The hum of the Tardis was the most relaxing sound in the entire universe. Or at least, it was to the Doctor. As he sat in his swing underneath the Tardis console working on some wires, the humming was sweeter to him than the song of a siren. And he had had plenty of experience with those.
He was trying, once again, to bring her to full capacity. Despite all the work he'd done over so many centuries, in all his time with her she had never been fully functional. It was as if she didn't want to be fixed, didn't want to be perfect. Not that he minded. To him she would always be perfect. Well, most of time anyway.
"Come on old girl, work with me here," he said through his teeth. She had been difficult lately. Resisting his attempts to repair her, even though she usually enjoyed it. Not responding when he asked her to do something. Changing and moving rooms without warning. He was used to that last one, but it had been happening a lot more lately, and it was starting to irk him. He knew why she was behaving this way, and he refused to give in. This battle of wills would last until one of them broke, and even though she usually won, he was determined to not back down this time.
"You can pout all you want, I'm not going back down there. The universe is doing just fine
without me, and I refuse to entangle myself in its affairs. We're not taking a trip just so you can stretch your legs. Er, I mean, oh you know what I mean."
The Tardis let out a loud roar, a sound the Doctor hadn't heard in a while. He felt the Tardis dematerializing, and he charged up the stairs to stop her. But just as he reached the console, the noise stopped, and the Tardis kicked him out. The door opened on its own and he was forced out, landing face-first in the snow. As he got back on his feet, practically melting the snow off his body with the intense heat of his anger, the door shut in his face. He pulled out his key and shoved it into the lock, but the door wouldn't budge.
"Oh, that's really mature, kicking me out into the snow because I hurt your feelings," he snarled at her. "Well, fine! I don't need you to get around, I've got two legs that work just fine. I'll just go entertain myself until you come crawling back to me like you always do!"
She ignored his rant, and he turned on his heel to find two children at his feet staring up at him wide-eyed.
"Mister, why are you yelling at a box?" one of them asked.
"Because the box and I aren't friends anymore!" he shouted, scaring away the children.
He stormed off, away from the only thing he had left to stand by him. He felt bad for yelling at her, for traumatizing the children, and for not taking her out more often. He had been living on that tiny little cloud for such a long time now, and she couldn't bear to sit still for very long, just like him. He was the one being unreasonable and he knew it, but he wasn't in the mood for apologizing.
He took a look at the environment he was in, it just now occurring to him that in her current mood the Tardis had probably dumped him somewhere very painful and deadly. But no, it looked like modern-day London. The night was dark and the stars were out, but there was no moon.
"Excuse me," he said to a couple of elderly women passing by on the street. "I hit my head and have terrible amnesia, could you tell me what year this is?"
"Oh you poor dear!" one of them exclaimed. "Amnesia, you say? Ellie, doesn't your husband have that, too?"
"That's anemia, Becky," said Ellie with a roll of her eyes. "Have you got your hearing aid in?"
Becky ignored her and latched herself onto the Doctor's arm. "I'm Becky. You come with us, handsome, we'll take care of your anesthesia."
The Doctor experienced a brief moment of panic before he said, "That's very kind of you, Becky, but I must go. I have a very important… um… meeting to go to. Yes, that's plausible."
"With who?" asked Ellie.
"The… Pope?" replied the Doctor. It was the only thing he could think to say. "Not so plausible…"
"How could you know that if you don't even know what year it is?" retorted Ellie as she put her hands on her hips.
"Very specific amnesia, it only affects the part of my brain that deals with passage of time."
"And apparently it affects the part of your brain that deals with fashion sense," said Ellie disapprovingly. "I'm sixty-eight years old and even I know that bow-ties are out of style. It's 2012, for heaven sakes!"
"Bow-ties are cool!" The Doctor was really starting to lose his patience.
"Don't you listen to her, Dearie. Real men where bow-ties," said Becky as she stroked his arm.
"Umm, thanks. But I really must go meet the Pope," he said as he tried to disentangle himself from her grip, feeling very uncomfortable.
"Nonsense!" declared Becky as her grip tightened. "The Pope can wait. You come with us out of the snow, and-"
Before she could finish her sentence, the Doctor broke free of her grip and ran as fast as he could to get away from them.
"Yeah, you run away, you loon!" he heard Ellie shout at him.
"Call me!" Becky yelled.
The Doctor ran until he was far away from the two ladies, glad to be rid of them. He then sauntered through the streets aimlessly, window-shopping as he went. He observed the people as he walked; he saw horrendous graffiti on a wall, a man wearing a ski mask run out of a bank, a report on a television about several murders that had been committed in the past week. All these terrible things made his already sour mood positively ugly.
