Someone spoke his name.
Help me. Won’t you help me? Don’t you hear me?
He swallowed hard. This was getting entirely too strange.
Half of UNIT and much of Torchwood already thought him to be bonkers. Pete
Tyler’s pet alien. Just stand back everyone, prepare to be amazed and get ready
to run. No one dared try to keep him on leash. Better to exploit his madness.
That’s what he’d always done. He worked best under pressure. In fact, the worse
things got, the more he liked it. He had always been one to dance in a
thunderstorm--or fly a kite. But storms carried an unfathomable energy as of
late. He did not understand it, despite the uneasy feeling that he should. That
he would, if only he still possessed the heightened sensitivity of a true Time
Lord and not this increasingly muddied up part-human cognition. Something was
wrong. He could not identify it but seemed also unable to escape it. Bad
dreams. Nightmares bleeding over from a life that had long since flown away in
the Tardis. As if he didn’t already struggle to get the sleep his half alien
physiology now required.
One heart. It still made him queasy.
He caught sight of his reflection as he dressed. His now
familiar aspect appeared the same, but the mirror only told half of the story.
If it were true that what mattered was inside a man…he didn’t want to think
about it. This body, this vessel into which so many lifetimes had been poured,
no longer kept pace with his feverish intentions. A second heart no longer beat
to the rhythm of Time itself. Miss more than a few days’ sleep and he was
exhausted. More than that and they were secretly delivering his unconscious
body to old Doc Sullivan who would, in turn, be ringing up UNIT’s
extraterrestrial specialist, Dr. Martha Jones. But sleeping meant dreaming, and
dreaming meant remembering, and remembering often meant nightmares. At times
his whole existence disgusted him. It just figured that he’d inherited both a
whopping load of human self-loathing and millennia of Time Lord guilt along
with all his favourite recipes for bananas. Thanks, a heap for that, mates!
The Tyler household was once again quiet and he slipped from
the bedroom, making his way down two flights of stairs to the kitchen. He
lifted the biscuit tin down from the only shelf they had found so far that
Rusty couldn’t get to. He twisted off the lid and inhaled. The Tyler’s new chef
baked the most gorgeous ginger snaps.
Half Three. He wondered what Rose was doing right now.
Wondered if she was out on the moors tracking aliens, verifying Rifts, or
snuggled warm in bed, missing him as much as he was missing her. Was it still
raining there? More importantly, did she feel this new rising storm, as if
something were racing toward them on the winds of Time and Space? She had
before, a long time ago. She had shared his dreams. Dreams dark enough to wake
her from her slumber, reaching for him, beseeching him for answers he could not
provide. No matter how terrible her dreams had been, his were worse. All he
could do was hold her close, waiting for the foreboding to fade with the dawn.
Not that it did.
I’m so sorry.
He shook his head to clear it, exhaling deeply.
Rose had taken it in stride, like so much else, chalking it
up to being a parting gift, courtesy of the Time Vortex. One did not look into
the Heart of the Tardis and come away unchanged. He had only to look into the
mirror to remind himself of that.
What an effort it had been the following night to act like
nothing was wrong though. Rose advised him to ignore what remained of his Time
Lord senses just this once, embrace his Inner Englishman, and soldier on. So he
had donned a dinner jacket for the Tyler’s posh New Year’s Eve gala and had
even made a go at styling his hair into a semblance of order. Surely, he could
feign dignity for a few hours, and if not, was reasonably sure he could concoct
a rapid escape with the aid of one small boy, a few bangers, and a West
Highland Terrier.
He remembered the night well. How Rose had laughed at his
grooming efforts, took away the styling mousse, and ruffled his hair into
unruly spikes that she said were cute. Who was he to argue? Then she set about
straightening his festive red bowtie, assuring him that their dreams were only
that. Dreams. Echoes back through microscopic fissures that the overuse of the
temporal cannon and dimension hoppers had caused. She shared his dreams because
they shared a bond. How else could she have found him after years of searching
across parallel worlds? A satisfying if not entirely plausible explanation.
What followed was a litany of “don’ts” to keep in mind once her parents’
boring, pampered guests arrived so they might avoid awkward situations like the
brief declarations of war against The Peaceable Kingdom the year before.
Torchwood Disney had been shut down for months, right in the middle of their
first entanglement with the off-world Transperion menace. He‘d rolled his eyes
but promised to behave. As long as no one did anything stupid. All bets were
off after that.
Another ginger snap. Another memory.
