A/N Not sure when the next chapter will be up after this one what with it being Christmas and all. So if i dont get another one up any time soon merry Christmas and a happy new year :)

Disclaimer: I own nothing other than Ari.

Ari had very little time to react to what she had just seen because as the Doctor re-entered the TARDIS things around her changed and she was stood on another planet, a planet she didn't recognise. The TARDIS was stood behind her and as she looked out over the foreign landscape she saw the Doctor walking away from her.

Wrapping her jacket more around her to protect herself from the wind that blew across the open rough field before her she ran to catch up with him. As she reached him she walked a little behind him not wanting to interfere. But as they came into view of a town up ahead he started to talk.

"After I broke the lock on the TARDIS I found myself at a bit of a loss as to what to do." He stopped walking and so did she. "I somehow found myself sticking to backwater planets, to places that had never heard of me, that had never heard of Time Lords, or of Visigher." He turned to her then but kept his eyes down cast so that she couldn't see them. "This is when it all changes Ari, are you sure you want to see this?"

"Yes." She answered instantly and he nodded.

"Very well, remember to push if you want it all to stop." She nodded and then he turned away from her and continued to walk and she knew that to him she was no longer there.

As they walked Ari took in the planet they were on. They were walking on rough ground that she knew had to be manmade because up out of the ground rose huge iron struts all tapering off into a point and looking like they had been made to prevent large ships from landing. Above the struts the overcast sky looked thunderous and she wondered if a storm was on its way or if the sky always looked like that.

As they entered the town they had been walking to she couldn't help but blanch at the stench of decay that assaulted her. The whole town seemed to be falling apart and even as she thought this a building close by started to collapse before her very eyes, yet what people she could see just went about as though nothing had happened.

Turning back to the Doctor she let her eyes roam over him for the first time. He was dressed the same way she had seen him in the images L'ixe had shown her, and though it was unlike him she was loathed to admit that he looked good.

Upping her pace she walked ahead of him before turning and walking backwards so that she could see him face on. However as soon as soon as she took in his face she stopped walking allowing him to move on ahead of her.

His face had been totally emotionless but it had been his eyes that now shook her to her very core. Those eyes hid nothing, they showed darkness and rage and she was sure that anyone confronted with those eyes head on would run.

Shaking herself physically she turned and quickly caught up with him ignoring the part of her that was begging her to turn back to walk away and to never find out what had happened to him.

But she need to carry on she needed to understand because until she understood she would never be able to trust him again, and as much as she loved him she knew that without trust then they would never be together.

As the Doctor entered a building she quickly followed after but paused as she crossed the threshold so that her eyes could adjust to the dark room she found herself in. Despite the darkness she could feel the size of the room knowing that it went far back into the shadows all around her.

People where sat at tables talking and drinking and as she took in the verity of races around her she started to become very uneasy which was rather silly, because this was a memory and she wasn't really here.

"Watch it love!" A voice suddenly spoke up behind her and she jumped moving out of the way of a small purple alien with jet black hair and glowing blue eyes. As the alien passed her by balancing a tray full of empty glasses she shot Ari a very annoyed look.

Okay, Ari thought, that can't be good. Obviously the Doctor had integrated her into his memory in some way rather than just letting her be a by stander.

Licking her lips she looked around the room once again and found the Doctor sat at the bar which held the only real bright light within the darkness around her. Quickly she made her way over to the bar and sat a few seats away from the Doctor so that she could watch him at least that had been the plan.

"Alright there sweetheart." A rough voice asked and she turned to her right to find a rather unsavoury looking man sat next to her. He was humanoid in appearance but his reptile like eyes gave away that he wasn't human at all. He had hair growing in patches all over his head and chin, and dirt covered most of his hand and arms, and she didn't even want to describe the smell coming off of him.

"I'm good thanks." Ari answered before turning back to look at the Doctor, surprised to find him downing a drink and then asking for another.

"How about you join me in the back for a drink." The man next to her asked and she couldn't help but shudder.

"Thanks for the offer but I'm not interested." She responded, surprised at how automatic the response came. Frowning slightly she chanced a quick glance at the Doctor before the man roughly grabbed her by the arm.

