~And once again, Conan uses his endless supply of useless knowledge to his advantage~

The Doctor was gone.

Okay, that wasn't so bad. She'd been alone plenty of times. There was that one time with the Wire when she'd gotten her face stolen… and then on her first trip with the Doctor when she'd almost been burned to death… and then that time during World War II when she'd been dangling a few hundred feet over London…

So her track record of "alone" wasn't too great. Rose was sure that she'd be able to survive this, though. Chased by an ancient Indian war goddess? Pffft, that was nothing. Her mum could deal with that thing.

Well, perhaps not. But her mum could bring the Doctor to his knees. There was only one problem, though, and that was…

"Conan! I said run!"

The boy continued gaping at the thirty-foot tall embodiment of death, destruction, life and creation that was currently living up to the "death and destruction" part of her name. With a groan, Rose darted forward and grabbed the child by the arm, lifting him into her arms and beginning to run. He barely reacted, only muttering in a dazed voice, "That's Kali. The war goddess."

"Yes. And she requested quite politely to be called 'Kal' before flinging the Doctor halfway across India. He'll be fine, by the way. Now be quiet and hold on!"

Perhaps it wasn't the best idea to speak in such a way to a seven year old child. Or perhaps it wasn't the best idea to take aforementioned child to ancient India where aliens disguised as gods were waiting to rise up again and take over the world.

She was going to throttle the doctor until he regenerated, then throw him to her mum, and then kill him again. Already she had plans of buying pears on their next trip to London.

But for the moment she'd have to settle for running for her life. It was lucky the goddess was still sluggish from hibernation.

She winced as a metallic rasp resonated through the air. A glance over her shoulder told Rose what she had feared—the goddess had unsheathed her sword. The oversized blade sliced right through a tree, sending it toppling with a huge crash.

A bush snagged onto her pants and she felt the material tear—damn it, those were her good jeans—but kept running. Suddenly Conan began to move. "Put me down!" He yelled.

"What?"

"Put me down! You can run faster!" Without waiting for her, the boy struggled out of her grip and hit the ground running. To her surprise, the boy quickly overtook her, his short legs working at a full sprint. With her burden relieved, Rose found herself able to run with much more ease.

"This way!" Conan yelled. He turned into a small space that Rose had to slide through. Then the boy gave a yelp and a moment later she knew why. The ground dropped right out from beneath her feet. She gave a small scream as she slid, the dirt giving way to rock that her limbs clashed painfully against. Then they spun onto a flat surface and came to a stop.

For a while, the only sound was their raspy breathing. Her arms and legs throbbed, feeling warm were the rock had scraped against bare skin and made it bleed. Then Rose asked, "Did you know about that?"

"Not at all," Conan choked back. A light flicked on, shining in her eyes before dropping. Her heart skipped before she realized the beam came from his watch.

The light traveled along red-brown rock. The walls were unnaturally smooth, engraved with geometric designs. Across from them was a tunnel that lead into darkness. Conan glanced at her. "Should we—" He was cut off as the ground began to shake. They both froze, listening to Kali's enraged roar before the goddess continued on her way.

They waited until it was silent. "…Better than going back up," Rose finally said. Conan made a faint noise of agreement.

Their footsteps echoed in the cavern. Conan's light traveled along the walls, tracing over the flawlessly even walls. "This is incredible," the boy breathed. His voice rebounded upon them. "It must have taken years to finish this." His hand reached out to touch the wall in an almost revering way.

"You're taking this awfully well," Rose commented.

Immediately, the boy tensed. He turned to her with a giggle that sounded almost nervous. "W-well, I adapt pretty quickly," he explained hurriedly. "Though I have to admit, Indian gods are pretty new to me." He faced the walls again, staring hard at the carvings.

Rose smiled fondly. "You'll get used to it. It's pretty overwhelming at first, but you kind of have to adjust if you're traveling with the Doctor."

"And what's with that, anyway?" She raised an eyebrow. Conan rubbed his forehead, continuing, "This whole 'Doctor' thing. He's no doctor, and I don't even know his name, and you all expect me to just drop everything and run off with you guys. This stuff isn't even supposed to be real!"

Rose winced a bit as he aimed a kick at the wall. For someone who had been practically worshiping the architecture minutes before, he didn't seem to care if he accidentally damaged ancient history. The denial was natural, though, even if the boy had already agreed to travel with them. She herself had been frozen when she first encountered on of the many oddities that seemed to follow the Doctor. "Come on, Conan," she coaxed. "I know it's hard. You're just a kid, and I really don't know what the Doctor is thinking but… I trust him. And if he says a seven year old should be on the TARDIS with us, then he's probably right. …Probably."

Conan gave a long sigh. "Never mind. I'll figure…" he waved his hand in a wide circle, "this out later. Alright, so it's supposed to be Kali that's currently on a homicidal rampage up there, right?"

"Seems like it."

"Well, Kali is known for representing two sides of things, right? Life and death, destruction and creation. Some say that she doesn't just represent creation, but also acts as a 'mother' to her followers. Basically, her worshippers are her children."

Rose nodded slowly. "So why would she be attacking us, then? I mean, we're not exactly worshippers but…"

"She's still supposed to be a mother," Conan finished with a nod. He began to pace, brows furrowing. "There was a legend I've heard… Kali was supposedly 'born' from Durga to fight evil, a bit like how Athena was 'born' from Zeus's cracked skull in battle. However, she got carried away with her fighting and just began to destroy everything. In order to stop her, her husband, Shiva, threw himself beneath her feet and shocked her out of her rage."

The blond stared at him. Under her gaze, the Japanese boy seemed to grow uncomfortable. "I, um, I…"

Suddenly, she gave a laugh, seeming to startle Conan. "You sound just like the Doctor. You both know all these random things and just pull them out of the air whenever you need them." She shook her head in exasperation and fondness. "Maybe that's why he likes you. You're practically a miniature human Doctor."

Conan almost looked offended. "How am I like that lunatic?"

She waved him away. "You're a lot smarter than you look, Conan. So do you think that throwing ourselves at Kali's feet would fix this?"

Relaxing somewhat, the boy shrugged. "No idea. It's only a legend and—"

A clatter silenced him. They both froze and glanced at each other. After a pause, Conan shone his watch light into the tunnel, and they both waited with baited breath as a figure approached.

"There you are!" The Doctor cried. "I just met a group of natives that might be able to calm down Kali. See, we have to throw ourselves at her feet and she just might snap out of her rampage—"

He stopped short as Conan banged his head against the wall and Rose began to giggle.

"Was it something I said?"

And so concludes the second chapter of Sanity is Relative. …That took a lot longer than I thought. See, I have a billion ideas for stuff to write, but they all take place later in the makeshift timeline I've created.

By the way, I am officially dubbing this as an AU seeing as I plan for Captain Jack to make a few appearances in this, which should not happen until season… 3 or 4. I forgot.

So once again, I feel a bit nervous as far as Rose's personality goes. I'm decently confident with the Doctor and Conan, but Rose always gives me trouble. I read her wiki page for reference, which gave me a few ideas for how she'll treat Conan.