Of course, "one last time" is never really quite good enough, is it?
Holed up in the TARDIS library, the Doctor realizes that despite his efforts to distract himself from the events of several weeks ago, adventures and near-misses and ridiculously complicated plots all brought upon himself in an effort to forget it all, he's reread the same line approximately thirteen times now, and still has no idea what it says.
The thing that irks me most is this shattered prison, after all. I'm tired, tired of being enclosed here
He can't decide if he should congratulate himself on his self-control, or hate himself for it.
I'm tired, tired of being enclosed here
He should probably be proud, or at the very least, satisfied. Mastery of all circumstances, including oneself, is a tenet ingrained in Gallifreyans from infancy. Self-control, cerebral understanding, measured emotions, a devotion to logic, and, most importantly, a duty to uphold the laws of time—this is what it means to be a Time Lord.
He left Rose as soon as he was able to make himself. He did the right thing.
I'm tired
…but what if he didn't?
I'm wearying to escape into that glorious world, and to be always there
There were no Reapers, there was no rift, and there is no warning tingling faintly in the back of his mind any longer; there's nothing to indicate that he did any lasting damage during their meeting. He even managed to avoid running into a younger copy of himself—within a thirty-minute time window, no less.
not seeing it dimly through tears
This was hardly the only time they'd briefly parted ways, for one reason or another. Who is to say that he never visited her during those times? Where is it written that he can't see her again?
and yearning for it through the walls of an aching heart, but really with it, and in it
Where is it written that he has to be alone?
and yearning
He drops the book and leaves it there.
She may only have a limited sentience, and she may not express it in as many words—or, indeed, any words at all—but the TARDIS does not like crossing the Doctor's personal timeline. He can feel her protesting, walls groaning and gears churning and glass column oozing out a sickly green hue. The Doctor pets the console reassuringly, rotating the temporal conduit array as the ship re-materializes.
"I know what I'm doing," he promises. "It's just one more trip. Just the one."
Curious, the Doctor has never heard the TARDIS make a sound so much like a disbelieving sigh before.
After scouring his memory for each and every instant he ever had to leave Rose on her own for any reason—not including the few times he deposited her with her mother for the weekend, he's already stolen a year from her, any more would be excessive—he has decided that the next point at which they briefly separated in his personal chronology is probably the best time to visit. It's the easiest way for him to keep track, and the easiest way to prevent her from becoming confused. He has a two-day window in which to visit her on Tharma-X, during an adventure where he might have been just the tiniest bit imprisoned for insulting their High Command.
(Really, he ought to have known better; it's hardly the first planet where he's been arrested for being rude.)
But Tharmaian prison isn't bad as far as prisons go, and he'd told Rose not to worry about rescuing him; he'd probably be released before either of them could override the security controls, anyway. The Doctor remembers cursing the facility's triple-deadlock seal at the time, but now, he'd kiss it if he could.
(Of course, if he's being completely honest, there are other things he'd much rather kiss, but that's not going to happen. No matter how much he might want it.)
He finds Rose sitting at the Tharmaian equivalent of a pub, sharing drinks with a fellow who's just a little too pretty and just a tad too interested in everything she has to say, but the Doctor is pleased to note that as soon as Rose's eyes land on him, her pretty-boy drinking buddy is completely forgotten.
"It's a prison break, then?" Rose asks conspiratorially, leaning over the bar.
"Maybe I got out on good behavior," the Doctor suggests, sitting down next to her.
Rose just laughs at him.
Temporal amnesiac displacement. He's got it all figured out.
Because as this venture wears on, as the two of them share drinks and laugh and generally draw grumpy looks from the other patrons in the pub, he's remembering these little times, these little instances, where Rose would give him the strangest looks, or refer to conversations he couldn't place, and now he knows why. It was not, as he initially suspected, Rose playing a strange and circuitous prank on him, nor was it the side-effects of the Bad Wolf phenomenon mucking about with her quantum balance. He simply couldn't place it because it hadn't happened yet, for him.
Naturally, Rose can't know that. But he's confident that if he rattles off enough technobabble in an attempt to explain his supposed memory loss, her eyes will glaze over and she won't question it.
He polishes off his drink and he's just about to stun her with his brilliantly-crafted diagnosis when she tilts her head and says, "It's your hair."
His fingers still on his glass. "What?"
"It's your hair that's different. Did you get a haircut when you got out of prison?"
"Yes?" he offers in response. (Klaxons start sounding in his brain, timelines straining again and telling him to run run run run away before she figures it out run run RUN.)
(Because temporal amnesiac displacement won't quite explain the regular variations in hair lengths, will it?)
(Does the outcome of this delicate timeline pendulum really pivot on Rose's observations of his hair?)
Rose doesn't look like she quite believes him. He doesn't blame her. As far as poker faces go, he might as well be screaming that he's got nothing but twos and sevens. But at least this explains that time she kept asking about spontaneous extreme hair regrowth.
The Doctor scrambles about for something to say. "Do you like it?" he asks.
"Do I like what?"
"The hair."
"It's different."
He can't stop himself. "Good different or bad different?"
She can't either. She grins. "Just different."
This seems like as good a time for a diversion as any. The Doctor deposits a crumpled-up bill in the tip jar (hoping it's from the right time period, won't do the bartender any good if it's from the year 8092, will it?) and, pushing up and away, he holds his hand out for Rose to take. When she looks at his hand, but doesn't respond otherwise, he wriggles his fingers.
"Shall we?"
Rose doesn't move. "Are you from my future?" she asks.
