“So, your mother and your granddad?” Vairë asked when Donna re-boarded the TARDIS. She’d moved the ship to their front garden.
“They’re not ready, yet,” Donna said. “They need to take care of a few things first.”
“I see,” Vairë said softly. Just then, the doors opened again and Martha strode up the ramp.
“So! You gonna come with us? We’re not exactly short of space,” Donna said to the younger woman.
“Oh, I have missed all this, but, you know. I’m good here. Back at home. And I’m better for having been away,” Martha laughed. Vairë smiled at her. She was so proud of her friend, a proper doctor, living a life day after day. “Besides,” Martha continued, flashing her engagement ring, “someone needs me. Never mind the universe, I’ve got a great big world of my own now!” she said as she started to walk down the ramp, towards the doors. Just then, the TARDIS doors slammed shut. All three women fell to the floor as the ship took flight.
“What? What!?” Vairë shouted in confusion.
“Vairë, don’t you dare!” Martha threatened.
“No, no, no! I didn’t touch anything!” Vairë replied as the Time Rotors spun up. “We’re in flight, it’s not me!”
“Where are we going?” Donna shouted.
“I don’t know, it’s out of control!” Vairë replied in confusion. Even her sister didn’t seem to know what was going on. All of them were being pulled somewhere.
“Vairë Carter, just listen to me! You take me home, take me home right now!” Martha demanded.
“What the hell’s it doing?” Donna shouted over the confusion.
“Controls aren’t working!” Vairë replied. She couldn’t even get a stable enough footing to see the monitor.
“You are completely… impossible!” Donna roared.
“Not impossible, just… a bit unlikely!” Vairë replied. Just then, the ship landed. The Time Rotors grew silent. “Well, let’s see where we are, shall we?” Vairë muttered as she pulled on her coat and headed out the doors, the other two women following in her wake. The three of them walked out into some kind of underground tunnel. Dirt covered the floor. Strange bits of twisted metal studded the area around them. “Why would the TARDIS bring us here?” Vairë wondered.
“Oh, I love this bit,” Martha sighed happily.
“I thought you wanted to go home,” Donna muttered.
“I know, but all the same… It’s that feeling you get…” Martha said.
“Like you swallowed a hamster?” Donna quipped.
“Don’t move, stay where you are! Drop your weapons!” a human man ordered as he ran onto the scene.
“We’re not armed! Look, no weapons. Never any weapons. We’re safe,” Vairë lied. No way was she going to admit to having two swords strapped to her back and a .44 pistol on a holster in the small of her back. Even if she never intended to use them, she wasn’t going to give away an advantage if she could help it.
“Look at their hands. They’re clean,” another man said, grabbing one of Vairë’s hands.
“Alright, process them! Her first,” the first man said quickly. The two other men walked up to Vairë and grabbed her, tucking her hands behind her back and then dragging her towards a machine.
“Oi, oi! What’s wrong with clean hands?!” she shouted, confused.
“What’s going on?” Martha shouted angrily.
“Leave her alone!” Donna threatened.
The two men shoved Vairë’s hand into the machine. It gripped her arm tightly and would not let go no matter how much she tried to pull away.
“Something tells me this isn’t about to check my blood pressure AAGGGH!” Vairë shrieked as the machine bit down on her.
“What’re you doing to her?” Donna demanded.
“Everyone gets processed,” the leader said calmly.
“It’s taken a tissue sample. Ow ow ow ow ow ow!” Vairë shouted as she continued to try to get free of the machine. “And extrapolated it! Some kind of accelerator?” she wondered.
“Are you alright?” Martha asked calmly. Ever the doctor no matter the situation.
“What on earth? That’s just…” Vairë muttered, staring at her hand where a y-shaped scar appeared. Then the doors of the machine opened and a girl, blonde with big green eyes, stepped out. She was young and slender with pale skin. Vairë stared at her in stupefaction.
