And now, just for a moment, let us take a look not into the future but the past, as events that have occurred previously may shape those that are to come for even those adrift in the sea of time are subject to the effects of their own past.

The Professor, though it would be some time before he would call himself by that name, was eight years old when, as custom for Time Lords, he was brought to stand before the untempered schism, the ancient rift in the fabric of the universe that had, in a way, created his people. As the boy stood there, staring into the raw might of the time vortex, his head was filled with visions he couldn't understand and wouldn't recall later.

He saw a group of people gathered around the body of a fallen comrade, a tall blonde man whispering something to the person on the ground, though he couldn't see who it was. He saw the death of Gallifrey in fire and the entire Time War. He saw a small, caramel skinned girl wielding what looked like a giant TARDIS key, battling a tall, thin man clad all in black. There were flashes of red lightning where another girl had her palms against the ground, drawing a pair of swords from nowhere. He saw two giants walking a circle before a creature covered in flames and blood.

The boy fell backward, his head and hearts throbbing in tandem

It was some time later when the boy, now out of the Prydon academy though still not yet known as the Professor, walked into the chambers of the Lady President of Gallifrey. The boy's mother was in the later years of her third regeneration, a fierce looking woman with gray streaking through her hair like lightning in a storm cloud. She had been gazing out of the window of her office, but as the door closed, she smiled widely at him.

"You've grown," she said jokingly. In truth, all that had grown since his nineteenth birthday, which had been nearly a century before, was his hair which now hung just past his shoulders, a recently popular style.

"Or you've shrank," he scoffed, grinning widely.

"I am sorry that I couldn't have been there," said the Lady President, turning to look out the window once again, at the forest of red and silver that was her private lands. "But all this business with Skaro has had me tied up in bureaucracy and war talks. This is the longest time I've had to myself in weeks."

"We both understand your duties, mother. The good of Gallifrey should come before smaller matters, though it wouldn't have killed them to let you have a few hours off to see a little bit of wedding. I mean, does the High council really think the Daleks are that much of a threat," asked the boy. It was obvious that he didn't think the Daleks were anything to be afraid of. "A nice long flight of stairs is all it takes to trip them up." The Lady President chuckled lightly but didn't smile.

"The council has been speaking of preemptively striking at Skaro. They seem to be harboring the delusion that they can somehow scare the Daleks into backing down."

"Maybe they can," replied the young Time Lord. This only gained a sad look from the Lady President; she knew better than to give in to her son's foolish optimism

The boy was in the middle of his own presidential campaign when war was declared. After more than a century and a half of hostility, the Time Lords had fired the first shot in what would become the most devastating war in the universe. But nobody on Gallifrey knew that. It the popular mind, it was thought that the Daleks would bow to the superior might of the Time Lords within a few days.

And the boy was no different in his thinking; he had never seen a living Dalek and knew what they looked like only from pictures and museum exhibits. So of course, it was a shock when every able bodied time lord outside the academy was drafted into the army and placed in their own TARDIS to go into battle.

The Time War was brutal. The young Time Lord had never known conflict that couldn't be settled with, at the most, an exchange of fists, yet here he was flying a ship into the heart of the enemy, leading on a monstrosity known only as the Nightmare Child in the hope that the Dalek fleet it was flying into would be destroyed and he would be able to escape.

As the war had raged on, the people of Gallifrey had grown more and more desperate to end the war, to the point of usurping his mother's seat as president and resurrecting old Rassilon in her place. Rassilon was a genius in the art of war, but also a man of greater cruelty than the Daleks. He commanded entire legions into suicide missions, only to use the same legion again at another point in their time line.

It was because of this that a certain renegade Time Lord had built a device known only as 'the moment,' a machine that would create an infinite paradox across the entire Time War, essentially wiping out both Skaro and Gallifrey in the process.

The boy sighed. He adjusted the controls of his TARDIS, checking the monitors to assure himself the monster he'd been charged with was still in tow. Sure enough, he could see the Nightmare Child, following dutifully. He smirked, thinking of the explosives he'd fabricated which lay within the depths of his ship, ready to rip apart both his ship and the monster he was leading into battle.

