Quantum Chiswicks

A Quantum Leap × Doctor Who Crossover fic
by Ashe P. Kirk

A sequel to Ten Lords-A-Leaping

Summary

When Sam leaps into a post-Journey’s End Donna in late 2008, a strange brain wave signal prevents Al from appearing to him.

The Doctor is nowhere to be found, except in Sam’s dreams every night; only in them, he’s the Doctor.

Set between Journey’s End and The End of Time (Doctor Who) and after Mirror Image (Quantum Leap)—read the final chapter of Ten Lords-A-Leaping for the connective tissue between the end of Mirror Image and the beginning of this story.
(I strongly recommend reading the whole thing before you read this one; it heavily refers back to the events of that story)

Chapter 1

Noble Pursuits

“Alright, who’s in there this time?” Al asked, watching Doctor Verbena Beeks as she dashed out of the Waiting Room, conspicuously lacking her usual poise.

“I think you’re gonna need a sedative,” Verbena replied, leaning back on the closed door and sighing.

“What, is it another serial killer or something?” Al asked. Verbena didn’t normally lose her cool in this way. It must have been bad.

“I don’t think so,” Verbena admitted, “but she’s… well, kinda scary.”

“She?” Al cocked his head. “How scary could some broad be? Let me try; I raised four girls—I’m sure I can cope.”

Verbena rolled her eyes. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” She stepped clear of the door as Al opened it and stepped inside.

“And who the bloody hell are you?!” the red-haired British woman yelled. She looked him up and down. “You must be one of the aliens everyone keeps talking about, because I doubt any human being would wear a suit that… yellow. I’ll thank you not to probe me or you’ll be in a world of hurt, you flipping yellow Martian! Imagine abducting me from my own kitchen. Oh, if you don’t take me back this bloody instant, I swear…”

Al found he had been backed against the wall as the woman had advanced on him.

Jeez, Beeks was right. She is kinda scary.

“Lady… get a grip, would ya!” Al countered, mustering up his most authoritative Admiral voice, “I’m not an alien and you’re not getting probed! Go sit your butt down over there and quit jumping to conclusions already.”

His boss voice was not effective with this woman, who violently stepped on Al’s foot.

“Ow! These shoes cost two hundred bucks, you know! Lay off!”

“Let me out of here, you walking road sign!” the woman screeched, inches from Al’s face.

Al ducked swiftly to the left and around the woman, cantering further into the room. He stopped at the glass table in the centre, leaning on it. The woman watched him, narrow-eyed.

“Listen, I know you’re… angry…” Al began, changing tack. Understatement. “…And you’re probably real confused. But I need you to calm down so I can explain what’s going on. Can you do that?”

“Alright, fine.” The woman crossed her arms, speaking tersely. “I’m calm. I’m positively bloody zen. Now explain. You can start with why you’re dressed as a lemon tart.”

“Okay,” Al said with a sigh of relief. Finally, he was getting somewhere. “But my choice of clothes has nothin’ to do with anything. This is just what I wear.”

“Humph,” the woman smirked, clearly amused. “Right then. You got a name, or should I just call you Laa-Laa? Who should I expect next? Tinkie-Winkie?”

Al raised an eyebrow, having no idea what that meant. “My name is Al.”

“Donna.”

Al did a double take. “Donna?!”

He thought back to the thing that woman River had said to Sam about a month prior: “You’ll be seeing a lot of Donna in the near future.” He should have known she was messing with them.

“Yes, ‘Donna.’ Donna Noble. You got a problem with my name, Bananaman?”

“Not at all,” Al said, continuing on with his questioning, “do you know the date, Donna?”

Donna’s face screwed up. “Don’t you have a calendar,  Al?”

“Just tell me so we can wrap this up,” Al sighed.

“Eleventh of December.”

“And the year?”

Donna glared at him. “Two thousand and eight.”

Al’s eyes widened with surprise. Sam leaped to the future?

Donna rambled on. “Now listen here, Brum—I know I’ve had memory problems, but I’ve been perfectly fine for months, you know. Tell me you didn’t kidnap me just for another flipping psych assessment. I already told the last lot where to shove their diagnosis!”

“I’m not here to diagnose you with anything,” said Al, tapping the new details into his handlink, “but if you want my professional opinion, I think you could use an attitude adjustment, sweetheart.”

“Oh, mind your own business, H.R. Pufnstuf.”

Al rolled his eyes, and headed for the door.

“Thanks for the illuminating chat, Donna. Listen, do me a favour, and don’t look at your reflection. You seem plenty stressed out as it is.”

“Reflection? What?”

As the door closed behind a smug Al, he heard Donna scream.

*        *        *

Sam’s eyes opened with a jolt. He didn’t think he’d fallen asleep sitting in a chair, but now here he was in one, in a bright white room. For a second he almost thought he was back at the Project, but then his eyes focused and he saw the circular console in the middle of the room. It reminded him of—the TARDIS? But that wasn’t right. It looked very different, in fact. Much cleaner, and brighter. Newer, somehow. The walls were lined with circular indentations, and the console itself was blockier and more simple-looking.

Did I leap again?

Sam’s first instinct was to find a mirror. He jumped up from his seat, and moved around the room, looking for a reflective surface.

“Grandfather, are you looking for something?” A girl’s voice.

Sam turned to the direction from which it came. A teenage girl with short, dark hair was emerging from a doorway, looking at him curiously.

“Uh… y-yes, a mirror,” he stammered.

The girl reached into a pocket of her coat, and pulled out a compact, flipping it open.

“Here you are,” she said. “What do you need it for? Can I help with something?”

Sam took the mirror, peering at his reflection. It was an old, white-haired man that stared back with piercing eyes.

“Grandfather?” the girl prompted.

“Never you mind, Susan,” he said, waving her away.

Susan?

He wandered to the console, and looked at the array of switches, buttons, and dials. Without hesitation, he began to operate the machine. To his eternal surprise, he seemed to know exactly what he was doing.

“Where are we going next?” Susan asked, as the TARDIS began its familiar wheezing noise.

Sam paused a moment, thinking. “Earth,” he said, the corners of his mouth turning upward.

This is so strange. Just who am I, anyway?

“Oh, can we go to the sixties?” Susan asked, her eyes lighting up. “I simply love the music of that era.”

“I think I can do that,” Sam said, expertly flipping switches and setting coordinates.

“And perhaps,” Susan said quietly, “we can stay, just for a while? I’d like to see what it’s like to be a human girl. I’ll bet there’s far less pressure on Earth than back home. Oh please, grandfather!”

So she’s not human.

“Y-yeah, why not?” Sam replied. “Hold onto something, my dear.”

Susan smiled at him as she grabbed at a chair. “Thank you, grandfather! You’re the best!”

The TARDIS shook as it came in for a landing. Against the wall, a display screen showed a scene fading into view: some kind of cluttered junkyard, Sam guessed.

“Alright, here we are,” Sam said, flicking a switch, which opened a bulky set of double doors on the wall.

Despite having spent several days in the sixties very recently—as far as he remembered—Sam found himself quite excited about venturing out there.

“Ladies first,” he said, gesturing to the door. Susan, grinning, dashed outside, and Sam followed behind.

He didn’t know what the hell was going on here, but the feeling he got when he saw Susan smile warmed him inside. If she was happy, he figured he was probably doing whatever he was here for.

As he stepped outside into the cold air, he turned around, seeing a familiar blue police box standing there in the scrap yard. And that’s when it clicked: this was the same TARDIS as he’d been in before, and this was the moment the Chameleon Circuit ceased function.

Then does that make me…?

The Doctor wasn’t an old man, though, was he? But—he was over nine hundred years old, Sam recalled. But then, that thing he’d said about his face. What was it again? It was ‘liable to change at any time?’ Or was he talking about Sam’s face at the time?

Sam scratched his head as he turned around again.

“Come on!” Susan shouted, as she opened the gate and bounded away to the foggy street. Sam reluctantly followed her into the mist, and quickly found himself losing his sense of direction.

“Susan? Where are you?”

“Susan? Who’s Susan?”

Who’s that?

“Hello?” The fog filled his eyes with white. He couldn’t see. The voice seemed to be coming from everywhere at once.

“Oh, would you wake up, Donna? You need to be at Cooper & Earhart in half an hour!”

Sam snapped awake, and he came to the realisation that all of that had been a bizarre dream of some sort. Staring him in the face was Sylvia Noble, the mother of the woman he’d leaped into—yesterday? The woman called Donna, that wasn’t his wife, but was instead a late-thirties redheaded temp from Chiswick who lived with her mother and grandfather.

“I suppose I was picturing a mouthy ginger,” the Doctor’s voice echoed in his mind.

Sam rubbed his eyes. “Did… you say half an hour?”

“I most certainly did,” Sylvia said, “now would you get going? You won’t have time for breakfast, so I hope you don’t pass out from low blood sugar. Happened to me once, you know.” She batted at Sam with a tea towel. “Move!”

Sam groaned as he shrunk away from the overbearing mother, and scrambled to his feet. “I’m going, I’m going! Lay off!”

He didn’t know what he was here for—Al had not shown up yet—but he had a sneaking suspicion it was to get this poor woman out of this house and away from her mother.

Chapter 2

Best Temp In Chiswick

Donna Elesee-Beckett was waiting for Al in the Control Room as he walked, smirking, away from the Waiting Room, hands in his pockets.

“Well, I didn’t get much out of her, but at least I got her back for trying to break my foot,” he said with a wink at the more demure Donna. “You know she’s called Donna too?”

“Sam leaped into a Donna…?” Donna grimaced. “I suppose he’ll remember me again, won’t he?”

“I think the cat’s out of the bag on that one already,” Al said, as he moved to the Control Panel and activated Ziggy. “Hey, sweetcheeks.”

“Good evening, Admiral,” purred Ziggy. “I trust you are intact after that encounter?”

“She was quite an adversary,” Al said, “but I think I got the better of her. Now, have you located Sam?”

“I processed the date and name you sent me and I’ve discovered Donna Noble’s likely address. However, due to the nature of a leap to the future, I have no data on Doctor Beckett’s purpose there. Furthermore, I’m having no success in locking onto his brainwaves.”

“Don’t tell me he split in half again?” Al rubbed his temples.

“He did not,” Ziggy confirmed, “he seems to be in one piece, but there is signal interference that I cannot penetrate.”

Donna and Al exchanged an alarmed look.

“Interference…?” Donna croaked. “What manner of interference?”

“Unknown.”

“Oh, that’s helpful,” Al moaned. “So, what? You’re saying we just can’t get to him? He’s gonna be alone for this leap?”

“Look on the bright side,” said Ziggy, “Doctor Beckett’s leap is over eight years in the future. You have plenty of time to come up with a solution to this problem.”

“Oh for the love of…” Al turned on his heel and headed back to the Waiting Room. “I’m gonna see if our guest has any more information.”

Al barrelled through the door, glaring at Donna, who sat in a huff on the table. Who was this woman, and what would cause this problem? Did she know anything about it?

“Alright, we need to know—what’s your story?” He demanded.

“My story?” Donna shouted, jumping from her seated position on the table. “Are you actually taking the piss? First you kidnap me, then you… I don’t know—turn me into a bloke or summin?” she gestured to the reflective surface of the table, “—and you’re asking me what my story is? I’m a temp from Chiswick, that’s all! And you still haven’t told me a bloody thing about what you plan to do to me, besides apparently bore me to death in a room with nothing but a table that shows me the wrong face in the reflection. I mean I kept hearing about all the aliens doing batty things to people, but I never saw it until now—and I’m not impressed! So why don’t you go on back to Mars and send me back home, or I swear I’ll step on every blessed foot in this prison, you hear me?!”

Donna was now red in the face, and breathing heavily, maintaining intense eye contact with Al, her teeth bared.

Al waited a moment before speaking. “Are you done?”

Donna, losing her aggressive posture, collapsed back onto the table, eyes down. “Yeah,” she muttered, the first quiet word out of her mouth this whole time. “Just tell me what you want with me.”

Al joined her on the table. “This might come as a shock to you,” he said, “but we didn’t bring you here for some nefarious purpose. You’re part of a government experiment—”

“Oh my god, I’m in bloody MK Ultra!” Donna exclaimed, eyes wild. “No flipping wonder I forgot months of my life! I’m a Manchurian Candidate! I’m gonna get a trigger phrase on my phone and assassinate the Queen or someth—”

“Didn’t I tell you to stop jumping to conclusions?” Al admonished. “It’s nothing like that! Just shut your yap and listen a damn minute, would you?”

Donna closed her mouth, biting her lip. “Alright, fine. Out with it, you talking dandelion.”

Eventually she’s going to run out of yellow things to compare me to, right?

“So, like I said, a government experiment…”

*        *        *

Sam sat in front of a computer screen in a cubicle of an office. Computer design had come a long way since 1995, he realised—it still didn’t come close to Ziggy, of course. The good thing about his leapee being a temp was that he had his job explained to him before he had to do it. The bad thing about it was that the work was dull as dishwater.

At least spreadsheet software had barely changed since he leaped.

It was a simple task of data entry. Sam had no trouble with it—in fact he had finished the stack of papers by mid-morning. Now he just had to kill time until he was given something else.

Where was Al?

In a moment of horror, he wondered if the fact that he changed Al’s history had caused them never to meet, or never to have created Project Quantum Leap in the first place. But then how was he leaping now?

He noted that the computer had an internet connection, so he opened a command prompt and attempted to ping Ziggy’s I.P. address.

Server not found. That was a bad sign.

He opened a browser, which loaded a search page of some kind. Sam didn’t know what a ‘Google’ was, but he typed ‘Al Calavicci’ into the text field and hit Enter.

He clicked on the first result, and found a page on a website called ‘Facebook’ that made his eyes well up.

Oh boy… Sam looked at the photo of Al, surrounded by a family he never had before. Beth and four girls. He knew at that moment that he’d done the right thing, no matter what else he may have changed. Even if he’d never met Al.

Upon seeing there was an option to message Al, he tried it, only to find he needed an account on the website to use the messaging function.

He wondered if Donna had an account. Well, if she did, he didn’t know the password anyway. He’d have to make his own.

But the account creation required an email address, and without Ziggy’s server available, he didn’t have one of those.

“Excuse me, are you using social media on company time?” came a man’s voice from behind.

Sam looked back at his supervisor, laughing nervously. “Ahh, sorry, I was just—”

The man, Anthony, pointed to the stack of papers. “You have plenty to do, Ms Noble. I suggest you get a move on, because we only asked the agency for three days work, and we expect it to be finished by then.”

“Uh, would you believe that I already finished?” Sam switched windows to the spreadsheet software and gestured to the extensive work he’d done.

Anthony scanned over it, disbelieving.

“Hmm. You did come highly recommended for your speed, but you’ve only been here three hours! How could you possibly have…” he trailed off, taking control of the mouse and scrolling through the hundreds of lines. He gave a low whistle. “We’ll have to double check this for errors…”

Sam nodded. “Is there anything else to do?”

Anthony frowned. “No. I suppose you needn’t come in tomorrow, if this is all correct.”

“And I’m guessing I’ll only get paid for today…”

“Hourly rates,” confirmed Anthony.

Am I being punished for my efficiency? Jeez, this is bleak.

Sam slumped, realising he’d just cheated Donna out of money. But, at least he had more free time now, he supposed. Time to figure out what he was here for.

“Well, I suppose you can go to lunch while I check over this,” Anthony said. Sam stood, frowning, and plodded toward the stairs that led outside.

Chapter 3

Time And Space Can Be A Bitch

Half way through his lunch, Sam received a phone call.

“Well, I have to hand it to you, Ms Noble,” Anthony said, “you didn’t miss a trick. I’m genuinely gobsmacked at this accuracy. Honestly, you may as well go home now.”

Sam sighed. “Will you tell the agency I worked the full day, or—”

“Oh, I suppose you earned that much,” Anthony conceded. “Listen, send us your CV and I’ll put you forward for any… salaried positions, should they come up. You’d probably do the job of three people at your rate. How’s that sound?”

“Okay, I will. Thank you,” Sam said politely, secretly hoping that wouldn’t put three other people out of a job should it come to pass.

As he hung up the phone, he noticed that a text message had come in on it at some point.

An unknown number. The message simply read: ‘Wester Drumlins – 2pm. Don’t be late.’

Sam looked at it with alarm. Of all places… he certainly never expected to go back to that creepy haunted house ever again. He definitely didn’t want to go there.

But this was the first lead he had that might help him uncover his purpose here. And it couldn’t be a coincidence, could it?

Finishing his Pret-a-Manger sandwich, Sam headed for the nearest tube station.

*        *        *

Sam turned a corner as he walked along the old road, and there it was, in significantly worse shape than in 1969. Sam ignored the distinct shiver running up his spine, swallowed, and made a beeline for the overgrown gate.

A sign was chained across the gates, announcing to all passers-by that the place was off limits. Probably for the best, considering what was inside.

Do I have to climb this gate, or…?

But as he inspected the gate, his nose picked up a familiar scent. A strong smell of tobacco was coming from… somewhere.

“Hello?” Sam called out.

“It’s real good to see you, Sam.” Al Calavicci stepped out from behind a bush, tapping ash from his cigar. He was older, but it was him. And his feet made audible ‘crunching’ noises as he stepped on fallen leaves. He was really here, in London, in the year 2008.

“Al…” Sam’s eyes widened, and he moved toward his friend—slowly at first, but he increased speed as he approached, and thrust his arms around Al. Al reciprocated, squeezing him tightly back.

“It’s been a while,” he said, voice thick with emotion. “I haven’t seen you in years.”

Sam released Al from his grip and took a step back. “You waited all this time?”

“Well, it’s complicated,” Al said. “Actually, it’s really complicated. But, yeah. I did have to wait nearly nine years to get a message to you.”

“A message?”

“Well, first off, you won’t be seeing me as a hologram this leap,” Al explained. “Ziggy had some signal interference, and couldn’t get a lock.”

“Well, that’s fine—you’re here in the flesh!”

Al cringed. “Yeah, but that’s the problem. This is my only part in your leap. Right here and now. I just had to set something in motion, and now I’m not supposed to—you know—interfere with events.”

“What?! Why?”

Al snorted. “What’s that thing the Doctor says? Timey-wimey?” he shook his head. “All of this already happened from my perspective. And changing it is a no-no. So I’m told.”

“So you’re told? By who?”

Al jabbed his cigar towards Sam. “By you. The you that hasn’t… uh, ‘you’d yet. Something about the universe being torn apart or… I dunno. You’ll understand at some point. More than me, anyway.”

Sam brushed a tear from his eye. “You came all the way to the UK just to tell me you won’t be helping me?”

Al gave him a sad smile. “I came all the way to the UK because I miss you, Sam. And even though this stupid time travel crapola means I can’t spend any time with you, at least I can see you one last time.”

“What do you mean, one last time?” Sam gripped Al by the arm. “What happens that we can’t see each other?”

Al took a puff of his cigar. “Well, here’s what I can tell you: when you leaped out of Donna, there was never another occupant in the Waiting Room, and the Project was eventually shut down.”

Sam’s jaw fell open. “My god. What happened to me?”

“I don’t know, Sam.”

“Well that explains why I couldn’t get through to Ziggy, but…” Sam ran a hand through his hair. “How did I tell you what to do if you never saw me again?!”

“I didn’t say I never saw you again,” he said quietly, then turned to the gate. “Now, I think the next thing that’s supposed to happen is you hear something coming from in there.”

“Hear someth—”

Sam blinked as he realised that there was a buzzing in his head. A very familiar kind of feeling, one he hadn’t felt since part of his mind was in the Weeping Angel.

“—oh.”

Al looked at the gate. “Well Sam, no way I’m going in there. I’m too old to climb that thing—and just looking at this place gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

Sam stared a moment at Al. “So, that’s it? I go in there, and you won’t be waiting for me when I come back out?”

Al gave Sam a grim look.

“I know, this stinks. But I promise you’ll see me again. An earlier model, I mean. I don’t know if I’ll ever see you again, but I’m going to hold out hope.” He dropped his cigar and stomped it out. “Oh, and one last thing. Thanks for saving my marriage, pal.”

“You know?”

Al nodded. “I remember both timelines, though the older I get, the more the old one fades. Still, I introduced some new techniques in the bedroom with Beth that were a carry-over from the old timeline—and boy did that spice things up.”

Sam chuckled, which devolved into a sob. He drew Al into another extended embrace. “I’m glad we still met. And that I didn’t undo everything that happened.”

“Me too, Sam.”

The buzzing in Sam’s head was calling to him, and it was increasing in volume.

“I guess I’d better follow that noise, huh?” Sam said, rubbing his head. “Don’t suppose you can tell me anything else?”

Al shook his head. “That’s all you told me. Good luck, Sam. And so long.”

The two of them spent a long moment staring at each other, waiting for the other to leave. Finally, Sam began looking for a foothold to hoist himself over the fence.

“Over here,” Al said, pointing to a tree branch protruding through the fence rails.

Sam studied it a moment, judging it suitable to use as a route up.

“Thanks,” he said, climbing to the top of the fence, and straddling it, looking down at his friend. His reluctance to leave Al behind still outweighed the powerful thrumming in his mind, and he sniffed, still openly weeping. He could see a glimmer in Al’s eye that suggested he too was about to cry.

“You better go,” Al said, glancing at his watch. “Yeah, go now. Ten past the hour. That’s what you told me.”

Sam nodded, wiping his eyes clear.

“Bye, Al,” he said before dropping to the other side of the fence.

Chapter 4

Code Ginger

Sam crept through the ruins of what was once a home to a little old lady. A place where his life had taken a strange turn. And as he followed the whining in his head, unbeknownst to him, he tripped an invisible sensor.

Somewhere across the city, a light began to flash, accompanied by an alarm, and a series of alerts were distributed across government devices. A man in a jeep made a U-turn, bound for Wester Drumlins.

The oblivious Sam found himself in a dark basement, where four angel statues stared at one another in a tight circle, arms interlocked.

Instinctively, he knew which one of the identical four was the one he could hear.

“It’s been a while. For you, anyway,” he said cautiously, reaching a hand to the angel’s shoulder.

He landed his hand on the frigid stone, and immediately removed it as the noise in his mind became a deafening scream. Upon relinquishing his touch, the noise dulled again.

Sam swallowed. “Hey, buddy. It’s me, Sam. Is… there anything left of you in there?” He reached out a hand again, and braced himself for the screeching. Placing his hand on the angel, this time, made him feel a strange sensation, like the angel’s mind had opened up, allowing him to explore. He hadn’t felt this kind of connection since he was inside this angel, reaching out to his counterpart. The screaming reduced to more of a depressed weeping, which seemed somehow appropriate.

“Can you understand me, Sam?” he asked quietly. “I can hear you in my head, so you can’t be completely gone…”

‘H—’ the angel whispered into his head. ‘Hhh—’

Sam bit his lip. “Harriet?” The feeling emanating from Angel Sam changed just a touch at the mention of the name. “Do… you want me to find her?”

The angel projected a deep feeling of grief into Sam’s head. And an image of a grave with white roses laid against the headstone.

“She… passed away? I’m so sorry.”

It made sense. She was the one who had him tethered to humanity. With her gone…

“I thought you were going to erase your mind?” he asked. “How do you still remember her?”

Another cry, followed by a series of images of Harriet’s face—but all warped and distorted. Sam didn’t know how to make sense of it, but it was chilling.

“I don’t understand…”

He moved closer to the angel, feeling its complete anguish, and wrapped his arms around it as best he could, trying to ignore the unpleasant cries that ripped through his mind. “Here, I know you like feeling warmth.”

This seemed to calm Angel Sam down, and the angel sent Sam a grateful feeling in return.

“We can stay like this a while if you want,” he said, doing his best not to just fall apart at the tragedy of it all.

“I don’t fink so,” came a man’s voice. “Step away from the statue.”

Sam turned his head, not ready to accept that he had to let go of Angel Sam. Standing in the shadows was a man in some sort of military tactical gear—though it was difficult to see in the dark—pointing a huge gun with an attached flashlight in his direction.

As the man caught sight of Sam’s face, he stepped back with a gasp.

“Oh, bugger me.”

He reached for a communicator, and spoke into it, eyes fixed on Sam. “Uh, Mother Hen, we’ve got a, um… Code Ginger. I repeat… Code Ginger.”

He pulled a ski mask over his face and emerged into the faint light.

“Listen, you need to leave here…” the man said, cautiously moving towards Sam. “Building’s condemned. It’s not safe. Come wif me.”

Sam narrowed his eyes. “You know something about these, don’t you?” He pointed to the angels.

“Yeh, it’s a lovely sculpture. Now come on. Let’s get out of here. I’ll take you home.” The man’s brown eyes were wide and intense against his dark skin that blended into the black mask in the dim light.

“Who do you work for?”

“That’s classified, Ma’am.” He waved his gun. “This fing isn’t just for show, you know? I’m actually trying to threaten you with it.”

“It’s not really working,” Sam admitted. This guy certainly didn’t seem like he was out for blood.

“Yeah, well, I know how to use it, okay? So just come on.”

Sam looked back at Angel Sam.

Sorry.

He turned back to the man. “Okay, I’ll go quietly.”

“You will?” The man almost seemed surprised at that. “Well… good. Come on, then.”

What in the world is a ‘Code Ginger’…? Sam wondered as he followed the man out of the basement.

“So why is a soldier… or mercenary—or whatever you are—guarding a dilapidated old building?” Sam asked his escort as they emerged into the sunlight.

“I’m, uh, private security. Hired to keep watch for trespassers.”

“With a gun the size of a golden retriever? That seems a little unlikely.”

The man glanced back at him, though his face was unreadable thanks to the mask. “Well, you should see the size of the yobs around here.”

This is all very fishy.

“Why did you put on that mask when you saw me? Are you trying to keep me from picking you up in a line-up? How do I know you’re not the… ‘yob?’”

The man chuckled. “I s’pose you don’t.”

As they reached the gate, Sam noted that it had been unlocked and opened. Whoever this guy was, he did indeed have the keys to this place.

He surely knew something.

Outside the gate, Sam peered down at the cigar stub on the ground—the last remaining evidence that Al had been here—and swallowed back the urge to cry again.

After securing the gates with the chain, the man pointed to a jeep parked by the road. “Hop in and I’ll take you home.”

Well, a lift home was a lift home—although this guy was most certainly hiding something, Sam had a weird feeling he was trustworthy, and he had no idea why. He shrugged, and got into the passenger seat.

As they drove, Sam attempted conversation.

“So… what’s your name?”

“Can’t tell you that.”

“That’s pretty hush-hush for private security.”

“I have eccentric employers.”

Sure you do.

“Is there anything you can tell me?”

“Nope.”

Sam rolled his eyes. “Good talk.”

“How about you?” the man asked. “What were you doing in that old place anyway? You’re taking up urban exploration a bit late in life, aren’t you?”

“Late in—?” Sam looked at his chauffeur with incredulity. “Jeez, life doesn’t end at thirty, you know.”

The man shrugged. “Maybe not, but it can’t be good for the old joints climbing fences, yeah?”

“My joints are perfectly fine,” Sam felt himself getting defensive, considering he himself was forty-six. Or was he forty-seven? He had lost track of that.

“Anyway, I was there because…” he paused to come up with a plausible reason. “I just… I heard a noise, and I was checking it out.”

Well, that was more or less true.

“And you just thought you’d hug some statues while you were there.”

“Seemed like the thing to do.”

This earned him a strange look from the man.

“You know, curiosity killed the cat.”

“I’m no cat.”

“Well I s’pose that’s true.”

The rest of the ride was spend in awkward silence, and it wasn’t until Donna’s house loomed in the distance that Sam realised he had never told this guy where he lived.

Chapter 5

A Fine Line Between Ally & Enemy

Sam glared at the man as the jeep pulled up to the kerb a few houses down from Donna’s place.

Who was this guy? He knew where Donna lived, and he’d never so much as given him her name. He either had some sophisticated facial recognition, or something strange was going on.

“Alright, end of the line,” the man said. “Out you get.”

Sam narrowed his eyes, and opened his mouth to say something, before deciding it might not be a good idea to at this point. He closed his mouth and gave the man a smile.

“Thanks for the ride,” he said, and climbed out.

As he put distance between himself and the vehicle, he took note of the licence plate. The man had a phone to his ear and was talking to someone animatedly. When he noticed Sam looking back, he gave a polite wave, hiding the phone from view. Sam reciprocated, and turned back around, heading into the house with a pensive frown.

“You’re home suspiciously early,” Sylvia said as Sam entered. He was hoping she wouldn’t barrage him with her criticisms so immediately, but apparently that was too much to ask for.

“I did too good a job,” Sam said wryly. “They sent me home early.”

“Oh, Donna, not again. I keep telling you, a hundred words per minute is much too fast for six quid an hour. They really ought to give you a raise, you know.”

A hundred? Wow, Donna’s not bad.

“Well why don’t you tell the temp agency that?” Sam muttered, heading for Donna’s bedroom. Surely he could get a moment’s peace in there.

“Maybe I will,” Sylvia said, following him through the house.

Okay, why don’t you go talk their ears off instead of mine?

He stopped at the bedroom door and turned around. Sylvia seemed intent on following him even now. “You’re not going to watch me change, are you?”

Sylvia looked away. “No, no. Go on.” She turned around as Sam shut the door, and he sighed with relief.

At times like these, he’d normally have Al to vent to. To bounce ideas off. But not this time. He was on his own.

Spotting a laptop computer sitting on Donna’s dresser, he grabbed it and swung it open. He had a decent amount of catching up to do when it came to technology, but he’d always been a quick study.

*        *        *

By the time Sam had programmed a rudimentary AI program to hack into transit databases in order to find the organisation linked to the licence plate, it was the evening.

He left it to run silently, and finally emerged from the bedroom, stretching.

“Evenin’ Donna,” said Donna’s grandfather, who he had discovered was named Wilfred, but most people called him ‘Wilf.’ He was in the hall, rugged up in a parka and beanie. “I’m heading up the hill. Care to join?”

“The hill?” Sam repeated in confusion. He noted the telescope under the man’s arm. Stargazing? “Uh… sure. Beats going in there…” he nodded towards the kitchen where Sylvia was sitting with a cup of tea and reading a magazine.

Wilf grinned at Sam. “Not ’alf wrong there, my love.” He winked. “Come along then, before she hears you.”

Sam mirrored the grin. He could definitely tell this impish old man had a soft spot for Donna.

Wilf pulled a coat off a rack by the door and held it out to Sam. “Don’t forget to stay toasty.”

The two of them headed out into the cold December night, and Wilf led Sam up a grassy hill that loomed behind the quiet residential street.

As the old man set up the telescope, Sam set up a pair of folding chairs, and took a seat, looking up at the brilliant full moon.

“Almost don’t need a telescope tonight,” remarked Wilf, following Sam’s gaze. “Well, I do, but only because I have old eyes. Maybe if you look in here—” he tapped the telescope, which was now standing on a tripod, “—you might see the little green men on the moon.”

Sam chuckled. “Little green men. Or little blue boxes.”

Wilf snapped his head to Sam. “What did you just say?”

Sam shook his head. “Nothing, nothing.”

This seemed to satisfy the old man, who shook his head, returning his attention to the sky.

Sam peered into the scope, moving it around until the moon could be seen.

“Your Mum was carrying you in her the night man first landed on the moon, you know,” said Wilf. “We all watched it on the telly. First time we could prove for certain that the moon weren’t made of Swiss cheese.”

Sam stifled a laugh.

“No, definitely not Swiss cheese,” he mumbled with a smirk. Not like my brain. “Just dust and rocks in every direction.” He smiled privately, as he thought of the events of that night that he’d experienced only a few days prior from his perspective. He wondered what Charlie was doing now. And Martha. They’d only have aged a year or so, even though he had met them both in 1969.

The Doctor had said Martha was finishing her doctorate. What if he looked her up? She might be able to help him figure things out.

“I’d like to think you were hearing the running commentary of that old broadcast,” said Wilf. “Deep in your Mum’s belly, hearing about humanity exploring the cosmos and all. One small step…”

“One giant leap…” Sam grinned. “I’d love to get out there and explore,” he admitted. Now that he knew the possibilities. Not just that one UFO he’d seen back in Charlemont, but having met actual aliens, and even sort of having been one for a while. There was so much out there.

He looked up at Wilf, who’d gone a little quiet. He was looking up at the sky, his eyes rimmed red.

“What’s wrong, Grandad?”

“What? Oh, nothing, love. Nothing at all. I’d love for you to go travel the stars. If I had a genie in a lamp, that would be my second wish, it would.”

Sam tilted his head. “Second? What would be the first?”

Wilf snorted, putting a gloved hand on Sam’s back. “That’s a secret I expect I’ll be taking to my grave, Donna.”

*        *        *

As Sam returned to the house about an hour later, chilled to the bone, he noticed there was a black Mini Cooper parked in the driveway. He didn’t think that belonged to any of this family. It was too new.

Curiously, he opened the front door. Sylvia was waiting for him in the hall. “Oh, I’m glad you’re back—I was just about to come and get you,” she said, taking a hold of Sam’s wrist and tugging him toward the living room, “Doctor Smith’s come for a check-up. Says it’s important.”

Doctor Smith? Sam’s brow furrowed.

“What kind of check-up?”

“Oh, you know. To do with your memory, dear.”

“Memory…?”

As he entered the living room, a woman stood from the sofa and turned towards them.

“Evening, Donna. Sorry to come over so late; I was just going over some CT scans from your last visit and I found something interesting I want to explore with you.”

Sam’s jaw slackened.

It was Martha Jones. She looked almost the same, but she was evidently a full-fledged doctor now, and stood with a long white lab coat and a stethoscope around her neck. She exuded an air of confidence that she’d not quite had before.

 “Uh… Martha?” Sam blurted before he realised it.

Martha’s smile dropped. “Oh my god, you remember my real name?” she said, eyes going wide.

“Wh-what’s going on here?” Sam asked, eyes flicking between the two, who were in turn looking at one another with alarm.

“I’m really, really sorry for what I’m about to do,” Martha said, biting her lip, “but it’s for your own safety.”

She reached into her coat, pulled out a gun, and shot it at him.

Sam stumbled back. He moved a hand to his neck and felt a tiny dart embedded in it. He pulled it out as the world began to blur around him.

“Wait… Martha, I’m… I’m—”

A moment later, he found his face against the carpeted floor, no longer able to form a coherent thought.

As he felt rough hands pulling his limbs, his consciousness faded away.

Stop…

Chapter 6

Brain Wave Surfing

Sam yawned as he awoke in the familiar environment of a hospital ward. A blue curtain stood as a barrier between him and the rest of the room, but he could hear feet shuffling around.

A glance downward showed that he was in striped pyjamas. Had someone changed his clothes?

A handful of footsteps approached the curtain, and a hand drew it back, revealing a bald man in a suit, accompanied by a group of what Sam guessed to be med students.

“Now then, Mister Smith, a very good morning to you,” said the man. “How are you today?”

Mister Smith?

Sam opened his mouth to answer, before his eyes focused on the student next to the man.

“Martha! Thank god! You didn’t give me time to explain.”

Martha stared back at him, eyebrows high. “Explain what? How do you know my name? Are you stalking me?”

Sam let his jaw hang, unsure of how to react to that.

“Uh…”

The man next to her gave her a confused glance. “Miss Jones, that’s hardly the way to speak to a patient, now is it?”

“Sorry sir,” Martha said, looking down. “It’s just this man came up to me in the street this morning, and now he knows my name.” She met Sam’s baffled eye. “You stepped in front of me half way down Chancellor Street and took your tie off.”

“I what?”

“That isn’t likely, Miss Jones,” the man said. “Mister John Smith here was admitted last night with severe abdominal pain, and he’s been here ever since.”

Okay, Sam thought, None of this makes a lick of sense.

“Regardless of how he knows your name, he still requires diagnosis. Please go ahead and show me what you’ve learned, Miss Jones.”

Martha frowned, and put her stethoscope on, placing the chestpiece against Sam’s racing heart.

She avoided his gaze as she moved it to the right side of his chest, and her eyes widened. She locked eyes with Sam, who gave her a puzzled look.

“Listen Martha, I really need to talk to you,” Sam whispered to her. “It’s me… Sam Beckett.”

Martha furrowed her brow. “Who?”

“I weep for future generations. Are you having trouble locating the heart, Miss Jones?”

Sam scowled at the patronising man. “You have some nerve correcting her bedside manner while you talk to her like she’s six years old in front of me. Give her a break. She’s just nervous, and I can see why, with the needling you’re giving her.”

He smiled at Martha. “I’m feeling fine now, but you might want to check my chart to be sure.”

“R-right,” Martha said, and reached for the chart. It gave her a visible static shock, and she dropped it, shaking her hand. “Not again!”

Sam squinted, suddenly disoriented. “Wait, it wasn’t you that picked that up. It was him.” He looked up at the man.

And suddenly, everyone around him stood motionless and silent. Sam sat bolt upright, and waved a trembling hand in front of Martha’s vacant eyes.

What in the world is happening?

MEMORY CORRUPTION.
INITIATE TRANS-SHIFT NOW.

*        *        *

Martha looked through the two-way mirror, hands fidgeting nervously as her eyes studied the sleeping Donna.

These past months had all been so terrible for the poor woman. She’d been so full of life when she and Martha had first met in front of the TARDIS. And that time she’d saved the entire universe—well, that was pretty special. But it had come with a great cost, and the Doctor had been forced to wall off and bury large pieces of her memories, and all the knowledge she’d absorbed from the Doctor’s mind.

