I did that little one shot for Ten, but after The Wedding of River Song I felt like Eleven probably needed some time to get his thoughts together too. This one's a little darker, but I hope you still like it.

Reason Enough:

It was raining again and this time the rain was quite a bit harder than before. It slashed down cold and heavy on his shoulders and hair, soaking into him and dripping away. Sodden in the darkness and the coolness of the fall evening. Ages had passed since he'd last visited the planet but the TARDIS had decided that it was time to return. To stand in the darkness and let it all fall away.

There was a bonfire where she'd brought him, left abandoned by some creature when the storm had started. It was off in the middle of a field about a quarter kilometer from the reddish dirt road, and as he looked at it he felt a strange sense of connection. It was fighting against the rain, burning hot and bright, drying the raindrops as they fell into its flames. It was buffeted and thrown by the wind, straining not just to remain alive but also to help warm the cool evening and light the deep darkness.

He could see why this was where she brought him when he needed to calm himself, needed to reconcile the fear and pain within into some sense that what he was doing was right. There was no more powerful image in the Universe than a fire struggling with a storm.

All this gallivanting around the Universe and he was changing it. Sometimes saving it. It was something he'd always done: person by person, place by place. Little people, little changes; little meanings, tiny sparks in the darkness and vastness of space.

Nearly meaningless.

Mostly harmless.

But now it was changing. The things he'd done recently to save people and earth and the Universe were in no way little. The changes he'd made were gigantic, massive transformations of the very fabric of reality.

He hadn't just saved Amelia's life; he'd rebooted all of creation.

He hadn't just cheated death inside the Tessilecta; he'd flouted the fundamental necessity of that death.

He hadn't just messed up Amy and Rory's lives; he'd made them important.

That was the problem and it scared him.

Importance destroyed people. People like him. He could see that now, that was why this place was sacred. It weighed down on him like his rain-soaked tweed jacket and began to wear at him inside. It made him face himself for who he was.

To be honest he didn't really like what he was seeing.

The fixed points he'd once held so dear were losing their meaning, slipping away from him. He noted they were there and walked right on past them. He felt he could do anything, go anywhere, change anything he wanted and the consequences would be his alone to face.

What was he capable of? What could he do if left unchecked?

He was no longer simply nudging the Universe. He was breaking it and resetting it in ways that no one, not even a Time Lord with hundreds of years' experience, should be allowed to do.

But there was no one to stop him.

That was his problem.

He needed someone to tell him no. Someone who wouldn't trust him so implicitly; he needed someone who would question him and plead with him and who would be willing to knock him out and tie him up in a cupboard if necessary.

At the same time he couldn't tell if he was ready to make Rory and Amy into that. And their daughter, maybe the only person in existence who could understand what it meant to feel all of time and space rushing though him every waking moment; she was something else entirely. River might understand his motives, may have had to live with them herself, but she would never be able to be that person either.

He stared for a moment at the flames, letting them burn impressions into his retinas. They danced wildly, and though they were still filled with power and fight, the dance seemed somehow more desperate than before.

He realized with a shock what was happening to them. The storm was winning. Just slightly, ever so slightly, the cold and rain and wind were beating out the flames.

Never in his life had he ever wanted to look back. There were monsters and horrors lurking in the depths of his memory, bits of him that would rip his mind soul apart if he tried to look into them beyond just a passing glance. Now he wished for the days when things were solved with ice cream and encouragement and laughter. He was still a child, not just in his mind but physically as well. For a Time Lord nine hundred was just little more than the point of a ten year old human. He was blowing through his remaining regenerations like they were nothing.

But beyond all this, he was determined not to let the storm win. It might be dark out there, it might be cold and the rain might pour down to the ground and whip into his skin like ice. The Universe might be huge and vast and complicated, and it might hurt simply to lie and say it was all ok. But there was also ice cream and friends and fish custard and happy endings. There was hope and love and life and tears of joy in the Universe. There were companions who made up enormous parts of his life and helped him up when he fell and who comforted and guided him into doing the right thing. People who loved him and people who would come from the corners of reality to save him if he needed it. He had several more lives to live, and he was going to make them worth it.

He supposed that was reason enough to keep on saving the day.

Thanks for reading!