Sometimes the Damsel Must Save Herself

"I listened close and I heard the ghost
Of Oseola cry."
--John Anderson; Seminole Wind







Songs swirled around him as the sky tore itself apart.

He had known storms like this; storms with tempestuous winds and searing, thick rain. He had known the storms came every season.
Every season, the tempests came and howled their violence and every season, the People moved beneath the ground or within the strong banfa'al trees for protection. Preparation had come down to an art form over the generations and the twins had told him how to protect himself if ever he was caught outdoors.
Except there was no one else with him.

He was alone in this storm.

--------------

He didn't want to wake up.

The storm was around him and swirled unforgivingly when he woke. When he was asleep, he could dream all he liked about whatever he liked.
He dreamed of Cinder, Zonker, 'Nathan, Home. He dreamed of strange things and barely-remembered places from long-ago travels.
His dreams took him to Rhy'Din, Evegren, Kisareth and back. They took him to the banfa'al groves and further to the strange, salted shores of a chilly little planet.
He was dreaming a pleasant dream about Archie, Zonker, and a ride down the beach with Ty'Rekh when the storm woke him.
I'm calling to you like a long-lost friend
the fires within him burned until there was little of himself left. he was as he knew he would be. The fires consumed him and the storm raged around him. Wind howled names in his ears, reminding him of the many lives he'd met in his years.
The sea roared at him, reminding him of the untold journeys.
The thunder mocked him, reminding him of the things he feared.

The fire and the storm left only a child in its wake.

The burning light faded into night.

The child left on the beach sat in a frozen posture, wrapped warmly in yeti-furs. he child sat with nothing of itself exposed to sight and not daring to move.
Its hands were folded in a prayer-like fashion beneath the fur and its head bowed forward. There was nothing but bare earth and the sea on either side but the child bowed as if in front of an invisible altar.

He heard the voices inside his head and felt the violent storm still raging through his veins. It was almost done; he knew that logically. Yet emotionally, he cried for it to cease sooner, to purge him all the more completely.

The strayed child knelt frozen in the sand and his voice prayed.

"...to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can..."

The TARDIS sat silently on the beach, a looming monolith seemingly made of blue wood and white paint, a symbol of hope to some; a Call Box. That required a key. Those in the know-how knew better but to anyone else the oddity of it would be baffling, especially once they stepped inside. But the TARDIS was neither observed nor paid attention to by anyone at the moment, save perhaps a rock crab trapped beneath it, its burrow blocked off...

"Lovely night, perfect place to pray, isn't it? Bit gloomy and dark if you ask me, but if you like that sort of thing..." The Doctor started to say, but trailed off; Renne didn't seem to be listening to him. Oh, he knew it was Renne based on what John Rashe had told him in passing, but, what was it about this particular oddity with eyes of midnight that held a comatose/tranced human and a psychologist in such thrall? He stepped closer, mindful of not getting too close, mindful of the fact that he was supposed to be clinically insane with a killer in his brain. "You must be Renne, I've heard a lot about you, aye? Oh yeah, I've heard of you but you'll not have heard of me. I'm the Doctor. I've come to find out a few things and I was so hoping you'd be able to help me. You see a fellow by the name of John Rashe sent me to see someone you might know, a person by the name of Dustin." The Doctor did not wait for a response; time was of the essence and he, timeless though he was, could almost feel each grain of sand tumbling down the funnel of the hour glass that represented Dustin's life.

"Dustin is currently in a hospital. He's got... a sickness in his head, too." Time to broach dangerous territory. "He's sleeping, and his sickness won't let him wake up yet. I'm told you're a healer, and if you're willing to help me, I'd be willing to try and help you." The Doctor waited to see what kind of a response this would get, his hand in his pocket, reassuringly resting on the Sonic Screwdriver... just in case.

He stood there silently, watching the strange blue person crawling about, offering prayers to the Gods only knew who. And perhaps it was only the Gods of this land that knew, and perhaps they would answer him, someday. But for now, the Doctor needed the little blue praying person to focus. Perhaps he had been babbling, but that's what the Doctor did. It was all people could hope for to keep up whenever he spoke, so often he said things beyond the normal ken of men, or women for that matter. No, he did not know Renne. Never claimed he did; he said he heard of him. Quite a difference there if one was paying attention and the Doctor, most assuredly, was paying attention to everything. And what he discovered bothered him on a primal level;

Renne didn't care.

