Disclaimer: Doctor Who belongs to the BBC. I do not own any of it, nor do I make any money from it.

A/N Thanks for the awesome reviews on the last chapter. Everyone was excited for three Doctors.

Part 2 will have some more action, explanations and even some drama. On a sidenote, it is extremely difficult to write quick dialogue when you have to keep specifying which Doctor is speaking.

Anything you recognise comes from the audio 'Caerdroia' and the humpty dumpty line is from an old episode of NCIS.

Happy Reading!

Ghosts of Oldbank: The Three Doctors

Previously

The room felt like it was being pressurised as a small green glow began to rise in the room. Fitz and Rose screamed, the pressure getting too intense for their human bodies. Just as suddenly it had happened, it stopped and the glow flashed a brilliant green before the room went back to normal again.

Rose fumbled around blindly, spots dancing in front of her eyes. Her hand encountered a velvet sleeve and she grabbed it. "Doctor?"

There came a strange echo as he replied with a 'Yes?' Rose blinked to clear her vision and saw Fitz staring open-mouthed in front of him. She followed his gaze and her jaw dropped.

There were three identical Doctors in front of them.

"Tell me I'm seeing in threes," said Rose, her eyes wide with disbelief.

"One of you," said Fitz, pointing at her while his eyes stayed fixed on the three Doctors. "One of me," he pointed at himself. "Three of the Doctor," he finished, pointing at them.

"Oh dear," said the one whose sleeve Rose was holding onto. "Well, this is something that doesn't happen everyday."

"The moon is quite pretty," said the one closest to Fitz, gazing out of the window with a dreamy expression on his face.

"It was a spectral beam projected into a sealed chamber," snapped the third Doctor gruffly, looking thoroughly angry for some reason.

"Yes," agreed the one near Rose, his voice more or less like himself rather than the gruff tones of the third one and the dreamy tone of the other one.

"Clearly, I got the brains," snapped the gruff one. "That one got the brain damage," he pointed at the one who was currently admiring the curtains. "You, what did you get?" he asked the one near Rose.

"The manners," he answered calmly.

"Can someone explain what the hell is going on?" demanded Fitz, his voice going slightly squeaky.

"Oh try and keep up!" snapped the grumpy Doctor as he rattled the door knob angrily.

"Doctor, what happened?" asked Rose, looking at the one near her. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the grumpy Doctor glare at her for some reason.

"Well," answered the calmer Doctor. "What we've been experiencing were spectres of people who have passed through these hallways over the years. Human beings, on principle, are very simple in terms of their dimensional existence…"

"A Time Lord, on the other hand, is much more complex and multifaceted," finished the grumpy Doctor in a tone that was decidedly bordering on supercilious.

"Somehow the instruments must have identified my bio-signature and activated the beam," said the calm Doctor.

"Did you know that these curtains match the exact shade of blue on the painting of the Third Empress of the Lost Moon of Poosh?" interrupted the dreamy Doctor.

Rose and Fitz stared at each other and back at the Doctors with identical looks of disbelief on their faces. Then, to everyone's enormous surprise, Rose started laughing. "Oh my god," she gasped through her laughter. "The beam thingy split you according to your different personalities."

"What?" snapped the grumpy Doctor, looking at her like she had just dribbled on her shirt.

Rose ignored him and looked at the calm Doctor next to her who was frowning thoughtfully. "Think about it," she told him. "This is you when you are you, that is you when you are, you know, a bit distracted," she said, nodding towards the Doctor next to Fitz who had found a yo-yo in his pocket and was performing a series of very impressive tricks with it. "And that," she began, looking at the grumpy Doctor who shot her a glare. "That is you when you are being a moody git," she finished, glaring right back at him.

"Excuse me," began the grumpy Doctor, starting to advance on her angrily only to have Fitz interrupt.

"You mean this is actually normal?" demanded Fitz. "And what the hell is a Time Lord?"

