A oneshot in which the Doctor tells River about his best mate. I had the idea because in Silence in the Library, River seems so honored to meet THE Donna Noble. It makes me wonder what he told her about Donna. So, here's what I picture happening.
And, as much as I wish I did own Doctor Who and all of the wonderful characters in it, I don't.
"Did I ever tell you about Donna Noble?"
"No, I don't think you did. Who was she?"
"She was brilliant. My best mate. She was brutally honest. With a voice that only had one volume. Loud. But, that's not quite her fault. Her mum, oh, her mum was a piece. Always on her case. Never could leave Donna alone about anything. Never listened to her. Refused to, as a matter of fact. But her grandfather, he was a wonderful man. Wilf. That's how I died last time. Saved him." He almost buries the part where he mentions that he saved Wilf, brushing it off as nothing.
"But Donna, oh, she was brilliant. For a few minutes, she was the most important person in the world. She saved my life, and every human being in the world. She saved me a couple times, actually. Loud, brash, rash, Donna Noble. We were gonna travel forever together, River, that was her plan. To see everything." He almost sounds like another man right now, then River realizes, he is. He's his last personality, the one before this face she knows and loves. This face she's kissed and poisoned and saved and lied to and followed and trusted with her life. She's the man he was before she met him. The one Donna Noble knew.
"Oh, River, you would have loved her. As time went on, she wasn't quite as loud, as brash, as brutal. She's part Time Lord now, but she doesn't even know it. I had this extra hand, you see. That's another story for another time. But it had been cut off, and a friend of mine managed to keep it alive. Jack Harkness. He was brilliant, too River, but that's still a different story. I needed to regenerate, but I wasn't ready to. Not yet. So I channeled the energy into that hand. The deleks were attacking again that day. You might even remember that day. The day the sky changed, the day the earth moved. The deleks were attacking again, and they actually managed to kill me. But I transferred the regeneration energy to that hand, and I managed to keep that face for a little while longer. We were in a bit of a pinch though. We were trapped, surrounded. Donna was alone inside of the T.A.R.D.I.S. And I'll never understand what possessed her to do it but she touched the hand, regeneration energy floating around it still. She created another me, a human me. He looked like me, he talked like me, and basically he was me. But a few minor changes. He was me but human. He had one heart. And Donna, she took on some Time Lord aspects. She became so much cleverer. She saved the world, River. She saved me. And she didn't even know it at the time. But she almost sacrificed herself to do it. But she didn't know that either. She knew it afterwards, of course. Once she felt her brain start to burn up. She was so purely human, and she was born that way. She couldn't handle being part Time Lord, River. No human can. Oh, she hated it too. She still wanted to travel with me forever. Be there as my best mate. She never wanted to be more. Made it clear I was not mating with her. But I needed a best friend, and she was it."
He sits there, lost in his memories. Finally, River has to know. "What happened to her?"
"I erased her memories. Every single one that had me in it is gone. Or really any connection to me. She saved my life, and I erased myself from hers. If she remembers me, her mind will burn. And she will die. So, either she loses her best mate, or she dies. Bit of a choice isn't it? And I didn't let her decide. I decided for her. Returned her to her tiny little piece of the world, where she was too wrapped up in herself to notice anything else. Even if I didn't kill her, I killed the person she became."
Even River doesn't know what to say. Doesn't know how to comfort him. After a few minutes, she sees him lock it all away again. Sees her floppy haired Doctor come back, with his lack of coordination and his bow ties and fezzes and Stetsons. And he just smiles and tries to act cool again. Tries to act like it was nothing and he's not missing a friend who doesn't even know he exists. And he goes out to the console room and takes them down for a landing on whatever planet he has chosen to surprise her with this time. And River cries for the man she loves, because she knows that he won't.