Chapter Text
Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity.
The Doctor’s words played over and over in Yaz’s mind – a looping soundtrack to the endless images of all the horrible things she had experienced that day that flashed through her mind on rotation.
Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity.
The Dregs. The state of Orphan 55. Then, realising that Orphan 55 was Earth. Realising that the Dregs had mutated from humans. Being separated from Ryan and not knowing if he was dead or alive. Having to keep on going with the knowledge that something as simple as talking too much could lead to her death. Watching as Vilma sacrificed herself to the Dregs so the rest of them could escape. The fear that they really might not make it out this time.
Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity.
It was all too much for her. The anxiety was overwhelming and Yaz didn’t know what to do with it.
Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity.
She was just one person who would make no difference in the grand scheme of things – how could she do enough to make a difference?
Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity. Be the best of humanity.
A noise that came from the TARDIS console startled her and brought her back into the present, suddenly aware of her surroundings once again.
She wasn’t quite sure how long she had been sat on the floor, hugging her knees with her back pressed against one of the TARDIS’s large crystalline pillars, but it had been long enough that she was starting to feel uncomfortable.
She shifted around for a few moments, until she realised that she wasn’t going to manage to get herself comfortable again, and she stood up.
Yaz moved around to the other side of the pillar to find that she was alone in the control room, and she frowned. The Doctor, Ryan, and Graham had all been in here when she had taken herself off to the other side of the room for a moment of near-privacy to gather her thoughts and now they were nowhere to be seen. Perhaps she had spent just a little too long pulling herself together. Ryan and Graham had probably gone to bed by now and The Doctor was probably off doing god-knows-what to god-knows-which part of the TARDIS.
She stood awkwardly near the console for a few moments, trying to decide whether she should go and look for them – just to make sure that everything was okay – or head to bed herself. Surely nothing bad could have happened to them on the TARDIS without her noticing while she was in the same room, Yaz knew that, but she couldn’t help but worry.
“Hiya Yaz!” The Doctor’s cheery voice drew Yaz away from the edge of the panic that she had been drifting towards and shifted her attention to the timelord standing at the top of the stairs, goggles sat atop her head with some sort of wrench-like tool in her hand.
“Oh. Hi.” Yaz said, forcing a weak smile.
“You okay?” The Doctor started to make her way down the stairs.
“Yeah. Fine. Have Graham and Ryan gone to bed?”
“Sort of. I think so.” The Doctor’s smile had slipped slightly, and she wrinkled her nose up in frustration. “Ryan seemed a bit upset and said he was going to bed and then Graham left straight after him and said he was going to make sure he was okay.”
“Oh. He’s probably upset about leaving Bella.” Yaz murmured.
“Probably. I wanted to help too, but I’m just so socially awkward I was worried I would say the wrong thing and make him more upset.” The Doctor confessed, avoiding Yaz’s gaze.
“I don’t think you would’ve ruined things.” Yaz said, offering up a supportive smile in The Doctor’s direction, though she couldn’t resist a bit of teasing, “Although you might have given him an inspiring speech that motivated him to go and punch a dalek.”
Her joke drew a quiet chuckle from The Doctor, a soft grin remaining on her face, eyes crinkling at the corners when her gaze landed on Yaz again.
“Thanks.” She murmured, taking a step closer to Yaz. “Uh, so, I was just about to do a bit of repair work on the TARDIS, would you maybe want to help me? Unless you’re going to bed, obviously.”
The Doctor was bouncing on the balls of her feet as she waited for an answer, although even she didn’t know whether that was out of nervousness or impatience.
“I’d love to help.” Yaz breathed, almost in shock that The Doctor had asked her to help when she had to tell Ryan off for touching the console too frequently.
“Brilliant!” The Doctor beamed at Yaz, and stuck one of her hands in her coat pocket, rummaging around for a moment before she pulled out a pair of goggles matching her own. She thrust them in Yaz’s direction, “You need to put these on, better play on the safe side!”
“I think you mean play it safe.” Yaz mumbled as she took the goggles from The Doctor and tried to put them on, rather unsuccessfully. The band caught on her hair, and she couldn’t tell whether she should put them on high enough to cover her eyebrows or low enough to sit on the bridge of her nose – both were equally uncomfortable. “Sorry. Doctor, I think I’ve messed up a bit trying to get these on.”
The Doctor turned to look at Yaz and had to hold back a laugh as she saw how frazzled she looked.
