Notes: Thank-you always, my darling Rose_Nebula and mrsbertucci. I love working with you ladies. You make me a better writer!
Trigger warning for scenes of violence and warfare and grave injury.
Thanks to doctorroseprompts for their 31 Days of Ficmas prompts. The one I'm using today is Peace.
Summary: Sometimes trouble finds you, no matter how well you plan, no matter how careful you are, no matter how many times you check the coordinates, but we just have to move on because life without a bit of wonder and adventure isn't really much of a life at all.
December 24th, 2025
Dear Father Christmas,
It's funny how when you become a parent, your perspective completely changes. Gallivanting around the universe, throwing ourselves in the face of danger for the greater good have had to be curtailed quite a bit. And me and the Doctor, we're both okay with that. I mean we still gallivant an awful lot. Just because we're not risking our lives and saving the universe at every stop along the way doesn't mean we've lost any of the sense of adventure.
The Doctor once said, "Trouble's just the bits in between." What he was really saying is that the real adventure lies in just experiencing the universe: seeing new things; exploring the wonders that are just around the next corner. Tiny wonders, grand wonders; they're all amazing in their own right.
But sometimes trouble finds you, no matter how well you plan, no matter how careful you are, no matter how many times you check the coordinates.
Trouble found us a few weeks ago.
The minute we opened the TARDIS doors, we should have turned around and gone back in. I could feel the Doctor's concern prickling through our bond, but nothing seemed out of place, so he stepped forward onto the grassy field. Wilfred and Charlie, whooping and shouting, pushed past me and out through the doors behind their father.
Hope sauntered behind them, looking thoughtfully around her as she went. She remarked how hot and dry the air was. The purplish grass beneath our feet was charred black at the edges, and I could see puffs of arid soil blow into the air where Charlie and Wilfred disturbed the ground as they tussled and chased in an impromptu game of tag.
I could still feel the uneasiness in the Doctor's mind, but on the outside he was his normal, chipper self, regaling us as we ambled along the trail about the fertile soils, and the succulent ubuli berries which were the single most valuable export from this planet. I couldn't help but notice, as the perspiration trickled down my back, the soil didn't seem very fertile. The place was like a bloody desert; not the sort of place you'd expect "succulent" berries to grow. I pointed this out.
"Yes that's very strange…" he muttered and I felt his worry. But then he was rambling on again about how today was the day of the ubuli festival, where one could sample ubuli pies, ubuli stew, ubuli jam, ubuli tea, and hundreds of other confections, savouries, and beverages made with the berries. Then there were the soaps and lotions, oils, the cleaning products, the candles, the medicines and tonics. The berry was considered one of the wonders of the universe, so versatile and so delicious, it really had no equal. "Aaaaand," the Doctor was spouting, "just around this bend, there is a small village, a perfect place to…"
His voice trailed away, and fear clenched my heart as a burst of warning surged through our bond. Ahead, where the village should have been, were the scorched remains of houses, trails of smoke drifting into the sky.
We needed to get the hell out of there.
"Let's go. Now!" the Doctor commanded. When he spoke like that, no one questioned him. No one dared.
Wilfred and Charlie, rushing around, playing a little way off the path, turned at the sound of his voice, and began to trot back to join us. Suddenly a fireball careened through the air, smashing into the ground directly in front of them, and sending a cascade of rubble flying.
I watched, helpless, as the bodies of my two youngest babies were flung backwards, and I was knocked off my feet by the aftershock of the explosion. Suddenly soldiers erupted from the smoldering village, firing lasers at another faction, who had just emerged from the brittle undergrowth behind me at the side of the path, both groups heedless of the fact that five innocent tourists were caught in the crossfire.
I heard Charlie's cries, so faint over the gunfire around us, and scrambled to my feet, ready to do whatever it took to get to her and her brother. Her brother! Wilfred… my baby! I couldn't see him. I couldn't hear him. I was frantic and I made to run to him, when the Doctor's arms caught me about the waist, hauling me to a stop. "You call the TARDIS; I'll get them." And he was gone, dodging the gunfire and the flames that burst to life on the parched grass.
Sweat and smoke stinging my eyes made it hard to see the controls on my sonic watch, and I fumbled with the TARDIS recall setting. Finally, I activated it, and the wheeze of her engines filled my ears, (the sound of hope) and she landed precisely next me.
Another explosion sent me reeling. Hope clung to the side of the TARDIS like a lifeline, and then, regaining her balance she flung the doors wide. I was panicking, desperate, and searched for the Doctor through the smoke, but as he emerged, staggering, struggling to stay upright, with Charlie right behind him, I couldn't bear to acknowledge the sight before me.
I felt my world spinning, caving in on me. I couldn't breathe; I couldn't think; I couldn't move. All I could do was watch Wilfred's limp form, dangling from his father's arms as he hurled through the TARDIS doors.
Then suddenly my senses cleared and the world around me was jarred with the sounds of laser cannons; hectic motions of soldiers distorted in the dust-hazed air; sweat and grit stung my eyes; and the stench of war, blood and death filled my nostrils. I watched as Hope bounded into the TARDIS behind the Doctor, and became aware of Charlie's hand slipping into mine, tugging me to safety.
The TARDIS doors snapped closed behind me, and that world at war was suddenly gone as though it had never existed.
But it had existed.
It did exist.
