A/N: SORRY! :/ Had a massive inspiration mind-block on this fic - I just was NOT able to put what I wanted into words I liked until now! TARDIS-sized apologies to all of you who have waited SO patiently! Here's the update you've waited long enough for. I hope you enjoy it. :D
Additional - for those of you who've watched 'Logopolis', please let me know what you think of this chapter's Watcher hypothesis, via review or PM. A second opinion is very useful to me.
Future Echoes
Romana let out a strangled cry of frustrated fury. It wasn't just fury, though...it was dread. The Master hadn't earned the moniker 'Gallifrey's Most Infamous Child' without reason. One thing was certain – between the collaboration with the Master and the appearance of the Watcher, this was not going to end well...
"I'm going after him," Tegan resolved, stepping toward the Door Control...only for the Time Lady to stop her. But before Romana could argue, the Air Stewardess cut her off with a look that said; 'Don't try to talk me out of this.'
Romana could only stare, uncomprehending. It was in times like these that she would see what the Doctor saw in Humans so much. "You'd risk your life...for someone you hardly know?"
"Well he doesn't want you going out there, does he?" Tegan retorted. "And since you're the one who promised to get me back to Heathrow...I guess I owe you one."
The Time Lady sighed. "Very well – I'll open the Door, but be careful," she added with a don't-argue-with-me expression.
"Yes, Ma'am," the Air Stewardess replied. "Please enjoy your flight," she joked weakly. No sooner had Romana opened the Door than Tegan had rushed out to aid the Doctor.
"Romana-" Adric protested, only to be cut off.
"Someone's got to help the Doctor, Adric," Romana deadpanned, her eyes drifting to the Corridor Entrance, noticing the Watcher standing there. "I need to find out who he," she pointed, at which both Nyssa and Adric turned to the ghostly man, "is...and why he's here."
The Watcher walked up to the Console and fixed Romana with a stare. It was then that she heard a voice in her head...though it sounded like there were at least ten people speaking – possibly more – their voice subsumed into each other. The Time Lady knew that it was the voice of the Watcher...
Do you trust me? The voice – or voices – of the ghostly entity presented the question to her...
...and the Time Lady's answer was thusly; Yes. There was no Time to not trust him.
Having confirmed that he had Romana's trust, the Watcher began working at the TARDIS Controls. Upon closer inspection, she noticed that he was tampering with the Co-ordinate Subsystem.
"What's he doing?" Nyssa asked, worry in her voice.
"He's unsetting the Co-ordinates," Adric gasped. The next words were laced with horror – a sentiment that would have been echoed by Romana if she had not come to know the Doctor so well...but if the Watcher did embody the man's past, present and future...they would get out of this. "He's disconnecting the entire Co-ordinate Subsystem! But he can't do that! NO!"
"What's the matter?!" their Trakenite friend cried in panic.
"Down, everyone!" Romana called to both of them, rushing into the Corridors with them, shutting the door and making them squat down. "We're being taken right out of the Space-time Continuum!" As she said this, she felt a little giddy as a most peculiar sensation came over her – a sensation she knew was connected to her Temporal sense. Since they were leaving Space and Time, that sense wouldn't be able to tell her anything – Time was...absent. When it was over, all three of them stood up.
"We're hovering," Adric realised, his mind quickly discerning the situation.
"Outside Space and Time," Nyssa added.
"But the TARDIS isn't supposed to do that," the Alzarian amongst them replied.
"A lot of what isn't supposed to happen seems to happen in a life with the Doctor, Adric," Romana told him. "That does appear to be the M.O. – take what can't be done and then do it." She smiled, but the smile was a hollow one – it had none of the enthusiasm or exuberance of the Cheshire Cat grins she'd sometimes shared with the Doctor in the Past. "Either way...we're safe from the Entropy Wave unleashed by the Collapse of Logopolis." Anything that was left of her smile faded away, and her mind tuned out of the conversation between Adric and Nyssa. Every world she'd ever known was now in the most grievous of perils. Even if the Doctor did manage to stop it, something was going to end up being destroyed. Her mind briefly went back to her Universal History classes – there had been rumours of a good chunk of this Reality disappearing completely in 1981, the event happening too fast for the Time Lords to discern which ones by simply observing. Time was being rewritten – to devastating effect.
