Chapter Text
It was quiet. Too quiet. Even the TARDIS seemed melancholy, her hum pitched lower than usual. She had tried to comfort the Doctor after they left Donna, but in truth, she missed the snarky redhead too. In the aftermath of defeating Davros and the Daleks, everything had happened so fast, but now it was starting to hit. Martha was off living her own life, joined by Mickey, interestingly enough; Jack was rebuilding what remained of Torchwood Three after it had been attacked by the Daleks; Rose was living her life in Pete’s World with the Metacrisis Doctor; Sarah Jane had returned to her son; Donna was oblivious that he even existed. Once again he was alone with his thoughts.
And they were bleak thoughts, indeed. Maybe Davros had been right. Maybe he did turn people into weapons. The TARDIS hummed angrily in response to this, mad at him for even considering such a thing. If anything, he made people better. Just look at Jack: the Doctor had turned him from confidence games to saving the earth. Things could have ended much differently if he hadn’t been there when the Doctor had been shot.
The TARDIS knew she had to do something to distract the Doctor before his thoughts turned much darker. With that in mind, she set off through the Vortex, throwing the Doctor to the grating of the control room as she flew. Several planets would fit her purpose, but she was drawn to one by a timeline she hadn’t noticed before and she knew the Doctor hadn’t even considered. That was where she needed to take him, and she landed discreetly in an empty alleyway. It took several rather forceful mental nudges, but she eventually got the Doctor off the floor and out the door, but not before receiving several colorful Gallifreyan curses.
Once outside, the Doctor took a moment to look around. The TARDIS had landed on Picon 3, a planet that was made up of a single city, most of which was a sort of market place. Specialty products from over a dozen planets could be found here. Shoving his hands deep in his pockets, the Doctor made his way down the street, passing vendors without really seeing them.
He didn’t really want to be there, but the TARDIS had made it clear she didn’t want him back until he was in a better frame of mind. She was sad enough without his depression adding to it. His face creased in a frown at this. He had been so caught up in his own melancholy that he hadn’t even noticed the TARDIS had been upset as well. She had loved Rose almost as much as he had, in her own way—always humming cheerfully when the pink and yellow girl was on board—and she had been quite fond of Donna, as well. She had taken a while to warm to Martha, but even the med student had been okay eventually. Then, of course, there was Jack, Mickey, and Sarah Jane. The TARDIS had had to say goodbye to so many of her favorite people recently, and the Doctor hadn’t even tried to comfort her because he was so busy wallowing in his own grief.
That would not do. The two of them had been through too much together for him to abandon her like that. He couldn’t shut her out. She was now all he had left in the universe, literally. He knew he would never fully recover from what had happened, but he could at least cling to her, and together they would keep their lost loved ones alive in their memory. Deciding to take at least some interest in the market and people around him, he began to look to see if there was anything that the TARDIS might like—an olive branch, as it were.
He had been out for almost an hour when a flash of blonde caught his eye. His hearts clenched as he thought of bringing Rose to a similar market, right before the Battle of Canary Wharf. Almost against his will, his eyes sought out the blonde head, and saw its owner discussing a brightly colored sarong-type article of clothing with a vendor. Something the seller said made her laugh, and the lilting sound drifted over to him, rooting his feet in place. Memories of tunnels, a laser grid, and a seven-day war drifted to the front of his mind, but as much as he might wish it otherwise, the blonde was not his daughter. Jenny was yet another person he had lost.
Knowing that standing there was not doing him any good, the Doctor swallowed past the watermelon-sized lump in his throat and turned to walk away. However, she turned first.
He had finally snapped. That was the only explanation he could come up with for what he saw. He had reached the maximum that a Time Lord mind could handle, and he was losing it. She was dead. She had jumped in the way when Cobb tried to shoot him. He had left her body on Messaline to be interred by the human and Hath soldiers-turned-colonists. He kept repeating this to himself as her face lit up at seeing him and she turned and ran towards him, throwing her arms around his neck and clinging to him when she was within reach.
