He's Fire And Ice And Rage

Excepting times where I've viciously slaughtered the entire population of Earth, these are the canonical companions and reoccurring characters I've managed to either kill off in my stories, or reference their unfortunate demise. Canonical characters who have died do not count unless they're referenced in my stories.

The Doctor
The TARDIS
The Master
The Rani
The Duplicate Tenth Doctor

Ace
Adam Mitchell
Adric
Alan Jackson
Anji Kapoor
Astrid Peth
Barbara Wright
Ben Jackson
Benton
Bernice Summerfield
Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart
Charley Pollard
Chris Cwej
Clyde Langer
Compassion
C'rizz
Destrii
Dodo Chaplet
Donna Noble (Like, five times)
Erimem
Evelyn Smythe
Fey Truscott-Sade
Fitz Kreiner
Frobisher
Grace Holloway
Grant Markham
Harry Sullivan
Hex
Ian Chesterton
Izzy Sinclair
Jack Harkness
Jackie Tyler
Jamie McCrimmon (he's next)
Jenny
Jo Grant
K-9
Kamelion
Katarina
Leela
Liz Shaw
Lucie Miller
Lucy Saxon
Luke Smith
Madame de Pompadour
Majenta Pryce
Maria Jackson
Martha Jones
Melanie Bush
Mickey Smith
Miranda
Nyssa
Peri Brown
Polly
River Song
Romana
Rose Tyler
Roz Forrester
Sam Jones
Sara Kingdom
Sarah Jane Smith
Sergeant Yates
Sharon
Ssard
Stacy Townsend
Steven Taylor
Susan Foreman
Tegan Jovanka
Trix MacMillan
Vicki
Victoria Waterfield
Vislor Turlough
Zoe Heriot

Muse: The Doctor (Ten)
Fandom: Doctor Who
Word Count: 182

1) Do you ever 'talk' to your characters?
Actually, I don't. I've tried, but it doesn't really work for me. I write for the Doctor, all right? He doesn't listen to anybody but the Doctor.

2) Do they talk back?
I've had "chatty muse" syndrome before. But for me it's like a constant ongoing story. Stories tend to come to me fully formed but in mix-matched pieces and I have to put the whole thing together later. I get the stream-of-consciousness stories sometimes, but they're generally in story form. I don't do very well with first person in writing and the Doctor doesn't "speak" to me, per say, but I do get stories for him.

3) Is there a particular ritual you have that lets you get in touch with your inner voices?
I re-read old threads that I thought were particularly good and watch episodes of the tone that I would like to write. This one clip tends to help as well, as it gives a good cadence on the Tenth Doctor's voice and speech pattern. It's basically two minutes of continuous talking.

MUN PROMPT:
You know how YOU write your muse. Now, pick out two other writers who you admire. How do you think they would each write a very short drabble of the same situation for your muse? If anyone would like, they can actually do this, and discuss the results. Nothing complicated. It can be as simple as a muse having a cup of coffee, ordering lunch, asking someone to dance. The exercise is in seeing the difference between how you see/write them and someone else would.

Several weeks ago, I asked other muns to write a prompt as my character, to compare how everyone would take the same situation and write it for him. The results were very interesting! I wrote this up before I put up the prompt, and I absolutely love the differences between everyone!

The prompt: Write the Doctor having tea first thing in the morning.

Mine:

He gets up much earlier than any of his companions do. When he has companions, that is. Pads out of his room unshaven, his hair nearly a crown atop his head, and in his jim jams with his bare feet pressed against the grating on the TARDIS floor.

They never really see him like this. They sleep through most of the evenings. It's better that way, creates the illusion that he never changes. Which, in a way, he doesn't.

He does typical morning things. Makes some toast. Boils some water for tea. Prints out the latest edition of the paper local to wherever they're flying.

His kitchen cabinets are full of a variety of teas from all over Earth. Red teas and green teas and black teas and even some strange purple tea that Romana bought that he still can't bring himself to drink. He selects an Earl Grey from 1893 and picks up two blue china cups and saucers.

When he's in the middle of research or taking a quick tea break from some adventure, he has several sturdy, on-hand mugs that he uses. When it comes to breakfast? He picks china. The flavor of the tea is different in that sort of dishware. When he pours the water, there's a tinny reverberation of water against the sides of the cup. The sound of the cup moving to and from the saucer has a clear schhhhleeurrrrrrp sound that can't possibly be described but he finds rather satisfying.

In this incarnation he likes his tea strong but can't possibly wait to let it steep. He sets both cups in front of himself and works on the one while the other steeps, so that the very last sip of the last cup is perfect. He reads the paper and munches on his toast and drinks and manages to not really feel too terribly domestic.

