A/N: Hi! I hope the intro was okay! Here is the first chapter really getting into it :D Please let me know your thoughts, I would love to know if anyone if keen to see where this goes.

Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who, only Thena


Thena pushed herself to her feet, sure that her mind was playing tricks on her. Though she was still in the pyjamas she had gone to bed in, she was most certainly not still in her bed. The road she stood on glistened with fresh rain, the dampness soaking into her bare feet. Thena wrapped her arms around herself, goosebumps forming on her exposed arms in the cool night air.

"EXTERMINATE!"

A large bronze thing rolled around the corner of a nearby brick house, making Thena freeze and hold her breath. No, it couldn't be. There was no such thing. But here it was right in front of her. A Dalek.

The large metal creature seemed to pause, assessing her with its singular glowing blue eye. Thena stayed rooted to the spot as the Dalek looked her up and down. Suddenly, its eye stalk flicked to something behind her.

"Thena!"

Thena spun around at the shout of her name to see a tall man running towards her. A tall man she recognised and the second impossible thing she had seen that night.

"DOCTOR! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!" The Dalek screeched, firing a single shot from its laser. Thena felt the beam rush past her as if it were a bullet and watched as it struck the man square in the chest. He crumpled to the ground, his legs twisting underneath him. Thena stood frozen as the Dalek turned back to her.

"Get down!" A blonde woman appeared out of nowhere and tackled Thena to the ground as a different laser shot over her head, destroying the Dalek. The blonde woman - another disturbingly familiar face - grabbed Thena's shoulders and began checking her over.

"Oh my god, are you alright?" She paused for a second, frowning as Thena just stared at her in shock. "We've got to get the Doctor."

Thena's eyes widened and her hands began to tremble.

"Doctor who?" She whispered.

"Rose, go! I've got Thena." A commanding American voice called from behind her. He had a long navy coat and carried a large gun, presumably the one that had destroyed the Dalek. "Thena? Thena, look at me," he urged gently, "I know this is scary, you warned me it would be your first time when I last saw you. But I need you to be brave, okay? We need to get the Doctor into the TARDIS."

Thena gripped his forearms and allowed him to help her stand again. She had met John Barrowman before at a convention and the only thing she could think now was how similar this man looked, albeit somewhat taller. The stranger seemed to know her, and his passing comment about having met her before caused her heart to pound uncomfortably in her chest. What in the fanfiction?

As Thena and the man she had dubbed Not Mr Barrowman reached the blonde girl and the supposed Doctor, an older red headed woman reached them from the opposite direction.

"Get him into the TARDIS, now!" Not Mr Barrowman ordered. He picked up another large gun, discarded by the blonde girl, covering her and the redhead from all angles as they struggled to lift the now barely conscious man. Thena just stood there lamely watching the scene that she had seen so many times before. She almost felt asd though she could reach out and there would be a television screen in front of her, separating her from the familiar strangers.

"Thena! That means you too! TARDIS, now!" Her head snapped up at her name being called, bringing her back to the reality of her situation. She meekly followed the American, hesitating at the set of blue doors the two women carrying the Doctor had pushed through moments ago. She placed a hand on the door, unable to bring herself to push it open. A larger hand then covered hers and she looked back up into mournful blue eyes. Wordlessly Not Mr Barrowman pushed her hand against the door to open it and ushered her into the impossible blue box.

For a moment, all Thena could see was gold. That seemed to be the predominant colour that decorated the literally larger than life box. In the back of her mind Thena briefly thought how the TV hadn't really done it justice. However she didn't have too much time to dwell on the majesty of the box as the redhead talked in a panic.

"What.. What do we do? There must be some medicine or something?" She asked, looking between them desperately.

"Just step back, all of you!" Not Mr Barrowman answered her. "He's dying, Rose, and you know what happens next."

The blonde girl - Rose - looked at the Doctor tearfully, "But he can't! Thena only just got here!"

Thena's eyes widened at Rose's words. That wasn't what she was supposed to say.

"What do you mean? What happens next?" The redhead demanded.

A soft gold glow began to emanate from the Doctor as he stood tall for the first time since being shot. The glow slowly began to intensify as the Doctor looked at his hands, turning them over.

"It's started." He stated plainly, his eyes meeting Thena's for the first time.

Not Mr Barrowman (who Thena supposed she should call Jack if she was in the company of who she thought she was) pulled the three women close to him.

"Here we go. Good luck, Doctor." Jack nodded at the glowing man. The redhead, who Thena had finally allowed herself to realise was Donna, looked at them all, confused.

"Will someone please tell me what's going on?" She asked, voice shaking.

"When he's dying," Rose began, "his body, it er- it sort of repairs itself it changes…" She trailed off, taking a deep breath. "But you can't!"

The Doctor looked at the four of them sadly.

"I'm sorry, it's too late-" His apology was cut off as the gold glow intensified tenfold, throwing his arms and head back.

"He's regenerating," Thena said quietly, the full gravity of her situation hitting her forcefully.

The blast of regeneration energy lasted longer than Thena had expected. She kept trying to move her head to look towards the Doctor but Jack kept her head firmly against his chest. After several long minutes the glow died down enough for Jack to release the three women. Thena immediately took a step away from the group, uncomfortable with being in such close proximity to people she barely knew. The Doctor sniffed loudly and shook his head like a dog after a bath.

"Now then, where were we?" He grinned. Noticing Thena had moved away from his other three companions his face fell slightly. "Thena?" He called somewhat timidly, like she was an animal that could be spooked at any sudden movements.

Thena stared at him, eyes as wide as saucers.

"You're… You're him," she breathed. Her whole body shook with shock and anxiety.

