Detour (Doctor Who, Donna Noble, gen)
Title: Detour
Author: gehayi
Recipient: lunaria225
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Donna Noble, Shaun Temple, The Doctor, River Song, Wilfred Mott
Word Count: 1753
Rating: Gen
Disclaimer: I most emphatically am not the BBC or any of the writers or directors associated with this show, and am not making any profit from this. No copyrights are being violate and no trademarks infringed upon.
Prompt: So there
it is again, the mind, with its
old bluster, its self-centered
question: what
is dimming, what is bright?
The spirit sinks and swells, which cannot tell
itself from any little luster.)
Summary: Post-The End of Time. Donna's conscious mind has forgotten everything. If she's to survive, her subconscious has to find ways for her to remember.
Author's Notes: Written for the Awesome Ladies Ficathon on LJ.
***
After the whatever-it-was that happened while she was sleeping, Donna begins to get hunches.
Not anything useful, like what numbers to play in the lottery or exactly what to say to a frustrating boss. No, these are weird hunches burbling up from who-knows-where. They don't make any sense, but she feels compelled to listen to anyway. Thoughts like I need to study physics pop into her mind when stargazing with her grandfather, and nothing will do until she's taking a class in elementary physics at Open University.
She finds she has a talent for it. And for upper mathematics. She takes classes in both, though her mother says that it's a horrible waste of money that won't help her get a better job or a rich husband.
She ignores her mother. The classes make her feel more...well, more whole. Which doesn't make sense, as she isn't broken.
She meets Shaun Temple and falls in love with him. Not a mad, passionate love, this, but something steady like the Rock of Gibraltar. Good, whispers something in Donna's mind. I need steadiness. And so will he. Eventually.
She's not sure what that means, and shoves it away.
***
Then the babies come, three of them--she insists on the third, being terribly unsettled by the idea of stopping at a boy and a girl. A boy named Jonathan and two girls, Christie and Jennifer (always Jennifer, never Jenny--that's another hunch). Jon and Christie are both born at home in rather a hurry, but Jennifer is born in the hospital, which is when she discovers there's something a bit odd about her youngest daughter.
Two hearts. A central nervous system that's infinitely more complicated than a human's should be. And a body temperature that's much cooler than normal. Everything else is normal, and the doctors say that Jennifer is perfectly healthy, it's just some sort of odd mutation. But they check the other two as well, and discover that Jon and Christie have traces of the mutation as well. Jon is the most nearly
(human)
normal. Christie is somewhere in between Jon and Jennifer.
Shaun isn't sure what to make of this. Neither is she, especially when she learns from the medicos that she's got bits of that odd mutation in her genes and chromosomes as well. It's as if she was a blend of human and...something else. She shoves that thought away too, and begins studying biology and medicine as well. She'll need such knowledge when the children grow up and ask questions.
***
When the children are still toddlers, she adopts clockmaking as a restful hobby. She deserves relaxation in her life, doesn't she? And from clockmaking it's only a bare step to steampunk clockworks.
By the time Jennifer enters primary school, Donna's hobbies have intensified. She feels that she must complete a particular project swiftly, as if she's on a deadline. She feels as if her nerves are rubbed raw now, as if a bomb might explode in her brain any minute.
She's working on one device at the moment--a pocket watch. She's built eighty-eight of them so far, and none of them work properly. She hasn't got the right mechanical parts for it, which is half the problem. A line from the old Star Trek crosses her mind...something about crafting a futuristic invention out of stone knives and bearskins.
She doesn't know why this is such an imperative. She only knows that it is. And she has a sick feeling that if she doesn't solve this problem and soon, four people will die, and she'll be one of them.
Shaun is angry that she's wasting all her time on "these stupid hobbies." Even though she can't explain why this isn't stupid, she's angry that Shaun thinks it is...and even angrier that he thinks his beliefs should take precedence. This outrages her, and again, she doesn't know why.
The eighty-ninth watch doesn't work. Nor does the ninety-ninth. And she's becoming frantic. It's been twelve years since she woke up after the something no one will talk about, and she hasn't aged a day. People comment on her youthful appearance daily now, and the thought that crosses her mind when they say this frightens her: Change isn't always instant. Think of tadpoles. Think of caterpillars. Metamorphosis can be slow, but it can't be stopped.
She's beginning to hate her subconscious.
***
The hundred-and-second watch works--but it only does half of what it needs to. Donna sighs, and sets herself the task of making the watch do far more than the original model (WHAT original model?) was designed for.
Shaun gets involved with his secretary. A blonde. (What is it with men obsessing over blondes?) It's awful, but she can't think about that right now. She has to focus on the real problem--the watch.
