1

In the TARDIS kitchen, breakfast was being made. The Doctor was half buried in the refrigerator, knocking things about, while his granddaughter poked a spatula at the eggs sizzling on the stove. The eggs were turning a very pretty shade of pink; nearly done. On the second burner, a kettle began to whistle. The Doctor ought to have done better than a whistling kettle. His granddaughter had a proper electric kettle in her ship. But he'd picked it up in his seventh regeneration, when he'd been easily amused, and never gotten around to replacing it.

The Doctor's dark, mussed head popped out behind the open refrigerator door. "Walker, you seen the marmalade?"

The Walker pulled a mug from the cupboard. "I believe Jenny ate it."

The Doctor's eyebrows rose nearly to his mussed hairline. "All of it?"

The Walker shrugged. "She had the jar and a spoon."

Her grandfather grimaced. "Not again! That's the third time this month!" He turned to glare back into the depths of the refrigerator, then bent. The clink of bottles being pushed into each other started again, along with a petulant muttering. "Now I'll have to use jam. I hate jam. Specially blackberry jam; how'd that even get in here? Oh, let me guess: Jenny. Don't know how that girl stomachs the stuff."

The Walker smiled to herself as she listened to the older man grumble.

"At least strawberry tastes all right, but of course we would be out of that too. Wonder if she ate that. Erg. Fine. Waffles. You don't put jam on waffles. Walker!" he announced, stepping into view, "We're having waffles today."

"All right, Grandfather."

Boot heels clicked in the hall as the Walker turned the eggs over, announcing Jenny's return. "Morning." she said, setting down an empty jar. Her father looked over his shoulder with a theatrically scandalized expression. "Morning! Is that all you can give me after scrounging the kitchen to within an inch of its life, a cheery good morning?"

Jenny glanced at him, her brow furrowing. "What?"

"You ate the marmalade! Again!"

Jenny raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. "There was less than two spoonfuls left. You ate most of it last night."

"I did not!"

"Yeah. You did. When you were working on the DC power filter for the Colony power sources you wanted to adapt."

The Doctor opened his mouth to respond-then his eyebrows rose. "Ah. Yes. Well, we're having waffles, and then we'll get along. Get out the waffle iron, will you?"

Jenny dropped her annoyed expression for a shrug and a nod. "Right."

"Why don't you use the food replicator?" the Walker asked, over the sound of clanging pans.

"Shoved the thing into a back room," the Doctor answered absently, reaching into a cupboard for the flour. "No matter what I did to it the food still tasted a bit off. Besides, I learned to cook!" Behind his back, Jenny made a so-so gesture with one hand. The Walker suppressed a giggle.

The Doctor hummed lightly as he worked, and soon had a number of waffles piling up on a plate. He served them up with a flourish worthy of a French chef.

"So," Jenny asked between bites, "Can we go to that show after breakfast?"

"Which show?" the Doctor asked, drowning his waffles in grasta syrup. Jenny slipped her plate neatly under the stream, stealing more syrup for herself.

"The Nickleback show. Remember, Nickleback? I say we hit the 2010 European set, or the 2009 show at Fiddler's Green in America. That's in…Colorado, right? Or Wyoming?"

"Colorado, 's I remember. And that was my syrup, by the way."

"You already got more syrup than waffle." she replied judiciously.

"I cannot understand how you can endure that American Modern style." the Walker commented coolly. "It's deafening."

"Oh come on!" Jenny replied, brushing platinum hair out of her eyes with the back of her hand. "When they start playing rock, your whole body gets into it. Your hearts beat faster, your blood pounds to the music." She put a hand against her sternum. "You can feel the beat right here and your whole body wants to dance. I love that feeling."

Her sister looked at her dubiously. Actually, she was Jenny's niece, since the Walker was the Doctor's granddaughter, while Jenny was his daughter and would have been sister to the Walker's mother. But they'd agreed that was all too much of a mouthful, and so the Walker referred to Jenny as her younger sister. Much younger, of course, since there was nearly four hundred years between them.

The Doctor pointed his fork at the older girl."Now, don't make that face, Walker. It's a real cultural experience, being at a rock concert. Besides, you like rock music."

"I've never liked American music."

"You liked the Common Men."

"Who were English, Grandfather, and sounded nothing like American Rock."

The Doctor shrugged. "Each to his own. You can pick the next trip. On that note, Jenny, one of these days-" he swallowed mightily and continued, "One of these days I'm going to have to take you to see the eighties. America in the nineteen-eighties; now that was rock and roll! But, Nickleback you said, Nickleback it is…"

"Grandfather, this is only a short trip before I return to Fanti-Havi, as I've told you." the Walker said, her mind straying back to the diplomatic matters of the planet she lived on. "I really do have work to do."