It's almost refreshing, having a morning routine. Completely different from the rest of his life.

Word Count: 323

Other interpretations:

eternityticking: here
eleventh_doctor: here
ninewho: here
fluffnfreckles: here
not_from_mars: here

Thank you so much to everyone who participated! I had a great deal of fun doing this!

My Doctor…

1. Has an ever-rotating timeline. Events and people all take place simultaneously. (Which makes canon-"fixing" easier when the series starts up.)

2. Talks loudly and quickly if for no other reason than he'll probably loose track of that train of thought if he doesn't say it immediately. In his defense, it is a fairly unstable and hefty train, so the thought of it getting derailed is fairly terrifying.

3. Was a pariah and exiled from the strict world of Gallifrey, and now longs for it with rose-tinted glasses, because while he may never have loved home, no longer having one changes everything.

4. Can not have children. Children were produced through Looming machines back on Gallifrey, and with them gone, it is impossible for him to reproduce.

5. Is half-human, as his human mother and Gallifreyan father Loomed him.

6. Loomed his own child with his wife at the time. This child later had a daughter, Susan.

7. Was neglectful of his child and upon losing him, doted terribly upon his granddaughter.

8. Travels for fun rather than duty, as he believes time travel should be. There is no chore in seeing the stars, only a sense of accomplishment.

9. Remembers every companion that he's ever traveled with and lost.

10. Recognizes his default state as "alone".

11. Except for the TARDIS, of course.

12. The TARDIS and the Doctor are now, and always will be my OTP. They are bonded in ways that people can't be, and have shared more than he and any human companion ever will. It is far from a Eros kind of love, but it is a complete connectivity to one another.

13. Is oblivious, in general, to human sexuality. It's all complicated, with hormones and needs and messy fluids and such. It's better to be oblivious.

14. Which does not mean that he does not recognize it when someone is sexually attracted to him.

15. It also does not mean that he has never had sex.

16. Being well over a thousand years old, he's had sex many times. Just…spread out over the course of many years.

17. After all, when intoxicated, it's not exactly easy to say no to a very insistent Benny. He also "danced" with Madame de Pompadour as opposed to simply dancing with her. And while he never talks about it, he was married in his youth, and he's met many men and women on many planets that he's shared an attraction with.

18. He didn't, however, make any sort of sexual move on Rose. He can't decide if he regrets this, or if he's glad he didn't spoil what they had with things he doesn't really understand.

19. Has known for a long, long time about how Martha feels about him. And Jack, too. Their feelings are not entirely unrequited, and while it seems like he doesn't notice they exist, he does.

20. He just knows that if he takes that extra step forward, he'll be even more heartbroken when the time has come for his default state to return.

Nope, never.

Does your muse drive you crazy?

I don't think that the term "crazy" quite suits someone like the Doctor. Enigmatic? Complicated? Completely bananas? Those seem more suited to him.

I think that it's less the muse and more the fandom itself that drives me crazy. How complicated is it to write a pup with no canon? Very. He's Loomed, he's got a grandkid, he's half-human, he's more than a Timelord, and, oh yeah, there are many websites that are dedicated to estimating how old he really is.

Let's see, what do we know? We know that Peter Moffat once said that Doctor Who has no canon. KThanxdood, srsly. 40+ years of time and space travel does tend to contradict many things, and the Doctor has bounced around in age, time traveling, and even his species' genetic makeup.

And then there's the Time War. How bloody little is known about the Time War except that it killed all the Gallifreyans and a bunch of races, and that the Doctor was on the front lines. Speaking of not knowing, what's the Doctor's name? We don't know! Not that I think I'd want canon to suddenly supply me with one, but, still. It's the frustration of not knowing when you write for a character.

In the end, I'm forced to create my own "canon", deciding that the Doctor was Loomed, yes, with the Other and a human woman (mentioned only in the TVM), but into the form of a child, not an adult, as Lungburrow implies (and is contradicted in Black Orchid and Smith and Jones, with references to the Doctor's youth). He is sterile, but being Loomed from the Other, he inherited Susan as a granddaughter, as she was his biological granddaughter, and the imprint from the Other on the Doctor made her recognize him (canon, Lungburrow).

But then, canon goes around and contradicts itself. Again.

"I was a dad, once." - 2.11, "Fear Her"

Soooooo, we get a rewrite. The Doctor is sterile, but, with another Timelord, Loomed a child for them. The child grew up, Loomed its own child, Susan.

These constant rewrites tend to drive me crazy.