By the one-hundred-and-fifteenth watch, she could design them in her sleep.
By the one-hundred-and-twenty-fifth, she thinks she might be doing just that.
The hundred-and-thirty-first watch is perfect. She doesn't know how she knows. She just does. Not even bothering to clean up the mess in the workshop, she goes upstairs to the master bedroom, pulls down the shades, lies down on the bed...and opens the watch.
It hurts. There are no words for how much it hurts. Being reshaped, atom by atom, into a completely non-human form--the only way she can survive, for her half-human half-Time Lord body is slowly burning itself out--is agony that makes hell look pleasant. And the original watch, the one she found in the TARDIS so many years ago and asked the Doctor about, was only designed to hold a blueprint of a Time Lord, while another device caused him to become wholly human. Her watch is transforming her and is holding the cellular imprint of the person that she can't be anymore. It's Time Lord tech with a twist. Like her.
After an eternity of anguish, it's over. She staggers from the bed to look at herself in the bathroom mirror.
She looks the same. She won't always--she knows that--but for now a familiar reflection is staring back at her, and that's good.
She hopes the children won't have to go through this hell, and fears that--thanks to the hybrid genes she passed on to them--they will.
The Doctor had never anticipated any of this. He had thought that making it impossible for her to consciously think about her half-transformed state would keep her from burning out. He never realized that more than her brain had changed--all of her had. If it hadn't been for her subconscious mind passing notes to her behind the Doctor's back for over a decade, she'd be dying in a matter of months, and her quarter-Time Lord children shortly after that.
When she sees him, she's going to give him a good punch in the snoot for being an idiot.
She wonders how Shaun will take this, then answers her own question. Though he's never said that he dislikes the difference in her and the children, she's heard him remark often enough about "the X-Men" and "the Ancients gene" and Primeval to know that he's not comfortable with genetic mutation. He won't like that she opted for transformation rather than death, and he'll hate the idea of his children becoming wholly Time Lord. He wants a normal wife and normal children, and being a former human turned alien isn't even approaching normal. She wonders if the marriage can survive this.
Which means that she'll need somewhere to go for a while...and, more importantly, a certain phone number. Getting hold of the person who has it won't be easy. She remembers now that Martha Jones works for UNIT, but she's not quite sure where the woman is assigned.
***
She spends the afternoon on the phone, playing telephone tag with one classified department after another and discovering that her temper hasn't altered one iota. After the fourth hour (by which time the children have wandered home from school and Shaun has come back from work), a man named Brigadier Alastair Lethbridge-Stewart cuts into an aggravating conversation with a officious soldier, telling her that there's a message for her--a list of numbers and nothing else.
Hesitantly, she punches it into her mobile, and a woman answers. "Hello, Donna! It's River. Glad you finally got my message. When would you like us to pick up you and the children?"
She can hear the Doctor--his voice just a touch off--spluttering in the background. "Donna? What are you--you can't be talking to Donna! She can't remember! She mustn't!"
"Bit late for that," River says cheerfully, then turns her attention back to Donna. "So. How long?"
"Half hour, maybe?" Donna replies. "I think we should pack. And I'd like to explain some of this to Shaun before we leave."
"Wait till we materialize," River says. "It'll save time. Don't worry, it won't take long and there'll be a minimum of unpleasantness. And after that---oh, you ARE in for some delicious times, you and the children and your granddad--"
"What?!"
"Wilfred Mott not exploring the universe?" River laughs as if that's the funniest joke she's ever heard. "You might as well try to part a Time Lord and his TARDIS. Now, go get ready, and we'll be at your place in twenty minutes and at Wilf's in twenty-five. And don't worry. I'm driving." And with that, River hangs up.
The children are clamoring to learn who that was and Shaun looks like a thundercloud, but Donna ignores them both, calling another number--one she knows by heart. When her grandfather answers, she takes a deep breath, then speaks.
"Hi. It's me, Donna. Listen, Granddad, the Doctor's going to be at your place in about...mm, twenty minutes now. Now don't panic, I'm fine. I just wanted to ask you--how would you like to come on a road trip with the kids and me? Nothing fancy, just a short journey round the galaxy. Sound all right to you?"
She can almost hear the smile in his voice. "Donna. You're back. Oh, God, you're back!"
"Oi! You think I was going to let the spaceman stop me from being me? Don't be silly. Just took me a while to navigate the detours and back roads, is all." A pause. "So. You coming?"
Her grandfather sounds like he's laughing and crying at the same time. "Ah, Donna. I wouldn't miss this for the world."
