Chapter Text
Nine
Asa had always been right by his side, even through the worst years of his life The Doctor had never been alone. So he knew that when he regenerated, even if he didn’t have any friends by his side, he would always have Asa.
Surprisingly, it didn’t take long for Asa to settle after their latest regeneration. She had taken the form of a medium sized wild earth cat. Later, the TARDIS had told him that it was a clouded leopard. She was perfect, small enough that she was able to sneak around when needed, but large enough that she presented as a threat.
And, of course, Rose had loved her as soon as she saw her. Though The Doctor hadn’t appreciated his companion’s constant claims of Asa being ‘cute’ or ‘adorable’, insisting that she was a ferocious predator, Asa had simply reveled in the compliments. It also helped that she got along quite well with Rose’s Arctic Wolf daemon Tarak.
Ten
The Doctor and Asa were not alone when they regenerated next, they had Rose and Tarak with them. However, it didn’t exactly help the situation, as both of them seemed rather freaked out at The Doctor’s new face and the fact that Asa kept on changing forms.
Then, they found themselves having to try and figure out who they were, whilst battling with a group of hostile aliens. Which, rather recklessly, The Doctor challenged to a duel. Asa settled during the battle, just after he had lost his hand, taking the form of a common squirrel monkey. Tarak and Rose seemed wary of them at first, but it didn’t take long for them to see that they were still the same man and daemon that. Later, Rose was looking up facts about common squirrel monkeys and The Doctor was pleased to learn that squirrel monkeys were known to have the largest brain for their body mass among all of Earth’s primates.
Asa was there with him when they lost Rose and Tarak, and she was there with him when he met Donna and Feliks, and when they met Martha and Marcellus, and when they reunited with The Master and Epiphany, and when they met the mysterious River and Pallas - who seemed to know them better than they knew themselves.
And she was there with him at the end, through his very last moments, so he didn’t have to go alone.
Eleven
The next regeneration was a strange mix of sadness and delight. Neither The Doctor nor Asa wanted to have to say goodbye to their friends, but they were also both extremely excited at the prospect of having new adventures.
Then they had met little Scottish Amelia Pond and her daemon Galloway, and then there was the crack in the wall. Then they went away for five minutes and came back to meet a larger Amelia Pond - now insisting on being called Amy - and they found that Galloway had settled as a red fox. Then there was Rory and his daemon Meredith. And then there was Prisoner Zero. And in all that time neither The Doctor nor Asa had really had the time to figure out who they were, but by the time they were standing on top of the hospital roof - warning the aliens to stay away from planet Earth - they had figured it out. Asa decided to settle as a black-footed ferret.
The Doctor hadn’t been too pleased at first, always hoping for something more helpful - like a bird. But in the end she had been exactly what he had needed. But time proved that she was a very helpful asset, being able to crawl into small spaces no one else could reach.
And, as ever, she had been by his side through everything. She was there when he found himself slowly falling in love with River Song, she was there to mourn with him when he lost his Ponds, she was there when he met the intriguing Clara Oswald and her daemon Kurush, and she was right by his side for all their years on Trenzalore, right until his final moments.
Twelve
By the time the next regeneration came around, The Doctor and Asa weren’t alone. This time they had Clara and Kurush. But then time and space and aliens got in the way, as they so often did when regenerating.
Asa took a very long time to settle this time, she tried more forms than The Doctor had ever seen her try, but she eventually settled as a little owl once they had gotten back to the TARDIS, joking that her eyes looked just as angry as his so called ‘attack eyebrows’.
The Doctor had been glad that she was a bird, and she had proved to be just as helpful as he had imagined. She stayed by his side through everything, losing Clara and Kurush, losing River and Pallas, and losing Bill and Vernados. He never had to be alone, and she shared in his grief and mourning.
Thirteen
The next regeneration was a fresh start, for both of them. However, as often happened in the moments after regeneration, the two of them were thrown from the TARDIS and into alien shenanigans. This time, they were in Sheffield and had four new friends and their daemons helping (and hindering) them.
The Doctor and Asa didn’t really have much time to think about who they were now, in this very new and very different body. They had no clue who they were the first time Tim Shaw asked them, but then they were on the cranes, and the two of them took a leap across - risking their life for someone they hardly knew, and Asa settled as a sandy coloured dog. Then, Tim Shaw asked them again who they were, and they knew.
Later, they figured out that Asa had settled not as a dog, but as a dingo. A wild dog that was sometimes mistaken for a domestic one, often resulting in injury on the human’s part. After learning that, The Doctor knew that Asa had settled as the perfect daemon for her.