Renne simply did not care about Dustin. That was obvious. What was less obvious, and ultimately more important, Renne didn't know Dustin. And obviously, didn't want to know him. The Doctor realized, almost belatedly, what kind of task he had ahead of him. And not for the first time, he considered giving up and just drifting away on the winds of time. He couldn't... and wouldn't... force Renne to see Dustin in the hospital. Renne's body language clearly said he didn't know and didn't care to know what the Doctor was talking about. But the Doctor banished such thoughts instantly; only when Dustin was dead and Renne fleeing across the galaxies to a place the Doctor couldn't reach would the Doctor give up.

Sadly, he was not unaccustomed to having to chase people to get answers and fully expected it this time... but he wouldn't chase Renne. If Renne fled, the Doctor would let him. The Sonic Screwdriver in his pocket was incredible, it could do just about anything except Julian your fries. But it couldn't affect free will, and it couldn't bring a person back to life. The Doctor had to be resourceful all the time, but this...? This was going to be difficult. He had his work cut out for him... but when didn't he?

He watched Renne silently; the silence, he noticed, was just as annoying to him as his talking... Can't catch a break, can I? The Doctor thought to himself. He watched as the blue person played dress-up. He watched him cradle a bullet casing reverently. Watched as Renne sang a sad song mournfully to the wintry skies, much like an Ood would have...

But Renne was no Ood. An Ood would likely have thrown himself off a cliff into an ocean to help, if the Doctor/Donna asked... and they'd have sang the entire way down. Renne was not an Ood, but then again, nothing was quite like an Ood... except an Ood. Renne was simply Renne... and the Doctor was simply the Doctor, the last of his kind, unbeknown to Renne. The Doctor closed his eyes and thought of the Face of Bo... Face of Bo would know what to do, if he were still alive. He thought of Martha... her answers always seemed to involve sacrificing herself, or suffering in silence... the Doctor gave a wan, but sad smile to the thought. Did ALL of his companions have to suffer on his behalf? Was he... worse than the problems he tried to cure? Did the Doctor cause more problems than he fixed...? Was he truly better off alone...?

No.

And that single word, that single thought, solidified his resolve. His eyes shot open in time to see Renne approaching him, and in that moment, the Doctor was struck with a brilliant idea so monumental it was astounding it had taken so long to hit him.

"Come with me, Renne. Together we can save a life. Help me, and I'll take you where- and whenever you want to go. You name the place. You name the time, and I'll take you there, but only if you'll help me now." The desperation in his voice, the iron-clad resolve and determination to save even one life would likely have seemed heroic to some people. But the Doctor knew he was no hero; he was a Doctor. He fixed things. And with all the gods of all the races of all the times and galaxies he had, and ever would visit as his witness... he would not fail again!

"Will you help me save a life, Renne?" The Doctor asked solemnly. "We save his life... maybe we can save you, too." The Doctor said evenly. His voice was so solid and even, you could balance the entirety of time and space upon it. Perhaps... that was exactly what it felt like to be the Doctor. A single word could change time. A single word could save a life.

At that moment, a single word, spoken at the right time, could undo, could destroy... everything. Life, the universe, time itself. And that word was...

No.

"How does the TARDIS taste?" The Doctor asked inquisitively. No, he'd never encountered anything that actually bit the TARDIS... rocked it, yes, the Weeping Angels had done that. Stole it? Oh yes, Dalek and Sontaran alike had done that; the Daleks even tried melting the TARDIS... but bite it? Apparently that was a Renne-only event. Not even the Vashta Nerada could have had much effect against it... so even Renne would find himself stymied at the durability of the strange blue monolith. "What you're gumming on is the TARDIS; that is my ship. It may seem a bit small on the outside but it's bigger on the inside; come on, I'll prove it to you." And then, Renne would hear a snap, as the Doctor snapped his fingers to open the doors, a trick revealed to him by way of a 'spoiler' by River Song... he bit back the memories immediately. He did not want a reminder of what he had lost... and had yet to receive, by the same token.

