Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who.

Author's Note: I hope no one is growing bored of this story. I hit a writing lull, but I'm pushing through :) Read, review, and hopefully enjoy.

"A broken clock keeps better time than you."

All across the universe someone is specializing in something. There are experts on the common variety garden mole and the not so common garden molecular integrity. A clan of Perilous Monks, having taken up their isolation on the spaceship Holier Than Thou, have dedicated their life to the science of silence and its positive effects on civilization. There are even experts on the eighth leg of the eight legged star-spider, just the eighth leg, none of the other seven seem to matter very much. The Doctor had never considered himself an expert on anything, though he dabbled in many subjects and knew a particular bit about exploding supernovas and porch swings. Gatsby Goode specialized in anything mundane, as did everyone else from the 32nd British Empire, and Berly was rather well-versed in ancient Atlantian quatrains. Indeed the universe and people's heads are full to bursting with useless knowledge.

Professor Flopp would argue that his specific expertise was anything but useless. He'd studied the Crystal Cove since boyhood, always the lonely lad with his scaly nose in a book while the other children floundered about. He'd been born serious, somewhat erratic, and altogether socially incompetent. The crystals were something that could be studied, understood to a certain degree, unlike sentient creatures (a viewpoint that psychologist tend to disagree with).

The Crystal Cove had always been Professor Flopp's obsession for reasons that not even he knew. The experts on what we don't know about ourselves might have an explanation, but Flopp had never given them much credence. All he knew was that he loved the Cove, as much as he was capable of loving anything, and it troubled him that the crystals were acting oddly. It troubled him more that he didn't know why. After all, he was an expert. By definition he was supposed to know why. Why didn't he? Why? Why?

"Why!" Professor Flopp threw aside the charts in his hand. He'd gone over them a thousand times in great detail, yet they still made no sense to him. Perhaps this signaled that his life had run its course. What does a specialist have to live for if they can't specialize anymore? The Crystal Cove was his life and he was losing his grip on both. Rubbing his tired eyes, he picked up the charts again, a desperate man looking for the missing piece, looking for the answer that wasn't there. The answer that had just entered the room.

"Hello," the Doctor said merrily, ignoring the sign on the door that clearly stated "Do Not Disturb". "Nice place you have." He took in the professor's cluttered study; all of the indecipherable maps and numbers, a brass jiggery pokery stuffed into a dusty corner. Professor Flopp gaped at him, a fish out of water. No one had ever barged into his study before.

"Excuse me!" Professor Flopp exclaimed, rather flushed around the gills.

"Your excused."

"Doctor," Gatsby gasped, rounding the corner with Berly behind her. They were both winded.

"Really, I must protest!" Professor Flopp protested.

"Sorry Sir." Berly clutched the stich in her side. "We're here on the Emperor's behalf." It was only half of a lie. She hoped the universe would forgive her.

"The emperor?" Professor Flopp had to sit down. The emperor had never shown much interest in him before. "Please don't touch that!" The Doctor stepped away from the whirly gig he'd been playing with. Experts could be so touchy about their equipment.

"Professor Flopp, I'd like to introduce you to Miss Gatsby and the, um, the Doctor."

"How do you do?" Gatsby said.

"He's in shock," the Doctor replied, studying a map pinned to the wall.

"I'm offended," Professor Flopp cried. "Really, the emperor could have at least sent a note of forewarning."

"Sorry Sir, there wasn't much time for that."

"Time!" The Doctor spun around. "Right, there isn't time! Well, there is time, but we don't have it. You're the expert? Funny tie for an expert. Are those seahorses?"

"I like this tie. It was a gift."

"No it wasn't," the Doctor guessed, correctly.

"Why has the emperor sent you stampeding into my study?" Professor Flopp directed the question to Berly. He didn't like the look of the foreigners.

"He thinks they can help us with the tremors." Another half-truth. The emperor didn't think the Doctor and his companion could help, he just didn't have many other options.

"Tremors, goodness, that's none of my concern."

"It's everyone's concern, Sir."

"Yes, of course, but I don't see how I can be of any use, so if you'd just-"

"Are you sure he's the expert? He doesn't seem very expert-y." The Doctor peered at the professor unconvinced.

"Don't be rude," Gatsby chided.

