I don't own Doctor Who. Sadly. But I own all the original characters you see in this episode.

Also, just for this episode, I'm not italicizing when the Doctor and the Guardian speak in Gallifreyan (since that'd be the entire episode—spoilers!).

GD~GD~GD~GD~

Deep in the heart of the TARDIS, a cloud of psychic pollen stirred, a few spores being carried up into the main levels of the time machine...

GD~GD~GD~GD~

"Alright, this time we are going to make it to Poosh." The Doctor said, flipping switches at random just like always.

The Guardian smirked. "Of course we are. Because I'm going to be the one flying her."

"I can do this!"

"Past evidence indicates otherwise."

He glared weakly at her. "Third time's the charm."

The Guardian frowned. "You know, I never understood that human phrase. The third time you try something usually tends to be the worst.

"Oi!" The Doctor leaned slightly to look at her across the console. The Guardian used his distraction to press a button that would erase whatever random commands he just gave the poor TARDIS.

Suddenly, as if the old time machine was reacting to the Guardian's touch, the unit exploded and everything jolted, throwing the two pilots into the air. The Guardian landed on her back and immediately rolled over to grab the floor grating as the TARDIS continued to shake and flip around.

A horrible grinding noise filled the room, far worse than the noise the time machine made when the Doctor left the brakes on. Dark gray smoke filled the room.

What the hell was happening?

The Guardian crawled over to the console unit, using her grip on the grating to keep herself from being thrown further away. She reached for the lever underneath, the emergency brake.

It sparked, forcing her to pull her hand away. She tried to touch it again, only for the same thing to happen. The third time, the console exploded, the force of it making her lose her grip on the grating and roll away. She caught herself just before she rolled off the platform.

She saw the Doctor pull himself to his feet using the console. He typed in a few commands and the TARDIS suddenly landed with an enormous thud. The room when completely dark. The Guardian closed her eyes, trying to pretend that she wasn't surrounded by darkness.

When she opened them a moment later, the emergency lights had come on. The Guardian stood slowly, using the railing to steady herself at first. On shaking legs she hurried over to the Doctor, wrapping her arms around his waist as he wrapped his arms around her.

"You okay?" She asked.

"Yeah. You?"

She nodded. "What the hell just happened?"

"No idea. And the scanner isn't working, so I don't even know where we are."

The Guardian pulled away from him to look over the damaged console. "Well, we can't take off on emergency power, and all the other rooms would be sealed off and life support cut. There's nothing we can do except look outside and hope we're someplace friendly, where we can get the parts needed to fix her."

"Alright then." The Doctor walked over to the doors and opened one.

The Guardian saw him stiffen before he stepped outside. "What is it?" She called, then hurried after him.

They had landed in a city, one that looked just like any other futuristic city. But…

Hundreds of people hurried back and forth through the streets, wearing long robes of multiple colors. Many of their heads and shoulders were covered by a bronze hat-like thing, one that the Guardian knew well.

But that was impossible.

Absolutely….

She looked up, past the tall spires and the clear dome at the burnt orange sky. She could see one sun clearly, and just make out another one through the buildings.

Her hand found the Doctor's.

They were on Gallifrey.

GD~GD~GD~GD~

An hour later, they sat in the console room, having tried everything they could think of to get the TARDIS working again.

It was impossible for them to be back on Gallifrey.

When the Doctor had Time Locked the planet, its entire history had been locked away as well. It should have been as though the planet never existed other than in legends and their memories.

So how the hell did the TARDIS manage to break through the Time Lock?

The Guardian tossed down her welding tool. "That's it. There's nothing else I can think of." She touched the time rotor. "She's dying."

"There must be something!" The Doctor snapped. She had noticed him getting steadily more upset as the hour wore on, so his outburst didn't surprise her.

"There is nothing, Eltanin."

"We can't be stuck here, Amadahy!" He paced the platform.

"Well, there is always the option of stealing another TARDIS," the Guardian quipped. Her teasing smile immediately died. Abandon this TARDIS—their home?

Never. Surely there was something they could do.

