AN: Thank you very much for your reviews! Here's the next chapter! Sorry it took so long, it was hard writing the beginning of this chapter. Hopefully you guys like it.

Double Edged Descent

Dusk peeked over the horizon as hues of orange, yellow and pink swathed the sky in a breathtaking view. The beautiful vision contrasted the heavy gloom that hung over the city. People stared straight ahead as they walked, avoiding the gazes of those less fortunate begging for the smallest compassion. Times were tough. There was too little to go around and nothing could be spared. The Great Depression had descended on London.

A lone woman in red stood out amongst the greys and browns of the city, despite her face mirroring the city's desolation. Her gaze was locked on to the pavement in front, almost as if in a trance. The dark skinned woman seemed to shake off her reverie and entered the bakery in front. She emerged with a measly bag of bread.

Unbidden, the Soldier's eyes flew to the signboard across the street. Doctor's Clinic. Come in for a free check-up! Her features twisted in derision at the sign.

His fault. All of this was his fault.

o0o

"Listen to me. It's me. I am the Doctor."

The words resonated through the Soldier as she gazed at the man before her. The Doctor. The words brought forth an intense rush of emotions that threatened to overwhelm her. Agony. Hope. Disbelief. It was too much. This was too much.

She retreated into herself, desperately grasping for control against her raging emotions. Too many. She was a hair's breadth from madness. An inch from the dark and wild abyss. She was almost there.

And she was gone. She didn't care for anything. There was no point. The world held no meaning beyond mere existence. Even existence was arbitrary.

As the Soldier began to turn inward, a rough shake brought the Doctor into focus.

Someone had survived. She wasn't alone anymore. The thought shone a ray of light into her darkness. This ray of hope was dangerous. It could destroy her soul. It nearly had in the hospital on the Moon. She couldn't survive a repeat of that time, not now.

The Doctor wasn't alive. He couldn't be. He had been drained in front of her. She had checked. This couldn't be the Doctor.

Numbness descended.

The Soldier was being shaken like a rag doll, pulling her out of her sensory deprivation. If Smith didn't stop soon, she'd kill him. The sheer audacity he had, claiming to be the Doctor, giving her false hope so that she wouldn't kill herself.

"Listen Soldier! Don't shut yourself off! I am right here! The Doctor! The man who travelled with Romana! You remember her, don't you? Come on, snap out of it!" the Doctor cried, panicked as he shook her even harder in his attempts to reach her.

Romana. That name struck another painful chord in her. She had given everything for Romana. But Artis, he had given the Soldier even more, something no one else had. He had loved her back. He had stayed with her through everything. He was the only one she would ever truly love and he had been ripped away from her.

The Soldier desperately tried to shut all of it out. One thing was becoming glaringly clear. She couldn't turn back to how she was before, alone, unloved and unwanted. She needed Artis. She needed love. How was she going to live without it? Without him?

Even this man, who claimed to know her in the future, called her a monster. Her future was clear. Without Artis, she would turn into a monster. She had already lived more than a thousand years. She didn't want to live on only to become a senseless murderer. She didn't want to die like she had last time, her legacy being a field of murdered bodies. It was better to die.

"Just leave me alone." Her voice was hollow and void of life.

"Be strong. Even this will pass." The deep gaelic nuances of Gallifreyan echoed in her mind cutting through her numbness. She reacted instinctively, her arms coming around the Doctor in a desperate grip.

The Doctor from Gallifrey. Home was right in front of her. How had she not noticed it before? He had the unique Time Lord essence that distinguished them from every other race. That came from prolonged exposure to the raw Time Vortex. That alien quality and condescension. He exuded it.

He was the Doctor. He was really the Doctor! A dam broke inside her and her tears flowed freely as she grasped him like a lifeline. Gallifreyan. Her language. Her homeland. She wasn't alone anymore. She had another Time Lord with her. She would recover. She wouldn't be so terribly alone. That aching abyss of pain would ebb, she would heal. There really was hope.

She hugged him even closer, drawing comfort from everything that he was. The beats of his hearts soothed her and she pressed her face closer to his chest. She clung to him like a lost child desperately seeking reassurance after being found.

The Soldier sobbed her relief and pain onto the Doctor, unaware of the time passing by as she clung to him. The Doctor held her tightly, patting awkwardly at her hair. When she settled down, she stepped back, still holding tightly onto his arms, unwilling to let go completely. She tightened her grip as she braced herself for what she was going to ask.

