Okay, sorry for the late update. I'm really, really, really busy, so there's going to be more of a gap but, I PROMISE that I will not give up on this. So, trust me.
This chapter will be told from the point of view of Donna.
I woke up this morning desperately wanting croissants. It's lucky my husband and I got a hotel across the street from this little cafe, where we'd gotten cupcakes after the flight. So I kissed his cheek as he slept and hurried to pick up a warm pastry. The little bell dinged as I pushed the door open, but the café was destroyed. It looked like a bomb hit it. A bleached blonde man who looks remarkably familiar jumps into a trashcan and it disappears. My temples start throbbing. I get headaches a lot. Maybe I'm getting old, although if anyone suggested it, I'd slap them.
"Oi!"
I thought there were only a few people in the shop, but at a second glance, I see three people hiding behind the bar and two sheltering behind the table. It's surprisingly crowded for a corner café in the morning. I notice that the croissants have been destroyed by a wayward espresso machine, which reminds me why I'm here. The man with a bowtie and a tweed jacket in the center of the shop stares at me like I'm a ghost. For a moment, I feel like I've seen him before. But not him, someone else.
If that makes sense
"What the hell happened here?"
A girl with long brown hair and sweet eyes brushes glass out of her hair and helps a short man with a carefree smile to his feet.
The man hasn't taken his eyes off of me. My head pounds in time to my heartbeat.
"Donna?"
How does he know my name?
"Who the hell are you?"
Why does my head hurt so much?
I feel my knees wobbling. Golden light obscures my vision and the man with the bowtie becomes a man in a pinstriped suit with messy hair. A long streak of nothing. I remember alien creatures, the noble Oods, the Daleks, the Metacrisis, an enormous wasp…It's like someone's driven a spike through my head. I feel…dizzy.
And everything goes black.
The Doctor's Point of View
Donna.
My best friend. The most important woman in all of creation. And now she's standing in this coffee shop and she doesn't know who I am.
Sam catches her as she falls, carefully moving her to a spot free from debris. Clara squeezes my hand.
"Is that Donna Noble? Your friend?"
I can only nod. John drops to his knees besides Donna and touches a hand to her head, taking her pulse with the other. Sherlock watches him with a strange look on his face.
"She's all right, but I can't tell why she fainted. Doctor, how do you know her?"
"She was…my companion. We traveled together. We were best friends. She saved the universe by absorbing my regeneration energy and creating a metacrisis…another, human version of myself. And she, in turn, gained some of my timelord energy. But it would have killed her. I had to erase what she was, what she became…kill her in order to save her."
I turn away. I can't look at her, at her face, at the person who was so good and so worthy and suffered the worst possible way, who lost what she was.
I hear Gabriel clear his throat behind me.
"You know, pal, I'm an archangel. I can do some pretty amazing things. There might be a way I can help her."
I can hear him kneel next to John and I chance a look over my shoulder. He's studying her face intently.
"I can help her. Her mind is so strong already, it just needs…a sort of reinforcement to bring back her memories."
"You can make her remember me?"
"Oh no, she'll do that. I just make sure she won't die in the process. But she has to give her consent. She has to choose to remember. It's her decision."
Donna stirs.
"No one better have stolen my wallet!"
I clear my throat.
"Donna."
She looks at me and for a moment I want to cry.
"My name is the Doctor. I need to ask you something."
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