The Guardian hurried out the doors. This was Gallifrey, birthplace of the TARDIS. Perhaps there was someone here who could do something. They never needed to know where the Doctor and the Guardian were from.

They would never need to know what the future had in store for Gallifrey.

"Amadahy!" The Doctor followed her.

The Guardian looked around, trying to get her bearings. She was certain this was Arcadia, though not a place she had gone very often. It was vaguely familiar…

Just then, she caught sight of a very familiar woman in deep blue robes, carrying an armful of books in one arm and pushing her spectacles back up her nose with the other hand. She wasn't wearing one of the hats, so her insanely curly red hair was free and unstyled, something that Gallifreyan society frowned upon.

"No..." The Guardian recognized where she was now.

And when she was.

She spun around to see the TARDIS doors slammed shut on their own. "No!" The Guardian cried and tried to open the door.

It was locked.

"Please!" Tears were freely streaming down her face as she pounded her fist against the doors. "Please, don't make me see this! Don't make me watch!"

She vaguely heard the Doctor calling her name, and she felt his hands on her shoulders, but she fought against him to stay beside the doors. "Please, let me in!" She begged the machine.

She couldn't be here.

There was no way she could bear to watch her mother die.

The Guardian knew the story well, even though she had been only five years old. The death of one's only loving parent was something one could never forget.

A transport was going to come out of nowhere, just as her mother was crossing the street. The angle would be just right to break her back and her neck. She was dead before regeneration could set in.

The Scholar had died in her first incarnation, leaving her daughter to suffer through over four hundred regenerations.

Something shifted in the Guardian. No. Just this once, the Universe owed her.

She stood and turned back to the street, easily finding the red-haired woman.

"Amadahy, whatever you are planning on doing, don't do it."

The Guardian ignored the Doctor. She saw the transport appear, just as her mother glanced down to look at the books in her hand. The Scholar shook her head, then started across the street in the direction of the Great Library.

The Guardian ran, pushing her way through the streets, using every one of her skills to get there in time. She dashed in front of the transport vehicle, hooked her arm around her mother's waist and dragged the woman out of the way just in time. The transporter brushed her heel as the Guardian and the Scholar fell to the walkway in a heap.

"What?" The Scholar looked around, feeling the ground for her spectacles.

The Guardian picked them up and handed them back to the woman. "Here."

The Scholar put them on and blinked. She looked so young, younger than the Guardian had remembered her as. It was hard to believe that she had five children, three of them in the Academy. Then again, everyone looked older than they really were to a child.

303.

That's how old her mother was.

Or how young she was, compared to the Guardian's 1,594—no matter what the Doctor said. She was more than five times as old as her mother ever had been.

Until now. The Guardian smiled. "Well, that was close."

The Scholar laughed—that low, gentle laugh that the Guardian remembered so clearly. "Yes, it was. Thank you so much. I just realized that I forgot my book on Three-Dimensional Euclidean Geometry at the Library. My daughter wanted me to teach her a little."

"Your daughter?" The Guardian asked. Neither of her sisters had been on holiday when their mother died, so why…

The Scholar smiled proudly. "Yes, my little Amadahy. Only five years old and she's fascinated by everything. I think she's going to become one of the Inspired. Her professors are going to be rather cross with me when she enters the Academy, but I can't stand the idea of her mind going to waste just because the High Council refused my application for her early admission."

"Why ever would they do that?" The Guardian asked absently. She didn't remember her mother teaching her mathematics. Nor did she recall any mention of an early admission into the Academy.

"My husband." She smiled tensely. "He and the High Council don't always see eye-to-eye. Only he's vocal about it."

The Guardian smiled. "Sounds much like my husband." She glanced behind her to see him leaning against the TARDIS. Her smile faltered at the disapproval in his eyes. So he had figured out what she had just done.

The Scholar's eyes widened. "Sorry. I'm the Scholar, of the House of Pelldown."

"The Guardian. Of..." She couldn't say Lungbarrow, as they were such a powerful house that the Doctor's connection would be figured out quickly. Nor could she say Pelldown for similar reasons. "...Oakdown."

