Much to his dismay, the Doctor had found another drawback of his new half-human body: he wasn't very good at being tied up in a suspended cage, slowly swinging a good eleven metres above the ground. He hadn't embarrassed himself so far, but if it were up to the king, he'd get a lifetime of chances to try.

The soft blue of a new day crept over the countryside. Soon, the sun's warming touch would reach them and finally dry their clothes. A stiff breeze clawed at their hair, draining the warmth out of their bodies and making them both shake and shudder miserably. The Doctor's nose was already reporting first signs of the sniffles.

They were an almost constant companion, he'd realised. Being human meant having one heart, needing to sleep, and having the sniffles.

Rose was much better at this; her scowl remained intact, burning into the bricks of the tower while they swung softly. Left. And right. And left. And right.

The Doctor hoped it wasn't an angry scowl; more an expression of pure concentration, since she was working to reach her multipurpose tool from her belt so she could cut them loose. It really was an excellent invention; equipped with a miniature perception filter, the angels hadn't suspected it to be anything other than a regular belt, doing only what any good belt would do, while looking slightly anachronistic.

Only a few metres further away, at eye level, a small balcony platform made of wood was set into the side of the tower. An armoured Illanti guard sat on a perch, reading a very small book. A waste of manpower, the Doctor thought; everyone in the castle could see them inside the cage.

But the king clearly didn't want to risk anything. And he wasn't wrong to assume they would be trying to break out.

The wind swallowed any sounds, and so far the guard hadn't taken notice of Rose's efforts. Bored, the Doctor's eyes started to wander, until he spotted something at the back of her belt, something smooth and round and grey. He leaned backward to inspect it.

'Stop looking,' she hissed, 'he's gonna see.'

'Is that a gun?'

'Hairdryer,' she whispered. 'They thought it was part of the outfit, fashion or something.' There was a clicking sound, and a strained movement went through her body as she tried to grab hold of the tool. Then she cursed as it slid through her fingers, cluttering to the wooden flooring.

'Why'd you bring a hairdryer?'

She gave him a cool look, between wet strands of blonde hair. 'You really don't know?'

'Fair enough.'

'Also I can use it as a fake space gun. Kinda looks like one.' The Doctor snorted, which made the guard look up from his book, shooting them a stern glance. Rose froze until his gaze went back down.

'How's that plan B coming along?' hissed Rose. 'Although, by all means, take your time. Doesn't seem like we'll be going anywhere anytime soon.'

'Right now you're my plan B.'

He'd hoped for a smile, but in vain. He knew he should apologise for earlier, for attacking the man she loved, the very man he failed to be. But there was still anger inside of him, keeping him from saying anything. Another imperfection of humanity, the root of all his problems.

No wonder she didn't see him. He wasn't him anymore.


'Here we go,' Rose said as she reached her knife. She flexed her muscles, beginning to saw at her restraints in careful movements. It wasn't long until the ropes cut into her wrists, her joints hurt from the effort of sawing, and she grew very cross from swinging in a cage way too high above a bunch of self-contented winged supermodels.

She decided to take a break and soon noticed that the Doctor had grown suspiciously quiet. Glancing at him from the side, she found that after all this time, she still had no clue about what was going on in his head most of the time. And with this new Doctor, she probably had even less of a chance of getting it right.

She had barely even recognised him earlier in the TARDIS. There had been a silent tension between them all this time, but this was her first fight with the Metacrisis Doctor.

Change him.

Memories of that day on Bad Wolf Bay flashed through her mind, and Rose decided that it was time to finally ask the question that had haunted her ever since.

'Can I ask you something?'

'Wouldn't be able to stop you if I wanted.'

'Why didn't he stay?'

'Hm?'

'Five months ago, after we've defeated the Daleks. We were all together, one big happy ending.'

'Rose...'

'He said, you were born in battle, and that I should change you. But then... couldn't we have done all that together? In our home universe? Why did he bring us here, why'd he just bog off?' Her voice had grown angry by the time she was finished.

The Doctor looked to the wooden floor panels of their swinging prison, avoiding her gaze. 'It was the best for everybody.'

'No, but look: if you really want to be with somebody, then wouldn't you do everything to be with them?'

The Metacrisis Doctor sighed. Then, with an airy, casual voice, he simply said, 'He's moved on, Rose.'

