"Look at the rest of the Doctor's time-stream, though. It's meant to be a neat line. The entire history of this incarnation is one of temporal orbits, retcons, paradoxes, parallel time lines, reiterations and divergences. … As for his future…he has three ninth incarnations. I've never seen anything like it."

(The Gallifrey Chronicles)

"What are YOU doing here?"

"What am I doing here? What are YOU doing here?"

"Wait … who ARE you two?"

The three men stared confusedly at each other, looking from face to bemused-looking face with varying degrees of severity. The man with close-cropped brown hair and an imposing leather jacket sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"Right, let's just sort this out logically," he said, in a strong Northern accent.

"That would appear to have been the general idea," said a man with fairly long black hair, in a very dry, sarcastic tone of voice. He raised an eyebrow condescendingly at the man in the leather jacket, who merely blinked.

"Obviously this is some sort of temporal paradox," said the man in the cravat thoughtfully, "based in some sort of parallel dimension."

"Who regenerated and made you High President?" the leather-jacketed man said, a hint of amusement in his voice. The man in the cravat looked abashed and muttered something to himself as he drew out something small and blue from his pocket.

"What's that?"

"What's what?"

"That," the long hair man said, pointing at the blue object.

"My mobile phone."

"Looks like my TARDIS," said the man in the leather jacket. The long-haired man looked at him oddly.

"I was going to say that," he said sulkily.

"You're kidding."

"I assure you, I do not kid."

"No signal," the man in the cravat said, apparently oblivious to the argument going on between the other two. He put the phone back in his pocket grumpily.

"That looks like my TARDIS," the man with the long hair informed him.

"Oi!" the man in the leather jacket exclaimed loudly. "You mean my TARDIS!"

"Your TARDIS?" asked the man in the cravat.

"Yes," chorused the other two men. They looked at each other with chagrin before the man in the cravat cleared his throat nervously.

"Perhaps we should introduce ourselves," he suggested timidly.

"A splendid idea," the long-haired man said, as if it was the first sensible thing that had been uttered in the entire conversation. He drew himself up self-importantly and gave a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "Good afternoon," he said.

"Morning."

"Evening."

"Yes, alright," he said exasperatedly, "we don't know what time it is, will you just let me introduce myself?"

The other two men exchanged amused glances as the first man cleared his throat again and glared mutinously at the other two.

"I am the Doctor."

"No you're not," chorused the other two men. The long-haired man blinked.

"I beg your pardon?"

"You're not the Doctor," said the man in the cravat.

"I am," said the leather-jacketed man, frowning deeply.

"What?" the other two men exclaimed.

"I'M the Doctor!" yelled the man in the cravat vehemently.

"Right," the leather-jacketed man said firmly, acting as peacemaker. "I think we've established that we're all called the Doctor. We've also established that we're in some sort of temporal paradox, and judging from our surroundings—"

"Or lack of them," interjected the man in the cravat."

"—we appear to be in a timeless, placeless existence which is probably some sort of mental construct formed in the mind's subconscious."

"So what you're saying," said the long-haired man, "is that this is a dream?"

"Sort of, yeah."

"I take it you do know what you're talking about?"

"Sort of, yeah."

"Wait a moment," said the man in the cravat, scratching his head. "Do you mean to tell us that we're in the same mental construct?"

"Yeah."

"Which would mean we're all in the same mind?"

"Yeah."

"Which would mean we're all the same person?"

"Ye—oh."

"Oh?"

"Oh."

"So whose mind, exactly, are we in?" asked the long-haired man rudely.

"All of ours," replied the man in the cravat. "And none of ours."

"English, please."

"Well, seeing as we're all the same person and we're meeting here, we're directly breaking the First Law of Time. However, seeing as we're not all actually here, the only laws we're breaking are the laws of physics."

"I believe I asked for English."

"Look, you're the Doctor, yeah?" said the man in the leather jacket exasperatedly.

"That is correct."

"And so's this bloke," he continued, jerking his thumb in the direction of the other man, who attempted to protest but was cut off by a look from the long-haired man.

"That would appear to be the case."

"And I'm the Doctor as well, yeah?"

"Apparently so."

"So we're all the same person!" the leather-jacketed man said happily, grinning widely and clapping his hands together. "All we've got to do is work out which of us is which regeneration, and then we can work out how to get out of this place!"

The other two men looked dubious. After a few seconds' silence while everyone thought about their situation, the man in the cravat cleared his throat nervously.

"So … which regeneration are you?" he said timidly to the man in the leather jacket.

"Nine."

"Oh, now you're just being silly," said the long-haired man, rolling his eyes patronisingly.

"Oh, don't tell me," said the man in the leather jacket, in a similarly annoyed tone of voice. "You're both Nine as well, aren't you?"

"Yes," they said together. The leather-jacketed man rubbed the bridge of his nose again and sank into a cross-legged position.

