"When the soul weeps, there is nothing so vulgar as laughter."
Tears drop down his nose as he stares into the powdery dust on the ground. He watches the briny secretion roll down off his face to make dingy spatters on the fabric of his trousers.
He could save a single one.
They all burned.
He listened to their agonized screams. Primal, instinctive reactions they had no control over. Even the high and mighty, cold hearted Time Lords could feel pain. He could hear that in the pleas for help, the wails of sorrow for fallen friends and family, the howls for revenge, and the excruciating screams as their flesh melted from their bones.
They all burned.
No one was left.
Just him. The lone, deranged, and ultimate traitor to his own kind.
The Doctor.
Though his eyes watered, and his blood pumped, fire was in his head, in his body, his soul. His flesh twisted into puddles, his bones became little more than charred ash, and his blood boiled. Sullying his mind, fire burned.
Eternal and forever burning, fire consumed. It devoured his spirit and forced his body to surrender to its will. Every step burned. His own hell.
And from this raging inferno, a new man was formed. Melded and tempered from the fire, he stood alone. For an eternity, laughter blistered at his soul. Smiles chaffed and rubbed at him like the fire had never done. Joy had been extinguished in his being. Though many would come to return what had been burned from his soul, few succeeded in replacing even a small part what he desired.
So his soul weeped.