"You're wife?" The girl repeated, eyes turning to Sky and running over her from top to toe. "You have a wife?"

"I- Eh...eh...yeah."

It had taken a lot more effort to say it aloud than he thought it would. After all this time thinking she was gone, to finally say it felt wrong, like he was lying to himself. It felt too good to be true, to surreal, too impossible. But there she was, and so was Rose.

Rose.

Saying those words to Rose added to the difficulty.

He had suspected how she felt, for a while now, noticing the looks and the little things she said. And he, well, maybe he had started to feel the same over time, with each adventure which passed. Perhaps...perhaps a little bit of the past had started to slip from the forefront of his mind.

But this changed everything. Everything! Sky was there and standing right in front of him with that smile and those eyes which always stayed the same no matter how she regenerated.

Moments seemed to pass but thankfully, Sky sensed the tension. Not that it was hard to miss with how the two gapped at one another. After darting her eyes between the pair until she became uncomfortable, she tried to break them out of it.

"All these years, and you can still find someone who is willing to let you drag them about." She wasn't stupid and she could remember her time as a human, especially those last few days, in great detail. She had seen the looks, the way they acted.

In that human, Sky had been dead; just a dream. So they looked at each other, that was the last thing she would allow herself to think about in that moment. All that mattered was she had found him, finally.

"You never wanted to join me." The Doctor couldn't help but grin and shake his head, slowly, watching on as Sky started to move around the TARDIS controls, this time looking much more clued up on what each of the buttons actually did.

Each time she grazed a new switch she looked up at the centre column, smiling and laughing. She could feel it, the TARDIS, speaking to her; welcoming her home.

"Spaceman." She chuckled, jokingly but such a simple word made their bond hum. "I had other responsibilities if you remember correctly." She was smiling so brightly, eyes sparkling, but within that glazed shine was a bitterness. A sour taste was left on her tongue from each of the words she spoke. Those memories were the ones which were forever drilling away at the back of their heads.

"I remember." The Doctor still smiled, the reality of it may have been haunting but the memories weren't. The memories were what had kept him fighting all of these years.

"So...what? Are you two still married or what?" It didn't take a genius to spot the bitterness in Rose's voice. But it just so happened there were two geniuses in the room.

"Yes, still, and technically we have been all this time." Where the Doctor looked hard done by, having to tell this girl the true answer, Sky felt a little guilty which wasn't what she had expected so soon.

Suddenly appearing in his life, that had never been her role. She had been the constant, the previous, the first. This was not how her mind had painted the scenario in her dreams, not in the entire century she had been searching.

And harder still, it was not exactly easy being herself right now. Everything was still new, it still seemed foreign like returning to your home after a holiday. Her eyes didn't quite feel right, her tongue felt wrong as she pushed it against her cheeks and she shook her limbs trying to get them to connect to her brain. Sky felt as though she were still floating out of her watch, above her body like a lost soul.

"Weird isn't it?" Sky tried to tease lightly between biting her cheek to try and get a little sensation gaged. But as she absentmindedly reached up and laid a hand against the centre console of the TARDIS, it was like an electric shock sparked up the entire room. The console pulsed violently and the whole room hummed. Surprised, Sky glanced over to the Doctor, who just smiled at her like she had did the greatest thing.

"She likes you, probably relieved to finally have another Time Lord other than me in her company."

"Well after decades of your heavy handed driving who wouldn't be relieved?" Flashing the Doctor a grin she returned to the console. But then she paused, stopping still as something came to her. A fleeting thought turned into a hunch which spiralled into an epiphany.

Looking up, Sky frowned and touched her fingers to her temple to harshly massage her temples as she dived deep into her thoughts and memories of the last day she had spent as herself. Things were starting to come back, she was remembering.

"What? What is it?" The Doctor asked with a hint of urgency.

"I'm trying to remember where she is?" Sky hissed and spun around on the spot hoping to find the answer. Where had she been, it must have been somewhere safe. "She..."

