It’s In Your Eyes
It's In Your Eyes
Hello, folks!
This has been lying around in my mind for quite some time, and I felt like writing it down after teasing Perrin Wolfbrother about it, so...for all you Whovians out there, do enjoy!
*
River's head still spun quietly, prompting her to dance a small jig around the cluttered cell of the Stormcage Prison she had inhabited for a number of years now. Her lustrous locks of hair flew through the air, framing her face when she finally came to a landing, pleasantly out of breath and smiling to herself with secret pleasure.
She wondered whether it was perfectly healthy to draw such pleasure from the fact she had spent so much time during the past three days or so running for her life. River was quite sure that her hair still faintly smelled of the ectoplasm from the para-natural creatures that had been infesting the ancient Rancophalanxian temple they had explored at leisure, until running into those Thyndopryssillian traders...oh, such friendly people, all two heads and four arms included, River thought, with satisfaction.
"Nothing like a good ghost hunt with The Doctor to keep a girl's cheeks rosy," River stated to herself, while observing her figure from the nearby mirror on the wall.
Taking the vortex manipulator from her arm felt like undressing entirely, or so it seemed for River as she gave it a fond stroke. Such a modest-looking device...but how it really was a gateway into so many secret worlds and experiences with the one man she had loved all her life, part of it without knowing so, but still, passionately, and warmly, like only she could.
She had been made for it, after all.
"Aaah..." River sighed, softly. Sleep would not come easily tonight, she decided, and wondered whether the guards would mind if she requested a late night snack. They had almost resorted to eating slugs at the Temple, after all.
Suddenly it was very quiet, however, she realized, and a prickling sensation went down her spine.
She stood very still, listening to the very space around her, as she felt her body begin to vibrate.
Danger?
Excitement?
The noise that broke the eerie, unnatural silence of the usually buzzing prison was the most wonderful sound she knew, the one whose arrival signaled adventure and romance, and its departure meant another stretch of lonely contemplation. Uncertainty, too, for she could never be sure where..._he..._would be coming from.
She rushed over to the bars separating her from the broad gangway, her head flopping from side to side as she spied, trying to catch sight of the archaic item so many cultures all over the universe saw as a symbol of simple hope.
For her, it was so much.
It only took a moment for the re-integration to run its course, and there it stood, its windows lit, and the sign above the door marked with the crest of St. John's Ambulance.
River clung to the bars, and watched, her heart racing. Such timing, she thought, just when she was out of one adventure...he would be coming back...
The seconds passed painfully, her eyes fixed on the blue box. The alarms were thankfully quiet. That made River smile. The box had a habit of slipping through even the most careful defenses, and doing it in style. If only he'd not insist on leaving the handbrake one, so as to make that ridiculous noise.
Whoooorrp. Whoooorp. Whoooorp.
The door opened, seizing her attention once more, as she waited...expected...
What emerged was a small, dark-haired woman, her shirt torn, her hair clinging to her face, blackened with soot and sweat. She walked with somewhat uncertain steps, a tentative venture out of the door of the box, looking into the dark corridor.
"Doctor Song?"
River's heart trembled.
"Clara?"
She recognized her, of course she did. They had first encountered in Madam Vastra's astral conference call, just before...just before that awful encounter in Trenzilore.
"Doctor Song, that is you!"
"Yes, Clara," her fingers fumbled over the bars, as she leaned closer, the young woman approaching now. "It is me."
"He needs you, Doctor Song," Clara spoke in a quiet voice as she approached the bars, "I've got this...will it do?"
She raised her arm, and in her hand, River saw the green glow of a very familiar item indeed.
"Yes, yes it will," she said, "may I have it?"
Clara offered the sonic screwdriver to the older woman, who took it gratefully, it's shape and weight familiar in her palm. It was as if she could still feel him upon its metallic surface. It felt wam...from Clara's hand, but...it was enough.
"Oh, he needs you...he..."
"Calm down," River whispered as she pointed the sonic screwdriver on the maglock assembly and pressed the button, the device emitting its characteristic high whine before the locks opened with loud clicks.
"Hurry," Clara breathed, "he says he needs you."
River stepped out of the confines of her cell and onto the corridor, her eyes drawn to the open door into the box.
His box.
Even with the sonic screwdriver in her hand, River had the presence of mind to brush a lock of hair from over her face. It would be bad of her not to make her presentable on such a momentous occasion. This was even with the worry nagging in her soul. This surely was not one of the good times...but even the bad times with him were more than she could hope for, in her own, quiet existence.
As soon as she stepped into the console room, she could tell.
She could feel it in the air, she could practically smell it.
"He told me to get you, and then he...he hasn't moved..." Clara spoke from behind her.
The tall, grey-haired man was sitting with his back slumped against the central console, his eyes opened and his lips moving, slowly, in a silent utterance, but no noise came out. His piercing eyes stood vacant and stared ahead of him, and long limbs laid sprawled motionlessly over the floor.
"He...I think he..."
"He has regenerated," River finished the sentence for Clara, as she approached, steeling herself as she approached her husband.
"I...I didn't know what to do...I...I asked the TARDIS to help me, and she...she just...she activated herself and then I was here..."
River's heart raced as she knelt by him, and placed her fingertips tenderly against his chin.
"It's you," she said, "oh, look at you..."
His brows twitched, briefly, but there seemed to be no other signs of recognition.
"Ohhh, I know this face so well..." River whispered as she stroked over his jaw, gently. "I've seen your every face, my love..."
"I...I don't know if he knows who he is, Doctor," Clara spoke, sounding desperate and distraught.
River smiled softly, her fingertips sliding so softly over his skin.
"Don't worry, sweetie," River whispered, trying to smile even when her eyes filled with tears, "you are so old now...it's alright to be a bit slow at start...so very alright..."
"Can you do anything for him?" Clara voiced.
"I'm doing everything I can, "River replied without turning to look at her, unable to take her eyes away from what must've been a very new face, for now, "alright, sweetie...it's alright."
Looking into his eyes, she hoped that he would remember soon.
"I know who you are," she said. "Let me help you remember."
*
Thank you for reading!