“Dad!” she whispered, and he could feel his neck getting wet from her happy tears, he could feel the weight of her hanging on his neck, he could feel the slightly-cooler-than-human temperature of a Time Lord radiating from her body.
He could feel the physical evidence of her being there, but his head refused to believe it. Jenny could feel his hesitation and drew back, concern written all over her face.
“Dad, it’s me, Jenny,” she said. “Don’t you remember me?”
“Of course I remember you, you’re my daughter,” he replied adamantly, struggling to maintain his voice.
“Then what’s wrong? Aren’t you happy to see me?” she asked, fighting the tears forming in her eyes.
“You’re dead,” he answered, shaking his head as his voice cracked; on top of everything else, he really didn’t think he could deal with seeing his dead daughter. Maybe it was finally time to call it quits.
“No, no, I came back,” she argued, grabbing him as he moved to step away. “After you left, I don’t know exactly what happened, but I came back to life. I took one of the shuttles from the ship and started traveling, just like you. Hoping I’d find you again, at some point.”
As she spoke, his mind ventured out, automatically seeking out some familiar presence. He was still close enough to feel a faint hum from the TARDIS, but a second presence made itself known. It was unfocused, but it was the distinct feel of a Time Lord mind. He had been too busy before to realize that she had acquired his mental abilities as well as his second heart. She probably didn’t know, either, but there would be time for that later.
Several tears escaped as he pulled her into bone-crushing hug. He wasn’t sure if he could fully accept her as his daughter again, but right then, he didn’t care. For once, the universe had given something back to him, instead of just taking.
Eventually, he managed to reign in his emotions and pull back and look at her properly. Her hair was a little darker and longer, and she wore a white button-up blouse, khaki cropped pants, and sandals instead of the soldier’s fatigues she had been “born” in. The sparkle in her eye remained, though.
“You look fantastic,” he said with a warm smile, bringing a blush to her cheeks.
“Thanks,” she replied, taking in his features in return. He looked older than she remembered, as if he had aged several years in the months it had been since she had last seen him. She kept this to herself, though, somehow knowing it was not something he particularly wanted to talk about. She wasn’t sure how she knew, she just did.
“So what are you doing here?” she asked instead.
“My ship kicked me out,” he said. “Long story, but I haven’t been in the best of moods lately, so she came here and kicked me out until I was in a better mood.”
“Your ship kicked you out?”
“To be honest, I can’t really blame her,” he shrugged.
“There is so much I have to learn about you,” Jenny said in awe.
“No time like the present. I know a little café not too far that has the best milkshakes in this galaxy,” he suggested, offering his arm, which she took eagerly, slinging her bag over her other shoulder.
Across the street, both Time Lords were unaware they were being observed. The man watched as they headed down to a small café, reporting their location to his partner over his communicator. They would follow and watch and wait for their opportunity to move in. If there was anything their past endeavors had taught them, it was patience.
The Doctor sipped on his banana milkshake as Jenny told him about her adventures since their parting. There were more than a few blunders as she tried to find her footing, but she seemed to be taking it all in stride, well aware that she had much to learn about traveling the universe. She seemed to have inherited his tendency to stumble into trouble; he couldn’t help his smile as she related being chased off a planet for wearing an orange shirt.
“Sounds like you’ve been busy,” he said, stirring the milkshake with the straw.
“Just trying to do what you always do,” she shrugged with a grin, finishing off her chocolate milkshake. “So what about you? Where are Donna and Martha?”
The Doctor paused, frowning as recent events came flooding back to his mind. He didn’t know if he was ready to talk about what had happened. He returned his attention to the remains of his milkshake.
“They went home,” he answered, and that was true enough.
Jenny knew there was more to it than he was saying, and images flashed in her mind. Terrible images that were unsettling at best.
“I had heard that several planets had disappeared, but I didn’t think such a thing was possible,” she said softly, eyes unfocused as the images continued. “The three-fold man and his children of time reunited to save all of reality. A farewell on a beach. The death of the most faithful friend, condemned to live the rest of her life without knowing the debt reality owes her.”
