"Ow!" The Doctor yelled, cursing in multiple languages and emerging with a hand pressed to his forehead. He turned to face the main column, letting out an agitated humph and a withering glare at his beloved ship. Although if you asked him right now he'd probably say "a disobedient, unappreciative ship that never does what I tell it too!" and start to list other unpleasing attributes he claimed she possessed at that moment. Other times he'd call her sexy.

"What was that for!" he exclaimed, throwing his unoccupied arm up in a frenzy and almost falling off the raised platform he'd walked onto. He steadied himself with his raised arm and straightened his bowtie sulkily while the Tardis hummed in amusement. It quickly stopped though when suddenly, the lights failed and the power died completely. The Doctor scowled in the dark.

Initially, it just added to his annoyance. As far as he was concerned at that moment the Tardis had done it to mock him, something which fell snugly into his pet hates, getting mocked by anyone, especially his ship.

This had all been strangely unusual, for her as she didn't normally result to violence when it came to his usual dilly dallying as for the most part it was completely harmless and beneficial in some cases... And her (sometimes evil in his opinion) humour at his pain annoyed him on his even on his good days. Today was certainly not one of those days sadly.

Today, he was in a foul mood, due to his failure in delivering the couple who currently travelled with him to a perfect holiday destination he'd been promising for weeks. It was a planet made entirely of diamond and several beautiful displays, similar to ice sculptures could be seen at this time in the year for them, and it was one of the Doctor's all time favourites. They of course had been sceptical that they would ever get there and when the Tardis had landed them in a rubbish tip, twentieth century America it had caused him a great lot of embarrassment and annoyance and justified his companions' lack of faith. What's more, they were still making fun of him and he knew it wouldn't die down for weeks. As usual he blamed the Tardis and her common miss-navigations that led to all kinds of trouble when Rory had climbed back into the Tardis with a banana skin hat but his companions didn't believe him or enjoyed harassing him anyway. Personally he wouldn't have minded the banana skin on his head...

Fiddling with the Tardis mechanics always cheered him up and so it had been the first thing he'd done since they'd retreated back to their room, claiming tiredness and lack of interest in trying to find another place. He'd pondered whether they would allow him to try again tomorrow and then picturing facing them, quickly changed thoughts. It relaxed him with the need to concentrate and gave him something to do while his constant human companions had to sleep.

Humans were cheap versions of the Time Lords and he made sure to boast to any new one he met. He also used it as a back up in an argument with the opinion that he could always call them an ape and they wouldn't be able to claim any such names back on him as that would be degrading them even father.

On a deeper level though, the Doctor without a name had many reservations for this. For one, he was always the one watching them die with every step he took and for another, he could never fall in love without having his hearts ripped, torn and shredded. For him, by the time he realised he was already too far in and that it could never ever be forever, it was too late. Then there was always their death to haunt him. Later, on his return, he'd try to pick up the shattered pieces of his hearts to try to put them back together again and would grab someone else to run with him because they stopped him having to look into his great big nothing. Riversong, he didn't understand her or their relationship. There was something wrong about her, something that reminded him of himself... but he didn't know why.

If you could feel his deepest feelings, he felt the greatest ache of loneliness and had constant reminders and names to add to his list of grief. His own losses (many resulting from the terrible actions he was forced to take) and the people he couldn't save had all resulted from his long and seemingly endless existence. Instead of dying like he sometimes thought he should, he faced a different man in the mirror, a stranger and who would mark a separate part of his existence and the rebuilding of his identity... again.

Riversong was just another name and when he ever pondered their strange friendship (if that's what you could call it) and her weird times to turn up, he tried to derive distance, because after all, knowing her too well meant thinking about her death for him harder. Death avoided him and he pondered when it would really meet him and when it would finally catch up with her in her timeline and his past timeline.

But back to now and the less depressing side of his life, travelling and acting childish and all mad scientist fun. This Time Lord was furious and he didn't care if he sounded like he was overreacting.

"Ha ha, very funny, now turn the lights back on or I won't bother fixing you ever again!" he warned with vicious anger, clearly not finding his current situation funny and hearing the surprised and confused cries of his two other companions as they too were interrupted from, well, whatever they were doing in their bedroom, (the Doctor had hinted to them after the last incident in their bedroom to since restrain from doing anything that might have future repercussions or involve domestics of any sort, especially babies).

"Amy, Rory, you two okay?" the Doctor called automatically and was greeted by two quiet but recognisable replies that they were both fine.

"But what's going on Doctor?" Amy's voice rung out through the ships hallways again, "Who turned off the lights?"

The Doctor gave what he thought was where the Tardis controls were another glare before replying calmly, "It's nothing, they should be back up in no time. The Tardis is just being difficult."

He thought he heard her chuckling and gritted his teeth. Everything was just going wrong today.

His ship still hadn't made a sound and the Doctor admitted, looking back, that his threat had been overly harsh. Worried that he might have offended her and that they'd be stuck inside for days, he moved forward and found his way to stroking the main console in the pitch black. He hoped his mainly selfish motives hadn't already destroyed any chance of her accepting his apology.

"I'm sorry; you know I didn't mean that. I was just in a bad mood; can you turn the lights back on?"

There was a low, menacing hum that sounded more like a groan from the depths of the Tardis but no lights dared to flicker on.

The Doctor sighed, annoyed at himself, a smidge still at the Tardis and his companions and now guilty for hurting his ship. It was his oldest, most loyal best friend after all. Dark thoughts were beginning to enter his mind of him losing her when four holograms began to flicker into life like ghosts or some might have said angels... But they were hardly them at all.