The two women realized at the same that they were still sitting on the ground, and they helped each other up.

"How about you and your husband come to my house?" The Scholar asked. "I'd love for my family to meet the woman who saved my life."

The Guardian shook her head reluctantly. "No, we are just passing through. Our TARDIS has been giving us problems, so we need to find the parts to fix her soon."

The Scholar grinned. "I have a friend who is very good with TARDISes. He's been working on them for centuries. Maybe he could help?"

The Guardian blinked, surprised for a moment, before she realized there were a lot of things about her mother that she didn't know. But maybe now her younger self would have a chance to learn more about the woman.

GD~GD~GD~GD~

After saying good-bye to the Scholar and receiving an invitation to visit her family if she had time, the Guardian made her away back over to the Doctor, who had gone back inside the now-unlocked TARDIS.

"She is sending a friend who might be able to help us fix the TARDIS." The Guardian told the Doctor as soon as she shut the doors behind her.

"So she's your mother." The Doctor said, not looking at her.

"Yes," the Guardian replied. His mental shields were up high enough that she couldn't even sense stray thoughts from him.

"Your mother who died when you were five years old?"

Oh, he was not going to go there with her. "Need I remind you that your TARDIS locked me out, forcing me to watch? I was hardly going to let my mother die!"

"You could have turned to me for help!" The Doctor shouted back, finally looking at her. The coldness in his eyes shocked her. "That seems to be a thing with you—you'd rather deal with things on your own than look to someone else for help."

"I ask you for help all the time!"

"But not emotional things—those you'd rather deal with alone."

"Like what?" The Guardian snapped.

"You ran away from me after you told Nancy about Kateri. You told Sarah Jane that you were pregnant before you told me. I seem to be the last one to know about anything going on in your life emotionally."

"So that's your problem? That I'm not open enough for you emotionally?" The Guardian laughed bitterly. "Well, forgive me for having issues expressing my emotions after three hundred years of being beaten to death for doing such a thing."

It was like the Doctor didn't even hear her. "And now you just changed your own personal history!"

"I saved my mother from dying. It's not like I abducted my past self from the High Council's training facility!"

"You may very well have done just that—for all you know, your mother might stop your father from handing you over to the High Council." He began pacing.

"And then perhaps I might grow up to be a happier, less emotionally-stunted person. I thought that you would appreciate that."

The Doctor glared at her. "Do you have any idea of what you've—no, wait, you wouldn't. After all, how could you? You didn't go to the Academy."

The Guardian winced at the derision in his tone. Surely he couldn't think that she was so very inferior just because she hadn't gone to the Academy? "And what would the Academy have taught me about time that you haven't already taught me?"

"The consequences of changing it!"

The Guardian's jaw tightened. "Oh, right, so I should have just let my mother die so time would remain the same? How many people have you saved? Isn't that changing time?"

"I know what I'm doing," the Doctor replied coldly.

She scoffed. "So nearly allying yourself with the Krillitanes to crack the Skasis Paradigm was knowing what you're doing? What happened to the man who was proud of me for saving Sir Robert MacLeish?"

"Starting to wonder if this wasn't your plan all along." He responded flatly.

"What?" The Guardian frowned, confused.

"When did you first think of it—that you could use a time machine to go back and save yourself from three hundred years of torture?"

Surely he couldn't be suggesting… "If I wanted a time machine to do that, why would I need you? I have the skills to steal a TARDIS of my own."

"Maybe there's just more of the Weapon in you than I thought—the sadistic killing machine who delights in destroying lives." He stepped closer to her, getting in her face as he practically spat the words.

She slapped him before she could stop herself. "Don't you dare! I hated every moment that I was the Weapon, just like you hated being the Warrior! Don't ever say that I took delight in what I did! You have no idea what I felt when I looked over the massacres that I committed when I was her!"

"Pride?" He spat.

She backed away, towards the doors.

"Superiority?"

Tears burned her eyes as she opened the doors.

"Satisfaction?"

