mltrefry: This was always the plan from the beginning. There's not enough happy endings for Nine, and I wanted a Rose that would be pleased beyond belief to have him back.

The Ninth Doctor only had one question on his mind as he took the TARDIS out of the Crucible to safety. He stared pointedly at Donna from across the console, still absolutely starkers. "Where's Rose?"

"Don't you think you should get dressed first?"

"No."

"She's on the Dalek Crucible with well, the other you."

"Then I have no time to waste," he replied as he headed towards the corridor. "I'll be back. Don't make a sound."

A short while later, Donna was still silent with shock as the new-old Doctor made the repairs to the TARDIS.

He had come back to the console room, clad in nearly all black- heavy boots, trousers, and a weathered leather jacket. His one concession to color was a maroon jumper. If Donna had ever been asked to describe what the "wrath of God" looked like, it would have been the expression in this particular Doctor's eyes when she told him the Daleks had Rose.

"Alright, got everything sorted here. But you've got to keep it buttoned, Donna. No one knows we're here and I want to keep it that way. Like on a submarine, where you can't even drop a spanner." The Doctor grinned, grasping the lapels of his jacket. "I missed this jacket. What do you think?"

"Bonkers, that's what! You are bonkers!"

"What? Is it the jumper then?"

Donna was incredulous. The entire universe was going to be destroyed and only the Doctor would want to talk about his jumper, of all things. "You grew out of a bloody hand in a jar, grin at me like a mental patient, and then you say 'fantastic'! Is that what Time Lords do? Lop a bit off, grow another one? You're like worms!"

"Shhhh, Donna! Unique, me! Never been another like me. All of pretty boy's regeneration energy went into the hand." He wriggled his fingers. "Remember the hand? Then you touched it and instantaneous biological metacrisis!" The Doctor's face then fell, realization dawning. "I grew...out of you. Suppose it could've been worse."

"Oi, watch it, Big Ears!"

"Oi, watch it, Ginger!"

Donna's jaw dropped. "Are you mocking me?"

"Nah, this me is all Northern, and a bit rough. Kinda like you, come to think of of it."

"Oi!" cried Donna.

"Didn't I say to shut it? Wait just a minute while I think about this. Oh, no. It can't be." The Doctor pressed his palm to his chest. "You have got to be kidding me! One heart! This body only has one bloody heart!"

"Like a human?"

"Oi, I've had about enough out of you!"

"Oh, and like this version of you is such a party! To think I thought you rather dishy in your picture. Why do you look like that again, anyway?"

The Doctor thought for a moment. "I don't know. By all rights, I should look like the other one. But that's not going to stop me. We've got to put a stop to Davros and I've got to get Rose out of there."

Donna shook her head, still confused. "Why did I keep hearing that single heartbeat?"

"Oh, that was me. I'm a complicated event in time and space, must have rippled back. And converging on you," The Doctor shrugged as he made his way towards the console."

"But why me? I'm not important. I'm nothing special."

"Oh, but you are. But you don't believe it, do you? Your mum did a real number on you, Donna. So now you have that sassy mouth and attitude as a result."

"Oi Spaceman, that's my mum!"

The Doctor snorted. "I'd love to have the chance to tell her that Jackie Tyler delivers a better slap than her, because I know. Old Pinstripes would never be blunt enough to tell her."

"Stop it!"

The Doctor leaned against the console, arms folded across his chest."All that shouting at the world. No one's listening, and why should they?"

"I mean it. Stop it, Doctor!"

"Look at what you did, Donna! We were always heading for this, from the moment you appeared on my TARDIS. We're not done yet, either. Headed for something, but for what?"

"Fate and destiny don't exist, do they, Doctor?"

"Might have agreed with you once, but that was before I met Rose." His eyes were nearly unfocused and his normally commanding voice was soft, reverent. "Fresh from the war, newly regenerated, and the TARDIS lands me in London. All to find a girl in the basement that was going to die if I didn't help her. Soon after that, I figured out I didn't want to die anymore."

Suddenly the TARDIS shuddered and the Doctor turned his attention to the monitor. "That's Z-Neutrino energy, flattened by the alignment of the planets into a single string. No! Davros, you can't!"

Donna stood next to him, watching as the twenty-seven planets glowed white. "What does it all mean, though?"

The Doctor's jaw dropped in horror as he realized what was happening. "Single-string Z-Neutrinos compressed into- no, no, no!"

