One month had passed since Lisa’s death, and Danny had taken it badly. He had taken to sitting in the White Hart, staring out of the window and doing nothing all day. Not even eating or drinking. The Doctor had finally convinced him to start eating, but even then it wouldn’t be much. Maybe half a sandwich and a glass of water.
“It’s not right,” said Danny, for what seemed like the umpteenth time. “It’s just not right.”
The Doctor sat alongside him and simply stared at the seat opposite.
“I mean…why? We’d just found a possible way to save her.”
“Accidents happen,” said the Doctor, as sympathetically as possible.
“Not accidents like them,” said Danny. “That was a one way street. The car was travelling in the wrong direction at 50 miles an hour in a bloody 30 mile zone!”
“I know,” said the Doctor.
“It’s almost like it was done deliberately.”
“It probably was,” said the Doctor, picking at a beer mat.
“What do you mean? Who would have done it?”
“Time,” said the Doctor. “Time has a strange way of course-correcting. You never quite know what’s going to happen. Something somewhere sensed that we were about to take her away and cause even more damage to space and time, and so time arranged to have her killed.”
“That’s insane,” said Danny, not able to grasp the concept.
“Nobody said that time ever made sense. If it did then we wouldn’t be in this mess in the first place.”
“It’s still not fair.”
“Danny, she’s gone. There’s nothing here for us now.”
“I know that,” he said, trying to hold back the tears again, “but she still lived her life. She still existed.”
“And you can hold those memories and that life within yourself. Within your heart. As long as you remember, she’ll never be gone.”
The Doctor checked the cat calendar he had put up on his bedroom wall. May 31st 1988. Tomorrow would mark one year since they had arrived in this time zone. One year of getting to know people and seeing Danny fall in love and then having to go through heartbreak. One year of a life that he knew wouldn’t exist if his plan worked.
Danny stood next to him, silent and still, his face showing no sign of emotion.
“Are you ready?” asked the Doctor
“Yes,” said Danny.
The Doctor flicked a switch on what resembled something like an upright, brass telescope and the machine started to buzz. The Doctor checked out the readings. There was nothing out there. He was about to give up and switch the machine off, when suddenly it started beeping.
“What is it?” asked Danny.
The Doctor looked like he could hardly contain his glee. “It’s the TARDIS. It’s still out there. Stranded in the vortex. Just drifting.”
Danny nodded. He wasn’t exactly happy, but he knew there was nothing left for him now.
“Activating the tether. Let’s reel her in!”
The Doctor flicked a few switches and after a few seconds they heard the familiar sound of the TARDIS engines. The sound of time and space being ripped apart. The blue-coloured box slowly began to materialise in the Doctor’s room, and, with a final thud, it became solid. It looked a bit battered and burnt, but still in good shape.
The Doctor gathered up all of his equipment, opened the TARDIS door and threw everything inside. He took out his room key and left it on the bed.
“Come on then,” he said eagerly.
“Just give me a minute,” said Danny.
The Doctor ducked into the box and Danny looked back at the room. He wished he had never come here. He wished none of it had ever happened. He should have stayed in Manchester and stuck with his job. He sighed and opened the TARDIS door.
“Bye Lisa,” he said sadly.
After a few minutes the same wheezing and groaning sound started up and the TARDIS dematerialised.
The bedroom door was flung open and Harry was standing there.
“Doctor, what the hell’s going on up here?”
But there was nobody in the room. Just the Doctor’s key left on the bed. And Harry started to feel everything around him go cold…
May, 1902
William and Caroline walked arm in arm along Corporation bridge and towards the Central Market. It was a fine, spring day and it was also the eve of their wedding. Everyone had been milling around the pair of them all day, trying to get them ready and organised. William had told his mother that they both needed some fresh air and they had left the Fieldgate house and made their way through town and towards the Central Market.
“What are we doing here?” asked Caroline, brushing her hair from out of her eyes. “It’s a bit out the way isn’t it?”
“I just wanted to take you here,” said William. “Tomorrow’s one year since we met each other. One year since you arrived here, at the Central Market.”
Caroline smiled and looked up at him. “Aww, you’re sweet.”
William smiled. “I just wanted you to have the opportunity to think about things.”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you have any regrets?”
Caroline looked at him and frowned, but still smiled. “You’re so bloody daft,” she said.
“I’m the one who gave you this life,” said William. “I just want you to be sure.”
Caroline took his hands and looked up at him. “I’ve never been so sure about anything in my life. This is my world now and you are my gorgeous husband-to-be.” She grabbed his coat and pulled him closer, kissing him on the lips.
There were a few mumbles and gasps from people nearby, unused to seeing such affection out on the streets.
“I love you,” said William.
“I love you too, you daft banana.”
The two of them laughed. “Fancy a pint in the Palace?”
“I wouldn’t say no,” said Caroline.
