for fandom_muses: Is There Not Some Reason To Fear I May Be Wrong
"Where so many hours have been spent in convincing myself that I am right, is there not some reason to fear I may be wrong?" - Jane Austen
It isn’t love like the Doctor knows it.
It’s raw and brutal and painful and aching. It’s about fractions and moments and filling in gaps and pieces. These are things a Proper Doctor never thinks about. Things are too long for Him, moments too infinite and interchangeable. There is nothing fleeting in His existence, so He can’t know what love is like for His Human self. Or maybe He can and it’s just another missing piece that the Human Doctor has forgotten.
Forever is so infinite, and now is the only thing that lasts. Love means grabbing onto things before they are gone forever. Everything will turn to dust, ready to vanish, ready to die. The Human Doctor was born with this knowledge. Born in a TARDIS that was being torn apart. Born from a woman facing her own demise. Born from a Man who saw more things disappear and die than any human could imagine. But this New Doctor was human. He knew it all. He knew battle and blood and death and destruction. He knew fading and aging and decaying. He knew it so he grabbed onto things.
His emotions are beyond him. They come and go and he has no control. The Proper Doctor has control, He has control over everything. He has control over His emotions, He has control over their destination, He has control over his Human self, He even has control over the Human Doctor’s emotions. This not quite Doctor wonders if the Proper one knows how much control He really has.
He is still a Doctor too, memories and experiences and common suffering. That makes him a Doctor, too. It has to. He clings to this because it means he’s not alone. He clings to this because it’s who he is. He clings to this because that’s how you keep the things you love. You cling and hold and hope they won’t disappear and turn to dust.
The Proper Doctor practices His control. He’s so cool and calm and collected. He’s a Proper Doctor, He is the Doctor. But this Human Doctor, he’s a Doctor, too. He’s still the Doctor. He has to be.
He’s not sure what happened. It was the same fight, always the same fight. The wrong words or the wrong tones, it didn’t matter, his emotions are blinding now. Emotions send him across the room. Emotions send the Proper Doctor tumbling to the floor. Emotions are why he’s standing above the Proper Doctor. He punched Him. He’s standing over Him. This Human Doctor, he feels so angry, but he thinks maybe he has control now, too. He can’t remember the last time he’s had control.
“I am the Doctor.”
The Proper Doctor is sitting on the floor, rubbing His jaw. Out of control. Their roles are reversed. “Would the Doctor punch someone?”
The Proper Doctor stands up, and the Human Doctor can’t think of a reply. There are too many things going on in his mind, it’s too scattered. He can’t think if the Proper Doctor would punch someone, but he knows the Proper Doctor would have control. So he steps forward and shoves the Doctor and watches him fall against the grating.
“I am the Doctor.”
“Right, the Doctor would behave like some sort of child.”
He’s not a child, and he hates it when the Doctor calls him that. He hates it and he hates watching the Proper Doctor try to stand, so he pushes Him back down again. It’s all about control. It’s all about clinging to things.
He struggles and pushes and pulls and he thinks he might have control. Even when He stands up again, he still might have control.
He grabs the Proper Doctor and pushes Him against the column. He doesn’t know why, even when it feels like maybe he has control it still feels like He is still in charge. He hates the way He looks at him now.
“I am the Doctor.”
“No, I’m the Doctor.” The Proper Doctor shouts this, and he’s almost sure He may have spit on him as well in the process.
He will always have control. It will always be Him and never him. But he can cling and hold and pull from Him the things that will make him whole. Complete the fractions and the missing pieces. Maybe then things will be easier. Maybe he can be something close to a real Doctor.
He doesn’t even think about it as he presses his mouth against His. He is desperate and needy and clinging on for anything. Pulling and hoping to gain that piece that will make everything fit together again. Finding himself and becoming the Doctor he knows he is.
The Doctor doesn’t move. Doesn’t react. Doesn’t push or pull. He doesn’t’ need to, He is the Doctor. He always has been. He stands and waits, because this is just another moment, meant to be tucked away. Meaningless in the grand scheme of things. He is a Doctor, He can think that way. He can stand above everything, looking down and picking and choosing the things He chooses to love and feel and live.
The human pushes himself away from the Doctor. Realization flooding his senses. Love means having your heart broken. One single heart that breaks so easily it’s hard to know how to live. Human hearts aren’t meant to have control. Even when they think they do, they are always erratic and chaotic.
“You’re the Doctor.”
“I know I’m the Doctor.”
As simple as that. Facts and figures and an entire existence can be simplified with just a few words. No need to cling to things, because He knows what He is, He always has been Himself. This human, he’s not Him. He’s not a Doctor. He’s just tired.
He nods and turns on his feet. He feels oddly hollow, like he lost a part of himself. How strange is that? When he thinks he might actually gain something, he loses the little bits he already had.
He loves things when they’re gone. He loves them because they are moments that will never happen again. He loves them because he can cling to them and learn from them and find ways to harden himself so one day he can be more like Him again.
It isn’t love the way He knows it.
It’s broken and fragmented and fleeting. It lasts minutes or seconds or something shorter than forever. It is meant to be short and captured in moments and glances and thoughts and emotions that shatter if you touch them the wrong way. Things are over before they begin, moments caught in a limbo between not quite and forever. Nothing lasts and everything fades. Even love. Especially love. Especially for a man who is still 'not quite'.
After all, he only exists halfway. That’s the sort of man he is.
A companion piece to this amazing prompt by
rude_not_ginger . So big thanks to her for writing an amazing prompt, an amazing Doctor, and taking the time to beta for me!