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saiilorstars · 4 years ago

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Falling in Temptation

Previous chapters • Sequel to Stars Dance • Fairy Tale Memoirs (Companion story)

Ch. 26: The God Complex

Fandom: Doctor Who // Pairing: 11th Doctor x OFC

Chapter summary: The travelers are stuck in a hotel hell-bent on showing them their worst fears. The Doctor's greatest fears shown to him is what finally pushes him to do something he should've done a long time ago.

Taglist: @ocfairygodmother @anotherunreadblog @maaaaarveeeeel @stareyedplanet @perfectlystiles

[If you’d like to be added to this specific OC’s stories/edits, send me a message!]

Avalon was sitting on mushy, green grass with her journal and pen. There was a sun, or a fake sun, shining up above in the 'sky'. There was a very visible flower scent that flooded the area with every breeze. Avalon loved the room the TARDIS had made for her, it was very...fairy-tale like. But also, it was the perfect place to attempt to write. It had only recently come up and Avalon couldn't be more thankful for the TARDIS again. She truly made life easier. The new room had been Avalon's new sanctuary to keep on drafting.

Of course, it usually only worked when a certain Time Lord wasn't around...and that was soon to end in...3...2...1...

"Gotcha!" the Doctor cheered as he took Avalon by surprise with a hug from behind.

The ginger flinched and dropped her journal and pen. She turned her head to the side and frowned, "I'm gonna slap you one of these days."

"But not today," the Doctor smirked and pressed a kiss to her lips. Afterwards, he moved over and sat down beside her, "So what are we doing on this fine morning?"

"How would you know it's morning?" Avalon chuckled, "You live in a time machine."

"Clearly because Amy and Rory were going into the kitchen for breakfast, duh," the Doctor playfully rolled his eyes.

"Don't be a smart alec with me, it'll cost you," Avalon warned and closed her journal, "Now I don't feel like being irritated in my own sanctuary."

"I would never," the Doctor mocked an offended face, making her laugh.

"I'm sorry," Avalon chuckled and set her journal down on her side. "I know I lock myself up over this thing," she nodded to the journal, "My family always got so irritated with me for it."

"I'm not upset, I was just missing you," the Doctor put an arm around her shoulders, "You're doing what you love, how can I be mad at that?"

Avalon scoffed, "As if I'm doing the thing I love. I want to be a writer but c'mon," she sighed, "We all know it's not happening, I just kid myself with this journal."

"Oi, I gave you that journal, let's not downplay its importance," the Doctor made a face, "And, not to mention, Emmalina gave you your first one, because she believed in you."

Avalon quietly picked up her journal and stared at its cover, her mind drifting off to the past, "She thought I could become one of the greatest writers in history."

"Well, it's not too late," the Doctor shrugged, "You're only 23, perfect age to begin."

"You've gotten to know me a lot better than anyone else, so you know that I'm not a very good person..."

"Let's not get into that topic," the Doctor sighed, "Because I've already told you that it's all senseless."

"No, it's not..." Avalon said quietly.

The Doctor ignored her comment and gently moved her to sit on his lap, "Okay, while I think you are completely wrong about that, I don't see any reason why you can't become a true writer."

"It's scary," Avalon sighed, "Plus, my reputation isn't all that great on Earth. Colleges literally look at everything and I've been arrested several times and I've actually gone to a juvenile detention. That alone disqualifies me, or discourages the admission. You see? There's no hope. I'm doomed to be an amateur for the rest of my life."

"Now wait a minute," the Doctor had to stop her, "Earth isn't the only place you can get some education. You're not even from Earth! You can go anywhere in the galaxy, Ava. They would look at your talent, your ambition, determination..."

"And do you think I have any of that?"

"Of course I do! All that and more," the Doctor kissed her hair, "Just say the word and we'll go and get you to see one of the professors."

Avalon lightly smiled as she thought of something, "You know, River's a professor, in the future," she raised her head to look at him, "You think she would be willing to help? Give some pointers?"

The Doctor hadn't quite thought of that, but knew right there it wouldn't be a good idea. "Ava, to contact that River right now would be far too dangerous. She'd be from way into the future and would have too much foreknowledge."

"Right," Avalon sheepishly smiled, "Guess I'd be on my own, then."

"Never, you'd have all of us, especially me," the Doctor nodded.

"It would be kind of nice," Avalon said and sighed a few seconds later. "I don't know. It's all so...new, you know? I don't know what I want to do."

"There's no rush, Ava. Take some time to think of all of your options and when you decide on something, you let me know and I'll do my best to help you."

Avalon nodded. It sounded like a good plan. She didn't want to rush into anything, especially something as important as an actual career. "You're incredible, do you know that?" She rested her head against his shoulder and smiled as she felt his arm wrap around her. "You're the best thing that's happened to me in my entire life."

"Wow, feel special now," the Doctor smiled. "Who'd known that the snappiest little girl in that sleepover would grow up and steal my hearts?"

"Mm, I had big goals," Avalon joked, "And don't call me 'snappy'. I wasn't 'snappy'. I was just making sure you weren't going to hurt my sister. But if your feelings are still hurt I'm sure there's something I can do about it now..."

"And what would that be?" the Doctor raised an eyebrow as she shifted her body to face him. She had that sneaky smile he came to love early on.

"A little of this," Avalon pecked his lips. "And a lot of this," she kissed him again but deepened it, making it so that both of them were left without air and quite dazed.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor excitedly popped his head over a staircase railing, looking down at the many spirals of the stairs below. The rest of the travelers did the same but unlike him, they were nowhere near pleased with the sight.

"'Let's go to Ravan-Skala,' he says," Amy began with a huff, ""The people are 600 feet tall, you have to talk to them in hot air balloons and the Tourist Information Centre is made of one of their hats,' he says."

"And yet, there are no such hats," Avalon finished for her and raised her head to look at the Time Lord, "You have lied and badly."

"This is just awful," Rory went ahead and added.

The Doctor looked at the three with a scowl, "Amy, Beaky—"

"I would think real hard before you nickname me," Avalon pointed a warning finger at him.

"Princess," the Doctor flashed a smile, Avalon playfully rolling her eyes as a response, "Now this could be the most exciting thing I have ever seen!"

"You're kidding," Rory shook his head.

"How can you be excited about a rubbish hotel on a rubbish bit of Earth?" Amy crossed her arms and stared at the Doctor in disbelief.

"I'm not that surprised," Avalon remarked, "He gets excited about the stupidest things."

The Doctor rolled his eyes and ignored their little remarks, "Because, assembled Ponds..."

"And Reynolds," Avalon interjected with an amused smile.

"And Reynolds," the Doctor quietly added it. It was slips like those that could create such problems for him and everyone else and yet his mouth still had the ability to continue making the error. It was just too much fun calling her a Pond. "This is not Earth. This has just been made to look like Earth. The craftsmanship involved... Can you imagine?"

"Then where are we?" Avalon grew tired of the ole mystery. Unfortunately for her, the Doctor didn't seem to agree as he led them through the staircase, returning back to where the TARDIS was parked, "Hello, Doctor?" she called again, making a face as he deeply sniffed a plant.

"I don't know," he finally answered her and turned around, "Something must have yanked us off course. Look at the detail on that cheese plant!" he excitedly pointed at the plant.

"You want me to be excited over a...plant?" Avalon raised an eyebrow and walked up to him, slowly smiling of amusement, "You're so weird," she rested her hands on his chest and chuckled, "Remember when you ate grass?"

"And you told me to never kiss you," the Doctor decided to remind her rather smugly, "Look at us now."

"Shut up," Avalon remembered that moment quite clearly. She'd never have imagined the alien who tasted blue grass and just about anything else he found intriguing would actually steal her heart.

"Um, hello?" Rory called back to them, pulling them out of their moment, "Who would mock up an Earth hotel?"

"Colonists maybe, recreating a bit of home," the Doctor thought as he turned Avalon around and wrapped his arms around her waist, "Like when ex-pats open English pubs in Majorca. No, whoever did this, I am shaking his/her hand/tentacle."

"Seriously, you get excited over the stupidest things," Avalon sighed with resignation.

Rory moved over to a wall full of photographs of various species, soon calling the attention to Amy, "Have you seen these? Look at the labels underneath," he pointed to a photograph of a Sontaran, "Commander Halke, defeat," he then moved onto a human, "Tim Heath, having his photo taken. Lady Silver-Tear... Daleks."

Amy agreed there was something strange in that and decided to look for herself, "Paige Barnes, other people's socks. Tim Nelson, balloons. Novice Prin, sabrewolves. Royston Luke Gold, Plymouth. Lucy Hayward, that brutal gorilla," she glanced over to the Doctor, "Doctor, what does it mean?

"I don't know, let's find out," the Doctor took Avalon's hand and pointed for them to start moving.

They entered the reception room where they could hear a soft tune playing in the background due to some radio player at the reception desk. The Doctor tapped a bell on the desk and immediately three people jumped from around the corner, one of them, a woman, brandishing a chair leg at them.

"Blimey, that was quick," the Doctor jumped back.

"We surrender!" cried the alien of the three strangers.

"No, it's OK, we're not..." Rory grew tensed and came up with, "We're nice!"

"She threatened me with a chair leg," the Doctor suddenly noticed and looked at the others in disbelief.

"Who are you?" the woman with the chair leg demanded.

"We're back in reception," the third of the trio took notice of the new room.

"We surrender!" repeated the alien.

"Never been threatened with a chair leg before!" the Doctor was still stuck on that, "No, I tell a lie."

"Did you just say, 'It's OK, we're nice?'" Amy had suddenly realized that and had to find out the reason for it.

"EVERYONE SHUT THE HELL UP!" came the loud yell of Avalon who successfully managed to quiet everyone down, "Thank you," she breathed in relief and straightened herself up. "God, sometimes…"

"Their pupils are dilated," the woman took notice of the travelers' faces.

"What?" Avalon looked at her with suspicion and confusion.

"They're as surprised as we are," the woman continued, "Besides which, if it's a trick, it'll tell us something."

"Oh, you're good," the Doctor pointed, genuinely impressed, "Oh, she's good. Amy, with regret, you're fired."

Avalon looked at him with a scowl, "Excuse you?"

"I'm kidding," the Doctor waved her off but looked at the woman and mimed holding a phone to his ear, "We'll talk," he whispered.

"EXCUSE YOU?" Avalon raised an eyebrow at him, "There'll be no 'talks'," she frowned, "Not unless you're prepared to die."

The Doctor loved when Avalon got jealous but battling it out in front of strangers wasn't exactly his idea of having fun. He tugged her to him, through struggle as she was clearly upset, and looked at the others, "I take it from the pathological compulsion to surrender, you're from Tivoli," he settled on the alien of the strangers.

"Yes, the most invaded planet in the galaxy. Our anthem is called Glory To Insert Name Here."

Avalon stopped struggling against the Doctor to glance at the alien, "That's...sad," she informed then continued to fight, mumbling a few curse words here and there.

"You with the face, Howie, you said you were surprised to be back in reception," the Doctor pointed to the young man with them.

"The walls move, everything changes," Howie struggled to say as he looked around.

"You, clever one, what's he talking about?" the Doctor had looked back at the woman in scrubs, "And what's your name?"

"Oh yes, that's working well," Avalon muttered and practically swatted his hands off her, but to no avail.

"The corridors twist and stretch, rooms vanish and pop up somewhere else," the woman explained, "It's like the hotel's alive. And, um, Rita," she was noticing the odd looks she was getting from Avalon and frankly felt a bit nervous.

"Let me go," Avalon ordered the Doctor and finally pushed him off. She rolled her eyes and jumped over the reception desk to the radio station, "New rule, this stays off all night," she glanced back at the others, "It's giving me a headache. Now, then, what were you saying about the hotel?"

"It's huge, with, like, no way out," Howie finished for Rita.

"Have you tried the front door?" Rory had to ask since the 'easiest way out' always seemed the most ignored option during their travels.

"No, in two days it never occurred to us to try the front door," Rita sarcastically replied, "Thank God you're here!"

"Oi, don't be rude to my best friend," Avalon snapped at her as she jumped on the desk again, taking a comfortable seat on it with her legs dangling.

The Doctor had taken out his sonic to scan the door and opened it to find a white brick wall, confirming Howie's statement, "They're not doors, they're walls, walls that look like doors. Door-walls, if you like, or "dwalls", "woors" even, though you'd probably got it when you said, "They're not doors." I mean, the windows are..." he moved over to a pair of curtains and flung them to the sides, only to find more wall behind, "Right, big day if you're a fan of walls."

"It's not just that," Rita quietly said, Howie and Trivol both also getting quiet, "The rooms have...things in them."

"Things? Hello! What kind of things?" the Doctor was once again excited, "Interesting things? I love things, ask anyone."

"Stupid things," Avalon remarked as she inspected her nails, clearly trying to seem disinterested.

"Bad dreams," Rita answered the question with fear evident in her tone.

"Well, that killed the mood," the Doctor's excitement faded.

"There was never a mood here," Avalon looked at him with a scowl, reminding him this hadn't even been their choice of adventure in the first place.

"How did you get here?" the Doctor focused on the problem at hand.

"I don't know, I'd just started my shift," Rita shrugged, "I must have passed out, because suddenly I was here."

"I was blogging, next thing, this," Howie gestured to the room.

"Oh, I was at work, I'm in town planning," the alien went next, "We're lining all the highways with trees, so invading forces can march in the shade."

"Still very sad," Avalon whispered to him.

"Which is nice for them," the alien continued, ignoring the comment.

"Yeah... So what have we got?" the Doctor reviewed the information they'd just gotten, "People snatched from their lives and dropped into an endless, shifting maze that looks like a 1980s hotel with bad dreams in the bedrooms. Well, apart from anything else, that's just rude."

"Says the rudest alien I've ever met," Avalon hopped off the desk with a clean smirk, "Now then, can we please get out of here? This hotel is creeping me out..." the Doctor agreed and reached to take her hand but she put them behind her back and sharply looked at him, "Under probation," she announced and headed off.

The Doctor made a face and looked at Amy and Rory, "Dare I ask what that even means?"

"Em, no," Amy shook her head and went off after Avalon, motioning for the others to do the same.

"See when Ava went out on dates she designated them as 'under probation'...and then she never saw them again," Rory decided to inform the Time Lord and had to hide his teasing smirk. It wasn't often he got to do that and since the Doctor had practically done that to himself, Rory figured why not?

~ 0 ~

As the group was coming up the staircase, the Doctor explained the plan to them all, "We'll pop back to the TARDIS, I'll do a planet-wide diagnostic sweep, then we'll have a sing song..." he trailed off when they'd reached the space in which the TARDIS was supposed to be in.

"And the TARDIS is gone," Avalon sighed, not very surprised as well, "Cos you parked it here, didn't you?"

"What's a TARDIS?" Howie looked at the travelers with confusion.

"Our way out," Rory groaned and held his head in his hands, "And it's gone!"

And suddenly, the music Avalon had shut off in the reception room played soothingly over the speakers.

"Okay, this is bad," the Doctor declared, "At the moment, I don't know how bad, but certainly we're three buses, a long walk and eight quid in a taxi from good. Are there any more of you?" he looked at Rita for the answer.

"Joe, but he's tied up right now," Rita leaned on the rail of the stairs, her eyes drifting to the side.

"Doing what?" the Doctor asked her.

"No, I mean he's...tied up right now," Rita made a face as the group realized her words now.

~ 0 ~

And Rita's words were proven true when the group entered the dining room that contained Joe strapped to a chair at one of the tables, identical laughing dummies surrounding him at the other tables.

"This is beyond creepy," Avalon breathed as she looked from one dummy to another, feeling even worse when the dummies all stopped laughing to turn their heads to them. "Oh yeah, we're definitely in a scary movie."

The Doctor went straight for the tied man, determined to figure out what was going on, "Hello, I'm the Doctor."

The man didn't seem quite there as he made a response, "You're going to die here."

"Well, they certainly didn't mention that in the brochure. Is Joe there?" the Doctor reached for a chair, "Can I have a quick word?"

"Oh, it's still me, Doctor, but I've seen the light. I lived a blasphemous life, but he has forgiven my inconstancy, and soon...he shall feast."

"Well, you've been here two days," the Doctor reminded, "What's he waiting for?"

"We weren't ready. We were still raw."

"But now you're what? Cooked?" the Doctor raised an eyebrow, suddenly lost.

"If you like," Joe shrugged then smiled, "Soon you will be, too," he assured, "Be patient. First...find your room."

"My room..." the Doctor followed.

"There's a room here for everyone, Doctor. Even you."

"You said you'd seen the light now."

"Nothing else matters anymore. Only him. It's like these things. I used to hate them! They make me laugh now," Joe had a laugh with the dummies, "Gottle o' geer! Gottle o' geer! You should go. He'll be here soon."

The Doctor stood up with a fake smile and grabbed a hand dolley to put under Joe's chair, "I think you should come with me."

~ 0 ~

The group returned to the reception room where the music was once again playing in the background. The Doctor was looking at the four strangers with curiosity, "Why you four? That's what I don't understand. Aside from all the other things I don't understand," he mused while he shut the music off.

"What does it matter?" Gibbis shook his head, "Sooner or later, someone will come along and rescue us. Or enslave us."

Avalon stared at him in utter awe, "That's the spirit," she remarked sarcastically.

"Okay, look, first we find the TARDIS," the Doctor said then wagged a finger at all of them, "If you feel drawn to a particular room, do not go in, and make sure someone else can see you at all times."

"Joe said 'he' will feast. Is there something here with us?" Rita wondered nervously while looking at Joe who was still nowhere with them in mind-terms.

Joe laughed after the question had been asked and so the Doctor glanced at him, "Something to add, Joe?"

"Here comes a candle to light you to bed, here comes a chopper to chop off your head," the man started saying, "Chop, chop, chop, chop."

"Can we do something about him?" Howie put a hand on his head as he tried ignoring Joe's words.

'I'm all over it," Avalon raised a hand as she moved to the desk, hopping on it and reaching underneath to pull out black dutch tape, "Put it on," she chucked it to Howie then looked at Joe, "He's saying stupid stuff I'd rather not hear."

And so, after Joe was taped over the mouth, they all headed for the hallways in an attempt to find the TARDIS.

"Personally, I think you've got the right idea," Gibbis said to Joe as he pushed the man's chair, "Times like this, I think of my old school motto, "Resistance Is Exhausting."

"I've worked out where we are," Howie announced to Rory.

"Hmm?" Rory looked at him.

"Norway."

"Norway?"

"You see, the US government has entire cities hidden in the Norwegian mountains. Earth is on a collision course with this other planet, and this is where they're going to send all the rich people when it kicks off."

"Amazing," Rory blinked.

"It's all there on the internet."

"No, it's amazing you've come up with a theory even more insane than what's actually happening."

The group was stopped when an older man came out of a room in front of them, "Have you forgotten your PE kit again?" the teacher looked at the Doctor, "Right, that's it, you're doing it in your pants!"

The Doctor shook off the odd moment and turned to see Howie nearing a door, "Hey! Don't!" he ran, even the group shifting to try and stop Howie.

The door to the room was opened and allowed the others the sight of young women looking like they were at a party. They all looked over and started laughing when they saw Howie, "Oh, look, girls, it's H-H-H-Howie!"

"What's "loser" in K-K-K-Klingon?" one of the girls asked then laughed again.

Howie backed away from the door, "Shut the d-d...the-the door!" the Doctor did as told, "This is just some m-m-messed-up CIA stuff, I-I-I'm telling you."

"You're right," the Doctor agreed with him in an attempt to calm him, "Keep telling yourself that. It's a CIA thing, nothing more..." he looked at the others and nodded for them to keep moving.

They reached a hallway that was in rather odd conditions. The Doctor looked at one of the walls with light sconces and plaster scraped off. Avalon found a paper on the floor and bent down to get it.

"Guys?" Rory had taken a double look at a fire exit that stood big and proud several feet away from him.

However, the growl of the beast grabbed everyone's attention and made everyone save Rory gather around.

"OK, whatever that is, it's not real, yeah?" Avalon questioned the Doctor, though she wasn't very convinced herself.

"No, no, I'm sure it isn't," the Doctor took her hand yet still backed away with her, "But just in case, let's run away and hide anyway. In here," he reached for a room and flung the door open, motioning for the others to get in while Rita took herself and Joe into another room.

"You liar," Avalon snapped at the Doctor.

"What? I can't try and make my Ava feel better?" he raised an eyebrow at her.

She rolled her eyes, "Oh shut up," she looked around him to where Rory was, "Oi, Rory! C'mon!" Rory was trying to find the fire exit that had mysteriously disappeared on him, "Rory!"

"Ava, please, get inside," the Doctor tried pushing her into the room.

"No, not without Rory," Avalon struggled against him, "Please?"

The Doctor groaned and turned for Rory, "COME ON!" he shouted for the human frantically. When Rory finally started coming towards them, the Doctor got Avalon inside the room and a couple seconds he and Rory followed.

"Aiiee!" the Doctor nearly fell over when he saw two Weeping Angels statues in the room facing them.

"Don't...blink," Amy was staring dead hard at the Angels and practically forcing Howie to do the same since Gibbis was cowering inside a cupboard on the side of the room.

"They're gonna get us," Avalon breathed as the lights flickered and the Angels changed positions.

"Ava, get back," the Doctor grabbed her arm while Rory took Amy's, "Why haven't they gotten us yet?"

"Do you really think we should be questioning that?" Avalon would've given him a look if the Angels were taking up her attention, "Why not 'oh, how can we get out of this?'.

The Doctor moved in front of her as he went towards the statues. Nervously, he tried touching one only to realize they weren't even real Angels, "They're not real," he said to the others.

"What?" Amy frowned, still not taking her eyes off the statues.

"They should have got us by now," the Doctor turned to Amy, "Amy, look at me, focus on me. It's your bad dream, that's all."

"I don't even think they're for us," Rory finally realized as the lights flickered again but the statues remained in place.

Avalon made a face as she looked around, "But if it's not Amy, then who's the room for—" she didn't get to finish her question when Gibbis let out a sharp scream from the cupboard and shut the door, answering her question right there and then.

The Doctor heard the steps of the beast getting closer so he went for the door, confusing the others.

"Doctor, what are you doing?" Amy had to ask, wondering what kind of plan he was forming to save them.

"I'm sorry, I just have to see what it is. I just have to see," the Doctor apologized and peered through the peephole in the door, finding the shadow of the beast on the other side, "Oh, look at you... You are beautiful..." he gasped when the beast suddenly stood on the other side staring right at him, "Oh, dear..." he cautiously stepped back.

"It's on the other side, isn't it?" Avalon assumed with a sigh.

"That...may be a possibility," the Doctor slowly went for the door again.

"And looking back at it again would make things better, how exactly?" Avalon grew nervous as he stared through the peephole. That door was just a door and if the beast wanted to it could take it down, the Doctor being the first one to go down with it.

"I think it's going after Joe," the Doctor announced as the beast started heading off. Once he thought they were safe, he opened the door and peered out into the hall, seeing the body of Joe being dragged around the corner, "Leave him alone!" he called and went after.

"No, Doctor!" Avalon moved to follow when Rory yanked her back, "No, what are you doing? We have to go help!"

Rory shook his head and gripped her arm, "The Doctor can't split himself into three to save himself, you and Joe. Stay here, okay?"

Avalon huffed and looked back in the direction the Doctor had gone off in. Even if she wanted to make a run for it, the hotel would probably shift the hallways and mess with her. She would just get lost and cause havoc.

But she knew why Rory had stopped her in the first place, they all knew.

It seemed like the Doctor's paranoia concerning their safety being completely on him had not gone away. Avalon was the first and foremost one to feel the presence of his senseless guilt. She tried and tried to make him see that everyone was responsible for themselves, as well as the fact that they were all aware of the dangers that came with traveling, but nothing worked. In the end, she, Rory, and Amy just tried to be more careful during their trips in an attempt to help the Doctor a bit.

~ 0 ~

Joe's body had been placed on a small dais in the dining room and was being scanned by the sonic, meanwhile the rest of the group was a bit dispersed through the room trying to get over the happenings.

Amy and Rory sat at a table trying to forget everything but it was harder to do than they thought. They were quietly conversing but when Avalon joined them, they stopped.

"Okay listen up," she plopped down into the empty chair. "Remember how I told you about the Doctor and his guilt? Well, it's about to overflow. We need to be careful for his sake."

"We're doing our best, believe us," Rory sighed.

"I know, just...try a little harder?" Avalon shifted in the chair only to feel something funny in her pocket. She remembered she'd stuck the scrap of paper she'd found earlier into her pocket. "Oh, wait!"

"What?" Rory watched her pull out the paper.

"I found this earlier..." Avalon mumbled as she skimmed the writing. She jumped from her chair and hurried towards the Doctor, "Doctor, look at this. I found it in a corridor, I completely forgot I had it." The Doctor quickly took it out of her hands and just as he was about to read it, she surprised him with a kiss on his cheek. "It is not all on you," she said for his puzzled face. "Please try to remember that."

The Doctor smiled at her for a moment before turning his attention to the paper. As kind as her words were, he couldn't give himself the luxury of getting distracted with her sweet kisses. There was a beast roaming the hallways and she could be its next target. He needed to get them out of there fast.

"My name is Lucy Hayward and I'm the last one left. It took Luke first. It got him on his first day, almost as soon as we arrived. It's funny. You don't know what's going to be in your room until you see it, then you realize it could never have been anything else. I just saw mine. It was a gorilla from a book I'd read as a kid. My God, that thing used to terrify me. The gaps between my worships are getting shorter, like contractions. This is what happened to the others... and how lucky they were. It's all so clear now. I'm so happy. Praise him."

"Praise him," Howie said not a moment after the Doctor had finished reading out loud.

"What did you just say?" the Doctor looked at him with surprise.

"Nothing," Howie shrugged but it was obvious he was fighting against something, "Praise him!" he nearly shouted then clapped his hand over his mouth.

"This is what happened to Joe!" Gibbis said in alarm as he rushed away from Howie.

"God, it's going to come for me now," Howie panicked while the others spoke over one another, definitely not helping the case.

"You'll lead it right here," Gibbis accused in terror.

"I won't leave you, I promise, you have my word, "the Doctor assured Howie but the young man wasn't so sure.

"I don't want to get eaten!"

"Howie, calm down!" Amy tried her hand at it as well.

"He's going to lead it right here!" Gibbis kept saying in the background.

The Doctor had enough and so activated the sonic above his head creating a high pitched noise that made everyone stop, "Thank you!"

"Don't you see? He'll lead it right here!" Gibbis was the first one to speak again.

"What do you suggest?" Rita turned to him.

"Look, whatever it is out there, it's obviously chosen Howard as its next course. Now...tragic though that is, this is no time for sentiment. I'm saying, if it were to... find him," Gibbis 'delicately' said. "It may be satisfied and let the rest of us go." Everyone looked at him in horror. "All I want to do is go home and be conquered and oppressed, is that too much to ask?!"

"You're no longer allowed to speak," Avalon declared not a minute later.

"We stay together," the Doctor announced and walked up to Gibbis, "Your civilization is one of the oldest in the galaxy. Now I see why. Your cowardice isn't quaint, it's sly, aggressive. It's how that gene of gutlessness has survived while so many others have perished. Well, not today. No-one else dies today. Right?"

"Yes..." Gibbis mouthed.

"Brilliant," and the Doctor turned back and went for Howie, "Howie, any second, it's going to possess you again," he informed as he sat the man down at a table, "When it does, I'm going to ask you some questions. Please try to answer them."

"I hope my mum's all right, she's going to be w-worried..." Howie mumbled, slowly slipping into a change that was clear through his face.

The Doctor sat across him and put on an enthusiastic expression, "Howie, you're next, we're all dead jealous, so tell us...How do we get a piece of the action? Why isn't he possessing all of us?"

"You guys have got all these distractions," Howie tapped his head while smiling in a languid way, "All these obstacles. It'd be so much easier if you just let it go, you know, clear the path."

"You want it to find you?" Avalon realized with horror, "Why? Don't you understand what it's going to do to you?"

But Howie seemed even more excited at the thought of it, "Are you kidding? He's going to kill us all! How cool is that?!"

The Doctor quietly stood and led the others away from the table, "It's as I thought, it feeds on fear. Everything, the rooms, Lucy's note, even the pictures in reception, has been put here to frighten us. So we have to resist it. Do whatever you have to, cross your fingers, say a prayer, think of a basket of kittens, but do not give in to the fear."

"OK, but what are we actually going to do?" Amy asked him curiously.

"We're going to catch ourselves a monster," the Doctor announced with a genuine smile this time.

~ 0 ~

"Can't believe we're doing this," Avalon mumbled to Rory as they stood on guard of the beast.

They were standing outside the beauty parlor of the hotel, Rory with a mop in his hands. They were waiting to lock the beast inside the room where the Doctor was, something Avalon wasn't too pleased with. Once again, she hadn't been allowed to help him because it was "too dangerous" and "she might get hurt" and all the usual crap that had taken custom to being thrown at her. Apparently, locking a door was the only thing she could do without getting hurt.

"Is it really such a surprise?" Rory countered her remark with a small smirk.

"No, as well as the fact that I'm playing guard again," Avalon rolled her eyes, "The Doctor's getting crazy with this protectiveness," she huffed.

"He's trying to keep you safe, Ava. Appreciate it."

"I do but there's a fine line and I don't want him to actually lose his mind trying to protect me, you and Amy. He's too hard on himself."

Rory could agree on that but what was he supposed to do? The Doctor was the Doctor. He long ago made his choice how to act and think. There was no changing his mind after a near thousand years of living.

"Rory, he's in!" they heard Amy's shout from the other side.

Quickly, Rory blocked the door behind them with the mop. Together, he and Avalon stayed near in case there was something else needed to be done.

"He shouldn't be there on his own," Avalon mumbled as they waited.

"Now who's overprotective?" Rory teased and nudged her side, earning a mock glare.

Avalon groaned. She hated when he made sense.

"I'm here!" Howie's voice filled the hallway, "Bring me death!"

"How did he get out?" Avalon then smacked her head, "Stupid question!" she scolded herself, "Remind me, WHY why did we leave Gibbis with him in the first place?"

"That..." Rory looked to the side, "...is a very good question."

"Mhm," Avalon groaned and went back to the door, "We have to make sure this..."

"No, no, no, no!" she managed to hear the Doctor through the other, "Ava, Rory, watch out!"

The glass of the door shattered and sent Avalon and Rory down to the floor. They missed the beast getting the mop out of the door handles to get out. A couple seconds later came the Doctor with Amy and Rita.

"Ava!" he helped Avalon sit up while Amy helped Rory, "Are you okay?"

Avalon groaned as she put a hand on her head, "Does this mean I can't even be a guard, then?"

The Doctor was slightly amused as he helped her up, "You're meant to be my princess," he pecked her lips once he made sure she was alright, "Now if you'll excuse me, I've got some saving to do..." He ran off after the beast to save Howie.

"What happened?" Rory looked back at the parlor where they could see basically everything shattered.

"I think we should be asking why Howie's out in the first place," Avalon shook her head, "I swear that alien is going to hear me."

"Okay, let's just go find the Doctor," Amy turned around and moved to walk. She only made it a couple steps down when she stopped and looked at a room, room 7, and instantly felt the urge to go inside.

"Amy..." Avalon was watching her curiously. Amy didn't listen and turned the knob of the door and peered inside, "Amy!" Avalon rushed down and slammed the door shut then yanked Amy back, "You shouldn't have done that. What did you see?"

"Nothing," Amy slowly got back to normal, "Nothing...I don't know, it was weird."

"C'mon," Rita called from the other side of the hallway.

