Disclaimer: Irregular Posting! Only Active When The Hyper-fixation Is!
!REQUEST OPEN! ≽^•༚• ྀི≼
Rules:
1. I'll do smut. But nothing fucking freaky. Feet lovers aren't welcome.
2. I will do character x character!
3. I'll write for any fandoms listed below. If its not on the list you can still ask but expect nothing.
4. Most importantly, don't hate me if it's shitty. I'm sensitive. 🥺
The people starve for anything god of war related. My giant husband hasn't been written for so long by anyone. I am begging you to write for Thor! Pretty pretty please with every cherry in the world on top do the same thing you did for Baldur and catch him up on the head cannons. I love you so much bro LOUD NO ANONYMOUS
✰ Warnings: Aimed for GN Reader, Smutty ABC thing at the end, IDK
✰ Request by: @gremlintheslut
✰ Rating: M
⋆.˚✮ Notes: I feel like Thor from the game doesn’t have a lot of screen time, so I’m not really confident in portraying his character. (Also, the only Thor depiction I’m super familiar with is MCU Thor.) I did my best, don’t hate me if it’s shit.
Also, he’s married, so I went into this with the idea that he had divorced or something at some point.
✰Confessing Your Love✰
Thor does not really give me the vibe of someone who would laugh off a genuine confession unless he thought it was a joke or a trick at first.
He’d probably go still for a second, stare, and make sure he heard you correctly.
“You love me?”
Once he realizes you mean it, he’d give you his full focus.
He’ll breathe a little heavier and consider his options.
Thor is emotional in a big, powerful way, and not always refined.
Since the confession took him of gaurd, he reacts by resting a hand on your cheek before he can tell himself otherwise.
For how powerful he is, and how many enemies Odin has, and him by proxy, he’ll consider it a trick at first.
He’ll ask you if you’re mocking him or lying.
When you grovel and tell him it’s true, and beg him to believe you, that little insecurity in the back of his mind will melt away.
“Do you understand what it means to stand beside me?”
He’s a wreck and a drunk; his own family has decided that.
So what good could he do for you?
Yet you are unwavering, and he feels the need to keep you close regardless of all of it.
There will be a long heart-to-heart about your feelings and desires for him, and his hesitation.
But after all that, he’s just a lonely broken man who revels in your affection.
He’ll want to take things slow, but he will find himself reaching for you regardless of that.
Thor is not a subtle man, so he’ll parade you around afterward.
✰Confessing his Love✰
Thor is not the kind of man who would pine forever and do nothing about it.
He waits longer than he should if he’s unsure, or if he thinks the timing is wrong, but once he decides to act, his confession will be direct.
He’d approach you privately when he finds you alone, just in case you turn him down.
He does not want witnesses to his embarrassment.
Nor does he want them for what he’d planned to do if you’d accepted him.
He’ll just say it.
“I want you.”
“I have tried to master this feeling, and I find I no longer wish to.”
He might accidentally come off a little intense in his confession.
His hand twitches, like he wants to hold your face or take your hand, but he waits for your reaction first.
When you look shocked, he just waits silently.
Maybe painfully, maybe intensely, but he’d wait.
He’ll watch every rise and fall of your shoulders and the gears turning behind your eyes.
As soon as your mind catches up with what just happened, and you smile at him and return the sentiment, all that tension in him breaks.
He cups your face, pulls you close, and kisses you.
✰Nicknames✰
He’d likely tolerate your nicknames for him at first, then secretly grow very attached to them.
At first, he might act a little gruff about it, especially with something very sweet or teasing.
When you first started calling him “Love”, “Dear”, and “Sweetheart”, his reaction would just be a raised brow and maybe a scoff.
“Is that what you call me now?”
He’s not used to soft and sweet pet names.
The world sees him as this big, imposing God, so that is how the world treats him.
When you call him these pet names, they make him feel a little more like just any other man.
He kinda likes it.
He warms up to them eventually, though he’d prefer the nicknames stay private.
They feel intimate with him, and would prefer it if it were just something between the two of you.
Though he’d eventually have his own for you as well.
He’d call you “Dear”, “Darling”, and “Beloved”.
Though he’ll stick with calling you by your name when others are around.
If you ever called him something outrageous, like cupcake, cutie, or sugar, he might react differently to those.
“You test me.”
Though as long as it’s not meant to tease or mock him, he’d very obviously indulge them anyway.
✰Little Gremlin✰
You are impossible, and I think that would fascinate him.
So if his lover has a talent for finding trouble, his immediate response would usually be physical and decisive.
He’d move in front of you, or actually hold you back if you were all but literally barking at someone, and glaring at the offensive party, even if you started it.
He would be constantly torn between scolding and laughing.
“You are forever one breath from disaster.”
A very obvious ‘you exasperate me, but I adore you’ kind of tone.
Thor would respect that you are not timid.
He likes that you are fiery and mouthy.
It’s constant entertainment, really.
A lover who turns into a tiny snarling beast when threatened?
Thor would pretend this is the most aggravating thing in the world.
He’d groan.
He’d mutter to himself.
He’d tell you to hush.
And then later, when the danger had passed, he’d remember exactly what you’d said and how you bit the man in that bar fight.
And he’d spare it a chuckle, and be privately entertained by it.
Sometimes he has to step in when he knows it’s a fight you won't win.
He’ll pick you up and move you out of the line of fire.
Plant a hand on the back of your neck to steer you away
Physically turning your face away from danger, so you stop barking at the enemy for one second.
“Enough. You’ve had your turn.”
Then handle it himself.
When you argue that you could’ve handled it just fine without him, he’d entertain the idea for a single second before, “No. You couldn’t.”
You’d bicker about it with him.
You insist you could handle yourself.
Thor telling you that was not the point.
You accusing him of treating them like you are fragile.
Thor snapped back that you are not fragile, merely reckless.
You calling him overbearing.
Him calling you impossible.
Then plenty of kissing and making up after the heat has settled.
He’s learned your patterns and your ways and is always paying attention to try to keep you out of trouble before you can find it.
✰His Reaction to your first Kiss✰
Thor and you are alone after an argument.
Thor is standing close, saying something low and serious, still focused on you with that full, heavy attention of his.
You’re struck by how open he is in that moment, even if he does not mean to be.
Even if you're bickering, he’s telling you off for doing something dangerous.
And before you can overthink it, you lean in and kiss him.
Thor goes completely still for a second.
The sudden affection catches him off guard.
His eyes widen slightly, and there is a brief moment where he just stands there.
He seems almost shocked by how gently you’re touching him.
For one suspended breath, he does not move, as though he is making sure this is truly happening.
Then his hands react before his words do.
He reaches for you carefully.
One hand at your waist, the other at your jaw.
At first, the return kiss is almost cautious, like he is restraining the full force of what he feels.
Then it deepens quickly, because Thor is not built for half-measures.
The kiss becomes a mess of tongue and teeth.
When you finally part, Thor stays very close, still holding on.
He is breathing heavier, staring at you, looking a little stunned and a little hungry for more.
He does not speak immediately.
Then he says something like, “Do that again.”
Afterward, he rests his forehead against yours.
From that point on, it would be much harder for him to pretend his feelings are manageable or hidden.
He’d be confused about how they went from bickering to tongue wrestling, but he wouldn’t argue.
He indulges in the affection you give him.
He can argue with you for your recklessness and ask questions later.
For now, he just wants to milk as much of his moment as he can.
✰Cuddle Bugs✰
Thor likes to cuddle.
Plain and simple.
While some men see it as a sign of weakness or silly, Thor sees it as just a natural thing between lovers.
It’s a comfort he has to look forward to after a long day.
And intimacy that doesn’t require mess like kissing and sex.
Thor’s love language is acts of service and physical touch.
He likes to hold you close.
Cuddling lets him do several things all at once:
Keeping you close.
Reassure himself that you’re safe.
Show affection without needing many words.
And relax in a way he does not allow himself to often.
He seems like the kind of man who carries a lot of tension, so lying with someone he loves wrapped against him would probably calm him more than he expects.
He doesn’t openly admit it in the beginning.
He acts as though he only tolerates it for your benefit.
He’d sigh and say, “Come here, then.”
But once the motion of your relationship is set, he grows comfortable admitting he likes and looks forward to it.
He likes it best when you're tucked against his chest, and he wraps his arms around you.
He also loves to be the big spoon.
Its the most comfortable to fall asleep in.
Though every now and then, after tossing and turning all night, he’ll wake up to find you spooning him.
He’s a big guy, and it's amusing to see your arm swung over him.
But he likes that too.
He’s not openly clingy, nor a man of profound words.
But when it’s just the two of you, winding down for some shut-eye, he’ll open his arms and wait for you to take your place in them.
He’ll pull you back when you try to get up too soon.
✰ABC’s✰
A is for Aftercare ★ Thor is very attentive afterward, even if he’s not overly talkative. He’d want you close, make sure they’re comfortable, tuck you against him, check whether they need water, warmth, or rest. His version of care would be practical and protective, with a softer side that he doesn’t show many people. He’d probably stroke your back or hair and keep them tucked to his chest until they drift off. He’d only worry about cleaning up the mess if you were uncomfortable with it. Otherwise, it's a future Thor problem.
B is for Body ★ Thor takes pride in his hands and arms, the parts of him most tied to his strength and ability to protect. His favorite part of your body is your face. He’s drawn to your expressive features, especially during the act. He likes to watch your face when he fucks you, or the curve of your lips when they're around his cock.
C is for Cum ★ He likes to come on you rather than in you. He likes how intimate the mess feels. He’s not done until you’ve cum.
D is for Dirty Secret ★ He may seem steady and dominant, but privately he’s more affected by tenderness, praise, and being wanted than he’d like anyone to know. So he’ll often let you be the one to take control and tell him what to do and how to do it. He’s a submissive top.
E is for Experience ★ He’s had plenty of experience. He’s a father, so clearly he’s fucked. But he feels inexperienced when it comes to fucking you. Everything you two get up to in the bedroom is really new to him. And what isn’t new is just intimidating. He’s fucked up relationships before, and he’s determined not to fuck up this one.
F is for Favorite Position ★ He favors positions that feel intimate rather than impersonal. So while he does love how you feel from behind, it’s not his favorite. He prefers letting you sit on him, either his cock or face, and set the pace. He likes to watch you use him.
G is for Grooming ★ I do not think Thor would be overly fussy or vain, but he would likely be clean and put together, just not shaved.
H is for Halla At Ya ★ His way of getting you in the mood would probably be through intense attention and physical closeness rather than clever pick-up lines. He’ll tell you outright that he’s turned on and what he wants from you. He’ll touch and caress whatever skin is exposed beneath your clothes. He’ll stand close and press as much of himself against you as he can until the clothes start coming off.
I is for Intimacy ★ Even if the moment is heated, there is a strong thread of care in it. Even if it’s a quick hard fuck, he’s kissing and coressing, and making sure you’re enjoying it.
J is for Jerk Off ★ He doesn’t mind it, but he’d rather it be your hand, mouth, ect, on him. Mostly, he’ll wait until he can get you alone, but if that's not an option, he’ll close his eyes and imagine it’s you touching him. He’s a big fan of lying beside you and touching you while you stroke him.
K is for Kink ★ He likes being used by you. With his size and strength, you can’t really do much in the way on manhalding him, but he likes it when you push him back and use him until you're finished. It gets him off to watch you enjoy yourself on his cock like he isn’t even there. Also, a mild overstimulation kink. If he’s finished and you’re still going, it’s painful in the sweetest way.
L is for Location ★ Any setting where he can fully focus on undoing you without interruption. He doesn’t really care for risky public places as much, though sometimes what happens happens. He prefers to fuck you in the comfort of your bed, or on the floor by the hearth.
M is for Motivation ★ He’s a slut for you doing those dirty little dances and stripping down in front of him. That's one way to get him in the mood real quick. But other than that, he finds that you showing feats of strength (not always physical ones) gets him hard rather quickly.
N is for “No” ★ Anything that feels cruel or mocking, or even humiliating, is a very easy way to make his dick deflate like a sad pool floaty. That degrading kind of dirty talk turns him off so quickly. Although he will agree to praise you for being a slut for him and vice versa, as that is just a fact, not an insult.
O is for Oral ★ Thor is a generous, attentive lover rather than a selfish one. He loves to put his mouth on you, taste you, and watch you squirm. Though he wouldn’t be a man if he didn’t like watching his cock disappear behind your lips and feel your tongue stroke him. Still, he’d much rather have you riding his face.
P is for Pull-Out Game ★ He’s not looking for you to get knocked up, so pull out game string with this one. However, if that's not a problem, he’ll leave it in and paint your insides happily. Still, he’d rather see his cum on your chest, back, or face.
Q is for Quickies ★ He prefers to be able to take his time. Though if the heat of the moment is strong, and you ask really nicely, he will happily give in. He’d absolutely be capable of being swept up in it, removing only the clothing necessary to get the job done. It’s not his favorite or a regular thing, but very likely passion runs high.
R is for Risk ★ He’s all for risk. If you want to try something new, no need to ask twice, or even once, just do it. He’s a blunt man; he’ll tell you outright if he’s not into it. But he’s always willing to try if it’ll make you cum.
S is for Stamina ★ He could go for hours if you let him. And he does, often. Though the longer it goes on, the more rounds that pass, the more he slows down. Not cause he’s tiered, he’s a God, but because he’s overstimulated and his cock is aching, and it just feels better to slow the pace when you’re on the 6th round of the night.
T is for Toys ★ Eh. He doesn’t care for them persay, but he likes your reactions to them. As long as you’re cumming, he won’t make a fuss.
U is for Unfair ★ His teasing would probably be very deliberate once he realized the effect he had. He’d enjoy getting a reaction out of you, especially if you're easily flustered. It’d mostly be teasing touches, edging you during foreplay, and remarks about how desperate you’re becoming.
V is for Volume ★ In the beginning, he’s quiet, low huffs and grunts. But as the night goes on, and his intense focus on unraveling you dissolves into a need for release, this man pants and moans just as badly as you. He’s not shy about how good you feel; he’ll praise you and moan your name, unashamed if anyone passing by overhears something. That’s their problem. His goal, aside from making you cum, however, is to make you sound just as much of a desperate whore as you make him. He loves it when you’re loud.
W is for Wild Card ★ Anyone would expect him to handle passion well, but soft touches, forehead kisses, quiet praise, or you fussing over him after a hard day? That would probably hit him straight in the chest. When you shower him with buttler fly kisses and lazy pecks afterward, it feels like a reward for a job well done.
X is for X-Ray ★ His dick is just like the rest of him. Big and thick. Need I say more?
Y is for Yearning ★ Moderate to severe. Your body is never far from his mind. If you’re down, he’s down.
Z is for Zzz ★ Once he’s tapped out, he’s out. Especially when you’re curled up against him and already worn out and asleep. That man goes into a cum indused comma for the next few hours. Completely dead to the world.
★ Part 1 ★ Part 2 ★ Part 3 ★ Part 4 ★ Part 5 ★ Part 5.2 ★
✰ Word Count: 15.2k
✰ Summary: The Doctor makes a friend with a humble barista in England. They’re friends. Thats it. They're just friends.
✰ Warnings: 10th Doctor, Genter Nutural Reader, They/Them pronouns, Romantic Pining, Donna Noble, Donna is a Third Wheel, Donna meddles, Donna ain't Subtle
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This is for @vexerieart, who made me smile with their kind words, bitch boosted my ego SO BAD. So I just want to return the favor, pay the smile forward. I hope this cheers you up since you’ve been sick, my love. <3
This part kinda got away from me a bit ngl.
The big light was off, only the television and the fairy lights strung through the little kitchenette lit the flat now, leaving the room washed in soft gold and blue. The glow from the TV flickered over the walls in restless shadows, while the fairy lights bled a warmer kind of light into the room, catching on glass, on the edges of furniture, on the careful little details they had spent the last hour arranging.
The couch had been shoved back farther than usual, its legs scraping stubbornly across the floor until it sat a little deeper into the room. The coffee table had been dragged closer to the television, leaving enough space in front of it for the real event.
The fort.
Blankets had been layered thick over the rug, topped with an unreasonable number of pillows for someone who lives alone, and a few stuffed animals they had absolutely not overthought before adding. A single bedsheet hovered over it all, taped to the back of the couch and clipped to two standing lamps to make a sloping roof, which sagged a little in the middle.
It looked very cozy, and maybe a little too cozy.
On the coffee table sat the spread they had proudly assembled earlier: the three bags of fundraiser popcorn, bowls ready for each flavor, a pitcher of lemonade sweating on a coaster, takeaway chips still warm in their paper wrapping, and a stack of DVDs gathered from the shelf because they still, somehow, had not chosen an actual movie.
They sat inside the fort now, leaning back against the couch cushions, knees drawn up slightly, staring at the whole setup with a slowly growing sense of panic.
It was nice but hat was the problem. It felt oo intimate, too much like the sort of thing a couple might do on purpose.
Their gaze moved over the blankets again, then to the stuffed animals, then to the soft slope of the sheet overhead, and they groaned quietly, dropping their head back against the couch.
“Oh no.”
Because what had sounded fun in theory, blankets, popcorn, stupid films, the full home theater experience, now looked suspiciously like they had built a date. An aggressively adorable date.
They rubbed both hands over their face and peeked out at the room again through their fingers, as though maybe it would somehow look less romantic if viewed from a different angle.
It did not. If anything, the dim lighting made it worse.
Their mind started racing in circles.
Maybe it was fine. Maybe it just looked cozy. Friends could be cozy. Friends watched films in forts all the time. Probably, somewhere, in theory.
But John was, well, John.
He would walk in, duck under the sheet, see the whole ridiculous little setup, and- and what? Think they were weird? Think they were trying too hard? Think they had lit the room like this on purpose because they’d gone fully insane and decided subtlety was overrated?
They looked toward the lamps holding up the fort and bit their lip.
They could still take it down. Not all of it, there wasn’t enough time for that, probably. But they could pull the sheet down. Move the pillows. Pretend the blankets were just there.
Except they had no idea when John was actually going to arrive. That was the other problem.
Whenever is good for him, they had said.
Which had seemed charming and laid-back at the time, right up until it became very unhelpful in practice.
He could show up in ten minutes, he could show up in an hour. He could text first. He could just come in.
If they started taking it down now and he arrived halfway through, that would be even worse. Then it would look like they had been building some sort of bizarre romance cave and chickened out at the last second. That was somehow more humiliating.
They let out a long breath and slumped a little deeper into the cushions behind them.
Maybe it was fine, he would think it was fun. Maybe he would grin that bright, boyish grin of his and say something teasing and duck inside and sit too close and everything would feel easy again.
That thought did not help nearly as much as it should have.
“This is ridiculous,” they muttered to the empty fort.
They looked toward the front door, listening for footsteps in the hall that never came, and felt the anticipation twist tighter in their chest.
Because beneath the panic, beneath the embarrassment and the overthinking and the very real temptation to yank the whole fort down and blame it on structural instability, there was one simple fact. They wanted him to like it.
Wanting him to see what they’d made and smile. Wanting him to think it was fun, or sweet, or clever. Wanting him to settle into the fort and look at home there, like he somehow always did in their flat, even in the middle of the most ridiculous little corners of their life.
They exhaled again and dropped their head back, staring up at the underside of the sheet.
They jumped at the knock hard enough to make the sheet roof above them flutter. For one stupid, hopeful second they thought it was him.
Then their brow furrowed.
John didn’t knock anymore. Not since they’d handed him an emergency key about a month ago after he’d gotten locked out in the hall because he’d left his phone and wallet inside while taking the rubbish out. He’d been absurdly grateful for it, as if they’d handed him a national honor instead of a key to a flat he was already halfway living in.
So if someone was knocking, it wasn’t him.
They pushed themself up too quickly, caught a shoulder against one of the standing lamps, and nearly took the whole fort down in a slow, tragic collapse.
“Oh, no, no, no!” They grabbed the lamp just in time and steadied it, waiting until the sheet roof stopped wobbling before backing away with a muttered curse.
Another knock sounded.
And then, faint through the door, the muffled shape of a woman’s voice. They stepped closer to the door, confusion deepening with every step. There was definitely someone talking just outside, sharp, hushed, fast enough that they couldn’t make out words, only tone. It sounded like bickering. Or scolding.
They frowned, unlocked the deadbolt, and pulled the door open.
John stood there.
Beside him was a redheaded woman around his age, both of them turning quickly as the door swung inward in the middle of what was clearly a very intense, very low-voiced argument.
The woman recovered first. John, meanwhile, looked exactly like a child who had just been caught doing something he absolutely should not have been doing.
The barista blinked.
The redhead stepped forward with all the confidence in the world and stuck out her hand. “Hello, nice to meet you. Donna Noble,” she said brightly.
They stared for half a second, then automatically took the offered hand. “Oh, hi.”
Donna shook once, firm and quick, and released them.
They looked from her to John and back again, trying to stitch this unexpected scene into anything resembling sense. Their brain scrambled, caught on one obvious thing, and finally supplied it.
“Donna,” they repeated. “Wait, John said Donna was a coworker.”
At that, John made the tiniest, most doomed sort of face.
Donna, however, lit up. “That’s me.”
Recognition fully settled in.
They pointed between Donna and John, still looking mildly stunned. “The terrifying and brilliant spitfire.”
Donna beamed. “One and only.” Then her smile faltered and the words replayed. Her eyes narrowed.
Slowly, very slowly, she turned her head toward the Doctor.
There was a dangerous little pause.
“Terrifying?”
The Doctor looked as though he had stepped squarely into a trap and heard it snap shut around his ankle. His hand came up on instinct, shielding one ear.
The barista pressed their lips together so hard they nearly hurt, fighting not to laugh.
Donna looked back at them. “Did I hear that right?”
The Doctor opened his mouth and closed it again.
Donna’s eyes widened with fresh outrage. “He called me terrifying?”
The barista made a strangled little sound and had to cover their mouth with one hand. John took one cautious half-step back, hand still near his ear in a gesture that suggested this was not theoretical self-protection but experience.
“Donna-”
She rounded on him immediately, “Oi! I’ll show you terrifying.”
The barista’s laugh broke free, bright and helpless, echoing into the hallway. They tried to muffle it and failed spectacularly.
John looked at them, betrayed. “Don’t encourage her.”
Donna pointed at him. “Too late.”
Still laughing, they stepped back and opened the door wider. “You two should come in before the neighbors think someone’s being murdered.”
“Oh, give it a minute,” Donna muttered, still glaring at the Doctor as she swept past him into the flat like she belonged there already.
John lingered for one brief second on the threshold, looking faintly put-upon and deeply embarrassed. Their met his eyes, still smiling.
“You called her terrifying?”
His expression shifted at once into weary self-defense. “I also said brilliant.”
He gave a tiny, put-upon sniff and stepped inside after Donna.
And then he stopped because Donna had stopped.
Because the second she crossed fully into the living room and saw the fort, the dim light, the blankets and pillows and fairy-light glow and carefully arranged snacks, Donna Noble went absolutely silent and they felt their stomach drop.
Oh no.
John saw it a heartbeat later and froze too, all fresh embarrassment abruptly replaced by a brand new kind. Donna turned very slowly to look at him. Her expression was unreadable for exactly one second.
Then she slapped a hand over her mouth and made a noise halfway between a gasp and a laugh. “Oh, you are joking.”
The Doctor looked like he wanted the floor to open and take him.
The barista, meanwhile, had never in their life wanted to vanish more.
“It’s not-” they started.
“Oh, no, don’t mind me,” Donna said, eyes glittering now as she took in every last detail. “Carry on. I’ve just accidentally walked into the most adorable crime scene in Britain.”
John closed his eyes briefly. “Donna.” There was murder in his voice, or at least the intent of it.
They stood there in the warm glow of the fairy lights, heart hammering and face burning, while Donna Noble, terrifying, brilliant Donna Noble, looked from the fort to the Doctor’s expression and seemed to understand far too much.
Donna smiled as if none of this were strange in the slightest.
“Sorry to barge in,” she said, waving one hand lightly as she stepped farther into the flat. “John”, she put just enough odd emphasis on the name to make it sound very deliberate, “and I were traveling back together.”
Their attention snagged on that emphasis for half a second, a tiny thread of curiosity tugging loose, but Donna was already carrying on before they could really sit with it.
“I’m from Chiswick,” she explained, shrugging out of her coat. “And I just couldn’t be bothered finishing the trek this late.”
They nodded politely. “Right, yeah. Of course.” They did not mention that Chiswick was only about a twenty-minute taxi ride from here, give or take traffic.
Donna, meanwhile, went on with easy cheer, as if she had been rehearsing this on the walk up. “John”, again with that peculiar little stress on his name, “was basically acting as my tour guide, and when he said he already had movie night plans with a friend, he invited me along so I wouldn’t have to spend the whole evening alone in some miserable hotel room.”
The barista looked over at John, then back at Donna, and smiled. “That was nice of him.”
John made a small noise in the back of his throat that sounded like he’d swallowed a protest and regretted it too late.
Still, they stepped back and opened their arm toward the room. “Well, you’re welcome in.”
“See?” Donna said brightly, shooting the Doctor a look that was all triumph. “Lovely.”
The Doctor said nothing. Which, to Donna, was as good as admitting she’d won.
He was getting irritated now, though. In that particular tight way that settled around his shoulders and sharpened the line of his mouth whenever Donna had pushed one inch too far and knew it.
Because subtle, she had promised. Subtle and normal and no trouble at all. And instead she had arrived at the flat with pointed emphasis on his fake name, a flimsy cover story, and all the delicacy of a marching band.
He did not want her here.
Not because he didn’t trust Donna exactly, well, perhaps a little because he didn’t trust Donna, but mostly because the second he stepped fully into the room and took in what they had built, everything in him drew taut with a different sort of vulnerability entirely.
The carefully made blanket bed. The pillows and stuffed animals. The dim room, softened by the television glow and the fairy lights bleeding in from the kitchenette. The coffee table with its bowls of popcorn and lemonade and takeaway chips and stack of DVDs.
They had done it all exactly as they’d said they would. And he hated, suddenly and irrationally, that Donna was here to see it.
Because it looked like a lot of effort, a lot of thought put into an evening he had been quietly looking forward. He did notice, too, that the whole room had a romantic sort of atmosphere to it. It would have been impossible not to notice, really. The dim lights alone did that much. Low light made anything look softer, closer, more intimate.
But he refused to let his mind run away with that. The rational part of him took hold, firm and determined not to make things worse than they already were.
Dim lights equaled romance, yes.
But you couldn’t very well have a proper movie night with all the overhead lights blazing like an interrogation room, could you? That would be absurd. The room had to be dim for the television. The fairy lights simply existed. The blankets were for comfort. The fort was exactly the sort of thing they would build because they thought it was fun, not because they had secretly engineered some grand romantic atmosphere.
It wasn’t on purpose, he was sure of it.
Mostly.
Even if, standing here now with Donna in the room and the whole thing laid out before him, it was deeply embarrassing to have someone who knew the truth of his hearts witness it.
Donna looked around with alarming interest.
They, still a little flustered but doing a much better job of recovering than he was, moved to clear a bit of space on the coffee table that did not need clearing. “Sorry, it’s a little chaotic.”
“No, it’s great,” Donna said at once. The Doctor looked at her sharply. She ignored him. “It’s cozy,” she added, with enough innocent warmth to be suspicious on principle.
They smiled, ducking their head a little. “Thanks. It might be slightly overcommitted.”
“That,” Donna said, “is the best kind.”
The Doctor made another small, disapproving sound.
They looked over at him with the faintest trace of a grin. “What?”
“Nothing,” he said too quickly.
Donna snorted. He shot her a warning glance that she met with the blandest expression imaginable.
Their eyes moved between them, curiosity surfacing again in a quiet little flicker. There was something odd in their rhythm together, not bad odd, exactly, but lived-in. Donna pushed at him in a way no coworker would, and John, for all his irritation, let her in a way he let almost no one.
It made the barista wonder, just for a second, who exactly Donna Noble was to him.
Donna, mercifully or perhaps not, took the question away before it could be asked.
“So,” she said, clapping her hands softly once, “what’s the film, then?”
The barista laughed. “That is actually still undecided.”
Donna gasped. “You built all this and didn’t pick the movie?”
“I know,” they admitted. “Terrible planning.”
The Doctor muttered, “I said as much.”
They pointed at him immediately. “You are outnumbered now, so I’m going to need less judgment and more cooperation.”
Donna grinned at that. “Oh, I like them.”
The Doctor closed his eyes for the briefest second, as if bracing himself.
For one awkward stretch of time, the three of them simply stood there. No one spoke. The television menu music looped softly in the background. Somewhere outside in the hall, a pipe clanked faintly in the wall. Inside the flat, however, the silence took on a life of its own.
The Doctor wanted, with increasing intensity, for Donna to suddenly remember some urgent reason to leave. A headache, traveler's fatigue, a sudden, overwhelming desire to return to the hotel room that did not exist.
Anything.
He was already halfway composing possible exits for her in his head and trying to decide whether he could physically herd her back toward the Tardis without making it obvious to the other two people in the room.
Donna, meanwhile, was doing exactly the opposite.
Her expression remained pleasant and open and entirely normal, but behind it her mind was racing at top speed, turning over angles and glances and atmosphere, trying to gauge whether the feelings she had dragged out of the Doctor in the console room had anything resembling an echo on the other side.
Not enough to be intrusive, of course. Well. Not too intrusive. Just enough to know.
The barista wanted the floor to swallow them whole. They stood near the coffee table with their hands clasped a little too tightly in front of them, smiling the strained sort of smile that only existed when someone was trying very hard to be gracious through a deeply inconvenient emotional collapse.
Because this was mortifying. Not Donna specifically. Donna seemed lovely, in a terrifying sort of way. But the situation was mortifying.
This had been meant to make John smile.
That was the humiliating part of it. They had spent the evening fussing over blankets and fairy lights and popcorn and DVDs, making something cozy and a little silly and maybe, if they were being fully honest, a bit special, all because they had missed him for the last week and wanted the night to feel good. Wanted him to be happy he was back, and maybe never want to leave. Wanted him to walk in, laugh, and climb under the blanket roof and look pleased.
And now there was a stranger in the middle of it. A stranger who seemed very comfortable. Very observant, very likely to remember every embarrassing detail of the fort forever.
They did not want to be mean, but they were, privately, a little bit mad at John for not giving them a heads-up that he was bringing a third wheel into their carefully assembled nest of blankets and snacks. If he had texted by the way, bringing a coworker, they would have had time to take the whole thing down and pretend this was an ordinary, low-stakes movie night and not this.
Still, the annoyance struggled to hold. Because John was John. Because, of course, if Donna really was traveling back with him and really was facing a lonely night in a hotel room, he would be exactly the sort of person to invite her along rather than leave her on her own.
That was the problem with him, really. He made it very hard to stay irritated for long.
So they stood there, caught between mortification and reluctant fondness, and looked at him.
John, for his part, looked caught too. Not guilty, exactly, just a bit like he knew this had all gone wrong the second he stepped through the door, and he had not yet found the correct combination of words to fix it.
Of course he looked sweet and awkward about it. That made it even worse.
Donna, apparently deciding the silence had ripened enough, clapped her hands softly once and smiled. “Right,” she said. “This is getting painfully British.”
That startled a laugh out of the barista before they could stop it. The Doctor shot Donna a look that she ignored it magnificently.
“We’ve got popcorn, haven’t we?” she went on, stepping toward the coffee table. “And chips. And a fort. Honestly, at this point it’d be rude not to carry on.”
The barista smiled a little more genuinely this time, grateful for the push. “Yeah. Right. Sorry. It’s just not how I pictured the start of the night.”
Donna’s brow lifted. “No?”
The barista let out a small huff of laughter. “Not exactly.”
The Doctor shifted, then finally spoke, his voice quieter than before. “Sorry.”
They looked at him.
He had his hands in his coat pockets now, shoulders slightly drawn in, expression apologetic in a way that made their irritation dissolve another inch.
“I should’ve said,” he added.
“Yeah,” they said, before they could soften it.
The Doctor winced.
“But,” they went on, gentler now, “I get it.”
He looked up to see them gave a tiny shrug. “You didn’t want your friend spending the night alone.”
Donna’s expression changed in a quick, unreadable flicker, something like satisfaction, something like tenderness, before she smoothed it away. The Doctor looked at the barista for a second too long, visibly relieved by how easily they had understood him.
So they broke eye contact first and gestured toward the fort. “Anyway. It’s done now.”
Donna’s face lit up. “Exactly.”
The Doctor still looked wary.
Donna turned to him immediately. “Oh, stop it. We’re not dismantling the fort just because you’ve got emotional issues.”
“I do not have emotional issues.”
Both Donna and the barista looked at him.
The Doctor paused, “…That was badly phrased.”
“Very,” Donna said.
The barista laughed, and some last knot of awkwardness loosened just enough for the room to feel breathable again.
Donna pointed toward the blanket bed. “Right. Who’s sitting where?”
The barista blinked at her.
“What?”
“Well someone’s got to decide before we all stand here until morning,” Donna said. “And I’m not above assigning seats.”
The Doctor muttered, “You’d enjoy that far too much.”
“I would.”
They stepped a little closer to the fort, glancing over the blankets with fresh uncertainty.
“I can take it down,” they offered, already half reaching for one of the clips holding the sheet in place. “There’s loads of room for two, but I’ve no idea how cramped it’ll be for three.”
“Oh, don’t you dare.” Donna, who had already kicked off her shoes by the door, looked properly scandalized.
They paused, hand still hovering near the lamp.
“I haven’t been in one of these since I was little. My grandad used to help me build them.”
That won a softer smile from them at once. “Yeah?”
“Oh, absolutely,” Donna said, warming instantly. “Blankets over chairs, cushions everywhere, torchlights under the duvet, the lot. Proper effort, too. None of this sad one-chair nonsense.”
They laughed. “He sounds sweet.”
Donna’s whole face changed when she spoke about him, “He is. Best man in the world.”
The Doctor smiled too, small and fond, just watching her.
Donna noticed and jerked her chin toward him. “Only person who probably cares more about my grandad than I do is the Doctor.”
The barista’s smile faltered into confusion, and the Doctor froze. Donna froze a beat later, realization hitting with visible force.
The barista tilted their head. “The Doctor?”
Donna’s eyes widened just slightly, “Hm?”
The Doctor looked as though he had been struck by lightning and was still deciding whether to fall over. For one long second no one moved.
Then Donna, because she was Donna, recovered first.
She gave a quick, careless shrug, forcing a casualness over the moment that almost worked. “Nickname.”
The barista blinked. “Nickname.”
“Yeah.”
They looked from Donna to John, curiosity sharpening now. “Are you a doctor?”
The Doctor made a small, strangled sound that was not a word.
Donna plowed on before he could fully collapse. “No.”
The barista’s brow furrowed. “Then why, ”
“He’s an archaeologist,” Donna said smoothly. “Working on his doctorate.”
The Doctor turned to look at her with the sort of silent betrayal usually reserved for war crimes. Donna did not even glance at him.
Their face lit with immediate understanding. “Oh.”
The Doctor opened his mouth, still trying to catch up with the lie, but Donna had already built the bridge and set fire to the exit behind him.
“You know,” she said breezily, waving one hand as if this explained everything. “History, ruins, old things, dirt. That sort of thing.”
The Doctor stared at her.
Archaeologist, of all the possible human professions. Donna knew exactly what she was doing. She knew, from the library, from the Vashta Nerada, from his own smug little quote about being a time traveler and pointing and laughing at archaeologists, that this was probably the funniest lie she could have chosen on short notice.
It was retaliation. A tiny, viciously well-timed act of payback for every secret he’d kept from her.
The Doctor’s jaw tightened. Still, when the barista looked back at him, expectant, he had no choice but to nod.
“Yes,” he said stiffly. “Archaeologist.”
Donna smiled to herself.
Theybought it immediately. Which was, frankly, insulting.
“Okay, that actually makes so much sense,” they said, looking at him with a new kind of delight. “Why did you never say?”
The Doctor sputtered. “I, well-”
“He’s weird about talking about work,” Donna cut in.
The Doctor shot her a murderous glance. They didn’t notice, they were too busy connecting all the little dots in their own head.
“No, but seriously,” they said, turning fully to him now. “That explains everything. The history facts, the museum obsession, the way you talk about dead people like you knew them.”
The Doctor’s eyes flicked up.
“And the whole constant traveling thing,” they finished, smiling. “You’re such a history nerd.”
The word nerd seemed to settle him a little, or at least pull him out of outright panic.
He gave a weak, uncomfortable little smile. “Bit.”
Donna folded her arms, looking far too pleased with herself.
They laughed softly and shook their head. “You made it seem like your job was so boring the way you never talked about it.”
The Doctor, still deeply irritated and not at all comfortable in his brand-new false profession, muttered, “Depends on the century.”
Donna coughed sharply into her hand to cover a laugh.
They grinned. “That was such an archaeologist thing to say.”
That, somehow, was worse. The Doctor closed his eyes briefly. Donna looked like Christmas had come early.
Still smiling, they stepped back toward the fort again. “Right, well. Archaeologist or not, I’m keeping the fort up if Donna wants in.”
Donna clapped once in approval. “That’s the spirit.”
The Doctor opened his eyes and looked between the two of them, Donna glowing with triumph, the barista glowing with relief, and realized, with quiet despair, that he had lost complete control of the evening in under five minutes.
“Don’t you two pick the film without me,” Donna said, already half walking backward toward the hall. Then she stopped and frowned. “Actually, where’s the bathroom?”
The Doctor and the barista answered at the exact same time, “Hall, second door on the left.” They both stopped, looked at each other, and the barista’s mouth twitched.
Donna pointed between them. “You two spend too much time together.”
“Oi,” the Doctor said.
Donna rolled her eyes. “And if you start in on one of his weird old-man films while I’m gone, I’ll know.”
“They’re not old-man films,” the Doctor protested.
“They are if no one under seventy has heard of them.” With that, she disappeared down the hall, still muttering about his taste in movies as she went.
The second the bathroom door clicked shut, the flat seemed to exhale.
The barista turned back to him at once, lips already curled into a teasing smile.
“Doctor,” they said, making the title sound far cheekier than Donna had. The Doctor smiled despite himself. It was impossible not to with them looking at him like that, amused, pleased, a little smug at having acquired a new thing to call him.
He slipped out of his trench coat and draped it over the armchair that had long since become the place for his things when he was here. Then he bent to untie his Converse and kicked them off, letting himself settle into the room in that quiet way he always did, as though some part of him unclenched the second he stepped inside.
They watched him do it.
“Why didn’t you ever mention work?” they asked softly.
The question wasn’t accusing, not really, but there was enough curiosity in it to make him pause.
He didn’t have a real answer to give them, not one he could say out loud. ‘Because I don’t actually have a job’ did not feel like a strong choice. So instead he settled for the nearest thing to truth he could manage.
“I don’t know,” he admitted, straightening. “When I’m here, work’s usually the last thing on my mind.”
The words landed warmer than he had meant them to. Immediately their brain tried to be unhelpful and twist it into something sweeter than it probably was, but they shut that down at once. Of course he’d be preoccupied when they were together. They were always doing something, games, films, food, talking nonsense for hours. It didn’t have to mean anything more than that.
Still, they nodded, smiling a little as they let him off the hook.
“Right,” they said. “Undercover Indiana Jones.”
The Doctor groaned as if physically wounded. “Absolutely not.”
“Not even a little?” That only made them laugh.
“No.”
“Bit of fedora energy.”
“Cruel,” he said, but he was laughing now too.
He slipped his hands into his pockets and, drawn by something softer, took a few slow steps closer to the television wall. His eyes lifted to the painting hanging above it.
Their painting, his atrocious little portrait of them, framed and hung there with a seriousness it had never earned. He looked at it for a moment, smiling faintly.
Even now, even after they had texted him the photo and told him they’d found a place for it, the sight of it there still did something strange to him. Made him feel chosen in some quiet, domestic way he had no business treasuring quite so much.
When he turned back, they were already watching him. The look on their face softened as soon as his eyes met theirs.
“It’s good to have you back,” they admitted.
The Doctor’s expression changed, his own smile going warmer. That open, boyish grin that always seemed to make him look younger and older all at once.
“It’s good to be back,” he said.
For a second they just stood there in the soft light, smiling at each other like the week apart had mattered more than either of them would usually say outright.
Then they glanced toward the hall, checking that Donna was still safely out of sight. When they looked back at him, their expression shifted into a mock severity that was entirely undercut by the way their eyes shone.
“You owe me,” they said in a hushed voice.
The Doctor faltered, though the grin did not quite leave his face. Because their trying-to-be-angry face was, unfortunately for them, not intimidating in the slightest.
“Do I?”
“Yes,” they said. “For bringing Donna along.”
He winced just a little and had the grace to look sheepish. “Sorry.”
They held the look another second, then let it soften with a shrug, “You’ll just have to make it up to me by sticking around a bit.”
That made something flicker in his face, something warm enough that they nearly looked away from it.
He grinned again, lighter now. “Can’t promise that.”
They narrowed their eyes.
“But,” he added, stepping a little closer, voice dropping just enough to feel private, “I’ll make the rest of my time here worth it.”
That pulled a grin out of them before they could help it.
“Smooth,” they murmured.
“I know.”
They looked like they were about to say something else when the bathroom door opened down the hall. Both of them stepped back on instinct.
And by the time Donna reappeared, drying her hands on a tissue and looking immediately suspicious of whatever she’d missed, the two of them had done a poor but determined job of arranging their faces into something much more casual.
Donna did not hesitate for even a second. The moment she ducked under the sheet roof, she surveyed the blanket bed like a general assessing a battlefield, then promptly made herself comfortable right at the edge in a spot that left only one sensible arrangement for the remaining two spaces.
The barista noticed.
The Doctor noticed.
Donna, judging by the deeply innocent look on her face as she folded one leg beneath herself and adjusted a cushion behind her back, absolutely noticed.
Neither of them said a word.
They stayed outside the fort for the moment anyway, both pretending this was entirely practical because someone still had to choose a film and put the DVD in. The Doctor crouched by the coffee table and began flipping through the little stack they’d gathered, cases clicking softly one against another in his hands.
He had seen every one of them. Some in cinemas, some on telly, some on other worlds where they had inexplicably become cult classics, and at least one while hanging upside down in the ventilation system of a diplomatic transport because the only functioning monitor in the place had been playing it on loop.
Still, he said nothing. For their sake, he was more than willing to pretend otherwise.
They hovered nearby, feeling a bit more self-conscious than they had a moment ago. Everything was different with Donna there, not worse exactly, just more visible. Less private. They glanced down at the stack and said, “Those seemed like films you might like. Assuming you haven’t seen them already.”
The Doctor looked up at them and smiled, warm enough to make their stomach do something irritating. “Thoughtful.”
Then he kept flipping through the cases, buying himself a second to settle the smile back into something manageable.
Donna groaned from inside the fort. “You’ve got to be careful what you pick.”
They looked over. “Why?”
“Because,” Donna said, with the air of someone passing on hard-won survival knowledge, “he’s got a terrible habit of spoiling the endings.”
The barista laughed. “That is true.”
The Doctor turned, offended. “It is not.”
“It is,” Donna and the barista said together. He stared at both of them in wounded disbelief.
Donna pointed at him. “You watch something for fifteen minutes, go all squinty, then suddenly announce who did it and why.”
“I do not announce it.”
“You do,” the barista said, smiling now as they leaned against the arm of the couch. “Not on purpose, but you definitely go all,” They scrunched their face and tilted their head in exaggerated concentration. “Oh. Well, that’s actually not accurate because-.”
Donna slapped her knee. “Yes!”
The Doctor made a disapproving noise. “I’m being slandered in stereo.”
“There’s no slander if it’s true,” Donna said.
The barista nodded. “You piece things together weirdly fast.”
“That’s not a crime.”
“No,” Donna said. “Just annoying.”
He put one hand over his chest. “I am not annoying.”
That got a laugh out of both of them, and he sat back on his heels with a little huff, watching them over the stack of DVDs in his hands.
It struck him then, not for the first time that evening, how odd and strangely lovely this was. Donna and the barista, bantering together already, both of them talking about him as though they had each separately collected enough of his habits to compare notes.
There was no malice in it at all.
Donna wasn’t finished. “And don’t get me started on how fast he talks.”
The barista let out an immediate laugh of recognition. “Oh, God, yes.”
The Doctor opened his mouth to object, but Donna steamrolled right over him.
“He’ll say something at top speed, all complete nonsense, then stop, sigh, and explain it again in actual human.”
The barista pointed at her, delighted. “Yes! Exactly that.”
“That is not fair,” the Doctor said.
“It is, spaceman,” Donna replied.
They were grinning now, warmed into the rhythm of it despite the initial awkwardness. “He did that during a movie night once.”
Donna turned to them with interest. “Go on.”
The Doctor narrowed his eyes. “Maybe don’t.”
But the barista was already laughing to themself.
“We watched this terrible indie film,” they said, “like, properly low-budget. Alien invasion, end of the world, all that.”
Donna brightened. “Sounds brilliant.”
“It was objectively awful,” the barista said. “And for at least half the film, he kept pausing to explain why none of it made any sense.”
“I did not pause it.”
“You paused it twice.”
“Twice is not ‘kept pausing.’”
Donna cackled. “What was wrong with it?”
They looked at the Doctor with a smile that was half apology, half delight. “Everything, apparently.”
The Doctor lifted a finger. “To be fair, the science was appalling.”
“It was a film,” they reminded him.
“It was nonsense.”
“It was fun.”
“There are standards.”
Donna was laughing so hard now she had to wipe at one eye. “Oh, I know that tone. He gets all righteous, like he’s been personally offended by the script.”
“He had a whole rant,” they said, turning more fully toward Donna now. “Like an actual monologue. About atmospheric conditions and sound in space and the fact that some kind of alien virus thing would not work the way the film claimed it would.”
The Doctor frowned. “Because it wouldn’t.”
“And then,” they went on, speaking over him, “he had to backtrack and explain it all again in simpler terms because I just stared at him.”
Donna pointed at the Doctor in vindication. “See?”
He looked between them, both of them smiling at him now with the same maddening fondness, and felt his mock offense lose most of its strength.
“That happened once,” he muttered.
The barista and Donna exchanged a look. Then, in perfect unison:
“No.”
The Doctor dropped his head with a groan while both of them laughed.
Donna reached for the cheesy popcorn and said, “Right. We’re picking the worst alien film you’ve got.”
The Doctor looked up sharply. “Absolutely not.”
They reached for the DVDs. “Now that,” they said, “might actually be fun.” They went straight to the DVD shelf and crouched in front of it, fingers skimming over old plastic cases until they made a triumphant little noise.
“Oh, no way.”
Donna craned her neck from the fort. “What?”
They pulled a case free and turned, grinning like they’d just unearthed buried treasure. “We have Battlefield Earth.”
The Doctor’s face changed instantly. He looked at the cover, then away from it, then back again with the expression of a man being shown a war crime.
“Oh no,” he said, pathetically.
Donna sat up straighter at once. “What is it?”
The barista laughed as they came back toward the fort, holding the case aloft. “One of the worst sci-fi films ever made.”
Donna’s eyes lit up. “Really?”
“Oh, absolutely,” they said. “I bought a whole bin of DVDs at a yard sale years ago and this was in it. Never watched it because every review I’d ever heard was horrific.”
The Doctor made a wounded sound in the back of his throat.
Donna looked from the case to his face and grinned wickedly. “Well, now we’re watching it.”
“We are not,” the Doctor said, with all the conviction of someone who already knew he had lost.
“Oh, we are,” Donna said.
They nodded, delighted now. “Definitely.”
The Doctor looked between the two of them, one redheaded menace and one human who should have been on his side and very much was not. Then, with the weary air of a man accepting his fate, ducked into the fort and slid down beside Donna.
“Fine,” he muttered. “If I’m to suffer, I’ll do it properly.”
Donna beamed. “That’s the spirit.”
They laughed under their breath and turned to the TV, feeding the DVD into the player. The machine whirred obligingly, and they grabbed the remote before dropping down onto their hands and knees to crawl into the fort.
The second they settled in, they realized they had been right to second-guess the setup. It was cramped. Donna had taken the far edge, half-curled into a nest of pillows with the confidence of someone who made herself comfortable anywhere. Which left the middle and the other side for the barista and the Doctor, and the only way for that to work was for them to be close.
They tucked themself in beside him and felt their shoulder press immediately against his.
So did he.
Neither of them moved away.
The fort was too small for that, really. What were they supposed to do, refuse basic geometry? There simply wasn’t room. Perfectly innocent. Still, the excuse sat there between them like a gift.
The Doctor adjusted one leg, trying not to seem too aware of where his knee brushed theirs under the blankets they threw across their laps. The barista shifted too, equally unsuccessful at pretending not to notice how warm he was through the fabric of his trousers and shirt sleeve.
Neither of them minded. Not nearly as much as they probably ought to have.
Donna, thankfully or perhaps not, was too occupied making a proper home for herself with a bowl of popcorn in her lap to comment. She wriggled deeper into the pile of cushions, snagged the buttered popcorn, then changed her mind and grabbed the candied one too.
“Right,” she said. “If this is as bad as you two say, I’m going to need sugar.”
The previews began to play, loud and ridiculous in the dark. The TV light flashed over the inside of the sheet roof, turning the whole fort blue and silver by turns.
The Doctor reached without ceremony for the takeaway chips on the coffee table and dragged them closer, helping himself immediately. The barista smiled and stole a few from the pile between his fingers and the carton, and he let them without so much as a glance.
Donna, meanwhile, went to town on the popcorn as though she’d been training for this exact moment.
For a little while, the awkwardness dissolved into the simple business of settling in. Blankets tugged into place. Bowls shifted around. The remote passed back and forth while the DVD coughed up another preview no one cared about.
Donna was muttering commentary at the previews already. The barista was trying not to laugh. Their shoulder still rested against his, light but constant, and every time they reached together for the chips, their hands nearly brushed.
It was not the night he had pictured. But as the menu screen finally gave way and the room dimmed further under the shifting light of the film, he found he couldn’t quite bring himself to mind.
“This,” Donna announced around a mouthful of popcorn, “had better be terrible.”
The barista grinned and hit play. Beside them, the Doctor let out a low, resigned sigh and leaned back into the pillows, already bracing himself for disaster.
For the first half of the film, the Doctor made a visible effort to behave.
Every now and then something on screen would happen, some impossible bit of technology, some laughable bit of alien logic, some wildly inaccurate choice that clearly offended him on a cellular level, and they could practically see him biting his tongue. His mouth would twitch. His eyes would narrow. He’d inhale like he was about to launch into a full lecture, then think better of it and grab another chip instead.
Apparently he was trying.
Donna, on the other hand, had no such restraint. She had been openly baffled from the opening stretch of the movie.
“I don’t understand,” she whispered loudly during one scene, squinting at the screen. “Is it the future or is everyone a caveman?”
The barista snorted softly.
The Doctor kept his eyes on the television. “It’s attempting both.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s bad.”
Donna made a face and reached for more popcorn.
They smiled to themself and stole a glance at the Doctor. He was trying to let most of it slide, clearly. Trying very hard to grant the film its many crimes against science and common sense because, as far as the average human audience was concerned, they simply did not know any better yet.
Still, every time one of the aliens fired a blaster on screen, the Doctor rolled his eyes so dramatically it nearly counted as a physical performance.
They noticed every single time. And because they didn’t know he was reacting to actual firsthand knowledge of alien weaponry, they found it deeply funny. To them it just looked like he was being absurdly picky about special effects and movie logic, the world’s most intense sci-fi snob unable to tolerate cinematic nonsense in peace.
Which, to be fair, was also true.
At one point another ridiculous burst of blue light shot across the screen, and the Doctor made a low, personally offended sound.
The barista bit back a laugh. “What now?”
He shook his head once. “Nothing.”
“That was a something noise.”
He gestured vaguely at the television. “That’s just not how those work.”
They smiled at the screen. “Those…?”
“The blasters.”
They looked over at him, “You say that like you’ve used one.”
The Doctor paused for half a beat too long, then reached for a chip and said, “I’ve seen enough films to know that was rubbish.”
Donna narrowed her eyes in amusement for all of two seconds before the film did something even stupider and pulled her attention away again.
By halfway through, all three of them had settled in enough that the crampedness of the fort had become less of a careful adjustment and more of a fact.
Donna had gradually expanded until she occupied far more of her side than seemed physically possible. The Doctor and the barista had, by silent agreement, compressed themselves into the remaining space and stopped pretending they weren’t pressed together from shoulder to knee.
Then Donna decided to make a performance out of it.
“Oh, for God’s sake,” she said, breaking away from the film to squirm dramatically. “Doctor, you are practically sitting on me.”
The Doctor blinked, affronted. “I am not.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
Donna shoved at him with one hand. “You’re all elbows.”
They laughed under their breath, eyes still on the screen.
“And honestly,” Donna continued, pushing harder now, “you’re so thin and bony it’s like being jabbed by a folding chair.”
“Donna!”
She shoved him again.
The Doctor, caught between the two of them and the limited architecture of the fort, gave way with a protesting noise and was forced bodily in the other direction, straight into them. They let out the tiniest breath of startled laughter, still looking at the film for one stubborn second longer before the full reality of the new arrangement registered.
The Doctor had been pushed even more firmly against them than before. His side was fully along theirs now, his knee crowding theirs under the blanket, and in the effort to keep himself balanced against Donna’s relentless complaints, he shifted and braced one arm along the the couch behind them.
And suddenly harm was around their shoulders. Not quite holding them but resting along the couch behind them, warm and close enough that if they leaned back even a fraction more, they would be tucked neatly into his side.
They went very still because some treacherous part of their brain, completely unhelpful and far too aware of romance tropes, immediately supplied the deeply humiliating thought that this was the most cliché thing that had ever happened in the history of human seating arrangements.
Arm around the back of the couch and accidental closeness? It was so cheesy it ought to have had its own soundtrack. Somewhere out there, an author is kicking their feet and saying your welcome.
The Doctor settled after Donna’s assault, adjusting his weight carefully so he wasn’t actually crushing either of them, and once he had stopped moving, the shape of him remained there beside them. His sleeve brushed the fabric of their shirt whenever either of them shifted.
Donna had done this, clearly. So if anyone were to question it, there was a perfectly innocent explanation. Tight fit, limited fort space, Donna Noble, and her aggressive insistence on personal comfort. Entirely practical.
A free pass, really.
The thought made their ears feel warm. Beside them, the Doctor was having a similarly difficult time pretending the situation was not affecting him at all. He kept his gaze on the film with heroic determination, jaw slightly set, as though the worst sci-fi movie imaginable required his full concentration and not a single shred of awareness for the warm person tucked against his side.
He was failing.
Donna only huffed once, satisfied now that she had established a more comfortable distance from the Doctor’s allegedly pointy bones, and muttered, “Better.”
The barista bit their lip to hide the smile threatening at the corners of their mouth. The Doctor’s arm stayed where it was.
For a little while, neither of them paid much attention to the film. The Doctor sat very still, doing an admirable job of pretending this was an entirely practical arrangement.
He watched them from the corner of his eye with a straight face that fooled absolutely no one. There was a fond gleam there, bright and quiet and impossible to miss if one looked closely enough. He kept his mouth carefully neutral, but his eyes gave him away every few seconds when they flicked down to them and softened.
It felt far too nice to have them tucked close to his side like this, to have a reason, however ridiculous, not to move away. He could feel the line of their shoulder against him, the warmth of them under the blanket, the slight shifts in their posture as they tried to settle more comfortably without making any of it obvious.
And though he was enjoying every second of it, he decided, with complete conviction, that he was absolutely never bringing Donna around the flat again.
Not ever. Not if this was the sort of dangerous situation her meddling created.
Beside him, they were trying with determination to look casual. They shifted once, then again, trying to find a position that didn’t leave their knee at an awkward angle or their shoulder knocking the standing lamp holding up the fort. The structure swayed faintly overhead whenever they moved too much, which only made them more cautious. Eventually, the least impossible solution required leaning a little more into him than they had before.
Which was not helping either of them at all.
They swallowed once, nervous now in that strange, breathless way that didn’t feel like panic exactly. They were hyperaware of where his arm was, where his side met theirs, how easy it would be to overthink every inch of contact until the whole of them combusted.
So they risked a glance up at him just to make sure he wasn’t uncomfortable. Only to find he was already looking down at them.
The Doctor’s expression had gone wonderfully unguarded in that private little pocket of shadow and television light. There was no real surprise on his face at being caught, only that growing grin and that bright glint in his eye, like he’d been quietly enjoying their attempts to get settled and had no intention of pretending otherwise.
It was impossible not to smile back. The grin pulled out of them instinctively, small at first and then wider when his own widened in return.
The Doctor’s eyes flicked once toward the lamp, then back to them, as if acknowledging the absurd practicality of their position while also thoroughly enjoying it. They ducked their head just a little, smile still there, and let themself settle properly at last.
Then Donna threw a piece of candied popcorn at the television and loudly demanded to know why everyone in the film looked damp, and the moment thinned into laughter.
By the time the credits rolled, they had stopped pretending to keep any kind of careful distance.
At some point during the second half of the film, the awkwardness had worn itself out. They had shifted, then settled, then shifted again, and now they were simply tucked into the Doctor’s side as though that had always been the natural end point of the evening. The bowl of popcorn rested in their lap, and the two of them had fallen into an easy rhythm of reaching into it without looking, fingers occasionally brushing and neither making a fuss of it.
The blanket over their legs had gone warm with shared body heat. The fort sagged softly above them. Donna had long since migrated into a nest of cushions at the opposite edge, somehow still managing to look like she was prepared to fight the film personally.
On screen, the credits began their slow crawl.
Donna broke the silence first. “That,” she announced, “was awful.”
The Doctor, without missing a beat, gave a quick, smug, “I told you so.”
They laughed under their breath, still half leaning into him. “Okay, yes, but not for the reasons you said.”
The Doctor looked down at them with mock offense. “Excuse me?”
“The movie itself was horrible,” they said, lifting a hand to count it off on their fingers while balancing the popcorn bowl with the other. “Bad acting. Bad effects. Bad dialogue. Bad everything.”
Donna pointed at the TV. “That one bloke looked like he was reading cue cards from across the room.”
“Exactly,” they said.
The Doctor sniffed lightly. “And the technology was nonsense.”
“We know,” Donna said.
“We know,” they echoed, a second off from Donna, grinning.
He looked faintly wounded by how little care they gave about his suffering.
Donna sat up a little, brow creased in fresh indignation now that the film had ended and she could devote proper energy to hating it. “No, but seriously, why were the humans suddenly flying the alien ships at the end?”
The Doctor blinked.
Donna turned fully toward him. “They were basically cave people at the beginning.”
“That is true,” they said, nodding.
“And then by the end,” Donna continued, hands moving as she built momentum, “they’re all up there flying about like they’ve had years of training. Where did that come from?”
The Doctor frowned thoughtfully at the TV screen, where names continued scrolling by in indifferent white letters.
“Hm.”
Donna leaned forward. “Don’t hm me. Explain it.”
He squinted slightly, as if perhaps the answer might be hidden somewhere in the credits if he stared hard enough. “They must have explained it at some point.”
There was a beat. Then both Donna and the barista turned to stare at him.
“You didn’t even notice that one?” the barista asked, laughing.
The Doctor looked vaguely defensive. “I was distracted by several other catastrophic failures happening simultaneously.”
Donna let out a bark of laughter. “So even you lost track.”
“I did not lose track.”
“You absolutely did,” they said.
Donna grinned. “Translation: it was such a bad movie even the Doctor gave up.”
They laughed harder at that, and the Doctor looked between the two of them with all the long-suffering patience of a man being unfairly persecuted. Still, he smiled.
It was dreadful. A waste of time by almost any proper metric of cinema.
And yet somehow none of them moved. The credits kept rolling. The menu music had not yet kicked back in. The room stayed dim and warm and close, lit by the pale flicker of the television and the softer amber halo from the fairy lights in the next room.
Donna reached lazily for the cheesy popcorn.
The Doctor, still beside them, shifted only enough to get a little more comfortable, not enough to disturb the shape they’d settled into.
No one got up to turn on the big light. No one started gathering bowls. No one suggested the night had run its course.
They had all agreed the film had been terrible, that the acting was wooden, the effects laughable, the plot full of holes big enough to fly alien ships through.
Donna let out a long sigh and sank deeper into the pillows. “Worst movie I’ve seen in ages.”
The barista smiled sleepily. “Same.”
The Doctor looked at the two of them, then at the fort, then at the screen still glowing faintly in front of them. His grin came back, small and satisfied.
“Well,” he said, “good company.”
Donna made a face but didn’t argue. Then she perked up suddenly, her attention snagging once more on the wall above the television.
“Wait,” she said, pointing with a loose bit of popcorn between her fingers. “Did you paint that thing? I swear, it's been staring at me all night.”
They followed her gaze and immediately laughed. The Doctor made a wounded sound.
“John painted that,” they said, grinning.
Donna’s eyebrows shot up. “He did?”
They nodded, still smiling as they looked at the portrait hanging above the TV. “He took me to the National Gallery for my birthday a few months ago, and there was this interactive exhibit where you could paint portraits. We painted each other.”
“Oh, that is brilliant.” Donna looked from the painting to the Doctor and back again, clearly delighted by this information.
“It is not,” the Doctor muttered.
“It is,” they and Donna said together for different reasons.
Donna, of course, was only getting started. “So where’s the one you did of him?”
That made them glance back at the Doctor with fresh curiosity. Because, actually, yes, they’d never gotten a straight answer on that.
They turned more fully toward him. “Yeah. Where did you put yours?”
“In my room.” The Doctor, who had been hoping very much that this subject would die quietly, made the fatal mistake of answering too casually.
“You have a room?” Donna looked at him with a brow raised. The question slipped out before she could stop it.
The Doctor went still.
They frowned slightly, confusion flickering over their face.
“Why wouldn’t he have a room?” they asked, looking between them. “At his apartment?”
Donna blinked.
The Doctor moved fast. He sat up a little straighter and gestured vaguely toward the painting above the TV as if that had always been the far more urgent subject. “Can we not keep discussing it like it’s some treasured masterpiece?” His tone was light, but his ears had gone a little pink in the television glow, which only made the barista smile.
“No,” they said flatly.
Donna, recovering quickly, nodded toward the portrait with a grin. “I mean, it’s not bad.”
“Thank you,” the Doctor said flatly.
“But,” she added, “it’s got personality.”
He looked scandalized. “That’s what people say when they’re trying not to say horrible.”
They laughed and shook their head. “It’s not bad.”
The Doctor turned to them with immediate disbelief. “You are the least objective person in the room.”
“I’m the person it was painted for.”
“Exactly.”
They looked up at the painting again, smile softening around the edges. “I do love it.” That quieted him more effectively than anything else had. They kept going, half to Donna and half to him now. “I mean it. It makes me happy every time I look at it.”
The Doctor’s expression shifted, embarrassment and warmth colliding into one big mess of blegh. Donna noticed, and very wisely chose not to comment.
The Doctor turned his head just enough to look at them properly, and the fondness in his face came through before he could stop it. Donna smiled to herself, watching the whole thing like she had front-row seats to a play she already knew the ending of.
Her eyes flicked between them, sparkling. Donna, after a suspiciously thoughtful pause, asked, “So how did you two meet then?”
The Doctor’s head turned toward her. He knew that she knew exactly how they had met. Which meant the question wasn’t innocent at all, and that alone was enough to put him on edge.
He looked at her with narrowed eyes. Donna looked back with perfect blandness.
The barista, unaware of the silent argument taking place over the top of the popcorn bowls, answered simply enough. “He became a regular at the café.” They shrugged one shoulder, keeping the explanation easy and surface-level. “Started coming in a lot. We talked. Kept talking.”
They did not mention the rest.
Did not mention the first day he’d looked like grief in a suit. Did not mention the quiet, aching loneliness they had seen in him before they even knew his favorite tea order. Did not mention any of the deeper, more personal pieces he had only given them carefully, later, in softer moments.
They had no idea how much Donna knew, and they were not about to start letting John’s cats out of the bag on his behalf.
Donna nodded along, accepting the version offered. “Right.” Then, as casually as one might ask about the weather, she said, “And how long have you been friends? Because you seem very close.”
The Doctor’s expression went flat. He did not like where she was taking this.
The barista, thankfully oblivious to the specific danger in the question, answered without much fuss. “About a year now.”
Donna nodded again. “Mm.”
The Doctor shifted, already preparing to cut her off before she got any cleverer, but the barista beat him to it.
“What about you?” they asked, turning the question neatly back on her. “Where’d you meet John?”
Donna did not hesitate, “He crashed my wedding.”
The barista’s eyes went wide. They turned to John so quickly he barely had time to brace himself.
He lifted both hands a little in self-defense. “Not like that.”
Donna snorted.
“That is not a defense,” they said, still staring at him.
“It sounds worse than it was.”
“It sounds exactly as bad as it sounds,” Donna said.
The barista looked between them, scandalized and delighted in equal measure. “He crashed your wedding?”
Donna grinned, settling in more comfortably beneath the blanket now that she had an audience. “Well. Sort of.”
The Doctor sank a little lower into the cushions, already regretting everything.
Donna launched into the story with theatrical ease, omitting all the alien invasion details with admirable quickness while still preserving the drama of it. “I was about to marry a complete prick,” she said. “And then I ran into him.”
She jerked her chin toward the Doctor, who made a small, put-upon face.
“I was going to be late,” Donna went on, “and he helped me get there.”
They nodded, following along.
“And when I got there,” Donna said, with mounting indignation even now, “they’d already had the reception without me.”
They sat upright. “Without you?”
Donna pointed at them immediately. “Exactly!”
“They had the reception without the bride?” they repeated, appalled.
“Yes!”
“Oh, that is awful.”
Donna slapped the Doctor on the arm. “See? See, they get it.”
The Doctor rubbed the spot with quiet offense. “I was there.”
“You weren’t offended enough on my behalf.”
“I was very offended.” He tried to defend.
“No, you were practical,” Donna said. “Different thing.”
They looked positively scandalized now, wholly invested. “That’s genuinely terrible.”
“It was,” Donna said, thrilled to have found such enthusiastic agreement. “And then, to make it all worse, when I got there, Lance was dancing with this little twit from the office. Nerys.”
The barista gasped softly. “No.”
“Yes.”
“Oh, I hate him already.”
“Thank you,” Donna said, pleased.
The Doctor, beside them, looked on with the weary expression of a man who had heard this story before and still knew better than to interrupt.
Donna waved one hand dramatically. “There was a lot of shouting.”
“I can imagine,” the barista said.
“A lot.”
The Doctor muttered, “There was quite a bit.”
Donna ignored him. “Anyway, long story short, I realized Lance never cared about me nearly as much as I’d convinced myself he did.” The room softened, just slightly. Donna’s tone did too, though only for a moment. “And I got out with my dignity,” she finished.
They smiled at her, warm and sincere. “Good.”
Donna held their gaze a second, then nodded once in quiet agreement with her own younger self. “Yeah.”
The Doctor watched the two of them from where he sat between them, something faintly fond flickering over his face.
Then they looked back at him and said, with fresh disbelief, “You really led with ‘not like that’ as if that helped.”
Donna burst out laughing.
The Doctor sighed. “It was the first thing I had.”
“It was terrible.”
“I know that now.”
Donna wiped at one eye. “Honestly, I don’t know how you talk your way out of anything.”
“He usually doesn’t,” they said. Oh, if only they knew.
“Brilliant,” he muttered. “I’ve been teamed up on.” The Doctor looked from one to the other, Donna grinning, them smiling with that same bright amusement, and shook his head slowly.
Donna leaned back against the pillow pile with enormous satisfaction. “Too right.”
Donna gave a little shrug, smoothing the sharpest edges off the story with the ease of someone who knew exactly which parts to keep and which to bury.
“We went our separate ways after that,” she said. “Then ran into each other again later by chance.”
The Doctor made a face at the phrase ‘by chance’, but let it go.
Donna went on breezily, “And the rest is history.”
That seemed to satisfy them well enough. They smiled, then perked up with a fresh thought, “So are you an archaeologist too?”
Before Donna could so much as inhale, the Doctor cut in, “She’s my assistant.”
Donna turned so sharply to glare at him that the blanket shifted over her lap.
His assistant. Of all the possible retaliations. Firecracker Donna Noble, reduced to some meek little archaeological assistant, trailing along behind him with a clipboard? Absolutely not.
The Doctor, of course, knew this perfectly well. Which was why he looked far too pleased with himself. He even had the gall to keep going.
“She was having a bit of trouble holding down a job,” he said, in the mildest tone imaginable, “what with her fiery personality, and I needed help. She got to travel, and I got assistance. Win-win, really.”
“Oi, spaceman,” Donna barked. “That is my business!”
The Doctor had the grace to look pleased with himself for all of half a second more before Donna started scolding him, flicking a hand full of popcorn in his direction like a weapon.
“That is rude,” she informed him.
“You started it.”
“Yeah, and I’ll finished it if you keep that up, you.”
The barista laughed softly under their breath, eyes moving between them with that same entertained fondness they’d worn all evening. Donna huffed one last time, then pushed herself up to standing, stretching her arms over her head until her back gave a satisfying little crack.
“Well,” she said, already stepping carefully over the edge of the blanket bed, “if anyone asks, I’m not his assistant, and if anyone asks twice, I’ll deny knowing either of you.”
The Doctor looked up at her. “Bold words from a woman who’s doing the potty dance right now.”
Donna pointed at him again. “Don’t talk about my potty dance, and don’t call ot that. I’m not a child.” And a second later she was padding off down the hall toward the bathroom.
The cozy spell she’d helped create broke with her movement.
The room felt different without her filling the edge of the fort with commentary and noise. A little more hollow, even with the credits music still humming softly and the white names rolling over a black screen.
He could no longer pretend any closeness between himself and the barista was merely the unavoidable result of Donna Noble’s physical bullying and the architecture of the fort. Donna had removed herself from the equation entirely, and still the barista remained tucked close against his side, warm and comfortable and seemingly not in any hurry to move.
He checked toward the hall as they watched Donna go. He should pull away, that was the sensible thing.
Not dramatically, not enough to make it awkward, just some natural little shift. Reach for the remote. Adjust a pillow. Sit up to stretch. Something that would put a bit more air between them before the silence grew too aware of itself.
But he hesitated because they still looked comfortable. Because they had not flinched back or edged away the second Donna left. And because, suddenly, pulling away seemed cruel.
So he stayed still for a moment, then another, trying to think of an excuse.
They, meanwhile, seemed occupied by far simpler concerns. They dipped a hand into the nearly empty popcorn bowl in their lap, sorting idly through the last pieces with complete seriousness, apparently hunting for one final acceptable piece of candied popcorn as the credits droned on in the background.
They were not thinking about him. Not at that second, anyway. They were looking down, lashes low in the shifting television light, brow faintly furrowed in concentration over something so ordinary and unimportant that it made his hearts ache.
The Doctor turned his head just slightly and watched their profile.
The soft line of their nose. The curve of their mouth when they were quietly pleased with a piece they’d selected. The way the TV glow caught on their cheek and turned one edge of them blue-white while the fairy lights left the rest warm.
And just like that, the comfortable little thump of his hearts melted into grief. Or more so the shape of it, arriving early as it always did, slipping its shadow under good moments to remind him they could not stay untouched forever.
An insecurity surfaced, sudden and ugly, of how wrong this was. To let himself get this attached when he already knew, somewhere down the line, he would have to pull the plug on it all or tell them the truth and watch whatever came after wreck the easy shape they had made together. Even if they never once stepped aboard the Tardis, even if he kept them on Earth and safe and wholly outside his real life, they still deserved more than this vague, drifting half-honesty. They deserved to know that one day there might come a time he simply did not return from “work.” Or worse, that he might come back with a different face and ask them to trust that he was still the same man. The thought made his stomach turn.
His gaze dropped to the popcorn bowl in their lap, to their fingers still picking carefully through the last pieces as if none of this was crashing through him at all.
And then, unwelcome and immovable, Donna’s voice rose again in his memory from earlier that night, before dinner with Wilf and a chat about the stars, before coming here.
‘If it doesn’t feel like a loss when it’s gone, then it meant nothing.’
Then the other one came, softer and somehow more infuriating for it.
‘So, you might as well enjoy as much of whatever word you choose while you can.’
The Doctor exhaled slowly through his nose. The barista let out the tiniest pleased hum, having apparently found a “good piece” at last, and popped it into their mouth. That tiny, stupid, ordinary sound nearly undid him.
He sat there beside them, considering Donna’s words while the credits rolled and the room stayed dim and warm around them. Considering the grief he could already taste at the edges of something not yet lost. Considering, too, the fact that he was here now, and they were here now, and for this brief moment the ending had not happened yet.
They finally glanced up, still chewing, and caught him looking.
“What?” they asked, voice quiet so it wouldn’t carry down the hall.
The Doctor blinked, drawn abruptly back to the room.
For one mad second he nearly said something honest. Not the whole truth, not anything so catastrophic as that, but something a little too real. That he was glad to be here. That he had missed them more than the days apart should have allowed. That watching them eat terrible candied popcorn under a blanket fort felt like standing too close to a life he wanted and did not trust himself to touch.
Instead he only looked at the bowl and said, “You’re being very selective.”
They smiled, immediate and easy.
“Well, yeah,” they said, tilting the bowl a little so he could see the pathetic handful of leftovers. “We’re down to the weird bits now.”
The Doctor huffed a small laugh.
They held up one misshapen cluster between finger and thumb. “See? That’s not popcorn anymore.”
Donna came back from the bathroom yawning before she said anything else. A proper, full-bodied yawn too, the sort that made her blink a little harder afterward and drag a hand through her hair like she’d only just realized how tired she was.
“Well,” she said, voice roughened by it, “I’m about done.”
Before either of them could ask what she meant, she started collecting herself by the door, shoving her feet back into her shoes, reaching for her coat, patting her pockets to make sure she had everything.
They sat up a little straighter from the fort, watching her in mild surprise. “You’re finished already?”
Donna glanced over, still shrugging into her coat. “Yeah. Getting tired, aren’t I?” She tossed the Doctor a quick look over her shoulder. “Figured he’d be heading back soon anyway.”
The barista blinked. That caught them off guard more than it should have. John normally stayed fairly late, especially on nights like this when there was no work in the morning and nothing pressing to hurry him off. And it was only ten.
Still, they didn’t argue.
“Oh,” they said, a little more quietly than before. “Okay.”
They pushed themself up from the blankets and started tidying almost automatically, smoothing down the fort roof where it had slipped and reaching for the nearest bowl on the coffee table. Except the Doctor didn’t move, he stayed exactly where he was for one more second, then looked up at Donna with a sharp little frown.
And then at them and something in his expression settled. Because no, actually, he wasn’t ready to leave.
He had wanted some real time with them tonight. Proper time. Time not split three ways or softened around Donna’s meddling or spent bracing for whatever she might say next. He’d promised he would make the rest of his time here worth it, and he had meant that.
So before they could get too far into clearing things away, he said, “I’m not leaving yet.”
They paused, bowl in hand, and looked back at him. Donna’s mouth curled immediately.
The Doctor stood then, slower than usual but with a certainty in it, and slipped his hands into his pockets. “I was actually going to stay a bit longer.”
Their face changed, surprise giving way to something warmer. Donna noticed, she turned fully toward him, one hand still on the doorknob, and gave him a look so cheeky it ought to have been illegal.
“Were you now?”
The Doctor sighed. “Donna.”
“No, no, fair enough,” she said, grin widening. “Wouldn’t want to interrupt your very important archaeological research.”
Theylaughed under their breath while the Doctor shot Donna a warning look that only made her brighter.
She softened it at the last second, though, turning back to the barista with a much kinder smile. “Thanks for letting me crash your night.”
They smiled back. “You’re welcome.”
Donna nodded once, pleased, then jerked her chin toward the Doctor. “He’s alright, really. Just odd.”
“I’m right here,” the Doctor said.
“I know.” She gave the barista a quick, conspiratorial little smile that made the Doctor instantly wary again. Then she opened the door and stepped out into the hall.
“Night, then,” she said.
“Night,” they answered.
The Doctor lingered half a step behind, still watching Donna with the exhausted caution of a man who knew she was capable of one final act of sabotage. To her credit, she kept moving, though not without one last look over her shoulder at him, full of smug affection and far too much understanding.
Then she disappeared down the hall, the door clicked shut, and the doctor flipped the deadbolt shut. And just like that, the flat went quiet again.
They stood by the coffee table, still holding the bowl, and looked back at him. Then the Doctor exhaled and seemed to shed an entire layer of tension at once. He tugged off his suit jacket first, draping it over the armchair. His tie followed a moment later, loosened and laid over the chair with less care than usual.
They chuckled under their breath as they started tidying the coffee table.
He looked over at them. “What?”
“Nothing,” they said, smiling to themself as they swept crumpled wrappers and napkins into the now-empty popcorn bowl. “You just look a lot less on edge.”
The Doctor made a small, noncommittal noise, which was answer enough.
They kept cleaning, leaving behind anything unfinished for continued pecking and gathering all the proper rubbish into the bowl. When they stood and carried it toward the kitchenette, he followed without thinking, hands slipping into his pockets again as he watched them tip the trash into the bin and set the bowl in the sink.
The fairy lights cast warm little reflections over the counter. The flat felt softer now.
The question came out before they could stop it, “Why’d you stay?”
The Doctor blinked, “Hm?”
They shrugged lightly, suddenly a bit self-conscious now that they’d said it out loud. “I mean Donna left. Thought you would’ve gone with her.”
He looked at them for a moment, then gave a small shrug of his own, “Said I’d make the most of our time.”
They stared at him for half a beat, and then the memory caught up. His voice from earlier, low and private while Donna was in the restroom the first time. I’ll make the rest of my time here worth it.
“Oh,” they said, the warmth of it coming back all at once. “Right.” A small laugh slipped out of them. The Doctor’s mouth softened into a grin.
The Doctor, still smiling from their little laugh, tilted his head and said, “Could do another film.”
They looked up.
“A better film,” he added, with emphasis.
That pulled a grin out of them immediately. They stepped closer to him, close enough that the smile in their face turned bright and conspiratorial as they glanced past him toward the fort and then back again.
“It would be a shame,” they said, “to waste a perfectly good fort.”
The Doctor felt his own grin deepen almost helplessly at their enthusiasm. It was infectious in the most dangerous way. Just being near it made him lighter.
Then they covered their mouth suddenly, like they had remembered something appalling.
“What?” he asked, amused now.
They looked at him with exaggerated solemnity. “I kept something from you.”
He raised a brow.
Without another word, they turned and opened the fridge. The Doctor leaned just enough to see around them as they revealed, with all the gravity of a major confession, two pints of ice cream tucked into the door.
He blinked.
They looked back over their shoulder at him, still in full deadly-serious mode. “I know.”
The Doctor laughed softly under his breath.
They turned to face him again and held the fridge open like a display case. “What flavor do you want?”
He considered the two pints. Not because he cared especially, he didn’t, not really. Ice cream was pleasant enough, but not the point. The point was the look on their face as they offered it to him like this was suddenly the most important decision of the evening.
“The chocolate one,” he said.
“Hm.” They thought about it for one second with absurd intensity, then nodded. “I also want that one. Suppose it’s big enough to share. ”
The Doctor shook his head, smiling. They grabbed the chocolate pint, shut the fridge with their hip, and immediately launched into a ramble on the walk back toward the fort.
“Okay, so we need something good this time,” they said, moving around the coffee table with quick purpose. “I’d like at least twenty minutes before your film criticism kicks in.”
The Doctor opened the drawer in the kitchenette and pulled out two spoons, still listening.
“And no alien invasions, probably, because that feels like tempting fate now.”
“A wise decision,” he said.
They pointed at him with the pint. “See? You’ve already started.”
He laughed and followed them back toward the fort, spoons in hand, shaking his head as they kept going, thoughts moving aloud faster than he could properly track. The room had settled into that lovely, late-night looseness he was familiar with now. They left the ice cream on the coffee table while they sorted through the remaining stack of DVDs.
The Doctor, already half disappearing back under the sheet roof, looked over from the fort and said, “Honestly, any of the ones you had out looked fine.”
They glanced back at him. “You don’t care?”
He settled himself more comfortably beneath the blankets, stretching one leg out and propping a pillow behind his back. “Not particularly.”
They laughed softly. “That’s not helpful.”
“It’s very helpful,” he said. “It means you can’t choose wrong.”
“That’s not how choices work.”
The Doctor only smiled and tucked himself in farther, looking altogether too at home there now, shirt sleeves a little rumpled, tie gone, shoes off, all the sharpness of earlier softened into something warm and boyish under the fairy lights and TV glow.
They shook their head at him, amused, and held one finger over the little pile of DVDs.
“Right then.” They played a quick round of eeny meeny miny mo under their breath, tapping each case in turn until they landed on one near the bottom of the stack.
“There,” they said, holding it up in triumph. “Fate has spoken.”
The Doctor made a thoughtful hum from inside the fort. “Dangerous system.”
“It’s efficient.”
“It’s reckless.”
“It’s democratic.”
That earned a quiet laugh from him as they crossed to the DVD player and fed the disc in. While it loaded, they gathered the leftover cases and slid them back onto the shelf.
The Doctor watched them over the back of the couch cushion as they ducked beneath the sheet and settled in beside him. He noticed immediately that they sat nearly as close as before. Shoulder to shoulder. Knee almost touching under the blanket. Close enough that no one could pretend it was simply a matter of limited space this time.
Donna was gone and so was the excuse.
He did not comment on it. He only shifted slightly to make room for them, calm and easy as if none of it required remarking on at all, though something warm came up low in his chest all the same.
They adjusted the blanket over their lap, reached out for the ice cream and the spoons, and for a second neither of them looked directly at the other.
The new film’s menu music started up softly.
The Doctor took the spoon they handed him. “What did fate choose for us, then?”
They finally glanced over, smiling. “You’ll live.”
The Doctor ended up staying much later than he had meant to. Later than he had told himself he would when Donna first left. Later than a sensible man with any interest in self-preservation ought to have stayed, considering Donna Noble was almost certainly waiting in the Tardis with enough material to torment him for weeks.
But then one film became two.
Two became four.
Somewhere between the second bowl of popcorn and the shared pint of chocolate ice cream, the fort stopped feeling like an event and became simply where they were. The DVDs stacked up in watched little piles. The fairy lights kept glowing. They had drifted from movies into games without even really deciding to, first Mario Kart, with all the usual accusations of cheating and deeply unfair item distribution, then a long, absurdly competitive hour of Uno that somehow grew more intense the more tired both of them became.
By the end of it, their eyes had started drooping between turns. They tried to fight it at first. He saw them doing it, blinking harder at their cards, rubbing at one eye with the heel of their hand, insisting they were still fully capable of humiliating him in a children’s card game while very obviously losing the battle against sleep.
The sight of it softened him in ways he tried not to inspect too closely.
He didn’t want to leave then. Not when the flat had gone so quiet and warm around them. Not when the night had stretched into that strange, intimate hour where everything felt gentler just because the rest of the world had gone to bed. Not when they were tired enough to stop guarding half their expressions and every smile looked softer for it.
But humans needed sleep in a way Time Lords did not.
So when they finally admitted, with a sleepy little laugh, that they were probably done for the night, he let them slip off to change into pajamas while he cleaned up the remains of the evening.
He did it almost without thinking.
Gathered the empty glasses, stacked the bowls, folded in the edges of the blanket fort just enough to keep it from collapsing entirely. He moved through their flat with that easy familiarity he had once found so dangerous and now only found quietly dear. The sort of familiarity that came from enough nights spent here to know where the rubbish bags were kept, which cupboard held the spare mugs, where the extra blanket usually got tossed when it wasn’t in use.
When they came back from the hall in soft pajamas, sleepier now and somehow even more unreasonably lovely for it, they found him by the coffee table with the last of the wrappers in hand.
They smiled at the sight. And then, because of course they did, they offered him the couch. The Doctor smiled at that but it was about two in the morning by then. Late enough that staying would have been the simplest thing in the world. Late enough that no excuse would have been needed beyond tiredness and the unfair coziness of the flat and the fact that Donna was not here to physically drag him away.
But Donna was waiting in the Tardis.
And if he stayed until morning, he knew exactly the kind of earful that would be waiting for him when he finally reappeared. Not that Donna would be truly cross, not in the important sense. But she would know too much. She already did. And the thought of facing her after spending the whole night here, sleeping on their couch like he belonged in the soft little margins of their life, made something in him tighten with embarrassment.
So he made an excuse. Something vague about needing to be up early. Something plausible enough to pass without sounding defensive. They looked faintly disappointed, though only for a second, and then smiled like they understood.
So he said his goodbyes and when he stepped out into the hall at last, coat on and tie still undone.
On the walk back to the Tardis, the Doctor had been forced to admit that Donna was irritatingly onto something. He couldn’t keep lying to them.
Not forever.
Not if he meant to keep coming back. Not if he meant to let this thing between them keep growing in all the quiet little ways it already had. Because every hour spent in that flat, every easy night and warm look and shared in-joke, only deepened the eventual pain of all the what-ifs waiting at the end of the road if he said nothing.
What if he regenerated.
What if he vanished one day and never came back.
What if time stretched oddly again and again until the lie itself became too large to step around.
Donna had not been wrong. He hated that. She had not been wrong when she told him that naming it did not change what it was. She had not been wrong when she made him see how cruel silence could become if he let it stand in for honesty long enough.
The hours he spent there, with them, were some of the simplest pleasures he had known in a very long time. That was the truth pressing in from the other side of the fear.
He was always moving. Always running. Always leaping toward the next crisis, the next impossible thing, the next bit of danger that demanded his cleverness before he had time to feel too much of anything else. That was the shape of his life, nothing but motion and noise.
But Earth, especially that flat, somehow made slowing down felt just as exhilarating as standing at the Tardis doors with the stars opening out before him.
A blanket fort. Tea in mismatched mugs. Bad films, game nights, shoes kicked off by the door. The softness of a lamp in the corner. The way a human life arranged itself into familiar little comforts and made a place for him among them.
It should not have mattered as much as it did.
But it did.
Because for all his love of the stars, for all his wonder at the universe, there had always been something about Earth that held him differently. Human beings, in all their fragility and ridiculousness and brilliance, had always had a way of reaching him where stranger, grander civilizations could not.
And that connection, his admiration for this planet, for these people, for their stubborn small kindnesses and their ability to make meaning out of the simplest things, had never felt stronger than it did now.
Not since he had stumbled, lonely and half-broken, into a quaint little café and found someone behind the counter who had looked at him and decided he was worth talking to.
By the time he reached the Tardis, that thought was still with him.
He would have to tell them.
Someday soon.
Because what he had found on Earth was too precious to keep building on a lie forever.
★ Part 1 ★ Part 2 ★ Part 3 ★ Part 4 ★ Part 5 ★ Part 5.2 ★
✰ Word Count: 10.8k
✰ Summary: The Doctor makes a friend with a humble barista in England. They’re friends. Thats it. They're just friends.
✰ Warnings: 10th Doctor, Genter Nutural Reader, They/Them pronouns, romantic pining, Donna Noble, Alien Invasion in London, What's New, Cybermen cause their easy to write, Non Canon Events, Will They? Wont they? Spoiler they Will
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This is for @vexerieart, who made me smile with their kind words, bitch boosted my ego SO BAD. So I just want to return the favor, pay the smile forward. I hope this cheers you up since you’ve been sick, my love. <3
Part 5.2 cause i keep forgetting tumbler has a limit per post. ugh
An hour had passed. Only an hour. It felt impossible that so much could fit inside sixty minutes.
An hour since the Cybermen had come down the corridor toward them, metal and certain and unstoppable.
An hour since those same Cybermen had suddenly stopped in their tracks, hands flying to their heads, bodies jerking violently, voices breaking open into screams that had not sounded mechanical at all. Human screams. Horrified, shattered, agonized human screams dragged up through steel throats.
An hour since they had crouched beside one of them on the floor while the ship dissolved into chaos and listened to the person trapped inside that metal shell grieve their own life. Their wife. Their son. The smell of coffee in the morning. A yellow front door. A dog they had loved. The first person they had shot after the conversion, and the next, and the next. All of it pouring out in fragments and gasps and tears that could no longer physically fall, because the body no longer belonged to them.
An hour since the Cybermen had remembered they were once people, and the remembering had been so monstrous, so unbearable, that many of them had torn themselves apart trying to escape it.
An hour since the Doctor had become less a man than a storm.
He had gone ship to ship. Reversed teleports. Dragged the living out, sent every human, terrified, injured, disbelieving, back down to Earth. Including them. Then he had put the Cyberman scout ships on automatic and sent them drifting, silent and full of their own dead, into the sun.
Now they sat on a curb in London and watched the world try to remember how to be a city again.
Soldiers moved through the street in waves, corralling survivors into triage points, shouting for medics, and loading the wounded onto stretchers. Floodlights had been dragged in somewhere and now cast harsh white pools over the road, glinting off broken glass and twisted metal. Men in fatigues knelt beside pieces of Cyberman technology with insulated gloves and sealed containers, collecting them one by one like they might still wake up and bite.
Smoke hung in the air, thinner now, but still there.
So did the smell. Burnt circuitry. Dust. Rain starting somewhere far away and not yet reaching them.
The Tardis stood down the road where it had been parked in a space no ordinary vehicle could possibly have fit into so neatly. Blue box, perfectly still, absurdly unchanged in the middle of a city clawing itself back from invasion.
They looked at it and looked away again.
The Doctor stood several yards off, speaking to someone important enough that other people were giving them both room. UNIT, maybe. Military. Government. They couldn’t tell anymore. The man facing him wore authority in the straightness of his spine and the earpiece in one ear, but even from here it was obvious who was controlling the conversation.
The Doctor’s coat was back on. His hair looked worse than ever. He spoke with fast, clipped precision, one hand cutting through the air as he explained something, corrected something, insisted on something. He looked exhausted.
They watched him and felt nothing simple.
Not relief, though there was some.
Not anger, though that had not gone anywhere.
Not gratitude, though they knew they should feel drowned in it.
Only a strange, hollow overwhelm, as if every feeling had been poured into them too quickly and now all of it had settled in separate layers they could not yet sort through.
The world had changed in an hour, or maybe they had.
Someone from a medical team had tried to approach them twice already. Check them over. Ask questions. Offer water. They had answered enough to be waved off for the moment, uninjured on the surface and too quiet to fuss with when there were people nearby bleeding visibly.
So they sat on the curb with their hands clasped between their knees and watched the Doctor from a distance he had created and not yet crossed.
The important man finally stepped away from him, barking orders into a radio as he went.
The Doctor stayed where he was for one moment longer then he turned and looked directly at them.
No grin. No shield of brightness. No John-shaped ease to soften it. Just the Doctor, tired to the bone and carrying too much and looking at them like he had been building toward this moment since the second he stepped out of the Tardis on that ship.
Their stomach turned over.
He started toward them slowly, trainers crunching over broken glass and grit.
They did not move.
The street worked around them, soldiers shouting, medics hurrying, generators humming, survivors crying quietly into blankets, but somehow the space between the curb and his approaching figure felt sealed off from all of it.
He stopped in front of them.
Close enough now that they could see the soot on his sleeve, the fresh nick near his jaw, the exhaustion in every line of his face. For a long, awkward moment, neither of them spoke.
Then, very softly, he said, “You alright?”
It was such a stupid, ordinary question that they almost laughed. They looked up at him, and they said rather simply, “I don’t know.”
The Doctor closed his eyes briefly, as that answer hurt him in exactly the way it should. When he opened them again, there was no John left in his face at all. Only the man underneath.
“Yeah,” he said.
The Doctor hesitated before sitting down. It was only a second, but they saw it in the corner of their eye, the moment he weighed the distance between them and chose caution. He lowered himself onto the curb beside them, not too close, leaving a respectful gap where once he would have folded easily into their space without thinking.
The silence stretched.
The city moved around them in waves of shouted orders and sirens and boots on broken pavement, but on the curb it felt oddly sealed off, like they were sitting inside the eye of something after it had already wrecked everything.
The Doctor cleared his throat softly, “Donna say goodbye before she left?” It was a flimsy question. They both knew it. Something to put into the silence so it wouldn’t choke them.
They didn’t answer or even look at him. They just kept staring ahead at the soldiers and medics and the smoking remains of London. The Doctor waited half a beat too long, then kept talking to fill the hole their silence had left.
“She’ll be back in a few hours,” he said, eyes on the street in front of them rather than on their face. “Wanted to check in on her family.”
His hands folded loosely between his knees. Uncharacteristically still.
“Looks like the attack centered around London,” he went on. “Didn’t get as far out as Chiswick. Not properly. Some panic, some power loss, but they’re alright.”
Still nothing from them, not even a nod. The Doctor swallowed once and glanced at them, then away again almost immediately when they didn’t turn. The gap between them on the curb felt enormous.
He had sat farther away on purpose, knowing they would be upset with him, knowing he had no right to slide back into closeness he had once been welcome in, at their shoulder, under blankets. Now he sat here careful not to presume.
They kept staring straight ahead.
He could see the profile of them in the harsh spill of work lights down the street, face drawn, eyes fixed, shock and exhaustion sitting under the skin like bruises. He wanted, with a near-physical ache, to ask what they were thinking.
He did not.
Instead he watched a stretcher go by and said quietly, “No one should’ve had to see any of that.”
That got the smallest reaction at last, their jaw tightened. The trouble was, there were no right words. So he sat there beside them, soot still on his sleeve, his tie crooked, and tried not to crowd the silence they had every right to keep.
A long moment passed.
Then another.
Finally, without looking at him, they said, “Donna told me some things.”
The Doctor went very still, and not cause he was surprised. Because he had known, somewhere in the back of his mind, that Donna would not leave them standing in the wreckage with nothing. But knowing it in theory and hearing it out loud were different beasts entirely.
He kept his voice careful. “Right.”
“She said you save people.”
The Doctor looked down at his hands, “I try.”
Their mouth twitched, “She said you’re wonderful.”
He let out the smallest breath through his nose, almost a laugh but too bruised to become one. “Did she.”
“She said none of us would be here without you.”
The Doctor said nothing to that. Because if he answered, he’d have to answer all the rest of it too, the body in the café, the hour aboard the ships, the people he hadn’t reached fast enough, the ones he had, the unbearable statistics of survival.
They finally turned their head then, not much, just enough that he could see the side of their eyes.
“She also said you lied because I meant too much.”
The Doctor shut his eyes for one brief second. When he opened them again, he still didn’t look at them directly.
“Sounds like Donna.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“No,” he said softly. “It’s not.”
The street noise swelled and receded around them.
A medic shouted for saline. Somewhere farther off, metal clanged into the back of a truck. The Tardis stood silent down the road like a fact waiting patiently to be addressed.
The Doctor dragged a hand over his face and exhaled. “I know you’ve got questions.”
