A Journey Across

Book 1 - A Journey Across

Chapter 2 - Mad man with a box

The TARDIS suddenly made a loud crunching noise, as if you put in the reverse at 120kmh.

The doctor ran towards the navigation console. "What was that? It can't be. No no no nonononono. Don't do this to me." He stormed around and quickly checked some readings. There was a short pause as the TARDIS and the doctor went completely silent. The TARDIS swoshed multiple times before making a loud crunching noise again.

"Oh no. We will not stop here. What do you want? What's wrong my dear?"

"Doctor?" asked a voice behind him.

The doctor was surprised, "ROSE? What are you doing here? Are you real? Well, sure you must be real, BUT HOW DID YOU GET HERE?"

"I'm not sure. I saw a bright flash and here I am," said Rose.

"Well, it is good to see you again, but... this means bad." The Doctors face looked increasingly worried as he stepped away from the console towards Rose.

"Didn't the walls between the universes close behind us or something?", asked Rose as she slowly walk around the doctor.

"Yes, they did" - he turned around and went to his console again - "and this means we have big problems. And you and your universe are the smaller ones."

Rose sighed, "What did you break this time?"

"I did not break anything," he said annoyed, "Why do people always assume that I cause trouble?"

"Maybe because you do?" Rose answered.

"Oh yeeaaah. Right.... Hmmm...... But this time it wasn't me," he reassured.

"So what is this big problem now?" asked Rose

"The time vortex collapsed completely", said the doctor as he hunched over some green buttons.

There was a pause before Rose responded, "WHAT?"

"Yes. I don't know how but the only thing that prevents us from becoming frozen statues, never to move again is a small time buffer in the TARDIS. If we ration it we could hold out 2 weeks. Maybe 2 and a half if you stop wandering off", answered the doctor.

"Stay focused," she almost yelled at him, "We need to find out what caused this."

He looked shortly at the consoles behind them, "Whatever caused this, it must have broken some underlying rules of the universe."

"What 'rules' do you mean?", Rose was confused.

"For example if you implode a black hole or go beyond the beginning of time. But the problem is, these things need an IMMENSE power. And I mean IMMENSE. Not even all ever existing TARDIS' could have produced that much energy in the lifetime of the universe.", he turned back to the console.

"Wouldn't we notice such a huge explosion?", She was now really worried, not only for the universe but also for the Doctor.

"Doesn't need to be a explosion. But let's see where it came from. The good thing is, the universe is frozen, we can observe," The doctor started pressing buttons, to enable the main monitor. It flickered when it turned on and the TARDIS made a crunching sound again.

"Are you sure, you put the right gear in?", asked Rose with an ironic voice.

"Naah. Hmm. Okay.... Right.. Ahhhaa! It didn't happen here," he quickly ran around to another monitor.

"What do you mean?", she asked.

"It can't be. That is just ... IMPOSSIBLE. Even the creators would have trouble doing THAT," The Doctor had a face expression that spoke of horror.

Rose yelled, "Doctor! what do you mean with `'creators'?"

"This was HUGE. Bigger than anything," he ran off to one of the back consoles, "It ripped right through space-time."

"Doctor, you have 3 seconds to explain" - she stepped towards the centre - "or I look back in the time vortex"

"The time vortex is gone. But okay.", said the Doctor, "In a parallel universe someone or something caused a massive explosion. But the worst part is, that this explosion was huge. The very definition of huge. It must have been bigger than it's own universe and he might exceeded the speed of light."

"But don't we do that all the time?" asked Rose.

The doctor kept explaining, "Yes, but we use the time-vortex to travel. This..... thing.... managed to that while maintaining it's space-time dimensions. The universe where it came from is collapsing. Like humans it does everything to survive. It sucks energy from other universes. Like our time-vortex. And it does a good job. It is very far away. It must be noticeable even in farther universes."

He looked at Rose and saw her puzzled look. He kept explaining, "You see, the more distance between to universe is, the more different they are. This one is basically like ours but some rules are different. The explosion was big enough to rip it apart and now it is a state of ever-collapsing," he seemed to talk without pause, "This collapsing causes energy to be drawn from other universes. The universes near that one must have shrunk to the size of a cherry by now. At least a cherry in this universe. Think of putting holes a football... but not a ball, the universe is not a ball but just assume and you take 100 other balls and connect them all. They will deflate if you don't fix the first one."

"Okaayyy. What can we do about it?"

"We have to flee, I'm afraid. This universe will be frozen and the collapse to. We have to go to a little bit farther universe where we have time to think," he started to pull the necessary levers.

"But the walls are closed, remember? They closed on the day you left me on the beach!" she followed the doctor.

"The explosion ripped these 'walls' apart, Rose. You are from this universe, and that is why you were sucked back," he shortly glanced up to Rose, "This universe is trying to gain energy and you are loaded with it."

"WHAT?" yelled Rose.

"Don't worry, you won't feel anything. At least nothing I am aware of."

"I think I want to hurry to this other universe. I'm not feeling very safe."

"I share that feeling. Allons-y!"

He pressed a little green button right of him. The TARDIS started to work again. It crunched horribly as the inner part of the console started moving.

"Rose?"

"Yes?" she looked worried.

"This could hurt! Hang on to something!"

A short explosions followed by several crunching noises. The TARDIS pulled with her full weight but didn't move. Suddenly something snapped with a loud clank and the TARDIS started to swosh normally.

They heard a single dong. Not a second later flaming pain was inching through Rose's body, eating up any rational thought and clear vision. Thankfully darkness consumed her and extinguished the fire inside.