She ran out into the street. Anything to get away from her husband shouting accusations against her. It was almost like he had somehow heard the dark voices in her nightmares, the ones that told her she enjoyed being the Weapon, being the one in control for once in her life.

What was worst, there was a time in her life where it had been true.

The first Weapon, the one she tried to forget about, had been everything that the Doctor had just described.

GD~GD~GD~GD~

It wasn't too difficult to find the way to her family's house from the TARDIS, now that the Guardian was starting to remember the time after her mother's death.

Since Time Lord bodies were burned to prevent any of their DNA from ending up in the wrong hands, only the very important Time Lords and Ladies had graves. Thus, it was a customary part of grieving to visit to location of the loved one's death. Even at only five years old, Amadahy had walked that stretch of Gallifrey between her house and the location of her mother's death many times. Sometimes with family. Sometimes alone.

She stopped in front of the tower-like building that housed the Arcadian branch of the House of Pelldown. The house was still in its glory days, unlike it had been when she had passed it during the War. Then, it had been empty and decaying, a sign that the House of Pelldown was near extinction, with all the heirs married away or dead.

The door opened and the Scholar hurried out, still in her blue robes. "Guardian? How ever did you find us?"

"I asked around," she lied. "Someone was kind enough to give me directions."

"Well, then, come in." The Scholar smiled and gestured inside.

The Guardian followed her mother into the familiar foyer. She looked around, seeing just how luxurious the house was for the first time. As a child, it had been normal for her, but now, as an adult, she realized that her family actually had been quite wealthy.

"Where is your husband?" The Scholar asked.

"He stay behind, working on our TARDIS." The Guardian hid her tears by pretending to be distracted by a vase. She seemed to recall her brother had accidentally knocked over and shattered that vase when they were 7.

Speaking of her brother… She heard a loud, rapid stumping of feet. A moment later, a dark-haired boy who seemed too small to have made so much noise appeared. "Maiteria!" He threw himself at her skirts. He was soon followed by a little girl with bright blue eyes and hair just like the Scholar's, only the little girl's was blonde.

The Guardian's breath caught.

"Hello, to you too, Chu'a." The Scholar laughed, hugging the boy. The little girl hurried into her mother's embrace. "Hello, Amadahy. Now, children, we have a guest. So how about you go get cleaned up." She wiped a bit of dirt off her son's face.

The boy glanced at the Guardian and ran off, his sister following him. The Scholar laughed. "Forgive my son. He can be very enthusiastic at times. My daughter is much quieter, as you saw, but she can be just as bad when you ask her about something that she's interested in." She smiled fondly in the direction that her children disappeared.

"I like enthusiasm." The Guardian replied. "And passion. Gallifreyan culture could use some more life to it."

The Scholar nodded. "I quite agree."

The door suddenly burst open. The Doctor walked in. He looked at the Guardian. "We've got problems."

"What sort of problems?"

There was a scream outside. The Guardian pushed past the Doctor, and ran outside. Dozens of black creatures that looked like a cross between an Earth praying mantis and a dragon swarmed around. One of them dove for a Time Lord out in the open, landing on him. A moment later, it rejoined the others, now no sign of the attacked Time Lord.

"Get back inside!" The Scholar shouted, grabbing the Guardian's arm and pulling her into the house.

"What the hell are those things?" The Guardian asked.

The Doctor ignored her. "How old is that door?" He asked the Scholar.

"Old enough. It should keep them at bay for a while."

"Is anyone going to answer me?" The Guardian nearly shouted.

The Doctor turned to her, his eyes filled with fury. "That is what happens when you mess with time without a damn for the consequences."

The Scholar also looked at her. "They're called Reapers," she explained gently. "They come when there has been a wound in time. Right now, they're trying to cleanse that wound."

"By devouring everyone in sight?" The Guardian winced as she heard another scream.

"Everyone. Everything. They're not going to stop until time is either put right, or the whole world is dead." The Doctor replied with a glare in her direction.

"No." She snapped back, responding to his unspoken comment. She couldn't lose her mother now. Not after all this.

