Chapter Seven: Love for Another

Red (or Ruby, as she appeared to be addressed as from several of the confused townsfolk) stepped out of Granny's Diner, lugging a short, stand-up sign with the diner name printed across it. A mini-sign was attached over the diner name, and it read "Closed." Red made certain that the sign was placed directly in front of the diner's entrance for everyone to see. After placing it there, she started to make her way towards the town hall where most of everyone had gathered after the wraith attack. However, she stopped once she looked over to the TARDIS, which was still parked on the sidewalk in front of the diner.

Ever since she and Henry came to the rescue of James and the Doctor, Red had not seen the Doctor step out from the TARDIS to talk to her or anyone else. Whatever Regina had done to take away his memories put a great effect on him, and Red had been concerned ever since she discovered that he didn't remember the life they once had before the curse. Red sighed in despair; she needed to check on him – needed to know if he was going to be alright. She hated leaving him alone, because she knew what he was like when he was alone.

Marching up to the TARDIS, Red hesitated in knocking on the door. She expected him to shout from inside that he did not want to be bothered at the moment and to come back later. Fortunately, the total opposite happened. "Come in!" He answered in a happy tone, which brought a warm smile upon Red's face as she opened the right door and entered the TARDIS.

The view inside the special blue box astounded Red much like everyone else who ever went into it – with only a couple of exceptions. Red always wondered what it was like inside, but she never got her chance because of the Doctor's betrayal on the first day that they met. It was something that she had never forgiven him on, at least not until the time he helped Snow try to save Prince Charming. After that failed rescue mission, moments with the Doctor were never the same, because he was never the same. He became a completely different man, one who Red learned to trust and even love.

But that man she once knew, the man named John Smith, was not there inside that special blue box. The man she expected to find was the same stranger she saw fall from the sky from that enchanted land he called "Gallifrey." He had no memories of meeting her, helping Snow rescue her prince, or even falling in love with Red. With these thoughts running through her mind, her happiness slightly dispersed. She just reminded herself that he looked like the man she fell in love with, not the man himself.

At first Red saw no sign of the Doctor in the large control room. "Where are you?" Red asked, her eyes wandering all over to find him.

"Down here!"

She heard his voice come beneath the console platform that she stepped upon, looking through the glass floor to see the Doctor with a pair of goggles over his eyes. He looked up at Red at the same time, and his face clearly dropped into what Red could tell was a mixture of surprise and a hint of horror. "Oh," he uttered before refocusing his attention on what he was working on and then giving Red that response she dreaded hearing from him outside the TARDIS: "Come back later. I'm a little busy right now."

This hurt Red and made her a little confused. Why call her inside and then tell her to leave? Something was up with the Doctor, and she was not leaving until the issue was solved. Moving down to join him beneath the console platform, Red saw that he was sitting on some type of swing and surrounded by an array of wires and control boxes that Red could not even begin to understand their functions. The Doctor knew she was there beside him, but he did not once look her way; instead he focused on two items in his hands – the sonic screwdriver and a piece of wood.

"What're you doing?" Red curiously asked.

He scanned the piece of wood with his sonic screwdriver and shook his head in disappointment as he looked to the device for absent readings. "I'm trying to sync my sonic with wood, so that it can finally work on wood."

"Why?"

"Because I need to find a special tree with a special type of wood."

"Why?"

"IS THAT THE ONLY WORD YOU KNOW IN THE WHOLE UNIVERSE?"

His tone made Red jump unexpectedly. "I-I'm s-sorry, John," she gingerly said as tears welled up in her eyes.

The Doctor sighed, removing the goggles from his head and rubbing his eyes in a combination of frustration and regret. "No, no. I'm sorry. Here I am trying to do the impossible. Magic…it's such a horrible challenge." He looked to Red, who was still slightly trembling. "You called me 'John' again. Out of everyone in this town, you're the only one who doesn't address me as 'Doctor.'"

Red weakly smiled. "I loved him."

The Doctor nodded understandingly. "And you married him."

The tears fell from Ruby's eyes as she sorrowfully said, "Yes."

"I wish I could be that man you love right now. But the truth is that he himself was a fairy tale. A product of whatever memory wipe that Regina put on—"

"I know, Joh…Doctor." Red interrupted, finally gaining the courage to address him by the name that he went by before she knew him as John Smith. "I know you're not him, but…I just can't help seeing his face. It's your face. And it scares me that it's him I'm seeing and not you."

The Doctor wanted to say something in response to that, but there was nothing he could say to change her thoughts on the matter.

"I just…don't know what to do." She briefly looked to the door leading out of the TARDIS and despairingly sighed. "I've got to go. Everyone's in front of the town hall looking for help." She then asked with hopeful eyes, "Will you still be here…in Storybrooke?"

The Doctor nodded and smiled. "There are lives to be saved. I'm not going anywhere anytime soon."

She was so overjoyed to hear this that she leaned in and gave him a kiss on the cheek. He sat there and stared at her in wide-eyed disbelief, not anticipating her sneaking in a kiss before she left the TARDIS. Adding to this shock, she lastly notified him upon walking out the door, "Oh, and in case you get hungry, Granny's got fish-sticks and custard in the diner. Just ignore the closed sign outside."

After that notification, the Doctor heard the door close. "Blimey," he whispered to himself while moving out from beneath the console platform. Red truly did know much about him – more than he knew of her. The thought of being married to Red Riding Hood as a completely different man unsettled him and even made him wonder what River would think if she ever found out. Neither marriage was legal by Time Lord standards – one took place in an alternate timeline while the other was in a fairy tale universe. It was the most complicated affair imaginable and the Doctor hadn't the slightest idea where to start in solving it; he had enough problems already.

As he went onto the console platform, he once again scanned the piece of wood with the sonic screwdriver. The device made a peculiar noise that made the Doctor believe he had succeeded in recalibrating its functions at first. Suddenly, the piece of wood burst into flames right in the Doctor's hand, and he quickly threw it down in reaction to the slight pain he received. Rapidly stomping on flaming piece of wood to put it out, the Doctor bemoaned over his failure. The work was so frustrating that he felt a searing pain overtake his temples, drowning out the pain he felt in his hand. It got so intense after a second that he sunk down to the floor, clasping the sides of his head.

While this painful sensation took over, brief images of places he had never been and people he had never met – to his recollection – flashed before his eyes. He felt as if he were experiencing the complicated life of another person through his or her eyes. After a moment of watching these images play out like a slideshow moving in fast motion, his mind began to realize that these memories were Regina's, or the life that she lived in the fairy tale world. The final image was of her taking a small book from Rumplestiltskin – a transaction that he watched happen through Regina's eyes.

The memory flashes abruptly ended and the Doctor's headache subsided. A name went through the Doctor's mind shortly thereafter, and he said it out loud in perplexing surprise. "Cora?"