Journey's Beginning
The TARDIS's engines wheezed sadly as her Time Rotor came to a halt, recognizing her destination for what it was and knowing what her Lord had decided would have to be done. Her sensors picking up on his internal struggle she sent a silent hum to brush against his mind, telling him how much it hurt her, too, to let go of their Wolf but also supporting him in his desicion.
Before her timelines lay unraveled, the future disclosed. She knew their Rose had to walk a different path, glow brightly in a world that was not their own. They had to let her go. But not without one last embrace, not without a reminder of what would always be her home.
'Give them this, my Thief' she whispered, only for him to hear. 'Give them a part of me so that they may remember. He will take her to the stars again, you know that he will. Give them this.'
Next to the Doctor a golden shimmer flared, illuminating a small branch at one of the coral struts – a bud, a seed if nothing else. For a moment he just regarded it, new as it was to him, brown eyes dark with the burden he would soon carry. Dark with the knowledge that once again he would leave her behind.
"But not alone. She won't be alone this time."
He almost jumped when Donna's voice suddenly sounded from behind him, her tone compassionate and understanding as somehow she picked up on his thoughts.
"You will still be with her, as the one she got to know. And you'll be able to live the life you always wanted with her. Isn't that good?"
He nodded, hesitantly, debating with himself whether it really was. Because he would not create new memories, would not share all what he offered her; because he would still lose her, in the end.
'You would always have. In this body you would. But his life is bound to hers, and you are him. It is your forever.'
Again the bud glowed and this time the Doctor reached for it, tugged gently until it came loose. He clasped it in long, cold fingers and drew in a deep breath. The choice was made, his own timeline forever connected with hers. With him – the one he had been before – it would follow the golden trace for as long as this universe allowed. He did the right thing. For her, always for her.
"We must go, they're waiting."
A sigh and his shoulders tensing as he pocketed the TARDIS's gift, feeling how a miniscule trace of life was stored deep within it - a part of his ship's consciousness that she was giving to her Wolf.
Beside him Donna gave a small smile, waited until he got into motion. Back towards this other him and towards her. One last time. To say goodbye forever.
.o.
Rose trailed slowly after Jackie as the doors opened before them. She knew where the TARDIS had landed them, knew that their last trip was to take her mother home. She had made her farewells long ago, each time she had departed to search foreign universes only to find her Doctor and yet now she was apprehensive, coming to a halt before the salty air could even register in her nose.
Something felt strange, out of place, adding to that uneasy feeling that came with leaving her family behind. Again.
It took her a little while but finally she recognized the sensation, turned slightly to see his gaze on her – heavy and grey and betraying him.
He watched her from where he stood close to the console, hands buried deep in the pockets of his leather jacket. Stance upright, he looked every bit the man she had once run away with and yet in his eyes she saw what he would reveal to no one else but her: His amazement upon seeing her again, like this, his doubts about who he was to her, whether she still remembered.
She herself had been no less shaken to watch him emerge from a TARDIS they had all thought destroyed, still couldn't really comprehend what had brought him back to existence. The man she had lost in a golden blaze, the one who had vanished from her life, so suddenly – leaving her heart-broken and mourning.
He had told her something about biological meta-crisis and remembering everything, about bearing her pinstriped Doctor's memories as well while they had steered his trusty ship, all of them together. She had not answered then, still too overwhelmed and even now she didn't quite know what to make of it. What to think of him, what to expect.
Outside, she heard her mum chatter about Tony to the Doctor she had crossed dimensions for, joking about how she would have named the child after the alien she had only come to truly accept as a part of her life after he had regenerated. Strangely unfair, that.
He laughed, pleased with the easiness with which she treated him – a stark contrast to the frown her first Doctor carried.
"You wanna come?"
The words were out before she'd even thought about them, hazel eyes widening a split second while her own voice rang in her ears. Warm, hopeful, and laced with pain.
"Sure you want me there?"
His own one was gruff, maybe even defeated - right as if he felt like an intruder who did not belong into their world anymore.
"S my mum we're saying bye to." She shrugged, as if that was good enough a reason. And somehow, to him, it was. This was important to her, though hard, and she invited him in. To be part of her life again, even if just for so short a time and he would not pass up the offer.