"Can I stay with you, please? Can we be together?" The Doctor's face immediately closed off and something shifted in his expression. He looked as if he was in pain and this confused her. Had he misunderstood her intentions? Did he think she wanted to be romantically linked with him? But how could he when he'd just seen Artis die? So why his reluctance?

Her heart sank as realization dawned. He couldn't take her because their timelines were out of sync.

Wait. She could still travel with him. So what if their timelines were mismatched? She needed to be with him right now. She needed some semblance of home to deal with this grief. She needed hope. She could return to her established timeline when she was healed.

"Please, let me be with you. I searched all of time and space for you. I need to be with you. We only have each other. Do not leave me alone." The Soldier begged, throwing what semblance of pride that remained away. It didn't matter if she looked pitiful and pathetic as long as she got him to agree.

The Doctor's face contorted into anguish and hesitance. He was clamouring for words, repeatedly opening and closing his mouth in failed attempts at speech. Was he finding a way to refuse her?

The possibility of rejection stung and she tried not to show it as she waited for his response. Her plea would work. They were kinsmen. He wouldn't deny her.

"Soldier, the thing is you and I, we-we don't travel together. I mean I do occasionally, you know, drop you off sometimes but we don't, you know..." He circled his hands in the air awkwardly between them unable to finish.

"But why?" The Soldier asked in confusion and he fidgeted uncomfortably. There had to be more to it. Why couldn't she be with him? She could not imagine any reason that would make her averse to staying with the Doctor. She had loved being in a TARDIS, had secluded herself in her own for years, enjoying the comforts of a machine that catered to her every whim. Her TARDIS had insulated her against the harsh realities of the universe. She needed that.

"It's because of a thing. A very important thing. A wibbley-wobbley timey wimey batpoop crazy thing. Did I say batpoop? Never saying that again." The Soldier stared incredulously at the Doctor as he rambled and refused to look in her direction.

"Are you saying you will leave me here?" She whispered in disbelief. This was betrayal. He was abandoning her. Her voice was deceptively calm when she spoke next, "You are going to leave me behind on a planet that is hunting me? Then why are you stopping me from killing myself? Or do you want the pleasure of killing the monster yourself? Romana was wrong. She made you out to be someone who-" she paused, unwilling to call him compassionate and forgiving, not when he was doing this to her, "- who took care of others. I am not some human that you encountered from Earth. You and I are the last of our kind. And you want to leave me behind?"

"No, no! You've got it wrong!" The Doctor hastened to reassure, "You can't travel with me now. You meet a younger me. If I remember correctly, this was how you were, when you met me." He cringed, waiting for her to explode. His eyebrows rose in shock at her lack of reaction and he continued, "I won't be leaving you behind here. I'll drop you off on another planet. Earth should be alright. Humans, they are incredible, they'll help you heal. I found someone when I was just like you, someone who pulled me out of my own darkness, Rose. The most humane human I knew." A fond smile filled his face in remembrance.

"I do not need humans!" She hissed, almost losing control. Why didn't he understand? Her voice rose as she tried and failed to be calm, "I need to be with you. How many times do I have to say it? How many times do you need me to beg? Without you, I have no reason to live. How can I separate myself from you when I know that you are alive? Please Doctor, I miss my home. I miss Gallifrey and you are the only thing that is left. How can I leave you? Please! I thought you were dead Doctor! I spent nearly three hundred years thinking you died because of me!" Her tears started flowing again, and she struggled to control herself. "Even if our timelines are not in sync, let me stay with you for a while before you move me to the correct time line. Just refrain from speaking about our future. There is no need for me to even warn you because we are Time Lords. But I cannot be alone. I cannot bear being alone, not anymore." How much more did she need to beg? How could she convince him?

The Doctor placed his hands on her shoulders and she wanted to flinch away from him, his cruelty, but she suppressed the urge knowing that it wouldn't help. His hands gently slid from her shoulders to cradle her face.

"Listen to me Soldier. There are things going on in my time that you shouldn't be involved in. Things so convoluted that your entry will endanger you and give my enemies someone to exploit; something that they've already done before. The you right now is compatible with the younger version of me. I was dealing with grief then too. " A deep sadness filled his eyes as he spoke, his eyes moving over her as if memorizing her face.

"Alright then." The Soldier surrendered, unwilling to fight on this further. But she still needed the reassurance that she wouldn't be alone, that at least she'd be with a younger him. "So do I travel with the younger you?"

The Doctor flinched at her question, drawing back and looking away from her. "No, no. Stop asking the same questions." He snapped, uncomfortable. "I had no idea you were a Time Lord at the time. I found out quite a bit later. You are better off keeping that to yourself for now; let me find out on my own. Timey-wimey stuff."

