Alright guys, I'm back! And I'm not dead.

I had a bit of writers block for this chapter. There are no episodes here, just some original content that's mainly filler. I wanted the fluff okay!

-RainingCoffee


The next few days are kind of awkward. I spend a lot of time with the Doctor, or in the library, ignoring the pensive looks Rose sends in my direction anytime we cross paths.

I feel bad for her, but the Doctor is right. I'm not going to let her feelings rule my decisions anymore. Once again, the dynamic changes of regeneration force me to learn something I'd already known before.

The Doctor either doesn't see the tension, or he does a better job at ignoring it than I do, but he goes on like everything is normal. Well, like our old version of normal before we got full time companions. Something has changed again, the status quo has shifted.

"What is it?" The Doctor asks, breaking me out of my introspection.

Looking down at the book I'd been trying to read, I shrug. "Was just thinking about things, s'all."

He makes a neutral noise in response, but doesn't say anything else, going back to his own reading. And that's what I'm talking about. He's in here, with me, like he's been for the last week. It's not as if the Doctor is neglecting his companions, he still spends some time every day with them, but the majority of his time is now spent with me.

I..can't say I'm not pleased. Because I'm essentially a selfish person and having his attention on me was more fulfilling than it probably should be, but that's not how it was when we first took on both Rose and Mickey.

It's not as if he didn't spend time with me when they came on, just, not as much as he had when it was just the two of us.

"Alright." The Doctor says, his book snapping shut. "That's enough reading for me, and I'm going to assume by the way you haven't flipped the page in five minutes that it's enough for you too."

I huff out a laugh, closing my own book. "Yeah, I keep getting distracted."

His raised eyebrow tells me that he's restraining a 'no really?'. A scowl of my own dares him to say it out loud. The Doctor doesn't take the dare.

"I was thinking we could go somewhere." He tells me, eyes lighting up.

Anticipation rushes through me, but I have to ask.. "Are we waiting until Mickey and Rose wake up?"

The Doctor gives me a look. "What do you think?"

Seeing as they had gone to bed a couple of hours ago, I was going to go with no. A smile curves my lips. "Random?"

"Maybe, it's been a while since we've done that. Last time we ended up in-" He tilts his head back, as if in thought. "Where did we end up again?"

I roll my eyes at him, getting up from the armchair I'd been sitting in and making my way towards the doorway. "You know exactly where we ended up last time."

The Doctor catches up quickly, teasing smile firmly in place. "No, no. Really. I'm an old man, things get away from me sometimes."

Keeping my face turned forward, I try my best to not let him annoy me.

It really doesn't work.

The Doctor laughs, bright and happy at whatever expression I'm making.

"Shut up." I mutter, face turning a blotchy red. It wasn't my fault that the plants had been telepathic. And that they'd taken a liking to me.

His hand comes down on the top of my head, ruffling my hair. My retaliatory swat is dodged successfully, and even more infuriating, my look of annoyance only causes the Doctor's eyes to brighten.

Hmph.

"You know, with how much you mess with my hair I'm half tempted to cut it all short." My hair is a disaster now so I pull my ponytail holder out, finger combing my hair back into some semblance of order before pulling it back up into a high tail.

"Hmm, change it how?" The Doctor asks, looking interested.

I pull some of my hair forward, over my shoulder, fingering the locks thoughtfully. "Short on the sides, close cut but not buzzed. A few inches on the top. Something that I can wear to either side. I used to wear something similar when I was in college, and I kind of miss it."

He smirks suddenly. "Just let me know when you want to change it, I'll grab the scissors."

"Oh no, mister." I waggle a finger at him. "I'm not letting you anywhere near my hair again!"

"You're sure? I think I've gotten better at it over the years." The Doctor argues, lips twitching. The hallway opens up, the familiar sight of the console room coming into view.

Waving him off, I nod to the console. "So where are we going tonight?"

He pretends to think about it, but I know he already has a whole mental room full of places for us to visit at some point so I don't know why he's posturing. "

And sure enough, it doesn't take him long to choose.

xxxx

"Okay! So. The Anadavari are a peaceful race, well peaceful after they rose up to over throw their Emperor nearly 900 years ago, who make the most incredible tapestries that you can imagine. The wool is weaved with such precision that each tapestry is like a snapshot in time." The Doctor rambles, sticking his hands in his pockets as we walk down the market.

