Mostly Harmless
Rating: PG
Prompt: #017 - Blue
Claim: The Time War
Table: Here
Spoilers: None
Characters: Fitz, the Doctor (8)
Summary: The Doctor and Fitz are talking to trees. The trees are talking back.
Note: This is probably crap. I'm still posting it. Tiny little amount of slash. Just Fitz being Fitz actually.
Yes, the title is shamelessly stolen from Douglas Adams.
The day way wonderful: warm air, the softest breeze and a perfect, blue sky. Earth blue, even, not that weird reddish violet watery blue of the planet they’d visited last month, where a giant gooseberry had tried to eat him. Fitz grimaced at the memory. Another adventure he could have done without. And not one qualified to impress chicks.
Now they were on a perfectly harmless world with a perfect blue sky. Only Fitz couldn’t see it because they had landed in a forest. A forest that would have been dark and scary if the leafs of the trees hadn’t been glowing. Which was kind of scary in itself, Fitz decided, but at least something he could tell about without blushing.
He’d lost the Doctor. Well, left him behind. Or rather, had been left behind by him. Two seconds after stepping out of the time travelling police box the Time Lord had cried “Oh, look at that!” and run off to inspect something between the plants. Fitz had risked a look and seen a bug that was in no way remarkable to him. He’d shrugged and wandered off.
“I’m wandering off now,” he’d said. “You’d better come along or you might lose me.”
The Doctor had answered “Quiet so,” and run after the bug that had spread its wings and flown deeper into the forest. Fitz could have followed then but decided not to, because he had to prove a point.
Whichever point that might have been.
So Fitz had wandered around. They were here because something was special about this planet but he’d forgotten what it was. After a moment of hard thinking he came to the conclusion that he’d probably not listened to the Doctor’s explanation. Well, he’d find out. Either he or the Doctor. Whoever got in trouble first. In the worst case they would meet at the TADRIS, out of breath and screaming.
Or, in the Doctor’s case, quite exited.
After five minutes of aimlessly wandering around Fitz got tired of the sight of trees. After six minutes he saw something that renewed his interest.
In the middle of the forest, between the trees, stood a girl. A young woman in fact. He hadn’t known this planet was inhibited but wasn’t exactly surprised either. More like pleased. Because the girl was very human (or human looking - Fitz didn’t care about details) and very beautiful. She wore a dress that glowed the same way the leafs surrounding them did, but it was short and tight. Her hair was a bit curly, like the Doctor’s, and the same shade as his as well. She had wonderful blue eyes. Like the Doctor. Fitz stood in front of her and didn’t even try to think of something to say. One look into those blue eyes and he was lost. They seemed to stare straight into his soul. He could drown in them, and he did. Just like…
Fitz got back to reality. He really, really had to stop comparing every beautiful girl he met to the Doctor. It was a bit gay. And he wasn’t gay. He was merely one of those guys who wished they could marry their best friend.
(No way! he told himself. He hadn’t actually thought that.)
Reality also contained a girl. At least he hadn’t been daydreaming - about meeting someone who was a lot like the Doctor but female. That would have been embarrassing.
Reality also had him searching for something to say. Something to make him interesting (He was a time traveller from space. How much more interesting could a guy be?), something to sweep her off her feet and into his arms. And bed.
She was smiling at him, a bit curious, a bit snotty. Very Doctor-like again. He reminded himself that that wasn’t actually an adjective.
“Hello!” he said, rather lamely. “I’m Fitz. You live here?”
She said nothing.
“Uhm… you have very nice eyes.” He mentally kicked himself. That was horrible! She still didn’t speak, only smiled. It made him nervous. He fished for his cigarettes.
The moment he found one and lighted it the girl screamed. Fitz nearly dropped his lighter. He’d met many chicks unable to accept his smoking habit but she was a bit extreme in her reaction.
Even more extreme when she suddenly melted away, became a big, slimy lump on the ground and then rose again as a big, scaly monster with many eyes and even more long, sharp teeth, that towered over him.
Eep! thought Fitz.
The monster roared.