"This is not my day," he muttered. He sighed loudly and looked up at the other two. "OK," he said resolutely. "Which of you two came first?"

"I think it was him," said the man in the cravat pointing to the long-haired man, who pulled himself up proudly and smiled greasily down at the leather-jacketed man. "And I think I'm second."

"Which makes me third."

"Apparently so."

"So how are we going to name ourselves?" asked the long-haired man. "We can't all go around calling ourselves 'the Doctor'. The confusion will be far too great."

"I suppose we could name ourselves after our current companions," the cravat man said thoughtfully.

"Forget it," said the man in the leather jacket bluntly. "I'm not calling myself 'Rose'."

"And I'm afraid 'Emma' doesn't suit me very well," said the long-haired man. The man in the cravat sighed.

"Shame," he said. "I think 'Alison' quite suits me." The man in the leather jacket stifled a giggle as the long-haired man sneered.

"OK," he said once he'd recovered. "For argument's sake, let's call you—" (he pointed at the long-haired man) "—Nine, you'll be Eighteen and I'll be Twenty-Seven."

"Run that logic past me?" the man in the cravat said, frowning. "Why can't we just be One, Two and Three?"

"Because there's already been a One, Two and Three of us. Me. Us. Oh, you know what I mean."

"Oh. So how exactly does your logic work?"

"Well, he's the first Nine, which is just Nine, you're the second, so two times Nine is Eighteen, and I'm Twenty-Seven 'cause that's three times Nine."

"An insightful, if illogical, way to avoid confusion," Nine said dryly. "Would someone now explain to me exactly why we appear to have three Ninth incarnations?"

"D'you want the long answer or the short answer?"

"The long one, preferably." Twenty-Seven looked at Eighteen, who cleared his throat nervously again.

"Well, one possible explanation is that the council of Rassilon has decided to bestow extra regenerations on us for no apparent reason, thereby allowing us to have three Ninth incarnations without us knowing. Alternatively, we could all be from parallel dimensions where our Ninth incarnations are all different."

"And the short answer?"

"Dunno," Twenty-Seven replied.

"You don't know what the short answer is?"

"No, that's the short answer. 'Dunno'."

"Well, glad we've got that one sorted," Eighteen said. "How do we get out of here now?"

"We wake up."

"That's it?"

"That's it."

"And how, exactly, do you propose we do that?" Nine said dryly.

"We could just slap him," Eighteen muttered to Twenty-Seven. Nine glared mutinously at the two of them.

"I can hear you, you know," he said testily. Twenty-Seven sniggered to himself as Eighteen looked slightly abashed.

"Well, what do you suggest, then?" said Eighteen, raising an eyebrow at Nine.

"We could always just shout for help."

"Oh, great," said Twenty-Seven sarcastically. "Brilliant plan, that is. Let's all shout for help like little girls. 'Help me! Help me! I'm trapped in my subconscious with two doppelgangers!'" He snorted. "Who exactly is gonna hear us if we yell for help?"

"Our companions, perhaps?" Nine said, just as sarcastically. "You forget, sir, that we are in a dream. That must logically mean that we are sleeping. I take it you are aware of the phenomenon of somniloquism?"

"Sleep talking!" said Eighteen, realisation dawning. "Of course! If we concentrate enough here, we might be able to make our unconscious bodies talk loudly enough to catch our respective companions' attentions, so that they can wake us up!"

"So at least two of us have a reasonable amount of intelligence," said Nine dryly.

"Oi!" said Twenty-Seven. "I resent that implication!"

"Oh, shut up, Dumbo."

"Right," he said forcefully. He stood up and drew himself up to his full height, took a deep breath, threw his head back and yelled as loudly as he could. "HEEEEEEEEELP!"

"I think you just burst my left eardrum," Eighteen said, exasperated.

"HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELP!" continued Twenty-Seven, before grinning wildly at Nine. "Come on then! Last one out of the subconscious is Wirrn grub!" He refilled his lungs and bellowed once again. "HEEEEEEEEEEEEELP!"

"HEEEEEEEEELP!" yelled Eighteen, taking his lead from Twenty-Seven. Nine rolled his eyes before joining in.

"HEEEEELP MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

HEEEEEEEEEEEEEELP …

"Doctor?"

The Doctor jerked awake and snapped his eyes open. Rose was looking down at him, a concerned look on her face.

"Are you alright?"

He sat up slowly and looked around. Alone. He was alone. The other two had gone. The relief made him laugh out loud. He grinned maniacally at Rose and hugged her tightly.

"I'm fine," he said happily. "Absolutely fantastic."

"Sounded like you were having a nightmare."

"I was. There were three of me."

"Three? Blimey, one's enough."

The Doctor laughed gently and pulled back to look at Rose. She smiled patiently at him as he lay back down on his bed.

"Think I've had enough sleep for this month," he said eventually. Rose rolled her eyes. The Doctor sat up again and grinned wildly again.

"Where to next?"