After a very long absence from writing, during which I graduated college and got married, I am once again trying to finish this story. Hopefully, some people are still interested in reading. Even if that isn't the case, it gives me satisfaction to keep writing.

"The balance? Explain."

The projected image of a little girl swallowed and shook her head.

"I can't."

The Doctor felt frustration boil up within him.

"Red, you may look like a ten year old to everyone else, but the both of us know that isn't really what you are." The little girl hunched in on herself in front of him and he tried to dial back on some of the "Oncoming Storm".

"Red, this is Rose, and she needs your help."

Red threw her hands up.

"I don't know how."

The Doctor took a deep breath.

"Did you see something? Something to do with the compass?" He watched her face as she seemed to think over the question.

"It's…tied to her somehow." Red spoke slowly. "…And to the other mind." She shrugged and The Doctor rubbed his eyes.

"I could try looking at her mind if you wanted?" The little girl voice brought the Doctor's head up so quickly it almost hurt.

"What?"

She cringed again, and he consciously made his voice gentler.

"Can you do that Red? Look into her mind…?"

The ten-year old look was back on Red's face and she shrugged.

"Of course. She's my Mum."

"Of course." The Doctor repeated, feeling like smacking his own forehead. "Your consciousness is patterned on hers, so you already have a mental link." He shook his head. "Why didn't I think of that earlier?" Red answered him with a blank look.

"Right. New plan." The Doctor bent to look at the monitor and rubbed his hand over his head. "Rose and the other mind both seem to be sleeping, so what I need you to do is look in and see if you can wake the other mind up." He stuck his hands in his pocket and wagged his head toward the compass. "Maybe if we can talk to whoever it is, we can convince them to get out of Rose." He turned back to look at Red, but then stopped with his mouth hanging slightly open.

In the space where the little girl had stood alone just a second before a woman now stood with her, blinking and looking around as if just waking up. Her eyes locked on him immediately, and she abruptly crouched in a defensive position her arms up, fists clenched.

The Doctor back pedaled.

"Wait, wait. Calm down. You're safe." He held up both hands and tried his best smile. She regarded him narrowly for another moment and then straightened up, unclenching her hands. The Doctor noted how the sleeve of her tunic fell back to cover her tattoo.

"You are the Corsair." He spoke carefully, both to placate her, and because the realization that he was actually talking to another Time Lord after all this time was finally hitting him.

Well, a Time Lord that isn't an insanely psychotic villain, at least.

The Corsair's face was unfamiliar to the Doctor, but he trusted the tattoo. The form of the Corsair was a woman of medium height and build, though what he could see of her forearms showed considerable muscle. Her features had what humans would call an Asian look, with a noticeable epicanthic fold and lack of eyelid crease, plus jet black hair that fell in a tight braid to the back of her knees. Her voice, when she spoke, was clipped and strangely rough as if she did a lot of shouting.

"You know my name sir, but I don't believe that I have had the pleasure of meeting you before."

The Doctor rocked back slightly on his heels.

"No, I don't suppose you have." He considered for a moment and then shook his head.

"But that isn't important now because we have a problem."

The woman regarded him narrowly.

"What problem is that?"

"Your mind is trespassing on my friend." The Doctor stated bluntly, and watched the face projected in front of him twist into an expression of surprise.

"That's…" The Corsair began, but then looked down and around at her surroundings. She seemed to waver for a moment, and then looked over at him.

"I don't have a body." It was partly a question, so the Doctor nodded.

The woman swallowed visibly and then tried another question.

"Do I have a body…somewhere?"

The Doctor felt his lips tighten.

"Unlikely." He glanced at the compass still clutched in Rose's hand. "At the very least your mind has been at the bottom of an ocean for the last thousand years."

The Corsair seemed to notice where he was looking and he saw her eyebrows go up as she took note of the compass in Rose's hand.

"That's a human!" The projection of a woman gave him another surprised look. "How could she even register, much less integrate my mind waves?"

The Doctor shook his head.

"She's not your average human…she's done things…seen things, that even you wouldn't imagine." He took a breath through his nose. "Somehow, she has integrated a certain portion of your mind, but it is hurting her, so I am going to have to ask you to get out."

The woman gave him a look that contained equal parts bafflement and contempt.

"And how, by the three shades of Orion, am I supposed to do that?"

Before he could frame a reply, she rounded on him.

"Who are you anyway? You're like a human, but your eyes say that you have seen Time…" She regarded him with her hands on her hips. "I have met you before with a different face." She strode toward him and her hand raised as if to grab his arm, but her hand passed right through his shoulder and back without him feeling a thing. She glared at her hand and then at him again, and he sighed.

"You always were one for action…" He looked her in the eyes. "The truth is that you have never met me before…at least…" He waggled his head back and forth a little. "Well, you've met me, but I wasn't exactly this me. And I've met you, only it was a different you…And it's all very complicated and timey-wimy but the main thing is that we need to help Rose."

As he spoke the Corsair backed away from him with her eyes growing larger as she looked at him. To his surprise her mouth actually fell open and a light of recognition dawned on her face.

"By Rassilon's cold heart, you're the Doctor!"

The Doctor had to wince as the Corsair took a full sixty seconds to use every swear word he had ever encountered and quite a few that he was unfamiliar with.

…And she still hasn't repeated herself once. He noted with some admiration. Still, enough is enough.

"Look, I'm fairly sure that is anatomically impossible." He broke into her continued rant, waving a hand to divert her attention. "Whoever I am isn't the issue though; the issue is that you are taking up space in Rose's head and possibly doing damage, and you have to get out."

"No", the woman projection shook her head and her finger at him. "Who you are is very much the issue, because you are supposed to be dead!"

"Says the woman who's been in a compass for the last thousand years." The Doctor muttered.

The Corsair didn't pay any attention to the jibe as she paced up and down the short floor space in front of Rose's sleeping form.

"You died in the Time War, with all the others. I saw you die!"

"I told you, it's complicated." The Doctor massaged the back of his neck and wondered if he was feeling a headache coming on.

There was a sudden stillness and the Doctor looked up to see the Corsair standing nearly nose to nose (though really more like nose to throat because of the height difference) with him.

She regarded him speculatively.

"You aren't dead."

He raised his eyebrows. "Clearly."

"But you are the Doctor?" She ran a critical eye over the length of him, and he sighed.

"For all intents and purposes, yes."

He watched her hesitate, and then she leaned in even closer to speak in a quiet, almost hiss.

"Then you must save the treasure."

The Doctor rocked back, knowing that confusion must be showing on his face since it was making a big question mark on his mind.

"What treasure?"

The confusion on his face was mirrored on the Corsair's for a moment, but then there was a blipping noise from one of the monitors, and a small groan from Rose's sleeping form. Abruptly the image of the Corsair wavered again, and then vanished, leaving the Doctor in the room with only a bunch of cobbled together scientific equipment and his human…who was trembling.