“Arm yourself!” the leader shouted, tossing the girl a gun. She caught it and handled it as if she had been born to wield such a thing.
“Where did she come from?” Martha asked, confused.
“From me,” Vairë whispered in awe. The girl…that was her daughter. Her daughter. A sudden wave of love, longing, and pride rushed over her. Vairë had never pictured herself as a mother but in this moment, she couldn’t picture herself as anything else. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t carried this girl within her for nine months. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t sweated, cried, and labored to bring her forth. This beautiful, incredible woman was her daughter and no one was going to say otherwise!
“From you?! How? Who is she?” Donna demanded.
“Well… she’s… well… she’s my daughter!” Vairë answered, tears springing to her eyes. That girl was her daughter! Hers! And no matter what, Vairë would protect her little girl, no matter the strange circumstances of her birth!
“Hello, mum,” the blonde said with a smile.
“Hello, baby,” Vairë whispered, her voice an equal mixture of awe and disbelief. She threw her arms around her daughter and wept in joy and in sorrow. “You’re my daughter,” she gasped. “You. Are. My daughter!”
~*~*~*~
Vairë knelt, holding her little girl in her arms. Jenny – short for “Generated Anamoly” – was gasping for breath in her arms. Jenny’s blood washed over her mother’s hands.
“Live, baby,” Vairë wept as she rocked her impossible daughter. “Live for Mummy? I was going to take you to Terra and show you the Mississippi River. I was going to take you to Galliterra and show you the Tol Eressëa. We would watch the twin suns set over it. I was going to teach you about time travel, fixed points and points in flux. We were going to go so many places, baby. Don’t give up. Live. Please live. Please?” Vairë cried. “You would get married one day and have babies of your own. I’d teach them. I’d spoil them rotten. Please, Jenny. Please?” she begged. “Jenny? Be strong, now. You need to hold on. D’you hear me? We’ve got things to do, you and me. Hey? Hey? We can go anywhere. Everywhere. You choose,” Vairë whispered, kissing her daughter on the forehead. General Cobb and the other humans and their Hath enemies watched in silence.
“That sounds good,” Jenny gasped.
“You’re my daughter and we’ve only just got started. You’re gonna be great. You’re gonna be more than great. You’re gonna be amazing! You hear me? Jenny?” Vairë shouted. But Jenny had stopped breathing. Half-human and half-TARDIS she might be, but she didn’t have the ability to rise from death.
“If we wait… If we just wait…” Vairë sobbed, rocking her daughter in her arms. She’d only had Jenny a short time. Surely the universe wouldn’t rip them apart now. She needed her baby. She needed the blonde girl. Finally, she would have someone to share everything with. She would have a family of her own – not one borrowed from her brother. Jenny was her daughter! Hers!
“There’s no sign, Vairë,” Martha whispered quietly. “She’s like you, but… maybe not enough.”
“No,” Vairë growled, setting her daughter, her precious child, on the ground. She kissed her forehead one last time. “Too much. That’s the truth of it. She was too much like me.” Vairë reached behind her and pulled out the .44 that Magnolia had given her as she stormed over to the humans, to General Cobb, who had killed her baby girl. She pressed the barrel of the pistol against Cobb’s forehead. Her hand shook. Tears rolled down her cheeks. He had stolen Jenny from her. He had taken all those years, all those adventures, away from both of them. Vairë could see his blood and brains staining the floor in front of her. She wanted nothing more than to kill this man. But killing him would not give her Jenny back. Jenny was dead. “I never would. Have you got that? I never would!” the blonde shouted as she pulled the pistol apart and threw the pieces across the “temple.” “When you start this new world. This world of Human and Hath… remember that! Make the foundation of this society. A woman who never would!” she roared.
