Kim Possible and all related characters are the property of Disney.

Doctor Who and all related characters are the property of the BBC.

This chapter features the Twelfth Doctor.

The Doctor came down the steps in the TARDIS console room carrying a green leather bound book. "The Worshipful and Ancient Law of Gallifrey," the Doctor announced. "One of the Artifacts of Rassilon, who was a co-founder of Time Lord society. He wasn't the hero many thought him to be. He was brought back to life to lead my people through the Time War. He was willing to sacrifice Earth so he wouldn't die again."

"You said that book would get us to this prison planet, though," Kim said. "Books don't do that."

"Yes, I said much the same thing when I had to figure out what was so special about it." The Doctor set the book on the console, opened the cover, and began turning pages. Switches and levers began to move on their own. "This isn't a book. It's a key. It's the only way to get to Shada." He turned another page. "You see, the book programs the TARDIS, telling it where and when to go."

"And this is where you took Tolkran after Toshimiru mopped the floor with him?" Ron asked.

"It seemed the best place," the Doctor replied. "And there was an empty cryo-pod. The one meant for Salyavin, a supposed Time Lord criminal with unique mental powers. He was never locked up, you see. He used his power to make everyone on Gallifrey think he had been imprisoned. The strain of that act caused him to regenerate, which allowed him to hide in plain sight. He'd also stolen this book so no one could check to make sure that Salyavin was actually there. He eventually ended up teaching at Cambridge. He was calling himself Professor Chronotis by then."

"A little on the nose, dontcha think?" Ron asked. "I mean chrono, time, Time Lord? No one figured that out?"

The Doctor shot a glare at Ron. "What human would know that without knowing what a Time Lord is? Moving on. In 1979 I went to Cambridge with my friend Romana. Chronotis wanted us to take the book back to Gallifrey for him. I may have… forgotten to do that after all was said and done. There was a misadventure involving an arrogant sort called Skagra who wanted to use Salyavin's power to take over the minds of everyone in the universe. We stopped him, but it was a busy afternoon. Anyway, I took Tolkran to Shada so he wouldn't cause us anymore trouble. Now he's back. I need to see how he escaped, and how he made it back to Earth."

The Doctor turned the last page and the time rotor kicked in, the central column rising and falling. The air was filled by that strange groan. "Next stop, prison!" the Doctor declared.

When the being called Tolkran had made it back to where he'd landed his ship by a country road outside of town, he found that both it and the human whose form he had stolen were gone. More than that, he had been exposed, and now the hated Doctor knew he was here. Even worse, he hadn't gotten his hands on the human called Stoppable.

Tolkran knew he had to hide until he found a new victim to mimic. As distasteful as it was, he escaped to the foul-smelling underground. Tolkran held his nose as he wrenched the manhole cover from its resting place in the street and vanished into the sewer.

He wandered around the stygian darkness for what seemed like an eternity. A fetid smelling eternity that continued to churn Tolkran's stomach. He thought he was going to pass out from the stench. He continued to a deeper tunnel, and he became lightheaded. He lurched forward, and the metal door he hit gave way and opened, letting him fall into a cavernous chamber that was beginning to light up.

Tolkran pulled himself to his feet as his eyes became accustomed to the brightness of the room. Somehow, this chamber seemed to go on forever. The lighting was warm, and there was a low, almost comforting buzz permeating the air. The best thing about this chamber, though, was the fact that it blocked out the smell.

Tolkran looked behind him at the door that led him into this unnaturally large enclosure. It appeared to be an ordinary door, one that looked like it belonged in the outer tunnel, but was incongruous with where he found himself.

"What is this place?" Tolkran said aloud, giving voice to what he had been asking himself silently since he fell into this odd room. He cautiously made his way deeper into this strange place.

When the Doctor stepped out of the TARDIS, he expected to hear the normal warnings of matter dispersion for breaking into the prison. There was nothing. The place was as quiet as a tomb. It should have looked the same as it had all those years ago, with the same lighting and the same bleak décor, but it didn't. The walkway they'd materialized on hadn't been there before. More than that, though, was the lack of background noise. "It's too quiet," the Doctor said.

"Aw, man!" Ron exclaimed as he exited the blue box. "Dude, those are totally famous last words!" He took in the expansive chamber. It looked really depressing. There were dark walls and nothing that made it look like anyone lived there.

"Yeah, this place looks like a prison," Clara said.

"Or like Freddy Krueger's boiler room," Kim observed. "Probably a good thing that the inmates were kept in suspended animation."

"All right," the Doctor said, clapping his hands together. "We need to split up and find an access terminal."

