Ghost Thief [Tenth Doctor]
Jul. 31st, 2006 06:02 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
misscamGhost Thief
by Camilla Sandman
Disclaimer: BBC's characters. My words.
Rating: PG
Summary: She is not yours, not even her likeness. You're a thief. You're stealing from Pandora's box, taking everyone's misery and grief and stuffing yourself. [Tenth Doctor, (Rose)]
Author's note: Tenth Ficathon entry for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
loneraven who wanted Ten being ruthless, gen, ghosts, and didn't want explicit romance. Set post-"Doomsday", with references to Rose and some vague hints of things to come. Thanks to lotus79 for beta. Prompt 020 for ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
50lyricsfanfic.
Table of Prompts
II
It's the sight of the ghost of Rose that makes the Doctor walk straight into a wall for the first time ever - at least in this incarnation.
He is walking down the street, humans busy all around him on a dull Tuesday that probably was a lot like the last dull Tuesday and the next dull Tuesday. Dull, dull, dull, with tea. Human life, and he is wondering at its persistent dullness when he sees Rose and nearly has a whiplash turning his head to have a better look.
Rose.
At first he thinks he's mistaken another blonde again, as can happen when the mind looks for what it wants to see. But it's not another blonde, it's not even someone alive. It's Rose, pale, ghostly, dead. He can't be wrong and he wants to be so badly his head seems to pound a little under the force of it. Or maybe that's from the impact with the wall, which seems to stare at him silently in insult as he peels himself off it.
"Sorry," he says to the wall, but attention never really leaving the vision of Rose. She just stands in the middle of a London street, and people walk around as if it's common. They avert their eyes and give her distance, but otherwise make no reactions at all. As if they're used to it and his mind is already racing over the possibilities of that.
Maybe London 2008 wasn't the best place to go for sock shopping after all.
"Rose?" he asks, approaching her carefully, unable to halt himself even if he want. He can't help his voice sounding gentle either, even as he wants to scream. It can't be Rose. Rose is a universe away and she's supposed to be alive, the only thing that makes it bearable.
The ghost looks up, and smiles. It's not Rose's smile, even if it uses her lips. It's too cruel, too predatory. It's not Rose. It can't be Rose, and he's not sure if he feels relief or grief.
"Now you're mine," the ghost says, and touches him.
He feels the touch like ice reaching into the firestorm that is his mind, chilling, reaching for his grief and finding it. It hurts so much he imagines humans dying under it, but he's not that, and he is sick of being played mind games with.
"No," he says firmly, and lets her feel all his grief.
Rose - no, not Rose, not Rose - screams in agony as he touches it back. It's just part of a mind, he finds, separated from the whole. Separated to hunt. Not for him, no. For the grieving, using the shapes of the dead, stealing their way into people's mind. Simple little thieves, finding humans an easy target for all the emotions they so readily let control them.
"Please..." the thing begs, and he doesn't feel much like mercy. "Too much. Dying. Please..."
Doesn't feel much like mercy at all, but it is Rose's voice, and for a moment he falters. It's enough for the ghost to slip free, turning into the flicker of energy he knows is its real form. The sudden loss of contact makes for loss of balance too and he falls backwards. He more hears than feels his head making contact with the concrete footpath.
"That has to hurt," he says, and then it does and everything goes rather dark.
II
Darkness becomes a face, a dark-skinned face of a young boy looking seriously at him. The Doctor has to fight the urge to scowl a little, because it's not exactly the vision he was hoping to wake up to. He can feel more than see others looking, probably assuming he's drunk.
"You shouldn't sleep on concrete," the boy informs him. "It hurts."
"Beats sleeping on the rocks of Steinakker. Now there's a planet putting the phrase 'sleep like a rock' to new meaning."
"It's sleep like a log, not a rock."
The Doctor pauses, smiling a little as he gets it up. "So it is. I'm the Doctor. "
"Martin," the boy says seriously, extending his hand and the Doctor shakes it. "Have you gone mental yet?"
"Should I?"
