THE MAN WHO FORGETS, doctor who [book 02]

viii. the daleks and captain john hart

     There's a strange knock on the TARDIS door, making Violet frown as she turns to check the scanner, thrown off by the appearance of John Hart outside the blue box's doors. His brown curls have lightened considerably since the last time she saw him decades ago, and it's not hard to see that Time has been moderately kind to the man, allowing him to retain a semblance of the youth he held when he, Jack, and Violet were trapped in the time loop so long ago for the female of the triad; back before their reality was shattered by the ending of the thing that brought them together in the first place.

     Clearing her throat, she opens the doors protecting her from having her hearts shattered again and faces the man who did such a thing on multiple occasions. "You're here sooner than I expected you to be. It's only been two days."

     John's eyebrow lifts slightly. "It has been much longer for me. You're a hard woman to find, love."

     "And you somehow manage to find me in the 1900's. That doesn't sit right."

     "You, uh, always did prefer living in times before your birth, and you really did love talking about some show called Outlander that was apparently set in the 1700's. So, yeah, I've been looking for you in the past and managed to find you here, smack bang in the middle of World War Two. You never have been one to stray far away from a fight for too long."

     Violet sighs and steps back, allowing her second husband to enter the TARDIS belonging to her fourth husband. "You've seen a lot of things, John, but I want to bet that you've never seen something like this old girl before."

     "What the hell are you on abou...?" John's clear disbelief fades off into awed silence, his strange blue eyes bordering on being horrified as he steps into the blue box and takes in the sheer impossibility of it all. He spins around in fumbling circles, almost tripping over the stairs as he heads toward the centre console of the time machine. "If I didn't know better, I'd say that this is damn impossible. How did you manage to find such a beautiful thing?"

     Violet closes the door and climbs the stairs, reclining against the console and watching the man she still harbours some form of twisted affection for. "She doesn't belong to me, or even to the Doctor mind you. She's a sentient being, and I will warn you now to not try to steal her. I won't be held responsible for when and where she decides to drop you off and leave you for dead."

     The TARDIS makes several strange electronic noises, making Violet snicker and John look downright offended. On the screen in front of the man are a few lines of English, telling John just what the TARDIS thinks of the idea — and it's one of the more vulgar and expletive things the blue box has had to say over the years. The fact of the matter is that the old girl is the one who does the stealing, not those she allows to pilot her on any given day. The blue box may well be 'just a piece of machinery' to some people, but to those who ride with her, she is everything.

     "So, the whole "being shit at relationships and feelings" thing you "had to get out of" before you were "in too deep" bullshit you were on about the last time we talked." Violet almost smiles in triumph at the pained look on John's face. "Want to tell me what that was all about? 'Cause we both know that is a load of fucking crap."

     John sighs. "I was scared, okay? You happy now? I said those things and left you all because I was scared." He drops onto the seat beside the console, running a hand through his hair and huffing out a breath. "The idea of staying with you, Jack, and Cicely after the time loop scared the crap out of me. I just knew that I was going to fuck it all up if I stayed, so I ran."

     "You know by now that it wasn't just us three you ran from. You ran from our daughter, John, and she grew up never knowing why her father wasn't there when she needed him! And I know all too well how something like that feels — and what it does to someone. I may have had someone who pretended to care and pretended to be my dad when both suited him, but that only makes me wish he'd never been there anyway. My father, a man from a planet no longer in existence, never really knew I existed until the day I had to watch him die to save myself and the Doctor."