or_timelords (
or_timelords) wrote2008-12-19 09:34 pm
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This could prove to be interesting.
from
laser_not_sonic
If you woke up one morning and found me in your bed, what's the first thing you'd think or say?
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If you woke up one morning and found me in your bed, what's the first thing you'd think or say?
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No, I mean, I can hear you. Hear that it's you. Your, you know...
[But no. He can hear the drums, and they sound like the Master's, but the rest of the telepathic signature doesn't feel at all like the Master. It feels more like - his own. Yeah. Now. That. That is creepy.]
[He narrows his eyes.]
Who are you?
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What?
[His turn for total loss in this conversation.]
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[He looks around. No clothes. But, oh. So that's where the icthyosaurus skeleton ended up. But what is his bed doing in here? And what is that man doing in his bed? And why does this feel not at all like the TARDIS, even though all of this is his stuff, and the room looks like the storage room on the 7.8th level?]
Where am I?
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[He sits up in bed, arm resting on one knee, watching the other Time Lord curiously, a bit wary but...this is another him. He's not worried, just puzzled.]
The TARDIS. Well. My TARDIS.
I'm the Doctor. [Because apparently he has to say this. Really, his identity should be obvious to his other self. He's never thought of the possibility that another Time Lord might mistake him for the Master. See similarities between him and the Master, yes—but not mistake him entirely. So he hasn't put two-and-two together yet, figured out why his other had to ask his identity.]
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No, I'm the Doctor. And this can't be the TARDIS, because it's not my TARDIS, and my TARDIS is the only TARDIS still in existence and, and this is an alternate reality, isn't it.
[Oh. Oh, this isn't good.]
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[He runs a hand through his hair and concludes that, yeah, he's awake enough now to get out of bed. So he does so, snagging his pants from where they're hanging over the ichtyosaurus' spine and hopping into them.] We're in the multiverse. Well, I call it the multiverse. Nexus, hub, rabbit hole, it's semantics, really. No paradox, absolutely none, it's the only impossible thing here, that's the fantastic bit.
Doesn't explain what you're doing in my TARDIS, though. [And you really don't know, either?, his expression asks.]
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[That's a concept that needs some getting used to. Not necessarily bad, but - no paradoxes? What? Really, where the hell has he ended up here?]
But if there are no paradoxes, then random people waking up in your bed should not surprise you. I mean, it's hardly as surprising as meeting yourself.
[And, really, this isn't so much surprising as utterly confusing. And unsettling, considering the steady rhythm of the drums distorting the telepathic signal he's getting from his other self. He's having the whole fight or flight thing - or in this case, it's more the 'find out more' or 'get the hell out' thing - so it's time for a displacement activity.]
Where are my clothes?
[They should be in the bathroom, it's where he left them. Maybe if he got transferred, they got transferred as well? There's a worrying thought, maybe random things from his TARDIS got transferred and are now duplicates on this TARDIS. Like himself. Okay. Displacement activity.]
[He looks around, locating a door behind himself, and opens it. Yup, storage room on level 7.8. His bedroom is somewhere else entirely, though, and that's where the bathroom is, and hopefully his clothes. Time to go and find out.]
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[Oh, hey, his other's leaving. Something about clothes. Well, speaking of which, he's still standing about in just his trousers. He snatches his jumper and jacket from the ichthyosaurus and pulls them on as he heads out after his other, still barefoot.]
Wardrobe's that way. [Not the way his other's going, where's he heading?]
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[The other - his other, he supposes, but whatever - is following him, and he's saying something about the - oh right, the wardrobe. There should be something to wear in the wardrobe. It's a rather extensive wardrobe, after all.]
[He turns around, and there's another little detail that makes this experience just another touch creepier; the other Time Lord is dressed exactly like his Ninth. Well. That means the brown suit should still be in the wardrobe. Or at least a duplicate of it.]
Right! Wardrobe. This way, right?
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[It started the moment his other saw him.]
Yeah, that way. Second left after the calender room, three doors down, past the armor—[OI, that won't help]—armoire. The armoire room. Past that.
[If his other heads off in that direction, he'll follow, but at a distance. To see if that makes a difference.]
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[But then, he doesn't have a leather jacket like that. Or the sound of drums in his head.]
[He doesn't wait for an answer but walks off towards the wardrobe. Calender room, yes, he's got one too, three doors that to his knowledge lead to a dining room (rather old-fashioned and British, complete with sinister chandeliers), a storage room with all kinds of knick-knacks, and a graveyard (he's been meaning to move it for ages, but for some reason, he never gets around to it), and there's the last room the other spoke of; the armoire room.]
