The Goddess of Time

by DoctorVanGogh

Rose lived her happily ever after with her Doctor in Pete's World, but now that story is over. Centuries later and Rose is living life in a new universe that is too mysterious to resist. However with Lilith trying to break the seals and Lucifer rising, Rose finds herself falling into a world that may not only have the power to bind her, but also the power to kill her - permanently.

8. A Little Bit of the Extraordinary 2

Dean meandered through the crowd of aliens drinking and laughing, much less disturbed than he had been before. The alien languages washed over him, surrounding him in a thick wall of impenetrable otherworld-ness. Never in his entire life had he imagined something like this was possible. He fought vampires and werewolves, had seen fairy tales come to life, had met angels. But aliens? Dean scratched the back of his neck, idly considering if this meant they'd have to take the crackpot aliens-abducted-me stories seriously now.

A pretty light green skinned alien smiled at Dean from near a high table. Dean grinned and headed towards her. Alien or not, there were some signals that seemed to be universal. He reached the table with a charming smile he'd only really used on one girl for the past few months, ignoring the feeling of unease that arose in him that it wasn't Rose he was smiling at like that. "Hi, I'm Dean."

The alien was pretty enough. She looked human despite the green hue to her skin. Her hair was a pale blonde colour and her eyes were a bit too large to be human, the bright blue iris' seemed massive. Her thin green lips turned down in a confused frown. She shook her head at him.

Dean frowned as well. "Sorry?" She opened her mouth and responded. Dean's brows rose when the only sounds that left the woman's mouth were alien. He opened his mouth, at a loss for words. The girl shrugged apologetically and walked away.

Dean huffed. How was he supposed to figure anything out if he couldn't even ask people questions? Was this why Rose knew so many languages? He'd been under the impression it had simply gone with the whole Goddess of Time thing.

At a loss in the ways of social interaction, Dean took in the building. There were various doors leading out of the bar and to the rest of what he could only assume was the space station of some kind. A door with a sign in an alien language on it caught his eye. He headed towards it, sure that if the words on the door were in English they would say 'Employees Only'.

He reached the door with ease despite the crowd. His eyes were instantly drawn to the ordinary circular knob to open the door. Dean's brows drew together, feeling like the little door handle was so very out of place on a space station. He tested it. Unlocked. As quietly as possible Dean slipped into the room.

The floor was dirt. Dean didn't know why that was the first difference he registered, but it was. The floor was hard packed dirt beneath his boots. The walls were a cold and slightly damp stone with torches hanging on the sides of the wall. Dean paused and quickly assessed if this was something he should show Sam and Rose. Deciding it was, he turned back to the door and met more hallway. It was gone. Wherever the door was that Dean had entered this medieval hallway through, it was gone now.

"Okay…" Dean whispered to himself, dragging the word out. He turned back around and headed further down the hallway.

He walked for almost ten minutes with no bend or change in the hall. Dean had decided it must be some underground tunnel, which was impossible because they were in outer space. "This has to be a trick." He whispered to himself.

Dean paused. Something had changed. Dean moved closer to the brick wall, squinting his eyes to see. He picked up the nearest torch and raised it closer to the wall. There, a small line of dark fluid seeped from somewhere above. Dean could smell it now, the fresh scent of blood. He didn't know how he could have missed it. Drips of blood seeped from the cracks above. Their ruby red hues glittered in the torchlight as they streamed down the dark stoned walls. Dean's eyes widened. "No." He whispered. He knew where he was now. "No." The torch fell from his grasp and he raced down the hall. The further he went the thicker the smell of blood became. He could taste it.

The hallway descended into darkness. Dean froze. He had entered a larger chamber; he could feel the draft against his bare arms. Bare? Hadn't he been wearing his jacket? It was gone now. All he was left in was his boots, jeans and t-shirt. Exactly what he had worn for forty years, exactly what he'd worn when he had died.

Dean spun around and raced to the hallway only to find jagged stone in its place. He pressed his palm against the wall, the sharp edges bit into his hand. His blood mixed with the blood of many others that continued to stream down the walls in small red lines.

Dean couldn't believe it. They'd done some things like this before, but never this elaborate. They had tricked him into thinking he was back before, but it'd never lasted this long. But they'd done it. And he was sure they'd manage to do it again. But before that he'd have to face the cold, true reality that he had been denied for so long.

Dean turned around and faced what he knew was behind him.

He was still in Hell.

---

Sam wandered through the crowd of aliens aimlessly. He couldn't understand any of the conversations around him so eavesdropping was out of the question. He eyed the various doors that presumably lead back out onto the rest of the space station. Sam briefly considered exploring the rest of the space station. Just as he had made the decision to leave through one of the many silver doors, he was stopped.

An amused and flirty voice called out to him in English, "Care for a drink Clifford?" Sam paused and turned to the woman sitting at the bar. She'd turned on her stool and was partially facing him, pinning him with her stunning violet eyes. She had a tanned complexion and long black hair elaborately braided down her back. Clinging to her tall, athletic body was a black jumpsuit with a zipper down the front. Sam raised his eyebrows. She looked human enough, and she spoke English. Rose had said they were on the other side of the universe though, so she couldn't be from earth. But she'd referenced Clifford the Red Dog; something he doubted had grown to universal fame.

The violet-eyed woman smirked at Sam's confused expression. "I've been to earth before. Multiple times actually." She explained kindly in an accented voice, an accent Sam had never heard before. Sam took the empty stool beside her. He was transfixed by her eyes, which he could now see were changing to a darker purple. The irises were large, too large in fact. Though she looked human enough, the girl clearly had a bit of alien in her. Her eyes were incredibly circular and the iris' were larger than that of a humans. They were beautiful, and the difference was subtle, probably only noticeable to a native earthling.

"But it's the 21 Century isn't it?" She turned to Sam and leaned an arm against the bar. "You guys won't make it out this far into the universe for a few more centuries yet." You guys, Sam noted the wording. She wasn't from earth, but looked human and clearly spoke the language. She'd said she'd visited before, clearly knew their history… a time traveller? Was that possible? Rose did it, but Rose was the exception to pretty much every rule. "What are you doing so far from Kansas, Dorothy?"

Sam smirked at her Wizard of Oz reference. The connection to his birthplace and the circumstances in which they'd suddenly found themselves across the universe were incredibly close. Hoping this girl might have some answers; he pulled his shoulders back and pretended he was someone of authority.

"That's what I'm trying to find out. Someone's got an illegal transport on earth that's throwing people out here. Know anything about that?"

The woman cocked her head to the side. Her eyes turned a murky navy blue colour with little flecks of grey. "Do you work for the Shadow Proclamation?"

Sam considered that question for only a second. "Yes."

The alien woman smiled and shook her head slowly. "I don't believe you."

Sam shrugged and looked around the space bar. "I wasn't told to convince anyone. I'm just trying to do my job."

The woman's smile was stunning. "Well now I believe it. You too stuck up to have a drink or what?"

Sam couldn't help but smile back. Her smile was sweet and warm, he'd sworn he'd seen that smile somewhere before. "Just one."

She winked. "That's what they all say." She raised her hand and was quickly gained attention from the bartender with the aide of her vibrant eyes. They seemed to draw people towards her. Or maybe it was that smile. Maybe she was a time traveller and he'd met her in the past. She ordered a couple of drinks in an alien language.

The beautiful alien turned back to Sam and smiled warmly again. There was something about that smile. "I'm Delaney."

"Sam."

"Does Sam have a last name?" Delaney asked with a smirk, her eyes turning back to that coy purple.

"Does Delaney?"

Delaney raised an eyebrow. "Delaney is my last name." She shrugged one of her shoulders delicately. "If it makes you feel better you can call me Laney."

Sam laughed and looked up at the ceiling, he shook his head lightly.

Their drinks came, two short glasses of a blue liquid with clear cubes of ice. Sam took a sip. He handled it better than whatever shot Rose had ordered for them. "So," Laney began after having taken a sip of her own drink, "transport? Who's behind it?"

Sam shrugged. "No clue."

"Well that's not helpful. Where'd you come out?"

Sam surveyed the room and pointed to a silver door he was fairly sure was the one they'd entered through. "A storage room back that way." Laney nodded and jumped up from her stool. She knocked back the rest of her drink and headed in the direction Sam had indicated. "Where're you going?" Sam followed her, leaving behind his barely touched drink. He grabbed her shoulder and spun her around, vaguely surprised that she wasn't incredibly shorter than him. Being around Rose's 5"4 self was clearly messing with his perception. "What're you doing?"

"I'm going to go check out the transport." She gave him a 'duh' look.

"That's really kind of you but I think I can handle it. I didn't ask for help." He tried to say it as politely as possible. He didn't want to hurt her feelings. He also didn't want a random alien girl hanging around if demons were still involved with these disappearances.

Laney shrugged. "I know, but I'm bored." With that she spun around and weaved through the crowd with a speed and precision that Sam lacked. He groaned and rolled his eyes as he chased after her. He reached the door just as she pressed the button for the doors to slide open. They stared at the interior of what was supposed to be a hallway, dumbfounded.

"Quite presumptuous of you, Sam." Laney looked up at Sam with a smirk and deep purple mischievous eyes to match.

Sam shook his head and followed the woman into what appeared to be a motel room. The covers on the beds were plaid, the ground carpeted and the rest of the décor dominated by a colour theme still clearly stuck in the 1970's. "I didn't… This isn't…"

Laney turned and grinned at him, her eyes more pink than purple now. "I didn't say I minded." She turned back around and surveyed the room.

Sam shook his head again. He looked behind him at the now closed wood door. "I don't understand. This was a hallway."

