Chapter One

Colours swirled and danced in front of the Doctor's eyes. An iron band tightened its grip around his chest, forcing the oxygen from his lungs, and he felt the force of the Void attempt to pull Jackie from his arms. Tightening his hold on her, blood vessels bursting under his skin, he tried to suck in a deep breath only for a wave of agony to burn through him before the Void spat them out. His grip loosened as the wrong universe flexed around him, and Jackie hit the ground first before he slammed down next to her.

The side of his head cracked against the floor, and his vision swam. Nausea rose in him at the beginnings of a concussion, and he clawed at his throat, trying to get oxygen back into his lungs. His body remembered how to breathe and he gasped air in: deep, desperate drags. The sudden influx of oxygen sent his head spinning more than it already was, and his body heaved with pain before he was vomiting Zoe's attempt at baekpal onto the floor. -

Somewhere behind him Jackie was upending her own rushed breakfast out of her stomach. He registered that, his brain forming quick connections: if Jackie was able to vomit then that meant she was able to breathe.

Jackie was alive.

He didn't know what state she was in, but that was a problem for when he had his body back under control. His head throbbed from its close acquaintance with the floor and his mind screamed at being cut off from the TARDIS: the sudden severing of their centuries-old connection left him hollow and shaky. The dark thoughts that his oldest and most beloved friend helped to keep at bay sank into him. He scrambled against the floor, pushing himself away from the sour stench of his vomit, and he curled in on himself. Knees tucked up to his chest, the Doctor pressed his forehead against them, clutching tightly at his calves as he rode out the pain of his mind being left open to his darkness.

Dredging the memory of an old Gallifreyan poem his father used to read to him, the Doctor began murmuring it under his breath, desperately seeking an anchor to stop him tumbling into the –

Fire licked across the arid, red landscape of Gallifrey. It climbed up the bricks of Arcadia, and it swept down towards the citadel. He felt it against his skin as he shied away from it as the glass on the Citadel shattered sending a rain of shards down on his head.

Akilam's hand was tight in his, sweat turning their grip clammy. They ran and ran and ran until she was gone, pulled from him with a scream, and then he was running again with the Moment, stuffed into a dusty sack, slung across his back. It hit heavily against his spine every time his feet hit the ground, and the pain kept him moving, anything to distract him from the sound of his people dying behind him, and –

He was falling.

The Doctor's mind buckled under the weight of his planet and his people being wrenched out of existence, the touch of the Moment burning against his palms. He felt the TARDIS around him as she tried to control their fall through her own screaming grief. They were falling away from Gallifrey, away from their worst day, as the Time Lock shifted and rippled around the Time War, locking his people – his home – in perpetual suffering, doomed to die again and again with no chance of salvation.

Regeneration energy burned under his skin. He wanted to turn it inwards, to burn himself to ash from the inside, but he couldn't control it. Every cell in his body ripped apart, the pain coursing through him without Gallifrey there to stabilise his eighth death.

He welcomed the pain even as his mouth stretched wide with a scream. The TARDIS exploded into electrical sparks and fire as his energy shot out from him and burned, burned, burned. His body convulsed, his hearts transforming, his bones stretching, hair receding into his scalp, and his skin tightening. It went on and on and on until he was sure he was dead – this time for good – and he was in whatever hell awaited him.

A hand touched his shoulder. He recoiled so violently that he slammed himself back into the wall behind him, caving a small dent with his body. He tried to reach out for the TARDIS only to find the empty space where she was supposed to live.

Levokania. Susan. Romana.

Mum. Dad.

Zoe.

His mind latched onto that last name and grabbed hold of it. It exploded with detail, light shining through the darkness in his mind: curly brown hair, smiling eyes, a mouth that he enjoyed kissing, and then –

"I love you," the name said over a dinner of crushed potatoes and olive oil. "I'm in love with you."

And the memories tumbled through him and chased out the darkness. He was on Planet One with her, face pressed into the nape of her neck as they watched the rain hammer down; he was in bed reading as she slept next to him, her arm draped over his thighs, holding him in place; he was tugging her into his arms as music swirled around them, the lights catching the gold flecks in her eyes and making her shine brighter than she already did.

He used her name and the memory of her love to pull himself out of the darkness, collapsing against the floor in a pile of limbs, sweat turning him cold.

The light hurt his eyes. His body gave one strong throb of pain before he started cataloguing his injuries. Stretched and bruised from the journey across the Void, the Doctor felt as though he had been put into a blender and blitzed. The first hop hadn't been bad, even if it had been slightly unpleasant, and it was a miracle that neither him nor Jackie had been turned inside out. Various blood vessels had burst; there was a minor concussion to pay attention to; sore lungs that had tried to draw in oxygen when there wasn't any; and two hearts that felt as though they had been caught in an iron grip and left bruised.

He sat up slowly and didn't notice the small tendrils of ice that looped their way over his bare skin fell from him, a remnant of the frozen Void.

The Doctor dragged a hand across his face and exhaled.

A choked sob came from near him, and his hearts started beating again, picking up pace in his chest when he remembered he wasn't alone. With a groan, he pushed his aching body across the floor and crawled towards Jackie. He lost the energy halfway and managed to grab hold of the back of her shirt and pull him towards her.

"Jackie," the Doctor gasped, his throat sandpapered raw. "You okay? Jackie?"

She shook and arched, the pain of crossing the Void twisting her mind as it had done his. He didn't know where she was, what horrors she was relieving, and he grew vaguely aware that she was shaking violently. His arm looped around Jackie, holding her close, as he tried to orient himself better, forcing the pain of Gallifrey away and ignoring the lingering echo of his worst regeneration to date, turning his mind away from the bleeding wound that was where the TARDIS lived.

Cut off from her, his mind ran rampant, tumbling down paths that he hadn't trod since meeting Rose.

"Drink this."

Someone shoved a glass of water under his nose for him to drink, but his body refused to cooperate. A hand tipped his chin up and held it to his lips, another cupping the back of his head. The water soothed the burn in his throat, a realisation that he must have been screaming slowly sinking into him, and his hand spread across Jackie's stomach, feeling the wild pounding of her heart reverberating through her torso. Her entire body shook against him, and he awkwardly took the glass from the helping hand and held it to her mouth. Jackie choked and spluttered even as she managed to drink some down, her violent shakes turning into a rolling tremble.

"Doctor, look at me." His eyes twitched before focusing on Mickey's face. Mickey. Cool relief spread across his raw nerves. "Can you speak?"

His tongue pressed against the roof of his mouth. "Mickey."

"Sorry, mate," not-Mickey grimaced, the tension around his eyes softening in sympathy. "It's Ricky. You've had a hell of a trip. The jumper's not supposed to carry two, and you two came flying through just now."

The Doctor frowned, not understanding. "Mickey?"

"I think he's in shock." Angela Price crouched next to him, her hand resting on Jackie's knee. "Doctor, it's Mrs Moore. Do you know where you are?"

Dragging himself away from the pain that bloomed in his mind, not daring to look around to see the absence of Zoe – he didn't know much right then but he knew that she wasn't with him and just the mere reminder threatened to render him useless – he nodded. Jackie's hands gripped his forearm, red marks pressing into his skin, as the tremors in her body started to ease.

"Yes," he said, mouth drying out. "I'm – Torchwood. Other universe."

The weight of what he had done trickled down his spine, and his face twitched, pained: whatever Angela saw on his face, it led to her squeezing his arm.

"It's okay," she said, quickly. "You're okay. Both of you are. We'll figure out what happens next, but you're both okay. Ricky, call for medical. We need a team up here."

Ricky nodded, and the Doctor heard him walking away. He rested his head against the ground and stared at the back of Jackie's. He focused on her timeline. The fear of it ending abruptly – the same fear that had sent him flying towards her to save her - gentled when the timeline spooled out before him, long and golden. He tightened his arm around her as the trembling finally gave way, and the dry, desperate sobs of a woman coming to realise she was cut off from her daughters hit her.

Jackie had always been smarter than people thought, and for that he was sorry, wishing she had a few more minutes of hope before reality crushed her.

With great care, the Doctor stretched out his mind and searched for the gaping hole in the universe that had threatened to destroy not one but two universes only to find nothing. The gaping chasms that made him curse humans from the tops of their heads to the tips of their toes was gone, only ever-diminishing cracks left.

A disturbance in his arms brought his attention back to Jackie, and she pushed away from him, batting at his arm that held her to him, and she shifted across the floor. He watched her, quiet and curious, and heard the dull sound of her depressing the button on the yellow transporter before he saw it. That was all he could hear for long minutes before she gave up and threw it from her with a cry, collapsing forward into her knees, looping her blood-stained hands around the back of her head.

Unable to comfort her any more than he had, the Doctor pushed himself up so that he was sitting: his ears throbbed loudly. Waiting until it passed, he climbed unsteadily to his feet and staggered towards the wall, pressing his hands against it and resting his forehead there. His fingers ran across the surface of it as though hoping to find a crack he could pry open, digging his way back home inch by inch, but it remained flat and unbroken. His elbows shook from the strength of holding his body up, and his cheek rested against the cool surface as he slid to the ground, slumped against the wall, defeated.

Even in his worst imaginings, he hadn't imagined a separation from Zoe.