The doors responded to the snapping of his fingers as if by magic, though the Doctor knew it was the fact that it responded to his will. He didn't know if it had always been like that... didn't know if it would remain if he had to Regenerate again... but for now, he made use of it. With the opening of the doors, he strode right in past Renne, and stood at the helm, so to speak.

"The TARDIS." He said dramatically, trying to direct Renne to come in. While Renne was exploring the hull of the ship, the Doctor continued to speak, hoping that Renne would eventually find his way inside. "My own personal time traveling ship. I can go anywhere... and more specifically, any-WHEN. The beauty of a ship like this, little Renne, is that it affords me a certain luxury. I can undo some mistakes. I can go wherever and whenever I'm needed. I've been to the beginning of Earth's time and the very end of it, millions of millions of years into the future and let me tell you, life in invaluable. It is intrinsically important not only to me but to every living creature imaginable. To some of those living creatures thus imagined, life is meant to be hunted and destroyed... but you... you're not like that. You can't be if the person that told me about you holds you in such high regard. And you can't be the type that destroys life if someone is fighting back Death itself in the hopes of seeing you again." It was true enough, the Doctor knew; Dustin was holding on, but why? Rashe had told him Dustin loved Renne... but Renne, the Doctor could sense, didn't love Dustin... so the Doctor deduced that Dustin was holding on for Renne...

"Renne... whatever you might be, I can say this; you're not evil. You may have the capability of doing evil things but every sentient creature does. You may be sick and that may be what causes you to... do unpleasant things but if someone is fighting death because they are counting on you to save them then by the gods of this and every galaxy I have ever visited... you cannot be evil. Now Renne... let's go save a life." And the Doctor waited, standing there staring out those doors, waiting for Renne. Waiting for Renne to give the okay. Waiting for Renne to decide that saving one life was important enough to leave the strange world they were standing in...

The Doctor waited until Renne was inside, but the moment he was, that was when things got really interesting.

"Closing the doors, Renne." And with a snap of the fingers, the doors shut as promised. "Now Renne... get ready. Time is on our side. Get ready Renne... it's going to be a bumpy ride." And without warning, the Doctor hit the switch.

With the same strange noise that it arrived with, the TARDIS departed, and through the same spiraling vortex it arrived in, it traveled back to Earth. And as it traveled, the Doctor spoke.

"Renne, we're going to be arriving in a hospital, so when we do, we're going to have to move fast. By coming with me, I'm guessing you're accepting my offer, so let's hope that's the case." Renne was extremely quiet, so quiet the Doctor wouldn't have known he was there if he couldn't see him... "Just so you remember, Renne, I made you a deal; you help save Dustin, and I'll take you anywhere and any-when you want." The Doctor reminded him. Eventually, the TARDIS bumped to a halt, and the Doctor pulled his coat on. "Well... we're here." And he opened the doors manually, and stepped out.

Dustin was where he had been left; there were a few Christmas cards hand-made by children still propped up on the bedside table, but the dust was thick enough to prove how little the hospital cared about this patient. The Doctor gave a silent growl deep in his throat.

"People... why can't they see how precious life is? Dustin is dying and the only people that care are children... bless their little hearts..." He gave a sigh and turned towards the TARDIS; it was blocking the door, thereby preventing anyone from getting in and disrupting them. "Renne... we are in room number zero-forty-two. A hospital on Earth. The doctors here on Earth in this hospital are not trying very hard to save Dustin; for what reason, I don't know. But I was told by John Rashe that Dustin here was waiting for you." That was mostly the truth, a deduction made by The Doctor; Rashe said Renne was important to Dustin. Dustin was comatose and in a healing trance. Rashe was convinced only Renne could help Dustin. Therefore, Dustin was waiting for Renne. From the TARDIS, Renne would, if he crawled out to investigate, discover the bed naught but one foot away and to the left; the cords for the machines and the IV were safely tucked under the blanket and sheet, so if Renne climbed up on the bed or simply crawled around it, he wouldn't get tangled up. It was cool in the room; it was snowing outside, but there were no windows. "This room contains a lot of equipment meant to tell people what condition Dustin is in, and help keep him alive." The Doctor explained. "That's what the beeping noise is; the steady beeping... the really slow one... that's his heart monitor." The Doctor explained further.

