The universe was infinite, and even the most advanced species had a limit to how far their universe reached, beyond that, was still the unknown.

Lance knew how big the universe was better than anybody.

He knew that the part of the universe Allura and Coran knew was vastly different then the universe Lance had come to know.

The part of the universe that Lance had been around.

After all, Allura and Coran had never heard of the Andromeda Galaxy, or the Milky Way Galaxy, in fact, the Galra, who had had ten thousand years to expand their empire, was still just beginning to discover the human's corner of the universe.

So yeah, Lance could understand how he had never heard about the Galra before now.

And he could understand how Allura and Coran had never heard of the Daleks.

Only now the Daleks were here, and there was no Doctor.

The team gathered in the command room, the communications screen was lit up, and the beings of Lance's nightmares were displayed on the other side.

Three Daleks, one front and center and one on each side.

And Lance felt his blood run cold.

Allura, diplomatic brave Allura, who always tried peace first had no chance against these beings.

As soon as her routine introduction was over, Lance awaited the Daleks response, because he knew he would be fighting his way out of this.

And sure enough...

"We are the Daleks! Prepare to be exterminated!"

His teammate's jaws dropped at the unexpected violent response, but Lance was already heading towards the Blue Lion's hanger.

But it was too late, the Daleks, as always, had taken the first step and were already aboard the castle. A massive explosion accompanied their arrival along with the flashing red lights of the sirens as they started to wail.

Shiro, as always, reacted immediately.

"Everyone bayards out! Be prepared to fight!"

Lance did as Shiro had ordered on instinct, he doubted that his blaster, despite it being far more advanced than any earth gun, would be enough to take down a whole ship of Daleks.

Lance had to think, and he had to think fast.

And then, he saw that the com link was still up. It was all in Altean, but Lance had been in space long enough now to understand the basics.

And even though he didn't have his cell phone on him anymore, the chip in the back making it what the Doctor had called a 'superphone,' he still had the one number in it memorized.

He had starred at it for hours, in the middle of the night when he couldn't sleep because he had gotten so used to the walls of the TARDIS and the faint humming sound that always seemed to echo through the walls and the floorboards.

He had starred at it when the Garrison had brought him to the brink of exhaustion when he wondered if all the frustration and pain of going through the program was worth it.

He would bring the phone out, and bring the number up, and he would star at it. His thumb hovering over the call button. His other hand fiddling with the necklace the Doctor had given him.

Wanting desperately to go back to how it had been, with the Doctor and the TARDIS, next stop everywhere.

He never pressed the call button; he knew that the Doctor was probably off somewhere, saving someone or going on some adventure. He didn't have time to entertain Lance.

And so there he stayed, back on Earth. But he had known, what was out there. And he was in the right place to get back to space, to go on those adventures again.

And so, he would stare at that number, until eventually, he had memorized it.

And now, even though it wasn't a superphone, he figured that a castle floating through space with a magic crystal powering it would have to do.

So while the others drew their weapons and moved towards the door, ready to fight, Lance ran towards the coms and dialed the one number in the entire universe that could get them out of this.

No one noticed what he had done; they had been too distracted by the door being completely disintegrated to see him making a phone call.

But the message was sent, and it was a message that the Doctor could never ignore.

Never once, in all the time that Lance had known him, had the Doctor ever ignored a call for help.

And once the Doctor had locked on to the message, he would find Lance's necklace and be able to pinpoint his exact location.

Only half a dozen Daleks entered the room, but, Lance rationalized, that was all the Daleks ever really needed when they thought they were going to win. And the Daleks always thought that they were going to win.

Keith, hot-headed fierce Keith, was swinging his sword down on the Daleks before anyone else had a chance to react.

Keith was going to die, Lance realized, there was nothing a sword could do to the armor of the Daleks. But what was worse was that Keith's actions sprung everyone else into motion.

As Lance had expected, Keith's sword bounced off the Daleks side with a loud CLANG! The shock vibrated up Keith's arm, visibly throwing Keith off and forcing him back.

Pidges weapon was also ineffective, the electricity it generated doing nothing to them, and the hook sliding off their bodies just as easily as Keith's sword had.

Hunks blaster was the most effective, hitting the Daleks in the side and forcing them back.

And still, the Dalek's moved forwards.

Lance grabbed his blaster, leveling it towards the nearest Dalek, aiming straight at the eyestalk.