Rose always took great pleasure in presenting him as Jon
Noble. Doctor Jon Noble. It was all he could do not to burst out laughing each
time she said it. Doc-tor Jon Noble. That night had been no different, but
after the third over-dressed, over-titled, overbearing Head of State’s
Significant Other examined him with a vintage eyepiece (all the rage that
season) and made polite but disparaging remakes about his foot attire, he and
Rose could no longer contain themselves and skived off like truant school children,
bursting through the patio doors, unable to stifle their giggling.
‘And what’s wrong with my shoes? Did I spill cranberry sauce
on them?’
‘I shoulda told her you were Sir Doctor of Tardis,’ Rose
said, slipping her hand into his. ‘A knighthood’s a knighthood, after all. They
don’t have to know it was Queen Victoria who did it.’
‘And then promptly banished me, Dame Rose. Besides, titles
have become rather passé here, what with a British President. Britain‘s Golden
Age. A bit lacklustre, without the Queen at Buckingham Palace though, isn‘t it?
Still,’ he sniffed, ‘could be worse. The country could still belong to Canada,
eh?’
‘You’ve picked up on the alternate history better than I
have.’
‘Well, that’s what I do, Rose Tyler. Pick up history. Put it
back the way it should be--
‘Interfere when it suits you—'
‘You can’t blame any of this on me. This world’s evolved
along a unique timeline. No doubt Queen Victoria’s not-so-mysterious death in
1879 had something to do with it,’ he told her, scratching absently at the back
of his neck. ‘Shame we weren’t here, but we were a little busy that day, you
wee timorous beastie.’
‘Naked timorous beastie,’ she reminded him with raised
eyebrows.
He wrinkled his nose, feeling a bit of heat on his face. He
looked back over his shoulder at the noisy throng of guests, despairing that
they would have to go back in.
‘We should move to Scotland,’ Rose said suddenly. ‘Buy a
house, yeah?’
‘In Scotland?’ he asked, adopting the accent as he spoke. It
always made her smile when he did that. He might just make it permanent. ‘Where
would you--aww, you mean the Torchwood estate? That dreary old place? It’s
practically falling in on top of itself and probably still smells like
werewolf. But, yeah, why not.’ Anything for you, Rose.
As they held hands in the moonlight the clouds rolled in
again and it began to rain. Rose pressed closer. He remembered how warm her
body felt next to his, how their breath hung in the cold night air. Far off,
voices carried on the night wind, a sad song for the darkest time of the year.
He would have gone on standing there, listening, if she hadn’t pulled him
inside.
He grazed his way through party trays of nibbles as he was
all but paraded past every realm of Society, all the while eyeing the tall
windows and scanning the rooms full of guests, expecting at any moment for
legions of marching Cybermen to crash the party. Or Daleks to levitate up the
dumbwaiter. The band played A Long, Long Time Ago, but it was another melody he
heard, far and away. Beautiful and sad like Ood Song. Around him glasses
clinked and inane voices gabbled on about all manner of pish posh. Gold and
diamonds gleamed and sparkled under the grand old house’s chandeliers. The rich
were the rich no matter what Universe you were in. Tony, Rose’s young brother,
ran through the house, powered by the excitement of the late hour and too many
sweets. He always envied the boy that freedom. When he did it people looked at
him funny. Rose looped her arm around his to steer him away from the bustling
crowd--and the nibbles-- commenting on how well connected her father remained
with the current government and UNIT and what that meant to the continued
funding for research and development at this world’s version of Torchwood, but
his thoughts were elsewhere.
Growing ever more distracted as the night wore on, he
eventually left British President Harriet Jones, (then in her second term of
office), in mid-sentence, catching Rose‘s eye as he mounted the stairs two at a
time. They had yet to even dance a single dance and she looked stunning in her
elegant Christian Dior cocktail dress that matched the star sapphire ring on
her left hand. The ring he had given her in keeping with one of the many quaint
human customs he had observed over the years. Her long blonde hair--oh, it had
been ages now since she’d worn it that way--was swept up off her neck, twisted
and adorned with the gold clasp he had designed after something he remembered
from his home planet, Gallifrey. All for his precious girl. He so loved being
with her at Christmastime and felt a pang of regret leaving her standing there,
obviously concerned about him but also disappointed. More and more, it seemed,
that was what he was doing. Disappointing her. She had made him better before.
Why did he still hurt so much? Was that what it meant to be part human?
He wanted to ask her if she could hear what he heard, that
far and away hymn that was growing ever closer, riding the Time Winds. But he
feared her answer. Why ruin her night entirely, subjecting her to his miserable
company? He made his worst mistakes at moments like that. Worse than eating
marmalade from a jar with his fingers. He thought he was doing her a favour,
but by the expression on Jackie Tyler‘s face as she led her daughter back
toward the festivities his gesture was not meeting with appreciation. He might
have been a green, odoriferous, googly-eyed Raxacoricofallapatorian for all she
looked at him with disdain.
