Chapter five.
"A long time ago," he smiled, "always wanted to start a story like that."
He cleared his throat, "anyway, it was about 6,600 years ago, give or take a century, and when I was in my 13th body. No, hang on, that was when I got them back."
He placed his hand on his chin thoughtfully. "It was more around when I was 1,200. So that would make it…" He trailed off, mumbling to himself, before he threw his hand out and said, "Oh, forget it, even my own counting system is confusing me. Mind you, I really was forgetful then."
In response to the questioning looks he replied, "well I regenerated twice into this one, well, three times now, and the other unaccounted... well, for a long time it was a secret I kept as close to me as my own name. But things…happened. I was called in to investigate Time Lord art. Time Lord art can be used as a stasis chamber you see? And it seemed that something was taking advantage of that, and they escaped. I discovered later that it was a very old nemesis of mine, the Zygons. They can change their appearance to look like anyone. While I was trying to figure all that out, a time fisher opened up. Naturally, I jumped in and I was surprised to find that it took me to, well, myself. It was crossing my own timeline in a huge way. But with the past me and the current me around, we could double my brainpower to figure it all out. Before anything more could happen, a third me, the secret me, the one I never talked about, did my best to never think about, suddenly appeared out of the time fisher as well. Only later when time caught up, was I able to remember what really happened.
The Moment, he whispered, the way one lowers their voice to tell a secret. "The weapon I was going to use to destroy Gallifrey, had become sentient. It created a projection."
The Doctor turned to beam at Rose. "It said that the name of its chosen form was called... Bad Wolf."
Rose Gasped. "But it wasn't me!" She shouted, before comprehending what she just blurted and forgetting her vow of temporary silence.
The Doctor chuckled.
"Of course not. And not only did I not remember it till later, as in my thirteenth body later, but it was also before I actually met you."
Rose grinned back. It was somehow endearing to know that she was in the Doctor's life even before she knew it. Even though it wasn't her, it was apparently her image or likeness or something.
"Anyway," the Doctor continued. "So The Moment was the one who opened the time fishers. She wanted me to show me what my life would be like if I went through with my plans. Only things went different. So so wonderfully different. I had this companion at the time, Clara her name was. She was absolutely stone-cold brilliant."
His expression gazed off fondly at her memory and he missed the brief flash of jealousy from Rose.
"I went with my younger self to meet the me that was about to do it. Gallifrey was un-time locked thanks to The Moment. And just when I was about to make the biggest mistake of my life, Clara reminded me of who I am, of who I really was, and who I promised myself to always be."
He smiled softly to himself. Looking off into a distinct past that only he could see.
"Just like that, I remembered. I remembered all the late nights, all the lonely ones, and the wishing, the centuries of pain. I remembered the desire to just be able to do it over, to change it. I used to think for days on end, uselessly, what I would do differently if nothing could stop me. And it turned out to not be useless at all. In that one moment, my two past selves and I were completely linked, and we all knew what must be done. I gathered every one of my past selves, we each used our own TARIDS's, and with all that power, we transported the whole planet into a painting, a stasis painting. Successfully suspending the planet in an alternate universe, safe and sound."
He swelled with pride at his own brilliance and accomplishment.
"But the timelines changed too much. I wasn't able to remember what happened since right before I almost destroyed the planet to myself suddenly dying of old age in the TARDIS. In my mind, I did just do it, and then I regenerated. Then almost that very same day, I went into a shop in London and found the most beautiful, clever, and brave human girl there. I grabbed her hand…"
He leaned over and took Rose's hand in his own, "and I told her to run."
He paused for a moment in happy silence. Allowing himself the simple pleasure of just holding her hand.
Rose didn't blush. She squeezed his hand reassuringly, letting him know just how much she agreed.
"That's a lot to take in," Jack said after a while.
"I know," the Doctor replied softly, never tearing his hand nor gaze from Rose.
"Okay, so Gallifrey was never really gone?"
The Doctor swallowed visibly and then nodded. He finally looked away from Rose, but instead of taking his hand away, he shimmied closer to where her legs rested and leaned against them.
Rose laughed lightly. They used to sit like this all the time, mostly in the library. She would sit on an armchair and he would sit on the floor and lean against her legs like the back of a chair.