Nodding curtly, he strode over to where she was, clenching his hands into fists behind the leather as he fought the urge to reach out and lace his once again callused fingers through hers. He had no right to do that anymore he reckoned, recalled the words that had never been answered – carried the knowledge of who they had been meant for. And so he just walked her by, dipped his chin slightly as he motioned for her to go ahead - missing the look that flashed over her features as he moved past, just like he did the twitch that travelled her right hand.
While from behind Donna breathed a silent sigh, the two of them walked out onto the sand, closely followed by the redhead.
"There we are again."
Muttered under her breath, Rose's words nearly got lost between the rustling of the waves and the breeze but Jackie Tyler heard her nevertheless.
A sympathetic smile ghosted over the older woman's lips while she turned away from the Doctor she had been talking to, knowing well what this place meant to her daughter. While she had found a new home in this universe, maybe even a better life, Rose had lost hers on this beach. And she was about to lose it again. The blonde could see it in those brown eyes that regarded her child with longing and regret, a truth written in their dark that for reasons that eluded her was veiled to the one he did this for.
She saw it in the redhead's gaze, too, and she breathed heavier for it. Getting her daughter back should have made her happy – in a way it even did – but all the same it also burdened her. For she knew that once more Rose's heart would be broken. And it would be her task, again, to try and mend what could not be repaired.
Steeling herself for the inevitable, Jackie finally affirmed "Back home" and let her gaze soften, determined to help her child in whichever way she could. And if that only meant being there for her when for the second time her world would fall apart.
Next to her the Time Lord suddenly tensed up, stepping away from her somewhat before he released a long breath, finally dropping the bomb.
"Where you both belong."
One heartbeat. Another one.
Then hazel eyes widened in confusion.
"What?" Rose's question was but a whisper on the wind but all the same it sounded like thunder in its rawness. Her eyes were on him in an instant, boring into his and demanding for an answer.
Squaring his shoulders, he didn't flinch under her burning stare, just willed her to understand.
"The walls between the universes are closing again, you've got to go home."
"But, this isn't home" she insisted, drawing back from him and her mother as if she had been burnt "You know it isn't. I spent all that time trying to find you, I will not" she had to suppress a shiver "I won't stay here."
He sighed silently, fighting to not show her his own anguish over the choice that he had made.
"But you must." He wanted her to see, desperately wanted her to comprehend why there was no other way. But he had yet to find the words with which he could accomplish that, casting a glance towards Donna who he knew was his only help in this.
The young woman stood back a little, watching the scene and ready to speak up for the man who was like a brother to her when not far from her the other Doctor suddenly ground out: "She needn't do anything. If she doesn't want to, you can't make her stay. It's her choice not yours."
He was angry, that much was easy to tell. His Northern accent sounded harsh and defensive, catching everyone by surprise.
"But it isn't, that's the whole point about it." While his meta-crisis self narrowed pale blue eyes at him, the double-hearted Doctor let his shoulders sink, shifting his attention to the one he had once been.
"We saved the universe today, all of the universes, but at a cost." And suddenly his eyes, too narrowed – hurt and disappointment flashing in the brown. "And the cost is you."
"I am you" There was a growl in how the leather-clad man spoke "And it has nothin' to do with Rose!"
"It has everything to do with her. You destroyed the Daleks, you committed genocide. Again." The Time Lord's gaze was cold and accusing, making it easier for the woman next to him to choose a side if ever she could. "You were born in battle, twice, full of blood and anger and revenge. Too dangerous to be left alone."
He watched his other self deflate the very moment he reminded him of the circumstances of his creation and why his genetic code had been chosen, watched as haunted pale eyes flickered to look horror-stricken at Rose, guilt now seeping into them like a shadow.
"She's got to stay. To look after you" his tone softened then, belying his true intentions "like she has done before."
It took several beats of his twin-hearts before the Doctor could tear his gaze from the one he had originated from, needed Rose to release a shuddered breath to break his focus.
"But" she swallowed hard, forcing the air to pass her tightening throat "he's not you."
Although her words spoke of something different she sounded doubtful, torn between what her mind seemed to know and what something deep inside insisted was true instead.
"He is me when we first met, and he needs you. We always have." Suddenly it was his own voice that nearly broke while he regarded her, taking her in with eyes that he knew were to never see her like this again. "You made us better, and you can do it again."
