"Blood is thicker than water and cheaper than beer."
-- Walt Kelly

 "Help you? How?"

 "More champagne."

 "SHOOT HIM!"

 Jadi raised his blaster and fired. The form of Gwilym Young dissolved, and reformed.

 "Not like that! Like this!" Suddenly, Wil's hands were filled with a blaster larger than anything Jadi had seen in years. But while it may have been big, it did not look like a real gun. Actually, what it looked like was a giant cartoon pistol with "Kill-O-Zap" painted on the side. With a ridiculous recoil effect, the blaster spit out a stream of energy, which hit the false Wil and blasted him to pieces.

 "That won't last long. We've only broken his concentration."

 Jadi stood there flabbergasted. "How did you...."

 "Kill a dream? First, I didn't kill it. Secondly, you know what it's like. When you realize you're dreaming, you gain a bit of control."

 "You know that this is some kind of shared dreamscape?"

 "Well, DUH!"

 Jadi was vaguely disturbed by this speech pattern. It didn't seem like the real Wil.

 "Come on, we have to find the kid." The thing-that-looked-like-Wil ran off, and Jadi, having nothing better to do, followed.

 Wil looked up at his doppelganger and fellow time traveler. "It worked?"

 "We're here, aren't we?"

 "Would someone tell me what the sprock is going on here!" Jadi had the overriding urge to shoot something, a sure sign that he was starting to lose control.

 "Jadi, meet my psychoses. Psycho, Jadi."

 Angela looked up at the three people around them.

 "If I'm seeing double, why is there only one of you, Jadi?"

 "Ferris? Is that really you? Are you...."

 "Drunk? You bet yer...."

 "Champagne, Jadi?" Wil handed a glass to the bounty hunter, who took it without asking where it had come from. Jadi was never one to refuse free alcohol. Maybe it would help him make some sense of this situation.

 "As for why there are two of me," Wil turned to face the Otherwil, "this loser represents all of my self-loathing, self-doubt, and every other self- that you can imagine. He was a recurring nightmare of mine as a child. He used to beat me up in all those dreams."

 The Otherwil proffered a hand to Jadi. "Nice to meet ya, Morok!"

 "Recently, I started seeing him again. Seems that in this dreamscape, he's as real as you and I, and that's how I figured out what was finally going on. Apparently, this is just some complex nightmare."

 "Not just a nightmare, Buzzcock," slurred Angela, "a shared nightmare. We're all stuck here in slumberland with no sight of Little Nemo."

 "With this simulacrum of myself, it was easy enough to use him to distract the Vicar -- that was the OTHER other me -- and slip out to another part of this nightmare. I had had a few glimpses of Angela, and set out to find her. I was going out to find you and the Doctor...."

 "The Doctor isn't here. He's probably slipped back to reality."

 "Well, that will save time. I was going to break away and find you, but it looks like you found me."

 "Break away?"

 Suddenly, before Jadi's eyes, Wil split in half. Each half grew another half, becoming a whole.

 "Neat trick, huh?" gloated the Otherwil. "I taught it to him."

 He felt himself nodding off quickly, and shocked himself awake. There was no time to waste right now, and entering the dreamscape would only slow him down. His work was best done here in reality.

 "Isn't it sad when they leave home, Jadi?" asked the Otherwil.

 "Shut up!" retorted Wil. "This is a dream, isn't it? Granted a really big, bad, ugly, stupid dream that is being shared with millions of others all over this planet, but still a dream. What do you do when you're dreaming that you're falling, and suddenly realize that you're dreaming."

 "Wake up."

 "Never was an imaginative one, was he?" Angela finished her glass, and got another. "Of course not, Jadi. You learn to fly."

 "More or less. Essentially, you improvise. You turn the dream to your terms. Since here the Otherwil is not just a facet of my," Wil sighed, "deeply disturbed personality but a real entity, it occurred to me that I should be able to create other doppelgangers, too. I'm using them to help keep the Vicar busy."

 "How many of you are there in this dreamscape right now?"

 "Not counting myself, twenty-three."

 Jadi had all he could do to keep from stumbling. Considering that he thought that one Wil was more than enough, he could hardly imagine twenty-three. His brain desperately struggled to make sense of the subreality around him.

 "Okay. Never mind that right now, let's get to something more concrete. Tell me just one thing. Why did you get Angela drunk?"

 Wil handed Jadi another glass of champagne, sensing he would need it. "She was having trouble focusing. The alcohol intoxication -- granted, the illusion of same, but the mind can do weird things -- causes delirium. It helps keep her here, since she can't dream."

 "Can't...what do you mean, 'Can't dream?'"

 "Oh, Jadi, you fool, don't you see?" Angela embraced him and whispered in his ear. "I'm not programmed to dream!"

 He bent down to gently stroke Angela's cheek. _Oh, poor, little dangerous, Angela. We'll get you home yet._

 He had just reached the door when Angela awoke screaming.

