Notes: Rose gets help in fixing her time line from an old friend. She leaves a message for her husband, and performs an awesome magic trick.

Chapter 8

The TARDIS had left the war torn street of London after directing the focus of the Torchwood Dimension Cannon, and returned to the time vortex. Inside, the passengers were getting to know each other.

Although Rose had a good grasp of the theory of time travel and paradoxes, there was something that was puzzling her.

"Doctor, if you've corrected the timeline, how come I can still remember that it was broken?"

"Hah! Rose Tyl…. Smith. Still asking the right questions I see," he said with a smile. "You always were brilliant."

She blushed slightly and gave him a smile.

"Where and when are we at the moment?" he asked her, going into school master mode.

"In the vortex."

"Which is?"

Rose paused, her eyes taking on a slight golden hue within the brown. "It is everything and nothing. It is everywhere and nowhere. It exists, and at the same time, it does not. Time has no meaning here." Her voice had an 'otherworldly' echo to it.

The Doctor put his hand to her face and gently rubbed her cheek with his thumb. "Yes, very good. So that means we are outside of all time lines."

Rose shook her head, coming back into the room. "Er, right. So once I re-enter my timeline, I'll forget what has happened and everything returns to how it should be."

"Normally that's the case, but you've had two alterations. The first one was when you were in the pyramid, that caused a second alteration when the Daleks moved the Earth."

"We are now in a temporal causal loop. We have corrected the events leading up to you finding me again. However, when you get to the pyramid and touch the emerald, you'll end up back here again, and again, and again."

"That's like 'Groundhog Day'," Rory observed.

"Exactly. this could be your first time around, or it could be your millionth. there's no way to know. Amy, Rory and me will go on our merry way after this, but you'll keep coming back."

"So I was right! To fix this, I have to get a message to John and myself without causing a paradox," Rose said.

The Doctor smiled at her once again. "There you go again, my brilliant Rose."

"Is it just me?" Rory asked. "Or is anyone else having trouble keeping up with this?"

Everyone just looked at him.

"No," Amy said, looking at the others. "It makes perfect sense."

"Oh…. It's just me then."

Rose felt sorry for Rory. She got the impression that he had been drawn into the Doctors World of Weirdness by Amy, and had gone along with it for her sake. Much like Mickey had when she first met the Doctor and he'd been kidnapped by the Autons.

She went over to him and stroked his arm. "I know it all seems a bit strange, but imagine life is like a DVD without the controls. Normally the disk plays from the beginning, when you're born, and finishes when you die," she explained.

"The TARDIS is like the remote control. It can pause, fast forward, rewind and even bring up a menu to select which scene you want to visit."

The Doctor nodded his head and smiled at her. She was doing it again, being brilliant and making things understandable.

Rory smiled at her uncertainly. "Yeah, I get that. It's just that it's all so…. Alien."

Rose laughed with him. "Yeah, tell me about it!"

"So Mrs. Smith, we have to get a message to your husband about the harmonic resonance feedback surge."

She grinned and started to sing. "I'll send an SOS to Pete's World, I hope that someone gets my, message in a bottle. We need to get back to Dad's universe to send a letter."

"Alrighty then, hold tight everyone. It might get a bit rough as we cross the breach."

There was a shudder and change in the cadence of the Time Rotor as she passed through the breach into the alternate universe.

"There we are, safely back in your universe."

"Well, technically THAT was my universe, this is my Dad's, but I know what yer mean. You're not goin' to get stuck here are ya?" Rose asked him.

"No. Think about it. As soon as you pass on the message, the time line is corrected and we were never here."

"I've just remembered, the TARDIS had a problem with the energy the first time we were here, but our 'New Girl' runs just fine," Rose informed him.

"That's because she grew up here, using the locally available energy sources. I'm using a buffer to compensate for the different energy in this universe so that it doesn't drain the Old Girl."

He was studying the display screen. "Have you got an idea for the best time to pass on a message? You'll have to do it through an intermediary so that you don't create a paradox."

"I know," Rose said as though he was trying to teach her to suck eggs. "That lesson was well learned." She was talking about trying to save her father again, and he knew it.

She came over to the console and bumped him over with her hips.

"Here, let me," Rose said with a smile, stroking the console. She set the coordinates and operated the controls. The TARDIS then materialised under the trees in the garden of the Tyler Mansion.

"Well, aren't you full of surprises?" he said with a smile of admiration.

She gave him her tongue in teeth smile.