"Wait, you've been here before," Clara said. "Did you forget where the computers are?"

"This place is like a TARDIS. It's bigger on the inside, and the corridors can be reconfigured. It's changed since I was last here. Nothing is where it was. Now, Clara, you and Kim go down that hallway. Ron and I will take this one."

"What? Why?" Kim and Clara asked at the same time. Kim, surprisingly, didn't call for a jinx.

The Doctor pinched the bridge of his nose in annoyance. "Because I need everyone to be on the alert, that's why! Kim, if you and Ron go off together, you may wind up screaming at each other! And Clara, if you were partnered with Ron, you'd go all fan girl at him!"

"Okay," Clara sighed, "you have a point." She was about to say something else to the Doctor, but he and Ron had already walked off.

Kim had no idea what she was looking for. The tech here looked nothing like what she saw in the TARDIS. "If you were a member of a technologically advanced race of pretentious time travelers, where would you put a computer terminal?"

"In the office where they keep the kettle," Clara replied.

"Do you think they have an office here?"

"Pretentious time travelers, remember?" Clara said. "I doubt it."

Kim stopped. "It really is too quiet here." She looked around and found another hallway branching off from the main corridor. She activated the flashlight app on her Kimunicator. "Let's see what's down here."

"Is that a good idea?"

"Probably not," Kim admitted, "but I have to know why it's so quiet. I get that this is supposed to be a cryogenic prison, but there should be some noise. The machinery has to make some kind of sound. I mean, if the TARDIS is as loud as she is, then why is this place as quiet as a tomb?"

They walked down the adjoining hall. The walls were covered in pipes and tubes. "Looks like plumbing," Clara observed.

"Probably the pipes that carry nutrients to the cryo-pods," Kim surmised. "No terminal." She swept her light around the corridor. She trained the light on a solid wall. "And now we're at a dead end."

"Well, it was a good idea," Clara said. They headed back to the main corridor and went back to their original search.

The Doctor and Ron strode down the other end of the corridor. "For a prison this place looks really industrial," Ron pointed out.

"It's a prison that keeps its inmates asleep," the Doctor said. "It doesn't have to look pretty."

"Prisons aren't pretty no matter what," Ron said. "Never had to stay in one before, but I visited a few back in my sidekicking days. This looks more like an alien spaceship."

"It's an alien prison," the Doctor said. "Hello!" He saw something out of the corner of his eye. It was a cylinder roughly seven feet tall and wide enough to hold an adult humanoid. The front hatch was wide open. "This isn't the cellblock. Why is there a cryo-pod here? And why is it open?" He put on his sonic glasses and started inspecting the pod. "It's been empty for a while. There's no residual refrigerant, and it's at room temperature."

"There are more down here!" Ron called out. He stood in front of a bank of dozens of open cryo-pods. "Was there a jailbreak?"

The Doctor pulled off the glasses. "I have a bad feeling that it's something worse than that."

"What's worse than a jailbreak?"

"An early release." He put the glasses back in his pocket. "Let's go find Kim and Clara. Maybe they've had better luck finding a terminal."

"Even if they found one, could they access it?"

The Doctor smiled. "Of course not. Part of this was me getting a chance to talk to you."

"I'm fine," Ron said enthusiastically. "I mean, come on! It's me! The Ron-Man! It's all good."

The Doctor shook his head. His old friend hadn't changed all that much. "'The Ron-Man' indeed. You didn't travel with me as long as some of my other companions, but we did go through more than one life or death struggle. You don't face off against a squad of Cybermen with someone without getting a feel for how they're doing."

"Man," Ron groused, "I never could pull one over on you."

"There are few who can." The Doctor smiled at his onetime companion. "I haven't been as proactive a friend as I could have been, and I am sorry about that, but I think I know you well enough to know when you're trying to put on a brave face."

Ron sighed. "I mean, my latest book hit the bestseller's list, I just celebrated four years of sobriety, and I'm working on a Captain Constellation screenplay." Ron stopped walking and slumped against the wall. "I was supposed to get married seven months ago, but my fiancé left me for her ex."

"I'm sorry."

"My professional life is going great!" Ron said. "My personal life is pretty good. I mean, I'm closer with my 'rents than I was as a kid, and my sister is thriving. She's eleven now and already in high school. She'll end up graduating by the time she's thirteen at this rate. My love life…" Ron sighed. "I can't win. I've had two long term relationships that crashed and burned. One left me for a new boyfriend, the other left me for an old one. That's why I think I'm gonna stick with the platonic relationships from now on."

