Sand In The Hourglass -- General

[A Moment In Subtext]

Doctor Who
Sand In The Hourglass
By. A Moment In Subtext

It's October, 1993, and Mickey Smith is seven years old.

He's not the happiest seven-year-old on his block, but he's content. He has a mother, and a father, and he's hoping that they'll give him a little brother for his next birthday. He even has a dog, a stray that sometimes sneaks into his room at night. He calls it Dally.
He only just turned seven a week or so ago, and his parents are taking him to the toy store to pick out his presents. Its a tradition they have.
He sits in the back seat of the car, his little legs almost - but not quite - touching the floor. His mother buckles the seat belt on him before taking her place (shotgun, as it is) beside his father. His father adjusts the rearview mirror slightly and they're off.
Its not a long drive to the toy store, just a few blocks, but traffic is moving slower than usual for some reason. A woman runs by, scream at the top of her lungs. Mickey watches her with wide eyes, and his mother looks after her troubledly. His father doesn't take his eyes off the road.
Then they see it. Its as tall as a full grown man, but it isn't human. For one thing, its skin is orange, bright, florescent orange, and its back is covered with long pointy spikes. Not only isn't it human, it isn't earthen in origin.
As they get nearer, his father stops the car. There's a squealing of breaks and it jerks to a stop. His mother and father get out of the car as quickly as possible. He hears his mother tell his father to run, that she'll get him out of the car, and his father listens. Dad hasn't gotten three feet from the car when a beam of light slices the air in front of him and he bursts into flames.
Mickey watches in shocked horror, while his mother tries to un-buckle him. The seat belt is sticking, and the two of them are starting to panic. Another beam of light hits the front of the car and it rocks, knocking his mother on her arse. He whimpers slightly as yet another laser hits her, her body suddenly becoming broken and bloody.
The monster jumps onto the front of the car and roars. Its a sound so deafening that Mickey cowers back in his seat, fumbling with the seat belt, but its still stuck. The monster kicks the windshield and it shatters, spraying broken glass all over him. He barely feels it. The monster roars again, then an odd keening sound fills the air. The monster stops suddenly and turns on its heel (or whatever passes as a heel for it) and runs.
Mickey looks around frantically, terrifiedly, still jerking futily at his seatbelt. The first thing he notices, oddly enough, is a blue box. It isn't a terribly conspicuous thing, but neither is it ordinary, and he watches it - stares at it - until a man comes out.
The man isn't very tall, not quite as tall as his father was, at least, and its hard thinking of his father in the past tense, but thats how it is. His skin is light, almost milk white compared to Mickeys, and the shock of ginger hair sticking up from his head looks almost like fire. The man picks his way through the burned and littered street directly to Mickey's parents car. When he gets there, he meets Mickey's gaze.
"Mickey Smith," he says, and even though its not a question, Mickey answers.
"No, sir," He says, "Mickey Laurence. Smith is my grandmothers name."
The man looks slightly surprised, but nods. "Righty-o, then. Let's get you out of here."
"I can't, sir." Mickey says meekly, afraid. "My seatbelt is stuck, and that thing killed my parents, and what if it comes back?" He whispers, fighting panic.
The man smiles. "It won't come back." He says. He pulls a silver stick out of his pocket and holds it agains the seatbelt for a second. When he pulls it way the belt pops free.
Mickey climbs out of the car quickly. "Thanks." He says to the man, not meeting his eyes.
"You're welcome." The man says gravely. "Now, run along to your gran, Mickey Smith. Forget that thing. Live. There was an accident. An orange sedan. That's what killed your parents. No one will believe anything else. Understand?"
Mickey nods, and scampers off the find his gran.

[A Moment In Subtext]

Its April, 2002, and Mickey Smith is seventeen years old.

