Chapter Text
Her prison resembled a small warehouse. It was bigger inside than the outside would suggest, but only a bit. It certainly wasn’t a multidimensional jumble of a million rooms, corridors, alcoves, ramps, stairs, and a swimming pool; it was far cruder tech than that. Positively claustrophobic for a thousand years. Of course, she was supposed to be dead. And it had lovely windows, the streaming sunlight had stung her eyes as she struggled to open them. She felt a cushion under her, an oversized padded stool? A chaise lounge? It was high and had no back; too narrow for a bed. The warmth and weight of an afghan draped over her was strangely comforting. Blearily, she moved her head towards the one she sensed was there. It was almost too difficult.
He looked uncomfortable.
“What?” she asked, barely able to speak.
“I sat like this with River. Long ago. She poisoned me, then gave me all her regenerations to save my life. She woke up like you just did.”
“Lucky her. And lucky you, I suppose.” She winced at the effort it took to say anything.
“Did you ever meet her? I thought you might have.”
Somewhere from the dregs of her being she pulled out a mysterious smile. “Spoilers,” she managed as the world grayed out again.
When she woke up, she felt only slightly better. He was still there.
“Don’t you have a life? Planets to save, people to help?”
“Just one. You.”
She tried to be unmoved. Her friend had become her jailer, thief of her free will. But she had been his on occasion, and she was touched.
“The question is, do you want me to? Were you serious about turning good?”
“Why would I have said it otherwise, my bold rescuer? My hero? My all?” She put a hand dramatically to her forehead and almost passed out again. She took a few deep, slow, breaths and the room steadied.
“Because you were going to die. And you could have said anything to save yourself.”
“It has gone the other way in the past,” She pointed out delicately.
He glanced at her in annoyance and began to pace. “Rules. You do not to attempt to leave this vault. For any reason, understand? No sabotage of mechanisms, people around me, or the laws of causality. If we’re successful, outings may be arranged on a trial basis. I say when.”
“So much for a thousand years imprisonment.”
“If this works…” he rushed back over and knelt by her at eye level. “Missy, if we can channel all your brilliance to do good in the universe…you won’t be the same person they tried to execute. My pledge won’t hold me, and you will be free.”
“Why, Doctor, that is the most dazzling piece of sophistry I’ve ever heard. Were you concocting that the entire time you sat there?”
“Some of it. Do you agree?”
She opened her mouth to negotiate, to weight the bargain with her own agenda when her stomach exploded in nausea; she choked on vomit before a gentle hand on her shoulder turned her away on her side. She retched on the shining vault floor. Who was she fooling? She had nothing to add.
With the stark practicality that drove her these days, she uttered: “I agree,” and spat out some lingering bile. A few minutes later she felt a damp towel over her mouth, cleaning the trail of saliva. A cup of water was prodded against her lips.
“Rest,” he said from behind her.
She did.
She didn’t remember ever really sleeping since she was grown. She napped as was customary for adults, in fits and starts. Yet, her first days in the vault, she slept. She slept as if she were exhausted, as if years of insomnia finally caught up with her. She would close her eyes and open them days later. At least they eventually found her a bed. But if she heard voices outside--if the barest whisper sounded in the dark--she would waken immediately, alert as if she merely snapped back to the present after a wandering thought.
He talked to her through the door. The things she learned through the crack were much more revealing than anything he said to her face. As he spoke, her mind would show her deviously creative ways to use whatever he told her in elaborate plots to sting him. Plans rose and fell in an instant before she managed to quiet them. She had to remind herself why she was there. She had to stifle the voices.