Author's Note: I know, it's been a while! You can blame my new favorite series of fics (the Monsoon Seasons series by noblecrescent) and also me being super gay for the return of this story. Please also forgive any dumb typos I made. My grammar isn't all that bad, but I tend to make a lot of silly mistakes when I type. But either way, I hope you all enjoy the newest chapter!

The Doctor looked across the console at me. "What's on your face?" she asked, her brows furrowed deeply.

I patted my hands against my cheeks in confusion. "N-Nothing?" My thumb dragged through the remnants on Missy's lipstick and immediately I felt the entirety of my face turn hot. Hastily licking the back of my hand, I rubbed at the stain along my lips with the hope that it would be gone before the Doctor could see it again.

A pair of dark combat boots stepped into sight and slowly, I trailed my eyes along the Doctor's frame to eventually meet her gaze. She frowned as she crouched down before me, one arm already extended towards my face. "Is this lipstick?" she inquired.

"Uh…"

The Doctor's frown materialized into a smile, albeit a confused one. "Why'd you put this on?"

"Oh, no reason," I mumbled, unable to meet the Time Lord's eyes any longer. They were the brightest, most inquisitive and capturing eyes I'd ever seen, and I feared I'd fall right into them.

"Well, you've smeared it now," she chuckled. "Here." Swiping her tongue across her thumb, the Doctor took up my attempts to clean my lips. She hummed softly, leaning in closer when the job proved to be more frustrating than she'd likely thought it would be.

I'm not a floozy. I don't just fall at someone's feet because they flash me a smile. But if there is one thing that can make me weak in the knees, it's someone like the Doctor doing exactly what she was doing. My gaze flitted across her face as she tugged at my bottom lip; it wasn't even a remotely romantic gesture, but it stirred something in me nonetheless. I couldn't help noticing how attractive she was, how smooth her skin was, how surprisingly pleasant she smelled. Is that Old Spice? Talk about a butch power move, I thought with an absent smile.

She glanced up at me and grinned. "What're you smiling about?"

"Nothing," I said quickly. "I was just thinking."

Her thumb was pressed lightly against my lip and I knew that if I had been standing up, I would've needed something to lean against. The Doctor reached inside her jacket and pulled out a handkerchief. She dabbed the fabric against my lip and then stood a second later, tucking it back into her pocket.

I put my hand in hers when she gestured for me to do so. "Since I realize," she began as she tugged me to my feet, "that this is all new for you, you should know something."

"Yes?"

The Doctor squeezed my hand. "I'm a touch telepath." Oh, God! She released my hand with a laugh. "I'm sorry, but I just had to see your face!"

If a black hole had appeared inside the TARDIS then, I would've flung myself inside without a second thought. I balled my hands into fists and pressed my knuckles against my cheeks, hoping the constant coolness of my fingers would calm the blush that raged across the entirety of my face. Turning my back on the Doctor, I squeezed my eyes shut and prayed to God that I might one day be able to live down this embarrassment.

A hand on my shoulder and another on the opposite bicep turned me back around. Still laughing good-naturedly, the Doctor tugged on my elbow so she could see my face. "Diana. Diana, I'm sorry." She took hold of my chin and directed my face towards her. "I didn't mean to pry, but you were practically screaming in there. It was impossible not to hear you."

"I-I-I-"

"Don't be," she interjected. "It's good to know that after all these years, you still find me attractive. Especially this daft face." Pressing a kiss to my forehead, the Doctor started for the opposite end of the console room. "Don't worry. I promise not to tease you anymore!"

Because of my temporary kidnapping on the Eye of Orion, the Doctor was adamant that we not travel anywhere in case someone else adapted Missy's idea. Instead, the Doctor decided to take me on a tour of the TARDIS. "Good on me for making you a map, but," she said as I trailed after her down a particularly long hallway, "let's be honest - a personalized tour is much better." Our main stops included everything on the map, except for hers and Clara's room, the latter of which I felt was vital not to mention, as well as a music room, astrometrics lab - the Doctor claimed that the writers of Star Trek: Voyager had absolutely stolen the idea from her - and a garden.

The garden surprised me more than anything else simply because it seemed as though the Doctor would need nothing short of a miracle to keep a plant alive in between all her ridiculous escapades and near death experiences. It was that thought that overcame my mind as we strolled through the garden, the Doctor uncharacteristically quiet. I could feel her watching me as we walked parallel to each other, a small, green hedge from some far away planet the only thing between us.