They looked back ahead. “That’s one word for it.”
He nodded, accepting that.
“And I know I don’t get to ease into any of this, not after,” he glanced toward the street, “Not after this.”
Their shoulders rose and fell in a tired breath. For a second he thought they might retreat into silence again.
Instead they asked, still not looking at him, “Is your name even John?”
The Doctor’s mouth tightened into a thin line, “No. John Smith is a name I use when I need to blend in.”
They laughed once, short, sharp, disbelieving, “Right.”
He risked a glance at them then. “It wasn’t meant to-”
“Be cruel?” they cut in.
He stopped.
Their voice stayed level, which somehow made it worse. “Because it was.”
The Doctor looked at the pavement between his shoes. “Yes,” he said.
No defense.
No cleverness.
Just yes.
That finally made them turn a little more toward him, enough to study his face properly for the first time since he’d sat down. He looked older like this. Not physically, not in any way they could point to, but in his eyes.
“You sat in my flat,” they said quietly. “You let me tell you things. You let me. . .” They stopped, jaw tightening. “And all that time you were something else.”
The Doctor met their eyes then.
“Not something else,” he said. “Still me.”
The answer made no sesnce to them, and irritated them so much they looked away again.
“You don’t get to say that like it fixes anything.”
“No.” His voice roughened. “I know.” Then, very carefully: “I am the Doctor.”
That much, at least, was clean.
They gave the faintest nod. “Alien.”
“Yes.”
“Time machine.”
He looked toward the Tardis down the road. “Yes.”
“Traveling for work,” they said, and this time there was the ghost of bitter humor in it.
The Doctor almost smiled, but couldn’t quite. “Sort of.”
That got a look from them, flat and exhausted and not remotely willing to indulge him.
He let out a breath. “I travel. Mostly for the fun of it, but I help where I can. Stop things when they need stopping.”
“Like tonight.”
“Yes.”
Their eyes searched his face in brief, unwilling little flicks. As if every answer made him both more recognizable and less so.
“And the Doctor,” they said after a moment. “That’s what? A title?”
The Doctor nodded once. “Near enough.”
They absorbed that, looking past him toward the Tardis again.
Then they asked the one thing he had been dreading most, “Was any of it real?”
The Doctor turned fully toward them. There were a thousand ways to misunderstand that question, and he knew exactly which one they meant.
His answer came without hesitation, “Yes.”
The force of it made them blink.
“All of that,” he said. “Every bit of that was real.”
Their face tightened, wounded by how much they wanted to believe him.
“The only thing that wasn’t,” he said more quietly, “was how much I let you know. I’m sorry.”
This time, there was no quick answer. No sharp comeback. Just the city breathing around them and the wreckage of a night that had torn every lie apart.
After a long while, they said, “You don’t get to be the person I miss and the person I’m angry at at the same time.”
The Doctor looked at them with something like heartbreak, “I know.”
They stood up so abruptly that the Doctor’s whole body tensed before he could stop it. For one horrible second, as their back turned to him and they looked out over the street instead of at him, he thought that was it. That they were leaving.
He felt the old panic rise with sick familiarity, Rose being taken away, Martha choosing herself, every ending he had half-earned and half-feared all at once. He had lied, and he had waited too long, and now of course he had lost them anyway. Of course, he had. That was the pattern. That was the warning he had feared so much, a self fulfilling prophocy.
Then they turned back, just to look at him with their arms folded and their face still tight with too many feelings.
“You and Donna fit in that blue box,” they said, glancing down the street toward the Tardis. “So what, do you just squeeze in?”
The Doctor blinked; it was not the question he had expected. And because relief was still ricocheting painfully through him from the mere fact that they were still here, his answer came out softer than he meant it to.
“You’d be surprised how much room there is in there.”
They raised a brow, intrigued, despite themself.
The Doctor saw it and, before he could think too hard about how much this mattered, made a small motion with one hand toward the Tardis, an offer.
They were not impressed. Their expression flattened immediately. “I am far too upset with you to step into your snog box.”
The Doctor flushed so quickly it was almost comical, “My what?”
They gave him a look that said ‘you heard me.’
He very carefully did not allow himself to picture anything that phrase suggested, which naturally meant his brain supplied several images just to be difficult.
“That is not,” he began, then stopped and started again with more dignity. “It’s not a snog box.”
They folded their arms tighter. “Mm.”
“It’s a ship.”
“That you apparently invite people into.”
“Yes, but not for,” He cut himself off, ears still warm. “It’s got more room than it looks from the outside.”
That got a tiny, unwilling shift at the corner of their mouth.
They looked over the road again, at the floodlights, the shouted orders, the crying, the awful noise after disaster that settled in once the immediate danger had passed and left people alone with what they’d seen. Their shoulders tightened almost imperceptibly.
“Is it at least quiet?” they asked.
The Doctor stood up, heart kicking harder. “Yes.”
They looked at him for one long second, weighing him, weighing the box, weighing their own frayed nerves.
Then they sighed.
“Fine,” they said. “I’ll go in there with you.”
The Doctor tried very hard not to let hope show too plainly on his face.
They pointed at him before he could say anything, “But only because Donna told me to interrogate you and not let you get away with dodging questions.”
That pulled a small laugh out of him before he could stop it, “Right,” he said. “Of course.”
They gave him one last deeply unimpressed look, and he sobered just enough to remember that this was not forgiveness. Not even close, but at least it was a door not yet shut.
So he turned and started walking toward the Tardis, and they fell into step beside him. The street felt strangely quiet between them despite the chaos still carrying on all around. Somewhere behind them, a woman cried into someone’s shoulder. Ahead, the blue box waited at the curb, impossible and still.
The Doctor kept his pace measured, not too fast. Giving them time, if they needed it, to stop. Halfway down the street, he glanced at them once.
They were looking at the Tardis with wary focus, like they still half expected it to vanish or reveal itself as some trick of shock and adrenaline.
“It’s called the Tardis,” he said quietly.
They looked at him.
He kept his eyes ahead. “Time And Relative Dimension In Space.”
There was a pause, then, with dry disbelief, “Of course it is.”
The Doctor smiled faintly.
They reached the doors. The Doctor stopped with one hand on the handle and looked back at them, suddenly aware of the weight of what came next. This was not just another room. This was the line between the life they had known him in and the one he had hidden.
He searched their face for any sign they wanted to turn back.
They only lifted their chin a fraction and said, “Open it.”
So he did, then stepped aside and let them see.
The doors stood open behind them, the ruined London street still visible for a moment at the edges, but the Tardis swallowed all of that almost immediately. Warm gold light spilled over metal and glass and strange glowing panels. The central column rose and fell with its steady wheezing hum, alive in the middle of the room. Ramps curved down around the console. Coral-like supports arched up into the ceiling. Everything gleamed with movement and purpose and impossible scale.
He watched their face.
Watched their eyes go wide, watched disbelief and wonder war quietly for dominance behind the shock of everything else. Even now, even with all the hurt between them, even with their anger sitting raw and rightful in the space between them, this was still his favorite part.
That first look. The moment reality gave way and something bigger came pouring in.
They looked at him once, quickly, as if to confirm he was not somehow joking, then back at the ship. And then, slowly, they stepped inside.
They moved like someone entering a cathedral and a dream at the same time, gaze darting from one impossible detail to the next. Their anger didn’t vanish, he could still see it in the tightness around their mouth, the guarded set of their shoulders, but wonder had gotten its hands on them too, and wonder was difficult to resist inside the Tardis.
He followed them in and shut the doors behind him.
The city noise fell away immediately. Silence, or as close as the Tardis ever came to it, settled over the room, threaded only with the low familiar hum of the engines and the rhythmic rise and fall of the time rotor.
They stood at the bottom of the ramp for a moment, turning slowly.
He gave them that moment. Walking past them without crowding, he shrugged off his coat and tossed it over one of the branching support beams that had, since the remodel, become the closest thing he had to a coat rack. It landed there easily, with the familiarity of a repeated habit.
Then he made for the console.
Not because anything needed doing. But his hands wanted somewhere to go, and some old instinct in him wanted, despite everything, to show off a little. So he flipped a switch, checked a readout, adjusted a dial that had no meaningful reason to be adjusted, and watched the screen with an expression of great concentration he absolutely did not need.
He would never admit that to them.
Behind him, they remained still for a beat longer. Then, slowly, they started making their way up the ramp.
Their steps were quiet. Their eyes moved over everything as they came, up the railings, across the glowing controls, toward the great impossible heart of the ship. By the time they reached the center console beside him, they were still speechless, still staring, still looking as though their mind had not yet decided whether to accept any of this as real.
The Doctor glanced sideways at them and fought the urge to smile too much. Because yes, there was still all the rest of it waiting. The anger. The explanations. The questions that would cut and deserve to. But right now they were standing beside him in the Tardis for the first time, and the room had gone soft with their wonder.
“That,” they said at last, very quietly, “is bigger.”
The Doctor’s mouth twitched, “Yes.”
They looked from the console to him, then back again. “A lot bigger.”
“Yes.”
They gave him a look, half dazed and half accusing. “You said it had more room.”
He lifted one shoulder. “It does.”
They blinked slowly, still turning in place as their eyes climbed the room again. “This isn’t more room, this is-”
“Impossible?”
They looked back at him.
He was smiling now, just enough for them to see the fond, helpless pride in it. They huffed a tiny breath of disbelief and turned one slow circle, taking in the coral arches, the metal grating, the humming light of the central column.
“It’s beautiful,” they said.
The Doctor looked at the Tardis then, because it was easier than looking directly at them while they stood in the middle of his oldest love and said something so simple and true about it.
“She likes you,” he said, almost absently.
That made them look at him. “What?”
He reached out and patted the console with one hand. “The Tardis.”
They stared at him for a second, then narrowed their eyes. “Your ship is alive.”
He considered. “Sort of.”
“Sort of.”
“Well, yes.” He tipped his head. “Bit more complicated than that.”
They let out a short, strained laugh and rubbed a hand over their face. “Of course it is.”
The Doctor’s fingers hovered over a switch, then stilled. The moment shifted. Wonder was still there, bright and fragile as a held breath, but under it something heavier returned. He felt it when they stopped turning. When their gaze left the room and settled back on him with new steadiness.
The Tardis hummed around them.
They stood beside the console now, close enough to touch but not touching, the impossible ship spread around them like the inside of a truth too large to hide any longer.
And finally, softly, with all that speechless awe narrowing down, they asked, “How long were you going to keep pretending?”
The Doctor sighed. His hands stayed busy on the console, fingers moving over switches and levers that did not need moving, eyes fixed stubbornly on the glowing readouts instead of on them. They could see it for what it was now, something to do with his body while the rest of him braced for impact.
“I’d been thinking about telling you,” he admitted. “Since Donna walked in on me texting you, really. And then everything came out.”
They said nothing. The Tardis hummed around them, warm and alive and impossible.
He swallowed once and kept going, voice lower now. “There are a lot of things about my life that make enjoying the simple things complicated.”
Their brow furrowed. “What things?”
That made whatever rhythm his hands had found on the controls falter. He looked down at them and then past them, his face suddenly gone hollow in a way that made something in their chest twist. The haunted look in his eyes was enough that, for one brief second, they almost took the question back.
Almost said never mind, almost told him to leave it. But then the anger in them stirred again, quiet and tired and still real. They had earned this answer, if they had earned anything tonight. So they bit their tongue and waited.
The Doctor drew in a breath. Let it out slowly.
Then he sighed and said, “Right. Beginning, then.”
That got their full attention. He turned one dial absently, not because he needed to, but because he still couldn’t seem to make himself look at them directly for too long.
“I’m a Time Lord,” he said.
The words sat in the air between them.
“A what?”
“A Time Lord.” He glanced at them then, quickly, as if checking whether the phrase landed at all. “My people. We were from a planet called Gallifrey.”
They stared at him, speechless for a beat, then nodded very faintly for him to continue. The Doctor’s mouth tightened in the effort of making something ancient and immeasurable fit into human words.
“The Time Lords created time travel,” he said. “Or, at the very least, perfected it before anyone else worth mentioning did. We created and upheld the Laws of Time. Monopolized it for quite a while, actually.” A tiny, joyless flicker touched his mouth. “Then had to regulate it once everyone else started getting ideas.”
Their eyes widened slightly.
“Yes,” he said, “it was all very imperial of us.”
They should have laughed at that; instead, they were too busy trying to process the fact that he was saying these things as if he were describing his old university department and not an entire civilization of beings who invented time travel.
The Doctor’s voice smoothed into something almost distant as he went on, the words coming a little easier now that he had started.
“Time Lords are sensitive to timelines. More than other species.” His fingers rested on the edge of the console, still at last. “We can feel them. See patterns in them. Possibilities. Branches. Fixed points. I can feel the Earth turning under my feet right now.”
That stopped them. They looked down automatically, as if they might somehow sense it too through the metal grating of the floor. Then back at him.
“‘All that is, all that was, all that ever could be,’” he said quietly. “That’s how it was put once.”
They let out a soft breath.
For all the shock, for all the betrayal and confusion and hurt still twisting through them, fascination had gotten its hands in too. They couldn’t help it. This was impossible and horrifying and incredible all at once, and their mind, traitorously, wanted to know more.
The Doctor saw that much and some old instinct in him softened. Not enough to ease the weight in the room, but enough to make him speak a little more freely.
“For a very long time,” he said, “when I was much younger, the Time Lords reigned in absolute power. Ten million years, give or take. We stood above everything. Entire civilizations looked at us and saw gods.” He looked away from them then, toward the central column rising and falling in its steady rhythm. “We were magnificent,” he said.
The word came out strange. It sounded like memory and grief. And longing for something too large and too ruined to name simply.
They listened without interrupting. His face had gone older again in the way it sometimes did. As if there were shadows beneath the skin that only showed themselves in certain lights and certain truths.
He kept talking, softer now.
“Gallifrey was. . .” He searched for the word and found none that satisfied him. “Beautiful. Orange skies. Silver leaves. Mountains that caught the light like glass. Towers all across the Capitol. Time energy in the air so strong it sang if you stood still long enough.”
He wasn’t looking at them now. He was looking through the tardis, through the room, through time itself to somewhere far beyond either of them.
“We weren’t simple,” he said. “None of this is.”
They held his gaze.
“No,” they said quietly. “I gathered.”
That drew the faintest twitch at the corner of his mouth. He drew a breath and went on, eyes fixed somewhere just past them now, as if it were easier to say these things if he didn’t have to look them in the eye.
“The thing about Time Lords,” he said, “is that to some species we’re as good as immortal.”
They frowned slightly, still trying to keep pace with him.
“We don’t age like humans do,” he explained. “Not remotely the same way. One regeneration can live for hundreds of years, depending on accidents, wars, bad decisions, all the usual.” He said it lightly, but the lightness didn’t quite hold.
They stared at him, and slowly, they asked, “How old are you?”
That, finally, made him look almost embarrassed. The Doctor glanced down at the console, rubbed the back of his neck once, and admitted, “Over nine hundred.”
Their eyes went wide.
He winced at the expression on their face. “I know.”
“No, I don’t think you do.”
He huffed the smallest breath of something like a laugh. “Right. Fair.”
They were still staring at him, trying to reconcile the man in front of them with the number he had just said as though it were something one could simply say and move past.
After a beat, he added more softly, “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you that’s basically early to mid-twenties by Time Lord standards.”
That made them blink and look around the room for someone to come out with a camera and tell them it’s all been a prank. Then they decided that particular road was best not explored too closely just yet, and seized on something else.
“What do you mean, regenerations?”
He nodded once, grateful enough that the question had shifted.
“It means,” he said, quieter now, “that this isn’t my first face.”
He kept going before they could interrupt.
“When a Time Lord is close to death, we can regenerate. All the cells in our body are burned and replaced. It rebuilds the body into a new one.”
They frowned, trying to picture it and failing.
“A new face,” he said. “New body. New brain, so new personality, to an extent.”
That got their full attention again.
“A new personality?”
He gave a small, uneven shrug. “Same person underneath. Same memories. Same history. But different, too. New instincts. New temper. Different habits. Different emphasis, I suppose.”
They looked at him like he had just described dying and reincarnating while still expecting everyone else to treat it like a wardrobe change.
The Doctor saw it in their face and said, “It’s complicated.”
“That’s your answer for everything.”
“Because everything is.”
The silence that followed felt denser than the rest, because now they were looking at him not only as a liar or an alien or a time traveler, but as someone who had stood at the edge of death enough times to change his face and keep going.
They swallowed.
“So…” Their voice came out thinner than they wanted. “How many times?”
The Doctor hesitated.
Then, because there was no point softening this one, “Ten.”
Their mouth parted slightly.
“This is your tenth face?”
“Tenth body,” he corrected quietly. “Ninth regeneration. Bit of a technical distinction.”
They gave him a pointed look.
He gave up and amended, “Yes. This is my tenth face.”
That sat between them a moment before, very carefully, “And you were just not going to mention that?”
The Doctor looked down at the console again. “No,” he said.
The honesty of it stung more than a deflection would have. They laughed once under their breath, not because it was funny but because their body needed somewhere for the shock to go.
“So one day,” they said, staring at him now with a kind of horrified clarity, “you could just show up looking like someone else.”
The Doctor did not answer immediately.
When he did, his voice had gone very quiet, “Yes.”
They looked away. Toward the central column. The glowing panels. Anywhere but him.
“What did you look like before?”
Then a rueful little smile touched his mouth. “Bit older,” he said. “Bit bigger ears.”
Despite everything, their brows lifted, “Bigger ears?”
“Oh, much.”
That got the tiniest breath of laughter out of them, unwilling and startled.
The Doctor’s smile deepened only a fraction, “Leather jacket,” he added. “Northern accent.”
They tried to picture it and failed so completely that the absurdity of that failure cut through the shock for one strange, fleeting second. Then the moment passed, and they looked at him again and saw the sadness underneath the humor.
He let out a breath and looked down at his hands on the console, “I never meant to get attached,” he said. “Well, sort of.”
The honesty of it was so plain that they didn’t interrupt.
“When we met, I was in a rough spot.” His mouth twitched faintly, without humor. “That’s putting it mildly, really. And then you were just there.”
He glanced up at them for half a second, then away again.
“You were easy to be around. Funny. Kind. You made ordinary things feel,” He searched for the word and settled on the truth. “Good.”
They stayed very still, listening.
“And I got addicted to it,” he admitted. “To you. To the flat, and tea, and game nights, and all of it.” He gave a small shake of his head. “By the time the lies had got properly involved, I was already afraid the truth would scare you off.”
That landed quietly between them.
He kept going before either of them could speak.
“Then there was the other fear.” His voice dropped. “That if I never told you, someday I’d regenerate and not be able to face you after. Because why would you believe it was me? Why should you?”
They swallowed, but said nothing.
“And all the while,” he said, “I was stuck between telling you and not telling you, and underneath both of those was the fact that I didn’t want you too involved in my life anyway.”
He lifted one hand and motioned toward the doors, toward the wreckage and sirens outside.
“Because things like this,” he said, and looked toward the doors, toward the city beyond, the memory of what had happened tonight still hanging in the air like smoke. “Happens all the time.”
“There’s a risk to being close to me. Always has been.” His jaw tightened. “And I didn’t want to be selfish enough to risk you.”
They looked at him and saw the old guilt in him before he said the next part.
“But I was selfish anyway,” he said softly. “Because I kept coming back. Kept lying. Kept making excuses to see you again.” He huffed the tiniest, most embarrassed little breath. “Couldn’t help myself.”
That should have been enough. It should have been the end of it.
But he was already past dignity now, and the Tardis hummed around them like a witness too old to care about pride.
“When I was with you,” he said, eyes fixed on the console, “being human was so easy. Or as easy as it gets. Life felt simple. Happy.” He laughed once under his breath, and this time there was a little sadness in it. “You made me wish I were human for a while.”
Their expression changed at that, but he didn’t see it yet. He was still looking down, still talking because he had finally started and did not know how to stop halfway.
“But my biology doesn’t much allow for simple. Or for equal.” His hands flexed once against the edge of the console. “What’s a year to me can be a lifetime to somebody else. Or a day, depending how I’m moving through it. And for you,” He swallowed. “Someday you’d be gone. And I’d still be here. And I’d have to grieve it.”
Only then did he look back at them, and stopped because they were smiling at him. A small, soft, almost helpless smile that did something awful and wonderful to his chest all at once.
He blinked. “What?”
They shook their head once, smile still there, eyes a little glassy now from too much of everything.
“That,” they said quietly, “is probably the most honest thing you’ve ever said to me.”
The Doctor stared.
Then, despite himself, the corner of his mouth twitched.
“I’ve said lots of honest things.”
Their smile deepened a fraction, warm now even through all the hurt. “You’re making it very hard to stay properly angry at you.”
He looked absurdly, painfully hopeful for one second before caution reasserted itself. “You’re still angry.”
“Yes.”
“Right.”
“But,” they added, looking down briefly before meeting his eyes again, “I think I understand why you made the mess.”
The Doctor went still in response to that.
“That doesn’t make it alright,” they said.
“No.”
“It doesn’t mean I’m not upset.”
“I know.”
“It definitely doesn’t mean you’re off the hook.”
That got a faint breath of laughter out of him. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
They watched him a moment longer, still smiling in that sad, thoughtful way.
Then they said, “You wished you were human.”
The Doctor looked away, embarrassed now that he had said it aloud. “Bit ridiculous.”
“No,” they said softly. “Bit sweet, actually.”
He looked back at them, and the look on their face was so open for one second that he had to glance down again just to steady himself.
“I meant what I said,” he murmured.
“I know.”
The Tardis kept humming around them, quiet and alive and full of truths neither of them had quite finished surviving yet.
After a beat, they tilted their head and asked, gentler now, “So what happens now?”
The Doctor let out a slow breath.
“That,” he said, “depends how much interrogating you intend to do.”
They gave him a tired little smile. “A lot.”
He nodded as if accepting a sentence. “Right, then.”
Their jaw tensed. They crossed their arms, shifting their weight from one foot to the other, clearly arguing with themself in silence. The Doctor stayed still on the far side of the console, hands light on the edge of it, waiting. Braced for another question, another demand, another hurt thing he deserved.
Instead, they moved with one quick step forward, then another. Before he could make sense of the look on their face, resolve and nerves and something almost angry in how certain it was, they grabbed him by the tie and kissed him.
It wasn’t hesitant but a little impulsive, yes. A little shaky in the fingers that tightened in his tie. But the kiss itself landed with all the force of a decision finally made. Their mouth warm against his, their hand fisted in the silk at his throat, the whole of them close enough that the Doctor had barely enough time to realize what was happening before instinct made him lean into it. And then they were pulling away again.
The Doctor just stared at them.
For one completely derailed second, he had half a mind to walk straight back out of the Tardis and ask one of the medics outside to treat him for the whiplash.
Their own face had gone a bit pink now, the force of what they’d done clearly catching up to them. They looked down almost immediately and, in a gesture so absurdly tender it nearly finished him off, reached up to fix the tie they had just mauled.
“You,” they admitted quietly, not looking at his face, “make me wish I was immortal.”
The Doctor forgot how breathing worked as their fingers smoothed the tie with great concentration, as though that was easier than meeting his eyes while saying any of this.
“I wanted to know everything about you,” they said. “Even before I found out you were a space crime-fighting alien.” A little breath of embarrassed laughter escaped them. “I wanted to spend the rest of my life getting to know every little thing about you.”
That made his knees feel alarmingly less reliable than he would have liked.
Then, because apparently they had not done enough damage already, they stepped back and said, “Sorry. About the kiss.” They were still looking down, shoulders drawing in a bit now. “I think I let the nice things you said get to my head.” A pause. “And if platonic is what you want, I can do that.”
“Martha,” the Doctor blurted.
They flinched enough that he saw at once what they thought he meant, that there was someone else, some girlfriend-shaped secret he had not yet got around to springing on them.
“No, no, not like that,” he said quickly, hands lifting in immediate defense of his own horrible phrasing. “Martha was, she was a friend. A companion. Traveled with me before Donna.”
They stood very still, listening. The Doctor was already talking too fast now, trying to get ahead of the misunderstanding and making it worse in the process.
“Martha wanted more from me than I could give her at the time. She, well, she fancied me.”
They nodded once, too calm, which only made him more anxious, because they looked exactly like someone quietly bracing themself to be told they were in the same miserable category as some woman he couldn’t love properly.
He pushed on.
“She left,” he said, the words coming rougher now. “And I thought, ” He stopped, frowned, started again. “I thought something was broken in me, because she was brilliant. She still is, brilliant and wonderful and one of the best people I’ve ever known, and I couldn’t,” He gestured vaguely, helplessly. “Couldn’t do it. Couldn’t be what she needed.”
He was rambling. He knew he was rambling.
“She’s moved on now,” he added, because apparently his mouth had abandoned him completely. “She’s engaged, actually. Which is amazing, good for her, obviously, because she deserves all of that, and-” He stopped.
Because they were staring at him with the patience of someone waiting for him to please, for the love of God, arrive at the point.
The Doctor shut his mouth. Then opened it again, slower this time.
“The point,” he said, breathless and a little dazed, “is that this isn’t that.”
They held his gaze, waiting. The Doctor swallowed once, then gave a small, uneven shake of his head. “I don’t think anything was broken in me after all.”
Their expression softened.
“I was in a dark place when Martha left and I met you,” he admitted. “So maybe that had something to do with it, maybe not. But I don’t think my lack of interest in her was because there was something wrong with me. Not really.” He glanced down, then back up again, more certain now that he had started. “I think it was just her and me weren’t that. And you and me,” He stopped there, the sentence hanging open between them.
The Doctor let out a quiet breath and looked at them with an honesty that felt almost new on his face now that he had finally stopped fighting it.
“Everything in my life is loud,” he said. “Fast. Exciting in the dangerous sense. Always moving, always shouting, always one catastrophe away from the next.” A faint, helpless smile touched his mouth. “And then there’s you.”
They smiled a little at that, though their eyes stayed intent on him.
“You make me calm,” he said softly. “You make me feel like I invented calm, which is,” He huffed the smallest laugh through his nose. “A very new sort of exciting.”
That did something terrible and lovely to their face, warming it all at once. The Doctor saw it and hesitated because now came the harder bit.
“I don’t want platonic,” he said, more quietly than before, but no less sure. “Not even slightly.”
They looked almost painfully pleased by that, but he kept going before the moment could carry him too far.
“But,” he added, and there was the caution again, the old fear threading itself carefully back through the openness, “I’m still not sure how much of myself I’ve got the guts to give.”
That landed more gently than he’d feared. They didn’t flinch from it. Didn’t harden. If anything, their smile softened even more, and something in their eye twinkled. And when they spoke, it was with that same simple warmth that had ruined him from the beginning.
“I’ll take anything I can get.”
For a second he looked almost stricken by the tenderness of it. Then his mouth curved, small and fond and a little disbelieving. “That’s not terribly self-protective.”
They gave one shoulder a tiny shrug. “Probably not.”
He laughed softly. But the look in his eyes when it faded was full of something alike gratitude, maybe, or awe. He stepped just a little closer, enough that the air between them thinned again.
“You deserve more than scraps,” he said.
“Maybe.” Their eyes flicked once to his mouth, then back up. “But I’d still rather have the truth in pieces than a lie all at once.”
“Alright,” he said. “Truth in pieces.”
They smiled. “Good.”
The Doctor looked at them for one long second, as if committing the shape of that smile to memory.
The Doctor’s eyes dropped to their mouth once, then lifted again.
“Are you still mad at me?” he asked.
They nodded at once, like he was an idiot for even asking. “Yes,” they said. “I’m mad. And traumatized. Severely.”
His smile fell for half a second, genuine concern flashing through the fondness.
Then they added, with perfect seriousness, “You’ll just have to spend the rest of your life making it up to me.”
And just like that, he was grinning again, that bright, boyish grin that always made something in their chest flutter in ways they were no longer particularly interested in hiding from.
The next thing he knew, they were kissing again. He wasn’t entirely sure who moved first. Maybe them. Maybe him. Maybe the space between them had simply given up pretending it was ever going to survive the night intact.
Either way, it didn’t matter.
Their hands were in his hair almost immediately, making a glorious mess of it, fingers catching and tugging just enough to make him breathe out a helpless little sound against their mouth. Their other hand had found his tie again and was ruining any work they’d done fixing it, pulling him in by the knot like they’d decided this was where he belonged now.
He, for his part, had been given far too much freedom.
His hands settled at their waist and the small of their back first, then shifted, warm and sure and incapable of pretending restraint for long once they were allowed not to. He drew them closer, palms moving in slow, absent strokes as though he couldn’t quite stop confirming they were real, here, kissing him back in the middle of the Tardis like the universe hadn’t just ended and restarted around them.
It was a long kiss. Every time they broke for air, it only lasted a second, a breath, a look, his mouth brushing the corner of theirs while both of them tried and failed to remember how breathing worked, before one of them tipped back in and found the other again.
The Doctor hadn’t known kissing could feel like this. Not with this much relief in it. This much want. This much ridiculous, almost painful happiness curled up inside every touch.
Their fingers in his hair made his whole body feel awake. His loosened tie hung forgotten between them. The Tardis hummed amused, steady and alive and mercifully unbothered by how thoroughly they were being derailed in her console room.
When they finally pulled back far enough to look at each other, both of them a little breathless, his hands were still firm at their waist and their fingers were still half tangled in his hair.
He looked ruined. So, they suspected, did they.
The Doctor blinked once, twice, as if returning from a very long distance, then said in a voice gone pleasantly rough, “Right.”
They smiled. “Right?”
He glanced down at their mouth again, helplessly. “Give me a second.”
The laugh that escaped them was soft and startled, muffled immediately against his lips as he kissed them again with far less caution than before. There was something almost giddy in it now, in the way he came back to them like he’d just remembered this was allowed. Like he still couldn’t quite believe it, and had to check again.
They were halfway to pulling back with some comment already forming, something smug and ridiculous about it turning out to be a snog box after all, but he moved first.
One quick turn.
Suddenly they were between him and the console, the warm metal edge at their back end and the Doctor in front of them, close enough that there was nowhere for the rest of the universe to fit. The central column rose and fell beside them with its low, living wheeze. The Tardi lights glowed gold over his face and caught in his hair where their hands had already made a complete disaster of it.
Whatever joke they’d been about to make vanished completely.
Their hands went to his face instead, instinctive and sure, palms cupping his jaw, thumbs brushing the warmth of his cheeks as if they needed to hold him there and feel the reality of him under their fingertips. His skin was warmer than they expected. Softer too, despite the tension still living under it.
The Doctor made the smallest sound against their mouth when their fingers slid up into his hair again.
Then his tongue met theirs and everything in him seemed to light at once. His hearts were beating so hard he felt half convinced they might actually give him away by sheer force, thudding in his chest with all the grace of a drumline. It was absurd. Undignified. Entirely beyond his ability to stop. Their hands on his face, their mouth opening for him, the closeness of their body pinned between his and the console, it was more intimacy than he had let himself imagine properly for months, and now that he had it, now that it was real and immediate and kissing him back, he didn’t know what to do with how much he wanted.
So he kissed them like he was trying to learn the shape of them with it.
One hand slid from their waist to the small of their back, pressing them closer still, while the other settled high against their side, thumb moving once under the fabric there in a touch almost reverent for all the heat in it. His tie, already mangled, hung uselessly between them. Their breath caught into his. His own came back to him in short, uneven pieces that only made them both smile briefly before diving back in.
The console at their back hummed and clicked around them, unbothered by the fact that its pilot was currently losing what little remained of his composure.
Their fingers at the side of his face gentled for a moment, and the Doctor almost melted on the spot. Their hands were holding him like they meant to keep him from spinning apart. His foreheads nearly touched when they broke for one quick breath.
Neither of them went far. Their noses brushed. His mouth lingered at the corner of theirs. He was smiling now, not boyish exactly, just wrecked and delighted and far too gone.
Then they kissed again, slower for half a second. And the Doctor’s hearts gave up any pretense of behaving sensibly at all.
Donna’s voice hit the room like a slap, “Oi, knock it off.”
They tore apart so fast it was almost violent.
The barista spun half away, one hand flying to their hair and the other to their shirt as though they could somehow smooth evidence out of existence by sheer panic. The Doctor lurched back from the console, face going red in record time as he yanked at his tie with the frantic dignity of a man trying very hard to look like he had absolutely not just been making out against the Tardis controls like a teenager left home alone.
Donna stood in the doorway, one hand still on the door, watching the two of them with an expression of profound disbelief and entirely too much satisfaction. The Doctor had never been more embarrassed in his life.
Which was saying quite a lot, considering how long that life had been.
Donna shut the doors behind her with maddening calm and looked him up and down. “Unbelievable.”
The Doctor was still trying to fix the tie they had absolutely destroyed. “Donna-”
“Oh, no, don’t start.” She held up a hand. “The other night I found you giggling at your phone like a fifteen-year-old, and now this.”
He made a wounded sound. “I was not giggling.”
“You were one breeze away from kicking your feet.”
The barista, still red-faced and trying very hard not to laugh, failed and made a tiny choking noise into their hand.
Donna pointed at the Doctor as she came farther into the room. “Honestly, are you even past thirteen by Time Lord standards?”
The Doctor looked scandalized. “I am over nine hundred years old.”
Donna shrugged. “Doesn’t show.”
They gave up on pretending they had merely been talking about the weather. The Doctor’s tie was hopeless. Their hair was definitely a state. The Tardis console itself probably looked offended.
Still, Donna approached them as if she had walked in on a perfectly ordinary conversation and not the two of them thoroughly compromising his dignity.
The Doctor finally got the tie somewhat straight and glared at her with whatever severity a man could muster while blushing like that.
Donna was unimpressed. “Don’t look at me like that,” she said. “You’re the one snogging people against the dashboard.”
“It’s not a dashboard.”
“That is your objection?”
The barista’s shoulders shook with laughter now, despite every effort to contain it. The Doctor looked between them, Donna openly delighted, the barista trying and failing not to smile, and closed his eyes briefly as if appealing to the Tardis herself for mercy.
The Tardis, apparently, had none to spare.
Donna turned to them, eyes glittering with far too much satisfaction.
“Well,” she said, “looks like the interrogation went well.”
They looked away, suddenly very interested in smoothing down a wrinkle in their sleeve. “There are still things we need to talk about.”
Donna snorted. “Didn’t look much like talking to me.”
The Doctor made a noise of deep suffering that was so adolescent in tone it nearly proved her point on the spot.
“Donna,” he groaned, with all the mortification of a schoolboy being humiliated by his mother in front of company.
Donna only looked smugger. Then, because she was physically incapable of not escalating, she asked, “So does this make-up make-out mean you’ll be coming with us?”
They turned to her, “Coming with you?”
“In the Tardis,” Donna said, gesturing around them as if the answer ought to be obvious. “Traveling.”
Silence.
The barista looked to the Doctor instinctively. He looked torn, caught at the center of two truths that hated sharing space with each other. Of course the idea of them in the Tardis with him lit something bright and impossible in his chest. The thought of showing them stars and histories and worlds they could not yet imagine was almost too lovely to look at directly.
But the fear was there too. Because having them here meant danger. Meant risk. Meant nights like tonight becoming a possibility not on the edges of his life but at the center of theirs.
And yet, they could have been hurt tonight whether he’d wanted them near his life or not. The sky had fallen without asking his permission. If he had not been there, they would have been lost to him all the same.
So maybe, some treacherous part of him thought, maybe having them by his side was safer after all. If that was what they wanted.
They, meanwhile, seemed to be arriving at a thought not entirely unlike his own. After a beat, they shook their head.
“Not yet,” they said. Donna raised a brow. The barista smiled a little, tired and honest and still just this side of overwhelmed. “I think I’ve got a few therapy sessions and some more interrogations to get through before we approach that bridge.”
The Doctor’s mouth twitched.
“But,” they added, glancing sideways at him, “the idea’s not completely off the table.”
There was a selfish kind of relief in it that warmed the Doctor immediately and made him feel guilty a second later, not because they hadn’t said yes, but because part of him was glad they hadn’t. Glad that, for now, their flat would still exist as its own quiet, human place he could come back to when he needed that steady calm they seemed to create around him by simply being there. And glad, too, that the Tardis could remain his offering to them whenever they wanted excitement, wonder, and the stars.
A beautiful combination, he thought before he could stop himself.
Donna, for her part, only shrugged, “Fair enough,” she said. “Worth asking.”
Then she snapped her fingers as another thought struck her. “Anyway, I left my mobile here, came back for it. I’m staying home tonight.”
The Doctor perked up. “Wilf’s there?”
Donna looked at him flatly. “Yes, Doctor. My grandad lives there.”
He tried not to look too pleased by the idea and failed spectacularly. Donna saw it and rolled her eyes with fond resignation before turning back to the barista.
“You’re welcome too,” she said. “If you want.”
They blinked. “What?”
Donna gestured vaguely toward London outside the doors. “Most of the city’s shut down for cleanup. You’ll probably have a nightmare getting back to your flat.”
That was, unfortunately, true. They thought about it for a second. The closed roads. The floodlights. The soldiers. The sheer exhausted wrongness of trying to make it home through a city still dragging itself back together.
Then Donna added, with the timing of a professional menace, “And Mum’s making dinner now.”
The idea of a home-cooked meal, warmth, normal voices, people talking over a table instead of under a metal sky, it all sounded dangerously appealing after everything the night had become.
Donna saw them wavering and nodded once, satisfied. “Thought that might help.”
The Doctor, who had already fully perked up at the thought of Wilf and a proper meal and maybe, if the universe was feeling unusually merciful, an evening ending in something almost resembling peace, looked at them carefully.
“No pressure,” he said, and meant it.
They exhaled, long and tired and suddenly aware of how deeply tired they actually were. Then they gave the smallest nod, “Okay.”
Donna smiled. “Good.”
The Doctor went straight to work. The second the decision had been made, he was back at the console, hands flying over switches and levers with the confidence of long habit. The Tardis woke around him, lights brightening, the central column beginning its steady rise and fall as he set coordinates with far more enthusiasm than the situation strictly required.
They watched him for a beat before asking, “What are you doing?”
He glanced over at them like the answer ought to have been painfully obvious. “Getting us there.”
“Right,” they said. “But how?”
The Doctor scoffed softly. “Well, unless you fancy finding a taxi in the middle of an active military clean-up, I don’t, and walking that far is entirely out of the question.”
Donna rolled her eyes so hard it nearly became a full-body movement. She had, after all, just walked there and back from Chiswick. But she kept her peace. Mostly because she could see him enjoying himself and had decided, for the moment, to let him show off.
The Doctor, sensing no one was actively stopping him, threw the last lever with flourish. The Tardis groaned into motion.
He saw it immediately, that involuntary widening of their eyes, the little startled laugh that escaped them as the floor seemed to shift under their feet and the whole ship filled with that impossible, living sound. Wonder got them again, quick and bright in its own right, and the Doctor grinned helplessly at the sight.
The Tardis shuddered once, twice, then settled. Silence fell in its wake.
They blinked and looked around as if expecting the walls themselves to have changed. “Did we move?”
Before the Doctor could answer, a polite but enthusiastic rap sounded at the door. His entire face changed and he abandoned the console and their question.
“Wilf,” Donna said, not sounding even slightly surprised.
The Doctor didn’t bother responding to them at all. He was already hurrying to the doors, grin widening as he pulled them open.
“Wilf!”
Wilfred Mott stood just outside with all the warmth of a man greeting the universe itself rather than one slightly disheveled alien in a suit. His face broke into a delighted smile at once.
“Doctor!”
The Doctor beamed and stepped aside, and immediately the little front garden beyond came into view, night-dark and modest and, according to the woman now appearing from the doorway behind Wilf, newly burdened with a police box on the lawn.
“Oh, honestly,” Sylvia complained, arms folded as she looked past Wilf toward the Tardis. “Does he have to park on my grass every time?”
The Doctor made an unrepentant face. “It was the best spot.”
“It is not a parking space.”
“It is now.”
From where they stood just inside the console room, they could hear the men already chattering over one another, catching up with that easy, immediate fondness that made the Doctor sound lighter than he had all night.
Wilf was full of questions before he’d even crossed the threshold. “You alright, then? Been a terrible business on the telly, well, what’s left of it, Donna said you’d been in the thick of it again.”
The Doctor waved a hand as if the Cyberman invasion had been mildly inconvenient traffic. “Nothing we couldn’t sort.”
Donna snorted and moved toward the doors. “That means it was catastrophic.”
Sylvia looked pointedly at her daughter. “And you’ve both got soot on you.”
“Fashion,” Donna said.
Wilf, however, had already leaned in toward the Tardis interior, peering around the Doctor with open curiosity. That was when he spotted them standing inside.
“Oh!” he said brightly.
The barista straightened a little. The Doctor looked back over his shoulder, suddenly remembering not everyone here had met yet.
Donna, ever delighted to narrate chaos, smiled and said, “See? I told you. He’s brought company.”
The Doctor opened his mouth, clearly prepared to protest her phrasing, but Wilf had already tipped his head kindly toward them in greeting.
“Well, come on then,” he said. “No one ought to be standing out there after a night like this.”
The barista smiled despite how wrung out they still felt.
Beside them, Donna leaned in just enough to murmur, “The only one you’ll ever have to fight for his attention with is my grandad.”
The Doctor heard that, “Donna,” he said, scandalized. She only grinned.
As they stepped down from the Tardis after Donna, the Doctor reached for their hand. Naturally, his fingers finding theirs in the dark as if they already knew the shape of them. Warm from the console room, a little rough at the knuckles, steady in a way they hadn’t been all night.
They looked at him.
He looked back with that softened expression they were beginning to understand belonged only to his truest moments, no performance, no teasing brightness, no clever dodge waiting behind it. Just the Doctor, tired and relieved and still here.
Their fingers closed around his in return.
Ahead of them, Donna was already marching toward the front door, calling for her mother not to start and for Wilf to put the kettle on if he wanted gossip. Sylvia was complaining about footprints. Wilf was laughing. The house glowed warm against the London night, windows lit, dinner waiting inside, ordinary life carrying on with stubborn human grace after the sky had nearly fallen in.
★ Part 1 ★ Part 2 ★ Part 3 ★ Part 4 ★ Part 5 ★ Part 5.2 ★
✰ Word Count: 10.3k
✰ Summary: The Doctor makes a friend with a humble barista in England. They’re friends. Thats it. They're just friends.
✰ Warnings: 10th Doctor, Genter Nutural Reader, They/Them pronouns, romantic pining, Donna Noble, Alien Invasion in London, What's New, Cybermen cause their easy to write, Non Canon Events, Will They? Wont they? Spoiler they Will
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This is for @vexerieart, who made me smile with their kind words, bitch boosted my ego SO BAD. So I just want to return the favor, pay the smile forward. I hope this cheers you up since you’ve been sick, my love. <3
London had become a battlefield in minutes.
One moment the Doctor had been striding through the street with Donna at his side, the familiar noise of the city rising around them in the ordinary, living way of it. Engines, footsteps, voices, a distant siren somewhere too far off to matter.
The next, the sky had darkened under steel.
The Doctor looked up sharply, trench coat snapping behind him as the sound hit a second later: the deep, mechanical drone of Cyberman scout ships hanging over the city like a threat made solid. They hovered between the buildings, ugly and deliberate, their undersides lit with cold blue light that swept over brick and glass and terrified faces below.
All around them, panic spread faster than sound. People screamed, and someone shouted for everyone to run.
A car swerved half onto the curb and clipped a postbox before the driver abandoned it entirely. Shop doors slammed. A child cried somewhere behind the Doctor’s shoulder. Across the street, a man stood frozen with his phone still in his hand, staring up at the ships as if looking hard enough might make them unreal.
Then the Cybermen came.
They marched from the end of the street in a line of steel and synchronized movement, ugly and merciless, their footsteps heavy enough to seem to shake the pavement. Energy weapons lifted with inhuman precision.
The first blast struck a man who had stumbled trying to run, he dropped instantly.
Donna gasped.
The Doctor moved without thinking, one arm shooting out to hold her back while his eyes swept the street, calculating too fast for thought.
“No, no, no.” His voice was barely more than breath, swallowed by the chaos around them.
A Cyberman’s voice boomed over the panic, cold and amplified, utterly devoid of urgency because urgency belonged to the living.
“Humans identified as incompatible for upgrade will be deleted.”
Another blast.
The crowd broke harder, people surging in every direction with no plan beyond getting away. The Doctor grabbed Donna’s arm and dragged her down behind an overturned newspaper stand just as a volley of energy fire tore through the place they’d been standing seconds before.
“Oh, this is bad,” Donna said, breathless and furious all at once.
The Doctor peered over the edge, sonic screwdriver already in his hand, though he knew before he even raised it that it would do precious little against a full invasion force.
“Bad?” he echoed. “Donna, this is catastrophic.”
Above them, another scout ship drifted lower between the buildings, close enough now that the Doctor could see the insignia burned into its metal plating.
This was organized, and the worst part, the part that made cold understanding slide down his spine, was that it had happened here.
In London. This bit of Earth, this ordinary stretch of street with frightened people pressed into doorways and Donna breathing hard beside him and the whole city coming apart under a steel sky.
His jaw tightened.
“They tracked the Tardis,” he said.
Donna turned to him. “What?”
He looked upward again, mind racing through impossibilities and hating every single answer. “They tracked us here. Don’t know how yet, but they did.”
Because this was no random target. Not really. Cybermen didn’t just drift into his orbit by accident, not on this scale, not with scout ships and marching units and enough force to blanket London in terror. Somewhere along the line, something had followed the trail of the Tardis.
Something had found him and now Earth was paying for it.
A blast hit the side of the building behind them, showering the pavement with brick and glass. Donna flinched, swearing loudly.
The Doctor’s eyes snapped back to the street.
Two Cybermen were advancing now through the smoke, scanning the cowering survivors behind abandoned cars and benches with mechanical calm, weapons raised.
“Do not resist. Surrender for upgrade.”
“Yeah, not happening,” Donna muttered.
The Doctor grabbed her shoulder and pulled her lower as another shot carved a glowing line through the air above them. Around them, fear rained through the city as thick as ash. The London he loved, messy, human, loud, impossible London, had become a hunting ground in the space of a breath.
And somewhere in that same city, was a café with someone who’d just clock in, who had no idea the sky had just fallen. The thought hit him like a blow.
Donna saw the change in his face immediately, “Doctor.”
He rose just enough to get a better look down the street, expression hardening into something bright and terrible.
The Doctor grabbed Donna’s hand and ran.
Not toward the nearest group of survivors or toward the Cybermen. Not toward the center of the chaos where instinct and guilt and every old wound in him screamed he ought to be.
He pulled her low behind the shell of an abandoned car instead, then darted between two more, heading hard and fast down a side street that angled toward the café.
Donna stumbled once keeping up, then found her footing and yanked at his hand.
“Oi!” she shouted over the panic around them. “Where are you going?”
The Doctor didn’t answer, he only ran faster, head down, coat snapping behind him as he steered them around a fallen bike and through a cloud of dust blown from a shattered shopfront.
Behind them, a Cyberman voice echoed cold and amplified through the street.
“Humans identified as compatible will be processed for upgrade.”
Then another.
“Incompatible subjects will be deleted.”
Donna twisted to look back. Across the road, people were being rounded up, herded with all the inhuman precision of livestock, while others who resisted or failed some unseen standard were simply shot where they stood. Blue energy blasts lit the street in horrible flashes. A woman dropped to her knees screaming. A man tried to drag someone to cover and was struck down before he’d made it three steps.
Donna jerked against the Doctor’s grip. “Doctor!”
He rounded on her just long enough to drag her behind the burnt-out shell of a van as another volley tore through the air nearby.
“We can’t just leave them!”
His face snapped toward hers.
“I can’t save all of them!” he shouted. The words came out sharper than he meant them to, edged with something raw enough to make Donna fall silent.
In his eyes there was fear and regret. The brutal knowledge of numbers, distance, time, and what happened if he made the wrong choice right now. He knew what he was doing and he hated it.
Donna looked at him for one long second, hearing everything in the crack of his voice that he hadn’t said aloud.
Something in her face changed. So she swallowed the rest of the protest, grabbed his hand back properly this time, and said, “Then move.”
The Doctor did.
They ducked lower and ran again, weaving through the wreckage of London as the sky groaned with Cyberman ships overhead. Sirens wailed uselessly in the distance. Smoke curled up between the buildings. Somewhere behind them came the sound of another explosion and the terrible, thin chorus of people who hadn’t gotten out fast enough.
The Doctor’s hearts hammered. Every second stretched too long and disappeared too fast. He cut them through alleys, across a service lane, around a lorry half-jackknifed into the curb. His mind was doing three things at once, tracking routes, listening for pursuit, and calculating the fastest way to get to the café.
Donna kept pace beside him, breath coming hard but steady, not asking again.
Once, as they crouched behind a low brick wall while two Cybermen passed through the next street over, she glanced sideways and said, quieter now, “It’s them, isn’t it?”
The Doctor did not answer he didn’t need to. Donna nodded once, grim and resigned, then waited for his signal.
When he moved again, she moved with him.
The front door of the café had not so much opened as exploded inward.
One second, there had been the ordinary noise of the morning shift, the hiss of steam, the clatter of cups, someone at the register apologizing for the wait, and the next there had been splintering wood, screaming, and the impossible shape of metal bodies stepping through the wreckage.
They did not remember deciding to run.
They remembered someone shouting. They remembered the new girl they had trained just a few days ago, dropping a tray so hard it shattered.
They remembered a man near the window trying to push past one of the things, alien, robot, whatever it was, and being shot so quickly that for a second their mind refused to understand what had happened.
Then the room had gone mad.
Now they were outside, herded down the street in a crowd of people under a sky gone wrong.
They kept their eyes moving because holding them still felt worse somehow. Every direction offered something awful. Shop windows blown out. Smoke rolling up from somewhere ahead. Cars are abandoned at strange angles in the road. People are crying openly. A child wailing for someone who wasn’t answering. The mechanical things marched at the edges of the crowd with terrifying calm, their hollow metal eyes fixed forward, their weapons held ready.
The café door hanging half off its hinges flashed through their mind again.
The body on the floor.
The way the machines had spoken in those dead, amplified voices, calling some people compatible and others incompatible as if they were talking about broken appliances instead of human beings.
Shock had wrapped around everything, muffling it. Most people around them were screaming or sobbing or begging questions no one answered. They did none of that because the fear had gone too deep and settled into something cold and rigid inside them.
Ahead of them, an older man stumbled and fell to one knee. The line of prisoners rippled around him, but before anyone could really react, one of the Cybermen seized him by the arm and hauled him back upright with mechanical ease. The man cried out, no one else did. Everyone had learned too quickly that attention could be fatal. They kept their head down after that.
The city looked unrecognizable.
This was a street they knew. They knew that off-license with the faded sign. Knew the chemist at the corner. Knew the bus stop where people always crowded too close in the rain. But all of it had been turned sideways by fear. London had become something hunted.
A woman near them was sobbing so hard she could barely breathe.
Someone else kept repeating, “It’s not real, it’s not real, it’s not real,” in a flat, exhausted voice that suggested they no longer believed it.
They swallowed and tried to think, to make sense of something.
Aliens. Robots. An invasion. People dead in the café. Marched through the street under gunpoint.
And somewhere stupidly, helplessly, was John. The thought came uninvited and lodged into their mind, unmoving.
Was he still out of town?
Had he seen the news yet, if there was even news left to see?
Would he know what was happening here?
Their chest tightened.
The most absurd part of it all was that some small traitorous corner of them still wanted him to walk around the corner like this was just another impossible thing he would somehow make better by existing in the room. John, with his coat and his quick eyes and his voice, was always half a step ahead of everyone else. The thought hurt almost immediately.
Because John was not here.
And even if he was in London, even if he had come back early, what exactly was he meant to do against this?
The person ahead of them let out a scream as another line of Cybermen turned onto the road from a side street, joining the escort. The crowd compressed in on itself, bodies bumping together in terrified instinct. They got jostled hard enough to lose their footing for half a step, and when they looked up, one of the metal faces was turned directly toward them.
They froze, and their stomach lurched. The Cyberman looked away again just as quickly, apparently deciding they were not worth immediate attention.
They kept walking.
Only about forty minutes had passed since the Doctor had found the café. Forty minutes since he’d skidded to a stop in front of the shattered doorway, chest heaving, and stared at the wreckage like he could force time backward through sheer refusal. Forty minutes since he had seen the body on the floor and the smear of panic frozen into overturned chairs and broken cups and blood.
He had not let himself think too hard about whose body it was. Had not let himself picture the alternatives too clearly.
He could only hope, desperately, that they had been taken. That “compatible for upgrade” had claimed them before “incompatible” had. That they were still somewhere inside this nightmare with their own face, their own mind, their own beating human heart.
And that he had not yet run out of time to keep it that way.
Now he was aboard the Cyberman ship, alone. Or close enough to alone for the moment.
The control room he’d broken into was empty, all steel and cold blue light and humming systems that pulsed through the walls like a mechanical nervous system. The room smelled faintly of heat and metal. All harsh angles and panels, and the quiet, inhuman efficiency of a machine built to move through the sky and strip whole cities bare.
The Doctor crouched in front of an open control panel with his coat flung half behind him, and his sleeves shoved up, hands buried wrist-deep in wiring. The sonic screwdriver was currently clamped between his teeth while he traced one strand to another, muttering around it under his breath.
He spat the sonic back into his hand, buzzed it once across the exposed circuitry, then shoved it between his teeth again while he reached deeper inside the panel.
Blue sparks flashed, and he ignored them.
Donna was aboard the Tardis, parked just in the corner. As safe as Donna Noble ever let herself be, anyway, which was to say likely pacing and swearing. But safe enough. Out of the firing line. Out of his way. He had practically had to shove her through the doors to get her there, promising he would come back, promising he needed her not dead for five bloody minutes so he could think.
She had hated it, but he had done it anyway. Because of this part, this race against time and steel and impossible odds, he could not split his focus.
Not while they were somewhere on this ship, or another ship, or some holding facility on the ground already queued for conversion.
He shut his eyes for one second and saw the café again.
His jaw clenched hard enough to ache.
“No,” he said to the wires, to the ship, to the thought itself. “No. Not happening.”
The sonic buzzed again.
At last a different panel came alive under his hand, a display lifting from black into lines of scrolling code and location grids. The Doctor yanked the screwdriver free from his mouth and leaned in close, eyes racing across the screen.
Multiple holding zones. Some already marked for transfer. Others pending classification. The Cybermen, efficient as ever, had spread their captives across the invasion force to avoid bottlenecks. Which meant he did not yet know where they were. Which meant every second spent guessing was stolen from whatever little time remained before “pending” became “upgraded.”
His hand flew over the controls, rewiring access permissions on the fly.
“Come on, come on, come on…”
One holding area flashed full. Another half-capacity. Another locked behind biometric nonsense he bypassed with a hard jab of the sonic and a muttered insult.
The screen expanded.
And with it came a live feed, grainy surveillance imagery of rows and rows of terrified people behind metal barriers under white industrial lights. Crying. Shaking. Huddled. Some trying to bargain with armored guards that did not hear pleading as language.
The Doctor scanned faces.
Not there.
He switched feeds.
Another room. More prisoners. A child clinging to an older sister. A man bleeding from the forehead. Two Cybermen standing watch like statues beside the far wall.
Not there.
Another.
Another.
He stopped breathing for half a second.
A familiar shoulder.
A familiar posture.
Head bowed, arms folded close to the body like they were trying to occupy less space than they physically did.
The Doctor leaned closer to the screen, one hand bracing hard against the metal frame of the console.
There.
Alive.
Still human.
The relief hit so violently it almost brought him to his knees. It was not joy, there was too much fear still inside it for that, but it was enough to make his vision blur for a single stupid second before he blinked it away.
“Got you,” he whispered.
On the screen, they stood in a holding chamber with maybe fifty others, penned behind a force barrier while Cybermen moved in and out through a far door. Processing queue, not yet conversion.
He checked the chamber code, mapped it against the ship layout, and felt the floor drop out of his stomach.
The Doctor straightened so fast he nearly cracked his head on the open panel above him. He grabbed the sonic, slammed the access hatch closed with his free hand, and turned toward the corridor at a dead run.
Forty minutes.
That was all it had taken for London to fall into pieces. Forty minutes to go from movie-night memories and untouched truths to metal skies and conversion lines. Now every second after that belonged to him.
The Doctor tore through the Tardis doors and into the console room with all the force of a storm breaking.
Donna was on him immediately, “What happened? Did you find them? What are those things? How do we stop them?”
Her questions came one on top of the other as he strode straight for the console, coat snapping behind him. He didn’t slow down. Didn’t even properly look at her yet. His hands were already moving, buttons, levers, switches, the old ship answering him with groans and flashing lights as he woke systems she hadn’t seen him touch in months.
“I found them,” he said first, because he knew that was the one she cared about most.
Donna let out a breath, sharp with relief.
“They’re alive. Still in processing. Not upgraded yet.”
“Right.”
The Doctor yanked a lever down, checked a monitor, then crossed to another panel. “The things are Cybermen.”
Donna followed half a step behind, keeping up by instinct now. “Yeah, gathered that much. What are they?”
He hit three buttons in quick succession and didn’t look away from the readout as he answered.
“They were human. Once.”
Donna stopped. The Doctor’s hands faltered only for the smallest fraction before continuing.
“Or something close enough,” he said. “Different worlds, different origins, but same idea. Flesh torn apart, bits replaced, emotions stripped out, every human thing cut away until all that’s left is logic and obedience and steel.”
Donna stared at him.
The console light flickered over his face, making him look sharper, older, the anger in him more visible.
“They upgrade people,” he went on, voice flat with the effort of staying functional. “Convert them. Shove all the fear and pain into some locked little corner and call it progress.”
Donna’s mouth twisted. “That’s sick.”
“Yes,” the Doctor said simply. “It is.”
He slammed his palm against a control and the central rotor jumped into a higher rhythm. Donna watched him, taking in the speed of him, the focus, the way grief and fury sat side by side in his face with no room between them.
“You’ve fought them before,” she said.
The Doctor nodded once. “Too many times.”
“And?”
“And I’m going to do what I always do,” he said. “Beat them.”
Donna almost smiled at that, except there was too much sharpness in him for it to land as comfort. He brought up a new display, blueprints and code flooding across the monitor in a wash of symbols she couldn’t begin to understand.
“Cybermen rely on emotional inhibitors,” he said. “Shut down the panic, the guilt, the horror of what’s been done to them. Keeps them compliant. Keeps them moving.”
Donna’s brow furrowed. “So if you shut that down…”
“They feel everything.” He said it quietly. “Done it before. That horror of releasing whats been done to them, it’ll kill ‘em all.”
Donna looked at him.
The Doctor kept his eyes on the screen, but his mouth had gone hard. “All at once. Every person still trapped in there, every fragment left alive enough to know what’s happened, ” He cut himself off and swallowed once. “That’s the cancellation code. Find it, feed it through the network, and the whole Cyberman system tears itself apart.”
Donna exhaled. “So that’s how you stop them.”
“That’s how I end them.”
The Tardis gave a low, rising hum beneath their feet as the Doctor rerouted more systems toward the Cyberman ship.
“But not yet,” he added.
Donna nodded immediately. “Them first.”
The Doctor looked up then, finally, and there was something raw in his eyes that made her chest tighten.
“The queue comes first,” he said. “I get them out, get them in here, get them safe. Then I go hunting for the code.”
Donna took that in. Took all of it in, the fear under his urgency, the way he said safe like a prayer and a command and a plea all at once.
“What do you need from me?” she asked.
The Doctor’s hands slowed, only for a second. Then he drew a breath and straightened. “Just follow my lead,” he said.
Donna studied him, as if deciding whether that answer was enough. It wasn’t, but it would have to do.
So she nodded once, sharp and steady. “Alright.”
The Doctor turned back to the console, voice already sharpening into action again. “When we board, stay close to me. No heroics unless I ask for them.”
Donna snorted. “Bit rich.”
“I mean it.”
“So do I.”
That almost tugged a smile out of him.
He set the final coordinates, fingers flying over the controls. “I’ll lock onto the holding chamber first, pull the doors if I can, scramble internal comms, make a path. If I can’t do that, we improvise.”
Donna folded her arms, settling in at his shoulder. “You always improvise.”
“Yes, but this time I’m admitting it.”
The Tardis’s engines rose around them, the ship responding to his urgency, time and space beginning to bend under his hands.
Donna looked at him sidelong. “You alright?” The question slipped out before she could stop it.
The Doctor didn’t answer straight away. His gaze stayed fixed on the monitor showing the holding queue, on the one tiny grainy image he had frozen there, on the person waiting without knowing he was this close.
“No,” he said at last. Honest as a wound.
Donna’s face softened. Then his jaw set again, and when he reached for the lever, there was murder in the motion.
They stood in line and moved when the line moved. That was all.
One small shuffle forward every so often, prompted by the bodies around them compressing in fear and the silent pressure of the Cybermen waiting ahead. It had become mechanical in its own horrible way.
Step. Stop. Breathe. Listen. Try not to think too hard.
The room, or corridor, or processing bay, or whatever industrial nightmare they had been funneled into, felt less like a place than a system. Bright white light washed all warmth out of everything.
Ahead, the Cybermen scanned each person as they reached the front. Then one of two outcomes. Some were shoved toward the left, deeper into the facility, through a set of doors that opened and shut with brutal efficiency.
Others were pulled right. Those did not go far. Those did not scream for very long.
They kept their eyes down until they couldn’t bear not knowing, then looked up and immediately wished they hadn’t.
The left-hand route led toward a corridor where the sounds were worse than the sight. Heavy, rhythmic, wet in the imagination even if it wasn’t in reality. They heard the whine of something electric. The grind of metal. A saw, maybe, or something close enough that the distinction didn’t matter. The sounds came and went as the doors opened, each time revealing just enough movement and shadow and strapped-down panic to make the line of waiting prisoners sway as one living mass.
Someone near them started sobbing openly. Someone else began praying under their breath.
A man farther ahead tried to bolt when his turn came. He made it two steps before a Cyberman seized him by the back of the neck and slammed him to the wall hard enough that everyone nearby flinched. He was dragged to the left after that, screaming until the doors closed and the sound became muffled machinery again.
Their mouth had gone dry. They swallowed and tasted nothing.
Their hands were cold, though the room itself was too warm. Their pulse had migrated somewhere awful and constant, hammering in the throat, the wrists, the gut. A woman behind them kept bumping lightly into their back every time the queue advanced, too lost in panic to apologize. They didn’t turn around. They didn’t think they could stand another human face right now, another set of eyes asking a question no one could answer.
The Cybermen scanned each person and decided.
Compatible.
Incompatible.
As if human beings could be reduced to a setting on a machine. They tried not to imagine what “compatible” meant anymore. Tried not to connect it to the corridor on the left and the screaming and the way people who passed through those doors did not come back out.
The line moved.
Another step.
Closer now.
They could see one of the Cybermen more clearly. The smooth steel face. The tubing at its neck. No anger in it, no thrill, no hate. That might have been worse. It was doing all of this without emotion, without judgment, like it was sorting stock in a warehouse.
They tried to think of ordinary things. Fairy lights in the kitchenette. The smell of coffee grounds. The scratch of an old DVD menu. John’s shoes by the door. The thoughts came broken and stupid, little human scraps held up against the machinery of this place like paper against fire. They did not help.
The line moved again.
Now they were close enough to hear the scan device whine as it swept over the next person. Close enough to see blood smeared faintly near the base of the right-hand wall where the “incompatible” bodies fell before they were dragged away.
As the line crept forward and the number of people between them and the scan dropped to only a handful, a new sound broke through the machinery.
A loud, wheezing groan.
They stiffened. For one confused second, they assumed it was just more ship noise, another awful mechanical system somewhere deeper in the walls, another warning tone for some part of the process they did not want to understand.
But then the Cybermen reacted.
Every metal body nearest the far end of the corridor snapped toward the noise, arms lifting, posture shifting from passive processing to active threat.
The person in front of them twisted halfway around to look back. They followed their gaze and saw a blue box appearing in the corridor.
Not rolling in. Not being carried. Appearing.
Their brain stalled on it immediately.
A box. A police box, absurdly old-fashioned, impossibly out of place in the middle of a steel nightmare. It shimmered at the edges like heat haze, flickering in and out of solidity while that strange, groaning wheeze filled the corridor. One second there was empty space. The next there was half a blue door, then a corner, then the whole impossible thing settling into existence with a final soft thud and a cheerful little chime that felt so bizarrely ordinary in this place it almost made their head spin.
For one suspended heartbeat all they could think was, “What the fuck?”
The Cybermen didn’t hesitate and advanced as one, heavy steps ringing on the metal floor, arms raised, forearm blasters charged and ready. Blue light built in the weapons with an ugly electronic whine.
People in the queue cried out, some crouching instinctively, others trying to press backward into the line, though there was nowhere to go. The corridor became a crush of fear and confusion.
The blue box door swung open and out popped John.
Their mind simply failed to process it.
One second: alien ship, metal monsters, blood, screams, imminent death.
Next second: John.
John, in his suit and coat, hair all over the place, sonic screwdriver in one hand and a look on his face they had never seen before, bright and terrible and utterly alive.
They took one step out of line before they could stop themself, straining for a better angle. Because it couldn’t be, except it was.
Not just a man who looked like John in the middle of an alien ship and a nightmare. Not some impossible resemblance lit by panic and bad light. It was him. The tilt of his head, the line of his mouth, the wildness in his hair, the way he stood like motion itself had decided to wear human skin.
One of the Cybermen advanced, weapon arm raised, “Identified: the Doctor.”
The name hit them like a second explosion, recalling what Donna had called him. The Doctor.
“Surrender for upgrade.”
Their mind snagged on it uselessly even as everything else kept moving too fast. John, no, apparently not John, apparently something else entirely, looked down the line of prisoners. His eyes swept over faces in one quick, terrible pass.
Then he saw them.
He stopped.
Only for a fraction of a second, but they saw it happen. Saw the whole of him catch on their face and hold there, relief and fear colliding so sharply it almost looked like pain.
Then he turned back to the three Cybermen in front of him, and something in him changed. The grimness didn’t vanish completely, but the tension in his face loosened by degrees, and his eyes sharpened into something brighter, more mocking and amused. His posture unwound from raw urgency into that infuriating, impossible casualness they knew so well, except now it was pointed like a blade.
He slipped both hands into his coat pockets as if he had not just stepped out of a blue box into a corridor full of killer robots. As if he had all the time in the universe.
“What are you doing here?” he asked, voice carrying clean and quick through the corridor. “And better yet, how did you track me down?”
The Cybermen did not fire. That, somehow, was almost more unnerving.
“We did not track you.”
The Doctor paced once across the width of the corridor, circling just out of immediate reach, head tilted in thought. He looked, absurdly, like a man arguing with a waiter over a bad meal instead of stalling three armed Cybermen while a crowd of terrified people watched.
“Oh, now I don’t believe that for a second,” he said. “Cybermen haven’t been to Earth on this world in quite some time. Not this version of it. Not this century. Not this branch. So unless this is all one tremendous coincidence, and I don’t much care for coincidence on a Tuesday, you tracked something.”
The Cybermen said nothing.
The Doctor kept moving, almost lazily, circling with his coat swaying around his legs.
“Question is what.” He pointed at them suddenly. “Advanced scanning? Psychic links? Temporal technology? Which one is it, because I’ll tell you now, each one is very unlike a Cyberman.”
The three metal figures held position, fixed on him. Behind them, the line of prisoners had gone deathly quiet. Even the screaming from farther down the hall seemed to have receded beneath the strange spectacle of this man talking to monsters like they were bureaucrats being mildly disappointing.
The Doctor stopped pacing and planted himself directly in front of the middle Cyberman as it turned to him, face lifted in challenge.
“Well?”
The Cybermen remained silent one beat too long.
His expression hardened. “No, go on. Tell me. I’d really like to know why you’ve decided to invade Earth now, and why you just happen to be doing it in the same city as my ship.”
That last word cracked with a bit of anger he didn’t bother hiding.
The Cyberman in the center finally answered, “Large energy signals were detected in this location.”
The Doctor stilled, then, slowly, he smiled. Not warmly or even close to kindly. The kind of smile that meant a puzzle piece had just clicked into place and someone else was about to regret it.
“Ah,” he said softly. “There we are.” He turned half away from them, thinking aloud now at the speed of his own mind.
“Not tracking me specifically, then. Tracking artron emissions. Or something close enough to them to make no difference. Large energy readings in one concentrated area,” His eyes flicked, just for an instant, toward the blue box behind him. “Oh, you stupid, clever things.”
They watched him, still half hidden in the line, heart hammering so hard they could feel it in their teeth.
Nothing made sense.
Not the box. Not the name. Not the way he stood there in front of the Cybermen as if he were the most dangerous thing in the corridor. Not the way the Cybermen had obeyed the rhythm of his conversation, even for these few seconds, like he had stepped into the room and changed the gravity of it.
But one truth had become impossible to deny.
John had lied.
Massively.
Catastrophically.
And whatever he really was, whatever “the Doctor” meant, he was very, very used to standing in the path of death and making it blink first.
The Doctor looked back up at the Cybermen, smile still in place.
“So that’s it, then,” he said. “You weren’t following me specifically. You were following the Tardis.”
The unfamiliar word meant nothing to them.
The recognition in the Cybermen’s silence meant everything to him.
His smile widened another fraction, “Brilliant. Well, not for you.”
Three Cybermen stood between him and the blue box, their backs turned to it, all their attention fixed on him. Their weapons were trained on his chest, blue light building in the barrels, but he didn’t move. Didn’t so much as flinch.
Instead, he tilted his head and said, almost conversationally, “Remind me. Last time you saw me?”
“Temporal encounter logged. Coordinates: Karsk-Vel, Sector Nine. Date classification unavailable.”
The name meant nothing to them. The Doctor, however, went still for half a beat, then gave a small nod of recognition.
“Oh, right,” he said. “That one.” He frowned slightly, remembering. “Bit of a mess, if I recall. Whole moon made of converters.”
The Cybermen did not respond.
The Doctor’s mouth twitched. “So it’s been a while, then.” He let the thought hang there just long enough to feel casual. Then he smiled, “Have you met Donna?”
The Cybermen did not have time to answer.
The blue box door flew open behind them.
Donna Noble burst out just far enough to hurl something into the corridor, a lumpy, unmistakably homemade object wrapped in tape and wires, the sort of thing that looked deeply unprofessional and therefore immediately dangerous. The Doctor caught it in one hand without even looking. The Cybermen reacted instantly, arms jerking up toward him, targeting systems recalibrating in a swarm of blue-lit precision.
But the Doctor only held up the device and kept talking.
“Now this,” he said brightly, “is what happens when you leave Donna Noble in a time machine full of spare parts and give her an instruction manual.”
Donna’s voice rang from the doorway behind them, “You are never calling it arts and crafts again!”
He grinned, eyes never leaving the Cybermen. “Counterpoint, it absolutely was.”
They couldn’t see exactly what he did next. His back was to them, shoulders angling just enough to hide the movement of his hands as he thumbed something loose or twisted a wire or let the sonic flash once against the taped casing.
All they knew was that one second the Doctor was standing there holding a ridiculous homemade bomb and talking far too fast, and the next a shrill pulse snapped through the corridor.
White-blue light burst outward in a hard ring.
The nearest Cyberman convulsed. Then all three of them did. Their metal bodies jerked violently, limbs seizing at impossible angles as the pulse tore through their systems. The Doctor took one quick step backward.
“EMP,” he said, almost cheerfully, over the awful electronic shriek of their failing systems. “Bit rude to the implants. Sorry about that.”
The Cybermen spasmed again and then dropped. All three hit the floor in near-perfect unison, steel crashing against metal hard enough to shake the corridor.
He tossed the EMP device back toward the TARDIS, and Donna caught it with both hands and a scandalized noise.
“Oi!” she snapped. “You could’ve warned me you were making me do the last bit!”
The Doctor was already turning back toward the corridor, coat swinging behind him. “Thought I’d let you have the glory.”
“That’s not glory!”
He flashed her a grin over his shoulder, quick and bright and entirely inappropriate for the moment. “Fine. Next time you do the stalling.”
Donna opened her mouth then shut it again. Because, irritatingly, she had no comeback for that. The look she gave him made it very clear she was deeply unhappy about this state of affairs anyway.
Then the Doctor turned to them. The whole corridor seemed to narrow around that one movement.
He stepped toward them, and for the first time since stepping out of the blue box, the frantic, dazzling, impossible energy in him shifted into something more human. He looked them dead in the eye.
A thousand things unsaid, crashing between them all at once.
He looked like a man with apologies stacked behind his teeth. Explanations. Truths. Regret. Relief so sharp it almost bled through everything else. They had questions enough to drown him in.
But the corridor was still full of screaming and alarms and the rush of people forcing themselves toward the TARDIS, and there simply wasn’t time for any of it.
His hand came out and closed around their arm as he pulled them out of the line and toward Donna, guiding them with firm urgency until they were close enough for her to grab them if needed.
“Stay with her,” he said.
They blinked. “What?”
The Doctor was already half turning away.
Panic cut through the shock fast enough to give them motion again. “Wait-”
He moved to leave, and they caught his sleeve instinctively.
“John-” They could hear how breathless they sounded. “You can’t just-”
“Shh.” His voice dropped, softening just for them in a way that made their chest hurt. “I know.”
No, they thought wildly, he didn’t. Or maybe he did. Because the look on his face said he knew exactly how much this was to ask.
He glanced toward the far end of the corridor, where more metallic footsteps were already beginning to echo back through the ship.
Then he looked at Donna.
“Stay here,” he told her. “With them. With everyone. Keep the EMP on.”
Donna straightened, grip tightening on the device. “Got it.”
The Doctor gave one quick nod.
Then they tried again, more desperate this time. “Where are you going?”
His eyes came back to them one last time, “To stop this,” he said.
Before they could answer, before they could demand more, or beg him not to, or ask what in God’s name was happening, he was moving.
He ran down the corridor at full speed, not hesitating once, vanishing into the ship with the same bright, impossible momentum he’d arrived with, heading toward God knew where to do God knew what.
They stood frozen for half a second, staring after him. Then Donna’s hand landed on their shoulder, firm and grounding.
“He’ll come back,” she said. She sounded like she believed it.
As the line dissolved and the rescued prisoners crowded together in the corridor, fear and confusion bouncing wildly off the metal walls, they turned on Donna, shaking a little. And angrier than they had any right to be when they were still alive, only because of him.
“Who is he really?” The question came out rough and breathless, sharper than they meant it to, but nothing about this made sense anymore and their mind was trying to build a bridge across a canyon with splinters.
John had called that box a time machine. The things had called him the Doctor, just as Donna had. He had known what they were, how they worked, how to stop them. He had stepped out of nowhere with impossible technology and impossible certainty and moved through all of this like it was terrifying but familiar. And the more they let the pieces knock against each other in their head, the worse it got.
Because suddenly every odd little thing about him had turned over at once. The historical facts and the way he talked about dead people. The technology and handy skills. The constant travel. The evasions and dodging of questions.
Donna was still gripping the EMP device, standing against the Tardis door like she was trying to be a wall between the frightened people and the ship beyond. She looked at them with a softness that only made the anger burn hotter.
“He’s called the Doctor,” she said gently.
“I got that bit,” they snapped.
Donna flinched, not from the volume, but from the hurt in it.
They ran a hand hard over their face and looked away for one second before turning back to her. “Who is he?” Their voice cracked on the last word.
Donna saw the awful beginning of understanding that none of this was a misunderstanding or a weird coincidence or some bizarre work emergency. This was the truth, or some terrible edge of it, and it had been standing in their flat drinking tea and calling itself John.
The corridor groaned around them. Somewhere farther down the ship came another dull explosion. One of the rescued people whimpered. Someone else asked if the blue box was safe. Donna ignored all of it for the second it took to look at them properly.
“He’s,” She stopped, searching for the least impossible version of the truth. “He’s not what you thought.”
“No, really?” That was so obviously inadequate it made their laugh come out bitter.
Donna took that without complaint.
“He’s an alien,” she said.
The word landed like a physical punch in the gut. They stared at her.
Donna kept going, because stopping now would only make it worse. “A good one,” she added quickly. “The best one, honestly, which I know sounds mad given the circumstances, but-”
“An alien,” they repeated.
Donna nodded once. Their eyes widened, then narrowed, then went glassy with the effort of trying to hold onto something stable while the whole shape of reality shifted under them.
“No,” they said, but not like they were disagreeing. More like their mind had simply thrown the word back out because they had nowhere to put it.
Donna’s face gentled. “Yeah.”
They looked toward the corridor where he had disappeared. Toward the place John had become the Doctor had become something impossible.
“He’s been lying to me.”
Donna winced, “Yes,” she said quietly. “He has.”
They swallowed, throat working painfully, “How long?”
Donna hesitated, which was answer enough.
“All of it?” they asked, voice thinning. “The job, the traveling, all of that?”
Donna drew in a breath. “Not all of it.”
They looked at her sharply.
“He does travel,” she said. “Constantly. And he does save people, if that helps at all. He just,” She glanced down the corridor too, as if he might somehow hear her choosing words. “He made himself smaller for you.”
That stopped them cold.
Donna saw it and pressed on, softer now. “I’m not saying it was right. It wasn’t. And he knows it wasn’t.” She shifted the EMP device in her hands and stepped a little closer. “But he wasn’t lying because he thought it was funny. He was lying because he was scared.”
“Scared of what?” They stared at her.
Donna gave them a sad sort of look.
“Of this,” she said.
They shook their head once, trying to clear it and failing. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
“It does if you know him.”
“I don’t know him,” they said, and the pain in that finally came through full force.
Donna’s expression broke around the edges.
They looked past Donna at the Tardis, eyes darting it impossibility, “That box. . . ”
Donna looked back too, then at them again. “It’s a ship. And a time machine.”
Their laugh this time was nearly hysterical. “Right. Sure.”
“I know how it sounds.”
“No, you don’t.” Their eyes flashed back to hers.
Donna held their gaze for a second, then jerked her chin toward the Tardis. “Come here.”
They didn’t move, their feet seemed fixed to the metal floor, rooted there by shock and anger and the awful sense that if they took one step closer to that impossible blue box, everything would become even more real than it already was.
Donna saw the refusal, sighed once through her nose, and came to them instead. She was grateful, at least, that they didn’t move away when she stopped in front of them. For a moment, she just stood there, the EMP device awkward in one hand, the other hovering like she wanted to touch their arm and wasn’t sure if she’d earned the right. In the end, she didn’t.
She looked at them with that rare, steady softness of hers and said, low enough that it felt private even in a corridor full of people, “He’s wonderful.”
They made the tiniest disbelieving sound.
Donna went on anyway, “I know that’s not what you want to hear right now,” she said. “But you need to know it.”
Their face stayed tight and stunned, but they listened.
So Donna told them. Not everything, there wasn’t time for everything, and half of what mattered wouldn’t make sense yet. But she told them enough.
“The first time I met him for real,” she said, “my ex-fiancé Lance was in cahoots with, this is going to sound ridiculous, so brace yourself, a giant spider alien woman.”
They stared at her.
“A giant what?”
“Exactly,” Donna said, almost amused at the insanity of it. “Welcome to his life.”
Despite themself, the barista’s mouth twitched in confused disbelief, but Donna didn’t stop.
“She wanted to eat everyone on Earth,” Donna said bluntly. “Lance had been spiking my coffee with Huon particles every day. Needed them to incubate in a human body till they were ready for use. Still don’t understand what that means really, but that's what the Doctor said.”
That got a full frown out of them now, their shock sharpening into something more focused and somehow more horrified.
“What?”
“Oh, I know.” Donna waved a hand. “Don’t worry too much about the details. The point is, it was bad. Properly bad. And he saved me. Stopped the spider lady. Got me out.”
The barista swallowed, the story sounded too impossible to fit inside one head.
And as Donna spoke, some remembered edge of the man they knew seemed to sharpen into something stranger. The way he had stepped into this ship and turned it from a place of terror into a battlefield he understood. They felt more nervous, not less, at the idea of meeting him properly when he came back.
Donna caught some of that in their face and sighed again.
“I saw something in him that night,” she said, quieter now.
The barista’s brow furrowed. They weren’t sure where she was going, but they let her keep going.
“There was fire everywhere,” Donna said. “And he was standing right in it. Waiting. Grieving someone he’d just lost.” Her eyes went distant for a second, pulled backward by the memory. “A friend. And I looked at him and thought, God, there’s a darkness there.”
The barista stared at her. They didn’t understand yet, not fully, but the seriousness in her voicemade a shiver go up their spine.
Donna gave a tiny shake of her head. “That’s his world,” she said. “That’s why I turned him down the first time. Why I didn’t get on board that box with him.” She nodded toward the Tardis. “I knew if I stepped into his life, I’d be stepping into all of that too.”
The barista’s gaze flicked to the blue box and then back.
Donna’s mouth tightened. “And then I regretted it.”
She didn’t linger there. Didn’t mention tracking him down or the stubborn, aching choice she’d made to find him again when she realized turning away hadn’t stopped her thinking of him, of the life and adventure he offered.
Instead she kept moving through the truth she wanted them to understand.
“I’ve seen Pompeii with my own eyes,” she said. “Seen people smiling and living and loving right before the sky buried them.” Her voice dipped lower. “I’ve seen a whole race called the Ood, kept as slaves. Locked up, tortured, treated like they weren’t even alive enough to matter. And they sang this beautiful song.”
The barista said nothing. Neither did the people huddled closest behind them. Donna didn’t notice that the others in line were listening too, or maybe she did and no longer cared. The corridor had gone quieter around her voice. Fear still lived in it, but now there was this too, people hanging on to the only calm, human thing they had been given.
“The world can be cruel,” Donna said, and there was iron in her now. “Cruel in ways you don’t even know to imagine until you see it. His world most of all.”
She paused for breath.
The barista stared at her, still trying to hold all of it at once. This wasn’t helping, wasn’t making them less angry, it wasn’t making the lie smaller. But it was changing the shape of their anger. Taking the neat edges off it and replacing them with understanding.
Donna looked at them carefully.
“And do you know what he still does?” she asked.
They didn’t answer.
“He runs straight at it anyway.” Donna nodded once, her voice thinning just slightly with the force of her own feeling.
“He keeps going into the worst places. Keeps saving people. Keeps hurting over every last one of them, whether he says it out loud or not.” Her eyes flicked down the corridor where he had vanished. “He acts like he’s this big impossible thing that can carry it all, but he can’t. Not really. He just keeps trying.”
The barista’s throat worked. They looked away for a second, toward the metal wall, the floor, anywhere but Donna’s face.
And in that second they remembered him in their flat. The Doctor. John. Whatever he was. Both things sat painfully together.
Donna saw the conflict in them and gentled a fraction.
“I’m not telling you this to make excuses for him,” she said. “He should’ve told you. I know that. And I promise you, he knows it too.”
Their eyes snapped back to hers.
“Then why are you telling me?”
Donna’s expression broke into something tired and honest.
“Because if he gets back here and you look at him and all you can see is the lie, you’ll miss the man underneath it.” She swallowed. “And he is worth seeing. Even when he’s an idiot.”
That almost got a laugh out of them. Instead they just stood there, breathing too shallowly, with the whole corridor listening and the whole world rearranging itself around the truth of one impossible man.
Donna drew a breath and kept going, as if once she had started she could not bear to leave the truth half-built.
“There’s a man called Caecilius,” she said. “Had a wife. Children. Lived in Pompeii. The Doctor saved them from the fires.”
The barista blinked.
Donna nodded once, fierce and certain. “Not everybody, he couldn’t. It was a fixed point, he couldn’t. But them, he got them out.” She didn’t pause long enough for the weight of that to settle before she pressed on. “And the Ood? Freed. The whole lot of them. The circle is broken, and now they sing because they want to. Not because someone’s forcing them.”
Her face had changed again as she spoke, more animated, more alive, as if all the fear in the corridor had found an answer in the shape of memory.
Then she cut herself off abruptly and asked, “You know ATMOS?”
The barista frowned. “Of course. Everyone knows ATMOS.”
A few of the other people in the corridor stirred faintly behind them at that. ATMOS was the kind of thing people did know. Cars. Systems. News. The sort of disaster that had become part of the collective memory of Earth, even if most people only remembered the headlines and the panic.
Donna nodded sharply. “Aliens.”
The word still hit strangely.
“Aliens built it. Nearly choked the whole planet to death.” Her mouth tightened. “He stopped it.”
The barista stared at her.
Donna looked almost bright with conviction now, warmed by the force of her own point.
“Everywhere I’ve been with him, it’s like that,” she said. “Awful things. Impossible things. Things no one should have to see. But he goes anyway. And when he gets there, he changes it. He saves people. He saves worlds. I’ve watched him end wars.” She glanced down the corridor, toward wherever the Doctor had vanished. Then she looked back at them, and her voice mellowed just enough to make the last part land cleanly.
“He is not for the faint of heart,” she said.
The corridor had gone still around her again. Even the others huddled nearby seemed to be listening intently now, frightened faces turned in their direction because in the middle of metal walls and screams and uncertainty, Donna was offering something people could hold onto.
A shape.
A reason.
“But none of us,” she said softly, “would be here without him.”
The barista looked away for a second, trying to swallow around the thickness in their throat. Because that, at least, was impossible to deny.
The barista’s voice, when it came, was quieter. “That doesn’t make him easier to trust.”
Donna nodded once, no argument in it. “No.”
“It doesn’t make the lying hurt less.”
“No.”
The honesty of that steadied something in them.
Donna shifted the EMP in her hands and added, “But it does mean when he gets back, you’ll be looking at the whole of him. Not just the worst bit.”
The barista let out a breath through their nose and looked down the corridor again, “Whole of him,” they echoed faintly.
It felt absurd that such a phrase could apply to someone who apparently carried time machines and alien invasions around like excess pocket change.
Donna almost smiled. “Well. As much of the whole as he’ll manage to spit out before he starts dodging.”
That won the smallest huff of laughter from the barista. A tiny thing, barely there, but it was enough to soften Donna’s face.
They turned away from Donna and from the blue box and from the corridor where he had disappeared, because all of it had become too much to look at directly.
It still felt like a nightmare. In the sick, floaty way of something, the mind kept insisting would snap apart any second if they just waited long enough. Any minute now, they thought, they would wake up. Maybe on the couch, maybe with the TV still on. Maybe with the second movie menu looping and their neck stiff from falling asleep against his shoulder.
Donna stepped closer and put an arm around them.
It was clumsy, not because Donna was bad at comfort, but because this sort of comfort had nowhere easy to go. They didn’t shove her away. They couldn’t quite summon the energy for that, but they didn’t lean into it either. They just stood there, rigid and exhausted, letting it happen.
After a long silence, they asked, “Why did he keep all of this from me?”
Donna was quiet for a moment, then she said, “He’s got his reasons.”
That answer landed badly enough that they turned to stare at her. Donna met the look without flinching.
“If you want answers,” she said, “interrogate him all you like when he gets back. Ask him everything. But I’m not telling his secrets for him.”
That confused them so completely that they just blinked at her. It was such an absurd line in the middle of all this that for a second they honestly looked at her like she’d grown two heads.
Donna sighed.
“I know,” she said. “I know how that sounds.”
“No, I don’t think you do.”
She winced faintly, then nodded down the corridor where the Doctor had gone. “He never wanted you dragged into any of this. Never wanted you in danger.”
Their mouth tightened.
“And that,” Donna said, a little more firmly now, “is all I’m saying on his behalf.”
The barista looked away again. For a moment, they said nothing. The corridor hummed. The other frightened people behind them shifted and whispered and tried not to listen too obviously, but they didn’t exactly have a choice. The ship still groaned around them like a living machine dreaming violent dreams.
Then, very quietly, they smiled. It was a sad little thing, barely a smile at all.
“I’m disappointed in myself,” they admitted.
Donna frowned. “Why?”
They let out a breath that might have been a laugh if there had been any humor left in it. “Because part of me is still standing here worrying about how much of him was real.”
Donna said nothing.
The barista looked down at their own hands.
“And that feels,” They searched for the word and found only bitterness. “Pathetic.”
Donna’s arm tightened slightly around them.
They shook their head. “Not because it doesn’t matter. I know it matters. It does. It hurts. It should hurt.” Their throat worked around the next words. “But we’ve just been marched through a ship by robots deciding who lives and who doesn’t, and somehow I’m still standing here thinking about every tea, every game night, every stupid little thing he ever said and wondering which parts were him and which parts were. . . whatever else he is.” Their eyes lifted to the corridor ahead again. “Like that’s the thing my brain picked.”
Donna was quiet for a long moment before she answered, “It’s not pathetic.”
The barista laughed weakly. “Feels like it.”
“No,” Donna said. “Feels human.”
That pulled their gaze back to her.
Donna’s expression had gone very steady now. “You thought you knew someone. Then the world cracked open and handed you a bigger, stranger version of them, and now you’re trying to work out whether the person you cared about was real.” She shrugged one shoulder. “That’s not pathetic. That’s what anyone would do.”
The barista’s face pinched, like they weren’t sure whether to be relieved or more upset by the kindness of that.
Donna went on, gentler now. “And for what it’s worth, the bits you’re thinking of?” She nodded vaguely, as if to encompass tea and films and cafés and all the rest. “Those are the bits I’d trust most.”
The barista frowned. “Why?”
“Because that’s the part of him he doesn’t know how to fake.”
They stared at her.
Donna continued, “The running about and the cleverness and all this,” she gave the ship a disgusted little glance, “that’s him too. But the small stuff? The way he looks at people he loves. The way he gets excited over nonsense. The way he sits in somebody’s flat and lets himself be ordinary for a bit.” She shook her head. “That’s real.”
The word hit like a bruise.
Love.
Donna had used it so naturally, so casually, that it almost slipped by unnoticed. The barista looked away before Donna could read too much in their face.
“That still doesn’t make it alright,” they said.
“No,” Donna agreed. “It doesn’t.”
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Then the barista asked, quieter now, “Does he even have a normal name?”
Donna actually smiled at that. “Oh, now that,” she said, “you’ll have to get out of him yourself.”
That won the faintest huff of breath from them. Not laughter, but closer.
Then the ship shuddered again, harder this time.
Somewhere deeper inside, alarms rose to a new pitch. The frightened cluster of survivors tightened in on itself, and every head in the corridor turned toward the same dark stretch of hall.
Donna straightened.
And with Donna’s words still settling painfully into place, they stood in the mouth of the impossible, waiting for the Doctor to come back and show them which part of him would arrive first: the liar, the alien, or the man who had saved them.
★ Part 1 ★ Part 2 ★ Part 3 ★ Part 4 ★ Part 5 ★ Part 5.2 ★
✰ Word Count: 12.6k
✰ Summary: The Doctor makes a friend with a humble barista in England. They’re friends. Thats it. They're just friends.
✰ Warnings: 10th Doctor, Genter Nutural Reader, They/Them pronouns, romantic pining, Donna Noble, Will They? Won’t They?, Doctor’s got it bad, Angsty, Blackmail
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This is for @vexerieart, who made me smile with their kind words, bitch boosted my ego SO BAD. So I just want to return the favor, pay the smile forward. I hope this cheers you up since you’ve been sick, my love. <3
A few months had changed more than the Doctor liked to admit.
Long enough for seasons to shift at the edges of London. Long enough for habits to settle into something reliable. Long enough for one human barista in a little café to become a fixed point in his life, and for Donna Noble, brilliant, impossible Donna Noble, to stride back into it and refuse to leave again.
She had taken him up on the offer in the end.
Not the first time he had asked, not when they had stood beneath a stolen sky with her wedding dress still in her memory and all that hurt still too fresh between them. But later, when life had circled back around in the way human lives sometimes did, she had said yes. And the Tardis, which had been too quiet for too long, had filled again with Donna’s voice, Donna’s laughter, Donna telling him when he was being an idiot and refusing to let him sink too far into himself.
It was good for him, more than good.
By now, he felt full of life again in a way he had not thought possible a year ago. Like someone had opened a window in a room he had forgotten was suffocating him.
That wasn’t only Donna’s doing.
Though he would sooner fling himself into a supernova than say it aloud, some part of that healing had begun in a café, over tea and easy conversation and the quiet, persistent warmth of someone who had looked at him one lonely afternoon and decided he needed a friend.
After Donna’s rejection, after Martha’s leaving, after Astrid’s death, he had gone to a dark place.
Not all at once, that was the trick of it. The darkness had crept in slowly, through silence and empty corridors and too much time alone with his own thoughts. He had sworn off companions in that stretch of bitterness and grief. Told himself he was done. No more inviting people in. No more asking anyone to stand too close to the edges of his life. It never ended well. It only ever changed shape.
Then he had met them, and somehow, against all reason, they had coaxed life back into him. Not by asking anything impossible of him or by demanding explanations or grand gestures or pieces of himself he did not know how to give. Just by being there. By making him laugh. By pulling him into game nights, days out on the town, and silly little text conversations that made the universe seem less cold when he was away.
It had been enough.
Enough to soften him. Enough to make him reach back toward the world instead of away from it. Enough that when Donna returned, he had actually been ready to let someone in again.
Even now, though, he had kept the lie.
John. Work trips. Vague excuses. The careful fiction of being an ordinary man who travelled too much and never quite explained what he did for a living.
He was in too deep to come clean now, or so he told himself.
Really, the truth was uglier and simpler than that: he had never wanted them involved to begin with. Not truly, not in the dangerous, breathless, blood-and-fire reality of his life. He had wanted them safe, kept separate, untouched by the part of him that drew in catastrophe like a storm system.
And yet lately, more and more often, he found himself thinking about telling them. Sitting them down and tearing through every careful lie he had built, trying to rebuild whatever trust that would be shattered in the telling. Showing them the Tardis at last. Explaining that all those impossible little things they had almost noticed, all those moments he had brushed away, had roots deeper and stranger than they could imagine. Offering, God help him, to sweep them away in the blue box and let them see it all, if they wanted.
That was one part of him, the dangerous, selfish part. The part that wanted to keep them close no matter the cost.
The other part knew better, or at least, knew history.
He had lived too long not to know how these stories ended. History always repeated itself with him. Different faces, different voices, same wounds in new arrangements. He was almost mad enough to keep hoping otherwise, and perhaps that was its own kind of insanity. Because anyone who stepped aboard the Tardis was bound, sooner or later, to one of only a handful of endings.
They died and left him with grief he would carry forever.
They left him of their own choice, and he would spend years wondering when exactly it had gone wrong.
Or they stayed long enough to grow older while he did not, until one day they retired from the Tardis and he watched time take them the ordinary way instead.
That was the curse of it. Even the gentlest ending still ended in loss. So he had made a compromise with himself. A coward’s compromise, perhaps, but one he could live with.
