Chapter 10

Timey Wimey

Later that evening, we went to the cliffs and settled down on the rocks to watch another sunset over the ocean. Deep below us, the waves of the alien seas roared with relentless fury against the rocks.

It took me a while to open the conversation. Most of the time, the Doctor was quite a blabbermouth, sometimes I definitley missed a button to switch him off, but that evening he had become remarkably taciturn. That gave me a lot of room to for reflections.

"Doctor, you've got a time machine." I finally broke the silence. "Why don't you go, visit me in say 2040, we have a chat, and you ask me how we solved it! Or you buy a biography if I'm such an important person. Or you go back in time to tonight before the shuttle crashed and wreck my car, then I'm unable to get to the crash site in time, and you can pick me up somewhere in the afternoon."

"Mmmmh, what?" I brought him back to the here and now, from wherever in time and space he had just had wandered off to, "Oh! Cutting your tyres...yes. See, that's crossing into established events -one of the main reasons for time paradox effects. You don't really want to know what that can cause... the reapers and all... The biography, I have one in my library. I just read it the other night. There's nothing about aliens in there. You played in the university theatre group, there was some heartbreak. And apparently parties, the occasional drug use and a serious brawl that got you almost kicked from campus, too?"

He eyed me inquiringly, I mumbled an embarrassed reply.

"You gave up working on your dissertation when you had a serious personal conflict with your doctoral advisor; you ventured into scientific journalism for a few years. It states, you found theoretical astrophysics was at a point of mere speculations. You wanted to help making science more accessible to everyone and you doubted that theoretical physics would earn you a living anyway, so you turned to journalism when somebody offered you the job."

I nodded.

"But then turned... ah, pardon, you'll turn back to physics and reconcile with your doctoral advisor. It gives no clear idea what caused this change of mind. Just some blah-blah about some inspiration, and then pulling together the strings that had always been there, some more blah-blah. Nothing clear at all. Apart from lecturing, you took on a rather secluded lifestyle in the later part of your life."

"A secluded lifestyle! Me? And I will reconcile with... that...idiot! Never!" I burst out. These revelations about my future life sounded absolutely horrifying!

"This is still my life!" I burst out. "You're sure, it's my biography you are talking about?"

"Yeah. It is. And you will! That man isn't an idiot!" he replied dangerously quiet.

"By the way, these facts stand against a complete mind wipe. Meddling with memories is one thing, messing with people's intentions and habits is a completely different business. You have to reconcile with that man! You both will be quite close later in your life. And by the way, you have to get a hand on your chaotic love and family life! And brawling, drinking and drugs are over! Stop! Offending! People!" He hit every word with deadly emphasis.

I rolled my eyes in despair. He couldn't be serious! He turned out to be even worse than my mother!

Suddenly all the light heartedness, humour and patience I had come to appreciate so much vanished from him, as if they had never existed. He hardly raised his voice when he continued; shrouded in a glorious halo of cold rage, like some dark, alien archangel, glaring at me.

"I see. Setting YOU on the right track will be a challenge! Now STOP behaving like a petulant three year old. GROW UP!"

I sat there, terrified. He had not been fierce in any way to me before and I had a feeling, that I had just scratched the edge of what he could be like if he got really angry. It had the desired effect... Pissing off the Time Lord seemed not to be such a good idea anymore.

He looked at me to see if he could find any remaining resistance there and I must have passed the test. His expression softened to grandfatherly understanding, with an almost playful, triumphant sparkle in his eyes.

"Good! That's settled then!" He went on crisply, obviously satisfied, leaving me shaken, and shocked and sobered, as if, without warning, the sky had fallen down on me.

"And you know why?" He continued very kindly, but I shrugged under his intent gaze. "Because you don't need any of that crap. You're maybe a bit messed up, but you're definitely a good person. Just be confident!"

I didn't answer to that, and tried my best not to show my boiling emotions. Inwardly, I squirmed, but my standard aggressive reaction to anything getting too emotionally close was not really an option on him. The thing I didn't want to discuss with a freaking telepathic alien was my psyche and my private life. Fortunately, he dropped the subject and continued casually, as if nothing had happened.