His hearts squeezed, agony lancing through him, and he closed his eyes to chase away the burning tears that threatened to spill. She was going to be devastated, and there was nothing he could do to make it better.

The only thing that gave the Doctor any comfort was that Jack was there, because he was certain that watching him and Jackie disappear would certainly have rendered the girls useless. He would take care of everything, take care of everyone, and Mickey would take care of Jack.

The people he cared about the most in all and every universe were safe. They had to be as he refused to accept the alternative.

Jackie's sobs broke through his pained thoughts once more. He forced strength into his body, gathering on the same reserve that had got him through the aftermath of Gallifrey's destruction, and he fell away from the wall. Legs refusing to cooperate, he crawled towards the biggest slice of home he had left as the medical team entered the room. His hand shot up to stop them, letting them tend to Jake first in order to give him and Jackie a few moments alone before whatever happened next.

They needed a moment.

"Jackie." Settling in front of her, his hands fell to her calves and curled his fingers around her blood-stained jeans and squeezed just enough to pull her out of her shocked grief and onto him. "Jackie."

"Take me home." Jackie wept into her knees. "Take me back to them."

The Doctor pulled her towards him. She looked up, startled and angry, only to find herself wrapped up in his arms. The sheer discomfort of him hugging her when they never normally touched each other like that – unless she was doing it to annoy him – passed quickly. He was strong and sturdy, and he carried a familiar scent that she pressed her nose into, gasping for breath. She had thought losing Pete was the worst feeling in the world but his senseless death had nothing on the fact that she was separated from her daughters by a universe, and she clung onto the only thing that made sense.

Later, she would find amusement in the fact that, right then, the Doctor was the least strange thing in her life.

"It's okay," the Doctor lied to the top of her head, cheek resting against her dark roots. "I promise, I'll get us home."

Her shoulders hitched, and she shook her head against his shoulder, voice muffled when she spoke words that shook. "You can't promise that."

"Look at me. Jackie, look at me." Reluctantly, she raised her head and stared into his bruised eyes. "I don't know how I'm going to do it but I promise you that I'll get us home. I promise."

It was easy to forget how old the Doctor was with how he behaved at times – an odd obsession with bananas and a penchant for tinkering with anything electronic like a curious child – but as she looked into his familiar face, Jackie was reminded that he was an alien who had lived longer than she was able to grasp. Once that thought would have frightened her, but now, when she had nothing except him and his promise, she sank into his alienness with relief and felt herself calm.

Jackie had seen him do mad and impossible things before, and if he said that he was going to get them home then there was no other choice but to believe him.

"Okay," she breathed, relaxing an inch. "Okay."

She swallowed and leaned into his hand when he smoothed her hair away from her tear-damp face, feeling like a child in need of comfort. He moved stiffly and reached into his pocket to remove a clean handkerchief, wiping the smeared mascara and blood from her face until she had control of her hands again to take over from him. They sat in silence, tangled together like brambles, just breathing as the adrenaline of the last few minutes started to drip from their bodies.

Jackie felt weak and wasn't able to stop shaking, the Doctor's arms around her keeping her steady. The drying blood turned her fingers tacky and fear shot through her at the thought of what they had been forced to leave behind.

"Are they okay?" Jackie asked, question cracked through with worry. "The others?"

As much as the Doctor wanted to reassure her, the words stuck in his throat. He didn't know, and the not knowing pulled at him. The situation hadn't been great when they were pulled across, the building falling down around them brick by brick. He was sure it had been coming down, and it wasn't as though the Ghost Room was particularly close to the ground.

Worry cloaked his hearts in a caul. He wanted to believe that even if everything had gone wrong in the worst possible way, Jack would know what to do. He would do his best to get everyone out safely.

And, as had been shown time and time again, Jack's best was always good enough.

The biggest and most immediate worry he had was Sarah Jane. The way she had hit the ground, her blood pooling around her with terrifying quickness, made his throat slick with bile at the thought that she might have just died in front of him and there was nothing he could do to save her. Guilt swamped him, and the very thought of Zoe – the danger she was in and the grief that was going to hit her – sent him teetering on the edge of madness.

"Yes," the Doctor replied. "They are. Of course they are."

Her tear-wet eyes narrowed. "Are you lyin' to me?"

"Maybe, I don't know," he sighed, pulling back and dropping his hand to the side, knuckles bumping against the floor. "I believe they are, if that means anything. The alternative..." he shook his head and swallowed. "They're fine. I met a future Zoe. She would've warned me if something truly awful had happened."

He didn't know that for certain.

He didn't know how old Zoe was when they met in the middle of the Blitz; whether she was centuries, perhaps millennia, removed from the events that had just happened. He shook his head, chest tight, desperate to be alone for just a few minutes so he could give into the emotions racing through him. He was sure that clear thought would come easier if he just had a few minutes of space.

"Doctor?" Jackie's hand gripped his forearm, her face swimming before his. "You saw her? You really saw her?"

"Yes," he said, nodding, throat thick. "The night we met Jack. She was fine. Better than fine. I don't know about Rose or Mickey or Jack but she would've told me. Given me a warning. Something. I know she would have."

The Zoe he knew now would give no thought to messing with the timelines if it meant saving someone she loved, but time changed people and anxiety flowed out of his chest that maybe she had changed too much to do that.

Don't think about it, the Doctor chastised himself. Focus on the now. Deal with everything else later.

"Are you okay?" The words jerked out of him, rough and abrupt. Jackie's hand spasmed on his arm, and she pulled it back to her lap. He wanted to apologise but his mouth was thick with grief, tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. "Are you...?"

Not sure how to end his second question, the Doctor fell silent.

Jackie laughed, a grating sound filled with pained. "No."

"Physically," he corrected. "I meant physically."

"Oh." It was as though she hadn't thought about her body, distracted by the pain that spread out from her heart. Her chin dipped, her eyes turning to look down at herself, face twisting at the sight of Sarah Jane's blood staining her clothes before she nodded. "Yeah, I think so. You?"

"More or less." No physical damage had been done that wouldn't heal in a few hours, a day at the most. Exhausted and lost, he rubbed his face only to wince at the bites that rolled across his fleshy palm. He held his hands out in front of him and stared, faintly surprised at the injury from barely an hour earlier. "I'd forgotten about that."

"What happened?" Jackie grabbed his wrist and looked at his injured palm where dried blood had congealed over his wounds only to split open again, leaving a smear of his own blood on the pale skin of his forehead. "How'd you do this?"

"Punched a mirror." Her head snapped up, startled. "Long story. It'll heal on its own. Don't fuss."

"If I don't fuss about you I'm goin' to start cryin' again," Jackie told him, fingers tightening on his wrist. "You're such a stupid alien."

"It was only a mirror," the Doctor grumbled.

"You trapped yourself here with me," she snapped, tears pooling in her eyes despite her best efforts to keep them at bay. "What were you thinkin'? Who's goin' to look after my girls now?"

"Jack and Mickey'll have that well in hand, and they can look out for each other," the Doctor reassured her. "C'mon. Do you think you can stand?"

He tucked his hand under her elbow and grasped hold of her other arm, carefully lifting her to her feet. Unfurled and standing straight the Doctor assessed just how awful she looked: the bottom half of her shirt and the top half of her trousers were soaked in blood, clearly having been caught by the spray of it when Sarah Jane had started bleeding. He quickly shrugged off his coat and put it around her shoulders so she didn't have to look down at herself and see herself.

"Doctor?"

Angela approached them again, and a small knot of tension loosened within the Doctor's cluttered chest. He wasn't friendless in this new world, and he had been in worst situations before without any friends and no resources. He had Angela, Ricky, Jake, and he hoped the resources of this universe's Torchwood to find his way back home to Zoe and his friends. More calm settled into his body as he quickly assessed what he did have, optimism beginning to flare between the cracks of despair settled in him.

He and Jackie were alive and unharmed, and if there was one thing his long life filled with great love and great pain had taught him it was that where there was life there was hope.

"I'm so sorry," Angela said, sincerely. "Is there any chance you can get back to the other side?"

"There's always a chance," the Doctor replied, clearing his throat to try and sound more like himself again. "It might take me a little time to figure it out, but give me an office, some biscuits, and enough explosive material, I'll find our way back home. Don't you doubt that."

"I wouldn't dare," she told him, hand fluttering out to squeeze his shoulder. "Until you do find a way to leave, you're more than welcome to stay as guests of Torchwood. I know what it is in your world but, well, I hope you've seen that we're much better."

"No arguments from me on that," he said, glancing at Jackie whose expression was clouding over, a sign that her temper was on the rise. "Maybe we should -"

"Where's Pete?" The fury that laced her question sent silence rolling through their small group. "Where's that rat bastard?"

"Yes, good question," the Doctor agreed, optimism giving way to an anger that rolled through him like hot treacle, spreading to every part of his body, at the reminder of Pete Tyler. Somewhere in the depths of his mind a storm started to build, thundering across his tongue. "I wouldn't mind having a quick chat with old Pete. Where is he?"

Angela eyed him, sensing the danger in that question, and she glanced to Jackie to see if she planned on calming him as Zoe might have done. Except Jackie had her arms folded tightly across her chest beneath the Doctor's coat and looked inclined to let the Doctor do whatever it was he wanted to do.

