A/N: We're on TEN, y'all! *blows party horn* This is the number of the Doctor whose fault it is that this fic is around! Yay!
For this special chapter I have a prompt I came up with while listening to the amazing David Tennant narrate the How to Train Your Dragon audiobook by the fantastic Cressida Cowell. Which I highly recommend; it you haven't read those brilliant books yet at least let the Doctor read them to you, come on.
Disclaimer: I don't own most of the cast, but I do own the twins. I also don't own the song by Jonsí. The bits read out of the book by the Doctor are actual excerpts from the book How to Train Your Dragon by Cressida Cowell and were not written by me.
The Metacrisis Doctor poked his head in his son's bedroom, his hand cupped around his nose and mouth. "Is it safe to breathe?"
"Dad," ten-year-old Jack laughed between coughs.
"I was just wondering if I needed a gas mask," the Doctor joshed. "Sorry you had to stay home from school today."
"'S not your fault," Jack rubbed his red, puffy eyes. "Is it?"
"No, I think it's because you're in a classroom full of kids five days a week," The Doctor sat down on the edge of his son's bed. "The flu bug is bound to pop up."
Jack moaned. "And I have to miss the read-aloud today."
"That's okay, I've got one!" The Doctor whipped the paperback from behind his back.
Jack scrutinized the selection. "You've already read that to us. Can't you just read Ender's Game?"
"No, you're not old enough for that one yet," the Doctor said.
"But that one's a kids book!" Jack protested.
"The target audience is ten- to twelve-year-olds."
"Human ten- to twelve-year-olds."
"You're seventy-five percent human," the Doctor shrugged. "And admit it, you liked the story."
Jack smiled. "Alright, fine."
"Besides, your gran keeps buggin me about reading you stuff for your age group," the Doctor muttered. "Y'know, like, not The Iliad."
"Aww."
The Doctor chuckled, then began to read. "'There were dragons when I was a boy-'"
"Read it in your Viking voice," Jack requested.
The Doctor switched to a Scottish accent. "'There were dragons when I was a boy. There were great, grim, sky dragons that nested on the cliff tops like gigantic scary birds. Little, brown, scuttly dragons that hunted down mice and rats in well-organized packs. Preposterously huge Sea Dragons that were twenty times as big as the Big Blue Whale and who killed for the fun of it. You will have to take my word for it, for the dragons are disappearing so fast that they may soon become extinct.'"
"Did you ever see a dragon?" Jack asked. "In real life, on your adventures."
"No," the Doctor admitted.
"Can we go find one?" Jack suggested. "When the TARDIS is fully grown, can we go back in time and find a dragon?"
"We sure can try," the Doctor said. Even he wasn't quite sure where the stories of dragons came from. He would be fascinated to find out. He continued reading. "'Nobody knows what is happening. They are crawling back into the sea from whence they came, leaving not a bone, not a fang, in the earth for men of the future to remember them by. So, in order that these amazing creatures should not be forgotten, I will tell this true story from my childhood. I was not the sort of boy who could train a dragon with the mere lifting of an eyebrow. I was not natural at the Heroism business. I had to work at it. This is the story of becoming a Hero the Hard Way.' I love this book, it's realistic."
"Did you have to become a hero the Hard Way too?" Jack asked.
"Yeah," said the Doctor. "Still a wonder I made it in the first place. Everybody assumed I would fail."
"You proved them wrong," said Jack.
The Doctor laughed. "Barely. On the second try. Did I ever tell you I only passed by a 51%?"
"Really?" Jack asked.
"Yep," the Doctor shook his head, "And even after that…"
"You were a Hiccup," Jack assessed.
"Yeah," the Doctor smiled sadly. "Little bit."
Jack thought this over. "But they were wrong, weren't they?"
The Doctor thought back to all the mistakes he'd made. "Sometimes I'm not so sure."
"But you saved the universe so many times," Jack reasoned. "And then the Doctor Donna happened, too."
"Yeah," he didn't disagree.
"'History, you see, is like the interlocking wheels turning in a ticking-thing,'" Jack quoted. "'Something unexpected happens, some sort of hiccup… The wheels are jogged… and then they set off again, beating out the time in a new pattern.'"
"See, you did enjoy the story," the Doctor ruffled his son's hair.
"The books were better than the movies," Jack said.
"Well, they're books, of course they are," the Doctor laughed.
"But the drawings are bad," Jack continued. "The movies are good too, I guess."
"The drawings aren't bad!" the Doctor said. He opened up to one of the pages. "Look at this dragon, this is brilliant!"
"You're just jealous cos you can't draw," Jack giggled.
The Doctor huffed. "Can I just keep reading?"
"Yeah."
He sat up, turning the page. "'One. First, Catch Your Dragon. Long ago, on the wild and windy isle of Berk, a smallish Viking with a longish name stood up to his ankles in snow. Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third, the Hope and Heir to the Tribe of the Hairy Hooligans, had been feeling slightly sick ever since he woke up that morning.'"
"Dad," Jack clearly wasn't paying attention. "Did you and Mum call us the Doctor Donna on purpose?"
"What?" he looked up from the book, confused.
"Well I'm named after you, the Doctor, and my twin sister is named after Donna," Jack explained.
The Doctor's jaw dropped. It had been a little over nine years since he and Rose had picked out the names of their twins, nine years they had been calling the twins by name every day, nine years retelling stories to them. It had taken nine years to figure this out. He felt extremely stupid and also ingenious at the same time.
"Apparently not," Jack reasoned.
"Definitely not," the Doctor confirmed, eyes wide.
"Back to the book then?" Jack said.
The Doctor considered protesting. This was the kind of life-changing revelation that he should probably pause to mull over for a good long time. The last time he had passed over something like this was Bad Wolf, and that hadn't been a smart move.
But he looked to his son's eager face and said, "Back to the book then!"
This would be one to tell Rose.
A/N: TEN BLOODY CHAPTERS AND I JUST FIGURED THIS OUT LIKE THREE DAYS AGO. I figured that since I had this epitome (at like 11:00 at night btw), Tentoo and Rose need to as well.
Also, I named Donna's boyfriend Fintan (after a cinematographer from Classic Who- didn't expect a lot of people to know that one) Whittaker (after the Adventures in Odyssey character). Whittaker. And if he and Donna get married her initials will be DW.
I'll get to requests for the next chapters. I don't mind more suggestions if you have them, though! Review and tell me how I did!