Laney nodded. "Oh it still is." She pointed to the door they'd entered through, which was now an ordinary wood door. "See that?" Sam followed the direction of her finger and looked at the edge of the door where the hinges met the wall. A small white light seeped through the cracks, barely noticeable. "It's a dimensional perception filter, like a perception filter on steroids basically. Technically we're still in the hallway. We haven't left the bar at all. We're just seeing something else. The person who controls it can put whatever they want here and whomever they want. You could live an entire life in here and walk out of this room with only five minutes having passed."

Sam nodded grimly. "I've dealt with something like this before."

Laney looked surprised. "Really? It's incredibly rare. The kind of technology you need to do this isn't easy to find. Not to mention the energy needed to power it." Sam was sure the Trickster would love to hear that. He'd undoubtedly be happy his work was admired.

Laney moved deeper into the motel room. She touched the fabric and opened the mini fridge, curious about almost everything she saw. "It looks like 21 Century earth… Have you ever been here before?"

Sam nodded. "Probably. Looks like a place I stayed in with my brother and dad when we were younger."

"Well that's worrisome. This," she waved her arms around in gesture of the motel room, "is from your memory." Laney shook her head, not liking the situation they'd found themselves in at all.

"And that's bad…"

Laney gave Sam a strange look at his hesitant response. If Sam were a part of the Shadow Proclamation then he would know more about perception filters. He should have recognized it immediately. "If it's pulling a scene from your memory than it's connected to our memories, and subsequently our minds. Whatever set up that transport wants to keep us busy, and away from it while it does what its got to do. Which begs the question, what's this guy after?"

Sam's eyes widened. "Rose!"

---

Rose sat at the bar where the Winchester's had left her. She stirred her new fruity drink with the black straw. She figured she'd wait around and see which of the boys found trouble first. If she went off then she knew she'd be the one to find it. She needed to be there for the boys this time. This was Rose's area of expertise and it wouldn't do for her to suddenly disappear on them.

Rose took another sip of her drink before turning to the suddenly occupied seat to her right. Death sat on the bar stool beside her. His back was slightly hunched, his gaunt face as pale as ever. Rose looked around, surprised to see the bar still crowded. This was the first time she'd ever seen Death around other people. She raised an eyebrow at the silent man as he took a sip of his beer. "Hello?"

Death took another sip of his beer. He didn't turn to her. "Erased from time."

"'scuse me?" Rose leaned closer, unsure if the noise had made her mishear him.

"That girl, the one and all the other girls. They're souls never made it into the astral plane. My reapers were quite distraught about that. They came to me instantly. I've looked into it as best I can. It seems that surge of energy we felt earlier was the effect of the girls disappearing." He turned to look at Rose then. His dark eyes were piercing as ever. "Not dying. But not being born. Never having existed at all."

"But what could do that? And why?"

Death's demeanour altered slightly back into his uncaring and distant façade. "I haven't the faintest idea." His eyes pinned her to her stool. "But it must be taken care of."

Rose nodded and took a sip of her drink. "On it."

Death raised an eyebrow at her, like a reprimanding parent. "I don't think you understand the severity of this issue. If time keeps getting meddled with, then you would suffer. It would weaken you, possibly damage you permanently."

Rose nodded again. "Right. Top of the list then." Death gave her a severe look. "I'll take care of it. I promise."

Death sighed. "Whatever this thing is, it has incredible powers. Do be careful." A glance around the room later and the seat beside Rose was once again vacant. She licked her lips and searched the bar for two tall plaid wearing humans. Nothing. Rose touched her finger to the communicator still hidden in her ear. "Sam? Dean?" No one answered.

Rose leaned her elbow on the bar and bit her fingernail as she considered going after them. If she left and they showed up she'll have missed them and they might go after her. If she stayed and they were in trouble she'd never forgive herself. Rose took another quick survey of the bar. A short three eyed man with talons on his hands stood by a door to the left. He was watching her. Rose narrowed her eyes as the man abruptly turned and disappeared through the door.

"Well that can't be good." Rose stood, giving Sam and Dean only a brief thought before she followed the three-eyed alien. They'd be fine, she thought once again. Rose eased through the crowd until she found the door the mysterious alien had left by. The mauve and white sign told her it was a maintenance door for employees only. Rose pulled out her sonic and unlocked it, looking over her shoulder quickly to make sure no one saw. She slipped through the door unnoticed.

Rose was in the TARDIS.

"Wasn't expectin' that…" She whispered to herself.

It was dark, powered down presumably. The metal grating and coral beams seemed cold and distant, a far cry from the alive and humming with adventure vibrancy she remembered. Rose stepped up the metal ramp and touched the console. It was cold and silent. This wasn't the TARDIS. She'd known that the second she stepped through the doors – as if the TARDIS would ever let her through with a buzz from a sonic – but the lack of life in the console confirmed it. This was a replica.

"Hello?" Rose called into the emptiness of the TARDIS look-alike. "Anyone there?" Hadn't the weird alien gone through this door? Had she gone through a different one? How could someone have even made a TARDIS replica?

Mind spinning with questions upon questions, Rose wandered past the console and to the door that lead deeper into the TARDIS. She paused halfway through the door when she heard a rustling from behind. She looked over her shoulder and back into the chillingly silent TARDIS console room. Nothing. Rose turned back and found herself in a sunlit house. Her breath caught. It was the house she'd lived in with her human Doctor. Rose softly touched the white wooden arch beside her that led into the living room. This was where she'd lived for decades in Pete's World. Michael, her second son was born in this house. She'd raised a family here. Rose bit her lip to keep the tears at bay. Her husband had died here.

Footsteps raced across the wood floors above. Rose's eyes shot to the ceiling, her breath stilling. The soft pitter-patter of children's feet moved across the floor above, laughter followed softly behind.

Rose glowered at the ceiling. "Alrigh', not funny." Her hands balled into fists. "Show yourself!" She shouted angrily at the house.

"Mummy?"

Rose spun around. A little girl who could only be two at the most, stood in the hallway by the front door of the house. Her light blond curls framed her face, eyes a bright brown like her father's. She was wearing flower printed pajamas, a small white stuffed rabbit hanging from one hand. "Mummy?" She asked again before covering her mouth to yawn, her white rabbit rising with it.

"Susie?" Rose whispered, her fists unclenching as her fingers began to tremble. "Bu'… you can't be here."

Susie frowned. Her bottom lip stuck out in a puppy dog pout she could have only inherited from her father. "I want juice!"

Rose shook her head and backed away. "You're not real." It was a trick, like the TARDIS. She wasn't real. She was just an illusion. Susie was gone. Susie was…

"Juice!" Susie raised her arms up, like she wanted to be held.

Rose backed away another step. She covered her ears and shook her head. The tears chocked her as she cried. "This isn't real." Susie rushed forward and hugged Rose's leg.

"Mummy…" She whined, dragging out the word. She pushed the side of her face into Rose's thigh, just the way she used to when she was alive.

Rose broke down. She fell to her knees and wrapped her arms tightly around her only daughter. She bit her lip hard enough to make it bleed – the only thing that would keep her tears away. Rose sat like that for a full minute before she pulled back. Susie had died before she'd even reached kindergarten; in a freak car accident that Rose only survived because she couldn't die. She was the only girl Rose had with the Doctor, and after she died they'd had no more children. Losing Ali had been hard enough. Losing Susie only a few years later had nearly killed them.

Rose pulled back and placed a hand gently on Susie's heart. Nothing. Susie was dead and this was just another illusion. Rose chocked. "Oh Susie. I'm so sorry, baby. I love you so much." Rose brushed her daughters soft curls back from her face. She placed her hands lightly on Susie's full pink cheeks. "You were so beautiful. You were perfect. Mummy loves you." Rose held her face gently, as if scared Susie might break. Trembling, Rose kissed her daughter on the forehead. Susie glowed gold and slowly disappeared into bright golden sand like fairy dust.

Rose stayed there crouched on the ground, her lips trembled with unshed tears. She couldn't even bring herself to be angry. It'd been centuries since she'd seen her daughter. The photos of her children, grandchildren and her parents that were on her vortex manipulator simply weren't the same. Rose let out a deep breath and stood. The illusion of Susie wasn't the same either.

Rose took deep steadying breaths as she looked around her old home. She opened the door to the basement, but it was simply the basement. Rose moved through the house. She opened doors and passed through arches with eyes closed, hoping that whatever had brought her here would take her somewhere else. Nothing was happening. She wandered through the cluttered, toy filled playroom on the main floor. Large windows looked out upon a bright green backyard with a playground and more toys. She tried to figure out where she was really; it couldn't be back in Pete's World. Rose knew this was an illusion, she just couldn't figure out how.

"Rose?"

Rose turned slowly, eyes wide. She blinked but still couldn't believe what she was seeing.

"Doctor?"

The Doctor rushed forward and wrapped Rose in a tight hug. Breathless, Rose clutched to his blue pinstripe suit. He looked just the way he had when they'd been left on Bad Wolf Bay together. His hair was messy from the wind. The smell of the sea was on his clothes. Rose pushed back. "You – you're not…" The words she'd said to her daughter so desperately were now lodged in her throat. They refused to come out.

The Doctor held Rose's face in his long hands. "I'm real." His brown eyes searched hers the way they always did when he was trying to get a very serious point across.

His face blurred behind a wall of tears. "You're an illusion." The words forced themselves out of their own accord.

"Well, yes." The Doctor admitted with a tilt of his head. He stepped back and gave Rose space to breathe. "But I'm also real."

Rose chocked on a watery laugh. She ran a hand through her hair to push it out of her face. "What?" She shook her head. "You're dead." She spit the words out like they were poison. The small smile his comment gave disappeared and she was suddenly very angry. She loved the Doctor, but he was supposed to be dead. He was supposed to be gone. She travelled for centuries simply to move on and now that she'd finally met another person who she might like, the Doctor was back. It wasn't fair. She was trying, he'd told her to try before he died. The Doctor had said he didn't want her sad and alone, he'd said she deserved to be loved. What was he doing there? How was he there?