"Not here, not anymore," she decided, smudging the truth only slightly. "He was taken into custody by Captain Perry after he -" she hesitated, not sure what to call his actions. "After he behaved as he did. Technically no one's in charge at the moment, which is going to be a problem when people start knocking on the door to find out what happened."

The Doctor ignored that last bit. "I want to speak with Pete. Jackie?"

"I don't want to talk to him." The decision tripped off her tongue without thought, and the rightness of it left her feeling as though a small weight had been removed from her chest. "I don't want to see him again. Not ever. He's not my Pete. Not even close."

"We'll take care of that for you," Angela promised. "And, Doctor, you can speak to him but not now. You've both just had a difficult day – and I can't believe you both survived coming across the Void like that, those transporters aren't made to carry two people at the same time. You're going to need some serious medical attention, some food, and then I'm sure you'd probably like to sleep."

Jackie knuckled her eyes, and the Doctor wondered how he was ever going to sleep again without the warm weight of Zoe in his bed and the TARDIS quiet and comforting in his mind.

Even on his worst days he had always had the TARDIS.

"We're going to have to move you quickly though," Angela continued, apologetically. "This place is going to be filled with politicians, scientists, and news cameras before too long wanting to know what's happened. It's best if we can keep the two of you under the radar for as long as we can."

The Doctor stared at her. "News cameras?"

"Don't even," she sighed, annoyed. "Ever since the Cybermen went missing, Torchwood's had to go public with everything. The decision to cross over into your universe was put to a global vote, which I was against but Pete said it'd be good for us. Thankfully, it was decided it was worth the risk if it meant stopping the environmental problems. When Pete came back with the news that Yvonne refused to stop the experiments, there was discussion of sending a bomb through."

"Right," he said, dragging the word out as he considered the implications, a sigh building in his throat. "I'm going to have to get up to speed with the politics as quickly as possible. Won't Jackie be an issue though?"

"She might be," Angela considered, tilting her head and looking at Jackie closely. "Not one I've given a lot of thought too though. We'll think of something even if it means keeping her out of sight."

Jackie looked between them, confused. "Why am I the problem? You're the one always blowin' things up an' stickin' your nose in where it doesn't belong."

"Charming," he muttered before clearing his throat again, an itch building in the depths of it. "Your counterpart here was a bit famous, that's all."

"Really? What for?"

"Er -"

"Philanthropy, mainly," Angela replied. "She and Pete were some of the richest people in the country. She did a lot of charity work and walked the red carpet a lot."

A strange feeling passed over Jackie, not sure how to take that information. "Right. An' she died, didn't she?"

"Yes," she confirmed. "And Pete's grief was very public and very angry. He became the face of cleaning up the Cybers, and he's given a lot of interviews about it and how her death's affected him. So, if you walk out into the world looking like you do, people are going to be up in arms about it. They'll probably suspect some sort of conspiracy or whatever it is people think in situations like these." The whites of her eyes flashed when she rolled them. "Not that we have a lot of situations like this."

"We can dye her hair." The Doctor swept his eyes over Jackie. "She's not a natural blonde."

"She is standin' right here," Jackie snapped, a fine tremble racing through her once more, and she tightened the Doctor's coat around her. "An' do we have to talk about this now? We've just –"

She broke off, words snagging in her throat. She turned to sweep the tears from her eyes with a furious dash of her hand.

"No, of course we don't, I'm sorry," Angela apologised, and she looked back over her shoulder. "Ricky?"

The sight of Ricky walking towards them looking so much like Mickey was almost too much for Jackie who ducked her head and balled the Doctor's handkerchief up in her hand, pressing it to her eyes. She didn't even complain when the Doctor put his arm around her shoulders and tugged her against his side, the lump in his throat easily ignored as he had more practice with doppelgängers of the people he cared about.

"Jake's doing okay," Ricky said upon reaching them. "He might need a skin graft but nothing important seems to have been damaged. Once I get him settled in the med centre, I can take care of these two. My nan'll put them up for as long as she needs to."

"Rita," the Doctor remembered, relief tripping through him at the reminder of another friendly face. "Of course. How is she?"

"Better than ever, thanks. She'll be happy to see you again. You should hear how she goes on about that night sometimes," Ricky told him, smiling. "I don't know how long it'll take you to find your way back, but I reckon Nan won't mind the house guests. I'll give her a call once I've seen to Jake."

Towards the back of the room, bathed in sunlight, Jake was fighting back against the medical professionals who were trying to get him to use a wheelchair, accidentally sending a keyboard clattering to the floor. "I'm telling you I'm fine! I don't need a wheelchair, I can walk! It's not my legs that were burned!"

Ricky drew in a deep, steadying breath. "Honestly, that man could be missing both his arms and be bleeding out on the floor and he'd say he's fine."

"As though you're any better," Angela scoffed, rocking when Ricky bumped her with his shoulder. "Before we do anything else, including having medical look you over now that the shock seems to have worn off, you two should probably shower. I mean no offence, Mrs Tyler -"

"Jackie," she corrected, exhaustion dripping from her. "It's Jackie."

"Jackie," Angela said with a nod. "You look like something out of a horror film at the moment. I take it that's not your blood?"

She shook her head. "No."

"Well, we've got some spare clothes knocking about you can change into," she said. "Both of you."

"Ah, I'm good on that front, thank you," the Doctor replied, not caring to part with his suit and coat until long after he had taken stock of everything he had on him. He hoped his penchant for shoving everything and anything into his pockets was going to be useful now that he was cut off from the TARDIS. "But a shower sounds...yeah."

He didn't particularly want a shower but he did want the few minutes it would allow him to be alone without anyone to worry about except himself. He hoped the fall of water would cover whatever tears he needed to shed before he needed to put on a strong front for Jackie.

His hand ached for Zoe's in his, and he flexed his fingers, knuckles brushing against the round of Jackie's shoulder.

"The Doctor needs somethin' for his hand," Jackie sniffed, wiping the tears that kept tracking silently down her cheeks away. "It's hurt."

He looked down at her and applied a little extra, comforting pressure to her shoulders. "I told you, it'll heal on it's own."

"Doctor." Jackie gave him a look that was equal mixture exasperation and pleading that immediately softened him towards her: as she was all he had in this universe, he was all she had as well. He had already conceded defeat in the seconds it took her to utter her quiet plea. "Just get it seen to, yeah?"

"Sure."

"Ricky, why don't you and the Doctor take Jake down to the medical centre and then you can show him to the men's showers?" Angela suggested. "I'll take Jackie to the women's so she can change."

Jackie nodded, quiet and docile in a way that she wasn't, and the Doctor removed his arm from around her only to rest his hand at the nape of her neck so that she looked up into his face. Her resemblance to Rose took his breath away, and he avoided looking too much into her eyes as they were the exact same shape and colour as Zoe's.

"I'll be back as soon as I can," the Doctor promised.

"Just get yourself looked at," Jackie said. "You're my only way home, an' I don't need you dyin' of a stupid infection."

"It'll take more than an infection to take me down," he assured her. "Go, shower. Ricky's right. You look awful."

Only a day earlier, a mouthful of good-natured abuse would have flown from her mouth in response to that; this time she merely leaned into him before pushing away as though she wasn't sure whether her legs were capable of supporting her weight without him, and she took Mrs Moore's offered arm. The Doctor watched her, unblinking, as she made her way out of the room, a small crumpled human whose back was bowed beneath the weight of their unexpected destination, and he turned back to look at the wall.

With how quickly time moved in this universe, the Doctor imagined that barely a minute had passed since he and Jackie had disappeared. He closed his eyes to imagine the other side: Zoe desperately trying to pry the wall open; Rose sobbing; and Jack trying to keep everyone together just long enough to get them all to safety, relying on good, kind, and steadfast Mickey to help him.

His gut ached with longing to be there with them, terrified at how long it was going to take him to find a way back, conscious that there was a time pressure given that Jackie was going to keep ageing like a human. He needed to get her home before Rose and Zoe lost too much time with her, and the Doctor needed to get home to Zoe to fulfil his promise of taking her dancing.

"Doctor?" Ricky stood back with his arm around Jake's waist – a compromise since the wheelchair was lying on its side where Jake had upturned it with a decisive and petulant kick – and the Doctor tore his eyes from the wall to look back at him. "You ready?"

No, he thought, even as he took the first step towards them, guilt pounding through him as it felt as though he was walking away from Zoe.

"Yeah," the Doctor lied. "I'm ready."


Abigail pointed the remote at the TV and angrily jabbed the red button, the screen flashing as it turned off. She stared at her reflection in the blackness, her heart thundering in her ears, and a fine tremble ran through her as she tried to wrap her head around what she had just seen. It didn't feel real. She rubbed her tongue against the roof of her mouth and tried to swallow, hand fumbling for the glass of water next to her. She clutched it and drank down a large mouthful, her mind spinning. She couldn't believe something like that had happened without her knowing it; she paid people specifically to make sure that she received the news from Torchwood first.

The water glass dropped from her hand, bouncing on the plush rug and sending the water flying. Pressing her face into her hands, fingers digging into the greasy roots of her hair, she ignored the sound of her live-in therapist shifting and moving at her side. She knew that Meredith was going to want to talk about the BBC breaking news report – it was what she paid her for after all – and the thought of having to put her thoughts and emotions into words made nausea slither its way up her throat.