"No one refuses Nox!" He growled in her ear and then her body moved of its own accord and that was when she fully understood what was going on, the Doctor had somehow placed her directly into his memory.

Forcing herself not to push free of the memory she let herself act out what had happened, so when a gun that she had no recognition of having before appeared in her hands and pressing against Nox's side she just went with it.

"I already told you, I'm not interested." She hissed between her teeth her eyes not leaving Nox.

Slowly Nox let her go and then started to stand. She kept her gun trained on him but what happened next happened so quickly she didn't react in time. Nox moved with such speed she wondered for a moment how someone so big could move so quickly, before his large dirt covered hand hit her hard across the face causing her to lose her grip on the gun and also causing the other side of her head to come in contact with the bar.

Dizzy and moaning in pain she started to sink to the floor only for hands to roughly grab her by the hair and pull her up before dragging her through the bar and then out into a back street.

Still not fully with it Ari had little choice but to allow Nox to push her against a wall. However when he started to pull at her clothing her head cleared quickly as it registered the danger she was in.

"No!" She shouted as she started to struggle against him, kicking and punching him as much as she could, but she was too small and weak next to Nox's size and weight.

"I do believe…" A voice Ari knew all too well spoke from behind Nox and she wanted to call out to him but couldn't because whoever she was playing had no idea who the Doctor was. "That when a lady says no then you respect her wishes."

Nox's grip in her relaxed slightly as he turned to look at the Doctor and she took the chance to pull herself free slightly allowing her to see the Doctor also.

He was stood a few feet away not really looking at either of them and with his hands clasped behind his back.

"Look if you want to play then come back later once I've finished with her." Nox grunter out to the Doctor before turning back to Ari and grabbing hold of her shirt and pulling hard ripping the fabric from her body. Shivering not only because of the cold wind now biting at her exposed skin but also out fear she started to fight against Nox once again only for him to stop his assault with a sigh and turn back to the Doctor once again this time letting her go fully allowing her to fall to the ground.

Looking up as she covered herself up a sight she had only seen once before presented itself to her. The Doctor was stood with the gun she had dropped in his hand and he was pointing it right between Nox's eyes.

"I won't tell you again." The Doctor almost growled and his green eyes, they eyes she loved so much where now almost totally black.

Nox slowly took a step away from the Doctor and then started to make his way to the end of the back street all the while followed by the gun the Doctor held.

Once he was gone Ari felt her body relax only for it to then start shaking uncontrollably as she closed her eyes.

"Are you okay?" The Doctor asked and she jumped at how close his voice was to her. Opening her eyes she took in his face and nodded.

"Yeah…yes, thank you."

"Not a problem." He said with a smile that never reached his eyes. He stood then and held his hand out to her. Taking it she let him pull her to her feet and was about to say thank you again when she saw Nox come back at them this time with a gun of his own in his hand.

She watched as if in slow motion as the thug lifted the gun aiming it right at the Doctors back. Again her body moved on its own and she pushed the Doctor aside just as Nox fired.

Pain erupted in her chest and then the sound of more gun fire filled the air as the Doctor emptied his gun into Nox's chest causing the big man to fall dead to the ground.

Ari looked at the dead man in shock still not believing her eyes, but then voices behind her drew her attention and she turned to find the Doctor knelt on the ground with a girl with long dark hair, pale skin and bright purple eyes led in his arms.

"What did you go and do that for?" The Doctor asked pressing his hand against the wound that was pouring with dark red blood.

"Thought I would repay the favour." The girl answered in a quiet voice. "You are the first person that has ever helped me like that."

Ari felt tears falling down her face as she watched the scene unfold before her.

"I would have been fine, I wouldn't have been hurt like you." He said angrily and Ari moved to kneel on the other side of the girl so that she could look at him. "You didn't have to do that!"

The girl looked at him even as she trouble to breath, holding on for as long as she could even as the life drained out of her.

"Yes I did." She simply said before her eyes closed and she stopped breathing.

"I didn't even know her name." The Doctor said looking up at her. "She dies saving my like, a life that wouldn't have ended, and I didn't even know who she was! Why did she do that?" He still sounded so angry and she knew that he was angry not only at the girl in his arms but also at her.