"Everyone who recognises a ghost goes mental. Mum says I shouldn't look at them so I won't recognise anyone. My neighbour did, she went batty."
The Doctor takes in this flow of unexpected information, and considers it. "Batty? I reckon she needs a Doctor then, don't you?"
"She's seen every doctor from London to Slough, mum says. They've been useless pricks, mum also says."
"She hasn't seen me," the Doctor says firmly. "And I'm definitely not from Slough."
Martin seems to accept this as good enough. "I can show you where she lives. Sure you haven't gone batty, though?"
"Oh, trust me. I was batty to begin with."
They walk away, the Doctor throwing one last look behind him to see the ghost is indeed gone, fled while he was out. No vision of Rose lingering. It was never there, not truly. Stolen ghosts to steal grief, only Rose isn't dead and he's about the only one who knows.
He is going to have to teach a few, he reckons.
II
The batty neighbour turns out to be an older woman named Charlotte, who does surprisingly open the door when he rings the bell. But he can tell something is wrong from the moment she lifts her eyes to meet his and he can see they're clear as glass and just as empty.
"Hello, Charlotte!" he says brightly still. "Very nice name. I'm the Doctor, this is Martin, your neighbour."
"Hello," Martin says from behind.
"Hello," Charlotte answers, but her voice is flat and there's no emotion at all in her reply. The Doctor is beginning to get a feeling for what's going on, and it doesn't make him feel particularly pleasant. He keeps trying to sound it, though.
"I was wondering if I could have a bit of a look inside your mind, Charlotte."
"If you like." Same flat voice, same lack of anything, but he's still gentle when he touches her temples and her mind. Very carefully, he shifts through her memories, enough to feel them still intact. That's not the problem. The alien in her head is, the alien that isn't him.
"Who was the ghost, Charlotte?"
"My husband."
He can see it now - a vision of her husband in the street one dull Wednesday and she couldn't help but look. Couldn't help but feel grief. Couldn't help but approach and open the way in, and then she was the ghost's and still is. Carefully, very carefully, he can feel the faint trail from this invading 'ghost' back to where it came from and intends to return when it has taken all it can.
Thief, and he knows where it lives now.
"Is she batty?" Martin asks, just honest curiosity in his voice.
"No. She isn't anything. She's just a ghost, only it's her body haunting, not her mind," he says sadly, letting go of her mind. He touches her wrinkled cheek just for a moment, feeling it fuel the rage that is already boiling away behind a locked door in his mind.
"I'm sorry," he says. "No one should use your grief against you like that. There is never any shame in mourning what is lost."
"Like my aunt?" Martin asks, and the Doctor turns to look at him.
"Like your aunt. What do you say we stop this thing, Martin?"
"Can we?"
He thinks. He knows how this particular alien was stopped before. The advantage of knowing time is sometimes getting the knowledge for free that others paid so much for. Yes. He can stop it. Should he?
Stealing emotions to live is still stealing, and leaving others with no life at all even if they're not dead. He can't allow that, not even for the purpose of surviving. Some lives come at too high a cost to the Universe. Some things cannot be allowed, and he knows how to stop it.
"We can now," he says, and it's decided.
II
Martin's full of excitement over the TARDIS and what the Doctor can make with it, and even more so when they get into it in a London street and step out of it in the basement of the the British Museum. The Doctor supposes it is fitting that someone taking the shapes of the dead would hide among relics of the past. Has a certain logic to it, a certain mind.
The mind knows he's there, he has no doubt, particularly when he sees Rose at the end of the hallway. "Stay behind me, Martin."
"Hello, Doctor," she says, and he knows it's seen a few things in his mind and decided to use it. "This part of the Hjarn'iak mind greets you."
"Bit far from home, aren't you?"
"I have no home, as well you know, Time Lord."
"Maybe if your kind hadn't stolen so much from your neighbours, they wouldn't have come together to destroy you. Common enemy is such an ice-breaker. Very good at parties."
She scowls. "We did what we needed to live. Can you blame us for that?"