She didn't know how she felt.

Her body and mind were numb – a spiralling, dizzying feeling swooping through her like a bird caught in a heat swell. She shifted her fingers and pressed her nails into her scalp until the pain digging into her broke through the numbness that had existed in her on and off ever since the Cyber attacks six years earlier.

Her mouth opened, and she sucked in a deep breath, pressing harder against her scalp: leaning into the pain was so much better than letting the paralysis settle in her. Her wrists ached for the cool slice of something sharp across her skin, and she wanted to break the glass beneath her foot so that the rich red of her blood spilt free and flowed out across her skin.

"Abby, stop." Meredith reached out to her and caught her wrists, prying them carefully from her scalp. "Come on now. You know what to do here. What have we practiced?"

A sound of protest gurgled in her throat, her head shaking.

"Name five things you can see," Meredith urged. "Come on now. Look around the room and name five things for me. You can do it."

Resentment burned through Abigail even as she snapped her head up, eyes connecting with the gaze of her reflection again. Her mouth was wired shut, jaw aching, and she rolled her neck to feel it crack, body twisting away from Meredith's.

There was a knife in the kitchen, she remembered.

"Abigail." Her name sounded like a whip crack through the room. "Five things. Go."

"TV."

She spat the word reluctantly into the space between them, bitter shards of anger making Meredith clamped down on a flinch.

"Good, that's one," Meredith said. "You see a TV. What else?"

Abigail's eyes flicked to the side. "Books."

"Okay, books," she said with a nod. "And – ?"

"Candles," Abigail continued, the tension in her jaw easing and her breath coming a little easier. "Coffee table."

"That's great, you're doing so good," Meredith encouraged her. "Just one more thing now, that's all. Just one more."

Abigail's throat moved when she swallowed, and her eyes landed on the dark blue velvet curtains that hung over the windows. They were an extravagance even her father had hesitated at when she insisted on them: expensive, bespoke curtains she ended up hating after only a week of them hanging in place. She stared at them, letting herself get lost in the material, breathing deeply and slowly.

"Curtains," she finally said. "I see curtains."

Abigail let Meredith talk her through the rest of the grounding technique, finding that her breath flowed into her without tension and pain by the time they reached the two things she was able to smell – her own sweat and the new flowers that had been placed in a vase that morning. She slumped back against the sofa, resting her head on the cushions there, and stared up the ceiling as her heart eased its rapid, anxious beating.

"There we go," Meredith said, softly. "How do you feel?"

"Better," Abigail replied, honestly. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," she said. "Do you feel the urge to harm yourself right now?"

She shook her head. "No."

"Okay, that's good." Meredith sat back and looked at her. Abigail never liked how any of her therapists looked at her, imagining them to be judging her or, worse, pitying her, and she deliberately averted her eyes. "Let's talk about what triggered this incident."

"Let's not," Abigail rebuffed, shaking her head. "I want a cup of tea."

She didn't even like tea.

Of all the drinks in the world, she never understood why people enjoyed steeping leaves in hot water and then drinking the result. Not even sugar, milk, and honey made it palatable; yet, the process of making tea was oddly calming to her and that was what she wanted right then. She wanted her hands to do something other than pressing the sharp edge of a blade against her skin; she wanted to not be sitting on her plush sofa staring at her reflection that only highlighted how little she had actually showered that week. Dark marks pressed beneath her eyes, her hair clumping with grease, and she was still wearing the same T-shirt she had spent the last two nights sleeping in.

So a cup of tea was exactly what she wanted.

"I know it's a lot to take in," Meredith began, her voice pitched low and soothing. "I don't know where to start, but we should –"

"If you don't know where to start then perhaps you should think about that before pushing me to speak about something neither of us understands," Abigail snapped. She tossed the soft throw from her lap and clambered to her feet, kicking the glass under the coffee table for the maid to pick up in the morning. "I'm going to make a cup of tea. Please don't follow me with your talk about feelings."

Anger stormed beneath the surface as she left the room. Meredith was her sixth therapist and had been successful in building on the work of her previous therapists, but Abigail was finding her to be less than beneficial to her overall well-being. In the beginning she was grateful for her, but it seemed that lately she kept feeling annoyed by her rather than soothed, finding that Meredith wanted to push deeper into the root causes of her issues rather than letting her approach it on her own. Abigail hated being pushed. No one had ever pushed her in her life, and she didn't appreciate someone she was paying doing that to her.

Perhaps, she considered as she stalked through the long, echoing hallways of her home, it was time to consider ending the arrangement and finding someone new. She remembered reading somewhere that it was healthy to change therapists when the patient felt they had reached the end of what they could accomplish together. She doubted Meredith would suggest ending the sessions as Abigail paid well and offered liberal benefits to those who worked for her, experience teaching her that buying loyalty worked just as well as nurturing it.

Not for the first time she wished that her second therapist, an older woman named Maggie who reminded her of her dead mother, hadn't retired as Abigail felt that she had been making true and honest progress with her. The thought of reaching out to her and offering her the ability to name her price quelled some of the anger and annoyance in her chest.

Decision made, Abigail felt better about the situation, and the lingering anxiety clouding her head eased. Diverting into a room that used to be an office but was now storage, boxes and desks covered in dust sheets, she placed a call through to her personal security team. As she pressed the buttons to connect – each part of the house having a different phone number that she memorised when she was a child – she rubbed a mark from the doorframe with her thumb.

The call immediately connected to her security in a building just off from the main house that remained lit up like Blackpool Tower day and night, and she cleared her throat, speaking briskly.

"Darell, it's Abigail," she said. "Please have Dr Finney's security pass revoked and have her escorted off the premises. I'm no longer in need of her services."

There was a beat of silence on the other end as it wasn't the first time she and Darell had had this conversation.

"Of course, Ms Naismith," Darell Emmet replied. "The usual procedure?"

"Please." She worried a sharp hangnail on her thumb and tilted her head back to observe a thin spider crawling across the ceiling. "Make sure she has her pay and a little something extra for the inconvenience."

"Consider it done," he said in the calm, precise way that made him an excellent head of security. "Good night, Ms Naismith."

Hanging up, Abigail felt lighter and her mood threatened to border on happy when she finally made her way into the kitchen. Very few rooms in the house were of use these days. Most had been shut up and covered with white sheets as it was no longer the busy social and business hub it used to be back in her father's day, or the vaguely remembered days of her mother when the walls glittered with decoration and happiness was in more plentiful supply. Instead, it was just her and her diminished staff moving about the house like ghosts of a better time.

However, the kitchen was one of the rooms that kept its warm, comforting character to it despite all the changes that had taken place over recent years. The large wooden table in the middle was still the same table she used to hide under, the chef at the time slipping her small pastries as she played with her dolls, listening to the work of a busy kitchen and people happy in their jobs.

She brushed her fingers across the surface before sighing.

The chef was gone for the night, but the lasagne he had made for her sat on the side, only partially eaten as her appetite tended to disappear halfway through meals these days. Abigail opened a drawer and rifled through it, looking for the beeswax paper she knew was in there as the whole house and everything in it had gone environmentally friendly two years earlier, just before Japan had been the first major fatality of climate change. Finding it, she covered the lasagne with it and put it in the fridge before removing a can of diet coke that she cracked open.

The hiss it gave introduced the tiniest burst of normalcy into her evening, and she sipped it, enjoying the bubbles bursting across her tongue, turning her attention to the tea.

When she was little, sometime after her mother died, Abigail went to China with her father for six months. It was in the days before Joshua Naismith worked for himself, his business still a fledgling idea that had been stopped in its tracks by the sudden diagnosis of cancer and subsequent long battle Eleanor Naismith suffered through, and he hadn't wanted to leave his young daughter behind. Abigail remembered going to an international school and having private lessons after class in Mandarin, piano, ballet, and so much more, her father desperate to make sure that she had everything she could ever dream of wanting. Yet, the one thing that stood out from that time was of the day she slipped away from her father and his security and sat herself on a stool next to an old woman in a hutong, enraptured as she watched her make tea.

Abigail had long since forgotten the little Mandarin she knew, and her ability on the piano was minimal at best, but tea making was something that had stayed with her through the years. She begged her father for a proper tea set, with all the accoutrements, upon their return to Britain – not that she needed to beg when he was happy to dote on her every whim – and she learned how to make tea.

The disappointment at not actually enjoying the drink was softened by the slow and steady process of proper tea making, a calm oasis in the storm of her life. She enjoyed the way her mind turned blissfully, wonderfully, blank when she set the kettle to boil and her hands moved the leaves into place, turning the silver steeping ball over and over in her fingers.

If there was one thing all her many therapists had taught her, it was that being grateful for the quiet moments, letting herself sink into them and enjoy them, was a healthy thing to do. So she allowed herself to enjoy the moment, knowing that once the tea was made her mind was going to be filled with questions and anger and pain.

With the water boiled, she poured it through the strainer and into the thin-boned china cup. She watched the water change colour, darkening as it strengthened. She left it there to take a seat at the table.

