[Storms] 028 - You Make a Plan...

[banished_dame]

You can make a plan
Carve it into stone
Like a feather falling
That is still unknown

Tied to the table, the slab whatever it is you're trying really hard not to be mad. Trying extremely - exceptionally hard not to be jealous in the least sort of the word, but it's difficult to do when you've got your life on the line and a robot in front of you with a blade looking to cut into you for bits and parts. It's really difficult to push those thoughts away and just think of the good, to just think that in the end it'll work out, cause it always works out. Instead all you're thinking is that if he'd just stop flirting with her, stop looking at her the way he's looking at her that maybe you wouldn't be in this spot... maybe you'd be somewhere else, somewhere far away, further than you'd ever been before.

It's hard to do that though because all you can think about is that while Mickey and you are strapped down, on his first go of the trip too for all that mattered, that while you're all here.... he wasn't. That deep space was just that and you're so far away from it all, and in that moment you'd never felt further away from him.

Until the clock speaks up
Says it’s time to go
You can choose the high
Or the lower road

" You are Compatible. "

You might clench your fist
You might fork your tongue
As you curse or praise
All the things you’ve done

Of course all that fear, all those moments you thought about were extremely hard to discern on their own because that feeling of never being further from him has now compounded upon itself as he walks into the room. His tie... tied to his head and he's been drinking, correction you know he's nearly pissed and he seems so happy.

Oh you'd seen him happy before, thought to be the cause of it on more than one occasion and you know that too, but this... this is different. He is... not himself, or maybe more himself than you've ever seen and it was Reinette... it was Madame de Pompadour that had done this to him. He practically was lit up with this radiant light and you're trying to ignore it because truthfully it's all you can think of, that and that his shirt is a bit untucked from his pants.

And he'd go off again, you knew that the moment he came back for you, it's this thing inside of him that can't help but help. Deep down you're figuring that he'd save the day and maybe...just maybe he'd go off with her. Go leave with her just because of the way he looked at her... the way he saw her in that different way than you'd ever been seen yourself. That the way he looked at you would never compare to that glow he had right now... while you're still strapped down to the slab.

And the faders move
And the music dies
As we pass over
On the arc of time

Still he's done it though, stopped them from cutting into your heads, your hearts... no parts taken from Rose or Mickey, but still you know it's not going to end. It never ends. It's like time, always and forever going on and on, and for the first time since you've met the Doctor time is actually ticking away... it's actually something you can't trust to be moving at the same speed as you. There's no backward... just forward. Always too fast too, and you can't help but feel a bit sad for it all. One woman waiting... always waiting for a single man that's got all the time in the world, but not enough to save her... well not really because history has to go on. If she's who he says she is... he can't do anything except slip into her life... and slip back out.

So you’ll nurse your love
like a wounded dove
in the covered cage of night

There's no time and you know it as she spoke to her. Seated there being called a child for all you know you're just that... a child in the middle of something so much more older than you. Compared to the likes of him you're not even on the same chart, and to her... well to her you're a child. Yet you know that time no matter how endless is ticking away for Reinette and for her life... and for her existence. You know the truth that all this shouldn't have happened, that there was no ship. No robots with clocks in their heads and there was no story of a man that changed her life. There was no ship, but you're on it... you've walked through it and you know the ship is alive, almost a living thing, with the remnants of an entire world that's waiting for this one woman and all you can think about is what you know. Because what you know is that if he could he'd save her... he'd stay too if he had to. That if he'd have stayed behind one of those times... if he'd chosen her instead of you, then you'd have been used for parts and he'd be back with her... no matter what he might say to you before... you can see that they've shared something. Yet you'll cling to the hope that one day he might look at you that same way.

Every star is crossed
by frenetic thoughts
they separate and then collide
and they twist like sheets
‘til you fall asleep
and they finally unwind
it’s a black balloon,
it’s a dream you’ll soon
deny

Now though... this isn't the way you'd expected it to go. Though if you're honest with yourself it's exactly what you'd feared would happen. He's rushing about and running like mad, but not like the madness that you recognize at all, it's different... it's urgent. Then he's gone once more and Mickey's shaking his head at you.

