It had been weeks since her first headache when the Doctor suggested a diversion on Kava, a carnival and market planet in the Jhitosk System. She'd jumped at the chance - she'd seen posters for the shows on several nearby planets during their visits, and even the Doctor had spoken of the one-of-a-kind items to be found amidst the tents and traders. His smile at her enthusiasm helped ease her frustration. She wanted to be better, if only to ease his worried frown and see that smile more often.

It had been a tense few weeks aboard the TARDIS. He'd taken to tinkering with the nanogenes for hours at a time without telling her why, and she had disappeared with headaches that she didn't want to bother him with. She'd tried to sleep them off at first, but after the first few days, she had abandoned that plan. She'd drunk more coffee than was healthy (the TARDIS had suddenly installed an ensuite bathroom for her), then tried some herbal medications. She had, out of some deep aversion and the Doctor's subtle steering, avoided aspirin.

The headaches came most nights, and they didn't stop when she managed to sleep. The pain ripped through her dreams, and she saw things. Even now, as she was straddling the line between sleep and wakefulness, she dreamt. The Time Vortex swirled in her mind. Half-asleep, the now-familiar hum grew louder in her ears, filling her mind with indecipherable noises and voices. She listened closer, forging meaning where she could. She knew his voice now, and though she tried to seize onto it, it flitted past her. She imagined she knew all his voices. She tried to focus on one, any one.

"Sing it again, father!" A small child's voice. Sleepy, but trying to pretend she wasn't.

"Last time, my dear, and then you have to sleep." His voice was loving, resigned, peaceful. She liked listening to his voice like that. She held onto that voice as he hummed the melody, the one that had seemed to follow her since she'd set foot on the TARDIS. It was haunting and minor, comforting only in the fact that she knew it, and knew his voice. She listened for a long while, the song repeating itself a few times. She was tempted to just let it lull her into a deep, oblivious sleep, just like the child.

The song continued, but it was no longer peaceful. It was hummed through gritted teeth, pain and rage and smoke and blood filling the air in this new dreamscape. Another voice she knew without having heard. Alone in a room she recognized as his workshop now, the song continued, and she understood that the child was gone. All the good things about that red world were gone. A modified De-Mat gun was on the workbench.

The pain echoed through her head again, and it almost seemed as if the Doctor noticed her cry of pain. She blinked, realizing that even his memory, this past self with the long flowing hair and jacket, was trying to take her pain. She pulled back, not wanting to hurt him anymore.

And then she heard it, just like she had the very first day. Only now she understood. "...All of time and space. How could she be so wrong? There are so many of them, in so many worlds and so many times, and they always think...She'll save every world we see and still think that she doesn't matter. That the universe will just go on ticking without her." There was a moment, a break. "I've done this to her, and she doesn't even know." She saw him now, clear as day, hunched over a cluster of wires under the console in the control room. His eyes were tired, and she reached a hand out to stroke his shoulder and comfort him. He leaned into it, though her hand wasn't really there.

"You heard that, didn't you? Your mind's wandering in ways you don't even know are possible. And it's my fault. You won't even remember this. But I'll find a way to fix it. A great fixer, me."

She couldn't find a voice to use, and instead ghosted a kiss upon his forehead. "And already so strong with this. Gallifrey would have loved you." His shoulders sagged again, and he tried to look into the spot where he thought she might be, if it were more than her mind's presence. "I do."

She lost him then, as a rush of information filled her mind. The Time Vortex, but more specifically the TARDIS. She'd felt a brush against her mind that felt like the word sister, but didn't understand much more. Timelines stretched out in front of her. Faces she suddenly knew names for, places she'd never yet seen that she momentarily called home, tools she couldn't invent that she suddenly had use for. Kava. Memory. Manipulator. Psychic Paper. Images and item names flashed across her mind like a shopping list. And then she knew - it was a shopping list.

Back in her bed, she blinked. She sat up slowly, her head, neck, and eyes still sore in the aftereffects of the headache. The dream had been so different from the destruction and fire of recent days. She gathered herself, trying not to let the words of her dream affect her as she got dressed. It was, after all, only a dream.

In the console room, the Doctor missed the touch of Miranda's mind already. It was both exhilarating and painful to have it happen. Exhilarating, because it had been so long since the mind of another Time Lord had touched his. Painful, because she was no Time Lord, and the nanogenes might yet kill her. He had to find the modifier kit on Kava. It was a hack, a non-standard upgrade, and there was only a chance it would work. But he couldn't let her carry on in such excruciating pain, though she pretended it was passing.

He scooted out from the console and sat in the captain's chair, tossing a ball in the air. If she didn't see him in the same place, she might disregard what she'd seen as a normal human dream. She might not realize what he'd said to her in his moment of weakness. He needed her not to remember.

When she finally appeared, her long dress, tied around her neck in a halter, stopped him cold, and the ball fell down on him, bopping him soundly in the nose. She giggled, though she tried to hide it behind her hand. He jumped up, tossing the ball aside, grinning from ear to ear. "Ready then?"

She slyly flipped a switch, sending him tumbling back into his chair as she calmly moved around the console, moving dials and pulling levers. "Kava, right? Year 28C10-203?"

He regained his balance, reaching under her arm to press a flashing button, taking the opportunity to breath her in when she was close. "Just where I was aiming."

She moved away from him. "And since I'm driving, we just might get there." She stuck her tongue out at him, then dodged around the console when he came at her with a shout of indignation. She tumbled to the ground when the TARDIS came to a stop, laughing hard as she stared up at the ceiling. It felt like old times. She reached blindly for his hand, letting his fingers intertwine with hers as he pulled her to her feet. She felt young and brash and adventurous. She felt like she could take on the universe with him.

She stopped at the door, turning to him. "Ready slowpoke?" He guided her by the waist as he pushed the door open. The markets of Kava stretched before her in every direction.