***
Author: gehayi
Recipient: lunaria225
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Donna Noble, Shaun Temple, The Doctor, River Song, Wilfred Mott
Word Count: 1753
Rating: Gen
Disclaimer: I most emphatically am not the BBC or any of the writers or directors associated with this show, and am not making any profit from this. No copyrights are being violate and no trademarks infringed upon.
Prompt: So there
it is again, the mind, with its
old bluster, its self-centered
question: what
is dimming, what is bright?
The spirit sinks and swells, which cannot tell
itself from any little luster.)
Summary: Post-The End of Time. Donna's conscious mind has forgotten everything. If she's to survive, her subconscious has to find ways for her to remember.
Author's Notes: Written for the Awesome Ladies Ficathon on LJ.
***
After the whatever-it-was that happened while she was sleeping, Donna begins to get hunches.
Not anything useful, like what numbers to play in the lottery or exactly what to say to a frustrating boss. No, these are weird hunches burbling up from who-knows-where. They don't make any sense, but she feels compelled to listen to anyway. Thoughts like I need to study physics pop into her mind when stargazing with her grandfather, and nothing will do until she's taking a class in elementary physics at Open University.
She finds she has a talent for it. And for upper mathematics. She takes classes in both, though her mother says that it's a horrible waste of money that won't help her get a better job or a rich husband.
She ignores her mother. The classes make her feel more...well, more whole. Which doesn't make sense, as she isn't broken.
She meets Shaun Temple and falls in love with him. Not a mad, passionate love, this, but something steady like the Rock of Gibraltar. Good, whispers something in Donna's mind. I need steadiness. And so will he. Eventually.
She's not sure what that means, and shoves it away.
***
Then the babies come, three of them--she insists on the third, being terribly unsettled by the idea of stopping at a boy and a girl. A boy named Jonathan and two girls, Christie and Jennifer (always Jennifer, never Jenny--that's another hunch). Jon and Christie are both born at home in rather a hurry, but Jennifer is born in the hospital, which is when she discovers there's something a bit odd about her youngest daughter.
Two hearts. A central nervous system that's infinitely more complicated than a human's should be. And a body temperature that's much cooler than normal. Everything else is normal, and the doctors say that Jennifer is perfectly healthy, it's just some sort of odd mutation. But they check the other two as well, and discover that Jon and Christie have traces of the mutation as well. Jon is the most nearly
(human)
normal. Christie is somewhere in between Jon and Jennifer.
Shaun isn't sure what to make of this. Neither is she, especially when she learns from the medicos that she's got bits of that odd mutation in her genes and chromosomes as well. It's as if she was a blend of human and...something else. She shoves that thought away too, and begins studying biology and medicine as well. She'll need such knowledge when the children grow up and ask questions.
***
When the children are still toddlers, she adopts clockmaking as a restful hobby. She deserves relaxation in her life, doesn't she? And from clockmaking it's only a bare step to steampunk clockworks.
By the time Jennifer enters primary school, Donna's hobbies have intensified. She feels that she must complete a particular project swiftly, as if she's on a deadline. She feels as if her nerves are rubbed raw now, as if a bomb might explode in her brain any minute.
She's working on one device at the moment--a pocket watch. She's built eighty-eight of them so far, and none of them work properly. She hasn't got the right mechanical parts for it, which is half the problem. A line from the old Star Trek crosses her mind...something about crafting a futuristic invention out of stone knives and bearskins.
She doesn't know why this is such an imperative. She only knows that it is. And she has a sick feeling that if she doesn't solve this problem and soon, four people will die, and she'll be one of them.
Shaun is angry that she's wasting all her time on "these stupid hobbies." Even though she can't explain why this isn't stupid, she's angry that Shaun thinks it is...and even angrier that he thinks his beliefs should take precedence. This outrages her, and again, she doesn't know why.
The eighty-ninth watch doesn't work. Nor does the ninety-ninth. And she's becoming frantic. It's been twelve years since she woke up after the something no one will talk about, and she hasn't aged a day. People comment on her youthful appearance daily now, and the thought that crosses her mind when they say this frightens her: Change isn't always instant. Think of tadpoles. Think of caterpillars. Metamorphosis can be slow, but it can't be stopped.
She's beginning to hate her subconscious.
***
The hundred-and-second watch works--but it only does half of what it needs to. Donna sighs, and sets herself the task of making the watch do far more than the original model (WHAT original model?) was designed for.
Shaun gets involved with his secretary. A blonde. (What is it with men obsessing over blondes?) It's awful, but she can't think about that right now. She has to focus on the real problem--the watch.