[The Doctor stops and looks around. He can't see the other Time Lord; maybe he didn't follow him. He hadn't realized how nervous that guy had been making him until now, when there's sudden relief at the absence of the steady drumming echo at the edge of his mind. The curiosity's stronger now. Who is that man? And if he's the same but not, then what does the 'but not' part entail?]
[This room is a room he doesn't have on his own TARDIS. It's different. It might be worth taking a look. The Doctor steps up to the door; let's see if it's locked.]
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[The Doctor in black turns the corner just as the door's sliding back.]
Oi, no! Don't touch that!
[And he starts running down the hallway, which won't help, because there's no way he can get there to close it in time and running really lets the cat out of the bag, but he has to try anyway.]
[The door, meanwhile, will be opening on a small room—a glorified walk-in closet, really, it's nothing compared to some of the TARDIS' rooms. Hooks and straps and magnetic clamps cover three of its walls—all securing guns, from a wide range of times and places, some of them nothing a 21st-century human would even recognize as a weapon. They have one thing in common—none of them are light arms. They're designed for going up against armored opponents; a few could even take out tanks or small spacecraft. A worktable stands against the fourth wall, with tools hanging on a retro 21st-century pegboard above it.]
[Oh, the guns have something else in common.]
[They're perfectly maintained. Not as display pieces, but for use. Which, judging by the lack of dust and tell-tale wear, many of them have seen. Some of them quite recently.]
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[Those are not armoires.]
[He takes a slow step into the room and lets his eyes wander across the walls. Guns. Guns mounted to the walls of the TARDIS, guns of every shape and kind, as long as it's a shape and kind that will wreak destruction on a grand scale. He recognizes most of them, but there are some that even he can't place. It's an armory. An armory on the TARDIS.]
[Something turns inside of him, and there's anger. Guns, war, destruction, they make him so angry. He turns around, and there he is, the other man, standing in the doorway. And the echo is back at the edge of the Doctor's mind, a steady beat, and it only makes him angrier. His jaw is set, and the expression in his eyes is hard.]
Why are you keeping guns on the TARDIS, Doctor?
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[Two other Doctors know about the choice he made on the Game Station. None of them know about the armory.]
[He stands in the doorway, one hand resting on the frame. The other Doctor's anger is terrible and fascinating—because it's his anger, an anger he's felt and used and been driven by but never seen. It looks the way it feels, even when it's coming from a version of him in pajamas. Hard. Distant yet precisely, needle-sharp present. Certain.]
[He's fairly certain he's looked like that when he's killed.]
Because they're necessary. Because the Daleks survived the War. Doctor.
[His tone isn't defensive or angry. It's a statement of fact, tinged with slight challenge. It's tempting to be defensive, but why? This is him, as much as the outrage in his other's face is his other's. This is what he and his universe have made of each other.]
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Guns, [the Doctor makes a gesture at the room,] guns are never a necessity. They are always a mistake. Using a gun makes you as bad as the one you're firing it at.
[His voice isn't raised, but every word is perfectly enunciated, and his jaw is tight. He takes a step closer towards the other Doctor.]
If you had learned anything in the War, that would have been it.
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Well, I'll tell you what I've learned when the War's over. Properly over, that is.
[He tips his head, from where he's now leaning against the doorway, indicating the hallway.]
C'mon, you'll want your suit and that coat.
[And he wants to get him out of here before he lets himself get angry or defensive, too.]
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[He swallows, partly because his mouth is dry, partly because it helps getting control of the anger, and ignores the other Doctor's attempt at deflection.]
The War is over, Doctor. Everybody died, and there's nothing left, but it is over.
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[He rubs at one eye, his version of something like a sigh. He hadn't wanted to get into this, but he can never seem to avoid it. Right now, they're talking at cross-purposes, and that won't change unless he explains.]
You're right. Everybody died. [He doesn't want to do this, he doesn't want to think about this again, it brings it up fresh every time, but...]
[He pushes off from the doorframe and stands straight.] Let me show you something. [And he raises his hands, reaching for the other Time Lord's temples, but not touching, not yet. He's waiting for permission.]
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[He needs to know what saved himself from becoming the man standing before him.]
[When the other man reaches out, his fingers spread out in the traditional gesture, asking for permission to create a connection, the Doctor tenses at first. So close to the other Doctor he can hear the drums; it's more than an echo now. He's got the drums, he's got guns; this other Doctor is a warrior, and the Doctor doesn't trust warriors.]
