//------------------------------// // CHAPTER THIRTY TWO: Delving Into Canon: A Doctor Who Primer // Story: The What and Whatiful Who // by cosby7 //------------------------------// “Well, it's very . . . bright.” Yeah, it was pretty bright. Nice. Tourists. “Trixie, you don't understand.” He hadn't moved from where he had first frozen in the doorway of the TARDIS. Gradually, Trixie had made her way outside into the vibrant scenery, in hopes that the stallion might follow her lead. However, that was not a thing that happened. Honestly, it was starting to make Trixie nervous. “No, Trixie supposes not, but then again, why should she? You have not told Trixie anything.” Suddenly, her mind caught up to her mouth. So often had she been in awe of Doctor Hooves that she had not even realized how impatient she had been growing with his secretiveness. Everything he said and did suggested there was infinitely more he was not telling her. Perhaps she had her secrets, as well, but nothing like a big orange planet. Nothing like the Master. “Trixie has gone along with you until now, not asking for so much as a hint, but she grows tired of your posturing, Doctor. That creature back there, the one that destroyed Equestria, imprisoned the Princesses and forced us to flee, he made it sound as though you are responsible for him. I don't know how much of that I can forgive, Doctor. Not without an explanation.” Only then, shaken to his senses by the verbal tongue lashing, did Doctor Hooves finally relax. “You're right.” He stepped forward and took a seat in the doorway. “I owe you an explanation. Probably more than one.” Trixie eyed him warily, as if she expected him to make a run for it any second. It was difficult at first, not looking where she walked and keeping her eye on the Doctor, but, eventually, she found a seat opposite him, on a patch of red grass. “Right then, where should I start?” “The beginning is usually where a story starts,” she said instinctively. “My father used to say that.” The Doctor chuckled. “He's not wrong, your dad. The beginning might be longer ago than you think, though.” “Very well,” Trixie replied thoughtfully. True, she had not really expected that to work. For some reason though, she thought this might: “Then answer me this: 'Doctor' who?” No sooner had the question been asked did Trixie find herself searching the stallion's face. How disappointing. She thought that would have gotten her more of a reaction. “I know it's not 'Hooves.' You have made that much apparent.” Doctor Not Hooves drew in a breath and the answer with it. What he was preparing to say was not a lecture or lesson. This was a topic he knew backwards and forwards, but it was not one he liked to tell. It was not one he liked to stop long enough to remember. “I'm called the Doctor. I am not a pony from Equestria, but a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey. The Time Lords are an ancient species that long ago unlocked the mysteries of time and space, allowing them to create technology to travel and manipulate it. At times they could be both ineffectual observers and ruthless tyrants.” “So, Time Lords look like ponies?” Trixie had always suspected that her form was the pinnacle of life in the galaxy. “Um, no, sorry, hold on. Used to,” he thought about it, whatever it was, “different circumstances when I'm asked that question. Sorry, no. Doesn't matter who came first.” “What?” “Nothing.” Ahem. “Time Lords don't look like ponies and ponies do not look like Time Lords. Time Lords look more like . . . .” Wow, this was tougher than he'd thought. “Have you ever heard of a human?” “Human?” It sounded vaguely familiar. “Trixie thinks maybe she has heard the name in a song? There was a street performer singing and playing a lyre that Trixie seems to recall, but nothing specific.” Trixie had often found herself drawn to street performers in spite of herself, if only because a few had passed through the troupe once upon a time. She vaguely recalled the unicorn being decent on her instrument, but nothing of the strange lyrics returned to her. “Okay, well then, um,” defeated, the Doctor returned to his puzzled expression. “Oh! Alright, so, think of a bear, except hairless, well mostly, talking, and with a different face.” His face suggested that this was a fair visual to work with. Trixie's face suggested the opposite. “Four legs, stands on two of them, not much hair, smooshed-in face, and wiggly things on the ends of the legs.” Suggestive Face 2: Electric Boogaloo. “Wiggly things?” “For holding stuff. And pressing. Stuff.” “Why don't they just use their hooves?” Doctor No Wiggly Things considered this honest enough question. “Not enough practice, I guess.” “And this is humans or Time Lords?” “Both! But we were doing it first!” Evidently, this was a matter of pride. Finding small victories was important, Trixie supposed, when being Great and Powerful was not in the cards. “But now you're a pony,” she observed. She had briefly considered making it a question, but, with all of this strangeness, it felt good to be sure of something. “That is a long story,” he faltered. “As we do not appear to be rushing back to Equestria, Trixie would seem to have nothing but time on her hooves,” she explained stubbornly. Legs crossed to indicate she would be making herself comfortable for the time being. However, he did not sigh and continue right away, as she had expected. Instead, he sighed and turned around to look back inside his TARDIS. There was a screen he was looking at, but there was no telling which one. All of them had some gibberish that she did not understand. At any rate, he at least gave the impression he was satisfied, upon turning back to her. “No, no rushing yet. Okay.” The word was exhaled, like a puff of smoke he hoped would drift away with all that answer he had breathed in earlier. No such luck. “The