Title: The Doctor Dances
Fandom: Doctor Who
- Characters: the Doctor & the Doctor, Donna
Rating: PG
Summary: The Doctor always seems to be meeting his younger selves. What's it like to meet his older self?
Notes: Takes place directly between DW 4x09 and 4x10 (title-wise, "The Forest of Death" and "Midnight"). So, if you meet yourself, whether older or younger, only the older will know what's about to happen. Every time we saw the Doctor meet himself, it was always the current incarnation meeting his younger incarnations. So what's that like, really? From a current Doctor's perspective, on an older Doctor. Oh, and I adore Miss Noble. ...And I think "the song" fits. Yep, we got lyrics in this. Which aren't mine. And I won't admit what they are...'cuz it's that shameful to me. Yus.
- b - e - g - i - n -
The TARDIS tended to land against his wishes more often than he liked, the Doctor realized long ago, and it was something he was not only used to, but often used it to his own advantage mystifying his mortal companions. He wouldn't ever know why the erratic behavior persisted, but by the end of it, he'd sussed out the reason (although there was that one time...).
"Oh that's gorgeous!"
But he wasn't quite sure why in all the starry heavens of today and tomorrow would the TARDIS land on-- "Donna, meet the Silver Algean Sealine of Rolgata 7 dash 1, the second. Silver Algean Sealine, meet Donna Noble of London, England, United Kingdom, Europe, Earth point 1. Unpopulated since the extinction of the Huerrons, until the standard year-- well, earth year 16233. Then the Eclesians will settle here and found a great empire...then ruin the planet forever." He thought about it. "Well, or until a meteor the size of Venus collides with it, creating the Grattle Rainbow. Very pretty, but...it's not this."
The sun was high over the coastline, peeking half-dressed from behind the tinted beige clouds, the silver sand awash with snowlight and somehow not blindingly so. With the wind but a breeze through the trees bearing fan-sized leaves-- Oh that's good, the Doctor thought. I should remember that one.-- it simulated the Most Perfect Day for the Beach. The horizon was nothing but violet blue from end-to-end, and the brine rolling up was as gentle as a baby's sigh. He wondered if there were any flesh-eating eels beneath the surf.
Donna was suddenly rushing passed him in travesty of a swimsuit-- rhinestones, really?-- and the Doctor was rather convinced she hadn't heard a word he said since 'Algean Sealine'. Which was too bad. The Doctor rather liked talking about the Huerrons. But in any case, Donna was setting herself up for a holiday, with a chair the TARDIS must have manipulated Donna into finding rather quickly. Which meant something: either this was for Donna's sole benefit, or Donna had to remain oblivious. "Hey alien boy, get your trunks on!"
"No thanks!" he chirped. "Just ate. Cramps and all that."
And it still didn't seem to matter. Whether he enjoyed himself here didn't appear to be Donna's concern. Then again, some sunlight didn't hurt. This planet's atmosphere was not only intact compared to 'modern day Earth's', but it was slightly thicker too. The Doctor didn't worry about Donna walking away from here with cancer, but he didn't say anything as she oiled herself up with sunblock. Besides, there were only fifteen Earth hours on this Rolgata planet; the sun would be setting in about four or so. Just don't ler her ask-- "Could you get my back?"
"When your front is nicely cooked." It was time look around and figure out what was so important about this place.
The TARDIS wasn't far from Donna; he could at least feel as though he wasn't leaving her unguarded as his feet sunk into the sandy grain of dirt and plant life that made up the coast's more firmer boundary. The flora that brushed him was somewhat blue-ish, a tint that might've been the lighting of the sun, but it looked pretty enough. Pretty shades of blue, blue-green, green-blue, maybe some green-violet, if that were even possible, but those were on the trees inland, shifting between the two deep colors in the flickering breeze.
Pity about the Huerrons. They had one kind of Paradise made just for them. Has it changed since them?
"Yes."
The Doctor's head jerked around to face the brush. The sound of a voice had been close, and it had to be...there. The Doctor stuck his arm in and swept the tender foliage aside, suddenly looking upon the only other living soul in thousands and thousands of miles sitting on a hunk of ancient, weathered obsidian (which the Doctor knew wasn't there naturally, as the only volcano-- no longer active, thank you-- was waywayway far inland) in the middle of a precisely circular niche in the plantlife, and perhaps the reason why the TARDIS landed out of place. And this soul plucked an earbud out of one ear and tucked it into the collar of his shirt, leaving the other in place. The device it was connected to was slipped conspicuously into his trouser pocket.
"It has changed."
The Doctor made a face of blatant confusion. "Sorry, and who are you?"
The stranger smiled, a queer, humorless smile and it reeked of familiarity. "Don't recognize the face? Well, you shouldn't. You don't know me. Call me a glamorous paparazzo: I've stalked you your entire life and farther. Even have the pictures to prove it."
The Doctor let his mind race as he stepped through the curtain, listening to them swish back into place behind himself. This wasn't a Black or White Guardian, and no temporal energy surrounded him, distinguishing him from mortality. His face-- no, he didn't recognize-- was young, like a teenager's or young adult's. Dressed like a common punk, his black hair spiked unlike his own, and a red coat was draped across his lap. A coat that didn't match the outfit-- oh bollocks. "Am I ever gonna be a ginger?!"
"Older, wiser, and still takes too long to recognize himself." A non-ginger with a barbed tongue. No threat to Donna's Place in the Universe then.
"You're not supposed to be here."
"Aren't I?"
"Yes!" But the other rolled his eyes, and the Doctor surrendered that line of thought. "What do you want?"
