[He's been in contact with another Doctor-who-had-Rose before, so he knows something of what he'll find. The quiet. The running and laughter and the tragedies, the friends lost and hurt, both unintentionally and because it had to be done. Memories taken away, so that they might survive.
Such regret. Over such small things. Things that had to be done.
But he understands that, the regret. It doesn't hurt him.
The love does. The true friends.
Those memories, he touches lightly, hesitantly, as though they might burn—or as though they might hypnotize, a moth drawn into the flame. If he looks too hard, he might never look away. He might try to take, and they're nothing that can be taken. They're the wake of time, the marks of events long since past, never to be relived.
He tries not to see, as he searches. He tries just to listen. To the quiet, though no matter how far into his other's mind he goes, his own drums still follow him, a mental pulse like the beating of his hearts.
He listens for an echo. Any echo, in any memory.
Goes far, far back. Back to when the Master—when Koschei—says his began. When they were very, very young.
There are differences there, between them, in the far past just as there are in the recent past, and those surprise him.
But there are no drums. Anywhere.
He's alone.
When he pulls back, into his own mind, he brushes by certain memories a second time. The Daleks, New York, the other helping them, even though they'd killed so many human beings. He can't understand; there were only four of them, then, it could have been over, and instead his other helped.
The Titanic. Astrid, every memory he can find. Turning them over, because she expects him to understand, to have shared those experiences, and he doesn't. They're secondhand to him, and they always will be.
Davros. The beach. The metacrisis.
A decision he approves of, and his other doesn't.
His other's response to that decision.
Too dangerous to be left on his own. Born in battle, full of blood and anger and revenge.
And that is what he hates, about being around his others. The shame. Knowing that that is how they see him.
Knowing that that is how some part of him, under the drums, sees himself.
He lingers, one last moment, in the quiet, and then snaps back into his own mind.]
[It feels wrong, and right. It feels dark, like entering a building after hours out in the sunlight. He'll adjust. He's adjusted before.]
[The drums grind away some of the shame, as he opens his eyes. Help. He should let his other help. He should say yes. He should.]
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Such regret. Over such small things. Things that had to be done.
But he understands that, the regret. It doesn't hurt him.
The love does. The true friends.
Those memories, he touches lightly, hesitantly, as though they might burn—or as though they might hypnotize, a moth drawn into the flame. If he looks too hard, he might never look away. He might try to take, and they're nothing that can be taken. They're the wake of time, the marks of events long since past, never to be relived.
He tries not to see, as he searches. He tries just to listen. To the quiet, though no matter how far into his other's mind he goes, his own drums still follow him, a mental pulse like the beating of his hearts.
He listens for an echo. Any echo, in any memory.
Goes far, far back. Back to when the Master—when Koschei—says his began. When they were very, very young.
There are differences there, between them, in the far past just as there are in the recent past, and those surprise him.
But there are no drums. Anywhere.
He's alone.
When he pulls back, into his own mind, he brushes by certain memories a second time. The Daleks, New York, the other helping them, even though they'd killed so many human beings. He can't understand; there were only four of them, then, it could have been over, and instead his other helped.
The Titanic. Astrid, every memory he can find. Turning them over, because she expects him to understand, to have shared those experiences, and he doesn't. They're secondhand to him, and they always will be.
Davros. The beach. The metacrisis.
A decision he approves of, and his other doesn't.
His other's response to that decision.
Too dangerous to be left on his own. Born in battle, full of blood and anger and revenge.
And that is what he hates, about being around his others. The shame. Knowing that that is how they see him.
Knowing that that is how some part of him, under the drums, sees himself.
He lingers, one last moment, in the quiet, and then snaps back into his own mind.]
[It feels wrong, and right. It feels dark, like entering a building after hours out in the sunlight. He'll adjust. He's adjusted before.]
[The drums grind away some of the shame, as he opens his eyes. Help. He should let his other help. He should say yes. He should.]