kore_logs | A Return to 'Normal'

Entry tags:

A Return to 'Normal'

Who: Mina, the Doctor
Where: Mina's house
When: Night of day 85
What: After the Doctor's return to sanity, he talks with Mina.
Warnings: none

After the Master had come and assisted the Doctor in repairing his shattered mind and memories, the Doctor slept nearly 48 hours. Part of that was doing his best to fix the remaining cracks and holes still exposed in his mind, and the rest was out of pure exhaustion.

That morning, Donna had laundered his clothes, and he slowly began eating again, and spent the afternoon fixing a few things that had been mostly repaired in Mina's kitchen. Donna had left in the late afternoon, after the Doctor's insistence he was fine, and he waited for Mina to wake. His pin-striped trousers had seen better days as had his button down shirt with his sleeves rolled up a bit as he sat in a chair flipping through a book in Mina's room.

Privacy? What was that to the Doctor? He had a distinctive disregard of boundaries which was rather ironic given his own in the TARDIS to his companions. Lucky for him, he had a ship that knew what they were, and kept those traveling with him, away.

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It takes him a moment to put the pieces together, and then he realized what Mina was saying and sat up. "It was too late by then, wasn't it?" He inhaled slowly, taking it all in and rubbed the back of his neck, lost in thought.

It was a bit tragic, wasn't it? "Was this before or after gallivanting the sea?" Most likely before, he assumed, and he felt like perhaps he knew her past better than he ever expected. At least a taste of it.

His, on the other hand, was just as complicated, but perhaps not quite as tragic, though there was plenty of blood stained on his hands.

She smiled sadly. Anyone else might have gotten confused by how twisted and circular her life was, but not him. He could follow the lines. Which she supposed could only make sense, given what he was.

Or had been.

"Before," she said. "Once I knew vampires existed, all I wanted was to know what they'd done to my Tom. So I dressed in his clothing and I left Devon County. Learned as best I could, about all the things that went bump in the night. I heard a rumor that there were great hordes of them in the New World, so I joined a ship and headed for the Caribbean. It was, tragically, taken by Calico Jack."

"Did you ever find out?" He watches her with great intensity, somewhat familiar with this part of her life, but he had to admit he was quite curious.

Was she as curious about him as he was her? Funny enough, he felt he wasn't terribly exciting given the TARDIS was gone and couldn't show her anything. Then there was the dilemma of how he returned after being away. His time lines all blurred and crossed, making him wonder what all had he said to her. Rose apparently was a popular topic and he mentally winced at that.

"Oh, yes," she murmured. "But not until one death and over two hundred years passed. That's always the way of things, isn't it? It's when you stop looking for answers, stop caring, that they have a way of finding you."

She trailed a finger along his shoulder and arm, the storm in her eyes gradually subsiding. At least a little bit. As much as it ever could.

"It was in Chicago, near the end," she murmured. "We broke into a Centurion stronghold to find some answers about the situation in the city. It was a church, with a sprawling basement beneath it. More of a dungeon, really. And as we were running for our lives, someone in one of the cells saw me. I heard him call out. 'Mark?' he asked. But we couldn't stop to help, we had to keep running. I was with my niece at the time, however. She returned a month later and broke him out."

Somehow her story, in a very vague way, made him think of the Master, how he went rogue, went into hiding, and fooled the Doctor in his last regeneration, and ironically was here in a faulty regeneration. Funny how time worked.

"But he had his memories back?" It was a guess, given how bitter Mina had mentioned him at the beginning. A shame. He'd like to see her happy after hearing all this.

"No," she said flatly. "He still thought he was Tom Barrett. But my niece? She has the ability to see through a false face. And she could see what he really was. Just another Joseph Brown."

Hearing that had nearly destroyed Mina. But she was strong. She was powerful. And she was far to stubborn to ever let herself be defeated by any man. In any way.

Mina shook her head. "Things happened so quickly after that. The True Fae were destroying the city, destroying me as well. And then Joseph Brown had his time machine and there was a battle and the city was burning. And then...well...here I am."

"And what do you suppose you would do if you returned?" Would she return to her death?

Mina's timeline was tricky to read, from a Time Lord's perspective, not that he would try to change it anyway. He couldn't and if living by the rules didn't stop him, learning that when he did try to control the laws of time, it wouldn't obey him. Time Lord or not, they weren't meant to be tampered with.

"I don't know," she admitted. And Mina sighed softly. She didn't particularly enjoy the game of 'what might have been' or 'what could be.' She had to live with what was. And as much as she hated Cape Kore, she supposed, she couldn't complain about it too much.

Because one thing was clear. Returning didn't mean returning to Chicago.

"I'd be in Arcadia, I suppose," she said. "The land of the Fae. I might be better off than the rest of the Kindred down there. At least I have a Fae inside of me. I imagine the others are suffering quite horribly."

He looks away for a moment, then speaks up, "I'm dying." Glancing back towards Mina, he clarifies, "There was a prophecy spoken to me just before I came here your song is ending... he will knock four times. I don't know when or where, but not long after going back, something is to return."

It still surprised him that the scientists hadn't forced him to regenerate here as punishment, making him to believe a fixed point is to come and something he couldn't change. The Master had something to do with it as well, and the Doctor wondered if it's he who kills him.

She sat up a little bit. "Dying?" she repeated. As far as she could tell, despite the condition she and Donna had found him in, he seemed, now, to be in perfect health. And he certainly had been, before the whole disaster.

Did 'dying' mean something different to the Time Lords.

And what was this business with prophecies? "You can't seriously believe that," she said.

