NOTE: Please don't worry if there are a few confusing bits in here, much like the show I'm adding some details that I'm not going to explain right away because I plan to use them later...perhaps not even until the sequel. And 'yes', I've been setting up for sequel to this for the past ten chapters or so. But I will revist the detail when I use them again, so youa also don't have to worry about remembering them all...that's my job. Giggle.

Chapter Thirty-five

"Doctor?"

"Hmmm?"

"You awake?"

"Probably wouldn't have answered you the first time if I wasn't." The Doctor teased.

"I meant properly awake." Amy clarified.

"What do you mean by that?"

"You were making me nervous. Your eyes are open but you're twitching like a dog chasing rabbits in his sleep. I thought you might be in some sort of trance or something."

"You're not far off actually. I'm taking this rare opportunity to organize my neurons a bit, the last week has been exhausting, and beyond that my regeneration into this body was a little rough to start with, plus it has been centuries since I've spent time in a Zero Room." The Doctor explained. "All in all a few weeks in here would do me wonders."

"Weeks?"

"Don't worry, Pond. I know we don't have that kind of time to rest."

"So time runs normally here?"

"Unfortunately, yes." The Doctor sighed. "Now hush please, if you're bored I can give you a complicated maths problem to work on."

"I'm never that bored, Doctor."

"I have some fun ones involving black hole physics." The Doctor added.

"Go back to chasing your rabbits."

The Doctor chuckled and closed his eyes so that Amy wouldn't be as unnerved by his neuro reworking. Despite the fact that the levitating forces offered him plenty of support Amy switched her position so that the Doctor could use her lap as a pillow. When Amy started to play idly with his hair the Zero Room's ability to enhance his own psychic capacity allowed the Doctor to feel Amy's concern for both himself and Rory. He tilted his head back to look up at Amy.

"It's going to be okay, Amy."

"You keep saying that, but I think that you're trying to convince yourself not me." Amy said and then gasped. "I'm sorry, I...I didn't mean to say that out loud."

"You didn't. Psychic link. If you don't want it to happen again you'd better stop playing with my hair."

"It's just so irresis..." Amy jerked her hand away. "Please tell me you didn't hear that."

"I won't tell Rory." The Doctor teased.

"I hate this room."

"I can't leave just yet. I need at least another hour or two before I'll have enough control over the bio-energy to be safe for any length of time in the real Universe. I had you come with me before when I thought I was going to need help finding something to replace the crystal set up, now that the TARDIS has solved that for me I can teleport you to go be with Rory and Jackles if you'd like."

"No." Amy shook her head. "I don't want you to be alone."

"Thank you."

Amy was careful to keep her hands to herself this time as the Doctor closed his eyes and turned his attention inward. In his own imagination the Doctor walked through the vast disorganized library of his memories and knowelage. It wasn't that he didn't know where every single book was, it was just that they were scattered across the floor and stacked up in piles on the shelves randomly instead of placed neatly back on the shelves where they belonged.

"It's a wonder I can think at all." The Doctor huffed.

Going up to one of the empty shelves the Doctor blew off the thick layer of dust. Placing his palms on the surface he closed his eyes and concentrated. After a moment he stepped back and opened his eyes again. He smiled as he inspected his work, a beautiful full shelf of leather bound books without titles. Repeating the process over the course of half an hour he ended up with a row about a fifteen yards long in place.

"There we go, River, cleaned up the time we spend on Tralangi Three...that was a hell of a night."

The Doctor smiled to himself as he reached out and affectionately brushed the spine of one of the books. A sudden sharp noise caused the Doctor to jolt in surprise, it had sounded like a book hitting the floor but there shouldn't be anything to cause one to fall. He furrowed his brow in concern, he had expected to be alone in his own head. Stalking through the broken down ruins of the vast metaphysical library he made his way towards a quiet sound. As he drew closer he decided it sounded like someone ripping paper.

"Hello?" The Doctor called.

The sound paused for a moment before resuming. The Doctor looked up and down the endless disorderly bookshelves before continuing towards the unsettling sound. Coming around the corner the Doctor tripped over something and with a yelp of surprise landed in a tangled heap. Rolling over he sat up and looked down at what he'd caught his foot on. On the floor small white cube about a foot square covered in Gallifreyan script was glowing a warm gold.

"Oh wow...you're still in here?" The Doctor stared at the cube in disbelief. "I just assumed I lost you several regenerations ago."

The Doctor hesitantly touched the glowing cube causing it to gleam brighter.