[He'll have to, though. If he wants to know, he will have to trust this other version of himself. He drops all his mental shielding and sends out an invitation, his eyes sliding shut almost on their own.]
//Show me.//
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[He lets his own shields down fully, too; if the other Doctor pries too closely into sensitive areas, he may pull back, try to shield, but for the moment, he'll let him see whatever he needs to, to understand the differences between them.
There's the Time War, the end of it, that choice and that burden, a common point between them, as is much of the history that goes before. Beyond that...everything starts to come apart.
No companions, for years following the Time War. Loneliness and anger and remembering the man he was, before the war, and searching for that man, across all of time and space. A restlessness, a scratching pressure at the back of his mind, that wasn't the drums yet but that would grow into them. No rest, no peace, no reasons, and no explanations. The last Dalek, and destroying it, and still finding no peace, though that may have been the first day of the drums. He can't remember; he isn't certain. They crept up, somehow, until they were a part of him and it's hard to know when they purred up from silence to thunder.
The Game Station. Jack, but no Rose. A choice. The same choice. Again.
And he chose killer.
Waking up after, as a new man. The rush of that, because, really, his Tenth is all about the rush, the wonder, the brilliant run from sight to sight, experience to experience, and, in the post-regenerative haze, in those first few moments, he hadn't had the memories to mar that outlook.
Coming awake properly, and wandering the station. No bodies, only gray dust; and he couldn't remember who he was or what had happened. The Earth below, gray clouds like duststorms continents wide and no green anywhere, and he'd known that wasn't right. Daleks, unmoving, dust pouring out through their casings, and that had stirred memories.
He hadn't wanted them back.
There was no point in changing his clothing, the way he usually did on regeneration. He was the same man. He had made the same choice. The new personality fought this, but he knew he was right. The personality was wrong. It hurt him. It wanted to reach out, to show off, to laugh and run and share the brilliant universe with friends. With humanity. It wanted to be close. It wanted to forgive.
More running, and discovering that some of the Daleks had still survived. Hunting them, always. Killing them without mercy and with cold-hot satisfaction.
Becoming the hunted, when the Family of Blood caught his scent. Using the Chameleon Arch to escape, leaving his human half back in the 20th century (and John Smith still lives, still human, still separate, a man who chose to go to the Great War, a shame) and the watch, himself, his Time Lord self, in the TARDIS.
Centuries of imprisonment. Until the TARDIS pulled him out of the watch and remade him, gave him the body he wears now, his Tenth recreated, right down to the Gallifreyan mark of exile on his arm. Gave him a second chance.
Resentment and gratitude and surprise and...something like humility. He hadn't even thought...Had never expected her to save him.
A new depth of connection with her, another change to get used to, another shift of self.
Like the drums. Which were constant now, loud and always and driving.
More hunting, and more exploring, and more anger, until...here.
The multiverse.
Learning how life had gone, for his others, in their universes. Learning what the drums meant to them. Gaining the first companion he's had since the War, Astrid, saved from her stardust existence by himself and one of his other's.
She's not even from his universe; he never met her, when she lived. Never saved the Titanic and failed to save her. She's stolen, and he doesn't understand their relationship, it's moving too fast, there's something wrong with it, but it's something. Perhaps it's a start.]
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[...He'll ask, if he can, to look into his other's mind. A mental question. He wants to see if there's anything, anything at all, of the man he is now in his other. If the drums are there, even the slightest echo of them, in any moment.
He won't admit it to himself, but he also just wants to see. The good memories. The Earth still whole, and the friends. Things going right and wrong, but right more often than wrong.]
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[They're loud, and they're insistent, and they send him reeling for a moment until he can see past them at the man behind the drums. He's open, inviting him into his mind as he himself is inviting the other man. And he doesn't waste any time.
The Time War, and the choice that ended it. It's there suddenly, all the horror and the hate and the guilt of that moment, and it takes the Doctor's breath away. But the other is moving on, almost brushing it off like it's nothing, like it's only the first horror of many. He is going down a different path than the one the Doctor took himself, and for a short moment, the Doctor wonders if following him isn't madness. He's here, though, and there's no going back, so follow him he does.
Down that path lies loneliness. The Doctor has known loneliness, but never this strong, never this insistent. It's a chosen loneliness becoming a forced one, getting more necessary and irreversible with every hour that passes. Oh, he remembers this, he remembers being here, but he also remembers that it stopped when an average human girl had, maybe out of understanding or maybe out of ignorance, broken down the walls and made him feel again.