Martha had only heard this second hand; when she’d heard whispers at UNIT that Donna was back home and had memory issues, she’d gone to visit to see if she could help. But Donna’s mother and grandfather had recognised her from the Subwave Network, and told her what had happened.

If she remembered, they said, she would burn up and die.

Donna wasn’t the same person Martha had met. She had different priorities. Her world was so small. And she would get a distant look in her eyes, as if part of her knew what had been taken from her.

So Martha had taken the name Doctor Smith, and stepped in as her personal physician.

She’d run many tests on Donna’s brain over the months, and they were always stable. Always the same.

But not today.

The brain waves on the monitor she was now looking at were completely different.

“I don’t know what to make of it,” she said. “She’s not in immediate danger, I don’t think. Her temperature is fine. But look at this comparison…”

She brought up the previous readings and overlaid them on the current ones. “Different frequency, different wavelength… and what in the world is this additional interference?” She pointed to a jagged line that moved across the top.

“Well, I saw her hugging and talking to a Weeping Angel. I fink she’s gone mental.”

“Yeah, that’s a serious problem. She shouldn’t know anything about them.” Martha chewed on her thumbnail. “She didn’t recognise you though, did she?”

“I was wearing a balaclava,” said Mickey Smith with a shrug. “But she was suspicious. I had the boys sweep her computer, and she had some kind of software running that was trying to trace my number plate—it’d already dug up that it was registered to UNIT. I don’t think Donna would know how to do that, unless something was bleeding through, yeah?”

“Yeah,” agreed Martha. “She’s a fast typist, but the only code she knows is Excel formulas as far as I’m aware.” She looked Mickey in the eye. “You said you had a conversation with her, right? How was she?”

Mickey stroked his chin. “Well, it’s not like I knew her at all,” he admitted, “we only spent a few hours in the TARDIS and by that point she was already half Time Lord. But she was asking probing questions. Think there was a lot going on in her head that she didn’t say.”

“Well that doesn’t sound right,” Martha mused. “I think we need to contact the Doctor.”

Mickey frowned. “So it’s come to that.”

“Well, what do you suggest we do?”

“We could try talking to her.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Mickey,” said Martha. “I don’t want to trigger any further memories. This is a delicate situation.”

“I see your point,” Mickey conceded.

Martha pulled out her phone, and called the Doctor’s number.

“Hello! You’ve… somehow… reached the Doctor. Well, you haven’t exactly reached me, because this is a recording.”

Martha cursed under her breath.

“I’m probably off arm-wrestling Joan of Arc. She still owes me a gros tournois. But you can always leave a message—I might even get back to you. It happens from time to time. But despite the nature of my means of travel, I can’t guarantee punctuality. Give it three to five weeks and I might show up. Sometimes it might take a year. Unless it’s urgent, in which case for pity’s sake, talk! Quickly! Oh wait, I think you need to wait until aft—”

The recording was cut off by the answering machine’s ‘beep.’

Martha grimaced. “Doctor, it’s Martha. Donna needs your help. Please call me back. I think you understand how urgent this could be.”

*        *        *

“Doctor, have you ever regenerated on purpose?”

Sam snapped his head towards the voice. She was a mature woman with full-bodied hair and a long white dress. She stood at—another TARDIS console, Sam realised. And she’d referred to him as ‘Doctor.’

What was happening to him?

“Regenerated?” he asked dumbly.

On the floor beside him, he noticed a blocky robotic… dog? As if in response to his glance, it cleared its throat loudly. As if it had a throat to clear.

“You’re in—what—your fourth now? Something like that?” the woman continued. “Have all of those previous changes been unwilling, or did you ever want to… you know… refresh your look?”

“Why would I?” Sam found himself saying. “I’m perfectly wonderful as I am.”

The woman stalked the console, adjusting levers. “Well it seems I’m stuck with you for a while, what with this randomiser, so I just feel I might want to… slip into something more comfortable.”

“Don’t do something so drastic on a whim,” Sam said, alarmed. “You only get thirteen of the things, you know.”

The meaning of this conversation was slowly seeping through. What regeneration was, and why it was such an unheard of thing to do willy-nilly. And it began to click why there seemed to be more than one Doctor.

“Well, if the fates are with me as they have been, the new me will see many years. Carpe diem, Doctor. It’s time for a change.”

Romana. The name of this woman came to Sam in a moment of clarity.

Sam looked down at his clothing. An enormous knitted scarf hung from his neck and down to his knees, weighing quite heavy on him, and a long coat sat around it.

He had to admit, this outfit was cosy, if a little scruffy.

“Well, it’s hardly my cup of tea, but if you’re so terribly set on doing that, I shan’t stand in your way.” His voice was settling in to the cadence, and the words were just falling out of his mouth. “Now, have you any idea why K-9 would need to clear his throat?”

“I didn’t know he had a throat. He’s your pet, not mine,” Romana said, crossing her arms.

“Yes, yes. Well, I’d best open him up and take a look.” He reached into his coat, feeling around for a sonic screwdriver, but instead his hand landed on a crumbled paper bag. He pulled it out and looked inside, finding a stash of jelly babies.

Don’t mind if I do, thought Sam, popping one in his mouth.

Chapter 7

Pour Some Sugar

The room around Sam faded again, and through the murky darkness, he heard a new voice.

“You ready, little brother?”

Sam found that he was face-to-face with a full length mirror. The reflection looking back was himself—only younger. And given what he was wearing, it could only have been one day.

Behind him in the mirror stood Tom Beckett, leaning in the doorway.

But Tom died.

Sam stood open-mouthed looking at his brother, decked out in his own suit. Lines on his face seemed to prove that he’d survived the war, and come home. Lived beyond his twenties.

Sam remembered; it was him who had saved Tom’s life in Vietnam. And now Tom had made it to see him marry Donna.

All of this realisation came in an emotion-drenched few seconds, and he swallowed back the urge to sob, composing himself to answer the question his brother had asked.

“Uh, yeah. Absolutely. Let’s go.” He gave his brother a wide smile, and the two of them headed out to the church altar, where a younger Al waited as co-Best Man, and Tom joined him at his side.

Sam recalled being too indecisive about picking just one of the two as Best Man: the brother he’d looked up to for his entire childhood versus his best friend and colleague—so he figured both of them deserved to share. There was no shortage of testosterone between the two career Navy men, but they were on their best behaviour today.

Sam waited by the reverend as the procession started. Gooshie and one of Donna’s girlfriends, Vicki, were first up the aisle. Gooshie looked decidedly uncomfortable in his tuxedo, and Vicki had her face pointed away from Gooshie’s, avoiding his breath. Sam stifled the urge to laugh at the awkwardness.

A few more appearances from faces Sam hadn’t seen in a long time. Then the flower girl, Al’s third daughter—what was her name? Billie? The newest memories seemed the most difficult to get straight.

And finally, the bride.

Donna, hand-in-hand with her General father.

She made it this time.

The two of them locked eyes. She was a vision in white, and they shared a smile as she approached him step by step.

Then the white turned to a shimmering gold. And Donna screamed, and vanished into an orange leap.

Wait! It didn’t happen like this! Not to my Donna. It was the other one.

As the church went silent and still, like in the hospital, Sam stepped forward, shouting into the unmoving faces.

“What’s happening to me? Hello, can anybody hear me? What’s going on? Please stop this…”

UNKNOWN MEMORY MISMATCH.
CLEARING CACHE…
RELEASING SUBJECT.

*        *        *

“She’s coming to…”

Martha stood pensively at the two-way mirror, watching Donna’s eyes blink open. She went tense, and scrambled to a sitting position in the hospital bed, staring at herself in the mirror.

“Oh boy,” she muttered, which Martha could hear through the listening device in the room.

Next, Donna felt the sensors attached to her temples, and pulled them off, cutting the brain wave feed.

“Damn,” Martha said, and turned to an assistant nurse watching with her. “We’ll need them reattached. But not yet. Give her a minute.”

The nurse nodded.

Donna continued scanning her eyes around the room, before stepping out of the bed and crossing to the two-way mirror. She knocked on it.

“Hello?” she asked, straining to see through the glass—which wasn’t possible. At least for human eyes. “Martha? Are you here?”

Martha tensed. She wanted more than anything to confirm Donna’s suspicions. But she couldn’t. It was too dangerous.

“Look, if there’s anyone listening,” said Donna, “I need you to get a message to Martha. Tell her I’d like to listen to some Def Leppard. Okay—you hear me? Def Leppard. On vinyl.”

Martha’s jaw dropped.

How could she be so daft? No wonder the brain waves were so bloody different! No wonder Donna was hugging a Weeping Angel and writing sophisticated software. It wasn’t Donna in there at all!

Martha turned around, and scooted out of the surveillance room, scanned her ID against the security panel leading to the hospital room, and opened the door.

“Records are a little scarce these days, Sam,” she said, meeting Sam’s eye with a grin. “But I can get you an iPod.”

Sam smiled back, his face full of relief. But he was still trepidatious, stopping short of approaching her. Instead, he hung back near the mirror.

“I tried to tell you, but you tranqed me too fast.”

Martha frowned. “I thought the Doctor got you home. What are you doing here?”

“Didn’t work out,” he said simply, before gesturing around the room. “What am I in here for, Martha? What are you doing to me? To Donna?”

Martha lowered her eyes. “Sit down… let me explain.” She gestured to the bed, and pulled a stray chair towards it. Sam cautiously sat at the edge of the bed.

“Tell me you don’t still have the tranq gun,” he said, wincing.

Martha shook her head. “No, but, um… we may have implanted a device in your arm that will administer a fast-acting sedative remotely.”

“What?! Why?” Sam inspected his arms, frantic.

“This is why we need to talk,” Martha said, gently tugging Sam’s arm downward, and pointing to the stitched up incision on his arm where the implant was inserted. “It’s all to do with Donna.”

Sam narrowed his eyes. “But Donna seems so… ordinary.”

“Believe me—she’s far from it.” Martha leaned in towards Sam. “So, Donna travelled with the Doctor.”

“She was the one who disappeared on her wedding day…” Sam murmured, seeming to have a dawning realisation. “And ended up in the TARDIS, right?”

“Right! I remember the Doctor mentioned that to you when we were on the moon!” Martha said, and the two of them shared a moment of fond remembrance of sitting there in the dust, gazing up at the Earth. “But later—after I left—she found him again and they spent time travelling.”

“The last time I saw the Doctor, he was alone,” Sam said quietly.

Martha raised her eyebrows. “Really? You saw him again?”

“Yeah, we can talk about that later. What’s going on with Donna?”

“Oh, blimey, where to begin?” Martha chuckled. “You weren’t here for the planets in the sky, were you?”

Sam looked back at her blankly. “Planets in the sky…?”

“Okay, well never mind that, I suppose. Let me start with Time Lord regeneration, then. Because that’s kind of where the whole thing kicks off. When a Time Lord is mortally injured—”

“—They change, right? Into a different person, but with the same memories?”

Martha gawked at him. “Yes, exactly. Has he told you that before?”

Sam’s face screwed up. “I don’t think so. I… I don’t know how I knew that.”

“Huh,” Martha said, taking a mental note to circle back to that. “Well anyway, that happened to the Doctor; only when it started, he threw the regeneration energy into a spare hand of his that was in a jar—that’s a story in itself—and successfully stopped it. But then Donna touched the hand, and it did this… this ‘metacrisis’ thing. Anyway, the result was there was a second Doctor somehow, and then all of the Doctor’s knowledge and memories were dumped into Donna’s mind, and that allowed her to stop the universe from being destroyed.”

Sam was staring back with complete bewilderment. “And now she’s living with her mother in Chiswick earning six pounds per hour?”

Martha laughed at this, despite herself. “Yeah. The sheer volume of the Time Lord mind was killing her, so the Doctor had to take her memories away. She can’t remember anything triggering, or the dam will break in her mind… and she’ll die.”

“So that’s why you looked so scared when I said your name?”

“And why I had to knock you out. I couldn’t risk Donna remembering more than that. Our last line of defence against her burning up is to put her into an induced coma and wait for the Doctor.”

Sam inspected the stitches in his arm silently for a moment.

“I don’t know why I’m here,” he said finally. “It surely wasn’t to get Donna institutionalised. Where are we, anyway?”

“I work for a joint government and military organisation called UNIT,” Martha explained. “This is part of the London HQ.”

“I thought you were doing something strange to me,” Sam muttered, gesturing to the bed. “I had really intense dreams. But I can’t remember what they were now.” He ran a frustrated hand through his hair. “Maybe it was the sedative.”

“Maybe,” Martha said. But, she thought, maybe not.

She could see in Sam’s eyes that he was thinking something similar.

Chapter 8

Geniuses and Idiots

“Here are the readings for your brainwaves,” Martha said, bringing up the recorded imaging from Sam’s time spent under observation. “I don’t suppose you know anything about neuroscience?”

“Enough to have built neurological hologram systems,” Sam said with a smug wink, as he leaned in and stared at his own brainwaves. Well, they were consistent with REM sleep, certainly. “Were they like this the whole time I was asleep?”

“The whole time you were hooked up to the sensors, yes. Well, until you woke up. They slowed a bit after that.”

Sam raised an eyebrow. “So my brain was working more when I was sleeping?”

Sam noted that there was something else there that didn’t belong.

“What is that?” he asked, pointing at the erratic zigzagging line that ran across the top of the screen. “I’ve never seen anything like it from a brain scan. Certainly not one of mine.”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Martha confessed. “Some kind of interference is the best we can figure.”

“Interference…” Sam murmured, finger at his chin. “Maybe this is what’s getting in the way of Ziggy…”

At Martha’s puzzled look, he clarified. “Al hasn’t been able to connect to me because of brain wave interference. He ended up waiting eight years to tell me that.” He sighed, rubbing his forehead.

Not only that, Sam thought, but he’d also brought him to the place that seemed to bring him to the attention of this ‘UNIT’ organisation, engineering his reunion with Martha.

He said he had to set something in motion, didn’t he?

Martha’s eyes were wide. “So, if neither of us know what this interference is…”

“…Then something weird’s going on?” finished Sam.

“I think we’d better do a CT scan, yeah?”

Sam didn’t love the idea of having such things on record with a foreign government, certainly. But perhaps this was the reason he was here; to get to the bottom of this.

“Agreed. Let’s get me prepped.”

At that moment, the door of the surveillance room swung open.

“Hey, they told me you brought Donna in here… why?” the man asked, eyes falling on Sam. “Uh, hello.” He gave a cautious wave.

Sam recognised the voice—this was the guy who’d found him at Wester Drumlins.

“Hello again,” he said, looking the man up and down. “No gigantic gun this time, I see. Can’t say I miss it.”

The man looked to Martha, eyes intense. “Is this a good idea?” he asked through clenched teeth.

“It’s okay,” Martha said, folding her arms. “Mickey, do you remember when I told you about my time in 1969… how there was a man who inhabited other people?”

“You mean the geezer who tried to have his family offed?”

“Martha, what did you tell him? It was a lot more complicated than that,” Sam said, his face flushing. “See, I was sharing a chunk of my brain neurons with a Weeping Angel—for convoluted reasons—and the void left by that was filled with the mind of the man I replaced, causing his identity to take over at an inopportune moment. Fortunately, my counterpart picked up the slack and prevented the murders. They definitely would have died if I hadn’t been there.”

Mickey glared, open-mouthed, at Sam. “…Oh.”

“My name’s Sam. Doctor Sam Beckett,” Sam introduced himself with a grin, extending his hand. “Nice to meet you. Mickey, was it?”

Mickey hesitantly shook his hand. “Well, that makes a bit more sense out of the past day,” he said slowly. “But if you’re him, then where’s Donna?”

“In the past,” Sam explained. “Some time in the year two thousand, I think. She’s safe and isolated from external stimuli, I promise.”

Mickey bit his lip, looking to Martha. “You think she’ll be right?”

“I can’t say. But there were no alien invasions back then, so she’s probably safer than being in the here and now.” Martha gestured to the brain wave reading. “Plus, whatever’s been causing this interference could have been an issue for her. So, maybe it’s better that she isn’t here.”

Mickey turned his eye back to Sam. “So all that business at Wester Drumlins…”

“I was visiting an old friend,” Sam said, struggling to avoid looking miserable about it.

“Angel Sam… how was he?” Martha asked quietly.

“Not good.” Sam shook his head, voice breaking. “I wish I knew how to help him.”

Martha engulfed him in a hug. “I’m sorry, Sam. The best we’ve been able to do is keep people away from them.”

“Yes, I saw that first-hand,” Sam muttered, meeting Mickey’s eye. “Well, I’d like to go back there if I can. He and I have a unique sort of connection. He might be able to tell me what he needs. I didn’t really get a chance last time, because a guy with a gun made me leave.”

“Yeah yeah,” Mickey said, eyes rolling. “Mickey the idiot strikes again.”

Sam squinted. “I never called you an idiot… who called you an idiot? That’s a horrible thing to say to someone…”

Mickey’s frown lifted into a grin. “Okay, I think I like you.”

*        *        *

In the year 2000, Al Calavicci paced in his bedroom, as his long-time and only wife Beth sat on the bed, watching him smoking yet another cigar.

“I can’t believe we’re just standing around doing nothing while Sam’s God-knows-where.”

“We know where he is,” Beth countered. “He’s in London in 2008.”

“Which makes it even worse. We know everything—except how to reach him. And I don’t think I can take another day of that angry broad in the Waiting Room.”

“The last time you saw him, didn’t you say he thought he met God?”

“Or Time, or Fate, or somethin’ else,” Al added.

“Right. If he was right, maybe it was intentional that you couldn’t be with him this time… for some reason.”

Al scowled. “If I ever get my hands on that bartender…”

“I see your ire has moved off the Doctor, at least,” Beth remarked.

“For all I know, they could be one and the same. Both just as mysterious as one another. Helluva few leaps it’s been, huh? I miss the comparatively simple days of Lee Harvey Oswald.”

Beth laughed. “You can’t really mean that.” She patted the bed beside her. “Come on, Al. No point obsessing. As long as that woman’s in the Waiting Room, at least we know Sam’s alive.”

Al sighed. “I guess so.” He turned a hungry eye to Beth. “Want me to show you a few new moves?”

“From the old timeline?” Beth asked, eyebrow raised. “Well, as long as you’re not thinking of Tina.”

Al felt his cheeks flush. “I would never. Not with you right in front of me.”

Beth smiled at this. “Alright Sailor. Show me what you’ve got.”

Chapter 9

Poking The Bear

Martha and Sam studied the CT scan closely, as Mickey stood back, arms crossed.

“So?” he asked. “You got to the bottom of it yet?”

“There’s nothing,” Sam muttered, defeated. “Everything looks normal.”

“It’s not your… aura thing getting in the way, is it?” Martha probed. “It warps reality, the Doctor said. It’s not hiding anything, is it?”

Sam frowned. “If there was a foreign object somewhere in my body, you should be able to see it,” he said. “But admittedly, this has never really come up before. I think the organs we’re looking at here are essentially Donna’s.”

“Fabulous,” Martha sighed. “So this has been a waste of time.”

“Well, not entirely,” Sam said, ever the optimist. “We’ve ruled out some kind of tangible implant—besides the one you put in my arm, of course.”

“But where does that leave us, then?” Mickey interjected.

“Something undetectable,” Martha mumbled, stroking her chin. “Except in the brain activity readings.” She turned to Mickey. “I hope the Doctor gets back to me soon. He’d know what to do from here. He’d probably just put his fingers on Sam’s temples and figure it out straight away.”

“If only I could remember what I was dreaming about,” Sam added, “that could provide us with clues, right?”

“What about hypnosis?” Mickey suggested. “You could try and bring up memories with that, couldn’t you?”

“Mickey, you’re a genius!” Martha said, grinning. She turned to Sam. “How about it?”

Sam shrugged. “It’s worth a shot,” he said quietly. “Though the last time…” He shivered. “It’ll have to be with someone I trust.”

Martha pursed her lips as Sam gazed at her. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Sam snorted, laying a hand on her shoulder. “Well, you’re the only one I trust around here. Even if you did shoot me yesterday.”

“I’ve never hypnotised anyone before,” Martha protested, “I wouldn’t know what to do!”

“Don’t even worry—I’ll get you what you need,” Mickey said, and promptly left the room.

“Okay… s’pose that’s that then,” Martha said with an amused smirk. “I’m gonna be a hypnotist, apparently.”

*        *        *

Six hours later, Martha flipped through the stack of papers Mickey had brought her as she strolled into Sam’s room.

“Alright Sam,” she said, taking a deep breath, “let’s give it a go, shall we?”

Sam sat down on his bed. “What do you need me to do?”

Martha pressed a button on the bed, raising the upper half to a 45 degree angle. “Just lie back,” she said, and moved her chair to the end of the bed, sitting down.

She pulled a silver chain from her pocket. At the end was a small white gemstone that glimmered in the light. Martha held it up to Sam.

“Mickey got this from the vaults,” she said. “It’s supposed to make hypnotism easier, apparently. Recovered from a, uh… ‘Master hypnotist’ years back.” She deliberately didn’t go into the details. “You just need to look at it while I talk you through it.”

“Okay,” Sam said, reclining and focusing his eyes on the crystal as Martha dangled it, letting it swing and spin naturally. The cold white lighting of the hospital room was captured by the facets of the gem and transformed into sparkling rainbows. Martha herself had to consciously make her eyes look away from it, and she turned them towards Sam.

“Okay, I want you to take deep breaths for me. In… and out… in… and out…”

Sam followed her instructions, and she repeated the commands a few more times before continuing.

“Look closely into the crystal,” she continued. “What do you see in there?”

“Refracted light,” Sam murmured.

Martha smirked at this. “Yeah, I suppose you do. Well, look deeply into that refracted light, and let the room around you melt away. All you see is the crystal, and all you hear is my voice. And as everything fades away, you begin to feel very relaxed, and very peaceful. Your arms and legs are feeling heavy now, and all your muscles are just unwinding, relaxing, losing all tension.”

Martha twisted the chain to give the crystal a little more movement. “What do you see now, Sam?”

“…Crystal.”

“Good. Now when I click my fingers, you’ll feel ten times more relaxed, and your eyelids will start to feel very heavy, so heavy that you’ll fight to keep them open. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Ready… three, two, one,” Martha snapped her fingers. Sam’s eyelids began to droop, and he blinked a few times, squinting to keep his eyes on the crystal.

Okay, this isn’t so hard, Martha thought.

“Keep your eyes on the light of the crystal,” she coaxed, “and try to keep them open. But the more you try, the harder it is to stay alert, and the more they’ll want to close. I’m going to count down from ten, and when I get to one, you won’t be able to fight it any more, and you’ll close your eyes. And when you close your eyes, my voice will be all there is. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“Ten… still breathing deeply. Nine. Becoming more and more relaxed… Eight… watching the crystal shimmering… Seven… hearing my voice, trusting me completely… Six… Five… Four… eyelids getting so heavy now… Three… Two… and, falling deeply into sleep… One.” Martha snapped her fingers once more, and Sam lost his battle with consciousness, slipping into a deep trance.

“Can you hear me, Sam?”

“Yes…” Sam mumbled.

“That’s good. Just keep relaxing, falling, deeper into your mind. So deep that you find yourself back in time, back to last night when you were dreaming. Can you see it, Sam?”

“Y-yeah…”

“Where are you?”

“Hospital… but it’s wrong. You weren’t supposed to pick up the chart.”

Martha raised an eyebrow.

“I’m in your dream?”

“Yeah, but… you don’t know me.”

“What am I doing?”

“You were trying to diagnose me, but you got confused by my second heart.”

“Second—?” Martha swallowed hard. “Who are you in this dream?”

“John Smith…”

Martha tried to steady her suddenly laboured breathing. “And what are you in hospital for?”

“Stomach cramps. But it was a cover.”

No way…

“What was that you said about the chart?”

“The man was supposed to get the shock, but you did instead. Now everything’s stopped. It’s wrong… corrupted. So they’re shifting to a different memory.”

“Who’s ‘they?’”

“I…” Sam’s brow furrowed. “I don’t know. But they’re watching. And listening.”

“Are they listening now?”

“Uh-huh. I think they’re angry. I wasn’t meant to know about them.”

Oh, no.

“Okay, Sam… are you able to block them off? Push them away?”

“I can’t. I don’t know how.”

“Think back, Sam. When did they first appear?”

Sam took a moment to answer. “The phone. The phone made a noise. When I was leaping in.”

“Donna’s phone?”

“Yes. And then I dropped it… and it was like it never happened.”

Martha bit her lip.

“Okay. I think we’d better move away from your dreams for now, stop drawing attention to ourselves. On the count of three, you’re going to wake up good as new, feeling refreshed, alright? One… two… three.” She clicked her fingers. “Wide awake now…”

Sam lifted his head, eyes opening. He drew a sharp breath. “What the hell…”

He locked eyes with Martha. “I’m not so sure that was a good idea, Martha.”

“Well, what’s done is done,” a voice said over the intercom, “but at least it gives me something to go off. Have I ever told you how brilliant you are, Martha Jones? I s’pose I must have, surely.”

Martha’s head snapped towards the two-way mirror on the wall as she realised who had just spoken. “Doctor!”

Chapter 10

Surveillance State of Mind

“Blimey, Sam,” the Doctor said as Sam and Martha burst into the surveillance room, “you’ve got yourself in a right mess, as usual. Can’t say I saw this one coming.”

“Look who I found breaking in,” Mickey said in a sardonic tone to Martha. He sat on the other side of the room from the Doctor, arms draped over the backrest of his back-to-front chair.

Sam gripped the Doctor’s arm roughly. “Did you see him?”

“Who?”

“The bartender! You were triangulating where he was, right?”

The Doctor evaded his eye. “Oh. Yes, we met. That was some time ago for me. A lot’s happened since then…”

“Who is he? I take it—since I’m here—that it didn’t go so well?”

“He’s…” the Doctor hesitated. “Listen, never mind that for the moment. There’s something in your head, and we need to figure out if it’s a danger. To you and, perhaps more importantly, to Donna.”

Sam’s shoulders slumped as he conceded the point. “I guess you’re right. Let’s put a pin in this.”

“Right. So, first order of business…” the Doctor extended his arms, “…bring it in.”

Martha and Sam exchanged a look, before moving in for a group hug.

“You too, Mickey,” the Doctor coaxed. “Don’t be shy.”

Mickey rolled his eyes, but approached the three, and laid his arms lightly around the group.

“There we are! Lovely,” said the Doctor, giving a final pat on the backs of those he could reach before pulling back.

Seeing the flash of sadness pass through the Doctor’s eyes, Sam couldn’t help but wonder if the hug was more for his own benefit than anyone else.

“So!” the Doctor continued, “that dream you described…”

“It was the day we met,” Martha chimed in. “He was dreaming about your memories.”

“Yes, it seems Sam is experiencing memories I’d buried under layers and layers of mental sediment in Donna’s mind. Something is excavating them—but they’re having difficulties because of Sam’s presence. Things are getting mixed up.” He narrowed his eyes, studying Sam. “Isn’t it lucky you’re here to experience this rather than Donna? Donna might already have died by now.”

Sam leaned back under the scrutiny. “Why do I feel like ‘luck’ had nothing to do with it?”

The Doctor grinned. “Oh, I’m certain it didn’t.” He gestured to a chair. “Sit down, Sam.”

As Sam took a seat, he saw the Doctor’s hands draw close to his temples.

“Here we go again…” he muttered, and the fingers touched his face.

“What?!” the Doctor exclaimed, jerking his hands away from Sam as if he’d just touched a stove, and shaking them. “That actually hurt! Some kind of defense mechanism against my telepathy, if I had to guess. Something really doesn’t want me interfering, do they?”

He frowned and began to pace, running his hands through his hair. “Right. Let’s look at the evidence: something is in your head, transferred to you via phone, that allows someone to gather information from your mind, particularly while you’re asleep. And whatever it is has installed sophisticated psychic defences. Think! What could it be? Who would be capable of this? Who would even know Donna has these things in her head?”

He stopped, head tilting at the ceiling as he tugged on his hair.

“Urgh, come on, make the connection…” he told himself. “Donna was incognito, nobody could have detected what she is, I made sure of that.”

His eyes widened. “But then a great big surge of Artron energy coursed through her when—” he pointed a finger at Sam, “—when you leaped into her. And if there was something out there… actively scanning for such surges at the time, it would have been alerted. Perhaps it was looking for someone who’d spent time with me… or perhaps just looking for anything unusual…” The Doctor slapped a hand to his forehead. “It might not have even been targeted to Donna at all—it just took an opportunity and got extremely lucky to find an unguarded repository of everything I know!”

“Doctor, what are you getting at?” Sam asked.

“There are people out there who would do anything for valuable information,” the Doctor explained, “and there’s a tremendous amount up here,” he said, tapping his temple. “So much knowledge that people would raze galaxies to get their hands on it. Now, my mind has too many defences to get into by most means, but the people I’ve travelled with? Well, most of them are humans. Much easier to crack open a human brain and mine for all the memories they need. So they track down people they think have information they want. People who’ve been in the Time Vortex, for example. They use a phone as a conduit to beam something like a Trojan horse into your mind, and quietly start collecting information by manipulating dreams to replay memories.”

He looked to Martha and Mickey. “You two might have it too, you know. How have your dreams been lately?”

The two exchanged worried glances.

“I don’t remember,” Mickey said with a pensive look.

“Sometimes, recently, I think I’ve had a nightmare, but I always forget it when I wake up,” Martha admitted.

The Doctor reached his hands for Martha’s temples. She stepped towards him, and as his fingers connected, he yelped, and pulled away.

“This is worse than I thought,” he muttered, shaking his head. “And it’s all my fault, isn’t it? I should never have put you all in this danger.” He avoided the gaze of the people around him, and fell back against a wall, arms crossed and head down.

“Are you okay?” Sam asked him quietly.

The Doctor sighed. “You just had to leap into her, didn’t you Sam?” he muttered. “All the billions of people on this planet, and you ended up in her. Well, it’s not like you chose to wear Donna’s face. Doesn’t make it hurt any less, of course.”

“I’m sorry,” was all Sam could say in reply.

Before him stood a man who felt responsible for everything that had gone wrong in the lives of the three—or really, four—people with him in the room. He was in a bad place, this Doctor. Much different to the last couple of times they’d crossed paths. He’d had darkness and grief in him before, but now it was like he bore gaping wounds rather than hastily stitched ones. Sam didn’t know how to help him.

“So we’re all… infected…” Mickey said, getting to the crux of the matter. “With something spying on our memories?”

The Doctor nodded. “Inside each of you, I suspect, is a program that’s using the alien signal in your brainwaves to broadcast to a central point within a modest radius. Either on the planet, or orbiting the planet. And it might be more than just the three of you that has this,” he said, face screwed up in thought. “If my telepathic connection’s been blocked, who knows what other defences could be in play if I attempt to trace where the signal is going? For all I know you could all be rigged with any number of nasty surprises just waiting for me to tamper.”

“Surprises?” Martha asked, eyes wide.

“This thing is buried in your brain,” explained the Doctor, “and it could have access to everything. The brain controls all aspects of your body. It could potentially stop your heart just like that.” He snapped his fingers.

Sam felt cold. “What… what do we do?”

“I don’t know!” The Doctor pounded a fist on the wall. “I—I don’t know. I need to think.”

“What if you bring all the data to Ziggy?” Sam suggested. “Al can’t get to me, but… you can get to him, right?”

The corners of the Doctor’s mouth lifted. “Now there’s a novel idea,” he said. “Keep this up and I might start to lose my preconceptions about Americans.”

He sprang up from the wall and began to wave around his sonic screwdriver—from the computers to each of the occupants of the room—presumably taking readings to pass on to Ziggy.

“Sit tight, you lot,” he said as he worked, “and stay out of trouble. I’ll be right back.”

And he disappeared out the door, his coat flapping around the corner.

Chapter 11

Cut Off

The Doctor dashed out of the UNIT medical facility, and out towards the carpark, where he’d left the TARDIS.

Sam had given him a brilliant suggestion, though the best Ziggy could do was calculate probabilities and make some suggestions. Still, while he was there he could check up on Donna; make sure she was doing alright.

Blimey, he hadn’t half made a mess of things, had he? All he’d wanted was some companionship, but every time, he caused nothing but pain to everyone around him. Better off alone. Nobody’s life to destroy but my own.

The Doctor reached the blue Police Box, opened it and stepped within.

And he stopped dead as he found he’d just walked into a pub.

“Well, that’s a bit unusual,” he commented, screwing up his face and checking that he had, in fact, walked into the door he thought he had. “Don’t remember this place smelling of stale beer and cigarettes before.”

He turned back to the room around him. It was empty and dark, as if closed, but a few lights shone over the bar, illuminating a familiar man leaning against it.

“I might have known,” the Doctor said, sighing. “This is hardly the time. What have you done with my TARDIS?”

“It’s safe and sound,” said Al the Bartender, gesturing to the stools at the bar. “Have a seat, Doctor.”

The Doctor approached the bar cautiously, eyes narrow.

“I know you, don’t I?” he tested. “From long ago. Posed as a monk, if I remember correctly.”

The bartender snorted. “That was a long time ago. Both of us have grown up since then.”

“You’re still playing games with me,” the Doctor said, taking a seat. “And meddling around in human history.”

“And you’re still a hypocrite. You’ve altered a lot more than I ever have—or will.”

“Maybe, but at least I don’t make other people do it.”

“Delegate, Doctor. You can’t do it all, you know.” The bartender raised a finger. “In almost every religion on this rock, there are stories of gods who task humans with quests. Even all-powerful ones. Why do you think they would need to?”

“You’re not seriously comparing yourself to a god now?”

The bartender turned away, and began to prepare a drink. “Who do you think I am, the Master?” He chuckled. “I never claimed to be anything of the sort. When Sam suggested it, I laughed in his face.” He looked up, meeting the Doctor’s eye. “What I’m trying to get at is that people need people. Yourself included.”

“Are you going to be billing me for this therapy?” the Doctor said, hiking a brow. “Or is it covered by the NHS? Frankly I’d love to stay for a chin-wag, but I’m on something of a tight schedule right now. Where’s my TARDIS?” He slammed his palms on the bar.

“You don’t get it, Doctor,” said the bartender with an amused smirk. “I need what’s happening to Sam to continue. I’m taking us to Christmas Day.”

The Doctor stiffened. “What?! You can’t!”

“Too late. Step outside now, and we’ll both find out just what happened in those two weeks. Then changing it will be against your strict rules, won’t it?” He placed the drink he’d been preparing in front of the Doctor—a warm mulled wine with a holly leaf decoration on the side. “Merry Christmas.”

“So long as I don’t go out there, if I don’t see this timeline, I can still go back into the events,” the Doctor said. “So I s’pose…” He took up the glass and sipped at it. “I can wait around.”

The bartender grinned. “Good.” He raised his own glass of mulled wine. “A toast to old times.”

“Oh, I do love being your prisoner,” the Doctor deadpanned, clinking his glass against it.

After another sip, he placed the glass down. “Is it you that’s done this to them? Why would you—”

“Nope,” came the simple reply from the bartender. “I’m merely taking advantage of the circumstances. And you should be thanking me for making sure Donna’s gone somewhere safe while all of this transpires.”

“Donna wouldn’t have been detected if Sam hadn’t leaped into her.”

“Wouldn’t she?” the bartender queried. “And how do you know for sure?”

“You must know who’s done this to them, if you knew to send Sam here.”

The bartender shrugged. “Maybe I do. And I know a lot more than that. It’s going to be fun watching events play out.”

The Doctor scowled, reaching into his pocket surreptitiously. “You already know what’s going to happen?”

“Well, sure. I engineered it just so.”

“And I suppose that’s why you’ve taken me out of commission, then,” the Doctor said, drinking the remainder of the wine. “I’m not predictable enough for your plan to come together?”

“Actually, you’re quite predictable. Which is why I knew you’d show up sooner or later, and why I programmed my TARDIS not to respond to your sonic screwdriver. Good thing too, since I know you’re trying to activate it right now.”

“Fair dues,” the Doctor said, “you’re cleverer than you used to be.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” the bartender winked. “But you know, even if you do manage to get back there, I have contingencies in place.”

He leaned forward. “I mean it, Doctor. Don’t stop this process. Don’t you want to see what happens? Aren’t you even a little curious?”

“Who wouldn’t be curious? But don’t you think he should have some say in the matter, at the very least? He has no idea what you have planned for him.”

“He will have a choice,” the bartender smiled. “And he’ll choose wisely—as always. I have faith in Sam Beckett.”

“What do you mean, he’ll have a choice?”

This elicited only a waggle of the bartender’s brows and a sly grin.

The Doctor clenched his teeth, took up his empty glass, and pointed his sonic screwdriver inside. A piercing screech filled the room, resulting in the glass shattering, and the wall behind the bar lifting to reveal the TARDIS console.

The bartender glared at him. “Now, look here; it’s one thing to boost your resonance to override my sonic dampeners, but deliberately breaking one of my glasses? I ought to put you on the ban list.”

He pulled the tea towel from his shoulder and threw it down in a huff, before hitting a button under the bar. Panels in the wall opened up, allowing some of the bartender’s pet autons to march in. They moved to each of the Doctor’s arms and held on tightly.

“You could have been more civil,” the bartender said, his smile gone. “I gave you hospitality and this is what I get in return? Sheesh. Next time I won’t even bother. Sam is a much more gracious patron, you know.”

