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charleygirlAuthor: charleygirl
Rating: G
Type: Gen, AU, Christmas
Characters Involved/Pairing: The Eighth Doctor, The Brigadier, Fitz Kreiner, Anji Kapoor
Summary: Two old friends talk for the last time...
Disclaimer: Doctor Who and all associated characters and themes belongs to the BBC.
Author's Note: This fic was written back in 2000, though never posted here before. Part of The Renewal Series, my alternative take on the end of the BBC Books Earth Arc. Set after Escape Velocity, but written before the publication of that novel. The Doctor regains his memories, but finds the reality of his actions hard to accept.
"It's just the ghost of what you want to be
And the ghost of the past that you live in
It's the ghost of the future that you're frightened of…"
Stevie Nicks, Ghosts.
'TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS...
The wind howled around the house, calling down the chimney, rattling the windows. Rain lashed against the double-glazed glass, pouring down it in torrents. The heavy curtains muffled the noise slightly, but not much. If Alistair hadn’t known better, he would have sworn that he felt the room lurch, as though it were a ship at sea.
It was what his mother would have called a “fearful night”. He checked his watch, glanced at the clock on the mantle-piece for confirmation. Doris would be back soon – the sooner the better. He should never have let her go out in this weather, but she had promised to help with the mulled wine and mince pies after Midnight Mass, and it wouldn’t do to let the vicar down.
He wasn’t entirely sure why he hadn’t wanted to go with her – they’d gone together every other Christmas. Something more important, something compelling…some instinct had made him stay behind in the quiet with the crackling fire and the steady ticking of the carriage clock.
There was something that fate had decreed he couldn’t miss. Exactly what it was, he couldn’t be sure.
As the minutes ticked past, he dozed in his chair, the warmth of the fire and the muted glow of the table lamp making him drowsy. It was in this half-dreaming state that he heard the voice, and was at first sure it couldn’t be real.
The voice was soft, measured, lilting. It somehow rose above the storm, over the cry of the wind, finding its way into the sitting room, to Alistair’s ears. Its song was familiar, one Alistair hadn’t heard in years. People just didn’t sing those old carols any more.
“In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,
In the bleak midwinter, long ago.”
Alistair shook his head, trying to work out where the voice could be coming from. As the sleep cleared from his mind, it came to him: carol singers. Who else could it be?
Stiffly, he climbed to his feet and made his way through to the hall. Doris wouldn’t be happy if he ignored them, left them on the step in this weather.
He reached the front door and opened it, fingers fumbling with the catch. He cursed in annoyance – surely the onset of arthritis. He was lucky to have escaped it this long. The door swung open – before he could see who was standing there, a familiar voice said:
“Hello, Brigadier. I’m not too late to deliver the season’s greetings, I hope?”
A pair of penetrating blue eyes met Alistair’s, peering out from beneath a fringe of soaking wet dark hair that had become plastered to its owner’s scalp. The hair was no longer the recognisable mop of ringlets: instead it was a short, slightly untidy crop of curls. A smile, rather crooked, touched the man’s mouth.
“Hello, Doctor,” said Alistair, managing not to show a trace of his surprise, “You’d better come in.”
He opened the door wider to allow the Time Lord over the threshold. Typically, the Doctor had neither coat nor umbrella. Gone was the green frock coat he’d favoured when Alistair had seen him last – he was dressed in an old smoky-grey velvet jacket, the fabric worn to a comfortable softness. Beneath it was a dress shirt with the wing collar open, and a waistcoat embroidered in some swirly pattern Alistair couldn’t make out.
He was also wet from head to foot.
“How long have you been standing out there?” Alistair demanded.
The Doctor just gave him an enigmatic smile. A raindrop ran down his long nose.
Alistair sighed. “Go and sit in front of the fire,” he said, and added, ”and that’s an order, Doctor.”