"Don't be rude," the Doctor mimicked. "There isn't time to be nice. We should be in the Cove already, and yet we're standing around here wasting our time on niceties. The universe is full of niceties. Go somewhere else if that's what you're looking for."

"Your rambling isn't helping us get anywhere faster," Gatsby snapped. To her amazement, the Doctor shut up. He pretended to zip his lips together, rather childishly. Gatsby let him sulk. She turned to the professor and gave the startled man a kind smile.

"Professor, we were told that you know more about the Crystal Cove than anyone else." Flattery, she'd learned long ago, could get you almost anywhere.

"That's true," Professor Flopp admitted.

"We were hoping you could take us there. My friend thinks they might have something to do with the tremors."

"I think I'd know if they did."

"Some expert," the Doctor muttered, unable to stay silent for long. Gatsby shot him a glare. He might know how to do a thousand things better than her, but he didn't have the faintest idea how to be civil.

"I've studied that Cove my entire life!"

"I've known about it for a few hours and I know it has something to do with tremors. Now I'm trying to find out what."

"Who are you?" Professor Flopp demanded.

"Clever. I'm clever."

"And rude," Gatsby muttered.

"Alright enough!" Berly decided it was time to step in before Professor Flopp declared war on the foreigners. She held up her hands and stood between them. Men, it didn't matter their species or where they were from, always needed to be better than other men. "Professor, we need to go to the Cove. It's the emperor's command. You wouldn't disobey your emperor?"

Professor Flopp seethed. The last thing he wanted to do was take that arrogant man into his precious Crystal Cove, but he had no choice. He didn't dare refuse the emperor. Though it chipped away a bit of his already broken pride, the professor lowered his head in defeat.

"I'll take you." And hope you drown on the way, he added to himself.

"Thank you very much," Gatsby said. "We really appreciate-"

"What did I say about niceties, Goode? The clock is ticking." The Doctor tapped his wrist where a watch would be if he had one.

"Here's a nicety for you." Then Gatsby called him something rather repulsive, a word the Doctor hadn't known she knew, a word that the professor had been thinking of using himself, a word that made Berly blush and snigger into her sleeve. Gatsby stomped to the door.

"The clock is ticking," she called over her shoulder, grinning, before exiting the study.

"Are these suits really necessary?" Gatsby snapped the sleeve of her elastic swim gear. "They're a bit tight." To put it lightly. She could hardly breathe in the thing. It felt like a second skin, a very stretchy, sheeny skin.

"To ward against hypothermia," Professor Flopp explained. The four of them were crammed into an elevator obviously not meant to transport so many people. The Doctor's elbow was snuggled between Gatsby's ribs rather painfully and the suit made her sweat. This was certainly no luxury cruise. The Doctor didn't seem to mind. He was content to peer over the professor's shoulder as he punched a few buttons on the console panel and jimmied a rusted, metal rod.

"We're over capacity, so try not to wriggle around," Professor Flopp warned.

"What happens if we do?" Gatsby asked hesitantly.

"We crash to the bottom of the ocean floor." The professor pressed the final button, before Gatsby could ask to sit this adventure out, not looking forward to crashing on the ocean floor. The elevator shimmied, groaned and complained. Then they were falling, too fast for Gatsby's taste. She didn't dare move as they plummeted down. Crammed in beside her, the Doctor whooped, and on the other side Berly fought to keep the contents of her lunch in her stomach. The gears growled more threateningly the further they sank. It felt as though they were falling for years, before with a sudden jolt that sent all of them forward against the unyielding safety bars, the elevator stopped. The Doctor was the first one out, pushing past the professor in his eagerness. Gatsby felt she would rather turn to jelly than follow him. She leaned against the wall for a moment to catch her breath, having left it at the top of the shaft.

"You alright?" Berly asked. She laid a cool hand on the girl's arm. Gatsby nodded.

"He forgets sometimes, the Doctor, he forgets that I'm not used to this."

"Used to what?"

"The universe."

"Are you two coming or do I have to do all of the impressive stuff without an audience?" The Doctor popped his head back into the elevator. Gatsby squared her shoulders. She didn't want him to know that she was frightened. Excited, certainly, but trembling on the inside. When she'd first boarded the Tardis she'd asked him to slow down. She wished she could ask him again. He was always moving, always thinking, and it was still so new to her. But Gatsby smiled. She tucked in her fears and followed him, playacting a bravery that she didn't have. Berly lagged behind the others, prepared to catch the girl should she faint.