Master—” “Trixie asked about your apperance. Not that . . . thing.” The thought of him still made her uneasy, even with him presumably eons and light-years away. “That's what I'm telling you. There may just be a tick more context than you thought. And you may just end up with more of your questions answered this way.” When it was clear she understood and would not interrupt, he cleared his throat and continued. “The Master was a renegade Time Lord. Actually, we both were. I just sort of went around, exploring, learning, cleaning up the occasional mess. Adventures! That's the ticket. Met lots of, well, 'ponies' is the wrong word, but you get the idea. Many different species of pony, some more pony-like, most of them less. I saw . . . so much.” His smile was wistful, almost sad. It was a melancholy sadness, though not without its hope. “The Master had a different idea of adventure. Most of our race thought the Time Lords were fit to rule the universe, if they so chose. Both the Master and I disagreed with that, but, where I thought the universe was not meant to be ruled, the Master thought that there was none fit to rule but him. We crossed paths more than once, which is rather impressive when you consider we were traveling all of time and space. Sometimes I tried to be his friend, brilliant mind like his, had to be some potential in there. If not for all the insanity he could do so much good. Usually, I just stopped him. I would stop him and he would disappear, parts unknown, physical states unknown. He'd always come back though, some time, some form or another. The ultimate survivor! Or maybe you'd prefer the term 'escape artist?'” He looked at her knowingly. She would have hid beneath her hat, had she not felt the need to look his answers in the face. While it was certainly true that she had more experience with them lately, escapes were a fair deal trickier to pull off than the razzle dazzle that the Great and Powerful Trixie was more accustomed to. There were some memories of acts she preferred forgotten. Cringe worthy memories. Blush worthy memories. Trixie cringed and blushed. “Anyway,” the Doctor stalled, bashfully looking away from the mare he hadn't meant to embarrass, probably, “a very long time ago, I thought I was done with him for good. Course, wasn't the first time I'd thought that, but, well, anypony who ever said 'With age comes wisdom' wasn't telling the whole truth. So he found his way back, a little less physically substantiated than when I'd last seen him, but just as brilliant. Just as crazy. And just as full of hate. He . . . hurt a friend of mine. Then he hurt me, but I still managed to send him back to where he'd come from.” She had to ask. “Your friend . . . did she . . . ?” Of course it was a she. Doctor Hooves only shook his head. “I don't know. I had to leave her somewhere. Then things,” he paused, planning the word, “escalated.” “You were hurt.” “That's right. I managed to send the Master away, but he was still able to do some damage. I was injured and so was the TARDIS. We were forced to crash land on your planet, near Ponyville. There was nothing I could do for the TARDIS, not then, and there was only one thing I could do for myself.” Again he stopped, careful to consider what was said next. “You've seen my pocket watch.” Trixie nodded. “That ornate one sitting open in the TARDIS.” “It's a component in a machine I have, called a Chameleon Arch. It's a device that lets a Time Lord literally transform his DNA into that of another species. Let's them blend in when there's a need to hide. The disguise is so complete, that it even overwrites a Time Lord's memories. Everything that's Time Lord goes in the watch and the Time Lord himself is unable to fathom the watch could be anything more than a watch. Until its necessary, a Time Lord can literally become another species.” “You wanted to forget who you are?” Trixie asked astutely, putting the clues together. “I,” he expected the answer, but hadn't been prepared to answer it, “thought it might be best. After what happened to my friend, not for the first time, I thought maybe I should lay low. Something would always come for me. If I was me. If I was the Doctor. The Master was right about that.” “But it didn't work.” “It worked. And it didn't.” His head bobbed from side to side, trying to figure out which he believed more. “Like I said, I was hurt. Not just in spirit, but in body. I used the Chameleon Arch, but there is another thing Time Lords can do. Whenever we're near death we can, sort of, cheat. Regenerate into a new form. I thought it would be alright if I just used the Arch, but biology has a way of surprising you. The transformation was so different from turning myself into a human or some other such thing, that it ended up using all of the TARDIS's remaining power and the all the energy from my burgeoning regeneration. Still not entirely sure just what it was. Might be more to this 'magic' of yours, even in the less arcane-inclined of your people. Anyway, all that power, burned everything out. The physical transformation completed, but it was only a halfway process. An earth pony with the memories of a Time Lord.” Hat rocked against horn as Trixie nodded sagely. “How long were you there before anypony really noticed?” He shrugged. “Not that much practice at calendars with all the pages like that. Years are longer than weeks, right?” Yes. They were. “I had nothing I could do with the TARDIS. Your planet achieves its marvels in a manner far different from most. And, even though the whole transformation didn't take, I still felt that maybe I could stand to keep quiet, keep still for a while. Convinced myself it was research. Few years, studying a planet like yours, could provide incredible information. No end of fun at dinner parties. But . . . the Master has been right about a lot of things.” Staring at the forlorn