"I really can't deal with you right now." The Doctor pulled his hand away and got to his feet. "I'm sorry...I...never mind, you're just memories, apologizing to a machine is pointless. Still, I am sorry I never bothered to check if you were still here."

The Doctor stared down at the box, unable to walk away. The sound of another book hitting the marble floor snapped him out of his trance and he turned away from the cube. Drawing closer to the continued sounds of frantically tearing paper the Doctor drew out his sonic. He wasn't sure what good it would be inside his own mind, but in the Zero Room he could make up a lot of the rules himself.

Finally coming to one row away from the source of the bizarre sound the Doctor pressed his back against the shelf. He carefully made his way towards the break in the shelves that would allow him to get around to the next row. Getting to the corner he peeked around to see who was mucking around in his memory.

"Ah...of course." The Doctor sighed putting the sonic away. "Well, that's...disturbing."

Sitting on the floor surrounded by a pile of tattered and torn books and their shredded pages was a mirror image of the Doctor. Sunk into his chest were the twin Vale Blades, blood soaked the front of his white shirt and his hair was plastered down by sweat. As the Doctor watched his gory self took a hold of a book and violently ripped the pages out.

The pages came free from the leather cover with a spray of gold. He tossed the book and the pages over his shoulder in a flurry of tattered paper. The pages slowly started to come together on their own. The Doctor could see other torn books further along that were organizing themselves once again and other groups of pages that were seeking their covers. The bloodied copy of the Doctor paid no attention to his guest as he continued in his endless task of destroying the self repairing books.

"So, you're the reasons for the gaps in my memory. Which I guess means *I'm* the reason. I couldn't handle the memories and this was my solution, but not a good one. Which is probably why I have the 'spells', if a book manages to heal itself I fall into the memory. Although, I wonder how I managed to affect the whole ship..." The Doctor mused sadly to himself. "In any case this is a battle that can not be won, I bet the memories fix themselves faster now that one of the Blades has been restored to me. I'm starting to remember them afterward. It will be even worse for you, for us, once I have the other Blade back. So you might as well stop now."

The Doctor stepped forward and leaned down to pick up one of the books. The other Doctor jumped to his feet with terrifying speed and snatched the book away, tearing it to shreds before snarling at the Doctor with blood stained teeth. The Doctor held his hands up in a sign of peace and took a step back. The copy watched the Doctor warily for a moment before he turned around and kicked at the pages that were trying to find one another, sending them into panic like a flock of birds taking flight from a predator. He sat back down in the blizzard of paper and just looked at his hopeless cause.

"I know you're just trying to help, and I appreciate that, I really do." The Doctor said gently. "And from what little I do remember, you're right; it's not something I want to have to live with. However, there is one memory here I need back, there is one book I need you to stop destroying..."

In an act of defiance the Vale Blade silenced version of the Doctor snatched up a book that had almost fixed itself, he glared up spitefully at the Doctor and pulled it apart.

"I can be a real prat sometimes." The Doctor said seriously.

The Vale Doctor smiled, drooling blood, before going back to his work.

"Please, I need to know what happened right after Aleena put those daggers in our chest. How did we end up on the other side of the Time Lock, five billion years in the past? How did I end up mostly human instead of just dead? I must have done something, I need to know what it was."

The Vale Doctor shook his head and in a burst of energy tore and scattered the pages of half a dozen books. The harder he worked to ruin the books the more alive they seemed to be. There were several dozen books surrounding him all of which had at least some damage, but there was one cover that was also torn into several pieces that was trying to pull itself back together again.

"These can't be all of them, I'm missing almost a week of my memory" the Doctor noted as he looked at the pile book the Vale was destroying "you must have condensed them into key points or something. Compressed memories, repressed memories, you know these can be dangerous. If you think you are doing this for our own good you're really doing more harm than goo..."

The Doctor stopped as the Vale chucked an empty leather cover at him. The Doctor ducked in time and the cover sailed over him. Landing on the floor the stripped down book cover started to inch its way back towards its pages.

"I'm not going away until I get what I want." The Doctor said firmly. "Since you are me you know how persistent we can be."

The Vale Doctor stopped what he was doing and hung his head in defeat for a moment. He looked around and found a page that had just mended itself. Getting to his feet he made sure that pages on the floor were well separated before stepping up to the Doctor. He held out the single page.

"One page? That's all I need to know?"

The Vale Doctor shook his head.

"So what is this? A test?"

The Vale nodded.

