Buffy still didn't know what was worse: the pain of from whatever killed her, or the pain from coming back to life. This time was especially disorienting. There was fire and smoke, but her hand was wet and covered in broken glass. She looked over at the bright yellow light beside her; she expected to see more fire, but instead there was the Doctor. The Doctor without any clothing.
"You're naked!" she heard Donna say.
"Oh yes," he answered. He jumped up and Buffy turned the other way. There were things in this universe she really, really did not need to see. The engines sounded so he must have moved the Tardis to a different location. It couldn't have been far since the ride was relatively quick. "Okay you two, gotta get these fires out and things repaired."
"Yeah, I'll get the fires," Buffy said while standing and moving for the fire extinguisher, "but you need to get some pants first."
"Right," he said with a nod. "Do it quietly."
"That man has no shame," Buffy said to Donna who looked especially dumbfounded. Buffy opened a compartment on the floor and pulled out an extinguisher. Quietly and quickly she went to work blasting down flames. The Doctor was running about making repairs (fully clothed), and Donna stood back while Buffy helped the Doctor. Words, facts, images, feelings were all racing through Buffy's mind—things that shouldn't be there but suddenly were. She pushed it aside.
"All repaired, lovely," the Doctor rambled quickly. "Sssh, no one knows we're here. Gotta keep quiet. Silent running, like on submarines when they can't even drop a spanner—don't drop a spanner! I like blue. What d'you think?
"You. Are. Bonkers!" Donna let out.
"Why? What's wrong with blue?"
"Is that what Time Lords do? Lop a bit off, grow another one. You're like worms!" Then she pointed at Buffy. "And she was dead! You said she'd be fine, but she was very much dead before. And now she's fine and you're a worm!"
"No, no, no, no, no, I'm unique. Never been another like me. 'Cause all that regeneration energy went into the hand. Look at my hand." He wiggled his fingers. "I love that hand. But then she touched it. WHAM!"
Donna shrieked.
"Sssh!" He shushed himself and walked over to Buffy, invading her personal space. "Instantaneous biological metacrisis. I grew out of you. Still, could be worse."
Buffy glared. "At least I'm already part Timelord. Do you know what would have happened if I was completely human and there was this two-way crisis? God!"
"Wait, what? Part Timelord?" Donna asked her.
"Why would that be bad?" the Doctor asked, but Buffy ignored him just as he had ignored Donna's question.
"Do you remember that time I called and you and the Doctor came to my apartment? I had some questions after finally realising I have this habit of not staying dead. Apparently it's a family thing on one side and the other side are Timelords."
"It's fine," the Doctor continued to himself. "Wait. No!"
"Family? There's more?" Donna and Buffy still ignored the spaceman.
"Well, the Timelords are all dead, but you've seen my dad, Jack."
"That good looking one?"
"Oh! You are kidding me, no way! One heart! I've got one heart!"
"Hey that's my dad! He's taken, and he's my dad, so… yeah."
"This body... has got only one heart!" the Doctor complained loudly and got the women's attention. "Spanners, sssh!"
"So you've got one heart. So do we all," Buffy said without sympathy.
"Aw, that's disgusting."
"Hey!"
"Hey!"
"Stop it," Donna said.
"No, wait, I'm... part Timelord, part human. I'm exactly like you. Well isn't that peachy?"
"Will someone explain what's going on?" Donna demanded in a whispered yell. "How exactly is Buffy part Timelord too?"
"My mother was in a sort of witness protection thing hiding as a human but she was really a Timelord and it's all rather long and complicated. Could you fill me in on what happened between the time I was inconveniently dead again and the full monty over here showed up?"
The Doctor—or rather the Doctor's new double—started tinkering with things while Donna explained what had happened. Just as the dalek hit Buffy and the Doctor, Jack had shown up and blasted the thing to bits. He had slung Buffy over a shoulder and with some help from Donna and Rose they got the Doctor into the Tardis. The Doctor started glowing, but he shot the golden light into his spare hand as they had just discussed. Then the Tardis was taken by the Daleks. Not being able to fight, they surrendered. But even though the Doctor and Jack said leaving Buffy's body would be fine, Donna lingered. When she finally did answer the Doctor's call to come out, the door slammed shut and she was trapped. The Daleks then sent the Tardis to be destroyed, but in the chaos Buffy rolled and her hand touched the severed hand in the jar.