Now would be a good time for running. Fitz dropped to his bottom instead.
“Uhm, Doctor?” he called. “Here’s a big, evil monster that totally doesn’t look like you at all and wants to eat me! Would be a great moment to come to my rescue!”
The monster had no legs, just grew out of the ground. That didn’t stop it from stretching until its teeth were just about to bite off Fitz’s head and let him die in shame. He’d never live that down.
And that was exactly the point that bothered him.
The ground between them suddenly exploded. The monster fell back, then turned its ugly head to where the Doctor was coming into view between the trees. He held a weapon in his hand.
“Look what I’ve got!” he said cheerfully. “Sonic blaster. Found it with a skeleton close to the TARDIS. It’s still working.”
“I can see that!” stated Fitz. “Now kill that thing!”
The Doctor came closer. The monster eyed him suspiciously but he lowered the weapon and grinned at it.
“Hello,” he said. “I’m the Doctor!”
“Dooctrrrrr,” growled the monster. “Out offf the waaay, Doctrrr!”
“No, you’d kill my friend.”
“Yesssssss.” At least it was honest. Fitz had like it better when it was a girl.
“Why would you want that?” The Doctor sounded curious, not at all angry or shocked. Fitz groaned. Once, just once he would like to have the Doctor come to his rescue and kill whatever was out to eat him without starting a discussion.
“He hurrtssssss the foressst.”
The Doctor glared at Fitz.
“You didn’t smoke here, did you?”
“Well…”
“What did I say about smoking in this place?”
“I don’t know, I didn’t listen!” He hadn’t really wanted to say that. The Doctor sighed exasperated and turned back to the monster.
“It won’t happen again,” he promised. “Please don’t kill him.”
The monster growled a little more, then melted back into the earth and was gone.
“Well,” said Fitz. “That was surprisingly easy.”
The Doctor glared at him. Before he could say something - and Fitz had heard enough lectures from him to know that he would - the leafs of the trees suddenly stared to rustle. A new voice could be heard and Fitz needed a moment to realize that it sounded in his head.
‘Child of Gallifrey,’ it said.
I guess it’s not talking to me then, Fitz decided. The Doctor looked at the trees surrounding him.
“The forest is telepathic,” he said by way of explanation. “It’s a living being, thousands of years old and very wise.”
“It wanted to eat me!” Fitz protested. The Doctor nodded.
“Like I said.”
‘Child of Gallifrey,’ the forest repeated. ‘Go home.’
“Not terribly interested,” the Doctor answered. “Sorry.”
“Uhm, hi.” Fitz looked at the branch in front of him and wondered if he was expected to shake it. “I’m Fitz.”
‘You need to leave,’ the forest insisted.
“If this is because of the ciggy, I’m terrible sorry. I didn’t know you were alive and all…”
‘Child of Gallifrey.’ Fitz felt ignored. ‘Leave.’
“Why?” the Doctor wanted to know.
‘You will bring devastation to this world.’
“Will I?” the Doctor frowned but he also looked a little concerned. “I know I have a reputation but I don’t see what could possible happen to this place.”
‘Death follows you.’
The Doctor looked at Fitz. His frown deepened. Fitz, still sitting on the ground, looked at the trees.
“I’m Fitz,” he repeated. “I’m harmless.”
The forest kept ignoring him.
‘We have no part in your war,’ it said. ‘We don’t want it on this world. Keep it away. Leave.’
“There is no war going on!” the Doctor explained.
‘It’s coming closer. It’s looking for you. Chasing you through time and space. Leave.’ The trees glowed brighter now and moved like in a storm, but Fitz felt no wind. Through the moving leafs he could finally see the sky, blue and just beginning to darken.
The Doctor’s voice was quiet.
“What are you talking about?”
‘We have seen many things. We know many things.’ The silent storm grew stronger still. The message was clear.
The Doctor turned to Fitz and offered a hand to help him up.
“Let’s go,” he said.
“What, just like that?”
“Just like that. We’re not welcome here.”
