Doctor Who: The Boy Who Remembered (Fan Fic)

Chapter 10: Reluctant Rulers

The cities of Tivoli were no less strange from up close than they had been from afar. There were a hundred unfinished ideas stacked atop one another. Half-finished buildings remained missing walls, there were openings that seemed to lead nowhere, and windows that had been mistaken for doors by smaller conquerors. There were streets with no real direction placed in the middle of parks, sidewalks that abruptly ended with no trace of where to go next, even cracks in concrete paths that had been utilized as planters. These were worlds resting upon worlds with no one rule to govern them all. And in the midst of the chaos, the Tivolians continued their business, all as if it was just another day. That was until the arrival of the Ood.

Benjamin French knew little when it came to politics, let alone intergalactic affairs. There had been a few brief rants from the Doctor while still aboard the Tardis, but with his memories being scrambled the stories had made no sense at all. What little had been made clear on their march to the closest of the Tivolian cities, the Future Capital of <Blank>, was that the Ood did not belong. Their home was somewhere far away in the Horsehead Nebula, a planet known only as the Ood Sphere, and one whose history had not been as pleasant as its people.

The Ood Sphere had been a place of peace for the Ood long before their discovery during the rapid expansion of humanity. In the thirty-ninth century the Second Great and Bountiful Human Empire had arrived, and rather than offer peace, they had enslaved the Ood. What followed was a commercial exploitation of the new found slaves that had willingly volunteered themselves into servitude. Each was given a translation sphere that would help them communicate by use of language, following which they were shipped to all the corners of the Bountiful Human Empire, then sold and bartered for by those willing to pay for their own personal assistant. And throughout the exploitation of the Ood humanity had continued to believe themselves the benevolent saviors that had brought them civilization.

There had been a dark rage that had formed in the Doctor's gaze as he had told of all he could remember. A heavy sadness that somehow recalled the tragedy of the Ood, all as if he had been a part of it. Yet amongst that dwindling memory there also came a flicker of hope. For just as he remembered their enslavement, so too, he could remember the cost of their freedom. There followed the image of an Ood Sphere cut free of captivity. A place of peace where the new generations had found a semblance of serenity. But the facts had only muddled the matter all the more and begged the question: why were the Ood so far from home?

After an hour of pointless debate, it had become clear neither Tapis nor his pleasant Ood companion held the answers they needed. It was then that the Doctor made a demand he always quite enjoyed, "Well then, that settles it, take me to your leader!"

It had been a loaded question, one which had sent the two spiraling back into their servile senselessness.

"We have no leader. We work together, for the betterment of all," stated the Ood.

"Don't listen to this one!" argued the skittish Tapis. "Of course we have a leader. What sort of people don't have a leader...a ruler...sweet...sweet ruler! It just gives me the feels thinking about it."

"There can be no leader amongst we who serve the people of Tivoli. Equality is not a divisive system. Otherwise we would not be equal" replied the pleasant mannered Ood.

The Tivolian was only growing more anxious and nervous with each word, "But that makes no sense! There is always a leader. There has to be a leader. You're our leaders. Don't you understand that by now?"

"You are frustrated," indicated his companion. "Angry, confused. Perhaps we should schedule a therapeutic session in a warm body of water."