"Where who is?" Rose asked, walking closer to the pair and watching Sky with the Doctor. "Who is it? Who've you lost?"

"Ah! I know! I was on...oh! Ah!...Cambridge Street!…No! Yes! No!" She argued with herself, completely leaving Rose in the dark as she continued to frown at the pacing woman who's head thrashed back and forth with each conflicting answer. "Yes! Cambridge street!" And with that, Sky turned on her heal and sprinted out of the TARDIS.

"Oh my God, she's more mad than you!" Rose managed to laugh honestly before they both took off running after her.

"Oh yes!" The Doctor grinned and by the time they also left the TARDIS, Sky had already gained her bearings and took off down the street in a full on sprint.

Her brain worked over time trying to remember. For Isabelle it may have been twelve years but for Sky it felt like ten minutes. She was certain she had made sure she was safe, made sure to keep her hidden and away from prying eyes that would snatch it up in a heart beat; whether that be curious humans or otherwise. She had placed her into hibernation and set her to be undetectable for what she feared would be the rest of time back then. When she had checked the street name and position she had barely felt the need to commit it to memory but god was she glad she had now.

Sky ran down street after street, never stopping for breath until she turned onto Cambridge street and then down the only alley way leading off from it.

And then there she was, only a few meters away right in the middle of the cobbled road, sleeping. She was still here after ten years, untouched and right where Sky had left her.

"Hey! Wait up a second eh?" She heard call Rose from behind her but there was already nowhere left to run. Sky walked the few last steps, using the time to take everything in. "What is it? What's here?" They both caught up to her, heavy beating footsteps slowing against the uneven ground. When they came to stand beside her, they joined her in looking up at the red telephone box. It was ordinary, the exact same one was stood further down on the opposite side of the road, and yet only Rose was questioning why they were here.

"Oh that is brilliant. I mean that is brilliant!" The Doctor took out the reading glasses from his coat and put them on then, with his hands in his pockets, he took a step forward to study the telephone box. Meanwhile Sky set about knocking on each white porcelain square, her ear pressed against the tiles. "A Type 50, very nice. But where did you get a Type 50 TARDIS from?"

"That's quite a long story." Sky smirked then jumped, laughing aloud when she finally knocked on a hollow square and pushed it in so a tiny door swung open. "Here we are."

"Oh look at that, a little trap door as well! Why don't I have a little trap door?" He continued to ramble. "Hang on is that?" He stopped, staring down at the small cylinder device Sky had taken out of the hatch along with the key to the TARDIS. She hadn't trusted her human self to look after them properly and had hidden them here before she had even changed.

"Yep. A sonic screwdriver." It wasn't dissimilar to his own but it definitely had its own traits; for starters it was completely matte black with the exception of a few gold details and sterling silver fixings. It was slightly thicker than the Doctors own, and half an inch shorter...and more scuffed, in fact it almost looked scorched in places.

"But. Where'd you get it?" The Doctor sneered, looking at Sky as if she was some sort of oddity.

"Built it myself." Sky answered plainly again, flipping the device in her hands. "Little help from the young girl too." She patted the side of the trustworthy TARDIS.

That shut him up. Turning around from facing the door, she smirked at him, unable to keep a straight face she noticed his slack jaw almost hitting the floor.

"What? I listened more than you thought I did and I had a lot of time on my hands. Not to mention, I learnt from the best." The Doctor smiled at that but was still overly shocked.

Sky had never been remotely interested when he went on about stuff like that, not for a long time at least. She was always the one telling him to put the silly stuff away while the kids were around or to put down the stupid screwdriver if he wasn't going to 'put it to good use and actually fix something'. He never thought she would have been able to build something so sleek...that worked.

"And it works properly?" His face twisted as he watched her check it over. After so many years she was surprised the thing hadn't spontaneously burst into flames to be honest.

