A/N sorry about the delay. I promise I'll try to keep a schedule. I just suddenly had to, well, work. Sad but true :)
Chapter 7
It's tricky, Time Lords' intuition. I know how to make this work, but my hands don't seem able to execute what I'm thinking.
Donna leans over my shoulder. "Aren't you done with the arts & crafts yet?", she asks as I burn my fingertip for the tenth time with the soldering iron. I quickly suck on it, then wave it in the air.
"Not quite done, no", I say.
"Here, I brought you some tea", she says, stepping back from the desk and dropping herself into an armchair.
"Thanks", I nod, putting down the screwdriver and turning to look at her. She gives me a faint smile. She doesn't look like one to hold a grudge, but I can sense she's still studying me.
"Listen, I...", she says, cautiously. "What I said, I didn't mean...".
"I know", I interrupt.
"Oh, of course you know. Let me apologize, please", she protests. No shutting up Donna when she's set on saying something. "I was just a little emotional, I didn't want to judge you".
I turn, looking at her as she picks up her Agatha Christie book, still gesturing around.
"You know, the Doctor told me your story. Or at least part of it, I assume".
I giggle bitterly. "Oh, I'd love to hear his side. I can't quite figure it out myself".
"Innit? Blimey, girl, you're messed up", she jokes.
"I know. Do you happen to know how to help me?", I ask smiling.
"Course I do. I just brought you tea, didn't I?", she winks.
I can't be glad enough that at least she's trying to get past the disappointment, unlike Martha did. But I know that even if she's pretending everything's okay, we both know things have been said.
Because, everything was cheer and laughter and games as soon as Donna joined the Tardis, but what happened in Pompeii really seems to have brought the eerie mood back; as far as first trips go, that was not a nice happy one. None of us could have anticipated that, Time Lords or not.
For starters, we were supposed to land in Rome. Rome, not Pompeii. Sure, close enough if you look at it in terms of the whole of time and space. But still, big difference. Just like Donna said, seven hills, not one single big mountain. Don't even get me started on how lousy is the Doctor at piloting. And, need I remind that we lost the Tardis? Again?
Thinking about it, that's when everything started going downwards.
"Ha. I've got it. Foss Street's this way", the Doctor had said once we three almost crashed into one another at a crossroad after looking for it on our own.
"No. Well, I found this big sort of amphitheatre thing. We can start there. We can gather everyone together. Maybe they've got a great big bell or something we could ring. Have they invented bells yet?". Because of course Donna wanted to warn the city. I should have realized right then things were not going to go well.
"What do you want a bell for?", the Doctor said. I mean, not going to be easy, especially if he wanted to keep acting so cynical, other than the usual oblivious.
"To warn everyone. Start the evacuation. What time does Vesuvius erupt? When's it due?", Donna insisted, I cringed a little.
"It's 79AD, twenty third of August, which makes volcano day tomorrow", he explained.
"Plenty of time. We could get everyone out easy".
"Yeah, except we're not going to", he stated coldly, and I was taken aback. I knew what he meant, of course, but still, the fact that we couldn't change what happened there didn't really make the decision to leave any easier. I knew for a fact we couldn't do anything different, but I still wish we could have.
"But that's what you do. You're the Doctor. You save people".
"Not this time", I said. "Pompeii is a fixed point in history, isn't it?", I asked him, interrupting their banter.
"What happens, happens. There is no stopping it", the Doctor explained.
"Says who?", Donna blurted.
"Says me", he said authoritatively. Like it mattered to Donna.
"What, and you're in charge?", she smirked.
"Tardis, Time Lord, yeah", he smirked back.
"Donna, human, no", she protested. "What about you?", she asked me.
"I do what the Doctor says we do", I said that because I didn't want to say out loud that there was nothing we could do, but Donna misinterpreted that.
"You what? Weren't yourself a human up until minutes ago? Now you're just going to let people die because you moved into the impressive know-it-all aliens team?", she was so upset, and it made me upset too.
The Doctor groaned loudly beside us. "My feelings don't change the fact he knows better", I managed to say, even if what Donna said was pretty stingy. And somehow true.
"So what? You going to let him boss you around like that?", she snapped.
"He's not bossing me around!" I protested, loudly. "I am a Time Lord too, and he's right. This is fixed, nothing we can do about it!", I insisted, even if my voice did lower a bit by the end of the sentence.
"Well some humans have to stand up to him. Funny though, from what he told me, you used to do just that. Whatever. I don't need your permission. I'll tell them myself".
Boy, that was... sharp. My impressive know-it-all alien brain told me I wasn't crying because there's something in a Time Lord biology that apparently turns every hint of showing any emotion into a cold blank stare. I recognize that from the Doctor. That's what he does. So I didn't cry, I didn't have any tears, I just stood there, silent, pretending what she said didn't matter, because, well, just because it's easier to pretend it doesn't matter.
