"For a long time now I thought I was just a survivor but I'm not." He sneered, "I'm the winner. That's who I am. The Time Lord Victorious."
"And there's no-one to stop you?" The woman asked and he scoffed at the implication.
Faces flashed through his mind at breakneck speed, a thousand years' worth of companions, friends- Martha-Donna…..Rose- "No."
"This is wrong, Doctor. I don't care who you are. The Time Lord Victorious is wrong."
"That's for me to decide." His lip turning as his eyes burnt into her, the impertinence of the human he'd deemed worthy enough to save.
"Is there nothing you can't do?"
Yes, he wanted to scream. "Not anymore."
The woman turned sadly towards the house and up the steps to the door, turning back at his retreating form and the blue box in the distance. Silently she draws the gun from her hip and closes the door. The sound of a gunshot echoes through the silent street and suddenly the realization of what he's made her do crashes through him as he spins towards the sound and falls back against the blue door, her voice echoing through his head.
"…I don't care who you are. A Time Lord Victorious is wrong….."
"I've gone too far." He breathes, eyes snapping to the figure standing in the road before him as he falls to his knees, "Is this it? My death? Is it time?"
The Ood who had become his friend once upon a time vanished and he scrambled for the lock, slamming the door shut behind him, dread filling him as he stared unseeing at the console.
"No." This can't be the end.
"No." I'm not ready.
"No." I don't want to go.
"No."
"Doctor?"
Someone was calling his name.
"No!"
"Doctor!" Rose took hold of his shoulders to steady him as he sat up, "Blimey you nearly scared me half to death screamin' blue bloody murder."
"Rose?" His hands were upon her cheeks, long delicate fingers tracing her features, "I was dreaming-"
"Nightmare more like," She corrected taking his hand and pushing a few loose strands of hair from the perspiration on his forehead, "Mum could hear ya from the kitchen."
"Something went wrong," He took a deep breath to calm himself, "It was- oh Rose what have I done-"
"You wha?" Her eyes widened in realisation. Oh gods no.
"Not you," She reminded him, squeezing his hand in reassurance, "Divergent pathways remember-"
"Yes, yes obviously but essentially-" He released her hand to tug viciously at his hair, "I am him, he is me, we are-"
"Doctor, stop." He stilled but remained with his head in his hands, "How 'bout we focus less on the who then yea, and more on the what and why?"
"I-he-" He began, swinging his legs down from the couch and into a sitting position with Rose altering her stance to follow, crouching down on the floor in front of him as he dragged his hands down his face with a sigh, "Someone lived- someone smart enough to know that things happen for a reason-"
She knew enough about altering fixed events to negate any further explanation from him.
"He's outta control isn't he?" She grit her teeth growling as Jackie's voice filtered in from down the hallway. "Stupid, stupid Time Idiot- "
"Yup." He shook his head with a sigh.
"Not like there's anything we can do mind-"
"Nope."
"Everythin' alright in here?" Jackie stuck her head around the door, dishcloth in hand and small child clung to her leg.
"It's fine." Rose snapped irritably.
"Oi," She waved a finger at her daughter menacingly, "I expect that sorta thing from himself not you miss-"
Clearly she expected some form of biting retort, but when none came. "Is he alright?"
"Yea," Rose watched him carefully, the imperceptible nod of his head an unspoken agreement to let the subject rest for now. "Yea he's good. Jus' hungry is all, right Doctor?"
Luckily the Doctor's stomach chose that exact moment to express its dissatisfaction at being empty.
"Exactly right," He sprung up from the couch perhaps a little too eagerly, "Completely famished."
"Well hurry along Mr Skin and Bones, lord knows how Rose puts up with all those sharp bones poking abo-"
"Mum!" Rose blushed furiously, pushing her back out into the hallway.
"Why is everyone convinced we're shagging?" He commented dryly as he shuffled down the hallway to the kitchen with his hands in his pockets.
"It's nothing new like I said." Rose hissed sitting herself down at the table, huffing under her breath, "Don't 'ave to act so impartial to the thought of it though."
"I did no such-" He began to object as he sat down beside her, halted by a sharp pain in his shin. "Ouch!"
He shot a wounded expression at the woman scooping potato quite violently onto her plate while Pete tried to hide his snort with a cough.
"Don't you start either-" Rose shot a glare across the table at him as Jackie continued oblivious to the exchange.
"I'm jus' sayin' since you're both stuck here, there's really no denying it is there?" Jackie offered, bringing a gravy float from the side board to the large dining table, "Always together you two, practically joined at the hip, been like that since old big ears."
Rose huffed, "Mum we're not-"
"Not yet anyways-" The Doctor muttered leaning his elbow against the table, his chin rest on his palm as Jackie continued her incessant ranting.
He tried not to smirk at the crimson flush that made Rose's glare marginally less menacing and rather more endearing. "Shut it, you."
"Lord only knows what the rest of the universe thinks," Jackie rolled her eyes dramatically and the Doctor couldn't help but wonder if she'd heard anything outside of her own internal monologue for the last five minutes, "Probably already married for all I know about bloody aliens-"
"Mum really-" Rose rubbed her temples in frustration, "Do you really have to-"
"Twenty-seven times." The Doctor mused almost to himself.
"Twenty-seven times, what?" Rose paused, Jackie lifting Tony into his high-chair as she stared.
"The number of times we've been married," He nodded the affirmative, eyes lost in the ceiling as he took a brief moment just to double check, "Both unintentional and otherwise."
"Seriously?" Rose raised an eyebrow curiously.
"Weeelll," He drawled, "Living together accounts for half of it, add in a lack of physical boundaries, skin on skin. Among other things…" He trailed off, reaching across the table for the potatoes.
