Hello there! Thank you for taking the time to click on this particular fic! I hope you enjoy it! Though I do apologize this one is a bit more gloomy than I expected...
I plan to have this as a sort of ongoing/episodic thing. I'll work on new segments when I can (which during the school year may not be a whole lot...), and I'll happily take any feedback or suggestions with any part of it!
I'll stop rambling now...
The door of the TARDIS creaked softly open.
Footsteps followed the sound. Shoes against floor making muffled thumps that echoed around the room.
The owner of the footsteps seemed not to care where they were taking him. He stood tall, and an oppressive calm hung around him. His gaze remained fixed forwards, on the console. As if to reach it was his only goal.
That wasn't true. His goal was to keep himself together. And he found he could best do that by focusing steadfast on something.
The Doctor reached the edge of the console, clutched it and swallowed.
A second set of less broken footsteps echoed in the corridor outside the console room. River Song appeared on the balcony, and ran her hand through her finger-in-a-light-socket curls.
"Hello dear." She said, her hand gliding along the railing as she hopped down the steps. "You alright?" She asked.
"Of course I am." Said the Doctor.
River came and leaned slightly to the right of the place opposite of the Doctor on the console. "Did you find the afterword?"
He nodded.
"Did it help any?" She asked.
The Doctor sighed. "Doesn't bring them back, but I'm glad to have it." He unconsciously touched his pocket, where River could see a corner of paper sticking out of it.
"What was that second trip?" Asked River. "I know the first was going to get that last page, but I heard the TARDIS flying a second time."
He looked up. "That was me doing one last favor." He said.
"What was it she wanted you to do?"
"I visited her." The Doctor traced a part of the controls absently.
River's eyes went wide. "You didn't…?"
"No of course not." Said the Doctor. "I know better than to try that… No… this was… going back to the beginning. Little Amelia…"
River nodded. "Of course." She said. "So are you alright?"
"You already asked me that." Said the Doctor.
"And you have a tremendous capacity for lying." Countered River.
"Because it's easier when I avoid it entirely." The Doctor's eerie calm seemed to strain around the edges. "It happened… and that's all."
"And how has that tactic been working for you?"
"I'm still in one piece." He drummed his fingers idly.
"Where are you going to go from here?" Asked River.
He shrugged. "I don't know, to be honest. Maybe just… take things slow. Stop off in some time and stay there a while." He gave a smile which seemed disconnected from the rest of his features. "I'll figure it out."
"Alright." Said River. "Just don't forget who you are."
"Who I am…" Muttered the Doctor. "Always the question, isn't it? Sometimes even I don't know…" he cleared his throat, now speaking aloud. "So what about you? Where should I drop you off?" He began prepping the time machine for a departure, circling around the console hitting various buttons and levers.
"Oh. Back home I suppose." Said River, circling in the opposite direction as she set the coordinates.
The Doctor wordlessly tugged on a lever, and they were off.
The TARDIS ran smoothly, almost like the relaxed, fluid motions of her primary inhabitant. An eerie disconnect from the usual flamboyant show of flailing limbs and storm-tossed TARDIS console room.
This concerned River. Sure, the man was still heartbroken, but this was the first time he hadn't made a joyride out of flying the TARDIS. This was the most efficient River had ever seen the Doctor fly.
Sure, the engines still whined, but River made no move to change the noise. It was probably the man's only steadfast thing, and therefore a source of comfort.
They landed with an echoing thump.
The Doctor sighed. "This should be it then."
"Thank you sweetie." River strode towards the doors, giving the Doctor a kiss on the cheek as she passed by him.
She put her hand on the door to open it, but then paused. She took one last glance back at her husband.
And that changed everything.
He stood there, leaning back up against the console, watching her with complete attention. Any passerby would have said that the man looked perfectly normal, if oddly dressed. Nothing about him seemed to betray any kind of care to anything that had just happened.
And yet he seemed as hollow as a broken bottle.
There was something quite different in his eyes from normal. Something that could scare anyone that knew him well. Something that undermined the very essence of the Doctor.
"Aren't you going?" The quiet, indifferent voice was the final straw.
River took her hand from the door, turned completely around to face him and threw her arms up in the air. "Alright!" She said "I'll come with you."
Some small spark of life made the Time Lord twitch slightly, and look at her with questioning. "Why?" He asked.
"One more psychopath won't make much difference." Said River, hopping back up towards him. "And you look so pathetic. I can't leave you like this."
"I don't look pathetic." Defended the Doctor.
"You do." River paused, then gave a small laugh. "I probably do too, I suppose."
The Doctor continued to watch her. River noticed that even now a distrust of everything was battling with his hopes. "So then…?"
"I'm staying by your side." Said River. "I've always wondered what sort of adventures your regular companions have." She smiled. "If of course, you're alright with that."
The Doctor stood there for a moment, then nodded. "Yes. Okay. Of course." He glanced down, then up again with a small smirk. "Sweetie."
River laughed. "I suppose I should go ahead and get my things, seeing as how we're right here already." She went back for the door. "I'll be back in a moment."
She stepped into her home. A small apartment located in a reasonably advanced section of history. Anachronisms and archeology things were here and there, though not too chaotically.
River sensed a presence behind her, and saw the Doctor lurking in the doorframe of the TARDIS. She ignored this and went into her bedroom, pulling a small suitcase out of her closet, which she kept packed in case of something like this. She opened it up and began a process of collecting important possessions that needed to be outside the bag most of the time. She drummed her fingers on the edge of the suitcase. That was probably it. She began to close it, but then remembered her journal. She swept out of the room and collided with the Doctor.
"Ah!" Yelped River. "What were you doing standing there in my doorway?"
"Just making sure you were alright." Said the Doctor, simply.
"I'm in my own home, love. I don't think anything bad can happen to me here." River now brushed past him and out into the main room, sweeping a small pile of papers, located on a wooden desk pressed up against a wall, aside and pulled out the blue-covered book which she used for keeping track of her own timeline.
She turned around and found him right behind her again. "Stop that." She said.
"Stop what?"
"I know you worry about what happens when you turn your back, but whenever I turn my back you've moved. Most people find that unnerving."
The Doctor nodded, then backed over to the TARDIS, still watching her as she went back into her bedroom, coming out a moment later with her bag.
"All set for now." Said River, following him back inside the blue box, closing the doors behind her after a final sweeping look of her home. She set her bags down a little ways inside, there was no need to move them to a room at the moment. She swept past the Doctor towards the console, and began to fly.
"Where are you going?" Asked the Doctor, quickly following her and watching over her shoulder.
"Spoilers." Purred River, as they flew through the vortex, the Doctor casually flicking a switch that made the TARDIS whoosh as he believed she was supposed to.