Title: Carry On Wayward Son
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: gen
Fandom: Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: doctorwho_100
Prompt: 26, Parents
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the lovely Tenth Doctor, unfortunately. Please do not sue.

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The Doctor closed his eyes, leaning back in the chair in front of the console and folding his arms behind his head. There had been so many thoughts going through his mind today, things that he hadn't thought about in a long time, memories that he'd been lost in.

Why would he suddenly begin thinking about his parents after so long without having thoughts of them break into his conscious mind? It had all been the fault of that song, he decided, that song he'd heard blaring from a car radio as he'd walked along a London street.

the lyrics of that song had been something that his father had told him long, long ago. They had stuck in his mind, becoming a mantra for him when he was a student at the Academy, pushing him on to become what he had always wanted to be since he was a small child.

He had never enjoyed a good relationship with his father. He'd always been much closer to his mother; the two of them had seemed to know what each other was thinking, without having to say the words aloud. Her humanity had almost seemed to make her more .... well, real.

His father had always seemed distant, and though he was obviously real, he had never played much of a part in the Doctor's life, other than as a stern lawmaker. He'd always had to obey his father when he was a child, and that had often rankled with him.

He'd never been the obedient type, even when he was small -- and there had been times when he had been punished for his disobedience. Even when his mother, the softer parent, had intervened, the punishments had been carried out, his father turning away from her pleading.

Still, there had been nuggets of wisdom that his father had given him, bits of which had stuck with him over the centuries. And whenever he happened to hear that song, it took him directly back to something that his father had told him when he was much younger.

"Carry on, wayward son." He had heard the mingled pride and wistfulness in his father's voice when he'd said those words, as he was going off to the Academy. His father had been a Time Lord, as had his father before him. He was expected to carry on that tradition.

Even if his fondest wish for as long as he could remember hadn't been to become what his father was, he would have been expected to do so. He would have had to take the tests to become what he was, and if he hadn't been able to pass them, he'd have been in disgrace.

He was generally considered his family's black sheep, anyway, the Doctor thought wryly. He'd barely made it through the Academy by the skin of his teeth; he hadn't been expected to do much with his Time Lord title. He'd always been far too rebellious for anyone to expect great things from him.

Yet he had done great things, the Doctor reminded himself. He might have been a wayward son in his father's eyes, but he had done so much to save the universe, even if he wasn't given credit for it. He'd never asked for that. It was enough to know that he'd done it.

But still .... it would have been nice to have some kind of acknowledgement from his father, the Doctor thought wistfully, heaving a sigh. His parent had never known of all the things he'd done; he hadn't been alive to see many of his son's accomplishments.

He'd at least known that his son had achieved what he had been expected to do and had become a Time Lord. But that wasn't enough; his father had expected him to buckle down and follow the rules, to be what he was told he should be, and nothing more.

The Doctor hadn't been able to do that. He had wanted more than the narrow scope he was allowed to navigate in; there had been so much more out there, so much to see and do. He had been adamant about following his own path, carving out his own niche in the world.

He had definitely managed to do that, the Doctor reflected. He had become notorious in the history books of his own people -- though not in a good way. Thanks to him, his people, his planet, no longer existed. He had been the one to destroy them.

He'd had to do it. He'd had no choice. He had agonized over that decision; the last thing that he'd wanted to do was commit genocide, especially as he was overseeing the destruction of his own home world, his own kind. It had been the worst thing he'd ever done.

But he'd had to do it. If he hadn't, the rest of the universe would have been destroyed -- and most probably Gallifrey along with it. So he'd had to make a choice -- either his people, his own home planet, or the entire universe. That had really been no choice at all.

He had done what he had to do -- but it had given him no sense of accomplishment, no sense of joy or of pride in himself. While some people might have looked at saving the entire universe, past, present and future, as being their finest hour, he saw it as an albatross around his neck.

What else could he see it as? It was something that no one else would have done -- well, no one except the Master, who still seemed to have a sense of glee over the destruction of what had once been his home. He had no compunction about that kind of destruction.

The Doctor pushed thoughts of his enemy out of his mind; he was trying to concentrate on his father, on the strange relationship he'd had with his parent. It certainly hadn't been what most people would consider a "normal" relationship between father and son.

But weren't most children wayward? Didn't most parents have to discipline their offspring sooner or later? He'd never done that with his own children; he'd been gone from Gallifrey too much of the time, and the woman he had married had brought them up.

To be quite honest, those children had been strangers to him. They had called him their father, and he'd felt a certain distant pride in their accomplishments. But after they had reached their first hundred years, he hadn't really kept in touch with them. They had simply faded out of his life.

He hadn't been a good parent. He knew that. He'd been away too often; his children had grown up without knowing him. They had both gone their own way, had their own families and branched out -- and had lived full lives without having him in them.

The Doctor sighed at the thought, realizing with a guilty feeling that there was no pang of regret for what could have been. He wasn't the sort of person who was meant to be a father, to raise a family. It had never been one of his goals, never something he would strive for.

Did that have something to do with his relationship with his own father? He frowned at the idea, wanting to turn it over in his mind but almost afraid to do so. He didn't want to explore his familial feelings too deeply. They might lead him to much more disturbing thoughts.

It was enough to remember those words that his father had said to him, words that hadn't seemed to be much at the time, but that he could now remember as clearly as though he was hearing them for the first time. "Carry on, wayward son."

He knew that his father had considered him a wayward child -- but there had been such a wistfulness in his voice when he had said those words. His father, in spite of not having the utmost confidence in him, had still known that he would uphold his family's traditions.

His father had known that he would become a Time Lord, that he would make it through the Academy. He had expected his son to carry on -- and that son had done so. Maybe not in the way that his father had wanted, or the way that he had expected, but he had fulfilled that wish.

No one had expected him to actually go out into space. No one had expected him to earn his own Tardis; no one had really expected him to graduate from the Academy. And it certainly hadn't been easy for him; every day had been something of a struggle.

But he had made it through. He had done what he wanted to do; he'd achieved his lifetime goal of being a Time Lord. He'd become what his parents had wanted him to be, even though his mother hadn't lived to see it. But he was sure that she had somehow known, and been proud of him.

Yes, maybe he had been a wayward son -- as well as a wayward Time Lord. But he had done the best he could, and he wouldn't change any decision that he'd made, even the bad ones. All of them had been learning experiences, and they had all combined to make him the person he was.

He liked that person, the Doctor told him, opening his eyes and getting to his feet. Of all the things he'd done, all the mistakes he'd made, there wasn't one thing that he would take back, one thing that he would have done differently. He stood by his choices.

They hadn't always been the best choices, but he had done his best given what he'd faced at the time. Even the destruction of his home and his people had been the only viable choice he could make, and he stood by it, though it would haunt him for the rest of his life.

He had carried on, just as his father had wanted him to. And he would continue to do so, until his final breath. Those were the words he had to keep uppermost in his mind -- and the words that he would have to live by for all of his days.

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