Rating: PG to PG-oh lets say 15.
Genre: Action/Adventure, Romance, Angst, Sci-Fi, bit of humor ( but wheres DW w/o the humor?)
Summary: She was mean't to be, the Bad Wolf. In an Alt!Earth, Rose Tyler struggles against a new threat to the planet after defeating the Sycorax leader. A new race seeks a power shes seen before, and a new ally resurrects feelings long since buried.
Chapter 1: Something About Susan
The house was tidy for once, silent as if the world around it had fled into nothingness. In other words, the kids were at their aunt's.
Sarah Jane Harkin, aged 45, was very thankful for that, her sister-in-law Jude. Always happy to take her children when Sarah needed a bit of rest.
Collapsing on the sofa, Sarah felt her eyelids flutter shut amid the sun streaming in through the slots in the blinds. It was warm and comforting and silently beautiful, and it was so, so rare in her current state. Having children at her age was really great, but also very exhausting. She could think of women far better suited for it. Sara chuckled, curling up a little more, savoring the moment.
She had fallen asleep pretty quickly when she heard it. That sound. That sound she'd thought she'd never hear after he'd said goodbye. Jumping up, Sarah Jane ran the length of the house, ending up in the garden just as it materialized. The Tardis.
"Doctor! Rose!" She shouted, grinning. Oh, she was glad to see them, especially Rose. It had occurred to her how much gossip they had to share beyond the gigglefest at the school. It would be nice, perhaps, for a cuppa with the younger woman.
When he stepped out, however, a chill stole the smile from her face. He wasn't grinning. In fact, he looked like his whole world had collapsed. And then she noticed the lack of Rose.
"Oh god. How long has it been?"
"Five years for you and her. And me." And then his face crumpled and he pulled her into a hug.
"Wheres Rose?" No reply. But she began to feel the shaking, and heard sobs---Sobs!!---as he found himself unable to speak or move beyond the comfort of his old friend's arms. Wordlessly she led him inside.
"I…I'm sorry for that Sarah Jane."
"Its no problem. That's what friends exist for. Everyone needs a support group, even Time Lords." Sarah set her cup down. Her husband, James, had come home not too long after The Doctor arrived. Sarah was grateful to herself for having told James everything. It made it easier to hear the Doctor's story without James thinking the wrong thing. He's only nodded sadly, sensing the Doctor's own mood, and taken K-9 for a walk in the sprawling yards of their home.
She almost wished she hadn't heard it. Cybermen. Jackie Tyler's alternate death, the Daleks, the Ghosts. Rose sacrificing herself to keep the portal to the Void open. The almost-death, the months of tears and pain, the goodbye at Bad Wolf Bay. And then the new Companion, Martha, getting married after traveling for a year with him. She told him about the sadder parts of her life, talked nonsense, and just listened.
"I'm still happy for her. Nice bloke..but get this, his name is Ricky….thats what got me looking like such a sad sack----ooh, another phrase/word/thing to avoid saying ever again---…I thought of Mickey and then..Rose. So I came here." He finished lamely, setting down his tea.
"You never told her, did you. That you love her."
"No…almost did at the café. Told her how hard it was watching humans wither and die especially when….but I didn't finish. Couldn't bear it. Then I got cut off before at the Bay. She knew though. I know it." He smiled weakly at her, then gazed thoughtfully at his empty cuppa.
"You came to the right place though. Earth." He looked at her quizzically, his eyebrows doing that Rock impression.
"Jack Harkness is looking for you. Wants to tell you to stay away from Torchwood. Says he wonders about the motives of his-ah-superiors." He nodded, grinning just at the mention of Jack's name. He missed the stupid pervert, to be honest.
The Doctor rose and so did Sarah Jane. He hugged her round the shoulder briefly.
"Don't say you're sorry. You needed to talk to someone."
"Thanks Sarah, and not just for the cuppa." he pecked her on the cheek and then Sarah Jane watched her first love and best friend go back into the Tardis through the kitchen window. She hoped he didn't stay alone too long this time.
