Author's Note: And the end!

Next up, "We Must Survive".

They sprinted through the police station. Navigating through the maze of pathways and corridors, ducking to avoid shots.

Jenny panted, as she kept hold of Jack. Tight as she could.

Despite that fact that his very presence was giving her a migraine of epic proportions.

"We can't lose them!" Hopper insisted, glancing over her shoulder. "They're…!"

Jenny shushed her, then darted around a corner, and slipped into a side-door. Plastering herself, Hopper, and the dead Jack against the wall — right behind the door.

And shushed Hopper, yet again.

"They're gone!" came the shout from outside.

Jenny thanked her lucky stars that this particular invasion had left her pursuers far stupider than usual.

"Must have gone into one of these rooms," said another policeman. He grabbed hold of the door to the room in which Jenny, Hopper, and Jack were hiding. Yanked the door open — so it almost banged right into Jenny's face.

But stopped, just inches away.

Concealing them all from view, as the policeman examined the room.

"Not in here," the policeman said, closing the door and heading off.

Jenny and Hopper both breathed a sigh of relief, hearing the policemen make their way down the hall and away from them.

Then slipped back outside, and managed to double back — away from the policemen who'd pursued them. And towards the chamber that held the Zillwell Machine.

But just before they arrived at that chamber, Jenny turned the other direction.

And headed towards the medical wing, instead.

"But the Zillwell Machine is back that…!" Hopper began.

Jenny quieted her. "It'll be guarded," she whispered. "And anyways… I don't need him to be right next to the Zillwell machine when it happens. Seo didn't try to kill him right next to the Zillwell machine."

Hopper frowned. "No?"

"No; she tried to kill him right next to her," said Jenny, using Hopper's key-card to unlock the medical ward. Raced inside, and set Jack down right next to the still-unconscious Seo. "And that's my plan, too. Barricade the door!"

Hopper did as she was told.

While Jenny, instead, focused on the medical machines around herself. Yanking them free from the wall and completely rewiring them, working as fast as she possibly could.

"About… what you said," said Hopper. "About someone throwing themselves in front of a bullet to save you." She hesitated, as she crammed a table in front of the door. "Way back, when I first joined the force, the Zillwell Machine showed me… a vision. Of how I'd die. Of you and a bullet, and then I—"

Jenny broke in with a sharp laugh, not stopping her work. "I bet it did."

Hopper's face went red. "What?"

Jenny glanced back over her shoulder. "Haven't you guessed by now?" she asked. "It was all in the movie!"

"In… the…?"

"The Zillwell Machine doesn't give visions, Hopper," said Jenny, softly. She turned back to her work. "It never has. You and the other policemen who claim you've used its projections to tell the future — you've been making it up. The whole time."

Hopper stared.

Jaw falling open.

"That's… that's… impossible!" said Hopper. "We know the future! We can't have…!"

"You claim that, when you joined the force, you saw me in a vision of how you'd die," said Jenny. "But you didn't jump the first time we met, or go white as a sheet or anything when you were holding me back from Gavin. Just like Peters didn't react when he first saw that second dome. And Gavin could never have known that Seo and Jack would arrive here, back when he was part of the force."

Hopper opened and closed her mouth a few times.

Speechless.

"But… but…" Hopper shook her head, trying to clear it. "But you said there weren't that many Poilarin on this planet! We've been using the Zillwell Machine to successfully catch criminals for ages, now. The crimes it predicts have happened! They…!"

Jenny just gave Hopper a long, sad stare.

"What?" said Hopper, twitching uncomfortably.

"I'm sorry," Jenny said. "I know you stood outside waiting for the crime to happen, because you thought you'd seen it in the Zillwell Machine. But the truth is… you didn't take the short-cut." She shrugged. "We ducked into a forensic lab, when we hid from those policemen, a few minutes ago. It had been in use, recently."

"We… don't need forensics!" Hopper insisted. "We have the Zillwell machine! We can…!"

"You do forensics all the time," Jenny countered. "You just don't remember it. Because every time you do it, the intellectual endeavor causes the Poilarin to chew through your memories of carrying out the forensics, as fast as that memory is made. It's why policemen always die so young."

"But…!"

"Thing is, you cops work part on intellect, part on instinct," Jenny went on, returning to her work. "The instinct remained, even after the intellect vanished. Instincts built on the evidence you'd all unearthed! The Zillwell machine was a cover story — to explain how you caught so many criminals. And later… the Poilarin used your belief in it as a weapon — to drive you to your deaths."