"What do you mean? Of course it does!" Sky chuckled before her face dropped. "Actually...setting 18a can sometimes be a little scorchy, and 14e can be a bit temperamental, melting rather than locking, then there's f47k..." For that Sky only visibly cringed and barred her teeth. "…and 236x does this funny old thing where it reverses itself in temperatures over 78 degrees, but other than that..." The Doctors's face had become increasingly more concerned as she listed off defect after defect but he only truly became worried when she seemed to not be bothered and simply dropped the tool into her pocket. Luckily for her, she was saved a lecture by Rose interrupting.

"Eh hello! Is it only me who hasn't got a clue what's going on! This is just a phone box!" Rose yelled to break up the Doctor and Sky and finally find out some answers out for herself.

"Is it?" Sky turned to look at Rose before turning the key in the lock finally and pushing open the box's door. "See for yourself." Sky really had to hold herself back from running in first but she knew she had to try and get comfortable with this girl if she was the new one. She'd been friends with Sarah Jane after all...and Leela, all the way up until the end...she could do the same with this girl.

Rose looked at Sky like she was a little mad, but as suspected she heard the gasp as soon as she was through the door. Then she walked in second, the Doctor hot on her tail.

"It's a TARDIS." Rose breathed, spinning in one quick turn to look back at them both.

Sky smiled but didn't respond, she didn't think she really needed to. Instead she walked straight passed the girl and up the grated floor to the navy blue console lighting the room up like a night sky. She looked over the matte black round of controls, just long enough to familiarise herself with them all before she opened up a black hole, or worse, right there in the centre of London. It was dark but her hands still managed to easily dance over the resting configs, finding just what she needed.

"Right, now, if I'm right this should wake her up." Sky smacked her hand down on half a dozen buttons and then wrapped her hand around a separate lever.

"And if your wrong?" She could see why the Doctor had picked Rose, she had that little spark of danger lurking right behind her eyes; she was searching for that adventure.

"Your guess is as good as mine." Without another second's warning, the lever was pushed up and it was like flicking a switch. The TARDIS literally roared to life, whirling loudly and pulsing manically, all of the mechanisms working hard to power up after such a long time sleeping. "Oh I've missed you!" All she got in reply was a low rumble, like a rising teenager, but it was enough for now.

The console had lightened, but only ever so slightly giving the illusion of a dusky sky. The control panel surrounded it in a perfect circle just like the Doctor's, only all of the buttons were perfectly arranged alongside each other, no broken bits or shoddily stuck on brick-a-brac. The encircling walls were a very dark grey, almost black, with specks of gold, creating a dome of stars over their heads. It was like walking into a black hole, and looking up from the centre console was like lying back and looking up at the night sky, especially when the TARDIS made sure to arrange ever changing constellations in the lights.

Suddenly a wild bleeping came from the scanner by the navigators chair and Sky jumped from her daydreaming state, running around the console to pull the scanner in front of her and study it. She looked over the alerts which still continued to stack up for a moment before smiling and spinning it around towards the Doctor, pulling him away from his inspections of her TARDIS.

"She found you."

The Doctor ran upon hearing the words and read aloud from the screen.

"49,695 unidentified signal requests." They weren't dated but she guessed the requests had been sent from the Doctors TARDIS over the past however many years. All this time and he had never give up searching for anyone, he was still out there never giving up hope. Well he had been right, she had been out there.

"Every day I sent out a signal, hoping it would bounce off something...someone..." He explained with a small smile, half sad, half relieved. Because it had finally happened. "But that doesn't make sense..." The Doctors face twisted as he pulled the screen over to himself. "You've only been here twelve years, the signal should have been picked up ages ago while it was still running."

"Not necessarily." Sky replied shyly. "I blocked all the signalling devices the moment I took her, I-" This was really a story for another time, it was a long story. But she had to explain to him why his attempts had failed for so long. "Darlek signals started to come through, started to track me, and I got so scared...I- I thought they were going to be able to chase me so I turned everything off. Just drifting through space and time with no trace. Lord I made sure I didn't even know where I was going for an age so no one could follow me..." She chuckled forcefully and swept a finger under her eye to stop the tears before they began. "I'm sorry." Slowly, the Doctor wrapped his arm around Sky's shoulder and drew her into an embrace.