“Well that might be because he doesn’t know what you are,” the Doctor said. “Well, the next time I talk to him, that’s going to change.”

The bartender looked at him coldly. “The next time you talk to him, he’ll already know.” He nodded to the autons. “Take him outside, fellas. I’ll call him a cab.”

Chapter 12

Those Who Remain

With the Doctor away, the remaining three sat in an uneasy silence, all trying to process the fact that their own brains were working against them.

It was still yet to really sink in for Sam that somewhere in the shared space of his and Donna’s brains lay all of the Doctor’s knowledge and experience. He didn’t know what it could mean for him that these memories could be dredged up; the Doctor hadn’t told him that he had the kind of risks Donna did from all the Time Lord mind, but then again, he hadn’t told him he was safe either.

Sam studied the faces of Martha and Mickey, who were making eye contact with one another, seeming almost to have a silent conversation passing between them.

“He said it might not just be the three of us, didn’t he?” Sam finally piped up.

Martha nodded. “If the… virus, or whatever it is, was latching on to anyone with a phone and Artron energy, like the Doctor suggested…”

“Then it could be part of anyone who’s been in the TARDIS, or travelled some other way through time,” finished Mickey.

“Like me,” Sam said.

“Or, through a vortex manipulator,” said Mickey.

“Or someone a Weeping Angel’s touched,” added Martha.

“How many people could we be talking about, here?” Sam asked.

“It can’t be that many, I don’t think,” Martha said. “UNIT has extensive files on people who’ve travelled with the Doctor. It might not have everyone, but it’s a start.”

“What about Charlie?”

Martha bit her lip. “Yeah, I guess he may well have it by now, mustn’t he?”

“Who’s Charlie?” Mickey asked.

“One of the angel victims,” Sam explained. “The Doctor brought him back home, right Martha?”

“Right.” Martha moved to a terminal and began to type. “I’m going to bring up the files…”

Sam turned to Mickey. “So what’s your story, anyway? You travelled with the Doctor?”

Mickey shrugged. “Yeah, on and off. He basically stole my girlfriend.”

“He what?”

Mickey chuckled. “Yeah, Rose were something special. Even stole the Doctor’s heart. Now she’s trapped in a parallel universe with the cloned Doctor. No hard feelings. Well, not any more, I’ve moved on. But I don’t fink the Doctor ever really did.”

Sam stared back at him blankly. “I… I see…” That whole situation sounded a little complicated.

“Yeah, it gets like that with the Doctor,” Mickey smirked, patting Sam on the shoulder. “You save the bloody world, and your reward is you lose people you love forever.”

“Yeah, I guess so…” Sam replied, thinking about the Weeping Angel with his identity imprinted in it, and the person he lost.

“You should hear what happened to me since the last time we saw each other,” Martha cut in, turning from the terminal. Her smile dropped. “I lived a full year on a post-apocalyptic Earth with billions dead. We managed to reverse it all and now only a few of my family even remember what happened. Took its toll on us, I can say. Ultimately, I had to leave the TARDIS because it was just too much to bear.”

“I’m so sorry,” said Sam. It was no wonder the Doctor seemed so lost and empty now, with all that happened to the people he got close to.

“The Doctor’s amazing,” Martha said, “but if you’re around him long enough, you inevitably get hurt—or worse, the people you love. And it’s not his fault, he’s always just doing his best to help people. But he has a knack for finding danger. Or danger finding him. You can’t live nine hundred years and not make a few enemies.”

“A few,” Mickey laughed. “Yeah, if you consider billions of Daleks and Cybermen and God-knows-who-else ‘a few.’”

“Well, they’re enemies to everyone, aren’t they?” Martha countered.

“I s’pose you’ve got me there.”

“I… think I’ve lost track of this conversation,” Sam mumbled. Though he couldn’t explain why he had vivid images in his head, and a feeling of foreboding that came to him when those foreign words ‘Dalek’ and ‘Cybermen’ had been mentioned.

He peered at the computer screen Martha had been using, and an array of photographs were spread across the screen—Martha, Donna, and Mickey were all there, among others. Some of the photos looked quite dated.

“So these are all the people who’ve travelled with him?”

“Those with current known Earth residences,” Martha said, nodding.

“Huh…” he said, scanning over the faces. All of them held some familiarity to him, which he found unsettling. He pointed to a man on the screen. “That guy sometimes wears a thing on his wrist, right?”

“A vortex manipulator,” confirmed Mickey. “That’s Captain Jack. Was he in your dreams?”

“I think we’ve established that I don’t really remember the dreams,” Sam said, shaking his head. He pointed to another face. “Her name’s… Sarah, isn’t it?”

“Sarah Jane. Met her and her tin dog years back. She travelled with the Doctor back in the seventies.”

“Tin dog… you mean K9?”

“You dreamt about K9?”

“Maybe—I think he had laryngitis.” Sam scratched the back of his head, turning away from Mickey’s puzzled expression to the computer screen. “So what should we do? Just call all these people up?”

“Well, there’s no need to concern most of them,” Martha said, “not until we’ve come up with a strategy to remove it from their brain. There’s nothing they can do about it in the meantime, so it might be better that they don’t know.”

“I think I’d have preferred not knowing,” Mickey confessed. “Don’t know if I’ll be getting a good night’s sleep tonight, if you know what I mean.”

Martha smirked. “Me either. But, I think we should give Torchwood a call. They might be able to offer some help, if they’re not already dealing with some other disaster.”

‘Torchwood.’ I know that word too.

“Jack should probably at least be filled in on this,” Mickey agreed. “He’s probably got more sensitive info in his head than either of us, yeah?”

“Alright, let’s give him a call,” said Martha, pulling out her phone and tapping on the buttons.

Sam stepped back, taking a deep breath. “Listen… while the Doctor’s gone, do you think I could take a field trip back to Wester Drumlins? I really think I need to help Angel Sam. He’s in a lot of pain, and…”

Martha already had her phone to her ear, but she met Mickey’s eye and nodded.

Mickey turned to Sam. “I think we can arrange that.”

*        *        *

The buzzing in Sam’s head notified him that the jeep was closing in on Wester Drumlins, without Sam even having to look.

It was bad this time.

Sam leaped out of the vehicle before it had fully stopped, and scrambled over the fence, leaving Mickey and Martha behind. He raced into the house, and down the stairs into the cold basement where the buzzing became almost unbearable.

“I’m here… it’s okay…” he said as he wrapped his arms around the statue, and heard its cries simmer down. “Sorry I had to leave before.”

A soft feeling of forgiveness was passed into his mind from the angel, and then a kind of questioning impression as the angel probed further into Sam’s mind.

“Wait, you can go in my mind?” he asked. “The Doctor said it hurt him.”

‘…hurts me too…’ came a small, strained voice worming into Sam’s mind through great effort. ‘…but…i’m in pain all the time…’

At the staircase, Martha and Mickey arrived. Mickey was once again carrying his large weapon—whether it would be any use against an angel, nobody was sure, but he’d explained he felt better having it than not.

“Come on over,” Sam called to them. “He can get inside my head! Maybe he can help!”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Martha said. “He’s not exactly in his right mind, is he?”

“Maybe it’s exactly what he needs,” Sam said. “He’s lost so much of himself—maybe he can get some back from me.”

‘n-no, i…’ Angel Sam sent him a pleading feeling. ‘…just want…’

“What is it?”

‘…to die.’

Sam swallowed back a lump in his throat.

“Why haven’t you erased your mind like you said you were going to?”

‘i tried. she won’t let me.’

“Who?”

The distorted images of Harriet flooded back into his mind. ‘…can’t forget…’

“Oh. I’m sorry. I—I don’t know how to help you, but when the Doctor gets back, we can ask him.”

‘okay.’

“Can you help me, though? There’s something in my mind that shouldn’t be there—like a foreign piece of programming. You couldn’t pry it out, could you?”

‘i’ll try.’

Sam felt tendrils poking at every corner of his mind. Then it was as if a pair of pincers closed around part of his brain and began to tug.

TAMPERING DETECTED.
INITIATING EMERGENCY LOCKDOWN.

Sam collapsed to the floor.

Chapter 13

Tea And Sympathy

After years of leaping, Sam was quite used to suddenly finding himself in awkward positions, but he had never quite got the hang of unexpectedly being in the middle of eating or drinking. Such was the case now: he coughed and sputtered as he choked on a cup of hot tea that was part way down his throat.

He peered down at the cup, which was the kind of teacup you would find in a grandmother’s cupboard; a floral design, and delicate features.

“Do make yourselves at home,” said a grey-haired woman, with a sly grin. She was little and hunched—frail. But her eyes twinkled.

Sam’s heart was pounding, but he couldn’t recall why; his first thought was that he’d leaped again, but something seemed off. Something tugged at his mind, something important.

He glanced at the reflective surface of the tea, and caught a clouded glimpse of a man with ears that stuck out considerably.

“If you’ll excuse me…” The little old lady turned away and left the room, which finally crossed into Sam’s perception.

He found himself in a quaint living room, with trinkets lining the shelves, and a seventies-era television against the wall. Wood panelling lined the walls, and the whole place smelled musty, like nobody had opened a window in some time.

“Is something wrong with the tea? She didn’t poison it, did she?” A woman’s voice. Sam turned his head, laying eyes on a woman he knew instinctively was named Rose.

Poison? Sam thought, alarmed.

“’Cos if she did,” Rose continued, “then that’s like four times she’ll have tried to kill you. Is that more or less than the Slitheen lady?” She was smirking at him.

I’d better answer, right?

“Probably even,” he said easily, the words popping out once again without any thought on his part—coupled with scattered pieces of understanding that informed him of what he was talking about. “But no, it’s not poisoned. Just Earl Grey.” He screwed up his nose and put the cup on its saucer, then placed it down on the coffee table in front of him.

But I like Earl Grey.

“What do you think she’s doing now? You reckon she has a blaster or something hidden away in the kitchen?” Rose stood up, crossing to a doorway and peeking around the frame. “Can’t see anythin’.”

“Not likely,” Sam said. “The TARDIS would have detected the anachronistic technology when I scanned. Only thing she had out of the ordinary was that vortex manipulator—and I disabled it.”

“Why did she come to nineteen seventy-free and just settle down in a stuffy old flat?”

“And why, upon meeting other time travellers, would her first instinct be to off them?” Sam mused. “The old bird’s got secrets, methinks.”

This happened to me before, didn’t it? Sam realised with a jolt. I keep living moments from the Doctor’s past. No—dreaming. I’ve been dreaming them. I’m asleep? When did I go to sleep? Why am I having these dreams? I feel like that’s something I should know.

He stood, and crossed to a window. It appeared they were a storey or two up from the ground, and—Sam tensed up as he thought he saw a familiar winged statue off in the distance.

Is that…

But his attention was redirected as he noticed a foul-smelling gas coming out of a vent in the wall that began to make him light-headed.

“Oh, I think that’s our cue to run,” Sam said, as he noticed jets of the white gas pouring out from various locations in the room around them. For some reason, he found himself grinning ear to ear as the two of them dashed out of the room, which was rapidly becoming clouded. “And, if we’re keeping score, I’d say this makes it even with the Slitheen.”

*        *        *

In 2000, Al awoke to the sound of his handlink going ballistic on his night stand. Grumbling, he rolled over, away from Beth’s sleeping form, and glanced at it through blurred eyes.

“Oh boy,” he mumbled as he read the data.

“Hmm?” Beth said dreamily, stirring from her slumber. “What’s wrong?”

Al swallowed. “It’s Donna. The one in the Waiting Room, I mean.”

Beth rubbed her eyes, leaning on her elbow. “What happened?”

“Ziggy says there was a strange energy reading in her head, and now they can’t wake her up.” Al cursed under his breath. “Can this damn leap get any worse?”

“Don’t you always say not to tempt fate by saying things like that?” Beth asked.

“Oh, crap! I just jinxed it, didn’t I?”

“Don’t make it a self-fulfilling prophecy, Al.” Beth climbed to her feet. “Well, you’d better go in for a full briefing. I’ll go with you—we’ll get through this together.”

“What would I do without you?” Al asked, standing up to plant a kiss on his wife.

*        *        *

“So, is it Donna that’s this heavy, or is it Sam?” Mickey asked as he and Martha carried the unconscious Sam back to the jeep.

“I don’t—” Martha grunted as she repositioned her aching arms, “—know. I think that’s the least of our concerns right now.”

“Yeah, you’re right. What the hell happened?”

Martha shook her head. “I don’t know. Either Angel Sam did something to him, or the signal in his head did something. Or both. Our best chance to figure it out is to hook the sensors up again and see what his brain is doing.”

“And wait for the Doctor, I assume.”

“Well, he said he’d be right back.”

“Yeah, well, for a Time Lord, he doesn’t always have good timing. He’s not above accidentally showing up way too late.”

They loaded the limp body into the back of the vehicle, and Martha looked down at the man she saw as Donna, hair strands strewn across her blank face. She brushed the hair aside and made sure Sam was in a safe, natural position before climbing into the passenger seat.

“What a mess…” she said with a deep sigh.

“What have you told Donna’s family, anyway?” Mickey asked as he pulled away.

Martha cradled her head in her hands. “She’s officially ‘under observation’—I don’t know how I’d explain this situation truthfully. It’s a bit much.”

“Fair enough,” Mickey said, “But if this keeps up much longer, they’re gonna start asking questions.”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” she muttered, turning her head to the back to keep an eye on the sleeping figure. She felt a tear trickle from her eye, and hastily brushed it away. This wasn’t the time to fall apart.

Martha felt a hand grasp hers. She looked back around at Mickey, who was reaching to her hand with his left arm while steering with the right. His eyes were on the road, but the squeeze of his hand on hers betrayed his split attention.

“We’ll get to the bottom of this,” he reassured her. “While we’re waiting for the Doctor, we can go up the chain of command, get more help. What did Jack say on the phone, by the way?”

“He said to keep him posted.” She peered down at his hand. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“Being someone I can talk to.”

Chapter 14

Making Memories

“Alright, Doctor whoever-you-are!” the little old lady cried, “Your slapper girlfriend is locked up in my homebrew gas chamber. She’ll be dead in six minutes!”

She cackled, her knitted shawl blowing in the wind like a cape.

“Any attempt to open the room will result in a deadly electrical shock. But if you give me the key to your time machine, I’ll let her go.”

“You won’t even know how to fly it, you know,” Sam said, channelling the bravado of the Doctor he was inhabiting. “And is this little threat of yours supposed to give me pause?” He laughed. “I’d get electrocuted in a second to save Rose. See ya!” He waved, and headed for the door to the apartment building.

The click of a gun cocking stopped him as he reached for the door. He turned back to the woman, who was aiming her pistol at him with quivering elderly hands.

“I could just shoot you dead and take it,” the woman spat. “Both of you can die, I don’t care. I can’t let the Agency find me.”

“That’s very cunning, but there’s something I might have neglected to tell you. Slipped my mind, you could say.”

“And what would that be?”

“There’s actually three of us.”

“Hey sweetheart,” came another voice—male, American accented. He approached from behind a tree, another gun aimed squarely at the woman. “Those two aren’t time agents, you know,” he continued. “On the other hand, I was one, and I know who you are. Drop the gun.”

The woman glared at Jack a moment, before lowering her weapon.

“Please don’t tell them I’m here,” she begged, accentuating her more frail characteristics. “Let me live out my days in peace. I’m just an old lady.”

“I have no love for the Time Agency either,” he said, taking the woman’s gun by the barrel with his free hand, “but you murdered six time agents. Why would you do something that monstrous?”

The woman began to cry crocodile tears, putting on an obvious performance. “I was forced to!”

“And I suppose you were also forced to sell their vortex manipulators on the black market?” Jack met Sam’s eye. “Doctor, go help Rose. I already shut down the generator; no more electric shock.”

“Fantastic,” Sam said with a smile, dashing into the building.

But as he headed into the corridor, he felt dizzy a moment, and fell against the wall as he attempted to regain his equilibrium.

At the end of the hall, an angel statue seemed to be reaching for him.

Then he blinked, and he was somewhere else.

Oh boy, what now?

He found he was sitting on an old fashioned sofa, in a room full of fine wooden furniture. In his hand, a newspaper suggested that the date was October 22nd, 1913.

“Mister Smith, here’s your tea…”

Sam’s head jerked up to see Martha Jones carrying a shining silver tray of tea, in which Sam caught his reflection—he was the Doctor again; the one he’d met, with the expressive face and sideburns. Though his hair was neatly combed, which didn’t seem quite right. Martha set the tray down on a table in front of him as he laid eyes on her outfit.

“Martha…” he murmured. “What are you wearing?”

She wore a traditional maid’s dress and apron, and Sam would never have pictured her in it until now. There was something incredibly wrong about it on her—she was a doctor, not a servant.

Martha inspected her clothes. “The same thing I wear every day, sir. Is there a problem?”

“Not as such…” Sam furrowed his brow, eyes darting around the room. Was this another memory? Why was Martha acting subservient to him? None of this was right.

“Uh, do you want to sit down?” he asked, shifting over and patting the seat.

Martha seemed surprised at the invitation. “Uh, if you’re offering, then… okay. Thank you, sir.”

“Why wouldn’t I offer?”

“Well, it’s just seen as unseemly for the maids to mingle so. But I’m not going to argue; my feet are killing me.” She grinned.

As Martha sat, Sam shot a narrowed eyed glance towards the door, making sure nobody else was here, before turning his eye back to Martha.

“Remind me again what we’re doing here?” he asked in a low voice.

“How do you mean, sir?”

“We’re undercover or something, right? What for?”

Martha looked back at him with wide eyes. “I… don’t know what you mean.”

Sam lowered his voice further. “Is there someone listening right now? Is that why you’re playing along? You recognise me, don’t you?”

Martha stood from the seat abruptly, her demeanour now tense. “Excuse me, I need to go. Duties to attend to.”

She crossed to the mantle, her eyes studying something there for a moment, and then hurried out of the room with purpose.

Sam stood, and retraced Martha’s steps. On the mantle sat a silver fob watch, with unusual circular markings.

He picked it up, and felt a strange tingle in his hand as he did so.

‘Don’t open that.’

Sam spun around, finding himself still alone in the room. That was…

‘Yeah, it’s me.’

“Where are you?”

‘Check the window.’

Sam rushed to the window, and drew back the curtains. There in the lush English garden outside stood a Weeping Angel, looking directly at him.

“It really is you,” Sam said, still struggling to grasp what was happening. “How did you get here?”

‘I got stuck here when the link was severed.’

“What link?” Sam ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t know what’s happening to me. Do you know anything?”

‘You’re dreaming.’

“I figured that much.”

‘There was something put in your mind that’s dragging out the Doctor’s memories.’

“Of course…” Sam drew a sharp breath as he remembered. “And… I asked you to remove it, didn’t I?”

‘Yes, but when I tried to pull it out, I triggered some kind of… lockdown mechanism, and it trapped my consciousness in your mind.’

“Oh boy.” Sam dragged a hand across his chin.

‘You said it.’

Sam tilted his head as it occurred to him that Angel Sam was speaking to him in complete sentences. “You sound… better.”

‘I guess the gaps in my mind were patched up by yours. But… that watch. It smells exactly like the Doctor. I wouldn’t open it if I were you… and well, I sort of am.’

“Why?”

‘Someone is listening for information on the Doctor, and…’

“You think this thing has information in it?” Sam peered down at the timepiece still in his palm, and he could almost hear whispers coming from it. He swallowed, and put it in his pocket.

“I’m coming outside,” he announced, and turned for the door.

‘Don’t bother… I think they’re about to change the channel. Listen—my senses are a bit off, but I don’t think it’s just the two of us in here.’

“What do you—?”

MEMORY CORRUPTION.
INITIATE TRANS-SHIFT NOW.

*        *        *

Donna groaned. Stuck in traffic—again! What rotten luck. She’d finally found a long-term contract and she was gonna ruin the whole thing by being flipping late for the third time in a week.

“Bollocks!” she yelled to nobody in particular.

Beside her car, on the footpath, an old man on a mobility scooter passed by, going at an enviable speed of ten miles per hour, she guessed. Wherever he was headed, he was going to get there first.

Donna pressed her head against the top of the steering wheel, grumbling.

As she pulled out her mobile phone to call the office, she paused as her head filled with the sound of a heart beating. A strange sort of feeling fell over her.

What is that…?

She blinked when she heard the blare of a car horn behind her. To her bafflement, the cars in front of her had gone, and it was now her that was holding up traffic.

“Yeah, awright, you can stop bipping now!” she shouted out the window. “I’m going!”

She hit the accelerator, and moved on up the road, not noticing that her supervisor had been listening to her strange episode through the phone on the passenger seat.

Chapter 15

Doctor’s Appointment

Martha rubbed her tired eyes as she watched Sam’s brain waves flying across the screen at double the rate they should have been. It had been like this for a day already. This was like nothing she’d ever seen; it must have been using tremendous amounts of energy to work like this. She didn’t know whether to give his feeding tube more or fewer calories—surely his brain couldn’t keep this up, and if it did, would it have detrimental effects on the rest of his body? If she provided him with the energy his brain activity demanded, would that just make the process more efficient, and give those listening more information?

She sighed, and pulled her communicator to her mouth. “Mother Hen to Tin Dog, do you read? Over.”

“Loud and clear, Mother Hen,” Mickey’s voice responded. “How’s the patient? Over.”

“Rotten, as a matter of fact. Don’t know what effect this rapid output will have on him long term—and I hope it doesn’t come to that. What about you? Over.”

“Been speaking with the big wigs at the Tower. They’ve promised to help—got some scientific advisor named Malcolm on it. You ever heard of him? Over.”

“I think so. Welshman? Kind of excitable?” Martha asked. “Over.”

“Yeah, that’s the guy,” Mickey confirmed. “But if the Doctor hasn’t figured it out, I dunno if he has a chance. You got back to Captain Jack about this? Over.”

“I have—they’re on the case too. Can’t go into details over UNIT comms—” Martha smirked, knowing that Torchwood had a way of worming into computers where they weren’t authorised, “—but he’ll be in touch. Over.”

“I’m sure I got no idea what you mean by that,” Mickey said facetiously. “And what about the Doctor? Anyfing? Over.”

Martha sighed. “Nope. I’m still getting his answering machine. I’ll keep trying. Over.”

She looked down at her phone with a sigh. Where was he?

“Alright. I’ll see you back there soon, yeah? Over and out.”

Martha hung up her communicator, and moved to the two-way mirror, eyes on Sam. Under his eyelids, his eyes were darting around, and his fingers twitched every few seconds. He was most certainly in an active dream state.

“What’s happening inside your head?” she murmured, wishing there was something more she could do than just monitor him and make sure he was stable. Anything.

*        *        *

Donna adjusted the heel of her shoe as she hurried along the pavement towards the office building. She was eleven minutes late already—how embarrassing. She’d have to suck up to the managers something major this time. Donna was not much of a brown-noser, but she could fake it well enough when she absolutely had to. Even if she felt like taking a long shower afterwards to get the stink off.

It was a little bit strange, though. She felt a strong sense of déjà vu as she walked the street. Every move she made felt like she’d done it before. Every face she saw, even the muggy air that caressed her cheeks.

Of course, everyone got déjà vu sometimes. She’d had it plenty before, just never quite this all-encompassing.

She reached the double doors of the office building, and pushed on them, opening up into… a church, where all eyes turned to her, and the flashes of cameras blazed across her eyes.

She hesitated a moment, feeling disoriented as she looked down at the bouquet in her arms.

Oh, right. She was getting married. Yeah, that was it. And beside her was her Dad, arm linked with hers as she walked up the aisle.

Donna didn’t know why seeing him made her sad.

As she walked towards Lance, who waited for her at the altar, she felt a terrible sense of foreboding. Just wedding day jitters, of course. Nothing to worry about there. She wasn’t going to give Nerys the satisfaction of looking like she was having cold feet, that was for bloody sure. Donna widened her smile and proceeded. The sick feeling in the pit of her stomach would soon be cast off like the bouquet she was holding.

Well, that’s what she figured until her vision filled with an orange light, and the room faded away.

And all of a sudden, a new room faded in. A pair of old wooden doors and a bunch of weird lights all over. An interior designer’s nightmare, really.

“What?” came a voice from behind.

She spun around, seeing some skinny bloke in a suit staring at her with open-mouthed surprise.

“What?” he repeated.

Donna looked him up and down. “Who are you?”

“But—”

“Where am I?”

“What?!” the man parroted again. Was that all he knew how to say?

“What the hell is this place?” Donna demanded. But somewhere deep down, she felt like she’d been here before.

The man’s shock faltered, and he looked down momentarily, before biting his lip and taking a good look at Donna.

Watch where your eyes are wandering, skinny man, Donna thought. She wanted to say it aloud, but something told her that wasn’t what she was supposed to be saying at this moment. So she waited for the man’s response.

“Oh boy,” he said, shaking his head and turning away from her.

No, that’s wrong.

“Oi, you’re not supposed to say that!” she blurted out.

He tensed up, and whirled around. “What do you mean by that?”

Donna furrowed her brow, looking away as she tried to figure out why she’d said that. “I dunno. I just thought you were going to go ‘what?!’ again. I don’t know why. Maybe ’cos you already said it three times.”

The man studied her a moment. “Uh. Sure, that could be why.” He approached her cautiously. “What happens next?”

“What are you asking me for?” she asked, crossing her arms. “I don’t even know what this place is, Spaceman!”

“Spaceman?”

“Yeah, ’cos you’re a bloody Martian or summin, right?”

“I never said I was an alien.” The man slowly moved out from behind the weird pillar in the centre of the room, and inched towards her.

“Sure you did…”

“When?”

Donna glared at him. “I don’t know! But…” She stormed to the doors and pulled them open, revealing the depths of outer space. She gestured to it. “That seems pretty alien to me, dunnit?”

The man frowned. “How did you know what was out there?”

Donna froze. How did she know? The scene outside these doors should have been terrifying to see.

“Do you know who I am?” the man approached her with methodical, cautious movements, his wide brown—or were they hazel?—eyes fixing on hers.

“No, why should I—” Donna blinked as it came to her. “Doctor. You’re some kind of doctor.”

The man—doctor—seemed to have a shadow pass over his face. “Well yeah, I am a doctor. In seven fields, actually. But you can call me Sam.”

“You don’t look like a ‘Sam’ to me,” Donna protested. She didn’t know why, but she was sure he wasn’t called ‘Sam.’

“Listen, Donna—” Sam said, leaning in to her.

He knows my name?

“—Whatever happens to you here… it’s all a dream, okay? It doesn’t mean anything. Don’t read into it.”

“A dream?” Donna murmured. “Well… granted, that would explain how I ended up in a space ship on my wedding day. And also why I was driving to work a minute before that.”

“Exactly. Just dream nonsense,” Sam said, grinning. Then the smile dropped, and he gripped her by the arms. “I don’t think this scenario’s going to last much longer—I messed it up again. So just remember: it’s a dream, and none of it’s real. Okay? Try and think mundane thoughts and you’ll be fine. I hope.”

Donna pursed her lips and nodded, completely flummoxed by the high strangeness of this apparent dream. She didn’t remember what she’d been doing before she went to sleep, but she must have eaten too much cheese, or mouldy bread or something.

Perhaps the oddest thing was that she felt as though this wasn’t the first time she’d been caught up in a long, bizarre dream.

And in the seconds before the world around her shifted, she thought she saw a hand floating in a jar on the floor.

Chapter 16

Going Off-Script

Sam put his foot down on the brakes.

“Doctor, why are we stopping? Is there something wrong with Bessie?”

Sam glanced at the woman beside him in the roadster—Jo, his intuition told him—and shook his head.

“No, nothing wrong,” he said casually. “Just don’t feel like driving any further.” He climbed out of the car and began walking away from it into the English countryside.

“Where are you going?” Jo asked, concern rising in her voice. “Don’t we have to get to the Master before he—”

“Nope. Wait there, okay?”

Jo frowned, but stayed put.

Sam kept walking until Jo and the yellow car, evidently named ‘Bessie,’ disappeared behind the crest of a hill. He sat in the grass, crossing his legs.

“Are you around?” he called out, closing his eyes. He waited a beat, and then opened them. Next to him now sat Angel Sam, hugging his knees.

‘I’m here.’

“You were right; I found Donna,” he said, fingers picking at the grass beneath him. “Whatever you triggered in my brain must have pulled her in through our shared mesons and neurons.” He shook his head. “I was hoping she wouldn’t end up caught up in all this.”

‘How’s her memory?’

“It seems to be working like mine,” Sam explained. “She intuits what’s supposed to happen, but she has limited context for it. I told her it’s all a dream and not to read into it. But I don’t know how long that’s going to last.” He shifted positions, moving closer to the statue. “How long have we been stuck in here, do you think?”

‘Hard to tell. Time moves differently in dreams.’

“Yeah, guess you’re right.” He laid back on the grass, sighing. “How are you feeling, by the way?”

‘I… I’m not sure I want to talk about it. Let’s just get through this for now.’

“You told me you wanted to die.” Sam placed a hand on the angel’s knee. “You don’t think we should talk about it?”

‘You don’t understand what I’ve been through. Please… just drop it for now.’

Sam’s heart broke for his counterpart. “Alright. I’ll leave it.”

He stared solemnly up at the overcast British sky. He’d seen about enough of it, truth be told. For an alien who had all of time and space to explore, the Doctor sure liked this specific part of this specific era of planet Earth.

‘I figure you can at least slow down whoever’s squeezing you for information if you just keep on going off-script,’ Angel Sam said, changing the subject.

“Yeah, that’s what I was thinking too. If I keep disrupting the flow of the memories, they won’t get much useful data. Of course, that will only buy time. I can’t do anything else from in here, can I?”

‘Surely the Doctor’s working on things out there.’

“You’d think so,” Sam said, pursing his lips. “But for all I know, mere minutes could have passed outside. How long will I need to keep this up? I know I’m asleep, but I feel kind of… tired.”

‘Unsurprising. Your brain’s gotta be overclocked. It’s juggling four different minds at once—you, me, Donna, and the Doctor. We already know Donna’s brain couldn’t even handle two of those. Not to mention the extra programming that keeps putting you in these different memories.’

Sam grimaced, imagining Martha having to set up some kind of liquid nitrogen cooling system for his brain, like he had done long ago for Ziggy.

“And every shift in memory probably causes a surge of processing power. So if I do keep shorting it out like this, it might make things worse for me.”

‘You may be right. I guess you should proceed with caution, whatever you do.’

“Yeah.” Sam melted into the grass, taking a moment to relax before the inevitable. “I think I feel a shift coming.”

‘Me too. Good luck. I’ll be around if you need me.’

Sam took a deep breath as the environment around him changed again. He was getting better at keeping his continuity of thought between shifts, but it was still intensely disorienting—just like leaping, only the situations in which he found himself were just a bit more outlandish.

And speaking of outlandish, that was the word he would have used to describe his new attire. A garish coat, a patchwork of different colours and patterns, garnished with a cyan bow dangling from his neck, and a cat pin on the lapel. Coupled with the bright yellow trousers, he must have been quite conspicuous.

Wow. I could almost believe I leaped into Al. But no, he had to admit Al had a better sense of style than this. He dressed boldly, but he tended to have an eye for colour coordination—this coat was all over the place. Like something a magician pulled out of his sleeve.

The first clue that he wasn’t on Earth was the starlit sky above him—he knew his astronomy, and none of the familiar constellations were up there, not a single one.

“Amazing…” he mumbled, studying the unfamiliar arrangement of stars. There were so many visible, more than he’d been able to see on the clearest of nights in the New Mexico desert.

Behind him stood the TARDIS, its lights being the primary source of light upon the immediate area. Beneath his feet was a hard, rocky terrain, and all around him seemed to be a pretty desolate reddish landscape.

And emerging from the doors was yet another companion—there had been so many different people. This one was a brunette woman. Peri, her name was, according to his surfacing memories.

“Didn’t you say there’d be civilisation here, Doctor?” she asked in an American accent. It was almost comforting to hear it, after all the British accents he’d been hearing of late.

Sam simply shrugged, continuing to appreciate the fresh air and the impressive firmament above.

“Well?” Peri persisted.

Sam resisted the urge to follow the script that the memory laid out for him, opting instead to take Peri’s hand and gesture with his free hand at the sky.

“Just look up there,” he said, grinning. “Those are stars human eyes have never laid eyes on. Isn’t that neat?”

She peered up at them. “It really is amazing,” she agreed, but had a puzzled look in her eyes.

Sam had an inkling about what was to happen next, and so he turned to face the group of creatures sneaking up on them.

“You don’t need to spoil the moment like that,” he chided. Peri gasped as she followed his gaze.

The creatures—who were humanoid, but olive green in colour and covered in a layer of what may have been slime—each had some kind of weapon pointed at him.

There are no consequences in these memories, are there? Sam thought as he stepped in front of Peri, guarding her. Well, even if this was all just a dream, he didn’t want to see someone get hurt.

“You will come with us,” said one of the creatures.

Sam pursed his lips. “I’d rather not…”

“If you do not come with us, then we shall disintegrate you.”

“No you won’t,” he countered. “I know for a fact that never happened.”

“Destroy them,” said one of the creatures, and they all aimed their weapons. And nothing happened.

“I thought so,” Sam muttered.

The creatures froze in place, like the time in the hospital, and the time at his wedding. The memory had hit another snag. All he had to do was point out the contradiction, and everything would stop.

He had the key now. It was just a matter of making sure his brain wasn’t going to overload.

He took a final look at the alien sky before the scene changed again.

He found himself sitting on a park bench, one leg crossed over the other as he stared at the Golden Gate Bridge.

America? Well, that was a change. Was this one of his own memories, perhaps? When was the last time he’d been to San Francisco?

“My god, it really is you,” a woman said, approaching him. She seemed familiar, but he couldn’t quite place her. “I never thought I’d see you again. But then I got your email. Almost thought it was junk.” She sat on the bench beside him. “That was until I saw the part about Madame Butterfly.”

“Email… what year is this?” Sam asked, almost too casually.

“You didn’t think to check? Still two thousand.”

Sam’s heart lurched. If only this wasn’t a dream, he could call home.

“What made you contact me—is there something going on, Doctor? Another world-ending catastrophe on the horizon? Something you need a cardiologist for?”

Cardiologist? Sam’s eyes widened as he realised where he knew her from.

“Doctor Grace Holloway…” he murmured. As he recalled, he’d met her at a medical convention in San Diego back in the early nineties. He’d been playing piano for fun in the hotel lobby, and she’d appreciated his rendition of Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2. He’d lamented to her that his performance of it was not as entertaining as Bugs Bunny.

“Small world…”

Maybe this time, he didn’t need to rush to make them change the channel. He was in his own time, with someone he knew, in his home country, and he didn’t seem to be in immediate danger.

“What do you mean?” Grace tilted her head.

“Nothing, nothing. Now, about the world-ending catastrophe…”

Chapter 17

Assemble The Troops

Martha was dabbing Sam’s drenched brow with a damp cloth when Mickey poked his head in the door. Sam was cold all over, except his forehead, which was burning, as if his body heat had all moved to his head.

“Hey, I’m back,” Mickey announced. “And, uh… I brought a friend.”

He opened the door further, revealing a dishevelled man in fingerless gloves and a lab coat. He adjusted his glasses, looking at Martha with an open mouth.

“Doctor Taylor,” Martha greeted the scientist, extending her hand. “Nice to meet you properly.”

“Oh, please call me Malcolm,” he said, taking her hand in both of his and shaking vigorously. “There’s really only one Doctor that matters, now isn’t there? I’ve read all about the both of you and I have to say it is a genuine privilege to work with the Doctor’s personal friends.”

He approached the sleeping form on the bed. “And this is Donna Noble? Cor blimey, I always did want to meet the woman who saved us all. What a pity she’s in this state.”

Martha exchanged an amused glance with Mickey. “Was he like this on the drive here?”

Mickey nodded. “It’s nice to be appreciated,” he said, suppressing a laugh.

“Malcolm, you should know—” Martha said, placing a hand on the man’s back as he hunched over Sam, “—this isn’t exactly Donna.”

“Oh yes, yes, I understand,” Malcolm rambled in his singsong Welsh cadence, “I’ve read all about Sam Beckett from your reports, Martha—but I knew about him before that, you know. You could say he was quite an inspiration when I was younger. Did you know he’s a Nobel Prize winner? Physics. Well that’s one of my fields, too, but I’ve never quite managed that kind of accolade. Oh, I wouldn’t mind shaking that man’s hand. But it seems it’s not exactly a man’s hand at the moment, is it? Still…”

He took Sam’s icy hand and gave it a short shake. “My goodness, it’s like a two-in-one handshake of personal heroes. If only either of them were conscious of it. Is she… he… supposed to be this cold?”

“No,” Martha said with a frown, “It’s the heightened brain activity. It’s concentrating his heat in his head. Sapping it away from his extremities.”

“Oh, indeed, indeed, may I see those readings?” he said, stroking his chin.

Martha showed him into the room behind the mirror, and he scurried from screen to screen, mumbling ‘hmm’ and ‘oh’ as he went.

“Well I can’t say I’ve ever seen a set of brainwaves reach a half a Malcolm before, that’s a bit concerning,” he muttered. Martha had no clue what that meant, so she said nothing.

“And I’ve been told this whole thing originated from a signal over a mobile phone—is that so?”

