Just as when he was a child, the Doctor found himself staring into a Vortex filled to the brim with his name. He longed to look away, to run away, to hide himself in the shade of a tree as he had when he was a child. But he needed to know where the split occurred. His quest was doomed without that knowledge. And so he steeled himself, and began to search.
A million, billion, trillion timelines streamed past him, eating away at his awareness. Futures, Pasts, Presents, all existing/never existing/always existing rushed past him, their shining lights instantly snuffed by the next round that swirled around, offered up for his inspection. Planets died before they were born, races that never evolved swam before his eyes. The whole of everything was laid out before him, barred to his gaze.
And through it all, burned his Name.
His mind began to crumble under the onslaught of the information. Not even a Time Lord's brain could handle it all. Only beings like the TARDIS matrix could handle the power of the Vortex for so long. Fear shot through him, and he rotated his mind so that it was the fear that was sheared off next. He was being paired down. Reduced with every new burst of information. His knowledge of planets and stars vanished next, cut away as he was inundated with all the alternate futures of the planet Syrnas. His memories of his past lives vanished, then those of his Academy days. More and more of his thoughts and memories were lost to him until all that was left was a mission. A goal. One final thought so small that it could slide in and around the lines and possibilities of the Vortex without touching them.
His thought – just the one – darted in and out of the waves of information, too small to be destroyed, but large enough to continue with its goal. It sampled currents of time tasting without a tongue, looking without eyes, sensing without skin; for the fracture point where the world-without-a-name existed and the thing-he-wanted-back had been lost/abandoned/stolen/fled to.
Days passed. Years. Eons in a fraction of a second. The dancing thread dipped into current after current, moved on. Came back. Swirled and curled around a singular point in time. It settled there, mission complete. But its very stillness doomed it, for Time was never still, and neither was the Vortex. Alternatives and futures battered the thread, slicing away its existence.
ooOO00OOoo
The Doctor came aware and was confused by his own existence. Shouldn't he exist? Didn't he exist? Why was this surprising?
He was spun about, cocooned by the warmth of the TARDIS' comforting presence. She couldn't speak to him in words, but she made her affection for him known just the same. Images of familiar men hovered above and to the right of him, while names and descriptions of a hundred billion stars floated around him, and he wondered where he was that so much knowledge floated tantalizingly out of reach. The gold mist wrapped around the familiar men and drug them closer to him, and he reached out a hand towards them. Right before he was going to connect with them, they dissolved in a shower of silver sparks that hovered for a brief second before flying at him, like so many shooting stars. Something clicked in his mind, and suddenly he knew who those familiar strangers were. Past bodies, past lives. His past, staring him in the face.
The gold mist pulled the stars closer and he looked around, even as they began to dissolve into tiny silver sparks. Beyond the stars and planets were mathematical equations. Formal ceremonies of his people waited beyond them, and a cluster of men and women hovered at his side. His life, his memories, everything that made him the Doctor was cocooned from the ravages of the Vortex by the TARDIS, and she was tenderly putting the pieces of him back together.
How long it took, he never knew. He was constantly rediscovering things that he always knew; remembering things he'd never forgotten. "Thank you, Old Girl," he said fondly. Staring into the Vortex as he had done was foolish. So very foolish. But she'd saved him from a danger he'd not even been aware of.
Was saving him.
She floated the last bit of himself over and as he absorbed the essence, he suddenly remembered what he was doing in the Vortex in the first place. He looked around frantically for the beginnings of Pete's World. He knew that he'd found it. At least, he knew that he thought he found it. But all he saw around him was the golden glow of the TARDIS. How to talk to her? He didn't have what he needed – he had to remember…maybe he was still missing a part of himself? The part that knew where the split was.
He spun about and saw a large spiny box being pushed at him by the TARDIS. Its wood was the dark black of the anneilo tree. Metal spears emerged from its edges, seeming to grow straight out of the box. He eyed it warily as she hauled it ever closer to him. There was no sense of familiarity with this like there had been with the other fragments of himself, and it gave him the distinct impression of containing nothing good. But he was surrounded by the powerful, benevolent mind of the TARDIS and had no way to retreat. If only he had more confidence that she was aware of his limitations and wouldn't bring him anything that would re-fracture his mind.
But as he had no other option, he hung there passively as she brought it close enough to press it against the side of his head. As if he'd be able to absorb its contents through osmosis. The metal spines made that more than a little uncomfortable. But she was right about the box, for the spines softened and wrapped around his head in a disturbing, though not overtly threatening manner.
Then the lid cracked open and it was like being hit gently in the head with a sledgehammer. His brain sloshed over the sides of his skull while his eyes rattled about in their sockets, and he was pretty sure his body, wherever it was, had just bitten deep into his tongue. But he understood her message. Mostly. Though the bit about guns and bananas puzzled him a bit.
She pushed him backwards. Or was it sideways with a slightly upwards tilt? Either way, he suddenly found himself stumbling away from an Untempered Schism that had already wandered off. He braced himself against the nearest gnarled tree and proceeded to do his level best to turn his stomach inside out.
ooOO00OOoo
He eventually made it back to where he'd left his bag of supplies. Dropping to his knees, he fished out a bottle of water, carefully rinsing the taste of sick out of his mouth. He was still sorting through the information the TARDIS had given him. Much if it was incomprehensible gibberish, packed with images of alien races he'd never encountered before.
Arched doorways into empty spaces flitted next to large three-lipped six-eyed monstrosities, sat peaceably in the field at the base of a complete bridge that ended abruptly off the end of a cliff, the whole thing shining in the sun…
What she meant by all this, he had no idea. The only thing that did make sense was the coordinates for the split he'd been looking for. The rest would probably work itself out in time.
The Doctor settled his pack on his back and prepared to head back to town, thinking longingly of the bed he had in the room there. But he'd only taken three steps when he remembered his cover story and came to a halt. He was supposed to be a geologist out studying rocks. If he didn't go out and actually dig up some rocks, it would look suspicious. Grumbling about Rose and the lengths he would go for love, the Doctor turned on his heel and headed out to the fields.
ooOO00OOoo
It wasn't that bad, really. Digging up rocks. He always preferred movement to holding still, and this was certainly movement, even if it wasn't particularly in the direction of his goal. He swung the pickaxe and marveled at something so universal even as he watched a chunk of rock break free from the larger mass and tumble to his feet. He gazed down at the crystalline structure and thought how much Rose would laugh at him if he built the doorway out of this stuff. With its density and hardness paired with its structure, it looked like nothing so much as diamond.
He crouched down and poked at the rock. Of course, if he was to use these as the basis of the link between the universes, he'd be better off building a bridge than a doorway. He could just see it. A bridge along the white cliffs of the Sea of Tranquility, anchored on one end in the red grass of his homeworld, on the other, across the void, to a Gallifrey without Time Lords. If he was to put it in just the right spot, it would be hit with the last rays of Nox as it set, and the first rays of Zed as it rose. All day. So long as there was a sun in the sky, Rose's Bridge would glitter and gleam, shine against…wait a minute. That wasn't his imagination. That was one of the images the TARDIS had left him!
He eyed the large boulder before him. That would be much too big to use, and hacking into bits would be far too much effort. Especially since there were plenty of smaller ones at its base he could use.
A bridge of diamond built inexplicably out from the edge of a cliff to cross the boundary into her world so he could be reunited again with the woman he loved. Rose was going to laugh herself sick.