"'Armageddon'?" Rose stared at the holograph. "I've seen the end of the world. It's not like this."
"It's not the end of the world, Rose," The Doctor said, fishing his glasses out of his pinstriped pocket. "It's the end of all things."
"There's some sort of massive instability just there," Jamie said, pointing. His father, the other incarnation of the Doctor, nodded his agreement.
Rose crossed her arms and frowned up at the display. "It looks like its spreading," she said, as the display shifted.
"That's because it is," Jack confirmed. "I see it now. See, that main line there is our timeline, the one that's all thick and bold. But you see how it's beginning to twist there? There's a great big paradox right in the middle of it, and it's effects are spreading to alternate timelines."
"If enough alternate timelines become too unstable, they…oh, it's difficult to explain," the eighth Doctor rubbed the bridge of his nose. "You see, if they start crossing quantum barriers, matter begins to cross each other and…"
"Universe go boom," Rose interjected dryly. "I understand enough about quantum physics to know what happens when you cross alternate time streams. Well," she corrected, "enough to know it's bad."
"You know anything about quantum physics?" The Tenth Doctor blinked owlishly at her through his eyeglasses.
She shot him a glare. "You're the one who insisted I get a proper education."
Eight rolled his eyes. "What she means is that Romana insulted her intelligence by offering to send her a tutor, so instead of telling her to shove off, she accepted the offer and learned everything her lovely little human brain could hold."
"I forgot most of it when we left Gallifrey," Rose admitted. "But you should have seen the look on Romana's face at the next dinner party."
"I don't remember her being that bitchy," the Doctor snorted.
His previous self shrugged. "She got elected president."
"Good point."
"She was alright once she got over you being married to a stupid ape," Rose said. "So what do we do about this paradox? Presumably we find it and fix it?"
Jack shook his head. "It's moving."
Rose frowned. "I don't understand."
Jack shrugged. "Yeah, me either. I've never seen anything like this. But if this continues…if the fabric of space-time becomes any further unwound…"
"Then it really is Armageddon," the Doctor said. "The end of all things."
A pinging sound erupted from the TARDIS control. Gwyneth frowned and tugged her pigtails over her ears, hiding behind Jack's legs. "What's that? I don't remember that sound," the Doctor frowned.
"Proximity alert," Eight explained, flicking a control and pulling down a view screen. "For the station…oh." His face immediately drained of color.
The other Doctor, Rose and Jack all moved in behind him to get a view. "Oh, my God," Rose said. "How can this be? This isn't possible!"
"It's a Time War," the tenth Doctor said grimly. "Anything's possible. Do you remember what I told you back in Cardiff in 1869? Your world can be rewritten in the blink of an eye?"
She met his gaze, eyes wide with fear. "I remember."
"So can mine."
"Doctor…" Jack said. "That's the same fleet."
"Same fleet as what?" the eighth Doctor frowned. "It's not the same fleet I just fought. That fleet was destroyed around Nestenrania in 586 BC, Earth reckoning. The only other fleet we knew of should be on their way to Gallifrey now, not here."
"No, it's not the same fleet that attacked Gallifrey," Jack said. "It's the same fleet that attacked Earth in 200100."
"Damn!" Rose pulled her mobile phone from her pocket. The same mobile, the Doctor noticed, raising an eyebrow. She pressed a button he didn't remember seeing before. "This is the Director," she said, "Send a priority signal: All Stations to Alert Status One. Get the shield satellites up and initiate invasion protocol. Repeat: All Stations to Alert Status One. Alert Status One. Invasion Imminent."
"Mum's the Director of Torchwood now," Jamie explained to the confused Doctor.
"I've got to get to the control room," Rose said. "Jack, come with me." She looked at both of the Doctors. "You two, figure out what's going on and how to stop it. We'll buy you the time. And you two," she leveled a look at her children, "will stay here, inside the TARDIS, and you will do precisely as your told, do you understand?"
"But mum, if I can –"
"No, Jamie," she said firmly. "You will not step foot outside this ship unless either of us tells you to, do you understand me?"