The Scholar, who had moved over to the window, suddenly screamed. The Guardian hurried to join her, just in time to see a Reaper attack her father, the Outlaw. She placed her hands on the shoulders of her now-sobbing mother. Her father may have been terrible to her, but he and her mother had been deeply in love.

The Doctor grabbed her arm and pulled her into a side room, muttering "excuse me" to the Scholar.

The Guardian wrenched her arm free. "Was that really necessary? She is distraught."

"Yep. Because her husband just died. Because you had to save her."

"Oh, so this is all my fault?"

The Doctor pretended to think. "Let me see… yes!"

The Guardian took a deep breath. "There must be something we can do."

"Yes. Your mother can die."

Without thinking, the Guardian slapped him. "Don't bring that up every again! You're the 'expert'. Find something that we can do to save the world, without killing my mother."

"Nope." The Doctor replied, walking towards the door. "You started this. You find a way to save your mother." He left the room, the Guardian following him. To her shock, he went directly to the front door and walked right out.

She screamed when he was attacked by a Reaper.

What had she done? Had she made her husband hate her so much that he was willing to die, rather than be with her any longer?

She stumbled over to the Scholar, who had been joined by her two small children.

The Guardian looked away from her past self. It seemed that she was going to have to make a choice—her mother, or all of Gallifrey.

GD~GD~GD~GD~

"What was the wound to time?" The Scholar asked quietly.

The Guardian looked up. It had been nearly an hour since the Doctor had walked away from her and died. The Reapers were still outside, like they knew where the Guardian and the Scholar were. Mercifully, the children had fallen asleep.

"Guardian?" Her mother's voice startled her.

"Nothing. It doesn't matter."

The Scholar breathed a scoff. "Well, clearly that's not true. Otherwise, the Reapers wouldn't be here."

Silence stretched between the two women when the Guardian refused to answer. What could she say? She had spent the last hour trying to come up with an alternate solution. But she had nothing. She didn't know enough about time to find a loophole.

"You're my Amadahy from the future, aren't you?"

The Guardian looked up in surprise. "How did you—"

The Scholar looked away. "I overheard some of your fight with your husband. I was supposed to die, wasn't I?"

"Yes." The Guardian swallowed. "We didn't intend to be where we were. Something went wrong with our TARDIS. I tried to let things happen as I knew they did, but the TARDIS locked its doors. And I couldn't bear—" She broke off.

The Scholar rose and moved over to kneel in front of the Guardian. "My passionate Amadahy." She placed her hands on either side of the Guardian's face. "You are so beautiful."

The Guardian looked down, tears filling her eyes. "I miss you so much, Maiteria."

"Moreso now, I imagine." She gestured to the Guardian's stomach.

The Guardian glanced up in surprise.

Her mother laughed quietly. "Oh, darling. Of course I can tell. I've been pregnant four times. So tell me about my grandchild."

The Guardian smiled, feeling her tears slip down her cheeks. "Grandchildren. A boy and a girl."

"Like you and Chu'a."

"My husband was a twin also, except he had a brother." The Guardian tore her thoughts away from the Doctor. "I'm due in a little over two months. We were so looking forward to them." She glanced out the window. She saw one of the Reapers dive down for a moment. "It seems the Universe has other plans."

Her mother gave her a sad look and stood. She walked over to her sleeping children. She gave each a kiss and whispered something in their ear. Then she came back over to the Guardian.

"I can't let you do this," she protested, realizing what her mother was planning.

"I'm not giving you a choice, Amadahy." Her mother shook her head. "Time should repair itself as soon as I die. In theory, everyone who died should return, including your father and your husband."

"But you'll be dead." The Guardian whispered, her tears flowing again.

"And you'll live. Darling, I wasn't there to teach you how to be a mother, but if this is the only parenting advice I can give, then it's worth it: no sacrifice is too big if it gives your children a future."

"I would have destroyed Gallifrey to save you, Maiteria."

Her mother smiled sadly. "I know that, because you're my passionate Amadahy. But because I'm your mother, I can't let you have that on your conscience." Her mother kissed her forehead. "I love you, Amadahy. And I am so proud of the woman you've become."