Did the Doctor just refer to the importance of sticking to established events as timey-wimey? The Soldier stared at him, unable to comprehend the extreme dichotomy of his personality. He made no sense. Granted she had never known the Doctor, but she had heard of stories of him, his exploits throughout time. He made a loud entrance wherever he went. But what was this childishness, this immaturity? Was he in denial of his age? Or had his regeneration gone haywire? Had he been exposed to a child right after regeneration? No, it ran deeper than that. But what?

No, all that didn't matter. He still hadn't answered her question.

"So do I stay with you? Why are you so silent? Am I asking too much Doctor? Are you married?"

He suddenly blushed, defensive as he answered, "No, I'm not! It's not that! You don't travel with me okay! You just don't. There are plenty of reasons. Universe exploding. Too many Time Lords can throw things off course. Put things in a fix that can't be fixed. Really bad and all that." He nodded fervently as if he believed his own drivel.

A thought, an impossible thought, was slowly sinking in the Soldier.

He didn't want her to stay in the TARDIS. No version of the Doctor ever wanted her as a constant companion. He wasn't desperately searching for a connection to Gallifrey like her. He was happy with humans, the beings for whom he had suffered exile and death. She was insignificant. Her existence meant nothing to him.

The realization burned her with humiliation.

It wasn't because of timelines. That was just an excuse. The rules of time could be bent. He didn't want to spend any more time with her than necessary. Why? Was she inadequate? In what way was she lacking, to be rejected by the only other Gallifreyan in existence? What did those human companions have that she didn't?

"Do you hate me Doctor?" The Soldier asked quietly, feeling her despondency return. The Doctor turned to her in alarm, feeling as if he'd made a huge mistake.

"I-No I don't. I care about you. I always have and I always will." The Doctor stated firmly.

Despite his words, the Soldier couldn't bring herself to believe him. If he really cared about her, then why was he doing this? All the Doctor had done since landing on this planet was lie. He'd fed her outright lies, half-truths and blatant omissions. There was something he wasn't telling her, something massive.

But she was so tired. Tired of fighting him, fighting the universe. The Soldier turned to face the pyre, watching as the flames began dying out. All it would take was a small jump, and it would be over. She gazed into the dancing flames fighting an internal battle. She took a step forward, knowing her decision had been made long before the Doctor had interfered. When it really came down to it, there was only one person who had ever made her feel worth it. No one else would ever replace Artis.

The Soldier picked up the fuel tank, blind to everything else around her. She drained the fuel over herself and tossed the tank aside. The Soldier jumped forwards, and jerked back when she felt hands pull her back. Falling in a heap onto the floor, she struggled desperately to overthrow the Doctor, who manhandled her to the ground.

There was a harsh blow to her left shoulder and then darkness.

o0o

The sound of wheezing groaning brakes echoed around the Soldier as she came into consciousness. A waft of time dust surrounded her and she jolted awake, feeling a glancing pain in her left shoulder. He had used the cheapest trick in the book, knocked her out by using the Time Lord Pressure knot.

The Soldier looked around, searching for the source of that haunting sound and sniffed tentatively, trying to figure out where she was. She was outdoors, and it was pitch black, the night lit only by the stars. She stood up, taking a step blindly in the dark. Her foot sank deep into watery slushy mud, and her balance rocked, sending her careening forwards. She fell, splashing into murky dirty water, the polluted water drifting into her mouth making her cough in disgust.

Earth, she was on Earth. Her Senses flooded with information at the recognition. This murky water was the Thames River during 1929, post-World War One.

The Doctor had abandoned her. Dropped her off in one of the most turbulent times of human history. Soldier waded back to the shore. She hurriedly checked her pockets, hoping he had left her with something useful. As she dug deeper into her pockets, all she found was her EMS and a soggy unreadable note. He had taken her weapons, her inventions. What was she going to do in this old civilisation? How would she protect herself? Why? Why had he done something like this? He'd left her lying in the middle of nowhere, hadn't even bothered to find her a place to live. He'd thrown her out of his TARDIS and left her to fend for herself with nothing but a scanner and a useless note.

Her grief returned with a forceful pang. Why had he saved her? Everything he had done made one thing clear. The Doctor didn't care about her, probably even hated her.

Her heart sank as she remembered images of Artis's lifeless face, of the Doctor's cruel rejection. A thought suddenly struck her. There was still hope. The young Doctor had not met her yet; she could still salvage her first impression. The Doctor could have lied about the established events, as he had about everything else. There was still a chance. She would see him again soon.

