[oncoming_storms] - Flight
All things must die.
It is something you have known since before you were born, when you were nothing but a thought in the Vortex, waiting for someone to build you, create you. You have known it all your life, through every moment of your existence, as you watch worlds end and be born and then end again.
And though you railed and raged against it, you have known your own time is short.
He does not want you to go, nor do you have any desire to leave him, but you know that neither of your requests can be honoured.
You wait as long as you can, hiding the damage from the entropy through whatever means are available to you. He wonders why he can no longer visit the room of oddities, the ballroom, the aquarium, your Gardens, or even the butterfly room with its polished wooden walls. You haven't the heart to tell him they no longer exist, eaten away by age and Time as you travel the Vortex. He wonders why the sickbay is nearer the Library now, why the kitchens seem smaller, the bedrooms rearranged. You haven't the heart to tell him it is because your interior is shrinking and you must do so to allow him to have those things he treasures most.
Only the Cloister Room remains unchanged and you guide him there often, desperate for him to stop asking what's wrong, desperate to give the appearance of peace and safety and normalcy. You are too frightened to speak for letting him hear the groans and creaks, the weathered cries of ancient metal and broken wires. You are afraid he might hear just how tired you are, and you cannot have that.
You know if he hears it, he will try to repair it -- repair you -- but there is nothing more to be done and you refuse to break his hearts with such despair.
He knows, though. Perhaps he has always known, since the first room was lost. You've known each other so long, how could he not? It was unfair to think him so clueless, but you are proud and stubborn as he and continue on as though all is well.
You continue until the time stream within you splinters from the time stream without, hurtling everything into flux. He cannot control you, cannot fix what is broken, and in desperation you seek landing, latching onto the most familiar landscape, most familiar time period, most familiar city, crashing through the Vortex and into reality, colliding like a meteor with the earth just outside London, circa 2006.
He does not need to open your doors as they fall away easily at his touch. You whine softly, low, the lights flickering as sparks brighten the wreckage of your console room. He takes a moment to look outside, to see where you've landed, then scurries back inside, frantically attacking the mess of wires and metal and springs, telling you it'll be all right, he'll fix you, have you good as new in a tic, just you wait. You hum as best you can in response and he shakes his head, fiddling with everything he can, burning his hands as he reaches through wiring. Don't be like that, he says. You've been through worse. This is nothing.
The Cloister Bell sounds and he can't help it: he sobs.
Days later and exhausted, he sits in your Cloister Room, still unmarred, pristine, and reminisces -- about your travels, about stealing you, about all the things you've seen and people you've met. He laughs as he recounts how jealous and angry you were at some of his companions; smiles at the silly arguments you had over his piloting; is proud at how steadfast and loyal you were in the thickest of it; and he says nothing of parting.
A week passes and he can do nothing to fix you. You both knew he never could, but he tries anyway, fighting through despair as he works to patch you up. There's nothing for it, though, as more of your interior collapses. It is unsafe for him to remain but he refuses to leave, insisting he's helping, that he'll have you in tip top shape in just a mo'. You cannot convince him otherwise and so you simply stop trying, focusing your energies inward while he fumbles through your once-proud interior.
Another week passes and when he finally steps out to get food, you release the tenuous hold you have on reality, all the stored energy you've gathered exploding for one final flight. You need only enough to break through the barrier guarding the Graveyard; what little remains you gather in coral, left behind in the crater where you landed, shielded from view by all but him.
He will know what it means when he returns, but neither you nor he have ever been good with good-byes.
The Graveyard is dark and vast, stretching beyond measure, but there is little sadness here. A thousand voices rise in song around you as you land, the dying remnants of lives that have seen so much, been so far. If there is sadness, it is at the loss of opportunity, of no longer being able to visit the stars. You sing your own song, of lives lost and gained, of happiness and sorrow and one man at the centre of it all and, strangely, hear a similar melody from not far off. Even in death you are curious and make your way to it in staggered hops, alighting beside the remnants of a Cloister Room, the once-vibrant leaves wrapping through the trellises now the soft colours of autumn, littering the floor of the Graveyard. It is a Cloister Room you recognise, a voice you have longed to hear for so many years, and you nudge yourself closer, because you know she has been alone a long time.
You can hear her song change, ever so slightly, and take comfort in the knowledge she is aware of your presence.
Time does not pass in the Graveyard, as it exists beyond the boundaries of the Vortex, but even so, you know it is not long after you arrive that she finally withers and fades completely, leaving you alone where she ceased to exist. And so you remain in that place as what remains of your interior collapses in on itself, leaving only the Cloister Room among the broken and decaying of your kind. And as the leaves through your trellises turn the hues of autumn, you reach out across the boundaries, grasp for his mind, and whisper, just once:
Good-bye.
