One more chapter after this...and maybe a small epilogue.

Remember: This IS a part of a series, serving as a prequel to With Starlight in Their Wake

"But what do they want with me?" Donna asked what everyone was thinking.

What did the Santas—or, rather, the controller—what did they want with Donna? She was no one big and powerful—just a temp. Rose knew from experience that the robots only cared about getting to their target. Everyone else was just an obstacle to be destroyed. Last Christmas she'd been one of the few to get past when they were after the Doctor. This year, he'd been reduced to a mere obstacle. Which meant Donna was, somehow, more important than Time's Champion.

The Doctor stopped assaulting the computer and straightened up. "Somehow you've been dosed with Huon energy, and that's a problem because Huon energy hasn't existed since the Dark Times. The only place you'd find a Huon particle now is in a remnant in the Heart of the TARDIS. See? That's what happened."

Donna seemed to understand that this wasn't a good thing. She was staring at him, mouth open in worry, with her hand pressed against her stomach.

"Say," the Doctor began, grabbing a mug off the desk, "that this is the TARDIS, and that's you." He picked up a pencil. "The particles inside you activated. The two sets of particles magnetized and—WHAP!" He tossed the pencil into the mug. "You were pulled inside the TARDIS."

"I'm a pencil inside a mug?"

"Yes, you are." He gave the mug a shake. "4-H. Sums you up." Setting it down on the table, he went to find another computer to hack. "Lance, what was H.C. Clements working on?"

Donna was scared and this time there was no bravado to mask it. When the Doctor moved and revealed Rose standing behind him, their eyes met and she saw naked fear in the older woman's eyes. She wished she could console her, but there was nothing she could say that would help. Because she knew where she'd seen Huon particles now. When she'd looked into the TARDIS. She'd had the Time Vortex in her head and the Heart in her body. If the Doctor hadn't intervened, she would've died—but whether from the Vortex, the Heart, or both, she didn't know.

The Doctor found an abnormality in the official building plans and led them down to the reception level and the other elevator to prove it.

"Are you telling me this building's got a secret floor?" Lance asked skeptically.

"No, I'm showing you this building's got a secret floor."

Rose smiled, lips pressed together, and held down a laugh.

"It needs a key," Donna pointed out.

"I don't." The Doctor sonicked the lock on the Lower Basement button in the lift. Donna's eyebrows lifted but she recovered quickly. Lance's eyes nearly bugged out of his head and he openly gawked at the Doctor and Rose.

"Right, then. Thanks you two. We can handle this." The Doctor smiled and tucked the sonic into his pocket. Rose joined him in the lift. "See you later."

"No way, Martian. You're the man who keeps saving my life—budge up, Rose," she added, stepping quickly into the lift. "I'm not letting you out of my sight."

"Going down."

Lance remained outside.

"Lance," Donna ordered.

"M-maybe I should go to the police."

"Inside."

He sighed and did as he was told without further protest. Rose stepped back next to the Doctor so there was room for him. She was beginning to think Donna had been lying earlier when she told them about Lance wearing her down about marriage. The man would obey his own shadow if it started barking orders at him. Like Mickey, long ago; only he'd toughened up over time after being around the Doctor and after meeting Rickey. Lance probably wouldn't have the chance and would not be wearing the pants in the relationship.

She wasn't sure if she liked Donna yet. The jury was still out on that one.

"To honor and obey," the Doctor deadpanned.

"Tell me about it, mate."

"Oi!" Donna snapped.

Rose elbowed the Doctor and cracked a grin when he looked at her. He smiled in response. The lift descended quickly, though not nearly fast enough for Rose. The silence was so far beyond awkward that she was afraid to even breathe too loud. The doors opened to a cold, damp tunnel with an eerie green glow. They four of them stepped out into the tunnel and Rose shivered, pulling her jacket tighter. It smelled like wet pavement and mold and her nose wrinkled.

"What is this place?" she asked.

"Dunno," the Doctor replied. He looked from one end of the tunnel to the other. "Let's find out."

