Rose rested her cheek against the cold wall, her heart pounding and tears streaming down her face. He was gone. Really gone, as in the other side of a completely different universe, and there was no way to reach him. Yes, she was safe, and yes, she was with her family and Mickey, but she was alone. When it came down to the tiny details, the man who had shown her how to live and who had become an integral part of her was gone, back to his life of solitude. As her thoughts slowed down and she realised just how…final…it all was, she realised that out of everything, it was the Doctor that she felt sorry for. Despite the fact she had lost her best friend and was stuck in a parallel universe, he had nobody else; no family and no friends. Just himself and the TARDIS. She knew the blue box would look after him, yet she still found herself crying her heart out, for the friend she lost and could never see again.

That had been seven years ago, and Rose had grown a great deal since that day. Turns out she had seen the Doctor again, briefly, on the beach, but that had been the true end to her travelling days. For her, it was over; she had declared her love and he had disappeared. She had joined the forces of Torchwood in her world, a small part of her refusing to lose her connections to him completely, and she was a great asset when it came to protecting this Earth against alien threats and other covert issues. With her depth of knowledge and experience she had quickly worked her way through the ranks until she reached Head of Torchwood, a position she had held for the last four years.

Her home life had altered a lot too. Her mother had had baby Holly, and Rose took as great a care of her sister as though she had been her own child. She was haunted by the look that crossed his brown eyes when she had mentioned a baby that day, and oh how she wished that Holly was her daughter, not her sister. Her hectic professional life and deep involvement with Holly had lead to Rose living with her mum in the family home. It was a set of circumstances that suited everyone very well; when Rose was home that is. Any spare time she had was spent in the house, but since she was on call 24/7, she had no set shifts or rest times. This, of course, gave her very little time to spend out of the house socialising. Admittedly it was a stark contrast to her teenage years, when she would meet up with someone nearly every night, whether they went out or just hung around the Powell Estate. This left her only friends as the people she met at work, or already knew. Deep down, Rose knew Mickey still held a torch for her, but thankfully he was keeping his distance from her, romantically; she figured that he knew more of what transpired on the beach than he let on, but it was never a topic of conversation at the house, let alone between them.

Initially Rose had joined Torchwood to try and bury herself in work where she could help others, hoping that easing their pain would ease her own. Now she had a completely different agenda. If they existed, and there was no evidence to suggest either way, Rose planned on tracking down the Time Lords of her world. She had no intentions of becoming as obsessive as Yvonne Hartman had, but she reasoned that they would be excellent allies, both in her personal life and the work of Torchwood.

It took her months of personal research, hard graft, and interrogation of any and every thing that came into contact with Torchwood, but eventually she heard a rumour that there had been one travelling within a few thousand light years of Earth. So one night, Rose used her computer to reconstruct a distress signal that she had heard once while she was on her travels, and sent it out. Then she sat in her chair, planning on staying there for however long it took. She had become used to relying on her own hard work and leaving luck out of it, but she found herself crossing her fingers in the hope that luck would sway this over to her, make it go in her favour.

She stayed there, in her office for the next three days, leaving only briefly to use the toilet, and her only breaks in concentration were to drink coffee and tell her second-in-command how to deal with a runaway Balthor that was terrorising the streets of Dublin. It all paid off though. Just as dawn was breaking on the fourth day, a sound woke her up from a nap. A sound she had hoped against all odds to hear again. And then, before her eyes, what she presumed a working TARDIS looked like appeared. It was a little shimmery patch before turning into a giant office plant, blending perfectly into the corner of her office. A door became evident, and out of it stepped a woman dressed in a dress and cape. She peered around her and then focussed her gaze upon Rose. Rose almost swallowed in trepidation at the silence, but stilled herself and held the lady's gaze.

'Well then, where is the trouble? I must admit I was rather curious at why the Torchwood tower would be in distress, and it would appear my curiosity got the better of me.'

There was a pause as Rose tried to compose a reply in her head. The wording of this was essential in obtaining help; get it wrong, and everything could go wrong.

'There are two reasons for my signal, and I shall do my best to explain them. First of all, I have been looking through the Torchwood archive files, and nowhere is there a mention of Time Lord-Torchwood collaboration or alliance, and I feel that this is something which is lacking. Both of us possess skills and attributes which could be of great help to the other. And my second reason… My second reason is far more personal. I would like to make a request, or ask a favour, the underlying point is still the same– '

'Stop right there.' Rose's heart dropped. Had she mishandled the whole situation? 'If there was no mention of us in the archive, then how do you know of us? We are not a publicised race when it comes to humans; other species know of us, but your people are far too young a nation to know yet.'

