I walk the maze of moments, but everywhere I turn to
Begins a new beginning but never finds a finish
I walk to the horizon and there I find another
It all seems so surprising and then I find that I know


You go there you're gone forever, I go there I'll lose my way
If we stay here we're not together, anywhere is...


To leave the thread of all time and let it make a dark line
In hopes that I can still find the way back to the moment
I took the turn and turned to begin a new beginning
Still looking for the answer I cannot find the finish
It's either this way or that way, it's one way or the other
It should be one direction it could be on reflection
The turn I have just taken, the turn that I was making
I might be just beginning, I might be near the end.
	--Enya



Chapter 2:  THE MAZE OF MOMENTS

	The Doctor held his breath for a moment, not sure if he trusted the sudden 
stability.  He looked around.  Nothing seemed seriously damaged.  Romana was still 
clutching the console but seemed unhurt.
	"Well, that was exciting.  Ace, are you all right?"
	"Doctor..."
	"Just a minute, Romana.  Ace?"  He peered under the console.  "Ace?  Where 
are you?"  He whirled, realizing that she was not in the console room.
	"Doctor..."
	He flung open the door to the corridor and shouted down it.  "Ace!"  No reply.  
He turned back to Romana.  "Where the devil is she?" 
	"That's what I've been trying to tell you, Doctor.  She's with us."


	Ace's eyes flicked from one Time Lord to the other, trying to orient herself.  
The Doctor was looking at her with a familiar expression that was equal parts 
curiosity, speculativeness and caution.  It was an expression she'd seen on her 
Doctor's face many times...it was odd to see it upon the face of this stranger who 
was not a stranger.
	"Just a minute, Doctor," she said, her thoughts whirling.  She realized that she 
could not tell these people very much without altering the timeline, something she 
was not willing to risk.
	Romana edged over to the Doctor.  "Do you know her?" she whispered.
	"Never saw her before in my life," he replied.  "But she seems to know us."
	Ace stepped forward, taking a deep breath.  "My name is Dorothy McShane, but 
both of you have always called me Ace."
	"Always?" the Doctor said, his eyebrows shooting into his forehead.
	"Yes.  I am from the future.  I'm the companion of your seventh incarnation," 
she said, figuring that much was safe.  She looked at Romana.  "You and I have met a 
few times, Romana.  I, uh, think that's all I should say for now."
	The Doctor and Romana exchanged a glance.  "You're from my future, then."
	"Yes.  I'm originally from twentieth-century Earth, but I've spent time in lots 
of centuries.  I was brought here by a timestorm...caused, I think, by a being called 
Fenric."
	The Doctor nodded, blowing air through his teeth.  "Fenric, eh?  How do you 
know that?"
	"Because it's happened to me before."


	The Doctor looked around wildly, his face confused.  "No, she's not, she's gone! 
 What I'm trying to find out is..."
	Romana held out a hand and stopped him.  "You don't understand.  She's with us 
a hundred and fifty years ago, during your fourth incarnation.  She's just been 
tossed back in your own timeline."
	He stared at her.  "You knew this all along and you didn't tell me?"
	"Doctor, it happened.  It must happen, we couldn't have stopped it.  I shouldn't 
have to tell you this."
	"So how is it that you remember this and I don't?"
	"Well, I don't really remember very much of it.  I remember her arriving on 
the TARDIS and I remember a few bits and pieces..."  She shook her head in 
frustration.  "I can feel more details in my mind but I just can't quite recall."
	He grabbed her shoulders and gave her a quick shake.  "Well, try to remember!  
What happened?"  She looked at him helplessly and he realized he was gripping her 
shoulders a little more tightly than he meant to.  He let her go at once.  "I'm sorry, 
it's just that..."
	"Don't apologize, I understand.  But you don't remember anything at all?"
	"No, I really don't.  When I met Ace on Iceworld I swear it was the first time 
I'd ever seen her before...I knew that I'd be taking her with me but there were other 
reasons for that."  He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, then snapped his fingers.  "The 
TARDIS must have made me forget," he said.
	"What?"
	"Well, sometime back then during Ace's little road trip I must have met myself! 
 That'd be logical...I would have tried to get her back here where she belongs.  The 
TARDIS would have suppressed my memories of the meeting and the events leading 
up to it to prevent memory paradoxes."
	"I didn't know TARDISes had that feature," Romana said, her brow furrowing.
	"They don't anymore.  The new models have safeties that prevent Time Lords 
meeting themselves altogether.  Mine allows it, but it compensates by not letting me 
remember it.  It must have affected you, too, but less effectively because it's not 
your TARDIS.  The former you and the current you must have also met."  He grinned. 
 "Don't you see what that means?  It means that we'll get Ace back!  It's just a 
question of when and where."
	"I should think that our first action would have been to try and return her to 
her proper place in the timeline," she said.
	"That follows.  If I know Ace, though, she'll be very cautious about what she 
tells us."  He stared off into space.  "I wonder what...or who...caused this."  He 
looked at Romana.  "It's probably there, in your mind."
	"Can we dig it out, perhaps?"
	He smiled slowly.  "We can surely try."


