Chapter 2

As the TARDIS whirled through space, Vincent sat with his feet dangling off the edge of the floor that surrounded the centre console while the Doctor walked around calmly as though putting something off.

"Doctor?" asked Vincent. "Do you ever think about it?"

"About what?" answered the Time Lord, too busy looking at the centre console and thinking to even look at the artist.

"About whatever you did all that time ago."

The Doctor immediately turned his head. Although Vincent had his back to him he knew that this had grabbed his attention. "How did you?"

"Your eyes, my dear Doctor," said Vincent as the Time Lord came and sat down beside him. "You can tell a lot from someone's eyes. They say that the eyes are the window to the soul and your soul my dear dear friend, is tortured and torn. Whatever you did in the past still haunts you. The fear, the regret, the anguish, it's all still as fresh as the day that it happened. You can try to hide it but your eyes will always tell the story of every battle you ever fought."

The Doctor felt a single hot tear streak down his face as he listened to the artist's words and recalled memories that he had locked away and vowed never to remember again; the memories of the Time War. After that final day and what he had done he had locked all of the terrifying and haunting demons in his head, but that didn't stop them from tearing him to pieces every single day. Memories of children playing in the orange fields of his home planet, the first day of the war, the attack on Gallifrey's second city, the number of bodies lying dead and still on the once beautiful streets of his home and his final act of mercy which lead to the deaths of every living thing on the planet. A million images raced through his mind almost making him almost lose control.

"Maybe you're right Vincent," he said at last. "These eyes are almost a thousand years old and they have seen more than anyone would want to see. I've done things that make me a hero to entire galaxies and I have saved so many people, but none of that matters when done with the hands that have murdered billions. Women, children; no one was spared that day. On that day I broke the promise I made all those years ago. I was no longer faith and hope and strength. I was no longer The Doctor. I was fear and rage and darkness and death. And that's what I am today."

"No you're not. I tend to think of myself as a good judge of character, Doctor, and you are no murderer. Although there is great pain in your eyes there is also hope and optimism. Obviously you made a choice and you are now paying for that choice. But what was the alternative?"

The Doctor simply turned his head and looked at the painter who looked directly back at him. After what seemed like an eternity the two men slowly got to their feet. The Time Lord had always admired Vincent from what he had heard of him but meeting him in person had taken it further. He could see the legendary painter wasn't just a great artist but also an altogether great human being. There was something eerie but also beautiful about how he saw the world and also people. It was as though things were simply paintings on a canvas to him while at the same time he could see the beauty and the wonder in something as simple as a rain drop. For the first time in The Doctor's memory he found himself wishing that he had a mind that worked as Vincent's did.

The TARDIS landed. As the two men stepped outside Vincent knew where he was instantly. "Arles! I'm home."

"Vincent," said The Doctor. "We need to establish where exactly in your timeline you went off track."

"What do you mean?"

"Something happened in your life that caused you to do something totally at odds to what history has said you did. We need to figure out why and when this happened. Tell me about the past few years."

"Well as you've probably noticed I am missing my ear," he said tilting his head slightly. "That was a dark time for me. I admitted myself to Saint Remy asylum after that and I was there for around a year with my doctor. After that I moved to be closer to him in Auvers-sur-Oise, but that didn't work out so I came and moved back to Arles."

"No no no, that history is wrong. You shouldn't have moved back to Arles. You never moved back to Arles," The Doctor said to himself loudly so Vincent could hear as he ruffled his hair and paced before finally turning. "What day?"

"What?"

"What day, Vincent? What day did you move back here?"

"Errm 27th July 1890 I think."

The gravity of the situation suddenly hit and The Doctor's energy was gone straight away. "What is it, Doctor? Is that important?"

The forlorn Time Lord looked into the eyes of one of the greatest men to ever walk the Earth and knew that as the artist looked back he'd be able to see the fear and the pain that he was now feeling. "I'm sorry, Vincent. I'm so sorry."