"No, you did the right thing." He deleted all of the messages, smiling at her, before he stepped away and continued to look around.

This was all very weird for him. Years of thinking he was alone, thinking the TARDIS was all he had left, believing she was dead along with all of the others; and yet there she was, in this whole form.

Standing together, Time Lady and TARDIS...they were right there, right there in front of him.

"So...are you going to leave her here while you're away?"

"Away?" Rose repeated before Sky even had the chance to.

"Yeah..." He said to Rose before repeating it for Sky who looked just as surprised. "Yeah you're...you're going to come with me aren't you?" He looked sheepish as he asked her the question, and it was sweet until the question set in. After so long, he still wanted her with him?

"Come with you?" She asked barely able to face looking at him.

"Are you mad! Of course!" The Doctor laughed, looking away after his outburst shyly. "Absolutely, yes...come with me."

"But..." Sky's eyes looked over at Rose briefly who was looking around the TARDIS but still half listening to the pair. "I mean...you have..." She looked to the Doctor and then back at Rose, hoping he would understand without her actually having to say it, and he did, acknowledging it by nodding.

"If you would rather stay here..." He shrugged and tried to make it come across casual but of course it didn't; she had still known him for long enough to see right through him. "Or if you are happier being on your own."

Things grew very awkward very quickly, not to mention stiff. The Doctor didn't want to ask a second time but she didn't want to agree too fast, something told her she would be intruding and it put a hold on her.

As much as she never wanted to let him out of her sight ever again, she couldn't quite gain the courage to grasp onto him. Maybe it was the fear of it not being real, of it being just another dream and she would awake in a moment as a human, in her bed, in that attic. The last week having just been a symptom of deep sleep.

"No, of course...course I'm not." She spoke, catching the attention of the Doctor and Rose also. "I mean...no. I want to, it's just..." Stopping, Sky's eyes studied the ground around the Doctor's feet. "It's been a long time."

"Right." The Doctor's eyes also fell to the floor as he kicked the ground nervously, the disappointment was clear in his voice and it made her hearts beat faster. "No, of course...yeah..."

What was she thinking? What? Over one hundred years of searching and when she finally got what she had wanted, she was going to turn it down and run away? Was that who this version of her was? A runaway?

No. Absolutely not, no. She had been The Runaway. Just like she had been The Coward, The General and The Mother. This one had to be someone different, she had to be stronger given everything her predecessors had seen.

"I-" She tried to reply but nothing in her mind would come out right.

Inside she wanted to hold onto him and never let go. She wanted to grip him tight like she had done the moment she escaped that watch. The overwhelming urge to show him how much she'd missed him was there but she couldn't, it had been too long. She was being torn apart from the inside by want and fear.

"No no, that's fine. I understand. Really I do." The Doctor crossed his arms and nodded, finally meeting her eyes and it almost killed her. He was trying so hard to hide it but his eyes became just the tiniest bit glossy.

"I would love too." The words came so easy that Sky barely register saying them. That hum and those eyes drew them from her heart, so easily separating her wishes from her worries. "Like falling off a horse right?" She shrugged, swallowing a sudden rush of emotion which washed over her like a wave in a storm.

And then he started laughing, shaking his head back and forth and fighting back his own emotions.

"You hate horses."

"I know."

What were they saying? Absolute nonsense going by how Rose was looking at them, but of course it was nonsense, it was them. They barely communicated in anything less than that.

"But if I'm left to my own devices who knows what I'd end up doing…Probably trapped in a Parallel Universe."

"Oh, stranger things have happened." He had that look, the one which told Sky she really didn't want to know. "But really, I mean really? You would..."

