7Inspiration came from a story I found on AO3 called Going Under by melancholydreadfuldream. I would encourage everyone to go and read it!
Also vaguely inspired by the story Reality on here too.
Since the Doctor regenerated into a woman, she had been acting strange. On the surface, it was difficult to notice a difference. Certainly, her new companions wouldn't have anything to compare her new behaviour with, having only just met her.
Isobel however, did notice. She had fallen into the Doctor's path a while ago and had remained with him – then her - since, not entirely through choice. The Doctor's cheerful demeanour had always remained when in company of the others; however, Isobel would often catch her the way her face would fall when she thought no one was looking.
The Doctor was usually a bubbly character, funny, confident in the face of danger. Regeneration made some of the Doctor's already existing characteristics more muted or pronounced yes, however, this incarnation of the Doctor was like a completely different person. She was overly cheery, as though she were trying to overcompensate for something else. It would take Isobel a while to figure out exactly what it was that the Doctor was hiding with her cheerful disposition.
It started with the Doctor recklessly putting her friends in danger.
Yaz, Graham and Ryan stood, holding the equipment required to beam the Doctor and Isobel back to the TARDIS, wherever it had decided to relocate. However, when the trio – who the Doctor would later colloquially refer to as the fam – were transported into the vacuum of space with them, the Doctor only being bailed out by sheer luck, the Time Lord had not even offered so much as an apology to her friends.
Isobel let the matter go, attributing it to post-regenerative stress. However, an unsettling feeling set itself firmly within her gut and would not leave, no matter how many times she reassured herself. Then she began to notice something callous in the way the Doctor would address those who would dare stand against her, even being cruel towards beings she deemed inferior.
"We are not shooting those spiders." The Doctor had been firm.
"And instead… you want to lock them in a room and let them slowly starve to death?" Isobel retorted. She was, surprisingly in agreement with Jack Robertson in this instance.
She caught the way the Doctor's lips twitched up into a smirk. Later when the two were alone, the Doctor had shared something even more chilling about her plot.
"You wouldn't have had to worry about the spiders starving to death you know."
Isobel glanced up at the Doctor from her kindle. "Really?" Her voice was hopeful.
"Yeah. When confined to such tight spaces, spiders cannibalise each other. So, they wouldn't really have starved." She beamed, proud of her gun-free solution.
Isobel's stomach turned. "Actually, I think that makes it worse." She whispered. The unmoved expression on the Doctor's face did nothing to soothe her concern for the Doctor's sudden lack of morality. "You have essentially punished them for the tragic fate of having taken form so far below your own. And that isn't you."
When the Doctor had killed a human though, Isobel snapped.
She watched on in horror as the Kerblam droids opened their parcels and began to pop the explosive bubble wrap, Charlie caught in amongst them. She would wait until Yaz, Ryan and Graham were gone to confront the Doctor, as always.
She stormed in through the TARDIS door and gripped the Doctor's arm, face twisting into a sneer. "You didn't need to do that! You could have disposed of the parcels safely, why did you kill him?"
"He would have killed all of those people Isobel. Are you siding with a killer?" The Doctor challenged; her eyes dark.
"He never succeeded in killing anyone. The only killer I see is you. What happened to I never would, or does that only apply to murdering people with guns? Are other weapons on the table?"
The Doctor scowled at the offhanded reminder of the day Jenny had sacrificed herself. "And where did that get me?" She snapped, shrugging off the human's grip with ease and moving around the TARDIS console, presumably to skip to the next day to pick the fam up. She tended to do that when she was tired of Isobel chastising her. Pulling the wibbly leaver with much more force than necessary, she added; "and stop fortune telling, you're going to get someone hurt." Her tone left no room for argument.
"I want to go home."
"You can't. You know too much to be left to roam free. The only place for you would be a psych ward, so if you want…"
Isobel sighed shakily. "No. No, I'll…I'll stay."
The Doctor smiled, satisfied.
Then came the destruction of Gallifrey. Again.