"It's what my people are called," said the grumpy Doctor, directing a 'I think you're a stupid ape' look at Fitz. "You didn't think that everyone had a time machine that was bigger on the inside, did you?"

Fitz flushed but Rose came to his defence. "How is he supposed to know if we didn't tell him?" she snapped at the grumpy Doctor who glared at her and started fiddling with the door knob again. "And no, Fitz. This is the first time this has happened. So," she said, turning to the calm Doctor. "How do we fix it?"

"Fix?" he asked, as if she had pulled him away from another line of thought.

"Yeah, fix," agreed Fitz. "How do we put humpty dumpty back together again?"

"They never managed to put humpty dumpty back together again," said the dreamy Doctor mournfully. "It was tragic."

"That's 'cos the king only had horses and men," quoted Rose cheekily, shooting him a smile that had him giggling. Rose was surprised at how happy that laugh sounded.

"There has to be a way to reverse this," said the grumpy Doctor, casting a disdainful look towards his giggling self. "We have to find the instruments that projected that beam. It has to be in this castle somewhere."

"Yes," nodded the calm Doctor. "I think it would be best if we split up. That way we shall cover more ground."

"You think that's a good idea, Doctor?" asked Rose uncertainly.

"Yes," answered the grumpy Doctor, throwing her a look that implied he thought her question was rather useless.

Rose bristled at the look but Fitz intervened with a question of his own. "How do we keep track of the three of you? You can't all be the Doctor."

The dreamy Doctor gave a high giggle. "Why not? It is not often I get to call myself the Doctor, short of introducing myself," he said, sounding quite excited. "It will be so exciting, wouldn't it, Doctor and Doctor?" he asked his other two selves, both of whom ignored him.

"No, it's confusing," Fitz told him. "You can be Tigger, and the grumpy one can be Eeyore."

"Don't be silly, Fitz," said Rose, though her lips twitched at the nicknames. "This is the Doctor," she said, pointing to the calm one. "The one next to you is...Eccentric Doctor, and that one can be the Sulky Doctor," she added, nodding towards the grumpy one.

"Hmph," said the Sulky Doctor as he finally got the door open. Without a backward glance at anyone else, he left the study.

The others followed him quickly and found themselves back in the foyer. "Well, I think I shall take the lower levels," said the Doctor. "Fitz and you take the gardens and the yard," he told the Eccentric Doctor. "You and Rose could explore the top floors," he added, looking at the Sulky one.

Rose looked unhappy at having to go with the moody git but she refrained from showing her displeasure, though the Sulky Doctor did pick up that she was less than happy at the arrangement. "We shall meet back here in 2 hours," said the Sulky Doctor. "Be on the lookout for anything that might seem out of place, and for goodness sake, watch your backs."

With that grim pronouncement, he started walking up the stairway. Rose jogged after him, while the Eccentric Doctor and Fitz left the castle to go out into the gardens. With a determined nod to himself, the Doctor started exploring the various rooms on the ground floor.

"So, why can't we just go back to the TARDIS?" asked Fitz as they navigated the undergrowth.

"Too risky," said the Eccentric Doctor, stopping to admire an old, and completely dry fountain. He jumped inside quickly, the dry leaves crunching under his feet as he walked all around the round fountain a few times. "Oh," he said in surprise. "This is making me giddy."

"Maybe you shouldn't circle it then," said Fitz, torn between amusement and being weirded out. He was ashamed to admit it, but it honestly hadn't occurred to him that the Doctor was an alien. Now that he knew different, he felt a bit foolish. It wasn't like the future would have time machines like the TARDIS.

The Doctor stopped circling the fountain and jumped out again. "This one time, Nyssa and I were on Ganymede Delta and there was a fountain full of honey. I wanted to jump in, you know, just to see what it felt like. But I didn't. I can't remember why. It would have been fun," he said, scratching the top of his head as if genuinely thinking about it.

"Who's Nyssa?" asked Fitz curiously.