He blinks. He opens his mouth. Nothing comes out, not even a lie. His mouth closes again, his teeth snapping together with a loud click.
(But really, he thinks; he shouldn't be surprised. Rose is no fool, and his hair is rather splendid. He finds himself irrationally hating it all of a sudden. Traitorous beautiful Time Lord genetics.)
"Why do you ask?" he wonders, trying and failing to keep his voice casual.
"Because you look different sometimes, and you keep acting like you haven't seen me in ages, and then you don't remember any of it," Rose says slowly. "And your hand can't seem to decide whether it's got a scar or not."
The Doctor looks down at the hand in question. Certain enough, there's a tiny silver crescent-shaped scar there, puckered edges glistening in the low light of the pub and giving him away. It was quite the nasty little cut, once upon a time, and Martha had stitched it up for him on the fly. She'd done such a good job it had never occurred to him to use the dermal regenerator to fix it. Now he's kicking himself.
This is what he gets for indulging in emotions and sentimentality. A lack of preparedness, a suspicious Rose, an end to his good time, and one hell of an impending time sense headache.
"I don't suppose you'd buy temporal amnesiac displacement as an excuse?" the Doctor asks, without even a single shred of hope that she'll say yes.
Rose shakes her head no, and wraps her arms around her body protectively.
The Doctor sighs. "Well," he says, rubbing at the back of his skull, "I had sort of hoped it would take you a bit longer to figure it out."
"Am I dead?" Rose asks. "In the future? Is that why you keep coming back to see me?"
"You know I can't tell you things like that," he replies softly.
"Then why are you doing this?"
That's a really good question, and one he knows she deserves an answer for. He looks away instead, pats his fingers in the ring of condensation that has accumulated around the base of his glass. His fingers tap the bar with a wet smack.
He weighs the merits of being honest, for once. Not just with her, but with himself, too.
"Doctor?" Rose tries, and he hates how worried she sounds.
"Sorry," he blurts out. He shakes himself. "This was a mistake. I'm sorry."
He runs out of there before she can stop him.
The Doctor swears to himself that he'll never do it again, buries himself in adventure after adventure and plot after plot in an effort to forget the temptation. Replacing one distraction for another. He feels a deep and abiding understanding for addicts that he's never understood before, a renewed appreciation for the struggles of those who can't even seem to find normalcy without just one more hit. And he certainly has a greater comprehension of the disgust and self-loathing that trickles in afterward.
Then he visits a desert world, and he learns he's about to die.
It's a strange feeling, knowing he's going to die soon. If he had to pick one word for it, it would be crushing. He feels the weight pressing in on his chest, behind his eyes. All around him. It feels like the entire universe is caving in. For all the times he's saved the bloody place, for all the things he's given up for it, the world is going to compact and pressurize him until there's nothing left but dust.
He's never asked for much of anything, but is this really his reward? To fade out of existence, old and bitter and alone?
But impending death has a funny way of galvanizing people, and nowhere does it say he's only allowed to feel one thing. Certainly, crushing applies. So does reckless.
"You haven't died," he tells Rose in a neon garden in the year 789/berum/g, local time. He tells her that before either of them can say anything else, before she can even tell him hello. "You're alive and well. And happy. Very happy." At least he hopes that part is true.
"But I'm not with you anymore?" Rose asks, crestfallen.
"I didn't say that."
"Then why do you keep visiting me like this?"
He takes a deep breath. Extreme caution must be observed if he wants to get through this without causing significant damage to the timelines. (He's reckless, but he's not stupid.) This means he can only be so honest with her right now.
"I miss you," he admits.
Honest enough. It's just about the most intimate thing he's ever said to her, and his guts squirm with nervousness, and he struggles not to swallow so obviously that she can see it.
Rose's cheeks tinge just a tiny bit with pink. "Really?" she asks, surprised.
"Really. You, erm...you've been spending a bit more time with your mother these days," the Doctor tells her, carefully plucking the truths she can and can't know—because surely she must spend time with her mother in the other universe, right? "And, well, you know me. Not exactly domesticated, am I?"
"Why, though? Is Mum all right?"
He's breaking so many rules right now. But he's finding it a little difficult to care too much. If the universe didn't want him to do this, then maybe the universe shouldn't be punishing him with an untimely and unnecessary death.
The Doctor nods. "Perfectly fine. I imagine you're just helping out with the baby."
Rose's mouth falls open. "Mum has a baby? With who?"
"Nope!" the Doctor rebuts cheerfully, popping the last syllable. "This crystal ball has read its last. I'm only saying anything so that you don't worry, or do something stupid. And I can trust you to keep this information to yourself, right?"
"Yes." Rose nods vigorously. "Absolutely! You can trust me!"
The Doctor's time sense fades to a dull thrum in the background. Pieces are falling back together as they should; Rose, and by extension, the universe, must be happy enough with his explanation to stop any kind of traumatic time-space fluxes from taking place. She won't go running to his younger self to warn him about Cybermen and a pair of levers in an empty white room. Tension eases from the Doctor's shoulders and he allows himself to relax just a little bit.
It's a lot harder to feel like he's dying when she's around.
"By the way," Rose ventures, a shy smile brightening up her face, "Thank you. For trusting me."
"No problem." He offers his arm and she takes it, threading her fingers together in the crook of his elbow. "Now, has anyone ever given you a tour while regaling the history of the Five Neon Gardens of Urdun Vry?"
"Nope," she replies with a grin, "But I have a feeling you're about to."
She's not wrong.