Chapter Text
“Doctor… look at your hand.”
In retrospect, it was difficult to pretend that the Doctor’s glowing hand wasn’t a distraction. The mango-everything ice cream—which did indeed taste like everything in a pleasant, subtle way—was merely another sensation, a chill on the tongue, a bloom of rich, sweet cream. If she was going to pick a flavor, it had better be one that only the TARDIS could make in its ice cream manufacturing plant. Of course the TARDIS had an ice cream manufacture behind the ice cream parlor, great silver vats of every flavor in the universe.
Yaz had never felt so helpless. She could carry the Doctor off a dying planet. She could pilot the TARDIS for a breakneck, last millisecond rescue. There was nothing she could do to stop the sparking gold particles whorling from the Doctor’s fingertips.
Yaz barely remembered landing in Croydon, but everyone she dropped off understood: there was no time for goodbyes. It had been a hasty “see you” to everyone and a hug for Graham. Kate had started calling cars by the time Yaz made her retreat behind the creaky door. She coaxed the TARDIS into the vortex with a gentle word.
Yaz had glanced at the Doctor then, and the sliver of golden glimmer she had seen on the Master’s planet had blossomed from the Doctor’s thumb to her wrist. Maybe it was just the leftovers of degeneration, Yaz reasoned, trying not to worry. She took a moment for several shaky breaths, once the adrenaline came crashing down, once she had made a cup of tea, and the gold faded back out to her short relief. But it came back within the hour, after her second biscuit, the same shine of the universe beaming through the Doctor’s skin like a muted sun. And still, she slept, and Yaz recalled the Doctor on Grace’s sofa, in her ragged, overlarge clothes, exhaling a shimmering breath of regenerative energy. She wore the same peaceful expression on the sporadic occasions when she really slept, only taking a few hours at a time for much-needed rest.
Then the deep bong of the cloister bell confirmed what was happening. Wearily, Yaz patted the console.
“Thanks, mate,” she said softly, still not sure why she was addressing the box. “She’ll be fine. She’s got to be fine. You were brilliant, you were… Think I did alright myself, if you’ll let me have that…” Yaz felt like she was babbling. She sank onto the floor by the Doctor’s knees.
Two assured fingers found the soft skin of the Doctor’s wrist. Warmer than usual, she realized, like a threatening fever. Her cheek too, Yaz felt with a more tentative back of her hand. After everything, the Doctor, her Doctor, was burning away at her fingertips.
“Come on,” whispered Yaz, “wake up.” She shouldn’t think it was a waste of time for the Doctor to sleep through this; not a second spent with the Doctor was anything less than precious. She grasped the edge of the Doctor’s sleeve like a child holding a blanket. Briefly panicked, she wondered if the Doctor would regenerate in her sleep. But the Doctor slept on, unchanging but for the gentle glow of her hand fading in and out, as if indecisive about what was happening.
Of all the times the Doctor had said her name—I’m calling you Yaz cos we’re friends now, can’t have a universe with no Yaz, gold star for Yaz—the rough, anguished cry ripped from the forced regeneration chamber was the worst. Yaz felt too slow, transfixed by the holo-projection, willing the Doctor to pull herself free, cut the lights, the power, destroy something, anything with her sonic. The Doctor could get herself out of these situations, but this time, this one time, she had called to Yaz because she was out of options. There was no one else who could save the Doctor, not even herself.
“And I did save you, didn’t I,” said Yaz, stroking a strand of the Doctor’s hair from her peaceful, sooty face. “I’m proper chuffed, myself.” She lost the fight with her burgeoning tears, and they spilled, hot and thick onto her lap. One dripped onto the Doctor’s glowing hand, hissing from existence as she twitched. The glow flickered out like a fading flame and Yaz muffled a shaky sob.
We used to be you. Decades ago. So this was the sort of thing that happened when companions didn’t leave the TARDIS willingly. Yaz almost envied Dan’s hasty retreat; she almost wished she could have left at any time, with Graham and Ryan, maybe. But that was just it, she couldn’t dream of leaving, not even when it was about to happen.
The corner of the Doctor’s mouth twitched, and that crease in her between her brows furrowed its way into place. Yaz stifled a gasping sob with her hand. She bit down, trembling, and the Doctor grunted softly, eyes still closed.
One thought pushed its way into Yaz’s mind: she shouldn’t let the Doctor see her like this. She stood, returning to the console in time to wipe her eyes. One more look couldn’t hurt. The Doctor was no longer glowing. Best act casual. She could pretend it was okay, that they had saved the day and they were on to the next adventure, everything would be alright. Yaz fixed her face into an incurious expression, no cracks of dread leaking through as she stared at a monitor. The Doctor inhaled audibly, and Yaz tensed, waiting for the inevitable.
“Did we do it?”
The Doctor wiggled her feet on the TARDIS roof in a blithe way that meant half her expansive mind was focusing on how to make this any easier. The same way she smiled so hard when all Yaz could do was melt into more tears. Spoonful of sugar, a lick of ice cream. Earth turned below them and they said nothing for a while.
And it was maybe a little easier, once she ran out of tears and dull acceptance replaced the sharp pang of sadness. The ache of it settled in the pit of Yaz’s stomach, but it was hard to cleave to when ice cream was flavored with joy and maybe even a hint of melancholy, cloaked in sweet, nostalgic mango. She could manage a smile now, at least. Even in the oxygen bubble, ice cream didn’t melt in a hurry in space.
