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CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

TIME OUT OF JOINT

"I can't take much more of this," Eroica said as he sagged against the wall, a hand going to his head.

The Major turned an annoyed scowl in his direction but did not comment. He couldn't exactly deride the thief for getting himself involved in this mess, since that was the bloody KGB's doing. All he could do was put up with him until they returned to their own time and he could be rid of him.

"Is that it?" Turlough wanted to know. "Now we just...wait for the Time Lords to figure out we're here?"

"Well, it might be a good idea to contact them," the Doctor said mildly. "Hopefully, they'll be more helpful than that last time I called them."

"Doctor," Eroica said in a small voice. "We can't just...leave Jason on the floor like this." He looked down at the Alterran's inert form and shuddered, closing his eyes. "It's not decent."

The Doctor sighed heavily. "Yes." He threw a quick glance in Turlough's direction. "We'll put him in Tegan's room until..." His voice trailed off and he closed his eyes. Until I can contact Tel-Shye with the bad news. He thought back on all the years Jason had traveled with him. All those years his father had been dead set against it, trying to get him to return home so he would be safe, only for him to die because of something he had gotten involved in on his own.

Turlough crossed to the inner door and pushed it open. He was in no condition to be carrying anyone, and probably should not have been on his feet nearly as long as he had been already. He turned back and waited.

Eroica looked down and took a hesitant step, stopping dead when Klaus snapped, "I'll carry him." The thief gave him a stunned look but did not reply. After all, technically, the Major had just killed the person in charge of his mission.

"Where is this room?" the Major asked as he knelt down.

"Just in here," Turlough replied, nodding through the open door.

Klaus nodded and turned back. The expression on his face changed from cold determination to shock when he repositioned the body in order to lift it from the floor. Was that a moan I just heard? He put his fingers to Jason's neck, his eyes widening at the same time. "Doctor, he's still alive!" he announced in astonishment.

"What?" everyone in the room cried in a collective gasp.

The Doctor strode across the room and knelt down at the Alterran's side. "What in this cosmos is keeping you going?" he muttered, shaking his head.

"Is it Jason or that...thing?" Turlough wanted to know.

The Doctor looked up, drawing a deep breath. He did not reply directly. Instead, he looked at the Major. "Let's get him off the floor, shall we?"

* * *

Less than an hour after being placed in Tegan's room, Jason slowly opened his eyes, being somewhat surprised to find himself alive. Again. He realized very quickly that he lacked the strength to move. In fact, he scarcely had the energy to keep his eyes open. He took stock of his injuries, or lack there of, and discovered why he was so weak. The alien DNA had been purged from his system, but his own DNA was unstable...and unraveling.

Great. I'm going to die. Again.

Jason heard movement in the room and mustered his strength to turn his head. A few feet away, the Major was sitting in a chair, calmly smoking a cigarette, and silently watching him. The officer gave no reaction when the Alterran's eyes locked onto him, continuing in his silence.

"If you're trying to unnerve me," Jason said weakly, "don't bother. I don't have the energy."

The Major's eyes flickered but he did not reply.

Jason closed his eyes. "Are you here as my bodyguard, or my executioner?"

This question got a reaction. Klaus sat back in his chair and crossed his arms. "Why would you think I'm your executioner?"

Jason had to struggle to open his eyes again. "You've already killed me once," he replied calmly. "I've no doubt you won't hesitate to do so again if you believe it's necessary."

The Major's eyebrows went up. "And will it be necessary?"

"No. My DNA is unraveling at the seams." Jason closed his eyes and sighed. "I can't seem to stay alive, can I?"

"The Doctor is trying to find a way of stopping the...unraveling."

"He's alright, then?"

"Yes."

Jason breathed a sigh of relief. "How did he get the alien DNA out of my system in the first place?"

"He didn't. After I shot you, Lord Gloria dropped the TARDIS key into your blood," the Major informed matter of factly. "The Doctor said the TARDIS did the rest."

"The TARDIS..." Jason gave a wry smile. "We must've left the separation program running."

"Separation program?"

"Yes. The one that put you back together. It separated my DNA from yours and Dorian's so the transmat could..." Jason's voice trailed off. "I guess the old girl couldn't extract and stabilize mine at the same time."

"An either/or proposition?" Klaus concluded.

"Yes."

The Major took a drag from his cigarette and sat thoughtfully a moment. "Could the TARDIS stabilize your DNA if the same thing happened?"

"Coming in contact with the key, you mean?"

"Yes."

"I'm sure the Doctor's thought of that. It must only work one time. The imprint must've been erased." Jason drew a deep breath and struggled to open his eyes. "You won't have the pleasure of killing me again."

