Leta took after her father. She looked like her mother: slight of build, pretty but not incredibly so, though she had her father's dark hair. But her mother didn't have the fighting spirit, the cockiness, the tough attitude.
People didn't look at Leta and think she was dangerous. People looked at her and thought she was your average girl, who wore more makeup than was strictly necessary and was a lot braver with her boyfriend—the one she didn't actually have—behind her. A person might even look at her and think she was helpless.
That was their undoing, if that person happened to be her enemy. She wasn't as vicious as her father, but she was still more like him than anyone. She didn't scare easily, and her not-girly purse held not only her money and her (energy-enhancer spiked) lipstick, but also her paralysis blaster, her sonic pen, and her stunglasses.
She was a lot like the Doctor, too. Maybe that was why he'd chosen her, out of everyone in the world, to travel with him. She wondered if Rose Tyler was like that, too. Caring, brave, continually filled with awe and respect and admiration for every species out there, every form of life (except perhaps Daleks). She wondered if Rose, like both herself and the Doctor, was a bit...undomestic.
Domestic was most certainly not a word used to describe Leta, or her father, or the Doctor. Ever. Period. So it was quite unusual for her to be doing something as ordinary, quiet, unexciting, and, yes, domestic as grocery shopping.
Of course, she was always the one who did the shopping when the TARDIS food supply ran out.
That aside, grocery shopping was exactly what she was doing. It was true that they did need some real food, but that wasn't the real reason. Really, she was walking down the street carrying more food than she could easily carry with any comfort for the sole purpose of it getting dumped on the ground.
Another curious thing about Leta was that she had an incredibly accurate memory and a vivid and, if possible, even more accurate imagination. One look at that picture and she would remember Rose Tyler's face for the rest of her life. And just from that picture, she could get a pretty clear idea of what the back of Rose's head would look like.
And when she saw a very blonde girl in jeans and a sweatshirt, she knew it was time to put her plan into action.
She half-ran up the other side of the street and crossed. The girl was definitely Rose. Same eyes, same hair, same face shape. No way it was someone else. Unless it was a really, really good shape shifter. Or a clone. Or Rose's long lost twin sister. Whatever.
Leta stepped into Rose's path. Rose saw her, but she was walking quickly, and had no time to turn away. Leta fell, spilling groceries across the ground.
"Oh!" said Rose. "I'm sorry!" She began helping pick up the spilled food.
"Oh, no, it's my fault," Leta apologized, turning all of her considerable charm on. "You don't need to help me."
"I shouldn't have run into you. I'll help, whether you like it or not."
Oh, yes. She was definitely like the Doctor, at least in the area of being stubborn.
It took them nearly ten minutes of crawling on the ground between everyone walking around the streets before they got everything. When they'd finally finished, Leta stood up and picked up her shopping bags. "Thank you, Miss. I'm Leta, by the way. Who're you?"
Rose hesitated. "Leta?" She frowned in thought, then began speaking softly. "I'm always running, all the time. Running for my life. I have been for twelve years. Danger follows me, until I turn and face it. Sometimes I negotiate, sometimes I flee. Sometimes I manage to save them all. Usually, I can't. Once, a long time ago, I cried for every one I couldn't save. Now, I have no more tears to shed for them, so I bury the bodies and move on. More often than not, I have no choice but to fight. That's who I am."
She began walking, and beckoned for Leta to follow her. "I'm the girl who stood tall and brave and unmoved while people were slaughtered around me, but I'm the girl who broke afterwards, when no one was watching, and cried until I couldn't cry anymore. I'm the girl who didn't have anyone there to comfort me. I'm the girl who killed, not one time, one evildoer, but hundred of them. I'm the girl who wondered who they were, if their families would miss them, if they were really evil or just misguided. I'm the girl who stopped wondering, because I couldn't kill them if I remembered they were real people, too. That's who I am."
She stopped, turned to face Leta. "I love the rain. I go out in a thunderstorm and dance and laugh, but I'm crying when I do, and it's like the sky is crying too. I used to hate cherries. Now I love the taste of them, but I won't eat them, I can't. I look up into the night sky and see more then you have ever seen there, more than you ever will see. I can sense the whole universe, Leta. The movement of every planet, every star, every galaxy. Did you know that galaxies move all the time, always? They never stop. And I know it, and I love it and I hate it at once. I can feel it all, to the edges of the universe and to the center. I know everything, everywhere, and when I think about it it drives me insane. It makes me feel so tiny, so helpless, so insignificant. My heart is breaking, every breath I take, every second I live. I look into the night sky and I feel alone."