He turned to his father. "Dad, if you let me –"
"No, Jamie," he echoed Rose. "Your mother is right." He knelt before his son, putting a hand on the boy's shoulder, his blue eyes intense. "You're a brave boy, my son, and you're brilliant. You've seen and done things no one else your age in the universe has seen and done. But this foe is beyond you, do you understand that? These aren't any ordinary enemy, Jamie.
They're Daleks."
……………………………………………………………………..
"All Stations to Alert Status One…"
The voice repeated, and Rose stared at the speaker. "Does that sound a bit familiar to you, Doctor?"
He scratched one leather-clad shoulder and frowned. "Yeah. Sounds a bit like you, doesn't it? Must come from the same region of London as you."
"Must, yeah," she shrugged. "Where are we?"
"Maintenance tunnel, looks like," he said, taking her hand again and moving forward. "I think it opens up out here into some sort of landing bay."
"Feel like I'm in Star Wars," Rose muttered. "Like I should have big buns on the side of my head and a lightsaber."
"Those things are so flash," he snorted.
"What, lightsabers? I've always wanted one. I used to have the biggest crush on Luke Skywalker."
"I could make a Freudian comment there, but I'm going to be a good boy and restrain myself."
Rose repressed a grin. "Such a gentleman." It had taken them a while, but they were finally back to joking around again. After the incident with her father, she'd been afraid he'd take her home for good, but he hadn't.
And they were finally back to normal.
They rounded a corner and came to a set of doors, which the Doctor opened with the sonic screwdriver. As they slid open, Rose saw a massive chamber beyond – bigger than anything she'd ever seen on an Earth space station before.
This definitely topped Platform One. And Satellite Five.
There were rows and rows of… "Are those spaceships?" she asked, excitement creeping into her voice.
He grinned back at her. "Yup." He looked around at them. "Impressive, too, for the twenty-first century."
"But this all looks way more advanced than stuff on Satellite Five, but it's nearer in the future. Well, my future."
"If you lot hadn't had the Dark Ages, you'd have been in space a full century earlier than Sputnik."
"I remember hearing that somewhere," Rose mused. "You know, that's a good point. With you around, why did we have the Dark Ages? Don't you usually stop that kind of thing?"
"Could have done, yeah. Could have stopped the Holocaust, too. Doesn't mean that I should, and you've seen why."
She winced, but there was no real reprimand in his voice. It still stung, though.
He smiled gently at her and squeezed her hand in reassurance. "You see, even if you know what you're doing, even if it will save millions of lives, sometimes you just can't interfere with the past. If I'd prevented Hitler and the Holocaust, it would have led to something much, much worse."
"Worse than six million people starving in death camps?" She blinked in disbelief.
"Yes," he said, and there was a note of finality to his voice. "And no, I won't tell you," he said for good measure. "Some things it's better to have no concept of."
"Is that…" the thought seemed to pop out of her mouth before she had time to think about it, but she hesitated.
"What?"
She smiled and shook her head. "Never mind, forgot what I was going to say. Anyway, back to the spaceships…isn't this all a bit too advanced?"
"For Earth, yeah," the Doctor replied. "But these aren't Earth design, they're alien."
"From where?"
"Don't know, don't recognize the design," he mused. "But look there, a computer terminal! How convenient."
It took him only seconds to hack past the security programs with the sonic screwdriver. Within another second, he was flipping past screens of data while Rose moved closer to the hull of one of the spaceships, examining it. "It's got a name," she smiled. "'The Dawntreader'. That's out of a book, isn't it?"
The Doctor didn't reply, but his shoulders stiffened visibly.
"Come on," she chided, "I know you think I'm a bit of a chav, but I do know how to read, thank you."
"Rose."
Her name came out of his mouth like a strangled moan. Instantly her heart leaped into her throat and she rushed back over to him. "What is it? What's wrong?" She looked down at the computer screen and saw what he'd been looking at. "Doctor," she said slowly, "what are they?"
"Daleks," he whispered. "Thousands of them. Millions, maybe."
"But you said they were gone! That one Van Statten had was the last!"
"I don't understand, either," he said, closing his eyes. When he opened them again, he stared almost unseeingly past the computer monitor.