People are bustling back and forth, haggling over wares or running errands. There is jewelry, pottery, food, textiles- I make a noise of surprise, my steps hurrying me over to what I think the Doctor was talking about.

The tapestry features a girl in a field, surrounded by flowers. She had a smile on her face, hands busy making a crown of the flowers she was surrounded by.

For a moment I could taste the air that was being depicted, something similar to honeysuckle lingering next to the tang of ozone. There was to be a storm later. I was content in my task, gathering herbs for the days work, but I couldn't resist stopping to make a crown of flowers to bring back for my little sister.

The Doctor's hand covers my eyes, ripping me away from the vision. Was it a vision? Disorientation numbs my senses and for a long second I'm not entirely sure why I'm not still in the field. Then it clicks and the next breath I draw in centers me some. The smell of the marketplace filling my head instead of the flowers I had imagined. That was- "Telepathic tapestries."

"Exactly." The Doctor murmurs, pressing me further back into his chest. "Sorry, thought I had a bit more time to tell you about them. Shields up, quickly now."

One shaky exhale later and I have passable shields in place. They weren't something that I normally kept up, as they were incredibly draining to maintain, but I could easily be drawn into the tapestry without them. The Doctor said that it's something I needed to practice though, and times like these I was reminded of why.

He runs a mental hand across my shields, directing me to fix certain areas that doesn't hold up to his mental prodding. It takes me a few tries to fix everything and by the time the Doctor deems me ready nearly 5 minutes have passed.

I blink out into the sunshine once again, the tapestry being the first thing I see. Its pull is unmistakable, but with my shields up it's more of a gentle nostalgia than the urgent immersion that I'd experienced.

The shopkeeper hands a customer a rolled up tapestry, before turning to us with an indulgent smile. "We don't often get visitors here, and even more rarely is one telepathic enough for our tapestries to pull them in like it did your youngin'."

"Yes, well, I've seen them before and wanted to show Willa how beautiful they were." The Doctor explains, hand resting on my shoulder. His presence is still strong in my mind, an unmistakable safeguard in case my shields drop. "I just hadn't expected them to be this far down in the marketplace, aren't they normally up by the fountain?"

"Fountain, sir?" The shopkeeper asks, a furrow of what I'm going to assume is confusion creasing the area between his head tentacles. "Oh! Do you mean the water circle?"

The Doctor nods. I hide a smile, loving the way that the translation circuit translates certain things. The echo of tentacles alongside his face in the manner of the Anadavari people, or at least form what I've seen of them, is interesting to watch.

The shopkeeper shakes his shoulders front to back. "There are not many people who are skilled enough to make the tapestries in the first place, so they wind up in whatever area that person is able to put up a tent. I suppose last time you were here the person who was selling tapestries was closer to the watering hole."

There is a faint hint of confusion transferring over from the Doctor's hand on my shoulder but he doesn't comment on it, instead he thanks the shopkeeper and then we are on our way.

"You'll love it Willa." The Doctor gestures out at the various tents. "The fountain has several statues around it to commemorate the successful coup. But the statues are made from harkensti, which has the resiliency of granite but the workability of marble."

I frown up at him. "Why did you say it like that?"

His lips quirk up into a smile. "The stone workers of the Anadavari are just as skilled as the Greeks were at carving the stone. The statues are exceptional in their detail." The Doctor pauses and I can feel him run a metal hand over my shields. "Something about the mixture of harkensti, and the Anadavari's ability to imbue their work with emotions combined together to create quite the experience."

"So, are the statues telepathic?" I ask, confused. He lost me halfway through his explanation.

"Not like the tapestries." The Doctor hums, changing tracks. "The detail on the statues allow you to see exactly what the statue was portrayed as feeling. So if the statue was happy, you also get a burst of it's happiness."

And if that statue is 'feeling' anything else, you also get a burst of that too. What a dangerous technique.

So the two of us meander our way towards the fountain. We do eventually reach a water feature, but it's really more of a watering hole, just like the shopkeeper said earlier.

The Doctor's fingers twitch, tightening against my shoulder. A glance behind me shows a displeased frown on his face.

"What's wrong?" I have to ask, concerned.

"The tapestries will have to wait for another day Willa." He tells me, already turning us around, urging me into a fast walk. "It's seems we've gotten the date a bit wrong."

My concern deepens as I take in the way his jaw is clenched. "How wrong?"