"People do things with no thought about what it would cost them. They do it out of love or thanks, they do it because of a kindness show to them, and they do it because to not do anything would be wrong."

He held her eyes a moment longer then looked down the street to the dead Nox.

"Well I am fed up of it." He suddenly said gently putting the girl on the ground before picking up the now recharged gun.

"What are you doing?" She asked before he hands went to her mouth.

He turned to look down at her his eyes now totally black.

"You're about to see."

.*.*.*.

Time shifted and she want from kneeling on a rough floor to standing in a room which was so over done in opulence that it made her feel slightly sick. The room was richly furnished in dark red wooden furniture, the wood even covered the walls in panelling, but it was the amount of gold, and precious jewels that really made it hard to be in such a room. There was enough wealth on one wall to feed a whole country and she had never been one to show off in such a way and she had always despised how one person could keep so much for themselves.

Turning her eyes away from the displayed wealth she looked at the Doctor as he sat with his legs crossed and his hands clasped together as they rested on his lap. It was a pose she recognised as a dangerous one, but it would seem that the other man occupying the room saw no such threat.

"Who the hell do you think you are?" The short balding man asked as he paced before the Doctor. "You walk into my town and kill one of my best men and then you think you can walk in here and what? Demand that I leave?!"

"Well to answer your first question, I am the Doctor."

The other man barked out a laugh and Ari want to slap his round chubby face. "Is that meant to be some sort of a nickname?"

"No, it is just my name." The Doctor answered quietly.

"Well then, Doctor, I will ask you again. Who the hell do you think you are?"

Ari watched then as the man she loved, the man she had saved countless of times, the man she had lost and found again finally became someone she didn't recognise.

"I am your worst nightmare." The Doctor said and he stood and raised the gun he had hidden in his bigger on the inside pocked and aimed it right at the man's head. "As I have said already, you are to stop all dealings on this planet and leave, immediately."

The man took an involuntary step back coming to a stop as his desk got in the way. Ari could clearly see the mans fear in his dark grey eyes as the Doctor advanced the gun still in his hand.

"And what if I refuse? The man stuttered out.

"I won't give you a second chance." The Doctor said matter of factually.

"Okay, okay fine. Just give me a few days,"

"You have one hour."

"What?"

"You heard. One hour and if after that hour you are still here I won't be very lenient."

"You have no right!"

"I have every right! The Doctor all but shouted. "You are the on that has no right! And I will not stand by and watch as you and your men harass and kill innocent people!" He turned than and headed to the door, but before he was halfway there he stopped and Ari's heart started to beat hard in her chest.

"In fact…" The Doctor said and started to turn, the gun slowly raising once again.

"No." Ari whispered her hands going to her chest.

"Why should I give you a chance at all? I always give chances and someone always gets hurt or windes up dead. So maybe I should just stop giving chances and then people who don't deserve to die will live and those that have done wrong get what is come to them."

"You wouldn't…"

"I'm not sure anymore if I would or not." The Doctor said as the gun in his hand levelled with the mans head. "Let's find out shall we?"

Ari flinched as the gun fired and the laser round hit the man in the middle of his head killing him instantly.

Looking from the dead man to the Doctor Ari had to blink back tears as the Doctor looked at the gun.

"It would seem that I would... Interesting." He muttered before turning and walking out of the door.

Ari pushed and she pushed hard her eyes opening as she pulled away from the Doctor and tears fell unchecked down her face. Breathing hard she watched as the Doctor opened his eyes his hands shaking slightly as he lowered them to his knees.

"It gets worse?" She asked once she got her breathing back under control.

"Yes."

"You killed two men."

"Yes…"

"One in cold blood."

"Yes."

"Why?!" She demanded.

"Because I could."

She hadn't expected that answer, but as she remembered the look on his face as he shot the gang leader or whoever he was she realised that he was only giving her the truth.

"We can stop." He offered.

"No, this needs to be finished or I will never do it."

"Okay." He said taking a breath before lifting his hands back up to her temples, but she pulled away slightly.

"I do have one question."

"What?"

"Why did you put me in that girl?"

"Because I saw you when I looked at her."

She had thought as much but she just needed it confirmed.

"Ready?" He asked and she nodded closing her eyes.