There were rules, of course. There always had to be rules.

Rule One: There were to be no remarks on anybody's outfit, current Companion, TARDIS desktop themes, or any other item that would cause even the slightest offence to any person, place, or thing present in the room.

Rule Two: No substitutions. Once you were out, no one could take your place.

Rule Three: No violence, including violence that is remembered, instigated, or implied.

Rule Four: Jack was not to take advantage of anyone after tonight's events were finished.

Rule Five: In years to come this was never EVER to be spoken of.

There were reasons why the Doctor never often visited the Dark Ages. The temptation was hard to ignore at times, but somehow he usually managed to brush it off and concentrate on the present. But today was the final straw. And it seemed that every other Doctor agreed with him.

Ten had landed a few feet from Two's ship, and hopped out of the doors still trying to fit his right shoe on. A bit more hopping and a knot or two later, he was back on two feet and took a look around. Everyone gave Six's ship a wide berth, for he was rather possessive and would shoot death glares at anyone who got too close. Nine had parked his in a literal corner, while Seven and Eight's were so close that one could barely see the tiny space that separated them. One's and Three's were exactly thirty meters from each other, and Four's kept disappearing one second and reappearing a foot to the right of Five. Eleven was trying to reason with his to actually shut the doors, because she kept swinging them open to show off her insides. Thirteen just sauntered into the room currently without a Companion and TARDIS altogether, obviously deciding that he wanted his to remain separate from the crowd. Twelve was pushing his right under the light of one of the torches that hung from the stone, moss covered walls while his Companion, a boy of no more than nine, shouted directions at him of how farther he still had to go.

As for the other Doctors, they were milling about talking amongst each other. Ten saw Rose wave at him from where she was talking with Nine and Peri, so he trotted over to where they were and joined in the conversation after interrupting Rose about the REAL trick to winning the 25th century lottery. Jack was behaving himself as he and Ace were trying desperately to solve a riddle that Five had asked them. K-9 kept giving Eight little nudges to socialize with Amy and Sarah Jane. Adric shuffled his feet every now and then as Jamie told him about Scottish folk dancing. And those were just the more noticeable conversations that caught Eleven's eye as he joined the group after giving up on his old girl.

"Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears!" Thirteen shouted from the only doorway that could be seen in the dim lighting. Every single face turned towards his.

"Copycat!" Seven shouted at him.

The oldest of them all just smirked, shrugged, and then muttered something about always wanting to try that on himself for once. "Anyway, you all know why we are here. I found THE Fifty Barrels already, and whenever you are ready I say we jump the shark."

"Jumping the shark is not what we want to do in this case," Nine spoke up.

"The phrase does not suite the situation," beeped K-9.

" 'Getting this party started' would have been a beh'er choice, sir!" squeaked Rose timidly, with Jack, Nine, and Ten all reaching for her hands at the same time to offer support.

"This way then!" One yelled, holding his hand up and beckoning as he pushed past Thirteen through the door.

As a single horde they swept through the corridors of the castle. They were deep underground, so there was a lot of pushing and shoving up the stairs. Finally they entered a large, well lit hall with fire places on three sides. As castles go it had that castle smell, there were odd tufts of straw on the floor, the dust was in the air and not on the floor. A giant sheet of parchment for the rules was placed in the center of the Round Table. Four was the one who volunteered to officially write up the regulations.

The rules finished, every single person present had to sign in. Liz was the first to march up and affix her signature on the paper, then she handed it to Rory, who gave it to Harry, who tossed it to Katarina, who placed it daintily in the hands of Grace, who marched over to Mel, who resisted skipping as she handed it to One, whose neat scrawl was messy in comparison to Eight's, who rolled it up like a scroll and launched it javelin style to Tegan, she fumbling with it a little then signing and pushing it into the arms of Thirteen, who the second after he was done had it torn from his hands by Donna. Happy with her signature, she gave it to Ace, who signed it as Barbara and Ian took it from her before giving it to Six to reread before signing at the urging of Nyssa and Amy, who together moved out of the way to give Romana and Polly a chance. Turlough got in line behind them, the nine year old that came with Twelve grabbing onto Turlough's arm so he could be lifted up in his arms to sign it also. Three ruffled the boy's hair as he walked forward, which he shouldn't have done because that earned him a kick which was blocked at the last second by Ten. FINALLY, every single Doctor and Companion who had been brought along had agreed to the rules, and it was time for each Doctor to take a seat.