Avalon sharply looked at Amy and grabbed her arm to get back with the others. They found the Doctor kneeling by Howie's body, instantly knowing the man was dead.

From around the corner, Gibbis showed himself, meekly speaking, "He got free. He overpowered me," the Doctor ignored him as he strode back to the others, "It might leave us alone now. Maybe now we'll be safe. Wait!"

~ 0 ~

The Doctor stood in front of the wall pictures they'd looked at earlier, specifically Howie's. Rory came to join him and immediately the Doctor had to wonder, "Have you found your room yet?"

"No, no," Rory shook his head, "And neither has Ava. I have to wonder, though, is that good or bad?"

"I believe the phrase went 'Avalon Reynolds does not get afraid'," the Doctor smiled, "Maybe she got that from you."

"I used to be afraid," Rory shrugged, "But then...after all the time I spent with you in the TARDIS, what was left to be scared of?"

The Doctor sharply looked at him, "You said that in the past tense."

Rory was silent for a few seconds until a sigh slipped through. "My family. River's out there, in prison, and we have Avalon here but...she's already gotten so hurt. My biggest fear now is what could happen to my family."

The Doctor swallowed hard. That could directly be linked to him. "I'm trying to keep everyone safe…"

"I know," Rory turned to him. "But it's like Avalon said, not everything is on you. Sometimes things happen and no one can prevent them."

The Doctor could only nod but to believe him right now was a difficult task. He instead moved away from the wall to go meet the others. On his way, he met Rita halfway there. "Rita! Brilliant! How are you? Not panicking, are you?" But he didn't wait to hear the answer when he continued, "Good, good. Because I am literally an otter's toenail away from getting us out of here."

"Why?" Rita finally managed a word in.

"Excellent question," the Doctor acknowledged but instead went around her, "Excellent question," he remarked but stopped once he realized he had no idea what she meant, "Why what?"

"Why is it up to you to save us? That's quite a God complex you have there."

The Doctor looked down to where Avalon and Amy were downstairs, "I brought them here," he said quietly, "They'd say it was their choice, but offer a child a suitcase full of sweets and they'll take it. Offer someone all of time and space and they'll take that, too. Which is why you shouldn't. Which is why grown-ups were invented."

"All of time and space, eh?" Rita called as the Time Lord continued his way down.

"Oh, yeah," he glanced back, "And when we get out of this, I'll show you, too."

Rita laughed, "I don't know what you're talking about. But I have a feeling you just did it again."

The Doctor nodded then noticed a security camera up on the corner, " Right down to the smallest detail. Got you, Mr Minotaur..." he dashed down the stairs and made note to head to the cameras' room.

Avalon was hurrying down the stairs with Amy and Rory, all trying to locate a missing Rita, when suddenly Avalon stopped in a hallway. She didn't know why but...something stopped her. She took a few steps forwards, ignoring Amy's and Rory's call back at the staircase to follow them. They'd continued on without her.

Suddenly, all the doors on both sides of her faded so that only one door stood out. Number 51. Her feet moved and before she even registered what she was doing, her hand found the doorknob and pushed the door open.

The room was a bright white with a medical bed and the standard IV pumps: a hospital room. Avalon saw a woman's back as she sat on the bed holding an infant in her arms. There was a nurse waiting for the woman on the side.

"What will you name her, ma'am?" the nurse inquired.

"Don't care," the mother answered rather coldly.

It certainly took the nurse by surprise. "Excuse me?"

Avalon could see the mother's head rising to meet the nurse. "I said I don't care. She's a nuisance. I don't want her here, I don't need her, so if you could just..." The mother held the infant out for the nurse.

"Ma'am, this is really unusual," the nurse was flabbergasted. "Are you sure you don't want to think about naming-"

"I don't care!" the mother snapped. "I don't want her! Take her! Put her up for adoption or something!"

"But I-I don't...ma'am if this is really what you want, we need a name-"

The mother groaned. "You want a name? Fine! Go with, uh, Avalon! There! You got a name, now take her away!"

Avalon watched as the nurse pulled the pink blanket from the infant's face to reveal a soft tuft of orange hair. Her breath hitched. That was her?

"TAKE HER!" The mother yelled at the nurse, making the woman jump in her spot. "God! Not even her father wanted her and I am not going to be stuck with her! GO!"

The nurse jumped one more time before rushing out of the room...right past Avalon.

"That can't be me..." She said as if she was trying to convince herself.

At the sound of her voice, the mother looked back and though Avalon met her gaze, she couldn't say that she remembered the woman at all. But she knew the look of hatred when she saw one.

The mother's face contorted with utter loathing. "Don't tell me it's you! God! What the hell do I have to do to get away from you? Haven't you taken the hint already?"

Tears pooled in Avalon's eyes as the woman kept shouting at her to leave the room. "You can't...you can't hate me..."

The mother barked a sardonic laugh. "I do! because you were a nuisance from the start! From the moment that I knew you existed! I knew you that you were going to be a waste of space and I decided that I didn't need that in my life. You could be someone else's burden!"

"But I'm your daughter," Avalon barely choked the words out. She felt like she couldn't breathe and suddenly she really wished she could have a hug from that woman. Her mother.

"You're a waste in the world," the mother snapped. "You were born to cause trouble. I had the right idea to get out before you hurt me. Tell me, have you hurt anyone in your life?"

Avalon blinked once and suddenly she was no longer in a hospital room. There was a breeze and sand and water...and a gunshot. An astronaut had fired at the Doctor until he was dead on the ground.

"NO!" Avalon screamed at the top of her lungs and ran forwards.

'Have you hurt anyone in your life?' The wicked mother repeated over and over. 'Have you hurt anyone in your life?'

The astronaut pulled off its helmet just as Avalon came to a stop beside the Doctor's body. It was her. It was a straight, emotionless her who turned away and disappeared.

"I didn't mean to, I wouldn't..." Avalon hands went back and forth while she decided whether or not to touch him. "I wouldn't hurt you, I wouldn't hurt you..."

She just couldn't, not him, never him.

~ 0 ~

In the dining room once again, the remaining group sat in a dispersed manner contemplating their next move, all in the meanwhile the Doctor was finishing up a rather big tantrum. To say he was unhappy would be the understatement of the year. Three people were dead and the next one could be anyone and so far he had nothing to save them. This was becoming a running theme for him and his good streak of luck could end at any moment. This time could be the time he loses someone, Amy, Rory, or Avalon. It always happens, at some point something has to happen.

Avalon cleared her throat, pushing aside her own turmoil at the moment to focus on the big picture. She didn't want him to find out about her room. "I may be temperamental but even I know throwing things isn't going to help," she said quietly. The Doctor gave a small nod and took her extended hand, "So why don't we review, instead?" she offered and looked around, "We know the beast preys on people's fear and possesses them."

"But Rita wasn't afraid, she was brave and calm," the Doctor said in pure frustration, "Maybe it's something to do with the people, some connection between the four of you that'll tell me how to fight it."

"Yes. You keep saying that, but you never do. And while we wait, people keep dying," Gibbis remarked in irritation, "And we'll be next!"

"Look, he'll work it out, he always does," Amy spoke up, "Just let him riff and move anything expensive out of his way."

"Oh, nice, Amy, support the tantrums," Avalon threw her a mock-scolding face.

"We support yours," Amy countered with a small smirk.

"Hey!"

While the two gingers went back and forth, something had sparked inside the Doctor's head, something of Amy's, "Oh, no. Oh, no, no..." he started repeating.

Avalon looked at him, worried, "What? What is it?"

"It's not fear. It's faith. Not just religious faith, faith in something," he got to thinking and even pacing, "Howard believed in conspiracies, external forces controlling the world. Joe had dice cufflinks and a chain with a horseshoe. He was a gambler. Gamblers believe in luck, an intangible force that helps them win or lose. Gibbis rejected personal autonomy and is waiting for the next batch of invaders to tell him what to do. They all believe there's something guiding them, about to save them. That's what it replaces. Every time someone was confronted with their most primal fear, they fell back on their most fundamental faith," he sat on a barstool and rubbed his face as he realized, "And all this time, I've been telling you to dig deep. Find the thing that keeps you brave. I made you expose your faith. Show them what they needed."

"But why us? Why are we here?" Rory frowned in confusion.

"It doesn't want you. That's why it kept showing you a way out. You're not religious or superstitious, so there's no faith for you to fall back on."

"Me?" Amy was next to frown, disliking what had just been said, "Why me? Why not her?" she glanced at Avalon.

"It seeks out the strongest faith," the Doctor explained but Avalon interrupted him with the revelation that she had seen her own room as well. It seemed like hiding it wouldn't be happening anymore.

"I saw it," she whispered, eyes downcast. "It was there...number 51."

"Oh Ava," the Doctor immediately came to her and wrapped her up in his arms. She wanted him to hold her as tight as possible. "I'm so, so sorry," he whispered to her. He wouldn't ask what she saw just as he hoped that she would never ask what he saw in his own room.

"Okay but if Avalon saw a room too...how do you know it didn't bring us here because of her?" Amy had to ask just for the sake of clarity. She would much rather have the beast come for her instead of Avalon.

"Because I don't have a strong faith system," Avalon said. "I don't believe in hope very much. I'm like you, Amy, in that I know my Fairy Tale Man will always try to save me but I also know that he's not always able to do everything. That would just be unrealistic." She leaned her head against the Doctor's chest. He tries his best, though."

"I will always try," he whispered to her.

"Okay, so...what's going on with me then?" Amy questioned, swallowing hard now that she was next on the list of the hunted. "

"It's your faith in me," the Doctor sighed and looked at Amy who was staring at him in horror, "That's what brought us here."

"But why do they lose their faith before they die and start worshipping..."it"?" Rory inquired.

"It needs to convert the faith into a form 'it' can consume. Faith is an energy, the specific emotional energy the creature needs to live. Which is why at the end of her note, Lucy said..."

"Praise him," Amy said, and finished.

"Exactly," the Doctor nodded and for a moment no one realized what...

"Did she just...?" Avalon's eyes widened.

"No. Oh, please, no," Rory stood up from his chair and moved to Amy, and already they could hear the beast coming for her.

~ 0 ~

Now the group ran as fast as they could down the hallways, away from the beast who wasn't that far away. Amy suddenly stopped and turned to face the beast.

"Amy?" the Doctor had noticed and looked back.

"What the hell are you doing?" Avalon hissed, "Get over here now!"

"He is beautiful," Amy hadn't heard a word as she gazed upon the beast getting closer.

"Leave her! Just leave her!" Gibbis nearly begged as he backtracked.

The Doctor and Rory hurried over to Amy and dragged her away. They ran into a room that happened to be Amy's. Inside was her younger self sitting on her suitcase as she waited and watched the window, simulating the night she had waited for the Doctor.

"Boy does that bring back memories," Avalon blinked. To think, she had scolded Amy for being so naive for waiting for an alien that they would probably never see again. Now look where they were?

Amy knelt to the floor with her hands on her head, "Doctor, it's happening. It's changing me, it's changing my thoughts."

The Doctor looked around the room in desperation, Avalon and Rory were trying to keep the door shut and Gibbis was cowering once more. He had to do something, and that something would cost him. Slowly, he knelt beside Amy, "I can't save you from this, there's nothing I can do to stop this."

She looked at him in confusion, "What?"

"I stole your childhood and now I've led you by the hand to your death. But the worst thing is, I knew. I knew this would happen. This is what always happens."

"It's in!" Avalon cried as the beast swung open the door of the room.

"Forget your faith in me," the Doctor insisted to Amy, flinching as the beast growled at the doorway, "I took you with me because I was vain, because I wanted to be adored. Look at you. Glorious Pond. The girl who waited for me. I'm not a hero. I really am just a mad man in a box. And it's time we saw each other as we really are," he kissed Amy's forehead and smiled at her, "Amy Williams. It's time to stop waiting," he stood up and watched the beast stumble back into the hall.

As the beast fell to the floor, the lights began flickering, the room changing into a darker one with just a control panel and the TARDIS.

The Doctor moved over to the beast and knelt down by it, "I severed the food supply. Sacrificing their faith in me. I gave you the space to die. Shhh, shhh."

"What is this place?" Avalon looked around in awe.

"The real location we've been in this whole time," the Doctor looked around as well, "A ship, a prison ship."

"And what is it, a minotaur?" Amy looked at the beast, "Or an alien? Or an alien minotaur? That's not a question I thought I'd be asking this morning."

"It's both, actually," the Doctor walked to the control panel and checked the screen for any information, "Yeah. Here we go. Distant cousin of the Nimon. They descend on planets and set themselves up as Gods to be worshipped. Which is fine, until the inhabitants get all secular and advanced enough to build bonkers prisons.

"Correction. Prisons in space," Rory pointed to the porthole he and Gibbis were looking through.

"Where are the guards?" Avalon asked.

"No need for any. It's all automated," the Doctor gestured to the controls, "It drifts through space, snatching people with belief systems and converts their faith into food for the creature."

"It didn't want just me," Amy decided to point out, "So, you must believe in some god or someone, or they'd have shown you the door, too. So, what do Time Lords pray to?"

But of course, the Doctor had acted as if the question had not been asked, "According to the in-flight recorder, the program developed glitches. It got stuck on the same setting, the fears from the people before us weren't tidied away."

Avalon turned to the beast as it growled, "It's still alive...but what's it saying?"

The Doctor listened in as he moved closer to the beat again, "An ancient creature, drenched in the blood of the innocent, drifting in space through an endless, shifting maze. For such a creature, death would be a gift," he knelt down and put a hand on the beast, "Then accept it. And sleep well," he stood up and started his way back to the TARDIS with the others when the beast growled again.

"I wasn't talking about myself."

That alone was the making of a big decision.

~ 0 ~

Later that same day, Avalon was rummaging through her room frantically. It wasn't until there was a knock on her door that she finally halted, "Come in!" she gave the shout and continued her search.

The Doctor stepped inside and watched her for a moment, "What...are you doing?"

"I can't find my journal!" she sighed in irritation as she slammed shut a drawer from her vanity desk, "The thing's gone! Disappeared!" she rubbed the side of her head, "You wouldn't have happened to see it, did you?" her tone was full of hope.

"Now that you mention it, yeah, I think so. In the console room," the Doctor held a hand for her, "Want to come and search there?"

"Yes," she nodded and took his hand, "I don't understand, I know I left it in my room. I put it on my desk on the first drawer. How could it get into the console?"

"You probably just forgot," the Doctor shrugged, "No big deal."

Avalon scoffed, "This coming from the man who loses it completely when his screwdriver isn't in his pocket."

"Oi, it's valuable!"

"Well, so is my journal," Avalon concluded. As soon as they entered the console room Avalon started searching frantically again, missing the sad stare the Doctor was giving her all the meanwhile, "I don't see it, are you sure you saw it around here?"

"Uh, yeah, silver book," the Doctor nodded, "Definitely in here..."

Avalon made a face and sighed as she continued looking around. She was getting agitated that her journal wasn't showing up. She couldn't just lose it!

"Ava," the Doctor recognized her angry face and he definitely didn't want for her to be angry now. He slowly moved around the console for the ginger, "Ava?"

"Hm, what?" she muttered while looking.

"Don't be upset, please."

"How can I not be!?" Avalon growled as she stopped the search, "You gave me that journal, you spent time on it for me...and I lose it? No! I have to find it, I'll find it, I promise."

The Doctor smiled and put a hand under her chin, "Don't worry so much."

"How can I not? Not only is it my prized possession but it's also a sentimental gift from you," she said quietly, "I don't want you to think that I'm careless about it."

The Doctor had to laugh at that one, "You? Careless about your journal? Ava, I could never think that. If there is one thing you care for it's that journal. Sometimes I think you care more for it than your own life!"

"It's special..." Avalon mumbled with a small pout on her face for being laughed at.

"But none more special than you," the Doctor gave her a peck on the lips, "And, just a note, you are very special."

"Shut up," she blushed lightly.

"Why? I'm saying the truth," the Doctor put an arm around her waist and brought her up against him, "Ava doesn't like hearing praises about herself?" he chuckled as she blushed even deeper.

He was going to miss that.

"You just love messing with me, don't you?" Avalon groaned.

"Don't you do the same to me?"

"Yes...but it's cute when I do it," Avalon innocently shrugged, "And besides, usually when I do it you get one of these," she kissed him, "So everyone wins."

"Everybody wins?" the Doctor raised an eyebrow, "Just like that?" Avalon nodded with a clean smile on her face, making him chuckle again, "You're so adorable. I..." he slowly wrapped his other arm around her as well and leaned closer to her.

"You what?" she asked in anticipation.

The Doctor raised a hand to rest on her cheek and gazed at her for a minute, taking note of all her features to remember them perfectly when she was...

"Doctor?" Avalon asked again, "You what?"

But the Doctor didn't answer as instead he chose to kiss her. Satisfied with the alternative, Avalon fell into the kiss. Gently, the Doctor turned her around and leaned her on the console, deepening the kiss. Avalon had never felt a kiss like that and if she hadn't been so into it she would've questioned it.

"Where did that come from?" she finally took a breath after they'd pulled away. "And how can I get that to happen again?"

The Doctor laughed lightly. "You have no idea the power you have over me." He rested his forehead against hers, bringing up a finger to stroke over her cheek. "You're my princess, my Ava. I love you."

Avalon smiled. "I love you too, Fairy Tale Man."

They both heard footsteps coming from the corridors and looked in time to see Amy and Rory walking out.

"Ah, glad you're both here," the Doctor straightened up and took Avalon's hand, "I have a surprise for you two," he looked at the human pair.

"You do?" Amy raised an eyebrow, confused. She thought with the trip earlier all he would want to do was stay inside the TARDIS.

"You'll like it," he assured as he turned for the console and started setting in coordinations, gripping Avalon's hand tighter than ever as he knew what was coming.

~ 0 ~

The group stepped out into a sunny, calm, Earth, street. There were colorful townhouses in a row across them with a park on the other side.

"Don't tell me. This isn't Earth, that isn't a real house," Amy nodded to one of the houses they were approaching, "And inside lives a goblin, who feeds on indecision."

"Good one," Avalon laughed.

"Nope. Real Earth, real house," the Doctor tossed Amy a set of keys, "Real door keys!"

"You're not serious?" Amy looked between him and the keys.

"The car too?" Rory was hypnotized with the bright red car in front of them, "But that's my favorite car! How did you know that was my favorite car?"

The Doctor rolled his eyes as he reminded Rory, "You showed me a picture of it once and said, 'That's my favorite car'," he tossed Rory the car keys.

"Wait a minute..." Avalon was slowly putting pieces together, at least in regards to Amy and Rory, "...you're doing this be-" but the Doctor placed a finger over her lips.

"We'll talk," he gave a smile, a fake one, "Can I have a word with Amy, first?"

"Okay..." Avalon whispered and nodded. The Doctor gave her a small kiss and turned her for the house that now belonged to her grandparents.

"I'll go with her, there's a tone to celebrate," Rory happily said but stopped beside the Doctor before actually leaving, "Now, Amy's probably going to we can't accept this because it's too extravagant and we'll always feel a crippling sense of obligation," he looked over his shoulder to Amy, "It's a risk I'm willing to take!" he laughed and went after Avalon inside the house.

Amy leaned against the bonnet of the car and patted the spot beside her, "Hey," she called to the Time Lord, "So... You're leaving, aren't you?"

"You haven't seen the last of me," he assured, "Bad Penny is my middle name! Seriously, the looks I get when I fill in a form..."

"Why now?"

"Because you're still breathing," the Doctor quietly said, falling serious.

"Well, I think this is about the washing-up, personally," Amy remarked, making them both laugh a little, sadly. She stood off the car and glanced back at the house, "And Avalon? What happens to her?"

"Amy, you know the Silence is still out there. I can't...I can't keep acting...I can't keep pretending like I don't know what's coming," he swallowed hard.

Amy studied his expression, waiting for him to say more, but she soon understood what he was struggling to say...and it broke her heart. "Oh my God, you know." The Doctor avoided her gaze but his silence was answer enough. "You know about Lake Silencio."

"Knowing what's coming...I cannot and will not have Avalon around for that. I'm her Fairy Tale Man and I would rather die than put her in danger. If the Silence wants me, then let them have me but they will not touch her. Never again."

"I understand, I do, and I'm very grateful you're thinking about her safety but leaving her behind on Earth...don't you think that's just as dangerous?"

"No, I'll have eyes on her. I'll give Jack and Martha a call, I'll be in touch with a slightly older River Song. I'm keeping Avalon safe until...until I figure out how to defeat the Silence. Either Kovarian dies, or I will." The Doctor straightened himself up, standing by his words, and reached inside his jacket to pull out Avalon's silver journal. He had taken it from her room to avoid having to explain to her why she needed to bring it out of the TARDIS right now. He brushed a hand over the cover. 'A.H.R.' was still shining brightly as the day he carved it. Avalon Harmony Reynolds. Beautiful name for a beautiful girl who deserved to live out her days in peace.

He held the journal out to Amy, willing her to take it. "Tell her she can be anything she wants to be. She's the impossible girl, after all. Been doing the impossible ever since she was born."

Amy took the journal from him and nodded. "You don't want to say goodbye to her?"

"If I see her again, I won't be able to leave," he confessed with a heavy sigh. "I love her too much and that's my weakness. If she asks me to stay, I'm going to stay." And he couldn't do that to her. His room had shown him the consequences if he continued to ignore the future. He would die before he had to hold Avalon's dead body in his arms.

"She's going to continue asking so many questions..." Amy said sadly, choosing to understand his motives as the best option for all of them.

"Answer them. Answer everything she wants to know, even about River."

Amy suspected that wouldn't happen anytime soon. Avalon had no interest in learning about her biological mother. "Listen, if you bump into River, whichever version you meet, you tell her to stop by because her daughter's going to need her."

"Will do," the Doctor promised and gave her a quick hug.

"Look after yourself, please," Amy said, watching him backtrack to the TARDIS. He opened the door, glancing back at Amy who already had tears in her eyes, "Bye," she waved.

The Doctor waved back and entered the TARDIS, soon de-materializing. Of course, that happened right about the time Avalon and Rory had stepped out of the brand new house.

Avalon, who'd been carrying glasses in her hands, dropped them to the ground and hurried down the steps as she saw the blue box disappearing, "What happened!? Where's he going!?" She ran up to Amy.

"He's saving us," Amy said quietly and held her journal out.

Avalon swallowed the lump that'd formed in her throat. "No…" If he had left that then it meant he'd left all of them for good. "No, Amy, don't...don't give me that…"

"I'm sorry," Amy tried giving her the journal but Avalon threw it to the side, as hard as her strength allowed.

"He can't just leave me! He can't...the Silence wants him!" Avalon yelled with tears in her eyes. "He can't be on his own!"

"Ava…" Rory wanted to touch her but she backed away from them.

"You don't get it!? Kovarian wants him to be alone! He's going to do something stupid and I'm...I'm stuck here!"

"He's trying to save us all," Amy stepped towards her.

Avalon directed a rather furious glare on her. "How could you let him go like that!? I told you! I...I need to find him!" She clapped a hand over the watch on her wrist. "I love him, he can't just do this!"

"Avalon-"

"NO!" Avalon screamed. "Don't...I have to find him! He doesn't know - he doesn't know that I could still be the astronaut! That's what was in my room! I'm the astronaut and I kill him! The Silence can't have him! I'll drown myself first before I ever put on that astronaut suit!"

"Avalon, please calm down!" Rory wanted to catch her but she was backtracking further from them, completely hysterical.

"Leave me alone!" She turned away and ran off. She had to go find the Doctor before the Silence found him first.

#ocappreciation #doctor who #11th doctor #fd: doctor who #dw #11th doctor fics #11th doctor imagines #doctor who imagine #dw imagine #dw fics #oc: Avalon Reynolds #fic: falling in temptation

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dwaynepride · 4 years ago

Text

the unfortunate case of nonchalance

PART VI - IN SOME SAD WAY

summary: it’s time to leave the town behind, and jethro may be leaving a piece of his heart behind, as well.

words: 1,497

warnings: female reader

tags: @fairytale07 @jrenn10 @f4nboi @purplestarsr5 @ladyzombiielove @littlemiss3ma @minikate–24-05 @consultingdoctorwholock @dressed-up-just-like-z1ggy @ms-allenbrown @ikbenplant @dylpickles1267 @diaryofafan17 @specialagentlokitty @pageofultron @stanathanxoox @kittenlittle24

author’s note: final part of the cowboy!au series. this is a part of meg’s 11k challenge. the prompts are cowboy au and secret relationship trope.

part V

March 10th, 1889

Anthony DiNozzo died this morning. Just after the sun came up.

The medicine we risked so much to fetch for him did nothing. Doctor Mallard said it was too late. The infection had gotten too bad and he went septic.

The day was spent mourning, but also packing up. Our leaving hinged on Anthony being strong enough to ride, but since he’s gone, we have no reason to delay any further. Every day we spend here is another day the law finds us.

We’re leaving at dawn, but I’m not quite ready. Anthony’s death has made it difficult to move on, I admit. But he’s not the sole reason for my hesitance.

Tonight, I’m riding to Y/N’s home for the final time.

I hope she’ll want to leave with me. I know I’m not nothing, in comparison. Can’t even promise to keep her safe or comfortable. But now, with Anthony gone, I’m not sure I can take two losses.

Even if the others only know of one.

That candle flickered in your window again.

A faint light, golden and warm, pushing back the darkness of the night.

It’s truly shocking to Jethro how the sight soothes him. Even with the lingering threat of the law finding him back in town and taking him away to be hanged, it’s almost as if he can feel the warmth of that candle from this distance. And it was also a sign - you were there, waiting for him.

He quickly climbs off his horse, feet silent as wind as Jethro makes his way to the window. His heart beats fast, thumping against his ribs, even as he straightens up to peer through your window. Again, you’re on your bed; but this time, you’re not lounging and reading. Your back is facing him, head down, and Jethro can’t see what you’re so focused on.

It doesn’t matter, right now.

Gently, he taps on the window. After first, you don’t hear, so he has to tap again. That’s when your head snaps up in surprise, whirling around to the window. Jethro’s sees your eyes go wide, and it nearly makes him smile. You’re shocked, but happy to see him.

He motions you to some outside. Jethro wishes he could communicate for you to bring some clothes while you’re leaving. It may be too dangerous to go walking in and out of the house. But Jethro quickly decides he can just buy you new clothes. He’d spend his final penny on them.

But instead of walking out your door, you approach the window. Jethro backs away so you can open it, and now, he can’t hide his smile. Doesn’t even attempt to. The last day or so has quite literally been Hell.

You were like a balm on his soul.

It is strange, though, that you’re not sharing his delight. “I told you I’d return,” he says.

Your hands lean against the windowsill, as if trying to get closer. Jethro takes the liberty of taking a step towards you. “You should not have taken the risk,” you tell him in a soft voice. Almost sad in the knowledge that Jethro risked his life.

So his head shakes fervently. “Never mind that. Did you tell your father about us? How did he react?”

Jethro watches as your eyes drop away, and your head shakes softy. “I didn’t say anything. I- I couldn’t, Jethro.”

His head cocks to the side, and Jethro tries not to let his disappointment show. Even if your father was so stiff and strict, the idea of taking you away without a hint of what’s happened doesn’t quite sit right with him. Jethro’s family may be long in the ground, but yours still care.

That was your choice, though. And Jethro could do little to change it.

“My friend, the one who was shot, died yesterday.”

Instantly, your eyes flash back up to his. Big and full of a sad pity that reminds Jethro of his own grief. He doesn’t say it - doesn’t say a lot of things - but he wishes you were outside with him. Wishes you’d hold him and make the pain go away, even for just a moment. “I’m so sorry,” you eventually breathe out.

Jethro nods, and it takes effort to push away the grief to speak up. He knows there’s not a lot of time left. “With Anthony now gone, we’ll be moving on. We’re not sure where, but I’d want you with me, sweetheart.” Jethro pauses. Lets his words sink in - he’s aware just how heavy the request is. “Last thing I wanna do is take you away from your home, but I wanna be with you. For as long as you’ll have me.”

The way he spills his heart, Jethro’s so unfamiliar with that searing vulnerability it brings. It’s difficult to lift his head and look in your eyes, but he does it. Wants to convey the seriousness of his words.

Finally, you exhale. “I can’t go with you.”

Jethro’s face falls, eyebrows knitting together in his confusion. Your eyes avert away, but he won’t let you off so easy. He steps closer to catch your gaze. “Can I ask why?” He implores. “Is it because I’m a wanted man?”

“No, Jethro, no...” You sigh, head shaking sadly. Jethro can see the effort it takes for you to keep your tears in. Why were you crying? Why was this so damn complicated? “I’ve got family obligations-”

“You’ve got obligations to yourself,” Jethro cuts in loudly. He reels himself in, wise enough to know that his temper will only cut their conversation even shorter. But the intensity of his gaze hasn’t faltered - fueled by the rapid pumping of his heart. “Obligations to what you want, not for what your family wants. Sweetheart, listen to me; I love-”

“I’m getting married, Jethro.”

The hard beating in his chest stops dead.

For a moment, he wonders if he even heard you right. After all, you’re both talking very low. But Jethro isn’t one to live in any fantasy - he knows what you said. He’s got good ears. Plus, the look on your face is pained and the tears finally fall down your cheeks, to which you quickly wipe away. As if not wanting Jethro to see you cry over him.

He doesn’t know what to say. So you continue. “My father’s business associate. He can really help my family, Jethro. It’s something I need to do, and I’m sorry you don’t understand.”

Your father. Your fucking father.

“I really enjoyed our time together-”

“Did you ever love me?”

His question is sharp. To the point. It makes you flinch slightly, as if it hurt to be asked. “Jethro...”

“All the time we spent together, it’s not for nothin’. Even a fool like me knows that.” Your eyes fall away, and Jethro sees how your hands clutch the windowsill. He knows you feel the same. It’s a gut feeling and if anything, it just pisses him off that you’re trying to deny it because of your father. Jethro knows the world isn’t fair, but reckons he’s been flung enough shit.

Surely, he deserves something good, even if he isn’t.

You don’t respond. Jethro huffs with a shake of his head. “If you love me, truly, you’ll come away with me.”

Jethro can hardly recognize his own voice. It’s almost a plea to leave with him. Walking away without you....damn, it might almost feel as awful as it did walking away from Shannon’s grave for the final time. Perhaps even worse, because he’s so close. He could reach out and touch you, but his limbs are still numb.

Your gaze meets his - full of tears, but Jethro stands steady. At least until you slowly shake your head. “I don’t. I don’t love you, Jethro Gibbs.”

I don’t love you.

“You really must leave, before the lawmen come.”

I don’t love you.

Jethro blinks once, and your window is closed. The candle is blown out. He can’t move.

So that’s it. That warm memory of kissing by the river, surrounded by the scent of wildflowers - Jethro had been completely right. You’ve made a fool out of him. But not the kind of fool he was expecting. That kind of lovesick fool he’d tease younger men about because they’d chase their woman around for an extra kiss.

He’s a worse fool, somehow. A fool for ever thinking he’d get that happy ending.

As Jethro climbs up on his horse, he notices how the stars are fainter than normal. The sun’ll be coming up soon. Your world will keep going on; getting married to some man you likely don’t even love. Having babies and living in a perfect white home far away from wherever Jethro might end up tomorrow. Because he’ll be leaving this town behind.

Hopefully forever.

And as he rides off, his heart turns colder than the night breeze.