"Cube: play the radio," Abigail ordered to the Lumex cube in the corner of the room. It burst to life, a blue light clicking on, and a brief catch of static before the sounds of the national radio station filled the silent kitchen. She leant forwards on her elbows and placed her face in her hands, exhausted. "Better. That's better."

She hated the sound of silence. She hated the way it made her mind twist and turn on things she didn't want to think about.

"...Jones gave one of the better speeches of her career today," Bart Graham, the leading news analyst on LBC, said in Broad Yorkshire. "Definitely a highlight for her. Far surpassing the disastrous Lincoln speech two months ago."

A wave of tinny laughter filtered through the kitchen.

"Not hard really, was it?" The amusement in Zuhura Saibh's voice was unmistakeable. "Although, we should probably say for sake of fairness that the president put her controversial mistake down to the medication she was taking at the time to deal with the chronic back pain that's plagued her since her thirties."

"Well, whatever she was having, I wouldn't mind some," Bart quipped to more laughter. "But, come on now, you lot. Let's be serious here because, rumour has it, we are serious news station. Tonight, the president said that Torchwood has finally dealt with the problem of the particle weapon from the other universe – words I still can't believe I'm saying even after all these years. What do you think? Is she telling the truth?"

"Why wouldn't she be?" Neal Garrick asked. "It's a stupid thing to lie about and say what you will about President Jones but she's not a liar. Can't say that about many politicians at the end of the day, truth be told. If she says it's over, I don't see why it wouldn't be."

"I agree," Bart said. "Still, it's odd that we didn't hear from Pete Tyler. He's been front and centre in this operation from day one."

"I thought that as well," Zuhura said. "Maybe he was hurt?"

"Couldn't have been, the president said no one was hurt," Robbie Dale replied. "Who knows what's it like travelling between universes. Maybe it knocks you out or something. I'm looking forward to hearing what he has to say though. He's never shied away from opening Torchwood up to more scrutiny and I can't wait to get my hands on the reports when they go public."

"Do you really think they'll make it public?" Zuhura asked, surprised. "I thought they'd classify it for national security."

"More like universal security." Robbie sounded pleased with himself for thinking that up even as it landed flat. "And they can't keep it classified, not under the Torchwood Act Jones pushed through last year. This is a global issue and so they have to make it public unless all heads of states around the world agree, and we all know the Japanese will never agree to that. Not after the loss of their country. They'll want to make sure it's finished with and to give the remaining Japanese peace of mind."

"Whatever's made public to us, I think it's clear that we can finally put to bed the Cyber question once and for all," Bart told them. "After six years of the CRG dredging up the dead and keeping the wounds open, it'll be good to put that night behind us. I think it's pretty obvious that the Cybers can't get back from whatever this Void is."

"I don't know," Zuhura replied. "I don't think they're going to accept that. They've always advocated for the return of the Cybers. I doubt they're going to view what happened to them as a good thing."

"Maybe not but what can they do?" Neal asked."The Void is the space between the universes, and it's not like we can travel in our space properly as it is. It was pure bad luck we had a connection to the other universe that's caused all of these problems. There's not a chance in hell we'll be able to get into the Void even if we wanted to. The CRG's going to lose momentum with this."

"Don't count them out yet," Robbie warned. "There's a lot of anger there. They've never liked how the government handled the aftermath. This is going to create more problems than it solves."

"It's solved the biggest problem of climate change," Zuhura told them. "Or at least it's stopped it from getting worse."

"And what's the worst they can do?" Neal asked. "They'll kick a few MPs out of their seats, have a couple of protest marches, wave a few banners, but they can't really do anything else. They need to accept, just like everyone else has already done, that their loved ones died the moment they became Cybers. John Lumic killed them and banging on the CRG drum isn't going to change any of that."

"See, this is why our listeners tune in," Bart joked, "the tender empathy is always on display."

"I'm being realistic," Neal replied. "And, quite frankly, they've exhausted my empathy. No one but them wants the Cybers back. It's unnatural, sick. Who wants one of them living next door to you? You'd never know if its programming was going to override it at any point. You'd be constantly living in fear. It's -"

Abigail flung the Lumex cube across the kitchen and watched it shatter on impact against the second refrigerator, the sudden silence broken by the rush of hot, angry blood through her ears.

"Bastards," she muttered, swiping at her damp eyes. She swallowed the rest of her coke down, hiccuped, covered a small burp, and left the kitchen into the small garden where the chef grew the fruits, vegetables, and herbs he used daily. "Don't know what they're fucking talking about." She furiously kicked at a loose pebble. "Cowards."

Grabbing the torch that hung from the wall, the path was bathed in light before her, and she stalked down its winding route towards the tree line where there stood a small concrete building. It used to be the gardener's toolshed but Abigail converted it four years earlier, constructing another shed for the gardener closer to the house under the thinking that he was getting too old to be trooping up and down the garden for all the things he needed.

No one but her came near the old toolshed. It was the one area of the house that was off limits to everyone but her.

Inputting a six-digit pin on a keyboard that kept the door looked, the cover released to reveal a biometric reader. She bit the torch in place between her teeth and pressed her palm against the reader, a light flashing beneath it as it scanned her, and she then leaned in close for a retinal scan. The light temporarily blinded her in one eye, and she blinked away the pinprick white lights that danced in front of her while the door clicked open.

The electronics that ran it – a nuclear generator, bought off the black market from Azerbaijan – sent the iron of the door scraping against the concrete floor, and she shivered as cold air washed over her.

Abigail grabbed the door and made sure it was securely closed behind her before she turned and shone the light onto the ground. The faded antique rug was, perhaps, a giveaway that there was a trap door, but she felt better having something tossed over the top of it rather than leaving it open and obvious to anyone who might succeed in getting through the first line of security. Toeing it up, she groped about on the floor for the hatch, wincing as her nail caught on the edge and the hatch clattered back loudly against the ground.

She worked her body down into the hole, closed the hatch, and climbed down the icy ladder that pricked cold into her fingers and bones. The deeper she went the colder she became. She thought about doubling back for a coat before deciding that the cold was nice change from her stuffy house where the air always smelt stale despite how many windows she left open.

At the bottom of the ladder she turned and came face-to-face with another layer of security that required her biometrics again before the system beeped. The final step required a voice-encoded activation set to register one phrase and one phrase only.

Abigail cleared her throat, mind filled with hazy memories of her mother, and warbled softly:

"You are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy when skies are grey. You'll never know dear, how much I love you. Please don't take my sunshine away."

Sniffing, she dragged her sleeve across her eyes as the final door opened.

It was always difficult for her to come this far, though she tried to make the effort at least once a week, typically in the middle of the night so that no questions were asked about her whereabouts. Sometimes she wondered if she was doing the right thing, whether it would have been better to let nature run its course: she didn't know. Millions of pounds and a trail of dead bodies meant that she was in too deep to go back on her decision now, and so she straightened her spine and steeled her shoulders just like her father taught her and walked inside.

White steam rolled off of the computers lining the wall – medical machinery that kept track of the vitals that were so important to her – and she brushed past the transparent sheets that helped keep the air pure and infection free.

Slowly, and with careful footsteps, she approached the bed where her father lay. The sight of him never failed to snatch the breath from her lungs, leaving her dizzy and breathless, as he was covered in the metal of Lumic's Cybermen. The pieces that had been pried off him revealed pallid, grey flesh that looked as though it was a missed heartbeat away from dying, and his eyes were always open as the doctor who had first helped him accidentally ripped them off with the face plate.

He was a horrific sight, one that kept her up at night when she couldn't sleep, but he remained her father.

Abigail reached out and gently touched his human hand, curling her fingers around his knuckles, wishing that his usual warmth was there instead of the chilled touch that reminded her he still hovered between life and death. She crouched down and pressed her lips to the back of his hand, trying to breathe warmth back into him, wiping her eyes against his skin where her tears dried into small, icy pearls.

"Daddy?" Joshua never responded no matter how much hope filled her voice. It took her a long time to be grateful for that as she decided his silence was better than hearing that horrible, two-syllable word falling from his tongue in a voice that wasn't entirely his own. "Things just got a little more difficult today. Torchwood...they've done something, but it's okay. I'm still working on a way to help you. I don't know how much longer it'll be, but I promise...I'm doing the best I can."

Straightening up, she braced herself on his Cyber-clad arm and pressed another soft kiss to his gauzy forehead where his skin hadn't even begun to scab from the face plate removal four years ago. He kept oozing blood, but she refused to let that stop her from kissing his forehead, knowing that if she was in the same position, he wouldn't hesitate.

"It's all going to be okay," Abigail whispered. "I promise."


Jackie jolted awake when the car rolled over a pothole, and she rubbed the sleep from her eyes. For all that she had thought sleep was going to be a stranger to her, she had fallen asleep the second she sat down in the backseat of the Torchwood car Ricky ushered them into, reassuring them that Rita was waiting for them at the other end. Her shower had only delayed the aches and pains that stole over her once she was seated, the adrenaline faded from her body, and she grimaced when she turned her head to the window.

Every inch of her hurt.

She remembered being entirely unsympathetic when Rose and Zoe came back from God knows where – some planet at the backend of the universe where they had to run for their lives, like usual – complaining of stiffness and aching muscles. She empathised them with a little more now. Their lives were so active and Jackie had spent only one day doing what they normally did and she was exhausted. It was only a mild comfort when she caught the Doctor wincing; his movements stiff and pained that told her maybe what she had gone through was worse than the usual running her girls did.