Time Pony, Trixie felt wrong. In more ways than she could count, let alone notice all at once. That face for one. Those expressions simply wouldn't do. And that shape. It was like an aura off him, a shadow she had never noticed before. Everypony was a pony, of course, but for the first time she realized, shocked at having somehow missed it before, his shape simply was not right. But even that was not it. Something was missing. He had told her a lot. He had not told her everything. “There's something you are not telling me, Doctor. When you saw this was your planet, you were surprised. And not just because we hadn't meant to go here. You said I didn't understand. What don't I understand, Doctor?” “Look at you,” he beamed proudly, “the Great and Detectivey Trixie Lulamoon! There's a future for you in this. Always trust the pony with the time machine when he talks about the future.” Sorry, not getting away that easy. The hat slumped definitively, making the unsaid point. “When I said that I thought the Master was gone for good, it was because he went with my people.” This was the final hurdle on this conversation track. Doctor Hooves frowned as he finally jumped it. “There was a war. And more. The last great Time War, fought between the Time Lords and a race of monsters called the Daleks. Nothing but hatred, intolerance, and plungers. Sort of the anti-pony. They were defeated. Both of them. By me. It was the only way to end it and I did it twice. Locked my entire race, my entire planet, away so that it could never be reached and never escaped. Time Locked. Every single thing I know to be true about the universe tells me I should not be able to be here right now. But this is Gallifrey. The real Gallifrey. I'd stake my TARDIS on it.” That sounded rather definitive. “Then how are we here?” “Honestly,” the Doctor replied with a head scratch, finally reaching a question he did not so much mind answering, “I don't know. Only way I can figure is the Master had something to do with it. That impact as we took off, that was him, attacking in the instant we left that time and space. Problem is, the abilities of a draconequus are impossible to miss and the history difficult to forget, but what exactly they can do is not very well documented. I mean, that's the point. They're very nearly physical manifestations of chaos. Merely existing is defying the laws of the universe for them. He may have tried to bring us back and he may have tried to unmake our existence. I doubt even he would know. Either way, that energy must have reacted with the time vortex in a way that caused us to pass through the Time Lock.” Trixie waved her hoof over her head. Yeah, that's where that all went. Right over that thing. “If it makes you feel any better, I made most of that up just now.” “Well,” the mare began slowly, still understanding very little, though probably more than she realized, “is the 'Time Lock' broken then? Or are we stuck behind it?” Sudden fear gripped her as she realized what her own question suggested. “Can we still get back to Equestria?” “No. No. Yes.” “Good, good, good?” “A Time Lock cannot be broken. It can be subverted, far too often, it seems, but never broken completely. And according to the TARDIS, there's a window that we can still get through.” “Brilliant!” Trixie cheered and then instantly blushed. She'd been spending too much time around this lord. “But the window is closing. If we go, then it will have to be soon now. And then the window will be shut again.” “'If?' Doctor, what do you mean 'if?' Of course we're going back to Equestria! We need to stop the Master and save everypony!” “It's not that simple!” he roared, although Trixie did not feel his anger focused at her. “I thought I would never be able to visit my planet again. The way we got here though, I never thought it was possible. It might be a loophole. I could go back to the Gallifreyan high council, warn the other Time Lords of what will happen. I could stop the whole chain of events that led to the Time War. Trixie,” she could see just the slightest wetness, there, in his eyes, “I could be the Doctor again! The real Doctor and not just the war criminal who couldn't bear to give up his name and his box.” Silently, unblinking, Trixie rose from her seat and calmly walked to the cowering alien. Gentle as a mother would a child, she blanketed herself around him in a sturdy hug. “Doctor, you can't. I'm sorry, but you can't.” “WHY NOT?” “Because you sound like him.” That was it. That was what he needed to hear. It always was when it came from them. Those companions of his. No, wisdom certainly did not need age. Far too often he found, the old just forgot what the young already knew. His hoof reached hers. “I know. You're right. I know.” They stayed like that for a little while, just feeling the other's warmth, listening to the rhythm of each other's breathing. Finally, the Doctor seemed to loosen and Trixie stepped away, back towards the crimson grove. “We should get going,” Doctor Most Definitely Hooves stated, forcing his voice not to crack. “Equestria won't wait forever.” Trixie appeared not to hear him as she drifted closer to one of the trees, its many silver leaves glittering brilliantly in the light of the twin suns. “How much longer will the window be open?” He gazed back inside his TARDIS. “Not long. Only a few more minutes now.” Without a single look back, she let her horn glow, and a single silver leaf drifted down from the nearest tree. The glow took it and the shimmering silver of the leaf reflected the purple light all the way onto the Doctor's waiting hoof. “Equestria has waited hundreds of years. They can wait a few minutes more.” When she finally turned to look at him, the smile that alighted the Great and Powerful Trixie's face was softer and more beautiful than anypony could ever expect to see. “Let's wait out the clock.”