"Don't give up on happiness. Love, my friend, is always wise. Now come on! Let's go find Clara and Kim."

"Too late! We've found you," Clara said. She and Kim were coming up from a side corridor.

"Any luck on finding a terminal?" the Doctor asked.

"We found what looks like a computer," Kim said. "At least, I think it is. I'm not really sure what a Time Lord computer is supposed to look like."

"Excellent. Lead the way!" The Doctor and Clara headed off down the corridor. Kim stayed back with Ron.

"I overheard some of what you two were talking about," Kim told Ron. "I didn't know you were in recovery."

Ron furrowed his brow in confusion. "Really? I've been pretty public about that."

"Yeah, well, I haven't followed your life all that closely. It felt, I don't know, wrong somehow. Like I didn't have the right." Kim gave Ron a sad look. "I've even asked my fam not to tell me too much about what your private life is like. Again, it feels wrong. Like I'm intruding where I'm not allowed."

They started walking again. "I was self-medicating," Ron told her. "It turns out I had undiagnosed clinical depression with a side order of PTSD for good measure, probably from some of the life and death sitches we got into back in the day. Success made things worse. The impostor syndrome hit, so I drank to get numb. I just never drove drunk or got wasted in public."

Ron was quiet for a moment. He didn't want to admit this next part, but decided it was important. "Remember at Yamanouchi when I said the anger almost destroyed me?" Kim nodded. "That's why. I was also drowning my sorrows. Unfortunately, I'm a nasty drunk. I didn't get into any fights, but I was not fun to be around. When Felix stopped talking to me and Hana stopped wanting to be around me is when I knew there was a problem."

"You got help, though," Kim said.

"Which is the only reason I was Felix's best man," Ron said. "When I gave the toast, my glass had sparkling cider. As for Hana, she was my biggest supporter when I went into rehab."

"Reed had a drinking problem," Kim told him. "Actually, he still does. As far as I know, he still hasn't gotten help. Somehow, he's managed to keep from getting fired."

"You can't make someone get help," Ron said. "You have to want help, and I wanted it. I was destroying myself." Ron shoved his hands in his pockets, being careful not to disturb a sleeping Rufus. "And, if I'm being honest, I was still dealing with a lot of self-loathing. I still am, but nowadays I'm going the therapy route."

Kim stopped in her tracks. "I did this to you," she said quietly. Ron hadn't heard her. He was still catching up to the Doctor and Clara.

When Kim and Ron joined the others, the Doctor was accessing the terminal. Ron didn't know what he was expecting, but the boxy monitor and foldout keyboard wasn't it. "This looks like something out of the eighties."

"Every world has its eighties, Ron," the Doctor said. "However, this system came from the thirties. I'll let you guess which century." He keyed in a few commands. "It's running on minimal power, but it has enough to let me access the databank."

Swirling characters danced over the screen. The Doctor could obviously read it, even though no one else could. The TARDIS translated everything except Gallifreyan. "According to this, the Time Lords woke up the inmates and conscripted them into the Time War. As I suspected, it was an early release. There's no mention of our Zygon friend."

"Well that doesn't help," Ron said. "Maybe he attacked everyone when they turned the cryo-thingie off and they didn't want to admit that part."

"Possibly," the Doctor said. "But I can't imagine Tolkran was too coherent when he woke up. Think about it, he was asleep for centuries. He was probably a bit groggy. Think of how you are when you first wake up in the morning, Ron. Sometimes it took over half an hour for you to wake up enough to string a full sentence together."

Kim couldn't help but laugh. "Only half an hour?" she said between giggles.

Ron gave her a dirty look. "Oh hardy har har," he grumbled. "Like you're any better. I seem to remember you becoming quite the fan of espresso."

"All right, that's enough!" the Doctor barked. "We still have a mystery on our hands here. Question: how did a freshly awoken Zygon get through a platoon of Time Lords and escape? For that matter, how did the Time Lords get here in the first place if I have the only key?"

Kim went back to mission mode. "You said the book was one of Rassilon's artifacts, right? And that he'd been brought back from the dead? That's a good trick, by the way."

"Easy for us," the Doctor said. "Upon a Time Lord's final death, their consciousness is uploaded to a database called the Matrix." He saw that Ron was about to say something. "And not like the Keanu Reeves movies!"

"Sorry," Ron said contritely.

"I think I follow where you're going with this, Kim," the Doctor said. "I had Rassilon's artifact, but the Time Lords had Rassilon himself, which let them come here and do a recruitment drive. As good a hypothesis as any right now."

"So now what?" Clara asked. "It sounds like this little trip was a bust!"

