A/N : Written for Who Contest for the prompt 'Reunion'.

For A Good Man Hurts

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"In that moment I understood that the cruellest words in the universe are if only."
- Lisa See, Peony in Love

"Doctor."

There is a moment—a barely important, almost inconsequential moment when his hearts stop and his breath hitches. He eyes what stands before him almost suspiciously: only air, no wind, just emptiness and white; so much white.

"Amy," he breaths out finally as the silence grows too long, because he knows that voice, he has lived for that voice, he lost that voice.

He turns around slowly, unsure and suspicious, knowing that this is certainly fake, while something inside of him, something that shouldn't exist, hopes against hope that it is truly her.

But what he sees when he turns around is nothing. Emptiness and white, that's all this place is, and his hearts burst with hurt and twists in rage.

"Doctor," the voice says again, louder, almost like a plea for help with the Scottish accent coming through splendidly; it is accompanied by an echo of a voice that sounds so very much like Rory. "Doctor," it says. "Doctor... Doctor... Doctor… "

He turns on his heels, his head whipping over his shoulder and to the side in search of these elusive voices. He turns again, once, twice, and stops, the tips of his fingers rubbing incessantly against themselves as his scowl deepens.

"Whatever this is," he says dangerously, his voice deep with foreboding, "it's not to your best interest. I would suggest you stop what it is that you're trying to do, because, let's face it…" He turns once more, throwing his arms out as he faces nothing but emptiness. "You're not going to win."

"Doctor."

He pauses once again, his hearts thumping maddeningly as he drops his arms slowly. The voice is behind him, and it feels closer and clearer than the previous voices had. It's a voice he thought he would never hear again.

Closing his eyes, he turns around, dreading the moment when he will see what he knew he would see. He allows himself only a moment of hesitation before his eyes open at the scene that had happened so long ago.

Rose Tyler stands before him, her hair whipping incessantly around her as a breeze he does not feel causes a shiver to travel up her spine. She stares at him with wide eyes, expectant and full of love. His hearts break for her.

"Doctor," she says, her smile wide and hopeful. "You came back!"

"Rose…" He steps back carefully, his eyes studying her form for any technical patterns to prove that she isn't real. Because she isn't real—she can't be, even if she looks like it.

"Doctor," another voice says to his side. Martha Jones grins proudly, dressed in a white coat with tired but content eyes. "I finally became one, a doctor, I mean; like I said I would. Was certified and everything. Life couldn't be any better."

"Doctor!" a screeching sound blasts in his ears before he is tackled with a bone-crunching hug. His arms tighten around Donna Noble—the Donna Noble—in the flesh, before she pushes away from him and slaps him hard. As he touches his hurt cheek, he stares at her in surprise. "Did ya think I wouldn't notice that you came down for a cuppa and didn't speak to me?" she asks him, her tone far from insulted and sounding more amused. "Did ya really?"

"What do you think?" Amy Pond's voice comes from behind him.

He turns on his heels quickly to see a baby in her arms, a mini-Pond, playing with her father's finger as the mother looks on completely besotted. Rory keeps his eyes on the baby, but Amy looks at him, her eyes full of tears of happiness.

"I think she needs a trip around the universe, don't you?"

He knows this is not real, of course he does. But his hearts swell all the same, and he steps forward cautiously, his eyes falling on what might have been had he never taken Amelia Pond with him all those years ago.

Rory twitches, his glance falling between the baby and the Doctor. "Not a word about the nose. I find it hard to live it down already, without having you brainwashing the baby against it."

Rory looks up and stares at him, his eyes concerned. "Is everything all right? You don't seem… normal." He shrugs. "Normal as in your type of normal. Not our type of normal. Although, we hardly know what your type of normal is—"

"Shut up, Idiot," Amy says with an affectionate roll of her eyes and the Doctor lets out a short, happy laugh despise himself. Regardless of knowing that this is all fake and probably being played in his head by a high functioning transmitter, he had missed the Ponds most dearly.

"Doctor," another voice says, softly, a voice buried deep in his past. His grin falls and he turns slowly, knowing the voice that is seared into his brain like it is seared into his regenerating skin: Katarina.

She's lying on the floor, limbs awkwardly around her as her eyes study his intently. She gasps for air with each breath, air that can never be found in space. He knows it is not real, of course he does, but he runs to her anyway, falling onto his knees and taking her face in his hands.

"It's all right," he says, mostly for himself, and not at all for her. "It will all be fine," he says quickly as he pushes the hair from her face and meets her eyes with his own. "You will be fine." Promises, that's what he does. He gives them all promises that he can never keep.

She smiles at him sweetly, her lungs pulling for air that she can't have.

"Doctor."