"Well," the Doctor inclined his head, "Not him him, I'm definitely a Timelord and not an actor on the telly. Although, stranger things have happened. Like today of all days being your first time here. Well, I suppose if Rose is here too, makes sense from what you told me what would happen. But I can't really tell you what you told me, spoilers and all that. Not to mention the paradox, now that is a spoiler-"

"Doctor!" Jack interrupted his rambling, gesturing to Thena as she moved slowly around the TARDIS console and crouched down. She peered at the large jar containing the Doctor's severed hand. The residual regeneration energy swirled enticingly, as if beckoning her to reach out and touch it. The Doctor moved to crouch beside her.

"There now," he blew gently at the golden energy, dispersing it into nothing. "You see? Used the regeneration energy to heal myself but as soon as that was done I didn't need to change. I didn't want to," he straightened, holding a hand out to pull Thena up beside him, "why would I? Look at me" He straightened his tie indignantly. "So, to stop the regeneration from going all the way, I syphoned off the rest into a handy bio-matching receptacle. Namely my hand. My hand there," he pointed to the jar, "my handy spare hand. Remember, Rose? Christmas day? Sycorax? Lost my hand in a sword fight? That's my hand!" He grinned proudly. "What do you think?"

"Spoilers," Rose said, glancing at Thena, who started at hearing Rose say that word, "but you're still you?" She asked hesitantly.

"I'm still me," the Doctor replied, smiling softly at her.

Rose rushed forward and threw her arms around the Doctor in a tight hug. Thena watched the scene before her, feeling something was off. There was something lacking in the way they interacted, some level of love and relief that Thena had always seen in their reunion on the show. Suddenly the TARDIS jolted with the lights going out, plunging them into a half light. The Doctor and Rose separated, each running around the console to look at the scanner screen.

"Never waste time with a hug," the Doctor muttered to himself, studying the screen. Donna, Rose, and Jack crowded around him. Thena hung back, gripping the rails that surrounded the console. If this was going where it had in the show, it was certainly not something she was excited about.

"They've got us." The Doctor grimaced. "Power's gone. Some kind of Chronon loop?" He guessed.

"There's a massive Dalek ship at the centre of the planets," Jack offered. "They're calling it the Crucible. Guess that's our destination," he shrugged.

"You said these planets were like an engine," Donna reminded the Doctor, "but what for?"

"Thena?" The Doctor called from the scanner. The four of them looked at her expectantly, like it was perfectly normal to look to her for guidance in a situation like this.

"I…I…" She stuttered. "I'm dreaming. This… this…" She let out a hysterical laugh and gestured around the TARDIS. "This isn't real. Okay, sure, this is a concerningly realistic dream. Quite vivid. Feels different to sleep paralysis. But I would like to wake up now please! I would really very much like to not dream about Daleks destroying the universe!" As Thena rambled, her voice rose a few pitches, her breathing becoming shorter and shorter. Great, now I'm having panic attacks in my sleep!

"Thena," the Doctor said gently, taking a slow step towards her and reaching a hand towards her, "this is real. I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry, but whatever is happening right now, it's breaking down the walls of the universe. This universe is parallel to yours. You slipped through a crack, I've not quite figured out how or why you were pulled to me specifically." The Doctor explained. Thena swallowed thickly before taking a few deep breaths and nodded.

"Like…" She paused for a moment, taking one more big breath to calm herself. "Like Spider-Man?"

The Doctor smiled. There was the Thena he knew - a great big pop culture nerd. She peered up at him, her blue eyes sparkling with innocence. This was Thena brand new, not yet jaded from her travels with him, not yet knowing or trusting him.

"Yeah," he said with a laugh, "like Spider-Man."

"I'm sorry," Jack interrupted, confused, "Spider-Man?"

"It's a multidimensional thing, there's a film in the future." The Doctor explained, waving a hand dismissively before going back to the scanner. He grabbed Thena's hand and pulled her with him. Odd.

"Rose!" He cried suddenly in realisation. "You've been in a parallel world! That world's running ahead of this one, you've seen the future," he deduced, "what is it?"

"It's the darkness." She said flatly.

"The stars were going out," Donna remembered.

"One by one," Rose confirmed, "we looked up at the sky and they were just dying. Basically, we've been building this, um, this travel machine, um, this dimension cannon," she explained awkwardly, "so I could erm, so I could-"

"What?" The Doctor pressed.

"So I could come back!" Rose rolled her eyes as he smirked. "Shut up. Anyway, it just suddenly started working and the dimensions started to collapse. Not just my world, not just here, but the whole of reality. Even the void was dead! Something is destroying everything."

"But in that parallel world," Donna began, "you said something to me."

"The dimension cannon could measure timelines and it's weird, Donna, they all seem to converge on you." Rose told her. "Well, and Thena but that's spoilers, isn't it?"

"Me?!" Thena exclaimed.

"It hasn't happened for you yet." The Doctor said quickly, looking at his shoes and shoving his hands into his pockets.

"What do you mean, yet?" Thena inquired. "If I'm from a parallel world like Rose, surely that means you can take me back at the end of this? Right? Right, Doctor?!"

"The TARDIS has been to Rose's world before, even if it was by accident." He began to explain, coming to stand in front of her. His stance was one Thena was all too familiar with - the stance of someone who was about to deliver bad news. "I can take Rose home when this is over because the TARDIS can recognise the energy of her universe and steer us to the right one. The TARDIS has never been to your world. As far as I'm aware, it never will. Trying to take you home would be like shooting at a target in the dark, except there are a million million targets and they're constantly moving and changing and new ones are appearing all the time. It would be impossible to send you back to the right universe. I'm sorry."

Thena gaped at him.