Martha nodded. “I think the Doctor said there was something seeking out people with Artron energy, and used the phone as a conduit to place a piece of programming in his head. In our heads. Something that uses our brains to transmit memories when we’re asleep.”

“Artron energy… yes… yes, I see…” Malcolm paced the room, his brow heavy. “And there’s a broadcast from each of your brains on a specific frequency. But even should I manage to tap into that, the data would surely be encrypted, and I’d never know where it was heading.”

“I suspect that’s as far as the Doctor got in working it out before he left,” Martha said, sighing.

Malcolm clawed at his hair as he thought.

“Well, let’s change tack and look at the phone signal,” he said finally. “If we can replicate the circumstances by which the signal was drawn to a phone, then maybe we can bait it and trace where it comes from.”

“And how do we do that?” Martha asked. “We need someone who hasn’t been infected with this thing, but has travelled in time.”

“Not necessarily,” Malcolm said, holding up a finger, “We just need to give someone a dose of Artron energy. Just enough to be recognised by whatever this is.”

“And how do we do that without sending someone through time?”

Malcolm grinned. “I’ll need you, and—” his gaze moved to Mickey, “—you, and whoever else you can get a hold of who has Artron energy in their system.”

“What’ll you do with us?” Mickey said with a cautious squint.

“Have you heard of dialysis, by chance?” Malcolm asked, pushing his glasses up his nose.

*        *        *

Sam held a finger to his lips as the sonic screwdriver unlocked the fire door on the side of the nondescript building by the docks.

Grace wasn’t well-dressed for the occasion, with her heels and pencil skirt.

“You should take the shoes off—too loud,” he whispered as he proceeded inside.

“Did you really need me to tag along?” she whispered back, pulling off her shoes. “What use am I? I don’t know how to sneak around.”

“It’s an emergency distress signal, we might need to perform surgery,” he replied, stooping over as he crept.

“Oh please. You just wanted someone to talk to, didn’t you?”

“Maybe. Or to use for a distraction.” He grinned back at her, which got him an eye roll in response. “Come on, you didn’t think I’d be in town and not get you into some form of mischief, surely?”

“Well if you must know, I would have hoped for something a little more romantic than creeping around a warehouse.”

Romantic? Sam thought as images of his wife filled his mind, I’m not gonna have to kiss her, am I?

Sam shushed her as they approached another door with a keypad at the handle. The sonic device made short work of it, and something inside the little box made a popping noise before a wisp of smoke rose out of it, and he tried the handle. It opened easily, and he cautiously peered around the door with one eye.

The room within had the appearance of a hospital ward, only massive. At a glance, Sam guessed there were twenty or more beds all in rows, most of which had unconscious occupants, with wires coming from their heads. The wires snaked their way into clusters, eventually all meeting up at the far end of the room, where they were funnelled into a wall.

“Oh my god,” Grace whispered. “What the hell is this place? Are they alive?”

Sam responded with another shush, before slinking into the eerily silent room, and studying the nearest sleeping person, who appeared to be an early twenties woman.

Grace came up behind him and began checking vital signs.

“Steady pulse…” she murmured. “No obvious signs of illness. She looks…”

“Like she’s taking a nap?” Sam suggested. The woman was wearing some form of military gear—in fact, many of those sleeping here were.

“Yeah, I guess. I hope this isn’t a quarantine of some kind, and we’ve been exposed to a contagion…”

Sam looked to the end of the woman’s bed for a chart, but there wasn’t one.

“Isn’t it weird that these are all soldiers or something, but we didn’t see any outside guarding the place?” Grace added.

“Yeah, that’s worth noting,” Sam said, gingerly prodding the wires attached to the woman’s head. He let his eyes trace them to the end of the room. “Where do all these wires go, do you suppose…?”

He jogged to the wall where the wires all joined and protruded from a hole cut in the wall. Sam placed an eye to the small gap at the top of the hole, and squinted to see within.

It seemed to lead to a room beyond, but he couldn’t make anything out other than some reflective surface that was bouncing light into his eyes. He held his ear to the gap, and heard only the humming of machinery. Finally, he pointed the sonic screwdriver at it, which gave him confirmation that the distress signal originated within.

He spun around. “We need to find a way into this room. Look for panels, seams in the wall, anything suspicious.”

Grace looked at the wall to her left, tilted her head, then the rest of her body, neck craning. “Or just… a regular door, maybe?”

Sam moved to her position, and realised the wall ended short of the corner of the room, and behind it lay a door.

“Well, that was easy. Come on.”

The two progressed into the room, and what they found reminded Sam of Ziggy’s control room, only significantly less stylish. He studied the panels inside and it dawned on him what they’d just stumbled on.

“Are those people being used as part of a supercomputer?” he murmured as he assessed what components all the wires were connecting to. “They are! They’re all hooked up to provide processing power and memory. Wow… I don’t know whether to be impressed or horrified, to be honest.”

“Doctor, you finally came!” came a voice that Sam found strangely familiar. “I was beginning to think I was wasting my time.”

“Hello? Who said that?”

From behind another control panel, a grease-stained head popped up.

Sam was completely taken aback when he saw the face of Al the Bartender.

“Oh boy,” he croaked.

Chapter 18

God, Time Lord, Fate, Whatever

Sam’s jaw was hanging as he watched the man he had once thought to be God climb up from his kneeling position, wiping his brow. He looked younger, sans moustache, and had significantly less of an enigmatic quality since the last time Sam had seen him. But it was definitely him.

“Do you know I had to reverse-engineer primitive Earth hardware to get that signal out?” the man said, waving around a spanner. “And none of these tools are sonic. None! My back is killing me!”

Sam was in such shock that he just let the Doctor’s words flow through him in an attempt to understand just what was going on.

“Did you hook up seventeen people’s brains to a computer just to send me a distress signal?”

‘Al’ stared at him a moment, apparently surprised at the implication.

“What? No! The signal beacon was the easy part. I hooked up seventeen people’s brains to a computer so I could find out where to point it in order to actually reach you.” He raised his hands defensively. “Look, I didn’t want it reaching someone else who’d snatch me up to put me on trial. I heard what happened to you a while back. Both times.”

Sam felt Grace’s hand curl around his.

“Uh, do you two know each other?” she asked uneasily.

It was the bartender who responded first. “Oh, yeah. We go way back. And you’re Doctor Grace Holloway, right? Well, I know you are because I’ve seen you in the paper from time to time.” He gave her a wink. “And you can just call me Al. That’s what I’ve been going by lately, anyway. Like the song.” He extended a grease-blackened hand to her, and she warily shook it, wiping the residue on a handkerchief when she was done.

“Weren’t you travelling with Lucie, last I heard?” Sam asked, the question popping out without thought.

Al raised his eyebrows. “Oh, are you that far behind? No, that was a regeneration or two back for me, Doctor. I’ve lived a lifetime since then. Tell me, do you think I’m more handsome this time around?”

Oh my god, he’s a Time Lord.

“Well, it might be hard to tell from the grease, so never mind that,” he continued. “Anyway, down to business: I need your help. I know we’ve had our disagreements, but my TARDIS is having mechanical troubles. I could use a jump.”

Sam stared back at him, mouth gaping. “So what, you built a human-powered supercomputer—” he gestured to the hole in the wall, “—out of seventeen living human minds, so you could find me and ask me for a jump start?”

Al shook his head. “No, no, I didn’t build this computer,” he said, chuckling. “If I had, do you think the user interface would look like that?” He gestured to the screens on the walls, which did appear to have an interface that wasn’t entirely unlike Microsoft Windows.

Sam squinted. “Are you telling me humans built a human-powered computer?”

“Brilliant deduction, Sherlock,” Al said, wiping his hands on a rag. “And you should be pleased to note that all of the people currently hooked up are staff from this facility getting a taste of their own medicine.” He tilted his head, seeing Sam’s expression. “Relax already! They’re only sleeping. They’ll be fine.”

“What is this facility?” Grace asked.

Al tapped on a nearby keyboard, and the screens lit up with a logo.

“UNIT?!” Sam exclaimed. “I didn’t know they were up to things like this…”

“For what it’s worth, it’s all been consensual. Test subjects are paid and everything,” Al said. “They got the idea for hybrid systems like this from some prototype in a facility out in the desert. Very secretive, though. I couldn’t find any good information about it.”

Sam felt sick to his stomach. This project existed because of… Ziggy?

“But hey!” continued Al, “Now that you’re here, I can release the subjects—I no longer need their combined knowledge of your known movement patterns and contact channels.”

He flipped a few switches on a console, and the computer powered down. One monitor remained, showing a CCTV feed of the room outside, where the bed’s occupants each began to stir.

What kind of sick game is this?

Sam couldn’t hold it back any more. He grabbed the man by the collar. “So you’re a Time Lord. Why the hell have you been manipulating me? Answer me, dammit!”

The greasy man looked at him through bewildered eyes. “Manip—what are you talking about? I swear I just wanted a jump start, honest!”

“Stop playing games with me,” Sam hissed.

“I’m past our silly old games if you are,” Al said, still struggling to get out of Sam’s grip. “I’ve even dedicated myself to helping one person at a time instead of trying to alter fixed points. I don’t mess with the big picture any more. Cross my hearts!”

Sam let go of the collar, and rubbed at his aching forehead. “You’re not really here, are you? It’s… just the Doctor’s memory.”

He shook his head, as the scene around him froze in place. This younger version of Al the Bartender—it might have been before he’d even started controlling Sam’s leaps. He didn’t seem to know about Quantum Leap—even though the date was five years after Sam started leaping.

The guy had a time machine, there was no reason he couldn’t have discovered the project long after this point in his own timeline.

Sam’s head was swimming. So this was why the Doctor had avoided the subject; this was all a Time Lord’s doing, and one he knew at that. He must have felt… guilty.

Just how much of what was happening to him now were the carefully planned machinations of this—Monk? That was who the Doctor’s memories told him this man was. He didn’t look like much of a monk now. Perhaps Sam was better off thinking of him as simply ‘the Bartender.’

Regardless, Sam wasn’t going to get many answers from a mere memory.

Sam turned away from the man, looking to Grace, who was similarly frozen in time.

“It was nice seeing you again,” he muttered, as she dissolved from his view.

*        *        *

Charlie Ward yawned as he shuffled out of the lecture theatre. What a right bore that had been. He knew law would be a dry degree, but this was worse than he’d anticipated.

He very nearly longed for his days working in a record store in 1969. At least there was music, even if it was ninety percent Beatles.

He let his eyes drift over the handout on intellectual property law, and for the life of him his brain simply refused to read the words. He was going to fail the next exam, wasn’t he?

As he rounded a corner, he felt an arm curl itself around his shoulders. He looked up from the paper.

“Morning, Charlie,” Martha said, grinning. “How are your studies coming along?”

Charlie groaned. “Oh bloody hell, what is it now? Your lot said you’d leave me alone. I have nuffin else to offer.”

“I’m really sorry,” Martha said, “but there is one more thing.”

“Yeah, of course there is.” Charlie folded up his papers, stuffing them into his loosely hanging messenger bag. “Go ahead, then.”

“How have your dreams been lately, Charlie?” Martha asked, leading him out of the University of London building and onto the chilly street.

“Dreams?” Charlie furrowed his brow, struggling to recall any of his recent dreams. “I don’t know. Why? Wait, don’t tell me. I bet there’s some alien running around feeding on dreams—it’s always bloody somefing like that, yeah? That’s the only reason UNIT shows up.”

This elicited a laugh from Martha. “Well, you’re not too far off, but you’ll get a briefing when we get to HQ, okay? There’s a reason we need you, and well, how are you with needles?”

“Needles? What the hell are you planning to do with me? I have essays to write, you know.”

Martha didn’t answer, instead moving to the kerb where a jeep pulled up. “Come on.”

She led Charlie into the back seat, and sat beside him. In the front were two men Charlie didn’t know. As the driver pulled away, the passenger turned to face him.

“Hey kid,” the man said in an American accent, holding a hand out. “Captain Jack Harkness. And you must be Charlie Ward, right?”

“Y-yeah,” Charlie stammered, shaking his hand.

“Looks like we’re all going to be making a donation today,” Jack said, grinning.

“Donation…?”

“Artron energy. It’s a kind of radiation you absorb from the Time Vortex. Only a handful of people in the world have traces in their system—those who’ve travelled in time. Lucky us.”

“Why are we donating this stuff…?”

“It’s the only way we can help your old buddy Sam,” the driver said.

“I told you, you’ll get a briefing at headquarters,” Martha said. “Just relax, okay?”

Charlie hadn’t relaxed in a long time.

Chapter 19

Passing The Time

The medical lab seemed more of a strange sort of support group, as a group of five former time travellers sat on seats in a circle, each hooked up to a modified dialysis machine.

Martha sat between Mickey and Charlie, and across from her sat Jack and Sarah Jane Smith.

“So,” Martha said to the others, as her eyes moved around the circle, “We’ve got a while to sit here; might as well make conversation, eh?”

“Oh, I have a question!” Sarah Jane said, raising her hand. “Why did you need the five of us here?”

“Ooh, allow me to answer that, if you will,” Malcolm said, scurrying into the room. “And might I add that it’s an honour being in your presence, marm.”

“That’s sweet of you, but terribly unnecessary,” Sarah Jane remarked, and Martha shot her a smirk.

“The Artron particles in your bloodstream are a mere fraction of the total in your bodies,” Malcolm explained. “It’s inside all of your muscle and bones and organs and brain, you see. So while I can collect some from your blood, it wouldn’t be enough to constitute one of you. I’m hoping five should be enough, but it remains to be seen. It depends on how efficient my MALC proves to be.”

“MALC?”

“Module for Artron Liquid Collection,” Malcolm said proudly.

Martha stifled a laugh, realising that he had named another thing after himself.

“Who’s going to be the lucky winner of the Artron dose when we’re done here, anyway?” Jack asked.

“I’m sure we’ll find a volunteer,” Mickey said. “One thing UNIT has going for it is the number of people hanging ’round.”

“I’m terribly sorry if any of you feel unwell from this process,” Malcolm said, checking readings on each machine. “For what it’s worth, we have a catered lunch arranged.”

A moment of silence passed, as everyone exchanged awkward glances. Jack broke the silence with a breath in.

“Well, it’s a riot seeing you all again,” he said, “circumstances notwithstanding. I mean, I’d bleed for all of you—and boy have I—but this is ridiculous, huh?”

A wave of uneasy laughter passed through the room.

“So, you all seem to know each other,” Charlie observed, “better than me at any rate. What’s all your stories?”

Martha pointed to each person in the room, rattling off their names.

“We all travelled with the Doctor at one time or another,” she said. “And we all helped fly the Earth back home when the Daleks stole it.”

“Ah, that was you lot?” Charlie glanced around with a muted impressed expression. “Not bad. Lost my lunch from travel sickness, but.” Martha recalled it wasn’t easy to shock the kid, not with all his strange—and largely inconvenient—alien encounters in the past.

“And what about you—Charlie, was it?” Sarah Jane asked Charlie. “Where do you enter the picture?”

“Alien statue monster,” Charlie said with the kind of understated attitude that was his signature. “Sent me to the sixties, Doctor brought me back a few months later. Oh yeah, and I spent a couple of days in 1999 while another bloke stole my identity, but I don’t remember too much of that.”

Sarah Jane sent a puzzled look to Martha.

“That is basically what happened,” Martha admitted. “Though the ‘identity theft’ part is a tad more complicated than that.”

“What was that you said about helping Sam before?” Charlie asked Mickey. “Is he here or somefin?”

“Um, yes and no,” Martha said with a grimace. “He is here, but he’s in a coma right now. Has been for a week now—we think something went wrong with the programming in his brain and it’s gone into some kind of overdrive. He’s in a perpetual dream state.” She met Charlie’s eye with a tight frown. “Happened after he made contact with Angel Sam.”

Charlie’s eyebrows raised at this. “The friendly statue’s alive still?”

Martha nodded.

“Do you think that could happen to us?” asked Sarah Jane with alarm. “The coma, I mean?”

“We don’t know,” said Mickey. “Could be unique to him, or it could happen to all of us given enough time. Which is why we have to get to the bottom of this right quick.”

“Hence the dialysis,” Malcolm added with a grin. “Now once we have our little Artron honey-pot set up, I should be able to trace the signal as it comes in and find its geographic origin. The Doctor said it would either be on Earth or in orbit—let’s hope it’s the former, for our budget’s sake!”

*        *        *

The celery pinned to Sam’s lapel was a bit wilted. That was certainly an observation he would never have expected to make.

Besides that, things were going perfectly fine. Sure, he felt extremely cold one moment and smouldering hot the next. And he was exhausted. And he kept finding himself in what felt like mortal danger, causing adrenaline spikes.

But he was fine. Really.

He just had to ride this out. Change the channel when things got overwhelming. Fight his fatigue. Wait for help. Wait for the Doctor.

Sam leaned against the TARDIS console, and slid to the floor with a sigh.

“Are you alright, Doctor?” came the voice of yet another companion. Who was it this time? Nyssa, maybe? Oh—what did it matter?

“I need a minute,” he said, rubbing his eyes.

‘You don’t look so good.’

Sam opened his eyes to see Angel Sam leaning against the wall, arms folded.

“Haven’t seen you in a bit,” he observed.

“Who, me?” asked Nyssa, peering down at him. “I was just using the restroom. I was only gone a few minutes.”

Oh right, Angel Sam isn’t part of the memory, so she doesn’t see him there.

Sam smiled at the woman. “Right you are. Well, I suppose it’s my turn.” He climbed to his feet—boy, his body sure did feel heavy right now—and headed for the doors.

‘Meeting in the bathroom? I feel like Al,’ Angel Sam joked as Sam found his way into the ‘Little Time Lord’s Room.’

“Where have you been? Feels like it’s been months of these memories since I last saw you.”

‘I’ve been keeping tabs on Donna,’ Angel Sam explained. ‘I can watch her, but I can’t get into her head like I can you.’

“I’m glad you can do that much, at least,” he said. “Is she okay?”

‘Yeah, she’s been mostly reliving her memories without deviation, though during moments of lucidity she finds the whole thing funny, and has a tendency towards laughter. She isn’t taking anything seriously.’

“That’s great to hear.”

‘There is one thing, though.’ Angel Sam’s voice faltered.

“What is it?”

‘There’s a hand in a jar that shows up in every different scenario. Just kind of sits there in the background. I don’t know whether or not she notices it.’

“Like the Doctor’s hand that did the metacrisis thing?”

‘I guess so. And… it smells just like that fob watch.’

“Oh boy. Keep her away from it.”

‘That’s the plan.’

“You’d better go, then.”

At Sam’s next blink, the statue disappeared, followed closely by another shift in the scenery.

And this time, he was surrounded by a bunch of metal pepper pots with plungers and whisks sticking out.

So these things are the Daleks, he realised.

*        *        *

“What kind of an ’orrible Christmas is this turning out to be?” Wilf lamented over his tea as he watched Sylvia icing a fruitcake. “Without Donna, it’s hardly merry and bright, is it?”

In his hands, he fidgeted with a set of floppy reindeer antlers on a headband. He didn’t have the heart to wear them.

“Well what do you want me to do about that, Dad?” Sylvia snipped. “It’s hardly my fault they had to take her away.”

“I say we march on into that UNIT place and demand to know what’s wrong with her,” Wilf said, pounding a fist on the kitchen table. “It’s what Donna would want. She can’t stay cooped up there for the holidays! She’ll be going mad, she will! You can’t keep a songbird caged like that.”

Sylvia frowned. “I’m worried too, but Donna’s in serious trouble. She was remembering things.”

Wilf cradled his head in his hands. “Alright, I admit she did mention a ‘little blue box’ up on the hill… but she was fine, Sylvie. She weren’t burning up or nothing!”

Sylvia placed a plastic holly decoration on the top of the cake, and turned to Wilf. “Maybe we can ask to see her. But if they say ‘no,’ we really should just drop it. Martha knows what she’s doing.”

“Alright,” Wilf sighed, “if Martha says we can’t see her, then I’ll leave it be. Only Martha, though. No baby-faced private is going to stand in my way, oh no!”

He gave a resolute nod and stood. “Righto love, warm up the ol’ jam jar. We’ve a mission ahead!”

Chapter 20

He Sees You When You’re Sleeping

Wilf marched to the UNIT Headquarters entrance, where two men in red berets and large guns stood guard.

“Alright lads, I’m here to see Donna and you’d best stand aside,” he announced, as Sylvia sheepishly brought up the rear.

“Sorry sir,” said one of the soldiers, “UNIT personnel only beyond this point.”

“It’s Christmas Eve and I shan’t leave until I see my granddaughter!” Wilf summoned all his half-forgotten military experience to appear imposing, moving in close to the man, who couldn’t have been a day older than twenty-five. “Now you go find Doctor Martha Jones and tell her just what I told you. Toodle pip!”

The man, who was looking more like a kid by the second, shrank from him, nodded, and disappeared into the building.

The remaining man moved to the centre of the doors, gripping his weapon for dear life.

Precisely seven minutes later, Martha appeared at the doors.

“Good afternoon, you two. I’ve been dreading this,” she said through clenched teeth.

“Why? What’s wrong with my daughter?” Sylvia demanded.

“Come on inside, I’ll explain everything. You deserve to know.”

*        *        *

Sam glanced down at his garb: he was the one with the leather jacket again. And as he looked up, it occurred to him that tens of deadly laser weapons were pointed directly at him. Despite knowing this was a memory, his heart pounded as he looked upon a horrifying mutant creature staring at him with one piercing eye.

As he let his mind fill in the context, he realised the sheer stakes of the present situation. Before him sat a weapon that would destroy not only the Daleks and himself, but the entire Earth. The Doctor had prepared it, but couldn’t go through with the act.

It seemed the Doctor was faced with such unbearable decisions on far too many occasions. Now he understood what River had meant when she’d told him just how catastrophic meddling in the Doctor’s timeline could be.

The tense stand-off was interrupted by the sound of the TARDIS materialising behind him. He turned to look upon it, wondering who could be piloting.

The doors flung open, and a figure appeared, backlit by blinding tendrils of light. Rose Tyler looked at him, cheeks wet with tears, and a haunted look in her eyes.

“…Rose?” Sam asked, his understanding of the situation lagging as he stared in confusion. “What—”

“I see you there, Sam Beckett,” she said quietly.

“Wait… but you’re a memory.”

“Don’t concern yourself with that,” she said, shaking her head. “Just know that I speak to you—the man who puts right what once went wrong.”

This wasn’t Rose’s voice. It was somebody else speaking through her. Something else.

Sam glanced back at the Daleks, only to find the room now empty save for him and whoever this was.

“Are you… God?” he asked. Well, he knew it wasn’t the bartender, at any rate.

“No—I am the Bad Wolf. And I’ve come to help you.”

Bad Wolf?

“I have to get out of this dream…” he said, shivering as a deep chill passed through his bones.

“Yes, you won’t withstand this for much longer,” the Bad Wolf confirmed, “but you have a choice to make.”

She turned, gesturing to the TARDIS. “Observe.”

Inside, Sam could see Donna on the floor by the console, reaching for the hand in the jar. She was frozen in time, her fingers outstretched.

“Deep in her subconscious, Donna Noble longs for her lost memories,” the Bad Wolf continued. “The hand calls to her. When she touches it, the buried knowledge will awaken. And she will die.”

“No…” Sam ran for the doors, only to find them slamming in his face.

“You cannot stop her, Sam Beckett. But all is not lost. There is a way to awaken from the dreams.” She pointed to his jacket pocket. “You’ve had the answer all along.”

Sam reached within, and his hand landed on a cool metal fob watch. He pulled it out, and looked at it in fear.

“You want me to open this? No, I… I can’t,” Sam shook his head vehemently. “It’ll give all the Doctor’s secrets to whoever’s doing all this to me.”

“Precisely,” the Bad Wolf said. “When the knowledge is transmitted, only then will you be released from your long slumber. And Donna will live.”

“No, there’s gotta be some way to hold her back from touching the hand…” he gestured to the TARDIS. “Can Angel Sam do something to—”

“Time runs short for all of you in this mind,” she replied with sadness in her eyes. “The cold you feel is death nearing.”

Sam took a step back in alarm. “If Donna will die if she has the Doctor’s memories, won’t the same thing happen to me? Am I choosing between sacrificing myself and sacrificing Donna? And if I don’t choose, both of us will die?”

Or rather, the three of us—Angel Sam included.

The Bad Wolf smiled at him. “You’ve already made your choice, haven’t you Doctor Beckett?”

And she was gone.

Sam looked down at the watch, swallowing back the urge to cry.

Yeah. Of course he’d made his choice. Whether he survived or not, he wasn’t going to let Donna die.

After a deep breath in and out, Sam opened the watch and peered within.

*        *        *

It was 01:26 am on Christmas Day when the monitors in the surveillance room started flashing red. An alert began to sound, and Martha awoke in the on-call room, where she lay on a spartan cot next to Wilf and Sylvia, who’d opted to spend the night so they could ring in Christmas Day at Donna’s side.

She scrambled to her feet and rushed to see what was happening, with the other two ambling behind more sluggishly.

But by the time Martha arrived at the bedside, the sleeping figure had resumed their normal vital signs.

And as Martha studied the brainwaves, she realised that they matched Donna.

Sam was gone.

As Wilf and Sylvia entered, Donna’s eyes blinked open, and she glanced up in confusion, squinting at the three.

“Oi, why are you lot watching me sleep?” she asked, rubbing her eyes. “What a creepy thing to wake up to! Please don’t tell me I was snoring.”

Then she caught sight of her reflection in the two-way mirror, and her mouth drifted open as she studied the sensors stuck on her head.

“Oh, hell. What did I miss this time?”

“Not Christmas, if that makes you feel any better,” Wilf said, grinning as he wrapped his arms around her. “You’re right on time for that, Donna my love.”

*        *        *

In the car park outside the UNIT medical facility, a blue police box materialised. It was a TARDIS that didn’t belong to the Doctor, but the Doctor was inside, being apprehended by autons.

The door swung open, and he was thrust out into the cold night air.

“You call this hospitality?” he protested. “Pfft! I was a stowaway on the Space Titanic and was treated with more dignity by a swarm of homicidal angel robots! I’m giving this place one star on Yelp. Well, maybe two. It was in a convenient location and it’s open Christmas Day. And that mulled wine was quite lovely. But certainly no more than two stars.”

As the autons headed back inside, he turned to walk away, only to almost trip on something on the ground. There on the concrete lay a familiar brown-haired man in a white skin-tight jumpsuit, curled up in the foetal position. Sam was unresponsive and shivering, shallow misty breaths rising from his mouth.

The Doctor frantically pulled off his coat, and wrapped Sam in it. His extremities were freezing cold, but upon touching his forehead, the Doctor was alarmed to feel a burning fever.

He turned his head back to the TARDIS—its doors were still open. Within, the bartender waved him back inside.

“Bring him in, Doctor; he’ll catch his death out there.”

Chapter 21

Hot and Cold

“What did you do to him?!” the Doctor demanded as he pulled Sam through the doors of the Bartender’s TARDIS.

He could feel Sam’s body shake under his coat.

“I didn’t do a thing,” the Bartender said. “Not directly, anyway. I keep telling you that.”

“His brain is working him to death!” The Doctor barked. “If he dies…”

“Won’t last much longer, I promise.” The Bartender tossed a cold compress to the Doctor. “Put that on his forehead, but keep tabs on how cold the rest of him gets. This is a nasty process.”

What process, exactly?

A muffled groan rose from the floor.

To the Doctor’s shock, Sam’s eyes were open. He wasn’t looking towards the Doctor; rather, he was looking curiously at his hands, which he held, trembling, up to his face. He flexed his fingers, and something about doing it made him break into a smile.

“Sam… are you feeling alright?” asked the Doctor, watching Sam closely.

Sam finally seemed to notice he wasn’t alone, and his eyes turned towards the Doctor, struggling to focus on him.

He let out a soft chuckle. “It’s been a while since I moved,” he mumbled, “but I’m still so cold…”

His attention moved back to his hands, then his sleeves, and he tugged at the fabric with a frown.

“Fermi suit…?” he mumbled. “How did… wait, where am I?”

With some difficulty, he pulled himself up to a sitting position, and ran a hand through his hair, glancing around the low-lit pub floor. He squinted at the Bartender, who waved to him. But he said nothing, instead turning to the Doctor.

“I don’t think I can be awake for long,” he said, rubbing his sweaty brow, “but I just wanted to make sure Sam was in a safe place.”

The Doctor cocked his head—that was an odd wording. “You don’t normally speak in the third person, do you?”

Sam smiled, but his eyes were filling with tears. “Yeah, well, I haven’t been in this body for about sixty-five years. I don’t really have the right to call it mine, do I?”

“Sixty-five—no! No, it can’t be—can it?” the Doctor’s mouth was agape as he inspected Sam’s eyes and ran his sonic screwdriver over his body, as if that was going to give him the information he needed (it wasn’t). “Angel Sam?”

Sam busied himself putting on the Doctor’s coat properly, wrapping it tightly around himself and pulling up the collar. “Thank you for this… he’s freezing.”

“You’re quite welcome—now how did you end up in there?” the Doctor persisted. “And what happened to Sam?”

“It’s not important how I got here,” Angel Sam said, shaking his head. “But as for Sam—he’s just assimilated a lot of memories, and it’s put him in something of an identity crisis. I stepped up to the front to stop other… personalities from emerging.”

“Memories?” the Doctor turned to the Bartender with a glower. “What’s he done, Monk?”

“Sam made his choice!” the Bartender announced, beaming. “I knew he’d make the right one. The man’s a damn saint. Best of humanity, right there on the floor of my bar. And now he has the knowledge needed to really make a difference.”

“You mean he’s got all my knowledge? But that’ll kill him, like it would have done Donna.”

“It won’t. He’s been prepared.”

Angel Sam’s head turned towards the Bartender. “Who are you…?”

“Bartender,” he replied simply, giving a wink.

“I admit he does make a good banana daiquiri,” the Doctor said, turning back to Angel Sam. “Anyway, can you help Sam?”

“Yes, but I have to go back to sleep,” he said, and brushed a stray tear from his cheek. “Will you look after Sam’s body in the meantime?”

“Of course I will, Angel Sam,” the Doctor said, favouring him with his most winning smile.

“Listen, I—” Angel Sam shifted awkwardly, “—I haven’t had physical contact in a long time, and… this might be my last chance. Can I… hug you?”

“Oh, it would be my pleasure,” the Doctor said, pulling Angel Sam into a bear hug. “You just go ahead and hang on as long as you need.”

Angel Sam squeezed back tightly. “Thank you.”

After a minute or two, Sam’s body went limp in the Doctor’s arms, and he was unconscious once more, leaving a wet patch of tears on the Doctor’s pinstripe shoulder.

The Doctor gently let the sleeping Sam down to the floor. He applied the cold compress to Sam’s clammy forehead, and held a warm hand on his in an effort to defrost his fingers.

As he silently wished good luck to Angel Sam, a wisp of blue energy rose out of Sam’s mouth.

“What…” Hearts racing, he snapped his head around to the Bartender, who was sending him back a smug smile.

“Oh, I love it when a plan comes together,” he said, wiping his hands on his apron.

*        *        *

It was as though his head was filled with a cacophony of voices all shouting at once. He had no coherent thoughts, and his mind was buzzing with hundreds of people, each telling him what to do.

He had no idea who he was; which personality belonged front and centre. He was adrift in a sea of faces, floating over them as they clawed up at him.

‘Don’t panic.’

The voice sliced through the others like a razor.

‘Can you hear me, Sam?’

“Sam…?” he mumbled, “…who is—?”

‘That’s who you are.’

“I am?” he parsed this information, trying to understand—but his head was too noisy. It hurt. “And who are you?”

‘You call me Angel Sam, remember?’

“Oh… I know you, don’t I?”

‘Yeah, buddy. I guess we keep helping each other remember who we are, don’t we?’

“Why are there so many voices…?”

‘You’ve been a lot of people, and so has the Doctor. They’re all swirling around in your mind, vying for control. I’m holding them off for now. Keeping the seat warm, I guess you could say. Until you can find yourself.’

“How do I do that?”

‘This should help…’

Familiar images appeared around him. A farm, a family, universities, professors, patients, friends, a wife, and a man in a loud suit holding a cigar.

The images brought with them memories, and he was thankful to relearn these facts about himself.

He was Doctor Samuel John Beckett, born August 8th, 1953, and grew up in Elk Ridge Indiana. He built Project Quantum Leap with Al Calavicci. He had a wife named Donna.

I remember.

“I… think I understand now,” he said quietly. “Thanks for reminding me. But all these other people…”

‘They’re remnants. Some from leaping, some from the Doctor.’

“I don’t know how to make them stop shouting.”

‘They’ll pipe down if you assert yourself. Maybe.’

“Well, it’s worth a try,” Sam laughed. “And you… you came out of the angel, didn’t you?”

‘Yeah.’

“You were cut off when my mind closed up…”

‘Trapped again, in a different body this time. But still trapped.’ Angel Sam’s voice was emotional.

“You don’t have to be, do you?”

‘What?’

“Aren’t we the same? Why can’t we—I don’t know—re-combine?”

Angel Sam hesitated a moment. ‘…Even if that were possible, you don’t want the burdens I carry. Believe me.’

“I have the Doctor’s memories,” Sam retorted. “How much heavier can a burden get?”

‘I see your point.’

On the dim pub floor, a smile tickled at the sleeping Sam’s lips as the fever broke.

Chapter 22

Onwards and Upwards

UNIT Headquarters was a quiet place on Christmas Day. Martha hadn’t planned on spending much time here today; not until Donna’s family had shown up. Now she was somewhat stuck here supervising them—not that she didn’t have things to do now that Donna had awoken, of course.

Even Malcolm had the day off—his work was in his lab, and the last she’d heard he was working on making the Artron energy into a form best suited to be absorbed into the body.

He’d been working his tail off on this, and Martha felt sick to her stomach when she thought of the Doctor abandoning them to this. How could he do such a thing?

When he’d been here, he’d seemed agitated and unstable. Different to how he had been when he was with her. He’d been severely affected by Donna’s fate. Maybe he just couldn’t bear it any longer, and fled.

“Something wrong, love?” Wilf had come up behind Martha as she stood staring absent-mindedly at the monitors in the surveillance room. His interruption made her jump.

“Oh, no. Just thinking, Mister Mott.”

“What are we looking at here, anyway?” he asked. “Looks awfully scientific and complicated.”

“These are Donna’s brain waves,” she explained, pointing a finger at the visualisation on the screen. “Crucially, this shows that her mind is clear of the interference that indicates the presence of the programming that was transmitted to Sam through her phone.” She looked back to Wilf, biting her lip. “And it’s why we cannot, under any circumstances, allow Donna access to a phone right now.”

“Oh, blimey,” Wilf said. “She isn’t going to take that well.”

“We’re going to have to concoct some lie to tell her. As usual…” Martha sighed. She was tired of the vast web of untruths they all had to maintain to protect Donna.

“Whatever you say, Doctor Smith,” Wilf said with a conspiratorial wink.

“Doctor Smith? Who’s been pulling from my shallow pool of aliases? Get your own pseudonym!”

Martha tensed up as she heard the familiar voice. Open-mouthed, she turned to the Doctor, who was leaning against the door frame, arms crossed, a goofy grin plastered on his face. Wilf similarly turned, and let out a hoot of excitement as he laid eyes on the man.

“Terribly sorry I’m late,” he said, acting nonchalant. “I ran into an old frenemy in the pub, and it took me a week and a half to finish my glass of wine. Don’t worry, the place is getting two stars when I review it. Well okay—maybe three, all things considered.”

His attention turned to the old man. “Wilfred Mott!” he said in a cheerful, high-pitched squeak. “Since when do you work for UNIT?”

“I came here looking for Donna,” Wilf said, brusquely, pointing an accusing finger. “And I discovered that you’ve been neglecting her, Doctor. Now you’d best make it up to her, mustn’t you?”

The Doctor looked through the two-way mirror at Donna, who was lazily flipping through a magazine, and his eyes turned forlorn. He watched her for a moment before turning back to Wilf.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “For everything.”

“Just make sure she’s safe, will you?”

Martha landed a hand on his shoulder. “She doesn’t have the signal in her head.”

The Doctor nodded. “That’s brilliant, Martha Jones. You just make sure that brain of hers stays clear of phones—and probably radios too, to err on the side of caution.” He raked a hand through his hair, eyes shifting towards the door. “Listen—don’t suppose you have a bed free? I have a patient to admit.”

*        *        *

On the other side of a wall from Donna’s observation room, Martha and the Doctor carried the unconscious form of Sam Beckett to a bed.

“So this is what Sam looks like,” Martha murmured, as she pulled a blanket over the tall, dashing man. “He’s a little bit cuter than I expected.”

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. “What did you expect? Two heads? Great big thick glasses? I don’t think they’d survive the leap, so I’d hope he doesn’t need them.”

Martha shrugged. “I don’t know. You don’t expect genius scientists to be handsome, do you?”

“Excusez-moi?” the Doctor said, looking wounded.

“Present company excluded, obviously,” Martha grinned. “S’pose you could say I have a type. But I’m exploring other options,” she added hastily, looking down at Sam as she held a stethoscope to his chest.

The Doctor smirked at her, before changing the subject. “So—have you made any headway in my unscheduled absence? Regarding our mysterious information-gatherers, I should say.”

