Earthbound, Chapter 22
Chapter Title: The Dying of the Light
Author: stormwolf10
Summary: Can time be changed, and if it can, should it?
Disclaimer: I don't own any Doctor Who canon character.
"Doctor? What's wrong?" Jack asked as Nine slumped to the floor and Rose raced to his side.
Ten reeled back a bit, holding his head with a groan. "Our past selves, part of us, have disappeared out of time. Whoever's tampering with the Time War is behind this, I'm sure. It's...affecting him more than me, probably because of the human biology. Thank you again, Donna."
Jack and Rose carefully helped Nine to his feet, who wobbled and nearly toppled over again, but they held him fast. "Are you alright, Doctor?" Rose asked Nine, who looked to her and nodded weakly.
"But if they were taken out of time, and you're their future, wouldn't you start to disappear too?" Jack asked.
Nine straightened, his mouth again set in a grim line. "If it is permanent, then yes. Eventually he and I will start disappearing."
"Even if he's part human?" Rose asked in alarm.
"Even then," Ten said, "If I no longer exist in the past, then I wouldn't be able to exist now."
"Right then, we have to find whoever's left and get this mystery solved before it's too late," Nine said, striding off down the hall, with Jack, Rose and Ten following quickly behind.
Romana carefully hauled Eight to his feet as Ace did the same for Seven. "What the heck was that, Professor?" Ace asked, handing Seven back his hat.
"Their past selves have been severed from the timestream," Romana explained, "It's as if they're being ripped out of existence piece by piece. Soon they'll both disappear as well, unless we find the Rani and stop her."
Seven settled his hat back on his head and pulled his sonic screwdriver from his pocket. The other Time Lords did the same. "Well then, perhaps we can locate her TARDIS."
"If it is her, maybe she pulled our past selves there. It is hard to tell how much more advanced her TARDIS is," Eight said as he followed Romana out of the room with the rest of them.
Sonic screwdrivers held out, Romana and the two Doctors walked through the labyrinthine corodors of the capitol. "Aha! Got her!" Romana said suddenly, "The signal is this way." She pointed down a hallway that curved to the west.
Seven and Eight looked at her with surprise, then down to their sonics with equally baffled expressions. "I've got nothing here, Romana. Are you sure?" Eight asked.
"Of course I'm sure. If you remember, my sonic screwdriver is much more advanced than your own, Doctor."
Seven elbowed Ace as she snickered, and nudged her forward, lifting his sonic again as they followed the Lady President towards the origin of the signal. At the end of the hallway loomed a wide archway, and the circular room beyond was stark white and completely devoid of furniture or decoration. Nor, they noticed as they stepped inside, did it contain the Rani's TARDIS.
"Did you find anything?" Ten asked as he, Nine, Jack and Rose came up behind them, looking around the room.
Eight shook his head, his soft curls bouncing. "Nothing. Romana thought she'd received readings of the Rani's TARDIS in this direction, but it seems to be a dead end."
There was a rush of energy and swirling blue-white light, and they spun around to find a force field surrounding the entire interior of the room. As they turned for the archway, they found Romana standing outside it, her dark eyes pained. In her shaking hands was a small device, it's green lights blinking as it held the force field in place.
"Romana! What are you doing?" Nine thundered, slamming his open palm into the force field between them in an attempt to break it's hold.
"I'm sorry, Doctor. I'm so sorry," she replied simply, a look of desperate sadness on her face.
In the headquarters of the Chancellery Guard, Susan and her grandfather were quickly working at the keyboards in front of an enormous bank of computers as Two spoke with the Commander.
"We've had no luck securing the location of the Rani or her TARDIS, Doctor."
"Oh, dear," Two sighed, exchanging a worried look with Jamie, "Well, thank you anyway, Commander Zorell."
"Are you sure the Rani is behind this, Doctor?" Zorell asked, "Or any Time Lord for that matter? I find it very hard to believe one of our own would do this."
"Ah, well, no, actually we have no proof that the Rani has anything to do with this," Two admitted, "But all signs point to a Time Lord being involved. No Dalek could infiltrate this far into the Capitol without notice."
