A lot of people have asked if I have a masterpost, and I did not, so I decided to finally make one before things got even more out of hand lol
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Collabs:
Through the Cracks (of Time and Space) - (a collab with @borrowedtimeandspace that blends my borrower AU with her BTaS universe— 25/25 chapters posted)
Multi-part stories:
New Perspectives - 1 / 2 / 3 / (what if?) - (Borrower Oliver and James switch sizes)
James Finds a Child - 1 / 2 - (James finds a borrower child and Oliver isn't there to help)
Failed Meeting - 1 / 2 - (James meets borrower Sammy for the first time)
Romantic and Hopeless - 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / 12 / 13 - (Oscar and borrower Sammy are soulmates. A story based on @tinyundercover's soulmate mechanics from their story 'Pepper and Felix' (except it's 18, not 21))
Oliver's Daycare - 1 / 2 - (Borrower Oliver finds a human toddler crying alone and decides to entertain her until her parents return)
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One-part stories:
Friends in High Places - (James and borrower Oliver meet for the first time)
Stay a Little Longer - (Semi-continuation of 'Friends in High Places'. James and borrower Oliver bond more)
Doesn't Change a Thing - (Size-shifter James is assured by Oliver that this doesn't change their friendship)
Soggy Cereal - (Oliver meets borrower James when he falls into his bowl of cereal)
Crow Army - (Borrower Oliver shows James his army of crows)
Injured - (James has to help an injured borrower Oliver) + bonus
Disaster Strikes - (Freddie meets his best friend's crush for the first time! Wait why is she so small?)
First Time - (James lets borrower Oliver drink some alcohol, not realising the borrower has never drank before)
Something's Off - (Oliver is reunited with Tanner! But this version of his cousin is a borrower..?)
Oliver Finds a Child - (Oliver finds a borrower child whilst working and helps them get home safe and sound)
Accidents Made in Anger - (James is angry and borrower Oliver tries to comfort him, but gets hurt by James in the process)
A Whole New World (literally) - (Borrower Sammy and Oliver find themselves magically transported into the forest of a ferocious dryad named Jamai...but perhaps he's more gentle than he appears?)
Jarred - (Oliver gets frustrated over borrower James's stunts and decides to put him in a jar)
Herbicide - (Ren is injured by an angel and Jamai takes care of her)
Movie Night - (Borrower James accidentally drops in on Oliver whilst the human is watching TV)
Pixie In Need - (Jamai finding an injured pixie)
A Helping Hand - (Cody, literally larger than life, checks on Earth and the humans living there)
Under His Eye - (Ryker after having just kidnapped Sammy and Tanner is suddenly greeted by a giant eye in the sky)
Under His Eye (what if?) - (An alternate ending to Under His Eye in which Ryker is recognised by Cody)
Silent But Friendly - (Kid Oliver finds kid borrower James in a tub of oats and tries to befriend him)
Fear and Familiarity - (Ferrin and Rhys meet in dire circumstances for the first time. But something feels familiar...)
Lily in Wonderland - (A human ends up shrunk in Iavoros, but luckily Cody and Jael are here to help)
I did not realise that changing my name would destroy every single link in my masterpost and in the posts themselves but that's finally fixed now hehe
I may delete some g/t ish stories when they're set within the canon, but rest assured those will be reposted again. Pretty much all the stories left up in the masterpost will be left up on this account
Alright the new blog has been made and is @t3a-tan whilst this blog has been appropriately named gt3a-tan. I'm gonna be cleansing some of my posts, deleting the non g/t stories and shifting them over to the new account slowly but surely
I'll still post here, but it will be g/t content: specifically the borrower au stuff ^^
Honestly y'all I've made so many changes over the past year whilst not posting and I'm tempted to just make a new tumblr account focused primarily on non g/t content and instead on just my comic and the process of me planning it out and world building
Plus it's an opportunity to focus on a new audience since I've attracted mostly g/t folk, which is fine, but means most people following me are not interested in the non g/t stuff which is....most of what i do.
Why did you decide to give your characters Pakistani roots do you have have Pakistani roots yourself too I guess you don't need a reason but still I'm just curious as a Pakistani myself we don't get a lot of representation 🥲 also loving there new name they are so classy
I'm not Pakistani myself, I'm actually white (sorry 😔), but I grew up in an area that is predominantly Asian and Muslim. My school was also like that, so a lot of my friends growing up were Pakistani themselves.
I think that's why they ended up like that in my head when I was younger, since it was just what I saw a lot and gravitated towards since I found the parts of the culture I was shown and included in to be really cool.
When I was younger Sammy and Tanner existed pretty casually. I knew they were supposed to be Pakistani, but I didn't really think of portraying that because accurate portrayal didn't mean much to me at the time (since I was 10). Then as I've gotten older and seen the lack of representation and understood a lot more about the world and why accurate representation means so much to people it just became more and more important for me to do that myself.
I volunteer in schools and as an art mentor, so I've also seen how happy it makes a lot of young people seeing themselves represented firsthand.
Their parents are Charlie Rosa-Qureshi and Haris Rosa-Qureshi
Oliver is now Yusuf Qureshi
Abigail is now Maryam Qureshi
Their parents are Zubeda Siddiqui and Zakariya Qureshi
In the borrower AU their surnames will stay as Button and Oakwood respectively.
Sorry for changing things up so late, but it's been nagging me for a while— if anyone has any criticisms of the names or opinions then send me a message or an ask!
I'm thinking of changing Sammy, Tanner, and Oliver's names to be more reflective of their Pakistani heritage. I came up with their original names when I was 10 soooo I think they're due for it
The ideas are:
Sammy = Samiah (Sami)
Tanner = Tariq
Oliver = Yusuf or Idris
Their surnames (not in the borrower au) would be Rosa-Qureshi for Samiah and Tariq and Qureshi for whichever name Oliver is changed to.
every time i listen to ‘trolley problem’ by cricket! (exclamation mark included in his name) i think of ryker. am i crazy or based.
I can kind of see it, although only slightly ^^"
Songs I associate with Ryker are:
Placing the Blame - sELF (this one is definitely number one)
House - Charli xcx ft. John Cale (I know it gog turned into a meme song but it's peak, and I can imagine it as a conversation between him and Sammy through his notebooks)
The smell of dust was quite familiar to Zepheera, no matter how long it had been since she'd spent significant time inside the walls of a human home. She hurried a few steps away from the hole she'd found at the back of a cabinet, where she was consumed by musty darkness.
Only then could she let herself completely relax, leaning wearily against the inside of the wall to catch her breath. Despite the years she spent avoiding such places, she couldn't help being comforted by it. She'd grown up in them, born and raised. People like her had done for generations, making use of all the warm and dark nooks and crannies the bigger folk left unused in their homesteads.
Except that the humans in question were usually unaware of the borrowers present not so far away from them, blissfully ignorant of the tiny homes constructed in the walls and under the floors. They would write off all the little things going missing as a lapse in their own memory or forgetting to buy more of whatever thing they were after before it could run low. So long as they stayed unknown and unseen, borrowers were safe and comfortable living alongside human beings.
Zepheera's case was different. These ones brought her to their flat, and expected her to stay close by. And on any other day, she would have taken this fine opportunity to get far away from them and hope they wouldn't go to extreme lengths to find her or other borrowers.
Today, no matter which way she looked at it, that was no longer an option.
If she hadn't experienced that statue…that Weeping Angel for herself, she'd have a hard time believing a word they said to her, let alone trusting them in the slightest. Bizarre as their story was, Zepheera had to acknowledge that they appeared honest. She at least counted herself lucky that they wanted to genuinely help and were willing to listen to her, rather than cage her up like an oddity or do away with her like vermin.
Not that that meant she trusted them wholeheartedly, or that she'd put herself in a position to let them take care of her however they saw fit. She only needed them to get her out of 1969 and back to the present day. And as a plus, it seemed that they didn't know anything about what she was.
She reckoned it was better to keep it that way.
For now, Zepheera did need to find a place she could safely sleep, and that wasn't going to happen if she stood around. So she heaved a deep breath and forced her feet forward, knowing she had a lot of work ahead of her.
~~~
The next few hours were spent exploring the walls of the Doctor and Martha’s flat, checking for weak points that Zepheera could use to access it. It wasn't a difficult task, but a long one since she made sure to search the place thoroughly.
She did find a few signs of prior borrower occupation which gave her pause– things like makeshift stairs and ladders leading to crucial, well hidden entrances into and out of the walls– but they looked like they hadn't been used in quite some time, to her relief. Putting aside Zepheera's personal reservations about living with her own kind, it would be difficult to hide the fact that the humans there knew she existed and was sticking around. Empty walls meant that she wouldn't have to deal with inevitable panic, and nobody would feel the need to abandon their home on Zepheera's account.
Mapping the place out from bottom to top, she quickly ruled out any space under the floorboards as an option for her temporary home– for several reasons. Traditionally, that space was more used for long-term established homes, and Zepheera would have a difficult time making herself comfortable without a lot more work than she was willing to put in for something temporary.
Not to mention that, after the night's events, she’d prefer to be far from underfoot.
The passages in the walls were efficient for getting around, but not ideal for living. The open spaces weren't very secure without a means to close them off, and the aged state of the building made them a bit more weak than Zepheera was comfortable with. Still, she made note of every natural crack and hidden door that her predecessors had established, taking a quick peek out of each one to understand where they led.
A few of them let out in the bedroom that Martha occupied, the only one available in the small flat. Even though Martha was asleep, Zepheera backed out once she saw where those entrances led. She'd have very little use for them, she decided, since she didn't plan to borrow from people who already knew she was there. They might not take so kindly to her if she got caught taking from their things.
The rest of the entrances led to the common area, in out-of-sight places like the kitchen cabinets or behind the sofa. Zepheera had a bit of a harder time determining exactly where those ones let out because, as he'd told her plainly earlier, the Doctor was still awake and active. She could feel him pacing around, hear the distant rumble of him muttering to himself. The most Zepheera was able to do was glance out, then quickly move on; even if her presence wasn't a secret, she wasn't a fan of being spotted sneaking in and out of the walls.
The last place Zepheera checked turned out to be the most promising: a crack that opened up onto one of the exposed rafters near the ceiling.
She actually risked walking out into the open to take stock of the surroundings. The wooden beam ran up and down the common space, plenty wide enough for Zepheera to walk about with comfortable room on either side, and thick enough to securely support the weight of a few lighting fixtures. Those lights were off, which meant the exposed ceiling was cast in nice, safe shadows. Looking down, Zepheera had a good view of the entire kitchen and sitting area– even better than she'd had earlier.
A creak in the distance made Zepheera crouch instinctively, sharp violet eyes quickly finding the Doctor settling in on the worn-out couch under the far window. In the light of a small lamp, she could see that the floor around him was littered with various appliances, some of which looked gutted out. Though the man was still fully dressed, Converse and all, he lay across it with his ankles crossed over one another and his arms folded behind his head. He wasn't asleep, but staring out the window up toward the sky.
Zepheera let herself relax, standing up straight again when it seemed like the Doctor wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. Her decision was basically made, and she shrugged off her knapsack and looked around for the least dusty spot on top of the rafter.
It wasn't the most hidden of places, but it was also far from a long-term home. Zepheera did have a decent view of half the flat from up there. So long as she stayed over their heads and kept quiet, it was less than likely that the humans would spot her while she kept an eye on what they were up to. Not to mention that any warmth that the run-down flat managed to generate rose and made the ceiling a decent temperature. Warmer than Zepheera would have been on the streets, for sure.
Exhaustion hit her the moment she picked a spot and set her pack down, and she all but threw herself down to use it as a pillow. It was about as comfy as a dusty slab of wood could be, and yet Zepheera managed to drift off almost immediately.
So deep was Zepheera's sleep that she took no notice when the Doctor's attention slid away from the window and darted around. Normally he might have overlooked a sound so faint, but now that he knew someone incredibly small might be there…
He sat up slightly, propping himself up on an elbow as he murmured an almost hopeful, “Hello…?”
Only silence answered him. He didn't particularly expect an answer, given how cagey Zepheera had been so far, but it was worth a try.
The Doctor truly hoped they could work on it. For now, he simply reached over and clicked off his little side lamp, letting darkness settle over his corner of the flat, too.
Note: Thank you everyone for following our story to the end!
