A Shattered Past

Flashes of color and light. Voices saying things, but muted as if they were in water. A select few images that seemed clearer than the rest, mainly seas of red grass and little pinpoints of light scattered across the inky black canvas of the universe.

These were some of the only things he had, that, and the strange black and green box that had been next to him when he first woke. At first, the man had felt this was normal. No memories, laying on the cobblestone street of 18th century London, clad in nothing but a pair of jeans, a ripped white t-shirt, and a strange blue tie around his neck. But as he slowly woke to the sound of the clopping of hooves and the chatter of people, he knew that there was something wrong. It wasn't the sort of knowing that came about by a working of logic; the man had no memories, thus no logic to base anything on. This was a gut feeling. Something was wrong here.

The man sat up, looking around. Most were dressed in fine dresses or fancy suits. He looked down at his own appearance. Why didn't he have a dress? Why was he not clothed in a fancy suit? Many also walked around with canes, and the man wondered if he had a cane. But when he reached into his pocket, he found no cane. The closest thing to a cane was a small metal device that glowed and buzzed when he pressed a button. He stored the strange item away, hoping to figure out what it was later.

He craned his neck to look at the strange box behind him. Nobody gave it a single glance, as if it were invisible, though he could see it just fine. It was foreboding and mysterious, with an exterior black like the sky and green doors that glowed like the device he'd found in his pocket, just without the buzz. The box caused a tingle in the back of his head and a warming to his hearts, though why, he wasn't sure. When he rose to try opening the doors, they remained shut, as if they had been locked. But how could they have been locked? There was no keyhole visible, so it must have had to been locked from the inside. He imagined it must be stuffy, crammed in a box of this size for so long. He rapped his knuckles on the door twice, but there was no answer.

He turned from the box and again gazed out into the crowds of people, a small frown on his face. It was an annoying feeling, akin to when you forget someone's name and no matter how hard you try you can't remember it, just more massive and confusing. Theta Sigma spoke his first words since waking up, his voice hoarse and dry, either from not being used in a while or from too much yelling.

"Who am I?"

A bright flash of light and she was there. There where? Not the twenty-first century, nor the twentieth. Nineteenth? Eighteenth? She should have done a bit more research, though, admittedly, she never planned to come this far back. Well hell, it wasn't her timeline. She was just going to stick around the twenty-first century since that's where everything happened. Even her fluid timeline never went further than her birth date. It had been going all wibbly wobbly since her stay at Madame Vastra's. But that wasn't important right now. What was important was for her to figure out why she was pulled here. Maybe her manipulator had conked out. Mal looked down at the device but found it looked just the same and didn't seem to be broken.

She tugged the sleeves of her hoodie over her hands, hiding the complicated piece of technology from the world and herself. Denial. That was a word for it all. Well, denial and acceptance all at the same time. Oh, stop dwelling on things. Why're we here?

Mal was walking down the street, eyeing this building and that. People gave her offending looks though she knew it was because she was a woman who wasn't wearing a dress. But dresses would be mighty difficult to wear and run in if you were someone like Mal. She wasn't about to conform and was just glad no one had stopped her to ask questions of any sort.

She saw it then. The black TARDIS struck a cord to her memory and Theta came to mind. How long had it been since she'd last seen the spunky Time Lord? But his presence meant danger. It always did with this lot. And right now she couldn't be apart of it. She just couldn't.

Quickly, Mal pressed herself to a wall and began tinkering with the vortex manipulator. She was begging under her breath for it to work, to take her back to her proper time and away from the feeling of foreboding doom lingering around this era. But nothing. It wouldn't work. It was obvious to her why when that light feeling entered her head. She was swimming, floating. And then she was back in the moment. "Wibbly wobbly..." Mal muttered to herself, not giving a single damn if she sounded crazy.