Either way she was in pain, and she hated it.

Out of the window, a London that wasn't hers passed by. Lifting a sore arm, Jackie brushed her damp hair from her eyes and considered how everything looked the same. All the landmarks where were they should be, and they looked exactly as she had always known them – even the people looked the same.

It was nothing at all like anything she had read in the old pulp science fiction she used to devour as a child. Parallel universes were supposed to be drastically different with steam engines and hoverboards, not exactly the same except for the zeppelins.

They littered the sky, and her eyes snagged on one, watching it coast slowly across the darkening sky, the blue bleeding into reds and oranges as the sun began to set. She remembered Mickey telling her about them when they finally visited after the TARDIS was fixed and Jack's knees were healed, his excitement at flying one bubbling over as Jack fondly cupped the back of his neck.

"Zoe," the Doctor muttered. Jackie snapped her head around, pain spreading out at the ill-advised movement, and stared at him. His eyes were shut, mouth parted, forehead burrowed deep into a frown, and she realised he was asleep. "Careful...don't burn the apples."

Jackie reached out to wake him, her fingers hovering over his arm, before she pulled back. She doubted he was going to be able to sleep much over the next few days, and she hoped that the superior biology he always touted kept him going. She didn't know what a lack of sleep did to a Time Lord but she figured he was grown enough to deal with things how he wanted.

Deciding that bad sleep was better than no sleep at all, she left him to his mumbling, hoping that whatever Zoe was doing to the apples in his dreams wasn't the start of a nightmare. Knowing her daughter, it could go either way.

A lump formed in her throat at the thought of her daughters, and she turned away from him, the weight of all that had happened pressing in on her.

It was as though a nightmare had opened its jaws and swallowed her whole.

She kept expecting to wake up in the flat to find Rose and Zoe lounging in the living room, nonsense spilling back and forth between them. While her life had taken some odd turns over the last few years, ending up in a parallel universe hadn't been a thing she was worried about. She hadn't known it was something to fear, not even after everyone else had come back from this universe the first time with a few new bruises and fresh traumas to keep them awake at night. Going to Mars was one thing, holidaying in future Jamaica another, but being trapped in this universe with a Mickey who wasn't Mickey and a Pete who wasn't Pete was too much for her.

The fact the Doctor hadn't already conjured up a way to get them home by sticking some tape to a piece of paper and doing something flashy with a computer unnerved her just a little bit less than the silence he exuded since his shower. Jackie never planned on telling him but she believed him capable of doing just about anything. The things she had seen him do were incomprehensible to her that she didn't understand why he couldn't snap his fingers and take them home. From fixing Zoe's brain to stopping multiple alien invasions and actually making caramel without burning himself once, he was capable of things that would make other people weep.

It made her feel sick that he appeared stymied by their current situation.

She supposed it was inevitable that even the Doctor had limits with what he was able to do, and Jackie supposed that she was glad she was stuck here with him rather than anyone else. She didn't want to think about the heartbreak she would have felt if Rose or Zoe had been the one sucked into the Void, not knowing if they were safe or not. At least with how things had happened she hoped that they at least had each other and the boys.

The Doctor was right: Jack would take care of everything and everyone. He was a steady pair of hands in a crisis, someone who kept a cool head about him, and he was almost as mad as the Doctor, though possessing far superior social skills and manners.

And Mickey – sweet, kind, overlooked Mickey - had yet to abandon Rose in her time of need, and if anyone had reason enough to turn his back on Rose then it was Mickey Smith. He hadn't though, and he would never, because that was the sort of man he was. And Rose would never give up on Zoe, protecting her little sister any way she could.

And Zoe -

Jackie breathed deeply. Her little girl had done the impossible once before. A small spark of hope grew in the pit of her stomach that maybe, just maybe, her daughter would do it again.

Between the Doctor working on a solution in this universe and Zoe working on one in theirs, Jackie hoped that her nightmare would end sooner rather than later. She wanted to go home to her flat and put the kettle on, sinking into her familiar and comfortable sofa, feet propped up on her coffee table, safe and sound without any stupid aliens trying to ruin her life. And while she knew that the Doctor would stop at nothing to make sure she was back at home, she didn't know what the interim meant for her.

Was she supposed to wait until he figured out what to do?

Where was she going to live?

How could she live in a world where she was very publicly dead?

All manner of questions swirled around her mind, clouding her thinking, choking her with the immensity of their impossibility. Just as it threatened to get too much, the car turned into the Docklands and a bubble of relief burst in her chest.

A good few years had passed since she had reason to visit the Docklands, and it was difficult to tell whether it was the same or different to what she knew. She looked at the pedestrians on the pavement – a man and woman walking hand in hand, an old man moving slowly with a walking stick – and she wondered how bad it was back home.

The Daleks and the Cybermen had been laying waste to London by the time they opened up the Void to suck them into it. She wondered if the Powell Estate had escaped the destruction or if the place that she had called home for the last twenty years was a pile of rubble. The thought of Priti, Ru, Bev, Fahrouz, and all the other people she knew and considered friends stuck under broken concrete turned her stomach.

She swallowed hard and peered more intently out of the window, reading the shop signs as the car sailed past. There was an Indian restaurant, a Chinese supermarket, a tatty-looking Spar, and a laundrette. It was all so normal that it pained her. The similarities left her feeling untethered and lost, and she turned, hand pressing against the Doctor's shoulder, waking him up.

He woke immediately, his nostrils flaring with a sharp inhalation, and he stared at her. "What?"

"We're almost there," Jackie said, ignoring the sleep-sharpened irritation in his voice. "Not much longer."

"Right." He knuckled at his eyes. "Be good to see Rita again. She was a laugh last time. Hopefully she won't drive us anywhere though."

She frowned at him. "Why would she? She's blind."

"Didn't stop her last time," the Doctor said, and there was a story there that Jackie was sure he would tell her if she asked if only to hear himself speak. "How long was I out?"

"Don't know, ten minutes, maybe twenty," she told him. "You look like you needed it."

He yawned. "Not likely. I don't waste my life sleeping like you humans."

"Oh, give off," she snapped. "I'm not listenin' to you complain about humans for however long we're stuck here. Either say somethin' nice or don't say anythin'."

The Doctor blinked, startled, and he nodded. "Okay."

Conscious that she was snapping at him for no good reason, Jackie looked back out of the window and ignored the sounds of him rifling through his pockets. She didn't understand how it worked but she knew that his pockets were deeper than they should be and were capable of carrying all sorts of things without weighing it down. She hoped there was something useful in there for him to use to start figuring things out as all she had was her phone, a couple of hair ties, and some chapstick that was nearly finished.

Not what she would have chosen to take to a parallel universe if she had had the choice.

"Here we are, sir, ma'am." The driver pulled the car smoothly along the side of the pavement. Jackie looked up at Rita's house and wondered if a hotel would have been better for them given the way her stomach was knotting itself up with nerves. "Will you be requiring anything else?"

"No, thank you," the Doctor said, opening his door and climbing out. "Thanks for the ride."

Jackie froze in her seat as the door to Rita's house opened and Rita Smith stepped outside, feeling her way through the door. An emotional punch landed in the centre of Jackie's chest, the breath rushing from her, and her fingers tightened on the handle of the door.

The last time she saw Rita Smith was three days before her death, and then, before she knew it, she was helping Mickey organise the funeral and giving him cup of tea after cup of tea as he cried his grief out on her sofa. She watched as the Doctor stepped forward. His voice was a low murmur through the car window before he bent down and wrapped Rita in a tight hug. Rita laughed and patted his back fondly before resting her hand on his cheek, saying something to him that brought a small smile to his mouth.

Pulling back, he looked around for Jackie and paused at the sight of her still in the car. He untangled himself from Rita and opened the car door, bringing his head down, understanding settled in the lines around his eyes.

"I know it's a little weird but you can do it," he assured her. "She's not really the Rita you knew. Different universe, different people. Just like Pete."

The reminder of Pete chased her nerves away, replacing them with a hot swell of anger, and her nostrils flared in a huff. It wasn't as though she had much of a choice in the matter, not unless she wanted to sleep in the back of the car, and she gestured him out of the way before getting out of the car. Sore and weak, she held onto the Doctor's arm as she limped forwards.

"Hello, Rita," Jackie greeted, her voice hoarse. "It's been a long time."

"Jackie Tyler," Rita replied, shaking her head in disbelief. "Last time I saw you was at my girl's funeral before you got too big for your britches and went off to live in that mansion of yours."

"I've never lived in a mansion," she told her. "An' the last time I saw you was just before you died."

Rita tapped her cane against the ground. "It's a strange old world we're living in these days when the dead are coming back to life." She stretched out for Jackie, feeling for her shoulders. "C'mere, my girl. Come give me a hug. I reckon you need one after today."

Stepping into her open arms, Jackie looped her arms around Rita's soft body and hugged her: the scent of her perfume – the same in both universes – made her more homesick than she already was. Tears pricked at her eyes, and a sob began its crawl up her throat. She pulled back quickly, the Doctor's hand coming to rest on her shoulder in a small show of support she appreciated.

