The bright blue box materialized silently in the narrow alley of a perfectly ordinary street in London. The alley was mostly a place for the residents to wheel their garbage and recycling out without cluttering up the main road. It was surrounded by walls of sweet picket fences, the sight of which would have given one of the Doctor's previous incarnations a migraine from the sheer domesticity of it.
Inside the bright blue box, the Doctors were arguing over who would be the first one out the door. Clara was arguing with herself over whether their bickering was amusing or incredibly annoying.
"We need to see what we're walking into!" Clara's usual Doctor exclaimed, peering into the view screen.
"Oh, don't be such a wimp." The recently appeared Doctor wrenched the view screen out of his stubborn grasp. Oh, forget it. If her usual Doctor was Doctor 1.0, then this new one would just have to be Doctor 2.0.
"Do you have a death wish suddenly? Don't forget that you're -"
"What?" Doctor 2.0 challenged, raising an eyebrow and staring down his other self. "Fragile? Vulnerable? Human?" The other man looked at the floor. "Don't forget that I still think like you do! Sure, things have happened and changed us, but down at the base, at the core, we're still the same. So don't think you can get all overprotective just because you're too scared to see me die. I've been managing perfectly well for the past twenty years without you."
"Twenty?!" The Doctor's eyes narrowed and he pulled out his sonic screwdriver, scanning Doctor 2.0 quickly. "But you - you've only aged about eight years! That can't be right..."
"Yeah, it's a long story, so..." the second Doctor trailed off, staring at the view screen. His face paled and he abruptly shoved himself away from the console and ran for the door. He paused to grab a long tan coat that had appeared on the coat rack before yanking the doors open.
"What is it?" Clara asked, alarmed as the door practically bounced on its hinges behind Doctor 2.0's retreating figure. The Doctor was staring at the view screen in confusion.
"Nothing. He just up and ran into someone's backyard." He paused and looked at Clara. "Does he seem a little odd to you?"
"...compared to what exactly?"
"Point taken." The Doctor pushed the view screen back into place and walked purposefully towards the doors.
"Not to mention, Doctor, the man's just been trapped here away from his children and his wife is missing. I think he's entitled to act a little strangely."
"Yes, there is an awful lot going on today, isn't there?"
"Just a bit, yeah," Clara agreed as they stepped out into the sunshine.
A few minutes later, they stepped into one of the larger houses in the neighborhood - one that the Doctor insisted his other self had gone into. He claimed it was because he could feel the unique call of a Time Lord/Human hybrid mind. Clara was pretty sure it was because the back gate was swinging open.
"Doctor?" Clara called out hesitantly as she looked around the bright sunny kitchen.
"Yes?" the Doctor replied.
"No, not - I meant the other one," Clara hissed back.
"How was I supposed to know? You were right, Clara, it is quite confusing."
"Well, he doesn't seem keen to give up his own identity because why should he, so why don't you come up with a new name?"
"That - No, I don't have to. I'm the -"
"Doctor!" a new voice broke into their whispered argument. A voice the Doctor hadn't heard since... "What are you doing, you monster! Let them go!"
The Doctor raced out of the room, yanking Clara after him. They sprinted up the stairs, following the voice and burst into what appeared to be the master bedroom.
It was a beautiful room, filled with blues, deep purples and dark wood furniture. A massive skylight took up most of the ceiling, filling the space with gentle sunlight, offsetting the otherwise dark color scheme. A small vase stood on one bedside table holding a small bunch of white myosotis flowers.
Forget-me-nots.
The Doctor took note of none of this, however. Taking in the scene before him, he quickly grabbed the indignant Wilfred Mott and pulled the man he had died for behind him.
"What - who are you? Get your hands off me!" Wilf sputtered. Clara, not knowing what was going on but trusting the Doctor, placed a calming hand on Wilfred's arm. The Doctor stepped forward, pointing his sonic screwdriver at the woman before him.
She was glowing. There really was no other word for it. A golden glow enveloped every inch of her. Every strand of her long wild hair radiated. Her long, graceful hands, stretched out before her, were wrapped in tendrils of golden light.
"Let them go," the Doctor said in a low voice. The woman didn't acknowledge his presence. He stepped forward and pressed the sonic into the small of her back. "I said. Let. Them. Go."
She turned to him and smiled sadly. He hesitated for a moment. Her tearstained face and pained expression reminded him of a mad, wonderful pink and yellow human who had stopped at nothing to save him. She shook her head.
"I can't," she replied. Her voice echoed softly within itself, trembling sound waves bouncing off of themselves. She turned back and raised her arms above her head.
They all watched, frightened and horrified as she lifted the unconscious meta-crisis Doctor and Donna Noble into the air, enveloping them in that same golden light.
Their bodies began to shake and tendrils of light began to reach out between them. As the tendrils connected, they flared up, shining brighter.