"You're the sign of better times, did you know?" said the other with a sad smile. "For all your loss, for all that you suffer and condemn and barely manage to survive with your sanity in tact, I'd wish for those times a hundred days over. At least...the Library, right?"
"Careful," the Doctor chided narrowly. "Timelines and all."
"I know that! I bloody well know that!" It was like a volcano rupture. The older version slid off his rock to stand in the Doctor's personal space, his face contorted and voice quavering. "But this is what I got! Can you imagine what sort of therapy our last face is going to need? I could pour my heart out to him, speak of everything that's tearing me into meat grind, and he'd have no one to use in kind! But I needed to talk to myself...and I had to get the lord of bloody justice."
The Doctor sniffed indignantly. Must be be insulted by himself? Was that even cosmically legal? "What's going on?"
The Elder shook his head. "Don't get cushy where you are," he warned sharply. "The pain never stops. It keeps getting bigger and bigger, and someday, you'll get to this point."
"Spoilers," the Doctor hissed.
"And River Song did a number on you," the Elder hissed back.
"Did you love her?"
"Now that would be cheating. ...But you already figured out why she knew our name, and why she had the screwdriver. She knew why when she uploaded all those people. You'll find out if you gave them up for other reasons than to save her life."
The Doctor closed his eyes. Could she be a woman to fill that void where he wouldn't even let Jenny try without a fight? Something like Rose? Or only the love of a companion? That book was well worn and loved (it was probably a gift from himself; where else would anyone get a journal that resembled the TARDIS?), an obvious testament to the truth in her admitting the rules laid down were his own. She was lovely, with the right 51st century tang that Jack carried. He wondered what it was like for those types to be in the same room?
"You need to talk."
"I need," he countered, "to reaffirm my life from where I can see the damn greater good in it. Time goes on. They don't stop coming. I don't stop finding people. They don't learn. They don't listen. Things don't get simpler. Things were simpler..."
The Doctor didn't hide his surprise. "You call this simple?? Vashta Nerada, the Ood, being the cause of two points of known history? Jenny? And that's just recently?"
The moment he said Jenny's name, he noted, his Elder shifted his weigh as he looked away. "I call this not being dragged down with the responsibilities of certain companions you will have in your future, and what they are capable of, among other unrelated pressures, of which there are many." He then returned the eye contact. "Just..."
The Elder leaned forward, and the Doctor eyed him warily as he pressed intimately close, one arm cast around the Doctor's waist. It spoke a lot: this version didn't seem to be limited in desire for physical contact. Even when it came to handling himself. A little odd, if the Doctor thought about it. Something might've happened during this regenerative transition. Or he was taught how to be freer. That might be dangerous.
Luckily, he wasn't entirely bound to the laws of the Blinovitch Limitation Effect; the most that affected him was a slight sense of vertigo, but that was simply from being touched by his own aged space cavity a Time Lord took up, and that eventually corrected itself.
"Convince me." Pleading. "Blindly convince me it's worth carrying on, when you know nothing of what's in our future." The Elder laid his head on the Doctor's shoulder, like time passage didn't steal away this young form's youth, creating the facade of universal naivety. "Please remind me."
The Elder sighed and the Doctor stiffened. But this close, so close he could smell what soap he would be using, he heard the faint tones of a melody. Archaic earth tech; how...human. "What are you listening to?"
"Song I heard once. Humans never stopped having an affinity for cartoon mice." And the Elder slipped the bud hooked on his shirt into the Doctor's ear. "I liked it."
/ Dreams to dream
In the dark of the night
When the world goes wrong
I can still make it right
I can see so far in my dreams
I'll follow my dreams
Until they come true /
"Just dance with me."
"Funny taste in partners," the Doctor mumbled and went the extra mile, taking the Elder's hand in his and pressing it close to them. The Elder made an amused noise. "Narcisstic much?"
"It's to make up for how much I used to hate myself. Now shush and sway."
/ Come with me
You will see what I mean
There's a world inside
No one else ever sees
You will go so far in my dreams
Somewhere in my dreams
Your dreams will come true
/ There is a star
Waiting to guide us
Shining inside us
When we close our eyes
/ Don't let go
If you stay close to me
In my dreams tonight
You will see what I see
Dreams to dream
As near as can be
Inside you and me
They always come true /
- t - i - m - e -
The sky birthed its stars in the fiery gold of kings as the sun went down, glittering over the edge of the horizon with the silver specs at their backs, breaking the dusk into night. The Elder hadn't let go until the sun vanished, parting in the twin moons' light. But the entire time, the Doctor retold stories of the good times, reaching as far back as his first face, even dared to mention Susan's name, reminding himself it was all on her that began this journey. And that's what it came down to, in the end: Family.
"Are you going to be okay?"
"Can't tell you. You'll have to find out when it's your turn. ...And..." His voice tightened. "Good luck."
And the Elder disappeared into the brush, away from the beach, and if it weren't for the crushed grass and the darkening sky, the Doctor could believe he'd been alone the entire time. ...Well, technically he had been, according to the universe. The same exact person, in two places in close proximity? A dust cloud hiccoughed for all the cosmic realities noticed.
The Doctor retraced his steps up the beach to find Donna positively...glare-y. If the water here could freeze, it could have with the temperature she was manipulating to her whim. Chilly. "When my front was cooked, yeah? Where'd you pop off to then?"
"Oh, I was just looking for some Huerron remnants," he said, not going for the solemn approach. She'd get worried then. He didn't want her worried over something that wasn't truly fixable. "Lost track of time. So sorry. Can I make it up to you?"
She made a face, thinking while she scrutinized him closely. Wheels were turning in that pretty ginger head, the Doctor recognized, and wondered if she would call him out on it. "Could do with a proper spa..."
"Brilliant! I know just the place."