Davey
The next morning after Davey didn't appear downstairs for breakfast, Rose and the Doctor walked up the stairs and knocked on his door. No answer. "Davey? Sweetheart, it's Mum. Please let me in. Please talk to me."
No answer. She tried the knob, but it was locked, and knocked again, louder. "Davey?"
After a minute, they heard his muffled reply. "I don't want to. Not now."
They shared an anguished look, and the Doctor motioned to his pocket, where his sonic screwdriver always lived, but Rose shook her head. "When, then?" She called through the door. "This afternoon?" She paused, then put just a bit of a severe Mum note into her voice. "I want an answer, David."
Finally, "Tomorrow."
She sighed. "OK, tomorrow. But I'm holding you to that." As they turned away, his hand seeking hers automatically, she shook her head at Lucy peeking out the next door. "No, Luce, let him be."
Lucy pulled her head back in and closed the door to a crack, watching her aunt and uncle go past and down the stairs. Then she softly shut it the rest of the way, crossed her bedroom to the balcony door and slipped outside, stepping over to the end towards Davey's room. Each of the balconies on the house were edged with wooden balustrades between solid masonry piers on each corner; the railings were several inches wide and sturdy enough to stand on.
It was the gap that worried her. Davey's railing was four feet away, and the ground was three stories below. Stop it, she told herself. I'm an actress, and I do all my own stunts. He's a prisoner of war, a freedom fighter, and I'm his sweetheart, come to break him out of jail. She crouched down and scuttled over to the front railing, peering through the slats to study the courtyard and what she could see of the breezeway. Just then, Rose and the Doctor appeared out the side door and walked through the breezeway towards the bridge to the dunes and disappeared. Guards are all gone. It's now or never!
She picked up a chair and moved it quietly to the corner between the wall and railing, then used it to stepped gingerly up to the railing, steadying herself with one hand on the wall. Then she took a deep breath, stood tall, and suddenly leapt across the gap, touching one foot on the other railing as she sailed gracefully past it to land on the balcony floor, dropping and turning a somersault like she'd seen in the movies. Owww. She'd landed too hard on the other foot. I need to practice that. Later.
She slipped inside the room – his balcony door was unlocked – and over to her cousin's bed. He was still under the covers, lying on his stomach with his head buried in his pillow. She poked him and he shot upright, gasping, before he realized it was her.
"Lu-uce! Don't scare me like that!"
Lucy ignored his protests and plopped onto the bed beside him, crossing her legs and building a pyramid of knees, elbows, fists and chin. She studied him for a moment before asking, "What's your malfunction?"
He collapsed back down to his previous position. "I don't want to talk about it," came the muffled reply from the pillow.
She decided to wait him out and didn't move, simply gazing expressionless at the back of his head. After several long minutes, he sighed and rolled over, and she could see from his puffy eyes that he'd been crying.
"I look at him, and it's like he's a stranger, an alien. I don't know who he is anymore. I don't know who I am anymore." He didn't have to specify who "he" was.
"He's your father," she replied didactically.
Davey stared at her, tears prickling, then shook his head. "That's just it, Luce. He isn't."
She blinked. "What?"
"He's not my father. He and Mum didn't make me. Your dad did. My Uncle Mike is my real father."
"What? Are you sure?" Her chin had come off her hands, which seemed to hover in midair, as untethered to her body as he felt he was to reality.
He nodded. "They told me so, yesterday. I'm not his son. But now he's got a daughter. He's got Jenny. A real Time Lord. I'm just a stupid human. He doesn't need me anymore."
She wasn't quite ready to deal with that yet, still stuck on the brute fact. "My dad cheated on my mum, with your mum? And everybody knew about it?"
Davey shook his head. "He didn't cheat. It was before your mum and dad got married. And before mine got married, too. They sorted themselves out after, I guess. Mum said they... you know... only once."
"Wow. She actually said that?"
"Yeah."
They were silent for a while. Then she commented, "That sucks."
"Yeah."
Another pause.
"So what are you gonna do?"
A tear escaped, and he angrily swiped it off with the back of a hand. "I don't know. That's just it. I don't know what to do." He sniffled, and then had an idea. "Maybe I could come live with you, all the time. Then he could go off with Jenny like he wants to, and just forget about me."
"How do you know that's what he wants?"
"Huh?"
"How do you know? Did he say so? It didn't look like it, last night."
He stared. "Of course he wants to. He's always going on and on about Time Lords, he and Aunt Hannah both." He snorted. "Aunt Hannah. She's his mother! Our grandmother! Did you know that, Luce?"
"How can she be his mother if she's so much younger than he is? I mean, they're both old, but shouldn't she look like Grandmum Sylvia or Granddad Wilf?"
"She regenerated, just like he does. Got a new body and a new face. Weren't you listening?"
"That's... that's not real, is it? Weren't they just saying shit, just playacting?"
"No, Luce, they weren't. It's real. My Dad... I mean the Doctor, he's nine hundred years old. And he's had ten different faces. The same man." He stared a moment, then shook his head and repeated, "I don't know who he is anymore. He's not human, not like us. He's an alien, Luce. A Time Lord."
"I thought that was just a title, like... like Doctor. You mean he really is from another planet?"
Davey nodded.
"So when you guys take off in the TARD', you really are going to other planets, too?"
He nodded again. "And other times, too. It really is a time machine, Luce."
She spluttered. "And you want to give that up?" She shook her head emphatically. "I wouldn't give that up for anything, no matter who I had to put up with."
"Fine! Then let's just trade places! Then you can go with them and be their trained stupid human, and I'll go to school with Loren and pay football!"
They stared at each other again. Then, Lucy reminded him, "They probably wouldn't let us trade," and he deflated. She went on, "Mum always tells us when we have a problem with somebody, we should talk it out with them, not other people."
He shook his head. "I don't wanna talk to him. Or Mum. Luce, they lied to me. They've been lying to me my whole life! He's not my Dad!" Even as he said it, he remembered Rose's dictum about his 'real Dad', and felt the guilt rise up again, warring with his pain and anger.
Lucy saw the turmoil in his eyes, instinctively knowing with all the wisdom of her almost-nine years that he wasn't as sure as he sounded. Suddenly she switched tracks, pointing a finger at his chest. "My birthday's day after tomorrow, and I don't want you ruining it." His eyes widened at the uncharacteristic accusation. "So you talk to him before then, got it?" Silent, he just stared, blinking back tears, and she relented. "Look, you always told me he was your best friend, that you could talk to him about anything. Maybe that hasn't changed. Maybe you should try it."
He looked away at last and finally shrugged. "Maybe." Another head shake. "But I don't want to do it today. I told Mum tomorrow."
"OK." Mercurial as ever, Lucy accepted his scheduling, and gave him a sudden huge grin. "So you're actually my brother, not my cousin, huh?"
He hadn't realized that. Slowly an answering grin crept across his face. "Yeah... I guess I am. Half-brother, anyway."
"You're not gonna start bossing me around like Loren, are you?"
He considered. "Depends. Are you gonna start acting all bratty and steal my stuff?"
She drew herself up, insulted. "I'm never a brat!"
"Then I'll make a deal with you. I won't go bossy if you don't go bratty."
She dropped the insulted look and grinned back, spitting on her hand and holding it out. "Deal." He copied her and they sealed the deal.
Another idea occurred to Lucy. "Do you think the Big Brats know?"
"About your Dad being mine? No... I don't think so. And let's not tell them, OK? It's our secret this time."
She nodded. "Cross my heart."