Even the Master, her childhood friend, had seen the Doctor's brutality when her elbow harshly came into contact with the his head, effectively breaking his perception filter and exposing his race to the phalanx of Nazi's who were quickly surrounding them. "Now they'll see the real you." She called coldly, grabbing Isobel's hand and making a sprint back to the TARDIS.
"Was that really necessary?!" Isobel exclaimed the moment they made it inside.
"Was what necessary?" Came the Doctor's passive response, her voice distant as she set the ship to dematerialise.
"Sending the Master to a concentration camp. And for what? Because you felt like it? They were already going to arrest him for being a spy, you didn't need to do that!"
"He deserved it."
Those words, spoken flatly, her face devoid of all emotion as she turned to face the human, left Isobel utterly breathless. She swallowed, composing herself. "This isn't you." She muttered, a broken whisper. But the Doctor heard her nonetheless. She always did.
"Isn't it? I lost Gallifrey once. And then just when I had gotten it back, it got ripped away from me again! A wealth of wisdom, now buried beneath a city of dust." The Doctor's change in mood appeared from nowhere, twisting her face into a horrid concoction of grief and rage, her eyes ablaze. She was not finished being angry. And now Isobel would bore the brunt of the Doctor's rage.
How dare she tell the Oncoming Storm that she was wrong.
"The Doctor I know wouldn't have done that! I thought revenge was foolish? I thought forgiveness was always wise. For someone who hates guns you have no problem handing people a fate worse than death." Oh, if only she knew. "You forgave him for destroying the Earth and torturing Martha's family during the year that never was! Besides you…" She was torn between heeding the Doctor's orders never to share her knowledge of future events, and a desperate want for the Doctor to be calm again. Eventually, she settled on the latter. "Everything will be okay. I know it will."
The Time Lord inhaled, her eyes widening. She was always surprised at this humans' outbursts of fortune telling, as the Doctor had opted to call it. "I keep telling you to stop doing that." She snapped.
Isobel covered her mouth, realising what she had said. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to… I'm so…" She looked into the Doctor's eyes, searching for any warmth. For any kind of compassion. Finding none, she swallowed. It had happened too many times. "I just wanted you to be okay."
Sighing, the Doctor turned and began fiddling with the TARDIS. She huffed, having being given another reason to complain. "And you wonder why I can't let you out of my sight. You just can't control yourself, can you?"
Isobel's eyes found the floor. She was paralysed in place, for fear that if she made the wrong move, she would set off the Doctor again. "When will you believe me when I tell you I'm not…time sensitive."
The Doctor's head shot up, glaring at the human woman with contempt. "And what would you have me believe? That you're from a universe where my entire life is a fictitious creation for your entertainment?"
Isobel could not make eye contact. Her cheeks burned as the implication of the Doctor's words truly hit home.
"I thought maybe you would be better by now." The Doctor's words cut ever deeper. Tears threatened to fall. The Doctor didn't notice. Either that or she didn't care to.
The threat of being left in a psych ward had burdened her mind since the Doctor had mentioned it first and kept her from answering back. She skirted her way around the outside of the console room, eager for escape from the Doctor's mood, which would no-doubt be channelled through her now.
She's tired of me. She thinks I'm a burden.
"I'm sorry." She muttered as she left. She did not get a response.
The Doctor was intelligent. A scientist. A liar. A manipulator by nature. Isobel grudged the day that intelligence began to be used against her. She would make an outstanding politician. She allowed others to make sacrifices for her, even destroyed a TARDIS in the name of defeating the Daleks.
"Aren't TARDIS's sentient?" Isobel prodded.
"It wasn't my TARDIS, so it doesn't matter." Was all the reply she got.
There was no doubt the Doctor had changed. What she never expected however, was to be awoken to the Doctor storming into her room while she slept, shaking her awake and screaming her name. Her expression was manic, the afterimage of tears clouded the Doctor's usually fake-bubbly expression.
"Why didn't you tell me?!"