"Oh." Rose frowned, mentally calculating as many as she was aware of, "Blimey, I had no idea."
"Yup." He replied.
"Told you." Jackie's expression was decidedly smug as she spooned out little Tony's dinner.
"How come you never said though," Rose shook her head, "All those times and you never-"
"Why would I?" He raised an eyebrow, spooning a heaping pile of peas onto his plate. "It's not like it would have mattered. Besides, considering your issues with the TARDIS I thought it prudent to not share-"
"Oi," She stopped him, holding a plate of chicken just out of reach, "A legitimate concern at the time thank you very much, it's different now though init."
"Alright you two," Jackie warned waving a serving spoon menacingly at them, "That's enough domestics for one night, eat ya Tea."
Jackie made to pass the gravy when Rose gasped, her fork clattering loudly against the china as she clutched at her temples with a hiss at the searing stab of pain that shot through her mind.
"Rose?!" The Doctor, abandoning his meal, had her head firmly grasped between his hands before she tried to remove herself from the table only to have her knees buckle as she fell into him.
"What is it? Tell me what's wrong!"
Fire and brimstone flashed through his mind as she mirrored his hold, the touch of her forging enough of a telepathic circuit for him to not only feel her agony but bear witness to the fragment of time playing in a continuous loop as it burnt its way through her synapses.
"Ending, burning, falling- all of it falling…."
"Doctor," Jackie stood and rounded the table, "What's wrong with Rose."
"I know, I can see it." He shook her firmly, ignoring her mother's demands as Tony began crying. "Let it go Rose, let it go now!"
"Doctor?" Jackie warned, mirroring his position at Rose's side.
"Give him a moment love." Pete implored, shushing Tony as he removed him from his chair.
"Rose, please." He whispered as he rocked back and forth.
"I see the end, the black and pitch and screaming fire, burning," She laughed hysterically as her arm shot out to grab roughly at the hand rest on her knee, "Ending….Ending…..Ending ….Ending…."
"Doctor what she talkin' about." Pete put his hand on the other man's shoulder.
"A prophecy-"
"So small," She murmured ducking her head closer as her other hand gripped at his hair as she brought their foreheads together, "Do you see it, Doctor…bright and cold, a tiny star, falling, burning-"
He gasped as he observed from his own perspective, yet not, as he worked on some wiring, a bright object streaking across Earth's sky towards the ground. "No."
"He must stand at arms, or lose himself and all this world, to the End of Time."
Rose returned to herself and stared into his terrified gaze, panting with exertion, "What the bloody hell was that?!"
The Doctor bit off a stream of alien obscenities before pressing a relieved kiss to her forehead and shooting to his feet to pace the dining room in agitation.
"Nothing good that's for sure." He pulled at the wild mess of his hair, "We should be sealed off for all intents and purposes but for some reason we're experiencing a temporal backlash of- of memory or-"
"That wasn't a memory," She shook her head adamantly, "It said He, and unless you're in the habit of referring to yourself in the third person-"
He gesticulated wildly, "I know!"
She ignored his tone, shaking her head in confusion. "But why me, why now?"
He raised an incredulous brow at the comment before she recalled their conversation from only a few hours ago. "Oh yea, right."
"Doesn't explain the timing though," He flopped back into his chair, pushing potato around his plate before scooping it into his mouth, "Even with the differential between universes, it's almost as if time's - bleeding, but why?"
"Something's coming." Rose muttered, the Doctor eyeing her cautiously.
"Hmmmm, but what?"
It was at this point Jackie felt the need to intervene, "Look, I won't pretend to understand half of what the two of ya's are on about, but if it has anything to do with his other nibs then what chance have we got of helpin' eh?"
"Chances are that whatever it is affecting the 'me' there to reach the 'me' here, and Rose by extension, obviously has the ability to influence the multiverse in general." The Doctor mused over a bean.
"But what has the power to do that?" Pete queried, his brow creased in deep concern.
He shrugged, "One race is extinct, the other disappeared from this reality entirely during the War."
"Eternals?" Rose stilled, fork paused at her lips.
"Possibly," He nodded, narrowing his gaze at her, "Although how you've come by that conclusion intrigues me more."
"Wasn't you," She shook her head, "They've been here before. Left all sortsa problems too."
"How so?" He leant an elbow on the table, chin rest in palm as Pete continued for her.
"We've got a few of their little knick knacks in the archives at Cardiff," He scoffed, "The records are what you'd expect left over from the old Torchwood regime, a few encrypted files, even got a photo in there somewhere."
The Doctor made to stand, "Show me."
"What now?" Pete frowned mid bite.
"No next week," The Doctor rolled his eyes, "Of course now!"
"Oh no you don't," Jackie pushed him back into his seat with a plop, "You've barely touched your dinner and my son won't be without his father for meal times neither."
"But-"
Rose snorted at the indignant pout that sprouted across his features, "And don't look at me like that, the world isn't gonna end in the next five minutes."
His mouth gaped like a fish. "It might-"
"Shut up and eat your greens, Doctor," She scoffed, "You can go play aliens when you're done."
"Blimey," He sniffed, "Is she always like this?"
"Pretty much." Pete muttered earning himself a glare from across the table.
"And we've still got dessert to go." Rose added under her breath.
"Mutter all you want," Jackie chided, "But considerin' this is the first time we've all been together under the one roof as a family, something I thought might never 'appen again mind you, can you really blame me for wanting five more bloody minutes of normalcy before the next alien invasion."
Not a peep was heard as the rest of the table finished their meals.
"That's what I thought," Jackie beamed smugly, slicing into the pecan pie displayed prominently in the middle of the table. "Now, who wants coffee?"