She turned away. "That's who I am, Leta. That's what I am. I'm aware, painfully aware of every heartbeat on every planet, in every solar system, in every galaxy, in the whole entire universe. Every life. I know how long forever is, because I've seen it. I've seen the end of it. Some people call me Bad Wolf, or simply Wolf. That's who I am."
Leta bit her lip, thinking. "You seem...different. Sad. Older."
Wolf, who should have been Rose, looked at her. "Who are you, Leta?"
"I'm just a girl," said Leta. "I've always been different. I've always known that there was other life. I'm a lot like a friend of mine. I'm a lot like you, but happier. I can't feel the world turning, orbiting and flying through space, but I know that it is. I'm the girl you used to be, Wolf. I'm the girl who doesn't feel the movement of the universe, who wonders who the enemies I fight are. I'm different from you. I'm the one who knew to begin with not to shed those tears, not to think about those lives. I'm the girl who knows someday, I'll look at those stars, and I'll see them for more than every other human does because I've been there, Wolf. I've seen it. I've done this for five years, now, and I still don't believe it. Did you? Do you, even now?"
Wolf looked at her. "You're a lot more like me than you realize. Neither of us is really the girl we look like."
Leta nodded.
Wolf leaned against the wall behind her. "So, what are you doing on this side of town? The shop is all the way over there." She gestured at the sunset.
"I—er—got lost."
"Where are you going? You want some help?"
Leta grinned. "Does—never mind." Her smile faded slightly. She always told the Doctor how strange it was that he could feel the world turning under his feet, but he could get lost. She'd been about to ask if it made it easier, but she decided against it. "Well—er—I'm looking for this big, ah, box."
Wolf's eyes suddenly flashed golden, and sorrow crossed her face. "So that's how you know so much."
"This box, it's--"
"I know." She started walking quickly. Leta followed, sorry to have made Wolf upset. Wolf didn't speak until they reached the end of the street where the TARDIS was waiting.
"Listen, Leta," she said that, turning to face the other girl. "When you see the Doctor, tell him..." She thought, and remembered the little café on the corner of Oak Heights Avenue and Storm Trail Lane. "Tell him, "Corner of Oak and Storm." Will you do that for me?"
"Yes," said Leta, and there was something in her eyes that Wolf had to trust. "I'll tell him."
"Good night, Leta."
"Good night."
As Leta turned and ran towards the TARDIS, Wolf watched her go. She was so innocent, so trusting. Did she know that she was going to be left behind, eventually? Would she come to realize, in time, that it was because he cared that he had to do it? Wolf had realized it. Would things be different, now? Now that she was a protector? Now that she would live forever?
Five years, she said, she thought as she turned away and walked down the street. Five years now. He's taking them younger these days. She walked quickly as the final rays of sunlight went out and the streetlamps came on. She can't be much older than twenty—she must have been, what, fifteen when she joined? Sixteen? Young. And I'm sure I've heard her name before, I just can't for the life of me think where...
The Candlelight Café was well-named. As Wolf approached, she saw the candles in the window being lit, casting their warm glow across the street. She entered the little coffee shop and sat down at a table next to the window, looking out over Storm Trail Lane. She sighed softly, watching the flickering flames.
The other chair at the table was pulled out with a scrape, and Sarali sat down. "Hey, you alright?"
"I'm fine." She wasn't, really, but she had become a lot better at hiding her emotions. It helped that she had no tears left to shed, that she was numb to the pain by now.
"Sure." Wolf smiled a little. She knew very well Sarali doubted she was fine, but that was normal. In some ways, in Sarali's mind, Wolf was never fine. Sarali wasn't quite as naïve as Leta, but she had no idea what Wolf had suffered.
"Oh, will the winter never end, will warmth I never find?" said Wolf softly. "For sunlight changed to snowfall when the world left me behind. I feel the cold no longer, for my feeling has all gone, yet though I wish to feel my hands, my warmth is all alone."
"Second stanza of "Will the Winter Never End," anonymous," said Sarali. "You only quote things when you're relating to them. What's going on?"
Wolf looked up, pain surging through her heart. "Memories," she whispered, and saw in her best friend's eyes the truth they both understood.
A/N: This chapter was so sad! Poor R—I mean, Wolf! Of course, everyone but Leta and Sarali know who she really is. :P Reviews are fantastic. Chibi!s of the four characters if you review! Also, if anyone knows who Leta is like, I'll give you a chibi of that one, too. :D