Chapter Text
You had known the Doctor since the days of your childhood in the Academy on Gallifrey. You'd been best friends ever since, and even though you'd been through the Time War apart, he had still somehow managed to find you. By the most ironic of coincidences, you managed to fall in love with The Oncoming Storm - who soon took it upon himself to make you his wife.
It had been hundreds of years and a whole new face since you'd married each other. You loved him with every fiber of your being - especially the childlike persona he exhibited and the wonder you often saw deep in those emerald green eyes of his. Especially whenever it was the two of you and your beloved Ponds. But beneath that impenetrable mask he so often wore was the shell of a man who was weighed down with all he'd seen. Regardless of his demons and the ghosts that haunted him, you had never loved another man more.
The Doctor had originally planned on taking you to New New New Mexico for something (you swore it was for the nude beaches), but you instead arrived on the outskirts of a town called Mercy and everything had sort of escalated from there. After your last altercation with the Master - which had also been the last time you'd seen the darker side of the Doctor - You never though you'd see the raging Time Lord that lurked beneath the skin ever again.
The way he had looked at you when he'd gone into that glass box with all intentions of dying.. Like he was committing the sight of you to memory before he was bathed in the eternal darkness of death. It was not a memory you wanted to relive.
"I just thought I'd put you all in enough danger... Perhaps if I left-" You casually leaned against Amy Pond as Karla-Jex spoke, tugging at the (y/h/c) braid that she'd done for you inside the TARDIS earlier that morning as a way to keep your hair from falling in your face.
The abrupt shout of "Lying!" had you early jumping out of your own skin as the Doctor stormed back into the room, his brow furrowed with anger as he glowered at the other man. You pressed your lips into a thin line and parted from Amelia to reluctantly rest your hand against the curve of his shoulder.
"Doctor?"
"Every word, everything he says." His muscles spasmed under the softness of your touch as your fingers ghosted over the curve of his elbow, drinking in the feeling of the tweed fabric of his coat until you linked your fingers together. The Doctor glanced at your concerned gaze through his peripheral vision as he swallowed the bile in his throat, carefully reminding himself that you were in the room with him - and that he had no need to resort to such a measure as violence. It didn't suit him.
Your heart began to accelerate as you watched him back Karla-Jex into the nearest chair and tower over the smaller man. "It's all lies." He repeated, lips curled back in a vicious snarl. "This man is a murderer."
"I am a scientist!" He protested.
"Sit down." The Doctor snapped. When Karla-Jex didn't immediately comply, the Time Lord's expression contorted to raw anger as he now stood chest to chest with the other man. "SIT DOWN!" Had this excursion taken place when you had first reunited with the man you loved, part of you might have had an inkling of fear lingering deep within at the sight of such anger. It was something to behold.. The fury of a Time Lord.
It was purely instinctive for you to want to remain at your husbands side, and had it not been for Amy coaxing you backward and out the door - you might as well have stayed inside the Prison. You quirked an eyebrow at the redheaded woman as she quietly shut the door behind her and proceeded to hold her hands up in surrender.
"I don't want you to get hurt because of how angry he is." Amy explained. You knowingly nodded at her claim and leaned against the railing of the porch, lifting your hand to your line of sight to gaze upon the wedding ring that adorned your finger. "You know as well as I do that he'll never forgive himself if he hurts you."
You knew she was right. The Doctor had carried an irrational fear of your death since the start of your relationship, and even after the four faces you'd been part of and the whispered promises to stay by his side, he always believed that one day he would drive you away in the most painful way possible - and it would be the end of him.
You craned your neck to hear the conversation continuing inside. "Tell them what you are."
"What am I, Doctor?" Karla-Jex snapped back in reply, the emblem etched into his skin blazing in the sunlight. The two men were so deep into the conversation that neither noticed your returned presence in the room. "A war hero." As Isaac stepped back in to intervene, the Doctor turned around and his expression immediately softened when he saw the fear that lingered in your eyes. You were never afraid of him unless you thought he was going to kill somebody.
The Time Lord swallowed thickly and stepped forward to close the gap between you. A shaky breath broke past your lips as his fingers prodded at your hips, desperate to find a hold on your body that would ground him. "I'm still me." He whispered in your ear as his lips grazed the side of your neck. You were halted in response whenever he turned away from you and walked back towards the cell. "The Gun Slinger is a cyborg."
"A what?"
"Half man, half machine. Jex built it. He and his team took volunteers and told them that they'd be selected for special training." You inwardly cringed at his words, imagining what it'd be like to be restrained to a table as people performed experiments on you against your own will. There would have been blood spilled. "And experimented on them. Fused their bodies with weaponry, and programmed them to kill!"
Your face contorted with disgust. You had no desire to associate with anyone of a species who killed people against their own will for their own benefit. It was cruel, it was horrifying, and most of all, it was inhumane. "Okay," Isaac replied hesitantly. "Why? Why would you do that Doc?"
"We'd been in warfare for nine years. A war that had already decimated half of our planet." Memories of your time fighting on the front lines of the Time War came rushing back to the forefront of your mind, and had you not been leaning against Amy, you probably would've vomited on the spot. The Scot looked at you with concern, quietly motioning to Rory that he needed to follow the two of you back outside so the others could continue in private.
"I hate to bring this up, but you're awfully pale." Amy murmured as she leaned her weight against the railing of the porch. You sighed irritably as Rory examined you for any signs of illness before stepping away to wipe the sweat off your forehead with the back of your hand. "Care to tell me why you almost vomited?"