Oh, that night. That terrible, terrible night.
As the clock ticked away the final hours of the year, rain
turned to snow, cloaking the English countryside under a chill mantle. The
haunting melody played on, a distant, irrefutable death knell. He paced the
bedroom, tossing jacket and tie aside, loosening his collar. Listening.
Listening. The song grew in intensity until it was all he could hear. Sorrow
all he could feel. His already diminished composure shattered, and he fled the
house to take refuge in the vaulted orangery Pete Tyler had agreed to give him
use of to conceal his workshop--and where he had hidden the rapidly growing
Tardis. Had it been possible, he would have entered the fledging Time Ship
itself that night, but it was too soon. Too soon and too dangerous. Even for a
Time Lord.
The terraced flagstones leading up the hillside to the
greenhouse might have been a snow-capped mountain for all the effort it took to
ascend. Inside at last, he bolted shut the door before falling to his knees
amid flowering bougainvillea and fuchsia, head pressed between his hands,
waiting for a death that wasn‘t even his own.
As if they didn’t already think he was barmy.
When he failed to answer Rose‘s repeated entreaties, Pete
broke the door down with a fire axe, the blow shattering several panels of
glass in the ceiling. Cold air rushed in, but not before Jackie Tyler, who
breezed in like a tropical storm, fists on her hips, demanding an explanation
and calling him a lunatic. And other things. He wouldn’t have argued the point
even if he could have.
Even now, years later, he could feel that terrible pain and
recall what a struggle it had been just to focus on them. Pete still in his
dinner jacket, Jackie and Rose in their designer gowns, and Tony, dressed in
his jim-jams at such a late hour, pushing in behind them, his dark eyes
shimmering pools. Everyone was talking at once (humans really were a gabby
species), but Jackie loudest and fastest of all, like a replay of his torturous
last Regeneration a forgotten number of Christmases before when she asked him
what he needed in a rapid-fire succession of words, never stopping long enough
to listen to his answer.
‘Oh, not this again,’ she said at long last, bending down to
look at him more closely. ‘He hasn‘t changed, has he?’
‘What do you mean, Mum? Of course, he hasn‘t changed,’ Rose
told her, rushing to his side. Her fingers felt wonderfully cool on his hot
skin. ‘He can’t Regenerate. Not anymore.’
‘Well, I don’t know,’ Jackie told her daughter, bending to
touch his forehead with a finely manicured hand. ‘Have a look at him. He’s just
the same as before. Burning a fever. And look at his eyes. What do you need
this time sweetheart? Wait, don’t tell me. I remember. Tea. Pete, put the
kettle on. Tony, get mummy a blanket, there‘s a good boy.’
English mums. Ever so practical in a crisis. Even when they
were cross.
Rose sat beside him on the floor, wrapping him in Tony’s
Secret Squirrel blanket, holding him against her now crumpled gown. For the
first time in days, he felt like he was reconnecting to reality. At least this
reality. By the look on Pete’s face, it was clear the man thought more was
required but soon enough a hot cuppa was pressed between his fingers and Rose
dropped two sugar cubes in. Just the way you like it. He inhaled deeply, unable
to focus on anything besides the steam, the warmth, the scent of Rose’s hair,
until, quite suddenly, he asked for an apple. Tony was quick to fetch one from
the house. For some reason it tasted like rubbish.
‘It‘s him, isn‘t it?’ Rose asked him softly, searching his
eyes for answers he feared he did not have. ‘He’s gone, isn‘t he? He’s… changed
again?’
‘I expect so.’
Not for the first time he had to turn away from the tears
coursing down Rose Tyler’s face, resigning himself to the fact that no matter
how much she wanted to love him, she would always, always, love the Doctor.
When synapses were again firing, he went for one of his now
infamous drives where he drove very fast for a very long time. Often until all
the petrol was spent. Rose tracked him down not far from Balmoral Castle in
Scotland where he had made arrangements to buy the now decrepit Torchwood
Estate for her with little more than charm and, he was told, good looks. He
told her Merry Christmas! She told him to put on his coat before he caught his
death in the cold.
Why was it that even when he did the right thing, it was the
wrong thing?
He peered into the empty biscuit tin sadly.
Someone spoke his name.
He wondered if Pete would mind if he borrowed the other
Jeep.
***
‘Rory, what’s wrong with him? He’s all clammy.’