#ncis x reader #ncis reader insert #leroy jethro gibbs x reader #leroy jethro gibbs imagine

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moonbelt · 5 years ago

Text

»worth the wait

↳ soulmates au | somewhat bootleg coffeeshop au

pairing » jeon jungkook | reader

genre » soft angst + fluff + sexual themes

word count » 9.280

» on Earth V12 everyone is born with half of their emotions – the other half is safely kept within the soul of their soulmate. however, its been a few wee years and it’s safe to say that you don’t have one. or at least you dont think so. but the universe cant possibly hate you so much as to leave you without your emotions for the rest of your life, or can it?

authors note » yeah yeah, it’s been a while. but soulmate aus are literally the only thing that give me joy and hope about love so.... hope you enjoy it!

The doctor at the local health clinic tells you that there's no use in holding out for a soulmate. Giving up is the best way to ensure less heartbreak, she diagnosed. It’s much better that way.

You've already passed the age criteria to find one, she said. Typically, a year or two after nineteen is the maximum time it takes for you to find the one, she'd told you with a tone of neutral candor. Your doctor probably felt sad – pitiful almost, at that fact. But she was careful to not let it show. That although there was nothing biologically wrong with you, the hard-cold truth remains that you can't feel what she does, what other seven billion people in the world feel — emotions. Or at least a subset of them.

To emote, you believe, is a privilege that not everyone receives. However, history and biology books taught you, just like it did to everyone else on Earth V12, that once you came of age you earn that right. That once the universe believes you've merited it, you get to experience the wild, wide and boisterous range of emotions.

You've read about it. Oh, how much you've read. Huddled and bundled up in thousands of blankets on the window seat in your bedroom back at your family home. Even now in university, in between study breaks and long hours of researching on metaphysics. You read to feel but you don't know exactly what you should be feeling. You read to understand, to know the differences between being sad and being upset. Am I sad that the Universe has decided I'm not worthy of a soulmate? Or am I upset that I believe I need a soulmate to begin with? You don't know. Like a thousand other things that simply just do not make any sense.

They told you not to worry. After all, everyone has a soulmate. It's unfathomable to believe otherwise. That's just the way things are. The way things have always been. The beginning and the end.

You watched, a little wide-eyed, disoriented and mystified as your closest friend and associate, Taehyung, became a different person in the five seconds after he met his soulmate, Eden. It was like a dam had been bust open right before your very eyes. It's a little hard to explain, even now that it's been a couple of years, you'd never quite seen anything like it.

The books say that eons ago gods, back in the time when they walked amongst us, granted wishes. But they also took gifts away. And one day when a fight broke out between two demigod children which resulted in one of them dying, the Sun god came down from his place on high and decided with a few other gods that the human emotions within us — the ones that spark hate and contempt and love and weakness — were to blame. Emotions, the god argued, did not play into reasoning or knowledge. And hence they needed to be earned back. Or at the very least, we needed to recognize their value.

But he couldn't just hoist billions worth of people's emotions into thin air. Instead, what he stripped from one he placed in another. The very essence of soulmates. By splitting the emotions people carry and making them search for The One with their other half, the god decreed that he had made the most beautiful creation. The Sun god ruled this as a magnificent feat, tooting his own horn about his generosity to break humans apart.

To take something apart and then put it back together again, just as you found it — perfect in all its nature, is something you long for. Something you yearn to understand. How is it possible to place jagged pieces back together and get something so phenomenal in return? To get something whole?

To experience Love the way the novels and books you devour describe it. To feel that Sadness that can cause people to cry rivers. You want to know this whole other world that everyone seems to get but you. You have Apathy — loads of it. You understand what it's like to be Disinterested; very much so. Frightened and Scared, you know. However, Hope and Serenity, you do not.

It's a struggle because it makes you insensitive. You simply can't understand what others are going through if you've never had an inkling to what they feel. And you have no idea what to say to comfort them because everything you say comes out wrong, everything you try to emote comes out forced and makes you feel like a bad liar.

"I just don't get why anyone would do that, you know?" Taehyung sighs loudly and over-dramatically before he takes a sip of his macchiato. "Like I hate when people take my stuff without asking. It makes me absolutely livid."

Eden nods in agreement. "It's the principle of the thing."

"Exactly!" Taehyung cries out in joy of being understood. Of being related to. "I swear I can't wait to move out and get a place with you. Everyone in that frat drives me up the fucking wall."

An odd third-wheel is what you feel like. So out of place next to your friends that you've known for years. You don't quite get why Taehyung is so mad at his frat brothers for borrowing his stuff, typically if he told them not to, they wouldn't. That's just how communication works. But nah, Taehyung is livid. And Eden agrees. He’s been livid before too.

"You could always tell your roommate to not touch your stuff," you say, interrupting Eden and Taehyung as they throw around other instances when people took their shit without asking. "I would do that."

Taehyung rolls his eyes, not in a condescending way like the other people in your university, but it still very much rubs your spine the wrong way. "The thing is; I have told him. Repeatedly. He’s got like, I don’t know, cement filled in his ears or something. He never listens."

Every soulmate pair is different in their mannerisms and the way they flow into each other. For Taehyung and Eden, it's like they complement each other and always have to add on to what the other says. Like a sign that they are there, and they've got their back. You guess it's adorable, in the same way little cats pawing at your ankles is adorable.

"It's like common decency," Eden tries to explain, his mop of ashy-white hair haunting over his eyes. "People generally just don't like other people touching their shit without permission."

And see, this is where your problem lies. You understand the principle of the act; you understand why someone would get theoretically mad at it. It's an inconvenience at best and rude at worst. But is it worth getting absolutely angry over? You're not sure. You're not even sure how someone can get angry with it. That's the big distinction between the people with soulmates and the people without.

Taehyung looks at you with pity swimming in his light brown irises and smiles. But it's without humor, without the type of light he reserves for Eden, without feeling. "Oh, you just don't understand."

There was a time when you understood your friend and he understood you. There was a time that both of you scoffed at the imperfections of the soulmate enigmatic system. And for a moment it leaves you in a state of disarray with how far he has evolved from you. How different the two of you have become.

You spend the rest of the hour focused on your hot chocolate and reading your Mythology and Folklores That Absolutely, Factually, Most-Definitely Happened book. You leave Eden and Taehyung to discuss whatever it is they discuss about. You so clearly can't simply understand what they go through, it makes no sense to dawdle in their conversations then.

It's the last week before the university closes for winter break but the snow has been piling up for months now. Hanging out at cafes felt like a good idea at the time, what's not to like about baked goods and the smell of heady caffeine? But now you wish you'd never come at all. Or at the very least, that you'd come alone.

So, when Taehyung and Eden start packing up – they have work to get to – you don't budge. You look them in the eye and tell them that spending a few more hours in the cafe sounds like something you're craving. It's been a while since you left your apartment for something other than school and volunteering.

Taehyung scrunches his nose and pouts his lips. "You're coming out to the party tonight though, right? It's the last one before break and it's time you had some fun. Today is your birthday, after all. Maybe you'll find—"

Before he can finish that sentence, you force a grin onto your face and a pep into your voice to try and drag him off that course. You're desperately tired of remembering your own birthday. Nothing good ever comes out of it. And you doubt the ripe old age of twenty-one would do anything different. "Don't worry, I'll be there. Your fraternity is the one hosting, yes?"

He nods his head as he slings his messenger bag across his shoulder. "Yeah. Don't be late, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah. I'll see you guys then." You long for them to go already and leave you to your lonesome. You have a very interesting book to get back to. "Bye Eden, have fun in the studio." You wave them off on their way out and hope to the gods that they do not drag this outing any longer.

Once they are gone and the chatter around you falls into a nice subliminal background noise, you peel open the pages of the myth and folklore book and begin to read again.

Ah, yes, the Sun god. The creator of soulmates and the one that cursed all humanity. You wonder now if the god regrets his decision. What about the people like you? The ones that seemingly never find that other half. Are you just supposed to swagger through life with one leg oddly bent? Did the god merely not give a flying crow-shit? How come it was so easy for Eden and Taehyung to find each other whereas it's become exponentially hard for you? Are you not worthy of your own emotions? Are you not worthy to experience that all-encompassing love? Is it simply just an haute club that you could never even dream of barging into?

You sigh and lean back in your chair. The book gives you more questions than it does answers. In fact, it barely gives you any solutions. All it does is relay what happened ages upon ages ago in hopes you will understand. But you don't. These days it feels like you don't understand a thing.

You were meant to have found your half exactly three years ago and nothing of that sort has even thought of happening. Sometimes you feel little bursts, like your half was feeling so much intense emotions that it filtered through the cracks into your side. But nothing to write home about. It leaves you with a lingering sense of hoping for something… more.

Maybe it's because you're not paying attention — after all, you're too busy lamenting on your disproportionate life — that you don't notice the chime of the bell as the café door is pulled open. You don't notice the swells of oohs and ahhs that erupt from the shops teenage companions like they've witnessed the second coming of a god, or better yet some YouStreamer.

You do not notice the slow, creeping feeling of madness that is seeping into your bones. No, you could never notice that when it feels one and a part of you. You don't notice anything really, not until a voice above you lets out a sound of admiration and awe all laced into one exhale.

"Oh," the voice says. "That's a good book."

Your body isn't made to be twisted around but you do it anyway. Testing the limits of how far it will go. And when you crash into deep, soulful brown eyes that look to you like they hold all of the world's greatest mysteries, you freeze. And even though you know time is a theoretical construct and there's no way to actually stop the passing of it, you believe that in this tiny secluded café, time with all its boundaries, halts.

Academically, you know this isn't true. The world still turns, and as much as you wish it, it does not revolve around you. The snow still falls softly to the ground outside, the graceful music pumping through the coffeeshop's stereo is still playing. Nothing truly stops, but something inside of you does.

It takes all you can give to break forth from the haze cast upon you to speak. Speak, dammit! But you're in awe, mesmerized by a sight you've never sensed so well before. You've met countless people, some conventionally attractive, others more idiosyncratically beautiful but none have made you feel like this.

Taehyung describes attraction as something that is either there or it is not. The books describe attraction as a feeling that can make you desire somebody. You've never felt attraction, not like this. You've felt the vague need to be intimate with another but never like this. Like you crave something – someone – you don’t even know.

The person is tall with hard, crystal cut angles and visible confidence. It's with the way he holds himself like he knows his place in the world. Like he never has to question it. It draws you in. Makes you examine him thoroughly from the tip of his fluffy black hair to the heel of his patent leather boots.

He cocks an eyebrow and for a shy of a second, you are highly embarrassed by the fact that you've spent gods-knows how many moments just ogling him. You never ogle. You've quite literally never ogled in your life… until now that is.

You clear your throat and attempt to come off as blasé. Which is hard considering the awkward positioning of your body and the rigorous pounding of your heart in its cage. "It's not a good book. It's a great one. Probably why I read it so much."

"Debating the existence of the old gods, are we?" His voice is laced intrinsically with mirth and amusement.

"More like debating the existence of my life, really."

He chuckles, a sound that fills all the jagged crevices of your soul and body. He moves and you do the same, shifting from your oddly angled position to look at him better. You don't really know how to explain it, this feeling coursing through your veins. Like you know everything there is to know about him, even though you clearly have never met him before.

You clear your throat and will your mind to stop. This is honestly atrocious, outrageous and, frankly disconcerting. It feels like some random spaz has possessed your body and is making you mewl and purr like some damn cat on the street.

"I'm Jungkook, by the way," he finally says when you find the courage to look back up at him. You respond with your name, pronouncing the syllables clear enough so that he doesn't mess it up. But he gets it. And then he tries the name aloud, twisting it around on his tongue. "It is a good day to question our existence, isn't it, __?"

You smile up at him, a different smile from the one you gave Taehyung and Eden earlier. This one comes easily, and it tilts the corners of your lips without feeling faux and fraud-like. You don't even have to try.

"Depends," you say. "Do you consider a cold as shit day in the middle of Winter to be a good day?"

The tips of his lips upturn into an uncanny lopsided grin. One that feels like he's withholding more than he lets on. "A little."

The line in front of him moves and you find yourself watching the way his body propels forward almost gracefully to order a hot chocolate with extra whipped cream and extra salted caramel drizzle. It's then that you turn your head back to your table and busy yourself with fiddling with your fingers.

You feel something nudging your chest as if begging you to listen for a hiss in the wind – of a window or door being carefully opened. But you push that away. You have no idea what it means. And now, you're too busy focused with reeling your cheeks back to a substandard level of hot. You're not sure why basic communication with this dude has you channeling the same emotes as one of the schoolgirl children in the movies you watched when you were younger. You're an adult for seven heaven's sake. You are better than this!

Your cheeks and your ears do not agree. Instead, they inflame themselves hotter than ever. What is it about Jungkook that has you willing to sell a piece of your soul just to talk to him? You've never felt like this. Like nothing you say could surprise him, mind the fact that you just met him.

This time you are aware when he strides over to the seat that had Taehyung had previously occupied. You look up at him, into those deep russet eyes that hold flecks of something so beautiful and then you feel it. The magnetic pull of someone enigmatic. Someone that holds simply more. Maybe not for others, but to you.

His backpack loosens around his shoulders and his veiny hands clutch the Styrofoam cup with an ardent need as he speaks. "Would you mind if I sit here?"

Normally you would be repulsed by the question. What would ever possess someone that you don't know to act so familiar? But you don’t think as you motion for him to take it. After all, it wouldn’t feel right to just send him away. There’s a thin thread tangling and stretching between the two of you and you would be damned if you cut it on your own accord.

Jungkook finds himself lowering his body nimbly into the chair in front of you. And then you find yourself discussing more with Jungkook than you’ve spoken with anyone else in years. It feels relaxing — freeing. But also like a cruel joke from the Sun god. Here’s someone that makes you feel somewhat whole but there’s no indication that the two of you are even meant to be. How sad.

He talks as if his mind has no filters; effortlessly switching between topics. Do you play any sports? Piano is about as rigorous an exercise as you can handle and Jungkook laughs as he tells you that he’s Vice-Captain of the Baseball team, although now they’re not participating in any tournaments. The air in your lungs turns frigid when you ask if he attends the same university as you and then the air is goddamn stolen from your lungs when he responds with a yes.

“No way,” you cry. “I would have seen you on campus.”

Jungkook sends you a lazy grin. “You would’ve but I doubt you take your head out of your books often.”

You concede. “Okay… maybe a little. But still, isn’t our school defending champions or something? I’m pretty sure I’ve heard of the team doing well before, just not you in particular.”

“Ah, I get it. I’m not popular enough.” He jokes. “Perhaps I need to print out a flyer of my face and paste it around school?”

“That’d be fun. There’s no way I’d miss you then.”

He laughs, a loud sound that expands the more seconds pass. He laughs as though you’re the funniest person in the room, which you doubt. But you laugh along too.

“So, what do you do for fun?” Jungkook asks.

“Other than the obvious reading and playing the piano?” You tilt your head to the side and scratch the nape of your neck before you continue on. “Well, I’m studying Metaphysics and researching the fundamentals of soulmates. Why some find theirs and why others don’t.”

“That’s fun?”

You shrug, a small smile playing on your lips, but you refuse to apologize for your interests. “To me. I guess it just helps me understand.”

Jungkook seems to soak in your answer, his eyes drifting from your eyes to the top of your head, down to your gray turtleneck and glitzy star-shaped earrings. And you take your time to truly examine his face. How perfectly in line his nose is with the rest of his bone structure. How perfectly his jaw and cheekbones accentuate his physical beauty. And how for some reason he reminds you of what you believe the children of gods looked back when demigods were a thing. His face makes you think regal and heavenly all at once.

“What’s your theory?” Jungkook finally breaks you out of your ogle match.

“My what?”

“Theory,” he repeats. “On why some find their other half and others don’t.”

You bite your lip. Not sure if what you say might offend him. There’s no sign that he has found his soulmate or not and you don’t want to be increasingly insensitive. You do not want to hear another ‘Oh, you just don’t understand.’ Especially not out of his lips. You reckon you won’t be able to bear it. At least not today.

“It’s simple, I guess. It all boils down to has the person merited it? Earned it? The Sun god split us apart because he believed we needed to find the value in our feelings. I guess the ones without soulmates simply haven’t attained that understanding yet.”

Jungkook frowns and your heart thrusts itself into a deep panic. See, now you’ve gone and done it. This is why you hate talking, hate speaking. You ruin people’s moods (much like you do your own) without a second thought and honestly, now that you think about it. This must be why you have yet to find your one. You barely understand the emotions you do have; how can you possibly comprehend others?

After a minute or maybe three, Jungkook takes a big sip out of his drink before he focuses his attention back on you and you feel yourself burning. A light excavating through the muggy mess that is your mind.

“Have you merited it? The other half of your feelings, I mean.”

Is he asking you if you’ve found your soulmate?

“No. Not yet.”

“Oh.” Is all he says but you hear the unsaid meanings. “Personally, I think the god did something terrible by rupturing us apart. What good has it really done anyone?”

You don’t answer. Not only because you don’t have a good response but also because the topic of soulmates has you on edge already. Someone like Jungkook obviously has all his emotions and has found his half, you think. You doubt the two of you are even on the same wavelength on the matter. So, instead of answering you change the direction of the conversation to him and his collegiate baseball career.

And everything after that clusters into a ball of yeses. When he asks you for your number, when he asks you if you’ve heard of Beta Tau Sigma, and subsequently when he invites you to Beta Tau Sigma’s end of the year party later today even though you already promised Taehyung you’d be there.

Suddenly, you wonder if Jungkook and Taehyung are friends, you guess they should be since they are frat brothers, but he never mentioned his name before. So now you wonder if Taehyung has separate friendship circles for those with and without soulmates. You don’t get mad or angry at the thought. But your mood dampens anyway.

“Wanna know what I think?” Jungkook speaks up just as the two of you are packing your stuff from the table. He doesn’t wait for you to say yes; he presses on almost immediately. “There’s no time limit on soulmates. And to believe so is to believe there’s a time limit on life itself. Our whole lives we’ve been told that the old gods exist and that the old gods did this and that and blah, blah, blah. But then they tell us that if we don’t find our other half by eighteen, better yet seventeen, there’s something wrong with us?”

Jungkook laughs but there’s not a shred of sparkle in it. “Us… the people born out of the happenings of gods? Okay, riddle me this. If we are so clinically incapable of finding our soulmates, then why do we long for them anyways? Why would there be pieces of my very soul that feel so incomplete?”

You’re dumbstruck by him. And again, you feel the little tilt in the wind that sounds to your ears like someone is knocking on a door that you can't see. But this time even though you do not have an answer for him, you force yourself to spit something out.

“If I were to find my soulmate this very second, I’d believe you.”

He smiles down at you, the one where his eyes fold into deep crescent moons and again you think that he’s holding out on you. Holding onto a secret that only he knows. “Won't that be amazing.”

The day goes by without you paying attention to much else. You meet with your philosophy professor on the advancement of your thesis paper even though you have no idea what you want to base the paper on. Almost every relation between soulmates and reality has been explored and at times you find that your professor and you clash on too many issues. You grunt through the meeting, walking on thousands of eggshells before you finally head back to your apartment but once you put your feet up on the couch, you get a text from Taehyung.

TAE » Remember, you promised!!

You » ...

TAE » Don't tell me you've forgotten Beta Tau's party slash your birthday bash? You promised!!! People might start thinking I made you up L

Although you know deep in the deepest crevice of your heart that Taehyung doesn’t mean anything harmful by his statement, it makes you squeamish.

You » What's that supposed to mean? Now I'm the token soulmate-less? Bragging about all my deficiencies to your fraternity brothers that I've never met? Be my guest.

TAE » Oh fuck. You know that's not what I meant __. I'd never do that. I didn't mean for it to come off that way.

But it did.

And you’re not sure where this surge of despondency is coming from. Almost like a switch in your psyche has been flipped. Some part of you acknowledges that earlier today, you would not have read that message as anything but harmless. But the situation has changed. It’s like your body is thrumming with unshed resentment. Resentment at who? You don’t know but Taehyung seems to be on the receiving end of it.

It’s this feeling of deep antipathy that propels you into getting dressed for the damn party. Not the fact that it is your birthday, not the fact that there is a slight possibility of finding your soulmate at the wretched place. No. You get dressed because there would be free booze and people stupid enough to pick a fight with you in your current state. Well, maybe not a real fight. But there’s a thrumming in your veins and you don’t know how to curb it. You’ve never felt anything akin to it before. Oh, and maybe the small huge chance that you’ll see Jungkook again.

By the time you get to the Beta Tau Sigma house lined up on Greek Row you are quite literally ready to burst at the seams. The weather is cold as fucking shit and although it stopped lightly snowing, the breeze has you tightening your hold on your navy jacket. What is up with everyone today and being a major dick to you? First, it was your professor, and then it was your neighbor that stopped you on your way out of your apartment to pity the fact that you hadn’t found someone on your twenty-first birthday.

Fuck off, you almost screamed at her. Leave me the fuck alone and go shag your boyfriend in the back of his termite-ridden Honda!

But you’d smiled through it, bearing the stinging of your cheeks as you stretched them past your limit and fisted your palms so hard that you created crescent shapes into your flesh.

And gods, you’re tired of smiling through it. Tired of being told that you’re not allowed to feel anything other than your predisposed emotes. Exhausted with having to always be passive. Nothing is supposed to hurt you. At least not emotionally. But you feel a swelling in your chest like your heart is about ten beats away from finally asphyxiating itself.

You push through the frat house and find Taehyung almost immediately. And you watch with a hint of simmering hatred as he cracks joke after joke and his brothers and friends laugh and you feel more and more isolated between their world and yours. And then the hatred comes to a boiling point when you catch two lovebirds giggling and making out on the sofa next your foot.

You blink and blink and blink again. Coming here was a bad idea. To be surrounded so much by the one thing you desperately want but can't have. The irritation and animosity that’s been brewing within you transforms into something more solemn. Dimming itself down to a feeling of major disappointment. At yourself, at the world, at the cursed Sun god.

The second you're about to pivot the fuck out of there, a pair of eyes to the side of the room fixes on you and you are stunned into a halt.

His eyes say a thousand things at once and you hear it deep in your soul. His eyes rake over your entire body as if looking for the source of your imminent distress but when he comes up short, his pretty lips squeeze together and form words that you suddenly want to be etched onto your very being.

“You okay?”

No one – and you mean this without irony – has ever asked you that in all seriousness. Not your parents, not your friends, and certainly not you. Your parents try, you guess, they know how hard it is to not have a soulmate, but they found each other early and never had to question themselves. Never had to question the essence of their souls.

And that’s when you feel it; a quiver in your lips. You open your mouth in an attempt to say something – anything – but nothing comes out and you close it, only to repeat the motion with no improvement.

Jungkook crosses the room in long strides and before you know it, he is everywhere around you. All black. Black tee-shirt, black cargo pants, black sneakers. You didn’t realize how big he was before but now that you have, you can un-see it. Lean and lithe but strong and sturdy. A walking contradiction. Especially with the light shining from his eyes.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” He asks as he puts his hands on your shoulders and centers you.

You hate, absolutely despise, how watery your voice sounds when you say “Nothing. This party is just so lame that I’m feeling a little off.”

The both of you know how bad your lie is but for some reason, he rolls with it. “Yeah? I was thinking the same thing actually. This has to be the worst thing Tae has ever put on and to think he said it’s supposed to be a birthday party. I could do much better.”

And now you feel utterly terrible. You’d been so ready to rip Taehyung a new one, assumed his prejudice against you for what? Awful. You’re so awful as a person that of course, you haven’t earned the right to find the other half of your emotions. Of-fucking-course.

You’ve never felt so out of your own body before. Who is this impostor that has possessed you and when can you get your body and appropriate feelings back? You need it back before you completely annihilate all your relationships.

“I’m sorry. I don’t usually act like this.”

“Why are you sorry?” He seems genuinely confused.

“I… You probably wanted to have fun with your brothers and all. And here I am just – “

Jungkook squeezes your shoulders hard which forces you to raise your attention from staring at your shoes to gazing at his face. It’s a much-needed distraction from the wobble in your voice and the feeling of cotton in your throat.

“You need some fresh air?” He poses his statement as a question, but you don’t really have a choice in the matter anyway because he slides his warm fingers into yours and although you feel a momentous spark, you let him drag you through the house.

Taehyung notices you then and begins to rush towards you. Perhaps he’s glad that you still came out tonight even though you had a fight with him earlier. Perhaps he’s relieved that you don’t utterly hate him. But you attempt to give him a watery smile that is both apologetic and reassuring, but his eyes fly down to you and Jungkook’s conjoined hands and he pauses.

And it’s not the smile he usually gives you. No. This one closely resembles the ones he reserves for Eden. Like maybe you’ve found your sanctuary. Maybe you’ve come to finally understand.

You scoff at the thought just as Jungkook snatches two Margarita cans from a cooler and pulls you up the stairs and through a hallway that leads to a balcony. When you're outside, he motions for you to take a seat on one of few white benches. Without saying a word, he passes a can to you. You clasp the cold drink between your fingers and revel in the iciness sipping through your flesh.

You've never experienced this feeling of tranquility meshed with a creeping sense of foolhardiness with another person in your life. And you're struggling with how to process it.

“Wanna talk about it?” Jungkook finally breaks the silence, sitting right beside you. The warmth emanating from his body warms you down to your toes and you revel in it.

No. Yes. Fuck. “I don’t know. I’m just being stupid, and it doesn’t matter anyway.”

“I know you're not stupid and it does matter. It matters a lot.”

Great, you think. One more person in the grand universe that you're destined to disappoint. You sigh and stare out at the starless sky. You always hold your feelings in check and rigorously work to not let the few emotions you do have to get the best of you. To not cloud your judgment. But during the course of this whole day, you’ve felt like you're on a ledge. On the precipice between falling and drowning. Like your mind is waging a war against itself.

You are not a crybaby. But even as you think this, you feel wetness at your eyeballs and a stinging in your cheeks, and you blink and blink to try and push it away. But it feels like your body is burning with never before experienced sensations and it scares you. You open your mouth and the choking feeling from before returns, it muddles everything else and you panic. You refuse to cry in front of Jungkook. Not now when you feel so downright weak.

“P-pieces of my –” Against your will your voice cracks. “Pieces of my very soul are so incomplete.”

The corners of your eyes fill up more with tears that you desperately do not want to shed. And it takes everything in you to not raise your hand to swipe the madness away.

Stop! Stop, goddammit! Stop this very instant! You’re above this. Better than this. You didn’t cry when the doctor told you that there was nothing biologically wrong with you, you didn’t cry when your group friends slowly diminished as they found oneness with their partners and others more attuned to them. You didn't cry then, so why are you on the verge of it now of all times and days?

And even though you're trying your damn hardest to not have a full-on breakdown, you feel your body heave and then sniffle. Gods this is so embarrassing. You turn your face away from the sky and instead focus it on the cold can in between your fingers.

You pushed away your feelings until they were stuffed in the darkest parts of your mind and now it seems, they are breaking out without a care in the world about the consequences.

“Remember I told you that my theory has to do with some of us earning the privilege of someone else? I haven't earned it. Heck, I haven't earned anything. I'm passive. I try not to be but investing myself into others has never worked in my favor. All the emotions I do have feel so negative that when I'm around people I can't help but not connect. Because I don't understand half of what they are saying or feeling, and I hate it. I hate it so much.”

You're a piece of work, __, your ex-partners had said. You've dated around before; scavenging for love in uncanny, dim places with people destined to be with others until they finally realized that you were not theirs.

Because everyone eventually did. Realize the oddity of not being empathic. There's something defective about you. You can't seem to find anyone willing to be around you for two weeks talk less of forever. But everyone you'd been with magically happened to find theirs. The stars seem to gravitate away from you like you exude such a power that is so repulsive.

And it hurts. It hurts so fucking much. Like hot coal sliding down your spine and marring flesh. But you can't stop your mouth from speaking, the words tearing the edges of your lips with each choked up sound you exhale. "A part of me doesn't care if I don't have a soulmate, I mean, my life shouldn't be dictated by whether or not I have someone tied to my arm. But the other half of me desperately wants it. I get this ridiculous chasm of sadness when I think about every emotion that I can't experience because I'm not worth it. I've never been worth it."

Your throat is burning. Your eyes are burning. Every part of your body is aching madly but Jungkook doesn't say a thing. Your chest begins the act of carving in on itself and if you didn't know any better you would reckon that your heart is cracking into two halves.

Gods, this is pathetic. You feel so pathetic. All your life you've never felt like the world had conspired against you until this very moment. Like the Sun god had taken a special hatred on you and dumped all these folds of resentment into your soul. You wanted to claw it out.

And for some reason you will never understand, you keep going. As if the cracking of your voice and the upheaval of your shoulders wasn't enough, actual tears started to slip and slide down your cheeks.

“Why the fuck does our society bank on soulmates anyways? What's so great about them that everyone acts like if you don't have one you've been done a great disservice? Why me?" A whole bunch of unfiltered anger bursts inside you and propels you from the bench and a graver sniff infiltrates your voice. "Seven billion people on Earth V12 and you would think that I would be able to find someone in this mess of a world but no. I've wasted twenty-one years of my life without knowing anything. Without feeling anything. I can't do it anymore. I don't want to do it anymore. I want to feel something. Anything. I'm tired of being like –”

Oh, seven hells, you feel like you are dying. Decomposing to dust on the balcony of a fraternity house in the middle of winter in your favorite jeans and so-so high-tops.

It feels like every section of your body is withering away. Rotting. Falling apart and there's nothing you can do to stop the trajectory. Tears pool beneath your chin before they cascade into the neck of your shirt. Your lips quiver so badly you're afraid they might never be the same. If this is what sorrow feels like you hope you never experience it again. It makes you feel gutted.

Your vision becomes so blurry that you can barely make out the dark sky in front of you. Can barely even think. And try as you might, the tears just keep rolling.

You’re not sure of when Jungkook stands up but you feel him wrap his arms around you – tentatively, all-encompassing and fully, and rest his chin on the side of your head. He doesn’t say a word, and maybe it’s because he doesn’t need to. You feel him. The budge on the window sill that leads to your soul. You feel him there. But you want him to let go. There are certain things you acutely feel like you do not deserve, and he is one of them.

“Let me go,” your voice sounds like two trains grinding against each other and it makes you pull away from his embrace. But Jungkook’s arms stretch around your torso.

“No.” Is the soft reply that weighs on your ears. His body is warmer than you want it to be because it's making you feel at home.

“I –”

“It’s okay. You can let it out.” In some kind of way, he feels even closer than before. Like he's impressing himself into your lungs. Like he's giving you the very air that you so desperately need to breathe. Like he's forcing you to bloom and he doesn't care if he has to be the one that solely weeds away at all the nonsensicalities in your chest to make sure it happens.

And maybe some part of him just knows that a part of you is desperate to run away from the unknown because he hugs you harder, tighter, and firmer. So much so that now you can't breathe for different reasons. You don’t know what to do so you let him.

“You don’t need to prove your worth to anyone. Not me, not the gods… no one. And –” You make a move to interrupt him but Jungkook cuts himself off. “Do you feel it?” He asks with his torso pressed against yours and your heart syncing along with his.

“Feel what?” You croak out.

“I can't explain it, that’s why I need you to feel it. It’s every around us you have to, I don’t know, listen.”

You don’t want to, but you do it. You squeeze your eyes shut and wrap your fingers around the Jungkook’s shirt and wait. You wait for the madness in your mind to calm down. You wait for the apprehension in your heart to subside. But nothing happens and you feel worse than before.

“Jungkook,” you start.

“Don’t.” You swear you hear a slight tear in his voice. “Just listen.”

Listen, he says, but what are you even listening for? Here you are, miserable than ever and being told to listen. To the universe? Or listen for that goddamn hiss in the wind again? But all you hear is the sniffles that your chest is releasing and the slight exhale of Jungkook’s hot breath against your cheek. And you don’t know how to explain it. But it is then when you are doubtful and least expect to hear – talk less of feeling anything, that you identify it.

