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It’s a beautiful day when the old sage tells him about regeneration. The stream glints with the reflected light of the silver leaves. The boy (decades before he would shed his name for a title and wasn’t that, in its own way, a type of regeneration) listens with an intensity that he will come to hide in the years to come. His teachers, when called to remember their troublesome pupil, will recall a boy always half preoccupied with something else, when he even bothered to show up. The boy will learn to hide his enthusiasm for things that are below him, failure will teach him to act as if he never cared in the first place just as it sets an expression of superiority on his face and shapes his attitude to suggest to the world that he’s always correct and never worried.
That’s the future though and time has not yet come to hang like a cloak over his shoulders. Even here, on this planet at the heart of the web of time, there’s a difference between now and will be. Now, he fixes his whole being on the sage, eyes bright with the stars. The sage tells him that regeneration of the body is an examination of the soul. The body is merely the vessel (on other days, the sage shows him tricks of the body, a ball of fire cupped easily in the hand, floating above the ground by the power of his mind – the boy will almost manage to understand them, the man never really will: the Doctor is too tied together body and soul), the body dies and is reborn in a new form, but the mind/soul is regenerated. It is a time for thought. A time for reflection on who you were and who you want to be. His parents would sigh over the romanticized tales, quasi-religious nonsense, but they don’t know where he goes.
The Academy teaches them about regeneration repeatedly through the years. The early classes are rather vague, ‘only just beyond Tales for Time Tots,’ a friend mutters, but then she’s already concentrating in the sciences. Like as in most of his classes, he doesn’t do very well (‘theta or sigma’ another friend taunts with every returned assignment, but he just adopts his most superior smirk and quietly tweaks the shared experiment just enough that it’ll break down the next time his dark haired friend tries to touch it). Not that he cares, he had more interesting things to do than worry about schoolwork. And if his tutor sighs about wasted potential, lost potential is better than the fear that there’s nothing to waste.
The lecturer has a rather annoying voice (something for him to work on, next regeneration, students whisper), and a worse way of speaking. He makes everything come out like a rote chant. Regeneration is a science that Time Lords have mastered, as they have all others. The Great Rassilon set forth the web of time and wove into his people an understanding of time. Regeneration requires only an understanding of genetics, when one life unraveled a new one was reworked, rewoven in the loom of the mind. Regeneration was a chance to smooth out any kinks in the personality, to reorganize the mind. He tended to look pointedly at the boy when he said that. The boy grouched about abuse of metaphors by dry scientists and decides that he likes Omega better than ‘the Great Rassilon’: an explorer of the unknown, a hero (Time Lords have no patience for heroes, later he decides it’s because they don’t make very good ones).
When he’s expelled from his Chapter, it’s been years since he’s though of the sage’s words. He’s an old man but still so young. He spits out his rejection of his heritage and runs off like a thief in the night (quite literally, a case bobbing at his heels). He lost something, somewhere, a belief, perhaps, in something more. Maybe it was the years of always only barely making it, of never fitting in, maybe it was his attempts at holding on to a dream long changed from something to marvel at to the formality of rote thought. Rassilon’s promise rings in his mind; will not flux or wither or change its shape – and it sounds more a curse than a blessing to his ears. Whoever you are, whatever you do, nothing will ever change. However stubborn – however slow – he didn’t manage to escape that lesson.
He unlearns it bit by bit. First there’s Susan with her innocent joy and honest enthusiasm. She shows that there’s still room in his heart for someone else. She reminds him of when he used to dream of the stars, and he finds he doesn’t want to crush her hopes of finding wonders into just scribbled mathematical formulas. Her questions lead to explorations, she believes in him completely (he preens like a peacock, like a child who so rarely heard anything approaching praise). No interference, of course, but she can’t live a life cut off (they can’t return home) so a little interaction is necessary.
Then come the two humans. Ignorant, rude, shoving their way into his home – and then saving his life, Susan’s life, quarrels and friendship, dependence and growth. He watches them change and he can almost admit he’s changing too. He remembers, as he lies on a beach with his friend (a word that has none of the sharp challenge, the competitiveness, or the bite of slight mockery, it once had), that Gallifrey might not change but he’s still growing.
(“It’s beautiful,” Barbara says. Vicki and Ian have wandered off down the shore, their voices floating back, words lost in the roar of the waves. He doesn’t respond. Maybe earlier he would have groused about stating the obvious and earlier still would have told her loftily that ‘beauty’ was an imprecise concept and not a useful descriptor or that his eyes could take in far more colors than hers and so could appreciate the scene much more thoroughly. Now, he simply takes in the beauty of the pure blue water against the shining white sand and agrees.)
