A/N: Hey everyone! I have a new chapter for you! :D This story is un-betaed so any and all mistakes are my own. Let me know what you think! :)

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who or any of its characters.


There was an uncomfortable silence that followed the Doctor's words; none of the parties involved were willing to break the tension. Luckily, a voice from the other side of the door called out for the Doctor.

"Oi, Spaceman! Martha called again asking you to hurry up! She needs to see us soon!" Donna cried out.

Everyone in the room jumped at her sudden interruption, but surprisingly it caused a bit of laughter to erupt from all three of them. Leave it to Donna to break the stalemate. Freya sat down as Jack offered her some biscuits to nibble on and the Doctor swiped one before perching on the edge of Jack's desk.

Freya cleared her throat and spoke firmly, "She told me to come to Cardiff. Said that it was somewhere that you frequented."

The Doctor nodded in agreement. "I come here to refuel sometimes. So, what…what else has she told you?"

He was nervous; very much so. Right in front of him was living proof that the walls between the universes were not as solid as he previously believed and the question was how much damage had been done to the fabric of reality? There was no point telling Freya just how dangerous travel between dimensions was because he had a feeling she was already well aware of that. Whatever was after her and…and Rose must be incredibly dangerous and volatile.

"Yes, she mentioned that," Freya commented with a bit of humor. "I really don't know where to start and, judging by what Donna said, I should make this quick."

"Time machine," the Doctor quipped.

"Still, I guess I should begin with why we are seeking your help in the first place," Freya started, glancing around the room for a moment before giving the Doctor her full attention.

The Doctor smiled disarmingly, hoping to ease her anxiety. "That sounds good."

Swallowing around the lump in her throat, Freya began her version of the events that lead up to and following her separation with her mother. "We had stayed on Earth for a while; mum and I both worked for Torchwood for a long time, but eventually we left for various reasons."

"What kinds of reasons?" the Doctor interrupted, earning him an elbow in the side from Jack.

Her expression turned a bit grim. "Some things happened at Torchwood and, well, we couldn't stay any longer."

"What about Jackie and the rest of them?"

"Um, that's something that's still hard for me to talk about. I don't mean to shut you out about that, it's just, it's still difficult to discuss. Just really personal." Freya remarked, flinching at how botched it sounded.

The Doctor wasn't convinced, "What happened? Are they okay?"

"They're fine; they're happy. It's just that some things happened because of Torchwood." She wasn't completely lying, they had been very happy and it wasn't until after Tony passed away that things changed. Although Freya couldn't tell him that they were already long dead, she could try and pacify him with a semi-truth; they all lived good lives. It's just that Freya and her mother outlived them.

"I thought Pete ran Torchwood?"

"He did," Freya stressed somewhat irritably, "but, as I've said, things happened and that's not really important at the moment. Please, let me tell you some other time when I'm ready to talk about it. I need to explain what's happening right now."

Reluctantly, the Doctor agreed and Freya continued. "Mum had some contacts that were able to get us off world without Torchwood finding out and we were able to find some colonies willing to take us for a while. After some time we found a planet where we were able to get some steady work and a decent apartment. For a while we were doing well, but then one night everything went to hell."

The Doctor sucked in his breath and murmured, "They found you." It wasn't a question.

She nodded slowly and the Doctor noticed her wince of fear; these creatures terrified her. What kind of creature could be so awful that Rose would risk losing her child to the Void? He shuddered at the thought.

"Yeah. I got off early that night, was working at a mechanic shop at the port where mum worked, and I was on my way home when…when I felt something." She shivered at the vague memory of the encounter.

"Felt what?"

"I don't know, it was like a pressure at the back of my mind. Like something trying to enter it. Next thing I knew, I was lying on the couch in our apartment and mum was grabbing everything she could pack. She contacted some friends who offered us a lift and we left for another planet in a different solar system." Freya couldn't remember what happened between her encounter with the creatures and waking up at home and her mother refused to talk about it. For a long time it angered Freya that her mother refused to discuss the event, but eventually she got the message; she was better off not knowing.

"We settled into a new place with what little money we had and mum was really skittish for the longest time. We thought we had lost them, but we were wrong. They found us again and we had to leave once more. It went on like this for a while before mum finally figured that the only way to stop them was to find the only person who could. You."

The Doctor beamed at Rose's faith in him. The fact that she entrusted him with her daughter made his heart swell. There were several lingering questions, many of which pertaining to the advanced technology that Freya had, but he figured that he could ask her about that later. "What about these tears?"

Fidgeting, Freya rubbed the back of her neck as another one of her headaches started building up again. "Ah, well, those have been around since I was young. It's actually how we lost Mickey."

"What?!" the Doctor bellowed. "What happened to Mickey?!"