"Grandfather, look!" Susan shouted, pointing to the screen in front of her as the first Doctor approached.
"It's a distress call from a Commander Alevia," he said, running a hand over his face as he read the Gallifreyan writing in front of him.
Zorell approached the two of them with a worried expression. "Commander Alevia is leading our forces out in the front lines since the Doctor was removed."
Susan ran her fingertip along the text, reading the report out loud to everyone. "Reinforcements needed immediately. Repeat, immediate reinforcements needed. Our numbers are dwindling. Dalek fleet at least ten million strong and heading for Gallifrey."
All eyes lifted to the window to look up into the sky. In the far distance, pinpricks of light began to fill the sky like stars.
"We have to find the others, now!" The first Doctor told the rest, grabbing Susan's hand as they ran, leaving Commander Zorell behind to call up more troops for battle.
"Romana, tell us what is going on!" Ten pleaded, standing next to Nine in front of the forcefield.
"I saw the future, Doctor," Romana explained, "I used the Space/Time Visualizer to look into the future. I saw what you, he, will do."
Ten and Nine slowly stepped away from the barrier, realization dawning in their faces as the rest looked at each other in confusion. Ace took the opportunity to step up, irritation bubbling up inside her. "Oi!" she shouted, "What do you mean 'what he will do'? You've got us now, why not just spill it, eh?"
"Ace is right. No use is keeping us in the dark now, Romana. You've got us trapped," Seven concurred.
"Very well. I was the one who brought him back to Gallifrey. I'm the one who sealed him in the Tomb of Rassilon. I didn't think that he was going to summon his other selves, but there was no time to think of that. What he would do was coming far too soon. I had to act."
"You don't understand," Nine said, "This has to happen. If he doesn't do this, the Daleks will overrun Gallifrey and begin working on destroying the whole universe. And you meddling with the time lines will have catastrophic consequences, not just for this universe, but the whole of creation. Is that what you want?"
Nudging Ace aside, Eight appeared in the archway, pressing his palms to the force field. "Tell me what you saw, Romana," he commanded.
"Don't!" Ten shouted, "You can't tell him what he's going to do before he does it. You know that, Romana."
"You cannot tell him," Nine said in a quietly commanding tone.
Romana looked between them for a moment, uncertainty in her eyes. Then, without warning, she looked to Eight, the uncertainty returning back to their previous look of desperate sorrow. "I saw you, in your TARDIS. You were out there, amongst the Daleks. Then...you pulled a lever and...then there was nothing but fire. And then my vision widened so that I could witness it. A wave of energy, emanating from your TARDIS, spreading out across the Dalek fleet, reducing the ships to atoms in one second, but...then the wave continued. It did not stop until Gallifrey itself was nothing more than a smoldering rock. Nothing survived. Your TARDIS hurtled through space and crashed to Earth, killing you instantly with the force of the blow. And...just as you were regenerating, the vision ended."
When Romana's retelling ended, Seven was clutching his hat in his hands, frozen in place with horror. Ace was likewise in shock, holding onto Rose, who held her hands to her mouth. Jack stood a bit away from them all, taking great gulps of air to steady himself, the hand still holding the pistol shaking. Nine and Ten both stood with their heads lowered, tears trailing down their cheeks as that old wound re-opened and bled in their minds.
"I'm sorry, Doctor," Romana said softly, "But I made a promise to protect Gallifrey with every part of my being. And I will. I'll find another way to destroy the Daleks. I promise."
"Romana, please, let us out of here!" Eight shouted, but she simply shook her head.
As she turned to leave, there was a flash of tartan and Jamie was suddenly there, tackling the Lady President to the ground. The first and second Doctors followed her to the ground, their hands pressed to her forehead and their eyes closed as they rendered her unconscious with the force of their combined will. Susan scrambled for the device that had dropped to the floor and held it up, dropping the force field.
"Oh, good job, Susan!" Ten said with a faint smile of relief as he, Nine and Eight rushed forward to hug the girl.
Jack helped Two and Jamie to lift Romana and set her carefully down in the room. As they got the force field back into place, Romana began to stir and sit up slowly. "Quick work, you guys," he said to One and Two with a grin, "Pretty spry for two old men."