He dies slowly. The weakness of his body, which he has tried so hard to ignore, grows stark and unignorable as he stumbles through the cold. The sage’s words come back, as if they had never left. Maybe they had always been there, in his heart. He’s not that eager boy. He’s the Doctor – proud, cold, exited, mischievous, with friends he could have never imagined. He’s learned to say that he’s wrong. Who does he want to be? What does he want? He wants to keep going. He can’t revert to what he once was, and he doesn’t want to. He is a renegade, not an exile. He won’t claim his name or heritage. He wants to explore the universe, make new friends, right wrongs. He wants to step forward, not back from the world. In death he loves life.
1 … extreme atmospheric pressures coupled with advanced years proved a great strain…
The Doctor knows they’re catching up with him. He and his TARDIS have plenty of experience at dodging reality, but it turns out there really are something you can’t escape even once you’ve traversed the Land of Fiction. He’s learned to keep trying. Right now, they’re alone on the edge of a forest. Zoe is doing her best to analyze it all, a tactic for dealing with nature and the unknown formed to settle the nerves of someone who’d so rarely left the sterile walls of her home. He can understand that. Jamie is looking for danger, they’ve known each other a long time now (I knew from the beginning there was always danger, Jamie says, trying to reassure him, he doesn’t know what could’ve ever done to deserve this, warmer for it being undeserved), but his sense of wonder has only grown.
He runs because this is what they’re trying to steal from him, and they won’t even know what they’ve taken. The thrill of using his wits against an opponent for something that matters. Friends who saw him change from one body to another and took to them both. The piper who has travelled so far but keeps Scotland with him. The girl who was brave in her fear. The genius who had escaped as he had, before she had started to believe her world was right. Adventure and friendship and facing evil and saying, no. Whatever happens to him, he’ll have this, more than they ever can understand.
They’ve taken Jamie and Zoe away and now they’ve come for him. The Doctor can feel the weight of their attention as he changes. They’re trying to warp his weave, as his teacher would say (and the thought makes him want to laugh). It’s just their kind of punishment. Claim lenience just because they think they can still use him. There’s a resonance, he is reflected back through their eyes. The Doctor sets all his stubbornness forth, he will be his own man, follow his own will. He won’t let people be taken away without struggle. He dies at their mercy, but he will live on his own strength, his own character.
2 … traditional punishment of the…
“You know, Jo, that was really rather brilliant.”
She beams at him, so terribly young and eager. So happy for his approval. He wants to be worthy of her faith. Of her terrifying willingness to give up her life to save his. The Master isn’t the only Time Lord who would stumble when trying to understand that sort of sacrifice. They cling to life so desperately, even back in silent halls where they claim to have stamped out desperation. They have centuries she will never have; she has already done so much more than some have over multiple regenerations. He wants to show her the universe, all the shining facets of it like jewels in a collection of knowledge.
“Well, I remembered what you said about the Gikoils’ reaction to the rain and I thought, if a little rain is too much, a full weather show of the Earth would send them packing!”
He laughs, “You had it right. Not very adventurous people, the Gikoils. You can never get away from them if you go on a package holiday tour, and they never stop complaining.”
She insists that he tell her all about space tourism as she sets the kettle on. They sit together, her wavering back and forth on how much she believes his claims. He keeps a straight face as he assures her it really is just like a trip to Wales, as hard as it is in the face of her indignation. He has work he has to do, more important matters to attend to they might say, but this is what’s important. These moments. He wants them to last forever.
It’s a slow and terrible way to go, radiation. The right thing to do, though, fear must be faced, responsibility taken – and all that, as the Brigadier would say. Still, the Doctor wants to be free, he was trapped but, even worse, he had trapped himself even when let go. The expanse of the universe narrowing to earth (the hurt as they leave him grows ever stronger, when did he start to care this much about humans; about just one species in a universe full of wonders), like the tiger trapped in his mental cage. Liz had understood. She had known when to leave. So had Jo. He wishes he had been better able to let go. He wonders what Sarah Jane will think of the man he’s becoming.
3 …radiation from the planet of…
He settles down for a week fishing off Blackpool. He lands a few centuries off, but, as he airily tells Romana, fishing is extremely boring so it’s for the best that they just relax on deckchairs. Romana mutters something under her breath. It’s likely not very impolite, but he likes to think she wouldn’t have devolved into the vulgarity of muttering at all before they met.
