor's reprogramming gave it little choice. It would answer any question he posed, no matter how classified the information.
"Explanation: I was using this plateau as a vantage point to observe the meatbag settlement below. Your ill-advised yelling and stumbling about was compromising my position, and as such, you had to be terminated."
It sounded like an excuse, and probably was, given Rusty's penchant for unadulterated violence, but it was plausible enough.
"And why exactly were you observing this settlement?"
"Answer: My assassination protocols detail that I must observe and memorise the daily routine of a targeted meatbag before I select a point at which to terminate its pitiful existence."
Revulsion fortified itself at the back of the Doctor's throat.
"Assassination. So that's what you do. You exterminate anyone you are told to, without question? Of course you do; I can't expect rubbish robots like you to think for yourselves." He fixed the the robot in question with a dismissive glare, folding his arms. "You're not even a droid. You're just a big, walking weapon. Like a soldier, but... rustier."
"Objection: Why, grey one, you wound me! I am not rusty. In fact, I am in prime condition. You are correct: burning holes through selected meatbags in the service of my master is my primary function, but I do have a personal reason for my actions."
The Doctor raised an eyebrow.
"Of course you do. And that reason is your addiction to murder and carnage. which..."
"Interjection: Which was also undoubtedly programmed into me by my master; you are correct. Ah, what glorious irony."
Before he could question whether it fully qualified as irony, the Doctor lost interest in the current topic of conversation (as was his wont), and moved on with yet another question.
"Yes. Whatever. Boring. Now, tell me what's wrong with your universe."
There was a moment of silence as water dripped from leaves in the sickly air of the jungle.
"Query: What are you talking about, wrinkled one?"
The Time Lord gestured impatiently. "Your universe. There's some sort of force in it. Big, mystical, all-encompassing, extremely annoying... can't miss it. It's messing with my ship."
The droid's voice expressed what sounded like a tentative interest when it spoke next.
"Query: Are you referring to the Force?"
"A force, yes. I said it was a force. But what force? You're not much use if you can't be more specific than that." The Doctor wished he'd had the good fortune to be stuck in a jungle with an intelligent droid.
"Condescending explanation: They energy you are asking about is not just a force; it is the Force. That is the only name meatbags give to it."
The Time Lord scoffed. "That isn't very imaginative of them."
"Agreement: Indeed it is not."
"And what is 'the Force', exactly?"
"Definition: The Force: an energy field which forms the basis for all meatbag life in the galaxy and can be connected to or used by certain individuals, who often form into sects such as those infuriating pseudo-pacifist Jedi or the infinitely superior Sith."
The Doctor replied with the obvious deduction: "Just guessing wildly here, but does your master happen to be one of these Sith?"
"Confirmation: You are correct: my master is a Sith. He is also statistically likely to thoroughly eviscerate you once he discovers that you have corrupted my programming and forced me to reveal this information... a spectacle which I shall enjoy immensely."
Of course. Judging by Rusty's charming personality, the Sith probably weren't particularly friendly people. The Doctor had reached the same conclusion about the Jedi, of course; both groups sounded like religious sects, and if there was anything more dangerous than a large group of collectively delusional fanatics, it was a large group of collectively delusional fanatics with the command of a mysterious and powerful energy field. And so, his train of thought inevitably led him to contemplate this field itself. This Force clearly matched the description of the energy he had felt - or rather not felt. He supposed he wasn't one of those individuals who could connect to it; he couldn't be, given that he hadn't been born into its universe. In the past, when he wore a younger face, he might have distrusted such an entity, tried to look for its source or prove its falsehood, but he was older now, and he knew reality better. He could feel the space the Force's absence left, and he knew that it was as ancient and vast as this universe. So, as counterintuitive as it felt, he accepted its presence. But that didn't mean he had to like it. In fact, there was very little about this universe that he liked. The ancient Time Lord had enough experience in the field of solving other people's problems to be able to tell subconsciously when there were problems to be solved, and this galaxy felt as though it were rife with them.
As he turned back to Rusty and asked the resentful droid his next probing question, he tried to convince himself that he was daunted and exhausted by the very prospect of resolving yet another crisis - to no avail. However he tried to suppress it, the familiar onrushing tide of a challenge and the thrilling unknown tore through his weary façade. This universe was not the star-splattered backyard he was used to; he could smell trouble on the mildly soggy jungle wind. This galaxy seemed conflicted. It felt wounded.
And who better to heal a wound than a Doctor?
A/N: If anyone has read this far, thank you! This is my first time writing on this site; I'm going to see how it goes. Constructive criticism is appreciated. I'm probably not going to upload chapters too regularly if only because each one is relatively long but I am hoping to get somewhere with this story and have some great character arcs along the way. I plan for this to span from just before Revan's capture until the end of KotOR 1 with a few timeskips and of course the Doctor thrown into the mix to make everything even more interesting. Revan in this story will be male and roughly adhere to the canon appearance but he'll be far more grey than LS or DS (as he should be!) There will be RevanxBastila but it won't be the focus of the story. I hope someone, somewhere enjoys reading this!