"Not necessarily," the Doctor said. "Remember that this is a prison. There should be tools here we can take with us for pacifying our friend."

"Unless the inmates were already asleep when they were brought here," Ron said, almost to himself. "Easier to transport, no chance of a jailbreak or a riot."

Everyone looked at Ron, almost surprised by the insight. "Potential Boy strikes again," Kim said approvingly.

Ron scowled. "You don't get to call me that anymore. Excuse me for a minute." He turned and walked away. He needed to calm down before he decided to have a drink. He knew there was a liquor cabinet in the TARDIS somewhere.

Kim sighed. "I don't know what to do about him."

"There's nothing you can do," the Doctor said. "Take it from someone who's loved and lost more than a few times in the last two thousand years. Even when you think you're over heartbreak, sometimes a little bit of hurt still lingers, and the bitterness spreads like an infection."

"He'll never forgive me, will he?"

"The bigger question," the Doctor said, "is will you forgive yourself?"

Clara had followed Ron down the corridor to make sure he didn't get lost. "Ron! Wait up!"

"I'm okay, Clara," he said. "I just needed a few minutes."

"I get that. I've had a few boyfriends who decided to dump me and get a new girl. Sometimes without even telling me. The fun times were when they just stopped talking to me and left me totally alone."

Ron winced. "You got ghosted? I've never had that."

"I don't recommend it." Clara didn't know what to say. This man was someone she admired. His books had brought her countless hours of joy and terror. His horror stories had chilled her to the bone and his science fiction and urban fantasy works had made her look at things with an almost childlike wonder.

There always seemed to be an undercurrent of agony in his narratives, as if he was tapping a deep well of sorrow and was weaving that into his tales. Maybe he was. Maybe that was why Ron Stoppable's stories were so visceral. Maybe that was why he wouldn't let it go, despite what he told people.

"You're a good writer," Clara finally said. "One of my faves. We came all the way to Middleton so I could get my book signed."

"I saw it on the console," Ron said. "I'll sign it for you when we get back to the TARDIS."

She smiled. "Thank you. Do you mind if I share an observation I just had?"

"If I say 'no' will you keep it to yourself?" Ron asked, his voice sounding tired and defeated.

"Of course."

Ron was quiet for a minute. He didn't really want to hear what Clara had to say. He didn't know her, and she didn't know him. What possible insights could she have? "Go ahead," he told her, despite himself.

"I think you're afraid to forgive Kim."

Ron glowered at her. What the heck kind of an observation was that? "I'm not mad at her anymore," he said.

"I didn't say you were. You can let go of being mad at someone and still not forgive them. You can let go of anger but hold onto the hurt, and you've got a death grip on that hurt. I've read every single one of your books and short stories. There's an almost palpable sense of anguish in everything you've ever written. You're so close mouthed about your relationships that I had no idea the rumors about you and Kim dating were true."

Ron was getting annoyed. He was regretting listening to her. "What's your point?"

"I think you're afraid to lose that pain and that's why you won't forgive Kim. You're afraid that, if you let it go, you won't be able to write anymore."

Ron let out a long, weary sigh. He leaned against a nearby wall and slid down it until he was sitting on the floor. "Writing is the one thing I'm good at. The one thing I did that Kim had nothing to do with. People knew me for it. If I don't have that…" he trailed off.

"I lived my life in Kim's shadow," he said after a long silence. "Kim Possible was the girl who could do anything. I was the guy who couldn't do anything. I was an afterthought at best and ignored at worst. No one even remembered my name! That kind of thing sticks with you. Kim was my best friend and then my girlfriend, so I stuck it out.

"Getting together with her was amazing. I was so in love with her. I thought she loved me too, but I found out she didn't. I mean, you don't stab a guy through the heart like she did and love him. I cut ties and went to live my own life. I had to. I might have started drinking a lot sooner if I hadn't." He let out a sad laugh. "You have no idea how much I want a drink right now."

"But you won't," Clara said in a concerned voice. "Right?"

"No, I won't," Ron said. "It'd be a lot easier if I could call Steve right now. He helps talk me down."

"Steve who?"

"Stephen King. I did a book tour in Australia with him and his son last year, and we swapped recovery stories. We call each other up every now and again just to see how we're doing."

Clara offered Ron her hand and helped him up. "Come on, let's get back before Kim sends out a search party." After they started back, Clara decided she couldn't resist the temptation anymore.

"So, did you really, uh, get it on with Lorwardia's queen?"

Ron sighed. "The Doctor told you about that, huh?"

"You want to give me the details?"

Ron gave her the side eye. "Not really."

