CHAPTER 1: Allons-y!
He'd given up, she could see the distance in his eyes. The physical void that had been separating them for years had now become an emotional empty space between them. She knew now that his mind was made up, he would not take her, though she knew he had missed her, as she had him, she knew that for him there was little difference between another five minutes and another five decades. To a Timelord both were no more than a blink of an eye compared to the hundreds of years which he would live on long after she had withered and died. By leaving her he was freeing himself of that fate and numbing his own pain with the knowledge that this would make her happy – and when it came down to it, if the roles were reversed, would she not do the same?
Almost sounding as if they were under the waves that were throwing themselves onto the mercy of the shore, the Doctors and Donna were speaking in tongues about how to speed up the growth rate for the TARDIS coral that the Doctor had gifted her and the human Doctor. Rose's mind raced on as she desperately tried to process the situation, knowing that if she were to change her mind she had but mere moments. However, their words swirled in the breeze of the beach around her, echoing in her mind and reverberating in her chest, 'you'll grow old at the same time as me', 'Together…together…together'. Images of a life she had never dared to dream of simmered at the back of her mind, along with a potential future of them together with her family. It was her Mother and little Tony she had dreaded leaving behind the most. But now she may be able to watch him grow up after all. All those potential birthdays, Christmases, weddings and with her Doctor who would stay 'her Doctor', 'this body can't regenerate'. There were so many could-be's calling her back, coaxing her to stay.
'NO, this wasn't how it was supposed to go' she thought. She stepped forward exclaiming, "But it's still not right, the Doctor is still you". "And I'm him" he replied. It was no use, deep down she knew that the temptation of the images in her mind would weaken any resolve she may have had to object to the Doctors' plan. Nevertheless, there was one more thing she must know, one more thing that the Timelord had to prove before she could take herself out of his life for what would be forever. He was about to turn to leave, it was now or never, "Alright, both of you answer me this. When I last stood on this beach on the worst day of my life, what was the last thing you said to me?". The Doctor in blue came closer so she was between them, meanwhile, she looked up at the Timelord expectantly, "Go on, say it!".
"I said Rose Tyler," he said resolutely.
"Yeh and how was that sentence gonna end?"
"Does it need saying", replied the Timelord wearing a look that barely concealed all the love and sadness that he would never reveal. In that moment Rose knew that is how it would always have been with him but that she had no right to ask any more from him. She turned to the human Doctor in blue, "and you Doctor? What was the end of that sentence"?
He leaned over to whisper in her ear, his singular heart racing in his chest, "I love you".
Rose let out a breath she didn't realise she had been holding as the intensity of his gaze and his words threatened to overwhelm her, there was no longer a choice to be made. She grabbed his blue lapels and pulled him into an urgent kiss. It could have lasted minutes or seconds, she could not tell, only breaking away at the sound of a door closing and the TARDIS dematerialising. Her stomach twisted as she turned towards what was just an empty space. 'He doesn't like endings and he doesn't do goodbyes, I should have known', she thought. Before she could vocalise the emotion which had gone beyond overwhelming to almost numbing, she felt a cool hand slide into hers. Rose and the human Doctor turned to each other lost for words. As the Doctor opened his mouth his thoughts were interrupted by the shrill voice of Jackie. "I know you two probably need a minute but I'm bloody freezing and gasping for a cuppa". At that, the Doctor snapped out of his reverie and rolling his eyes when only Rose could see his face. "Quite right, no point standing around", he exclaimed. Then lowering his voice and waggling his eyebrows at Rose adding, "especially when we have a whole new universe to explore". Rose although through tears couldn't help but grin back. The realisation that they had a full life together finally sinking in and spreading through her creating a warm uplifting sensation despite the furious wind and Norwegian chill. "Allons-y," said the Doctor as he pulled Rose by the hand following behind Jackie who was already marching with purpose across the sand ahead.
As they walked up off the beach Jackie babbled on the phone to Pete making the arrangements to get them all back to London. Just behind the Doctor and Rose strolled hand-in-hand. To break the silence and distract herself from her exhaustion and frankly confusing emotional state Rose had started quizzing the Doctor on the finer points of the metacrisis. She knew that whichever version of himself he was, he always felt in his element when it came to explanations of the scientific kind. "So explain it to me some more, how can there be two of you? Like actually two of you?", she said trying to sound light-hearted. The Doctor paused, he should have expected this, after all however incredible Rose was, to a human mind he could just appear to be a clone, even if he did have all his memories. Also given that he had just offered to spend his life with her, she should fully understand who he was. His Timelord self had given a somewhat brief and ominous description of him as a dangerous genocidal duplicate.
"So", he replied. "You saw how I, well the other me, poured the regeneration energy into my handy spare hand". He waved said hand in the air. Rose nodded and squinted at him quizzically. He continued, "Well that wasn't all I put into it, regeneration is a pretty uncontrolled process hence all the explosivity...explodiness that's not right no…explosiveness that's the one! Languages always take a while to synch after a regeneration. Anyway, what I was getting at is, I also threw a bit of my consciousness, my soul if you like, into it. But a Timelord consciousness needs a brain, it can't exactly exist in a hand I mean can you imagine!? Aside from the fact that there just isn't enough expressions in intergalactic one handed sign language for the terms in dimensional science, it's just a waste".
"Doctor!", Rose interjected trying to pull him back to the point while failing to conceal a smile. He was so similar, so 'Doctorey'…well, he was the Doctor, but also so different, his newly acquired humanity making him different in a way that she could not quite put her finger on. "So it's like someone cloned your brain and put a part of your soul with all your memories into a human body…or like you regenerated into a human with a Timelord brain using Donna's DNA as a base-print". The Doctor stopped reminded again of how quick and amazing this pink and yellow human was, grinning wildly he scooped her up in a hug twirling her around, "HA, ah you are brilliant Rose Tyler". As he put her down Rose retorted "Well it's not that complex is it", she winked and smiled at him with her tongue caught between her teeth before then grabbing his hand and dragging him towards her Mother who was calling for them to "get a shift on" and threatening to leave without them. "Allons-y," said Rose as they ran hand in hand towards the taxi waiting to take them to their new life.