Big Guy in the sky, He lied too

[not_the_question]

WHO: Doctor and Open (Some locked options in Comments)
WHAT: Doctor’s slower than usual recovery and other needs-must before the shift to Kirkwall
WHEN: From TTT return to Drakonis 30
WHERE: All around Skyhold and nearby outside
WARNINGS: The Doctor's story is sad and depressing and might come out a bit these days.
NOTES: Feel free to use these as starters, or make your own. If you have an idea and want me to write up a starer, send a PM.

Healing Tents
The little TTT group had made sure the Doctor got this far. He was fairly disappointed that he hadn’t healed as quickly as he was used to. On the other hand, given the bit of road-rash on his face from when he fell, it was probably for the best. If that healed too quickly, the game would be up for him. Now he was here, in one of the tents trying to ward off anyone trying to heal him with magic. Mostly, he just wanted to slip back to the cubby that he shared with Jamie and be done with it. He just needed to slip into his Time Lord healing coma and he’d be fine.

"Look, can you possibly do any of this without touching me?"


Herald’s Rest
The Doctor drinks wine now. He can’t stand anything else for now. He’s spending more and more time here. Partly to escape everyone and partly to watch everyone. Mostly, because he’s trying to ignore his feelings about River and his TARDIS. He hates that he feels so alien here. Oh he’s an alien everywhere but on Gallifrey, but here? He actually feels alien. So, he drinks and watches people. He might even be drawn into conversation, if the person is interesting enough.

"You're right, that wasn't a good story."


Griffons
The Doctor felt a special connection to the Griffons. Not only because he could talk to them, but they were a bit like his TARDIS. Glorious creatures. While he knew Potatoes was quite fond of him. Well, story of his life when it came to companions. Today, he was spending time with Little White Monster. Mostly because while none of the griffons were neglected, he had noticed that she had a personality that very few had the patience for. His ability to speak Griffon helped with that. In some ways she reminded him of River. Which he found oddly comforting.

"All right, girl, let's see what we have for you today."

Comments

[not_the_question]

The Doctor being wrong. It's been known to happen. On occasion. Sometimes. Little things that don't matter. (Like the planet NOT being destroyed by trees.) Anyway, back to the situation in front of him.

"What? You want me to jump right in without even one glass? I thought this was because of that drinking challenge."

He's mostly not kidding, even if he says it lightly. Okay, fine, no drink, no overly emotional story.

"I was told I shouldn't travel alone, so I cut someone's head out of a cyber-robot and glued it back onto a body. He now travels with me. Even pilots the TARDIS pretty well."

What? That's pretty much all there is to Nardole. Nice and safe.

[wontforgetyou]

It'd never been entirely about the drinking challenge, at least from Jamie's point of view. He was still trying to figure out what had happened to change the Doctor so much, and if some drinks were going to help with that, then so be it. Having the Doctor use that tone and then promptly turn around and say something that frankly sounded like he was making it up, though...well, it was a good way to get his lips to press together and his mouth to tug off to one side.

"Och, I knew you weren't going to take this seriously. Why do I even bother?"

Pushing himself to his feet, he walked over to a chest that sat flush against the far wall and flipping the lid open. After a few moments of rummaging, he pulled out a small sealed cask and a couple of wooden cups, thrusting the latter out at the Doctor.

"Fine, you want a drink? Here's that Qunari stuff I mentioned. It's called mara...maraas-lok, and you can thank Korrin for it later on."

[not_the_question]

His jaw drops. "Jamie, that was me... "

He sighs, grateful that Jamie wasn't going to leave him. He finds two glasses in his pockets (what? it happens with his pockets.) and offers Jamie one.

He took a sip and shook his head once, because wow, that was pretty powerful. But... good.

"I am taking this seriously. I just... things like this are hard for me. That is how my most recent companion became my companion. What I'm leaving out is the most recent person who told me that I shouldn't travel alone..."

He takes another sip. Because he hadn't talked about her since... And he doesn't know he'll be able to do it now...

"It was..." another sip. "... my wife. On the day I sent her to her death."

He gives Jamie a look that says 'Is that real enough for you?'

[wontforgetyou]

Well, the glasses were a step up from the wooden cups he had, and with a shrug he accepts the glass from the Doctor, filling it only partway before putting the cups away again. There was enough maraas-lok left to have more than that - but since he's not sure if Korrin will be able to get another shipment at some point down the line, he's been conserving what's left.

That may very well change, though, because what the Doctor says is quite possibly one of the last things he'd ever expected to hear, and his eyebrows wind up shooting up far enough that they practically disappear into his bangs.

"Your wife?"

It's so much at odds with what he remembers of the Doctor's reaction to lassies that it almost seems as improbable an idea of scooping out someone's head and attaching it to a body. Granted, the lasses who'd tended to be interested in the Doctor were the ones like the malevolent Chairman Babs or the evil Hecuba...so maybe it was understandable why there'd been that sort of reaction in the first place. Still, it's enough of a surprise that he winds up staring at the Doctor over the top of his glass for a good few seconds before he manages to get past it enough to ask another question...or two.

"And how do you mean you 'sent her to her death'? What happened?"

[not_the_question]

This one glass wouldn't be quite enough for the whole story, so Jamie is going to get the abbreviated version.

"She was a time traveller too. We kept meeting in the wrong order. The first time I met her was the day she died. She died to save my life. But I was only in my tenth body then. And she had lived through the whole of our relationship already."

He took a sip. Because, he figured he had to pace himself, no matter how much he would like to drink more.

