Chapter 8
Memories, Lily's Room, and Gossiping!
~0~
Allison's POV
FLASHBACK
"Ah!" I announced, poking my head out the TARDIS before completely exiting the contraption. "Just breathe that futuristic planet smell in." I hesitated for a moment before giggling at myself.
What was I doing? I haven't had a companion for over twenty years, or was it longer than that? Oh well, I may have lost count, and that's alright. But sometimes, I get a little lonely… Maybe I should get a companion, maybe…
"Ha, look at me, talking to myself." I said as I closed the TARDIS door and breathed in the planet's air. My TARDIS was now disguised as a metal cylindrical pod. My nose twitched as the foul scented air hit me with full force. Oh, why did I pick New Earth 15? I don't know, I set the TARDIS to random and this is where it sent me. Hopefully, something interesting will happen here.
I ruffled my neck-length ginger hair as I walked down the false-brick streets of New Earth. Man, I loved this regeneration; I had bright green eyes, a cute thin nose, a mischievous smile, and I was GINGER! I was dressed in a hot pink crop top over an orange camisole, a pair of leggings that was white on the right leg and a pale gray on the left, and a pair of faded orange low riding converse. I loved this regeneration, because it preceded the horrible regeneration who thought that she could save the world wearing a dress, she did, but that's just… no.
I was on my ninth regeneration, so I was the Tenth Guardian. That's my name, the Guardian. Back on my home planet, Gallifrey, I was always guarding my friends and protecting them from trouble, so they started calling me the Guardian. And when I graduated, with my TARDIS license mind you, the name just stuck, I guess.
I came across what appeared to be multiple, large trash bins all against the walls an alleyway. I started to walk down the strip of ground between them, they all burst to life. The bins opened up and showed what looked like salespeople with long strips of varying patches behind them.
"Bravery!" One man yelled at me. "Get your bravery here, enough courage in one patch to help you achieve any goal you like."
"Oh, that's rubbish." A young woman with a Scottish accent advertised from another bin. "Look here, Runner's High, some call it the best feeling in the world."
"True love!" Another woman from surprise, surprise another bin advertised. "I got True Love here, but a pretty girl like yourself probably don't need it."
"Happy, a classic, but always appreciated. Everybody loves someone who's Happy." Yet another voice chimed in.
"I'm- I'm alright, really." I replied earnestly. This is why I didn't like this planet, it's just full of junkies and they're all addicted to fake emotions. They don't even want to have real emotions, they're just content with marinating in a stew of fake emotions and fake living. I normally enjoy the exploits of humans and hope for the best for them, but these humans are just disgusting.
I quickly power walked down another alleyway and to what looked like a metal door. It was locked, aw, now I have to break in somewhere. I took out my sonic that was tucked in at the back of my leggings. It was a gold model that was about six inches long and had a bright orange tip. I soniced the door, wincing slightly at the irritating noise of it (hm, maybe my next sonic should have a silent mode), and walked through the now unlocked door.
I was met with a cloud of smoke, followed by another and another. The smoke was overpowering and smacked me in the face repeatedly as I stumbled forward blindly. The door behind me slammed shut all by itself. The smoke burned the insides of my lungs and I felt like I was about to die when a gloved hand grabbed my wrist and pulled me forward.
When I could finally see again, I saw that I was in one of the hover-vehicles that were popular on New Earth during this time period. And that the person who had supposedly led me out of the smoke was just taking off a faded red bandana, which he probably used so that he wouldn't breathe in the smoke, and a pair of protective airtight goggles. He was wearing a brown jumpsuit under a brown aviator's jacket, this guy must like brown. I got a good look of the man who helped me and shall I say, 'Woah'.
This guy had light blond hair, deep brown eyes, broad shoulders, and perfect lips. WAIT! Why was I staring at this guy's lips?
"That was kinda dumb," The mystery guy stated in an American accent. Oh my Rassilon, even his voice is smoking!
"Excuse me?" I asked, hoping that he didn't notice the slight squeak in my voice. He didn't, hallelujah!
"You just standing out there sucking in the smoke, you could have died." The stranger said with concern.
"Oh well, thank you." I replied, a bit awkward just crashing in this guy's… Oh, what can I call this, uh, thing? The place I was in, was decked out like a house would normally be, so I guess this was this guy's home. "Nice place." I complimented, trying very hard to not let the fact that I'm not really good at social interaction stop me.
