Doctor Whooves Episode 11: Parents' Day

by Doctor Perseus

The Merging Begins

Chapter 4: The Merging Begins

Sweet Apple Acres, Ponyville, Equestria, Gaia, Summer, 996 C.E.

"What?!" asked the still surprised Rose. The Reaper screamed again and flew down towards them.

"Duck!" Derpy warned. Everypony heeded the warning and dropped to the ground as the Reaper proceeded to fly over them. Rose held onto her younger self tightly as the Reaper flew back down towards them. She didn't know what was going on or where she had been transported to but she knew that the Reapers were an apparent danger to her, no matter when or where she ended up. The Doctor grabbed onto Rose's hand and helped her up.

"How are we supposed to defeat that thing?!" Johnny asked.

"I don't know! But it's coming back!" Twilight cried. The Reaper screeched again as it flew back down. Suddenly, a ball of fire appeared out of nowhere and smashed into the Reaper. It didn't cause much damage but it did make the creature dizzy for a moment.

"Where on earth did that come from?!" Rarity asked. That's when a series of fireballs began falling from the ceiling, out of thin air. The barn began to bend and twist as if its walls were made of flexible plastic and were being bent by a giant. For a second, Rose could swear that she could see the interior of the church she had previously been in. Shadowy figures began appearing all around them and even the Reaper was beginning to become slightly confused.

"What's happening?!" Fluttershy asked.

"Those are some pretty colors!" Pinkie exclaimed as she pointed towards the ceiling. The colors of the barn were beginning to mix with a layer of colors that seemed to be coming from a window of colored glass. The Doctor then noticed a familiar object in the distance. In the vision of the ghostly church, he could see his Sonic Screwdriver perched inside a golden outline of the TARDIS. He pulled out his own Sonic Screwdriver and, with a shrug of his shoulders, aimed it at the ghostly Screwdriver and fired. A loud, sonic sound began reverberating throughout the barn and the Reaper began to scream. The ghostly church began to disappear. Another shadowy figure, flying in the air within the vision of the church, flew towards the Reaper. The Reaper flew towards the shadow and they both exploded in a fiery cloud of golden ashes. The ashes fell to the ground and disappeared into nothing. For a second afterwards, Johnny and Emily swore that they could see the interior of the burning grain silo. Then the vision disappeared, leaving both of them bewildered and confused.

"What was that?!" Rainbow Dash asked.

"Where's my sister and that dirty mare?" Big Mac asked.

"And who are they?" asked Sarah the pegasus. Rose was still in shock. She continued to hold her past self tightly as the group of ponies approached her.

"W...where am I?" Rose asked.

"You're in Equestria, Rose. Circa 996," the Doctor replied. "I'm the Doctor."

"You can't be the Doctor. The Doctor's an alien who looks like a human! You're a-"

"An alien who looks like a pony but once looked like a human. I know this is a lot to take in, Rose, but I am the Doctor. I may not look like your Doctor but I am a future version of him."

"Prove it."

"Okay then, if you insist. You're Rose Tyler. Born in 1986. Hometown is London, England. Your mother's name is Jaqueline "Jackie" Tyler and your father's name is Pete Tyler but he died in 1987 due to being hit by a car on his way to the wedding of Stuart Hoskins and Sarah Clarke. My ship is called the TARDIS, which stands for Time and Relative Dimension in Space. I met you in 2005 when you ran into an army of Autons in the department store in which you worked. Henrik's I believe is what it was called. We helped save your boyfriend, Mickey Smith, from the Autons and that's when you began your travels with me. If I have your current place in my timeline correct then so far you've seen the death of Earth, met Charles Dickens, saved London from the Slitheen family, met a Dalek below Utah in 2012, and have traveled to the year 200,000 to save Satellite 5 from the Editor...and that's all the major events that I recount from the top of my head."

Rose stood there in shocked silence. She couldn't believe it. Somehow, someway, the pony in the blue suit standing before her was indeed the Doctor. Rose approached the Doctor and knelt down, staring deeply into his eyes in the process. The Doctor smiled and took one of Rose's hands in one of his hooves.

"I remember when you asked me why I had a northern accent if I were an alien," he chuckled. "And I remember saying, "Lots of planets have a north," in response. Do you remember that?"