The proof was in the grime on my clothes and skin; the fear in Charlie's eyes; the ringing in my ears from the explosions of bombs; and in the lifeless body of my son who lay in the infirmary.
"Mum! Mum!" Charlie's insistent voice challenged my brain and body to function. "Mum, we need to get into the Vortex. Now!"
I felt so helpless. So useless. But, this, this was something I could do. Take my family to safety. Better late than never, yeah.
I stepped up to the console and began to push buttons and pull switches and spin dials, and Charlie followed me, checking my input. Twice more around, each of us. Then, one nod from Charlie, and I pulled the final lever into position and we left the madness of that warzone behind to float in the peace of the Vortex.
I searched for the Doctor along our bond, but he had closed himself off, probably not wanting to worry me with all he was feeling in that moment. But, I needed him. Still, Wilfred needed him more, and he wouldn't appreciate all of my emotions affecting his concentration.
I collapsed to the floor, sobbing, and Charlie's arms wrapped around me, seeking out our bond. We cried together for a minute or two, then determined, we each pushed our emotions deep down inside our souls, wiped our tears, and with a deep breath walked through the infirmary doors.
Everything was dead quiet apart from the beeping of medical equipment. Wilfred lay there, looking small and helpless as the Doctor and Hope worked over him. As I watched Hope work, quickly and steadily, alongside her father, I felt such pride and joy as I realized what a strong young woman she was becoming. Then I felt guilt over being able to feel anything but worry for my son. It's mental how it's possible to feel so many conflicting emotions in a single moment. The Doctor met my gaze, and despite that our bond wasn't open, I could tell he was experiencing the same emotional conflict as me. He offered me a small tight smile, and returned his attention back to his patient.
Just half an hour later (though it seemed like forever), me and the Doctor each were clinging to one of Wilfred's hands, sending him all our love through our parental bond. He was all right. He would be all right. He had a concussion, a couple of broken ribs, but also a serious spinal fracture. I couldn't be thankful enough for all of the state of the art (circa 640th Century) medical equipment the Doctor had insisted on acquiring for the TARDIS after my injury a few years back. Without it, Wilfred's prognosis would have not been "expecting a full recovery".
We stayed in the Vortex for a few days, and the stillness and quiet set me on edge. I think the Doctor was feeling the same, but he still wouldn't open up to me. He didn't even speak to me or look at me, unless it was about day to day things. There again, I was doing the same to him. The guilt over what had happened was eating away at us.
That's when I realized why we used to keep leaping from one death-defying adventure to another. That lifestyle allowed us to run and hide from our deeper feelings; the immediacy of the more primal emotions, the fight and flight responses, overshadowed the urge to indulge in the more complex ones. Like guilt. So much guilt…
But we had also learned the hard way that running from our feelings didn't make it any easier to face them later on. Me and the Doctor spent so much time in our early days together in the Prime Universe, not communicating properly, and it had cost us years of our lives before I was able to get back to him. But in this universe, we had vowed not to let that happen. Of course, we both broke that vow more than once, but in the end, we always discovered we were stronger together.
We needed to talk.
I found him standing with his back to me, watching the kids play. Wilfred was in his bed, recuperating, and his sisters were entertaining him with two of Charlie's drones, two beautiful butterflies she'd dubbed Mothra and Battra, who were currently battling it out above him. They were all laughing, uninhibited, their joy filling the TARDIS. I envied them.
I took the Doctor's hand and led him away, wrapping his mind in my thoughts, trying to weaken the barriers he'd put up to keep me out. I took him to bed, reluctant though he was, and we made love, though his bond was still closed to me. But afterwards, as we lay there, he traced his fingers along the ugly, ragged scar that crossed from one side of my abdomen to the other, and pressed kisses along it. His tears were wetting my skin and suddenly, he opened his soul to me, a mad flood of emotions, pent up over the last few days.
"I knew we should have gone straight back, but I didn't," he sobbed aloud, and I stroked his hair. "I don't know why I didn't."
"Me too, love. I knew it too."
Whether we're human or Time Lord… we're living, thinking beings, and sometimes we make mistakes. Sometimes we choose to turn right instead of left; sometimes we don't think things through; sometimes we just long for adventure so badly we ignore our instincts. Whatever the reason, we just have to move on with life and try to learn from our mistakes, because life without a bit of wonder and adventure isn't really much of a life at all.
Just yesterday, at Wilfred's request for our first TARDIS adventure since he was injured, we returned to that same planet a few decades earlier in its timeline: it was lush and green and the fields were filled with ubuli berry bushes everywhere you looked. Hedgerows lined the path, and the village was filled with friendly chatter and smells of baking. It was sad to think of what the future held for these kind people. They couldn't know a three-year drought would hit them in just twenty years' time. Angry, bankrupt merchants, who relied on the ubuli berries for their trade, would gather armies to declare war on this peaceful, agrarian society, in retaliation for not being able to send their usual harvest.
Me and the Doctor wrapped our arms around one another, joy and peace filling our souls, as we watched our son running and playing, carefree, with his sisters. And when he took a huge bite of ubuli berry pie and grinned at us with a big, purple mustache of berry juice, we knew the adventure would always be worth the risk.
Happy Christmas, Santa. Hope you enjoy the ubuli berry treats we left you this year. There are enough to share with everyone, even the reindeer have their own special ubuli snacks!
love, Rose