"I don't see any crystals." Gatsby couldn't see much at all. Professor Flopp was leading them down a dark stretch of tunnel.

"It isn't far," he called over his shoulder. Gatsby certainly hoped it wasn't. The tunnel floor was slick with moss. She was focusing so hard on not slipping that she didn't notice when they passed into the Cove. She heard Berly take in a deep, appreciative breath behind her. An eerie light splashed across her feet. She looked up.

The Cove, more of a cavern, wrapped around them. She recognized the crystals from the buildings above, but these were glowing, pulsating, alive. They seemed to breathe color. The Cove's ceiling was too high up to see. She almost broke her neck trying. Every inch was made of Crystal, great and jagged slabs.

"Watch your step," Professor Flopp advised, leading them further inside.

"It's beautiful," Berly whispered. She'd grown up in a city built with the crystals, but she'd never seen them so raw. The Doctor held up his hands. They were painted by the light, more colors than he'd seen in all of his travels across the universe. He placed his ear to a formation of rosy crystal and gestured for Gatsby to do the same.

"Sounds like singing," she exclaimed. "The whole place! But what's that other sound? That roar?"

"Oh, that'll be the whirlpool," the professor explained. He pointed to a tower of onyx stone which reflected the four of them in a shimmery, only half there way. The Doctor rushed forward, ignored the professor's warning to be careful, and began to climb. There weren't many footholds and the crystal was slick, but he managed well enough. Leaving the others behind, forgotten for a moment, he reached the top and looked down into the whirlpool nesting among the crystals. Yes, it did sound like singing, the haunting chorus of the universe. The whirlpool hummed. It beckoned. It swirled deeper and deeper into time and space, reminding him of the Time Vortex he'd confronted as a child. He could hear whispers, faint verses.

Don't forget to milk the cow.

Which was first, the body or the soul?

Doctor, where are you? Doctor. Doctor.

So many voices from so many worlds. His name. A child crying. A mother singing a Gallifreyan lullaby.

Will it hurt?

Are you sure?

The clock is ticking.

Where did Gatsby Goode go?

He didn't know he'd been leaning forward until he felt someone tug at the back of his suit. Gatsby looked at him concerned.

"You were going over," she said, still holding his suit. It took the Doctor a second to clear his mind of the voices. They were gone now, lingering gently in his mind, soft touches in the dark. For the first time in a very, very long time, the Doctor felt frightened. That Gallifreyan lullaby had been so familiar. How could it have escaped the time lock?

"Doctor, are you alright? What is it?" She glanced at the whirlpool, but it's depths unnerved her and she couldn't look for long.

"It's waking up," he whispered.

"What is?"

"Time." But it wasn't the Doctor who answered. It wasn't the professor or Berly, still waiting below. It was an old woman, standing not too far away, though neither Gatsby or the Doctor had noticed her. Her bronzed scales were dulled by age and her eyes, those eyes, seemed to reflect what he'd seen in the whirlpool.

"It's been growing, the whirlpool," the old woman said. "It's why things keep falling into Atlantis, your ship included. Time is getting hungry."

"What do you mean?" the Doctor asked.

"Who knows what I mean? I only say the words that come to me. I hardly know what they mean."

"Who are you?" Gatsby thought it was the more important question.

"I look into the whirlpool. I've seen Time."

"That's hardly a name."

"What's a name Gatsby Goode? The girl in the flying box with the mad man." The old woman moved closer and Gatsby strengthened her hold on the Doctor. "Where did Gatsby Goode go? They're looking for you."

"Who?"

"The people who dream." Dreams. Gatsby thought of the dream she'd had and couldn't remember. She wasn't sure she wanted to now. To her relief, the old woman stepped back.

"Atlantis will drown," she stated, a matter of fact. "If the Doctor doesn't know why the crystals are glowing."

"What do you mean?" the Doctor called after her. The old woman was slipping away to the other side of the onyx cup, the cup of the world, the worldpool.

"I just say it. You find out what it means." Then she was gone as quickly as she'd come, disappearing over the other side. The Doctor and Gatsby stared long after they'd lost sight of her. They were left in a sort of dream and when they woke up, they couldn't tell if it'd happened or not, but they remembered.

