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“Dawn Amelia Song, stay where I can see you!” River called after her.
“Okay Mummy!” The little girl said, without looking back, sweetly in the way that meant trouble, blonde curls bouncing as she skipped off to play with her friends.
River sighed fondly, turned to the Doctor on the park bench watching the ducks in the pond. “I swear I have to put a leash on her, she wanders off too much.” She bumped shoulders with the Doctor. “Like you.”
The Doctor huffed. “And you.”
“Sweetie, I caught her eating soil to figure out where we had landed ‘like mama does.’” River deadpanned.
“Love, she built a gun out of Legos the other day.” The Doctor's voice came out a little strained. “Said it was to take down bad guys like mummy does”
A sound escaped River’s throat.
“It's not funny, River.”
“It's a little funny.”
River looked for Dawn in the playground, there she was on the swings with Charlotte. River turned back to the Doctor and froze.
“What?” The Doctor asked. “Is there something on my face?”
Her face was covered in tally marks.
River turned back to Dawn. A woman was walking up to the swings.
Kovarian.
She ran as fast as her legs could carry her, Kovarian was taking Dawn's hand, leading her away and no matter how fast River ran the distance between them kept stretching, no no no no-
River woke up with a sharp intake of breath, jolting upright in her bed, in the TARDIS, immense relief coursing through her that it had only been a dream but dread still gripping her pounding hearts.
“River?” The Doctor asked, coming into view, the TARDIS had upped the lights without being asked. No tally marks on her face. Good- that was good. The Doctor cupped her cheek, the warmth was grounding, calmed her hearts a little. “Bad dream?”
River nodded, between the two of them they had many.
“Want to talk about it?”
“It's stupid-” River tried to brush it off.
“Tell me anyway.” The Doctor insisted, softly, thumb caressing her cheek.
There was a long pause before River spoke.
“Kovarian and the Silence came back- but it wasn't for me this time, it was for Dawn. It's just my mind being cruel because…” River trailed off.
The Doctor’s hand slid from River’s cheek to grab her hands, giving her a reassuring squeeze. “You keep waiting for the other shoe to drop.” The Doctor finished for her, if River didn’t know for a fact that she had her mental shields up she would think the Doctor was reading her mind. “For someone to take her away from us.”
“Yes.” She breathed. “If it's not Kovarian- it's something else.” Time, the universe itself because the universe was good at taking things away from her, not giving her things to keep.
“I half keep expecting to hear a knock on the TARDIS door, and she's standing there all grown in front of me telling us we have to let her go or the universe will end.” She laughed at herself, it was wet with tears. The Doctor’s thumb drew soothing circles on the back of River’s hand, listening without interrupting, letting her say what she needed to.
“I'm afraid,” River admitted. “that she'll do to me what I did to my parents. They asked you to find their baby. But if Melody was found, I would be lost.” So she had asked the Doctor not to. “I tried to make up for it, inserting myself into their lives as Mels, so they would get to raise me and it still wasn't enough.” It would never be enough. “Everything in my life has been out of order and I keep- thinking, why would raising our daughter be any different?”
“Oh, Love.” The Doctor said without an ounce of pity and all the heartbreak. “It will be different- it is different. Like you've said, she's our new beginning.”
(River remembered the day she had said that well, holding her daughter in her arms for the first time, in awe, announcing her name to the Doctor’s companions- Dawn Amelia. it was a name the Doctor and River had decided together, with care. It had been important to give her a name that was just hers before it was anyone else's while still honoring the people they had both loved).
The Doctor cupped her face, held her eyes. “You have been there for all her firsts. Her first word.” (Her first word was custard. Well- 'turd.' But she was obviously trying to say custard, obviously).
“Her first steps.” (Her first steps were in the TARDIS, where else? Skipped the crawling and went straight to walking then running right into River’s arms). “Her first planet.” (Darillium, their home for twenty-four years, they had taken Dawn back there. Dawn's eyes- the Doctor’s hazel green had gotten so wide hearing the singing towers for the first time, trying to locate where the sound was coming from, curious from the start).
“We'll be in her life for every first to come, every day, so much so that she'll decide to go to a university in another universe just to get away from us.” That got an unwitting snort from River and the Doctor's lips twitched.
