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mtxref_ficAuthor's Note: Written for < lj user="fic_promptly">'s Author's choice, author's choice, How many people can say they crash their own funeral?, and on request from juliet316. Featuring several Who-niverse characters and OCs. Also written for < lj user="tamingthemuse">'s Prompt 398: Requiem
"The planet Thanatos, with it's capital, the Necropolis of Litharge," the Doctor said, as he opened the door of the TARDIS.
"Thanatos? Isn't that from Greek mythology?" Clara asked, stepping through, adjusting the skirts of the black dress that he had asked her to wear.
"Well, the Greeks got the name from the Thanatosians, when one of their scout ships crash landed in the mouth of the River Styx," the Doctor said.
Clara stared up at the cityscape before them: the buildings lifted up like carefully ruinous Gothic cathedrals, their buttresses and arches shadowed against a grey sky. "Oh... I can see why," she said. The buildings suggested old mausoleums, piled one on top of the other, a massive, domed temple rising in the midst of the city.
A tall, gaunt man with a bone-white face and grey hair approached, his lean form dressed in a Victorian frock coat with a frilled shirt, the lace at his throat and cuffs trimmed in black and black gloves on his hands approached. "The Doctor and his companion, I presume?" he asked, in a voice like a gust of wind echoing in a sepulchral vault.
"The Doctor and Clara Oswald," the Doctor replied.
"Right this way," the gaunt man said, bowing and gesturing with one hand toward a causeway that lead to the temple. The Doctor adjusted the skirts of his jacket, hiding the red lining as best he could and beckoned Clara to follow.
"It's a funeral," she realized, following the Doctor, the undertaker following them a pace or two behind.
"For a very good friend of mine: a gent named Jack Harkness, styled himself a Captain," the Doctor said, pausing to let Clara catch up with him.
"Sounds like a rascally fellow," Clara observed.
"And every bit as rascally as he sounds," the Doctor said. "I traveled with him, long time ago: we were younger then."
"Till time caught up with him?" Clara asked, feeling her heart sink.
"Perhaps: haven't traveled with him in some time; he did a lot on his own, even before we met," the Doctor replied.
"Ooh, other kinds of time travelers besides Time Lords," Clara noticed.
"Time Agents: opportunists, most of them, though they've been pulling the strings through time and space for some time," the Doctor said. "Several assassinations, disappearing items. Wrote the Voynich Manuscript."
They ascended a ramp leading to the double doors of the temple, standing open to receive them, flanked by two tall figures in black draperies that covered them from brow to ground. As soon as they entered, the figures pushed the doors shut behind them.
They entered the main hall, a large room under a rotunda lit softly from above through colored glass windows, finding it thronged with people -- broadly defined. Some of them looked like trees or cats, and to one side stood a jar taller than the Doctor, containing a head without a body, easily the size of a tall man, its dinner-plate sized eyes downcast.
A woman in black with a shock of long, curly, sandy-colored hair approached, a black fedora tilted over her forehead. Two young people in their twenties trailed her, one a girl in a long black dress with a high collar, a black veil hiding her head and face, the other a slightly rat-faced young man in a vaguely antique black suit.
"Oh Doctor, I think this is the last time: I don't think he's coming back," the curly-haired woman said, reaching to the Doctor. He put his arms about her, comfortingly.
"He would have wanted it this way, River: the years had started to weigh on him," the Doctor said, soothingly, but Clara could see the sorrow in his grey eyes.
"But he had so much life in him yet," she said, beginning to cry. The veiled girl put a hand on River's shoulder, while the young man looked vaguely uncomfortable.
"Your dad?" Clara asked, trying to draw the young man out, help him not feel so awkward.
"One of my dads," the youngster said.
"Primary parent, you might say," the Doctor said. "Same goes for Verrity, the young lady in black."
"Primary parent?" Clara asked, puzzled, looking from the young man to the Doctor and back for clarification.
"What you'd call a mother, though you've not come up with a better fitting label," the Doctor said.
"He was father and mother to 'Thuseley and me," Verrity said, lifting her veiled head.
"Left me to babysit the kidlets," added a tall, blond man with a cruel face, clad in a battered, red uniform over a dingy singlet.
"You had plenty of help from me," River said, smirking up at the newcomer, despite her tears.
"Except when I had to raise 'Thuseley on my loneself," Verrity grumbled.
"Hey, I turned out all right," 'Thuseley argued.
"As a second-story man," the man in red said, with pride.
"When I trained you to be a highwayman," Verrity said, patiently.
"Wonderful, a crime family," Clara murmured.