Taking this as a confession, Rose felt her heart turn to stone inside her chest, hurting her more than even the biting wind. Screwing up her mouth, she softly nodded. 'So that's that, then.'

'Timelords and humans are very similar in that regard,' he began to explain. 'Sooner or later we all arrive at a point where we have to take our dreams and stuff them into some crate under the roof of our minds.'

'Oh, stop it,' she hissed. 'You never even tried. I spent two years travelling from dimension to dimension, just for you! And you, right away, you just move on, and find yourself someone else to travel with.'

'You were supposed to do the same.'

'What?'

'You could have had a good life, with Mickey or someone else.'

Rose scoffed. 'How? After everything, how could I just settle?'

The guard loudly cleared his throat, shooting them a stern glance, but he didn't say anything. Instead, his left wing flapped, making him seem like an outraged reader in a library, trying to read his book in silence. They both paused and in the silence felt miserable, until Rose resumed her work at the restraints.

'He moved on, because he always does,' the Doctor went on. 'A real expert in that subject, he is. There were so many companions before you... But that doesn't mean he never felt anything for any of them. Doesn't mean he never wished for a significant change of circumstances. Like say, miraculously turning into a human.'

Rose huffed. 'Mister Miracle.'

'Oh, it's a tragedy,' the Doctor said in an overly dramatic tone. 'On a personal level, it's an epic, cataclysmic tragedy, but losing immortality also has its benefits.'

'Like what?'

'It changes your perspective. One brief lifespan, one hell of a bonfire. As a Timelord, I had to consider the long game. It was a constant struggle, thinking versus feeling, the brain against the heart. But that's over now. Goodbye, long game. There's nothing to stop me from chasing any dreams I've got buried inside that gnarly ol' crate.'

Rose stopped her work, considering the Doctor's words. 'Dreams like being tied up in a swinging cage, super high, air's freezing, for the rest of your life? Except whenever some psycho-angel needs you to punch a password into some machine to mind-control a dragon?'

'With you by my side?'

She looked at him then, expecting a cheeky smile, but the Doctor hadn't been joking. It was only after a few moments that he cracked into a wide grin. 'And who are you trying to fool? I know you like this.'

'Beats the evening programme, I s'pose,' and they shared a brief smile. Maybe he was OK, after all? A little more complicated, a little more human. Could she live with that?

She made a delighted sound as her ties finally snapped under the pressure of her blade. 'Looks like there's another significant change in circumstances right around the-'

She was interrupted by a violent scream. It came from the Illanti guard who was dying in horrible pain, as a shrill whine was filling the tower, and the screaming angel was enveloped in a red glow, before he disappeared without a trace. Rose and the Doctor stared in disbelief, their hearts suddenly racing.

The shot had come from above. A male Illanti stood at the balcony on top of the tower, right underneath the roof. He was packing away what looked like a futuristic weapon.

'Who's that?' Rose asked, breathless.

'Blorph'g,' the Doctor said, incredulously.

'The humanitarian cactus?' To Rose, he just looked like an ordinary Illanti, ornate clothing, rich brown locks bobbing on his head. But then she remembered what the Doctor had told her about the shimmer, and she found the device on his wrist almost right away.

The disguised alien aimed another, much simpler weapon at the roof above him. It shot out a thin thread which connected with a dull thunk. He carefully stepped to the edge of the balcony and began hovering down to their slowly swinging cage, his giant wings remaining folded and useless at his back.

Rose took her chance as he was busy making his way down, and quickly reached for the recharged EMP bean, easily grabbing it from her tool belt. She was feeling very satisfied with herself, because she'd thought about recharging it earlier in an electrical outlet on the TARDIS console. Disarming this daftly named cactus-in-disguise would be a piece of cake.

'Wait,' the Doctor hissed, spotting her move.

Rose glared at him. 'Why?'

'I want to interrogate him first.'

'Aren't I a lucky fellow,' said the descending figure in a conversational manner. 'Just when I need a man with all the answers, you come stumbling back into the lion's den, and present yourself on a silver platter.'

'You didn't have to kill him,' growled the Doctor.

'Collateral damage for getting you out of here,' he said after landing ontop of the rattling cage. 'Really, Doctor, not even a thank you?'

'What, for sending that sledge-hammer slinging smith after me? Too kind, really.'