There was a sudden shake and the Doctor raced back to the console. "It's the planets. The twenty-seven planets. Single string Z-neutrinos compressed. No way."
"What was it?" Donna asked. "Doctor, what did it do?"
"It takes the electrical field holding atoms together and destroys it," Buffy explained. "Matter dissolves, falling apart."
"And the planets?"
"One vast transmitter," replied the Doctor, "blasting that wavelength across the whole universe and destroying everything."
"Rose said the darkness is coming," Donna said.
"The stars going out," said the Doctor. "All stars, all life, gone bit by bit."
"Remind me, who is Rose?" Buffy asked. "Donna, do you wanna fill me in again?"
Donna explained things again while the Doctor rushed about. He pulled things from compartments under the floor and pieced together a large gun-like object.
"So what is this thing?" Donna asked.
"It's our only hope, a Z-Neutrino biological inversion catalyser."
"Yeah, Earth-girl, remember?"
"Davros said he'd built those Daleks out of himself, his genetic code runs through the entire race. If I can use this to lock the Crucible's transmission onto Davros himself..."
"It destroys the Daleks," Buffy finished.
"Biggest backfire in history."
"So you're going to kill them all," Buffy said.
"Problem?" the Doctor asked. "They'd be killing themselves."
"No, I'm all for slaying them, but it's not really…"
"What?"
"Your style."
The Doctor just shrugged.
"It is," said Donna. "Or it was. Does it matter if it saves the planets?"
No one had an answer to that. The weapon completed, the Doctor ran around the console to kick things off. "Ready! Maximum power!"
The Tardis lurched forward while its engines groaned. When they landed the Doctor stepped out. Buffy was far enough behind to see him hit with an energy blast from Davros. Donna rushed out to use the weapon. In that merest part of a second Buffy's brain saw the human Doctor recovering on one side and to another side was a control panel. Letting Donna be a distraction, Buffy used stealth and speed to run and duck under that panel. Donna landed beside her a moment later. There was yelling and their weapon was destroyed.
"I was wrong about your warriors, Doctor. They are pathetic." Davros continued to talk while the countdown started. The insane figure in the dalek wheelchair was too caught up in his own dramatic monologue to notice what Buffy was doing. The countdown reached its end, but alarms blared out and the engines whined to a halt.
"Oops," said Buffy. "Did I just close all Z-Neutrino relay loops using an internalised synchronous back-feed reversal loop? My bad."
Everyone looked at her, but it was the Doctor—the original Doctor—who spoke. "Buffy, how did you know…"
"But she's alive too!" Rose was saying.
Buffy just smiled.
"You'll suffer for this," threatened Davros as he raised his hand.
Buffy rolled her eyes and flipped a lever. The electricity backfired onto Davros. "Not if I get you first with a bio-electric dampening field with a retrogressive arc inversion."
"Exterminate her!"
"Exterminate! Exterminate!"
Everyone else looked nervous, but the words, numbers, and images that had been bouncing around her brain were coming together. Her brain had been processing it all and now she knew exactly which buttons to press.
"Weapons non-functional!" the Daleks shouted.
"Yeah, sorry about that. Macrotransmission of a K-filter wavelength blocking Dalek weaponry in a self-replicating energy blindfold matrix."
"How did you work that out?" the Doctor demanded. "You're..."
"Part Timelord," new!Doctor said.
"Yeah but…"
"Part human, part Timelord, and a two-way biological metacrisis," said Buffy. "You keep zapping the Timelord part of my brain so I just keep getting smarter. Smart enough to take down the holding cells and seal this vault. So are you guys gonna help or what?"
"Stop them!" Davros yelled. "Get her away from the controls!"
