The Eleventh Doctor was a much happier fellow. Younger, energetic...but he had a dark side too. Maybe it was someone's bad influence...

Life goes on and your priorities change. The Cracks, the Ponds, the Silence, the Question. The Impossible Girl. You don't forget the important things...but they move to the back of your mind sometimes. Until someone says something to conjure them up.

"Are you proposing to someone?"

The Doctor jumped and turned around. Amy was holding a ring box. Rory's ring box. Poor, poor Rory.

The Doctor felt his hearts sink. He thought about Rory being sucked into the bright white fissure, taken from this world...just like the Master. Amy was lucky in a way—at least she couldn't feel her heartache. You can't miss what you don't remember.

When the Pandorica opened, and the universe was rebooted, there was a faint hope in the Doctor's hearts that the Master might have returned. After all, Amy's parents had. But the Doctor knew it wasn't true. He would've felt him in his head. Even though the link Rassilon had made between them was broken...there would always be an ineffable bond between them.

Oh well. Weddings always cheered him up.

"You knew Sam was the Master, didn't you?"

The TARDIS pursed her lips, bobbing her head from side to side. "Yes and no."

"What's that supposed to mean?" the Doctor pouted.

"I could sense something was very wrong with him. His mind...it was like pouring salt into coffee. Not that I've ever had coffee. Is coffee any good? Does-"

The Doctor grabbed her hands gently before she could go off on a tangent. "But you didn't know it was him."

The TARDIS gave him a sorrowful look. "I think deep down I did. I didn't want to believe it, for your sake...but for the record, he really did love you. Both of them. And Sam really was good to the core."

The Doctor wrinkled his nose at her. "Then why did you keep shocking him?"

"Well...he was rather an idiot, wasn't he?"

The Doctor couldn't help but laugh.

Crong...crong...crong...

The sound of the cloister was calling to him like a siren song. The Doctor stared at the ominous 11 on the hotel room door...and slowly pushed it open.

"Of course...who else?"

The dark haired, violet eyed boy in rust colored robes stared at him tearfully, sitting before one of the Cracks. "Are you going to leave me again?" Koschei said with a sniffle. Suddenly he was encapsulated by white light, and sucked into the Crack, his screams echoing through the chasm.

The Doctor swallowed and let the door swing closed.

In a strange way, the Doctor thought the Master actually might have liked River Song. Sure, he would've probably tried to kill her since she was in love with the Doctor...but the Master would've respected the hell out of her, an honor he didn't grant most humans.

"What was he like? When he was a child?" River asked him one day with her head on his shoulder. They were sitting with their feet dangling out of the TARDIS doors as the ship hovered in space and they stared out into the Feralox Nebula.

The Doctor sighed, playing idly with her fingers. "He was...gentle. And sweet. And good. And also a mad genius. A lot like you."

"I'll take that as a compliment."

"It was meant to be."

River lifted her head from his shoulder. "Why don't you try to rescue him?"

"He's on Gallifrey. Impossible to reach."

"He escaped once."

"I doubt he'd be that lucky twice. He's never had much of it to begin with."

River stared at him with a pained expression. The Doctor tried to give her a smile. "Besides, wouldn't you get jealous if he came back?"

"Oh, sweetie..." River slowly smirked. "What makes you think there wouldn't be room for me in between the two of you?"

The Doctor nearly fell out of the TARDIS in surprise, which made River laugh. It made him laugh too.