"Do you think Mr. Clements knows about this place?" Donna wondered.

"The mysterious H.C. Clements? I think he's part of it. Oh, look—transport." He bounded over to a door and sonicked the lock. Opening it, he poked his head in, and his voice echoed gleefully when he spoke, "I've always wanted to ride one of these."

The Doctor backed out of the storage room, pulling a Segway with him. "Here we are, then. There's only three in here so, Rose—you'll have to ride with me."

That proved to be more difficult than it sounded. Each scooter was only designed for one rider at a time. She had to stand pressed tightly to his back with her feet almost on the edge and her arms around his waist so she wouldn't fall off. Thank God the Doctor had good balance and managed to find a good spot to stand that kept them both balanced.

The three scooters rolled side by side down the green-lit tunnels in silence. Rose rested her cheek between the Doctor's shoulder blades and watched Donna. She saw the older woman's lips press together, a smile pulling at her lips, and her shoulders shaking. Donna glanced at the Doctor. Rose knew him well enough to know that he either had a giddy grin on his face or he was looking stern. Whichever look he was trying to sport Rose figured it was funny enough because Donna suddenly sputtered out a laugh. Looking at the Doctor again she laughed harder, bending forward in her mirth. Rose felt the Doctor's body shake underneath her cheek and she grinned, biting her lower lip.

She knew how ridiculous it looked: the Oncoming Storm and the Valiant Child riding on a Segway together. If their enemies could see them now, they'd probably all die laughing.

Donna shrieked with laughter beside them. She heard the cackle from deep within the Doctor's chest and it reverberated throughout her. A slightly hysterical giggle bubbled up through her lips and she buried her face in his jacket to smother it. If she started laughing now she might end up crying.

The breaks on their Segway squeaked as the Doctor stopped them. Rose was close enough to feel the shift in his muscles and stepped down so he could get off. His hand tightened around her arm for half a second as he passed her on the way to the door. The sign on it said Authorized Personnel Only in blocked letters. Above it was an all-too-familiar logo, a series of hexagons arranged into a 'T' above the word Torchwood. Rose's lip curled at the sight.

He turned the wheel on the door and hefted it open. Inside was a small, lit room containing a single metal ladder. The Doctor peered around inside then stepped out. "Wait here," he ordered. "Just need to get my bearings. Don't," he added, pointing his finger at them severely, lingering on Rose, "do anything. And don't wander off."

"'Kay," Rose sighed.

Donna took a step towards the door. "You better come back."

The Doctor grinned at her. "I couldn't get rid of you if I tried. Keep an eye on Rose; make sure she doesn't fall over."

"I'm fine." Rose grumbled as he started up the ladder.

"No, you're really not, sweetheart." Donna turned around. "You look like hell. …It'll be okay, you'll see. My mum was devastated, too, after Gran died, but she got better."

"No, you don't understand. Mum isn't dead. She's in another universe. Those Cybermen and Daleks, uh—you saw them, Lance, didn't you?" She looked at the black man.

He pressed his lips together and nodded. "Yeah. Saw 'em."

"Well, we were there. Me, the Doctor, Mum—we were trying to stop it from happening. Those Cybermen came from another universe parallel to ours. Bit different, but alike in a lot of ways. Following me so far?"

"I think so," Donna said.

"We defeated the Cybermen over on that parallel world, but that universe's version of my mum died. It's a long, long story, but when the Cybermen came through to our world, some of the people from the other universe came, too, includin' the parallel version of my dad. Dad died when I was a baby, so Mum went with him, and the plan was for me to go to, but I didn't… I couldn't leave the Doctor." She paused and rubbed her lips together. When she spoke again, her voice was choked, "He needs me and—and I love him.

"I knew staying here meant I'd lose her, but I didn't… It didn't really hit me until afterwards." Rose swallowed and wiped the tears from her eyes. "I…I feel almost like I've betrayed her. It's always been the two of us, fendin' for ourselves and takin' care of each other. But I kept goin' with the Doctor and leavin' her behind, and now I've done it for good."

