Had this written for ages, but life as been happening and I've been unable to post it. But it's up now, so that's that, I guess. Anywho, go forth and enjoy! Disclaimer- *promptly provides witty disclaimer*
London, March 27th, 2008
The Doctor walked the streets, breathing in the warm afternoon air, grateful to be outside for a while. Though this regeneration of him was far better suited for domestics than the last one (something that he most definitely blamed Rose for), there was still only so much he could take in one day, and as it would so happen, his limit for sitting still while Rose insisted on shopping was only about an hour. So here he was, just a few years in his companion's future, at two in the afternoon, with nothing to do and all the time in the world to do it. He turned a corner in the downtown, working his way down the street, both hands stuck inside of his coat's pockets while the rest of it trailed behind him. Casting glances left and right, examining his surroundings and making sure that nothing in the immediate area was about to explode or have hoards of hostile aliens come flooding out of it, his gaze eventually settled on something, and he came to a stop in his walk, turning to face what had captured his attention instead ; Something that served as a remembrance to a story he'd heard about for hundreds of years, through all of his travels, something that was irrevocably etched in space and time, something that, if these stories held any truth to them, he'd had a role in.
Something that resided in an indent between two buildings on the street he was walking down.
Something black, with white lettering that was roughly twenty feet tall and at least double that wide.
The Canary Wharf memorial.
The blocked, capitalized letters at the top of the stone spelled out exactly what it was, giving the whole thing a sense of finality.
He knew the gist of the story, of course. It was almost impossible not to. But he'd reserved himself from the details, even the most general ones. Because if what he's heard is true, and he really does play a part in it, then it's best that he doesn't know too much.
He knew that there had been a battle of some type, be tween whom, he hadn't the faintest, and he knew that there had been a great number of casualties in said battle.
Honestly, the was the extent of his knowledge. But, he thought, glancing over the thousands of names carved into the black stone wall, it couldn't hurt anything if he just looked at the memorial.
He glanced at the names, thousands of them ona conservative estimate, stamped into the stone, one after another. Most of them were unfamiliar, though a few he recognized. His eyes skimmed over the name 'Carl Harris', and he is momentarily stunned by the sheer volume of death and destruction caused by this battle, that it had managed to reach that far. He shook his head somewhat, continuing down the list of names. He flinched slightly and felt his spine stiffen as he came across the name 'Mary Harkness'.
Jack.
Harkness wasn't a very common surname after all, seeing as how it was from the 51st century. The Time Lord felt a twinge of happiness for the Immortal, that he'd found someone and settled down with them, at least for a while, that turned into a pang of sorrow because, in just a few years, Jack was going to lose that someone, that transformed into a gut wrenching guilt, because it was his fault that the good captain was stuck here and was immortal in the first place, his fault that he would forever be stuck in the cycle of loving and losing.
Quickly moving on from that particular name on the list before his mind wandered to the idea of actually going and visiting Jack and apologizing, because he knew that he was too much a coward for that, the Doctor continued scanning the list, looking for, but hoping that he would run across no more familiar names.
It was on the seventh column of names, a bit more than three fourths of the way down, that the Doctor's breathing hitched and he took, stumbled really, a step back.
"No..." He breathed. "No, no, no, no, no..."
Below 'John Novak', in the same white lettering as every other name, was yet another featureless addition to the list, one that may have been nearly meaningless to other passerby, but felt like a punch in the stomach to him.
'Rose Tyler'
~oOo~
Later
"-and so then I said, 'Shirene, that's'-" Rose broke off mid sentence, eyes trained on the Doctor, who had just a moments before had been piloting the TARDIS, but had stopped, instead focusing on Rose, expression blank, body motionless. eyebrows drawing together slightly, Rose took a step towards the Time Lord.
"You alright there?" She questioned. The Doctor blinked, hesitating only slightly before allowing a smile to light up his features , although the grin was equally as empty as his expression had been just seconds ago.
"I'm right as rain." He assured her. "Absolutely fine."