"Well, then it's a good thing we're going to a short one-night concert, isn't it? But I'm going to eat before we go anywhere, and you two ought to do the same. They say breakfast is the most important meal of the day."

"Who says that?" Jenny asked interestedly. The Doctor shrugged, mouth full. Somebody called 'they', I'd guess.

Jenny rolled her eyes in her father's direction as the Walker chuckled, tucking in. She did have to admit, the waffles weren't bad at all.

In record time they were in the console room, Jenny's body taunt with eagerness, a smile hovering around the edges of her mouth. She glanced up at the time rotor, closed her eyes, then grinned widely.

"Now don't go getting the old thing overexcited." the Doctor chided, his head bent over the knobs and switches in front of him. He flipped two switches, turned several knobs, pulled a lever-frowned, smacked the panel that housed it, and pulled again-then smiled slightly. After tapping at the main keyboard, he looked up.

"Right then, coordinates set, all calibrated."

"'Kay." Jenny said, and pulled the handbrake.

The Doctor watched the ship work with a quiet pleasure. On his left his daughter manned the stabilization and orientation controls. On his right, his granddaughter kept the directional vectors in check. They were doing rather well, if he said so himself.

Until the grating of the ship shuddered beneath his feet. The Doctor frowned. "Jenny, keep the stabilizing matrix steady."

"I was, Father."

"Then you must've laid off on the gravimetric pump. Try-"

The ship juddered hard enough to throw off his balance. He clung to the console. Ah well. They had been doing alright. The Doctor glanced over the readings in front of him as he braced his legs. Oddly, they didn't register any cause for the turbulence, not even the imbalances that came of poor driving.

"Father! Something weird's lighting up over here!"

"What's it look like?" he shouted over the clamor of the ship.

"Bright yellow triangle pointing—wait- now it's a bright orange triangle, pointing down!"

"What?" The Doctor ran to see for himself. Jenny had been right. The power-depletion light was on. What was that doing lit?

"What is it?" Jenny asked, her voice sharp.

"We're running out of power." he replied in surprise. "Why're you running out of power?"

"We're off course!" the Walker shouted, "Grandfather, I can't pull us back into the proper vectors!"

"In a minute!" The Doctor yelled back, bracing his feet as the ship bucked and spun. He rushed around the console, trying to find some cause for the problem.

"Father! It's red now!"

"Gah!" The Doctor grabbed two levers and pulled down, hard. "What color's it now?"

"Orange!"

"Course still changing!"

"We still headed for Earth?"

"Yes!"

"Then let it alone an' get over here!"

The ship gyrated all around them. This was the nastiest turbulence they'd hit in a long time. And the TARDIS wasn't happy about it either. Under his own emotions he felt roiling anger and frustration. Something was happening, and she wasn't doing it.

What is going on?

"Push that! And the next one!" the Doctor shouted to his daughter.

"What about this?"

"That too!"

"The light's red now-no-it turned mauve!"

"We're leaving the Vortex!" the Walker called out. The lights inside the console room dimmed to a sickly red hue, loosing strange shadows that danced as the ship jerked and shook.

Jenny held on to the console with both hands. "Father, I think we're gonna-"

There was a bone-shaking lurch, a slam that knocked him to the floor, a wheezing scream out of the machinery beneath the grate.

Stillness.

Silence.

The Doctor got slowly to his feet. His dark eyes moved from his daughter, already standing, to his granddaughter, who'd landed in the console chair. The Walker looked a little dazed, but she was all right. They were both all right. His stomach unclenched.

Right. Everyone's all right. Everything's all right, 'cept the power loss.

So what in the Seven Systems just happened?

For a moment, the three Time Lords stared at one another, breathless, dazed.

Then Jenny turned on her heel, and took off at a jog for the door. The Doctor's form tensed. "Jenny, I think-"

But she had already pulled the door open and was silhouetted against the opening, staring out. Beyond the door, green hills stretched away to the horizon, framed in a soft blue sky.

All right, Earth, Northern Hemisphere probably, looks like either spring or early summer, earlier than the nineteenth century from the look of it, but…

Then Jenny's form went rigid.

"Jenny-" the Doctor said, warning in his voice. Too late. She was out the door. "Jenny!" the Doctor took off down the ramp and out the door. One look told him exactly when and where they were. He took a precious moment to look around, eyes wide. "Oh-oh..."

One of the worst possible places they could have landed. One of the absolute worst.

A wave of anger, Jenny's anger, flashed through his head like lightning. There was a crash from around the other side of the ship. The Doctor ran to the side. And then he saw what was happening behind his ship.

"Jenny, no wait , don't-"

But his warning was too late. Jenny had already reached the crowd of men, landing a flying kick into the first one who came within reach. She hit out at the one beside him, delivering a blow that probably broke the human's jaw. Her form was outlined black against the flames that reached out of the burning house, licking orange and red.

The Doctor began to run.