Written for the (last) rdficathon! Prompt #51: The Doctor finds a way to assist to River's trial for his murder, unable to intervene as he watches River being clobbered by a biased audience. Took ages to finish this... and many thanks to Sarah and Megs for all their help and encouragement. Title is from Shakespeare's 'Merchant of Venice'

oh and FYI: Doctor is S8 (set at the end of 'Deep Breath').


Regeneration. The act of completely changing -physically, mentally- and discarding your past self to start fresh.

On Gallifrey, it was considered a benefit of being a Time Lord. A way of proving they were superior to those races who merely died when their bodies expired… though, personally, the Doctor had always wondered if it was actually a bad joke perpetrated by the Ancients.

Because the process was bad enough: exhilarating pain coursing through you, rewriting every cell until an unfamiliar face and body and mind emerged. But afterwards, there was the task of finding what will be from the wreckage of what was… You could be anything; and the rule had been that those first few hours were crucial. Your actions, those around you; all of it imprinted upon a new-born Time Lord to turn them into whatever they were meant to be. Sinner or saviour or scholar or soldier…

Of course, he'd never been quite like that. Different face, different bodies; but startling similarities between his selves. (His own fault, probably. Must've had something to do with being thrust into dangerous situations from the moment a new life took over; and usually with companions depending upon him for their safety.) And, too, it had been so long since the last time that one might say he was out of practice with the whole process… not to mention that he'd rather thought the last time was the last… but times changed, and the Doctor changed. And now he found himself in a new sequence of regenerations. Starting over, far from home and anyone who would understand.

It struck him, always at the most importune moment. His own kind… on Gallifrey, they'd understood the proper ways to lead the newly-regenerated through the trauma. He never thought he'd miss that; the pomposity of the Time Lords, always thinking they knew best.

Except, he did miss it. The familiarity of not having to explain. Because despite his phone call, Clara had looked at him and seen a stranger; Vastra and the rest were accepting but hardly better.

The Doctor sighed, reaching out a hand –left? Yes, left. He was still having trouble telling one from the other- to close the TARDIS doors, and turn on the engines.

"Do you miss it too? Home." His fingers stroked the plotter; and the Doctor managed a grim smile at the TARDIS' soft electronic purr. "Must be difficult for you, isn't it? When I can't even remember how to fly you… when I'm still not sure who I've become. And this desktop… not enough light in here, is there? Darkness in every corner of the TARDIS, darkness in me…"

The Doctor pressed his lips together, staring blankly at the console before him. He didn't want to think about the last few hours. He closed his eyes, but that was worse. Not just memory but images in his mind. A dinosaur burning; his fault. Clara's terrified face behind the bars; his fault. An unmoving body, impaled on the steeple…

His eyes sprang open, and the Doctor looked around the room.

"So that's it, who I am now? Madman. Murderer." He frowned. The first few hours of life set the pattern of who you would become. But what if your first acts lead to violence or death? What does that say about who you are?

"I never thought," he murmured, "that I was nice. Or always right in what I did. You make the choices you must. But I thought I was… that I had…"

He pictured River, suddenly. Outside the crash of the Byzantium, the faintest smile on her face as she watched him.

Best man I've ever known.

"I thought I was a good man. Maybe I'm not anymore."

The TARDIS started, without him doing anything at all. The rotor raising and falling, the ship thrumming beneath his fingers; and the Doctor watched as she set her own course.

"Clara won't appreciate being left behind," he mused. "Ah, for the best. One solo trip, you and me? Survivors from Gallifrey, setting off together. My sexy girl, the only one who could possibly understand how I feel…"

They landed without even a jolt, the tell-tale vworp-vworp of the handbrake oddly muted for the first time in the Doctor's memory. He didn't bother with environment checks before heading for the doors (no need; the TARDIS would hardly have taken him someplace uninhabitable of her own volition) even though he did know better. Always do environment checks. He could almost hear River's impatient sigh in his mind, the stern inflections in her voice as she teased him.

Why so impatient, sweetie? What happens when you walk into something ridiculous? Or dangerous?

He scoffed, opening the doors without even a pause. No matter what his wife had said, she always knew. Didn't matter where he was, he always walked into something ridiculously dangerous.

