Doctor Who: The Day of the Doctor

“Invasion Earth* and had insisted on watching it. They nearly derailed the negotiations by shouting, cheering, and joining in, and they had spent the next hour calling each other Dr. Who and talking like Peter Cushing.”

“‘Because you live in a time machine. All of history is still happening outside those doors. On a good night that means everyone you ever met is still alive and you can’t wait to see them again. On a bad night, it means everyone’s dead, and you want to charge around the universe, pretending you can do something about that.’ She looked up at me. ‘I know which version of you I prefer.’”

I said we’re not the same. Here’s why. All my life, every day, I’ve wished I was someone else. I’ve wanted to be Kate, or Sarah Jane Smith, or Amy Pond, or anyone really. But you’re a shape-shifter, you’ve been lots of other people—and you want to be me. I think that makes you a much better Petronella Osgood than I am.

I think I’d like to be a better version. If the Doctor can’t always be a hero, we’re going to need a few more, right?

“I have no idea how long I stood there. An hour perhaps. Or a minute, or a day. Time takes on a different meaning when it is measured in the heartbeats of the billions you are about to destroy.”

The last day. The floor tremored at his feet. Were there shockwaves coming out of the painting?

The last day. He was back on Karn, so many faces ago, and he was drinking the poison, ready to walk into the storm.

The last day. The desert was hot beneath his boots, and a tiny barn shimmered on the horizon.

The last day. Elizabeth of England tilted back her face to be kissed, but it wasn’t really her.

The last day. He was trapped in a cell with two old men who hated him, but the shadows hid their faces.

The last day. He was standing in a gallery, and Clara was asking him if he was okay.

There was a town, on the southern shore of Lake Calasper, ripped apart by a giant earthquake. No one should have survived, but everywhere the people ran, they found a police telephone box standing in front of them, opening its doors.

A tornado tore through a tiny village, till a ring of blue boxes spun round the storm in the opposite direction, shrinking it into the ground.

As cities and towns and villages burned all around the planet, blue boxes came hurtling through the smoke, rescuing people from windows and rooftops.

A sky transporter, plunging towards the heart of the Capitol was suddenly being piloted by a funny man with big ears and a black jacket. Everyone on board stared out of the windows, as he climbed along the wing, to rewire one of the engines.

A ship on the high seas, about to capsize, was suddenly captained by a strange little man in a frock coat and check trousers, who kept offering people gobstoppers and complaining about his aunt being giddy.

There was a man with a ridiculous umbrella, who evacuated a school as a mountain crumbled towards it, and kept everyone laughing as they ran. A gentle cricketer took command of a hospital on fire, rescued the patients and completed an operation, as the flames licked at the theatre door. A man with a cloud of white hair and a swirling cape stood on a beach and, with a tiny silver rod, froze a whole tsunami as it thundered towards a town. A laughing joker in a colourful coat led a party of miners out of the tunnels that had come crashing down around them. Four children, trapped on the side of a cliff face, knew beyond doubt that no one was coming to their rescue, till the end of an absurdly long scarf dangled down in front of them.

I was everywhere I was needed that day, across all my lives, and I believe I have never run so fast. If I sound proud, forgive me: it is the inverse of the shame I carried for so many years. This was the last day of the Time War, but it was no longer the worst day of my life. Instead, this was the day the people of Gallifrey rose up and put 2.47 billion children safely to bed. This was the day I remembered who I was, and swore never to forget again.

This was the day of the Doctor.