"Tell you what?!" Isobel sat up; eyes still heavy with sleep which was quickly dissipating as second-hand panic took hold of her.
"Come with me. Now." The Time Lord's tone left no room for argument as she grabbed the woman by the upper arm in a brutish grip, dragging her from her room with inhuman strength. She did not even allow her to slip on her shoes.
Isobel's heart beat quintupled as she was forced to follow after the Doctor's hurried strides. The rapid patter of her bare feet hitting the corridor floor combined with the troubled humming of the TARDIS.
She was taken outside of the ship in the freezing cold, wearing only her nightdress. Goosebumps wracked her entire form, however the cold from the winter did nothing to compare to the chill that shuddered down her spine, caused by the sight that greeted her.
The once white snow, purity, now stained crimson.
Isobel gagged, turning away and covering her eyes. "Why would you…!"
"No, you don't." The Doctor grabbed her from behind, turning her around with unnatural strength. It somehow always took her aback that such strength was held within such a slender frame. Such strength which was once used to protect her, was now used to cause her suffering. One arm had Isobel pinned to the Doctor's front, the other held her chin up, forcing her to look at the scene before them.
"Keep your eyes open." The Doctor bit through gritted teeth.
"I don't want to!" Isobel screeched, tears streaming down her reddened cheeks. "Why would you make me look?! What did you do?""
She felt the doctor's posture stiffen behind her. "Me? This wasn't me. All you had to do was warn me. This could have been prevented." And with that, Isobel found herself pushed to the ground. She hit the frost with a thud, crying out as her knee was hit particularly hard and blood began to run from the joint. Though it was nothing in comparison to what horror lay mere feet away.
Bodies. Three bodies. All of their faces painfully familiar.
The Doctor turned away, a strangled cry of anguish escaping her as her hands tore at her hair.
"I didn't know this would happen. You always tell me I'm not allowed to…to f-f-fortune tell anyway!" Isobel choked out between her frantic gasps for air as she began to hyperventilate. "What…happened."
The Doctor did not speak.
"Doctor, what happened?" She pleaded.
Eyes sharp as blades, the Doctor turned. "Why didn't you stop it? Any other time, you can't seem to shut up about all the knowledge you have about my life. The one time it's life and death, you say nothing. You let this happen, didn't you? Trying to punish me, were you? You let them die." With every word she spoke, she descended closer to the quivering human, who now desperately tried to scoot back. With every rapid movement of her legs, she was no-doubt exposing herself to the Time Lord stood over her, but she didn't care. Terror had her in its grasp. She simply had to get away. The Doctor had lost her mind. And the way she was looking at Isobel made her suspect that her blood would soon stain the white landscape too.
She frantically made to rise, turn, intending to run. Where she would run to, she did not know. However, desperation and a need to get away had stolen over her and dimmed her wits.
She didn't make it very far, for as soon as she was stood, she found herself tackled to the ground. A shrill screech ripped through her, hurting her throat. This was wrong. This wasn't supposed to happen. Had her presence in this universe caused such unprecedented changes? Had they finally reached the point at which Isobel had not seen enough of the series to be able to predict events anymore?
The Doctor had thrust the responsibility of their friend's deaths on her shoulders and it was too much to bear.
"Get off me!" She screeched between mouthfuls of snow as her face was buried into the ground. She tired to buck her hips to get the Time Lord – the monster off of her.
The Doctor's hands moved to encase her temples and she screeched, attempting to move her face from side to side but it was no use. It was like trying to struggle against the hold of a weeping angel, her grip would not give.
Sleep.
The command reverberated throughout her mind and in an instant, all cogent thoughts left her and her vision tunnelled, white into black as the weight of the Doctor pinning her down seemed to increase tenfold.
When her struggling finally ceased, the Doctor gathered her prize in her arms, gazing down at the inanimate human. The Doctor's expression was vacant, empty. However inside, she felt invigorated.