 "WIL, NO!!"

 "I'm losing control of this section. The Vicar is coming."

 "What the heck is the Vicar? And what do you mean, 'not programmed to dream?!?'" Now Jadi really wanted to shoot something, which was a sure sign that he was getting annoyed.

 "No time. Ask the Doctor. Both of you, where were you when you fell asleep?"

 "What the sprock ARE you talking about?" Now Jadi really, really, wanted to shoot something. Anything. Please let something move.

 "Where you were when you last remember something that you can confirm was real."

 Jadi suppressed his natural, homicidal, tendencies. "I honestly don't know. It wasn't until Angela turned into the Doctor that I realized this wasn't real."

 "And I was in the TAR...I...turned...into...what?"

 "It doesn't matter, Angela! It was his dream, what do you think happened?" Wil pulled a map out of his pocket, "handy isn't it, having anything you can imagine?" He pointed to a specific room in a specific building on the Otherversity grounds on the map. A big red X appeared saying YOU WERE HERE. "This is where you'll find my unconscious body. Get to the TARDIS. Find the Doctor, and bring him to me. Maybe with his help, we can defeat this thing."

 Suddenly, the hills were alive with the sounds of Wils running for home.

 "He's coming! He's coming!" screamed the Other Wils.

 "Time for the big show." Said the Otherwil.

 Wil turned to his fellow travelers. "Go. Get safe. Get the Doctor." He kissed Angela on the cheek. "I love you," he wispered. He then embraced Jadi. "You too. You've been like a brother to me. An abusive brother, but a brother. Take care of yourselves."

 Wil stepped back three paces, and pulled out two more big, cartoony Kill-O-Zap guns. "Time to wake up!"

 Angela tried to scream "WIL, NO!" but Wil had pulled the trigger before she could say the words.

 "And, then I woke up." She breathed deeply. "Doctor, what is the Vicar?"

 "It seems to be a very strong being that thrives on mental energy. It siphons off all mental activity and personality from its victims, joining them into a giant gestalt entity. Before long it will have finished off this planet, and ready to move on."

 "And the dreamscape?"

 "More of a side-effect. The creation of such a powerful gestalt will usually result in a shared unconsciousness in its victims. Sort of psychic detritus."

 "You mean?"

 "Yes. We're all infected. The Vicar is within all of us. You, Jadi, Wil...and me." He sighed, with the weight of seven and a half lifetimes on his shoulders. "I suppose it could tell we weren't from this universe, and was planning to use us to infest our universe as we return. I promised myself that I would never again dirty my hands and destroy another being wilfully. But I may have to."

 But Angela wasn't listening. She was staring at the readouts of the medi-scanner.

 "You know."

 "Yes, I know."

 Angela couldn't bring herself to look the Doctor in the eye. "Then you know about the self-destruct mechanism."

 "Yes. A rather nasty one. It's not everybody who has a bomb in them capable of creating an artificial singularity."

 "Could we use that bomb to hot-wire the TARDIS? I mean, could it substitute for the Eye Of Harmony?"

 "It would be impossible to control the steering of the TARDIS as we re-enter our universe, and rather difficult steering at all until I could re-establish a link with the real Eye, but yes, it could get us home."

 "Then why didn't you take it out of me to begin with?"

 The Doctor took Angela's hands in his. "It's not mine to take. It's yours to give. Besides, it's dangerous."

 "Ahem."

 The Doctor and Angela quickly turned to the door of the Zero Room, to see Jadi coming in, carrying the unconscious form of Wil.

 The Otherwil watched the being that they had made an enemy of as it also pulled itself together. As the last of the Other Wils rejoined with the real Wil, the manifestation of everything negative in Wil's mind turned to face him.

 "You can't do this."

 "I know that."

 "You aren't up to it."

 "I know that."

 "And yet, you fool, you're going to stand there and let yourself be killed."

 "I know that."

 "Maybe there's some hope for us yet."

 "I need you."

 "Oh, NOW he admits it. Deny me for your whole lifetime, and...."

 "I was naive! I thought I could segregate my dark side, and be a better person. I was young and stupid. I didn't know that every person needs their dark halves. I denied my negative personality traits; hell, I denied you. And I became a simpering little wimp. I admit that. Yes, I admit it all! It was my stupid refusal to use criticism, humiliation, and other negativity to improve myself that built you into the psychosis you are. Made me the psycho that I am. But for good or bad, I did create you...."

 Wil grabbed the Otherwil by the hand.

 "And...now...I...need...you!"

 Wil focused, and the Otherwil's hand started to melt and fuse into Wil's hand. Gradually, the two bodies slid together, like two streams running together to form a river, and within moments, the Otherwil was completely gone.

 The unified Wil glared menacingly at the form of the Vicar as it formed and loomed over him.