Rose let her muscles remember how to move and refused to think about the majesty of the crown as she removed it from his head. She placed it in his lap; marveling and how smooth it felt to the touch. It was almost like water, diamond water.
She then played with his hair, gently massaging her hands over his still slightly damp scalp.
She missed this... she missed him.
She was deliberately not looking at her mother. She wanted it to just be the two of them, in the TARDIS library, on a lazy night in. The Doctor would tell her a story, and they would sit there contentedly, and just be.
The Doctor didn't have a book in front of him. But that didn't stop him from telling Rose a story.
"It wasn't too long after my timeline caught up and I was able to properly search for Gallifrey, that I found it. It was nothing like I ever imagined it would be, finding it. It was located on a planet that was once going to be my burial sight, but I changed that, like other things. Or really, Clara changed that, she really did a lot for me..."
He tired off. Rose didn't want to be rude, and fought the little five-year-old monster inside of her that wanted to shout at him to shut up about this Clara girl, and focus instead that the Doctor owed this girl his life and by extension, so did she now.
The Doctor gave his head a little jerk beneath Rose's fingers, and she moved them away, resting them on her side.
The Doctor leaned his head back to look at her upside down and gave her a crooked little smile.
Rose smiled back. She knew that look. She continued playing with his hair and he relaxed against her legs, sighing contentedly.
"There was this huge war. I ended up growing old there... again. I got very old. That place became a third home to me, and I became very fond of it. I protected that world against all my old enemies and some new. But then came the day I was too old to fight. I knew that was the moment I was going to die and I could do nothing but accept it. But Clara, she..." he gave a little chuckle.
"She told them off, the lot of them! Told them if they ever cared about me they would help me and not let me die. And they honestly did! They gave me a whole new regeneration cycle. And with it, some new tricks."
He didn't elaborate on what "tricks" meant, but they all knew. That must be how he got his strange new powers.
"Regenerated again after that, died of old age again. The life I lived after that was... Interesting to say the least. Clara traveled with me for a long time after that. Honestly, it was one of the first times someone stopped traveling with me because they were too old. She got married you see, had children. It became really hard to travel with her after that, but I still visited until she died, and even now I still see her boy David all the time. He's my Godson. That was new for me, we don't have those here, but I think we should, I love it! Anyway, all the while that this was happening with Clara, Gallifrey was trying to get back to its own feet. It wasn't doing so well. It was out of commission for a long time and things were different. The people had all seen real horrors and it made everyone a little less stuck up about it all. I'm not sure why, maybe I just didn't want to see it at first, but it took me a while to realize that they kept coming to me and asking me things, getting advice, making me come back to do this and that. It was only when they wouldn't even make a law without asking me first that I just decided to demand an explanation."
He looked solemn for a moment, but it vanished very quickly, to be replaced by a barely audible sigh. "Be careful what you wish for," he whispered softly.
The Doctor paused in his story. He stared hard at the crown in his lap, frowning at it. As if it was the cause of all his problems instead of the infinite glory it exuded.
No one interrupted him, and they sat in peaceful silence, trying to process the vast amounts that he was telling them at once.
"I traveled, more than anyone; I had real experience, more than anyone…" His voice was robotic and he spoke in a monotone that sounded rehearsed, copied. It didn't sound like his voice at all.
"I saved more lives than anyone," he all but spat.
"I felt more than anyone, I was more powerful than anyone, I was cleverer than anyone, I was always right, I was the one who saved Gallifrey, and countless other places, I was the one who everyone wanted, and this apparently meant that I had no choice. At least, all that was the list of reasons they gave me. But sometimes, I'm still not convinced that they aren't just scared of my power. They never exactly "gave" me my enhancement of my general Time Lord psychic-ness. You see, when a Time Lord turns one thousand, there is a change. Honestly, it's kind of similar to your human puberty thing."
Jack laughed and mouthed thing?
"Depending on the Time Lord, and depending on his natural state of ability, brainpower, excreta, his or her psychic ability can enhance or something else could change. That being said, it is extremely uncommon for what happened to me to happen...ever! There were only ever three people that gained that kind of enhanced abilities. Me, the Master, and Rassilon himself. With me being the only living one now…well, who's left to overthrow me?" He added bitterly.
They were silent for a moment. Jack broke it first.
