The Depth of Blue
Title: The Depths of the Blue
Fandom: Power Rangers/Doctor Who
Rating: PG13
Synopsis: What happened to Billy and how he got out of it.
Characters: Billy Cranston (Blue Ranger v. 1.0), Cestria, The Doctor (mentioned), Trini Kwan (mentioned)
------------------
Madness had a tendency to creep up on him in the afternoons.
He was mostly lucid these days, or at least, as lucid as you could get with only ghosts to speak to and only yourself for real company. That had taken him three years and it had a habit of slipping after a while. Usually after he checked the traps and had allowed himself a quiet giggle in memory of the scout master who had once said, “Mr. Cranston, your son is smart, but he's useless as an outdoorsman.”
Today, the lunacy came in the form of daydreaming, of what could have been. He was midway through a handful of kelp, when a crystalline sphere rolled to his feet, marked with handprints that glowed violet and sparkling. He picked it up and found it light and resilient, almost bouncy. The handprints were child-sized and fading to respond to his own touch.
“Toss it back, Daddy!”
The words were not in English. He could understand them, though the accent would forever balance between his and her mother's and would sound like a speech impediment to her friends. A child waved to him from the edge of the rocks. Little Sally, racing towards him. Salacia, they'd named her, for the Roman goddess of the sea and she was the most beautiful female in the universe, in training. That title still belonged to Cestria, who playfully plucked the globe from his fingers and tossed it to their daughter. Cestria rested her head on his shoulder, a smile on her face as she wrapped an arm around his waist.
“Tell me about this hero of yours, the... Physician?”
“Doctor,” Billy said, “They called him the Doctor.”
“And he was not human.”
“That's been debated for a while. He could be half-human, though they never explain how. He's an enigma, and that's the whole point. His history was rarely an issue. History itself was what mattered. He protected it, made it better, safer. He meddled. And it was always okay. You always knew it'd be okay, because he was the Doctor and he always did the right thing, even if it went against the rules.”
Sally had begun tossing the ball in the air, stepping carefully backwards and catching it each time.
“He meddled. Why do you put it that way?” Cestria looked up at him. Billy shrugged with his other shoulder, trying not to knock her off of him.
“He just did. He caused trouble, or got into it, but the trouble was always worth it in the end. And he never traveled alone, either, so sometimes the trouble wasn't his fault.”
“Family?”
“Only once. His granddaughter, Susan, but most of them became like family after a while.” He sighed, remembering happy evenings waiting for the local PBS stations to cue up that eerie, thundering song. “I guess I used to wish I was one of them. The lucky ones, who followed him everywhere. Then, I used to imagine that Mom faked her death to go with him, and she was coming back for Dad and me. I chalked up the time between to the fact that the TARDIS is notoriously difficult to steer.”
Sally was still playing with her ball and seemed to be perfectly aware of the edge. She stopped for a moment to wave at them. They waved back.
“You wonder where he is now. You wonder why your hero has abandoned you in your hour of greatest need.” Cestria began to stand up, dusting herself off. Billy got to his feet to follow, but she had dropped a little seed of confusion in his mind.
“No. He's not real. He's a character on T.V., nothing else. He can't abandon anyone because he was never there.”
Cestria turned and wasn't Cestria anymore. His mother faced him. Beautiful green eyes, a shock of short-cropped red hair, a grin for miles, elf-sized and sprightly, as though the cancer had never touched her.
He reached out and she slipped away from him, just a few steps from his grasp. “He was real to you. The only irrational thought you ever had was that a strange man in strange clothes and a big blue box would save you from the loneliness. And then, he never came. The people look up to the hero, but who can the hero look up to?”
She took off running towards Sally. He would have followed, but all he could do was watch. First, Sally's ball flew too high and she staggered backwards and heedless over the lip of the rocks. Then, his mother, no, Cestria, no, Trini, twirling, running, dancing, flung herself into the waters below.
He heard himself scream, ran for the place where they fell, even though he knew it was all another hallucination. He gazed down at the crashing blue waves, saltier than tears, and screamed in rage and recollection. The fires that had burned. The stench of death. The screams. Cestria, badly wounded already, flinging him out of the lock as the walls around her buckled and sprayed sea water. He couldn't remember how he'd survived, or why he'd bothered. Yes, who can the hero look up to? Who can the hero call to for help? Everywhere, he was reminded of his brief stint of saving the world. Blue skies, blue waters, blue shadows, every shade of blue except the one that had made it all worth it at the time. The thought that the Doctor would have been proud of him had eased his worries every night.
Damn him. Damn him for not being real.
“Damn you!” he screamed to the sea, “Where the hell were you, Doctor? Where were you, when people were dying and a civilization was wiped out? Where in God's name were you when a bunch of teenagers had to save the world? You were nowhere nearby when disaster struck! You never meddled when we needed you most! Well, now, you're too god-damn late! Do you hear me? You're late, you meddlesome old bastard! Where the fuck are you now? Do you hear me? You're late!”
Behind him, there was a noise. It was an odd wheezy sound, like a razorblade dragged along piano wire. Billy was nearly afraid to turn around. That sound could be anything, really. It could be a firearm, powering up, or some alien species, trying to breathe the atmosphere.
But, hope springs eternal.
He turned and smiled at the deepest, truest shade of blue he'd ever seen. T.V. didn't do it justice.