"Ladies and gentlemen and cats and trees, if we could gather in the center of the hall, we shall commence," the gaunt undertaker called. A stone plinth rose from the center of the floor and two figures entered from a door at the head of the hall, carrying a bier on which stood a black box not much larger than a laptop case. Clara thought she heard the Doctor draw in a breath.
"Awfully small for a coffin: cremation?" Clara asked in a low voice.
"Something like that," Verrity said, adjusting her veil over her face.
"There wasn't much left," River said, choked up again.
Someone pounded on the doors leading outside, then they crashed open, someone flinging them from outside. That someone a tall man with dark hair on end, his robust form completely naked. All eyes and other sense organs turned to the doorway and a gasp rose from several creatures. The head in the jar turned its eyes, mouth relaxing. The crowd parted as the newcomer approached.
"Hasn't changed his style," the man in the red coat remarked.
"Oh, I did *not* need to see that," 'Thuseley groaned, covering his eyes with one gloved hand.
"Someone having a funeral and they didn't invite me? Oh wait, I'm the guest of honor, only I showed up in a different way," the newcomer said.
Verrity lifted her veil, looking up at the newcomer, then pulled the veil off her head and held it up to the naked guy. "Might want to put this on: there's a tree glaring at us," she said. And sure enough, the tree-woman in the gathering had averted her eyes.
"Can't scandalize a tree, her leaves might fall off," the newcomer said, accepting the veil and winding it around his hips as a crude loin cloth.
"He's perfectly at ease in the skin he's in." Clara observed.
"Comes from a different time and place: people are used to such things then," the Doctor replied.
"So, if he's the one they're having the funeral for, how is he alive?" Clara asked. "Faked his death?"
"Or something ended him and he reconstituted," the Doctor said.
"Like you?"
"No, he's different: something happened to him so that he's a fact, a fixed point in time," the Doctor replied, and Clara thought he sounded almost morose.
The tall guy -- or rather, Captain Harkness, approached the Doctor. "Doctor, you've been to several of my bachelor parties -- and weddings -- now you've been to my funeral. How many people can say that?"
"As many as can say they've crashed their own funeral?" the Doctor replied. "Now what've you gotten yourself into that you ended up in a box *that* small?"
"Someone who got creative with an acid bath," Jack replied. "Just pulled myself together from a few scant cells left behind in the undertaker's work room."
"So, if you're there," Clara said, looking to the coffin. "How come you're here?" she asked.
"Guess the universe decided there's room enough for only one of me," Jack replied, looking to the coffin somewhat ruefully, as if he relished the idea.
juliet316. Featuring several Who-niverse characters and OCs. Also written for < lj user="tamingthemuse">'s Prompt 398: Requiem"The planet Thanatos, with it's capital, the Necropolis of Litharge," the Doctor said, as he opened the door of the TARDIS.
"Thanatos? Isn't that from Greek mythology?" Clara asked, stepping through, adjusting the skirts of the black dress that he had asked her to wear.
"Well, the Greeks got the name from the Thanatosians, when one of their scout ships crash landed in the mouth of the River Styx," the Doctor said.
Clara stared up at the cityscape before them: the buildings lifted up like carefully ruinous Gothic cathedrals, their buttresses and arches shadowed against a grey sky. "Oh... I can see why," she said. The buildings suggested old mausoleums, piled one on top of the other, a massive, domed temple rising in the midst of the city.
A tall, gaunt man with a bone-white face and grey hair approached, his lean form dressed in a Victorian frock coat with a frilled shirt, the lace at his throat and cuffs trimmed in black and black gloves on his hands approached. "The Doctor and his companion, I presume?" he asked, in a voice like a gust of wind echoing in a sepulchral vault.
"The Doctor and Clara Oswald," the Doctor replied.
"Right this way," the gaunt man said, bowing and gesturing with one hand toward a causeway that lead to the temple. The Doctor adjusted the skirts of his jacket, hiding the red lining as best he could and beckoned Clara to follow.
"It's a funeral," she realized, following the Doctor, the undertaker following them a pace or two behind.
"For a very good friend of mine: a gent named Jack Harkness, styled himself a Captain," the Doctor said, pausing to let Clara catch up with him.
"Sounds like a rascally fellow," Clara observed.
"And every bit as rascally as he sounds," the Doctor said. "I traveled with him, long time ago: we were younger then."
"Till time caught up with him?" Clara asked, feeling her heart sink.
"Perhaps: haven't traveled with him in some time; he did a lot on his own, even before we met," the Doctor replied.
"Ooh, other kinds of time travelers besides Time Lords," Clara noticed.
"Time Agents: opportunists, most of them, though they've been pulling the strings through time and space for some time," the Doctor said. "Several assassinations, disappearing items. Wrote the Voynich Manuscript."