The Major stubbed out his cigarette and got to his feet. "I find nothing pleasurable in killing a friend," he said coldly.

Jason blinked. Did he just say friend? I'm dying and going mad.

Klaus reached into his pocket, pulling out a TARDIS key. "This is yours, I believe," he said as he held it out.

"Major, I just told you..."

"This isn't the one you gave the Earl," Klaus interrupted. "This is the one you gave me."

"What...?" Jason's eyes opened fully and looked at the key dangling from the Major's fingers. "You still remember what happened before?"

"Almost everything."

Jason scowled. "Almost?"

"That's not important now," Klaus said impatiently. "Take the key."

"No, I can't..."

"Do you want to die a third time?"

Jason drew a deep breath. "Major, the reason we came here was to stop the future from being altered."

"So?"

"I'm supposed to be dead."

Klaus met the Alterran's gaze steadily. "How do you know that?" he said sharply. "What if your dying changes the future?"

Jason blinked. He hadn't considered that possibility. "I might not have the strength to withstand the process."

"What difference does it make? You're gonna die anyway."

"You really have a way with words, you know that?"

"Shut up and take the key."

"Major..."

Before Jason could object, the Major was placing the key in his hand and closing the fingers around it.

Everyone in the console room practically jumped out of their skin at the sound of Jason suddenly screaming at the top of his voice. "Klaus! No!"

"Bloody hell!" Eroica exclaimed. "The Major's killing him. Again!"

The Doctor was already storming to the inner door. He struggled with the door to Tegan's room to no avail. It refused to open.

"He's jammed it shut," the Doctor said as he started pounding on the door. "Major! Open the door."

Silence.

"Major! Dammit, open the door!"

Klaus stood at Jason's bedside, looking over at the doorway in silence as the Doctor continued to pound on it from the opposite side. The chair he had been sitting in was jammed up against it, effectively keeping the Time Lord out. He turned his gaze back to Jason, who was gasping for breath, his eyes tightly closed. His body was starting to glow faintly, radiating from the key clenched in his fist.

The Doctor straightened as a scream burst forth from the other side of the door. He turned on his heel, pushing Turlough and Eroica aside as he stormed back into the console room.

"Doctor!" Eroica gasped. He turned to Turlough in bewilderment. "Where's he going?"

Turlough shrugged. "It's best not to ask when he's like this." He jumped and threw a nervous look back at the door as Jason screamed again. "What the hell is he doing in there?"

Eroica shuddered. "With the Major, it's usually best not to ask, either," he replied knowingly.

The Doctor reappeared, making straight for a door in the far wall that Turlough suddenly realized had not been there a few seconds earlier. Then he knew what the Doctor had done. He had changed the TARDIS's architectural configuration. No doubt this door now led into Tegan's bedroom.

Turlough's suspicions were confirmed when the Doctor threw open the door.

Klaus look up in surprise when the far wall suddenly had a door in it that was just as suddenly thrown open, the Doctor on the threshold, a look of thunder on his face. A look that changed to total bewilderment when he saw the officer standing calmly at the bedside. Jason was writhing on the bed, his body glowing faintly.

"Major, what on Earth...?" the Doctor began. He got no further. At that moment, Jason let out a low moan and went limp. The key dropped from his hand and hit the floor with a faint clank.

Klaus gave the Time Lord a steady look before bending down to retrieve the key. He wordlessly returned it to his pocket, going on to light a cigarette as the Doctor came over and quickly checked the Alterran's condition.

After a moment, the Doctor looked up. "What did you do?" he practically demanded.

The Major blew smoke in the air, meeting the Time Lord's accusing gaze. "The same as the Earl."

"Me?" Eroica gasped from the doorway. "What did I do?"

"You gave him his key."

The Doctor blinked. It had completely slipped his memory that Jason had given the Major a TARDIS key. Then again, he had though that the key had been lost after the creature's attack. Obviously, the officer had not lost the key. It was equally obvious that he also had not lost the memories that had suddenly returned to him.

The Major pulled the chair away from the door and took a seat. He looked as if absolutely nothing out of the ordinary had happened as he calmly smoked his cigarette. "How long do you think it will be before we can return to 1987?" he asked conversationally.

The words were no sooner out of his mouth when the TARDIS gave a violent judder. If there had not been a second violent lurch, the Doctor would have said that this was the TARDIS being removed from the gash in the vortex by the Time Lords. But they had a bit more finesse than this.

The Doctor headed back to the console room, stopping dead in his tracks when he reached the inner door. The time column was moving. Somehow, the time machine had taken flight on her own. He crossed to the console and scrutinized the readings, becoming all the more puzzled as he went.

"Doctor, what's happening?" Turlough asked sheepishly.