Flinching at his loud tone, she looked away from him, trying to control her own emotions. "He was one of the first to attempt going through the Void after Canary Wharf. The tears were really small and far between at first, so they didn't notice them until I was about six. After that they started monitoring their appearances and eventually decided that they needed someone's help. Your help. They didn't know what was happening and they were incredibly worried about something cataclysmic occurring. Mickey was one of the leaders of the project."

The Doctor processed her words; something just didn't add up. The timeline, for one, but also the tears and the creatures. Had the creatures come through one of the tears or had they created them? And from where had the creatures come from? By her description he discerned that they were possibly strong telepaths and very good at tracking.

Freya leaned back against her seat and stretched out her legs, wincing at the stiffness. "One day they were doing routine checks of the tears and one appeared close to Torchwood. I don't know if it was simply a coincidence or what, but Mickey took off with part of his team to find it. They had barely made it into the warehouse where the tear was when Mickey activated the cannon. It closed right after he passed through it."

A few tears gathered in her eyes and she blinked them away just as she always did. "He never came home."

Jack handed her a tissue and waited for her breathing to calm. Freya's shoulders shook from the effort to keep from crying, her voice breaking as she spoke. "Mum was devastated, but she carried on. We all did. It's been so long." Sniffing, she changed topics. "We had been on the run for a while when mum made the choice to send me through the Void. She said she found the 'right tear.' I don't know what she meant by that, but she's never wrong when it comes to that stuff and I have no idea why. I had just finished modifying the dimension jumper when they found us again and honestly, my mum was much better at getting away when I wasn't there for her to worry about. It's a good thing I left when I did."

Unfortunately it was true; her mother's abilities worked much better when she only had to worry about herself. With the added strain of Freya, her mum had to exert twice as much energy just to get them away from the creatures. Without her dragging her mother down, Freya could only hope that Rose was able to get away from the creatures in time.

"I'm sure she didn't want you to leave." Jack chimed in.

Freya smirked weakly. "Yeah, didn't matter though. Had to leave before they found us. Knowing her, she probably escaped before they even saw her. She's good at that."

Warmth spread through the Doctor's chest at her words as memories of Rose giggling behind him as they ran from pursuing aliens hordes passed through his mind. Oh yes, she was very good at escaping; he made sure of that. It still hurt to think about her, but the feeling dulled a bit in the presence of her child. He didn't know why, but there was just something about her that made some of the pain fade away.

"Yeah, she was," the Doctor murmured.

"Right before she activated the dimension jumper she told me that finding you was imperative. The first place I landed in was the 51st century, and don't even get me started on some of the things I saw there, where I ran into a Time Agent. Managed to get the guy drunk enough to not notice me swiping out a few parts from his Vortex Manipulator. I feel bad for him, poor guy was having a bad day as it was, but I needed the extra parts. For some reason my time jumper didn't work properly in this dimension. It was having trouble calibrating coordinates." Freya finished her tea and reached for another biscuit as Jack barked out a laugh.

"You ran into a Time Agent the moment you got here; talk about coincidence! I was a former Time Agent myself." Smirking, Jack walked over to the door, leaning out a bit, and asked Ianto if he would be kind enough to bring some more tea.

Freya sighed but gave Jack an amused look. "Yeah, there seems to be a lot of coincidences happening around me lately. Anyway, I swapped out my old parts for the new ones and let me tell you, navigation in this universe is a bitch. Took me all over the place before I finally figured out how to narrow down the coordinates. Eventually, after some detours, I was able to get to Cardiff and that's when the time jumper finally quit. So here we are."

The Doctor raised his eyebrows and took a deep breath before stating, "That's one hell of a story, of which, I'm sure, you've omitted quite a bit."

"You're right." Freya said calmly as Ianto came in with another round of tea. "As much as my mother trusted you, I'm not sure how much information about you that she might have, shall we say, exaggerated. I want to be certain that you are the man she told me about before giving you the rest of the details. For now, though, I think we are in a good place. The only problem at the moment is identifying the tears and where they might be. The biggest hurdle that Torchwood, from my universe, faced was determining what the tears looked like. Most only lasted seconds and by the time Torchwood identified them, they were gone."

Taking a sip of his tea, the Doctor contemplated her words. That was curious. If the tears only lasted mere moments, it was no wonder the humans couldn't find them quickly enough.

"And another thing, Doctor," Freya said quietly, interrupting his train of thought, "they were nearly untraceable. We can't identify the epicenter or determine when the next one will appear. It's as if they all happen at once but at different points in time and that doesn't make any sense."

That did present a problem and one not easily solved. He might be able to hunt down one or two of the tears, but by the time the TARDIS might find one there was a high probability it would be gone before he could even run scans on it. He ran a hand through his hair in contemplation. "Well, how did Rose find one?"

Freya bit her lip; that was something that even she wasn't sure about. She really didn't have a clue how her mother was capable of just sensing them and it made Freya wonder what her mother's connection might have been. Or if there even was one. "Honestly, I haven't a clue."