Gatsby let go of the Doctor. She shook her head and a thousand unanswered questions rattled around. What had the woman meant about people who dreamed, people looking for her? Who had the woman been? How could Time be hungry?

"Come on," the Doctor said.

"Doctor-"

"Not now."

"But she said-"

"Yes, I heard." He cupped Gatsby's face in his hands. She didn't bother to conceal her fear this time. The woman's words had shaken something lose inside of her, a foggy memory that she couldn't quite catch, a secret just beyond her understanding; like when you ask yourself "Who Am I?" and you feel the answer quivering inside of the cage of your ribs, but you can't speak it, you can't curve the words around it.

"This city is in terrible danger though and we're running out of time. First thing's first, save Atlantis."

"But-"

"Gatsby Goode, trust me." She did, though the old woman's words echoed in her thoughts. The Doctor was right. Prioritize, she told herself, focus. It was a difficult task.

As they scaled back down to Berly and the professor and the whirlpool loosened its grip on them, Gatsby felt silly for being so scared of an old woman. She was probably senile. Didn't know what she was talking about. Absolutely bonkers. At least that's what Gatsby made herself believe.

"What were you doing up there?" Berly asked. "You were gone for ages."

"Really, it couldn't have been more than five minutes," Gatsby said. Why did it seem they kept losing so much time? She had to sit down. She felt light headed, dizzy, upended.

"The whirlpool has that effect on people." Professor Flopp looked sympathetic. He'd only gone to see the whirlpool once and it had been enough. He'd heard things. Things that still made him shiver when he was alone at night. He passed the girl a canteen of water.

"There was a woman up there," the Doctor announced. He'd pulled his sonic screwdriver from somewhere, though where he'd kept it in the impossibly tight suits Gatsby wasn't sure, and was now jumping around, tapping the crystals. Professor's Flopp's expression darkened.

"Oh, that was just O'Problem Pealot."

"O'Problem Pealot?" Gatsby repeated, not sure she'd heard correctly.

"She considers herself a seer," Berly explained. "But everyone knows she's insane."

"Spent too much time staring into the whirlpool. It's turned her brain to mush." Gatsby slumped over in relief. So the woman was crazy. Thank goodness. Whatever it was that she'd said about…about dreams…Gatsby found that she couldn't remember exactly what had just happened. How very strange?

"She said…" Gatsby struggled to recall the exact words. "She said that Atlantis would drown. Something about time. Time is falling? No, that's not it. Maybe time is grooming. Doctor what did she say?"

"Growing. It's growing," he muttered. "But what about the crystals? Why are they glowing?" He slapped the sonic screwdriver against the crystal wall.

"That's what I've been trying to figure out," Professor Flopp said. "I've done a thousand tests, but everything is in conclusive." The Doctor wasn't listening. They didn't have time to run a thousand more tests. He had to understand now.

"The whirlpool's growing," he muttered. "The crystals are…the crystals…OF COURSE!"

"Goodness!" Berly cried, startled by his outburst. Gatsby didn't flinch. She was becoming accustomed to this and she knew the Doctor had just put the puzzle together, judging by his fanatic grin.

"They're isotopic magnets, idle all of these years," he explained, more to himself than to them. "All of the digging and poking you've done down here, cutting off great chunks of them to make your buildings, has activated them. They're making the whirlpool grow! The whirlpool…the whirlpool…" He thought of the voices he'd heard, undistinguishable in his memory now. "Things falling into Atlantis. The Tardis falling into Atlantis five hundred years ago…"

"Get to the point," Gatsby urged.

"It's a vortex! A great, big wound in time and it's festering. The crystals are ripping it wide open."

"That doesn't sound good," Berly said.

"Oh no, it's awful. It's buckets of awful. It's-"

"Alright, we get it." Gatsby stood up and prepared herself for the next danger. "How do we stop it?" The Doctor stopped moving. He looked at each one of them, Gatsby last.

"We don't stop it," the Doctor said gravely. "We get out of the way."

How do we out run a hungry time vortex? Gatsby wondered, but wasn't brave enough to ask out loud. It was the question they all asked themselves. No one knew the answer. Not even the Doctor.