Not so for this Doctor. There's hate, there's loneliness, and there's the War, the War that never ends, the War that goes on and on in his head and his heart, poisoning him from the inside. When he kills the Dalek, the Doctor is not at all surprised; he himself nearly would have, if not for the innocence of a young, human mind to stop him. Instead of the warmth of a connection to another, this Doctor finds the drums.
Earth. The hurt of the loss is physical, it tears his hearts out. The other's ability to feel had been dulled at that point; it had hurt him, but the strong, solid walls that hadn't been chipped away at and eventually broken down protect the innermost part of himself. At what price, though. He's reborn, and there's a moment of ignorance, a moment of clarity and newness, before the past weighs down and drags him back to his old self. It makes the Doctor want to scream; this is wrong, so wrong, this is not how it's supposed to be. But he's an observer of things long past, and there is nothing he can do.
Hunting, always killing, because this is what they are now. The drums beating a steady beat in their head as they roam the universe, seeking, destroying, moving on. Every death they bring feels like another piece of his soul taken away, and when the Family of Blood picks up their scent, it's almost a relief. Running, running is better that killing, less deadening. But no matter how fast and how far they run, war still finds them, finds their human half, overshadows his life, claims its tribute.
They're hidden now, though. Hidden away in the watch, in the TARDIS, in a cave deep under the earth, and it's a relief at first. No more killing, no more death, just silence.
Silence, but not complete. The drums are there, beating away, and with nothing to drown them out, nothing to satisfy them, they grow stronger. Harder. More demanding. They want, they need, they must have. But they are imprisoned, they can't give. All they can do is listen, and feel.
Until there's freedom. The most loyal of companions, the one that had been at their side all that time, taken too much for granted to even be recognized for what she was, the TARDIS gives them life. They don't know if they want it; there's safety in captivity. But it's not a choice. Nothing ever is, not really.
War again. Their old mistress, their old master. Death and violence, and still they are trying to find that connection, the one they know must be there, the one that restored them. It's still about love, it must be, it's what gave them life. It's there, it just needs to be found.
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[The mystery of the drums, still unexplained. I can help. Let me help you, maybe we can find the source, maybe we can find the cure. You and me, we can try all of this again, we can try new ways. We can try everything. They weren't there before, perhaps they're don't have to be a part of what you are. Let me help.]
[His mind is open, laid out, nothing is hidden. And he's giving permission; take anything you need, this is all rightfully yours as much as it is mine. Maybe it's more yours than mine, even. You've paid a much higher price.]
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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.]
no subject
The other Doctor goes deeper. As deep as he can, goes back, goes to a time so long ago, when the Doctor first started to run. The Schism, the Vortex, the oppressing infinite vastness of it all. It still makes him want to run, even though it's only a memory, glossed over by centuries of flight. And yes, he was a different person back then. He changed when he left. Or so he'd thought for a long time. Lately, he's beginning to wonder.
But no, there are no drums. He's never felt them, not in himself. He doesn't know where they take their origin, but they are not a part of him.
The other Doctor pulls back. Along the way, he brushes by some memories, memories that are the Doctor's. Memories of times they don't share.
It's already over. It's been over for a long time. Killing the Cult of Skaro wouldn't have made any difference. It wouldn't have brought anyone back. It simply would have ended more life.
Astrid is a hurtful memory; she died for him. Like so many others. He is grateful that she was found, thankful she's not drifting amongst the stars anymore. Although, maybe his Astrid is. Maybe she's still lost. Like Donna. Like Rose. Like so many others.
And then there's anger, resentment from his other, and no. Don't. He didn't have a choice, he didn't know what to do. He had been lost. So much had changed, and none of them could see it, with their small human minds and their small human worlds. Even his duplicate hadn't, because even though they shared memories, he wasn't a Time Lord. And there hadn't been time to explain. There never is.]
[Then the other Doctor leaves his mind, abruptly, and the silence is deafening. Everything is so still, so quiet, and blindly the Doctor reaches out, putting his hand on the door frame for balance.
The world slowly bleeds back around him, sensation by sensation. His vision is blurry, and as he blinks, tears make his eyelashes stick together. He raises his other hand to his face, and there is wetness on his cheeks. He wipes it away, quickly, not wanting the other Doctor to think that he is pitying him. It's not pity. It's grief.]
[When he raises his eyes to meet the other Doctor's, his throat constricts. He doesn't know what to say. He has to say something, words are what he does, words are his power. But for once, he is at a loss. All he could have said he already expressed when their minds were connected.]
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