Clara pouted. "You're no fun."

Ron smirked at her. "That's not what she said." He walked off with a grin.

I'm going to get that story out of him if it's the last thing I do.

When Ron rejoined Kim and the Doctor, he saw that the Time Lord had torn apart the terminal and was rewiring it. "Uh oh," Ron said. "Sometimes when you tear things apart, they kinda like to blow up after you put them back together."

The Doctor glared at Ron. "That only happened once!" He made a face and growled. "Okay, maybe more than once. I'd forgotten to reverse the polarity of the neutron flow. I won't do that this time."

"We had an idea," Kim told them.

"It was your idea," the Doctor said.

"Diagnostic data," Kim explained. "Each of these pods has to be networked to a centralized control system. I would imagine that a Zygon's life signs are a lot different from a Gallifreyan's."

"So I'm rewiring this terminal to gain access to the central mainframe. I can tap into the diagnostic systems directly that way."

The Doctor worked for another few minutes, using his sonic glasses to solder wires into place. "There we are." He put the outer case back together and input a few commands. "That's more like it. Let's see, what pod did I put Tolkran in? I think it was unit nine-nine-five-seven-one-zero."

An image flickered to life on the terminal's screen. It was a representation of the pod, with an outline of its occupant. "There he is. According to this biometric data, the reprogramming I did on the pod was working. Tolkran was in suspended animation. He should have stayed that way."

The Doctor searched through the readings. "Tolkran was sleeping peacefully for quite a while." He scrolled through more entries. "There was a power fluctuation. The pod lost power, and the failsafe kicked in, reviving him so he wouldn't die in the pod. Normally, some automated stewards would have come by to subdue the prisoner, repair the pod, and put the prisoner back into suspended animation. That didn't happen this time. Since our friend is a Zygon, he was able to recover faster than the robot could get there."

"So that's how he woke up," Ron said, "but how'd he do the whole jailbreak thing?"

The Doctor rubbed his chin. Then he keyed in a few more commands. He pulled up a catalogue of all equipment and materiel on the planet. "That may be your answer," the Doctor said, pointing to what looked like a ship. "You can only get here by TARDIS, but this is a big prison. It takes up the entire surface of Shada as well as some underground caverns. A shuttle would be needed to get to different parts of the planet.

"According to this, the shuttle had no time travel capabilities, but more than enough range to get from one part of the planet to another, as well as to orbit." The Doctor scrolled through some more schematics. "It looks like there's a rudimentary faster than light drive, probably in case of emergencies. I imagine Tolkran hit the thrusters and just flew, coasting along until he came to the major space ways."

"Wait, I'm confused," Ron said. "You need a TARDIS to get here but not to leave? That doesn't make sense."

"Agreed," Kim said.

"The door is only locked from one side," the Doctor explained. "Tolkran left before the Time Lords arrived, and he spent centuries trying to get to Earth." He looked at Ron. "To you, me, and Toshimiru to get his revenge."

"And Toshimiru is long dead," Ron said in a shaky voice. "I wouldn't want to be us right now."

Kim went into mission mode. "This is an emergency. Doctor, can you get us to UNIT HQ in London? I need to make a direct request for backup. It's time to get a response team in on this."

She inwardly winced. Response team could very well mean Reed, and he's the last person I need in on this. I'll just request anyone but him.

"Back to the TARDIS," the Doctor said. Before he left, he yanked a small cube from the terminal. "Backup data core. Hopefully this will have a full record of Tolkran's bio signs." He gazed around the secret prison one last time. "I'm glad you never had to come back here, Chronotis, and that you were able to live out your days in peace. May we all be that lucky."

How did Tolkran get to Earth? Where did he wind up in the Middleton sewer? Will Reed come back to be a thorn in the sides of both Kim and Ron? We'll find out next time.

As for Ron being in recovery, like I mentioned before, addiction runs in my family. My sister has been in recovery for over twenty years, and I'm incredibly proud of her for that.

My father was also an addict and would always dive headfirst off the wagon after being sober for a while. I'm convinced that contributed to his death in 2022.

I broke the cycle, mainly through my own fears of addiction. Let me put it to you this way, I had hip surgery in August of 2023, and I only took three of my prescription pain meds, and I had to be in a lot of pain to do that. I was more willing to be in agony than to take medication that would help out of fear of getting hooked. There are, however, worse fears to have.

I don't see Ron's struggles with addiction as a character flaw, but as an obstacle to overcome. Also, it's a juxtaposition of Reed and his own struggles with addiction. Reed doesn't think he has a problem, like my father did, whereas Ron asked for help, like my sister did.