Before she could muse anymore on these thoughts, the Watcher entered the Corridors and beckoned the group to follow him. They did so...
*DW*
...finding themselves in the Cloister Room a while later. Romana remained silent in deep thought while Adric summarised the events of this day to Nyssa.
"When all this began, the Doctor and Romana wanted to reconfigure the TARDIS so it would work like the Master's," he told her.
"What's wrong with it?" Nyssa asked him.
But it was Romana who supplied the answer, speaking for the first time in a while. "She was already a Museum piece when the Doctor stole her, Nyssa," she informed her Trakenite friend. "Entropy is taking its toll on the Old Girl. The Chameleon Circuit malfunctioned around 300 years back in his Timestream...or so he says..."
Gets a bit difficult to remember after a while, doesn't it, Romanadvoratrelundar? Several different voices joked inside her head...at which she looked up, one glance at the ghostly figure telling her that it was the Watcher speaking.
"Romana?" both Adric and Nyssa asked her.
"He wants to speak with me," Romana answered them. "Wait here." She then began walking up to the ethereal man who was supposedly a representation of the Doctor's essence. You wanted to talk to me? She asked the Watcher...who raised his hands to her temple, the Time Lady taking it as a sign of wanting to initiate a telepathic contact. But was that even possible for beings like the Watcher?
The answer soon became abundantly clear...
*DW*
Romana found herself in a blurry landscape. The tint of burnt orange that pervaded the place was too vivid to have any kind of material existence. This left only one explanation – the landscape (or was it mindscape?) was the representation of the mind – or soul – of the Watcher. And speaking of the Watcher...
"Hello," the white-clad figure – not quite so ethereal here as he had been in Reality – spoke in twelve different voices...some more noticeable than others. At least one was Scottish...while another bore a Cockney accent. But there was one voice that stood out for her amongst all the others – the one she recognised as the distinctive booming voice of the Doctor she knew now...the fourth incarnation. But as there were twelve voices speaking...this must be a representation of the Doctor's future as well as his past and present.
"What is this...Doctor?" Romana couldn't help but ask. This was one of the occasions when she was bordering on clueless. This should be quite impossible...
"Never say impossible, Romana...just a little unlikely," one voice answered this time, as if to reply to what she had thought rather than what she had said. That voice had a...Cockney (if she recalled correctly)...accent to it.
"How?" was all the Time Lady could say to the strange figure before her.
"It's a Timey-wimey thing," another voice replied...so young, yet so old.
What a ridiculous turn of phrase! Romana snorted to herself.
"Agreed," yet another voice replied. "Those two talk like children...I swear that they're ashamed of being grown-ups!" This voice was more gravelly than the last two...yet there was a younger feel to it than them.
"You've always been an overgrown child, Doctor," Romana smiled a cheeky smile as she said this. "This is your mindscape – if you can speak in twelve different voices...it follows that you can appear as twelve different people. Show yourselves."