'Oh, stop your whining.' The fake angel got down on his knees and crept warily toward the edge of the shuddering cage. It was clear that he wasn't the sort of man who performed acrobatic stunts on a daily basis; his movements were tense and jerky, and he froze whenever the cage shook too much. The Doctor's stomach lurched from the additional movement.

'Why isn't he killing us?' Rose whispered, but the Doctor had already jumped a few steps ahead. 'Figured out that you need us after all, haven't you?'

One hand still clutching the grappling gun, Blorph'g pulled out a small metal rod with a round tip that gleamed like dark oil in the early morning light. He carefully reached down to the metal lock, and slid it inside. He turned it and after a couple secondsthe lock simply opened up without any apparent resistance.

'Ah, that's brilliant,' the Doctor said, torn between anger and curiosity. 'A carbon-fiber grappling gun, and a liquid-metal lock pick? Where'd you find those pretties?'

He stepped inside the cage and packed the lock pick away. 'I don't think you want to know.'

The Doctor watched Blorph'g threading the grappling gun through the bars where it hung at his ready. He didn't retract the connecting piece from the ceiling, which told the Doctor that he planned on using it to re-ascend to the top of the tower once his business here was over. But what exactly was his business?

'Where's the anamoeta crystal? Lost it somewhere? Or have you grown tired of all that mind controlling?'

The fake angel pulled a menacing-looking ray-gun from underneath his shimmer-clothing and pointed it at the Doctor. 'Now, if you wouldn't mind coming with me?'

'Gotta say, not bad. A James Bond villain could take some pointers from you.'

'Today, Doctor.'

'Today's far from over,' the Doctor countered. 'First I want you to answer a couple questions.'

Wordlessly, Blorph'g aimed at Rose.

'Alright, alright!' hurried the Doctor. 'Just tell me what you need first?'

Blorph'g smiled. 'You will uncouple the control matrix of the Varrachian Mind Controller for me.'

The Doctor shrugged. 'Impossible. Ask me something else.'

He gestured with his gun at Rose. 'You really don't like your friend, do you?'

'Listen,' the Doctor said, 'if I uncouple the control matrix, the machine locks itself down. Production glitch, not even an overseer authority can do anything about that.'

Then his face lit up with a realisation. 'Wait, you already tried that, didn't you? And now the whole system's down!'

The sour look on Blorph'g's face told him that he was right.

'But why do you need to... Ohhh... I see. You do have a spaceship after all. The pacifier pod, I assume. You've repaired it all this time, but you're still missing the control matrix from the mind controller. That's why you needed my help – to disassemble the machine. I'm right, aren't I?'

Blorph'g huffed, his expression growing more and more sour as the Doctor continued talking to himself. 'And trusting old me just gave you everything you wanted. But wait, that's rubbish! A pacifier pod has an FTL drive, but you can't start that from a planet's surface. How are you going to get it into space?'

Now it was Blorph'g's turn to smile. 'You'll find out if you come with-'

'Of course!' the Doctor shouted, making Rose jump, and almost activate her EMP bean. 'The Andoria! You took the rocket and put it inside the tower, and you fixed your pacifier pod to it.'

Blorph'g's sour face was back. 'Very good, Doctor. Now-'

'But you can't start up a rocket inside the castle!' the Doctor interrupted again. 'You will kill all the Illantis!'

Blorph'g scoffed. 'Don't you think I know?'

'Why are you doing this?' Rose demanded, utterly bewildered by the alien's casual disregard for life. 'It's not exactly humanitarian.'

He scrutinised her, and after a few moments he slowly began to shake his head. 'You wouldn't understand. None of you would understand.'

'Help us understand, then,' the Doctor said, shrugging his shoulders. 'We've got time.'

But angel-Blorph'g shook his head. 'You're not going to trick me. Stand up now, Doctor.'

'It's love, isn't it?' asked Rose. 'You're doing all this to get back to someone.'

For a couple moments, the only sound was the wind. Blorph'g's angelic features froze on an unreadable expression.

'I swore an eternal vow,' he said calmly.

The Doctor answered this by blowing raspberry. 'You call that love? That's not love, that's an obsession. No, forget that. It's mass murder! Love isn't supposed to be mass murder. Blimey!' The Doctor suddenly looked startled. 'The autosave!' he gasped.

'These arrogant pricks have it coming!' Blorph'g snapped.