Amy and Rory stood with their mouths open, looking in wonder at this amazing woman who seemed to be able to give the Doctor a run for his money.

"Is she a Time Lord?" Rory asked Amy. "Are you a Time Lord?" he asked Rose.

Rose laughed. "No, there's only one Time Lord, and you're lookin' at 'im."

"But she did marry his hybrid twin brother," Jack told them.

"So what's your plan then?" The Doctor asked her.

"Well I did think about just postin' a letter to John, but I didn't want to leave it to chance. So I've decided to hand deliver it to a special friend."

"And will this friend be okay with you disappearing in front of them?"

"Oh yes. He's a bit of a magician, an' I've been waitin' to blow him away with a magic trick. This one will have 'im scrathin' his head for years."

"And the message?" he asked.

Rose opened the breast pocket of her uniform and took out two envelopes.

"I don't need this one anymore. It was a message to Chrissie, the Technical Support Specialist, to send me five minutes earlier." She handed him the second envelope.

He took it and looked at the Gallifreyan writing on the front. It was the infinity symbol, the same as on their wedding rings. He turned the envelope over, lifted out the piece of paper and unfolded it. There was more Gallifreyan script written on the paper.

"You have nice handwriting," he complimented her.

"I had a good teacher," she complimented back. "It must have been all those years working as a Scrutationary Archivist at the Bureau of Continual Observation."

His eyebrows raised in surprise. Rose gave a single laugh at the expression on his face.

"John told me all about your early life on Gallifrey." Her expression then went sombre. "About your wife…. and your family."

He cleared his throat. 'Swiftly moving on', would be the phrase to use. Rose realised that this was a fully fledged Time Lord, who didn't have a 'Donna' side to connect with.

She knew that he loved her, so much so that he had sacrificed his own happiness so that she could be happy in this universe with his twin. But he would never commit to a long term relationship with a short term life form. He'd already done that and got the sad face t-shirt.

"That's a good message," he said, changing the subject as though they had never spoken of his past life. "Short, direct and to the point."

"So John will understand and act on the information?"

"Absolutely. So, are you ready?"

"Absolutely," she said with a grin.

She went to Jack and hugged him. He kissed the top of her head as he rubbed her back.

"Well gorgeous, that's another adventure in the bag. It was good to see him again, wasn't it?"

"Yeah. I've missed him. Thanks for everything Jack."

"No problem Sweetheart. Now go get your family back."

She released the hug with Jack and turned to Amy. Although she had only just met her, Rose knew that she was a kindred spirit.

"It's good to know that he's got someone like you to keep him in line," she said smiling. She looked over to the Doctor and saw him raise an eyebrow in protest.

"It's been nice meeting an old friend of his. Getting him to open up about his past is like pulling teeth," Amy said.

Rose laughed. "Yeah I know. Three and a half years, and all I got were hints and whispers." They hugged and Rose looked her up and down.

"I love the outfit by the way. How do you get away with the short skirt? Every time I wore a mini, I was either runnin' for my life or dangling off a ladder where you could see my knickers," she laughed.

Amy laughed with her. "I know, but Rory likes to look at my legs," she confided.

"Amy!" Rory protested, embarrassed by his fiancé's admission.

"What? I was just telling the truth."

Rose suddenly remembered when 'duplicate Jack' appeared in their world. He had told them that he thought the Doctor had regenerated and was travelling with a policewoman who was wearing a too short uniform.

"Wait a minute, you're the policewoman in the short skirt."

Amy blushed. "Er, I'm not actually a policewoman. It was a kissogram outfit."

She leaned toward Rose. "That one's Rory's favourite," she said with a wink and cheeky grin.

"AMY!" Rory rolled his eyes in embarrassment.

Rose went over to him and held his hand. She wanted to give him the benefit of her experience with Mickey in the TARDIS.

"I know it all seems a bit strange and alien," she started.

"And dangerous," he added. "Don't forget dangerous."

"Oh dangerous is just the bit in between," she told him. "It can be dangerous stepping out the front door to go to work."

"I know, but it's as though he goes looking for trouble, or more like trouble comes looking for him."

"Yeah, no argument from me there. But give it a chance, the rewards are worth it. My old boyfriend Mickey ran straight out of the TARDIS and wouldn't go back in at first. But eventually he came around, and he had a great time."

Rory gave her a lopsided smile. "Okay, maybe I will. Our first date in Venice was a bit of a disaster, too many vampires," he said with a laugh. Rose laughed with him. "But the Doctor has offered to make it up to us with another try, and Amy seems keen to try."

