ashes ➝ Doctor Who²

XXXXIX

"Nothing can stop the detonation. Nothing and no one!"
- Davros, Journey's End

There was a soft wheezing from the back of the room, it made Penelope's entire body stand on edge. The familiarity was paralysing. Everyone turned to look at the soft glow of the TARDIS returning, the Doctor and Davros equally as shocked.

"But that's.."

"Impossible."

The TARDIS materialises, and the new Doctor appears in the doorway. Penelope's heart almost dropped when he smiled at her briefly. She had to look between him and the Doctor, their eyes were different; this other Doctor looked at her the way John did.

Jack was grinning.

"Brilliant."

The other Doctor ran across the room, a weapon in his hands similar to the one they had brought from Torchwood.

"Don't!"

Davros zaps the new Doctor. He drops the weapon in pain, Penelope couldn't take it. She started banging on the lights of the holding cell, the light burning her hands as she watched him hit the floor.

"Leave him alone!"

"Activate holding cell."

Donna runs from out from within the TARDIS, picking up the gun and instantly making herself a target without knowing what she was doing.

"Doctor! I've got it. But I don't know what to do!"

Davros zaps Donna, sending her flying backwards. Once again, it drops to the floor. Their only weapon being thrown about wasn't exactly a great plan.

"Donna! Donna! Are you all right, Donna?"

She wasn't responding, which only made Penelope hit the barrier harder, feeling the burns on her hands begin to bleed against the light. This can't be it. This can't be how it all ends.

"Destroy the weapon." A Dalek obeyed, and the weapon exploded where it lay on the floor. Penelope had to stop hitting the walls of her chamber, there really wasn't anything she could do. And shooting through it likely wouldn't do anything either. She felt hopeless again. "I was wrong about your warriors, Doctor. They are pathetic."

"How comes there are two of you?"

"Human biological metacrisis. Never mind that. Now we've got no way of stopping the Reality Bomb."

From somewhere above them in the ship, a Dalek started a countdown. Feeling cold once again, Penelope wrapped her arms around herself. Dying isn't so bad, but feeling this isolated in the end was agonising.

"Detonation in twenty rels. Nineteen.."

"Stand witness, Time Lord. Stand witness, humans. Your strategies have failed, your weapons are useless, and. Oh. The end of the universe has come."

Penelope couldn't feel her fingers anymore, the creeping cold taking it over, but she reached up to play with the silver ring around her neck. She had stained her shirt with blood from her hands and felt she couldn't do any more than wait for the inevitable.

"Nine, eight, seven.."

The Doctor, both versions of him, watched her closely as their hearts burned. This new Doctor was born so early after John Smith he barely knew anything but love for her. Her first and actual Doctor, the one who had broken her, the regret he feels will never fade. And he will never forgive himself.

"Six, five, four.."

Jasper wished he was closer. He would do anything to hold her right now and tell her it was okay. Even if they both knew it wasn't, it would be a reason to be in the other's embrace.