"And now let's Dead or Alive these bitches." She hit buttons and spun a dial.
Daleks lost control and started to spin. "Help me. Help me."
"Like a record, baby," she said as she made them spin the other way.
"What did you do?" asked new!Doctor.
"Trip-stitch circuit-breaker in the psycho-kinetic threshold manipulator. Duh."
"But that's brilliant!" said new!Doctor.
"Why did we never think of that?" asked the Doctor.
"I'll write you a list," Buffy said while rolling her eyes. "Now, let's send that trip signal all over the ship and then get these planets back where they belong."
"Stop this at once!" Davros shouted.
Buffy didn't need to worry about him since Jack had grabbed a couple of large blasters. A man she didn't know was holding up Davros and everyone else looked to be having fun pushing the now impotent Daleks out of the way. With two Doctors it was quick work getting the planets sent home one by one.
"Is anyone gonna tell us what's going on?" Rose came up and asked.
The Doctor opened his mouth to answer, but Buffy cut him off. "Short version: regeneration energy went into hand, I touched hand, hand grew into second Doctor, and I got bits of his brain stuffed into my noggin." Buffy then slapped the original Doctor.
"Oi, what was that for?" he shouted with a frown settling over his face.
"You left a hand with all that energy just hanging around for anyone to bump into! It's fine for this two way thing with someone who already has a Timelord brain, but what if it had been Donna?"
"What would have happened?" Sarah Jane asked.
"Aaaallll that information suddenly forced into a human head?" Buffy mimed an explosion. "Bchsssshh!"
Donna then was giving the Doctor a slap of her own.
"But there's really two Doctors?" Rose asked. Buffy nodded.
"I can't tell you what I'm thinking right now," said Jack as he shook his head.
Davros, who had been following the conversation from where he was held at gunpoint, turned to the crazy Dalek exposed from its casing. "But you promised me, Dalek Caan. Why did you not foresee this?"
The Dalek giggled maniacally.
"Oh I think he did," said the Doctor. "Something's been manipulating the timelines for ages. Getting everything to the right place at the right time."
"This would always have happened," said Dalek Caan. "I only helped Doctor."
"You betrayed the Daleks," said Davros.
"I saw the Daleks. What we have done throughout time and space, I saw the truth of us, creator, and I decreed no more."
With a shout from Jack, everyone looked to where a new Dalek entered the vault.
"Davros, you have betrayed us."
"It was Dalek Caan," Davros argued.
"The Vault will be purged, you will all be exterminated." The large Dalek shot at the control panel before anyone could stop it. Jack shot it dead in return with a large explosion.
"Oh, we've lost the magnetron," said the Doctor as he looked at the damage to the controls. "And there's only one planet left. Oh, guess which one! But we can use the Tardis!"
Buffy joined the Doctor in the Tardis to help. She was running calculations through her mind while looking at the readings when there was the unmistakable blast of an explosion. The Doctor ran out to see what it was. There was yelling, more explosions, and then everyone was running into the Tardis. With everyone safely inside, the Doctor sent the Tardis to the space outside of the exploding crucible.
"And what about the Earth?" Sarah Jane asked. "It's stuck in the wrong part of space!"
"I'm on it," the Doctor replied while turning a monitor. "Torchwood Hub, this is the Doctor. Are you receiving me?"
"Loud and clear," Buffy heard Gwen respond. "Is Jack there?"
"Can't get rid of him. Jack, what's her name?"
"Gwen Cooper," Jack answered.
The Doctor and Rose were sharing an odd look while staring at the screen. "Tell me, Gwen Cooper, are you from an old Cardiff family?"
"Yes. All the way back to the 1800s."
The Doctor and Rose grinned. "Ah, I thought so: spatial genetic multiplicity. Yeah, yeah, it's a funny old world… Now, Torchwood, I want you to open up that Rift manipulator and send all the power to me.
"Doing it now," said Tosh.
"What's that for?" Gwen asked.
"It's a tow-rope. Now then, Sarah, what was your son's name?"
