The Doctor pulled the Master and Harry along and the six stepped onto the platform. Harry had an idea of what it did but was still surprised when it began to go down at an almost terrifying speed. It didn't hold a candle to his old Firebolt though, or SATURN he could move vast distances with her.
The Doctor looked at Harry and the Master with a grin and Harry returned it, he was still holding the Master's hand but he wasn't as scared anymore he knew now where the TARDIS was and could transport them all to it now.
"Autodestruct in fifteen minutes." The computer reminded them as then landed.
The Doctor looked up and, finally, saw an orange ball of swirling energy.
"The data core. Over four thousand living minds trapped inside."
"Yeah, well, they won't living much longer. We're running out of time." Said the Master running up behind them slowed down because of Harry's smaller leg length.
Harry reached their side and, suddenly, fell to his knees, panting.
"Harry!" shouted the Master and Doctor together, crouching beside him.
The tot grabbed his head as if in pain and then the Master took his face between his hands and lifted it so he could see him in the eyes.
"Wrong, so wrong. The souls. their souls are not supposed to be here. Souls without a body mustn't be here, souls without a body belong with Death. They're not alive any longer. But they're not dead either. This is so wrong." Mumbled the tot as though he was hallucinating and in agony because of it.
River's eyes widened in understanding and the Master looked at her pleadingly. She crouched down beside the Timelord and took Harry's hand's in her own.
"Harry, listen to me. You have to strengthen your mental shields. You must or the pain will only increase. Strengthen the shields, Harry. Your other powers are growing too fast at the moment because of what's going on. close off you mind to everything even time, Harry and centre yourself."
The younger time traveller released a pitiful moan and nodded slightly. Harry closed his eyes and started to do just that. Relieved, River stood up.
"How did you know what to do?"
She said nothing and the Master gave a frustrated sigh, but he couldn't hide the relief he felt at seeing the pain slowly leaving Harry's face.
"We'll have to carry him." Said River also looking at the tot. "It'll take him a couple of minutes to strengthen the shields enough."
The Master nodded determined and picked up his son with utmost care, as if afraid he would break if he wasn't careful enough. He felt concern at his state but didn't say anything aloud.
"Help me." Called a little girl's voice. "Please, help me."
"What's that?" asked Anita.
The Master reluctantly put Harry down, resting against the wall, and caressed his face sweetly before taking his screwdriver out and pointing it at the computer.
"Was that a child?" Asked River referring to the voice they had heard.
"The computer's in sleep mode. I can't wake it up. I'm trying." Said the Doctor tapping the keyboard and clearly frustrated.
"Doctor, these readings…" Commented suddenly the Master.
"I know. You would think it was… dreaming."
Engrossed in the conversation, they didn't notice the young Timelord stirring and opening his eyes.
"It is dreaming. Of a normal life, and a lovely dad, and of every book ever written." Explained Mr. Lux taking off a pair of gloves.
"Computers don't dream." Protested Anita.
"Help me. Please, help me." Called again the girl
"No, but little girls do." Mr. Lux then proceeded to pull a breaker and a door opened. The Doctor looked at him as he went into the next room and glanced at Harry.
He was surprised when a pair of beautiful green eyes looked back at him, he smiled widely at his son.
"Harry." Both the Master and the Doctor were over at him in seconds and helping him up on his feet.
"What did I miss."
"Oh, not much. The computer's dreaming."
Harry snorted at the way the Doctor talked, as if it was completely normal. Well, with the things the Timelords see, it very well could be. Still supported by his dad, Harry walked beside him after Mr. Lux and the others.
In the next room, they saw as a node turned to them and they had to contain a gasp. It had the face of a little girl.
"Please, help me." Begged she opening her eyes. "Please, help me.
"Oh, my god." Exclaimed River.
"It's the little girl. The girl we saw in the computer."
"She's not in the computer. In a way, she is the computer. The main command node. This is Cal." Explained Mr. Lux with moist eyes.
"Cal is a child? A child hooked up to a mainframe? Why didn't you tell us this? We needed to know this!" Protested the Master.
"Because she's family!" Answered Mr. Lux passionately. "Cal. Charlotte Abigail Lux. My grandfather's youngest daughter. She was dying, so he built her a library and put her living mind inside, with a moon to look over her, and all of human history to pass the time. Any era to live in, any book to read. She loved books more than anything and he gave her them all. He asked only that she be left in peace. A secret! Not a freak show."
