Strong Enough to Bring Sun to the Darkest Days
Pairing : Billy Hargrove x Platonic!Fem!Reader
Warnings : mentions of depression, suicidal ideation and anxiety
Word count : 708
A/N : today has been extremely hard and i just needed an escape, this most likely won't be as good as my others but i just needed a distraction.
You hadn't seen your best friend in two weeks, you were currently holed up in your bedroom, having your mother make any unwanted guests to leave and unfortunately, that included Billy. You barely had the energy to drag yourself out of your bed to do some form of hygiene, most of the time, it was the bare minimum.
Your episodes became more frequent, more harmful to your mental health with the thoughts of wanting to go to sleep one night and not waking up the next. The first few days, you spent endless hours crying until you could no longer cry, just get the burning sensation of the tears and the burning in your nose.
At night, you felt nauseous when you were left home alone, afraid something would happen, your teeth would chatter, your hands would shake and your heart rate picked up, you thought your heart was going to explode.
Your parents left once again, both having a night job and as soon as the deadbolt locked, the anxiety settled into your belly as you bit your tongue, trying to swallow your lunch back down, deciding on skipping out on dinner. Not even an hour had passed before you heard footsteps in front of your window.
You tried to be rational, trying to tell yourself it was just a stray animal until someone's knuckles hit the window quickly, three taps. You tried to smile, you knew exactly who it was, but you just couldn't bring yourself to do it. You got up, your body aching from being in your bed, your bed having an indent in the shape of your body.
You pulled the black curtains back and there he was. Billy smiled, wiggling his fingers as he pointed at your latch, wanting you to unlock your window. He unlocked it and peeled the window up, listening to it creak from not being used for fourteen days. Billy ducked under the window, letting himself into your bedroom before you quickly shut the window, latching it and closing your curtains.
"What're you doing here," you asked as you made your way back to your bed, laying in your crater, the mattress hugging your body, trying to provide you comfort. Billy looked at you, tossing his leather wallet onto your bedside table, moving you over so he could sit beside you. "Why are you shutting me out?" You shrugged, you couldn't tell him you were getting bad again, he had helped you so much.
He reached for you, not wanting to overstep any boundaries by grabbing you. You reached out as well, grabbing his slightly calloused hand. "I'm getting bad again," you said quietly and he nodded, nudging your body over so he could lay beside you. "I know," he said just as quietly. "I wanted to give you some time but I was getting worried, but I haven't seen you in two weeks. They usually only last a couple days." You nodded, "They've been back to back." He nodded once more.
He squeezed your hand tightly so you'd pay attention to him, "I love you and I'm here if you ever need me. You can come to me whenever you need something or someone, okay?" You nodded, moving closer to him as you placed your head on his shoulder. "I love you too, B." He smiled, pressing a kiss to your forehead, and you smiled as you felt his smile.
"Can you stay the night?" He nodded as he moved his head to one of your pillows. "Already got a change of clothes in the car, sweetheart." You nodded. "Thank you for everything." He smiled, "You don't need to thank me. I'll do anything for you, you know that." You nodded, twisting the silver ring on his finger.
"Scoot, my ass is hanging over the bed." You laughed and moved for him as he moved so he was on the bed. "Go to sleep." You nodded, knowing how much sleep you'd been getting lately. "Love you." He smiled, "Love you too, sweetheart." He pressed a kiss to your forehead once more before holding you tightly, gently pressing your ear to his chest, where his heart would be.
One finger traced your features softly, lulling you to sleep.
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Doctor Who, but Chronologically 28
Fun fact! If we were watching normally in a normal order, Rose would have just left, and this would be a Christmas special. But we're not. Instead we suffer on.
Last episode was 1913 - this time we're jumping a whole year, to 1914. Small jump! So this shouldn't be too weird. After all, we had a lot of discussion in the previous episode about what 1914 would be like.
It's Twice Upon a Time. Lol
OKAY so there will be a LOT of new questions here, Jesus. We begin with old Hartnell footage! Fun! Which fades into David Bradley playing the First Doctor as he refuses to regenerate and tries to die instead. Turns out Capaldi is here doing the same thing?!? So interestingly, we've now seen Capaldi's first AND last episodes. Fascinating.
("708 episodes ago", reads the caption, showing Hartnell grouching about. "Lol", says I.)
Anyway, there are two (2) main threads here, and one is the relatively minor but fairly fun (albeit very hole-y) sci-fi plot; the second is Double Doctor Fun, but unfortunately this was written by Steven Moffat who thinks 60s Man = Misogynist UNLIKE CAPALDI OBVIOUSLY so it goes, um, badly. I'm getting ahead of myself, hang on:
Mark Gatiss is pulled into the same moment in time as the Doctors because they're causing a timeline error. He was, in fact, about to be shot in the head by a German soldier in WW1, but then time froze around him, so he climbed out of his crater and got pulled here; I can't help but feel the director could have made some better choices, though, because on climbing out of the crater we're treated to multiple shots of other soldiers just drinking tea and chatting in their trench rather than, you know, helping Mark Gatiss. This is not how we work as a team, lads. Where's Tim when you need him.