Donna looked at her considering and licked her lips. "I just have one question: did your Mum choose to stay there?"

"She could've come back right after me, but she didn't. So, yeah, I think she did."

Donna pulled Rose into a hug and patted her back soothingly. "Then no, Rose, I don't think you betrayed her. You made your choice and she made hers. She's happy, right? I wager you will be, too, one day. She's got her man and you got yours."

Rose laughed once. "I told you, Donna, we're not married."

"Don't matter. I see the way you look at each other. Especially earlier when you were dancing! Lookin' at you two… It was like I was at your wedding reception!" she laughed and Rose smiled.

The Doctor dropped down from the ladder with a grunt. "Thames flood barrier! Right on top of us."

Rose pulled away from Donna, eyebrows raised. "You're kiddin' me."

"Nope! Torchwood must've snuck in and built this place underneath."

"What? There's, like, a secret base hidden underneath a major London landmark?" Donna gaped at him, completely stunned.

"I know! Unheard of," he agreed with a wink at Rose.

Donna looked shrewdly between them. "What else is there?"

"Torchwood's main base at Canary Wharf, Nestine Consciousness lair underneath the London Eye… There's also a family of Oerthians currently living in the gardens of Buckingham palace." He chuckled to himself and walked past them.

"You're telling me that story later," Rose ordered.

He smiled fondly at her over his shoulder. "Come on, I think we might've found where this glow is coming from."

Leaving the Segways behind, Rose, Donna, and Lance followed the Doctor down the passageway. The green light grew brighter and brighter until they came to the end of the tunnel where it was emitting from panels on the walls, highlighting the caution signs and warnings stamped in black ink on the walls. The Doctor pushed open a door with the Torchwood logo and looked around curiously.

"Ooh," he murmured, shoving the door out of his way. "Look at this!"

They filed into the room, the Doctor running ahead to get a look at everything. They were in some sort of laboratory, the kind of place you needed top marks in your a-levels and in university before you'd even be told about its existence. There were all manners of machines which only the Doctor had a prayer of discerning. Many of them consisted of a lot of clear, liquid-filled pipes and containers, twisted and arranged intricately, like a water clock.

The Doctor darted around, all agog at being surrounded by what he called particle extruders. She and Donna followed him further into the room. Lance, overwhelmed by everything around him, remained behind them uncertainly. The Doctor tapped on one of the glass tubes with his knuckle and looked it up and down.

"Brilliant," he murmured. He ducked down and tried to look up one of the wider pipes. "They've been manufacturing Huon particles. In case my people got rid of Huons, they unraveled the atomic structure."

"Your people? Who are they?" Lance demanded. "What company do you represent?"

"Oh, I'm a freelancer. But this lot are rebuilding them."

"How?" Rose asked, running her fingers down one of the thinner pipes. She felt a strange tingling where the tips of her fingers made contact with the glass, like the tiny bubbles inside the tube were brushing against them. She drew her hand back, curling her fingers. The tingling faded but she felt the TARDIS probing her mind curiously in a way she never had before.

The ship had felt that? Only vaguely listening to the Doctor explain how Torchwood had been using the river to make the particles, Rose touched her hand to the tube again. The tingling picked right back up where it had left off and something akin to surprise filtered through the mental link between herself and the TARDIS. The Doctor had said earlier that the only remaining Huon was inside the Heart of the TARDIS—the ship must have sensed it through her.

"No," Rose sighed and turned from the tubes. "I meant how would they even know about them? You said they're billions of years gone. How would Torchwood have found out?"

"I don't know," he answered grimly. He was holding a vial of the liquid in his hand and she wondered if her fingers would tingle when she touched it. "But I'm not sure how they got their hands on technology advanced enough to effectively probe that breech, either."

Donna reached forward and tapped the vial with her finger. "That's inside me?"