Except that this wasn't either. The Doctor stopped abruptly, tilting his head right and left to look curiously at his surroundings.

A courtroom. High ceilings and no windows, the overcrowded benches made of a dark-stained wood. A judge in the front; a familiar looking woman, her face severe and unyielding. A jury panel of humanoids; again, all of them familiar…

He bit the inside of his cheek. That man, the orange one wearing a three-piece suit? He recognised him… had it been on a trip to Magus with the Ponds when they helped the survivors from a dragon attack? The Doctor could remember an orange face beneath the soot, praising his name. And the woman beside him, three-armed and fish-faced could only come from Pagnat. Names, not his thing now. But he could suddenly remember engineering peace talks during their Civil War, leaving his companion to assist in the hospital… therefore, yes. That woman sitting in the jury box had been the chief surgeon, calmly lecturing about differences in alien and human biology to the fascinated medical student, Martha Jones.

Each face on the jury was a glimpse of his past. People he'd helped. Races saved…

"Your life is supposed to flash before your eyes before you die," muttered the Doctor. "Not after you've been reborn."

"Come on," someone beside him said. "You roll with the punches when you time travel, Doctor. I thought you knew that?"

The voice sounded foreign; well, everyone sounded foreign these days to his ears. But he didn't even sound English –he sounded American- and the Doctor turned, knowing instantly who it was beside him.

"Captain."

"Oh, we're formal these days?" Jack Harkness grinned back at him, tucking his hands into his pockets and leaning back to survey the Doctor. "Yeah, guess we are formal. That outfit is a bit of an anachronism here, you know. Very… Victorian."

The Doctor sniffed the air cautiously, nostrils flaring as he resisted the temptation to stick out his tongue. (Far too juvenile; that action belonged to a much younger man who had never minded looking like a fool.)

"Fifty-first century," he said shortly. "Yet you're wearing a coat from World War Two. You're the wrong one to talk to me about anachronisms."

"But I look good," said Jack. "Which is more than I can say about you… You're looking a little pale, Doctor."

"Scottish. Same thing. Also," added the Doctor, "recently regenerated."

"Yes," Jack said slowly. "I thought so. Because you knew better back then, to come here as yourself. But like this? Smart move. You won't be recognised; even though, that might help the case."

Much as he liked Jack, much as he'd always felt he was a friend, the Doctor couldn't focus on what Jack seemed to not be saying. Plain speech. No word games; was that too much to ask from people these days?

"What case?" He turned, gazing across the room. "And why are all these people here? Never thought the Fifty-first century was into live court drama."

"I think regeneration," Jack lowered his voice on the last word, "has made you forget humanity. Live court drama will always be popular. And especially this one.

"This is the trial to decide the fate of Melody Pond, otherwise known as River Song. The woman who killed the Doctor."

Caught off guard and sputtering wordlessly, the Doctor allowed himself to be pulled into an empty row of seats near the back of the hall. Two thousand years old and he was no wiser; just realising how much there was to atone for. Because he'd never thought about her trial, not seriously… he had asked once, but River had shrugged nonchalantly; never saying much beyond a teasing comment that her barrister had swooped in like a guardian angel at the last minute, arguing down her sentence. (And that she rather wondered if he'd done it because he fancied her… which, admittedly, had made him a bit jealous, and he'd never asked again.)

Damn her for hiding the damage; it must have been a terrifying experience. And, truthfully, damn himself for never wanting the details. Nearly a thousand years, and it had never occurred to him to look it up for himself. He hadn't wanted to ask then, and he still didn't; but next to him, Jack shifted uncomfortably, obviously not pleased at having to be the bearer of bad news.

"They're trying to uncover the truth," he hissed from the side of his mouth, trying to keep his voice low. "Rumour is that River hasn't been talking at all since the Church captured her. Probably shell-shocked from the blast of time; but they're using that to prove her guilt. The fact that she shows no remorse doesn't help her case, either."

"Trying to uncover the truth? How would they even know? Sounds like idiots trying to lead each other. Look around." The Doctor waved his hand to encompass the hall's inhabitants. "Lower mental processes, all of them. They wouldn't understand the truth here if it came up and asked them to dance."