	Ace leaned her elbows on the console, her head in her hands.  They didn't 
believe her.  The Doctor and Romana were conferring in the corner and glancing over 
at her every so often.  She didn't suppose that in their positions she'd believe it 
either.  In trying not to reveal too much about the future her story ended up being a 
tangle of loose threads that didn't add up to a very convincing explanation.
	The Doctor came back over to the console.  "Well, Ace, I'm not usually prone to 
jumping at shadows but I must say that I'm having a hard time taking you at your 
word."
	She nodded.  "Yes, I can see how you might."
	"You say that you've been my companion for a long time, and you say that 
you've been thrown back in time by this Fenric being whose motives are unknown.  
Try to see it from our perspective...you could be anyone, even if you say that you 
know me."
	She smiled a a little sadly.  "I know everything about you, Doctor.  I know how 
frustrating it was for you when you were exiled to Earth by the Time Lords.  I know 
how lonely and afraid you felt as you lay dying of radiation poisoning in the TARDIS.  
I know that your claim to the Gallifreyan presidency wasn't so much a clever ploy as 
a last-ditch attempt to avoid summary execution.  I know all your companions, I 
know all your enemies.  I even know about the plans you set in motion when you told 
Davros about his future defeats."  At that, the Doctor looked up sharply.  "I know a 
thousand other things about you that I can't mention because for you, they haven't 
happened yet."  Romana and the Doctor exchanged a look.
	"Well?" she asked him, one eyebrow arched almost into her hairline.
	He walked up to Ace and with narrowed eyes examined her closely for a 
moment.  "You know, I can't say exactly why but I believe you," he finally said.  She 
met his eyes squarely and relaxed a bit, for she could see a trace of her husband 
there.  He broke into a wide grin again, and it was the sort of smile you couldn't help 
but return.  He clapped her on the shoulder.  "Let's have some tea and figure this 
out, shall we?"  They walked out of the console room trailed by Romana, her lips 
pressed together tightly.