And it’s a beautiful thing. Like two halves of a comet melding into each other to crest a dynamic explosion into your very being. Something that lifts the burden weighing down on your heart and helps you to finally breathe. Breathing in through your nose feels better. Feels easier.

The thread you’d felt before in your mind that had been so tangled and messed up that you could barely discern what it was suddenly fizzled, expanded and stretched out and when you feel for the force at the other end of the cord and come in contact with an aura that reminds you so much of the person in front of you, you are shocked. Better yet, surprised.

You don’t know to explain it. Heck, you’ve never experienced such a colorful array of emotions in your life that for a minute or maybe three, it leaves you dazed and disoriented. It feels like your body is in a vacuum and is receiving dangerous sensations at the speed of light.

It’s burning. Oh, how it's burning. It’s burning through every fiber of your existence but unlike before, this burn doesn’t make you want to choke up and die. Instead, it revitalizes you.

“Do you feel it?” Jungkook asks again.

This time you have an answer that you don’t have to scour for.

“I feel it. I feel it so much. I feel it everywhere. I –” you don’t know whether to cry even harder or laugh at the oddity of the situation and that leaves you in an awkward limbo of both. “Oh, gods. It’s you.”

All the haphazard sensations you’ve been feeling all day. The anger – no lividness –at your neighbor, the overwhelming sadness, the uncharted pettiness at Taehyung with a bare minimum reason to be. It all finally starts to make sense. Everything – or at least, all of that – happened after you’d met him. After you’d been exposed to someone akin to a livewire.

This is nothing like the books said. You’d gone your whole life thinking, believing, that when you met your other half, you’d instantaneously know. Like the skies would crack open and some kind of bell would resound. Now you realize how ridiculously absurd that would be, but it had made sense at the time.

Words lose their meaning in an effort to explain what you feel. Your body is being put back together again. Pieces that you hadn’t realized were even missing suddenly fit into each other. You welcome the tingling in your veins and instead of ignoring the sparks igniting beneath your bones, you embrace it. And oh, it is magnificent.

In this loud, beer-infested fraternity house with slovenly college students pushing against each other downstairs and on the day you turn a striking twenty-one, you find someone that the history and biology and mythology books could have never predicted.

Jungkook’s voice is much softer than before. Is that possible? But it is. And he holds you tighter, holding you like you’re unbreakable.

“To me, you're the moon, the sun – the whole fucking galaxy. I’ve always known you existed, and I’ve waited to find you for a long time. I carried your half with me for so long, how could I not? In the depths of my mind and when I really concentrated about it, I could feel you. Somewhere close but sometimes distant. I held out for you… always. So, you’ll forever be worth it. And you don’t need to earn me, you already have me. You’ve always had me.”

The stain of his words etches itself onto your soul and becomes a part and parcel of you. They quiet the chatter of your heart and bring subliminal teardrops to the crooks of your eyes but this time you don’t mind it. How could you ever mind it?

“So, you’ve always known then?” You don’t sniffle or sob and your voice doesn’t pathetically crack. Instead, you maneuver your face away from his chest so you can see his eyes. In the process, your bodies disentangle and you miss his warmth but this is really happening. And you’re desperate.

He smiles. It's blinding in its glory and it blitzes straight into your core. “Always. It's destiny; you and me.”

You and him. Him and you. You like the sound of that.

“Even though we had to wait for so long.”

Jungkook rolls his eyes like he’s tired of you thinking about time as some enormous continuum rather than the now. “We have the rest of our lives to be together. I don’t think knowing you a bit earlier would change that. It is what it is. And even if I had to wait five years, fuck, even ten. I wouldn’t give up. Not on you, __. Not on my other half.” He spits the last words out so vehemently you don’t have the audacity to doubt it. “What we have is more sacred than anything in the world. I’d be stupid to let that go without trying.”

“You’re not stupid.”

“And you’re not unloved by anyone in this world so stop thinking that.”

“I was not –”

He sends you an exasperated look, one that you immediately identify because the bond the two of you have defies all logic. One that says that he knows you. He knows that the tears that sprung to your eyes earlier were not simply because you were overwhelmed by everything in the universe but also because you felt like you had lucked out of the love train. Watching your friends find havens with their other halves and seeing that couple giggle on the couch like it was the end of high school all over again, it made you feel desolate. And Jungkook felt that. Somehow in some way, he knew.

“I love you. I’ve only met you and I know that much. So, what about your friends? Your family? They love you too albeit in different ways than what I'm feeling. But no matter how much the Sun god split us apart, I, you – we – have always known that we were made for each other. So, yes. I love you.”

You’re pretty sure your mind all but blows up into a tiny clusterfuck of a mass because you can’t even hear what Jungkook says next. You’re hyper fixated on what he had just said. He loves you? How does he even know that? What was this? Had your brain and ears finally imploded on themselves? Was this alternate reality?

“Do you need me to repeat it?”

What? Huh? What?

“I don’t know what to call it. Maybe love at first sight?” He carries on like you’re not having a self-induced heart attack right before his eyes. “Never believed in that before but then I saw you and gods, you’re the most beautiful person I've ever seen in my life. I sure hope when you saw me it was the same because I have no idea how to describe what you do to me.”

But you understand what he’s saying because you did feel it. You felt so much when you first looked at him and you still feel it now.

“Like everything suddenly made sense. The whole craze about finding soulmates finally made fucking sense. I finally understood.”

You blink and blink so fast that you fear your eyelids might not keep up with the action. You never thought your other half would be a huge, spectacular talker and that they would know just how to steal the breath from your lungs away. But Jungkook knows. You're finding a lot of new things this night and one of them is that Jungkook is a hopeful romantic. It almost makes your body bring on another set of waterworks.

“I love you.” He says the soul-breaking words again. “And I already know that love is malleable but what I feel in my bones is for forever.”

In your bones, transformed out of what had laid dormant you felt Love. All around you love. Like you could mess up, you could do the oddest thing in the universe and the love would still be there. You want to shout it out. For the first time in your little life, you feel love and you want it always. And you want to give it always.

And you don’t know how you know but you know that he’s about to kiss you. Oh, gods. He’s about to kiss you right after –

“I love you too.” You hurl out fast enough and it slows down Jungkook’s advancement towards you. “And I have no idea what I'm doing but I'll do it with you. I don’t trust just anyone but what we have is bigger than trust. Like you said, it’s life itself.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I would wait forever for you too.”

“I know,” he says and you don’t run away when he steps closer to your body. And his fingers reach for a set of yours. You raise your free hand to his chest and feel the rapid, erratic beating of his heart in its cage.

“And I've never done this before. But I'll do my best I –”

“We don’t graded,” he cuts you off with a laugh. “And I know.”

He knows.

His free hand cups your cheek and you almost hyperventilate. Almost. But you’d rather die than miss this. So, you take deep, long breaths that inflate your system with the mix of sandalwood, earth, and hope. And then his lips press onto yours and give you a happy death. His lips crush yours with a force reserved for rocks and specks of dust breaking away from comets. His kiss wakes you up. And you love it.

Before you can even push further, his lips move to the side of your cheek, barely-there before it cascades to the other. And then his mouth is on your brow bone, a light presence that feels heavenly beautiful and nerve-wracking all at once before his lips rest on the middle of your forehead.

Jungkook’s lips came back to yours and kissed one corner of your mouth and then the other. Oh, seven hells, you can’t think. You don’t want to either. Instead, you open your mouth and kiss him back with more fervor. You lithely raise on your toes and kiss the apples of his cheeks, his temples, his brow bones, beneath his lips and right on his chin. Gods, it feels like you kiss him everywhere.

The hand on his chest feels how frenzied his heart is pounding and it makes you smile because you’re sure your heart is doing the same. You close your eyes and wrap your arms around his neck. You don’t need to say anything in this moment because what needs to be said is all around you and under your skin. He reached forward and kissed you again. This time harder, and more frivolous and you gave and gave and took and took. And when the two of you finally break apart for air, you feel a tingle of cosmic goodness down your limbs.

Fuck.

He grins, actually no, he does more than that. He momentarily lights up like a firetruck and pulls you impossibly closer. And you think he has the most beautiful smile in the universe. You want to keep that on his face forever.

“You’re worth it,” you tell him, breathless.

“Worth what?” He asks smugly, his smile turning cocky as he acts like he doesn’t know.

You roll your eyes, your shoulders shaking as you laugh. A genuine one that warms your belly. “Worth the wait.”

a/n » hooo my god, this is the first thing i’ve written in about a year? and it feels so good to write and even better to pour my soul into this soulmate au. i really hope y’all loved it!! and please do tell me what you think!

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©️ 2019 kai, moonbelt [aka high-on-food]

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raywritesthings · 5 years ago

Text

Death and Taxes

My Writing Fandom: Doctor Who Characters: Eleventh Doctor, River Song, Clara Oswald, Kate Stewart Pairing: Eleventh Doctor/River Song Summary: River wants a house now that she's out of prison, and the Doctor must embark on the dreaded task of personal finance. / Canon Compliant *Can be read on my AO3 or FFN, links are in bio*

He took Professor Song to see the premiere of the Galactic Federation Symphony. The musicians consisted of Draconians, Alpha Centaurians, and humans, with an Ice Warrior serving as conductor. It was a pleasant evening, music and champagne — the latter of which he did not partake in, content to watch his wife sip at her flute with a smile curving her lips. Much better than the first time they’d met after Manhattan. Even so, they carefully danced around the subject of his travels or companions. It hardly mattered; Clara was home with the children again, so he may as well have been alone.

“So then, back to the Luna University? Or perhaps dancing under the Karaveen Nebula? The night is still young,” the Doctor remarked as he led them arm in arm back through the TARDIS doors.

“Actually, Doctor, I’ve got a matter of business to discuss with you,” River countered in a way that surprisingly enough did not at all sound like an innuendo, and he was getting rather good at picking those up from her.

“Oh?”

She slipped her hand into his, and they walked past the console, up into the corridor and through a door which today led into his study. He perched himself on the corner of his desk, arms folded and legs crossed at the ankle.

“Well, Professor Song, what can I do for you?”

She smirked. “I was hoping you'd ask.” Then she pulled out a stack of paper and files far too large to have fit in an ordinary clutch and set them down just to the right of him with a very heavy thud.

The Doctor blinked. “What’s this?”

“It's what I need you to do for me,” she answered. “I’m buying a house near the university, and there's a lot that needs filled out as far as mortgage payments and property taxes are concerned. Not to mention the loan I’ve got to take from the bank. You’ll have to co-sign on that, by the way.”

The Doctor, whose lip had been curling in distaste with every word she spoke, looked at her with wide eyes. “Co-sign?”

River gave a well-worn sigh. “Yes, Sweetie. I get a better deal if someone does, and you being my husband makes you the ideal candidate. Joint filing.”

“Taxes?” He echoed numbly, thumbing through the stack once. There were all sorts of official looking titles and tiny boxes and very fine print he would most certainly need Amy's glasses for. The Doctor shook his head. “No. No, I haven’t done taxes in — well, er, come to think of it I’m not sure I’ve ever done them. I won’t start now.”

“And what am I supposed to do then? Sleep in my office?”

“Well, no,” he acknowledged. “Couldn't you just — I mean it's not like you haven't before — couldn't you, ah, find some money somewhere?”

“Oh yes, that’ll go over lovely. Paying off my mortgage with undisclosed income. Then they can arrest me again for tax evasion — that’ll be twenty life sentences at least.” Her unimpressed look morphed into something a little more earnest, a little more beseeching. “I’m only trying to get a life after prison started, Doctor.”

Oh. Well, that just wasn’t fair. There really was no faulting her, was there? After all she'd done for him in saving his life, River Song was just asking for a little aid in getting the next chapter of hers going. The last chapter, of which he could never tell her even as it drew ever nearer.

The Doctor stared. River stared back, one perfectly sculpted eyebrow arched imperiously.

“So, you’ll bring it round the next time you stop by? Lovely.” Without another word, much less waiting for his response, she turned and swept from the room.

“River. River!”

When after a moment she did not return, the Doctor was forced to half-run to catch her up in the console room, where she was already working the controls.

“River, I am homeless. Stateless. Planetless, even! My estate consists of a Type 40 Time Capsule, and it's stolen property.”

“You think my credit’s much better, honey? I'm an ex-con.” She glanced back at him, curls falling in a wave down her shoulder. It was quite the look. “Seeing as we both know how that happened I shouldn't think it’d be that unreasonable of a request.”

The Doctor’s mouth fell open, but nothing came immediately to mind.

River smirked. “I didn’t think so.” The time rotor pulsed once more, then quieted, about the only indication they’d landed whenever his wife was the one driving. Then she continued down the ramp to the doors.

“You could always stay.” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them, and yet hopeless as he knew it was he carried on. “Keep a vortex manipulator onboard, pop over to the University whenever you felt like teaching, then back here. You’re welcome here.”

You’re wanted here, was what he wished to say.

River had paused in front of the doors, and when she turned around this time she looked pained. “Thank you, Sweetie. But we both know that isn't what we are.”

How could they know without ever having tried it? That, at least, he managed to reign in. She already thought him enough of a sentimental old fool, after all.

“I’ll have to have a look around the place sometime,” he came up with instead. “Seeing as it’ll be half mine.”

“Oh honey, that's a promise,” River replied with a wink, and he dredged up a smile just for her. Then she was out the doors and out of his life once again. The Doctor bowed his head briefly, then reached for the dematerialization lever to head back into the Vortex.

Returning to his desk, the Doctor eyed up the stack that waited for him. To his view, it appeared to tower over everything else, particularly once he’d taken his seat. His Everest. He blew out a breath and took out her mother’s glasses. “Right then. Taxes.” The Doctor shrugged. “How hard can they be, really?”

—-

Taxes, as it turned out, could be very hard.

The forms were printed as tiny as he’d suspected and were twice as tricky. To fill one out, he needed to know something called a credit score. The Doctor did not know what a credit score was, and when he asked Clara her eyes went the biggest he’d ever seen them.

“Why do you want to know something like that?”

“Idle curiosity.”

Clara snorted and turned away. He never actually got an answer.

There was a helpline number in incredibly small print at the bottom of the phone. The Doctor liked helplines. A helpline had directed his new friend into his life. Or back into it. He still didn’t know exactly how he had met Clara twice before without her remembering it.

Nevertheless, the Doctor called the number. There was a funny automated voice someone had tried to make sound like a human but seemingly gave up halfway through, and it listed off a whole lot of options and numbers to press accordingly. The Doctor waited until the end of the list, where it told him that if he stayed on the line a real person might actually talk to him. That was much better.

He was tapping his toes along with a very mellow xylophone playing a repetitive verse for several minutes before the music abruptly cut off.

“This is Keisha with Lunar Revenue, how may I help you this morning?”

The Doctor jumped and nearly fumbled the phone. “Keisha! Ha! Yes, you can help me. I need to know what a credit score is.”

“What a credit score is or what your credit score is, sir?”

“Both, preferably.”

There was a pause.

“Uh, well, a credit score is a number a person’s given based on their financial history, and depends on factors like bill payments or outstanding loans,” she explained slowly, as though waiting for him to stop and assure her he understood at any moment. “And to get your credit score, I’m going to need some information from you, sir. Can I have your name?”

“The Doctor,” he readily supplied.

“Alright, and first and last name, sir?”

“No, no,” he said, waving a hand cheerily though it presumably made no difference to her. “Just the Doctor.”

“I’m afraid that’s not a name, sir.”

“Well, of course it isn’t just a name. It’s my name. It’d be silly if you had multiple people running around calling themselves the Doctor — there’s already enough of me doing that.”

There was another long pause. “Well, sir, I will try to find your information in our system, but it might take some time.”

“How much?”

“If you could please hold.”

“Er, yes? Hold what?” He pulled the phone back to look at the receiver. “Keisha? Hello?”

Keisha’s voice had been replaced by the xylophone. And maybe some strings.

“Keisha,” the Doctor grumbled under his breath. He sighed and set the phone down on its side, where he could still make out the music. The Doctor paced around a bit on the main platform, then up on the second level. He went down below to do some maintenance, then came back up.

The music was still playing. He hated waiting.

“Right, okay. Time to jump the line.”

The Doctor hung up the phone. A short trip through the Vortex later and he was striding out into a very tiny cubicle in which was sat a very startled woman with very nice, intricate braids woven into her hair.

“Keisha, right?” The Doctor checked. “I was on the phone with you an hour and a half ago. The Doctor, remember?”

“How did you—”

“I was in the neighborhood. Listen, the way I see it, the faster we get this all sorted out is the less time we have to spend on it, right? So let’s sort it out.” He dropped the files on her desk and gestured at them. “That’s everything I’ve got so far, but I can’t get anywhere without the credit score.”

“This is to co-sign for a house?” She asked after briefly skimming the top form. She was either very clever or just very literate. Possibly both.

“Yes, my wife wants one. It seems very tedious, but her 150th is coming up, so.” He shrugged.

“Right…” She rolled her shoulders and opened up a new window on her computer, which was a flat screen embedded into the cubicle wall. “This is your first time filing with us?”

“Yes.”

“Then we’ll need to open an account. Let me see what I can find in terms of identification.”

After some tapping on the screen interspersed with checking some of the things he had written down, she turned back around in her chair.

“We have on file here that you’re dead.”

“Ah. Yes. Well, that would be spoilers for me. See, I clearly haven’t died yet.” The Doctor splayed his arms wide in demonstration. It wasn’t as though he could tell her that what they had on record was his fake death. That just wouldn’t do.

“I’m not sure what you mean,” said Keisha.

“Neither am I, most days. But since I am not dead, could I have the information I need to fill out the paperwork for my wife?”

“I’m afraid not, sir. Even if I ignore the claim that you’re dead, you don’t seem to have a record of any credit.”

He rocked back on his heels, hands planted at his waist. “Well, how exactly do you go about getting one?”

“Making purchases and paying them back,” She answered blandly. “Loans. That sort of thing.”

“That’s what people do?”

“Yes. Usually with money they make at their jobs, sir.”

Well, there was a thought. “I’ve had one of those! Maybe they can get me a credit score.”

“Maybe, sir.”

“Alright, then, I’ll be back in a mo’,” he told her, seizing the stack of papers River had given him once more, though he staggered under the additional weight as Keisha through another heavy-looking file. “What’s this, then?”

“Life insurance policy. You may want to take one out before you are dead, sir.”

The Doctor considered, then shook his head. “I’ll be dead before I’d have sorted it out, I expect.” At least he hoped.

Just a quick trip, and then he might soon have all this bureaucratic nonsense out of his life. If the Time Lords could see him now.

The things one did for love.

—-

Kate Stewart had been enjoying a cuppa at her desk until the peace and quiet was shattered by the sound of a wheezing engine, and the papers in front of her were scattered in a sudden strong wind.

She looked up to find the TARDIS materializing right in her office doorway.

“Kate!” The Doctor came bounding out the doors in a purple coat and vest this time, though the bowtie, it seemed, was a constant. She mentally made a note to add that to the file.

“Doctor, this is a surprise. Are we under attack?”

“Not at all, just looking for a bit of assistance.”

Kate raised an eyebrow. “With?”

“Taxes,” he answered plainly. Kate nearly fell out of her chair. “River’s eyeing up a house near the Luna University, and there’s a whole thing about payments and whatnot that she’s asked me to sign on for with her, but I haven’t got much in the way of financial history.”

Kate scrambled for a pen and a notepad to start writing this down. At the top of the page, she labeled River? with a large circle surrounding the name.

“See, as of now I have absolutely horrible credit because there’s very little way for me to establish a record of buying and paying for things,” he continued on. “But then I thought, you know who has records? UNIT has records! Loads of records. Records by the bucketful! Surely if anyone has a record of me holding a steady position where I incurred expenses and compensated them, it’ll be UNIT.” The Doctor paused and looked at her. “So would you happen to have something like that?”

“Er, yes, I imagine.” Kate placed a call down to their records keeper, then asked for a pot of tea to be put on while they waited. Her own cup, she requested to be made particularly strong.

“So, you’re buying a house?” She asked to make conversation.

“River’s buying the house,” he corrected her.

“Still, not very like you.” He had lived on Earth for years while working full-time with UNIT and had, by all accounts, slept in the TARDIS parked in his lab.

“Yes, well, River has a habit of making me do things not very like me,” he said, in a tone that was as exasperated as it was fond. He perked up as their records keeper entered with a very old cardboard box. “There we go. Excellent! Give the man a raise.”

“You won’t be getting a raise, Jeremy,” she informed the records keeper matter-of-factly. He nodded and left the room.

The Doctor had popped the lid of the box and was thumbing through the papers. “Credit, credit… not actually sure where I’m meant to find it. Ah well, Keisha will know.” He replaced the lid and hauled the whole box into his arms. “Thanks very much, Kate.”

“Actually, Doctor, since we’re on the subject and if my recollection serves me, we don’t seem to have an accurate date on when you held the lab position with us. Would you be able to—”

The Time Lord was already walking back into his box, and he waved a hand over his shoulder. “Oh, just pick one.”

Kate’s sigh was covered by the departing TARDIS engines.

—-

Clara entered the TARDIS Wednesday morning with a skip in her step. “Mine turn to pick, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Chin Boy agreed, stepping away from the controls as though ceding them to her. She wasn’t actually going to fly this thing, mind. No matter what he’d said about the old cow starting to warm up to her. “Where to?”

“I’m glad you asked.” Clara lifted her old book out of her satchel and hugged it to her chest for a moment. Then, just as she’d opened the cover, the phone rang outside.

“That’s odd.” She knew she’d called him on it, before, but just how many people knew that number anyway? Apart from that woman in the shop, she supposed.

“Ah, hold the thought, Clara,” he said, hurrying around her with a slide of the heels and leaving the ship. “Hello? It has? Approved? Keisha, I could kiss you!”

“Not a snog box, my arse,” Clara muttered under her breath. She hurried to the doorway and leaned out. “Oi, mind not shouting for the whole street to hear?” Artie and Angie were getting curious enough about where she always went on her days off, especially since the latter claimed Clara never used to go anywhere at all.

The Doctor put his hand over the bottom of the phone. “Sorry,” he said, not sounding sorry in the least. “Just got some very good news for one Professor Song.”

Clara raised her eyebrows. “Friend of yours?”

He nodded distractedly, then half-turned away as he continued to speak into the phone. “Yes. Yes, I can stop by. I’ll take the papers over myself to have them signed. You’ve been a saint, Keisha, you’ll do great things. I’m sure of it. Keep working wonders. Yes, bye-bye.”

He hung up the phone and dropped back against the doors with relief as though he’d just completed a marathon.

“You okay?” She asked wryly.

He popped right back up. “Okay? I’m more than okay on this day of days.”

“Right, this day where we’re apparently going to fill paperwork with professors?”

The Doctor paused. “Er, no. I’ll take care of that. Alone.” He tugged at his ear, looking uncomfortable with twitching limbs.

“Something the matter?”

“What? No, nothing. Just, best for me to pay a private visit.” He nodded to himself. “Yeah.”

Perhaps Professor Song didn’t like unfamiliar visitors. Clara pictured a stuffy, studious bloke surrounded by bookshelves and nodded to herself.

“Well then, I suppose I will pick after all. Any further expected interruptions?” She asked, fixing him with a mock arch look.

“None whatsoever.” He gestured back inside of the box. “Lead on, Clara.”

The leader, was she? She quite liked the sound of that.

—-

River did not like being led places. “Where are we going?”

“You’ll see,” was all he said, his breath tickling her ear while his hands rested over her eyes. Oh, he was infuriating sometimes.

“You know I can get out of this any time I like.”

“Yes. And you can get out… now!” He pulled his hands back, and River stood blinking at a front door.

Not just any front door. Her front door. The one she wanted.

“You just fancied a look, then?” He hadn’t brought up the favor she’d asked of him, though she knew by their diaries that he had been asked, and River hadn’t brought it up either. She didn’t want to be too pushy, or else he’d get his back up. It was his way.

“Nope,” he told her, then withdrew a pen and a form from his vest pocket. “Sign here, please.”

His signature was already affixed under where she was meant to. “Is this…?”

“It’s yours. Already is, actually, I’ve jumped us ahead a few days after I’ve filed the papers, which I’ll do after you sign them. You are the proud owner of four walls, a door and the dimensionally-proportional space contained therein.”

River numbly took the pen and paper and signed her name. It hardly seemed real. It felt like a dream.

She’d never had a home of her own. There was the TARDIS, of course, but no one owned her. Her mother’s childhood home had been Amy’s house and same as her dad’s. Her parent’s place — well, there had been a guest room she’d used now and then. So had other people. They all knew she didn’t live there with them.

But this… this was a space for her to be and to do with as she pleased. She could put things up on the walls or in a drawer without worrying about them being monitored by the Silence or taken during a cell inspection or missing the next time she met up with a younger version of her husband.

“Why anyone would want to be is beyond me, of course,” he was saying now with an exaggerated sniff. He was putting on a show to hide how secretly pleased he was as she gazed on him in wonder.

A part of her had thought he’d never do it.

“You have the keys?” A second later, they were dangling in front of her face, and River snatched them out of the air. She hurried to throw open the door and entered. A sitting room, kitchen, table with chairs. A hallway leading back towards a bed and bath. Tiny and utterly mundane and beautiful.

“You don’t have to go and file those right away, do you?” She asked, reaching back blindly for his hand. He grasped hers loosely in his, twining their fingers.

“No, not right away. Why, have a celebration in mind? We could watch telly, pick out new paint colors…”

River looked back at him with a smirk. “I was thinking we could break in the rooms, honey.”

It was her husband who smirked right back at her. “Now you’re talking.” He kicked the door shut with a ridiculous flail of one leg and was in her arms the next breath.

“Home, Sweetie, Home,” River whispered against his lips.

—-

The Doctor waved goodbye to Clara as she exited the TARDIS once more. They’d had an interesting time of things in the Sombrero Galaxy which, disappointingly, had not included sombreros. But they’d made it back in one piece; frankly, he counted it a mark of success each time Clara came back in one piece. He wasn’t sure whether the third time really was the charm in her case or not, but he was very sure he couldn’t lose her the same way he had lost the other two Claras. Not when he’d already lost so much.

Before he could take off again, there was a flash of light that caused him to duck down under the console for a moment before realizing it wasn’t coming at him. Instead, it hovered across the room, slowly taking shape.

Ah, a delivery. He occasionally received deliveries — perhaps that fez he’d ordered was finally here — but when the light faded, it was not a mechanized courier who stood there, but a letter that dropped to the floor.

The Doctor hurried round to that side of the console and picked it up. It was labeled with the logo of Lunar Revenue. He pinched the bridge of his nose and opened the envelope, bracing himself for what new form or inquiry he needed to fill.

Inside was a single sheet of paper. It read:

Dear The Doctor,

Lunar Services was notified June 7th of the passing of Professor R. Song, the borrower of an outstanding loan on a residence. While we are deeply saddened for your loss, as co-signer you have inherited the remaining balance of that loan. If you wish to have the property taken as collateral to settle the debt, no further action need be taken. Please be advised that this may harm your credit score.

If you would like to continue paying the remaining balance and retain the property, please contact one of our Customer Care Reps at the following number.

He didn’t read the number, for the letter slipped from his fingertips and fluttered to the floor. His hand went to his lips. He had known, yes, that this day was coming, but he hadn’t thought- he’d never expected—

He’d never realized he would be notified of his own wife’s death with such an afterthought.

Anger flaring up within him, he kicked at the letter. It skidded across the floor and stopped, the outline of the tread of his boots printed over one corner. The envelope went next in the opposite direction. It looked rather pitiful and useless, which matched his mood.

He sunk down on the steps and didn’t hear the door opening again. But he heard Clara’s voice. “Everything alright? You haven’t gone yet.”

The Doctor leapt up as if scalded, spinning on his toes as his face contorted in an effort to force the water welling up in his eyes back down. Clara was bending down towards the letter from Lunar Services.

��Don’t touch that!”

She jumped back as he tore it from her grasp, pressing it to his chest. “No need to get tetchy,” she snapped, though she seemed taken aback when their eyes met. “Chin Boy?”

Clara reached towards him, but he stepped back, turning to brace a hand on the control panel as he tucked the letter away.

“Sorry. Just some… private correspondence,” he muttered to the buttons and levers.

“Was it from Professor Song?”

His head bowed, bracing himself.

“I only saw the name, I didn’t read anything else,” Clara hurried to say.

A breath released. She hadn’t seen. He didn’t have to talk about this, this thing he had never talked about ever. “yes, it was from Professor Song,” he lied, and the lie came easy.

“Okay. Well… I guess I’ll leave you to answer it.” She said, and he could hear her drift one foot back towards the door.

“Thank you, Clara,” he said, and he looked once at her over his shoulder. “See ya Wednesday.”

“See ya,” she echoed, the barest of smiles gracing her lips, a mark that he’d at least done a little to reassure her. When the door closed a second time, he immediately pulled the lever to dematerialize. He couldn’t afford to stick around again by mistake.

Once safely alone, the Doctor took out the letter again, eyes scanning over the words. If you would like to continue paying the remaining balance and retain the property… Retain the property?

It had been River’s house, not his. River would be in every room. Her things and the scent of her perfume and the sound of her laugh — just thinking of it was enough to fill his lungs and head so much that he could hardly breathe, could hardly think.

If you wish to have the property taken as collateral to settle the debt, no further action need be taken. Please be advised that this may harm your credit score, the letter said, and that felt better. No action could be taken. There was nothing he could do, nothing he could change.

The Doctor marched back to his study and opened a drawer. He placed the letter inside as far back as it would fit, then shut it. He knew already that he would never open it again nor speak to anyone from Lunar Services, tax evasion and bad credit be damned.

He’d never wanted the score or the house. He just wanted her. Now he would have none.

#eleven appreciation weekend #eleventh doctor #river song #eleven x river #doctor who #doctor x river #my writing

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thelittlesttimelord · 5 years ago

Text

The Littlest Timelord: Cracks in Time Chapter 33

TITLE: The Littlest Timelord: Cracks in Time Chapter 33 PAIRING: No Pairing RATING: T CHAPTER: 33/? SUMMARY: A little girl escapes the Time War when the Timelord’s return in “End of Time Part 2″. The newly regenerated Doctor must now raise the little girl while trying to find out why cracks in time keep following them around.

[A/N - We’re getting down to the wire, guys!]

“So what's this got to do with the TARDIS?” Amy asked.

River had left to go back to the Roman camp, leaving Elise, Amy, and the Doctor on their own.

“Nothing, as far as I know,” the Doctor said.

“But Vincent's painting. The TARDIS was exploding. Is that going to happen?”

“One problem at a time. There's forcefield technology inside this box. If I can enhance the signal, I could extend it all over Stonehenge. Could buy us half an hour.”

“What good is half an hour?”

“There are fruit flies live on Hoppledom Six that live for twenty minutes and they don't even mate for life. There was going to be a point to that. I'll get back to you.”

“So, are you proposing to someone?”

“I'm sorry?”

“I found this in your pocket.”

Elise and the Doctor looked at her. She was holding her engagement ring.

“No. No, no, that's er, a memory. A friend of mine. Someone I lost.” The Doctor tried taking it from her, but she pulled away from him. “Do you mind?”

“It's weird. I feel, I don't know, something,” Amy said.

The Doctor and Elise realized that on some level, she remembered Rory.

“People fall out of the world sometimes, but they always leave traces. Little things we can't quite account for. Faces in photographs, luggage, half eaten meals, rings. Nothing is ever forgotten, not completely. And if something can be remembered, it can come back.”

“So, was she nice, your friend?” Amy asked, handing the ring back to the Doctor.

“Remember that night you flew away with me?”

“Of course I do.”