“Here, let me help.” She said, taking a step closer to Yaz. She set about trying to free the band from Yaz’s hair, one hand coming up to carefully cup Yaz’s chin to keep her head steady while she untangled the goggles’ band from her hair. Yaz’s stomach lurched at the unexpected contact and anxiety washed over her, although she had no idea why.
Just as she was starting to get things under control, The Doctor successfully freed the goggles, moving the band into place before she adjusted the goggles on Yaz’s face, sending her stomach into a frenzy of nerves again.
“How’s that?” The Doctor asked.
“Better. Thanks.” Yaz said, although it came out more like a squeak. She was very aware of The Doctor’s hand on her face and she hand to take a step back to break the contact so she could have a moment of reprieve.
“Good. I’ll just get the panel open and then you can help me, yeah?”
Yaz just nodded – she didn’t trust the integrity of her voice if she tried to speak again.
The Doctor sat down cross-legged on the floor and carefully opened up a panel at the base of the console, reaching her hand up towards Yaz.
“Can you pass me the wrench please?”
“Yeah.” Yaz grabbed it from the side and brought it over to The Doctor, crouching down near the panel. She peered in at the mess of wires and pipes and realised that she had absolutely no idea how The Doctor knew what she was doing – or even if she knew what she was doing. “Is there a manual for this stuff?”
“What do you mean?”
“TARDIS repairs. This ship is massive and you have so many different parts to fix and you never have any sort of manual when you do it.”
“Oh, yeah I don’t really do manuals.” The Doctor said, waving off the question. She took the wrench from Yaz and started messing about inside the panel. “I just sort of guess. Things tend to work out because, well, I assume the TARDIS would stop me if I was about to do anything drastic that could damage her permanently.”
“Do manuals exist?”
“Maybe. They probably had them on Gallifrey. I just never really paid attention to them.”
“Right.”
They fell into silence as The Doctor worked and Yaz watched her. Without a conversation to keep her distracted, Yaz found her thoughts drifting back towards the image of Vilma and the Dregs.
“Can you just hold the blue wire for me while I fix these two?” The Doctor asked.
“Oh? Mhm, yeah.” Yaz said, absently.
She reached into the panel and grabbed on to the wire, her shaky hand causing the live end of the wire to brush against some metal in the panel, sending sparks flying. Yaz hissed in pain and withdrew her hand, dropping the wire.
“Yaz!” The Doctor cried out and reached out to grab on to her wrist, “Are you okay?”
“Uh, I think so. It didn’t hurt that much. My fault. I wasn’t paying attention properly. Sorry. I didn’t ruin anything did I?”
“You sure you’re okay?” The Doctor asked, much less concerned about the TARDIS wiring than she was about Yaz, fumbling for her sonic with her free hand.
“Just a little shock, honestly. I’m fine.”
The Doctor gave her a quick once over with the sonic, and once she was satisfied that Yaz wasn’t seriously hurt, she stood up.
“Come on.” The Doctor reached down to grab on to both of Yaz’s hands and pulled her to her feet.
She let go of one hand but kept a firm hold of the other one as she led her over to the staircase, gesturing for Yaz to sit down.
“You’ve not been yourself since we got back to the TARDIS earlier on. Tell me what’s wrong.” The Doctor said, rather bluntly.
“It’s nothing, really.” Yaz muttered, avoiding The Doctor’s gaze.
“Yaz…” The Doctor murmured, her voice softening, and she sat down on the step next to Yaz, “Something is obviously bothering you. I’m worried about you. You could’ve gotten seriously hurt then.”
“Today was just…intense.” Yaz sighed, closing her eyes for a moment, only to be met with the rotation of images that had plagues her mind earlier, so she opened them again. “I can’t stop thinking about it.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Every time I close my eyes, I see them. I see it.”
“The Dregs? The planet?” The Doctor asked, trying to coax more information out of Yaz.
“Not just that.” Yaz whispered, “Before she sacrificed herself, Vilma told me to live. She said it to me. Then I had to watch as the Dregs attacked her. I can’t stop thinking about it.”
“Oh, Yaz…” The Doctor sighed, and she reached out to squeeze her shoulder, “You know there’s nothing you could’ve done that wouldn’t have gotten you killed too, don’t you?”
“Really? Because I didn’t even try. I froze. I just watched. I could have tried to do something.”