"So, does that mean you've had this ability for a while now?"
The Doctor shook his head, staring deeply at his crown again.
"No, I always had the potential for it, probably something to do with my unique brain. But I fought it, I didn't want it, and when I hit my thousandth birthday, I hid myself away and did…well, a lot of things that I shouldn't have, to try and dormant it. But once I got the new cycle… everything I did to bury my potential enhancement came undone as well…"
He looked up sharply; Rose took her hands off of him in alarm and for the first time he seemed not to notice. She couldn't see his face, only the back of his head. But judging from Jack's concerned frown and the way the Doctor's voice cracked when he said well, she knew, she just knew that he was fighting back tears.
Rose made up her mind. She let go of all her doubts about whether he was her Doctor or not and just slid down from the sofa, and pulled him into a tight hug.
He returned the embrace fervently, but he did not start sobbing. But then Rose really didn't think he would. Instead, he stared hard, unfocused at what seemed to be something only he could see.
"So, they made you do it, take the job I mean?" Jack said, barely above a whisper. Changing the subject away from the Doctor's telekinesis.
The Doctor nodded into Rose's blouse, refusing to give up the comfort of being in her arms.
"But, it can't be so bad, righ'? I mean," Jackie waved her arms around at all the splendor of the grand room, "what's so bad about being king or whatever you are?"
The Doctor gently pushed himself away from Rose but didn't move far. He placed his hands in hers and straightened his back.
"What's wrong Jackie," he began voice suddenly calm. "Is that I never wanted this, I hate being in this position, I hate people saluting me and watching after my every move, nothing gets done without me saying so. Do you know how frustrating that is? I don't have all the answers you know, and if I make a mistake, it's the kind of mistake that can cost lives. And I know I've been living that way for ages already, but I don't want…I don't want the cost to be my own people's lives…not again….It's so stifling. I got to control my regenerations after my 13th, but what was the point in becoming what I wanted, if I could never express anything other than the proper etiquette of a king and always be perfectly presentable."
His voice changed pitch, and became much higher and mocking as he said the last two lines.
"No, I like wearing what I like, doing what I like, and going where I like. And that's the worst part, isn't it? I can't bloody leave here! I can't leave my duties even for a day. I never felt so trapped in my own skin before, and I've literally been trapped in my own skin before, not fun let me tell you."
"You can't travel? Ever?" Rose tried to imagine the Doctor not traveling around in the TARDIS was like trying to imagine a friendly Dalek, it just didn't happen.
He nodded, grimly.
She suddenly understood him completely. This was her Doctor. This is what happened to him when he couldn't even be himself. She could tell moments of solitude like this were rare for him. It must have been the first time he felt like he could really open up in a long time. If everyone here was as stuffy as they seemed, then he could never lose face in front of anyone. She imagined what it would be like to always wear a mask, to never get close to anyone because they were too busy idolizing you, to be forced to hold on to that idolization to maintain authority. She shuddered, even thinking about it made her feel lonely and depressed.
She thought of the annoyed look the Doctor had when he had to pull his hood down, and when everyone saluted him. It was all so un-Doctor-ish, that it made Rose's heart twinge painfully with pity.
"But can't you just, ya know, quit?" Rose asked gently.
The Doctor sighed deeply. "Yeah, I technically can, but…well… it's really complicated. I know I'm the only one who can make this place better. So I keep telling myself that once I'm done, once everything is the way it always should have been, people will get used to the new ways."
He looked suddenly hopeful. "And when that happens, the planet will be set in its new ways and I can nominate someone else to take over for me. Then, and only then I can fully resign with no regrets or hard feelings. Then I can leave Gallifrey in peace and trust it to stay that way and continue my travels." He smiled, "but this time, I'll have a place to return to, and not as the last of my kind. I won't be running away this time."
His hopeful expression vanished quickly, replaced by an almost depressed one. "But that is going to be in a very long time. I hope I still have a regeneration or two left by then. I'm not sure I want to devote all the rest of my lives to here. My passion is and always will be traveling. And here I am only helping one place. I am making up my debt for making the wrong choice the first time around… sort of…"
"Come on, but there really must be something good about it, right?" Jack egged.
"Well, I did make a LOT of deals and arrangements." The Doctor sneered slyly.
"Like what?" Jack egged him onto the happier topic.