He says something in high Gallifreyan, something about a deity (a curse if there was ever one), before shaking his head. His fingers tighten even more, yanking me from the street to hide behind a tent filled with beaded bracelets. "Oh, because our luck is horrible, I'd say about 900 years."

"That revolution you were telling me about?" I whisper, tilting me head when shouting, barely audible, starts to reach my ears.

"We need to get back to the Tardis, now." The Doctor murmurs, already lightyears away.

But I'm still busy making connections. "The tapestries, they were further down the marketplace than you were expecting. And the fountain, we never found it because it wasn't there yet. That's why the shopkeeper was so confused when you asked."

"Yes, good job, come now Willa." He directs me, hurrying us across the back of the tent. The route we are taking is in the opposite direction of the raised voices, but there is something..

The Doctor's hand tenses, but before he can do anything I jerk us into a tent full of textiles just in time for a large swath of people to round the corner. The people in the marketplace are afraid now, and they are also trying to get away from the revolutionaries. If we had stayed on the path we were following we would have been swallowed by the crowd and split up.

He waits a beat, until most of the people are gone, before turning to face me. His hands frame my face, mind surging forward with intent. Barriers spring up, far stronger than any I'd produced earlier. Walls of Azbantium compared to my walls of dirt. "Sorry, but I have a feeling that you're going to need them."

It hadn't been a vision, what I'd felt, but it had been unsettling. Almost as if-my mind shies away from the thought.

"No, I didn't mean it like that. Instincts like that are good, you need to pay attention when they tell you what to do." He whispers, turning to inspect the street once more.

I know. I know that. But. It wasn't something that I wanted to think about. Pushing that aside, I lean in closer to the Doctor, matching his volume. "So what's so different about this revolution? I rarely see you this stressed out about being in the wrong place at the wrong time."

The Doctor shakes his head. It's clear from the way his lips are pursed that he's not going to say anything. That's not..ideal.

He urges us along, keeping a tight grip on my hand. I keep expecting people to rush out from somewhere like they had before. There are a couple of stragglers hanging around, but they are all rushing in the opposite direction than we are.

Several tense minutes later, we manage to make it back to the area where we parked the Tardis. The only problem is, the Tardis isn't where we last left it.

I blow out a sharp breath of air, annoyed. "It can never be that easy, can it?"

The Doctor doesn't reply, but his expression does sour even more. The curiosity burns. I want to know why he's so upset. It takes a large amount of self control to not ask him what he's so worried about.

But then I don't have to ask him, I can feel it.

There is a subtle tug at the corner of my mental shields. I twist my head around, trying to find what's doing it. There's nothing there.

"Keep your shields up." The Doctor's voice whips through the marketplace. "Don't drop them for anything."

My hand tightens around his and I take a step closer. A chill runs down my spine at the fact I'd tried to step away in the first place. A subtle tug was all it took to get me to look in it's direction? To step away from my caretaker and the safety he offers.

Well, whatever this is must be incredibly strong.

"Okay, starting to get creepy now." I murmur into the silence.

The Doctor tightens his grip on my hand, his mouth a stark line across his face. "We need to find the Tardis quickly."

So down the street we go. Whatever the presence is tugs on my shields twice more before the Doctor pulls me into an abandoned tent.

"Willa." He states, kneeling down in front of me. "I have to find the Tardis, but to do that I'm going to have to leave you here. It's tracking us using your shields as a sort of echolocation almost. It's why it keeps trying."

"Okay." I nod, showing my agreement.

The Doctor hesitates. "The shields I raised, they are the strongest I can make without completely going into you mind. But I don't want to leave you here unprotected."

I frown, confused. "Then do what you have to do. I trust you."

"This is going to feel weird." He says, and then I understand.

A sort of disassociation travels over me. I am both Willa and the Doctor at the same time. But then the shields are in place, and I'm just me again.

The Doctor places a kiss to my forehead before leaving the tent without a backward glance.

The fog persists though. It's almost as if the shields are so strong that I'm not perceiving the world like I normally do. Everything has a sheen to it.

Maybe that's why I don't notice them until they are directly on top of me. People from the marketplace? I don't know, but they are strong and I don't have enough focus to struggle.

So I allow them to pull me along.

A gentle knocking along the outside of my shields starts up again. Whatever it is wants in.

Our path leads us to what looks to be a central hall. It's a large room, with dozens of Anadavarians inside.

