Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters in this story (if I did, it would make a lot less sense and would not be as amazing as it is)

Rose sat on her bed and stared at the wall of her bedroom. She had been sitting like that for a while now, breathing gently. In. Out. Repeat. If her exterior looked calm, then inside her head was anything but. Her mind was scrambling, trying to make sense of her situation. The Doctor had changed. In to someone else, except, deep down if you watched him, the way he moved, his frown, his smile, they were all the same. But he wasn't…right. It was hard to describe, he was the same person she trusted with her life but he was suddenly wearing a new body, a body that was confusing. This was the worst bit. Part of Rose wanted to be angry, why did he have to leave her all alone with this familiar stranger? Why did he never think to even mention, even warn her about what happens when he was mortally wounded? But, it's hard to be angry with someone you don't feel like you know, even if you saw them change before your eyes. It's hard to be angry at someone that looks so…innocent? Young? Hot?

Oh dear, just that thought in itself was going into dangerous territory. Rose had promised herself, soon after being invited aboard the TARDIS that she would not let herself fall in love with The Doctor. Well, while other people were around anyway. She didn't want to spoil the fact that he wanted her to stay, to keep him company. He had chosen her out of all the people (and aliens) in space and time, and she didn't want to hurt him by wanting something he couldn't give. Maybe didn't even feel, couldn't feel. It would just cause pain for both parties if she put herself in such a stupid and vulnerable position as to force him to make her leave. He trusted her and she refused to let him down.

They had had a comfortable relationship without any pointless and futile declarations of love anyway. He seemed happy to oblige her and keep holding hands, like he sensed that it comforted her. She could cope with aliens and other planets and near death experiences and the constant feeling of being way out of her depth, as long as he was near, as long as he cared enough to keep her safe. Surrounded by unfamiliar things and situations and people, that little bit of familiarity, that solid…sameness kept her sane.

But he had to go and ruin it. Rose so desperately wanted to be angry with him. To shout and scream and rage at him, to make him feel some of the confusion and pain and loneliness that she suddenly felt. All that comfort had been ripped away from her, and what had been left in its place was a dashingly handsome, skinny young man. It was hard to be angry with brown, innocent eyes that were almost as big as her own. The big baddies were going to have a hard time keeping a straight face if, after having heard all the tales of The Doctor, they were faced with that pair.

She sighed, shattering the silence that surrounded her. She knew, had to admit, that it wasn't his fault. It was hers. She was the one that he had saved by sucking the vortex out of her head and into his own. He had, essentially died to save her from burning inside her mind. She shivered. The tiny amount of what had happened that she could remember was filled with fire and light and…sadness. She had known everything and known that everything would end. All that is would cease to be, like it never had been, lost with no one to remember, to care. The universe would disappear and there would be no one to cry, no one to miss it. It would be replaced with a new universe, all shiny and new, and there would be no one left to care that it existed only because another had died. The sadness was all because she had known that The Doctor could see this in his mind, all the time. He could feel the universe dying, every second of every day and still he kept going. He could feel how pointless, how futile life was and still he kept fighting for people, aliens that didn't know, didn't care. He kept fighting because it was the right thing to do. In the end, no one would know. No one would care. But his still did it, and this mattered more than anything. That was the reason that Rose loved him so completely (although she tried hard not to let it show…too much). He had the power to do anything, to create, to destroy, to dictate people's lives and instead he had devoted his life to watching the universe, intervening now and then because he could not stand to see others in pain when he could make a difference. He had lived for 900 years, and even though every single second left a mark of darkness on his soul, a flatness hidden deep in his eyes, he still cared. The universe had not been kind to him, had changed him, had taken his tolerance and patience for beings that thought themselves clever and powerful and turned it slowly into despair, sadness, but he still fought for what was right, even though no one deserved him.

For a few golden minutes, Rose had understood the Doctor, why he kept going. She had fought the burning in her mind, ignored the fact that she could feel herself dying because she had not wanted to leave him alone. She was the only one that understood him in that shining moment of clarity and she knew that it would destroy him to take that away from him through pure selfishness.

She should have known though, that he would save her. He was too good to let her burn, even if it meant that he would loose the only thing he craved, an equal. He kissed her and saved her and at the same time, took away any hope of complete happiness because he could not let her die, and, she had realised in a burst of happiness, because he loved her.

It was all gone now though. Her brain had hidden it all at the back of her mind, along with the memory of the pain, to save itself from the anguish that remembering would provoke. All that Rose could remember was a deep sadness, mixed in with flashes of agony and light and fire.

And now he was gone.

Except that she couldn't even grieve for the loss that she felt because he wasn't gone, not really. She needed to cry, and mourn and then move on, but she couldn't, didn't have time because he was still there, just wrong, and he expected her to understand, seemed to have forgotten that she was only human and needed time because she still didn't believe that it was really him, still wished that he hadn't left her feeling so alone. Even the TARDIS seemed to have moved on, accepted the new Doctor, and she couldn't understand, not yet. So, she did the only thing she could, and locked the pain and loss and sadness away in a drawer, to sift through later, when things had calmed down.

Then, she would keep going. She would keep helping him, even if he was different, because she had seen the goodness in him. She would help him at all costs, because he deserved it. He deserved someone to care for him, and help him and keep him safe. He deserved that right, even if everything else was taken away.

The TARDIS jolted and she knew that they had landed again. She stood up and stretched, feeling her joints cracking, then, picking up her jumper from the chair in the corner, left the room to find the Doctor, leaving all the sadness behind, for now.

TBC…..