'Well, you see, I'm not exactly your average human…'

Rose then went on to explain her situation and how she came to be on the Earth they were now standing on. They remained in silence for a good few more minutes after completion of the story before the Time Lady spoke.

'If I may, I think I know what your second request would be. For the first, I can say yes, communications between the two of us is appropriate, proactive, and sensible – I commend you for the initiative. As for the second, I must consult with the Council. Meet me back here in two days' time and I shall have an answer. You need to go home and rest. Do so, and return refreshed. I shall be here. My name is Romanadvotreludar, though you may prefer to simply use Romana.'

'Thank you, so much. I really do appreciate this. I'm–'

'–Rose Tyler, I know. I did some research before answering the distress call. Now go.'

Two days passed, during which Rose spent most of her time asleep. Before her meeting, she took a long bath and helped put Holly to bed. Then, silent as the night, she made her way to her office, stopping off for a coffee en route. She had nearly drunk the whole cup when Romana's TARDIS appeared in her office again. Quickly she drank the last couple of mouthfuls and threw the cup away just as the Time Lady stepped out. There was a faint smile on her lips, and she walked over to Rose's desk, pulling out the seat opposite her and placing herself in it.

'The Council has agreed with me on your first request, and we shall work out the exact details at a later date. As for the second, they have asked me to first check that what you say is true; they are a suspicious group, but not without cause.'

There was no need for Rose to even consider the request for a moment; she would do anything if it helped them reach a quick decision. Romana stood and walked around the desk, before kneeling in front of Rose. She touched her fingers to the human's temples and closed her eyes. There was an initial shock factor that reverberated through their link, but Romana felt it relax; she then continued her probing. This mind was curious, more so than the distress signal, more so than many things she had encountered. It was almost as though the human had been exposed to the vortex itself, as all Time children are. Two words kept appearing, 'Bad Wolf', and these were accompanied by memories of a TARDIS, a regeneration, and a world that was so similar to her own, yet there were some striking differences. Romana had seen all she needed, so she pulled out of the human's mind. There was no need invading privacy just to satisfy her curiosity – she had seen what she needed to.

Rose opened her eyes with a gasp. She had seen everything that Romana had, and the only word fit to describe it was surreal. She had also managed to pick up on the Time Lady's feelings of awe and slight confusion, before a dominant feeling of contentment blocked everything else out. Romana was still knelt in front of her, and she was about to check she was okay, when the Time Lady opened her eyes and spoke first.

'I have no doubt you are who you say you are; in fact, you are more than you explained. Bad Wolf was no mere experience, rather more that it changed your entire make up as a person and being, the way your mind sounds and fits together. I do have one more question though. Do you still have the key to his TARDIS that I saw?'

Fingers trembling, Rose reached under the collar of her shirt and lifted out a long necklace made of tattered string. Hanging from it was a key. Romana reached out as though to touch it, but stopped herself, waiting for Rose to nod her approval. She did so, and as fingers touched metal, Rose would swear they both began to glow. Romana looked at total peace, and when she drew her fingers back she let out a breath.

'Rose, I am pleased to say that, on behalf of the Time Lords, I can help you go back to your Doctor. Your DNA never fully returned to human after having the Time Vortex run through you. I can use that, this key, and some of our technology. Theoretically, it will get you into this Doctor's TARDIS. I'm not going o sugar coat it though. It is exceptionally high risk and fraught with ifs and maybes. I would use our 'inter-universary-worm-hole-generator and your DNA with the key, reverse the polarity on them, set it to the co-ordinates, and combine it all together. If one bit is even slightly out though then you will never travel again. You won't cease to exist either; you will simply be unable to move, lost in the Time Vortex forever more. This technology has rarely been used, and the success rate is unknown. There is no way of knowing if it works or not, but we have spent many years perfecting it. That may be one reason that your Doctor hasn't used it to travel here, he–'

'No, that's not it. He is the last one in my world, the last Time Lord, flying with the last TARDIS. All he has is on board his ship, nothing more. of course, he could engineer things if he wanted, but it would mean sourcing the parts from somewhere on board the TARDIS, or switching in with alternatives…'

Rose looked as a wave of loss and pain crossed Romana's face, before she composed herself. She nodded, and continued speaking.

'Forgive me, I was unaware – that did not surface in your thoughts when I had a look. Be that as it may then, the dangers still stand. It is entirely your choice. However, I must let you know that there are only five hours in which to do this. The Council provisionally opened it up should you have been telling the truth, but they gave me a close off time to prevent anybody else accessing or abusing it. The set-up takes an hour minimum to complete normally, though of course things may be a little easier or harder with your situation with the Vortex.'