┌────── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆⋆⋅☆⋅⋆⋆⋅☆⋅⋆⋆⋅☆⋅⋆⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──────┐
Zepheera sat at the edge of her bed, carefully wrapping her freshly washed teacups in fabric and placing them in a drawer. It was almost a shame, she thought. She kept a small collection of teacups mainly for the sake of having spares, rather than actually hoping to use more than one at a time. Having backups was always a good idea for a borrower, especially one leading such an active lifestyle as Zepheera did. And they did come in handy this time, if not in the way she'd expected.
Part of her wished she'd been able to give Oliver one of the cups from the Tertatian tea set. She reckoned he'd get a kick out of a souvenir from the borrower-sized aliens she'd told him about back at his burrow. With everything going on earlier, Zepheera just didn't think of it in time.
She shook that thought away as she closed the drawer. That moment had passed, and the Doctor had already parked the TARDIS behind the moon “for a bit of a breather”, whatever that meant. Soon they'd be moving on to some other time and place for the next adventure.
It'll have to wait for next time, she decided, hopeful that it wouldn't be too long before they came back to visit.
When she stood, she paused to smooth out the blanket she'd carefully folded and laid out at the foot of her bed. Her fingertips traced the embroidered flowers once again, still taken aback by how deeply Oliver had unintentionally touched her with the gift. With his friendship in general. There weren't many people that Zepheera met during her and the Doctor's travels that she could trust so quickly and would be so eager to see again. It was a very odd feeling indeed.
Zepheera tried to clear her head of it all as she changed into a fresh set of clothes, threw on her candy-wrapper vest, and tossed her knapsack over her shoulder as she made to stroll out of her room. She very nearly succeeded, but then hesitated just before she could duck through the crack. After a moment she gave a small sigh, reached out to her shelf for the box of biscuits Oliver had made, and left with it tucked under her arm.
~~~
“There we go. That's better, isn't it?” the Doctor cooed as he slowly circled the console and brushed one hand against its center column. Almost in response, an ambient hum echoed through the room like a sigh of relief.
He could hardly blame her. As much as Tanner enjoyed being inside the TARDIS, the feeling was unfortunately not mutual. It wasn't his fault, not really. He was just…an impossible thing. Coexisting in symbiosis with an embodiment of the complete antithesis of reality. The Doctor could only imagine Tanner's presence was less than comfortable for his poor ship; though the inner workings of the TARDIS were incredibly complex, the closest approximation he could even vaguely equate it to was indigestion.
The Doctor followed her lead and all but tossed himself onto the worn yellow seat nearby with a soft groan, draping his arms along the back and propping his feet up on the edge of the console. For the first time in about a day, he was able to sit back with nothing pressing to do.
He'd kept himself occupied during the time Zepheera and their guests were sleeping, and took the opportunity to return to the Laundry Spot to, ironically enough, clean out the place. It wasn't too likely that anyone would find Ryker's hidden laboratory anytime soon, but given Oliver's descriptions of his deteriorating mental state of late, it seemed better to not take the risk that he left anything behind that someone might be able to misuse if it was discovered.
On the one hand, the Doctor didn't have much to confiscate in the way of technology. It seemed that Ryker either arrived with the bare minimum or simply didn't operate with high tech. He still took the computer from the very back room and had plans to comb through its files later on, just in case.
What Ryker lacked in the tech department, he rather overcompensated with literature. Specifically journals and notes, in nearly every nook and cranny the Doctor thought to check. Ordinarily he wouldn't have bothered with collecting every single scrap of paper he could find; anyone who stumbled upon it all might simply write it off as the scribblings of a madman like Oliver did initially, There was always the chance that the wrong eyes could find some meaning in his words, but that still wouldn't warrant such a thorough sweep.
Then the Doctor caught a few glimpses in his writing that he simply couldn’t overlook.
References to angels were to be expected, given what little the Doctor knew about Ryker’s past. The Doctor wrote most of those off at first as ancient history, expressions of the trauma he must have endured in the midst of the Celestial War. Until he happened to look a little closer at one entry that also mentioned Earth– not a known territory for a skirmish in the war, as far as the Doctor was aware.
At first he wanted to believe that it was simply Ryker’s own inner demons haunting him and fueling his paranoia that brought this notion on. That he’d simply been so used to being surrounded by enemies that he couldn’t stop seeing them.
Then he remembered things that Ryker had said to him almost in passing. Things he could see that others couldn’t, like the aura of darkness emanating from the void substance, or the wings of an angel hidden from sight. It also wasn't in a particularly recent journal, so Ryker's mental state couldn't be completely blamed.
That was when the Doctor resolved to collect every single thing Ryker had written down. He couldn’t afford to miss a single detail.
He almost regretted that decision when he made his way up to the flat above the launderette. It was even more of a mess than the lab or the office. Scrawled green eyes stared at him from the walls, just as Oliver had said, only now the Doctor had some more context as to what they depicted.
Jade Eye… another mystery Ryker left behind. What exactly could an entity like Ryker described have to do with him specifically? Why did he feel Jade Eye would be after him, and how did the void come into all of that?
The Doctor shook off those questions and continued cleaning out the flat. He couldn't waste time speculating on every bizarre aspect of Ryker's life, as that well seemed nearly bottomless.
It took most of the night for the Doctor to bring everything he found back to the TARDIS and even begin to organize it. Time ran too short for him to look too deeply into each point of interest, but by the time the night cycle began to transition to day, he'd formed a few messy piles and filed them away separately.
One file was packed with personal notes and journals of Ryker's that, as far as the Doctor could tell, were simply to do with his own life, his thoughts and feelings. One day, he thought, he might go through all of that for posterity's sake, and to ensure that nothing in there had to do with anything else uncovered.
Any mentions of angels or the war went into another file. As much as he didn’t like the sound of angels infiltrating Earth, he had to put it on the backburner. He had no intentions of getting himself and Zepheera wrapped up in the Celestial War, but if it was beginning to affect Earth even subtly, then he couldn’t ignore it forever. And in order to deal with it safely, he’d need to be as informed as he could possibly be.
Much of the rest had to do with Ryker's experiments, and quite a bit involved a particular endeavor that left a sour taste in the Doctor's mouth.
The Kriegerin Project. He could recall the name in passing, mostly tied to the Kriegerin Massacre, but never heard of anything as detailed as what he found among Ryker's belongings. He was evidently a major player behind the scenes, treating it at least in part as yet another experiment.
From what little the Doctor could stomach to skim through as he locked everything away, he would administer a serum to his subjects, all children, to draw out special abilities from them. Only to pit them against each other in horrific battles royale every half-century.
There probably wasn’t a pleasant way for the Doctor to be reminded of what exactly an Eschaton was, but that didn’t make him feel any better about it. All those children…
He did notice references to a particular subject, a boy called Kiran, and the extraction of his blood to make a serum Ryker stored away for later experiments. That sounded awfully familiar, but the Doctor had to make the decision to look into that another time. He was running out of time to finish cleaning the whole place out before the others woke up.
The Doctor breathed deeply as he lounged in his seat, running one hand down his face to massage all the tension out of it. It had been a long night for him, and based on the sheer amount that Ryker had written down, he predicted it wouldn’t be his last for a while.
A light tug at the shoulder of his jacket broke the Doctor out of his swirling thoughts, and he glanced over to find Zepheera climbing into view. Evidently he'd been so wrapped up in his head that he'd missed her return to the console room, and she'd made her own way up the back of the seat to join him.
“Alright?” he murmured as she got settled right where his shoulder met his arm.
Zepheera gave a nod and said, “Fine, yeah.” He could tell she also had things on her mind, but let it go for the moment. After all, he didn’t plan on dumping everything he’d learned about Ryker onto her, not until he had a better idea of what exactly to do with all that information.
Then something went crunch in his ear, and he looked more closely to find she'd let a tiny box rest in her lap and was holding something up to her mouth, but she was too close for him to properly make out what it was
“What're you eating?” he asked.
“Biscuit. Oliver made ‘em,” she mumbled as she swallowed. She reached into the box with her free hand and stretched her arm out long in front of her. “Here, try one.”
Arching an eyebrow, the Doctor lifted a fingertip up to receive the offered biscuit. It was quite big by borrower standards, but still had room to spare on the pad of his first finger.
“He baked these in that tree? Like–?”
“Like Keebler, yeah. Made that joke already,” Zepheera chuckled breathily.
With a bemused yet fond smile, the Doctor popped the tiny cookie onto the tip of his tongue where it quickly lost integrity. That didn't stop the flavor from lingering, though. “Mm! Wow, that is good.”
“That boy…” Zepheera suddenly mused, drawing the Doctor's attention again. He could see her staring ahead in deep thought, almost worried to say what was on her mind. “He's going to be like that forever, isn't he?”
The Doctor blinked at this abrupt change of subject, but pondered aloud now that it was brought up. “The void– or…Aleph, I suppose they go by now…changed Tanner's physiology completely. He'll be alright, so long as they've got each other. Wouldn't be shocked if at this point Tanner needs Aleph to survive.”
“You know what I mean, Doctor,” said Zepheera in a slightly firmer tone, more pointed as he danced around the subject. For his part, the Doctor met her gaze only briefly before turning away as a courtesy while he let out a long breath.
“The void isn't a place where anything is meant to survive. Based on Aleph's descriptions…I don't think Tanner did, either. I don't believe in miracles, but I'll say that he was incredibly lucky that the void was conscious enough to revive him in any capacity.” As he reached the point that he knew Zepheera was needling him about, he looked back to her. “Aside from Tanner, though, it would have no frame of reference for what exactly life entails. And at this point…it's hard to say whether or not Aleph has the capacity to adapt further, even if they can learn what it means to be alive. To be mortal.”
“To age…”
The Doctor's lips pressed into a thin line. “It's hard to say,” he repeated evenly. “All of this is unprecedented, to say the least. We don't know what Aleph is capable of, so…we'll see.”
He held her gaze until she nodded in return. “Yeah… Time will tell, I guess.”
Though the Doctor could tell she wasn't completely convinced, she sounded reassured at least. More optimistic for the kid. Reaching up to poke at her dangling foot, the Doctor insisted, “They'll be alright.”
“I know,” she said as she gave his finger a half-hearted kick. Sensing the end of their serious talk, Zepheera packed away the box of biscuits and scooted more towards the center of the Doctor's shoulder.
Once she had more stable seating, the Doctor hopped out of the seat and turned his attention to the console, circling around to each panel and manipulating a few controls as he moved. “Right! So… Where to next?”
Zepheera moved even closer to the Doctor's neck, clinging to his collar in anticipation of the usual chaos that unfolded when he began to pilot in earnest. “Honestly? You were talking up that dragon planet and it did make me curious.”
“Ahh, Unktenari! Well, I definitely won't say no to that one. We'll have some better stories to tell Tanner and the others about it, then!” He quickly punched in the coordinates and braced his hand against the main lever. “Ready?”
“Always,” Zepheera smirked, gripping the fabric even tighter.
The Doctor grinned widely and threw the lever back with an enthusiastic “Allons-y!”
~~~
Oliver would be back any day now, according to James’s calendar app. It had been a boring month and a half, with his hours filled by the monotony of writing crime reports and keeping documents up to date.
He had joked that he and Oliver had a similar career in the past, though he couldn’t help but feel envious of the smaller man’s passion and motivation. It had almost driven him to work harder himself— for a day or two, before the boredom of talking with his coworkers made him revert to wanting to shut himself away from society again.
Seeing Mackenzie on the weekends was the only reprieve he got from his own thoughts, so every other day he tried to stay focused on updating reports and going on patrol, responding to calls at the drop of a hat just to have something to do. Since meeting Oliver, making conversation with anyone else just felt intolerable; he hadn’t realized how much he hated small talk until he was brought into Oliver’s world.
In his restless state Oliver’s voice played in the back of his mind with the usual light scoldings: “I don’t see why you let the washing up pile up so much before doing it”, “you ought to keep your shoes by the door rather than simply kicking them off”, “the fridge has different shelves for a reason. I can help you organize if you need help”.
Now the house was tidier than ever before.
So when James heard a familiar knock against his rear window he couldn’t help leaping up from the couch, almost tripping over the coffee table in the process, and opening the spotless window with a large grin smeared across his expression.
“Oliver..! Hey mate, how are you? Let me get you inside, it’s still a bit chilly out there, ent’it?” He reached down with calloused hands, fingers twitching with a suppressed desire to scoop the borrower up after missing him for so many weeks. Even so, his palms turned upwards instinctively as he offered his friend a lift, trying not to seem too eager.