He stared up at them, half in awe, half in confusion. Had the Tardis decided to forgive him, so soon? His guilt level rose at the thought that she might be a better friend than himself and of his outburst.

Four humans began to take place (he didn't reckon the Tardis would have a reason to show him Time Lords), the first taking a clearer form before the others. The young woman stood, clad with the distinctive features of straightened blonde hair, a new blue leather jacket, a plain mauve pink shirt poking out from beneath it and reasonably tight black pants. Before he knew it he had a Rose Tyler hologram staring straight at him with hard brown eyes. He gaped dumbly, unsure whether this was punishment or some kind of sick joke.

Her skin glowed, providing him with a meagre amount of light to see with as she spoke robotically, "This is the voice interface, Emergency Protocol 5534, please do not panic."

Beside her another figure had almost emerged, also young and also clad in new leather jacket, except this one was red. Her dark complexion flickered as well with invisible candle light.

"This is the voice interface, Emergency Protocol 5534, please do not panic," Rose Tyler and Martha Jones now repeated together.

The Doctor was panicking (and worrying) though, as his noble Donna took her place beside them, dressed also in a leather coat but a longer one, open at the front to reveal a stylish grey sweater and a red belt and easily recognisable from the last time she'd remembered him before he'd wiped away all her memories of him to save her from burning up. What was going on? What was emergency protocol 5534?

He was pretty well sure now that this wasn't a joke; the Tardis never activated protocols as a joke.

"This is the voice interface, Emergency Protocol 5534, please do not panic," the three voiced in synced monotone.

The Doctor had had enough as he predicted what would happen when the fourth figure emerged and screamed, "Just be quiet!" And they were.

"Now what on Earth," he questioned slowly to the system, "Is Emergency Protocol 5534? Tell me!"

There was a brief more moment of unnerving stillness before the four, now joined by their very own Amy Pond, continued, "Emergency Protocol 665 has also been activated. Please do not panic."

The Doctor realised he'd dumped himself on the glass floor after demanding answers and sprung up to the face the four glowing faces of his companions past and present to ask again, "tell me! Explain yourself!"

He. Hated. Suspense.

Again, there was another silence before they finally answered, "Emergency Protocol 665 has been activated due to instability in the time line causing a split between two separate time streams."

"A crack in time again? I thought I'd fixed that, "A dark frown burrowed on his face, "And what is Emergency Protocol 5534?" Although he wasn't sure he wanted to know. The suspense was now more of something resembling dread.

"Emergency Protocol 665 has been activated due to an unauthorised removal of four of your companions from their given timeline. All took place at the same time, in different locations on Earths."

Fear was practically bubbling up inside the Doctor now as he muttered the simple question, "when?" He could feel something wrong in his own timeline, something had changed that shouldn't of since they lights had cut out and he knew somehow it related to the people in front of him.

"The 30th of September, 2011 at 9:24PM is the closest the Tardis could detect to their disappearances." They hadn't taken any time to answer him now and he wondered if they'd been slow at first to make him suffer but then he decided it was probably them loading or booting and that that was more likely...

The Doctor opened his mouth in disbelieve as he looked up at the glowing red head, "But I just went there with Amy and Rory, we visited Brazil, nothing was wro- ah..." Because there was something wrong. Amy had disappeared.

"But who's doing it and where may I ask is the crack?" his voice raised itself in pitch again and he wondered if Rory was about to storm in in his own confusion, wanting answers. The Doctor hoped not, because he didn't have any. He was more full of questions and worries than her husband was.

"The kidnapper could not be identified. Scans are still taking place but are being halted by the system's attempting closure of the crack." At least the voice interface had started calling it a crack instead of wasting his time with a lengthy description. He was really sick of having a conversation with a computer though.

Then they continued, "The crack as been located on a Tardis wall separating a hallway with Amelia Pond and Rory William's bedroom."

The Doctor's mouth fell open as he realised that there was a new danger to fix and he ran out of the control room as fast as he could without any proper light, stumbling over stray wires and machinery and whatever got in the way of his descent. The four holograms stayed there staring into the space he'd been, obviously waiting for him to return as he felt his way along the Tardis corridors.

"Why that room, why does it always have to be the room they're in?" he mumbled agitatedly to himself and then piped up, "Rory? Rory, are you there? Get out of your room!" after a moment he added, "And don't touch the wall!"

It then occurred to him that Rory probably seen the crack open and evacuated before the Doctor could get there, just as the Tardis's emergency lights came on. The bells didn't go off, much to his relief and he had almost reached their hallway. Things can't get any worse today, he thought grimly to himself and as always when someone uses this saying, it did.

He turned the corner, not finding Rory, but assuming he was still in his room. Without Amy to bother him he might have even fallen asleep the Doctor mused with withering hope. It wasn't until he entered the dark room and found it empty and devoid of anything but a large jagged smile on the wall that he realised something was deeply wrong here too. He could feel the time particles in the air and knew that the crack was too powerful to have just formed without something important that just got fed to it.

Something, like Rory.

It just wasn't the Doctor's day.


Author's Note: This is a new story I'm writing. I haven't written anything for ages and I'm trying to redo all my old stories which is why I'm not updating them. But I will... When I get time *shakes fist at Teachers*. Although I'm only in Year 8 so I can't complain... Anyway this won't get updated for at least a week (sorry!) because I'll be away but I'll update when I get back. I will be able to reply to feedback probably though so comments are much appreciated! And I want to make this a reasonably long story so I hope some people stick around to read it because I have some ideas of what I want to do with it.

Cheers,

Lara