The Doctor's Message: an episode postscript-fic
I just watched Silence in the Library and Forest of the Dead, and oh my, I was blown away.
Definite spoilers for those two episodes are below. I would love to hear comments, but please be aware that I've only seen up through those two episodes and Midnight, which is the one that directly follows it.
I don't own the Doctor or any other character who appears in Doctor Who, and I make no profit from this story, which is simply a work of appreciative fiction. (See how nice and non-spoilery I was with my disclaimer?)
And now ...
The Doctor's Message
The message hadn’t gone astray, of course.
On the morning after that lovely glorious night on Darillium, he sat alone in the TARDIS. He opened the billfold of his psychic paper and watched the message appear, right on time.
The Library. Come as soon as you can. X
River’s handwriting, the last time he would ever see it. He knew then what had happened all those years ago, which was also right now, and what he had to do. He closed his eyes and pressed his lips to the X on the psychic paper. Then it was the work of but a moment to send the message on through the years, back in time to his former self. For a Time Lord, the task was as simple as scribbling a note on the back of a shopping list.
Last night, it had seemed so easy.
“Take my sonic tomorrow! For luck!” He had practiced that line for hours, watching his reflection in the TARDIS, hoping he’d sound as carefree and impulsive as he wanted her to think the gesture was.
He knew that in his past, which was also the future, which was also right now, he had done, would do, what he could to save her. He knew that she would live forever in the core of the greatest library of all Time and Space, ghost swarms of Vashta Nerada protecting her from intruders but preventing his own return. He had thought that these truths would make this morning easier to bear.
He had been wrong.
As his psychic paper went blank, the Doctor clutched it to his hearts and wept.
Definite spoilers for those two episodes are below. I would love to hear comments, but please be aware that I've only seen up through those two episodes and Midnight, which is the one that directly follows it.
I don't own the Doctor or any other character who appears in Doctor Who, and I make no profit from this story, which is simply a work of appreciative fiction. (See how nice and non-spoilery I was with my disclaimer?)
And now ...
The Doctor's Message
The message hadn’t gone astray, of course.
On the morning after that lovely glorious night on Darillium, he sat alone in the TARDIS. He opened the billfold of his psychic paper and watched the message appear, right on time.
The Library. Come as soon as you can. X
River’s handwriting, the last time he would ever see it. He knew then what had happened all those years ago, which was also right now, and what he had to do. He closed his eyes and pressed his lips to the X on the psychic paper. Then it was the work of but a moment to send the message on through the years, back in time to his former self. For a Time Lord, the task was as simple as scribbling a note on the back of a shopping list.
Last night, it had seemed so easy.
“Take my sonic tomorrow! For luck!” He had practiced that line for hours, watching his reflection in the TARDIS, hoping he’d sound as carefree and impulsive as he wanted her to think the gesture was.
He knew that in his past, which was also the future, which was also right now, he had done, would do, what he could to save her. He knew that she would live forever in the core of the greatest library of all Time and Space, ghost swarms of Vashta Nerada protecting her from intruders but preventing his own return. He had thought that these truths would make this morning easier to bear.
He had been wrong.
As his psychic paper went blank, the Doctor clutched it to his hearts and wept.