He would go off and do what he must. Save worlds. Run headlong into danger. Keep Donna safe as best he could, though that was often like trying to contain lightning in a teacup. And when he came back to Earth, when the fighting was done and the shouting was over and the universe had been stitched together for one more day, he would visit.
As often as he could, he would keep them in his life in the only way he trusted himself to. At a distance near enough to matter, but far enough, hopefully, to spare them from becoming one more tragedy he could never quite stop reliving.
The Doctor stood at the console with one hand braced against the railing, laughing under his breath while Donna Noble paced the grating like an aggrieved union representative prepared to personally dismantle an entire civilization.
“I’m telling you now,” Donna said, jabbing a finger in his direction, “that place was a scam.”
The Doctor’s grin widened. “It wasn’t a scam.”
“It absolutely was. ‘The most innovative workforce in the Spiral Arm,’” she quoted, piling on an exaggeratedly grand voice that made him snort. “‘A shining example of labor and progress.’ Yeah? Well all I saw was a planet full of people who hated their jobs and looked like they wanted to bite their managers.”
He turned back to the console, flicking a switch with absent ease as the Tardis hummed around them. “Not all of them.”
“Most of them.”
“Some.”
“Alright, fine,” Donna said, throwing up her hands. “Enough that I noticed.”
The Doctor tilted his head concedingly. “That’s fair.”
Donna planted her hands on her hips, still fuming. “And another thing, PTO.”
He looked over at her. “Pardon?”
“They had it in their contracts,” she said, still marching back and forth, her voice climbing again with fresh outrage. “Properly written down. Owed to them, and still they had to fight tooth and nail to get permission to use it.”
The Doctor gave a sympathetic wince.
“And don’t get me started on the docked pay.”
“Donna.”
“No, because I am serious.” She rounded on him fully now. “Docked pay for lunch. Docked pay for bathroom breaks. Bathroom breaks, Doctor! What are they meant to do, explode politely on company time?”
That made him laugh outright, bright and helpless.
Donna pointed at him again. “Don’t laugh.”
“I’m not laughing at you.”
“You are.”
“I’m laughing at the phrase ‘explode politely.’”
“Well, good, because that’s what they expected.”
The Doctor leaned back against the console, still smiling. “To be fair, in that particular corner of the universe, in that period of time, it was still a relatively new labor system. They were working out the kinks.”
“The kinks?” Donna stared at him.
“Yes.”
“The kinks were worker exploitation.”
He lifted one shoulder. “Temporarily.”
She made a sound of deep offense. “Oh, well, that’s alright then.”
He kept going anyway, because it was too much fun winding her up. “In a few thousand years, they'll fix all of it. Better protections, better pay, properly enforced leave, the whole lot. Eventually, they do become exactly what they boast about.”
Donna folded her arms. “Then you should’ve brought me there.”
The Doctor blinked. “What?”
“To the planet when it was sorted,” she said, as if this were the most obvious correction in the world. “Not in the middle of all the rubbish version.”
He smiled despite himself and turned a dial. “Couldn’t.”
“Why not?”
He glanced at her, already knowing she would hate the answer. “Because the annual festival still wasn’t celebrated then.”
Donna’s mouth fell open in disbelief, then she barked, “Oh, that’s rubbish.”
“It is not rubbish.”The Doctor laughed again, delighted now.
“It is! You’re telling me you dragged me halfway across the universe to a planet full of miserable office workers because you wanted to see a parade?”
“It was a very good parade.”
“It had floating balloons.”
“They were sentient lantern-whales, Donna.”
“They were balloons with opinions.”
The Doctor grinned, hands flying lightly over the controls while she continued muttering to herself.
“And the food,” Donna added darkly, not nearly done. “You said the food would be worth it.”
“It was worth it.”
“No it wasn’t.”
“You had three helpings.”
“That’s because I was starving.”
“You had dessert.”
“I was being polite.”
The Doctor actually had to look away for a second, smiling to himself as he adjusted the monitor. Donna watched him, narrowed her eyes, and then huffed a laugh of her own despite all her complaining.
“You know what your problem is?” she said.
“Go on.”
“You think sticking a festival on top of something makes it charming.”
He turned back to her, eyebrows raised. “Doesn’t it?”
“No.”
“Bit.”
“No.”
He smiled wider. “Definitely bit.”
“Rubbish.” She spat, though she was smiling herself.
The Doctor felt the faint buzz of his phone against his pocket. He knew who it was before he even reached for it. The only number saved in that phone.
That alone was enough to shift something in his expression, only slightly, but there all the same. He cleared his throat, smoothing over the moment before Donna could clock it too obviously, and turned back to the console with studied casualness.
“Donna,” he said, a touch too brightly, “fancy popping in to see your family for a quick visit?”
Donna, who had been only half pretending not to sulk anymore, perked, “Grandad?”
Her whole face softened with immediate interest, all righteous annoyance with alien labor systems vanishing beneath the much more important prospect of Wilf.
“Yeah, alright,” she said, already sounding lighter. “He’ll be dead excited to hear about the last few trips.”
The Doctor nodded, leaning one hip against the console. “Thought he might.”
Donna crossed her arms, but the edge had gone from her posture now, replaced by the restless little energy she always got when home was suddenly within reach. “And anyway, someone’s got to appreciate my suffering on the planet of miserable office workers.”
“You did suffer nobly.”
“I did, yeah.”
The Doctor grinned, then, because he couldn’t resist, added, “And of course, you’d get to see your mother as well.”
“Oh yeah,” she said. Donna’s expression flattened instantly. “Meh.”
That made him laugh.
She pointed at him. “Don’t start. You know what she’s like.”
“I do, yes.”
“She’ll ask where I’ve been, then ignore the answer, then complain I don’t visit enough.”
“She loves you.”
“I know she loves me,” Donna said, already rolling her eyes. “Doesn’t make her less hard work.”
The Doctor’s smile only deepened.
Donna gave a dramatic sigh, but there was no real complaint in it. “Alright. Fine. Give me a bit first, yeah? I’m not turning up at Mum’s looking like I’ve been dragged through three galaxies.”
He glanced at her hair, then at the state of her jacket, and wisely said, “Fair.”
She made a face at him. “Cheek.”
Then, already half turning toward the corridor, she added, “I’m having a shower and changing first. If Grandad gets adventure stories, he’s getting the polished version of me, thanks.”
The Doctor nodded. “Take your time.”
Donna disappeared down the corridor toward her room, muttering something to herself about alien dust and how she still thought the office-worker planet had been a waste of perfectly good daylight.
The Doctor waited until she was fully out of sight. Then he let the smile he’d been trying not to show spread properly across his face.
He slipped the phone from his pocket at last andleaned back against the console, one ankle crossing over the other while he flipped open the little phone in his hand.
The screen glowed faintly against the blue-green light of the console room.
A message blinked up at him.
Out of town? Wanna do a movie night or something soon?
His smile came quickly and without permission. There it was again, that warm little lift in his chest he never quite managed to prepare for, no matter how often it happened. He stared at the message for a second longer than necessary, thumb hovering over the keys.
Then he typed back.
Am out of town at the moment, yes. Movie night depends entirely on what film you’ve got in mind.
He hit send, and a response came back almost immediately.
:( You work too much
The Doctor let out a soft breath of amusement through his nose, gaze lingering on the words. He knew what that meant, or at least, he suspected he did.
‘You’re gone too often. I miss you. Come back soon.’
His grin widened, smaller this time, softer. Before he could overthink it, he typed:
Miss you too.
The second he sent it, he made a face at himself.
“Oh, smooth,” he muttered under his breath. He immediately tapped out another message, barreling past his own honesty as quickly as possible.
So. What movie are we talking about, then?
He stared at the screen, waiting.
No answer.
The Doctor’s smile faded into something more uncertain. He shifted his weight against the console and glanced down the corridor toward Donna’s room, suddenly seized by the ridiculous worry that she might reappear at exactly the wrong moment and demand to know why he looked like a teenager hiding contraband.
With no sign of her, he looked back at the phone, still nothing. A full minute passed.
His mouth tightened.
Had that been too much? Too obvious? Too strange? Humans were difficult enough in person; over text they became a minefield of silences and timing and read-between-the-lines terrors.
The Doctor checked down the corridor again, just to be certain Donna wasn’t doubling back for some forgotten question.
Then, finally, the phone buzzed in his hand.
Didn’t have anything specific in mind tbh
The Doctor let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding and smiled to himself, equal parts relieved and faintly annoyed at how quickly he had managed to work himself into nerves over a perfectly ordinary reply.
He typed back almost immediately.
Thinking cinema or staying in?
The reply came fast this time, bright and decisive.
Staying in 100%. There were school girls outside the shop doing a fundraiser and selling flavored popcorn. I bought three bags.
The Doctor smiled before he’d even read the rest of it.
Three?
Don’t judge me.
He did, a little. Not enough to stop smiling. His thumbs moved over the keypad again.
What flavors?
Truthfully, he did not much care about the answer itself. Popcorn was popcorn, in his opinion, useful as a vehicle for salt and very little else. But asking felt right. The sort of question that kept them talking.
And they did, enthusiastically.
Classic butter, obviously.
A cheesy one because I was curious
And a candied one that looked weirdly interesting
He could practically hear them saying it, that bright little current of excitement threading through the words. Before he could answer, another message arrived.
So definitely a night in.
Then another.
Blankets.
Another.
Pillow fort maybe??
Another.
Lights out except for little lamps or the fairy lights
Another.
And proper food too! not just popcorn I’m not an animal
The Doctor laughed softly under his breath. The messages kept coming.
Like actual takeaway or pizza or something?
Actually no pizza, ive had too much lately blugh
Full home theatre experience
I could even move the coffee table
This is becoming an event now
With every buzz of the phone against his palm, his smile widened.
It was ridiculous, really, how easily they could do this to him. How a few excited texts about popcorn and blanket forts could make the whole of him feel warmer, lighter, more absurdly fond than any sensible man ought to.
He leaned more comfortably against the console, eyes flicking over each new message as though there might be some hidden treasure in them beyond the obvious one: that they wanted him there. That they were building the evening in their mind and fitting him neatly into it.
His thumbs hovered for a moment before he finally replied.
You’ve planned everything except the actual film.
There was a short pause.
Then:
Details.
He laughed again.
That is the one detail a movie night traditionally requires.
No it doesn’t. Vibes are more important.
You cannot watch vibes for two hours.
Watch me.
The Doctor shook his head, grin full and boyish now, and tapped out:
You are deeply unserious.
And yet you keep texting me.
That made him pause just long enough for that familiar, fluttering warmth to settle a little deeper in his chest. Then he smiled to himself and typed back:
Someone has to keep this operation organised.
Wow. Rude.
I’m bringing the popcorn and the fort-building skills
You can bring your weirdly strong opinions about films
He could not even argue with that.
I do have very strong opinions about films.
I know.
That’s part of the charm.
The Doctor stared at that one for a beat longer than the others, then glanced once more down the corridor on instinct, as though Donna might somehow emerge and catch him smiling at his phone like an idiot.
Still clear.
He looked back down to the buzz of another text.
So are you in or not, johnny????
His grin softened at the nickname, even if it wasn’t his actual name.
I’m in.
Provided you choose a film that doesn’t make me despair for the future of cinema.
Their response was immediate.
No promises.
I’ll text you when I’m back in town. Pick the film by then.
The response came quickly, full of mock offense.
I always do the planning.
You should try it sometime.
The Doctor snorted softly.
It was your idea.
You plan. I’m merely a guest.
A beat later, another message buzzed in.
Merely a guest??
Wow.
His grin widened.
When you drag me into your schemes, you plan them.
When I take you out, I plan it.
That is just arguing semantics.
The Doctor laughed under his breath, leaning one shoulder more fully into the console. He let them have the last word on that and shifted the conversation instead.
How was work?
This time the reply took longer.
He waited, flipping the phone shut and open again once before it finally buzzed in his hand with a long block of text.
Actually kind of madHad to train a new girl today and she was lovelygenuinely really funny
>:( but it was the busiest day of the week and my manager only put the two of us on the morning shift
So basically I was working alone while trying to teach someone else at the same time
Like throwing her in the deep end and telling her to learn to swim while sharks circle
The Doctor frowned as he read.
He could picture it too easily, them rushed off their feet, trying to smile through stress and customers and broken rhythms, taking on too much because there was no one else to do it. His thumb hovered over the keys for a moment before he typed back.
That sounds awful. sorry
Their answer came after only a few seconds.
It honestly ended up being a really good day tho
She kept cracking jokes and keeping spirits up
It was mostly just the morning rush that was bad
The Doctor’s frown eased. He leaned back again, relieved, already starting to compose some answer about them having a talent for surviving chaos when the phone buzzed once more.
Thanks for worrying about me tho
How’s your work trip going?
He stared at that first line a moment too long.
‘Thanks for worrying about me.’ Something in it caught under his ribs, warm enough to leave him smiling at the screen before the second half of the message landed fully.
How’s your work trip going?
The smile faded into thought.
The Doctor glanced instinctively down the corridor, toward where Donna had disappeared. No sign of her yet. Just the soft hum of the Tardis and the quiet weight of the phone in his hand.
He did not want to lie to them, not more than he already had. Lately he had taken to avoiding it where he could, sidestepping instead, telling half-truths rather than complete inventions. It didn’t fix anything, not really, but it eased the guilt enough to let him sleep.
So he typed:
Not bad, actually. Got a coworker traveling with me lately, Donna. She’s a bit of a spitfire, keeps things from getting dull.
He looked at the message before sending it. Not untrue, not even mostly untrue. He sent it and waited, turning the phone over once in his hand.
The reply came fast.
Donna sounds terrifying.
The Doctor laughed aloud.
Often. But mostly brilliant.
Another buzz.
You attract intense people.
His eyes flicked over that one, and the corner of his mouth lifted again.
Takes one to know one.
Rude.
Accurate but rude
He shook his head, smiling helplessly now, the earlier tension easing away again as the conversation slipped back into its usual rhythm.
Any ETA for when you’ll be back in town?
The Doctor’s thumb hovered over the keys.
For him, if he wanted, he could be at their flat within the hour. Sooner, probably, as soon as Donna was settled at home and he could make an excuse to get back to the Tardis without her. He could set the coordinates, skim through the vortex, and knock on their door before the tea in their kettle had properly cooled.
Instead, he glanced up at the console.
One of the clocks had been set to their local time for so long now that he no longer even thought about it being there. He checked it, did the tiny bit of arithmetic required to make the answer sound normal, then looked back down at the phone.
Should be back Saturday.
What time do you want me at your place?
He sent it, and the response came back almost immediately, bright enough that he could feel the energy of it through the screen.
Finally!!
I haven’t seen you in nearly a week
The Doctor frowned at that. A week?
For them, yes, of course.
He looked up at the console again, at the clock ticking dutifully onward in their time, and felt that familiar little jolt of dislocation. It hadn’t felt like a week to him. Not remotely, not even three full days, really, depending on how one counted a labor dispute on an alien world and the long way back through Donna Noble’s opinions.
And yet at the same time, it felt like years.
That was the trouble with missing someone. Time became slippery around it. Too short and too long all at once.
The phone buzzed again.
Stop by whenever works for you
That softened something in him immediately.
No fussing over exact times, no pretending indifference, just the easy permission to arrive. The sort of thing that should have felt ordinary by now and somehow never did.
He smiled faintly, reading the first message once more.
I haven’t seen you in nearly a week.
The Doctor leaned back against the console, expression turning quieter. For them, nearly a week had passed. For him, barely any time at all.
And still, somehow, he understood exactly what they meant. Because he had been feeling the same strange stretch of absence from the opposite side of it, carrying them in the back of his mind through planets and corridors and Donna’s endless commentary, with that odd sensation that no matter how busy he kept himself, some part of him remained pointed stubbornly toward Earth.
Toward them. His thumb moved over the keys again.
Saturday it is, then.
He sent it before he could sit with the sentiment too long, then looked down the corridor once more, listening for Donna.
Still nothing.
Just the Tardis humming around him and the little phone in his hand, holding open this ridiculous, fragile second life he had built for himself, one where he lied and missed people and counted days in two directions at once.
It took them so long to answer that the Doctor eventually assumed the conversation had run its course.
He checked the clock again, and it was late enough that they were probably getting ready for bed by now. He smiled to himself at the thought and snapped the phone shut.
Crossing the console room, he moved toward the little spot where he kept the charger for it tucked among various bits of technology that looked far more advanced and infinitely less beloved. He plugged the phone in, watching the tiny screen light up faintly as it began to charge.
And because his mind was unhelpful, it wandered at once to the one time he had actually seen their night routine play out.
There had been a storm that evening, rain hammering the windows hard enough to turn the street outside into a blur of reflected streetlamps and black glass. He had made some token protest about walking back in it, and they had looked at him as if he were stupid and told him to crash on the couch because they weren’t about to let him go stumbling through a downpour at that hour.
So he had stayed, and from the safe, ordinary distance of their living room, he had watched them wind down for the night.
They had made tea in the little kitchen while the storm muttered beyond the windows. Changed into comfortable pajamas that somehow made them look softer and younger and even more impossible to leave. Curled up for a while with a book, legs tucked beneath them, reading until a yawn finally stole over them and they blinked at the page as though betrayed by their own exhaustion.
Then they had said goodnight, easy and fond and utterly trusting, and disappeared down the hall while he remained on the couch with a blanket and two hearts that had felt far too full for such a small, human evening.
It had been intimate in a way he had not expected.
Now, as he stood in the glow of the console lights, he found himself imagining them doing it all again tonight. Tea in hand, hair mussed from a shower perhaps. Smiling a little to themself while thinking of him and Saturday.
The thought made his own mouth soften into a helpless smile.
Then the phone buzzed.
The Doctor turned back, unplugging it almost immediately, and flipped it open.
Sorry. Spilled my tea and had to clean it up.
He laughed under his breath. Thumb moving quickly now, he typed back:
Clumsy.
I assumed you’d gone to bed.
He sent it, still smiling, and leaned one shoulder against the console again while he waited for whatever ridiculous defense they were about to mount on behalf of their tea.
Nah not yet
I got up to check what films I already had on the shelf so I could ask your opinion
And then tripped over the rug like an idiot
The Doctor let out a quiet laugh, the sound escaping before he could stop it.
He could picture it far too easily. The little flat half-lit and drowsy, them padding about in socks or bare feet, distracted by the thought of Saturday, only to catch the edge of the rug and go down in a heap with a muttered curse and a cup of tea in hand.
He shook his head to himself and typed.
Did you burn yourself?
The answer came quickly.
No
But my rug is suffering
He smiled.
Tragic.
A terrible loss.
A pause, then another message appeared.
Wait I want to show you something
He straightened a little. Before he could respond, the phone buzzed again with the arrival of a photo.
The Doctor stared down at the tiny, grainy image. The old flip phone’s graphics were still rubbish, even after he’d done what he could to improve them, all muddied shadows and softened edges. But he knew that room instantly anyway.
Their living room. The entertainment center beneath the television. The familiar clutter of shelves and consoles. The lamp in the corner casting that same warm amber glow.
But the camera was angled slightly higher, focused on the wall above the TV.
And there was his painting. The one he had made of them in the museum months ago. The dreadful, orange-tinted, uneven little portrait he had nearly died of embarrassment over. The one they had laughed at and insisted they liked. The one they’d said they were “looking for a place to put,” after it had sat in their room for far longer than he’d expected.
It was hanging there now, centered above the television where a poster had been for as long as he had known their flat.
For a moment he simply stared at the little photo, the low-quality screen doing nothing to soften the impact of it. His ridiculous painting, framed by the shape of their life. Placed somewhere visible. His mouth parted slightly, but no sound came out.
Without meaning to, his thoughts jumped at once to his own room aboard the Tardis, to the portrait they had painted of him. That one had gone beside the bed, the one his timelord biology rarely required him to use. He had told himself it was only because he liked it. Because it was good, because it was theirs.
His thumb hovered uselessly over the keypad.
He remembered asking them once what they’d done with his painting after the museum. They’d shrugged it off, said they were still figuring out where to put it, and he’d thought no more of it beyond a quiet, selfish hope that they hadn’t thrown it in a drawer out of mercy. But they had hung it in the living room.
Somewhere they would see it every day. Somewhere anyone who visited might ask about it. The thought made something warm and painful twist through his chest.
His phone buzzed again.
I finally hung it up
Thought you should know
The Doctor read that twice. His expression softened into something helpless, almost boyish in its openness, and he leaned back against the console as though the strength had gone briefly out of his knees.
He typed, erased it. Tried again. Erased that too. Nothing he came up with felt equal to the quiet enormity of what they had shown him.
At last, slowly, he managed:
You hung it up.
It felt stupidly obvious, but it was all he had. Their reply came back with quick affection woven through it, even in text.
Yeah I like it so duh
Gonna miss my poster tho
But sacrifices must be made
The Doctor laughed very softly. His eyes drifted back to the photo of his horrendous work of art. He swallowed once and typed:
It’s terrible.
They answered immediately.
It’s mine.
For a long moment he didn’t move at all, just stood there in the humming heart of the Tardis with the tiny phone in his hand and that picture glowing on the screen, feeling something in him go dangerously soft.
Because of course they had kept it, of course they had found a place for it. And of course, though he had no right to want this, some treacherous part of him thrilled at the thought of that painting hanging in their home while the portrait they had made of him watched over his bed aboard the Tardis.
As if each of them had carried a version of the other away and quietly made space for it.
His thumb finally moved again.
I’m glad.
He hesitated, then added:
Looks good there.
This time their response took a little longer, and when it came, it was brief.
Yeah It does
The Doctor smiled at the screen for a second too long, already knowing he would look at that blurry little photo again later, and later still, until he knew every pixel of it by heart.
“What’re you doing?” Donna’s voice cut across the console room so suddenly that the Doctor nearly jumped out of his skin.
He jerked around, snapping the phone shut and making a very obvious attempt to slip it back into his pocket as though that might somehow qualify as casual.
“Nothing,” he said. Which, unfortunately, was the least convincing possible answer.
Donna stood at the edge of the grating, fresh from the shower and changed into clean clothes, her hair still a bit damp around the edges. She looked comfortable, refreshed, and instantly suspicious.
Her eyes narrowed.
“Nothing,” she repeated.
The Doctor straightened beside the console and busied himself with adjusting a dial that did not need adjusting. “That’s what I said.”
Donna didn’t move for a second. She just looked at him with the sort of expression that a mother gives when they ask you about school, but knows you’re lying cause your teacher already rang home about your behavior. Then she started toward him.
“Hang on,” she said. “Since when have you got a mobile?”
The Doctor shrugged one shoulder without looking at her. “Had it a while.”
“A while.” Donna stopped dead.
“Yes.”
“And I didn’t know?”
He flicked another switch. “Apparently not.”
Donna stared at him in growing outrage. “You’ve got a secret phone?”
“It isn’t secret.”
“It is if I didn’t know about it! You hid it in your pocket.”
The Doctor turned, face set in a look of exaggerated patience. “Donna, I’m allowed to own a phone.”
“That’s not the point.”
“It rather feels like the point.”
She jabbed a finger at his pocket. “You were texting someone.”
“No, I wasn’t.”
Donna’s mouth fell open. “Oh, don’t insult me. I literally walked in and watched you panic.”
“I did not panic.”
“You did that thing with your face.”
“What thing?”
“That guilty thing.”
The Doctor looked deeply offended. “I don’t have a guilty thing.”
“You absolutely do.”
He folded his arms. “You’re imagining it.”
Donna gave a short, disbelieving laugh and moved in closer, peering at him like she might be able to spot the truth written under his skin if she got near enough.
“Who is it?” she demanded.
“No one.”
“No one,” Donna repeated flatly. “Right. And that’s why you looked like I’d caught you snogging behind the bike sheds.”
The Doctor choked. “Donna!”
“Well you did!”
He turned away from her immediately, making a show of fiddling with the console again. “You’re being ridiculous.”
“No, I’m being observant.”
“You’re being nosy.”
“I’m your friend. It’s my job.”
The Doctor made a quiet, affronted noise under his breath. Donna crossed her arms and leaned one hip against the console, settling in with the unmistakable air of a woman who had no intention of letting this go until she had every last detail.
“I didn’t know you even had a phone,” she said. “That alone is suspicious.”
“It’s not suspicious.”
“It is when you’re grinning at it like a teenager.”
The Doctor froze for the smallest fraction of a second, big mistake, cause donna saw.
Her eyes widened in triumph. “Oh my God.”
“No.”
“Oh my God, there is someone.”
“There isn’t.”
“There absolutely is.”
He turned back to her with a glare that would have made lesser people back off immediately. Donna Noble, of course, was not lesser people.
“Donna,” he said through gritted teeth.
She leaned forward slightly, eyes bright now with delight. “Who are you texting?”
The Doctor’s jaw worked once. “No one important.”
That was the wrong thing to say.
“Oh, that is a lie,” she said, almost reverently.
“It is not.”
“It so is. You can’t even look at me properly.”
“I can look at you perfectly well.”
“Then do it.”
He did, for one full second, then his gaze slid away again.
Donna clapped a hand over her mouth, scandalized. “Doctor.”
He shut his eyes briefly, already regretting every choice that had led him to this moment.
“What?”
“You’re texting someone.”
“I am not, ”
“You are, and we’ve covered that. So you can't exactly deny it now.” Donna’s suspicion sharpened into certainty so fast it was practically visible.
“Well,” she said slowly, drawing the word out in a way that was instantly, viciously familiar, “this is interesting.”
The Doctor pointed at her. “Don’t.”
She gasped. “You do say it like that!”
He dropped his hand, momentarily betrayed by the universe itself.
Donna grinned, now fully enjoying herself. “Who is it?”
“No one.”
“Is it a woman?”
“No.”
She blinked. “A man?”
“No!”
“Then who?”
The Doctor exhaled hard through his nose and looked toward the corridor as if escape might somehow present itself if he believed in it strongly enough.
Donna followed the glance and snorted. “Oh no you don’t. You are not running off. You were clearly texting someone, you’ve got a secret phone, and now you’re acting weird.”
“I always act weird.”
“Not like this.”
He shoved his hands into his pockets, as though burying them might hide the problem. Donna’s eyes flicked to the pocket with the phone, then back to his face. Her expression softened just a fraction, not less curious, but a touch less combative.
“Doctor,” she said, gentler now. “Who is it?”
He looked at her and saw, beneath all the nosiness and delight and barely-contained interrogation, the real concern. Curiosity, yes, but not cruelty. Donna wanted to know because she cared, because she had noticed something shifting in him and intended to drag it into daylight. Donna caught the hesitation in his expression and immediately stepped in on it.
“Aha.”
The Doctor groaned. “Oh, for-”
“You hesitated.”
“I did not.”
“You did.”
He dragged a hand over his face. “Donna.” He drew out her name, exasperated. But she was already off again, circling him like a detective who had found the first proper clue.
“You’ve been disappearing off on your own every time we come back to Earth,” she said, more to herself now than to him. “Always saying you’ve got something to do. And the phone-”
“There is nothing strange about me having a phone.”
“There is when you’re you.”
He made a face at that.
Donna’s eyes narrowed further, mind clearly racing now. “And all those little detours before we land…”
The Doctor went very still. There it was, he saw the exact moment the pieces began to move in her clever head.
Donna gasped. Not a small gasp, not a quiet little intake of breath, one of her full-bodied, morally offended gasps, the kind that suggested someone, somewhere, had committed a personal crime against her.
“Oh my God.”
The Doctor did not react. Or rather, he reacted by immediately becoming very interested in the console. He moved around it with brisk purpose, all long strides and fixed attention, as though inputting coordinates required every ounce of his concentration.
Donna pointed at him anyway.
“You’re seeing someone.”
He said nothing. That silence was, to Donna Noble, louder than any confession.
“You are,” she said again, voice climbing in disbelief as she followed him around the console. “You are seeing someone and you didn’t tell me.”
The Doctor kept his mouth firmly shut and reached for a lever, then a dial, then another switch. Anything to avoid answering.
“Unbelievable.” Donna’s eyes widened further with every second of non-response.
Still nothing. He keyed in the coordinates for her mother’s house with studied precision, face set into that maddeningly blank expression he wore when he thought silence could save him.
It could not. Not from Donna at least.
“Oi,” she barked, in that very specific Donna Noble cadence that could stop traffic and probably lesser gods. “Don’t you ‘silent treatment’ me, spaceman.”
The Doctor winced, but did not turn around.
She came closer, arms folded now, wounded outrage written all over her face. “Keeping your secret lover a secret from me of all people.”
He spun around so fast the coat tails swished.
“They are not my lover,” he snapped. “Or anything like that.”
Donna froze. The words hung in the console room, sharp and sudden.
The Doctor’s expression shifted almost immediately afterward, anger giving way to the familiar look of a man who regretted speaking the second he’d done it. He looked away, jaw tightening, and turned back to the controls.
The Tardis groaned faintly as he readied her for takeoff.
Donna just stared at him, because of the way he’d denied it. Fast and sharp and defensive. And underneath all of that, plain as day to anyone who knew him even half as well as she now did, was the bruised edge of something else he’d refuse to speak of..
Donna’s outrage softened into understanding so quickly it almost hurt. He wasn’t hiding a grand romance; he was pining, the poor idiot.
She watched him for another second, taking in the rigid line of his shoulders, the way he kept his face turned away from her, how very carefully he was pretending to be occupied. And because Donna Noble was many things but never stupid, the shape of it came together in her mind all at once, close enough to the truth to sting.
There was someone.
Someone human, probably, if she were guessing by the way he’d gone all strange and soft and secretive about Earth. Someone he kept slipping off to see when he brought her home to visit. Someone important enough that just texting them made him grin like a teenager, but distant enough, or complicated enough, that he’d snapped the second she called them his lover.
Which meant he wanted them and didn’t have them.
Donna’s heart sank a little for him.
Because suddenly it was all there. The hidden phone. The vanished hours. The ridiculous expression on his face when she’d caught him. And beneath all of it, the same old Doctor ache she was beginning to recognize too well: wanting something he was already halfway convinced he couldn’t keep.
She felt sorry for him then.
The Doctor kept working the controls, studiously ignoring her.
Donna let him have the silence for a few beats.
Then, much gentler than before, she said, “Oh, Doctor.”
He didn’t answer.
Donna watched him for a long moment while the Tardis groaned into motion around them.
Then, quieter now, she asked, “Are you going to see them after you drop me off?”
His eyes flicked up to hers and then away again so quickly it might have meant nothing to anyone else. To Donna, it meant everything. There was shame in it, almost painfully plain.
Donna’s voice softened further. “Why keep them secret?”
Still nothing.
The Doctor’s hand moved over the console, fingers tightening slightly on a dial as though the Tardis might save him if he just kept flying her hard enough. He looked anywhere but at Donna, at the monitor, at the rotor, at a switch that absolutely did not need adjusting.
Donna stepped closer and without fanfare, she laid her hand over his. The whole of him seemed to go still at once, every restless bit of motion abruptly stilled beneath that small touch.
“Doctor,” Donna said softly. Her hand stayed where it was, firm and grounding, and when she spoke again her voice had gone almost motherly, gentle, steady, with none of the earlier teasing left in it.
“I already know something is going on,” she said. “So there’s no point bottling it all up like you always do.”
The Doctor’s face tightened as though holding himself together had suddenly become more difficult than before. Donna could see the conflict moving across his features in little flashes, the instinct to shut down, to joke, to deflect, to run. All of it warring with the awful relief of being seen anyway.
“You don’t have to tell me every detail,” she went on. “Not if you don’t want to. But don’t stand there acting like you’ve got to carry all of it by yourself.”
His hand shifted slightly under hers, not pulling away, just uncertain. The Doctor finally looked at her properly then. And written all over his face in a way he probably thought he was hiding: the fear, the wanting, the guilt. A whole storm of it all.
“Oh, sweetheart,” she murmured, the words slipping out before she could stop them.
He let out a breath through his nose, something close to a laugh and nowhere near one. “Don’t.”
“I’m serious.”
“That’s worse.”
“Good.” Her thumb moved once against the back of his hand. “Means you might actually listen.”
He looked away again, but not as sharply this time.
Donna kept her voice low. “You like them.”
The Doctor said nothing, but he didn’t have to; it was in his eyes.
Donna nodded to herself, sad and fond all at once. “Yeah.”
The Tardis thrummed around them, steady as a heartbeat. For a second it seemed he still might refuse. Might close up again and leave her with silence and half-glances and all the rest of it.
But when he spoke, his voice came out quieter than she expected.
“It’s complicated.”
Donna’s hand stayed over his. “Course it is.”
He gave a tiny shake of his head, eyes fixed on the console. “No, you don’t understand.”
“Then help me out.”
That made his mouth tighten. He hesitated for so long she thought he might stop there.
Then, very softly, he said, “They think I’m human.”
Donna blinked. “Human?”
“A man with a job. Too many work trips. A mobile phone.” His mouth twisted faintly at that, bitter and self-aware. “Just ordinary.”
Donna stared at him for a beat, “You never told them?”
The Doctor shook his head once.
And suddenly Donna understood the depth of it, not just a crush, not just a hidden person on Earth he’d gone all moon-eyed over, but a whole lie laid carefully between them and tended for months because he hadn’t known how to do anything else.
“Oh, Doctor.”
“I know.”
“No, you really don’t.”
He laughed again, brittle this time. “I do, actually. I know exactly how bad it sounds.”
Donna watched him, all sharp edges and tired eyes and centuries of damage wrapped up in one impossible man, and felt her heart squeeze for him.
“Why?” she asked gently. “Why hide all that from them?”
His face went still, “Because I didn’t want them involved.” He kept going now, because once he had started, it was all too close to the surface to stop. “I didn’t want them in danger. Didn’t want them looking at my life and thinking it was exciting or grand or worth stepping into.” His jaw worked once. “And I didn’t want. . . ” He stopped, then forced it the rest out anyway. “I didn’t want to lose them.”
Donna’s hand tightened over his. He finally turned his head just enough to meet her eyes again, and there was something so raw in his expression that Donna’s throat tightened.
“They’re safe like this,” he said. “I visit. I leave. They stay out of it.”
“And you’re miserable.”
The Doctor looked away.
Donna sighed softly. “Oh, spaceman.”
He flinched at that just a little, enough that she knew she’d hit the mark.
“You can’t keep someone at arm’s length and then act surprised when it hurts,” she said. “Not if you care about them this much.”
His voice dropped almost to nothing. “What am I supposed to do?”
Donna didn’t answer right away.
Because that, unfortunately, was the question. She could see it all over him, the way he wanted the answer to be impossible, because impossible was safer than hope.
So she gentled her hand over his once more and said the only true thing she had, “You don’t have to decide it all tonight.”
The Doctor almost folded in on himself. Donna could see it in the way his shoulders curved forward, the way his free hand came up to drag across his mouth, the way his thoughts seemed to catch and circle and catch again faster than he could sort them.
“It’s not just,” He broke off, shook his head, and started again, quieter. “It’s not just that I like them.”
Donna said nothing, only waited. Now that he had started, he was no longer talking to avoid the truth. He was talking because it had built up too long, and there was no tidy place to put it now that Donna had opened the box.
“I’m comfortable there,” he said. “With them. It’s just simple.” His mouth twisted faintly, helplessly. “Or it feels simple. Their flat, tea, terrible films, takeaway, just quality time. Nothing exploding, no one pointing anything at me, no one expecting me to save a planet before supper.”
Donna’s face softened.
“And I keep,” He laughed once under his breath, but it was brittle. “I keep falling for it. With being simply human. Or as close as I can get. Just John. Just a bloke showing up for game night.”
He looked away, jaw tightening.
“And even if I kept it up,” he went on, words starting to tumble now, “even if everything somehow went perfectly and I never slipped and they never asked the wrong question and I managed to keep the lie going, what then?”
Donna stayed still, her hand on his, grounding him while he spiraled.
“They’d age,” he said. “Sooner or later enough to notice I’m not. Not properly. Not the same way.” He swallowed. “Or worse.”
“What if I regenerate?” His voice thinned around it.
Donna looked at him like he’d suggested something impossible.
“What am I meant to say then?” he asked, the question aimed somewhere beyond her, beyond the room. “How do I explain that I’m the same man when I’ve got a different face? Different body, different voice, whole different everything? How do I ask them to believe that? To trust me after all the lying before I even get to that part?”
His eyes shut briefly.
“And if I can’t, if I’m too much of a coward to tell them then, what do they think when I go off for ‘work’ and never come back?” His voice dropped lower. “What are they meant to do with that?”
Donna felt her chest ache watching him stripped of all his cleverness, and having it replaced by not just fear of the truth, but fear of leaving a wound behind in someone he cared about. Fear of becoming a ghost in their life because he had not been brave enough to be a real person in it.
“I’ve been selfish,” he said.
Donna frowned. “Doctor, ”
“No, I have.” He shook his head hard. “Letting it get this far. Letting them matter like this when I knew- when I should’ve known better.”
He stopped, then said more quietly, “I’d just been alone so long after Martha.”
Donna’s brow pinched. She looked at him more carefully. “How long exactly were you on your own after Martha went home?”
He hesitated. Then, because Donna had never once made honesty feel like a trap, he answered.
“A few months.”
Donna nodded slowly.
“And then I met Astrid.”
The name was unfamiliar, but the way he said it told her enough already. He stared at the console while he spoke, eyes fixed on nothing.
“She was a waitress,” he said softly. “On a cruise ship. In space.” The ghost of a smile tried to touch his mouth and failed. “Brilliant. Funny. Bold as anything. She was going to come with me.”
Donna’s expression changed when the Doctor stopped there.
Donna’s hand tightened over his. “She died.”
His face gave him away, the old pain in it, still fresh-edged somehow, still raw enough that even now he couldn’t shape the words himself.
“Oh, Doctor,” Donna said quietly.
He gave the tiniest nod, admitting it without having to say it aloud. Then he pushed on, because stopping there would hurt too much.
“After that,” he said, voice flatter now, worn thin by memory, “I was on my own nearly a year.”
A year.
Donna let that settle.
And she could see it suddenly, the shape of what those months must have done to him. Martha leaving because she had to choose herself. Astrid gone before she’d even had the chance to stay. A year of corridors and stars and no one to talk to but himself.
Then he gave a small, humorless breath. “And then I stopped for tea.”
Donna almost smiled through the sadness of it.
“Tea,” she repeated.
He nodded once. “Tea. I met them by chance,” he said. “Didn’t mean for any of it to happen. I just went in because I didn’t want to feel like that for one more hour.”
Donna said nothing.
He looked down at their joined hands, though he was clearly seeing some little café instead of the console room.
“I didn’t want to make the same mess of it I had with Martha,” he admitted. “Didn’t want to stand there again while someone cared too much and I had nothing honest to give back. Didn’t want to lose them the way I lost Astrid. Or Rose. Or any of the others.”
He drew in a breath and let it out slowly, “But then I wanted to see them again.” The words were simple but devastating.
“And once I did, that should’ve been it, shouldn’t it? I should’ve pulled away. Kept it brief. Left it alone.” He laughed under his breath, bitterly fond. “Instead I kept coming back. Tea, then chats, then game nights, then museums and birthdays and all the rest of it. And every time I thought this is enough, leave it here, I’d turn around and want one more hour.”
Donna watched him, heart sore with it.
“So the lie kept going,” he said. “Deeper and deeper, and every time I should’ve stopped it I told myself it was kinder this way. Safer. Easier on them.”
He looked at her then, finally, and there was so much conflict in his face Donna nearly reached up to smooth it away like he was a child again.
“But I couldn’t pull away,” he said, almost to himself. “And I refuse to let them in on the half of me that would hurt them.”
That was the center of it. The conviction that the truest part of him, the Doctor, the Time Lord, the life in the Tardis, was also the part most likely to ruin whatever good thing he had managed to build.
Donna looked at him for a long moment. Then, very softly, she said, “You really love them, don’t you?”
The Doctor stared at her as if she had said the single most appalling thing possible. His eyes went wide. Shock flashed across his face first, then offense, real, almost comically indignant offense that might have been funny in any other circumstance. It settled into a look that was somewhere between horror and ‘how dare you’.
“Donna,” he said. Just her name, but packed full of outrage.
She didn’t budge.
The Doctor opened his mouth, then closed it again. His expression only grew more scandalized, like the word itself had set off alarms somewhere deep inside him.
He did not use that word. Not casually. Not carelessly. Not at all, if he could help it.
Not since the Time War.
Not since Gallifrey burned.
Not since he had lost his family and with them the part of himself that had once said that sort of thing freely, without fear that the saying of it might become a curse.
Love was not a harmless word to him. It was not light. It was not young. It was not some sweet little human confession spoken over tea or beneath fairy lights or in the hush after a good day. It was a word with ruins behind it, graves of the people he could never have back.
And Donna, who knew him just well enough now to see all of that cross his face in one quick storm, softened instantly.
“Oh,” she said, quieter now.
The Doctor looked away, jaw tight, one hand braced hard against the console as though the floor had shifted under him.
“No,” he said, but it came out thin.
Donna tilted her head. “Doctor, ”
“No.” He shook his head once, sharper this time, eyes fixed stubbornly on the time rotor. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“That.” He gestured vaguely, helplessly, as if the accusation itself still hung in the air between them. “Don’t put words to it.”
Donna was silent for a beat. His eyes began to burn with tears and his jaw set, grinding teeth. How could she say that? How could she open the box and shove her nosey human hands in and start taking things out and giving them names?
Then, gently, “Because it isn’t true?”
The Doctor laughed once through his nose, but there was no humor in it. “Because it’s not that simple.”
Which was not an answer.
She stayed where she was, her hand still resting near his on the console, no longer pushing, only present. “Right,” she said softly. “But it’s something.”
His silence stretched, and inside it Donna could see him trying to outrun himself again, to reduce it, contain it, turn it into something smaller and safer and less likely to break him open.
When he finally spoke, his voice had gone very quiet, “I care about them.”
Donna almost smiled, but he shot her a warning look before she could.
“I do,” he insisted. “I care about them. I’m fond of them. I worry about them. I-” He stopped, visibly irritated with himself for having started the list at all.
Donna waited.
“They matter,” His eyes dropped to the floor between his feet. Then the Doctor spoke again, slower this time, like he was picking his way barefoot across broken glass. “I haven’t let myself think in those terms in a very long time.”
Donna’s other hand came up to his shoulder, rubbing soothingly coxing it out of him. He looked so much older then. Not in his face, he still wore that same young shape, same expressive mouth, same bright, wounded eyes, but in the weight of him. In the exhaustion of someone who had buried entire parts of himself so deeply he had almost mistaken the burial for healing.
“Since before-” he said quietly.
Donna didn’t make him explain before what. She knew he meant before the war, before Gallifrey fell. The Doctor drew in a breath and let it out slowly.
“I can’t,” He shook his head. “Donna, if I start calling it that, if I let it become that in my own head-” He stopped again.
This time Donna finished it for him, barely above a whisper, “Then you can lose it.”
His eyes flicked to hers.
There was no point denying that because that was the horror in it, wasn’t it? Not the feeling itself, but the fact that naming it gave it a body, something time could take.
The Doctor looked down at his hands. After a while, he said, very quietly, “I don’t know what to do with it.”
That softened place in Donna, the one she kept locked down beneath all the shouting and sarcasm and sharp edges, stayed on her face for another moment. It was rare enough to feel almost holy when it surfaced, and rarer still for it to last.
So she asked, just as softly, “D’you want to know what I think?”
The Doctor looked up at her with wet eyes. He wasn’t crying, not quite, but close enough that the shine in them caught in the console light. He looked at her as if she were about to hand him the answer to the universe itself. Something monumental. The sort of advice that might crack his whole life open and set it right.
Donna Noble stared at him for one long suspenseful moment, then flicked him sharply on the ear.
The Doctor yelped and flinched back so fast he nearly lost his footing. His hand flew up to the offended ear, eyes widening in shock. “Ow! What the was that for?”
“For being thick.” Donna folded her arms.
He stood a step back from her now, one hand clapped over his ear like a scandalized schoolboy, his entire devastating mood cracked clean open by the sheer violence of Donna’s timing. His face had gone blank with confusion.
Donna looked at him like he was an idiot. “Honestly.”
He was so baffled by the sudden switch that he couldn’t even summon a comeback. He just stood there, holding his ear, blinking at her.
She took one step forward, voice rising back into that unmistakable Donna cadence. “Let me ask you something. If you’re so terrified of someone getting hurt by being with you,” she demanded, “then what the hell am I doing here?”
He blinked at her.
Donna pressed on before he could wriggle free. “If it’s all so dangerous, if it’s all so doomed, if everyone around you is apparently one wrong step from tragedy, then why’d you let me come?”
The Doctor’s mouth opened. “Donna, that’s not-”
“No, answer me.”
He frowned, still half stunned. “Of course I don’t want anything happening to you.”
“Right.”
“Of course not.”
“Then why am I here?”
The Doctor stared at her, hand still lingering near his ear, he had no answer at all because Donna did have a point.
He’d kept them carefully at arm’s length. A whole relationship built around the idea of staying just far enough back to protect them from the worst of him.
But Donna?
Donna was in the Tardis. At his side, running into danger with him as naturally as breathing. He had let her in without even properly interrogating the contradiction of it.
Why was she the exception? Why had that felt different? Why was he only just now noticing it?
He stared at her, bewilderment deepening. “I. . .” Then nothing.
Donna’s expression shifted, not softer exactly, but more grounded. Less scolding mother, more concerned friend who had decided honesty was kinder than comfort.
“Someday,” she said, “my grandad’s going to die.”
The Doctor’s head jerked back slightly. The statement came so cleanly and suddenly that for a second he looked even more confused than before.
Donna pointed at him. “Don’t you start.”
“I wasn’t, ”
“Yes, you were.” She took a breath, steadied herself, and when she spoke again her voice had lost the edge. “That fact scares me. I hate it. I hate thinking about it.”
The Doctor’s face changed, because of course it did now that he was thinking of something happening to Wilf.
Donna nodded once. “Exactly. But it doesn’t stop me loving him, does it?”
The Doctor looked down.
“You can call it whatever word you want,” Donna said. “You can dance around it, chop it up smaller, stick it in a box and label it something else if that helps you sleep at night. But that doesn’t change what it is.”
Donna stepped closer. The Doctor immediately flinched back and raised a hand to protect his ear. She stopped dead and gave him a long, unimpressed look. He lowered the hand slowly.
“That was one time,” she said.
“It hurt.”
“Don’t be dramatic.”
He still looked suspicious, but he didn’t move again, and Donna let it go.
When she spoke next, her tone turned gentler, “I’m on board the Tardis with you because, just like everyone else, you need someone,” she said. “Everyone does, even you.”
The console room hummed around them. The old ship, listening.
Donna’s voice softened another fraction. “Losing someone is part of having them in the first place.”
He swallowed.
“If it doesn’t feel like a loss when it’s gone,” she went on, “then it meant nothing. And if you’re this scared to lose them now,” Donna said, “then you’ve already got them, in a way.”
The Doctor’s eyes dropped to the floor. His hand had fallen away from his ear entirely now, forgotten. Donna watched him take that in, watched the words settle through all his fear and all his centuries of caution and strike somewhere painfully close to center.
“So,” she said, with a small shrug that could not hide the tenderness beneath it, “you might as well enjoy as much of whatever word you choose while you can.”
The Doctor stood very still.
His expression had gone strange again. Like she had reached in and moved something fundamental a few inches to the left, and now he was standing there trying to understand the new shape of himself.
After a long silence, he said, almost dazed, “That’s your advice?”
Donna snorted. “What, were you expecting poetry?”
He looked at her with the faintest spark of himself returning. “A bit.”
“You got an ear flick.”
“I did get an ear flick.”
“Count yourself lucky.”
That pulled the smallest, weakest laugh out of him. Donna saw it and smiled, just slightly.
The Doctor dragged a hand over his face and looked away, breath catching halfway to a sigh. “I hate it when you make sense.”
“I know.”
“And I especially hate it when you make sense by threatening me.”
“That’s because you’re thick.”
He almost argued, then thought better of it, because somewhere in the middle of her bizarre combination of violence and compassion, she had done what he’d been unable to do for himself: She had made the thing feel less like a complicated catastrophe and more like a simple fact.
He leaned back against the console at last, spent and thoughtful and still a little protective of his injured ear.
“Take me home,” Donna said, with the firm finality of someone issuing orders rather than making a request.
The Doctor nodded once and turned back to the controls. He slipped easily into the motions of it, hands moving over levers and dials, the Tardis answering him with her familiar groan and thrum. It was muscle memory by now, or something deeper than that. Even rattled, even emotionally flayed open and stitched back together by Donna Noble in the span of ten minutes, he could still fly the ship.
Donna hovered near the console, arms folded.
“And you’re staying for dinner,” she informed him. Then she squinted upward as if trying to calculate time by sheer force. “Or lunch. Or whatever it is by the time we get there.”
The Doctor didn’t argue.
“Good,” Donna said, taking his silence for agreement exactly as she intended. “You’ll sit there, you’ll chat with Grandad, you’ll smile, you’ll laugh.”
The Doctor glanced at her sidelong, mouth twitching.
“You’ll perk up,” she went on. “I’m not having you skulking around my mum’s house looking like a kicked puppy.”
That got a faint smile out of him. He could picture it easily enough, Wilf’s warm face lighting up at the sight of them, the easy comfort of tea and stories and Donna rolling her eyes while still leaning into every second of it. Time well spent.
And from there, because his mind was treacherous, it wandered to Saturday. To a little flat and a pillow fort probably already half-planned in their head. To the certainty that when he knocked, they’d be waiting for him. The thought warmed him.
Then Donna cut cleanly through it.
“And after we’ve had our fill of my mother,” she said, too casually, “we’ll pop back in the Tardis and you’ll introduce me to this friend of yours.”
The Doctor stopped dead, every movement on the console hit a visible hitch. Then he looked at her. “What?”
Donna lifted a brow. “You heard me.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
The Doctor turned fully away from the controls, scandalized. “Absolutely not.”
Donna didn’t even blink. “Absolutely yes.”
“Donna-”
“If you’re pretending to be human,” she said, shrugging one shoulder, “then I’ve got no problem. I am human.”
“That is not the problem.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Then what is?”
The Doctor opened his mouth, closed it, then pened it again. “It just isn’t.”
Donna’s expression flattened. “That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the answer you’re getting.”
“Oh, don’t be stupid.”
“I’m not being stupid.”
“You’re being incredibly stupid.”
The Doctor’s voice rose. “Donna!”
She stepped in before he could build up momentum and, with deadly efficiency, flicked his other ear.
He yelped and jerked back, one hand flying up in immediate self-defense. “Ow! What is wrong with you?”
Donna drew herself up. “What is wrong with you?”
“That is my other ear!”
“Good. Balanced now.”
“You can’t keep doing that!” The Doctor stared at her in disbelief, cupping the offended ear.
“I can, and I will.”
He glared. “Violence is not a substitute for persuasion.”
“It is when you’re being thick.”
He made a strangled noise of outrage.
Donna pointed at him before he could launch into a proper protest. “You just spent all that time standing there having a breakdown over this person, and now you’re acting like introducing them to one normal woman from Chiswick is too much?”
The Doctor still had one hand clamped over his ear. “You are not normal.”
Donna blinked. “Oi.”
“You’re not!”
She gave this a second’s thought. “Fair point. But I’m human, and that’s close enough.”
He dropped his hand just long enough to gesture wildly. “Donna, you don’t understand.”
“Then explain it.”
“I can’t just turn up with you!”
“Why not?”
“Because,” He stopped, visibly grasping for words. “Because I can’t.”
Donna folded her arms. “That’s nonsense.”
“It isn’t.”
“It is.”
The Doctor dragged a hand through his hair, already looking frayed again. “They know me one way.”
“And?”
“And you complicate that.”
Donna gaped at him. “Me?”
“Yes, you!”
“What, by existing?”
“By asking questions!”
“I’m allowed to ask questions!”
“Exactly!”
Donna stared at him for one long beat, then huffed through her nose. “So what, I’d blow your cover in five minutes?”
The Doctor didn’t answer which was answer enough.
Her eyes widened in fresh offense. “Oh, that is rude.”
“It’s also true.”
“I can do subtle!”
The Doctor looked at her and Donna looked back. Then she pointed at him again. “Alright, maybe not subtle. But I can behave.”
That earned a deeply skeptical sound from him.
“Doctor,” she said, warningly.
He sighed, rubbing at his temple now instead of his ears. “It’s not just that.”
Donna’s expression shifted to something more serious.
He looked away, back to the console, to the moving light in the rotor, to anything that wasn’t her knowing face. “They’ve got an idea of me,” he said quietly. “And I told them about you, said you were a coworker. I can’t show up to plans we made with a random coworker.”
Donna said nothing, just watched the line of his shoulders tighten. He was afraid. Afraid the careful balance he’d built would crack if too many truths stood next to each other at once. Donna took that in, and though her expression softened a fraction, her resolve did not.
“Right,” she said. “Still meeting them.”
The Doctor actually laughed then, a short, disbelieving sound. “Donna!”
“No, because now I definitely want to. Anyone who’s got you this twisted up must be worth knowing.”
He groaned and turned back to the controls, pretending very hard that flying the Tardis required absolute concentration and not wanting in the slightest to continue this conversation.
Donna leaned one elbow on the console, watching him with infuriating patience.
“You can protest all you like,” she said. “I’m meeting them eventually.”
The Doctor muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like ‘over my dead body’.
Donna heard it anyway. “Don’t be dramatic.”
“I’m not dramatic.”
She gave him a long look.
The Doctor, still nursing both ears in spirit if not in action, glared at the controls as though they had somehow betrayed him too. But beneath the protest and panic and Donna’s impossible meddling, there was another feeling curling quietly through him.
The image of them meeting.
Donna with her sharp tongue and sharper heart. Them with their quick humor and infuriating warmth. They’d get along so well. Which probably, he thought grimly, meant Donna was right again.
Donna watched him work the controls for another moment, then said, far too casually, “We could always ask my grandad what he thinks.”
The Doctor turned to her so fast he looked genuinely horrified. She brightened at once, because that reaction alone was worth saying it.
“What?” she asked innocently. “Grandad wives lovely advice. Bit of perspective, that’s all.”
“You are not dragging Wilf into this.” The Doctor stared at her as though she had just threatened him with public execution.
Donna’s grin widened. “Why not?”
“Because, ” He stopped, scandalized by the fact that he apparently had to explain this. “Because he does not need to know about my,” He made a vague, useless gesture in the air. “This.”
Donna folded her arms, delighted. “Your what?”
The Doctor looked deeply betrayed. “You know exactly what.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” she said, drawing the moment out with shameless pleasure. “Could be all sorts. Your little secret friend. Your mysterious text messages. Your tragic pining.”
“Donna!”
She laughed outright.
And the thing was, he did love Wilf. Deeply, instinctively, in that way that had no room for irony. Loved him like comfort and starlight and tea on cold nights. Loved him with something dangerously close to the shape of a father, or perhaps the closest thing he could bear to one.
Which was precisely why the idea of Donna going to Wilf with the Doctor’s relationship drama felt so catastrophically, absurdly humiliating. It was all kinds of elementary-school embarrassing.
The Doctor actually looked ill at the prospect.
“I’m just saying,” she said, shrugging one shoulder, “you could bite the bullet and introduce me, and Grandad never has to know.”
The Doctor narrowed his eyes. “That,” he said, “is an appallingly weak attempt at blackmail.”
Donna lifted her chin. “Still blackmail.”
“It’s not even proper blackmail. There’s no finesse.”
“And yet,” she said, smug now, “it’s working.”
Worse than the threat itself, worse even than the image of Donna sitting at Wilf’s kitchen table saying ‘so the Doctor’s got a thing for someone and he’s being weird about it’, was the maddening fact that she was right, it was working.
The Tardis groaned softly as the last coordinates settled into place, and the console room lights shifted around them. Earth. Chiswick. Wilf. Sylvia. Lunch or dinner or whatever meal Donna’s mother would insist on feeding them at.
The Doctor looked down at the console for one second longer than necessary, then reached for the lever.
★ Part 1 ★ Part 2 ★ Part 3 ★ Part 4 ★ Part 5 ★ Part 5.2 ★
✰ Word Count: 15k
✰ Summary: The Doctor makes a friend with a humble barista in England. They’re friends. Thats it. They're just friends.
✰ Warnings: 10th Doctor, Genter Nutural Reader, They/Them pronouns, romantic pining, Will They? Won’t They?, the doctor is bad at art, “Well” -The Doctor, Art nerds
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This is for @vexerieart, who made me smile with their kind words, bitch boosted my ego SO BAD. So I just want to return the favor, pay the smile forward. I hope this cheers you up since you’ve been sick, my love. <3
Btw I am an art geek lol! The paintings I reference are housed in London's National Gallery, and I would die to see them irl.
The Doctor’s hands were buried deep in the pockets of his coat, shoulders slightly hunched, head tipped at just enough of an angle to suggest he was seeing something no one else in the room could. The soft lighting caught in the sharp line of his profile, gilding the bridge of his nose and the restless intelligence in his eyes. He looked entirely at home beneath centuries of framed history, like he belonged among old things and old stories.
“The brushwork’s lighter than people expect,” he said, voice low but quick, the words already gathering speed as he went. “That’s the trick of it. Everyone remembers the color first, the greens, the reflections, all that lovely softness, but the structure underneath is terribly clever. Makes it look effortless. Isn’t, of course. Never is.”
He took one hand out of his pocket to gesture vaguely toward the canvas hanging just inches from his face, fingers fluttering through the air as if he could map each detail without quite touching it.
“The Water-Lily Pond,” he went on, his tone bright with admiration, “people talk about it like it’s just tranquil, but it’s not just tranquil. That bridge there, Japanese influence, obviously, Monet was fascinated, and the way he lets the foliage nearly swallow it, that’s deliberate. Makes it feel like you’ve stumbled onto it by accident, like nature happened to arrange itself into art while no one was looking.”
He leaned in a little closer, eyes narrowing slightly.
“Which is nonsense, obviously. Takes a staggering amount of work to make something look that unforced.”
He sounded less like someone reciting facts and more like someone talking about an old friend whose habits he knew by heart. The sort of enthusiasm that turned him into something almost luminous overtook him, his words tumbling faster and faster as he warmed to the subject.
“Monet understood atmosphere in a way very few people ever do. Not just what a place looked like, but what it felt like to stand in it. That’s harder. Anyone can paint a bridge. Capturing the air around it? Different thing entirely.”
He shifted his weight, the sole of his trainer squeaking faintly against the polished floor. His tie hung slightly crooked from the walk it took to get here, but he seemed entirely unaware of it, too caught up in the painting to care.
“And he was stubborn,” the Doctor added, almost fondly. “Which helped. Painters ought to be stubborn. Don’t trust one who isn’t. You don’t keep chasing light like that unless something in you refuses to give up, no matter how many times it slips away.”
Only then did he step back from the canvas at last, slow and reluctant, like pulling himself out of deep water. His gaze stayed on the painting another second longer before he exhaled softly through his nose and muttered, almost to himself, “Claude was a clever man.”
The spell of his rambling broke when they stepped in beside him, close enough that their shoulder nearly brushed his arm.
They tipped their head, looking from the painting to him with a crooked little smile. “You know,” they said, “it’s getting a bit ridiculous how much you know about art.”
The Doctor finally dragged his eyes away from the Monet and glanced down at them. “Is it?”
“Yes.” They folded their arms, feigning offense. “I’m meant to be the artist here. You’re supposed to be the geek.”
That won a laugh from him, quick and bright and entirely unbothered.
“Oh, you are,” he said easily. “You have your art. I have history.” Something about the way he said it, like the two of them fit naturally into those roles, made their smile soften.
“Right,” they murmured, amused. “Convenient for you.”
“Very.”
He gave the painting one last lingering look before finally turning away, and together they began to drift through the rest of the gallery.
The room opened wide around them, grand and quiet in the way museums always seemed to be. Tall walls stretched upward, hung in careful rows with heavy gilt frames and little brass plaques. The polished wood floor shone beneath the overhead lights, reflecting a softened glow that made every step feel just a touch more hushed, more careful. Crown molding traced the ceiling in elegant detail, lending the whole hall a weighty sort of importance, as though even the air inside expected reverence.
Their footsteps clicked softly as they walked side by side, slowing now and then before one painting or another, never quite in a hurry. The Doctor kept his hands in his coat pockets this time, posture loose and wandering, though there was still that restless alertness in him, as if every frame on the wall might prompt another delighted little lecture if given half the chance.
And beside him, they smiled to themselves, because it was impossible not to. He looked so entirely in his element here.
“Seriously,” they said, glancing over at him as they slowed in front of another painting, “thank you.” They thanked him again, though by this point it had to be the thousandth time.
The Doctor looked almost offended by the repetition, though the smile tugging at his mouth ruined the effect. “You’re welcome,” he said, softer this time. Then, with a little tilt of his head, “And happy birthday. Again.”
They laughed under their breath, hands slipping into their pockets as they turned in a slow circle to take in the room around them once more. “This is so much better than staying home, ordering takeout, and arguing over a game.”
The Doctor made a quiet, dismissive sound. “There’d be no arguing if you didn’t cheat.”
They turned to him at once. “I do not cheat.”
Before they could properly start protesting, he spoke over them instead, voice brightening as he looked around the gallery again. His grin was impossible to miss, boyish and pleased, like a child being proven right in real time.
“Well?” he said, spreading one hand slightly as though presenting the entire hall to them. “What did I say?”
They narrowed their eyes, already smiling. “Oh no.”
“What?”
“That’s an I told you so face.”
“It is not.”
“It absolutely is.”
He looked delighted with himself. “Well, maybe just a little.”
They laughed and shook their head, and he continued before the moment could slip away, already swept up again in his own enthusiasm.
“I said birthdays deserved proper celebration,” he reminded them, walking backward for a step or two so he could face them more fully as they moved through the room. “Not just takeaway and television and your frankly alarming determination to destroy me at games.”
“Alarming?”
“Yes,” he said gravely. “Deeply worrying.”
They bumped his arm lightly with the back of their hand, and he only grinned wider. Then his attention flicked outward again, toward the paintings, the soft light, the polished floors stretching ahead of them.
“This,” he said, turning half in place to gesture around them, “this is a celebration. History and beauty and a thousand stories all crammed into one building. Humans at their best, really. Trying to leave something behind that says we were here, and this mattered.”
His voice had gone a touch warmer, less teasing now, touched with that familiar note of awe he got whenever he spoke about something he loved.
“Museums are marvelous,” he went on. “Bit quiet for some people, I know, but I love them. Love the way they hold time still, just for a little while. You can walk through entire lifetimes in a single afternoon. Art, invention, memory, obsession, half the human race putting pieces of themselves on display and hoping the other half bothers to look.”
They watched him as he spoke, far more interested in him than any of the paintings on the wall. He always did this. Took something ordinary, or at least something they’d thought was ordinary, and made it feel bigger, stranger, somehow alive with meaning they hadn’t noticed before.
They smiled and tipped their head. “Be honest.”
He glanced at them. “Always dangerous.”
“Was this present really for me,” they asked, “or for you?”
That won an immediate grin. He stepped a little closer as they kept walking, the sleeve of his coat brushing theirs before he nudged their shoulder with his, lightly at first, almost playful.
Then he didn’t move away.
The contact stayed there, easy and warm, his shoulder pressed to theirs as though it had happened by accident and was simply too natural to correct.
“Why can’t it be both?” he asked.
They looked up at him. He was still smiling, eyes bright with mischief, but there was something gentler tucked underneath it now. Something fond enough to make their stomach flip in a way they very firmly refused to examine.
So they rolled their eyes instead, because that was safer.
“Convenient answer.”
“Best kind.”
They huffed a laugh, and neither of them broke the line of contact as they wandered deeper into the gallery, shoulder to shoulder beneath the high ceilings and watchful frames.
They had barely made it halfway down the wall before the Doctor lit up all over again.
“Oh!” He pointed suddenly, the sound bright enough that they followed his hand at once.
A large painting hung a few frames ahead, sunlit and open in tone, full of quiet figures along a riverbank. It had the sort of softness that invited you in before you understood why.
They slowed beside him and tipped their head. “That is pretty.”
The Doctor’s grin widened at once, the look of a man delighted to have found a new excuse to talk. They glanced up at him and braced themself automatically, already expecting the ramble.
He did not disappoint.
“Bathers at Asnières,” he said, almost fondly, stepping a little closer to the canvas. “Georges Seurat. Early work, this one. Before everyone started going on about the other one.”
He gestured loosely toward the painting, fingers flicking from one figure to another as he spoke.
“It’s younger somehow, isn’t it? More open. You can feel him trying things out, light, composition, atmosphere. There’s structure to it, obviously, carefully arranged, but it hasn’t yet become quite so controlled.” He tilted his head, eyes narrowing thoughtfully. “Still terribly clever, though.”
They smiled, watching him more than the painting. He always looked brightest when he was explaining something. His whole face changed, more alive somehow, all quick eyes and animated hands and that eager note in his voice like he genuinely couldn’t help sharing every interesting thing in his head.
“Are you familiar with A Day at the Park?” he asked suddenly, glancing at them. Then he corrected himself with a little wrinkle of his nose. “Or, more accurately, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte.”
Their face lit with recognition. “Is that the one made up of all the little dots?”
The Doctor beamed, clearly delighted that they knew what he meant.
“Yes!” he said, almost triumphant. “That’s the one. Same artist. Georges Seurat. Father of Pointillism.”
“This was his too?” They looked back at the painting with renewed interest.
“Mmhm.” The Doctor nodded, pleased with himself and with them for following along. “Painted only two years before the one everyone knows him for. Which is fascinating, really, because you can already feel where he’s heading, but he’s not fully there yet.”
They leaned a little closer to the canvas, squinting as though dots might suddenly reveal themselves if they stared hard enough. “Wait. So was all his art made of little dots?”
“No, not all of it.” The Doctor chuckled softly at that, stepping in beside them.
They squinted harder anyway. “I’m looking for dots.”
“You won’t find many here.”
“That sounds like quitter talk.”
He laughed under his breath, warm and amused, and they could feel the sound more than hear it with how close he stood.
“Pointillism didn’t spring fully formed out of thin air,” he said. “He worked toward it. Experimented. Shifted. Like most artists do when they’re busy becoming themselves.”
They glanced up at him. “That was annoyingly poetic.”
“I’m allowed. We’re in a museum.”
They smiled and looked back at the painting.
From this close, they could see more of what he meant. The color, the careful balance of figures, the light resting over the scene. Not dots, exactly, but something deliberate all the same.
The Doctor stepped nearer the little brass plaque, then leaned back again, hands returning to his coat pockets. “It’s funny,” he said, a thoughtful note slipping into his voice. “Everyone remembers the famous technique. The gimmick, if you like. But there’s always all this,” he nodded toward the canvas, “before it. The years of figuring things out. People love the finished version of an artist. They’re less interested in the becoming.”
They looked at him for a second, caught unexpectedly by the softness in his tone. Then, because that felt a little too serious all of a sudden, they nudged his arm lightly with theirs.
“So what you’re saying is,” they said, “I’m witnessing your early work whenever you lose at Mario Kart.”
“That is not even remotely similar.” The Doctor turned to them with a look of deep offense.
“It is to me.”
“I’m talking about artistic development. You’re talking nonsense.”
They grinned. “And yet you understood me perfectly.”
He shook his head, but the corner of his mouth lifted anyway.
The Doctor perked up again almost immediately, as if standing still for too long might do him actual harm.
“Come on,” he said, already turning and motioning for them to follow. “Plenty more to see. So many paintings, so little daylight.”
They laughed and let him lead them farther down the hall, his energy returning in that familiar rush, quick steps, bright eyes, coat swaying around his legs as he moved from one possibility to the next.
It was in moments like this that the want hit him hardest.
Not just to show them a museum. To show them everything, the real everything.
He wanted, absurdly and all at once, to catch their hand and pull them out of this hushed gallery, back through the streets of London, into the Tardis. He wanted to watch their face the first time the doors opened onto somewhere impossible. To take them not just to paintings, but to the moments before they were paintings. To the cramped studios and sunlit fields and half-finished canvases leaning against walls while genius was still wet paint.
He wanted to introduce them. Not in the vague, showy way he sometimes hinted at history, but properly.
Tea with van Gogh while he talked too quickly and gestured with paint-stained hands. A polite handshake with Leonardo da Vinci and an argument that lasted three hours because neither of them knew when to stop. A lazy afternoon in Giverny, mud on their shoes, while Monet squinted at light on the water and complained that the color wasn’t right yet.
He wanted them to see the becoming of things. The drafts, the mistakes, the humanity inside all those famous names. He wanted to give them that.
The thought landed warm and sharp in his chest. And then, just as quickly, it turned sour.
Because he couldn’t, not really. Not without telling them the truth. The Doctor’s steps slowed only a fraction before he forced them steady again, hands sinking deeper into his coat pockets.
He had dug this hole too deep now.
John, with his vague work trips and his easy smiles and his little half-truths, had become too solid a shape between them. Telling them now would not be some simple correction, not some harmless reveal followed by a laugh and an explanation. It would crack something open. Alter the shape of him in their eyes. Change this, whatever this was, into something stranger and harder to hold.
And maybe they would take it well. Maybe they would laugh in disbelief, ask a hundred brilliant questions, lean into it with that same open curiosity they brought to everything else.
Or maybe they wouldn’t. Maybe they would look at him and only see the lie. The omissions. The oddness they had excused because they thought he was only a man with quirks and secrets, not this.
Not a Time Lord. Not an alien. Not a traveler who could pluck centuries out of the air like petals and hand them over as though they weighed nothing.
He wasn’t willing to risk that; that was the ugly truth of it. For all his talk, all his swagger, all the centuries of clever plans and impossible bravery, when it came to this, to them, he was a coward.
He kept walking.
Beside him, they were still smiling faintly from the last joke, still looking around the gallery with an artist’s eye, still entirely unaware of the war quietly waged inside him.
The Doctor glanced at them and felt that old, dangerous fondness tighten in his chest. He swallowed it down, tucked the truth neatly out of sight, and pointed ahead to another painting with renewed brightness.
“Ooh,” he said, seizing on the distraction with practiced ease. “Now that one’s interesting.”
They stepped up beside the next painting and both slowed instinctively.
It was a portrait of a young woman in white, standing atop a wolf pelt rug, her dress falling in soft, luminous folds around her feet. Her red hair spilled loose over her shoulders, and something was arresting in the way she held herself, dreamlike and distant, as though she had been interrupted halfway through a thought and never quite returned from it.
The barista tipped their head, studying it.
“She’s beautiful,” they murmured. “Look at the detail in her face.” Their eyes traced the work more closely. “And her hair. God, that’s good.”
The Doctor stood beside them, hands in his coat pockets, smiling faintly, though some piece of him still seemed a little far away, still shaking off the private thought that had caught him on the walk over.
They took a half step back from the canvas and looked up at him expectantly. The Doctor, still only half paying attention, didn’t notice at first. Then he glanced down, caught them staring, and lifted his brows.
“What?”
“What do you mean, what?” They gave him a look.
He blinked innocently. “What are you looking at me for?”
They gestured between him and the painting. “For the lecture, obviously.”
“The lecture.”
“Yes. The painting, the artist, some scandalous little historical detail you happen to know for no normal reason.”
The Doctor scoffed, a laugh slipping into it. “I do not know everything.”
They smiled, slow and teasing. “Mm. You only make it look that way when you show off.”
“I am not showing off.”
“You absolutely are.”
He opened his mouth, clearly preparing a defense, but before he could deliver it, they turned toward the little plaque beneath the frame and leaned in to read it.
“Symphony in White, number one. The White Girl,” they read aloud. “James Whistler.”
The Doctor made a small sound of recognition. “Oh.”
They looked back at him immediately, triumphant. “There it is.”
He narrowed his eyes. “There what is?”
“That noise.”
“What noise?”
“That oh, I know this one noise.”
“I’ve got a noise?” His mouth twitched despite himself.
“You’ve got several.”
“I do not.”
“You do.”
They pointed toward the painting with one finger, smiling. “Go on then, encyclopedia.”
The Doctor huffed a laugh through his nose and tilted his head toward the canvas again, whatever had clouded him a moment ago now softened by their easy insistence.
“Well,” he said, drawing the word out as he looked the painting over, “for one thing, Whistler always did have a flair for naming things as though they were musical compositions. Bit pretentious. Effective, though.”
They smiled to themself, pleased to have coaxed him back into it. As they drifted away from the painting and on toward the next, the Doctor was still frowning at them in exaggerated offense.
“I do not have noises,” he said.
They laughed under their breath, hands tucked into their coat pockets as they walked. “You absolutely do.”
“I don’t.”
“You do.”
“Name one.” The Doctor slowed slightly, watching them out of the corner of his eye.
They looked up at him with a grin that should have warned him not to ask.
“Well,” they said.
He blinked.
They straightened a little and slipped into a pitch-perfect imitation of him, complete with the slight pause and particular emphasis he always used when he was about to correct someone or double back on something he’d said too quickly.
“Well.” They lifted a finger in the air, their voice tipping into his exact inflection with unsettling accuracy. “Well. Well. Well.”
The Doctor stopped short.
They kept going, delighted now, “Well no, that’s not what I meant, ‘cause technically-”
He stared at them. They were laughing too hard to finish properly, shoulders shaking with it, their face lit with the sheer satisfaction of having caught him in something so absurdly specific.
“That is not what I sound like.” The Doctor narrowed his eyes.
They pointed at him immediately. “That was exactly what you sound like.”
“It was not.”
“It was.”
He fell into step beside them again, still looking mildly scandalized. “It was a grotesque exaggeration.”
They were still chuckling. “No, it wasn’t.”
“Yes, it was.”
“You say ‘well’ all the time.”
“I do not say it three times.”
They shrugged. The Doctor made an affronted noise under his breath, which only sent them into another fresh wave of laughter.
“Oh, and that!” they said, turning toward him as they walked backward for a step. “That little offended huff thing.”
He looked even more betrayed. “I’m beginning to regret bringing you here.”
“Liar.”
He opened his mouth to retort, but they were already rolling on.
“You’ve got the sniff, too.”
The Doctor hesitated. “The what?”
“The sniff.”
They demonstrated it, just a tiny scrunch of the nose and a quiet little sound that was maddeningly, horribly familiar.
“Oh, no.” His expression changed, flattening with horror.
“Oh, yes,” they said, grinning wider. “You do it when you’re uncomfortable.”
“I do not.”
“And when you’re thinking about what to say.”
“That’s nonsense.”
“It’s not nonsense.” They tilted their head, studying him with obvious mischief. “You do it all the time.”
He shook his head once, as if refusing the entire premise on principle. “I absolutely don’t.”
They gave him a look that said he was fooling no one.
Then, with a smile that softened around the edges, they added, “You do it over text, too.”
The Doctor glanced at them. “Over text.”
“Mmhm.”
“That’s impossible.”
“It really isn’t.”
He looked deeply skeptical. “How, exactly, does one sniff in a text message?”
They laughed quietly and turned their attention to the next painting only halfway, more interested in him than the art now.
“I don’t know,” they admitted, “but somehow you manage it.”
“That makes no sense.”
“I know.” They smiled to themself. “When you’re away and we’re texting, sometimes I can practically hear it anyway. Like you’re in the room doing that little thinking face at your phone.”
The Doctor said nothing for a moment. They kept walking, but more slowly now, the museum hushed around them.
“You just,” They shrugged one shoulder. “You’ve got very specific habits, I guess.”
He was still looking at them.
“And you text like you talk,” they went on. “So it’s not hard to imagine the rest.”
There it was, in the middle of their teasing and impressions and easy little observations: the plain fact that they noticed him. That they had spent enough time with him, in person and apart, to know the shape of his pauses. The sounds he made when he was uncertain. The odd rhythm of him well enough to hear it even in silence. The Doctor felt something in his chest go tight and warm at once.
“That’s mildly unsettling.” He tried for offense again, but it came out weaker than before.
They smiled and bumped his arm lightly with theirs. “I know you.”
For one brief second, the Doctor forgot whatever glib response he’d been about to give. Then he recovered, sniffed, actually sniffed, and immediately looked annoyed with himself for doing it.
They laughed so brightly at that that even he had to smile.
“Oh, don’t start,” he muttered.
“Too late,” they said, still grinning. “That one was practically on command.”
He shook his head, though the corners of his mouth had given up the fight entirely now.
The Doctor changed the subject so quickly it was almost impressive.
“Tea,” he said, with the brisk certainty of a man declaring a solution rather than making a suggestion. “Or something equally restorative. It must be nearly lunchtime by now.”
They let him steer the conversation away without protest. Whatever he’d been trying to outrun with that abrupt pivot, he was doing it with enough charm that it hardly felt worth chasing. Instead, they smiled, cheeky, knowing, and slipped their arm through his as naturally as breathing.
“Lead the way, then.”
The Doctor glanced down at where they’d linked onto him, and for half a second, his expression flickered with something he couldn’t quite smooth over in time. Then it settled back into a grin, easy and bright, and he started forward with them tucked at his side.
They left the gallery hall together, their steps softening as they crossed from the polished wood floors into the main corridor. The museum opened wider here, the ceilings higher, the light cooler and brighter from the skylights above. Footsteps echoed faintly off the stone, and voices carried in low, respectful murmurs from visitors drifting between exhibits.
The Doctor seemed entirely recovered now, his energy turning outward again.
“Oh!” he said suddenly, perking up. “Gift shop.”
They laughed. “What about it?”
“We’ve got to stop there before we go.”
They looked up at him, amused. “Do we?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He glanced at them as though the answer should have been painfully obvious. “Because I love a little shop.”
“Of course you do.” That earned a snort of laughter from them.
“They’ve always got something odd in them,” he said, already warming to the subject. “Postcards no one sends, pencils no one needs, tiny overpriced replicas of ancient objects, brilliant.”
“Overpriced tat,” they translated.
He looked delighted. “Exactly.”
They shook their head, smiling, and stayed hooked on his arm as they continued down the corridor.
Along one wall, set back into a shallow alcove, stood a large bronze statue on display, dark and gleaming beneath its dedicated lights, imposing enough to pull the eye even at a distance. The Doctor’s gaze snagged on it for a moment, his attention shifting instinctively toward the shape of it, curiosity already beginning to flicker.
But they were in the middle of saying something, some teasing remark about him absolutely buying a museum-branded pen and pretending it was a historical treasure, and he looked back to them instead, his focus stolen before he could properly take the statue in.
They were just passing the alcove when two women standing in front of it stepped forward.
“Excuse me?” one of them asked.
The Doctor and the barista both slowed.
The woman lifted her phone with an apologetic smile. “Sorry to bother you, would one of you mind taking a photo for us?”
The Doctor blinked once, attention shifting fully at last. The Doctor took the phone, all easy smiles and bright manners.
“Of course,” he said. “Right then, stand wherever you like.”
The two women moved back in front of the statue, adjusting themselves with the half-laughing fussiness of people trying to decide who looked better on which side. They were older, though not old, stylish in a comfortable sort of way, clearly out enjoying the day together.
The Doctor held up the phone and beamed at them as though this were a professional engagement.
“Lovely,” he said. “Now then, smile.”
They did, and he snapped the photo. Then another and another.
The barista stood off to the side watching, amused, as he immediately slipped into full charm. He angled the phone slightly, stepped a fraction to the left, then crouched just enough to improve the shot.
“Oh, that’s nice,” he said. “Very nice. Bit closer together, yes, like that. Wonderful.”
One of the women laughed. “You’re taking this very seriously.”
“Well, if you’re going to have a photograph, it ought to be a good one.”
The other woman touched her friend’s arm and smiled toward the camera again. The Doctor took another few shots, looking absurdly pleased with himself.
“Perfect,” he said. “One more, there we are. Brilliant.”
The barista watched him linger on the screen, still tapping away, still clearly taking more than just the one picture he’d been asked for. There was something almost unbearably endearing about the concentration on his face, like he’d decided this tiny favor deserved the full weight of his attention.
They nudged him lightly in the side.
The Doctor glanced at them, blinking once as if he’d momentarily forgotten where he was. “Hm?”
“You can stop now, Mr. photographer.”
“Oh.” He looked back at the phone, then up at the women, and gave a cheeky little grin. “Right. Yes. Sorry.” He handed the phone back.
The woman who had asked for help took it with a smile. “Thank you so much.”
“Not at all,” the Doctor said.
She looked between the two of them then, her expression warming further. “And you two are adorable.”
The Doctor cocked his head. There was just a flicker of pause, so brief most people would have missed it.
Then he smiled anyway, easy as ever. “Thank you.”
The women drifted off a moment later, already looking down at the photos and murmuring to each other in pleased little tones.
The Doctor and the barista started walking again. Only now, the barista had gone strangely stiff beside him. The shift in posture was small, but he had become annoyingly good at reading them; he felt it there in the slight tension of their arm still looped through his, in the way their gaze fixed a bit too hard on the corridor ahead.
He glanced sideways at them. “What?”
They looked up too quickly. “Nothing.”
The Doctor arched a brow. They made a face, awkward and a little pinched around the edges, then looked forward again.
After another few steps, they said, “She thought we were a couple.”
The Doctor was quiet for half a beat, then, “Ah.”
“And a cute one, apparently.” They cleared their throat.
He made a small sound that might have been amusement, might have been surprise. They risked a glance at him and found him looking back, curious, as though he was trying to figure out why this had rattled them.
“You just said thank you,” they said, a touch too pointedly.
The Doctor blinked. “Yes.”
They stared at him. He stared back. Then, slowly, understanding began to dawn across his face.
“Oh,” he said.
They looked away again at once, suddenly fascinated by a sign for the museum café.
“I mean,” they said awkwardly, “that’s all. It’s just, she assumed, and then you-”
“Said thank you.”
“Yes.”
“That was the issue, was it?” The Doctor’s mouth twitched.
They exhaled through their nose, embarrassed now that they’d started talking at all. “It was a bit like agreeing with her.”
He looked ahead for a moment, thinking. Then he glanced back to them, his expression impossible to read for a second, somewhere between amused and something softer, stranger.
“Well,” he said lightly, “she said we were adorable. Felt rude to argue.”
That made them huff a laugh despite themselves. He smiled at the sound, pleased to have coaxed it out of them. But the air had shifted, only slightly.
The Doctor looked ahead again, his voice gentler when he added, “Besides, I think she was mostly being nice.”
They nodded, though they weren’t sure that actually made it less complicated. Still linked to his arm, they kept walking toward the café, both a little quieter than before, and both thinking far more about that woman’s offhand comment than either of them wanted to admit.
It had begun as a joke, or near enough. A passing comment from a stranger, harmless and brief, the sort of thing that should have slid past him without leaving a mark. Normally it would have. Normally he would have smiled, said something clever, and moved on without a second thought.
But the thought stayed. The trouble was that he hadn’t minded it at all.
If anything, being mistaken for their boyfriend, or whatever neat little human label the woman had meant, had not felt odd in the slightest. No jolt of wrongness. No instinctive need to laugh it off or correct her, he hadn’t even really realized or thought about it until they mentioned it. The words had landed with a strange, easy sort of fit, settling against him like they belonged somewhere his mind had already built without asking permission.
No, the awkward part had been them.
The way they had stiffened beside him. The careful, stilted way they had brought it up. The embarrassment curling around the edges of their voice as though the whole thing had caught them off guard in a way it hadn’t caught him.
That was what had left him unsettled. Because the possibility had been there, hadn’t it? Quietly and patiently, creeping up in the back of his mind for months.
Woven through game nights and takeaway boxes and long conversations in their little flat. Through the ease of knowing which mug was theirs, of watching them curl into the corner of the couch with sleep heavy in their eyes. Through linked arms in museum corridors and texts sent too often to be casual and the way his hearts had gone so impossibly still when they’d leaned close to him on the sofa.
It did not feel absurd.
It would have been easier if it felt ridiculous, if the very idea had made him recoil in disbelief. But instead it rose up in him with terrible, disarming softness. An image more than a thought. Domestic evenings recast in a different light. The same flat, the same couch, the same laughter, only now with all the careful deniability stripped away.
It almost made him smile until sense caught up with him, and the smile never came. Because the moment he let the thought settle properly, all its complications crowded in behind it.
He had said it before, to Rose, once. Quietly, in one of those rare moments when honesty had slipped out before he could stop it. The curse of a Time Lord. How humans aged and withered and changed, and he didn’t. Not the same way. He could love them, perhaps, but never in the clean, equal way stories liked to promise. Not while time kept moving so differently through him. Not while he remained, and they did not.
He could still hear himself saying it. How one day she would grow old, and he would not, how he would watch. And now it’s them he’d be forced to watch.
His jaw tightened almost imperceptibly.
Even if he were foolish enough to let himself feel these things freely, even if he stopped lying to himself about what was happening here, about what he wanted, there was no future in it that didn’t fray at the edges the longer he looked. They would age, their face would change. Their life would move forward in ways his never really did. And if he stayed too close for too long, if he let them watch the years gather on themselves while he remained infuriatingly, impossibly the same, they would notice.
Of course they would notice.
Humans noticed more than people gave them credit for. They noticed habits, sounds, the shape of pauses in text messages. They noticed when someone was late, when someone smiled too long, when someone never seemed to change quite the way they ought to.
They would catch on.
And then what? Tell them the truth after all that? Confess not only what he was, but how long he had hidden it? Let their trust break across the reality of him?
The Doctor looked ahead, expression smoothing into something unreadable as museum visitors drifted past and their footsteps echoed softly through the corridor. Beside him, they were still tucked against his arm, still warm and real and terribly easy to want more of.
Best not to let his mind wander there. Best to keep this as it was, light, undefined, safe in its uncertainty. Friendship he could manage, he told himself; it was still enough.
So he fixed his eyes on the corridor ahead and kept walking beside them, all the while feeling the quiet ache of the life he was already half-imagining and already denying himself.
By the time they found themself in the next wing of the museum, the afternoon had softened pleasantly around them.
Lunch had been nice, nothing remarkable, just tea and sandwiches and a shared pastry they had both insisted they didn’t really want until it was gone. After that had come a slow wander through the gift shop, where the Doctor had picked up and examined at least twelve different items with deep personal interest before putting every single one back.
Apparently, loving a little shop did not necessarily translate to buying from it. They had teased him for spending five full minutes admiring a set of absurdly overpriced postcards, and he had defended himself by claiming they were “well curated,” which had only made them laugh harder.
A couple more exhibits had followed after that, their pace slower now, less intent on seeing everything and more content to simply drift. By then the museum had grown a little busier, voices threading through the halls in low murmurs, footsteps rising and falling over polished floors.
That was how they stumbled onto the interactive exhibit.
It had clearly been designed with children in mind. Bright signage. Cheerful staff. A line of easels already arranged on both sides of two long tables, beneath a hanging banner encouraging visitors to “Paint Like the Masters.” Little trays of paints sat ready on each stand, with brushes laid out beside blank canvases.
Despite the branding, there were very few actual children in sight. Mostly adults, really. Museum-goers who had either arrived with enough curiosity to try it or enough self-confidence not to mind looking a little silly. A few couples, a pair of university students in oversized jumpers, and one older man taking the whole thing extremely seriously.
At the front of the setup stood an instructor in a paint-splattered apron, cheerfully explaining that for ten pounds, a “measly little tenner,” as the sign put it, anyone could join in for a guided portrait session.
The Doctor had only glanced at it once before they saw the exact moment interest sparked in his face.
“Oh,” he said.
They looked from the easels to him and immediately smiled. “Oh?”
His hands slipped into his coat pockets, posture going falsely casual in a way that made it obvious he was trying not to sound too eager. “Portraits.”
They followed his gaze. “You want to do it.”
He looked at them sidelong. “I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
He huffed the tiniest laugh, then nodded toward the setup. “Come on. Could be fun.”
They raised a brow. “You? Willingly agreeing to let me paint you?”
The Doctor smiled, that bright, boyish one that usually meant he’d already made up his mind. “Why not?”
So that was how they ended up there.
Now they sat across from each other at neighboring easels, a little cluster of paints and brushes between them, each with a blank canvas already bearing the first few hesitant strokes of a portrait.
The museum’s grandeur gave way here to a different kind of atmosphere, lighter, noisier, full of chatter and half-laughter and the occasional groan from someone realizing their painting looked nothing like a human face. The smell of acrylic paint hung faintly in the air, mingling with the dry museum warmth and the distant hum of voices from the adjoining galleries.
The Doctor had shed his coat again, draping it over the back of his chair. A brush rested awkwardly in his fingers. They had never seen anyone hold a paintbrush with such suspicion.
“Oh, that’s tragic already,” they said, peering at the way he gripped it.
The Doctor looked up at once, offended. “I haven’t even started.”
“Yes, and yet.”
He glanced down at the blank canvas in front of him as though it had personally wronged him by requiring manual skill. “This is a ridiculous tool.”
“It’s a brush.”
“It’s flimsy.”
They laughed softly and dipped their own brush into a wash of color. “You sound like you’re blaming the equipment in advance.”
He narrowed his eyes at them, then looked back to his easel with renewed determination. Across from him, they smiled and began sketching in the loose shape of his face.
The position suited him infuriatingly well. One arm folded loosely over the back of the chair, one leg stretched out a bit farther than the other, head tilted just slightly as he tried to divide his attention between painting and studying them. The overhead light caught in his hair and along the sharp lines of his features. His expression kept shifting every few seconds, focused, then amused, then suspicious whenever he thought they were looking at him for too long.
Which they were.
“You’re staring,” he said, not looking up from his canvas.
“That’s the assignment.”
“There are polite ways to do it.”
“You’re sitting for a portrait.”
“Yes, but there are still standards.”
They smiled to themself and dragged another careful line of paint across the page. “You volunteered.”
“I was tricked.”
“You suggested it.”
“I was manipulated into suggesting it.”
That earned a laugh from the instructor somewhere nearby, and the Doctor looked briefly betrayed that he had acquired an audience. They only smiled wider and kept painting.
For all his complaining, he seemed to be enjoying himself. There was that little crease in his brow again, the one that always appeared when something genuinely caught his attention. He kept glancing up at them, then down again to his canvas, trying to translate what he saw into shape and color with far more seriousness than the children’s activity arguably required.
It was, they thought, adorable. So they bent over their painting instead, hiding their smile in the concentration of it, while around them brushes scratched lightly against canvas and the museum afternoon carried on.
They grinned down at their canvas, a quiet chuckle slipping out before they could stop it. Across from them, the Doctor looked up immediately.
“What?” he asked, narrowing his eyes in suspicion. “What’s so funny?”
They bit back another laugh and shook their head, dipping their brush in water as if that might somehow save them. “Nothing.”
“That was not a nothing laugh.”
“It was.”
He set his own brush down for a moment, leaning forward slightly in his chair. “Show me.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m still working on it, it’s gotta be a surprise.”
“That’s never stopped you mocking me before.”
They huffed a laugh and finally glanced up at him, smile still tugging at the corners of their mouth. “It’s your hair.”
The Doctor blinked. “My hair.”
“Yes.”
He frowned, lifting a hand automatically to touch it. “What about it?”
They tilted their head, studying the painted version of him with exaggerated seriousness. “It’s tricky.”
“Tricky.”
“Very.” They made a vague little motion with the end of their brush. “Tall hair is hard to capture.”
That won a brief, affronted pause. Then the Doctor ran a hand through it, pushing it back in a gesture that only made the unruly shape of it more pronounced.
“My hair,” he informed them, “is one of my main attractions.”
They hummed thoughtfully, eyes dropping back to the canvas as they added another few careful strokes. “Mm.”
He waited.
They nodded once, still not looking up. “Agreed.”
The Doctor went still. It was such an easy answer, tossed out so casually, that for a second it didn’t seem to land until it did.
They were focused on the portrait again, lower lip caught briefly between their teeth as they tried to get the shape of his ridiculous hairline right, entirely unaware of what they’d done to him with two offhand syllables.
The Doctor forgot his own painting.
Forgot the instructor somewhere off to the side, reminding everyone to think about proportion. Forgot the scrape of chairs and the low museum chatter and the paint drying at the tip of his brush.
He only looked at them.
At the easy concentration on their face. The pleased little curve of their mouth. The way they’d said it without flirtation, almost without thinking, just honest, as though agreeing that yes, of course he was attractive, and now back to the matter of painting him.
Something warm and startled moved through him. Then, because he was him, he recovered just quickly enough to pretend he hadn’t been caught staring.
He picked up his brush again and glanced at their face with exaggerated deliberation, as though he had only paused to gather reference for his own work.
“Hold still,” he said, affecting concentration. “Can’t paint you if you keep moving.”
They looked up, one brow arching. “I haven’t moved.”
“You did just then.”
“That was blinking, John.”
“Very disruptive blinking.”
They laughed softly and shook their head, but settled a little more squarely in their seat all the same. The Doctor tried to focus on his canvas. Tried very hard, actually.
But now there was a new and deeply inconvenient awareness humming under his skin, making him feel just a touch too warm in the museum light. He cleared his throat and made a show of studying the line of their jaw, the tilt of their head, the shape of their mouth, all in the name of art.
The Doctor glanced up from his canvas again, brush held awkwardly between his fingers, and smiled faintly.
“You know,” he said, “in all the time I’ve known you, this is the first time I’m actually going to see your work.”
They looked up. “That’s not true.”
“It is,” he said at once. “Properly, I mean. You’ve got all those sketchbooks lying about your flat, paint stains on half your things, that tablet always balanced on your knee. . .”
His mouth softened with quiet amusement as he went on.
“All those evenings I’ve been sat on your couch reading something off your shelf while you’re hunched in the corner with a stylus, muttering at the screen.” He gave them a pointed look. “And not once have you actually shown me.”
They huffed a small laugh, eyes dropping back to their painting. “That’s because most of the time I’m just messing about.”
“No, it isn’t.”
“Yes, it is.”
“It really isn’t.”
They smiled despite themself and dragged another line of paint down the canvas. “You’re very insistent about things you know nothing about.”
The Doctor made a quiet, disbelieving sound. “I know you’ve avoided it every single time I’ve asked.”
That was true, annoyingly.
He continued, now clearly on a roll. “Every time I’ve tried to get a look, you change the subject or tell me it’s not finished yet.”
They shrugged one shoulder. “Because it usually isn’t.”
“Mmhm.”
“It isn’t a crime to want to finish something before showing it to people.”
“No,” he said. “But after this many months, it’s starting to look suspicious.”
That made them laugh under their breath.
He leaned back slightly in his chair, eyes bright now, all easy honesty. “I’m excited, that’s all.”
The words landed more gently than they expected. Their hand stilled for a moment against the canvas. They looked down at the half-painted version of him in front of them, the shape of his face already there, the impossible task of his hair still only half-solved, and tried not to let the warmth of that admission spread too far.
“It’s not that serious,” they said, aiming for casual and not quite making it.
The Doctor’s brow lifted.
They sighed softly and gave in a little. “I know I’ve got talent,” they said. “I’m self-aware enough to admit that.”