“And you asked me why I was taking you and I told you there wasn't a reason. I was lying.”

“What, so you did have a reason?”

“Your house.”

“My house.”

“It was too big. Too many empty rooms. Does it ever bother you, Amy, that your life doesn't make any sense?”

An energy bolt was fired at them and they ran to hide behind the Pandorica.

“What was that?” Amy asked.

“Okay, I need a proper look. Got to draw its fire, give it a target,” the Doctor said.

“How?”

“You know how sometimes I have really brilliant ideas?”

“Yes.”

“Sorry.” The Doctor ran out into the open. “Look at me, I'm a target!”

Elise rolled her eyes. How the hell had he lived for this long?

He ducked behind one of the pillars.

“What is that?” Amy asked.

“Cyberarm. Arm of Cyberman,” the Doctor told her.

“And what's a Cyberman?”

“Oh, sort of part man, part robot. The organic part must have died out years ago. Now the robot part is looking for, well, fresh meat.”

“What, us?”

“It's just like being an organ donor, except you're alive and sort of screaming. I need to get round behind it. Could you draw its fire?”

“What, like you did?”

“You'll be fine if you're quick. It's only got one arm, literally.”

Amy reluctantly ran out into the open and the Doctor pounced on the arm. He managed to sonic it.

“Doctor?” Amy asked.

“Scrambled its circuits, but stay where you are, it could be bluffing.”

“Bluffing? It's an arm.”

“I said stay where you are!”

Amy looked down and saw a cable winding around her ankle. “Doctor?” she asked. The cable pulled her to floor.

“Amy!” the Doctor yelled.

The Cyberman arm shocked the Doctor, effectively knocking him out.

“Doctor!” Amy yelled as Elise ran over to the Doctor.

She put her head on his chest, hearing both his hearts beating. Elise heard Amy scream.

She was being attacked by a Cyberman head.

Elise ran over to her and pulled out her sonic screwdriver. She pointed it at the Cyberman head, but it wasn’t doing anything.

Amy managed to bash it against a pillar until it let her go. She threw it to the floor and it crawled away. “Doctor?” Amy asked. A dart hit Amy in the neck.

“You will be assimilated.”

“Yeah? You and whose body?” Amy quipped.

A headless, armless Cyberman entered the chamber. It placed its head back on as Amy and Elise backed up through the big door.

The door slammed shut.

“Doctor!” Amy yelled.

A roman sword pierced the door. It swung open to reveal the Cyberman stuck to the door.

“Who, who are you?” Amy asked the Roman.

He took off his helmet. “Hello, Amy.”

It was Rory!

Amy passed out and Rory caught her, gently laying her on a stone.

Elise hugged Rory’s legs.

“Hey Elise,” he said, patting her head.

“Sir, the man's coming round,” a soldier said.

“Amy? Where's Amy? Elise?” the Doctor said, running towards them.

“She's fine, Doctor. Just unconscious. Elise is fine too,” Rory told him.

The Doctor quickly soniced her. “Okay. Yes, she's sedated, that's all. Half an hour, she'll be fine. Okay, Romans. Good. I was just wishing for Romans. Good old River. How many?”

“Fifty men up top, volunteers. What about that thing?” Rory pointed to the Cyberman stuck to the door.

“Fifty? You're not exactly a legion.”

“Your friend was very persuasive, but it's a tough sell.”

“Yes, I know that, Rory. I'm not exactly one to miss the obvious. But we need everything we can get.” The Doctor picked up two guns. “Okay, Cyberweapons. This is basically a sentry box, so headless wonder here was a sentry. Probably got himself duffed up by the locals. Never underestimate a Celt.”

“Doctor?”

“Hush, Rory. Thinking. Why leave a Cyberman on guard, unless it's a Cyberthing in the box. But why would they lock up one of their own? Okay, no, not a Cyberthing, but what? What? No, I'm missing something obvious, Rory. Something big. Something right slap in front of me. I can feel it.”

Elise thought it was funny how the Doctor was standing right in front of Rory (and addressing him by name) and still not realizing that he was talking to Rory.

“Yeah, I think you probably are,” Rory told him.

“I'll get it in a minute.”

The Doctor walked into the next room and dropped the guns. He re-entered the chamber and poked Rory. “Hello again,” he said.

“Hello.” “How've you been?”

“Good. Yeah. Good. I mean, Roman.”

The awkwardness was so thick you could cut it with a knife.

“Rory, I'm not trying to be rude, but you died.”

“Yeah, I know. I was there.”

“You died and then you were erased from time. You didn't just die, you were never born at all. You never existed.”

“Erased? What does that mean?”

“How can you be here?”

“I don't know. It's kind of fuzzy.”

“Fuzzy?”

“Well, I died and turned into a Roman. It's very distracting.”

Rory walked over to Amy and stroked her hair. “Did she miss me?”

Before the Doctor could answer his question, the ground shook.

They ran back into the chamber to find the designs on the Pandorica were glowing green and moving.

“What is it? What's happening?” Rory asked.

“The final phase. It's opening.” The Doctor grabbed his communicator and called River. “Yes. Now hurry up and get the TARDIS here I need equipment!” He hung up and approached the Pandorica. “What are you? They're all here, all of them, all for you. What could you possibly be?”

The Doctor grabbed the communicator and soniced it, effectively making it a megaphone. “Sorry, sorry, dropped it. Hello, Stonehenge! Who takes the Pandorica, takes the universe,” he said as they ascended the stairs, “But bad news, everyone…” The Doctor jumped up on the Altar stone. “Because guess who? Ha! Listen, you lot, you're all whizzing about. It's really very distracting. Could you all just stay still a minute because I am talking!”

The spaceships stopped moving.

“The question of the hour is, who's got the Pandorica? Answer, I do. Next question. Who's coming to take it from me? Come on! Look at me. No plan, no back up, no weapons worth a damn. Oh, and something else. I don't have anything to lose! So, if you're sitting up there in your silly little spaceship, with all your silly little guns, and you've got any plans on taking the Pandorica tonight, just remember who's standing in your way. Remember every black day I ever stopped you, and then, and then, do the smart thing. Let somebody else try first.”

Elise clapped as the spaceships retreated. She hoped that one day she could give speeches like that. She wanted to be exactly like the Doctor when she grew up.

The Doctor jumped down from the Altar stone and high-fived Elise. “That'll keep them squabbling for half an hour,” the Doctor told them, “Romans.” The Doctor, Elise, and Rory went back down to the Pandorica chamber.

“They're still out there. What do we do now?” Rory asked.

“If I can stop whatever's in this box getting out, then they'll go home.”

“Right.”

“Rory, I'm sorry. You're going to have to be very brave now.”

Amy walked straight past Rory to get to the Doctor. “Oh, my head.”

“Ah,” the Doctor said, opening his mouth.

Amy did the same.

“Just your basic knock-out drops. Get some fresh air, you'll be fine,” he told her.

“Is it safe up there?”

“Not remotely, but it's fresh.”

“Fine.” Amy turned around and bumped into Rory. “Oh, you're the guy, yeah? The one who did the swordy thing.”

“Yeah,” he said.

“Well, thanks for the swording. Nice swording.”

Amy headed up the stairs.

“No problem. My men are up there. They'll look after you,” Rory told her.

“Good. Love a Roman.”

Rory turned back to the Doctor. “She doesn't remember me. How can she not remember me?”

“Because you never existed. There are cracks. Cracks in time. There's going to be a huge explosion in the future, on one particular day. And every other moment in history is cracking around it.”

“So how does that work? What kind of explosion? What exploded?”

“Doesn't matter. The cracks are everywhere now. Get too close to them and you can fall right out of the universe.”

“So I fell through a crack and now I was never born?”

“Basically.”

“Well, how did I end up here?”

“I don't know, you shouldn't have.” The Doctor stopped working on the Pandorica and approached Rory. “What happened? From your point of view, what physically happened?”

“I was in the cave, with you, Elise, and Amy. I was dying, and then I was just here, a Roman soldier. A proper Roman. Head full of Roman stuff. A whole other life, just here like I'd woken up from a dream. I started to think it was a dream, you, Amy, Elise, and Leadworth. And then today, in the camp, the men were talking about the visitors. The girl with the red hair. I thought you'd come back for me. But she can't even remember me.”

“Oh, shut up.”

“What?”

The Doctor tossed the ring box to Rory. “Go get her.”

“But I don't understand. Why am I here?”

“Because you are. The universe is big. It's vast and complicated and ridiculous, and sometimes, very rarely, impossible things just happen and we call them miracles, and that's the theory. Nine hundred years, never seen one yet, but this would do me. Now get upstairs. She's Amy and she's surrounded by Romans. I'm not sure history can take it.” The Doctor clapped Rory on the back and he left.

Elise looked up at the Doctor with a smile.

“Oh shut up”, he told her.

#eleventh doctor fanfiction #eleventh doctor imagine #eleventh doctor #Doctor Who fanfiction #doctor who #doctor who imagine #amy pond #amy pond imagine #Rory Williams #rory williams imagine #the littlest timelord #the littlest timelord: cracks in time #the pandorica opens

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rolandfaunte · 6 years ago

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The Story of Sewing Kit

I guess it kind of starts in the fall of 2016. Up until this point I had had some issues with anxiety/depression, and huge issues with sleep, but nothing that I would have considered to be an emergency. All of the sudden it seemed like accomplishments were becoming less frequent. Before this, when I was happy, each thought that came about in regards to an obligation was accompanied by a bit of energy that could be used to do it. That energy stopped showing up and the list of things that needed to be done began to grow as the likelihood of those tasks being completed began to shrink. I think of it like a car. Before these issues, when the car was required to drive a certain distance, gas would simply appear in the tank. Now, those same distances were required, but the gas no longer appeared. In this metaphor, the gas is provided by the subconscious, or just “the sub” as I like to call it. When you’re hungry, the sub gives you a bit of gas to go to the kitchen or order something. When you’re hungry but depressed, that gas never arrives. What then? Can you create you own? I’ve come to think of consciously-generated fuel as will power, and I didn’t really seem to have any at that time. The truth of the matter is that the sub was getting sick and, as a result, I started slowly dissolving into a pathetic mess. After sleep and motivation were gone, the disease began to target my self-worth. By the disease, I mean the bipolar disorder that at the time I was unaware of but would soon be diagnosed. The pattern of life I was developing mostly consisted of doing nothing or crying. At this point my life sill wasn’t necessarily all that bad, because I would only spend a few hours per day in a truly horrible place and would otherwise just be numb and fragile. This would be changing soon but the issue was still manageable enough that I didn’t do anything about it. In this time period, a typical day would begin with a skipped class and inactivity until around 5 o’clock, when I would retreat to my room and cry for a while about nothing and then just be numb again. My sense of self-worth was very low but I was yet to have any suicidal thoughts or full disconnections from reality. It was bad of course, but nothing compared to what was to come. In the context of the future that I’m now aware of, it’s hard to see this time period as so terrible, though it was certainly worse than anything that had preceded it. In the fall of 2016 I was introduced to Dr. K. We tried a few standard ssris and I took them religiously, thinking that they could bring back an older version of myself but they didn’t work very well. We tried a few different combinations but my decline was accelerating at an alarming rate. Each day of this time period would be the best day I would have for months to come. The episodes of tearfulness and misery became the standard mode of my life. I kept these things mostly private from those I knew well because I found them to be embarrassing and extremely confusing. After a while of this, in the springtime, a new type of episode began to emerge. It was one of infinite bliss and unstable happiness. My self-worth inflated to an amazing degree and I was filled with what felt like an infinite love and sense of connection to all things. I would create things at an alarming pace that all turned out to be of terrible quality but at the time seemed to me to be far more important than anything else in the history of the world. These were my first true experiences with hypomania. These episodes would break ferociously. I remember walking to campus in a state of absolute ecstasy, being extremely impressed with myself and all of the amazing things I would come to accomplish. My genius was absolute and my understanding of the world was absolutely messianic. The introduction of mania made for an incredibly ridiculous life, in which I was either overflowing with energy and ecstasy or begging a god I didn’t believe in to bring about some accident that would kill me. Neither version of the brain could remember the other, and I never seemed to spend any time in between them. I told my doctor of these things and he asked me to more elaborately journal during these moments, which I proceeded to do. When I next went to visit him he said he thought I might have a bipolar disorder and wanted to try a different tact medically. One med, Latuda, was very successful but left me with an unacceptable side-effect called akathisia. When I went to see him after a few weeks we had a lengthy conversation about my sense of the future and my hope for recovery and he regretfully informed me that I was ill to a point at which out-patient treatment wouldn’t be enough and it was time for me to be admitted. On the day I was admitted, I remember laying in some sort of examination room when a nurse entered and asked how I was feeling. Through tears I informed her, “I’m never going to be happy ever again.” I meant that. I was sure of it in ways I’ve never been sure of anything else. At some point before the Latuda I had begun to lose my relationship with reality but it was now gone entirely. I had no sense of what was real and was entirely possessed by the darkest thoughts imaginable, or perhaps even worse than that depending on who is being asked. For those who haven’t been depressed, these types of thoughts remain beyond imagination. When entering the ward I was presented with a line on which I needed to sign my name and write the date. I paused at the part of the paper that required the date and looked up to the nurse in confusion. Her and I were both visibly surprised by the fact that, not only did I not know what month it was, I also didn’t know whether it was 2015 or 2016. I can’t explain how or why, but I simply did not know. It was like looking at a bill at a restaurant and your brain just refusing the put in the effort to calculate a tip, except mine couldn’t even put in the effort to tell me what year it was. In that hospital I felt as though I was joining the ranks of those to whom I was truly similar. The broken and unproductive elements of society who were unable to do anything other than consume resources and spread misery and chaos. I looked at the outlets that fed energy to the medical machines, the nurses and the attendants, the food we ate, and the light that let us see it and saw them all as a waste. Why wouldn’t they just let us destroy ourselves? Why did they insist on keeping us in places where suicide was impossible when it was obviously the best thing for anyone who ended up here? I’ve never in my life spent so much time staring at a clock. The issues with sleep had made a vengeful reemergence and the time spent in the hospital truly felt like an eternity. I remember looking out of the window at a woman walking to work and thinking “I will literally never do that. I will never have a job. I will never contribute. I will never be useful enough to have to be anywhere ever.” When I was discharged, things improved in the sense that I no longer had to live my entire life on one hallway but my life was, to me at least, objectively and inarguably worse than death. I remember saying to myself that I would trade literally anyone’s life for my own. I would become anyone else and do whatever they had to do as long as it wasn’t this. I spent most of my time daydreaming about eternal nothingness. If I were to, today, right now as I write this, compile a list of reasons to not kill myself, it would be long to a point where I would get bored with the task. At that time the list consisted of two things: my family, and the girl I loved. One of the things I’ve come to realize about the disease is that it is a logical genius, and was able to provide me with an unending collection of reasons why those two elements did not belong there. Its mission was to empty the list. As for my family, one of its favorite arguments was that, over time, I would come to bring them far more harm than they could currently imagine. I would suck the goodness from their lives as they tried to care for me, exhaust them emotionally, consume their resources, and burden them infinitely. I would spoil our family’s good name and make them hate me. In a net, long term evaluation of their pain, it would be best for them to deal with my death for a few years and recover rather than have me drain them of life until I finally submitted at a later date, which I was convinced I would. As for my girlfriend, the argument was a bit different. The disease didn’t need me to necessarily excuse my suicide to her but rather find a way to remove her from my life. It told me that she only stayed with me out of a moral obligation, that she resented me secretly for how unimpressive and obviously useless I was. It told me that if I truly cared about her, I would end things between us and allow her to be free of that entanglement which, according to the disease, was something she wanted but could not bring herself to execute. These were two on the list of endless arguments in favor of me emptying the list of reasons not to do what the disease wanted me to. Both elements of the list stood stead-fast, but the disease is a beast against which arguments cannot be won while it still exists, the arguments are perpetual. The memories of that summer are quiet because I wasn’t quite there when they were made. I spent nearly the entirety of every day inside my own head, consumed by some mixture of panic, pain, dread, anger, or sadness, among others. I would wake up in the morning and simply think to myself “I can’t believe I have to do this for another day. I can’t. I can’t fucking do this anymore.” I remember thinking about how I wouldn’t wish it upon my very worst enemy. This was a punishment far worse than death, and yet somehow I had ended up inside of it without ever having committed any obvious crime. I remember sitting by the river with my best friend. This was my favorite place, next to my favorite person, and I felt nothing. It was gone and so was I. That summer moved forward into the fall when I was introduced to a physical miracle by the name of Seroquel. It brought me the most consistent sleep I had had in years, but the dosage was high to a point where my life was extremely muted and I was very dull. Next to depression, this was a miracle. When the dose of Seroquel was lowered and my mind was clearing up I began the process of trying to move these experiences out of my memories and into words and music. Unfortunately, I had never done any sort of recording before so I truly had no idea what I was doing. I was starting from scratch, with no outside help other than google. I learned how to use the different pieces of equipment very slowly, and still had only ever played piano and guitar. I listened to drums more closely to try and figure out how best to use them, as with bass, and finally started using other instruments to supplement the songs. Altogether, the process was absolutely grueling and nearly drove me out of my mind. I can’t even count how many times I worked from the early afternoon until the waking hours only to delete everything I had done. If I had to put a number on how much time was actually put into that album, including the learning process, I would start at 500 hours. Over the months I began to think of Sewing Kit as a potential weapon against future depression, thinking that when the next episode hit and the disease asked “what value do you bring?” I would have something to gesture towards and be able to confidently say “I made something that was worth making.” And that’s that. That’s Sewing Kit.

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team-free-squiggle · 6 years ago

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T.A.R.D.I.S. Chapter 1: Roman + Bored = The Best Idea Ever

Warnings: language, innapropriate jokes, fight scenes, certain song lyrics, Sympathetic Deceit, mentions of fear and anxiety, mentions of weaponry near the end

Roman sat on the couch in the commons area of the mindscape, stunned as he tried to process that he had just finished the show that had quickly become his new favorite thing ever. What would he do now? No more new episodes until next year?

Doctor Who would have to wait a whole year? No more watching Tricey chase golf balls, no more watching the 9th Doctor fall in love with Rose Tyler, no more being introduced to different species across space and time? What would Roman do with his life and time now?

Logan would think this silly, he would say to just rewatch the series if it meant that much to him. Roman, however, knew from experience that you only get to see things the first time once, and that the feeling of rewatching is never quite the same as watching it the first time around.

Patton would be sympathetic, but would remind him that there would be a new season next year. Roman was not okay with this, he didn’t want to wait a year to see more of the Doctor’s grand adventures!

Roman knew that Virgil would understand, and would just hug Roman because he sympathized heavily. Actually, Roman recalled with a small, fond smile, Virgil was the one that got him into Doctor Who in the first place.

Roman didn’t really want to see his boyfriends right now, as he needed time to emotionally process everything that his boyfriends wouldn’t be able to understand, so he got up from the couch. After turning off the TV and the lights, he went to his room, and from there into the Kingdom of the Imagination.

Roman, upon entering Thomas’s Imagination, stopped to take in the view from his balcony in the palace. Little children raced each other in the village below, some playing games like soccer or just relaxing and talking. Others in the village hung out with their friends, and walked around town just having fun. Roman couldn’t help but smile at the scene - a happy, prospering village surrounded by a golden sunrise and lush green hills. A bright blue river babbled happily down from a nearby mountain into a small forest, which let in the light from the bright sun shining down over everything.

Roman felt himself ease into the familiarity of watching the sunrise, letting his creativity flow automatically into doing something worthwhile with his emotions. Roman never was one to laze around when he was feeling, because all of his emotions made his creative works that much better and that much more genuine.

Roman smiled at the handsome lords, gorgeous ladies, and stunning nonbinary royalty as he moved through the palace and they waved at him. He was friendly with everyone, no matter their supposed ‘status’ in his Kingdom. That’s why no one bowed, no one was too strict or formal - it was just a friendly, creative, supportive environment. Everything Roman needed to come up with a good idea.

Roman went to the theater. Modeled after the great William Shakespeare's Globe Theater, Roman always went there to stand on the stage alone and just think. It was a way for him to tap into centuries of creative energy, and to generate some of his best ideas. So he thought about Doctor Who, what he loved about it and what he wished he could do with those feelings about it.

It was during this time that Roman realized something - ‘What if I had my own adventures like the Doctor’s?’ Roman began to plan out loud - he would personally much rather travel through stories than travel through a universe that, while interesting, was much less appealing to him than the fantastical worlds he read about. He recognized the complication of needing a Tardis, however, and that’s where his creativity came in.

Roman channeled his emotions into a single thought, willing the object in his mind to become reality and to do everything he wanted it to do and more.

Virgil, Patton, and Logan were looking for their boyfriend. Thomas wanted to discuss some video ideas with the Sides, and they definitely needed Creativity for that. They couldn’t find him anywhere in the mindscape, though, and were beginning to become worried.

Logan realized, luckily, that they hadn’t checked Imagination, which is where Roman was likely to be, especially since he probably wanted to create something. This calmed them all down quite a bit, especially Virgil since he was the literal embodiment of Anxiety.

They sunk down into Roman’s room, quickly making their way to his extravagant theater. They were greeted by the other royalty in the palace with great enthusiasm, and were suddenly reminded that they, too, were all Princes in Roman’s world of Imagination.

They were polite to them all, but did insist that they had to find Roman. The people in the palace confirmed their suspicion that Roman was, in fact, inside his theater. They thanked everyone and made their way to their boyfriend happily, glad he was already in Creative (albeit borderline Daydream) Mode, and walked into the theater to see Roman, on stage, staring happily at a British Police Public Call Box.

They all stopped, Patton and Logan stopping out of confusion. Virgil had stopped out of shock, before making a very high pitched, practically inhuman shriek of happiness and running towards the stage. Roman turned around, startled, luckily with enough time to catch Virgil who had literally leapt into his arms with an excited “OHMYGODROMAN!!!”

Roman laughed happily, kissing Virgil softly before opening the door to the Tardis. Patton and Logan moved slowly towards the stage, extremely confused as to why Virgil was so excited over a freaking blue box.

Virgil took his boyfriends’ hands when everyone was on stage, pulling them towards and into the box.

“Uh, Virgil, I don’t think we’ll all… fit…” Logan trailed off when he stepped inside the bigger-on-the-inside, hella magical box.

He and Patton wandered around, admiring the hexagonal walls. It was a clean, dark blue and silver theme while having accents of bright blues. The thing that Logan identified as a control panel, however, had all sorts of red and purple and gold buttons. It was a mix of all their colours, and yet maintained a specific style that Logan could only assume was from whatever Roman had based this off of.

Patton noticed the picture frames of the four of them scattered around the large room, and he too saw the colours that went with all of them. He sat in the light blue bean-bag he discovered in the corner, admiring the room as Logan sat in the dark blue bean-bag next to him. Virgil collapsed into a black and purple bean-bag, pulling a red and gold one out for Roman, who sat next to them.

“Babe you made a Tardis, and it’s like… like… for all of us!!! How!? What!? You’re fucking amazing!” Virgil nuzzled into Roman’s side like the black cat he is, smiling as widely as the day Patton had asked him, Logan, and Roman out on a date the first time. Roman blushed happily.

“Well, I finished the show, and had a lot of emotions that I decided to put into a positive creative energy that could be used to make the four of us happy,” he whispered, slightly embarrassed. Patton and Logan were still staring around the box happily and in awe, and also hella confused as to what their other two boyfriends were going on about.

Virgil, on the other hand, knew exactly what Roman was feeling and hugged him.

“I’m so proud of you, doing this… it’s amazing, Ro.” Roman melted into the hug, heart melting slightly as his boyfriend said those words to him, of all people.

Logan and Patton smiled at their boyfriends for a moment, before the two broke apart and Logan got to ask the question that had been banging on the inside of his head for the last few minutes, since he had first seen the Tardis.

“So what the hell is this thing, exactly?” He exclaimed, not wanting to be confused anymore.

Before Patton could reprimand him for his language, Virgil jumped in with an explanation.

“In the show I recently introduced Roman to, Doctor Who, the main character can travel through Space and Time using his Tardis, which looks almost exactly like this. It’s the machine that travels through Space and Time, Logan. It can go anywhere, anywhen. It’s freaking amazing.” The other three Sides couldn’t help but notice how Virgil’s eyes lit up as he spoke, and god, he spoke with such passion that the others couldn’t help but fall in love with him even more.

Then Roman spoke up.

“While all of that is true, I, uh… I made some modifications. Instead of travelling through Space and Time, this Tardis travels through stories. We can go through books, and movies, and TV shows, and maybe more. I don’t know. I just wanted to make this so the four of us could have some very interesting dates.” He blushed a lot as he spoke, almost stuttering as he was unsure of how his boyfriends would respond. He looked down at the ground at the end, ready to have them shoot down his ideas.

When they didn’t say anything after a short while, Roman looked up. He was not prepared for how each of his boyfriends was looking at him, having prepared for disappointment and to be told no.

How wrong he was.

Instead, Logan was staring at him in admiration and awe, with a huge smile and a proud look in his eyes. Logan had had no idea that Roman would ever make something that appealed to all of them. He was impressed with how Roman did this, and that emotions could make something that could become everything to all of them.

Patton was smiling too, absolutely proud of his Creatively inclined boyfriend. Patton didn’t know exactly what Roman had done yet, but he was proud nonetheless. Plus he was excited for the potential of something to do with stories. Honestly, he was just bouncing excitedly as he looked at Roman, the background being one of Roman’s amazing creations.

Virgil, too, was smiling, and he moved towards Roman in order to hug him. Roman could only focus on that wonderful hug after the smile, though, because this one affected Roman the most. He knew Virgil held the context of what he was talking about. Not to mention, Virgil’s smile always melts Roman’s heart. The way that his face just lights up, but he somehow manages to smile with his eyes too.

Then there was the way that he was able to hug Roman and convey everything they both were feeling - anxiety, nervousness, yes - but creativity and passion and pure, unfiltered love and admiration. Logan and Patton joined, and all of a sudden Roman could feel that they were all impressed and happy and that all four of them loved one another without fear.

The emotions were almost overwhelming, but none of them minded. It was perfect for who the four of them are together - a family whose fire can never die. And with that feeling in mind, Roman fired up the engine of his family’s Tardis.

“All the stories, the tales, the arts in the world. Anything ever written or that will ever be written. Where would you like to start?” Roman smirked at his boyfriends, all four of them ready for the best adventure they would have to date.

#big bang fic #lamp sanders #angel writes #symp. dee #all centered #thomas sanders #sanders sides #sanders sides fanfiction #long fic

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readingraebow · 6 years ago

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Everything is Illuminated Section One

An Overture to the Commencement of a Very Rigid Journey - The Dial, 1941-1804-1941

1. Have you ever read this book before or seen the movie? If not, what do you know of the story? I have not read this book or seen the movie though my best friend in high school was obsessed with it. Her favorite actor was Liev Schreiber and he directed this movie so she watched it a lot though I never got around to watching it with her. And she read the book and loved it and told me to read it. So I bought it but, uh, never actually read it. Though if it's anything like Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, it's probably absolutely bananas but also amazing. And I honestly don't know anything about it. Though I was just reading some of the little review blurbs on the first few pages and apparently it's about the Holocaust?? That is actual proof that I know nothing about this book. But I'm very excited to get started with it!!

2. Where did Alex’s grandfather work and why is he coming out of retirement? I honestly don't remember reading the answer to the first part of this question and flipping back through, I couldn't find it soooo stealing part of Lizzy's answer (because I'm bad at things). He was a driver for Heritage Touring and he comes out of retirement to drive around The Hero (who is also the author; way to write yourself as a character into your own book *slow claps*) who has come to the Ukraine to search for the village where his grandfather lived and a woman named Augustine who saved his grandfather's life during the war and, thus, allowed him to exist.

3. Why did Yankel’s wife leave him? How did she break the news to him? She left him for another man and he just comes home to find a note on the door that says "I had to do it for myself." And the part that mystifies him is that it was so simple for her. He says that she was the love of his life but apparently that wasn't the case for her. She just left the note tacked to the door like she'd done with other notes with things for him to do or messages that she'd stepped out and would be right back. But leaving him is something much bigger and it hadn't seemed like a hard decision for her. And, yet, for him there wasn't really anyone else. He never married again.

4. What is Brod’s role in the parade? Have you ever been in a parade before? Brod is the most beautiful girl in Trachimbrod so she's the Float Queen. Basically this means she dresses up as a mermaid and rides in the parade. And then she throws sacks in to the river after which she was named and a bunch of men jump in to try to find the sacks and one of them finds the winning sack which has a bunch of money in it. And I have actually! I've been in 6. The first was in New Mexico. We had a family reunion on my grandmother's side (but I was a kid so I think it was her father's siblings and their descendants but I don't quite remember) and we had a float in their parade. I was like 5 or something so I just remember wearing a pinafore and pretending to stir a pot while I tried super hard not to fall off the float, haha. And then four times were when I was in band and marched. My hometown has two parades every year, one for Christmas and one for our annual festival in May, and I played flue in three of those. In one of them I got to hold the banner (and, thus, didn't have to play an instrument while walking in step which I was supremely bad at and hated). And, honestly, I don't really like parades so that was one of the reasons why I quit band, haha. And I'm also kind of glad I don't really have to go to parades anymore. Though, that being said, the last time I was in a parade was in October when I visited my aunt and helped her out with their Apple Days festival (which she conveniently didn't tell me I was working, haha) and so I walked with her and helped corral all the kids who had won the Johnny Appleseed contest and were riding around us on bikes. Thankfully, that was the world's shortest parade because I am also not great at corralling children, haha. So basically I don't have great luck with parades.

5. What happens to Brod on her way home from the parade? What does she discover when she finally arrives? I think she's raped? In the chapter before that, she sees a page of what will become her story and it mentions that she was raped and then that's mentioned again, in passing, at the beginning of the chapter when she's riding on the float. So then, when she's coming home from the parade she has to evade all of the drunks who are lusting after her and she comes home to find Yankel dead on the floor. And then outside the window, she sees the guy who won the sack contest staring at her. And basically that's where it stops? So it implies that she was raped but it never goes into detail. And it was right after she found Yankel dead. What a horrible day for her O.O

6. What is Alex saving his money for? He's saving his money to move to America. He says he keeps all of his money in the cookie jar in the kitchen which is safe because it's been ten years since his mother made cookies. He reasons that when the cookie jar is full, he'll have enough money to move to America. But he wants to be sure he has enough money for a really nice apartment in Times Square that is big enough for him and Little Igor and will have a large-screen tv to watch basketball, a jacuzzi, and a hi-fi. (Somehow I don't think a cookie jar full of money will be enough for all of that but okay.) He also asks Jonathan to send him articles about America (sports, movies, girls & accounting schools) so he can learn more about it for when he moves there.

7. How does the search for Trachimbrod go? Super not well. Sammy Davis Junior Junior ends up eating all of Jonathan's papers, including the map, so they have no idea where they're going. So they ask someone for directions and he's never heard of Trachimbrod so he gives them a general direction to go and tells them when they get close, someone should be able to tell them where to find it. Except everyone else they stop to ask says they also haven't heard of it. So they just end up driving around, waiting for someone to have actually heard of Trachimbrod. So, finally, they stop and ask this woman and she says she hasn't heard of it either but something in her tone says otherwise. And when Alex shows her the photograph, she says no but he says it sounds like a different kind of no. So he just keeps asking her if she knows anyone in the picture and she keeps saying no. And then finally he asks if anyone in the picture knows her. And then she says "I have been waiting for you for so long." And Alex points at the car and tells her they're searching for Trachimbrod. And she says "You are here. I am it." So Trachimbrod is apparently a person????? 8. What happens to the Kolker after he gets the job at the mill? Brod had a feeling that something bad would happen to him so she didn't want him to go to work and tried to stop him. But he went anyway and a saw blade ended up flying off its bearing and basically ricocheted around the room before finally embedding itself perpendicular in the top of the Kolker's head. It didn't kill him though. In fact, it didn't injure him at all except for the creation of violent mood swings. It basically created a second, very angry personality who would yell awful things at everyone and caused him to start beating Brod. This was completely unlike his normal personality and he couldn't control the violent side. After something would happen, he would apologize profusely and sometimes even ask what had happened. But, anyway, it created a more violent side which sent him to every doctor to try to get it stopped. However, the only way to stop it would be to remove the blade which would probably kill him. So instead, he just decided to sleep in a separate bedroom for the last year of his life which caused him to stop beating Brod but also meant that the last year of their marriage had them living almost entirely apart and communicating only through a hole cut between the two rooms.

