Started my daily ficlets to make the hiatus pass, then decided to keep going with a 2nd cycle, and then a 3rd, 4th, etc through 78th cycle. Now cycle 79!

"Instrumental Glory"
Doctor Who/Glee crossover #8
From DW: 10th Doctor, Donna
From Glee: Blaine

1. Street Music

Mesiary, in the year 2015

Every morning, his day began just as the one before, and he was content for it. Every evening, he would work his shift at the factory, and it brought him money, and it was all good and well. But he doubted he could ever make it through those hours if not for the other hours, the ones before his work shift, where he headed out of his house, his case in hand, found his regular post, and produced the instrument from inside the case. Whether he attracted one solitary listener, or a few, or a crowd, he would welcome them with the same enthusiasm. He knew his music touched them, and that was all he could want in the world.

The skies had been plagued with constant cluster clouds for days, but on that morning, it was its natural pale violet again, and he looked forward to joyful passersby, enjoying the clear air and maybe even the music he would play for them. He would let the day tell him what piece to begin with and the rest would come from there.

He had seen one of his best days in weeks, and maybe this had only made him that much more inspired, which in turn brought around more listeners. The numbers had dwindled near the end of his playing hours, but he was not yet done, and he would go on playing, for anyone who came, or for his own pleasure. But as it so happened, after several minutes of being on his own, he spotted her.

The girl couldn't have been more than nine or ten years old. Her hair was a vibrant ginger, neatly pulled into twin looping braids, her eyes a piercing blue. She was watching him play with an intent he rarely saw in anyone so young, but he had a feeling he knew what was pulling her focus.

"Hello there," he tipped his head to her. She barely reacted. "You play, too, don't you?" She took a few slow steps in his direction, eyes still on the instrument in his hands. "Well let's see then," he stopped playing and offered her his instrument. She looked at it, then at him. "Go on," he insisted. "It's alright." So finally, she nudged the bag slung around her shoulder to the side, to hold the instrument properly.

He'd figured she might be a bit clumsy with it, still learning, but right away she stood and held it as though it had been part of her frame for as long as she lived. When she began to play, he was stunned. He knew the piece she played, a Mesiaran classic, but he didn't knock that he had ever heard it played so beautifully, so hauntingly. It brought tears to his eyes. He crouched in front of her, the better to watch her hands as they worked the instrument he himself had handled day after day for the twenty-four years he had owned it, since the day of his fourteenth birthday.

"Child, what is your name?" he asked once her hands had stilled. She gave him the instrument back.

"Cree," she said.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Cree," he smiled, offering her his hand. She stared at it. "My name is Tarren. Where did you learn to play like this?" he asked, abandoning the quest of shaking the little prodigy's hand. Her fingers had closed around the strap to her bag, and when he looked at it again, he saw the crest and understood. "You're a student of the Isher Academy then?" She nodded.

He would have attended it himself, as a child, if his family had had the means. He had tried several times to win his entry but never got it. For a while he had been bitter about it, but then he had found his calling. It had very little prestige, but it made him happy and that was all that mattered to him. Having heard the girl now, he had to wonder if maybe the people had Isher had had it right all along to keep him out. She was in a class all on her own.

"You know what, Cree, it would be my honor to hear you play again. Whenever you feel like it, you come and find me here again, and I'll be happy to lend…"

She reached into her bag and pulled out an elongated tube, strings surrounding its midsection, curved at the end. As she tugged at the ends, it stretched out to its full length and snapped locked as he could see the strings disappeared into the tube. It was sleek, polished… yet again, making him feel inferior for a beat, though he hid it into a smile.

"Well… looks like you have things covered, don't you?" She nodded. "So how about you and I we give this a try, you with yours, me with mine?" She stared at him for a moment, then she nodded once more. Every time she did, the curved braids would hop about. It reminded him of his nieces, and he smiled. "Right, then," he stood back up, as she looked around. "I tell you, we just might draw in a couple stragglers," he promised, amused at her search for an audience. He was amazed as it was that no one had come around when she'd played before. It should have filled the street.

He began to play first, and Cree watched him, that same intent back in her eyes. Eventually he gave her a nod, signalling that the moment would come for her to play along with him. She leaned the tube against her shoulder, her fingers poised to the strings, and she slowly came to pluck them.

He felt a vibration come from the stringed instrument, and his own hands still. He felt paralysed. He tried to speak, to alert her of his distress, until he realized… it was her instrument, it was the source of the vibration, the curved end… The expression on her face was the same as it had been when she'd played his instrument, and the last thing Tarren would wonder, before his brain stopped working, was whether she even realized what she was doing.

He would never know, as his body fell lifeless to the street where he had stood, day after day, rain or shine, for years. The small girl stopped playing, and having shut her instrument, she slipped it back into her bag and walked down the street, her heels clicking in the silence.

TO BE CONTINUED (TOMORROW)