"Did you see that?" he asked suddenly, looking over Fitz's shoulder. Before Fitz had a chance to turn around and look, the Doctor had taken off running. With a groan, Fitz followed him.

The Doctor darted through the dead trunks and the overgrown foliage with a speed and grace that seemed to defy the laws of physics, and Fitz was nearly cursing by the time he found the Doctor again. He was kneeling, peering at the small body of water in the ground. Fitz was about to grumble about him running off like that, when he noticed that the body of water was no more than six feet in diameter, but the water inside was clear as a crystal.

"What the hell?" he mumbled, kneeling next to it like the Doctor.

"Hmm," said the Doctor as he picked up a few rocks and dropped them into it. The water rippled but the rocks seemed to disappear. The water stayed clear as ever. "This is marvellous!" cried the Doctor in delight. "It's like the hole that Alice disappeared into. I warned her, but she never did listen. Rabbit holes are not always reliable, you know. I've been down a few of them myself."

Fitz nodded uncertainly, not sure if his ramblings were true or just tall tales. "Where do you think it leads?" he asked. The other Doctor, the one who seemed perpetually angry for some reason, had told them to be on the lookout for anything that didn't fit. Fitz was sure that a small pool of water with water as clear as this in the midst of dead vegetation, certainly qualified as being out of place.

"Only one way to find out," said the Doctor with an excited grin. Before Fitz could stop him, he dived head first into the pool.

"Nothing here either," said Rose, shutting the door. So far, they'd got through several different hallways and even more rooms, but they had found nothing. The Doctor hadn't said a word, short of snapping at her when she paused to admire some of the paintings or rooms.

"Yes, I know. I saw it too," he snapped, stalking off towards the next room.

Rose glared at his back, her temper simmering under the surface. One more snide remark, and she was going to push him down the stairs. Lost in her angry thoughts, she bumped into his back when he stood in the doorway of the next room.

"Watch it, will you?" he snapped at her.

Rose's patience snapped. "That is it!" she said angrily, rounding on him. "I have had it up to here with your snappish, rude and frankly condescending attitude. I don't know what your problem is, and honestly, I don't even care right now. So you can either button it up or we can go our separate ways."

He looked furious, and Rose had never seen the Doctor so angry at her before. But she refused to back down, staring at him stubbornly. "You have had it?" he demanded. "What about me? I have to put up with your whining attitude and your insistence at stopping in these rooms to look at dusty old paintings. You know what I don't understand, Rose Tyler?" he asked, advancing on her. "How my other two selves put up with YOU!"

Stung, Rose stumbled back, his words hurting more than she would have thought. Tears pricked her eyes but she refused to give him the satisfaction. "Fine then," she said, her voice surprisingly steady, considering how close to tears she was. "I'll get out of your hair."

She turned around and stomped away, not stopping to see his reaction. She heard footsteps behind her and she increased her pace, wanting to get away from him as fast as possible. She rounded the corner into one of the unexplored hallways, this one looking more dilapidated than the rest of the castle.

"Rose!" she heard him call but Rose broke out into a run, ignoring his calls to stop. The wood flooring creaked under her feet as she ran. In her determination to get away from the Doctor, she missed the especially creaky part of the hallway floor. It gave out under her feet and Rose screamed, scrambling to hold onto something to stop herself from plummeting to the ground nearly twenty feet below her. Her fingers found purchase into the broken off wooden floor as she held on for dear life.

"ROSE!" The Doctor was running up to the part of the hallway that had collapsed, fear prominent in his voice. He found Rose hanging on for dear life and he immediately sprung into action. "Rose, hold on!" he said, tiptoeing over to a sturdy part of the floor next to her.

"Hurry! My hand is slipping," said Rose, wincing as the wood splinters dug into her fingers.

The Doctor lay down flat on the floor on his belly and reached his arms down to hook his hands under Rose's arms. "Rose, I'm going to need you to wrap your arms around my neck," he said, forcing his voice to be calm.

