past the breaking point [closed]

[battleborndr]

Who: Donna and the metacrisis Doctor.
What: Secrets are harder to keep locked up tight when you're human. Or maybe he's just become incompetent.
When: After Jeeves is noticeably gone.
Where: Traverse Town, home.
Warnings: ANGST. Doctor Who s4 finale major spoilers!




The funny thing about breaking points is that they always exist, even in dreams, even if you try to pretend they're not real.

The Doctor's room is more of a mess than usual. The mess spills out into the hall, and even Harkness doesn't dare enter, just hiding on the fringes, keeping low to the ground and looking as worried as a Dream Eater can manage. Wires, scraps of metal, clock fragments. He's perched at his desk over some awful looking device that might belong in a horror movie, which isn't what it was supposed to be at all--it was supposed to be elegant and lovely and Jeeves would have liked it.

He swipes his arms across the desk and everything crashes to the floor around him. His elbows hit the surface and he holds his head. Regret. He's not new to regret. It hides in a nice home in his mind, sidling along between the lines of anger and happiness.

Jeeves was supposed to be here and they were supposed to talk, but who the hell can the Doctor talk to, now?!

Harkness bolts from his spot outside the hall, too shaken up by his human, and maybe he can find someone that can help, or maybe he'll just hide further away.

Comments

[oi_earthgirl]

Donna heard a crash from where she was sitting, and glanced down at River, who was sitting next to her on the couch. Soon, she saw Harkness come running out of the hallway, diving behind something in the corner. River hopped over, chittering at him when she reached the corner.

"That's not good." Donna said, before standing and walking down the hallway he just came running through. She picked her way through the mess and leaned against the doorway. "Doctor?"

[battleborndr]

Harkness stayed with River, out of the way, not wanting to go back right then. Donna could handle his human. Hopefully.

The Doctor didn't startle until he heard Donna call out to him, and he jerked, lifting his head and turning to look at her with wide and wild eyes. "Donna..." No, no... This isn't... He can't have her here, not right now. "Sorry. Bit busy," he told her, with some fool's hope that it would be enough to send her away. Of course, it didn't help that the things he had been "busy with" were now a wreck on the floor.

[oi_earthgirl]

"You know, that would be a much better argument if you didn't just shove all that..." She motioned towards the stuff on the floor. "Onto the floor." She crossed her arms and walked into the room, walking over to the pile of stuff on the floor and picking something up.

"What were you working on before your temper tantrum?" If her normal attitude didn't work, she'd try another tactic, but this was always first.

[battleborndr]

Though he twitched at the words "temper tantrum," her normal attitude worked, at least for the moment. His looked down at the remnants, then off to some distant corner, not meeting her eyes.

"I was thinking of Jeeves," he answered, as though it would explain everything.

It wasn't that he was trying to be difficult, but...

[oi_earthgirl]

"From rumors I've heard, he's gone. Woke up and went back to his home." She turned over the...thing...in her hand, wondering what it was supposed to do, before leaning on the edge of the desk.

"You two did seem to be talking a lot." She glanced down at him. "I'm sorry he's gone."

[battleborndr]

It was supposed to be a clock at one point, and then his mind started to wander and it became a discombobulated monster of parts.

"Yeah, he's gone alright," the Doctor grumbled. He didn't want to act this way around Donna, but he couldn't reel it back. He kept thinking of that stupid last conversation he had with Jeeves. "We stopped talking." He remembered how Jeeves closed off. He thought that, maybe, if he actually tried to talk to Jeeves again, they might have been alright.

He reminded himself that he distanced himself on purpose, however...

[oi_earthgirl]

Donna set down the clock on the desk, pushing it towards the Doctor. Maybe he could finish it as a reminder of Jeeves. But, she wasn't going to push it.

"That happens. Then later, you talk again. It would have happened, you know that." She looked at him for a second, before sighing and continuing on. "And I'm sure he'll always remember you, who wouldn't?" Maybe she wasn't the best for a pep talk, but she could damn well try.

[battleborndr]

He was trying. He really, honestly was. He held together that dam inside him because this was Donna, and Donna was important and amazing and--

And said the wrong thing without realizing what it would do to crumble him.

