"But... You said you were the last of your people, Doctor." Martha said, surprise on her face.
The Doctor looked stunned. "I... I am. It's impossible."
"What does it mean?" Victoria asked, confused.
"Aye!" Jamie agreed.
The Doctor didn't reply, running his hands through his hair. "It can't... unless..." He frowned, but he seemed to be beginning to understand.
"The timelines shouldn't allow it to happen, but my younger self is here. With both of us here, it would create a weak point, and that would enable anyone who knew how to jump timelines..."
The others stared, not understanding.
"What do you mean, Doctor?" Martha asked.
"Whoever it is must come from my younger self's timeline, because they can't exist in mine." He flipped some controls. "I'll try to isolate the vortex energy and bring us there."
Martha and Victoria still looked confused, but Jamie nodded.
"Oh, aye, Doctor." He leaned closer to victoria. "Just nod and act like ye ken what he means," he whispered.
Victoria nodded absently, though she frowned. "I don't understand what's going on, but I'm going to get changed. It's very uncomfortable to sleep in one's clothes."
Jamie shook his head, but Martha agreed. "Could I get a change of clothes too?"
Victoria smiled. "I'll show you the way."
Martha and Victoria left.
Jamie watched the Doctor work. "Can ye fly this thing?" He asked.
"Jamie," The Doctor grinned. "Of course I can. I know I never got where I was going when I was your Doctor, but I've had a lot of practice."
"Ah-ha! So ye really never could pilot the Tardis?" Jamie smiled. This couldn't be his Doctor. Though they all knew it, his Doctor would never admit to not being able to control the Tardis.
The Doctor laughed. "No, I nearly flunked my driver's test."
Jamie frowned, not understanding.
The Doctor waved a hand in dismissal. "Nevermind." He paused a moment, looking at Jamie. "Its good to see you again, Jamie. It's been over five hundred years for me since I was traveling with you."
Jamie frowned further. "Ye said ye were 450 a few weeks ago. That means you're nearly a thousand years old." Jamie's face filled with disbelief. "Are ye immortal, Doctor?" He asked, frustratedly.
The Doctor shook his head. "No. I have thirteen lives, Jamie. Your Doctor was my second life. I'm on my tenth now."
Jamie tried to wrap his head around this, not believing a word of it. "So... there are thirteen of ye?"
"Yes."
Jamie shook his head. He had heard a lot of crazy things but this took the cake. His Doctor talked nonsense sometimes, but never to this scale. "I... How can ye be the Doctor though, My Doctor?"
The Doctor came over to him and rest a hand on his shoulder. "Jamie... I know ita hard to believe, but maybe this will help." He took a deep breath, and began, slowly.
"We met on the Scottish highlands, during the aftermath of the battle of Culloden. You took me, Polly Wright, and Ben Jackson captive. Then we were captured by the redcoats, and I pretended to be German to get out of a hanging. After we escaped the slave traders, your clansmen were off to France, but you offered to help us get back to the Tardis, and ended up coming aboard. Do you remember?"
Jamie stared at the strange man. "How could ye...?"
"Because I'm the same man, Jamie." The Doctor looked into his eyes. "It's still me, Jamie."
Jamie looked at him. Something in him knew. Something knew it was the Doctor. Finally, he relaxed, letting himself believe it. "Okay, Doctor. How are ye going to stop whoever it is that took My Doctor?"
The Doctor grinned and put both hands on Jamie's shoulders. "I knew you'd come round!"
"How do I look?" Victoria whirled around, showing off the knee-length skirt she had chosen. It had the same tartan Jamie wore on it. On top, she had cute a sweater with the sleeves pushed up to her elbows.
"That looks great!" Martha smiled.
"Thanks. You look good too, though I admit I'm not quite used to the fashion of the future." Victoria smiled back.
"If you don't mind, when do you come from?" Martha asked.
"1866," Victoria responded. Her face fell slightly. "The Doctor and Jamie rescued me from these horrible creatures called Daleks. I traveled with them afterward because... well... My father was killed." She looked down for a moment.
"I'm so sorry..." Martha felt a sick feeling in her stomach. She hadn't meant to bring that up.
"It's alright. It's not your fault. I've had so much more to think about though since I joined in their travels. The Doctor watches over me like I'm his own, and Jamie keeps an eye on both of us." Victoria smiled.
"Are you and Jamie..." Martha ventured.