They ascended a ramp leading to the double doors of the temple, standing open to receive them, flanked by two tall figures in black draperies that covered them from brow to ground. As soon as they entered, the figures pushed the doors shut behind them.
They entered the main hall, a large room under a rotunda lit softly from above through colored glass windows, finding it thronged with people -- broadly defined. Some of them looked like trees or cats, and to one side stood a jar taller than the Doctor, containing a head without a body, easily the size of a tall man, its dinner-plate sized eyes downcast.
A woman in black with a shock of long, curly, sandy-colored hair approached, a black fedora tilted over her forehead. Two young people in their twenties trailed her, one a girl in a long black dress with a high collar, a black veil hiding her head and face, the other a slightly rat-faced young man in a vaguely antique black suit.
"Oh Doctor, I think this is the last time: I don't think he's coming back," the curly-haired woman said, reaching to the Doctor. He put his arms about her, comfortingly.
"He would have wanted it this way, River: the years had started to weigh on him," the Doctor said, soothingly, but Clara could see the sorrow in his grey eyes.
"But he had so much life in him yet," she said, beginning to cry. The veiled girl put a hand on River's shoulder, while the young man looked vaguely uncomfortable.
"Your dad?" Clara asked, trying to draw the young man out, help him not feel so awkward.
"One of my dads," the youngster said.
"Primary parent, you might say," the Doctor said. "Same goes for Verrity, the young lady in black."
"Primary parent?" Clara asked, puzzled, looking from the young man to the Doctor and back for clarification.
"What you'd call a mother, though you've not come up with a better fitting label," the Doctor said.
"He was father and mother to 'Thuseley and me," Verrity said, lifting her veiled head.
"Left me to babysit the kidlets," added a tall, blond man with a cruel face, clad in a battered, red uniform over a dingy singlet.
"You had plenty of help from me," River said, smirking up at the newcomer, despite her tears.
"Except when I had to raise 'Thuseley on my loneself," Verrity grumbled.
"Hey, I turned out all right," 'Thuseley argued.
"As a second-story man," the man in red said, with pride.
"When I trained you to be a highwayman," Verrity said, patiently.
"Wonderful, a crime family," Clara murmured.
"Ladies and gentlemen and cats and trees, if we could gather in the center of the hall, we shall commence," the gaunt undertaker called. A stone plinth rose from the center of the floor and two figures entered from a door at the head of the hall, carrying a bier on which stood a black box not much larger than a laptop case. Clara thought she heard the Doctor draw in a breath.
"Awfully small for a coffin: cremation?" Clara asked in a low voice.
"Something like that," Verrity said, adjusting her veil over her face.
"There wasn't much left," River said, choked up again.
Someone pounded on the doors leading outside, then they crashed open, someone flinging them from outside. That someone a tall man with dark hair on end, his robust form completely naked. All eyes and other sense organs turned to the doorway and a gasp rose from several creatures. The head in the jar turned its eyes, mouth relaxing. The crowd parted as the newcomer approached.
"Hasn't changed his style," the man in the red coat remarked.
"Oh, I did *not* need to see that," 'Thuseley groaned, covering his eyes with one gloved hand.
"Someone having a funeral and they didn't invite me? Oh wait, I'm the guest of honor, only I showed up in a different way," the newcomer said.
Verrity lifted her veil, looking up at the newcomer, then pulled the veil off her head and held it up to the naked guy. "Might want to put this on: there's a tree glaring at us," she said. And sure enough, the tree-woman in the gathering had averted her eyes.
"Can't scandalize a tree, her leaves might fall off," the newcomer said, accepting the veil and winding it around his hips as a crude loin cloth.
"He's perfectly at ease in the skin he's in." Clara observed.
"Comes from a different time and place: people are used to such things then," the Doctor replied.
"So, if he's the one they're having the funeral for, how is he alive?" Clara asked. "Faked his death?"
"Or something ended him and he reconstituted," the Doctor said.
"Like you?"
"No, he's different: something happened to him so that he's a fact, a fixed point in time," the Doctor replied, and Clara thought he sounded almost morose.
The tall guy -- or rather, Captain Harkness, approached the Doctor. "Doctor, you've been to several of my bachelor parties -- and weddings -- now you've been to my funeral. How many people can say that?"
"As many as can say they've crashed their own funeral?" the Doctor replied. "Now what've you gotten yourself into that you ended up in a box *that* small?"
"Someone who got creative with an acid bath," Jack replied. "Just pulled myself together from a few scant cells left behind in the undertaker's work room."
"So, if you're there," Clara said, looking to the coffin. "How come you're here?" she asked.
"Guess the universe decided there's room enough for only one of me," Jack replied, looking to the coffin somewhat ruefully, as if he relished the idea.
