TERRAFORM
ELEVEN
"The black hole manipulator," said The Doctor in high professorial mode, pointing to the object which had become totally integrated into the TARDIS console, "is from another ship, not this one. But it doesn't matter, as Wil pointed out, it is Time Lord tech, and therefore can be and has been easily assimilated by my TARDIS. She knows now what it does and has shared that information with me. Before, I only had only a most rudimentary understanding of what it could do. Now I know it can, among other things, create, destroy, alter, split apart and combine black holes."
Anticipating Wil's question, he quickly continued. "The device requires huge amounts of energy to manipulate black holes, but the good news is it can use the energy of a black hole itself to perform those actions for which it was designed. It is like a perpetual motion machine – as long as we have black holes to manipulate, it will continue to manipulate them.
"It is also an incredibly powerful and dangerous tool. In the wrong hands it could easily destroy our galaxy, if not our universe. That we are even contemplating using it is terrifyingly risky."
The Doctor paused, looking at his companions: the woman he loved more than anyone else in the universe; the man who was his best and most trusted friend; and, a precious, fantastically intelligent human female who he hardly knew but already valued beyond measure.
"The TARDIS will shield us from the gamma radiation ravages of the galaxy, let's call it 'Enigma' because that's what the Time Lords named it, and she should protect us against making any horrible mistakes with the black hole manipulator. But mistakes are still possible; they could be doozies, and we have to help each other avoid them."
"Doctor," Rose said. "You're scaring me."
"Quite right, too. You've been near one on a good day, Rose. Imagine a black hole on a bad day." The Doctor suddenly found himself in the surprising state of having nothing else to say.
"Rose," continued Wil when she saw The Doctor go quiet. "Black holes are the alpha and omega of our cosmic existence. This universe began with a singularity, and will end in one as well. As far as we know, there is no structure in the universe, nothing so huge and nothing so powerful that can withstand the tidal forces of black hole.
"Get too near a black hole, and it is inescapable; get simply close enough, and it distorts the shape of spacetime. You certainly don't ever want to create one by mistake, nor do you want to get pulled in past one's event horizon."
"I'd second that!" said Jack with a shudder. "So we all agree, black holes are bad, but we're nevertheless going to walk right up, knock on its door, and manipulate one?"
"More than one!" exclaimed The Doctor. "My plan is to split the super-massive black hole Wil tells us is at the center of Enigma: rip off a piece to power the formation of our subspace bubble; use another slice to construct a wormhole so we can send a message back, before our universe was created, to the Terraformers; tear off a third, or is it fourth, I've lost count, portion to bring them forward to their new home in our universe; and finally, take a teeny-tiny section of it to replenish my kaput spacetime device – all the while using other chunks to power the TARDIS and the black hole manipulator.
"Let's see, is that it?" The Doctor looked a Jack and raised an eyebrow. "Oh, and maybe while we're at it, we'll cut a sliver off and rebuild the personal, private, secret singularity Jack keeps in his wristband.
"Did I forget anything?"