The tapestry that we are approaching is bigger than anything I'd seen in the market. The whole side of the room is covered in it. The tapestry itself is nondescript, just a room with a simple chair in it. But the feeling it gives off.

I shiver under my jacket. It wants me to look into its heart, insidious tendrils creeping into my mind. I was intensely thankful that the Doctor had raised stronger shields. They were the only thing keeping me from becoming like the people around me.

People who were definitely not in their right minds.

Even as I sat there, trying to ignore the mental prodding, the crowd around me was growing restless. A quick glance around the room shows that nothing has changed, but then a figure steps into the room.

The crowd stills, focusing their attention to that person. It's an Anadavarian, no different from any of the others to my eyes, but something is clearly catching the others attention.

The first thing he does is roll up the arms of his shirt, taking his time. Every movement is purposeful. It isn't until he picks up a paint brush that I realize what exactly is going on. The Anadavarian slathers a line across the throne, then another, and another. A crude form of a person starts to take shape.

I had a vague hope that by putting the paint on the tapestry that it would negate the presence, but I knew it was a fools hope. And I was right, the crowd sways with each new line, energy building.

The knocking at my shields turns back into a tugging. Then it turns to a violent battering ram. I clutch at my head, trying to do something, anything, to stop the pain.

Someone grabs me from behind, arms twining around my shoulders. An involuntary noise leaves my mouth, or at least I think it does. My mouth opens, my throat vibrates, but I'm essentially blind and deaf to anything around me.

The arms pick me up, the world twists. It takes me far longer than it should to realize that I've been thrown over a shoulder and that whoever has a hold of me is moving fast. The farther away we get from the tapestry the more the pain in my head dissipates. Until I'm left hanging limp in my perch over the Doctor's shoulder. The keening dies down, my voice petering out.

It takes longer than I'm comfortable admitting to scrabble my thoughts together. "…..did you find the Tardis?"

"Yes." He replies simply, not pausing in his long strides.

I groan miserably. "Having mental powers really suck sometimes." I'm getting sick of this to be honest. It feels as though half the time I walk around with a headache, or the fear of seeing to much and causing myself to bleed. "….I'm tired of being helpless.."

The Doctor pauses abruptly, swinging me down from his shoulder so he can see me properly. He cups my cheeks with his hands, leaning down so he's the only thing I can see. "Quiet now, I don't think I've ever met another person as not helpless as you are."

The urge to hide my face is unresistable but the Doctor's hands are insistent. My lower lip trembles traitorously. "..But I'm always needing you to come save me. And I was the one who couldn't hold up to whatever that thing was, you obviously had no problem with it."

"If I remember correctly, you're saving me half of the time so I don't want to hear you use that as an example again. And the only reason that you had such an adverse reaction to the tapestry was due to the fact that it was focused on you. It probably would have been better for you to have dropped your shields, but you were holding to them stubbornly." The Doctor murmurs, mentally poking around the warped walls of the shields he had erected.

I glare at him balefully, gently swatting him away from the most sensitive bits. "You told me to keep the shields up!"

"Stop that." He scolds, doing whatever it is he's doing. A second later a sort of cooling sensation covers the hurt. I almost sag in relief, as it is I relax into his hold. "See?"

Yeah, I see.

"And yes, I told you to keep your shields up." The Doctor purses his lips. "I didn't expect to find you in the center of the coup, next to the catalyst. If I had known that I would have told you to do things differently."

"Hindsight is 20/20." I murmur.

He nods. "Exactly." Pulling his hands away, the Doctor studies me. "Better now?"

"Yeah, whatever you did made the pain much better." I tell him. And it made me feel a little more emotionally stable, which I don't say. The Doctor probably knows anyways, but I want to keep the illusion of my dignity.

The Doctor quietly places a hand on my shoulder, leading me along. It only takes a couple more minutes to reach the Tardis, and only a second for the Doctor to pilot us away.

No one mentions trying to hit the right time period. There's a sort of unspoken agreement hanging in the air that we've had enough excitement for the day.

"Are you okay?" The Doctor eventually asks, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye.

"….I just hate how inevitable it all seems." I murmur after a pause.

The Doctor nods. "And?"

There is something to be said for the stubbornness of a man who's lived as long as the Doctor. I know what's he's getting at, but I don't want to address the feeling that's been tightening around my neck.

"Willa" He prompts, after the silence drags on for a long while.