“No. You couldn’t.” The Doctor said firmly. “When she told you to live, she wasn’t putting any blame on to you, she was trying to tell you that she had made her choice and you needed to keep going. You had been looking after her the whole time we were outside of the resort, I bet she knew you would’ve followed her if she hadn’t given you that warning, and she didn’t want that for you.”
“I could’ve tried to stop her.”
“Yaz, Vilma’s death was not your fault. She would say the same.”
“Well, we’ll never know for sure, will we?”
“Don’t do that.”
“Don’t do what?”
“Look, Yaz,” The Doctor paused for a moment, hesitant about opening herself up, but she pushed through those nerves for Yaz. “I’m so old, and I’ve lost so many people in my life, sometimes in circumstances like this so I’ve had plenty of experience in survivors guilt. It doesn’t help to put the blame on yourself, all it does is make you feel worse. Focus on what you did do for her, not what you couldn’t do. You were there for her. You looked out for her. If it wasn’t for you, she might not have made it as far as she did.”
Yaz looked up at The Doctor, eyes misty with tears, and it broke both of The Doctor’s hearts to see her so hurt.
“I wish I could make this all better for you, Yaz.” The Doctor said in a hushed voice, “I can’t make you stop blaming yourself, but I can tell you that you did everything you could, and no one else blames you.”
“Well I don’t think I was quite ‘the best of humanity’” Yaz muttered tearfully, cringing as her voice cracked.
“Wait…has what I said made you feel like this?” The Doctor asked, her voice laced with concern.
“No. Not really. Sorry, I didn’t mean that. I just mean…well, it doesn’t really feel like I can be the best of humanity. If I can’t save one woman, how can I help save the Earth from that future?”
“When I said be the best of humanity, I meant keep doing what you’re doing. I already think you are the best of humanity. Do you really think I’d let anyone but the best of humanity travel with me?” The Doctor said quietly, using her elbow to playfully nudge Yaz’s side in an attempt to lighten the mood. “Seriously though, I wasn’t trying to put any pressure on you. I was trying to say it will be people like you who will be able to change that future.”
“Right. Sorry. I think I was just so overwhelmed I misunderstood what you said.”
“You don’t have to apologise. I am going to take full responsibility for this misunderstanding. It’s the social awkwardness. Good thing I didn’t go and speak to Ryan when he left, eh? I definitely would’ve made things worse.”
“Nah. You always make things better.” Yaz nudged The Doctor back, a soft smile on her face.
“You think so?”
“I know you do.”
A bashful smile crept over The Doctor’s face and she had to look away for a moment.
“I think I’m going to go to bed now. Thanks for everything tonight.”
“Any time. Really. Any time you’re feeling overwhelmed, you can tell me.” The Doctor said, sincerely.
“Thanks.”
The Doctor watched Yaz stand up and found herself searching for something she could do, just to get an extra few moments with Yaz.
“Do you need a hug before you go?” She blurted out, “Hugs help, right?”
“I thought you didn’t like hugs.” Yaz said, pausing in the archway that led to the TARDIS corridor, eyebrows raised.
“Well, since it’s you, I could definitely make an exception.”
“Oh. Okay. Yeah. That would be nice.”
The Doctor grinned and stood up, quickly closing the gap between them, arms outstretched before she reached Yaz so that when she did she could just pull her into a tight hug. Yaz’s eyes slipped shut when she felt The Doctor’s arms around her and she reciprocated, inhaling deeply as she did. Yaz wasn’t sure what the appropriate length of time was for a goodnight hug, or a hope-you’re-okay hug, or whatever type of hug this was, but she was almost certain that they had surpassed that when they finally separated.
She hadn’t realised how much she had needed a hug until the exact moment that she had been pulled into The Doctor’s arms – Yaz couldn’t help but note that she had very strong arms.
“Right, bed.” The Doctor sighed.
“What?”
“Bed. For you. You said you were going to bed, and I think you really do need sleep.”
“Right. I did say that. Okay, I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Goodnight. Feel free to come and find me if you need anything.” The Doctor said.
“Thanks. Goodnight.”
Yaz raised her hand in a little wave before she turned around and started to head down the corridor, unaware that The Doctor had watched her go until she had turned a corner and was out of sight.
She was quite relieved that she’d had that conversation with The Doctor now, the images of the day hadn’t left her completely but they were a little fuzzier, and not at the forefront of her mind anymore. Although the thought that had replaced them perplexed her:
The Doctor smelled really nice.