History Repeats

They followed the trail of light that the thing falling out of the sky had left. It had landed not too far away from where the TARDIS was, which, as Rose thought, was good for a quick getaway. When they finally reached it, there was a massive yet shallow crater in the ground and smoke was all over the place. Rose coughed. Waving smoke out of her face, she looked closely into the crater and said, "Uh, Doctor… What's down there?"

"I think I know. But I intend to find out for sure." The Doctor replied grimly.

"Oh, please be careful Doctor!" cried Rose, as he prepared to jump into the immense crater. He turned round and looked at her, those expressive eyes showing such a care Rose had never seen before in his eyes.

"I'll take care, Rose… I promise." And at this he gave Rose a tender hug and jumped.

Rose stood by the edge of the crater, alone again, not knowing what was happening to her Doctor.

The Doctor stood in the centre of the crater, looking around him. He took out his sonic screwdriver and walked slowly to the centre of the hollow space, because logically that would be where the crash-landed object was. He walked a little closer, and gasped. Because dead centre to the empty gap was a TARDIS. Not a police box, but unmistakeably a TARDIS, because they were all shaped like something inconspicuous. It appeared to be unharmed, somehow, or it had already been fixed in the time Rose and the Doctor had been following its light trail.

"Oh, no…" breathed the Doctor, as realisation dawned horribly. "It can't be… but how? It should be impossible…"

"Impossible? Nothing for a timelord, and definitely nothing for me, Doctor. You should know by now that you can't get away from me…" The Doctor turned around and gasped a second time. Stood in front of him was The Master.

"What are you doing here? How did you get here?"

"It was easy enough. I followed the power trail your TARDIS left in mine, and inevitably, found the gap between the universes that you fell through. Why didn't you think that I'd follow you?" The Doctor was about to reply, but the Master continued. "Silly Doctor, always making assumptions, well you were wrong this time… and now I am going to get your last regeneration!" The doctor turned to face the Master's TARDIS.

"You can't do this, Master! It's wrong to take people's regenerations and lives to prolong your own! Don't you remember the penalty for doing that on Gallifrey? They took away your regenerations, didn't they? So you only had one life… how did that feel? Bad? Well…" He had no chance to say any more, because the Master had attacked him with his Sonic Screwdriver, which had been adapted to be more lethal than the Doctor's. Before he could say another word, The Doctor died. The Master, believing he had finally won, stepped into his TARDIS and vanished.

Rose was getting steadily more worried. She sat down stood up and paced the side of the crater, then sat down again. Suddenly she heard voices and a commotion, then silence. She was almost beside herself with her anxiousness. She heard the familiar whirring sound of a TARDIS fading out, and knew what this must mean. She jumped into the dark, smoky hole.

"Doctor?" She cried. "DOCTOR? Where are you? Please answer!" Then she tripped over something lying on the ground. She got up, dreading what it might be, and felt for what it was. She felt a hand, and an arm… a head… that hair! "Oh, God!" She started to panic. It was the Doctor. She felt for the other hand, and found the Sonic Screwdriver, and shone it at him. By the light of the Sonic Screwdriver, she felt his pulse. Nothing.

"Gone." She whispered. "He's gone again… my Doctor." She started to cry, great heart wrenching sobs which would have melted the hearts of even Cybermen if they had been near.

"I CAN'T DO THIS AGAIN! YOU'VE LEFT ME AGAIN AND I'M ON MY OWN AGAIN AND I CAN'T LIVE LIKE I HAVE FOR THE LAST TWENTY YEARS AGAIN!" She wasn't thinking straight, the only thought running through her head was the thought that her Doctor was really not coming back this time. She ran, and ran, for about an hour, until she had to stop by a sheer cliff. An idea darted through her head, and for lack of any other solution to her problems, she accepted it. She walked slowly up to the edge of the cliff.

"I'm sorry Mum. I'm sorry Dad, and Elliot. I'm sorry Mickey, for all the wasted years we could have spent together. I'm sorry doctor," she started to cry again at this, "I'm sorry that I had to go like this, I know you and me would both have preferred to die heroically saving the world… I just can't live like this any more…" With these words she closed her eyes and prepared to jump…