His ship rocked as it was hit by a blast from the Dalek Crucible, a massive saucer holding nearly a half billion of the Kaled mutants. The boy adjusted his speed, towing the Nightmare Child faster, flying straight at the saucer. As he closed in, he lowered his shields; even better to destroy a Dalek ship along with himself and the abominable nightmare he was towing.

He pushed a button, releasing the Nightmare child from its tethers. The boy readied himself as the jaws of the monster closed around both his ship and the Crucible and with all the determination he could muster, he pushed the button to detonate explosives with enough power to shatter his entire timeline.

And then…nothing. He had expected pain at the very least. Instead, everything seemed much the same. He checked the monitors, looking for any sign that he'd made even a scratch on either of his targets but what he found was nothing. There was no sign of the Nightmare Child or the Crucible. He checked his instruments, looking for any other Time Lord ships. He found none.

Somehow, though he wouldn't find out how for many years, the boy who would soon call himself the Professor had missed the end of the Time War. Not only had he missed it, he had escaped it.

Now, let us take a look at yet another piece of this mosaic, at another place and time.

Rosie sighed as she boarded the train for school. She'd almost missed the bullet train again this morning, which would have been a disaster for both her grades and attendance record. She closed her eyes, leaning back in her seat as the train took off from the station. After a few minutes, the train's acceleration leveled out and she opened her eyes to look around. The train wasn't as crowded as usual, which she was thankful for; large crowds were not something she particularly cared for. In her section of the train, there were only three other people; an old woman holding a handbag that seemed several times too large for her to carry, a balding man in business clothes and a tall, dark haired man in a red suit.

There was something disconcerting about the way the dark haired man was looking at the business man. Granted, the balding individual was looking severely unwell; he was sweating and his skin had taken on an almost purplish hue while the whites of his eyes had turned a pale yellow color. Rosie turned her head, trying not to think about what the bald man might have or how contagious it might be.

The train arrived at its destination after what felt to Rosie like hours, though both the clock and the conductor said it had only been fifteen minutes. The girl shook her head as she left the train with the elderly woman. She was glad to be rid of the two unsettling men, though something still seemed off. She looked around, uncertain of what it was for a few seconds until it hit her that the usually crowded train station seemed almost deserted. She glanced at the few dozen people around her, looking for any sign of whatever illness the bald man on the train had been suffering from but quit as she was shoved aside by a large man. She glanced at her watch, and felt her heart racing; she was nearly late for school.

The rest of the day seemed to fly by. Rosie looked around, but didn't see any more people with the symptoms that she'd seen the bald man suffering from. It was later that night before she even saw anything out of the ordinary.

It was the middle of the night. She wasn't sure why she'd woken up at first, but then she heard it; a rapping on the bedroom window. Rosie sat up in bed, looking at the window where the tiniest shadow could be seen through her curtains. She reached up, pulling the curtains back and nearly screamed.

There were outside, no less than a half dozen creatures clinging to the wall, looking in her room with glowing yellow eyes. The glass smashed, a clawed purple-black hand reaching in and dragging her out as she screamed for her parents.

The fall from her bedroom window should have killed her. It was five stories up, but she was okay when she touched the ground. She ran, bare feet pounding the pavement as more of the yellow eyed creatures appeared from everywhere. She tripped, slamming into the ground and one of the creatures was on top of her, claws sinking into her. Any second, she knew, she'd be gone, but the pain of the creature's claws ripped through to her core.

"Hey," said a voice somewhere above her. There was an explosion somewhere above her; her vision cleared and she saw the same tall, dark haired man from the train standing above her, a large triple barreled gun in hand.

They ran. Rosie had never ran so fast before, and the claw marks in her side burned like lava flowing through her body. "Duck," said the red suited man, pointing the gun where her head had been seconds before.

The resounding shot almost knocked Rosie off her feet again, if not for a strong hand holding her up, half dragging her forward. She was thrown onto the floor of something, a door slamming closed behind them.

"What….where are we?"

"It's a gummi ship," replied her savior. "We have to leave this world. Now."

"But…" Rosie looked out the window as the ship began moving, seeing the world beginning to turn dark. "My home." Her savior sighed.

"I'm sorry."