Vignette 37: Jamie McCrimmon, the Second Doctor, and the Ninth Doctor; part 2 of 2.
Jamie continued to hug this Doctor. He didn't have to wonder as to what he had been through. Jamie knew.
"How bad was it?" the Scot asked.
"How bad was what?"
"The war?"
The Doctor pulled away from his embrace just to stare at him in amazement.
"How did…?"
"How did I know?" Jamie asked. "Because the look in yer eyes is the same one that I used to have when ye found me at Culloden Moor."
The Doctor stared at him for a moment before nodding in understanding.
"What happened, Doctor?" Jamie asked, softly. "What happened in the war?"
"Horrible things, Jamie," he said, looking away. "I've done horrible things. I'm not the hero you thought I was."
"Ye'll always be my hero," the piper stated.
The Doctor didn't reply to this; his throat tightened. It turned out that he was spared from reply as Jamie's Doctor now arrived.
"Alright, which one of me crashed the TARDIS here!?" he demanded, and then he stopped and stared open-mouth at the interior. "…Oh my word—what have you done to her!? I don't like it!"
The other Doctor snapped out of his daze as he looked upon his younger self.
"I fully intended for this to be a nice, relaxing holiday at the seaside—not another opportunity to break the Laws of Time!" Jamie's Doctor said. "The Time Lords are bound to bring us grief for this!"
"I don't think so," the other Doctor said.
"Just what do you mean by that?"
"I mean, I don't think they will," he simply stated, and it was Jamie's eyes that widened in sudden understanding.
The war must have involved Gallifrey, the piper realized. And something had happened to the Time Lords. Still, the piper found it difficult to sympathize with the other Time Lords after everything they had put his Doctor through—and how they always insulted him mercilessly.
"Yes, well, you do have the gift of hindsight," Jamie's Doctor conceded, not cluing in on the other Doctor's mood. "Very well; we'd best not stay here and cross timestreams any further than we have to. Come along, Jamie."
"Wait," Jamie said. "Before ye and I go back, there's something that I need to say—that both of ye need to hear."
Jamie's Doctor blinked, surprised to hear Jamie's serious tone.
"Jamie, what's going on?" he asked. "What did he tell you?"
"That does nae matter; ye'll find oot eventually, won' ye?"
"…True…"
"I just wanted to thank ye," Jamie said. "For e'erything ye did for me. Ye saved my life back at Culloden. But ye di'n stop there. Ye took me along, even though ye had no reason to. Ye took an uneducated war child under yer wing. Ye taught me to read and write. And ye taught me how to think things through, rather than to rush in blindly. And there's more than that, actually. Traveling with ye, these past thirteen years… Och I know it sounds silly…. But it's been just fantastic."
"Fantastic…" the other Doctor repeated. He looked away, but the corners of his mouth twitched into a ghost of a smile. "Yes; yes, it was, Jamie. Absolutely fantastic."
"I agree; I don't think it's a silly thing to say at all," Jamie's Doctor said. "And it's not as though it hasn't been enjoyable for me." He placed his hands on Jamie's shoulders. "In fact, I daresay I've gotten in return much more than I gave."
"I can agree with that," the other Doctor said, and he now looked at his past self. "I'm rather jealous of you, you know. You've got him with you still. All I've got left are the memories."
"Yes, well, I…" Jamie's Doctor began, but he trailed off as he now looked into his other self's eyes—and saw the immeasurable pain within them. "Oh, my word…"
"Doctor?" Jamie asked.
"I don't know what you've been through, but I know you shouldn't travel alone," he said. "Jamie…"
"Eh?" the Scot asked.
"Jamie, I think it might be prudent, perhaps even necessary, if you spend some time with my future self—travel with him for some time."
"No," the other Doctor said, so quickly that both Jamie and his Doctor stared at him. "The paradoxes it would create…"
"Yes, I suppose so…" Jamie's Doctor sighed. "Very well; come along, Jamie. We'd best let him get on his way."
His Doctor turned and left, pausing to sneer at the console room's décor once more before exiting.
"Are ye going to be alright?" Jamie asked, as he began to follow his Doctor.
"I'll be fantastic," the other Doctor promised, evidently having found a new favorite word.
Jamie smiled, and then folded his arms.
"Are ye going to say it, too?"
"Yes, I am. You look after him," he said. "It wasn't just the paradoxes that made me turn down his offer. Not that I wouldn't want to travel with you again—but he needs you more than I do."
"And I need him, too," Jamie promised.
And as he left, he saw, out of the corner of his eye, that this Doctor finally managed a genuine smile. He stepped outside this TARDIS, and watched with his Doctor as it dematerialized.
"I do wonder what he went through," Jamie's Doctor sighed, as they walked back the way they had come. "Of course, as you said, I'll find out anyway…"
"I just hope he does nae travel alone; ye were right—ye don' deserve that," the Scot said, pausing to purchase another drink from the nearby hotel. He ended up buying two drinks, much to his Doctor's surprise.
"Haven't you had enough?"
Wordlessly, Jamie smiled and handed him one of the drinks.
"Oh! Well, thank you, Jamie. Hmm, yes I see what you mean about the umbrellas. Rather whimsical, don't you think?"
"Just like ye," the piper said, and he raised his glass. "To us?"
The Doctor grinned and raised his glass to meet Jamie's.
"To us."