The pain of having lost three of her four companions was momentarily expelled as she tackled Isobel to the ground, as she excreted her strength over the lesser being. That's all humans were, after all. The lesser beings. However, now, in the calm, the pain returned and she wished that Isobel would awaken so that they could do it all again.
The human's limbs were a concerning shade of mauve however, and the Doctor realised that she would not be afforded the opportunity of playing with her again if she succumbed to the cold. She sighed, carrying her inside.
When Isobel had came around, she sat awake with a start. She sat upright, swinging her legs over the side of her bed. All was silent, save for the gentle humming of the TARDIS walls. Such tranquillity led the woman to believe that the Doctor's outburst had been merely a dream and that her friends had in fact, not been left laying dead in the snow from God knows what. She desperately hoped. Such events felt so far away. Too hazy to be real. The Doctor would never do that to her. Right?
She stood, shoving her feet into her slippers and exiting into the hallway. As she made her way to the console room, heart hammering in her chest, the first thing she noticed was that unlike every other morning when she awoke, she could not hear the usual chatter and laughter emanating from the main room. Swallowing the lump in her throat, the golden glow of the console room which was once comforting, had been replaced by a solemn blue. Tentatively wandering towards the door, her heart just about stopped when she caught sight of a single spatter of blood, dried and brown in colour.
So, it hadn't been a dream. Her friends were gone. And the Doctor truly had lost it.
Her hand lingered on the handle of the TARDIS door. She should leave. She should really leave before things escalated. The Doctor had become increasingly colder towards her, but this was an entire new level. And now with Graham, Yaz and Ryan gone, there was no one to shoulder the brunt of the Doctor's moods with her anymore. There was no telling what might happen now.
Mind made up, she moved to open the door when a familiar voice called out from behind her. She cursed the TARDIS for being telepathically linked with the Doctor. And she cursed the Doctor's remarkable hearing, not entirely being sure which was to blame.
"Where are you going? Want to leave me as well, do you? Want to kill our friends and then leave?"
"I didn't kill them. I promise I didn't know that would happen." Isobel kept her back to the Doctor as she began to tremble, sensing the Time Lord coming ever closer. Tears clouded her vision and her voice broke when she spoke. "And you went too far. I can't stay with you if you think its okay to just throw me around like a dolly. I need to leave."
"Oh dear. You don't get a choice. You honestly think I can leave you to your own devices, allow you to wonder around the world on your own, knowing what you know about future events?" The Doctor was right behind her now. Her hand, encased in a black leather glove, came to ensnare the human woman's hand where it was resting on the door handle. "Come away from the door. Before someone gets hurt."
At last, Isobel turned to face the alien woman. When she did her jaw slackened.
Gone was the Doctor's bright and silly demeanour, the clothes, the comical facial expressions. All gone. In its place were robes black as night, the onyx collar adorned by other members of her species sitting proud and mighty on her shoulders, adding to the height the alien already had on her and dwarfing Isobel immensely.
"You aren't the boss of me Doctor. Take. Me. Home." She seethed.
The Doctor's bland face morphed into a smirk. Her eyes remained lifeless, like those of a shark. "No."
Isobel drew away from her, pressing her back against the TARDIS door in a bid to get away from the alien.
"This is going to go much smoother for you if you obey me." She grabbed Isobel by her torso and pulled her back with such strength that she tripped and landed on the floor, her head smacking against the step leading to the console.
Isobel cried out, looking up to the Doctor with frantic eyes. She watched, confused as the Doctor reached into her pocket and produced her sonic screwdriver. Opening the TARDIS door revealed that they were in space. Without sparing another thought, the Doctor threw her screwdriver out into the cold void, closing the doors and turning back to gaze at the human laying at her feet.
"Why would you do that?" Asked Isobel, between quiet sobs as she trembled.
"Screwdrivers are for fixing things. And I am through with trying to fix things." Her voice held all the dark shades of expression which her face lacked.
Her Time-Lord collar, pure metal and no doubt a heavy burden to carry, was nothing compared to the weight that settled itself in Isobel's heart. The Doctor was gone too.