Hopper couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"But… our planet went to war over it!" Hopper said. "Our whole world died because—"

"Your world died because the Poilarin invaded it," Jenny countered. She shook out her hand, as the bit of machinery she was hooking up sparked, violently. "And, afterwards, people struggled to figure out what had happened and why the world looked like this. If governments had actually fought over the Zillwell Machine — it wouldn't have wound up staying right around where it had been built. Would it?"

Hopper supposed not.

But it was still a lot to take in.

"I'm sorry," said Jenny. "Your Zillwell Machine couldn't see the future any more than that machine in the movie. It's just a temporal wormhole to facilitate an invasion — that's all."

She stepped back, admiring her work.

A smile lighting up her face.

"There," said Jenny. Dusting off her hands. "Finished. Oh, and…" Gesturing at Hopper. "You might want to get back."

"Get…?" Hopper began.

But was interrupted by a loud banging at the door. The juddering of force against the barricade, as the cops finally found out where they were. And began trying to get in.

"Not a moment too soon," Jenny said. Grabbed Hopper by the arm, and thrust her back behind the machine she'd just cobbled together. "I mean it — stay back. With your Zillwell Machine a fake, you've never seen an actual gateway into the vortex. But I have."

"Gateway into…?! What?!" Hopper said.

Jenny adjusted some switches. "Seo isn't the only one with special blood," she said. A gleam in her eyes. "My dad's the last Time Lord, you know. And I got his blood. And that means…" She pounded her fist down on a button. "I have a special connection to the vortex."

The machine beside Jenny burst with a brilliant white light, spiraling in a swirl of colors and time and concepts — too great for any nearby to take in.

It emitted a sudden burst of energy, making everything in its wake — every scrap of wood, every gurney, every flake of paint or bundle of carpet — wither and age and decay, in an instant.

Everything… except Jack and Seo.

"Come on," said Jenny, adjusting something on the side of the machine she'd built. "Come back to life, Jack! I know you want to!"

The shouting grew even louder, outside the door.

As Hopper just stared at the swirl of light that was the time vortex. An odd expression growing on her face — as she stepped forwards, hand outstretched.

"I've seen this before," Hopper said, as if in a trance. "This is how I'll die. My destiny—"

Jenny caught her by the wrist, lurched her back. "Don't be stupid!" Jenny shouted. "I told you, Hopper — you saw nothing! It wasn't real!"

"No," said Hopper. "I saw it. Back when I first became a cop, the Zillwell Machine showed me how I'd die. There was this swirling portal of light, and I—"

"A few minutes ago, you said the Zillwell Machine showed you charging in front of a bullet to save my life!" Jenny insisted. "It's not real, Hopper! It's the Poilarin, trying to stop me. They know what I'm doing, and they're desperate!"

But Hopper wasn't having any of this.

She threw Jenny back, and lunged for the machinery. "It's not going to work!" Hopper shouted. "I know what I have to do! Give my life to save the galaxy!"

She darted towards the stream of temporal energy, before Jenny could stop her.

"No, wait!" Jenny shouted.

But that was the moment that — with a gasp — Jack jerked back to life.

The entire world froze around them.

And then… in a single hiccup of time, space, and the universe — the world condensed into a tiny little ball. A singularity of impossibility, squeezing Jack and the time distortion together and making him scream…

And in that scream, the current reality shattered.

Replaced by a new one.

Seo's eyes popped open, as she suddenly sat upright, in a burst of motion.

And took in her surroundings.

"MIT infirmary," said Jenny, gesturing at the busy hustle-and-bustle around her. "It's quite a nice place, actually, when it isn't in decay and ruin. They give you access to all the latest tech and everything you need to conduct high-scale experiments from your sick-bed."

"Plus," said Jack, coming into view and tugging the shade away from the window, "right outside of Baker House."

He winked.

As, outside the window, Seo could see a piano hurtling through the air at an acceleration of 9.8 meters per second squared, and smashing into the ground with a splintering CRUNCH.

"Gotta hand it to you, kid," said Jack. "You said Jenny'd be at Baker House during the annual Piano Drop. And you were right."

Seo took this all in.

Her face falling into utter and complete glee. "I did it." She jumped out of bed, clapping with excitement. "I did it! I actually did it!"

"Yes, you managed to use Jack's resurrection and reset to reset the wormhole," Jenny agreed. "Like it never existed in the first place. The time distortion wiped the whole thing from history — which really shouldn't have been that easy, come to think of it."

