Fandom: Doctor Who - the end of the episode "Forest of the Dead"

Disclaimer: Nothing is mine, I just like playing with the innards of a TV Series is all…

A/N: Everything is because I need sleep and it's 2am and I ended up listening to Fall Out Boys "Thnks fr the mmrs" for some reason and part of the lyrics stuck to me and made me do it….

River smiled, her lips trembling as she took in the gravity defying brown hair and the dark, haunted eyes on that face she didn't recognize for a soul she knew almost better than her own.

"Spoilers" She said sweetly, ignoring her own tears, before connecting the two ends of the plug.

The energy flew between the two and she could feel the light speeding pain crashing through her as she grounded her teeth and held her ground, unwilling to let a cry get out of her.

In the light years that passed in the seconds that the power needed her as a circuit before totally obliterating her, millions of thoughts went through the woman's mind.

Images collided in her mind. The superposition of images of a certain man with a crooky grin and a bowtie and of ones of the same man, with other faces, faces older and grimmer. One in particular that was so recent and so heart-breaking. Her heart went out for the man who had been present all through her life, in one form or another. Imaginary friend, target, lover, savior. And all this time, all her life, he had known, all the way through. He had known exactly where she would be this very day. He had loved her more deeply and intensely than she could have ever hoped, and still held from her that the very first time he ever met her, was on the day of her death. Self-sacrificing idiot…

She couldn't help but hear her own words repeated endlessly in her mind. "You knew". That incredible bastard. That beautiful idiot. He had known her whole life and never said one word. But he had taken her to the towers of Durillium, that night had been magical in every sense possible. She should have known. She should have realized.

The Doctor lies. That was one of the Rules after all, don't wander off and the Doctor lies.

She didn't know what life would have had in stores for her had she known and she didn't care. The adventures, the thrill of living in the trails of the Doctor, never really disappeared after all. And she had known for a long time, in the divergent trajectories that their timelines had always been in, that there would be one day when she would meet a Doctor that would not remember her. And she had known just as long, that the day that Doctor would stand in front of her and she would not see any recognition in his eyes, that would be the death of her. She had meant what she said to Rory all that time ago, but she never thought of it quite so literally, all irony aside.

The face had been a surprise, she had nearly forgotten those long and tedious hours of research all those years ago when she was searching for a Good Man. She had nearly forgotten the face of his former regenerations. And Time Lord DNA obliged, she had not seen the face first but the soul, the unmistakable aura of the Last Time Lord, she had pursued and loved for longer than he had known her.

But even if the face and voice were wrong and the gimmicks off, there was always this little something, so indefinably Doctor in the Gallifreyan man. But it still felt wrong, just, not quite right. Like you know when picking up a fruit, that it is not quite ripe enough yet. And that had been the source of her bitterness and her frustration all the way through this one last adventure.

That even though she knew him, it was not this him, he wasn't her Doctor. Not yet.

But she got to meet his Donna, his best friend, that even the spitfire that was Amelia Pond, could not budge from his dual hearts. For even if he didn't talk about her, never even mentioned her more than once in all the years they chased after each other, he would never forget the one that got her Spaceman out of his funk and back into enjoying life again. The most important woman in the Universe. His DoctorDonna.

It all came down to this, amusingly enough. Him in handcuffs and her saving the lives of thousands of innocents. Oh how the tables have turned, from that one time in Alpha Matraxis with the Army of Angels. And it all came down to saving lives at the risk of their own, as always.

Because that was what being around the Doctor did to everyone, after all. He worked so hard and felt so much. It was nearly inevitable, feeling compelled to be the best that you could ever be, just to feel like you would make the Doctor proud and that the faith and attention and presence he gave you, was not misplaced. That the running and excitement and mystery, was all for something. It made you feel part of something big and important and oh so fantastic.

But as she looked back into those deep, haunted brown eyes for the last time, another pair of eyes, lighter and smiling flickered on top of them, making her smile contently, the only she could think of, were the words of an old pop song from the 2000s, back on Earth.

"He tasted like you, only sweeter…"