A/N: Circumstances seem to suck any goodness out of life recently, but while I was watching the end of "The Big Bang," this just came to me.I hope you enjoy.
Her Name Is River
"Her name was Rose."
River stood in the doorway of a room she'd never been in before. The walls were pink, the color of the Pink Bubblegum Ice Cream she had once tried on twenty-first century Earth. Everything was pink. So blindingly so, that it was almost as if walking into another dimension. Without entering nor turning around she asked, "What happened to her?"
"She got trapped in another universe, one that's closed off from this one forever."
River's eyes swept across Rose's dressers, before finally landing on a photograph by the bed. She took a daring step across the threshold and moved as silent as a feline across the pale pink carpet. She could still pick up a whiff of fragrance in the room from a long forgotten perfume, trapped in the fibers of the bed sheets, which had been locked inside for as long as that door had remained closed. She delicately wrapped her hands around the photograph and lifted it from its spot, leaving a few clean lines in the dust. "I remember this one," she said quietly. "He took me to Asgard."
The Doctor hovered in the doorway, watching River as she brushed her finger along the edge of the frame, wiping away the layers of dust. He fingered his burgundy bow tie contemplatively, then sunk one large leather boot onto the pink floor for the very first time. Step by step, he came closer to his future and closer to his past until he was close enough to lay his hand on the wrist of the first. "I took you to Asgard," he corrected. "I may change my face, but I'm still the same in here." He crossed his hands over his chest like a pharaoh and rested his hands across his hearts.
"Do you still love her?" The question seemed to catch him off guard and she saw it, in the briefest fraction of a fraction. It wasn't unusual for her to catch him off guard, but not like that.
"I love all my companions."
River shook her bush of ginger curls. "Are you still in love with her?"
"What would make you assume-"
"I'm not an ass and neither are you. Answer my question, Doctor."
The Doctor slid his fingers up the back of her hand that held the frame and encased it in his. Minutes seemed to pass like centuries until he finally pushed his hand up just a sliver more and took the frame from her hand. His eyes were silent as he examined the ferocious smile, bulging eyes, and spiky hair of his former face who stood next to the petite blonde with the full pink lips. "I loved her once."
"Do you love her now?"
"When I found Rose, it was after the Time War. I was full of madness and hate and fervor then. She was young and fresh and…human. I've always been attracted to humans because of their humanity; I've always wanted to emulate it and after the War, Rose reminded me of that. I latched onto her and didn't even realize."
"And she latched onto you in return?" River surmised. "But that's nothing new: we all do. We all fall madly in love with you, Doctor. Don't we?"
"She did, and she thought she would stay forever with me, until – until Canary Wharf."
"The alternate universe?"
"Yes."
"I'm sorry." There was no malice in her voice, no jealousy, just an ache for not what she had lost, but for what he had lost.
"No." The Doctor shook his head as he admired the photograph. "Rose's story isn't a sad one, not really. You see, you remember what I told you about Donna, don't you?"
"Donna Noble?" River questioned rhetorically. "Of course," she grinned. "'The most important woman in the whole of creation!' I regret I was never able to meet her, before…"
The Doctor smiled slightly. "You never know," he cautioned. "Well," he continued before she could think of what he meant by that, "the meta crisis that turned her half Timelord was a two-way meta crisis and from my hand, it birthed a whole new clone of me." He pressed the pad of his index finger to his tenth generation.
"Like a starfish?"
"Precisely. Only he was half Donna; half human."
"He only had one heart?"
"And one life. But my face and all of my memories. And also, having been created in the heat and blood of the battle with Davros, the penchant for blood that I'd had when I first met Rose. At the same time that the stars were going out, Rose managed to break back through to this universe-"
"And before she went back, you sent your clone with her?"
"As quick to piece it together as always," he complimented with the genuine smile he always reserved for River.
"And quick enough to know, you still haven't answered my question. Or maybe, that in and of itself is answer enough. Not that – not that I'm trying to pry, I just…"
"Want to know where my hearts lie. That's…nothing to be ashamed of." The Doctor stole one last glance at the photo and then replaced it to its dusty resting spot on the dresser, before taking River's face in his hands. "Rose Tyler was a human girl that I loved, just the same as I love all of my companions," he emphasized again. "You're right, though, she did mean more to me than others and from time to time, that happens. Rose will always have a place in my heart, just like Amy and Rory and Donna and Jack, but am I in love with her? No."
"Would that answer be different if Canary Wharf hadn't happened? If the meta crisis had never taken place?"
"No."
"How can you be so sure?"
"Because Rose served a purpose in my life, but she was not the one I'm willing to give my name to."
"Your name?" River asked, her eyes brimming with confusion. "It's not as if there haven't been Mrs. 'Smiths' before. Queen Elizabeth, for example. And that, may I remind you, is just an illusion anyway."
The Doctor held his finger to her lips. "Not that name," he explained softly, as he lifted her hand to look at the glowing red Gallifreyan diamond on her ring finger. "My real name. There is only living being that knows it and that's me: it's my biggest secret and the single thing that holds the most power over anyone and there's only one way I can tell it."
"H-how?"
The Doctor took her by the hand, the same way she'd done that same day in The Library when they'd run from the Vashta Nerada, and walked her to the door. "During my wedding vows. But not in the traditional Earth ceremony as you might think, otherwise you would be correct, many Earth women – including Her Majesty – would already know it. No, I mean during a traditional Gallifreyan wedding ritual."
"But I'm not even a Timelady," she pointed out in surprise.
"No, you're not. You're so much more than that: you're the only woman I've ever wanted to marry in the ancient traditions of my race." The Doctor closed his hand around the door knob on Rose's room and closed it with a soft click. "There's only one being in the whole of time and space that's my equal, who I love without condition. Her name is River."