Jack frowned. "This new regeneration. A bit cruel?"

Yes. Maybe. The Doctor shrugged irritably, not wanting to be reminded of who he was, or who he could have become.

"You never used to be this against humanity," continued Jack.

"Before, they weren't trying to prosecute my wife."

"Oh, I don't know about that. How quickly you forget Salem, eh, Doctor?"

Despite himself, the Doctor found his temper lightening. "Her hair was no reason to claim she was a witch."

"Her blaster didn't help."

"No. Taking out that barn was a mistake, even if it did eliminate the invaders." The Doctor sighed, glancing surreptitiously at the other man. He'd never been quite sure what Jack knew or didn't. Again, his fault. Never asking.

"There's nothing they can prove about what really happened there at Lake Silencio." he finally said. "They wouldn't believe the real events."

Jack smiled suddenly. "Quite true. Because there'd be nothing to prove about a wedding that took place where time died."

"Yes," said the Doctor, relieved. "Or how she fought the suit's controls and refused to let it take over."

"And upset the balance of the Universe. Some would say she should be punished for that."

"Time Lord," said the Doctor. "We are the protectors from paradox. It was my right to punish her."

"But you chose to marry her instead." Jack was still grinning. "Can't say I blame you for that. Your wife is quite a woman."

He was never certain if he was going to scowl at Jack for the innuendo, or break into a satisfied grin himself. But the courtroom doors opened in that moment, the air filled with expectant murmurs from the crowd and the heavy footsteps of no less than ten Judoon soldiers, marching in time.

And in their midst was River.

So long since he'd seen her, and now it was with different eyes. But he couldn't have forgotten anything. The way her curls danced around her face, lightly brushing her shoulders. The curves of waist and hip and bum, evident even in the utilitarian business suit they'd dressed her in. They sat her down behind a glass enclosure, facing the room; and he stared at her.

She looked miserable. Not so that anyone else might notice, but he did. She was his wife, and he knew that despite the proud set of her head, the carefully blank look on her face; her cheeks were pale, her fingers twisted together in her lap. All signs that River Song was not as emotionless as the judge and jury might believe.

"And so it begins," Jack murmured, sitting back in his seat. "The trial that will be talked about for centuries to come."

"Hardly that," retorted the Doctor. "She'll be pardoned eventually." One day in the future, at least. After his younger self went through time, erasing his existence so that her sentence could be overturned.

"Will she?" Jack sounded faintly incredulous as the opening statements were mounted. "Time can be rewritten, you know. Even one line can change everything."

"Are you," said the Doctor, "actually daring to lecture me on time travel?"

"The only other person who might is up in the box," said Jack. "And at the mercy of this court and her defense."

Such as it was. The Doctor frowned. Her defense was headed by a man with a mousy voice, nowhere near strident enough to cut through the angry whispers. His arguments were half-hearted at best; as though even he couldn't manage to believe his client's innocence, let alone defend it.

"That's the best she could come up with?" As the Doctor watched, the man looked up, met River's eyes and visibly blanched, stumbling over his next sentences.

"Not a lot of forerunners for the privilege. I would've offered, but… well." Even without looking, the Doctor could see Jack's smirk. "Probably best to keep me away from the law. Especially in the Fifty-first Century."

He nodded, listening as the prosecution began to call their witnesses. The first few were soldiers of the Church, giving various accounts of the scene at Lake Silencio. The Doctor particularly disliked one of them: a stern older man who gleefully described how River fought against being taken into custody -even as the Doctor's body burned behind her- showing no remorse for her actions as she overpowered officers, leading them on a chase across the stars until they cornered her…

"I hate soldiers," muttered the Doctor. "Hypocrites, the lot."

"Not really fair to condemn all of them, for a few who are corrupt."

"Isn't it?" The Doctor leaned forward, his eyes narrowed to see River's face and how this was affecting her. The boos and hisses of the audience, the horrified expressions of the jury… but she wasn't reacting at all. Just staring before her, looking bored.