"Thanks, it's the Hover-Trek 900 B Square." He stated with pride. I'm not even gonna pretend I understand what he just said.
"Well, you sure decked it out." I commented, looking at the various 57th century knick-knacks on the vehicle's walls. "Oh, I should probably introduce myself. My name's the Guardian."
"Hello, Guardian." Mystery guy said, cracking a smile. He looks cute when he smiles, I- uh mean, he looks like a Gavin. "My name is Harthorellechike-Quinth-Waithrin-Ackladius." I'm not gonna try to even pronounce that, this regeneration is very bad with names, and just hearing that one made my brain hurt.
"You mind if I call you 'Gavin'?" I asked, already filing this guy down as Gavin in my head. Oh, please say no, otherwise I'm just gonna call you Harth and have to refile.
"Not at all." He answered. Okay, so this human may not be disgusting.
Wait! What was I doing? I am a Timelord, he's a human. I can't have feelings for him. I have lived over 800 years of life, well 851 years, and he's what, 27? He is not even a toddler compared to me, he is a newborn. I can NOT have feelings for him
I was interrupted from my chastising myself as an alarm sounded from the control mechanism of Gavin's vehicle. Gavin eyes lit up as he leapt towards where the alarm was sounding. I've seen that look before, it's the look I get whenever I'm piloting my TARDIS. He started pushing multiple buttons and pulled on a makeshift headset.
"This is Beta 1-9, what do ya got for me, Suze?" Gavin said into the headset. Who the heck was 'Suze'?
"Three vehicles all slammed into different vehicles, all at the same time, yet on different junctions. This is the fourteenth time this has happened." A voice from something on the primitive control panel said.
"Thanks, Alpha. I'll look into that." Gavin replied before taking off the headset and shutting off the communications device.
"Do, uh," I said, looking up from my hands. "Do you want some help, with looking into that?" Gavin just gave me a toothy smile.
PRESENT
My heart swelled at the memory as I felt a hot tear slide down my cheek. I never realized how bad I had it for that guy.
Gavin and I figured out what was making all those cars crash, a group of rogue cat-nuns had hacked into the vehicles and were attacking all the vehicles who were carrying what they saw as 'non-humans'. Basically they were mad the Doctor foiled their plan for human experimentation and they were taking it out on the freeway.
Gavin came with me when I left New Earth and after a few adventures and whole lot of running, I realized that I had more than a crush and I had finally built up the courage to tell him how I feel. And I remember feeling my heart almost explode when he said he felt the same.
I flew through more memories with Gavin until I came to the last one. I won't go into detail about it, because it was just too painful for me.
We were facing some Cybermen who were planning to drain a sun to use as energy for their ship, so that they could spread the Cyber-way. I lost Gavin that day, he was electrocuted by a Cyberman. My heart cracked as I lived out the memory of the light leaving his eyes. That was the day my hatred for the Cybermen became full-blown.
Lily is the first companion that I had after Gavin, but I still miss the guy who could make me smile and was able to confuse with his mechanic talk. I remember when I showed him the TARDIS, he was like a kid in a candy store.
I let a few tears slide down my cheeks as I slid to the floor. I felt the same uneasiness in my stomach again, though this time the pain was even worse. My eyes widened and I knew what I was about to remember.
The Last Great Time War.
~0~
Lily's POV
I walked down the hallway to my room. I smiled as I saw that the gray door had a green sign that said, "DUMBLE", on it, making it a Dumble-door. The door slid open by itself when I stopped in front of it.
"Okay, that was slightly cool." I said before walking into my room. And I'm just gonna say this, Holy Macaroni!
It was incredible! This room was about twice the size of my dorm room, meaning I actually had room to twirl without hitting something. The walls were a light blue and covered in decorations from: photos of myself with my friends that I had gotten from malls in Tennessee; posters of each of the Harry Potter movies and some of my favorite Disney movies, including Peter Pan; and drawings that I kept hidden from everyone else because I'm not that great of an artist, but I love drawing any way. All the walls were like this except the back wall, behind the bed: which was covered in sticky notes and taped up sheets of set music. The floor was a dark blue shag carpet, which I absolutely loved. The bed was queen sized with a panda print bedspread.
