AN: Here's a quick one with Nine waking up just after the War. Gets a bit angsty, but I tried to wrap things up with a hint of hope. Enjoy! And if you feel like it, please do leave a review! :)

Breathe in. Breathe out. Repeat.

The man (he wasn't entirely certain what his name should be, because it had been so long since he had used it for himself) had to focus on every individual breath, because if he didn't, he thought he might forget to breathe altogether. His eyes felt raw and his throat felt scratchy and his lips were cracked with dried blood, as though he had been crying. No, crying wasn't strong enough to describe it- it was more like he had been sobbing. His teeth were tightly ground together, and his ice blue eyes searched the ceiling of the junky old time machine, confusion lining his features.

Why was he lying on the floor?

It was as though someone had carefully placed him there, but he couldn't remember who. He felt the ghost of a kiss on his forehead.

Live, and be the Doctor again.

That was supposed to be his name. The woman, she called him that, the woman…

He couldn't remember. The memories were slipping away already. But they were replaced with fresh ones. Memories that would terrify any sane person. Drive them insane. He had always been a bit mad.

Burning. Everything, burning, screaming, falling, Arcadia, falling, help, oh, Rassilon, please, please, help, the silence, the silence is falling-

Breathe in. Breathe out.

His mental blocks slammed into place. The silence was too much for his mind to handle, and he knew something had been tampered with, leaving him even more vulnerable. He sat up, gripping the side of the console for support, his breathing shallow.

Dead. They were all dead.

The man leapt to his feet unsteadily, hunching over the cold metal of the console for balance. Once the spots cleared from his vision and he was certain that he wasn't going to topple over, he whirled around the console with a mad, furious passion, hot, unidentifiable emotion welling up in his chest and flooding his entire frame. He trembled as he spun around the TARDIS console, slamming his fist down on buttons, shoving up switches so that the time machine jerked and jolted, and the cloister bells sounded in alarm.

The old time machine nearly screamed in alarm as she saw where he was headed. Her Thief, her poor, poor Thief was spiraling directly into a black hole.

Usually, she didn't take over; she preferred to gently guide the Doctor on where to go, and she was always content to take him where he needed to be. But now, now, as he refused to listen to her panicked sounds of alarm, as he took them directly into danger, she had to take the reins.

She forced the her capsule in an entirely different direction, the force of it so great that it threw her Thief stomach first into her console. She felt a morbid sense of satisfaction.

Good. I hope he's learned his lesson.

He needed to see that he had to live. Romana's telepathic suggestion had been strong, but it wasn't enough. The Doctor had always been far too free-willed to listen to silly mind tricks. He had to make that decision for himself. And she had the perfect place, the perfect person, to show him what he meant to the universe.

The man- he still wasn't sure about using his name- gasped as his ship rebelled against him, as he was thrown into the console, and onto the floor, his gut aching from the blow to the metal. He tried to crawl back up to the controls to take the reins back on his ship, but the TARDIS landed with a sharp jolt, throwing him back to the floor, and before he could make his way back up to the middle, the room flooded with smoke.

He coughed, his respiratory bypass system kicking in immediately, but the upkeep of his extra air storage had never been comfortable. It was designed specifically for emergencies, and this situation was no coincidence: his TARDIS had mutinied against him, and she wanted him to go outside.

Interfering cow.

But his survival instinct finally took over, and he crawled to the exit, his lungs on fire. When he landed face first in the cool, sweet grass (that, he reminded himself, he most definitely did not deserve to smell), the doors locked behind him, rather ostensibly. Breathing in the fresh air that was welcome in his lungs, he stumbled to his feet and hammered on the door.

"Let me back in!" he attempted to yell, but it came out as nothing louder than a hoarse burr. His eyes burned. "You know it's best if we die out with them! No place for us anymore, not in this universe, not in any universe!"

The doors sparked at his fingertips gently as he screamed at the stubborn lump of metal, and he hissed, sucking on them lightly as he backed away, scowling deeply.

"Fine," he spat. "You want me to leave, I'll leave! Don't expect to see me any time soon, though!"

He slunk away from the box, deftly ignoring all the odd stares directed his way. He couldn't be bothered by whatever ignorant species thought he was mad.

Even though he was mad.

He walked for hours away from the only remnant of his home, his hearts blazing with bitter anger, most of which was designated towards himself. But his legs grew weary after a long while, and he collapsed onto a park bench, sweat slicking his neck, his forehead. At the same time, chills raced down his spine. He felt time twisting even more now, and he struggled to reconstruct his barriers despite his shattered mental state.

"Are you okay?"

The voice beside him made all the air leave his binary vascular lungs, and he swore to himself that it was his imagination. It had to be. Because if it wasn't his mind playing tricks on him, if the boy speaking to him was real…

"I asked you a question, didn't I? You look in a right state of things."

The Time Lord turned his gaze, almost fearfully, though the boy who appeared next to him was nothing to be afraid of.

He was a teenager, probably around sixteen or seventeen, with a mop of hair that almost perfectly resembled the Beatles in their prime. He was wearing odd, pajama-like clothing, and the man's hearts seized up in agony at the sight of the blue and gold star on his breast pocket.

"What's wrong?"

His voice softened from the sharp tone from before, and the stranger's deep brown eyes gazed into his ice blue ones. The Time Lord hadn't seen those eyes in centuries. Those eyes were dead. Long dead.

"Adric-" he managed to sputter out, before the Alzarian's eyes closed off again, flashing with suspicion.

"How do you know who I am?" the boy asked quickly, recoiling slightly. "No one knows me in this universe. Except the Doctor, and Tegan and Nyssa. But especially no one here."