He's been living with his gran for the past nine years, ever since an orange sedan rammed his parents car on the way to the toy store, killing them both, but leaving Mickey miraculously alive. Its not something he's proud of, but he's made the best of his life. He's just your average everyday guy.
And, like your average, everyday guy, he's hanging out at the mall, alone, watching the myriad amounts of attractive girls who'll never pay him any mind, and looking for the maybe one of two percent who will. Unfortunately, he's not really succeeding. He finally gives in to temptation and heads to the food court. Maybe some chips will help him along.
He's not expecting anything that happens next. A familiar keening sound fills the air, but no one pays it any mind. They must be attributing it to mall-static, but he's not. He can't recall quite where he's heard it before, but the sound brings back memories of his parents, and he suddenly doesn't feel hungry any more. He sets the chips down on the table and leans back in his seat.
"Hmm, must have over shot it a bit." A voice says behind him, and he turns. "Ah, Mickey Smith, long time no see." The ginger-haired man says cheerfully.
Mickey looks at him for a moment, then says carefully. "You were there when my parents died."
"Yes, I was." The man replies, and he sits down across from Mickey. "You mind?" He asks, motioning to the chips.
"Go ahead." Mickey says with a shrug, and the man does.
"So," The man says conversationally, "What are you doing in this rat-trap of a shopping center? I can't believe that you'd be the mall-shopping type."
Mickey rolls his eyes. "What do you think? Cruising for chicks." He laughs at the confused look on the mans face. "Looking a girls? Geez, what century have you been living in?"
"Thirty-second," The man says, and Mickey is half-tempted to believe him. Then he leans forward conspirentially, and motions with a chip. "How about her?"
Mickey follows the other mans gaze to a beautiful blond haired girl. "Oh, no way, man. She's so out of my league."
"How do you know?" The man asked.
"Well, I mean, look at her!"
"Yes, I see, very pretty girl." He nods. "How does that-?"
"Her clothes, man! They're top designer! She's got to be super rich. No way a girl like that would go out with a city bum like me."
"Rose Tyler," The man says, as if reading from a dossier, "Lives with her mum in a flat at the Powell Estate. Gets her clothes at a discount, since she works at the store. Barely enough money between them to pay the cable bill." The motions with the chip again. "You should ask her out."
"Yeah?" Mickey asks.
"Sure! Besides, I saw her looking at you a while ago. I think she likes you." He singsongs.
Mickey gives him a look. "How old are you?" The man opens his mouth to answer, and Mickey cuts him off. "Never mind, I don't want to know."
He stands up, walks away, and asks Rose Tyler out. To his surprise, she says yes. He goes back to thank the man, but he's already gone, and Mickey isn't that surprised, because he's already heard the oddly familiar keening.

[A Moment In Subtext]

Its March, 2005, and Mickey Smith has just kissed his girlfriend goodbye and seen her off to work when he hears it.

The same odd, strangely familiar keening that preceded a visit from the odd, ginger-haired man. But the day wears on, and there is no sign of the man, and Mickey almost thinks he imagined the sound. Then Rose's store explodes, and her job goes caput, and there are so many other things to think of that it doesn't occur to him that it was real until its too late.
He's been kidnapped by a giant, talking, plastic mess, and its nearly scaring him to death, but Rose doesn't seem scared. She seems almost perfectly at ease around the strange, leather-clad, big-earred fellow, and he almost doesn't recognize him.
Then he and Rose are plastered against the side of a blue box, a locked blue box, and Mickey knows. The man, this Doctor that Rose has to save, he's familiar. The box certainly is. But Mickey is scared, and melting in his fear. He's justified, he thinks almost angrily, at the looks the Doctor is giving him. But he says nothing.
The two of them are dragged inside the box, and he's shocked, and more frightened than he was to begin with. He wonders where the man, the ginger-haired man who'd been so kind to him, had gone, and if he knew this dangerous creep. The Doctor offered Rose a chance to go with him, and Mickey clung to her. He didn't want her to be injured.
And the Doctor had left. Thank goodness for small miracles, he thought, before he heard the keening again, and the man was back. Then the man mentioned time travel and Mickey realized, this Doctor, was the same ginger haired man. His hair growns out, he gets it dyed, contacts to change the color of his eyes, it'd take a little bit of doing for the face, but Mickey thinks he could pull it off, and sometime in the future, the Doctor would do all that, and he'd come back in time and save Mickey from the orange "sedan," and introduce him to Rose.
Mickey lets Rose go with that revelation.
He's suspected of murder, and he thinks it isn't fair. First his parents, and now this? He wants to blame it on the Doctor, this part of it, but that would mean blaming the ginger-haired man, and Mickey can't bring himself to do that. So when they come back, Mickey devotes himself to helping them just a little at a time, building his courage on the foundation that Rose and the Doctor are doing so much more, and for a while that works.
There's a year or so on the interrim, where he helps and isn't noticed to Doctor offers to let him go along, but he declines. He makes up a reason that this Doctor, this Doctor who doesn't know him yet and thinks he's an idiot (but doesn't really), will find plausible, and begs off.