One sat at the top of the circle, Thirteen at the bottom, Ten on the far right, and Four on the far left. Every other one just filled in the empty spaces.

"A ten on Seven!" Ace whispered to those around her.

"Fifteen on Eleven," came Rory's muffled words.

"Twenty on Nine!" countered Jack, glaring at Rose challengingly.

"A hundred on Three AND Four!"

Jack looked up and gaped at Sarah Jane slamming the money on one of the fifty barrels lining the outskirts of the room.

Ian was the one who grabbed the ceramic cups, placing one before every Time Lord at the table. Martha, slightly intimidated by the way Two kept shooting her funny looks, was the one to take the handle of a clay pitcher and dip it into the single open barrel. Once it was full, she filled each cup with the bright blue alcohol, starting at Nine and finishing with Eight, who was on Nine's left.

"So…it's a drinking game?" Susan wondered quietly to herself.

"These idiots," said Donna right next to her, " 'S all a matter of pride to them. They want to know which one can hold the most of…wha'ever that drink is."

"It's one of the most intoxicating drinks ever invented by humans," Romana spoke up, "The people who brewed it up were so drunk from the fumes alone that they couldn't even come up with a name whenever they thought about it."

"From what I heard," Zoe said to them, "they brewed only those fifty barrels, and then destroyed the recipe."

"Jack, you know anything about this?" Jo turned to him.

"Only that I wish that I was joining in. And that they hid it somewhere in the early Middle Ages. Hidden in legend, I suppose." With that he gave a cheeky grin.

Altogether, each Doctor lifted their cups, toasted each other, and then downed the contents. In unison an excited and painful shout erupted from each of their lungs as it burned the back of their throats. Eleven gave a small hiccup, but other than that they all reached out their cups for a second round, confident glances all around to signal that not one of them was giving up.

Martha sniffed the end of the finger tips that had held the handle of the pitcher and immediately was knocked out; she would have fallen to the floor if Ben hadn't caught her. He and Dodo carried her over and laid her on her right side against three sacks of potatoes. Jack reached for the pitcher and was bombarded with shouts from the men at the table. Giving Rose an "I just wanted to see what they would do" smirk, he handed it to someone more responsible…Amy. Eleven's eyebrows shot up, but other than that he made no movement when Amy came with their second round.

By round five there was actual conversation at the table. Six was asking Two about his relationship with physics, while Four was grinning goofily as Seven patted him on the head and asked him about some moon stripes on a forest floor.

Round seven surprised everybody with Twelve sliding to the floor and snoring loudly. The boy smacked himself on the head and shouted, "He'll nevah let me live it down." Other than that Twelve was left to just lie there.

Round thirteen saw Nine and One with their arms around each other singing an honest to goodness pirate chantey while swinging their glasses back and forth. Five had stood and tried to make a toast to the TARDIS, but he slipped and crashed to the floor to lie beside Two, who had fallen asleep the round before. Five punched Two in the arm to get a reaction out of him, but only a snort came before Two rolled onto his other side. Shrugging, Five waved at Tegan before letting his eyelids droop.

Round fifteen was met with a strange appearance. The two of the Masters came into the room arm in arm, took one look around, the one on the right gasping and saying, "Sweet-" with the other finishing his sentence "-merciful Rassilon" before fleeing back through the door from which they came. Seeing this, One turned to Seven, laughed himself hoarse, then sat back down to fall asleep leaning on Eleven's shoulder, who was toasting Three, Four, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, and Thirteen, who were still in the running.

