He stumbled across the decking of the TARDIS, towards the console. It hurt, all of him hurt; every fibre of his being, each one of his cells. His hearts were beating too fast, his mind was racing. His skin was glowing gold, motes of light were dancing before his eyes. It was too soon, it was always too soon.
He felt her arms around him, helping him along, and he wanted to speak to warn her. She tried to get him up the steps, but his boot snagged the landing, and he stumbled.
"Doctor?" she asked, and he thought, for a moment, just for a moment… "What's wrong, Doctor? What's happening?"
"I…" he tried to speak, but agony coursed through him, slamming shut his jaw. He tried to keep a hold of the railing that ringed the console, but it slipped from his fingers, and he spilled across the floor.
She went to his side, and he saw the hot tears spilling down her cheeks. He wanted to reach up, to brush them off her skin, the colour of coffee.
"I'm regenerating," he managed, through gritted teeth. "I'm sorry, Amy."
The girl's forehead crinkled. "Who? Doctor, I'm not…"
He cut her off with a scream, as a burst of energy sent a pain-wracked spasm through his entire being. "No, Rory, listen to me! I'm regenerating, I'm changing. I was too hurt by the plasma blasts, saving that girl…"
"That girl was me, Doctor!" she said, and he remembered her, all of a sudden. Anastasia, Tess, the girl he'd run through the crashed spaceship to save, the girl he'd absorbed all of that energy for, the girl he'd saved. "You saved me, Doctor, you saved me!"
The Doctor frowned, and he could have sworn he felt a tear form in the corner of his eye. "Polly? Martha? Tegan? Eliza?"
"No, Doctor, I'm Tess. I'm Tess, Doctor. Eliza's safe, Doctor, she's gone home. You took her home, just after we met?" she said, her voice ragged, begging. "Remember, Doctor, tell me you remember!"
The Doctor nodded, swallowing back the pain. "I remember, Tess, I do. And I'm sorry, we only just met, and now you have to see this…"
"What's happening?" she asked, the tears flowing freely now. "Are you dying?"
Smiling ruefully, he shook his head. "A little like that. Not really. Totally. No… it's complicated. It's very complicated. My face will change, my whole being, but I'll still be the same. Maybe."
The pain burst forth from him, a shining, blinding light, a force that threw Tess back from him. She managed to pull herself up on the console, and turned to look at the Doctor, terror in her eyes; terror for him, concern for him, for her new friend. "I don't understand, Doctor!"
"Get back!" he cried, as another wave of energy burnt from him.
She skittered across the decking, but still kept her eyes locked on him.
"What's happening?" she called.
"I'm regenerating!" he cried, and finally, the energy overcome him; as the light absorbed him, as his consciousness faded into it, he saw their faces. He saw Amy, long red hair, freckles and her smile; he saw Rory, the centurion, the soldier, the warrior; he saw River, her mystery and her darkness and and all her love; he saw Eliza, the young scientist, the lost soul on her journey of redemption. And then the light stopped, and he saw Tess.
Beautiful Tess, barely seventeen years old, a refugee, an orphan, who'd lost faith in the universe, in goodness and in hope.
"We'll see it all, Tess!" he promised her, crying through the flames and the burning. She nodded, scared stiff, tears glinting in the inner light of the TARDIS, of his TARDIS. "You and me, time and space, you watch us run! Geronimo!"
With one final scream, he was gone; he burnt, and then the energy bled away into the air, and a new man stepped forward.
"Can you feel that?"
Rory Williams froze, and turned to his wife. She had a bowl balanced on her swollen stomach, as she lay on the couch, a spoon halfway to her mouth.
"Feel what?" he was crouched on the carpet, little Vincent wrapped in his arms, the redheaded boy who looked exactly like his mother struggling with all his might against his father's grip.
Amy turned her head to the left, ever so slightly, and frowned. "It's him. It's the Doctor."
She looked at Rory.
"You're crying," she said, tears staining her own cheeks.
"Daddy," Vincent said, "you're crying."
Rory reached up, and his fingers came away from his cheek wet. He looked at Amy. "He's gone. Hasn't he?"
Releasing his son, he went over to his wife, and pulled her into a tight, tight hug.
In the depths of the Stormcage Containment Facility, River Song sat on her bunk, reading. It was how she spent most of her time, these days… her release was just a few days away, her professorship a few weeks behind that, but for now, she was reading.
And then she felt it, in the core of her being. A sadness she couldn't explain, but one she recognised. Unbidden, thoughts of Alfava Matraxis came to mind, of the Pandorica, of running from Daleks and chasing Zygons.
She set her book aside, and she began to cry.
She was in her laboratory, finishing a report on her latest experiment, when she felt it. Eliza Fairbanks turned to the viewport, and stared out at the Horsehead Nebula, at the stars beyond. Stars she'd touched, stars she'd seen. All thanks to him.
She'd only said goodbye to the Doctor a few days earlier, but it felt like hours, like minutes. Only moments, really.
"Are you all right?" a lab assistant she didn't yet recognise asked her.
"Yes," she said, frowning. "Yes, I'm fine."
"Ma'am," he said, "you're crying."
Eliza caught her reflection in the transparisteel viewport, and she saw the tears. She knew it, then, in that instant; somewhere, somehow, her Doctor was gone. Sobs wracked her body as she sunk to the deck, and outside the viewport, the galaxy kept on spinning.
Aboard the TARDIS, he looked at Tess, and grinned, still wearing a tattered tweed jacket, a singed bowtie.
"D-Doctor?" she asked.
He blinked, shook his head. "Yes. That's me. Doctor comma the."
Tess swallowed. "Your face…"
He reached up, feeling his chin. "It's not bad, is it?"
"It's not yours!"
"It is now," the Doctor insisted. "Regeneration. Tricky thing, it is, never quite sure where you'll end up. Like the TARDIS. The metaphors write themselves!"
"Metaphors?" Tess repeated, thoroughly confused. "What are you talking about?"
"Nothing on Earth," the new Doctor said, "that's for sure. Now, wherever shall we go?"
He began to spin around the TARDIS console, and Tess couldn't help but grin; maybe it was the way he moved, the way he slammed down the levers, tapped at the typewriter. Whoever this man looked like, he was the Doctor.
As the time rotor began to move up and down, he stopped, and for a second, a pained look crossed his face.
Tess moved to his side, quick as lightning. "Are you all right?"
"Yeah, fine. A little post-regeneration unhappiness, but I'll be fine," he said, looking at her sideways. "Now, tell me. Am I ginger this time? Please, let me be ginger."