"You weren't protecting a patent, you were protecting her." Realized Harry looking at the man softly. "She's the conscience that I felt before."
"This is only half a life, of course. But it's forever." Muttered the man lovingly caressing the node's face.
"And then the shadows came." Added the Doctor.
"The shadows. I have to- I have to save- have to save." Intervened the node girl.
"And she saved them. She saved everyone in The Library. Folded them into her dreams and kept them safe." Continued explaining the Dcotor.
"Then, why didn't she tell us?" Asked Anita confused.
"Because she's forgotten. She's got over four thousand living minds chatting away inside her head. It must be like being… well, us."
Harry squeezed the Doctor's and Master's hands, offering comfort even though he knew what the Doctor meant, and they smiled weakly at him, grateful.
"So what do we do?" Wondered River.
"Autodestruct in ten minutes." Reminded the computer.
That snapped the Doctor out of his thoughts of the three of them and he ran to the other panels in the other room while talking. The others ran after him.
"Easy! We beam all the people out of the data core. The computer will reset and stop the countdown." He tapped the keyboard in the computer and rubbed his head.
"Difficult. Charlotte doesn't have enough memory space left to make the transfer." He looked around and spotted a panel, which he then opened and took a cable.
"I'll hook myself up to the computer. She can borrow my memory space."
"Difficult! It'll kill you stone dead."
"Yeah, it's easy to criticise."
"It'll burn out both your hearts, and don't think you'll regenerate."
"Doctor!" Harry was looking at the man with wide scared eyes and the Timelord paused
The man turned to face Harry and walked till they were in front of each other. He looked down in those incredibly green eyes and sighed, resting his forehead upon his own, closing his own eyes for a second.
"Harry, there's no other option. I have to…"
"Let me do it." interrupted Harry.
"I could..." He started to try and explain
"You wouldn't survive." Harry was going to talk again, but the Doctor didn't let him. "And if, by some miracle, you did… you would lose your memory. I don't want to die." Whispered the Doctor making tears appear in Harry's eyes, remembering having thought the same thing years ago, when facing the Dark Lord.
"I don't want to die, Harry. I want to travel with you and your dad, through all of time and space, to show you the wonders of the universe. I want to do and show you so many things." A tear fell from Harry's eyes, who tried to speak once again.
"But above everything, I want to make sure that you live. I need to know that you have a future. And the only way to make sure of that is by doing this you will still have your other dad with you, he can carry on teaching you and showing you all of time and space."
"I won't let you do it. Doctor, please, listen to me…" Begged Harry desperately.
"Harry, our own little boy… The Master's and mine, our own little and stubborn Harry…"
The Doctor closed his eyes and pressed their foreheads more firmly together. One of his hands came up to rest at the back of his neck and, without a warning and without giving him time to notice anything, the Doctor used the hand on his shoulder and neck to pinch a pressure point to put him to sleep.
The Doctor quickly caught him before he could fall and hit his head, and gently lowered to the floor his already unconscious body.
"Doctor!" Exclaimed River Song and the Master taking a step forward.
"He's okay. He'll be unconscious for about fifteen minutes, I think." Said the Doctor softly caressing the face of the now peacefully asleep tot and cleaning a stray tear from Harry's cheek.
"I'll try my best to return to you, Harry. I always will."
"Doctor…" River Song demanded, and the Master was giving him a look that was very hard to interpret.
The man stood up and, after a last look at who he thought of as a son, started to work with his screwdriver and the wires.
"I'm right. This works. Shut up." Said the Doctor ignoring them all. "Now listen. You, the Master and Luxury boy, back up to the main library. Prime any data cells you can find for maximum download, and before you say anything else, you two, I just want to mention it in passing, shut up."
"Oh, I hate you sometimes!" Exclaimed the woman.
"I know."
"Mr. Lux, Master please with me." Ordered the Professor.
"Anita, if he dies, I'll kill him!"
The three ran out of the room and Anita looked at the Doctor, that was now working on the computer.
"What about the Vashta Nerada?"
"These are their forests. I'm going to seal Charlotte inside her little world, take everybody else away." He ran to another panel and pulled some breakers.
"The shadows can swarm to their heart's content."
"So, you think they're just going to let us go?"
"Best offer they're going to get."
"You're going to make them an offer?"