Round sixteen saw the end of Seven and Six's participation in the whole matter. They gave each other a look in silent agreement, then got up, took a step towards the crowd of Companions that still surrounded the Round Table, and got in a sitting position that resembled something like meditation, and let themselves fall unconscious right there.

Round seventeen was pretty intense. From what the thirteen TARDISes present could translate amongst the drunken words spewing out of Eight's mouth, he wanted desperately to know how tall the remaining Doctors were in comparison to him. Lining up in no particular order, Ten came up to Four's forehead, while Three's shoulder was just above Eleven's hair. Nine refused to join in, close to breaking the rule of no remembered violence. A pat on the back from Thirteen got him out of it soon enough for him to notice how Eight had passed out on the table itself, lying on his back with his arms outstretched.

Round eighteen was worse. Four was having his hair closely examined by a Ten who was giving a raspberry (the one made by tongues) to anyone who dared bringing up the color of his tie. Four looked at Thirteen for help, and when they grabbed each other at the forearm Four pulled Thirteen backwards so that their chairs fell out from underneath them and they were asleep before they fell to the floor, opposite the two potato sacks that Martha was still lying on. Laughter from Ace, Grace, Susan, Rose, and Jamie erupted from a few feet away, and now all of the companions rushed forward to the edges of the table, making sure not to step on anyone.

Round nineteen was catastrophic. Every companion was shouting "Chug, chug, chug, chug!" to the Doctors and pounding their fists on the table. Three, Nine, Eleven, and Ten were staring each other down, cups raised defiantly and together they chugged it down in a single gulp. A minute passed, on all fronts. And then it happened. Eleven stood to his full height. He turned around to every human being in the room, and asked them to back away three feet. Without argument they did so. "Carry me!" he shouted, throwing his arms out and jumping right towards them. He landed on Donna's, Barbara's, Harry's, and Victoria's hands, and then all of the companions pushed him up and along like he was a rocker in the seventies. Amy gave him the same look she had when he had been changing outfits in the hospital, staring up at him as she pushed him along above her head to Sarah Jane. Eventually he was pushed back to the table. Three regarded him enviously. Eleven thrust out his pointer finger, shouted "HAPPY-" and then a monstrous BURP escaped his mouth, and he finished with "PRIMES!" before curling up on the floor like a baby and sleeping as quietly as one.

"So when exactly does a Time Lord get alcohol poisoning?" Steven asked, a bit of fear creeping into his voice.

"No clue," was all Romana could think to say. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the Master was back. A different one though. He was the oldest Master yet, in age but not appearance, lacking the beard, and was chatting it up with River Song. The Rani was in the doorway that the two previous Masters had come through, taking notes like mad. Romana might have been worried, but frankly seeing the Doctor, any of them, drunk was a once in a three regeneration opportunity. She figured they were thinking the same way. So she turned back and kept watching.

For details on round twenty-one, please refer to the beginning of round nineteen, minus Eleven. The cheers of "CHUG, CHUG!" were louder, though, much louder. When they put their cups down Ten had a blue-ish beer foam mustache and was grinning like a school boy after an unexpected kiss from a girl he'd been crushing on for months. He was the one to hiccup this time. But they wouldn't stop. And they were funny, high pitched hiccups. Bursting into song didn't help either. As shrill as ever, "I'd like ta beeeeeee….Undah tha seeeeeeeeeeea. In annnnn Octapuses gARden. In tha shhhhhhhhhay-DAH."

"Enough wid da Beatles," slurred Nine from across the way.

"Please," came Three's drawl, before he smacked himself to stay awake, "some decency would be niiiiice."

"Have WEEEEEE EVAH cared 'bout decency?" Ten asked, apparently very appalled by the notion.

"No!" came the shout from a member of the crowd.