"I'll have you know, young man, that I have a few more tricks under my sleeve," the first Doctor said imperiously, straightening his jacket.
Seven looked to Nine and Ten, looking troubled. "Is that really what happened in your past?" He asked, once again setting his hat on his head with a frown.
"I'm afraid so," Nine replied.
"Well...then I suppose that is the way it has to be."
Eight said nothing. He simply stood apart from all of them, uncertainty clouding his blue eyes as he stared at Romana and pondered her vision. It can't be. I can't kill my own kind. This just...cannot be.
Noticing her predicament, Romana gasped and pushed herself to her feet, running for the wall of energy, pressing her hands against it as Eight had, staring right at him as if sensing his doubt. "Please, you know time can be changed. If the Time Lords survive, we can repair whatever damage that is done because of it, but they have to survive. If you do what I saw you do in my vision, our home, our people, will be gone."
"She's right," Eight whispered.
"Two million Dalek ships are on their way to Gallifrey and our forces are all but gone," Two told the others.
"There is no way you can fight them all," Jack said to Romana, "The men and women out there who were already sent to die are gone. What makes you think you can do any better?"
"You have to let me try!" she cried, "There must be another way! I just needed time to stop you, and then I'd think of a way. I know I could!"
Nine stormed angrily up to Romana's prison, shouting as close to her face as the force field would permit. "Don't you think that if there was another way, I WOULD HAVE THOUGHT OF IT AND DONE IT? Do you think that the first idea I had was to just WIPE OUT MY OWN PEOPLE?"
Ten tangled his hands in his hair and began pacing, a sudden wave of hope washing over him. "Maybe I can do something. Like Donna said...that little bit of human, that spark of ingenuity. Maybe that bit of me can help me find a way!"
"But there is no other way!" Nine growled.
Taking Ten and Eight by the arm, Rose pulled them both aside as the rest tried to calm Nine. "Tell me one thing, Doctor," she said quietly, addressing Ten, "If you change history, will we ever meet?"
"Probably not. I wouldn't have crash-landed on Earth, and it's possible the Nestene Consciousness wouldn't have had to come here. I still don't know when their protein planets were destroyed. It could have been in the blast, but Rose...my people. My family..."
"I know, Doctor, but just let me finish. If you never met me, you would have never taken me to Platform One, right? Think of all the people Cassandra would have killed without you there to save them. The Face of Boe, too, remember? This means you never would have gone to New New York to see him. Think of all those New Humans that would still be tortured and killed by the thousands by those cat nuns. And, you never would have taken Adam and I to Satellite 5, which means the Jagrafess would still be there, stunting the Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire, yeah?"
"And the Game Station wouldn't have been made, killing all those people in their insane games," Ten said, "And the Daleks wouldn't have had to retreat and rebuild their numbers by cannibalizing humans. The battle of Canary Wharf would have never happened, Caan might not have brought Davros back, and I would have never had to wipe Donna's memory to save her life."
"You might not have even met Donna in the first place, Doctor. Or Martha. Or Jack."
Stepping up beside them, Nine laid a hand each on Ten and Eight's shoulders and said, "If we let Romana have her way, she will lose. The Daleks will destroy Gallifrey and wipe the universe of anyone and anything that wasn't a Dalek like them. They would control time and space. None of the humans we've met would even be alive."
"Then it's settled, I suppose," Eight said, setting his shoulders, "We have to let events happen as they were meant to to begin with. For the sake of the universe."
Ten moved to the archway where Romana was still standing, leaning against the force field with tears in her eyes. "We can find a way to save you, Romana. Maybe you can come back with me to the alternate universe. You can still survive this."
"Please, don't," Romana pleaded, "Not our beautiful Gallifrey. Please..."
"It has to be this way. Deep down you know it's true. I tried to think it was possible, but really...I know it has to be done. Let me help you. You don't have to die."
Taking a deep breath, Romana closed her dark eyes and shook her head. "No," she said, her voice taking on a more calm and regal tone, "I am Lady President Romana. If my home is to perish, then I shall perish with it."
