Archive of Our Own ^beta

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The Doctor is dead.

At least, he thinks he is.

The first thing he feels is a pleasant numbness, more than welcome after the searing pain of a regeneration. But then even that fades, and the Doctor finds himself standing in his TARDIS, watching as his beloved ship burns and breaks, all because he was dying.

It is then, and he surveys the damage with a pained expression, he notices the young man wearing his clothes.

He’s rambling on about his legs, moving about like a child on a sugar high, and it takes the Doctor a moment to realize that he’s, well, the Doctor. Significantly younger and bouncier and more ridiculous than he ever was, and the bloke hadn’t even picked an outfit yet.

He didn’t know why he was still there, or why the new Doctor apparently couldn’t see him, but he had nothing better to do than stick around and watch. So he did. He watched as the new Doctor crashed the TARDIS into a garden shed, befriended little Amelia Pond, left Amelia Pond, and then come back approximately twelve years later to recollect the now-older Amel- sorry, Amy Pond.

He ended up wearing a bowtie and tweed, and the Doctor suddenly wishes he could regenerate again.

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The others are here too, he learned… Wherever ‘here’ was. He’d met and spoken with them all in turn, in a strange place that they’d taken to calling home. It resembled the TARDIS, or more accurately, multiple versions of her, all crammed into one space. A sort of heaven, he supposes. Each Doctor had his own favorite spot, but for the latest arrival, he preferred to continue watching the new incarnation. It was actually rather fun, phasing out of what he deemed another reality so easily and slipping back into the ‘real world’ (or at least the world he knew the best), like a ghost from a horror film- not that he thinks he’s particularly scary or anything.

Sometimes, he’ll just lean against the railing of the (new, colorful, and admittedly rather cool) TARDIS, watching his new body run around and spout nonsense, arms flailing and teeth bared in a childish grin. He wonders why on earth he ended up being a five-year-old trapped in a slightly older body, but he’ll still have a small smile on his face and his next incarnation continues on, oblivious.

River Song makes a reappearance, and she’s the same as ever; flirty and fun and mysterious, which of course immediately attracts the new Doctor to her. The old Doctor likes her well enough- she did save his life- but he finds himself constantly annoyed at the way the new Doctor gazed at her. Like she was the only mystery worth solving, and he was the case’s Sherlock Holmes.

The old Doctor would scowl and think quietly to himself, that if his newer self knew he was there, he would be more obsessed with figuring out his mystery than that of some… archaeologist.

He doesn't, though, so it’s a moot point. 

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The Doctor and Amy are joined by yet another human: Rory Williams, Amelia’s fiance. he reminds the old Doctor of Mickey, just a bit, and he wonders in the new Doctor thinks so, too.

The three of them travel, have adventures, the usual fare, but then everything goes to hell when Rory is killed and then erased from history, never having existed to anyone at all. Amy forgets all about him, but the Doctor remembers. He keeps the ring Rory had and makes a silent vow to find a way to make it up to Amy.

He stares at the console, the ring box open and glaring accusingly at him, and the old Doctor can’t help but walk up to him. The new Doctor shudders when he touches his shoulder, but he doesn’t look up from the console. They stay like that for a while before Amy suddenly bounds down the stairs, all happy smiles and ginger hair as if her world hadn’t fallen apart less than an hour ago. Then, the new Doctor fakes a smile and takes her on a trip, anywhere she wants to go, because he feels bad and he needs to be nice.

The old Doctor doesn’t leave his side for a minute.

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Rory’s alive. He’s alive and Roman, which, considering the fact that he’s an associate of the Doctor’s, is really one of the better scenarios to come out of death with. But he’s also alive, Roman, and plastic, and so are the other Romans with him.

The new Doctor is trapped inside the Pandorica, River is stuck in an exploding TARDIS, and Amy is now the dead one. The old Doctor feels an unreasonable rush of panic course through his technically non-existent body as the Pandorica’s walls close around his new incarnation, who screams for their enemies to stop this, you don’t know what you’re doing, stop. But moments later, the universe is dying and the Doctor suddenly reappears to a mourning Rory, bearing a mop and a fez, as energetic as ever. The old Doctor almost laughs upon seeing him.