Victoria blushed slightly. "Oh, no. I mean, I know he cares for me, and I certainly care for him, but... it just wouldn't work. Between you and me, I think he sees me as a sister, and besides, we're from different times, he and I. He comes from 1746, and the battle of Culloden. He's trained for adventure and battle, and I prefer peace and quiet. He comes from over a hundred years before me." She frowned slightly but then smiled. "Sometimes I forget that."
Martha smiled.
"Enough about me. What about you, Martha? How did you meet the Doctor?"
"It's a long story. I worked at a hospital, and one day it was taken by aliens. The Doctor showed up out of nowhere and fixed it all. It sounds crazy, I know."
Victoria laughed. "After everything I've seen, nothing surprises me anymore."
Martha laughed. "Yeah, me too. Speaking of the Doctor, why don't we go see what he and Jamie are up too?"
"Alright."
Salamander stayed in the doorway a moment, looking into the gloom of the detention block. In the nearest cell sat his double, surrounded by the golden strands of energy, as he now called it for lack of a better phrase. The Master hadn't seen fit to put the Doctor back in the restraints it seemed, as the little man was seated on the bench in the cell, playing a gentle tune on his recorder. The sound hit Salamander's ears like fingernails on a chalkboard, but he didn't react, only observing the little man, and the bright gold around him.
The Doctor paused in his playing for a moment. "Are you coming in, Salamander, or will you stand there all day?" He said, an eyebrow raising.
Salamander frowned. He should leave.
His feet moved closer to the cell, as if of their own accord.
The Doctor's dark eyes followed his movements, and for some strange reason, Salamander felt threatened. It was all too similar to-...
"Welcome to the TARDIS." His double stared back, his features frozen, and his eyes burning with a quiet rage, and wisdom beyond his years. Those eyes... they sent an awful chill down his spine. They seemed to be staring into his soul, seeing his every secret. Those eyes made him want to shrink back and beg for mercy. As opposed to earlier when they were kind and gentle, full of laughter, now they were dark and brooding, like a silent god passing judgment.
Ramon smiled slightly, putting on his air of cool confidence, in spite of the overwhelming feeling washing over him.
"Thank you. You were doing so well impersonating me, I thought I would return the compliment."
The Doctor stared back, his strange eyes narrowing, and becoming icy cold, sending a shiver down Ramon's spine-...
"Are... are you quite alright?"
Salamander was yanked from the vision as the Doctor approached him from inside the cell. There was confused concern on his face.
Salamander took a quick breath and stepped back. "I..." He felt suddenly angry. "I don't need your sympathy. There is nothing wrong with me."
The Doctor's eyes narrowed, but he didn't push the matter. "Why are you here?" He asked. "Come to gloat? Or have you changed your mind about keeping me alive?"
Kill the Doctor? Once again, Salamander was bombarded with memories and images-...
"And now I'm going to kill you." He said as he shoved the Doctor against the console. His face, his hauntingly familiar face, only twisted into a slight smile. It chilled Ramon's bones-...
Salamander clutched his head, gasping.
The Doctor stood back, a frown on his face. After a moment, he spoke slowly. "Something happened to you in the Vortex, Salamander. Something impossible, that no one in the universe has ever survived. What happened to you? Do you feel different?"
Salamander closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Then he opened them. "I... There is golden... energy..."
The Doctor looked interested. "Yes... go on..."
Salamander frowned, closing his eyes again. "I see it everywhere, but most clearly around people. It seems to flow in strands around them, some short and others long... I do not understand it. It is particularly vibrant around you, Doctor..." His eyes opened. "So many bright strands wrapping around you... Some short, and some impossibly long..." Salamander looked at the Doctor a moment, frustration in his eyes. "It is driving me mad! What does it mean?" He clutched his head in frustration. "What does it mean?"
The Doctor looked at him, thoughtfully. "It... I don't know, but it seems to me... Its almost as if you've developed the ability to sense timelines, something only my people have the ability to do... Who knows what other side effects you could have from the vortex..."
Salamander looked at the Doctor. "Timelines?"
"All the possible paths a person could choose, and their ends."
"Your people... Do you see it too?"
The Doctor smiled slightly. "My people have the ability to perceive them, but not actually see them. And even then it requires concentration and certain conditions. It seems you have a much more heightened ability to sense it... its very fascinating..."