[A Moment In Subtext]

Its almost Christmas, 2006, and Rose has returned with a stranger.

A stranger who isn't a stranger, Mickey thinks, because he's still the Doctor, just a bit more hyper, and leaner, and younger. If there wasn't something between them before, there will be soon.
Mickey isn't really surprised by the fact that the Doctor switched faces. It was something that had occured to him a long time ago, in all actuality, in his reading and research. He couldn't find a better explaination and now its been proven to him.
But this Doctor isn't ginger, so he isn't the same man Mickey knows. He will be in the future. And when he asks Rose if he's ginger (because he's never been ginger before), Mickey almost laughs. But he still doesn't say anything.
Eventually, he does go with them, and he stays in a parallel universe, saving the world in his own way, a hero in his own right. That's just the way it is. So, his Torchwood develops the universe-hoppers and he goes and helps to save the world again. He's successful, and Rose is successful, and the Doctor is successful, and the worlds are saved.
Except that Rose is trapped here with him, and the Doctor is there, and now there's no way for them to communicate.
He doesn't even stop to think that the Doctor might not know what he's done for Mickey and Rose, until its too late.

[A Moment In Subtext]

Its July, 2008, and he's watching the universe unravel.

Its hardly as surprising as it should be, but he and Rose have both travelled with the Doctor, and have both worked at Torchwood, and they've grown accustomed to watching things fall apart. It just usually isn't themselves.
This time, its all of them from the Other Universe, himself and Rose and Jackie, and little Thomas Tyler, Pete and Jackie's son, and they're coming apart at the seams. They don't know exactly whats happening, but it started soon after Rose said goodbye to the Doctor in Norway.
It started with Mickey himself, though none of them have been able to find out why. The morning after they returned to the Powell Estate, he woke up sick and pale. He emptied his stomach, but if felt a bit like he was being ripped apart from the inside. It only lasted an hour, and then it vanished and they thought that was that. Maybe an alien bug or something.
But the same thing happened the next week to Rose, and the week after that to Jackie. Then they started to forget things. Jake forgot who Mickey was, though he remembered his old friend Ricky had died. Pete forgot who Jackie, this Jackie, at least, was. The baby started to cry more often.
Torchwood wasn't really much of a help. When the baby suddenly vanished one day, then reappeared a few moments later, they knew there was a problem. Suddenly, Cybermen started to appear, and no one but them seemed surprised. Panicked, frightened, yes, but no surprised.
Then there was a loud screech, and something grabbed one of the Cybermen, and it vanished. Mickey stared at the creature in surprise.
"Ohmygod, its a Reaper!" Rose yelled.
"A what?" He asked.
"Run!" Rose instructed, and he ran. "Its a Reaper," She explained as they ran. "The Doctor and I fought them when I went back to save my dad. My real dad." She clarified suddenly. "They came because there was a paradox, or some such thing. Something that shouldn't have been."
"Well then, what're they doing here now?" Mickey asked as they skidded to a stop.
"I don't know!" Rose yelled.
"Wish the Doctor were here!" Mickey yelled.
"Yeah!" Rose agreed. "He'd know what to do!"
Then one of the Reapers grabbed her shoulder and she vanished, her hand disappearing from his even as he stared at the fading afterimage. He turned angrilly and slammed the first loose item he could find into the Reapers head.
The world went dark.