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The Doctor’s regenerations were always chaotic, that bit was unavoidable. The first time you saw it happen you didn’t even know how to react or what to do. It was hard to help deal with the physical complications of a regenerating body when it felt like the person in front of you was a stranger. Rationally, you knew that they were still the same person you knew and loved. But that didn’t stop you from feeling like the person in front of you wasn’t the Doctor.
It was an odd feeling, seeing someone that you knew so personally and feeling like you’d never seen them before. You looked at him and yet you didn’t know him. At least, you didn’t know this version yet. Considering face-changing boyfriends weren’t a common occurrence for 21st-century Earth, it was a feeling that was hard to explain to others. It left you feeling cold and alone, struggling to look at someone you had never seen before and find the person that you loved most inside them.
But, this wasn’t your first rodeo. It wasn’t as scary as the first time he had changed his face. This time, you knew what was coming. Even still, it didn’t matter how much you prepared for the day that the Doctor would change. No matter what, you wouldn’t have been prepared for this face. Out of all of the possibilities in your mind, this wasn’t even close to what you had thought he would look like.
You had learned long ago that you didn’t care what face the Doctor had on. Sure, you had your favorites, it was hard not to. This one was different, there was no denying that. The point had never been how he looked, but rather who he was. You loved the Doctor, and that meant that you loved every version of him.
“How do you know you’re still going to love him?” your mum had once asked you, “When he changes?”
It wasn’t something you had ever really thought about before. Sure, he had changed, but never this much. All of the faces you had been with were age-appropriate, even if the alien wearing them wasn’t.
However, this version wasn’t young. Not that he had ever been, but now he looked it. You’d never seen him this old, with deep-set wrinkles etched into his face. He was cross too, his eyebrows reminding you of two bushy grey caterpillars, constantly drawn downwards in disapproval. Maybe it was because he was Scottish. The Scots were notoriously cross, weren’t they?
After the hectic air of it all, after the restless regeneration energy had burned off, and the alien problem of the day had been solved, he was still your Doctor. That much you knew. No face could change that. As with every regeneration you had experienced, there was going to be an adjustment period. The painful span of time where you had to learn all of his new quirks, likes, dislikes, and little things that set him apart from the versions before him.
This time felt different, and not in a way that you particularly liked. The Doctor was withdrawn from you, seemingly disinterested in letting you get to know his new face. You tried (and ultimately failed) not to take it personally, he was likely to have his own thoughts and emotions about the new look.
Even if you didn’t want it, he’d given you your space, knowing that you needed time to process. It still hurt him, the way that you looked at him. He’d told you once how disorienting it was, having you look at him like a stranger.
“You look at me and you don’t see me. Do you have any idea what that’s like?” he had pleaded with you the first time he changed. “It’s me. I’m right here.”
You tried not to look at him like that, you really did. Yet, you still found yourself looking at this new face with obvious unfamiliarity. It was hard to see the alien that you loved under there, but you knew they were in there. It was simply a matter of peeling back the onion layers until you found him, the bits of your Doctor that could never change.
It wasn’t hard to find him. He was sitting in the console room as you had expected, the space now updated with sleek metal panels and bookshelves full of dusty classics from across the galaxy. Every interior seemed to match each iteration of the Doctor, almost as if it was custom-tailored to their tastes. A part of you wished that you could get into the Doctor’s head like that. You wanted to know what this face was like, you wanted to know each and every quick and eccentricity that came with it. You wanted to know that he still loved you.
Just like all of the faces before him, he had spent his alone time tinkering. A mess of mechanics were strewn before him, rusty metal cogs and bolts scattered across his work table. There had been a time when you would have asked what he was working on, assuming that there was an end result that came out of his fiddling. Now, you knew that he just needed something to occupy his mind and body. It was the same reason that he fixed the console (even when it didn’t need to be fixed), attempted to cook (which usually resulted in the kitchen on fire), took things apart, put them back together, or constructed small gifts from the scraps. You didn’t know it yet, but this rendition would take up the guitar. He would write you love songs that didn’t always sound like love songs, spending hours finding the right string of notes to compose the song that was you . Sometimes, he would play them for you. Others, he kept in his hearts.
You plopped down on the metal floor next to his work chair, your head next to his knee. For a moment, he didn’t look up from the mess of gears he was dismantling. This wasn’t unusual, sometimes he was so focused he’d go hours before noticing you were in the room with him. At least, that’s how it had worked in the past.
Tentatively, you rested your chin on his knee. This also wasn’t new. The Doctor - your Doctor - liked to be touched. His hand in yours every time you left the TARDIS, his arms wrapped tightly around you whenever he felt like it, affectionate kisses pressed against your hair or temple. Underneath your chin, you felt the subtle tightening of muscles in his leg. It was an unfamiliar sensation to you. The Doctor wasn’t usually like this, he wasn’t averse to your touch. This Doctor must be different, you reminded yourself. Reluctantly, you pulled your head away, removing it from his lap. You opted instead to look up at him silently, searching his eyes for something .