He was on his feet in an instant, spinning away from her, out of reach and not even touching the half-clock, almost to the door before he pivoted around again, his gaze molten. He couldn't hold it in, Donna. He just couldn't.

"Oh, lovely!" he shouted, voice pitching up high and laced with bitterness. He swayed a little in motion, wound up, a distorted mimicry of the Donna in him. "He'll remember the Doctor. That's just great, Donna! I'm sure if a TARDIS ever shows up at his doorstep, he'll just skip off willy-nilly without much thought!"

Who wouldn't.

Who wouldn't.

Who wouldn't.

Despite where his mind currently was tripping, the two words ring through his head.

[oi_earthgirl]

Donna watched as the Doctor had his moment, not saying or doing anything while he got it out of his system. It really was the best thing to do. When he was done, she waited for a few minutes, watching as River peered into the room for a second...She'd heard someone shouting, and it wasn't her person, so she was worried. Donna shook her head. She was just fine. Then she turned back to her friend.

"Yes. He will remember the Doctor. As you. Because that is who you are, and what your name is. To him, you are the Doctor. And that isn't wrong." She got up and walked over to where he was standing, poking her finger into his chest.

"You may not be exactly the Doctor I know, but you're still him. You're still The Doctor to me, and to Jeeves, and to the people you've talked to here. And nothing can change that." She poked his forehead.

"As far as I'm concerned, Doctor, he will remember you."

[battleborndr]

"You won't," he told her, teeth clenched and voice intense.

It was out before he could stop himself. He had yet relearned his brain-to-mouth filter. It was too late to take it back now, though he wondered if maybe he could pass it off as nothing.

Unlikely.

[oi_earthgirl]

Donna glared at him for a moment before gritting her teeth for a second. Those were fighting words.

"Excuse me?" She snapped back. "I don't plan on forgetting any of this. I mean, how can I?"

But something...something wasn't right.

[battleborndr]

He smiled lopsidedly at her spirit, but it's fleeting, and his gaze darted away again. He wasn't sure he could handle saying his next words to her while seeing her face.

"Donna... there's something I have to tell you..."

About her future. About things he's not supposed to tell her. He's broken rules before, but this was...

Something he could no longer keep to himself.

He wished more than ever that he told Jeeves.

"It's..." He chewed at his lip and looked around his room. "...Maybe you should sit down."

[oi_earthgirl]

Donna gave him a funny look. Something was making him nervous...she thought, and it apparently had something to do with her. She grabbed the chair he had vacated a few seconds before and sat on it.

"Ok. Go ahead."

This just didn't sound good.

[battleborndr]

He started to chicken out the moment she took his seat. The went against everything he knew!

And yet...

Well. Mostly human, part Time Lord? Interestingly enough he couldn't feel those peculiar threads of Time bowing under the weight he was starting to apply to them.

Maybe that's why he decided to screw the rules, buck up, and tell her. So what if she woke up and remembered? So what if he changed everything? So what if he stopped existing? Maybe Donna would still be Donna! Even the "Davros Problem" could be solved a multitude of different ways, what with Jack and Sarah Jane... There were options. Who cared if the Doctor didn't see them like that.

"I told you I was human, but I didn't say how or why," he started, finally meeting her gaze. "I have you to thank to that, Donna. Well, mostly. I suppose the Doctor inadvertently was involved," his voice dropped lower, and a little snide, "not that he appreciated it."

Ah. No. Stop.

He pushed that down and smiled at her, really smiled. "Donna, you're brilliant. Always. I know you don't think you are special, but you are." He stepped over to her and crouched down, his hands finding one of hers. "You saved reality. All of reality. You--"

He choked up and look down, eyes closed.

[oi_earthgirl]

Donna listened to him as he chattered for a bit, taking in his nervous body language. Whatever he was trying to say, it wasn't good, and it involved her.

When he choked and stopped talking, looking down, instead of at her, she understood. She did something to create this human Doctor, something that apparently saved reality.

But she got this feeling that something bad happens in the process. She got up and walked over, placing a hand on his arm.

"Doctor. What happens, happens. I'm interested to know...But I also understand I shouldn't know." She was trying to tell him that he didn't need to continue if he didn't want.