Author's Note: You know, if I'd written about the Doctor turning his hand into a clone and sending it off with Rose in the alternate universe, it would have been laughable. And now it's canon. Funny, that. (Post Journey's End.)
He's not talking much, which is weird and wrong and out of place, just like he is. Rose keeps her gaze trained on the window, terrain rushing by like water. Which, she supposes, is appropriate, given that every time she takes a breath she feels like she's drowning.
He reaches for her, like he did on the beach, and she looks down to see the fingers of the hand that was cut off by the Sycorax grasping hers. She remembers how squeamish she had been to hold the re-grown hand when he'd first proffered it, fingers wriggling, her new new Doctor, and she grins spastically up at the face of his replacement.
"This is a bit weird," she says, a hysterical edge of laughter in her voice. She disengages her fingers from his, trying not to notice the way his face flashes with hurt and resignation, though maybe not that order. She can still hear his voice - not his voice, but the voice she'd dreamed of, waited for, sought out. An almost imperceptible cringe; does it need saying? You left me, she thinks, turning her head to the window again. You left me again, and I came all that way.
Jackie turns in her seat, flicking a glance at Rose and then opening a volley of chatter at the Doctor. Not the Doctor. "What are we calling you?" Rose asks, her voice cutting smoothly across her mother's.
The car is silent while the question is considered. Rose is pretty sure he's looking at her, but she doesn't lift her eyes. The back of the seat in front of her is textured like skin, and she wants to kiss him again, perversely. An angry kiss, one that involves teeth and claws and leaves both of them bloody.
"I don't know," he says, finally, and Jackie comes back to life, flinging suggestions at him while Rose goes back to her window, watching the imaginary distance between her and her Doctor spiraling out like forever.