"Thanks for letting us stay with you, I know we're probably putting you out," the Doctor said, surprising Jackie with his manners as he had never once apologised to her for putting her out. "We won't be here long term. If we're going to be staying in this universe for a while, we'll get our own place."

Though it was the first Jackie was hearing off it, it felt right. She didn't think she was capable of living with the ghosts of her past for longer than she had to and the Doctor wasn't the worst roommate at the end of the day. He kept things relatively tidy, knew how to cook, and didn't expect anyone to do his laundry for him, which was more than could be said for most people she had lived with in the past, her husband and daughters included.

"Stay as long as you like, dear," Rita told him. "With the boys off working all the time, I don't get much in the way of company. Now, come on. Ricky said you haven't eaten, so I put a little something together. Leftovers, mind, but it's my cooking so you know it's good. As I like to say, things are always better on a full stomach."

Jackie followed Rita into the house and saw that it was exactly as she remembered. Dark walls and a thick, dark, patterned carpet that ran through the whole house with the exception of the kitchen and the bathroom. Decorative plates were mounted on the wall but instead of the kings of the United Kingdom and Queen Elizabeth II, they memorialised events Jackie didn't understand. She remembered that this universe didn't have a royal family, an offhand remark from Rose who thought it was probably better that way, and she turned away from them, feeling overwhelmed.

Laid out on the dining table that was pressed into the corner of the living room on a plastic tablecloth was all the food Jackie associated with Rita: goat stew, ackee and saltfish, jerk chicken, and mashed potatoes. The Doctor's stomach gave a loud rumble, and he placed a hand over it.

"Sorry," he apologised. "I haven't eaten in a while. Last thing I ate was Zoe's -" his breath hitched, pain lancing across his features. He cleared his throat and continued. "She was making this thing from home. My home, not hers. It wasn't very good but she was trying."

It was Jackie's turn to reach out and press the flat of her palm between his shoulder blades, supporting and comforting. He briefly leaned back into her touch as Rita urged them to take a seat.

"Sit down, sit down. Nothing worse than a table full of food people don't eat," Rita said, sitting with them, and Jackie caught the Doctor's hand before he started eating, stopping him in time as Rita bowed her head over the food to pray. "Dear Lord, thank you for this food and bless you for delivering my friends safe through danger and into the comfort of their friends. Amen."

"Amen," Jackie murmured, releasing the Doctor's hand again, lips twitching at the grateful smile the Doctor shot her.

Conversation was non-existent as they ate, the Doctor and Jackie too hungry now that food was in front of them to think about anything except sating their hunger. The last time she had felt so hungry was after she gave birth to Rose. She had begged her sister to go out and get her something proper to eat, not the rubbish the hospital was feeding her. She would have asked Pete but he had been too enraptured in their newborn daughter to pay any attention to her, and when Caroline came back with a steaming pizza, Jackie fell on it like a starving wolf.

When it came time to give birth to Zoe, Jackie thought ahead and ordered a pizza between contractions.

As she scooped the ackee and saltfish into her mouth, chewing and swallowing to quickly get to the next mouthful, the fog in her mind started clearing and the aches in her body didn't feel as bad. Rita was right. Things did seem better when there was food in the stomach. She glanced to the Doctor and was relieved to see that he had some colour back in his cheeks and seemed less feral than earlier.

After eating, she sat in one of Rita's comfortable armchairs cradling a cup of tea as the Doctor filled their host in on everything that had happened since they last saw each other. Since the conversation didn't require her input, she let her mind drift.

Inevitably it ended up on her daughters. She wondered what Rose and Zoe were doing right then, hoping they were on the TARDIS and were warm and safe with a belly full of good food like she was. Mickey tended to cook when someone was hurting, and a faint trail of amusement fluttered through her at the thought that her daughters were eating the same dishes that she and the Doctor were eating only universes apart.

"– Jackie –"

Her name pulled her out of her thoughts, and she stared at the Doctor. "Sorry, what were you sayin'?"

Only after she had spoken did she realise she was interrupting him.

"I was just saying that you shouldn't have ended up here," the Doctor told her. "I was telling Rita about how you got here."

"Oh." Jackie frowned into her tea. "Yeah."

"I always thought that Pete Tyler was no good," Rita said, clucking her tongue in disapproval. "Oh, he was all right at the beginning but after he pulled that nonsense with your money, you should've given him the boot."

Jackie looked up. "What money?"

"When he took your savings and put it into Vitex," she reminded her. "Lord, I'd never seen you so angry. We all thought that was it for the two of you but you stayed with him. It was only luck that Vitex took off. It could've gone the other way just as easily and then where would you have been?"

The Doctor looked at her, faint question on his lips, and she shrugged, just as confused as he was.

"Never happened to me," Jackie said. "Didn't have any savings after Rose was born anyway. It all went on her."

"Different lives," the Doctor mused, shaking his head, disappointed. "Pete should've realised that when he met Rose and Zoe and realised who they were later. I know Jake and Ricky told him, and it's not exactly hard to figure out. Rose looks a lot like her dad. He never should have done what he did. If he hadn't –"

He let the sentence trail off as they both knew that if he hadn't interfered then neither of them would be in this universe. Jackie would have been able to keep the lever upright without the worry of being pulled across the Void, and the Doctor would never have had to jump after her to save her.

Yet even as Rita was given free reign to denigrate Pete's character on her behalf, part of her wanted to protest and defend her husband. It was difficult to remember that the Pete Tyler who had damned her to this universe wasn't her husband even though she knew that. She didn't know how the Doctor could distinguish between their universe and this one so easily; her heart felt as though it was wrapped in barbed wire, bleeding each time she thought about her not-husband, feeling the betrayal as keenly as though her Pete had done it.

"I've made up the spare rooms for you," Rita told them once the full story had been told. "Ricky and Jake are going to be staying at their flat for a while. They normally come and spend the weekends with me when they're in the country but he told me to turn their room over to you. There's fresh sheets on the bed, towels in the cupboard, and you're to treat this place like your home, you hear me? I don't want to have two strangers moving about the place. You're friends and you're to treat it as such."

"Thank you, Rita," the Doctor said, gratefully. "I – we – appreciate you doing this for us."

"Nonsense," she scoffed, collecting the plates on the table as she talked. "Without you and that other grandson of mine, this world'd be under Cyber control. The least I can do is put you up for as long as you need."

Jackie got to her feet to help her, needing to do something with her hands and body rather than just sitting still, carrying the dirty plates into the kitchen where Rita filled a sink full of soapy water even as a dishwasher sat under the counter. Jackie didn't mind, finding the routine of drying the plates as Rita washed them soothing. The running commentary of things that she had missed since Odessa's funeral told her that Rita was having trouble distinguishing her from the Jackie Tyler who had died and she felt closer to the woman.

"I didn't get to spend a lot of time with your daughters," Rita said at last, "but they seemed like good girls. Brave. Smart. You shouldn't worry about them while you're here. You'll just make yourself sick with things you can't change."

Jackie breathed in deeply, pain sparking through her. "I can't not worry about them."

"I know," Rita said, and Jackie remembered all of Odessa's attempted suicides, her drug problem, and the dark days when the depression withered everything it touched. Of course Rita knew what it was like to worry about daughters. "Lord knows I spent many a night worrying about Odessa only for it all to end the way it did. Your girls seemed like they had good heads on their shoulders, able to deal with things that would send most people running for the hills. Try and remember that when you're up late worrying."

A small smile appeared. "Thanks."

"If you need to talk about anything, you just come and find me, dear," Rita offered. "My shoulders can hold whatever weight you're carrying about with you. Don't you worry."

Jackie swallowed against the lump in her throat and murmured her thanks again, a small sniffle escaping her, and Rita let the conversation drop.

Later, Rita excused herself to bed as it was already long past the time she normally retired, the Doctor and Jackie were left alone in her living room with an open invitation to help themselves to any of the food as long as they cleaned up after themselves. With another cup of tea in her hands, Jackie stared out of the window and into the dark street, wondering why the street lamps weren't lit.

The Doctor sat opposite her and touched her leg with his foot. "You all right?"

"I used to come here, y'know," Jackie said, not looking at him. "Back home. Rita slipped an' fell once when Mickey was little – this was just after his mum died – an' she needed some help gettin' around. I'd come over at least once a month after that, right up until she died. An' now I'm sittin' back in her house after speakin' to her."

"It's strange," he agreed.

"More than strange," she said. "It's weird. Everythin' is so normal here - except them bleedin' blimps - an' I keep expectin' to hear the girls comin' in any second now."

The Doctor looked into his tea, frowning. "Yeah."

"You've got no idea how to get us home, do you?" Jackie said, staring at him. "I can see it on your face. You're completely lost."

"I wouldn't say completely lo –"

"Doctor."

"Oh, all right," he sighed. "I've got no idea what to do or where to start. I keep turning ideas over in my head but without the TARDIS to run simulations I'm not sure where's a good place to jump in."

"Right," she said, taking note of how old he looked in the half-moon light that flooded the room. "You're goin' to do that thing where you just make it up as you go along, aren't you?"