They were about to open the door and go inside when Caroline decided to turn and look back at the Central Market. Whatever was to come in the future didn’t matter to her now. This was her life, and she couldn’t be more happier.
And that’s when she heard it. A sound she had not heard in a year. The sound of a thousand naughty schoolchildren running their nails down a chalkboard. The sound of wheezing and groaning engines.
The sound of the TARDIS.
William also turned to look as the two of them saw the blue box materialise next to the clock tower in the market place.
“No,” said Caroline, feeling her world beginning to pull apart. “Why?”
“Is that…?”
Caroline nodded slowly. “It’s the TARDIS.”
“Then they found you after all,” said William.
“And I’m going to tell them they’ve had a wasted journey,” she said, hoisting up her dress and marching over the road towards the TARDIS. “This is my life now. I don’t need to go back with them.”
The door to the TARDIS opened and the Doctor and Danny stepped out. The Doctor spotted Caroline marching over, followed by William, and he broke into a grin.
“Caroline!” He held out his arms to hug her, but she didn’t respond.
“Everything okay?” asked Danny.
“Doctor,” said Caroline, a little shaken. “It’s brilliant to see you and everything, but I’m not going with you.”
“Caroline, stop-”
“No,” said Caroline. “I’ve become a part of this time. I’m marrying William tomorrow.”
William nodded at the Doctor and Danny.
“Nice to meet you, William, but Caroline-”
“I said no,” she said, tears flooding her eyes. “Thank you for coming back for me, but I can’t go with you. This is my life now.”
“It’s not that simple,” said the Doctor.
“Oh, just leave her,” said Danny. “She’s happy. Let her be happy.”
The Doctor turned angrily on Danny. “Stay out of this, Danny. You know what happens.”
“What do you mean?” asked Caroline.
The Doctor turned back to Caroline and put his hands on her shoulders, meeting her teary gaze. “We’ve been stuck in 1988. A slightly different 1988 where we discovered that if you stay, the orphanage will be set on fire, by accident, by you.”
Caroline started breathing faster. “No. No it can’t be.”
“It’s true,” said Danny, sadly. “You have a happy life, but those powers deep inside you set fire to the building and a few of the kids die.”
“Then…then save the kids,” said Caroline, hopefully.
“I can’t just do that. I need you to come with me. You and William will have children of your own and they will also have this power inside of them. It’s something we can’t risk.”
“So you’re willing to erase my entire future because of something you can’t risk?” snapped Caroline.
“Take it easy, my love,” said William, putting a hand on her shoulder.
“No,” said Caroline, “I won’t let him destroy us.”
“But the children-”
“It’s a bloody time machine!” shouted Caroline. “It can come backwards and forwards and save the kids and check up on me. There has to be another way!”
“There isn’t,” said the Doctor sadly. “I need to put time right.”
Danny shook his head and disappeared back inside the TARDIS. He’d seen enough of Caroline’s heartbreak.
“Then you’re going to have to drag me back in there, because I don’t want to step foot inside that crazy, stupid box ever again.”
“Caroline-”
“And why can’t we take William with us?”
“Because William needs to stay here. If he leaves the orphanage will fall apart anyway and those children will be homeless.”
“You’re just grasping at straws!” yelled Caroline.
“Don’t be so silly. I want you to be happy, but time has to be put right. William has to stay here.”
“No! No, no, no, NO!!” She turned and ran.
“Stay there,” said William to the Doctor, and turned and ran after her.
He found Caroline around the corner, sat on the path with her back up against the wall. She was sobbing and had her knees pulled in tight.
“Caroline…” said William, sitting down beside her.
“I knew it! I just knew it. He couldn’t just turn up on the day I arrived, could he? No, he has to wait a whole year for me to fall in love and then come and get me.”
“And if he had turned up on the same day you arrived, we never would have met. We never would have had all of this time together.”
Caroline looked up at William, her eyes red. “I don’t want to go. I want to stay with you.”
“I want you to stay as well. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
“Then why aren’t you fighting for me?”
William took her hand and looked down sadly. “Somehow I always knew you’d be taken away from me. That’s why I always asked you if you were sure.”
“But I’m not going anywhere.”
“The children, Caroline. Think of those poor little children.”
“So you want me to go?”
“It’s not like that,” he said, moving in closer to her. “I don’t claim to fully understand the mechanics of your situation, but I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I knew there was a way of preventing what would happen.”
Caroline sniffed. “I don’t want to go. I really don’t want to go. There must be another way.”
“Listen,” said William, putting his arm around her. “The last few months have been the happiest of my life. I never thought I’d ever feel this way about someone. You have changed my life in ways that I never thought possible. I’ll never forget that moment I first met you, beside the clock tower, dressed in that ever-so-short red dress.”
Caroline laughed through the tears.
