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“Shh. Don’t tell your mother. It’ll be my little treat.” She loved hearing those words from them. It meant that they were going to take her somewhere new and exciting. They were her favorite uncle, and she was their favorite niece—only niece, really, but logistics didn’t really matter here—which meant that they spoiled her as much as her mother would allow. And also more than that because her mother didn’t have to know everything.
“Why would I tell her? She’d try and ground me again.”
He smiled. “That’s the attitude I like to see!” He grinned, ruffling her hair. They hurried her into the TARDIS, shutting the doors securely behind them.
“Where are we going today?” she asked.
“Well, there’s this little planet called Zimia in the Astraeus galaxy and they get the most gorgeous meteor showers. Think of it as the aurora borealis but with shooting stars,” he sighed happily, pulling levers and pushing buttons. Rose wasn’t going to pretend for a second that she knew what they did. He pulled the big lever—that one she knew—and off the TARDIS went, wheezing along the way. She wondered why it made that noise.
The TARDIS ground to a stop, causing the Doctor to grin and rush over to the doors. Rose followed after them, albeit more calmly. They disappeared out the door, and Rose did too, stopping to close her eyes and breathe in the night air.
She could hear the sounds of alien insects chirping, and while the climate seemed somewhat colder than Earth, it felt all around the same. She could hear the Doctor gallivanting around in the grass. She opened her eyes and gazed up at the stars, beautiful and warm, unspoiled by light pollution. There were many, twinkling back at her like the stars of home, even though it was a very different galaxy.
She heard the Doctor let out a big whoop, and then the sound of their antics ceased. She turned her head to find them laying in the grass, a big stupid grin smeared across their face. She sat down next to him, kicking her legs out in front of her before laying down too. What a tragedy it would’ve been if he could not travel the universe anymore. He was old, impossibly old, she knew that. Maybe even older than the stars or galaxies themselves. They had said that they were over four billion years old, and yet they were still so full of childlike wonder. She hoped she could be like that when she was older, although she’d never end up as old as them. How sad it must be, to be that old and watch your loved ones succumb to the inevitable passage of time.
“This planet is located in the middle of a large asteroid belt,” they began, interrupting the silence. “Despite its size, most of the debris in the belt is quite small compared to other asteroid belts. So, due to this, the planet attracts a lot of the debris into its atmosphere, leading to regular occurrences of shooting stars,” he smiled. He loved showing off by knowing things. “There’s one now,” he said, pointing at a brilliant ember being pulled across the night sky.
“It’s beautiful,” she said.
“I know,” he replied. “Once, when I was young, me and my friend went to see a meteor shower. Of course it was our home planet, not this one, but it was beautiful nonetheless.” He gave a deep sigh, one of those ones that could make you believe that he was as old as he said he was.
Another star streaked by, tainting the inky black sky with wisps of white. “Make a wish,” she said, gazing into the limitless void of stars.
“What?” he looked at her, incredulous.
“You know what they say, make a wish! Surely you must know that’s a human custom.”
She saw them wrinkle their nose. “But that makes no sense!” he started. “Shooting stars are just meteorite debris hitting the atmosphere and dissolving into dust as they make their way down to the crust!” He motioned wildly. “You can’t just make wishes on them!”
“Shush,” she said. “Make a wish.”
“I wish for—” they started.
“No! You can’t say your wish out loud or it won’t come true!” They stared at her, shutting their mouth and looking back at the night sky. I wish for them to be happy, she thought. They seemed happy enough, usually, but sometimes there seemed to be a deep chasm of sorrow and loneliness where their hearts should be. It bled into their eyes, and it made them look as old as they said they were. It always looked like they were missing half their soul. As if it belonged to someone else.
They laughed. “Alright.”
“So what did you wish for?” she nudged him.
“Didn’t you just say that you can’t say it out loud?” he asked.
“Yeah, but I want to know.”
“Well maybe I wished for Donna to not find out about this excursion. Woo, she is scary when she’s mad,” he said, pulling himself to his feet and extending his hand to Rose. “Come on,” he said as he helped haul her to her feet. “We ought to be getting back.” He began to saunter towards the TARDIS, stopping when he noticed Rose wasn’t following. “Why aren’t you coming?”
“Oh, sorry,” she said, snapping out of her trance of looking at the night sky. “Coming!” she yelled as she hurried after them. Behind her, a bright star streaked across the sky, breaking into a million little pieces as the atmosphere tore it apart.