The bed was standard size and standard comfort, which really isn't all that comfortable or that big. Big enough for one person the size of Dustin to lay on it and not fall off either side, with railings to prevent said-falling if he rolled about, which he didn't. It was dim in the room, with only a single fluorescent bulb over the bed and the luminescent lights of the machines to light the place up. The place smelled clean, at least, which meant the hospital staff was at least cleaning him on a regular basis and, likely had him set up on a catheter and other such... functional equipment. The blanket on the bed was standard-issue hospital quality material, so it was itchy, coarse and thin all at once, and the sheet underneath was of an overly-starched brand and variety; truly, this room represented the bare-minimum of hospital care.

"I don't know why Rashe was convinced you could help Dustin... but he was, and I'm putting my faith in you too. Remember Renne... you promised..." The Doctor only hoped that Renne would remember the terms of the agreement... and still agree to them. He stood there at Dustin's bedside, hands in his pockets, his all-too-knowing eyes following Renne's every movement.

Two seconds or a month? To the Doctor, they might as well be one and the same. But for what it was worth, the Doctor always kept his word.

Souls of the Departed. Souls clinging to Life.

Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you. -Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche


Dustin was in a healing trance. He was unaware of his surroundings. There was only one thing Dustin truly knew:

He was in grave danger.

From his own perspective, trapped within his own mind, he was in a literal sea of depression; the water too murky to see clearly, yet clear enough to reveal the sharks swimming all around him and under him. The path he had taken to get here was perilous... someone had tried to get in... and in fact, they almost succeeded in freeing him... but then that person VANISHED. Gone. And sadly enough, it was their own choosing to leave...

But Dustin was accustomed to that by now. In his own mind he floated on a piece of flotsam, his chest bleeding frantically into the ocean. He was pale and turning blue from the blood loss and the cold. It was his mind.

It was not always his rules.

And he was whispering, whispering so gently he couldn't hear himself over the roaring of the ocean, but he knew what he was saying. He knew he was saying it. This time... no icy cold was going to stop him from saying it. No sword-wielding women would threaten him. And though the skies were black as oil in a light-less cave, and the waters churning from the harsh wind and the swirling of the sharks, Dustin cried out to the one person... the one person he knew... could help him.

"Renne... help me..."

~ ~ ~

His body was comatose, in a healing trance, and it readily accepted the empathic healing Renne was using. And his neural pathways were jam packed with a single, obnoxiously loud thought.

RENNE HELP ME

That was it. No punctuation, no emphasis on pronunciation. Just those words, endlessly, forever and ever, never ending, never stopping. Just a monotonous repetition of the three words,

RENNE HELP ME

It came from Dustin. It originated from Dustin. And it cried out to a single entity.

RENNE

And it asked for a single thing.

HELP ME

That was it. The emotion behind it was fear, and a smidgen of hope. It cried out, endlessly beyond the vast reaches of time and space, a call, a beacon, a lost voice of a lost soul.

RENNE HELP ME

Even as Renne WAS helping Dustin remove the physical illness from his head, there remained something deeper... more profound and yet more sinister. Something was simply WRONG with Dustin. Even removing the growth from his brain did not awaken him; he remained trapped in his own mind. He was unreachable by normal means...

RENNE HELP ME

But what help could Renne possibly give now? He had already done what was expected of him, hadn't he? Wasn't this what Dustin had been waiting for...? Wasn't it? Or was there something more? Something that had yet to be revealed? Perhaps something... buried and forgotten about, buried in the abyss of the deep subconscious? And who would dare to look deep enough to know what, if anything, was buried there, seeping through the cracks, waiting to be discovered again? What could possibly be buried so deeply in the subconscious that it might have taken years to even begin to seep through?

Who would be brave enough to go looking?

Who would be curious enough to wonder?

Who would be stubborn enough to try?

RENNE HELP ME