"No, no, I can't," said Rose, unwilling to relinquish the tenuous grip that was preventing her from falling to her death.

"Yes, you can," he said, meeting her eyes and Rose was surprised to see how scared -no, how terrified- he looked. "Please, Rose. Trust me. One hand at a time, I won't let you fall."

Nodding nervously, Rose loosened one hand and wrapped it around the Doctor's neck. His grip on her was strong and it gave her the courage to wrap the other hand around his neck too. Once her grip was secure, she gave a nod when he asked her if she was ready.

"At three then," he said, his breathing laboured as his grip under her arms was the only thing keeping her from falling. "One, two, three…"

With a mighty heave, the Doctor pulled Rose up and on top of him as he fell back on his back. The two of them tried to catch their breath, their hearts racing at the near miss.

The Doctor was the first to recover as he cupped Rose's face with both his hands and tilted it up towards him to look at her. "Rose, are you alright? Are you hurt? Does anything hurt?" he asked frantically.

Rose stared at him, wondering if he was the same Doctor who had told her moments ago that he couldn't stand her. Right now, he was a complete one-eighty from that, looking her up and down as if determined to make sure that every inch of her was unharmed and uninjured. "No, I am fine," she said slowly, but it didn't stop his frantic gaze. He rolled her onto her back and hovered over her, checking her arms and legs again for injuries that he might have missed.

When he found none, he grabbed both her hands and held them between his hearts and rested his forehead on hers. "I thought I'd lost you," he murmured, sounding genuinely terrified.

"You didn't, I'm here," she said, feeling the need to reassure him even as her head was spinning with his mood swings.

His eyes snapped open at that, and Rose was knocked speechless by the depth of emotions in his eyes. She had never seen him like that, and her breath stuttered in her chest when he bent down and brushed his lips against hers in a tender, almost chaste gesture.

The kiss jolted her into action. She pushed him away and scrambled to her feet. "No," she said, moving away from him.

"Rose?" he asked, sounding so broken that it almost changed her mind.

"No," she repeated, more for her sake than his. "You can't do this to me. You can't just...pushing me away one minute and...and then lookin' at me an-and kissin' me like that. It's not fair."

"Rose," he said again as he stood up.

Rose moved back until she was nearly backed against the wall. "The whole of last week, and now, this. I don't even know what's going on wi-AAARRRGGHHH…."

"Rose!" screamed the Doctor as the wall behind her slid open, taking Rose into the darkness beyond it. He ran to it but it slid shut before he got there. "Rose!" he screamed again as he banged his fists against the wall. But there was no reply.

Someone, or something, had taken Rose.

The lower levels turned up nothing until the calm, rational version of the Doctor found the stone stairwell that would lead into the foundations of the castle.

He hoped that Fitz, Rose and his other two selves had better luck than him when it came to finding something that would explain this whole business. He managed to unlock the door at the bottom of the stairwell and nearly gagged as the stench of rotting remains and stale produce hit him. Definitely the dungeons and extensive ones at that, he deduced as he descended into them.

He drew out the torch from his pocket and shone it around, looking for anything that might be of use. It was a typical dungeon, with stone prison cells, rusty chains on the wall and corridors upon corridors of a twisted labyrinth. With a sigh, he contemplated using a string or something equally useful for navigating the corridors when he felt a sharp blow at the back of his head.

His vision went black but before he lost consciousness, he could have sworn he saw a pair of red eyes.

A/N End of Part 2. So, what did you think?

I know that Tigger!Eight is a favourite with many people but I have always had a soft spot for Eeyore!Eight. Wonder what that says about me.

Anyway, this chapter was fun to write. To recap, Eccentric Eight is down the rabbit hole, Rose is taken through the wall, and the calm Doctor has been captured. Fun times indeed.

Out of curiosity, would anyone have a problem if the rating on this story went up to 'M' to accommodate a potential smut scene? Let me know.

The next chapter will deal with the events as they unfold further. It will be up soon. See you then!

~ Phoenix