Rose could hear the clip of shoes against the landing bay floor. "Someone's coming," she said. "Maybe we can help them. We need to warn them or something."
The Doctor's gaze sharpened and he blinked in disbelief at the monitor. His head whipped around just as he grabbed Rose and pushed her behind the nearest spaceship. "Down!" he snapped.
……………………………………………………………………..
Rose strode along the landing bay floor, her work boots clacking against the flooring. "Jack," she said to the man beside her, "how can this be happening?"
He shook his head. "I don't know, Rose. But we'll get through it."
She swallowed past a sudden lump in her throat. "You said that last time."
He stopped, forcing her to stop to turn and look at him. "And I was right."
Rose shook her head and bit her lip. "You died, Jack."
"I remember it, thanks. It hurt. A lot." He smiled ruefully. "But you brought me back, Rose."
Her eyes widened. "Oh, God, Jack…what if this is my fault?"
He frowned. "What do you mean?"
"I still don't remember everything that happened on Gamestation. I mean, I know what I did, and I can remember pieces of it now. I remember destroying the Daleks. I remember bringing you back, and I remember throwing the words 'Bad Wolf' across my own time path."
He gave a soft 'ah' of comprehension as he realized where she was going. "And you think you may have changed something else?"
"The Doctor stopped me," she said. "He stopped me from holding onto the Vortex; made me let it go. But what if I was trying to change something? What if…I don't know, I mean, I could see everything through the Vortex. I could be everywhere at any time. Jack," she said desperately, "what if I tried to change something about the Time War? What if I could see what would happen to my life, what Gallifrey would mean to me…and what if I decided to not let it burn?"
Jack was silent for a long moment, looking at her and she could see in his eyes that he was taking her seriously. She was grateful for that. After the first few times she'd traveled with him, he'd stopped patronizing her. He'd started treating her more as a partner, and less as a little sister or a girlfriend or someone that needed protected.
"You don't know for sure," Jack said finally. "And until we do, it's no use to fret over it now. We have to focus on the task at hand."
"Right," she nodded gratefully. "Let's go. I'm going to get things running in the control room. Can you take control of Sigma Station and make sure the weapon's ready?"
"Already on it. I've radioed ahead, and my ship is fueled up and ready to go."
She cupped his face and gave him a quick, chaste kiss on the lips. "You're worth fighting for, Jack. You always have been, and you always will be."
"Same goes for you."
She grinned, just a bit maniacally. "See you in hell, then."
…………………………………………………………………………
"Go to her," he said.
The Doctor looked up from the quantum readout he was studying. "What?" he asked, tugging the glasses from his face.
"Go to her," his previous self said, putting one arm through the sleeve of his green frock coat.
He missed that coat. That had been an incredibly comfortable coat.
"I don't know what you mean," he said.
The eighth Doctor smiled. Had he always looked so enigmatic? "I love her," he said simply. "From the first moment I landed in London and stumbled across her. Literally. She was lying in a pile of rubble and I tripped and fell over her."
They both laughed, and he continued, "You see, as soon as I helped her, she recognized me and tried to hide the fact she knew me."
"She had a hard time when I regenerated," the tenth Doctor said softly. "I wound up showing her photographs of previous bodies. Bit of a stupid idea, and it only made things worse at the time."
"I knew I could change my own future," Eight went on. "I know the consequences of my actions, and I know that there are probably more I'm not aware of. In fact, all this is probably my fault."
"Was it worth it?"
His previous self cocked his head slightly. "Every second of it. I've never known what love is before. Not really. Not like this. And do you know what?"
"What?"
"It still is worth it. She's worth it. Which is why I'm telling you to shift off your backside and go talk to her before all of this goes to hell in a hand basket." He grinned. "She already knows how much I love her, but she needs to know that it won't end with this body. Or the next."
He stood. "But the Daleks…"
"Are still at the edge of the solar system. We have defenses in place for this sort of thing. It won't stop them, but it will buy us time. I'll contact Sarah Jane and see what she can do with the Farristellians on her end. Go to her," he repeated, pointing to the door.
………………………………………………………………………..
"Rose!"