They looked for the voice for a second, each holding out their cups once more. Jamie was the one to quickly fill their cups with blue again. Ten held his out to the other two. They clinked the cups together, with Ten declaring "Ladzzzz, I'll toast ta thhhhAt." Nods from Three and Nine said they agreed whole heartedly.

What round is this again? The last one had two…so this is round twenty-three…right?

"COME ON, DOCTOR!" screamed Nyssa.

"These guys are nothing!" Jack shouted next.

"We're counting on you!" Sara Kingdom yelled, interrupting Susan's, "Just swallow one more!"

Every single companion, except Rose, who was torn between two of them, was shouting encouragement left and right to the three that STILL were standing.

"You mind keeping it down?" was heard above the roar.

Before any human could reply or question who that was, Three shouted back, "Sorry, Arthur!"

Another call came from a balcony above the hall. There was no one there, but the voice itself was much more gravelly than the first, "Camelot's not soundproof, you know!"

Nine was the one to shout this time, "We've got that, Merlin!"

Ten gave them all a look. "Weeeee're…innnnnnnnnnnnn….CAMMMELLLLOT?"

"Yes," came Twelve's voice from a ways off. "Perfect place, ain't it? Now keep goin'. Wanna see how this ends up." But he couldn't stay awake for long, so he fell asleep again.

Six sat back up, looked around once, then lay back on the floor too.

"Well, CHHHH-AH-PPPPPSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS. I'm out! Hehheheh…. OOT 'ND ABOOT!" and Ten bowed to them all before slumping down in his chair at last.

A gasp came from several of the girls in the room. And then there was an uproar as Companions made their claims again. Sarah Jane ended up tripling her bet on Three.

It was one more round before the victor was officially found. Nine was gripping the Table to keep himself standing. He and Three were now giving their most challenging glares ever. Imagine if you will. The steel blue and lighter blue eyes fixed on each other. Three held his cup out first, his arm shaking but his resolve steady. It was filled, and he swallowed, confidence in every move he made. Nine held his out too, slower this time in the drinking, the burning in his throat that had been previously numb now flaring up again, and as he finished he squeezed his eyes shut, forcing the last of it down. Opening his eyes again, he saw that everyone, even a king and a wizard from high above, was watching him, and not Three. They expect me to fall, he thought to himself. But dwelling on that would have to wait. For looking across the wooden expanse that separated them, he could see it. Three was slowly…slowly, inching down to the Round Table's surface. A crash resounded in his ears, but his eyes were doing something along the lines of slow motion, for to him Three was still falling. The younger of the two came in contact with the table. He lay his face down onto the cool surface, let his arm fall to his side, and the cup slipped from his fingers. Being ceramic, he watched it break into pieces on the stone floor.

It hit every entity in the room, even the tin dog standing idly beside the left leg of Mel and the right leg of Donna, that Nine had won. And Nine was going to be the first one to say anything about it.

Triumph burned in his mind now, and he looked around at every face in the room not asleep or resting from their drunken stupor, and he smiled. A crazy smile it was, too. He leapt up on the Round Table of the knights of King Arthur, and pointed right at Three.

"Whhhad did Aye say? He cahhhhn't hold his liquor!" After a pause, he beckoned to Jack and Rose from the crowd, and they curiously made their way through the crowd to stand behind his now empty chair. Bashfully, he asked them, "Hhhhhalp meh down from heeeere?"

That is when it hit the masses. A collection of groans and cheers exploded, and Jack reached out to take Nine's arm and help him from the table. Tegan and Adric were hugging each other like there would be no tomorrow, meanwhile Ace grinned from ear to ear as Sarah Jane, although heavily disappointed, respectfully and with dignity handed over bills worth at least six hundred from her wallet. Susan allowed herself to give a little "Yeah!" before covering her mouth with embarrassment and surprise. Katarina, Vicki, and Victoria giggled in a little group off to the side, Jo and Liz were among the half of the crowd that still were beyond shock, and then there was Peri and Ben pounding their fists old-school style. But the best sound of all. Everyone conscious right then began to laugh. Pure laughter echoed in the fortress. Heck, it echoed in the valleys and hills outside. The laughter of the adventurers of the Fourth and Fifth dimensions was something beautiful in its own right.