 "Yeah, he did, but it turned out he wasn't that far from where I was. So I grabbed him. I guess I was programmed to be a romantic. And speaking of which...." He laid the boy on the floor, gently. The Doctor quickly removed the medi-scanner from Angela and set it up for Wil.

 "So, uh," Angela stammered, "how much did you hear?"

 "The truth, Angela!" The Doctor's voice shocked her; she had never heard him yell like that. "Tell him the truth right now!"

 "Okay. There's four things you need to know. One, I have a bomb inside me capable of wiping out four solar systems, which the Doctor is going to try to remove and use to get us home.

 "Two, I'm also pregnant.

 "Three, I think it's yours.

 "And...." She hesitated.

 "Angela?" The Doctor was staring straight through her eyes, into her soul.

 "And four...I'm not human."

 "Foolish mortal. You resisted me."

 "Of course I resisted." Wil could swear he was yelling, but realized it was all in his mind. "What did you think I was going to do?"

 "You will join with the Vicar. You will join with all of us. You will become a part of us."

 "You want me to join you? Very well. You asked for it."

 And Wil opened his mind to the entity

 The Vicar experienced the humiliation of being rejected by his family.

 The Vicar felt the anger of learning who his father really was, and knowing there was nothing he could do about it.

 The Vicar suffered the savage beatings given by a master who despised what he had become, and what the child represented.

 The Vicar endured long, fearful nights with a rage building within that threatened to smother its entire being.

 "I guess you don't deal with too many paranoiac schizophrenics in this backwater Otherverse. Tasty, huh?" thought Wil. "Next time you decide to eat a brain, be a little more discriminating."

 The Vicar recoiled, and Wil dropped the last of his defenses, openin his mind the rest of the way.

 "You mean," Angela started to frame a question, but the Doctor interrupted her.

 "Yes. Wil is trying to destroy the Vicar by destroying his own mind."

 Suddenly, a meter spiked. "Wil, no," the Doctor whispered.

 Protect yourself. Retreat. You cannot survive here.

 Planetwide, sleepers awoke. Olf awoke. Gui awoke. Oltobanig and Octagim awoke.

 The entity called the Vicar withdrew from the dreamscape, breaking connections as it went. Unable to break the connection with Wil Young, it reached out, grabbed a deep part of the boy's mind, and crushed it.

 Free from the darkness that had engulfed it, the Vicar withdrew to regain its strength.

 "Wil?" Jadi leaned in and listened for a heartbeat that was no longer there.

 "Buzzcock?" Angela felt for a pulse that she knew would be still.

 "GWILYM!" screamed the Doctor as he buried his head in his hands.

 Darkness.

 Oblivion.

 "So, you did it."

 ...

 "You went and got yourself killed."

 ...

 "And you're just going to lie there."

 ...

 "You really have no clue, do you?"

 ...

 "Guess it's up to me. Again. Not much to work with, but it will have to do."

 The form of the Otherwil melted into the unconsciousness that was once Gwilym Young.

 And it began.

 Slowly, she slipped up next to his side. He was angrily muttering. "Katarina. Sarah Kingdom. Adric. Roslyn. Samantha." He seemed to be bordering on tears. "Never, ever again."

 "Doctor?" Angela's voice was tentative, almost like that of a frightened child. "Is the Vicar gone?"

 "Oh, no. I can feel it. It's just weakened. Wounded. But it will be back." She saw the flash in his eyes again. "And I will be waiting for it."

 "Doctor! Get over here!"

 The Doctor placed his hand on Wil's chest.

 "Oh, my giddy aunt, what have I done? What have I done?"

 "Doctor?"

 "What is it?" Jadi kept his eyes on Wil even as he addressed the Doctor.

 Now Wil's body had taken on a faint glow. Before long it was as if it had been lit from inside by a bright searchlight.

 "The nanites. On Arcis station, I used some of my nanites to repair Wil's back. I had no idea they would stay in his bloodstream. Oh, Rassilon, what have I done?!"

 Angela's mind sorted through all the data she had taken in while jacked into the TARDIS memory banks while in the System. "You mean...."

 "He's regenerating."

 It was Wil. And it was not Wil. The body on the floor looked a few years older than the Gwilym they were used to. Instead of the short cropped hair he had taken to wearing, he now had shoulder length hair, which looked like it should be gathered into a ponytail. Other than that, anyone who had not seen Wil for a while would just assume they were natural changes over a period of time. But the three witnesses knew what had really happened.

 Wil sat up, opened his eyes, took a deep breath, and stared at the wall. "Hm. Bit blurry. Anyone seen my glasses?"

 "Kid?"

 "I wish you'd stop calling me that, Jadi."

 "Buzzcock?"

 "And I REALLY wish you'd stop calling me that, Angela."

 The Doctor leaned in close.

 "Hello, Gwilym Young."

 Wil stared at the Doctor's face.

 "You were expecting someone else?"

 To be continued.