“Hey,” you whispered, your eyes never leaving his. These eyes were different, a dusty mix of blue and grey, rather than the illusive hazel you had grown so accustomed to. Even if the color was different, you could see the same emotions in those eyes. You knew how to read the Doctor like a book, and their eyes had always been the key.
“Hey,” he said back, his voice deep but smooth. The accent was new, but you weren’t complaining. It suited him. A deep, gravelly Scottish that slid from his lips like melted butter.
“What are you working on?” you asked, tilting your head in the direction of the scraps. The question was more out of habit than genuine interest. That’s how you dealt with the change, you’d revert back to the basics.
“Don’t do that,” he said, turning back to his work.
“What?”
“Act like I’m the same,” he grumbled. It was strange, hearing him grumble in a way that didn’t come off as childish. Maybe it was the accent, or maybe it was the frown lines. Either way, the tone didn’t feel like it should come with a frustrated stomp of his foot. Rather, he sounded like a grumpy old man. The kind that yelled at kids to get off of his lawn.
“You are,” you whispered earnestly, still looking up at him. You couldn’t take your eyes off of him, intently studying his face as if it was the last time you would ever see it. Realistically, you knew that you had time. You would get to know this face slowly, just as you had the prior ones. Piece by piece, you would gather the little quirks that set them all apart from each other.
“I got old.”
“Happens to the best of us,” you murmur, resting your chin back down on his knee. You felt his muscles tense again, but you didn’t relent. If it bothered him enough, he’d ask you to move. “I’ll get old too, you know?”
“This is different,” he sighed, setting the gears down on the table with a thunk. “You’re still young, and I’m not.”
“You never were,” you point out, tilting your eyes up to meet his.
The Doctor sighed, running his hand over his face. You didn’t need to know his new habits to recognize that he was frustrated. With the situation or with you, you had yet to figure out. So, you did the only thing you could think of when he was like this. Even if this iteration of the Doctor didn’t like touch, it was the only way that you knew how to comfort him.
Gently, you got up from the floor. “Can I?” you asked, gesturing to his lap. You didn’t normally ask. In fact, it was usually the Doctor that pulled you into his lap. But this was different, he was different. You wanted to give him an out, an opportunity to relent.
He stared blankly at you for a second, apprehensive to the question. Stiffly, he nodded, the gesture almost reluctant. You slid yourself into his lap before he could change his mind, your arms wrapping around his shoulders. His muscles were still taught and awkward, his arms resting rigid at his sides. It took him a minute to adjust, but he slowly started to relax a little bit. There was still a reluctance to the affection, but his arms encircled your waist, more out of muscle memory than anything else. It wasn’t hard for you to relax into the touch like it was for him. Without hesitation, you dropped your head down to his shoulder. The peak of your nose brushed against the side of his neck, sending a wave of sparks through his body.
“I still love you,” you whispered, your breath fanning across his skin. “That’s not going to change.”
He remained silent for a while, his arms tense around your waist. Even if he wasn’t speaking to you, he was still holding you. That was enough for you.
“I don’t care that you got old,” you add after a while, pulling back so you could look at him. “I wouldn’t care if you were purple, had two heads, or were a woman. I wouldn’t even care if you were a worm. I’d still love you .”
“I’m not going to turn into a worm,” he groaned, his voice gruff.
“But the other things?”
“I’ll keep you guessing.” He smiled slightly, the expression hauntingly familiar. It almost looked wrong on this face, the ghost of a smile creating more wrinkles on his face.
You smile at him, chuckling softly. “Still the same,” you state. Your eyes still danced across his face, silently mapping out the curves of his new face. “My point is, I don’t care what you look like. Are you still the Doctor?”
“Yes,” he whispered. You nodded in understanding, one of your fingers floating up to his face, softly tracing the length of one of his wrinkles. His eyes fluttered closed at your touch, you weren’t sure if the motion conveyed bliss or discomfort at the contact.
“Then I still love you. You’re still my boyfriend, so long as you’ll still have me,” you stated, dropping your hand back down from his face. This iteration didn’t seem to welcome your contact and you didn’t want to push your limits. Still, you yearned to sit like this for hours, running your hands over his face until you had memorized every single wrinkle and imperfection of his face. But, you knew that you had to be patient.
He sighed, his hand coming up to cup your cheek. The gesture was familiar, but the hand doing it wasn’t. The juxtaposition was jarring at first, but you quickly leaned into his touch. It was going to be like this for a while, you reminded yourself. Change happens slowly, usually coming with a painful adjustment period. You would know this Doctor as you had known each one that came before him, just not yet. Eventually, the new and old would blend together to the point that they were inseparable, and then the whole cycle would start anew.
You leaned forward, pressing your forehead against his. Your noses brushed together, the unfamiliar slope of his new nose meeting the unchanging slope of yours. The contact caused the corners of your mouth to tug upwards, a ghost of a smile lighting your face up.
“Of course, I’ll still have you,” he said gently, the pad of his thumb swiping back and forth across the soft skin of your cheek. “My face might change, but that doesn’t.”
The pair of you sat in silence for a while, the constant thrum of the TARDIS the only sound in the room. He never fully relaxed into your touch, you figured he never would. His arms were still around your waist, his grip gentle yet unyielding. Even if he was awkward about it, he was willing to hold you.