“And I would dearly love to marry you and have a family with you and grow old with you,” he continued, “but maybe this was just a gift from God. Maybe we never really were meant to have it. I believe that perfection is something that you can’t ever possess. I know you’re not a particularly religious woman, but I don’t believe that we reach perfection until we are in the Lord’s Kingdom. And I’ve at least managed to glimpse perfection.”
She looked at him, continuing to cry, and then buried her head in his chest, unable to speak any more words.
William kissed her on the top of her head. “I’ll always remember you, my love. I will never forget this time.”
Caroline and William turned the corner and found the Doctor, leaning on the TARDIS and looking up at the clock tower. He looked sad.
“What a shame they pulled this down,” he said, almost to himself.
“Doctor,” said Caroline, “I’m ready.”
“You’re coming then?”
“I don’t want to, and I don’t want to travel with you anymore, but if it saves the children then I have to go with you.”
The Doctor nodded sadly and opened the TARDIS door. “I’ll give you a moment.” He disappeared inside.
Caroline turned back to William, trying to fight back the tears again. “What will you do now?”
“I don’t know,” said William. “People have disappeared in this town before. I’ll just tell them that you…disappeared.”
“They’ll ask questions.”
“Let them ask away. They may become a bit suspicious of me, but I’ll take it. And then I’ll go back to the orphanage. Hazel and I can continue running it.”
Caroline pulled him close and kissed him. “If there’s ever any way that I can come back-”
“No,” said William quickly. “Let me just remember you like this. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life hoping that you’ll come back to me. It’s enough to know that you’ll still be out there, back in your own time and living your life.”
Caroline shook her head. “I’ll never be happy. Not again. Not after this.”
William put a finger on her lips. “Live your life, Caroline. Please, just live your life.”
She sniffed back the tears and gave him another hug. “Don’t forget me.”
“Never,” said William.
Caroline took her gold cross from around her neck and put it in William’s hand. “My grandma gave this to me. I want you to have it.”
“I’ll treasure it,” said William.
Caroline turned to go, stood in the TARDIS doors, took one last look at William and then went inside.
He simply stood there, looking absolutely devastated but still attempting to smile. She knew he was trying to fight the tears.
She closed the door quietly and slowly.
A few minutes later the box dematerialised with a huge gust of wind. And all was silent. William stood there, next to the clock tower with Caroline’s cross in his hand.
And then he fell to his knees.
She was gone.
A little while later and all was quiet in the TARDIS. Nobody had spoken.
The Doctor was busy flicking switches and turning dials as the time rotor rose and fell gently. Finally, Danny crossed over to Caroline who was still sat in her grey dress.
“You look beautiful, you know?”
She managed a weak smile. “Thanks, Danny.”
“I missed you.”
She smiled weakly.
He sat down beside her. “This was a tough one. Out of everything that’s happened to us, this was hard going.”
“You don’t say,” said Caroline. “I should be marrying William tomorrow.”
“People,” said the Doctor, from over the other side of the console, “I’ve got a bit of information for the both of you.”
Caroline and Danny got up and slowly made their way to where the Doctor was standing.
“I’ve been doing some research through the TARDIS databanks. I looked up William Fieldgate for you, Caroline.”
“Go on,” said Caroline, prepared for the worst.
“Well, it seems he continued to work at the orphanage for over ten years and then he went to war. He came back alive and well and continued to work to make orphanages around the country better places.”
Caroline smiled. “Did he ever meet anyone knew?”
“No,” said the Doctor. “He devoted his life to those children and he died-”
“No,” said Caroline. “I don’t want to know when he died. I just want to think he’s still out there somewhere. Please.”
The Doctor smiled sadly and nodded. “Okay, Miss Parker.”
“It’s Fieldgate,” said Caroline.
“I beg your pardon?”
“You can call me Caroline Fieldgate from now on. We may be separated by time and space, but I’m still his and he’s still mine. He’ll always be my love.”
The Doctor nodded again and then turned to Danny. “And I’m afraid, of course, the Fieldgate family lineage died with William. There were never any more Fieldgate’s after him.”
“Why are you telling us all of this?” asked Danny. “It doesn’t help either of us.”
“No,” said the Doctor, “but it might go some way towards repairing your wounds.”
“How?” asked Danny. “Lisa’s gone.”
The Doctor couldn’t answer that. He smiled sadly at the both and then made his way out of the console room and into the depths of his ship. “I need to check Matthew’s okay.”
Danny looked at Caroline. “Did you mean what you said? Do you still want to stop travelling with the Doctor?”
Caroline just looked at Danny for a long, long time, not saying anything. Then she smiled at him. “It is good to see you again.”
Danny smiled and the two embraced, but it was going to be a long, long time until anything would ever get back to normal.
THE END
Next Time: The Lighthouse
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| Alternate 1980's Cover |
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