A/N: Hiya! Thank you so much to everyone who posted a review, I'm trying to get as much content out as I can, so there's actually a decent amount of story for people to read. I do love to hear from whoever has read this. Please be kind, I'm not a writer and this is just for fun! Thanks!

Warning: Coarse language


"You mean," Thena said slowly, "I can never go home?"

The TARDIS shuddered and the scanner beeped loudly. The Doctor leapt towards it and studied the screen for a moment.

"The Dalek Crucible." He announced darkly. "All aboard."

Thena stood frozen, processing what the Doctor had just told her. Donna took notice of the devastated look creeping its way onto Thena's face and grasped her hands before they began to tremble.

"It's gonna be okay, yeah?" Donna tried to reassure the young woman. "You've got so much to look forward to. The first time I met ya, for starters!" Thena looked at her sharply.

"Why do you know me?" She cocked her head. "I know who you all are, seems like I've even told you how from what the Doctor has said. But I don't understand. If I only just got here. How can we have met before?"

"Ummm…" Donna seemed at a loss for words.

"Wibbly wobbly…" The Doctor waved a hand dismissively, still studying the screen on the scanner.

"Oh no," Thena was beginning to get angry now, "oh hell no. This is not some Mary Sue fanfiction where I bounce around your timeline, disappearing and reappearing randomly in a flash of light!"

"Well…" The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck bashfully.

"I have classes! I was half way through my degree! What about my family, my friends?! What are they gonna think has happened to me?!" She shouted at the Doctor, who hung his head like a scolded schoolboy.

The TARDIS scanner beeped again, sounding a little more insistent. The Doctor looked sadly at Thena, then at the three companions who had watched her shout at him before finally looking towards the door.

"We'll have to go out," he said quietly, "because if we don't go out, they'll get in."

"You told me nothing could get through those doors." Rose insisted.

"You've got extrapolator shielding," Jack added.

"Last time we fought the Daleks," the Doctor began, glancing at Thena, "they were scavengers and hybrids, and mad. This is a fully fledged Dalek empire at the height of its power. Experts at fighting TARDISes, they can do anything. Right now, that wooden door," he indicated the front doors, "is just wood."

Knowing what was coming, Thena looked at Donna still standing close to her. Donna appeared oblivious to everything around her, staring into space. Thena knew she was hearing the heartbeat of the meta-crisis Doctor rippling back from what could only be moments in the future. The longer Thena stared at Donna, she swore she could almost hear the heartbeat herself. Except… Wait, it couldn't be! Thena could hear a beat but it was a beat of four not two. Like the drumbeat in the Master's head… No, not a drumbeat. A heartbeat. The heartbeat of a Timelord…

"Thena? Donna?"

Both women snapped out of the trance.

"Yeah." Donna said halfheartedly.

"I'm sorry," the Doctor apologised, "there's nothing else we can do."

"No, I know," Donna reassured him.

"Thena? I will get you out of this, I swear. I'll-"

"It's okay, Doctor." Thena interrupted, meeting the Doctor's intense gaze. He searched her face for any indication of how exactly it would be okay. Thena always knew what happened, she always dropped little hints or pointed things out that he had missed. She had only recently explained to him how she knew these things, in the aftermath of the Library. Right now, even through her anxiety, the Doctor could see the familiar quiet confidence that everything would work out in the end.

"Right then," he conceded, turning back to the group, "all of us together."

"Daleks!" Rose exclaimed in mock enthusiasm.

"Oh, god!" Jack laughed.

"It's been good though hasn't it?" The Doctor asked, looking meaningfully at each of his companions. "All of us, all of it. Everything we did." He smiled and nodded to Donna, "you were brilliant." He turned to Jack, "and you were brilliant." He turned to Rose, his smile becoming a little sadder, "and you were brilliant." Thena expected him to stop there but finally he turned to her as well, a storm of emotions in his eyes. "You, Thena, were, are, and always will be brilliant." He paused, letting out a large puff of air. "Blimey."

With that, the Doctor turned to move towards the door, closely followed by Jack and Rose. Thena hung back behind Donna, deciding that almost getting killed in an almost destroyed TARDIS was the safer option than going out into a ship full of Daleks. She watched cautiously as Donna paused on the walkway to the door. Then a sound once again began to invade her own ears. The double heartbeat seemed to get louder and louder, closer and closer…

BANG!

Thena leapt forward with Donna as the TARDIS door slammed, staying close to her as she grabbed the door handles and pulled on them frantically.

"Doctor?!" Donna called desperately. "What have you done?"

"It wasn't me!" The Doctor's muffled voice came from the other side of the door. "I didn't do anything!"

"I'm not staying behind!" Donna yelled.

Thena backed away towards the centre of the TARDIS console and grabbed on the railing that lined it. She began to brace herself for when the Daleks dropped the TARDIS into their engine core. She squeezed her eyes closed as Donna continued to desperately pound on the door, begging the Doctor to let her out. The TARDIS lurched suddenly, throwing Donna to the ground. Flames erupted around the edges of the console room with bulbs exploding around the walls.