She went to the door and disappeared without a glance back. The Guardian watched through the window until she could no longer see her mother.

A few minutes later, the Guardian heard her past-self and her brother scream in their sleep. She closed her eyes and let the tears continue to stream freely. Her mother was dead all over again.

Thud!

She opened her eyes and looked out the window. The Reapers were still out there, and one was pounding on the door.

Thud!

The Guardian sat down. Time should have healed itself. What was wrong? Why wasn't anyone coming back? Unless… she dropped her head in her hands.

The Reapers weren't just trying to heal the rupture. They were trying to stop what caused it. They wanted her dead too.

Her husband. Her mother. Now her and her children.

Numbly, she stood and walked to the door. She stepped outside, and barely noticed as one of the Reapers attacked her.

GD~GD~GD~GD~

The Guardian found herself in a blindingly white room. A moment later, the lights turned off, plunging her into total darkness. She couldn't control her scream.

The lights turned back on, blinding her again.

Then it was dark again.

Light.

Dark.

Light.

Dark.

The Guardian curled up on the floor that was alternating between cold and hot. She knew exactly where she was. She was back in her cell on Gallifrey. When she had been only 100 years old, her instructors had left her in there for over a year, never allowing her interaction with another living creature, while they taught her eyes to adjust to light changes faster and her body to handle rapid temperature changes.

In the end, she had lost her mind and they had to force two regenerations on her just to get her back to a semi-normal state.

"Stop!" She cried, holding her head. "Please, stop!"

Light.

Dark.

Light.

Dark.

"For the love of Gallifrey, stop!"

Light.

Dark.

Light.

Dark.

No more. She sat up suddenly, a horrifyingly familiar sensation rising in her. She rose to her feet effortlessly and strode over to the door.

"Let me out, or I swear I will kill you and your entire family." She spoke coldly, flatly.

She was unsurprised when the door buzzed and opened. Even the strongest warriors of the Time Lords had been terrified of the Weapon.

The Guardian stepped out of the cell, only to find herself in her old training room. She frowned a tiny bit, glancing behind her. Her cell had not opened into the training room. When had that changed?

She heard movement on the other side of the darkened room. She pulled out one of her guns. "Show yourself."

"Put that away." A confident, familiar voice rang across the enormous room, just before a woman stepped into the light from the cell. "You could never hurt me."

The Guardian dropped her gun.

The woman smirked. Her blood-red lips made her skin look as pale as a dead woman's. Her platinum-colored hair was pulled up in a tight bun; her eyes the color of ice. Her tightly cut black uniform only served to make her features look even more pale.

The Guardian knew her. Only too well.

This was the first Weapon.

Her worst incarnation.

The one that she could have described as purely evil.

Even the incarnation that followed her, the second Weapon, had possessed some amount of conscience and emotion. But this one… born of more torture and the pain from Doctor's abandonment when he fled from the Time War—she had enjoyed killing. Anything to strike out against the Doctor. To punish him for abandoning her to the War.

This woman truly was the perfect psychopath.

"Did you enjoy it?" The Weapon asked, still smirking.

"Enjoy what?"

"Being me." She moved closer, slowly, like a ghostly panther. "Threatening to murder an entire family if you weren't let out of your cage."

"I did what I had to." The Guardian replied, stepping back. "You know as well as I do what happened the last time I was in that cell."

The Weapon chuckled mockingly. "Oh, yes. You became me. How interesting that you should become me again to get out."

"I did not become you."

The Weapon breathed another mocking laugh. "Perhaps you're right. Look at you. The little girl who thought she could mess with time. Are you proud of yourself?"

"Of course not." The Guardian snapped. Her mother was dead. So was her husband. What was there to be proud of?

"At least I did what I did to protect Gallifrey. And then you had to go destroy all my hard work. Tsk. Tsk."

"You didn't murder so many innocent people because you wanted to protect Gallifrey," the Guardian spat. "You enjoyed it."