Salamander looked at the man smiling warmly back at him. "You understand it? Could you help me?"
"I can try." The Doctor motioned to the bars. "These might make it a little difficult though... I don't suppose you could let me out, could you? We can go back to my friends, and I'll do everything in my power to help you."
Salamander felt sudden ice fill his heart, and his face suddenly grew hard. "Let you out? Is that all you wanted? You were not trying to help, only escape?" His voice rose in anger. "You think you can use me like that, hm? Well, you are wrong!" He turned, and quickly left the room, angrily.
The Doctor watched after him, surprise on his face. After a moment, he sighed, moving back to the bench and pulling his recorder out of his pocket again.
"Brigadier!"
The brigadier turned to face the young man saluting to her. "At ease, Private. What is it?"
"Ma'am, there's been a break-in at the tower. Two men. One was wounded"
"What? How?"
"We don't know, ma'am. They just... appeared, and then disappeared."
"Was anything stolen?"
"Only one thing, Ma'am, from the Archives." The young man handed her a file.
Her eyes widened when she saw what was inside. "Private, are you certain?"
"Yes, Ma'am."
"Then things have become much more dire. I must speak with the Doctor immediately." She saluted the young man, who mirrored her, and swiftly marched out of the room.
Jamie paced back and forth, restlessly. He paused waiving a hand in frustration. "Och, Doctor, why is it taking so long?" He frowned.
The Doctor glanced up at him from the controls. "Patience. This isn't as easy as it looks." The Doctor returned to his fiddling, and Jamie sighed, returning to his pacing.
The Scotsman hated to think that the Doctor, his Doctor, had been gone for nearly twenty-four hours now. Who knows what they could be doing to him? He paused again. "Are ye sure ye cannae work faster?" He asked.
The Doctor didn't look up. "I'd work faster if you didn't keep interrupting me." He said, plainly.
Jamie took the hint and stayed quiet. He moved to the chair that sat near the console and sat down, but he couldn't get comfortable. "Is there anything I can do tae help?" He asked after a moment.
The Doctor simply paused, looking at him with a frown.
Jamie frowned. "Right. Sorry." He tapped his fingers nervously on the arm of the chair.
After what seemed to stretch out for hours, the Doctor straightened up. "There, that should do it."
Jamie stood up. "Now what?"
"Now I can bring the Tardis to the approximate location of this energy source. That should bring us within about a half-mile of it."
Jamie frowned. "Can ye nae do better than that?" He asked.
The Doctor patted his shoulder. "'Fraid not."
There was a knock at the door. "Doctor?"
The Doctor flipped a switch on the console, and the doors opened. The brigadier entered, only looking taken aback for a moment. "There you are. We've had a change in circumstances."
"Oh?"
"You are no doubt aware that in Unit's Archives, we hold the only known time travel device other than your tardis, a vortex manipulator."
The Doctor chuckled. "It's hardly time travel, but yes, I knew about it."
The Brigadier frowned. "It's been stolen."
The Doctor looked suddenly surprised. "What?"
"Someone managed to slip into headquarters undetected and steal it from right under our noses."
The Doctor frowned. "But why... why would they need a vortex manipulator if they have a Tardis?"
Jamie had a sudden thought. "If it is Salamander, he always tries tae have a backup plan. Maybe he doesnae trust whoever he's working with?"
The Doctor looked at Jamie. "Yes, that would make sense." He turned to the brigadier. "I've discovered another Tardis in the area. We were about to go investigate when you brought us this news."
The brigadier nodded. "I'll stay here in case you need help. You know how to contact us?"
The Doctor smiled. "Same as always."
"Very good. Good luck."
The Doctor nodded, and the Brigadier disappeared out the door.
"D'ye think it was Salamander?" Jamie asked.
"Probably. It's been a long time, but I do remember he was one to have multiple exit strategies if needed."
With that, the Time Lord began working the controls, and the Tardis central Column began rising and falling as the ship took off. In a few moments, it landed again, the familiar sound of the machine's engines filling the space around them.
"Where are we?" Jamie asked.
"Looks like we're by the seaside." The Doctor motioned to the scanner. "And a lot of warehouses. Pretty cliche if you ask me. Let's get the girls and take a look outside."
"We're already here." Martha and Victoria came from the hallway door. "Have we landed?"
"Yup." The Doctor said. "Let's take a look." He dashed to the door, the others following him.