They hurried back to the TARDIS and Fitz constantly expected another monster to show up and finish them off. Nothing happened, only the trees raging in silence. Once inside the ship the Doctor moved to the console without another word. Seconds later they dematerialized.
“You run without finding out what’s going on? How unusual.” Though Fitz didn’t exactly mind. That forest had been creepy.
The Doctor beamed at him and Fitz though: Crap!
“Here we are. Already landed. Same spot, a hundred years later. Perhaps the forest will be a bit more informative now it’s had time to calm down.”
And I’m so looking forward to seeing it again! thought Fitz. Loud he said: “Do you have any idea what it was talking about?”
“Not the slightest.” The Doctor made his way over to the door.
“Sure there is no war going on?”
“Non I would know of.” He looked thoughtful, worried. “Of course that entity can sense -“ He fell silent.
Through the open door Fitz could see an endless, bare wasteland. Blackened stone, scorched earth, a world dead for an hundred years.
“Maybe the TARDIS missed the spot again,” he said helplessly. The Doctor didn’t react.
“There is nothing here,” he whispered. “Nothing at all!” Fitz saw him standing there, in the open door, in front of a devastated landscape and wondered why it seemed so natural to see him surrounded by death and destruction.
He thought of the forest’s words.
“Did we do this?” he asked. “Because we were here?”
The Doctor said nothing. Just closed the door, leaned his head against the wood and closed his eyes. Fitz didn’t know what to do.
“Doctor?”
Suddenly the Doctor whirled around, his fists clenched, and ran over to the console, started flicking switches with a look of barely contained fury on his face.
“Doctor?” Fitz tried again. “Who did that? Do you know?”
For a moment the Doctor gave no sign of having heard him. When he finally spoke Fitz didn’t know if it was an answer of if he was talking to himself.
“I’ve seen that kind of devastation before.”
“Where?”
The Doctor stopped in his movements, calmed down and suddenly looked quite normal again, all traces of fury gone from his face, but not from his eyes. Fitz looked into their blue depths and was scared.
The Doctor smiled faintly.
“Skaro,” he said.
-
September 30, 2007
Prompt: #017 - Blue
Claim: The Time War
Table: Here
Spoilers: None
Characters: Fitz, the Doctor (8)
Summary: The Doctor and Fitz are talking to trees. The trees are talking back.
Note: This is probably crap. I'm still posting it. Tiny little amount of slash. Just Fitz being Fitz actually.
Yes, the title is shamelessly stolen from Douglas Adams.
The day way wonderful: warm air, the softest breeze and a perfect, blue sky. Earth blue, even, not that weird reddish violet watery blue of the planet they’d visited last month, where a giant gooseberry had tried to eat him. Fitz grimaced at the memory. Another adventure he could have done without. And not one qualified to impress chicks.
Now they were on a perfectly harmless world with a perfect blue sky. Only Fitz couldn’t see it because they had landed in a forest. A forest that would have been dark and scary if the leafs of the trees hadn’t been glowing. Which was kind of scary in itself, Fitz decided, but at least something he could tell about without blushing.
He’d lost the Doctor. Well, left him behind. Or rather, had been left behind by him. Two seconds after stepping out of the time travelling police box the Time Lord had cried “Oh, look at that!” and run off to inspect something between the plants. Fitz had risked a look and seen a bug that was in no way remarkable to him. He’d shrugged and wandered off.
“I’m wandering off now,” he’d said. “You’d better come along or you might lose me.”
The Doctor had answered “Quiet so,” and run after the bug that had spread its wings and flown deeper into the forest. Fitz could have followed then but decided not to, because he had to prove a point.
Whichever point that might have been.
So Fitz had wandered around. They were here because something was special about this planet but he’d forgotten what it was. After a moment of hard thinking he came to the conclusion that he’d probably not listened to the Doctor’s explanation. Well, he’d find out. Either he or the Doctor. Whoever got in trouble first. In the worst case they would meet at the TADRIS, out of breath and screaming.
Or, in the Doctor’s case, quite exited.
After five minutes of aimlessly wandering around Fitz got tired of the sight of trees. After six minutes he saw something that renewed his interest.