"Oh no... I'm takin' off next stop yeah? Make him take me back, cause look all this was fun... the ice guns and the robot clocks that are men, but strapped to a table sure I can handle that, but you? You mooning over Him while he's all googly eyes all over her?"

"I'm not all mooning over him! I'm..." tugging your hair to the back of your head, you can't even think of the lie to let out, because it's the truth. Letting it go along with a breath that you weren't even sure you'd been holding onto, you glance to him because maybe in that moment you'll think of something other than the truth. Of course then The Doctor was racing past you again, the Fireplace spinning and then the Doctor was gone. "I just... I thought it'd always be..."

"You an' him through all time and space? Rose... you don't get it d'ya? It won't be like that... you'd seen Sarah Jane Smith, all the others too? Who knows how many... who knows what else he'd have done if he hadn't run into her."

Standing there in front of Mickey though knowing the truth, knowing it the moment Reinette stepped onto the vessel with Mickey and you... Reinette was different and she was worth saving. You just wish it wasn't your Doctor that was doing all the saving all the time.

"So what then? You'll just leave... and I'll see you when? Next time we drop by? I can't think of it like that, because... I mean what'll you do?"

"Me? Oh now you're worried about me? Rose... you've got this new life, and it's not with me... I know when I'm not welcome, and when he gets back? He'll take me back... I got a good life... I got a job and someone's gotta look after your Mum, cause lord knows she'll go mad if you're off for that long again."

Time isn't what it should be and you know it as you glance to the fireplace, "It's been too long... I mean we barely had five minutes... for years. The last time he went through... the glass broke and he had no way to get back, and you're wondering if maybe he'd stayed... that he'd chosen to be with her. Just for a bit, because for you... for this side of the fireplace a few years would be just a few moments time. You could take the TARDIS... take Mickey back and it'd just sit there... like it did before... back when he sent you back, when he stayed behind to save the world.

I hear if you make friends
With Jesus Christ
You’ll get right up
From that chalk outline

And then you'll get dolled up
And you'll dress in white
All to take your place
In his chorus line

But he shows up, just as you'd always hoped him to. Ever the same grin on his face, but his hand isn't pressing at the lapel of his jacket it's clinging tight to the hand of a woman who's waited perhaps her whole life to spend this time with him. You can't even fathom it, knowing him for such brief intervals, those tiny fragments of her life spotted with his... and you envy her for a moment. To have that sort of connection with him. To have so little time with him and still impact him so greatly. You watched him from the other side call out to her and tucked your hands into those back pockets. Now you watch the two of them from the other side, heading toward the TARDIS, walking with such wonder in Reinette's eyes and you can't help but wonder if it was like that for you. If you looked at the world, through those new eyes seeing things so amazing for the first time.

And then in you’ll come
With those marching drums
In a saintly compromise
No more whiskey slurs
No more blonde hair girls
For your whole eternal life
And you’ll do the dance
That was choreographed
At the very dawn of time
Singing “I told you son,
The day would come,
You would die, you die, you die, you die…”

The history books would be changed. No death for Madame de Pompadour, no quiet ride into the night, no final farewell to her country. She'd have vanished never to be seen, but her legacy always recalled. The Doctor kept her hand as he helped her over the grates, and through the doorways... down the hallways that would soon become familiar to her. Mickey already packing his things, already dismissing the whole idea of adding himself to the lot of them. The likes of it all.

As she's settling into her room the Doctor returns to the console, setting a course to bring Mickey back home and you can't help but ask to yourself only... 'Why her?'

To the deepest part
Of the human heart
The fear of death expands
‘til we crack the code,
we’ve always known
But could never understand
On a circuit board
We’ll soon be born
Again, again, again, again…