Oliver smiled back up at him, removing his fur cloak from where it hung over his broad shoulders and stepping onto the offered hand with the same graceful and unbothered energy James had missed.
“I’m alright, thank you. A little worn out— my rounds didn’t go exactly as planned…” he replied, leaning casually against one of James’s fingers to stay upright as the human stood up straight again and closed the window, carrying them both back over to the sofa. His deep brown eyes focused on Oliver, giving the borrower his undivided attention as he sat down and lowered his hand to the coffee table.
“What happened? Nothing bad I hope.” Once his hand was no longer occupied he opened the drawer in the coffee table, removing a tiny sofa and ottoman he had bought almost a year ago and setting them down. Oliver collapsed onto the cushions before James’s hands had even fully retracted, laying across the sofa with his hands interlocked over his stomach.
“Overall, it’s quite the opposite. I…made a new friend— a borrower very similar to myself, and acquired two new lodgers in my burrow.” Despite his claim, James could see the troubled expression on his friend's face and leaned forward onto his knees with concern. “The new lodgers in question are Sammy and Tanner.”
It took a moment for those names to fully process in his brain, but as soon as they did James could feel his heart jump into his throat. Oliver rarely brought up his family; when he did whatever pleasant memory he was recalling to James would quickly turn to grief, so both men chose to avoid the topic most of the time. But James knew that Oliver had been alone for years, and he knew that he had started coming to terms with the fact that his missing cousins and aunt were dead.
Clearly not.
James inhaled sharply as he sat up, scratching at his stubble.
“Shit, Oliver. That’s…yeah I can imagine what a mix of emotions this must be. Are they okay? How did you find them anyway? I presume your ah..borrower friend helped,” he murmured, keeping his tone tactful as he stared down at his friend with a sympathetic wince. Oliver let out a hum, turning his gaze from the ceiling in order to meet James’s eyes.
He sat up and cleared his throat; an obvious sign of an incoming ramble that James was fortunately used to at this point.
“Well, on the very first day of my rounds I ended up crossing paths with an alien time traveler who happened to be friends with a borrower, and they requested my help with tracking down an energy that their ship had been picking up. I obliged, and although it turned out my help wasn’t necessarily needed I’m certainly grateful that I came along because we ended up in a secret underground lab and Sammy was in one of the rooms.” He paused to take a breath, but James quickly interrupted.
“Wait wait— what the hell do you mean alien time traveler?? Where were you??” he blurted, brows furrowed with confusion because he knew that Oliver didn’t usually lie but it definitely felt like a joke of some sort. Giving him a mildly scolding look for the interruption, Oliver readjusted his glasses and waved his hand dismissively at the questions, as if he could make them disappear by simply batting them away.
“I will explain properly in time, just…let me get my thoughts out please.” He waited for a nod from James before clearing his throat and continuing. “Right…so. It turns out Ryker, the one I kept asking for wellness checks on, he’s also an alien. Not a time traveler though, as far as I’m aware. And he had this…void…goo in his secret lab, which then turned out to be sentient and it was attached to Tanner, so it brought him out of the void and back into this dimension, though I’m almost certain he’s turned into some kind of undead being. I’m…suspecting that he won’t even age, and the implications of that are worrying.”
James allowed the silence that followed to hang in the air for several moments this time as Oliver caught his breath. Regaining some level of composure, Oliver looked up at him and let a soft breath fall from his bitten lips, hand rubbing at the back of his neck in an attempt to relieve some of his tension.
“I am overjoyed to have them both back— every morning it is a delight to wake up and see them both and know they are now safe. But I didn’t think it would feel this difficult— I was not prepared for the state they were both in, and the thought of what either of them have been through just breaks my heart. They both have nightmares regularly, and Sammy in particular keeps crying out in her sleep.” His brows knitted together, green eyes cast downwards at his lap as his hands shook slightly. “If I could take all of their pain and fears away even if it meant feeling everything myself in turn, I would do it in a heartbeat…”
Logically of course, James knew that it would have been almost impossible for Oliver to find his cousins in an untraumatized state given the circumstances of their capture from what he recalled. But even so, he and Oliver had been holding out hope that they might be okay; just out of reach, living out their lives as borrowers in another city. From the sounds of things though it was clear that Oliver’s aunt was presumably not in the picture, and that his cousins had been through something worse than hell.
“Awh mate…” James couldn’t help but bite the inside of his cheek nervously as he tried to think of something to do. It wasn’t often that Oliver needed comfort, but it was clear that this was one of those instances. He reached down and cupped his hands together slowly, nudging Oliver with his fingertip, silently asking his permission to continue. After receiving a short nod, James let his fingers connect under his friend’s tiny form, lifting him off of the couch and holding him in his lap. “Sounds like you need a proper relax. You sore or anything?”
Oliver shifted uncomfortably at the suggestion; resistant to the idea as always. James found it endearing what a hard worker the man was, but he could also be frustratingly stubborn about not letting anyone else take care of him.
“I’m…fine. It’s out of my system now.” he assured, laying back against the calloused palms cradling him.
Now that James got a second look, Oliver looked even more exhausted than normal. Raising an eyebrow to call his bluff, James pressed one of his fingers against the smaller man’s back, rubbing it in a repetitive soothing motion. As he suspected, even such a simple back rub was enough to make Oliver’s shoulders droop.
“Out of your system, my ass… I think you at least deserve a massage and a cuppa while you're here. And while we’re at it, I’m gonna need context on all this alien shite before it drives me mad.” Making sure not to be too forceful and watching Oliver carefully to gauge whether he was just being stubborn or if he was genuinely uncomfortable, James turned the borrower onto his stomach so that he could massage his back more effectively. Saltily, he added, “I thought you said you didn’t believe in any of that sort of ‘conspiracy stuff’.”
Begrudgingly the borrower relaxed into the gentle motions against his stiff back, shoving down his embarrassment with a sigh.
“Well…I didn’t. And I still don’t think aliens have interacted with earth in the way you think— but I certainly can’t deny that I did become entangled in alien activity,” he explained in a matter-of-fact tone. “I met the Doctor, who told me he was a Time Lord— a species that coincidentally looks very human despite having a different physiology. He was joined by Zepheera, a borrower, although afflicted with immortality. They were rather pleasant company.”
“Rather pleasant company,” James scoffed in disbelief, but tried hard to focus on the pressure he was applying; very aware of how fragile the body he was handling could be even if Oliver acted like he was made of solid steel. “You’re lucky they didn’t abduct you. 5-6% of people get abducted by aliens, you know!”
Oliver shook his head, letting it rest in his folded arms as James focused on his tense shoulders.
“We’ve spoken about this before. Those studies are hardly substantiated, and even if it were the case that those numbers were true, that wouldn’t make 5-6% the likelihood of being abducted.” He turned his head to one side so that his voice wouldn’t be muffled by his forearms, although he didn’t bother trying to look up at James at this angle. “Regardless, yes they were pleasant company. I have…never really been able to act as myself around other borrowers, as you know. It was nice to meet one as open-minded and intelligent as Zepheera.”
James at least had enough tact not to make any retorts about it this time, though he felt a mix of happiness for Oliver meeting someone of his own kind who was like-minded, and a hint of jealousy at the way he spoke about her. He knew that his friendship with Oliver couldn’t be the same as it was between him and other borrowers; simply because of the size difference and cultural differences, but it still stung to hear him hurl praises at this ‘Zepheera’ lady.
To distract himself, he changed the subject.
“And the guy running that laundry place turned out to be an alien too? What do you know... It seems obvious in hindsight, the guy seemed to have a few screws loose,” James remarked, before grimacing as he recalled Oliver’s cousins’ involvement with the man. “...I mean…you’d have to, if you’re willing to kidnap a couple of kids.”
Oliver simply nodded to that point. His eyes closed when James’s finger reached a particularly knotted area, tensing at first before relaxing once he managed to rid him of it. He always found himself surprised by what a delicate and precise touch James could have at times, considering how clumsy he was in other areas. He was trying not to fall asleep, his tired brain latching onto the conversation to claw himself back to consciousness.
“It wasn’t obvious. You and I both believed he was simply a man suffering with severe mental health issues, and I believe that is still the case, regardless of his species.” He let out a weary sigh, subtly rubbing at his eyes from under his glasses. “The Doctor took care of him anyway, so I can just be glad that monster can’t touch my cousins ever again. Among…other people. It seems that the shootings were his doing— he had a hit list, although I’m not sure why exactly.”
“Wait what?” James’s finger stopped for a moment, hovering above Oliver’s shoulders as that realization hit him like a tidal wave. His mouth opened and closed a few times in shock, then coughed awkwardly and added under his breath. “That is uh….that’s gonna be a difficult crime report to make. If I mention anything about aliens to the department they’ll definitely laugh me out of the workforce.”
Oliver slowly forced himself to sit back up, stretching before reclining back as he met James’s gaze, giving his hovering finger a reassuring pat.
“Apologies, I…perhaps should have kept that fact to myself.” He offered a soft smile, one that instantly eased James’s worries. The human huffed from his nose and leaned back against the sofa cushions, glancing towards the kitchen in consideration, debating whether he could be bothered to get up and make tea given all of the huge revelations that were suddenly being brought to his attention.
“Nah, mate. You’re fine.” He turned his gaze back down towards Oliver and quirked a lopsided grin. “Ya know…all this information is making me thirsty. Fancy a cuppa while we chat some more?”
Oliver’s own expression brightened at the suggestion, the corners of his eyes crinkling as he nodded.
Note: Thank you everyone for following our story to the end!
┌────── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆⋆⋅☆⋅⋆⋆⋅☆⋅⋆⋆⋅☆⋅⋆⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──────┐
Zepheera sat at the edge of her bed, carefully wrapping her freshly washed teacups in fabric and placing them in a drawer. It was almost a shame, she thought. She kept a small collection of teacups mainly for the sake of having spares, rather than actually hoping to use more than one at a time. Having backups was always a good idea for a borrower, especially one leading such an active lifestyle as Zepheera did. And they did come in handy this time, if not in the way she'd expected.
Part of her wished she'd been able to give Oliver one of the cups from the Tertatian tea set. She reckoned he'd get a kick out of a souvenir from the borrower-sized aliens she'd told him about back at his burrow. With everything going on earlier, Zepheera just didn't think of it in time.
She shook that thought away as she closed the drawer. That moment had passed, and the Doctor had already parked the TARDIS behind the moon “for a bit of a breather”, whatever that meant. Soon they'd be moving on to some other time and place for the next adventure.
It'll have to wait for next time, she decided, hopeful that it wouldn't be too long before they came back to visit.
When she stood, she paused to smooth out the blanket she'd carefully folded and laid out at the foot of her bed. Her fingertips traced the embroidered flowers once again, still taken aback by how deeply Oliver had unintentionally touched her with the gift. With his friendship in general. There weren't many people that Zepheera met during her and the Doctor's travels that she could trust so quickly and would be so eager to see again. It was a very odd feeling indeed.
Zepheera tried to clear her head of it all as she changed into a fresh set of clothes, threw on her candy-wrapper vest, and tossed her knapsack over her shoulder as she made to stroll out of her room. She very nearly succeeded, but then hesitated just before she could duck through the crack. After a moment she gave a small sigh, reached out to her shelf for the box of biscuits Oliver had made, and left with it tucked under her arm.
~~~
“There we go. That's better, isn't it?” the Doctor cooed as he slowly circled the console and brushed one hand against its center column. Almost in response, an ambient hum echoed through the room like a sigh of relief.
He could hardly blame her. As much as Tanner enjoyed being inside the TARDIS, the feeling was unfortunately not mutual. It wasn't his fault, not really. He was just…an impossible thing. Coexisting in symbiosis with an embodiment of the complete antithesis of reality. The Doctor could only imagine Tanner's presence was less than comfortable for his poor ship; though the inner workings of the TARDIS were incredibly complex, the closest approximation he could even vaguely equate it to was indigestion.
The Doctor followed her lead and all but tossed himself onto the worn yellow seat nearby with a soft groan, draping his arms along the back and propping his feet up on the edge of the console. For the first time in about a day, he was able to sit back with nothing pressing to do.