"About visiting you 2040... This here is a junction, David. The time line might be already slightly altered. If I go into the future from this perspective we have now, into your personal future, I can't be sure what time line I'll find. If it's already an altered one, I couldn't get back to you and change it again. There are things that mustn't be done with time travel, and this is one of them, jumping around, juggling with infinite possibilities. Because it causes horrible disasters. No, we have to decide what to do here. I have to decide it here. On the basis of what we have. And there's no room for mistakes."

He looked up, straight into my eyes. I closed mine quickly. After his attempt to wipe my memory, looking into his eyes too deeply gave me the goosebumps. After a long period of silence, I continued, cautiously choosing the words, hoping not to offend him again after his outbreak.

"So, you say I become something like what? Let me guess... a famous physicist? What will my dissertation be about? And how will I die? I mean, you'll erase these memories anyway, right? So please do me this one favour and tell me! Just for now!"

Contrary to my expectation, my requests didn't provoke another outburst of anger. He just hesitated for some time. And then gave in.

"Well... Okay! Of all people... You deserve it. I can't tell you how or when you'll die. And I have no idea who can. You'll live to a ripe old age and then, one night, you'll just disappear without a trace. It's a big mystery... Hm... Maybe one day I should go and find out." He mused.

I just gaped at the Doctor, who flicked some dirt off his jacket, obviously not entirely comfortable to reveal so much so openly.

"So! The title of your dissertation? It's A theory of gravity, dark matter and the multidimensional nature of the universe. First work on that field in human history that actually makes sense, after all that overrated wormhole crap. But what's even more important for humanity, later you'll work on the theoretic background to fusion powered engines. That will make human interstellar space travel possible. They'll award you with the Nobel Prize. Or, they'll try. Three times, actually. But you'll refuse to accept."

Right! I will get awarded with the Nobel Prize! And turn it down! Several times! That was some breathtaking news about my future... Of course I knew, how fusion engines worked, I had spent enough time in that university library back in New New York. But without these memories? I heavily doubted, that I'd be able to pull that off.

"Hm... Do you have a copy of the dissertation somewhere, by any chance?"

The Doctor looked up and I watched his jaw drop. He got a shade paler, ruffled his unruly mop of hair with both hands and then stared at me.

"Of course! I have a copy!" He declared.

Without another word, he jumped up and headed for the Tardis with long, hurried strides. I slowly made my way there too, wondering, what tarantula had bitten him.

Half an hour later he found me in the kitchen, a book, bound in grey cardboard in his hand.

"Here it is!" He slumped down in one of the Renaissance chairs and carefully weighed his words.

"See, I've met Professor Barnham - you- once before."

That news blew my mind... "What?"

"Yeah. It's true! From my perspective, it was very long time ago. But for you it'll be 2047. Spring. I looked different then, an earlier regeneration, third one, anyway... I am a lot older than I look by human standards. And I can instead of dying, regenerate my body a few times. Take on another physical form... You read about this on the database; it's what Xian wanted to experiment on... Doesn't matter now... anyway... Should have recognized you straight away when I saw you, at the crash site..."

"So you know me?" I gasped.

He nodded. "Mmmmh. Yeah. But that was really a very long time ago. For me. And I wouldn't exactly call a short meeting knowing. I just dropped in on him - you- for a cup of tea when I was accidently in the area. I had frequent steering problems with the Tardis back then." He gave me one of his crooked grins.

"So I took the chance to meet Barnham; I was curious about the old genius. When I told him -you- just to call me the Doctor, it didn't bother him, he just asked me if we had met before. I hadn't, I told him. I spent an afternoon with him. He was most friendly to me and enthusiastic about my visit but he didn't show any signs of recognition. As far as I know, he was very open minded and generally enjoyed having colleagues visiting for a chat. Showing them his greenhouse full of magnificent tropical orchids and the huge, overgrown garden. He was famous for referring to himself just as some stupid old maths teacher and for his enthusiasm for helping the kids in the neighbourhood with their homework, rather than being the guest of honour at conferences. He just said his work was done and life is more than mathematic calculations. He supported all kinds of environmental and humanitarian organisations."