Your expression grew dark as you stared at the woman who had essentially become your best friend in the time you had known one another. "Do you and your husband wish to know all my deepest, darkest secrets? There are things I have done that the two of you would despise me for." She intently studied you for a moment before softly shaking her head, causing the breath you'd been holding to forcibly exhale. "Good, because you'd hate me if you did."
You couldn't help the tears that built in your eyes as you listened to your husband yell at the murderer inside. You had spent everyday regretting the choices that the two of you made on Gallifrey. But even with all of the blood of your own people on your hands, the two of you had still always come back to each other. There was no denying he was your everything, your rock, your best friend.. your soulmate.
You pressed your ear against the door out of sheer curiosity once you'd heard Jex speak your name. "When I look at you Doctor, and that pretty girl with the ancient eyes outside, it's almost like looking into a mirror. On both of you! There's rage there, and guilt, like me. Solitude.. Everything but the nerve to do what needs to be done."
Had Amy not pushed you to the side, the Doctor would've easily ran you over as he roughly shoved Jex through town and back towards the boundary line. "STOP IT DOCTOR!" You yelled, hastily pushing through the growing crowd of people. Your hearts nearly stopped whenever he shoved Jex over the line and snatched a revolver out of one of the towns peoples holsters. "You know as well as I do that you won't shoot him!"
Which was true. The mere fact that he was pulling a gun out, let alone threatening to shoot somebody, set you off. The version of him that you had married refused to hold a gun, let alone look at one. And now that he was compromising, you were done watching him try to kill people to save others. "You wouldn't."
Your stomach crawled into your throat as he cocked the hammer of the revolver back towards himself, resistance to pulling the trigger evident in his eyes. He's still there, still your Doctor. "I genuinely don't know." Rory pressed a hand against your shoulder, causing you to turn to him and see the gun he was resting in your hand.
"Calm him down." The Centurion whispered as the people around him shifted anxiously. "You're the only one who can."
Before you could fully register what was happening, the Doctor was pointing his weapon at the townspeople and you were firing a warning shot into the air. "Let him come back, Doctor!" His face flooded with disbelief as he stared at you, the revolver still clutched in his hand.
"Or what?" He deadpanned. "You won't shoot me, y/n!"
"How do you know?" You snapped back. "If it's to keep you from killing these people, maybe I will! Maybe I've changed in the time we've been married, clearly you've been taking stupid lessons since I saw you last-" You nearly laughed at yourself as the gun went off again, firing a bullet at the ground. "I'm sorry, I really didn't mean to do that!" Another shot fired, and you doubled over with laughter. "Or that!"
"We can end this right now, y/n! We can save everyone right now!" The Doctor stormed in your direction, causing you to freeze as he was only mere inches away. You could practically feel his breath fanning over your face, green eyes questioning as they flickered between your own and the tantalizing curve of your mouth. If you were to only lean forward a few inches, he would be putty in your hands.
"This is not how we roll, genius!" You snapped in retaliation, the weapon in your grasps clattering to the ground as you clutched the sleeves of his tweed jacket. "And you know it! What's happened to you, old man? When did killing someone become an option?!"
In the entire time they had been traveling with you and the Doctor, Rory and Amy had never seen you so furious. The Doctor had only vaguely informed them of your part in the War, and even then - Neither of them knew the ghosts that haunted your every waking moment. You did everything in your power to be the best wife you could to a very broken man, and to remind your husband that he was, in face, a better man then he claimed to be. "Jex has to pay for his crimes!"
"And then what then? Are you going to hunt down the people who made the weapons we used to kill our race?" His jaw tightened at the mention of the Timelords, all of whom were dead because of the two of you. "A gun, a bomb?"
"But they keep coming back! Don't you see?! Every time I negotiate, I try to understand. Well, not today! No!" He was hovering over you at that point, fists curled at his sides as you held your breath - prepared for him to lash out at you. "Today, I honor the victims first! His, the Masters, The Daleks, all the people who died because of my mercy!" You turned your head away from him, oblivious to the flicker of confusion in his eyes as you blinked away tears threatening to fall.
"Do you see what happens when we drift away from each other? We start to lose ourselves." You choked out, cupping his face in your hands. Ever since the Ponds had taken permanent residence inside the TARDIS, you'd been off doing other things with River Song, and had only come back to visit your husband because it had been so long since you'd seen each other. "People like you and me, with hearts like ours, mercy is in our blood. K-Killing people? That's not you. That's not us."
You leaned forward and gingerly rubbed your nose against his own, hot breath fanning his face as he pulled you to him to close the gap between you. Nimble fingers danced along your sides until curving comfortably over your hip, while his free hand snaked upward to curl in your hair. Satisfaction permeated the electricity coursing through your veins as he audibly whimpered at your touch - having been deprived of it for as long as he had. It was just as he moved to deepen your kiss that you were forced to retreat, resting your forehead against his own as he snaked both arms around your waist.
"I need you to be here with me." He whispered fiercely. "Don't leave me ever again."
A smile caressed your face as he stood tall, staring down at you with his beautiful green eyes. Once again you had saved him from himself, and to you... that was a massive success. Bonus points if he ended up smiling by the time you were finished. "I won't, old man." You mused as you booped his nose. ''Now, I believe we have a town to save." You peered around the Doctor's shoulder and met Jex's eyes. "And another Doctor as well. What can I say?"
He nudged his hip with your own as you simultaneously crossed your arms over your chest. "Geronimo."