The Doctor grimaced. "Again, yes. But heaven's just a network, really. And they don't deadlock the doors." He winked at her cheekily.

"Heaven?" Her mind raced with everything that the Winchester's had told her about ghosts. The Doctor had been dead for too long to be a malevolent spirit, or have unfinished business. He was from a different universe too, but if he was right and heaven was a network then only the Doctor could figure out how to access other universes through it.

The Doctor shrugged. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and rocked on his heels. "Or whatever you want to call it. Different names for different religions. Earth alone has millions of words for it."

Rose shook her head and sniffled. The soreness of her throat was subsiding and the tears had receded for now. She knew this Doctor couldn't be real, like Susie wasn't. But there was something about him. His eyes were so much brighter than Susie's had been. She'd been a memory on repeat, but the Doctor was saying things she'd never heard before.

"They've reached you telepathically, Rose," he was saying now. "They just wanted to pull an image from your mind to trick you, but I'm not human. At least, my minds not human. Time Lords work differently; they got more than they bargained for with me. This isn't really me," he gestured to his body, "but it is my mind. This is me, the Doctor, talking to you, Rose Tyler."

Rose stared at him. Just stared at him. It was the Doctor, it was actually him. She didn't know how to take that. She was angry that he was back right when she had started to move on. She was happy to see him, hear him, be able to touch him. She missed him like she missed a limb. But the sight of his face made her think of all the family she had lost. He may have been there then, but he couldn't stay. The Doctor was dead, and despite all his previous regenerations, he couldn't cheat death again. He would leave and Rose would be left heartbroken as if it were the day he died all over again.

The Doctor raised a hand and gently grazed his knuckled along her cheekbone. He looked sad. "It's been centuries for you hasn't it?"

Rose rushed into his arms. She held him just as tightly as he held her. "I thought I'd mourned you." She mumbled into his suit and shirt. The tears hadn't fallen yet out of sheer will, but Rose knew they would soon if they continued down this emotional path. She was torn between loving the feel of his arms around her and hating him for putting her through this.

"You have," he whispered, his mouth pressed against the top of her head, "but it's always difficult to see a ghost." He knew this was killing her. The Doctor would have done anything to see Rose, but not at her own expense. Which meant that he had important information for her.

Rose sighed and stepped back. She shook her self and straightened her shoulders. There was no more time for tears and heartache. "Alrigh', how long have we got?"

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "You mean when do I go back?" Rose nodded. "Not sure exactly. This thing," he pointed to their old house, "it's called a dimensional perception filter. It's incredibly rare and takes an incredible amount of power to run it. And as I've mentioned before, whoever is controlling it is doing it telepathically. The rooms will change, some will be random but most will be familiar. They're from your memories."

"I was in the TARDIS before, but I haven't gone anywhere since."

The Doctor raised his eyebrows and leaned forward, his manic energy was starting to build up. "Ah, see, that's because these people are playing with you. They'll be bringing up illusions of people from your memory, try and trick you and make you think this is real. Bit of torture, bit of guilt. Pretty routine. You were stuck here because picking me up took a bit longer than they expected. I can show you a point to focus on that'll allow you to access the perception filter. That'll let you travel to another area within this maze they've set up."

"Will you follow me through?"

The Doctor paused. He considered for a moment before he said, "Yes, but I might end up somewhere else within that section of the maze. I'll try to find you again. But I won't disappear fully until you shut this all down." He gestured with a shrug of his shoulders and a look up at the ceiling, indicating the perception filter.

Rose frowned, suddenly very concerned for the Doctor. "And then? Where do you go? What happens to you?"

The smile that the Doctor gave Rose was incredibly tender. "I'll go back. Don't worry about me Rose. We're all very happy. Happy and safe."

Rose tensed. For almost a full minute she didn't breathe. "All?"

The Doctor opened his mouth, but no words came out. His eyes were watery as he finally said, "All but one." The air rushed out of Rose's lungs. "You were right, Rose. The entire time, he's alive, Rose. He's still alive. I don't know where, maybe this…" He paused and looked around in a half confused half disturbed manner. "…this weird universe you're in, maybe another."

Rose's hands rose to her mouth. Her eyes pressed closed as she let out a light, happy laugh. Ali was alive. Her son was out there. "Oh thank god." Rose touched her hands to her heart. She smiled brilliantly at the Doctor. "That's… Doctor tha's the best news I've heard in a really long time."

The Doctor shrugged nonchalantly, though his smug smile gave him away. "I do my best."

Rose dropped her hands to her sides. She took a cleansing breath and released all the emotional baggage that had previously piled onto her in the past twenty minutes. "Alrigh', show me the way out. I gotta get to Sam and Dean and then we gotta shut this thing down and whoever is runnin' it. Some girls have been erased from time already."

"Sam and Dean?" The Doctor leaned forward, eyebrows raised. "No, wait… erased?"

Rose waved her hand carelessly. "Yeah, I'll explain when we find the boys."

"The boys?"

Rose could almost see the old jealousy rise up in him. "Doctor…" She couldn't help the smile that touched her lips.

"Right, yes. Sorry." He turned and led Rose toward the front door of the house. He pointed to the corner of the door. "See that light along the crack of the door?" Rose squinted at the door before nodding. "When you focus on the perception filter, focus on that component of it. It'll allow you more control over where you go. Instinct should take you from there."

Rose nodded. "Righ'." She turned to the Doctor. "I'll see you on the other side."

The Doctor smiled. "Just like old times. Shiver n' Shake!"

A moment later and Rose and the Doctor were gone. The house disappeared. All that was left behind was a dark and dusty maintenance room.

---

Sam opened the closet door and stepped out onto an open field. The sun was just setting in the distance. The sky was lit up with bright oranges, purples, pinks and blues. The grass was short in the field, the empty space lined with trees from a surrounding forest. Sam frowned, the place looked familiar to him.

Laney swung the door shut behind them. "Okay. A field. Is this it then? The end?" She stepped around Sam and walked deeper into the field aimlessly. "I mean, where's the next door gonna come from now?"

Sam rubbed his forehead as he inwardly groaned. They'd been through numerous locations, half of them motels that he and his brother had stayed at. Sometimes it was just a random generic place, like a family restaurant at dinnertime. More often than not they were being thrown to places in Sam's past. It was starting to give him a migraine. He needed to find Rose. He was almost positive that whatever this thing was – and he was fairly sure it was a Trickster – was after Rose. He didn't know why yet but he had to get to Rose and Dean and then they could all figure it out.

"This is a waste of time." Sam kicked his foot through the grass and ran his hands through his hair. "We need to find Rose and Dean."

Laney looked at him over her shoulder. "Right, you mentioned them about two cottages and the Grand Canyon ago. Partners?" She raised an eyebrow.

"Uhh… yeah."

"You don't work for the Shadow Proclamation, do you?"

"Uhh… no." She should have known. The Shadow Proclamation almost never recruited humans from as early as the 21 Century to work for them.

Laney nodded and faced Sam fully. She crossed her tight jumpsuit clad arms over her chest. "So who are Rose and Dean?"

"Dean's my brother." Sam admitted. "Rose is a friend of ours."

Laney pursed her lips as she considered this minor deception of his. She nodded. "Okay. You think they're lost somewhere in this nuthouse?"

Sam chuckled despite himself. "I'd be surprised if they aren't."

Laney sighed. "What have I got myself into?" She perked up instantly, grinned and winked at Sam over her shoulder as she walked away. "Come on, Big Foot." They wandered through the field towards the edge of the forest.

Sam glanced at Laney out of the corner of his eye once, twice. He was dying to ask her, "So are you a time traveller?"

"Yup!" Laney replied in a chipper manner. Sam was shocked by her answer. He hadn't even realized he'd asked that aloud. "I'm from the future." She wiggled her fingers at him as she said the words like the opener to a 1940's horror movie.

Sam smirked. "Yeah? So what're you doing at a bar in the 21 Century?"

Laney nodded her head from side to side as she considered his question and how best to go about answering it. "See, from my time, time travel is pretty safe to use. It just requires a lot of money, energy, and time to prepare. It almost isn't worth it. I was working for this company that'd devised a new way to time travel. I was beta testing it and it worked. I travelled all over the 21 Century, spent a lot of time on earth."

"But…?"

Laney smiled at him. "But, then it didn't work." She didn't elaborate and Sam didn't ask for details, though there was clearly a lot she was holding back. "Because I was spending so much time in the 21 Century, I was here when it stopped and… well I've just been trying to make the most of it ever since."

Sam nodded. "Right, travelling around space?"

She sent him an impish grin. "What gave it away?"

They reached the edge of the field near the forest. Through the trees they could see another opening and what looked to be a road. They moved into the forest and headed in the direction of the road. The place didn't look like somewhere he'd been anymore. He looked over his shoulder at the open field before he disappeared into the woods. Maybe it was just pieces of his memory. They broke through the woods and ended up on the paved road they'd spotted.

Sam raised his eyebrows. "Whoa." It was the Impala. It was sitting on the road as if they'd left it there for a quick walk in the woods. Sam looked around for Dean, half expecting him to be waiting for them by his baby.

Laney saw Sam's look of recognition at the automobile. "Another memory? We haven't had one in a while."

Sam nodded and shrugged as he walked up to the car. "Yes and no. It's not really a memory. But the car, it's what Rose, Dean and I travel around in."

Laney looked impressed as she walked around the sleek black muscle car. "Really? She's pretty." They stood on either side, Laney at the passenger's door and Sam at the driver's side. "But if you drive a retro car," Sam's smile was amused, Laney pointed a finger at him over the hood of the car, "don't laugh, I'm serious. It's a car. I'd only ever seen pictures of these before I travelled around earth. If you drive this, how'd you get to the other side of the galaxy?"

"The teleport."