"You stand in the market place announcing the end of the world, they'll just think you're a mad old soothsayer. Now, come on. Tardis. We are getting out of here", he had said, firmly.
"Well, I might just have something to say about that, Spaceman", Donna repeated.
And even now, I can't help but wonder how much I've changed. Because Donna was right, I used to stand up to him, tell him what I thought, express what I needed to express. I was the one who might just have something to say about that.
And now... I suppose it's part of growing, but I'm still scared of what I can do, so I'm usually keeping my mouth shut and following the Doctor no matter what.
Bacuase I used to be human, but now, being a Time Lord made me more clever but not necessarily wiser. Sometimes I'm terrified at the idea of what my brain can do. And I think the Doctor is too, even if he doesn't say it.
Clearly he's conflicted about me being his friend who he cares about, but still a product of his nemesis. He didn't really say it aloud, but I know we share the fear I might do something incredibly crazy and unhinged and probably evil because that's where my mind comes from.
But I know. Because when I first asked him the Master's laser screwdriver, he didn't look too happy about me tinkering with it. I had to insist. A lot. But I managed to convince him that having a device of my own could be good and useful for the both of us. Since there's been a lot of times when I was just, well, stuck, because we have to share his sonic screwdriver. Which he isn't happy about either, sharing his beloved sonic. So, he reluctantly agreed.
Actually, since I can't even get rid of the isomorphic controls, he probably only agreed because he thought I couldn't make it work.
I twist it into my hands. How he even made it, it's unbelievable. Such a brilliant mind. Maybe I should be even more scared than what I actually am. Because it's my biggest wish, and at the same time, my biggest fear, that he might be back someday.
Of course the fact that now there's even a prophecy about it didn't really help me relax about it.
"Doctor. That's your name", Evelina had said.
"How did you know that?", the Doctor asked, surprised. Well I know soothsayers and fortune tellers have all tricks to make you believe they really know stuff, but that was a little specific.
"You and your companion, made from time", she added, staring ahead of herself, not that I didn't know she was talking about me.
"And you. You call yourself Noble". Well, a little too specific. That was really creepy.
"You all come from so far away", she kept going, even after her mother insisted she stopped.
"The female soothsayer is inclined to invent all sorts of vagaries", the Augur, Lucius, said then.
"Oh, not this time, Lucius", the Doctor said.
"No, I reckon you've been out-soothsayed", I added.
"Is that so, people from Gallifrey?". Now that really creeped the both of us out.
"What?", the Doctor asked, merely surprised, I suppose more concerned about how he knew rather than what he was really saying.
"The strangest of images. Your home is lost in fire, is it not?", he insisted.
"Doctor, what are they doing?", Donna asked, clearly freaking out too.
"And you, daughter of London", Lucius kept on.
Donna was now scared, I think. "...How does he know that?".
"This is the gift of Pompeii. Every single oracle tells the truth", the Augur replied, smugly.
"That's impossible", Donna said then.
And then came the weird prophecies.
"Doctor, she is returning".
"Who is? Who's she?", he asked, and I wondered if he could refer to Rose. Because that could mean I really saw her, back home outside Adipose Industries.
But then, I didn't give it much thought because then he said to me, "And you won't be able to save the one you fear the most".
"And you, daughter of London. There is something on your back", he said to Donna.
"What's that mean?".
"Even the word Doctor is false. Your real name is hidden. It burns in the stars, in the Cascade of Medusa herself. You, and the child with no name, you are Lords, sir. Lords of Time".
I'm sure the Doctor shivered just as much as I did.
As much as I'd like to keep my human feelings and emotions, I am a Time Lord. No escape from that. But I couldn't help but envy Donna, back then. Because everytime I think I'm doing okay and that I'm not really the mess I believe I am, something happens or someone says something just to remind me that even if I'm not human anymore, I'm not really a Time Lord.
I don't even have a name.
And... the one I fear the most? Will I... try and fail to save the Master?
As it's been explained to me, by the lovely skarosianlifeform, there are so many informations I don't have. Maybe I should use my time to watch Classic Who instead of writing fanfiction? Anyway, the five million language thing, I think there's a point where Nine says that. But I could easily be mistaken, who knows. Whatever, trivia time!
-I've decided that when time reversed on the Valiant after the gollum-like Doctor became himself with the help of Martha, the laser screwdriver was left around there and the Doctor picked it up. Why? well, because I want Zoe to have it.
-I imagine the Tardis library furnished a bit like Eight's Tardis console room, except much bigger and with a big olympic swimming pool at the center. But still, nice and posh antique furnishing, chaiselongues, brocade sofas, that sort of stuff. Lots of gold and red and carpets and tapestry.
That's all, next chapter tomorrow. Thanks again!