No Compromises: Chapter 1

Pete's World, Present Day

5:30 PM

"Don't be ridiculous," Rose said sternly. "Whatever it is, I'm going with you."

"No. You're. Not." He couldn't let her win this one. Usually, she got whatever she wanted, but this time there could be no compromise.

"Doctor, I thought we've agreed that you don't need to protect me all the time, and I thought we agreed it a long time ago. I'm a top agent at Torchwood. I can handle any time, any place, any aliens. And you said you it was important! I should help!"

The Doctor sighed. It wasn't that he didn't think she could "handle" this journey. But he couldn't tell her that, either. So he just stood there, in their kitchen, staring at her dumbly, mustering all of his strength to not just run out, knowing it would infuriate Rose.

"Doctor, I'm not a little girl anymore. We're married for god's sake. Equals, yeah? So tell me why you feel the need to exclude me from this trip of yours on our TARDIS when she's only just gotten to the point where we can actually use her."

"It's just something I have to take care of on my own." The Doctor felt the anger that always hid deep inside him slowly prickling beneath the surface. He couldn't engage in this anymore for the sake of Rose's feelings. She was asking questions he couldn't answer right now, and he had no time to be arguing.

Rose noticed the way his jaw was set, the way his eyes had darkened but avoided her gaze. She rarely saw flashes of the "old" Doctor in her half-human husband these days, but he had all the same memories and sometimes that angst and pain got the better of him. She was sympathetic, but that wasn't an excuse for why he was being so evasive and short with her. "At least tell me where you're going. How long you'll be gone."

The more she badgered him, the less he could control himself. The Doctor snapped his head up and shouted through gritted teeth, "Why can't you just trust me?!"

Rose jumped, startled. He so rarely lost his temper with her in this way. Usually, he just brooded when something bothered him, until she dragged it out of him and they worked it out. She felt tears start to invade her eyes and blinked them back. She would not start crying like a little child because someone yelled at her. That was idiotic and also a weakness she didn't particularly want to show him at the moment. Her own anger rising, she shouted back. "I DO trust you, and you know that. But for you to just take off without telling me where you're going or why or when you'll be back is not fair and you know it."

"Don't talk to me about fair. If things were fair I wouldn't have had to make my best friend forget me. I wouldn't have lost you for two years. I wouldn't be stuck as a stupid human!" The last word was spoken with such disdain that the Doctor practically recoiled as he said it. An instant later, though, his whole body was flooded with regret. He'd taken it too far, had said too much.

Rose didn't bother stopping the tears this time. "Well. Nice to know what you really think. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go deal with my stupid human emotions," she said softly as she tread out of the room, every step heavy with sadness. The Doctor cringed at the sound of their bedroom door slamming. He had really hurt her, something he never meant to do – something he never, ever means to do. He longed to go to her, to tell her everything, to apologize and beg her to understand and not worry, but he couldn't. Besides, the current tension between them meant that she'd avoid asking him any more questions for awhile and that would keep her safer. He felt a tiny bit of reassurance at that, but couldn't think about this fight anymore. They'd been arguing for ten full minutes and time was of the essence; he had to get to the TARDIS now.

He scrawled a note on a piece of paper, left it on the kitchen table, and hurried out the back door to the garden where the TARDIS waited. He set to work at the console, putting in coordinates. From the bedroom, Rose heard the telltale grinding whir of the TARDIS taking off and cried harder.

The Doctor arrived at his first stop mere moments later. He'd only gone to the other end of London, to the woods not far from the Tyler Estate. His final destination wasn't somewhere he'd need the TARDIS to travel to, but he couldn't risk Rose finding out where he was going, so he wanted to leave the impression that he could be anywhere in the universe.

Little did she know, he wasn't going anywhere in this universe.

About an hour of walking and tube rides later, the Doctor was at Torchwood, prepping a dimension cannon to take him to his former universe – their former universe.

"I love you, Rose," he said aloud, and then he held his breath and activated the device. And with that, the most important journey of the Doctor's life began.

The journey to save Rose Tyler.