Here's the layout of the apartment, if anyone was wondering. I felt like building it, then decided that I could share it. Give you a look into where Ruby and Jenny live. That's really it. Enjoy the chapter!
-B
When I came back , Jenny was staring at me.
"What... on earth... just happened?" she asked as I pulled my hands away from her face. "I..."
Her eyebrows scrunched up as she looked at me, trying to make sense of what I'd just shown her. I had no idea if she saw her own memories or if it was mine that she saw, but I was sure they'd have similar effects, whichever she saw.
She looked around the apartment, her eyes first settling on the LEGO shelf by the door. "Where'd the bus go?" she asked.
That was all I needed. I threw myself around her, and whispered, "You're back..."
"Ruby, what on earth?' she asked, pushing me off. "Why are you acting so strange?"
"You're gonna have lots of questions, but I will answer them tomorrow. Tomorrow, I will take you to meet the friends I keep talking about.
***
We agreed to meet in the Tardis again, giving Jenny the 'full treatment' so to speak. I did feel bad a little. I hadn't really given any other explanation for the way I'd acted last night, nor would I answer her question as to where the Harry Potter memorabilia went. The boxed set of Doctor Who seasons had vanished as well. We'd also bought the next set: The Matt Smith collection, consisting of seasons 5-9, and for kind of obvious reasons... that was gone as well.
I answered none of her questions as I half-dragged her to where the Tardis was.
"That's impossible," Ruby muttered as she stared at the wooden police box. She shook her head, and said again, "That's impossible. That can't-"
"Welcome to my world," I said. "Come on! They're waiting!"
"They?" Jenny asked. "Who on Earth are they?"
"My friends," I said. "Now come on."
Jenny shook her head again. "Your friends... This is the Tardis, right? I mean, why else would a British Police box from like 1940 or whatever be here... on a random Pennsylvanian side street in 2013. Your friends are in the Tardis."
"Yes, they are," I said. "Now come on!"
I pulled on her arm again, but she still didn't move. She was frozen in place.
"Jenny, come on," I said again.
"Ruby, what on earth is going on?" she asked, turning to me.
"I can explain it if you come inside. Please. It'll be a lot easier. Oh, and um... try and control your freak out when we get inside. I mean, I told them to expect something, but... you know. Just try."
This time when I pulled on her arm, she let me take her. I pushed on the door, and it swung inwards. Jenny looked around in crazy awe. Her eyes darted from face to face, then she looked at me. "Ruby, pinch me," she muttered. "Wait no, don't. I don't want to wake up."
"It's not a dream, Jenny," I said to her. "Unfortunately."
"Unfortun- Ruby, how is-"
"So this is the famous Jenny," the Doctor said with a bright smile. "I was wondering when we'd get to meet you."
"That's..."
"The tenth Doctor," I said. "He doesn't know what happens in the future, and I haven't said much."
"Don't want to bring all of time collapsing in on itself, I 'm guessing," Jenny said.
"Sure, something like that," I responded. "The others seem to have been taken from their proper time."
As Jenny scanned the room again, I shut the Tardis door. Then she remarked, "Isn't Sam supposed to be comatose? You know, because of the trials?"
Sam and Dean looked at each other.
"Jenny!" I said.
"Sorry, I..."
"He was," Dean said, while also silently miming it's okay with a head shake and holding his hands up for a brief moment. "Surprised me when he walked into the pizza place like nothing had happened, but maybe that was Ruby doing something. By accident, of course. You didn't really know what you were doing right then."
Jenny spun to me.
"I haven't told her yet..." I muttered.
"You did this?" she asked, raising her voice. I couldn't make heads or tails of her tone.
"It wasn't on purpose!"
"How long have they-"
"Since Saturday. Well, and Sunday," I said. "They've all been here since the weekend."
"The weekend? And you're only telling me now?"
"If I showed you any earlier, you wouldn't get it. You would've just seen them as people."
"No, I wouldn't have."
"Yeah, you would've, Jenny. Until last night, you'd forgotten everything. In fact, the only people in the world who know the truth are standing here. Well, us and the villains that came over."
"Villains? What villains?"
"We've got Voldemort, Lucifer, Cybermen... And the Daleks."
"The daleks? But-"
"Jenny, don't," I said. In a voice barely above a whisper, I said, "All I've told them about is the Cult of Skaro. They don't know about anything else."
"Do they know..."
I shook my head, I didn't know exactly what she was gonna ask, but most likely the answer was no. "The last major thing that happened was the Cyberman parallel world."
Her eyes went wide, then she nodded.
"You two okay over there?" Dean asked.
"She'll be okay," I said.
"Maybe," Jenny said. "I mean this is.. It's just..."
"Impossible?" the Doctor supplied.
"Exactly," she said. Then she paused and added, "How'd you know?"
"Ruby reacted the same way when she first saw us," Rose said.
"She did?" Jenny asked, looking at me. I nodded. "How did... everyone get here?" Jenny asked.