In your mind, he needed comfort and this was the only way you knew how to provide it (even if it didn’t appear to be ideal for him anymore). In his mind, your affections were more for your benefit than his. Maybe it was both. Either way, it hung unspoken in the air; you both needed this.
After a while, you pulled your head back up from its resting spot on his shoulder. Your eyes met his again and you felt the familiar flutter of emotions in your stomach. It didn’t matter when, where, or what face he was wearing, the Doctor always managed to make you flustered with nothing more than a look.
“I want to know this face,” you said quietly, almost as if your words would scare him away.
“So do I.”
Sometimes you forgot that regeneration was a change for him too. He also had to learn all of the new quirks and subtleties that came with his new body. As hard as the adjustment period was for you, it was just as bad for him.
“Let’s start with the basics,” you offer. He looks at you for a moment, his eyes searching your face. It was odd, considering you weren’t the one with a new face. Then again, the Doctor had always been an odd individual. After a beat, he nodded.
“Favorite color?”
The Doctor rolled his eyes, groaning in slight irritation. Still, he relented. “I think it’s red now.”
“What kind of red?” you inquired, “Rusty red? Taylor Swift lipstick red? Kool-Aid red? Sunset red?” you listed the different shades off, your rambling clearly annoying the Doctor.
“Burgundy,” he grunted.
“That’s an acceptable red,” you shrug, indifferent in the matter.
“What would you consider an unacceptable red?”
“I’ll let you know when I find it.” This gets you a small smile from the Doctor, the emotion hardly perceptible.
“Pears?” You move on.
“Nope,” he growls, his frown deepening. You nodded with a smile, finding a wee bit of solace in the fact that the pear thing hadn’t changed. That was probably a static part of the Doctor’s personality.
“You’ve managed to sit still for this long, are you mellowing out with age?” you tease, poking fun at his usual restlessness. Usually, by now the Doctor was at least bouncing his leg. He needed to be in constant motion, his ADHD manifesting in just about every way that it could. Right now, he seemed oddly calm. As much as you found he could be.
“ No ,” he says immediately, his eyebrows drawing together. He seemed to have a permanent wrinkle from scowling, the crease right between his thick eyebrows. “Just because I have a few wrinkles doesn’t make me a tired old man.”
“Didn’t say you were.”
“Time Lords don’t get aches and pains like humans do. This body is perfectly physically fit,” he explained, an air of indignance in his voice. You caught on to the defensive nature of his answer and deemed it best to move on, not wanting to further poke at what appeared to be a newfound insecurity of his.
“Favorite bird?”
“Favorite bird ?” he scoffed, one of his eyebrows raising in question.
“The last face had very strong ornithology options,” you explain. He had loved peacocks, flamingos, parrots, and generally any bird that was brightly colored and flashy. He had been no better than a toddler when it came to things like that.
“The one with the chin?” He taps his chin for emphasis, his weathered fingers resting against the new slope of his jawbone. The shape of his chin was significantly different, the new one significantly more subtle with a sloping jawline to match. You run your fingers down the slope of his jaw, feeling the difference in the angle.
“Yeah, the one with the chin.”
“He was very opinionated,” the Doctor whispered, his eyes on yours. He hadn’t pushed your hand away or stiffened under your touch. Maybe he was ok with this kind of intimacy, the gentle and subdued version.
“You aren’t?” you whisper, your eyes flitting up from his jawline to his eyes.
“Not sure yet.”
“But no ornithology opinions?” you smile, one side of your mouth twitching up further than the other.
“Not at the moment, no.”
“But you’ll let me know? If you do form some,” you say softly, your tone playful.
“You’ll be the first to know,” he rasps, his tone deep and grumbly. “Ducks still have plenty of time to piss me off.”
“That’s an ornithology opinion,” you point out, your fingers still lingering on his jawline. “One we might need to unpack.”
“Later.”
“Ok,” you whisper, your touch continuously feather light against his skin. He still hadn’t pulled away, which was a good sign. Still, you figured it was best to check. “This ok?”
Ever so slightly, the movement almost imperceptible, he leans into the touch of your hand. “Yeah,” he whispers, his voice strained. You nod, adjusting your hand so you can fully cup his face. Both of you look at each other for a moment, silently searching the other’s face. The longer that you looked at the new face, the more you liked it. There was always something more to see in his face, another microexpression for you to decode. He wasn’t cross, only his eyebrows were. Underneath those relentlessly angry bushes lay gentle eyes full of nothing but love for you. Time would show that they weren’t always like that, but right now they were. Soft, affectionate, and entirely enamored at the sight of you.
“And me?” you whisper, your voice slightly shaky. “Thoughts on me?”
The Doctor inhales, his breath hitching at your question. He tugs your hand down from his face and for a second you think he’s going to change his mind. Instead, he places his hand on your face, his weathered hand resting against the smooth planes of your face.
“I will love you for as long as you will let me. And even after that, likely.”
“How does forever sound?”
“Not long enough,” he murmurs, tucking a bit of your hair behind your ear, the gesture surprisingly gentle. “No time will ever be enough with you.”