I hope you enjoyed the last couple of chapters. I enjoyed writing them. If I somehow missed you then speak up and I'll see what I can do. :)
Right...so...Let's get back to the depressing stuff. I think the last couple of chapters were a nice break.
The TARDIS hovers in space overlooking the Tarantula nebula. A place where stars are born. The doors are open and I sit with my legs dangling out into the nothingness as I contemplate the years I have spent in this world. I am eighty two years old, though I certainly don't look it. Anyone who's met me wouldn't believe my age to be past twenty five but there you go. Sixty four years since I fell into Pete's world. Sixty four years since I've seen my parents faces or heard their voices. Sixty four years and that doesn't even count the years in the void. And even though the darkness has dimmed, I'm still in it. Life is darkness with pockets of light to keep you on the path.
As I sit here thinking about the last six decades I think back to all of the things that don't add up. Little things that I've been ignoring for a long time. Too long. But I can't anymore. The timelines show me that there is a storm coming my way. A choice is on to have to be made, and whatever that choice is it's going to lead me to cross my own timeline. I just don't know why. But the thing that really doesn't add up is the Doctor
I thought I understood him all those years ago but I knew nothing. Perhaps we are kindred spirits. Perhaps we have both made difficult and often similar decisions, but I didn't know him as a person. Now I do. I know him and his wife and their son better than I knew my own family. That's what happens when you give someone your time. So I think about how I know him, and I realize that he is hiding something from me. He has been for a long time.
I can't quite put my finger on what it is. Little things. A sideways glance here. A worried expression there. The day I regenerated. Something about that day niggles at me. And as I sit here I finally realize what the look on his face was conveying. Recognition. He knew my face, this face. And as I think about all the things that Meta's memory ghost has told me over the years, I remember one important thing. We still have a lot to do, and I had to live. Not because he wanted me to, not because Rose needed me to; but because for some reason the universe did. And the sisters of Karn made sure that I survived.
I sense the Doctor enter the control room. He usually wakes up from our weekly sleep first, but today I couldn't even fall asleep. He comes and sits himself next to me. Our feet sway together in the nether space. White chucks next to black combat boots. It's a funny comparison. "Couldn't sleep?" He asks.
I feel my lips quirk in a rye smile. "No. Not tonight."
We look at the swirls of color in the nebula before us. After a moment, he breaks the silence. "It reminds me of that time in the Orion Nebula."
He grins as I start to laugh outright at the memory he's brought up. "Oh your face! I've never seen you look so horrified."
"It's not my fault you looked terrifying. I've never seen anyone look so red! In a thousand years I've never seen anyone get that sunburned." We continue to laugh.
"How long ago was that now?" I wonder out loud.
"Oh a good twenty years or so ago now. Junior was around forty at the time i think."
"Yeah. Twenty years. Mmm." It amazes me that I can say things like that. Once it was my parents telling me stories from twenty years ago. Now I'm the one reminiscing about things that may have happened fifty years ago depending.
"You look confused." I realize he's right. I'm furrowing my brow.
"No. Just thoughtful."
"Thinking is good. What about?"
I take a deep breath. "I was thinking about how old I am. Yes, to you I'm a child still but...if things had been different Id be spoiling grandchildren by now. I could have had a very different life. I was going to finish school. Get a job. No idea what though. I hadn't really decided or thought about what I wanted to do. I would have gotten married and grown old and passed away in my sleep. But here I am, watching stars explode into existence. Seeing colors that I never knew existed. I always knew the universe was big but never this big."
I pause for a moment to turn toward him. "And then you. I knew you once but not at the same time. And over the years we've become similar but we're still very much different. And I'm out of foreknowledge. I have been for decades. But it doesn't change the fact that I still know more of your past then I lived with you. But then again...I suppose you know me better then you let on too. Don't you."
His gaze flickers back to the raging storm outside the door. "When did you figure that?"
"About two hours ago. I couldn't ignore it any longer. You did good hiding it I admit. Didn't really get suspicious till last week when I blew up that Dalek." We'd found a rogue Dalek on some backward planet causing trouble. In the end, I was the one to take it apart this time. It was old and demented; easy compared to other situations we've faced.
He sighs. "I can't deny it can I?"
I shake my head sadly. "No."
He huffs out a breath. "River said something to me once that I think sums it up perfectly. It's like looking at a photograph of someone before you knew them. You know it's them. But they're not quite...done yet. And until last week, you weren't done yet."
"It was the first time you saw me as you knew me." He nods in confirmation. "You know this means I can't stay."
He rubs his hand over his face. "Time can be rewritten."
"Sometimes. But I don't think this can." I contemplate all the clues I've had this far, and I keep coming back to the same conclusion. "You knew me in the time war. Right?"
He's about to reply but he can't bring himself to. What is he supposed to say I don't know. "Rose isn't going to like it, and Junior will sulk for weeks."
"What happens if I don't go? Mm? What happens?"
He looks me in the eye and tells me the truth. Pure truth, and it scares me. "Then the war never would have ended. You give me the gun and I pull the trigger. Always."
That's why I could see the Bad Wolf as the moment. She wasn't just judging the Doctor, she was judging me. Words leave me. We sit in silence for a long time longer. I don't pay attention to what my times sense to tell me. We sit and we watch stars catch fire until Rose and Junior wake up. We don't tell them right away. We go for another trip. Someplace calm. A private beach on a slow and peaceful planet. My reprieve before going off to war. But all vacations end.
Rose notices first. She corners me about it late in our trip. I tell her all of it since she needs to know. She gets a bit mad at the Doctor for not telling her that I was "her." Whoever "her" is. Junior remains oblivious at first. But then we all sit in the living room and I explain it. He's not too happy about it. But there's nothing he can do. Nothing at all.
I don't take much with me. I have the clothes on my back, a journal in my pocket and a lifetime of happy memories to sustain me. Juniors tearful goodbye breaks my hearts but it's time for him to move on. He doesn't need me anymore.
I say goodbye to the Doctor next. "Thank you. For everything." He nods toward his family. If I hadn't changed everything, he wouldn't have them. And he knows it. I give him a hug and then face Rose.
After only a moment's hesitation, she embraces me. We stand tree crying for a fair amount of time. "I'll miss you," she says.
"I'll miss you too. But it's alright. Everything's going to be fine. You'll see." We pull apart and I head for the TARDIS doors. I turn and look back at my family one last time.
"Love you." I give them a watery smile.
"We love you too." Rose speaks for the rest of them. I opens the doors and move I go out.
"No!" Junior barrels into me. "Please don't go. You'll die. Please don't." He's mumbling into my jacket but it's still tearing at my heart strings. I kiss his forehead.
"Never cruel or cowardly, never give up and never give in. Look at me." He looks at me and I speak earnestly. "You are going to be fantastic. Remember what I taught you. Be happy, be smart..."
"...and smile for the camera," he finishes for me. I smile.
"Hole in one little Raggedy man." I kiss his forehead and then rush out the door, closing it behind me. I walk away into the waist high scarlet grass toward the sun rising on the burnt orange horizon, and I don't look back. Not even when I hear it dematerializing. I look into the distance to see the lightning flash of battle. I square my shoulders, and charge toward the fray.