In which I am once again disappoint. *Sigh* Oh, well. Continuing quote from Lord Byron's Manfred.
oOo
From thy false tears I did distil
An essence which hath strength to kill;
From thy own heart I then did wring
The black blood in its blackest spring;
From thy own smile I snatch'd the snake,
For there it coil'd as in a brake;
From thy own lip I drew the charm
Which gave all these their chiefest harm;
In proving every poison known,
I found the strongest was thine own.
.
The boy is not Davros. It's you. That age when you cried, when you were afraid of the monsters under the bed, of the dark, of the future ahead of you. And yet here you are, your rest unburdened, free from nightmares.
(He kneels beside the child and he's briefly, irrationally envious of the peace he can see on the young face.)
Because someone comforted you. Someone told you it was okay to be afraid. Fear is a superpower. Fear can make you faster and cleverer and stronger.
"Fear makes companions of us all."
He could have sworn the chair by the hat-stand wasn't occupied. Well, maybe it wasn't. Now it is.
Under expressive eyebrows and shoulder length, greyish-white hair combed neatly back, the piercing blue eyes of his first self are open and gazing thoughtfully at the floor in front of him, at the past and the future.
"So it does," he answers.
"Hm." The other one leans forward and has to stop a carved wooden cane from clattering to the floor. He puts it aside with a sound of annoyance and stands up easily. He walks over to the sleeping boy and taking off his opera cape, drapes it over his younger self. "Good gracious, I'll catch my death", he grumbles. Then he glances quickly at the older version and walks back to his chair.
He doesn't sit down though. He sighs and holds onto his lapels and gazes at the child. You don't get up, even though your feet and lower legs are getting numb. Somewhere in the distance, the sound of something metallic dropping to the floor is heard. The other is still there; but you didn't want, you didn't dare look back. Typical.
"Amazing, isn't it? How easy it is to change the life of a child. Sometimes, one day is all it takes. Just one."
He slumps against the wall too. Something is crumbling inside his chest. He must not be that strong or wise after all, because his fear isn't making him remotely kind. He just feels empty.
You are accountable for what you may have created.
Centuries upon centuries of battling mad scientists, and suddenly, you are Frankenstein.
He's far too miserable to appreciate the irony.
Something is happening to the room. Everything shakes and goes in and out of focus for a few seconds, like a glitch in a broken television set. He can see his own TARDIS, his own console room just for a moment. Is she crashing somewhere? Again? He looks from the child to the old man, both completely undisturbed and unnaturally still, and though he doesn't have the energy, he absurdly wants to laugh.
("It's okay. This is just a dream. Just lie back again. Just lie back on the bed. It will all be okay if you just lie down and go to sleep. Just do that for me. Just sleep. Listen.")
Dreams within dreams within dreams, Clara. Within nightmares within Dante's Inferno. Have I taught you nothing? Well, I'll admit this must be rare. It'll never happen to you. If it does, I'm taking you to see Robin Hood again and buying enough ice-cream to last all the Merry Men for a year. Swear on it.
Clara.
And something is trying to crush his skull as he sits there, the pressure tightening, tightening, and it has nothing to do with whatever is happening around him. Because, oh God, what, how can he tell her?
Everything is fading around him, it's like he's blinking too fast, too much. The time-rotor is there, it ends in three rotating silver rings and the Gallifreyan symbols fly before his eyes in a blur, searing his irises.
Clara would forgive him.
Clara would forgive him if he told her, she would, he's absolutely sure of it; and somehow, that only makes it worse.
The boy is not there anymore and he sees his adult first self turning to leave.
"Susan." He blurts it out suddenly at the other one, something makes him, he doesn't know what it is.
He stops and you can see him hesitate. He turns and looks at you over his shoulder.
Would she understand?
You don't speak the words aloud, but you're sure he somehow knows what you are asking.
He doesn't answer. He walks away and he seems to dissolve into thin air as everything comes crashing down.
You don't move. The floor lurches violently under you and the shadows lengthen like reaching hands. You think of Susan and it takes conscious effort to close your eyes.
.
.
It feels as if a wave is rushing over him. There is no sound. He endures it, curled in on himself. Behind his eyes, colours waver and flash wildly. He can feel through no sense he can explain the TARDIS reassembling around him. Finally, her rhythmic hum breaks the silence.
The stairs are digging uncomfortably into his back.
He's sprawled on the stairs leading to the upper level. However, there is no upper level.
Almost everywhere he looks he sees swirling dark, rushing to form into shapes as soon as his gaze falls on what should be there. It's like his concentrating on them urges everything into existence. There's the lower level, a bookcase between two bright roundels, a computer terminal, the doors, a spare jacket, the chalkboard, the narrow corridor leading to the swimming pool, all bathed in twilight.
