Yet again, another XKCD inspired oneshot...

Title: Playgrounds
Rating: G
Disclaimer: I own neither the comic nor Doctor Who.
Notes:
I did look up the coordinates so those are accurate. :)

http :// imgs. xkcd. com/comics / dreamgirl. png

Seriously... go look at the comic.

Sunday… 2:35 in the afternoon… Martha looked around the empty playground in North Cambridge, Massachusetts in America.

There were no children, strangely enough. It made her think about the sad American stereotype of children being too involved in computers and video games to play on the swing sets and teeter totters of the sand box she was in now.

When the Doctor had told her that they were going to take a look at the trees that changed color in the fall in northeastern United States, she expected this romantic drive down a country road with orange and red leaves covering the sky and coloring the wind. She didn't expect a suburban neighborhood and an empty playground and hardly a tree in sight.

Then, again, she had a feeling that there was an ulterior motive to this trip. There were a hundred thousand other planets and she had a feeling that if she prodded enough there would be a planet where the leaves would turn purple and neon pink if you stood there long enough.

But there was something strange about the Doctor when she met him in the TARDIS console room that morning.

The Doctor looked like he slept in the console room chair and had just burst out of his seat. He was scribbling numbers as he mumbled about things being too impossible but that he had to try.

Martha sat on one of the rubber seats of a swing set, rocking back and forth, watching the Doctor standing in one specific spot. He even created an echo with his sonic screwdriver in to the ground and out to space so that he could stand in the exact coordinates that he was on now.

"Science is about precision," he said distractedly. "You should know all 'bout that, right? Being a doctor yourself? Can't slice a man's heart at a millimeter off your mark, can you? Right… Well…" Martha watched as his eyes turned skywards and then scanned the horizon.

"What are we doing here, Doctor?" Martha asked.

"I'll… I'll be just a minute. Promise… Really." He looked at his watch and frowned. "Well, maybe six minutes. But afterwards, off to the mountains…" The Doctor gave her one of his reassuring grins but she saw through it like glass. Martha gave him a weak smile in return and walked to the swings where she sat now.

2:37 pm and Martha saw the Doctor tense from her distance. His feet dug into the sand and he used the sonic screwdriver to make sure he was in place again. The Doctor's right hand clenched and unclenched repeatedly and he was turning pale.

2:38 pm and Martha saw the look of desperation in the Doctor's face. He spun around. His eyes watched every piece of movement in the world. Nothing seemed to escape his notice.

2:39 pm and Martha saw the Doctor run his hands through his hair. She might have imagined it but she thought she heard him growl in frustration. He made his way towards her and sat in the swing next to her without a word.

"What happened?" Martha stilled her swing and looked intently on the Doctor who was staring at the spot he was rooted on just moments earlier.

"I don't sleep often." The Doctor's voice was soft. It was completely devoid of the manic energy and charisma that made any woman fall in love him. His eyes were dull and his hair didn't even seem to have energy to be "big hair" today. "Time Lord. Much more efficient and just altogether better than all other humanoid physiologies, I think."

Martha rolled her eyes but let him continue.

"I slept last night," he said. "I dreamt about a girl…" Martha saw his eyes close and she could almost see him reliving his dream. "The world was dying. There were cracks between universes and we both knew, though we fought it tooth and nail… We both knew that we had very little time together…"

"Was she Rose?" Martha asked the obvious question but the Doctor didn't seem to hear.

"I dream of this girl quite often actually… Usually, she just falls into the chasm, screaming… Or maybe I was screaming… I can never really tell anymore… But last night was different… She held onto me before she fell and she whispered numbers. She whispered numbers that were a latitude and longitude. There was a date and a time.

"I thought maybe… I don't know. Maybe I'd see her again? That maybe she found a way back across the Void herself?"

Martha tilted her head, in question. "Well, did you?"

"Did I what?" His eyes opened and Martha saw the traces of tears.

"Did you see her?"

The Doctor sighed. "I wanted to…"

"But DID you?"

"It turns out wanting something doesn't make it real," the Doctor murmured. His hands rose to clutch at the chains of his swing. Martha watched as they suddenly clenched and the Doctor closed his eyes again. This time a tear managed to escape.

"What's wrong?" Martha sensed that there was something different in his closed eyes.

"I thought… For a moment, I just thought that…" His eyes were open again and the insincere happiness that so often plagues his features appeared again. "But I know better, of course."

Martha frowned.

"Come now," he grinned. He sat up and grabbed Martha's hand to run back towards the TARDIS. "The leaves don't put up their show if there's no audience… I mean they do.. But it wouldn't be a show if there was no audience now would there…"

Martha laughed nervously in reply.

What happened (or didn't happen) in that Massachusetts playground was never mentioned again.

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The blond woman sighed in disappointment as she trudged towards her own seat on a swing. The dark man in the seat next to her looked sympathetically on.

"This time, it was only a dream," Rose murmured. Her hand stretched out to meet Mickey's. "I really should've known." Her tears were threatening escape from her eyes again and as always she refused to fight them. "But after five years, I still somehow manage to hope."

"It's what he loved about you, Rose," Mickey said. "He knew you'd come, no matter where and when he called. It's one of the many things he loved about you."

"You don't know that he loves me," she chuckled softly. She let go of his hand and moved to clutch the chains of her swing. "He never even said—"

Her words were interrupted by a gasp. Her forehead tilted to her hands and she could swear that she could smell her Doctor's scent in the air around her. His cool hands were on hers at that very moment and suddenly it was gone.

Her eyes widened in a cry, as if her vocal urge to stop his movement would be heard across the universes but to no avail. He was gone and the feeling she had then was gone with him.

"I felt him. I felt him, Mickey," she grinned through her tears.

It really wasn't enough for Rose Tyler but it would tide her over. At least until another dream called to her again.