	Romana sat down in a deep plush chair in the study and tried to relax as much 
as possible.  The Doctor perched on an ottoman right in front of her and leaned 
forward, placing the tips of both his index fingers gently at her temples.  She did the 
same to him, and after a moment the connection was made.
	Romana...think back to the day Ace came to the TARDIS.  When was that?
	It was...it was...I *know* but I can't remember...
	Hmm...maybe this will help:  what were you wearing?
	Oh...the school uniform...boater hat...right after Paris!  Duggan!
	Scaroth?
	Yes...just left Paris...no more than twenty minutes gone by...she was sitting on 
the floor...she wondered why I was wearing different clothes...then she saw you and 
knew what had happened.
	How much did she tell us?
	She said...she said she was a companion, and that...that...it was a timestorm.
	Timestorm...of course.  What else?
	She didn't want to say too much...she said that it was..."Fenric!" she 
exclaimed, her eyes popping open and her fingers dropping away from his temples.
	"She was sure it was the same?"
	"Yes, she was sure.  It was Fenric.  That's really all that I remember.  After 
that it just fades into the next crisis you and I got mixed up in."
	He stood and began pacing again.  "Paris, Paris...I think I'm beginning to 
understand this.  That was before the chess game," he said, looking at her 
significantly.
	"You never really did tell me what happened there."
	"I didn't want you involved."
	"I most certainly was involved, we had a third companion for three months 
because of it."
	"Will you stop interrupting?  What happened was that I defeated Fenric at chess 
and managed to imprison him in a bottle, I thought for all time.  Much later, Ace and I 
encountered him in World War II Britain and I thought we beat him again...but a being 
like that, one can never really defeat, I suppose.  He must still be out there, plotting 
revenge."
	"He's doing this for revenge?"
	"Oh, nothing so mundane.  I have a feeling that he's trying to prevent the chess 
game from ever happening.  He sent Ace..."  He stopped pacing and shut his eyes, 
uttering a light curse in old Gallifreyan, remembering Ace's connection to Fenric.  
"He's going to try and divert us so we never make it to Constantinople."
	"Why Ace?"
	"Because, Romana, she is one of the wolves of Fenric.  Her family has been 
touched, you might say cursed, by Fenric...and he has a connection to her that he can 
exploit.  He did it before."
	"Does she know that?"
	"Oh yes.  But she can't tell when he's using her and when he isn't.  What she's 
doing might seem perfectly reasonable and as if she's thought of it herself, but she'd 
never be sure it wasn't Fenric speaking through her.  If she's thinking straight she'll 
be very cautious about offering any advice or assistance when there's always the 
chance that it might lead to trouble."
	"If he succeeds in stopping the chess game a lot of things could change," 
Romana said.
	"That's putting it mildly.  If he had been free all those centuries it's highly 
unlikely that he would ever have transported Ace to Iceworld...he did it so that she'd 
be there to give him assistance when he and I met next.  If he succeeds, I'll never 
meet her...and that would alter things in more ways than I'd care to contemplate."  
He raised his left hand and twisted his wedding ring on his finger.  "I don't fancy the 
possibility of having had to face Davros and Cybermen and Ishtar with Mel at my 
side," he muttered.
	"That's the least of it," Romana said.  "If your theory is correct, it might not 
matter.  We could both be dead.  It sounds like he wouldn't be content merely to
prevent the chess game.  After losing his freedom to you not once but twice, he'd 
want to be sure that you *never* had contact with him.  Think about the alterations 
to the timeline if you died before your fourth regeneration."
	The Doctor sighed, clasping his hands behind his back.  "This is all my fault," he 
murmured.  "If I'd just been content with my relationship with Ace as it was, this 
might never have happened."
	"I don't follow.  She could have played the same part in his plans whether she 
was with you or not!"
	"I'm not so sure.  She wouldn't have had the necessary knowledge of my past to 
serve him adequately.  I've told her a lot of things over the past year that she didn't 
know before.  He'd have been much better off with you, for example, or even Benny."
	"But Benny and I aren't wolves of Fenric."
	He sighed again.  "The fact remains that I may have allowed Fenric to maneuver 
his way into freedom once again because of my love for a human woman...and what's 
worse I may also have endangered you, me, and most of all her," he said.  Romana 
rolled her eyes.
	"I give up.  It seems you're determined to turn this into some dark carnival of 
the soul where every funhouse mirror has your reflection in it.  Must you always 
wallow in self-recrimination?  Everything in the universe does not lead back to your 
actions, you know.  Sometimes I think you overestimate your own significance."
	He glanced at her, one corner of his mouth turning up.  "I hope you're right."


	Ace paced up and down in the study, much the same way her husband was doing 
a hundred-odd years in the future.  She could feel both of them watching her, but she 
was determined not to say a word without thinking it through first.  He had never 
heard of Fenric, so she was right in thinking that this was before the chess game.  If 
Fenric could prevent that initial contact he would have been free all that time...and 
she would never have met the Doctor and would probably still be stuck in Perivale.  
She suspected that she had a part to play in whatever Fenric had planned, but she'd 
be damned if she'd go along with it willingly.
	"I think I know what Fenric is planning," she said finally.
	"Well?" the Doctor said, leaning against the mantelpiece.
	"I don't think I should tell you," she said tightly.
	Romana's eyebrow reached new heights.  "And why is that?"
	"You don't understand.  Fenric...he has this way of controlling me without my 
knowledge.  My family is sort of cursed by him, and once in the past I served him 
without realizing I was doing it.  I don't want to chance helping him again, so I don't 
think I should tell you anything or offer any advice or do anything that might 
*seem* right but would actually be assisting him."
	The Doctor shook his head in confusion.  "Well, if we want to throw the 
proverbial monkey wrench in his plans I say the best course of action would be to 
get your back to your proper place.  You can't help him prevent past events if you're 
not around."
	Ace nodded dubiously.  Seemed like a good idea, but far too easy.  Would Fenric 
actually let them get her back to her Doctor?  Surely he would not allow them such a 
quick way out.  The Doctor and Romana were already heading to the console room 
and Ace had no real choice but to follow.