Amy is placed inside the Pandorica, Rory guards her for two-thousand years, and the Doctor takes the shortcut. Then the Doctor dies again, but the old Doctor has the sense to be skeptical this time, and remains so when they rescue River from the TARDIS and he gets shot by the Dalek- because by then, he’s figured out the plan, and he hates to admit that it’s actually pretty clever.

The Doctor flies the Pandorica into the exploding TARDIS, and then he’s stuck outside of time, watching a rewind of his life. But the old Doctor is there, too. Still unseen, but he’s there.

The new Doctor kneels next to the bedside of the young Amelia Pond, telling her the story of the TARDIS and the daft old man who stole it, and then he says this.

“I think I’ll skip the rest of the rewind. I hate repeats.”

And it’s almost like a dagger in the old Doctor, who feels hurt and confused. Did the new Doctor hold such little respect for his past lives? What was he be to him? A painful memory? Something best left alone, in the past?

But he should have realized by now that his new body has a lying habit, and the new Doctor does see more of the rewind, though it’s all jumbled together and very, very quick. They both see Romana, Peri, Ian and Barbara, Susan, Sarah Jane, Vislor, K-9, Donna, Martha, Rose, everyone,and each and every one of their old bodies- even the Time War. They both grimace at that one.

Then the new Doctor stops in a very familiar TARDIS, which looks like a mash-up artwork of coral and grunge, and stares at the back of the man at the console, who doesn’t even know he’s there. The old Doctor stares alongside him.

The new Doctor is smiling, as his previous body flicks switches with careless ease, parading around proudly in a pinstriped suit and an outrageous hairstyle.

“Good on you, mate,” he whispers, and the old Doctor turns to stare at him. The new Doctor turns away and leaves the rewind, ready to spend eternity outside the universe, unaware that his long-time ghost is determined to come with him.

(Amy remembers him, though, so it’s all fine. She and Rory get married and they start traveling again, but the old Doctor can’t shake the feeling that he almost did something horribly wrong.)

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The Doctor dies (again), comes back (again), Amy gets kidnapped, and the Doctor and Rory go all out to rescue her. The old Doctor wants to be angry with his newer self for getting caught up in his emotions- he blew up an entire Cyber Legion, for god’s sake!- but at the same time, he understands. So he settles for a glower that no one else can see as the Doctor triumphantly rescues his companion and her baby- only he doesn’t. Kovarian gets the last laugh.

Only, she doesn’t.

As it turns out, River is Amy and Rory’s baby.

The Doctor spends the next few weeks obsessively searching for her, causing the old Doctor to feel something unpleasant form in his gut, but he can’t for the life of him figure out what it is. But anyway.

They find River and all is well, right up until the Doctor realizes he’s going to die soon, and then River makes a big mess out of time just to save him. The old Doctor already knows what the plan is this time, so he’s not concerned, and in fact is kind of proud of his future self. Although the unpleasant gut-feeling from earlier returns when River and the new Doctor are married and kissing, but it saves the universe, so he pushes the feeling back as far as possible and continues his steadfast vigil by the new Doctor’s side.

He erases himself from every database in the universe and continues on his merry way, his ghost at his back.

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When Amy and Rory leave, the new Doctor is in a bad place. He doesn’t travel, he doesn’t smile, and he doesn’t even wear his ridiculous bowties anymore. He locks himself up in the TARDIS- which is now cold and grey and metal- after isolating them both on a cloud above Victorian London, and doesn’t breathe a word to anyone, except for Madame Vastra and her cohorts. The old Doctor wants to thank them for being so kind, but since he’s, well, a ghost, his gratitude goes unheard. Still, it’s the thought that counts.

As for the old Doctor, he remains closer to the new one than anyone else, determined to prove his loyalty to a man who was both himself and not even aware of his existence. He sits by the new Doctor in quiet contemplation, and winces when his future self gets that distant, faraway look in his eyes, the look that has far too much pain and sadness for a man that looks as young as he does.