Wordlessly, the Doctor turned the tip of the vial to the left and the clear liquid inside began to glow with a golden light. A moment later, Donna's entire body started to shine with the same light, illuminating her like a Christmas tree.

A moment after that, Rose felt the tingling travel in a wave up her body. She drew in a breath of air and a wordless melody drifted through Rose's mind. It was a feminine voice, light and airy, and…familiar, like a dream once had and never quite forgotten. It was beautiful. It was sad. She could listen to it forever. She felt like she could tear down the sky itself and not be harmed. She felt like she was a child in the safety her mother's arms.

The Doctor and Donna were saying words that didn't quite reach her. Her eyes slid closed, but not before they flicked to Lance and saw that he just so happened to be glancing at her. Dimly she registered the way his eyes widened in disbelief, but it wasn't the song, so it didn't matter.

Eyes closed, breath held, mouth shut; all she knew was the song in her head. Her heart beat faster, her hands curled into fists. She wanted to throw her head back and howl to the universe.

He is the last Lord of Time, she is the last TARDIS, and she is the only Wolf.

The song faded quite abruptly and her entire being cried out at its loss. With a shuddering gasp, she opened her eyes. She licked her lips and shook her head quickly. No one was even paying her any attention, not with the Doctor going off on one of his manic monologues, hopping and rocking and gesturing wildly.

"—of your life, walking down the aisle—oh, your body's a battleground! There's a chemical war inside! Adrenaline, acetylcholine—WHAM go the endorphins, oh, you're cooking! Yeah, you're like a walking oven! A pressure cooker, a microwave—all churning away, the particles reach boiling point—SHAZAM!"

Donna smacked him, harder than before, and he stumbled back a few steps. "What did I do this time?" he protested indignantly, his voice still up a few octaves.

"Are you enjoying this?" Donna demanded.

The Doctor shifted his weight back and forth, lowering his eyes penitently, like a child after being scolded by his mum.

Donna took a deep breath and let it out. She took a few steps forward. "Right. Just tell me. These particles—are they dangerous? Am I safe?"

"Yes," he nodded.

"Doctor," she admonished, "if your lot got rid of Huon particles, why did they do that?"

The Doctor's face reflected a millennia's worth of sadness and his voice was deep and serious, "Because they were deadly."

She shook her head once and looked away. "Oh, my God."

"I'll sort it out, Donna," he promised her quickly. "Whatever's been done to you, I'll reverse it. I'm not about to let another mother lose her daughter."

Sudden, omnipresent hissing, loud and deep and ugly, slid through the room. Rose literally jumped half a foot in the air at the sound, her mind going back to an incident they had not long ago with some snakes. Amidst the hissing came a voice that sent shivers down Rose's spine, speaking, "Ooh, she is long since lost."

The hissing continued and the wall before them labeled LAB 003 slowly started to rise. Rose moved closer to the Doctor.

"I have waited so long," the hissing voice continued, decidedly female.

The wall continued to retreat upwards, revealing another room off to the first and easily two times bigger. The most prominent feature was the bloody great hole in the middle of the floor.

"Hibernating at the edge of the universe…until the secret heart was uncovered and called out to waken!"

Rose, the Doctor, and Donna didn't notice the dozen robots, standing on two levels of walkways against each wall, until they moved. The three of them eyed the guns trained on them nervously, but the robots didn't fire. They needed Donna alive; as long as she was around them the robots wouldn't risk shooting her. The Doctor sauntered forward with his hands in his pockets and examined the hole.

"Someone's been digging. …Oh, very Torchwood. Drilled by laser. How far down does it go?"

"Down and down, all the way to the center of the Earth!" the voice replied.

"Really? Seriously, what for?"

"An energy source," Rose guessed.

"Why?"

"Well, Torchwood was messin' with the breach lookin' for free energy. An' back on Krop Tor, Danny told me they worked for the Torchwood archive. Remember what they were drillin' for?"

The Doctor's eyes widened and he murmured, "Good point." Raising his voice, he turned away from Rose and addressed the speaker, "Is that what they were after? Energy?"