Rose arched a skeptical eyebrow but didn't push the issue, only too aware that any attempt to extract the truth from him would likely result in the Time Lord skating around the questions on dangerously thin ice. It would only be a matter of time before that ice broke and the Doctor fell through it, dragging along everyone else who was unfortunate enough to be there with him as well.
She let him lie.
Rose turned away and the Doctor let out a not quite audible sigh of relief.
He certainly hadn't meant to be looking at Rose like that, but...Her name on the memorial. It was bothering him, to say the least. Putting him on the verge f a full fledged panic attack was probably a more accurate evaluation of his current situation. He shook his head in a futile attempt to clear his mind of thoughts of the memorial.
Shooting one last glance at her, the Doctor pulled a final lever that sent the TARDIS into the deep and seemingly endless depths of space, a new, single minded purpose to take at least Rose's name pf that list.
Time could be re-written.
He'd be damned if he couldn't re-write that chapter.
~oOo~
Four months, six day, eighteen hours and thirty-two minutes later
He stands, pressed against the white wall, waiting, hoping, praying for her to come back, though he knows it to be useless. She's gone. Not quite in the same way he'd imagined when he'd first seen her name etched into the Canary Wharf memorial, but nonetheless, she's gone, never to return. And though he knows this, for the longest time he ignores it, insisting against the far more logical, but never quite as dominant part of himself that says that he should leave this place; Get back in the TARDIS, and never come back. Set the controls to random and move on with his life. Eventually though, the endurance of logic overpowers the passion of emotion, and he turns away, entering the TARDIS, feeling emptier than he has in a long time.
She's gone. She's gone, and though he'd known about this, known it would happen, it hadn't helped him in the least bit. He'd failed his companion, his friend, again. Another loss in the long line of failures. Ian, Barbra, Jamie, Adric, Ace, Susan, Jo, Sarah Jane-
And now there was Rose Tyler, tacked onto the end of that list.
He'd thought he'd grown hard in the last few years, had grown used to loss and pain and emptiness, but now, now he knows that he was wrong.
Maybe it will always hurt this much.
Maybe, one day, he'll go numb to it all.
He raises his hand to pull a lever, one that will pull him from the Time Vortex and land him God knows where. Somewhere in between wanting to pull the lever and actually doing it though, his momentum is lost and his hand falls to his side. Jaw clenched, he stumbles backwards from the console and collapses into the captain's chair.
He's done.
He's done with the love and the loss and the guilt and the running and the hiding and the shame and the hurt of everything.
He's just done.
And before he can think better of it, he curls up in the chair, wraps his arms around himself, and sobs.
~oOo~
"Of course there's a way, Amelia." The Doctor chastised, working his way around the TARDIS console. "I am sort of brilliant, you know."
"But it's not like you can just pop into the past and change things as you like." Pointed out Amy. "I mean, there's got to be some rules, right? Some limits?"
"Yeah." Agreed Rory from beside his wife. He hesitated a moment. "The universe in your hands, changed as you like? It's a bit scary to think about."
"I know what I'm doing..." The Time Lord muttered. "It's sort of in the name, isn't it? Time Lord? It'd be a bit pompous if we didn't know what we were playing with."
"But how can you just go back and change this stuff? Won't it change history?" Questioned Amy. At this, the Doctor stopped what he had been doing, turning around to face his companions. Glancing them over, he saw the slight worry that was present on their features.
'Change history'
His mind flashed back to Rose, back to Canary Wharf, back to that damned memorial he's seen, so many years ago by now. He'd known what was going to happen, had tried so hard to change it, and yet had still come up short in the end. Shaking his head slightly at this, he turns his attention back to Amy and Rory, who are still watching him, and does what he always does when his friends need him.
He puts up his mask, forces a smile that's too confident, too arrogant for it to be anything but faked, and says what he now knows to be a lie.
"Every second of every moment of history is constantly in flux, Amy. It'll be perfectly alright. After all, time can be re-written."
I don't know why I'm so cruel to my favorite characters. I just don't. But there's nothing that can be done about it I suppose, so I might as well just keep writing these things. Moving on, it would be awesome if you could be so kind as to leave a review telling me what you thought of this. Even if you dont, thanks for reading, have a fantastic day, and DFTBA!