"Yes," he says brightly and holds up a finger. "Your first mistake was taking the form of Rose in the first place. She isn't dead. She can't be a ghost. If you had any connections with ghosts at all, you would know this. But you don't know, because all you've done is absorb information and use it. Taking images of the dead and looking for the living that would respond to them."
He pauses, fury like a firestorm in his blood. and holds up a second finger. "Your second mistake was taking the form of Rose and keeping it. She is not yours, not even her likeness. You're a thief. You're stealing from Pandora's box, taking everyone's misery and grief and stuffing yourself."
He smiles, but there is no real warmth to it. "But I'm here to slam the lid shut and I don't care if your hand gets in the way."
Rose smiles, and this time it is Rose's smile and he hates the thing for it. "You won't kill me as Rose."
"No," he agrees. "Which is why I brought Martin."
He steps to the side, and Martin seems to understand, stepping forward. Rose's form freezes, and the Doctor knows a tasty meal of young human grief is just too much not to reach for. Another ghost is walking into the hallway, another part of the Hjarn'iak mind looking like what has to be Martin's aunt. He averts his eyes from her, not really wanting to look what he's about to kill.
Instead, he holds out his hand, and his smile feels nasty even to him.
"Here's the grief of my people," he says grimly, the globe in his hand as light as a feather and as heavy as the Universe. "I've put it all in here, every bit of it. I give it to you. Your third mistake is being greedy."
He breathes at it, and Rose is already pleading with him not to, but it's not her form the globe finds and sinks into. It's not her form that ripples, not her form that sends the emotions on to every part of the mind. It can't break the bonds that hold it together, never could. He knows it, and now he's used it against it.
Rose's form fades too, in agonised scream he knows all the human minds with a ghost in will feel too, but it had to be done. No more stealing.
But it's not Rose's form he chose to kill. That's important.
"What happened?" Martin asks, a little dazed.
"You know how you need food to live, but if you eat too much, you feel really bad? Same thing no matter what your food is."
"So it got sick? Like mum says I will if I eat all my candy in one day?"
"Exactly like your mum says. In fact, I have a feeling your mum will have a lot to say if you don't get home very soon. Best not to upset mums, really. They have a dreadful vocabulary. Best not to tell her about this at all or she'll have a lot to say that you don't want to hear."
Martin reflects on this, following the Doctor back into the TARDIS. "Like she'll think me batty? Can't I just come with you and mum doesn't have to say anything at all?"
"No," the Doctor says sharply, and winces at his own tone. "No, Martin. You have a life of dull Tuesdays ahead of you, and it's going to be wonderful."
"Please?"
"Maybe if we meet again."
Martin looks downcast as the TARDIS noisily starts up and then fades down again, but he follows the Doctor to the door without protest and looks a little impressed at seeing his own street even.
"That a promise, then?"
"Sure. Martin, Earth, going with me if we meet again."
"Martin Jones," the boy says seriously. "Don't forget."
"Nice name, Jones. I like it. I won't forget, Martin Jones."
And then he's alone in the TARDIS, as he always ends up. He closes the door, leaning against it for just a moment. Some thieves can be stopped, but not the biggest thief of them all. The Universe steals what it wants, even from him. Especially from him. Everything found ends up lost.
Oh, Rose, he thinks.
There is no shame in mourning what is lost. There's just always new things to find, and he walks over to the console and starts the ancient engines with enthusiasm. Ghosts are ghosts. There's a whole Universe of the living out there to see and new people to meet.
Nice name, Jones. Yes. He won't forget it.
He never forgets anything, and memories haunt better than ghosts.
FIN
by Camilla Sandman
Disclaimer: BBC's characters. My words.
Rating: PG
Summary: She is not yours, not even her likeness. You're a thief. You're stealing from Pandora's box, taking everyone's misery and grief and stuffing yourself. [Tenth Doctor, (Rose)]
Author's note: Tenth Ficathon entry for
loneraven who wanted Ten being ruthless, gen, ghosts, and didn't want explicit romance. Set post-"Doomsday", with references to Rose and some vague hints of things to come. Thanks to lotus79 for beta. Prompt 020 for 50lyricsfanfic.Table of Prompts
II
It's the sight of the ghost of Rose that makes the Doctor walk straight into a wall for the first time ever - at least in this incarnation.