I ran, kicking my shoes off in the process, and belly-flopped on the bed. The bed sank a little bit I took a deep breath in of the sheets, it even smelled like my sheets! The only way this room could get any cooler would be if… No, that's back in the real world. But if the drawings, pictures, and not to mention various other things that I loved are in this room then maybe… Alright! I'm doing it.
I slid off the super comfortable bed and onto the carpet. I saw this familiar shadow under the bed and pulled out the case. I sat crisscross as I opened the sacred item. It was just a plain guitar case with my initials on the spine in blue sparkly ink and multiple cat stickers all over it.
The first thing that my eyes caught was my wand. I gingerly picked it up, remembering when I got like it was yesterday. I went to Harry Potter World with my family as kind of a graduation present to me. I had read that you can go into Ollivander's wand shop, and if they pick the most enthusiastic person and they get to choose a wand, or rather, a wand chose them.
It took about three visits, countless hours of waiting, and a sign before they picked up me but it was worth it. I had received my wand, after a few failed attempts and bought with some money I had saved up over the course of three months as a babysitter.
My wand was a 10 inch cherry with a Thestral tail hair. I raised it high, giggling all the while, and muttered a spell.
"Lumos Maxima!" I said. The fair lights glowed even brighter and I squealed. "It worked!" I'm either magic, or the lights are just use vocal commands. I'm gonna go with the first option. I then looked down and my jaw dropped. The wand fell from my hand and my hands reached shakily for the other thing in the guitar case other than my story journal, which was filled with story ideas I had but I never did anything about.
I carefully picked up my Yamaha FG700 acoustic guitar and set it into its rightful place in my lap. How in the world was this thing here? When I was 17, my little brother, Will, accidently set fire to this thing with a firecracker, burning half of it. I never forgave him for that, but I moved on and kept the case as a sort of carrying case/ memory box. Man, I loved this thing! I had so many memories of myself just listening to country music and strumming along with the artists. I quickly strummed a few cords and grinned to myself at how beautiful it sounded; it was in perfect condition just like it was four years ago.
I was perfectly content with just leaning against my bed and strumming my guitar, but a crash sent me into action.
My bare feet quickly padded against the cool TARDIS floor as I ran back to the control room, where I saw Allison. She was shaking on the ground, a broken glass jar which once contained a purple liquid was right beside her in pieces. Holy Cow! Was she having a seizure?!
I quickly ran over to her and grabbed her shoulders, before I dragged her away from whatever was spilt and started shaking her.
"Allison? Allison! Hey! Look at me!" I demanded as I looked into her hazel eyes for any sign that she was hearing me. Her eyes were glazed over and she looked like she was living a nightmare. I kept shaking her and screaming her name, having no idea what else to do. What the heck was happening to her?
~0~
Allison's POV
FLASHBACK
I was sprinting, my gun hitting my back with each stride I took, I had to get out of here. Lights from the Daleks' death rays lit up the sky as I ran for my life. This place was supposed to be safe, Arcadia was the safest place on Gallifrey; at least that's what the High Council said. The High Council, they really screwed up this time, those old farts have doomed us all. We're all dead, just because they weren't prepared for the Dalek invasion.
The Daleks on Skaro were awfully quiet for a very long time, but instead of investigating it, the High Council saw it as an act of peace. Peace?! Those things prime objective was to destroy and the High Council of idiots thought they wanted peace?! Ugh! I should have killed Davros when he just started this abomination.
You can't change the past, Guardian. You just have to move on. I thought to myself as I ran past all the carnage that was occurring around me. I was right, I had to get out of here now.
I soon saw my TARDIS, disguised as an out-of-service transporter, and I ran with renewed energy. The doors opened on their own, my TARDIS realizing that I was near and wanting to enter. I ran in, and the doors slammed behind me. I ran to the controls and quickly launched myself into space, falling at the extreme force of the unexpected launch.
My breathing was heavy and tears streamed down my face as I yanked off my helmet. In this regeneration, the sixth one, I had fulfilled my name as the Guardian. I had protected the people of Gallifrey for over three hundred years; that was longer than I ever stayed on one regeneration. I swore that I would protect the people, but this!
I slammed my fist on the TARDIS console. I couldn't protect anyone from this, even though I tried so hard. I had fought with my squadron until every man but I was dead, and then… I ran. I ran like the coward I am, because I knew that I couldn't help anymore; my gun was empty and the Daleks were raining from the sky in thousands.
