Archive of Our Own ^beta

It isn't long after the invasion of the Shakri cubes that Kate Stewart, sitting at the bank of the Thames with a cup of black tea that is rapidly becoming cold in the late February air, receives another visit from the Doctor. Well, it has not been long in the Doctor's terms, perhaps. Six months and a library of paperwork for her, but who's keeping track?

The first thing she notices is that he has on a different jacket-- it’s the swollen purple of unripe blackberries and rather scratchy-looking. A pair of rounded spectacles hang haphazardly from his nose, which is dusted pink from the cold, and he is waving at her with a box in his other hand from the gate a few meters away.

A sip of tea masks Kate’s smile. She can't say she had been expecting this one, and she wonders if she should be worried. "And here I thought my birthday would be boring," she says, speaking just loud enough that he can hear her.

The Doctor bounds on over in that coltish, if somewhat gangly gait that he has, and the second thing Kate notices is how...off-balance he is. It is something in his step, the way his legs jactitate, that suggests a restlessness. The third thing Kate observes is that the young couple from before (Amelia and Rory, she remembers now) is not with him.

Her savoir faire whispers that now is not the right time to ask about it.

"If you wanted boring you wouldn't be working at UNIT, General," the Doctor says, giving her a warm smile. The fingers of his free hand twitch once, but he doesn’t salute. "I have something I thought you might like."

Kate sets her tea down on the bench beside her and rises. "Shall I call backup?"

The Doctor shakes his head. "Not necessary. Although I'd appreciate it if you disabled your automated memory filters for the next thirty minutes. For some reason I can't seem to do it myself." His eyes twinkle.

Kate steals a glance around to make sure no one is listening in, and rolls her eyes. "How on earth did you find out about the Black Archives?" she groans.

"I didn't. On Earth, I mean," he replies with a wink. "If UNIT thinks they can keep anything from me they are gravely mistaken. But because I owe you a favor, I've decided to temporarily put my feelings regarding the storage of alien technology aside to present you with a one-time treasure to your collection." The Doctor gives the box in his arms a light pat, and Kate thinks then that it is a kind of fond pat. It makes imagining the contents of the box all the more frightening.

Once they reach the Undergallery Kate slips on a pair of gloves, sets the box on the table and peers inside, prepared for the worst. When she sees the contents she raises an eyebrow at the Doctor.

"They're really not my type," she says, before she can stop herself. Two jokes in the spans of one hour? She really will have to keep her sense of humor in check. Or perhaps, her recent bout of jest comes from the urge to relieve the calm undercurrent of dread she is feeling for no reason she can seem to explain. All Kate knows is that there is something very, very wrong with the way the Doctor is smiling. And she doesn't like it.

"Fifty-first century court shoes, or pumps, as they say nowadays," the Doctor announces, for all in the world sounding like a salesman pitching. He is fiddling with the watch on his left wrist (it is upside down and has four hands, Kate notices)."Five inch heel height with one and a quarter platform, size eight and a half. Carmine red; purchased on the Esplanade of Helena."

Kate swallows, suddenly uncomfortable. When it comes to the Doctor, nothing is ever as it seems. His manic flailing and colorful anacoluthia is nothing more than a tool to wend others away from sore subjects. His skin is smooth and tight with youth, but there are crows feet at the corners of his eyes that only hint at an age he himself can no longer keep track of.

If it looks like a duck, Kate starts to think, and immediately chokes the thought off. A smile is never a smile, and a shoe is never a shoe.

With care, Kate places the shoes on the table and holds one up to the light. She can see her reflection in its shine, long and pink, and runs a finger down the thin heel. "Pointy," she comments, still staring at the shoe. "And the perks?"

The Doctor clears his throat. "The wax is comprised of a laser-disabling compound, as well as frequency disrupters hidden in both heels."

"Ah." Kate puts the shoe down. Slowly. She cannot begin to fathom the Doctor’s motives for doing...anything, really, and this is no different. But a part of her concludes that when the Doctor is at his strangest, it is usually personal. She turns toward him, frowning. "I'm not saying I don't appreciate your generosity, Doctor, but why not put them in the Delirium Archive?"

The Doctor looks humored. "In the same room as Magnatine Dynasty crystals? Please," he scoffs. "Not to mention one hundred seventy-first century museums are so full of security lasers it's like walking through a Catkind elementary school."

"Point taken. May I ask to whom these shoes belonged?"