I listened to the Doctor, amazed and speechless about my future...

"I wonder now. When it comes to wiping your mind, I can't have done the complete version. You were pretending not to know me, because you didn't want to corrupt my time line! Anyway...when I left, he wished me a good time and gave me this book as a farewell. He signed it for me. I never seriously read it because I'm familiar with the content anyway. I have an extensive autograph collection of important scientists from all over the universe. Hobby of mine, hunting for autographs..."

He smirked and handed me the book. "Here! Read it. After all, maybe it's more than a souvenir!"

The title of the shabby volume was faded, it read "A theory of gravity, dark matter and the multidimensional nature of the universe" Holding this old book, my own old book in my hands gave me the creeps.

The first page carried a signature that looked eerily familiar. I looked down at my own scribbling, under a printed dedication, petrified. I read out loud what was written there.

"This work is dedicated to the one person who opened me the doors to knowledge, brightens my days and will be my friend forever."

The Doctor blinked; we looked at each other in bewildered silence.

I slowly flipped through pages of mathematic calculations and explanatory text. When I arrived at the end, I found something else.

"There is some epilogue, too."

"What does it say?" The Doctor asked.

"If there is one thing in the universe that is dangerous, it is not weapons. It is knowledge. With great knowledge comes great responsibility. May whoever holds this in hands handle knowledge responsibly, so that the future of mankind may be safe. NYUSA."

The Doctor looked at me with an unreadable non expression on his face.

"NYUSA!"

"Hm, yes." he replied carefully, after a while. "Barnham lived and worked -you will live and work- in the USA for a long time, later in your life. New York University. Ironic, isn't it? When I visited Barnham, he lived at his estate in upstate New York. You seem to have kept an affinity to New York... "

"Yes. I must have! NYUSA is also the official abbreviation for the scientific archives of New New York's university! Doctor, this book wasn't printed in the USA. It's the first edition from England, from the year 2014. This book is the message! I'm maybe a solid mathematician. But I know one thing; I'm not the new Einstein, Doctor. This work is groundbreaking! But it's not my work. And it'll never be. I can understand this, sure, teach it. But thinking it up, with a few inspirations only, in four years. That's beyond me. Measured to this, I'll never be more than just some simple maths teacher."

The Doctor stared at me, in eerie silence. Then he nodded, thoughtfully.

"Yes. I can see now. When you offered me to sacrifice your memories, allowed me to manipulate your future, when you offered me that much, I should have known. That you deserve more of my trust, too! Seems, you've been quite good at keeping secrets, all those years... I was very wrong!"

So my future was set. I took a deep breath of moist, salty air, and shakily exhaled, clearing my mind of the chaos that all this news caused me. It dawned on me, that from now on, I had to live with it! I hadn't wanted him to erase my memories. But now, ironically as it was, I had to live with them. The burden of knowledge. And I wasn't sure anymore if the latter was so much better...

Now travelling time and space was not on the program anymore. He decided to postpone that and promised me an 'Earth from Cambrium to Palaeolithicum' tour and a live supernova explosion I had asked of him for later. He appeared to be slightly bored by what I wanted to see anyway, only rolling his eyes...

We spent the next days working out how to get me back into my old, new life as smoothly as possible. Namely to teleport me into the shuttle wreck a few moments after our departure to the Rutan mother ship.

He organised me a suit, like the one I had worn on the crash day and a new press badge. I can tell you, if you ever come across the Doctor, never try to go shopping with him! It's just... well... you have to find out for yourself... there is a tendency with him to end up in trouble... and for a member of some grand old civilisation he can behave embarrassingly silly... Then, at last, he got a bucket full of the proper rubble and dust to give me the authentic crash day finish.

"What are they going to do with me? I'm a civilian. I haven't committed a crime. Technically, they have no right to take me into custody, do they?" I asked him when we had dinner, between two delicious bites of something that he had introduced to me as roasted Ractacorian flesh eating eggplant.