She heard a voice call her name and looked around wildly. The Doctor's hand was still pressing her down behind the spaceship, and she looked at him quizzically. He frowned at her and shrugged, obviously as confused as she was. But the pressure keeping her in place didn't ease.
And suddenly she saw why.
The footsteps grew louder as their owner came into view. Hidden behind the spaceship, Rose was incredibly grateful to be out of sight. If she hadn't already seen something like this…if she hadn't already known it could happen, she may have just fainted from shock
It was her.
She tore her eyes away and looked at the Doctor. He looked at her in the same instant, and there was only confusion in his eyes. Silently, he shook his head, letting her know to remain quiet and out of the way. If anything, his grip keeping her in place tightened.
Well, she wasn't about to make that mistake again. Nodding back to him that she understood, she returned her gaze to the woman standing in the hallway.
God…it really was her, wasn't it? It wasn't just someone who looked like her, it was really…it was herself standing just there.
"Rose, wait!" the voice she'd heard a moment ago said. A second later, a tall, thin man with messy brown hair and a pinstriped suit strode into view.
She turned to look at him, the other Rose – Rose Two. "I need to get to the control room," Rose-Two said quickly. "If the Daleks get past the first round of security satellites before we've anticipated, then –"
"I know, believe me, I know," the man said. "I just…I wanted…I mean…"
They stared at each other for a heartbeat before she started laughing. Wearily, he pulled her into a warm hug. "God," Rose-Two snorted. "You're such shit at goodbyes."
The man pulled Rose-Two tighter against him. "This isn't goodbye. It wasn't last time, and it won't be this time."
"I love you," she said. "I want you to know that. It wasn't just him or…the other one. It was you, too."
"I know," he said softly. "I love you, too, Rose. I always have. Even longer than I've known about, apparently."
Rose-Two started laughing again. "We are so…"
"Romantic? Shakespearian? Domestic?" He waggled his eyebrows.
"Bloody weird."
He laughed, and then pulled her in for a kiss that lasted so long Rose thought they must have both run out of breath. Who was this man? He was handsome, she'd give him that. Who was he that he'd become so important to her?
He pulled away from the kiss, leaving Rose-Two panting for breath. At least he must be a good kisser. "Rose," he said, "if we get out of this alive, if we set this whole Armageddon thing right, then some things might…change."
Rose-Two closed her eyes. "I know. I can't say I'm ready for it, but I…I knew it would happen. I just didn't anticipate being here to see it."
"No, Rose," the man said. "It might not happen at all."
She frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Just that. Remember what I told you when you saved your father? How time would rearrange itself around him being alive?"
Rose's heart stopped beating for a minute, and the Doctor's hand on her back suddenly tightened into an almost painful grip. She snuck a glance at him, and he was looking at the two people in the hallway with the same amount of cold shock that she felt.
But…that couldn't be…
Rose-Two was saying something. "…happen this time? How could it? You mean you might not regenerate?"
The man frowned slightly and shrugged. "I don't know Rose, I really don't."
"What happens to you if…if it doesn't happen? God, what happens to us? If you don't regenerate into…him…then what if you don't find me in that basement at Henrik's? What if we never meet?"
The man smiled slightly. "I've already met you before Henrik's and the Autons, you saw to that. My guess is that time would rearrange itself over that meeting instead."
"And what about you?" she prompted.
"I'll still be with you, Rose."
"That's not what I meant."
"I know," he said, his voice hoarse. "I can't tell you what you want to hear, Rose, but I can tell you…I'll always be with you. Some way or another."
Rose-Two pressed her hand to her mouth and squeezed her eyes shut against tears as the man pulled her into another hug. After what seemed like an eternity, during which Rose and the Doctor both held their breath, the two finally pulled apart at the sound of someone shouting something incomprehensible.
The man turned away and shouted something back. "I've got to go," he said to Rose-Two, who nodded. "And so do you."
She nodded again, unable to speak.
He let go of her hand and started to walk away, but then paused and turned around. "Rose?" he said. "You're worth it. You're worth every second of it."
As he walked away and his footsteps faded, Rose-Two wiped away her tears and brushed her hair back from her face.
"So are you…" she murmured. "Doctor."
………………………………………………………………………………..
TBC