Ten pressed his hands against where Romana's lay on the translucent wall of humming energy, dropping his forehead to the force field and choking back a sob as the memories of the Master refusing to regenerate and dying in his arms floated to the surface. "Romana, no!" he cried, "Please, I can help!"
"Leave me, Doctor," Romana whispered.
"Romana..."
"Go."
As Romana pulled away from the force field and stepped back in stoic silence, Ten's shoulders shook as he wept like a lost child. After a moment, the rest of the Doctors gently pulled him away from the archway and, with the companions, led him out of the Capitol and back to the TARDIS.
With Five gone, the TARDIS interior had changed to Nine's, green light reflecting off the sweeping coral spires surrounding the central console. Nine was at the console, working on getting them back to the TARDIS Eight had left outside the Tomb of Rassilon, Ten was curled up with Rose on the captain's chair with Jack hovering nearby, and the rest of the Doctors and their companions were milling about the console room.
"I don't see what the other me was complaining about," Two said with mild cheerfulness as he looked around, "I think the coral's nice. It looks very artistic."
"A great waste of space I think," the first Doctor grumbled, tapping one of the lightly glowing spires.
"All right," Nine said, "The versions of ourselves and their companions were trapped in a time bubble. Once I repair the Time Lock, all of us, including them, will return to their respective places in the time line. Those of us from the past will have no memory of this happening, because it won't have happened to us yet."
"You two," he continued, nodding to Ten and Rose, "will still remember because you're from our present. This is still a part of your personal time lines."
After a few short moments, they landed beside Eight's TARDIS. Everyone gathered together to give their respective goodbyes, including Ten, who had gathered himself together again.
"Well," Two said with an unsettled catch in his voice, "This is all quite sad, really, but I suppose what must be done will be done."
The first Doctor nodded his aged head. "It is sad, but I had a feeling that Gallifrey wouldn't go on forever," he agreed, "Everything has it's time and everything dies. Even Gallifrey." Nine and Ten exchanged a sad look and nodded in agreement.
Seven patted Eight on the arm and smiled reassuringly up at him. "You will do what's right. We always do," he said, "Everything will be alright. Gallifrey won't be completely lost. It will live on in you."
"I must say," The first Doctor noted, "I'm glad to know that I will be so wise in my future, even though I won't remember knowing it."
Rose wandered up to the other companions, giving Susan a curious look. "So, why do you call him Grandfather?"
Susan blinked. "Because he is my grandfather," she replied.
"But, if he had grandchildren that must mean...he had children."
"Didn't he ever tell you?"
Rose glanced over to where Ten was standing and looked slightly embarrassed. "Yeah, he did, I just didn't believe him, and we never really spoke of it again," she said, then quickly turned to Ace to change the subject, "And why do you call him Professor?"
"Figured I liked it more than 'Doctor'," Ace responded with a shrug and a cheeky grin.
"Right, well, I suppose there's no time like the present," Eight said, "Though, I must admit I don't know how I'm going to do this."
"You'll know when the time comes," Nine said, clapping him on the back as Eight gave a weak smile and headed out of the TARDIS.
Once Eight had gone, Nine began to work around the console again, pressing buttons here, pulling a lever there. "Time's up, everyone," he announced, flicking a final switch that caused all of them to begin fading from sight.
While he still had the chance, Jack pulled Rose into a tight hug. "See you soon," he grinned.
"I'm sure you will!" she laughed in return.
"I know you won't remember this," Ten said to his previous self, "But you love Rose. You won't ever say it, but you do, and I have no problem saying it."
Without a chance to reply, Nine faded out of sight, still staring at Rose.
Rain began pouring down on Ten and Rose again as they reappeared in the garden, exactly where they'd left. For a long time they just stood rooted to the spot, gazing at one another, letting the enormity of what had just happened sink in. He then gathered her up in his arms and buried his face in her drenched hair, allowing one last shudder to shake him.
"I'm almost glad you never told me now," Rose murmured into his chest, "That had to be the hardest thing you ever did."
"Yeah..."
"I'm so sorry."
Ten didn't answer. He simply crushed her tighter to his chest, ignoring the rain as they held each other and tried to forget.