He is walking down the street, humans busy all around him on a dull Tuesday that probably was a lot like the last dull Tuesday and the next dull Tuesday. Dull, dull, dull, with tea. Human life, and he is wondering at its persistent dullness when he sees Rose and nearly has a whiplash turning his head to have a better look.
Rose.
At first he thinks he's mistaken another blonde again, as can happen when the mind looks for what it wants to see. But it's not another blonde, it's not even someone alive. It's Rose, pale, ghostly, dead. He can't be wrong and he wants to be so badly his head seems to pound a little under the force of it. Or maybe that's from the impact with the wall, which seems to stare at him silently in insult as he peels himself off it.
"Sorry," he says to the wall, but attention never really leaving the vision of Rose. She just stands in the middle of a London street, and people walk around as if it's common. They avert their eyes and give her distance, but otherwise make no reactions at all. As if they're used to it and his mind is already racing over the possibilities of that.
Maybe London 2008 wasn't the best place to go for sock shopping after all.
"Rose?" he asks, approaching her carefully, unable to halt himself even if he want. He can't help his voice sounding gentle either, even as he wants to scream. It can't be Rose. Rose is a universe away and she's supposed to be alive, the only thing that makes it bearable.
The ghost looks up, and smiles. It's not Rose's smile, even if it uses her lips. It's too cruel, too predatory. It's not Rose. It can't be Rose, and he's not sure if he feels relief or grief.
"Now you're mine," the ghost says, and touches him.
He feels the touch like ice reaching into the firestorm that is his mind, chilling, reaching for his grief and finding it. It hurts so much he imagines humans dying under it, but he's not that, and he is sick of being played mind games with.
"No," he says firmly, and lets her feel all his grief.
Rose - no, not Rose, not Rose - screams in agony as he touches it back. It's just part of a mind, he finds, separated from the whole. Separated to hunt. Not for him, no. For the grieving, using the shapes of the dead, stealing their way into people's mind. Simple little thieves, finding humans an easy target for all the emotions they so readily let control them.
"Please..." the thing begs, and he doesn't feel much like mercy. "Too much. Dying. Please..."
Doesn't feel much like mercy at all, but it is Rose's voice, and for a moment he falters. It's enough for the ghost to slip free, turning into the flicker of energy he knows is its real form. The sudden loss of contact makes for loss of balance too and he falls backwards. He more hears than feels his head making contact with the concrete footpath.
"That has to hurt," he says, and then it does and everything goes rather dark.
II
Darkness becomes a face, a dark-skinned face of a young boy looking seriously at him. The Doctor has to fight the urge to scowl a little, because it's not exactly the vision he was hoping to wake up to. He can feel more than see others looking, probably assuming he's drunk.
"You shouldn't sleep on concrete," the boy informs him. "It hurts."
"Beats sleeping on the rocks of Steinakker. Now there's a planet putting the phrase 'sleep like a rock' to new meaning."
"It's sleep like a log, not a rock."
The Doctor pauses, smiling a little as he gets it up. "So it is. I'm the Doctor. "
"Martin," the boy says seriously, extending his hand and the Doctor shakes it. "Have you gone mental yet?"
"Should I?"
"Everyone who recognises a ghost goes mental. Mum says I shouldn't look at them so I won't recognise anyone. My neighbour did, she went batty."
The Doctor takes in this flow of unexpected information, and considers it. "Batty? I reckon she needs a Doctor then, don't you?"
"She's seen every doctor from London to Slough, mum says. They've been useless pricks, mum also says."
"She hasn't seen me," the Doctor says firmly. "And I'm definitely not from Slough."
Martin seems to accept this as good enough. "I can show you where she lives. Sure you haven't gone batty, though?"
"Oh, trust me. I was batty to begin with."