Another part of her knew he wouldn't, but not as the same man. That one was dead. And another part of her cried for that.
5 months later
Pete's world.
Humming would always be the first thing the baby would be attracted to. She knew her mother by humming, by the unearthly minor sound of the song, always in humming. She grabbed at her hair and giggled when she pursed her lips. She loved her mummy's brown hair.
"Sweetheart, don't pull. 's not nice-like." She grinned then, unable to truly be cross with her five year, five month old daughter.
Just like her father.
Rose Tyler, Vice Chairman of Torchwood Institute, set her baby girl down in her crib and left the snuggled child to sleep. Finally.
"Doctor." She whispered. It hurt still. It always would. How many times had she said that before bed, hoping that somehow he'd hear her. But that was ok, because she got right back up with her wonderful family the next day and remembered why she should love life. She was a mother, a heroine to her people, a deterrent to any who thought to harm Earth. The Bad Wolf. But five years was a lot of time, too.
Five years. Five years and five months……four since she'd lied to the father and said she was getting a sister rather than already having had a daughter. His daughter. The true last Time Lord ( or Lady). How could she of told him? " oh, not me. I'm not pregnant. I was though, shes yours. Remember that last time on Barcelona?". She snorted. Figured the day before they returned to her mum's flat, the day they'd spent as husbands and wives spend nights, was the day she forgot her birth control. But look what it gave her. A piece of him, the greatest sign of his love.
She'd moved on, making life bearable, then good, then utterly fantastic. She'd just returned from a diplomatic mission to the Venutians, the inhabitants of Venus in this dimension…and before that had dueled the Sycorax leader into a peace treaty. Fantastic.
Her feet suddenly slipped from under her as a large jolt ran the length of the house. Startled, she immediately ran towards the nursery, only to see her precious 'Frey still sound asleep. Slipping on her dressing gown ("very Arthur Dent" she thought), Rose ran downstairs and outside, catching the glow from the park just as it fades from impact.
"Work never really ends for me, does it?" She asked herself. Shes laughing inside.
That is until she gets closer, until she saw the capsule and the young woman lying as if asleep, clutching a battered nanogene container, which was seeping golden light. Her hair was cropped short, dirty blonde and very mod looking. It was mussed though, by either the crash or her tight containment in the capsule.
Rose knelt by the girl, and saw her more clearly in the moonlight. Her face was soft, shaped like the bottom half of a heart and was pale as Rose's own skin. She gently pulled the nanogene container from her hands and set it aside, returning to probe gently along the stranger's arms and legs, just to make sure nothing felt broken or potentially scarred. There was a pulse, but it was entirely too strong. Not human then.
Something in Rose's stomach dropped away as she lay her head above where a human heart would be. She pulled back suddenly, as if burned, her breathing erratic.
Oh god. oh god….this wasn't possible. It couldn't be. Rose lay her head down again, only on the right side of the girl's body. A gentle tha-thump greeted her ear. She'd asked and read and learned so much about alien physiologies since that day at Henrick's department store that she knew lying before her could only be one thing.
Gallifrey. She was holding a girl from Gallifrey.
The girl stirred in Rose's arms, her lovely hazel eyes boring into Rose's. They relaxed, and then she smiled, speaking in a plain, dignified accent.
"Hi…thanks. Get me…out of here?...thanks.." Rose nodded, and without a word positioned herself to pick up her new charge. The girl lay her head on Rose's shoulder, sighing in relief. The damaged capsule was in her hand.
"By…the way. My name is Susan."
This is totally, completely, the fault of the DW community TimeandChips. So this is also going up there. I honestly needed another post-Doomsday/Martha fic like I need a hole in the head, as one of the t&c members pointed out. But I got so inspired by Sarah Jane, of all people, that I had to write a fic for it.
Susan's appearance may be different. i really don't know if shes blonde, the picture WAS black-and-white I was looking at. Anything else about her is just what I've heared. Personality...well I can only base her off of 9/10. Shes mostly 10 though.