I swore that I would protect, that I would guard everyone I could, but I didn't. I knew that this war could not be won, because I had never seen a war as bad as this. I knew that we would lose, and when I did, I ran away.
I hated myself. I had turned my back on my own kind, for the sake of my own skin. I was disgusting, I was a coward, and I wasn't the Guardian!
I looked down at my hands, which were starting to glow a faint gold.
This was it. This was my chance to be the Guardian again, I could start over, save planets-
"ALLISON!" A voice from all around me screamed.
PRESENT
I was yanked brutally out of my horrible memory. When I resurfaced in the present, I saw that Lily had been shaking me and that I was on the floor. I also noticed that I had accidently knocked a gar filled with a strange liquid had been knocked over, but decided to clean that up later.
"Allison, are you okay?" Lily asked me, sisterly concern almost exploding out of her chocolate brown eyes.
"Yeah," I answered, my voice was scratchy as if I hadn't talked in a year. "Yeah, I'm fine."
"That's a load of-" Lily stopped herself before she cussed. "Please say it."
"Shit."
"Not what I would say, but good enough."
"Lil, I'm fine." I said, staring to get up.
"No!" Lily said, pulling me back down to the metal grated ground with some unknown super human strength. "I know you're lying. You can't keep every bottled up."
"I don't know what you're talking about." I said honestly. What did she mean by 'bottled up'? Sure, I don't really show my true emotions and how I actually feel about some things, but I'm just saving those emotions for later where I can properly deal with them.
"Yes, you do." Lily said, narrowing her eyes at me. "Now talk."
So, I talked. I told Lily everything: about how I fought and ran in the Time War, about how I'm actually 1007 years-old, and about my adventures with Gavin.
"So…" I said, breaking the minute long silence after I had finished telling my tale. "That's it."
"You really loved that guy, didn't you?" she asked, cocking her head to the side. I just nodded, a smile forming on my lips at the slight mention of Gavin, before I started snickering. "What?" Lily asked after a while.
"I tell you basically my life story, and you go straight to the romantic stuff?" I questioned while now laughing.
"Hey, I'm a hopeless romance lover." Lily stated with a fake frown before she too stared laughing.
"I know that," I said between fits of giggles. "How, how many times did you read The Fault In Our Stars?" I asked even though I already knew the answer.
"That doesn't matter." Lily said, trying to sound serious and failing.
"12 times!" I exclaimed.
"It was a good book!" She countered.
Our laughter soon died down and I was almost asleep before Lily shot up.
"Oh my goodness!" She said while walking out of my vision area. "Allison, are you still awake?"
"No!" I answered groggily. Today has just been really tiring for me, and all I wanted to do was sleep.
"Well, I got you a present." That got my attention. I shot up for my lying down position, rubbing my back because sleeping on a grated floor kinda hurts.
"What is it?" I asked as I saw Lily rummaging in the bag I got at that little shop in Tokyo.
"Close your eyes." Lily commanded. I obeyed and closed my eyes. After about five seconds of waiting, something hit me right in the chest.
"Ow!" I said, opening my eyes and glaring at Lily. I looked down and saw what she had thrown at me.
"I know you like that show and I saw that thing, so I got it." Lily said while I opened the package. It was a Pop! Figurine of Mikasa Ackerman from Attack on Titan.
"Thank you, Lily." I said, standing up and placing the figurine on the console.
"You're welcome." Lily said, before stretching and popping her back. "Whelp! Now, I'm actually gonna go to bed. Try not to have another seizure on me, huh?"
"I'll try my best." I said, she will probably hang that over me forever. Lily started walking out but then turned back to face me when she was about to turn the corner.
"You're not a coward." Lily said, snapping my attention and gaze to her. "No matter what you think, you're not a coward, and you never will be."
"Thank you." I said sincerely before Lily nodded and turned the corner to go to her room. I turned back to the console and started pressing buttons that would lead to our next adventure, but Lily's words kept echoing through my head. Gavin was the only other person who has ever told me that, and I guess know I was finally taking it to heart.
I mean, I have saved people, countless times. I have guarded people before. I think maybe I finally earned my name the Guardian back.
I think that maybe, just maybe, that I'm not a coward. At least, not any more.