The Doctor jumped at the chance. "I'm proud of this one! My authority can be questioned, but if no one gives me a better reason for why something can't be done, then my rule wins out every time no matter what. Trust me when I say that's unheard of in this culture. When I said to open up to trade and tourism, everyone thought I was mad, but because no one gave a good reason why not, I got what I wanted, and now we are thriving. Gallifrey is part of a galaxy, not just lording over it. Our neighbors like us for the first time ever, and our economy and trade has never been better. And due to all our new consumers, all the children here are being raised in an entirely new atmosphere. They aren't just around natives and that is helping to slowly drown out the initial prejudices that everyone here seems to just be born with."
He grinned like a puppy who was just given a snack.
"They said it was my wisdom and experience that gave me that kind of knowledge. All the presidents before me were pretty much the same and Gallifreyan laws, customs, and our culture has been practically stuck in time. Ironic huh?"
He didn't wait for an answer and just prowled on instead.
"One of the first things I did was to get rid of the No Human laws. Humans weren't allowed on Gallifrey before, did you know? And now apparently, they are being transported here to use our prisons."
His eyes became dark like a shadow was cast over his face.
"Apparently, all-time law violations come here. I worked hard to make it so."
His voice got lower, more animal-like, and more dangerous. "But I am also working on making our prisons ten times better than they ever were. We have regulations here, on how to treat prisoners, and they… they perverted it, just because you're human."
He spat. They hate humans; they are still so very closed-minded, even after more than a century of the new rules.
Then the Doctor capriciously replaced all his weariness in a way that only the Doctor ever could. The shadow vanished as if it were never there, to be replaced by an old look. A very old look. His eyes shone with wisdom far beyond the years of his face.
It always was a shock to her to see him look his age. Rose constantly forgot just how ancient he really was. He made it so easy to forget as well; as if he wanted people to forget.
Rose remembered the Doctor yelling at the men on the stairs. She remembered how they had flinched and looked scared of him.
Was he yelling at them about that?
She understood Gallifreyan now, but it was weird. Though the language was in her head, she didn't understand it at the time, and therefore she couldn't remember what they were saying. In her memory, she could only hear a jumble of sounds, exactly how it sounded to her when she first heard it, before understanding. She could only recall the smooth loopy-ness of the sounds, almost like the writing of it.
Like clockwork, she thought.
Rose squeezed the Doctor's hand reassuringly. He looked up gratefully, but she could still see the guilt behind his eyes.
He looked at her seriously, and said, "I am really sorry about what was done to you. I really am. I-"
"Shh, it's okay, none of us blame you."
She had no way of knowing for sure if that was true, but if it wasn't, no one corrected her.
Before he could respond, a knock at the door made them all jump, although not as much as the Doctor did.
He leaped up in one motion, and in almost a blur of limbs, he was standing tall with his crown perched neatly back in place. He wiped his face with the back of his hand, then paused for a second, taking a deep breath.
Then he took the crown off again, looked at his reflection in it, and then put it back on, satisfied that his eyes were no longer red and puffy. He straightened his perfect robes as if sitting on the floor had crinkled them somehow.
Rose realized only as he stood, that he was wearing really odd golden shoes that rose up in the front by the toes. It was like he had golden toes that curled up and into a spiral above the rest of his foot. It looked really ugly, but somehow also beautiful and fitting.
He crossed in the room in a powerful but elegant gait. He gently touched the doorknob and then stood back as the door swung open slowly revealing the woman who had brought them their food cart before.
Upon seeing the Doctor, she bowed deeply and only straightened up when he gave her the okay to do so.
Even though Rose knew more of the details now, it was still odd seeing that happen before her eyes, and she shifted on the floor uncomfortably.
She imagined the woman's flashing glance to be a facade to her thoughts, believing her to surely be thinking something along the lines of, faintly human, and, good, let them appear lower than us and sit on the floor.
By the time she realized the woman hadn't even properly entered the room before her hasty exit, she understood that her imagination was getting the best of her again.
She needed time alone to process everything that had just happened and that she had just been told. But she would not take it; even should the moment arise, unless she could guarantee that the Doctor would still be there when she was ready. It was her biggest fear, to have him, and lose him... again.