"Are you alright?" she finally asked.

"Hm? Oh. Yeah." I ran the pad of my thumb across the nails of my other fingers, absently wondering if the Doctor had any nail clippers on board. "Just thinking."

"Penny for your thoughts?"

I sighed. There's a lot of them. Brushing a few stray hairs out of my eyes, I said, "Don't you ever get scared? Of dying?"

The Doctor halted mid-step and looked at me as though I'd just spewed heresy. "What made you think of that?"

I shrugged. "My brain just sort of jumped down a rabbit hole."

"Are you scared you're going to die?"

An empty laugh bubbled up in my chest. "That's a loaded question, but that's not why I asked. I just-… I just thought that you're always traveling and always going on big adventures, but sometimes - most of the time, now that I think about it - things go wrong and people get hurt. You get hurt. Doesn't that scare you?"

"Does it scare you?" the Doctor countered, her voice suddenly very soft and very low.

I hadn't expected her to turn the question back on me, but the answer rang loud and clear in my mind nonetheless. "I don't know," I lied, looking anywhere but into the Doctor's eyes. "I asked you first."

The Doctor smiled sadly and she suddenly seemed very small inside her big, leather jacket. "Yeah, but I know you, Diana. Better than you might think and I know how you think. It's okay to be scared." I shifted uncomfortably, stuffing my hands into my trouser pockets with a huff. "In all the time we've traveled together, I-… I've always done everything - anything - possible to keep you safe. You don't have to be afraid."

But I am. I thought about the Starmen and how terrified I'd been when they attacked, how I'd run as fast as I could and cowered while the Doctor scaled its body and risked her life to save the world. "I could never do what you do," I breathed. "Run headfirst into danger? Throw myself into a battle to save someone, to save the world o-or a galaxy or the universe? Doctor, what you did today, I couldn't-… I could never do that. I'd run away."

"Diana, when I was young, before I'd met all the people and done all things I have, all I did was run. I stole a TARDIS and my granddaughter, and we ran! I never stopped running, I still haven't. Except now I run towards danger instead of away." Beaming as thought the sun was shining through her very skin, the Doctor looked at me and her face radiated hope. "I was downright horrible back then, to be honest, but I learned something: I saved a person's life and it changed me. Once you help people, once you start saving them, everything changes and it's wonderful!"

The Doctor suddenly lifted her leg and climbed over the hedge, stumbling onto the pathway when her foot caught on a branch. She took my hand and smiled. "Come with me."

And then we were running. Well, the Doctor was running and I was jogging awkwardly behind her with most of my limbs flailing like one of those air-powered balloon tubes at a car dealership. Running while holding hands honestly wasn't as easy as it looked.

"Where are we going?" I asked, half out of breath.

We burst into the console room a second later, bolting up the walkway where the Doctor dropped my hand and gestured for me to take my place in front of the console. "You're the pilot - figure it out."

"What?"

Crossing her arms over her chest, the Doctor grinned at me. "G, 179 degrees."

"Wh-"

"Plus zero point two."

"What are you saying?"

"I don't know, pilot. What am I saying?"

"Am I supposed to understand you?"

The Doctor sighed, pulling an exasperated expression. "Oh, come on! You're smart!"

"Okay, smart ass, say it again and let me figure it out!" I snapped, only half annoyed.

"G, 179 degrees plus zero point two."

Frowning, I looked down at the console as I repeated the numbers in my head, straining to decipher them. G? Degrees? 179? Well, it can't be temperature, can i- "Oh!" My lips curled into a broad smile and I smacked myself in the forehead, laughing. "Oh, stupid!"

Laid out across the panel were several different keyboards in a variety of colors. One of them, small and square, was colored red and the numbers zero through ten were carved into the keys, as well as a combination of letters. I quickly typed out the letter and numbers, and then looked at the Doctor.

"What next?" I asked.

"It's a bit big," she teased, stepping closer and leaning against the console so she was closer to my height. "You sure you can handle it?"

I snickered. "That's what she said." I leaned in close and smirked, not failing to notice the way the Doctor's eyes dropped to my mouth. Oddly enough, it just made me feel that much more competitive. Whatever she was trying to do, I'd show her just how good I was. "Try me."

"N fifty-one point five one six W zero point twelve seventy-eight."

I glanced back at the keyboard, my heart stammering as I felt the first of the numbers already slipping away. If she hadn't looked at me like that, I told myself. "N one five-"

"Fifty-one," the Doctor interjected.