Laney's mouth made an 'o' shape. "Right, I forgot about that. And now that I've remembered I'll reiterate my previous question, 'Why would someone set up a teleport on earth during the 21 Century?'"

Sam shrugged. "Yeah, no clue. I'm sure Rose will figure it out.

Laney pursed her lips and leaned against the side of the car. "Right… so you and this Rose girl…?" She raised her eyebrows, silently questioning him. Sam almost took a step back when he saw Laney's expression. It hit him like a physical blow. The sharp arch of her brow, with the slight pucker of her lips and the hard glint in her crystal blue eyes; it was jealousy. But not just anyone's jealousy. The expressions and mannerisms. That smile. Jess. It was all Jess. Laney reminded Sam of Jess.

Sam's took in a shuddering breath. He didn't know how to process his most recent revelation about the humanoid alien before him. "What? Uhhh, no. No. Dean would… no." He shook his head vehemently.

Laney nodded nonchalantly. "Right, right… And are you then…?" They looked nothing alike. Laney was all dark hair and pale creamy skin. Her eyes were wider and the constant colour change was incredibly alien to him. But the way she cocked her hip to the side, the frame of her athletic body and the way her lips curled up into that soft smile.

Since Jess' death, Sam had always considered himself to be emotionally unavailable. Ruby didn't count. Any of his little trysts didn't really count in his mind. They were physical. Sometimes he found himself with Ruby just so he could justify wallowing in self-pity and thinking about Jess. The truth was that four years had passed and he still wasn't over her. He'd never be over Jess.

But Laney wasn't Jess. She was a time traveling alien from the future. They were the furthest things from each other. So why was he suddenly thinking of Jess when he looked at her? More importantly, why didn't he feel guilty when he did?

"Let's just find Rose and Dean, okay?" Sam opened the driver's side door and got in the car.

Laney smirked, amused by his awkwardness and piled into the car beside him. "Whatever you say, cowboy."

---

The Doctor appeared in a dark and cold underground cellar. He blinked a few times as his eyes adjusted to the sudden darkness that had enveloped him. There were faint sounds of people calling out, screaming and crying. The Doctor suppressed a shiver and ran a hand through his hair. "Blimey…" He whispered to himself, this was supposed to be someone's memory?

Movement alerted the Doctor to another presence in the room. In the corner of the cellar was a crumpled body. "Hello?" The shadow moved slowly before a fit of body wracking coughs overcame them. The Doctor instantly went to his pockets, only mildly surprised to find them still bigger on the inside. He pulled out a bottle of water. Uncapping the top, he eased closer to the coughing man. "It's alright," he spoke softly, not wanting to spook the sick man, "just ease back a bit." The Doctor helped the man lean back against the jagged stonewall. "That's it, there we go." He gently tipped back the water bottle to help the man drink. He sipped a bit of the water before coughing again.

The Doctor waited patiently for the coughing to subside. The man was bruised. His face didn't seem swollen but there was a dark purple colour along his right cheekbone and his left jawline that suggested he'd been there for a while. Blood had dried along his bottom lip and the darker stains on his shirt and jeans suggested there were more wounds yet to be seen. A simmering rage bubbled in the Doctor's veins. Who had done this?

"Can you stand?" The Doctor asked gently. He greatly hoped this wasn't one of the boys Rose had mentioned. She was going to be furious.

Bright green eyes opened and fixed the Doctor with a much steadier gaze than he would have expected from someone so utterly beaten. "Who are you?" His voice was deep and gruff, untrusting.

"I'm here to help." The man's cold gaze didn't waver. "I'm the Doctor." A flicker of confusion passed through the man's eyes before quickly disappearing. The Doctor caught the look and quickly understood that somehow this man recognized his name. "You've heard of me?" That was almost never a positive occurrence.

The man narrowed his eyes at the Doctor. He shook his head almost imperceptibly, as though he hadn't realized he was doing it. "This isn't real. You don't exist. You were just… a part of the story."

The Doctor widened his eyes as he thought. The beaten man's words flying through his mind as he tried to fit them into an order that made sense. He couldn't. He was missing facts. "Sorry, what story is that?"

The man moved to get up. He groaned with the effort. The Doctor stepped back quickly before offering his hand and pulling him up. He was tall; the Doctor observed, and far more muscled than the Time Lord. Despite being of similar heights, the tortured man with his muscles and larger frame looked so much more… imposing than the Doctor.

"What's your name?" The man didn't answer the Doctor. He looked around the small stoned prison, clearly searching for something the Doctor couldn't see. Who had Rose been searching for? "Are you Sam?" The man's head whipped around to the Doctor. "Or Dean?" The man narrowed his eyes at the Doctor but remained silent. The Doctor shoved his hands into his pockets and nodded, Dean it is. "Right, going with the whole 'not-here-not-real' thing then?" The Doctor surveyed the room more closely as he rambled. "Makes sense, technically I'm not here. Well not physically at least. Somethin' about this universe though, you lot were able to get my mind here and let me tell you that's no easy feat."

Dean barely listened to what he believed to be a hallucination and instead focused on finding a doorway out of hell. He'd never found one before, but that didn't stop him from trying. Briefly he wondered why he was locked away in the stone room again, and not out torturing other souls.

"Look, I know you think I'm just an illusion and to an extent you're right but you need to ask yourself something Dean," Dean turned and glared at the Doctor, the Time Lord didn't back down, "am I an illusion brought on by this hell or is this hell also an illusion?"

"What do you mean?"

"The problem with dreams is that they feel so real in the moment. Afterwards you think to yourself 'of course it was all fake', you can feel how fake it was. The memory is blurry and fading away even as you try to recall it." The Doctor stepped closer to Dean, his brown eyes wide and intense as he tried to get his point across to the hunter. "Illusions, hallucinations, perception filters, take your pick. They work the same way; they pull on the same part of your mind to trick you. So what you need to ask yourself Dean is: are the memories you had before this fading away? Was it all a hallucination?"

Dean's brow furrowed in confusion. He looked all around his prison, one he knew so well. He thought back on his adventures the last few months. Sam's connection with Ruby, the seals, Castiel, Rose. Was it a hallucination? It had to be, because if it wasn't… how was he in hell again? How was Rose's dead husband standing before him? But the things they'd done, he remembered it all so clearly. Dean looked down at his hands as he recalled crawling out of his own grave. The dirt in his fingernails. The lack of air and his joy at breaking through to the surface. His anger at finding out where Sam had been and what he'd been doing.

Dean suddenly recalled when he'd been attacked by the Djinn. Dean knew all too well the difference between hallucination and reality. One thing he remembered of his fake world with the Djinn was that sometimes reality bled through. Dean narrowed his eyes at the walls around him. He focused all his concentration on pushing past the fog that was making him see what wasn't real. Black spots dotted his vision. He was about to stop when the walls flickered out of existence. It was only a second, but it was enough. He was still in the maintenance room he'd first left the bar to go search. Dean hadn't moved. He wasn't in hell. This was the illusion. Dean looked down at his bruised and battered body. Whatever kind of illusion it was, it felt incredibly real.

Dean looked up at the Doctor, who was watching him closely as he waited for Dean's reaction. "Okay," Dean nodded, "but I still don't get how you're here. You're supposed to be dead."

The Doctor grinned. Oh, he could see why Rose went with these boys. If Sam was anything like Dean, than Rose had found herself a couple of great companions. "I am dead, but your universe really doesn't seem to care about that." Dean opened his mouth but the Doctor continued. "I'm a projection, a part of the whole illusion. But they pulled on my memory and got all of me instead. So here I am." The Doctor waved his hand.

"Okay." Dean took a moment to process that. "Who are 'they'?"

The Doctor shrugged. "Whoever's set up the dimensional perception filter." At Dean's blank face the Doctor elaborated. "This whole illusion. Makes you think you're in one place but really you're in another. It's tricky stuff, takes a lot of power and intelligent technology not to mention a brilliant designer."

Dean nodded. "Alright, well we should get out and find Rose and Sam and tell them about it."

The Doctor shook his head. "Rose is already here. Which is the sole reason I'm here. They're using your memories against you, to try and trick you and break you down. Rose and I popped out of the room we were in to this one." Dean looked around the small stone prison. The Doctor tugged on his ear as he made a face. "Yeah, don't know where Rose is." He made a hand gesture. "Probably somewhere else in your illusion." The Doctor looked up at the ceiling as he considered the stonework and tried to guess how old the place was. "While we're on the topic, where are we? Some sort of castle, I expect?"

"Hell."

The Doctor turned to Dean, his eyes cold and his mouth pinched into a straight line. "Well we'd better find Rose then." He pointed to a wall. "The door out is there." He then shoved a hand into his pockets. "I wonder if…" His hand came back out with a rubber ducky. The Doctor grinned and winked at Dean. "Bigger on the inside. Didn't think they'd have anything in them, but if I can just find my sonic…"

Dean gave the Doctor a confused look before turning towards where he said the door was. That was the man Rose had married? He was like a child in a suit pretending to be an adult. But even as Dean thought it, he knew he was only kidding himself. The Doctor had a dark look in his eyes, one he covered with an easy smile and quick wink. The Doctor was a burdened man, tortured and self-hating. It terrified Dean how similar he felt to the man Rose had loved. She certainly had a type.

The wall slid to the side and the little blonde goddess raced into the room. "Dean!" She threw herself into his arms and despite how much it hurt with all his cuts and bruises, Dean held her as tightly as he could. "Are you okay?" Rose pulled back the second she felt Dean wince. "Oh my god, Dean what happened."

"It's nothing, I'm fine. I just got caught up in the… illusion." Dean pressed his fingers into her waist; slightly distracted by the way her gold dress seemed to glow in the hell-light.

"Come here." She pulled his face down and kissed his forehead, releasing a wave of energy that erased his injuries from time. "Can't mess up tha' pretty face," Rose said with a smirk, "only thing you've got goin'."

