Author's Note: I hope you all take the time to review! It's just a short piece but I'd still love to hear what you think. Set at the end of 10's reign.
Sometimes, he spent days inside the TARDIS, walking along the corridors. He'd find the swimming pool and the library (sometimes in the same place) or pop into the never-used kitchen (because the food other people offered him was so much more interesting). He walked into a tennis court he'd completely forgotten about and then into a room with a blackboard and desks – a classroom, though for what purpose he really had no idea.
This was his only home, and he liked that it was a mystery. He liked it because – he'd always be able to find what he needed if he needed it. And what wonders to explore! He was in the TARDIS every day of his life – it was his one and only possession and he treasured it greatly – and yet even that wasn't a constant.
Rooms disappeared sometimes to be archived and new ones would pop in. But never the important rooms. Those rooms remained where they were, like tiny bubbles of necessary memory.
He had days left. The Ood had spoken of the end and he was certain they were right. New face meant new perceptions on the world, even if the memories were the same.
So – he took a last stroll through his TARDIS.
He poked his head into Martha's room. She had left a few hair scrunchies on the bed-side table and a book she had borrowed from the library was on her pillow – Grey's Anatomy, of all things – had she really thought she'd get any studying done while being whisked around the world on adventures with him?
A few more corridors over was where Jack had stayed during his brief time on the TARDIS. He hadn't had much time to personalize it to his taste but he did have a small photograph pinned to the wall next to the bed – an older couple were smiling out of it. Jack's parents? He had never noticed nor thought to ask.
There was a small alcove near the kitchens with a huge bean-bag chair in the corner. It was still indented from the few nights Micky had stayed there, and on the floor next to it was an empty water glass and a pair of Rose's shoes. The Doctor felt his heart clench tightly for a moment and then release.
Donna's room had hat boxes in it, still. He'd given all of her things back to her when she left, of course, but in the confusion of unpacking, the hats had just been thrown on top of the piles of clothing for Donna's mother to sort through while she slept through yet another great adventure. He ran his hands over the lid of the box and wondered – as he had wondered every day since he had left her – if she were happy.
Rose's room was the hardest to walk into, partly because she had inhabited it the longest. She had stayed with him, even through regeneration, and he couldn't help but wonder, had things been different, if she would still be beside him, learning to love yet another version of him. Well, yes of course she would. A jacket was hung over the post at the end of the bed and the covers were pulled down as if she had only just woken up. She had pictures of Micky and her mother and her friends from her old life taped to the wall and in the center was one of him, the Doctor, and Rose grinning like idiots in a picture that she had forced him into taking at a tourist location on one of the many planets they had visited together.
They looked happy. Were they happy? Rose and the Doctor? Because they were together, after all.
The Doctor had to keep reminding himself of that. He was with Rose. Or – one version of him was with her, anyway. He sunk to the bed, running a hand over his face.
New face, new perceptions. When he was a different person – a new man – would this room still make his heart pound and his fists clench? Would he still be haunted by the what-ifs and could-have-beens?
He didn't want to change, but perhaps it would be a relief to escape the loneliness.
Author's Note: No matter how many times I watch 10's last moments on the show, I still cry like a baby.