"Thena!" Donna staggered towards the young woman, coughing. She grabbed hold of the railing next to where Thena's knuckles were turning white. Smoke poured from the fire surrounding the women and bits of debris fell from places Thena couldn't even see. What she could see was the jar containing the severed hand slowly beginning to pulse with a soft golden light.

"Thena!" Donna caught her attention. "Thena, please tell me you know what to do!"

Thena opened and closed her mouth several times before simply looking over Donna's shoulder and nodding to the hand.

"But that's just…" Donna trailed off, moving unsteadily towards it and pulling Thena with her.

A sudden jolt caused both women to crash to the ground. Thena immediately pushed herself up and carried on trying to reach for the hand, intending on shoving it towards Donna so the meta-crisis Doctor could be born. Unbeknownst to her, Donna was also struggling forwards, stretching her fingers towards the jar. Their eyes met briefly before both pushed forwards and touched the jar at the same time. It exploded in a flash of gold, knocking Donna and Thena backwards. Donna landed hard on her back but when she looked beside her, Thena was nowhere to be seen.

"This must be how it starts…" Donna wondered, trailing off as a body seemed to be forming, stemming from the hand.


Thena sat up with a gasp, hands flying to her chest. There was a dull pain behind her sternum and her heart seemed to be thudding uncomfortably and irregularly. She lay on a single bed in a clean white room, tables and equipment she didn't recognise lining the walls. All in all, it looked decidedly medical. She glanced down at herself and felt a shiver creep up her spine at the grime and soot that covered her pyjamas. An unfortunate reminder that her experiences before she had passed out had indeed been real. Before she passed out… Donna! The Daleks! The Doctor! What happened? Where was she now? Did everything work out how it had in the show? Suddenly, a door on the other side of the room slid open and another eerily familiar face walked in.

"Hey now, Thena, let's calm down, eh? Don't really want a heart going into cardiac arrest before you know how to restart it." The man smiled at her kindly, his hands fidgeting nervously.

"You…" Thena started to speak, but her voice was hoarse, coming out in barely a whisper.

"Yes! Me! Hello!" The man waved with both hands before clasping them back together. "You were in a right state when you got here, though I've been expecting this for a while. Must apologise for past me, not even letting you change out of your jimjams!"

"You're the Doctor?" Thena tried talking again, her voice coming out a bit stronger this time. Of course, she knew that this was the Doctor, all floppy hair and bow ties. His eleventh incarnation to be precise. But she wanted to hear him say it, just to be sure.

"Yes!" He replied excitedly. "Did quite a number on you, that meta-crisis, eh? Changed it all! Bet your chest is feeling a bit sore, isn't it?" He pulled out his green tipped sonic screwdriver and scanned her.

"Doctor?" Thena asked timidly. "What happened?"

The Doctor hesitated in his scanning, his eyes darkening.

"Donna became the Doctor-Donna, just like she was supposed to. Another me, a human me, grew out of the hand and he destroyed the Daleks, just like he was supposed to. Then at the end of it all, when everyone had gone home and it was wrapped up all nicely in a little bow, I lost my best friend and the love of my life, just like I was supposed to." He recounted bitterly.

"I'm sorry," Thena told him quietly, not quite knowing what else to say.

"But! Then you came back! That was a nice surprise when I thought you'd burned up in the TARDIS. Hadn't lost quite as much as I first thought." Thena frowned as a smile found its way back onto his face. "Turns out, the TARDIS was almost destroyed, and all that time vortex leaking out, the ol' girl channeled into you."

"Wait, what?" Thena said lamely.

"The TARDIS was being ripped apart, only just got out in the nick of time. Teeny bit of time vortex leaked out, but she was smart enough to contain it. Otherwise the Daleks would've gotten hold of it." The Doctor explained. "And then the meta-crisis happened and whoa nelly!" He exclaimed, grinning at her.

"Doctor… what happened?" Thena was getting anxious now, there was clearly something more that he wasn't quite telling her.

"Well…" He rubbed the back of his neck in a way that reminded her of the tenth Doctor. "Both you and Donna touched the hand, Doctor two-point-zero grew into a human, Donna absorbed my mind, and you…"

"What is it?" Thena urged. "What?"

"Some of my biology absorbed into you and it seems that, well, the time vortex that was in you triplicated it and well…" He trailed off again refusing to meet Thena's eye.

"And what? Doctor, what happened to me?" She demanded.

"Well that changed it from a smidge of Time Lord DNA to a complete biology rewrite. Oh, and you were flung into the future because your body needed to process the time vortex. Like a kidney! Except not like a kidney, forget I said kidney. But because of my DNA sparking it, it's my personal timeline. And I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, but the time vortex isn't finished with you yet."

Then sat quietly for a moment, mulling over this explanation.

"Okay, so I'm literally living a fanfiction right now. Cool. Awesome. Love that for me," she ranted sarcastically, "so I get to bounce around your timeline, appearing randomly, for a few days at a time, and we never meet in the right order. Am I right?

"More or less," the Doctor nodded.

"I just have one question though. Just a small detail. If you could clarify for me?"

"Shoot."

Thena took a deep breath.

"What the fuck do you mean by complete biology rewrite?!"