"Foolish humans! They finally noticed what was beneath them and tried to reach it. So curious; so ignorant."

"Only a madman talks to thin air, and trust me, you don't want to make me mad. Where are you?"

"High in the sky, floating so high on Christmas night."

"I didn't come all this way to talk on the intercom! Come on, let's have a look at you!" he goaded.

"Who are you with such command?!"

"I'm the Doctor!"

"Prepare your best medicines, Doctor Man, for you will be sick at heart!" she proclaimed and appeared before them on the platform in a flash of blue light. Rose recoiled at the sight.

It was a spider. A huge, blood red spider, with the body of a tarantula, all hairy rear and long legs. From where the head should have been protruded a humanoid torso with two pincer-ended arms and a horned head with eight eyes across it. The whole body gleamed in the light. She thrashed her legs and pincers, hissing and weaving her torso in a threatening manner.

The Doctor was completely thunderstruck. "Racnoss," he breathed. "But that's impossible. You're one of the Racnoss!"

The spider woman pushed her body higher into the air, like a human drawing herself up to full height. "Empress of the Racnoss!" she declared with another hiss.

The Doctor walked towards her, his shock giving way to curiosity. "If you're the Empress, where are the rest of the Racnoss? Or…are you the only one?"

"Such a sharp mind," she responded.

"That's it—last of your kind," he murmured, leaning towards his companions to explain. "The Racnoss come from the Dark Times, billions of years ago. Billions. They were carnivores—omnivores. They devoured whole planets."

"Racnoss are born starving!" the Empress snarled at him. "Is that our fault?"

"They eat people?" Donna asked, horrified.

The Doctor swallowed. "H.C. Clements, did he wear those—those, um, black-and-white shoes?"

"He did. We used to laugh. We used to call him 'The Fat Cat in Spats.'"

The Doctor pointed at the web on the ceiling. They followed his finger upwards and noticed a pair of spats protruding from the web. Donna recognized them at once.

"Oh, my God!" She looked like she was about to be sick and her eyes flicked around the web, noticing a few more limbs visible here and there, and she thought of the people that had mysteriously "quit" over the last few months. Her stomach nearly rebelled.

"Mm, my Christmas dinner!" the giant spider cackled.

"You shouldn't even exist," the Doctor told her. "Way back in history, the fledgling empires went to war against the Racnoss. They were wiped out!" he added loudly with a look at the Empress.

"Except for me."

Donna took a step forward. "But that's what I've got inside me, that Huon energy thing. Oi! Look at me, lady. I'm talking. Where do I fit in?"

Rose noticed someone inching down the stairs towards the spider. It was Lance, holding an axe in his hand. Donna must've already seen him and was distracting her so he could get close enough to attack. Rose tried to keep her eyes off of him, though she wondered how an axe would be able to help.

"How come I get all stacked up with these Huon particles?" Donna demanded. The Empress started to turn towards Lance. "Look at me, you! Look me in the eye and tell me!"

"The bride is so feisty!" she laughed.

"Yes, I am! And I don't know what you are, you big…thing." she gestured with her hands. Lance was almost upon her, axe raised. "But a spider's just a spider. And an ax is an axe. NOW DO IT!"

Lance raised the axe and the Empress jerked her torso around. She let out a snarling hiss and lifted up just a bit higher, but she didn't move to attack. Lance froze with the axe raised and his look of fear melted away into a laugh. His laugh turned into a cackle and the Empress joined in. Lance dropped the axe and tapped one of the Empress's legs.

Rose clenched her fists angrily and looked up at the Doctor. He was glaring at the pair on the platform darkly.

"That was a good one," Lance chortled. "Your face!"

"Lance is funny," the Empress told the three down below.

Donna shook her head disbelievingly. "What?"

"I'm sorry," the Doctor murmured, turning towards her.

"Sorry for what? Lance, don't be so stupid! GET HER!"

"Donna," Rose said quietly.