“Good.”
“But,” They dipped their brush back into the paint, watching the color gather at the bristles. “There’s always that little voice saying it’s still not good enough. That it could be better. That if someone else sees it, they’ll spot every wrong thing straight away.”
The Doctor didn’t even let them finish the thought properly.
“You’re brilliant,” he said.
They looked up. His voice had cut cleanly through their self-deprecation, warm and certain and leaving absolutely no room for argument.
“You are,” he went on, meeting their eyes across the easels. “And you’ve no right to say otherwise.”
The phrasing was so entirely him that it caught them off guard, not just the certainty of it, but the almost offended conviction, as though the idea of them doubting their own talent were something personally irritating to him.
They smiled before they could stop themself. The Doctor smiled back.
For a beat, neither of them painted. They just looked at each other across the little gap between their easels, brushes paused in hand, the museum noise fading to something distant and unimportant around them. Then they ducked their head first, smiling into their canvas.
“Bossy,” they murmured.
“Accurate,” he said automatically.
That pulled another quiet laugh from them, and both of them returned to their paintings, still smiling, still carrying the warmth of the moment with them as the portraits slowly took shape.
The Doctor worked at his portrait in brief, careful strokes before glancing up at them again.
“Have you ever thought about doing something with this properly?” he asked.
They looked over the top of their canvas. “With painting?”
“With any of it,” he said, gesturing vaguely with his brush. “Art. Design. Illustration. Something that actually uses your talent instead of making you wrestle coffee machines and the general public.”
They huffed a laugh at that, though it came out softer than amused. “The café’s wonderful, actually.”
The Doctor lifted a brow.
“It is,” they insisted. “Mostly. It’s just that customer service jobs are like that. People are exhausting. Machines break. Managers lie. Someone always acts like their flat white is a matter of life and death.”
The Doctor nodded once, conceding the point. “No, I don’t disagree with that.”
They smiled faintly and returned to the portrait, adding another stroke near his collar. For a moment, the only sounds between them were the light scrape of brushes on canvas and the instructor somewhere nearby reminding a child not to drink the paint water.
Then they said, more quietly, “I did try once.”
The Doctor looked up at once. They kept their eyes on their canvas, like it would be easier to talk if they didn’t have to see his face while doing it.
“I looked for work in fields where I could actually use my art,” they said. “Design stuff, freelance bits, junior creative roles, illustration, anything, really. Just something that would get my foot in the door.”
He listened without interrupting now, the brush in his hand gone still.
“But everything was either not paying enough to survive off,” they went on, “or they just weren’t hiring. Or they wanted three years’ experience for an entry-level job, which is always fun.”
That made the Doctor pull a face. “Humans do love making impossible little systems for themselves.”
“‘Humans’? You talk like you aren’t one sometimes.” They smiled, though only briefly. “But, yeah.”
He studied them for a second, curing himself for a moment, then asked, with genuine surprise, “So that was it? You gave up?”
The question was so immediate, so plainly baffled, that they glanced up despite themself.
“The café was only meant to be temporary,” they admitted. They shrugged one shoulder. “Just something to pay rent while I figured things out and waited for an opportunity.”
Their brush moved again, slower now, more out of habit than purpose.
“But the opportunity never came,” they said. “And after a while,” Another shrug.“The barista thing just sort of became the fallback.”
The Doctor’s face changed. Something more troubled than pity, more personal. As if the idea offended him on their behalf. He leaned back a little in his chair, studying them in silence for a beat too long.
They noticed and gave a faint, self-conscious smile. “That sounds more depressing out loud than it does in my head.”
“It’s not depressing,” he said.
They raised a brow. “No?”
“It’s,” He frowned, searching for the right shape of it. “Wrong, is what it is.”
They laughed softly. “Bit dramatic.”
“No, it isn’t.” He looked at them properly then, voice sharpening with conviction. “You’re talented. You care about it. You should be doing something that lets you use that.”
Something warm and uncomfortable twisted in their chest at the certainty in his tone.
They looked back down at the canvas, trying to hide their smile by pretending to fuss with the paint. “You make it sound simple.”
“It isn’t simple,” he admitted. “Doesn’t mean it’s not true.”
They didn’t answer right away. Around them, the little painting class carried on: brushes clinking in water cups, quiet chatter, the occasional laugh from another easel. But the space between them had narrowed again, thinned into something private.
Finally, they said, “Maybe one day.”
The Doctor held their gaze for a moment longer, like he wanted to argue with the “maybe” of it.
Then he nodded once. “Yeah,” he said quietly. “Maybe one day.”
They went quiet after that, brush hovering for a moment above the canvas as they looked at him properly.
John had gone back to painting, or at least pretending to. His tongue pressed faintly to the inside of his cheek in concentration, brows drawn together as he studied the shape of their face and tried, with very mixed success, to translate it onto canvas. He looked sincere even in silence. Earnest in a way that never felt forced.
That was the thing about him. When he cared, he cared all the way.
Lucky, they thought. That was what they were. Ridiculously lucky to have him in their corner at all.
He had never even seen their work before today, not really. Not finished, not properly. And yet the little scraps he had picked up, the sketchbooks lying around, the way they talked about color or composition, the time they lost to a tablet screen, had been enough for him. Enough to make him believe in their talent with that same stubborn certainty he seemed to bring to everything.
As if passion alone proved potential. As if loving something that much had to count for something in the end.
It made them want to try again.
Not in the vague, wistful way they sometimes thought about it while half-asleep or on a bad shift at the café, but actively. Properly. Like maybe they could start looking again. Start applying. Start making a real effort instead of quietly assuming it would all go nowhere.
And if it did go somewhere, if they actually found something, some little opening, some chance to use their art for real, they’d have him to thank for it. The idea came so sweetly it almost made them smile.
The sort of story you told later, years down the line. The sort of thing you laughed about fondly while telling your grandkids how one very annoying man had once sat across from you in a museum and insisted you were brilliant until you finally believed him.
The thought landed then made them do a double take within their own mind.
Grandkids?
Their brush stalled entirely.
What the hell was that?
They stared at the canvas without seeing it for a second, suddenly, acutely aware of themself in a way that felt almost embarrassing.
Grandkids?
This man was their friend. Yes, he was gorgeous, which was unfortunate but survivable. Yes, he was kind, and clever, and brilliant in that way that made them feel like the dullest person in any given room and somehow never bad about it. Yes, he was compassionate and funny and so mysteriously put together and gloriously strange that sometimes just looking at him too long felt like the beginning of a bad idea.
And yes, terrifyingly, he was miles out of their league.
But none of that changed the fact that he was their friend. A weirdly attentive, devastatingly attractive, emotionally confusing friend, but still.
They were not meant to be thinking about grandkids. They were not meant to be building entire futures off one warm conversation and a little too much eye contact over acrylic paint.
That was absurd.
They shifted in their chair and forced themself to look down at the portrait again, dragging the brush through a stroke that probably went far too dark around his collar.
Across from them, the Doctor glanced up almost immediately.
“You alright?”
Their head snapped up. “What?”
He tilted his own, studying them with mild concern. “You’ve gone all odd.”
They let out a quick laugh that sounded a little too thin to their own ears. “I’m painting, that’s all.”
“That wasn’t a painting face.”
“No?”
“No. More of a spiraling quietly in public face.”
That pulled a real laugh from them, thank God.
They shook their head and dipped the brush back into water, buying themself a second. “I’m fine.”
“Right,” he said slowly. The Doctor looked unconvinced, but not enough to push.
They smiled, smaller this time, and looked back to the canvas before he could study them any harder.
They were fine, just a little too aware, suddenly, of the shape of his mouth when he smiled. The warmth in his voice when he told them they were brilliant. The dangerous ease of imagining him in places he had no business being, in stories, in futures, in quiet little domestic scenes they had no right to want.
Then they looked up at him across the easel and said, “You ask a lot about me, but you never really say much about yourself.”
The Doctor’s brush paused. It was only for a second, but they caught it, that little stillness, that fractional hesitation that always seemed to come over him when he was deciding whether to joke, dodge, or tell the truth.
He glanced down at his canvas, then back up at them. “What do you want to know?”
They tilted their head, considering him. “Your travels, I guess.”
He shrugged one shoulder, trying for casual. “Work is work.”
They gave him a look over the top of their painting. “That’s vague.”
“It’s accurate.”
“It’s annoyingly accurate.”
The Doctor’s mouth twitched, but he said nothing else, which told them all they needed to know. He was dodging. So they pushed, though gently.
“Why do you travel so much?”
The Doctor’s expression shifted, not dramatically, not enough for anyone who didn’t know him to notice, but they did. The ease in him dimmed just a little. His eyes dropped, not to the canvas this time, but somewhere lower, more inward.
When he spoke, his voice was quieter, “I just like to keep moving.”
They waited.
He let out a breath through his nose, almost a laugh, except there was no humor in it. “Staying put too long tends to lead to misery.”
Their brow furrowed. That was not the kind of answer someone gave lightly, or by accident.
They set their brush down altogether and looked at him properly now. “Do you have family in town?”
The question seemed to catch him off guard. He looked up at them sharply, something almost startled in his face.
“What?”
They held his gaze, softening. “You just,” They shrugged a little, trying not to make him bolt from the moment. “You seemed lonely when I met you.”
The Doctor stared at them, not offended, or upset, just surprised.
He gave the faintest, most disbelieving shake of his head. “Was I that obvious?”
“That was the whole reason I started chatting to you.” Their smile turned small and a little sad around the edges.
The Doctor blinked. They looked down at their hands for a second, then back up at him, their expression open now in a way that made his chest tighten.
“You came in looking like your heart had been broken,” they said softly. “And I don’t know. You just looked like you needed a friend.”
Something in the Doctor’s face changed then, slowly, like warmth returning to somewhere it had gone cold. His mouth curved, not into one of his usual grins, but into something softer. Almost disbelieving. That made them smile too, though more faintly.
Then he looked down at his hands, at the brush he was still holding without using, and quietly admitted, “No. No family in town.”
A beat.
“No family left, actually.”
The words seemed to settle heavily between them. They didn’t speak.
The Doctor swallowed once, eyes fixed on the table between the easels as though it were easier to tell the truth to the space between them than directly to their face.
“I’ve just,” He exhaled, the sound thin and tired. “Been on the move since.”
His smile came back, but only barely, and only in the saddest sense of the word. Not a real smile. Just an old habit trying to soften something that didn’t want softening.
“Stopping for too long gives me time to remember,” he said. “And remembering hurts, so,” He gave the smallest shrug in the world. “I keep moving.”
They stared at him, their chest aching with the simplicity of it. He said it like it was practical. Like it was just a thing he’d worked out about himself, no more dramatic than choosing to walk instead of stand still.
But the pain in it sat plain beneath the words.
Without thinking too much about it, before they could second-guess themself, they reached across the little gap between their easels and laid their hand over his.
The Doctor went still. Their fingers curled lightly around his, warm and steady and entirely without demand or word, just comfort. He looked down at their hand, then up at them. They smiled, sad and soft all at once. He smiled back in that same broken little way, and this time he let it stay.
Neither of them said anything for a while after that.
The museum carried on quietly around them, brushes scratching canvas, the instructor speaking to someone on the far side of the room, footsteps passing through the neighboring hall, but at their easels, the world had narrowed to the space between their joined hands and the fragile truth he had finally let them see.
They were the first to break the silence.
“I’m sorry,” they said softly. “I didn’t mean to drag all that up.”
The Doctor shook his head. “No.” His voice was gentle, firmer on the second try. “No, don’t be sorry.”
Their hand was still over his. Only now, at some point they hadn’t quite noticed, his had turned beneath it. He was holding theirs back. His thumb moved absently across their knuckles, a small, unconscious stroke that sent a warmth up their arm so sudden and strange they had to work not to react to it. He didn’t seem to realize he was doing it. Or if he did, he gave no sign.
“There’s no need to be sorry,” he said again, quieter now. “You only asked.”
They watched him across the easel, barely breathing. He glanced down at their joined hands, then back up at them. His expression had gone open in that rare way they were beginning to understand was precious, unguarded, a little uncertain, but entirely sincere.
“You are important to me,” he said.
The Doctor kept going, as if once he had started, stopping would only make it harder.
“I mean it,” he said. “This, ” He gave the smallest motion with his head, as though he meant the museum, the painting class, the long game nights, the tea after bad shifts, all of it at once. “Our time together. It matters to me.”
His thumb brushed once more over their knuckles. They could feel their pulse in their wrist.
“You’re brilliant,” he went on, voice warming as he spoke, conviction gathering under every word. “And funny, and fascinating, and far better company than most people I’ve met in the last-” He caught himself, mouth twitching. “A while.”
That made them smile despite the tightness in their chest.
“You give me something to look forward to,” he admitted. “And I,” He exhaled a little laugh through his nose, almost embarrassed by the honesty of it. “I don’t know that I could thank you enough for that.”
By the end of it, they were both smiling. Their throat felt too tight for anything grand or clever, so what came out was a little breathless and simple.
“Ditto.”
The Doctor blinked, then he laughed, bright and soft and helpless around the edges.
“Ditto?” he repeated.
They gave a tiny shrug, smiling wider now. “What? It means ‘the same thing.’”
“I know what it means.”
“Then there you go.”
“Could’ve said something a bit more poetic.” He shook his head, still chuckling, and looked down as though he needed the break from their face.
“You did enough poetry for both of us.”
That only made him smile harder. Their hands stayed where they were for one more heartbeat, then two, neither of them quite rushing to let go. And when at last they did pull apart, it was only because the instructor’s cheerful voice cut across the room to announce that they ought to be adding finishing details by now.
The spell thinned, but it didn’t break.
It lingered in the way they looked at each other afterward, both of them a little lighter, a little softer, as they picked up their brushes again and returned to their portraits with smiles neither quite seemed able to shake.
“Hm.” They pulled back from the canvas, squinting at it with the exaggerated seriousness of someone preparing to deliver bad news.
The Doctor glanced up from his own painting immediately. “What’s hm?”
They tipped their head one way, then the other. “I might’ve made your nose too big.” They looked from the portrait to his actual face, then gave a tiny, indifferent shrug. “Meh.”
The Doctor narrowed his eyes. “Meh?”
Their mouth twitched. “I mean. . .”
“It’s not wildly inaccurate.” They reached for a clean brush and began carefully softening the line they’d laid down, still looking far too amused for his liking.
“Oi,” he said at once, offended.
They laughed under their breath, still working at the correction. “What?”
“My nose is perfectly fine.”
“Didn’t say it wasn’t.”
“You implied it.”
They glanced up at him with infuriating innocence. “I implied nothing. The brush implied it.”
“The brush,” he repeated flatly.
“Yes.”
The Doctor sat back in his chair, scandalized. “For your information, it used to be worse.” The second the words left his mouth, he froze.
They looked up. Then their eyes widened, comically, dramatically wide.
“What?”
The Doctor’s mind went completely blank for half a second.
“What?” he echoed, much too quickly.
They lowered the brush slowly, staring at him in open delight. “What do you mean it used to be worse?”
He sat very still.
They pointed at him with the clean brush like a barrister about to cross-examine a witness. “John.”
The Doctor scrambled for the first plausible human explanation and nearly tripped over all of them at once.
“I- well- deviated septum.” He nodded as though that settled everything. “Yes. Deviated septum. Surgery.”
They stared at him.
He smiled too brightly. “Very common.”
Their expression did not change. “That,” they said carefully, “is the worst lie you’ve ever told me.”
The Doctor drew himself up, wounded. “It is not.”
“It absolutely is.”
They were grinning now, laughing while they went back to fussing over the nose in the painting. “A deviated septum?”
“It happens.”
“And it made your nose different?”
“Yes.”
“In a way you compare to your old one like you’re talking about a previous draft?”
The Doctor opened his mouth, found nothing helpful, and closed it again.
They were full-on laughing at him now, shoulders shaking as they fixed the brushstrokes. “Oh my God.”
“It’s entirely plausible.”
“It is not plausible.”
“It is to someone.”
“Not to me.”
He gave a tiny, defensive sniff. That only made them laugh harder.
“You’ve had a nose job,” they declared.
“I have not had a nose job.”
“You absolutely have.”
“I haven’t!”
They sat back to admire their correction, then looked him over with exaggerated suspicion. “Wow.”
The Doctor frowned. “Wow what?”
They sighed, shaking their head as though terribly disappointed by the revelation. “Your handsome face was too good to be true.” He went very still. They carried right on, oblivious to the effect of the word. “I should’ve seen the writing on the wall.”
The Doctor’s brain, most unhelpfully, latched onto exactly one part of that sentence.
Handsome.
They were still smiling at the portrait, entirely pleased with themself, still half-lost in the joke and not paying nearly enough attention to him.
Which was just as well, because the alternative explanation they had jumped to, ridiculous, human, cosmetic surgery, was infinitely better than the truth. Better than anything remotely adjacent to regeneration or Time Lords or the impossible biology he absolutely could not explain from an easel in a museum.
So yes, relief came first. Followed closely by amusement. And then, rather inconveniently, flattery.
The Doctor tried very hard not to look as pleased by that as he felt. He failed, but only slightly.
“Oh, so now I’m handsome,” he said, aiming for dry and landing somewhere a touch too smug.
They blinked once, clearly realizing a beat too late what they had actually said out loud. The Doctor’s smile widened.
They pointed the brush at him at once, accusatory. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“Get smug.”
“I’m not smug.”
“You are absolutely smug.”
He leaned back a little farther in his chair, looking unbearably satisfied with himself. “You called me handsome.”
They groaned. “That is not the point.”
“It’s a very good point.”
“It was in the context of accusing you of secret cosmetic procedures.”
“Still counts.”
They rolled their eyes, though their mouth betrayed them by curling at the corners. “You’re impossible.”
“And yet,” he said, all bright-eyed mischief again, “apparently very handsome.”
They laughed despite themself and shook their head, returning to the portrait before he could get any more unbearable about it.
Across from them, the Doctor picked up his brush again with far too much self-satisfaction for one man, privately thanking every star in the sky that they had chosen nose job over anything even remotely close to the truth.
They grumbled at him without looking up from their canvas. “You need to hurry up, by the way. I’m nearly done.”
The Doctor made a small noise of offense. “Rushing perfection is never wise.”
That earned a snort from them.“Perfection,” they repeated.
“Yep.”
“You are painting with a lot of confidence for a man who has not once cleaned his brush properly.”
The Doctor glanced down at the muddled colors collecting near the base of his bristles and chose, very sensibly, not to acknowledge that. “Art is about instinct.”
“Art is also about not turning every skin tone grey.”
He huffed a laugh under his breath, and both of them bent back over their work.
The little portrait class around them had begun to wind down. Some people were already standing, holding up their paintings with delighted embarrassment while the instructor made encouraging rounds. The afternoon light had shifted warmer through the high windows, softening the museum hall into gold and dust and quiet voices.
The Doctor focused on his picture.
Or tried to.
Because his mind kept drifting to the day he’d had. The museum, and their linked arms in the corridor. The way they had laughed at his nonsense and listened to his rambling anyway. Lunch, tea, the gift shop, their shoulder pressed to his as they walked. Their hand over his at the easel. The softness in their face when he had said too much and somehow not regretted it.
He felt closer to them now. The truth of that settled over him with startling ease. Closer not only because of the hours spent together, but because something in the space between them had shifted, opened. They had seen a little more of him today, nothing dangerous, not the real danger, but enough. Enough that he could still feel the warmth of their comfort like a handprint left behind.
And they had been so gentle with it. So wonderfully gentle.
The Doctor lowered his brush for a moment and looked at them properly.
They were concentrating, mouth slightly pursed, one hand steadying the edge of the canvas while the other worked in careful strokes. There was paint on one of their fingers now, a streak they either hadn’t noticed or didn’t care about. Their hair had shifted loose over the course of the session, a few strands catching the light when they tilted their head.
For one moment, just one, he let himself feel it without trying to name it smaller than it was. The care and want. The dangerous, growing pull of something that would become impossible the second he looked at it too long.
He knew himself well enough to know what came next. Sooner or later he would have to box it all up. Shut the lid. Shove it away somewhere dark and hard to reach. File it beside all the other things he had not allowed himself to keep. He knew that. Knew it with the same grim certainty he knew his own name.
For now, he let it be.
He let himself sit there in the museum light and enjoy the shape of his own happiness. Let himself bask in the impossible sweetness of being here with them, of being wanted here, of feeling this stupidly boyish grin spreading across his face every time they glanced up.
And they did glance up.
Often.
Each time, it was brief at first, a quick check of his face, his posture, some detail for the portrait, but neither of them seemed in much of a hurry to look away. Their eyes would catch, and there would be that little pause. A smile tugging at one mouth, then the other. A shared look that had very little to do with painting and everything to do with the fact that they were both enjoying being looked at.
The Doctor caught himself sneaking glances that had nothing whatsoever to do with artistic reference. The line of their mouth when they tried not to smile. The way their eyes lit when they were amused. The softness in their expression when they forgot to guard it.
He smiled to himself and went back to his canvas before he could be caught too openly staring.
Across from him, they were having thoughts dangerously close to the same.
Their brush moved more slowly now, not because the painting required it, but because they were stalling, letting the moment stretch. The whole day had felt strangely perfect, better than they had let themself expect, better than any birthday in recent memory. They felt closer to him too, and that closeness sat warm in their chest, threaded through with something they still refused to examine too directly.
He had been wonderful today. Infuriating, smug, ridiculous, yes, but wonderful.
Thoughtful enough to plan all this. Sincere enough to listen. Soft enough, when it mattered, to let them see the hurt tucked beneath all his brightness. They still could not quite believe he had said those things to them. That they were important to him. That he looked forward to them.
It made their chest feel too full in a way that was almost painful. So they did what he was doing, though neither of them knew it.
They let themself enjoy it, just for a moment. Just the looks, and the smiles, and the dangerous ease of being seen by him and liking it far too much.
They looked up again and he was already looking at them. This time neither of them pretended it was for the painting.
The Doctor’s grin widened, young and bright and so open it made something in them catch. They smiled back, slower, softer, and for a second the rest of the room seemed to blur around the edges. Just easels and drying paint and the warm museum hush holding them in place while something unnamed passed gently between them.
Then the instructor clapped their hands once and announced that time was nearly up, and the spell thinned into laughter and movement.
The Doctor added one last, deeply questionable touch to the portrait and then set his brush down with all the solemnity of a man concluding important work.
He looked at it.
Then kept looking at it.
And the longer he stared, the more torn he became between laughing outright and quietly folding the canvas in half so that no living soul would ever have to witness what he had done.
Apparently, art was not his strong suit.
The portrait was dreadful. Not abstract in an interesting way. Not stylized with intention. Just wrong..
They were there, technically. In the broadest possible sense. A rough arrangement of features had made it onto the canvas, and if one already knew what they looked like, one might perhaps identify them under favorable conditions. But everything about it had gone slightly sideways. Their face was too blocky. Their eyes had come out too large, giving them a startled expression they did not possess in real life. Their nose had somehow ended up too small, which he felt was unfair considering the amount of grief they had given him about his own. Their hair had ceased being hair at some point and become a single shape hovering over their head like a weather event.
And their skin had acquired an orange hue. The Doctor frowned harder. He had not used any orange paint, he was nearly certain of that.
He leaned in, scrutinizing the canvas as though closer proximity might reveal where he had gone so catastrophically astray. It did not. If anything, the details only got worse. In a few places the colors had blurred together into a muddy, tragic mess that suggested he had perhaps attempted to paint them during an earthquake.
It looked, he thought grimly, like the sort of thing a child brought home from school while a teacher praised their confidence.
His mouth flattened. Without thinking too much about it, he picked the brush back up.
Perhaps it could be salvaged.
He added a bit near the cheek, which did not help. He tried softening one line around the mouth, which made it actively haunted. The Doctor froze, stared at the fresh damage, and slowly lowered the brush. Fix what, exactly? All of it?
He looked from one side of the portrait to the other, searching for some reachable starting point, some single area he could improve enough to pretend the rest had been intentional.
There wasn’t one, there was no saving it. With the air of a man conceding defeat to a superior enemy, he set the brush down again.
Then, cautiously, he looked up to see whether they were finished.
And found them already watching him, entirely, unmistakably amused.
The Doctor held still.
They were leaning back slightly in their chair now, brush idle in their fingers, smile curling wider by the second as they took in the whole scene, his frown, the abandoned attempts at repair, the unmistakable air of artistic despair radiating from him.
“You done?” they asked, far too innocently.
The Doctor looked back at the portrait, then at them, then back at the portrait again. “That,” he said carefully, “depends on how one defines done.”
They laughed immediately.
He narrowed his eyes. “Don’t.”
“I haven’t said anything.”
“You’re about to.”
They bit down on the smile and failed. “You looked like you were trying to negotiate with it.”
“I was assessing my options.”
“And?”
“There are none.”
That made them laugh harder, warm and helpless and impossible not to join in, though he tried very hard not to.
“It’s not that bad,” they said, which was exactly the sort of thing someone said when it was very bad indeed.
The Doctor gave them a look. “Liar.”
They grinned, shoulders lifting in a tiny, guilty shrug. “A little.”
He glanced down at it once more and exhaled through his nose. “Honestly, I’m not sure how it got orange.”
“You made me orange?” That only renewed their amusement.
“I didn’t mean to.”
“Impressive.”
“It was an accident.”
They set their own brush down at last, smile still lingering, and looked between him and the portrait with open delight. “Can I see?”
The Doctor’s expression shifted at once into instinctive alarm.
He put one hand lightly over the edge of the canvas as though he might shield it from view.
“Absolutely not.”
That made them laugh so brightly that a few nearby people glanced over, smiling in spite of themselves. The Doctor sighed and looked back at his hopeless painting, already knowing he was doomed.
They were finished.
He could tell by the way they added the last few careful strokes without hesitation, then leaned in to sign the bottom corner with neat, practiced confidence. After that they set the brush down, sat back, and looked at their work with the quiet satisfaction of someone who knew exactly when to stop.
The Doctor, meanwhile, was still half-guarding his own canvas like it contained classified material.
They glanced from their painting to his and smiled. “Alright. You first.”
He recoiled immediately. “No.”
Their smile widened. “Come on.”
“No.”
“You first,” he said, one hand still planted at the edge of his easel as though he thought they might make a grab for it. “Mine is in a delicate state.”
They laughed under their breath. “That sounds made up.”
The Doctor shook his head firmly. “You first.”
They looked at him for a moment longer, clearly hoping they could wear him down by sheer persistence, but he only lifted his brows and held fast.
At last, with a little huff of amusement, they relented, “Fine.”
They picked up their canvas, turned it around, and angled it toward him.
The Doctor sat up straighter.
It was beautiful. Bold, vibrant colors gave the whole thing a warmth and life that his own disaster of a portrait had never come within miles of touching. The lines were soft without losing definition, giving the piece a stylized quality that felt intentional and confident rather than imprecise.
His hair, impossible as it was, had been rendered with actual shape and movement rather than becoming a single alarming mass. The angles of his face were there, slightly exaggerated but clearly on purpose, folded into the style rather than fighting against it. Even the fall of his brown pinstriped suit had made it onto the canvas: the lines of the jacket, the slight bend of his shoulders, the posture he hadn’t realized he’d been holding as he sat for them.
There was life in it. And, worst of all, it looked undeniably like him.
The Doctor stared.
“Well?” they asked, trying for casual and failing just slightly.
He blinked once and leaned in a fraction closer, eyes moving over the portrait again.
“It’s,” He stopped, because good felt woefully insufficient. “That’s amazing.”
Their smile softened.
“No, really,” he said, glancing up at them now with something like awe. “You’ve got the suit right and the hair, which frankly is a miracle in itself, and it actually looks like me.”
“It does help that you’ve got a memorable face.”
He ignored that entirely, still staring at the painting. “The colors are brilliant.”
They ducked their head a little, pleased in spite of themself. “You think?”
“I know.”
He looked back at the canvas, mouth parting faintly in disbelief. There was something almost embarrassing in how much he loved it. They had looked at him that long, that carefully, and produced this.
Which, of course, only made the existence of his own portrait exponentially more humiliating.
The Doctor sat back slowly, still smiling at theirs, and seized the opportunity to continue talking before they could redirect the attention.
“The lines are lovely,” he said, buying time shamelessly now. “And the exaggeration works, that’s the thing, it looks meant. It’s got style.”
Their eyes narrowed at him in mild suspicion, he carried on regardless.
“The folds in the suit, look, there, even that bit at the shoulder. And you got the expression right somehow, which is, honestly, how did you do that?”
They laughed softly. “You’re stalling.”
The Doctor looked up at once, offended. “I am appreciating.”
“You are panicking and appreciating at the same time.”
He opened his mouth to deny it, but the truth of it was probably visible all over his face. He grumbled under his breath and, before he could lose his nerve, turned his canvas around without ceremony.
He kept hold of the edges for a second longer than necessary, watching their face far more closely than the painting itself.
They grinned, and not the strained sort of smile people used when they were trying desperately to be polite. There was an actual glimmer in their eyes, a little twinkle of amusement and warmth that told him, immediately and unmistakably, that they didn’t hate it.
The Doctor exhaled, though only slightly.
He tipped his chin up with what he hoped passed for dignity. “I was going for abstract.”
“Mm. Of course.” They hummed, nodding in the solemn, generous way people did when agreeing to an obvious lie out of kindness.
The Doctor gestured vaguely at the canvas, still trying to rescue some scrap of artistic intention from the wreckage. “Well, I say abstract…”
They looked at him. He looked back at the painting.
“It’s more of a caricature.”
Their smile tugged wider.
“Well, not really,” he amended quickly. “But it looks like you.”
A beat.
“Well. Not really, no.”
When he looked up again, they were laughing to themself, helplessly, fondly amused, shoulders beginning to shake with it as they bit at the inside of their cheek.
The Doctor drew himself up, preparing to object on principle.
“I’ll have you know,-”
“Well,” they said.
He stopped.
Their grin widened.
“Well,” they repeated, lifting one finger in the air.
The Doctor stared.
“Well. Well. Well,” they went on, in a dead-on imitation of his cadence from earlier, each word carrying that exact thoughtful little inflection he used when trying to double back over a sentence that had already gone wrong.
His face fell into a deeply unimpressed expression. Or tried to anyway, because the spark in his eyes ruined it entirely.
They pointed at him triumphantly. “There it is.”
The Doctor narrowed his eyes. “You are impossible.”
“And yet,” they said, still smiling at the painting, “I know all your noises.”
“That is not a noise.”
“It absolutely is.”
“It’s a word.”
“It’s a specific word you say in a very specific way.”
He opened his mouth, found no argument that wouldn’t immediately prove their point, and closed it again. That only made them laugh harder.
The Doctor shook his head, but there was no real irritation in it now. Only surrender. And affection. Far too much affection, really, for someone currently being mocked for both his speech patterns and his artistic failure.
“You’re enjoying this far too much,” he muttered.
“Oh, enormously.”
They looked back down at the portrait and softened a little, their laughter settling into something warmer. “I like it, though.”
The Doctor blinked. “You do not.”
“I do.”
“It’s dreadful.”
“It’s sincere.”
He glanced down at the orange-tinted disaster in spite of himself.
Their painted self stared back up from the canvas with oversized eyes and suspiciously smooth features, looking like they had been rendered from memory during mild turbulence.
They smiled at it anyway.
“It’s very you,” they said.
The Doctor looked over at them. “That doesn’t even mean anything.”
“It does to me.”
That shut him up more effectively than any joke had.
They set their own portrait carefully to the side and reached for his, holding it by the edges with surprising tenderness for something that deserved, by all artistic standards, to be quietly buried.
“I mean it,” they said. “You made me look sort of startled and slightly haunted, which I’m choosing to take as flattering.”
He let out a short, helpless laugh through his nose.
“And the colors are…” They tilted the painting, considering. “Bold.”
“Orange,” he said flatly.
They nodded. “Very orange.”
He dropped his head for a second. “I didn’t use orange.”
That made them laugh again, and this time he joined them properly.
The instructor called from the front of the room that everyone was welcome to take their portraits home, and all around them people began standing, gathering belongings, comparing paintings with the mixture of pride and embarrassment that seemed to be the true point of the exercise.
But for a second longer, they stayed where they were.
★ Part 1 ★ Part 2 ★ Part 3 ★ Part 4 ★ Part 5 ★ Part 5.2 ★
✰ Word Count: 14.3k
✰ Summary: The Doctor makes a friend with a humble barista in England. They’re friends. Thats it. They're just friends.
✰ Warnings: 10th Doctor, Genter Nutural Reader, They/Them pronouns, romantic pining, Will They? Won’t They?, Game Nights, Established Friendship, Martha Dipped lol
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This is for @vexerieart, who made me smile with their kind words, bitch boosted my ego SO BAD. So I just want to return the favor, pay the smile forward. I hope this cheers you up since you’ve been sick, my love. <3
The Doctor leaned against the console, arms folded loosely, staring at the slow spiral of the vortex through the monitor.
A thousand possible destinations hovered in the back of his mind.
He could land on a planet where the oceans floated above the sky, entire tides drifting lazily through the air like wandering ghosts. He could visit a city carved into the side of a living comet, watch its crystal towers glow as the tail burned bright against the black of space. He could go back five billion years and watch the first spark of a star being born.
The universe stretched endlessly in every direction, and still he couldn’t decide where to go.
His eyes followed the soft swirl of the vortex as it pulsed across the screen, blues and violets folding into themselves. Usually the sight of it filled him with restless excitement, the familiar itch to pull a lever, slam a button, and send the Tardis tumbling somewhere impossible; today, it only made him feel tired.
Martha Jones had been brilliant.
The thought slipped into his mind so quietly he almost missed it. The Doctor shifted where he leaned against the console, one hand coming up to rub absently at the back of his neck.
Brilliant, stubborn, endlessly brave Martha Jones. The sort of human who walked straight into impossible situations and decided they weren’t impossible after all.
He could still hear the quiet certainty in her voice the day she left. No anger. No shouting. Just that calm, steady tone that made it very clear she had already made up her mind.
“This is me getting out.”
The Doctor’s mouth pressed into a thin line. He remembered the way the console room had felt that day, too quiet, too large. Martha was standing there with her arms folded in that determined way of hers while he searched desperately for the right words.
He had tried to explain it.
Tried to tell her that it wasn’t about her. Never about her, that his hearts were complicated things. That he carried centuries of ghosts with him wherever he went. That loving someone properly, the way she deserved, was harder than it should have been.
But explanations didn’t make it hurt less, and he couldn’t lie to her. He hadn’t loved Martha Jones the way she deserved to be loved. So she had done the bravest thing possible, and she had chosen herself. She chose her family, her career, and her own heart.
The Doctor stared at the vortex for a long moment, his reflection faintly visible in the monitor's glass, thin frame, rumpled suit, tie hanging slightly crooked, as it had been for most of the day.
Or the last three days. Time blurred when you were drifting.
The Tardis hummed softly beneath his feet, the sound low and comforting, like a patient sigh. He pushed himself upright and wandered slowly around the console, fingers brushing absentmindedly over switches and levers without actually touching any of them.
He could go anywhere, anywhere at all. That was the problem, really. When you had forever stretched out in front of you, it became very easy to stop choosing.
Though lately he’d been lingering, on Earth, mostly. London, specifically. He told himself it was because Earth was familiar and comfortable. A good place to recover after losing another companion. Humans were wonderfully distracting creatures, loud and messy and endlessly entertaining.
Easy to watch, and easy to blend into. Even easier to leave. But if he was being honest with himself, which he generally tried not to do, there was another reason he kept ending up back there.
A small café tucked into a quiet street, not far from a little row of flats.
Warm lights in the windows. The smell of roasted coffee beans drifting out the door whenever someone came or went. A bell above the entrance that chimed cheerfully, no matter how miserable the weather outside might be.
It was the sort of place humans described as cozy. The sort of place that felt warm even when you stepped in from the rain. The tables were a bit mismatched, the chairs worn smooth from years of people sitting in them. A chalkboard menu hung crooked behind the counter, usually decorated with little doodles in the corners.
Nothing remarkable and certainly nothing extraordinary. The Doctor found himself smiling whenever he thought about it, though. Which was odd, really. He had seen wonders beyond imagining. Entire civilizations sculpted out of light. Libraries the size of planets. Music composed from solar winds.
And yet something as simple as the smell of coffee drifting through the Tardis memory banks could tug that same quiet smile onto his face. He’d catch it sometimes while wandering the ship, a scent or a sound, something small and ordinary, and suddenly his thoughts would wander back there without his permission.
The clatter of ceramic cups. The soft hiss of a milk steamer. The low hum of quiet conversation.
The Doctor blinked.
His smile softened slightly as the memory sharpened.
Behind the counter, sleeves pushed up, hair slightly mussed from a long shift. A little streak of paint sometimes smudged somewhere it probably shouldn’t be, on their wrist, cheek, the edge of their jaw. They always smelled faintly of coffee beans and acrylic paint.
The Doctor’s gaze drifted across the console room as the thought settled.
Funny, that.
How the memory of the café always seemed to come with a very particular laugh echoing through it. He shifted his weight, tapping his fingers idly against the console as the image continued to unfold in his mind.
Because it wasn’t really the café he kept thinking about.
It was the way they leaned against the counter when things were slow, sketchbook open beside the register. The quick, absentminded flick of their pencil while they talked. The way their eyes lit up whenever he described somewhere strange he’d “visited for work.”
Or how they’d grin, bright and unguarded, whenever the bell above the door chimed and they looked up to see him walking in.
The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly.
“Well that’s…” he muttered to himself. The Doctor exhaled slowly through his nose, shaking his head once as if trying to clear it. His finger wagged in the air as if lecturing himself.
He paused. The Tardis hummed softly beneath him, sounding suspiciously amused.
“Oh hush,” he told her. The moment stretched quietly for a few seconds.
Bzzzt.
The Doctor startled slightly. The sound was small, quiet as a mouse under the hum of the Tadris, but very out of place.
He glanced down toward the console, brow furrowing. The culprit revealed itself a moment later, an old, slightly battered flip phone resting near the edge of the console where he’d left it to charge. The tiny screen glowed faintly as it buzzed again.
The Doctor stared at it.
“…Oh.”
He straightened immediately. Crossing the room in two quick strides, he snatched the phone from the console just as it buzzed once more in his hand. There was only one contact saved in the entire device.
He flipped it open and a single new message blinked up at him.
“Don’t be late.”
“Oh, am I now?” he murmured under his breath, eyes scanning the message again. The Doctor felt the corners of his mouth lift before he could stop them.
He snapped the phone shut with a soft click, already feeling the sluggish fog in his mind evaporating. Energy rushed back into him like someone had flipped a switch. Suddenly the console room didn’t feel quite so quiet anymore.
The Doctor bounced lightly on the balls of his feet, setting the phone back down as he reached for a lever.
“Right then!” he said brightly, fingers flying across the controls.
Coordinates snapped into place with practiced ease.
London.
Present day.
One quiet little street.
Just about closing time.
“Oh, this is going to be brilliant.” The Doctor grinned to himself as he slammed the lever downward.
The Tardis settled with her usual wheezing groan, the sound echoing gently through the console room before fading into a satisfied hum.
The Doctor gave the console an affectionate pat. “Perfect parking as always,” he said, peering at the monitor.
A narrow London street appeared on the screen, quiet this time of evening, the pavement still damp from earlier rain. Streetlights glowed amber against the slick pavement. The café sat exactly where it always did, warm light spilling through the windows like a beacon. And just a few blocks away, tucked neatly in a dark alley where no one would think to look, stood a blue police box.
The Doctor straightened his tie with a small, satisfied nod. He reached for the door and then stopped halfway there.
“…Phone.”
He turned back around immediately, scanning the console.
The little flip phone still sat where he’d set it down earlier, charging cable dangling lazily over the edge. He snatched it up and slipped it into his jacket pocket.
“Nearly forgot you,” he muttered. Then his eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “…Wallet.”
The Doctor groaned softly and spun back toward the console again.
“Honestly,” he grumbled to himself, rummaging through a small pile of odds and ends he’d accumulated near one of the panels. “You’d think after nine hundred years I’d remember the basics.”
His fingers finally closed around the slim leather wallet. He held it up with a faintly suspicious look. Still felt a bit ridiculous, if he was honest, for him to own a wallet.
For most of his life, he’d never needed one. If he needed something, he either found it, borrowed it, built it from scratch with spare parts, or occasionally saved the planet and accepted tea as payment afterward.
But apparently, humans had expectations. Namely, that when you said “I’ll get the next round,” you were expected to actually possess the means to do so.
He flipped the wallet open. A few bills of human currency sat neatly folded inside. A handful of cards filled the slots, some real, some not quite. And tucked neatly behind them, psychic paper rested like a quiet safety net.
“Let’s see, cash, cards, psychic paper, loyalty cards…” He froze. “Loyalty cards?” The Doctor pulled one free and held it up in front of his face.
A brightly colored fro-yo punch card stared back at him. Nine little circles had been stamped neatly across the bottom. One empty space remained.
He stared at it for a moment, then he let out a quiet chuckle.
“Well, that’s absurdly human.” He turned the card slightly in the light, inspecting it like it was some rare alien artifact.
“One more frozen yogurt and you get a free one. Brilliant system.” he read aloud. His grin widened slightly, “Terrible financial model, mind you, but brilliant.”
He slipped the card back into the wallet and tucked it into his jacket pocket. Funny how quickly these little things accumulate. Wallets, phones, fro-yo punch cards, all evidence of a life that only looked ordinary.
The Doctor gave the console one last quick glance, patting his coat as he mentally checked his inventory.
Phone?
Pocket.
Wallet?
Pocket.
Sonic screwdriver?
Always.
He nodded once, satisfied.
“Right then.”
With that, he strode toward the Tardis doors and pulled them open.
Cool evening air drifted in immediately, carrying with it the faint sounds of the city settling into the night. The Doctor stepped out onto the pavement, locking the doors behind him with a familiar snap. For a moment, he simply stood there, hands tucked casually in his coat pockets.
Then he bounced lightly on his heels. Energy hummed through him again, the same restless excitement that had been missing earlier in the vortex.
The Doctor walked down the street with his hands tucked comfortably in his pockets, long limbs loose and relaxed, that bright, boyish grin of his lighting up his face as if the whole evening belonged to him.
His trainers clicked softly against the uneven cobblestones.
London was settling into night. The earlier rain had left the air cool and fresh, the pavement reflecting the glow of streetlamps in soft gold smears. A faint breeze tugged at his coat as he walked, rustling the edges of it behind him.
He tilted his head back slightly, eyes drifting upward. The first few stars were beginning to appear through the haze of the city sky. Not many, London’s lights swallowed most of them, but the ones that managed to break through still looked beautiful to him.
They always did. To humans, they were distant pinpricks of light, but to him, they were places. Memories and old friends. Entire worlds living their lives out there while he wandered through the quiet streets of Earth pretending, for a little while, to be something simpler.
His gaze dropped again as he turned the corner. And his thoughts wandered, as they often did on this particular walk, back to the first time he’d stepped into the café.
He’d only meant to stop for a moment. Just a cup of tea, nothing more than that. He remembered the way the bell above the door had chimed when he pushed it open, the warm air inside washing over him as he stepped in from the chilly street. The smell of roasted coffee beans had wrapped around him immediately, rich and comforting.
At the time, he’d been feeling particularly sorry for himself. Not that he’d admitted it out loud.
But the loneliness had been there, sitting heavy in his chest like it sometimes did when a companion left, and the universe suddenly felt far too large again. So he’d wandered inside, ordered a tea, and planned to sit quietly for a few minutes until the feeling passed.
Instead, he’d gotten two hours of conversation. Two hours of easy, effortless chatter with the barista behind the counter.
It had started simply enough, a quick question about what sort of tea he preferred. Then a follow-up comment about his accent. Then a passing remark about the book he’d been holding that spiraled into a surprisingly passionate debate about whether the science in the latest sci-fi film made any sense whatsoever.
The Doctor had blinked at them across the counter at one point, halfway through explaining orbital mechanics with his hands waving enthusiastically through the air.
They’d been laughing, actually laughing. Not the polite sort of laugh humans sometimes used when he talked too fast or got carried away, a real one. It was ugly, and they snorted, but it was wonderful. Bright and delighted and entirely unbothered by the fact that he’d somehow turned a casual tea order into a miniature lecture about gravity wells.
They’d talked in bursts between customers, quick exchanges whenever the café quieted down. And wasn’t until he’d left that the Doctor had realized the tight ache in his chest had vanished. He’d left the café that evening, stepping back out into the London night feeling lighter than he had in weeks. Completely forgetting that he’d walked in there upset in the first place.
After that, well, it had become a bit of a habit. Whenever the loneliness crept back in, whenever the universe started feeling a bit too quiet, he’d find himself wandering down this very street again.
Pop in for a tea and have a chat. Listen to them ramble about whatever project they were working on that week, or excitedly describe some obscure documentary they’d watched at two in the morning. And somehow, every time, the ache would fade.
The Doctor’s grin softened as he continued down the sidewalk.
Next thing he knew, the two of them were making plans. They’d asked for his number one evening while wiping down the counter, pencil tucked behind their ear like they’d forgotten it was there.
Game nights had followed soon after that, Mario Kart tournaments that turned strangely competitive. Debates over book recommendations that sometimes lasted longer than the games themselves. Lengthy arguments about whether any science-fiction film in existence had ever actually gotten the science right. The Doctor had opinions about that, strong opinions.
His steps slowed as the café came into view. The light was still on inside, glowing through the windows and spilling softly onto the pavement. But the little sign hanging on the door had already been flipped around to ‘closed’.
The Doctor frowned slightly, tilting his head as he approached. That was odd; they were usually just finishing up around this time. He leaned slightly to one side, trying to peer through the glass, but the angle and the reflection of the streetlights made it difficult to see very far inside.
“No matter,” he murmured to himself. He reached for the door handle and gave it a gentle tug, but it was locked. The Doctor rocked back on his heels with a small huff of amusement. “Right. Yes. Security. Very responsible.”
He knocked twice against the glass. The sound echoed faintly inside the quiet café. He waited, hands slipping back into his pockets as he glanced casually up and down the empty street.
Nothing.
He leaned a little closer to the door and knocked again, slightly louder this time. A beat passed, followed by a tremendous crash that echoed from somewhere deeper inside the café, followed immediately by a sharp yelp.
The Doctor’s head snapped up. In one smooth motion, he was already digging into his coat pocket. The sonic screwdriver flicked to life in his hand with a familiar blue glow.
“Sorry about this,” he muttered to the lock. The sonic buzzed softly against it.
Click.
The door popped open, and the Doctor slipped inside quickly, letting it swing shut behind him as he moved deeper into the café.
“Hello?” he called, voice raised slightly now. “Everything alright in here?”
He followed the sound of hurried clattering and a string of muffled curses toward the back.
“Because that sounded-”
He rounded the corner and stopped. Flour was everywhere. It dusted the counter like fresh snow. Covered the floor in messy white streaks. Hung faintly in the air like a cloud that hadn’t quite settled yet.
In the center of the chaos stood the barista. A large metal baking pan had apparently met a dramatic end on the floor beside them, a lump of half-prepared pastry dough slowly sliding out of it like it had also given up on life.
They looked absolutely furious.
Flour clung to their clothes, dusted their hair, streaked across their cheek where they’d clearly tried to brush it away with the back of their hand. They glared down at the pan like it had personally betrayed them.
“Stupid-” they muttered under their breath, nudging it with the toe of their shoe. A warm chuckle escaped him before he could stop it.
“Well,” he said lightly, leaning his shoulder against the doorway, arms folding loosely across his chest.
“That’s one way to redecorate.”
Their head snapped up.
For a split second, the irritation on their face didn’t fade, and if anything, the sight of him seemed to make them look even more exasperated.
But the Doctor’s grin only widened. He gestured vaguely at the flour-coated battlefield around them, “I take it the soufflé fought back?”
“Oh, don’t you start,” they snapped, pointing a flour-covered finger at him. Then their eyes narrowed.
The Doctor immediately lifted both hands in surrender, though the grin tugging at his mouth refused to disappear.
“What?” he said innocently. “Just making an observation.”
They scoffed, turning away from him with a dramatic huff and crouching to grab the fallen pan from the floor.
“My entire day has been an observation,” they grumbled. The Doctor leaned casually against the doorway, arms folding again as he watched them begin scooping the ruined dough back toward the pan.
“Oh?” he said lightly. “Do go on. I sense a story.”
They shot him a look.
“Oh you bet there’s a story.” They set the pan on the counter with a loud clatter and grabbed a cloth, wiping flour off the edge of the work surface with quick, frustrated swipes.
“The espresso machine broke this morning. And apparently,” they continued, voice dripping with irritation, “that means every single person who walks through the door thinks it’s my fault, like I took a bat to it myself.”
They mimicked a customer’s whining tone as they scrubbed at a flour streak.
“‘What do you mean the latte machine is down?’ I don’t know, Susan, maybe it broke. Happens sometimes. Machines do that.”
The Doctor let out a quiet snort of laughter.
“Don’t laugh.” They pointed the cloth at him again.
“Sorry,” he said quickly, though his smile only widened. They tossed the cloth into the sink and grabbed a broom leaning against the wall.
“And of course the manager keeps saying someone’s coming to fix it,” they continued, sweeping aggressively at the flour-covered floor.
“But do they come fix it?”
“I’m sensing a no.” The Doctor tilted his head.
“Correct.” Flour puffed into the air with every irritated sweep of the broom. “So all day it’s been customers complaining, orders taking twice as long, people glaring at me like I personally sabotaged their good mood.”
They paused long enough to shove the fallen pan back onto the counter.
“And then,” they continued, voice climbing another notch in frustration, “my coworker very confidently tells me before he leaves that he finished prepping the dough for tomorrow.”
The Doctor’s eyes drifted slowly toward the half-collapsed pastry mess.
“…Ah.”
“Yes,” they said flatly. “Ah.” They gestured dramatically toward the dough.
“Except guess what?”
“I’m going to assume the dough was not, in fact, prepped.”
“Ding ding ding.” They dumped another small avalanche of flour into the trash and wiped their hands on their apron.
“So I had to do that,” they continued, nodding toward the mixing bowl on the counter. “Which would’ve been fine. But then the stupid pan slipped.” They pointed accusingly at the metal tray, as it had personally insulted them. “And now there’s flour everywhere.”
The café fell quiet for a moment except for the soft scrape of the broom across the floor. The Doctor watched them move around the kitchen, sweeping, wiping, stacking things back where they belonged, their earlier fury gradually settling into tired resignation.
For all their grumbling, they were already halfway through cleaning the disaster. He pushed himself off the doorway and wandered a few steps closer, careful to avoid the worst of the flour. His expression had softened now, amusement still flickering in his eyes but tempered by genuine sympathy.
“Sounds like a rough shift,” he said gently.
“That’s putting it mildly.” They huffed. They leaned the broom against the wall again, brushing flour from their hands before glancing back at him.
“And then you show up and laugh at me.”
“I did not laugh at you.” The Doctor placed a hand dramatically over his chest.
“You absolutely did.” They raised an eyebrow.
“Alright,” he admitted, shrugging slightly. “Maybe a little.”
Despite themselves, the corner of their mouth twitched. The Doctor noticed immediately and that small, satisfied grin returned to his face.
“Tell you what,” he said casually, rolling up his sleeves. “Point me toward the offending machine.”
“What?” They blinked at him.
“The broken one,” he clarified, gesturing toward the café. “Espresso machine, wasn’t it?”
“Oh, wait.” Their eyes lit up slightly as they straightened. “You fixed my computer that one time.”
The Doctor paused mid-step, looking faintly pleased with himself. “I did, yes.”
“In like… five minutes.”
“Well,” he said modestly, brushing imaginary dust from his sleeve, “it was only a loose connection.”
“Come on then!” Before he could even respond, they were already leading the way back through the café. The Doctor followed with an amused smile tugging at his mouth.
The espresso machine sat behind the counter like a sulking metal brick, its display screen dark and unhelpful. They leaned across the counter and tapped it with the side of their hand.
“This stupid thing,” they muttered.
The Doctor crouched slightly beside it, inspecting the machine with an exaggerated seriousness that made it look as though he were examining alien technology rather than a commercial coffee maker. He plucked a pair of glasses out of his pocket and put them on. They almost made fun of the way his mouth hung open slightly as he focused, but thought best of it since he was doing them a favor.
“Well,” he murmured thoughtfully, tilting his head one way and then the other, “let’s see what we’ve got here.”
They hovered beside him, clearly trying not to look too hopeful.
“I mean, you probably can’t fix it tonight,” they said quickly. “But if you could at least figure out what’s wrong, I could tell my manager and maybe they’ll actually send someone useful tomorrow.”
The Doctor hummed absently, fingers already turning a panel slightly to peer inside.
“Mmm.”
“I’ll finish cleaning up the war zone in the back while you, uh, do your tech wizard thing,” they added. They rocked back on their heels.
“Good plan,” he said without looking up.
“Don’t electrocute yourself.” They pointed a warning finger at him.
The Doctor snorted softly. “I’ll do my best.”
Satisfied, they disappeared back through the doorway toward the kitchen.
The Doctor waited, listened to the faint sounds of sweeping and clattering from the back for a few seconds. Then he leaned back slightly and peeked around the corner.
“Right then,” he murmured. His hand slipped casually into his coat pocket, and the sonic screwdriver appeared with a soft metallic flick. The blue light buzzed quietly as he held it near the back panel of the espresso machine.
“Let’s see what’s upset you,” he whispered. The sonic hummed, scanning. The Doctor’s brow furrowed.
“Oh, you poor thing,” he muttered to the machine. “Clogged pressure valve. No wonder you’ve been throwing a tantrum.”
A quick adjustment. A gentle tap. The sonic buzzed again. The machine gave a soft mechanical whirr. The display screen flickered back to life.
“There we go.” The Doctor grinned. He slipped the sonic screwdriver back into his coat pocket just as the footsteps from the kitchen began approaching again. By the time they rounded the corner, he was already tightening the panel back into place like he’d been manually tinkering the entire time.
“Well?” they asked hopefully. They stepped behind the counter, brushing flour from their hands.
“Try it.” The Doctor gave the machine a small, satisfied pat.
“No freaking way.” They stared at him like he had grown a second head.
The Doctor only gestured politely toward the machine. “Go on.”
Suspicion written all over their face, they leaned forward and pressed one of the buttons. The machine hummed, not the angry, grinding noise it had apparently been making earlier. A normal hum. The display lit up fully, the system warming itself like nothing had ever been wrong.
“No. Way.” They pressed another button, and the grinder spun up with a healthy whirr.
The Doctor rocked back on his heels, folding his arms like a man who had simply tightened a loose screw.
“What was wrong with it?” they demanded, already crouching down to peer at the panel he’d been fiddling with. “And how did you fix it that fast?”
“Oh, simple,” he said breezily. “Pressure valve was clogged.”
“That’s it?” They blinked again.
“Mmhm.” He leaned casually against the counter. “Build-up in the line. Happens with machines like this when they’re overworked. Just needed clearing out.”
“You figured that out in like two minutes.” They squinted at him.
“Good with systems.” He gave a modest shrug.
“You’re weirdly good with tech.” They leaned back against the counter, shaking their head slowly in disbelief.
“Is that so strange?” The Doctor’s grin tilted slightly.
They studied him for a moment, then pointed accusingly.
“You’re secretly a robot.”
“I beg your pardon?” The Doctor choked on a laugh.
“Seriously,” they continued, crossing their arms. “You fixed my computer in five minutes last month. Now you just resurrected the espresso machine like it’s nothing.”
“Robot.” They narrowed their eyes.
“Terribly rude accusation.” He stuck his chin up. He fidgeted with his hands, dipping into his pockets, and sniffled for some reason, a habit of his they’d noticed but never questioned.
“You can’t prove you’re not.”
“Pretty sure I can.” He scoffed as if this were an actual accusation that could get him in trouble if true. Yet the growing grin was killing his mock seriousness.
“Robot.” They waved a dismissive hand.
The Doctor shook his head with a quiet chuckle, letting the teasing slide off him easily.
“Just lucky, that’s all.”
They were still staring at him with amused suspicion when something caught their eye.
“Wait.”
“What?” The Doctor blinked.
“How did you get in?” They tilted their head slightly, looking past his shoulder.
“Oh.” The Doctor followed their gaze. The front door sat across the café, perfectly innocent in the dim light.
“I locked the door when I flipped the sign.”
“Yes.” The Doctor nodded quickly.
“So. . . ” They gestured toward him. “How are you in here?”
“I walked in?” The Doctor stared at the door again, then back at them.
“No you didn’t.” They frowned.
“Yes I did.”
“I locked it.” They squinted.
“Did you though?” The Doctor tilted his head thoughtfully, as if deeply considering this new information.
“Yes.”
“Are you absolutely certain?”
“Well,” They hesitated.
“Because I just walked in.” The Doctor shrugged casually, gesturing loosely toward the door. He rubbed his earlobe, a tic they’d noticed he did often when he was considering something particularly confusing.
“Huh, I guess I did.”
“Easy mistake.” The Doctor nodded, hands sliding into his pockets like a perfectly innocent bystander.
“I could’ve sworn I locked it.” They rubbed the back of their neck.
“Long day,” he offered helpfully.
“Yeah.” They gave a small shrug. “Guess I forgot.” They shook their head once, clearly deciding it wasn’t worth the mental energy to think about any further.
“Well,” they sighed, glancing back toward the kitchen. “I’m definitely not fixing that dough tonight.”
“No?” The Doctor raised an eyebrow.
“Nope.” They grabbed their apron strings and began untying them. They tossed the apron onto the counter. “Morning shift can deal with it. I’m already in overtime, and I am done.”
The Doctor nodded approvingly.
They walked over to the light switches and flicked off the overhead lights one by one, the café dimming until only the soft glow from the streetlamps filtered through the windows.
“Ready?” they asked, grabbing their coat from the back of a chair.
“Absolutely.” The Doctor stepped outside first, waiting on the pavement while they locked up properly this time.
They slipped into the coat and headed for the door. He watched as they double-checked the handle.
“Locked,” they confirmed. They turned back toward him, keys jingling as they shoved them into their pocket.
“Excellent.”
“Alright,” they said, a little bit of that earlier exhaustion fading now.
“So.” They pointed down the street. “Game night?”
“Careful, John,” they said sweetly, eyes glued to the screen. “You’re falling behind.”
On the television, their kart sped through the final stretch of the track, bright colors flashing across the screen as the finish line crept closer. Beside them, the Doctor made a quiet, frustrated noise.
The two of them were sprawled across the couch in their living room, controllers in hand, the glow of the TV filling the small space. The room itself was a little cluttered in the comfortable way of someone who lived there fully, books stacked on the coffee table, a half-finished sketchbook open beside a mug, pencils scattered nearby.
Art supplies were everywhere if you knew where to look. A tablet and stylus sat charging near the armrest. A few printed sketches were pinned haphazardly to the wall beside the TV. Even the edge of the coffee table had faint little paint smudges that never quite came off.
The Doctor had made himself thoroughly comfortable. His long trench coat hung over the back of the armchair across the room. His suit jacket had joined it at some point earlier in the evening, and his tie had been loosened and abandoned there too, the knot half undone.
Now he lounged beside them in his button-down shirt, one ankle crossed over the other with his feet propped on the edge of the coffee table like he owned the place.
Despite how relaxed he looked, he was playing like his life depended on it. His brow was furrowed in fierce concentration, eyes darting across the screen, fingers working the controller with absolute focus.
It was the exact same expression he’d worn earlier while fixing the café machine. Like he was calculating something far more serious than a cartoon racing game.
“You talked a big game earlier.” They glanced sideways at him and grinned.
“I did not.”
“You absolutely did,” they said, nudging his knee with theirs. “You said and I quote: ‘I’ve got a feeling about this one.’”
“I do have a feeling about this one,” he insisted.
“Yeah? What feeling is that? My dust kicking up into your face?” They laughed again.
“No, that I’m about to win.”
They made an exaggerated “ooooh” noise. “Confident.”
“Accurate,” he corrected.
“You’re in seventh place.” They pointed dramatically at the screen.
“That can change.”
“Not in the next ten seconds, it can’t.”
“Oh, just you watch.” The Doctor leaned forward suddenly, posture sharpening.
“Uh huh.” Their grin widened, and the finish line loomed closer. His kart sped forward, weaving through the track with surprising skill for someone who had been crashing into walls twenty minutes ago.
“Okay, when did you get good?” They raised an eyebrow.
“I was always good.”
“You drove off a cliff twice.”
“That was reconnaissance.”
They laughed again, nearly losing focus on their own race. On the screen, their character launched forward in first pace. Their victory music erupted from the TV.
“YES!” They threw their hands up. The Doctor groaned. Only a moment later, his kart crossed the finish line in fourth place.
“So about that feeling?” They slowly turned to him with the most smug expression imaginable.
“Well.” The Doctor leaned back against the couch with an exaggerated sigh of defeat. He pointed vaguely toward the television, “That was clearly rigged.”
“Rigged?!” They gasped.
“Yes.”
“By who?!”
“You.”
“I would never.” They clutched their chest in mock offense.
“You absolutely would.”
“You’re just bad at Mario Kart.” They shook their head, grinning.
“You’re bad at Mario Kart.”
They laughed so hard they nearly dropped the controller. The Doctor watched them for a moment, a reluctant smile creeping onto his face despite his protests. There was something warm about the way they laughed, completely unguarded, head tipped slightly back like the sound just escaped them naturally.
A sharp knock sounded at the door, and both of them looked up instinctively.
“That’ll be the pizza,” the barista said, still looking smuggly at their victory screen. Before they could even think about moving for the door, the Doctor was already on his feet.
“I’ll get it.”
They leaned forward on the couch, setting their controller down. “Hang on, I’ve got-”
But he was already crossing the room.
“John, ” They groaned.
Too late.
He reached the little side table by the door, scooping up his wallet with practiced ease. A few folded bills slipped out between his fingers as he opened the door.
The delivery guy on the other side looked barely old enough to drive, balancing two pizza boxes in his hands.
“Uh, pizza for-”
“Yes, that’s us,” He said brightly, taking the boxes from him before the poor kid had even finished the sentence. Behind him, the barista was already pushing themselves off the couch.
“Hey, wait-”
He held up a hand without even turning around, the universal signal for too late. He passed the kid the cash.
“Keep the change,” he added easily.
“Oh, uh, seriously? Thanks, man.” The kid blinked at the bills, clearly doing the mental math.
“Have a good night,” The Doctor said with a friendly smile.
“You too.”
The door closed. The barista crossed their arms, glaring at his back.
“You did not just do that.”
“Do what?” The Doctor turned around with the pizza boxes stacked neatly in his arms like he hadn’t heard a word.
“Pay for the whole thing.”
“You bought the games,” he said lightly. He walked toward the kitchen table, setting the boxes down.
“That was months ago.”
“And yet here we are.”
“Show-off,” they muttered. They rolled their eyes, but the corner of their mouth twitched as they pushed off the couch and headed into the kitchen. He pretended not to hear.
The apartment’s kitchen was small, barely more than a corner carved out of the living space, but it felt lived-in. Magnets crowded the refrigerator door. Grocery lists, scribbled notes, and a couple of small doodles were tucked beneath them.
They grabbed two plates from the cabinet and set them down on the table with a soft clink before reaching for a pair of cups.
The Doctor slid into one of the chairs, leaning back slightly as he watched them move around the kitchen with easy familiarity.
They opened the fridge and pulled out a pitcher of lemonade. As they set it on the counter and began filling the glasses, something on the fridge caught his eye.
“What’s that?” He tilted his head.
They glanced over their shoulder. “What’s what?”
John pointed toward the calendar pinned beneath a magnet. One particular date had been circled. Several thick loops of ink surrounded the number like someone had really wanted it to be noticed. They followed his finger.
“Oh.” They shrugged casually. “Nothing important.”
“Nothing important,” he repeated. He leaned forward in his chair, squinting slightly.
“Yep.”
He stood up, wandering a little closer to the fridge as if inspecting it might reveal a secret.
“That date,” he said slowly, “appears to have been circled approximately six times.”
“Yeah, well.” They poured the second glass and set the pitcher down. They slid one of the glasses across the table to his spot before sitting down themselves. “A friend of mine did that.”
He blinked. “A friend?”
“Yeah, Alex, remember? Told you about ‘em.” They grabbed a slice of pizza and shrugged. “They were over a couple of weeks ago. It came up in conversation.” They gestured vaguely toward the calendar. “So they circled it.”
“Your birthday.” The Doctor looked back at the fridge, piecing the puzzle together
They nodded around a bite of pizza. “Mhm.”
“Well then.” He smiled instantly, lifting his glass slightly in a small toast. “Happy early birthday.”
“Thanks.” They huffed a quiet laugh.
The Doctor took a sip of lemonade, then set the glass down and leaned his forearms on the table, his expression turning curious. “So,” he asked, “what are the plans?”
They hesitated, pizza halfway to their mouth. It was only a beat, brief enough that someone less observant might have missed it, but he noticed. The way their eyes flicked down to the table. The tiny shift in their shoulders.
They took the bite anyway, chewed, swallowed, then shrugged one shoulder. “Haven’t really made any.”
They kept their tone light, casual, like it didn’t matter either way. Like they hadn’t thought about it much at all.
They definitely did not mention the real reason they didn’t make planes, that they hadn’t known if he would be around.
That “John” was always traveling for work, popping in and vanishing again with that easy smile and vague explanations, and they had learned not to assume too much. Better not to build up a whole day in their head just to find out he was out of town. Better not to want something specific and then be disappointed when life turned out ordinary instead.
The Doctor’s face pulled into a little grimace, all offended disbelief.
“No plans?”
They shook their head.
“That won’t do.”
He pushed back from the fridge and joined them properly at the table, carrying his lemonade with him. He dropped into the chair opposite them, long legs folding awkwardly under the small table, then immediately reached over and helped himself to a slice of pizza as though this were now a very serious planning session.
“You’ve got to want to do something,” he said around a bite, gesturing with the slice in hand. “It’s your birthday.”
They snorted softly. “That’s a lot of pressure for a Tuesday.”
“It’s not pressure,” he argued. “It’s celebration. Entirely different thing.”
They smiled despite themselves, tracing a fingertip through a bead of condensation running down the side of their glass. “Easy for you to say.”
“It is, yes,” he said at once, entirely unapologetic. “Now then. Think. There must be something.”
They leaned back in their chair, considering him over the rim of their glass. “What if you’re traveling? Or working?”
The question came out more casual than it felt.
The Doctor answered without hesitation, “I can make time.” Something in his voice made them look up properly.
He was still holding the pizza slice, one elbow braced on the table, his expression easy, but there was a certainty in it now. A quiet sincerity that softened the lines of his face.
“Don’t worry about that,” he said. “I can make time for your birthday.”
“That was unbelievably cheesy.” Their mouth curved before they could stop it.
The Doctor put a hand to his chest, mock wounded. “I was being sincere.”
“I know,” they said, grinning into their lemonade. “That’s what made it cheesy.”
He pointed at them with the pizza. “You say cheesy. I say charming.”
They laughed, and he smiled back, pleased with himself.
For a moment, the kitchen felt smaller somehow. The hum of the refrigerator, the soft glow from the lamp in the living room, the open pizza box between them, the half-finished game still paused on the television in the other room, it all seemed to narrow around the two of them at the table.
The Doctor’s smile lingered a little too long, their own did too. His eyes dropped, briefly, to their mouth. Theirs caught on the softness in his expression. It was only a second. Barely that.
But something in the air shifted.
The barista cleared their throat first, looking down at the table as they reached for another slice they didn’t really want yet. “I mean,” they said, voice a touch lighter than before, “nothing’s coming to mind.”
The Doctor blinked once, as if shaking himself out of something, then sat back in his chair.
“Nothing at all?”
They shrugged, keeping their gaze on the pizza box. “Maybe just another game night. Or a movie.”
“A movie,” he repeated, as though testing the idea.
“Or both.”
He tilted his head. “That’s your big birthday celebration?”
They finally looked back at him, one brow lifting. “What’s wrong with that?”
He opened his mouth, clearly prepared to argue, then paused. There was affection in his expression now, helpless and fond.
“Nothing,” he said at last, though he still sounded like he thought there was quite a lot wrong with it. “Nothing at all.”
The Doctor kept talking.
Something about birthdays being criminally underappreciated, about how humans had a baffling tendency to waste perfectly good excuses for celebration, about how “just another game night” sounded suspiciously like the sort of thing someone said when they’d resigned themselves to having no imagination.
His voice carried on easily from across the table, animated and warm, words tumbling over each other as he gestured with one hand and stole another bite of pizza with the other.
They only caught about half of it.
Because somewhere in the middle of his rambling, their attention had drifted, not away from him, never really away from him, but inward.
Toward the strange, quiet truth of him, that John left all the time.
Not in any dramatic way. He never stood in the doorway and announced some grand departure. He never warned them more than vaguely, if at all. Usually, they only found out after the fact, when they sent him a text in the middle of the day and got one back an hour later saying he was out of town. Or busy with work. Or traveling. Always so casual, like it was nothing.
Like disappearing for two or three days at a time was perfectly normal. Sometimes it was only a couple of days. Once, it had been a full week. A week that had dragged and stretched and somehow managed to feel longer than entire months before they’d known him.
It was stupid, really.
They had lived a perfectly functional life before John wandered into the café asking for tea and looking like a man trying very hard not to be lonely. They had gone to work, come home, drawn until their eyes burned, scrolled aimlessly on their phone, gone to sleep, done it all again. The days had passed well enough.
Then he had arrived, and somehow, in the space of a few months, he had ruined ordinary life.
Because he made it interesting, because when he was around, nothing ever stayed ordinary for long.
He asked questions no one else asked. Not the usual polite little things people said to fill silence, but real questions, odd questions, questions that made them laugh and think and see themselves differently. He wanted to know what they liked to draw most and why. He wanted to know what kind of weather felt best to walk in. He wanted to know what they’d wanted to be when they were eight, and whether they still thought about it.
He listened, too, that was the big thing. John listened like every answer mattered. Like the most mundane fact about their life was worth turning over in his hands and examining from every angle. And because of that, the world always seemed a little stranger with him in it.
A puddle on the sidewalk after rain became something worth noticing because he would stop and stare at the reflection in it like it was art. A crooked old building became interesting because he’d point out some little detail in the brickwork they’d never seen before. A burnt cup of coffee, a weird cloud formation, a pigeon walking with too much attitude, somehow, with him around, all of it felt charged with a kind of wonder they couldn’t quite explain.
That was what they missed when he was gone. That was what they told themselves, anyway.
Not him specifically, just that. His way of looking at things and the energy he brought with him. The feeling that something unexpected could happen at any second.
That was why they texted him every day, even when he was away.
That was why they checked their phone more often when they knew he was gone, waiting for those spotty little replies that came in at odd times. Why a simple Busy, text you later could leave them irrationally restless for the rest of the evening. Why the apartment always felt a little too quiet when he was out of town, no matter how much music they played or how many shows they put on in the background.
He was just their friend. Their best friend, probably, which still felt absurd to admit after only a few months. But he was.
Somewhere along the line, John had become the first person they wanted to tell things to.
Funny customer at work? John.
Weird documentary recommendation? John.
A sketch they were proud of, a joke they knew he’d like, a complaint about the bus being late, a photo of a very dramatic-looking seagull they’d seen outside the café, John, John, John.
And now he sat across from them at their tiny kitchen table, rambling passionately about birthday plans like the whole thing was a matter of cosmic importance.
They looked at him properly then.
At the way his hands moved when he talked. The way his hair had gone slightly messy from the couch. The way he looked so entirely at home here, in their little flat, in his shirtsleeves with his tie abandoned in the other room and his lemonade sweating onto the table.
He was still talking.
“…and I’m just saying, if you don’t at least consider doing something memorable, then frankly I may have to intervene, which no one wants.”
They smiled before they could stop themselves.
No one wants, he said. As if they wouldn’t let him ruin every quiet plan they had if it meant he stayed.
“Alright,” they said at last, setting their glass down and leaning back in their chair. “I’ll put some thought into it, and I’ll tell you next time we talk.”
The Doctor studied them for a second, as if weighing whether that answer was sufficient. Then, apparently deciding it would do, he nodded once. “Good.”
The sternness of it was undercut entirely by the pleased little smile tugging at his mouth.
They smiled back despite themselves, relieved the subject seemed to be settled, for now, anyway. Knowing him, it was only temporarily settled. There was no way he was letting a birthday go by with nothing more than a half-hearted plan and a shrug, but at least he’d stopped looking at them like they were personally offending the concept of celebration.
They finished their third slices in near silence, then they leaned back in their chair with a groan, one hand pressed lightly to their stomach.
“This is ridiculous,” they muttered.
The Doctor looked up from where he was finishing the crust of his own slice. “Mm?”
“This pizza,” they said, glaring accusingly at the open box on the table as if it had personally wronged them, “has no right being this good.”
A smile pulled at his mouth.
They looked down at the remaining slices with deep, genuine conflict. “I want more.”
“Go on then.”
“I physically cannot.”
The Doctor laughed softly, low and warm, and reached for his lemonade. “Ah,” he said. “You’ve reached the important stage.”
They narrowed their eyes. “What stage?”
“The art of leftover pizza.”
They scoffed. “That’s not art. That’s self-restraint.”
“No, no,” he said, setting his glass down and lifting a finger like he was about to begin a lecture. “Cold pizza the next morning, reheated pizza at midday, unexpectedly excellent pizza at two in the morning, very delicate science, leftover pizza.”
They laughed under their breath as they gathered up the paper napkins and stacked their plates. “You sound like you’ve put a weird amount of thought into this.”
“I contain multitudes.”
“That’s one way to put it.”
They stood and carried the leftover pizza boxes into the kitchen, shifting things around in the fridge to make room for it. A carton of eggs got nudged to the side, then a jar of something questionable-looking that had been lurking in the back was moved to a lower shelf. The Doctor rose a moment later and followed with the empty glasses and plates.
They glanced back over their shoulder. “D’you want to take some with you?”
He shook his head at once. “No, thank you.”
“You sure?”
“Quite sure.”
They slid the pizza box into place and shut the fridge with a little more force than necessary. “Then I’ve made a terrible mistake.”
The Doctor leaned one hip against the counter, amused. “Ordering too much pizza is hardly a tragedy.”
“It is when I’m going to be eating it for the next three days.”
He hummed. “Again, I fail to see the problem.”
They gave him a flat look, which only made him smile wider. Before they could say anything else, he rolled his sleeves farther up his forearms and reached for the plates.
They blinked. “What are you doing?”
“Washing up.”
“You don’t have to, ”
“I know.” He turned toward the sink and ran the tap, warm water rushing over the ceramic. The sleeves of his shirt sat pushed up just below his elbows now, his jacket and tie still abandoned in the living room. Without all the layers of his suit put properly together, he looked softer somehow.
They stood still for a moment with one hand resting on the edge of the counter, watching him.
The kitchen light caught in the slight bend of his shoulders as he worked, in the line of his back beneath the thin white shirt. He was slim, yes, but not fragile. There was a lean sort of strength there, easy to miss under all the sharp tailoring and constant motion. His waist narrowed cleanly, and the movement of his arms as he scrubbed at one of the plates made the muscles in his back shift faintly under the fabric.
It was a pretty sight.
Anyone with functioning eyes could tell John was attractive. Hell, a blind man could probably sense it somehow. It was ridiculous, really, how unfairly charming he was without even trying, hair all mussed from the couch, sleeves rolled up, washing dishes in their tiny kitchen like he did it every day.
It felt domestic. The thought settled in before they could stop it. They shoved it away before it could grow teeth.
“Right,” they said abruptly, pushing off the counter.
The Doctor glanced sideways at them, still holding a soapy plate. “Right what?”
“Rematch.” They crossed their arms and leaned against the opposite counter, arranging their face into something smug and unaffected.
“Excuse me?”
They tilted their head, “Mario Kart. Unless, of course, you’re too scared.”
“Too scared?” The Doctor turned fully then, plate still in hand, giving them a look so offended it nearly made them laugh.
They gave a solemn nod. “Understandable, really. Some people just aren’t built for that kind of pressure.”
His eyes narrowed. They smiled sweetly.
“If you like, we can play something else.”
He set the plate in the drying rack with exaggerated care, the line of his mouth tightening in what they now recognized as competitive irritation.
“I am not scared of Mario Kart.”
“Mm.”
“I’m not.”
“Course not.”
He pointed the dishcloth at them. “You’re insufferable.”
“And yet,” they said, spreading their hands, “still winning.”
The Doctor muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like cheater.
They grinned.
“Racing games aren’t for everyone, John. It’s alright. There’s no shame in it.”
“There is shame in losing to you repeatedly, yes.”
That made them laugh properly.
Still smirking, they pushed off the counter and headed back toward the living room. “I’ll go see what else I’ve got, then, shall I? Something a little less emotionally devastating for you.”
Behind them, the Doctor made an affronted noise.
“I can hear you, you know.”
“That’s the idea.” They were still smiling as they disappeared into the other room, with the sound of him muttering mockingly after them and the tap running warm in the kitchen behind him.
He smiled to himself and turned back to the sink.
The water ran warm over his hands, steam curling faintly in the small kitchen as he rinsed the last streaks of sauce from their plates. There were only a few from dinner, but when he glanced to the side, he noticed another mug tucked near the back of the sink, a bowl, and a spoon with the dried remains of breakfast clinging stubbornly to it.
He paused for a moment, then reached for those too. Might as well.
The tap hummed softly. Ceramic clinked against ceramic. From the other room, he could hear them moving things around, drawers opening and closing, the occasional muttered commentary to themselves while they looked for something suitably humiliating for him to lose at next.
It was all so ordinary, and that was precisely what made it strange. The Doctor scrubbed absently at the bowl, his mind wandering as easily as his hands.
This flat had begun to feel familiar to him in a way he had not quite meant for it to. He knew which cabinet held the glasses now, which floorboard near the hall gave a little creak if you stepped on it too hard, which lamp they liked to leave on instead of the brighter overhead light because it made the room feel warmer. He knew the smell of the place after rain when the windows had been cracked open for an hour. He knew where they tossed their coat when they were tired and where their sketchbook usually ended up when inspiration struck in the middle of breakfast. Somehow, without his noticing when it had happened, he had made himself at home here.
It should not have been surprising. He had been here often enough. Tea after shifts, evenings stretched too late over games and takeaway and rambling conversations, the occasional half-hour stop that somehow turned into three. Repetition made places familiar. That was only natural.
For humans, especially, this stage of friendship was ordinary enough. You spent enough time around each other, and eventually, the boundaries softened. You stopped asking before getting your own glass of water. You remembered where the clean towels were kept. You folded yourself into the shape of each other’s lives in small, thoughtless ways.
The Doctor dried his hands on the dish towel, then reached for the mug.
And yet for him, it did not feel easy. It felt foreign in a way he could not quite name.
He had done versions of this before, of course. Dinner at Jackie Tyler’s with the telly blaring in the background and Rose rolling her eyes at her mother. Christmas dinners. Sunday lunches. Sitting in cramped kitchens while companions and their families moved around him as though he belonged there, at least for an evening. He had spent time in their homes, made them laugh, let himself be drawn into their routines for a few hours at a time.
But this did not feel like that. The difference, he thought, was in the stillness of it. No family bustling around. No larger orbit to disappear into. No one else absorbing the weight of his presence. Just him and them in this little flat, falling into domestic rhythms so naturally it unsettled him.
Him at the sink, them in the next room. His coat draped over a chair. Their laughter still lingering in the air. It had the shape of something he did not let himself have.
The Doctor stared at the dish in his hands for a beat too long.
He remembered Martha, then, as he had far too often lately. Not because this felt the same but really because it didn’t. That was the problem.
With Martha, he had known. Known from nearly the beginning that she was stepping toward something he could not give her. Known she looked at him and saw a possibility he was not brave enough, or whole enough, to become. He had liked her immensely, trusted her, admired her, but always with a line drawn in his own mind, however poorly he handled it.
This felt different. It had slipped under his guard while he was busy pretending he only came back for tea and conversation and the convenience of Earth.
Only friendship, he told himself. That was all this was.
A friend who texted him every day. A friend whose flat felt warm before he even stepped inside. A friend who looked entirely too pleased with themself whenever they beat him at some ridiculous human game. A friend whose presence eased that old ache in his chest better than most things in the universe had managed lately.
The Doctor exhaled quietly through his nose.
“Dangerous,” he thought. He rinsed the last of the soap away and set the mug on the rack beside the others.
From the living room came the sound of their voice, raised just enough to carry, “I’ve got options, you know!”
“Do you?” he called back. The Doctor smiled despite himself, head dipping.
“Yes! Loads!”
“That sounds suspicious.” He reached for the towel again, drying his hands more slowly this time.
There it was, that warmth again. That ridiculous, impossible ease he seemed to find here and nowhere else.
The Doctor glanced toward the doorway, toward the next room where they were undoubtedly standing in front of some shelf or cabinet with narrowed eyes and a controller in hand, still talking to him like he’d never left the room at all.
His mouth softened into something fond before he could stop it. He straightened, folding the dish towel over the edge of the sink with more care than necessary, and tried to gather himself back into something safer. And yet, as he stepped toward the living room, he had the uncomfortable feeling that he was lying to himself more than he was to them.
By the time the Doctor stepped back into the living room, they were already halfway through listing options.
“. . . or there’s Mario Party, but that gets violent, and I don’t mean in a fun way, I mean in a friendship-ending way, so maybe not that. And I’ve got Smash somewhere, unless you’re one of those annoying people who button-mash and then pretend it’s strategy, and-”
They were crouched in front of the low shelf beneath the television, one hand braced on the cabinet door, the other rifling through a stack of game cases with mounting excitement. They had apparently started talking the second they left the kitchen and had not once paused to consider that he was still in the other room.
The Doctor stopped in the doorway and leaned against the frame, hands slipping into his pockets. A smile tugged at his mouth before he could stop it.
There was something wonderfully unguarded about them like this, rambling to fill the room, caught up in their own enthusiasm, entirely unconcerned with how they looked. Their hair had fallen slightly out of place over the course of the evening, their socks were mismatched, and they were talking to the game shelf like it was personally responsible for solving the crisis of what to play next. The Doctor found he didn’t mind watching.
They pulled out one game case, frowned at it, shoved it back, then reached for another.
“No, that one’s two player, but it’s all shooting, and I have a feeling you’d absolutely hate it…”
The Doctor’s smile widened.
Then, suddenly, they froze, a small, sharp intake of breath. They gasped and whipped around to look at him with the sort of expression people usually wore upon receiving divine revelation.
“Oh,” they said.
The Doctor lifted a brow. “Oh?”
“No, actually, you don’t get a choice.” They straightened so quickly they nearly smacked their head on the edge of the shelf.
He blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
“I know exactly what we’re playing.”
There was a brightness in their face now, pleased and triumphant, as if they had just pulled off something terribly clever. They abandoned the Nintendo shelf altogether and scrambled to the other side of the television stand, where the Xbox sat gathering a light dusting of neglect.
“Should I be worried?” The Doctor watched them with fond amusement.
“Yes,” they said cheerfully. “But in a fun way.”
They crouched to switch consoles, and the television flickered black for a moment before a new screen glowed to life. The familiar little startup chime filled the room.
“Come on, sit down,” they said, already reaching for controllers.
The Doctor obeyed before he’d properly thought about it, crossing the room and dropping back onto the couch. The cushions dipped beneath his weight, still faintly warm from where he’d been before. His shirt sleeves were still rolled up from doing the dishes, braces visible, jacket and tie abandoned across the armchair like they had been shed by a different man entirely.
They turned and crossed back to him, one controller in each hand. Then, with no ceremony whatsoever, they flopped down beside him hard enough to jostle the couch. Their shoulder knocked lightly against his, the Doctor’s breath caught for the smallest fraction of a second.
They didn’t seem to notice, just handed him one of the controllers and pointed at him with the other, “Close your eyes.”
He looked at them, amused. “That sounds trustworthy.”
“Just do it.”
The Doctor grinned and let his head tip slightly to one side. “Bossy.”
“John.”
“Alright, alright.” He shifted deeper into the couch, closed his eyes, and settled the controller loosely in his hands.
The room changed when he stopped looking at it. The television hummed softly somewhere ahead of him. A menu clicked faintly as they navigated through screens. The lamp in the corner cast warmth over his closed eyelids. From somewhere outside came the muted wash of distant traffic.
And there, immediate and inescapable, was the feeling of them beside him. Their shoulder pressed against his. A point of warmth along his arm and side.
His head fell back against the couch cushion as he listened to them ramble, their voice close now, closer than it had any right to be, almost directly near his ear as they talked.
“I completely forgot I had this,” they said, words tumbling over themselves in that breathless way they got when they were excited. “I bought it because it was cheap and the concept was weird and interesting, and then I never got around to actually playing it with anyone, which is tragic, honestly, because this is exactly the sort of game night situation it was made for…”
“Mm,” he murmured.
“And I remember thinking at the time that it’d either be brilliant or completely stupid, which, to be fair, are two of my favorite categories for games.”
“Excellent categories.”
“Exactly.” They bumped his shoulder again, gentler this time, entirely casual.
The Doctor let out a slow breath. It was a peculiar feeling, noticing himself calm. He had thought he was calm already. He had been relaxed in the kitchen, content at the table, light enough to laugh and tease and let the evening carry him wherever it liked.
But this was something else. The sort of calm that did not merely mean the absence of worry, but the complete unspooling of it. As though every restless wire in him had gone slack all at once. As though, without warning, he had stumbled into the very invention of calm and found it waiting on a slightly worn couch in a little flat above a row of shops.
His hearts felt slow in his chest. It startled him a bit, that more than anything. How thoroughly at ease he was. How natural it felt to sit here with his eyes closed simply because they had asked him to, trusting the shape of the moment, the softness of their voice, the warmth of their shoulder against his.
He stayed very still, afraid that if he moved too much he would somehow break whatever this was.
“Nearly there,” they said, quieter now, as if they had drifted into the same strange pocket of softness without realizing it.
The Doctor swallowed, small and unnoticeable. His thumb traced absently over one of the controller buttons.
He could smell their shampoo faintly beneath the lingering scent of pizza and lemonade. Could hear the tiny scrape of the analog stick as they clicked through the final menu screens. Could feel the rise and fall of their breathing where their arm rested against his.
“Right,” they said at last, satisfaction brightening their voice again. “Okay. You can look.”
The Doctor opened his eyes, though part of him wished, ridiculously, that he could sit in that suspended moment just a little longer.
He turned his head toward them first instead of the screen. They were already watching him, smiling like they’d arranged some grand surprise and could hardly wait for his reaction. And for one disorienting second, the game did not matter at all.
When the Doctor finally dragged his attention from their face to the television, he found a title screen waiting for him in bright, playful letters, Escape Academy.
Beside him, they grinned. “Ever heard of escape rooms?”
He shifted the controller in his hands, eyes still on the screen. “Yes,” he said, drawing the word out thoughtfully. “Been to one once.”
They turned toward him a little more, one knee folding up beneath them on the couch. “Really?”
“Mhm.”
Their brows lifted. “And?”
The Doctor gave a small shrug, mouth twitching. “It was alright.”
That alone told them it had probably been something far more dramatic than alright, but they let it go. They were too pleased with themselves at the moment to get sidetracked.
“Well,” they said, gesturing at the television with their controller, “this is basically that, but as a game. Puzzles, clues, weird little rooms, solving stuff under pressure…”
As they explained, their voice picked up speed again, bright with enthusiasm. The title screen reflected in their eyes as they talked, and the Doctor found himself listening as much to them as to the words themselves.
“It’s all logic and observation and pattern recognition, apparently,” they went on. “So, you know. Very much your thing.”
“My thing, is it?” His brow lifted at that.
“Oh, absolutely.” They nudged his arm lightly with their elbow. “This has your name all over it.”
The Doctor huffed a quiet laugh and looked back to the screen, intrigued despite himself. The art style was clever, colorful without being childish, and the premise already sounded promising.
“And,” they added, drawing the word out for emphasis, “the best part is we’re on a team.”
He turned his head slightly. “A team.”
“A team,” they repeated, smug now. “So you don’t have to get all butt hurt about losing.”
“I do not get butt hurt.” The Doctor made an offended noise at once.
They bit back a laugh and failed spectacularly. “You absolutely do.”
“I do not.”
“You pout.”
“I never pout.”
“You become deeply insufferable in very specific ways.”
He turned fully toward them then, controller in hand, expression full of mock offense. “I’ll have you know I am gracious in defeat.”
They stared at him. The Doctor stared back, holding the look for all of two seconds before the corner of his mouth twitched.
They grinned. “Sure you are.”
He grumbled something under his breath about slander and character assassination, but his attention was already drifting back to the screen.
Because he looked interested now, not just going along with whatever they picked because he was too polite to say otherwise, but genuinely curious. His thumb moved over the controller buttons as he studied the menus, posture subtly sharpening the way it always did when something had properly caught his attention.
They felt a little spark of satisfaction at that.
Good.
They had chosen right.
For all his complaining, for all his dramatic sulking whenever Mario Kart went against him, they liked making him happy. It was embarrassingly simple, really. The smallest signs of his interest, a raised brow, that intent little focus settling over his face, the quick brightening in his eyes, were enough to make them feel oddly triumphant. As if they had won something.
“See?” they said, trying and failing to hide the smug note in their voice. “Perfect choice.”
The Doctor glanced at them sidelong. “Possibly.”
“Possibly?”
He tilted his head, expression turning playfully serious. “I reserve the right to judge after we’ve played.”
They rolled their eyes. “Fine. But I’m right.”
“That remains to be seen.” Still, he was smiling.
They clicked play, and the game dropped them into its prologue: a virtual escape room designed to look like the cheapest real-life version imaginable.
The walls were badly painted to resemble stone. A plastic skeleton slumped in one corner. A faux-candle chandelier hung crookedly from the ceiling. Everything about it looked slightly off, like it had been built over a weekend by people with far more enthusiasm than budget.
They immediately laughed.
“Oh, this is tragic,” they said, delighted.
The Doctor tilted his head at the screen, already leaning forward. “It’s trying very hard.”
“It’s failing very hard.”
He made a quiet, amused hum, but his focus was already sharpening. His thumb flicked over the controls as he guided his character around the room, testing doors, checking shelves, scanning every cheap prop and suspicious object with a concentration that would have looked more appropriate in a crisis than on a couch during game night.
Beside him, they were still taking in the art style.
It was cute, in a strange little way. Bright and exaggerated, with enough detail to make the room feel intentionally tacky rather than poorly designed. The kind of game that knew exactly what it was doing. They liked that about it immediately.
After a few minutes of laughing over the game’s silly humor and charmingly cheap art style, they breezed through the prologue.
It turned out not to be much of a challenge at all, more a tutorial than anything else, introducing the basic mechanics and, to their surprise, setting up an actual plot. They had not expected that. They had assumed it would be little more than a string of disconnected puzzle rooms with a gimmicky title, but apparently the game had ambitions.
“Look at that,” they said as a new bit of dialogue popped up on the screen. “Lore.”
The Doctor made a thoughtful noise beside them, though his attention seemed split between the unfolding setup and the puzzle interface. “Dangerous thing, story. One minute you’re opening a chest, next thing you know you’re emotionally invested.”
They snorted.
The prologue itself was easy. Almost insultingly so. Even they could tell the clues were elementary, the sort of training-wheel puzzles meant to ease players in before the real game began. The Doctor solved them with such speed it barely seemed to count, and even they were able to keep up without much effort.
When the final little practice room came to an end and the game declared them successful, the Doctor leaned back against the couch and gave an exaggerated yawn.
“Oh, shut up.” They turned to him with a laugh already breaking loose.
He stretched one arm along the back of the couch, all false boredom and insufferable smugness. “Was that it?”
“It was the prologue.”
“Mm. Thrilling.”
“You are such a snob.”
“I’m not a snob,” he said, still looking thoroughly unconvinced by the game’s opening effort. “I just expected slightly more challenge from an institution calling itself an academy.”
They rolled their eyes, still smiling, and clicked them onward into the real game.
That was when things improved. The next room dropped them into something with actual teeth, more complicated clues, less obvious connections, multiple threads of logic crisscrossing at once. It required attention now, real attention, and the Doctor visibly perked up beside them.
His whole posture sharpened.
He leaned forward, controller in hand, eyes flicking rapidly over the environment as if he were mapping it all at once. A clue on one side of the room, a symbol on the wall, a number buried in the details of a poster, and somehow, impossibly, he seemed to see how they connected almost the instant he found them.
They, meanwhile, felt about ten steps behind from the start.
“Wait,” they said for what had to be the fifth time in as many minutes. “How did you get that from that?”
The Doctor, who was already halfway through testing a code, barely looked away from the screen. “Well, the shapes matched the order on the sign, except reversed, because the mirror over there changes the orientation, and the number sequence had to correspond to the color pattern or it wouldn’t make any sense.”
“…Right.” They stared at him.
“Oh, don’t look at me like that.” He glanced sideways at them then, clocking the expression on their face, and the corner of his mouth curled.
“Like what?”
“Like I’ve just performed sorcery.”
“You kind of have.”
He grinned and returned to the puzzle.
That was the pattern for the rest of the night.
Each level got harder. The clues got trickier, the rooms more layered, the logic more demanding. And somehow the Doctor only seemed to enjoy himself more. The harder the puzzle, the brighter he became, more animated, more focused, more delighted by the challenge of it. He would notice tiny details they had barely registered, test theories aloud at terrifying speed, and move from one solution to the next with the sort of confidence that should have been irritating.
And maybe it was a little, but mostly, it was impressive.
They found themself watching him as much as the game sometimes, marveling at how quickly his mind moved. He didn’t just solve things, he saw them. He’d glance at a room and, within seconds, start pulling threads they hadn’t even realized were there.
Meanwhile, they did their best not to become completely dead weight.
Whenever he threw himself fully at one puzzle, they would wander off in-game and search for another problem to tackle on their own, determined to solve at least something before he got there first.
Sometimes they managed it. Not often, but enough to matter.
“Aha!” they said at one point, sitting up straighter as they cracked the answer to a small side puzzle before he even noticed it existed. “Got one.”
The Doctor turned just in time to watch the mechanism unlock.
They pointed at the screen with exaggerated pride. “That was me.”
His expression shifted into one of grave seriousness. “Well done.”
They narrowed their eyes immediately. “That sounded patronizing.”
“It wasn’t.”
“It absolutely was.”
He pressed a hand to his chest. “I’m celebrating your achievement.”
“You’re mocking me.”
“Only a little.”
They huffed and nudged his knee with theirs.
Later, when he solved a far more complicated chain of clues in what felt like no time at all, he had the nerve to murmur, “See? Teamwork.”
They turned to him with a look. “You did all of that.”
“And you were here.”