“We’re close to figuring out the source of the signal,” Martha said. “Our science advisor extracted Artron energy from the blood of five former time travellers, and it’s being made into a nebulisable form. We’re going to have someone inhale it to dose them with enough to attract the signal.”

The Doctor looked impressed. “Well, that’s clever,” he said. “I hadn’t thought of that. But will five people be enough?” He screwed up his face as he tried to decide on the answer to his own question.

“I can take you to the lab if you want to have a look at the readings,” Martha suggested.

“Oh, readings! Love a reading. Readings are my favourite. Allons-y, Martha—lead the way.”

*        *        *

The sterile fluorescent light on the ceiling was bright in Sam’s eyes when he woke. He squinted, bringing up his hand to shade himself, and used his other hand to brush away the droplets of sweat that had apparently beaded on his face. His body seemed to have returned to a manageable temperature, though his brow was still a bit warm.

So… I survived.

He was in a hospital room again. But this wasn’t the same room—he was against a different wall of the room. It was reversed, like a mirror of the other room he’d been in, back… how long ago? It felt like years.

The next thing he noticed was his reflection in what he figured must have been another two-way mirror. It really was Sam looking back—Fermi suit and all. He should have been glad to be himself again, but all he could think was that Al would be searching for him, but there would be nobody in the Waiting Room to give Ziggy clues to his whereabouts.

Just as he’d said when they’d met in front of Wester Drumlins.

Was he stuck in the future now? No, not if he could get a ride in the TARDIS back home to 2000.

Where was the Doctor? He was sure that he—no, Angel Sam—had spoken to him. And also present was—Oh, that Bartender is going to get a piece of my mind if I see him again.

He struggled to a sitting position—boy, he felt weak. Just how long had he been in a coma?

He felt the muscles in his arms; they were still a decent size and firmness. Perhaps it had been the fever that had made him feel so off. He’d need a bit more recovery time, but not before he figured out what was happening.

He unsteadily climbed out of the bed, pulling away stray sensors and a drip needle, and approached the mirror, knocking at it.

“Hello?” he said in a strained voice. “Martha? Doctor? Anybody? I’m awake.”

He stood for a moment in silence, waiting for a response of some kind. Nothing.

He moved to the door, trying the handle. Locked.

But as he stepped up to the mirror again, it occurred to him through his reflection that he was wearing the Doctor’s coat.

He reached into the pockets, and grinned as his fingers closed around a sonic screwdriver. He let out a triumphant laugh, and returned to the door. He unlocked it easily, and slipped out into the hall, glancing around—it was pretty quiet. Unusually so. Suspiciously so, even.

 He’d only taken two steps when he realised that his room was immediately adjacent to the room he’d been in last time. Upon peering through the small square window in the door, he spotted Donna, flanked by her mother and grandfather. She was engaged in a spirited conversation with her mother—or, perhaps, an argument.

Sam wasn’t prepared for what he felt when he looked at them. He stumbled back as the guilt lanced through his heart.

He found stability by holding a hand to the wall, and took a moment to breathe.

“It’s not my memory. It’s not my memory,” he whispered. But, it was a memory that might as well have been his, considering just how powerful it was.

Compartmentalise it, he told himself. He does it all the time. He has to. And so do I.

With the endless sea of crystal clear memories now available to Sam, he knew now why his memory had to be Swiss-cheesed while he’d been leaping; so he could focus on the issue at hand. Not get carried away thinking about his own past so much. Only remember what was necessary.

But now, far from having holes in his memory, his mind teemed with memories, the vast majority of which didn’t even belong to him. Did he now have to learn to filter all of this? How?

He retreated from Donna’s room. It was too much. He’d need time to figure this out. This thing that the Bartender had orchestrated, whatever he’d done to Sam, it seemed there was no going back now. Onwards and upwards, the Doctor would say. Keep moving forward. Don’t look back.

As he proceeded down the corridor, he overheard muffled voices.

“We need one more. But I won’t drag Donna into it. Not after all I’ve done.”

It was the Doctor.

“What about Sam?” asked a voice that Sam was fairly certain belonged to Martha.

“The man was on the brink of death not an hour ago, Martha. And he’s still in a coma. I doubt he could take the strain on his body.”

Sam chuckled as he approached the door, and placed his ear against it.

“Well it doesn’t have to be today.”

“Martha, whoever’s doing this now has all of my secrets. That includes things that absolutely nobody must know. We need to destroy that data… lickety split!” The Doctor stumbled a moment at the phrase. “Blimey—Martha, don’t ever let me say ‘lickety split’ again. I’m going to hold you to that.”

At this, Sam waved the sonic screwdriver over the door, opening it wide. The occupants of the room turned to him with surprise as Sam tossed the gadget towards the Doctor.

“Here, you left this in your coat,” Sam said with a wink. “Now what did you need me for?”

Chapter 23

Smart Casual

As he stood at the entrance to the laboratory, Sam felt his knees buckling, and he let the door frame catch him.

“Sam, you shouldn’t be out of bed…” Martha chided, approaching him with her arms out.

“I’m okay,” he insisted, recomposing himself. “Comparatively speaking, anyway. Whatever’s going on, I want to help.”

Martha looked to the Doctor.

“Think you can handle a few hours of dialysis?” he asked Sam with a shrug.

“Is that all?” Sam said. He’d thought it might be something more strenuous. “Sure. But… why?”

“It’s for your Artron energy,” Martha explained. “We’re going to distil it and use it for bait.”

“To trace the signal?” Sam asked excitedly. “Martha Jones, that’s brilliant!”

He drew a hand to his mouth, locking eyes with the Doctor. “Oh boy, I’m talking like you.”

The Doctor grimaced. “Donna had a bit of that when she…”

“It would be easier if you had a filter,” Sam said with a wry smirk.

“Oi, that’s my personality you’re complaining about,” the Doctor retorted. “And I’ll have you know that my ability to ramble has saved me on numerous occasions. Numerous!”

“Yeah. I know.” Sam began to remove the Doctor’s coat. “Listen, I wouldn’t mind getting into more comfortable clothes than this Fermi suit. You have a big closet in the TARDIS, right?” He threw the coat to the Doctor, and instantly regretted it, knowing how much stuff was in the pockets that could come in handy.

“My TARDIS may or may not be available,” the Doctor lamented. “But if it’s not, I’m sure the Monk will tell us why it’s vitally important that he’s keeping it from me.” He rolled his eyes.

“The Monk—” Sam huffed. “I can’t believe he’s been behind all of this. Why me?”

“Who?” Martha asked, looking entirely lost in the conversation.

“Another Time Lord,” Sam said.

“Another one? My god…” Martha was surprised and almost terrified, and Sam now understood why—knowing all that she’d been through with the Master. There was that guilt again. But with it came a strong sense of respect and appreciation. Martha was extraordinary.

“He’s not a bad guy,” Sam reassured her. “At least… I don’t think he is—not in the traditional sense. But he’s definitely manipulative. He took control of my leaps from the very beginning.”

Sam raised an eyebrow at the Doctor. “You and he butted heads on a few occasions, but you’re not that different, are you?”

“I’m a lot more responsible,” the Doctor said defensively, pushing Sam aside as he left the lab. Sam smiled privately at Martha, and shook his head.

“He’s not really,” he whispered, tapping his temple. “I know.”

Martha giggled, and the two of them followed the Doctor out into the corridor.

*        *        *

“So you’re saying this isn’t your TARDIS?” Sam asked, inspecting the blue box sitting in the UNIT parking lot.

“The Monk’s has a fully functional Chameleon Circuit,” the Doctor explained, “and I suspect he landed it over the top of mine. So mine will be somewhere inside his, hidden away.”

“Tough break,” Sam mumbled.

The Doctor opened the doors, revealing… his own TARDIS.

“Oh. Never mind, then.”

“That means he’s gone…” Sam said, disappointed. “Guess he’s one step ahead of us, as usual.”

“I don’t like it when someone out-matches me,” the Doctor griped. “I’m supposed to be the clever one.”

Sam stifled a laugh. “No wonder you never got along with the Time Lords.”

“Oi, don’t you get clever now, too.”

As Sam and the Doctor proceeded inside the TARDIS, Martha hung back outside.

“You’re not coming in?” Sam asked.

Martha snorted. “Look, the last time I went inside without intending to go anywhere, it spontaneously took us all to another planet in the middle of a war zone. I’m not risking that again. Fool me twice.”

“Fair enough,” Sam said, and waved to her before heading further into the ship.

He rifled through the racks upon racks of clothes, collected over centuries of travel through space and time.

He’d never really been too fussed with his own appearance before leaping—just the average button-up shirt and pants combo was sufficient. Something plain, uninteresting. Leather belt and shoes. And after that, he just wore whatever the leapee kept in their closet.

He thought Al would have a field day here in the Doctor’s closet. These racks held all kinds of weird and wonderful clothes. But what did he want? Who was he now? What did Sam Beckett wear, anyway?

It was a good hour before Sam emerged from the depths of the TARDIS, wearing blue jeans with a turquoise shirt tucked into the waist, and a brown leather jacket hanging loosely over the top. His hair was combed, but freely moving on his head, and his shoes… well, he couldn’t get the Doctor’s chucks out of his mind, so he tried out a pair of tan ones and they were pretty damn comfortable.

And finally, a little pair of yellow decorative glasses were pinned to his jacket, in honour of Al, who always embellished his own suits with such things.

It wasn’t an ostentatious outfit. It wasn’t fancy. But it made him feel comfortable in a way he hadn’t been in a long time.

“Looking sharp,” the Doctor commented as Sam entered the Console Room. “Well, probably. If there’s one thing nobody has ever accused me of, it’s knowing anything about fashion.”

“With a wardrobe like that, you could’ve fooled me,” Sam said, adjusting his jacket cuffs.

“Well, I have to be prepared to blend into any situation throughout time,” the Doctor said sagely.

“And yet, you only ever wear two suits,” Sam retorted. Feeling a little exhausted, he flopped onto the seat by the console. “And one of them’s in a parallel universe now.”

“I told you not to get clever! Didn’t I say that?”

“You don’t like that I know all your secrets now, do you?”

The Doctor glared at him, his face losing its cheerful mask. “What do you think?”

“I won’t tell anyone.”

“You’d better not!”

It didn’t need to be said between them that Sam knew the Doctor’s name.

“Have I ever given you a reason to think I’d betray your trust like that?”

The Doctor looked away from him, and began heading for the door. “No. He’s right, you are the ‘best of humanity.’ Assuming we can even call you ‘human’ now. Come on.”

Sam didn’t want to think about that possibility. About what he had become, and what it meant for his future.

He wished Al was here. Or Donna. Someone who could reassure him of his own humanity.

*        *        *

“It’s Christmas Day?” Sam gawked at Martha as she hooked up the dialysis machine. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

He sat on the bed in which he’d woken up earlier—his change of outfit had taken a lot out of him, and he was resigned to the fact he’d be here for the rest of the day.

“I’m telling you now!” Martha laughed. “Don’t worry, I have dinner plans with my family. I’m not sacrificing my holiday entirely by being here. Besides, I’m still spending my day with people I care about.”

“Well—me too,” Sam said with a smile. “I can’t be with family either, but at least I’m with friends. Merry Christmas, Doctor Jones.”

“Merry Christmas, Doctor Beckett,” Martha replied, switching on the machine. “Not the nicest way to spend it, hooked up to a machine like this. But I don’t suppose you get to celebrate very often anyway, do you?”

“Not as such,” Sam agreed, and laid back on the bed, looking up to the ceiling. “Listen…”

Martha looked down at him curiously. “What?”

“He may not have… loved you, but he thought the world of you all the same. And still does. He just doesn’t know how to talk about that kind of thing.”

Martha blushed and hid her eyes. “Oh my god, you know all about it now, don’t you? How I fancied him?”

Sam chuckled. “I sure do. I know all about everyone he travelled with. You did really well for yourself, you know. I think you made the right choice leaving when you did. You and Mickey have that in common.”

“Yeah, I suppose we do,” Martha said thoughtfully, and took a seat at the end of the bed. “What are you going to do after this, Sam?”

Sam was about to go with his gut reaction to the question—to go home—but stopped himself when he realised what Al had told him the last time they’d spoken. He’d said Sam would encounter a ‘younger model’ of Al than his 2008 version, but hadn’t specified under what circumstances. And it had been some time since that version of himself had seen the older Al—enough that Al would take a trip to England to see him personally. Sam had a strange feeling that he’d be unable to alter the events to come.

“I… don’t know,” he admitted. “But I’m sure it’s not over for me yet.”

Chapter 24

After Effects

Martha knocked on the door of Donna’s room, before opening the door and sticking a head inside.

“All right, you three?” she chirped before wheeling in a trolley of food. “I brought you a nice Christmas lunch. Well, I can’t lie—it’s a bit dire. But it’s the best I could rustle up from the hospital kitchen.”

It was mostly standard hospital food, with a few Christmas crackers and some processed turkey and cranberry sandwiches.

“Doctor Smith, I don’t get why I need to be locked into this room,” Donna said, looking at the food with disdain. “Can’t I even have my phone? Or a telly? If I miss Strictly Come Dancing tonight, I’ll pitch a fit, I bloody promise.”

“I’m sorry, Donna,” Martha said, internally cringing, “we have to keep all communications devices away from you right now; it’ll interfere with our sensitive equipment.”

Donna pouted, crossing her arms. “Whatever this thing is that’s wrong with my brain, I’ll be glad to see the back of it. I hope whatever you’re doing will do the trick, because I’ve had about enough of this forgetfulness. One day I’m gonna wake up and my whole life will have passed me by and I won’t remember a minute of it. I’ll be on my death bed wondering what happened on EastEnders fifty years in the past.”

Martha frowned. “I certainly hope it doesn’t come to that,” she said, before heading back to the door. “Merry Christmas, and I’m sorry you had to spend it here.”

“Oh, love, don’t you worry about that,” Wilf said. “As long as the family’s all together, we’ll be right. Now you go see yours, alright sweetheart?”

Martha smiled. “I will,” she said, and left the room, locking the door behind her. She let out a held breath, and proceeded into the surveillance room next door, where the Doctor was watching the scene quietly, his face in shadow.

Placing a hand on the Doctor’s shoulder, she joined him. “Come on, Sam’s dialysis should be finishing up. No sense hanging around here. Doesn’t look like it’s doing you much good, is it?”

The Doctor rubbed his eyes, doing that thing he always did where he put his feelings in a locked box and threw it to the back of his mind, and he brightened up.

“Right—yes! Sam. Let’s go check in on him.”

He traipsed out into the corridor, and to Sam’s room, with Martha following behind.

“Oi, why didn’t you tell me the Doctor was back?” Mickey had appeared at the end of the hall.

“It’s Christmas. I thought you had the day off?!” Martha asked him, terribly surprised to see him here.

“Oh yeah, Christmas,” he said with a roll of his eyes, “and who am I meant to spend it with? The neighbour’s cat? Everyone I know is in a parallel dimension now. I figured I might as well see if you were here. And you are—wif the Doctor, no less.”

The Doctor grinned at him. “Well, you’re just in time to watch me do something clever. Come on, let’s see if Sam’s dialysis has yielded results.”

“Sam’s?” Mickey asked. “What, he’s recovered from—?”

Martha opened the door, and gestured to Sam, who had his head deep in a textbook on neurology.

“Who’s he?”

“That’s Sam.”

“Okay. How much did I bloody well miss around here, exactly?!”

Sam looked up at this, and waved at the three. “Afternoon. The MALC collected four hundred micrograms.” He hiked a thumb at the machine. “I’ve already disconnected my blood vessels, and the Artron solution is in the vial, so you’re good to go.”

He held up the textbook. “This thing doesn’t mention  neural backthreading—wait, I must be thinking of the thirty-first century.” he scratched his head, glancing at the Doctor. “God! How do you keep all this in order? I keep half expecting a cat lady in a habit to walk through the door.”

“Takes a bit of practice,” the Doctor said with a sympathetic look.

“No, seriously,” Mickey said. “What did I miss?”

“Well…” Martha said, hesitating as she watched the Doctor collecting the vial from the machine and scooting back out the door, soles squeaking on the linoleum. “…Sam absorbed the Doctor’s memories, just like Donna did.”

Sam leaned back against his pillow. “Unfortunately, that means whoever’s been messing with our brains also has that information.”

Martha nodded. “And so the Doctor’s finishing what Malcolm started. We just need a volunteer now.”

“Urgently,” Sam added.

“But it’s a skeleton crew ’cos of Christmas,” Mickey said with a groan.

“But we do have Donna’s family here,” Martha said quietly.

A moment passed in silence, before Martha heard a sob coming from Sam. Alarmed, she rushed to his side.

“Sam?! What’s wrong?” she asked, leaning over him to see his flushed face. He turned, hiding his eyes from her.

“Sorry,” he said in a choked voice, “I’m having trouble regulating my emotions right now.” He sniffed. “I was thinking about Donna and her family, and… well…”

He forced a laugh. “If the Doctor wasn’t so good at hiding his emotions, he’d probably be doing the same.” He wiped at his face with the heel of his hand. “Looking at the two of you isn’t much easier. It’s no wonder he keeps himself busy all the time. I’m sorry, this must look ridiculous…”

Martha bundled him into a hug. “It doesn’t. Cry it out, yeah?”

“Uh…” Mickey shifted on his feet, looking awkward. “I’ll go check up on the Doctor.”

And he disappeared from the room, leaving Martha consoling Sam, who somehow seemed more like the Doctor than ever before, despite him never being nearly this vulnerable.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“For what?”

“Everything I—he put you through.”

Martha raised an eyebrow at that little slip.

“You’re not the Doctor,” she said softly. “You didn’t put me through anything, Sam.”

“I did, though. I was one of the angels, remember? I hunted you.”

“That was Angel Sam…”

He pulled away from her, looking her in the eye. “Both of us are in here, you know. I am he and he is me.”

Quite suddenly, he burst into laughter. “And we are all together…”

“Sam?”

“Sorry, I was just thinking of something Jo Grant said a long time ago.”

Martha blinked. “The Doctor’s assistant at UNIT back in the seventies?”

“Yeah—I’ve never actually met her though, have I?” Sam shook his head, burying his head in his hands. “I think I’m losing it. One man isn’t supposed to just take on a millennium’s worth of memories in an instant. No matter how much I was ‘prepared’ for it—I might not die, but it could easily throw me off the deep end. The Doctor’s had lifetimes to organise all of this, but I haven’t.”

Martha didn’t know what to say, so she brought Sam into another hug, this one more motherly. She held his head against her chest, shushing him gently.

“It’ll be okay,” she murmured. “You should get some sleep. You might feel better after a proper rest.”

“But I need to help…”

“You’re not helping anyone in this state, Sam. Rest now.”

She gently guided him to his pillow, and dabbed a tissue at his wet cheeks.

“If there’s anything urgent, I’ll come get you,” Martha said with her kindest smile, before crossing to the door, and turning off the overhead lights on her way out.

Chapter 25

Fugitives

“Well, this is cosy,” Sylvia said, as she sat on the end of Donna’s hospital bed, chewing on the remainder of her sandwich. “I can’t say it’s the Christmas I envisioned this year, but it’s… adequate.”

Donna raised a cynical eyebrow. “Come off it, Mum. You’re not fooling anyone. This is a naff Christmas! You don’t have to humour me. We’re in a hospital and I have wires coming out of my head like the bloody Borg Queen.”

“It isn’t about where you are, Donna,” Wilf insisted. “It’s about who yer with.”

“Well personally, I’d rather be with a bottle of Pinot Grigio and a fit bloke. We have nought for two in here, Granddad.”

Donna crossed her arms as the door opened, and Doctor Smith slid into the room. She smiled at Donna, before shifting her gaze to Sylvia. “Missus Noble, can I borrow you? I have some test results to discuss, if you don’t mind.”

Sylvia exchanged a look with Wilf, before heading for the door, and disappearing out of it with the doctor.

After a minute of listening to footsteps fade down the corridor, Donna slapped her magazine closed, and pulled off the paper crown she’d ‘won’ from her cracker, casting it to the floor.

“Gramps, I’ve just about had it,” she moaned to Wilf. “This is a rubbish Christmas!” She leaned to her grandfather, a sly grin on her face. “While Mum’s off with Doctor Smith, how’s about we give this lot the slip and go home? Sod all of this. They can do this testing after the bloody holidays. They’ve got no right to keep me here.”

She began violently yanking the sensors off herself.

“Donna, we mustn’t, dear—it’s for your own good,” Wilf protested as Donna climbed out of the bed. “Besides, the door’s locked, innit? We’ll hardly get through there.”

“We’ll just see about that, won’t we?” Donna said, crossing to the door and inspecting it. “Got a bank card or summin, Granddad?”

“Oh, Donna… I can’t help you get out of here—I promised Doctor Smith!” Wilf was wide-eyed, his hands up and defensive.

“Fat lot of good you are,” Donna said, shaking her head as she raided the food trolley for a butter knife. “Well, I’m getting out of here whether you help or not. I’ll not be held prisoner. Just who does Doctor Smith think she is, anyway? Where did Mum even find her?”

Wilf hovered as she jammed the knife in to the door, hoping to pry the lock back into the door handle.

“Doctor Smith is just trying to help you, sweetheart,” he said in a sympathetic tone. “I know she is.”

“Yeah? Well, she can help my empty bed.” With that, Donna’s attempts proved fruitful and she successfully jimmied open the door. “Ha!”

“Donna…”

She stepped out into the corridor, and shut the door behind her, flipping the lock shut—it was clear Granddad was probably going to dob her in—and waggled her fingers into the window, at his pouting face.

“Toodles, Gramps. Merry bloody Christmas!”

She began walking away, pulling from her pocket her phone, which she’d pilfered from her mother’s handbag earlier.

Who should I call? she wondered. Someone needed to be able to come get her—wherever she was. Shaun Temple, maybe? He’d gone on a couple of successful dates with her. He was a looker, too.

But, she supposed, she needed to figure out where she was before calling.

As she made a move to find an exit, she heard something coming from the room next to the one she’d been in. She peered into the window. It was dark, but she could make out a figure on a bed much like the one she’d been in, burying his head in his knees.

The poor bloke was crying. Well, she figured, if there was someone else trapped in here like she was, maybe she should give him the chance to get out of here too. He certainly didn’t look like he was having a good time in here.

She unlocked and opened the door, peeking inside.

“Hello?” she said, flipping on the light switch. “You alright in ’ere, mate?”

The man’s head whipped up to her, and his mouth fell open.

He’s not half bad looking, is he? she thought as she appreciated the man’s chiseled good looks and distinguished tuft of white hair hanging over his forehead. Just the right sort of age, too. Of course, he would have looked a bit cuter without the blotchy, tear-stained face.

But somewhere in the back of her mind, she thought she recognised that face. Perhaps she’d seen him around.

“Could hear your sobs from out in the hall, you know,” she said with a smirk. “Not that I’m against men crying. It’s rather endearing. Look, I’m in the midst of a bit of an escape here—wanna come along?”

He stared another moment, before wiping at his eyes. “Y-you shouldn’t be in here,” he finally said.

Oh, he’s American. How international.

“Neither should you. Come on!” She pointed a thumb to the door. “Let’s blow this joint!” She moved to the bed and held out a hand. “Come with me. It’s not healthy to be stuck alone in a room on Christmas. We can find a pub and have a nice drink.”

The man took a calculated look at her face, then her hand, then the door, then back to her face. Then he took her hand and allowed her to help him up.

“Listen… I—”

“You can thank me later. Let’s just get out of here. I’m Donna, by the way.”

“…I’m Sam.”

She looked back at him with a tilted head. “Huh. I think I had a dream about a Sam last night. Didn’t look like you, though.”

“Uh, well, you know… it’s a common name.”

“Yeah, s’pose it is,” she muttered as she led him out into the corridor, and followed signs to the exit. Sam was wordless as she pulled him along, but she could just feel the discomfort coming from him.

Donna wondered what was the matter with him. Well, whatever it was, she was sure that being locked into some sterile white room in the dark wasn’t helping things.

As they reached an exit, she carefully cracked open the door to see if the coast was clear.

“Ah, good old Christmas,” she whispered back to Sam with a grin. “Everyone’s gone home.”

She pulled his wrist as they left the building, and she glanced around at the grass fields and single roads extending in each direction.

“Where the hell are we?” she mumbled.

Sam pulled back on her. “You know, we should really go back—”

Donna gave him a look. “Not a chance, sunshine. You can go if you really want to stay cooped up in there, crying by yourself.”

Sam shook his head. “I can’t leave you alone…”

“Well then, come on!” she said, tugging him along as she picked a direction and started walking.

It was after about five minutes of hiking into the rolling hills that a little country pub loomed in the distance.

“There we are, I knew we’d find something!” she said, grinning. “Let’s go find out where we are.”

Sam had an apprehensive look on his face as they approached the quaint little establishment, which was called the Angel’s Harp Inn.

As Donna dragged Sam into the doors of the pub, she felt him tense up even more. She turned to him and saw that he was staring intensely at the man behind the bar, who was in casual discussion with a patron.

“You alright?” she asked him. Maybe this guy was a bit unstable, she thought.

He seemed to snap out of the look he was giving, and his eyes flicked to hers.

“Uh… sure. I’m okay. Would you excuse me a minute?”

Donna let go of his wrist. “Yeah, alright. I have to go to the ladies’ room anyway.” She took a step towards the restrooms before turning back to him, pointing a finger of warning. “You’d better be here when I get back. I want to get to know you better. Do us a favour and order me a Pinot Grigio, if you could.” She flashed him a flirtatious smile and handed him a twenty pound note that she’d stolen from her mother before continuing onward.

As she got into the bathroom, she pulled out her phone and scrolled through her contacts to Shaun, before finally deciding against calling him. After all, she was with another guy. She’d have to talk her way out of how that looked—no thanks.

She could probably get the barman to ring up for a taxi.

But who was this stranger she’d quite literally dragged along on her adventure, anyway? She couldn’t wait to find out.

Chapter 26

Womanly Wiles

As Sam watched Donna head into the restroom, he pinched the bridge of his nose and squeezed his eyes closed.

What a mess. Just what was he supposed to do now with Donna running around outside the confines of her hospital room? She had no idea of the danger she was in.

With a deep breath, he approached the bar and slapped his hand down on its surface, garnering the Bartender’s attention. He peeled off from the man he’d been chatting with, and smiled at Sam.

“Afternoon, Sam.”

“Why did you do this to me?” Sam asked in as calm a voice as he could muster. He didn’t know if there were any ‘real’ people in this pub, but he didn’t want to make a scene if there were.

“Do what?”

“Oh, stop it. We both know all of this was your grand design.” Sam leaned forward, lowering his voice. “I feel like I’m losing my mind. Is that part of your plan too?”

“I gave you all the tools you need to help people,” the Bartender said with a smile; Sam couldn’t tell if it was genuine or not. “That’s all you wanted to do, right?”

Sam clawed at his hair. “Having all this knowledge dumped in my head… it’s too much. I never asked for this.”

“You chose to take the knowledge, didn’t you?” The Bartender winked. “I just made sure you had that choice.”

“Some choice!” Sam scoffed. “It was the only way that allowed Donna to survive. What was I supposed to do?”

The Bartender held out his hands. “The right thing, of course. And you did it without hesitation. That proves to me you’ve earned the upgrade.”

“Upgrade?” Sam scowled. “Yeah, sure feels like an upgrade alright. I don’t know what memories are mine and what aren’t at this point.”

“Don’t worry so much, Sam,” the Bartender chuckled. “It’s natural to have some mental instability while settling into a regeneration. You’ll pull through.”

Sam’s eyes popped open wide. “I’m sorry, what?”

The Bartender put a finger to his lips, and nodded towards the bathroom door, where Donna was emerging.

“Pinot Grigio, coming right up,” he said, raiding a refrigerator behind the bar for a bottle of white wine.

Donna approached Sam, and leaned on the bar beside him.

“So…” she said, casually placing a hand under her chin and, to Sam’s best guess, possibly trying to make herself look flirtatious, “…you’re American, are you?”

“Uh… yeah,” Sam confirmed. “I’ve spent a lot of time in London, though,” he added. In fact, now he knew so much about London through history that he might as well have grown up in the place.

“That’s fascinating,” Donna said, running a finger over his collar. “What brought you here? Or rather, what brought you to that hospital we both came from?”

Sam tensed up. He probably should have thought of something earlier.

“Uh, memory issues,” he said quietly.

“You too?” Donna said.

The Bartender placed a glass of wine each in front of her and Sam, and left the bottle, giving Sam a wink before he wandered away from them. Donna picked up her glass and took a sip, maintaining eye contact with Sam.

“Is Doctor Smith treating you too?” she continued.

“Uh, yeah.”

“Do you think she’s—” Donna leaned in, “—above board?”

Sam squinted. “What do you mean, exactly?”

“Well, she had us locked into our rooms, didn’t she? That seems a bit suspect to me. What if we’re test subjects? What if she, or whoever she works for, is behind what’s been happening to us?”

She placed a sensual hand on his bicep, and squeezed it. “Blimey, you have firm muscles.”

Sam, now thoroughly uncomfortable, stepped away from her, and held up his hands defensively. “Uh, listen, I’m flattered. Really. But—”

“Oh bollocks, let me guess: you’re gay.” She slapped a palm to her face. “Not again! Ah Donna, you sure can pick ’em!”

“Actually, I’m married…” Sam corrected. “But listen! I’m sure you’d be a catch for some lucky guy! Just… maybe not me.”

Donna squinted, eyeing his hands. “If you’re married, then where’s your wedding ring?”

“Uhh… well, you know. I had one of my, um, forgetfulness episodes, and I don’t know what happened to it.”

Donna didn’t look at all convinced, but returned to her wine. She upended the glass and gulped what was there, until it was empty. Then she poured herself another.

“Well, at least you were a gentleman about my… advances,” she said, cheeks flushing. Sam wasn’t sure if it was embarrassment or the alcohol. Maybe both. “Where’s your wife now?”

Sam bit his lip. “Uh, she’s over in the States, I guess.”

“You guess?”

“Memory,” he said, tapping his head. Well, at least that was a convenient excuse.

Donna snorted. “It’s good to meet someone who understands what I’ve been going through,” she said with a sigh. “I’ve forgotten so much, I might as well not even have lived the past year.”

“I do understand,” Sam said. “There was a time I couldn’t remember I even had a wife.”

“Really?” Donna’s eyes widened. “Oh hell, what if I’m in a committed relationship right now and I don’t even remember?” She took another large swig of her wine. Out of politeness, Sam also had a little from his glass.

As he put his glass down, he realised that she had pulled out a cell phone and was tapping buttons. Sam’s chest tightened as he saw it. He couldn’t let her use the thing and risk being exposed to the signal.

“Uh, w-what are you doing?” he stammered.

“I have to check on a bloke I was casually dating and see if our relationship’s progressed at all,” she said, and started to draw the phone to her ear. Sam plucked it out of her hand in a quick movement and hung up the call.

“Oi!” Donna cried, “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Well… uh…”

“Give me that—” Donna lunged for Sam, but as she reached him, instead of grabbing for the phone, she kind of just collapsed onto him. As Sam looked down at her, he realised she’d lost consciousness.

“What the…?”

“I activated the implant,” the Bartender said, holding up what appeared to be a sonic… corkscrew.

“Implant…” Sam looked down at his arm, recalling the remotely activated sedative capsule Martha had implanted under the skin of his arm. It must have transferred into Donna when he leaped out of her. He looked up at the Bartender. “Thanks, I guess.”

He gently pulled Donna’s sleeping form to a booth against the wall of the pub, where he propped her up on the seat.

None of the other patrons paid mind to this, so either the two of them had been cloaked by a perception filter, or all of the other people here were mere autons. Sam wouldn’t have put either option past the Bartender.

The Bartender in question approached, carrying over the wine that had been left at the bar.

“Here. I wouldn’t offer the lady any more wine, though. She looks like she’s had enough.” He winked.

*        *        *

“And you’re sure this will be harmless?” Sylvia asked nervously, looking with great suspicion at the nebuliser.

“Mostly harmless,” the Doctor said with a bright grin. “Side effects of Artron energy may include mild dizziness, déjà vu, and—in rare cases—psychic awakenings. Your family doesn’t have a history of premonitions, does it?”

“Oh, I don’t know why I trust you, Doctor,” Sylvia muttered, frowning.

“Must be my honest face. Now come on, then. Deep breaths.”

Martha and Mickey looked at one another with a private smirk.

With a trepidatious glance at Martha, Sylvia donned the respiration mask. Martha helped fasten it, and the Doctor switched on the machine.

And then, Martha received an alert on her communicator from Donna’s call button.

“I’d better go see what Donna needs,” she said, heading out the door.

A minute later, she rushed back in with bad news.

Chapter 27

Lost and Found

Sam slumped in the seat of the booth, across the table from the sleeping Donna. He grasped her hand as she snored.

“You just sleep it off,” he said, “and… sorry.”

He took his wine and finished it, before emptying the rest of the bottle into his glass.

The Bartender slid into the booth beside him. “Well Sam, now’s your opportunity to talk to me. Shoot.”

“She won’t be out for very long, will she?” Sam said with a sigh. He peered down at Donna’s phone, and began to scroll through the contacts. Finding the entry for ‘Doctor Smith,’ he hesitated, and looked up at the Bartender. Well, it was now or—perhaps—never.

“What am I?” he asked quietly.

The Bartender raised his eyebrows, grinning. “Nothing that’s ever existed before! Pretty neat, right?” He leaned over and ruffled Sam’s hair. “But hey, you’ve always been on a different wavelength to the rest. I believe they called yours a once-in-a-generation mind, didn’t they? The next Einstein?”

“Hmph.” Sam combed his fingers through his hair in an effort to straighten it. “I don’t think Albert Einstein ever knew about the silver-leaved trees on a planet that no longer exists.”

“No, but he did learn a thing or two from me.” the Bartender chuckled. “Come to think of it, he’s where I picked up my name.”

Sam didn’t know whether or not to believe that, so he decided not to entertain the idea.

“So you’ve been putting me through all these years of leaping, making me something… inhuman. For what? Just for fun?”

“Well, it was fun,” the Bartender conceded. “But look at all you’ve done, Sam. It’s been a pleasure to see the work you’ve been doing; saving lives, helping others. Making the future of the human race brighter. You are still human. You just have a few new… improvements. Call it evolution.”

“Improvements?”

The Bartender waggled his eyebrows, but didn’t elaborate.

“And I suppose you have more plans for me, now that you’ve… quote-unquote ‘upgraded’ me?” Sam silently pleaded for him to say ‘no.’

“I’ve laid out a path,” the Bartender said with a flourish, “and you can refuse—you’ve always had that choice, Sam. But something tells me you won’t.”

Sam sighed. “You’re not going to tell me, are you?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t want to spoil things,” he said, giving that enigmatic smile he was so good at. “But I’ll give you a hint: when the time comes, you won’t have to wait for the Doctor.”

With that, he pulled himself to his feet.

“Don’t bother calling, by the way. I’ll take us back.”

Against the wall of Donna’s now empty hospital room, a cabinet appeared out of nowhere, accompanied by a groaning noise. As the doors opened, Sam spilled out, carrying Donna awkwardly.

He looked up to the Bartender inside, who waved at him.

“Until next time, Sam.” With that, he pulled the doors shut. A moment later, the cabinet faded away like it was never there.

Sam wrestled with Donna’s limp form to return her to her bed, and, after pressing the Call button, took a seat on the chair by the bed.

He melted into it, exhausted. He still hadn’t slept since Martha had told him to. Not for lack of trying. But now, he found his eyelids drooping as he sat in the chair, and moments later he dozed off.

*        *        *

Sam awoke to a pillow slapping him in the face. He jumped, and looked around in confusion, before spotting Donna preparing to lob another pillow towards him.

“Wh-what are you—” he mumbled, still trying to comprehend what was happening.

“How did we get back here? Did you drug me?!” Donna accused, chucking the pillow. Sam managed to catch it, and held onto it in case he needed a shield from more projectiles.

“Take it easy!” he cried. “I can honestly say I did not drug you… I promise!”

She rubbed her temples. “God, what a headache. You’d better not be lying, you… you shifty Muppet!”

“Alright Donna, simmer down,” Martha said, entering the room with her tranq gun pointed at the angry redhead. “Or I’ll shoot you with another dose.” She met Sam’s eye, giving him a knowing look.

“So it was you,” Donna snarled. “I’ve had it up to here with being treated this way, Doctor Smith. If you even are a doctor. I demand to be released!”

Martha didn’t flinch.

“Doctor Beckett, why don’t you step out into the corridor?” she said, gesturing with her head.

“Wait, he’s a doctor too?” Donna asked, brow furrowed. “Oh, don’t tell me he works here. No bloody wonder you found me.” She groaned, and laid back on the bed, defeated.

Sam stood and moved to her side.

“For what it’s worth, Doctor Smith does have your best interests at heart. I promise.”

“What else were you lying about? You don’t have memory problems? I bet you’re not married either.”

“No, all that’s true,” Sam said quietly. Well, it was mostly true. Maybe not the specifics of what he’d said, but the general idea. “Please, Donna. Trust her.”

Donna glared at Martha. “Trust the lady pointin’ a gun at me.” She rolled her eyes. “I’d sooner trust that mechanic who tried to charge me for a new set of tyres when I put in for an oil change.”