	Theo ordered another cup of mocha latte, her favorite trendy coffee drink.  
This would be the third...if she wasn't careful she'd be bouncing off the walls before 
too long.  Her eyes were on the door.  She was expecting someone, the problem was
she didn't know what he looked like.  He could have taken whatever body he liked.
	She opened a book and pretended to read it.  There were no Guardians watching 
her back, no Legion lurking around the corner.  Not even Angel knew she had
arranged this meeting.  Nor was it the first time.  She and Seth occasionally raised 
the white flag to discuss matters of common interest to them, and this matter was 
definitely of common interest.  If she played her cards right she might even be able 
to get some information out of him.
	People came and went in a steady stream.  He was half an hour late.  She 
turned towards the coffee bar to scan the crowd again and when she turned back 
around he was sitting across from her.
	She snickered despite herself.  "Oh, that's you," she said sarcastically.  Gone 
was the suave, dark-haired exterior he'd had for centuries.  In its place was a tall, 
incredibly skinny guy with a narrow beak-nosed face and mousy combed-over 
thinning hair.
	"Don't rub it in, best I could do.  The situation was rather urgent."
	"Are you stuck with it?"
	"Happily, no.  The downside of transference is that I can't stay in one body for 
too long.  A month tops."
	"You're telling me that every time I see you you're going to look different?"
	"As if I could fool you with mere external appearances," he said.  "So what's 
up?"
	She leaned back in her chair and idly twirled her empty coffee cup on the table. 
 "You ever heard of a being called Fenric?"
	Seth thought for a moment.  "I think so.  One of the Old Ones, yes?"
	She nodded.  "He ever...freelanced for you?"
	"That's a laugh.  I could never control him, nor could you.  Why?"
	"He's messing around with the Doctor again."
	"And you wanted to make sure that I wasn't pulling his strings."
	She shrugged.  "I knew it wasn't too likely.  We've little or no power over 
those guys."
	"Best to leave well enough alone, then."
	"Agreed.  Waiter?"


	The Doctor jumped to the console.  "Now, you've got to tell me exactly what 
date and time it was when you left."
	Ace squinched her eyes shut and rubbed her forehead.  "Oh, man, that's not so 
easy."  She opened her eyes just in time to see the Doctor dart over in front of her 
and fix her eyes with his large blue ones.  She couldn't look away...but she could feel 
him paging through her mind.  Very eerie.  This Doctor clearly had strong mental 
abilities, as did hers.  He looked away.
	"Right, then, off we go."
	"Can you land on a TARDIS in the Vortex?"
	"Well...I might be able to pull it off.  It's not impossible, the Master's done it to 
me.  Just hang on and hope for the best."  He entered the course correction and at 
once the TARDIS veered out of control.  Ace was hardly surprised...that would have 
been way too easy.  It was almost the exact reverse of what had happened the first 
time;  she was thrown against the console while the Doctor and Romana were thrown 
across the room.
	The Doctor tried to crawl up towards the console but couldn't quite reach it.  
Ace's eyes flicked over the controls...everything was going crazy.  "I know what to 
do," she shouted at him, her hands flying over the levers and buttons.  The TARDIS 
gave a screeching whine and then thumped to standstill.  The time rotor was 
motionless.  They'd landed.
	"Are we there?" Romana said, quietly.
	"I don't know," the Doctor said, examining the readouts.  He peered at Ace.  
"What did you do?"
	"I reset the dimensional stabilizer and bypassed the secondary artron flux 
compensators."
	"Good heavens, where'd you learn that?"
	"It's worked before," she muttered, turning to the viewscreen.  It showed a 
very blank dark-colored wall.
	"Well, that's certainly helpful," he said.  "We *are* on some sort of ship, 
according to these readings."
	"The TARDIS?" Ace asked, scarcely daring to hope.
	"No...but at least we're not floating down the Vortex in a million pieces."  He 
hit the door controls and the three of them edged outside.
	They were in a corridor that was completely without aesthetic value or clues 
of any kind as to what ship this was.  Dark walls, blank floors, no doors.  The faint 
hum of machinery hung in the air and they could feel its vibrations in their feet.  Ace 
wished for some of her equipment...she was completely unarmed and felt almost 
naked.  The Doctor looked both ways and then tiptoed down the hallway, motioning
for them to stay near the TARDIS.  Ace and Romana peered around the corner to 
watch him edge his way to a T-junction.  He poked his head out and then suddenly 
turned around and hurried back to them.  "Someone's coming," he whispered.  They 
watched from around the corner as the sound of an approaching...something...grew 
louder.
	"Oh, I know that sound," Ace hissed.  No sooner were the words out of her 
mouth than a Dalek in white and gold livery appeared at the T-junction and started 
rolling towards them.
	"Let's get back in the TARDIS," the Doctor whispered.  They turned away from 
the corner to find themselves eye to eyepiece with another patrol Dalek coming the 
other way.  Both Daleks began screeching hysterically.
	"INTRUDER ALERT!  INTRUDER ALERT!  YOU WILL BE EXTERMINATED!"



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