Lance stared at her for a second as if he couldn't believe it. "God, she's thick. Months, I've had to put up with her. Months! A woman who can't even point to Germany on a map."

Donna's jaw moved up and down but no sound came out. She looked at the Doctor and Rose for help. They were looking at her sadly. She swallowed thickly. "I don't understand."

"How did you meet him?" the Doctor asked her.

"In the office."

"He made you coffee."

"What?"

Rose looked back at the tubes and vats of huon particles. "In liquid form," she murmured, realizing.

"What do you know? The blonde is the smart one." he sneered at them. Walking around the Empress's legs, he went on, "Every day, I made you coffee."

"You had to be dosed with liquid particles over six months." the Doctor explained.

"He was poisoning me?" she realized quietly. Rose nodded.

The Doctor glared at Lance venomously. "It was all there in the job title—the Head of Human Resources."

"This time, it's personnel." Lance smirked and he and the Empress chuckled again.

Donna still didn't seem to comprehend everything. "But…we were getting married."

"Well, I could risk you running off. I had to say yes." Lance's voice turned mocking. "And then I was stuck with a woman who thinks the height of excitement is a new flavor of Pringle."

Donna stared at him, taking his abuse silently. With every word her face grew even sadder. Rose was torn between wanting to hug her and wanting to yell slurs at the man and tell him to shut up.

"Oh, I had to sit there and listen to all that yap, yap, yap!" he went on. "'Ooh, Brad and Angelina! Is Posh pregnant? X Factor, Atkins Diet, Feng Shui, Split Ends, text me, text me, text me!' Dear God, the never-ending fountain, of fat, stupid trivia! …I deserve a medal!"

Rose gritted her teeth. "You want one? Because I'd be more than happy to shove it up your arse!"

Lance laughed once mockingly and opened his arms in invitation.

"What's she offered you? The Empress of the Racnoss," the Doctor asked. "What are you, her consort?"

"It's better than a night with her."

"But I love you," Donna told him plaintively.

Lance looked at her pityingly. "That's what made it easy."

Donna looked so alone in that moment that Rose couldn't help but put her hand on the woman's shoulder, glaring up at Lance with renewed venom. This whole day was his fault. She hoped he'd trip and fall down the hole.

"It's like you said, Doctor—the big picture—what's the point of it all if the Human Race is nothing? That's what the Empress can give me. A chance to…go out there. To see it. The size of it all." Launce paused and his eyebrows furrowed. "I think you understand that, don't you, Doctor?"

The Empress hissed loudly. "Who is this little physician?"

"She said Martian."

The Doctor walked around behind Rose and Donna to get closer to the hole. "Oh, I'm sort of…homeless." He peered down at it and asked, "But the point is, what's down here? The Racnoss are extinct. What's gonna help you 4,000 miles down? That's just the molten core of the Earth, isn't it?"

Lance titled his head to the side. "I think he wants us to talk."

"I think so, too," the Empress agreed.

"Well, tough. All we need is Donna. Though, I think your little girlfriend might be worth keeping around."

"Don't you dare," the Doctor growled dangerously at the same time Rose snapped, "Go to Hell!"

"Kill this chattering little Doctor Man!" the Empress commanded.

"Don't you hurt him!" Donna shouted, trying to shield him with her body.

"No, no, Donna," the Doctor said quietly and pushed her away. "It's alright."

"No! I won't let 'em!"

The Empress lifted herself higher into the air, shouting, "AT ARMS!" And the robots turned their guns towards the Doctor, Rose, and Donna once more.

He held up his hands. "Ah, now—except…"

"Take aim!"

"Well, I just want to point out the obvious—"

"They won't hit the bride. They're such very good shots."

"Just, just, just, just—hold on, hold on, just a tuck, just a tiny, little—just a tick." The Doctor waited until he was sure he had their interest, before continuing; "If you think about it, the particles activated in Donna and drew her inside my spaceship."

He pulled the vial of Huon out of his pocket. "So, reverse it…" he twisted the nozzle and the particles glowed once more, followed swiftly by Donna.