Martha lowered the tranq gun. “I’m sorry this has happened, Donna. It’s just when patients with certain memory conditions wander off, a lot of the time they end up lost, in an unfamiliar environment, and sometimes they die. I didn’t want that to happen to you.”

Donna glared at Martha. “Are you saying I have Alzheimer’s or something?”

“We don’t know what you have exactly,” Martha lied, “but we can’t be too careful, not so soon after an… episode.”

Donna’s eyes welled up, and she began to sob. “What the bloody hell is wrong with me?” she wailed.

Sam sat on the side of the bed and wrapped his arms around her.

“Hey…” he murmured. “It’s okay. See, crying’s nice and cathartic, right? That’s why I was doing it.”

He reached into his pocket, and handed her the twenty pounds she’d given him earlier. Donna smirked at it, and plucked it out of his hand, before laying her head on Sam’s chest.

“Well, if I had to cry,” she said between sniffles, “at least I have a tall man with strong arms consoling me.” She tried to laugh, but it came out more as a mangled sob.

Sam glanced up at Martha, who grimaced and gestured for the door.

“You’re needed in—um—pathology, Doctor Beckett.”

Sam gave Donna a final squeeze before prying himself away from her.

“I’ll come see you later if you want,” he said. “Just promise me you’ll be here when I do.”

Donna wiped at her nose. “Oh, alright. But I’ll need more magazines.”

“I can do that,” Martha said with a smile.

Chapter 28

Phone Home

“What happened?” Martha hissed as she locked the door. “Where did you go? And, perhaps more confusingly, how did you get back?!”

Sam rubbed his eyes, shaking his head. “Well, she got out—I don’t know how—and saw me in the other room. She asked me to escape with her… I had to tag along, didn’t I? Otherwise she could have just vanished into the hills. And I wasn’t about to physically restrain her.”

“But you did activate the implant. How?” Martha asked.

“It wasn’t me. It was the Bartender.”

Martha gave a wave to Mickey, who had rounded a corner and was heading for the two. “Can you stand guard? We have an escape artist on our hands.”

“You got it, boss,” Mickey said with a wink, as Sam and Martha headed for the lab.

“What bartender?” Martha continued, staring at Sam blankly.

“Uh, the Monk. Same guy. The point is, he did it as soon as she was about to make a phone call. And then he brought us back here in his TARDIS.”

“So he is a good guy?”

Sam wasn’t terribly sure how to answer that.

“Well, he certainly sees himself as such,” he finally said. “He has this whole—” he gestured wildly, “—master plan for me, and he won’t tell me a damn thing. But he seems intent on my continuing to help people… which I guess is good. I’m just really tired of being used, you know?”

Martha mulled this over thoughtfully. “So you’re basically his errand boy.”

Sam snorted. “Something like that.”

“What happens if you refuse to do it any longer?”

“He claims I’d be allowed to stop, but he doesn’t think I will. So I guess he’s going to be giving me another one of those so-called ‘choices’ that aren’t really any choice at all.”

Sam shivered, with thoughts of Mount Vesuvius coming to mind. Donna and the Doctor had faced a choice then: of causing the eruption that would destroy Pompeii, or allowing humanity to be wiped out. Choices of that magnitude in the hands of two people—what if that was the sort of thing the Bartender had in store for Sam? What a horrific burden, atop a mountain of previous burdens that Sam couldn’t get out of his head. Memories upon memories of terrible choices.

While leaping, he’d killed people—always out of necessity, but it still weighed on him. And he still hadn’t truly processed the angel memories, either. There was a time when that part of him had lost so much of his identity that he operated primarily as a part of a hivemind, except for corners of his mind that flooded with guilt upon every successful feed. Just not enough to stop himself when the hunger came. This was why he hadn’t wanted to rejoin with Sam again—and maybe one day, he’d come to terms with it.

But even beyond the burdens of the memories from the many lives of Sam Beckett, stood an ocean of the Doctor’s actions throughout his long life, which loomed large over his own.

He didn’t want to think about it. And he frankly didn’t think he had the right to make such consequential decisions, if indeed such things were intended for him.

As they approached the lab door, the Doctor burst out of it, face serious.

“I thought I heard the pair of you out here,” he said, tapping his sonic screwdriver against his hand. “Is Donna alright?”

“She’s fine,” Sam reassured him. “And… I guess we have the Monk to thank for that. He brought her back.”

“But we need to move quickly,” Martha interjected, “because Donna’s patience is running thin, and there’s no telling when she’ll try to get out of here again, or get her hands on a phone.”

“Well then, you’re in luck,” the Doctor said, tapping the sonic screwdriver to Martha’s nose. “We’re ready to trace the signal.”

With that, he waved them into the lab, where Wilf and Sylvia were sitting at a table, worried looks on their faces.

“Alright, boys and girls,” the Doctor announced. “Donna’s safe and sound, so let’s get to it!” He pointed his sonic at Wilf. “Wilf, you go back to Donna’s room… and try not to let her run off again, will you?”

“Oh, and grab some extra magazines from the on-call room for her, yeah?” Martha added.

Wilf gave a nod and a salute. “Aye aye!” he said, and marched out of the room.

The Doctor moved his attention to Sylvia.

“Alright, Sylvia Noble, all I need from you now is your esteemed presence while I do some sciency-wyency things. So sit tight.”

He held out a hand. “Who’s got a phone I can borrow?”

Sam was the first to respond, pulling Donna’s phone from his pocket and handing it over.

“Brilliant, this’ll do nicely. Now, Sam, I want you to—” he hesitated as he watched Sam tapping away on a computer keyboard, writing a tracing algorithm. He leaned over his shoulder, studying the complex code. “Oh. Yes, keep doing that. Good job.”

“Don’t you have a phone to work on?” Sam asked with a smirk, eyes still on the screen.

“Don’t get clever!” the Doctor said with a laugh, before turning to Martha as he began to take apart the phone. “Martha, I need copper wires. Red coated ones.”

“Red? Why?”

He donned his glasses. “Because red facilitates the correct spectrum of subatomic—oh, you’re not buying that load of codswallop, are you? I’m in a ‘red’ kind of mood, that’s why.”

“Red wires it is, then,” she said simply, and vanished out the door.

As he worked, Sam felt a hand come down on his shoulder. “How are you feeling, Sam?” the Doctor asked quietly in his ear.

Sam took a moment to respond, filling the silence with the clacking of his deft typing.

“How do you feel most of the time?” he finally muttered.

“I’m sorry,” the Doctor replied.

“No point dwelling on it now, I guess. What’s done is done.”

“That’s the spirit. The only way is forward.”

“Onwards and upwards, right?”

“Good man.” The Doctor gave him a pat on the back, and returned to his work.

As the room filled with the chirping of the sonic screwdriver punctuated by keyboard strikes, Sam was well aware that for both of them, embracing such a philosophy was easier said than done.

*        *        *

With the phone wired up to the lab computer, the Doctor handed it to Sylvia.

“Alright, Sylvia, now it’s all up to you. Phone a friend.”

Sylvia looked down at the phone, wincing. “You know, our lives were so simple before you and your ruddy old box showed up, Doctor. Now I’m taking drugs and getting some virus planted in my head just to keep Donna safe.”

The Doctor looked wounded. “Yeah, I know. I’m sorry.”

“Well that’s not fair,” Sam cut in. “If it weren’t for him, Donna would have been killed by the Racnoss two years ago—followed by everyone else, might I add.”

“Who even are you, anyhow?” Sylvia asked him, her eyes narrow.

“Doesn’t matter. Just…” he trailed off, gesturing to the phone insistently. “Don’t worry, we’ve rerouted the audio output to the computer, so you won’t have the signal blasted into your ear.”

Sylvia sighed in defeat, and dialled up the speaking clock. As she brought it to her ear, all in the room waited tensely. Martha and Sam watched the computer monitor that visualised the incoming audio along with other data, while the Doctor kept his sonic screwdriver pointed at the phone.

“At the third stroke, the time will be five twenty-two and thirty seconds…” The audio was silent, but Sam could somehow make out, through the visualisation of the sound waves, what was being said.  He could only assume it was a skill the Doctor’s mind gave him.

Beep. Beep… screech!

“There’s the signal!”

Sam’s eyes flicked to the stream of encoded data coming through, which were translated by his code to readable information, and subsequently processed to trace the signal back to a set of spacial coordinates, and finally plugged into a GPS system.

“We have a lock.”

Sam, Martha, and the Doctor gathered around the satellite map as it generated.

“Wait, is that the Golden Gate Bridge…?” Martha murmured.

“I know that place!” Sam and the Doctor blurted out simultaneously.

The pinpointed location was a nondescript building by the docks, in San Francisco. A place where UNIT had, eight years prior, been experimenting with hybrid computers.

Sam exchanged a startled glance with the Doctor.

“Blimey…” Sam mumbled.

“Pardon me, you lot! Can I hang up now?” Sylvia asked from across the room.

Chapter 29

Parting Ways

Donna chucked another magazine on the floor with a groan.

“These are all five years old, Gramps,” she complained. “I’ve read them all before, even the one about Prince Charles’s illegitimate half-alien baby. For once I wish my memory of something would sod off, just so I could read something that feels new.”

“I’m afraid that’s all I could get my hands on, Donna,” Wilf said with a broad shrug. “But I’m open for a bit of chitchat. How about that? Or, what about we sing some Christmas carols? I’ve got quite a repertoire.”

“No offence, but I’m not much in the mood for Jingle Bells a la Mott,” Donna said with a wry smile. “Thanks, but no thanks.”

Wilf offered an apologetic smile, and stood from his seat, planting himself on the bed beside her.

“Donna, listen…” he said, putting his arm over her shoulders, “I think things are going to improve for you, starting tomorrow.”

“And why do you say that?”

“It’s just a feeling I have. They’re going to sort you out here, and we’ll take you home, and you’ll have a terrific 2009. I feel it in my old man bones.”

“Well you’d better watch those old man bones, because this bed is only big enough for one of us, and I don’t intend to be the one who falls out,” Donna said with a grin. “But I don’t share your optimism, Granddad. I thought my memory problems were finished, but I just lost another couple of weeks. What’s to say that won’t happen again?”

Wilf thought for a moment, then spoke. “Maybe you can keep a diary. Write in it every day. Then, if you forget something, you’ll at least have a record of what you missed.”

“Oh right, diary of a temp,” Donna scoffed, “the most boring diary of all time.” She shook her head. “I try to imagine my future, and all I can see is spreadsheets and letterheads and a different boss every flipping week, underpaying me. Oh, and an endless string of ‘Mister Wrongs’ in the evenings.”

“Well, if you ask me, all you’ve got to do is fight the future you don’t want, and try and shape it into something you do.”

“Look at you, all sage wisdom today,” Donna said, giving her grandfather a nudge with her elbow. “You must be getting old.”

Wilf chuckled. “I’ve lived a life or two. Can’t get out of it without at least a handful of wisdom to share.”

“Well, thanks, old man. I hope you’re right.”

“Of course I am!” He squeezed her, and climbed off the bed, returning to his seat. “You sure you don’t want to sing something? Silent Night?”

Donna laughed. “I’m feeling more ‘silent night’ in the literal sense than the musical,” she said with a grin. She leaned back in the bed. “Granddad, I really want to make a phone call. Remember Shaun? He hasn’t heard from me in three weeks that I can remember. What if we’ve had more dates and I can’t remember? I can’t leave him hanging.”

“No phones allowed, Donna. Interferes with—”

“Oh, that’s nonsense. You know how they make you turn off your phone on a plane because it supposedly interferes with the equipment? That’s rubbish, too, you know!”

“It’s the electromagnetism,” Wilf explained. “Same kind of force as what’s being measured in your brain.  It’s all electrical pulses, you know. Put a phone to your head and the sensors will go all haywire.”

Donna gave him a cynical look. “Did Doctor Smith tell you that?”

“I told you, I’ve picked up some wisdom here and there,” he said proudly. “I’m sure Shaun will forgive you. You can call him soon as you get out of here. Okay?”

“Oh, all bloody right,” Donna sighed, and retrieved a magazine from the floor. “Righto, Charles, what kind of strange old alien did you hook up with? Other than Camilla?”

*        *        *

A wide-eyed Sam met Martha’s gaze as what they were looking at sunk in.

“What is it?” Martha asked.

“Martha, I think UNIT owns this building,” he said quietly. “The Doctor stumbled on them trying to create a hybrid computer back in 2000. Exactly the kind of neural computer that might be capable of inserting programming into our brains…”

Martha glared back at him, incredulous. “No, they wouldn’t do something like this to us.” She glanced at the Doctor. “Would they? Not without asking, surely.”

The Doctor frowned. “Only one way to find out, isn’t there?” He turned on his heel, and headed for the door.

Sam and Martha stole another glance at one another, before both turned to follow him out.

“Wait… am I finished here?” Sylvia called out.

“You can go,” Martha called out as she left the room.

“Doctor, I’ve seen the San Francisco UNIT facility,” Martha persisted as she power-walked to catch up to the Doctor’s long strides. “But it’s not that building.”

“Well, I’ve been there,” the Doctor said, turning around and walking backwards as he spoke. “And it makes a gobsmacking amount of sense that the signal is coming from there.” He was furious as he spun back around.

“Let’s not jump to conclusions,” Sam added. “The last time you were there, they weren’t even in control of the place.”

The Doctor eyed Sam, lips a straight line. “Isn’t it extremely interesting that the Monk was there then too, though?”

Sam rubbed his forehead. “Well, if this is all his design, it’s hardly a coincidence. But that version of him didn’t even know about me yet.”

The Doctor nodded, rubbing his chin, and turned to Martha. “Listen, could you go ring up whoever’s in charge here these days and see if they know anything? Meanwhile I’ll swing by San Francisco and see if I can’t destroy everything they’ve built there for violating us all on a fundamental level. Sound good?”

“Sounds fantastic,” Martha said, and headed for her office. “Be safe,” she called out to the Doctor before disappearing around a corner.

“Oh, never,” the Doctor said with a sadness-tinged smile, and turned to continue to the exit.

“Can I come with you?” Sam asked. “I’ve been there too—well, kind of. I can help.”

The Doctor clenched his teeth, inhaling through them. “Best not. I try not to take passengers into danger these days. Surely you understand?”

Sam deflated. “Oh. Okay. There must be some way for me to help, though.”

“Tell you what,” the Doctor continued, “why don’t you see if you can remotely access their servers? If you can destroy the data they’ve collected from here, then it might save me some work on the other side.”

Sam nodded. “Sure, I can do that.”

The Doctor placed an affectionate hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Sam Beckett, it’s been brilliant.”

“You’re not planning to come back, are you?” Sam said, seeing the look in his eyes.

“Onwards and upwards,” the Doctor replied, as if that was all that needed to be said.

Sam smiled. “Well, I guess until next time… goodbye, Doctor.”

“You think there’ll be a next time, do you?”

“You don’t feel it? I don’t know how, but I know.” It was the same feeling he had when he’d first seen Alia ‘die’—somewhere deep within, he knew he’d see her again, too.

The Doctor squinted at him. “Well, I’m not one to argue with nebulous gut feelings. In my experience, they more often than not turn out right. So, I suppose I’ll see you around.”

He continued down the hall, taking one final look back at Sam with a cheerful wave, before busting open the doors and trotting away to the parking lot.

Sam slowly turned, and headed for Donna’s room so he could enlist Mickey’s assistance in his task.

Chapter 30

Intruder Window

The Doctor had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach as he closed the TARDIS doors behind him, and he couldn’t quite pinpoint why.

Was it loneliness? He’d vowed to travel alone from here on out—so nobody else would suffer the inevitably detrimental effects of being near him—but he had to admit he would frequently find himself talking out of habit, only to remember that he was by himself. Well, that wasn’t strictly true. He had the TARDIS. She was always there, listening. Even if she couldn’t talk back.

If not loneliness, then what? Guilt? Well, he always had that. But maybe it was leaving Sam, when he’d promised to get the man home. He was in his own aura now, he could just be taken home to 2000 in the TARDIS, easy as pie.

But his Time Lord senses were tingling—something told him that was not a good idea, though he wasn’t quite sure why that would be. Certainly, the Monk had a connection to all of these goings on, and perhaps that was what was raising his hackles.

And as he attempted to land the TARDIS in the facility where he had once encountered that other Time Lord, it refused to materialise.

“What are you doing that for?” he mumbled to the time machine, frowning. “Don’t be difficult now. Hardly the time for this sort of nonsense.”

He was getting similar readings to the time he attempted to land her inside the Project Quantum Leap complex. Some kind of radium ring inside was messing with the controls.

“Easy does it, dear,” he murmured to the console, steering away from the area of effect.

The closest the TARDIS would allow him to land was at the water’s edge about forty metres from the building.

He stepped out, and very nearly stepped off the concrete dock and into the San Francisco Bay. He barely caught himself before he took an involuntary dip in the frigid waters, and glanced around in the hopes nobody had seen that unfortunate stumble.

“Well, there’s a new advantage to being alone,” he mumbled, and turned towards the facility, assessing his options for entry.

Security was significantly beefed up since his last visit. Razor wire atop concrete walls surrounded it, and there were a pair of nondescript-looking men with large guns standing guard at the singular entrance.

Well, that was a pain. Still, there were few places he couldn’t bluff his way into. He pulled his psychic paper from his coat pocket, and strolled up to the guards.

“Morning, men,” he said, flipping the wallet open, “UNIT Health and Safety, here for an inspection. Yes, I know it’s Christmas. You can never know when a safety violation’s been committed, I always say. The wife threatened to leave me if I went to work today, but I told her firmly that worker safety is worth more than our marriage. I’ll be ringing in the new year with divorce papers, but it’s all worth it to keep folks like you safe on the job, it is.”

The men looked at one another, wide eyed.

“Oh my god, it’s him!” one of them murmured, mouth ajar.

“Dude, it is him…” the other said. “The Doctor!”

“Ah, that figures,” the Doctor said. He shrugged and pocketed the psychic paper. “Well since you know who I am, let’s skip the pleasantries. Who’s in charge, and when can I see ’em?”

“Um, I’m sorry sir,” said the guard on the left, “but we’re under specific orders to take you into custody if you turned up.”

The two men aimed their weapons at him.

“Come with us, sir,” said the guard on the right. “Sorry.”

The Doctor frowned. “So you’re taking me inside?”

“Yes, Mister Doctor, sir…”

“Well, looks like our goals are aligned, then. You can lower the guns; can’t stand having guns pointed at me, and UNIT would surely want me alive. Not much use to them as a corpse. I’ll come quietly—well I say that, but I’ll probably talk your ears off all the way, so it won’t be so quiet. Did your superiors happen to mention how much I like to talk?”

“Yes, sir.”

*        *        *

“I’ve never heard of this place, but if it’s connected to the UNIT systems, we’ll be able to find a way in,” Mickey said as he typed away at the computer terminal. “That’s if we can find the sodding network location. I don’t know what I’m looking for.”

Sam leaned over him, watching him navigate the network of UNIT facilities throughout the world.

He found himself wishing he had a sonic screwdriver of his own. He suspected it would make short work of this process. Still, he sat atop a mountain of computer knowledge, and it wasn’t just because of what the Doctor knew. Sam had developed and built Ziggy, and she was still far more sophisticated in most ways than the technology of 2008.

He sat down at another terminal, and began rapidly writing up a script that would trawl the network for markers of the code in the signal that had been transcribed during Sylvia’s phone call.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he said. Mickey rolled his chair over to Sam’s monitor and stared, open-mouthed, at his script.

“Bloody hell,” he breathed. “You really do have the Doctor’s mind.”

“Actually, this is all me,” Sam said smugly.

“Oh right, you wrote that program to trace my plates when we first met,” he said. “Man, I’m jealous.”

“Jealous of what?” came Martha’s curious voice as she entered the lab.

“The Nobel-Prize-winning genius,” Mickey replied. “Putting me out of a job.”

Martha gave a wry smile. “Well, that might be for the best at this point. I just spoke with the bosses and we’ve been given orders from the top to drop this whole investigation.”

“The top?” Sam questioned.

“United Nations Headquarters in New York.” Martha spat out. “As if I didn’t put my neck on the line for them. Short bloody memory.”

“Well, I’m not giving up,” said Mickey. “To hell with the big wigs. Let’s just see those useless bellends try and stop us.”

Sam peered up at Martha. “I’m seeing this through until this thing is out of all our heads.”

“I was hoping you’d say that,” Martha said to the two men, her expression brightening.

Sam slapped the Enter key, and the script began to run. “Now we wait.”

*        *        *

“We’ll need your coat,” the guard said as the Doctor was led to a large cage. He was dismayed to note that it was reinforced with a number of varied materials—steel, wood, thick bulletproof glass, and concrete.

“Blimey, you have covered your bases,” he remarked, in an almost-impressed tone, as his coat was pulled from him and another guard began to pat him down.

“Found the sonic screwdriver,” the young man said a moment later, pulling the Doctor’s precious tool from his trouser pocket.

“Excellent,” said another man who now stood in the doorway. “Make sure you check those pockets thoroughly; they’re deeper than they look.”

“And who are you?” the Doctor asked, turning his head to study the man. “Don’t suppose you’re in charge of this operation?”

“Name’s Thomas Jessop,” the man said, his large brown eyes looking the Doctor up and down. “And no, I’m not in charge. But we’ll be getting well-acquainted all the same. Pleasure to meet you in the flesh, Doctor. I honestly thought it would take you longer to sniff us out.”

The man was quite young-looking—couldn’t have been older than twenty-five. He was African American, his bald head reflecting the overhead lights. He wore a bright red suit and black tie; obviously not one of the low tier grunts.

“Well-acquainted, you say?” the Doctor remarked. “Blimey, how easy do you think I am? Take me out to dinner first.”

Thomas let out a girlish giggle. “Ooh, you’re just as witty as they say. I’ll be looking forward to our talk later. Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you—unless you want me to.” He winked, and the Doctor cringed.

Thomas’s attention turned to the guards. “Make sure the cell is deadlocked, would you?”

The Doctor frowned as the man disappeared out the door of the dark room, and he was unceremoniously shoved into the cell and the door slammed behind him, which he heard bolt shut in numerous locations and in numerous materials.

The Doctor gripped one of the bars, locking eyes with one of the guards.

“Well, I can check ‘enter the building’ off my to-do list,” he said, “but the rest might have to wait a while, unless you fellows are in the mood for betraying your superiors today?” he waited a beat. “No? Nobody?” He made a show of crossing his arms. “Fine, be that way. But I can promise you’ll wish you did once I’m done annoying you.”

*        *        *

“Hi Mum,” Martha said, her phone at her ear. “I’m so sorry, but something’s come up at work and I won’t make it to dinner.”

“Martha, you can’t be serious! What could be—”

“Mum. You know the kind of work I do. This is big-time serious. Lives in the balance, that kind of thing? Believe me, I’d love to be eating your Christmas turkey right about now—promise. But it’s important and urgent, what I’m doing.”

Her mother sighed deeply. “Alright. You be safe.”

“The only thing that isn’t safe about me right now might be my job. But I’ll talk to you about that later, Mum. Tell everyone I love them and I’ll see them soon, yeah?”

“Okay, Martha. We love you too.”

“Bye, Mum.” Martha hung up with a resigned sigh, and returned her attention to the work Mickey and Sam were doing at the computer.

Sam cracked his knuckles, leaning back in his chair.

“We’re in!” he announced.

Mickey laughed. “Good lord, it’s like you’re a hacker from a film.” He peered at the screen, where Sam had cut into the feeds of each CCTV camera, which were cycling through one at a time.

A courtyard, where some guards patrolled. A lobby. A room where people were working on computer terminals. A room where men in lab coats were writing equations on a whiteboard. A hallway. A cafeteria. A dark room containing a large elaborate-looking cage.

“There’s the Doctor!” Sam cried, spotting the Time Lord sitting cross-legged behind the bars of the cell.

Sam paused the cycling of the cameras and squinted at the image.

“He doesn’t look like he’s getting much done, does he?” asked Martha.

“Oh, he’ll just wait until the guards are looking the other way and sonic his way out,” Mickey said dismissively. “He’s always got some way out of fings like that.”

“I don’t think that’s possible this time,” Sam observed, pointing at the gate on the cage. “I think they made this thing just for him. The sonic screwdriver doesn’t penetrate wood, and there’s wooden locking mechanisms. There are probably all kinds of fail-safes on this thing.”

“What are they doing?!” Martha wailed. “This is absolute madness. Capturing the Doctor and stealing all his secrets—what’s their bloody game here?!”

She furiously balled up her fist and punched the desk, and Mickey placed a gentle hand on her shoulder.

“Hey, calm down… or at least channel that anger. We just need to keep at it, right Sam?”

Martha and Mickey turned around, and were met with an empty chair.

“Where’d he go?” Martha asked, bewildered.

On the computer screen was a camera feed of a couple of people lying in beds, with wires attached to their heads. One of them looked a little familiar to Martha.

“He leaped.”

Martha and Mickey’s heads snapped around to the door.

“Al?!” Martha’s jaw dropped. There in the doorway stood an older Al, twiddling an unlit cigar in his fingers.

“Who?” Mickey queried.

“Happy Christmas, kids,” Al said wryly. “Those two sleeping there—” Al pointed to the monitors, “—that’s Gooshie and Tina. They used to work with us. Sam caught sight of them and boom! Leap.”

“Where did he go?” Martha croaked.

“Where do you think?” Al gestured to the monitors. “He’s gone to rescue them.”

Martha peered at the monitor, then back to Al. “How do you… know all this?”

“Sam told me so.”

“Can someone explain what’s happening?” Mickey demanded.

“Sure thing,” Al said, and leaned out the door, turning his head down the hall. “Sam!”

“Pipe down, Al. I don’t want Donna hearing you call me that,” came the voice of Wilf, who appeared in the doorway. He looked at the speechless Mickey and Martha. “Good to see you two again. I guess it’s only been a minute for you though, hasn’t it?”

Chapter 31

A Lateral Leap

“—And I’ve always wondered why you humans don’t have a word for that feeling you get when you’re half way to sneezing but it doesn’t quite make it, and you’re kind of in a Schrödinger’s Nose situation, caught in a superposition where you’re both sneezing and not sneezing simultaneously,” the Doctor rambled, watching the guards rubbing their eyes in frustration. “The word I’d suggest is ‘snuzzing.’ Oh, and did you know that while sneezing is a primarily Earth phenomenon, there are these lizard-like creatures on a planet called Stugg that have a sneeze that shoots a tiny hole through anything in front of it for six miles. But it’s such a small hole that you mightn’t even realise it. I’ve got one in my hand. Want to see? You’ll need a microscope that can view subatomic particles.”

“Would you shut the hell up!” one of the guards shouted suddenly.

“Listen, I volunteered to be your prisoner,” the Doctor said with a shrug, “but I never did volunteer to shut my big old gob. If you don’t like it, you can always let me out. You’ll never have to hear me again.”

The guard groaned in response, burying his head in his arms. “They didn’t train us to cope with this kind of psychological torture.”

“My stories aren’t that meandering as to constitute torture, surely?” The Doctor said, indignant. “Then again… hmm, you’d best let the General Assembly know what to add to their definitions of torture. I can picture it now: Article one, point three. ‘A special category of torture is as follows: Mouthy Doctor talking nonsense until your head feels like rolling away.’”

“Make it stop…”

“Now men, is that any way to treat our esteemed guest?” The smiling Thomas Jessop was now entering the room, striding with ease and confidence towards the cage. “Sorry, Doctor. It’s hard to find good help these days.”

“Now now,” the Doctor said, “It’s my fault. This mouth of mine should be classified a weapon of mass distraction.” He lost his irreverence, and glared at Jessop. “Now, what do you want with me?”

Jessop chuckled. “Literally nothing. We have all your  knowledge now. It should be sufficient for our needs.”

“In that case—and I hate to sound ungrateful for your boundless hospitality, but, uh—what’s with the cage?”

“Doctor, you were here to destroy all the intelligence we acquired, right?”

“You mean the secrets you ripped out of the minds of everyone I care about?” He tilted his head, as if to think about it, before giving Jessop a cold stare. “Why-ever would you think that?”

“Man. I can’t believe it was so easy to get you in that cell.” Jessop laughed—a manic sort of laugh that the Doctor wouldn’t have thought odd coming out of the Master’s mouth—and turned around. “It’s simple, Doc. You stay put here ’til we finish what we’re doing.”

“Which is?”

“We’re building a time machine.” With that, he skipped his way out of the room, humming to himself.

*        *        *

Sam was floating in the blue light, reaching for someone whose mind would accept him. He felt as though he’d done this before, but that memory had been scrubbed—but now, it seemed to rise out of his mind, reminding him how to do this.

He’d done this before to save Tom, hadn’t he?

He had found someone’s dying regret, and traced it back to the moment they could have changed it. And that regret provided an opportunity to the leapee to accept his help.

It was the only time before that he’d found his own way to a leap through sheer force of will… until he returned to Beth with the assistance of the Bartender.

But now, he somehow knew the Bartender wasn’t pointing him in any particular direction. He was allowing Sam to make his own conscious choices, finally.

And he found a person’s anguish. Someone who wanted… needed… to redo a moment in their life. Sam used it as a tether, climbing back from that point to a shining window of opportunity, on Christmas Day of 2008, in the city of San Francisco.

“Will you let me help you?” he asked—somehow, in his shapeless form.

And, wordlessly, the acceptance came. It was strong and clear, echoing back from the regret in a wave.

Thank you.

Sam’s arrival wasn’t quite like any previous leap that he had experienced. Sure, there was his vision filling with blue light, and then he was somewhere else, in a different position than he had been, mind blank, scrambling to try and look like he knew what he was doing.

But there was something else happening.

When he looked down, he saw someone else’s hands; someone else’s body. Someone who looked quite different to himself.  That had never happened before. He always saw his own body, except in the mirror.

Was this part of his so-called ‘upgrade?’ Why the hell couldn’t the Bartender just explain these things instead of throwing him in the deep end and hoping he didn’t sink?

And some upgrade! This body he saw when he looked down was old and frail. Whoever this was couldn’t have been younger than seventy.

And yet, he didn’t really feel any weaker or less spry. He’d need to figure that one out later, he decided.

So where did I leap to? he thought as he took stock of his surroundings—a large control room. He was wearing a lab coat and standing in the middle of the room holding a clipboard. Why did I come here?

He hadn’t expected to leap, had he? He’d been at the UNIT medical facility, watching the security cameras at—oh!

He’d seen Gooshie and Tina! They were here, having their brains used like they were mere objects. Against their will, he had to assume. But why?

‘What’s happening…?’

Sam blinked. That wasn’t his voice. And it wasn’t Angel Sam, either. But it was… unsettlingly familiar.

Hello? Sam glanced around the room before hurrying to a less exposed spot by a control panel, where he made himself look busy.

‘It’s… dark here,’ the voice in his head murmured. ‘Where am I? Who are you?’

My name’s Sam Beckett. Who are you?

‘No… no, that can’t be right.’

Who are you? Tell me your name. Please.

‘Sebastian LoNigro.’

With a racing heart, Sam peered down at the ID badge attached to his coat. ‘Prof Sebastian LoNigro – Head Physicist’—below a picture of an ancient, white-haired version of his old MIT Professor—the man with whom he developed his theory of time travel.

“Oh boy.”

Sam swallowed. Was this the trade-off for leaping without a Waiting Room? To have an open line of telepathic communication with the leapee, occupying the same space?

He closed his eyes, and reached inside himself for the source of the voice. And he felt Sebastian LoNigro’s presence there; scared and vulnerable.

Professor… it’s me! Sam communicated to his once mentor. Sorry to barge in like this, but I think you… gave me permission. You may not understand why just yet, though. It was like a… a temporal wave reflecting back on your own timeline from the end of your life. I rode it back here; your future regret gave me the ability to step in at this moment. Did that make any sense?

‘Sam Beckett… oh my, that does sound like you, doesn’t it?’ the professor’s voice wavered. ‘Did you… leap here?’

So you know about my work.

‘Yes, as much as was available. But everyone thought you were dead or lost forever. I have been working with UNIT in the hopes of building a new time machine.’

Sam’s eyes popped open with alarm. So that’s what Gooshie and Tina were doing here. They were being harvested for information. Sebastian was involved in all this? How could he—?

Sam felt sick to his stomach.

“Morning, Seb, my man!” came a voice from behind Sam, followed by a heavy hand on his shoulder. Sam turned to see a man in a red suit, white teeth gleaming through an unsettling smile. “Sorry to drag you in on Christmas, but we’ve hit paydirt!”

“Paydirt?”

“The Doctor’s agreed to help us complete the project! He’s generously gifted us with a massive database of his knowledge and experience.”

Liar.

“Oh… that’s great!” Sam said, attempting to sound genuine. “Where is he?”

“Oh, he’s just getting a debrief with General Logan. Strap in, old man; pretty soon it’ll be on like Donkey Kong! If we pull this off, you can always go back in time to spend Christmas with your family, right Sebs?”

The man gave Sam a playful punch in the arm, which was quite a bit harder than it should have been, and skipped away with a childlike exuberance.

Some people just rubbed Sam the wrong way, and the man he was watching now high-fiving one of the assistant scientists was one of them. Nothing about him seemed even a little bit genuine.

Who the hell was that guy? Sam directed this question to the presence in his mind.

‘That’s Thomas Jessop,’ Sebastian provided. ‘He’s a Silicon Valley tech billionaire who’s been helping the facility develop its computer systems. He has muscled in on becoming second in command around here. Money talks, as usual.’

So this was the guy who’d more than likely been orchestrating this whole ordeal. Sam’s gut reaction, then, had been correct.

He had a lot of work to do.

Chapter 32

Pockets!

A small letterbox hatch opened up in the side of the cage, and a guard pushed through a tray of food.

“Fresh from the cafeteria,” the guard said with an apologetic shrug.

The Doctor, who was lying face-up on the hard concrete floor, turned his head to the tray, taking in the uninspiring array of plastic-wrapped non-perishables.

“What, dare I ask, is ‘fresh’ about any of this?” he asked, raising an eyebrow, as he picked up one of the items. “I’m fairly sure the half-life of one of these Twinkies is forty-five years.”

“Sorry, sir,” the guard said awkwardly, shutting the hatch and moving away from the cage. He took a seat at the table that furnished the remainder of the room where they’d set up this cage, and picked up a newspaper to read. Across from him was another guard, chewing on an apple with one hand and texting with the other.

“You don’t happen to have a spare paper, do you?” the Doctor asked. “Getting a bit bored here. And when I get bored, I get more annoying than ever. Just a fair warning.”

“You can have it when I’m done,” the guard said, as he pulled out a pen to do the crossword. “You don’t happen to know a six-letter word meaning ‘Fy-si… fizz-ick—’” He squinted at the paper, sounding out the word. “—Physician?”

“You’re joking, aren’t you?”

The guard opened his mouth to answer, but was interrupted by the sound of the door opening. The guard dropped the pen and stood from his chair, saluting. “Sir!”

Oh, brilliant. Who’s come to gloat this time?

The Doctor tilted his head to see who had entered, but from his vantage point on the floor, he could only see a pair of loafers poking out from under a pair of brown trousers shuffling in.

“Uh, at ease?” came an old man’s uncertain voice. “Listen, could you clear out of here? I have to, er, question the prisoner.”

“But sir, we’re under strict orders from Mister Jessop…”

“Mister Jessop sent me here to speak with the Doctor,” the man said. “I need to pick his brain about subatomic agitated carbon quarks. I’m sure that would be quite boring to listen to.”

Oh? The Doctor rose to a sitting position, and looked up at the old man.

He spoke his next words in Old Gallifreyan: “If you’re who I think you are, comment on my atrocious lunch.”

“What did he just say?” the guard still eating his apple commented.

“Beats me,” the old man said with a casual shrug, before peering down at the Doctor’s food tray. “Is that really what you’re feeding him? Twinkies and pudding cups? Give the man a little dignity.” He thrust his hands into the back of the guard beside him. “Both of you, go find him something with real nutritional value! Get going!”

So you came after all, Sam Beckett.

The guards reluctantly filed out of the room, and Sam shut the door behind him.

“I told you we’d meet again,” he said with a weak smile. “Sooner than I thought, but…”

“Nebulous gut feelings,” the Doctor said. “I tell you—those things are strikingly accurate.”

“How do I get you out of here?” Sam asked, cutting straight to the point.

“You can’t, unless you happen to have a series of six keys,” the Doctor lamented. “Frankly I’m not even sure if the bloke in the red suit has all six. But more importantly, what are you doing here, Sam? I specifically wanted you to stay behind.”

Sam gave him a wry smirk. “How often does that work out for you, Doctor? Asking people to stay behind?”

Well, he had him there.

“Admittedly, almost never,” the Doctor conceded with a bitter chuckle. “Tell you what, if you can get your hands on my sonic screwdriver, you’ll at least be able to do what I came here for, even if you can’t get me out of here.” He climbed to his feet, unwrapping a Twinkie and taking a generous bite out of it.

“Where is it?” Sam asked, glancing around the mostly bare room.

“Have you met Jessop?”

“I have been unfortunate enough to meet that guy, yes. Are you saying he’s got it?”

“Last I saw of it. However…” the Doctor nodded towards the other side of the room, where a long brown coat was hanging on a hook. “You might find something of use in there.”

Sam’s lips curled into a smile, and he dashed over to it, in movements that did not quite befit an elderly gentleman. As he rifled through the pockets, the Doctor could hear him muttering quietly to himself.