There’s one particularly bad day, when the new Doctor is in his room and he catches sight of a crudely-made police box lying on his desk- a memento from Amy, who brought it aboard shortly after her wedding. He’d picked up the box with shaking fingers, staring at it for all of five seconds before he threw it against the wall and started crying.

The old Doctor’s hand was once again consoling on the new Doctor’s trembling shoulders, and he can’t tell if it’s just the tears, or if he’s shaking from how cold he must feel. After what must have been hours, a red-eyed Doctor gets up from his bed and picks up the toy box once more, placing it in a storage room and locking the door behind him.

The old Doctor just wishes he could hear him. Hear the words ‘it’s okay.’ But he can’t. That doesn’t stop the old Doctor from saying it.

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Clara, as far as the old Doctor is concerned, is a godsend. She’s courageous and bold and has that element of mystery that the Doctor just can’t resist, and she’s the one who rescues the new Doctor from his slump. She’s Clara, she’s a Victorian governess, and she’s Oswin Oswald. For the first time in a long time, the new Doctor is excited and motivated.

So the old Doctor once again resigns himself to being a passive observer, since his future self doesn’t need anymore comforting- though, to be honest, he didn’t know if he even helped him at all- and he seems to have his hands full with Clara, the Impossible Girl. And for a while, all is well. There are laughs and screams, aliens and robots, and the new Doctor even gets a wardrobe that the old Doctor rather likes, even if the bowtie is still irritatingly present.

But then it happens, and the Doctor(s) wind up in the one place they can never be- Trenzalore. The old Doctor stands with Clara and the new Doctor, staring up at the monumentally large TARDIS which serves as his grave, when a soft touch reaches his shoulder.

He jumps, of course, since the only touches he’s received since he regenerated belonged to the other Doctors who had also ‘died’, and even then, that wasn’t too often. He spends most of his time in the real universe, after all, despite the teasing from his other selves.

He’s doubly shocked when it’s River Song standing there, smiling at him with gentle eyes.

“Hello, sweetie,” she offers, and he just gapes at her like an idiot.

“I can’t say I’m surprised,” continues the archaeologist who should be dead, or at the very least unable to see him, like everyone else. “He always did mention that he thought he was being watched.”

He waits for his breathing to calm before addressing her. “This can’t be it, right?” he asks. “He can’t die here.”

She smiles again. “No, he doesn’t. Not now. Maybe in the future, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned from you, sweetie, it’s that despite what you claim, nothing is ever set in stone.”

His brow furrows, and he’s about to press for more, but River glides past him with all the grace a ghost should have, and she begins speaking to Clara, whom he realizes can’t see him. He sighs and resigns himself to following along, but River never speaks to him again.

She does throw him an unreadable glance, as she kisses her husband for the last time, but he looks away and she disappears. Then the new Doctor, after seconds of deliberation, hops into his time stream to rescue Clara, who’s been shattered into hundreds of pieces and scattered across his life.

When he does find Clara, she’s not alone. There’s a distinctly familiar form staring off into the distance, and the new Doctor acknowledges him. But he doesn’t do it kindly, and he turns tail and runs as soon as he can. The old Doctor stays a bit longer, and wonders why he hasn’t seen that particular ghost yet.

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It’s one thing, the old Doctor finds, to be watching a future version of yourself as a disembodied soul. It’s quite another thing to do the same while also watching the old version- that is, the version that still has the pinstripes and hair. There are two Doctors, actual, physical Doctors, running around Elizabethan England with their Time War counterpart reluctantly tagging along.

The old Doctor is surprised, to say the least, when the exact image of Rose Tyler is seen grinning at the him, but she holds a finger to her lips when he tries to talk to her. He finds out that she is The Moment, and he’s not surprised anymore.

He likes how the new Doctor interacts with himself. There are tense moments, but those were to be expected, and everything else between the two of them is friendly and bordering flirtation. The old Doctor is hardly bothered by how much he enjoys it.