The Doctor nodded meekly and slipped through to the sitting room while Alistair went to find a towel. His joints creaked as he climbed the stairs – must be the damp. Suddenly he felt his age more acutely. For all his claims to be centuries old, this version of the Doctor looked young enough to be Alistair’s son.
By the time he returned, the Doctor was kneeling on the rug before the grate, miraculously dry. His face looked pensive, troubled, in the firelight.
Alistair put the towel down on a chair and went to the crystal decanter on the sideboard, pouring two glasses of whisky. “Here,” he said, holding one out to the Doctor. “To take the chill off.”
The Time Lord looked at the glass for a long moment, almost as if he’d never seen single malt before. After a pause, he accepted the drink, and retreated with it to the armchair on the other side of the fireplace.
They sat in silence for some time, Alistair savouring the flavour of the whisky, the Doctor nursing his glass and staring into the fire. The lights from the Christmas tree behind him cast odd shadows over his face.
“Well,” said Alistair eventually, “This is a pleasant surprise. Doris will be in soon – you will stay and say hello, won’t you?”
The Doctor looked up. His eyes were large in the dim light – for a moment they were haunted, lost. And then…Alistair thought he could make out something else, something the Doctor had never shown before. It was fear. Yes, there was definitely a measure of fear in those eyes. They were eyes that should have belonged to an old man, but they were gazing out at him from the face of a young one. He shivered involuntarily.
“I can’t stay, Alistair,” said the Doctor quietly. “I came to say goodbye.”
Alistair frowned. “Goodbye? But – “
The Doctor dug in his waistcoat pocket and produced a small glass globe. It looked rather like one of those children’s snow storms – the firelight diffused through it in a myriad of rainbow colours. “I want you to have this,” the Doctor said, handing it to Alistair.
The Brigadier looked at it. “What is it?”
“My memories.”
“What? I don’t understand – “
The Doctor had sat back in the chair, as if retreating into the shadows. “I want you to look after them for me. I may need them one day. I need someone to keep them safe for me.”
“Are you going to lose them?”
“Oh, yes.” He took a deep, almost shaky breath, and looked down at his untouched whisky. “I’m going to forget everything. Everything about my past.”
“Good God. Why?”
“Because my other selves have decided that it’s for the best. And in a way, I suppose it is. I’ve been dragging the weight of my life around with me for too long. It’s a weight that‘s becoming too much to bear.” The Doctor paused for a moment, then continued, “I lost my memory before, completely. When I got it back, I was happy, until I remembered why I lost it in the first place. I did something unforgivable, Alistair. I destroyed Gallifrey. Murdered my own people.”
Alistair thought about that for a long moment. “I’m sure you did it for the best of reasons,” he said finally.
“It was inexcusable.”
“We can’t always excuse our actions, Doctor. We just have to do what’s right. I know that you wouldn’t have taken such a step without a very good reason.”
The Doctor looked into the fire again. “There was a reason. It was the lesser of two evils. That doesn’t mean I can forgive myself.”
“We all have our demons.”
“They decided, between them, that I should forget. I can’t function with the guilt I’m feeling. So they’re taking my memories, siphoning them off bit by bit. I don’t want to lose them – that’s why I’ve given them to you. I can’t think of anyone I’d trust with them more.”
Alistair rolled the globe in his palm. “Surely, if you were to keep this – “
“I’ll forget what it is, before long. They’ll leave me with barely enough knowledge to fly the TARDIS.” The Doctor sighed. “It won’t be so bad when it’s all over, I suppose. I won’t know what’s happened.” He seemed to sag against the cushions, and his face suddenly looked impossibly ancient. “I’m one thousand, one hundred and ten, Alistair. I’m tired. I can’t go on like this…I want it to be over.”
The Brigadier felt incredibly helpless. There was nothing he could do – couldn’t call in the troops, break out the guns. All he could say was: “So, we’ll never meet again.”