"And they better take it, because right now, I'm finding it very hard to make any kind of offer at all. You know what?" The man paused and looked at the spacesuit.
"I really liked Anita. She was brave, even when she was crying. And she never gave in., and you ate her." The Doctor pointed his screwdriver at her and cleared the visor, which revealed a skull.
"But I'm going to let that pass, as long as you let them pass."
"How long have you known?"
"Since Harry used his powers. Oh, you didn't eat her right away, no. but what he was doing was working and you were getting so weak that the only options you had left were to leave or to get inside her suit faster than you had wanted to. Then, you waited inside the suit and ate Anita when Harry was distracted. You're intelligent. You know Harry would have noticed if you killed her when he was focused on her." The man was already in front of the suit, looking at the blinking green light.
"She's nearly gone. Be kind."
"These are our forests. We are not kind."
"I'm giving you back your forests, but you are giving me them. You are letting them go."
"These are our forests. They are our meat." Said the suit controlling swarm extending an arm when the Doctor walked back.
Shadows started to stretch out from Anita's suit, swarms of Vashta Nerada in search of new meat. The Doctor put himself between them and Harry.
"Don't play games with me." Warned the furious man clearly demonstrating the on-coning storm.
"You've just killed someone I like and are now trying to eat one of the most important persons in my life. That is not a safe place to stand. I'm the Doctor and you're in the biggest library in the universe. Look me up."
The shadows paused in their advance for a moment, as if contemplating what to do, and then retreated back into the suit.
"You have one day." The swarm said.
The spacesuit collapsed to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut. The Doctor turned back to the computer and didn't see River until she spoke.
"Oh, Anita." Muttered the professor hand on the helmet of the woman's suit.
"I'm sorry. She's been dead a while now. I told you to go!"
"Lux can manage with just the Master, but you can't."
Noticing something strange in the professor's voice, the Doctor turned around and found himself receiving a punch to the head. Then, blackness overcame him.
The Doctor blinked his eyes. What had happened? He didn't remember…
"Autodestruct in two minutes."
What did that mean? Autodestruct? Where was he? The Timelord blinked again and lifted his head to look around.
No more than a meter from him, lying unconscious on the floor, he saw a child. A child with very familiar black unruly hair. Harry!
Everything returned to him. The Library, the Vashta Nerada, Charlotte, autodestruct… He looked up to see River Song connecting two wires.
"Oh, no, no, no, no. come on, what are you doing? That's my job!"
"And I'm not allowed to have a career, I suppose?" Questioned River Song from where she sat messing with all types of cables.
"Why am I handcuffed? Why do you even have handcuffs?" Asked the Doctor trying to free himself.
"Spoilers." Answered she with a pleased grin.
"This is not a joke. Stop it. This is going to kill you! I would have a chance, you don't have any."
"You don't have a chance, and neither do I." Intervened she angry.
"The only person with any chance is Harry, but as you have knocked him out, he can't." She calmed down and took a deep breath.
"I'm timing it for the end of the countdown. There'll be a blip in the command flow. That way it should improve our chances of a clean download."
"River, please. No." Pleaded the Doctor.
"Funny thing is this means you've always known how I was going to die. All the times I've met you, the Master and the Son, you knew I was coming here." The Doctor looked at her with wide eyes.
"The last time I saw you, the real you, the future you I mean, you turned up on my doorstep, with a new haircut and a new suit. You took me to Darillium to see the Singing Towers. What a night that was. The Towers sang, and you cried. Harry too. He couldn't look at me without crying. Even the Master had tears in his eyes"
"Autodestruct in one minute."
"None of you would tell me why, but I suppose you knew it was time. My time. Time to come to The Library. You even gave me your screwdriver. That should have been a clue."
It was then the Doctor noticed the two screwdrivers and her diary in front of himself and tried to grab them, but they were just out of his reach.
"There's nothing you can do."
"You can let me do this."
"If you die here, it'll mean I've never met you."
"Time can be rewritten."
"Not those times. Not one line. Don't you dare." Said the woman with tears in her eyes.
"It's okay. It's okay. It's not over for you. You'll see me again. You've got so many things to do. You, The Master and The Son, all of time and space to run through, more than even you can imagine when Harry ages."
"River, whatever it is you said to Harry, it made him trust you implicitly."