How many times had he saved the world? How many times had he vouched for the goodness, the worth of the human race to other species so that they would let them live? And yet despite all the work he'd put into this silly little planet, there was little to show for it. Let alone the entire universe. He tried and tried, but no matter how hard he tried the universe was still so full of evil, of creatures who wanted nothing more than to wipe out every other race from existence. What good had he done, really? It seemed that every time he tried to help he did more harm than good. It seemed all he ever brought with him was death, chaos, and trouble.
It's a wonder the word "Doctor" means healer and wise man, and not foolish destroyer, he thought to himself.
This was why he had given up on helping. He had received over a dozen calls for help over the past month, but he had ignored them all, though not without much difficulty. It had taken him eleven lifetimes for it to penetrate his thick skull, but he finally realized that the universe was better off without him, and that he was better off alone. He missed having company, but at least this way he would avoid another heartbreak. Like he needed anymore of those.
Lost in his dark thoughts, he wasn't paying attention to where he was going and collided heads with a human being with a very familiar face.
"Ow!" they both cried out in unison as they both grabbed their heads.
"Oi! Watch where you're going!" said the human, a young woman.
"Oi yourself!" he retorted. He looked at her face and nearly jumped when he saw her face. Clara Oswin Oswald had risen from the grave. Again.
"Who are you, anyway?" she asked, hands on hips.
Instead of answering her question, he took off in the opposite direction. He was doing a lot of running that night, and that was saying something.
The Doctor continued to run through the streets, not caring in the least bit that everyone was staring at him. He didn't know where he was going, but that was okay, a lot of the time he didn't have a set course in mind. It was a good thing, since the Tardis rarely took him where he wanted to go when he did.
He didn't stop until he ran out of breath in front of a church. For reasons he would never understand, he walked inside and sat down in the pew in the very back.
The church was beautiful inside and out. The church was huge, with many people in the pews holding open Bibles. The walls were white and the carpet was a deep red. Behind the pulpit where the preacher stood there was a golden cross.
The Doctor had gone back and watched the stories from that book as they happened, and loved each one. He loved the idea that the humans had a real Savior that wasn't him. He didn't know if the human's God's protection extended to Time Lords, but he sometimes liked to think that He would show him a bit of mercy when his regenerations ran out.
The sight of Clara again shook him to his core. He couldn't stop himself from thinking about how fun it would be to take her across the universe, and the places he would like to show her. The mystery behind her tempted him to investigate, he wanted so badly to find out what exactly she was. More than anything, though, he wanted a friend, as he was so lonely. But he couldn't, wouldn't, bring her with him. He was done with humans, done with the universe, and besides, if her track record was any indication, he'd just have to watch her die again, and he'd seen enough death.
His dilemma tore at him, it felt like he was dying, even though he knew he wasn't. The only time he was happy was when he had a hand to hold, but he couldn't have a friendship without putting that person in danger. He thought of Amy and Rory and River, his silly companions who had given him something he hadn't had in centuries: a family. Why couldn't he just have a simple life, where the most he would ever have to worry about would be a job and taxes, instead of Daleks and Cybermen?
In his despair he clasped his fingers together and whispered, "Oh God, I don't know if you can hear me, but if you can, please tell me what to do. I can't go on like this, my life is unbearable. I've saved your people so many times, please do me this favor and just give me a sign? Sorry, I didn't mean for that to rhyme."
He opened his eyes and said to himself, "If only I had never stolen that Tardis in the first place. If only I had never starting adventuring and helping, then I wouldn't have this problem." Then, under his breath, he added, "I wouldn't have had to meet and lose all those wonderful, stupid, brave, crazy, incredible people. And they wouldn't have met me. I would never have gotten the chance to screw up their lives the way I did."
He looked up, and noticed that the church was empty. How long had he been sitting there? But then he heard a child's voice calling out.
"Help me! Is anyone there? Please help me!"
The Doctor stood to go to the child, but stopped when he realized what he was doing.
"No, you are not going to help," he scolded himself. "You are going to walk out that door, call the police, and let them handle it. This is me, walking out the door."
When he moved his feet towards the exit, he found that they weren't listening, and they took him instead towards the sound of the child's cries. The Doctor might be able to ignore distress calls, but when it came to children crying, it was impossible.
When he reached the door the sound was coming from, he looked down at his feet and muttered, "You two are just as bad as Sexy."
He opened the door and found a little girl hiding in a supply closet. But what really caught his eye was the Silent reaching out to her, its mouth opening wide.
"Help me!" the girl screamed.
The Doctor reached for his sonic screwdriver but found that it wasn't in any of his pockets. Of course the one day he wasn't carrying it around with him was the day Sexy decided to kick him out.