Dean smirked back. "You callin' me pretty again?"

"Oh, shut up." Rose smiled and turned to the Doctor. She was surprised to see him harbouring a lot less jealously then she'd have expected after that display. "Three of us now, we should find Sam, yeah?"

Dean's eyes widened. "He's here?" He looked around their small cell.

Rose touched Dean's arm softly. "Probably a different illusion for him. But yeah, 'm assumin' at least. I didn't see him in the bar when I left."

The Doctor nodded. "We should probably leave here anyways. We don't want to be here when another memory of this place crops up."

Rose nodded. She turned to the door she'd entered in through. It had slid closed again behind her. She pulled her sonic screwdriver out of her pocket and opened it back up. The three stepped through into what appeared to be Bobby's study. Books were scattered across the room in their usual disarray, a used blanket strewn across the couch, the tiny television sat in the corner. There was even a bottle of Jack Daniels with a half used glass beside it, like Bobby had just stepped out and would be back any moment. Rose glanced over her shoulder, but the door they'd passed through was gone.

The three of them sighed in relief. Simply being in the memory of hell was oppressing. Memory… the Doctor glanced at Dean over Rose's head. Whoever this man was, he had been to hell. The Doctor replayed Dean's earlier interaction with Rose. He was inclined to believe that it was a mistake, that this man wasn't supposed to end up in hell; but there was something about his eyes. The man was tortured in more ways than one and the Doctor knew first hand how that weighed on a person.

His gaze moved down to the little blonde woman between them as she explained to Dean that the victims had been erased from time and that's why he and Sam couldn't remember the case. Of course Rose was attracted to Dean. She was simply drawn to people who needed her, and she never gave up on them.

"But if they're doing that," Dean was saying, "erasing people from time, how was there a missing persons case for multiple girls in the first place?"

"Whoevers doing this must have taken the girls but held off on erasing them right away." Rose shrugged. "Donno why, but that's the only way that could have happened like that."

"And you remember because you are Time. So obviously they can't get it past you."

"Like to see them try." Rose smiled her tongue in teeth smile as she winked playfully.

Dean smiled and looked around the familiar surroundings once more. He nodded to himself before saying, "We should find Sammy. He's somewhere in this maze and I'd rather him with us."

Rose nodded. "I agree. You two stay here, I'm gonna go pick him up, alrigh'?"

"You'll be okay?"

Rose smiled warmly up at the hunter. "Promise." Rose turned and gave the Doctor a stern look. "And you don't go dissapearin' without sayin' goodbye."

The Doctor grinned. "Wouldn't dream of it." Rose nodded again. She glanced back and forth between the Time Lord and the hunter before closing her eyes and focusing in on Sam. Rose glowed brightly like time energy, the way her eyes did when she would come back to life. A second later and she'd disappeared back into the maze of memories.

There was a pause of silence between the hunter and Time Lord for a long moment. Dean turned towards a stack of books, his concentration on the problem at hand. He picked one of the books up and was only vaguely surprised to find that it was full of information. The memory had to be Rose's or Sam's, Dean figured, since he knew for a fact he didn't have Bobby's books memorized. He flipped through a couple of them, wondering if one about the Trickster was in the mix. It was the only monster he could think of with enough power to run a scam like this.

"So where are we?" Dean spun around at the Doctor's question.

"A friend's, Bobby's. It's his house."

The Doctor nodded and picked up a book. He fanned it from cover to cover and put it back. "Interesting collection of books."

"They come in handy for hunting." The Doctor frowned at Dean in confusion. "Sam and I, and our friend Bobby, we hunt monsters. Vampires, werewolves, shape shifters, demons."

The Doctor's eyes widened, a small smile played at the corner of his lips. "Really? They're real in this universe? Actual monsters? Not aliens?"

Dean forced down a chuckle. He looked about as excited as Rose does whenever they come up against a new monster. "Yeah. But they're not all sunshine and rainbows. They're monsters. Killers, psycho's, all around bad things."

The Doctor nodded, agreeing with Dean before making a face and saying excitedly, "But come on. Monsters." Dean rolled his eyes and moved towards a different stack of books. This was clearly where Rose got her sense of wonder in the face of bloodthirsty creatures. Dean didn't know whether he should see the Doctor as a good influence or a bad one. "And you're teaching her to do it too?"

Dean glanced over his shoulder and found the Doctor far more serious than he had been since they met. "Rose?" The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Yeah I am." The Doctor didn't miss the fact that Dean singularized that statement. "She's good at it too, a real natural."

The Doctor levelled Dean with a stare the hunter couldn't quite decipher. It was intense and piercing, the Doctor's eyes seemed to see straight through him into the depths of his tarnished and bruised soul, and analyzed it. When the Time Lord finally spoke it wasn't what Dean expected. "Rose is precious."

Dean's brow furrowed in confusion. "I know." The depth of her compassion alone was something precious, not to mention her fight, her humour, her intelligence or her smile. Dean knew Rose was precious. The fact had never been in question.

The Doctor disagreed. "No, you don't know." Dean turned around and gave his full attention to the long dead husband, a scowl already in place. "There are millions upon billions of universes in the world. Some of them you were never born in, others you've simply got a different life. Rose isn't in any of these worlds. There is no version of Rose in any other universe. Do you know how impossible that is? There are even other versions of me! I mean, they're not Time Lords, but still…"

Dean's eyes narrowed. "What does this have to do with anything?" He gritted his teeth, fully prepared to tell the Doctor to take a hike if he so much as thought of telling Dean to leave Rose alone – not that he was after Rose. Not that he and Rose were going to do anything – no, they'd talked about that. It was just the principle of the matter.

"Since Rose doesn't exist anywhere else, neither do our children." The hardness in Dean's glare softened to a more curious look. "They are the most import people in all the universes to me."

Dean fixed the Doctor with a determined look. "I'll make sure they're safe, Doctor." It wasn't just a promise; it was a vow.

The Doctor shook his head. "No – well yes, do that – but also: be good enough for them. I tired my best but being good enough for someone like Rose is almost impossible. It's your turn now."

Dean's brow slowly rose incredulously. "Are you – are you giving me your blessing?"

The Doctor considered that for a moment, his head cocked to the side. "Well yes… I guess I am."

Dean's eyes widened. He shook his head and took a step back from the alien. "Rose and I – we're not…"

The Doctor smiled ruefully and scratched the back of his neck, his other hand having found his way into the pocket of his trousers. "Yeah," the Doctor nodded, "I was the same at the start. You might have your own reasons for holding back from each other, they might be very good reasons. But whatever they are, I don't want them to be because of me. I died a very long time ago. And Rose deserves to be happy, to be loved."

The Doctor's eyes were wide in a way that Dean could only see as an attempt to hold back tears, though there were none in sight. Despite the centuries that separated the long dead Doctor and his Rose, he still clearly loved her very much. Dean returned his attention to the Doctor as he spoke again. "I would never begrudge Rose anything, especially not love. She has been through so much, and I'm sad to say that almost all of it is entirely my fault. Don't make my mistake, don't hold her at bay. Don't waste time. Just love her. It's the most exceptional experience in the world."

Dean swallowed. He wasn't willing to admit just how much the Doctor's words had affected him. He'd been fighting a losing battle against Rose from the start, but it was his own battle and one he didn't feel entirely comfortable speaking to Rose's dead husband about.

"Do you know where Ali is?"

The Doctor didn't look at all surprised by the change in topic. He let out a breath, silently relieved that the conversation was over. He shook his head. "No. I know he's not dead. Rose thinks he's in your universe and she's almost never wrong. You'll learn that the hard way."

"There's nothing you can tell us?"

The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck again as he thought. "'fraid not, except – Ali was in the TARDIS when the explosion went off, causing an abrupt dematerialization. The TARDIS was still growing though. So she got a bit confused and travelled through" the Doctor paused when he saw the openly confused look on Dean's face, "right sorry. Ali should still be in the TARDIS. Chances are the TARDIS even fell from a much higher level of the atmosphere."

"He fell out of the sky? Can he survive that?"

The Doctor nodded, unconcerned. "If he's in the TARDIS, then yes. The TARDIS would then go on lockdown and not let Alistair out until she deemed it safe." Dean froze momentarily at the mention of Ali's full name. Rose hadn't used it before and he quickly reasoned why. It was far too similar to Alastair's, the demon who'd tortured him in Hell.

Pushing those much darker thoughts away, Dean frowned at the Doctor in confusion. He'd called the Impala 'baby' and 'she' countless times, but there was something about the way that the Doctor spoke about the TARDIS. It was as if the other man thought it was alive. "How can a time machine do all that?"

"She's not just a machine. She alive." Dean raised his eyebrows. He wished he could say that he'd heard crazier things. "The TARDIS is an alien herself. Time lords grew them back on my home planet. The only other one left in existence is my one in our original universe."

"Wait, but why…" A bright light cut off Dean's question and both men shielded their gaze as Rose returned.

"'m back!" Dean and the Doctor looked up at the bright and shimmering woman, her gold dress emanating a softer version of her goddess-like time energy. Rose grinned mischievously at Dean and whispered, "Sam got a girlfriend!"

Dean raised his eyebrows and glanced over at his younger brother standing next to a beautiful young woman with long braided back black hair and a tight fitted jumpsuit to match. Dean smirked. "Good work Sammy! 'bout time you got laid." Sam glared at his brother before quickly entering Bobby's study with the humanoid alien at his side.

The Doctor's eyes took in the female and widened considerably. "Oh! Well aren't you beautiful!" Dean's eyes widened and he looked to Rose, waiting for her to explode as her husband drooled over another woman. He didn't expect Rose to be smiling widely, brimming with excitement. "You're a Draless, right?" The Doctor was asking the woman as he leaned down and looked closely into her eyes. Dean was shocked to notice her eyes had turned a muddy brown when they had been purple before. Upon closer inspection he realized that the irises were actually larger than a humans, the shape of her eye shape was much more circular, almost larger. She looked human enough, but Dean quickly doubted that she was.

