Foreman almost dreaded when Susan would come to him. Yes, she was his daughter once again...but she was also his curious daughter, overflowing with questions he couldn't find the proper answers to. With her newfound knowledge, she only found herself craving more information until there was nothing left for her to look for.

There was so much of a gap in her memory of her past that she couldn't help but push to know more and more. Despite only four years of her life deleted from her mind, that handful of years marked her early development, had the time she'd spent with her parents before she'd started moving around with the Doctor and growing up with him.

Foreman couldn't find a single reason to blame his daughter for wanting to know more, still he wished he could find some way to suppress her all-devouring curiosity on the subject. There were some things she simply wasn't ready to hear about yet, even though she was centuries old. The news of her parents was fresh, and therefore news of her mother would sting and spoil the happiness she'd gained.

Of course, Foreman was practically inviting Susan to him by standing within the TARDIS library. Although he had many issues surrounding these book-filled spaces, he wished to start breaking down his innate hatred of them. Only one library had ruined his life, after all. From what he knew, this library had only helped.

He had to admit, there was somewhat of a calming effect which hung around in the air of the TARDIS library. Within these shelves, countless years of knowledge and information from all about the universe were contained within pages and even a few bottles. The sheer magnitude could've easily put him into a state of awe, but instead he just felt at ease. The information couldn't hurt him.

Foreman assumed this sensation was the one that inevitably ended up leading Susan back to the room over and over again. She could learn so much just by reading a single book, and in the area there were thousands to be found. It was something which could only be described as pleasing, in Foreman's opinion.

But his time in the TARDIS library soon became a time for him to wait until Susan ended up bounding in and noticing that he was standing there, prepared to assault him with a barrage of questions. The moment he heard her light footsteps sending a gentle echo through the hallways outside, he pulled himself into a slightly straighter posture and tried to lighten himself up. There was no avoiding her interrogation in the end.

"Hello, Father," Susan greeted. "I adore calling you Father, but it is difficult to remember sometimes...at least these start with the same letter. Foreman and Father. One and the same."

"Indeed. You must consider yourself rather lucky because of it, yes?" Foreman asked, starting to steer the conversation in a certain direction. "I could've used my Gallifreyan name instead."

"Your Gallifreyan name?" Susan asked. "I didn't even think that you would have a Gallifreyan name, of course! What is it, Father?"

"Well, it's quite a mouthful - Rechsamsayqueyer. Your mother didn't even say it most of the time simply because she thought it was too much to say at the end of the day. That's why I'm Foreman."

"Oh. Well, it's lovely to know that. I do have quite a bit to catch up on, so I suppose that every last piece of information has to count for something."

"Every last piece," Foreman echoed, knowing that he'd accidentally opened the door to the very subject matter he'd been attempting to shy away from.

"I just wish I could've started learning all of it sooner, like when I met you for the first time," Susan said.

"Better to start late than to never start at all, I suppose."

"Why couldn't I have known before?" Susan asked, her eyes bulging. She seemed as if she might suddenly burst into tears, something which Foreman found just as terrifying as answering her question.

He would much rather be straightforward and tell her every last detail he could find to answer her querying, but he knew he wasn't allowed to be quite so discreet with the information he had in his hands.

"It's...it's quite a complicated situation, Susan. I'm not sure-"

"You're not sure I could understand it?" Susan said, already beginning to place words within Foreman's mouth. "Not sure I could comprehend something so important? I think I can comprehend it very well. It's not that complicated to know that my family was right before me for such a long time."

"Susan, that's not what I meant," Foreman hastily butted in. "I know you are perfectly capable of understanding what I have to say. It's just that...you weren't allowed to know for a while. In fact, I most likely shouldn't have said anything when I did."

"You're my father, and I wasn't allowed to know that?" Susan said. "Why couldn't you tell me sooner? Why didn't you tell me sooner? You had plenty of opportunities to do so, I'm sure of that."

"I wanted to tell you sooner, I swear!" Foreman said, finding himself already beginning to get frustrated with the situation. If Susan continued to push him in such a manner, he might end up cracking in a way that he had promised himself he would never do again after causing so much harm in the TARDIS.

"You wanted to tell me and yet you kept your lips shut?"

"You think I wanted to be around my long lost daughter and be unable to tell her who I was and how much she meant to be? You think I wanted any of that? It wasn't me, Susan."

"Then who was it? What was it? What was keeping you back from telling me that my father was right in front of me this entire time?"

"Your grandfather," Foreman said, resisiting the urge to hiss. "He told me it was too dangerous. It would cause so many paradoxes to erupt in this universe, he swore on it. He told me I wouldn't be able to handle having a daughter once again."

"Grandfather really said that to you?" Susan said, her eyes bulging. "I know he can be petty and mean, but I didn't think his grumpiness would become cruelty."

"Susan, I told you it was more complicated than you might think," Foreman said, holding his hands out and shaking them. "I told you that it might not be what you expected."

"I hate this," Susan said, her voice barely more than a murmur. "It's as if no one in this TARDIS truly cares about me, if they're willing to keep such secrets right behind my back, right under my nose. What did either of you hope to gain by keeping my own life away from me? Why would you do such a thing, Father?"

"Susan, I love you more than I can ever express. You're my daughter, and the four years I had with you in my life were incredible simply because I had a child. You were my child, my brilliant child. I would've told you the very first time we met if the Doctor had allowed me to."

"I might not have believed you then," Susan admitted. "I might've thought you were just lying to me for the sake of messing with my mind."

