Work Text:
It dawns on him one morning, as he has nothing to do, and that was always a dangerous position for him to be in.
“You're younger than I've ever seen you.”
At the time, he didn’t know what it meant. Later, he thought it was the same as Clara telling him that she could see his age in his eyes, as River had mentioned them as well. But now, now he has the same face that he did before, only older. She never saw that face any older than it had been then, but this is still that face, only older.
It’s a terrible decision, that’s not the way to deal with all the people that he lost, with all the guilt and loss of purpose. It’s not the way to deal with anything, but once the idea gets in his mind, he can’t give up on it. He spends the whole day trying to convince himself not to go through with it, and it’s late into the night when he finally gives up and goes into the TARDIS.
“Just one little jump, hardly counts as anything. We’ll just sneak in and out of my timeline, no one will notice,” he says aloud to the TARDIS, or maybe he’s saying that to himself.
He can’t just take this face as an opportunity to impersonate his past self, that’s not what fixing himself means. And yet…
The TARDIS takes him to a party in a glass dome built on an asteroid. There’s a story there, but it’s not his place to investigate. He shouldn’t even be there in the first place, and the less he knows about things, the less tempted he will be to interfere.
He finds her sitting by herself at the bar, a glass of wine on her hand, and she takes his breath away. River Song, still alive, past the point which he knew to be his last with her. A second chance for a face that keeps being given second chances.
“River,” he calls, stopping next to her, and it occurs to him only now that he doesn’t know what to say, but it’s too late to stop and think about something now.
She turns to him, puzzled for only a moment before her face lights up. “Doctor, I haven’t seen this one before. You look older than your picture,” she says, touching his cheek.
Then he was right, she thinks that he’s the same incarnation that first met her from his perspective, matching him to the pictures of his first regeneration cycle that he gifted her. Well, the first regeneration cycle that he knew of.
“You’ll see me younger too, although I probably shouldn’t tell you about that.”
She laughs. “I see you’re learning. Alright, where are we, what have we done?” she asks, opening her purse to take her journal.
Of course, she has to catalogue every meeting, she can trace their combined timelines in a way that he can’t. He puts a hand on her wrist, not holding her, but as a silent request for her to stop.
“Can we skip that this time?” he asks, and she frowns at what’s sure to be a strange request.
There is a way that they do things, and he’s breaking the rules. More rules than she even knows of.
“Is there something wrong?” she asks, as perceptive as ever.
So often he felt like she knew him better than he knew himself, so often she had the upper hand at knowing about his future, even as he knew their ending from the start, but now is the first time that he truly feels like she doesn’t know him after all. This was a mistake, he shouldn’t have come here. They had their goodbyes, they had an end, something almost like closure, so rare in his life, and here he is, poking at the wound again, all because he has this face that can’t help but look to the past and try to fix his own mistakes.
“Spoilers,” he says, stealing her line. He offers her a hand. “I can’t stay here for long, but I was hoping we could dance?”
If she finds anything about this strange, she mentions nothing as she takes his hand. Between them, maybe this isn’t even enough to register as strange.
He guides her to the dance floor, and once there he realises that he isn’t entirely sure as to what to do.
“You do know how to dance, don’t you?” she teases, placing his hand on her hip.
Slowly, it comes back to him, and he guides her through tentative steps, more swaying to the music than properly dancing, but he thinks that he could get the hang of this. He’s more open emotionally now, and perhaps that would also extend to being looser with his movements. He knew how to do that before, so it’s just a matter of relearning.
“I love this place, it’s absolutely beautiful,” she says, looking up.
He does so as well, and finds what she’s talking about. From the dance floor, they have an unimpeded view of the glass ceiling, and beyond it, the universe. It’s a bit too bright to properly see all the stars that should be visible from an asteroid, but it’s still quite the sight. He can’t help but track their position from the position of the stars above, but he tries to see them as River does, rather than simply points of navigation, not wanting to know too much about where they are.
He looks back at River. “I don’t need to stargaze to have a beautiful view,” he says, surprising himself with how good that sounded.
“Oh, flattery will get you everywhere, Doctor. But first, we dance. It’s rare enough to get the opportunity with you, and I’m not wasting it,” she says, resting her head on his shoulder and letting him sway her a little out of rhythm.
He holds her close, and wonders how he’ll be able to let her go. He has never been good at this, he’ll either ignore his grief or let it destroy him, and he’s afraid that he might be doing the latter now. He lost her, he mourned her, he accepted that he would never see her again, and now here she is, in his arms again, alive and happy and recognising him, the sort of moment that he thought that he would never have again with her.
He never did learn how many times she saw this face. How many dates can he fit in those moments between the would be last and the first time that he saw her? He kisses her on the top of the head, and lets the music guide them. It’s a terrible decision, but he can’t walk it back now. All the times that they met out of order, maybe it was all to allow the choice that he’s making now, the terrible choice that might break his heart again, that might only make things worse, but he’s been given more time, and that’s all that he wants. More time, to live, to make up for his mistakes, with his friends, and with River as well.
As long as she can keep thinking that he’s still in his former incarnation, maybe he can still visit her, just a few more times. Maybe their goodbye doesn’t have to be as final as he thought it was. Maybe they can have a few more moments of happiness, stolen from in between his past lives, plucked right out of his timeline. But that is another bad decision, for another lonely night where he can convince himself of anything, just so he doesn’t have to face all the people he’s lost.
For now, he holds River in his arms, and they dance.