SPOILERS: None

SUMMARY: SGA crossover with Doctor Who (both old and new series)

DISCLAIMER: The following story is a work of fanfiction, and as such is for fan enjoyment only. All recognizable characters/settings are the property of their respective owners. No copyright infringement is intended, and no profit is made.

AN: So, congratulations to those who are still with me! I've actually gotten a lot more hits and reviews than I expected - remember, this was written to appease the rabid plot-bunny, not because I think that it's a valid theory (though it would explain a lot…)

Time Passages

By kerravon

2. Questions

OK, whatever was going on, Sheppard was seriously freaked, and Rodney had had enough. He strode over to the pair, determined to get some answers, or at least to get his colonel back. "Look, I don't know who you are, but my name is Rodney McKay and this is John Sheppard. We're both members of the Atlantis Expedition; I'm Chief Science Officer and he's the Chief Military Officer." He stared down at John, who had curled into himself once again. "Not that you can tell by looking at him right now…"

Sheppard began rocking back and forth, chanting, "I'll never know, I'll never know, I'll never know…" under his breath.

Wings of alarm settled permanently in Rodney's throat as he quickly knelt and grabbed Sheppard's face. "Colonel, snap out of it! I need some help here; what - is - going - on?" Releasing his hold, he slapped him hard enough to hopefully get some semblance of a sane reaction out of the man.

Sheppard just turned lost, watery eyes towards him and, in a small, soft voice, whispered, "He left me, Rodney. He saved me, then he left me." He buried his face in McKay's shoulder. Rodney wasn't sure, but he thought the colonel might be crying.

Although absolutely aghast at the unfamiliar contact, and disturbed to his soul, he grimaced and reached gingerly around to pat John on the back. "Ummm…there…there…" he tried unconvincingly.

A chuckle reminded him of the other presence in the room. "Not very good at that, are you."

McKay looked at him incredulously. "No," he replied. "I run a science lab. My people do not, I assure you, come crying on my shoulder!"

Leatherjacket shook his head once and smiled knowingly. "I'm sure they don't."

"And what's that supposed to mean?" McKay shrilled defensively.

Their host spread his open hands to the sides, palms forward. "Nothing. I was just agreeing with you."

McKay harumphed, then stared uncomfortably at the sobbing bundle in his arms. "Ermmm, John Sheppard is never like this, Mister…"

"Doctor," Leathercoat corrected.

"Whatever," Rodney continued with a dismissive wave of his hand. "Anyway, as I was saying…"

"It's my name," interrupted the other man.

That stopped McKay mid-sentence. "What? You mean your name is 'Doctor'?"

The taller man flashed a blinding grin of approval, as if a particularly slow child had just learned his abc's. "Precisely." He gestured to Sheppard. "Your friend there knows. Can't say I place him, though, and that's…troubling."

"You think you're troubled? Look at him! I don't know who you are to bring him to this state. Heightmeyer is going to have a field day with this."

"Heightmeyer?"

"Our base psychiatrist." McKay frowned. "Normally I'd say Colonel Sheppard would be the last person to need her services; he literally laughs in the face of danger! Every day!"

Bracing his hands on his knees, the Doctor stood. "Well, clearly your friend has experienced some trauma. Why don't we move him to a spare bedroom, get him cleaned up and settled in a bed, then you can tell me where you want to go."

"Cleaned up?"

The Doctor gestured to Sheppard's sleeve, which was now blood-soaked and dripping on McKay. "Oh, great. That's just perfect, Colonel; you've bled all over my best jacket!"

The Doctor raised an eyebrow at his comments, then bent and, placing one hand beneath Sheppard's knees and the other behind his back, scooped him up as one would a child. Sheppard appeared to be either asleep or comatose as he was gingerly carried through the door to the outer corridor, with McKay trailing behind.

As they walked through the maze of hallways beyond the main control room, Rodney suddenly began snapping his fingers as an idea occurred to him. "Hey, when Ronon was shot yesterday, he went crazi..er for a few minutes, then passed out. Could the Dryldaans be coating their bullets with a psychogenic compound?"

The Doctor considered the question for a minute as he came to a stop in front of a relatively nondescript door. "Possible, but not probable. The compound would have to stand extreme heat and friction, but it would certainly make it easier to capture their prey." Nodding at the door, he continued, "Would you mind opening that?"

"What? Oh…sure." McKay pushed the door open and held it for the Doctor to enter with his burden.

He laid Sheppard on the bed, then threw a blanket over his legs and feet. "Let's see what we have here, hmmm?" he commented, easing Sheppard's arm out of his jacket. However, rather than examining the wound, he carefully evaluated the two holes in the sleeve. Without looking away from his study, he asked McKay, "Do you know if he was shot from the front or the back?"

"Has to be the back. They've been chasing us all afternoon." Rodney wondered at the question, but saw no problem with answering it.

"Fine, then." The Doctor produced a small pair of scissors and cut out the fabric surrounding the entrance hole, which he held up triumphantly. "I'll do a chemical analysis on this while you get that wound cleaned; there are towels, soap and water through there." He pointed to the small bathroom that opened off the bedchamber. "Back in a jiff."