Shoving away from the desk, the Doctor paced around the room muttering and tugging at his hair. After a few moments he sighed heavily and stated, "Well, the only thing we can do is run through some diagnostics on that 'dimension jumper' and see if we can't figure out something from that. In the meantime you should get some more rest and we'll see what Martha needs."

"You're not running off without me, Doctor. I want to see what all the fuss is about." Freya turned around to face the pinstriped man, staring sternly at him to get her point across. He wasn't going to leave her behind.

"Wouldn't dream of it." A smile flitted across his face as he took in his soon to be companion. This would be different; he could feel it underneath his skin. There was something about her that just screamed at him and it wasn't because she was Rose's daughter. Something so very obvious, but he couldn't see it.

Rose would know.

Even now, she would tell him what he was missing; the important fact that would pull everything together. Burying those thoughts, knowing no good would come of them, the Doctor stopped his insistent pacing and went back to lean against the desk. "Well, I guess that settles it then."

"Yup." Freya stood up, swaying a bit before Jack reached out a hand to steady her. Thanking him, she waited for the Doctor to speak again.

"Well," the Doctor stressed slowly, "I guess we should go tell Donna we're almost ready to leave."

He stood and walked to the door, holding it open for Freya and Jack. They all walked back into the main room, spotting Donna and Gwen talking animatedly about something or other. Both women stopped speaking the moment the trio started making their way over to them.

Freya saw her dimension jumper being analyzed by a woman wearing glasses and a lab coat. Quirking a brow, she looked at Jack curiously.

"Toshiko Sato, but we just call her Tosh. Resident technical genius; you'd like her." Jack said as the woman in question raised her head as they approached. She grinned warily at them, eyes never straying from Freya.

Interesting, Freya thought as they passed the woman to meet up with Donna and Gwen. The Doctor lingered behind them, looking around at all the different equipment.

Donna was the first to speak. "We all set? And you," she bit out, walking around Jack and Freya and poking the Doctor in the chest, "behave. I don't want you getting all high and mighty on her or I'll put you in your place, you hear me?"

Paling a bit, the Doctor nodded vigorously. Freya wondered just what exactly the Doctor's and Donna's relationship was; were they just friends or more like siblings? Either way, it was certainly entertaining.

The Doctor quickly busied himself with the dimension jumper while Jack pulled Freya into a tight hug. "Make sure that you get Rosie back and tell her I miss her dearly; I want to hear all about how well the Doctor 'dances'," he whispered to her, waggling his eyebrows, and she smacked him as her face contorted with disgust.

"That's nasty, Jack. You do know exactly who I am, correct? Those are some mental images that I try to avoid thinking about." Shuddering at the thoughts his words produced, Freya murmured her deepest thanks to him. "If you ever need anything, well, I'd say you could call me but I don't think my phone gets any service in the Time Vortex."

She took out a small phone that Jack recognized as 51st century technology just as the Doctor swaggered over to them. "Ooo, what's this? A phone. I can upgrade it, if you want?" he offered, leaning in to inspect the phone. Freya handed it over with no small amount of hesitancy and the Doctor snatched it from her hand. He pulled out a small, cylindrical device that she could only guess was the infamous sonic screwdriver. A whirring sound emitted from the device as the Doctor removed the backing and soniced the internal parts of the phone. He then started to babble. "Let's see: 51st century, Carceeniien Galaxy, Planet Porsha, the Goragan Market Place, am I correct?"

Freya was stunned. "How the hell did you guess that?!"

"Well, I am a genius. Wasn't that hard to guess, really," he preened as he handed the phone back.

"Doctor, what did I just get done telling you?" Donna barked at him.

The Doctor at least had the decency to look a smidgen chastised before bounding off towards the TARDIS, dimension jumper in hand. Everyone waited for the doors to close behind him before saying their last goodbyes. Freya gave Jack her number just in case anything happened or he needed anything. He gave her one last hug and kissed her on the forehead, which caught her by surprise.

Jack went to give Donna a handshake, but the red haired woman had other ideas as she pulled him into a hug that may have lasted longer than absolutely necessary, although he didn't seem to mind at all. Donna started waltzing over to the TARDIS, telling Freya to hurry up.

Gwen walked over to Freya and shook her hand, giving a warm smile. Freya thanked them one last time and waved goodbye before heading over to Donna, who was waiting rather impatiently by the doors. Donna went through first and Freya just stood there for a few seconds, soaking it in.

This was it.

She was there; she had finally made it.

Something warm and pleasant tingled in the back of her mind. Oh! Her mother told her about the TARDIS; she gets into your head. She should feel apprehensive about that, but she didn't. It was oddly comforting.

Grasping hold of her mother's key, Freya took a deep breath and steeled her nerves as she stepped over the threshold into the TARDIS for the very first time.