Red Bicycle

by dragonchrysalis

"Who says I'm not, red bicycle when you were twelve?" Set just after Journey's End, the Doctor wallows in his inevitable loneliness. That is, until he remembers something seemingly inconsequential: Rose got a red bicycle for Christmas when she was 12. What follows is a wild, heartbreaking quest to give twelve year old Rose Tyler the one thing she wants most in the world.

The TARDIS was too quiet; eerily quiet, really. No matter how many times he had heard various people exclaim "It's bigger on the inside!" he had never thought of the TARDIS as big. Now, though, he looked around and acutely felt the ache of the empty space. He never knew loneliness could hurt this much. Chalk it up to another thing he hadn't learned in 900 plus years.

Martha had Tom; Rose had her mother, bless that wonderful Jackie Tyler. Even Donna, who would never remember a thing, would always have Wilf to take care of her. That man would go to the ends of the earth for his granddaughter. And Jack, well, Jack would always find someone, even if it was just a one night stand. Jack would be okay. That left the Doctor, alone again. Somehow it always seemed to end up this way.

Almost unconsciously, he started pacing around the console room, his feet tracing the places where just hours before, six people had stood, flying the TARDIS the way it was meant to be flown. Unbidden, a memory floated into his head, of a time when he was happy and naïve. A time when his face, his old face, was alight with glee….

"Everybody lives, Rose!" He was beaming, nearly skipping with joy. "Just this once, everybody lives!"

Hah. Like that ever lasted for long.

"Look at you, beaming away like you're Father Christmas!" Rose had teased with a giggle. He smirked.

"Who says I'm not, red bicycle when you were twelve?"

At the time it had just slipped out. He didn't think much of it. He had laughed at the expression on Rose's face and then forgot all about it. But now…

Sometimes things…happened, to Time Lords. Similar to déjà vu, actually, because that's where humans got the concept from. They would remember things they did in the past, though they were things from future regenerations. It was all quite confusing and very timey wimey, but it wasn't unheard of.

And in that instant, the Doctor knew what he had to do. He whirled around, full of purpose once again, and frantically started flipping switches and turning knobs. He set the TARDIS to land in December 1998, just before the 12th Christmas in the life of a little, unremarkable pink and yellow girl.

"Oh, fantastic!"