Turning her back on the humans, Vairë went back to her daughter. She reached up and pulled one of the swords free and then laid it over her daughter’s body. Clasping Jenny’s cold hands to the hilt, Vairë kissed her one last time. “Your Aunt Magnolia and your Auntie TARDIS would have loved you, baby girl,” Vairë whispered sadly. “Go well on your journey, sweetheart. Mummy will sing you into the West, into the Deathless Lands. And, one day, Mummy will join you there and we’ll sing the Song of the Children of Men, baby. We’ll sing the Song. Together,” Vairë sobbed as she began to sing. She felt Martha and Donna lifting her up and carrying her back to the TARDIS. Vairë couldn’t move. She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t think. Her mind was filled with images of her impossible daughter. Her heart was filled with sorrow of the too-short time she’d had with Jenny. With the child she’d never thought she would have.
~*~*~*~
“Jenny was the reason for the TARDIS bringing us here,” Vairë said hours later, once she had calmed down enough to be rational. “It just got here too soon, which then created Jenny in the first place. Paradox. An endless paradox. Time to go home?” she asked, glancing up at Martha.
“Yeah. Home,” Martha whispered, her heart breaking for her friend. Vairë walked over and placed her hands on the console. She began to sing, but without her usual enthusiasm and heart. The words felt almost…mechanical. But still, the TARDIS spun them through the Vortex, sending them back to Earth. Once it landed, Donna and Martha left, Donna following to make certain the younger woman got home all right.
“You sure about this?” the redhead asked.
“Yeah, positive. I can’t do this anymore,” Martha sighed. It was too much. The heartache, the fear, the life constantly on the edge. She wanted stability and safety and love. And now, thanks to Vairë, Martha had those things. “You’ll be the same one day,” she told Donna.
“Not me. Never! How could I ever go back to normal life after seeing all this?” Donna scoffed. “I’m gonna travel with that woman forever.”
“Good luck,” Martha said sadly as Donna hugged her.
“And you,” Donna whispered.
“We’re making a habit of this,” Vairë sighed. She’d followed the other two off the TARDIS. She wanted a chance to give Martha Jones a proper goodbye.
“Yeah. And you’d think it’d get easier,” Martha said, laughing without mirth. “All those things you’ve been ready to die for. I thought for a moment there you’d finally found something worth living for,” she whispered, thinking about Jenny.
“Oh… there’s always something worth living for, Martha,” Vairë whispered, embracing the other woman and holding her tight. Martha had been the first person to give Vairë a reason to stop. A reason to keep living. No matter what happened, Vairë Carter would always remember that.
“Bye, ‘Weaver,’” Martha whispered softly.
“Goodbye, Doctor Jones,” Vairë replied in the same tone, pressing a gentle sisterly kiss to Martha’s cheek. “I will never forget you.”
“I’ll never forget you,” Martha whispered. “And I’ll never forget Jenny.”
Pulling away and nodding tearfully, Vairë and Donna went back to the TARDIS and began their journey to their next adventure.
~*~*~*~
Back on Messaline, the humans and the Hath were holding a funeral. A blonde woman lay on a bier, her hands folded over her chest. A sword lay across her, her fingers wrapped carefully around the hilt. She was a woman of legend, the daughter of a strange woman. In her name, peace reigned between the two species. She had died to bring them that dream. Her funeral would cement the peace between the two very different species.
Then, suddenly, she breathed. A stream of golden energy flew out of her mouth. Her watchers stared in awe as she sat up, clutching the sword her mother had given her.
“Hello, boys,” Jenny laughed.
“Jenny? What’re you doing? Come back!” the young soldier, a man named Cline, shouted as she gripped the sword and ran off towards the shuttle.
“Sorry. Can’t stop. What you gonna do, tell my mum?” Jenny asked, broadcasting her voice over the intercom.
“But where are you going?!” Cline demanded.
“Oh, I’ve got the whole universe! Planets to save, civilizations to rescue, creatures to defeat… and an awful lot of running to do! Love the running,” she breathed. In time, she’d search out her mum. She’d let the other woman know what had happened. But for now, adventure awaited. Firing the shuttle’s engines, Jenny headed off to the stars.