"It seems the TARDIS is taking us back to 1987 all on her own," the Doctor replied as he looked up.

"But...what about that...creature?" Eroica asked. "And the crack in the vortex, or whatever it was?"

"It was never there."

Everyone jumped when Jason suddenly spoke.

Eroica turned back, seeing the Alterran struggling to sit up. He could not quite manage it and fell back onto the pillow.

"I'm no doctor," Klaus remarked aridly, "but I don't think you should be doing that."

An amused smile came to Jason's face and he chuckled. "And you say you don't have a sense of humor," he said softly. His voice was weak, but undeniably his own. He turned his head to look at the others who now stood in the doorway. They seemed hesitant to come near him. Considering all that had just happened, he could hardly blame them.

"Do you think it will be necessary to shoot me, Major?" he asked mildly.

"Not today."

Jason closed his eyes and drew a deep breath. "Tomorrow, then. When Time returns to normal."

"What do you mean?" This was the Doctor, who had returned to the room. He did not like the readings he had seen on the instruments in console room.

Jason opened his eyes. "That...thing drew energy from temporal paradoxes."

"We know all that," Turlough said impatiently.

"During that...power struggle it was...winding things...backward."

"Backward?"

Jason nodded. "That's why the Major suddenly remembered everything."

"I don't remember everything," Klaus said matter of factly.

Eroica gave him a stunned look. "How do you know that? How can you possibly know...well, that you don't know?"

"Time went out of joint," the Major replied. "I remember it happening and nothing after. Not until we returned to the starting point."

The Doctor's eyes narrowed. Somehow, he had the feeling that there was more to this. That time was still out of joint somehow. Somewhere. Somewhen.

"It's just a small paradox, but enough to cause a ripple in the fabric of Space/Time," Jason said quietly.

"And give it more power," the Doctor concluded.

"Yes." Jason paused a moment, drawing a deep breath. "When it...took me over, I saw what it'd done. It...wound time back too far."

The Doctor frowned. "Too far?"

Jason nodded. "The gash in the vortex. It's...closing on its own because of it."

The Doctor's eyes widening. "It caused the paradox that will keep it out of our universe," he said in an amazed tone. "That explains the readings the TARDIS is picking up." He threw a quick glance back into the console room.

"That alien whatever-it-was discovered it by accident," Jason said.

"When the transmat latched onto the time corridor," the Doctor concluded.

"But..." Turlough broke off when all eyes turned to him. He sighed heavily, asking, "Why would it take on the identity of a KGB scientist?"

"Fear," Jason said softly.

The Doctor's eyes widened. "Yes, I'm beginning to understand now."

The Major sat back in his chair and crossed his arms. "Care to enlighten us, Herr Doctor?" he said astringently.

The Doctor gave him a knowing look before stating that it seemed likely that the alien parasite had assumed the identity of Borodin because of the fear the man instilled in others. Especially if the real Borodin were already allied with Ivanov. Rather than jumping out of corners, all he had to do was walk into a room and people would be terrified.

"And then the Major went and killed Ivanov," the Doctor concluded. "And you, Jason, threw the transmat offline, completely isolating it."

Jason closed his eyes and sighed heavily. "And put it into withdrawal. Wonderful."

"It's dead now," the Major stated flatly. "It won't be terrorizing anyone anymore." He gave the Earl a steady look that completely bewildered him. He would never know what had really happened to him. And Klaus was not about to tell him.

The Doctor saw Jason struggling to keep his eyes open and gave him a small smile. "Jason, you get some rest," he said calmly, "while I make certain that gash is completely sealed."

Eroica looked in the Major's direction before crossing to the bedside. "Now it's my turn to look after you," he said happily.

"Dorian, I just need to sleep," Jason said quietly.

"The Major's watched you sleep long enough," Eroica replied as he sat down on the bed. "It's my turn."

"Great. Do you think this is your chance to finally get into my bed?" Jason said playfully.

"You meant it isn't?" Eroica said innocently.

"No."

"I was right," Eroica moaned playfully. "You don't love me anymore."

Jason's eyes flickered in the Major's direction. "Major, if he tries anything while I'm asleep, please, shoot him for me."

"Is that an order, your royal highness?" Klaus replied coolly.

"Yes."

An evil smile came to the Major's face, his eyes narrowing. "I think I might enjoy carrying out that order."

"Major!" Eroica gasped. He heard Jason give a chuckle and turned back to him with an annoyed look on his face. "You two are evil, do you hear me! Evil!"

The Doctor gave a very dramatic groan and turned to leave. "Well, obviously things are back to normal inside the TARDIS," he said as he went back into the console room. "Let's see about the rest of the universe."

* * *

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