Suddenly fearing the page covered in tiny golden Gallifreyan script the Doctor hesitated. The Vale Doctor wasn't going to wait forever, his books were mending themselves at his feet. When he went to turn away the Doctor reached out and snatched the page away from him. Touching the memory instantly threw him back into it.

"I'm sorry, Time Lord, you were too dangerous." Aleena said sadly. "I will not use your power for myself...but I couldn't let you keep it either."

The Doctor had barely heard Aleena's words. She had slammed the Vale Blades into his chest and he had felt his hearts stop. The initial pain dissolved into peace, however seconds later the Doctor jerked awake with a wash of sheer panic. Aleena cried out in shock and stumbled back, having thought he was dead. Trying to take a breath the Doctor choked on the blood filling his lungs. His hearts had stopped when first impaled but now they pounded again. With each beat they slice themselves apart again on the invasive metal.

"What's happening?!" Aleena asked horrified. "You...you should be dead!"

Terrified the Doctor looked to Aleena and tried to ask for help. Convulsively swallowing blood and only able to breathe out a small amount of gold dust the Doctor couldn't find his voice. His chest burned from the lack of oxygen, but instead of leading to death it just reset the faulty regeneration cycle that Jackles had been triggering in him for days. The fear of being caught in a body that couldn't die was far worse than any pain he was currently experiencing. Fighting panic and restraint he continued to look to Aleena for help. She was trembling violently as she watched him struggle, unwilling to step closer.

"Th...this wasn't supposed to happen!" Aleena whimpered. "I...I...I don't know what to do..."

The Doctor calmed himself enough to stare at her and then down at the daggers stuck in his chest before making a motion that suggested he'd be endlessly grateful if she'd pull them out. It took Aleena a second to figure out what the Doctor wanted and a full minute to gather up the courage to actually step closer to do it. She reached out to grab one of the hilts and as she did so a snap of electricity burned the pattern in the handle into her palm.

Back in the library the page had come to an end and the Vale took it away from him again. Reeling from the memory the Doctor gasped sharply and staggered a few steps back. He pressed his hand against his chest before he doubled over and retched violently. Forcing his stomach back under control he took a few deep breaths just to remind himself that he could. The Doctor pulled his hands though his hair a few times and tried to push the memory of his broken hearts and useless lungs out of his thoughts.

"Ho...how long was I like that?" The Doctor whispered.

The Vale Doctor looked around and started gathering up specific scattered pages. He allowed a few of the tattered ones to mend themselves as he brought them together. He had spread these particular pages further than any of the others and had to walk a circle to get them all. Careful to keep the pages in two separate handfuls he brought them over and held them up to the Doctor. Looking at what had to be over a hundred pages the Doctor cringed.

"I was afraid of that. Aleena must have run off to get Jackles, he would have wanted to run tests, she'd already demonstrated that it wasn't as simple as yanking the Blades out." The Doctor reached up and rubbed his chest. "I could have spent hours breathless before I decided to somehow slaughter the ship to escape...and that's what I would have thought I was doing, taking everyone down with me. Considering the bang I made, I might have even thought I was going to rip a hole in the Universe...maybe I did. Did I?"

The Vale Doctor just shrugged his shoulders showing he either didn't know or didn't care.

"Can't just skip to the last page, eh?"

The Vale shook his head sadly.

"Alright, then we'll do this hard way." The Doctor took a step forward and held his hand out. "Hand me the next page."

The Vale Doctor took a step back and greedily clutched the living pages.

"I have to remember. I need to know what I did."

The Vale shook his head stubbornly.

"Why won't you give me those pages?" The Doctor demanded angrily.

The Vale tried to speak but all that came from his parted lips was blood. The Doctor took a step forward to help him but the Vale jerked back and snarled at him like a wounded animal. After ripping the pages and scatting them again the Vale Doctor cupped his hand and spat a pool of blood into his palm. Dipping his index finger in the blood he bend down and scrawled a message out on the marble floor.

YOU ARE NOT STRONG ENOUGH

"I really am, I promise." The Doctor assured. "I'm strong enough. I was rattled by the first page, but I can do this."

The Vale Doctor narrowed his eyes and glared icily at the Doctor for a moment. Looking weary he turned away and sat down heavily before going back to shredding the pages. The leather bound covered memories were now actively trying to escape his grasp, but they could only slowly flutter away from him and were easily caught. The torn edges glittered with gold regeneration dust as they worked to find one another. The Doctor looked down at the page that he'd already touched and shivered.

"Then again if I was strong enough...you wouldn't be here in the first place, now would you?"