"Right."

"Don't let me distract you." I glanced at the Time Lord from the corner of my eye; had she moved closer? "Point five one six."

I echoed the words under my breath as I typed them out, hyper aware of the way the Doctor shifted her body weight so her shoulder brushed against mine. She repeated the final section of numbers for me and when I finished relaying them into the TARDIS, I dared to meet her eyes. She was so close and I was so, so okay with it.

"Now?"

"Take us home, pilot."

"Where are we going?"

The Doctor smiled. "That would be telling."

When the TARDIS took off with a groan, the overhead lights flashed blue-green. The reflection of those lights against the Doctor's dark skin was incredibly beautiful and I watched as she straightened, readjusting the collar of her jacket as she kept her eyes locked on mine. The TARDIS shuddered to a halt seconds later and the lights returned to normal.

"Well?" I asked.

"What do you suppose you'd say to someone if you wanted to convince them to travel with you?"

Well, that was unexpected. I shook my head. "I don't know."

"What would you say to a girl, a very clever girl, if you wanted to convince her to travel with you?"

"I don't know," I said again. "Why are you asking me this?"

The Doctor started for the doors. "Because I'm trying to figure out how to convince your new best friend to travel with us." The door creaked as the Time Lady pulled it open. She stuck her head out and called, "By the way, Rose? Did I also mention that it travels in time?"

Stepping back a few paces, the Doctor winked in my direction and then focused on the door. A blonde woman came sprinting through the doorway a moment later. She slowed, taking a deep breath, and smiled as she gazed up at the ceiling. The door creaked and snapped shut, drawing the blonde from her thoughts. Her eyes flitted across the room before finally landing on me and realization washed over me as she flashed me a tongue-in-teeth smile.

"Rose Tyler, you remember Diana."

Rose wiggled her fingers at me. "Hiya!"

"Now, before we go any farther, I should explain something." Rose and I shot the Doctor a concerned look. "The Diana you met before is different from the one you're seeing now. She's, uh, a bit younger."

"Oh. Okay." Rose frowned. "Why?"

"Long story short, she time travels on her own sometimes, without me, and right now, she's not sure she wants to travel like we usually do. So," she continued, pacing around the console, "I thought, why not show her how magnificent it really is out there? And why not show her with a friend?"

Rose raised her eyebrows. "Me?"

"Mhm!"

"But I barely know her! Or you, for that matter. Not that I don't like you," she added hastily.

"Well, everyone needs a friend!" The Doctor's smile flickered, as if something had crossed her mind that wasn't as pleasant as her mood. "Even me. So, what do you say? Fancy a trip through time and space, Rose Tyler?"

Rose looked carefully at the Doctor, then at me, then back at the Doctor. Finally, she smiled and nodded enthusiastically, her hair bouncing slightly. "Yes. Absolutely, yes! Where are we going?"

The Doctor grinned. "Well, that depends on you two, doesn't it? Where do you want to go? Backwards or forwards in time?"

Rose glanced at me, her eyebrows raised again. "D'you have a favorite?"

"I don't know. Do you?"

She bit down on her bottom lip in concentration. "Future!"

The Doctor nodded seriously, moving to one of the console panels. "How far?"

"One hundred years."

A pulled lever and five seconds later, the TARDIS had de- and rematerialized. "There you go," said the Doctor, gesturing to the TARDIS doors. "Step outside, it's the twenty second century."

Rose's mouth dropped open and I smiled; she was pretty damn cute. "You're kidding."

The Doctor shrugged nonchalantly. "That's a bit boring, though. Do you want to go further?"

"Fine by me!"

Another five seconds passed and the TARDIS had landed somewhere new. "Ten thousand years in the future. Step outside, it's the year 12,005, the new Roman Empire."

Rose scoffed. "You think you're so impressive."

"I am so impressive!" the Doctor insisted. "Diana, tell her!"

"Oh, yeah, get your girlfriend to compliment you." Rose rolled her eyes and my heart stopped. Did she just say-? "You wish!"

The Doctor looked at me and seemed torn. It was impossible not to notice the stunned expression on my face, even I could tell that I looked like a fish out of water, but there was something sparkling in her eyes that I knew meant she was eager to prove herself - to both of us. She huffed and pointed at Rose. "Right then, Rose Tyler, you asked for it. I know exactly where to go. Hold on!"