'How long does that give me to choose then?'

'Just thirty minutes I'm afraid. I am so sorry it cannot be any longer, and I appreciate it is a hard choice to make, but the Council are very particular and do not appreciate time-wasters or delays.'

Rose dipped her head in acknowledgement and her brow furrowed in concentration. If she were on her Earth, she would have done it without a second's thought. But here… Things were different. If she went, it would mean leaving her family here, leaving Holly without the sister she had grown up with. On the other hand, it would mean reuniting with the Doctor, her Doctor. Going back to the life she had been torn from and picking up where they had left off. Or would it? What if he had moved on, found someone else to travel with? She cleared her mind of all her thoughts, and the first thing that reappeared was 'go'. The dangers were to be expected and if they gave her a chance of being with the Doctor again, she would probably face far worse, with even less probability of it working.

'I'll do it. But I need to call my family first; there isn't enough time to say goodbye in person, so I need to call them. I'll be back in a minute or two.'

Rose wandered out of her office and down the hallway to one of the many technician offices. She knew that in here was a video recorder, similar to the one that produced a hologram in the TARDIS. Without hesitation she started it up and recorded a separate file for each person she needed to. In her one to Mickey she said that he would need to co-ordinate with Romana to create an information-share situation, and that she was the 'real deal'. She also recorded two messages for Holly, one now, fit for a seven year old, and one for later on, to be shown when her mum thought was suitable. Then she took her mobile phone out of her pocket and hit her house phone on speed-dial. It was no surprise that Holly answered the phone – this was the sort of time that she usually woke up.

'Hey there sweetie! Yeah, I know I'm up early, look, is mum there? Well, could you wake her up for me, it's important… Thanks sweetie, love you too. Hi, mum, yes I know what time it is! I'm at work. No, there isn't a nuclear meltdown or anything… No, no I don't need back up… Will you be quiet for a moment mum, this is really important. Right, I'm not really sure how it's best to say this, so I'm just going to come out with it. I'm going back to our time, our Earth. I know what I'm doing, okay? I'd love to, but I don't know if it'll be possible to contact you when I get there, you saw what the Doctor had to do to contact us seven years ago… If I can, I will. Look, there's something else, you've each got a video in the tech room, my floor. Holly has two, one for now, and one later. I love you mum… Yeah, I know I'm doing the right thing. No regrets, no doubts, that's what you always say, right? Love you.'

Rose hung up the phone before the tears running down her face started changing her voice. Of course it would be alright, it had to be alright. Her family would be fine here, and should anything go wrong, the Doctor was not expecting her, and her mum did not think she would phone. No one would be any the wiser. The best way for it to be. She made her way back to her office, wiping the tears from her cheeks.

There was a black box lying on her desk, and next to it was something resembling a phone. Romana swooped in before she touched anything, shaking her head while muttering numbers under her breath. A few seconds later she looked up and asked for Rose to touch the tip of her key to the top of the box, followed by her index finger tip. She muttered a few more sequences before shaking her head and smiling at Rose.

'Right, well, this her,' she motioned to the phone-like object, 'is what you may refer to as a literal burn phone. Again, there is no guarantee that it will work, but if it does, then once you reach the Doctor, you can make one phone call on it, for no more than 5 minutes, before it incinerates itself. Even if you reach him, the phone may not work, but if I have made the correct calculations then there is no reason why it won't. it has its home co-ordinates set to this part of this Earth, and will pick up your co-ordinates when you reach him. It's sort of a reverse inter-universary-worm-hole-generator for lack of a better name. it's a little project of my own, adapting the main frame of the box, and reversing it.'

'Thank you, I… I really hope it works.'

She gave the Time Lady a weak smile before pocketing the phone, making sure it was safe.

'Oh, before I forget, Mickey will be coming here to watch a hologram of me, and I told him to be here in four days, at noon to meet with you to discuss the information-share we briefly discussed, is that okay?'

'That will be fine. Now, whether it's due to the Vortex in you or not, it is all up and running far quicker than predicted. Do you wish to wait a bit before going through, or go now?'

'No point delaying really, nothing's going to happen between now and going later, hey?'

'Very valid argument. Well, the next time you touch your finger to the box you will go. There should be about five seconds between contact and travel. Calculations predict that travel should be near instantaneous, but that is all hypothetical. Really, all that can be confirmed is the five seconds. All that is left for me to say is good luck, and safe travel.'

'Thank you, thank you so much Romana. Goodbye, and be gentle with Mickey, he's a bit silly at times, but he's one of the best.'

'Good luck Rose Tyler, Bad Wolf. Rassilion be with you.'

