A/N: So, I'm nervous, because this is a rewrite of the beach scene of Doomsday. RTD, of course, is an amazing writer, and I liked to play around with his plots and characters. And I actually don't particularly like this piece...I couldn't think of an opening, so I just plunged in. And the wording of the ending confused me greatly...anyways...
"Where are you?" she asks, and wishes that wherever he is she could be, too.
"Inside the TARDIS," he answers, and the familiar feeling of stupidity reddens her cheeks. Of course he would be in the TARDIS. "There's one tiny gap in the universe, and it's just about to close, and it takes a lot of power to send this projection. I'm in orbit around a supernova." She smiles; he's babbling. "I'm burning up a sun just to say goodbye." The smile drops. That's what it is, this beach, these precious seconds: their goodbye.
"You look like a ghost," she says. He's there, she can see him, but he's on the other side; just out of reach. Like a ghost.
"Oh! I can fix that." He digs around in his pockets for a moment and produces the sonic screwdriver. She can't hear it buzz, but his image becomes clearer, like he's really there. It breaks her heart.
"I can't…?" she mumbles the words like a question.
"No you can't," he confirms, "The whole thing would fracture. Two universes would collapse." She notices that he's sticking to rambling. Rambling is safe, she knows.
"Sorry."
He smiles, and then asks her where the gap came out, and she answers. They're in Norway, at Dårlig Ulv Stranden. Bad Wolf Bay.
"How long have we got?" she questions, her eyes hot with the beginnings of tears.
"'Bout two minutes." Factual. He watches her as she breaks down, and knows that right now, right now is the moment he has to tell her. "Rose," he commands her attention, and she tearfully looks up at him. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, but I'm going to disappear in one minute and fifty-two seconds and I'm going to tell you this before I go." He looks at her earnestly. "Rose Tyler, have a fantastic life. Do everything and anything or do nothing at all. Just promise me." He looks at her, and she can see he's breaking as well.
"I promise."
He grins his manic grin, but after a few seconds it weakens. "And," he licks his lips, "I suppose, if it's my last chance to say it," he exhales, "Rose Tyler, I love you."
She stares at him, speechless. The world around her and the man in front of her isn't tangible. Nothing in these seconds is real to her, and she doesn't know what to believe. But nevertheless, she has to say something, and so she opens her mouth.
But he's gone, leaving not quite nothing behind him. There are no footprints in the sand to mark his presence, but there is a girl standing on the beach. A perfectly ordinary girl that would've filled her life with food and work and sleep, had she not met him. But she did, and she traveled across the galaxies. She thought it would never end, after all, with a time machine she had all the time in the world. Now, she still has all the time in the world. But all she's got to fill it with is food, work, sleep, and the pain.