"Yes," Rose said with a laugh. "I remember." Rose then reached forward and gave the Doctor a hug. The Doctor happily hugged her back. Twilight and Derpy looked at each other awkwardly and then turned back to the Doctor and Rose. "It's you! I can't believe it's really you!"

"I could easily say the same thing."

Rose stepped back from the Doctor and stood up. Johnny was the first to step forward.

"I'm glad that you two have reunited but my daughter just disappeared in a flash of golden light. Ah would be very happy to know exactly where she's gone off to," he stated.

"Right!" the Doctor exclaimed. He turned towards Twilight, Derpy, and the others and beckoned them over. "Let me discuss this with my group in private for a moment!"

The Doctor huddled in a group with Twilight, Derpy, Spike, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Rarity. Rose stood quietly in the center of the barn, continuing to keep her infant self calm and collected.

"So what exactly just happened?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"It's hard to say exactly but I think I have an idea," said the Doctor.

"Well spit it out then!" exclaimed Pinkie.

"We're all ears," Spike added.

"Okay. I believe our two paradoxes have somehow managed to cross paths," the Doctor replied.

"Two paradoxes? I thought there was only one paradox," said Rarity.

"He's talking about Rose's," said Twilight and Derpy together.

"Thank you, you two!" the Doctor said happily. Twilight and Derpy blushed slightly and turned away from each other.

"Rose is in a paradox too?" Fluttershy asked.

"Yes. I've already told Twilight and Derpy this story but, several years ago when I was traveling with Rose, I took her back to see her father who had died when she was a baby. She saved his life and thus a paradox was created and the Reapers were able to enter our universe. The same situation has happened here with Applejack saving her parents. I don't know how or why but our two paradoxes, taking place in different dimensions and times, and somehow managed to collide. Now, if my theory is correct, if Rose and her infant self are here then that means Applejack and her younger self are in the church where my younger self is."

"So...we're basically dealing with a paradox within a paradox," Spike guessed.

"Pretty much."

"Come on!" Rainbow Dash groaned. "We just had to deal with the Weeping Angels and their freaky, never-ending paradox and now we have to deal with these Reapers and two paradoxes?!"

"Yeah."

"Why can we ever face a small problem? Why do problems involving you have to be freaking ginormous?!"

"I've dealt with problems like this throughout the nine centuries of my existence and I'm still not able to answer that question with a satisfactory answer."

"I guess it's kind of like whether or not we'll ever find out what your name is," Fluttershy said with a smile. "It'll always be one of those unanswerable questions."

"Anyway, moving on, from what we just saw it's safe to assume that our two timelines are merging."

"That really doesn't sound good," said Twilight.

"I don't think it is," Derpy added.

"It's not, in the long run. At first, everything will be fine. This barn and the church will probably just exist in one place of time and space. Then the true merging will commence and time itself will collapse."

"Lovely," said Rarity sarcastically.

"This whole thing is odd, though."

"I think I would describe this crisis as more than being odd, Doctor," said Twilight.

"I know that but my past self is experiencing this too...and I don't remember any of it."

"You don't?" Pinkie asked.

"No. Well, I don't remember much because I was devoured by a Reaper but I definitely don't remember the two Roses disappearing and the two Applejacks appearing in their place. I would remember that."

"More paradox mumbo jumbo probably," Derpy guessed.

"Perhaps."

As the Doctor and the others continued their discussion, Rose went off and sat by herself in a corner of the barn. She could hear the Reapers screaming outside. She looked towards Johnny, Emily, and Big Mac to see that they were incredibly worried. She had no idea who Applejack was but it was apparent that she meant a lot to them. She turned back to the group of huddled ponies and chuckled at the sight of Spike the dragon.

"Oh, Doctor. Of all the worlds to end up in, you just had to go for the weirdest," she sighed. She still couldn't believe that the Doctor she knew and traveled with was going to eventually become a chestnut stallion with a brown mane and a blue suit. Change was certainly strange sometimes. She leaned back against one of the barn's support posts and sighed. "I wonder what my Doctor's doing right now."

St. Markus Church, London, England, Earth, Autumn, 1987 A.D.

The Doctor had taken the two Applejacks to a corner of the church to discuss the current situation with them. Following the weird vision of the barn and the disappearance of the two Roses and the Reaper, the Doctor had a lot to discuss with the two mares.

"I really don't know what to ask first," the Doctor sighed as he buried his face in his hands. "I guess I should start off by asking where Rose is."

