Anachronistic

A Stitch in Time

Disclaimer: I own nothing. It's not a very fun thing to own. :(

Friends, Romans, Countrymen, Lend Me Your Ears: Taken from my 'What If' series!! Also: Lookit, it's Andi! ((Set pre-Fathers Day; post-Exit Wounds; and Andromidalia's from somewhere rather far in the future with Ten and post-Doomsday but AU-ish.)) Enjoy! :)

"You can't tell them, Andi." Jack stared down at the...he'd forgotten how old she was, actually.

The brunette lifted her head up to glare at him from the chair. "Don't think you can tell me what I can or can't do, Jack Harkness." She crossed her arms over her chest stubbornly.

"But I can if it's going to cause a paradox and make us all Reaper lunch." He put his hands on his hips. No matter how old she was, he was still older than her. "They can't know, Andromida."

Andi looked from him to out the transparent wall, where her fathers TARDIS was parked. It had landed out of the right time again, ending up in the Torchwood hub in the middle of one of her visits, carrying a Doctor in leather and a much younger Rose Tyler.

Since about three seconds after they'd landed, Jack had been doing his best to keep Andi from even breathing around them, and it was getting annoying. She knew better than to say something stupid like "oh, did we mention, I'm your daughter from a future that this you isn't going to see due to Daleks arriving in a few months and something about a Vortex."

That, and she'd set up her mental sheilds to keep anything from accidentally slipping out, which she wasn't quite used to doing to this degree and it felt like all her thoughts were bottled up in her head, rattling around and starting to fizz up like a soda. Usually her father told her to keep them up just enough to be ready if something tried to invade her mind, though she was sure it was partly due to the fact he'd been tired of being the only mentality in his mind since the Time War.

Which this version of him had just come from. He just looked so sad...

"What about ret-con? You've used it before." The comment may have come out a bit accusatory...

Jack sighed. "We don't know how it would react with a Gallifreyan system."

She looked back at him. "Well, what ab-"

"No, Andi." He cut her off. "No talking, no telling. Not that they're your parents, not that you're a Time Lady, not even that you know them. It's too dangerous."

Andi glared at him again. He opened his mouth to speak again but instead shook his head and left the room, her glare on him the whole way.

In the Hub, Gwen was talking with Rose, and the Doctor was standing off to the side, looking like he didn't want to be here; he probably didn't.

Andi stood at the window and watched them, glare fading into a pained look at the people beyond the glass. There had to be a better way to do this...

That thought was added to the rest bouncing around in her skull.

"She needs a recharge." The Doctor repeated after Rose asked why they hadn't left yet for the millionth time. "That, and she refuses to budge." He shot the time/space machine a look. "An' I'm suprised you haven't run off with one of the pretty boys."

Rose just barely resisted rolling her eyes; they'd had this conversation a few times too. "All seem taken. 'Sides, nobody'll talk to me." She pouted.

"Don't take it personally." A new voice said. It was the one who at least claimed he was in charge, Jack or something like that. "They're all a bit nervous about paradoxes."

The Doctor shifted, almost imperceptivly, closed to Rose. "Probably right too." He wasn't glaring. Well, not quite.

Jack just grinned at him. "Better safe than sorry. We can't be how far along you two are, so even telling you which team'll come out on top could end badly."

"Could that actually happen?" Rose looked up at the Doctor.

He shrugged. "Might. No telling how a paradox can go 'bout now, now that-" He cut the sentence short. "Probably for the best."

Jack nodded. "It's one of the first lessons you get at the Agency, 'loose lips shred Time Lines'. Or something like that."

Rose pouted a moment more. "I have a feeling this will be one boring day."

At that moment, the universe decided to prove her wrong.

"Jack! Rift activity!" Ianto shouted from somewhere further inside the hub, just as the alarms went off.

A door opened and the girl that the Doctor had noticed before stepped out, glaring at the ceiling.

"Wrong again." The Doctor grinned at Rose with a teasing tone.

She sighed. "Never a dull moment."

Friends, Romans, Countrymen, Lend Me Your Ears: ...Reveiws are love!