It emerges that glass people are taking people from the instant before they die, harvesting their something, and then returning them to their timestream to die and avoid fucking up history. Harvesting what? Well, for zero reason other than "The Plot Requires It", we don't find out right away. But both Doctors climb aboard Capaldi's TARDIS (there are some fun quips about the size of the windows that must have given several folks on Gallifrey Base a dry orgasm) and promptly get abducted by a spaceship shaped like a Sims plumbob. It's the glass people.
... and then Bill turns up.
... and Capaldi FREAKS THE FUCK OUT.
Because it turns out that Bill! Is dead! After having turned into a Cyberman! And choosing to die to save others!!
MASSIVE NEWS. What a strange choice to tell us this before showing her conversion and death. Honestly, you'd almost think this is a terrible viewing order for this show.
Except this Bill is a copy, but with all her memories, so this kicks off a running theme about how memories maketh the man except the Doctor disagrees. But this Bill also says she didn't die because she pulled a woman in a puddle called Heather so now I have a LOT of questions.
The glass people show them the original forms of the Doctor from Hartnell to Capaldi, and call him the Doctor of War because Moffat really loves his Mary Sue elements. They escape the plumbob, jump into the original TARDIS ("Aren't the windows the wrong size?" asks Bill), and run away to try and find out who the original person was that the main glass alien is mimicking. This is to find out what the glass people are actually harvesting. For literally no reason at all, the glass people didn't just tell them that.
Meanwhile! The First Doctor is a raging misogynist who keeps suggesting the women clean the TARDIS, and Capaldi is in an agony of embarrassment trying to stop him! And it's funny, sure, these are good actors, but FUCK OFF AND DIE IN FIRE. That is NOT the First Doctor. The First Doctor was a gentleman who respected all the women he knew and met, and his favouritest and best friend in all the world was Barbara, and like fuck did he devalue them like this. It was the men he used to devalue and see as brainless useful muscle. Meanwhile, it's fucking Capaldi who straight up abuses the women he meets including his companions, and it's Matt fucking Smith who yells "Do as you're told and go back to the TARDIS!" at Amy (who complied meekly, let's all remember.) This is absolutely fucking enraging. Hartnell was LESS SEXIST than anything Moffat puts out, and yet here's Moffat acting like he's a bastion of progression fuck off fuck off FUCK OFF
(ahem)
Actually I'm not done because then there's a "men's browsing history" joke Jesus FUCKING Christ okay I'm done
Anyway, after a last bit of misogyny for good measure, which Bill somehow wins by looking the First Doctor in the eye and going "I'm a lesbian and I get more pussy than you", making David Bradley's monocle fall out in spite of him not even wearing it at that point, they land on a sort of fantasy red war torn forge planet inhabited by mutant octopuses. Capaldi inexplicably tries to make Bill stay in the TARDIS. Naturally she puts up token resistance and then obeys.
Anyway, Capaldi goes up the tower. There's a Dalek! We know those, we saw them by the Pandorica in the second episode, and also once in the Doctor's dream journal in the last episode. This one is called Rusty.
"Remember when I shrank down and went inside you and showed you that Daleks are bad?" says the Doctor. "Good times."
I don't remember that. That has not happened yet. Intriguing.
Anyway, Rusty the Good Dalek shows them that the original glass alien woman is a researcher from the year five billion and 12. What they're harvesting is memories, so that the dead can then be resurrected of sorts to speak again through the glass bodies.
"Oh," says the Doctor. "Not evil."
One can't help but feel most of this episode was extraneous and could have been avoided if the glass aliens had just... said that.
Anyway, Bill is also glass, and also knows all of this, so again, she could also have explained this.
They return Mark Gatiss to die in a crater. Except the Doctor shifts the timestream by a couple of hours, so the 1914 Christmas Armistice kicks in and saves him, which is just as well, given that the rest of the army was uselessly drinking tea like 20 yards away. It's genuinely quite moving. Also it turns out he's a Lethbridge-Stewart! Nice touch. The First Doctor has a moment of sagaciously staring into the middle distance and saying "So this is what it means to be a Doctor of War," which is nauseating but you know, fine. He wanders back to his TARDIS and regenerates into Robin Hood in the TARDIS files.
Meanwhile Capaldi heads back to his own. Last conversation with Bill, who tells him that the most important thing about a person is their memories. "Look," she says, "I'll prove it," and turns into Clara.
Except??? It turns out??! The Doctor had somehow FORGOTTEN CLARA (so many questions)
Then Nardole turns up as a glass alien too, so I presume that means he's dead and all. "I have glass nipples and invisible hair," he volunteers, and I think I will never not have questions about Nardole.
Anyway, the Doctor flies away to regenerate alone. He has a great monologue, right, and Peter Capaldi is of course an absolutely superb actor, just completely nails it, except for the fact that the monologue does not remotely suit this Doctor.