'No, no, no, listen!' the Doctor interrupted him. 'It wouldn't be just the Illantis! The mind control adaptation saves the data of those it controlled automatically, with an autosave function. Makes it a lot easier to do it again, saves time and energy. But there's a catch: if the control matrix gets disconnected, the antenna sends out a psychoclastic pulse on the brainwave frequency of those it has interacted with, alerting them to the fantastic news that the instrument of their oppression has been destroyed. That's why the Varrachians got rid of it, because the tiniest glitch could lead to revolts, slaves mutineering against their masters and such.'

'Oh my god,' Rose breathed. The Doctor nodded. 'It would send Felgorn rampaging across the countryside, with no means to stop him. Do you understand, Blorph'g? You wouldn't just kill the Illantis, you might end up killing tens of thousands of innocent people!'

To Blorph'g, all this was clearly new information, because he looked genuinely shocked.

'You've lived a lifetime among them,' the Doctor said, trying to nudge him further away from this horrible decision. 'You can't do this.'

And truly, for a moment, it seemed as if the true scale of his endeavour was scaring some sense into the green alien. The battle was visible in his eyes as he began to mutter. 'These people would have died long ago if it wasn't for me and my Dragon's Bane.'

'Really?' the Doctor asked, raising an eyebrow. 'So the dragon did attack first after all? And it was only then that you built the machine?'

He waved the argument away with his gun. 'It would have attacked sooner or later!'

'You don't know that,' the Doctor said calmly.

'It's not fair,' Blorph'g said, shaking his head. 'After everything...'

'I'm sorry,' said Rose.

The alien walked a couple paces through the swinging cage, and for the very last time, Rose believed he might change his mind. But then he gritted his teeth, aiming his gun directly at the Doctor's head. 'What do you know, Doctor?' he spat, 'What do you know about anything?'

'I know something about love,' he replied. 'Love is the result of evolution,' he began, 'A bunch of chemical reactions aimed at escaping extinction. And it can make your life incredibly miserable, but also incredibly beautiful. And it's really up to everyone to decide which one it will be for them.'

For a moment, Rose forgot all about Blorph'g, and his deadly ray gun, and the EMP bean in her hand, which she was supposed to press any second now – for a moment, all she could think about was how selfish she'd been during all that time she'd been jumping through dimensions, looking for the Doctor. How she'd kept everyone at a distance; Mickey, and of course her family. Tony had already been there, and she'd hardly spent time with him, her little brother!

And of course, she'd achieved a lot by trying to find him again, but it could have also gone the other way. This mad alien was the best example of that.

Rose wasn't the only one affected by the Doctor's words; Blorph'g stared hatefully at him, unable to combat his arguments, unable to see his own fault. With a determined move, he brandished his gun and aimed it at Rose again. 'Pretty words, but I think I'll cut our little debate short, Doctor.'

The Doctor's eyes widened as he remembered. 'Oh, but wait! I'm such an idiot, I completely forgot! We can help you! We have a spaceship of our own.'

'Sure you do.'

'I mean it! OK, she's hatched only a few months ago and is still a bit dodgy, but –'

'Nobody comes here by spaceship, Doctor.'

'But we did! Didn't I ever tell you? The spiky metal ball, remember? It's in the sewers; it's how we got here!'

Blorph'g scoffed. 'You landed your spaceship in the sewers?'

'It's a bit complicated, would take some time to explain, but the short version is, I can get you to your home world in five minutes. I swear it.'

But Blorph'g merely scoffed. 'Let me guess, all I have to do is let you go?'

The Doctor shrugged. 'Well, that's kind of a requirement. See, my TARDIS is still in its infancy, and nobody but me can fly her. Sometimes even I can't, if I'm being perfectly honest.'

'Otherwise we wouldn't even be here,' added Rose with a smile. Blorph'g however was running out of patience. He pressed a few buttons on his gun and aimed it at Rose's knee. 'There, a tenth of its power. Well, enough to cut off a leg without killing her. What's it going to be, Doctor?'

'Rose…' he said tensely, but she had already pressed her thumb on the trigger. The mechanism activated, its whistling filling the tower, bouncing off the walls, as it quickly pitched higher.

Blorph'g seemed to realise that a move was being made against him, so he aimed his gun at Rose's head, and pulled the trigger.