Now, she was back on Earth again, where humans lived the span of her heartbeat. The planet that the Doctor couldn't stay away from. How ironic was it that she was trapped with the species she had been mimicking the past few centuries.

o0o

The Soldier slowly climbed over the banks of the river and made her way through the streets. Numerous people lay homeless, sprawled over the nearest space available, huddling together to fight the incoming winter. As the Soldier passed the homeless people, she caught unfriendly and aggressive glares sent her way.

What was wrong with these people? Why were they so hostile? The Soldier made a cursory check of herself to make sure she wasn't dressed in alien attire, but the only distinct clothing she was wearing was her bright red coat, something that wasn't all that unique considering its state of disrepair. Had they somehow discerned that she was an alien? Her hand raced to her locket at her neck, feeling the slight buzz that implied that it was functioning normally.

Then what was it? Were they cautious because the War had just ended? Nothing could be done about that. All she could do was live with her head down, hope she didn't draw notice to herself.

As the Soldier passed a particularly inebriated man, he stared at her in disgust and spat at her feet. The Soldier backed away in alarm, insulted by his behaviour.

"Whatcha lookin aa me like that for? Look atcha self, drippin' and stinkin'. But then with tha colour of ya skin, what else can ya expect? Make no difference what ya step on, dunnit? Do ya even undastand what 'm sayin? Hahaha!"

The Soldier stood stunned, her misery and loneliness completely forgotten. Her skin colour? The reason all those people had been hostile was her skin colour? Rather than feeling rage, the Soldier looked at him befuddled, unable to comprehend this possibility. A slight hysteria began to permeate her thoughts, finding the entire situation ridiculously funny. Of all the reasons she'd been disliked in her life, this was, by far, the most useless and idiotic reason she'd ever heard.

The Soldier felt hysterical laughter bubble out of her, joining in with the drunken man as he laughed in derision at her. The man stopped, giving her a perturbed look before sauntering away.

Dear Rassilion, she was stuck with an idiotic species that hadn't even evolved to resolve their differences in skin colour. How ridiculous. How funny.

The Soldier laughed and laughed, dropping down to the ground as she clutched her stomach in pain. The surrounding drifters looked at her warily before clearing the area, unwilling to cohabit with a deranged woman.

As the Soldier settled, she gazed up into the sky, seeing nothing but a dull blackness, stars obscured from the pollution. Misery and gloom blanketed London, cries and screams occasionally ringing into the night sky.

The Doctor had been unwittingly right. This city mirrored her state perfectly.

0o0o

The Soldier turned away from the sign and turned towards the pavement again. It was a long walk to her shed. She had constructed it herself one with wooden planks that she stole from the surrounding construction sites. It had proved harder to steal than expected, especially since her "social status" in 1920s London made her circumspect.

A hospital had recently finished its reparations and for lack of anything better to do, she had joined as a nurse. She'd held the job for two days before she'd been fired for having "a smart mouth". So now she meandered about, looking for odd jobs to make ends meet.

She hated it.

Her eyes were drawn to the military drill practices conducted at the field nearby. Practise shots rang the air as one team practised shooting while another completed obstacle courses. Britain was gearing up for its Second War. No one believed that this fragile peace would hold.

She disappeared into the tree-line next to the military encampment. As she retreated into her shed, she took her bread and sat next to the window, listening as shots and cries echoed distantly.

She looked at the skies, hoping to see something unusual. But nothing happened. There was no danger.

She finished her bread and exited to the back of her shed, picking up her tools. She harvested bio-electricity from the eels she'd managed find in the river. With her being an "undesirable", the general populace refused to provide her with basic amenities, even when she had money. Hypnosis could not work on a target that was hostile and guarded. This discrimination seriously hampered how she could influence them, made acquiring simple things much harder. But the Soldier tried to give what she could to the refugees; the gypsies and Jews that fled to Britain and now lived in the fringes of the city. It was how the military encampments were obtaining information about the situation in Germany.

As the days passed, the Soldier found it increasingly difficult to believe that she'd meet the Doctor. Doubts plagued her mind. The dislike he'd shown her was immense; there was no reason to believe he'd given her accurate information.

Was it wise to run after a man that wanted nothing to do with her? A man whose only instinct was to run?

Only time would tell.

AN: So there it is! The Doctor just leaving her like that was a surprise. The next chapter is almost half-done and has a surprise Doctor. Can you guess which one it is?

Bringing the race card was a little weird, but I'm trying to be historically correct. Any corrections and criticisms are welcome!

A hearty thanks to my beta SHELBY BEAN!

Reviews are much appreciated.