"I…" the man once known as the Doctor managed, but the words died before they left his lips. He had to leave. It was the only proper response for the situation, but he couldn't help but remain fixed in his place. His feet were glued to the ground, and his lungs felt as dry as his mouth. "Adric, my boy…"

"Excuse me?" Adric snapped, folding his arms across his chest in indignation. "I refuse to sit here and listen to you patronize me like this-!"

"Adric, I'm… I'm not…" The Doctor had to stop to catch his breath. "Please, I'm a friend. Of… of the Doctor's."

Adric's suspicion lessened slightly, but his expression was still wary. He kept his posture in the same tense stance.

"You know the Doctor?" he asked quietly. "What's he look like, then?"

"Oh, don't be daft, Adric," the Time Lord bit back, harsher than he meant to. "Not really a fair question, considering he's… where he came from." There was a visible pause when the Doctor brought up his race. He was the only one left, now. "Anyways. When he was with you, he had the long scarf, the grin, the jelly babies. With…" He swallowed. Romana's dying screams echoed in his ears. He tasted bile.

Live, and be the Doctor again.

He shook his head, continuing on.

"And if he's regenerated already, and you're with Nyssa and Tegan, he's likely wearing cricket whites and celery on his lapel like a right idiot," he scoffed, recalling his past self's strange affinity for wearable vegetables. "And he's probably all wrapped up with Nyssa and Tegan and he's probably hurting you more than he's helping…" The Doctor shuddered, his mouth drying up. He had gone over everything he could have done better with Adric, and maybe, if he'd done something differently, the boy would still be alive.

Adric stared at this strange, broken man before him closer now, looking deeply at the icy blue eyes that so much resembled those of his Doctor, the blonde one that seemed, in his post regenerative state, to not care about Adric one bit.

"Doctor…?"

"That is not my name, boy," the Time Lord hissed, and Adric's eyebrows shot up in indignation. "Not… not anymore."

"Doctor, I can see that it's you," the Alzarian replied, rolling his eyes. "Got yourself into some mess again? I suppose you're on your own. No me there anymore." He paused. The Doctor shrunk. The boy was always so smart. So logical. So matter of fact. "Am I wrong?"

"No."

Adric hesitated, the nervous pause making it clear that he knew absolutely what happened, even if he didn't know every detail.

"Well. That answers that, then, doesn't it?" His voice was surprisingly calm for someone who just found out they were going to die, though a slight wobble was evident. "I suppose we had a good run. Were… Nyssa and Tegan- were they okay?"

The Doctor said nothing.

"They can take care of themselves, I suppose," the boy continued, hiding thinly the tremor of emotion. "But Doctor… something's happened to you. I can tell that much. Your expression… it reminds me of when we ran into the Silurians and the Sea Devils. When they all… died. You said there should have been another way." It was as though Adric could sense that he was treading on volcanic rock. "There wasn't another way. It happened again, didn't it? You had to make another one of those decisions, didn't you?"

The Time Lord remained silent for another moment, before he turned his head to meet the boy's dark eyes.

"How… how did you…?"

"I'm smarter than you give me credit for. Than you," he paused, "than you gave me credit for. Whatever it was… I know you wouldn't have done it if you thought there was another way."

"There… should have been," his voice came out in shallow, short breaths. "There should have been. There should have been another way. There should have been another way."

A hand on his shoulder. His breath caught in his throat, stopping him short.

"No," Adric said firmly. "I don't know what happened to make you give up your name, but I do know that you wouldn't do anything if you weren't sure it was the only way. You…" He hesitated. "You must live, Doctor. It's not your time yet. Because statistically, the amount of times you saved someone is far greater than the amount of times you didn't."

"I don't see how that's a reason."

"There are people out there who need your help," Adric snapped, and the Doctor recoiled at his sudden anger. "Quit wallowing and do something about it. I don't care what you've done. I don't. Because as much as I resent you sometimes, Doctor," A wry smile curved onto his lips. "I know how important you are to the universe."

"Oh, Adric…" the Time Lord's voice trembled. "I… I never appreciated you. You were brilliant. I'm sorry. I was… so wrapped up with… with regenerating, and then trying to get Tegan back home, and Nyssa never recovered from the destruction of… the destruction of…"

He couldn't finish. Adric released his shoulder.

"It's fine," the Alzarian replied quietly. "I understand. I do. I know I act childish most of the time, but I really do respect you, you know."

"I know," the Doctor replied. "I know, my boy, I-"

"Adric!"

Another voice. A past voice. A voice that sounded very, very different outside his own lips. The Doctor ducked his face away.

"We've been looking all over for you!" the Fifth regeneration of the Doctor approached. The Ninth stared at the cricketers shoes, keeping his chin tucked down so that his prior self couldn't see. "Honestly, Adric, you can't just keep wandering off whenever you like, you'll get yourself killed someday, and then where would we be, without your stunning wit?" Sarcasm reeked from the voice, and the Ninth cringed at the words that rang far too true. "Who's this?"

The Doctor kept his head down.

"It's… no one," Adric stated bluntly, and the Doctor let out a sigh of relief at his lie. "Just someone I was talking to. Not every planet has some evil alien plot. And you'd be lost without me."

Their footsteps trailed away with their voices, and the Doctor let out the oxygen he hadn't realized he had been holding in his respiratory bypass. His body trembling, he forced himself to rise to unsteady feet.

"There are people out there who need your help. Quit wallowing and do something about it."

The Time Lord mustered a deep breath. As much as he didn't want to admit it, the Alzarian genius was right. He owed a debt to the universe. And he couldn't go into repaying that debt by wallowing for a second longer.

He started his way back, staggering to his TARDIS, his hearts thrumming nervously, but with something he hadn't felt in centuries.

Hope.