"Oh, probably confine you for a few days. Trespassing, something like that..." He mumbled, mouth full, carefully avoiding cutting himself on the fangs of his plant tentacle and then licking his fingers. "For your own safety of course. Radiation, bio hazard, health risk... etcetera. SIS and UNIT will try to interrogate you. Know what? If they get too annoying, attack is the best defence! Insist that they give you interviews on all the alien activities lately and question them about that skinny guy who vanished into thin air. That'll scare the hell out of them. And of course a concussion also always comes in handy as an excuse. Especially after the explosion of the gravity generator. Something must have hit your head. Just tell them you have a bad headache." He grinned cheekily. Me too. This sounded like an excellent plan!

The next morning, the Doctor rigged up a teleport with a time difference. He materialized in orbit around earth, just after we had left it heading New New York.

He encouraged me to have a look at my home world from space, so we watched it from behind the safety of the Tardis force-field for a while and I was as awed by my blue home as probably all the astronauts who had seen this spectacular view before me.

Suddenly, taken aback by the realisation that the Doctor would never be able to see his own home again, I closed the doors.

"Something wrong? You don't like it?"

Probably the Time Lord didn't appreciate too much to be treated like a raw egg by me.

"Oh, no. No, it's nothing. I was just lost in thoughts for a moment" I gave him an empathic smile.

"Okay then" He picked up the bucket with sand from a corner of the console hall, mocking a very ceremonial attitude. Then threw handfuls of it at me, gleefully chuckling like a little kid, helping me rubbing it in until he decided that I was satisfactorily dirty.

„See you in a few days then, when they released you."

"Your days or mine?" I asked.

"Oh. I see. You learn fast!" he replied with a grin. "Your days. I just need to see that the army gets rid of the wreck at some atomic test site where it can blow up safely, and then arrange a few things for you. Then I'll drop by at your place. So for me, hm, maybe not as long. This time I won't stand you up! Is there enough space in your apartment to materialize?"

"You see, my apartment is a bit, um... messy... But yes, I can clear up enough space." I gave him the exact location and imagined with horror, the Doctor materializing somewhere between dirty clothes, stacks of books and DVDs, computers and my unwashed dishes... I HAD to clean before he turned up. I sighed. What my mother had never managed, in 27 years, the Doctor now did with ease! Probably she'd love him to pieces, if she knew what he was putting me through.

"One more thing. There are some people down there who know me. You don't reveal anything, to anyone. I'll later introduce you to one or two of them. In the meantime you'll play ignorant. At all cost. Don't you get tempted! You know what's at stake. Right, then..."

He bent over his beloved console and pulled a few levers.

I tried to put up a brave face, but my weak knees must have showed. He interrupted his work. This time I didn't avoid him when he gazed affectionately into my eyes. "David, if you want to keep secrets, I can tell you from my own round about thousand years of experience, there is one crucial point: Enjoy yourself."

I was flabbergasted. That was the most unlikely piece of advice I had ever heard. All my life people had told me to work harder. Pull myself together. Not to be such a sissy... And of course I had revolted against it. Probably still was revolting against it. But it had rubbed off. I knew, somehow, I had internalized a lot more of that, than I wanted to acknowledge.

"Yes, true." He continued very kindly, "If you worry, you get uptight, and if you are too uptight, you'll never pull off a convincing show. You understand? You relax! I know you can do this. I've seen it happen! You looked like a genuinely happy person when I met you. Life is a stage, so play your part and be confident, just never get reckless, okay? It's going to be all right!"

I let that sink in. He was right.

"Ready?"

"Ready! Beam me down, Scotty!"

The Time Lord seemed to understand my joke and grinned mischievously. "Brilliant! See you then! Good luck!"

With those words in my ears, the familiar shapes of the console hall faded. This time the chill of the teleport didn't take me unexpectedly...

...

So, did that plan work? Well, I was more than just a bit naive, back then. Firstly, there's the sheer force of old habits, that is almost as strong and inevitable as gravity itself. My old habits. And then, there's the other lesson I had to learn about the Doctor. That nothing, that involves him is going smooth and easy. But at the same time, it turned out to be a mindblowing adventure.

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A little note from the autor:

So that was my little story. A big thank you for reading to the relentless but anonymous readers of my screbblings, who have stayed with me until the end :-)) Or... Not the end, as mentioned above it's not going to be so easy, and there is a sequel in the making.