Section One Reading Journal

What on earth did I just read????? So this is easily the strangest book I’ve ever read. And I’m not even done yet. Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close is one of my absolute favorite books and even though it’s a mess, it’s a really weird, enjoyable mess that kind of grabs you and makes you want to figure out where this is going. That’s not really how I feel about this book?? I just-- I don’t know. This one is so weird.

As of right now, I can’t really keep any of the characters straight (especially since everyone keeps changing names?????? What even???) except for Brod and Jonathan and Alex (though I literally didn’t know his name was Alex; I thought it was Sasha). I’m just really, really not following this book? I do finally have the three stories kind of straight though it seems like they’re all actually one story, just told on a very non-linear timeline.

I just-- I really don’t know what I think about this book. I feel like I will like it more after I finish it because it seems like it will be something really, really amazing when it all comes together. So I think this is one of those that’s a complete mess the first time around but once you get it (and maybe even read it again or watch the movie-- so at least have ~some kind of second interaction with it), it’s really great. I’m hoping that’s how I’ll feel. But right now, I’m just really not loving it.

Though the writing is, as always, super beautiful and there are lots of really great quotes. And Alex not understanding how words work is really hilarious. And no one understanding that Jonathan is a vegetarian is also hilarious. Especially that they won’t let you make modifications to orders??? Like you can’t just not make meat??? How is that hard???? That seems easier to me. But okay then.

So yeah. Some parts of this book I’m really enjoying. But some parts are just super weird and very confusing. Including all of Brom’s life. It seemed like her husband was the one who raped her but apparently he was coming to save her/check on her/came to the parade to meet her??? And she genuinely loved him. All of that could’ve been just *a little bit* clearer. Because I was so totally confused. And that’s how pretty much all of her story has gone.

But, anyway, I’m hoping the rest of this book will clear up everything we’ve read so far. I remember Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close being super weird the fist time around too but I don’t remember it being downright confusing. I don’t remember spending half the book wondering what was happening and if I’d ever feel like I wasn’t totally lost. So I have high hopes for the second half and I can’t wait to get into it!

(Also, as a weird side note, this book reminds me a lot of Chuck Palahniuk’s Pygmy. That one was also “written by” someone who could barely speak English and was hard as hell to get into but, in my opinion, it was honestly well worth it. It was kind of a headache to read at first but once you got used to it, it got a lot better. And that’s one of my absolute favorite Chuck books. So that’s kind of why I’m thinking this one might turn out the same way. I’m having lots of flashbacks to reading that one, haha.)

#trcbooks #2015: everything is illuminated #2015 reading challenge

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violetsystems · 4 years ago

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#personal

It is usually my favorite time of the year. Although, I do remember a Halloween years ago when I sat in a corner at a party on my phone alone scrolling through tumblr. My mom loves this time of year. Her birthday is Monday and we usually walk in the day of the dead parade in my neighborhood. Her costume this year is a gypsy witch which if anybody didn’t know by now is part of my heritage. My Croatian grandfather dropped out in the sixth grade after his mother died. He would tell me stories of the church refusing to bury her and how he had to take care of his siblings learning six languages in the process. He and his brother were in the army and Navy respectively. He married into a Bohemian German family where he had two daughters. My mother lives in the house she grew up in. I used to sit at the table on Sundays watching Shaw Brothers films while my grandfather taught me Serbian curse words. My favorite movie back then was Chinese Superninjas and my grandmother was always asleep in a chair listening to a Cubs game. Anytime anyone got decapitated I would look to my grandfather and he would be lost in an article about electronics. The basement was filled with wires and circuit boards. He was a licensed union electrician who fell into disability. Before that he was an army mechanic in the war. Magic and technology was what filled most of my adolescence. My father’s side of the family was all Swedish, a son of a poor Lutheran minister and also in the military. Back then, families were a little more nuclear. My mom’s cousin and my dad’s sister met around the same time my dad and my mom. Subsequently, I have twin cousins who are eerily double related. I also have a cousin on that side of the family who lives in Hong Kong as is adopted. I learned the hard way sitting at a dinner table at a school called Li Po Chun where she lived and taught. I spoke about music and art at that school to survivors of the Iraq war who openly hated Americans like myself. I remember my cousin telling me how important it was how I cut through that hate and fear talking about music with them. That night the oldest living relative was at the table. It was the first time I ever set foot in China let alone Hong Kong. Her daughter who was half Kenyan and her son who was half Chinese sat at that table along with her husband from Beijing. Louise sat at the head of the table attended by a live in nurse. She was in her nineties at that point. Her husband had passed but was a Swedish missionary who travelled the world helping people depending on your political views. I said out loud how it was good to meet someone who I was blood related to halfway across the world. She gave a hushed and sad smile. “Your dad never told you did he?” My cousin was adopted. Later after dinner I sat with her son and drew. It was his favorite activity to share. He taught me Chinese characters and I taught him the Korean characters I knew. We never talked about blood ever again.

Being an only child, these experiences of connection to family can be intense. There really isn’t much of a legacy for me back here in the states. My parents are divorced. My dad remarried into a family that is very different from what I am used to. His wife is nice but religious. Some of the family are police. My dad told me once her brother had fallen into a culture of online forums for gun rights. I spoke to my dad over the phone just the other day. We gently brushed politics over Pelosi and Mnuchin. My dad is an accountant. It’s easy to shift the conversation to something like stocks. But truthfully, I know he and his wife support things like the supreme court nomination. That frightens me in more ways than anyone can know. But those kind of politics have done nothing for me in this situation I have found myself in over the last four or five months. The only piece of government action that affects me favorably at all has been the CARES act. More specifically, the fact that the bulk of my pension is affected by the tax legislation. It literally saved my life. That expires at the end of the year and who knows when the next round of layoffs will happen. And yet politicians are sitting in offices they were bought into arguing concepts about when life begins. Which is funny because politicians don’t really care about life. They care about money, power and how to control the bulk of it. The tones of an election year are deafening over ideological talking points. I hear people like Ken Griffin talking about how he’d rather not pay fair taxes. I also hear Ken Griffin donates heavily to the campaigns of Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio. He has his prize Basquiat hanging in the Art Institute along with his history of supporting the Christian right. I never made the connection as to why abortion protesters were always allowed to protest outside of that school. They used to stand there for hours with signs in front of my building. Years later, there’s a chick fil a right next door. It seems odd until you realize the money is all connected, ideologically and otherwise. In America these days, freedom is only attached to religious expression and the money attached to it. A woman’s right to choose factors nowhere into this. However you feel about abortion or religion in general in America should fall down to a basic function. Is it government’s job to dictate what you do with your life on an ideological level? Or is it their job to use your tax dollars to maintain infrastructure? In an era where the Senate in America is only concerned about loading the courts with yes men and women, it’s pretty obvious. The stimulus to keep the economy going is nowhere in sight. People like Ken Griffin talk loudly about how the answer is getting people back to work and not incentivising people to hurt the GDP. Liam Gallagher and Johnny Marr are among a host of musicians who have hit back at London Chancellor’s Rishi Sunak’s suggestion that people should “adapt” their jobs during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. They would much rather get you back in the machine in any number of startups their sons created. Ken Griffin got rich of his daddy’s connections in times like these. Just like the health care industry gets rich putting you at risk. I put my money in the markets too with no help or advice. For the record, I’m doing quite well these days in my portfolio without any handouts other than my pension.

All the while, I’m trying to apply for jobs in the most insensitive, impersonal and isolated time of my life. I’m alone in ways I cannot explain or even comprehend. And I’m stuck in the middle with people I love like ghosts on the net trying to find a voice. These people in power say they care. Say they have divine insight from God about how you should live your life. Have all the time in the world to type their feelings and beliefs on twitter but do absolutely nothing to help the country heal. And I sit in financial webinars with banks and investors who all say the same thing. The country needs help from the government to recover from these dangerous times. A time where health care is so important and so expensive. Who profits from all this death? The doctors and lawyers that move to Saipan and other tax havens to escape their fair share of the blame? The country is number one at dying these days from a disease that’s easily mitigated by keeping to yourself and wearing a mask. Sounds poetic. And yet everyone can’t keep their distance from me when I walk out the door to restock my fridge. They can’t help sabotaging every attempt to keep my mental state in tact when I face crippling social exclusion. I do still have friends. Mostly in the neighborhood. And yet there’s enemies too. It seems living in this town for years has only one advantage. Everyone thinks they know everything about me. They think I’m a Chinese spy. They think I’m a Satanist. They think I’m in league with a secret organization hell bent on destroying American freedom. And they act out on it every day in my public space without my consent because they think they know me. But they never ask my name. They never look me in the eye. They gossip and plot behind my back. And sooner or later, I just get bored and adapt. I apply for more jobs overseas. All the jobs in China. A few in New York. But New York is more of the same. Startups for daddy’s little business school graduate. A bunch of cock sure closet misogynists who have learned the slick talk corporate snake oil about freedom. These people care so much about your uterus they voted for a guy who literally said in the most vulgar terms to impregnate women forcefully. You think those people care about human life at any stage of conception? They care about votes. They care about people to brainwash. Cheap labor. I literally had to listen to a Bloomberg pundit talk about how a baby boom in the COVID era would be great for shareholders. Trillion dollar companies that pass the savings onto investors instead of the consumer. I hear nothing but people banging the war drum to increase the cost of things. Inflation is a good thing when the wealth disparity is so wildly out of balance. These times seem dark. Almost comedic. But when you shine the light for years from this lighthouse you know one thing. These people are nothing but husks on a balance sheet. They have no culture and no history other than burying and exiling the truth until it drowns in the river like a mob hit. And America is drowning in this cesspool day after day. I’m an only child. There’s a chance my legacy will die and never be retold. But then again, there are things out there more precious than blood. And the streets run red with it everyday without a care in the world. What price do you put on a life when you value none of it? Ask Ken Griffin. I’m sure he could buy your silence. Or maybe he has enough money to throw away to silence you for good. It’s the Chicago way after all. I should know. <3 Tim

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annie-rereads · 4 years ago

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Annie Rereads Immortal Beloved by Cate Tiernan

Immortal Beloved Chapter 2

I have read this book mulitple times and the two that follow. The main character, Nas, and her journey of growth throughout the story is something that I admire. This tale of self-discovery, love, and healing is something that I haven’t found in many other books and I find that its a realistic take on the journey to change.

After some of the events I’ve witnessed, the Incy/cabbie/magick/neck night should seem like a party. I’ve raced away in the night, clinging to a horse’s mane, with a city behind me burned to the ground. I’ve seen bodies covered with the oozing sores of the bubonic plague, piled high in city streets like logs because there wasn’t enough people alive to bury them. I was in Paris on July 14, 1789. You never forget the sight of a human head on a pike.

But we aren’t at war now. We were living an ordinary life, or as ordinary a life as an Immortal can have.

Chapter 2 finds Nas in the immediate aftermath of the cabbie night. While we know she’s running, we having quite gotten to the running part of the story yet. Nas goes over things she’s experienced, all of them truly horrible, and the reasons why this new horrible thing shouldn’t phase her. Except it does, and that makes sense. While one can get desensitized to horrible acts (something I’ve seen my generation talk about often enough), those horrible acts are still going to effect you. Especially if they happen during peace time. Yet, it also shows that while Nas did a terrible thing by walking away, she isn’t a bad person. She knows what she did was wrong and that’s important if your story is going to include massive growth of a character.

In the paragraphs following this introduction, Nas makes mention of “northern raiders” and “berserkers”, which are a group of people that come into play later in the story.

Fun Fact: One of the things that Nas says she experienced is the storming of the Bastille which occured on July 14th.

Where had Incy gotten that spell? Yes, we’re Immortal, we have magic running through our veins, but one has to learn on purpose how to use it. Over the years, I’d known some people who were all about studying magick, learning spells, learning whatever they needed to learn to wield it. But I’d figured out a long time ago that I didn’t want to. I’d seen the death and destruction that magick could cause, I’d seen what people were willing to do to pursue it, and I didn’t want anything to do with it. I wanted to pretend it didn’t exist. And I’d found some like-minded aefrelyffen (an old word for immortals), and we hung out.

It’s important that Nas provides us context on magick, alongside the nature and rules of Immortals as she does later. It’s important that we, as readers, know that what Incy did has to be sought out. Magick has to be learned, and if Nas’s learning later on is anything to go by, it also has to be practiced. This makes what Incy did more disturbing because if he learned to a man’s back in a similar way that Nas learns to put ristrictions on her magick, then it means Incy practiced on other people.

Nas also gives examples of ways she’s used magick, all small which is probably because she doesn’t like to use it. She’s seen what magick does to people and boy has she seen things. She also used magic for the same things we all probably would. For all that her snark and actions might rub a reader the wrong way, these almost petty uses for magick endears her to us just a little.

To me he was sweet and generous and funny and fun, willing to go anywhere, do anything. He was the one who would call me to go to Morocoo at a moment’s notice. The one I’d call to get me out of a jam.

Simple friendly things like this are called into question in a later book, where we find out that Nas was actually reluctant to a lot of Incy’s “go here, do this” attitude.

We would howl about it afterward, falling together, laughing until tears came out of our eyes. The fact that we’d never been lovers, never had that awkwardness between us, only made it more perfect.

Incy and Nas’s friendship really does seem good and wonderful, similar to that almost to the friendships plenty of real people have. Except Incy did something terrible and its reminiscent of the times were you find out your friend wasn’t the kind of person you thought they were. And it’s incredible that they were never lovers, that it never came up for them, not even as a one-night-stand. And I can almost understand why, as later we find out that Incy was obsessed with her power. He had everything he wanted: unfathomable power and a friend to pull around to enjoy all his whims.

It was as if I’d woken up into a different life from the one I’d woken up into yesterday, and I was a different person. And this life and I were both suddenly much darker and grosser and more dangerous than I’d realized.

What Nas is feeling is familiar to me, having gone through some dark things myself (although nothing like she has). I like to think that its a common trauma or shock response to feel as if the world is different and darker. Because in that aftermath it is, as you’ve gone through something that was truly horrible. A big part of healing is moving on and out of that darkness, and realizing that that thing was out of your control and is not reflective of how the world is in its entirety.

Except for me. The mark on the back of my neck was a burn, and I’d had it since I was ten years old. It had never faded, never changed, and the skin was slightly indented, patterned.

We find out more about the mysterious thing on Nas’s neck! It’s a scar that’s been there since she was young, and unlike all other scars or injuries that Immortals get, it hasn’t changed at all. It was caused by magic, powerful magic, which explains why its never changed. And the reason everyone who has seen her scar is dead is because they were all probably mortal themselves. Incy is probably the first Immortal to see it, ever. And even if he doesn’t automatically know what it means, he can certainly find out. And now we’re left with the question of what magical object caused it?

It said, Trevor Hollis, 48, an independent taxicab driver, was attacked last night by one of his fares and suffered a broken spine. He is in the ICU of St. Jame’s Hospital, undergoing tests. Doctors have said he will likely be paralyzed from the shoulders down. He has been unable to name or describe his attacker. His wife and children have been at his side.

And suddenly we know about the cabbie and it makes the situation somehow so much worse. He is a father! He has a wife! It’s unclear if he was the sole provider for the family but either way this is devestating to them. And he can’t name his attackers which gives an excuse as to why he never appears again. We never do learn his ultimate fate though, never learn if he’s permantly paralyzed which is very likely unfortunately.

Finally, at about eight, I got up and went to my bedroom and pulled out my biggest suitcase, the one that could hold a dead pony. (Before you go there, I’ll clarify that it never has.)

Hahaha. We all have that one friend that would ask that question. I would. I am that friend. All my friends are that friend.

“Mr. Bawz and Mr. Innosauce were looking for you, Miss Nastalya,” he told me. I’d always been amused at how he butchered all of our names.

Nas is on the run. And look at the comparison on how she responds to this man messing up her and her friends names versus how Incy reacted to the cabbie. Nas finds it humorous. Incy broke a man’s back. Just because the doorman here is kinder than the cabbie and the fact that Incy was probably very drunk accounts for little or nothing. Nas may be a chronic partier who’s done her fair share of bad things, but she’s nothing like Incy’s level of bad.

“Here you are, Ms. Douglas,” said the clerk, handing over a set of keys. “And how do you say your name?”

“Phillipa,” I answered. Like every immortal, I have a bunch of different passports and IDs and driver’s licenses. Someone always has a friend who knows someone who can get what we need.

Okay so until Nas’s name changes again, because I know it will, she is Phillipa for now. This also explains a little more about what being an immortal is like: you need fake stuff because you’re old and suspecious otherwise. No doubt you also have to change countries or pretend to die.

The rental-car people could have plotted the course to West Lowing for me, but then they might have remembered doing it, if anyone asked them later. And right now I just wanted to disappear. I felt like - like the devil was after me. Like I was being swallowed up in a disaster or something and had to get far away.

Phillipa is headed for West Lowing, Massachusetts. Its near a bunch of other places also named Lowing, such as Lowing Lake and Lowing River. She’s hoping to get lost there, and going through an awful lot of effort to get lost, but its such as specific place that she’s clearly hoping to find something there. And given she apparently needs a map to get there, its not a place she’s been before.

So, the whole immortal thing. You must have questions. I don’t have all the answers.

World-building. Immortals have been around for such a long time that no one knows where they really came from. Like their name suggests, they don’t really die. They can have kids and partners, although unless your partner is also immortal your mortal partner and children will die. Mortal children of an immortal live longer than other mortals. Immortals age differently (one year = one year then one year = 100 human years). Phillipa is 460 years old, born in the year 1551. Immortals don’t get life-long illnesses or more fatal illnesses like cancer or diabetes. They do get colds and the plague. They live their lives like mortal people do, some party and others learn.

I didn’t even know what I was looking for. A sign? Either a literal sign, like RIVER’S EDGE, TURN LEFT, or a metaphorical sign, like a burning bush or something, a bolt of lightning point me in the right direction.

Phillipa is looking for a place called River’s Edge. She can’t find it so she uses a spell to find it. She also remembers how she learned about this place. A woman named River found her and Incy after the two and some mortals (who died unfortunately) were in a car accident in 1929. River told Nastasya (current name, no more Phillipa) who was then Christiane that she could be more, have more, than she currently did if she went to River’s Edge. River and Nastasya had immediately recognized each other as immortals, in a similar way that gay people can recognize each other, but also in a way that provides much more certainty. Nastasya refused so River left, leaving Nas with an open invitation. Nas and Incy hitched a ride sometime later. Nas has now hit a low enough point where she is seeking out River. It’s been eighty years and no guarentee that River is still there.

Nas eventually finds the long winding road to River’s Edge.

There was a tap on the window of my car, and I jumped, barely able to stifle a scream.

My frantic eyes focused, and the man leaned down to look at me.

This lovely man is an immortal too and he also lives at River’s Edge. He is apparently very handsome, a Viking god as Nas puts it. He is somewhat familiar to her, but she isn’t sure how as she can’t remember how she knows him. She recognizes him as another kind of immortal. There are two kinds. The kind that take their power from the life around them and then the kind that don’t.

The chapter ends with this reveal and the confirmation that River is still there.

#reread #immortal beloved #cate tiernan

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bacontodae · 7 years ago

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Promise

Pairing: Baekhyun x Reader

Genre: Angst, Fluff (a little bit)

Length: 1.6k

Warnings: Character Death, Illness

Requested by @heart-baek-bleed

Thank you for the request!

(Requests are open if ya wanna send one right on in)

Each day was long, almost never-ending. Each of these days I spent remembering back when I wasn’t living a complete lie, hiding the truth from my loved ones. There was something about breaking devastating news like this to your family and friends that made you want to hide under heaps of blankets never to see the light of day again; well I don’t need to hide under blankets to know that I won’t see the light for much longer.

I had been diagnosed with a medical condition that caused me to constantly cough up blood. I wasn’t bed ridden nor in unbearable pain but that didn’t mean that I didn’t experience painful jolts that felt like literal death. Ten months ago I was diagnosed and still to this day my boyfriend Baekhyun has no idea. I simply just do not have the will or strength to tell him especially because I have been given a countdown- the countdown to my last days alive.

I had brought my wonderful mother along with me for my doctor’s appointment as I knew I could trust her with all the information. Granted, she might not have been the best person to take in terms of emotional aspects as she was sobbing uncontrollably in the car on the way home. She tried to convince me to explain everything to Baekhyun but for some reason, I couldn’t. It was like I could already see his hurt expression and hear his worrisome words. He cared too much about someone who had three months left to live.

My throat felt like it was ripping into shreds as I coughed into what was once a clean white tissue. My illness was slowly eating me from within and I just longed for release, for something that would take my mind off the pain that electrocuted my body whenever I had an ‘episode’ (as the doctors called it).

I hauled my body out of my bed, where I was previously watching the new KDrama, and threw away the bloody tissue. For some strange reason, throwing out these tissues was no longer a dreaded occurrence because it happened so often; it was almost like a daily routine that only seemed to get worse by the day.

You may have asked yourself “why are you almost dead if you only cough up blood?” and I don’t have an answer for you. I regret now but back when I was being informed about my illness, the doctor explained the entirety of it including the cause and why I was on a countdown but I didn’t listen. I was too busy thinking about how I was going to break the news to Baekhyun. I wouldn’t expect a good reaction, I’m going to die but maybe he would understand.

The jangling of the keys at the front door startled me because I was usually given a warning when Baekhyun was to come home so that I could completely dispose the tissues. Panic ensued as I scrambled to find a good but sanitary hiding spot for the used tissue but I had nothing.

“Y/N, I called for you but you did-“ Baekhyun stopped mid sentence to look at my nervous face and then at the bloody tissue. I couldn’t even begin to comprehend what was going through his mind in this moment as his face was unreadable.

“What’s happened?” He asked his voice quiet and soft like the caring and compassionate boyfriend I knew he was. Was this really the way I was about to explain to him that I had a disease? The air was thick with tension and I could tell that we both hated every second of it.

I sighed and sat on the bed after throwing the tissue in the bin.

“I guess it’s time you find out…”

The conversation with Baekhyun didn’t go as well as I had initially planned but it definitely could have been worse. He understood, with some difficulty, and he made the promise to never leave me until the end. When he said that my heart crumbled into a heap of dust because I did not deserve someone this amazing and loyal. Of course he was slightly offended that I hadn’t told him yet considering that I had had this disease for quite some time now but he was still considerate and amazingly kind like how I knew him to be.

The beautiful frosty snowflakes fell from the sky gracefully like miniature ballet dancers and coated the floor like a blanket. The air was so cold that it could turn and liquid into ice, no doubt about it. Winter had always been my favourite season and it wasn’t just because of the beautiful weather. Three years ago in December, today exactly, was when I had met Baekhyun. He looked so peaceful walking his dog through the winter’s snow and his soft smile said exactly that. I knew that I shouldn’t have bothered him but for some reason I couldn’t help it. We ended up having a conversation about this special season and about how it was his favourite as well. I know it’s cliché to say but I’m pretty sure there was a connection from the very beginning.

We exchanged numbers and from that point on, we talked every single day making sure that not one piece of information was lost over the phone. He was quite literally the boyfriend I was waiting for; that special guy that would be there for me no matter what and he did exactly that.

“Y/N?” Baekhyun called gliding out of our shared bedroom with his suit and tie on. He looked so handsome in the pristine blazer and it only seemed to make me fall in love with him that little bit more. I was wearing a white gown to go along with the winter theme and because it was my favourite colour. It had been confirmed that I only had a week left by my doctor and that I could pass at any given moment during that week. Baekhyun, being the amazing boyfriend he was, wanted to make sure that I left this world by his side and with something to hold onto. He had arranged to sing my favourite song to me at my favourite place by the river just in case today was my last day. I had cried for hours when he had told me this information because he was so sweet and really didn’t need to do it yet here he was.

“Are you ready?” He asked holding out his slender hand for me to take and I did so because I was still unstable from the episode I had had previously. We loaded into his car and drove off to the destination with gentle classical music playing in the background. The world looked so much better in the winter; everything was so cosy and beautiful to look at, kind of like the location we had met at. It was my favourite place still to this day as it held so many special memories.

We had arrived and the wooden structure that led off into the now frozen river looked amazing considering how it was dusted with snowflakes. Baekhyun once again held out his hand to assist me getting out of the car before we headed over to the location anticipating his performance. My best friend Jiyeon was already here with her boyfriend as I had requested them to come with us. It would be a special moment that I wanted to share with three people that I love to bits.

Baekhyun walked up to the higher grounds where the set up for him to sing his song was all ready to go. Seats decorated with white bows were on the lower grounds where the three of us sat side by side.

“This is for my beautiful and unbelievably strong girlfriend, Y/N.” He began to sing my favourite song “Promise” which automatically brought me to tears because the lyrics were genius and genuinely meant something to me. Baekhyun obviously knew this so he would sing it to me when I was settling down for bed sometimes. He was truly something special I wanted nothing more than to stay with him for the rest of my life.

But it was then that I started violently coughing. Baekhyun had thankfully gotten through the whole song before this and was bowing to my friends who were applauding him. I automatically knew that my life was coming to an end but at least I would leave with Baekhyun by my side. In a frantic hurry, Baekhyun ran to my side, tears already collecting in his eyes. I hated seeing him like this but I was pretty much helpless at this point; all I could do was look through my eyelashes at him and listen to his calls to Jiyeon along the lines of “Call the ambulance!”.

I could feel my body getting weaker and weaker with every strained breath I took. My throat was on fire but Baekhyun’s arms that were wrapped around me seemed to make me feel better…and safer.

Through his sobs and his desperate cries, Baekhyun managed to choke out these words that hit me like a truck.

“I love you…wait for me, yeah?”

I wanted to weep and hold his hand and scream that I will never leave him but I couldn’t. I could choke out my own last words.

“I love you too.”

I felt my eyes close slowly but gently as Baekhyun’s sobs only got louder and more desperate.

#baekhyun #byun baekhyun #baekhyun fanfic #baekhyun fanfiction #baekhyun angst #baekhyun fluff #exo #exo fic #exo angst #exo fluff #exo fanfiction #baekhyun x reader

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saiilorstars · 5 years ago

Text

The Beginning of Everything

Ch. 22: The Future Comes Across

// Story Masterlist //

Fandom: Doctor Who

Pairing: 10th Doctor x Female OC

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Chapter summary: After visiting King Henry VIII, the Doctor doesn’t know how to confront Renata about what happened between them. Renata’s continued silence only makes the Doctor even more nervous. But, there’s more to Renata’s silence than he believes and instead of finding an easier way to come clean to him, Renata comes across...River Song.

It was a rare sight to see the Doctor so silent and only looking at a screen. Donna didn't think she'd ever seen him like that, which made it harder to break his concentration. She'd tiptoed into the console room, careful not to be heard as she came up behind him. And that's when she saw what he was looking at on the screen.

Ginger hair and freckles. "Is that her?" her soft voice was still enough to make the Doctor jump. Donna didn't mind that he'd swooped to shut down the screen, almost bonking his head along the corner in the process. Donna had seen enough to understand. "That was her, wasn't it? Zuriah? The girl you used to love?"

The Doctor didn't say anything as he moved away from Donna. She watched him walk slowly around the console,, his head hanging low. "I didn't mean to sneak up on you. But...if it counts for anything… she's really pretty."

A light smile spread across the Doctor's face. "Yeah, she was…"

Donna smiled with him. "We're you just remembering her?" The Doctor was about to shake his head but something stopped him midway. Donna studied his unusual expression and ultimately had to ask what was wrong. "You know I won't say anything."

At that, the Doctor smiled again. "It's stupid."

"If it's what's making that face I don't think it is."

The Doctor sighed. "It doesn't make sense."

"What doesn't?"

"Zuriah...Renata…" he closed his eyes and let his back lean against the console, "Ever since the whole Agatha Christie incident I can't stop thinking about the moment I kissed Renata." And he wouldn't even mention the kiss they shared a few days ago in Hampton Court Palace. It still made his insides warm up like there was no tomorrow.

"Aah," Donna was fast to smirk.

"I've just been thinking, realizing, that it was very familiar. Everything between Renata and I...it's just so familiar."

"You mean...Renata reminded you of Zuriah?" Donna tilted her head. It was a fair thing considering the two women had been friends long ago. Except, it was one thing was to be reminded of Zuriah because of the friendship she shared with Renata and another thing was to remember Zuriah by kissing her friend.

"I know, it doesn't make sense and it's plain awful that I'm doing this," the Doctor leaned away from the console. He couldn't figure it out. He was just so confused and it was driving him crazy. Worst of all was that he didn't have the courage to talk to Renata about it, at least not yet. It'd been a few days since the whole King Henry visit and while they had shared a wonderful moment, neither seemed to be able to talk about it afterwards. They were still close, they were good friends, but...something wasn't right. It pained the Doctor that Renata wouldn't talk about their kiss, that she wouldn't mention their night adventure through the palace. Had she regretted it? Was she being kind and just ignoring it? Moving on from it?

The Doctor felt his hearts stop each time he thought about Renata moving on from that kiss. Donna was right, he was smitten with Renata. He was so smitten with her.

"Doctor?" Donna called his name when his face had turned pale. "Hey, are you okay?"

"No, no I'm not," he exhaled deeply as he let his body lean against the console. "Oh, Donna. You were right."

"I was," Donna nodded her head firmly before asking, "What was I right about?"

"I like Renata. I really like her and right now...I'm going crazy."

Donna's eyes widened. She thought she would have to work at least a few more weeks to crack the Doctor, but it seems like Renata took care of that already. "Oh, um...well, at least you admit it. That's a good step. Honestly, it wasn't that hard to tell. Anyone could see it."

"Yeah?" the Doctor glanced at her. "What do you think about Renata, then? You think she...reciprocates these...feelings?"

Donna scoffed. "Please! It's so obvious, Doctor! I don't know how you missed it! The way she looks at you! All those little smiles she gives you! How could you have missed it? Well, I suppose the same way she missed the fact you like her too! For two people who are so smart, you sure are dumb!"

"Alright, alright, I get it," the Doctor rolled his eyes. Leave it to Donna to make him smile right now.

"So what are you going to do? Ask her out on a date? Oh, how about-"

"Donna, we kissed. We kissed and now I don't know how to talk to her about it," the Doctor found himself blurting. He couldn't picture himself having this type of talk with anyone, but Donna gave him a sense of security. She would keep his secrets just like he imagined Gabby kept Renata's. He wondered if Renata had told Gabby about their kiss...

"Wow, you work fast!" Donna laughed.

"It's not all so good. I haven't been able to talk to her about it and now I'm wondering if it's even worth doing it," the Doctor sighed. "If she hasn't talked to me about it then...wouldn't that mean she doesn't want to talk about it?

"Not precisely. Could just be that Renata's nervous about it," Donna shrugged. "I've had loads of friends do that."

"So then how do I talk to her about it?"