"To us, it was sort of random," Dean said. "I mean, I was driving Sam to a hospital. I got hungry and I saw this pizza place nearby, so I pulled in there. Met Ruby, Sam walks in... We think we've found a case with this odd news report and Ruby acts like she's a hunter."
"Couldn't exactly tell the truth," I shrugged.
"I was taking Harry home after a long day at the Ministry," Hermione spoke up. "He and Ron had been there extra late, and since we weren't going super far from each other, Ron and I'd Apparate to his house, drop him off, then we'd go home. Except we all wound up on some side street... here. It was still night, but we'd managed to find a motel to stay at. Our magic wasn't working, and we didn't have any Muggle money, much less American, so we just kind of wandered around until morning. We'd needed something to eat, and we didn't want to go too far from where we'd wound up."
"That pizza place where we met Ruby was right next to where we wound up after the Apparition failed," Ron said. "I mean, we had no money, but Ruby helped us out. Gave us that... what'd you call it? 'Wawa gift card'?"
"Yeah, that's what it was," I said with a small chuckle.
"You gave him that?" Jenny asked.
"I never use it anyway. And besides, it's not like it's exactly hard to get another if I really wanted to."
"True," Jenny muttered.
"We were heading back home," Rose said. "Back to London. Something... I'm not even sure, but something happened to the Tardis."
"We were being pulled," the Doctor said. "Something had pulled us out of the Time Vortex. It wasn't like the last time we crossed worlds, where the Vortex... vanished." He shook his head. "Something pulled us out of the Vortex, which is basically impossible to do. But it happened. And we landed.. here. In the middle of -- what'd you say, Sparrowmont?, America in July of 2013. We went to that pizza place. Rose was hungry, even though I could've sworn she'd just eaten, and I wondered if maybe I could get some answers from someone inside. Then we met Ruby."
"This happened... Saturday and Sunday?"
"Yep," I said. "Saturday I met the Winchesters, the Doctor, and Rose. Sunday I met Harry, Ron, and Hermione. Then we all met Lucifer Sunday afternoon."
"Lucifer?" Jenny asked. "He's here? But I thought-"
"So are Voldemort, Daleks, and Cybermen," I said before she could finish.
She opened her mouth a few times, but not a sound came out. "You're serious," she said finally.
"Completely," I said.
Jenny shook her head. "And you're at the center of all of this?" she said, looking at me. "Why?"
"Because apparently I'm something called a Guardian. I'm supposed to protect the universes."
"Universes."
"Everything we've ever watched or read that we think of as fictional... is real. Each movie or book or even comic book for all I know created a new universe around those characters and what was written. If there's a movie and a book... they blend, but whichever came out first, the book generally, seems to take precedence."
"The power of imagination," the Doctor remarked.
"It's a lot, I know," I said, looking over at Jenny. She was taking it... surprisingly well. 'Course having me there probably helped her to be grounded, but even then. This was a lot for anyone, really. I'm not even sure how I managed it so well, if I did. Maybe it was part of my Guardian thing.
***
The rest of the day was mostly spent trying to come up with a plan of attack now that Voldemort was alive-but-out-of-the-count and Lucifer was stuck in town. There wasn't much that could destroy a Dalek, but we figured I could. I argued that we couldn't kill them, using the same reasoning as I'd used against killing Voldemort. I was skipping some of the main details, but they too had been taken out of time, much like Voldemort and the Doctor. Meaning if we killed them here and now, it'd create a paradox, and that would be bad. Jenny reasoned that we couldn't kill Lucifer either, for a similar reason. No one from another universe could die, all for the same reason: it'd create a paradox.
Then my mother messaged me, reminding me that I'd promised Emma I'd spend tomorrow with her.
"Crap," I muttered.
"What is it?" Jenny asked.
"I promised Emma we'd spend the day together tomorrow."
"That's an issue?"
"With all of this going on... I'm scared now. What if something happens? What if something happens to her? She's just a kid!"
"I'll be with you, okay?" Jenny said. "It'll be okay."
I offered her a small smile of thanks, but I shook my head. "I said it'd just be us. We haven't done that in a while."
"Do you have any particular plans with her?" Jenny asked.
"Who's Emma?" Dean cut in.
"My sister," I said. "With all of this happening this week, I honestly forgot I was going to do this. But no one knows about her. If I hang out with her..."
"Our enemies will likely find out about her," Sam finished. "And you don't want that to happen."
I shook my head.
"It'll look weird if you don't follow through," Jenny said. "And not to mention how disappointed Emma's gonna be."
"I know. That's my issue. I want to. I really do, but..."
"I say you should go anyway," Rose said. "We can take care of ourselves. You've got all of us on your phone if you run into trouble. We'll be there as soon as we can."
"Speaking of Emma..." Jenny started. "Emma was basically begging your mom to stay at our place tonight. Not knowing that that'd be a problem, I said yes. They'll be there soon."
"Then I suppose it's time we break up for the night," I said. "I'll see you later, okay?" I promised.