Title: Killing Loneliness
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: gen
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: 30_forbidden
Prompt: 24, Lonely
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the Tenth Doctor. Please do not sue.

***

The Doctor wandered down the graveled pathway, not taking in the beautiful view on either side of him. He was looking down at the path, watching as he put one foot in front of the other, aimlessly wandering with no particular place to go.

Wasn't that what his life had always been like? he asked himself with a sigh, shoving his hands into his pockets. Never any certain place to go, never any real goal. Only wandering the universe, looking around him at everything that went on.

Of course, he was a part of what happened in the galaxy more often than not, even when he didn't intend to be. He seemed to have an unerring instinct for getting himself into trouble, though that was always the last thing he was looking for.

But now, here on this pleasure planet, he could reflect back on how he was spending his life. Suddenly, it seemed like something of a waste, even with all the good things he'd done and all the amazing sights he'd seen in his lifetime.

It didn't seem to amount to much when there was always such a deep loneliness gnawing at him from within. A loneliness that he couldn't shake off.

Even when he had companions, he always knew in the back of his mind that they wouldn't be there forever. Either they would age and die, or they would choose to go back to their own lives, picking up the threads of what they'd left behind when they'd been with him.

Those lives didn't include him. He'd simply been an interesting detour from their intended path, a detour that they would remember with fondness, but one that they would never stay with. They would always choose to go back to the paths they'd chosen before he'd known them.

He really couldn't blame any of his companions for that. And his loneliness wasn't their fault; he was more than willing to accept the blame for that squarely upon his own slender shoulders. After all, it wasn't fair to blame others for his own shortcomings.

Maybe they would have stayed with him if he'd been able to open up to them more, if he'd told them everything about himself. Or if he'd been willing to be more to them than just a friend, if he'd made some effor to be the lover they'd wanted.

But he couldn't do that. It would have been lying to them about his feelings, and worse, lying to himself about what he really wanted.

He wasn't willing to live a lie, not even for lifelong companionship, the Doctor told himself with a sigh. In the long run, that would only have made the loneliness more pronounced. He would have drawn further into himself and nursed resentments.

That wasn't how he wanted to live, and he didn't want any of his companions to have that sort of life, either. They all deserved better than to be with someone who didn't truly love them in the way that they wanted him to.

He'd been told long ago, when he had been a child with dreams of becoming a Time Lord, that it was a lonely life. He'd scoffed at that; nothing had seemed as important then as achieving his dream, being the one thing he'd ever wanted to be.

Loneliness had seemed such a small price to pay for the excitement of traveling the galaxy, being able to regenerate into new bodies. He hadn't known what lonely meant then; he'd had his family, his friends, his life on Gallifrey. Lonely had been a concept that he hadn't understood.

But he certainly understood it all too well now, he thought, aimlessly kicking at a pebble in his path and watching it skitter off into the vegetation that surrounded him.

Even when he had a companion with him, there was still a core of loneliness that kept him from getting too close to them. Maybe it was the knowledge that they would leave all too soon; he didn't want to give himself over to a closer friendship than he absolutely had to.

He'd gone over his reasons over and over again in his mind, and he'd never come to any satisfactory conclusion in his own mind as to just why he found it so hard to open up completely to any of his companions, why he held so much of himself back from them.

That was his own way of clinging to his loneliness, wasn't it? That killing loneliness that he wanted more than anything to be a thing of the past. The loneliness that had followed him around for so long that it seemed to be a part of him.

The Doctor's head came up, his breath catching in his throat, his eyes wide with the realization that he'd just found the answer to a question he'd been asking himself for what felt like centuries. There was his answer, right in front of his face.

His loneliness had become a part of him. He was unwilling to give it up, even unable to do so, no matter how much he might protest to the contrary.

Even though he hated being alone, he'd gotten so comfortable with that loneliness that he was unable to throw it off, even when he had a chance. He kept other people at arm's length, afraid to let them get too close for fear of losing the loneliness that he held even closer.

It was something of a security blanket for him, really. The Doctor blinked a few times, realizing that he'd been standing stock-still for a few moments as the revelation had sunk into his brain. Slowly, he began to walk again, not caring where he was going.

Was it possible that he used that loneliness as an excuse for his own failures? Not that they happened often, a little voice in the back of his head piped up, but they were there, a testament to the fact that he would never be infallible.

He could always fall back on that convenient excuse, blame the fact that he was lonely and therefore distracted for any bad decisions he might happen to make. Had he done that in his own mind, trying to absolve himself of whatever guilt he might have felt?

Was the killing loneliness that drove him onward through the galaxy his way of putting up barriers that kept him isolated because he was afraid to reveal too much of himself?

The ache that he felt whenever he thought of spending the rest of his life alone -- was that a genuine pain, or was it relief disguised as regret? After all, if he held on to that loneliness, telling himself that it was his destiny, he wouldn't have to break through the barriers he'd set up.

The Doctor shook his head, scowling. That couldn't be true. He couldn't have convinced himself all these years that he had to be alone simply to keep himself protected from the pain that being close to others could cause him. He wasn't that warped.

Wasn't he? that small voice in his mind piped up again, the words insistent. He'd certainly had a lot of time to work on building his neuroses, and it could very well be that dealing with being lonely was his biggest one. A psychiatrist would have a field day with him.

Heaving a sigh, he turned to retrace his steps back to the Tardis. He probably wasn't going to stay on this planet; there didn't seem to be much use for him to be on a pleasure planet alone, especially with the disturbing thoughts that were now whirling around in his mind.

It would be much easier to be alone in the far reaches of time and space than here on this planet. But wherever he went, those questions would follow him, he thought with another sigh. And something told him that it would be quite a while before he had any satisfactory answers -- if ever.

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