"Never be cruel!" is his opening line.
Yes you read that right. Mr "Clara you're so ugly and stupid." Mr "If you try to fight off your abuser you're a child who needs to grow up." Mr "I mock and belittle women until they cry and then accuse them of sulking." Mr "I make fun of people's cultural artefacts." That guy. That guy's opening line is "Never be cruel!" Followed swiftly by "Always try to be nice! Never fail to be kind!"
Fucking hell.
Here's a good bit though:
"Never tell anyone your name. No one would understand it anyway. Except children. Children can hear your name, if their hearts are in the right place, and the stars are too. But nobody else, ever."
Fascinating! We have heard nothing so far about the Doctor's real name.
Also he includes "Never eat pears!", so but for a deleted scene in Human Nature/Family of Blood this is a two-parter about the Doctor not liking pears.
And then; Regeneration!!! The first one we've seen!! We saw Capaldi's first episode, but he was post-regen then; this is our first on screen. Destroys the TARDIS, lads. Just completely fucks it up. Doors everywhere.
And we get Whittaker! A ring drops off her finger. Wonder if that was important?
Anyway she immediately crashes the TARDIS and falls out to her death
SO MANY NEW QUESTIONS?!?!?????
“She” (an unknown person) is returning (perhaps River returned as Missy. Maybe Me? Maybe Clara???!)
There is something on Donna’s back
An entire planet, Pyrovilia, just… disappeared, somehow. (Maybe because the TARDIS is exploding??? Saturnine was also lost, and that WAS because of the TARDIS exploding. The lion man’s planet was also lost but he was a bit of a knob about it if I’m honest.)
Amy is maybe dead (she’s not)
The Doctor has been cubed (he’s out, but how?)
River is possibly blown up (unless she’s Missy)
The TARDIS has blown up (It’s fine now. Except it’s sort of melting now because it’s corrupted, but it’s fine again)
The universe appears to have ended (the universe is back again)
The Doctor has employed(?) Nardole
(And Nardole was “reassembled???” NEW INFO: Nardole had glass nipples and invisible hair?? WHAT THE FUCK IS HE)
There’s a vault in the TARDIS and it contains Missy but we don’t know why (sometimes she knocks for the bants)
What has happened to all these companions and where are the new ones coming from?
There’s an immortal Viking girl now. Her name is Me and she’s now looking after the people the Doctor abandons
What’s With The Silence?
Why was Rory entirely unconcerned by the entire world suddenly going silent when that is Not Normal and should have been, at the very least, extremely disconcerting?
What did the Doctor do to Queen Lizzie One?
Who is Captain Jack Harkness? (Is he the one who gave the companions a warning about the lone cyberman?)
Why is Amy seeing a one-eyed woman in a vanishing window?
What’s with the Doctor’s future involving getting shot by an astronaut?
Is Amy pregnant and why is it inconclusive?
Who is Sarah-Jane Smith?
How is the Doctor Bill’s teacher and why/where does he have an office?
What is going on with the Cyber War and the Cyberium???
Who did the Doctor lose to Cyber Conversion?
What happened with the Other Cyber War?
What happened with the Third War that deleted the void?
Why does Rose seem particularly important?
What’s with the Weeping Angel statues, and why can’t you blink at them?
What order do these Doctors go in? (Eccleston, Tennant, uncertain, Smith, Capaldi. NEW INFO: Whittaker)
Which companion just… forgot the Doctor, and how?
Yaz and Vinder are about to die as Mori/Mwri/Muuri
There is a Lupari shield around Earth.
What’s a Time War?
What’s the Rift?
What’s Bad Wolf?
What happened with Amy’s pregnancy?
In which war did the Doctor become a war criminal, and how?
Who is the Master?
Why has Amy forgotten Rory?
Is Rory plastic or not?
Why is the Doctor sulking on a cloud?
How exactly does the Doctor have a cloud?
What exactly happened with Strax to, uh, tame him?
Which friend killed Strax?
Which friend brought Strax back?
Where did this lesbian lizard and human couple come from?
What happened with Clara as Souffle Girl and the Daleks?
How does Clara actually join?
Why so many Claras?
Why is Missy apparently in robo-heaven?
Why is probably!Missy pushing Clara and the Doctor together?
What is Trensilor and what happened there?
Who is Handles?
The Doctor is about to be dissolved by a beautiful geode man
The universe is being crushed by the Flux
Will the Doctor open the fobwatch?
Sontarans are invading Earth again
Who is Kate?
Who is Osgood? Another name of Clara’s again?
The fuck is the deal with the Grand Serpent
Does Martha get to go to an ice cream planet with 12-fingered massage aliens?
How did the Doctor forget Clara?
Who is Bill's puddle girlfriend Heather?
How did Nardole die?
When does Bill get Cyberman-ed and die?
When does the Doctor shrink and enter a Dalek called Rusty?
Whittaker is falling to her death rn
Was that ring relevant?
Does anyone know the Doctor's name?
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