"Rose?" Applejack the elder asked.

"We don't know any Rose," Applejack the younger replied. This was a lie. Applejack's younger self may not have heard of any Rose but Applejack the elder certainly did.

"Ah do."

"So you know where Rose has ended up?" the Doctor asked.

"No...I'm not entirely sure about that. Ah just know who you're talking about."

"How? How do you know Rose?"

"Ah don't know her on a personal level but, if you are the Doctor, then you've told me about her before...or are going to tell me about her."

"What are you talking about?"

"Let's just say that I'm traveling around with your future self and you've told me about this whole event before. You told me how you took Rose back in time to see her father, only for it to end up with Rose saving her father's life and causing a paradox which let the Reapers appear."

"Huh. I guess you do know me. It looks like I'm going to be keeping some very odd company in the future."

"What's that supposed to mean?!"

"Nothing! Nothing! So, from how things look, I can only determine that you and my future self are dealing with a paradox of your own."

"You could say that."

"And how did this paradox come about?"

"Ah-"

Applejack stopped. She looked at her younger self. She couldn't bear to say it. How could she say to her younger self that her parents were supposed to die that day and that their continued existence is what was causing the paradox and the presence of the Reapers in the first place?

"Let's just say that somepony prevented a certain...event from occurring."

"Somepony? What world are you from anyway?"

"Equestria. It's a country on the planet Gaia. What world is this, anyway?"

"You're in England. It's a country on the planet Earth."

"I'm guessing this is where humans come from."

"Yes."

"What about you? Where does your species come from, again? Ah don't think your future self has told me that particular detail yet."

"Gallifrey. That's my...that was my planet's name."

"What happened to it?"

"It got destroyed in the Last Great Time War."

Applejack remembered her Doctor mentioning the Last Great Time War when he was reading her the riot act back in Ponyville. She obviously didn't know much about it but it was pretty clear to her that this was pretty devastating to the Doctor in many ways.

"So how are we to get back home and how are we supposed to get rid of those...things?" asked Applejack the younger.

"They're called Reapers," Applejack the elder corrected.

"Ah don't care what they're called! They're threatening the lives of my family and me! Ah nearly lost my parents earlier today in that grain silo! Ah don't want to lose them from a group of winged varmints!"

"You don't know the half of it."

Applejack made sure to say that last statement under her breath. The Doctor looked and noticed that Jackie was finally starting to come to and she quickly realized that her baby Rose was missing. That's when the building shook again and a shady vision of the barn appeared for a brief moment before vanishing again.

"It looks like we don't have much time before our two timelines interconnect," said the Doctor.

"Sure looks like it," Applejack the elder added. Suddenly, another ghostly image appeared but it wasn't of the barn this time. It was a vision of the church a few minutes previously. The vision quickly disappeared.

"What was that?" Applejack the younger asked.

"It seems that different times in this timestream are beginning to connect. This isn't good. The Reapers are growing stronger as we speak and we have two paradoxes slowly drawing closer and closer together. If these two paradoxes manage to merge completely then we can just say goodbye to our bodies because we'll all be torn apart: atom by atom," said the Doctor.

"Ah really hope that doesn't happen," Applejack the elder croaked. The building shook again, only this time it was much more violent. Half of the church began to disappear and was beginning to be replaced by the interior of a barn. Shadowy figures were walking around in this barn segment but were progressively become more and more solid with each passing second.

"Too bad...because it looks like it's started."

Comments

[Amber flicker]

DUN DUN DUN~!

[MariusIoannesP]

"So...we're basically dealing with a paradox within a paradox," Spike guessed.

Once again, Spike hits the nail on the head.
And here, Doc Perseus proves he can write the 9th Doctor as well as the 10th. (He can also does the 11th in just a Doctor Who fan fiction on Fanfiction.net.)

[CoatedHades436]

A paradox within a paradox? PARADOX-CEPTION!!!!!!

[Spirit Shift]

"Why can we ever face a small problem? Why do problems involving you have to be freaking ginormous?!" "I've dealt with problems like this throughout the nine centuries of my existence and I'm still not able to answer that question with a satisfactory answer." "I guess it's kind of like whether or not we'll ever find out what your name is," Fluttershy said with a smile. "It'll always be one of those unanswerable questions."

There's just.......so much win in these two paragraphs i don't know where to start lol