Word count: 1979

Utopia, Part I

"Good, good, good!"

"Apparently I'm good," said the Doctor, smiling at his two companions, Captain Jack Harkness and Martha Jones as he followed the enthusiastic Professor Yana to his lab.

Not half an hour ago, the Doctor and Martha had landed in Cardiff in order to recharge the Tardis. It was where they had met Jack, who was an old companion of the Time Lord who had been abandoned in the year 200,100. Jack had jumped on the ship has it had been leaving Earth and his presence had caused the Tardis to fly to the end of the universe.

It was then that Martha had discovered that Jack couldn't die, something she still had problems grasping entirely. Give her paradox any day, but a man who couldn't die? It was a bit too weird for her.

From what she had understood of the short discussion the two men had had before they had had to run for their lives again, Jack's immortality was all thanks to Rose.

Jack had been overjoyed to hear that the blonde was still alive (for some reason he had thought her dead), at least until the Doctor mentioned that the girl had disappeared.

Martha had met the Doctor and Rose when she had been working as a medical student - a story involving Judoons and the hospital being transferred to the moon. The blonde girl was a bit mysterious since no one, not even the Doctor knew where or when she came from but she was also really nice. At first Martha had been a bit jealous, but Rose's life obviously wasn't that easy and she and the Doctor were obviously in love.

Then one day, she had just disappeared. She had left to buy herself a new dress and had never come back. The Doctor had been a right mess after that, but she knew he was still hoping she'd come back. Apparently it wasn't the first time she made a disappearing act, but it usually lasted a couple of weeks maximum and by the time they met Jack more than half a year had gone by without any news.

Back to the base though.

The last colony in the universe, hosting the last living beings of the whole universe, all of them gathered there in the hope to get to the mysterious Utopia. There was no need to saw how pleasant a surprise it had been to find that even when the stars had stopped shining and after the universe became cold people still hadn't lost all hope of survival.

As soon as they had arrived there, the Doctor had been 'kidnapped' by Yana, the scientist of the base so he could help him make the rocket work. Said rocket was supposed to take everyone to Utopia but for now it wasn't working.

Upon his arrival in the lab, the Doctor had immediately began to tinker with everything he could find, complimenting the genius of the old professor who had created everything by himself as he tried to bring himself up to date on the technology. It was nice to see that even the Doctor didn't know everything, and for the Doctor it was a very refreshing feeling to find something he could still learn.

The old man worked with another scientist named Chantho, who was the last of the inhabitants of the planet they were on. Chantho was very helpful and kind. She made very nice company for Martha when the Doctor and Yana took off on a science conversation she hadn't ever had any hope to understand. Even Jack who had acted like he understood in the beginning was now as lost as she was, and Chantho was nicely trying to explain to the both of them what had happened to the universe in the last few years - to her knowledge at least - and also gave them more information as to what Utopia was exactly.

Martha knew the Doctor was acting like a kid on sugar high set free in a candy store just a few feet behind her, but she had nothing more to do than listen to Chantho's stories and Jack's flirting. She felt a bit useless and it almost made her wish something would happen, just so she wouldn't die of boredom.

-oOo-

The Doctor was in heaven. Sure, Jack' presence was still a nasty presence at the back of his mind, his time senses tingling uncomfortably at the thought that he was so close to a fixe point in time - an unnatural fixe point - and they also were at the end of the universe, farther than anyone with a time machine had ever dared explore. The Tardis was possibly somewhere on this planet, surrounded by hostile beings (he didn't really know how to call the things who lived on this planet, trying to kill anyone they came across) but then it also wasn't the first time something like that happened and he knew the old girl could take care of herself. And let's say that it wouldn't be the first time he'd have to cross into enemy territory to get back to his magnificent ship.

Plus he was somewhere and somewhen completely new, and how many times could he actually say that? And Yana was absolutely brilliant. A true genius, and working with him was a real honor. Some of his ideas shouldn't even have been able to work but somehow they did and it was all thanks to him some people had survived to the end of the universe here and would be able to leave this planet o go to this Utopia.

It warmed his hearts to see that at the end of everything humanity was still doing good an that they had hope, even if he knew that there were high chances the signal for Utopia was nothing more than a fluke. Everything had its time after all, and death is the one thing no one could escape.

Or at least no one should be able to, he thought as he sneaked a glance to the passenger he had picked up involuntarily on Earth. The man whose timeline burned too brightly and too endlessly in time was laughing as he talked to Martha, probably about some of his naked stories.