"I'm glad I didn't say anything to you, then," Foreman sighed. "I might've scared you away. You might not have learned to love me like a brother."

"It's going to be a strange thing to learn to love you like a father, then," Susan said, sending her shoulders up into another shrug. "I suppose I have to, though."

"You don't have to do anything if you don't want to," Foreman said, shaking his head. "You've been told a lot of things that you were never expecting to hear as of late, and I don't want to force you into thinking anything that you don't want to think."

"That's the whole reason you cared about me so deeply this entire time," Susan realised. "You never loved me romantically. You loved me as a father and only wanted to protect me. I can't believe I didn't see it sooner. I feel so foolish now."

"The Doctor and I did our best to keep it from you, there's no reason to feel foolish about it. I apologise for the pain it's caused you."

"I just don't understand why you would ever want to keep it from me," Susan said. "You tell me that it was because of Grandfather, of course, because you didn't wish time to fall apart...but time clearly hasn't fallen apart yet."

"I am so sorry, Susan," Foreman blubbered out, his guilt pushing to get to him and overwhelm him completely. He never had any desire to treat his daughter in such a manner, and yet here was!

"I'm sorry as well," Susan said, but her apology didn't sound quite as deep at the one coming from her father. "I should...I should stop asking about it. I clearly won't receive any answers."

Foreman didn't grant a response to her this time around.

"Tell me more about my mother, now," Susan demanded. "You owe it to me, now. You didn't tell me anything about yourself for the longest time because you were being crushed by Grandfather's thumb, but I have to know about more now that you're freed."

"You want to know about Brook now?" Foreman said, biting his lip. He didn't want to speak about everything he'd gone through with Brook - this was the one thing which had kept him from telling her about everything for the longest time. Certainly he couldn't manage to speak the entire truth now.

But the girl most certainly did deserve to know what things had happened in the past. She deserved to know why she'd been ejected from the family to begin with. It was her birth, her past, everything which had inevitably led her to this very moment. If she didn't know, Foreman would be guilty of withholding such valuable information for her.

It would destroy him to explain to her what the Library was and what it meant to him. All of those memories he'd forced himself to barricade in his mind would come flooding back in a matter of moments, and he wouldn't be able to take it. Even this simply thought of recognising that the memories were there ended up causing pangs in both his hearts.

Susan wasn't ready to know about that, not yet.

"She was beautiful," Foreman started to say, deciding he could just take an entirely different route to speaking about this issue. "I saw her in two different regenerations. Her first one had curly hair, a wild mass of curly hair. Then she regenerated and she ended up with long, dark hair, darker than the fathomless sky. But in both versions, she had the same brown eyes. Those never changed."

"Brown eyes," Susan echoed. "That must be where I got my eyes from."

"Indeed. She always carried a TARDIS key around her neck, no matter what. She wouldn't let it go no matter what happened to her. She loved that key as much as anything...more likely more than she loved me, I might think."

"I doubt that," Susan said, shaking her head. "If she was even half as much in love with you as she seem to be in love with her, then she wouldn't have loved anything quite as much as she'd love you."

Foreman wanted to rebutt this statement, knowing that he could think of so many stories where Brook had literally risked her life in order to save that damned key of hers. But Susan's words ended up piercing both of his hearts simultaneously - was his love of Brook really so obvious? It wasn't as if he minded that, he knew he loved Brook.

And of course, Brook had ended up risking her life in order to save him from the Time War to begin with. That was just the first time they'd met, and she'd already managed to show just how much she cared. She hadn't even known who he was. Then she'd allowed him to stay with her for ages on end, allowed him to become her friend and then her lover.

"You seem to know her just as well as I do," Foreman said, shaking his head. "I suppose I never thought much about why she was doing anything, just that she was doing it. I don't really know what to say about it."

"I only know things about her because of you," Susan replied with a shrug.

"I miss her more than I can ever say," Foreman said, shaking his head. "I don't think anyone fully understands just how much it burns. I try to cast her out of my mind, yes, but there is only so much you can do when the memory of her always comes flooding back in."

"I wish I could remember her at all," Susan said, heaving out a sigh of her own. "It feels like it's just out of my reach, as if my fingertips are brushing against the memories of you and her and I just can't quite get to it."

"I wish there was some way I could help you remember. I mean, I could speak to you about the few years I spent with you, but...I don't know if that'll work at all. It'll just be stories."

"Stories from hundreds of years ago, too," Susan said, releasing a sigh. "I don't know if it would work, but there is always the possiblity."

"Possibility, yes. Close to zero, also yes."

"I just wish I didn't have to worry about finding as many stories of Brook...of my mother as possible. I wish I could have some of my own to talk of. I wish I could simply know about her as a daughter should know about her mother."

"There is no reason for you to feel guilty about it," Foreman said, shaking his head. "You had nothing to do with the fact that she was plucked from both of our lives. I will give you everything you need to know."

"But where is she?"

"She's far away now," Foreman said. "Out of reach."

"It's starting to seem like everything we have in front of us is just out of reach," Susan said. "My four years which I spent with you and...and my mother. It should be right in front of me, and yet I can't recall it at all. And then, of course, everything with Gallifrey...you know what I mean, of course."

"You understand it perfectly, then. It's far too complicated to attempt to figure out entirely, especially because it's right out of reach. There isn't much more we can do, I'm afraid."

"I can wish," Susan said. "I can wish for it to work out."