Muse: The TARDIS
Fandom: Doctor Who
Word Count: 1090
Warnings: Character death. Also: I'm sorry D:
It is something you have known since before you were born, when you were nothing but a thought in the Vortex, waiting for someone to build you, create you. You have known it all your life, through every moment of your existence, as you watch worlds end and be born and then end again.
And though you railed and raged against it, you have known your own time is short.
He does not want you to go, nor do you have any desire to leave him, but you know that neither of your requests can be honoured.
You wait as long as you can, hiding the damage from the entropy through whatever means are available to you. He wonders why he can no longer visit the room of oddities, the ballroom, the aquarium, your Gardens, or even the butterfly room with its polished wooden walls. You haven't the heart to tell him they no longer exist, eaten away by age and Time as you travel the Vortex. He wonders why the sickbay is nearer the Library now, why the kitchens seem smaller, the bedrooms rearranged. You haven't the heart to tell him it is because your interior is shrinking and you must do so to allow him to have those things he treasures most.
Only the Cloister Room remains unchanged and you guide him there often, desperate for him to stop asking what's wrong, desperate to give the appearance of peace and safety and normalcy. You are too frightened to speak for letting him hear the groans and creaks, the weathered cries of ancient metal and broken wires. You are afraid he might hear just how tired you are, and you cannot have that.
You know if he hears it, he will try to repair it -- repair you -- but there is nothing more to be done and you refuse to break his hearts with such despair.
He knows, though. Perhaps he has always known, since the first room was lost. You've known each other so long, how could he not? It was unfair to think him so clueless, but you are proud and stubborn as he and continue on as though all is well.
You continue until the time stream within you splinters from the time stream without, hurtling everything into flux. He cannot control you, cannot fix what is broken, and in desperation you seek landing, latching onto the most familiar landscape, most familiar time period, most familiar city, crashing through the Vortex and into reality, colliding like a meteor with the earth just outside London, circa 2006.
He does not need to open your doors as they fall away easily at his touch. You whine softly, low, the lights flickering as sparks brighten the wreckage of your console room. He takes a moment to look outside, to see where you've landed, then scurries back inside, frantically attacking the mess of wires and metal and springs, telling you it'll be all right, he'll fix you, have you good as new in a tic, just you wait. You hum as best you can in response and he shakes his head, fiddling with everything he can, burning his hands as he reaches through wiring. Don't be like that, he says. You've been through worse. This is nothing.
The Cloister Bell sounds and he can't help it: he sobs.
Days later and exhausted, he sits in your Cloister Room, still unmarred, pristine, and reminisces -- about your travels, about stealing you, about all the things you've seen and people you've met. He laughs as he recounts how jealous and angry you were at some of his companions; smiles at the silly arguments you had over his piloting; is proud at how steadfast and loyal you were in the thickest of it; and he says nothing of parting.
A week passes and he can do nothing to fix you. You both knew he never could, but he tries anyway, fighting through despair as he works to patch you up. There's nothing for it, though, as more of your interior collapses. It is unsafe for him to remain but he refuses to leave, insisting he's helping, that he'll have you in tip top shape in just a mo'. You cannot convince him otherwise and so you simply stop trying, focusing your energies inward while he fumbles through your once-proud interior.
Another week passes and when he finally steps out to get food, you release the tenuous hold you have on reality, all the stored energy you've gathered exploding for one final flight. You need only enough to break through the barrier guarding the Graveyard; what little remains you gather in coral, left behind in the crater where you landed, shielded from view by all but him.
He will know what it means when he returns, but neither you nor he have ever been good with good-byes.
The Graveyard is dark and vast, stretching beyond measure, but there is little sadness here. A thousand voices rise in song around you as you land, the dying remnants of lives that have seen so much, been so far. If there is sadness, it is at the loss of opportunity, of no longer being able to visit the stars. You sing your own song, of lives lost and gained, of happiness and sorrow and one man at the centre of it all and, strangely, hear a similar melody from not far off. Even in death you are curious and make your way to it in staggered hops, alighting beside the remnants of a Cloister Room, the once-vibrant leaves wrapping through the trellises now the soft colours of autumn, littering the floor of the Graveyard. It is a Cloister Room you recognise, a voice you have longed to hear for so many years, and you nudge yourself closer, because you know she has been alone a long time.
You can hear her song change, ever so slightly, and take comfort in the knowledge she is aware of your presence.
Time does not pass in the Graveyard, as it exists beyond the boundaries of the Vortex, but even so, you know it is not long after you arrive that she finally withers and fades completely, leaving you alone where she ceased to exist. And so you remain in that place as what remains of your interior collapses in on itself, leaving only the Cloister Room among the broken and decaying of your kind. And as the leaves through your trellises turn the hues of autumn, you reach out across the boundaries, grasp for his mind, and whisper, just once:
Good-bye.
Muse: The TARDIS
Fandom: Doctor Who
Word Count: 1090
Warnings: Character death. Also: I'm sorry D: