A windswept desolate beach, in the-middle-of-nowhere Norway. A curious blue box and a cluster of people. The same man in two different suits. A blonde woman who was close to tears. A blonde woman who had no idea what she would become.
"Alright, both of you answer me this."Rose Tyler stood between her tow Doctors, one in pinstripes, one in blue, and both in converse. "When I last stood on this beach on the worst day of my life, you said 'Rose Tyler…'now how was that sentence gonna end?" She stared pointedly at the pinstriped Time Lord.
He looked back at her, a great and terrible sadness and loss in his eyes and he said, his voice failing to mask his sorrow, "Does it really need saying?"
She stared back at him, incredulously and hurt. "Does it need saying?" her voice, starting as a whisper grew to a shout. She broke down into tears and started to pound on his chest with each sentence. "Does it need saying?" she cried. "I broke down the walls of the universe to hear you say it and now that I finally find you, you dump me back on the same stupid beach, with a look-alike grown from a hand. How do I know he's even you? It's like you can't wait to get rid of me!" Her arms dropped to her sides, but she raised her hands to cover her tears. "You must really hate me." She whispered audible only to herself and the two men beside her.
The Doctor couldn't help himself any longer. Giving a not-really-meant apologetic glance at his metacrisis, he reached out and enveloped Rose in a hug. He had meant to leave her here, let her be happy and safe even if it meant she would hate him. But the one thing in the universe he absolutely couldn't bear was to see Rose Tyler cry. He pulled away, just a little and tilted her head up to look at him. "No, not hate you, I could never hate you. I just want what's best for you, I want to see you smile, even if it would mean you would hate me. Rose, I-… I…I….."
Softly, afraid that he would find another excuse, hide behind the long dead rules that said he couldn't love her, she asked "What Doctor, what?"
He opened and closed his mouth, like a fish gasping in air. "Nothing, it's nothing…" he finally managed to choke out.
She looked again into his chocolate eyes, pain clearly showing in her own eyes, lighter than he remembered. Not hazel any longer, but honey colored. At first he couldn't comprehend what he was seeing, but as the first moan passed her lips and she crumpled into his arms he thought only of what he could have done, what he should have said now, what he should have said so long ago on the same beach. "Rose!" HE screamed as her tear-wracked body started to glow golden.
The Rose-that-wasn't-Rose slowly stood, and in the voice that wasn't her's, the lilting heart-wrenching double tone of time, told the Doctor this. "You, man of time who cannot admit your feelings no matter how many chances given you. Carefully orchestrated chances that shouldn't have been. You whose meeting was chance, but whose destiny is history. If you care about her only enough to palm her off to a shouldn't have been copy in an alternate universe know this. If you had once bothered to hear her out, to ask her just what she went through to get back to you, you would have had a happy ending. But the universe now demands a tragedy, and I am now powerless to prevent it. The odds are stacked against you, if you cannot find her are the end that is the beginning, all is lost, and forever stranded, she will become the heart, the shining one…" The Bad Wolf, the golden goddess of time stared at him, piercing his innermost soul and sang to him.
One Little Time Lord Running all Along
Running for Forever, Running after Rose,
Where the Time will take him,
No One ever knows,
One Little Time Lord Running after Rose.
The golden glow faded, and Rose's frightened eyes stared up at him. "Doctor?" she questioned, her voice growing fainter and fainter. Disbelieving, the battle scarred Time Lord watched the love of two of his lives disappear before his eyes.