The Weapon smirked again. "Perhaps I did. But don't tell me you didn't enjoy having the power to completely destroy Gallifrey in your hands." She slipped up beside the Guardian and whispered in her ear, "You can't lie to me. I am you, after all."

The Guardian recoiled.

"You can never hid anything from me, Guardian. I know you better than you know yourself. Oh, how you hate playing the perfect little wife of that man, the Doctor." She spat his name.

The Guardian whirled around. "I'm happy for the first time in my life!"

"Really? You? Happy as a wife and a mother? That's not the life for someone like us, and you know it. We should be joining the Sontarans in battle. Or maybe even the Papal Mainframe. Those self-righteous saints do love a good bloodbath."

"No." The Guardian replied. "I belong where I am."

"Perhaps. But just remember that I could easily steal all of that away from you." Suddenly, before the Guardian could block her, the Weapon kicked her in the stomach.

She fell to her knees, crying out in pain. She gripped her stomach, her eyes widening as she realized just what the Weapon had done. She could feel it in her mind.

Her children were dead.

"Dead husband, dead children, dead Guardian," the Weapon chanted. She pulled one of her guns out of the holder on her left hip. "Dead husband, dead children, dead Guardian." She leaned down to whisper in the Guardian's ear again. "I told you I could steal it all away from you."

Then she leveled her gun at the Guardian's temple and fired.

GD~GD~GD~GD~

The Guardian awoke with a scream. She was sitting up in bed, her gun out and pointed into the darkness. Her hearts pounded, and she could barely breathe. She snapped the fingers of her free hand, turning the lights on.

There was no one in the room besides her and the Doctor.

Nevertheless, her hearts continued to beat three times as fast as they should. She struggled to take a deep breath.

"Amadahy," the Doctor said quietly.

He sat up slowly and placed his hands around hers. Her grip loosened on the gun, and she allowed him to take it. She heard him place it on the table beside the bed before he pulled her against him, her back to his chest, his arms wrapped around her waist.

Feeling his breath on her shoulder and neck helped her calm down, as did sensing the twins nudging her mind to remind her that they were still there. Her hearts-rate and breathing normalized.

She started sobbing as she remembered the details of her dream. Every vivid, painful detail flashed through her memory all over again.

"It was just a dream, Amadahy. We're safe in the TARDIS, far away from Gallifrey."

She flinched. He had seen it all, hadn't he?

Of course he had. Ever since they had bonded completely, they often shared dreams. Usually, those dreamed tended to be of a more pleasant variety. Rarely ever did they share nightmares, mostly because their mental walls would go up very quickly at the first sign of a nightmare, even in their sleep.

Normally, Gallifreyans could tell the difference between a dream and reality. So why hadn't she been able to sense the difference this time?

For the love of Clom, they had been back on Gallifrey. That alone should have told her something was wrong.

"I'm sorry that you had to see that." She whispered. As it had been her dream, he would have had no control over what his dream self did. He had been forced to watch himself choose to die rather than remain with her.

His hand stilled where it had been gently stroking her stomach. She realized that he had connected with the twins, trying to reassure them. Of course. They had been pulled along into her nightmare too.

"There's nothing to forgive, Amadahy. It was a dream. You couldn't control it anymore than I could."

"But what I did..." She squeezed her eyes shut, grateful that he was behind her and couldn't see her tears. "Eltanin, if I had had the choice, I don't know if I would have done it differently." She had realized it when they were in 1941. If she had the power to save her mother, then she would. Damn the future. "I don't know if I really would be able to let my mother die."

His arms tightened around her. "And I would be there with you every moment." He kissed the side of her head, then whispered. "I would never leave you, Amadahy."

She flinched, remembering the dream version of him walking right into the Reaper's attack. "You can't promise that."

"Yes, I can." He insisted.

"Maybe you can. But you will one day regenerate. It's basically a guarantee with you."

She felt more than heard him chuckle.

"And one day, when you change, everything about you will change. You'll be a totally different man. You may not even love me any more."

"Amadahy—"

"You've seen how much I can change from regeneration to regeneration," she interrupted. "We can't control what we become. You may find yourself becoming a man who couldn't stand a soldier wife."