Jenny paused.

Then added, "Maybe it's just because I stepped in and leant you some of my brilliance."

Seo turned to her. "What? Oh, that. No, that's not impressive — that's just invention born from necessity." She grabbed Jenny by the hand, and practically dragged her out of the hospital. "What's impressive is — I found you! You, Jenny, who are brilliant and have done all kinds of studying and learning about Time Lords and time things. And do you know what that means?"

Jenny turned to Jack, a little desperately.

"Don't look at me; she's been going on about this for days," Jack said, with a shrug.

"It means," said Seo, heading back to her ship, "that you can fix my chameleon circuit!"

"Chameleon circuit?!" Jenny cried. "What's a chameleon circuit?!"

On the roof of Baker House, MIT students were wrapping up their formal Piano Drop gala. A symphony orchestra playing a medley of works from across Earth's past.

And below, Jenny emerged from Seo's ship.

A ship that still looked like a shamble of colors and shapes in no particular order.

"All right," Jenny said, with a sigh, wiping a smudge of grease from her forehead. "Given that I didn't know a chameleon circuit existed until about twenty minutes ago, and that I've never actually seen a working one… I think I've done pretty well."

Seo bounced on her toes, expectantly. "You fixed it?"

Jenny shook her head. "Couldn't figure out how to do that," she admitted. "But I did find out how to jam it in a single shape. So that it'd at least blend in with something, at some point in time and space."

She stepped aside.

"Wait for it," Jenny said. "Ten seconds."

The ship glowed, very slightly.

Then, all at once, condensed from a swirl of shapes and colors into… a single, solid object.

"There we go!" said Jenny, proudly. Touched its wooden sides. "Saw these on Earth, at one point, and thought — wouldn't it be wonderful to have a ship that looked like one? So I figured…"

Jenny trailed off.

As she saw the look of growing horror on Seo's face.

"What?" said Jenny. Looking between the blue paintwork of the ship, and Seo. "What's wrong?"

Jack began laughing.

Uncontrollably.

"What?" Jenny insisted. "Your ship now looks like a 1960's police box. It's brilliant; I mean, who else would ever think of having a time machine that looks like a 1960's…?"

"Who else?!" Seo screamed, launching herself at Jenny. "Who else?! Don't you know?!"

"Definitely the Doctor's daughter," Jack commented. "What can I say?"

Seo shoved Jenny back inside her ship. "Fix it!" she shouted. "Anything else! Anything at all! Just not a police box!"

"Does one of you want to tell me what this is all about?" Jenny demanded, as she disappeared inside Seo's ship. "I mean…!"

By the end of the next day, Jenny had managed to jam the chameleon circuit into the shape of Seo's old ship.

With glass panels in the shape of a smallish pillar.

"I don't know, Seo," Jenny sighed, when she was done. "This doesn't blend in with anything. It's just sort of… weird looking." Shook her head, sadly. "The police box idea was better."

"If slightly unoriginal," Jack put in.

Jenny shrugged. "How was I supposed to know? I've never seen Dad's ship, before."

Seo examined her ship. A large grin on her face. "It's perfect," she decided. "The best shape there is!" Then swept Jenny into a tight hug. "Thanks for fixing my chameleon circuit."

Jack, behind them, cleared his throat.

Pointedly.

"Oh, and… um… thanks for saving the galaxy, too," Seo put in, hurriedly, at Jack's reminder. "And our lives."

"Don't mention it," said Jenny. Withdrawing from the hug. "We should do lunch, sometime. Catch up. Maybe save the universe."

Seo beamed. "I'll pencil you in for the 50th of Jencil, 5072," she said. "Planet Habinot, café…"

"Naw, let's do the Planet Zeranx," Jenny cut in, "at café Silco." Shrugged. "I know the guy who runs it. Saved him from the Colofontair, a while back. Brilliant crepe suzettes."

"Colo—?"

"Long story." Jenny turned back to her own ship, in the distance. "I'll tell you more over lunch. But for now… I want to go investigate more about these 'piano drops'. They seem fascinating."

Jack and Seo watched, as she disappeared into the distance.

Towards her own ship.

Which, annoyingly enough, wasn't shaped like a police box or anything wonderful like that. Just a big, metal ship, looking annoyingly ship-like.

But it was home.

"Monsters to fight, pianos to drop," said Jenny, heading to the cockpit, "and a lot of running still to do." She started up the engines, launching the ship into the vortex. "Yesterday's another day."