He'd kept himself occupied during the time Zepheera and their guests were sleeping, and took the opportunity to return to the Laundry Spot to, ironically enough, clean out the place. It wasn't too likely that anyone would find Ryker's hidden laboratory anytime soon, but given Oliver's descriptions of his deteriorating mental state of late, it seemed better to not take the risk that he left anything behind that someone might be able to misuse if it was discovered.
On the one hand, the Doctor didn't have much to confiscate in the way of technology. It seemed that Ryker either arrived with the bare minimum or simply didn't operate with high tech. He still took the computer from the very back room and had plans to comb through its files later on, just in case.
What Ryker lacked in the tech department, he rather overcompensated with literature. Specifically journals and notes, in nearly every nook and cranny the Doctor thought to check. Ordinarily he wouldn't have bothered with collecting every single scrap of paper he could find; anyone who stumbled upon it all might simply write it off as the scribblings of a madman like Oliver did initially, There was always the chance that the wrong eyes could find some meaning in his words, but that still wouldn't warrant such a thorough sweep.
Then the Doctor caught a few glimpses in his writing that he simply couldn’t overlook.
References to angels were to be expected, given what little the Doctor knew about Ryker’s past. The Doctor wrote most of those off at first as ancient history, expressions of the trauma he must have endured in the midst of the Celestial War. Until he happened to look a little closer at one entry that also mentioned Earth– not a known territory for a skirmish in the war, as far as the Doctor was aware.
At first he wanted to believe that it was simply Ryker’s own inner demons haunting him and fueling his paranoia that brought this notion on. That he’d simply been so used to being surrounded by enemies that he couldn’t stop seeing them.
Then he remembered things that Ryker had said to him almost in passing. Things he could see that others couldn’t, like the aura of darkness emanating from the void substance, or the wings of an angel hidden from sight. It also wasn't in a particularly recent journal, so Ryker's mental state couldn't be completely blamed.
That was when the Doctor resolved to collect every single thing Ryker had written down. He couldn’t afford to miss a single detail.
He almost regretted that decision when he made his way up to the flat above the launderette. It was even more of a mess than the lab or the office. Scrawled green eyes stared at him from the walls, just as Oliver had said, only now the Doctor had some more context as to what they depicted.
Jade Eye… another mystery Ryker left behind. What exactly could an entity like Ryker described have to do with him specifically? Why did he feel Jade Eye would be after him, and how did the void come into all of that?
The Doctor shook off those questions and continued cleaning out the flat. He couldn't waste time speculating on every bizarre aspect of Ryker's life, as that well seemed nearly bottomless.
It took most of the night for the Doctor to bring everything he found back to the TARDIS and even begin to organize it. Time ran too short for him to look too deeply into each point of interest, but by the time the night cycle began to transition to day, he'd formed a few messy piles and filed them away separately.
One file was packed with personal notes and journals of Ryker's that, as far as the Doctor could tell, were simply to do with his own life, his thoughts and feelings. One day, he thought, he might go through all of that for posterity's sake, and to ensure that nothing in there had to do with anything else uncovered.
Any mentions of angels or the war went into another file. As much as he didn’t like the sound of angels infiltrating Earth, he had to put it on the backburner. He had no intentions of getting himself and Zepheera wrapped up in the Celestial War, but if it was beginning to affect Earth even subtly, then he couldn’t ignore it forever. And in order to deal with it safely, he’d need to be as informed as he could possibly be.
Much of the rest had to do with Ryker's experiments, and quite a bit involved a particular endeavor that left a sour taste in the Doctor's mouth.
The Kriegerin Project. He could recall the name in passing, mostly tied to the Kriegerin Massacre, but never heard of anything as detailed as what he found among Ryker's belongings. He was evidently a major player behind the scenes, treating it at least in part as yet another experiment.
From what little the Doctor could stomach to skim through as he locked everything away, he would administer a serum to his subjects, all children, to draw out special abilities from them. Only to pit them against each other in horrific battles royale every half-century.
There probably wasn’t a pleasant way for the Doctor to be reminded of what exactly an Eschaton was, but that didn’t make him feel any better about it. All those children…
He did notice references to a particular subject, a boy called Kiran, and the extraction of his blood to make a serum Ryker stored away for later experiments. That sounded awfully familiar, but the Doctor had to make the decision to look into that another time. He was running out of time to finish cleaning the whole place out before the others woke up.
The Doctor breathed deeply as he lounged in his seat, running one hand down his face to massage all the tension out of it. It had been a long night for him, and based on the sheer amount that Ryker had written down, he predicted it wouldn’t be his last for a while.
A light tug at the shoulder of his jacket broke the Doctor out of his swirling thoughts, and he glanced over to find Zepheera climbing into view. Evidently he'd been so wrapped up in his head that he'd missed her return to the console room, and she'd made her own way up the back of the seat to join him.
“Alright?” he murmured as she got settled right where his shoulder met his arm.
Zepheera gave a nod and said, “Fine, yeah.” He could tell she also had things on her mind, but let it go for the moment. After all, he didn’t plan on dumping everything he’d learned about Ryker onto her, not until he had a better idea of what exactly to do with all that information.
Then something went crunch in his ear, and he looked more closely to find she'd let a tiny box rest in her lap and was holding something up to her mouth, but she was too close for him to properly make out what it was
“What're you eating?” he asked.
“Biscuit. Oliver made ‘em,” she mumbled as she swallowed. She reached into the box with her free hand and stretched her arm out long in front of her. “Here, try one.”
Arching an eyebrow, the Doctor lifted a fingertip up to receive the offered biscuit. It was quite big by borrower standards, but still had room to spare on the pad of his first finger.
“He baked these in that tree? Like–?”
“Like Keebler, yeah. Made that joke already,” Zepheera chuckled breathily.
With a bemused yet fond smile, the Doctor popped the tiny cookie onto the tip of his tongue where it quickly lost integrity. That didn't stop the flavor from lingering, though. “Mm! Wow, that is good.”
“That boy…” Zepheera suddenly mused, drawing the Doctor's attention again. He could see her staring ahead in deep thought, almost worried to say what was on her mind. “He's going to be like that forever, isn't he?”
The Doctor blinked at this abrupt change of subject, but pondered aloud now that it was brought up. “The void– or…Aleph, I suppose they go by now…changed Tanner's physiology completely. He'll be alright, so long as they've got each other. Wouldn't be shocked if at this point Tanner needs Aleph to survive.”
“You know what I mean, Doctor,” said Zepheera in a slightly firmer tone, more pointed as he danced around the subject. For his part, the Doctor met her gaze only briefly before turning away as a courtesy while he let out a long breath.
“The void isn't a place where anything is meant to survive. Based on Aleph's descriptions…I don't think Tanner did, either. I don't believe in miracles, but I'll say that he was incredibly lucky that the void was conscious enough to revive him in any capacity.” As he reached the point that he knew Zepheera was needling him about, he looked back to her. “Aside from Tanner, though, it would have no frame of reference for what exactly life entails. And at this point…it's hard to say whether or not Aleph has the capacity to adapt further, even if they can learn what it means to be alive. To be mortal.”
“To age…”
The Doctor's lips pressed into a thin line. “It's hard to say,” he repeated evenly. “All of this is unprecedented, to say the least. We don't know what Aleph is capable of, so…we'll see.”
He held her gaze until she nodded in return. “Yeah… Time will tell, I guess.”
Though the Doctor could tell she wasn't completely convinced, she sounded reassured at least. More optimistic for the kid. Reaching up to poke at her dangling foot, the Doctor insisted, “They'll be alright.”
“I know,” she said as she gave his finger a half-hearted kick. Sensing the end of their serious talk, Zepheera packed away the box of biscuits and scooted more towards the center of the Doctor's shoulder.
Once she had more stable seating, the Doctor hopped out of the seat and turned his attention to the console, circling around to each panel and manipulating a few controls as he moved. “Right! So… Where to next?”
Zepheera moved even closer to the Doctor's neck, clinging to his collar in anticipation of the usual chaos that unfolded when he began to pilot in earnest. “Honestly? You were talking up that dragon planet and it did make me curious.”
“Ahh, Unktenari! Well, I definitely won't say no to that one. We'll have some better stories to tell Tanner and the others about it, then!” He quickly punched in the coordinates and braced his hand against the main lever. “Ready?”
“Always,” Zepheera smirked, gripping the fabric even tighter.
The Doctor grinned widely and threw the lever back with an enthusiastic “Allons-y!”
~~~
Oliver would be back any day now, according to James’s calendar app. It had been a boring month and a half, with his hours filled by the monotony of writing crime reports and keeping documents up to date.
He had joked that he and Oliver had a similar career in the past, though he couldn’t help but feel envious of the smaller man’s passion and motivation. It had almost driven him to work harder himself— for a day or two, before the boredom of talking with his coworkers made him revert to wanting to shut himself away from society again.
Seeing Mackenzie on the weekends was the only reprieve he got from his own thoughts, so every other day he tried to stay focused on updating reports and going on patrol, responding to calls at the drop of a hat just to have something to do. Since meeting Oliver, making conversation with anyone else just felt intolerable; he hadn’t realized how much he hated small talk until he was brought into Oliver’s world.
In his restless state Oliver’s voice played in the back of his mind with the usual light scoldings: “I don’t see why you let the washing up pile up so much before doing it”, “you ought to keep your shoes by the door rather than simply kicking them off”, “the fridge has different shelves for a reason. I can help you organize if you need help”.
Now the house was tidier than ever before.
So when James heard a familiar knock against his rear window he couldn’t help leaping up from the couch, almost tripping over the coffee table in the process, and opening the spotless window with a large grin smeared across his expression.
“Oliver..! Hey mate, how are you? Let me get you inside, it’s still a bit chilly out there, ent’it?” He reached down with calloused hands, fingers twitching with a suppressed desire to scoop the borrower up after missing him for so many weeks. Even so, his palms turned upwards instinctively as he offered his friend a lift, trying not to seem too eager.
Oliver smiled back up at him, removing his fur cloak from where it hung over his broad shoulders and stepping onto the offered hand with the same graceful and unbothered energy James had missed.
“I’m alright, thank you. A little worn out— my rounds didn’t go exactly as planned…” he replied, leaning casually against one of James’s fingers to stay upright as the human stood up straight again and closed the window, carrying them both back over to the sofa. His deep brown eyes focused on Oliver, giving the borrower his undivided attention as he sat down and lowered his hand to the coffee table.
“What happened? Nothing bad I hope.” Once his hand was no longer occupied he opened the drawer in the coffee table, removing a tiny sofa and ottoman he had bought almost a year ago and setting them down. Oliver collapsed onto the cushions before James’s hands had even fully retracted, laying across the sofa with his hands interlocked over his stomach.
“Overall, it’s quite the opposite. I…made a new friend— a borrower very similar to myself, and acquired two new lodgers in my burrow.” Despite his claim, James could see the troubled expression on his friend's face and leaned forward onto his knees with concern. “The new lodgers in question are Sammy and Tanner.”
It took a moment for those names to fully process in his brain, but as soon as they did James could feel his heart jump into his throat. Oliver rarely brought up his family; when he did whatever pleasant memory he was recalling to James would quickly turn to grief, so both men chose to avoid the topic most of the time. But James knew that Oliver had been alone for years, and he knew that he had started coming to terms with the fact that his missing cousins and aunt were dead.
Clearly not.
James inhaled sharply as he sat up, scratching at his stubble.
“Shit, Oliver. That’s…yeah I can imagine what a mix of emotions this must be. Are they okay? How did you find them anyway? I presume your ah..borrower friend helped,” he murmured, keeping his tone tactful as he stared down at his friend with a sympathetic wince. Oliver let out a hum, turning his gaze from the ceiling in order to meet James’s eyes.
He sat up and cleared his throat; an obvious sign of an incoming ramble that James was fortunately used to at this point.
“Well, on the very first day of my rounds I ended up crossing paths with an alien time traveler who happened to be friends with a borrower, and they requested my help with tracking down an energy that their ship had been picking up. I obliged, and although it turned out my help wasn’t necessarily needed I’m certainly grateful that I came along because we ended up in a secret underground lab and Sammy was in one of the rooms.” He paused to take a breath, but James quickly interrupted.
“Wait wait— what the hell do you mean alien time traveler?? Where were you??” he blurted, brows furrowed with confusion because he knew that Oliver didn’t usually lie but it definitely felt like a joke of some sort. Giving him a mildly scolding look for the interruption, Oliver readjusted his glasses and waved his hand dismissively at the questions, as if he could make them disappear by simply batting them away.