The Doctor pushed in a second silver food cart and slid it next to the first one. If it was possible, the silver wear on this cart, made the one before it look like an old wooden spoon.
The Doctor looked thoughtfully at the two karts.
"Hm," he said. "I thought I had canceled my usual dinner. Oh well," he shrugged, "guess not. But honestly, did you lot have enough to eat? Because there is more and I can't possibly eat this all on my own."
It took a moment for Rose to register what he had said.
"Sorry, did you say dinner?"
He nodded, pausing his inspection of some kind of bright green and purple looking ball. He placed it back into a bowl full of identical items and sat back on the floor, this time leaning against his desk, looking expectant.
Rose sighed, resigned to her fate. She picked up the ball on its greener side and assuming it was some type of fruit, bit into it with gusto.
He raised his eyebrows, silently asking for her opinion.
A burst of intense, juicy flavor pooled onto her tongue. She moaned in pleasure, then blushed once she registered that the strange little sound had come from her.
The Doctor chuckled. "See, not poison then?"
Jack shrugged and picked up a ball and threw it to Jackie. She fumbled and nearly missed it, but managed to catch it last minute. She frowned at him but bit into it tentatively none the less.
Her face lit up I'm a matching expression of Rose's delight. Then, without a word, fervently proceeded to devour the rest of the strange fruit.
Rose was halfway done with her Fruit ball when she reached the purple side and gave a little gasp of surprise. "The colors are different flavors?" She exclaimed.
It came out like a question, even though she meant it as a surprised statement.
"Yup," the Doctor said, throwing one up and down, still leaning on the desk. He didn't eat anything though.
"What did you expect; fruit to be only one flavor at a time? Nah, that's an earth thing. Our fruits have many flavors at a time, more fun that way."
He praised it as if he was responsible for the planet's vegetation. But she wouldn't be surprised if he somehow revealed that he was, what with all the bomb sells he dropped by them so far that day.
He turned and looked fondly out of the massive French windows. Rose could see the light on the left side fading, but though it was dimming toward the left, the right side remained brightly fixed.
"Doctor?"
"Hm?" He hummed without turning his view from the window.
"Why did it, I mean how I'd it-"
He turned to meet her eyes, and her words failed her. The light from the right side of the window hit his eyes.
The eyes that were undoubtedly, irrevocably, the eyes of her Doctor. Eyes that were wary yet full of life.
She swallowed a lump in the back of her throat and forced herself not to look away.
"Two suns." He said simply.
"Sorry," Jackie blurted, now finished her first fruit and reaching over for a second, "but are you sayin' this place 'as two suns? Like earth suns bu'...two?"
For a moment Rose wondered why that was so shocking. Sure it was interesting, beautiful, and it finally solved the odd lighting mystery, but-
"Oh," she breathed.
That's right; Jackie had never been to another planet before. This was the first time she was ever truly off of planet earth, and her first planet was Gallifrey of all places.
Rose secretly wished her first planet was also Gallifrey, not because of the planet itself, but she wanted her first planet, something special to her, to be something also special to the Doctor.
"Hang on, so what's a day here?" Jack inquired curiously.
"Thought you'd never ask!"
Any chance to show off made the Doctor practically bounce off the walls in his best imitation of a newborn puppy.
"Days here a much much longer than on earth. And our nights are much shorter, makes sense, it's not like we need as much sleep as you humans and you can see why. We were literally not made for it."
"So what's dinner time or how does... I'm not even sure how to ask that." Jack grinned sheepishly. "Oh well."
"S'okay," he shrugged. "Dinner isn't really a time here. It's more of, I haven't had a meal in such and such hours and that means its dinner. We also have three meals a day, but we still eat less than humans, because the time span we have those meals in is much larger than yours."
"Okay, we get it you know?" Jack said starkly. "Time Lord superior biology, yadda ya." He rolled his eyes, but he was grinning.
The Doctor feigned ignorance. "Why Captain Jack Harkness, whatever do you mean?"
"If you boys are done flirting…" Rose teased.
The Doctor gave an indignant huff and Jack laughed.
This was peaceful. This was right. This was how it used to be, how it should always be, and how she wished it would never stop being.
Why do all good things come to an end?
Why indeed.
But for once, she was just happy to truly savor the moment and focus all her energy on trying to retain every detail of it in her memory forever.