In the hall of the Tardis, time echoes long lost memories. Around one corner is the slight flutter of a flute, up a flight of stairs is the bark of a robotic dog saying 'Master', and a stroll through a specific hallway causing a cringe at the fateful words 'carrot juice'. The Doctor struggled to keep nostalgia from eating away at his quiet moments, keep the longing for company at bay… keep others safe. But in the act staving off boredom, new sounds are formed.

More recently, the strum of an electric guitar roared through the halls. The Tardis was always bigger on the inside, rooms within rooms built on whole mansions worth of other spaces and in those quiet halls riffs of fierce passion were filled and stored. The Doctor sometimes wondered if his Tardis would ever bother to explain why she collected the past like stamps, or perhaps he was afraid she might tell if he dared to ask.

The sorrow seeped into his fingers and each note strung out became less pleasing to hear. He decided to stop and allow the silence to come in and hopefully bleed away the festering sore embodied by the ring on his finger. In that humble piece of metal was an echo of everything left behind by a man with more faces worn than company kept. He prepped to make his rounds through the hallways and remember happier times, a habit he did when things became too bitter to bother moving forward, when a new sound entered his ears. It sounded feminine, muffled for some reason, and a slight grunt clearly from Nardole told him this was the outbursts of the present. The Doctor closed his eyes, clearing and relocating the past with the slight act of clenching and unclenching his hands, the past reflected a man who could make mistakes that he no longer could afford to make. He mussed his grey hair slightly and straightened his jacket as his old shape built from experience and a tenacity to never fade easily helped him step towards the newest future that awaited him.