“That is not teamwork.”
“It is moral support.”
He teased them throughout the night whenever they missed something obvious, or what he considered obvious, anyway. A hidden pattern in a row of books, a clue tucked inside a painting frame, a sequence that apparently made perfect sense if one had only bothered to observe properly.
“Oh, come on,” he said once, laughing under his breath as they fumbled through a theory that made no sense at all. “You can’t honestly have thought that was the answer.”
“It looked like it could be the answer.”
“It looked like nonsense.”
They pointed at him with the controller. “Keep that energy when we play Mario Kart again.” That stopped him just long enough for satisfaction to bloom in their chest.
The Doctor grumbled and settled back into the cushions a little. “Entirely different skill set.”
“Mmhm.”
“Completely unrelated.”
“Sounds like fear.” They grinned and returned their attention to the game while he muttered something under his breath about slander and hostile work environments.
He always settled after that. The teasing remained, threaded through everything, light and easy and warm. But whenever they brought up Mario Kart, it took just enough wind out of his sails to make him tolerable again. And they liked that.
Liked the rhythm of it.
His impossible cleverness, their mock offense. His smugness, their quick barked comebacks. The way the two of them fell into the game, into the evening, into each other’s company so naturally that hours began to slide by without either of them noticing.
By the time the credits rolled, the clock on the microwave read a little after one in the morning.
Neither of them had noticed the hour creeping up.
The living room had grown quieter as the night wore on, their earlier energy softened by the low lamp in the corner, the blue glow of the television, and the pleasant kind of tiredness that came from laughing too much and thinking too hard for too long. The empty glasses were still on the coffee table. The pizza box sat shut in the kitchen. Somewhere near the couch cushions, one of the controllers had slipped half out of sight.
They blinked slowly at the screen, eyes heavy, a sleepy, satisfied smile lingering at the corners of their mouth. They had had the time of their life, that much was obvious.
It showed in the loose way they were folded into the couch, one leg tucked under them, shoulders slumped with the sort of comfort only a truly good night could leave behind. Their hair had fallen a bit more out of place over the course of the evening. Their voice, when they finally laughed softly and said, “We actually finished the whole thing,” came out a little rough with tiredness.
Beside them, the Doctor looked much the same, in his own way.
Not human, no, and not governed by sleep in quite the same relentless fashion. He could go much longer without it. But even so, there was a pleasant sort of drain in him now, a heaviness at the edges that felt less like exhaustion and more like the afterglow of something deeply enjoyed.
He had had a wonderful time. More than wonderful, if he was being honest.
Still, he knew better. There was a line between staying because he was welcome and lingering so long he risked becoming too much. The hour had stretched late enough now that if he stayed any longer, it would stop being a game night and start becoming something softer, sleepier, more intimate than he trusted himself to navigate.
So, reluctantly, he pushed himself to his feet.
“Well,” he said, his voice quieter now, touched through with that same contented tiredness. “I should probably go.”
They looked up at him from the couch, still smiling, though something in their expression dipped just slightly at the words.
“Yeah,” they said after a moment. “Probably.”
Neither of them sounded especially pleased about it.
The Doctor smiled to himself and reached for his jacket where it still hung over the armchair. He slipped it on, rolling his shoulders once to settle it properly, then reached for his tie. It had gone slightly crooked over the course of the night, left discarded for hours before he looped it back into place with absent, practiced fingers.
They watched him from the couch at first, chin tipped into one hand.
There was something unfairly charming about the transformation. One moment he was all rolled sleeves and boyish laughter on their couch; the next he was putting himself back together piece by piece, becoming John again in the shape they had first met him in, sharp suit, neat tie, long coat. Still the same man, but not quite.
He caught them looking just as he settled the tie knot and glanced over.
“What?” he asked lightly.
They shook their head, smile turning private and a little sheepish. “Nothing.”
The Doctor narrowed his eyes with playful suspicion, but let it go. He slipped into his trench coat, smoothing the lapels down with quick hands, then followed them to the door when they stood. They opened the door for him and leaned against the frame, sleepiness making their posture soft and easy.
He paused there for a moment, one hand in his coat pocket, the other resting lightly at his side.
“That was good,” they said.
The Doctor’s mouth curved. “It was.”
“Even if you were insufferable about half the puzzles.”
“I was brilliant about half the puzzles.”
They huffed a tired laugh. “Arrogant.”
“No, you were brilliant, too.”
They smiled at each other for a beat. Then, because apparently neither of them was quite ready to let the night end cleanly, they said, “We should do a real escape room sometime.”
“A real one?” The Doctor blinked once.
“Yeah.” They shrugged, though the idea had clearly already taken hold the moment they said it. “Could be fun.”
He tilted his head, considering.
A few months ago, the thought might have struck him as quaint. Slightly silly, even. Paying to be locked in a room and solve problems for fun when he spent half his life doing far more dangerous versions of that for free.
He found he didn’t hate the idea. In fact, the image came far too easily: the two of them in some absurd themed room, them accusing him of showing off, him accusing them of cheating, both of them laughing while the clock ran down.
“Could be,” he agreed. His expression softened without meaning to.
They brightened just a little at that, pleased he hadn’t dismissed it.
“Alright,” they said. “Then we’ll do that.”
The Doctor nodded once. “Next time I’m in town.”
There it was. Not just a vague idea tossed into the air, but a plan. Small and casual on the surface, yet enough to settle warmly between them. They loved it when he made plans, cause he didn’t always, but when he did, there was always a certainty when he’d be back. John never fell through on his plans.
Their smile lingered, softer now. “Text me when you’re back?”
“I always do.”
“Eventually.”
He grinned, unoffended. “I’ll do better.”
“You’d better.”
For a moment, neither of them moved. The Doctor stood just beyond the doorway, coat on, ready to leave. They stayed half inside the warm little flat, one hand still on the door, looking tired and happy and altogether too dear to him for comfort.
Then they stepped back slightly, the motion small but final.
“Night, John.”
His face softened again. “Night.”
He turned and headed down the hall, and they waited until he disappeared from sight before shutting the door.
And as they stood there for one sleepy second longer than necessary, already thinking about escape rooms and next time and the inevitable text that would come when he was gone again, they found themself smiling at nothing.
The 10th Doctor ☆ The Doctor makes a friend with a humble barista in England. They’re friends. Thats it. They're just friends.
✰ Warnings: 10th Doctor, Genter Nutural Reader, They/Them pronouns, romantic pining, Donna Noble, Slightly Angsty, Mostly Fluff, Idiots in Love
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This is for @vexerieart, who made me smile with their kind words, bitch boosted my ego SO BAD. So I just want to return the favor, pay the smile forward. I hope this cheers you up since you’ve been sick, my love. <3
Request: “Maybe one where the Doctor is trying to have a friend but refuses to have a companion because he's convinced that everyone he travels with will have a horrible fate, so he tries to do it the normal way. Ends up befriending a Barista at a café. Reader and Doctor get close in the normal human way, reader doesn't know that he's an alien or time traveler or anything.”
+ “the doctor and reader being super competitive with game night, to the point that even outside of their planned nights they banter about it”
+ “the TARDIS matchmaking. or donna. or literally anyone.”
The best way to get your request(s) expedited is to give me a lil mwah mwah, y’know. This is common sense.
✰ Word Count: 14.2k
✰ Summary: John Smith is just a simple teacher. John Smith has feelings for the school's librarian. John Smith doesn’t know he’s a Time Lord. John Smith doesn’t know she’s his wife.
✰ Warnings: Takes place over the episode Family of Blood, 10th Doctor, Martha knows her place, Established Relationship, Canon-Typical Violence, Hurt/Comfort, The Doctor’s wife is a badass, The Doctor being the Doctor, The Doctor is whipped, Suggestive Smooches, the Doctor is a flirt
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This will follow the Episode's plot. There are some changes, though; I took some creative liberties for the final stretch.
And I tried to avoid using direct quotes from the show, but The Doctor’s ramble on the ship was just too good to change. Paul Cornell did a fab job. Round of applause for Paul Cornell, everyone. Muwa! <3
The courtyard is lit in harsh, uneven pools of lamplight and moon-glow, shadows stretching long and distorted across the stone. Sandbags have been piled hastily along the inner walls, desks and benches dragged out and overturned to make crude barricades. Behind them, boys huddle shoulder to shoulder, fingers white-knuckled around rifles no child should ever have to touch, let alone aim at another living thing. The night has turned bitterly cold, their breath fogs the air in pale clouds, each exhale visible, each inhale shallow and shaky.
Beyond the gates, the straw army pounds and slashes. The sound is relentless, thuds, splintering cracks, the awful rasp of something that wants in and will not stop.
The Headmaster stands behind them, rigid and unflinching. A man who has already seen war, who wears his service like a badge of honor. To him, this is a duty that would give glory to any man. His voice carries sharp and clear as he issues commands, as if these boys were seasoned soldiers and not students who were meant to be asleep in their beds.
Some of them cry. One boy squeezes his eyes shut for a second, whispering that he wants to go home. Another stares down the scope of his rifle, breath hitching, knuckles trembling so hard the barrel wavers.
But there is no one else.
John stands among them. The weight of the rifle in his hands feels wrong. His jaw tightens as he looks along the line of boys, sees their fear, their courage, their utter lack of choice. Every instinct in him rebels at the thought of them dying here.
Yet he knows there is nowhere left to run.
He raises his rifle, shoulders squaring as the Headmaster’s voice cuts through the noise like a blade.
“At post!”
The barricade doesn’t give so much as it gives way, the gate buckles inward under the sheer, relentless force of it, and then it bursts open. Scarecrow soldiers pour into the courtyard. They move in a grotesque rush, straw bodies jerking forward. Moonlight catches on empty faces and stitched seams as they flood through the breach.
“Fire!” the headmaster roars.
The night explodes.
The boys fire in panicked bursts, some squeezing their eyes shut as they pull the trigger, others sobbing openly as recoil bruises their shoulders. Bullets tear into straw and fabric, sending hay and dust spraying into the air.
Scarecrow men collapse into pieces. Arms rip free. Heads snap back. Bodies crumple into heaps of straw and cloth, lifeless the moment they hit the ground. The courtyard fills with smoke and the sickly-sweet smell of dry grass torn apart.
John’s rifle stays raised, aimed, but he doesn’t fire. He watches instead, boys cry as they shoot, watches childhood burn away with every pull of a trigger. Straw flies. Enemies fall. The line holds.
At some point, he’s not sure when, his rifle lowers. The noise fades from thunder to echoes, then to nothing at all.
“Cease fire!” the headmaster calls.
Silence crashes down, broken only by ragged breathing and the soft settling of debris.
The courtyard is littered with fallen scarecrow soldiers, torn apart and motionless.
John looks down at his hands. His finger never left the trigger guard. He hasn’t fired a single shot. He stands there, stunned, surrounded by boys who have just killed for the first time.
The librarian watches from the window, Martha standing close at her side. Her eyes never leave John.
She sees it the moment it happens, the subtle shift in him, the realization settling heavy in his chest as he looks down at the rifle in his hands. She knows it because she has always known him. Because mercy is not something he chooses; it is something he is.
A kind man. A merciful man. It’s why he chose the name ‘Doctor’.
A man who cannot simply take a life.
He’s seen war before, fought in battles so bloody that the stains of them linger as ripples through time. He buried it so deeply it became instinct. Even without memory of the greatest war the universe has ever known, the revulsion remains, etched into him deeper than recall. The Doctor learned long ago what blood costs. John Smith feels it without knowing why.
She exhales softly and turns from the window. “Come on,” she murmurs. Martha follows her out into the night.
The courtyard is eerily quiet now. Smoke hangs low in the air. Straw and torn cloth litter the stone, scattered where enemies fell moments before. The boys stand frozen, rifles still raised, unsure what to do with their hands.
The headmaster steps forward, staring down at one of the fallen figures.
“Good Lord,” he breathes. He crouches, tugging at the remnants of a sleeve, tearing it open.
“Straw. They’re- they’re made entirely of straw,” he says, disbelief flooding his voice.
A ripple moves through the yard. One of the boys, barely more than a child, turns slowly toward John. His voice is small, trembling.
“Mr. Smith,” he asks, “does that mean we didn’t kill anyone?”
John swallows hard, a painful knot forming in his throat. He doesn’t answer. He can’t. The silence stretches, heavy and full of awe and confusion, as the impossible truth settles over them all.
How could any of this be real?
John feels the weight of someone’s gaze.
He turns.
The librarian stands at the edge of the courtyard, moonlight catching in her hair, eyes fixed on him with an expression that makes his chest ache. Her words from earlier burn fresh in his mind, refusing to fade.
For a heartbeat, he almost holds her gaze, then he looks away.
The headmaster stiffens. It’s nothing anyone else hears, nothing more than a faint shift in the air, a sound too soft to place, but whatever it is, it snaps him to attention. His hand jerks up, and he moves fast, retreating behind the nearest cover.
“Stand at attention!” he calls sharply.
And then everything stops as a little girl steps through the gates, red balloon bobbing gently above her head in the cold night air.
The headmaster steps out from behind cover, lowering his voice. “Lower your weapons,” he orders. “Careful now.”
He walks toward her, concern etched into his features. “My dear,” he says kindly, “you shouldn’t be out here. It’s dangerous.” His tone softens further as recognition flickers. “You’re the Cartwrights’ girl, yes?”
Martha breaks from the line, heart in her throat. “Sir, don’t,” she shouts. “Please, don’t go near her!”
The headmaster stops and turns sharply. “Miss Jones,” he snaps, “that is quite enough. You will not speak out of turn. ”
“She’s dangerous,” the librarian cuts in, stepping forward, her voice calm but unyielding. “She’s involved. You must stay away from her.”
He rounds on her, incredulous. “I will not leave a child standing alone in a battlefield,” he barks.
The irony hangs heavy in the air. Even the boys feel it.
The little girl tilts her head, watching him approach again. “You’re funny,” she says evenly.
He smiles faintly, reaching for her hand. “Come along now. Let’s get you somewhere safe.”
“You’re very funny,” she repeats.
And then she lifts her arm, the gun is already in her hand.
There is a sharp, buzzing whine, a flash of green light, and the headmaster is gone. He explodes into ash where he stands, the remnants of him scattering across the stone in a soft, terrible cloud.
The balloon bobs once as the boys stare in horror at the empty space where their headmaster stood moments before. The girl lowers the weapon, expression unchanged.
The girl tilts her head, eyes sweeping the frozen courtyard, “Well?” she asks lightly. “Is anyone going to shoot me?”
No one moves. The rifles shake in young hands. Breath fogs the air. Terror roots them to the stone.
John is the first to break the spell. Slowly, he lowers his weapon. His voice cuts through the silence, steady and commanding, carrying farther than he expects.
“Enough,” he says. “No more of this.” He turns to the boys. “Retreat inside. Now.”
They hesitate, then obey. One by one, rifles drop. Feet shuffle backward. Fear overrides pride as they retreat toward the doors. The librarian steps forward, placing herself between the children and the girl, gun raised, stance firm. The balloon sways gently. The girl goes quiet, watching, unreadable.
Then Baines emerges from the shadows, gun in hand, “Running already?” he mocks. “How disappointing.”
He lifts his weapon and barks an order into the night. “Reanimate.”
The straw stirs. Bodies on the ground shudder and twitch, straw knitting itself back together with awful purpose. The courtyard begins to move again, too much, too fast.
The librarian doesn’t hesitate. She fires.
Once. Twice. Again and again.
Green flashes from alien weapons answer her shots, stone chips flying as she forces the Family of Blood to dive for cover. Straw men burst apart mid-rise. She advances a step, relentless, fury blazing through every pull of the trigger.
John grabs her arm. “Come on!” he shouts. “Now!”
She fires once more, then lets him pull her back.
Students run. Teachers shout. Doors slam open as bodies flood inside. The courtyard erupts into chaos, screams echoing as the Family of Blood hunts for sport, laughing as they fire after fleeing children.
John drags her through the doorway just as shots rake the stone behind them.
The corridors are chaotic. Boys shout names, grab each other’s sleeves, trip and scramble back up again. Somewhere, glass shatters. Somewhere else, a door slams too hard and splinters.
John is everywhere at once, shoving doors open, pointing, shouting over the noise. “That way! Keep moving! Don’t stop, just run!”
Martha is at his shoulder, hauling a terrified boy to his feet, pushing another toward the exit. The librarian brings up the rear, gun raised, eyes sharp, every sense tuned outward as if she can feel the Family pressing in.
They burst through a rear door into the cold night.
“Go!” John orders, voice raw now. “Run far, don’t look back!”
The boys spill out into the dark, scattering into the trees and fields beyond the grounds. One by one, then in clusters, then finally only a handful left, until there are none.
John turns back to the doorway, chest heaving.
“Right,” he says. “You two, go with them. I’ll stay. Make sure no one’s left inside.”
“No.” The librarian doesn’t even hesitate.
She steps in front of him, blocking the door, gun still in her hand. “You go.”
He stares at her like she’s lost her mind. “Absolutely not. I’m not leaving you here.”
“You have to,” she snaps. “You’re the one they want.”
“And I’m not sending you back in there alone,” he fires back, anger flaring through the fear. “I won’t.”
Martha looks between them, breathless. “We don’t have time for this-”
“She’ll cover you,” the librarian insists, eyes never leaving John. “I’ll hold them off and get the rest out.”
His jaw tightens. “Don’t you dare order me around!”
“Go!” she shouts over him, voice cutting clean through the argument. “Martha, take him to the Cartwrights’ house. I’ll find you there.”
Before he can process it, she’s already turning back toward the building.
“Don’t you dare-” John grabs her arm, anger and fear tangling together. “You don’t get to decide that! You don’t get to just throw yourself into-”
A green blast slams into the wall between them. The impact throws them apart.
“Doctor!” Martha yells, hauling him backward as another shot cracks past where his head had been a second earlier.
He fights her, claws forward, eyes locked on the woman he loves as she’s driven back by the advancing straw men. She stumbles, fires, retreats, and then the door behind her slams shut.
Mr. Phillips’s office, John knows that room, he’d had meetings in there dozens of times. No back exit, no way out.
“No!” he screams, voice tearing itself raw as straw soldiers flood the corridor, cutting her off completely.
Another blast hits near John’s feet. Martha doesn’t ask anymore. She drags him.
“Doctor move!”
His shoes slip on stone as she pulls him through the door, green fire ripping into the wall behind them. The building roars with violence as they spill out into the night, the school vomiting smoke and chaos into the dark.
He twists, reaching back, eyes desperate but the doors slam shut under a barrage of fire.
She’s gone.
They sprint across the grounds, breath burning, the sounds of battle chasing them into the trees. His heart feels like it’s being torn out of his chest with every step away from her. Once they reach the treeline, John wrenches his arm free.
“I’m not leaving without her.” His voice is hoarse, the words shaking loose from a place too deep to steady. He turns back toward the school.
Martha grabs his sleeve again. “Doctor, she can handle herself. She’s faced Daleks. She’s faced worse than this. The Family won’t scare her.”
He whirls on her, eyes blazing. “I’m not the Doctor,” he snaps. “I don’t regenerate. I don’t have centuries of plans and tricks and second chances.” His voice cracks. “I’m just a man. And she’s in there alone.”
That stops Martha for half a heartbeat.
Then she plants her feet and meets his gaze, fierce and unyielding. “It doesn’t matter who you are right now,” she says. “What matters is that you stay alive. That’s what she wanted. That’s what she chose.”
John shakes his head helplessly. “I can’t just run.”
“You already did.” Martha says softly. “She told me to get you to that house,” Martha continues, voice gentler now, “now your job is to protect yourself until she can get out and find us. That’s what she’s counting on.”
John falters. He stands there in the cold dark, breath hitching, hands useless at his sides. He has no plan. No idea how to fight a family of monsters wearing human faces.
All he has is the echo of her voice.
“You are the most real thing I know.”
And then
“The Doctor-” Spoken like another man, a ghost, someone she lost and still carries.
He’d convinced himself, in that terrible moment, that she only loved him because of who he resembled. That he was temporary. A placeholder for someone greater.
It doesn’t matter now.
The thought of her hurt, cornered, alone in that building tears something vital out of him. Whatever he is, whatever he isn’t, the idea of losing her shatters him completely.
“I don’t know what to do,” he admits, barely audible.
Martha’s grip tightens on his arm. “Then let me think for both of us,” she says. “Just, come on. Please.”
John hesitates. Then, broken and desperate and utterly lost, he nods. He follows Martha deeper into the trees, every step away from the school, feeling like a betrayal he will never forgive himself for.
The Cartwrights’ house is quiet in the way abandoned places always are, like the walls are holding their breath. John sits at the small kitchen table, turned sideways in the chair, one arm draped over the back, his body angled away from Martha. An old pot of tea sits between them, forgotten and ice-cold, a thin film clouding the surface. No one has touched it in a long while.
Martha watches him from across the room, helpless.
She doesn’t interrupt. There’s nothing to say that won’t shatter him further, and she knows it. So she waits, hands folded tight in her lap, listening to the house creak and settle around them.
John stares into nothing.
His mind won’t stop.
He doesn’t want to be the Doctor. He doesn’t want centuries and war and running and loss. He doesn’t want to be a legend or a weapon or a man the universe keeps dragging back into horror because it needs him.
He wants to be human. He wants to be John Smith.
He wants to wake up every morning in the same bed, beside the same woman. He wants to marry her, properly, publicly, with a ceremony and blue flowers and vows. He wants children with her laugh and her eyes, wants to grow old and soft and ordinary. He wants arguments over nothing, quiet evenings, grey hair, aching knees, and a life that ends when it’s supposed to.
And the woman he wants all of that with, he doesn’t even know if she’s alive.
The thought cuts deeper than anything else.
What if she’s dead? What if she died believing he didn’t understand her, believing he thought her love was conditional? What if the last thing between them was an argument he didn’t get to finish? A misspoken mistake, he never forgave her for?
His chest tightens, breath going shallow. Dark thoughts creep in, unwelcome and relentless, whispering that none of this is fair, that his life was never really his, that even his happiness came with an expiration date.
“Doc-” Martha shifts in her chair, choosing her words carefully. “John, are you alright?”
He doesn’t look at her. Doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t even seem to hear her. His gaze stays fixed on some distant point only he can see, jaw set, eyes hollowed out by thoughts too heavy to surface.
Martha swallows and tries again.
“You should know,” she says gently, “the Doctor, he’s extraordinary. Truly. Traveling with him was- it was everything. All of time and space, right there in our hands. And he loved showing it to people. Loved sharing it.” A small, fond smile flickers across her face. “That’s why I stayed. That’s why I went with him. Why I trust him.”
She talks about the wonders. The joy. The importance of him. How much he meant to her. To so many others.
John doesn’t react.
Her words wash over him and sink without leaving a ripple. He’s too far inside his own fear, his own grief, to grasp onto any of it. The universe, time and space, legends and heroes, it all feels impossibly distant compared to the simple, aching truth pounding in his chest.
She might be dead, and soon he will be too, so nothing else matters.
Martha trails off, the weight of the silence pressing down on her. She exhales shakily and mutters, more to herself than to him, “It’s not like it matters anyway.” She looks down at her hands. “We can’t do anything without the watch.”
John startles at the sound of a knock at the door, gentle, almost polite.
His head turns toward the door before Martha can even rise from her chair. Hope surges so fast it hurts. He’s on his feet in an instant, crossing the room and swinging the door open-
And it isn’t her.
It’s Tim.
The boy stands on the threshold, pale and shaken, clutching something in his hand like it might bite him if he lets go. When he looks up at John, there’s something older in his eyes than there should be.
“I think,” Tim says quietly, “this belongs to you.”
He holds out the watch.
John’s chest caves in. There it is. The thing that ends him. The thing that proves every fear right.
His hope dies on the spot. He doesn’t take it. He doesn’t even speak.
He turns away, walking back to the table like a man moving toward a sentence already passed, his shoulders slumping, his face gone utterly grave. He sits where he was before, staring at the same empty place, only now the truth has weight and shape.
Martha rushes forward, ushering Tim inside with a whispered thank-you, hands already reaching for the watch. The moment her fingers close around it, her face lights up, relieved and joyful.
“You had the watch this whole time?” she breathes. She turns to John, ready to explain, ready to fix this, and stops.
She sees his eyes; the empty look of a man who’s already dead.
The hope drains out of her all at once.
“Oh,” she whispers. Martha crosses the room in two steps and drops to her knees in front of him.
“John,” she says, soft but urgent, angling herself so he can’t avoid her face. “Look at me. Please.”
He doesn’t respond. His eyes stay unfocused, like he’s already halfway gone.
“We need the Doctor,” she pleads, voice cracking despite her effort to stay calm. “He can fix this. He always fixes things. He’ll have a plan, something brilliant and impossible, and he’ll stop them before anyone else dies. Before she-” Martha swallows hard. “We need him. Right now.”
Nothing.
So she reaches out and presses the watch into his hand herself. The moment the cool metal touches his skin, John jerks like he’s been shocked. His fingers curl reflexively around it, knuckles whitening as he looks down.
Whispers.
He can hear them, not clearly, not as words, but as pressure. Like voices speaking just below the surface of thought. It sends a chill straight through him, raising gooseflesh along his arms.
Tim, hovering near the door, stiffens. “You can hear it?” he asks quietly. “It spoke to me.”
Martha looks between them, confused. “Spoke?”
John swallows, “It’s like it’s sleeping.”
Tim frowns, brow furrowing. “Why did it talk to me?”
John answers without hesitation, the words tumbling out smooth and precise. “Oh, just a low-level telepathic field, you were born with it. Perfectly harmless. Some humans have it. Usually shows up as intuition, good guesses, deja-” He stops dead.
His breath catches sharply, like the sentence has been ripped out of him mid-thought. His eyes widen, horror dawning as he realizes what just happened.
“That-” he whispers. “That wasn’t- I don’t know how I know that.” But the explanation had made perfect sense. Perfectly obvious when it should’nt be.
“Is that him?” He asks trembling. “Is that how he talks?” John stares down at the watch in his hand, heart pounding, whispers curling tighter around his thoughts.
Martha’s smile trembles, “Yes, that's him. We need him, John. We need the Doctor. You have to open the watch.”
“What about me?” John snaps, finally, pain ripping through his voice. He clutches the watch like it’s a live thing. “What happens to me? I don’t want to be the Doctor. I don’t want to disappear. I don’t want to die. I want-”
The night explodes.
A blinding white-hot flash floods the room, followed by a thunderous crack that rattles the walls. Tim yelps and staggers back from the window. John and Martha both spin toward the light, hearts leaping into their throats.
Before either of them can speak, the front door slams open.
She’s there.
The librarian bursts inside, hair disheveled, breath ragged, eyes blown wide with urgency. “They’re destroying the village,” she says, voice shaking but fierce. “They’re burning it to the ground.”
John drops the watch, it hits the floor with a dull clatter, forgotten instantly.
He crosses the room in a second and crashes into her, arms wrapping around her like he’s afraid she’ll vanish if he lets go. A broken sob tears out of him, muffled against her shoulder, the sound raw and helpless and utterly human.
“I thought-” He can’t finish.
She holds him back just as tightly, one arm firm around his shoulders, the other cradling the back of his head, fingers threading through his hair in slow strokes. She murmurs his name over and over, low and steady, anchoring him while the world outside burns.
Through the window, Tim watches streaks of light carve through the sky, one after another, detonating across the village. Houses erupt. Fires bloom. The night turns violent and bright.
Martha bends, scooping the watch up from the floor, checking it with shaking hands like it might be broken. She straightens, eyes blazing now, not gentle, not pleading anymore.
“John,” she says firmly. “This isn’t a discussion anymore. They’re killing people. Innocent people. He’s the only one who can stop this.”
John clings to the woman in his arms, face buried against her, breathing her in like it might be the last chance he gets.
Martha steps closer, holding the watch out between them. “You have to open it,” she says. “Now.”
John’s hands fist in the fabric of her coat like it’s the only solid thing left in the world.
“I don’t want to be a story,” he sobs into her shoulder, the words breaking apart as they leave him. “I’m real. I’m here. I’m a person.” His breath stutters. “I want to live. I want to grow old. I want this.” His grip tightens. “But if I don’t- if I don’t die- then he doesn’t come back. And if he doesn’t come back-”
He chokes, the sentence collapsing under its own weight.
“I don’t want to die,” he whispers. “But I don’t want them to die either.”
She holds him as if she can physically keep him from splitting in two. Her arms are iron around him now, jaw set, eyes burning as another distant explosion rattles the windows.
Martha’s voice cuts through his sobs, firm and relentless, refusing to let him disappear into her shoulder and the safety of her arms.
“John, listen to me,” she says, talking over him, over the ticking, over the bombs. “People are dying right now. Not later, now. He can stop this. You know he can. He’s the only one who can.”
John shakes his head weakly against his lover’s collarbone. “I don’t want to go,” he whispers. “I don’t want to vanish. I don’t want to be replaced.”
“You’re not being replaced,” Martha insists, even as her eyes shine with unshed tears. “You’re saving them. You’re saving us. You’re saving everyone.”
Another blast flashes through the window. Tim flinches again, hands pressed to the glass, watching the village burn.
Martha steps closer, bringing the watch into John’s line of sight, her voice shaking but unyielding. “If you wait any longer, there won’t be anything left to save. Please. We need him. We need you to bring him back.”
John’s breath comes in ragged gasps. He clings to the woman he loves, torn between the simple, fragile life he wants more than anything, and the horrible fate that the universe is gifting him, like it’s something glorious.
She pulls away from John so sharply that it steals the air from his lungs. When she turns, there is fire in her eyes, the same blazing, ferocious look he saw in the dance hall. The same look she wore when she called him her husband and stared down armed monsters without flinching.
Now it’s aimed at Martha.
“Stop,” she roars. The word cracks through the room like a gunshot.
Martha freezes mid-breath. Tim recoils, pressing himself back against the wall, eyes wide.
The Doctor’s wife turns slowly, deliberately, her gaze dropping to the watch resting in Martha’s open palm. Then her eyes lift and turn to Tim.
“Why did you have it?” she asks, voice still sharp, but measured now. Controlled.
Tim swallows. “It spoke to me,” he says meekly, shrinking under her stare. “It said it was trapped. That it needed to be hidden. So I hid it.”
Her expression shifts. “You did good,” she says, surprising him. Tim exhales shakily. Then her eyes narrow. “But you should never have opened it.”
He nods quickly, chastened. “I’m sorry.”
She turns back to Martha. Martha opens her mouth, already bracing herself, hands lifting instinctively as if to defend, to explain.
“Zip it,” she snaps. Martha closes her mouth.
John watches all of this like he’s underwater, but when she turns back toward him, the fire dimming just a fraction, his hand finds hers without thinking.
John’s voice comes out small, almost hopeful in its desperation. “We can just give it to them,” he says, gesturing weakly toward the watch. “They can have it. They’ll leave. I can stay.” His grip tightens on her hand. “We can stay. We can get married properly this time. I can live. We can grow old. Isn’t that- isn’t that enough?”
Her face crumples with grief, “Oh, John.” Her eyes shine, filling as she looks at him like he’s already slipping away. “It won’t work. It can’t.”
She takes a breath, steadying herself, forcing the truth through the ache in her chest. “If they get that watch, they’ll use what’s inside it. Time Lord energy. They’ll become immortal, or close enough. And then they’ll hunt. For sport. Whole worlds will burn because of it.”
She shakes her head slowly. “No matter what happens, they cannot have it.”
The hope drains out of him all at once.
He folds in on himself, a broken sound tearing from his chest as tears spill freely now. “I don’t want to die,” he sobs. “I don’t want to stop existing.”
He looks up at her, eyes red and pleading, voice cracking apart. “Why can’t you want that too? Why can’t you want me? Why can’t you love John Smith?” The words tumble faster, tangled with grief and fear. “Was it all a lie? You just love the face. You love him. You love the Doctor- not me.”
“Stop.” She doesn’t shout this time. She interrupts him gently but firmly, like she’s stopping him from stepping off a ledge. “You are the Doctor.”
He shakes his head violently. “No- no, I’m not. I don’t know what he knows. I don’t remember what he’s done. I don’t-”
She guides him down into a chair, pressing softly but insistently until he’s sitting. Then she lowers herself to the floor in front of him, so he can’t look away. She takes his face in her hands.
“You think memory is what makes a person?” she asks quietly. “You think that’s all he is?”
He can’t answer.
She swallows, voice trembling but certain. “The Doctor isn’t his memories, John. He’s his choices. His mercy. His kindness. His refusal to pick up a gun, even when everyone else does.”
Her thumbs brush the tears from his cheeks. “You didn’t fire tonight. Not once. You rang that bell knowing it would put boys in danger because you couldn’t stand the thought of anyone else being taken by surprise. You offered yourself just now to save the world, even though you’re terrified.”
She leans in, forehead touching his. “That’s him. That’s always been him.” Her voice breaks. “And that’s you.”
“I’ve seen a man,” she says softly, “who loves knowledge so much he can’t help but share it. I’ve seen a man who is passionate about everything he does. Who throws himself fully into his work, into people, into caring.”
She smiles sadly. “A man who thinks quickly. Cleverly. Who can look at chaos and, in a few spare seconds, save a mother and her child with nothing but a ball and instinct.”
“A man who protects. Who provides. Who steps forward when things go wrong, even when he’s afraid.” She looks up at him then, eyes shining. “And I’ve seen his love. His mind. His heart. I’ve seen how wonderful he is.”
“I am so lucky,” she whispers, “that he chose me.”
John’s sobs are quiet. The tears still come, but slower now. He listens and with every word she speaks, something inside him loosens.
She isn’t describing a ghost. She’s describing him.
Everything she says is the very things she’s praised him for since yesterday, the way she looked at him in the halls, at the dance, in his study. The reasons he believed, desperately, that she loved him. His shoulders sag. His breathing evens out, just a little.
Without breaking eye contact with John, she speaks, “Martha, who does that sound like to you?”
Martha doesn’t hesitate. “The Doctor,” she answers, like it’s the simplest truth in the world. “You’re describing the Doctor.”
John turns to her, horror flashing across his face, breath catching in his throat. “No-” he starts.
But gentle fingers guide his chin back toward her before the panic can spiral. Her hand stays there, warm and grounding, thumb brushing the tears from his cheek with infinite care.
“John,” she says softly. “Listen to me.”
He does, he can’t help it when she speaks like that.
“I don’t know where you got the idea that you’d be dying,” she continues, voice calm but firm. “Because that’s not how I see this. Not at all.”
His brow furrows, confusion replacing terror. “But the watch-”
“The watch doesn’t kill you,” she says. “It returns what you already are.”
She leans closer, forehead nearly touching his. “You’re not disappearing. You’re not being erased. You’re remembering.”
“That’s the only difference,” she goes on gently. “Between you and the Doctor. Memory. Everything else- the man I fell in love with, the man Martha knows, the man who won’t fire a gun and can’t walk away from people in danger, that man is already here.”
John stares at her. Awe floods his expression, cutting through the fear like dawn after a long night. His breath goes shallow, “I’m not going to die?” he whispers.
She smiles through her own tears. “No, my love,” she murmurs. “You’re going to remember.”
She doesn’t look away from him as she reaches one hand back toward Martha. Martha understands immediately and places the watch into her palm. She turns back to John and gently sets the watch in his hand, then lays her own hand over his, warm and steady, anchoring him.
“It’s alright,” she whispers. “I’m right here.”
The world tilts. For a heartbeat, John is certain he’s been moved, teleported, displaced, because suddenly he is standing on a beach.
Warm sand beneath his bare feet. His suit jacket discarded carelessly a few paces away. The sun is low and golden, painting everything soft. She’s there, dress simple and flowing, skirts hitched up as she splashes through the shallows.
She turns, grinning, and flings a sheet of water straight at his face. He sputters, laughing, and lunges for her. They tumble together into the surf, his arms wrapping around her as she laughs and wriggles, protesting breathlessly while he kisses her cheek and tickles her sides until she squeals and begs him to stop.
The sound of her laughter is the most real thing he’s ever known.
The vision flickers.
Now they’re in a bed, an odd room with unfamiliar walls, soft lamplight. She’s curled into his side, cheek against his chest, smiling faintly as sleep tugs at her. He’s reading aloud from a book he doesn’t recognize, voice low and gentle.
She hums contentedly, eyes half-lidded, beautiful in a way so intimate it almost hurts. His arm tightens around her without thinking.
Another shift.
They stand on a cliff overlooking a vast stretch of water, wind tugging at their clothes. She leans into him, head resting on his shoulder, his arm secure around her waist.
She’s looking down at her hand, at the ring on her finger. He notices the way her thumb turns it absently, the way her smile softens when she looks at it. He leans down and kisses her temple, then her lips, and she exhales against him like she’s been waiting for it.
The visions don’t feel like dreams.
John’s breath stutters as the room comes back into focus around him, the cold house, the burning village beyond the walls, the ticking watch beneath his palm.
He swallows hard, breath still uneven. “Did you,” His voice wavers. “Did you see that? Did you see what we could have had?”
She smiles at him, “John,” she says gently, “we already did.”
He blinks, confused, and she leans back just enough to reach beneath her coat. Slowly, deliberately, she draws a thin chain out from under the fabric. It glints in the low light.
Hanging from it are two rings and a key.
“Our wedding bands,” she explains quietly, thumb brushing over the familiar metal. “I kept them close. Always.” Her eyes lift to his, easing the fear she sees there. “You don’t have to choose tonight. Not like this. Not under fire.”
Martha opens her mouth, just a reflex, really, and the fire is back in her eyes instantly. A warning so fierce Martha freezes mid-word.
“Sorry,” Martha mutters quickly, snapping her mouth shut and stepping back.
The fire vanishes just as fast as it came.
John notices the control, the resolve, the way she can turn that on and off like a blade sheathed at will. Under different circumstances, he might have found it impressive. Might have found it intoxicating.
Right now, it’s terrifying.
She turns back to him, “I have a plan,” she says. “You won’t like it. Martha won’t like it. No one will.” A grim little smile flickers. “But it will end this. And it will give you time.”
“But we need to move,” she continues. “Right now. So I need to know.”
John looks down at the rings resting in her palm. At the watch in his own hand, ticking softly like a second heart. The memories still feel borrowed, like clothes he hasn’t grown into yet. His fingers tighten.
He hesitates and she understands. She straightens, spine stiff, and addresses the room, though it’s mostly Martha she’s speaking to.
“We’re moving to Plan C.”
Martha opens her mouth, already bracing for disaster, then stops. “Okay,” she says, exhaling. “I hate that, but okay. A plan is a plan.”
The librarian nods once, sharp and decisive. She crosses the room and grabs the alien pistol, the one she’d dropped by the door when John held her. “You stay here,” she tells Martha. “With them. Don’t move.”
Martha frowns. “They can track us.”
“Exactly,” she replies. “So you stay put. They’ve found the Tardis, it’s at the school. If they’re tearing up the village, they’ve probably left scarecrows behind to guard it.”
Martha stiffens. “You’re going back there?”
“If I’m not back in an hour,” she continues, ignoring the protest, “you take John and Tim, you get to the Tardis, and you get the hell out of here.”
Silence slams down.
“What are you going to do?” Martha asks quietly.
The look in her eyes answers before she does.
Tim shakes his head, stepping forward. “You can’t go alone,” he blurts. “That’s stupid. You need help.”
John’s already at her side, hands gripping her arms like he might anchor her to the floor. “Please,” he begs. “Just leave with us. We’ll go together. We’ll hide. I can’t-” His voice cracks. “I can’t lose you.”
Martha’s anger finally boils over. “You’re talking about killing them,” she snaps. “That’s not what he does. The Doctor doesn’t kill. He wouldn’t want this; he wouldn’t be happy with you.”
The room erupts.
“I don’t care if he’s happy, I want her safe!”
“You can’t just decide this!”
“You’ll get yourself killed!” Tim protests, eyes wide.
“You’re not thinking straight!”
“Enough!” Her voice tears through the room like a shockwave. “The Doctor isn’t here,” she roars. “I am.”
Silence. Utter, stunned silence.
“I am Plan B. Plan C. Plan D—all the way to bloody Z if I have to be.” Her jaw tightens, words sharp with bitter truth. “It’s never been needed with him around. You’ve been spoiled by his brilliance. By the fact that he always finds a way where no one else has to get their hands dirty.”
“But he isn’t here.” Her hand presses briefly to her chest. “I inherit the responsibility.”
She turns on Martha fully now, every ounce of authority she possesses bearing down. “My husband’s life, and everyone else’s, is on the line. So shut up and do as you’re told.”
“If I’m not back in one hour,” she continues, “you take John and Tim to the Tardis. Switch off the emergency power. Flip the lever, yes, the one you’re thinking of. I’ve already set her to cruise the vortex.”
John’s breath stutters. “Cruise the vortex?”
“She’ll keep you in flight,” she says, not looking at him because if she does, she might falter. “You’ll have to live on board. However long it takes, until the Family dies off.” Her eyes soften, just barely. “Then she’ll bring you back.”
A last stitch contingency she never wanted to use. A plan born of loving the Doctor long enough to know that someday she might have to finish a fight without him.
“Your job,” she says coldly, every word edged like a blade, “is to keep him safe until I’ve dealt with this. That’s it.”
“If anything happens to him,” she continues, voice dropping to a lethal calm, “I will board the Tardis and burn this planet to ash. Then I will find whatever hellhole those things crawled out of, and I will make them wish I’d just killed them.”
She steps closer to Martha, close enough that there’s no mistaking the promise in her words. “The Doctor shows mercy,” she spits. “I am not the Doctor. I am his wife.”
A beat.
“Understood?”
Martha swallows hard, “Understood,” she says quietly, nodding once.
John watches her, heart pounding, fear and love tangled so tightly he can barely breathe. He knows that look. He’s seen it before—in dreams, in flashes, in the way the Doctor stands when the universe is about to be put right, no matter the cost.
But this isn’t mercy standing there. It’s devotion, a fury, a love so vast it’s willing to damn worlds to protect one man.
“Martha.”
Martha looks up, startled. She crosses the room and presses the alien gun into Martha’s hands. “For the scarecrows,” she says. “Or for anything that gets too close to them.”
Martha’s fingers curl around it instinctively. “What about you?”
In answer, the librarian reaches into her pocket and pulls out the sonic screwdriver, holding it up between them. “This is better suited to what I’m doing.”
Martha nods, no argument this time.
Then she turns to John, and everything else falls away. She’s across the room in a heartbeat, hands on his face, kissing him hard and breathless like she’s trying to carve the moment into both of them. He melts into it instantly, arms wrapping around her, desperate, heart hammering so loud he’s sure she can feel it.
“I love you,” she says against his lips, voice shaking just enough to hurt. “More than anything.”
He believes her. God, he believes her. But the way she says it makes his chest tighten painfully. It feels like a goodbye.
“Don’t-” he starts, pulling her closer. “Don’t say it like that.”
She presses her forehead to his, eyes shining. “Just in case,” she whispers.
His protest dies in his throat. She kisses him one last time, and then she’s already stepping back, already turning away before he can grab her again, before he can beg.
The door opens, and then she’s gone, swallowed by the night. The door shuts behind her with a final, hollow sound. John stands there, stunned, lips still tingling, heart breaking open in his chest as the silence crashes down around them.
Martha grips the gun tightly, exhales shakily, hands trembling at her sides. Tim stares at the floor, wide-eyed. John stands frozen, staring at the door like sheer will might bring her back.
The Doctor didn’t marry her for nothing.
Cooper’s Field is where they’ll be, she could feel it. The meteorite wasn’t a coincidence; there’s no such thing. She slows as she crosses into it, every sense sharpened.
“I know you’re here,” she murmurs.
She lifts the sonic screwdriver and flicks it on. The familiar whirr cuts through the silence, the blue light sweeping in a slow arc as she scans the space ahead of her. Signals stack. Readings overlap in ways that make her jaw tighten.
A ship, cloaked, sitting smugly in the middle of a human field like it owns the place.
“Found you,” she mutters.
She steps forward and extends her hand. At first, she felt nothing for a few paces, then her fingers met resistance. Green light ripples outward from the point of contact, fizzing like disturbed water, the illusion peeling back in shimmering waves. The outline of the ship bleeds into view.
She presses her hand flat against the hull and walks, slow and deliberate, palm gliding over cold metal as she circles it. She maps it by touch, memorizing shape and scale, feeling for weaknesses, for seams.
An interruption in the surface, the entrance. She steps inside, green light swallowing the night, leaving Cooper’s Field empty once more, no sign that anything is there at all.
The interior of the ship glows an artificial green, light pulsing faintly through vein-like cables in the walls. Controls protrude from every surface: knobs, levers, ridges, and ports that jut out like scales on a beast.
She takes only a few steps before she sees them.
All four of the Family of Blood stand ahead of her, backs turned, clustered around the main control bank. Green light washes over their borrowed faces. Baines, Son of Mine, stands at the center, posture loose and smug, hands dancing over controls as explosions bloom across a display. He’s enjoying himself.
She doesn’t announce herself, but it doesn’t matter because they feel her the moment she fully enters the chamber.
All at once, they turn. Recognition flickers across their faces, then surprise, then irritation, then amusement.
She raises the sonic screwdriver. The buzz is sharp, sparks leap from the nearest console. The sonic screams, forcing power through systems never meant to withstand it. Then a flat, miserable whine as the display cuts out.
Then Son of Mine laughs, “Well,” he says, clapping slowly, the sound echoing too loud in the deadened space. “You could have just said ‘please’.”
“I warned you,” she says evenly. “At the dance. I told you the next time I saw you, I’d kill you.”
Mother of Mine snorts, stepping forward just enough for the light to catch her stolen face. “You’ve lost your weapon,” she mocks, voice syrup-slow. “How tragic.”
She raises her gun lazily, barrel settling on the Doctor’s wife’s chest like this is all terribly boring. The Doctor’s wife moves before any of them can finish a breath. A sharp step in, her shoe slams into Father of Mine’s knee with brutal precision. He buckles with a howl, balance gone, body pitching forward and she takes him.
She twists with his fall, yanking him upright just enough to drag him back against her, his body a shield. One arm hooks under his chin, the other rips the gun from his slack grip in a single, fluid motion.
Metal kisses his skull.
“Don’t,” she says calmly.
Mother of Mine stiffens, fury flashing across her stolen face as she snaps her own weapon up, sights locking on. “How dare you!” she snarls. “You coward, using Husband of Mine like a shield!”
“Oh, don’t be dramatic,” she says lightly, tightening her hold. “It’s sort of our thing, actually.”
Baines’ eyes flick between them, calculating, irritation sharpening into something closer to unease.
She presses the barrel harder to Father of Mine’s temple. “Second time now,” she adds conversationally. “You’d think you’d learn not to stand so close to me.”
Father of Mine groans, hands clawing uselessly at her arm.
“Drop it,” she tells Mother of Mine, voice still even. “Or I redecorate this ship with whatever passes for his thoughts.”
The green emergency lights pulse. Slowly, Baines steps forward, and he claps a mocking applause, echoing too loudly in the ship.
“Well done,” he drawls, head tilting as his grin sharpens. “Very dramatic. Very human. But you don’t have it in you. You didn’t before, and you don’t now.”
He spreads his hands just a little, inviting. “Go on. Pull the trigger. Let’s see if you’re bluffing like your husband always is.”
Her arm moves. The shot cracks through the chamber, sharp, deafening in the enclosed space.
The beam scorches the deck right where Baines’ foot was a heartbeat earlier. He yelps and jumps back, the smugness finally breaking as the heat kisses too close for comfort. Before anyone can react, the gun is back where it started.
Her face is stone. “That,” she says quietly, “was me being polite.”
Father of Mine trembles against her, breath hitching, the reality of the situation crashing in fully now. Mother of Mine curses under her breath, gun wavering just a fraction.
“Try me again,” she says, eyes flicking to Baines. “I dare you.”
She draws a slow breath, steadying the gun, her voice low, “This is your last warning. You will leave planet Earth, now. You take your ship and you go so far and so fast that this solar system becomes a bad memory.” Her eyes flick to each of them in turn. “What you’re doing here is a crime against a level five planet. Interference. Mass murder. Predation.”
Her jaw tightens. “And if you think feeding on what’s inside that watch makes you untouchable, if you think immortality excuses you, you’re wrong.” She leans in just enough for Father of Mine to feel it. “You’ll be criminals; the Shadow Proclamation doesn’t care how long you live. It only cares how loudly you scream when it catches you.”
For a heartbeat, she expects something like fear, calculation, or hesitation. She gets none. Baines just smiles like she’s explained a rule they never intended to follow.
Mother of Mine scoffs, curling her lip. “Empty threats.” Daughter of Mine watches silently, head tilted, curiosity outweighing caution.
Their arrogance doesn’t shock her. “Right,” she murmurs, more to herself than to them. “I did try.”
She makes the decision in a single, terrible heartbeat. Mother of Mine first, she’s furthest from her, but she’s armed. Then Baines. Then the child. Clark last, keep him breathing, keep him between her and the rest of them.
It doesn’t feel good, it feels heavy and wrong and necessary all at once. Better them than him. Better this than the village burning. Better blood on her hands than on John’s conscience.
Her finger tightens.
“Stop!” The voice echoes into the room. “Wait, please!”
Her breath catches. Her head snaps toward the entrance, horror flooding her face so fast it almost knocks her off balance.
John Smith.
He’s stumbling through the open hatch, breathless, hair wild, eyes bright with panic and resolve all tangled together. He looks out of place in this green-lit nightmare.
For a split second, she forgets to breathe.
“How-” she whispers, aghast. How did he find them?
Behind her, the Family of Blood reacts not with fear, but delight.
Baines’ grin spreads slow and satisfied. Mother of Mine laughs softly under her breath. Even the child tilts her head, curious.
“Well,” Baines murmurs, pleased. “How thoughtful of you to bring him to us.”
Her heart drops into her stomach.
“John,” she says sharply, without turning fully away from the Family, gun still locked on Father of Mine. “You were supposed to stay hidden.”
He swallows, stepping closer despite the danger screaming from every surface. “I couldn’t,” he says hoarsely. “I couldn’t just sit there and wait while you- while you did this alone.”
John takes another step toward her. He sees it all now, the way she’s braced, the way Father of Mine is locked against her chest, the gun pressed to his skull. He doesn’t know how close they were to dying, doesn’t know how steady her hand had been a second ago.
“Please,” he says, breathless, panic scraping his throat raw. “Just- just leave her alone. You don’t need to do this.”
He moves too fast. His foot catches on something, maybe the uneven deck, maybe his own shaking legs, and he stumbles. He throws out a hand to catch himself against the wall, hand brushing over the scale-like levers that stud the surface.
John freezes, startled, hand still on the wall. “I-I’m sorry-”
Mother of Mine turns slowly, head tilting as she sniffs the air, lips curling in something like amusement, “Oh, you can smell it, can’t you, family of mine?” she says lazily, eyes raking over him. “Still human.”
Baines laughs, soft and cruel. “You ran all this way just to beg? How sweet.”
She speaks sharply, ready to drag him back by force if she has to, “John, listen to me-”
He doesn’t; he interrupts her to address the Family, “I don’t know what’s going on,” he says, breathless but clear. “I don’t understand any of this. I haven’t done anything wrong.”
Baines’ smile widens, delighted.
John swallows and keeps going. “But I know people are dying. Innocent people. And it has to stop.”
Mother of Mine scoffs, amused. “Oh, he is sweet.”
John ignores her, too. “I don’t care about the Doctor,” he says, the words landing like a knife she feels in her ribs. “I don’t care about any of it. I just want you to leave.”
He reaches into his pocket, and her heart stops.
“No!” she shouts, voice cracking as she twists, trying to reach him while still holding Father of Mine pinned. “John, don’t you dare- don’t- run!”
He pulls out the watch.
“This is what you want,” he says, holding it out, arm trembling. “You can have it. It’s yours if you agree to leave her alone. Leave everyone alone. Get off this planet and never come back.”
The ship seems to hold its breath. Baines’ eyes gleam. Mother of Mine’s smile turns predatory. Even Daughter of Mine leans forward slightly, curious. Her grip on Father of Mine tightens involuntarily, gun pressing harder to his skull.
“John,” she pleads now, raw and unguarded. “Please. You don’t know what you’re giving them. You don’t know what that will do.”
He finally looks at her then, and the guilt in his eyes guts her.
“I know you’re doing this for me,” he whispers. His mouth trembles, but he keeps the watch extended. “And I can’t let you die for it.”
The Family watches them like it’s the finest entertainment they’ve had in centuries.
Baines extends his hand slowly, theatrically, like he’s doing John a kindness. John takes a step forward, as he passes her, his shoulder brushes the wall, and his shoulder catches on another row of the scale-like levers.
Baines snatches the watch from John’s hand. For a heartbeat, the universe narrows to that small, silver object resting in his palm. He turns it, admiring the weight of it. All four of them stare, like hungry vultures.
Baines suddenly grabs John by the collar and yanks him close, face inches away, eyes never leaving the watch. “Don’t be stupid,” he murmurs. “Handing this over doesn’t save your life.”
He shoves John back hard.
John slams into the wall, wind knocked clean out of him, boots skidding. As he goes down, his hands scrape across the protruding levers, click, click, clack, a discordant chorus as systems shift and re-route without permission.
She moves instantly.
Her foot snaps into Clark’s knee again, hard enough to drop him with a howl. She releases him without a second thought and rushes to John, fear slicing through her chest.
“John-” She drops beside him, hands already on his shoulders, checking his head, his ribs, his arms. “Are you hurt? Tell me where it hurts.”
He coughs, shakes his head, then reaches for her instead, hands framing her face in panic. “Are you- did they-”
“I’m fine,” she snaps under her breath, equal parts relief and fury. “You absolute idiot.” She hauls him up, tucking him tight against her side, one arm locked around his back like she can shield him by will alone. He clings to her for a moment, then steadies, keeping a protective hand at her waist even now.
Across the chamber, the Family gathers closer around the watch. They don’t look at the humans anymore. They’re too busy basking, heads inclined, breathing slow and satisfied, sharing a silent, triumphant communion as Baines turns the watch in his hand like a crown.
“Finally, the lives of a Time Lord will be ours.” Baines murmurs, almost ceremonial. He flips the watch open like it’s nothing, just greedy confidence.
All four of them inhale. Desperate breaths, chests expanding as they try to drink in whatever should pour out, power, light, immortality, victory.
Nothing happens. The air stays dead and still. For one strange, suspended second, no one speaks. Then every head snaps toward John at once.
“It’s empty!” Baines snarls, fury exploding through his voice. “You lied to us!”
John stares back at them, wide-eyed, breath shallow, utterly lost. “What, no-”
The librarian’s face twists, fear flashing first, then confusion. She stares at the open watch in Baines’s hand like it’s the most fascinating puzzle she’s ever seen, mind racing, gears spinning so fast she almost forgets to breathe.
“That’s not possible,” she whispers.
John swallows hard, voice trembling as he forces the question out. “Where- where is it?” He looks at the watch.
“You tell me!” Baines snaps, fury curdling into panic as he hurls the watch across the chamber.
John catches it without even looking, and everything about him changes. His shoulders square, his spine straightens. The frantic tremor drains out of him like dust in space pulled by gravity. Then he sighs, equal parts amusement and disappointment.
“Oh,” he says mildly. “That’s embarrassing.” He rolls the watch in his hands, thumbs flicking over the casing with unconscious familiarity, already half-dismantling it. “You really did think it was that simple.”
The Family of Blood stares at him, bewildered.
“Olfactory misdirection, like ventriloquism of the nose. It’s very elementary in some parts of the galaxy.” He looks genuinely amused as he fiddles with the mechanism.
The Doctor squeezes her arm once, then lets go and steps forward. He reaches into his coat pocket, the watch disappearing as his fingers come back with a familiar pair of glasses. He slips them on, the gesture casual, almost fond.
“Right,” he mutters, already pacing. He moves through the chamber with easy confidence, eyes scanning the walls, the ducts, the cables that snake like veins through the ship’s bones. His wife watches him go, still catching up, recognizing this rhythm. The way his mind unfolds when there’s a problem to solve and monsters foolish enough to stand nearby.
“It has got to be said,” he remarks conversationally, peering up, “I don’t like the look of that hydrokinometer.”
The Family’s heads follow his gaze despite themselves. High above, tucked along the ceiling, a cluster of pipes pulses faintly.
“And that,” he continues, strolling beneath it, “seems to be indicating you’ve got energy feedback feeding all the way through the retrostabilisers-” he gestures vaguely, “feeding back into the primary heat converters.” He stops beside one of those converters, leaning casually against it, and gives it two sharp knocks with his knuckles.
Tok. Tok. The sound echoes.
“Oh!” He straightens suddenly, eyebrows lifting in exaggerated, mocking alarm. Then he turns back to them, and the sarcasm drains from his face. “Because if there’s one thing you really shouldn’t have done,” he says quietly, shaking his head once, “You shouldn’t have let me press all those buttons.”
The ship responds.
A deep, resonant thrum rolls through the deck, lights flaring brighter, systems whining as power surges where it shouldn’t. The Family of Blood stares at him in stunned silence now. Predators are realizing the trap has closed on them instead.
He steps back to her side, fingers sliding into hers, but doesn’t look away from Baines, Son of Mine.
“But, in fairness,” he says mildly, almost kindly, “I will give you one word of advice.”
His face splits into a wide, delighted grin. “Run.”
He yanks her with him, and they move, feet pounding against the deck as alarms erupt all at once. Red light floods the ship, drowning out the sickly green, sirens screaming in protest as systems overload and fail spectacularly.
Behind them, she hears Baines shout, voice sharp with panic. “Out out!”
They burst through the entrance and sprint into Cooper’s Field, grass whipping at their legs as the night air slams into their lungs. She laughs, keeping pace with him as best she can. “I just want you to know,” she shouts over the alarms and the roar, “I have never been more attracted to you than when you’re showing off like this!”
He shoots her a grin without slowing, eyes bright behind his glasses.
The Family is still running some paces behind them when the ship finally goes. The night fractures into heat and sound, a roar so loud it seems to punch the air out of her lungs.
The Doctor doesn’t hesitate to grab her as the force of it takes them both down hard into the grass. The impact knocks the breath from her chest as they hit the ground, and then he’s there one arm braced beside her head, the other curled around her shoulders, his body a shield as the blast washes over them.
Fire blooms behind them, white-hot and blinding. She squeezes her eyes shut, then risks a glance back, the light stinging tears from them even as it begins to die down into a furious, rolling flame.
He’s practically lying on top of her, hair a mess, refusing to move until the worst of it settles. And then, because she’s alive, because he’s alive, she laughs.
It bubbles out of her, breathless and half-hysterical. “You absolute idiot,” she pants, shoving weakly at his shoulder. “You scared the hell out of me!”
His face breaks into the softest smile, relief written all over it. He leans closer, forehead briefly touching hers.
“Noted,” he says lightly. “Next time I blow something up, I’ll give you a countdown. More than five seconds sound good?”
She snorts. He chuckles and finally shifts, helping her sit up, then pulling her to her feet with hands that linger just a second longer than necessary, but he’s allowed. Then he turns.
The flames crackle behind them, casting long shadows across Cooper’s Field. A few yards back, the Family of Blood lie scattered on the ground, thrown hard by the blast
The Doctor’s expression hardens as he walks toward them, no grin now, no clever sparkle. She stays with him, shoulder to shoulder, matching his pace. The Family of Blood lie in the scorched grass, slowly pushing themselves up. One by one, they look at them.
Mother of Mine still has her gun clenched in her hand. Her face twists, shock bleeding into hatred, into the kind of rage that has nowhere left to go.
She steps forward and brings her shoe down hard on Mother of Mine’s wrist. There’s a sharp cry as fingers loosen and the gun clatters free. She bends, scoops it up, and walks a few measured steps toward the fire. Without ceremony, she tosses it into the flames. The metal vanishes with a hiss and a flare of sparks.
When she turns back, The Doctor is looking at her. The look in his eyes is something halfway between disapproval and anger, and awe and admiration. Something like joy mixed with sorrow, if there is even a word to describe the blend of the two. The look is gone almost as soon as she notices it.
His gaze drops back to the Family.
They’re scrambling now, fear finally cracking through their arrogance. Son of Mine bares his teeth, rage simmering beneath the surface. Father of Mine wheezes, clutching his side. Daughter of Mine stares up at them, silent and unreadable.
She steps closer and lays her hand gently on his arm. She’s seen that look before, after Rose. After losses, he never lets anyone see him carry. That far-away stillness, like something sharp has lodged itself behind his ribs. But this is not the moment for questions, not with them watching.
“What now, dear?” she asks softly.
The Doctor doesn’t look at her at first. His eyes stay on the Family, on the way they huddle together in the grass, stripped of their confidence at last.
“Go back to the house,” he says quietly. “Martha and Tim will be waiting. Tell them it’s over.”
She searches his face. “And you?” He doesn’t answer. She nods once, no argument, no protest. She knows better.
She leans up and kisses his cheek, “I love you,” she says, simply.
His eyes flick to hers for just a second, and something in his expression softens, just enough for her to see it. “I know,” he murmurs.
She turns and walks away.
The Doctor steps forward. The Family of Blood shrink back instinctively.
Son of Mine snarls. “You said you were merciful.”
“I am,” the Doctor replies calmly. “To humans.”
He crouches slightly, bringing himself level with them, his voice almost conversational now. “You wanted to live forever. So I’ll give it to you.”
Fear finally cracks through their faces.
Father of Mine screams as his body is drawn away, compressed, sealed into a living chain, bound and wrapped around by the heart of a collapsing dwarf star, where he will burn and endure and never die.
Mother of Mine is next. She vanishes in a rush of displaced air, sealed into the event horizon of a collapsing galaxy. She will be imprisoned there and endure and never die.
Daughter of Mine is placed inside a mirror, every mirror. Trapped and in the background of everyone’s lives, unable to interfere, she will endure and never die.
Son of Mine is condemned to a life frozen in time, locked into a scarecrow, standing watch in an empty field, fully aware, fully alive, as centuries grind past him grain by grain. He will endure and never die.
When it’s done, the night goes quiet. The Doctor stands alone in Cooper’s Field, the fire dying behind him, the stars cold overhead. Then he turns and starts walking back toward the house, toward his wife, toward the people who are waiting for him.
Morning comes softly. The sun is hidden behind clouds that dribble raindrops here and there, like it can’t decide whether or not to commit. Morning dew covers the grass and catches the light of stubborn sunbeams that peak through, a light misty fog rolling over the hills.
She stands on the hill side alone, coat pulled tight around her, hands tucked into her sleeves against the lingering chill. Below her, the field stretches out empty and quiet, as though it has never known war or monsters or the judgment of a Time Lord.
Behind her, the Tardis rests at the tip top of the hill. Martha is already inside, warm and waiting.
Two months is all it’s been since they hid themselves away here. Since the universe narrowed down to classrooms and libraries and tea that went cold on wooden tables..
Two days since she officially met John Smith.
Since she watched him smile shyly in a hallway. Since she saw him fumble with books and stammer over invitations and look at her like she was something miraculous. Since she fell in love with him all over again.
She exhales slowly, breath fogging the air.
John Smith was real. He is real. He always was.
The Doctor appears at her side without a sound. She startles despite herself, breath hitching as she turns, then she laughs quietly, shaking her head. “Honestly,” she murmurs, half to herself. “I should get you a bell.”
He smiles at that, soft and fond, and stays where he is, shoulder to shoulder, close enough that she can feel the warmth of him without him crowding her.
She looks back out over the field for a moment, then reaches up and hooks a finger beneath the thin chain at her throat. “You’ll be wanting this back,” she says gently.
She lifts the chain over her head and lets his wedding band slide into her palm before holding it out to him. His eyes drop to it, then to her hand. She’s already wearing hers again.
He notices the way it sits there now, and how strange it had felt at first when he’d put it on. How he’d kept fidgeting with it, twisting it, adjusting it like it didn’t quite belong yet. A Time Lord indulgence in a very human symbol. But she’d smiled every time she caught him wearing it, so it was easy to get used to.
He looks up at her with a grin that’s all warmth and quiet pride, then holds out his hand, theatrically patient.
“Well?” he prompts lightly.
She snorts under her breath, utterly unsurprised by the dramatics, and steps closer. With exaggerated care, like a knight bestowing a sacred honor, she slides the ring onto his finger.
“There,” she says, finishing with a tiny flourish of her wrist. “Official.”
He flexes his fingers once, admiring it, then lets his hand fall naturally into hers. He goes quiet for a second. She can practically see the gears turning behind his eyes, ideas clicking into place faster than he can sort them. She watches him fondly, already smiling because she knows something is coming.
He looks back at her then, suddenly earnest. “Do you want to get married?”
She blinks. Then laughs, “We are married.”
He shakes his head immediately, dismissing it with a little flick of his hand, already rolling forward. “No, no- well, yes, technically, obviously. But I mean properly. The whole thing.”
She arches a brow, amused, as he launches in.
“A dress, your choice, obviously, though I reserve the right to gasp dramatically. A tux for me. Guests, well, some guests, not everyone I’ve ever met, that’d take centuries. A church, or a garden, or a cliff edge. Cliffs are nice, very dramatic. Reception, dancing, cake. Then a honeymoon, just us in the Tardis for a while.”
She doesn’t interrupt him. She just watches, eyes soft, heart full, as he talks himself in little circles about details that don’t matter at all.
Then he grimaces suddenly. “I suppose I’d need a best man.”
The way he says it, like it’s personally offensive, makes her laugh outright. He stops, mid-spiral, and looks at her. There it is, that lovesick, utterly undone expression he can’t seem to help when she’s around.
“What?” he asks, smiling helplessly. “I’m serious.”
“I know,” she says gently. “That’s why it’s adorable.”
He exhales a quiet laugh and steps closer, hands finding her waist like it’s the most natural thing in the universe. “So,” he says, softer now, “what do you think?”
Her smile softens at his words, the teasing gone. She leans into him fully now, arms sliding beneath his coat and settling around his waist. He responds without thinking, one arm drawing her in at the shoulders, protective and familiar, the other still tucked in his pocket.
She tilts her head just enough to look up at him. “This sudden desire for a very human wedding,” she asks gently, “does it have anything to do with John Smith?”
He exhales through his nose, a quiet, rueful sound. “Yeah,” he admits. “It does.” He pulls his hand from his pocket and holds it in front of them, turning it so the ring catches the morning light.
“I’ve always loved humans,” he says, thoughtful now. “That’s no secret. Their curiosity, their stubbornness, their way of doing things that makes absolutely no sense, and yet it works. That’s why I keep coming back.”
He watches the ring as he speaks.
“When I first wore this,” he continues, “I thought it was ridiculous. Just a bit of metal, completely useless.”
She snorts softly, but he presses on.
“I still don’t really understand it,” he admits, lowering his hand again, slipping it back into his pocket. “Even after I got used to it. Even after I realised it made you smile.” He glances at her then, a little embarrassed.
“It always felt pointless. A symbol for something I already knew. I didn’t need it to know.” He pauses, then adds quietly, “But that’s the thing. Being John. . . ”
His voice softens, “Being John, I imagined a future. Watching you walk toward me in a dress, standing there and saying our vows for everyone important to witness. John cared about that.”
His arm tightens around her shoulders, just a fraction.
“And you’ve honoured my ways,” he says. “So I want to honour yours,” he finishes. “If you’ll let me.”
She snorts softly and looks up at him, eyes bright with affection. “You’re an idiot,” she tells him fondly, “if you think I’d ever pass up the chance to marry you all over again.”
His grin is immediate, wide and cheeky. He doesn’t even hesitate, just leans down and steals a quick, warm smooch.
Her voice is quiet when she asks it, careful, like she’s afraid the question itself might hurt him. “Did John have a right to be scared?”
He blinks, thrown for a moment, and she rushes to explain, words tumbling out before she can stop them. That she thought it would be like remembering, like waking up. Not like being replaced. That she’d told him he wasn’t dying, that he was real, that he’d still exist somehow, and what if she was wrong? What if she’d given him hope that wasn’t fair?
The thought twists her stomach.
He listens without interrupting, face softening with every word. When she finally trails off, he exhales slowly, long and measured, like he’s choosing how much truth to give without breaking her heart.
“Yes,” he says gently. “He did.”
She looks up at him, eyes searching.
He shifts his weight, thoughtful. “Regeneration’s the closest thing I can compare it to,” he continues. “When I change, I’m still me. Same memories, same core. But I’m not the man I was before. Not really.”
“The man you met first, the face before this one, he’s gone. Not dead. Just not the one steering anymore. He’s still part of me, all of them are. Buried layers. Echoes.”
His gaze returns to hers.
“John Smith is like that,” he says softly. “He wasn’t erased, he was folded away. Dormant. Still in here.”
She nods slowly, breathing easier now. “So he’s still there?” she asks.
He smiles, small and reassuring. “Somewhere,” He nods, “he always will be.”
She hesitates before asking, thumb tracing the seam of his coat. “Are you afraid when you regenerate?”
He’s quiet for a beat, then nods. “Every time,” he says honestly. “It’s terrifying.”
She blinks. “But you didn’t seem scared last time. When I saw it.”
He gives a small, wry smile. “That’s because by the time it happens, theres no point in cryin when your aleady.” He exhales. “The worst part is watching people decide whether they still know you. Whether they still want you.”
Her brow furrows. He goes on, gentler now.
“I’ve had people pull away. Treat me differently. Like I’m a stranger pretending to be someone they knew.” His shoulders lift in a small shrug. “I’ve lost relationships that way. They couldn’t make peace with the change.”
She frowns deeply at that, almost offended on his behalf. “I don’t understand that at all.”
He looks at her then, like the answer to an unspoken question has just confirmed itself. His smile turns warm. “I know,” he says softly. “That’s one of the many reasons you’re extraordinary.”
Then, inevitably, his eyes sparkle.
“Also,” he adds, tone shifting, “you stayed exactly the same.”
She narrows her eyes. “Meaning?”
“Meaning,” he says brightly, “your interest in me remained hilariously obvious.”
Her mouth falls open. “Excuse you.”
“Oh, come on,” he laughs. “From the start, you fancied me.” He teased with a sing-song tone.
She scoffs, pushing at him. “I was not obvious. And I was certainly not desperate as you make it sound.”
He tilts his head, considering. “I think I recal a time where you .”
“That proves nothing.”
He pivots smoothly, that familiar glint in his eye returning as he nudges the moment lighter. “You know,” he says, pretending to ponder, “you were remarkably protective. Borderline alarming, really.” He gives her a sideways look. “All that glaring and threatening and gun-wielding.”
She scoffs, “Oh, don’t even start, I hated every second. Never make me do that again. I don’t know how you manage everytime.”
“Well,” He grins, “ I do make it look easy.”
She snorts. “You make it look good, too.”
That earns her a slow, knowing smirk. He very much picks up what she’s putting down.
“Mm,” he hums. “Can’t argue with that. You were very impressive back there. You know. Holding a man hostage, quoting the Articals of the Shadow Proclamation like you wrote it yourself.”
She arches a brow. “Oh?”
“I don’t usually go for violent tactics,” he continues lightly, “got my reasons. But something about that fire in you when you were protecting me-” He shrugs, smile crooked. “I almost didn’t mind the gun.”
She laughs, warm and a little breathless. “Almost?”
“Well,” he says, leaning closer, voice lower now, playful but sincere, “let’s just say it was unexpectedly hot.”
“Careful,” she warns. “You’re encouraging bad behavior.”
He kisses her without warning. It’s instinctive, pure reflex, like he’s been holding it back for hours and finally gave up pretending he could. She startles only for a heartbeat before smiling into it, shifting from his side to step fully in front of him, fitting herself into his space like she’s always known where she belongs.
His hand slips from his pocket, joining the other to cradle her face, thumbs warm at her jaw. He kisses her slowly, unhurried, like he’s memorising her all over again.
She pulls back just enough to breathe. He doesn’t let her go far, stealing soft kisses at the corner of her mouth, at her cheek, patient and teasing, until she laughs under her breath and leans back in on her own terms.
She sighs against him, content, arms slipping beneath his coat to find warmth, her hands rubbing slow circles at his back. The familiarity of it settles him. He hums quietly, pleased, a sound that vibrates between them, and nudges at her lip with a gentle flick of his tongue that makes her smile before she gives in.
Somewhere off to the side, there’s the unmistakable sound of the Tardis door opening, a sharp intake of breath, then the door shuts again with a decisive thunk, as if Martha decided, quite wisely, to pretend she hadn’t seen anything.
She grins against him, warmth blooming in her chest. Pulling back just enough to look up at him, she tilts her head toward the blue box. “You know,” she murmurs, amused, “we are very much in public.”
He follows her gaze, then looks back at her with zero remorse and a glint of mischief. “Oh, please,” he says lightly. “You started it.”
“I absolutely did not-”
He doesn’t let her finish, leaning in and chasing her lips with a teasing kiss that makes her laugh despite herself. “Started it,” he repeats smugly, brushing another quick kiss against her mouth. She shakes her head, smiling, hands curling into his coat again as she dodges just enough to make him work for it.
He exhales slowly, the sound heavy in his chest, and when he looks at her again it’s that look. The look he'd given her the night before, when the world was ending, when he was proud of her and furious with fate all at once. When he looked at her like being with her was both the best thing he’d ever done and the cruelest trick the universe had ever played on him.
Her smile falters, she almost asks what’s wrong, but he speaks first.
“I love you.”
She just stares at him, wide-eyed. Breath caught somewhere it won’t move from, because the Doctor doesn’t say that.
He never has, not to her knowlage. Not out loud, instead he shows it with an action that speaks louder than words ever could. He knows too well what love costs. He knows how long it lasts for him, and how briefly it lasts for everyone else. He’s buried too many people who mattered. Watched too many futures end.
The Doctor shows love. He never names it.
And yet here he is, standing in the morning light, ring warm on his finger, saying the one word he’s sworn off across centuries.
Her lips part, but no sound comes out.
“John loved you just as much as I do,” he says, voice low, honest. “More, maybe, because he didn’t have centuries of loss teaching him how to brace for it. He was fascinated by you. Every little thing. The way you spoke, the way you moved through a room, the way you looked at him like he mattered.”
His thumbs trace slow, reverent paths along her cheeks as he speaks, grounding himself in the feel of her.
“He was intoxicated by you,” he admits, a soft, almost fond smile tugging at his mouth. “Thought about you constantly. Woke up from dreams where you were his wife, where he already had everything, and felt jealous of his own dreams.” A quiet breath of a laugh. “Imagine that. Jealous of himself.”
She melts against him, forehead resting to his chest now, arms slipping around his waist as if she might fall if she doesn’t hold on.
“John loved you more than anything,” he continues. “That feeling didn’t disappear when he did. I feel what he felt, what he wanted.”
His voice falters, “And before this face,” he says softly, “before I regenerated, the last thing that man felt was regret. Knowing he’d never said it. Knowing he’d never get the chance to be the one to tell you.”
Her breath catches.
“That regret lives in me too,” he says. He leans his forehead to hers, eyes closed now, stroking her cheeks like he’s memorizing her.
“I didn’t want to risk it happening again,” he confesses. “I didn’t want to be pushed aside and let some future version of me, some stranger in my place, be the one who finally says it. If he ever does.”
He opens his eyes and looks at her, vulnerable in a way only she ever sees.
“I wanted it to be me,” he says. “This version. This body. This moment. I wanted you to know.”
She’s swooning now, heart full to bursting, fingers clutching at his coat as if he’s the only solid thing left in the universe.
She tilts her face up to his, eyes shining. “I already knew,” she whispers. He exhales, relief and love and centuries of restraint loosening all at once, and pulls her fully into his arms, chin resting ontop of her head.
She presses her face into the warm curve of his neck, voice muffled there, breath tickling his skin when she speaks, “I love you too.”
She stays there a moment, arms snug around him, before lifting her head just enough to ask, quietly, “Do you remember what I said to John? About him being the same man, just without remembering it?”
He nods, “I remember,” he says gently.
She pulls back just enough to look at him, eyes earnest. “I still see it that way,” she tells him. “You’ve got differences, sure. Different habits, but you’ve been the same man since the day I met you. This face. Another one. Or John Smith.” She smiles softly. “It’s still you.”
He knows she means it to comfort him. He feels the care in every word, the deliberate kindness of it, and that effort alone warms something deep in his chest. But it doesn’t change the truth he carries. Not entirely.
Then her expression shifts, playful now, and she adds lightly, “That said, this version is my favorite. Just don’t tell the others.”
He laughs, real and bright, the sound slipping free before he can stop it. “Oh, absolutely not. They’re already insufferable.”
She grins at him, pleased she got that laugh, and he leans in to press a kiss into her hair, holding her a little tighter. Grateful, even if the comfort isn’t complete, for the way she always tries to make space for him exactly as he is.
“You done snogging?” Martha’s voice carries from the open doors of the Tardis, dry as ever.
They both freeze for half a second, then turn toward her at the same time and break into identical, sheepish grins. He clears his throat, suddenly very interested in anything that isn’t eye contact. She laughs under her breath, cheeks warm, and reluctantly lets go of his coat.
“Honestly,” Martha adds, arms folded, unimpressed but not unkind. “You two are unbelievable.”
“Oh, she’s my wife, I'm allowed,” he shoots back lightly, guiding his wife toward the ship. “And it’s called affection.”
“It’s called clingy,” Martha counters, stepping back to give them room. “Chronically so.”
She snorts. “You love it.”
Martha rolls her eyes but steps aside, letting them pass. “Yeah, yeah. I love having to brun the image out of my retnas.” But she’s smiling, greatful her two closest friends are safe.
They board the Tardis together, fingers brushing, laughter still soft between them as the doors close behind. The blue box hums warmly, familiar and alive, like she was excited to show them what waited next.
✰ Word Count: 8.2k
✰ Summary: John Smith is just a simple teacher. John Smith has feelings for the school's librarian. John Smith doesn’t know he’s a Time Lord. John Smith doesn’t know she’s his wife.
✰ Warnings: Takes place over the episode Human Nature & Family of Blood, 10th Doctor, Established, Martha knows her place, Relationship, Canon-Typical Violence
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This will very closely follow the plot of the Episode. I tried to avoid using direct quotes, but I wrote this while watching the episode, so it runs closely parallel.
Night has settled completely now.
John stands by the window of his study, one hand resting against the sill as he looks out at the stars. Clouds drift lazily past, breaking the sky into uneven patches of silver and dark. Somewhere in the distance, music carries faintly on the air, the dance has begun.
She should have been here by now.
The thought creeps in uninvited, unwelcome. He tells himself it’s foolish, that people are late all the time, that there could be a dozen perfectly reasonable explanations. And yet, another part of him wonders, painfully, if she’s changed her mind. If he’s built too much hope on stolen glances and shared warmth.
For a moment, the idea settles heavily in his chest. Then he remembers her voice.
“I would always be there,” She’d said. “With you. If that’s something you want.”
He remembers the way she said it, the way her hands framed his face. The way she kissed him, soft and sure, like a promise rather than a question. The doubt loosens its grip.
He exhales slowly, resting his forehead against the glass. “She’ll come,” he murmurs, more to himself than anything else.
He closes his eyes and lets the memories steady him, the way she fit against him on the couch, the warmth of her, the quiet certainty in her eyes when she looked at him like he was worth choosing.
Just as he considers walking across to the wing where the female staff are housed, half-resolved to knock on her door and risk looking foolish, a gentle knock sounds behind him. He turns at once, hope blooming bright and warm.
He doesn’t even manage a word. The door opens, and she slips inside, closing it softly behind her.
For a heartbeat, he can only stare.
She looks nervous and apologetic, as though she’s bracing for disappointment. But she is still radiant.
She wears a deep blue dress, modest and elegant, the fabric rich and flattering. White lace trims the sleeves, tapering into delicate ruffles at her wrists, and small pearls catch the light like stars. The dress skims her form before falling into a loose, graceful skirt at her hips, the high collar ruffled just enough to frame her collarbones and the soft skin of her throat.
John forgets how to breathe.
She notices his gaze immediately. Color rises in her cheeks as he takes her in without shame or restraint, his admiration open and reverent. She shifts slightly, suddenly shy beneath his attention, fingers curling into the fabric of her skirt.
“I’m sorry,” she says at last, breaking the silence. Her voice wobbles just a touch. “I didn’t mean to keep you waiting.”
The panic in her eyes twists something in his chest. “I went to my room and realized I didn’t own anything nice enough for the occasion.” She winces, glancing down at herself. “I had to rush about borrowing, and this was the only dress that fit.”
She looks back up at him, uncertain now, vulnerable. “It might be too much,” she adds softly. “For a village dance. It’s more elegant than the occasion calls for, I’m afraid.”
“Is it?” she asks, searching his face. “Too much?”
He shakes his head immediately, breathless, a quiet laugh escaping him in disbelief. “No,” he says, voice low and sincere. “Not at all.”
He steps closer without realizing it, eyes warm and unwavering, “You’re beautiful.”
The tension drains from her at once, relief softening her expression into a smile that makes his heart stumble.
John closes the distance between them without thinking, arms settling warmly around her waist. She fits there effortlessly, her hands rising to rest on his shoulders, fingers light but sure.
He exhales, almost a laugh. “You’re beautiful,” he says again, like the word still isn’t enough. “That color, good heavens, it suits you perfectly.”
She smiles up at him, eyes bright. “It’s my favorite shade of blue,” she admits. She leaves out the fact that it's the same shade as the Tardis, well, nearly anyway.
He grins, delighted by the small confession. “Then after tonight,” he says softly, “I think it’s become mine as well.”
She chuckles at that, the sound warm and easy, and something in his chest loosens at hearing it. He leans in, welcoming the laughter, smoothing it into a soft, lingering kiss.
Before he can pull her impossibly closer, the door bursts open. They spring apart as if struck by lightning.
“Martha!” John snaps, heart hammering, eyes wide as she rushes in without so much as a pause. “That is twice now. You cannot keep barging in like this! You knock-”
But Martha isn’t listening; she barely seems to register the room at all.
She’s breathless, eyes too bright, words tumbling over each other as she paces a step into the study and then stops, hands shaking. “They’ve found us,” she blurts. “They’ve found him. I saw them- Doctor, listen to me-”
John pinches the bridge of his nose, frustration flaring hot and sharp. “Martha, please, this is wildly inappropriate. Whatever this is, it can wait.”
“It can’t!” she snaps, voice cracking. “They’re here. They look like people, normal people, but they’re not, they’re not!” She turns in a frantic half-circle, as if the walls themselves might be listening. “One of them, it looked like Jenny. Or it possessed Jenny, or something wearing her face, I don’t know, but it wasn’t her, Doctor, I know it wasn’t-”
To John, it sounds unhinged.
His confusion twists into irritation, his evening, their evening, fracturing by the second. “Martha, you’re not making any sense,” he says sharply. “You’re exhausted, clearly, and whatever story you’re telling-”
“I’m not making it up!” she insists, near tears now. “They’re after you-”
“Enough,” John cuts in, exasperated. “I don’t know what’s got into you, but you’re scaring everyone.” He gestures vaguely between himself and the librarian, as if only just remembering she’s there. “This isn’t the time for these… fantasies.”
Martha stares at him, horror dawning in her eyes.
Behind her calm exterior, the librarian is anything but calm. Inside, her chest is caving in. This perfect night, the dance, the warmth of his arms, the certainty of them, it’s all crumbling in real time. The hunters are here. Martha wouldn’t panic like this without reason. She never does.
And John, sweet and brilliant John, has no idea how close the danger truly is. She forces herself to stay still, to breathe, to keep her expression gentle even as dread coils tight in her stomach.
Martha scoffs, sharp and bitter, and spins toward the fireplace. “Open the watch,” she demands. “Just open it.”
She strides to the mantel without waiting for permission; she’s cleaned this room a hundred times, knows every inch of it. The watch has always been there. Unmoved. Untouched. Waiting.
But the space is empty.
Her breath stutters. Panic curdles into something colder, sharper. “No, no, no, no-”
John’s patience finally snaps.
“Martha, that is enough,” he says, voice raised now, anger cutting through his confusion. “You burst in here, interrupting me and my-” He gestures helplessly. “And now you’re talking about monsters and demanding I open some ridiculous old trinket I don’t even recall owning!”
She whirls back to him, eyes wild. “Doctor, where did you put it? Did you move it? You can’t have moved it, it’s important, it’s-”
“Doctor?” he shouts over her rising voice. “Don’t call me that! The Doctor isn’t real; he’s a character in a dream. That’s all. This,” He points at her, furious and hurt and frightened all at once. “This is madness. You’re going mad, Martha. And I will not have it in my study. You need to leave. Now.”
The words land like a blow. Before Martha can respond, a hand closes gently around hers. John’s librarian. The Doctor’s wife.
She doesn’t raise her voice. She simply meets Martha’s eyes and gives a small, steady nod. “Come with me,” she murmurs, already guiding her toward the door.
As they walk, she leans in just enough to whisper, voice low and urgent. “None of this works without the watch. We need to find it.”
Martha swallows hard, nodding, grounding herself in the calm authority she’s followed across galaxies. “I know.”
“I’ll stay with him,” the librarian continues. “Keep him safe.” Her grip tightens briefly. “You go to the Tarids. Make sure it hasn’t been discovered. And bring me the sonic, it’s in his coat pocket. It might help. Meet us at the dance.”
Martha inhales deeply, then exhales, steadying. “Right.”
She nods once more, resolve settling back into place. The Doctor didn’t marry this woman for nothing.
Martha pulls away and runs. The door closes behind her.
The librarian turns back to John, unable to fully mask the worry etched across her face now. She forces herself to soften it, stepping closer, placing a hand lightly on his arm.
“I’m sorry,” she says gently. “She’s frightened. We all are, I think.”
John looks shaken, angry, and confused, but he nods, trying to collect himself. She stays where she is, close at his side, eyes flicking once, just once, to the empty mantel.
They walk together toward the dance hall, her hand resting lightly on his bicep as he guides her down the quiet path. The music drifts out through the open doors, warm and inviting, and she can feel the tension slowly bleeding out of him, exactly as she’d hoped. She’d worked hard to calm him after Martha left, grounding him in the present, in this. And now he’s smiling again.
Good. That matters.
Inside her head, though, everything is anything but calm. The hunters take human form. The hunters can hide just like they were.
Martha’s panicked words echo even as she keeps her expression serene. If the hunters are here, they could be anyone: teachers, villagers, students, smiling faces pressed together on the dance floor.
John pauses at the door, releasing her arm just long enough to reach into his pocket and place a few coins into the tin held out by a man collecting donations for veterans. She slows, glancing over her shoulder, nerves prickling as her eyes sweep the square one more time.
“Look at that,” John says softly, turning back to her with a gentle smile. “The stars are beautiful tonight.”
She realizes, belatedly, that he thinks that’s what she was looking at.
She turns fully to him, schooling her expression into something warm and untroubled, and smiles. “They really are.” He offers his arm again, and she takes it without hesitation.
As they step inside, laughter and music swelling around them, something catches her eye at the edge of the doorway, a boy half-hidden behind the corner of the building. Fair-haired, watching them far too intently for coincidence.
Tim, she thinks, recognition snapping into place.
Her smile doesn’t falter as John leads her onto the floor, but her attention sharpens. She files the sight away, cataloguing it with a thousand other instincts honed across time and terror.
The moment they step fully into the hall, the music swells, and the announcer’s voice rings out cheerfully, calling for everyone to take their partners for a waltz.
John’s face lights up at once. “Oh,” he says, eyes sparkling, “impeccable timing.”
He turns to her with exaggerated formality, straightening his posture and offering a bow that’s just a touch too theatrical to be taken seriously. “My lady,” he declares, “would you grant me this dance?”
Despite everything, despite hunters and fear and the fragile edge of the night, she laughs. A real laugh, bright and bubbling out of her before she can stop it.
“I suppose I could be persuaded,” she replies, matching his drama with a graceful incline of her head as she places her hand in his.
His grin widens, triumphant and delighted, and he guides her onto the dance floor as the first notes of the waltz begin to flow through the room. He places one hand carefully at her waist, the other holding hers, respectful and sure, as if dancing with her has always been second nature.
And for her it is. She’s danced with her husband a thousand times. In ballrooms on distant worlds, in the quiet hum of the Tardis, barefoot and laughing as the universe spun outside. And yet this, this borrowed life, this human moment, feels just as special as every other.
They begin to move together, steps falling easily into place, bodies finding a familiar rhythm neither of them needs to think about.
They turn and twirl beneath the light, the music carrying them gently across the floor. She watches him as they move, and the fear swells quietly in her chest, uninvited and sharp. The thought of something happening to him tonight presses in until it almost steals her breath.
John notices as the waltz goes on, her eyes grow a little sadder, her smile softer, more fragile. He spins her once, smoothly, confidently, and draws her back into his arms, hoping the movement, the closeness, might chase whatever shadow has crossed her face.
It doesn’t.
“What’s wrong?” he asks softly, voice low enough that only she can hear.
She inhales, steadying herself. Her lower lip trembles despite her effort to keep it still, and the sight nearly makes him stop dancing altogether, until she tightens her hold just enough to keep him with her.
“You make me happier,” she says quietly, “than I’ve ever been in my life.”
His heart stutters.
“And that frightens me,” she continues, voice barely above a whisper. “I worry about losing you.”
He smiles then, gentle and sincere, thumb brushing reassuringly at her hand. “That won’t happen,” he promises. “I won’t go anywhere.”
She looks at him, eyes shining with a pain that only love alone can bring. She knows he means it. She knows that, in his own way, he could actually keep that promise.
And that makes it hurt all the more.
They turn again, music carrying them forward, and she finally lets the truth slip free, mid-waltz, mid-breath, mid-heartbeat.
“I love you,” she says.
The words land between them like something sacred.
John falters just enough for her to feel it, his breath catching, his grip tightening instinctively as if to anchor himself to the moment. The world seems to hush around them, the music dimming to a distant echo.
The music swells into its final note, and the song comes to a gentle close. Around them, people cheer and clap, some laughing as they move into the next dance, others drifting off to the edges of the hall.
But they don’t move. John’s hand is still warm at her waist. Her hand still rests on his arm. Their other hands remain interlocked, fingers laced as if neither of them quite remembers how to let go.
He looks at her like she’s extraordinary. The sensible, reasonable part of his mind whispers that they’ve only just gotten to know each other. That this is sudden. That it’s all moving far too quickly.
The rest of him doesn’t care in the slightest. The rest of him is soaring.
“I-” He swallows, voice soft when he finally speaks. “I love you too.”
The words are simple, and they hit her harder than a freight train could dream to.
Because the Doctor never says it.
Not aloud. Not plainly. He shows it instead, in staying, in protecting, in choosing, in sacrificing pieces of himself without ever asking to be thanked. He guards the word fiercely, knowing what it costs to love people he will outlive. Knowing how much it will hurt to say it and lose them anyway.
She’s always understood that. Always accepted it. Long before they married. Long before forever became something fragile and finite. She never needed the words.
The Doctor didn’t have to say it; she just knew.
But John says it without flinching. Without knowing the weight of it. Without centuries of grief pressing down on the syllables, trapping them in his throat. He says it like a truth he’s delighted to discover, like something bright and inevitable. She tightens her grip on his hand just a little, smiling up at him, eyes shining with a deep, steady affection that has survived faces and names and lifetimes.
John’s attention drifts for a moment as another couple spins a little too close, nearly colliding with them.
“Excuse me, oh, terribly sorry,” he mutters, flashing them an apologetic look as he gently steers her out of the way. He guides her toward a small table near the edge of the hall, relief written all over his face when he finds it empty.
“Here,” he says, already moving to pull out the chair for her. “Please.”
She sits, still smiling, still a little breathless, and looks up at him like this night might never end.
“I’ll fetch us some refreshments,” he offers, fidgeting with the tablecloth, voice breathy.
She laughs softly, nodding. “Thank you.” They share one more look before he disappears into the crowd.
The moment he’s gone, her smile softens, but her focus sharpens, eyes scanning. Tim stands near the wall, pretending to watch the dancers while his eyes flick too often toward doors and corners. He’s too still too alert.
In the far corner, a man slumps against the wall with a drink clutched loosely in hand, one poor decision away from being shown the door. His gaze is unfocused, but there’s something off about the way he watches the room, like he’s waiting rather than enjoying.
An older woman patrols the edges of the dance floor like a general, posture impeccable, lips pursed as she scolds any couple who dares to stand too close.
And then there’s the little girl. She sits near the edge of the hall, a red balloon bobbing gently above her head. She isn’t dancing or speaking to anyone, just watching, eyes too knowing for her age, fingers curled tight around the string. That one makes her pause.
Martha suddenly drops into the chair opposite her. She looks composed, back straight, expression carefully neutral, but the tension in her shoulders gives her away. Her eyes flick once toward the door, then back.
“What’s the plan?” she asks under her breath. “Because whatever this is, this isn’t sustainable.”
The doctor’s wife stills. She meets Martha’s gaze and, without a word, gives her a look that burns. A sharp, silent warning. Not now, and certainly not here. Martha falters for half a second, clearly confused by the intensity of it, and then doesn’t take the hint.
Before she can push again, John appears beside the table with two glasses in hand.
“Oh no,” he groans softly, already weary. “Martha, please don’t start again.” He sets the drinks down, smiling tightly, and rests his hand on the back of the librarian’s chair, protective. His thumb brushes the wood absentmindedly, grounding himself there.
The doctor’s wife doesn’t relax. Her eyes sweep the room again. Tim by the wall. The drunk in the corner. The balloon bobbing gently above the little girl’s head. Too many eyes. Too many unknowns. Then she looks back at Martha, expression firmer now, unmistakably stern.
Get it together, Martha Jone. Martha sees the look, but she isn’t really looking at her, she’s looking at John. Or rather, the man she knows is buried inside him. Her gaze is urgent, as if sheer will makes him simply be the Doctor again if she just looks hard enough.
Martha pushes back her chair and stands. She doesn’t raise her voice; she softens it, but is still desperate in a way that makes it worse.
“John,” she says, looking up at him. “You’re not real. You are the Doctor. He’s not a dream. He’s you. He always has been.”
John’s jaw tightens. His hand curls more firmly around the back of the librarian’s chair, knuckles whitening as he fights the familiar frustration rising in his chest. He keeps his tone even, controlled, aware of the music, the eyes, the fragile happiness of the evening.
“Martha,” he says carefully, “we are not doing this. Not tonight.”
But she presses on, eyes shining, voice trembling.
“You’ve felt it,” she insists. “You have. That sense that something’s missing. That you can’t quite remember the important bits of your own life. Like you woke up halfway through a story and no one filled you in.”
The words hit closer than he wants them to. He opens his mouth to dismiss it, and stops, because yes, there have been moments. Small ones. A fleeting tug at the back of his mind. But none of that matters now, not compared to her, to this night. To the woman sitting at his side.
“It doesn’t mean anything,” he says, firmer now. “And even if it did, I’m not letting you ruin this.”