He left the scientist standing stock-still, mouth hanging open, and one finger raised as if to make a point. McKay shut his jaw with a snap, then turned towards the bathroom. "Fine, then," he muttered. "But you owe me one, Colonel."

Cleanup should have been relatively easy. While he despised the sight of blood and was reluctant to even touch the wound, much less scrub it, Rodney was even more unnerved by Sheppard's behavior. He endeavored to clean the bullet track of all traces of any foreign substance while the injured man slept. Thankfully the tear was little more than a scratch. He was almost done when the Doctor reappeared, bandages in hand.

Tossing them to McKay, he said, "Well, you were right. There's a highly stable psychotropic compound imbedded in the cloth around the entry hole; as we surmised, they capture prisoners more easily if they are asleep or curled up in gibbering balls."

"That explains why they're such lousy shots; they were just trying to wing us!" He finished wrapping John's arm and taped it down; when Beckett had seen his 'bandage' covering his sleeve after the Genii attack, he'd insisted on Rodney learning the basics of first aid.

"But that still doesn't explain how he knows who I am, or how you two got into the Tardis."

"Excuse me; 'Tardis'?" Rodney's brow wrinkled in confusion at the term.

"Oh, yes. Stands for 'Time And Relative Dimensions In Space'. It's what my ship is called." The Doctor was inordinately pleased with himself.

"Which means…?" Rodney prompted.

A huge grin split the Doctor's face. "That it's bigger on the inside than on the outside." At Rodney's eye-roll, he continued, "And…that we can travel anywhere in time or space we want to."

"A time machine? You have a time machine?" asked Rodney in amazement.

"That's right. Now how did you two get in?" He was suddenly deadly serious. "The Tardis is nearly impregnable; you must have a key."

McKay pointed at the prone figure on the bed. "He does. It's on his dogtags."

The Doctor reached over and lifted the tags slightly so that he could see the key underneath. Eyebrows shooting up, he whistled softly then remarked, "It's one of my keys all right; one of the older ones." Gesturing to McKay to come over, he pointed at the geometric design on the front of the oddly-shaped silver toned polygon, "See that? This type of key is user-specific; it is genetically encoded to keep it from being used by the wrong hands. Literally."

Rodney stared at him. "Sort of like the ATA gene…So that means that Sheppard didn't just find this somewhere, and wasn't given it by a friend or relative…"

"No." The Doctor gently returned the key to the soldier's chest and pulled the blanket up to the man's chin. "No, I must have given it to him; that's the only way it would have opened the door." He became pensive. "I just don't remember him…"

Staring at the sleeping man's features as if running them through an enormous archive, he finally shook his head. "Come, Doctor McKay. Let him rest while I show you around the place." The two slipped quietly out of the room, easing the door shut behind them.

McKay's jaw, already gaping, slipped lower as the tour progressed through room after room, lower and lower. When they finally returned to the control room, he shook his head in amazement. "This IS a tesseract isn't it? How did you make it and keep it stable in our 4-dimensonal space?"

"Careful planning," was the flippant answer. "And its more than a mere tesseract, it uses all 11 dimensions." Although he rather liked the irascible scientist, he found that he could only tolerate him in small doses, and wasn't really in the mood for the inevitable argument that would follow the 'shoebox' explanation. Changing the subject to one he was really interested in, he blurted, "So, what do you know about your friend?"

"Clearly not as much as I thought I did," replied Rodney petulantly. He was rather hurt that in all the time they'd spent together, his having traveled in a time machine had never come up.

"If you could tell me what you do know, it might help jog my memory. I've lived a long time, and have had quite a few companions scattered across the universe." He pulled two stools up to the central console, indicating that Rodney should make himself comfortable.

McKay shrugged. "OK…let's see. He's about 37, I think, and has no family to speak of. He loves flying…anything, but on Earth has a preference for helicopters. He's not the best man to be in charge of the military component of our expedition, but I'll deny saying it to my dying day. He's too impulsive; has this nasty tendency towards heroics and self-sacrifice. Still, he keeps his head in a tight situation, he's intensely loyal and I want him at my back in a firefight. 'We don't abandon our people' is one of his guiding principles; in fact, that's what got him sent to Antarctica, disobeying a direct order."

The Doctor's eyes narrowed. "He certainly sounds like someone I'd be proud to travel with; I only take the best. But he's still not ringing any bells." He jumped up, latched his hands behind his back, and began pacing. "Is there anything else? Anything at all?"

Rodney perched on the edge of his stool, lips pursed in concentration. "Well…there is one thing. He's much smarter than he lets on; I have no idea why he would hide it, I certainly wouldn't, but he's particularly good at mathematics."

The Doctor whirled, eyes wide. "How good?" He stared intently at the scientist.

Rodney scooted back on his seat nervously. "Umm…I'll deny this as well, but…he's among the best I've ever seen. He can even occasionally find errors in my calculations."

The Doctor collapsed onto his stool again, completely deflated. "By the Eye of Rassilon…" he murmured.

Rodney leaned forward. "Why? Is it important?"

The Doctor turned eyes every bit as haunted as Sheppard's towards the physicist. In a low voice, he whispered, "I thought he was dead. I saw him die. How can he be all grown up and in another galaxy?"

TBC…

AN: So? SO? Have you figured it out, too? jumps up and down in excitement See why I couldn't let go?