Minisode: Memories
Nighttime on the TARDIS gave the Professor more than a moment or two to himself as he turned the pages of an old photo album. In his younger years, he kept an old Polaroid he used, something his research partner and best friend told him would be the best thing to do, to take pictures to prove what they were seeing, before even they were claimed to be doctored nonsense by a mad scientist by the Gallifreyan Scientific Counsel. As he turned the pages, the pictures began to get darker and darker, the TARDIS becoming more and more run down, roundels and wall panels being replaced with sheet metal, the console having wires and pieces hanging off of it, even the time rotor was cracked. Eventually, he could take no more, and slammed the book shut, putting it on the end table next to his chair, and put his head in his hands.
Why now? The Professor thought to himself. Why now do these memories of his haunt him so, does nothing he did heal him of those wounds from so long ago...? In the back of his mind, he could still hear it. The calls for attack, the charges, the cursing, the fighting, echoing back in his mind, as his hand shakily reached over and pulled out an old, decrepit, ancient photo album of it's own, even the cover was smudged with grease and oil long since dried and caked on the inside cover, all that looked new on the cover was the golden 3 emblazoned on it, but with a few bits chipped away. The sounds grew louder and louder in his head as he turned the cover away, eyeing the drafting papers, the medal, and the first orders from his "commanding officer", the newly saved and recrafted Chief Stellar Engineer and High General Omega, before tossing the book back onto his shelf, as finally the memory became clear.
He watched a planet burn. How many before, He could now, did not want to recall, but he watched another world ruined by Dalek integration and subsequent Timelord intervention, when he finally could take no longer. His mind, after so long clouded and brainwashed by the rules and laws of being a soldier in the Timelord Army became too much for him, he finally could no longer take the death and devastation. For one tiny moment, he looked at that world, it's surface crackling with lava and finally his mind broke free. He was himself again, He was the Professor again, all of those angers and rage he held against people and things he never knew, redirected at the very people who turned him into this, like a super soldier for them. No More. Before the memory faded from his mind, he could remember smashing his radio to bits, yanking out the dual remote control and piloting the TARDIS to the first, and closest, free world he could find. He had to stop them. He had to stop it. No More.