The Doctor closes his eyes and grits his teeth. He knows that voice as well as anyone: Adric. He feels the urge to turn and look, and he might have, had he not heard his name spoken in another voice from another place.

"Doctor," another voice to his right says softly. Tegan.

"Doctor," says a voice that sounds a lot like Rory.

"Doctor," Mickey calls from behind him.

"Doctor," good ol' Sarah Jane pleads with him from beside Katarina, accompanied softly by the light chuckle of one who could only be River Song. She was never one to plead with him; even at the end, she would always laugh.

"Doctor... Doctor... Doctor... Doctor," they all say, as his former companions scream in agony all around him. For years he has managed to forget them, his friends, who meant the world to him as they travelled together. He placed his memories of them in small compartments in his mind, using time to bring on new friends and forget the hurt left by the former. He could never forget them, not completely, but time helped it hurt less. Oh, so much less. For a while he would forget their sacrifice and his failure, and for a while, he would be happy again.

"Doctor... Doctor... Doctor..." He screws his eyes shut tighter and holds Katarina to him, knowing that this is not real, but feeling helpless against the emotional assault it's bringing against him. He feels the sting of tears for all those he had left behind, for all who had left him, and for those few he wasn't able to save.

"Doctor," they cry, their voices so very familiar, the sound overlapping one over the other until it is a wave of sound that gets louder and more desperate with each passing moment. All his companions; the innocent souls whose lives he had ruined, they call out to him as if he can help, when he knows he can't. He left them all behind; alive or dead, he left them all.

He knows he must look and assess the situation, but he doesn't. Each time he hears his name, there is a chip in the armour he had carefully constructed around himself, his mind remembering the last moments he had had with each and every one of them.

He keeps his eyes closed and listen to them call for him, over and over, pleading for him to save them, over and over, begging for him to listen, over and over. Each time they call for him he feels his resolve weaken. Each time they call for him, he feels his guilt overwhelm him. One hundred and eighty five voices, he counts in his mind, before it becomes one hundred and ninety five, a second later.

The soft brush of a hand against his cheek makes him open his eyes to see the sad smile of Amy Pond—no longer little Amelia Pond who was waiting for the Doctor—but Amy Pond, his lost friend, kneeling on the other side of Katarina's breathless body, pulling him closer.

"Don't cry," she says, her eyes full of tears and pain as her other hand clutches her stomach that is stained with blood. Amelia Pond, hurt, and unable to be saved by him. That is his nightmare. Her fingers tighten on his cheek, her smile gentle and full of affection. "My raggedy man."

And that does it; whatever the plan was, if it was to break him, it succeeds. He falls forward, almost limp, and is caught easily by her embrace. He let's go of Katarina, now lying lifeless and circles his arms around his Amy Pond, the first face that this face saw, his fingers curling into her clothed skin desperately as he buries his face into her shoulder.

She shushes him gently, her fingers running through his hair soothingly as his arms tighten around her further.

"Now, now, Doctor. I'm here. It's going to be all right."

He feels gentle fingers place something against his chest, and then the voice changes. "It took me forever to find you. I'm glad you're not hurt."

He realises with a pang that he is shaking, roughly at the same time that he realises that the voice belongs to Clara, the impossible girl who died because of him. He pulls back quickly, his hand reaching for his chest to pull the item from her grasp. He calms instantly with the sonic in his hand, and with a few quick flicks, the emptiness dissolves to be replaced by metal.

He stares all around him, chest heaving, still shaky, still guilt-ridden with all the pleas of 'Doctor' playing inside his head, and Clara watches him carefully as he studies the interior of the room he has been imprisoned in.

"What is it?" she asks gently. "What is this place?"

He ignores her, getting to his feet as he buries his mind in the newest mystery surrounding them. "Just as I thought." He walks around the room, sonic in hand, studying the readings with his back turned towards her. "It's a transmitter. They took what I wanted to see and twisted it. Twisted it so much until all I saw was…" he trails off, his mind jumping from each and every 'Doctor' and each and every goodbye of a thousand years.

"Doctor…" Her voice is hesitant. "Are you all right?"

"Hm? Yes, yes, of course I'm all right. I'm always… all right."

"I don't know what they did to you," Clara says softly, her tone full of worry. "But, whatever it is, they will pay, yes?"

He stops his observation to meet her gaze. She watches him eagerly, the way that all of his companions once did, wide-eyed and mystified, looking at him as their saviour. He can't lose another; not like he has lost everyone else.

"Yes," he says softly, his voice sounding flat to his own ears. "They will pay."

She nods like she knows he's talking about whoever it was that has trapped them on this unknown planet, but he knows he is talking about himself. No one needs to be shown justice for their sins, more than himself.

Fin.