Now they had to clean up. It wasn't that hard, though. Someone was nice enough to rouse Martha from her potato sack, and they popped a TARDIS pain killer into her mouth to quell the oncoming headache. Jack had Nine's arm around his shoulder, and led him down towards the cavern where all of the ships were waiting to receive their drunk drivers. Three was grabbed by Jo and Liz together, while Six became Mel's charge. Ian half-heartedly was the one to become One's crutch, then Five had Turlough to lean against as Adric volunteered to clean up the shattered cup. Two had Ben and Zoe, with Polly and Jamie grabbed rags and cleaned the alcohol from the floor. Rose walked quietly up to Ten, and got on her knees by his chair. She brushed a stray lock of hair that was out of place, and his eyes fluttered open. A soft "Heeeey…" escaped from him, and she smiled even more through her laughter. Then of course Donna had to slap him on his shoulder to get him moving, and he was soon through the archway following Rory and Eleven with Amy trotting behind. Grace had Eight all safe and sound in his TARDIS, so she came back, and seeing the young boy's annoyed and lost expression, she lifted Twelve off the floor without another thought on the matter.

"Thanks, miss," said the boy, and all three of them left the hall.

"I have located the Doctor, mistress," K-9 alerted Leela and Romana, who rolled their eyes at the exact same time before Leela muttered "Good boy" under her breath and they rolled Four onto his other side. Four mumbled something in Gallifreyan that obviously only Romana could understand, because she had to wipe the shock off her face before it could gain any purchase. She ordered him to stand on his own two feet, which after a few minutes he managed to do, and they ushered him out the door, grabbing onto his arms if he chose to fall. Seven was managing just fine with Ace, who was still smiling to herself. The Rani had left this time and place the second she saw that Three was out cold, because she had a lot of data to analyze before the day was over.

Down in the windowless room below various Doctors were entering various TARDISes. Rose and Jack ended up entering the same one by mistake. Nine's, to be exact. Together they helped their Doctors to the med bay, which was thankfully not the same blinding white that one would find in hospitals. Jack promised them he would be back shortly with two "Perfect Bananas", and Rose left looking for some tea.

Thirteen woke up on his own an hour later at the sound of twelve TARDISes dematerializing at once. Obviously their pilots were conscious enough to get them out of there, and he could feel the timelines setting themselves right. The first thing that he saw was River…but her face was upside down. A side effect from the drink, maybe? His head was off the ground…that was good, wasn't it? No…maybe not. His head was on her lap. He shot up, doubling over as he sat up when the alcohol in his belly gave his nerves a pretty hard time.

She smiled at him questioningly. "I had to come and see what you were up to," was her explanation as she pulled out her spoiler journal.

"Journals away today, my dear." After seeing the look on her face he finished with, "Not the 'my dear' your thinking of, I promise."

"What was the idea behind this whole thing?" she inquired instead, letting his comment slide.

"Honestly?" A nod from her prompted him to continue. "You hear…" a pause, for he was trying to re-master his speech methods and come up with a good explanation at the same time, "these stories in fiction where a character must face his worst enemy, which turns out to be himself? Well, I got it in mah stupid, thick head that there was a way that I could do tha' and have a bloody good time too."

"You wanted to beat yourself…it just didn't matter which self it was?"

"Preeeeecisely."

What neither of them noticed was a tip-toeing Master creeping into the room. He inched, step by step, towards the abandoned barrels. Using a recovered tissue compression manipulator that he stole from one of his previous selves, he shrunk a barrel down to fit in the palm of his hand, and put it into his pocket for later use beside the laser screwdriver. He slunk out James Bond style after that, laughing inside his own head at his reason for choosing that barrel. You see, all the others were empty.