Robin scrambled out of the TARDIS doors, almost forgetting to shut them in her hurry. "Oi! At least I don't fly so recklessly that my companions fall into the wires! And then forget them there! You might just want to check those before we leave." She crossed her arms, sticking her tongue out at the Time Lord as she rushed to catch up with him. "Alright, where did your signal take us, then?" She took a look around, trying to remember what part of history this was... definitely Earth, but... when? That's when she noticed Mal, being the only woman there not actually wearing a dress. "Mal!" She wrapped her arms around the woman in a hug, feeling so bad for what she did to her the last time they met. "Are you, you know... alright?" Her eyes flickered down to her stomach purposefully, not really sure if she told, or was willing to tell the Doctor yet. Then she realized. "Hold on how are you here? Seriously how much can I miss, I wasn't gone THAT long..."

What was that noise?

Theta's eyes darted over to an alley, where a strange wheezing sound was emanating. It was important somehow, but he didn't know why. But the sound almost brought up memories; if he closed his eyes, he could make out a blurry blue shape, with a light fading in and out above it. It made no sense, but he nevertheless jogged over to the alley.

The amnesic Timelord poked his head around the corner. What he saw was vastly different from everything else he'd seen so far. There was a large blue box; much like the black and green box he woke up next to. Maybe they had some sort of connection? There were also three people gathered in front of it, one tall dude with large ears and a black jacket, one redhead girl that looked flustered, and one brunette that looked even more flustered than the other. Their clothes were like his; completely out of place. None of them had canes, either. He was brought relief from that. He had been wondering if he was the only one in the city without a cane.

"Hello?"

He stepped around the corner, revealing his presence. Not that he knew, but his appearance was probably a little worrying. His usually neat hair was long and greasy, hanging in front of his dirt-covered face. He had no shoes, and his feet were all scraped up. His shirt was ripped by something that looked a lot like claws. His bowtie hung limply. And his eyes; they portrayed pure confusion, as if he didn't know his own name, which he didn't by the way.

Mal was still fiddling with the device and seemed to be working faster as soon as she heard the familiar groan of the TARDIS. No, no, no, bad time. Bad. Work, work, work! It was too late. She heard the creak of the blue doors and instantly jerked her sleeve back over the manipulator. The unmistakable Northern accent of the Doctor rang out and she swallowed. No offence to them all but she hadn't wanted to run into her friends so soon. This wasn't twenty-first century London as she had hoped it would be and that set her back from her plans. Well, the plans of the ones helping her. "Doctor." She greeted with a small nod to her head and was quite proud when she managed not to flinch at the physical contact.

She was going to respond to the Doctor's question but Robin's appearance cut her off. Turning to look at the girl, Mal felt saddened once again at the site of her. She never did question what happened with her and Sonya but honestly didn't want to know. And suddenly she was being hugged and she wasn't too sure how to respond. Mal reached up and patted Robin's head before gently prying her hands off of her. "I'm okay. And I'm here because... it's... I'm not here. I'm really not. Just trying to leave, actually."

And of course, as luck would have it, Theta rounded the corner. Mal looked up and swallowed nervously but was taken aback by the Timelord's appearance. "Whoa.. are you alright, man? Th-that's... you must have had quite a tumble. Or row with your TARDIS. Right, sorry I can't stay." Spinning on her heel so her back was facing them, Mal began to tinker with the manipulator. She muttered loudly under her breath an resulted to just smacking the bloody thing. "Curse it all to hell!"

Robin frowned, wondering why the pair of them were so interested in this man. Well they probably knew him... but obviously they didn't know him. Then again.... time lines... But no, he was in modern clothing, if a bit roughed up. Poor man, whatever happened to him... Looking from Mal to the Doctor, she tried to see if she could get a clue from either of them on what his name was, but then she spotted it. The black and green box in the slight distance. Her eyes widened as she remembered what Time Lords could do... if... Striding up to the man, she stared at his bowtie and decided that it most certainly was him. "Theta...? What happened..." She stared into his eyes, feeling so sorry for whatever they must have done... whoever they were... But he looked so confused, why? Theta usually mucked things up a bit, but not like this. "Doctor, what happened?" Chastising herself for the question, she realized he would probably have no idea. Well... he was the Doctor, but still.

