Notes: The characters aren't mine, and the story is! This is a short piece that takes place in Season 6B, immediately after Jamie rejoins him (taking place immediately after my "Promises Not Broken" oneshot). It was requested and inspired by aragonite, and is a sister fic to "A Silent and Quiet Restoration." Happy New Year!
The TARDIS whirred and screeched in protest—flying right into a temporal disturbance would have that effect, but this one was far worse than the other ones that the Celestial Intervention Agency had ordered him to look into.
The Doctor's hands were on the console, pressing buttons to try to calm the TARDIS down.
"Steady, Old Girl… steady…"
He didn't want to do this, but he had no choice—if he refused… if he even showed one sign of rebellion… they'd do it to him again.
His face paled at the very memory of that moment—
"The time has come for you to change your appearance, Doctor, and begin your exile…"
The TARDIS's screeching and flashing lights were causing him to revisit what the Time Lords had made him experience—the intense sounds, lights, and the endless sensations that there were needles stuck into every inch of his skin… And the intensity of all of those sensations increased with every passing second.
"No…" he weakly moaned, clutching at his head.
Without his hands on the console, the TARDIS lurched, out of control, sending him flying across the console room; his suit jacket sleeve and shirtsleeve tore as he caught the fabric on something as he landed. He didn't even notice this; his mind was elsewhere, remembering how the painful intensity he had felt in those moments only continued to increase…
"What are you doing!?" he had cried out. "Nooooooo… Stop! You're making me giddy!"
But no relief had come his way. He had felt as though he was falling; perhaps he had been falling… falling, repeatedly crying out one word as the torment intensified—
"No! No! No! No! No!"
He had been silently begging for the release of unconsciousness; the overstimulation of his senses would likely have gotten him to that point, and then further render his body to the breaking point…
"Doctor!"
"No, no, no, no…" he repeated.
"DOCTOR!"
The Doctor's eyes flew open, seeing a pair of hazel eyes looking down at him with concern.
He let out a weak whimper. Of course… when the Celestial Intervention Agency stopped the sensory overload process, granting him his conditional reprieve of his forced regeneration sentence, he suffered from hallucinations for a few days afterwards—many of them being hallucinations of Jamie in the TARDIS. And what hurt more than the sensory overload process was the empty feeling when he would reach out his hand to grip Jamie's arm, only to phase right through the illusion.
And then there had been the false Jamie and Zoe he had seen in the Tomb of Rassilon… They had seemed so real… even their screams as they faded away had torn into him.
Screams…
The TARDIS lurched and shrieked again.
"The console…!" he exclaimed.
He got up, attempting to walk through the illusion to get to the console quickly.
But Jamie let out a cry as the Doctor collided with him; the Scot fell to the floor, wincing in pain.
"Oh…!" the Doctor exclaimed, wide-eyed. "Oh dear! I…"
He threw a lever on the console and then dropped to his knees beside the piper, his eyes wide as he helped him sit.
His hands touched solid flesh and cloth.
"You're real…" he breathed, placing a hand on the side of his face.
But Jamie was staring at him with a mixture of horror and concern, and the Doctor's face fell.
"Oh no…" he said. "Did… did I hurt you…? I… Ah!"
He scrambled to fetch the medical kit, pausing as the TARDIS lurched again; he looked up, spacing out at the flashing lights again.
"No…" he whispered again, the kit falling from his hands as he clutched at his head again. "Nooooooo…"
"Doctor!"
The Doctor looked in time to see the Scot now pressing buttons on the console, as though trying to get the TARDIS to calm down. Whatever he did seemed to work; the lurching and the sounds and lights stopped. The Scot now walked over to the Doctor and gently took his arm, helping him to his feet.
"Jamie…" the Gallifreyan whispered. "Jamie."
"Ye forgot I was here…" the piper said, hurt. "I only just came back, and ye forgot I was here!"
"No!" the Doctor said, gripping his arm. "No, I didn't forget you were here! I thought… I…."
A faraway look was in his eye again as he recalled the false Jamie in the tomb—the agonized scream…
"No…" he moaned again, covering his face with his free hand, while the other hand holding Jamie's arm tightened his grip.
Don't fade away, too, he mentally pleaded. Please don't fade away…
Jamie stared at him for a moment, and then began to lead him down the corridors of the TARDIS.
"Where… where are you taking me…?" the Doctor asked.
Jamie didn't answer, and the Doctor was surprised to see the piper leading him to his study. The TARDIS, calm now, ignited a fire in the fireplace as Jamie gently sat down with the Doctor on the hearth-rug.
"Jamie…? Why…?"
"I always used to come here when I was upset," Jamie reminded him. "When I first started traveling with ye…"
"Yes, that's right…" the Doctor said. "But that was so long ago…"
Jamie stared at him.
"It was nae that long ago…" he said. "Aye, a few years, but…."
"Hmm? Oh. Oh, of course."
"Doctor?"
"Yes, Jamie?"
"What did they do to ye?"
"…I don't know what you mean," the Doctor lied.
"The Time Lords. What did they do to ye? Ye ne'er went into a state like that—like the one I saw ye in back in the console room."
The Doctor looked into the fire, remembering how the Celestial Intervention Agency put their demands on him—the countless missions that he did all on his own… all the while pleading with them to see Jamie and Zoe again…
And then, finally, the miracle he had been praying for…
"Doctor," one of them had said. "We are allowing you permission to restore the Scots boy's memories and allow him to travel to with you, should he choose to do so. We do not think much of your affinity towards humans, but we are confident that he will not spend too much time with you this time."