"Well, first you gotta know what you want to to tell her. I have seen so many relationships fail because the bloke has no idea what he wants. That's a sure way to make a woman angry. What do you want with Renata?"

The Doctor exhaled at the question. If he was being honest with himself, the first thing he would want from Renata was to kiss her again. He'd want nothing more than to kiss her and for a longer time than their previous one had been. "I do want something with her but I also confess that...that I'm concerned."

"Concerned about what?" Donna asked curiously.

"That everything about her is so familiar. It's not fair to her that I keep thinking about Zuriah. And then I don't know why I keep thinking back to Zuriah."

"Maybe you just need some time to sort your head out," Donna suggested. He wouldn't be the first man to be confused between two women, even if one was a ghost.

"I guess..." the Doctor sighed. He might just be horrible though because even though he was confused, he knew that he did want Renata. He wanted her now. It made it incredibly hard to keep his hands from touching her during these past days. He even struggled not to keep looking at her after what was considered normal. He had no idea how Renata was so normal. Actually, maybe he did. She was trained to keep her emotions inside and she was damn good at it.

The Doctor didn't know if she was acting normal because she'd moved on from their kiss or if she was just faking. It was driving him crazy! He needed to figure something out soon because he didn't know how much longer he could last like this.

~ 0 ~

Renata was completely enamored with their current location. It was a huge library that was literally the planet. "This is it," she murmured as she made her way through the reception area. "This is literally my favorite trip."

"We've only been here for 2 minutes," Gabby pointed out but Renata waved her off.

"I don't care. This is my favorite one. It's so big, it's full of books, it's quiet and...normal..." Renata turned to the Doctor, allowing him to view her wide-eyed expression. "Why did it take you so long to show me this place?"

The Doctor smiled a tight smile, one that Renata discreetly noticed. She could only guess what was running through his head. She inwardly sighed to herself. She was ruining things, she knew she was but she was such a coward...and scared. She was so scared.

After their kiss in King Henry VIII's palace, Renata knew there was no way she could keep up her charade with the Doctor. That was ruined the moment she let him put his lips on hers. She loved him too much and the fact he had chosen to kiss her meant that he was starting to feel something for her...but the wrong her. She would truly be the worst type of woman if she allowed the Doctor to develop feelings for this version of her when he didn't know who she really was. That's where she drew the line. She would hurt him even more if she let him believe he was falling for a different woman. But she was so scared to tell him the truth. She had lied for too long that he was definitely react badly to it. It was his right to. He had been fed too many lies, one after the other, that the only thing he should do with her was to throw her out of the TARDIS. Just thinking about it broke Renata's hearts, but she knew she had no right to protest.

If she was being honest, she was disgusted with herself. For too long she had hidden and lied and it was only now that she realized she only set up the path that would hurt the man she loved most. It seemed like she was always destined to hurt the Doctor. Renata hated herself. Every day, she hated herself a little bit more.

"This is the 51st century, right?" Renata crossed the reception, leading the group through a door that would bring them to quite a view. She needed to control her feelings right now. She was secretly flexing her fingers as the familiar warmth spread through them. That energy was getting stronger, like it wanted to burst. "You know, I'm not much of a future girl but I do like the fact that this Century has holovids, direct to brain downloads and fiction mist."

"What? You get a book download into your head?" Donna tapped the side of her own head.

"Yeah, I know, not all that great if you're old fashioned and want a physical copy."

"Oh wow," Donna came first to see the view ahead of them. She walked closer to the rail and saw endless aisles of bookshelves. "It truly is a city!"

"The Library," the Doctor came up beside her to admire the view. "So big it doesn't need a name. Just a great big 'the'."

"A library that's a planet!" Renata laughed as she came to the view as well. "Now this is fantastic!"

"It is," agreed the Doctor. "The whole core of the planet is the index computer, biggest hard drive ever. And up here, every book ever written. Whole continents of Jeffrey Archer, Bridget Jones, Monty Python's Big Red Book. Brand new editions, specially printed. We're near the equator, so…" he licked his finger and raised it to the air, "This must be Biographies! I do love biographies!"

"Yeah, very you. Always a death at the end," Donna remarked. Gabby cleared her throat and gave her a pointed look. "Right," Donna murmured. The topic about death was a touchy one considering their uptight Time Lady still wasn't being honest about her own death arriving.

Renata had wandered away from the railing and sifted through some books, but she ultimately realized that they were very much alone. "It's so... silent," she remarked. "Where is everyone?"

The Doctor wondered the same thing. He found an information terminal and tinkered with it.

"Maybe it's a Sunday?" Donna said.

"No, I never land on Sundays. Sundays are boring."

"It is library. Maybe everyone's really quiet," Gabby thought next.

"Yeah, maybe. But they'd still show up on the system," the Doctor murmured as he went deeper into the terminal's system.

"I'm beginning to think that there's something going on," Renata left the table of books she stopped by and walked over to the Doctor. "This wasn't your first choice of trips."

"It wasn't?" he repeated, not really paying her attention. The system was a bit difficult to get through.

"No. If I recall correctly, you mentioned something about a beach…"

"Did I?"

"Yeah, so why the sudden change?"

But the Doctor had finally found something worthwhile. "Now, that's interesting. I'm scanning for life forms. If I do a scan looking for your basic humanoids - you know, your book readers, few limbs and a face - apart from us, I get nothing. Zippo, nada, see?"

Renata gazed at the screen herself to confirm what he was saying. "Hm, nobody home I guess?"

"Right, but if I widen the parameters to any kind of life…" the Doctor went in again to change the settings and this time when the scan was done they got an "error; .000; lifeform number capped at maximum record' on the screen. "A million million. Gives up after that. A million million."

"But... there's nothing here…" Gabby gave an unsettling look around the place. She was starting to get a bad feeling. "There's no-one."

"And not a sound," the Doctor added. "A million million life forms, and silence in the Library."

"But there's no-one here. There's just books. I mean, it's not the books, is it?" Donna wanted to laugh but then she realized she'd seen crazier things before. "Wait...can the books be alive?"

Renata turned her head slowly at the nearest table of books. She wanted to think it was a crazy idea but, like Donna had also thought, they'd seen far crazier things already. She cautiously moved to the table and reached for a book, readying herself in case one of them snapped to bite her-

"Welcome!"

Renata actually yelled and snapped her hand back to her chest.

"It came from in there!" Gabby pointed in the direction they'd come from. They all bolted back and searched for the source of the unknown voice.

It turned out to be a Node, a statue with an actual face on its head. "I am Courtesy Node 710/aqua. Please enjoy the Library and respect the personal access codes of all your fellow readers regardless of species or hygiene taboo."

Donna couldn't help but stare at its talking face. It was too creepy. "That face, it looks real."

The Doctor knew where she was getting at and wondered how badly it would get to her. "Yeah, don't worry about it."

"But a statue with a real face, though! It's a hologram or something, isn't it?"

"It's got to be," Gabby said instinctively but then shot a look at Renata when the doubt got to her. "Right?" Renata didn't say anything but the face she was making had all the answers. Gabby wrinkled her nose in disgust. "Oh, that's gross!"

"Additional," the Mode started up again. "There follows a brief message from the head librarian for your urgent attention. It has been edited for tone and content by Felman Lux Automated Decency Filter. Message follows. 'Run. For God's sake, run. No way is safe. The Library has sealed itself, we can't...oh, they're here. Arg. Slarg. Snick.'" Message ends. Please switch off your mobile comm units for the comfort of other readers."

"So that's why we're here…" the Doctor murmured. "Any other messages, same date stamp?"

"One additional message. This message carries a Felman Lux coherency warning of 5, 0, 11…"The Doctor could not deal with the legalities and hurried the Node along. "Message follows: 'Count the shadows. For God's sake, remember... if you want to live, count the shadows.' Message ends."

There was a collective fear that spread amongst the group.

"Everyone...stay out of the shadows," the Doctor warned as he himself made sure not to stand over a shadow that wasn't his.

"This is supposed to be a library - what could there be in the Shadows?" Renata could not believe that something as simple - as peaceful - as a library could be ruined.

The Doctor couldn't answer correctly, so he started leading them through another door to come across a huge aisle of bookshelves. It was several floors high, possibly endless since they couldn't even see the actual top.

"Alright Doctor, the jig is up," Donna said, shooting him all her suspicious looks. "We weren't just in the neighborhood. Why are we here?"

The Doctor supposed she was right. Better to start with the truth if they wanted to focus on figuring out what was wrong with the library. "Yeah, alright, I kind of, sort of lied a bit. I got a message on the psychic paper."

"You did what!?" Renata groaned. She should've known better than to believe he would openly come to a place like this when the only adventure were the skyscraper bookshelves.

He showed them his psychic paper which had a message left for him. ' The Library. Come as soon as you can. x'

"What do you think? Cry for help?"

"Cry for help - with a kiss?" Gabby raised an eyebrow at him. "Looks more like a message for a date."

"Who's it from?" asked Renata with an unusual hardness in her tone.

"No idea."

"So then we have no idea if this has all just been a big ole trap?"

The Doctor briefly looked to the side. "Uuh…"

Renata groaned. "This is why we do environmental checks before we leave the TARDIS!"

"I didn't think we needed one! This is a library!"

"Those were the rumors until a statue told us to run!"

Gabby didn't want to listen to them bicker so she looked away, but in doing so she noticed that the lights were going out at the end of the corridor. "Uh, guys! The lights!"

The Doctor and Renata quit arguing to see what Gabby meant and we're equally horrified to see darkness coming towards them.

"Run!" the Doctor ordered before taking charge. They came to a locked door and despite attempting to use his sonic, it wouldn't budge. "Jammed! The wood's warped!"

"What? And the sonic doesn't work!?" Donna exclaimed.

"I can't, it's wood!"

"What?" Gabby nearly keeled over from shock. "That thing can do hundreds of things against aliens but it can't open a stupid wooden door!?"

"Dare I ask about mine?" Renata waved her own sonic in the air.

"I...wouldn't," the Doctor sighed and tried fiddling with his sonic again. There had to be something he could do. "Hang on, hang on, if I can vibrate the molecules, fry the bindings, I can shatterline the interface…"

Donna groaned. At this rate they would die faster. "Oh, get out of the way!" she shoved the man to the side and kicked the door open with all her might.

"Alright Donna!" Gabby laughed, impressed with their friend's quick thinking.

"Yeah, yeah, get in!" Renata ushered them in first then pulled the Doctor behind her.

Together they quickly shut the door and used a book to bolt it. When the Doctor turned around to see where they were, he found a small girl standing a few feet away.

"Oh! Hello! Sorry to burst on you like this. OK if we stop here for a bit?"

But the girl blinked and turned into a sphere instead.

"That's...new." Gabby blinked. "Can we expect more little girls turning into spheres?"

The Doctor, not amused with her question, shot her a momentary glare. He rushed to pick up the sphere and sonicked it. "Security camera. Switched itself off."

"Why would it switch off?" asked Renata when she joined him. It looked high tech, definitely something a library like this one would have.

Somewhere along the sonicking, the sphere gave a high pitched scream. It almost sounded like it was…

"Wait, stop!" Renata snag he'd the sphere from the Doctor's hands. "Look!" she turned it over from him to see the words running along its screen.

'No, stop it, no, no!'

"Ooh, I'm sorry!" the Doctor put the sonic away for the moment. Scanning it wouldn't be an option anymore. "I really am, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."

"It's alive," Renata carefully put the sphere back on the floor.

"I thought you said it was a security camera," Donna eyed the sphere as if it would move on them.

"It is. It's an alive one," the Doctor said.

"Look, it's saying something else," Gabby saw new words running across the screen. She bent down beside it to read aloud. "The others are coming?" she looked up at the alien pair, confused and a bit afraid. "Who are the 'others'?"

"I'm afraid to ask what that even means," sighed Donna who then noticed another Node in the room. "But I guess we'll have to." She walked up to it and, despite however creepy it was, she asked it a question. "Excuse me, what does it mean, "others"?"

"That's barely more than a speak your weight machine, it can't help you," the Doctor pointed out before she wasted more of her breath.

"So why's it got a face?"

The Node took care of the answer "This flesh aspect was donated by Mark Chambers on the occasion of his death."

Donna leaned forwards when she thought she heard wrong. Even Gabby had gotten back on her feet to stare in horror.

"It's a real face?!" Donna almost shrieked.

"It has been actualized individually for you from the many facial aspects saved to our extensive flesh banks. Please enjoy."

"Enjoy?" Gabby repeated.

"It chose me a dead face it thought I'd like?" Donna turned away from the Node, almost outraged. "That statue's got a real dead person's face on it…"

"Unfortunately that's not so uncommon here in the 51st century," Renata said with a crinkled nose.

"I want to leave now," Gabby resolved and turned away from the Node as well. She was about to walk away when the Doctor shouted for her to stop. He dove forwards to yank her in the opposite direction.

"What!? Ah!" she pushed him away in fear.

"The shadow, look!"

She'd been about to step on a dark shadow behind her. "What about it?"

"Count the shadows."

"One. There, I counted it, one shadow."

"Gabby you're not getting it," Renata seemed a bit more afraid than usual. "If that's a shadow...what's casting it?"

Gabby froze with wide eyes. Donna quickly looked around her immediate area to see if there was another unaccounted Shadow nearby.

"Oh! I'm thick! Look at me, I'm old and thick!" the Doctor banged a few fingers against his head. "Head's too full of stuff, I need a bigger head!"

"I think the world would literally explode," Renata couldn't help make the remark. It did elicit a smile from him though, a rather nice one.

They followed the Doctor towards a corridor and saw that it was pitch dark except for one lamp still blinking.

"Power must be going," Donna concluded.

"This place runs on fission cells. They'll outburn the sun," the Doctor said.

"Then why is it dark?"

"...it's not dark."

Donna went wide-eyed and turned away, only when she did she realized that the shadow Gabby had nearly stepped on was no longer there. "That shadow. It's gone."

That was it for the Doctor. "We need to get back to the TARDIS." Of course for Gabby and Donna it was very weird behavior.

"Why?" asked Gabby.

"Because that shadow hasn't gone. It's moved."

"Doctor, I don't like this place anymore," Renata was frantically searching for more Shadows trying to literally creep up on them.

"Reminder," the Node started again, "The Library has been breached, others are coming. Reminder: the Library has been breached, others are coming. Reminder: the Library has been breached…"

Another door in the room flung open and allowed six people - dressed in white spacesuits - inside. One of them, presumed to be the leader, walked straight to the Doctor, an action that made the man backtrack a couple steps.

The spacesuited person switched their visor to transparent to show their face. A woman with ashy brown hair and blue eyes smiled at him. "Hello sweetie."

Renata raised an eyebrow at her, but the Doctor had only gotten the fact that there were 6 unidentified humans trespassing into a dangerous place. "Get out!" he ordered them. "All of you, turn around, get back in your rocket and fly away! Tell your grandchildren you came to the Library and lived, they won't believe you!"

The woman inside the spacesuit paid him no attention and turned to her crew instead. "Pop your helmets, everyone. We've got breathers." At her command, everyone removed their helmets.

"How do you know they're not androids?" one of the females in the crew asked her.

"Cos I've dated androids. They're rubbish."

A bald man went straight to the group, looking just as displeased with them as the Doctor was with the crew. "Who is this? You said we were the only expedition, I paid for exclusives."

The woman shrugged. "I lied, I'm always lying. Bound to be others."

"Miss Evangelista," the man barked at a petite woman. "I want to see the contracts."

"You came through the north door, yeah?" the ashy-brown haired woman asked the Doctor. "How's that, much damage?"

"Please, just leave," the Doctor went flat with his tone. "I'm asking you seriously and properly, just lea... Hang on. Did you say expedition?"

"My expedition, I funded it," the bald man made sure to clarify it.

"And how are you feeling about it?" Renata questioned him since she was sure they'd probably come across the fearsome shadows.

"Oh, you're not, are you? Tell me you're not archaeologists," the Doctor rubbed his face in frustration. That's the last thing he needed.

"Got a problem with archaeologists?" the lead woman asked from him, sounding amused.

The Doctor dropped his hands to his side. "I'm a time traveler. I point and laugh at archaeologists."

"Well that's not nice," Gabby chuckled. The woman spared her a look that wasn't too...kind. It quieted Gabby down in seconds.

"Who are you?" asked Donna. She wasn't given any type of look.

"Ah. Professor River Song, archaeologist."

"River Song, lovely name. As you're leaving, and you're leaving now... you need to set up a quarantine beacon," the Doctor turned her around for the nearest door. "Code-wall the planet, the whole planet. Nobody comes here, not ever again... not one living thing, not here, not ever."

"Wait, stop!" he heard Renata cry. He'd turned to see one of the female crew members had nearly stepped on a shadow. "Trust me, you don't want to go anywhere near a shadow. "What's your name?"

"Anita," the woman responded shakily.

"Anita, stay out of the shadows, alright?"

"Yeah, we got that," River cut in, sounding a bit irritated with Renata. Like Gabby - though more - Renata was getting a similar cold look.

"She's right," the Doctor agreed with Renata. "Not a foot, not a finger in the shadows till you're safely back in your ship. Goes for all of you. Stay in the light. Find a nice, bright spot and just stand. If you understand me, look very, very scared."

"Those aren't very good instructions," Gabby remarked.

The Doctor could agree but he worked with what he had. He suddenly pointed at another man of the crew. "You, who are you?"

"Uh, Dave."

"OK, Dave-"

"Oh, well Other Dave, because that's Proper Dave the pilot-" he pointed to the last man of the crew, "-he was the first Dave, so when we…"

The Doctor didn't want to listen anymore, not when their lives were in danger. He grabbed Other Dave and walked them to the open door. "Other Dave, the way you came, does it look the same as before?"

"Yeah. Oh, it's a bit darker."

"How much darker?"

"Oh, like I could see where we came through just like a moment ago. I can't now."

The Doctor took that as the red alarm it was. "Seal up this door. We'll find another way out."

"We're not looking for a way out," the bald man said in a snark.

"Oh, so you want to die," Renata said as the only logical reason behind his choice.

The man glared at her but called for the petite woman from before. "Miss Evangelista?"

Miss Evangelista gathered the travelers together to hand them each a pile of papers. "I'm Mr. Lux's personal... everything. You need to sign these contracts agreeing that your individual experience inside the Library are the intellectual property of the Felman Lux Corporation."

"Humans," Renata looked at the Doctor and this time he couldn't really say anything to her. Instead, he ripped up the contract, prompting the others to do the same.

Lux nearly lost it at their outright disrespect. "My family built this Library. I have rights!"

"You have a mouth that won't stop," River promptly corrected and turned to the Doctor with a sweet smile, as if she hadn't just been rude. "You think there's danger here?"

The Doctor's expression was flat. Was he not being clear when he tried throwing them out? Did he have to speak louder? He cleared his throat and went ahead and explained one more time, "Something came to this Library and killed everything in it, killed a whole world. Danger? Could be."

"But that was 100 years ago. The Library's been silent for 100 years. Whatever came here is long dead."

"Or it's just something that's really patient," Renata offered an alternative she believed could be very true. Unfortunately, River ignored her.

"What are you doing?" Lux asked Other Dave when he caught the man locking up the door.

"He said seal the door!"

"Torch!" the Doctor said right before snatching a torch from Lux's hand.

"You're taking orders from him?" Lux glared at his crew member for the blatant disobedience.

"Spooky, isn't it?" the Doctor found the time to smirk at Lux as he walked to the other side of the room. There were so many things he could look through, but he doubted one of them would give him an idea of how to get everybody out of there unharmed. "Almost every species in the universe has an irrational fear of the dark. But they're wrong. Cos it's not irrational. It's Vashta Nerada."

"Vastha what?" Gabby raised an eyebrow at him.

"Oh not that…" Renata brought a hand to cover her mouth. That was seriously the last thing they needed. That lesson she learned very fast in the academy - mostly because it had scared the living daylights out of her.

"What's Vashta Nerada?" Donna asked the same question in hopes of finally getting the answer.

"Bad, just very bad," Renata dropped her hand to her side. "It's what's in the dark. It's what's always in the dark. So it makes it harder to fight...I'd rather see Weeping Angels. Doctor," she marched for him, missing the way River watched her, "How do we fight Vashta Nerada without getting killed?"

She'd stopped him momentarily from his search, but it was only for him to see her honest fear. He didn't want to tell her that he had no idea, but…

There's always something, he reminded himself. He looked around the room for the slightest of things that could help. "Lights!" he exclaimed. "That's what we need, lights. You got lights?"

"What for?" called River.

"Form a circle, safe area, big as you can, lights pointing out."

"Oi! Do as he says!" River told the rest of the crew, even clapping her hands to make sure they heard her. Despite Lux's defensiveness, the crew followed River's instructions. "Anita, unpack the lights. Other Dave, make sure the door's secure, then help Anita. Mr. Lux, put your helmet back on, block the visor. Proper Dave, find an active terminal. I want you to access the Library database, see what you can find about what happened here a hundred years ago. Pretty Boy, you're with me. Step into my office."

Renata shot River a look for her choice of words. She seemed to know the Doctor but...he didn't seem to. But she was a bit...distant with the rest. She'd already noticed long ago that River had only introduced herself because Donna asked her but even then River had yet to introduce herself to Gabby or Renata herself.

"I have no idea what's going on," Gabby came over to Renata, heaving a big sigh. "All I know is that I should be afraid...of the dark. Did I get that right?"

Renata hated to nod her head, but she had to. "We'll get out of this, we always do."

"Pretty boy, with me I said!" River's call for the Doctor garnered both their attention. The Doctor had yet to notice he was being requested.

"And should we be worried about her?" Gabby whispered to Renata while discreetly pointing a finger at River. "We have no idea who she is."

"No, but…" Renata brought her arms over one another, her tongue swiveling inside while she tried calming herself, "...she seems to know the Doctor very well."

"Doctor, for goodness' sake!" River got tired and motioned the Doctor to join her.

"Oh was I Pretty Boy?" he stopped to question his companions.

"Yes," Donna answered flatly then thought to the side for a moment. "Did that come out a bit quick?"

"Pretty?!"

"Meh."

Renata smiled at Donna. When the Doctor finally joined River at a different table, she was rummaging through her bag. She pulled out a dark blue book with the TARDIS pattern on the cover.

"Thanks," she said.

"For what?"

"The usual. For coming when I call."

The Doctor blinked, almost tempted to take his psychic paper out to reread the message again. "Oh, that was you?"

River smiled but it was one that led to confusion. "You're doing a very good job, acting like you don't know me. What did I do this time, according to Gabby?"

"Gabby?" the Doctor repeated, briefly glancing at the girl. Renata was keeping her and Donna busy in safe zones, as well as overlooking what the others were doing. "Why would she say something?"

"Well, one never knows with her but since she's always with Renata I'm always prepared," River grabbed her TARDIS colored blue book. The Doctor caught onto the extra emphasis River put on Renata's name and it didn't exactly sound friendly. "OK, shall we do diaries, then? Where are we this time?" she searched his face for any type of clue but all she saw was that he was very young. "So I'd say it's early days for you. So, um…" she opened her book and skimmed a few pages, "Crash of the Byzantium, have we done that yet?" the Doctor scrunched his face, giving her the answer she needed. "Oh, how about the Silva gemstone hunt?" The Doctor was silent. "Blimey, very early days, then. Huh, life with a time traveler, never knew it could be such hard work." She lowered her book and really examined the Doctor's face. She blinked when it hit her. "You're so young."

"I'm really not, you know…"

"Nah, but you are. Your eyes. You're younger than I've ever seen you."

"You've seen me before, then?"

River stiffened when a new realization struck her, the possibility of it making her shake for a moment. "Doctor... please tell me you know who I am?" The hope on her face made the Doctor feel terrible when he asked her who she was. He always remembered everyone he met, but River was not one of them.

An alarm rang in the room, but it was a strange type. Still, it made everyone in the room jump.

"Sorry, that was me!" Proper Dave cleared his throat. "Trying to get through into the security protocols, I seem to have set something off. What is that? Is that an alarm?"

"No…" Renata looked at Gabby and Donna, the answer right at the tip of her tongue.

"It's a phone!" Gabby exclaimed first.

"I'm trying to call up the data core, but it's not responding. Just that noise," Proper Dave explained.

"No buddy, that's a phone," Gabby wanted to walk over to him but as soon as she took a few steps towards him, Renata pulled her back. "Okay…"

"Let me try something," the Doctor headed for the terminal that Proper Dave was working on. He noticed the screen was showing the same symbol the security camera they'd found earlier had. Access denied. "OK, doesn't like that, let's try something else." He did a bit more tinkering and was relieved to see that this time the screen was brightening up. "OK, here it comes. Hello?"

The screen showed a little girl who looked perfectly normal, though very much confused. "Hello," she came closer to the screen. "Are you in my television?"

"Well, no, I'm, I'm... sort of in space. I, I was trying to call up the data core of a triple-grid security processor."

"Doctor, she doesn't understand that," Renata laughed at him and moved up to stand beside him. "Hi there sweetie," she smiled at the girl. "Is there an adult with you, by any chance?"

"My Dad is," the girl smiled back at her. She tilted her head suddenly, examining the pair on her end of the screen. "I know you! You were in my Library."

"Your library?" the two Time Lords repeated.

"The Library's never been on the television before. What have you done?"

Renata turned her head at the Doctor, her expression nearly asking him the same thing.

"I-I didn't do anything!" he exclaimed. "I just rerouted the interface…"

But the connection broke then.

"Who was that?" asked River as she walked on over as well. The screen returned to its 'access denied' bit.

"I need another terminal!" the Doctor decided and ran to where River had set up her station. There was another terminal beside it. "Keep working on those lights, we need those lights!"

"Is there anything we can do?" Gabby caught River by the arm but the moment she did River jerked away...almost in fear. It froze Gabby in her spot, but it didn't keep River at bay.

"I told you to never touch me!"

"I didn't mean-"

"Keep your butterflies off of me!" River's voice, though threatening, had an underlying shakiness. River soon met Renata's gaze and gave the Time Lady a cold glare. "She touched me so don't even start!"

Renata blinked with bemusement, something that further angered River. "I have no idea what you're talking about." River scoffed. "I really don't." Renata said calmly. She wasn't much for stand offs, especially with people she didn't even know. "But please don't yell at my friend. She hasn't done anything."

"Renée?" the Doctor called to the Time Lady. Renata's eyes lingered on River's glaring gaze, wanting to figure out the puzzle right in that moment but it was impossible. So, she walked away to reach the Doctor. "What was that about?" he asked her quietly.

"I don't know," Renata shrugged. "But maybe you'll find out considering she seems to know you...and very well by the looks of it."

The Doctor's brow furrowed at her accusation. "What are you trying to say?"

Suddenly, Renata saw them back in King Henry's palace with the Doctor accusing her of having an affair with the King. She was getting the same feeling, the same urge, to ask the Doctor. She didn't have the right to. She couldn't be even worse than what she already was. "Nothing, I'm sorry," she sighed.

"Renata," the Doctor started with a new nervousness that hadn't been on his face seconds ago, "I've been...I've been meaning to talk to you..."

Renata swallowed hard when she presumed where the conversation would steer to. In her attempt to look away, she spotted River's diary on the table. "What's that?"

"Hm?" the Doctor followed her gaze to the table and saw the diary. "Oh, uh, it's hers. It's her diary."

"It's just like the TARDIS…"

"Yes, I've noticed."

"Don't touch it," River came by to take the book off the table. "You're not allowed to see inside the book, it's against the rules."

"What rules?" frowned Renata.

"Yours," River made a nod at her then the Doctor.

"Ah." Renata wouldn't even question it then. She was about to turn away when books started flinging off the shelves.

"What's that!?" Donna ducked and yanked Gabby down with her before they were both smacked in the face. "Doctor!"

"I didn't do anything!" the man cried. "Did you!?" he set eyes on Proper Dave.

"No!"

"Doesn't matter who did it - someone stop it!" Renata covered her head with her arms.

The Doctor returned to the terminal without being hit - yet - and saw the screen were now blinking 'CAL'. "What's CAL?"

The books eventually stopped flying off, letting the crew and the travelers get back on their feet.

"This is beyond crazy," Gabby said after being able to stand again. "What's causing the books to fly off the shelves? The Shadows?"

"Don't be ridiculous," River rolled her eyes. "It's probably the girl."

"Begging the question of who is that little girl," the Doctor took in a deep breath. Nothing was making sense. "What's she got to do with this place? How does the data core work? What's the principle? And what's CAL?"

That last question River could answer. "Ask Mr. Lux. He owns the place."

"CAL, what is it?" he turned to the man in question, expecting an answer but instead god a sneer.

"Sorry. You didn't sign your personal experience contracts."

The noise that slipped through Renata's lips was not a kind one. "Humans!" she gestured to Lux as her prime example. "We're all in danger of dying but you care more about protecting a patent!? Doctor!"

"Yeah, alright, I'll give you that one," the Doctor raised his hands. Today was not a good day for humankind.

"I'm protecting my family's pride," Lux tried defending himself but his answer was no better than the first.

"Well, funny thing, Mr Lux, I don't want to see everyone in this room dead because some idiot thinks his pride is more important!" the Doctor snapped.

"Then why don't you sign his contract?" River made him pause where he was. Of course before he answered, she grinned mischievously. "I didn't either. I'm getting worse than you."

"Okay, okay, okay. Let's start at the beginning. What happened here?" the Doctor really tried focusing this time. If he couldn't figure things out from where they stood, but maybe if he started from the beginning, things could change. "On the actual day, a hundred years ago, what physically happened?"

"There was a message from the Library. Just one," River answered. ""The lights are going out". Then the computer sealed the planet, and there was nothing for a hundred years."

"It's taken three generations of my family just to decode the seals and get back in," Lux added.

"Did you ever think that was a clue not to open it?" asked Donna. If she saw three different, high tech locks on a door she would take that as something that shouldn't be opened under any circumstances.

"Um... excuse me…" Miss Evangalista tried to cut into the conversation but Lux shut her down without even sparing her a glance. She'd actually found something on the wall.

"There was one other thing in the last message…" River said after a moment. As soon as she admitted it, Lux threw daggers at her.

"That's confidential!"

"I trust this man. With my life, with everything!" River's certainty left various reactions amongst the TARDIS travelers.

Both Gabby and Donna were in similar states of surprise considering the Doctor had never even mentioned that woman.

Renata was simply stunned. She'd never met anyone who had that same belief in the Doctor. It saddened her a bit to realize that she - Zuriah - was no longer the only woman to have had that type of faith in the Doctor. You made everything happened, she blamed herself. He had no obligation to stay alone because she made the wrong choice. But it made her wonder just how well River actually knew the Doctor and vice versa. River was clearly from the future and Renata didn't even know what the future held for herself anymore.

The Doctor didn't know what to do with himself. He felt guilty that River trusted him when he really had zero clue who she was. She was so sure and yet clearly hurt that he didn't know her. That was time travel, unfortunately. Sometimes not everything happened in order.

"You've only just met him!" Lux barked but he was no match for River's voice.

"No, he's only just met me!"

"Um. This might be important actually…" Miss Evangelista tried once again but the conversation was too heated for any interruptions.

"In a moment!" Lux shouted at her and that was it for her.

River sighed heavily and went for her PDA left on the table. Better to get things moving before they were killed, after all. "This is a data extract that came with the message." She came back to the Doctor to show him the complete message.

He took it from her and saw the main reason they were in the building. ""4022 saved. No survivors."

"4022, that's the exact number of people who were in the Library when the planet was sealed."

"But how can 4022 people have been saved if there were no survivors?" Donna inquired. So far the building had been absolutely silent. Unless these people were seriously good hiders, the building was empty.

"That's what we're here to find out," River told her.

"And so far, what we haven't found any bodies," Lux added.

