"It's not fair!"

The moment the words were out of his mouth, he knew he'd gone too far. Or would go too far... Time was becoming confused.

But it wasn't until he felt the lethal radiation flooding his body, felt the entirety of his essence slowly ignite, that the realistation hit him.

He hadn't just defied the Universe. In saving Adelaide Brooks, in believing himself the 'Timelord Victorious', he'd become everything that his previous incarnations had rebelled against and run from. That Gallifreyan pride and blindness had taken root in his soul and festered, untameable, the last, lonely remnant of his planet buried deep inside his psyche.

And it had steered him too close to the sun, so that now his wings burned, hot and painful.

Rebirth in fire.

He held off regeneration as long as he could, seeing only too late the possibilities and things that could have been. His wings were melting, burning, and he at once longed for and feared the cool sparkling seabeneath him. He didn't want to go, and yet these vestiges of Gallifrey would go with him.

No more 'Timelord victorious': Icarus would burn.

As he should.