The woman leaned back, away from the Doctor's inquisitive stare. She nodded awkwardly.

Rose jumped forward beside the Doctor excitedly. "Half Draless you mean. The other half looks relatively human, right?"

"Uhh, yes?" The woman looked to Sam who shrugged, not knowing who the extra man was.

The Doctor stood straight and considered Rose's words for less then a second. "Human plus?"

Rose nodded and shrugged. She looked over her shoulder to Dean and explained. "The Draless are an alien race that is incredibly kind, not to mention beautiful. You can see it in her eyes."

"Windows to the soul," the Doctor philosophized. "Mind you, that's incredibly true for a Draless."

Sam turned a questioning look to his brother. "Who is this?" He gestured to the Doctor.

"Oh!" The Doctor exclaimed. "Right, I'm being ride again. It's a habit." He stuck out his hand and quickly shook Sam's. "I'm the Doctor, and you must be Dean's little brother Sammy, Sam, Samuel."

"Laney." The woman introduced of herself as she shook the Doctor hand as well.

Sam frowned at the odd man. "Rose's dead husband?"

"Yup!" The Doctor winked and smiled. Sam turned to Rose with a glare that demanded an explanation. Rose shrugged and nodded her head to the side, implying she'd tell him later. "Now, we need to figure out who has created this labyrinth and stop them before they try to kill you lot. Any ideas?"

"The Trickster." Sam and Dean said together.

Rose frowned in confusion. "Who?"

Dean gestured to the room. "He's done something like this before. Well, not this exactly, but he's definitely got the power."

The Doctor cocked his head to the side. "But does he have the intellect?"

At the other's confused faces, Rose explained. "Whoever is doin' this isn't runnin' it with magic. 's bein' controlled telepathically, and 's bein' run through machines. Magic might be powerin' it, but everythin' else is pretty alien."

Sam nodded. "So not the Trickster. Then who?"

The Doctor wandered the room aimlessly, flipping through books as he went. "Someone with brains. They've got power to generate this level of tech too, but from somewhere…" The Doctor trailed off before resting on Rose in her short dress and high heels. A club she'd said. Bait. "The girls. Why take them through space?"

Rose crossed her arms and shifted in her stance, face serious. Nothing came to her.

"They all looked like Rose." Everyone turned to Dean. "I know you guys said I'm being paranoid but… they all looked like you, Rose."

Rose opened her mouth but the Doctor spoke first. "Like Rose?" Dean nodded. "Why you? Why you exactly?"

Rose shrugged, still believing it didn't matter as much as the two were making it seem. "Blonde is a very popular characteristic for people to become fixated on, Doctor."

The Doctor nodded, conceding to that fact but didn't let the argument die. "But they look like you and then disappear through time? Come on, Rose, that's no coincidence. But the fact remains the same – related to you or not – why take them through a teleport? Oh!" The Doctor snapped his fingers and pointed at Rose, eyes wide. "It waited, Rose. It took those girls and then waited. The longer someone is out of their proper timeline, where they're properly supposed to be, the more complex their timeline becomes which means – no." The Doctor froze mid rant. His eyes widened like saucers as he stood up straight, staring off into the distance, horrified. "Oh no."

Laney stepped forward first. "What? What is it?"

The Doctor ignored her and turned back to Rose. "Rose how did you get through to this universe?"

Rose crinkled her nose and shook her head. "Through the void, 's the only way. But I was careful, Doctor, I closed all entry ways and exits."

"Yes, but could something have slipped through with you?"

Rose's eyes narrowed. "You mean a Cyberman or a Dalek?" She didn't see how either of those could be related. None of this was their MO, but she wasn't one to question the Doctor's line of thought before he got to the end of it.

The Doctor shook his head slowly. His eyes were still wide in horror; his shoulders were slumped in defeat. "There are other things than just Cybermen and Dalek's in the void, Rose. Things much worse than them."

Sam and Dean tensed. They didn't know about Cybermen or Daleks, but from Rose's face they could tell they were serious threats. From what the Doctor was implying, whatever had hitched a ride with Rose from her other universe was bad news.

Laney was one step behind the Winchesters. "What's the void?"

Rose glanced at her and supplied quickly, "'s the gap between universes."

"Time Lords used to throw things there," the Doctor explained quietly, "things they couldn't control. Things that were threats to the universe, multiverse…"

There was a moment of hesitation in the room. No one daring to ask what unspeakable creatures the Doctor could be remembering. Finally, Rose asked tentatively, "Doctor? What got through?"

"A Chronovore."

Dean nodded and stepped forward. "Great, what is it and how do we kill it?" Sam rolled his eyes.

The Doctor looked flabbergasted. "You – you can't just kill a Chronovore. They're ancient, older than Time Lords. They eat universes. It's why the Time Lords trapped them in the void."

Laney shook her head. "But if they eat universes, why are they killing girls?"

"See that's just it. It's not just killing them, it's erasing them from time. That's what happens to you when you're eaten by a Chronovore. They're attracted to time abnormalities, time travellers, basically the more complex the timeline the tastier they are."

Dean nodded. "So we're like the all you can eat, huh?"

The Doctor shook his head. "You're the appetizer." He turned to Rose who was staring hard at the old wood floors of Bobby's study.

"I'm the buffet," she supplied quietly.

The Doctor nodded, glad that she understood but still wanting to make sure she knew exactly what that meant. "You're endless Rose. You've got a bigger connection to time than any being in all of the universes. I've seen you control it. The Chronovore waited to kill the girls, yes, because it would affect their timeline. But more importantly, it allowed time for you to notice."

Dean narrowed his eyes, jaw clenched. Rose sighed. "So it was a trap." She glanced at Dean, an apology in her eyes. She'd underestimated her importance in this world, but Dean had not. He'd talked to the angels and he knew that Rose was a target, even if she hadn't wanted to believe it.

The Doctor surged towards Rose and grasped her arms. He bent down so he was eye level with her. "Rose, you need to run. You need to get out of here!"

Rose bristled instantly. She pulled out of the Doctor's grasp and glared defiantly back at him. "'m not runnin'! Not when this thing can destroy the universe. I brought it here, I'll get rid of it."

"It will kill you, Rose."

"Not if I kill it first."

The Doctor sighed. "Rose…"

"How do we kill it Doctor?" The Doctor stared desperately into her eyes, imploring her to not do this. It was a losing battle. Rose against the Chronovore and the Doctor against Rose. He was as helpless to Rose as Rose would be to the monster that awaited her.

The Doctor leaned back and tugged at his hair as he groaned in annoyance. "You can't. The only thing that's ever been recorded to kill a Chronovore is the blood of an Eternal."

Dean narrowed his eyes. He'd heard that title before, where had he heard that? "Eternal?"

The Doctor nodded and gestured airily. "Death, Love, Hope, Fate – sort of like personifications of the ideas. They were in our original universe but they're all long gone now. Left, died, I'm not sure really." He shrugged.

Laney pulled herself up to sit on Bobby's desk. She crossed her legs and leaned forward as she considered their predicament. "Could we have Eternals in our world?" Dean frowned in concentration. Where had he heard that title?

The Doctor nodded his head from side to side as he considered, his hands stuffed into his pockets. "Yes, but – well… How do you go about getting a hold of them? Can't just call them up, give 'em a ring…"

"I've got an idea." All eyes turned to Rose.

Sam made a face. "An idea that's going to get us the blood of an Eternal?"

Rose smiled but didn't respond. She turned to the Doctor and smiled gratefully. "Thank you, Doctor."

The Doctor didn't look happy. "Rose? What're you going to do?" He knew his wife all too well, whatever Rose had planned did not involve her own safety but only the safety of all the others.

"We're going to get out of here first. I followed a shifty lookin' bloke in here and 'm assuming he's workin' for the Chronovore. He'll tell us where it's hidin' at."

The Doctor raised his eyebrows. "And then?"

Rose smiled. "It was lovely to see you again."

"Hopefully it'll be a while before we meet again…" Rose heard the question in his comment. You won't die now, will you?

Rose responded with a sad smile as she touched the Doctor's cheek. "I'm sure it will." The Doctor could see the pain in her eyes and unfortunately he knew that Rose was not thinking ahead to a short death but to a long life in which she won't see his face for long again. He didn't want her to die, but he didn't want her to live suffering. And she wouldn't. Rose had the Winchesters now, and the Doctor was positive that they would do everything to see her safe and with her son.

The Doctor wrapped his arms around Rose and pulled her in for a tight hug. Rose smiled, remembering every single hug they'd ever shared. The moments raced through her mind. Not too long ago, seeing the Doctor would have broken her. She'd certainly come a long way since leaving her other universe and meeting the Winchesters.

The Doctor's face as he held Rose was a study in heartbreak. The pure and unadulterated hurt and longing that radiated from the set of his mouth and the crease by his eyes almost made Dean look away. He'd never seen a man look so broken. Dean wasn't sure how Rose had been handling having the Doctor around. He couldn't get a read on her emotional state about it. Watching the Doctor then as he held the woman he loved and missed dearly, Dean knew that however Rose was feeling it was nothing in comparison to the depth of the Doctor's despair. Rose was immortal. She had to live and she had to move on. But the Doctor was dead. He couldn't move on from his love for her. All he could do was wait for her to eventually join him – if she ever did.

Rose stepped back and smiled at the Doctor who'd quickly covered his heartbreak. "Alright. Let's go." The Doctor nodded at her briefly before giving Dean a long look. The two men nodded, an understanding passing between them. Rose was immortal, but Dean would protect that immortality with – no. Dean's eyes widened and he turned to the blonde goddess. Rose wasn't immortal, she was Eternal.