“As for Kovarian, even if she's stupid enough to try and take Dawn from us, she'll never succeed. I didn't know what I was up against with Melody, with you, I know now and I will not let it happen again. Never again. I promise you.” The Doctor lightly rested her forehead against River’s for a moment before pulling away.
"And if a future Dawn does come knocking on our door demanding we give little Dawn up, she's just going to have to march herself back to whatever cursed timeline she came from and disappear." The Doctor's tone was light but she meant every word.
"You don’t mean that-.” River started, knowing the Doctor was treading into dangerous territory.
"I mean it, River.” The Doctor said steely-eyed and resolute. “I am done sacrificing the people I love for the universe."
She kissed the Doctor, hard. Hand curling around her nape. Thank you, she thought didn't know what for, maybe she did, knowing the Doctor heard it.
The Doctor chased her mouth as she tried to pull away. She clasped the Doctor’s shoulders. “I need to check on Dawn.” Needed to see with her own eyes that Dawn was alright, knowing she was but still-.
The Doctor understood, released her waist, stood and offered a hand, pulling her from the bed. “Come on then.”
Dawn's room was three doors down from theirs where she was supposed to be sleeping, but the TARDIS redirected them instead to the console room where she actually was, standing on a stepstool, in footie pajamas, peering over at the console controls, both hands braced on the lever for the custard cream dispenser.
A heist. A custard cream heist.
River almost laughed, but instead adopted a stern voice. “Dawn Amelia Song, what are you doing out of bed?”
The 5-year-old's face scrunched. Caught. She turned around very slowly, mouth and nose covered in buttercream, and shot them both puppy dog eyes. “I got hungry, Mummy.”
The Doctor looked up at the ceiling in exasperation. “Why didn't you tell us she was awake?”
If the TARDIS could shrug, she would be shrugging right now, they all knew what this was. The TARDIS took her grandmotherly duties very seriously in that she aided Dawn's sugar addiction or anything else Dawn wanted, really, and was damn proud of it.
Her lack of boundaries was half the reason Dawn existed, a strap that had worked particularly well courtesy of the TARDIS (one day vomiting her guts out into the toilet River had told the Doctor “Next time she decides she wants a grandchild.” River patted the ship's floor. “You're carrying it.” Behind her, rubbing her back, the Doctor had squeaked at the prospect).
Now, River scooped Dawn up into her arms, walking away with her. “Let's get you cleaned up.”
The TARDIS dispensed one last biscuit, the Doctor stayed behind to grab it, it was halfway to her mouth when she caught Dawn's eyes, looking at the biscuit in the Doctor’s hand over River’s shoulder, longingly, chin wobbling like she hadn’t just gorged on several already, knowing exactly what she was doing.
The Doctor sighed fondly. Pulled the biscuit apart, strode forward to give the cream half to Dawn, her eyes lit up as she took it with a victorious giggle. River chose not to comment on it.
She happily munched on her biscuit as they made their way back through the corridor. “Mummy, you missed my room.” She told River as she saw the familiar door pass them by.
“You're sleeping with us tonight.” River tickled her a little, making her squeal. “So you can't orchestrate any more biscuit heists.” River booped her cream covered nose, the truth was she just wanted her near for her own peace of mind.
Dawn had had her fill, she wouldn't be needing to pull off another heist, for tonight at least so she threw her arms up and yelled, “Yay sleepover!”
Between the two of them, the Doctor and River got her clean and in bed in record time, she had wiggled between them, and had kneed the Doctor in the stomach at least twice in the process of finding a comfortable spot before settling down on her back.
“Mama?” Dawn asked just when they thought she had fallen asleep. “Tell me a story.”
The Doctor was always down to tell a story. “Oh do you want to hear about the time I-”
“No, Mama.”
“You don’t even know what I-”
“Tell me about the first time you two met.”
The Doctor shared a look with River over Dawn's head.
For the Doctor their first meeting had ended in River’s death. For River their first meeting had been her attempted murder of the Doctor. Neither story was exactly kid-friendly.
“Er…” The Doctor's face scrunched, at a loss for what the right thing to say was.
River came to her rescue. Saving her damsel in distress like always. “We met because of our mutual friends.” She said, amusement clear in her voice. “Your grandparents.” It was the truth.
“Really?” Dawn was intrigued.
“Yes.” River said and spun the tale, Dawn drifted off to sleep to the sound of River’s voice and remained there, between them, safe and sound.