It took a moment for him to realize that Theta might actually be his name, and the girl was talking to him, not to empty space.

"Theta? Am I Theta? Odd sort of name...what kind of parents name their kid Theta, of all things? Why not something normal, like Jason, or Adam, or Christopher? Theta. Isn't that a Greek letter or something?" he realized he must be rambling. He blinked a few times to escape his reverie, and focused his eyes on Robin.

"I'm sorry...do I know you?"

Mal gave up trying to work the device. She sighed heavily and stepped up beside the Doctor, peering into Theta's face right along beside him. Her brows knitted together as she stared at him. There was no recognition there. Odd. Well, if she was stuck here may as well figure out what the hell was going on. Did he smoke his head somewhere? She glanced over at Robin when the girl spoke then her eyes flickered over to Theta when he spoke. Yeah, definitely forgot.

You, technically, now us all. She's Robin. I'm Mal. And Theta isn't exactly odd for..." Mal stopped there, not sure if she should just simply reveal he wasn't exactly human. Surely it wouldn't come as that big of a shock. But he was racking off very human names. Did he think he was a single hearted ape? She looked to the Doctor much like Robin had, figuring he'd have the answers out of old habit. Would she always turn to this man? Well... no, actually. This was probably the first time she'd ever admit it.

Robin grinned up at the Doctor, her eyes flicking to Theta before she finally whirled to face Mal. "You wanna come? Or you sick of us already?" Sticking her tongue out playfully at the woman, she giggled. "If nothing else, we can drop you back in your time period." As she shrugged, her eyes widened slightly before she spun around to Thet. "Oh! We didn't even ask if you were willing to come! I don't think you'd take kindly to us kidnapping you... Come on, though. It's fun, I promise. Usually. Sort of. Well... I guess it all depends on if you base 'fun' on safety." Realizing she wasn't really helping, she backed off with her efforts to make him want to come. They'd probably end up dragging him in there anyway, and even if not, somehow the Doctor usually convinced people. Usually.

Theta was having a hard time keeping up. Memory loss? Well, ok, it was kind of obvious that he was missing a few of his marbles, but it made him wonder just how much he was missing. And regeneration? Did he regenerate? He looked down at his apparently new hands, a bunch of questions bouncing around in his head. What caused him to regenerate? What did he look like before? Was he a jerk or kind? Which regeneration was he in now? Robin's question startled him out of his musings. Theta twitched, looking up at the girl with a no duh look.

"Of course I'm coming. Why wouldn't I come? You people obviously know me, better chances sticking together than walking around the streets aimlessly. Unless you know me because we're enemies, but you look friendly enough, so I don't think you want to kill me. Except for that one. You look kind of annoyed. Why're you annoyed? Is it because your Manipulator is broken? I can fix that, you know. Hey, does anybody have a sweatshirt I can borrow?"

He said all of this really quickly, without pausing for breath. As soon as he'd finished he looked around expectantly, as if he actually expected everyone to understand the string of words that he had just spouted out. If the old Theta had ADHD on a human scale, then the new Theta had it on a Timelord scale, plus one and a cup of crazy. After a few seconds, which was apparently too long for his new attention span, he turned his eyes to the Doctor, referring to the other Timelord's suggestion for going out and having 'fun'.

"So what do you have in mind?"

Mal looked at Robin and scowled at the younger girl. This was not part of her plans for today but she supposed she could help Theta remember a few things since she was part of his past. And if worse came to worse at the end of the day she could hitch a ride with the Doctor. But shouldn't they be going to places he's been before to help jog his memory? Mal recalled seeing that on a TV show once and figured it could work for a Time Lord. They had higher functioning brains after all. Though she'd be damned to admit that, their egos were big enough.