Author: stormwolf10
Summary: Can time be changed, and if it can, should it?
Disclaimer: I don't own any Doctor Who canon character.
"Doctor? What's wrong?" Jack asked as Nine slumped to the floor and Rose raced to his side.
Ten reeled back a bit, holding his head with a groan. "Our past selves, part of us, have disappeared out of time. Whoever's tampering with the Time War is behind this, I'm sure. It's...affecting him more than me, probably because of the human biology. Thank you again, Donna."
Jack and Rose carefully helped Nine to his feet, who wobbled and nearly toppled over again, but they held him fast. "Are you alright, Doctor?" Rose asked Nine, who looked to her and nodded weakly.
"But if they were taken out of time, and you're their future, wouldn't you start to disappear too?" Jack asked.
Nine straightened, his mouth again set in a grim line. "If it is permanent, then yes. Eventually he and I will start disappearing."
"Even if he's part human?" Rose asked in alarm.
"Even then," Ten said, "If I no longer exist in the past, then I wouldn't be able to exist now."
"Right then, we have to find whoever's left and get this mystery solved before it's too late," Nine said, striding off down the hall, with Jack, Rose and Ten following quickly behind.
Romana carefully hauled Eight to his feet as Ace did the same for Seven. "What the heck was that, Professor?" Ace asked, handing Seven back his hat.
"Their past selves have been severed from the timestream," Romana explained, "It's as if they're being ripped out of existence piece by piece. Soon they'll both disappear as well, unless we find the Rani and stop her."
Seven settled his hat back on his head and pulled his sonic screwdriver from his pocket. The other Time Lords did the same. "Well then, perhaps we can locate her TARDIS."
"If it is her, maybe she pulled our past selves there. It is hard to tell how much more advanced her TARDIS is," Eight said as he followed Romana out of the room with the rest of them.
Sonic screwdrivers held out, Romana and the two Doctors walked through the labyrinthine corodors of the capitol. "Aha! Got her!" Romana said suddenly, "The signal is this way." She pointed down a hallway that curved to the west.
Seven and Eight looked at her with surprise, then down to their sonics with equally baffled expressions. "I've got nothing here, Romana. Are you sure?" Eight asked.
"Of course I'm sure. If you remember, my sonic screwdriver is much more advanced than your own, Doctor."
Seven elbowed Ace as she snickered, and nudged her forward, lifting his sonic again as they followed the Lady President towards the origin of the signal. At the end of the hallway loomed a wide archway, and the circular room beyond was stark white and completely devoid of furniture or decoration. Nor, they noticed as they stepped inside, did it contain the Rani's TARDIS.
"Did you find anything?" Ten asked as he, Nine, Jack and Rose came up behind them, looking around the room.
Eight shook his head, his soft curls bouncing. "Nothing. Romana thought she'd received readings of the Rani's TARDIS in this direction, but it seems to be a dead end."
There was a rush of energy and swirling blue-white light, and they spun around to find a force field surrounding the entire interior of the room. As they turned for the archway, they found Romana standing outside it, her dark eyes pained. In her shaking hands was a small device, it's green lights blinking as it held the force field in place.
"Romana! What are you doing?" Nine thundered, slamming his open palm into the force field between them in an attempt to break it's hold.
"I'm sorry, Doctor. I'm so sorry," she replied simply, a look of desperate sadness on her face.
In the headquarters of the Chancellery Guard, Susan and her grandfather were quickly working at the keyboards in front of an enormous bank of computers as Two spoke with the Commander.
"We've had no luck securing the location of the Rani or her TARDIS, Doctor."
"Oh, dear," Two sighed, exchanging a worried look with Jamie, "Well, thank you anyway, Commander Zorell."
"Are you sure the Rani is behind this, Doctor?" Zorell asked, "Or any Time Lord for that matter? I find it very hard to believe one of our own would do this."
"Ah, well, no, actually we have no proof that the Rani has anything to do with this," Two admitted, "But all signs point to a Time Lord being involved. No Dalek could infiltrate this far into the Capitol without notice."