"Everything you did was in the name of peace and sanity."

"But not in the name of the Guardian." She sighed. "I suppose I do have one regret—I should have kept my chosen name. I was the one who originally changed it to the Weapon, you know."

He nodded. She had shown him that when they were married.

"She was so very different from who I had been before, the name change fit. But when she died, I should have fought to become the Guardian again. The woman most of the Universe remembers the Weapon as—she did the best she could. I never should have let her actions be tied to those of a psychopathic murderer."

"Then stop calling her 'the Weapon'," he whispered. "Call her 'the Guardian'."

A slow smile appeared. She could do that. At least in her own mind, she could stop the Ultimate Psychopath from ruining her War-self's actions.

"She's a liar." The Guardian said suddenly, remembering something else the Weapon had tried to ruin.

"Hm?"

"When she said that I wasn't happy with you."

"I know."

The Guardian shifted to see the Doctor's knowing smirk. "You!" She playfully shoved him back again the pillows, the terror of her nightmare temporarily forgotten as she focused on the Doctor's smug attitude.

GD~GD~GD~GD~

The Guardian found herself in the library, just glancing over the titles. After a couple of days, most of the effects of her nightmare had worn off, or she had at least been able to push it aside.

But a few things had stayed, one of them being the idea of her mother teaching her a few Academy subjects. She had no memories to prove it, so why did her mind bring that up?

She noticed a book on Euclidean geometry and reached up to grab it, just as the Doctor wrapped his arms around her from behind.

"I found something." He whispered in her ear.

He held out a hand in front of them. Several tiny white balls lay on his palm.

"What are they?" She asked, frowning.

"Your nightmare."

She twisted around to face him, now confused. How could a few white balls be her nightmare?

"Psychic pollen." He explained. "I found them in the vents to your training room. This particular type feeds on the fears of a victim, magnifies them and turns it against them. We must have picked some up during our travels, carried the spores in."

The Guardian blinked. "So all that was the result of a few specks that I breathed in?" Could that have been the cause of all the nightmares she had been suffering recently? Not just the last one?

"I hope not all of it. I happen to hope that our daughter looks like you did as a child." The Doctor grinned at her, but then it faded. "It's a bit unusual, though. I'm not sure how the pollen ended up getting into those particular vents. There were thousands other places that would have been more likely."

That familiar feeling of a coming storm returned. The Guardian forced a smile. "Well, I'm sure you'll figure it out." She kissed him, pushing her concerns to the back of her mind. "But I wanted to do some reading."

"Euclidean geometry?" He smirked and reached for the book, not having to strain himself at all, like she had.

She pouted a little and accepted the book.

They ended up sitting together in a chair beside the fireplace, as the Doctor insisted on staying nearby to help explain anything she didn't understand completely, as it was a rather advanced subject.

To their surprise, she needed very little help. The information seemed almost familiar, like she had learned it a long time ago.

She smiled. Perhaps her mother really had taught her some things before she died.

And maybe, if her dream had been right about that at least, then perhaps it had been right about how proud her mother had been and would have been of her.

GD~GD~GD~GD~

Now, what did you think of my version of "Father's Day"? You may have guessed, but I got the idea from a thought the Guardian had in "The Doctor Dances", when she notes that she would have destroyed Gallifrey to save her mother. Add psychic pollen, and there you go!

I hope the Doctor and the Guardian's conversation when she woke up made sense. If not, I'd be happy to explain a bit deeper.

But did you like my borrowing a couple of lines from 'The Name of the Doctor?' I kind of imagine Nine as quoting the justification that the Warrior used (which was why he said it in the episode), and Eleven was later repeating what he vaguely remembered the Guardian saying.

For anyone who is curious, I imagine the 1st Weapon as looking kind of like Jennifer Morrison when she went all Dark Swan in Once Upon A Time.

Also (hint of the future), does the description of little Amadahy sound a bit familiar?

Next Time: The Doctor and the Guardian meet a VERY old friend. Oh, and the final month of the Guardian's pregnancy isn't at all as pleasant as the first 7 months have been.