He gets up, and starts walking around the still-forming place in (probably) too careless a manner. What danger? His mind wanders and he catches himself trying to imagine, on a whim, what a Weeping Angel would do in such a situation.
A smile tugs at the corners of his mouth and drowns inside his exhaustion and misery before it reaches his eyes. The banister near one of the seats seems tangible enough and he leans against it with a sigh, heavily, hanging his head.
Something crashes to the floor behind him and his head snaps back up again. A dull thud of flesh and bone. Living.
(Quick, painful, rattling breaths, broken by inarticulate moans. Not for long.)
He stumbles in his haste, regains his footing, and runs around the console. Don't panic. You're a Doctor.
So is he.
A spasm shakes his whole upper body and a bloodied hand flails around ineffectually, trying to grasp your ankle. You drop to your knees beside him and don't know what to do.
The brown hair, drenched with sweat and blood, is long and wavy, the pale, contorted face looks barely thirty-five. He's wearing the Victorian velvet frockcoat ensemble, utterly ruined but recognisable. He might just have walked through Grace's door.
You know he looked different, he was different, he was much, much older when he died; yet here he is, breathing his last, suffering as if the spaceship crashed on Karn just a minute ago.
"No–no, don't…" A strangled cry of agony is the only response. "It's okay… it's okay", he lies miserably, and tries to hold him as he's thrashing and coughing, push the cravat away to take his pulse.
But his eyes find your face and a hand rises with great effort. His trembling fingers rest against your temple, your cheek, and you feel everything he feels, the memories pour out of him like poison, filling your mind as your own thoughts mingle with his.
Images, sounds, flashes of bright light.
All timelines are there in his head, conflicting, all horrible. He wanders the Earth, he waits, not knowing who he is. Friends and allies die and he can't stop it, he battles enough paradoxes as it is. He is stabbed. Rassilon tricks him and anti-time pours into the universe, possesses him, runs out of his eyes. Zagreus sits inside your head. Everything is a white void. The Daleks conquer the Earth, and surely this is enough now; enough.
("Cut my throat."
"I can't."
"I can't do it myself, it needs precision. Right across the vocal cords.")
Screaming. Not just his own.
He loses one of his hearts. Davros captures him and that part is not clear, there's just blissful, blissful insanity. The guilt rises and rises. Why does he get to live?
You're drowning, you need to leave. But he doesn't break contact. You don't think he can.
He is tortured so horribly, he doesn't even remember why or who did it any more. Light City's drones rumble ominously. Christ recrucified, he's trying to help the Master, two murdered humans at his feet, the world seconds from ending. Give me your hand.
(Davros is sick. He's dying. He has asked to see you.)
Is it the memories or your own conscience that's clogging you down?
The Time War starts and he desperately tries to mend the wounds while they hate him. He pleads with his own people, rages against them; leave that planet in peace. Because we are not Daleks.
("Who can tell the difference any more?")
I see beauty. I see divinity. I see hatred.
You grab his wrist and try to break the connection and it's like trying to pry a white-hot iron from inside your skull. Your heartbeat goes out of control as if trying to match his.
Suicide. It was suicide. Death by despair. Physician, heal thyself.
"…Into whatsoever houses I enter, I will enter to help the sick, and I will abstain from all intentional wrong-doing and harm–"
He stares down at the desolate, ashen face and he can't breathe. It's just a powerless hiss of air through his clenched teeth while his mind is burning.
("I help where I can. I will not fight."
"Because you are the good man, as you call yourself?"
"I call myself the Doctor."
"It's the same thing in your mind."
"I'd like to think so.")
He twists violently and manages to tear his face away with a scream.
You're still holding his wrist and you don't care if you are hurting him, you can't help it if you are. Your own arm is shaking from shoulder to fingertips. But his hand relaxes in your grip and when an index finger brushes lightly, accidentally against your cheek, you can only feel him letting go.
"No–"
The other's chest is barely rising any more, and a single tear runs down his face, a clear track that soon mingles with the blood and the grime. His lips are moving soundlessly and he bends down to listen, releasing his hand. It grasps his jacket feebly, and when he sits back up again, unable to make out a word, it thuds to the floor. There's nothing to be done.
Blue locks on blue, but there's no restoring fire this time, no cup of pain, and after a few moments the younger, kinder eyes seem to glaze over, their gaze losing focus, becoming fixed and empty.
He moves no more, and for a while, you continue to stare into the blank eyes, windows to a soul no longer there, something blocking your throat, your chest. Then you close them carefully and stagger to your feet. The TARDIS is now exactly as it should be, but everything seems to have a sharp, almost painful edge to it. You rub your temples and collapse on the nearest seat. You sit as still as the body on the floor, equally pale and cold, feeling a million times heavier and hollower. You listen to the quiet sounds of the ship and you stare at him with dull, bloodshot eyes. You don't think. There is no time. At some point you blink and he just stops being there.
.
(to be concluded...)