He was pleading by now, pleading with her to not make it any harder on him.
All the while, around them Jackie and her first Doctor stood still, lost in their own thoughts when suddenly Donna stepped forward, recognizing that the young blonde did not yet understand.
"There's more to it than that though" she said, locking her gaze with Rose's. "Don't you see what he's trying to give you? A chance to start all over." Then she glanced at the single-hearted man, encouraging him. "Tell her. Go on."
While Donna had never gotten to travel with this version of the Doctor she knew him, knew him just as well as she did the Time Lord who had chosen her as his companion.
They were one, connected in the love they felt for this one human – their pink and yellow girl. Both of them had always been frightened, frightened to lose her to time and old age, scared of a future that would be devoid of her presence – an eternity to spend without her by their side. This was their chance to live without that fear, and she wouldn't let them pass on it.
"Tell her" she prodded again, nodding as she reached out with her mind, nudging him like his ship would have always done – making him comprehend what her Doctor was truly giving him.
He gasped as finally he took her point, almost recoiled as Rose turned to look at him, searching his face for something even she herself didn't know to name.
"I" he began but faltered, arching his back and suppressing the urge to run. Rose's gaze was fixed on him, open and yet surrounded by a wall that he could not penetrate, try as he might. She was waiting for him to give her a reason, to explain what Donna would not reveal. Thrown back in time and into a world that wasn't her own she wanted him to make it right, like he had before, like he always would. But he had betrayed her, more than once. And the offer felt like that, too – like treason.
"It's no' just the looks, Rose" he finally found the strength to continue, although where that strength came from he did not know, choosing his words as wisely as he could "it's me, too. Inside. Am who I was before, when we were still travellin'. Complete with the daft old face an' the stupid grins."
He forced his lips to curl, a pathetic attempt to make her smile but she only frowned at him, bewildered.
His shoulders slumped then.
"Got all the memories, all the thoughts. 'S all the same, 'cept-"
There were tears in her eyes, almost brimming over, an old hurt melting into her gaze that had his single heart beat painfully against his chest. He could still remember the way she had looked at him after his regeneration, remembered how she had cried over him, this him – the one he was now – and he saw it all surface anew. She looked at him and in her eyes he didn't see the woman she had become, because in their depths His Rose awakened as if she had risen from a slumber. Yearning and wounded, lost and alone.
"Have only got one heart this time 'round. " How he managed to let his voice sound so steady he had no idea. He was shaking, and while no one else seemed to notice he knew that Rose did.
Tentatively, she took a step towards him, quivering lips parting to ask what echoed in her mind: "What's that mean?"
There was an odd kind of curiosity in her tone, a foreboding that unsettled him as much as it amazed him.
"It means that I'm part human. I will age, no funny tricks anymore. No regeneration. Just … jus' this one heart." He added the last bit as kind of an explanation, shifting his weight to his other foot uneasily while he gauged her reaction.
The frown on her face intensified, her mind reeling to catch up with what he had just told.
"You'll grow old?" she finally exhaled "Same time as me?"
He could suddenly hear her past self, almost choked when he became aware of what lay in her voice was above everything else – hope.
Numbly, he shook his head yes.
"Only got this one life now, Rose" Inside, this lone precious organ that now sustained his whole fragile new body started thrumming against its confines, reminding him of the painful truth of what he said, making him feel incredibly vulnerable as he prepared to finish what he had begun. "We … could spend it together. If you want."
Blood rushed in his ears, creating a noise that was disconcerting as much as it was annoying but he ignored it all when Rose advanced him, a single stubborn tear trailing down her face.
"A life together?"
She reached out for him with a shaking hand, warm fingertips settling on where his jacket left his jumper exposed - right above his heart.
Feeling the beat underneath them and the warmth that he emitted she looked up at him in wonder, unbelieving and yet longing for what she had always thought she could never have.
"For as long as you will have it."
His breath caught in his throat, a burning sensation that came with her presence, with her touch. Hesitantly, as if he feared she might just disappear the moment he moved he lifted his own hand, curled long fingers about hers and squeezed them gently. He didn't know if it was enough, if it could ever be enough for her. He wasn't the man she had fought for, wasn't the one she had returned for and a part of him broke under the burden that this knowledge was to him. And still he offered his future to her, this fleeting glimpse in time that was the only thing he had left to give.