"You lot, you spend all your time thinking about dying, like you're going to get killed by eggs or beef or global warming or asteroids," the Doctor said as we stood on foreign ground, in a beige colored room with a window that revealed a view of my planet far, far below us. It was large and blue, and just hovering in empty space like a puppet on a string. "But you never take time to imagine the impossible: that maybe you survive! This is the year five point five slash apple slash twenty-six. Five billion years in your future, and this is the day- Oh, hold on."She checked the brown wrist watch on her wrist and nodded. "This is the day the Sun expands." Through the window, I watched as the sun released a huge flare that made the room turn red. "Welcome to the end of the world."

I shuffled forward a few steps and convinced myself to look as far out the window as I possibly could. I pressed my forehead against the glass and peered down, squinting past the faint reflection of my face and the glare of the inside lighting. There was nothing, just emptiness. A few stars twinkled when I tilted my head in the right direction and blocked the glare of the sun with my hand.

"Oh, God," I moaned, falling back a bit with my eyes screwed shut. It was like looking into the never-ending depths of the sea and that was already something that struck pure terror in my heart. "No more of that."

"Oh, but it's beautiful!" Rose gasped. "Isn't it?"

I happened to look back at the pair as the Doctor's eyes landed on me. She smiled faintly and nodded. "It is."

I blushed and quickly looked away. Oh, boy.

Eager to show us the rest of the ship, the Doctor guided us to an exit that opened up into a long, narrow hallway. I could hear Rose gasping and whispering under her breath as we went, and I couldn't blame her for being so awestruck. It was truly incredible.

Something nudged me in the shoulder. I turned my head to see the Doctor eyeing me; she'd bumped her shoulder against mine. "You okay?" she asked. "You're very quiet."

"Yeah?"

She stopped, caught my elbow and pulled me to a stop as well, and waited for Rose to continue a few paces before looking back to me, whispering, "Look, about what Rose said earlier, about calling you my girlfriend? If that bothered you, I'm sorry. She was only teasing me."

"About what?"

The Doctor seemed alarmed by the question. "Ah. W-Well, that's a- that's a good question."

A computerized voice burst to life overhead, making both myself and the Doctor withdraw from each other in surprise. "Shuttles five and six now docking." The Doctor spotted Rose at the far end of the hallway and gestured for me to follow her. "Guests are reminded that Platform One forbids the use of weapons, teleportation and religion. Earth Death is scheduled for fifteen thirty nine, followed by drinks in the Manchester Suite."

"Religion's forbidden?" I said curiously. "That sounds…not right."

The Doctor scoffed lightly, her eyes trained on Rose as we hurried to catch up to her. "That sounds human."

Rose turned around as we felt into step behind her. She reached for the Doctor's arm, her fingers curling around the Doctor's sleeve, and drew closer to her. "So, when it says guests, does that mean people?"

"Depends what you mean by people."

Rose frowned. "I mean people. What do you mean?"

"Aliens." The Doctor grinned and surged past Rose, heading for a panel in the dark, marble wall.

"What are they doing on board this spaceship?" she asked. "What's it all for?"

"'What's it for'?" I echoed. "They're here to watch the Earth burn, Rose," I said, as if the answer was obvious. I blinked, rubbing my palm against the base of my skull where a dull ache had started, and shook my head to try and clear my thoughts. "Uh, s-sorry, that was rude."

"Something wrong with your head?"

I met the Doctor's eyes hesitantly and could tell immediately that she was worried. "No, I'm fine. Just a headache." I caught Rose's attention with an apologetic smile. "I'm really sorry. My brain's been a little foggy recently."

"Are you sick?" the blonde asked. "You need some aspirin?"

I smiled, shaking my head. "No, but thank you, Rose." My smile melted away rather quickly, however, when the ache in my head intensified for a moment and then faded away like low-level radiation. "I'm just having trouble remembering," I murmured.

The Doctor, who had been fiddling with the panel on the wall while I was speaking, suddenly stopped and lowered her screwdriver. "Remembering what?"

I looked over my shoulder in the direction we'd come from, picturing the Earth hovering below us as it waited to be engulfed by the sun. "The end of the world."

An almost memory sparked to life deep within my mind: a person, their silhouette the only thing visible besides the swirling mass of brown, dark red, and gold that seemed to bleed into each other. They were in danger and I had to save them. I slipped my fingers behind my glasses to rub my eyes and the vision disappeared, the memory with it. A sudden dizzy spell made me sway to one side, throwing me off balance and I, as a result, stumbled into Rose.

