2. Meeting the Ancestors.
A portal doorway appears nearby and becomes bright. It seems it's Simeon's next destination. He walks easily to it and steps through it.
Another queue is there, and he is encouraged to join it by another beagle. .
This time they are queuing to arrive at a reception desk with a busy looking receptionist. Simeon has no idea what to say. .
Shortly he arrives at the front of the queue and the receptionist reads his name badge.
"Simeon Stanley Ground," she says as the Voice Controlled machine before her presents information to her on the screen.
"Please join the queue for the Time Room. Beyond the Time Room, you are to proceed to Visitation Room eight."
She applies a sticker on his shirt. "That will take you to the right time." .
Simeon's surprised. Surely his ancestors can't be expected to be there just for him the moment he arrives? .
The receptionist notices his hesitation.
"The Time Room will take you to the correct time for you to meet your first ancestor. Then go to Visitation Room eight when you get there," she repeats, adding a smidgeon more information to encourage Simeon to just go! .
Simeon wanders away from the reception desk, his mind a whirl of possibilities. Who will he meet first? His parents had given him instruction about his forebears and shown him their family trees. He expects he will, in his turn, receive his own family tree with both of their family trees combined. For now, he recalls the few entries on the tree, some dating back to when things started to be recorded in written form, well before the founding of the Division on Gallifrey.
Who will he see first? Will he measure up to their expectations? He knows that years ago, they used to have high expectations of all their descendants. Will they know anything about him and his future? What will they know? What will their system tell them? .
Excitement courses through him as he approaches an open doorway with a room descriptor "Time Room" in chiselled relief on the almost comically accentuated lintel above the door. .
The Time Room. .
Simeon's surprised to find no room as such, just a corridor. . A few steps later he emerges from the other end of the short corridor.
For a moment he wanders around in a sort of daze, trying to orientate himself and wondering what he must do next.
He sees one of his peers heading for a doorway inscribed with "Visitation Room Seven". Nearby he sees his own target destination room and feels better about approaching the doorway. He pauses and peers through the entranceway of Visitation Room Eight, but a mist shrouds anything beyond. How he would like to see in before going in! .
He steps through the doorway and the mist clears. An elderly couple occupy two chairs on the other side of a table.
He recognises these two from pictures his parents had shown him. They are two of his great-grandparents. They had died before the annihilation of Gallifrey at the Master's hands. He knows exactly how far back in time he's travelled to see them.
John and Edith are sat on the other side of a table from where Simeon entered. They've merely had to book the meeting room at a moment when they're on the brink of dying, when all Time Lords have just a day left before their extinguishment (TV episode Heaven Sent mentions this).
"Greetings to my great-grandparents, John and Edith," he says before he sits on a nearby chair. He's unsure just what to say but greeting them ranks highly to start with.
Simeon hopes that at his young age they won't drag up his future and their doubtless high expectations. His life has by-and-large been a happy blur so far.
But contact with anyone from before the re-building of Gallifrey is bound to be chancy. They will not be able to understand what has happened to Gallifrey - the changes that have taken place, the different and easier requirements placed on every citizen. In his great-grandparents' time, requirements had been harsh and adherence to rules and laws had been required to be strict on pain of death. In his own time, it was apparently easy in comparison.
Simeon's great-grandfather, John speaks. "You must not associate with the Doctor. He's nothing but trouble!"
This must be high on their agenda to say.
This causes young Simeon to think about how things might have changed and attitudes towards the Doctor might have changed, too. In Simeon's time, the Doctor is revered and to be highly thanked for rescuing their futures.
Back in the days of the Division, he was often Gallifrey's arch enemy ... according to the Division, that is. .
At this point in Simeon's timeline, he hasn't met the Doctor and knows little about him except that he keeps cropping up with positively glowing references as Gallifrey seeks to show its gratefulness for its restoration.
Simeon feels that the Doctor has in some way been put down in the past, yet his history lessons have skated over the past of the Doctor himself. It's as if it has had to be blotted out.
On the other hand, the dodgy history of the Division has been laid bare, along with the iron grip that the Division had had on all their citizens.
He feels sure that his ancestors are under the grip of the Division. Yet how can he possibly convey all this to them?
His thoughts come back suddenly. His prior warnings that information transfer must be minimised evaporate and are gone! . Right now, a pure desire to challenge their view pervades him. .
"Is that what the Division tells you to say?" he asks.
He becomes aware that his father must have, in his turn, visited his great-grandparents. Maybe he, too, has conveyed misgivings about the integrity of the Division. How can he say anything to rectify what the Division are still doing to these ancestors?
"Policy and reality sometimes differ!" he reiterates the dodgy motto of the Division. "Their lies abound and cover up everything. No-one can ever hear any truth from them!" He hopes that his apparent ridicule of the Division and its motto carries some thought for them to grasp.
He can't tell them that he owes his very existence to the Doctor. Even at his tender age he has easily grasped what has happened on Gallifrey, and all because the Doctor cared for his home planet and the people (ref. 9).
But then, maybe his ancestors' meeting with him is being monitored? Maybe his ancestors might have to toe the party line?
Suddenly, he fears that he might have already said too much, and their Visitation session might be terminated along with all three of them.
"I'm sorry!" he apologises. He feels the need to tell them that things have improved since their day, but somehow without angering the Division authorities who might be listening in!
"I'm usually able to speak openly. Things improve," he says. He hopes he's said something to encourage them.
Simeon's great-grandmother, Edith, looks up suddenly, as if someone has entered to interrupt. Simeon fears the Visitation might be intruded to force it to come to an abrupt end. Maybe he's said too much already!
He stands up and spins around to face what Edith saw. He's tense and ready!
What does he see?