While she turned her palm away from the soft fabric that he wore, hazel gaze on how her fingers intertwined with his without her demanding them to, naturally as if they had never been parted, she felt herself drown in this moment – in what was returned to her. And she wanted to believe, this part of her that had never stopped missing him blazing and consuming her, holding on to him so that he might never vanish from her life again.
She hardly registered when from behind her pinstriped Doctor spoke up, telling about something that they both better take with them. The promise of a life among the stars.
'My gift to you and your Thief.'
She heard the TARDIS in her head, whispering, a sound like chimes ancient and new, startling her.
'I will grow once more, my Wolf, for you and for him. When the time has come we will be one again.'
Unconsciously she brought her free hand up, grasped at familiar black leather for support, unable to decipher whether what she heard was real and yet recognizing, somehow, the voice with which the ship spoke. As if she had encountered it before.
She felt him glance down at her just before he unfurled his left arm, accepted the coral bud while he listened intently to Donna's rambling speech – words that held no meaning to Rose but which obviously were rather intelligible for the two men.
"Wouldn't 'ave thought of that. Quite clever, that's what you are."
Almost she could hear the appreciative smile her first Doctor bestowed upon the redhead, felt him store the precious item away in this pocket that still was trans-dimensional.
"Oh, and" this time it was him who spoke up – the man she had grown to love as much as the one whose warmth invaded her like a gentle haze. "I reckon you might find this to be useful."
Another item tossed, her hand slipping from the Doctor's as he caught the device, grey eyes wide in surprise.
"That's your screw-driver" Rose mumbled as she, too, caught sight of what had been exchanged. "But… don't you need it?"
"Nah" the Time Lord smirked, brown gaze for once alit and content "made myself a copy. This one's for you."
For a moment it seemed he wished to say more, like there was something else he wanted them to know but suddenly the TARDIS wheezed behind them, reminding them of that time was running short. His smile died that very instant.
"We got to go" he clarified for her as much as himself "this reality is sealing itself off. Forever."
While she tore away from the Doctor who was all leather and human, the Time Lord spun on his heels, not bearing to look her in the eyes when he knew she couldn't possibly just accept what had been decided on for her.
"But it's not right." Her voice was close to breaking, revealing her inner struggle to understand. "He's… The Doctor, it's still you." She bit her lip then, face pallid and tears upon her cheeks. Lost and forlorn as she was.
"And I was him." His tone was rough, very nearly cold even but underneath there lay a truth he had always dreaded to lay open. Yet as he saw her he knew he could not keep it from her any longer. "He became me for you, Rose Tyler. And he would do it again if he had to."
There was a sharp intake of air and her head jerking up as she realized what he was telling her, read between the lines and decoded the meaning of his disclosure.
"Is that true?" She breathed, lips trembling and hazel gaze back on sharp features and pale eyes that shied away from her, strangely sad and haunted. "Did you regenerate because of me?"
He opened his mouth as if to speak but no sound would follow the move. There was just the wind and the sea. In the end it was his silence that was her answer.
"All right then" her heart hammered within her as she spoke, voices, images tumbling through her mind, tormenting her with a newfound knowledge but also kindled feelings she had once buried in the deepest recesses of her memory.
"Both of you, answer me this." She had to know, know now before she shattered. Needed them to not hide from her any longer. "When I last stood on this beach on the worst day of my life" her gaze flickered between them, took them both in alternately as her first Doctor walked up to her reluctantly "What was the last thing you said to me? What would you have said?"
Her breaths came quick and short, her chest rising and falling in an agitated rhythm while she turned to the full Time Lord first. A part of her wanted him to say it, wanted to hear the words from him. Another wanted him to fall silent.
He did.
Does it need saying? She could have said yes, could have replied what he should not have been asking for in the first place. But she turned instead, gathered whatever strength she had left within herself to whisper.
"And you, Doctor" her voice almost cracked, calling him by his name for the first time since he had returned to her "How would that sentence have ended?"
A muscle worked in his jaw while he regarded her, his eyes suddenly blue and his soul laid bare in front of her. In their depths she could see him fight – against things he had always kept from her, saw when finally he appeared to make a choice because he had nothing left to lose, save her.