"Grandfather, look!" Susan shouted, pointing to the screen in front of her as the first Doctor approached.
"It's a distress call from a Commander Alevia," he said, running a hand over his face as he read the Gallifreyan writing in front of him.
Zorell approached the two of them with a worried expression. "Commander Alevia is leading our forces out in the front lines since the Doctor was removed."
Susan ran her fingertip along the text, reading the report out loud to everyone. "Reinforcements needed immediately. Repeat, immediate reinforcements needed. Our numbers are dwindling. Dalek fleet at least ten million strong and heading for Gallifrey."
All eyes lifted to the window to look up into the sky. In the far distance, pinpricks of light began to fill the sky like stars.
"We have to find the others, now!" The first Doctor told the rest, grabbing Susan's hand as they ran, leaving Commander Zorell behind to call up more troops for battle.
"Romana, tell us what is going on!" Ten pleaded, standing next to Nine in front of the forcefield.
"I saw the future, Doctor," Romana explained, "I used the Space/Time Visualizer to look into the future. I saw what you, he, will do."
Ten and Nine slowly stepped away from the barrier, realization dawning in their faces as the rest looked at each other in confusion. Ace took the opportunity to step up, irritation bubbling up inside her. "Oi!" she shouted, "What do you mean 'what he will do'? You've got us now, why not just spill it, eh?"
"Ace is right. No use is keeping us in the dark now, Romana. You've got us trapped," Seven concurred.
"Very well. I was the one who brought him back to Gallifrey. I'm the one who sealed him in the Tomb of Rassilon. I didn't think that he was going to summon his other selves, but there was no time to think of that. What he would do was coming far too soon. I had to act."
"You don't understand," Nine said, "This has to happen. If he doesn't do this, the Daleks will overrun Gallifrey and begin working on destroying the whole universe. And you meddling with the time lines will have catastrophic consequences, not just for this universe, but the whole of creation. Is that what you want?"
Nudging Ace aside, Eight appeared in the archway, pressing his palms to the force field. "Tell me what you saw, Romana," he commanded.
"Don't!" Ten shouted, "You can't tell him what he's going to do before he does it. You know that, Romana."
"You cannot tell him," Nine said in a quietly commanding tone.
Romana looked between them for a moment, uncertainty in her eyes. Then, without warning, she looked to Eight, the uncertainty returning back to their previous look of desperate sorrow. "I saw you, in your TARDIS. You were out there, amongst the Daleks. Then...you pulled a lever and...then there was nothing but fire. And then my vision widened so that I could witness it. A wave of energy, emanating from your TARDIS, spreading out across the Dalek fleet, reducing the ships to atoms in one second, but...then the wave continued. It did not stop until Gallifrey itself was nothing more than a smoldering rock. Nothing survived. Your TARDIS hurtled through space and crashed to Earth, killing you instantly with the force of the blow. And...just as you were regenerating, the vision ended."
When Romana's retelling ended, Seven was clutching his hat in his hands, frozen in place with horror. Ace was likewise in shock, holding onto Rose, who held her hands to her mouth. Jack stood a bit away from them all, taking great gulps of air to steady himself, the hand still holding the pistol shaking. Nine and Ten both stood with their heads lowered, tears trailing down their cheeks as that old wound re-opened and bled in their minds.
"I'm sorry, Doctor," Romana said softly, "But I made a promise to protect Gallifrey with every part of my being. And I will. I'll find another way to destroy the Daleks. I promise."
"Romana, please, let us out of here!" Eight shouted, but she simply shook her head.
As she turned to leave, there was a flash of tartan and Jamie was suddenly there, tackling the Lady President to the ground. The first and second Doctors followed her to the ground, their hands pressed to her forehead and their eyes closed as they rendered her unconscious with the force of their combined will. Susan scrambled for the device that had dropped to the floor and held it up, dropping the force field.
"Oh, good job, Susan!" Ten said with a faint smile of relief as he, Nine and Eight rushed forward to hug the girl.
Jack helped Two and Jamie to lift Romana and set her carefully down in the room. As they got the force field back into place, Romana began to stir and sit up slowly. "Quick work, you guys," he said to One and Two with a grin, "Pretty spry for two old men."