"I typically don't, they're often nothing but rubbish," He nonchalantly rubs at his eyelid, "But the timing of this mentioning... and the Master here confirmed it as well. I'm not suppose to know about my future, just as I'm not able to tell you yours, but if he wasn't lying to me, some challenging times are upon me." The Master had mentioned Rassilon and the Time Lords, but how much of this was truth?

It was becoming more and more difficult to believe and trust the Master, and given the drums in his head were real and had driven him to madness... The Doctor could only wonder.

"It is rubbish," she insisted. "The only way it can be true is if you allow it to be a self-fulling prophecy. Those are the only ones that are real." Psychological warfare. That's all prophecy was. She was sure of it. Even prophetic Cruac--and she believed in Cruac--was nothing but a changed perception of the reality that was.

The future was utterly malleable.

Catching her hand, he pulls Mina slightly forward to place a simple kiss to her lips. "Why would I want to go? Look at me! Imagine changing this?" Yup, he was back to his cheeky self.

Though he'd like to believe Mina, and tended to agree with her, something about this prophecy was different. The Master's being here disturbed him, and even more so when without shame, he told hints of his future well knowing he wasn't suppose to. And there was the question of Professor Song from the library. She was from his future and hinted of a different face.

Only time will tell, and nothing is to change with being here trapped in Kore.

She kissed him back, surprised by how natural such an elusive gesture felt. Although she still didn't fully understand the regeneration business, she decided that there was no such thing as the same soul in a different body. Not really. And so, she would have to make him believe, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that destiny was nothing more than a word of the resigned.

He would be a fighter, if she had any say.

And Mina did so enjoy getting her way.

So she leaned in on the kiss, her fingers digging into his hair.

He was told he had been gone for a few days, but it felt like years to him, and if he had his TARDIS, it very well could have been years. But it felt like it had been years since he had last kissed Mina, sparking a little bit of excitement and interest in him again.

Right, he was most likely hated and had a tarnished reputation about him now in Kore, but knowing he had at least two friends was indeed reassuring. And maybe Mina was right, maybe he could climb back up that hill and be forgiven. That was at least some encouragement to not be completely gutted after his mind shattered into pieces and poked at like a science experiment.

Cupping her cheek in a hand, he's returning the kiss. Taking it slow and lazy, like it was their very first time, letting the memories edge closer and determined to make a new one to go with it.

That was more like it. A little less defeatist talk. A little more...well...some might say enthusiasm. Languid though it began.

"Mmm." She broke the kiss, her face still hovering close to his. "We were a bit careless, in all the chaos," she murmured. "Didn't think to give you any kind of proper 'welcome back' celebration. How very, very thoughtless of us."

"Very thoughtless, though I didn't know you went for mentally insane types." He replied meeting her for another kiss before following up with, "Does this celebration include cake? I can handle that... and I'll have to find you more tea."

There was about ten seconds where he felt rather guilty for using up her supply. He would have to make sure she had emergency rations for the future. Priorities and terribly British!

She laughed. The fact that he'd used up most of her supply didn't bother her much. He was practically her only visitor anyway. Besides, she could hardly indulge, British though she was.

"I've put Donna in charge of the refreshments," she replied. "Which leaves me blissfully free to take responsibility for the activities."

Mina leaned over, nipping his earlobe. "Convenient, I think."

With a pleased hum, his hand slipped from cupping her cheek to entangling in her hair, "Very convenient!"

Was she trying to make him melt? Because it was working. "You know I wouldn't leave you, Mina. I wouldn't leave you behind..."

That was a funny thing to say. It gave her pause. A great deal of pause, actually. Her damn curiosity was sometimes a burden.

"Why would you say that?" she asked.

"Because," He says that almost like it answered everything as he pulls back, meeting her eyes with his own dark ones, "I promised to take you with me, to travel with me, and I'm not taking back my word. All of time and space..."

His fingers play along her neck, moving in a teasing nonsensical pattern.

It was about then that Mina wondered if he ever had left someone behind. She knew about Donna, of course. But more than that.

Another bit to tease, from whatever she could observe and whatever she could remember from his mad ramblings, she supposed. Mina did find a mystery somewhat enticing.

Rather like his fingers, at the moment.

"All of time and space," she repeated, the corners of her lips twitching. "It's quite a lot."

He had, and some of that was intentional, and some wasn't. It started with his granddaughter, Susan, who needed to be locked out of the TARDIS and to grow up without him. He was heartbroken just as much as she was, but knew she was ready to be on her own. There were some other names and faces to go along with that, but each had a different circumstance or story.

"I've been running all this time, why stop now?" He offers an amused chuckle before pulling her back in for another kiss.

She kissed him back. With her usual gusto. But she had to admit, her mind was a little bit unsettled. She really didn't know nearly as much about him as she wanted to. Perhaps that was the nature of these kind of relationships. Learning more over time. Obviously, she was out of practice. But the thought of any more rude awakenings, like she'd had with Tom, was not pleasant.

Well. She would just have to feel her way through. And be a bit more on her guard than she had been.

Of course, that didn't mean she couldn't thoroughly enjoy herself.

And if the noise coming from deep in her throat wasn't indication enough, her hand sliding along his chest was probably a good sign.

She probably noticed he was thin. Naturally he was, but his ribs were bit more prominent than usual, making it hard to miss even just under his shirt. It wasn't like him to be caught up in these hangups, as it was humans that had that silly aversion to being naked to others, but he knew his energy and stamina weren't even close to what it had been before.

And yet he was still not stopping her. She knew, and even if she hadn't, her training would tell her just by looking at him. Even though he had slept more than he could ever recall, she would understand; she always did.

With one hand holding his weight as he leaned back slightly, he deepened the current kiss, appreciating this closeness.

A Return to 'Normal'

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