The Daughter of Gallifrey

10: The Wrinkled Picture

"What do you mean, Thomas, the girl with the big watch? Who's that?" The Doctor placed a hand on Caroline's shoulder and looked at her in the mirror, his face scrunched up in curiosity. But she didn't answer, only stared in awe at her reflection, touching her hair and cheeks and nose and chin.

"It was me," she whispered again, more to herself than the Doctor or Rory.

"But I don't understand. Who's the girl with the watch?" the Doctor persisted.

"The big watch, Doctor. The girl had a huge watch on her wrist." Caroline motioned to her right wrist, then glanced up at the Doctor. "Big and black and it lit up sometimes. She visited me when I was younger."

"Visited you?" The Doctor asked, genuine concern washing over his face.

"Yes. At the park. In my room. Just moments when I was alone. She would appear, but I always thought I had just imagined her because I was lonely a lot." She shifted and her gaze fell on her feet. "I didn't really have many friends because I was always reading. I didn't talk much." Her voice lowered. "I still don't." Caroline found herself in the mirror again, and her hands began to shake. "But how can it be me?"

"Why don't we sit down?" Rory suggested, noticing her trembling and indicating with his thumb the couch in the next room. "Doctor?" The Doctor looked up from Caroline and nodded.

"Yes, yes. Wonderful idea, Rory." He turned Caroline toward the other room and have her a little nudge. "Why don't you put a kettle on?" He instructed Rory with a quick smile that didn't linger.

This girl just kept getting more complicated. He wasn't sure how much more he could manage without going crazy. Her calm was slightly nervewracking for the Doctor. He was used to having at least some of the answers, if not most, but now he was completely lost. Up a creek without a paddle, he thought the phrase was. Or maybe that wasn't right at all. Who knew? Right now he certainly didn't.

"Doctor, I really don't know what's going on. How can I be the other girl, too?" Caroline collapsed on the couch, sinking several inches into the thick cushion. "I know what she-I-said to me-the younger me-but I still don't understand. Not really. Do you, Doctor? Does anything make sense?" Her expectant eyes glistened as she held her breath, waiting for an answer.

The Doctor scrunched his face into a rather perplexing expression and rubbed his chin vigorously. He drifted downward to rest next to Caroline, lost in his own cogitation.

She could practically hear his thoughts forming and developing and then connecting and looping together to create a comprehensible response. It was like watching the accumulation of millions of water droplets as they compacted and condensed to form a billowing and swelling storm cloud of vast and quite possibly infinite proportions. Caroline almost forgot her troubles as she witnessed the phenomenon that the was the Time Lord mind hard at work.

The Doctor abruptly straightened up, his eyes brimming considerably with understanding and a ridiculous grin spread across his childlike face.

"Right then, little Thomas, I know you can be this girl you've seen before because of me. You met me and now you have access to a living, breathing time and space machine. You can go back and say those things to your younger self. It is possible. But the watch, however, I've got no idea. Well, no, that's wrong. That's a lie. I have five."

"But, Doctor-" Caroline started to interject, but the older Time Lord leaped up from the couch, both his index fingers held up.

"No wait, with the context of what you said before, two." He looked down at Caroline. "Did she ever ripple?"

"What?"

"The girl, Thomas. You. Did her image ever ripple or shift? Maybe fuzz like a telly screen with bad reception?"

"Um-"

"This is important. Think hard, Caroline Thomas."

"No, she never...rippled. But I don't-" Caroline tried again to add something, but the Doctor was too caught up in his process of elimination.

"Oh, brilliant! That means-" Caroline stood up and jerked down sharply on his sleeve.

"DOCTOR! WILL YOU LISTEN TO ME?" She shouted, now rather cross. The Doctor stopped mid-sentence and focused his attention on the seething girl.

"Is everything alright in there?" Rory called from the kitchen. Hasty footsteps accompanied his holler. He appeared in the doorway shortly after.

"Fine, Rory. Just fine," the Doctor replied, only glancing up to notice Rory's concerned expression for a second before returning to face Caroline.

"Doctor, the girl didn't-I mean, I didn't-oh, whatever! She didn't use the TARDIS. She wouldn't've had time. She was there one moment and gone the next. I'd look away for a second and she'd already have disappeared. She couldnt've run off that fast. Not when she was at the park. Or even in my house. That's impossible."

"But then-"

"She didn't use the TARDIS, Doctor." Caroline's statement struck with a finality that caused the Doctor to retreat back to his seat on the couch. The kettle's high pitched whistle was heard from the kitchen.

"I'll get that," Rory said, eyeing the Doctor with a worried look before giving Caroline a nod and disappearing into the other room.

With a tiny little sigh, Caroline leaned against the arm of the couch, pulling a small, badly wrinkled picture from the pocket of her jumper. She rubbed her thumb over the sole face on the faded paper, and prepared herself to shed more tears, but they were dried up. Tears were no longer an option for her body, as its reserve water was depleted. She was slightly thankful.

The Doctor looked up from his wringing hands and peered over Caroline's shoulder at the apparently much-loved photo and his hearts leaped into his throat. His lips formed words but it took a moment for his vocal cords to catch up.

"Captain?"