Title: Five Ways Mme de Pompadour Comes Back Into Ten’s Life
Author:
Fandom: Torchwood
Pairing: Reinette/Ten
Warning: Spoilers for “The Girl in the Fireplace”
Rating: General
Summary: Five ways Mme de Pompadour comes back into Ten’s life
1. Crossing the time lines
The Doctor steps out of the TARDIS the moment it’s fully materialized, and looks around, beaming. “Versailles!” he says with obvious pleasure. “Martha, we’re in France!”
“It’s lovely,” she says as she joins him on the neatly manicured lawn. “Are we pre- or post-Revolution?”
“I would say pre-,” he says, pointing to the elegant women in elaborate wigs, one of whom is already walking towards them. “Quite a bit pre-, I would say.”
Martha smooths her hair and straightens her jacket as the woman calls to them softly, “Doctor?”
The Doctor starts to speak, and it’s the first time in their acquaintance that Martha can remember him sounding so happy and so abashed at once. “Reinette?”
“Doctor,” she answers, now close enough for them to see her face–and she’s lovely and blonde and formidable, and she curtsies a little before she takes the Doctor’s hand. “Doctor,” she says again, and all the Doctor can do is beam like he’s just met his best friend.
2. Last minute reprieve
“Get the TARDIS ready!” the Doctor shouts to Rose and Mickey, and steps back through the fireplace. When Reinette turns from the window to smile at him, her face is a little softer and more lined than the last time he saw her, but it’s Reinette nonetheless, and she throws her arms around him.
“I knew you’d come, my angel.”
“I’m sorry I kept you waiting,” he says and grabs the bag that has been waiting who-knows-how-long, and holds onto her hand as they step through the fireplace, back to the ship. “Let’s see what’s out there.”
3. Deus ex machina
“. . . and the second she figured out that I’m actually not from eighteenth-century France she asked if I could travel in time, and basically stowed away.” Jack tosses back the rest of his martini. Reinette looks unrepentant and happy. “We’ve been bouncing around for a couple centuries, looking for you, Doctor.”
The Doctor can’t bring himself to scold either of them, even though history is now getting more tangled than it should. This Jack isn’t his Jack, not yet, and if he calls him Jack he’ll just look at the Doctor in confusion, and it’s quite likely that this breach of policy is why the Time Agency takes away those two years of Jack’s memory.
“You are a clever girl, Reinette,” is all he says, and tells himself not to worry about Jack. He knows how it will play out.
4. No such thing as ghosts
Except in this case, it would seem. Her presence on the TARDIS is gentle and reassuring: a scent, an invisible touch, a whisper. He talks to her because it feels right to talk to her, and it doesn’t matter how she found them though he suspects it has something to do with the TARDIS trying to make him happy. He feels her sometimes, ghostly arms around him, sharing her wisdom and love the only way she can.
There are worse things than not being able to touch. At least she’s here, which is a gift beyond imagination.
5. Something to do with bananas
Bananas are far more interesting than anyone knows, even aside from the potassium. Did you know that if you make a wish upon a banana, on a certain night under a certain moon, it just might come true?
Reinette didn’t, but she doesn’t care to question the mechanics of it; she wished for the Doctor and here he is, holding the door open and beaming. “Bananas! Just what I was craving. Come on, dear, it’s a big universe and there’s so much to see.”
end