Martha’s hand slips into her pocket, and then she pulls it out, the sonic screwdriver. The room doesn’t vanish, music doesn’t stop, but something inside John does. The words die in his throat.
He stares at the object in her palm, metallic and strange. Impossible. In her hand rests the Doctor’s screwdriver, from his dreams, from the journal. From the man from another world that isn’t supposed to be.
Slowly, very slowly, he reaches out and takes it from her. His fingers curl around it with a familiarity that makes his breath hitch. He turns it in his hand, eyes distant now, unfocused.
The librarian is on her feet, “Martha, enough.” Her voice is low, sharp, carrying an authority that cuts clean through the moment. “Stop. Right now.”
Martha whirls to her, stunned. “We need him. They’re here,” she says, incredulous. “This is exactly what we were supposed to do-”
“No, this is not how. Not here. Not like this.” She snaps back and steps closer to Martha, eyes blazing. “You don’t do this in public. Who knows who could be listening.”
The doors bang open, and a man stumbles in, Mr. Clark, known to most of the locals as a respectable farmer of the village, and he knocks over a coat rack as he does. The crash echoes through the hall like a gunshot.
He raises his voice, sharp and carrying. “Silence!”
The room freezes. In his hand is a pistol no one has ever seen before. Gasps ripple through the crowd as people scatter instinctively, backs pressing to walls, skirts gathered, chairs scraping. Behind him comes Jeremy Baines, face unnervingly calm. Jenny follows, walking with eerie purpose, moving to the center of the room as if summoned.
Then more figures appear. Scarecrow soldiers shuffle in at the doors, stiff and unmistakably alien, taking positions with mechanical obedience, blocking every exit.
A man near the front, shaking but brave enough to try, steps forward. “Mr. Clark,” he says, voice trembling, “what on earth do you think you’re-”
Clark turns and fires without hesitation. The green blast hits the man square in the chest. There is just enough time for a single scream before his body disintegrates into dust, scattering across the floor.
The hall explodes into chaos. People scream, cry, and clutch each other. Some huddle together for safety, as though it would stop a bullet. Others try to run, only to be herded back by the soldiers.
Martha turns to John, heart in her throat, and snatches the sonic screwdriver from his hand, shoving it deep into her pocket. “Forget everything I said,” she hisses under her breath. “Don’t say a word.”
John barely hears her. He’s staring, stunned, breath shallow, the impossible horror unfolding faster than his mind can catch up. Beside him, the librarian closes her eyes for half a second, just long enough to swallow the bitter, burning ‘I told you so’ that threatens to spill out. She doesn’t look at Martha. She can’t afford to get angry right now; a man is dead.
Clark shouts again, louder now, amplified by alien authority. “I said silence!” The screams choke off into terrified whimpers in response.
Jeremy Baines stands at the center of the room, flanked by Jenny and Clark, posture too still, eyes too knowing. He looks out over the crowd like a general surveying conquered ground.
John’s hand finds hers. She laces her fingers through his without hesitation, grip firm and grounding, anchoring him as the world tilts violently out from under them.
Baines voice is calm, formal in a way that is mocking in its precision. “Mr. Smith,” he says, eyes snapping to John without his head turning. “If you would be so kind. I’d like a word.”
John manages one step closer to her, fingers tightening around hers, a silent instinct to shield and be shielded.
“Wait.” The voice is small. The little girl with the red balloon steps forward. Her face is as blank as the others. “I already know. He’s the Doctor. I heard them talking.” The balloon bobs once at her side as she pushes through to stand by Baines.
The librarian’s gaze flies to Martha. Martha looks panicked, bewildered in horror, dawning as the full weight of the mistake crashes down on her.
“That,” the librarian murmurs under her breath, the words sharp and bitter despite herself, “is why I told you so.”
Baines’s lips curl. It’s the first real expression he’s shown, and it’s deeply wrong, eyes unblinking. He turns his full attention to John now, delight flickering across his features.
“Well,” His gaze drags over him, assessing. “You took human form.” He sounds impressed, no, amused.
John’s heart is pounding so hard he can hear it in his ears. He shakes his head, panic tightening his chest. “No,” he says, voice unsteady but defiant. “That’s- that’s ridiculous. Of course, I’m human. I’ve always been human. Since the day I was born.”
Jenny sneers, the last of her borrowed warmth gone. “He’s no good human,” she says flatly.
Clark grumbles in agreement, “We need a Time Lord.”
Baines steps forward, grin sharp and delighted, and raises his gun until it’s pointed squarely at John’s chest. “Change back,” he orders.
John flinches at the sight of the weapon, heart slamming against his ribs. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he stammers. “I can’t- there’s nothing to change back into.”
“Change back!” Baines roars, patience snapping.
“I don’t know how!” John shouts back, panic breaking through his careful composure. His hands lift helplessly, eyes darting from face to face, searching for someone to tell him this is a nightmare he’ll wake up from. One of his dreams of the monsters the Doctor fights.
Jenny grabs Martha roughly, dragging her forward, one arm locked tight around her shoulders. Martha cries out as cold metal presses against her temple.
“She’s your friend,” Jenny says calmly, almost gently. “You could save her. All you have to do is change.”
“Martha!” John chokes. “I can’t! I don’t know what you want from me!”
Jenny leans closer to Martha, voice lowering. “She told me about you,” she continues softly. “About your lover.”
John’s breath leaves him in a rush. Before he can react, Clark lunges, and strong hands seize the librarian, tearing her from John’s side. She gasps as she’s dragged away, fighting him on instinct, but a gun snaps up, pressed hard to her temple.
John freezes.
Her eyes are wide, locked on his, fear blazing through the calm she’s worn all night. One wrong word, one wrong move, and she’s done for. Whether it’s the Doctor or John Smith, the man who loves her will watch her die.
Baines smiles like a man savoring a puzzle finally solved.
“Choose,” he says lightly. John stands shaking, caught between terror and love, the world screaming at him to become someone that doesn’t exist.
John’s eyes burn, vision blurring as he looks back and forth between them. Martha, her lip trembling despite her effort to stay brave, fear breaking through in sharp, helpless flashes. And her, his love, eyes wide at first, then slowly, steady as she takes shaky breaths and forces herself to be calm. John sees it happen. Sees the moment she accepts the possibility.
It’s a sick game, and they all know it.
Baines smiles, savoring the silence. Jenny’s grip tightens just enough to make Martha gasp. Clark presses the gun harder to the librarian’s temple, daring John to breathe wrong.
“Choose,” Baines repeats softly. “Your friend or your lover.”
John shakes his head, a broken sound tearing out of his throat. “Please,” he whispers. “I don’t understand. I can’t- I can’t!”
In the corner of the room, Tim watches, his fingers slip into his pocket. The watch opens. Golden light spills out, warm and impossible, whispering secrets no human mind should hear. ‘Time Lord.’
All four of them freeze, heads lift in perfect, predatory unison. They sniff. The scent hits them like blood in the water.
That’s all the opening she needs. She twists Clark’s arm with brutal precision, dislocating it in a sharp, efficient motion. He shouts as the gun drops, and she snatches it mid-fall, spinning and slamming the barrel into his chest. In one fluid motion, she wrenches free and reverses their positions, gun leveled at his head.
“Step away from him,” she snarls, voice stripped of softness. Stripped of human.
The room goes utterly still. Baines raises his gun, slow and deliberate, aiming it at her head.
“Well,” he says lightly, almost conversational. “Look at you.” His eyes rake over her, assessing. “You’re weak. That much is obvious.” A smile curves his mouth. “Are you willing to shoot? To kill?”
She doesn’t answer him, she lifts the gun and fires. The shot cracks through the hall, deafening. Plaster rains down as the laser tears into the ceiling, sending screams and gasps rippling through the crowd. Before the echo fades, the gun is back at Clark’s head, pressed hard enough to leave a mark.
“Test me,” she says, voice low, shaking with fury rather than fear. “I dare you.”
Baines tilts his head, intrigued. “You look frightened,” he muses. “A coward at heart, I think.”
Her laugh is short and humorless, “You killed an innocent man,” she snaps. “Likely more than one. You invaded a level five planet and disturbed the peace.” Her eyes burn, locked on his. “And then,” Her grip tightens. “You threatened the life of the man I love.”
For the first time, Baines hesitates. He studies her now, no longer amused.
“Once more,” she says, voice deadly calm. “Test my patience.”
A beat passes.
Then, slowly, Baines lowers his gun. As if on some unspoken signal, the others follow. Clark freezes, weapon still at his head, Jenny loosens her grip entirely, stepping back as though released from a command.
Martha doesn’t waste the moment. She slips free and moves quick, unharmed, eyes never leaving them until she’s safely back beside John.
John watches it all in stunned silence.
The woman he loves, so gentle and so careful with her words, so reserved in every emotion except her devotion to him. He watches her stand there holding a gun like it’s second nature. Like she’s done this before. Like threatening lives is not a line she’s never crossed, but one she knows exactly where to stand behind.
“Well done,” Baines says, voice dripping with mock admiration. “Truly. I’m impressed.” His smile twists sharply. “But all this hiding is rather pathetic, isn’t it? The great Doctor, running from his fate. Crawling into a human shell. Playing house while the universe waits.”
He tilts his head, eyes glittering. “Hiding among insects.”
“For a moment,” he adds lightly, “I thought perhaps you were bluffing.”
The fire in her eyes dies, a cold look overtaking them. Like looking at a bug you just squished beneath your shoe.
“Don’t,” she says quietly. “Don’t you dare put dirt on my husband’s name.”
John’s breath hitches.
Husband?
The word echoes in his head, slamming into something fragile and half-remembered. A dream where he’d whispered it against her skin, where she’d smiled like it was the most natural thing in the universe. Dreams he’d woken from aching, jealous of a man he thought wasn’t real.
But she’s standing here now, saying it like it’s the truth.
She was his wife. He was her husband.
If that was real, then what else was? The ground seems to tilt beneath John’s feet. A sick, dizzying thought claws its way up his spine. What does that make him? If the Doctor were real, does that mean he isn’t?
He doesn’t have time to chase it.
“John,” she says sharply, snapping his attention back to her. She doesn’t look away from Baines, but her voice softens just enough to reach him. “Get everyone out. Now.”
She barks, without turning, “Martha, move!”
Martha doesn’t hesitate this time, already shouting for people to run, herding the terrified crowd toward the exits as the Scarecrow soldiers shift, uncertain, awaiting orders that don’t come.
John shakes his head, panic surging. “I’m not leaving you,” he says hoarsely. “I won’t.”
“I need you to,” she says, fierce and pleading all at once. “Please.”
Baines laughs, delighted. “Hear that?” he mocks. “The Doctor, reduced to a frightened little man who won’t even run properly.” His eyes gleam. “A human coward.”
John’s hands clench. And the Family of Blood watches her like predators held at bay, knowing this standoff is only temporary.
Her eyes never leave Baines, not for a second. But her voice softens when she speaks again, pitched only for John, anchoring him even as she stands like a blade between him and death.
“John,” she says. Not Doctor. Not the name they’re trying to drag out of him.“I love you. I’ve loved you longer than you’ve loved me,” she continues, steady despite the way her chest tightens. “Longer than you can remember. You’ve been my everything.”
John’s breath stutters. His eyes shine, glassy, torn apart by the weight of it.
“Please,” she says. “Go. Get somewhere safe. If anything happens to him,” she goes on, voice cooling as it carries through the hall, “there will be nobody left alive worth mercy.”
Baines’s smile flickers.
“Mercy,” she says quietly, “was always his thing. Talking. Negotiating. Giving chances.” A humorless breath leaves her. “I followed his lead. I learned it from him.”
Her grip tightens on the gun.
“But without him,” she says, eyes burning now, “I will have none.”
John sees it then, how much of him lives in her. How the gentleness, the hope, the restraint are things she chose because of him. How love is the only thing holding those pieces together. And how easily they would shatter.
She turns her head just enough to meet his eyes.
“I don’t know who I would become if I lost you,” she admits softly. Her voice breaks just a little at the end. “So please. If you love me, go.”
John’s lip trembles. He shakes his head once, helplessly. And finally he folds. A broken sound escapes him as he turns away, hands shaking as he starts guiding people toward the exits, his heart tearing itself free with every step he takes away from her.
She watches him go. And the Family of Blood watches her, no longer amused, no longer mocking.
She waits, counts the seconds between footsteps, the echo of panic fading down corridors and out into the night. Only when the hall is empty, only when John’s presence is no longer a fragile thing she has to shield, does she move again.
She shoves Clark away with a sharp twist of her shoulder and brings the gun up, arm steady.
“What happened to the people whose faces you’re wearing?” she asks flatly.
Baines answers without hesitation, pleased with himself. “Consumed,” he says. “Their bodies are ours now. We wear them. We are them.”
Something cold and satisfied settles behind her eyes.
“Good,” she says quietly. “That makes this easier.”
They hesitate just a fraction.
“You have one chance,” she continues, voice calm, deadly. “Get on your ship and leave this planet. If I see you again,” her finger tightens on the trigger, “I will kill you.”
For a heartbeat, it almost works, then Baines smiles. They step forward together, slow and deliberate, predators calling a bluff.
“Get her,” he says.
Hands lunge from behind. The gun bucks in her hand, once, twice, and the Scarecrow soldiers explode into straw and dust, bursting apart in showers of chaff that fill the air. She spins, fires again, and another one collapses, lifeless and empty.
They shout, curse, and scramble. Baines yells for more of his play-soldiers, his voice cracking with rage as she bolts for the door, boots pounding against the floor. She bursts out into the night, and there just beyond the gate was John.
Her heart stutters. “Run!” she shouts, grabbing his hand without slowing. He laces his fingers through hers, grips tight, and they run together into the dark.
John bursts through the main doors of the school, boots skidding slightly on the stone as he stumbles inside. The building looms around them, old England in stone and iron, a sprawling compound with thick walls and narrow corridors, more fortress than school. Outside, the gates slammed shut behind them, sealing the yards and cutting off the night.
John doesn’t slow. He runs straight into the main hall and grabs the bell. The sound is deafening. The bell rings out again and again, its iron voice rolling through the halls, up stairwells, into dormitories. A bell meant to wake boys for lessons, to mark the rhythm of order and discipline, is now repurposed into an alarm.
Martha skids to a halt behind him. “Doctor, what are you doing?!”
He ignores her.
“Enemy at the door!” he shouts, voice carrying, amplified by stone and urgency. “Enemy at the door! Take arms!”
Martha stares at him like he’s lost his mind. “Stop it! You can’t-J”
But it’s already too late, the school comes alive. Doors fly open. Footsteps thunder as boys pour into the corridors, faces sharp with adrenaline and confusion. Faculty bark orders. Word spreads like fire through dry timber.
Martha grabs his arm. “They’re children!” she snaps. “You can’t expect them to fight-”
John turns on her, breath hard, eyes fierce with something ancient and unyielding. “They’re trained,” he says. “Trained to serve king and country if it ever comes to that.”
The words come too easily.
The doctor’s wife stands a few steps back, heart in her throat, watching the building transform around them. Seeing the instincts surface, the authority, the command voice that bends rooms to his will even now.
Martha scoffs in disbelief. “This is insane.” She spins on her heel and runs, already shouting over her shoulder, “I need to find the watch!” And just like that, she’s gone, disappearing into the chaos.
John turns back to the hall, still ringing with motion and sound, and the doctor’s wife watches him with a mixture of fear and awe.He doesn’t remember who he is, but the universe does.
Somewhere deep within the school, far from the ringing bell and the rush of boots on stone, Tim hides. He’s wedged beneath a staircase in a narrow, forgotten alcove, just wide enough for a boy who knows how to make himself small. His knees are pulled tight to his chest, his back pressed against the cold wall.
In his hands, the watch burns warm. He clutches it like a secret too heavy to put down, fingers curled tight around the smooth metal as whispers seep out, low and insistent, threading straight into his thoughts.
“Keep me safe. Keep me hidden. The time is not right. Not yet. The Family is abroad.”
Tim swallows, breath shallow, eyes darting at every distant shout and footstep echoing through the building. The voices soothe him even as they command him, filling the hollow spaces in his chest with purpose; the fate of a Time Lord rests in a boy’s hands.
Downstairs, the headmaster returns. He steps into the hall with measured strides, his coat dusted with ash, his face pale but composed in that rigid, practiced way men of his station are taught to master. The noise dips the moment he appears. Boys straighten and voices hush.
“Mr. Phillips is dead,” he says. The words are final.
A murmur ripples through the room, but the headmaster lifts a hand and it stills. His jaw tightens, eyes briefly glassy, but he does not allow himself to linger there.
“I have seen things tonight,” he admits, voice steady despite the tremor beneath it, “that I cannot adequately explain. But I know this much, what is outside these walls is hostile.” He turns, addressing the room as a whole. “Barricade the school. Secure doors and windows. Prepare to defend it.”
The boys move at once. Furniture is dragged into place. Desks overturned and stacked. Heavy doors reinforced. Orders are passed down corridors with clipped efficiency as chaos reshapes itself into something disciplined, almost military. These boys were raised on duty and obedience, and tonight, they answer it.
Outside the walls, the Family of Blood divides their attention.
Mr Clark, no longer Mr Clark at all, moves away from the school grounds, Father of Mine wearing his skin as he stalks off on a separate, unseen mission.
Baines, now wholly Son of Mine, waits at the edge of the yard with the straw army gathered behind him. Jenny, Mother of Mine, stands at his side, eyes hungry.
And the little girl, Daughter of Mine, has already slipped inside. Small feet are silent on wood, red balloon trailing behind her like a marker of doom. She moves through the school unnoticed, unseen, gathering intelligence with empty eyes and perfect patience.
The trap is closing.
And somewhere beneath a staircase, a boy clutches a watch and waits, while war creeps ever closer to the heart of the school.
John approaches the librarian quietly. She’s standing at one of the tall windows, watching the dark grounds beyond the glass, the alien pistol clenched tight in one hand. Her posture is steady, but there’s a sadness in her eyes that wasn’t there before, something bruised and aching beneath the resolve.
She senses him before she turns.
“Well,” she says dryly, not looking away just yet, “I suppose that dance will go down as one of the more memorable evenings of my life.” The corner of her mouth lifts, wry and bittersweet. “Shame about the armed invasion.”
John huffs out a breath that’s almost a laugh, matching her tone without missing a beat. “Terrible timing,” he murmurs. “Really ruins the romance.” For a heartbeat, they let the sarcasm sit between them.
Then his voice changes, “Am I . . . real?” he asks.
She turns to him fully now.
“If my dreams are true,” he continues, words tumbling out as the fear finally catches up, “then I’m just- what? A character? A shell? A disguise you wear until you’re finished with me?” His eyes shine, overwhelmed. “Does that mean I end? That I disappear when the Doctor comes back?”
The thought devastates him. That his life, his memories, his feelings, her, might all be a lie. Something temporary. Disposable.
She steps into his space immediately, “No,” she says sharply. “Absolutely not. Take that back.”
Her free hand comes up to cup his cheek, firm and grounding. He leans into her touch without thinking, breath hitching like he’s been waiting for permission to fall apart.
Her voice drops to a whisper, “You are the most real thing I know.” She presses her thumb gently against his skin. “You’re not a disguise. You’re not a lie.”
His voice is small when he asks it, like he’s afraid the answer might shatter him if it’s said too loudly. “What happens to me if the Doctor comes back?” He swallows. “What does that mean for me, John Smith? The simple human teacher.”
She doesn’t hesitate, “You are anything but simple,” she says at once, fierce and sincere. “You are magnificent. You are wonderful. I’ve told you that already, and I’ll tell you again as many times as you need to hear it.” Her hand stays at his cheek. Her thumb brushes lightly, anchoring him. “I love you.”
For half a second, the fear loosens its grip. He almost smiles, almost swoons, at the certainty in her voice.
Then she exhales.
“I don’t know,” she admits softly. “The Doctor was in a rush,” she continues, eyes dropping just for a moment before lifting back to his. “We were running. Hiding. None of this was part of the plan. I don’t know how they found us.” A faint smile touches her lips. “And I, embarrassingly, I never really thought it through. When he was around, he made the plans. He decided, and I followed.”
She searches his face, clearly wishing she had something firmer to give him. “I don’t know exactly how it works when he comes back. I wish I did.”
It isn’t comforting. Because hearing the woman he loves talk about him like he’s a different man, like he’s a chapter that might simply close, isn’t reassuring at all. It makes the fear sharper, more personal.
He pulls in a shaky breath. “You talk about him like he’s someone else. He’s the man you lost, who you hold in your heart. ”
Her face crumples just a little, regret flashing through her eyes as she realizes exactly how it sounded. “No, John, that’s not what I meant,” she says quickly. “I didn’t mean-” She falters, then tries again, voice soft and urgent.
“You are him. And he’s you. It’s not separate, not really. It’s the same soul, the same heart, just different pieces at different times.” The explanation tangles as it leaves her mouth. She hears it herself, how thin it sounds, how close it is to the things everyone else has been shouting at him all night.
“I love you,” she insists. “Not a ghost. Not a memory. You.”
But he’s already shaking his head. The words don’t reach him the way she needs them to.
To John, all he hears is confirmation of the fear he’s been carrying since the dance ended, that he’s temporary. That he’s a shadow cast by someone greater. That her love exists because of who he reminds her of, not because of who he is.
His heart breaks quietly.
Without another word, he turns away from her. He moves toward the boys, toward the barricades and the weapons being handed out, because that’s all he knows how to do with the ache in his chest. Duty. Order. Action. Something solid to hold onto when his emotions are coming apart.
She watches him go, helpless, the space where his warmth was moments ago suddenly cold.
It couldn’t be further from the truth. She doesn’t love him because he’s a ghost of another man. She loves him because he is kind. Because he is brave. Because he chose her. Because even without memories of stars and wars and centuries of grief, he is still him.
But John Smith doesn’t know that. And as he takes up arms alongside the boys, heartbreaking, back straight, doing what he believes is expected of him.
Somewhere within the school, in the hush between distant footsteps and shouted orders, Tim whispers into the dark. “What do I do?” he asks the watch, voice barely more than breath. “Tell me what I’m supposed to do.”
The watch answers, “Beware.”
Tim frowns. “Beware what?”
There’s a pause, “Her.”
Tim’s head snaps up. At the far end of the corridor stands the little girl with the red balloon. She’s closer than she should be. Still as stone. Watching him.
Tim scrambles to his feet, heart racing, pressing the watch tight to his chest. “Stay back,” he says, forcing steel into his voice. “I know who you are. I saw you at the dance.”
The girl sniffs the air, nostrils flaring slightly, eyes bright with hunger. “You have something,” she says calmly. “Give it to me.”
“No,” Tim snaps. He backs away a step, courage bolstered by the whispers thrumming in his skull. “You’re not getting it.”
Her head tilts. “You’re hiding something. Show me.”
Tim’s fear sharpens into resolve. He lifts the watch with shaking hands and snaps it open. Golden light pours out, bright and terrible.
The girl gasps.
In an instant, visions flood her mind of a man standing victorious amid fire and ruin, foe broken at his feet, eyes burning with ancient fury and mercy alike. The Doctor at his finest.
She turns and runs, balloon bobbing wildly as she vanishes down the corridor. Tim slams the watch shut, panting, having seen the same vision.
Through the invisible thread that binds them, the Family of Blood knows now. Knows where the Time Lord’s essence is hidden.
In a watch. In the hands of a boy.
Outside the school walls, Son of Mine lifts his head. He smiles.
“There you are,” he murmurs, feeling it through the link, the flare of Time Lord essence, brief but unmistakable. “Found you.”
There is no need for patience now. No need for games or negotiations. The watch has been revealed, and the humans have outlived whatever mercy they might have been granted. He can kill them all and pluck the watch from their ruin.
“Attack,” he commands. The straw soldiers surge forward.
✰ Word Count: 17.5k
✰ Summary: John Smith is just a simple teacher. John Smith has feelings for the school's librarian. John Smith doesn’t know he’s a Time Lord. John Smith doesn’t know she’s his wife.
✰ Warnings: Takes place over the episode Human Nature, 10th Doctor, Established Relationship, Martha knows her place, ain't nobody care bout that nurse, Joan minds her business, Mostly PG with a suggestive make out sesh, John is Whipped
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: This will follow the plot of the Episode. I tried to avoid using direct quotes, but I wrote this while watching the episode, so it runs closely parallel.
PS. This took me A WEEK, yall. Also its in parts cause tumbler has a character limit lol. found that out the hard way.
The morning sun spills through the thin curtains in pale gold stripes, warming the small room and the narrow bed within it. John Smith wakes slowly, pleasantly rested, limbs heavy in the way they only ever are after deep sleep. For a moment, he lies still, staring up at the ceiling, watching dust motes drift lazily through the light.
Stretching, he swings his legs over the side of the bed and reaches for the robe hanging from the chair. The floor is cold beneath his bare feet, the old wood creaking softly as he stands. He ties the robe loosely over his pyjamas, still half-asleep, when a knock sounds at the door.
Two quick raps.
“Come in,” he calls, voice soothed with sleep.
The door opens, and Martha steps inside, balancing a tray in her hands. Steam curls gently from a teapot; the scent of toast and eggs follows her in. She pauses when she sees him standing there in his robe.
“You’re not properly dressed,” she says, tone light but firm, turning to excuse herself. “I can come back if you like.”
John smiles, a little embarrassed, tugging the robe closer around himself. “It’s quite all right, truly. Set it down.”
She studies him for a heartbeat. There is something in her eyes he doesn’t quite understand, then she nods and steps fully into the room. She sets the tray down on the small table with practiced care, adjusting the cup so the handle faces outward.
“You slept well?” she asks.
“Very,” he replies easily. “Rather better than usual, actually. I had an extraordinary dream.”
She drifts further into the room, fingers finding the edge of the curtains. “What did you dream last night?” she asks, casual as breathing.
John shifts his weight, leaning back against the edge of his desk. The wood is cool through his sleeve. He watches her rather than the breakfast, eyes following as she moves, unpinning the day, inch by inch.
She pulls the curtain aside. Sunlight floods the room at once, filling the corners that had been content with shadow. Dust motes leap into view, dancing.
He hesitates. His gaze drifts upward, unfocused, searching the air as though the answer might be written there. “Sometimes,” he begins slowly, “I dream that I’m an adventurer, I suppose. A madman, if you asked anyone sensible.”
She stills for half a second before moving to the other window.
“In the dream,” he continues, warming to it now,“I have a name there,” he adds, almost shyly. “The Doctor.”
Her back is to him, and for one dangerous heartbeat, she lets it show. Her face twists in longing so sharp it nearly steals her breath. She misses him. She inhales, steadying herself. By the time she turns to the second window, her expression is once again perfectly composed.
John doesn’t notice. He’s still looking into nothing, still chasing the echo of a man he doesn’t know he used to be.
“You were there too,” he says suddenly.
Her fingers pause against the curtain tie.
“In my dream,” he explains, smiling faintly, “you were with me. My companion, I think.” He glances at her, amused.
She gives a quiet huff of laughter as she pulls the curtain open, light spilling across the far wall. “A teacher and a housemaid,” she says lightly. “Never, sir.”
“Oh, quite,” he agrees, grin widening. “But then, I wasn’t a teacher in the dream.”
“No?”
“No. I was a man from another world.” He shrugs, easy and unconcerned. “I imagine that gives one a bit more freedom.”
There is more, another part of the dream, hovering just out of reach, embarrassing in the way dreams so often are when dragged into the light of day. He doesn’t look at her as it surfaces; instead, his gaze fixes on the wall opposite him.
There had been a woman, another of the staff here at the school. Quiet in her own way, kind and clever. The sort of woman whose presence lingers after she’s gone, whose smile he always seems to notice when he least expects it. She has caught his eye more than once in waking life, though he has never had the nerve to do more than exchange polite words with her in the corridor.
In the dream, there had been no such hesitation. In the dream, she had been his wife.
The memory of it makes his ears warm. The way she’d looked at him there, as though she had always known him. They had kissed, just once. Sweet and gentle and simple. He exhales softly through his nose, almost laughing at himself. The man he is in his dreams is a lucky one. Bold in ways John Smith has never quite managed to be.
He is certainly not about to confess that part of it to the maid standing across the room. Friendly as they are, she is still almost a stranger. And some dreams, especially foolish ones, are best kept private.
She turns back to him with a smile practiced enough to pass for effortless and holds out the folded newspaper. He takes it with a murmur of thanks.
“Monday,” she says lightly. “Don’t let the boys catch you unprepared.”
He glances down at the masthead, eyes skimming automatically.
Monday, November 10th, 1913.
The date means nothing to him beyond its usefulness. Another day. Another timetable. Another small, orderly square in a life that feels comfortably, reassuringly ordinary.
To her, it feels like a weight. He doesn’t remember her. Not the way he once did. Now she is just a maid, a friendly face, someone who brings his breakfast and reminds him of the time.
He has no idea that the dreams he speaks of so casually are memories, that the madman, the adventurer, the man called the Doctor, is not imagination but history. His history.
She wonders, not for the first time, if it hurts him more or her.
Her gaze drifts to the far wall, as if she might see through it. She thinks of her friend. Of the woman who loves him fiercely enough to let him forget her. Wherever she is now, she’s likely doing exactly what she was told, blending in, keeping her head down, working quietly among strangers who have no idea how close they are to the center of the universe.
She always was better at following his orders. Martha was always envious of her for how simple all the chaos was to her.
John clears his throat softly, drawing her back. “Anything interesting in the news?” he asks, already half-smiling.
She shakes her head. “Nothing that concerns you, sir.” Martha straightens, smoothing her apron as if she has suddenly remembered her place in the world.
“I should be getting on,” she says lightly. “Plenty to do.”
John looks up from the paper at once. He folds it neatly, setting it aside before standing, manners drilled into him as firmly as Latin declensions. “Of course. Thank you again, Martha.”
“Have a good day, John.”
“You as well.”
He lifts a hand in a polite wave as she turns for the door, fingers brushing the frame as she steps out into the corridor. She doesn’t look back. The door closes softly behind her, clicking into place with a finality that makes his chest feel oddly hollow.
John stands there for a moment, hand still half-raised, before letting it fall.
John Smith walks down the corridor, the echoes of recited dates and uneven handwriting still ringing faintly in his ears. Lessons finished for now, he moves to retrieve what will be needed for his next lectures.
Down near the stairwell, two women kneel side by side on the tiled floor, sleeves rolled up, skirts tucked carefully out of the way as they scrub at a stubborn patch of grime. The sharp scent of soap hangs in the air.
Martha looks up first. Their eyes meet, and she smiles, polite “Good morning, Mr. Smith,” she says.
He returns it without hesitation, inclining his head. “Yes, good morning.”
He offers a brief, professional nod and continues on, footsteps fading as he takes the stairs, already half-lost to his next task. The moment is brief. Nothing at all.
And yet, as Martha lowers her gaze back to the floor, the smile lingers. Seeing him, even like this, even reduced to manners and distance, still warms something in her chest.
Beside her, Jenny snorts softly. “You always smile like that when he walks by,” she says, scrubbing with exaggerated effort. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you’re sweet on Mr. Smith.”
Martha huffs a quiet laugh, dipping her brush back into the bucket. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Oh, I’m serious,” Jenny insists, grinning sideways at her. “Though I don’t know why, considering his head in the clouds.”
Martha shakes her head. “He’s just… kind,” she says after a moment. “Kinder than most.”
Jenny’s teasing softens. “That so?”
“Yes.” Martha keeps her eyes on the floor as she speaks, voice steady. “Especially considering… well.” She gestures vaguely at herself. “Not everyone here is very welcoming.”
Jenny hums, thoughtful now. “That does count for something.”
“It does,” Martha agrees quietly.
Just as they settle back into their rhythm, brushes moving in quiet tandem, footsteps echo down the corridor. Two boys, sixteen, perhaps seventeen, saunter past them, blazers immaculate, shoes polished to a shine neither woman could ever afford. Their voices carry that particular tone of bored entitlement, sharpened by the knowledge that nothing here truly belongs to the people maintaining it.
One of them slows, glancing down at the kneeling women with open disdain.
“Now then, you two,” he says. “You’re not paid to have fun.”
Martha and Jenny are both still at the sound.
“Yes, sir,” Jenny answers quickly, head bowed.
“Sorry, sir,” Martha adds, her voice even, practiced. She keeps her eyes on the floor. They both do. They know better than to meet his gaze. The second boy laughs, a short, sharp sound. He leans closer, hands clasped behind his back as if inspecting their work.
“Though I suppose,” he says lazily, eyes flicking to Martha’s hands, “it’d be hard to tell if the floor’s clean anyway. With hands like that.”
He gestures vaguely, mockingly, at her skin. For a moment, everything in Martha goes very still.
Her mouth tightens into something that might pass for a smile if one didn’t look too closely. Her shoulders remain straight. Her hands do not stop moving, though her grip on the brush turns white-knuckled.
She does not respond. She cannot. The boys laugh, loud, pleased with themselves. Posh scoffs and chuckles, elbows nudging each other as though they’ve just delivered the cleverest line in England.
The boys have barely turned to leave when a voice stops them.
“That will be quite enough.” It is calm, which somehow makes it worse.
They freeze mid-step. Standing a few paces behind them is a woman they both recognize immediately, the new librarian.
She wore a sensible skirt and a blouse buttoned neatly at the collar. She looks, at first glance, exactly like what she is known to be here: wise, patient, unassuming. The sort of woman who remembers which boys struggle with Latin declensions and quietly slips extra books onto their desks. The sort who stays late to help them catch up without ever making them feel small.
She is kind, and she is respected.
Her eyes move from one boy to the other, taking them in with a measured stillness that makes their smirks falter.
“I happened to hear you,” she continues gently. “And I am deeply disappointed.”
One of the boys scoffs, trying to recover his footing. “We were only joking, miss.”
“No,” she says softly. “You weren’t.”
Behind them, Martha’s breath catches. To the school, this woman is simply another member of staff. To Martha, she is something else entirely.
She is the Doctor’s wife.
The woman who has stood beneath alien skies and never flinched. Who has run toward danger with her chin lifted and her hand steady in his. Who has stared down Daleks and Cybermen and horrors without names, not with weapons, but with the absolute certainty that cruelty does not get to win.
Martha knows that look on her face.
The boys shift uncomfortably.
“You will apologize,” the librarian says. “Now.”
There is a beat of silence.
One boy laughs weakly. “I don’t see why-”
“Apologize,” she repeats, her voice unchanged. Something in her eyes sharpens. The corridor seems to lean toward her.
The first boy swallows. His bravado cracks, just a little. “Sorry,” he mutters, not looking at Martha.
She tilts her head. “That was not addressed to me.”
Both boys turn, reluctantly, toward the women still kneeling on the floor. Jenny stares back, stunned. Martha lifts her gaze slowly.
“I said,” the librarian adds, “now.”
“I- sorry,” the second boy says at last, face flushed, words rushed and graceless.
The first echoes him, quieter this time. “Sorry.”
“Good,” she says. “You may go.”
They do not wait to be told twice. Shoes scuff sharply against the stone as they retreat down the corridor, their laughter conspicuously absent now.
The librarian turns then, attention settling gently on the two women. Her expression softens, the steel she used so sparingly slipping back beneath warmth.
“I’m sorry you were spoken to that way,” she says. “It was unacceptable.”
Jenny nods, still a little wide-eyed. “Thank you, miss.”
Martha doesn’t speak right away. She looks at her friend instead. The woman who is pretending, bravely, to be ordinary. The woman who loves a man who no longer knows her. The woman who has crossed eternity and still kneels here, defending dignity in a quiet English corridor.
The librarian steps closer, skirts brushing the tile as she approaches them properly now. The authority she wielded a moment ago is gone, folded away like a well-read page, replaced with something warmer.
“Are you both all right?” she asks.
Jenny nods quickly, already scrambling to her feet. “Yes, miss. Thank you- truly. That was very kind of you.”
The woman smiles at her, gentle and sincere. “Of course. No one deserves to be spoken to that way.”
Her gaze shifts then, sharper, and lands squarely on Martha. For just a heartbeat, the mask slips.
Martha looks up at her and smiles, something fond and knowing curling at the edges. “Thank you,” she says quietly. “For stepping in.”
The woman exhales through her nose, lips twitching. “Well. Can’t have my reputation ruined.” She tilts her head, eyes glinting. “Just my civic duty.” A mock serious salute.
Martha snorts before she can stop herself, laughter spilling out, sudden and real. “God, don’t start.”
Jenny blinks between them. “I don’t think I follow.”
“That’s quite all right,” the librarian says smoothly, patting Jenny’s shoulder. She turns back to Martha, voice lowering just enough. “Come see me later. When you’ve a moment.”
Martha nods, “I will.”
For a second longer, they hold each other’s gaze, two women carrying the weight of a man who no longer knows either of them, two friends standing guard in very different ways.
Then the librarian straightens, smile returning to its public version. “Take care of yourselves,” she says, and with that she moves on, footsteps light as she ascends the stairs.
Martha watches her go, warmth settling in her chest.
Jenny looks at her sideways. “You two know each other well.”
Martha dips her brush back into the bucket, still smiling. “You could say that.”
The stairs creak softly beneath her sensible shoes as she climbs, one hand trailing along the banister out of habit. She doesn’t realize she’s following John Smith’s path, only that this is the quickest way to the headmaster’s office, and that her patience is wearing thin.
“Honestly,” she mutters under her breath, barely aware she’s doing it. “If one more boy insists he definitely returned a book that has clearly vanished into the ether, I may start charging rent for imaginary shelves.”
Her lips purse as she reaches the landing. It is, in her mind, a matter of principle. Books are meant to be returned. Respect for the library is respect for knowledge itself, and she takes both rather seriously. Asking politely has only gone so far, smiles, promises, and nothing delivered. The headmaster, she hopes, might help her devise something firmer. A system. Consequences. Accountability.
She turns down the corridor, still muttering. “Not even obscure texts, either. Greek primers, school histories- one would think they’d at least lose something interesting-”
She stops short, realizing she’s speaking aloud again.
The habit sneaks up on her sometimes. Thinking out loud, muttering when she’s irritated, or when her thoughts start moving faster than propriety allows. She’d been terribly self-conscious of it once, long ago, apologizing, flushing, trying to swallow her words before they escaped.
'Oh, don’t stop,' he’d said then, eyes bright with delight. 'It’s like listening to the universe sort itself out.'
A smile tugs at her mouth despite herself.
Later, much later, he’d admitted, a little sheepishly, that he’d always found it adorable. Amusing when she was just his companion. Endearing when she became his wife.
The memory slows her steps.
For a moment, the corridor seems longer, quieter. She lets the smile linger, bittersweet but warm, carrying it with her as she resumes walking. There are still rules to enforce, books to recover.
As if the universe was listening to her, she rounds the corner and there he is. For a moment, the world narrows to the length of the corridor.
John Smith is heading toward her, arms wrapped around a precarious tower of books stacked from his stomach nearly to his chin, loose papers threatening mutiny on top. He walks carefully, brow furrowed in concentration, every step measured as though the fate of the universe depends on keeping the pile upright.
She stops without realizing she has. It steals her breath in the quietest way.
He is still handsome to her. Still him. It doesn’t matter that the face is different from the one she first met, or that the sharp angles and familiar grin belong to another incarnation entirely.
Still brilliant. Still trying to carry too much at once. Except now it's books and not the burdens of a Time Lord.
She watches him for a heartbeat longer than she should, affection blooming warm and unguarded in her chest. She remembers the first time she saw him, another face, another smile, another impossible man, and how she had known, instantly and irrevocably, that her life would never be the same.
He adjusts his grip, a corner of paper slipping loose. She almost steps forward on instinct, the urge to help him so natural it aches.
My dear, she thinks softly, fondly. You never did learn to ask for help.
For now, she simply stands there and admires him as he approaches, this man who no longer knows her, who believes himself human, who has forgotten the stars and still somehow carries their gravity with him.
As he draws closer, shifting the weight of the books yet again, John finally lifts his eyes and stops short.
It’s her.
The woman from his dream. The one whose face had lingered long after he woke, whose smile had felt impossibly familiar. The librarian. She is also the woman he kissed and called his wife, only in sleep.
She smiles at him first, polite and warm. “Good morning, Mr. Smith.”
His grin comes easily, reflexive. “Good morn-”
The papers slip thanks to just enough distraction. The loose stack slides off the top of the books and flutters to the floor in an undignified scatter. A few pages skid across the wood. One spins to a stop by her feet.
“Oh-blast it,” he mutters, cheeks warming as he stares down at the mess. “I’m so sorry, I- clearly I’ve taken on more than I can manage.”
Before he can try to crouch, she’s already bending down, movements smooth and unhurried. She gathers the papers neatly, tapping the edges together with practiced ease.
“No harm done,” she says lightly.
He lets out a breathy laugh, half mortified, half relieved. “I was trying to convince myself I could manage.”
“And failing admirably,” she teases gently.
She straightens and hands the papers back to him, then pauses, eyes flicking to the remaining tower of books wobbling in his arms.
“Here,” she adds. “Let me help.”
“Oh, I couldn’t possibly-”
“Nonsense,” she says, already reaching for the stack. “I’m a librarian. Taking care of books is quite literally my job.”
He laughs again, softer this time. “Well, when you put it that way…”
She relieves him of half the pile with ease, then she places the papers carefully on top of what remains in his arms, straightening them with the same reverence she gives every book.
“There,” she says. “Much safer.”
“Thank you,” he replies, and means far more than the words cover.
As they start walking together, John realizes that he has stopped paying attention to where he’s going. His gaze keeps drifting back to her face, the line of her smile, the quiet confidence in the way she carries herself.
He stares at her, openly now, caught somewhere between admiration and disbelief. Amusement flickers in her eyes, gentle and knowing, but she says nothing, letting him look.
She adjusts her grip on the books, glancing down the corridor ahead of them. “I don’t suppose you’ve seen the headmaster this morning?”
John blinks, dragged back into the present. “I have, actually. Just after first lesson.” He tilts his head, thinking. “But I’m afraid he was on his way to a meeting. He should be in it by now.”
Her shoulders sag just slightly. “Ah.” She exhales, then murmurs under her breath, “Blast.” The word is soft, unladylike, and entirely sincere.
Almost immediately she straightens, brushing the moment away as though it never happened. “Never mind. I’ll catch him later.”
John hesitates, curiosity getting the better of him. “If you don’t mind my asking, what seems to be the trouble?”
She glances at the books in her arms, lips quirking. “People,” she says simply. “Or rather, people who borrow books and forget they ever did. I’ve asked politely, repeatedly. It’s beginning to feel less like forgetfulness and more like a personal slight against the concept of libraries.”
He smiles at that, warm and sympathetic. “A grave offense indeed.”
“Truly,” she agrees, solemn.
“Well,” he says after a moment, brightening, “I could mention it to my students. Impress upon them the importance of returning what they borrow. A bit of peer pressure can be remarkably effective.”
Her face softens. “That would be very kind of you.”
“Not at all,” he replies. “I’m quite fond of books myself. I’d hate to see them mistreated.”
She smiles then, genuine and grateful, and the sight of it sends a small, inexplicable thrill through him.
“Thank you, Mr. Smith.”
They walk on in companionable silence for a few steps before she glances around. “So,” she asks lightly, “where are we headed?”
He opens his mouth to answer and stops. He looks down the corridor ahead of them, then behind, then back again, “That’s odd.”
Her eyebrow lifts.
“I appear,” he admits, cheeks warming, “to have gone entirely the wrong way.”
She lets out a soft laugh, the sound catching him off guard. “Lost already?”
“Only mildly,” he says, good-naturedly. “I was meant to be taking these to my next class, but I’ve somehow ended up nowhere near the proper stairwell.”
He turns on his heel, sheepish but smiling. “This way, then.”
He leads her down a narrower corridor toward a back stairwell, footsteps echoing lightly against the stone. She follows without hesitation, amusement dancing in her eyes.
She chuckles again. “Distracted, were you?”
He clears his throat. “It does happen.”
They descend together, steps measured, books hugged close as their footsteps echo softly down the stairwell. When they reach the second landing, her attention drifts, and then catches.
She slows, eyes lighting on a small bulletin board nailed into the wall. A brightly lettered flier sits pinned among notices for lost gloves and Latin clubs.
ANNUAL VILLAGE DANCE
“Oh,” she says, stopping outright.
John pauses a step below her and turns back. He watches her read it, the way her mouth curves into a small smile, the way something unguarded flickers across her face.
“I hadn’t realized that was so soon,” she murmurs. “Tomorrow already.”
“The dance?” he asks, following her gaze.
She nods. “Yes.”
For a moment, she seems almost tempted by the idea. Then she glances at him, casual but curious. “Are you attending?”
John blinks. “I-” He looks at the flier, then back at her. “No. I mean, I hadn’t even thought about it, to be honest.”
“And you?” he asks, before he can overthink it. “Were you planning to go?”
She shakes her head. “No.” Then, after a beat, she adds honestly, “It would be fun, I think. But I’ve no one to go with.”
Something quiet slips into her voice then, something more personal. “It’s been a while,” she admits, almost sheepish, “since anyone asked me to dance.”
The words stir a memory she does not invite but cannot stop.
A different place. Soft golden light spilling across the Tardis console room as music hums low and distant. His hands warm and sure at her waist. Her arms loose around his shoulders. His head bowed, temple resting against hers as they sway.
No running. No danger. Just the two of them, breathing together.
The ache blooms suddenly in her chest. She draws in a careful breath, steadying herself, and lets the memory settle back where it belongs, folded away, precious and painful all at once. When she looks back at John, her smile is gentler now, a little sad around the edges but no less sincere.
“I-” He clears his throat.
She stills, watching him with open curiosity.
He fidgets, shifting the books in his arms, then realizes she’s carrying half of them and flushes deeper. “I mean- well- you said you hadn’t anyone to go with and I—” He laughs, a nervous little sound. “That is, not that I’m assuming you’d want to go with me, of course, that would be terribly forward, and you’ve every right to say no, and I’d completely understand-”
He stops, winces, and barrels on anyway.
“I thought, perhaps, if you were inclined-”
The words tangle and trip over each other. He grimaces, already retreating. “I’m sorry, this was foolish. Please ignore me. I didn’t mean to-”
Her smile stops him. A soft and amused thing that did wonders to encourage him forward. There’s a twinkle in her eye that makes his breath catch. She doesn’t interrupt him. She doesn’t look uncomfortable. She looks fond.
Something steadies inside him. He swallows, straightens, and tries again.
“What I mean is,” he says more carefully, “I would very much like to take you to the dance. If you’d have me.”
For a heartbeat, the world holds its breath. Then his foot slips.
It’s absurdly sudden. One moment he’s standing, nerves buzzing through him; the next, his heel finds nothing but air. The edge of the top step disappears beneath him and his balance goes with it.
The books lurch. His arms flail uselessly as gravity makes its opinion known.
“John!” she cries.
The books hit the stairs first, thudding and skidding, pages scattering like startled birds. She drops the rest without hesitation and lunges forward, heart in her throat as he tumbles backward, limbs tangling, body bouncing down the steps in a graceless, breathless sprawl.
“John- John!” Her voice echoes sharply with panic.
She’s at the railing in an instant, skirts forgotten, pulse roaring in her ears as she stares down at him. All the careful walls she’s built, the restraint, the distance, the rules, crack in the face of the one thing she cannot bear.
Him hurt.
John lies there with a groan, the world reduced to sharp edges and aching noise. Tile presses cold and unforgiving into his back, pain radiating everywhere at once, shoulder, hip, head, too loud for thought, too immediate for dignity.
“-you there,” a voice snaps nearby, brisk and commanding. “You- yes, you. Run and fetch the nurse. Now.”
Footsteps scatter, hurried and obeying. Then she is there again. Right there.
“John,” she says, softly at first. “John, can you hear me?”
The sound of his name cuts through the haze. He blinks, vision swimming, and when his eyes finally focus, she’s above him, kneeling on the tile, skirts pooled at her knees. Her brow is drawn tight in a deep frown, eyes shining a little too brightly with worry she hasn’t quite mastered away.
“There you are,” she murmurs, relief threading through her voice even as concern sharpens it. “Stay with me.”
“I-” He winces as he tries to shift, thinks better of it. “I seem to have… made a bit of a fool of myself.”
Her breath hitches. “Don’t,” she says immediately. “Don’t talk like that.”
She leans closer, hands hovering before settling gently at his shoulders, steadying him, grounding him. “Keep your eyes open, please. Just for me. You may have hit your head.”
“A concussion?” he guesses weakly.
“Possibly,” she says, and the word carries far more fear than she means it to.
He swallows and does as she asks, keeping his eyes on her face. It’s difficult to look away anyway. She’s so close he can see the fine lines of worry at the corner of her eyes, the way her lips press together when she concentrates. Her hands move carefully, checking his temples, his arms, his ribs, fussing over him with an intimacy that makes his ears burn even through the pain.
“I’m terribly sorry,” he mutters again. “I didn’t mean to-”
“John,” she interrupts, firm but gentle. “You fell. That’s all that matters.”
Her fingers brush his sleeve, then his wrist, checking his pulse. The contact sends a strange warmth through him, utterly at odds with the ache in his body.
He laughs faintly, immediately regrets it. “If I weren’t in quite so much pain,” he admits, “this would be rather a pleasant way to pass the morning.”
She exhales a breath that might be a laugh, might be a sob. “You’re impossible.”
John sits carefully on the edge of the chair beside his desk, hands folded in his lap as though he’s afraid moving them might undo him entirely. The school’s nurse, Joan, stands directly behind him, fingers prodding at his head, then tilting it this way and that.
“Any dizziness?” she asks.
“No,” John answers promptly. “Well, only the usual sort one feels after humiliating oneself in a stairwell.”
She hums. “Nausea?”
“No.”
“Blurred vision?”
“No, I- well, no.”
She straightens with a satisfied sniff. “Then you’re quite all right, Mr. Smith. A bruise or two, nothing more.”
Just two feet to his right, the librarian leans back against his desk, arms folded loosely, posture composed. Her expression is calmer now, but the worry hasn’t fully left her eyes. She watches the nurse’s hands carefully, as though memorizing every place they touch him just in case.
The door flies open without warning.
“Sir, are you alright?” Martha skids to a halt just inside the threshold, breathless, eyes wide with concern.
The nurse whirls around. “Excuse me?”
Martha blinks. “I just wanted to see if he was all right.”
The nurse gives her a pointed look. “And you thought bursting into a master’s study without so much as a knock was appropriate?” Her voice sharpens. “You may be staff, but that does not excuse rudeness. Or impropriety.”
Martha opens her mouth. Closes it. Then exhales slowly.
Behind the nurse, the librarian’s lips twitch.
“Oh, right then, my apologies,” Martha says, tone so flat it could frost glass. She backs out into the corridor, turns very deliberately, and raps her knuckles against the already open door.
She steps back inside. “Is he all right?”
John bites the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling.
The nurse does not share his struggle. “Yes,” she snaps. “As I just said, he is quite fine.”
Martha folds her arms. “Have you checked him for a concussion?”
The nurse scoffs. “I assure you, I know far more about such matters than you do.”
There’s a brief pause, then the librarian speaks.
“Actually,” she says mildly, “Martha studied medicine.”
All eyes turn to her.
“She’s been keeping up with her studies while working here,” the librarian continues, gesturing vaguely toward the shelves as if the walls themselves are witnesses. “Borrowed several medical texts from the library, in fact. Quite diligent.”
Martha blinks once, then nods solemnly. “Very diligent.”
The nurse’s mouth opens. Closes. Her cheeks color.
“Well,” she says stiffly, straightening her apron. “Be that as it may, Mr. Smith shows no signs of concussion at present.”
“Good,” Martha replies pleasantly.
John looks between them, eyebrows lifted, openly impressed. “I had no idea,” he says to Martha.
She shrugs. “One picks things up.”
The librarian meets Martha’s eyes for just a second, amused, approving, fond.
The nurse clears her throat. “I’ll check on you again later, Mr. Smith,” she says curtly, already moving toward the door.
Once she’s gone, the room exhales.
Martha immediately steps closer. “You scared me,” she says, softer now. “How do you feel?”
“Sore,” John admits. “But remarkably well cared for.”
His gaze drifts, unthinking, to the librarian still leaning against his desk. She meets his eyes, something warm and unreadable passing between them.
“Yes,” she says quietly. “You were.”
And John Smith, sitting there bruised and breathless and inexplicably full of awe, knows with sudden certainty that whatever else today has been, it has been anything but ordinary.
Martha clears her throat and, almost visibly, steps back into her role. She reaches for the scattered papers and the fallen books with practiced efficiency. “I’ll tidy up,” she says, as though she hasn’t already crossed galaxies for the man sitting in that chair.
John nods gratefully. “Thank you.”
She moves about the room, straightening, stacking, restoring order where chaos briefly reigned. The normalcy of it all presses in, a little too tight.
John shifts in his seat, wincing faintly, then glances between the two women. The librarian has in her place by his desk, posture relaxed but attentive, eyes still flicking to him every so often as if checking he hasn’t vanished when she wasn’t looking.
“So,” he says, mostly to fill the silence. Mostly to stop thinking about how close she is. “I was just telling her,” he gestures vaguely toward the librarian, “about my dreams.”
Martha stills for half a second.
Then her eyes lift, bright with sudden interest, as if a switch has been flipped. “Your dreams?”
The librarian straightens, attention sharpening, the calm concern on her face giving way to something intent.
John notices both reactions and laughs softly, already a little self-conscious. “Only half of them,” he adds quickly, glancing at Martha. “I mentioned them briefly this morning. Didn’t go into much detail.”
“Oh?” the librarian says gently. “You left out the best parts, then?”
“Well,” He rubs the back of his neck, sheepishly. “That depends on one’s definition of best, I suppose.”
He shifts again, uncomfortable now for reasons that have nothing to do with bruises. “It’s going to sound rather silly,” he warns, waving a hand as if trying to dismiss it before it can embarrass him. “So feel free to stop me if I begin to make a fool of myself again. I seem to have a talent for it today.”
Martha smiles to herself as she continues tidying, but she listens closely.
John exhales and continues, voice light, deliberately casual. “They’re not ordinary dreams. I’m not myself in them. Or rather, I am, but I’m also someone else. Less concerned with gravity and staircases.”
The librarian’s eyes soften.
“There’s traveling,” he goes on, warming to it despite himself. “Impossible traveling. And danger. And-” He laughs again, shaking his head. “Honestly, it sounds absurd when I say it aloud.”
“It doesn’t,” she says quietly.
He looks at her, surprised.
She smiles, encouraging. “Go on.”
And somehow, with the librarian watching him like that and Martha listening like it matters more than it should, John Smith finds himself wanting, very much, to keep talking.
He hesitates, then adds, almost as an afterthought, as though it hardly counts, “I started writing them down.”
Martha’s hands pause mid-tidy.
The librarian’s head lifts. “You did?”
He lets out a small, embarrassed laugh. “Only for myself. To make sense of them, really. I was going to stop, but it sort of became a habit, then a hobby.”
“May I see?” she asks. And John finds, rather helplessly, that he cannot say no.
“Well,” He stands, a bit stiffly, brushing off his trousers before moving toward his desk. “I’ve never shown anyone before,” he admits, flustered grin firmly in place as he opens a drawer and pulls out a slim journal, its spine worn from use. “So you must promise not to laugh.”
“I promise,” she says firmly.
He hands it over, fingers lingering for the briefest second before letting go.
She takes it with care, as though it might be fragile, and begins to flip through the pages. Her eyes scan lines of cramped handwriting, then widen just slightly at the sketches scattered between paragraphs, angular towers under alien skies, constellations that don’t belong to any Earthly map, and creatures she recognized. Daleks and Ood, Cybermen and Clockwork Droids. His memories, leaking through in his dreams.
As she reads, John keeps talking, unable to stop himself now.
“In the dreams, I’m not from here. Not really, I’m from the future.” He laughs softly. “Quite a ways from it, actually. And there’s this- this blue box. Ridiculous thing, bigger on the inside. It takes me to other worlds.”
She turns a page, doesn’t interrupt him, just keeps reading and her smile grows. John notices, and it does something to him.
“Well,” he says, softer now, “I suppose that’s the worst of it. Mad dreams of boxes and stars.”
She finally looks up at him, eyes bright, expression unreadable in the best way.
“I don’t think it’s foolish,” she says simply.
The relief that washes over him is almost comical.
He flashes a big, dopey grin, “I’m glad,” he says. “Because I rather like them.”
And as she turns another page of the journal, of his memories. On the page is a very beautiful sketch of her. The sketch is rougher than the others, lines uncertain, where the rest of the journal is confident. The strokes overlap as if he’d erased and redrawn more than once, trying to get something right. Her posture, the fall of her hair, the cut of her clothes, she recognizes it instantly.
The outfit she wore when he married her. Her breath catches, sharp and quiet.
She remembers the moment with devastating clarity: the hum of the Tardis beneath her feet, his hands warm and steady at her waist, the way he leaned in and whispered his name against her ear before promising himself to her. The universe had felt very small then. Just the two of them, choosing each other.
She doesn’t know how much of that memory has bled into his dreams. If he remembers the words, the vows, the way he smiled like he couldn’t quite believe his luck. But he remembers her. She traces the edge of the page with her thumb, reverent, grateful in a way that tightens her chest.
John notices the pause.
“Oh-” He leans in, then freezes when he sees what she’s looking at. Color rushes to his face at once. “That- well,” He lets out an awkward laugh, rubbing at his neck. “I didn’t mean for that to seem odd.”
He rushes on, eager to explain it away. “You were just- present, I suppose. In the dreams, both of you were,” he adds quickly, glancing toward Martha, who pretends very hard to be rearranging books on the far side of the room. “I thought if I didn’t write it down, I’d forget the details. And I draw better than I write, sometimes.”
He clears his throat. “Please don’t read too much into it.”
She looks up at him then. The same man. The same soul. The same earnestness. Memory or not, he is still him. Still, the man she chose. Still, the man who chose her.
Her smile is soft. Almost tender enough to hurt, “I think it’s rather lovely,” she says.
Something in his chest gives way. He meets her gaze, and for a moment, the world seems to tilt. Neither of them speaks. They don’t need to. Across the room, Martha watches the way they look at each other and feels a strange, aching relief bloom in her chest.
She clears her throat softly, the sound breaking the fragile stillness between them.
For a fleeting moment, uncertainty creeps in. She doesn’t know whether she’s allowed to want him like this. As John Smith, as a man who smiles shyly and stumbles over his words and doesn’t remember whispering vows into her ear among the stars.
But she lets herself feel something else instead, a strange, out-of-body sort of gratitude. For the first two months after they arrived here, he’d barely looked at her. Polite and distant strangers. It had hurt more than she ever let on. Yet now it’s as though something has shifted, as though whatever part of him remembers how to orbit her has finally found its way back.
He can hardly look away.
John inhales, clearly about to say something, something that makes his shoulders tense and his eyes soften, but then he glances to the side and Martha is still there. He falters, doubt rushing in all at once. His mouth closes. He looks suddenly unsure of his place again, of what he’s allowed to say.
The librarian notices immediately. She smiles at him and then flicks a glance toward Martha that is anything but subtle. Martha catches it and beams.
“Oh,” she says brightly, already stepping back. “Right. I should- yes. I’ll leave you to it.” She pauses at the door, glancing between them, eyes shining. “I’m glad you’re feeling better, John.”
“Thank you, Martha,” he replies, genuinely.
She slips out, closing the door gently behind her.
In the corridor, Martha presses a hand briefly to her chest, overwhelmed with a joy she hadn’t dared to expect. They’re still there. Still them. Even stripped of memory, even buried under months of careful pretending, the connection has found its way back. Like a flame that needed no match to light.
The librarian looks back at John, her smile soft and a little breathless, and whatever he was going to say before suddenly feels possible again.
John breathy laugh that doesn’t quite manage to hide his nerves, “I’m afraid,” he says, glancing anywhere but directly at her, “I’ve made rather a habit of embarrassing myself today.” He grimaces good-naturedly. “At this rate, I’ll have quite a reputation.”
She doesn’t interrupt him. Instead, she closes the journal gently and holds it to her chest, fingers curling around the worn cover as if it’s something precious, which he notices. She watches him with a fondness so deep it nearly aches, her expression soft, full of understanding he can’t quite explain.
The Doctor had rarely been uncertain. He was decisive, brilliant, confident to the point of arrogance at times, when the universe demanded it. A man who spoke with certainty about time, about stars, about things no human should ever have words for.
And yet she recognises him now, just as clearly.
She has walked past his classroom before, slowed her steps without meaning to, listened through the open door. Heard that tone in his voice when he lectured, animated by a confident authority. The same voice he once used to explain the birth of galaxies to her, hands waving, eyes alight with wonder.
The same man.
Even here, even now, John Smith fumbling over his words, uncertain and flushed, she recognizes him. She’s seen this version too. After their first kiss. It was a heated, reckless moment, born of a ‘I refuse to die without doing this’ kind of certainty. And later, safe in the Tarids, when he’d suddenly gone quiet and shy and unsure how to speak to her without frightening her away.
That was just like this.
John Smith is the Doctor, not in face, not in memory, but in everything that matters. The way he looks at her like she is something extraordinary, and is startled by his own feelings.
“You’re allowed to be human,” she says gently. “Especially after a day like this.”
His shoulders ease at that, tension bleeding out of him without his realizing it. “I appreciate you saying so.”
She shifts the journal slightly, still holding it close. “You didn’t make a fool of yourself. I found it all quite charming,” she adds softly. Her brow furrows just slightly, “Aside from you falling down the stairs, that was terrifying. Promise to be more careful, John.”
The way she says his name does something to him.
John’s grin breaks wide and unguarded, giddy in a way that surprises even him. He straightens a little despite the ache in his ribs, nodding quickly. “I promise,” he says. “Absolutely. No more stair-related heroics.”
She huffs a quiet laugh. He laughs too, flustered and bright, eyes shining as if the day’s chaos has finally settled into something wonderful instead of overwhelming.
Night settles over the village in a sharp, biting November cold. The windows of the pub glow warm and amber against the dark, laughter and music spilling out each time the door opens.
The librarian joins Martha and Jenny at a small table just outside, the three of them wrapped in coats. She fits there easily, no stiffness or awkward sense of rank, just another woman grateful for good company.
Jenny watches her with open curiosity, still a little amazed.
“I have to say,” she ventures, smiling as she leans in, “I didn’t expect you to come out with us. Not many ladies in your position would.”
The librarian chuckles softly. “I find it’s much easier to enjoy life when one doesn’t put oneself on a pedestal.”
Jenny grins at that, clearly charmed. She glances between the two women. “I was wondering, if you don’t mind me asking, how do you and Martha know each other? You seemed awfully familiar earlier today.”
At that moment, the pub door opens again, letting in a burst of cold air along with Martha. She carries two glasses and slows when she hears the question.
She sets one drink carefully in front of Jenny. “Here you go,” she says, then looks up with an easy smile.
The librarian doesn’t miss a beat, “We came to town around the same time,” she explains smoothly. “Didn’t know a soul between us.”
Martha nods along, picking up her own drink. “We were both looking for work,” she adds. “It just happened.”
“It did,” the librarian agrees warmly, turning her gaze on Martha. “Some friendships don’t require effort. They simply make sense.” There’s a depth to the way she says it that slips right past Jenny, but not Martha.
Martha meets her eyes over the rim of her glass and understands instantly. This isn’t the librarian speaking to a housemaid; this is the Doctor’s wife speaking to his companion. A truth wrapped in a lie, gentle enough to keep them safe.
Jenny smiles, satisfied. “Well, you’re lucky to have each other.”
Martha lifts her mug slightly in agreement. “Very lucky.”
The librarian grins softly and tugs her coat a little tighter around herself, settling back in her chair as Jenny and Martha fall into easy chatter beside her. Their voices blend together but gradually they fade into background noise, like music drifting from another room.
Her gaze lifts above the pub and the tree line, beyond the thin smear of cloud, the stars glitter cold and sharp against the night. She lets herself look at them for a moment longer than necessary.
Once, she saw stars up close. Watched them burn and die from impossible vantage points. Stood on worlds where the sky was a riot of color and light, where constellations meant something different entirely. She remembers leaning against the console of the Tardis, his shoulder warm at her side, both of them quiet for once as they watched the universe pass by.
She misses the hum of the ship, the rush of danger, the running that always followed the Doctor wherever he went. She misses him.
But she still has her husband, just a quieter version now. The thought steadies her. It’s strange, she thinks, how peace can feel almost as frightening as chaos after so long without it. How sitting still, sharing a drink, and listening to laughter can feel like learning a new language. But still, it was nice, even knowing there are murderous aliens somewhere out there, living out their short lives searching for him.
She exhales slowly and lets the calm settle in her bones.
Her mind drifts back to him without effort. She wonders if he’s in his study now, sleeves rolled up, brow furrowed as he grades papers by lamplight. Or perhaps he’s already preparing for bed, moving carefully like he promised, bruises aching just enough to remind him of today.
She wonders if he’ll dream tonight, another memory will surface, of her, of them. Of vows whispered into the hum of a ship that no longer exists in his mind. If he’ll wake with that familiar, puzzled feeling in his chest, carrying love he doesn’t yet have words for.
She hopes so.
The light is brief, a faint blip of green in the sky, so quick it might be mistaken for a trick of the eye, but her smile vanishes instantly. The change in her is so sharp it’s almost frightening.
Martha sees it.
The look she wore, she wore when a Judoon platoon leveled weapons on the Moon. When Daleks revealed themselves in Manhattan. When Professor Lazarus mutated and became something monstrous and hungry. The look she gets when the universe stops being quaint and starts being dangerous.
Her body goes subtly rigid, shoulders squaring, chin lifting as her eyes track the place the light had been. Martha follows her gaze just in time to see the green glow blink out, swallowed by the night.
Her stomach drops.
“Did you-” Martha starts, then stops herself, forcing her voice down, casual. Her heart is already racing. “Did you see that?”
“Yes,” she says quietly. Her eyes remain on the sky, calculating, listening for something no one else would know to hear, as the Doctor taught her.
Jenny frowns, craning her neck. “See what?”
Martha swallows and pastes on a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Probably nothing,” she says quickly. “Just light playing tricks. You know how it is.”
Jenny squints upward again. “Didn’t see a thing.”
The librarian finally looks away from the sky, her expression smoothing back into something almost normal, but Martha knows better. She’s seen this woman go from laughing to life-or-death in a heartbeat, and this is the space right before the storm breaks. She reaches for her drink but doesn’t lift it, fingers tight around the mug.
“How far is the school from here?” the librarian asks, mild on the surface.
Martha answers just as calmly. “Ten minutes. Less, if we hurry.”
Jenny laughs nervously. “Hurry? For what?”
The librarian smiles at her then, completely convincing. “Oh, nothing at all,” she says. “Just librarian’s instincts.”
Martha is the first to see her figure break away from the darker stretch of road, skirts hitched just enough to run, breath coming hard in sharp white puffs. The glow from the pub lamps catches her face as she gets closer, and Martha’s stomach tightens.
“Matron?” she says, already rising to her feet. “Are you all right?”
The librarian stands as well, turning just in time to see the school nurse reach them. Joan slows only when she’s right there, stopping between them and the pub, one hand braced on her chest as she tries to catch her breath. Her eyes are wide and fearful, fixed on the sky.
“Did you see it?” Joan asks, voice thin, barely steady. “The light?”
Martha’s heart sink and the librarian’s posture changed, stepping closer. She doesn’t crowd Joan.
“Tell me what you saw,” she says calmly.
Joan swallows, glancing upward again, as if afraid it might come back. “Something in the woods,” she says. “A light right overhead. I thought- at first I thought it was lightning, but it wasn’t right. It moved.” She lets out a shaky breath. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
The librarian nods slowly, eyes sharp, cataloguing every word. “How long did it last?”
“Seconds. Barely that.”
Jenny looks between them, brow furrowed, still seated at the table. “I don’t understand,” she says, half-laughing with unease. “What light? I didn’t see anything.”
John steps out of the pub just then, the door swinging shut behind him with a wash of warmth and laughter he leaves behind. He pauses, hat in hand, clearly mid-excuse to someone inside who has already gone back to their drink.
He looks up and smiles. His eyes find her first, as they seem determined to do now. The librarian. His smile softens, private and pleased, just for her. It lingers a beat too long before he notices the others.
The nurse, pale and shaken. Martha, standing far too stiffly. Jenny, baffled and looking around for answers.
“Oh,” he says, fidgeting with the brim of his hat. “Have I missed something?”
“John,” the librarian says gently.
He takes a step closer, instinctively angling himself nearer to her than anyone else. “Good evening,” he adds, nodding politely to the group. His gaze flicks back to her again, a quiet reassurance in it, before he looks around. “What are we all standing about in the cold for?”
Joan draws a sharp breath and lifts her arm, pointing skyward. “There, look!”
The green light returns, streaking across the sky in a smooth, luminous arc, brighter this time, unmistakable. Joan gasps, breathless all over again. “What is that?”
Jenny lets out a quiet, awed laugh. “It’s beautiful.”
John watches it for a moment, head tilted, expression thoughtful rather than alarmed. “A meteorite,” he says calmly. “Or perhaps just a comet fragment. Bits of rock falling through the atmosphere, burning up on entry. Happens more often than people think.” His voice is steady, confident, pitched carefully for the nurse’s benefit.
Joan swallows and nods toward the dark stretch of trees beyond the village. “It came down in the woods.” Her voice wavers despite herself.
John doesn’t hesitate. “They always seem closer than they are,” he says gently. “Perspective plays tricks at night. If anything fell at all, it would be miles off. You’re quite safe.”
She clings to the calm certainty in his tone, shoulders easing as she exhales a shaky breath. “Yes, of course. That makes sense.” Her eyes linger on the sky a moment longer before finally dropping.
He notices that she’s steadier but still rattled. “If you’d like,” he offers, already shifting his hat in his hands, “I’ll escort you back to the school. No sense going alone in the dark.”
Joan nods, grateful. “I’d appreciate that.”
John turns back to the others. “Ladies, you’re welcome to join us,” he adds lightly.
Martha answers before anyone else can. Her eyes are still searching the sky. “No, thank you,” she says politely. Jenny lifts her glass and takes a sip, saying nothing at all.
John accepts it with a nod, then looks to the librarian. His smile softens, hopeful in that earnest way of his. “What about you?” he asks. “Would you care to come along?” Even with Joan there, hovering awkwardly at his side, he clearly wants the extra minutes with her.
She meets his eyes and, for a heartbeat, considers it. Then she rests a hand lightly on his arm.
“I’ll stay,” she says gently. “Just to be sure they all get home safely.”
The disappointment flashes across his face before he can stop it, but he covers it just as quickly with a smile, glancing down at where her hand still lingers.
“Of course,” he says. “That’s. . . very kind of you.”
She smiles back, small but sincere, and withdraws her hand.
John tips his hat to the group, then turns to Joan. Together they start down the road toward the school, their figures soon swallowed by shadow and lamplight. The librarian watches him go until he’s out of sight.
The moment John disappears down the road, the librarian turns sharply.
“Jenny,” she says, “Which direction did the light seem to be moving?”
Jenny blinks, startled to be addressed so directly. “Oh- um,” She glances instinctively toward the dark edge of the village. “That way, I think that’ll be toward Cooper’s Field.”
“Thank you.”
The words are barely out of her mouth before she’s moving. She skirts around the table with purpose, coat pulled tighter as she sets off down the road at a brisk, determined pace. The calm librarian vanishes in an instant, replaced by something older and sharper, a woman who has chased danger across planets and knows exactly when time has run out.
“Martha,” she says, already walking faster.
Martha doesn’t question it. She’s falling into step beside her, heart pounding. They break into a near run.
“Oi!” Jenny calls after them, scrambling up from her chair. “Where are you going? It’s dark, and cold, you could get hurt!”
Neither woman slows.
By the time Jenny reaches them, breath puffing out in annoyed clouds, the other two are already moving with urgency, skirts gathered, boots crunching against gravel and frost-hardened earth. The village lights fall away behind them.
Cooper’s Field stretches out before them, far and dark, and utterly ordinary. There is no smoke or scorch marks, no strange debris half-buried in the earth. Just open land and the low sigh of wind moving through winter-dry stems.
Jenny slows first, hands on her hips, breath coming hard. “Well?” she says, looking around pointedly. “This is it. Nothing.”
Martha turns in a slow circle, eyes scanning the ground, the tree line, the sky. Her pulse refuses to slow. “It doesn’t make sense,” she murmurs.
Jenny snorts, rubbing her arms against the cold. “Mr. Smith said it was just a rock, a meteorite. He’s educated, he’d know.” She frowns at them both. “I don’t see why you’d doubt him.”
The librarian doesn’t answer. She steps past them, boots crunching softly as she moves deeper into the field. There truly is nothing but her stomach drops. A horrible, familiar sensation settles in her chest, the feeling she’s learned to trust above all others, the one that whispers you’re missing something.
She stops, breath shallow, turning slowly in place.
“It should be here,” she says quietly. Martha joins her, eyes darting as though willing something to reveal itself.
Jenny shivers hard, rubbing her arms. “That’s enough for me,” she says, teeth nearly chattering. “It’s freezing, it’s dark, and there’s nothing here. Can we please go home before I lose a toe?”
Martha hesitates, eyes still scanning the field, unwilling to let it go. The librarian feels it too, that wrongness humming just beneath the quiet, but Jenny is right about one thing; there’s nothing more they can see.
Reluctantly, she nods. “All right.”
They turn back toward the village, boots crunching softly over frost-stiff grass, their breath pale in the air. They never know how close they were.
Thirty feet from where they stood, space bends ever so slightly, light folding in on itself. A ship rests in perfect stillness, its hull cloaked, its presence masked from human senses. It had been there the entire time.
Nor do the women yet know of Jeremy Baines, a boy from the school, who had strayed too close to the edge of Cooper’s Field earlier that evening, drawn by the same green light like a moth to flame.
Now he stands somewhere else entirely. Metal walls hum softly around him. Shadows move where they shouldn’t, and something hungry is reaching into him, threading itself through his thoughts, hollowing him out to make room.
The hunters have found their vessel.
Gunfire screams through the air.
“Look out!” The Doctor’s voice cuts sharply and urgently as he grabs for them, brown pinstriped suit already singed at the hem, dirty Converse skidding on metal as he shoves them both toward the open doors of the TARDIS. Bolts of dangerous alien energy snap past, close enough to scorch the wall.
“Doctor!” Martha shouts, ducking instinctively.
“I’ve got you, go, go, go!” he yells back, one hand locked tight around his wife’s wrist, the other already waving wildly as he backpedals, eyes flicking everywhere at once.
His wife nearly loses her footing, and he tightens his grip, hauling her forward without hesitation. “Eyes on me,” he tells her, fierce and focused for just a heartbeat, like the universe has narrowed to her face alone. “Don’t stop.”
They scramble up the ramp, Martha first, then her, the Tardis doors yawning wide behind them like a promise. The Doctor spins at the threshold, firing one last glare over his shoulder at the chaos chasing them. He dives inside, slamming the doors shut as another volley hits against the blue wood.
Inside, the Tardis lurches, engines roaring to life. Martha grabs the console to steady herself, heart hammering. The Doctor is already moving, fingers flying, coat flaring as he throws switches and cranks levers with manic precision.
The Doctor in three long strides, hands snapping up to grip Martha by the shoulders, “Did they see you?” he demands, eyes wild, voice sharp with an edge she’s only heard when things have gone very, very wrong. “Martha- did they see you?”
Martha sucks in a breath, forcing her racing thoughts into order. “No,” she says, certain now. “No, they couldn’t have.”
With a sharp nod, he releases her and spins away before she can even steady herself, then he’s in front of his wife. His hands come up gently this time, cradling the sides of her head, thumbs warm against her cheeks. The contrast is jarring, but with the same urgency.
“Did they see you?” he asks her, low and intense. “Did anyone see you?”
She meets his gaze without hesitation, breath still ragged but steady where it counts. “No,” she says. “They didn’t.”
For a fraction of a second, his eyes close, then he lets go.
“Right,” he says, already turning back to the console. “Off we go, then.”
He slams a lever down. The Tardis groans its familiar wheez, and tears itself free of the moment, engines screaming as reality peels away. Relief washes through the room.
It lasts exactly one second.
A sharp beep-beep-beep cuts through the air, he looks up at one of the monitors. Gallifreyan script scrolls across it in angry, pulsing lines, meaningless to the humans behind him, devastatingly clear to him.
“Oh, you have got to be kidding me,” he groans, running a hand down his face. Then, quieter, darker, “They’re following us.”
Martha steps closer, confusion cutting through her fear. “Doctor, how could they be following us? We’re in a time machine.”
He’s already moving again, darting around the console, fingers flying, switches snapping into new positions. “Stolen technology,” he snaps. “They’ve got a time agent’s vortex manipulator.”
He’s pacing now, agitation radiating off him. He stops dead, hand tangles in his hair, eyes wide, panicked. “They can follow us wherever we go,” he says, “They’re never going to stop.”
He turns to them then,“You have to trust me,” he says. There isn’t even a pause.
“We do,” Martha answers instantly.
“Always,” his wife says, just as firmly. That’s all he needs.
From there, everything becomes a blur, moments snapping past too quickly to hold, The Doctor is already moving, hands flying, pulling open panels Martha has never seen before. He presses something into his wife’s hands: a watch.
“You keep this,” he says, breathless. “It’s me. In a way.”
Martha frowns. “Doctor-”
“Those creatures are hunters,” he barrels on, pacing, talking too fast now, words tripping over each other the way they always do when he’s terrified. “They can sniff out anyone. And me-” He laughs once, humorless. “I’m a Time Lord, they can track me throught time and space.”
“So we hide,” his wife says immediately.
“Yes,” he agrees. “Exactly. We hide. They’ve only got a few months left, three at most. Short lifespans. We wait them out.”
Martha cuts in, “Hiding won’t work if they can track you.”
“Yes,” he breathes. “You’re right. You’re absolutely right. I can hide my scent,” he continues, voice steadier now that he’s found the solution. “Rewrite my biology. Make myself human. Properly human. Nothing for them to follow.”
Martha’s blood runs cold. “Doctor-”
“A chameleon arch,” he says, “I’ll store everything I am in the watch, memories, biology, the lot of it, and become someone else. Completely.”
Flashes of it overlap now, The Doctor explaining faster than either of them can interrupt. His wife gripping the watch like it’s made of glass. Martha shaking her head even as she understands. The Doctor insisting it’s the safest option. The only option.
“I’ll be human,” he says, voice softening when he looks at his wife. “I won’t remember any of it. You. Me. Us.”
Her chest aches but she nods anyway.
“We wait,” he says. “We live quietly. We let the hunters burn out.”
The memory comes in fragments, violent, unkind ones. The chameleon arch settles over his head with a final, terrible click.
He screams.
It tears out of him, raw and helpless, a sound that doesn’t belong to the man who so often laughs in the face of danger. His body arches against as the arch lights up, energy surging, rewriting him cell by cell. Two hearts falter. One stops. His biology twists, compresses, collapses into Human.
Martha can’t look away, like a train wreck. Horror pins her in place, hands clenched uselessly at her sides.
His wife doesn’t look away either. She stands her ground, fists trembling at her sides, tears streaking silently down her face. Every instinct in her screams to stop it, to pull him free, to take the pain for him if she could, but she knows this is the only way. Knows he chose this. Knows he’d make the same choice again.
“I’m here,” she says fiercely, voice breaking. “I’m right here. You’re not alone.”
He can’t hear her.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispers to him. “I wish it hadn’t hurt. I wish-” Her voice catches. “I wish I could have made it easier.”
She shakes the memory away like cold water from her hands. The pain, the screaming, the light, it all folds back into the past where it belongs.
A moment later, Martha comes in after her.
“Hello,” Martha says automatically, back to the doors as she closes them. She pauses, frowns, then huffs at herself. “Honestly, talking to a machine.”
“She’s alive, y’know.”
Martha jumps, and then spots her, leaning casually against the console, peering at her from around the controls with a knowing smile.
“Oh!” Martha presses a hand to her chest. “Don’t do that.”
The Doctor’s wife grins. “Sorry. Couldn’t resist.”
Martha exhales, then laughs despite herself. “You’re going to give me a heart attack one of these days.”
“Occupational hazard,” she replies lightly.
They look at each other for a beat, the weight of everything unspoken hanging between them.
Then Martha smiles properly. “You all right?”
She nods. “I am. Just remembering.”
“Yeah,” Martha says softly. “Me too.” Martha drifts toward the console, fingers brushing familiar edges without thinking. That’s when she notices the monitor.
The Doctor’s face fills the screen, paused, caught mid-gesture as if he might start talking again at any moment. The video he made for them before the arch. Before forgetting.
“Oh,” Martha murmurs. “You too, then.”
The Doctor’s wife follows her gaze, eyes softening for just a second. “Mm.”
Martha folds her arms loosely. “I figured after last night’s… meteorite, we were all thinking the same thing.”
She nods once. “Hard not to.”
Silence stretches between them, thick with unasked questions. Martha glances back at the frozen image on the screen. “What did you think?” she asks carefully. “About what he said. About what we’re meant to do now.”
The Doctor’s wife doesn’t answer right away. She turns fully to Martha instead, expression calm, like shes done this a thousand times, followed impossible instructions and trusted the man who gave them.
“We stick to the script,” she says quietly. “Exactly as he laid it out.”
Martha’s jaw tightens. “Blend in.”
“Blend in,” she agrees. “Live our lives. Keep him safe.”
“And if it gets worse?” Martha presses.
Her eyes harden “Then we do what we have to. Not before, not a second early.”
Martha nods slowly, understanding settling in.
The knock comes just as John is setting his papers into neat piles.
“Yes?” he calls, crossing the room to the door.
When he opens it, Tim stands there, hand respectfully tucked behind his back. One of the brighter boys in his class, though he rarely seems to realize it.
“Sir,” Tim says quickly, as if afraid he’ll be dismissed, “you said I was to pick up a book?”
“Ah, yes, of course.” John’s face softens with recognition. “Come in, Timothy.”
He steps aside to let the boy pass, leaving the door open behind him as Tim moves into the study.
“It was right here somewhere,” he mutters, lifting a stack of papers, then another. Tim smiles faintly and comes to a stop near the fireplace, waiting as instructed.
John glances over his shoulder. “Your last essay,” he says casually, “was good. Very good. But not as strong as I know it could have been. Your marks are not as high as they could be.”
Tim shrugs, trying for nonchalance. “I’m in the top ten, sir.”
“Yes,” John agrees, straightening slightly. “You are.”
He sighs and abandons the desk, stepping past Tim toward the alcove shelves. “But you could very easily be at the top.” He crouches to scan the lower shelves, fingers trailing along spines. “You lover your head and avoid mocker of your classmates, but you’re clever. Shame to put that to waist.”
Tim’s attention drifts as Mr. Smith keeps talking, something about potential and wasted brilliance and applying oneself. The words blur together once the teacher moves out of sight, voice echoing faintly from the alcove.
That’s when Tim hears it. Whispers overlapping, too many at once. Not loud. He stiffens, heart thudding, eyes flicking around the study. His gaze drifts, the pocket watch sits on the mantelpiece, plain at first glance. Something about it that makes his skin prickle.
He lifts the watch andt’s heavier than he expects. Cool in his palm. His thumb brushes over the strange engraving etched into the casin, symbols that look like gears almost.
The whispers sharpen as it lays un his palm.
“Timothy.”
He inhales sharply.
“Hide us.”
“I’m trapped.”
“I’m waiting. Always waiting.”
His fingers tighten.
“Reach out, boy. Hide us.”
The final whisper cuts through the rest, clear as a bell struck in his mind.
“Time Lord.”
His breath catches. His thumb flips the watch open.
Golden light spills out, liquid and living, flowing within the boring silver casing like sunlight given form. It hums in his bones and vibrated through his chest.
Tim has always had a knack for it. Guessing answers before the questions were finished. Knowing when to duck before a ball was thrown. Sensing when trouble was coming. He’d told himself it was luck.
This is not luck.
The voices pull at him, pleading. They know his name. They sound afraid. Footsteps approach him. Panic flares, but instinct answers faster. Tim snaps the watch shut and slips it into his pocket just as Mr. Smith re-enters the room, book in hand, still talking.
“…and that’s precisely why you shouldn’t hold yourself back,” John is saying warmly. “You owe it to yourself to see just how far you can go.”
He holds out the book, smiling, entirely unaware. “Here you are,” he says. “And Timothy? Do think about what I said.”
Tim takes it with hands that are only just steady enough. The instant his fingers touch the book, the world shatters.
Creatures of steel chanting in unison. Daleks. Cold, silver giants marching without mercy. Cybermen. Red eyes glowing in the dark. An Ood, its song aching and mournful. A werewolf lunging beneath a full moon. Flesh respaing, mutated monsters born of human arrogance.
And threaded through it all was Mr. Smith, but not Mr Smith. His face, but a man called the Doctor. The visions slam together, overwhelming and terrifying.
A voice echoes in his mind, “The power of a Time Lord.”
“Timothy?” John asks, concern sharpening his voice. “Are you all right?”
The world snaps back into place. Tim swallows hard, forcing himself upright. His heart is pounding so loudly he’s sure Mr. Smith must hear it.
“Yes, sir,” he says quickly, nodding. “I’m fine. Thank you.”
John studies him for a moment longer, frown faint but genuine. “If you’re feeling unwell-”
“No, sir,” Tim insists, polite, composed by sheer force of will. “Truly. Thank you, for evrything.”
John smiles again, warmth returning. “Any time. I expect great things from you, Timothy.”
Tim manages a smile in return, “Good day, sir.” He turns and leaves before his legs can betray him.
He has no idea that opening the watch, even for that single, stolen second, was enough. Enough for the hunters to catch a wiff of their prey.
He pauses at the threshold just as someone steps into view.
The librarian lifts her hand and gives a light knock against the already open doorframe, more habit than necessity.
John looks up instantly, his face breaking into a wide, genuine smile. “Oh, good afternoon.”
Tim straightens automatically. “Good afternoon, miss.”
She meets his gaze, “Good afternoon, Timothy,” she says warmly. “I hope your studies go well.”
“Yes, miss. Thank you.” His fingers curl tighter in his pocket, knuckles whitening around the watch without quite knowing why. “Good day.”
He slips past her and down the corridor, footsteps quickening the farther he gets from the study. She watches him go, a faint crease forming between her brows.
Then she turns back to John. Her bashful grin blooms slowly, unmistakably human despite all the centuries behind it. “Am I interrupting?”
“Not at all,” John says, taking a few steps toward her. “So, what brings you by?” he asks.
She lifts one shoulder in a small, almost sheepish shrug. “Nothing important, really. I just wanted to check on you.”
A warm flush creeps up his neck and settles firmly in his cheeks. “Oh. Well. That’s very kind of you.” He gestures vaguely to himself, as if presenting evidence. “I’m quite all right, I promise. The bruise from yesterday’s incident is already fading.”
She nods, visibly relieved. “I’m glad.”
They fall quiet after that. Their eyes meet and stay there, the moment stretching longer than either of them intends.
At last, she draws in a breath. “Well,” she says gently, stepping back, “I should let you get on with your work.” She turns to go.
“Wait.” The word slips out before he’s had time to think better of it. She stops and looks back at him, something hopeful twinkling in her eyes.
John swallows, fingers curling and uncurling at his side. “I’ve only a few hours left of my duties for the day,” he says carefully. “After classes end, that is.” He hesitates, then pushes on. “I wondered, if you might care to join me for a walk.”
Her smile blooms, “I think,” she says, “that sounds like a wonderful idea.”
The breath he’s been holding escapes him in a shaky, quiet chuckle of pure relief. “Splendid,” he says, far too quickly. “Excellent. I’ll- yes. Then I’ll see you later.”
She inclines her head, eyes warm. “You will.” With that, she properly excuses herself and slips out into the corridor, footsteps light.
John stands there for a long moment after she’s gone, hand pressed to his ribs where the bruise aches faintly. He smiles to himself and returns to his desk, counting the hours without quite realizing he’s doing it.
The sky hangs low and heavy with clouds, the sort that presses the world into muted greys. They walk with their coats pulled tight, breath puffing faint white in the chill, their steps falling into an easy rhythm.
Side by side, but not quite close enough to touch. Just a few inches between their shoulders that feels impossibly like miles to them both.
She laughs at something he’s just said, a bright, unguarded sound that cuts through the cold. John watches it happen like it’s a small miracle, his grin slow and helpless, eyes fixed on the way her smile crinkles just so at the corners. When her laughter fades, he hesitates only a moment before speaking again.
“Tell me about you,” he says. “If you don’t mind. I feel as though I know you, and yet I don’t. Not really.”
She considers that as they walk.
“My childhood?” she asks lightly. “Average. Boring, even. Nothing remarkable. No grand tragedies or triumphs. Just ordinary.”
He hums thoughtfully. “Ordinary doesn’t seem to suit you.”
She smiles at that but doesn’t comment on the irony. “After school,” she continues, eyes forward, “I traveled for a while.”
He brightens instantly. “Did you?”
“Yes.” There’s warmth there, but restraint too. “I wanted to see what was out there.”
“And where did you go?” he asks, genuinely eager.
She tilts her head, thoughtful. “Everywhere my feet could take me.”
He laughs softly. “That sounds like a great deal of ground to cover.”
“It was.”
They walk in companionable quiet for a few steps before he asks the question that’s been forming since the moment she spoke.
“Why did you stop?” he says gently. “Why settle here, of all places, and become a librarian?”
Her pace doesn’t change, but something in her does. She exhales, slow and measured. “Out of necessity.”
He glances at her then, noting the careful way she keeps her gaze ahead, the subtle tightening around her eyes. He doesn’t press, his instinct tells him not to.
“I see,” he says quietly. She nods once, grateful for the understanding.
He’s quiet for a few steps, boots crunching softly along the path, before another question slips out, “Did you always want to be a librarian?” he asks. “Or did you have some other dream, once?”
She smiles to herself, the expression turning inward. “I’m sure I did,” she says. “When I was in school, something grand, no doubt.” She laughs softly. “But whatever it was feels very small now. Insignificant.”
He glances at her, curious but careful. “What changed?”
Her smile softens. “Traveling did. It has a way of rearranging what matters.” She takes a breath, steady. “By the end of it, the only dream I really cared about was being happily married.”
The words hang in the cold air between them. John’s steps slow, just slightly.
“Oh,” he says. Then, after a moment, hesitant, unsure whether he’s crossed a line. “Did you… ever marry?”
She nods, “Yes.”
There’s no hesitation in it. No doubt.
“There was a man,” she continues quietly, “and I adored him. With my whole heart.” She keeps her eyes forward. “He’s far away now.”
John’s expression changes, more solemn. He nods, assuming what most would. “I’m very sorry,” he says softly.
She sees the shift, understands it immediately, and can’t let him carry that weight for her.
“It doesn’t hurt,” she says, turning to him then. “Not like that. I’m not grieving.” A small smile returns. “In a way, he’s still very much with me. Still here.” She puts a hand to her chest, to the rings that hang from a chain, along with her key for the Tardis, just beneath the layers of her clothes.
John absorbs that, nodding slowly. “I see.”
He hesitates, then adds, almost apologetically, “I’ve never been married myself. But-” He offers a sympathetic smile. “I imagine loving someone like that never really leaves you.”
“No,” she agrees softly. “It doesn’t.”
He clears his throat, clearly searching for firmer ground. “So,” he says, a little too quickly, “what’s your favorite book?”
She gives him an amused, slightly puzzled look, one brow lifting at the abrupt turn.
He winces. “I’m sorry. That was awkward. I was only trying to lighten the mood.”
Her smile softens, saving him from himself. “You needn’t apologize.”
She thinks for a moment, gaze drifting ahead, and then says, lightly enough, “Jane Austen.”
It’s an easy answer. A safe one.
The truth is something else entirely: a novel from Gallifrey, old even by Time Lord standards, its language strange and lyrical. A story the Doctor once read aloud to her in the quiet of the TARDIS, voice low and careful, sharing a piece of himself he rarely let anyone see.
But she can’t tell John that. So Jane Austen it is.
His face brightens. “An excellent choice,” he says warmly.
As they reach the village square, their path cuts gently across the grass, boots damp with cold earth. She glances sideways at him, the faintest smile playing at her lips.
“And you?” she asks. “Did you always want to be a teacher? Or was there something else you imagined for yourself?”
He laughs softly, a little sheepish. “Truthfully? I never really thought about it. I just became one.” He shrugs. “But I do enjoy it. More than I expected.”
She smiles at that. “You amaze me, you know.”
He blinks. “I- sorry?”
“I’ve listened,” she admits, almost casually. “When I have a free moment. Your lectures.”
He nearly trips over a tuft of grass. “You’ve- what?”
She laughs at his expression. “Only in passing,” she reassures him. “But I couldn’t help it.”
“Well,” He clears his throat, flustered. “I hope I wasn’t too dull.”
“Quite the opposite,” she says at once. “You explain things so beautifully. You take these complicated ideas and make them feel approachable. As though anyone could understand them, if they only listened long enough.”
He sputters, heat rising to his face. “That’s very kind of you. I don’t know that it comes easily- I just, well, I suppose I like sharing what I know.”
“And you’re magnificent at it,” she says softly.
He looks at her, startled by the way she’s watching him. There’s something dewy in her eyes, something unguarded and sincere, and it makes his chest tighten.
“You are,” she continues, voice steady but full. “Your mind. Your curiosity. The way you care. It’s extraordinary to me.”
He swallows, words failing him for once. “I- thank you,” he manages, utterly sincere. “That means more than I can say.”
The thought hits him all at once and he stops walking. She takes one more step before realizing he’s no longer beside her. When she turns back, he’s moved ahead of her, standing squarely in her path. Not crowding, solid two feet between them, deliberate and respectful.
He looks at her like she’s a question he’s been turning over for days. Weeks. Like the most magnificent puzzle he’s ever been given and is only just beginning to understand.
She stills, breath caught somewhere just beneath her ribs.
“I realized,” he says, smiling a little at himself, “that I never finished asking you something earlier. I was rather rudely interrupted by gravity.”
She lets out a soft laugh, already blushing.
“But before that,” he continues, eyes never leaving hers, “there’s something I ought to say.”
Her heart beats a little faster. She can feel it. He can probably see it.
“I noticed you on my first day here,” he admits. “In the halls, between classes. The headmaster was giving you a tour.” He smiles at the memory. “I remember thinking, quite distinctly, that the building suddenly seemed brighter.”
Her breath hitches.
“You were captivating,” he says simply. “Still are.”
Her head bows without her quite meaning it to, a shy, instinctive gesture, and she smiles as color blooms warmly in her cheeks. She tucks her hands into her coat sleeves, shifting her weight, suddenly very aware of herself under his gaze.