"Diana!"

I could feel hands and arms on me, fingers in my hair, probing at the back of my neck. The Doctor's face, distorted with worry, swam before me, but I couldn't focus on it. Flashes of golden hair caught my eye and I tried to follow them, my eyes chasing the tail ends of Rose's hair as she hovered over me.

"Diana! Diana, look at me!" Annoyed at the Doctor's demanding tone, I forced my eyes to roll in her direction and frowned when my vision finally focused on her.

"I'm fine," I groaned.

The Doctor scowled. "Like hell you are. We're taking you back to the TARDIS."

My hand trembled as I tried to grab onto the Doctor's coat, my fingers grasping weakly at her lapel. "No. D-Don't," I struggled to say. "I have to…save someone."

"Oh, I didn't mean for you to take me so literally!"

I groaned again and shut my eyes, turning my face away from the Doctor. "Not so loud, God." I took a deep breath in, held it for a few seconds, and then exhaled slowly through my nose. I repeated this three more times and on my last exhalation, I opened my eyes again. The dizziness had dissipated by then, so I fisted the Doctor's lapel in my hand and focused on her again. "Help me up, please."

With the Doctor on my right side and Rose on my left, they helped me rise and continued to hold onto my arms as I found my footing. "I think I'm alright now," I said, bouncing slightly on my toes to test out my balance.

"What happened?" Rose asked worriedly.

"I don't know. I had this memory of something, of someone, and then…" I trailed off and brushed my hair away from my eyes. "That was kind of horrible. I've never felt so dizzy before. Doctor, what was that?"

The emotions swirling in the Doctor's eyes were almost impossible to interpret, but her face was easier to read. She was worried, confused, and scared, and I knew that if the Doctor was scared, then whatever was going on inside my head wasn't good. She reached for my face and her fingertips just brushed my cheekbone. "I don't know," she admitted. "We should go. I have to-"

A surge of anger rose up in my chest and I snapped, "No!" The Doctor stared at me incredulously, her mouth a rigid line. "We can't go."

"Diana, you always do this, but will you please, for once, listen to me? You're not well!"

"No. No, we have to stay," I said, gripping her forearm and looking seriously into her eyes. "I-I can't explain it, but there's something inside me that says we have to stay." My free hand balled into a fist and thumped against my chest directly above my heart. It felt as though I'd eaten a spoonful of peanut butter that was now stuck in my throat - I couldn't breathe and the lump in my throat was painful, but it meant something. It was telling me to stay. "I-I've never felt this way before."

The Doctor smiled the saddest, most loving smile I'd ever seen. She shook her head, sighing, "You never change." Letting her chin fall to her chest, the Doctor sighed again. "Alright, we'll stay."

The lump in my throat suddenly vanished and I took a deep, gasping breath. "Thank you," I said. "Thank you."

"But if anything else happens, I'm taking you back to the TARDIS."

"Okay."

The Doctor watched me for a moment, her fingers tapping nervously against the surface of her screwdriver. Finally, she nodded and turned back to the panel that had captured her attention before my dizzy spell.

"Blimey," said Rose, her hands poised on her hips, "are you two always this intense?"

"Only on a good day." The Doctor turned and flashed us both a grin as a door to the left of the panel, which I had only just noticed, slid open. "And today's a pretty good day. I even got the door open!"

Beyond the door was a vast room, mostly painted beige with hints of marble along the walls, with an enormous viewing window and a ceiling that seemed to hover several stories above our heads. Through the window was the same sight we had been greeted with when we first exited the TARDIS: the sun, standing ready to envelop the Earth with a fiery embrace. As we three approached the window, Rose spoke up again, inquiring about the Earth's seemingly unchanged surface and the sun's expansion.

"The planet's now property of the National Trust," the Doctor explained. "They've been keeping it preserved. See down there?" She pointed to one of the tiny spaceships hovering above the Earth, which didn't look like much more than big hump of metal floating about. "Gravity satellites holding back the sun. And the continents - the Trust shifted them back, too. That right there's a classic Earth. But now the money's run out, so nature takes over."

Rose looked horrified. "But what about all the people? Aren't you going to do something?"

The Doctor shook her head, swinging her arms free from their crossed position over her chest to rest behind her back, her hands clasped together. "It's empty. They're all gone. No one left."

Rose's shoulders slumped and she looked out the window again at the Earth, her hand pressed against the glass. "Just us, then. It really is the end of the world."