“I will explain properly in time, just…let me get my thoughts out please.” He waited for a nod from James before clearing his throat and continuing. “Right…so. It turns out Ryker, the one I kept asking for wellness checks on, he’s also an alien. Not a time traveler though, as far as I’m aware. And he had this…void…goo in his secret lab, which then turned out to be sentient and it was attached to Tanner, so it brought him out of the void and back into this dimension, though I’m almost certain he’s turned into some kind of undead being. I’m…suspecting that he won’t even age, and the implications of that are worrying.”
James allowed the silence that followed to hang in the air for several moments this time as Oliver caught his breath. Regaining some level of composure, Oliver looked up at him and let a soft breath fall from his bitten lips, hand rubbing at the back of his neck in an attempt to relieve some of his tension.
“I am overjoyed to have them both back— every morning it is a delight to wake up and see them both and know they are now safe. But I didn’t think it would feel this difficult— I was not prepared for the state they were both in, and the thought of what either of them have been through just breaks my heart. They both have nightmares regularly, and Sammy in particular keeps crying out in her sleep.” His brows knitted together, green eyes cast downwards at his lap as his hands shook slightly. “If I could take all of their pain and fears away even if it meant feeling everything myself in turn, I would do it in a heartbeat…”
Logically of course, James knew that it would have been almost impossible for Oliver to find his cousins in an untraumatized state given the circumstances of their capture from what he recalled. But even so, he and Oliver had been holding out hope that they might be okay; just out of reach, living out their lives as borrowers in another city. From the sounds of things though it was clear that Oliver’s aunt was presumably not in the picture, and that his cousins had been through something worse than hell.
“Awh mate…” James couldn’t help but bite the inside of his cheek nervously as he tried to think of something to do. It wasn’t often that Oliver needed comfort, but it was clear that this was one of those instances. He reached down and cupped his hands together slowly, nudging Oliver with his fingertip, silently asking his permission to continue. After receiving a short nod, James let his fingers connect under his friend’s tiny form, lifting him off of the couch and holding him in his lap. “Sounds like you need a proper relax. You sore or anything?”
Oliver shifted uncomfortably at the suggestion; resistant to the idea as always. James found it endearing what a hard worker the man was, but he could also be frustratingly stubborn about not letting anyone else take care of him.
“I’m…fine. It’s out of my system now.” he assured, laying back against the calloused palms cradling him.
Now that James got a second look, Oliver looked even more exhausted than normal. Raising an eyebrow to call his bluff, James pressed one of his fingers against the smaller man’s back, rubbing it in a repetitive soothing motion. As he suspected, even such a simple back rub was enough to make Oliver’s shoulders droop.
“Out of your system, my ass… I think you at least deserve a massage and a cuppa while you're here. And while we’re at it, I’m gonna need context on all this alien shite before it drives me mad.” Making sure not to be too forceful and watching Oliver carefully to gauge whether he was just being stubborn or if he was genuinely uncomfortable, James turned the borrower onto his stomach so that he could massage his back more effectively. Saltily, he added, “I thought you said you didn’t believe in any of that sort of ‘conspiracy stuff’.”
Begrudgingly the borrower relaxed into the gentle motions against his stiff back, shoving down his embarrassment with a sigh.
“Well…I didn’t. And I still don’t think aliens have interacted with earth in the way you think— but I certainly can’t deny that I did become entangled in alien activity,” he explained in a matter-of-fact tone. “I met the Doctor, who told me he was a Time Lord— a species that coincidentally looks very human despite having a different physiology. He was joined by Zepheera, a borrower, although afflicted with immortality. They were rather pleasant company.”
“Rather pleasant company,” James scoffed in disbelief, but tried hard to focus on the pressure he was applying; very aware of how fragile the body he was handling could be even if Oliver acted like he was made of solid steel. “You’re lucky they didn’t abduct you. 5-6% of people get abducted by aliens, you know!”
Oliver shook his head, letting it rest in his folded arms as James focused on his tense shoulders.
“We’ve spoken about this before. Those studies are hardly substantiated, and even if it were the case that those numbers were true, that wouldn’t make 5-6% the likelihood of being abducted.” He turned his head to one side so that his voice wouldn’t be muffled by his forearms, although he didn’t bother trying to look up at James at this angle. “Regardless, yes they were pleasant company. I have…never really been able to act as myself around other borrowers, as you know. It was nice to meet one as open-minded and intelligent as Zepheera.”
James at least had enough tact not to make any retorts about it this time, though he felt a mix of happiness for Oliver meeting someone of his own kind who was like-minded, and a hint of jealousy at the way he spoke about her. He knew that his friendship with Oliver couldn’t be the same as it was between him and other borrowers; simply because of the size difference and cultural differences, but it still stung to hear him hurl praises at this ‘Zepheera’ lady.
To distract himself, he changed the subject.
“And the guy running that laundry place turned out to be an alien too? What do you know... It seems obvious in hindsight, the guy seemed to have a few screws loose,” James remarked, before grimacing as he recalled Oliver’s cousins’ involvement with the man. “...I mean…you’d have to, if you’re willing to kidnap a couple of kids.”
Oliver simply nodded to that point. His eyes closed when James’s finger reached a particularly knotted area, tensing at first before relaxing once he managed to rid him of it. He always found himself surprised by what a delicate and precise touch James could have at times, considering how clumsy he was in other areas. He was trying not to fall asleep, his tired brain latching onto the conversation to claw himself back to consciousness.
“It wasn’t obvious. You and I both believed he was simply a man suffering with severe mental health issues, and I believe that is still the case, regardless of his species.” He let out a weary sigh, subtly rubbing at his eyes from under his glasses. “The Doctor took care of him anyway, so I can just be glad that monster can’t touch my cousins ever again. Among…other people. It seems that the shootings were his doing— he had a hit list, although I’m not sure why exactly.”
“Wait what?” James’s finger stopped for a moment, hovering above Oliver’s shoulders as that realization hit him like a tidal wave. His mouth opened and closed a few times in shock, then coughed awkwardly and added under his breath. “That is uh….that’s gonna be a difficult crime report to make. If I mention anything about aliens to the department they’ll definitely laugh me out of the workforce.”
Oliver slowly forced himself to sit back up, stretching before reclining back as he met James’s gaze, giving his hovering finger a reassuring pat.
“Apologies, I…perhaps should have kept that fact to myself.” He offered a soft smile, one that instantly eased James’s worries. The human huffed from his nose and leaned back against the sofa cushions, glancing towards the kitchen in consideration, debating whether he could be bothered to get up and make tea given all of the huge revelations that were suddenly being brought to his attention.
“Nah, mate. You’re fine.” He turned his gaze back down towards Oliver and quirked a lopsided grin. “Ya know…all this information is making me thirsty. Fancy a cuppa while we chat some more?”
Oliver’s own expression brightened at the suggestion, the corners of his eyes crinkling as he nodded.
Note: Hope my fellow USAmericans had a good Thanksgiving, and have a safe Black Friday!
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As the Doctor made his way almost gingerly around to the other side of the bed, Zepheera got up to start gathering her things. She made sure everyone had their fill of the granola before packing it away, and insisted they leave their teacups when they were done with them, saying, “I’ll clean them up later.” With the extra room in her pack, she tossed in the small tube of burn ointment; part of it stuck out the top, but it was secure enough that she paid it no mind.
The Doctor had crossed to the other side of the bed by then, and picked up the larger cup of tea from the floor to set aside high up and out of the way. Then he mindfully lowered into a crouch and waited for Zepheera’s signal to lay his upturned hand near the borrowers.
Zepheera shook off the bittersweet feeling in the air as she took her previous position on top of the Doctor’s wrist to allow the others more room in his palm, offering her hand to help them up if needed.
The other three moved as a unit, with Oliver ushering Sammy forward and Tanner still holding onto her arm as they walked up to the open hand. Sammy collected herself much better this time around, though she couldn't help how her heart instinctively raced the closer she got to the Doctor.
Once they were all on board they sat down, Oliver looking relieved by the lack of a fuss, and Tanner just seeming content to be held. The warmth radiating up from the Doctor's palm was pleasant for his cold body, relaxing as the heat seeped into his muscles. Sammy was still tense but managed to focus more on her brother than on being carried.
Once his cousins seemed to be settled, Oliver looked towards the Doctor and Zepheera, giving them a polite nod to signal that they were all ready to go.
This time, Zepheera took a seat with everyone else. There was just enough room for her to sit cross-legged along the heel of the Doctor’s palm. He then lifted the lot of them as he did the night before, using his other hand for extra stability as he stood and walked out into the corridor.
The Doctor prioritized having a smooth stride over speed, so it took a few good minutes before the path opened up into the console room. Very glad he’d had the foresight to pilot the TARDIS beforehand, which would be significantly more difficult with one hand full of borrowers (not to mention intense for the kids), he started straight for the door. He paused at the threshold when a thought occurred to him.
“Oh…! Nearly forgot,” he muttered under his breath as his unoccupied hand fell away to dig through his chest pocket. When it came back up, it held Oliver’s cloak pinched between two fingers; slightly rumpled from the less than ideal storage, but overall in good condition. He gave it a gentle shake to straighten it out, then held it within Oliver’s reach, careful to not come too close to the siblings. “There you are. Sorry I didn’t think of it sooner, things got a bit… Well, y’know.”
Oliver blinked, almost forgetting about his cloak himself amidst all the chaos of the previous day. He graciously retrieved his fur cloak from the Doctor's fingers with a nod, before choosing to drape the warm fabric over the shoulders of his cousins instead.
“It has been a rather… hectic time. You've done more than enough though, Doctor, thank you,” Oliver assured, giving the giant finger beside him a calm pat to acknowledge his appreciation towards the time lord. Every time his gaze was drawn back to Sammy and Tanner his heart just swelled with relief to have both of his cousins back and safe. He was already planning out exactly how he would expand his burrow to give them each a room to sleep in.
Tanner nuzzled into the fluffy fabric, running his fingers over the soft hairs in fascination. He couldn't remember feeling anything quite as fluffy in his life before, and the texture was incredible. He pulled it around himself a bit more, leaning into Sammy so they could both wrap themselves up in the large cloak. He could see that she seemed to be in deep thought of some kind, but she was present enough to hug up to him and hold the cloak shut with anticipation for the winter air.
The Doctor smiled softly to see Oliver's gesture toward his cousins and the way they so readily accepted it, before he reminded himself to focus. Their home was so close. He just had to get them there.
With that in mind, he pulled the door open with his newly freed hand and stepped out into the brisk woods.
“Right,” said the Doctor as he looked around the immediate area. Even though there was truly no way for him to know what to look out for, his head was still on a swivel to take in the new surroundings. “Really hoping I got the coordinates at least somewhat accurate…”
In an attempt to be helpful, Zepheera skimmed the trees, a thoughtful frown pinching her brow. “I think we're close… that patch of trees looks familiar…sort of.” Her tone quickly lost confidence. The circumstances of her brief visits to Oliver's burrow didn't give her the best impression of its exact location in the sprawling forest, against which the blue wood finish of the TARDIS stood out like a sore thumb.
“We are close,” Oliver assured with a nod, pointing towards the east. “It's about 10 meters that way. There's a blackberry bush growing right beside the oak, so it shouldn't be too difficult to spot.”
“Blackberries?” Tanner perked up. He recalled the taste from the few times Ryker would bring him and Sammy a treat and it was definitely his favourite food. He wasn't entirely sure why they were in a bush, but he hoped they would be easy to get to so he could eat some later.
Oliver chuckled, understanding where the younger borrower's enthusiasm was coming from immediately. The few times he had been able to visit after moving out he had heard stories from his aunt and uncle about Tanner's love for berries and how he would beg for them just about every borrowing trip.
“They aren't quite in season yet, but I have blackberry jam you can try,” he offered with a fond expression, a smile playing at his lips. Tanner nodded along, though it was very obvious he didn't know what ‘in season' meant.
Following Oliver's finger, the Doctor's gaze quickly fell on an oak tree with a nearby berry bush. His expression brightened immediately, and he made his way there as quickly as he could manage without disrupting the borrowers in hand.
He stopped about a pace away and once again slowed his movements down as he lowered himself into a crouch. The back of his hand flattened a small patch of grass near the roots while he waited for all the smaller folk to disembark.