In the middle of the forest, between the trees, stood a girl. A young woman in fact. He hadn’t known this planet was inhibited but wasn’t exactly surprised either. More like pleased. Because the girl was very human (or human looking - Fitz didn’t care about details) and very beautiful. She wore a dress that glowed the same way the leafs surrounding them did, but it was short and tight. Her hair was a bit curly, like the Doctor’s, and the same shade as his as well. She had wonderful blue eyes. Like the Doctor. Fitz stood in front of her and didn’t even try to think of something to say. One look into those blue eyes and he was lost. They seemed to stare straight into his soul. He could drown in them, and he did. Just like…
Fitz got back to reality. He really, really had to stop comparing every beautiful girl he met to the Doctor. It was a bit gay. And he wasn’t gay. He was merely one of those guys who wished they could marry their best friend.
(No way! he told himself. He hadn’t actually thought that.)
Reality also contained a girl. At least he hadn’t been daydreaming - about meeting someone who was a lot like the Doctor but female. That would have been embarrassing.
Reality also had him searching for something to say. Something to make him interesting (He was a time traveller from space. How much more interesting could a guy be?), something to sweep her off her feet and into his arms. And bed.
She was smiling at him, a bit curious, a bit snotty. Very Doctor-like again. He reminded himself that that wasn’t actually an adjective.
“Hello!” he said, rather lamely. “I’m Fitz. You live here?”
She said nothing.
“Uhm… you have very nice eyes.” He mentally kicked himself. That was horrible! She still didn’t speak, only smiled. It made him nervous. He fished for his cigarettes.
The moment he found one and lighted it the girl screamed. Fitz nearly dropped his lighter. He’d met many chicks unable to accept his smoking habit but she was a bit extreme in her reaction.
Even more extreme when she suddenly melted away, became a big, slimy lump on the ground and then rose again as a big, scaly monster with many eyes and even more long, sharp teeth, that towered over him.
Eep! thought Fitz.
The monster roared.
Now would be a good time for running. Fitz dropped to his bottom instead.
“Uhm, Doctor?” he called. “Here’s a big, evil monster that totally doesn’t look like you at all and wants to eat me! Would be a great moment to come to my rescue!”
The monster had no legs, just grew out of the ground. That didn’t stop it from stretching until its teeth were just about to bite off Fitz’s head and let him die in shame. He’d never live that down.
And that was exactly the point that bothered him.
The ground between them suddenly exploded. The monster fell back, then turned its ugly head to where the Doctor was coming into view between the trees. He held a weapon in his hand.
“Look what I’ve got!” he said cheerfully. “Sonic blaster. Found it with a skeleton close to the TARDIS. It’s still working.”
“I can see that!” stated Fitz. “Now kill that thing!”
The Doctor came closer. The monster eyed him suspiciously but he lowered the weapon and grinned at it.
“Hello,” he said. “I’m the Doctor!”
“Dooctrrrrr,” growled the monster. “Out offf the waaay, Doctrrr!”
“No, you’d kill my friend.”
“Yesssssss.” At least it was honest. Fitz had like it better when it was a girl.
“Why would you want that?” The Doctor sounded curious, not at all angry or shocked. Fitz groaned. Once, just once he would like to have the Doctor come to his rescue and kill whatever was out to eat him without starting a discussion.
“He hurrtssssss the foressst.”
The Doctor glared at Fitz.
“You didn’t smoke here, did you?”
“Well…”
“What did I say about smoking in this place?”
“I don’t know, I didn’t listen!” He hadn’t really wanted to say that. The Doctor sighed exasperated and turned back to the monster.
“It won’t happen again,” he promised. “Please don’t kill him.”
The monster growled a little more, then melted back into the earth and was gone.
“Well,” said Fitz. “That was surprisingly easy.”
The Doctor glared at him. Before he could say something - and Fitz had heard enough lectures from him to know that he would - the leafs of the trees suddenly stared to rustle. A new voice could be heard and Fitz needed a moment to realize that it sounded in his head.