They walk away, the Doctor throwing one last look behind him to see the ghost is indeed gone, fled while he was out. No vision of Rose lingering. It was never there, not truly. Stolen ghosts to steal grief, only Rose isn't dead and he's about the only one who knows.
He is going to have to teach a few, he reckons.
II
The batty neighbour turns out to be an older woman named Charlotte, who does surprisingly open the door when he rings the bell. But he can tell something is wrong from the moment she lifts her eyes to meet his and he can see they're clear as glass and just as empty.
"Hello, Charlotte!" he says brightly still. "Very nice name. I'm the Doctor, this is Martin, your neighbour."
"Hello," Martin says from behind.
"Hello," Charlotte answers, but her voice is flat and there's no emotion at all in her reply. The Doctor is beginning to get a feeling for what's going on, and it doesn't make him feel particularly pleasant. He keeps trying to sound it, though.
"I was wondering if I could have a bit of a look inside your mind, Charlotte."
"If you like." Same flat voice, same lack of anything, but he's still gentle when he touches her temples and her mind. Very carefully, he shifts through her memories, enough to feel them still intact. That's not the problem. The alien in her head is, the alien that isn't him.
"Who was the ghost, Charlotte?"
"My husband."
He can see it now - a vision of her husband in the street one dull Wednesday and she couldn't help but look. Couldn't help but feel grief. Couldn't help but approach and open the way in, and then she was the ghost's and still is. Carefully, very carefully, he can feel the faint trail from this invading 'ghost' back to where it came from and intends to return when it has taken all it can.
Thief, and he knows where it lives now.
"Is she batty?" Martin asks, just honest curiosity in his voice.
"No. She isn't anything. She's just a ghost, only it's her body haunting, not her mind," he says sadly, letting go of her mind. He touches her wrinkled cheek just for a moment, feeling it fuel the rage that is already boiling away behind a locked door in his mind.
"I'm sorry," he says. "No one should use your grief against you like that. There is never any shame in mourning what is lost."
"Like my aunt?" Martin asks, and the Doctor turns to look at him.
"Like your aunt. What do you say we stop this thing, Martin?"
"Can we?"
He thinks. He knows how this particular alien was stopped before. The advantage of knowing time is sometimes getting the knowledge for free that others paid so much for. Yes. He can stop it. Should he?
Stealing emotions to live is still stealing, and leaving others with no life at all even if they're not dead. He can't allow that, not even for the purpose of surviving. Some lives come at too high a cost to the Universe. Some things cannot be allowed, and he knows how to stop it.
"We can now," he says, and it's decided.
II
Martin's full of excitement over the TARDIS and what the Doctor can make with it, and even more so when they get into it in a London street and step out of it in the basement of the the British Museum. The Doctor supposes it is fitting that someone taking the shapes of the dead would hide among relics of the past. Has a certain logic to it, a certain mind.
The mind knows he's there, he has no doubt, particularly when he sees Rose at the end of the hallway. "Stay behind me, Martin."
"Hello, Doctor," she says, and he knows it's seen a few things in his mind and decided to use it. "This part of the Hjarn'iak mind greets you."
"Bit far from home, aren't you?"
"I have no home, as well you know, Time Lord."
"Maybe if your kind hadn't stolen so much from your neighbours, they wouldn't have come together to destroy you. Common enemy is such an ice-breaker. Very good at parties."
She scowls. "We did what we needed to live. Can you blame us for that?"
"Yes," he says brightly and holds up a finger. "Your first mistake was taking the form of Rose in the first place. She isn't dead. She can't be a ghost. If you had any connections with ghosts at all, you would know this. But you don't know, because all you've done is absorb information and use it. Taking images of the dead and looking for the living that would respond to them."
He pauses, fury like a firestorm in his blood. and holds up a second finger. "Your second mistake was taking the form of Rose and keeping it. She is not yours, not even her likeness. You're a thief. You're stealing from Pandora's box, taking everyone's misery and grief and stuffing yourself."
He smiles, but there is no real warmth to it. "But I'm here to slam the lid shut and I don't care if your hand gets in the way."