"Well that's good isn't it?" Gabby's question earned her some strange looks. With a nervous smile, she elaborated. "I meant, if there aren't any bodies yet, it means there's a chance they're still alive.'

"Yes but where are they?" River hurriedly asked but didn't give Gabby the attention to even listen to her theories.

Suddenly, Miss Evangelista screamed but the crew and the travelers realized that she wasn't even in the room.

"When did she leave!?" Renata asked after a quick, frantic search for her in the room.

"Never mind that, c'mon!" the Doctor led the chase for the source of the woman's scream.

They came to a lecture room but all they found was a skeleton on the ground...wearing the same spacesuit Miss Evangelista was.

"Careful!" the Doctor warned the group as they gathered around the skeleton. "Everybody, careful! Stay in the light."

"Because of that, obviously," Renata gestured to the skeleton then glanced at Lux. "You wanted a body, there it is."

"Is that...is that Miss Evangelista?" River was horrified to see what was left of her co-worker. As if she couldn't fully believe it, she grabbed her communicator built into her spacesuit and called into it. "Miss Evangelista, please state your current…" but at the same time she spoke, her voice was heard in the spacesuit of the skeleton. She lowered her hand and carefully walked up to the skeleton. She pulled out a piece of the spacesuit's collar from its back and revealed a communicator that was still blinking green. "It's her. It's Miss Evangelista."

"We heard her scream a few seconds ago. What could do that to a person in a few seconds?" Anita asked, though she wasn't very interested in the answers. All she was interested in was getting the hell out of there.

"It took a lot less than a few seconds," the Doctor murmured. He felt at sole blame. He'd been so focus on figuring out who River was that he...he didn't even see when Miss Evangelista wandered out.

Renata didn't have to be telepathically connected with him to know where his thoughts were. She scooted to his side and touched his arm, giving him a small smile when he looked her way. "It's not," she said softly, hoping he would take her words seriously.

It seemed like he did. He found his own smile that he gave her and took her hand from his arm to hold in his own. It was a small moment but a moment nonetheless, and it was enough to give the Doctor the same feelings he'd been getting about her lately.

'Hello?'

River blinked at the sudden call from Miss Evangelista, but she secretly thanked it for cutting the two Time Lords apart. It was just like Renata to play soft when the moment called for it, but God forbid the Doctor did something wrong. "Um, I'm sorry everyone, um, this isn't going to be pleasant. She's ghosting."

"She's what?" Donna didn't know whether she should be looking for a ghost around.

'Hello, excuse me? I - I'm sorry, hello? Excuse me?'

"That's...that's her, that's Miss Evangelista!" Donna wondered, for a brief moment, if Miss Evangelista was still alive somewhere. Perhaps the skeleton was a decoy.

"I don't want to sound horrible, but couldn't we just... you know?" Proper Dave made a gesture to cut off the communication, but River frowned at him.

"This is her last moment... no, we can't. A little respect, thank you!"

'Sorry, where am I? Excuse me?'

"But is that really her, though?" Gabby Miss Evangelista.

"It's a data ghost, she'll be gone in a moment," River sighed and reached for her communicator again. "Miss Evangelista, you're fine, just relax. We'll be with you presently."

"What's a data ghost?" Gabby y turned to the Doctor and Renata for the answer. She got a feeling the first answer was all River would give her.

"There's a neural relay in the communicator, lets you send thought mails," the Doctor pointed to the blinking green lights on Miss Evangelista's spacesuit. "That's it there, those green lights. Sometimes it can hold an impression of a living consciousness for a short time after death. Like an after image."

"My grandfather lasted a day. Kept talking about his shoelaces," Anita said with her head hanging low.

'I can't see, I can't... Where am I?'

"She's just brain waves now. The pattern won't hold for long," Proper Dave said.

"She's conscious! She's thinking!" Donna argued.

'I can't see, I can't... I don't know what I'm thinking.'

"She's a footprint on the beach. And the tide's coming in," said the Doctor.

'Where's that woman? The nice woman... is she there?'

"What woman?" Lux looked around but as far as he knew, Miss Evangelista barely had friends.

"She means... I think, she means me," Donna realized after a few seconds. She'd only talked to the woman for a few minutes but...she was nice, probably nicer than the rest of the crew.

'Is she there? The nice woman?'

"Yeah, she's here, hang on," River turned to Donna. "Go ahead. She can hear you."

Donna fervently shook her head. "No!"

"Donna," the Doctor inched closer to the ginger. "Help her."

Donna felt like she was being asked the impossible. They wanted her to talk to the dead? That was too much. "She's dead!"

'Hello? Is that the nice woman?'

"Donna, she's fading," the Doctor tried again. "It's just for a few seconds. Help her."

Donna sighed. "Yeah, I guess... I'm here." She only took a few steps towards the skeleton. "You OK?"

'What I said before, about being stupid. Don't tell the others, they'll only laugh.'

Donna felt like shooting the crew a glare for how they made that poor woman feel all the time, but what would be the point? At least they have the decency to look ashamed of themselves. "Course I won't. Course I won't tell them."

'Don't tell the others, they'll only laugh…'

"I won't tell them. I said I won't," Donna promised her.

'Don't tell the others, they'll only laugh.'

"I'm not going to tell them."

'Don't tell the others, they'll only laugh.'

"She's looping now. The pattern's degrading," River said once Miss Evangelista started stuttering. Eventually, she had to shut the neural relay down.

"That was... that was horrible. That was the most horrible thing I've ever seen," Donna covered her face for a moment to calm herself down.

River was glaring daggers but at nothing in particular. "No. It's just a freak of technology. But whatever did this to her, whatever killed her... I'd like a word with that."

"I'll introduce you," the Doctor was on the same level of anger as River. He stormed out of the lecture room, leaving the others to follow, and returned to their room. "I'm gonna need a packed lunch."

"Hang on!" River exclaimed and went to retrieve her bag. She seemed to know exactly what he would like and that was simply shocking for Renata.

"So are we ever going to figure out who she is?" Gabby quietly made her question to Renata and Donna. The Doctor was working on his own but River seemed to linger around him in case he needed some assistance. "And how she knows the Doctor?"

"She's a time traveler, isn't it obvious?" Renata folded her arms over her chest. She couldn't help the irritation towards River, but what else could she feel? She hated to admit that she was jealous, like she had any sort of claim on the Doctor. The disgust towards herself might have raised in that moment.

"Ren?" Gabby touched her arm. "Hey, whatever you think...it's not."

Renata shook her head, smiling sourly. "It doesn't matter, Gabriella. I have...I have no right." She turned away, about to walk when she felt the warmth again only this time it sort of...hurt. She made a face and raised her hands, only to stop midway with a yelp. Something hard hit her stomach from the inside. "Ah!"

"Ren, you okay?" Donna heard the yelp along with Gabby.

"Y-yeah…" Renata tried her hardest to keep her next yelp inside. Her face strained to keep her mouth shut, but the fact she was wrapping her arm around her stomach gave her up.

"Renata!" Donna reached over and turned the Time Lady around, gasping when she saw how pale Renata had gone. She even felt a crazy heat from Renata's arm, through the Time Lady's coat, and backtracked.

Gabby had seen the whole thing and panicked. She thought the worst. "Doctor!"

Hearing her call made the Doctor whirl around. "What!? Gabby!" He then saw Renata's current state and bolted for them. "Out of the shadows! Out of the shadows!"

"No, no, there's no shadows," Renata found her voice, although she had to take several deep breaths to continue talking. "They're just being-"

"She looked like she was in pain and she's really warm, Doctor," Donna told him, her voice going right over Renata's tone. "Is it a fever? Can Time Ladies get fevers?"

"I do not have a fever!" Renata shouted, far louder than she had intended to.

The Doctor planted a hand over her forehead - making her lean back a few inches - and immediately felt the heat Donna was talking about. "That is-"

Renata swatted his hand away from her and glared at Gabby and Donna. "I'm fine, stop being over dramatic." The pain had subsided like it never even happened.

"Yes, please," River may not have been right next to them but her sharp voice was enough to pull the group apart.

Renata didn't know whether to be mad with River for her attitude or to thank the woman for cutting them off. She touched the Doctor's arm and offered him a soft smile. "I'm really okay," she said in a whisper, but the Doctor wasn't very convinced.

He stepped closer to her, leaving barely enough space between them. There was nothing but concern in his eyes for her. "We talked about this," he reminded her. "We need to be very cautious about your health…"

He hated to admit that her health was declining, not noticeably but steadily. He'd done new exams after visiting King Henry and was startled to see that the energy was further mutating inside her. There was no clear reading that could tell the Doctor why it was happening and much less what it was becoming. But it was interrupting her daily life, he could see it. There were moments were Renata got tired easily without doing anything in the first place. Then there was the strange heat flashes, warmth that came directly from the energy levels spiking. And the gold flicker in her eyes...that's what truly let him see that there was something inside Renata. It scared him to the bone what was lurking through her insides, hurting her...

Renata cupped his face, offering him her best smile. She was doing what she did best: hiding her feelings. "I'm okay Doctor. Really. Don't worry about me." He looked at her for a long while then, as if he was about to leave, but instead he pressed the back of his hand to her forehead again. She was really hot. "Vashta Nerada," she reminded him. "It will kill everyone in this room. Don't stop for me."

The Doctor hated to leave her, but she was right. Vashta Nerada would kill all of them if they didn't get out and what good would he be to Renata if they were all dead? With a sigh, he nodded his head. "Donna, Gabby, you keep an eye on her alright?" he looked directly at the women, expression close to dark with a warning. They were not to leave Renata's side.

River watched the Doctor return to his work across the room and waited a few minutes before making her own way up to Donna, Gabby and Renata. "You're Donna?" she stopped in front of the ginger. There was a glint of fascination in her eyes, but Donna also swore she saw...pity? Was that right?

"Yeah, yeah, I am," Donna nodded. "But it's not like you asked us who we are, right?" her gesture at Gabby and Renata flew over River's head. "Something you want to say?"

"No, uh, well actually yeah…" River paused for a second, glancing at the Doctor with a soft smile on her face. "Thank you." Donna blinked, not expecting for River to say that out of all things. "Thanks."

"Come again?"

River returned her attention to Donna but her eyes flickered to Renata still preoccupied with her hands. "What's wrong with you?"

Renata blinked up from her hands and frowned. "Excuse me?"

"We are in danger and you're distracting the Doctor with something, no doubt, dramatic."

Renata was stunned at the woman's brashness. "I-I don't intend to-"

River scoffed. "Sure. Listen, if you don't mind, we'd sort of like to get out of here alive and you being dramatic is not going to help anyone."

"I wasn't!" Renata exclaimed. She balled her fists once the warmth reflourished under her skin. She really shouldn't be arguing with anyone right now. "Look, River, I don't...I don't know why you're so upset with me but it shouldn't be a priority right now, don't you think? It's like you said, we need to get out of here alive."

River visibly tensed up. Renata always did that. River despised the annoying talent Renata had to always rearrange things so that she came out looking right while the other person, usually River, came out looking like the bad person. Even now, she still had the stupid talent and it was infuriating. She had said they needed to get out first but somehow Renata repeated the same thing and now both Gabby and Donna were looking at River with disapproval.

Renata was a master at reading faces. She had to be in order to know how to best please them. Her family taught her how to do it and how to always pick up on the right quirks. Right now, she could easily tell that she'd just further irritated River...but she wasn't sure why. She could barely argue, she couldn't move around a lot...what could she have done?

"I'm sorry," she felt compelled to say but even that was wrong.

"Oh, of course," River seemed to be expecting that...and she was. At one point or another, it almost always came up. Apologizing. That always made Renata look better in front of people, in front of the Doctor. "Save it, he's not watching!"

"I didn't mean to-"

"Stop it!" River snapped, getting more frustrated with each of Renata's attempts.

"You know what-" Gabby suddenly yanked Renata back, leaving the poor Time Lady to stumble backwards for Donna to catch, "-you need to back off!" She got right in River's face and since Gabby was smaller, she had to be on her tippy-toes. "Ren's not doing anything! You want to save people? Then go do it! Why are you being so mean? In case you haven't noticed, none of us-" she gestured to Renata, Donna and herself, "-know you! That means whatever you're mad about, we haven't even done yet. That makes you an extra type of prick."

"Gabriella, stop it!" Renata hissed and pulled the girl back, never having seen Gabby so worked up and much less having a stand off with anyone. She never wanted to see that even if it was on her behalf. "We are not going to waste time with silly arguments. I won't have it."

"It's funny, Gabby, you're so young. Nothing's happened to you but even now, you're still just like her," River's eyes flickered to Renata for show. Her previous hardness faded into strain. She wanted to appear brave, to be strong in front of those two women who were known to be strong. She was brave and strong and clever. She was really clever and she wasn't going to let some early baby versions of Renata and Gabby make her doubt that.

"Then that means I'm going to become a really good person," Gabby said confidently and glanced at Renata with a warm smile.

Renata blinked tears away. Her hearts warmed for a second with Gabby's utmost belief in her words. Gabby really thought that being like her would make her a better person.

"OK, we've got a live one!" the Doctor suddenly called, completely in the dark about the side conversation (or argument) that'd been going on. He was circling a shadow on the floor, careful not to step on it. "That's darkness down those tunnels, this is not a shadow. It's a swarm. A man-eating swarm." He used one of the chicken legs from River's lunch as bait for proof. He chucked it into the shadow and it was devoured before even hitting the ground. It left the entire group horrified. "The piranhas of the air, the Vashta Nerada. Literally 'the shadows that melt the flesh'. Most planets have them, but usually in small clusters. I've never seen an infestation on this scale, or this aggressive."

"What d'you mean, most planets? Not Earth?" Donna, along with Gabby, had an inkling feeling that it wasn't the case.

"Mmmm, Earth, and a billion other worlds. Where there's meat, there's Vashta Nerada. You can see them sometimes, if you look. The dust in sunbeams."

"Doctor, not to question your expertise but…I think we would've noticed if we had killer shadows on Earth," Gabby said, but her nervous smile faded with his long stare.

"Normally they live on roadkill. But sometimes people go missing. Not everyone comes back out of the dark."

"That's a lovely way to put it," Renata warned him with one of her own looks not to go into further detail. It was a fearsome idea that Gabby, nor Donna, were ready for.

"Every shadow?" River asked him, half curious for the real answer but the other half of her wanting to end such dramatics again.

"No. But any shadow."

"So what do we do?"

"Daleks - aim for the eyestalk. Sontarans - back of the neck. Vashta Nerada... Run! Just run."

"Run? Run where?"

"This is an index point. There must be an exit teleport somewhere," the Doctor searched the room rather urgently but settled for anything Lux could offer. The building was his after all.

"Don't look at me, I haven't memorized the schematics!" the man barked.

"You know," Renata stepped up beside River, "You can hate me all you want, but the one thing we can agree on is that he-" she nodded towards Lux, "-is no help at all."

"Mm," River hated to agree but she was right.

"Doctor, the little shop!" Donna had spotted a smaller room at the other end of the room. "They always make you go through the little shop on the way out so they can sell you stuff!"

"You're right! Brilliant! That's why I like the little shop!" the Doctor beamed.

"OK, let's move it!" Proper Dave exclaimed, ready to head out when the Doctor shouted for him to stop.

"Actually, Proper Dave, could you stay where you are for a moment?"

"Why?"

"I'm sorry. I am so, so sorry. But you've got two shadows."

Everyone's gazes immediately fell to the double shadows below Proper Dave. It definitely kept the man still.

"It's how they hunt, they latch on to a food source and keep it fresh," the Doctor muttered.

"What do I do?"

"You stay absolutely still. Like there's a wasp in the room, like there's a million wasps," the Doctor was very careful how he moved around the room. If the shadows were moving then any one of them could be next.

"We're not leaving you, Dave," River promised the terrified man.

"Course we're not leaving," agreed the Doctor. "Where's your helmet? Don't point, just tell me."

"On the floor, by my bag."

Anita retrieved the helmet for them and handed it to the Doctor. "Thanks. Now, the rest of you, helmets back on and sealed up. We'll need everything we've got."

"I would like to point out that we do not have helmets," Gabby cleared her throat to say.

"Yeah, but we're safe anyway," the Doctor said dismissively.

Gabby exchanged looks with Donna, both being confused by that statement. "How are we safe?" Donna asked him.

"We're not, that was a clever lie to shut you up!"

"Well, rude," Renata crossed her arms. "But he's not wrong so Gabby, Donna just...just stay with me alright?" The two women in question nodded.

"Professor, anything I can do with the suit?" the Doctor turned to River for help.

"We can increase the mesh-density, dial it up 400%. Make it a tougher meal!"

"Okay!" the Doctor pulled his sonic out and used it on Proper Dave's spacesuit. "800%! Pass it on!" he was about to hand River the sonic when she revealed her own...a rather familiar one though.

Renata nearly keeled over when she saw it. The Doctor was frozen in his spot while River went around the crew to sonic their suits.

Renata moved past Gabby and Donna to get closer, coming to a stop beside the Doctor just as River returned. "That's my screwdriver," Renata blinked.

"No, it's not," River said with a deep scowl.

"Yes, it is," Renata was sure of it. "It's my sonic screwdriver - fancier, but it is." And before River could deny it again, Renata pulled hers out as well. Both sonic screwdrivers were embedded with the same gold and white shades. River's gold was stronger and the tip seemed to be more high tech, but all in all it was the same sonic screwdriver.

River seemed just as stunned as Renata now. "How did…" her eyes flickered to the Doctor, accusing, "That was a cheap trick!"

"What?" he frowned, having no idea what she was going on about.

"You told me you made this!"

"He probably did," Renata murmured sadly. So much for being special.

The Doctor didn't know what was worse: seeing Renata's disappointed face, or seeing River's furious face. He himself was just...so confused. Why would he make a sonic screwdriver for River? He didn't go around making them just for anyone - by that logic, he should've made one for Gabby and Donna, or even Martha! How important could River be? And more to the point, why would he make one using the same schematics he used for Renata's?

Renata put her sonic away and sighed. "It's mine," she assured River. "But before you throw it away, if the Doctor gave it to you, it's because you would need it. Think about that, please."

Of course River was thinking about it. How stupid did Renata think she was? The Doctor never did anything without a good reason. She curled her hand around the sonic, gripping it tightly. She should've known better than to fully trust that he made the sonic all on his own. Renata would never let a project like that be done without her knowledge.

"Fine," River muttered and went on her way.

"Ren..." the Doctor tried touching her but she stepped away from him, an action that actually hurt. If she was stepping away then she didn't want to be near him and much less want him to touch her. And as of late, he discovered that he really liked to touch her. Hold hands, be close...

Renata yelped in surprise when the Doctor gently brought her from her side to his front. Her free hand had come to rest over his chest and her other hand seemed locked under the Doctor's free hand.

"You had fun?" the Doctor asked quietly though with his ragged breathing it came out a little louder than intended. They were both still trying to catch their breaths, they could feel it. Renata felt the Doctor's chest heaving up and down under her hand and since Renata's chest was pressed to his, the Doctor could feel her own heavy breathing.

The Doctor felt his breath leave him. What he would give to relive that moment again and not this one.

"We need to get them out of here," Renata's quiet voice pulled the Doctor out of his thoughts, missing the blush that crept over his face. He followed her gaze over to Gabby and Donna and realized she wanted to transport them back to the TARDIS. Neither of them knew what would happen with the Vashta Nerada around.

"You're right," he agreed. "Donna! Gabby! With us!" he made the motion as he and Renata led them towards the gift shop Donna pointed out earlier.

"What are we doing, we're shopping? Is it a good time to shop?" Donna understood his brain worked far differently than theirs but this one had to be a bad idea.

"That sonic...why was it like yours?" Gabby stopped to ask Renata that. She knew exactly that it was Renata's because she'd been there when the Doctor had made it. Granted she didn't know half the things that went into the sonic but the idea was the same.

"I don't know," Renata put on her best smile as she ushered Gabby onto the small platform of the gift shop. "Just stand still, okay?"

"Donna, you too," the Doctor tried to hide his grimness as he brought Donna over to Gabby's side.

"What is this?" Gabby looked down to the ground. There were odd circular patterns on it.

"It's a teleport. Stand in the middle. Can't send the others, TARDIS won't recognize them."

"Wait, what are you doing?" Donna started to look around more frantically.

"It's like Gabby said: you don't have suits, you're not safe!"

Gabby seemed to be closer to realizing what he was going to do. "Neither do you!" she exclaimed. "You and Renata are in as much danger as we are!"

"Thing is Gabriella, you haven't lived and you have no business being in this kind of danger. You and Donna are our number one priority right now," Renata smiled kindly then looked at the Doctor, giving him the nod to activate the teleport.

Donna's eyes widened. "Doctor, don't-"

But the teleport activated and pulled them out.

"You know, Renée-"

Renata raised a hand to stop the Doctor from even finishing his sentence. "Don't. I'm not going anywhere. I made that mistake once, I'm not doing it again."

The Doctor paused to give her a strange look, of course puzzled about her words. What could she have meant?

"Doctor!" River called from the other room.

The two hurried back and went straight to Proper Dave. They saw that he'd lost one shadow.

"Where did it go?" the Doctor quickly searched the immediate area. He pulled Renata's arm to bring her to his side. For the time being, that was the only area safe enough to stand.

"It's just gone. I... I looked round, one shadow," Proper Dave said

"Does that mean we can leave?" River urgently asked, ready to make a run for it. "I don't want to hang around here."

"I don't know why we're still here," huffed Lux. "We can leave him, can't we? I mean, no offence…"

"Seriously?" Renata glanced at River, gesturing at the man to prove he was still the only thing that could agree on.

"Yeah, fine!" River exclaimed. "Mr. Lux, shut up!"

"Did you feel anything?" the Doctor preferred to focus his attention on Proper Dave. The Vashta Nerada leaving him it made absolutely no sense, which made him drunk this was all a trick that would end with their lives. "Like an energy transfer? Anything at all?"

"No, no, but, look, it's, it's gone!"

"Stop there, stop, stop, stop there, stop moving! They're never just gone. And they never give up!" the Doctor sonicked the only shadow Proper Dave had. "Well, this one's benign."

"Hey, who turned out the lights?"

"No-one, they're fine."

"No, seriously, turn them back on!"

River was clearly confused but she wasn't the only one. None of them understood what was going on. "They are on."

"I can't see a ruddy thing!"

The Doctor straightened on his feet, expression even more dark than earlier. He had an idea of what was happening. "Dave, turn round."

Proper Dave turned back to the group but his face was completely in the dark. It looked like his helmet had it's visor tint back on.

"What's going on? Why can't I see?" Proper Dave helplessly asked. "Is the power gone, are we safe here?"

Renata swallowed hard. She liked to be realistic and seeing this… indicated what was about to happen.

"Dave, I want you to stay still, absolutely still," the Doctor warned but he caught the light stiffen that Dave suddenly did. "Dave, Dave? Dave, can you hear me, are you all right? Talk to me, Dave."

"I'm fine, I'm OK, I'm... I'm fine."

"I want you to stay still, absolutely still."

"No, Doctor…" Renata slowly walked up behind him, pressing a hand to his shoulder. He barely looked to her when Proper Dave started stuttering the same few words over and over.

The lights on his communicator were blinking, just like Miss Evangelista's was earlier too.

"He's gone. He's ghosting," River lowered her head with a sigh.

"Then why is he still standing?" Lux retracted a step for good measure.

"Hey! Who turned out the lights? Hey! Who turned out the lights?"

The Doctor attempted to move closer to Proper Dave but Renata gripped his arm. "Please don't," she whispered. Behind her, River pursed her lips together. She'd been about to say the same thing to him.

"Dave, can you hear me?" the Doctor he gently removed Renata's hand from his arm, his expression promising her that he would be careful.

"Hey! Who turned out the lights?" Proper Dave seized the Doctor's neck and gripped it with incredible force.

"Doctor!" Renata exclaimed.

Proper Dave's helmet was finally lit and it allowed for the others to see what was left of him: a skeleton. "Who turned out the lights? Hey! Who turned out the lights?"

"Excuse me!" River shoved Renata to the side and used her upgraded sonic on the skeleton. However, instead of the usual flashy lights like previous screwdrivers...this one released a particular interesting type of energy.

A swarm of golden butterflies emanated from the tip of the screwdriver and raced towards the skeleton. It was enough to force the skeleton to release the Doctor. The Time Lord coughed as the air returned to his lungs.

"Back from it, get back, right back!"

"Butterflies!?" River seemed even more outraged with her sonic than earlier when she discovered it was from Renata's schematics. "Are you kidding me!?"

"Those are my...my butterflies," Renata whispered in horror. She looked down at our own hands, remembering when the same golden butterflies that had surrounded her at Zhe's gallery.

"I hate butterflies," River gritted her teeth together.

"Let's go!" the Doctor yanked River back since she was too preoccupied with her screwdriver to notice Proper Dave getting closer to her.

"Doesn't move very fast does it?" Lux inquired about the skeleton's awkward manner of walking.

"It's a swarm in a suit. But it's learning," the Doctor said.

"Not very promising," Renata said then and not a moment later saw several shadows reaching out from proper Dave's body. They were coming for them. "As is that…" her voice shook with terrible fear.

"What do we do? Where do we go?" Lux frantically asked.

"See that wall behind you?" River turned around to face the group. "Duck!" those in question docked as she blasted a hole in the wall with a particular type of weapon.

"Squareness gun!" the Doctor laughed at their luck, but River focused on getting them all out of there first. They made a run down an aisle that was far too dark for their liking.

"You said not every shadow, right?" Renata's head wouldn't stop turning from one side to the other thinking that the next shadow they would come across would be Vashta Nerada.

"Right, but any shadow!"

"Hey! Who turned out the lights?" Proper Dave - or the Vashta Nerada - was following them and quicker now.

"And GO!" the Doctor yelled at the group who needed no other command to pick up their pace. The Doctor took Renata's hand and yanked her forwards, but even as they ran he could once again feel the insane heat from her skin. And when he happened to side-glance her, he was shocked to see how pale and weary she was.

As soon as they could find a refuge, the group sealed the door of the new room as best as they could with what they had. The Doctor left Renata somewhere she could rest, after sure there were enough shadows but her own, then hurried to the nearest lamp to get more light. River neared him a few seconds later.

"Trying to boost the power. Light doesn't stop them, but it slows them down," he said during a struggle with his sonic. There was light but a weak one.

"So, what's the plan? Do we have a plan?" Seeing his struggle, River used her own sonic to strengthen the light.

The Doctor eyed the golden white sonic. "Your screwdriver...it looks exactly like the one I made Renata."

Remembering that made River frown. "Yeah, I know. You tricked me."

"I did?"

"You said you made it but you never told me it was the same basic idea you used for Renata's first one."

"First one?"

River exhaled. "Sorry, spoilers. I just…I can't stand when you trick me like that, alright? You know I trust you with everything I have and…"

"Who are you?" the Doctor got tired of asking and never getting the answer. "I don't get it. I would never give a sonic screwdriver to anyone-"

"That isn't Renée, I know," River mimicked his tone then rolled her eyes. "That's why I can't believe I fell for it."

The Doctor inwardly sighed. His eyes flickered to Renata who seemed to be getting back on her feet, but still seemed very weary. "What's wrong with her?"

River briefly expressed confusion but she followed his gaze towards Renata. The Time Lady was once again studying her hands.

"How can I help her?"

River still didn't understand the question, much less the gravity of it, until she realized where in the timeline they were. "She's ill." She turned back to the Doctor. "This is when she's ill because...because she's been infected."

The Doctor winced at the word. Infection. How could he have let that happen? "I wasn't careful and she got hurt."

"No," River said sharply. "It wasn't your fault. She should've been more careful. Not everything that happens to her is on you, Doctor. Sometimes it's her own fault."

"How could you say that?" the Doctor frowned at her. "She didn't ask to be infected. She's innocent."

River almost laughed. "Ha! Renata is anything but innocent. Good people don't lead you on, Doctor. You know she's keeping a secret from you, right?"

"You're not supposed to tell me anything-"

"I know but I can't stand it! You always think that she's such a sweet, innocent woman but you never remember how you two started out: with lies. She's been lying to you, Doctor. Future you can be mad at me he wants but I know that I am right. I've always been right. But you…" she sighed as if she'd been tired for centuries now, "You have always been blind when it comes to her." That was her sad reality, a reality she'd tried to accept now that everything had passed...had been done...but it still made her angry just as the first time she learned everything.

"I don't believe that," the Doctor said quietly, though River wanted to believe she saw a flash of curiosity on his face. "So you're not going to tell me how to help her, then?"

"I don't know," River answered honestly. "I know about her getting sick but I don't know how she became...what she is later on." The Doctor narrowed his eyes on her, willing her to speak the truth. "I really don't!"

With a sigh, he turned away from her. He came to Renata and, without even asking, pressed his hand to her forehead. "You're still burning hot…"

"Maybe Donna was right, I am running a fever," Renata said with a weary smile.

Remembering their companions, the Doctor checked his sonic to make sure they were safe and sound in the TARDIS. His stomach churned when he saw that it wasn't the case. "They're not in the TARDIS."

"What?" Renata saw his horrified face.

"They're not there. I should've received a signal, the console signals me if there's a teleport breach."

"Well if they're not there, then where are they?" Renata leaned away from the table she was supporting herself on.

The Doctor had no idea. And that scared him. He ran to the nearest Node available to get some answers. "Donna Noble, Gabby Gonzalez. They're somewhere in this Library. Do you have the software to locate their position?"

The Node turned its head to the two, horrifying them with Donna's face planted right on it. "Donna Noble and Gabby Gonzalez have left the Library. Donna Noble and Gabby Gonzalez have been saved."

Renata nearly fell backwards if the Doctor hadn't latched a hand to her arm.

"Donna Noble and Gabby Gonzalez have left the Library. Donna Noble and Gabby Gonzalez have been saved."

"But how can it be Donna? How's that possible?" River came rushing up behind them.

"G-Gabby…" Renata knew very well that wherever Donna was, so was Gabby. "Oh my God, where are they!?"

"Donna Noble and Gabby Gonzalez have left the Library. Donna Noble and Gabby Gonzalez have been saved."

"Hey! Who turned out the lights?" Proper Dave appeared in the aisle, ready to chase them again, but neither the Doctor not Renata had the energy to keep going when they had no idea if their friends were even alive.

"We have to go!" River called to the others. "Doctor, we've got to go, now!"

"But where are they!?" Renata shouted at the Node. "Where are Donna and Gabby!? Where are they!? Where…" she felt her chest burning with her yelling, or perhaps for something else, and leaned over.

"Renée!" the Doctor meant to help her but River yanked him back.

"We need to go!" she shouted, but his voice roared over hers.

"I'M NOT LEAVING WITHOUT HER!"

Renata coughed horrifically, as if she were about to throw up. Her upper body was leaning down, hands on her knees, as she tried to catch a literal breath. She could feel the outrageous heat trying to burst from her again but she didn't know how to let it go.

"Renata, look at me!" the Doctor frantically tried to straightening her so he could see her face, but she shook her head and kept coughing.

"Doctor!" River called again. "It's coming!"

Proper Dave was dangerously close to them.

Renata coughed particularly hard one moment and widened her eyes when she saw a wisp of golden energy slipping between her lips. The first thing that popped into her mind was regeneration.

The Doctor saw it as well and gaped. "What the-"

River had angrily come for them both and grabbed them by the collars of their shirts. "We have to GO!" She was not going to let one die because the other was being dramatic. Tale as old as time!

#doctor who #10th doctor #ocappreciation #ocapp #10th doctor fics #doctor who fics #dw fics #dw imagines #10th doctor imagines #oc: Renata Cartwright #gabby gonzalez #donna noble #fic: the beginning of everything

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