The team had regrouped, back to back like they so often did in training, as the Daleks slowly surrounded them.

Allura tried talking to them again.

"Please, we had no intentions of hurting you, we were just passing through."

"We have no interest in your words." The Dalek in front of Allura responded to her, in the screeching voice that they all shared.

"No mercy."

The Dalek was going to kill Allura. And after everything that Allura had been through, this was not how she deserved to die.

Lance squeezed his eyes shut. The team wasn't prepared for the Daleks; no one was prepared for the Daleks.

And their only hope was a madman in a box.

But there was no time to wait for his mad Doctor.

"Wait!" Lance yelled, retracting his Bayard. Somehow, holding a gun didn't seem right when he was talking about the Doctor, that wasn't the Doctors way.

"The Doctor." Lance blurted out, desperate to stop the Dalek from killing Allura. The entire team and Coran had shifted towards Allura; they were all doing what they had been trained to do, protect your teammate. However, Lance thought that in this moment, what they were doing was more than training. This was a more primal instinct, protect your family.

Lance's words worked.

All of the Daleks shifted their attention towards him.

"You know of the Doctor?!" The Dalek in front of Shiro screeched at him.

His teammate's attention locked onto him, looks of confusion filling everyone's faces, but Lance didn't have time to stop and explain it to them.

He had to save their lives.

"I used to travel with the Doctor." Admitting it out loud was strange, never once had Lance said it out loud, who was there to tell it to? No one he knew would understand, and anyone he did tell would think that he was crazy.

But the Daleks new what it meant.

"You were his companion?!" One of the Daleks shrieked, but Lance had long ago gave up identifying which one, because if there was one thing that Lance had learned from the Doctor, was that one way to stall for time to come up with a plan was by talking.

And Lance was very good at talking.

"That's right!" Lance said taking a step forward and feeling only a little satisfaction over the fear that was pounding in his heart when the Daleks didn't move to attack him.

He had their attention.

Lance could feel himself talking, but he couldn't hear what he was saying, just continued to rant about what he had done with the Doctor, trying to find a way out of this. But the others were still surrounded by the Daleks, despite all the attention being on him.

And then miraculously, Lance's necklace started to feel warm.

And Lance grinned, because the Doctor had always enjoyed making a bit of a flashy entrance.

"And you know what?" Lance asked the Daleks, coming back into himself as he continued to grin.

He could feel the question hanging in the air.

"I was fifteen when the Doctor crashed into the ocean and swept me up into the sky, and let me tell you; there is one thing you never, never, want to do when you are an adult in charge of a child."

Lance took a step back towards his teammates, feeling their gaze bore into his back, but it didn't matter, they needed to be as close to him as possible for this to work.

"You never want to lose a child."

There was a faint sound now, and a soft wind seemed to be picking up in the room coming from nowhere.

"And you certainly never want to lose a child in space. But," Lance continued, "If you do lose a kid, you want to make sure that you can find them no matter where they've found themselves."

By now the Daleks had realized what was happening, but it was too late.

The walls were starting to materialize around them, the sound of the TARDIS had grown impossibly loud.

And then it was silent.

Lance turned around; everyone was in the box with him. Everyone had made it.

And then, Lance saw the Doctor.

The Doctor who was stepping away from his control panel, turning around to great him or to lecture him or who knows what because Lance didn't give him the chance to do anything.

Lance had already sprinted forwards towards the Doctor and wrapped his arms around him, in a big hug and had felt more like a kid then he had in a very long time as he clung onto the Doctor.

The Doctor, as always, was slow to respond to affection, carefully placing his arms around Lance as he clung onto him like a Koala and refused to let go.

"It's okay Lance, your okay." Was whispered into his ear and Lance just grabbed on tighter for a moment longer before pulling away, feeling much lighter with just those simple words.

"Lance?"

It was Hunk, his best friend through everything, who had asked so many questions just by saying his name.

Lance turned to look at them, they didn't seem scared, weary maybe, but that was understandable. The inside of the TARDIS was similar to the inside of the castleship so it wasn't much of a shock to them, not like it would have been if they had walked in through the front door. But they had almost died, only being saved after being snatched from their home. And their friend who they had trusted with their lives was hugging a strange man that appeared to be human.

Lance took a deep breath, facing everyone.

"Guy's this is the Doctor, and when I was fifteen years old, he abducted me after he crash-landed on the beach..."