"Gonna have to improvise, then," he said as he looked around him, but then he immediately forgot what he was doing. He noticed a broom, and when he heard the girl cry out again he grabbed it.
The Silent turned its attention to him and he swatted at it with the broom. He knocked it into a bunch of janitorial supplies, grabbed the girl, and ran with her out of the church.
"Why am I running?" he asked himself aloud. "Oh well, I assume I have a good reason, usually do."
"Is the monster gone?" asked the girl.
"Oh, hello. Where did you come from? Monster you say?" Then it clicked. "Oh, it must have been a Silent, that's why I can't remember. It's either that or I'm the monster you're talking about and I'm kidnapping you," he chuckled.
"Are we safe now?"
"About as safe as ever, I suppose." He suddenly recalled that one of those distress messages had mentioned the Silence. Not his problem, though. He'd saved the girl, he would do nothing else.
"Where do you live?" he asked her.
"I have no home," she replied.
"Homeless? Okay, where are your parents?"
"I have no parents."
"Oh, an orphan, then. What's your name?"
"I have no name."
This made the Doctor stop in his tracks. He quirked an eyebrow and finally took a good look at the child in his arms. She wore a plain white dress and had snow white skin and hair that reached to her feet to match. She looked like an angel, except for two eyes that were also white, no pupils, that gave her a demonic look that conflicted with her beautiful face.
"Are you blind?" he asked as he set her down on the sidewalk. He then kneeled down to face her.
"Yes."
This made the Doctor wonder what the Silent's effect on her had been. Since she couldn't see the alien, would she forget that it had been there? She hadn't forgotten when they had fled like he had. That was interesting.
He didn't know what to make of this child. She had no parents, no home, no eyesight, not even a name.
"What should I call you, then? And what am I going to do with you?" The nearest police station was the logical answer, but he couldn't stifle his boundless curiosity.
"You ask many questions, but now I must ask one of my own. What do you most desire?"
"Pardon?" he asked, taken aback.
"You helped me when I called, not many do. For your act of kindness, I will grant you one in return. What do you most desire?"
Of course the Doctor didn't believe she could really grant him a wish, but he decided to humor her anyway.
"So, I get a wish, huh? So you're like a genie, then? Well, let's see… perhaps a dinosaur that could fit in my pocket. Or a rocket-powered scooter. Or maybe I should just wish for a screwdriver that works on wood, that would certainly come in handy. Let me just grab my Christmas list-"
"There is no need, for I have heard your soul cry out, and it has told me the greatest desire of your hearts. It shall be yours."
The girl placed her icy cold hands on the sides of his head and kissed his forehead. The Doctor squeezed his eyes shut, half expecting something to happen, but when he opened them, nothing had changed. But the girl was gone.
"Little girl?" he called out. He wished he had something to call her, it sounded like he was calling a dog. He spent half an hour searching for her, but found no sign that she had ever existed.
"Well, at least now I won't have to worry about finding her a place to stay for the night," said the Doctor. "I do hope she's all right, though. Very odd, but I like odd. She was a cutie, even with those creepy eyes."
All of a sudden, the wind picked up and blew so hard it almost knocked him down.
"That's strange," remarked the Doctor, his words lost in the powerful gusts. "Perhaps I should check the weather channel while I'm here, it just wouldn't do to get caught in a hurricane. Actually that sounds like fun."
The wind blew the all the snow away, but didn't stop there. The Doctor gaped as the wind tore apart the houses and buildings around him like scraps of paper. He looked down at his feet and watched incredulously as pieces of pavement flew up around him, and then the dirt underneath it. Every car, every lamp post, even all the people walking the street were ripped to shreds and blown away. No one reacted, no one screamed or tried to escape the wind. Not one person noticed that their very existence was being extinguished. It was as if they didn't even feel themselves being torn apart.
"What in the world is going on?" yelled the Doctor. He needed to get back to the Tardis, but when he tried to move nothing happened. He looked down and saw that he himself was being ripped apart along with everyone else. He had disappeared up to his knees, but he felt no pain at all. In fact, if he hadn't been watching himself being unraveled like a sweater, he would never have known.
All of this was happening so fast it gave him no time to think or come up with some kind of plan. The whole of reality was disappearing around him and all he could do was watch. Despite the life he lived, he didn't feel fear very often. But right then he was truly afraid.
By the time both his legs were completely gone, the world had fallen apart around him. There was nothing around him but an explosion of light so bright it blinded him. Unable to do anything else, the Doctor let loose a scream of fear and helplessness, but it was cut off as the last of him was unwound, and he and the world were no more.