Rose smiles, and this time it is Rose's smile and he hates the thing for it. "You won't kill me as Rose."
"No," he agrees. "Which is why I brought Martin."
He steps to the side, and Martin seems to understand, stepping forward. Rose's form freezes, and the Doctor knows a tasty meal of young human grief is just too much not to reach for. Another ghost is walking into the hallway, another part of the Hjarn'iak mind looking like what has to be Martin's aunt. He averts his eyes from her, not really wanting to look what he's about to kill.
Instead, he holds out his hand, and his smile feels nasty even to him.
"Here's the grief of my people," he says grimly, the globe in his hand as light as a feather and as heavy as the Universe. "I've put it all in here, every bit of it. I give it to you. Your third mistake is being greedy."
He breathes at it, and Rose is already pleading with him not to, but it's not her form the globe finds and sinks into. It's not her form that ripples, not her form that sends the emotions on to every part of the mind. It can't break the bonds that hold it together, never could. He knows it, and now he's used it against it.
Rose's form fades too, in agonised scream he knows all the human minds with a ghost in will feel too, but it had to be done. No more stealing.
But it's not Rose's form he chose to kill. That's important.
"What happened?" Martin asks, a little dazed.
"You know how you need food to live, but if you eat too much, you feel really bad? Same thing no matter what your food is."
"So it got sick? Like mum says I will if I eat all my candy in one day?"
"Exactly like your mum says. In fact, I have a feeling your mum will have a lot to say if you don't get home very soon. Best not to upset mums, really. They have a dreadful vocabulary. Best not to tell her about this at all or she'll have a lot to say that you don't want to hear."
Martin reflects on this, following the Doctor back into the TARDIS. "Like she'll think me batty? Can't I just come with you and mum doesn't have to say anything at all?"
"No," the Doctor says sharply, and winces at his own tone. "No, Martin. You have a life of dull Tuesdays ahead of you, and it's going to be wonderful."
"Please?"
"Maybe if we meet again."
Martin looks downcast as the TARDIS noisily starts up and then fades down again, but he follows the Doctor to the door without protest and looks a little impressed at seeing his own street even.
"That a promise, then?"
"Sure. Martin, Earth, going with me if we meet again."
"Martin Jones," the boy says seriously. "Don't forget."
"Nice name, Jones. I like it. I won't forget, Martin Jones."
And then he's alone in the TARDIS, as he always ends up. He closes the door, leaning against it for just a moment. Some thieves can be stopped, but not the biggest thief of them all. The Universe steals what it wants, even from him. Especially from him. Everything found ends up lost.
Oh, Rose, he thinks.
There is no shame in mourning what is lost. There's just always new things to find, and he walks over to the console and starts the ancient engines with enthusiasm. Ghosts are ghosts. There's a whole Universe of the living out there to see and new people to meet.
Nice name, Jones. Yes. He won't forget it.
He never forgets anything, and memories haunt better than ghosts.
FIN
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-07-31 04:36 am (UTC)And oh, I love Martin. He needs to be canon and grow up to be adorkable so Ten can come back for him, and they can have adventures. Yes, I am a hopeless sap. Shush.
Brava, Cam. Such a lovely look into Ten's grief.
And oh yes, I thought immediately of you when Rose mentioned they were in Norway at the end of "Doomsday".
no subject
Date: 2006-07-31 06:07 am (UTC)Glad you liked - not sure what would be best for Ten, really. Not losing at her all in his thinking, probably. But once you do lose someone, I'm thinking there is no way that is any better than any other. All have their various drawbacks.
And heh on Martin.
Anyhoo, thanks!
no subject
Date: 2006-07-31 05:19 am (UTC)Loved this story. Very haunting and poignant. Poor Ten, seeing Rose's 'ghost' and the pain brought to the surface again. Although that said, I did have a giggle at the mental picture of him walking into a wall.
Very, very nice job, as always!!
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Date: 2006-07-31 06:11 am (UTC)Thanks :)
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Date: 2006-08-01 06:32 am (UTC)This was lovely. Bravo!
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