Shaking it off, the Doctor turned to Donna. "No time to waste now, Donna. When I ask you for a certain tool, you hand it to me."

On the Crucible, Davros continue to relentlessly taunt the Doctor. "The man who abhors violence. Never carrying a gun. But this is the truth, Doctor. You take ordinary people and you fashion them into weapons. Behold your Children of Time, transformed into murderers. I made the Daleks, Doctor. You made this."

The pinstriped Doctor was in terror. He had been separated from Rose when they were imprisoned in separate holding cells. They had been forced to watch in horror as Davros tested the Reality Bomb. Now his friends were in this hell with them. Mickey and Jackie had followed Rose from Pete's World to be facing this hell.

It was all because Davros was right. He had fashioned the very dearest humans to him into weapons. Martha actually held a key to a doomsday device that would destroy Earth and all of humanity in the process. Sarah Jane actually possessed a warp star, and Jack stood with it wired up, ready to blow it all up. He wouldn't dare pick up a gun, but his companions had become his armed soldiers. His morality was twisted, indeed. He had always been a bit of a madman, but now he was a hypocrite of the worst sort.

He thought of his son, waiting on Earth. His mother had likely reassured him that he would fix all of this, and all would be well. He had never laid eyes on him, didn't even know his name. He felt helpless as the lives of those he cared about most were in grave danger.

Donna stared, fascinated, as the Doctor cobbled together a device at lightning speed. "So what does this thing do?"

"It's our only hope, a Z-Neutrino biological inversion catalyser."

Donna rolled her eyes at the technobabble. "Yeah. Earthgirl, remember?"

"Davros said he built those Daleks out of himself. His genetic code runs through the entire race. If I can use this to lock the Crucible's transmission onto Davros himself-"

"It will destroy the Daleks?"

"Backfire like you wouldn't believe! All done now, so now we can get this sorted." The Doctor flashed Donna a goofy grin. "Just a warning, it never works out well when we run into our other selves. Once he finds out I'm back, he won't need any hair gel to make his hair stand up. He's in for a shocker!"

Donna thought for a moment. "And what about Rose?"

The Doctor's pleased expression fell. "I hope she's happy to see me. She did all that dimension hopping just to get back to the other me. I do want to meet my son. I don't even know his name, and I just want him safe and protected, along with his mother."

"But in order to do that," he continued, his voice deepening with authority, "I have to stop Davros. So get over there and pull that lever. We have all of reality to save."

Donna scurried to take her place at the console, feeling hope for the first time since this nightmare started.

Rose didn't know what to think anymore. No TARDIS, the Doctor imprisoned in a temporal holding cell. Nearly all of his closest companions, including Sarah Jane, had been transmatted aboard the Crucible. Earlier, she could have sworn she heard the TARDIS whisper encouragement to her. She knew it wasn't destroyed, because she was pretty sure that the Doctor would have reacted more violently if his bond with his ancient time ship had been severed.

She was furious at her mum. She had begged her not to follow her, and her mother, stubborn as always, had defied her after feigning agreement. She knew better than to blame Mickey. She knew that her mother had a way of steamrolling over anyone who dared to try to get in her way. Her mum had put her above Pete and even Tony, defiantly crossing dimensions with Mickey at her side.

Rose thought of Jack, tucked away at Sarah Jane's house with Luke and Sarah Jane's elaborate alien computer system. All she wanted was a way out of this nightmare. That was her only thought as Davros continued to taunt them all, especially the Doctor.

"The final prophecy is in place," gloated Davros. "The Doctor and his children, all gathered as witnesses. Supreme Dalek, the time has come! Now, detonate the Reality Bomb!"

"Activate planetary alignment field!" cried the Supreme Dalek. "Universal Reality Detonation in two hundred rels!

Rose heard the Doctor plead with Davros. "You can't, Davros, just listen to me! Just stop!"

Davros merely laughed, the cackle of a psychopath, as he crowed about what was to come. "Nothing can stop the detonation, nothing and no one!"

Suddenly Rose's ears caught an unmistakable sound. She looked around to see if the others could hear it. By their surprised, but pleased expressions, she knew it was the most beautiful sound in any universe. She smiled in hope as the TARDIS materialized in front of them all.

The door opened, and nothing but white light flooded the entrance of the ship, obscuring her view of who was coming. That soon changed and then Rose gasped as she saw the silhouette of the man in the doorway.