Buried Keys; Doctor Who; PG
Jul. 10th, 2009 10:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
morgynleriTitle: Buried Keys
Fandom: Doctor Who
AU: Darker Guardians
Rating: PG
Timeframe: Before The Man At the End of the Universe.
It doesn't look like much, isn't meant to look like much. Just a small sequence of proteins that lock in neatly with all the others, vanish into the background like so much useless noise. A key, buried in the genetic code of one small, unborn child, that will be passed on down, waiting and dormant until they find the lock it goes to. With no way to know how long that might be.
The lock is buried, too, more impressive, and protected in a different manner. Branches and shelves and life flourishing around the vault in vibrant color and variety, cradling the lock until the key finds it. A key, any one of the duplicates that spread through the population of a fledgling species as the guardian watches. And waits.
He flees when it is done, when the task he promised to carry out is done, and he hides, as he always has. Changing himself, twisting his genetic code, wiping centuries of memory clean, abandoning the ship that took care of him. Tear-blind, in agony, and terrified of something he no longer remembers, taken in by the last of a dead race, on a dead planet, in a dying universe.
One day, he'll remember. One day, someone will find the lock. One day, the key will be unburied.
But not today.
Crossposted:
AO3, LiveJournal, my website
Fandom: Doctor Who
AU: Darker Guardians
Rating: PG
Timeframe: Before The Man At the End of the Universe.
It doesn't look like much, isn't meant to look like much. Just a small sequence of proteins that lock in neatly with all the others, vanish into the background like so much useless noise. A key, buried in the genetic code of one small, unborn child, that will be passed on down, waiting and dormant until they find the lock it goes to. With no way to know how long that might be.
The lock is buried, too, more impressive, and protected in a different manner. Branches and shelves and life flourishing around the vault in vibrant color and variety, cradling the lock until the key finds it. A key, any one of the duplicates that spread through the population of a fledgling species as the guardian watches. And waits.
He flees when it is done, when the task he promised to carry out is done, and he hides, as he always has. Changing himself, twisting his genetic code, wiping centuries of memory clean, abandoning the ship that took care of him. Tear-blind, in agony, and terrified of something he no longer remembers, taken in by the last of a dead race, on a dead planet, in a dying universe.
One day, he'll remember. One day, someone will find the lock. One day, the key will be unburied.
But not today.
Crossposted:
AO3, LiveJournal, my website