Rose glowed and the entire room turned a bright golden colour. Dean closed his eyes to protect them from the shimmering time energy of Rose's power. When he opened them again they were back in the observation room. The view of the unknown galaxy spread across the glass panel before them.

The group gazed out at the nebula, a swirl of blues and greens. Bright golden lights glimmered in the distance. "Alright!" Rose turned to the other three with a bright smile. "Let's find tha' Chronovore."

Dean grabbed her arm before she could head towards the door. "Rose, you can't do this."

Rose smiled reassuringly. "I told you Dean, I've got a plan."

"You're an Eternal Rose, Cas told me."

Sam's eyes widened at the revelation. "What? Why didn't you tell us?" Laney stepped back, sensing a family dispute starting in.

Rose shifted under the brother's fierce stares. "I didn' think you'd know what it meant."

Dean narrowed his eyes. "What it means is that you're going to try and sacrifice yourself to save us."

"I might not die." Rose defended.

Sam shook his head, in agreement with his brother. "But you don't know for sure."

Dean nodded. "Which means it's out of the question." Sam nodded as well.

"Oi!"

"I'm not letting you sacrifice yourself for us Rose!"

Rose glared daggers at Dean and ripped her arm from his grip. "Don't be so self involved, Dean." Dean raised his eyebrows at her comment. "The only reason this universe hasn't been eaten yet is because tha' Chronovore is waitin' to eat me first. It's gonna destroy everything, the universe will only be safe if we kill it. It isn't about you and it isn't about me, it's about what needs to be done." The three glared at each other. Rose sighed. "I told you Dean, I have a plan."

Silence.

"So you've got a plan. Doesn't mean it can't be improved." All eyes turned to Laney who wore a mischievous smile on her face, eyes a dark and devious purple.

---

Laney glanced down the darkened hallway. Empty. She'd finally lost them. The music from the spacebar briefly echoed down the hall as a doorway opened and closed somewhere in the distance.

"You will follow."

Laney spun around. A smaller man stood before her with three eyes and talons on his hands. A Frashden, from a nearby planet if Laney remembered correctly. Their third eye had the ability to see further than any other species in the galaxy. Laney narrowed her eyes at him. This must have been the one Rose had seen earlier.

"Follow?" She questioned him coldly. If Rose's guess was right, than this alien was working for the Chronovore. Rose had planned to use him to find the Chronovore. Laney pursed her lips and raised her chin. If the plan could work for Rose, than it could work for her.

"You are what she seeks." The Frashden hissed. Faster than Laney could see, the alien lunged towards her. His talons bit into the material of her jumpsuit, but didn't break. Laney winced and tried to pull back from the vice like grip. "You will follow." The alien turned and half dragged Laney along behind him in the direction of the Chronovore.

Laney had time travelled quite a bit in her short lifetime. She had a complex time stream and she knew that was what made the alien think she was Rose. The Chronovore would be able to tell the difference though. That was okay though, Laney decided, she could use this to her advantage.

A door slid open and Laney was pushed through. She stumbled forward but managed to stay upright. The door slid closed behind her, the Frashden had left her there.

"Who are you?" An impetuous voice questioned.

Laney's eyes widened when they took in the sight of the little brunette humanoid girl. She was tiny, couldn't have been more than three years old. Her little pale feet stuck out from beneath her long silver gown. It was silk and regal, almost making the toddler look like a queen before her kingdom. The girl had curly brown hair that reached her knees and steel like eyes that portrayed wisdom beyond her years. This was the Chronovore?

"You – you're…?"

The little girl stepped closer, arms crossed and mouth pursed in displeasure. "You're not who I wanted." Laney didn't know what to say, was the Chronovore… pouting? The all powerful and incredibly ancient alien sighed. "How hard is it to find one measly little time traveller?"

"I'm a time traveller." Laney objected before she realized what she was saying.

The Chronovore rolled her eyes. "Yes, well, obviously. I meant the blonde." A smile crept across the alien's face, one that was full of such insidious intent that Laney had to take a step back. "Doesn't she just look delicious?" The girl looked heavenward. "You're just a snack. Less than that." She eyes Laney, wholly unimpressed. "I mean, look at yourself. I've had pets that had more complicated time streams." She smiled fondly. "Those were the good ol' days."

"Then let me go."

The Chronovore watched Laney curiously, genuinely confused. "Where would the fun be in that?" Laney took another step back as the Chronovore's vicious smile returned in full force.

The door slid open and Rose was unceremoniously thrown onto the floor beside Laney. The Chronovore's eyes locked on the blonde, the silver of her irises glowed unearthly. "Finally," she moaned.

Laney's eyes snapped up from Rose to the Chronovore and back again. She moved before the thought even entered her mind on what she knew had to be done. Laney grabbed Rose and pulled her up from the floor, a knife pressed firmly against the blonde's stomach.

Rose glanced down at the weapon and gasped lightly. Her eyes flickered up to Laney's. Laney's irises were so dark they looked almost black. "Let me go," she ordered the Chronovore, "and you can have her." Rose's jaw dropped.

"Is that a joke?" The Chronovore exclaimed at the same time Rose hollered, "Laney stop!" The little girl narrowed her eyes between the two time travellers. "But you two know each other. You were in the maze together. What'd you think? I wasn't born yesterday."

"Laney," Rose implored, "this wasn't a part of the plan."

Laney's dark eyes turned to the older time traveller. Rose had to fight the shiver that threatened to run down her spine. "This wasn't a part of your plan. This was mine the entire time." Rose's eyes widened. Laney turned back to the Chronovore. "I'll give her to you, I swear, just let me live."

The Chronovore narrowed her eyes between the two. She knew they'd been working together, but for the life of her she couldn't see any way they could gain an advantage in defeating her from this betrayal. It was real. The younger time traveller had played the others. The Chronovore was almost impressed. She sighed and threw her arms ups in defeat. "Fine!"

Laney smirked and suddenly pushed her knife into Rose's stomach. Rose half screamed, half gasped in surprise. The Chronovore jumped forward as she shrieked in outrage.

"What did you do?"

Laney stumbled back and Rose collapsed to the ground. The hand holding the bloody knife was shaking. "I gave myself a little insurance. You won't come after me if you want to eat her before she dies." The Chronovore's eyes glowed dangerously, her teeth bared in fury. Laney ran from the room.

Rose gasped as blood gushed past her fingers. She wouldn't die. Rose knew that. She wouldn't die. She looked up at the Chronovore. Rose wouldn't die from a knife wound.

The Chronovore rolled her eyes and clenched her little hands into fists. "And I was going to play with you first." She pouted and crossed her arms. Her eyes surveyed the dying blonde before her. The one she'd put so much effort into luring there. The blonde's timeline was so long. All the places she been, all the centuries she'd lived. She had an even more enticing past than half the Time Lords that the Chronovore had devoured in her youth. Only a few more minutes and then it'd all be gone.

"Well?" The Chronovore asked. "Aren't you angry? Don't mortals usually get angry about now? Futility of life and all that? Betrayal. Et tu Brutae?"

Rose huffed. She looked up at the Chronovore from her position on the floor. Both of her hands were pushed against the wound painfully, drenched in blood. "Shouldn't I be askin' you the same thing?" Rose gasped between laboured breaths.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Rose smirked. "Don't you get it? New universe. New rules." Rose lunged forward and wrapped her blood soaked hands around the Chronovore's throat. The skin sizzled as the girl shrieked. The flesh of her pale throat quickly began to boil. "I'm an Eternal." Rose hissed and her eyes glowed gold.

The Chronovore continued to howl and screech until her skin boiled and melted into a pile of bubbling flesh and fabric. Rose fell back when it was finished. She dragged herself away from the boiling puddle of Chronovore until she felt she was a safe distance away. She collapsed back against the metal floor.

The door slid open.

"Rose?" Laney leaned over her, her eyes dark blue and worried. "You said you wouldn't die. You said you'd be okay!" Laney shook Rose's shoulder. The blonde moaned as her eyes flickered open. "Rose, please be okay. Please be alright." She glanced over her shoulder. Sam and Dean had gone after the Frashden. They'd never forgive her if Rose died.

"Oh, Juniper Delaney…" Laney's eyes widened and she turned back to Rose. Rose smiled weakly. "'m always alrigh'." With that, Rose's eyes fluttered shut.

"Rose?" Laney brought a hand to her mouth, but it didn't stop the soft cry from coming out. What had she done wrong? They'd said this would work. They'd said Rose wouldn't be hurt by it.

Rose gasped awake, her eyes glowing gold. Laney jumped back, eyes wide. Laney's eyes could become a lot of colours, but not that. They couldn't glow gold like that. Rose took a couple of deep breaths before she turned to the half Draless. "You alright?"

Laney nodded mutely. "How'd you do that?"

Rose smiled. "Told ya, 'm an Eternal." Rose picked herself up and held out a hand to the time traveller. Laney took it and pulled herself up. "Means I can't die."

"Right. No, because that makes perfect sense." Rose laughed at Laney's sarcasm.

"Come on, let's go find the boys before they get any more culture shock." Rose turned and headed towards the door.

"We should probably find you clothes first." Rose paused and looked down at her blood soaked dress. She glanced over her shoulder at Laney and smiled sheepishly.

"Forgot 'bout that."

Laney smirked. "Come on." She led Rose out the door and down the empty hallway. "But don't think you're getting off that easily. I mean, seriously, who told you what my full name was?" There was a pause. "And don't you dare tell anyone else."

---

They spent another day on the space station before Rose got her vortex manipulator working again. After a brief discussion with the Winchester brothers, they decided to stay another day for Laney's benefit. The time traveller had been instrumental in taking down the Chronovore, it'd been her plan after all. She'd also helped Sam through the maze without even being asked and found a jumpsuit that Rose could wear, which Dean was incredibly thankful for. Rose wanted to pay the alien back before they left back to earth and she could really only think of doing that in one way.

