She showed up at his flat without warning. He'd forgotten until the moment she shoved the door open that she still had a key. Of course she did, though. As if he'd ever ask for it back. Never again.

Lying on the bed, with the television playing something brainless that he wasn't even concentrating on before she strode furiously into his bedroom demanding his full attention, he really had nowhere to go to retreat from her glower.

"Were you even gonna tell me?" she shouted. "A phone call would have been a start! I had to hear it from Suzanne at work! D'you know how that made me feel?"

He wanted to be annoyed by her selfishness in that moment. He wasn't. He'd probably be saying much the same things in her place. She was hurt – rightly so – and there was no one else to take it out on.

But that was the point. He hadn't wanted to hurt her any more than necessary. He hadn't wanted her to have to see him like this.

"Rose," he entreated. His voice came out weaker than he intended.

Her expression softened and the fight seemed to go out of her. "Oh, Doctor," she said, her words nearly lost in a mumble.

He held out a hand to her, wincing, and she stepped towards him, sliding into the bed beside him and curling against the left side of his body.

He wished the contact didn't hurt.

"How long?" she asked, her warm breath stirring his hair across his ear.

The Doctor turned over, ignoring the way it hurt, so that he could look at her properly. His legs tangled with hers accidentally in the process. Neither of them complained.

"Weeks," the Doctor admitted. "Maybe less."

Rose avoided his eyes, instead burying her head in his shoulder and shaking it slightly against him in denial.

"But you can't. You're a Time Lord."

The Doctor sighed. "I'm as much human as anything else these days. And humans get sick."

"If we could just get the Cannon workin' again, and get back to him, he could fix you," Rose entreated.

"We can't," the Doctor said. "The walls have closed fully. The Cannon is useless."

"Then go to hospital! At least give them the chance."

"They can't help," the Doctor said gently. "All they can do is prolong it a bit. I've lived too long to want that. And I don't want to be in some sterile 21st century hospital room when..."

His shoulder felt damp, suddenly, and the Doctor realised Rose was crying. She fisted her hands in his shirt and shook slightly.

This was what he'd wanted so badly to avoid. Not having to witness her grief, so much. That didn't matter. It was that he hadn't wanted her to have to go through this with him. The powerlessness of waiting, and knowing.

And, well, he hadn't quite wanted to find out whether she'd be willing to go through it with him, either, after that last raging fight. The things that had been said... And it had been months since they'd seen each other last. He hadn't wanted to risk learning that he'd managed to push her away for good now, right before...

"You can't leave me," Rose whispered against him. "You can't. You promised me you'd grow old with me, remember?" She pulled away enough to raise her reddened eyes to his, meeting his gaze for the first time since entering the room. "Remember that? You said you'd spend your life with me, and we've wasted all this time apart, and you can't ..."

The physical pain of hugging her was nothing compared to the hurt of not having her pressed tightly against him at that moment, so he tolerated it without complaint.

"Don't leave me," she whispered. "I can't ... I don't know how to be here without you waitin' for me. I couldn't do it last time. I can't go through that again. I just can't." Her voice broke on the last word.

"Rose Tyler," the Doctor said with a low, forced chuckle. "You're brilliant. You never needed me."

A loud sob escaped from her, then, and it was all the Doctor could do not to join her in tears.

He had a lot of bits of Donna in him that showed up unexpectedly, but not that part. Not the part that didn't think the universe would shatter apart if he dared to cry. That idea still eluded him, no matter that his emotions were now much closer to human than they'd ever been prior to the metacrisis.

"I always need you," Rose whimpered. "You don't even know how many times I ended up on your doorstep with the key out ready these last few months. If you're not here..."

She'd been so close, and he hadn't known it. His single heart would have broken, in that moment, if it wasn't already defective.

"You've still got your Mum and Pete. And Tony. And there's always Torchwood."

"Shut up," she demanded. "I don't want all of that. Not if it means I have to watch you..."

Die.

The word hung in the air between them like an impenetrable fog.

He'd always thought, when she'd been travelling with him, that he'd be one to have to live on without her. Then he'd let himself hope that maybe they could have each other for their whole lives when he'd become part-human.

He'd never imagined this.

"You don't have to watch," the Doctor offered. He'd never intended that for her, anyway.

"Don't be more of an idiot than you can help," she with a miserable sort of half-laugh. "Just because you're leavin' me doesn't mean I'm ever gonna leave you."

The Doctor didn't know what to say to that, so he merely clutched at her harder.

"I'm gonna stay with you forever," she promised shakily.

Neither of them voiced the obvious truth of which they were both so aware.

Forever wasn't going to last much longer.

~FIN~