He adores it. Admires the way she squirms just slightly, not uncomfortable, but like she had energy to burn all of a sudden. The way her smile turns bashful and genuine. The way her eyes flick up to his and away again, as though she’s trying very hard not to float off the ground.
His human heart flutters and he knows, with absolute certainty, that this moment matters. She looks back up at him then, eyes bright, waiting. And John Smith, standing in the village square beneath a dull sky, thinks he has never wanted anything more than what he is about to ask.
He opens his mouth and then his eyes flick past her shoulder. Something clicks.
Not consciously, just a sudden, razor-sharp alignment of details: the two men tugging on the pulley above the shopfront, the piano swaying as it’s hauled upward, the rope fraying where it rubs against the edge. The mother turning the corner with a pram, humming to herself, utterly unaware.
His words trail off mid-breath.
She notices the change in him immediately. “John?”
He steps aside, quick and decisive, reaching down to the bench where a boy sits tossing a ball lazily into the air as his mother watches. John plucks it from the arc without breaking stride.
“I’m sorry,” he says absently, already calculating.
He turns, plants his feet, and throws. The ball leaves his hand with startling precision. It strikes a length of scaffolding pipe with a hollow clang, knocking it sideways just enough to dislodge a loose brick. The brick tips, slides, and drops, smashing into a jug perched on a crate below. The jug tumbles, its base skidding across the ground and rolling directly into the woman’s path.
The librarian spins at the sound. She sees it all unfold, the absurd, impossible chain of events clicking together like a Rube Goldberg machine set into motion by instinct alone.
The woman gasps as the jug skids in front of her, startling her into stopping short. She stumbles back, clutching the carriage and in the next heartbeat, the rope snaps.
The piano crashes down with a thunderous crash, smashing into the street mere feet from where the woman and her child would have been. Wood splinters. Keys scatter. The sound echoes through the square.
The woman screams, stepping backward in shock, pulling the pram with her. People shout. The men above swear loudly and rush to check on the woman and her child. The boy stares at the empty space where his ball had been, mouth hanging open.
The librarian stands frozen. Her heart is pounding with recognition. She turns slowly back to John. He’s breathing a little harder now, hand still half-raised from the throw, eyes fixed on the wreckage as if he can’t quite believe what he’s just done.
He was completely human, yet she’s seen that look before. That instinct. That impossible instinct that arrives before thought, before fear, before hesitation.
John Smith is just as much the Doctor now, as he was two months ago, before they hid.
John finally looks at her, flushed and a little dazed. “I-” He swallows.
She’s staring at him. In complete and utter awe, her eyes sweep over him as if she’s seeing him for the first time and the thousandth time all at once, bright with something that steals the rest of his words clean out of his mouth.
“You,” she says, voice low and certain, “are impossibly wonderful.”
He blinks.
She steps closer, near enough that the air between them hums. “Truly,” she goes on, eyes shining. “You never cease to amaze me. Not once. The way you think, the way you act.” She smiles, soft and reverent. “I feel extraordinarily lucky to have met you.”
They are for John Smith, earnest schoolteacher with a bruised rib and ink-stained fingers. And they are for the Doctor, ancient and brilliant and endlessly running.
Her impossible man.
He barely hears himself speak. The words tumble out of him, breathless and ecstatic, carried on the dizzy warmth of the way she’s looking at him. “Would you go to the dance with me?” he blurts. “Tonight. Properly. As my date.”
She laughs, “Yes,” she says like he’s ridiculous for ever thinking the answer might be anything else. “Of course yes.”
His grin breaks wide and helpless, joy spilling out of him as easily as breath. He laughs too, the sound light and giddy, feeling utterly drunk on the way she’s admiring him. They stand there in the village square, smiling and laughing, the danger forgotten for just a moment, the universe held at bay by nothing more than mutual wonder and the promise of a dance.
John’s study is lit low and warm, the fire reduced to embers that glow more than burn. She sits beside him on the leather couch, the day’s excitement finally ebbing into something calm and intimate. They’re close now, his arm stretched along the back of the couch, around her, easy and protective. Her side presses into his, fitting there like it always has.
She holds the journal open between them.
“This one’s newer,” he says quietly, almost shy again. “Last night’s, actally.”
She leans in, shoulder brushing his chest as she looks down at the page. Messy handwriting spills across it, looping and hurried, interrupted by sketches wedged into the margins. Crude but earnest drawings of plastic men mid-motion, arms bent at impossible angles filled the page. A woman with a pleasant smile and kind eyes he labeled ‘Rose’. And then herself, sketched more carefully than the others, lines softened, posture familiar.
Her smile curves as she takes it in.
“Plastic men?” she murmurs, amused.
He chuckles. “Yes. Ridiculous, I know.” He hesitates, then adds, “You were there. With me.”
She looks at the drawing of herself again, touched in a way that makes her chest ache sweetly.
“And Rose?” she asks gently.
“She was… important,” he says, thoughtful. “Brave. Clever. I trusted her.” He glances at her, then admits more openly now, “But you,” He exhales. “You’ve been in a great many of them.”
She stills.
“I didn’t say before,” he continues, voice lower, more honest than it’s ever been. “I suppose I was embarrassed. It seemed forward, dreaming of someone I barely knew.” His smile turns self-conscious. “But you’re always there. A constant. Wherever I am, whatever’s happening, you’re there.”
She lifts her gaze from the page to his face. The look she gives him is soft and utterly undone. Love-sick. Full of a thousand memories he doesn’t have. For a moment, he forgets how to breathe. His heart stutters at the sight of it, and he finds himself leaning in without meaning to, drawn by the way her eyes hold him like he’s something precious. He swallows, suddenly overwhelmed, and laughs under his breath.
“I would always be there,” she says softly. “With you. If that’s something you want.”
His breath catches, actually quivers, and for once, words abandon him entirely. Instead, he leans in. The kiss is tentative, almost stolen. Just a brush of lips, gentle and unsure, like he’s afraid of breaking something precious. It lasts only a heartbeat before he pulls back, color rushing to his face.
“I’m sorry,” he murmurs at once, voice low and flustered. “I’ve never-”
The journal slips from her fingers and lands forgotten in her lap.
“John,” she says, already lifting her hands, cupping his face with a tenderness that steals the rest of his words. “Stop talking.”
She pulls him back in.
This time the kiss is certain still soft, still unhurried, but filled with everything she’s held back for so long. He exhales against her lips, melting into it, instinct taking over where memory cannot.
His arm slides from the back of the couch to wrap around her shoulders, drawing her closer until there’s no space left to question. His other hand settles at her waist, thumb brushing slow and reverent against her hip, as if memorizing the shape of her.
He’s lost, utterly lost in her warmth, her closeness, the way she fits against him like this has always been where they were meant to end up.
They part just enough to breathe, but he stays close, forehead brushing hers. His voice was more a breathless murmur against her lips. “I feel like a boy with a terrible crush,” he admits, almost laughing at himself. “Or,” he exhales shakily, “as though I’m quite drunk.”
She pulls back a little more at that, concern flickering across her face. “I’m sorry,” she says softly. “Is it too much?”
The space between them feels wrong immediately, like a terrible crime has been commited.
“No no,” he says, reaching for her, fingers curling into her as he draws her back. His voice steadies with certainty. “I’ve never enjoyed anything more than the way you kiss me.”
Her smile turns playful, eyes bright. “In that case,” she teases, “you haven’t seen anything yet.”
Her hands slide from his cheeks to the back of his head, fingers threading through his hair in a way that leaves him utterly undone. When she kisses him again, it’s deeper and he gasps softly in surprise before giving in completely. His arms tighten around her, holding her closer, hands warm and reverent at her waist. He feels unmoored, breathless, like he’s sinking into something wonderful and inevitable all at once.
She makes a small, pleased sound against his mouth, and it’s all the encouragement he needs. His touch grows surer, slower, as if he’s learning her by feel alone.
John Smith has never felt so lost. His breath breaks into a low, helpless sound against her mouth as she presses closer, her touch tracing down from his neck to his chest with an intimacy that makes his thoughts scatter. He knows, some distant responsible part of him, that this isn’t proper. They were coworkers, and unmarried at that. A line once crossed can’t be uncrossed.
But propriety feels very far away when she leans into him like that, when she makes that soft, pleased sound that tells him, quite clearly, that she’s enjoying this every bit as much as he is. Maybe even more, judging by the way she shivers when his hand strokes up and down her waist, edging a little to close to somewhere it had no right to be on an unmarried woman.
It sends him reeling. For a split second, a reckless thought flashes through him, laying her back on the couch, the world narrowing to just the two of them.
The door opens.
They break apart instantly, breathless, startled, the moment shattering like glass. John jerks back, hand flying up as if caught doing something criminal, heart pounding so hard he’s certain it must be audible. She straightens just as quickly, smoothing her skirt, composure snapping back into place with impressive speed, though her eyes are still bright, cheeks flushed.
John snaps upright, mortified heat flooding his face. “Martha! You can’t just barge in, you- you should have knocked!”
Martha freezes, eyes wide for exactly one second, long enough to register what she’s interrupted, before her gaze flicks to the librarian. The two women meet each other’s eyes. And there it is: a perfectly synchronized, tightly contained smile. Girl to girl, a look full of ‘oh, I see’ and ‘get it girl’ that only someone who knows you well could manage.
Martha bites her lip, fighting a grin. “Sorry,” she mutters, already backing out. “Won’t happen again.” And then she’s gone, the door clicking shut far too cheerfully behind her.
She rises from the couch, and he follows suit, John drags a hand through his hair, breath still uneven. Words tumbling out. “You don’t have to leave. Truly. I mean, you’re welcome to stay, I-”
She steps closer before he can say another word, and she kisses him.
It’s gentler this time. Sweet in the way the first was, making his chest ache. His hands find her waist immediately, like they know exactly where they belong, and he melts into it with a quiet, helpless sigh.
She pulls back just far enough to speak, lips still brushing his. “If I stay,” she murmurs, amused, “we’ll miss the dance.” The meaning lands a beat later.
“Oh,” He flushes a deep red, nodding too quickly. “Yes. Yes, of course. The dance.”
She laughs softly. “Besides,” she adds, teasing warmth in her voice, “I’m rather a wait-for-marriage kind of woman.”
His mouth opens then closes. He nods again, thoroughly undone.
She kisses him once more, chaste, “I’ll see you later.” Then she’s gone.
The door shuts gently behind her. John Smith sinks back onto the couch like his legs have finally remembered gravity, chest rising and falling as he stares at the ceiling. He lifts a hand to his mouth, still feeling the ghost of her kiss, and laughs under his breath.
John Smith feels like the luckiest man in the world.
In the servants’ wing, Martha stands at the small table tucked into the corner of the room she shares with Jenny. A tray is laid out carefully: a fresh pot of tea, two cups, and a small cake on a platter, far nicer than anything she could afford with what she’s paid.
Her smile is enormous. She steps back to admire it, arms folding loosely over her chest, and lets herself breathe for once.
John is getting closer to his wife, even without knowing who she truly is. Even without the memories, the titles, the centuries. The connection is still there, stubborn and undeniable, like it’s woven too deeply into him to ever truly disappear. For the first time in what feels like forever, her shoulders loosen.
Just a little longer.
The hunters will burn out, their short lives ending as they always do. The watch will open. The Doctor will come back to himself. And the three of them will step back into the Tardis like they were always meant to.
Running again. Together.
Martha looks down at the tea tray, smile softening into something fond and fiercely protective.
“Almost there,” she whispers.
The door creaks open, Jenny steps in, still wearing her coat and gloves instead of her maid’s uniform, cheeks pink from the cold. Martha looks up at once, smiling.
“There you are,” she says easily. “Where’ve you been all day?”
Jenny doesn’t answer right away. She just stands there staring ahead, eyes unfocused, expression oddly blank.
Martha gestures to the table. “I’ve got tea. Mr. Pool wasn’t in the mood this afternoon, so he let me have it.” She grins. “Figured we could enjoy it together.”
A few long seconds pass then Jenny sniffs.
Martha’s smile softens with concern. “Are you all right?” she asks gently, pulling out a chair. “You sound a bit sniffly.”
Jenny blinks. It’s like a switch flips behind her eyes.
“Oh, yes,” she says, a beat too late, more present. “Yes, I must’ve caught a cold. Been out in the chill too long, I expect.”
Martha nods, though her smile fades just a fraction. “You should sit, then. Warm up.”
Jenny crosses the room and takes the seat opposite her, movements smooth, deliberate. She keeps her hands in her pockets and waits, like a computer awaiting an input command. Martha doesn’t notice at first.
Martha lifts the teapot, steam curling lazily into the air as she pours Jenny a cup.
“You should’ve seen them,” she says with a grin, unable to help herself. “Mr. Smith and the librarian, together. They looked happy.” She chuckles, stirring her own tea. “I’m really glad for them.”
Jenny watches the stream of tea fill her cup. “You seem very invested,” she says mildly. “Why?”
Martha smiles into her mug. “Because they’re my friends. And because, well, they’re made for each other.” She shrugs, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “It’s nice to see good people find something good.”
She keeps talking as she stirs, warmth and excitement bubbling over now that she’s let herself relax. “I’m just excited, really. To see them together. To be together again.”
Jenny’s head tilts. “Together again?” she asks. “The three of you?”
Martha doesn’t hesitated, she trusts Jenny, or thinks she does.
“Yes,” she says easily. “We used to travel together, the three of us.” Her smile turns nostalgic. “And we will again. Soon.”
Jenny’s fingers curl slowly around her cup. “You travelled with them?” Jenny tilts her head, eyes fixed a little too intently on Martha. “And where did you travel? Where are you going this time?”
Martha lets out a small laugh and waves it off, stirring her tea. “Oh, it’s complicated.”
Jenny doesn’t smile back. “Complicated how?” she presses. “It sounds fascinating. You should tell me. Tell me now.”
Martha opens her mouth to deflect again, but Jenny repeats herself, voice smoother, insistence sharpening with each word. The longer she talks, the more off she feels. Her eyes don’t quite blink when they should and her smile doesn’t reach them. It’s like watching someone perform humanity from memory.
A chill crawls up Martha’s spine. The Doctor’s wife had told her once, half-joking, half-serious: If you ever think someone’s not human, offer them something no human would ever want. See what they do.
Martha lifts the teapot slightly. “More tea?”
Jenny’s grin widens too eager, haven't even had touched her cup yet. “Yes. I’d like that.”
“Of course,” Martha says lightly. She adds, “Would you like gravy in it?”
Martha’s smile stays perfectly polite as her heart begins to race. “I’ll just fetch it, then,” she says, already standing. “Won’t be a moment.”
Jenny nods, hands unmoving from her pockets, watching Martha with keen, unreadable interest. Martha turns away, every instinct screaming now, the certainty sharp and cold in her gut.
The moment she’s in the hall, Martha closes the door behind her until the latch clicks into place with the softest sound possible. She stands there for half a second, heart hammering, listening.
She takes three quiet steps away from the door and then she runs. Down the stairs, skirts gathered, boots thudding far too loudly for her liking. Her breath burns in her chest as instinct takes over, every lesson she’s ever learned screaming the same thing at once.
They’ve been found.
Her mind races ahead of her body, already forming the next steps. Get to the Doctor. Get to the watch. Wake him up. Whatever the cost.
She takes the stairs two at a time now, pulse roaring in her ears, fear sharp and focused rather than panicked. Whatever is wearing Jenny’s face is learning fast, and it knows too much already.
John Smith has had his borrowed peace. It was time to tetire John Smith and bring the Dcotor back.
Plan B, she thinks desperately. Please tell me you left us a plan B.
The sun has only just slipped below the horizon, leaving the sky wih faint streaks of gold as night took over. The dance will be starting any moment now, music tuning up, lanterns being lit, people beginning to trickle in with excited murmurs and rustling coats.
John stands in front of the mirror in his room, fingers working carefully at his tie. He grins at his own reflection like an absolute idiot.
He pauses, takes a breath, adjusts it again and laughs softly under his breath. The heat and urgency from earlier have settled into something calmer now, steadier, though the memory of her is still very much there. The way she smiled. The way she kissed him.
He smooths down his waistcoat, feeling a little ridiculous and a little wonderful all at once.
“I’ve got it bad,” he murmurs to himself.
The thought strikes him again that he feels like the luckiest man on the planet. To have met someone like her. To have been seen by her. To be adored in return, so openly and sincerely, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
A teacher, an ordinary man. Simple ol’ John Smith. The luckiest man alive on planet Earth.
Welcome Home Rose ★ Rose Tyler has a friend. This friend is bitter about Rose’s sudden departure. The Doctor makes it up to her. Theres something about her that fascinated him. Rose is jelly.
My Dear John Smith ★ Part 1 ★ Part 2 ★ Part 3 ★ John Smith is just a simple teacher. John Smith has feelings for the school's librarian. John Smith doesn’t know he’s a Time Lord. John Smith doesn’t know she’s his wife.
Human Hours ★ The Doctor makes a friend with a humble barista in England. They’re friends. Thats it. They're just friends. Request by @vexerieart
★ 11th Doctor ★
Is this a Date? ★ The Doctor plans a trip to a beautiful alien city. Amy and Rory decide to sit this one out and rest. It’s just you two.
✰ Word Count: 17.3k
✰ Summary: Rose Tyler has a friend. This friend is bitter about Rose’s sudden departure. The Doctor makes it up to her. Theres something about her that fascinated him. Rose is jelly.
✰ Warnings: 10th Doctor, Set just after Age of Steal, After Mickey stays in the other dimension, The Doctor x Rose doesn’t exist, The Doctor has a crush, Jackie Tyler(need I say more), Jackie can cook(?) but she can’t make tea, the Doctor is a bit OOC, the Tardis says PULL TO OPEN
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: HOTTAKE Rose should’ve had more consequences for how she treated Micky, a wonderful and faithful man, how she took him for granted and walked all over him. As much as I loved her, the fact that she ran off and flirted with other guys(The Doctor, Jack, and that dude from satellite 9- I forget his name) always rubbed me the wrong way. It’s giving ‘you didn’t cheat, but you’re still a trader’ vibes. I always thought she was a tad selfish and undeserving. So this is going to run with that. If you don't like it or agree, that's why they call it a hottake, so whomp whomp.
The bag was cutting into her fingers by the time she reached the corner of the street, thin plastic stretched to its limit by tins, bread, and a bottle of milk she’d almost forgotten she needed. It was late afternoon, London-grey even when the sky insisted it was technically still daylight. The kind of hour where buses groaned louder, people walked faster, and the city felt like it was politely pushing you out of the way.
She shifted the bag to her other hand and slowed, boots scuffing against the pavement as she approached her building.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket, a dull vibration of something that wasn’t quite important enough to announce itself properly. Hope leapt anyway, sharp and embarrassing. She stopped walking, dug the phone out with cold fingers.
Nothing important, just a message from her boss asking if she could pick up a shift tomorrow. She checked the messages from who she’d hoped had texted her just now. Just her own message staring back at her from three days ago.
You okay? Haven’t heard from you. Just checking in.
No reply. No read receipt. Just silence.
Mickey Smith had never been a great texter, but this was different. It was like he fell of the face of the earth, or just decided she wasnt worth his time any more.
She locked the screen and exhaled slowly through her nose, jaw tightening as she started walking again. She told herself not to take it personally. She told herself a lot of things these days. Most of them half-truths she repeated like montras until they almost sounded convincing.
The lift in her building was still broken, a handwritten sign taped to the door that had been there long enough to feel like part of the décor. She took the stairs, counting steps without meaning to, the way she did when her thoughts got too loud.
It hadn’t always been like this.
There was a time, not even that long ago, when she’d dreaded going home because she knew she’d be talked into staying out. Late-night chips, laughing so hard her ribs hurt, leaning against shop counters long after closing time while Rose complained about customers and Mickey made stupid jokes just to get her to smile again.
Three peas in a pod. That was how it had felt.
She and Rose had met at the shop, both broke, both bored, both pretending the place was temporary. They’d bonded over shared shifts and mutual disdain for the same regulars, over tea breaks that turned into confessions. Rose was bright and loud and fearless in a way she’d never quite managed to be, and somehow that made her feel braver just standing nearby.
Mickey had been there too. The awkward, earnest, endlessly loyal man she came to adore as a dear friend. He’d slipped into her life sideways, like a brother she hadn’t known she was missing. When Rose was late, it was Mickey she talked to. When Rose disappeared into herself, it was Mickey who noticed first.
And then the shop burned down.
Everyone joked about it later, called it bad luck or fate or just another thing London swallowed whole. But it had been the beginning of the end, really. Rose had changed after that, restless in a way that went beyond boredom. Always looking past the present, past them.
Then suddanly, Rose had left.
Not dramatically. Not even properly explained. Just gone. Traveling, her mum said after she’d returned like nothing happened. With a friend. A man no one seemed able to describe clearly.
At first there were postcards. Quick calls. Breathless stories that never quite made sense. Then there were gaps. Silences that stretched until it felt rude to ask questions about them. She’d stopped expecting replies from Rose eventually. It hurt less that way.
Mickey had stayed.
They’d grown closer in the quiet aftermath, two people orbiting the same absence. They talked about everything except Rose, until they didn’t have to avoid her name anymore. He’d been there when the loneliness hit hardest, when the flat felt too quiet and the future felt too empty.
He was family.
Which was why it had felt wrong to find out from JackieTyler of all people that they’d broken up.
“Oh, love,” Jackiehad said, leaning in the doorway with her mug of tea and that look that meant gossip wrapped in concern. “Didn’t Rose tell you? Mickey moved out weeks ago. Packed up and left. Don’t know where he’s gone.”
Weeks.
The word had echoed in her head long after she’d climbed the stairs to her flat, groceries forgotten in her hand, phone clutched tight in her other. She reached her door now and fumbled for her keys and groceries rustling softly. The hallway smelled faintly of cleaning solution and something burnt from downstairs.
Inside, she set the bag down and leaned against the door, eyes closed. She hadn’t lost just one friend. She’d lost all of them, one by one, and somehow she’d been the last to notice.
She unpacked the groceries slowly, more out of habit than necessity. Bread on the counter. Milk in the fridge. Tins lined up with unnecessary precision, as though order might settle something restless inside her.
Rose crept back into her thoughts whether she wanted her to or not. How selfish she’d been.
Leaving without telling anyone properly, without reassurance. Disappearing for months at a time and letting people worry, especially her mum. Jackie had tried to play it off, all smiles and tea offers, but the strain had been there beneath it. The way she lingered on Rose’s name, the way her eyes searched faces for scraps of news.
Then Rose had come back.
Not even properly back, just around. Sweeping in with a man no one had ever met, sitting at her mum’s table for tea like nothing had changed, like she hadn’t vanished from everyone’s lives. And then she’d left again. No knock on her door. No text. No, I’m back, come see me.
She’d had to hear about it from Jackie. Again.
“Oh, Rose came round last week, darlin’,” Jackie had said, casual as anything. “She’s traveling with a friend now.”
A friend.
Rose had left her to pick up the pieces. Left her to sit with Mickey while he spiraled, while he vented and ranted and tried to make sense of something that was slowly hollowing him out. She’d listened as he admitted, voice tight and wounded, that it felt like Rose was slipping away. That she only reached out when it suited her. That he felt like a backup plan she couldn’t quite let go of.
“I feel like I’m just. . . there,” he’d said once, staring at the floor. “Like she doesn’t want me, but she doesn’t want to lose me either.”
It had broken her heart, because she’d felt it too. How selfish her best friend had turned out to be.
She shut the fridge door a little harder than necessary and leaned against the counter, arms folded tight across her chest. Anger came easily, easier than admitting how much she missed her.
Because beneath the resentment and the bitterness the simple fact that she missed Rose terribly. She missed her laugh, her energy, the way she filled a room without trying. Missed the certainty of being someone’s person. Even now, after everything, a single message would have been enough.
Thinking of you.
Or-
Sorry I disappeared.
Or even-
I haven’t forgotten you.
Just one text would’ve made her feel like she still mattered. Like she wasn’t so easily left behind. Like she hadn’t been erased from a life that once felt inseparable from her own.
She told herself not to think about Rose anymore. There was no point. Wherever Rose was she was likely having far too much fun to spare a thought for the people she’d left behind. Dwelling on it would only twist the knife deeper, and she was tired of crying over ghosts.
So she tied up the trash bag, looped the plastic tight, and grabbed her keys.
The balcany outside her flat was quiet, just the familiar dull hum of the building settling, kids playing before it got two dark, and the traffic in the distance. It was noisy, but it was quiet to her. She stepped out, pulled the door shut behind her, and reached back to lock it before heading for the stairs.
“Oi!” The voice came from behind her.
Impossible.
Her hand froze on the key. Slowly, like the world might shatter if she moved too fast, she turned.
Rose Tyler was standing there, barely a few feet away, grinning at her like she hadn’t vanished for months. Like she hadn’t walked straight out of her life and expected the door to still be open when she wandered back.
“Hey!” Rose said cheerfully, stepping closer. “Blimey, it’s been ages. How’ve you been?”
The trash bag slipped slightly in her grip.She couldn’t speak.
Her mind refused to catch up with what her eyes were seeing, Rose in her hoodie and jacket, hair a little wilder than she remembered, cheeks flushed with life. Not a story relayed secondhand by her mum.
Rose tilted her head, smile faltering just a fraction. “You alright? You look like you’ve seen-”
Someone cleared their throat behind her.
Only then did she notice the man standing just over Rose’s shoulder.
Tall, thin, dressed in a suit that looked like it had seen better days but was worn with an odd sort of confidence. He offered a polite smile, warm and curious all at once, and lifted his hand in a small, almost shy wave.
“Hello,” he said.
She barely registered it.
She would have, under different circumstances, been acutely aware of how attractive he was. The kind of handsome that snuck up on you rather than demanded attention. But right now, he was nothing more than a blur at the edges of her vision.
Because Rose was here, standing in her hallway, asking how she’d been, as if nothing had happened at all.
The urge to ignore Rose entirely, to give her a taste of her own disappearance, burned hot and sharp in her chest. She scoffed softly, the sound bitter even to her own ears, and turned back to her door instead. The key slid into the lock with a decisive click.
She didn’t look at Rose again.
She started down the hall with the trash bag swinging lightly at her side, footsteps brisk, purposeful. Five feet. That was all she gave herself. Five feet before Mickey’s face popped in her mind.
Mickey, sitting on the edge of her sofa, shoulders slumped. Mickey, staring at his phone like it might explain why the person he loved kept slipping further out of reach. Mickey, hurt and confused and quietly breaking until one day he’d just gone.
She stopped.
Her shoulders sagged as she exhaled, long and slow, like she was surrendering to something she didn’t actually want to face. Then she turned back.
Rose Tyler had gone pale. The bright, easy grin was gone, replaced by something raw and startled, eyes shining like she’d been slapped without warning. She looked heartbroken, as if it had never crossed her mind that this reunion might not be joyful.
Behind her, the man in the suit had lost his smile too. He shifted his weight, rubbing the back of his neck with a wince that suggested he’d at least anticipated fallout. Like he’d known this wasn’t going to be neat, even if Rose hadn’t.
Rose swallowed. “I-”
“When,” she interrupted, voice tight but steady, “was the last time you saw Mickey?”
Rose blinked, clearly thrown by the sudden shift. “Mickey?” she echoed, like the name itself had surprised her.
“Yes, Mickey,” she snapped, grip tightening around the rubbish bag. “My friend. Your boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend apparently. The one who vanished.”
Rose’s mouth opened, then closed again. Her brows knitted together, guilt creeping unmistakably into her expression. “I- I don’t know exactly. It’s been a bit.” It was a lie and she could tell, she’d known Rose for a long time after all.
“A bit,” she repeated flatly.
Rose flinched.
“Do you know where he went?” she pressed. “Did he tell you? Did he tell anyone? Because he stopped answering his phone weeks ago, Rose. He didn’t say goodbye. He didn’t explain. He just disappeared.”
Silence stretched, thick and uncomfortable. Rose looked away first.
“I didn’t mean for it to happen like that,” she said quietly. “Things just got complicated.”
“Funny,” she replied, bitterness seeping through despite herself. “That’s exactly how he described it too.”
The Doctor shifted again, eyes flicking between them, observant now, less awkward bystander, more something ancient and attentive. He didn’t interrupt. Didn’t explain. Just watched Rose like he was seeing consequences catch up to her in real time.
Rose dragged a hand through her hair, voice small. “I can explain- I- He wanted to go somewhere else for a while. He’s fine, it was just a last minute decision."
“Well, guess he took out a page from your book,” she said. “He’s not the only one stopped looking back.” The words hung there, unkind but true.
Rose looked at her then and whatever she saw seemed to finally crack through her defensiveness. “I didn’t forget about you,” she said quickly. “I swear. I just- everything’s been moving so fast.”
She let out a short, humorless laugh. “Yeah, just not for the people you leave standing still.”
Rose opened her mouth and closed it again. There were a thousand truths stacked behind her eyes, none of them usable.
She couldn’t tell her she’d been falling through time and space with an alien who called himself the Doctor. She couldn’t explain parallel worlds or battles or the way some choices closed doors forever. She couldn’t say that Mickey hadn’t been abandoned, that he’d chosen to stay behind in another dimension, safe and settled in a life that no longer fit Rose’s.
Not without sounding completely mad. So instead, Rose did the only thing she could.
“Please,” she said, stepping forward, hands half-raised like she was afraid her friend might bolt. “Just- just give me a chance to explain. Properly. I promise it’ll make sense if you let me talk.”
She didn’t soften.
She didn’t step back either, but her expression hardened into something weary and resolute. “You could explain,” she said. “But first, give me one good reason.”
Rose blinked. “One…?”
“One good reason you left,” she continued evenly. “One good reason that doesn’t involve you disappearing for months and letting everyone else deal with the fallout. One good reason that makes any of this,” she gestured vaguely between them, “okay.”
Rose’s confidence faltered.
“I- well, I mean-” She stumbled, words tangling as she searched for something solid, something normal. “It’s just… things changed, and I-”
Every answer she reached for collapsed under its own weight. Every truth sounded impossible. Every lie sounded thin. The disappointment that crossed her friend’s face was quiet, but it cut deeper than anger ever could.
Rose swallowed hard, panic flashing in her eyes. “Okay. Right. Um, maybe this will help.” She turned abruptly and grabbed the sleeve of the man behind her. “This is the Doctor.”
The Doctor straightened instantly at the sound of his name, like a switch had been flipped. His polite awkwardness sharpened into alert curiosity, posture subtly shifting as he was dragged fully into the conversation.
“Hello,” he said again, a little more carefully this time. “Nice to properly meet you.”
She looked at him for the first time properly then. Too well put together for someone who looked like he didn’t quite belong anywhere. Clever eyes that missed nothing. And suddenly, she was very tired.
“Oh, no,” she said flatly, shaking her head before Rose could continue. “Stop.”
Rose froze. “What?”
She let out a breath that sounded more like a laugh without any humor. “I’m not interested, Rose. Not even a little.”
“In what?” Rose asked, though her voice wavered.
“In befriending your rebound boyfriend,” she said coolly, eyes flicking once to the Doctor and then back to Rose. “Or whatever this is supposed to be.”
The Doctor’s brows shot up. “Rebound- I’m not-?”
Rose flushed. “He’s not-!”
“Because if that’s where this is going,” she continued, voice firm, “save it. I’ve spent long enough cleaning up emotional messes you leave behind. I’m not signing up to do it again.”
The Doctor glanced at Rose, then back at her, mouth opening like he might object, then closing again as he seemed to reassess. Whatever he saw in her expression made him think better of it.
Rose looked stricken.
“He’s not my boyfriend,” she said quickly, flustered. “I swear. It’s not like that.”
Her friend’s eyes narrowed, skepticism warring with exhaustion. “Then maybe,” she said quietly, “you should start explaining what is like that. Because from where I’m standing, Rose… it looks exactly like what Micky was worried about. You ran off with another man while he waited for you to fall back inlove with him, finally have the decency to break things off.” Her voice was steady but unforgiving.
“That’s not fair,” Rose snapped immediately, color rising in her cheeks. “I didn’t cheat on him, and I don't like you implying I did.”
The Doctor shifted beside her, clearly sensing the wrongness of the moment, but he stayed silent.
“I loved Mickey,” Rose went on, words tumbling out faster now. “I still do. We just drifted apart, that happens. People change.”
She held Rose’s gaze, unmoved, “Yeah,” she said flatly. “They do.”
Rose faltered. “It wasn’t like that. I didn’t mean for it to happen.”
“No,” she agreed, sharp and precise. “You just weren’t around anymore.”
Rose opened her mouth to argue, to defend herself, but she barreled on, the truth spilling out now that it had found momentum.
“You were always gone. Always somewhere else. Even when you were here, you weren’t really here. You left him waiting, Rose. You left him wondering what he’d done wrong while you disappeared with someone else.”
“That’s not-” Rose started.
“You don’t get to be offended,” she interrupted, voice trembling despite her best efforts to keep it steady. “Not when that’s exactly how it looked. Not when that’s how it felt.”
Rose’s expression cracked, hurt and guilt tangling in her eyes.
“I didn’t think he’d leave,” she whispered.
“And that,” she replied softly, “is the problem.”
Rose looked away, swallowing hard, and for the first time since she’d reappeared, she looked less like someone who’d been living an adventure, and more like someone finally being forced to look at the damage she’d left behind.
Footsteps sounded from behind the ‘Doctor’ man, hurried and familiar.
“What’s all this, then?”
Jackie Tyler appeared, cardigan pulled tight around her, eyes already sharp with concern. She took one look at the scene, Rose’s wet eyes, her stricken expression, and her mouth tightened instantly.
“Rose?” Jackie said, moving closer. “What’s going on? What’s happened? What’s she said to you?”
Rose sniffed, shaking her head, clearly overwhelmed, and Jackie rounded on her without hesitation.
“Well?” Jackie demanded, voice rising. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? Look at her, she’s in bits.”
She stared at Jackie in disbelief, a hollow laugh slipping out before she could stop it. “You’re joking,” she said flatly.
Jackie blinked. “Excuse me?”
“You’re really going to stand there and act like she’s done nothing wrong?” Her voice trembled now, anger finally breaking through the restraint she’d been clinging to. “Because I was here, Jackie. I was here when she disappeared. I was here when you cried and made posters and printed fliers, when you didn’t know if your daughter was dead or alive.”
Jackie faltered, lips parting.
“I was the one sitting with you,” she continued, words coming faster now. “Me and Micky. Making tea you didn’t drink. Telling you she’d come back. So don’t tell me I don’t have the right to be angry.”
Rose flinched at her name, guilt flooding her face.
“You never called,” she said, turning back to her friend. “You stopped answering texts. And when you finally did start coming home, you didn’t even bother to knock on my door. I had to hear about it secondhand. Every time.”
Her chest ached, the old hurt rising like a bruise being pressed too hard.
“It’s not fair,” she said, voice cracking despite herself. “It’s not fair that you get to cry and play the victim now, when I was the one waiting. Waiting for a call. Waiting for a visit. Waiting to matter again.”
Rose shook her head weakly. “I didn’t mean to-”
“I know, that’s the problem.” She took a shaky breath, eyes burning. “You were a bad friend, Rose. And I hate that saying it hurts this much, but it’s true.”
The words hit hard. Rose’s face crumpled.
“And I regret introducing Mickey to you,” she added quietly. “Because you took both of us for granted. You showed up when it was convenient, and disappeared when it wasn’t.”
Jackie looked between them, her instinctive motherly defense slowly eroding as the truth settled in. Her shoulders sagged, a long sigh escaping her.
“…She’s not wrong,” Jackie murmured, rubbing her temples. “God help me, she’s not.”
Rose’s eyes widened. “Mum-”
“Don’t,” Jackie said gently but firmly. “Sweetie, just. . . don’t.”
She turned back to her, voice softer now, regret threaded through it. “You’ve every right to be upset, love. Every bloody right.”
Then, after a moment, she straightened slightly, ever the mum despite everything. “Why don’t you come over for a cuppa,” she said, gesturing toward her flat. “All of you. Sit down. Talk it out properly before this gets any worse.”
The offer hung in the air, Rose looked at her hopefully, eyes red and pleading. She didn’t answer right away.
A few hours later, she sat curled on the edge of Jackie Tyler’s couch, mug of tea cooling untouched in her hands. Her brain still felt like it had been shaken and put back together wrong.
Aliens. Time travel. A blue police box that was somehow a spaceship, bigger on the inside, called the Tardis, whatever that actually meant. Daleks with their screeching voices and single-minded hatred. Cybermen. Slitheen posing as politicians. Worlds stacked on top of worlds, timelines branching like cracked glass.
And the Doctor.
The Doctor sat opposite her, perched awkwardly on the arm of a chair like he wasn’t entirely sure furniture obeyed the same rules he did. He’d explained everything at a mile a minute, hands waving, eyes bright with an enthusiasm that made the impossible sound almost reasonable..
And then there was Mickey. That had been the part that hurt the most.
Not because he’d left, she understood that now, but because he couldn’t come back. A parallel dimension. Another version of London. A life he’d chosen because staying had meant living in someone else’s shadow forever.
“He couldn’t answer his phone,” Rose had said softly. “Even if he wanted to.”
That knowledge settled in her chest like a stone.
She’d been bitter still, she hadn’t pretended otherwise. She’d pointed out, bluntly, that Rose could’ve been having a tea party with Jesus Christ himself this entire time and it still wouldn’t excuse abandoning the people who loved her. You didn’t leave friends behind like a knackered sofa on the curb and expect them to be fine with it.
Rose had taken it. No excuses. No jokes.
But eventually she’d admitted something else too. That even if she liked to believe she would’ve done things differently, she wasn’t sure she actually would have. Not if she’d been shown the universe. Not if every day was danger and wonder and impossible beauty wrapped together. It was probably very easy to get swept up in it all. To keep saying I’ll call tomorrow until tomorrow stopped existing.
So they’d made a deal.
Rose would come home. Properly home. Every few days, no matter how badly she wanted to see another planet or chase another impossible horizon. She’d check her phone every single time she stepped into the Tardis. No exceptions. No excuses.
Jackie had agreed instantly, arms crossed, expression sharp.
“For my sake,” she’d said pointedly. “Because I’m not printing fliers again.”
Now, sitting there with the quiet settling back into the flat, it all felt heavier. The universe was bigger than she’d ever imagined. She’d known about aliens, everyone did by now with what happened last christmas, but it was so much bigger than even that.
Dinner smells drifted in from the kitchens, onions sizzling, Jackie muttering to herself as she moved about with the well-practiced rhythm of a woman feeding people to keep them from falling apart.
Jackie Tyler was in her element now, clattering pans with purpose. “If the world’s not ending for five minutes,” she called over her shoulder, “you can all survive long enough for a proper meal.”
Rose laughed, the sound lighter than it had been all evening.
She noticed it too, the way Rose kept glancing at her, like she was checking to make sure the storm had really passed. Or at least eased. There was no scowl now, no sharp edge to her breathing, and that alone seemed to relax Rose visibly.
The three of them sat in the living room, her on one end of the sofa, Rose tucked cross-legged on the other, and The Doctor hovering somewhere in between, perched awkwardly.
Conversation flowed in fits and starts. Safe topics at first; Jackie’s neighbors, the state of the lift, The Doctor making an offhand comment about the kettle being “surprisingly resilient given the decade,” which earned him a look from Jackie that suggested don’t start.
She found herself listening more than speaking, letting the sound of their voices wash over her. It felt strange to sit here like this. Like they were almost back to something that resembled normal.
She wasn’t ready to forgive Rose. The hurt was still there, tucked under her ribs where it ached if she thought about it too hard. And she didn’t pretend otherwise. Rose seemed to understand.
“I know I don’t get it back straight away,” Rose said quietly at one point, eyes fixed on her hands. “Your trust, I know I’ve got a lot to make up for.”
She met Rose’s gaze, measured and honest. “It’s going to take time.”
“I’ve got time,” Rose said immediately. Then more sincere than she’d sounded all night, “I’ve got the rest of my life. And I mean that.”
The Doctor watched them both, expression unreadable but attentive, like he understood the weight of promises better than most. Jackie reappeared in the doorway a moment later, wiping her hands on a tea towel.
“Right,” she announced. “Dinner in ten. And nobody’s running off to another planet before then.”
The Doctor leaned back on the chair, nose wrinkling faintly. “Hope dinner’s better than the tea,” he muttered under his breath.
“What was that?” Jackie called from the kitchen immediately.
He straightened at once. “Nothing! Complimenting it. Pre-emptively. Very optimistic tea, really.”
Jackie scoffed. “Cheeky.”
She couldn’t help the small chuckle that escaped her. Rose just smiled, clearly used to the bickering, used to him. The Doctor glanced between them, then finally turned his full attention to her, expression softening into something more earnest.
“Right,” he said. “I feel like I sort of… skipped a proper introduction. ‘Hello, I’m an alien who travels through time and space’ isn’t exactly standard first-impression material.”
She raised a brow. “Bit much for a handshake, yeah.”
He grinned, pleased. “Exactly. So, before all that, how did you and Rose meet?”
She glanced at Rose briefly, then back at him. “We worked in a shop together. Before it burned down.”
His face did something odd, half wince, half smile, like a child caught halfway between guilt and pride.
“Oh,” he said. “Right. About that.”
Her curiosity sharpened instantly. “What?”
Rose groaned. “Doctor.”
He lifted his hands defensively, eyes bright with mischief. “In my defense, it was already compromised.”
She looked between them. “Why do I feel like I’m about to hear something insane again?”
Rose sighed, resigned. “That was the night we met. Autons tried to invade Earth. Plastic people. Shop dummies.”
“They were very rude,” the Doctor added. “And surprisingly flammable.”
Her mouth fell open. “You’re telling me-”
“I blew it up,” he said cheerfully. “Saved the planet. Rose helped. Brilliant first date, really.”
Rose swatted his arm. “It was not a date.”
She stared at him, then laughed. A startled, incredulous sound she hadn’t expected to make.
“That was you?” she said, shaking her head. “All this time I thought it was faulty wiring.”
“Faulty wiring with ambition,” he corrected.
As he told the story, hands moving, words tumbling over themselves, eyes alight with that unmistakable spark, she found herself watching him more than listening. His mannerisms were impossible not to notice. The way he leaned forward when he got excited. The quick grin, crooked and unapologetic. The mischief in his eyes that suggested danger and delight in equal measure.
He was magnetic. She grew more amused with every detail, every interruption from Rose, every exaggerated aside. Somewhere along the way, the weight she’d been carrying eased just a little.
Jackie’s voice floated in from the kitchen. “Rose! Give me a hand with the table, love.”
Rose popped up immediately. “Yeah, coming!”
She shot her friend a small, hopeful smile before disappearing into the next room, the clatter of cutlery following her. The flat felt quieter without her, like the air had shifted.
She and the Doctor watched her go. Then they just looked at each other. A long, awkward beat stretched between them, neither quite sure how to step into it. His earlier bravado had softened into something more hesitant, hands fidgeting in his pant pockets. Finally, he cleared his throat.
“So,” The Doctor said, too casual, “what do you do for fun?”
The question came out rushed, clearly the first thing he’d latched onto. He immediately looked faintly mortified, because he was nine hundred years old, a Time Lord, and this was a stranger. A very pretty stranger, admittedly, but that was beside the point. Entirely.
She didn’t seem to mind.
She shrugged lightly. “I read. A lot. Scroll through forums when I can’t sleep. I like sci-fi telly,” she added, amused by the way his eyebrows jumped at that almost judgmental but he school the expression. “Mostly I work, though. Feels like that’s where most of my time goes.”
“Right,” he said, nodding earnestly, like this was vital information. “Important things, then. Reading. Sci-fi. Forums are very underrated. You get some excellent conspiracy theories.”
She laughed, then tilted her head. “What about you?”
His grin came instantly, bright and unapologetic. “Oh, I like to set the controls to random and let the Tardis take me wherever she feels like.”
She blinked. “Isn’t that dangerous? Not knowing where you’ll end up?”
He leaned in just slightly, eyes glinting. “Oh yes.”
Something about the way he said it, delighted and wicked,made her smile back without thinking. She found herself genuinely entertained by him. It helped, admittedly, that he was pretty. But more than that, he was interesting in a way that tugged at her curiosity.
“I can see how Rose got caught up in it all,” she said thoughtfully. “Especially with you. You make a brilliant first impression. I can only imagine how much fun you are once someone actually gets to know you.”
He froze for half a second, then his smile softened, something shy and touched slipping through the bravado.
“Well,” he said quietly, “that might be the nicest thing anyone’s said to me all day.”
Their eyes met again, the moment lingering just a little longer this time. From the other room, Rose’s laugh rang out as Jackie bossed her around.
The Doctor hesitated. It was subtle, just a fraction too long before he spoke again, but she noticed. He rubbed his thumb against the seam of his pocket, eyes flicking briefly toward the doorway Rose had disappeared through, as if weighing whether this was his place to say anything at all.
“There is one more thing,” The Doctor said gently. “About Mickey.”
Her shoulders tensed, but she nodded. “Okay.”
“In the other world,” he continued carefully, “his gran’s still alive. Same flat and everything.” A small, fond smile tugged at his mouth. “From what I gathered, they were very close. He stayed, mostly because he thought it might bring her some comfort. Not being alone.”
The tension eased out of her in a slow breath.
“Oh,” she said quietly.
The smile that followed was bittersweet, soft at the edges. “I’m glad,” she admitted. “She was wonderful. Used to insist on feeding everyone whether they were hungry or not. Mickey adored her.”
“She adored him right back,” the Doctor said. “That much was obvious.”
The moment settled between them, gentle and sad and complete in a way grief rarely was. Closure wasn’t something people got often. He seemed to recognize that too. He shifted then, moving to sit on the couch beside her not too close, careful of her space.
“Can I ask you something?” he said, quieter now.
She glanced at him. “Sure.”
“Family,” he said. “Do you have anyone waiting for you at home?”
She shook her head, a simple motion that carried more weight than it should have. “Not really. I moved out ages ago. It’s just me now.” A pause. Then, honest and unguarded, “I don’t really feel a want to visit anyone.”
“Oh,” he said softly. “I’m sorry.”
She gave a small shrug, like it was an old bruise she’d learned not to press. “It’s fine. It’s been that way a while.”
He nodded slowly, reading what she hadn’t said. The quiet evenings. The limited circle. The way losses stacked when there weren’t many people to begin with.
“That’s probably why,” he said gently, “Rose leaving hurt the way it did.”
Her breath caught, just slightly.
“When you don’t have many people,” he went on, voice low, “losing even one feels catastrophic.”
She looked at him and saw it mirrored there. Different details. Same shape of pain. He understood. Maybe not in the same way. Maybe not for the same reasons. But he understood what it was to outlive, to be left behind, to love fiercely because there were only so many chances left to do so.
Then, from the kitchen, Jackie called that dinner was ready. The spell broke but the understanding didn’t.
That night, Rose had stayed.
The Doctor, mercifully perceptive, had excused himself early, muttering something about “checking the stabilizers” and disappearing back to the Tardis to give them space. What followed hadn’t been neat or pretty, but it had been real. Late-night tea. Biscuits gone stale. Voices lowered and raised in turns. Old hurts dragged into the light and finally spoken aloud instead of festering.
She, Rose, and Jackie had ended up sprawled across the living room in mismatched blankets like teenagers again, a strange, healing sort of slumber party. Jackie cried. Rose cried harder. She cried too, eventually, until the sharpest edges of the pain dulled just enough to breathe around.
They didn’t fix everything, but they started.
By morning, Rose had left with The Doctor, not sneaking away this time, not vanishing between one moment and the next. She’d knocked on her door properly, eyes bright but sincere, and wrapped her in a long, grounding hug.
“I’ll be back,” Rose promised. “I swear.”
She believed her.
Now, days later, she lounged on her own couch, the familiarity of her flat settling comfortably around her. Socks kicked off somewhere on the floor. A mug of coffee sweating quietly on the table beside her. The television murmured in the background, some daytime program she wasn’t really watching, just letting exist to keep the silence from growing teeth.
A book rested open in her hands. She read a few pages. Paused. Turned another page. Her eyes drifted off the page without her realizing it, the words blurring together as her thoughts wandered somewhere else entirely.
To him.
The Doctor.
She wondered how he was doing, wherever doing happened to be for someone like him. Somewhere loud and dangerous, probably. Somewhere impossible. He’d been so kind that night, so careful with her feelings in a way she hadn’t expected. It might have been the bare minimum, sure, but it had stood out all the same, especially after Rose’s instinctive defensiveness at the beginning of it all, after feeling like she’d had to justify her hurt just to be allowed to have it.
With him, she hadn’t. He’d listened. Not to argue, not to fix, just to understand. She realized, with a small, surprised ache, that she missed him.
She missed the way his eyes lit up when he talked about the universe, the rapid-fire explanations that somehow made nonsense sound logical. She wanted to hear more stories about planets that weren’t on any map, about disasters narrowly avoided, about places so beautiful they made centuries-old memories feel new again.
And she wanted to ask him questions about the alien thing, mostly. He looked human. Two arms, two legs, familiar expressions. But he clearly wasn’t, and that fascinated her. How did that work? What felt different to him? What was different about him?
She had a dozen questions lined up in her head, curious and half-formed, tbut she didn’t know if she’d ever get answers. Didn’t know when she’d see him again, or if she would at all.
That was the strange thing about knowing someone who lived outside the rules of ordinary life. They slipped through cracks you didn’t even know were there.
She sighed softly, thumb marking her place in the book as she leaned back against the couch. The sound hit the air like a living thing.
A deep, wheezing woosh, mechanical and impossible, close enough to make the hairs on her arms lift. Her heart jumped and then she grinned. She knew that sound.
She’d heard it the morning Rose and the Doctor had left. Hadn’t seen the Tardis yet, not properly, but she didn’t need to. The noise alone was unmistakable now, like a calling card from another reality.
She dropped her book onto the couch without bothering to mark the page, slid her feet into her slippers, and crossed the room in a hurry. The TV clicked off as she passed it. If Rose was back, she knew exactly where she’d be going, her moms flat.
The hallway felt shorter than usual as she moved, anticipation buzzing under her skin. She reached the door just as voices rounded the corner, unmistakable.
Rose Tyler came into view first, mid-laugh, looking brighter than she had in weeks, beside her was The Doctor. He stopped short when he saw her, surprise flickering across his face before breaking into a grin that felt entirely genuine.
“Well,” he said, delighted, “that’s excellent timing.”
Rose beamed. “See? I told you she’d hear it.”
She laughed, breathless and happy in a way that surprised her, standing there in her slippers with her heart thumping. “Hard not to,” she said. “Sounds like the universe clearing its throat.”
The Doctor’s eyes lit up at that. “Oh, I like her.”
“So,” she asked lightly, “how long has it been for you two? Since, you know, time travel and all.”
The Doctor answered before Rose Tyler could even draw breath.
“Just about a week,” he said cheerfully. “Give or take a few minutes. We visited a planet with seven moons, lovely sunsets, absolute nightmare tides. Then there was coronation of Queen Elizabeth II and this thing called the Wire.”
She blinked. “The wire?”
“Creature,” he clarified, far too casually. “Lived in the television signal. Ate people’s brainwaves through their TVs.”
Her face did something between horror and fascination. “That’s, oh my god. That’s awful. and terrifying. And why is that a thing.”
Rose grinned. “You should’ve seen it. Nearly got me good, actually.”
She shot Rose an immediate look. “That’s not funny.”
Rose’s smile faltered just a bit. “I was fine.”
The Doctor stepped in smoothly, resting a reassuring hand on Rose’s shoulder. “She was never in any real danger,” he said firmly. “The Wire was dealt with pretty easily in the end. Won’t bother anyone again. All wrapped up.”
He glanced at Rose, softer now. “Nothing’s going to happen to her on my watch.”
That did something to her chest, settled it, just a little. She nodded, relieved despite herself. “Good. I’m glad you both made it back okay.”
Then, after a beat, she looked at him properly. “And you? Are you alright?”
The Doctor paused, clearly not expecting that question. Then he grinned, genuinely pleased. “Yeah,” he said. “I am. Thanks for asking.” The Doctor stood there smiling, looked at her like that concern mattered more than she knew.
Rose caught the way the Doctor’s eyes lingered, the soft twinkle in them as he looked at her friend like she was the most interesting thing in the room. The sight sparked a brief, unexpected pang of jealousy in her chest.
She didn’t have long to sit with it cause Jackie flung the door open with perfect timing. “Rose!” she exclaimed, grabbing her daughter by the arm and hauling her inside. “You didn’t tell me you were popping back so soon!”
“Mum!” Rose laughed, stumbling forward.
Jackie shot her friend a look over Rose’s shoulder. “I should’ve had you do the scolding ages ago. Seems you’re the only one who finally got her to take coming home seriously.”
“Happy to be of service,” she replied dryly.
The Doctor chuckled as Rose was dragged fully into the flat, Jackie’s voice already launching into a fresh round of affectionate fussing. The door remained open for them but for a brief moment neither she nor The Doctor moved to follow.
They stood there instead, facing each other with small, easy smile, unspoken joy passing between them at the simple fact of seeing one another again.
“Your timing’s funny,” she said casually. “I was just thinking about you.” She meant nothing by it, just an observation of a coincidence.
But the Doctor’s brain latched onto exactly one part of that sentence.
“Oh,” he said, suddenly flustered. “You were?”
His ears went a touch pink as he cleared his throat, suddenly very interested in adjusting his jacket. “Right. Well. Good timing then. Excellent timing. I’m very punctual. Well . . . sometimes. Well . . . it depends.”
She blinked, then smiled, amused. He flashed her a sheepish grin and finally stepped forward, following Rose inside, trying to look like the idea that she’d been thinking about him hadn’t just made his entire day.
Jackie immediately went into overdrive, scooping up half-folded laundry from the couch and piling it onto a chair. “I swear, I only sat down for one minute,” she said, already fluffing cushions and clearing space. “Honestly, you’d think I lived in a pigsty.”
“I don’t,” Rose said brightly, grabbing an armful of clothes to help finish folding.
Jackie snorted. “That’s one word for it. Tea? I’ll put the kettle on.”
The Doctor’s face betrayed him immediately. Not dramatically, just a subtle tightening around the eyes, a look of quiet dread that didn’t escape her notice. She bit back a smile.
“I can make it,” she offered quickly, stepping forward. “You’ve got your hands full, Jackie.”
It was half true. Jackie was fussing over Rose like she might disappear again if she looked away too long. The other half was t he faint, relieved smile that spread across the Doctor’s face was absolutely worth the effort.
“Oh, you’re a star,” Jackie said warmly. “Thank you, love.”
She nodded and slipped into the kitchen, already filling the kettle. Behind her, Rose and Jackie continued folding and chatting, the room filling with the easy noise of reunion. The Doctor lingered for a moment, hands in his pockets, rocking slightly on his heels like he was debating something very serious.
Jackie had Rose. Rose had Jackie.
He didn’t need to be there. He told himself he was just being helpful. So he followed her into the kitchen.
The Doctor leaned against the counter, pretending casual interest in the kettle as it heated. “Thought I’d assist,” he said lightly. “Moral support. Very important. Kitchens can be dangerous.”
She glanced at him, amused. “With a kettle?”
“Oh yes. Terrifying things.”
She laughed softly as she reached for mugs, the sound easy and unguarded. He watched her for a moment longer than necessary, comforted by the ordinary intimacy of it, cups clinking, water running, the smell of tea leaves.
Really, he just wanted a few more minutes. A little longer to talk to her, away from the noise, before the universe inevitably demanded his attention again.
“So,” The Doctor said lightly, “what were you thinking about just then?”
She lifted a mug, gesturing toward the kettle as it clicked off. “Tea…?” she offered, deadpan.
He laughed, a quick, delighted sound. “Right, yes, thrilling inner life. No, I meant-” He hesitated just a fraction, then went for it. “What were you thinking about me? Before we turned up.” Just genuinely curious.
She blinked, then laughed softly, shaking her head as she dropped a teabag into a mug. “You’re very friendly,” she said, thoughtful now. “But also mysterious, and I’ve got a lot of questions.”
“Oh good,” he said immediately. “Love questions.”
“The how, the why, the what,” she went on, glancing at him. “Of who you are.”
His smile softened, less showy now. “Go on, then.”
She considered him for a moment, eyes searching his face. “Why do you look so human,” she asked, “if you’re not? I mean, you look exactly like one. And are there other aliens like that? Human-looking ones?”
That did it. His eyes lit up, delighted by the rightness of the question.
“Oh, excellent place to start,” he said, straightening. “Short answer? Coincidence and convergent evolution. Long answer?” He gestured vaguely. “Very long. Possibly involves ancient timelines and a lot of running.”
She smiled as she poured the water. “I’ve got time.”
He watched her for a beat, something warm and unreadable passing over his face.
“Right,” he said softly. “So, humans aren’t as unique as you think. Bipedal, bilateral symmetry, opposable thumbs- avery popular design across the universe. And Time Lords, my people, we’re very similar. Same basic blueprint. Two hearts, though. That’s a bit different.”
She paused mid-pour. “Two.”
“Yep,” he said cheerfully. “Handy in a crisis.”
“And the others?” she asked.
“Oh, loads of human-looking species,” he said. “Some closer than others. Some are cousins. Some just happen to look like you. Universe loves recycling ideas.”
She shook her head in quiet amazement, handing him a mug. “That’s incredible.”
He took it carefully, smiling at her over the rim. “You’re taking this remarkably well.”
She shrugged. “I’ve already accepted plastic people and brain-eating televisions. This feels reasonable.”
He laughed again, softer this time. “And that,” he said, eyes bright, “is why I was curious what you were thinking.” Because she wasn’t frightened, she was interested. And for a man who spent his life running, that kind of curiosity was dangerous in the best possible way.
It was the trait he looked for in everyone he welcomed into the Tardis. Not fearlessness, no one sensible was fearless, but wonder. The willingness to look at the impossible and ask ‘why’ instead of just ‘how do I get away’.
That thought sparked something.
He only considered it for a moment before he spoke. “I could show you,” he said casually, like he was offering to point out the view from a window. “The Tardis, I mean. If you think I’m fascinating, you should see my ship. She’s beautiful.”
She stared at him.
“Are you serious?” she asked, a little breathless now. “I mean, are you sure? I could just take a peek, I’ve been so curious but I didn’t want to-”
He looked at her like she’d just asked if the sky was allowed to be blue.
“Alright?” he echoed, incredulous. “You’re asking if it’s alright? Of course you’re welcome.” He shook his head, smiling.
Her face lit up instantly. She beamed and did what could only be described as a small, uncontained happy dance right there in the kitchen, mug in hand, tea sloshing dangerously close to the rim.
He laughed outright, delighted. “Careful! Temporal displacement I can fix. Spilled tea? Tragedy.”
She laughed too, cheeks warm, still grinning as she finished pouring.
Then like it was nothing, like he hadn’t just cracked her world open already, he added, “And if you ever wanted you could come with me.”
She froze, “Come with you?”
“Mm-hmm,” he said lightly. “Anywhere. Anywhen. All of time and space. Your choice.”
Her eyes sparkled, wonder blooming bright and unguarded across her face as she actually let herself imagine it. Stars she’d never seen. Places no one had names for. Histories untouched, futures unwritten. The universe at the palm of her hand, the greatest gift.
Her smile softened, then tilted shyly downward, like she’d suddenly remembered herself. “There was another part,” she admitted, quieter now. “Slightly embarrassing.”
The Doctor cocked his head, instantly attentive. “Embarrassing parts are usually the important ones.”
She huffed a small laugh at that, then turned back to the counter, finishing the tea and setting the mugs aside to steep. She kept her eyes on the kettle a moment longer than necessary.
“Well,” she said, carefully, “that first night, with you telling stories. About where you’ve been, what you’ve seen.” She hesitated, then went on, braver. “You’re a really good storyteller.”
His eyebrows lifted.
“I kept thinking about it,” she continued, voice warm but self-conscious. “About the places you mentioned. The way you talked about them. And I realized I missed you.” She rushed the last part slightly. “Not in a strange way, just because I wanted to hear more stories.”
That did it. He went still, like someone had gently but decisively unplugged his brain.
“Oh,” he said, eloquent as ever.
She risked a glance at him then and immediately looked away again, cheeks warm. “I know that probably sounds silly.”
“No,” he said at once, flustered now in a way that had nothing to do with saving the universe. “No, it doesn’t. I just-” He laughed, running a hand through his hair. “You missed me.”
She nodded, tiny and earnest. “Yeah.”
He looked absurdly pleased. Genuinely, openly flattered, like she’d handed him something precious without realizing it. The centuries-old grief, the running, the walls, none of it mattered in that moment.
She went on, softer now. “And when you talked about showing me the Tardis, the idea of having a story of my own.” She smiled faintly. “That made me happy.” Then, quickly, before the moment could tip too far, she added, “But, I still want to hear yours. If you’re willing. More stories, I mean.”
He stared at her for a beat, then his smile spread slow and bright, something fond and unmistakably sincere.
“Willing?” he echoed. “I’ve been waiting centuries for someone who actually wants to hear them. Most people tell me i talk to much”
“Call it inexpirance, but you may not talk enough.” The kettle clicked softly as the tea finished steeping, grounding the moment in something ordinary and warm.
Rose Tyler poked her head into the kitchen, brows lifting. “What’s taking so-”
She stopped; The Doctor was leaning back against the counter, posture loose in a way Rose had rarely seen, looking at her friend with a smile that was softer than his usual grin, a fond little thing. And her friend stood there with the kettle between them like a shield, bashfully studying anything but his face.
Something unpleasant twisted in Rose’s chest: jealousy.
It surprised her with its sharpness, and she hated it immediately. He’d just met her a week ago. Properly met her, anyway. And the Doctor, her Doctor, had never shown much interest in romance at all. He ran, he joked, he flirted harmlessly sometimes, but he never lingered like this. Never looked at someone like they were interesting in a way that went beyond curiosity.
So what was so special about her?
The thought felt ugly the moment it formed, and guilt followed close behind. Rose swallowed it down hard. This wasn’t fair on anyone. The Doctor was charming and handsome and brilliant, yes, and maybe some small, foolish part of her had always assumed that if he ever did look at someone like that, it would be her.
But standing there in the doorway, watching them, she forced herself to breathe. Her friend hadn’t done anything wrong. If anything, she’d been extraordinary. She was honest, firm, kind when it mattered. And if the Doctor saw something in her who was Rose to begrudge it? Especially when she herself wasn’t even sure what she wanted, or if she’d ever truly had a chance at all.
Besides, Rose told herself firmly, she might be reading into things that weren’t there. The Doctor was friendly. He smiled like that sometimes.
Maybe.
Regardless, right then, in that kitchen, The Doctor was having a realization he absolutely hadn’t planned on. He knew what he was feeling, and that was the problem.
She fascinated him. Completely, utterly. From the very first night, standing her ground when Rose tried to deflect, refusing to let anyone wriggle out of the hurt they’d caused. Holding Rose accountable not out of cruelty, but out of love. Giving her a chance to be forgiven without pretending nothing had happened.
Strength, he decided, came in many forms. And hers was quiet, steady, unshowy. Sweet, but not naïve. Fiery, but fair. Reasonable in a universe that rarely was. She’d impressed him. Deeply.
And somewhere between her curiosity, her kindness, and the way she’d handled the impossible without flinching, he’d found himself flatteringly, inconveniently, undeniably drawn in.
It was ridiculous. If you’d told him two weeks ago that he’d develop a crush on someone he’d just met, he’d have pointed and laughed at you like you admitted to being an archaeologist. Absolutely ridiculous.
He didn’t do this. He didn’t linger. He didn’t let himself want. Yet here he was, leaning against a counter in a London kitchen, smiling at a woman who made him want to slow down and talk.
Rose cleared her throat loudly. Both of them jumped.
“Tea ready, then?” Rose asked, forcing brightness into her voice.
Her friend turned, relief and embarrassment flickering across her face. “Yeah, sorry, just finished.”
The Doctor straightened a bit too quickly, running a hand through his hair. “Right. Tea. Excellent.”
Rose smiled, the jealousy already retreating, guilt still lingering but quieter now. She watched them and made herself a promise. Whatever this was, she wouldn’t be the one to ruin it. Not after everything she’d done already, even if it sucked for her.
A few hours later, tea cups were rinsed and stacked, chatter had softened into comfortable quiet, and the sun had dipped low enough to paint the street in warm gold.
She stood on the pavement staring at a blue police box.
Up close, it was ridiculous. Utterly ordinary in the way only something profoundly unordinary could be hiding behind. Beside it, The Doctor beamed like a child on Christmas morning.
“Go on,” he urged, bouncing on his heels. “You open the doors. Always better that way.”
Her stomach fluttered. She hesitated, wiping her suddenly sweaty palm on her trousers, then reached out and pulled the door open.
She didn’t step inside. Couldn’t. She just stared.
The world fell away in a rush of soundless astonishment as her eyes tried to make sense of what they were seeing. The space stretched impossibly before her, golden and vast and alive, humming with something ancient and welcoming. Her thoughts skidded to a halt, overwhelmed.
When she finally found her voice, it came out breathless and reverent.
“I didn’t really believe the whole ‘bigger on the inside’ thing,” she said softly. “But this is- this is even more incredible than I imagined.”
She turned her head to look at him, and froze. The Doctor looked horrified. Not mildly concerned or puzzled. Properly, utterly mortified.
“Oh god,” she said instantly, heart leaping into her throat. “What? What did I do?”
He stepped forward quickly and shut the door.
Her panic spiked. “Doctor?”
For half a second she was convinced she’d committed some unspeakable cosmic crime. Then she watched his expression shift in real time. Horror melted into confusion. Confusion into wonder.
He grabbed the handle and pulled the door open again. Stared at the hinges then closed it. Then, slowly, deliberately, he pushed the doors open. He turned to her, eyes wide, stunned and utterly delighted.
“Why did you pull?” he asked.
She blinked at him. “Because that’s what the sign says?” She pointed at the door, where the instructions were very clearly printed.
PULL TO OPEN
He stared at it, then stared at her. “I’ve always pushed,” he admitted faintly.
She raised a brow, amusement blooming through her lingering awe. “You’ve had this thing for how long?”
“About seven hundred years,” he said with a jut of his chin as he did quick math. “Give or take.”
“And you’ve been opening it wrong the whole time.”
He laughed, loud and incredulous, running a hand through his hair. “Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.” She smiled back, warmth and wonder tangling together in her chest. The Doctor shrugged off the door mishap like it hadn’t quietly rocked his understanding of reality just a little, then stepped aside with a flourish.
“After you,” The Doctor said warmly.
She crossed the threshold at last.
The moment her foot touched the floor, she turned slowly in place, eyes wide, breath catching as she took it all in. The hum of the engines vibrated through her bones, not loud, but like it was breathing. Golden light glinted off the console, shadows stretching up into impossible heights.
“Oh,” she breathed. “It’s wonderful.” That word felt inadequate, but it was all she had.
She drifted closer to the console, fingers hovering just above the surface, respectful even in her awe. Dials and levers and switches crowded together in beautiful, incomprehensible harmony.
She grinned, impressed. “This looks like it could do anything.”
The Doctor didn’t answer right away, he just watched her. This was his favorite part, always had been. The moment someone saw the Tardis properly for the first time. The wonder, the sparkle in their eyes when the universe cracked open and invited them in. He admired her curiosity, the way she leaned in, the way her questions formed before she even spoke them.
“Did you build it?” she asked suddenly, turning to him. “Or did you buy it?”
He laughed softly. “Oh no. Tardises aren’t built.”
She blinked. “They’re not?”
“They’re grown,” he said. “Raised.”
Her head snapped around as she spun in a slow circle, eyes even wider than before. “Wait, does that mean the Tardis is alive?”
His grin was immediate and unapologetic. “Very much so, she’s sentient. Organic and incredibly complex, smarter than me most days.”
She stared at the console like it might blink back at her. “That’s incredible.” Then, carefully, “Does she have a name, or is ‘Tardis’ her name?”
“Tardis isn’t a name,” he said thoughtfully. “It’s an acronym; Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. What she is, not who.”
“So what do you call her?” she asked.
He shrugged lightly. “Well, that’s the thing, I don’t really know if she has a name. I don’t have a way of speaking to her properly. Not like that. Maybe she does, maybe she’s beyond the social construct of names entirely.”
She absorbed that in reverent silence, eyes flicking between him and the console, fingers curling at her sides like she was holding herself still.
She stood at the console a moment longer, watching the lights blink and pulse like something breathing. She said softly, almost shy. “You’re beautiful.”
The air shifted and a low hum rolled through the room. It seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once, mechanical and otherworldly, like the Tardis itself had drawn a slow, pleased breath.
She froze. “Was that-?”
The Doctor’s grin spread instantly, bright and delighted, “She likes you.”
Her face lit up, wonder written into every line. “She said thank you.”
“She did,” he confirmed. “Very polite.”
She beamed, laughter bubbling up as she turned in another slow circle, taking it all in again his world, his impossible ship, the warmth of being welcomed by something so ancient and alive.
Then her curiosity tugged her back to him.
“What about you?” she asked gently. “You said you’re a Time Lord. What exactly does that mean? What were you meant to do?”
His smile softened, “Time Lords,” he said slowly, choosing his words cafully, “We didn’t just travel through it they ruled over the laws of time and space. We invented time travel. We grew Tardises to help monitor reality, fix paradoxes, protect the universe from tearing itself apart.”
He looked past her, past the console, eyes dimming with old grief.
“My people are gone now . . . there was a war,” He difted off, decideing not to go into details of that now. “I’m the last Time Lord.”
Her chest tightened.
“And she,” he added quietly, resting a hand against the console, “is the last Tardis.” The sadness in his eyes moved her more than all the wonders he’d shown her. She stepped closer, voice gentle but certain.
“Then at least you have each other,” she said. “You and her. That’s a beautiful friendship.”
For a moment, he couldn’t speak. He looked at the console, his ship, his oldest friend, the one constant that had stayed when everything else burned and fell away, and felt a swell of gratitude so sharp it almost hurt.
“Yes,” he said softly. “It is.”
The Tardis hummed again, warmer this time, and the Doctor smiled, grateful for the ship that had saved him more times than he could count, and for the woman standing beside him who had seen the heart of it all so clearly.
The Doctor cleared his throat, the sound just a little too deliberate. He shrugged out of his trench coat and draped it over the railing, the familiar motion giving his hands something to do. Then he moved around the console, fingers idly adjusting switches and dials that didn’t need adjusting, muscle memory, a habit for comfort, to keep distance.
Vulnerability had a way of sneaking up on him.
He didn’t linger in it. Showing the raw edges of himself to someone he’d just met went against his instinct, and yet he’d done it anyway. Trusted her with something fragile without quite knowing why. So he pivoted.
“Well then,” The Doctor said lightly, not quite meeting her eyes, “enough about me. What about you?”
She blinked, surprised. “Me?”
“Yes, you,” he said, glancing up now, earnest beneath the deflection. “Tell me something. Anything. Hobbies, dreams, secret ambitions, irrational fears.”
The Tardis hummed, low and knowing.
“Oh no you don’t,” he muttered under his breath, giving the console a pointed look. “Stay out of it.”
The hum deepened, amused. He ignored his ship, his ancient conspirator, and focused instead on the woman standing across from him. The way she smiled, warm and curious, like she wasn’t intimidated by the universe humming around them. Like she was comfortable here already.
His two hearts gave an entirely unhelpful thump. He straightened, giving her his full attention now, and smiled back, softer than before, but no less bright.
“Go on,” he said gently. “Your turn.”
She shrugged, a little self-conscious now that the focus was on her.
“There’s not much to tell,” she said. “I’m just going through the motions, really. Finished school, moved out on my own. Couldn’t afford university on a shop salary, so I got a flat and buckled down, worked, paid rent, thats about it.” She gestured vaguely, like her life could be summed up with a flick of her wrist. “Outside of Rose, Micky, and Jackie, I don’t have much of a social life. No impressive hobbies or anything worth showing off.”
The words came easily. Too easily.
She’d been minimizing herself for as long as she could remember. It was second nature now, shrinking her story down before anyone else could decide it wasn’t enough. She wasn’t anything special. That was the rule she lived by.
The Doctor didn’t believe a word of it. The Doctor watched her as she spoke, brow faintly furrowed, like she was describing someone else entirely. Someone who was dull and forgettable. It didn’t line up with the woman standing in his Tardis, unafraid, curious, kind enough to speak gently to a sentient time machine. It didn’t line up with the way his hearts reacted every time she smiled at him.
“There has to be something,” he said softly. “People don’t just exist like that.”
She hesitated, then sighed. “I wanted to be a teacher,” she admitted. “If I could’ve afforded it, that’s what I would’ve done.”
Something in his expression shifted.
“Oh,” he said.
And suddenly he could see it, clear as a memory that hadn’t happened yet. Her standing at the front of a classroom, chalk dust on her hands, explaining something with that quiet enthusiasm of hers. Smiling when someone finally got it. Sharing knowledge not because she wanted credit, but because she wanted others to understand. It fit her perfectly.
“That makes sense,” he said, warmth creeping into his voice. “You’re curious. Bright. You ask the right questions and you listen. That’s what good teachers do.”
She blinked. “You think so?”
“I know so,” he said, without hesitation. “That’s special.”
For a moment she just stared at him, then she grinned, a little disbelieving that thats all it took to be ‘special’. No one had ever said that to her before. She shrugged again, instinctively trying to shake it off, but her cheeks had gone warm, and she knew it.
“Bet you say things like that to all the girls,” she teased lightly, aiming for casual.
The Doctor scoffed immediately, a soft laugh escaping him as he shook his head. “Absolutely not.” He smiled wide. “I don’t say things I don’t mean.”
That was not the answer she’d expected. And notably, he hadn’t rushed to deny the implication that he might be flirting with her. She blinked, just a fraction, caught off guard by that realization. Flustered in a way that had nothing to do with aliens or time machines.
“Oh,” she said, then quickly waved it off. “Right. Sorry. I was joking.”
He hummed, still smiling, eyes gentle. “I know.”
She turned away under the pretense of looking at the console again, not wanting to read too much into anything. Overthinking had a way of ruining perfectly good moments, and she wasn’t about to let her brain spiral now.
The Tardis gave a soft, knowing hum.
A cheerful voice rang out behind them.
“Hello!” Rose bounded into the Tardis, all energy and familiarity, coming to a stop beside the console like she belonged there, which, to be fair, she did. Her eyes flicked between them almost immediately.
She clocked the details in a heartbeat. Her friend’s cheeks were pink an The Doctor cleared his throat and took two conspicuously casual steps away, suddenly very invested in a cluster of buttons and levers that absolutely did not need his attention. Rose’s brow lifted just a fraction.
Her friend, determined not to let her thoughts spiral, turned first, grinning a little too brightly, nerves humming under her skin. “Hey,” she said. “What’s up?”
Rose shrugged, feigning nonchalance. “Just wondering what you two were up to.”
Before either of them could answer, The Doctor jumped in, far too quickly.
“I was just about to ask if she wanted to take me up on my offer,” he said, spinning back toward them. “Go somewhere.”
Rose blinked. “Your offer?" That was new.
Her smile tightened almost imperceptibly as the realization settled in her mind. This was the first she was hearing about her friend possibly joining them. The small, guilty jealousy she’d been trying to suppress surged again, sharp and unwelcome.
She didn’t like the idea of sharing. She’d always felt special here. Like she was important and chosen. And if her friend came along too, didn’t that mean she wasn’t as special? Not as necessary?
Rose nodded anyway, forcing a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Yeah. Brilliant,” she said. “That’d be great.”
The Doctor noticed the stiffness and the way her posture locked up just a bit too much. He felt a flicker of disappointment settle in his chest. He’d seen this before, Rose’s possessiveness, this need to be the only one. It wasn’t new, and it wasn’t something he liked about her.
He didn’t say anything but the feeling lingered. Thankfully, his guest missed all of it entirely, she was beaming.
“Are you serious?” she asked, eyes shining. “I can really come with you? I mean, are you sure? I don’t want to intrude.”
“Intrude?” he echoed, incredulous.
He waved the thought away immediately, smiling at her with easy warmth. “Of course you’re welcome. The Tardis likes you, and you’re splendid company.”
The TARDIS hummed approvingly, as if on cue.
Her face lit up fully then, unguarded excitement spilling over. “That’s- Thank you! Oh, wow, this’ll be so much fun.” Ecstatic didn’t even begin to cover the arua coming off her, the light in her eyes.
Watching her like that, so openly delighted, so unaware of the quiet tension beside her, the Doctor felt certain of one thing; inviting her had been the right choice. Even if it complicated things.
The Doctor moved around the console with infectious energy, fingers dancing over switches as he read the engines like a living pulse. He shared in her excitement easily, grinning as the Tardis thrummed beneath them, ready.
“Where do you want to go?” He asked, spinning back toward her, eyes alight. He spread his hands, generous and sincere. “Past. Future. Another planet. Another galaxy. Anywhere at all, your call.”
She laughed, caught up in it, his enthusiasm lifting her clean off the floor. She did a little bunny hop back toward the console, peering over the controls as he talked, watching him move, watching how alive he was like this.
“Diamond waterfalls,” he rattled on, delighted. “Or a planet where everything’s edible, even the dirt, though I wouldn’t recommend it. Or floating cities. Or- oh!- bioluminescent forests that sing when it rains.”
She stared, wide-eyed, wild fascination dancing across her face. By the time he finished his ramble, he’d circled the console completely and come to a stop right in front of her. He waited, quiet now, looking straight into her eyes.
“Well?” he asked softly.
She hesitated, jittery with energy, then grinned, “What if we let the Tardis decide?”
His grin spread slow and proud. “Random?”
She nodded. “You said you like that.”
He laughed, delighted. “Brave choice. Especially for your first trip. Could be dangerous,” he added lightly, echoing her from a week ago.
She didn’t miss a beat. “I’ll take my chances, doc.”
He paused, just a flicker, then smiled, unbothered. He preferred Doctor, sure. But coming from her, it felt right. The Tardis hummed, pleased.
Behind them, a tight voice cut in. “Are we leaving now, then?”
Rose Tyler stood near the railing, arms crossed just a touch too carefully. “Because I just made dinner plans with Mum. Was hoping we’d all join.”
The Doctor glanced at her, reading the stiffness she tried to hide. He sighed, gentle but firm. “You could stay with your mum,” he offered. “We’ll just pop out for a quick trip. Be back before supper’s ready.”
Rose stared at him, stunned. He hadn’t offered to stay. He’d offered to leave without her.
“Oh,” she said, masking it quickly. “Right. Yeah, sure. Have fun.” She turned to go, lightness forced, and nearly made it out-
“Rose,” her friend said, stopping her.
She crossed the distance and pulled Rose into a hug, brief but sincere. “I’ll see you soon,” she promised. Rose softened at that, hugging her back.
“Be safe,” she said quietly, then she left.
The Doctor watched her go for a moment, conflicted, then turned back to the console. He set the final coordinates, none at all, and threw the lever.
The engines roared to life.
The Tardis lurched forward with a delighted shudder, and as time and space peeled away, he glanced at his new companion, eyes bright, heart racing, ready.
“Hold on,” he said, grinning.
They were running. Hand in hand, feet pounding against unfamiliar ground, breath tearing from her chest as shouts rang out behind them.
“Hey! You! Stop!” Gunfire cracked the air, sharp and terrifying.
They’d been on the planet for five minutes. Five. Barely enough time to marvel at the sky, violet and gold, someone had started yelling about trespassing on government property and opening fire like introductions were optional.
“RUN!” The Doctor shouted, already dragging her forward, finger interlocked.
She didn’t argue. Didn’t hesitate. She trusted him instinctively, legs burning as they sprinted toward the blue box, heart hammering loud enough she was sure the shooters could hear it.
The doors slammed open, they burst inside, and she spun immediately, throwing her back against the doors as they banged shut behind them. The echo of shouted orders and gunfire cut off abruptly, replaced by the familiar hum of the Tardis, steady, alive, reassuring.
“Oh my god,” she gasped, palms flat against the wood, chest heaving. “Oh my god.”
The Doctor didn’t stop moving, leaping for the console, hands flying over switches and levers with practiced precision, coat flaring as the engines began to roar. “Sorry about that!” he called over his shoulder. “Bit trigger-happy down there. Some planets really don’t like visitors.”
The ship shuddered violently.
She slid down the doors slightly, knees weak, adrenaline still screaming through her veins. “You said-” she sucked in a breath, half laughing, half panicked, “you said we’d walk around.”
“We did!” he protested, throwing a lever. “Briefly! Very scenic! Then we ran!”
The Tardis lurched, the familiar wheezing woosh rising as space itself twisted away from them.She laughed then, hands shaking as she pushed herself upright again.
“Is it always like this?”
He glanced back at her, eyes alight, grin sharp and exhilarated. “Only half the time.”
The engines settled, the danger left behind somewhere else entirely. She let out a long, shaky breath, adrenaline finally ebbing. The Tardis finally settled into a smooth, drifting hum. Just the steady, living heartbeat of the ship as it carried them somewhere bullets couldn’t reach.
The Doctor slowed, hands resting on the console as the last lever clicked into place. He turned to her then, rubbing the back of his neck, a touch embarrassed despite himself.
“Sorry about that,” he said. “First trips tend to involve a bit of running. Occupational hazard.” He hesitated, nerves flickering behind the grin. “You alright? We can go home if you want. No pressure. Being shot at in the first five minutes isn’t exactly-”
He didn’t finish the sentence because she was laughing. Not a polite chuckle, or even nervous laughter. Full-on, belly-aching laughter that bent her forward as she approached the console, one hand braced against it for balance.
He blinked. Then smiled.
“…What?” he asked, genuinely curious.
She wiped at her eyes, still grinning as she straightened. “I just realized something,” she said. “I finally get why you always push the doors.”
He frowned. “You do?”
“Yeah,” she said, gesturing back toward where they’d just fled. “If you’ve made a habit of running back here for your life, pulling would slow you down, pushing’s faster, makes sense.”
He stared at her for half a second. Then he laughed, bright and delighted, pointing at her like she’d just solved a riddle the universe itself hadn’t bothered explaining.
“Finally, someone gets it.” He straightened, confidence back in full force now. “Alright then. Round two?”
She nodded immediately. “Round two.”
He didn’t even wait for her to say anything else, hands already moving, dancing across the controls as the Tardis responded eagerly. She watched him work, smiling, the fear already fading into exhilaration.
“Hold on,” he said cheerfully, throwing the final lever. “Again.”
The Tardis did her thing. The engines rose and fell in a familiar, rhythmic wheeze, the floor tilting just enough to make her grab the edge of the console on instinct. The Doctor steadied himself easily, one hand braced, the other still dancing across controls like this was second nature. There was a brief patch of turbulence. Nothing violent, just enough to make the lights flicker and the console hum louder, as if the ship were clearing her throat.
“Perfectly normal,” The Doctor said cheerfully over the noise. “Bit of traffic in the vortex.”
She laughed and held on anyway.
Then a wheeze and a thud.The sound was soft, almost gentle, like a careful landing rather than a crash. The engines quieted into a contented purr, the motion settling beneath their feet until the ship was still.
The Doctor straightened, listening, then grinned. “There we are.”
She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding, heart still racing, excitement buzzing through her veins as she looked around.
“Where are we?” she asked.
He glanced at the readouts, eyes sparkling. “Somewhere new.” The Tardis hummed approvingly. “Right, i’ll go first. Just in case.” The Doctor said briskly, already moving.
“In case of what,” she muttered, following him anyway, “more people trying to shoot us?”
He shot her a look over his shoulder. “You say that like it’s unlikely.”
She rolled her eyes, amused despite herself, and hovered just behind him as he cracked the doors open. They stepped out and immediately regretted it.
The alleyway was narrow and grimy, boxed in by towering sheets of corrugated metal on either side. The ground was uneven beneath their feet, layered with trash bags, broken crates, and things she didn’t want to identify. The air was thick and sour, the unmistakable stench of something that had died and been forgotten under a pile of rubbish.
Her eyes watered instantly.
“Oh. Oh wow,” she said, voice pinched. “That’s powerful.”
The Doctor groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Oh no. No, no, no. She did not.” He glanced back at the Tardis, parked squarely atop a mound of trash like she belonged there and muttered, “Honestly, you could’ve aimed for anywhere else. I gotta hosing you down later.”
She tried to smile, but the smell forced a frown onto her face anyway. She took a shallow breath through her mouth and immediately regretted that too. The sight of her expression made something in him falter.
The rebounded confidence he’d been riding deflated just a touch, shoulders dropping as he turned back to her. “Sorry,” he said quietly. “Not exactly scenic. Her standards can be questionable sometimes.”
He cast another pointed look at the Tardis. “Alleyways are not adventures.”
She shook her head quickly, waving the apology away. “Hey, no, it’s fine- really.” She gestured vaguely around them, eyes still watering. “Even Paris has its ugly parts. Doesn’t mean the whole trip’s ruined.”
He studied her for a moment, searching her face for disappointment and finding none. Just determination and the curiosity that interested him. A genuine effort to stay open to whatever came next.
Slowly, his smile returned, “Well,” he said, hands slipping into his coat pockets, “that’s a very healthy attitude toward interstellar tourism.”
She laughed, scrunching her nose again. “So, where are we? And how fast can we get out of this smell?”
“Not sure,” He glanced around the alley, eyes sharp now, trying to piece things together. “I’m usually very good at this. Can normally tell the year just by the smell.” He muttered.
She made a face. “You are not sniffing anything in here.”
“Oh, absolutely not,” he agreed quickly. “Some mysteries are better left unsolved.”
He tilted his head, listening, scanning, frowning in a way that was more intrigued than concerned. “I’ve got no clue.” He smiled faintly.
She blinked. “Is that bad?”
He shook his head, pleased. “No, just unusual. Bit of a puzzle. I like puzzles.” Then, without pausing to consider it, he slipped one hand out of his coat pocket and took hers.
“Come on,” he said lightly, already leading her toward the end of the alley. “Let’s see where we are.”
She went with him easily, fingers curling around his without hesitation. A small, curious thought drifted through her mind, does he do this with everyone? But it didn’t linger long enough to matter. She didn’t care either way. She liked it. Liked the quiet reassurance of it, the way it grounded her and pulled her forward.
The alley had been a vile, forgotten maze between buildings, metal walls pressed so close together it felt like the space itself had been abandoned. Then it finally spat them out and opened suddenly into light and motion.
A market.
Not loud exactly, but alive. A modest bustle flowed around them. People were bartering, voices overlapping, the clatter of machinery being repaired right on the street. The city looked like poverty colliding head-on with high technology, patched metal and neon wiring, scavenged parts repurposed into something functional and proud.
Stalls lined the walkways, selling recycled tech stacked in bins, mismatched clothing, strange tools, and more recycled tech. Food vendors worked over sizzling grills, the air thick with the scent of spiced meat and hot oil, undercut by the ever-present tang of motor grease. It wasn’t flowers and shampoo. But it was much better than the alley.
Her nose wrinkled, then relaxed, and she took a deeper breath. “That’s an improvement.”
The Doctor chuckled, still holding her hand as they slowed their pace. Around them, all manner of species passed by, tall, short, scaled, furred, glowing faintly, sporting extra limbs or eyes. None of them payed the slightest bit of attention to the human gawking openly at everything.
She turned in a slow circle, eyes wide, taking it all in. “They don’t even care we’re here.”
“Best kind of place,” The Doctor said fondly. “Means we’re not interesting enough to be dangerous.”
He smiled then, pleased as something clicked into place. “Ah. I know where we are.”
She looked at him eagerly. “You do?”
“Glaztra, a series of planets,” he explained as they began walking through the market together. “Started as a refuge. People displaced by wars, disasters, collapsing systems. They gathered here because nowhere else would take them.”
Her brows knit. “What war?”
He shook his head. “That’s the thing, there wasn’t one single war. Over millions of years, this place grew from one settlement on one planet into a civilization spanning six.”
She glanced up at the skyline, patched towers rising against an unfamiliar sky. “Six planets?”
“Mm-hmm,” he said. “Same government, shared culture. Blended traditions. Think… Pacific islands on Earth. Different islands, same people.”
She nodded slowly, absorbing it.
“Though, I'm not sure which of the six we’re on,” he added casually.
They passed a stall where someone was haggling over a piece of glowing circuitry, the vendor shouting cheerfully as another customer tried to barter in three different languages.
“You can hop between them pretty easily,” he went on. “Rent a ship for about the same price as a cab back on Earth. Pop over to another planet for lunch if you fancy it.”
She laughed, amazed. “That’s incredible.”
The Doctor slowed near a cluttered stall stacked high with coils, screens, and bits of tech that looked like they’d lived three different lives already. He waited a beat for the shopkeeper to finish arguing with another customer then a blur shot past them.
Something like a motorbike, low and loud, skimming far too close to the foot traffic. The Doctor reacted without thinking, hand tightening around hers as he pulled her in against his side, turning his body slightly to shield her from the rush of air and metal.
“Oi- watch it!” someone yelled after the bike.
She startled, then realized she was pressed fully against him, arm to arm, hip to hip, his hand firm and sure at her back. He didn’t linger on it. Didn’t make a thing of it at all. Just kept her there, safely out of the flow, like that was the most natural thing in the universe.
Her cheeks warmed anyway.
With her tucked against him, he leaned toward the stall. “Excuse me,” The Doctor said pleasantly. “Which of the six are we on?”
The shopkeeper squinted at them. “Glaztra-Four,” he said shortly. “Section Seven. Honestly- how do you not know that?”
The Doctor smiled as if he hadn’t heard the insult at all. “Brilliant. Thanks.”
He guided her away from the stall and back into the moving crowd before releasing her and taking her hand again, far too smoothly for her to pretend she hadn’t noticed. She took a breath, steadying herself, then glanced up at him.
“He spoke English,” she said slowly. “Really well.”
The Doctor chuckled. “Ah. No, he didn’t.”
She frowned. “He didn’t?”
“They’re not speaking English at all, ” he explained. “The Tardis translates everything, spoken and written. You hear what your brain’s most comfortable with, same for them. You sound like your speaking their language.”
Her eyes widened. “That’s incredible.”
“She is,” he agreed warmly. He opened his mouth again, then added, far too casually, “Though I’d have understood him anyway. I speak the language.”
She blinked. “You do.”
“All of them,” he said lightly. “Well, nearly all of them.”
She stopped walking and looked at him properly.
“Oh,” she said, grinning. “You’re absolutely showing off.”
He scoffed. “I am not.”
“You are,” she insisted, laughing.
He waved it off, but the faint pink tint creeping into his ears betrayed him. “Purely informational.”
“Mm-hmm,” she said. “And let me guess, you’re not jealous of the Tardis at all.”
“Jealous?” He straightened. “Of the Tardis? Please, she cheats.”
She laughed, delighted, and he smiled back, ears still pink, expression fond and unapologetically pleased that he’d managed to impress her at least a little. And as they merged back into the flow of the market together.
They drifted past more stalls, the crowd ebbing and flowing around them, and it didn’t take long for The Doctor to notice a pattern. Her gaze lingered just a second longer at food vendors than anywhere else. Grills, steam and the the sizzle of oil caught her eye. Not obvious, very subtle, but enough that he noticed.
He smiled to himself.
“Hungry?” he asked gently.
She hesitated, then shook her head. “Not really. Jackie’s cooking later. I don’t want to spoil my appetite, would be rude to not eat when we get back.”
He gave her a look. “You’re already being shot at on alien planets and worrying about manners.”
She laughed despite herself.
“Just a little something,” he said. “Quick bite to tide you over.”
She sighed, defeated, then nodded. “Alright. Something small.”
“Brilliant.”
He scanned the street once more, then abruptly veered toward what looked like a large, grimy computer terminal embedded into the side of a building, half public information hub, half something else. He stepped up to it like he knew exactly what he was doing. Before she could ask, he pulled out his sonic screwdriver and aimed it at the screen.
Blue light flared and the tool buzzed. The terminal whined in protest, and then a subtle panel slid open with a click. Coins clattered down into a shallow slot, spilling like a coin return on a vending machine. He casually scooped one up.
She stared at him. “Did you just rob an ATM?”
He looked at her, utterly unbothered, grin wide and unapologetic. “Borrowed.”
She crossed her arms. “You stole money from a public terminal.”
“Redistributed,” he corrected cheerfully.
She opened her mouth to argue but he took her hand again and tugged her back into the crowd before she could finish the thought.
“Come on,” he said lightly. “Let’s find something suitable for a human palate. And preferably something that won’t try to eat you back.”
She shook her head, laughing, letting herself be pulled along.
They were back inside the Tardis, the doors shut, the engines settling into that familiar, comforting hum, and they were laughing. It wasn’t even about something particularly funny. Just a moment from the market, a misunderstanding, a vendor who’d tried to upsell them something mildly alarming, the way the Doctor had talked his way out of it with sheer confidence and nonsense. On its own, it wouldn’t have been worth more than a breathy chuckle.
But together it felt lighter, happier. Like the kind of laughter that came after standing a little too close, looking into eachother eyes, and realizing you were both thinking the same thing.
She leaned against the railing, still smiling, watching him as he circled the console. The Doctor rambled on, hands moving animatedly as he explained something alien and complicated, trade routes, energy currents, social customs that involved at least three moons and a hat she was fairly sure no one should ever wear. She didn’t understand most of it, and she didn’t need to.
She watched the way he moved instead, the ease of him here, the way the Tardis seemed to respond to his presence, the spark in his eyes when he talked about the universe like it was an old friend that kept surprising him. She smiled without quite realizing she was doing it.
His ramble tapered off mid-thought, hands slowing on the controls as he glanced over at her, just to check. And his hearts promptly melted.
She was looking at him with that soft, unguarded smile again. The look in her eye felt almost intimate.
“What’re you thinking about?” The Doctor asked gently.
She sighed, the sound fond rather than tired, and pushed herself away from the railing. She stepped up to the console carefully, eyes flicking over the maze of controls as she chose a safe place to rest her hands, palms flat, fingers still, deliberate.
He noticed, her care, the respect. He didn’t comment. Just waited.
“I think,” she said slowly, “I owe Rose an apology.”
His brows knit in quiet surprise. “You do?”
She nodded. “I was so upset with her. About not visiting. Not calling. About getting caught up in everything.” Her gaze dropped to the console, lights reflecting softly in her eyes. “And I still think she hurt people. That matters. But…” She glanced up at him then, meeting his eyes. “I get it a little more now.”
He stayed silent, inviting her to keep going.
“I don’t want to go home yet,” she admitted. “I don’t want this to be over.”
The words landed softly, no drama, no expectation.
“I was just thinking about how strange it is,” she continued, a small, bittersweet smile tugging at her mouth. “That something can feel so right so quickly. And how much I’m going to miss it when it’s done.”
She looked around the Tardis, the hum, the light, the impossible space, then back to him.
“I’m going to miss this,” she said. “Very much.”