"Autodestruct in ten…"
"Harry doesn't trust just anyone, not that quickly or with that much conviction. Yet he trusted you as soon as you said something to him."
"Nine, eight, seven…"
"You know things about us, things we still haven't told even each other obviously things we haven't seen in his head. You know all about us. That can only mean you're very important to us…"
"Hush, now."
"Four, three…"
"Spoilers."
"Two, one."
River smiled through her tears and joined the two power cables together. A blinding light filled the room and the Doctor had no other option but to cover his eyes.
Just as the light faded the Master returned to both the Doctor and his son.
"What happened?"
"She knocked me out and handcuffed me to this pipe then took my place. Master she said something, something regarding Harry, she said he would have been fine but even with his psionic abilities it would still have burned through him like it would us yet she said it wouldn't that we have more than even we can imagine as Harry grows. She knows things about him that he obviously knows as well but wouldn't tell either of us or show it to us he can't hide anything from us. Can he?"
"I honestly don't know, Why did he have trouble with the bodies in the computer we didn't yet you saw yourself he was in agony talking about souls without bodies belonging to death. He has already admitted meeting him, perhaps it's time we sat him down and asked as much as we can?"
Suddenly they both looked over to Harry as he started to come around.
"What happened?" Asked Harry looking around only for his eyes to land on River Song.
"NO! You stupid woman." He then turned to the Doctor.
"YOU KNOCKED ME OUT! You knocked me out without letting me explain and now River is dead I could have survived now I'm a full Timelord. I wouldn't have even regenerated, I could have shoved them all into my head and transport them back out, but you wouldn't let me explain just because you are older than me. I feel like you are just as much my dad and you know that you know I will obey you too, but you didn't listen to me because of that you didn't let me explain, and now a family member of ours is dead." And harry started to cry
"Null what do you mean?" Asked the Master gently he knew they were alone and he need to let him know that he would listen to him.
"She was somehow related to us it's the only way she could have said to me that which she did it's a password protected sentence against even both of you, think of it like the fiddilus charm on my mind it would only be given out to those who become family, you have the information but only I would know what she was telling us without outright saying it. She is from part of our family in the future a true part of it, she probably knows all our names our true names to have the information she gave me i think she would have to have. We've spent the day in company and seen the death of a family member." He was still crying as he explained.
With that he sent a wandless spell at the handcuffs the doctor has attached to him releasing him then pulling up SATURN he pressed some buttons then looked at the two.
"I'm going back to my room" And with that he turned a button and was gone.
"Well, we screwed that up!"
"YOU knocked him out without listening to him, he must have checked the timeline to know he would be okay or he is hiding things on purpose from us, I heard what she said but it meant nothing to me, yet from her asking for help from the marauders convinced him to trust her completely. He has never done that other than with me before! What does he mean she would have to be family, how?"
"Come on then let's get back to the TARDIS, we can ask him then!"
"I will talk to him I think he's really upset with you at the moment, you're going to have to talk to him on your own after we get some answers though and if he's right you're going to have to apologise to him."
They both started to walk back along the corridor to the anti-gravity platform when the Doctor suddenly stopped and grabbed the screwdriver of River and asked out loud.
"If she was family and we will see her again and we knew she would die here then why did we only give her a screwdriver?"
"You think I know how your mind works like mine, it doesn't I don't know why you would do that but Harry would have pressured us into saving her if he knew."
They both looked over the screwdriver before finding a panel and removing it saw green light lit across the board.
"Oh were good, we saved her ourselves!" Spoke the Doctor looking at the lights.
They ran back to River and plugged the screwdriver into an upload port watching her conscience download into the mainframe, they watched as Charlotte rotated and smiled then winked at them.
Eventually they left and talking, made it up to walk along the rooms to the TARDIS. They were shocked to find Donna just stepping off a teleport platform and the Doctor ran up to her, by the time the Master got there the Doctor was getting another telling off it seemed him sending Donna through the transporters sent her to the core. To say she was not happy was an understatement, but she was looking around for someone.
She explained about the virtual world and the man she had met, she felt he was real, even though a lot of things in that environment weren't. the doctor explained that they were going to go into the vortex as he and the Master needed to talk to Harry alone if she didn't mind.
She agreed and they were off back to the TARDIS, as they got there the Doctor had a weird look on his face and looking at the Master in silent query, he brought his hand up and clicked his fingers. To his shock and the Master's the door opened for him.