The Doctor’s hand kept glowing like a roadside flare and Yaz had to stop herself looking, willing it to stop. The nighttime lights in Europe winked back as if to reflect the Doctor’s energy. She fixed her gaze on the dark ocean for a while.
“I chose the place we met because,” said Yaz, “I’ve never been happier than with you.” The Doctor wiped a smidge of ice cream from the corner of her mouth with her thumb, her eyes warm and full and earnest when she looked at Yaz. “You really are the best person I’ve ever met. Doctor, I…” She paused, unsure if she could say it. “I’ve loved being with you, too.”
“That means,” breathed the Doctor, “oh, that means the universe, coming from you.” She leaned sideways so their shoulders touched. “Stars, but you’re one in a billion, Yaz. Trillion, even.” Her lips puckered slightly, her brow rumpled with calculations. “One in a duotrigintillion,” she settled.
Yaz laughed, a little, hollow sound, but it made the Doctor’s smile brighter. “You’re just making sounds,” she echoed Graham, years ago when the Kerblam man had materialized in the TARDIS.
“It’s a real number! I can write the maths out for you, if you like,” said the Doctor. She crunched her cone. “Load of zeros but we can fit them on the biggest whiteboard in the TARDIS—Oh, what about a googolplex? Great word, googolplex…”
Yaz could have kissed her then. They finished their ice cream in comfortable silence, and the world kept spinning. She could see the edge of Pakistan by the time she gave in to the impulse to rest her head on the Doctor’s shoulder. As always, the Doctor flinched at a touch she herself hadn’t initiated, but then she relaxed and rested her head against Yaz’s. She reached for Yaz’s hand then, and Yaz felt their fingers lacing like they had always done, like their hands were molded for each other, burn scars, calluses, and all.
“I wish we had more time,” whispered Yaz. “I wasn’t done with the universe. I’m not done with you.”
“The universe’s not done with you either, Yasmin Khan,” declared the Doctor. Her thumb traced Yaz’s first knuckle. “There’s a way you’ll see more. I know it.” They rested on each other, trembling as much together as they were apart.
“Would you still come round for tea at mine?”
The Doctor breathed a painful laugh. Yaz could feel her nod. “Whenever I can.”
They saw Europe again before the Doctor suggested they climb down.
“I’ll drop you back home, as promised,” she said, helping Yaz through the door. Yaz lingered in the doorway, taking a last long look at Earth, holding the Doctor in place by her hand.
“You remember taking us to see fireworks?” asked Yaz, eyes on the lights below.
“I remember everything,” said the Doctor. She followed the tether of her arm back to Yaz, joining her to look out at Earth again.
“We could see all of them from up here.” One by one, each time zone had lit up with a rainbow of color. The Doctor’s scarf had tickled Yaz’s ear; Ryan and Graham huddled close for the show, all four of them marveling at the colorful blips on the Earth’s surface, on the clearest New Year’s Eve in history.
“That we could, Yaz.” Yaz tore her eyes away from the planet, and tears raced in neat lines from the Doctor’s eyes. “I’m sorry,” said the Doctor, wiping her face on her sleeve. “I just hate this part.” She gave herself a little shake, and her brave, smiling face was back.
“It’s okay to be sad,” whispered Yaz. “We’re not saying goodbye, remember.” The Doctor pressed her forehead to Yaz’s. She nodded, gently held Yaz’s cheek. Yaz found herself holding the Doctor’s sleeve again, hot tears falling fast down her cheeks again.
Then the Doctor cupped both of Yaz’s cheeks. Their shining eyes met, and the Doctor pressed her burning lips to Yaz’s brow. God, but she was holding back all that golden fire for this, thought Yaz, failing to steady her heaving chest. She dropped her gaze to the floor, to those boots, the wrinkled striped socks, and the night sky hem of that coat.
“Hey,” said the Doctor, drawing Yaz’s chin up with her glowing hand. Her hazel eyes reflected a pinprick of its light, and Yaz thought she could see every adventure they had swimming there, and more they hadn’t. Two straight lines of tears streaked the Doctor’s face again, shining like frozen comets in the sky, but she didn’t allow any more to fall. “We’ll be alright, us,” the Doctor whispered. “We were brilliant, weren’t we?”
Yaz could only nod, her jaw quivering. Her eyes rested on the Doctor’s mouth, on that winning smile that hadn’t quite reached her eyes.
“Always be with you, Yaz,” murmured the Doctor. “Promise you won’t forget me?”
“Like I could,” chuckled Yaz, her throat tight. “I don’t fly a TARDIS for just anyone.”
“That’s my Yaz,” smiled the Doctor. Yaz pulled her eyes to her Doctor’s.
She almost didn’t want to kiss her. Kissing the Doctor would only make this harder. But what was one more ounce of agony to the already enormous, incalculable weight of leaving? Yaz reached for the Doctor’s shoulders, the place where the fabric of her coat still covered skin, and the Doctor understood.
In the doorway of the TARDIS, with Earth spinning and spinning and billions of lives thrumming on below them, time froze. The Doctor kissed Yaz, long and soft and slow, and Yaz kissed her back. It was not a goodbye.