With a sigh he went back to his conversation, suddenly missing Rose fiercely. She would have been happy to see Jack again even though he wished he wished she would stay far away from the flirty Captain.

"You should meet my niece. She's been very helpful to me all these years, I'm sure you'll love her," said Yana, their conversation having left the 'how this piece of technology work' for the 'what happened to him to make him come here and what his life was like'.

"I thought Chantho was your assistant and that she was the only other scientist here," asked the Doctor, frowning.

"Oh she is. Chantho has assisted me in this work for as long as I've been here, but Rose helped me before. As I said she's been very helpful and I really don't know where I would be without her. I've been in charge of her for as long as I can remember but truthfully sometime it feels like she's the one in charge of me. She's a kind soul, I'm sure you'll like her," the old man explained with a fond smile.

The Doctor could have sworn his hearts skipped a beat at the name, but it wasn't the first time someone he met mentioned a person wearing that name. Rose had left - no, disappeared, she wouldn't have left - for seven months now but he still looked everywhere for her, his hand often stretched only to meet empty air where before he was holding another hand.

"Really? And how did you come to be in her charge, if that's not too much to ask?" The Doctor asked, curious despite himself.

"Oh we were found together, back when I still a young lad. We wandered from one refugee ship to another until we got here and I met Chantho. We began working on the rocket not long after that and we've been on the Utopia project ever since. Rose actually gave me a few ideas on what to do when we were stuck somewhere."

That sealed it. There really was no way this Rose had anything to do with his Rose. If she had been found with the Professor back when he had been a child, she would be too as old as he was. Still, she sounded like a nice lady to meet if she was able to keep up with a genius like the Professor.

"I'd be honored to meet her then," smiled the Doctor, "you must be very proud of her if she's helped you that much in your work and survived in these harsh times."

"Yes, proud…" Yana faltered and for a second something dark flashed in his eyes. Before the Doctor even had time to worry about it though, it was already gone. The Professor brought his hand to his head and slowly rubbed it. "I'm sorry Doctor. I have those headaches sometimes, they're horrible. It's the curse of old age," he added half-jokingly, looking better already.

"Are you sure you're alright?"

"Yes, yes, I'm perfectly fine. Though the sooner we manage to make that rocket fly the better."

"Of course. I'll help you and you'll see, soon enough everyone will be soaring of into space!"

"Thank you. But first, you should meet my niece I think. After all, I did tell you you should."

The old man left the lab part of the room and went toward the door where he used an odd device to ask to be joined by his niece. A voice answered, telling him she was on her way.

The next five minutes were spent tidying up the place a bit. Jack shoved the Doctor's hand back in his backpack but not before the Doctor noticed it and promised to confiscate it. It wouldn't do to scare everyone into thinking them mad; even though it was highly possible they had seen weirder things.

Finally they heard footsteps coming and a light knocking on the door.

"Enter my dear," said the Professor, "there are some people I want to introduce you."

The woman who entered the room was blonde and wore a white top with blue jeans (though they probably weren't real jeans, those had disappeared with Earth when the planet had been destroyed). She looked human, but unless humans had gained the ability to remain young and the same age for sixty years, which was about the age Yana was, she wasn't human.

Because the woman who had just entered the room, Yana's niece, was either a perfect copy of Rose Tyler or she was Rose Tyler. And since no beings were ever truly identical unless they were cloned or shape shifters… There was a high probability this was the Rose the Doctor knew. This Rose also shared the same lack of visible timelines around her, like they were locked away or very well hidden, that Rose had and as far as he knew no one had ever had his or hers timelines hidden that way.

Which meant that this Rose had either been kidnapped from when she was with him and put here where she somehow survived without aging for sixty years or she was younger and hadn't met him yet. While the first was highly improbable, the second brought even more questions as to how she had even been able to find herself on Earth in 2005.

The Doctor didn't have any more time to think on those possibilities as Yana was introducing his niece to everyone, seemingly not noticing his three guests' gobsmacked expressions.

AN/

I've been meaning to write on Doctor Who for a while now… This wasn't what I had planned but the idea for this literally hit me when I was in the car earlier and I couldn't close my eyes without writing this first.

I'd like to have feedback on this, to know what you think of it :p And I'm currently hesitating between continuing it like that with perhaps flashbacks or discussion which would give the information or coming back in the past and explain how Rose got there in a chapter or two…

Anyway, I hope you liked this.

This author is poor. This author is hungry. Have mercy, leave a review.