"Cover your eyes!" the Doctor shouted, abandoning his one sided confrontation with the woman. He threw his arms around Clara and Wilfred and threw the three of them to the floor.
A loud crackling sizzle filled the air, almost like the sound of a log being thrown onto a fire. The light blazed out from the two figures in the air, filling the house with an impossibly blinding light.
Silence.
At first, the Doctor feared that he had gone deaf. Then he heard Clara take a shaky breath from beneath him. Wilf shifted, his trousers brushing against the hardwood floor.
Slowly, he stood and turned to face the girl. Clara gently helped Wilf to his feet, the pensioner stubbornly waving away her concerned look.
"What have you done," the Doctor said darkly. Donna and the other Doctor were lying side by side on the large bed. They looked so peaceful that he might have been fooled if it weren't for the overwhelming silence echoing in his mind. The tickle of that part-human mind was gone.
The woman turned. He could see her clearly now that the brilliant glow had faded. She was only a girl, just a teenager. She looked at him, calmly meeting his eye, saying nothing. Her eyes were an almost green colour with golden flecks. She had long, wild hair, golden blonde and streaming down her back, loose and untamed.
The Doctor knew better than to be fooled by appearances. He stepped towards her, brandishing his sonic. Her expression never changed, but her eyes seemed sadder the closer he came.
"Who are you? What did you do to them?" he demanded. She smiled gently.
"I fixed it," she replied. The soft tone seemed somehow odd coming from her. Her voice was one that should be shouting, laughing, teasing. Not demure, not resigned.
"Fixed what? What did you do to my Donna?!" Wilf demanded, coming to stand beside the Doctor. He stubbornly resisted the Doctor's attempts to move him out of any potential harm's way.
"I gave her back to you, Wilfred," the girl replied. "I gave her back to you, to the Doctors, to herself."
"Who are you." The Doctor's voice had reached a dangerous tone. His eyes were narrowing and he advanced on the girl. She stepped back until he had her cornered against a wall. Her face was still calm and composed, but her eyes were filled with pain.
"I mean you no harm," she replied. "Please, I am only helping, only have helped, only will help. Trust me."
"Trust you? Why?" he asked. "You won't even tell me who you are!"
"That trait is something I've come by quite naturally, Doctor."
Get away from her.
The angry command blazed across the Doctor's mind and he took an involuntary step back.
"Doctor! Oh thank goodness!" Wilf exclaimed from behind them. The Doctor felt a heavy hand on his shoulder, pulling him back, forcing him away from the girl.
"What -" the question died on the Doctor's lips as he stared at his meta-crisis self. The part-human tickle was still missing. …no, not missing… it was different now, like he was… no. No, he... He couldn't be. That was just...
"You do not ever, ever threaten my daughter," the meta-crisis Doctor said quietly in the Time Lord's ear, his voice controlled and measured. He pulled back and looked up at the girl. "Janie, love, how did you get here?"
"Oh, come on, Dad, you know that answer better than anyone." Jane grinned. The meta-crisis Doctor laughed and shook his head. He threw his arms around her and swept her into a hug.
"Where's your mum?" he asked after a few relished moments. "Your gran said she disappeared, but I can't find her."
"She's safe. She's at home." She looked away, avoiding his gaze. The smile slowly fell from the meta-crisis Doctor's face.
"Jane, what's going on?" he asked. She shook her head. He took a deep breath and froze, stalled like some awful realization had just slapped him in the face.
He looked at her, horrified. He placed his hand on his chest.
"Oh, no. No, no, no. What have you done?" He reached out and grasped her shoulders. "You brought me here, didn't you? I thought you understood. You can't go around doing things like this!"
"I'm not doing anything that I haven't already done, won't already do, am not already doing," she replied.
"Why are you doing this? Jane Tyler, answer me!"
She reached up on her toes and whispered something to him. With a small sad smile, she stepped out of her horrified dad's grasp, reached her hand into the air and vanished.
"We need to have a talk," the Time Lord Doctor said, angrily grabbing his meta-crisis' arm. "Who the hell was that? Your daughter?! What did you do to her? I know that energy. I know what that means, but I don't know how she has it. What did you do? And why didn't you think to mention it before?"
"Just give me a bloody moment, alright?" the meta-crisis snapped. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you every detail of my life for the past twenty years. Been a little busy. You know, the whole my wife is missing situation. Oh, and being stuck in the wrong universe. Again. Right, and let's not forget the fact that with me stuck here, my wife missing, and Jane going renegade, my children are currently at a very high risk of being raised by Jackie Tyler!"
"Don't you ever stop talking!?" a loud, brash voice slammed in between the two Doctors. They turned. Wilf was smiling gleefully near the bed. Clara seemed to be vaguely at peace with her now constant state of bemusement.
And Donna Noble was sitting up, staring at them as though they were insane.
"Now somebody tell me what the hell is going on!"