It turns out deckchairs are banned, which is just a sign of troubled times that need to be addressed, as he doesn’t tell Romana as she’s wandered off. She does do that. He finds himself meeting some fascinating people with passionate interests in the future and the necessity of art and something about the BBC, which he doesn’t pay too much attention to. Romana has likely made her own friends; she’s gotten better at that. He doesn’t worry.
He remembers being fresh out of the Academy. He’ll never say so, her ego is far too large as it is, but Romana handles the wildness of the universe better than he probably would’ve at her age. He hadn’t wanted to travel with another Time Lord, he might not be running from them anymore, but he has no interest in his people’s judgment. Romana is as young and arrogant and full of certainty as any new graduate, but she’s also clever and open minded and personable (for one of his people). She’s willing to learn, and that’s hope for the future he’d never looked for. She’ll find him again, or he’ll find her, when everything’s sorted out. They always do. Companions are like that.
The Doctor falls, unable to say if he was dropped. Perhaps he’s been closed off in this life, wilder and more independent. In the moment it seems slightly amusing that after such a life he dies while trying to work with his oldest, best enemy (friend or foe, the Master never could manage to deal with the consequences of his actions, probably came from trying to control everything). Death has a way of showing you the truth of things, he’s died enough to learn that. He can rely on people, need them even and it doesn’t have to be a trap. He appears to have gained responsibility for a number of young people; he wonders what Romana would think of that. She’d probably be slightly alarmed. Correctly, too. Well, in the end there was no point running from death when you could just drop into it. He considers laughing at the joke, but the wind would just whip it away. He’ll miss this laugh, it had weight to it.
He wonders what the next laugh will be like.
4 …a fall from a great height…
For once, everyone’s getting along. There are times when he feels like he’s constantly trying to play peacemaker in endless arguments, but when things are quiet, he can admit that’s not quite fair. It’s usually Nyssa trying to make peace, with the endless and yet somehow still exasperated patience of a girl from a world of serenity confronted with chaos. He doesn’t always help with that.
But for all his own temper can boil up when Tegan’s yelling about something that’s not his fault and Adric’s sulking and Nyssa is being overly reasonable to a degree that just makes him feel guilty, there are really far more moments of cheerful chaos. Tegan is defending Adric from accusations of cheating at cards, poking her finger at an alien several heads taller and much broader than her without fear and enough confidence that he thinks it won’t be her backing down in the end. Nyssa is speaking with the Daughter of the Salon, their heads leaning towards each other as they pour together over a book, not appearing to notice the noise. Little sandwiches have gone around without complaints or sudden poisonings.
In this moment, he’s not responsible for a boy who’s in the wrong universe or a girl who lost everything to one of his own people (to his enemy, friend, murderer, different type of responsibility) or the woman who he can’t get home and whose aunt he couldn’t save. As loud and full as the TARDIS can feel, that’s not such a bad thing; and even if he feels a need to keep checking back on what his friends are doing, it doesn’t mean he can’t enjoy the Salon himself.
It’s a difficult change, he had to hold on such a long time. He’s responsible for this life. Friends call to him: dead (and there should’ve been something he could’ve done; so young, so much promise that he should have helped instead of frustrated if only they’d said -), left (grown so much – but into what; pride in others always seems to hurt, maybe because he doesn’t deserve to have it and the man who should be proud is devoured -), disillusioned (what would he have done, at that moment if she hadn’t been there? Had he been right to let one person’s regard affect him that much -), returned (family and responsibility and everything he had run from so long ago, it’s good that he’d faced up to it, had he really wanted to go -), burning (he had to be willing to watch, after everything they’ve been to each other, he’s learned how to watch people die -). So many hard choices, so many memories…he’s not sure if he’s able to accept who he is anymore. He left his home so long ago, he left it so recently.
He carries a girl in his arms. He barely knows her; she’s become a good friend. He doesn’t know what is true. It doesn’t matter. He’s the Doctor. He doesn’t regret the sacrifice. He can’t let regret hold him back.
5 …slow poisoning with prolonged activity…
Peri is happy. He’d puffed up a little, ready to take offense at the surprise mixed with delight or that he isn’t just as happy visiting one of the most wonderous gardens in the universe or – he would’ve found something, but Peri had just hugged him before dashing off, shouting out when she finds something she just has to show him. He follows more sedately, one of them has to have a little dignity. It’s good to see her so carefree. So happy.
He hopes she’s happy. Things had been so uncertain, in the beginning. He’s had friends see him from one body to the next, and it’s never entirely easy for humans. Or for non-humans. None of them had to deal with such hostile instability (even if they brought up having to carry him around far too often). He’d been afraid that he’d ruined things, had run from the idea of taking her home while still unforgiven. But she has forgiven him, she likes him, calls him her best friend without hesitation or clarification. Maybe he should have said something, but as easily as words come, speaking the right ones doesn’t always follow that.