Mal raised her eyebrows at Theta in surprise. His words just tumbled out and in response she looked around like maybe there was an off switch to his rambling. Wait, what? Did he say she looked like she would kill him? Well that wasn't correct though she felt uncomfortable being around here. "Manipulator? I have no idea what your-" Mal trailed off, figuring denying the fact she had it was pointless since the Doctor bloody well knew it. Nonetheless she tugged her sleeve further down and suppressed a sigh. "It doesn't need fixing, it's just being stubborn. This happened once before."

She turned to look at the Doctor and Robin and huffed out another breath. Oh, maybe she did sound annoyed with all this sighing and shifting on her feet. Well, this lot would be use to that wouldn't they? They use to be the center of her annoyance regularly in her past. "Yeah, what did you have in mind?"

Robin tried to shoot Theta a reassuring smile, taking the hint to stay behind for the time being. She'd been around the universe long enough to know that people have much less patience with children because of their steriotype. Anyway! She turned to Mal, her smile melting away. What was going on? "Mal you okay? I mean usually you're not exactly the one begging us to take you, but today... What's wrong?" She winced at her word choice, remembering how 'wrong' usually upset people because they think they've been insulted. That wasn't what she was trying to do at all, but it was too late to take it back, so she went with it.

Theta shot the nine-hundred-or-so-year-old a confused look, but nevertheless let himself be led away from the two girls. He tapped his fingers against his leg in a hyperactive way as the Doctor asked him stuff, restraining the urge to tap his foot as well. As soon as he was finished with the questions, Theta stared down at the ground, thinking. His fingers stopped their tapping, and it was a few more seconds before he started to speak.

"I-I remember some things, but most of it doesn't make any sense. There's some smell I remember well...I think it's a type of fruit. And this red field keeps popping up. Oh, and stars. I remember lots of constellations on lots of different planets" he looked up into the sky, eyes searching out the Earth constellations that he knew, mentally drawing out the pictures, imaginary lines going from dot to dot, forming shapes "I think I must have traveled a lot..."

Mal blinked as the Doctor took Theta off to the side.  She didn't say anything, just watched as the two of them wondered off and she began to ponder what had caused this to happen.  It was a futile train of thought considering she didn't have a vast amount of knowledge on anything.  Especially Time Lords.  

As Robin addressed her she slowly turned to look at the younger girl, her brows furrowing together.  "Why wouldn't I be okay?"  It came out quickly, her voice took on a defensive tone.  Mal appeared very offended at the redhead's words and crossed her arms over her chest, huffing out a breath as she began to pace. "I'm not begging anything of you two!  Why does there have to be something wrong for me to want to tag behind?  Huh?  Do I look like something is wrong?  You saying I look ugly?  Fat?"

Well, in all honesty, a lot was wrong with Mal.  This included her mental state and emotional levels.  If she was asked this a few months ago she would have simply shrugged and said nothing, leaving it at that.  But now she was having a whole dramatic episode and feeling dejected.  She covered her face with her hands and started to just cry.  It only served to anger her more so she quickly wiped the tears away and stared up at the sky in a rage, remaining silent.

Robin sighed, wrapping her arms around Mal. "Sorry, I just wanted to make sure you weren't upset. Make sure nothing is bugging you, you know?" She let go, looking up and offering the woman a weak smile. There was no way she wasn't lying, it was obvious. Although if she felt the need to hide it, she wasn't about to dig it out of her, especially since she was rubbish with sad people. The best she could offer them was a hug, really. Turning around, her smile widened as she saw the Doctor and Theta coming back. Maybe they could get Mal's mind off of whatever was wrong. Then again, maybe they were wrong. Ugh, this is why she didn't get people.

"Come on, it'll be fun Mal. You know it will." She grinned up at her, her excitement as well as her anticipation building with each passing second. "So where are we going, then? Some place he can jump start his memory or just a place to relax and wait? Ooh, if we do, can we go to that planet with the singing flowers?" She giggled, beginning to bounce on her toes. That was a habit she had to make her self pretend she didn't pick up from the Doctor. "Theta, anywhere you remember specifically you'd want to go?"