"In my defence, those plans generally work out in my favour," the Doctor replied before rolling his shoulders and rubbing his nose. His long fingers dropped to his knee where he drummed a beat against his trousers. "Truth is, my people only crossed between universes when they had to. I was being flippant when I said we were popping back and forth all the time. There was a lot of regulation to cross through the walls of one universe into another, and it wasn't exactly encouraged so it wasn't taught to us. Nothing except the basics so we knew what not to do."

She stared at him. "You're sayin' you don't even know what to do? You know everythin'!"

"Flattering but wrong," he said. "What I'm saying is that I don't know where to start, there's a difference. I think I do, maybe, and once I sleep on it and give it a few days I'll probably know what to do, but I'm going to have to teach myself an entire branch of science I've spent the last millennia not caring about. Even for me that's going to be a lot of work."

"But...you're a Time Lord." She waved her hand at his head. "You've got that superior brain you're always bangin' on about. How hard can it be?"

His eyes rolled to the ceiling. "I should've known going on about that would come back and bite me."

"Doctor." The panic that edged his name forced him to look at her. "Can you get us home?"

"Yes," the Doctor said, firmly, watching his reassurance ease his shoulders. "Think about it like this: Zoe didn't know the science behind the Delta Wave generator and she had to start from somewhere, right? So she started learning maths and science and engineering until she figured out what she needed. She had an end point in mind and was able to work back from that to start. I know that we need to get back to our universe so I'm going to work back from that and figure out where to start and then, you know, start."

"It took Zoe four years to figure that out," Jackie pointed out. "Four years an' a lot of loneliness. She hasn't been the same since."

"Yes," he agreed, a pang echoing through him at the thought of how lonely she was going to be now he wasn't there. "And don't ever tell her I said this but I'm much, much smarter than she is."

Jackie raised her eyebrows, unimpressed. "Oh, are you now?"

"Don't be like that, it's a biological fact," he argued. "My people use more of our brains than humans do. If she had the same amount of brain power as I did, she'd be smarter than me, no doubt about that."

She sipped her tea, her silence pointed, and he hurried on.

"My point is that I can probably figure out a way to get us home before four years is up," the Doctor continued. "And don't forget that time runs faster on this side for us than it does for them, so four years would be about – ooo." He did the maths quickly. "About six months."

"But it's still four years for us," Jackie said. "An' it's not like I'm gettin' any younger, Doctor."

"Yeah..." he sighed, regretful an apology seeping into his face. "Not much I can do about that. I'm sorry, I really am. I might be called a Time Lord but I can't actually control the flow of time. Life would be a lot easier, and less painful, if I could."

The moonlight spilled through the living room and bathed Jackie's hands and arms in its silvery light. Having changed at Torchwood, stuffing her ruined clothes into a bag to be incinerated, she now wore a pair of Torchwood-issued, standard grey sweat pants and a jumper from Mrs Moore that was a little tight around her bust; she tugged at it uncomfortably as she processed what the Doctor told her.

The thought of being stuck in a parallel universe for four years, cut off from her daughters, with only the Doctor for company filled her with such dread that she pressed her face into her hands and pushed her fingers through her hair, catching on the knots there. She wanted to cry and scream and claw her way back home. All she could think about was the moment she lost her grip on the lever, the Void snapping her towards it, and the sheer, incomprehensible panic that filled her.

She had been so sure she was going to die.

It seemed so likely that the panic had encompassed her, wrapped around her, and her mind had filled with all the things she was going to miss out on. She wasn't going to see Mickey and Jack grow into each other more; she wasn't going to see Rose find someone worthy of her; and she wasn't going to see Zoe and the Doctor get married. She was going to miss all of it.

She vividly remembered screaming at the unfairness of it before the Doctor's body slammed into hers. The strong grip of his legs wrapping around hers, her nose jammed into his shoulder as she clung onto him, and then they were jumping, falling into another universe.

"Why'd you do it?" Jackie asked to her hands. "What the hell made you do it?

"Do what?"

"Jump after me," she snapped, raising her head. "You left Zoe behind an' the TARDIS. You could've gone on like normal an' you wouldn't be stuck here with me. So why the hell did you do it, you stupid alien?"

"This is the thanks I get," the Doctor muttered, rubbing his eyes in frustration. "Of course I jumped after you, why wouldn't I?"

"Because we're trapped!" Jackie brought her hand down onto the back of the sofa,startling him. She glared at him, anger pulsing through her though she didn't know why. "You've gone an' got yourself trapped because you came after me."

"And saved your life," he reminded her. "You'd have died the second you entered the Void if I hadn't."

"But -"

"If you think for a second that I'd let you die when I could do something to stop it, you really don't know me at all," the Doctor interrupted, testily. "I saved you because you're my friend. I saved you because I could. I know I was joking before – a little – but you are family to me and not just because you're Rose and Zoe's mum but because of everything else. You didn't have to forgive me for bringing Rose back twelve months late, and Rassilon knows when Zoe was sick after Mondas it gave you more of a reason to hate me but you didn't, not really. I jumped after you because you're my family. Because you and the others...you're all I've got."

His gaze jerked away from her, the sharp profile of his face caught in the moonlight, annoyed at himself for revealing too much of himself. Jackie stared at him, watching as he wiped at his face, utterly exhausted, and all the lingering anger she had been carrying since Rose's disappearance dropped away from her. It dissolved in the face of his pain and his affection for her: an affection so strong that he gave up the only home he had left and the woman he loved to make sure she lived another day.

She cleared her throat and rubbed at her face, missing the days when the biggest thing she had to worry about was who her girls were dating.

"Thank you," Jackie finally said. "Just...thanks."

His jaw twitched, chin dipping in a brief nod. "You're welcome."

"S'pose if I was goin' to be stuck with anyone, you're a good person to be stuck with," she said, offering an olive branch. "Reckon you'd prefer Zoe though."

"At least I wouldn't worry as much if she was here," the Doctor admitted, grasping hold of it. "I'm just glad Jack's there with her. If anyone can stop her sinking too deeply into her bad feelings, it's him."

"You think she's definitely goin' to try an' get us back?"

"Yes." It was a fact of his life post-Gallifrey that if he was in trouble, Zoe would come for him, except this time there were two universes and the Void standing in her way. "She's going to drive herself mad trying to reach us."

Jackie dipped her index finger into her tea and sucked it into her mouth. "Can she do it?"

"Only if she wants to be responsible for the destruction of two universes," the Doctor said, "which, knowing her as I do, is something she doesn't want. No. She's going to give it the old college try, realise the dangers, and then feel awfully guilty about not succeeding. That's where Rose'll come in."

Jackie smiled, a small thing that was a shadow of its normal self. "At least they've got each other, yeah?"

"Yeah."

"D'you think Sarah Jane's all right?"

"I hope so, I really, really do." Fresh fear gripped his hearts. "It was a brave thing you did, by the way, helping her like that. I guess I know now where Rose and Zoe get their recklessness from."

"Oh, shut up," she said, embarrassed.

"We are going to be okay." The Doctor reached out a hand and covered hers, thumb tucking beneath her fingers. "We're both alive and unharmed and that means there's a chance."

"I believe you," Jackie said. "God knows that surprises me these days but I believe you. I'm just hopin' you'll believe yourself one day too."

"See? Family." His eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled at her. "Only family would be able to see that I'm lying to myself."

A low, soft laugh rolled out of her. "You're an idiot."

"Possibly." A yawn caught her unawares ,and he watched her roll through it. "You should go to bed. You've had a long day."

She frowned. "So have you."

"Time Lord," he reminded her. "Don't need to sleep that much. You've got the sleeping pills I gave you?" She patted her pocket where the stolen pills rattled. "Make sure you take one tonight, you'll feel better in the morning for it."

"You're not that kind of doctor," Jackie told him, taking her cup to the sink and rinsing it out. When she came back, she stood behind him and rested her hands on his shoulders, smoothing at the hair on the top of his head to try and make it relatively decent. "Try an' get some sleep tonight too. That big brain of yours needs to rest."

The Doctor covered her hands with his. "Yes, ma'am."

She leaned over, hesitated, and pressed a quick kiss to the top of his head before she talked herself out of it. "G'night, Doctor."

"Night, Jackie," he murmured, watching her go.

When she left the room, he reached up and touched the spot she kissed. If only Zoe was around to see it, she would laugh herself sick once she got over the surprise. Without her there though he was left trapped in the silence, listening to the faint sounds of Jackie getting ready for bed. Only when all the noises stopped did he stand up and walk out of the house and into the small back garden that was more paved courtyard than garden.

Since London was still under energy rationing, there were no street lights to obscure his view of the sky. He tilted his head back and looked up at the new and unfamiliar stars. Some were missing, others were clustered more closely together than in his universe, but they were still stars. He had never been too fussed about what kind he looked at as long as they were beautiful, which they always were. The sight of them helped soothe the raging beast of anxiety, fear, and homesickness that had plagued him from the moment he arrived, and he breathed in the deep, unsettling night air with its peppery taste and thought of home.

He thought of Zoe and the last quick kiss they shared. If he had known it would be their last for a long time, he would have made it last longer. He wanted to be back with her, nestled together in their bed, the sound of her heart beat lulling him to sleep as she turned the pages of a book above his head.

A tear tracked its way down his face as he thought of Zoe an entire universe away without him.

"I'm coming for you, love," the Doctor promised on a whisper. "Wait for me."