A few silent moments passed before the Watcher dispersed into twelve separate cavities of Light...which reformed into different people around her. The first figure to form was an old man dressed in Edwardian formal garb, holding in his hand a walking stick Romana could have sworn she'd seen someplace in the TARDIS Wardrobe. The second figure was in clothes several sizes too big for him and sported a haircut reminiscent of the members of an Earth band known as 'The Beatles', while the white-haired third figure was wearing a frilly shirt and a blue velvet jacket, with a cape, of all things, to top it all off. The next figure to appear was one Romana recognised immediately – it was the Doctor's curly-haired current incarnation, complete with the maroon frock coat and multicoloured scarf. Where had that scarf got to? Was the brief thought the Time Lady happened upon before the next incarnation appeared, a blonde-haired man sporting Cricket garb of the Earth Edwardian Era, celery tucked onto the left lapel of the beige coat. Romana almost got eye ache when she saw what the next blonde (but curly-haired) man was wearing – the most ridiculous patchwork coat she had ever seen in her lives! Not even the most pompous and arrogant Time Lords would have given wearing that – accompanied by yellow and black striped trousers – a second thought! The seventh figure to appear was garbed in a dark brown suit paired with one of the most wilfully odd jumpers (question marks?) the Time Lady had ever seen, carrying a question-mark-handled umbrella in hand. If the last two people were a midlife crisis for the Doctor, the handsome shaggy auburn-haired figure to follow seemed to signify the end to it – the velvet appeared to have made a comeback, this time in the form of a green frock coat and accompanied by a cravat and a cream-coloured waistcoat. The flounce that the outfit imparted was completely absent on the next figure – wearing a Soldier's garb and adorned with a weapons belt, he was arguably the most shocking incarnation so far. This was followed by a short-haired Doctor wearing a jumper, a leather jacket and a pair of jeans, who was in turn succeeded by a spiky-haired pretty-boy sporting a brown pinstriped suit with white canvas shoes. The final figure was floppy-haired, with a purple frock coat, dark waistcoat and trousers, the finishing touch being a bow tie, which, unlike the second figure's, appeared to be hand-tied.
There were now absolutely no doubts in Romana's mind – these men were the Doctor...through the ages, as it were. But how was this possible?
"Don't you remember what I said on the Empress, Romana?" the 4th Doctor – she couldn't think of a suitable system of identification save for numbering – asked with his signature grin. "I specialise in the impossible."
"But there can't be this many of you..." Romana trailed off, a thought occurring to her, "...unless, of course...you're from his future?" There was a consensus of confirmation from all the Doctors present. "How?"
"When you've travelled the Universe as long as we have, Romana, you're bound to run into yourself," the rainbow-garbed Doctor answered with a shrug.
"Don't patronise me, Doctor, just tell me," the Time Lady scolded the garishly-clad man, before fixing the others, one at a time, with a stare. "How did this happen?"
"As I said, Timey-wimey," the Doctor in the purple frock coat replied, much to the irritation of some of the others...especially the one wearing the weapons belt.
"Oh, Timey-wimey again," the man groaned. "What exactly is your issue with telling her like it is?!"
"I've...no idea where he gets it from," the celery-wearing Doctor piped up in an effort to save face, though any fool could tell that he was the guilty incarnation.
"Oh, for Heaven's sake!" the elderly 1st Doctor snapped, pre-emptively stopping an argument before it could even begin. The man then turned to the velvet-clad 3rd incarnation. "Why don't you explain it to this young lady?"
"What?!" the baggy-clothed 2nd Doctor exclaimed. "Why the Fancypants?!"
"Because the Scarecrow will just end up twittering on and fooling around with his flute, that's why," the 3rd Doctor replied none too pleasantly.
"Just because you're not musical-!" the 2nd began raising his voice at the slight against his recorder.
But the man was cut off by the 1st. "Oh, use your intelligence, you tiresome clown – you could never resist the chance to play that blasted flute!"
The 2nd Doctor just huffed, while the 3rd began explaining what was happening. "As best that I understand it, my dear," the 3rd Doctor began, "we are all the combined echoes of the lives that the Doctor has led – from Gallifrey" – he pointed to the 1st Doctor – "to Trenzalore." He gestured to the Doctor in the purple frock coat.
This left a few urgent questions in Romana's mind. "But if you're all of the Doctors, echoing back from the end of his life...couldn't this infer a Universe-ending paradox?" she asked them.
"No," the man in leather answered. "As long as the Doctor of your time doesn't learn about who we really are...Time should be fine."
"So what did you tell him on Earth?" Romana questioned them. It was best that the Doctor did not know what lay ahead his future.
"We only informed him that we were from the Future...and that his life was drawing to a close," the Doctor in the brown suit and question-mark jumper replied sombrely.
The Time Lady was speechless. So, it was certain – the Doctor that she knew so well...was going to die. "And there's nothing I can do to stop it, is there?" In retrospect, she couldn't stop herself from thinking that if she'd flat-out refused to leave him on Logopolis...she may have been able to prevent that from happening. A single tear fell across her left cheek...and the man in the velvet frock coat took her by the hand and clasped it firmly.