Rose turned to face the little box. The black box that was to decide whether she lived, or became a lifeless entity destined to float around and become part of the vortex. One touch, and everything could end. One touch, and she could be with him again. Be with her love. Her Doctor. Instinctively, she took a breath, put one hand over her burn phone, and with the other touched the box.

It was one of the most surreal sensations she could have imagined. There was the initial contact with the hardness of the box, but as the five seconds passed, her vision clouded and a numbness started to spread over the pad of her finger. Then it suddenly felt like her fingertip expanded into a tunnel and everything simultaneously went numb and black.

Silence was Rose's world, and a stray thought entered her head, that if this was being the vortex then perhaps it wasn't the worst outcome that could have been. It was really quite peaceful, like an eternal dream…

This was shattered when noise crashed into her senses, light blinding her through her closed eyelids, and pain exploding all over her. Slowly everything started to make sense, separating itself from the jumble and becoming its own individual sense. The first one that her brain computed was the grinding noise of a TARDIS, the second was her eyes opening. Though everything looked a little odd; she could see the metal grating of the floor clearly, and two sneakers in front of her, attached to two brown legs… As she became more conscious, she realised everything she was seeing was upside down – had her eyes been damaged in the transporting?

Ah. No. She suddenly worked out why things did not feel quite right. She was in fact lying crumpled, upside down, in what could be an awkward attempt at a shoulder stand, her back leaning against the TARDIS console. It seemed as though minutes had passed, but the reaction of the man in front of her told her that was not true. He seemed to put aside his confusion and immediately knelt next to her, placing one hand around the back of her knees, and the other on her shoulder.

'Are you okay to move?'

'Th-think so, yeah…'

Slowly he took her weight as best he could, and turned her so she was lying on her back. In typical fashion, he produced his sonic screwdriver from his pocket, accompanied by a stethoscope, and proceeded to listen to her heart beat, then sonic her to get a reading.

'Well, good news is you have broken anything, here's something to take away any pain, 'cos that looked awkward and painful... On another note, is that really you, Rose? What are you doing here? I mean, how? You wer– I'm– How?'

Rose took the tablet, grateful for the thought of something to ease her aching. She started to sit up but was gently held down, a raised eyebrow and slight shake of the head given as explanation.

She explained everything to him, working at Torchwood, becoming Head of Torchwood, and tracking down the Time Lords. When it came to the distress signal part, she could have sworn she heard a murmur of approval coupled with 'sneaky', but she carried on, reaching the inter-universary-worm-hole-generator. Nothing seemed to shock him, but his eyes had sparked when she mentioned the Time Lords being alive on the other Earth.

'But, you could have lost everything, why chance it?'

'I couldn't let my chance go. I'd have regretted it forever, knowing that there was a possibility, however slim, of me coming back here, back to you.'

'Your family?'

'I'll miss them terribly, but they know I love them, and they sort of understand. As much as mum goes on about how I should have forgotten everything and moved on, deep down she understands. I mean, look how she was with my dad from the other universe? That's a similar sort of thing really…

'Anyway, nothing seems to have changed around here, has it?'

'Well, you know me, hard to move on properly. And after the beach, well it was even harder. There were a couple of people – Martha, Donna – but neither lasted here very long, really. They just weren't you. So I stopped searching. No one was going to replace you, so I stopped trying. And here I am. Although if you do go for a swim any time you should be careful, the pool changed places with the library…'

And so it was, Rose returned to the TARDIS, and she and her Doctor continued their travels around the universe, exploring, having fun, and helping people who needed it. It was almost like nothing had changed, but there was an unspoken phrase that hung between them. Any hugs or contact lasted a bit longer than it had before, there was a little extra squeeze in there, and more feeling behind it. They didn't need to say the words 'I love you', because they both knew it, just as they had for the last seven years, and before that even. There would come a time when it would be whispered between them, when one of them was feeling low, or something big had happened, but for now, they just knew. Bad Wolf and her Oncoming Storm were back together, set to travel the universe.

This is a little something I found while scouring old notebooks... It was the first part of a longer saga, and written many years ago. Despite the state of the original, I thought it was worth typing up/editing/nearly rewriting in order to post it up. As you can probably tell, it was written after Doomsday first aired, and this was my solution for Rose reaching the Doctor again. So, as intended, everything up until Doomsday happened, anything after teh end of (new) Series 2, well... That didn't. There was no regeneration, no Matt Smith, and Martha/Donna, although mentioned, had no big impact on his travels.

I hope you enjoyed reading it, and didn't find it too tedious, especially since it has been posted... 4(?) years after the original airing... Reviews are coverted, and help me improve!

Woody2792x