There is a pause, and Kate swallows again, her throat clicking. In places like these it does not do well to remain quiet for too long. The Doctor's face is long despite the smile that still rests there, and even though she is forty-three today Kate suddenly feels incredibly young, looking at him.

He does not answer for a moment. Kate watches him, and she thinks then that there are other kinds of black holes. There are kinds that don’t need stars to die to be born. There is one right here in this room with them, she thinks, consuming despair and the passing time of heavy pauses and words squeezing through the lips of a mouth in labor. She wonders when he will answer.

"Professor River Song," the Doctor finally says.

Of course. The Doctor's file, as well as the files of all his major companions, are made accessible to the heads of UNIT, after all. Then it really hits Kate, because it is one thing to have read those files and another thing to have understood them. Another thing entirely.

"I thought the TARDIS could use some redecorating," the Doctor adds, waving a hand dismissively through the air. "Spring cleaning, if you like (although it is winter now, if I'm not mistaken). Thought I'd lost them with the old console room. Her Cat Woman shoes, she called them. She left them hanging from the scanner screen. By the blue stabilizers, actually. I kept the stabilizers."

"Technically, we are supposed to confiscate any and all alien technology presented to us," Kate begins, "but I understand that didn't go so well with Torchwood One or Van Statten's Vault in Utah, so we try to be more open about things." The Doctor looks at her from behind a long fringe of hair, his expression utterly unreadable.

"I'm not saying I want to make a habit of relinquishing dangerous technology from our possession, but I think you should keep the shoes," Kate says, tucking a strand of blonde hair behind one ear.

The Doctor considers it a moment before giving a little laugh. It is light and thin; dandelion spores in the wind. He shakes his head. "True, River was born on Demon's Run, but she is considered a citizen of Earth," he replies. "Some part of her should remain on her home planet."

Or because you can’t bear to keep them, Kate thinks. She says aloud, “I see.” Part of her wants to rest a comforting hand on the Doctor’s arm. But bonhomie with extraterrestrials seems to go against all UNIT protocol. But. She understands the files, and she wants him to see that. UNIT has changed. The good Captain has made sure of that.

The Doctor must sense this, because his lips pinch together in a smile and he leans back, ever so slightly. “You know, I never liked these court shoes,” he begins, shaking his finger like a curmudgeonly schoolteacher. His eyebrows are lost somewhere in his hairline. “River, she always left them lying around for someone to trip over. I remember this one time on the Retrosynthesizing Gazebo auction of Luronica when…”

Kate lets him prattle on, looking appropriately humored. The story--some escapade involving a Callisto Pulse and an a capella concert in the Seventh Transept--is nonlinear, aorist, and sporadic in its use of tense and point of view, but Kate listens. She does not quite understand the story, but then again, she does not think she is meant to.

“And I’m going somewhere,” the Doctor says, in the middle of a sentence describing the history of traditional Luronican polyrhythms. “A place that scares me more than anywhere in the universe, and I don’t want to go, but I have to, and River won’t--she can’t--”

“Doctor,” Kate interrupts, cool and low and calm, and bugger it all because she’s not a guidance counselor, “You’re rambling.”

The Doctor, for a split second, seems to freeze. He clears his throat and picks at a spot on that unsightly aubergine-purple coat. “Yes, I suppose I am a bit,” he admits. “Sorry. Bad habit.”

“That’s quite alright,” Kate replies, and decides that it’s now or never if she is ever going to get an answer. That watch on his wrist looks broken, and Kate finds herself wondering if he has wound it recently. “Those two, the redhead...are you entertaining new passengers now?”

“Not at the moment, no.”

“Well then--” Kate pauses to choose her words carefully. The Doctor is not fragile, or so he lets others believe, but if a companion is no longer with him, history says it is not usually by his choice. “Wherever it is you have to go, well, you should find some company.”

“People keep saying that to me nowadays,” the Doctor replies, pouting. “Heaven forbid I should come across as clingy.” His gaze falls to the box on the table and he bows his head.

“Enjoy your shoes, Tiger,” he says.

But when he looks up his face is striated with a few less lines, and his eyes are somehow cliquant. For a second Kate thinks she can see galaxies in there, birling with untold constellations; a cirrus of skeining lives that remind Kate Stewart that the Doctor is not human, has never been, will never be.

For a second she thinks she can see what River Song saw in there. She smiles. The watch will be wound, and the clock will tick again. The Doctor will be alright.

Kate isn’t worried.