"Romanadvoratrelundar," he told her. "You've already done a great deal about it. Just by being here...you might have averted something worse."
"He's right," the Doctor in pinstripes continued. "If you don't believe us...ask the guy who's next in line to be the Doctor." He gestured to the man in the Edwardian Cricketer's garb...and Romana turned her attention to him.
"What do they mean?" she tentatively asked the man she now recognised as the 5th Doctor.
"If you hadn't stayed after the TARDIS left E-Space, Romana..." the young man told her, "...I think my predecessor would have died...in pain...afraid...wishing desperately to see you one last time." No-one noticed the 4th Doctor blushing, which was probably just as well for him – he didn't think he could have endured any teasing at the moment. "The upcoming regeneration is part of who the Doctor could one day be – the only way you can help..."
"Is by being there," Romana finished. "But just by being there?"
"Not precisely," the Doctor in the dark suit told her. "You could open a telepathic link with him to ease the passing...and, more crucially, to witness an important vision when the time comes."
"A vision of the Future? More paradoxes?" the Time Lady inquired, smiling despite knowing what had to happen.
"Once this encounter with the Master is over, there are some things you'll have to forget about this meeting," the man in the rainbow coat explained. "You'll remember us as a vague indication of the Doctor's future...but the precise details will fade to dreams, as will the vision you and the Doctor will witness during his regeneration. You can't know too much about the Future, Romana."
"Touché," she replied cheekily. "But there are a couple of things I really ought to ask before this conference closes down."
"Name them," was the perfectly-in-unison, chorused reply from all Doctors present.
"Shouldn't there be thirteen of you? I only count twelve."
The man in the pinstriped suit blushed uncontrollably at this. "Well...I..."
"Sandshoes here cheated...and regenerated into the same face," the man wearing the purple coat and the hand-tied bow tie answered for his predecessor.
"How?" Romana asked him.
"Spoilers," Sandshoes and Dickie-Bow replied in perfect unison.
The man with the bandolier groaned in good-natured frustration at their antics before focusing on the Time Lady. "And the last thing?"
"Are you really just echoes...or are you something more?"
This was the question that provoked the longest silence. For a moment...it looked like she may not get an answer. But soon enough...
"You remember the custom of the Naming Ceremony, no doubt?" the 3rd Doctor asked her.
"Yes – that the name you choose is your promise," she replied with a fond smile. "Go on."
"If I were to hazard a guess...I would guess that we're an embodiment of the promise," he told her.
"Never cruel, nor cowardly," Pinstripes continued for the 3rd Doctor.
"Never give up...never give in," the Warrior trailed on.
"And while we're here...there's a few nuggets of wisdom we've picked up over the centuries," the leather-clad Doctor added, before turning to the earlier incarnations. "Care to share, Doctors?"
"Courage isn't just a matter of not being afraid – it's being afraid and doing what you have to do anyway," the 3rd Doctor told her.
"If ever you wonder whether you've done good in the Universe...Time will tell – it always does," the Doctor in the dark brown suit continued.
"You can choose for your lives to be different to anyone else's," the 2nd Doctor took up the slack. "If you really wanted it...there may well be nobody in the Universe who could do what you choose to do – that's what makes people unique."
"Right now, all over the Universe, Romana," the 4th Doctor told her, "the pain is persisting and the crying continuing...all because of the actions of one man – the Master. It must be stopped."
"How can we stop it?" she asked them.
"If the Master could unleash this...apocalypse," the Doctor in the bad coat began, "it follows that the Doctor should be able to halt it in its tracks."
"Brave hearts, Romana," the 5th Doctor told her with a warm smile. "This is where we must leave you."
"But before we leave...there is one thing you must know," the Warrior told her. But before the man could continue, the Time Lady raised her hand, making him fall silent.
"I think I already know," Romana smiled...although, if truth be told, she had two ideas of what he had been about to say. One idea was; 'I miss you.' The other was; 'I never stopped loving you.' But now was not the time to worry about what may have happened to her in the Doctor's future – they had a Universe to save. "Goodbye, Doctors." So saying, she pulled out of the mindscape and closed off the telepathic conference with the Watcher...