‘He probably has a fever.’
‘Yes, but why does he have a fever?’ Amy Pond asked, fixing
her husband with an exasperated gaze. ‘He never gets sick. Is it some sort of
Space Flu? Maybe he went back to that awful jungle planet he just had to drag
us to to see those sloth bat thingies? I told him not to eat those green
bananas.’
Rory looked down to where Amy stood in the space below the
Tardis control console. She had changed her clothes, trading bunny slippers and
a nightie for jeans and a plaid shirt. Above her, the crystalline Time Rotor
continued to rise and fall with graceful precision. Lights on the control
panels flickered. Instruments spun and weird, looping Gallifreyan script
flickered in waves over the monitors. Music now trickled from unseen speakers
in the ceiling. The Proclaimers’ A Long, Long Time Ago. It seemed to be stuck
in a loop.
Show me things I don't want to see
(Wanna see, wanna see, wanna see)
Remind me of who I thought I was gonna be
(Gonna be, gonna be, gonna be)
Take me places I used to go
(Used to go, used to go)
A long, long time ago.
The last time they had travelled with the Doctor it had been
Ian Dury, Elvis Costello and Wreckless Eric. Tomorrow it would probably be
Dirty Blues. As long as it wasn’t more Judoon love ballads. For all intents and
purposes all seemed well in the Tardis. Except for the Doctor himself who, Rory
had to admit, was anything but well.
That and it seemed to him like they were going faster than
normal through the Space Time Vortex.
He clattered back down the steps, stethoscope in hand. He
debated telling Amy that hiding in the den of looping cables and shimmering
wires beneath the main flight deck wasn’t really all that unusual, but the
Doctor wasn’t swinging lazily in the repair harness, whispering sweet nothings
to the Tardis itself. Herself. To the contrary, he was huddled like a
frightened child in a thunderstorm not far from the storage closet under the
stairs that they had pulled him out of kicking and screaming earlier. He had been
uncharacteristically quiet and still since Amy had slapped him hard across the
face in a desperate attempt to snap him out of whatever delirium had wound him
into a writhing mass of flailing limbs. Stunned, the Doctor ceased his
convulsions, his soulful grey-green eyes wide at the sight of the blood
dripping from Rory’s nose and down the front of his plaid shirt. His square jaw
worked side to side, the words ‘I’m sorry’ barely whispering from his lips.
Then he was as pale as he had been before the tirade, scrambling as far away
from his companions as the low edges of the compartment would allow. If Amy
hadn’t blocked his escape, he’d have been back down his rabbit hole.
Rory extended the stethoscope toward his wife, but she
grabbed his arm instead and pulled him closer
‘You’re the nurse. Do some nursing.’
‘Yes, and he’s an Eleven-Hundred-year-old alien with two
hearts and I think I may have a deviated septum.’ Rory touched his nose
carefully. ‘He’s a lot stronger than he looks.’
‘Oooh, poor baby,’ Amy crooned at him. She kissed his nose
as gently as she had kissed his burnt fingers, then bent down near the Doctor.
‘Doctor it’s me, yeah? So, Rory’s back. Try not to hit him again, okay? Be a
good Alien and we‘ll get you a whole case of Jammie Dodgers.’
The Doctor made no reply, only pulled further into the
shadows. He wouldn’t look at them, but he whispered something. They leaned in
close. He whispered again.
‘What did he say?’ Rory asked. ‘Did he ask for River?’
‘No. I don’t think… no. It was something else. Doctor? Say
again. What? I think he’s delirious. Or maybe that‘s Gallifreyan.’
‘She’s probably already with him, you know. In another
timeline. Even if we can contact her, what’s she going to do? Slap him harder
than you already did?’
‘Oy!’ Amy snapped at him. ‘I was improvising. It worked,
didn’t it?’
‘Yes, well if you’d left him alone before maybe he’d still
be sleeping.’
‘Oh, so it’s my fault?’
‘Well… no... yes... Maybe.’ Rory looked back at the Doctor,
then at his wife. Such a life they lead. If defied logic.
‘We need help,’ Amy told him, squeezing his hand. ‘He needs
help. Go on, pretty. Talk to the Tardis again. I don’t think he came and got
us. Not this time. She did. She brought him to us. Remember what he told us?
That she said she always took him where he needed to go even if it wasn’t where
he wanted to go? Well now‘s the time to find out if that‘s true.’
Rory wiped his nose on the back of his sleeve, wishing once
more that they were back home. Travelling with the Doctor rarely ended well.
This time hadn’t even started out well.
end of chapter two