The hissing of metal doors sliding open drew all three of us from our thoughts. Hurrying through the doorway was a man about the Doctor's height, dressed in copper colored robes with a matching cap, and he was literally blue in the face. He was in the middle of giving out orders to a group of other, child-sized, blue people when he spotted us.

"Who the hell are you?" he demanded, striding across the room in a matter of seconds.

The Doctor humphed. "Oh, that's nice," she grumbled. "Thanks."

"How did you get in here? This is a maximum hospitality zone," the man told us. His eyes were pale gold and slitted like a snake's, and although I tried very hard not to be disturbed by his appearance, I couldn't help but feel uncomfortable. It was like talking to a member of the Blue Man Group, only with some fancy under eye tattoos and snake eyes. "The guests have disembarked- Oh! Oh, no, they're already here!"

Following the man's gaze to the doors, I saw a group of people enter the room and a woman at the very front who's bark-like skin sparked the completion of the memory I had been trying to decipher earlier. She wasn't much taller than myself, her skin was dark brown and instead of hair covering the top of her head, there was what looked like part of a mossy tree trunk that extended several inches. I noticed with a smile that the tips of the trunk were decorated with autumn colored leaves. Her red overskirt flared out as she walked and in my mind, the blurred image that I had seen before cleared up and merged with the real-life image.

I could hear the Doctor speaking, first to the blue man and then to Rose after the man hurried off in the tree woman's direction, but I didn't care enough to listen to a word of it. I watched as the blue man approached the tree woman and apologized for not introducing her. She smiled kindly and replied, just soft enough that I couldn't hear her, and waited patiently for him to hurry over to a podium beside the entrance.

"Introducing the first of our honored guests, we have, representing the Forest of Cheam, trees!" the man announced. "Namely, Jabe, Lute and Coffa."

I inhaled sharply, snapping my fingers as the final piece of the puzzle that was my memory clicked into place. "Of course!" I exclaimed in a shout-whisper. "Jabe!"

"You know her?" asked Rose.

"No," I replied with a shake of my head. "But I remember her."

"Also in attendance," the blue man continued to announce, "are the Doctor, her wife, Diana Scott, and their companion, Rose Tyler."

That was enough to draw my attention from Jabe and her group of tree people. I whirled on the Doctor, eyes wide and mouth agape. "Wife?"

"It was the best I could come up with!" she insisted.

"I barely know you!"

That, in turn, drew Rose's attention and she frowned at me. "Wait, you what?"

The blue man cleared his throat loudly, his eyes focused on us. "There will be an exchange of gifts representing peace after everyone has been announced," he said, his voice a touch louder than necessary. "If you all could keep the room circulating, please? Thank you. Next, from the solicitors Jolco and Jolco, we have the Moxx of Balhoon!"

For the next few minutes, the same basic pattern was followed: the names, titles, and/or ranks of the guests would be announced, followed by their entrance at the front of the room. I watched curiously as some of them entered, not having seen most of them before like the Adherents of the Repeated Meme or the ambassadors from the city-state of Binding Light, but for the most part my attention remained fixed on Jabe and her people. The moment I saw her, I knew that she was part of, if not the whole reason why I felt so strongly about staying on the station. The purpose of which was still uncertain as that part of my memory hadn't cleared up yet, but I knew that there was something important about her.

After everyone had been introduced, including the Face of Boe, who was also apparently the sponsor of the entire event, the exchanging of gifts was initiated. The Doctor patted down her chest, feeling the outside of all her coat and trouser pockets, but found nothing other than her psychic paper.

"The Gift of Peace," said Jabe, the first of the guests to approach us. She turned to one of her people, a tree person easily a foot taller than the Doctor with bark-skin almost as pale as mine, and picked up a small plant. "I bring you a cutting of my grandfather."

The Doctor tenderly took the plant in her hands and smiled. "Thank you." She quickly handed it over to me and I held it close to my chest, inspecting the little green leaves that hung from the main stem. Was I holding a person in my hands? The Doctor laughed a little and bounced awkwardly on her toes. "Gifts," she muttered. "Uh, I give you in return air from my lungs!"

Jabe's lips fluttered into a smile. "How…intimate," she sighed.

The Doctor grinned. "There's more where that came from," she assured her.

"I bet there is."

My eyes followed Jabe and her party as they left to hand out the rest of their peace offerings. Why did I remember her? I wondered. What's so special about her that I need to stay so badly? And why can't I remember what's going to happen?