Summary: 'He needs a simple phrase to make them follow him into the magic box that is bigger on the inside.' Slightly AU. Comments Welcome
"I have been a believer in the magic of language since, at a very early age, I discovered that some words got me into trouble and others got me out"
Katherine Dunn
When he's young (by Time Lord standards that is), he dreams. Daydreams in fact, that often get him into trouble, as he continues to daydream during Academy classes despite repeated warnings and punishments from the Professors. His dreams are not to be tolerated, and yet he persists. He dreams of exploring the universe in a way that no Time Lord ever should – with adventure and sounds and smells and running and danger and people. He dreams of others travelling with him, (not Time Lords of course, they laugh at him and call him names like outsider and freak and are really not very nice sometimes) but other races, depending on what his lessons are on that day. When they study the life cycle of the Str'eilm, it's a rather…blue companion who accompanies him on the wild adventures in his head. When they have a lecture on the funeral rites on the planet Kranell 6, his companion sings songs to the Goddess in the sun and doesn't eat anything orange. Then the day comes when the race of Homo sapiens are introduced. Humans, he thinks are most definitely not 'a primitive, mostly harmless species, not worthy of any special notice at all'. He thinks that they seem to be a most innovative species, and quickly decides that he will always travel with a human – because he can show them wonders beyond their 'primitive' natures, dangers that they'd never dream of and perhaps he can make them see how special they really are.
He carefully constructs his dream worlds, painting glorious skylines and colourful scenes across the inside of his eyelids. He creates realistic monsters to fight, and imagines situations that are positively ingenious – but always imagines a peaceful victory. Most of all, he thinks of what he'll say (what his catchphrase will be, if you will). He needs a simple phrase to make them follow him into the magic box that is bigger on the inside, a sentence that will get them to believe in his ability to save whatever planet they find themselves on. For the longest time he cannot think of the perfect phrase, something that rolls off of his tongue in as many languages as possible (including his own). It isn't until the day he graduates from the Academy (barely) and into his name (The Doctor, it's very him he thinks), that an idea comes to him. The perfect five words to say to any companion/rescuer/passerby.
It's one of the first things he says to his TARDIS – after telling her how beautiful she is (sentient time machines like compliments as much as anyone else), and yes of course he knows how to fly her and can they please just leave now before he gets hauled out and put before the Tribunal! She is the first one he says his catchphrase to – his five magic words to convince her to just go-go-go anywhere that isn't right here right now, but make it as far away as possible and somewhere interesting if she wouldn't mind! And by some miracle – the TARDIS, his TARDIS now he supposes – does exactly as he begs, immediately after he utters them. It's a heady feeling, to be instantly obeyed like that – and he makes a pact with himself from that moment: for as long as his hearts beat, no matter what else changes about him, he will always use his magic phrase to help and to heal the peoples of wherever he is.
And he does.
With every new body, he clings to that one bit of stability (his TARDIS doesn't count, she changes herself irreversibly, the same way he does, all the time and without regret) the one piece of him that remains the same throughout everything, despite the sound travelling over different vocal chords, the words being formed by different mouths and floating past different lips.
He uses other words as his weapons; he bends and shapes them to his will, easily disarming assailants who favour more violent means of attack. But his secret stability remains untainted from any twisting – always constant.
His magic words work differently on different people. Some do as he asks instantly, almost blindly – and many regret it in the aftermath. Some reject him just as fast, refusing to believe him and his tale of certain destruction until they cannot deny it any longer. Some choose to ignore his message until he does something extraordinary, then they follow as blindly as the others who follow instantly.
(Some days, words fail him, no-one believes him and all is lost. He never looks back to those days, focusing on the ones his words saved instead and blocking out the screams of the damned ones that he cannot rescue)
His lives continue in this pattern, until his 907th year and his 11th face, when he meets a most curiou- wonderf- Scottish woman. He meets her at 7, and she questions him in a way most adults would never dare to, but believes him soon enough. He meets her at 19, and she hits him with a cricket bat. This time there are more questions from the now broken woman, and she will not listen to his words, any of his words, so he does something he has never had to do before. Grasping her wrist in the cool air of the little Leadworth car park with his tie trapped in a car door and with twenty minutes to save the Earth, he pushes his way into her head and mutters his special words into the very depths of her subconscious. Once said, they ring around inside her brain as undeniable truth. She agrees to believe (for twenty minutes at least) and they charge off and save the world (again) just in time, the way all his childhood daydreams foretold he would.
He meets her again at 21. Her eyes plead with him to say the words that beat themselves behind her eyelids when she sleeps, and whisper themselves into her ears when she wakes. So he takes her hand (a perfect fit for his) steps nearer and tucks a strand of fiery hair behind her ear. He leans ever closer until his lips brush the shell of her (his hearts thunder in his chest, her lungs bellow like a steam train in hers) and he whispers his perfect, never-changing words, rustling her hair with his breath. She shivers (a delightful motion he wishes to see again and again) before stepping back and considering his words. After a pause, she steps back into his embrace and murmur her own words into his ear – words like 'Always', and 'Forever' that echo strangely in his head. He has no doubt she truly means it (unlike others who only think that they did).
He never has to speak his special words to her again, but they still beat a gentle rhythm in her head at night. The Doctor's never-changing words, tumble through her brain to the beat heart while she sleeps.
"Trust me. I'm the Doctor"
And Amelia Pond smiles in her dreams of running and adventure and danger and people, always trusting her Doctor will be there when she wakes.