Tears streamed down her face as the Doctor’s memories continued to flash before her, weighed down with more emotion than she would have believed possible. The shear enormity of the grief he bore was enough to smother her. This is what he meant when he said Time Lords were a shared suffering, it had to be.
The Doctor sat frozen in his seat. There was no way she could know these things unless she had been inside his mind, but he would have felt the intrusion. Well, she might have picked up on a few things if he had let his mental barriers slip, but this was far more than an empathic response. There was no doubt that she was seeing his memories. Her Time Lord telepathy was more developed than he had imagined.
A small part of him rejoiced; he was no longer the last of the Time Lords! If he had been unsure about taking Jenny along in the TARDIS, he was decided now. He had a responsibility to teach her all he could about her heritage. It would be a far cry from an education at the Academy, but he would do the best he could.
Not wanting to make her suffer more than she already had by his memories, he shifted his thoughts to more pleasant things. Now that he was aware of her presence, he was able to guide her to what he wanted to show her. He led her to a door in his mind that glistened like mother-of-pearl, and pushed it open to reveal a wide field of red grass beneath an amber sky. Silver trees shimmered in the distance, and farther off stood the crystal dome of the Citadel of the Time Lords.
This was my home, he gently told Jenny as she took in the sight before her. This is how I choose to remember Gallifrey, in its golden age.
It’s beautiful, she whispered, in awe of the beauty of this strange world. Where is it?
Her question was innocent enough, but it still made him wince. It’s gone, he said. It burned in the Time War. This is the only place it exists now, in my memories.
Jenny was at a loss for words, so she simply took his hand. Slowly, the Doctor led her back out of his mind, and they were once more in the small café. Her tears had stopped, but her eyes still glistened.
“That’s who the Time Lords are,” he told her. “That and so much more.”
She simply nodded, the weight of his words settling in.
“So,” he said, suddenly shifting gears and leaving the heaviness of their previous conversation behind, “shall we go get your things?”
“I’m sorry?” she asked, scrambling to catch up with his change of topic.
“You still want to come with me, don’t you?”
“You still want me to come with you?” she asked excitedly.
“Of course,” he replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
“Oh yes, thank you, thank you, thank you!” she squealed, rounding the small table to throw her arms around him just as she had in the tunnel with him and Donna. “I promise I’ll learn anything you wish to teach me, and I’ll do my best to stay out of trouble, and I won’t take up too much space.”
“Trust me, that last one won’t be a problem in the TARDIS,” he said with a grin, looking forward to something for the first time in a while. “Come on, let’s go get your things.”
Practically bouncing with excitement, Jenny led the way out of the café and down the street to the spaceport where she had left her shuttle.
In her excitement, she dashed ahead, rounding a corner. Something triggered in the back of the Doctor’s mind, alerting him to danger, and he hurried to catch up to her. By the time he reached to corner, however, it was too late.
Jenny was nowhere to be seen.
The Doctor’s eyes scanned the busy street, examining each face in the hope of finding some indication of… something. He sniffed the air, sticking his tongue out to detect that slightly metallic twang left behind by a transmit beam. Nothing. That meant whoever had grabbed her had literally grabbed her. His brow furrowed as he tried to put together a plan of action.
“Pst.”
The sound was so soft he might have missed it, except for his superior hearing. He swung around, searching for the speaker.
“Over here.”
His eyes landed on a small Picon woman standing about fifteen feet away in the doorway of a posh-looking shop. Her clothes indicated she was lower class, employed by the shop, judging by the colors of her uniform matching the awning over the entrance. She furtively glanced around, as if afraid of being caught.
“You’re looking for the pink and yellow girl?” she asked timidly.
“Yes, do you know what happened?” he pressed anxiously.
“She was taken. They have her,” she said cryptically.
“Who has her? Why did they take her?” he continued, wanting answers but guessing he wouldn’t get much from the skittish woman.
“She’s an off-worlder, so they took her. They always take off-worlders. Don’t want them to stay.” Here she looked around again, even more afraid. “Who was she?”
