Archive of Our Own ^beta

His only crime was love.

Steven turns his head, slowly, feebly, where he’s strewn across the metal floor, to look at Oliver. The young boy is pale and shivering, breath coming in reedy wheezes as the oxygen dwindles. 

He asked Steven not to hate him. Not to turn him away. Steven was expecting the worst, but no—

His only crime was love. Something nasty coils deep in Steven’s gut. Oliver complained of his primitive time, and he was right too, but—Steven’s crime of love seemed far, far worse. 

At least now—

At least he can be with her—

Steven feels sick. It must be the air. He thinks about Sara, feels sicker. Before, he could pretend it was all a matter of circumstance. It wasn’t really his fault that they died. 

But now—

Here—

“You’re thinking so loud,” Oliver whispers, an eye cracking open to watch him. Steven wants to scold him again, about using up air, but it’s his fault they’re so low, anyways. His stunt with redirecting them might have worked, yes, but it will kill them both in the process. 

“So many die.” He says thinly. 

“I think that’s part of living, mate.” Oliver croaks. 

With what little energy he has left, Steven rolls his head away, gaze glued to the ceiling. There’s a beautiful, almost ethereal glow coming through the glass, but it doesn’t matter. They’re going to die. The thought doesn’t scare Steven; he embraces it. Death has always, it appears, clung right to his shoulders, held him in its palm like a lover. 

A lover. 

She’s dead, he thinks dimly. I killed her. A foolish boy born in the fight, throwing all semblances of stability away for adventure, because he was bored. Everyone bleeds away eventually, yes, yeah, but why not him? Katarina saved him. Then she died. Brett tried helping them. Then he died. He gets these dreams, too, flashes of memory, bitten between bouts of restless sleep and nightmares — dreams of another world, where Katarina lived, where a sweet man named Krell died. It doesn’t matter. That world is dead, too. 

Everyone he and the Doctor lure into their rancid world leaves only in death, and now Oliver has come tumbling along, and Steven was glad for it, wasn’t he? Awful as it sounds. When he saw a fellow companion stepping through the doors of the TARDIS, he knows he thought to himself, this time, this time for sure.

“It’s not your fault.” Oliver’s voice floats up. Steven wants to believe him. But it doesn’t matter whose fault it is, because at the end of the day, Steven won’t feel the burden. No, he only feels cool relief flooding his sense at the thought of it just—ending. No more danger. No more war. No more imprisonment, insanity, everything that sought to eat at him, whither him—it would be over. He won’t feel the grief or the pain or the weight of the world, no, because—

Well—

The Doctor will.

Poor Doctor. He loses all of us.  

***

Oliver doesn’t die. Neither does Steven. 

They’re back in the TARDIS now, the Doctor fussing at the controls, murmuring about archives and records. Steven is still befuddled by their presence in those databases. 

But he can’t care to think about it yet. He focuses on curling his injured fist, flexing each finger, waiting for feeling to return. He can feel Oliver’s eyes boring into him insistently like hot irons. 

As the Doctor wanders about the console, hands in a flurry — alarming Steven, as he hardly knows what he’s doing — Oliver steps in. 

“Steven—“ he tries to say. 

“I won’t see you die.” Steven says shortly. “I won’t see anyone else die. So don’t be reckless, or stupid, wherever we go, okay?”

Oliver gives him an uneasy smile. “Alright, old boy.”

***

Oliver dies. 

He throws himself into the shower of sparks, the fray of energy, tackling the last creature with a triumphant shout, even as his body dissipates, smokes, melts away into the hot, warped air. Steven stares and stares and stares, horror growing wild and nauseating inside him, stretching out for the boy before he’s gone but—

The Doctor yanks him back. 

Steven gapes. His remains drift down to the steel, unforgiving floor, a mess of charred flesh and soul. 

“Oliver—“ Steven tries to say. The Doctor is heaving him back, back towards the TARDIS, and Steven isn’t resisting. His limbs won’t move, he’s freezing up, he—

“Steven.” 

Bright white lights dazzle his vision. Steven blinks, squinting. How did he—when did—The Doctor is looking down at him, a concerned wrinkle furrowing his brow. “Steven, my boy. Are you alright?”

He’s sitting on the floor of the console room in the TARDIS. It’s cold. He’s cold. The Doctor’s weathered hands, digging into his arms where his short sleeves have rucked up, are cold. 

“Doctor,” he says, slow, stupid, fucking stupid. “I can’t. Not anymore.”

He crouches in front of Steven, dark blue eyes petrifying and icy. “But we will.”

Something hot lights up in his chest, licks up his throat like fire. His blurry vision clears as he looks at the Doctor. Strange how he has put his whole life in this stranger’s hands. Time and time again the Doctor has risked Steven’s life. And his own, of course, but—

You don’t go into battle without a sword, Oliver joked when Steven said he’d no need for a hat against the rain. He supposes he joined the TARDIS seeking asylum, yes, but also adventure. How can he complain when he gets that?

“My dear boy,” he continues softly. “It’s the only thing we can do. For them. We will.” It’s the most gentle Steven has ever heard him. He raises his hands, clutches the Doctor’s shoulders. They’re a right sight, they are. A deserter and an exile, according to most. It’s no wonder they stuck so fast, so quick, and no wonder that everyone they met—Steven grinds his teeth. The Doctor is right. They cannot stop now. Because then what was the point of it all? Katarina and Sara and Oliver and countless others? 

“We will.”

They will. 

***

And they do. 

***

Steven goes blank sometimes. 

Not— empty. But sometimes, the Doctor catches him staring off into space — both literally, and not. A hollow sheen takes over his eyes, like his mind has screeched to a stop, haunted gaze glued to the wall or the stars or the heaving time rotor. 

The Doctor could say something. He could ask the boy. Could drop him off. Could put a pause to their travels. 

But he doesn’t. 

Because — well — Steven won’t ever see it, but sometimes the Doctor does the same. Sometimes when Steven is lost to his own mind, mouth parted with unspoken words, eyes glazed, the Doctor loses himself, too, and finds his thoughts stamping back to the past or the future or anything in between. 

So he doesn’t speak, lest Steven turn the question on him. He only stays, he’s only silent. The death between them is thick and tangible enough tacitly as is. No point in bringing it to the surface with words. 

“Can you die?” Steven asks suddenly, lifting his head to look at the Doctor. They stand adjacent at the console, attentions sucked into the hypnotic central column as it slows to a halt. 

“It’s complicated.” The Doctor says. 

“Right.” Steven sounds bitter. “Go on, then. Let’s open the doors.” The Doctor doesn’t move. “What’s gotten into you?”

“My boy,” he says. “Do you think this will be our last one?” He pauses. “Do you want it to be?”

Steven scoffs. “Not for the world.” 

The Doctor glances at him. His eyes gleam with determination. Right. Steven Taylor. The Doctor straightens and adjusts his lapels. 

“Of course.”