"They're responsible for this," snapped the Doctor. "They stole a baby from her parents and experimented on her. Trained her to be a killer, made her one of their own; and now they condemn her for it. What's not to hate about them?"

He didn't realise how loud his voice had gotten until Jack's hand brushed over his, cautiously.

"Careful," he murmured. "Won't help anyone if we get thrown out of here."

"Of everyone here," said the Doctor, "I think that I would have the right to say what I want about her killing the Doctor."

"You do." Jack conceded the point with a brief nod, a flirtatious smile for the people around them who had turned curiously in their direction.

"But," he continued in a softer voice, "only if you want to go up there and speak for her. Which then means that everything River sacrificed for them to think you're dead would be useless. And you would still be walking around the Universe with a target on your back."

The Doctor bit back a snarl, his face tight with tension. Jack was right, of course. Erasing himself from history only made sense when his 'killer' was locked away, and the world stopped believing that he existed apart from fairy tales and occasional jaunts out of time.

But it hurt, listening to the case they'd built against River. Witness after witness swearing to her guilt, her violent tendencies. A classmate from the Luna University claimed she'd once had to be pulled off him, after attacking him with no provocation. (The Doctor knew better; he'd stolen River's research and passed it off as his own so that she failed that quarter and almost lost her scholarship.) A waitress from the University local reluctantly disclosed that River had gotten into no less than sixteen bar fights on their premises; though at least she made certain to mention that they'd all been in defense of patrons too scared to fight for themselves.

"I don't want to hear any more of this," said the Doctor finally. His hands hurt; he'd been clenching them together for the last few hours, tighter and tighter with each new story. "I can't stay."

"Yes, you can." Jack was completely serious for a change. He leaned closer to the Doctor, his lips close to his ear. "You have to stay. They've only got one more witness for the prosecution."

"They've said enough," said the Doctor, half-standing up already. "What more could there be?"

Of everything in the world, the Doctor hated it when he was wrong, as he was right then. Surprise made his balance waver and he dropped back down abruptly, biting his tongue in the process; as Madame Kovarian walked calmly down the aisle to the witness box.

If there were justice, thought the Doctor, seeing her smile as she was sworn in, she'd have died for what she did. The Church would have cast her out.

But sometimes, there was no justice. He had no doubts that she'd obviously struck a deal… or that the leaders in the Church would have protected their own in the end, despite the fact that Kovarian's splinter cult had been responsible for killing the Doctor and bringing this whole trial about.

And, despite the fact that it was so clear, now. This –all this – had obviously been her ultimate goal. She had made a weapon, engineered a weapon; but always planned to neutralise it in the end. A gun can be turned back upon its owner, after all; and she'd never intended that River would walk free after completing her mission.

Ah, for a window high above London here, and Kovarian instead of a droid. He'd even accept the blame for that one. Not the thoughts of a good man, not at all; but he wasn't a good man these days, was he? The Doctor's hands were shaking, his lips pressed together into a thin line, his every thought tainted with anger and retribution as he listened to her smiling recitation of River's accomplishments. Video footage was called into evidence and the Doctor watched with the rest of the room in silence at the images of Melody, age six, whimpering in terror as tears streamed down her cheeks at her attackers' shoves and slaps; until they finally goaded her into fighting back. Mels at fifteen, cut lip and bruises all over her arms. Her eyes were wild like a caged animal, darting right and left as she saw five, ten –no fifteen– people coming toward her dressed all in black, swooping around her like belligerent shadows until she began throwing punches, lashing out with deadly ferocity to bring them all down within minutes.

And then the footage from the Luna University library cameras of River being forced into the suit. The final images at Lake Silencio. Kovarian had been careful, very careful to allow no audio. The entire trial might implode if the jury were to hear River's impassioned pleading for him to run, the sound of her sobbing.

No, there was only his face before her. The resignation and sadness; and the Doctor found himself following the movement of his own lips.

You are forgiven. Always and completely forgiven.

The screen stopped on his face, frozen in a rictus of pain and lit with the glow of the energy blast. Still smiling, Kovarian stood up to leave. Jack's hand closed on the Doctor's wrist, preventing anything he might have done as she swept past them up the aisle, out of the courtroom. The doors closed, and out of the stunned quiet left behind the prosecutor began her final remarks.