“Oh, you’ll see me again, many times. But when we meet in 2012, that will be the last. It’s the last time you’ll see this incarnation – there won’t be visits from my successors. “ Now the Doctor did finally drink his whisky – he knocked it back in one gulp. “I had to come, while I still know you. You’re…” He smiled, and it was warm and genuine. “Well, you’re my oldest friend. No one else has known all of me. You’re unique. I wanted to say a proper goodbye.”
He held out a hand. Alistair grasped it without hesitation. The skin was cooler than his own, dry and soft. Like yet unalike. That summed the Doctor up, really.
“I should go,” said the Doctor, his voice soft.
“At least let me give you something.” Alistair’s eye fell on a set of car keys resting on the sideboard. He reached out and picked them up. “Here – the keys to Bessie. No one else will be driving her now.”
The Doctor blinked in surprise. “I can’t – “
Alistair dropped the keys into his palm. “Take them. They belong to you.”
“Thank you.” There was a catch in the Time Lord’s voice. He climbed to his feet. “I really must go. Fitz and Anji will be wondering what’s become of me.”
“They’re waiting, then?”
“They decided to go to Midnight Mass. Anji’s not a Christian, but she went to support Fitz. I’m sure the ones who matter won’t mind.”
Stiffly standing up, Alistair nodded. “We’re all equal in His eyes. Even those not of this Earth.”
As they made their way to the front door, he stopped to fetch a tin from the kitchen. “Take these,” he told the Doctor, “Doris would want you to. They’re the best I’ve ever tasted.”
A shadow seemed to pass over the Doctor’s face at the mention of Doris’s name. The hollow look returned to his eyes. “Goodbye, Alistair. I‘m going to miss you.”
“You’ve been the strangest, most infuriating person I ever met,” said Alistair, “but also the best man I’ve ever known. It has been a privilege to share your friendship.” They shook hands again, and this time the clasp was tighter, lasted longer. The Brigadier briefly wondered whether the Doctor would try to hug him.
In the event, he needn’t have worried. The Doctor turned towards the door, then stopped. “Over the next few years, you may think that life isn’t worth living any more, but it will get better, believe me. The torture can’t last forever.” He opened the door, and, with a backward glance and a smile, vanished into the rain-lashed night.
Alistair shut the door, and leaned against it for a long time. When he finally moved, he was surprised to find that his eyes were wet. Outside, car tyres crunched on the gravel. A door opened and then banged shut. Doris was back.
Things change, friends come and go, but life goes on.
Brushing at his eyes with a handkerchief, he went to put the kettle on.
***
Anji and Fitz emerged from the church to find a very wet and windswept Doctor sitting on the low wall outside. He appeared to be oblivious to the awful weather, clutching a cake tin and staring into space.
“God, you’re soaked,” Fitz exclaimed when they reached him. “What’ve you been doing?”
The Time Lord declined to answer. Without a word, he led them into the rain, back to the TARDIS
“You need a towel,” said Fitz as they all filed into the ship. The light spilling through the open door was comforting, cosy after the dreadful storm outside.
As if noticing for the first time that his face was full of water, the Doctor pulled out an oversized paisley handkerchief and wiped it away. “Better?”
Fitz didn’t comment, but Anji noticed that the water around the Doctor’s eyes was still there. And it was trickling down his cheek.
He pulled the lid off the cake tin. “Here,” he said, his voice cracking slightly, “We can’t let these go to waste, can we?”
“Mince pies?” Fitz took one. “Where have you been?”
“Reminding myself of how precious friendship is.” The Doctor took a mince pie for himself and offered them to Anji. “Isn’t that one of the messages of Christmas?”
“If it’s not, it should be,” said Anji.
“Seconded,” Fitz agreed.
“Well, then,” said the Doctor, with a watery smile, “here’s to friendship.”
Fitz raised his mince pie in a mock toast. “And a Merry Christmas to everyone everywhere.”
***
And out in the gale, rain hammering on the battered wood, the TARDIS faded away, the howl of its ancient engines muffled by the bells that began to chime the first Christmas morning of the new millennium.
FIN
Quote from “In The Bleak Midwinter” by Christina Rossetti