Zepheera's chin lifted to properly take in the tree and its surroundings for the first time. Though there was very little to distinguish it from any other oak in the woods at first glance, knowing that it was Oliver's home gave it an air of importance. It stood mightily in place, and would be more than sufficient to keep him and his cousins safe. Zepheera appreciated that, and hoped that she could remember what it looked like if she and the Doctor came back to visit.
Oliver stepped off of the Doctor's hand elegantly as always, the casual manner in which he was able to move from palm to grass showcasing just how often he got rides from larger hands. Sammy and Tanner on the other hand were still a little wobbly on the uneven surface, steadying themselves by taking Oliver's offered hand as they stepped off.
Once they were steady on the ground, Tanner couldn't help but stare at all of the colours and the light coming from high above despite the lack of ceiling. The sun, I think. The grass blades were about as tall as him. He reached out to poke it, surprised by the almost rubbery texture. After feeling the grass for a few more moments, he retracted his hand to stay huddled up in the fur cloak, as much as his eyes wandered.
Sammy cast a wary glance up at the Doctor, a puzzled look spreading across her expression. So close to safety and yet he still hadn’t dropped the facade. Even when she had made a deal to not complain once Tanner was safe, even though he had agreed she couldn't see any of the telltale signs that he was about to snatch her up. She observed his large hand more critically, frowning in thought and staring as if that would somehow make his fingers twitch in her direction.
Her heart rate increased the longer she anticipated something, before her eyes snapped up to meet the Doctor's.
“Y-you…” She cleared her throat awkwardly to get the stammer out of her words, shoulders bunching up. “You're really…just gonna let us go? Even though I said I wouldn't complain..?” She averted her gaze, brows furrowing with a mix of confusion and a reluctance to accept that she was being released. “You…you agreed to the deal too.”
“I did,” the Doctor agreed evenly. As he held Sammy’s gaze, he somehow managed to smile with his eyes more than what he let show in the slightest upturn of the corners of his lips. “The deal was, no complaints about anything I might do. So…this is what I’m doing.”
Glancing up towards the Doctor, Sammy inspected his expression for any deceit but only found sincerity. She shifted her weight side to side with discomfort before nodding in acceptance. “...thanks.”
The second Zepheera hopped down from his palm to join the others, the Doctor’s hand lifted and turned over without moving any closer. He waved a few fingers in the smallest shooing motion he could muster. “Well? Go on, off you pop. Gotta be warmer in there than it is out here,” he insisted with a more prominent grin.
Zepheera shook her head good-naturedly at him before turning to Oliver and removing the tube of burn ointment from her pack. It was hardly full, but plenty to last a borrower for a good while if used sparingly.
“Thought this might be good to have for Sammy’s burn while it heals,” she said as she offered it to Oliver. “I know it wasn’t too bad, but I didn’t know if you had anything to help with the pain.”
Oliver took the offered ointment with a smile.
“Ah, thank you, Zepheera. I believe I have some herbs, but this will probably be much more effective.” He placed it in his pack before letting out a small hum of thought. After all that the Doctor and Zepheera had done for him and his cousins it felt impolite to see them off with nothing. He held up a finger in the universal sign of ‘one moment please’, entering his burrow and leaving the door ajar.
After rummaging around in one of the boxes he kept in the living room, he finally found what he was looking for; a knitted blanket. It was one of his first successful knitting projects in which he had decided to embroider the green blanket with purple flowery patterns. It was lined at the bottom with silk. He brushed off any fluff that might be clinging to it, shifting to hold it in one arm as he went into the kitchen and filled a small box with various biscuits he had baked, as well as a tiny glass bottle of cordial.
Waltzing back outside, Oliver held the gifts towards Zepheera.
“A parting gift. As thanks for all of your help.” He looked up at the Doctor and offered an apologetic smile. “Apologies. I don't have much to offer that would be of any use to you, but I can promise that you and Zepheera are always welcome here. Whether that's because you need help or you'd just like to stop by for tea.”
Remembering to keep his motions small, the Doctor waved off Oliver’s concerns. “Nah, don’t worry about it. Just happy to be of help.”
Zepheera, meanwhile, was speechless. Parting gifts were certainly a first, and these… She ran a hand delicately, almost reverently over the knitted fabric of the blanket, lingering on the embroidered flowers. Oliver had no way of knowing the resemblance they bore to the flowers of a weed she'd been partial to in her youth. Memories of exchanging them with someone she'd loved dearly sparked through her mind’s eye so quickly that her body couldn't decide whether to laugh or cry.
Before a consensus could be reached, she shifted everything under one arm and reached the other up behind Oliver’s neck to pull him down into a tight hug.
“Thank you,” she whispered, barely finding her voice after such a touching gesture. She and the Doctor weren’t usually ones to stick around for goodbyes, let alone thank-yous; they didn’t do anything for praise or recognition. Zepheera in particular often went unsung, which she was more than fine with since most folk bigger than her were a risk by nature, and most of the universe was much bigger than her. It was quite rare for her to interact with someone even close to her own size, let alone make a connection with them. Something about Oliver was always just right, no matter what.
At first Oliver was slightly startled by the sudden hug he was pulled into. As he registered her hushed gratitude he soon hugged back, sensing that the gifts clearly meant more to her than he had expected.
Zepheera swallowed thickly, not wanting to get overly emotional in front of everyone. “I don’t… You’re a good friend,” she said with a few fond pats to the back of Oliver’s shoulder before she finally let him go.
Smiling softly at her words, Oliver took her free hand into his and gave it a reassuring pat.
“It's not difficult to be good to someone who is a good friend themselves. It's been a delight to meet you and be in your company.” He bowed his head in a gesture of goodwill and fondness, then released her hand and let his own fall back to his sides.
While he sat quietly to let them have their moment, the Doctor did consider Oliver’s offer of hospitality. “Can’t say I won’t pop by once in a while to check in,” he mused as his gaze slid toward Tanner. He gave the kid a playful wink to hopefully take out any serious air lingering around that statement, then glanced back toward Oliver. “Might not be terribly often, though, seems like you’ve got things well in hand here.”
Tanner giggled when he spotted the wink, glad to know that this wasn't a goodbye forever, as much as he was still reluctant to lose two new friends so quickly. He glanced up at Sammy for a moment, debating whether to leave the fur cloak they were both huddled up in or not. His indecisive staring seemed to catch her attention as he found himself suddenly meeting her gaze, averting it swiftly like he had been caught doing something wrong.
Sammy knew exactly what he was thinking with one look, and as reluctant as she was to allow it she also began to accept that maybe—just maybe—the Doctor wasn't like the larger folk she had interacted with in the past. With a sigh, she opened up the cloak and nodded her head in the giant's direction.
“...Go on then.”
Tanner brightened up once he got his sister's approval and, unable to contain his desire, he disappeared in an instant and reappeared standing on the grass just beside one of the Doctor's hands still planted on the ground. He leaned forwards and hugged one of the fingers within his reach, ignoring the awkward angle necessary for it.
“Next time you visit I'll be really good at using my new powers. Promise..!” he chirped enthusiastically, before his tone changed to be quieter, almost hesitant. “P-please don't be gone for too long…”
The Doctor blinked, then chuckled lightly to see Tanner's attempt at hugging his finger. Moving slowly, he lifted his hand– and Tanner along with it– to allow for the room to curl his finger down to be at a better angle for the boy's embrace.
“I'll try not to,” he promised in return, reaching down with his other hand to gently ruffle Tanner's curly hair. “Just keep a cool head, and don't push yourself. You've got plenty of time to figure it out.”
Fascinated as he was by Tanner's very existence, he and Sammy had been through far too much for their ages to subject them to any more stress. The new abilities the kid was beginning to manifest, while intriguing, weren't exactly worrying so far. Certainly something to follow up with down the line, but not monitor all that closely.
It was highly unlikely that Tanner would end up a threat to others or himself, based on the way Aleph seemed to frame their connection with him. And with Oliver and Sammy around, he imagined that was a fairly neutral and safe environment to test those waters.
Tanner beamed in response to the hair ruffle, letting out a soft giggle before finally releasing the Doctor's finger. He hopped backwards with a little salute, then ran over to Zepheera next and hugged her around the waist once Oliver stepped out of the way.
“I hope you have lots of fun adventures and missions with the Doctor..! I'll miss you.” He buried his face in her vest before peering up at her and tilting his head, pitch black pools meeting violet.
“I-I haven't really said goodbye before… I've never gotten to…people just go away someday. But it's nice, because I know you'll come back.” He smiled as he spoke that final sentence, content with the goodbye even though he felt sad too.
Though she hadn’t expected such an enthusiastic goodbye from Tanner, seeing him run up gave Zepheera enough time to anticipate it. She chuckled softly as she gave his smaller shoulders a squeeze with her free arm.
“I’ll miss you, too,” she admitted with a small smile. As she turned it to Sammy and Oliver in turn, she added, “All of you. You’ve no idea how glad I am that you can be together.”
Looking back down to meet Tanner’s inky gaze, Zepheera shifted her grip on him to lay a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “And hey. Since you know we’ll be back, it’s not really ‘goodbye’, is it? It’s just ‘see you later’, and that’s not so bad.”
Tanner's face lit up, nodding enthusiastically.
“See you later! That definitely sounds better…” He stepped back away finally, to return to Sammy's side now that she had moved to stand beside Oliver, his boundless energy causing him to rock on his feet, hands clasped behind his back. “You're so smart, Zepheera, no wonder you're a space borrower.”
Sammy shook her head in amusement, ruffling Tanner's hair as she met Zepheera's gaze with some hesitation. Not out of fear or dislike, just unsure if it was her place to even say goodbye when she felt like all she had been doing this whole time was acting paranoid. Over nothing, apparently. She shoved her hands into the baggy pockets sewed to the sides of her trousers, glaze flickering between the ground and up at Zepheera.
“You’re… nice. Thanks for your help. I'm sorry for..being rude and all.” She lifted a hand to rub the back of her neck awkwardly. “Without you and the Doctor, I don't think I'd ever have gotten Tanner back. Or..even left the lab…”
Tanner's compliment made Zepheera smile so widely, heart swelling to see the boy in such high spirits after everything. Her expression softened as she listened to Sammy and regarded the siblings in turn. They had been through hell and back (quite literally in Tanner's case) and their experiences had obviously changed them inside and out. Truly healing from their experiences would take time.
“No worries at all, love. I get it,” she gently insisted. “It's…not easy to trust that things can be okay when they haven't for so long.”
Sammy managed to force herself to look up at the Doctor, as weird as it felt to do so whilst intentionally pushing down all of the instincts that had built up over the years. “You're not so bad either, space man. Just…you know. Really bloody massive,” she remarked, gesturing vaguely in his direction and wincing slightly at her poor attempt to be more friendly.
“Oh, I've been told. Repeatedly,” the Doctor assured her, briefly cutting his warm gaze toward Zepheera who shot back a smirk. “Not so bad yourself, Sammy.”
His grin remained in place, unfazed by her stilted words; he hardly took it personally, having some sort of idea of what she'd been put through at the hands of people much bigger than her. A fear response was only natural, and it would only do her and her brother some good to have space from things that might harm or trigger them. From what little he could glean about Oliver's burrow out in the peaceful forest, it seemed like the ideal place to achieve that.
A thought occurred to the Doctor, and he pushed himself up to sit on his haunches and dig through the pocket inside his jacket. He quickly extracted a small notepad and pen, jotting something down on the bottom margin and tearing it off.
“And this is for you,” he said as he carefully pinched the paper between two fingers and held it out where Oliver could reach it. “You can reach us here if anything goes wrong, or if you spot any kind of trouble that we might be able to help with.”
Spotting the series of numbers he'd written down, Zepheera remembered Oliver's limited experience with human technology and explained, “Your, erm…friend will know what to do with that.” She chose her words carefully, not wanting to give away that she wasn't the only one in the group who had a giant friend.
Oliver took the note and looked it over, readjusting his glasses only to be snapped out of his thoughts by Zepheera's words. His eyebrows raised in realization of which friend she was referring to, briefly glancing towards his cousins then back to her with a nod. He folded it neatly and placed it in his pack.
“Thank you.” He took a moment to straighten his collar before clearing his throat and offering a solemn smile. “Right. Well… I should get these two settled in and get to work on sleeping arrangements and such… But I wish you luck on your travels.”
He gestured to the burrow, leading his cousins to the door and turning back to look at the two time and space travelers once more and giving a polite wave. Sammy waved more stiffly as Tanner enthusiastically waved to them both.