“Yeah, I agree… no, no, I can do it. I understand, but…”

“Is Al here?” the Doctor interrupted, peering around the room. “I don’t think I’ve had the right configuration of brain waves since the stunted regeneration.”

Sam turned to meet his eye. “No, he’s not here; signal’s still in my head. I’m actually talking to this guy.” He pointed to his ID badge.

“You’re both present?” the Doctor probed, fascinated.

Sam nodded, and continued searching the coat. “And wouldn’t you know it, he’s a very old friend of mine. My old physics professor.”

“Given the goings-on here, I’m not entirely shocked by that,” said the Doctor before taking another bite from his Twinkie. “Given the goings-on…” he repeated gleefully, annunciating each syllable and enjoying the alliterative, bouncy nature of the phrase. He’d have to put that one in his pocket.

“Well, I don’t know how much use this is…” Sam said, pulling out the psychic paper, “but I guess it’s better with me than here.” He stuffed it in his lab coat pocket before reaching a hand into another pocket of the coat, a hidden one that the Doctor had a perception filter on. Sam only knew about it through the acquired memories.

I really have no secrets from you, do I?

The Doctor chewed thoughtfully on the remainder of the sweet cake, watching Sam recover the TARDIS key.

Well, the Doctor figured, at least it was in trustworthy enough hands.

Sam turned to face him, holding it up shakily. “You want this?”

“No, it’s no use to me while I’m trapped in here,” he said, waving a hand. “Just make sure it stays in your possession or I’ll be charging you ten quid for a new one.” He stepped to the bars, his face serious.

“She’s forty metres west, by the water,” he said quietly. “That’s if they haven’t brought her in. If you find her inside the building, don’t try to take off. No telling what she might do with the interference.”

Sam nodded. “I’m gonna get you out of here. Okay?”

The Doctor attempted to smile, but his eyes didn’t follow suit. “The important thing is getting my knowledge out of their hands. Do that, and you’ll have succeeded, whatever else happens. Good luck.”

Sam nodded, and placed the key into his shoe before heading for the door. “Leave it to…” he hesitated, tilting his head as he revised his sentence on the fly. “Us. Professor LoNigro has been very helpful.”

“Well, I’ll be sure to send him my thanks if we all make it out of here,” the Doctor said. “Now off you pop. Best not to be seen with me.”

But Sam had slipped out of the room before he even completed his sentence.

Chapter 33

Coming Out

As Sam, casually as he could, wandered back into the control room where he’d been as he first leaped in, another scientist came up to him with a roughly assembled stack of papers.

“Professor, we’ve started receiving some quantum calculations from the Doctor’s data bank, and I have no idea what I’m looking at,” the woman said, shaking her head. “It’s way beyond any of us. Can you make sense of it?” She pressed the stack into his hands, and he moved an eye over the data.

Sam recognised the numbers as belonging to some of the temporal stabilisation processes within the TARDIS, and he licked his lips nervously. After a quick check of her ID badge, he acquired her name.

“Rita, is there any filter on the information?” he asked. “This really could be for anything, couldn’t it?”

“Oh, it’s coming through to our hard drives in waves of this gibberish,” Rita said, frowning. “No wonder we were all forced to come in, we have to try and make heads or tails of this mess.”

Sam shifted uncomfortably on his feet. All this data—well, if anyone did manage to gain an understanding of it, they could do some real damage. But it seemed like they were having trouble.

What had happened to his work, anyway? These people seemed to be largely ignorant of his project and the physics involved. Had the records been destroyed?

“Well,” Sam finally said to the woman, handing her back the papers, “you just keep looking over this and mark anything you can figure out. For now, I need to go speak to Jessop.”

Rita sighed. “Okay. Don’t expect much to be marked, though.” She wandered back to her workstation, shoulders slumped.

What happened to my project, anyway? he asked the Professor. All I know is that it was evidently shut down some time after 2000.

‘It was shuttered in 2003, but there was an explosion in the facility just after that which made the place seal up, because it was flooded with radiation.’

Oh boy…

‘They couldn’t recover any of the equipment, and had incomplete data from your computer.’

Huh…

How disastrous. But, given what was happening here, possibly a better outcome than letting the likes of Jessop get his hands on time travel.

Sam headed towards Jessop’s office, trying to figure out how he could secret his hands on the sonic screwdriver, wherever it was now. He knocked on the door, which swooshed open Star Trek style, just like one of the doors at the Project Quantum Leap complex.

Within, Jessop was sitting at a large desk, eyes fixed at the wall beside the door. He had a video game controller in his hands, and was apparently playing something on a large TV. He paused the game, which was some kind of shooter that Sam didn’t care to know any more about, and slapped the controller down on the desk.

“Old man Sebby! What can I do you for?”

Sam furrowed his brow. “You’re playing video games while you’re making the rest of us try to decipher raw data none of us have ever seen before? On Christmas?”

Jessop shrugged. “I’m funding this project. I can do anything I want.”

Sam really, really couldn’t stand this guy.

“Speaking of which!” Jessop continued, lifting his finger. “A little birdie told me you found my pet. Who said you were allowed in Sector C? Not me, that’s for sure.”

Damn! He already knows?

“So. What did the Doctor tell you?”

“Nothing, really,” Sam said, trying to play it cool. “But why would you keep him locked up? I thought you said he offered to help us.”

Jessop sprung to his feet, skirting around his desk. “He did help us! You’re not a computer guy, so I wouldn’t expect you to understand, but we’ve been getting a lot of primo data from our neural imprints.”

“I do understand,” Sam countered. “You violated peoples’ minds and siphoned off their knowledge.”

“So he did tell you some things,” Jessop mused. “So tell me—and really think hard about this—what you plan to do about it, hmm Sebs? Bearing in mind, all the guards here answer to me.”

Sam took a deep breath, fighting the urge to throw a punch. “I can’t sit by and let you do this.”

Jessop pursed his lips. “Ohh, wrong answer, buddy.”

His eyes moved just past Sam, to the doorway, and he nodded. Sam’s wrists were grabbed from behind—a guard was now closing handcuffs over them.

I walked right into this, didn’t I? Sam cursed himself as he struggled against the guard.

“I guess the Doc is gonna have a roomie,” Jessop said, grinning. “Such a shame; you were really carrying the physics team.”

The guard began to pull him backwards towards the door.

No. I can’t. I can’t get put in there too. I can’t let Professor LoNigro be treated this way. I have to do something. I…

And as Sam’s adrenaline peaked, his eyes filled with blue, and for a second he felt like he was ripping a hole in spacetime.

Sam fell forward against the desk, his arms suddenly free-moving. He glanced up at Jessop, who was staring back at him with complete shock.

What just happened?

He turned around to see an equally shocked Sebastian LoNigro, still being detained by the guard, whose mouth had fallen open.

Sam looked down at himself, and realised he was back in the clothes he’d been wearing before he leaped.

He’d just… stepped out of the Professor?

A moment of silence passed, as the four people in the room took a moment to try and comprehend this turn of events, but Sam was the first to make a move, swiftly punching the guard, who fell against the wall.

Sam raided his belt for a gun, and he pointed it at Jessop before the bewildered billionaire could make a move.

“Nice to see you speechless for once,” Sam commented, before stepping up to him and searching his pockets. Inside his jacket, his fingers wrapped around a familiar metal shape, and he pulled the sonic screwdriver out of the pocket. “I need this.”

He pointed it at Sebastian, activating it, and the handcuffs dropped off his wrists to the floor. Sam grabbed them, and in a smooth movement, closed one of the cuffs over Jessop’s wrist. He took the other end, yanking Jessop toward the guard, and fastened the two of them together around a pipe in the wall.

“Beckett. You’re supposed to be dead,” Jessop said, staring at Sam’s face, seeming to be trying to understand it.

Sam shrugged. “Who told you that?”

“Your wife.”

Sam narrowed his eyes. “What do you know about my wife?”

Jessop’s arrogant smile returned. “Well, I know for a fact she’s dead.”

“What?!”

Jessop just laughed, saying no more.

Chapter 34

Delete, Delete!

“Answer me, damn you!” Sam cried, gripping Jessop’s collar. “What happened to Donna?”

“How did you do that trick with old Seb?” the smarmy man asked. “That was really something.”

“You don’t know what else I’m capable of,” Sam snarled.

And neither do I.

“So talk.”

Jessop pressed his lips together, still smiling that infuriating smile. Sam dropped his collar and turned to the professor.

“Do you know what he’s talking about?”

“I heard she died in the… explosion at Stallions Gate,” Sebastian said haltingly, still apparently trying to come to grips with having control of his body back.

Sam took a moment to process this.

I can’t accept that. I just can’t. Wouldn’t Al have said something when I saw him?

He shook his head. Maybe it was all a lie. Maybe she was in hiding, or…

“Sam, I’m glad to see you again,” Professor LoNigro said, cutting through Sam’s thought spiral. Sam looked up into his moist eyes, and he realised he wasn’t the only one having trouble. He brushed aside the pain he felt—there’d be time enough to deal with that. He couldn’t fall apart now; that was exactly what Jessop wanted.

“You too,” Sam said through a sigh. “I didn’t mean for this to happen. I’m sorry I’ve done this to you, Professor.”

Sebastian took his hand, shaking it, before making the decision to move further into a hug.

“Sam, you’ve uncovered more about this place in a few hours than I did in two years. I was foolish to trust—” he glared down at Jessop, “—a man like this.”

“What, a black man?” Jessop asked facetiously.

“A billionaire,” Sebastian corrected. “UNIT is supposed to serve the greater good, but a billionaire serves only his own interests. You don’t become rich by serving others.”

Jessop clicked his tongue. “Well, I guess your insubordination wasn’t just Doctor Beckett talking, then. Burning your bridges a little, aren’t we?”

Sebastian ignored him, and met Sam’s eye. “Come on, we have things to do, right?”

Sam nodded, and he turned to Jessop. “Where are the keys to the Doctor’s cell?”

“What, like I’m about to blurt it out?” he laughed.

“I didn’t think you would, but it was worth asking,” Sam said, casually waving the sonic screwdriver over Jessop.

“What are you doing with that?” he asked, a hint of nervousness in his voice. Sam enjoyed hearing that unease in this man who clearly prided himself on his confidence.

“Nothing,” he said, eyes checking the reading before he turned to the television and repeated a similar process. Once he finished, he nodded to Sebastian. “Come on.”

As they left the office, Sam locked the door with the sonic before pocketing it.

“What is that thing?” Sebastian asked, eyes wide.

“It’s the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver,” he said coolly, heading back to the control room with the professor at his heels.

“How do you know how to use it?” the old man asked, looking bewildered.

“To cut a long story short, I know because of what Jessop did to me. He has no idea that he’s the reason I can take him down.” Sam snorted, amused at the irony of the situation.

He showed Sebastian the sonic device, turning it in his hand. “This thing does a lot more than turn screws and open locks.”

As they arrived at the professor’s desk, Sam pointed the sonic at his computer, and it rapidly began working, opening and closing windows at high speed.

“What are you doing?” Sebastian asked, gawking at his computer.

“Right now, I’m erasing every trace of the Doctor’s knowledge,” he mumbled. “Because it was taken without permission, and it’s dangerous in the wrong hands. And uh, these are quite clearly the wrong hands.” He met Sebastian’s eye. “If you could gather up all the print-outs?”

The Professor nodded. “Alright. It’s a shame, but I’ll do as you ask.”

As the windows cycled through, entering and executing commands in quick succession, one word jumped out at Sam.

“LOTHOS.”

So that was what he was up against. He should have known. Cartoonish villainy aside, what else would be the result of a project trying to revive his own? But hadn’t River mentioned something about Edinburgh? This was pretty far from Scotland. Something didn’t quite add up.

And then Sam made a worrisome connection in his mind from something he’d heard Jessop say in passing earlier.

General… Logan?

Logan. Thomas. Lo. Th.

Lo. Th. OS.

He’d need to find this General Logan. Seemed like he might have been the top guy here, even ahead of Jessop.

As the final remnants of the Doctor’s knowledge were erased, Sam returned his attention to finding the whereabouts of Gooshie and Tina, who he knew had to be here somewhere.

And he discovered not only their location in the building, but he found he had immediate access to their current brain activity. Rows of data were pouring out of the two brains every second.

This ends now.

With a slip of his thumb against the side of the sonic, he released the two of them from their forced sleep.

“I’m coming,” he whispered, standing from the professor’s chair.

Sebastian was just now returning to him with a large stack of paper.

“Here are—” he began, and cut himself off when Sam reached into his pocket, grabbing the psychic paper.

“Listen, would you mind stepping out of your left shoe?” he asked, dropping to the floor.

“Uh… sure…” Sebastian said, dropping the stack on his desk and lifting his heel. Sam retrieved the key from within and jumped back to his feet.

“Appreciate it,” he said. “You shred or burn or otherwise destroy that paper, okay? I’ve got somewhere to be.”

He paused a moment, and pulled the professor’s cell phone from his pocket. “Sorry, can I borrow this? I haven’t got one—I’m a little behind the times. If there’s trouble, call it.”

“Uh… yeah, sure, okay,” Sebastian said, flustered, as he bent over to pull his loafer back onto his heel. As Sam began to run off, he shouted to him, “Wait! Sam, how can I call you when you have my phone?”

But Sam was already out of earshot.

Chapter 35

Use Your Brain, Dammit

Sam stepped into the elevator and hit the bottom button. As the doors closed, he began to hear a familiar tune coming from the speakers within.

“Hey there Delilah, I know times are getting hard…”

He chuckled. This was the first time he’d heard the official recording of this song.

“But just believe me, girl, someday I’ll pay the bills with this guitar, we’ll have it good…”

He raised his eyes to the ceiling, taking deep breaths. He suddenly felt incredibly alone. He knew he had allies and friends striving to help him—hell, even his old mentor was helping; he never thought they’d cross paths again—but deep down he realised that whatever he was now, whatever the Bartender had made him, was alone in the universe. He truly had… nobody. Nobody that could truly know what he was going through.

Even while he was still an ‘original flavour’ leaper, he hadn’t been the only one. And he’d had Al by his side.

But now… everything was different. And new. And just…

“Our friends would all make fun of us, and we’ll just laugh along because we know that none of them have felt this way…”

The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open silently, revealing a hall lined with lights, at the end of which hung a sign: ‘LOTHOS.’

“Delilah I can promise you that by the time we get through, the world will never ever be the same…”

A pair of guards was stationed under the sign, outside a set of double doors.

“And you’re to blame…”

Sam swallowed hard, and he summoned up the Doctor’s confidence from his experiences in his dreams. No sweat. Just do what he’d do.

He strode from the lift, pulling the psychic paper from his jacket.

Okay, my clothes aren’t exactly military, so let’s just say I’m Jessop’s personal IT technician.

“Merry Christmas, fellas,” he said to the men, flipping open the wallet. “Mister Jessop sent me to run diagnostics. Would you mind?”

The guards inspected the psychic paper, and their eyes widened.

“Yes, sir,” one of them said with a salute, and the two of them separated, allowing him a path through.

Jeez, Jessop has way too much authority here. Even his civilian staff are getting salutes.

Sam made an unprofessional salute back, before entering the doors, which slid open as he neared them.

Inside, a sea of processors and hard drives were set in rows upon rows of shelves, with lights on each flashing. Tubes of coolant were interspersed throughout the computer farm, but the room was still hot, with fans blowing warm air into his face from every direction.

This was the guts of Lothos. But it wasn’t the brain.

Sam navigated the vast array of machinery, nearly losing his sense of direction. But, finally against a far wall, he found the door he was looking for. He unlocked it with the sonic screwdriver, and pushed it open.

“Doctor B?!” Tina yanked the wires from her head and jumped out of the medical bed. “I can’t believe it!”

“Tina… I’m so glad you’re okay.” Sam scooped her into a hug, before looking down at the other bed, where Gooshie seemed to still be asleep. “Gooshie…?”

Sam was sure he’d released him in the system.

He pulled himself away from Tina and nudged Gooshie, panic rising in his chest. “Gooshie, wake up…”

“Five more minutes, Tina…” Gooshie mumbled, rolling over.

Sam sighed with relief, and turned back to Tina. “What happened here, Tina? How long have they been keeping you like this?”

Tina frowned. “I don’t even know where I am, let alone how long I been here, Doctor B!” She looked around the room, shivering. “This place gives me the creeps.”

“You and me both,” Sam agreed. “What’s the last thing you remember? What date was it?”

Tina scratched her temple. “Uhh, I think it was just after Halloween? Me and Gooshie dressed as Morticia and Gomez,” she said with a grin, which didn’t last long before fading. “And the day after that, I remember some guy tried to poach us for his tech conglomerate.”

“I don’t suppose that someone was Thomas Jessop?”

Recognition passed over Tina’s face. “That was the guy! I didn’t like him at all. All fancy suits and confidence, kinda like Al, but he made my skin crawl.” She blinked, her mind visibly switching gears. “Wait, Doctor B… you’re you! You came home! When did that happen?!”

“I’ll be happy to talk once I get you two out of here, okay? Now, could you get Gooshie up and at ‘em? I have a few loose ends to tie up—I’ll meet you back here in ten minutes, okay?” He glanced up at a clock on the wall, which read 12:55pm. “Five past one—got it? Be ready to make a break for it.”

Tina nodded. “I’m so glad you’re here, Doc,” she said, kissing him on the cheek. “Leave it to me.”

As he turned to leave the room, the phone in his pocket began to ring.

Oh no…

He pulled it out and checked the caller ID. +44? That was the UK’s country code.

“Hello?” he asked, bringing the phone cautiously to his ear.

“Hi Sam, I know you’re busy, but listen…”

Sam’s eyes widened. “Al?”

“Yeah, it’s me,” the voice confirmed. “Could you hand Tina the phone before you go do what you’re about to do?”

“Al, what’s going on? How did you get this number?”

“Sam. Give Tina the phone and get moving. You’ll understand later, okay?”

Sam tightened his slack jaw. “O…kay. Okay, Al.” He extended the phone to Tina. “It’s, um… for you, I guess.”

Tina accepted the phone, bewildered, and answered it. “…Al?”

Sam spun around, leaving the room, and headed for the control panels on the other side of the computer aisles.

All he needed to do now was to remove the signal from everyone’s brains, prevent such a thing from happening again, and then find the six keys to the Doctor’s cell, then mount a rescue, and escape the facility, preferably leaving it in ruins.

Real simple stuff.

As he reached the control panels, he spotted a door to their left. A plate with a name was slotted onto the front. ‘General Frank Logan.’

Sam couldn’t pass up the chance to snoop around the office of the head of this entire operation. Though he couldn’t imagine why the office was in the bowels of the facility.

He sonicked the door open, and it swung open into darkness. Sam felt around for a light switch, and as his fingers found it, he flipped it on, and what he saw made him audibly gasp.

General Logan wasn’t exactly… alive.

Well, his brain was, certainly. But it didn’t seem to have a body around it.

The brain of the General was wired inextricably into the computer’s mainframe. General Logan was Lothos.

Sam had to wonder if this had been a sacrifice the General had willingly made. Somehow, he doubted it.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured to the brain. “I’ll free you as soon as I can, but I have a few things I need to do first.”

He turned off the lights, and closed the door, trying to bury the feeling of abject horror. Jessop was an absolute monster of a man.

He returned to the control panel, and began making adjustments to the operation of the machine, and he sat at a workstation and began to access the—what had Jessop called them? Neural imprints?—to see if his and the Doctor’s combined knowledge could figure out a way to reverse what had been done to Sam and all the other time travellers.

Chapter 36

A Pair of Predicaments

A few hours earlier, in London…

Sam sat at the conference table, looking out of Wilf’s eyes at the disbelieving Martha and Mickey.

“How long have you been…” Martha said quietly, her eyes wide. She gestured to the old man’s body in lieu of finishing her sentence.

“Only an hour or so,” Sam replied, waving his hand. “Donna and I have been having a heart-to-heart. Just passed the torch to her mother.”

“And… you’re a later version of you than the one who just disappeared?” Mickey asked, his face screwed up.

“Correct.”

“That’s time travel for you,” Martha mused. “But what are you doing here?”

Sam clenched his jaw. “I don’t know yet. I just know something’s going to happen; that’s the best I’ve got. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t; Wilf wouldn’t have let me in.”

Beside him, Al shifted in his chair. “I know a thing or two, but I’m sworn to secrecy.”

“Right, because you have information from an even later me, right?” Sam chuckled at the layers of absurdity. He turned to Martha. “He was waiting for me outside when I arrived here, you know.”

“You got it,” Al said, tapping his cigar against the table in a nervous fidget. Sam could tell he was itching to light the thing. “Sam, you don’t know how much I wish I could tell you everything, but you were pretty damn insistent I keep my mouth shut about it.”

Sam nodded. “Yeah, I’m beginning to understand now—why the Doctor has the rules he does about what can and can’t be changed. For as long as he’s involved in events, we have to tread extremely carefully.”

“Especially while he’s being kept in a cage and the only one who can free him is the earlier Sam,” Martha guessed. Sam nodded.

“Well,” he took a deep breath, “there is one thing I know, and it’s that at 12:55pm Pacific Time, Al called—er, is gonna call—Professor LoNigro’s phone, and ask to speak to Tina.”

Al nodded. “I have a message to get to ’em.”

“Right. That should be 8:55pm London time, so we have a few hours to wait. And a bit after that—I’d say between five and eight minutes—I’m… the other me… is gonna send some data to you two,” Sam continued, pointing at Mickey and Martha. “So be ready for that. It’ll be the audio signal to get the intrusive software removed from everyone’s brains.”

“Oh, thank God!” Martha said. “How did you manage to do it?”

Sam shrugged. “Oh, you know… just reversed the polarity of the neutron flow.”

Sam noticed Al glancing at his watch.

He knows something.

“Al, what is it?”

Al turned his head to the door of the lab. “We should really start barricading ourselves in.”

Martha and Mickey exchanged a look of alarm.

“UNIT told you to stop looking into this, right?” Sam said, biting his lip.

“Blimey, they must be serious about it then,” Martha said, shoving a chair under the door handle. The others sprang into action, pushing heavy objects against the doors.

Mickey moved to a corner of the room, flipping a series of switches on the wall. “I’ll set the lab to independent battery power, so they won’t be able to cut us off,” he announced.

As if on cue, the overhead fluorescent lights went out, bathing the room in the soft, somewhat eerie glow of the secondary lighting. The sound of boots flooded into the corridor beyond the door, and a sharp knock came on it.

“Mickey Smith, Martha Jones,” a woman’s voice boomed, “please give yourselves up. We don’t want to resort to force.”

“We have a couple of innocent elderly blokes in here,” Mickey shouted back, “so you’d better bloody not do anything to injure them!”

Martha turned to Al, frantic. “They’re going to get through eventually. How are we supposed to hold them off until nine?!”

Al smirked. “Sweetheart, we’re in a highly advanced scientific laboratory.” He jabbed a cigar in Sam’s direction. “With a super genius.”

“You really think I can come up with something?” Sam asked, suddenly doubting himself.

“You bet your butt, and I can help you with that.” Al reached into his inner coat pocket. “In case you’ve been wondering what I’ve been doing since I saw you off at Drumlins two weeks ago, well—the later you and I have been working on a little something.” he said, and pulled out a sonic screwdriver, handing it to Sam.

Sam’s face lit up as he inspected the device, which was a little bulkier than the slimline design the Doctor used, and it used modified Earth tech, but it had the same functionality all the same. “You’re kidding…”

“Don’t thank me, thank future you,” Al said.

I’m holding a thing I made, but am yet to make, he thought with wonder. Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey…

*        *        *

“Gooshie!” Sam said brightly as he returned to the room where Tina and the programmer awaited. He gave Gooshie a tight hug.

“Doctor Beckett,” Gooshie said, a little puzzled, “how in the world—”

“Save it,” Sam said. “We’ve got to go.”

“You’re right,” Tina said, holding the cell phone out to Sam. “I just got another call—that creep Jessop’s on his way down here.”

“Dammit,” Sam muttered. “That rules out the elevator.”

He took the wrists of his former colleagues, and led them out of the room, through the rows of computers, which Tina was looking at with great interest.

“I need to get you to the TARDIS,” he said. “You’ll be safe in there.”

“The what?”

“The Doctor’s time machine.” Sam glanced back at the two excited faces. “Yeah, I know,” he said with a grin.

He approached the stairwell doors, and opened them, to find Jessop on the other side, the handcuffs swinging on his index finger, and a gun in his other hand pointed at Sam’s chest.

“Oops, you took a little too long, didn’t you?” he stepped out of the stairwell, a triumphant grin on his face as Sam stepped back. “But I’m glad you’re here. I’m thinking your brain would be a better fit for this system than the slightly dim General I’m using now. After all, the original hybrid computer we based this on used cell cultures from your brain, didn’t it?”

Sam folded his arms. “It did, yes. And there’s really nobody that knows more about hybrid systems than me,” he said in a calm voice. “Especially ones based on Ziggy.”

Jessop narrowed his eyes, seeing how cool Sam was acting. “What did you do?”

“So once I got your brainwave reading, it was a pretty simple matter of altering the imprint pattern to target you through your TV. I still need to know where those keys are, but I guess you’ll tell me in a minute.”

“You’re bluffing. It took ten years to develop this tech. You couldn’t have done that so fast… so easily.”

“A couple of weeks ago, you might have been right in that assessment.” Sam held up a chirping sonic screwdriver, which activated the emergency lockdown mode of the program that he’d put into Thomas Jessop’s mind. “Say goodnight…”

Jessop’s eyes rolled back, and he slumped into Sam’s waiting arms.

“Doctor Beckett… what did you just do?” Gooshie asked, his eyes bulging in their sockets.

“Just getting some information. With a little payback on the side.” With one hand, he ejected the cartridge of Jessop’s gun, and with the other, he checked the reading on the sonic screwdriver. After a moment, the location of the keys appeared. “Gotcha.”

*        *        *

Wilfred Mott felt a little claustrophobic.

Here was he, trapped inside his own mind, while a fellow was borrowing his worn out old body. Certainly not the sort of Christmas he’d been expecting, to be sure.

Well, he’d been polite enough about it, Wilf supposed. He’d been apologetic. But still. ’Twere a bit off-putting to be here in darkness, a far-off window to the outside world barely visible. Muffled sounds, like he was at the drive through cinema, watching his life on the screen without a pair of distance glasses, and the winda rolled up. He could get the gist of what were happening outside, but only by the skin of his teeth.

But it seemed likely that things were not great out there. Sam the leaping man had things under control for the time being. He’d rushed around with one of them sonic screwdrivers—just like the Doctor used—and built some kind of force field protecting the room from the soldiers in the hall. Probably. It wasn’t as if Wilf could understand it. Might as well have been magic to his old human mind.

“Oi oi—if you don’t mind me asking,” he called out into the darkness, “how much longer do you expect you’ll be borrowing me for, Mister Sam?”

‘As soon as we’re out of this predicament, I guess,’ Sam responded, his voice clear and echoing through the void. ‘Sorry again.’

“Is it true that was you in Donna before?”

‘Yes, and I’m sorry about that, too.’

“I s’pose, then, you have my gratitude. Martha told me you bein’ there might have protected her from that… um, earworm.”

‘As much as I’d like to take credit for that, I didn’t choose to leap into her. But I’m glad I was able to help all the same.’

Wilf watched, squinting, as Sam did more of his magic on a computer, before pulling out one of those little memory sticks—what were they called? USBs? Something like that—and handing it to Martha.

“Here’s the signal. We just need to get this to Jack and Sarah Jane,” his muffled voice said, “and they’ll be able to transmit the Uninstall program to the right people.”

“Terrific,” Martha said drily, “now all we have to do is find a way out of here past all these soldiers.”

“About that…” Sam said, eyeing a cupboard that they’d pushed against the door earlier, “What do you keep in this cabinet?”

Martha looked at it, head cocked. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t remember noticing it before now, do you?”

Martha shook her head slowly, and her eyes widened. “Oh my god, it has a perception filter on it. How long has this been here?”

“I’m not sure, but…” he took a hold of the handle and pulled it open, peering inside.

Wilf was flabbergasted to see a full sized, proper English pub inside the little cupboard.

“Just as I thought,” Sam said. “So, uh, anyone want a pint?”

Chapter 37

The Six Keys

“Okay, let’s hope this holds him long enough this time,” Sam said as he handcuffed the unconscious Jessop to the bed in which Tina had previously been asleep. “But there’s still the matter of gettin’ you two and the Doctor out of here. He’s probably notified all the guards to look out for me. And as soon as I shut down Lothos, he’s gonna wake up.”

Sam paced the room, thumbnail at his lip. “If I just knew how I leaped before, how I triggered it…”

Gooshie and Tina looked at one another, somewhat lost by his ramblings.

“Doctor B, is there anything we can do?” Tina asked.

Sam paused a moment before looking up at her. “Maybe, but it’d put you at risk.”

“I can’t say that doesn’t make me nervous,” Gooshie said, wiping sweat from his forehead, “but then again, everything makes me nervous, so what’s one more thing?”

Tina gave Gooshie a tight hug. “Exactly! We’re with you, Boss! What do you need us to do?”

Sam handed a wallet from his pocket to Tina. “This is psychic paper. It’ll show the guards whatever you want them to see. Try and make it something official. I don’t think the guards should be looking for you, just me. You two should blend in pretty well as staff.”

“How do you work it?” Tina said, looking at it with worry.

“I think it works best if you hardly even think about it. Give it a try.”

Tina held it up to Gooshie, whose eyes widened and cheeks flushed. “Tina, that’s naughty!”

Tina looked at it. “All I see is blank paper,” she said, frowning.

“Well, I don’t think I want to know what you just showed him,” Sam laughed. “Keep practising. In the meantime, I want you to hang onto the cell phone and wait here for my signal. Then I want you to delete the data of this computer and shut it all down, okay? The two of you should easily be able to get that done—it’s remarkably similar to Ziggy. I’ve already locked it into administrative mode, so you’ll have all the privileges.”

“No sweat, Doctor B,” Tina said with a flick of her hair. “Leave it to us.”

Gooshie was less confident, but nodded. “And after that?”

“Use the psychic paper to get outside, and look for a blue police phone box to the west, on the water. If you can’t find it, go somewhere public and wait for my call.” Sam handed Gooshie the TARDIS key. “This will open the box… and for the love of God, don’t lose it.”

“Y-yes, Doctor Beckett—I mean, no. I won’t lose it.” he gulped. “What happens if we get captured?”

Sam winced. “Then, uh… swallow the key.”

“I… I don’t know if I can do that.”

“Then don’t get captured.”

“Come on, Gooshie,” Tina said, “let’s go.” She gave Sam a final hug and kiss on the cheek. “Good luck.”

“You too.” Sam turned and raced to the stairwell. He began ascending the stairs two at a time, and found he wasn’t getting as breathless as he once would have. Just what other suprises did his new existence have in store? Not that he was complaining about this particular development.

He’d given away the psychic paper and the key to the TARDIS. All he had now was the sonic screwdriver, and the knowledge of six safes that each contained one of the keys to the Doctor’s cell.

But how was he supposed to get past the guards that were surely swarming the upper floors?

He reached the ground floor, and cracked open the stairwell door to see the backs of three guards standing immediately outside the door.

Oh boy. I don’t like my chances here.

Sam backed away, completely unable to decide what to do next. And as the indecision overtook him, the blue light came, and he leaped.

*        *        *

Sam closed the cabinet door behind him, securing himself, Martha, Mickey, and Wilf inside the Bartender’s TARDIS.

The Bartender had been awaiting their arrival with an expectant smile and a row of lagers.

“Sam, allow me to help you out of there,” he said, flipping up a section of bar to reveal a series of controls. His hands moved across them deftly, and a moment later, Sam slipped out of Wilf like an amoeba dividing in two. “Works best when you’re pumping with adrenaline, but there’s no point staying in that pocket dimension while you’re in here, is there?”

“Oh my stars,” Wilf said, patting his hands to his chest. “That weren’t half strange.”

Sam peered down at his own body again. “Is that what happens to me? I was wondering how I could keep my clothes like this.”

“You dissolve into an energy state, which passes into its own little pocket outside spacetime, and the parts of you that are needed become anchored to the person you leap into.”

“So instead of an aura, it’s the actual physical person I’m using…” he frowned. “It feels like more of a violation. Like I’m using them as a puppet.”

Wilf raised his hand. “If I may, Mister Sam. You were properly polite about it.”

Martha and Mickey had been silently listening to this exchange. Finally, Mickey walked to the bar, and guzzled one of the pints there all at once.

Wiping the foam off his mouth, he slammed down the glass and turned to the others. “Frankly I got no idea what’s going on. Is this a pub or a TARDIS?”

“What, it can’t be both?” the Bartender asked, and gestured to the remaining beers. “I pulled these for you all, if you want them.”

“Only if it’s Schlitz,” Sam said, taking a seat on a stool.

“Hard to get these days,” the Bartender said, “but I’ve got connections.” He winked, and pushed one of the glasses towards Sam.

“So, what did you want with me this time?” Sam pressed.

“You may want to be a few of these in before I divulge that information. Just a fair warning.”

Sam frowned at this. “I see.”

Next to him, Martha slid onto a stool. “D’you care to tell us the rest of what happened in San Francisco, then?”

Sam took a drink from his glass, and offered her a grin. “Well, okay. See, I leaped, and I knew I had to get to six different places. I didn’t know how I was gonna do it, but the sheer anxiety that caused me kind of made the impossible possible.” He leaned in towards her. “It was… really, really cool.”

*        *        *

The Doctor could hear some extra activity going on out in the corridor, but he couldn’t see anything except for Professor LoNigro, who was chained to the outside of his cage for daring to object to the frankly rude behaviour of Thomas Jessop.

“Don’t suppose you see what’s happening out there?” he asked the old man, pulling the top off a pudding cup and dipping his finger in it.

“No, just some guards passing by hurriedly,” Sebastian said. “They’re probably on high alert for Sam.”

“Yes, Sam…” the Doctor murmured. “And you said he just… jumped out of you, fully clothed, like he was using you as a doorway?”

“Yes, it was rather suprising to him, too.”

“Can you two shut it?” the guard across the room grumbled. “I’m trying to concentrate here.”

“Are you still on that crossword?” the Doctor asked. “You know, I can help. I know a lot about a lot.”

“I can do it myself.” The guard narrowed his eyes at the Doctor. “Oh, alright. What’s a moon of Mars, six letters?”

“There are two of them,” the Doctor said. “Any letters filled out?”

“Ends with O and S.”

“That doesn’t narrow it down any, I’m afraid.”

“Well then you’re no damn help, are you?”

“Oi! The moons of Mars are—”

“Phobos and Deimos…” the guard said.

“Blimey, if you knew the moons of Mars, why were you even asking me?”

The guard shook his head, and stood from his chair, grinning. “Doctor, I’m here to get you out.”

The Doctor stepped towards the bars of his cage, eyebrows high. “Is it…”

The guard winked. “I’ve been busy.”

“Sam Beckett, you cheeky thing…” The Doctor grinned. “But you still need the keys.”

“Oh yeah, about that…”

Sam moved to the door, and pulled it open, revealing six guards.

“What’s all this?” the Doctor said, glaring as they filed in.

Each guard reached into their pocket, pulled out a key, and placed it on the table. They then took a position against the wall. The Doctor noted that all of them had the same gait. Sam’s gait.

“Are you all Sam?”

The group of seven guards nodded.

“Don’t worry,” said one of the Sam guards, “it’s all perfectly logical.”

Professor LoNigro’s wide eyes wandered throughout the room. “I… I’m sure it is…”

“We’d better get going,” said one of the Sams, and they all waved as they filed out, careful not to make skin-to-skin contact with one another.

The remaining Sam, the original guard of this room, gathered up the keys and unlocked each of the six locks on the cage.

As he did so, he spoke: “I leaped into the first guard to get one of the keys, and then I realised, I had a bit of a time crunch—so I made the decision to leap into each one at the same time. One by one, but all meeting up here to hand myself the key.”

“That’s all very timey-wimey,” the Doctor observed with a rising smile. “Real fourth-dimensional thinking there.”

“Learned from the best.”

Finally, the Doctor was free.

Sam used the guard’s key to unlock Professor LoNigro’s cuffs, before then cuffing himself to the cage and throwing the key across the room.

“What are you doing that—oh,” Sebastian said, as Sam stepped out of the guard.

Sam reached into his jacket. “Oh good, it’s still there,” he said, handing the sonic screwdriver back to the Doctor. “Let’s get to the TARDIS, shall we?”

“Hey…” said the handcuffed guard, “Can I at least have my crossword?”

As the Doctor retrieved his coat from the hook against the wall, Sam chucked the newspaper to the guard.

“Go ahead, see if you can finish it,” he said. “You deserve at least one win today.”

As the three fugitives left the room, the guard called out, whining that he couldn’t reach his pen.

Chapter 38

Final Gambit

“Um… not that I’m doubting this plan of yours,” Professor LoNigro said as they proceeded down the corridor, “but aren’t there guards everywhere looking for us?”

“Trust me,” Sam said, and confidently strode into the lobby of the facility, where every soldier stood back with a smile, allowing him to pass.

The Doctor glanced around the room. “You really have been busy, haven’t you?”

“Every iteration of leap allowed me to identify what I had to do during the next one to allow us safe passage,” Sam said, waving to his previous selves. “So don’t worry about it.”