Her smile stayed gentle, but there was an ache behind it. Not regret, just the awareness that moments like this didn’t last forever.
The Doctor felt it then sharp and familiar and entirely unwelcome. That old, quiet dread that he knew all too well. Endings. The Doctor hated endings. He didn’t speak right away. Just watched her, hearts beating a little too fast, mind racing with things he didn’t yet have the courage to say.
Because for him, missing something usually meant it was already slipping away. And the idea of her missing this, missing him, before it had even ended…
The Doctor’s voice was softer when he spoke again, “You don’t have to go home,” The Doctor said. “You could come with us. Me and Rose. It doesn’t have to end yet.”
She looked at him then lifted a brow. “You saw how unhappy Rose was when you offered before,” she said plainly. “Don’t tell me you missed that.”
He stilled.
“I thought,” He hesitated, then let out a small breath. “I thought you hadn’t noticed.”
“I did,” she replied gently. “I just didn’t want to make it worse.”
She leaned against the console, arms folding loosely, “I’m used to it with Rose. I’ve seen it before.”
He frowned slightly. “Before?”
“With Mickey,” she said. “Before they were officially together. One of our coworkers showed interest in him, and Rose got… possessive. Same tight smile. Same forced enthusiasm.” She met his eyes. “That wasn’t happiness back there. That was her trying to swallow something she didn’t like.”
The Doctor absorbed that in silence.
“She fancies you,” she added quietly. “At least a little. I can tell.”
His mouth opened, then closed again.
“And I know,” she went on, voice steady but sad, “that if I came with you both, there’d be tension. Constantly. Between me and her. I don’t want that to be the thing that finally breaks our friendship.”
He ran a hand through his hair, clearly troubled. “I don’t- I’m not sure what Rose liking me has to do with you coming along.”
Then he stopped, eyes widening slightly as something occurred to him.
“Wait,” he said carefully. “Is that what you think? That you’d be a third wheel?”
She shrugged, just a little. “I didn’t want to be. For either of you.”
His answer came quickly, too quickly to be rehearsed, “No,” he said firmly. “No, that’s not it. And for the record-” He held her gaze, earnest and unmistakably sincere. “I don’t like Rose like that. Not that way.”
She searched his face, not exactly surprised.
“I was worried,” he admitted, quieter now, “that you thought I did. Or that you thought you’d be intruding on something.”
The Tardis hummed low and thoughtful around them.
She hesitated, then sighed “I had a feeling there was something,” she admitted. “Between you two. Or at least that it might be something. I couldn’t tell if it was mutual.”
He frowned slightly, still trying to follow.
“But it wouldn’t actually matter,” she went on, voice gentle but firm, “whether you fancied Rose or not. Because one of the fastest ways female friendships fall apart is when two girls end up circling the same guy. Even if they don’t mean to.”
The words settled. And then it clicked. Understanding hit him all at once.
“Oh,” The Doctor said softly.
He looked at her again, at the careful way she stood, the openness mixed with restraint, the courage it took to say all of that without accusation or expectation.
“You’re saying…” He trailed off, then finished quietly, “You fancy me too.”
She didn’t deny it, or blush dramatically, or rush to soften it into a joke, or backpeddle. She just met his eyes, steady and a little vulnerable, and gave a small, acknowledging nod.
“And if I came with you,” she continued, “whether we wanted it to happen or not, Rose and I would both end up competing for your attention. Consciously or not. I don’t want to be the reason we break.”
For a long moment, he said nothing. Then, against his better judgment, he smiled. Not a smug smile nor a triumphant one. Just stunned and ridiculously pleased.
The mental image that flickered through his mind, Rose and her bickering over him, of all people, was awkward and absurd and somehow very human. And the fact that she’d just admitted she fancied him, plainly and bravely, without trying to claim him he couldn’t help it.
“You know,” he said lightly, though his hearts were racing, “I’ve faced universe-ending horrors with less emotional complexity than this.”
She huffed a quiet laugh despite herself. But beneath his humor was something sincere, something careful and bright. He was smiling because she’d trusted him with the truth. Because she’d chosen honesty over possession.
The Doctor went quiet for a moment. He stood there, smiling at her brave, vulnerable honesty, letting it settle in his chest. He didn’t mind this. Whatever this was.
He didn’t even mind the inevitable, awkward conversation with Rose, the one where he’d have to be kind and clear and honest about not feeling that way. He could handle that, he always handled the hard talks, eventually.
The old fear lingered, of course. It always did. The echoing certainty that he would outlive anyone he let himself care about. That endings were baked into the deal. But right now it felt far away.
For a fleeting, dizzying moment, he felt like he was barely a hundred years old again, standing under Gallifrey’s burnt-orange skies, discovering what it meant to like someone and realizing, with astonishment, that they liked him back. Giddy and warm playground crushes. And he wasn’t ready for this to end either.
He wanted to see where it went.
Decision made, he straightened, spun back to the console, and flipped a few switches with renewed purpose. Buttons clicked. Coordinates locked in. The Tardis responded with a pleased, anticipatory hum.
“So,” The Doctor said casually, like he hadn’t just emotionally pivoted his entire existence, “how do you feel about Shakespeare?”
She blinked. “I- what?” The abrupt change gave her mental whiplash, but she recovered quickly. “I love him. Why?”
His grin turned positively mischievous. “Excellent.”
He gestured down one of the coral-lit corridors branching off from the console room. “Down there. Third left. You’ll find a wardrobe, look for the section labeled the early 1600s. Pick something comfortable.”
She eyed him suspiciously. “You’re joking.”
“I never joke about Shakespeare,” he said solemnly. Then ruined it with a grin. “Well . . . rarely.”
She shook her head, still smiling, and followed his directions, disappearing down the hall toward what he’d called a wardrobe with the skepticism of someone who had learned, very quickly, not to underestimate him.
He watched her go, hearts light, hands resting on the console.
While she was gone, footsteps fading down the corridor, the Doctor stood alone at the console and let himself feel it. Which was new. He rested his hands on the familiar controls, grounding himself, and considered how utterly whipped he already was.
It made no sense.
He’d known her- what? Days? Barely longer than that. A handful of conversations. One argument he wasn’t ven rally involved in. One laugh-filled sprint for their lives. And yet the way he felt around her was unmistakable, like his senses were tuned half a notch higher whenever she was near.
That wasn’t supposed to happen. Not to him.
The Doctor had lived centuries on centuries. He’d lost planets, families, entire eras. He’d loved before, deeply and disastrously, and learned the hard way what it cost to let himself want. He didn’t do quick. He didn’t do impulse. He certainly didn’t do crushes like some teenager discovering hormones for the first time.
And yet here he was. Completely blindsided.
It was out of left field in the most spectacular way. No slow burn he could pretend not to notice. No careful emotional distance. Just a sudden, undeniable pull. The way she looked at him when he talked. The way she listened and hung onto very word he said like each was more important than the last The way she challenged him without trying to control him, held people accountable without cruelty, chose honesty even when it cost her something she wanted just as badly as he did.
That bravery. That kindness. That laugh.
He scrubbed a hand over his face, half laughing at himself.
“Honestly,” he muttered to the console. “Pathetic.” The Tardis hummed, deeply unimpressed with that assessment. He ignored her.
He was still leaning against the console when he heard her footsteps return, lighter this time, almost buoyant. He looked up and forgot, briefly, how breathing worked.
She stood there beaming, clearly delighted with herself. The dress was simple by historical standards, a white linen base with soft, puffed sleeves; a front-laced corset in a rich, earthy green; a matching pleated skirt that brushed her ankles. Plain and practical, worn by average women of the era- peasants, laborers, people whose lives were work and survival.
But to her she looked like she’d stepped straight out of a Renaissance fair dream. She felt pretty, and that confidence radiated off her in a way no elaborate gown ever could. The way she held herself, her chin lifted, smile bright, eyes sparkling, made her glow.
The Doctor stared, openly and unapologetically.
“…Oh,” Was all he said. It came out softer than he’d meant to.
She glanced down at herself, suddenly shy despite the excitement. “Is it alright? It said common wear, so I figured-”
“Perfect,” he interrupted immediately. “Absolutely perfect.”
She looked back up at him, startled, then smiled even wider.
“You look like you belong there,” he added, warmth threading his voice. “Like you’ve always been.”
That made her laugh, a pleased little sound, and she did a small, delighted turn just to feel the skirt move. Watching her enjoy it, watching her feel beautiful, did something deep and dangerous to him.
The way confidence transformed her, the way joy sat so naturally on her shoulders. He’d seen queens in jeweled crowns look less radiant than she did right now in linen and green wool.
Standing there, hearts thudding far too fast, the Doctor thought- this is going to be a problem. A wonderful, exhilarating, absolutely inevitable problem.
He straightened, grinning like a man with a secret. “Ready, then?”
She nodded eagerly, then paused, stepping closer. “Wait. What are you actually planning?” She eyed his suit, amused. “And are you going to change, or are you just… wearing that?”
He just smiled and shrugged. “I don’t mind standing out. Besides-” his eyes softened as they flicked back to her dress, to the way she wore it so naturally, “I wanted you to have the full experience.” Before she could press him further, he turned back to the console, hands already moving as he readied the ship.
“Right,” he said casually, like he wasn’t about to upend her entire sense of time. “Whitehall. First of November. 1611.”
She blinked. “Okay…?”
He glanced over his shoulder, eyes bright. “First performance of The Tempest.”
Her eyes bulged. “You’re joking.”
He grinned, unrepentant. “I never joke about Shakespeare.”
She let out a sound that was half laugh, half gasp, and did that little excited hop he’d already noticed was a habit of hers, hands curling into her skirts as she beamed at him like he’d just handed her the universe.
“You’re serious,” she breathed.
“Deadly.”
She laughed again, giddy. “That’s- oh my god.”
Then something else clicked. Her smile softened, curiosity threading through the excitement. “Wait. If that’s where we’re going, why aren’t we heading home first?”
He hesitated just long enough for the truth to decide to come out.
“I didn’t want it to end yet,” he admitted, quietly honest.
Her cheeks warmed instantly, color blooming as she looked at him. The implication hung there between them, fragile and thrilling, the pull she felt wasn’t one-sided at all.
His grin gentled, less secret now, more sincere.
“So,” he said lightly, throwing the final lever, “fancy seeing history made?”
The Tardis roared to life as time folded around them, as the ship carried them toward Shakespeare and candlelight and a night that would echo for centuries, neither of them could quite stop smiling.
Some endings could wait. Tonight, they were going to the theatre.
i love how you write kratos but if your doing doctor x reader requests i want a doctor x male reader. im trans masc so if you could to that or just male. the doctor and his companion go out on a adventure alone and their both thinking about how it feels like a date but neither of them are sure if the other likes them back or not until someone mistakes them for a couple and they end up just going with it and confessing. so its just really cute and awkward. this can be any doctor im not picky. thx <3
ᯓ★Is this a date?
✰ Word Count: 16.1k
✰ Summary: The Doctor plans a trip to a beautiful alien city. Amy and Rory decide to sit this one out and rest. It’s just you two.
✰ Warnings: 11th Doctor(cause he's my fav), two idiots in love, male pronouns, mutual pinning, slight angst if you squint, sorry its so long i just love 11th doc <3
✰ Rating: PG-13
⋆.˚✮ Notes: I did my best to avoid any descriptions of anatomy and used male pronouns. I hope that works for everyone.
The doors of the Tardis slammed open with a bang that rattled the console, and four bodies tumbled inside in a breathless heap of limbs, coats, and shouted accusations.
“Running,” the Doctor announced frantically, a grin on his face, skidding across the glass floor toward the console. “Definitely running. That was, oh, that was not a welcoming committee.”
Behind him, Amy Pond dove through the doors just as a blast of neon-green energy scorched the air where her head had been a second earlier. Rory followed, half-dragging the younger man by the sleeve of his jacket.
“Door!” Rory shouted.
“I know!” the man yelled back, already reaching for it.
The Tardis doors groaned as he and Rory hauled them shut together, throwing their weight against the stubborn blue panels just as another barrage of angry alien shouting echoed from outside. Something thudded against the doors.
“Why,” Amy panted, pacing in tight circles with her hands in her hair, “do all your little detours turn into near-death experiences?”
“Oh, come on,” the Doctor said, flipping switches with manic precision. “That was hardly near death. Mildly singed at worst. You should’ve seen my seventh, no- eighth- oh, never mind.”
Another bang hit the doors.
Rory braced his shoulder harder. “Doctor!”
“Yes, yes, I’m aware we’re being shot at, thank you!” He yanked a lever down with a grin that was entirely too excited for the situation. “Honestly, though, whose idea was it to touch the glowing egg?”
Amy stopped pacing and jabbed a finger toward the guilty man in a jacket she deemed houredious and offensive to anyone with eyes. “His.”
The man scoffed. “It was pulsing, Amy. Pulsing things are basically invitations.”
Rory shot him a look. “So are bear traps.”
“I didn’t know it was sacred!”
“You never know anything!” Amy shot back, though her mouth twitched despite herself.
The Doctor glanced over his shoulder, eyes sparkling. “In his defense, it was very shiny.” The man met the Doctor’s gaze for half a second longer than necessary, just long enough for the adrenaline to do something strange in his chest, before looking away and pushing harder against the door as another angry shout echoed from outside.
“Doctor,” Rory said through clenched teeth, “any time now!”
“Almost there- oh! That’s new.” The Tardis lurched violently to the side.
Amy stumbled and grabbed the railing. “That doesn’t sound encouraging!”
“Oh, it’s very encouraging,” the Doctor said brightly. “Means they’ve hit the shields. Which means they’re trying. Which means-” He slammed his palm down on the console. “we’re gone!”
The familiar wheezing, groaning hum of the Tardis roared to life, drowning out the shouting aliens and shaking the room as time and space twisted around them. The pressure on the doors vanished. Rory and the man stumbled back, breathless, laughing despite themselves.
Amy collapsed onto the steps, exhaling hard. “I hate space.”
“You love space,” the Doctor corrected, bouncing on his heels as the Tardis finished its dramatic settling-down wobble with a final thunk, the central column slowing to a gentle, rhythmic rise and fall.
“Well!” the Doctor clapped his hands once, grinning. “Another narrow escape. Everyone alive? All limbs intact? No spontaneous extra heads?”
Amy lifted one hand from the step. “Ask me again in five minutes. I think my soul’s still lagging behind.”
Rory leaned back against her, stretching his legs out. “I’m just saying, if we’d listened to me and not poked the sacred alien egg-”
“It pulsed,” the man said mildly, already wandering toward the console. “That’s basically flirting.”
Amy snorted. “You flirt with everything.”
“I do not!”
“You flirted with a vending machine on Velrix-7.”
“It made eye contact.” He defended simply.
The Doctor laughed, delighted, and turned back to the console, fingers already dancing across the controls. The man stopped a respectful half-step away, leaning lightly against the rail, eyes following every movement.
He didn’t even realize he was doing it anymore. The Doctor noticed, he always did.
“Right,” the Doctor said, flicking a switch and peering at a glowing display. “Where to next, then? Somewhere relaxing? Somewhere not currently trying to vaporize us?”
Amy waved a hand lazily. “Surprise us.”
Rory nodded. “As long as it doesn’t involve running.”
“No running,” the Doctor promised solemnly, then immediately ruined it by adding, “Probably.”
The man smiled despite himself, eyes still on the Doctor’s hands as they skimmed over levers and buttons with impossible ease. He recognized more of them now than he used to. Knew what some of the symbols meant. Knew which switches not to touch unless he wanted to end up sideways in the 18th century. The Doctor noticed that, too.
“Oh!” he said suddenly, pointing without looking. “What’s that dial do?”
The man blinked. “That one?” He leaned in slightly, heart doing a stupid little flip at the closeness. “Spatial stabilizer. Keeps us from… sort of wobbling through dimensions like jelly.”
The Doctor’s grin widened. “Very good!”
Amy raised an eyebrow from the steps. “Since when do you know that?”
The man shrugged, trying not to look pleased. “Lessons.”
“Lessons,” Rory echoed. “Of course. The secret space lessons.”
“They’re not secret,” the Doctor said quickly, adjusting another lever. “Just exclusive.”
The man laughed under his breath, and the Doctor preened shamelessly, shoulders squaring just a bit as he worked. He loved this part, being watched, being admired, being understood. Especially by someone who wasn’t dazzled just by the spectacle, but by the mechanics of it all. He slowed slightly, deliberately, letting the man follow each step.
“Now,” the Doctor said, tapping a control. “If I wanted to set a course for somewhere sunny, two suns maybe, what would I adjust first?”
The man hesitated, then reached out, stopping just short of touching the console. “Temporal vector alignment. Otherwise we’d arrive. . . wrong.”
“Wrong how?”
“Wrong when,” he corrected.
The Doctor beamed. “Brilliant.”
Amy exchanged a look with Rory. “They’re insufferable.”
Rory smiled fondly. “Yeah. But kind of sweet.”
At the console, the man felt warmth creep up his neck under the Doctor’s approving gaze. He stepped back, hands in his pockets, pretending his pulse wasn’t racing over something so small. Watching the Doctor work felt like studying for an exam, if the exam involved impossible physics, flashing lights, and a teacher who grinned at you like you’d just done something wonderful simply by paying attention. The Doctor turned back to the controls, humming softly to himself, clearly enjoying the attention more than he’d ever admit.
Amy pushed herself up from the steps, smoothing her hair back into place as if reclaiming some dignity after the chaos. She wandered toward the console with purpose, clearly about to say something important.
The man barely noticed. What he did notice was Rory. Rory, who immediately popped up the second Amy stood, abandoning his seat to trail after her like gravity itself had recalibrated. He hovered just a step behind her, hand brushing the small of her back as if to make sure she didn’t vanish.
The man watched the scene unfold with an ache he didn’t bother to name. Rory was always like that, open, obvious, utterly unashamed in his devotion. He adored Amy with his whole chest, like loving her was the easiest, most natural thing in the universe. And she loved him right back just as fiercely.
The man swallowed.
Must be nice, he thought. To have someone you could fawn over without hesitation. Someone who fawned back. No second-guessing, no careful distance, no fear of ruining something precious by wanting more.
Before Amy could even open her mouth, he leaned against the console and smirked.
“Wow,” he said, tilting his head. “Careful there, Rory. If you stand any closer, people are going to think you’re surgically attached.”
Rory blinked. “What?”
“You followed her like a lost puppy,” the man continued cheerfully. “Again.”
Amy glanced back, amused. “He does do that.”
“I do not,” Rory protested, immediately indignant.
The Doctor looked up from the console, eyes lighting up. “Oh, he absolutely does.”
Rory turned on him. “You’re supposed to be neutral!”
“I’m never neutral,” the Doctor said happily. “I’m observant.”
The man pointed at Rory. “Five seconds ago, you were sitting down. Amy stands up, and suddenly, bam, there you are. Like she’s got a remote control.”
“She’s my wife,” Rory shot back.
“And?” the man raised his brows. “That just means you’re legally obligated to give her some personal space.”
Amy laughed, crossing her arms. “No, he’s right. You hover.”
“I do not hover!” Rory insisted, though he made no move to step away.
The Doctor leaned back slightly, hands steepled, grinning like he lived for moments like this. “Honestly, you two are unbearable. Completely obsessed with each other.”
“Disgustingly so,” the man added. “It’s like watching a romantic drama that never ends.”
Amy scoffed. “Oh, please. You’re just jealous.”
He opened his mouth, then paused, grin faltering for a fraction of a second before snapping back into place.
“Am I?” he said lightly. “No. I just don’t understand how you get anything done when you’re constantly making googly eyes at each other.”
Rory threw an arm around Amy’s shoulders. “We get plenty done.”
“Too much information,” the Doctor and the man said in unison.
Amy laughed, leaning into Rory without hesitation. “We’re married. We’re allowed.”
“Ah, yes,” the Doctor said sagely. “The sacred rights of marriage. Unlimited affection, public displays included.”
“And defending each other from mockery,” Rory added, glaring playfully at the man.
The man raised his hands in surrender. “Alright, alright. Lovebirds win. Carry on being insufferably happy.”
Rory grinned, triumphant, and Amy stuck her tongue out at them both.
The Doctor chuckled and turned back to the console, clearly pleased with the liveliness of the room. The man lingered beside him again, the banter fading into comfortable noise as the Tardis hummed around them. His smile softened as he watched Rory and Amy, so certain, so easy.
Amy leaned one hip against the console railing, eyes flicking between the Doctor’s hands and the man standing beside him. A small, knowing smile tugged at her mouth.
“Alright,” she said casually. “I’ve got a question.”
“Then I’m listening.” The Doctor grinned flippiung another switch and reading a screen simultaneously.
She pointed at the man with two fingers. “Why does he know how to fly the Tardis and I don’t?”
Slowly, he turned his head toward her. “Wait-”
Amy continued, undeterred. “Because, last I checked, I’ve been here longer than him.” She tilted her head, feigning offense. “Traveled more. Nearly died more. And yet somehow you’re the one getting flight lessons?”
Rory frowned. “Hold on. You can fly the Tardis?”
“I absolutely cannot,” the man said quickly. “Let’s clear that up right now.”
The Doctor finally looked up, brows lifting. “Oh, you absolutely can. Just badly.”
The man pressed a hand to his chest. “I’m wounded.”
Amy laughed. “I’m not mad,” she said, waving a hand. “Just curious. And maybe a little insulted on principle.”
The Doctor rocked back on his heels, thoughtful. “Well. That’s fair.”
He gestured vaguely between himself and the man. “When you two go home,” a nod to Amy and Rory “It’s just us. Fewer people aboard, fewer variables, fewer ways for things to go spectacularly wrong.”
“I resent that implication,” the man muttered.
“Oh, you absolutely should,” the Doctor shot back, grinning. “You once nearly inverted the gravity field.”
“That was one time.”
“And you screamed.”
“Because the floor went on the ceiling!”
Amy smirked. “So convenience?”
“Partly,” the Doctor admitted. “He started picking things up. Asking the right questions. Standing in the right places. You’d be amazed how many people stand in very wrong places.”
The man folded his arms. “So I was what. Practice?”
“No,” the Doctor said immediately. “Backup.” That landed differently.
The man blinked. “Oh.”
The Doctor continued, voice lighter but sincere. “The console was designed for multiple pilots. Time Lords didn’t fly alone, well, not usually. I only do because I had to. And having someone who understands the rhythms, the instincts, it could matter. One day.”
The man stared at the controls, heat creeping up his neck. “You could’ve said something.”
“I did,” the Doctor replied. “Repeatedly. You just kept saying ‘are you sure?’”
Amy watched the exchange with quiet interest.
“So,” she said slowly, “you trust him.”
The Doctor didn’t hesitate. “Yes.” The certainty in his voice made the room feel smaller somehow. Warmer.
The man tried to brush it off. “For the record, I think it’s very rude that you’re all discussing my competence like I’m not here.”
The Doctor leaned closer, voice conspiratorial. “Oh, don’t sulk. You’re very clever.”
“I am adequate.”
“You’re brilliant.”
The man huffed, but his smile gave him away. Amy’s gaze softened. She knew that look on the Doctor’s face, the one he got when he was holding something back. When he was choosing not to say more because saying it would make it real.
She didn’t push.
Instead, she smiled gently. “Alright then,” she said. “Makes sense.”
Rory blinked. “That’s it? You’re not going to interrogate him?”
“Nope,” Amy said, already turning away. “I get it.”
She caught the Doctor’s eye as she moved back toward the steps just a flicker of shared understanding.
The Doctor swallowed and turned back to the console, hands steady, heart anything but. And the man stayed beside him, close enough to feel the hum of the Tardis beneath his feet, unaware that he’d been invited into something far more important than flying lessons.
The Doctor turned back to the console before anyone could ask anything else of him. His hands moved easily, automatically, fingers tracing familiar paths over warm brass and glass. He gave himself something to do. He always did better when there was something to do.
Because the truth, the whole truth, was far messier than explanations about safety and convenience. Yes, it was practical. Yes, it made sense. Yes, the console had been designed for more than one pilot, and yes, having someone else who understood the rhythms of the ship could save lives one day.
All of that was true. But it wasn’t the reason he’d started teaching him.
The Doctor had spent centuries alone at this console. Centuries learning how to fly with hands that remembered what they’d lost. Centuries listening to the Tardis hum beneath him, the only constant he’d ever known. She was his home, his oldest companion, the last piece of a life that had burned away in war.
Letting someone else touch her, really touch her, understand her, was not something he did lightly. He’d told himself it was accidental at first. That the man had just noticed things. That curiosity had turned into questions, and questions into answers. That standing side by side had simply happened.
But that was a lie. The Doctor had noticed long before the man ever did. Noticed how he lingered near the console. How his eyes followed the controls not with hunger or entitlement, but with respect. How he listened, not just to the Doctor, but to the ship. How he didn’t try to impress, didn’t rush, didn’t demand.
The Doctor swallowed and adjusted a dial he didn’t actually need to touch.
He liked those moments, just the two of them, drifting through the vortex. Teaching him the language of time and motion, watching understanding bloom in his expression. Watching him care. He liked the way it felt intimate without being loud about it. The way sharing something sacred didn’t require words like romance or commitment to still mean something.
Because that was what it was, wasn’t it?
An offering. This is my home. This is how I keep it safe. This is how I survive. This is me letting you closer.
The Doctor had loved before. Gods, he had loved. He knew what it cost to say too much, too soon. Knew what happened when humans burned bright and fast against the long shadow of his life.
So he kept quiet. He laughed. He teased. He explained the sensible reasons and left the rest buried where it wouldn’t hurt either of them.
Amy had seen it anyway. Of course she had. The Doctor smiled faintly to himself, eyes on the console, pretending very hard that the sudden tightness in his chest was nothing at all.
He didn’t know what this was yet.
But he knew one thing with terrible certainty; if there ever came a day when he couldn’t do this alone, when the universe demanded more than one set of hands at the controls, he wanted it to be him.
And the Tardis hummed softly beneath them, as if she already knew.
Rory yawned. It was loud. A full-body kind of yawn that old people do after a thanksgiving feast. The Doctor flinched, his thoughts scattering ad toning back into the world around him, as Rory scrubbed a hand down his face and blinked blearily around the console room.
“Sorry,” Rory mumbled. “Didn’t mean to-”
Amy snorted. “You absolutely did. That was a statement.”
The man glanced over. “Wow. Riveting stuff, Rory. Really bringing the energy.”
“Oh, shut up,” Rory said weakly.
Amy’s gaze slid from her husband to the man, eyes narrowing thoughtfully. “You know what?” she said. “While we’re pointing things out, what is that jacket?”
He looked down at himself. “Not this again.”
“It’s ugly.”
“It is not.”
“It looks like it lost a fight with a charity shop.”
The man scoffed. “That’s rich coming from someone who once wore a dress made of literal plastic.”
“It was fashion,” Amy snapped.
“It was a bin bag.”
Rory groaned. “Please don’t start.”
“Oh, I’m starting,” Amy said, jabbing a finger at the man. “You look like my granfather. Thats saying something while you’re standing next to him.” She gave the Doctor in his signature tween and bow tie a pointed side eye.
“Oi,” The Doctor protested to deaf ears.
“It’s comfy!”
“It’s hidious!”
Amy’s voice shifted, the sharpness giving way to something quieter. She sighed, long and tired, and reached for Rory’s hand. He leaned into her immediately, eyes half-lidded.
“Alright,” she said gently. “That’s enough excitement for one day.”
Rory nodded, barely awake. “I vote bed.”
“Seconded.”
She looked toward the Doctor, something fond and grateful in her eyes. “We’re turning in.”
The Doctor turned, smile easy and understanding. “Good plan. Humans need sleep. Very important. Stops you from falling over mid-crisis.”
Rory managed a tired grin. “Night, Doctor.”
“Night,” the man added softly.
Amy slowed as they reached the corridor junction, then stopped altogether.
“Oh!” she said suddenly, like the thought had just occurred to her.
Rory blinked sleepily. “Oh what?”
She turned back toward the Doctor, hands clasped behind her back, eyes bright with mischief. “Doctor,” she spoke, voice light and teasing, “Do you think you could drop us home for the night?”
The Doctor looked up. “Home?”
“Yes,” Amy said, laying it on thick. “Our own home. Our own bed. After all this running and almost dying and,” she gestured vaguely, “being excluded from secret Tardis flight school.”
The man coughed, trying very hard not to smile.
Rory perked up instantly. “Wait, home home?”
Amy nodded. “Home home.”
Rory’s face lit up like Christmas. “With the shower?”
“Yes, Rory. With the shower.”
“And the bed that doesn’t wobble when the ship sneezes?”
“That too.”
Rory turned to the Doctor, hopeful. “Please?”
The Doctor crossed his arms. “You know there are showers on the Tardis.”
“Yes,” Amy said sweetly, “but they don’t smell like us.”
“And beds,” the Doctor continued stubbornly. “Plenty of beds.”
“They’re very timey-wimey,” Rory said diplomatically.
Amy stepped closer to the console, dropping her voice into exaggerated woundedness. “Besides,” she added, glancing pointedly between the Doctor and the man, “clearly I’m just in the way of very important private lessons.”
The man choked. “Amy.”
She gasped. “Oh, don’t Amy me. I see how it is. New favorite.”
The Doctor spluttered. “That is- I don’t-” He adjusted his bowtie and scoffed.
Amy clutched her chest dramatically. “It’s fine. I’ll survive. I’ll just go sleep in my boring human bed with my boring human husband.”
Rory waved cheerfully. “I’m boring!”
The Doctor groaned, rubbing his face. “You are impossible. Both of you.” But he was already turning back to the console.
Amy’s smile softened, teasing giving way to something warm and unmistakably intentional. She met the man’s eyes for just a second and winked. You’re welcome.
The Doctor began inputting coordinates, fingers flying. “A few hours after you left, yes? So you can wake up like none of this ever happened.”
“Perks of a time machine,” Amy said lightly.
The Tardis lurched into motion, the familiar wheeze filling the room.
Rory squeezed Amy’s hand. “I can’t wait to not be running.”
The Doctor huffed. “You’ll miss it.”
Amy smiled over her shoulder. “Maybe.”
The Tardis settled almost immediately.
“There,” the Doctor said. “Home. Bed. Shower. Domestic bliss.”
Amy stepped forward and wrapped him in a quick, fierce hug. “Thank you.”
Then, just as quickly, she pulled back and kissed his cheek. “Be good.”
The Doctor blinked. “I’m always good.”
She laughed, grabbed Rory’s hand, and headed for the doors. Rory waved enthusiastically at the man. “Night!”
“Night,” the man replied, pulse a little faster than it had been before.
The doors closed behind them with a soft thunk. Silence settled. The Doctor exhaled slowly, shoulders loosening as he turned back to the console and to the man standing beside him.
“Well,” he said lightly, eyes dancing. “Just us.”
The Tardis hummed, warm and approving. And somewhere deep inside, the Doctor was already deciding where to take him next.
The silence didn’t last long.
The man shifted his weight, hands still tucked into his jacket pockets. “So,” he said carefully, “since the Ponds have abandoned us to our extracurricular activities-”
“Lessons,” the Doctor corrected immediately.
“Lessons,” the man conceded, “I should probably point out that I’m human. And humans require sleep.”
The Doctor sniffed. “Debatable.” He turned a dial, watching the readout change. “Sleep is just the body doing maintenance because it hasn’t figured out how to multitask properly.”
“That’s incredibly dismissive of biology.”
“Biology is incredibly dismissive of productivity.”
The man folded his arms. “You watched Rory nearly pass out five minutes ago.”
“Yes, well, Rory is spectacularly human.”
“And I’m not?”
The Doctor glanced at him, eyes sharp with mischief. “You’re. . . less Rory.”
“High bar.”
The Doctor grinned. “Exactly.”
The man huffed a laugh. “For the record, sleep improves cognitive function, reaction time, and mood.”
“Temporary improvements,” the Doctor countered. “Adventure improves everything.”
“Adventure also gets people shot at.”
“Minor detail.”
The man leaned back against the railing. “You’re going to make me tired on purpose, aren’t you?”
“Possibly.”
“And then say it’s my fault.”
“Almost certainly.”
They stood there, eyeing each other with exaggerated seriousness, like scholars debating the fate of the universe rather than whether one of them should go to bed.
The man sighed theatrically. “You know, if I don’t sleep, I’ll be cranky.”
“I like cranky,” the Doctor said cheerfully. “Very honest.”
“I’ll make bad decisions.”
“Also like that.”
“I could die.”
The Doctor waved a hand. “Everyone could die. That’s not unique.”
The man opened his mouth to argue then stopped. Something shifted. The tension in his shoulders eased, his eyes brightening as a slow grin spread across his face. He tilted his head, studying the Doctor like he’d just remembered something very important.
“You said something earlier,” he said.
The Doctor stilled. “Did I?”
“Two suns.”
The Doctor’s face lit up instantly.
“Oh!” he burst out, already moving, energy snapping back into him like a live wire. “Yes! Two suns. Well, technically binary stellar bodies with slightly asynchronous orbits, but suns sounds nicer, doesn’t it?”
He danced around the console, flipping switches, slapping buttons with delighted urgency. “Oh, you’re going to love this place. Everyone does. It’s been romanticized to death, honestly, honeymoons, anniversaries, very dramatic proposals-”
“Honeymoons?” the man echoed faintly.
“Focus!” the Doctor said, though he was grinning. “It’s a resort planet. Lavish. Ridiculous. Always sunny, because, again, two suns, and four moons, which do marvelous things to the tides and the nightlife.”
The central column began to rise and fall faster.
“There are gardens,” the Doctor continued, talking with his whole body now, hands slicing the air, coat flaring. “Alien flora that actually responds to music. Trees so tall they had to build skywalks through the branches because- oh- they’re older than the cities beneath them.”
The man watched him, heart doing something inconvenient.
“And the technology!” the Doctor added. “Integrated seamlessly, nothing ugly, nothing harsh. It all grows with the place. Cities that breathe, lights that follow you, pathways that adjust so you’re always walking in the shade.”
The man smiled softly. “Sounds… peaceful.”
The Doctor paused, glancing back at him.
“It is,” he said, quieter now. Then his grin returned full force. “Which is exactly why we’re going. Humans sleep better after wonder.”
The Tardis groaned into motion, time and space folding around them.
The man laughed, shaking his head as he stepped closer to the console. “You’re impossible.”
“Yes,” the Doctor agreed happily. “But I have two suns.” And the Tardis hurled them forward, humming like she couldn’t wait to show them both.
The vortex unfurled around them in ribbons of gold and blue, the Tardis humming louder as the central column rose and fell with purpose.
The Doctor’s grin sharpened.
“Right,” he said suddenly, clapping his hands once. “Your turn.”
The man blinked. “My what?”
“Landing,” the Doctor said, already stepping aside from the console with exaggerated ceremony. “I’ve set the course. You just have to bring us in without flattening anything important.”
The man stared at the controls.
“Important like people?” he asked faintly.
“Yes,” the Doctor said brightly. “Very much people. Buildings too. Statues. Decorative fountains. Oh! And the trees, don’t hit the trees. They’re older than most civilizations and very grumpy about it.”
The man swallowed hard. “You didn’t mention this part.”
“I absolutely did.”
“No, you mentioned wobbling and humming and not touching the red one.”
“Ah,” the Doctor nodded. “This is after that.”
The man’s hands hovered over the console, suddenly aware of how many buttons there were. Too many. Far too many. His heart kicked up, adrenaline spiking all over again.
“I’m going to crash,” he muttered.
“You are not.”
“I’m going to crash spectacularly.”
“You really aren’t.”
“I’m going to hit a-”
The Doctor moved.
He stepped in close, close enough that the man could feel his presence like warmth at his back, one hand braced lightly on the console beside his, the other hovering near a lever without touching it.
“Hey,” the Doctor said, softer now. “Breathe.”
The man inhaled shakily.
“Good,” the Doctor continued. “You’ve done this part before. Feel the ship. She’ll tell you what she wants.”
The Tardis hummed, almost encouraging.
“Alright,” the Doctor said near his ear, voice steady and sure. “See that dial? Ease it back. Just a little. No- no, not that much. There. Perfect.”
The man did as he was told, fingers trembling at first, then settling as the ship responded, smoothing out beneath them.
“That’s it,” the Doctor murmured. “You’re flying.”
“I am terrified.”
“Yes,” the Doctor said. “That’s normal.”
The vortex shifted, the colors slowing as their destination drew closer.
“Now,” the Doctor said, calm as the eye of a storm, “when we drop out, you’re going to want to touch the stabilizer. Gently. Pretend it’s very expensive porcelain.”
“I’m going to break it.”
“You won’t. I’m right here.”
The man glanced sideways, catching the Doctor’s reflection in the glass focused, encouraging, utterly unafraid of him failing. Something in his chest unclenched. He adjusted the controls again, movements more confident now, guided by the Doctor’s voice and the ship’s steady hum.
“There,” the Doctor said with unmistakable pride. “See? Knew you had it.”
The vortex peeled away.
Light flooded the viewscreen, golden and warm, and the Tardis eased forward, descending smoothly toward a world of sunlit gardens and towering trees.
The man exhaled, breathless. “I didn’t hit anything.”
The Doctor beamed. “Not even a pigeon.”
“I hate that you specified that.”
The Doctor laughed, clapping him on the shoulder. “You did brilliantly.”
The Tardis settled with a gentle thunk, engines winding down as the ship came to rest. For a moment, neither of them moved.
The Doctor finally stepped back, hands in his pockets, eyes bright. “Told you you could do it.”
The man swallowed, pulse still racing, for reasons that had nothing to do with flying.
The Doctor snapped back into motion like a switch had been flipped.
“Right!” he said, already bounding off the platform. “Out we go, come on, come on- oh, you’re going to love this, I can feel it.”
He seized the man’s wrist, not tight, just guiding, and started tugging him toward the doors, words spilling out faster than his feet.
“Climate’s perfect, always is, well, perfect if you like sun, which you do because you’re human and humans are basically solar-powered, oh! Speaking of which-”
He stopped abruptly and poked the man’s chest.
“Jacket. Off.”
“What?” the man blinked.
“It’s warm. Two suns. You’ll melt. Also,” the Doctor squinted at it critically “It’s ugly.”
The man gasped, scandalized. “You take that back.”
“No,” the Doctor said cheerfully. “I won’t.”
“I like this jacket.”
“That’s unfortunate.”
The man scowled as he shrugged it off, grumbling as he draped it over the nearest railing. “For the record, this jacket has history.”
“Yes,” the Doctor replied, already moving again. “A tragic one.”
The man opened his mouth to retort, but the Doctor was suddenly right there again, close enough that the words dissolved before they could form.
“And the planet!” the Doctor continued, entirely unapologetic, eyes shining as he resumed walking. “Gardens everywhere, actual living ecosystems, not just decorative nonsense, in the middle of bustling cities. Flowers that open when you laugh, vines that glow at night, creatures that look like they’re made of stained glass-”
He gestured wildly as they walked, occasionally bumping shoulders, occasionally steering him by the elbow without even noticing he was doing it.
“Technology’s woven right in,” the Doctor went on. “None of that cold, metallic sterility. It grows with the place. Cities that breathe, brilliant, isn’t it?”
The man nodded, barely aware he was doing so. He wasn’t really listening to every word anymore. He was watching the Doctor.
Watching the way he lit up when he talked about worlds and cultures, the way his hands carved wonder out of the air, the way his excitement was so genuine it was contagious. This was the Doctor at his best, sharing, inviting, offering pieces of the universe like gifts.
This was why he traveled. This was why he stayed.
The Doctor slowed near the doors, still talking, still glowing with enthusiasm. “And the trees, oh, you’ll love the trees, taller than skyscrapers, older than most civilizations, and absolutely convinced they’re better than everyone else.”
He glanced back, finally noticing the man had gone quiet.
“Oh,” he said softly, smile turning fond. “You’re doing the staring thing again.”
The man flushed. “I’m listening.”
The Doctor grinned. “Good. Because we’re about to step into something beautiful.”
The Doctor didn’t open the doors himself. Instead, he stepped aside and made a small, almost ceremonial gesture toward the controls. “Go on,” he said lightly. “Honors are yours.”
The man hesitated for half a heartbeat, then reached out and pulled the door open. Light spilled in first, warm and rosy, flooding the console room with color that didn’t exist anywhere inside the Tardis. Then sound, soft music drifting in the air, not loud enough to intrude, just present, like the planet itself was humming.
The man froze.
Just outside the doors, birds fluttered past with wings like living stained glass, sunlight refracting through panes of emerald, amber, and violet as they darted and swooped. Their beaks chimed softly as they moved, a delicate, melodic sound that wove itself into the distant music.
Beyond them, the world opened up.
Humanoid locals strolled along wide paths, tall and elegant, skin in shades of blue and violet and soft lilac, glowing faintly beneath the twin suns. They laughed easily, dressed in flowing fabrics threaded with subtle lights. Modern buildings rose nearby, sleek and curved, glass and metal, but they were tangled with vines and flowering plants, balconies spilling over with greenery like something out of a fairytale. Technology and nature didn’t compete here; they coexisted.
The sky was a soft pink, streaked with gold where the suns hung low, and everywhere were flowers. Trees with blossoms instead of leaves. Alien berry bushes bursting with color along the edges of the paths. Moss-like plants glowing faintly between paving stones. Not an inch of ground was bare unless it was meant to be walked on.
It was overwhelming.
The man stepped forward slowly, like he was afraid the whole thing might vanish if he moved too fast. His eyes were wide, reflecting color and light and motion, his breath catching as he took it all in.
“Oh,” he whispered. It wasn’t awe dressed up in clever words. Just pure, honest wonder. The Doctor followed him out onto the threshold, stopping just behind him.
He’d seen this planet dozens of times. More, probably. He knew where the best views were, which paths led to the grand gardens, and which spots the tourists always crowded. He knew its rhythms, its festivals, its carefully curated beauty.
It hadn’t surprised him in a long time. But watching it through the man’s eyes, watching his shoulders slowly relax, watching the tightness leave his face as wonder replaced it, something unfamiliar stirred in the Doctor’s chest.
It felt new again.
The birds swept past once more, casting fractured rainbows over them both. The man laughed quietly, helplessly, as one brushed close enough that he could see the fine veins in its wings.
“It’s,” He shook his head, at a loss. “You didn’t say it was this beautiful.”
The Doctor smiled, soft and almost shy. “I did say gardens.”
“That’s not a garden,” the man said, still staring. “That’s a dream.”
The Doctor watched him take another step forward, sunlight catching in his hair, color reflected in his eyes, and the planet felt like more than a destination.
The man lingered there a moment longer, standing at the threshold as if rooted in place, eyes drinking in color and movement and light as if he might never get enough of it.
Behind him, the Doctor reached back and pulled the doors closed. They shut with a soft, familiar click. He tapped the panel once out of habit, locking it, then glanced up with a small, satisfied hum.
Perfect landing. Perfect placement. The Tardissat was neatly tucked into a curved alcove just off the main path, half-hidden behind flowering vines and tall, feathery plants that swayed gently in the warm breeze. She looked like she belonged there, like she’d always been meant to wait in that pocket of shade and color.
The Doctor smiled, proud in the quiet way he rarely allowed himself.
Then he turned back to the man. Without hesitation, without ceremony, he reached out and took his hand. He did it easily, naturally, just as he had with countless companions before. A guiding touch. A promise not to lose them in the crowd. An excuse he could name a dozen ways if anyone ever asked.
The man startled only slightly before his fingers curled back, warm and solid and real.
“Right,” the Doctor said, already stepping forward and gently tugging him along the path. “Options!”
They started walking, the ground warm beneath their feet, petals drifting lazily through the air.
“We could go left,” the Doctor continued, pointing ahead with his free hand, “toward the high gardens, skywalks through the treetops, views of all four moons if you time it right, very romantic, extremely dramatic.”
The man huffed a soft laugh, still half-dazed. “You say that like it’s a warning.”
“Oh, it is,” the Doctor said cheerfully. “Lots of proposals up there.”
He gestured the other way. “Or right, market district. Music, food that probably shouldn’t be trusted but absolutely should be eaten, locals who will definitely flirt with you.”
The man glanced sideways at him. “Definitely?”
“Yes,” the Doctor said, nodding once. “You’re very flirtable.”
The man’s grip tightened just a fraction.
“And then,” the Doctor added, voice dropping conspiratorially, “there’s the inner gardens. Quiet paths. Water features. Bioluminescent plants that only wake up when the suns dip. Less crowded. One of my personal favorites.”
He looked over then, really looked at the man’s expression, still glowing with wonder, still soft and open in a way the Doctor treasured.
“So,” he said lightly. “First stop?”
The path curved gently as they walked, winding between flowering trees and softly glowing vines. The air was warm and fragrant, carrying music from somewhere distant, never loud enough to intrude.
At some point, neither of them could have said when, the man drifted closer. It wasn’t deliberate. There was no clear reason for it. No sudden stumble, no narrowing of the path. He simply leaned in, shoulder brushing the Doctor’s arm, steps unconsciously matching his.
The Doctor noticed it, and he felt the warmth through the thin fabric of his coat, felt the subtle shift in weight as the man drew nearer. A smile tugged at his mouth before he could stop it, soft and private.
He’s just distracted, the Doctor told himself. The planet does that to people. Too many colors. Too much beauty.
He kept his pace steady, gaze forward, hand still loosely holding the man’s as if nothing had changed.
The man cleared his throat, breaking the quiet.
“Hey,” he said. “You hungry?”
The Doctor blinked. “Me? Never.”
“That’s a lie.”
“It’s an optimistic truth.”
The man smiled, eyes still roving over the gardens. “There were markets back there, you said? We could grab something to eat.”
The Doctor hummed thoughtfully. “Tempting.”
“And then,” the man added, almost casually, “you could show me your favorite place.”
The Doctor turned his head.
“My favorite place?”
“Yeah,” the man said, finally looking at him. There was something earnest there, something a little shy beneath the confidence. “You talk about everything like it’s incredible. I want to see the one thing you find the most fascinating.”
For a moment, the Doctor forgot to mask it. The surprise. The warmth. The quiet flutter in his chest. He recovered quickly, of course, he always did.
Tilting his head with a playful grin. “Careful,” he said lightly. “That’s a dangerous request.”
The man laughed. “I’ve noticed.”
The Doctor squeezed his hand just a fraction tighter as they walked on, telling himself it was a habit. Telling himself it meant nothing.
As they headed toward the markets, the gardens glowing around them like a dream built for romance, both of them wondered the same thing. Was it the planet making everything feel this way?
They’d learned that food here was not meant to wander. Every vendor they’d approached with a hopeful to-go? had reacted with the same gentle horror, hands fluttering, expressions politely scandalized. Eating while walking was apparently taboo. Messy. Disrespectful. Something you did if you wanted to be quietly judged by an entire city of beautiful strangers.
So they’d settled instead into a restaurant tucked beneath a canopy of flowering vines, its walls grown rather than built. Soft light pulsed through translucent leaves overhead, shifting color with the movement of the suns. The air was warm and fragrant, humming faintly with conversation and distant music.
They sat across from each other at a small, curved table.
The man stared down at his plate, fork hovering uncertainly. Whatever it was called, something with too many syllables and at least one sound humans were not meant to make, it looked like it belonged in a museum. Carefully arranged. Glossed with a dark, iridescent glaze. Garnished with something that shimmered faintly.
He took a bite.
“Oh,” he said, genuinely startled. “That’s actually incredible.”
The Doctor perked up immediately. “Is it?”
“It tastes like tangy barbecue chicken,” the man said slowly, chewing, “but fancy. Like the chicken went to culinary school and got an art degree.”
The Doctor laughed, nearly knocking his glass over. “Yes! That’s exactly it!”
“You’ve had this before?”
“Of course I have. I told you, a hundred times. Though last time it tasted more like citrus and regret.”
The man frowned. “Regret?”
“Long story. Involved a misunderstanding and a very competitive chef.”
The man laughed, shaking his head as he took another bite. “I can’t even pronounce the name. I’m just calling it ‘space chicken.’”
“That’s deeply offensive,” the Doctor said solemnly. “It has a proud cultural history.”
“It’s delicious,” the man countered. “I respect it immensely.”
The Doctor pointed his fork at him. “Careful. Complimenting alien cuisine is how you get invited to weddings.”
The man snorted. “I’ll take my chances.”
They ate, trading bites and comments, the conversation flowing easily, teasing remarks, exaggerated opinions, the Doctor insisting something was an acquired taste while the man insisted it tasted like soap. Their voices blended into the low hum of the restaurant, laughter coming easily, comfortably. At one point, the man caught himself just watching the Doctor talk, hands moving, eyes bright, mouth curving around words like he enjoyed the act of saying them as much as the meaning behind them.
He looked away quickly, focusing on his plate. The Doctor, of course, noticed. For a moment, there was a pause, just the clink of utensils, the soft glow of the space, the feeling of something unspoken settling comfortably between them. If anyone had been watching, it would have looked like a date. They both noticed that little detail, yet neither of them said anything about it.
The man took another bite of his ‘space chicken’, and let his gaze wander, idly, the way it does when conversation pauses just long enough for thoughts to slip in.
He noticed something he failed to see before. Not the locals, looking elegant and effortless, skin glowing softly in hues of blue. Not the tourists either, the ones who looked like him: wide-eyed, slightly overwhelmed, clearly trying not to stare.
It was the tables. Every single one of them had only two seats and two people. Bodies angled toward each other. Hands brushing. Heads inclined close, laughter shared softly, like the rest of the world had agreed to be quieter just for them.
Couples. Everywhere he looked.
It was early evening; the light had begun to shift, the twin suns slowly lowering, casting everything in warm gold and pink. The garden around the restaurant glowed gently, vines curling overhead like they’d grown specifically to frame moments like this. Music drifted in lazy, romantic currents, timed almost too perfectly to be a coincidence.
And there they were. Sitting across from each other. Doing exactly what everyone else was doing. He swallowed, suddenly aware of how close the Doctor felt even across the table. How easy the laughter had been. How natural it felt to be here with him.
Oh.
He glanced down at his plate, then back up, keeping it casual, but not really, not at all. He took in the Doctor’s posture, the way he leaned forward slightly when listening, the way his eyes softened when he smiled.
This place was designed for romance, a tourist trap for romance, that much was obvious. The local businesses were likely making a killing selling honeymoon packages, and advertising restaurants and events as perfect date spots. The atmosphere would make any moment feel charged. Any shared meal feels intimate. Anyone sitting across from someone they cared about might mistake the atmosphere for something more.
Right?
He shifted in his seat, nerves prickling. The Doctor noticed the change instantly. He always did.
“You alright?” the Doctor asked lightly, tilting his head. “Food not fighting back, is it?”
The man forced a small smile. “No, it’s great. Just-”
He gestured vaguely around them. The Doctor followed his gaze, than he went very still. The realization dawned slowly, then all at once. His eyes flicked from table to table, taking in the pairs, the body language, the unmistakable rhythm of it all.
“Oh,” he said.
There was a beat of silence.
The Doctor cleared his throat and reached for his glass, suddenly very interested in it. “Well. Yes. That’s… right.”
The man laughed awkwardly. “We’ve accidentally sat down in the middle of date night, haven’t we?”
The Doctor’s mouth twitched. “Seems so.”
Neither of them moved. Neither of them suggested leaving. The man met the Doctor’s eyes again, uncertainty and something softer mingling in his expression.
“So,” he said, trying for casual. “This is normal here?”
The Doctor nodded, a little too quickly. “Very. Hugely. This whole district’s basically built for . . . well.”
“Romance,” the man finished quietly. “What Paris wishes it was.”
“Yes,” the Doctor said.
They sat there, surrounded by couples, eating together beneath flowering vines as the light softened around them, both wondering the same thing, neither brave enough to ask.
Was this just the setting, or were they on a proper date with a friend they fancied?
The Doctor caught the shift as it happened. It was subtle. A tension he’d learned to recognize in humans long ago. The way the man’s shoulders had drawn in just a fraction, the way his smile hadn’t quite reached his eyes. Uncomfortable and uncertain.
The Doctor’s chest tightened.
Ah.
Of course, he’d misread it. Let himself drift too far. Let the planet, the setting, the quiet closeness blur lines that hadn’t been meant to move. The last thing he wanted, the very last thing, was to make his friend feel uncomfortable.
So he did what he always did, he joked. “That’s my fault entirely. Shouldn’t have brought you here during peak romance hours,” the Doctor said suddenly, waving a hand as if brushing the whole thing away.
The man blinked. “Peak?”
“Oh yes,” the Doctor continued lightly, leaning back in his chair, tone deliberately breezy. “This place absolutely capitalizes on it. Weddings, anniversaries, dramatic proposals at sunset, very lucrative. Bit of a nuisance, really.”
He laughed, a touch too loudly. “Honestly, I don’t know why everyone gets so caught up in that part. I come for the ecology. The integration of technology and flora. Fascinating stuff. Trees older than most empires, cities that grow instead of expand, that’s the appeal.”
He gestured vaguely around them. “All this?” He shrugged. “Just atmosphere.”
The man listened, nodding slowly, “Oh,” he said, after a beat. “Yeah. That makes sense.” He smiled, but not a real one, the kind you give when you didn’t want to make things awkward, like when you don't remember someone's name. “Would’ve been weird if you meant it that way,” he added lightly. “Guess I just got in my head a bit.”
The Doctor’s grin widened in relief, even as something quietly sank in his chest. “Happens,” he said. “Humans do that. Overthink.”
“Constantly,” the man agreed.
They both laughed.
It sounded right. It looked right. Anyone watching would’ve seen two friends sharing a meal, joking comfortably, but neither of them was. The man looked back down at his plate, the food suddenly less interesting. The idea that the Doctor hadn’t even considered this being a date stung more than he’d expected. He told himself it was silly. Of course the Doctor wouldn’t think that way. Of course this was just another stop, another world.
Still, it hurt.
Across from him, the Doctor lifted his glass, hiding the flicker of disappointment behind a smile that had carried him through centuries. He told himself he’d done the right thing. That easing the man’s discomfort mattered more than indulging a hope he had no right to.
Two hurt feelings carefully tucked behind practiced smiles, both convinced, entirely wrongly, that the other was relieved.
The mood lifted as they walked. The Doctor launched into a story about a recent adventure with Amy and Rory, hands already in motion as he spoke. The walkways narrowed as they went, branching off from the main thoroughfares into quieter stretches of greenery. Flowering vines climbed archways overhead, petals drifting lazily down around them. The distant music faded, replaced by the soft hum of insects and the occasional flutter of stained-glass wings passing above.
They walked more slowly without realizing it.
Fewer people passed them now, just the occasional couple strolling hand in hand, or a lone local tending to glowing plants along the path. The crowds thinned until it felt like the gardens belonged to them alone.
It felt like a dream. The Doctor’s grin widened as they walked, clearly struck by a memory that amused him far more than it should have.
“Oh!” he said suddenly. “You know, this place actually reminds me of something.”
The man glanced over. “That sounds dangerous.”
“Only mildly,” the Doctor replied cheerfully. “There was this one time, before you joined us, when Amy, Rory, and I got trapped by the Dream Lord.”
The man’s interest piqued immediately. “The what?”
“Manifestation of psychic pollen, ego, and unresolved self-loathing,” the Doctor said breezily. “Very dramatic. Anyway, we were stuck bouncing between a dream world and reality, couldn’t tell which was which. Both had ways to kill us.”
“That’s horrifying.” He responded, not sure why the Doctor wore a smile while discussing something so horrific, and wondering what the hell made him think of it now.
“Oh, absolutely,” the Doctor agreed. “But no one got hurt in the end, so it’s funny now.”
The man shook his head. “How did you get out?”
“We had to figure out which world was fake,” the Doctor explained lightly. “The trick was realizing that we couldn’t save ourselves in either. No escape. No clever solution. Just had to accept it.”
He said it like he was talking about a puzzle, not a nightmare.
The man glanced at him. “Then why bring it up?”
The Doctor chuckled, eyes sparkling with mischief. “Because I wish you’d been there.”
The man blinked. “Me?”
“Oh yes,” the Doctor continued, warming to the thought. “You would’ve loved it. Or hated it. Hard to say. But most importantly-” He leaned in slightly, voice dropping conspiratorially. “Rory had a ponytail.”
The man stopped walking. “A ponytail.”
“A long one,” the Doctor confirmed solemnly. “Hideous. Traumatizing. Like someone glued sadness to the back of his head.”
The man burst out laughing. “No.”
“Oh yes.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Imagine it,” the Doctor urged, shuddering theatrically. “Long hair, jeanjacket. Very intense, very moody. Looked like he was auditioning for a tragic space opera.”
The man wiped at his eyes, still laughing. “I can’t unsee that now.”
“Good,” the Doctor said. “Suffer as I have suffered.”
They both laughed, the sound ringing out into the quiet garden. The Doctor even wrapped his arms around himself, shivering dramatically.
“Honestly,” he added, “that ponytail was the real nightmare.”
The man shook his head, smiling wide. “Poor Rory. He’s never going to live that down.”
“Never,” the Doctor agreed, grin softening as they started walking again, their laughter fading naturally into something quieter as the gardens deepened around them. The path narrowed, lights glowing softly at their feet, petals drifting lazily through the warm air.
After a moment, the man spoke again.
“Hey,” he said, thoughtful now. “What made you think of that? The Dream Lord, I mean.”
The Doctor glanced sideways. “Hmm?”
“You were smiling,” the man continued. “Talking about something that honestly sounds terrifying. I just wondered what the connection was.”
The Doctor slowed a fraction.
He shrugged, easy and unbothered, their shoulders brushing as they walked. “Nothing complicated.”
The man waited.
“This place,” the Doctor said simply. “Feels like a dream.”
He gestured vaguely around them, the glowing plants, the softened light, the way the city seemed to hum rather than exist. “Cities like this. Too beautiful. Too polished. Makes your brain start asking questions.”
Is it real? How long will it last? What’s the catch?
He didn’t say the rest.
Didn’t say that walking here with him made everything feel lighter, unreal in the best possible way. Didn’t say that for once, the dream wasn’t threatening or sharp-edged; it was homely.
“So it reminded me of being in one,” the Doctor finished lightly. “That’s all.”
The man nodded, accepting the answer as it was given. “Huh. That makes sense.”
They kept walking.
The moment passed as easily as it had come, absorbed back into the rhythm of their steps and the quiet glow of the gardens. Somewhere nearby, water trickled softly. Above them, the sky deepened from pink to violet as the suns slipped lower.
“Oh!” the Doctor said, bright as a struck match, stopping in place for a moment to turn to his companion. “Oh, yes, we’re here!” He straightened, eyes alight, bouncing once on the balls of his feet like he’d just been handed a treat.
The man smiled to himself. He’s like a puppy, he thought fondly. A very tall, very excitable puppy with a time machine.
“We’ve made it,” the Doctor announced, already pointing ahead. “Just up there. My spot.”
“Finally,” the man said dramatically, pressing a hand to his lower back. “I was beginning to think this was a pilgrimage. I’ve aged at least a decade.”
The Doctor shot him a look. “It’s been fifteen minutes.”
“Emotionally? An hour.”
The Doctor laughed, shaking his head as they picked up the pace. “You exaggerate.”
“I learned from the best.”
The path sloped gently upward, the gardens thinning into something quieter, more intentional. The lights grew softer here, fewer and farther between, and the sounds of the city fell away until all that remained was the hush of leaves and the distant whisper of water.
The Doctor’s pace slowed from anticipation. He clasped his hands behind his back, then let them swing at his sides, then shoved them into his pockets, unable to settle.
He was nervous.
He didn’t admit that this place mattered more than he usually let places matter. That it wasn’t just beautiful, it was his. The one spot on the planet he returned to when he came here alone.
The man noticed anyway.
“You alright?” he asked gently.
The Doctor glanced at him, smile bright but uncertain. “Yes! Absolutely. Just- well. I like this place.”
“High praise,” the man teased.
The Doctor huffed. “I’m serious.”
“I know,” the man said softly.
They reached the top of the rise. The Doctor hesitated for just a second, then stepped aside with a flourish, gesturing grandly ahead of them.
“My spot,” he said, voice lighter than his heart felt.
He watched the man closely, nerves buzzing beneath his delight, waiting, always subconsciously, for that reaction. For approval.
The path opened into a narrow arch in the foliage, easy to miss if you didn’t know it was there. The Doctor ducked through first, pushing aside a curtain of flowering vines, then stepped back to let the man follow.
The world changed the moment he crossed the threshold.
A wide, open space stretched out before him, enclosed beneath a dome-like canopy of vines and flowering branches that wrapped inward from all sides, sealing the garden away from the rest of the city. The leaves overlapped in careful layers, filtering the last of the sunset into soft ribbons of gold and rose.
A secret garden, hidden inside a planet already overflowing with beauty. The man stopped breathing.
Marble statues ringed the space, each one unmistakably a figure of importance; leaders, scholars, artists, explorers. They weren’t stiff or imposing, but captured mid-motion: a hand raised in thought, a head tilted in laughter, fabric carved so delicately it looked as though it might flutter if the air stirred.
Small plaques rested at their bases, explaining who they were, what they had done, why they mattered. History preserved not as conquest, but as contribution.
The man swallowed. Humanity had never made anything like this.
At the heart of the garden stood a fountain, its marble basin half-lost to time and vines. Flowers bloomed along its edges, petals drifting lazily into the water as it trickled and chimed softly. It looked overtaken by nature, yet no less intentional for it. If anything, more beautiful.
The light was dim now, only fragments of sunlight slipping through the canopy overhead. In its place, tiny firefly-like insects drifted through the air, glowing a warm pinkish-orange, pulsing gently like slow heartbeats.
Butterflies fluttered lazily near the statues, wings like fractured stained glass. When they brushed past one another, they chimed softly, a sound so delicate it felt like the garden was breathing.
The man stood there, utterly still, “Wow,” he whispered.
Behind him, the Doctor watched. He didn’t speak. Didn’t joke. Didn’t fill the space with words. He watched the man take it in, the way his shoulders loosened, the way his eyes shone, the way wonder settled over him like something earned.
This was why it was his favorite place. Not just because it was beautiful, but also because it felt kept. Honored. Loved without being exploited. While the wonders the reast of this planet slowly became products for vacation packages, this small corner was left to exist in peace.
The Doctor smiled, soft and quiet, hearts warm in a way he didn’t have a name for. He’d brought him here hoping, without admitting it to himself, that the man would understand. Judging by the look on his face, he did.
The man let out a quiet breath, “This is,” He shook his head, a small smile tugging at his mouth. “Yeah. You’ve got excellent taste.”
The Doctor’s shoulders eased, just a little.
“Thought you might like it,” he said, trying for casual and only mostly succeeding.
The man began to walk slowly along the edge of the garden, drawn toward the statues. He moved carefully, like the place might be listening, pausing to read the plaques, to take in the delicate curve of carved stone and the impossible softness of marble that looked more like living skin than rock.
“They’re incredible,” he murmured. “We never managed anything like this. Not even close.”
The Doctor nodded, hands clasped behind his back. “They believed history should feel kind. Even when it wasn’t.”
They walked together, the Doctor a step behind now, explaining as they went what the plaques didn’t say, the ones he’d met, which ones he’d always liked best. His voice was quieter here, reverent, like he didn’t want to disturb the air.
“I haven’t been back in a long time,” he admitted after a moment.
The man glanced over his shoulder. “Really?”
“Mmm.” The Doctor stopped near one of the statues, eyes lifting to its face. “Last time I was here was, oh, a few hundred years ago.”
“With Amy and Rory?”
The Doctor smiled faintly. “No. Long before that.” He hesitated, then added, almost gently, “With my granddaughter.”
The man stopped.
“Your-” He caught himself. “You had a granddaughter?”
“Yes,” the Doctor said simply.
For a moment, the garden seemed to hold its breath.
“I was a father,” the Doctor went on, still looking at the statue, voice light but eyes anything but. “Had a whole family once.”
The man absorbed that in silence, surprise giving way to something heavier. He saw it, then he saw the glint in the Doctor’s eyes. Not sharp grief, but a pain worn smooth by time, still aching when touched.
He said softly, “What was she like?”
The Doctor’s smile warmed, real and fragile. “Brilliant. Clever. Asked too many questions. Laughed at all the wrong moments.” He glanced at the man. “You’d have gotten on famously.”
The man smiled back, heart tight.
“I brought her here,” the Doctor continued, gesturing around them, “before this place became what it is now. No romance districts. No weddings. Just beauty. I wanted to make her smile.” He looked around the garden again, firefly lights drifting past like memories. “She did.”
The man stepped closer, the space between them closing without either of them really deciding to do it.
“Thank you,” he said quietly.
The Doctor blinked. “For what?”
“For sharing this,” the man replied, meaning far more than just the garden. “I can tell it matters.”
The Doctor looked at him then, and something unguarded passed between them.
“Yes,” he said softly. “It does.”
They stood together in the heart of the secret garden, surrounded by history, by beauty, by things cherished and remembered.
The moment shifted without either of them meaning it to.
Conversation fell away, words no longer necessary, and they found themselves simply looking at each other. The man hadn’t realized he’d stopped walking until his feet were still and the Doctor was right there, close enough that the warmth of him felt tangible, like standing near a low-burning flame. Their smiles lingered, soft and unguarded, born from the shared intimacy of memory and trust.
Neither of them stepped back.
The Doctor’s eyes were bright in the dim garden light, reflecting the soft glow of firefly-lights and stained-glass wings drifting lazily behind him. There was something openly pleased in his expression, almost shy pride at having been understood and appreciated.
The man’s gaze lingered longer than politeness allowed. On the curve of the Doctor’s mouth. The familiar lines at the corners of his eyes.
They were inches apart. Close enough to feel each other’s breath. Close enough that the space between them felt charged, humming like the Tardis when it was just about to move. Time passed, but it was forgotten by both of them.
The man wasn’t sure how long they stood there. Seconds, maybe. Or longer. Long enough for the warmth to settle deep in his chest, long enough to savor the rare feeling of being cared for so openly. Of being chosen to see something precious.
The Doctor, for his part, didn’t look away either.
He took the moment greedily, memorizing it; the way the man’s eyes softened when he smiled, the easy affection written into his posture. The rare, steady comfort of someone who wanted to be here with him, not because of danger or obligation, but simply because they enjoyed one another.It was intimate in a way that didn’t demand anything more than what it was.
Eventually, far too late for either of them to pretend they hadn’t noticed, the Doctor cleared his throat softly, smile still lingering, and shifted just enough to remind the universe that time was, in fact, still moving.
The moment ended the way most fragile things did; awkwardly. The man shifted first, rubbing the back of his neck with a soft laugh that didn’t quite know where to go.
“Uh,” He glanced toward the fountain, then at one of the statues. “So. Statues. Very statuesque.”
The Doctor blinked, then nodded a beat too quickly. “Yes! Statues. Lots of history. Very. . . stony.”
They both stepped apart at the same time, like magnets suddenly remembering which way they were meant to face. The warmth lingered, refusing to vanish just because they’d moved. It sat in the space between them, confusing and persistent.
They walked again, slower now, circling the fountain, pretending they hadn’t just stood inches apart long enough for the world to forget itself. The man felt oddly buoyant. Happy, in a way that made his chest ache. And deeply, profoundly confused.
He doesn’t think of this as a date, he reminded himself. He made that very clear. And yet that look in the Doctors eyes just now, that closeness, and the way the Doctor had watched him like he mattered.
Across from him, the Doctor was doing his own quiet recalculations.
He was uncomfortable, he told himself again. You fixed it. You did the right thing. But the memory of the man’s eyes, warm and appreciative, didn’t fit neatly into that explanation. Didn’t match someone simply relieved to have lines redrawn.
They stole glances at each other when they thought the other wasn’t looking. Each time, they looked away too quickly.
Neither of them had the confidence, or the experience, to risk being wrong. Not about this. Not about someone who had already made himself a home on the Tardis, who mattered far too much to lose over a misread moment.
So they smiled. They joked. They moved on.
If Amy were here, she’d have smacked them both by now.
The Doctor had insisted, hands waving, voice rising, practically bouncing on his heels as he herded them into a sleek, glass-walled elevator and jabbed a button marked with more symbols than letters.
“Trust me,” he’d said, grinning. “Absolutely worth it. Best view on the planet. To die for. Metaphorically. Mostly.”
Now the elevator whispered to a stop, doors sliding open with a soft chime. Night spilled in.
They stepped out onto the skyline bridge at the top of one of the tallest buildings in the city, suspended between towers like a ribbon of light. Transparent panels curved overhead and beneath their feet, offering an uninterrupted view in every direction.
The Doctor immediately lit up.
“Oh oh, hang on, wrong way. No, wait, that’s the other bridge, ah!” He spun in a small circle, scanning the horizon, coat flaring. “Where are you, where are you…”
The man followed a few steps behind, hands in his pockets, smiling.
Below them, the city glowed.
Lights flowed through streets like constellations turned inside out. Gardens shimmered even in the dark, bioluminescent plants tracing soft patterns between buildings. The four moons hung low and luminous in the sky, each a different shade, casting overlapping light that painted the city in silvers and blues and faint violets. The two suns had long since set, leaving behind a sky so clear it felt deliberate.
The Doctor finally gasped. “There!”
He grabbed the railing and leaned forward, eyes shining. “Look at that.”
The man joined him, breath catching despite himself. “Wow.”
“See?” the Doctor said triumphantly. “Worth it.”
They stood side by side, watching the city breathe beneath them. The wind up here was gentle, warm, carrying distant music and the soft chiming of wings as stained-glass birds drifted past at eye level.
The Doctor leaned on the railing, utterly delighted, pointing things out; districts he liked, bridges he’d crossed before, places where the light did particularly beautiful things at certain hours. The man listened, half to the words, half to the sound of him.
In the quiet stretch between sentences, a thought finally settled, clear and steady, no longer tangled in nerves.
Whatever this is, it’s enough.
Whether the Doctor’s feelings were romantic or not, one thing was certain: he was his best friend. His favorite person to stand beside at the edge of impossible views. And that was something worth cherishing all on its own.
He smiled to himself, content.
“Hey,” he said softly.
The Doctor turned, grin already in place. “Mm?”
“Thanks for bringing me up here.”
The Doctor’s expression softened, just a touch. “Wouldn’t have been the same without you.” They turned back to the view, shoulders nearly brushing, the city glowing endlessly below them.
Anyone who knows the doctor knows one simple fact about the mad man with a box; he never stops running, t's his brand. Always moving, always going somewhere to do something, meet someone, anything. Always forward. Always sideways. Always everywhere.
The doctor doesn't sit still.
Even now, standing still at the edge of a skyline bridge, hands resting on the railing, coat fluttering gently in the warm night air, his mind was sprinting a mile a second. He watched the city glow beneath them, but he was also watching him; the human standing so comfortably at his side, close enough to feel without touching.
His precious companion. His friend.
And his thoughts were a mess of careful cataloguing.
He leaned in earlier. He held my hand without pulling away. He basically moved into the Tardis with me. He asked to see my favorite place. He looked at me like I mattered.
But then. . .
He laughed it off at the restaurant. He agreed when I framed it as not a date. He’s never made it clear whether he’s even attracted to the male sex.
The Doctor’s jaw tightened slightly as he stared out at the lights. Friendzone evidence. Plausible deniability. Safe explanations. He weighed every moment like data points in a cosmic equation he couldn’t solve no matter how clever he was.
Humans were like that. Beautifully unreadable, amazingly frustrating.
He shifted his weight, resisting the instinct to pace. To do something. That instinct, to move, to act, to leap before the fear could catch up, the instinct that had saved worlds. But this wasn’t a world, it was one person.
One person he had grown far too fond of.
The Doctor had loved before. He knew exactly how sharp that joy was, and how catastrophic the loss. He carried the ghosts of it with him everywhere. His family, his children, his granddaughter, his companions, and Rose. All had left him standing in the aftermath, still breathing, still moving.
Always surviving.
The question was never could he love again, it was whether he could survive losing another. Whether the warmth he felt now would be worth the inevitable pain that followed attachment. Because for him, it always followed. That was the curse of time.
He glanced sideways, just for a second.
The man was smiling softly at the view, relaxed, content, unaware of the storm unfolding inches away. Happy simply to be here. With him.
The Doctor’s hearts ached.
Would it be cruel, he wondered, to let him in knowing how this ends?
And yet to never try, to never risk it, to lock himself behind charm and jokes and motion forever. He’d tried that before, but being alone for too long only left him with the memories he runs from.
That was its own kind of loss. The curse of the Time Lord. Was it better to love and lose than to never love at all?
He swallowed, fingers curling against the railing.
He didn’t know the answer. He only knew that standing still beside him, letting the night stretch, letting the moment breathe, felt dangerously like something he wanted to choose.
The yawn slipped out of him before he could stop it.
He covered his mouth immediately, blinking as if embarrassed by the betrayal of his own body. “Sorry,” he said, voice rough with sleep. “Guess today finally caught up with me.”
He glanced sideways, cataloguing it the same way he catalogued everything, he softened posture, the slower blink, the way the sharpness of alert curiosity had melted into something gentler. Human-tired. End-of-day tired.
The sensible thing, the kind thing, would have been to take him back to the Tardis, to tuck him safely into a room that hummed like home and let him sleep while the universe waited. The Doctor knew that.
He also knew that if they went back now, he would retreat. He would busy himself. He would run again, into switches and levers and excuses, until this feeling dulled enough to be manageable once again.
He wasn’t ready for that.
He stared out at the city, lights pulsing below, and made a decision he would later pretend had been spontaneous.
“Stay a bit longer?” he asked. It came out softer than he meant it to. Not flippant or cheery like his tone was only minutes ago.
The man looked at him, surprised. “I mean… I’m pretty wiped.”
“I know,” the Doctor said quickly. “We don’t have to do anything. Just,” He gestured vaguely at the skyline, the moons, the quiet. “It’s nice up here. And we don’t have to rush back.”
He smiled, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes.
The man hesitated; he was tired after all. His feet ached from walking, his thoughts fuzzy at the edges. Every sensible instinct told him he should go lie down somewhere soft and let sleep claim him.
Then he saw the Doctor’s face.
Not the bright grin. Not the manic enthusiasm. The other one, the one that slipped through when he thought no one was watching. There was something in it now that made the man’s chest ache: a quiet sadness, restrained and unspoken, like he was bracing himself for something he didn’t want to lose.
The man sighed, fond and helpless.
“…Okay,” he said. “A little longer.”
The Doctor’s shoulders dropped, just a fraction. Relief flickered across his face before he masked it, quick as a heartbeat.
“Good,” he said, too lightly. “Didn’t want to leave just yet.”
They leaned back against the railing together, city lights reflecting in the glass beneath their feet. The man rested his elbows there, chin in his hands, eyelids heavy but content.
If staying meant easing that look from the Doctor’s eyes, even for a few more minutes, it was worth being a little extra tired.
The streets had changed.
Where earlier the district had been bright and bustling, now there was a gentler rhythm to everything. Market stalls were folding themselves away, fabric canopies retracting like flowers closing for the night, lights dimming from vibrant hues to soft embers. Vendors spoke in low voices as they counted credits or exchanged goodnights with lingering customers. The air smelled faintly of spices and cooling stone.
The city was winding down.
They walked side by side along the main avenue, their footsteps unhurried, passing couples drifting home, locals guiding children by the hand, tourists lingering for last looks before sleep claimed them. Music faded in and out as doors closed, laughter softening into murmurs.
Neither of them talked much. Not because there was nothing to say, but because the quiet felt earned. Which was an odd thing in the company of the Doctor.
The Doctor walked with his hands behind his back, posture looser now, less restless than usual. Every so often, he glanced sideways, checking in without meaning to, making sure the man was still there, still awake.
The man stifled another yawn, smiling faintly. “Whole city’s calling it a night.”
“Mmm,” the Doctor agreed. “They do this well. Not like humans. Humans fight sleep like it’s an enemy.”
The man laughed softly. “Because it wins.”
They turned down a narrower street that led back toward the gardens, lanterns glowing low along the path. The bioluminescent plants dimmed as if responding to the hour, pulsing slower, gentler.
The Doctor slowed his pace without thinking, matching the man’s tired steps. Above them, the moons drifted higher as the night passed on, pale light washing over the streets as the last stalls shut their doors.
They walked in easy step together, the quiet of the streets settling around them like a shared blanket. After a while, the man glanced over, his expression soft and unguarded in the dim light.
“Hey,” he said quietly. “I just- this was really wonderful.”
The Doctor turned his head, surprised into stillness.
“I mean it,” the man went on, a little shy now. “The planet. The gardens. The food. All of it. I don’t think I’ll ever forget today.” He smiled to himself. “This might actually be my new favorite place. One of those memories you pull out when everything’s a mess. You know, when things get loud.”
The Doctor felt something warm bloom behind his ribs.
“Happy place,” he murmured.
“Yeah,” the man said. “Exactly. So, thank you. For bringing me. For sharing it.”
The Doctor’s smile was softer than usual, slower to form. “I’m glad you liked it,” he said. “Truth is, I’d forgotten how much I missed it.” He looked ahead, then added, more quietly, “And I’m very glad I came back, with you.”
The man’s chest tightened at that, but he laughed instead, nudging the moment sideways before it could grow too heavy.
“Well,” he said lightly, “we’ll obviously have to come back. I didn’t nearly eat enough space chicken.”
The Doctor laughed, bright and delighted. “Obviously. Can’t leave a planet without fully appreciating its cuisine.”
“Next time,” the man added, “I’m ordering two. Maybe three. For science.”
“Of course,” the Doctor said solemnly. “Important research.”
They shared a laugh that echoed softly down the emptying street.
But as they walked on, the Doctor’s grin lingered longer than the joke required. He meant it. He would bring him back. Not just for the food, not just for the gardens, but because this version of the day, was already settling into his bones. Because even now, with the Tardis waiting just ahead, he could feel the edges of it slipping into memory.
And he knew that once they were back inside that blue box, once the doors closed and the engines hummed, he was going to miss this.
I wish this could last just a little longer.
The moment didn’t fade so much as it was interrupted.
“Oi.”
The voice cut through the quiet like gravel dragged across stone.
Both of them stopped.
The man turned first, brows knitting in confusion as a figure emerged from a small shop tucked between two flowering archways. The storefront was half-lit, its doors in the process of being pulled shut, displays of delicate jewelry and bundled flowers visible through the glass, bouquets wrapped in shimmering leaves, charms hung on thin chains, little trinkets clearly meant to be bought on impulse and gifted with meaning.
Souvenirs. Keepsakes. Love tokens.
The woman stepping out of the shop was older, properly older, in a way that suggested decades lived fully rather than delicately preserved. Her hair was silver and swept back in an elegant knot, her posture straight despite the faint stiffness in her movements. Her skin, like everyone else’s here, carried that same impossible beauty of deep violet-toned with blue, luminous even in the low light.
The woman came toward them with a scowl etched deep into her face, muttering under her breath as if she’d been carrying the complaint all evening and had finally found somewhere to put it.
“Ungrateful tourists,” she grumbled. “All smiles and empty pockets until they want something.”
The Doctor straightened immediately, all polite curiosity. “Oh! Sorry, have we done something wrong?”
The man’s stomach dropped at the question, guilt flaring before he even knew why. He glanced around instinctively, as if expecting a sign he’d missed or a rule he’d broken without realizing.
The woman didn’t answer right away.
She stopped a few steps in front of them, attention fixed not on their faces but on the small box in her hands. It was delicate, made of polished wood or stone, hard to tell in the lantern light, tied neatly with thin, shimmering ribbons. She worked at the knot with irritated fingers, still muttering as she did.
“Come here for beauty, for rest, for romance,” she said, tugging at the ribbon. “Then they treat it like a service. Like the whole city exists to perform for them.”
The Doctor opened his mouth, then closed it again, unsure. The man shifted his weight, heat creeping up his neck. He hadn’t meant to intrude. Hadn’t meant to take anything that wasn’t freely given.
The woman huffed, finally loosening the knot. “They forget we live here. That this is our home. They expect perfection, expect us to smile and bend and make their holiday magical.” She snapped the lid open with a sharp motion. “And if it isn’t, they act like it’s our failure.”
The Doctor frowned. “That’s… not right.”
“No,” she agreed flatly.
The man swallowed. He thought of the stalls they’d passed, the careful beauty curated for visitors, the way the city had seemed built to please. He hadn’t treated anyone poorly, but he understood, suddenly, how easy it was to consume a place without meaning to. How capitalism turned wonder into product and people into background.
“I’m sorry,” he said quietly, though he wasn’t sure exactly what he was apologizing for.
The woman glanced up at him then, sharp-eyed, and something in her expression shifted. Not warmth. Not quite. But acknowledgment.
“Hmph,” she said. “At least you’re listening.”
She looked back down at the box, adjusting the ribbon with more care now. “Doesn’t matter. Happens every day, no changing that.”
The Doctor tilted his head. “So… we didn’t break a rule?”
She held the small box tight in one hand now, fingers curled around it like it contained something fragile.
“You see this street?” she said, gesturing sharply with her chin. “I’ve watched it for decades. Working in my shop every day for four decades.”
The Doctor blinked. “It’s a very nice shop.”
She ignored him.
“There’s a man,” she went on, voice rough with contempt, “who comes here every season. Walks right where you’re standing. Buys flowers, jewels, little trinkets like these.” She shook the box once. It made no sound. “Makes his lady swoon. Holds her hand like it’s sacred. Kisses her in the open like he’s proud of it.”
The man frowned. “That sounds nice?”
The woman’s eyes flashed. “It would be. If it meant anything.”
She took a step closer, scowl deepening. “Every time I see him, it’s a different woman.”
“Oh,” the Doctor said softly.
“He parades them through my city,” she spat. “Uses our customs, our romance, our history like stage dressing. And then leaves. Comes back with someone new. Again. And again.”
She scoffed, bitterness sharp. “And he’s not the worst of them.”
The Doctor and the man exchanged another look, confusion layered now with something heavier.
“And then there are the couples,” the woman continued, her voice rising. “They come in, stand in my shop, bicker over prices, complain about the weather, complain about each other.” She waved her hand dismissively. “They don’t look at one another. Don’t listen. Don’t care.” Her grip tightened on the box. “It’s sickening.”
The man shifted uncomfortably. “I’m. . . sorry?”
She fixed him with a piercing stare. “If you’re going to intrude on someone’s home,” she said sharply, “on their way of life, on the things they hold sacred, then the least you can do is be honest.”
The Doctor’s brows knit. “Honest how?”
“Be in love,” she snapped. “Or don’t pretend you are.”
Silence settled over the street, thick and awkward.
The Doctor cleared his throat. “Right. Well. That’s very upsetting. Truly.”
The man nodded slowly. “Yeah. I mean. That’s awful.”
They both paused.
“But,” the man added carefully, “what does that have to do with us?”
The woman stared at them. Her gaze moved between them like she was looking for something she wasn’t sure she’d find. For a long moment, she said nothing.
Then she huffed sharply, turning away again. “Maybe nothing,” she muttered. “Or maybe I’m tired of watching people lie to themselves.”
The woman stopped again, breath sharp in her chest, and with a frustrated flick of her wrist finally flipped the box open. Fully open this time. She thrust it toward them, lid and ribbons dangling loose.
“Here,” she said gruffly. “Take it.”
The man reacted on instinct, his hands coming up to accept the box before he could think better of it. The wood was warm from her grip.
He looked down.
So did the Doctor.
Nestled inside was a stained-glass butterfly, delicate, impossibly fine, its wings made of fractured panes of rose, amber, and soft violet, threaded together with thin, elegant lines of metal. It caught the lantern light and scattered it, throwing faint rainbows across their hands.
It was just like the butterflies they’d seen in the Doctor’s garden.
The woman crossed her arms, expression still sour, but her voice softened despite itself. “They’re made by hand,” she said. “Local craft. Symbol of devotion here. Fragile, but enduring. Meant to be kept somewhere it’ll be seen.”
The man swallowed. “It’s beautiful.”
The Doctor nodded quietly. “It really is.”
“Hmph.” She waved off the compliment. “Thought it suited you.”
She looked between them again, her sharp gaze gentler now, almost approving. “You two are doing it right,” she said.
Both men froze.
“Doing what?” the Doctor asked faintly.
“Your relationship,” she said, as if it were obvious. “Quiet. Honest. None of that performative nonsense.” She scoffed. “I’ve seen too many couples who smile and kiss and hold hands, then step into my shop and do nothing but complain about how the other isn’t enough.”
The man’s ears went warm. The Doctor opened his mouth, then closed it again.
“They wish their partners were different,” the woman went on, bitterness flaring briefly. “Or younger. Or quieter. Or someone else entirely.” She shook her head. “It’s exhausting.”
She sighed, rubbing at her temple. “You, at least, look at each other like you mean it.”
The Doctor choked on absolutely nothing. The man stared very intently at the butterfly.
“And,” she added, nodding toward the box, “I remember you. Passed through earlier looking for food.”
The man glanced up, surprised. “You do?”
“Of course I do,” she snapped. “You’re the one who accepted ‘no food to go’ without arguing. Most tourists whine like it’s a personal attack.”
“Oh,” he said quietly. “Well. It’s your home, your rules.”
The woman studied him for a moment, then huffed. “Exactly.”
She looked back at the Doctor, then between them again, lips pursed. “It’s nice,” she said at last, almost reluctantly, “to see two young people who are actually in love and respectful.”
Silence fell like a dropped plate. The Doctor’s face went pink. The man’s brain short-circuited entirely.
“We-” the Doctor started.
“I-” the man said at the exact same time.
They both stopped.
“Goodnight,” she said gruffly. The woman waved a hand, already turning back toward her shop. She glanced back once more, eyes lingering on the butterfly in the man’s hands.
Neither of them corrected her.
They stood there as the woman disappeared into her shop, the door closing with a soft click that felt far louder than it should have. Lantern light pooled on the stones again, the city settling back into its quiet.
“Thank you,” the Doctor had said automatically, a beat too late, voice polite and helpless.
“Yes, thank you,” the man echoed, just as awkwardly.
The words lingered uselessly in the air after she was gone. Then there was nothing left to do but walk.
They turned and continued down the street toward the gardens where the Tardis waited, footsteps falling into an easy, familiar rhythm. No one spoke because there was suddenly too much to wrap their heads around.
The man held the box carefully against his chest, acutely aware of its weight, of the way the stained-glass butterfly inside caught the light with every step. His face was warm, heart doing something strange and fluttery he refused to name.
She thought we were together, he thought, not for the first time. And the Doctor hadn’t corrected her. Neither had he. That realization sat with him. Flattering? Yes.
He risked a glance sideways.
The Doctor was staring straight ahead, hands tucked into his coat pockets, posture composed in a way that suggested he was very deliberately not overthinking anything at all.
Which meant, of course, that he absolutely was.
The Doctor’s mind replayed the moment over and over, the woman’s certainty, the way neither of them had rushed to deny it, the way the man hadn’t laughed it off or bristled or stepped away.
Interesting, part of him thought.
He told himself it was nothing. An awkward misunderstanding. Cultural assumptions. A tired shopkeeper projecting meaning where there was none. Yet if it had truly been wrong, truly uncomfortable, his companion would have said something.
They walked on in silence, each privately cataloguing the same details, each arriving at the same cautious conclusion:
Don’t touch it. Don’t risk breaking whatever this is.
Better to let the moment remain what it was, a strange and flattering, than to poke at it and watch it fall apart.
Ahead, the gardens opened up once more, soft light glowing between trees and vines. Just beyond them, the Tardis sat, patient as ever. They walked toward it side by side, the butterfly chiming faintly in its box, both of them carrying the same unspoken thought.
Maybe it meant nothing. And, quietly, just beneath that: But maybe it didn’t.
The Doctor reached the Tardis first. The blue box sat tucked beneath the garden’s canopy, vines draped lazily across its corners like they were trying to keep it there a little longer. He slipped the key from his pocket out of habit, fingers already finding the familiar grooves.
He lifted it toward the lock and stopped. Just for a moment. Barely even a pause. The kind of hesitation no one ever noticed.
Except this time, someone did.
The man slowed behind him, the stained-glass butterfly box held gently with both hands. He’d been watching the Doctor’s back, the rise and fall of his shoulders, the way he always moved like he had somewhere to be, even when he didn’t.
That pause lodged itself in his chest. The thought he’d been carefully circling all evening, the one he’d been avoiding and reframing, slipped free before his brain could catch it.
“Was this-” he blurted.
The Doctor froze.
The man winced internally but pressed on, words tumbling out too fast now to stop them. “Was this supposed to be a date? I mean- did I miss something? Because that woman, maybe she was onto something, or-” He laughed weakly. “I just want to know if I completely misread the situation.”
There it was.
He told himself it was fine. That if the Doctor said no, he could laugh it off. Say right, okay, got it, chalk it up to a romantic planet and a grumpy shopkeeper and move on. He could handle that.
He had to handle that.
The Doctor turned. Slowly. And whatever answer the man had been bracing for evaporated instantly, because the look on the Doctor’s face was nothing like no.
It was almost comical.
Shock hit first, eyes wide, mouth parting as the question had physically struck him. Then something darker flashed beneath it, a flicker of horror, as if he’d just realized he’d stepped too close to a cliff edge he hadn’t meant to approach. And beneath both of those was something warm. The Doctor stared at him like he’d just been asked the most dangerous question in the universe.
The key slipped slightly in his fingers, catching the light. The garden hummed softly around them, firefly-lights pulsing, vines rustling gently overhead, the Tardis very pointedly not opening.
The silence pressed in on them, thick and humming, the little alcove suddenly too small to contain everything neither of them had said all night.
The man shifted, nerves finally bubbling over. “I’m-” He swallowed. “Sorry. I probably just read too much into what she said. Long day. Romantic planet. Crazy old lady, right? We can just-”
“Would you want it to be?”
The words cut clean through his apology. The Doctor’s voice was quiet. But there was nothing casual about it.
The man froze. His mouth opened. Closed. Opened again.
‘Yes’ sat right there, loud and terrifying on the tip of his tounge, but confidence had never been his strongest skill. He didn’t trust it. Didn’t trust himself not to want something that would hurt later.
His fingers tightened around the small box in his hands, thumb brushing the smooth edge, tracing the ribbon absentmindedly. The stained-glass butterfly chimed softly inside, a sound far too delicate for how hard his heart was pounding.
He glanced up, then down again, lips parting as if trying out answers he didn’t dare say aloud. He searched the Doctor’s face for clues, for permission, for some sign of what would make him happy, because somehow that mattered more than his own insecurities.
The Doctor watched him hesitate.
Watched the way his hands cradled the gift like it meant something. Watched the uncertainty war with want in his eyes. Watched him care so much it almost hurt to see.
Something in the Doctor broke.
He didn’t give the man time to talk himself out of it. The distance vanished in a single motion, coat brushing the man’s arm, one hand coming up to steady himself against the man’s shoulder as he leaned in and kissed him.
For half a second, the man stood stunned, then he melted into it, breath hitching softly as his body caught up to what his heart had known all along. The box tilted between them, forgotten, the butterfly chiming faintly like applause.
When the Doctor pulled back, just barely, their foreheads still close, the world felt very quiet. The Doctor searched his face, suddenly unsure again. However, the Doctor leaned in just a fraction more, forehead still resting against the man’s, breath warm, voice low enough it felt like a secret meant only for the space between them.
“I’ve been doing this all day,” he admitted quietly. “Wanting. Wondering. Telling myself it was the planet, or the gardens, or the music, anything but you.”
The man let out a soft, disbelieving laugh. “You too?”
“Oh, constantly,” the Doctor said, a wry smile tugging at his mouth. “You leaned closer and I thought, don’t read into it. You smiled at me and I thought, he smiles at everyone. That woman calls us a couple and I nearly combust, but I told myself you were probably relieved when she walked away.”
The man shook his head, laughing under his breath now, nerves melting into something lighter. “I spent the entire night convinced you’d already decided this definitely wasn’t a date.”
The Doctor blinked. “I spent the entire night convinced you were being polite.” They stared at each other for a beat then they both laughed
“Brilliant,” the Doctor murmured. “Two geniuses.”
“Hopeless,” the man agreed fondly.
The Doctor’s smile shifted to something more alive. The nervous edges smoothed into something bright and unmistakably him.
“Well,” he said, eyes dancing, “in that case…”
He surged forward and kissed him again. This one was nothing like the first. It was lively and full of pent-up energy, all warmth and confidence and delighted certainty. The Doctor kissed him like he’d finally decided to stop thinking and start feeling, hands coming up instinctively, joy practically buzzing through him. The man startled for half a second, then laughed into the kiss and kissed him right back, free hand curling into the Doctor’s coat as if that was exactly where it belonged.
When they finally pulled apart, both of them breathless and grinning, the night felt different. Lighter. Charged.
The Doctor’s eyes were bright, almost boyish with relief. “So,” he said softly, unable to stop smiling. “Just to be clear. . .”
The man smiled back, warm and certain now. “Yeah. I wanted it to be.”
The Doctor stepped back, practically glowing. Confidence rolled off him now, like he’d finally remembered exactly who he was. He lifted one hand and snapped his fingers sharply.
A Click and a familiar whirr. The TARDIS doors unlocked and swung open at once, obedient and eager, warm golden light spilling out into the garden alcove.
The Doctor grinned, pleased as anything. “Still got it.”
It was a ridiculous little flourish, completely unnecessary, and it reeked of showing off. The kind of trick you pulled when you wanted someone to look at you and think oh. The ship seemed to hum in agreement, the sound deep and affectionate, like she’d known all along how important today was going to be.
The human laughed, eyes bright. “She likes you.”
“She always does,” the Doctor said fondly, patting the doorframe as he stepped aside to let him enter first. “Knew this was a special stop.”
The man paused on the threshold, then looked back at him, smile slow and certain in a way it hadn’t been before.
“You know,” he said casually, far too casually, “I’ve always found you incredibly attractive when you do that.”
The Doctor froze, “What?”
The man shrugged, still smiling. “The whole snapping, doors opening, you-and-the-Tardis-being-on-the-same-wavelength thing.”
The Doctor’s ears went pink instantly.
“Oh,” he said, adjusting his bow tie with exaggerated care. “Well. Yes. I suppose it is rather dashing.” He flashed a cocky grin that didn’t quite hide how flustered he was. “Perks of being very clever and very charming.”
The man laughed and stepped inside, the butterfly box still held so carefully. The Doctor followed, hand lingering on the door for just a moment as the Tardis hummed warmly around them, welcoming them home, fully aware she’d just witnessed the beginning of something important.
your layout is SOOO cute! also omg I've just found your ghoul/cooper howard fic and WOWWW WHAT A GEM 😍i love your writing 😍 thank you so much for sharing your work with us! I'm so excited to read more
omg are we about to kiss rn...?
Also, Cooper is not baby girl, he is certified ✧Barbie Girl✧.
Also, also, I will be unbearable after season 2 drops. You can not hold me accountable for my actions.