"After spending twenty-four years together in linear time, the morning we parted ways, I knew I was sending her to her death. But... I couldn't tell her that. So... I didn't get to say good-bye the way I wanted."

Another sip. And the Doctor briefly wondered what Jamie's reaction would be if he told him about his family back on Gallifrey...

"I don't know why I'm surprised. Story of my life, really. After all, you all leave, eventually. Because you should. Or you find someone else. Some of you... forget me. On rare occasions I forget you. And sometimes... we're forced to be separated." Pointed look, Jamie, while it would be easy to assume he's talking about his wife, he means the times the Time Lords interfered. "People wonder why I keep to 'professional detachment'... these days? I suppose in the end, you all break my hearts. Each and every one of you."

And he really, really wants to slam back that glass now. And he very much forces himself not to. But it obviously takes an effort. Finally he meets Jamie's eyes.

"I did warn you that you might not like it when I got 'real' with you..."

[wontforgetyou]

For a moment Jamie considers saying that it's impossible to forget the Doctor. After all, it's not as though he'd forgotten, after all. The Doctor is pretty memorable, as far as he was concerned. The fact that the Time Lords have already meddled with things doesn't occur to him - and it won't, given the times they'd gotten involved before are times he's already been forced to forget. Right now, he still has no idea about his own fate, the one that's not so far away...or, more accurately hadn't been so far away before he'd been pulled here.

Still, something stops him, even if he's not sure what it is, exactly. Instead, he pushes the cask over towards the Doctor, letting him know it's okay to have more - if that's what the Doctor wants. As for Jamie, he seems more or less to have forgotten the glass in his own hand in favor of giving the Doctor a thoughtful look.

"So is that what happened with you and your wife, then? Someone forced you to be separated? Could you not have stopped it somehow?"

[not_the_question]

At the gesture of the cask being pushed towards him, he does swallow what's left in the tumbler. And then he poured a little more - not much, Jamie had obviously saved it - so just under a half a glass. Then he pushed it back. More out of respect. He could probably drink the whole bottle and it might a slight effect on him. This much? well, it was better than that fungus crap.

"No. Like I said, I met her on the day she died. If I hadn't sent her on her way, she wouldn't have been able to save me. If she didn't save me in my personal past as had already happened, then both of our timelines would have disintegrated..."

He took a sip - pacing himself again.

"Jamie, think of all the people I've saved in my lifetime. Hell, think of the people I saved just in the time we were together... If my timeline disintegrated? The change would probably cause the universe to implode. My... footprint is too big. The universe wouldn't be able to compensate for that kind of change."

So, no, he couldn't have saved her, even if he wanted to.

"She always loved me. Even when she thought I didn't love her in return, she loved me. And then, I repaid all of that by sending her to her death." His voice and breath both catch. He doesn't want to cry, but he might.

[wontforgetyou]

Even without tears, there's a lot of emotion underlying what the Doctor's saying, especially in that brief moment when his breath catches in the way it does, and Jamie's not immune to it. He leans forward, reaching out to clasp the Doctor's shoulder, if the Doctor lets him. If he'd prefer not to be touched, though, then that's alright with him. He's not about to protest if the Doctor decides to pull away. But if not, well - it's a small way for him to try and let the Doctor know that he'll be there for him, if he needs it.

"You had no choice, it sounds like. But...och, look. If you came to care for her that much, she must've been almost as clever as you are. I can't imagine you falling for anyone who wasn't."

Becoming friends with someone? Sure, that'd be different. There's him, after all, and while there are times that Jamie wonders why exactly the Doctor is willing to put up with someone who like him, they're still undeniably friends. But when it comes to love he imagines it has to take a special sort of woman to be able to keep up with the Doctor - and being almost as clever as the Doctor is is probably just the start.

"Plus you said that you kept meeting in the wrong order, right? So what makes you think she'd not figured out there was a chance something like that might happen at some point? And if she ran into you in your past and something happened where knew she had to save you...aye, well, seems to me that she'd likely thought about what she'd be willing to do a long time ago."

[not_the_question]

The Doctor doesn't pull away. Doesn't really lean into the touch either, but doesn't pull away. He slowly raises his eyes as Jamie continues to speak.

"I know... I do. I just..."

He misses her. Terribly. Another sip. Smaller this time, there's not much left and he's not going to ask for more.

"Immortality isn't living forever. That's not what it feels like. Immortality is everyone else dying. I just never quite get used to it."

He's quiet for a moment and then forces himself to smile. And it might be sadder than when he was close to tears.

"But, then why would I? Everyone has already figured out that I don't like endings."

It's partly why he doesn't stick around for the cleaning up.

[wontforgetyou]

"Aye, I've noticed that about you and endings."

It's hard not to notice that, given how keen the Doctor's been about slipping away once they've managed to fix whatever'd gone wrong in the places they'd wound up. At one time he'd thought that the main reason behind it was a sense of adventure, his not wanting to stay in one place for too long a sign of his wanting to see what was out there. Then he'd found out that at least part of it was because he was running away from his people.

Now? It seems that there's even more to it than he's realized. He, too, falls quiet for a few moments, nodding solemnly before reaching for his own glass and bringing it to his lips.

"Although I'd be surprised if anyone could get used to that sort of thing, to tell you the truth. What would you think your wife would tell you if she was here, though? Say she fell through a rift from another time. What would she say?"

[not_the_question]

There's a bit of a wet sound as he tries to force a chuckle through it. "Oh-ho-ho."

His lips quirk.

"She'd probably slap me and call me a sentimental idiot."

And then cup his cheek tenderly to easy the pain and snog him senseless. Not that he says that part, he has some boundaries.