Doctor Who Ficlet: The Guardian
Title: The Guardian
Fandom: Doctor Who
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: The Doctor, all incarnations
Rating: G
Spoilers: General.
Summary: He’s the self-appointed guardian of the universe and of time itself.
Word Count: 440
Written For: juliet316’s prompt ‘Doctor Who, author's choice, The Guardian,’ at
fic_promptly.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Doctor Who, or the characters. They belong to the BBC.
He’s the self-appointed guardian of the universe and of time itself. No one asked him to take on the task of protecting the timelines, no one suggested that he should travel in his TARDIS and offer help wherever it was needed. Even so, it feels like he has no choice.
He’s the one responsible for the Time War, the one who destroyed his own people in an unsuccessful attempt to wipe the greatest enemy they’d ever known out of existence for good. Because of him, he’s the only Time Lord left, so to him falls the duty of preventing worse fates befalling other worlds.
He can see all of time and space, it swirls around him ceaselessly and when the flow of time falters, he can’t ignore it, he’s driven to set it right. It’s a burden that weighs heavily upon him, but to set it aside would be to risk catastrophe.
There are places in the universe where he’s known as the Lonely God, other places that call him the Oncoming Storm. In truth, he’s both and neither. He dislikes being thought a god or a hero; he knows he’s far from perfect, has caused countless deaths and untold misery, but he can’t stop, has to keep trying, keep going. He has more enemies now than he can count; staying in one place makes him a sitting target.
So he keeps moving, from planet to planet, criss-crossing time at random, running headlong into trouble while keeping one step ahead of those who would see him fail, give up the fight and die. It can be an empty existence, and sometimes he thinks it’s better for everyone if he follows his chosen path alone, but he’s not that strong and there are always those who are willing, even eager, to travel with him, sharing his nomadic lifestyle and seeing things they would otherwise never have imagined.
His companions are his salvation, his conscience; they hold him in check and keep him from becoming too arrogant, too self-assured. They remind him that he’s not infallible, a lesson he’s learned more times than he can remember.
And they don’t let him forget. He remembers each and every one of them, with fondness, with exasperation, with regret, and with love. They are better, braver, more noble, and more deserving than he will ever be, and he blesses the universe that allows such wonderful and extraordinary beings to grace his life, however brief their lives may be compared to his own.
They make his endless journey more bearable, for without them, he would truly be lost, and what would become of the universe then?
The End