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The Doctor should never be alone. This rule may be just as important and well known to his companions as rule one, because this is rule two. The Doctor should never be alone. Bad things happen when the Doctor is alone.
“A-Amy? River? Rory? Please, someone, tell me what’s going on,” the Doctor begged, screaming at the Tardis. The closest thing he got to an answer was the familiar whoosh sound that he always got. Tears started pouring out of his eyes, face going from scared to blank. Being a psychopath came with its advantages sometimes.
His body went rigid as he stood up straight, movements completely mechanical in nature. Almost like he was again the Tesselecta instead of the normal Time Lord. He started off to one of the corridors in the Tardis, unsure of which one because nothing was fixed. The rooms shifted in accordance to his whims and desires and right now he desired his bathroom.
He desired the little blade in the cabinet on the wall, something so human, a habit he’d picked up from his missing companions. He desired the cold metal in his skin, the feel of pain as something so familiar because well, the Doctor cheats death but still feels the pain of cheating it, and that pain had become a grounds of solidarity and the voice of reason when there was none to be found.
Amy was dead. Her death was a fixed point in time, her soul split into two realities that had collided and locked her into a paradox so big that trying to stop it could rip time itself apart.
Rory, being the ever so loyal Last Centurion, went after her, unable to entertain the thought of being without her in life. So he joined her in death, created himself a paradox by killing the version of himself from a few minutes prior to, preserving his memory but deleting himself from existence.
River was gone. The regeneration energy she’d given to the Doctor to save him had come back to her, and she obliterated herself before he could even get the chance to save her.
For the first time in a while, he was utterly alone and without the option of no longer being alone.
So he walked to the bathroom, his faithful old girl directing him to the room he desired. It was so painful seeing his bedroom and bathroom, so large yet so bare. Time Lords don’t need sleep, it’s just a stress reliever and a distraction and a waste of time, as kids would say, even though time is never wasted.
Those mechanical movements set his body in front of the mirror, the mere reflection of himself covered in blood that wasn’t his was a taunting image. He pulled back his fist and shattered the mirror, not even recognising what he had done. He looked at his steadily bleeding hand heal up quickly.
He brushed the mirror shards out of his way as he opened the cabinet and grabbed his little box. In said little box was a blade made from old Tardis’s he collected from House. He didn’t want anything else to hurt him other than his old friends, so he fashioned a blade from their destroyed bodies.
He took off his jacket and threw it on the ground, and stripped himself of his button up. It’s a waste to ruin a perfectly good outfit. He brought up his left arm to about sink height and grabbed the blade with his right. He put the blade down on his left arm and gave it a fast and deep swipe down, relishing the blooming sensation of pain sweeping throughout his arm.
He picked up the now bloodied blade and repeated the process in a different spot, this time pressing the tip deeper to tickle the veins there. He groaned and grunted, pained sounds unwillingly leaving his mouth. He enjoyed this, so why grunt in pain?
He didn’t want to distract from his task to find out, and he picked up his blade again, now being careful of the steadily bleeding cuts on his wrist. He repeated this action, over and over, tearing up his wrist until it couldn’t be called anything but a few scraps of skin. It’s not like those simple injuries to kill him, but he sure as hell can make it feel like death.
He looked down into the sink, now filled and stained the dark red of his blood, his two hearts pumping rapidly to make up for the blood loss. He set down the knife on the edge of the sink, and promptly fell over, body giving up from the blood loss.
::
He woke up on the bathroom floor in a puddle of his own blood. His attempts to keep his shirt clean were futile, both articles of clothing now soaked through with his blood. He looked down at his arm to find it completely healed. His arm worked better than it had before, brand new cells and everything. Regeneration always made him feel amazing and absolutely horrible at the same time. His cells were the same and his body recognized that, he this brain rejected them from the instinct fear that they weren’t his.
Too many experiences with things being implanted into his body would do it, a serious case of PTSD affecting the psychopaths warped brain, because even he couldn’t beat his own brain. He found it! The one in the universe that can kill the Doctor is the Doctor, and even his stupid brain stops him from doing that. He was cursed to live his natural life, brain also working itself out of deadly situations, simply not allowing death. At least, not the death of himself. Kahler-Jex said his worst trait was his morality but he seemed to be lacking it when it comes to his instinctual survival or someone else’s. The brain always wants to preserve itself and that’s the what the Doctor is good at, getting himself not killed.
However, other people? Not as lucky. When it comes to him or them, and his brain gets the choice, it will always be him. Never will he ever, no matter how strong his morals, will he ever instinctively put other above himself. Not him. Not a Time Lord. He was perfect but he had his faults in the most perfect thing about him, his brain.
He’d wanted to save everyone, live by his rule of, not walking away, but he also had to live by the rule of, running away when protecting something precious. He had the choice. Walk away from the planet that was doomed no matter his interference, or run away with the three people in the universe who loved him and cared for him.
He chose to save the planet, his own morality getting in the way of his friends chances of survival, and they went along, ever trusting of the Doctor. Oh how he wished they didn’t trust him.
Lying Doctor. Deadly Doctor. Stupid Doctor.
In the situation, it made sense. Save the planet of billions and risk his friends, or let the planet die and save his friends. He went through the calculations as quick as he could, running through his own abilities and the abilities of the others. He put too much on them and he lost them. It’s all his own fault.
So he picked himself from the bathroom floor and stepped into the adjacent shower, stripping off his bottoms and ridding himself of the blood of himself and his friends. He never responded to violence well and seeing the natives of the planet get blown to bits and splatter him with his own blood made him angry, and an angry Doctor is an unreasonable Doctor. This only one more brought attention to his own mistakes killing his friends. At least the planet is safe, yeah?
::
From then on, he travelled alone. Unable to bear losing more friends and family and lovers.
He saved planet after planet, sometimes a whole galaxy alone. Always putting on that dazzling smile and always winning. Yet he went home unfeeling and tore himself apart but he always came back together.
Lying Doctor. Unfeeling Doctor. Deadly Doctor.