“Bye bye for now..! I'll tell Aleph you said see you later too!” The boy called out, holding onto his sister's arm with his other hand, huddled under Oliver's fur cloak once again.
The Doctor gave the boy a two fingered salute, and a small, respectful nod to the other two. Down in the grass, Zepheera gave a small wave back, then hesitated briefly before locking eyes with Oliver.
“Stay for takeoff,” she insisted with a warm yet ever so slightly mischievous grin toward him and the young siblings. “It's quite the sight from the outside.”
Clutching Oliver's parting gifts securely to her chest, Zepheera hopped up to stand in the center of the Doctor's waiting palm. They both now found it feeling quite empty without all the extra passengers. As the Doctor lifted her to his shoulder and she settled down alongside his collar, he slowly rose to his feet and took a few careful steps back before turning on his heel and strolling back to the blue box. It was hard to miss in all the greenery, unlike Oliver's cleverly hidden burrow.
Not long after the travelers vanished behind its doors, the light atop the police box began to glow, intensifying in time with a low thrum that the borrowers began to feel pulsing through the ground even at such a distance. A light wind kicked up the foliage just around the box, and it all but heaved an otherworldly noise; a wheezing groan that, in spite of everything, seemed to leave something hopeful in the air.
The intensity of the light fluctuated with each groan, and little by little it all began to fade out of sight. What was once an almost obnoxious blue box standing out in the lush forest slowly became translucent, and then transparent. The noise grew distant until there was nothing left but the dissipating winds muttering in the canopy.
Before long, the woods settled into place as though nothing had been out of place at all.
Oliver watched the takeoff with a sense of awe. He was grateful for the new friendship and for his cousins’ return, feeling a deep sense of admiration towards the Doctor and Zepheera for all they had given him. Internally wishing them well on their future (or past) travels, he gave a small nod of respect to the TARDIS as it faded from view.
Even with such an extraordinary view, his eyes were drawn to watch Sammy and Tanner’s expressions as they stared forward and watched the police box fade. His chest swelled with warmth at the sight, relieved once again to know that they were safe.
Tanner’s face lit up with awe as he watched the TARDIS disappear like a warm breath in the winter air. He smiled and waved until the blue box was completely gone, enjoying the fantastical sight despite his uncertainty about what would follow. It was hard to imagine what it would be like living outside of Ryker’s influence.
Sammy folded her arms around herself as she watched it play out, the weight of everything that had happened and what it meant still feeling heavy even when most of the reasons behind her anxiety were disappearing before her eyes. She sighed when the TARDIS turned completely transparent, a puff of steam escaping her lips.
A cold hand tugged on the threads of her sweater, startling her from her thoughts. She looked down and met Tanner’s bottomless gaze, seeing his own anxious expression and softening instantly. Her arms unfolded, reaching down to pat his head wordlessly. They didn’t need them to understand.
“Come along then you two. Let’s get you back inside where it’s warm.” Oliver’s calming voice spoke up, ushering Sammy and Tanner into his burrow.
As he did, he couldn't help but take one last glance over his shoulder. He had always been cordial with other borrowers when on his rounds or helping people out, but the only real friend he had was James. As a result he had simply accepted that making friends with another of his kind would be almost impossible.
Reluctant as he was to part so soon, he knew they couldn't stay forever. He could only hope that next time they met things would be less chaotic, but for now he had lots of work to do. With one final fond smile he closed the door gently, the warm light that had been pouring out from his burrow disappearing with the view of the inside.
Note: Hope my fellow USAmericans had a good Thanksgiving, and have a safe Black Friday!
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As the Doctor made his way almost gingerly around to the other side of the bed, Zepheera got up to start gathering her things. She made sure everyone had their fill of the granola before packing it away, and insisted they leave their teacups when they were done with them, saying, “I’ll clean them up later.” With the extra room in her pack, she tossed in the small tube of burn ointment; part of it stuck out the top, but it was secure enough that she paid it no mind.
The Doctor had crossed to the other side of the bed by then, and picked up the larger cup of tea from the floor to set aside high up and out of the way. Then he mindfully lowered into a crouch and waited for Zepheera’s signal to lay his upturned hand near the borrowers.
Zepheera shook off the bittersweet feeling in the air as she took her previous position on top of the Doctor’s wrist to allow the others more room in his palm, offering her hand to help them up if needed.
The other three moved as a unit, with Oliver ushering Sammy forward and Tanner still holding onto her arm as they walked up to the open hand. Sammy collected herself much better this time around, though she couldn't help how her heart instinctively raced the closer she got to the Doctor.
Once they were all on board they sat down, Oliver looking relieved by the lack of a fuss, and Tanner just seeming content to be held. The warmth radiating up from the Doctor's palm was pleasant for his cold body, relaxing as the heat seeped into his muscles. Sammy was still tense but managed to focus more on her brother than on being carried.
Once his cousins seemed to be settled, Oliver looked towards the Doctor and Zepheera, giving them a polite nod to signal that they were all ready to go.
This time, Zepheera took a seat with everyone else. There was just enough room for her to sit cross-legged along the heel of the Doctor’s palm. He then lifted the lot of them as he did the night before, using his other hand for extra stability as he stood and walked out into the corridor.
The Doctor prioritized having a smooth stride over speed, so it took a few good minutes before the path opened up into the console room. Very glad he’d had the foresight to pilot the TARDIS beforehand, which would be significantly more difficult with one hand full of borrowers (not to mention intense for the kids), he started straight for the door. He paused at the threshold when a thought occurred to him.
“Oh…! Nearly forgot,” he muttered under his breath as his unoccupied hand fell away to dig through his chest pocket. When it came back up, it held Oliver’s cloak pinched between two fingers; slightly rumpled from the less than ideal storage, but overall in good condition. He gave it a gentle shake to straighten it out, then held it within Oliver’s reach, careful to not come too close to the siblings. “There you are. Sorry I didn’t think of it sooner, things got a bit… Well, y’know.”
Oliver blinked, almost forgetting about his cloak himself amidst all the chaos of the previous day. He graciously retrieved his fur cloak from the Doctor's fingers with a nod, before choosing to drape the warm fabric over the shoulders of his cousins instead.
“It has been a rather… hectic time. You've done more than enough though, Doctor, thank you,” Oliver assured, giving the giant finger beside him a calm pat to acknowledge his appreciation towards the time lord. Every time his gaze was drawn back to Sammy and Tanner his heart just swelled with relief to have both of his cousins back and safe. He was already planning out exactly how he would expand his burrow to give them each a room to sleep in.
Tanner nuzzled into the fluffy fabric, running his fingers over the soft hairs in fascination. He couldn't remember feeling anything quite as fluffy in his life before, and the texture was incredible. He pulled it around himself a bit more, leaning into Sammy so they could both wrap themselves up in the large cloak. He could see that she seemed to be in deep thought of some kind, but she was present enough to hug up to him and hold the cloak shut with anticipation for the winter air.
The Doctor smiled softly to see Oliver's gesture toward his cousins and the way they so readily accepted it, before he reminded himself to focus. Their home was so close. He just had to get them there.
With that in mind, he pulled the door open with his newly freed hand and stepped out into the brisk woods.
“Right,” said the Doctor as he looked around the immediate area. Even though there was truly no way for him to know what to look out for, his head was still on a swivel to take in the new surroundings. “Really hoping I got the coordinates at least somewhat accurate…”
In an attempt to be helpful, Zepheera skimmed the trees, a thoughtful frown pinching her brow. “I think we're close… that patch of trees looks familiar…sort of.” Her tone quickly lost confidence. The circumstances of her brief visits to Oliver's burrow didn't give her the best impression of its exact location in the sprawling forest, against which the blue wood finish of the TARDIS stood out like a sore thumb.
“We are close,” Oliver assured with a nod, pointing towards the east. “It's about 10 meters that way. There's a blackberry bush growing right beside the oak, so it shouldn't be too difficult to spot.”
“Blackberries?” Tanner perked up. He recalled the taste from the few times Ryker would bring him and Sammy a treat and it was definitely his favourite food. He wasn't entirely sure why they were in a bush, but he hoped they would be easy to get to so he could eat some later.
Oliver chuckled, understanding where the younger borrower's enthusiasm was coming from immediately. The few times he had been able to visit after moving out he had heard stories from his aunt and uncle about Tanner's love for berries and how he would beg for them just about every borrowing trip.
“They aren't quite in season yet, but I have blackberry jam you can try,” he offered with a fond expression, a smile playing at his lips. Tanner nodded along, though it was very obvious he didn't know what ‘in season' meant.
Following Oliver's finger, the Doctor's gaze quickly fell on an oak tree with a nearby berry bush. His expression brightened immediately, and he made his way there as quickly as he could manage without disrupting the borrowers in hand.
He stopped about a pace away and once again slowed his movements down as he lowered himself into a crouch. The back of his hand flattened a small patch of grass near the roots while he waited for all the smaller folk to disembark.
Zepheera's chin lifted to properly take in the tree and its surroundings for the first time. Though there was very little to distinguish it from any other oak in the woods at first glance, knowing that it was Oliver's home gave it an air of importance. It stood mightily in place, and would be more than sufficient to keep him and his cousins safe. Zepheera appreciated that, and hoped that she could remember what it looked like if she and the Doctor came back to visit.
Oliver stepped off of the Doctor's hand elegantly as always, the casual manner in which he was able to move from palm to grass showcasing just how often he got rides from larger hands. Sammy and Tanner on the other hand were still a little wobbly on the uneven surface, steadying themselves by taking Oliver's offered hand as they stepped off.
Once they were steady on the ground, Tanner couldn't help but stare at all of the colours and the light coming from high above despite the lack of ceiling. The sun, I think. The grass blades were about as tall as him. He reached out to poke it, surprised by the almost rubbery texture. After feeling the grass for a few more moments, he retracted his hand to stay huddled up in the fur cloak, as much as his eyes wandered.
Sammy cast a wary glance up at the Doctor, a puzzled look spreading across her expression. So close to safety and yet he still hadn’t dropped the facade. Even when she had made a deal to not complain once Tanner was safe, even though he had agreed she couldn't see any of the telltale signs that he was about to snatch her up. She observed his large hand more critically, frowning in thought and staring as if that would somehow make his fingers twitch in her direction.
Her heart rate increased the longer she anticipated something, before her eyes snapped up to meet the Doctor's.
“Y-you…” She cleared her throat awkwardly to get the stammer out of her words, shoulders bunching up. “You're really…just gonna let us go? Even though I said I wouldn't complain..?” She averted her gaze, brows furrowing with a mix of confusion and a reluctance to accept that she was being released. “You…you agreed to the deal too.”
“I did,” the Doctor agreed evenly. As he held Sammy’s gaze, he somehow managed to smile with his eyes more than what he let show in the slightest upturn of the corners of his lips. “The deal was, no complaints about anything I might do. So…this is what I’m doing.”
Glancing up towards the Doctor, Sammy inspected his expression for any deceit but only found sincerity. She shifted her weight side to side with discomfort before nodding in acceptance. “...thanks.”
The second Zepheera hopped down from his palm to join the others, the Doctor’s hand lifted and turned over without moving any closer. He waved a few fingers in the smallest shooing motion he could muster. “Well? Go on, off you pop. Gotta be warmer in there than it is out here,” he insisted with a more prominent grin.
Zepheera shook her head good-naturedly at him before turning to Oliver and removing the tube of burn ointment from her pack. It was hardly full, but plenty to last a borrower for a good while if used sparingly.
“Thought this might be good to have for Sammy’s burn while it heals,” she said as she offered it to Oliver. “I know it wasn’t too bad, but I didn’t know if you had anything to help with the pain.”
Oliver took the offered ointment with a smile.
“Ah, thank you, Zepheera. I believe I have some herbs, but this will probably be much more effective.” He placed it in his pack before letting out a small hum of thought. After all that the Doctor and Zepheera had done for him and his cousins it felt impolite to see them off with nothing. He held up a finger in the universal sign of ‘one moment please’, entering his burrow and leaving the door ajar.
After rummaging around in one of the boxes he kept in the living room, he finally found what he was looking for; a knitted blanket. It was one of his first successful knitting projects in which he had decided to embroider the green blanket with purple flowery patterns. It was lined at the bottom with silk. He brushed off any fluff that might be clinging to it, shifting to hold it in one arm as he went into the kitchen and filled a small box with various biscuits he had baked, as well as a tiny glass bottle of cordial.