The next day…basically, it was the hangover of the millennia. Almost every Doctor was in his TARDIS, in the closest bathroom he had been able to find, leaning over the tub, and more than just sick to his stomach. One was surrounded by Susan, Barbara, Ian, Vicki, Steven, Katarina, Sara, and Dodo. Two had Polly, Ben, Jamie, Victoria, and Zoe. Three had Liz, Jo, and Sarah Jane all patting him on the back, while Four was receiving mixed looks from Harry, Leela, Romana, and even K-9. Five was in the presence of Adric, Nyssa, Tegan, and Turlough. Six kept trying to get Peri out of the way as he kept almost heaving over and over. Seven was grateful for Mel and Ace being with him, but rather wished they were in another room so he could have some time to himself. Eight was fine with having Grace giving him small sips of water every now and then, for she was probably used to his crazy health these days. Nine's TARDIS was still occupied by Rose and Jack and Nine AND Ten. Ten even had his own bathtub right beside Nine. Martha and Donna were in Ten's ship having coffee in the kitchen; his TARDIS was following Nine's closely, since she needed the pilot that was currently inside it. Eleven was just now staggering into the lavatory, Amy on his heels with Rory leaning against the door frame. Twelve was the only one on his own, or so he had through, because his groans brought the little guy to come in and sit on the counter by the sink. Thirteen normally would have been alone in his timeline, but River had apparently chosen to stick around.

Every single one of them was in that "ticked off cause of the hangover" kind of mood. At the same time, they said in a growl:

"Susan…"

"Jamie…"

"Sarah Jane…"

"Romana…"

"Tegan…"

"Peri…"

"Mel…"

"Grace…"

There was a echo of both a Northern and a British "Rose…"

"Amy…"

"Creet…"

"River…"

Then, at the same time, across different times and different spaces, they said in a rather stern voice:

"Never let me waste time by being wasted. EVER."

Disclaimer: Me owning Doctor Who would not happen even if I had an Improbability Drive at my disposal. I kind of enjoy the fact that I don't own any thing in the Whovian universe. Cause that would mean protecting certain important pieces of paper by spending loads of money and guarding it with my life. Which sounds really boring.

Author's Note: Yeah, this is a total crack!fic. Maybe half of it is canon, but the rest you can blame on good old fashioned inspiration. I came up with this after reading something on , and then came up with an idea of the Master and the Doctor challenging each other to a battle of wits. Which turned into an image in my head of Ten and Simm!Master doing the same thing that One and Nine are doing in round thirteen. Which turned into Doctors One through Eleven having a drinking game. Which made me remember that one extended scene in Lord of the Rings: Return of the King where Gimli and Legolas have a drinking contest, and I wanted to use two of the phrases from that in the story. But who to say them? Well, Susan is the most innocent of the bunch, even more innocent than the boy, so she would ask the question. But who would get the Gimli line? I had always wanted Three and Nine to have some sort of face off, so there was my answer. And I really wanted Nine to say it. Cause of the accent, you know how it is. Then I HAD to have it set at a round table, because all Doctors are mostly created somewhat equal, so then in comes a surprise visit from King Arthur and Merlin with THE Roundest Table of them all.

If anyone is wondering, there IS a small Utopia reference that I hadn't even intended to happen at the very end. Notice how no Doctor has had a companion younger than maybe sixteen, so that was why I gave Twelve the youngest companion yet. But I had never imagined that I would turn the boy into Creet. You know, the "the skies are made of diamonds" boy. Brownie points for totally screwing with the time lines.

So, here's a riddle for you.

it's Really nice to give.

they are Essential for writers to improve

many are Very keen to receive these

there lies a somewhat Impossibility to continue on without them

anyone and Everyone can give them

one can only ask Why doesn't everyone give them?

Put it all together and what do you get? I wouldn't mind a review, if you have any to spare. They are brain food, you know. Like M&Ms. Each one a different color, and the beautiful but rare misshapen ones being extra special or extra weird.