"Luke," she answered. "He's called Luke, and the computer's called Mr. Smith."
"Calling Luke and Mr. Smith, this is the Doctor. Come on Luke, shake a leg."
"Is mum there?" the boy asked.
"Oh she's fine and dandy," replied the Doctor while Sarah Jane shouted in joy. "Now, Mr. Smith, I want you to harness the Rift power and loop it around the Tardis."
"I regret I will need remote access to Tardis basecode numerals."
"Oh, blimey, that's gonna take a while."
"No, no, no, no, let me!" said Sarah Jane as she rushed over. "K-9, out you come!"
"Affirmative, mistress," said an adorable yet mechanical voice.
"Oh, good dog, K-9," cooed the Doctor. "Give Mr. Smith the basecode."
"Yes, master. Tardis basecode now being transferred. The process is simple."
"Now then, you lot," said the Doctor as he walked around giving instructions. "Cos, you know why this Tardis is always rattling about the place? It's designed to have six pilots. And I had to do it single handed. But not anymore! Now we can fly this thing like it's meant to be flown! We've got the Torchwood Rift looped around the Tardis by Mr. Smith, and we're gonna fly Planet Earth back home! Right then! Off we go!"
The trip back was rather joyful with everyone working together. Buffy and the new!Doctor were able to walk around and help everyone during the gentle ride. It was almost too soon before the Earth was back in its rightful orbit and the Tardis was materializing in London.
Everyone started saying goodbyes with Sarah Jane first out of the Tardis. Buffy went over to Donna.
"So are you going home or sticking around with the old bean pole?"
"I should stop by, see that they're okay," Donna answered. "But I'm not leaving him. Not for anything. What? What's that look for?"
Buffy shook her head. "Nothing. Just… don't be a stranger."
Donna smiled and pulled Buffy into a hug. Buffy went outside where the Doctor was using his sonic screwdriver on Jack's wrist strap while Martha was looking on.
"I told you, no teleport. And Martha, get rid of that Osterhagen thing, eh? Save the world one more time."
"Consider it done," Martha said with a smile.
"And oh… Buffy," the Doctor said as he noticed her. "You're not staying?"
"I think Donna's got you covered," Buffy answered. "I should stay and keep an eye on things here. And next time be more careful with your regeneration energy! You got lucky this time."
"So no ill effects? That's an awful lot in your brain…"
"That I can push down until I need it. I'm good with that. Cleopatra's got nothing on me."
"What?" he asked with a confused expression.
"Queen of Denial. You know… Egypt… De Nile?" She shook her head and gave him a hug. As they hugged she could feel his head move up and down while he finally got it. Jack and Martha saluted, and Buffy joined them as they started walking.
"You know," said Jack to Martha, "I'm not sure about UNIT these days. Maybe there's something else you could be doing."
"Oh! You could come work for me!" Buffy said.
"That's not what I was thinking," Jack complained.
"You've got enough people working for you at Torchwood… including a doctor, which I don't have so please say you'll join my team! It's all the way in Seattle but I doubt we'll stay local long."
"Hey you guys!"
They all turned to see Mickey running towards them.
"Oh, I thought I got rid of you," groaned Jack.
"So what's your guys' plans?" Mickey asked.
"Torchwood, same old same old," said Jack.
"I'm trying to get Martha to come work for me," Buffy said. "Hey, you could too!"
"Who are you again?" Mickey asked. "We weren't actually introduced."
"Buffy Summers: part Timelord, former Doctor's companion, former UNIT officer, former Torchwood member, and vampire slayer. And his kid." She gestured a thumb to Jack. "You?"
"Mickey Smith. Not a tin dog."
Buffy looked puzzled but Jack laughed. Jack said, "Now that's a résumé. Anyways, if you guys wanna give Torchwood a hand today, dinner and drinks tonight are on me."
A.N. One chapter left. It's only partially written, but I plan to work on it during my lunch breaks so it won't be long before it's done. I'm desperate to finally finish this story.