"Absolutely. I could do with a few refreshers." She began to chuckle and looked around the vast space she had genuinely missed. It was as close to a home as things got nowadays and it was beautiful, it it's own unique way. It didn't have fields or the light of two suns or a citadel and villages but it was warm and, if nothing else, something to talk to.

"It would be good to know you're not out there, flying round crashing into fixed events and...getting into the wrong situations."

"Oh you're one to talk." Rose scoffed from beside them, giving away she had been listening the whole time and to be honest they had both forgotten she was there, which would explain why they both jumped. The Doctor look towards the blonde and then back at the brunette who was smirking.

"Same old trouble maker eh?"

"Oh yes!" The Doctors smile grew into a grin. "Just like old times..."

"Just like old times." She agreed but couldn't help herself from glancing at Rose one more time out the corner of her eye.

'Don't worry about Rose, it's nothing. Just like it was always nothing Lelia.' The Doctor smiled, seeing the shock overcome her as she heard his silent voice, her green eyes darting around the console room until they fell upon him. Only then did she return the smile.

'Does she know that?' Had always been the line to follow back then, and then she would laugh as he wrapped his arms around her and jokingly shook her about like a doll. But that wouldn't have happened this time, so she didn't say it this time. Sky simply nodded and turned away to begin putting her TARDIS back into hibernation with some regret.

"I know, I know..." She hummed, pouting as what sounded like a long low whine sung about the cabin. Though her words could also be meant as a reply to the Doctor. She did know, deep down, once upon a time.

"Is she alright?" Rose startled the Doctor by creeping up behind him as they both watched her move around the console, humming to herself and the TARDIS as it shut down. It was like watching a mother sing her child to sleep, all low notes and shushing until the ship finally fell silent.

"Mmm..." The Doctor nodded easily but she wasn't convinced.

"She's talking to the TARDIS?" She whispered, voice laced with amusement, and it was contagious as the Doctor chuckled under his breath, nodding.

"Yeah she is." He sang. "Finer tune of telepathy. She's always had it." Since he could remember Sky had been able to hear things she wasn't meant to, whether it be inside of his head or another's. She had managed to talk to species he could only just get a feel for.

When it was first discovered, back during their days in the Academy, many of their own people said it was a great gift. Others said it meant she was of an artistic mind... and others hated her for it.

"Got me in trouble a few times." The Doctor scowled as he recalled the whispers, until the fonder memories arose. "More than a few actually...can't hide anything from the woman." He subconsciously rubbed the base of his palm against his temple before giving into the growing desire and temptation to be near her again. But as the Doctor took a leap forward, he was quickly caught by the arm and swung back around towards Rose.

"What? You mean she can like...read minds?"

"Yeah." Rose's eyes swelled. "Well, no...yes, sort of..." He stuttered, staring at Rose until he became lost in his own thoughts. "She does have a tendency to sort of...creep in…maybe, you know, try and keep your, you know..." The Doctor twirled a finger around his temple as he spoke awkwardly shifting on the spot. "Keep your mind closed until she gets back into the swing of being around others." He shrugged whilst glancing back over his shoulder, making sure she wasn't in ear shot.

"Keep my mind closed? How the hell am I supposed to do that?" Rose scoffed. The day had started out just fine and then suddenly she didn't have a face and now she was having to keep her mind shut off from a super telepathic alien housewife.

"Just, think of a door..." But then that same frown appeared, followed by an excited grin, then a scowl. The last time she had seen a door in his head she had walked right on through it. "Maybe one with a lock. And a barricade."

"...right..."

"I think I'm all finished here!" Sky announced, clapping her hands and interrupting Rose. "Ready when you are." When her eyes found them however, her face fell and she recoiled slightly from the look they were both send into her. "What?"

"Nothing!" The Doctor yelped, rocking back and forth on his heels. And as serious as he had been moments ago, the minute he felt that little push in his mind as she tried to have a rummage through his thoughts, he laughed aloud, practically rejoicing.

Sky was back, and she was in his head.