I own everything, I am beautiful as the night and terrible as the dawn, all shall love me and despair.
oOo
Let me rest in the arms of Slumber, for my open eyes are tired;
Let the silver-stringed lyre quiver and soothe my spirit;
Weave from the harp and lute a veil around my withering heart.
Sing of the past as you behold the dawn of hope in my eyes, for
Its magic meaning is a soft bed upon which my heart rests.
.
They find him while they're walking on the beach, lying on his back at the edge of the water.
The swirling fog that's only just lifting doesn't make it easy to spot things from a distance. But there's a surprised exclamation. One tugs at the other's sleeve and points. Oh, look. Look over there.
He's pale and unmoving, almost completely dry, an arm and a leg slightly bent in a strange symmetry. His eyes are closed.
The two walk closer, and if he could hear them –Could he? Is he? – he'd hear the hesitating but curious steps, the scraping on the large, smooth peddles that roll down to the near-silent waves.
They examine him carefully, murmur, and hover around uncertainly. Oh, what do we do?
Come here. Hey, come here, everyone.
.
.
I have passed a mountain peak and my soul is soaring in the
Firmament of complete and unbound freedom;
I am far, far away, my companions, and the clouds are
Hiding the hills from my eyes.
.
One by one, many come and sit by. Friends, family, and other reflections of the true Self, like light through a prism.
The latter tend to bicker, but there isn't much talk now.
The lapses of silence among quiet, almost whispered conversation –how did it happen? When? – are not of an awkward nature. They are the silences of drifting thought, remembrance, or contemplation, a connection with the inner light of everything around them.
A few simply look at him, and wait, patiently.
There is something indefinably, yet immensely sad and tired about him, from his tousled, grey hair to his feet, where the water laps at his boots. The tide may have brought him there, but he looks more as if he had fallen right at the edge of the sea from a great height.
("No, I know how that looks, trust me", someone says, and another laughs.)
It's the stillness, decides the Journalist, who's seen so many of the Time Lord's bodies and lives; this seeming emptiness that comes after the expulsion of a great amount of powerful energy, the lack of it now startling.
(She remembers describing the recently dead as looking as though they were sleeping, more than once. And it was apt; but when could anyone catch him sleeping anyway? Like this, with this much pained, wan exhaustion etched on his limbs, on the lines of his face?)
Where is the joyful, elegant animation, the mad, energetic chaos that dances across all time?
A single tear drops to the ground. It's always, always a pity.
.
.
Dry your tears, my friends, and raise your heads as the flowers
Raise their crowns to greet the dawn.
Look at the bride of Death standing like a column of light
Between my bed and the infinite;
Hold your breath and listen with me to the beckoning rustle of
Her white wings.
.
A faint wind starts blowing, ruffling hair and threatening the most flimsy of the hats. It smells like dust and cinnamon. A dropped umbrella starts floating away and is quickly retrieved by its owner.
At some point the Nurse kneels beside him and traces his injuries through the torn, tattered clothes, wincing in sympathy.
Most of the damage has been done by internal bleeding –traumatic brain injury, probable aortic rupture, multiple rib fractures, blast lung, dislocated shoulder– but there are many visible cuts, bruises, and burns. Some hidden wound in the back of his right leg still bleeds down a dark trouser-leg, releasing small, pinkish clouds that quickly disperse in the water.
There is light gushing out of a small wound on the man's forehead. He runs a hand through it, curiously, and points it out to his wife. She shrugs. They've seen weirder things.
(He doesn't check for a pulse. Some things have no meaning here. If he takes a soot-stained hand with grazed knuckles in his own, it's only with the hope that he may finally stir at the touch. And well, old habits and all that.)
The conversation gradually turns to other things. Philosophy, cooking. The Lady in Purple they found resting in the forest. Like him, she wouldn't wake.
The most curious thing of all is a very thin golden rope that's wound tightly around his right palm. It passes over his clenched fingers and disappears into the sea. Some tug at it experimentally, to no avail.
Eventually, the Lady in White and Gold kisses his forehead and stands up.
"Not yet. It's not his time. There is one more thing that he must do."
(A few, like the Teachers, are reluctant to leave him and protest, but there really isn't anything else any of them can do.)
One by one, they withdraw, and the water rises and takes him away again.
.
.
Carry me to the cypress woods and dig my grave where violets
And poppies grow not in the other's shadow;
Let my grave be deep so that the flood will not
Carry my bones to the open valley;
Let my grace be wide, so that the twilight shadows
Will come and sit by me.
.
He hears the fragmented echoes calling his name.
"Doctor!"
They sleep in my mind and I forget. I have to really want to, to bring them back in front of my eyes.
.
Cover me with soft earth, and let each handful be mixed
With seeds of jasmine, lilies and myrtle; and when they
Grow above me, and thrive on my body's element they will
Breathe the fragrance of my heart into space;
And reveal even to the sun the secret of my peace;
And sail with the breeze and comfort the wayfarer.
.
.
They find him later at the same spot, and they crowd around him again, in near silence.
Something has changed, though he is still unmoving, quickly, almost miraculously dry, and dressed in singed rags.
He somehow appears lighter. There is a soft glow about him, like the entire place is rubbing off on him. Now, he really looks like he could be sneaking a few hours of sleep in his TARDIS, when nobody was looking; not a sad, broken thing.
The golden thread is gone from his hand. As they sit beside him, they notice thin bruises across his palm, marking the passing of the fire.
(There is a murmur that quickly dies down to patient, quiet sympathy.)
Time goes on, in tiny, soft flakes that fall in the rhythm of the wave.
At some point his previous self gets bored, sits companionably, cross-legged near the older one's shins, picks up some peddles and unsuccessfully tries skipping them.
Someone brings out a sonic screwdriver. Two others set up a chessboard nearby and continue an unfinished game, while their companions offer whispered suggestions.
Clara Oswald starts playing with his hair.
"You're so fluffy."
(Jack laughs at that, then takes off his greatcoat and thoughtfully drapes it over the motionless Time Lord).
"Um, should we?..." he asks the rest after a while, uncertainly. He is still a bit unsure on this whole dying bit. The impressive lady whom the Doctor apparently married (!) shakes her head.
"Leave him rest a while, he's been through a lot".
But when she moves her hand into his, his fingers curl ever so slightly over her palm, and she smiles.
.
.
Go back to the joy of your dwellings and you will find there
That which Death cannot remove from you and me.
Leave with peace, for what you see here is far away in meaning
From the earthly world.
.
.
.
-the end-
Quotes and references? You bet! Come on, what are you, new?
I think this fic was mostly inspired by the fact that throughout the Series 10 finale, Twelve looked so bloody exhausted. I'm thinking Al Pacino at the end of Insomnia, or Hugh Jackman in Logan. (Behold, the Trifecta of Very Tired Blokes! What else do they have in common? Oh, they all die!)
I mean, okay, Capaldi is older than most Doctors, but daum. I don't know if it was the lighting, the makeup, the directing, or if he's just that good an actor, kudos. I just wanted to bring him a blanket and some hot chocolate, and sit by in sympathy going "there, there".
Thank you for reading! If you have any questions, if you didn't understand something, you need only ask. In general, comments are tremendously appreciated, and usually responded to.