Hi all, this is my first story on this site - if anyone is interested in beta-ing I'd love to hear from you, couldn't work out if there's any way to request betas through the site, it's kinda confusing. Meanwhile, got a fair idea where this story is going, got quite a lot more of it already written up just gotta get it in order. Hope you like, hope you review...


Tick tock, goes the clock

Introit

Tick tock, goes the clock, as the old song says,

Tick tock, goes the clock, until the end of days.

River Song, Archaeologist

That man.

That beautiful, mad man.

The first time I truly met him, I killed him. I'd been trained to kill him, it was my whole reason for being. It wasn't even something I was conscious of, or planned to do, it just happened. As soon as I got close enough I touched up my lipstick, tried to shoot him, planted a death kiss on his lips, then ran off to see 1939 Berlin as if I had no qualms about what I had done.

Truth to tell, there really were no qualms in my head. I was giddy with the rush of regeneration, and I felt like this huge weight had lifted from my shoulders. My life was just beginning.

Take a child, have her raised by memory-proof aliens, train her in violence, implant post-hypnotic suggestion of how and whom to kill, then lock her into a space-suit and isolate her from everything until she is finally able to break free. That child could turn out either of two ways: a submissive weakling, useless for any purpose but drudgery; or a psychotic rebel, a loose canon who could maim and kill without a thought.

When you think who my mother is, was it any wonder I turned out the dangerous but fun type?

It wasn't long, though, before I realised that man was too incredible to let die. He was willing to give his last breath to save the life of his killer.

He's a catalyst, that man. He makes people want to be so much better than they would have been. And for no-one is that more true than for me.

I didn't love him yet, not then.

But I found myself willing to give up everything to save him.

The Doctor, traveller

That woman.

That infuriating woman.

A devil in high heels, with a smile that could melt a glacier.

The first time I met her, I let her die. I was trying to save 4023 souls, including the wonderful Donna. I was willing to sacrifice myself for the greater good. Yet once again I ended up watching someone else make that sacrifice.

I wasn't a willing witness to her death, but with guile, and a pair of handcuffs, she kept me from making that sacrifice. With a whispered name in my ear she had made me realise that I was watching someone I would love, perhaps more than any other, sacrifice herself for me.

She seemed to know all about me, that woman. She spoke of adventures we would have one day, grand events with names straight out of a story book. Then she shut down my quest for foreknowledge with a taunting whisper of "spoilers".

I saved her, gave her a kind of life.

I didn't love her, not then.

But I found myself wondering how I could possibly live up to the memories she had of me.

River Song, Archaeologist

He came back to visit me, in the hospital. Although perhaps I should say 'went forward' rather than 'came back'.

He talked to me, told me stories about my parents. Spoke of amazing thigns with the assumption that I would one day see them. It took me a while to notice that he never really asked about me. Even longer for me to realise that he didn't need to ask, because he already know so much more about me than I knew.

One day he came in complaining about the so-called 'narrow-minded food choices' available in the hospital cafeteria, going on to tell me that it was my mother who had first cooked his favourite food: fish fingers and custard.

"Oh, shut up Doctor," I said, my frustration evident.

He looked shocked for a coment, then asked "Is it time then?"

That's when I broke down weeping.

"I killed you," I gasped out between sobs. "Why did you save me? Why bring me here to be fixed when I'm clearly still broken. The Silence took a little girl and turned her into a monster. You should have left me to die."

It wasn't that coherent of course, there were sobs between my words, and eventually hiccoughs as hysteria took hold of me. Looking back, I should be grateful I didn't inherit my parents' colouring, neither of them could cry in public without serious blotching. Suffice to say that by the time that man reached out to me I was a mess.

He took my hands and cradled them in his own.

"Ah, Melody Pond, how could I leave behind the little girl who was stolen from my best friends and used as a weapon against me. I failed you when I couldn't rescue you from the Silence."

"But I'm nothing now," I protested weakly. "I was raised solely to kill you, what do I do now that I've failed?"

"Melody Pond was raised to kill me, "he was so sincere it made my heart ache. "Melody Pond succeeded, then you stepped in and saved me. The Silence had nothing to do with creating the woman who could do that."

"I pondered her words before trying to articulate a new idea. "Melody killed you. I saved you. Melody was what the silence made me into…" my words trailed off, my eyes meeting his hesitantly.

He finished the idea. "River Son is the woman who overcame what was done to Melody to become a remarkable woman."

"River Song, "I tasted the name slowly, feeling it out, trying to decide if I could become that woman. "Do you think I can be her one day?" I asked.

He chuckled, placing my hands back on the covers. "Ah, River Song, all of history will be your playground." He patted my hands paternally, but there was a catch in his voice, a hint of some other feeling.

The Doctor, traveller

It was a strange paradox.

I knew she would mature into a remarkable woman. She would be vibrant, clever and disturbingly sexy.

But she would also be incarcerated for the murder of a man, a man she would describe as the best man she ever met. A man the Teselecta said was me.

She knew now that I would know her as River Song. Thanks to my final words as a dying man she knew that I loved River. Words which were intended to eventually help her forgive herself, gave her dangerous foreknowledge of our future interactions.

Ironic really, since the first time I met River she felt compelled to let me know that she knew of me. I still didn't know what it meant, he knowing my true name. That is something a Timelord could normally only tell his wife.

Would River kill me?

Would I marry her?

Foreknowledge could lead to dangerous questions for a time traveller.