She runs back to join him, face flushed and almost panting.
“Is this really any way to behave in a center of learning and advancement?” He says, trying to look stern.
She waves his words off, holding out what she’s found. He’d spent a few minutes complaining about the unnecessary addition of a gift shop, no doubt full of tacky trash to be found and discarded in the junkyards of space, which are full enough already, and about the needless commercialism of it all, and not because he was trying to justify landing them in after hours. But he has to admit, the pin of a cat inside a flower has a certain charm.
“And it matches your coat.” Peri says, with a grin that he finds he can’t properly scold, even in if he suspects there’s an insult in it.
The Doctor goes down with a blow to the head and that’s just typical, a little pragmatism, a little thought, and a shining star of individuality goes down to a knock on the noggin. They had never been able to accept him (they put him on trial) and it looked like the universe just followed the crowd. He had gone forth, the cat that walked by himself and in return for that gift the cat had never truly belonged. But cats didn’t look back. Cats didn’t feel the universe pressing in with nothing they could do, didn’t think of friends abandoned (he’d been taken away, but does that make a difference in the end) and have to hope that an old enemy (friend, enemy, killer, victim) was telling the truth.
He wonders what he could’ve done different. Not something he’s usually been prone to, you have to go on, but as a life ends, you’re entitled to wonder such things.
6 …trauma to the head…
Ace has made friends with a silvery orange being who seems to share her interest in ‘primitive’ explosives. He should probably interfere before they end up in trouble for getting too close to the glass, but it’s already too late and Ace is shouting about poxy museums being boring anyway. Her new friend seems to be enjoying it, even as they try to shush her as they pull her away. No doubt there’s something there. V’baet. The social order based off age, the growing rebellion and the increasing repression in response to that rebellion. Ace will fit right in.
It’s all so familiar.
No doubt there’ll be enough trouble that someone will check the sign-in sheet and come to ask him questions. The type they’ll think should be graced with capital letters. He should try to remember a bit more. Is the system based off religion? No, that’s right, it’s some sort of misunderstanding, willfully perpetrated, of their own biology. Knowledge to the people, knowledge of the people – that was the slogan he’d heard. There are people who have used the unrest for their own gain, but there are more well-meaning souls who simply want a better life or who truly believe in what they’ve been taught. So many lives. Injustice that must be fought.
He wonders if it’s a sign of age or having done this too many times that makes him keep wandering through the exhibits. He’d brought Victoria and Jamie here, a long time ago, far in the future. There had been new exhibits, but the one on typography that had so enthralled Victoria is still – already – here. He remembers her smile; on the nights he lets himself take out old memories.
Sometimes he thinks that he should go home, that he’s been gone so long that he doesn’t remember why he goes on. But he knows Ace will be there to find, once he talks his way through the useless questions, full of fire and so certain that they’ll help. She knows, and through her he knows too. So long as he has his friends, he can’t forget what’s really important.
He wasn’t expecting the guns. If it weren’t for the extreme pain, the Doctor might have worked up a dry smile – you could even say he’d walked straight into that one. He hopes they’ll forgive him, he’s not sure when he stopped being able to forgive himself. The man with the plan – but that wasn’t what he had wanted. He’d simply known too much, become too many things to too many beings. Elaborate traps that caught only himself. In for a penny, in for a basket. He wants to forget how to juggle without dropping a plate, remember why he loved life over death, to know why it’s better to be alive.
7 …bullet wounds compounded by a human medical operation unprepared for two…
The Doctor bleeds, it’s getting all over. His jacket feels thick and wet, even with only one heart pumping. The body is just a vessel. The mind/soul regenerates. Or doesn’t. For the first time he is choosing exactly what he will become, not reacting to hopes and circumstances. Perhaps he’s finally old enough to admit he’s not much good at self-reflection. He’s changing himself and it’s not for a good cause. He’s fought in many wars (the pacifist who doesn’t understand peace), now he’s reforming himself for one. Doctor – know thyselves: a zest for exploration, as stubborn as a mule, a bohemian making his way through space, a man with responsibilities to others, a pragmatist who lived life at his largest, a planner who knows everything and nothing, a dreamer who delights in reality.
A little boy who ran away.
There had been a moment where he had seen all possible universes, all possible realities – all the versions of him that there ever were and ever could be. Of course, he’d been mad at the time, but the best people often are.
∞