The Doctor stood before the door, a dark expression haunting his handsome, boyish face. Under his arm was a simple cardboard box, one or two items poking out from inside it. With the slight pressure of his hand on the handle, the Doctor pushed the door open.

There were a great many rooms within the TARDIS. Some were more visited than others. The wardrobe section, the galley, the swimming pool, the library and the workshop were among those that got most traffic, not counting the console room obviously. The place the Doctor found himself in now was one of the less visited on the ship.

It could be because not many of his companions knew of the room. This wasn't exactly somewhere he advertised much, even at times when he had a sad duty to perform, like now. It was the kind of place that was usually best visited alone.

The soft light inside made the room look dim, but the Doctor's eyes quickly adjusted. He stood just inside the doorway for a moment or two, taking in the pictures hanging on the walls, the alcoves beneath them all housing a cardboard box not unlike the one he carried.

His eyes strayed over a few of the more recent pictures. An oil painting of Romana's second incarnation, with her first in the upper right portion of the canvas. A computer generated image of K9. A simple pencil sketch of Leela.

He sighed, making his way over to the alcove to the right of Romana's. Here he placed the box he was carrying. Before he pushed it into its new home, his hand strayed over some of the contents. A Kinda necklace, modelled after a DNA strand. A fancy dress costume from their stop over in 1925. A Logopitan Memory Wafer. A tatty notebook crammed with complex equations. The broken remains of a blue and gold star shaped badge.

A single tear trickled down the Doctor's cheek. He and Adric hadn't always seen eye to eye, especially since his regeneration. But there had been a deeper bond between them that his other travelling companions, Nyssa and Tegan, probably hadn't realised. For the Doctor had recognised something of himself in the wayward mathematical prodigy, a memory of his own youthful enthusiasm, so long past now despite his current aspect.

Pushing the box firmly into place, he pulled out a roll of paper from the side pocket of his long fawn frock coat. Unrolling it, he saw again the charcoal sketch of a round-faced young man, with a dark unruly fringe and a twinkle of mischief in his eyes. Smiling sadly, the Doctor moved over to a side room, where he picked through some ornate picture frames until he found one that was a good fit.

Placing the sketch inside, he returned to the alcove. Stretching his already tall frame, he hung the portrait in its place and stepped back. Not quite straight. He corrected the angle and looked again. After a few moments he nodded, satisfied with the memorial.

His eyes strayed once more, over to some of the pictures and alcoves nearer to the door. Over the centuries he had known so many companions. In the end they all left, though it wasn't often that he was completely alone.

Crossing to the first of the portraits, he smiled at the face captured in oils upon it. Susan. How he had missed her when she remained on Earth with David Campbell. Not that it had been her choice of course. Not at first, not really. Despite the pull of her emotions, she would have stayed aboard the Ship had he asked her to. Shutting her out of the TARDIS had been the only way he could think of at the time to show her he approved and that he knew she had to remain behind.

Again his eyes misted over. Tegan would tease him mercilessly if she could see him now.

For a moment, his thoughts turned to his current company in the TARDIS. Nyssa, last survivor now of the Traken Union, and Tegan, a former air hostess from Earth. They would leave him too, probably soon, as both had been travelling with him for some time now. He had put off Adric's addition to the Hall of Memories for some time, unable to get the sketch just how he wanted it.

He glanced across at it again. While it still wasn't exactly perfect, what was in this Universe? He had captured the essence of his friend, and that would have to be enough.

Whenever somebody left the TARDIS, they always seemed to forget something, leave something behind. The Doctor sometimes wondered if it was deliberate, that they were leaving him something to remember them by, a keepsake.

All the bits and pieces were housed now in the boxes that lived under the pictures. One for each companion. Some left more than others, their departures made in haste, unplanned, or like Adric, in more tragic circumstances.

An Earth philosopher had once said that time heals. It didn't. But it did at least give distance to the memories, allowed those who remained behind to function.

Getting maudlin in your old age, Doctor, he thought to himself. With one final glance around, he moved over to the door and rested his hand on the handle.

Would there ever be a box brought in here with his name on it? One containing a black cravat, a recorder, a velvet smoking jacket, an extraordinarily long scarf, a stick of celery?

Shaking off the black mood that had descended upon him, the Doctor pulled open the door and stepped through, letting it shut behind him. He whistled a jaunty tune as he walked back towards the console room.

Behind him he left a room full of memories.