“I’m well impressed,” the Doctor said, holding up his hand to high-five the Sams that he passed. Each took him up on the gesture. “Normally I would frown on this kind of self-duplication, but the way you’ve done it is remarkably well executed and temporally sound. I’m beginning to understand what the old Monk sees in you.”

One more Sam pulled the door open for the trio to exit, and the ‘latest’ Sam gave him a salute.

“Thanks, buddy,” he said with a grin.

“Good to see we made it out,” the soldier-Sam replied, waving them off.

They headed towards the water, with the Doctor taking the lead as he brought them to the TARDIS, which still stood where he’d left it.

“Am I ever pleased to see you,” he said to the box, before turning to Sam. “You still have the key, I assume?”

“Uhh, well—” Sam scratched behind his head, before knocking sharply on the TARDIS door. “Gooshie has it.”

The Doctor squinted. “Who’s Gooshie?”

“Little guy, bad breath.” Sam knocked on the door again.

“Oh, him! From the Control Room!” the Doctor cried in remembrance, before his faced screwed up again. “Wait, he’s here too? Must be quite the reunion for you.”

Sam knocked a third time. “He should be here by now…”

“E-Excuse me…” One of the guards that Sam had not leaped into was approaching the group, holding a phone. “Phone call for a Doctor Beckett?”

Sam’s stomach dropped. “Oh… okay…” he took the phone and held it to his ear, trying his best not to sound worried. “Hello?”

“Doctor Beckett?”

“Gooshie!” Sam let out a held breath. “Thank god. Where are you?”

“Um, I’m still down in the mainframe. We kind of ran into trouble.”

Oh boy.

“What happened, Gooshie?”

“You probably should have searched me for more weapons,” Jessop’s voice came over the phone.

Sam’s fear turned to anger. “Don’t you dare hurt him. Or Tina.”

“I won’t. If you surrender yourself.”

“Surrender?”

“Doctor Beckett, you may have deleted all our data, but your brain has everything we need to get this project up and running. Give yourself up, let us use your brain. Hell, if you cooperate, I won’t even have to remove it from your body.”

“Don’t do it, Doctor B!” Tina’s voice cried out in the background.

“That’s sweet,” Jessop teased, “but these two are going back to bed if you don’t give yourself up. So it’s up to you.”

Sam swallowed. “I’m coming.”

He hung up the phone and pressed it into the guard’s palm before turning to the Doctor. “Looks like I have one more thing to do.”

He’d accounted for everything, up to this point. Now he’d have to think on his feet, like the Doctor.

“Can I help?” the Doctor asked.

“I couldn’t ask that of you, not after you just got out,” Sam said before turning to the guard and spreading his hands. “Okay, take me to Jessop.”

*        *        *

Tina hugged her knees as she sat on the floor of the mainframe room, peering up through misty eyes at Gooshie. He was being held hostage by Jessop, a gun at his throat.

“Well,” Jessop said, grinning his terrible grin, “Let’s hope your boss man wasn’t bluffing.”

Gooshie looked down at her with a grim face.

“Why would you wanna destroy so many lives just for your stupid time machine?” she spat at the man. “How do you sleep at night?”

“Oh, sweetie,” Jessop said, ruffling Tina’s hair. “We all have our reasons, don’t we? Things in the past we wished could be changed. Personally, I’d have liked to rip out my Daddy’s guts before he got the chance to beat my sister to death. What about you, darlin’? There must have been a reason that got you involved in Doctor Beckett’s mad science?”

“I just wanted to program a supercomputer…” Gooshie muttered. “And Doctor Beckett is my friend.”

“I didn’t ask you, Dumpster Breath. I asked your lady here.”

“That’s none of your beeswax!” Tina said, narrowing her eyes.

“Rude!” Jessop said, shaking his head, and looking down at Gooshie. “What is it with chicks these days? No respect.”

“Ooh, if you didn’t have my husband at gunpoint, I’d show you some disrespect, you slime!” Tina gave him the finger, before returning to her knee-hugging position. If only she could kick this snake in his manhood, she’d be able to get the both of them out of here.

“Let them go.”

Doctor Beckett’s voice echoed through the room, and he emerged, hands up, from one of the aisles of hard drive storage.

“I’m here, so just let my friends leave.”

Jessop chuckled. “I’m not stupid. I’m not letting them go until you’re neutralised.” He gestured with his head towards the room where Gooshie and Tina had slept. “Get in the bed. I’ll sing you a lullaby.”

“Don’t do it, Doctor B!” Tina cried. “It’s awful in there…”

“I know, but I’m out of options,” he said through a deep sigh. “I can’t let you two end up back in there.”

“Doctor Beckett…” Gooshie said softly, pleading.

Sam walked resolutely to the room, and sat on the bed, placing the sensors and headgear on, before lying down.

“There. I’m in. Now let them go.”

Jessop shook his head as he walked cockily to the bedside, still hanging onto the tense Gooshie. “Not until it’s lights out.”

A Sam shut his eyes, Tina bit her lip, fearing the worst.

But then, out of nowhere, Gooshie slammed an elbow into Jessop’s stomach, grabbing the gun and actually flipping Jessop to the floor.

What the hell?! she thought, before her eyes flicked to the bed and she realised Doctor B had disappeared.

“No way…” Tina murmured. “Doctor B, did you just—”

“Not now, Tina…”

‘Gooshie’ lowered himself into a fighting stance as Jessop began to climb to his feet, before spinning and roundhouse kicking the billionaire, which sent him back to the floor. His head hit the wall with a crack, and he fell unconscious, his neck at an awkward angle.

“Oh no…”

Falling to his knees, ‘Gooshie’ began feeling for Jessop’s pulse.

“Doctor B, it’s you in there, right?”

Sam looked up at her, nodding. “He’s alive, but he needs medical attention.”

Sam reached into Gooshie’s pocket, pulling out the phone on which Tina had spoken to Al earlier.

Oh, right! The message!

He offered her the phone. “Redial the last number called on this phone. Should be to a soldier upstairs that might be able to get medics here.”

Tina nodded, and did as asked, while Sam rushed around doing his doctor thing. If it were up to Tina, she’d leave him to rot for kidnapping her.

As Tina hung up the phone, she helped Sam move the slime bucket to the bed.

“Doctor Beckett, I—” she said, placing a hand on his shoulder and cringing as he looked up at her. “Aww, gee, you look just like my husband. This is too weird.”

“Oh, right. Sorry—hang on, could you grab me around the waist real tight?”

Tina cocked her head, but did as asked. Sam then began pushing forward, trying to escape her grip. After a moment, her arms gave way and he stumbled forward.

“Okay,” Sam said, scratching his head, “I guess it doesn’t work on command unless I’m really keyed up.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m… stuck in Gooshie for the moment. Sorry about that.” He shook his head. “Anyway, Jessop’s as stable as I can get him for now, but he might have a fracture in his skull. Let’s just get out of here before something else happens. There’s medics on the way, right?”

“Well, that’s what the soldier guy said,” confirmed Tina. “So let’s bounce!”

Sam nodded, and led her out of the mainframe, using the psychic paper to its full effect.

“I nearly forgot,” Tina added as they ascended in the elevator, “Al’s message. He told me to let you know at a quiet moment.” She grinned. “Actually, he said we’d be in an elevator.”

Sam’s eyebrows rose. “What is it?”

Tina pursed her lips. “Well, he said… ‘Donna’s alive, but you gotta save her first.’ I got no idea what that means! But… boy I hope it’s true—that she’s alive, I mean. We all went to a memorial for you and her five years ago! We thought you were both… you know.” She drew a finger across her neck.

Sam wrapped her in a hug, his eyes flooding with tears. “I… think I might know what that means, Tina. Thank you for telling me.”

He looked away, looking pensive. “You and Gooshie get to the TARDIS like I said. The Doctor is waiting there. As for me…” He met her eye as a tear fell. “I’ve gotta go. I feel it.”

“You’re gonna leap?”

“Bye, Tina.”

And with that, he blinked, and Tina saw his eyes change from Doctor B’s forlorn gaze to Gooshie’s bewildered bug eyes.

“I’ve never seen a Waiting Room like that before,” Gooshie mumbled, scratching his head.

Chapter 39

Moving On

Back in a TARDIS that looked like a bar (a ‘BARDIS,’ Sam wanted to call it), a group of four humans, a Time Lord in an apron, and a… ‘none of the above’… sat with drinks in hand as Sam recounted the events of what were concurrently happening in San Francisco to his slightly younger self.

“So you left the TARDIS key with Gooshie and just… left them to get out of there on their own?” Martha asked Sam, eyes wide. “I don’t expect the Doctor would have approved of that too much. You must really trust Gooshie.”

She took a sip of her pint as Sam scratched the back of his head.

“Uh, well…”

“Are you kidding?” Al said, shaking his head in disbelief. “Gooshie’s a genius, but he’s a scatterbrain. I still can’t believe you trusted him with it, Sam. The guy needs glasses and he never wears them because he always forgets where he left ’em. He loses things so much I’m surprised he managed to keep Tina’s engagement ring long enough to give it to her. Hell, he put a GPS tracker in his car not because someone stole it, but because he forgot where he parked it and just thought it was stolen.”

“Really?” Sam asked, caught off-guard by that admission. Then he shook his head—no need to get sidetracked, he figured. “Listen, it was fine. Tina was with him when I left, and she’s extremely well-organised,” Sam said defensively. “And, well… I had to go.”

“So then, is that when you came here?” Mickey asked. “Leapt into the old bloke?”

“Old bloke?” Wilf sulked. “That all I am around here?”

“No, that part comes later,” Sam said. At Mickey’s furrowed brow, he added, “I know—it’s complicated.”

“Everything is for the likes of us, innit?” said Mickey, stretching. “Don’t forget that my ex-girlfriend is living with a magically cloned Doctor in a parallel universe.”

“Well, when you put it like that…” Sam said, covering a grin with a sip of his beer.

Wilf was the next to speak up. “I hate to be a bother, but are Sylvia and Donna going to be alright with all them soldiers stomping around?”

Martha frowned. “They’re not after them, but they know Donna’s under my care. Since they aim to detain us, they’ll probably assign her a new doctor.”

“Whoever it is, they’re going to have their blessed hands full with those two,” Wilf observed. “Donna and ’er Mum together are a force of nature, they are.”

At this, Sam snorted mid-drink, and beer filled his sinus cavity. “Uh, yeah,” he said, wiping his face, “I think they’ll be able to handle themselves. Donna doesn’t need to be isolated any longer, because the signal’s been shut down.”

“The question is,” Martha said quietly to Mickey, “what do we do now? With UNIT out to get us?”

“We have plenty of evidence of their corruption,” Mickey said, “so we might be able to get the bad eggs weeded out. But after this, I don’t fink I want to work for this lot any more. Do you?”

Martha shook her head. “Selling us out, invading our minds—what they’ve done to us is unforgivable.”

“You two could run rings around those army guys,” Al said. “You could go freelance.”

“Freelance… what?” Martha asked, head tilted. “Like, alien bounty hunters or mercenaries, or something?”

Al shrugged. “Or something.”

“Oh, I’m sure that would pay well.” Mickey rolled his eyes.

“Well, you might need some seed money to start.” Al put his cigar between his teeth—still noticeably wishing he could light it, but being too polite to do so among this lot—and reached into his pocket, pulling out something. “The later Sam picked this up last week. It’s for you two—should take care of things.”

He handed it to Martha, and Sam caught a glimpse of a lottery ticket. Martha and Mickey stared at one another in muted amazement.

“So. Smith and Jones…” Martha said, a smile tickling at her lips.

“Partners in crime,” Mickey added. They shared a growing grin, and threw their arms around one another.

“Thank you, Al,” Martha murmured.

Al shot a wink in Sam’s direction. “You’d better memorise the winning numbers before you go back to meet me on the twelfth, Sam.”

Sam chuckled, and returned to his beer. “Jeez—who needs the Doctor when you have future me? I’m like Santa Claus.”

“Merry Christmas then, Santa,” Al said, raising his glass of root beer.

Sam clinked his glass against Al’s. “I’ve experienced this same Christmas multiple times already. Starting to feel like it’s never going to end.”

“Well, it’s about to, I think,” Al said. “And uh… sorry for what’s coming next—you ain’t gonna like it.”

*        *        *

June 5th, 2003
Stallions Gate, New Mexico

Project Quantum Leap was almost deserted, and Donna Elesee-Beckett was one of the few people who hadn’t entirely given up on the place, despite it being on the verge of shutting down. Even Tina and Gooshie had moved onto other things.

It was three women who remained: Beth, Sammy Jo, and herself.

Because Al wasn’t here. Al had become impatient and desperate as they’d continued searching for Sam. They were having no success—and when the Committee threatened to pull the plug, Al had done something drastic.

Al had leaped after him.

But he hadn’t anticipated that the Committee would heartlessly pull the plug that very day, even with him still out there.

“I’m sorry, but we told him not to do this,” Weitzmann had said. “We just don’t have the budget to continue this failed project any longer.”

And so, Al’s fate had been sealed. Lost in time, just like Sam.

Donna and Beth, both now widows to Quantum Leaping, only had one another. And Sammy Jo, Sam’s own daughter (though she still didn’t know it), desperate to bring the two men home, but no longer having the resources.

Sammy Jo had only met Sam the one time, that she knew about; his pre-leaping self, when he’d ended up in the Waiting Room, and helped her work on the Retrieval algorithms. Despite not knowing she was his daughter, that chance meeting had motivated her to continue working tenaciously, but as time went on it became clear that there was no getting Sam back through Retrieval. He’d dropped off the map, and now the Project was in ruins.

That was, until last week. A man—a very wealthy one—had contacted her, offering to inject the much-needed funds into the project once more.

And so, the three women met at the eerily silent Stallions Gate complex, and awaited the man who they hoped would be the project’s salvation.

“This is make or break, isn’t it?” Beth asked, squeezing Donna’s hand.

“Yeah.”

Sammy Jo just gave her an intense look, before straightening her lab coat and turning her attention to the elevator.

A moment later, the doors slid open to reveal a youthful man in a bright white suit.

“Ladies,” he said, grinning and extending a hand to Donna as he stepped out of the elevator.

Donna shook it cautiously. She didn’t know why she had a bad feeling about this guy.

“Mister Jessop,” she said, “please come this way.”

Chapter 40

Deal With The Devil

The conference table was long and mostly empty. At one end, Jessop sat with his leather briefcase on the table and self-assured smirk. At the other, Donna was flanked by Beth and Sammy Jo, huddled close for support. Outside the door, a single Navy Ensign stood, one of few staff left to guard the remains of the project.

“I’ve been looking forward to seeing this place,” Jessop said, rubbing his hands together. “Maybe as much as you’re looking forward to my cash injection.”

Donna laced her fingers, placing her hands on the table and leaning forward.

“Mister Jessop, what do you know about our project, exactly?” she asked, apprehensive about the way he was looking at her; all teeth and eyes, like the Cheshire Cat.

“For a start, I know you have the most advanced AI computer ever built,” he said. “And the man who masterminded it has been officially ‘unavailable’ for comment since 1995. Isn’t that right, Missus Beckett?”

Donna pressed her lips together.

“If you don’t mind my asking, Mister Jessop,” Sammy Jo said with a sceptical narrowing of her eyes, “how did you learn of this top secret project? All aspects are highly classified.”

Jessop leaned back in his leather chair, cradling the back of his head with his hands. “My company has its fingers in a few pies, Ms… what was your name again?”

Donna watched Sammy Jo bristle at the disrespect.

“My name is Doctor Fuller,” she said through gritted teeth.

“Ah, yes. Ms Fuller.”

Beneath the conference table, Sammy Jo’s hand closed into a fist.

“I design computer systems, ladies,” Jessop continued. “One such project brought me to a facility in San Francisco that was attempting to improve on the architecture of a computer I traced back here. Not too effectively, I admit. So I used my… considerable resources to find out what this project was all about. See, the normal rules don’t apply when you’re as rich as I am—I can find out just about anything if I grease the right palms. And hot damn! Time travel! Well, that sure piqued my interest, I gotta tell ya.”

So he knew.

“And you want to help us revive the project?” Beth asked.

Jessop’s eyes shone. “You bet your ass I do. The way I see it, it’ll pay for itself in investments—imagine getting in on the ground floor of the wealthiest companies and reaping the benefits in the present.”

Donna pulled at her skirt nervously. “Mister Jessop, we have strict rules against personal gains of that magnitude. The ethical and temporal implications could be—”

Jessop laughed. “I told you already. Rules are for peasants and board games. Where we’re going, we don’t need rules.” He rubbed his fingers together. “Ka-ching, girls.”

Donna exchanged a look of concern with Beth and Sammy Jo. Maybe this had been a mistake.

But Sam and Al were still out there, lost. Wondering what had happened. Wishing a hologram would appear to reassure them that someone cared. It was a dilemma, but she had a terrible feeling that agreeing to this man’s funding would be like signing away her soul to the devil.

“Well, are we here to do a deal, or what?” Jessop said, clapping his hands together before uncoupling his briefcase and pulling out some papers. “Just need to sign on the dotted line, and the money will rain down like you’re three of the bustiest strippers in all the land.”

This guy sure had a way of belittling women, didn’t he? Donna suppressed the urge to storm out of the room, opting instead to avert her eyes from the man.

“We’ll need time to read through this together in private,” Sammy Jo said tersely.

“Alright, no rush,” Jessop said, raising his palms. “But I understand your husband is… stuck out in time, Missus Beckett. Don’t you want him back?”

“Sam’s dead,” Donna said abruptly. She hadn’t intended for that to be her response, but it just slipped out. Something in her gut told her Sam would be safer that way.

“Oh, well. That’s a shame. And what about you, Missus Calavicci? If my sources are correct, your husband is stranded too. Tried to do what Beckett did years ago, trying to save the funding—but it didn’t work so well for him, did it?”

Beth was silent at his jibes, her eyes tearing up.

“Please, allow us to confer, Mister Jessop,” Sammy Jo reiterated.

Jessop stood from his seat. “Well, you want privacy? Maybe your ensign out there can show me around the place while you confer?”

Donna nodded. “Very well.” She opened the door, and leaned in close to the young man in his white uniform. “Show the man around, but don’t let him touch anything.”

The man—or boy, Donna thought; perhaps a similar age to the young Jessop himself—nodded and gave her a salute as Jessop emerged from the room.

“Ooh, a salute. I like that,” Jessop said, grinning. “When I take this place over, I am gonna get me so many salutes.”

The ensign stepped forward. “Right this way, sir.”

Donna stepped back into the conference room, shutting the door. She spun around, her expression turning sour.

“I hate him and I don’t want him anywhere near this place,” she hissed.

“Seconded,” Sammy Jo said. “As much as I don’t want to give up… I couldn’t live with myself if we gave him the reins. Doctor Beckett would never want that.”

“And neither would Al,” Beth added, blinking back tears.

“So that’s it, then,” Donna said quietly. “We’re all agreed.”

“I’m so sorry,” Sammy Jo said, her eyes flicking between the two other women. “I guess that’s it. They’re never coming back…”

Donna took a rasping, uneven breath. “I don’t know if I can accept that. Whatever was leaping Sam around—whether it’s that bartender or something else—wouldn’t just abandon us like this. Not after all Sam’s done for him.”

Beth put her hand on Donna’s back, rubbing it gently. “Wherever they are, I hope they’re at least together.”

When Jessop returned several minutes later, the three women were standing at the end of the room, each giving their most assertive glares.

“Well, have we got ourselves a deal?” Jessop asked, rounding the table like a shark circling its prey.

“I’m afraid we have to decline your offer, Mister Jessop,” said Donna curtly.

“Frankly, your cavalier attitude towards altering the past causes us a great deal of concern,” Sammy Jo added.

Jessop’s smile didn’t falter. “Well, that’s too bad, girls. You could have had a lot more control.” He chuckled. “The Committee has already granted me permission to strip this place down for parts and take your supercomputer back to Cali.”

“What?!” All three women cried.

No. This couldn’t be happening.

Jessop shrugged. “I’m sure UNIT will compensate you well enough for the data, though. Apparently, it’ll be invaluable for protecting the Earth from extraterrestrials. I don’t know or care about any of that, though. Long as it gets me what I want.”

He packed up his briefcase. “I’ll be here with my crew tomorrow. Pleasure doing business, girlies.”

“Wait!” Donna cried. “We accept!”

Jessop snorted as he turned for the door. “Offer’s been rescinded. Too bad, so sad. Buh-bye!”

Donna watched him leave, mouth open. This couldn’t be how it ended. To let such a man as this have everything she and everyone had worked so hard to achieve? To let him mess around in time with such flagrant irresponsibility?

When Donna returned to her office, she collapsed into her chair, weeping. This was such a cruel fate. And dangerous.

She wiped her eyes, and turned to a photo of herself and Sam that she kept on a shelf. Sometimes she’d talk to it, as if he was there—and she felt a strong need to do so now.

But when her eyes fell upon the frame, she saw that a folded up piece of paper was leaning against it. Written on the front was her name. And, if she didn’t know any better, she’d have thought it must be Sam’s handwriting.

With a trembling hand, she picked it up and opened it.

Send everyone home and meet me in
the Control Room at 10 PM
– Sam ♡

Chapter 41

Presumed Dead

Sam had a lot to complain about when it came to the knowledge that had been thrust into his brain—the fact he had to sort through and partition everything based on who experienced what was difficult enough, let alone the unbridled emotional rollercoaster that came with them, whether from the Doctor, from Donna, from Angel Sam, or from the endless parade of leapees that had left their impression on him. It had nearly overwhelmed him, and it was only through the sense of self Angel Sam had helped him identify that he had found his centre. It had all been painful, and he’d come terribly close to death.

But there were upsides.

One such advantage was the advanced technical knowledge that had flooded his mind. Such that the ins and outs of Project Quantum Leap seemed like child’s play now. Everywhere he’d looked, he could identify a more efficient, better way of doing things.

If he wanted to, he would be capable of restoring power to the facility completely off-the-grid, while reducing the power usage by at least 90%.

But he wasn’t here to do that, was he?

No. Instead, he was here to destroy the place so Jessop couldn’t get his paws on it. To fulfill what he’d already seen, where they were still years from figuring any of it out, and trying to cheat their way to knowledge of how to do it by taking it directly out of peoples’ minds.

He was here to create the explosion that had killed Donna. But Donna wasn’t going to die. And neither was Ziggy—it was all very clear to him now. Ziggy’s processors and components didn’t need to be the size of a football stadium. He just had to do a little rewiring of the wristlink, add a few parts he’d collected on the way here, and she’d fit inside.

Sam plunged a shovel into the desert sand, digging a hole where he had hidden something many years earlier, though it had only been about a day from his perspective.

The box was intact and undisturbed. Terrific. He retrieved it and opened it, seeing the objects he needed, and returned to the car, where he continued on to the complex where Donna would be waiting for him.

*        *        *

“Go home, men,” Donna told the guards at the front gates of the complex. “You are relieved. We are officially closing this place down for good as of now.”

“Yes ma’am,” the marines saluted her, and left their posts.

Donna continued through the building—there were no more than one or two on each floor, so it wasn’t exactly difficult.

Finally, she reached the lowest floor, where the Control Room awaited.

A single ensign stood outside it—the one who had been outside their meeting earlier, and who’d shown Jessop around.

“Ensign,” she said, “You’re relieved of duty. Go home.”

The ensign shook his head. “Sorry, Donna. No can do.”

Donna was about to protest when she realised and caught herself.

“Sam? Is that you?”

“It is, but we’re being watched, so don’t give it away.” He glanced pointedly at a security camera on the ceiling. “The feed uploads to a remote server. We can’t give away that I’m here, okay?”

Donna cocked her head. “Why?”

“Just trust me, okay? They need to believe you sacrificed yourself. It’s for your own safety.”

“Sacrificed?”

“Could you let us in to the Control Room? We can disable the cameras inside, but this one out here has to show we went in and didn’t come back out.”

“Sam, you’re scaring me.”

“Trust me, Donna.”

Donna looked into his eyes—they were pained, and well beyond the years of the young man around them.

“Alright,” she murmured, and placed her hand on the panel, causing the door to slip open. Inside, it was dark. Ziggy was silent and offline. Her brilliant coloured lights were dark.

Sam reached up to the camera set into the ceiling, and grabbed it, pulling it out of its recess, before disconnecting its wires.

“We should be safe in here now,” he said.

“What are we doing, Sam?”

Sam looked at her with a grim expression. “Jessop is bad news, and we can’t let him have any of my work. I’m sorry it’s come to this, Donna, but we need to destroy it.”

Donna brought a hand to her mouth. “Sam…”

“The only way I can think to do it that won’t cause a massive environmental disaster is to sabotage the radium ring that surrounds the Imaging Chamber, and flood the place with radiation. It won’t be safe to come in here, but the place will automatically seal up so none of the radiation escapes.” He frowned. “But the catch is, we can only do that from inside.”

Donna gasped. “Is that what you meant by sacrifice?!”

“It’s okay, Donna,” he said, taking her hand. “I’ve prepared. You’re gonna be safe. And so is he.” He pointed to a reflective surface, at the ensign.

“How, Sam? You said we were to come in here, and not come back out, didn’t you?”

Sam reached into his pocket, pulling out a box, which he handed to her.

“Open it,” he said, as he began striding to the control panel, and opening a hatch on the underside.

Donna pulled the box open, and found a black wrist strap of some kind. “What is this?”

“It’s called a ‘Vortex Manipulator.’ Strap it on. I’ll show you how to use it when I’m finished here. But it’s gonna be your ticket out of here.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a compact time machine. Stole it from a little old lady in the seventies.”

Donna stared at him as he tinkered. “What?”

“Well, she was a serial killer; I wasn’t going to pay her for it, was I?”

There was something very different about Sam, Donna thought. She wasn’t sure whether it was good or bad, but it was definitely strange.

Nevertheless, she trusted him all the same, and attached the device to her wrist.

“I’ll have something for your other wrist in a minute,” Sam mumbled as he worked. “Just need to…” He flipped a lever, and the room lit up.

Donna’s jaw dropped. “How did you…? They cut off the power, Sam.”

“I know,” Sam said, climbing out from under the panel. “I put in a temporary power cell; it’ll power up the place for the next thirty minutes. Or until the explosion, anyway.” He raised his eyes to Ziggy’s orb, which burst to life.

“Hello, Ziggy,” he called to her.

“It has been eighteen months, four days, six hours and fourteen minutes since I was deactivated,” Ziggy said with disapproval. “I’d be interested to know what took you so long to bring me back online, Doctor Elesee. And… hmm. Doctor Beckett? Is that you? You don’t have the readings I would normally associate with you, but I am detecting your brain waves. I’m… confused.”

“Ziggy, I would love nothing more than to recount to you my recent history, but we don’t have the time,” Sam said, slapping a reconfigured wristlink into a recess on the control panel. “If you value your consciousness, I recommend you download yourself into this. Quickly.”

Ziggy was silent for a moment, as the wristlink lit up and blinked.

“Doctor Beckett, how did you make a wristlink so spacious?”

Sam grinned up at the orb. “Would you say it’s… bigger on the inside?”

“Metaphorically speaking,” Ziggy conceded. “But why am I to migrate to this small device?”

“Because this complex is about to become incompatible with life. Please. Hurry, okay?” Sam hurried to the entrance of the Imaging Chamber, and popped open a hatch by the door, where he began to work.

Donna stood, awestruck, as she watched him. All of this was so strange. At the very least, all his swiss cheese memory must have been filled in for him to be so effortlessly making these upgrades and changes.

After several minutes, he turned away from the panel, wiping his brow.

“Okay. I’ve set up a reversal of the pilot power in the Imaging Chamber that will lead to a chain reaction and collapse of the radium ring once I power it up. I need you and—” he gestured to the ensign’s body, “—him out of here before I do it.”

Donna frowned. “How does that work?”

But Sam had already moved on to Ziggy. “How are you coming along, Ziggy?”

“76.81% copied, Doctor Beckett.”

“Great. Give the wristlink a jingle when you’re all the way there.” He turned back to Donna. “I’m not sure I’m quite ready to vacate,” he mumbled. “I need more adrenaline.” He reached into another pocket, pulling out a small case. “Good thing I packed some.”

He opened it and began assembling a syringe.

“Sam, what are you doing?”

Sam filled the needle from a vial and tapped it a few times, before depressing the syringe until some of the liquid began to ooze out.

“Just watch.” He jammed the syringe into his thigh, and pressed the plunger until all the liquid had gone in.

He closed his eyes, and took a deep breath, jumping a few times, before a blue light emanated from the ensign, and Sam stepped out of him.

How in the world did he do that?!

Donna’s knees went weak as she saw him emerge, and he caught her before she collapsed to the floor.

“Hi,” he said sheepishly. “I haven’t seen you in a while, huh?”

Donna was about to respond, but he drew her into a kiss before she could.

Well, he was different, but he still kissed the same. She melted into his arms, almost forgetting the danger all around.

At the control panel, the wristlink made a cheerful noise.

“Migration complete,” Ziggy’s voice rose from the watchlike device.

Sam pulled himself reluctantly away from her, and approached it, snatching it from the recess. He brought it back to Donna and gently attached it to her free wrist.

“Stay safe, okay?”

Donna looked up at him. “You’re saying that like you’re not coming with me.”

“I can’t. Remember what happened with the Weeping Angel? Quantum Fracturing Event? I can’t use the Vortex Manipulator. But you and Ensign Kane here can.” he gestured to the man he’d been wearing for the past day, who was looking grimly at him. “You just have to be hanging on to one another when you activate it, okay?”

“And you?”

“All going well, I’ll leap out of here before disaster hits.” He took her by the shoulders. “I’m sending you to Christmas Day, 2008. That’s when you’ll be safe from Jessop, okay? I’m sorry you’re gonna miss five years, but… that’s when I know you’re going to be okay.”

“Your last leap that we had a track of… with the other Donna. That was then, wasn’t it?”

Sam nodded. “A lot’s happened.” He planted a soft kiss on her forehead. “I love you. Now, you need to go.”

He took hold of her wrist, and opened a flap on the Vortex Manipulator, pointing to a button.

“I’ve got it all configured. Just press here when I tell you. Make sure you’ve got a hold of the ensign so you both get out of here alive.”

“I love you too, Sam,” Donna said, her eyes flooding with tears.

“I’ll see you again, Donna,” Sam said, squeezing her hand. “I swear.”

He turned to the ensign, taking his hand and shaking.

“Thank you for agreeing to do this for me. I’m so sorry to turn your life upside down, but if Jessop finds you, he’ll rip the memories from your head.”

“It’s alright, sir,” said Kane, giving Sam a salute. “It’s worth it for the chance to time travel.”

He moved to Donna, linking arms with her.

Sam brushed a tear from his eye as Donna looked down at her laden wrists.

“Take good care of Ziggy,” Sam said. “Now go.”

Donna nodded, tears rolling down her cheeks and tapped the button. In an instant, she felt an electrical tingle, followed by the feeling of being pushed off a cliff. Her stomach dropped and as she landed on a concrete surface, she felt dizzy and disoriented. She and Ensign Kane collapsed to the ground, dazed.

“You made it.”

Donna put a hand out to the solid ground as she looked upward towards the voice. It sounded like—

“Sam…?”

Sam crouched, holding a hand to her. “Welcome to London,” he said with a warm smile. “You could probably use a drink after that, huh? Come on, I know a place.”

Chapter 42

Life, the Universe, and Everything (Epilogue)

As Sam set his life’s work to explode, he ran his fingers over the main control panel, saying a silent goodbye to the place.

Once he was sure the chain reaction was in progress he looked up at the now-empty orb that was Ziggy, and whispered “goodbye.”

His next leap brought him into an old man, where Al was waiting for him, and he found a cabinet with a pub inside.

After spending some time retelling his story among friends, he found that the pub had moved to a street very close to where he’d sent Donna, and he knew that the Bartender had brought him there for that reason.

But as he opened the door to find her, he came face-to-face with himself.

“Oh boy,” he said, stepping back as the other him grinned.

“Looking for Donna?” he asked, and moved aside.

Donna was there, looking perhaps even more confused than Sam. She still wore the Vortex Manipulator on one wrist, and the wristlink on the other. Just behind her stood Ensign Kane, marvelling at the whole situation.

“How are there two of you?” she asked.

“I… I guess he must be from later along,” Sam said.

“That’s right,” Other Sam said. “I’m afraid you have to tag out now, buddy. Lot to do.” He leaned into the door, waving at those within.

“There you are,” Al said, crossing to the door. “I was beginning to think you’d left again.”

“Can’t get rid of me that easily,” Other Sam said with a grin. He and Al hugged, before he turned back to Sam. “Your next job is to find Al.”

“But he’s right here…?”

“He leaped, Sam…” Donna murmured. “He was looking for you.” Her eyes studied the older Al with confusion.

“You really leaped?” Sam asked, incredulous. “Why would you do that?”

“I thought I’d never see you again! What would you have done, Sam?”

“Okay, someone’s going to have to do explain what the bloody hell’s happening here, yeah?” Mickey cut in.

Other Sam stepped forward.

“This is my wife Donna,” he began, “who I sent here from 2003. Immediately after that, I leaped into Wilf, which is the version you’ve been talking to for the last few hours. I’m the version that built the sonic screwdriver Al gave him. I greeted Donna and the ensign she came here with when they landed, and now I’m here, and the earlier version of me has a few things to do before he becomes me, and one of those things is finding Al, who leaped about seven years ago, so he can go on to become the Al you’re looking at now. That make sense?”

“Not a jot or tittle,” Wilf said.

Martha grinned. “Wibbly-wobbly…”

“Timey-wimey,” Sam finished.

“Exactly,” said Other Sam.

“So… what do I need to do?” Sam asked his double.

Other Sam set about removing the devices from Donna’s wrists, and handing them to Sam.

“You’ll need these. There’s actually quite a few things you’ll have to do before you join up with me. Just make sure the Vortex Manipulator is offline when you leap.”

“Right. But where am I going?”

“Just think of Al. As long as you keep him in your mind, you’ll go in the right direction.”

Other Sam exchanged a look with Al. “I can’t tell you more, except… trust Doctor Song.”

Sam furrowed his brow. “Alright then…”

He looked around the room. “Well, I guess I’ll be seeing you—” he gestured to his double, “—presently.”

Donna stepped up to him. “I don’t understand even half of what’s happening, but… wherever you’re going… good luck.” She kissed him on the lips.

As she pulled away, Sam met Other Sam’s eye. He was looking sheepishly at them, his cheeks flushing.

“I remember that kiss,” he said, rubbing his neck.

Sam checked his pockets—one sonic screwdriver. One Vortex Manipulator. On his wrist, one wristlink.

Other Sam pulled up his sleeve, revealing his own wristlink, and produced his own sonic from his pocket. “Is it a paradox that I used this to build itself?”

“Yeah. But I think the universe can handle it,” Sam said, amused.

He turned to face the Bartender. “As for you… I don’t know whether to thank you or curse you out for all you’ve done.”

“I probably deserve both,” he replied with a shrug. “But just know I’m looking out for you, Sam. Now, you’d better go. My TARDIS really doesn’t like having two desynchronised versions of you in one place.”

“Okay, I’m going.” Sam waved to his friends, and closed his eyes as the blue light took him.

*        *        *

March 2nd, 2009
Edinburgh, Scotland

“Good morning, Mister Jessop,” said Doctor McKillop, opening the curtains of the hospital ward. “How are we feeling today?”

Jessop scowled at the man. He knew full well he hadn’t been able to utter a word. In response, he grunted, and looked away.

“We have a visitor for you today,” the doctor continued, moving to the door and pulling it open. A woman with flaming red hair stood in the doorway.

“This is him?” she asked, looking him over with unimpressed eyes. “He’s broken.”

“He’s had a brain injury,” said Doctor McKillop. “But we’re confident he’ll improve with time. He needs to relearn a few things, though. We’re one of the foremost rehabilitation centres in the world—he’s in good hands here.”

Jessop grunted again. He was tired of being talked about like he wasn’t there.

“Use your words, darling,” the woman said, and strolled to his bedside. “My name is Zoey. And your name is…” she waited for him to reply.

“He hasn’t regained his speech at this stage,” Doctor McKillop said. “He’s only been out of the coma for a couple of days now. But we have had some progress in writing. He sometimes uses the wrong letters, but he’s improving.” He placed a pencil in Jessop’s hand, and a notepad on his stomach. “Write your name, Mister Jessop.”

Jessop shakily put the pencil to paper and wrote what he hoped was his name.

Zoey peered down at it, and cackled. “I thought his name was Thomas.” She looked at the man in the bed. “You wrote ‘Thames.’ Like the river.”

Jessop rolled his eyes and groaned with frustration.

“Well, Thames,” she said, amusement dancing in her otherwise cold eyes, “I represent a… benefactor… who wishes to complete that project of yours. How would you like to help build Lothos 2.0? When you’re well enough, of course.”

Jessop grunted, and raised a thumb.

“…Uhh… ye—yeah,” he managed to say, though his tongue wasn’t doing what he wanted it to.

“Wonderful,” Zoey said. “In that case, you might want to be introduced to your new friend. Instead of using human brains as a base, you’ll be using this.”

She reached into her bag and produced what looked like a quartz crystal cluster.

“Wh—?” Jessop squinted at the rock in confusion.

Zoey placed it on his side table. “I’ll leave this here while you regain your mental faculties. I promise: after it talks to you, you won’t be nearly as confused as you look right now.”

She returned to the doorway. “Get well soon, Thames.”