"I'll have you know, young man, that I have a few more tricks under my sleeve," the first Doctor said imperiously, straightening his jacket.
Seven looked to Nine and Ten, looking troubled. "Is that really what happened in your past?" He asked, once again setting his hat on his head with a frown.
"I'm afraid so," Nine replied.
"Well...then I suppose that is the way it has to be."
Eight said nothing. He simply stood apart from all of them, uncertainty clouding his blue eyes as he stared at Romana and pondered her vision. It can't be. I can't kill my own kind. This just...cannot be.
Noticing her predicament, Romana gasped and pushed herself to her feet, running for the wall of energy, pressing her hands against it as Eight had, staring right at him as if sensing his doubt. "Please, you know time can be changed. If the Time Lords survive, we can repair whatever damage that is done because of it, but they have to survive. If you do what I saw you do in my vision, our home, our people, will be gone."
"She's right," Eight whispered.
"Two million Dalek ships are on their way to Gallifrey and our forces are all but gone," Two told the others.
"There is no way you can fight them all," Jack said to Romana, "The men and women out there who were already sent to die are gone. What makes you think you can do any better?"
"You have to let me try!" she cried, "There must be another way! I just needed time to stop you, and then I'd think of a way. I know I could!"
Nine stormed angrily up to Romana's prison, shouting as close to her face as the force field would permit. "Don't you think that if there was another way, I WOULD HAVE THOUGHT OF IT AND DONE IT? Do you think that the first idea I had was to just WIPE OUT MY OWN PEOPLE?"
Ten tangled his hands in his hair and began pacing, a sudden wave of hope washing over him. "Maybe I can do something. Like Donna said...that little bit of human, that spark of ingenuity. Maybe that bit of me can help me find a way!"
"But there is no other way!" Nine growled.
Taking Ten and Eight by the arm, Rose pulled them both aside as the rest tried to calm Nine. "Tell me one thing, Doctor," she said quietly, addressing Ten, "If you change history, will we ever meet?"
"Probably not. I wouldn't have crash-landed on Earth, and it's possible the Nestene Consciousness wouldn't have had to come here. I still don't know when their protein planets were destroyed. It could have been in the blast, but Rose...my people. My family..."
"I know, Doctor, but just let me finish. If you never met me, you would have never taken me to Platform One, right? Think of all the people Cassandra would have killed without you there to save them. The Face of Boe, too, remember? This means you never would have gone to New New York to see him. Think of all those New Humans that would still be tortured and killed by the thousands by those cat nuns. And, you never would have taken Adam and I to Satellite 5, which means the Jagrafess would still be there, stunting the Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire, yeah?"
"And the Game Station wouldn't have been made, killing all those people in their insane games," Ten said, "And the Daleks wouldn't have had to retreat and rebuild their numbers by cannibalizing humans. The battle of Canary Wharf would have never happened, Caan might not have brought Davros back, and I would have never had to wipe Donna's memory to save her life."
"You might not have even met Donna in the first place, Doctor. Or Martha. Or Jack."
Stepping up beside them, Nine laid a hand each on Ten and Eight's shoulders and said, "If we let Romana have her way, she will lose. The Daleks will destroy Gallifrey and wipe the universe of anyone and anything that wasn't a Dalek like them. They would control time and space. None of the humans we've met would even be alive."
"Then it's settled, I suppose," Eight said, setting his shoulders, "We have to let events happen as they were meant to to begin with. For the sake of the universe."
Ten moved to the archway where Romana was still standing, leaning against the force field with tears in her eyes. "We can find a way to save you, Romana. Maybe you can come back with me to the alternate universe. You can still survive this."
"Please, don't," Romana pleaded, "Not our beautiful Gallifrey. Please..."
"It has to be this way. Deep down you know it's true. I tried to think it was possible, but really...I know it has to be done. Let me help you. You don't have to die."
Taking a deep breath, Romana closed her dark eyes and shook her head. "No," she said, her voice taking on a more calm and regal tone, "I am Lady President Romana. If my home is to perish, then I shall perish with it."
