Chapter 10: Complications

The Doctor released her slightly.

"Your name." he told her. "How did I not figure it out before?"

"Brooke" he spoke. "Just Brooke" "Brooke literally means a smaller River."

"Brooke Asa Song" he said the name allowed.

"Asa?" he asked.

"It means Doctor, healer" Brooke clarified. "After you..."

Only River could think of a name like that, thought The Doctor. The thought of River now worried him, where did she go?

"Brooke, did they take River?" he asked concerned.

Brooke shook her head.

"I must find her." The Doctor announced.

"And this is where it all changes" Brooke replied sounding a lot like her mother.

"If you find her, you must leave me, she's pregnant with me somewhere right now; you see the danger don't you."

"I won't leave you. Not now not ever" The Doctor argued.

"But yet you must find my mother. And when you do, you would be changing the future it'll mean I never went through what I did, it'll mean we never met, not like this."

"I only just found you" The Doctor looked a Brooke his hearts heavy, he stroked his daughters' hair the same colour as his.

"There must be a way" he spoke with pain.

"What if I find River after you're taken and you stay here?" The Doctor thought out loud.

"You could" Brooke replied, "But is that the right thing, me being taken. It'll mean I still live this life and it means you'll never get to raise me."

Brooke had thought this all through, she watched her father trying to do what she desperately had attempted. Of course she wanted to stay, of course she wanted to be with her father and mother but she knew that wasn't right.

She should never have been taken, her father had admitted that himself. If he went and found her mother before Kovarian took her it would mean she would not have suffered, it would mean she would be born into safe hands and have a safe future. No self harm, no abuse, they would raise her the way she should be raised. But yes, who she was now would be erased. This version of her would cease to exist the whole time line would be snipped off into void.

Who was to decide?

The Doctor sat upon the steps in The TARDIS burying his face in his hands. Brooke joined him at his side. He looked up at her.

"I can't let you go Brooke, I can't" he sputtered. "You're my daughter" he spoke, the word daughter unfamiliarly rolling off his tongue. He thought of his previous children and the pain of their loss. "Not you Brooke, not you, I can't lose you" he continued.

Brooke stared back at him wanting to make the decision easier for him but she knew inside this decision in no way would be easy, for anyone. As The Doctor watched her, he read her face splattered with so much pain and loss. His heart throbbed with turmoil at the thought of the life she had lived due to his irresponsibility. He now realised what the awfully strange instinct was, how he naturally needed her to be safe, how he constantly worried about her in every way. It made sense how he'd not thought twice about healing her hand or why The TARDIS adored her.

Rather, out of the blue The Doctor tucked his daughter's wavy strands of hair behind her ear and smiled. Brooke watched his reaction in awe as he despite having a tempest of pain flowing inside him, closed his eyes for just a second and smiled with strength. She painfully smiled back swallowing her own ache.

The Doctor thought to himself, he'd just met his daughter and he wasn't going to let the pain and worry of what to do burden her; that was his responsibility and he would sort it out in some way or another.

"Brooke." He spoke. "Everything will be just fine" he told her with honesty. "I don't want you to worry now; you are safe; do you hear me Brooke? You are safe" he vowed to her. Brooke couldn't do anything but nodded and so holding her never she nodded in return.