Waltzing back outside, Oliver held the gifts towards Zepheera.
“A parting gift. As thanks for all of your help.” He looked up at the Doctor and offered an apologetic smile. “Apologies. I don't have much to offer that would be of any use to you, but I can promise that you and Zepheera are always welcome here. Whether that's because you need help or you'd just like to stop by for tea.”
Remembering to keep his motions small, the Doctor waved off Oliver’s concerns. “Nah, don’t worry about it. Just happy to be of help.”
Zepheera, meanwhile, was speechless. Parting gifts were certainly a first, and these… She ran a hand delicately, almost reverently over the knitted fabric of the blanket, lingering on the embroidered flowers. Oliver had no way of knowing the resemblance they bore to the flowers of a weed she'd been partial to in her youth. Memories of exchanging them with someone she'd loved dearly sparked through her mind’s eye so quickly that her body couldn't decide whether to laugh or cry.
Before a consensus could be reached, she shifted everything under one arm and reached the other up behind Oliver’s neck to pull him down into a tight hug.
“Thank you,” she whispered, barely finding her voice after such a touching gesture. She and the Doctor weren’t usually ones to stick around for goodbyes, let alone thank-yous; they didn’t do anything for praise or recognition. Zepheera in particular often went unsung, which she was more than fine with since most folk bigger than her were a risk by nature, and most of the universe was much bigger than her. It was quite rare for her to interact with someone even close to her own size, let alone make a connection with them. Something about Oliver was always just right, no matter what.
At first Oliver was slightly startled by the sudden hug he was pulled into. As he registered her hushed gratitude he soon hugged back, sensing that the gifts clearly meant more to her than he had expected.
Zepheera swallowed thickly, not wanting to get overly emotional in front of everyone. “I don’t… You’re a good friend,” she said with a few fond pats to the back of Oliver’s shoulder before she finally let him go.
Smiling softly at her words, Oliver took her free hand into his and gave it a reassuring pat.
“It's not difficult to be good to someone who is a good friend themselves. It's been a delight to meet you and be in your company.” He bowed his head in a gesture of goodwill and fondness, then released her hand and let his own fall back to his sides.
While he sat quietly to let them have their moment, the Doctor did consider Oliver’s offer of hospitality. “Can’t say I won’t pop by once in a while to check in,” he mused as his gaze slid toward Tanner. He gave the kid a playful wink to hopefully take out any serious air lingering around that statement, then glanced back toward Oliver. “Might not be terribly often, though, seems like you’ve got things well in hand here.”
Tanner giggled when he spotted the wink, glad to know that this wasn't a goodbye forever, as much as he was still reluctant to lose two new friends so quickly. He glanced up at Sammy for a moment, debating whether to leave the fur cloak they were both huddled up in or not. His indecisive staring seemed to catch her attention as he found himself suddenly meeting her gaze, averting it swiftly like he had been caught doing something wrong.
Sammy knew exactly what he was thinking with one look, and as reluctant as she was to allow it she also began to accept that maybe—just maybe—the Doctor wasn't like the larger folk she had interacted with in the past. With a sigh, she opened up the cloak and nodded her head in the giant's direction.
“...Go on then.”
Tanner brightened up once he got his sister's approval and, unable to contain his desire, he disappeared in an instant and reappeared standing on the grass just beside one of the Doctor's hands still planted on the ground. He leaned forwards and hugged one of the fingers within his reach, ignoring the awkward angle necessary for it.
“Next time you visit I'll be really good at using my new powers. Promise..!” he chirped enthusiastically, before his tone changed to be quieter, almost hesitant. “P-please don't be gone for too long…”
The Doctor blinked, then chuckled lightly to see Tanner's attempt at hugging his finger. Moving slowly, he lifted his hand– and Tanner along with it– to allow for the room to curl his finger down to be at a better angle for the boy's embrace.
“I'll try not to,” he promised in return, reaching down with his other hand to gently ruffle Tanner's curly hair. “Just keep a cool head, and don't push yourself. You've got plenty of time to figure it out.”
Fascinated as he was by Tanner's very existence, he and Sammy had been through far too much for their ages to subject them to any more stress. The new abilities the kid was beginning to manifest, while intriguing, weren't exactly worrying so far. Certainly something to follow up with down the line, but not monitor all that closely.
It was highly unlikely that Tanner would end up a threat to others or himself, based on the way Aleph seemed to frame their connection with him. And with Oliver and Sammy around, he imagined that was a fairly neutral and safe environment to test those waters.
Tanner beamed in response to the hair ruffle, letting out a soft giggle before finally releasing the Doctor's finger. He hopped backwards with a little salute, then ran over to Zepheera next and hugged her around the waist once Oliver stepped out of the way.
“I hope you have lots of fun adventures and missions with the Doctor..! I'll miss you.” He buried his face in her vest before peering up at her and tilting his head, pitch black pools meeting violet.
“I-I haven't really said goodbye before… I've never gotten to…people just go away someday. But it's nice, because I know you'll come back.” He smiled as he spoke that final sentence, content with the goodbye even though he felt sad too.
Though she hadn’t expected such an enthusiastic goodbye from Tanner, seeing him run up gave Zepheera enough time to anticipate it. She chuckled softly as she gave his smaller shoulders a squeeze with her free arm.
“I’ll miss you, too,” she admitted with a small smile. As she turned it to Sammy and Oliver in turn, she added, “All of you. You’ve no idea how glad I am that you can be together.”
Looking back down to meet Tanner’s inky gaze, Zepheera shifted her grip on him to lay a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “And hey. Since you know we’ll be back, it’s not really ‘goodbye’, is it? It’s just ‘see you later’, and that’s not so bad.”
Tanner's face lit up, nodding enthusiastically.
“See you later! That definitely sounds better…” He stepped back away finally, to return to Sammy's side now that she had moved to stand beside Oliver, his boundless energy causing him to rock on his feet, hands clasped behind his back. “You're so smart, Zepheera, no wonder you're a space borrower.”
Sammy shook her head in amusement, ruffling Tanner's hair as she met Zepheera's gaze with some hesitation. Not out of fear or dislike, just unsure if it was her place to even say goodbye when she felt like all she had been doing this whole time was acting paranoid. Over nothing, apparently. She shoved her hands into the baggy pockets sewed to the sides of her trousers, glaze flickering between the ground and up at Zepheera.
“You’re… nice. Thanks for your help. I'm sorry for..being rude and all.” She lifted a hand to rub the back of her neck awkwardly. “Without you and the Doctor, I don't think I'd ever have gotten Tanner back. Or..even left the lab…”
Tanner's compliment made Zepheera smile so widely, heart swelling to see the boy in such high spirits after everything. Her expression softened as she listened to Sammy and regarded the siblings in turn. They had been through hell and back (quite literally in Tanner's case) and their experiences had obviously changed them inside and out. Truly healing from their experiences would take time.
“No worries at all, love. I get it,” she gently insisted. “It's…not easy to trust that things can be okay when they haven't for so long.”
Sammy managed to force herself to look up at the Doctor, as weird as it felt to do so whilst intentionally pushing down all of the instincts that had built up over the years. “You're not so bad either, space man. Just…you know. Really bloody massive,” she remarked, gesturing vaguely in his direction and wincing slightly at her poor attempt to be more friendly.
“Oh, I've been told. Repeatedly,” the Doctor assured her, briefly cutting his warm gaze toward Zepheera who shot back a smirk. “Not so bad yourself, Sammy.”
His grin remained in place, unfazed by her stilted words; he hardly took it personally, having some sort of idea of what she'd been put through at the hands of people much bigger than her. A fear response was only natural, and it would only do her and her brother some good to have space from things that might harm or trigger them. From what little he could glean about Oliver's burrow out in the peaceful forest, it seemed like the ideal place to achieve that.
A thought occurred to the Doctor, and he pushed himself up to sit on his haunches and dig through the pocket inside his jacket. He quickly extracted a small notepad and pen, jotting something down on the bottom margin and tearing it off.
“And this is for you,” he said as he carefully pinched the paper between two fingers and held it out where Oliver could reach it. “You can reach us here if anything goes wrong, or if you spot any kind of trouble that we might be able to help with.”
Spotting the series of numbers he'd written down, Zepheera remembered Oliver's limited experience with human technology and explained, “Your, erm…friend will know what to do with that.” She chose her words carefully, not wanting to give away that she wasn't the only one in the group who had a giant friend.
Oliver took the note and looked it over, readjusting his glasses only to be snapped out of his thoughts by Zepheera's words. His eyebrows raised in realization of which friend she was referring to, briefly glancing towards his cousins then back to her with a nod. He folded it neatly and placed it in his pack.
“Thank you.” He took a moment to straighten his collar before clearing his throat and offering a solemn smile. “Right. Well… I should get these two settled in and get to work on sleeping arrangements and such… But I wish you luck on your travels.”
He gestured to the burrow, leading his cousins to the door and turning back to look at the two time and space travelers once more and giving a polite wave. Sammy waved more stiffly as Tanner enthusiastically waved to them both.
“Bye bye for now..! I'll tell Aleph you said see you later too!” The boy called out, holding onto his sister's arm with his other hand, huddled under Oliver's fur cloak once again.
The Doctor gave the boy a two fingered salute, and a small, respectful nod to the other two. Down in the grass, Zepheera gave a small wave back, then hesitated briefly before locking eyes with Oliver.
“Stay for takeoff,” she insisted with a warm yet ever so slightly mischievous grin toward him and the young siblings. “It's quite the sight from the outside.”
Clutching Oliver's parting gifts securely to her chest, Zepheera hopped up to stand in the center of the Doctor's waiting palm. They both now found it feeling quite empty without all the extra passengers. As the Doctor lifted her to his shoulder and she settled down alongside his collar, he slowly rose to his feet and took a few careful steps back before turning on his heel and strolling back to the blue box. It was hard to miss in all the greenery, unlike Oliver's cleverly hidden burrow.
Not long after the travelers vanished behind its doors, the light atop the police box began to glow, intensifying in time with a low thrum that the borrowers began to feel pulsing through the ground even at such a distance. A light wind kicked up the foliage just around the box, and it all but heaved an otherworldly noise; a wheezing groan that, in spite of everything, seemed to leave something hopeful in the air.
The intensity of the light fluctuated with each groan, and little by little it all began to fade out of sight. What was once an almost obnoxious blue box standing out in the lush forest slowly became translucent, and then transparent. The noise grew distant until there was nothing left but the dissipating winds muttering in the canopy.
Before long, the woods settled into place as though nothing had been out of place at all.
Oliver watched the takeoff with a sense of awe. He was grateful for the new friendship and for his cousins’ return, feeling a deep sense of admiration towards the Doctor and Zepheera for all they had given him. Internally wishing them well on their future (or past) travels, he gave a small nod of respect to the TARDIS as it faded from view.
Even with such an extraordinary view, his eyes were drawn to watch Sammy and Tanner’s expressions as they stared forward and watched the police box fade. His chest swelled with warmth at the sight, relieved once again to know that they were safe.
Tanner’s face lit up with awe as he watched the TARDIS disappear like a warm breath in the winter air. He smiled and waved until the blue box was completely gone, enjoying the fantastical sight despite his uncertainty about what would follow. It was hard to imagine what it would be like living outside of Ryker’s influence.
Sammy folded her arms around herself as she watched it play out, the weight of everything that had happened and what it meant still feeling heavy even when most of the reasons behind her anxiety were disappearing before her eyes. She sighed when the TARDIS turned completely transparent, a puff of steam escaping her lips.
A cold hand tugged on the threads of her sweater, startling her from her thoughts. She looked down and met Tanner’s bottomless gaze, seeing his own anxious expression and softening instantly. Her arms unfolded, reaching down to pat his head wordlessly. They didn’t need them to understand.
“Come along then you two. Let’s get you back inside where it’s warm.” Oliver’s calming voice spoke up, ushering Sammy and Tanner into his burrow.
As he did, he couldn't help but take one last glance over his shoulder. He had always been cordial with other borrowers when on his rounds or helping people out, but the only real friend he had was James. As a result he had simply accepted that making friends with another of his kind would be almost impossible.
Reluctant as he was to part so soon, he knew they couldn't stay forever. He could only hope that next time they met things would be less chaotic, but for now he had lots of work to do. With one final fond smile he closed the door gently, the warm light that had been pouring out from his burrow disappearing with the view of the inside.