By the one-hundred-and-fifteenth watch, she could design them in her sleep.
By the one-hundred-and-twenty-fifth, she thinks she might be doing just that.
The hundred-and-thirty-first watch is perfect. She doesn't know how she knows. She just does. Not even bothering to clean up the mess in the workshop, she goes upstairs to the master bedroom, pulls down the shades, lies down on the bed...and opens the watch.
It hurts. There are no words for how much it hurts. Being reshaped, atom by atom, into a completely non-human form--the only way she can survive, for her half-human half-Time Lord body is slowly burning itself out--is agony that makes hell look pleasant. And the original watch, the one she found in the TARDIS so many years ago and asked the Doctor about, was only designed to hold a blueprint of a Time Lord, while another device caused him to become wholly human. Her watch is transforming her and is holding the cellular imprint of the person that she can't be anymore. It's Time Lord tech with a twist. Like her.
After an eternity of anguish, it's over. She staggers from the bed to look at herself in the bathroom mirror.
She looks the same. She won't always--she knows that--but for now a familiar reflection is staring back at her, and that's good.
She hopes the children won't have to go through this hell, and fears that--thanks to the hybrid genes she passed on to them--they will.
The Doctor had never anticipated any of this. He had thought that making it impossible for her to consciously think about her half-transformed state would keep her from burning out. He never realized that more than her brain had changed--all of her had. If it hadn't been for her subconscious mind passing notes to her behind the Doctor's back for over a decade, she'd be dying in a matter of months, and her quarter-Time Lord children shortly after that.
When she sees him, she's going to give him a good punch in the snoot for being an idiot.
She wonders how Shaun will take this, then answers her own question. Though he's never said that he dislikes the difference in her and the children, she's heard him remark often enough about "the X-Men" and "the Ancients gene" and Primeval to know that he's not comfortable with genetic mutation. He won't like that she opted for transformation rather than death, and he'll hate the idea of his children becoming wholly Time Lord. He wants a normal wife and normal children, and being a former human turned alien isn't even approaching normal. She wonders if the marriage can survive this.
Which means that she'll need somewhere to go for a while...and, more importantly, a certain phone number. Getting hold of the person who has it won't be easy. She remembers now that Martha Jones works for UNIT, but she's not quite sure where the woman is assigned.
***
She spends the afternoon on the phone, playing telephone tag with one classified department after another and discovering that her temper hasn't altered one iota. After the fourth hour (by which time the children have wandered home from school and Shaun has come back from work), a man named Brigadier Alastair Lethbridge-Stewart cuts into an aggravating conversation with a officious soldier, telling her that there's a message for her--a list of numbers and nothing else.
Hesitantly, she punches it into her mobile, and a woman answers. "Hello, Donna! It's River. Glad you finally got my message. When would you like us to pick up you and the children?"
She can hear the Doctor--his voice just a touch off--spluttering in the background. "Donna? What are you--you can't be talking to Donna! She can't remember! She mustn't!"
"Bit late for that," River says cheerfully, then turns her attention back to Donna. "So. How long?"
"Half hour, maybe?" Donna replies. "I think we should pack. And I'd like to explain some of this to Shaun before we leave."
"Wait till we materialize," River says. "It'll save time. Don't worry, it won't take long and there'll be a minimum of unpleasantness. And after that---oh, you ARE in for some delicious times, you and the children and your granddad--"
"What?!"
"Wilfred Mott not exploring the universe?" River laughs as if that's the funniest joke she's ever heard. "You might as well try to part a Time Lord and his TARDIS. Now, go get ready, and we'll be at your place in twenty minutes and at Wilf's in twenty-five. And don't worry. I'm driving." And with that, River hangs up.
The children are clamoring to learn who that was and Shaun looks like a thundercloud, but Donna ignores them both, calling another number--one she knows by heart. When her grandfather answers, she takes a deep breath, then speaks.
"Hi. It's me, Donna. Listen, Granddad, the Doctor's going to be at your place in about...mm, twenty minutes now. Now don't panic, I'm fine. I just wanted to ask you--how would you like to come on a road trip with the kids and me? Nothing fancy, just a short journey round the galaxy. Sound all right to you?"
She can almost hear the smile in his voice. "Donna. You're back. Oh, God, you're back!"
"Oi! You think I was going to let the spaceman stop me from being me? Don't be silly. Just took me a while to navigate the detours and back roads, is all." A pause. "So. You coming?"
Her grandfather sounds like he's laughing and crying at the same time. "Ah, Donna. I wouldn't miss this for the world."
***