Rose sucked in a breath as the song flared to life in her mind once more and a tingle raced up her body. She closed her eyes. Swallowing, she tilted her head back, and once again had to fight the urge to do something completely mad. She felt powerful, she felt safe—and dimly, she registered that it was only happening because the Doctor had activated the Huon. If her mind wasn't filled with the song and the sense of the TARDIS rapidly approaching, she might've thought that it was a bad thing.

The song faded as quickly as it had come and when she opened her eyes she jumped, startled. They were inside the TARDIS. "What the hell?" she whispered, turning around.

The TARDIS brushed against her mind and the emotion she felt coming from the ship was definitely concern. Rose was more than a little worried herself. Once could be written off as coincidence, but twice? No. She was reacting to the Huon particles. Not as strongly as Donna was, but her body was definitely doing something. It had to be because she'd once had the Heart—Huon included—in her body. It'd obviously left some sort of mark, but nothing too serious or she wouldn't be standing here right now.

Donna sucked in a sharp, shuddering breath, her shoulders shaking. Rose said her name quietly. The woman looked up with tear-filled eyes and she immediately walked into Rose's open arms. Donna's shuddering breaths were loud in her ear, but she never uttered so much as a whimper. Rose hugged her tightly and patted her on the back. Glancing over at the Doctor, she saw him watching them glumly from over by the console.

It was just a bad day all around.

"We've arrived," the Doctor announced, subdued. "Want to see?"

"Where are we?" Rose asked.

"Weren't you listening?"

"Not really, no."

He rolled his eyes. "We're in the past, about 4.6 billion years, to the day the Earth was formed. If the Racnoss buried something at the planet's core, then it's been there since the beginning." He swung the monitor around to have a look outside. "We're going to find out what."

Frowning, he added, "That scanners a bit small. May be your way's best, Donna."

He went over to the door and motioned to them. "Come on."

Donna inhaled deeply and stepped out of the hug, wiping her eyes, and followed Rose over to the doors. The Doctor told them they'd be the first to ever see this, to which she replied, "All I want to see is my bed."

The Doctor grinned slightly and put his hands on the door handles. "Rose Tyler, Donna Noble, welcome…to the creation of the Earth."

He pulled the doors open wide and shifted aside so the two women could see. He stood behind them, hand resting on the edge of the door, and they gazed out in wonder. Before them was a mass of rocks, drifting aimlessly through space, and beyond them clouds of gasses, blues, pinks, oranges, and greens, lit by a small orange star. It was beautiful.

"There's no solar system, not yet," the Doctor murmured. "Only dust and rocks and gas." He pointed over Rose's head to the star in the distance. "There's the Sun over there, brand new. Just beginning to burn."

Shaking her head, Donna asked, "Where's the Earth?"

"There is no Earth," Rose replied.

"No, there is," he said. "It's all around us…in the dust."

Donna looked up at him and exhaled quietly. "Puts the wedding in perspective. Lance was right. We're just…tiny," she whispered the last word.

"No, but that's what you do." he nudged her. "The human race—making sense out of chaos. Marking it out with—with weddings and Christmas and calendars." His voice dropped to an awed murmur once more. "This whole process is beautiful, but only if it's being observed."

"I've seen it end," Rose realized softly. "Now I'm gonna see it begin."

Donna looked at her. "You've seen the end of the world?"

Rose nodded. "My very first trip. The sun swallows the planet, and everything in between. In the end it's just a bunch of rocks again."

A particularly large chunk of rock floated by the TARDIS at that moment and they watched it go.

"Eventually gravity takes hold," the Doctor said. "Say, one big rock, heavier than the others, starts to pull other rocks towards it. All the dust and rocks and elements get pulled in; everything, piling in until you get…" he held his hand out in front of him, fingers curled like they were holding a ball.

"The Earth," Donna finished.

"But the question is… What was that first rock?"