"This is for you." Rose explained as she held out a vortex manipulator. They were in the observation deck, the galaxy spread across the sky before them.

Laney's eyes widened as she took in the sleek black device. "What? Are you serious?"

Rose smiled her tongue in teeth smile. "Completely. I've even tweaked it a bit. If it starts to break down it'll take you directly to my own vortex manipulator. Tha' way, I can fix it so you don't get stuck again. 'course you can jus' press this," Rose popped open the holo-screen and indicated a button she'd added to the options menu when the wearer decided on a new location, "and you'll be with us again. For when you get tired of bein' alone."

Laney's mouth opened, but no words came out. Her eyes flushed pink and Rose new the woman was overjoyed. Rose smiled softly. "I've travelled on my own, Juniper. I know how lonely it gets. As a Draless, you can control your aging, but I can't even explain to you the joy of being with someone and growing old with him or her. I would give anything for that. Find someone; share the universe with him or her. But if you don't, or can't, or find trouble and need help – don't forget us. We'd be honoured to have you a part of the team."

"Rose… thank you." Laney pulled Rose against her and hugged her tightly. She smiled brightly when she pulled back. "Right! Now help me put this on." Rose laughed and obliged.

"Alrigh', let's go find the boys." Laney nodded and followed Rose back to the spacebar.

The bar was as packed as ever when they arrived. Despite this, they found the boys sitting on a couple of stools waiting for them. Dean was shaking his head at Sam when they made it to the two, saying, "Why do powerful being always choose to look like kids, though?"

Laney frowned in confusion. "What?"

Sam nodded. "Lilith."

"Yeah," Dean agreed.

Laney turned to Rose. "Who?"

"Demon."

"Whoa." Sam and Dean turned to her as she raised her hands. "Wait, what… seriously?"

Dean shook his head, incredulous. "You live in a world of time travel and aliens and that is hard for you to wrap your head around?" Rose picked up Dean's drink from the bar and smiled into it, amused, before she took a sip.

Laney shrugged. "Yeah, but this," she gestured to the spacebar, "this is normal. You're talking demons. That's crazy." Dean shook his head slightly, completely nonplussed at her reasoning.

Sam smiled. It quickly disappeared when he caught sight of an alien with three arms and a tail. He winced, still having a hard time getting used to this new world. Rose's World, he'd quickly taken to calling it. "I think I need another drink."

Rose smiled and put Dean's drink back on the bar. "Righ', you two do tha'." She gestured to Sam and Laney. "We're gonna go dance."

"We are?" Dean asked, amused.

Rose raised her eyebrow at him. "Yeah, I mean, the dress might not have made it but the shoes and jacket did." She gesture to her high heels and faux leather jacket she was still wearing, now coupled with the tight black jumpsuit that Laney had given her. "'m not lettin' them go to waste."

Sam raised an eyebrow. "I thought you wore the outfit as bait?"

Rose smiled wolfishly. "I wore it to catch my prey." Rose looked significantly at Dean before turning and gliding towards the dance floor, all hips.

Dean's jaw dropped indigently. "I resent that," he called out as he followed her to the dance floor, "I am no woman's prey."

Sam gestured to his brother. "And yet he falls right into the trap."

Laney laughed and took Dean's vacated seat. She turned to the bartender and ordered two drinks for them. She crossed her legs and leaned sideways against the bar as she stared at Sam. Rose's words about growing old with someone echoing in her mind. "I gotta say this was a lot of fun." She smiled at Sam, her hands in her lap as her fingers played with the end of her braid.

Sam grinned. It was certainly new. His eyes drank in Laney's legs, her soft smile and was that a beauty mark on her cheek? How had he missed that before? The adventure had been entirely different from the usual, but Laney made it feel so familiar. Every second he spent with her made him think more and more of Jess. It was the first time he'd ever been able to think of Jess without feeling guilty. And Sam wasn't too insecure to admit that that fact scared him. He didn't know what it meant, but he felt more at peace with this glowing alien woman on a strange spacebar than he'd felt since Jess had died.

"Aliens," Sam finally said, "it's definitely a new one for me."

"Oh, but come on, it's fun."

Sam laughed. "Which part? Getting lost in a psycho-maze, almost being eaten by a little girl, or watching Dean play right into Rose's hand?" He picked up the almost human looking beer he'd been served and took a sip.

Laney smiled at him; her eyes turned to a soft lilac colour that Sam instantly decided he liked best out of all the shades he'd seen so far. "Getting to meet you."

Something inside of Sam wanted to jump up and punch the air. A much darker part of Sam, one that had grown in the time Dean was dead, instantly reminded him of Ruby. Sam's smile faltered. He set his beer down and ran his hand down his jeans. "Laney… I…"

Laney smiled, but it didn't reach her now dark blue eyes. "Yeah, I figured." Sam held his breath. He briefly wondered what he would have said if things weren't so tangled up between him and Ruby. The darker part inside of him instantly shut down that train of thought. His path was set. He was doing what he had to do. It didn't matter what he wanted. "Good looking guy like you?" Laney was saying as she shook her head.

For just a moment, the lighter side of Sam that had been seeing Jess in this strange alien girl for the past three days leapt forward and took hold. Sam leaned towards the girl. "The offer still stands though, the offer Rose made you. It's from all of us. I – we… but you'd make a great hunter."

Laney's raised an eyebrow at that. She didn't really know what Sam meant when he said 'hunter', but she figured it had something to do with demons. "I'll probably take you up on that." She suddenly decided.

That lighter side of Sam punched the air in triumph. Sam smiled, feeling like he'd just won a battle with himself he hadn't known he'd been fighting.

"But not right now." Sam smile froze and he almost shivered as that lighter part inside of him shrunk so small it was as non-existent as it had been when they first landed on the space station. "I'm going to go see my family," Laney decided, "tell them I'm alive. Travel." She shrugged and glanced around the spacebar. When her gaze returned to Sam's it was bright and her eyes were a purple, somewhere between the lilac softness and deep mischievousness he'd seen previously. Sam didn't know what to make of it. "But I'll be back."

Sam smiled. "I'm looking forward to it." He decided he should have been more surprised with how much he found himself really looking forward to it.

Laney smirked and stood from the bar. "As you should be."

---

Rose exited the bathroom, steam escaping the small room as she did from her shower. They were back at the motel. Back on earth. Rose collapsed onto the couch, clad in Dean's plaid shirt and a pair of leggings. She yawned, almost surprised by how tired she was even though she had died, then stayed up for two days repairing her vortex manipulator, creating one for Laney and then deconstructing the teleport.

Rose stretched and leaned back into the couch as she waited for Dean. He'd gone off to talk to Castiel, who had apparently shown up at the club. Sam had disappeared. Usually that annoyed Rose, because she knew it meant he was with Ruby, but not this time. Rose stared at the black TV screen.

She knew there'd been something between Sam and Laney. She'd seen it. Not only had she seen it, she'd seen it. It was in their timelines. Laney was going to pop back into their lives again at some point. Rose wasn't sure when or in what capacity, all she knew what that Laney had brought something out in Sam that Rose had never seen before. It was just a spark, just a glimmer in his eyes. It reminded her of the little Sam she'd briefly met by accident when she'd gone into the past to learn more about the demons hold on him. There was an event between the past and the present that had acted as the catalyst for the demons to control Sam the way they did. Rose didn't know what it was, and she was sure it would be too painful to ask about. It was probably the death of someone important. Whatever it was, Laney was someone who could combat that catalyst. Aware of it or not, Juniper Delaney was important.

Rose bit the nail of her thumb worriedly. She simply hoped that Laney would come back before it was too late.

Dean entered the motel and quickly surveyed the room. His brows drew together in mild annoyance when he noticed Sam was gone.

"He's not with her." Rose defended.

Dean raised his eyebrows, not really believing Rose. He went and sat on the couch with her. "Oh? And we know this for sure?" He threw his arm across the back of the couch and Rose snuggled into his side. Oddly, Dean didn't comment.

Rose shrugged. "No, guess not. But I really don't think he is." They were silent for a moment, both lost in their thoughts. "So, what'd Castiel say?"

Dean smirked. "He was freaking out. He couldn't find us the past couple of days. He said he searched the entire galaxy. God his face when I told him we were in a different one." Rose grinned. "Anyways, problem's solved. We're back on angel radar."

Rose raised an eyebrow. "Well not this second, but 'm sure we will be soon." Dean raised an eyebrow at her questioningly. "I can tell when they're watchin'."

Dean nodded. "Of course you can." Rose rolled her eyes. "The Doctor and I had an interesting chat." Rose narrowed her eyes slightly at Dean, but didn't say anything. "We talked about Ali. Or, Alistair, I should say?"

Rose winced. "Yeah, sorry. I would have mentioned, but it just sounds so close to Alastair. I didn't… I didn't want to bring up those memories for you."

Dean nodded. "No, I get that. But the Doctor, he said that Ali would have fallen from the sky."

Rose frowned as she did the calculations in her head. She nodded slowly. "Yeah, probably. But the TARDIS would have protected him, why?"

"Because that's not very common, Rose." At Rose's confused look, he elaborated. "Falling from the sky is going to make national headlines. Doesn't matter if it's a rock or what. Everyone will be talking about it. It'll make finding Ali a lot easier."

Rose's eyes widened. "I never even thought of that. So you mean…"

Dean nodded. "If the TARDIS is in this universe, at this time, we'll be able to find it. We'll be able to find Ali."

---

This chapter is FORTY pages on a Word Document. Holy Canadian Bacon, what did I even write about? In other news, no, I'm not dead.

Did you like it? I'm on the fence about it? Thoughts on Laney? If you protest enough I won't bring her back (welll... maybe?).

Thanks for reading! :)