A/N: Tragically, I own nothing. If you like what you see below, or are even mildly interested to see where this might go, please leave a comment! I'm playing around with the idea of using this as a jumping off point, and would love to know if anyone would be interested in a follow up.
As evening falls, a dozen temps return to Chiswick; their flats and families, glass of cheap wine and trash on the telly. Trapped no more in the role of small cogs in ugly machines, they resume life where they left off this morning. Tomorrow will be more of the same, but tonight they are free.
All but one, who lingers over her desk, delaying the final moment where she must return to her empty house. She has purpose at work, answering phones and shuffling papers for a small construction firm, purpose her life lacks, regardless of the money she has squirreled away. It's a small existence, but its hers, and sometimes that's enough. Sometimes it's all she has.
Donna Noble, formerly Temple, opens the small brown door to her small dark flat, and clicks the light on before stepping inside and shutting the door behind her. "I'm home," she calls to no one, but the sound chases some of the darkness away, as though there could be someone awaiting her return and it's coincidence that they've stepped out for a moment. Madness? Maybe, but it's an insanity she can live with, one that smoothes over the lumps of her life.
She moves slowly through her rooms, trailing shoes, coat, and handbag, shuffling into her kitchen in stocking feet to heat a mug of tea, then carries it into her bedroom, conscientiously killing the lights behind her. The steaming mug goes on her dresser as she peels out of her work wear, slacks and blouse discarded in favor of a faded tee shirt and soft pants. With great care she takes the tea to bed, staring at the insubstantial curls of steam rising as the tea cools.
Years of practice have made her an expert at avoiding melancholy moments such as this. She fills her life with hobbies, drinks with the other office girls, who seem sillier and younger every year, visits to museums and sitting on the hill with her gramps, staring out at the cold lonely stars. She remembers a time when she wondered what he was looking for, a time when she could never get a satisfactory answer to her inquiries. Now she thinks she understands.
Tonight is different, though. A moment to allow her life to feel empty and confused. Three years ago she woke up on the ugly couch in her mother's home, puzzled and sore. An automobile accident, she was told, severe head trauma which had brought about the amnesia. She was lucky, everyone told her, and she grudgingly agreed after seeing the photos from the scene. Funny how it never really felt like luck. It should have been a fairy tale; her miraculous survival followed by a whirlwind romance and marriage, winning the lotto. It had been too good to last, and it hadn't. It wasn't Shaun's fault that he couldn't fix his wife's ills; that he could never complete her the way he felt a husband ought to. Riding out the good and bad days, waking nightmares where she feared she had lost further memories, and grew hysterical, requiring sedation. He never could come to grips with the confusion and loss she felt, and she had lost, or maybe never had, the words to explain.
Three years is time enough to accept that she will never recover what is missing. Whatever she might have had in those years, its gone forever. That time is lost to her, along with her husband, she has lost so very much time dwelling on it, trying to rediscover what is gone forever. Perhaps she should spend less time reflecting like this, but once in awhile doesn't feel like an overindulgence in grief. Draining her mug, she places the empty vessel on the nightstand and rolled under the bedclothes, mourning the unknowable losses of her life.
Donna sleeps, and when she sleeps she dreams of flying through flashing gold tunnels, of power beyond imagining. She is only a thought away from anywhere, any time. Lightning dances around her as she spirals and dances through the universe, but it cannot touch her anymore than her earthly sorrows can in this place of reverence. Another thought passes her brain, golden threads dancing across mental interfaces made whole and she floats to the surface of a planet she has never heard of, never seen, and knows intimately.
The people wait for her on bended knee on the glittering plain she descends upon, mountain ranges swaying in the breeze behind her. They have no word for what she is, as far as she cares there is no word for what she is, but they call her 'your radiance' and that feels right as anything. Her feet barely touch the ground as she walks among them, laying her hands on their faces and raising them up, priests and kings to guide and serve.
Another thought and she is shooting away, leaving behind the seed of civilizations which will set their calendars by her arrival and tell their children of a time when she walked with them. The edge of existence beckons, and she draws toward the border of reality, staring dreamily into the places beyond where things stare hungrily inwards. She meets those unknown enemies, a boundary between them and the rest of the universe, a line she dares them to cross. This is her territory, hers to traverse and protect.
Hers to destroy. The thought bubbles into her mind unbidden, and she shakes it away like a fly. She would never destroy it. Lazily, she retreats from the edges, surrounding herself with the wonderful gilded vortex, letting it carry her hither and thither. A song whispers through her mind, a song for her, sung through eternity. Her life, her sacrifices, her triumphs, remembered and honored in music forever. It stirs a longing in her soul for a partner lost and forgotten. The song changes, and its the encircling golden channel singing now, in the language that underwrites the fabric of reality. Comprehension comes independently of hearing, and she whispers the harmony until the agony becomes bearable again.
Donna Noble wakes to the sound of her alarm, scrubs dried tears away impatiently, and begins another day.