oOo

"Insufficient data, Master." K-9's flat, metallic voice sounded almost apologetic, and the Doctor patted the mechanical dog's head distractedly. "Unable to access requested information."

"Of course," he murmured. "I had a feeling you would be." He smiled slightly. "Unless you can somehow tap into the cosmic frequencies the White Guardian uses."

"Master?" The questioning note in K-9's voice was unmistakable, but the Doctor merely shook his head as he rose to his feet. They were in Lavinia's basement lab, her "puttering room," as she called it. Since the Doctor's visit had turned out to be an extended one, as she'd hoped, she'd set aside a generous portion of the room for his use. Not that his TARDIS wasn't sufficient for any "puttering" he might choose to do, but no one could miss the way Tegan tensed every time he entered the time machine without her.

"Sorry to bother you, K-9," he threw over his shoulder as he walked toward the door leading to the rest of the basement. "If I think of something you might actually be able to help me with, I'll let you know." He turned his head, intending to return to his TARDIS and do some further investigating, and just managed to stop himself from bumping into Tegan.

"Hullo," he said in surprise. "I didn't realize you were there." She was wearing a very fetching yellow sun dress, and he was about to compliment her on it when he belatedly noticed the glare she was wearing and wisely decided to save the compliment for later.

"Where've you been?" she demanded as she stalked into the room, allowing the door to slam shut behind her. The Doctor backed up a step. "You vanish into the TARDIS for almost a full day, Lavinia says you just appear in the hall out of nowhere, and the first thing you do when you come back is shut yourself up with K-9, no word of explanation, and not even bothering to let anyone know you've come back!"

"If I told you it was terribly important but that I didn't feel comfortable discussing it right now, would that suffice as an answer?" he asked hopefully.

"No," Tegan snapped.

The Doctor leaned against the edge of the nearest counter with a sigh. "Somehow I didn't think it would," he murmured.

"Well?"

The Doctor looked down at his feet, then brought his eyes back to meet Tegan's defiant gaze. She wasn't angry, in spite of the harshness of her voice. She was frightened, and he understood that fear, since he shared it. "I've had a visit from the White Guardian."

Tegan shook her head in stunned denial. "Not so soon," she protested in a voice barely above a whisper. A violent shudder wracked her frame, and the Doctor moved to take her in his arms. "Not so soon," she repeated numbly. "Can't the bloody universe wait just a little while longer?"

"I asked that same question myself," he murmured, his arms tightening around her in response to her continued shaking. "I was told that it could not, and that I was in effect disruptingthe very fabric of realityby taking this unofficial leave of absence."

Tegan's brow wrinkled in puzzlement as she stared up at him. "Disrupting reality? But you're a Time Lord; you're always going round fixing things back the way they're supposed to be!"

"Yes, well, apparently that is not as random as I've always believed, if I can take what the White Guardian tells me at face value," he replied. "I've never thought of myself as particularly important in the grand scheme of things, but now the White Guardian is trying to tell me that's exactly what I am. Particularly important. Only this time, the thing that needs fixing up is my own life, at least as far as it affects the larger universe." And to the detriment of the life he was attempting to build on Earth, was the unspoken caveat.

Tegan burrowed her face into his shoulder. "It's not fair."

The Doctor leaned down and kissed the top of her head, nodding his acceptance of her words, illogical though they were. It wasn't fair, but then, nothing in life was. "The question is," he said softly, almost to himself, "what am I going to do about it?"