As if on cue, something emerged from the gas fairly close to them. It was a circle with a dozen large spikes protruding from it, like some sort of star.

"The Racnoss," the Doctor whispered.

The Doctor raced back up the ramp to the console and started spinning one of the wheels. "Hold on. The Racnoss are hiding from the war. What's it doing?"

"Exactly what you said!"

All of the rocks in the immediate area were being drawn towards the ship, like matter being pulled towards a black hole. The Doctor rejoined them by the door. The rocks were sticking to the ship, forming a thick shell around it, and the Doctor let out a noise of understanding.

"They didn't just bury something at the center of the Earth. They became the center of the Earth. The first rock."

The TARDIS shuddered violently and Rose was knocked back into the Doctor. He barely managed to keep them both from falling over. He pushed her up the ramp and reached around Donna to push the doors shut. He raced up the ramp towards the console as the ship shuddered again.

Rose felt something like a tugging behind her stomach. She gripped the edge of the console to keep herself up right. Donna latched onto it beside her as another tremor rippled through the ship. The TARDIS hummed angrily as she was yanked through time against her will. The Doctor lost his balance and fell to the floor.

"What the hell's it doing?" Donna shouted over the rumbling.

The Doctor pulled himself back up and zipped around the controls. "Remember that little trick I pulled—particles pulling particles?" He kicked up a lever with his foot, flipping switches and turning nozzles. "Well, it works in reverse. They're pulling us back!"

"Can't you stop it?" Rose asked. That tugging feeling behind her navel was becoming almost painful.

"Hasn't this thing got a hand brake?" Donna demanded. "Cant you reverse or warp or beam or something?"

"Backseat driver," he muttered. "OH! Wait a minute!" From its spot underneath the far side of the console, the Doctor pulled out the extrapolator he'd kept after their incident with Margaret. "The extrapolator!" he announced and banged it down on the controls. "Can't stop us, but it should give us a good bump!"

"What do ya mean, a bump?" Rose shouted.

The Doctor didn't respond, picking up the abusive mallet, and slammed it into the extrapolator. They felt the familiar bump as they landed and the Doctor dropped the mallet, ushering them towards the door.

"We're about two hundred yards to the right," he told them as the emerged. "Come on!"

He took off running down the hall and Donna, skirt hitched, followed. Rose shut the door behind her so neither Lance nor a robot could get inside then run after them. The Doctor lead them back around the corner to the door that lead up to the Thames. Rose realized that their Segways were gone, but she didn't have time to wonder about that. Pulling out the stethoscope he kept in his pocket, the Doctor put the earpieces into his ears and placed the chest piece against the metal of the door.

"But what do we do?" Donna panted.

"I don't know. I make it up as I go along. But trust me, I've got a history."

"Every time we make a plan, it always fails," Rose puffed. She got her breathing under control relatively quickly and pushed the hair out of her face.

"But I still don't understand," Donna curled her hands in frustration. "I'm full of particles, but what for?"

"There's a Racnoss web at the center of the Earth," the Doctor glanced at them. "But my people unraveled their power source." Turning back to his work, "The Huon particles ceased to exist—"

If he'd looked at them for just a moment longer he would've noticed the pair of gloved hands that clamped around the mouths of his companions. If he hadn't had earplugs in his ears, muffling the world around him except for his own voice, he would've heard their quiet struggling. And he would've been able to stop the small group of robots from carrying them away.

"They've just been in hibernation for billions of years," he went on. "Frozen. Dead. Kaput! So you're the new key. Brand new particles—living particles! They need you to open it and neither of you have ever been this quiet."

He turned around, expecting to see them staring blankly at him or Rose staring at something important and waiting for him to notice (she liked doing that), but instead he found he was alone. He groaned as he looked up and down the hall and saw no sign of either of them. They both had habits of wandering off, but he highly doubted either of them would risk doing that with a bloodthirsty Racnoss in the next room.

Which probably meant, of course, that at some point in the last thirty seconds they'd managed to get captured, without him hearing a thing. He was impressed.

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