Ten pressed his hands against where Romana's lay on the translucent wall of humming energy, dropping his forehead to the force field and choking back a sob as the memories of the Master refusing to regenerate and dying in his arms floated to the surface. "Romana, no!" he cried, "Please, I can help!"
"Leave me, Doctor," Romana whispered.
"Romana..."
"Go."
As Romana pulled away from the force field and stepped back in stoic silence, Ten's shoulders shook as he wept like a lost child. After a moment, the rest of the Doctors gently pulled him away from the archway and, with the companions, led him out of the Capitol and back to the TARDIS.
With Five gone, the TARDIS interior had changed to Nine's, green light reflecting off the sweeping coral spires surrounding the central console. Nine was at the console, working on getting them back to the TARDIS Eight had left outside the Tomb of Rassilon, Ten was curled up with Rose on the captain's chair with Jack hovering nearby, and the rest of the Doctors and their companions were milling about the console room.
"I don't see what the other me was complaining about," Two said with mild cheerfulness as he looked around, "I think the coral's nice. It looks very artistic."
"A great waste of space I think," the first Doctor grumbled, tapping one of the lightly glowing spires.
"All right," Nine said, "The versions of ourselves and their companions were trapped in a time bubble. Once I repair the Time Lock, all of us, including them, will return to their respective places in the time line. Those of us from the past will have no memory of this happening, because it won't have happened to us yet."
"You two," he continued, nodding to Ten and Rose, "will still remember because you're from our present. This is still a part of your personal time lines."
After a few short moments, they landed beside Eight's TARDIS. Everyone gathered together to give their respective goodbyes, including Ten, who had gathered himself together again.
"Well," Two said with an unsettled catch in his voice, "This is all quite sad, really, but I suppose what must be done will be done."
The first Doctor nodded his aged head. "It is sad, but I had a feeling that Gallifrey wouldn't go on forever," he agreed, "Everything has it's time and everything dies. Even Gallifrey." Nine and Ten exchanged a sad look and nodded in agreement.
Seven patted Eight on the arm and smiled reassuringly up at him. "You will do what's right. We always do," he said, "Everything will be alright. Gallifrey won't be completely lost. It will live on in you."
"I must say," The first Doctor noted, "I'm glad to know that I will be so wise in my future, even though I won't remember knowing it."
Rose wandered up to the other companions, giving Susan a curious look. "So, why do you call him Grandfather?"
Susan blinked. "Because he is my grandfather," she replied.
"But, if he had grandchildren that must mean...he had children."
"Didn't he ever tell you?"
Rose glanced over to where Ten was standing and looked slightly embarrassed. "Yeah, he did, I just didn't believe him, and we never really spoke of it again," she said, then quickly turned to Ace to change the subject, "And why do you call him Professor?"
"Figured I liked it more than 'Doctor'," Ace responded with a shrug and a cheeky grin.
"Right, well, I suppose there's no time like the present," Eight said, "Though, I must admit I don't know how I'm going to do this."
"You'll know when the time comes," Nine said, clapping him on the back as Eight gave a weak smile and headed out of the TARDIS.
Once Eight had gone, Nine began to work around the console again, pressing buttons here, pulling a lever there. "Time's up, everyone," he announced, flicking a final switch that caused all of them to begin fading from sight.
While he still had the chance, Jack pulled Rose into a tight hug. "See you soon," he grinned.
"I'm sure you will!" she laughed in return.
"I know you won't remember this," Ten said to his previous self, "But you love Rose. You won't ever say it, but you do, and I have no problem saying it."
Without a chance to reply, Nine faded out of sight, still staring at Rose.
Rain began pouring down on Ten and Rose again as they reappeared in the garden, exactly where they'd left. For a long time they just stood rooted to the spot, gazing at one another, letting the enormity of what had just happened sink in. He then gathered her up in his arms and buried his face in her drenched hair, allowing one last shudder to shake him.
"I'm almost glad you never told me now," Rose murmured into his chest, "That had to be the hardest thing you ever did."
"Yeah..."
"I'm so sorry."
Ten didn't answer. He simply crushed her tighter to his chest, ignoring the rain as they held each other and tried to forget.