I close my eyes against the determined kindness I can see on his face. "I know it was a fixed point, that it had to happen. But I hate that we couldn't do anything to help. And the fact that, well-"

A hand cups the back of my head, pulling me into an impromptu hug. "So you do feel it, I wasn't sure if you'd developed enough for it yet."

"Something's coming." I whisper into his chest. There is a yawning chasm on the edge of my awareness, a storm waiting to unfold. It felt as though I was going to be swept away.

"I won't tell you not to be afraid." The Doctor murmurs, his mind enfolding around mine like a blanket. My fear dissipates, not gone, but smothered by the feeling of safety the Doctor elicits. "Fear is a firm motivator, one that makes you faster and stronger."

I nod, familiar with this speech.

"However, I will tell you to be cautious. Something is coming-" He pauses, attention turning outwards. The same yawning chasm that I've been experiencing lingers on the edge of his awareness as well. The Doctor pulls his attention back to the now, shaking his head. "I don't know what it is, but I want you to stay close for the next few months."

"I don't think that will be a problem." I murmur, still unsettled. A yawn splits my face a second later, the events of the day catching up to me. I hate that I've trained myself to follow a normal sleep schedule sometimes.

The Doctor laughs, some of the tension fading from his mind. "A normal sleep schedule is important for proper development."

Huffing, I pull back from his chest to give him a look. "And I suppose you always went to bed as a child when you were supposed to?"

"Of course not." He replies. I hadn't thought so. "Which is why I don't actually enforce a bedtime."

Enforce huh. I'd like to see him try. Another yawn crawls up my throat.

His amusement rises up, the metaphorical ocean surrounding my mind turning pink with affection. "And, there's the fact that I don't have to enforce anything when your own body does it for me."

I blink rapidly, trying to clear the moisture from my eyes. "Point taken."

"Come now." The Doctor tells me, fingers curling gently around my arm. He tugs lightly, and I follow him down the hallway.

The thing is, when I start to crash now, I crash hard. It used to be that I could stay up for days if I needed to, but that was before I regenerated. That being said, by the time we make it to my room I'm half asleep on my feet.

The Doctor lingers while I remove my shoes and jacket, watching as I climb into bed. Then instead of retreating off to do whatever it is he does when there isn't someone to be around, he pulls a chair up next to the bed and takes a seat.

I'm ridiculously grateful for it, but I've been emotional enough for the day so I do my best to not let it show on my face.

Reaching out with his hand, the Doctor grabs the wrist closest to him on the bed. A soft scold resonates from the contact, and a notion that I'm several centuries to young to be able to hide things from him.

Silly old man. I hide things from him all the time.

"Ah, maybe. Or maybe not." He murmurs, tapping his finger to my pulse point.

My heartsrate immediately slows to match the tapping. "You're cheating." I murmur, my voice thick with the beginning of sleep.

Soft laughter fills my mind. "Caretaker prerogative."

Blinking slowly, I watch the stars through my glass roof. The cosmos spin, planets being born while others die. It's so beautiful.

So very beautiful.

I'm asleep before I have a chance to realize it.


That's Balderdash – Thank you!

Moglefrog – I really like the fluff too! It's a nice change from writing just the episodes.

Kenzie – I'm glad it makes you happy, it makes me happy too.

PrincessMagic – Stay tuned! More dad Doctor is on it's way.

Leighward – I like to think that her dog was adopted by a very nice family with two daughters who showered the dog in love and kisses. But that's just my theory. About the Rose thing, I did try to write a bit from the Doctor's pov but I can't quite get into his headspace enough for it to seem genuine and not forced. But don't worry, things are about to change soon, I promise. This is not a Rose bashing fic, even if it's seemed that way so far.

Sam – Thank you!

LPWormer – I love your comment.

LeeMit531 – Thank you for saying so!

Whovianeverlark17 – I'm glad you are enjoying the story!

Aranel Nenharma – Here it is! And I'm back, I promise I won't not finish it. I just had writers block for a while. Started half a dozen side stories and tidbits that I'll probably never post instead. I just had to break though.

Drmsqnc – I'm glad you like it!

Rose1414 – Yeah…. Though I do have one of those in the works without the knowing the future bit…. Whoops?

Guest on chapter 1 – Here it is!

Bored411 – The Master is something that's going to have to be handled carefully. He's incredibly manic. I have an idea of what I'm going to do but that's far off into the future.