"There ya go then," she said encouragingly. "That's the spirit."

They hugged and rubbed backs before Rose finally stood in front of the man that she loved. And that didn't feel strange, because she was married to him. She had given birth to his son, and okay, he had a different face now, but he was the same man, definitely and absolutely.

She hugged him around the neck, and he returned the hug around her chest.

"Thank you…. for everything. Now, and in the past."

"You're welcome…. Rose Tyler," he said deliberately. She pulled away slightly and grinned at him.

"I meant it you know; when I said I love you."

"I know," he said, holding her face and stroking her cheek with his thumb.

"And I realise now that it doesn't need saying, because you said it every time you held my hand. Every time you smiled at me. Every time you hugged me, and every time you saved my life. Every time, it said that you loved me right back."

She cupped his face in her hands and she kissed him on the lips, and kept on kissing. It turned into a full on snog, with Rose running her hands through his not so great, but still good hair, and he wrapping his arms around her and pulling her in close.

Jack stood there grinning, while Amy and Rory stood with mouths wide open. They had never seen him express his emotions like this before.

They broke from the kiss and Rose pressed her lips together before running her tongue around them.

"Mmmmm. Different lips, but the same great kisser inside. Howd'ya do that?" she asked him with a wicked grin.

The Doctor was looking quite pleased with himself as he straightened his bowtie and pulled his jacket sleeves.

"Superior…."

"Gallifreyan anatomy," Rose finished for him with a laugh. She kissed him again and put the letter back in her pocket.

"I'd better go before Jackie gets home with Tony. Thanks again, and I'll see you next time the walls of reality let us meet." She headed for the door.

"Bye Rose," they all called after her. She opened the door, took one last look, smiled, waved, and stepped outside.

She closed the door of the TARDIS and gently stroked the blue wood.

["Bye Old Girl. Look after him for me."]

["Goodbye my little cub. I'll keep taking him where he needs to be. Take good care of my daughter."]

Rose nodded and patted the wood before turning and heading across the lawn towards the mansion. She walked past the garage and made her way around to the front of the house. She walked up the steps and rang the bell.

She heard footsteps approaching and the large front door opened. A well groomed man in a sharp suit smiled when he saw her.

"Rose?! What a surprise. The security system didn't pick you up."

She kissed him on the cheek before entering the hallway. "Afternoon Alistair. Just practisin' my Special Operations Agent skills," she said teasingly.

"They're very good," he said, following her down the hallway. "I'm afraid your Mother isn't back from the school run yet."

"That's okay; it was you I wanted to see anyway."

"Me? Really?" he asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Yeah," she grinned. "I've got a magic trick that'll knock yer socks off."

"Really? Oh I can't wait. What is it?"

"Well, it's a disappearin' trick and a sort of mind readin' trick." She took the letter out of her pocket.

"When I come over later with John, I want you to give him this envelope."

"What's in there?" Alistair asked.

"It's a prediction about a mission we'll be goin' on and it'll freak him out," she told him.

"And the disappearing trick?"

"Come with me, you are gonna love this." She took his hand and led him through to the kitchen.

"Right, let's set the scene. First, we shut the doors." She closed the doors to the large kitchen so that they were now in a closed room. She went over to the cupboard and took out a packet of cornflakes.

"Now we make it difficult for me to leave without bein' detected." She sprinkled cornflakes over the floor in front of the doors, so that anyone trying to leave would crunch the dry flakes.

"So would you agree that if I tried to leave, you'd hear me?" she asked him with a big smile.

"Yes, I suppose so. You could try to climb out of the window, but I'd hear that as well."

"Okay, I want you to close your eyes and put your hand over them. No peeking now." Alistair did as she asked.

"Now put your hand out and I'll give you the envelope." Alistair held out his hand.

"Ready? One…. Two…. Thr…." The envelope dropped onto his hand.

Alistair stood there in silence with his hand over his eyes, listening intently for Rose to try and leave the room.

"Oh, not quite getting to three was a nice touch, very theatrical," he said. There was no reply.

"Rose?" Still no reply. He took his hand away and opened his eyes. He was alone in the room, and the cornflakes were undisturbed, as was the kitchen window.

"ROSE?" he called out. She had to still be in the kitchen then. He started a systematic search of all the cabinets and hiding places.

"What the hell?" he said out loud when he was certain that she was not in the kitchen. He reached under the sink for the dustpan and brush, and started sweeping up the dry flakes of corn. His mind trying to work out how she'd managed to fool him.