“My daughter,” he replied, putting the pieces together to form a slightly more cohesive image.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” she whimpered before scurrying back inside the shop.
Well, at least he had somewhere to start, now. There was apparently a group opposed to off-worlders settling on Picon 3, and furthered their cause by kidnapping off-worlders right off the street. That meant that whoever it was had to have been following one or both of them for long enough to know that they weren’t native; enough humans had settled on the planet over the past few hundred years that the two of them wouldn’t have stood out right away. If they had been followed, that meant they had been targeted out of all the other off-worlders. And if they had been targeted, that meant there was something particular about them that this group wanted. Or it could have been a completely random selection and pure coincidence. Either way, he needed more information, and as much as he hated dealing with the police, they were the ones with the information.
Turning around, he set off at a dead run, dodging between people and carts, back to the TARDIS. He’d lost too many people, recently—already lost Jenny once. He wasn’t going to lose her again.
The darkness slowly pulled away, and Jenny found she was tied to a metal chair. The large room she was being held in had a single door and no windows, being lit only by a single light hanging from the ceiling. The grim appearance reminded her of Messaline during the war.
Her mind was still wired to be a soldier—though she had followed her father’s example and chosen to do otherwise—and she immediately began searching for a way out. Each wrist was tied to the back of the chair, which seemed to be made of un-reinforced metal, meaning there were weak spots at the joints. Unfortunately, there was nothing she could leverage it against to break free.
Deciding it was best if she could at least move about more freely, she gripped the back of the chair and picked her feat up onto the seat. With some careful shifting, she was able to stand and step over the back of the chair. Yes, she had to carry the chair in front of her, which was awkward given the way her wrists were tied, but at least she could move about and could use the chair as a weapon if need be.
Her next move was to investigate the door. At first glance, it appeared to be simply a metal slab, but closer inspection revealed a magnetic lock sealing the edges. Even if she had the necessary tools, it would be hard to break through the seal. As it was, her only asset was her programming and a metal chair. It appeared her only option was to wait until someone came for her. Flattening herself against the wall by the door as best she could, she stood and waited.
She didn’t have to wait long, though each second stretched into hours. A sharp clang announced the release of the seal, and the door slid out of the way. Jenny adjusted her grip on the chair and swung as hard as she could into the person entering.
The effect was just as desired and he rebounded from the hit, sprawling across the floor. Acting quickly, Jenny searched him as best she could with her hands restrained as they were. She lucked out, managing to weasel a pen knife out of his boot. She knew it was only a matter of time before someone else came looking, so she worked as fast as she could to sever the ties.
Once free, she hurried quietly down the corridor. There were no other rooms off of this leg of the hallway, but there was a bend several hundred feet from her cell. She slowed as she reached this turn, listening for anyone beyond. Not hearing anything, she continued on, brandishing the knife.
She had just enough time for déjà vu to set in as a jolt of electricity pulsed through her, sending her back into the blackness.
She came to ten minutes later. This time, she was shackled to a hook in the wall. The man she had assaulted with the chair now sat in it, arms crossed as he stared at her.
“You’re not gonna get out of here that easy,” he said. “You people come here and you think you can take over. You think we won’t care that you overrun our government, our businesses, taking away the jobs and rights of the Picon people. Well, my people and I are going to put a stop to that.”
Jenny knew he meant to be intimidating—and with anyone else, he would have been—but she could not stop herself from laughing.
“You think this is a joke?” he growled. “You’re not getting out of this alive. The off-worlders need an example, and you’re it.”
“You’re the one who’s in trouble, mate,” she shot back. “My dad will be here in no time, and when he gets here, you’d better pray he’s in a forgiving mood.”
“Others have talked like you do. ‘My friends are coming, they will save me.’ You won’t be the last, either.” Her jailor stood and walked back to the door, but turned back to say one last thing. “If you don’t cause too much trouble, I’ll make sure your death is quick.”
Once again, Jenny was left alone. She tested the chain tethering her to the wall, but the bolt securing her was fastened tight. If she was going to get out, help was going to have to come to her.