"Just what do you mean by that!?" the Doctor had demanded.
"Meaning that the boy will surely be disillusioned when he realizes that the Time Lord he once admired is a branded criminal in the eyes of his own people, forced to do what we order. Once he realizes that the freedom he enjoyed with you is no more, he will leave of his own volition."
"Doctor!?"
The Doctor, snapped back to the present by the sound of Jamie's voice, forced a smile, and placed a hand on his face again.
"They didn't do anything," he lied. "I'm just a bit… beside myself. I suppose seeing you again has gotten me into this state…"
He hadn't told Jamie about the Celestial Intervention Agency yet. He hadn't told him anything—the possibility of what the Agent had said about Jamie being disillusioned being true was too crippling a fear.
Jamie blinked, not convinced.
"Aye, I suppose I know what ye mean…" he said. "After the Time Lords wiped my memory, and I could nae remember what ye meant to me… For four days, I wandered aboot, trying to find someone I could nae properly remember. And I was being chased by Redcoats—that di'n help things. But now that I've found ye, and I've got my memories back… I'm scared I'll wake up and it'll all be a dream." He looked to the Doctor. "That's why ye di'n think I was really there, eh?"
"Quite right, Jamie. It seems too good to be true…"
"And it'll be e'en better when we get Zoe back, too, aye?"
The Doctor's face fell. He had not been given permission to see Zoe again.
"Doctor?"
"There are… complications with Zoe. I'm afraid we can't see her just yet."
"Why!?" Jamie exclaimed.
"Er… well… I… ah…"
He raised a hand to rub the back of his head, the tear in his sleeves becoming visible. He only noticed too late, when Jamie stared at the tear—specifically, at the serpent tattoo visible on his arm, which the Time Lords had given to him as a mark of his criminal status.
Jamie seized his arm before the Doctor could pull it away and pushed his sleeves back, staring at the tattoo in its entirety before looking up at the Doctor with questioning eyes.
"Ye ne'er had that before!"
"…Mad night in Las Vegas," the Doctor sputtered.
Jamie let his arm drop, and he nodded. He patted the Doctor on the shoulder, and then got up and left the room.
The Doctor stared after the door, his hearts sinking with every passing moment as Jamie did not return.
"No!" he exclaimed, thinking that this was an illusion after all, and that it had just ended. "Jamie! Jamie!"
He scrambled towards the door, screeching to a halt as Jamie returned with a blanket in his arms. They stared at each other.
"Oh. You went to get me a blanket…."
"Aye," the piper said, leading him back to the hearth-rug. He placed the blanket around the Doctor's shoulders. He then sat back down beside him, propping his chin in his hands. "What did ye think I left for? That I was upset that ye were lying to me?"
The Doctor cursed himself, silently. Of course, Jamie would know he was lying; it was obvious that he was traumatized from his near-execution, and even the first attempt at trying to cover up that nothing had happened would have been unbelievable.
"I'm used to ye leaving me in the dark," Jamie went on. "E'en after all this time, I still don' know yer name."
"Oh, Jamie—"
"No! No, I don' mind," the piper said, gripping the Doctor's arm. "Really, I don' mind. What I do mind is that I cannae help ye like ye were able to help me when we first met." He gave a wan smile. "Aye, well, I'm used to being useless…"
"No!" the Doctor exclaimed, gently placing a hand on Jamie's face again. "Please don't believe that, Jamie! You're helping me just by being here! You have no idea what I felt, stepping out onto Culloden again… and seeing you after fifty years."
Jamie's eyes widened.
"Fifty years!?" he exclaimed. "But it was four days!"
"For you," the Doctor said. "But time is relative, remember. And it was far longer for me."
"Why did ye wait so long? Were ye upset with me?"
"No," the Doctor said, pulling his sleeves back to show the tattoo on his arm. "Jamie, after they sent you away… They put me through a very painful process to punish me for breaking Gallifrey's rules. They were going to make me change—and every so often, I remember that. But then a special group of Time Lords—the Celestial Intervention Agency—decided that I would be more useful to them as one of their agents. However, I am still considered a criminal…" He glanced pointedly at the tattoo on his arm. "So they gave me that to remind me as I went on my missions. Eventually, after fifty years, they were generous enough to let me restore your memories."
"And now ye're free to go where'er ye want, right?" Jamie asked.
"No," the Doctor admitted. "That's why we can't see Zoe—I don't have permission. We… I have to work for them some more, and they have to be willing. And if my work is not satisfactory… Well, they make me change as they intended, and then force me into exile—without you."
Jamie shook his head, slowly, and the Doctor's face fell.
"Oh, Jamie, I'm so sorry. I know you were hoping that it would be just like before, but it won't…" He sighed. "They did say this would happen—that you would decide not to travel with me anymore…"
"Ye daft old man!"
The Doctor stared at him.
"Jamie—?"
"We could have stayed in Scotland for all I care; it does nae matter where we go!" the piper exclaimed. "I don' mind if the Time Lords throw us both in a dungeon by the time the day is over. I won' leave ye again!"
He smiled and, at last, the Doctor smiled a genuine smile; the Gallifreyan drew the Scot into a warm embrace. He wasn't alright—he was far from alright, but now, no matter what the Celestial Intervention Agency forced him to do, he wouldn't have to go through it alone. And that would help him recover from the last fifty years.
Even with Jamie's return, so much had changed, but the Doctor could take comfort in knowing that there were some things that would remain constant.