And then, well, they save Gallifrey, and he feels so relieved and happy that he wants to grab the new Doctor’s stupid, big-chinned face and just kiss it, but he’s still just a ghost, and his physical body doesn’t do anything, either. All the Doctors separate from each other, even the old Doctor, because suddenly he’s being pulled back into the TARDIS-shaped heaven, where all his other forms are, standing on a cloud surrounded by the stars.

They’re in a line, staring up at what the old Doctor recognizes with a start is Gallifrey. Tears gather in his eyes. The sound of the TARDIS barely registers in his mind, but the sudden appearance of new Doctor in this space, which should be impossible, is enough to get him to look away from Gallifrey.

He can’t help but smile at the new Doctor.

The new Doctor smiles right back.

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The old Doctor is by his side all throughout his tenure on Trenzalore. All nine hundred years, he stood as a guardian angel (of sorts) as his counterpart protected the tiny village of Christmas, with only a dismembered Cyberman head as a physical companion. Clara has been left behind; it was for the best.

The old Doctor makes sure he’s never alone. Even as the new Doctor grows older, grey hairs starting to overtake the brown, lines appearing on what used to be smooth, pale skin, the old Doctor is a steadfast, albeit invisible, fixture. But not once does the new Doctor lose his childishness, and even when he resembles an old man, he still goes out to play when the village children ask. It’s a point of both admiration and concern.

Clara comes back into the picture twice, but the last time is what the old Doctor recalls the most fondly. The new Doctor has been reduced to using a cane, much to his own displeasure, and he knows his time is running out. And he also knows that it’s his last body; after this, there would be no new Doctor.

Except for Clara, that cleverly impossible young girl, who goes up to the Time Lords and demands that they give him more lives, and they comply. Suddenly the new Doctor is shooting off the golden light of regeneration, blasting a Dalek fleet to smithereens while he’s at it, before running off the clock tower to his TARDIS in a reset body.

The old Doctor grins when he changes into a more modern outfit, and when he gets out a bowl of custard to have with his fish fingers. He makes a phone call to Clara, in the future, and is finished by the time Clara comes back to the TARDIS.

He’s saying goodbye. Amelia Pond is there, and she says goodnight to her raggedy man. The old Doctor doesn’t know if she can see him or not, and doesn’t get to find out when she vanishes moments later. The new Doctor pulls off his bowtie and Clara begs him not to go.

But it all happens so quickly, even the old Doctor is a bit dazed.

Suddenly he’s looking at a new new Doctor, one who’s old and gray but still fiercely energetic. And the new Doctor- the previously new one, he supposed- is standing next to him, looking shocked and confused, just as he was all those years ago when he regenerated. He’s staring at the new new Doctor, when his head turns slightly and he sees the old Doctor beside him.

“You…” he breathes, as if he can’t believe it. Which, to be fair, is probably true. But then, to the old Doctor’s shock, his stunned look breaks into a grin. “It was you.”

All the old Doctor can do is blink.

“You’ve been watching over me this whole time, haven’t you?” he continues, stepping closer. “When we thought Rory was gone, when the Ponds left… That cold presence on my shoulder. It was you, wasn’t it?

“I…” The old Doctor swallows the lump in his throat and nods. “Yes.”

And then the new Doctor laughs, his hands reaching out. The old Doctor barely has time to get in another blink before his face is cupped between warm, pale hands, and he’s being pulled forwards. Their lips meet in a flare of warmth and the blessed feeling of touch is enough to make the old Doctor almost cry. The TARDIS is crashing all around them, like it had been when the old Doctor regenerated, but they feel completely calm.

The new Doctor breaks the kiss, leaning his forehead against the old Doctor’s. His grin never leaves his face. “Only I would be my own guardian angel.”

The old Doctor brushes his fingers across his counterpart’s cheek, something he’s always been longing to do.

“What do we do now?” he asks. They’re vaguely aware of the new new Doctor’s shouting and Clara’s screaming. They can worry about them later, the old Doctor surmises. The new new Doctor needs some time to settle in before he has any past versions of himself spying on him.

His fingers move down and curl around the new Doctor’s hand. “We go home,” he whispers.

They’re gone in a misty haze, on their way to reunite with their past selves, and the old Doctor finally feels like he’s in heaven.