And so he leant forwards, lifted long fingers to ease a strand of hair behind her left ear, his thumb brushing against her skin gingerly, almost reverently. Reveling in the sensation – right as if it was the most wonderful thing he ever had experienced.
"It would've ended like it always would" he offered, bending down as he lowered his lips to the crown of her head, allowing them to ghost over it before he exhaled, murmured into her hair, low but solemnly.
"I love you. I shouldn't but I do."
He drew back before she even could react, leaving her to stare at him with eyes that again weren't her current ones anymore but which belonged to that version of herself who had lost him that day on the Game Station, in the wake of their fate.
The sob that left her shook her body, the relief in the muffled sound reverberating in her system only to be replaced a moment later by a longing for his presence that washed over her like a tidal wave.
Her hands sought purchase in his jumper albeit her senses seemed to have shut down on her, that part of herself that had always belonged to him taking control and stealing from him what he had once denied her to remember.
His lips felt soft and warm and infinitely familiar, their taste still a mixture of time – of past and present and future. He gave them all to her, responded to her kiss with a kind of despair that burnt in herself as well. Two souls reunited where they had least expected it, forced to lower any masks and any walls. He was there with her, single-hearted or not, laying his life in her hands like he had done before, building his own future on whatever time she would grant him.
He was the one she had first fallen in love with, the one she could never quite forget. He had been there within her pinstriped Doctor, had reassured her whenever she had doubted. He had come back.
The world around her started to spin as her lungs began to hurt, starved of oxygen as by then they were. Clutching at the fabric beneath her fingers for support she slowly drew back a little, panted as her breath mingled with his on lips that still tingled and tasted like him. And only when he tensed under her touch did she notice the quiet creak that the TARDIS's door released.
Although somewhere in her mind she knew that this would hurt him she jerked away, almost tripped as her knees at first refused to budge. Her feet moved on their own accord, carrying her towards the ship that prepared for flight.
He had already vanished from her gaze, had bereft her of yet another closure. But Donna was still there, leaning against the wooden texture and regarding her with an almost motherly gaze.
"The Doctor and Rose Tyler" she whispered as if she was foretelling something only she could see "In the TARDIS. As it should be."
And she smiled, nodded at the blonde because she, too, heard the ship hum behind her in farewell.
'Goodbye, my Wolf. We shall not meet again. Not like this.' The TARDIS sang and somehow she sounded strangely hopeful, her engines whirring with an ancient knowledge. 'But my child will be with you. Look after her, together with your Thief. Go and see the stars, my cub. Go and know that you will never be forgotten.'
The doors closed, the Time Rotor grinding into life as the blue box dissipated, leaving this reality for one last time - the proud vessel's flaring light the last greeting that she sent their way: her pink and yellow human and this version of her Lord who had once burnt for the Bad Wolf.
While each breath came with the distinct feeling of fire and of ice, Rose stared at the fading blue, mesmerized by the words that still echoed in her head with unknown clarity. She hardly felt the ground beneath her soles, or the winds that passed her by – was lost in this moment that was an ending as much as it was a beginning. Left behind and yet granted a new life. Letting go of all that had been she was expected to embrace the path that lay before her, no matter how utterly scary and fantastic it was.
The universe for sure had a twisted sense of redemption.
But it wasn't cruel. Not to her, not this time.
Her fingers laced through his effortlessly when silently he appeared at her side, equally doubting, equally enthralled. He looked down at her she knew, blue gaze open and seeking her own. To tell her of the chance that they were given, and of a promise he had no intentions to break.
He was there with her, for her, needing her like he always had; to build a new home with her, to return her to the stars where she belonged if only she would let him. And while she mourned, couldn't help but grieve over the one she had learned to love as well, she leant into him, felt his new warmth soothe her pain as he wrapped his arms about her. Shielding her like only he could ever have and it was then that she truly understood.
She had been given her very own forever. With him. Maybe not how she had imagined it, but in the end it still was what she had always wanted.
"Goodbye."
The sound got carried away by the breeze, a whisper that would never reach the one it was meant for as she voiced out what he had never granted her, not even now, and set the seal on her past.
Behind her she felt his previous self tense before he bent his neck, resting his chin on top of her head, not daring to speak out while together they watched how their old life faded from existence. To make way for something new and ultimately frightening - the biggest journey that either of them could possibly think of:
A life that would be theirs alone to live – him and her. Together.