‘Child of Gallifrey,’ it said.
I guess it’s not talking to me then, Fitz decided. The Doctor looked at the trees surrounding him.
“The forest is telepathic,” he said by way of explanation. “It’s a living being, thousands of years old and very wise.”
“It wanted to eat me!” Fitz protested. The Doctor nodded.
“Like I said.”
‘Child of Gallifrey,’ the forest repeated. ‘Go home.’
“Not terribly interested,” the Doctor answered. “Sorry.”
“Uhm, hi.” Fitz looked at the branch in front of him and wondered if he was expected to shake it. “I’m Fitz.”
‘You need to leave,’ the forest insisted.
“If this is because of the ciggy, I’m terrible sorry. I didn’t know you were alive and all…”
‘Child of Gallifrey.’ Fitz felt ignored. ‘Leave.’
“Why?” the Doctor wanted to know.
‘You will bring devastation to this world.’
“Will I?” the Doctor frowned but he also looked a little concerned. “I know I have a reputation but I don’t see what could possible happen to this place.”
‘Death follows you.’
The Doctor looked at Fitz. His frown deepened. Fitz, still sitting on the ground, looked at the trees.
“I’m Fitz,” he repeated. “I’m harmless.”
The forest kept ignoring him.
‘We have no part in your war,’ it said. ‘We don’t want it on this world. Keep it away. Leave.’
“There is no war going on!” the Doctor explained.
‘It’s coming closer. It’s looking for you. Chasing you through time and space. Leave.’ The trees glowed brighter now and moved like in a storm, but Fitz felt no wind. Through the moving leafs he could finally see the sky, blue and just beginning to darken.
The Doctor’s voice was quiet.
“What are you talking about?”
‘We have seen many things. We know many things.’ The silent storm grew stronger still. The message was clear.
The Doctor turned to Fitz and offered a hand to help him up.
“Let’s go,” he said.
“What, just like that?”
“Just like that. We’re not welcome here.”
They hurried back to the TARDIS and Fitz constantly expected another monster to show up and finish them off. Nothing happened, only the trees raging in silence. Once inside the ship the Doctor moved to the console without another word. Seconds later they dematerialized.
“You run without finding out what’s going on? How unusual.” Though Fitz didn’t exactly mind. That forest had been creepy.
The Doctor beamed at him and Fitz though: Crap!
“Here we are. Already landed. Same spot, a hundred years later. Perhaps the forest will be a bit more informative now it’s had time to calm down.”
And I’m so looking forward to seeing it again! thought Fitz. Loud he said: “Do you have any idea what it was talking about?”
“Not the slightest.” The Doctor made his way over to the door.
“Sure there is no war going on?”
“Non I would know of.” He looked thoughtful, worried. “Of course that entity can sense -“ He fell silent.
Through the open door Fitz could see an endless, bare wasteland. Blackened stone, scorched earth, a world dead for an hundred years.
“Maybe the TARDIS missed the spot again,” he said helplessly. The Doctor didn’t react.
“There is nothing here,” he whispered. “Nothing at all!” Fitz saw him standing there, in the open door, in front of a devastated landscape and wondered why it seemed so natural to see him surrounded by death and destruction.
He thought of the forest’s words.
“Did we do this?” he asked. “Because we were here?”
The Doctor said nothing. Just closed the door, leaned his head against the wood and closed his eyes. Fitz didn’t know what to do.
“Doctor?”
Suddenly the Doctor whirled around, his fists clenched, and ran over to the console, started flicking switches with a look of barely contained fury on his face.
“Doctor?” Fitz tried again. “Who did that? Do you know?”
For a moment the Doctor gave no sign of having heard him. When he finally spoke Fitz didn’t know if it was an answer of if he was talking to himself.
“I’ve seen that kind of devastation before.”
“Where?”
The Doctor stopped in his movements, calmed down and suddenly looked quite normal again, all traces of fury gone from his face, but not from his eyes. Fitz looked into their blue depths and was scared.
The Doctor smiled faintly.
“Skaro,” he said.
-
September 30, 2007