"I know how difficult that was for everyone to see," she said. "That level of unprovoked, violent attack, and upon such a man. One who always did right by those in our Universe; as I'm certain those of you in the jury box will remember." A snide side comment, to remind them all that they might not be there, if not for the Doctor.

"If you couldn't understand what he was saying, his final words, then let me share them with you. He was telling River Song that she was forgiven. 'Always and completely forgiven…' but when you look at that woman there," she pointed toward her, "do you think that she remembers him saying that, or even thought of changing her mind? Maybe you believe that with those words, he was attempting to plead for his life; because it seems unlikely that he could forgive her. As though any of us could, for her crimes! The violence from her youth. The lack of compassion that grew to unleash a psychopath into our world…

"One," added the prosecutor slyly, "who refused to even speak up for herself, or offer explanations. It is our opinion that she knows there is no excuse for what she has done. She is staying silent because she knows she deserves the highest penalty that can be given, for the senseless murder of the best man we will ever know.

"And ladies and gentlemen of the jury; I hope you will vote that she receives it."

The eyes of everyone in the courtroom were drawn to River, to see if she might finally speak; but she still sat quietly. Her face utterly expressionless, her eyes staring straight ahead with nothing in them. No thought. No emotion. No tears; and the Doctor realised suddenly that was the worst evidence of it all. She might have known he wasn't dead; but to everyone else, it was a lack of remorse. And that was what would condemn her.

The whispering started then. The crowd murmuring to themselves, the jury's mumbled asides. The defence attorney shrinking down in his seat, the prosecution smiling at each other.

"It's hopeless," Jack said suddenly. "Open and shut case, immediate sentencing. I don't even know her lawyer will say anything… I guess I'll have to do what I'm here for. Get into her holding and bring her something to help."

"Something like what?" asked the Doctor, pulling his scrutiny from his wife. "A cake with a file?"

"Something to bring an easier death than what the Shadow Proclamation will give her."

The Doctor turned slowly. "She doesn't die here, Jack. You don't understand."

"No," said Jack. "You don't understand, Doctor. If she won't speak for herself and her defence attorney is useless, then whatever other timelines we know of, River Song will be sentenced today and die in the morning."

"Ridiculous. She said she had a lawyer. Someone who swooped in at the last second who argued down her sentence to imprisonment." Regeneration might have changed him, but he could never forget anything associated with River. Every look, every conversation no matter how banal was locked away in his memory forever.

"Maybe," Jack mused, "he never got here. It isn't everyone who would be willing to defend a murderer. Or try to find a way to show people that what you see isn't necessarily the full story."

The Doctor's forehead creased, his eyebrows drawing together as he met Jack's eyes.

"Who sent you?" he asked suddenly. "Was it her…did River ever know?"

"That you might not make it?" Jack laughed softly. "Or that there were a lot of ways this could go?"

He sighed, shaking his head in mock indignation. "You know I'm not going to confirm that, Doctor. Could have been anyone."

It could have been. The Doctor managed to smile, albeit humourlessly. It could even have been himself, in the future, knowing that the man who would be in the courtroom might not be the good man River had always trusted.

But he hoped that whoever had sent Jack had known that he'd never let her down. Two thousand years; so much to atone for. Especially to his wife.

"Seems a pity," said the Doctor loudly, pitching his voice for the room to hear, "that in the Fifty-first century, it's so easy to condemn without knowing all the facts."

If he'd tried, he couldn't have found anything better to say to shut them all up. Heads swivelled. Jaws dropped. The Judge stared at him, a wrinkle between her brows as she tried –and failed- to place who he was.

"We are not," she said finally, "taking commentary from observers."

"Oh, but do I seem like an observer? I'm here for a reason."

"Which is? Identify yourself."

So many identities he could have said. The Doctor. The victim here. Her husband. The man she killed. But timelines had to be preserved. Rules followed.

The Doctor stood up, strolling casually down the aisle and being extremely careful not to look at River. Not yet.

"I'm no one special," said the Doctor. "Just someone who dropped by to speak for the defence."