Redeem (v.)—to free from what distresses or harms
She is used to blood and loss. Rather, she is trying to become numb to them and does her best not to let on that the atrocities she's seen (some in spite of them and some because of them) are seared into her mind. The memories burn like a fresh brand and she has yet to find a balm that will soothe her.
He has given her many wonderful memories and quite often they have peaceful adventures. If she is lucky, she dreams of their trip to Chanson, a planet on which everything and everyone sings—her favorite singers were the butterflies. If she is lucky, she dreams of their trip to Semoh, a planet populated entirely by talking horses; the Semohans are a race indebted to the Doctor and as such he and Rose were treated as honored guests—the King graced her with a ride along the coast at sunset, ferrying her Himself.
If she is lucky, she distracts him into telling her stories of places he has traveled before he knew her, and by the time he realizes how late it is, she is beyond the point of exhaustion and drops into a dead, dreamless sleep.
On the nights she is not so lucky, and the memories of the blood they have not kept from spilling haunt her dreams and rob her of a restful sleep, she occupies herself by reading. Sometimes, she writes letters to Jackie and Mickey that she will never send, or letters to her father she could not send even if she wanted to. Other times, she cooks—their trips to Earth and other planets for nutritional necessities are becoming more frequent the less sleep she gets. She and the Doctor have feasted on roast duck, turkey and all the trimmings, her favorite Italian foods; he has converted more exotic (read: alien) recipes into measurements she understands and sometimes her culinary adventures are as exciting as their foreign (read: alien) ones.
He never asks why they feast so lavishly at such odd hours. He merely waits for her to come find him or for the TARDIS to bring him to the kitchen. He smiles his magnificent toothy smile and digs into her latest creation with gusto. She doesn't know if he ever hates anything she makes, because he clears his plate every time and usually goes back for seconds. She suspects that if she does cook up something unsavory he will choke it down and never let on.
She suspects the things they protect each other from could fill an ocean.
He never asks if she's had a nightmare, as they sit eating and drink tea, or something stronger. He doesn't tell her it's late or query as to why she's conscious at an hour when most humans prefer to be deep asleep. He simply sits with her and chats, then helps her pack away the leftovers and stack the dishwasher when they're done eating. Then he hugs her and kisses her forehead, his lips soft and cool and the closest thing to a balm she knows save his hand his smile his eyes his voice, and walks away to sleep or read or brood.
She never follows him. These are the times when she cannot take his hand and trust that he'll lead her to safety. He has his own demons, phantoms she will never know, and she doesn't want to add to his burden. He has known so much pain, so much loss, and she knows what horrible guilt he would feel if he knew what haunted her.
He has been smiling less since the Dalek. She cannot imagine the guilt he feels, knowing that one survived, like him, that he did not succeed in destroying them all. She cannot imagine what he's witness, or what it must feel like to have something in common with your greatest nemesis.
Rose Tyler hides her pain, keeps her demons locked away, so as to provide him with some measure of solace. When he smiles, she can see forever and know as long as he's with her and they are in the light, it will be alright. It is the dark spaces that they both fear, each of them frightened for their own reasons. All she has to do is keep him smiling, and she knows she can accomplish this by smiling back, by cracking a joke, by asking for some chips and teasing him about his daft features. If she smiles for him she can pretend she isn't dying a bit inside and that every time more blood is shed or the more that Death surrounds them, a bit of her dies as well.
After what happened in Utah, she knows he fears that he will cause her death, however inadvertently. She wonders if he's terrified of losing her. She is terrified of leaving him. She cannot fathom it, not even for a second. As far as she is concerned, she will travel with him until she's old and gray, or until he kicks her out, whichever comes first.
If only she could sleep. They travel to New York on New Year's Eve, 1999—he wants to see how the people react when the world doesn't end with the dawn of Y2K—and before the ball drops, she slips into an absurdly large and even more absurdly designed Duane Reade for some over the counter sleeping pills. She hopes whatever legal sleeping aids she can by from the pharmacy will put her into a deep enough sleep that the nightmares will stay at bay. The pills fail and she wakes drenched in sweat and tears and feeling impossibly groggy and disoriented.
One night as she wanders the TARDIS, she stumbles across something akin to a wine cellar. It is immense and probably rivals the Queen's own collection. He has racks of reds, whites, ports, and sherries. He has a cupboard of other liquors as well, some familiar and some not. She takes a bottle of merlot and drinks the entire thing in her room before going to sleep. The nightmares stay away but she wakes with a vicious hangover and cannot decide which is worse, the disease or the cure. When she stumbles out to the kitchen, her head pounding and even the dim lights of the TARDIS too much for her eyes, he says nothing, merely makes her coffee and a sufficiently greasy breakfast that she forces herself to eat despite her nausea.
After she eats the last bit of bacon and sops up runny egg yolks with buttery toast, he takes her by the hand and leads her to the Med Bay. She wants to say something, have a suitable excuse—she's willing to fall back on the old PMS excuse—but she cannot find the words. She waits for him to yell at her, to her cross for nicking his wine and getting stinking drunk, but he doesn't. He merely helps her up on a table and runs some sort of nifty hangover-curing alien tech over her head.
She feels one of his cool hands cupping the base of her skull as the other wields the healing device. All at once, the pounding in her head subsides and the stabbing pain behind her eyes dissipates and she's not sure which is more soothing, the Spock tech or his flesh against hers,
"Thanks," she manages feebly, feeling spectacularly stupid. Her eyes meet his and it seems as though the two of them have become frozen in time. He sets down the device and brings his other hand to her face. As she watches, he closes his eyes and runs his fingertips over the contours of her face, like a blind man trying to get a sense of her. His fingers linger at her temples and she feels a slight pressure as they sink a bit into her flesh. Sighing, Rose closes her eyes as he beings to massage her temples. In spite of herself, her head sinks forward and the crown of her skull comes to rest against his chest. One hand travels over her hair and back to the nape of her neck, where he begins to lightly massage her. The rhythmic double thump-thump of his hearts reverberates through her, sound conducted by bone and brain and connective tissues.
She thinks, If I could only rest here every night, this might be enough to keep the nightmares away.
She hears his breath catch and he stops his ministrations. Her lids flutter open and she cranes her neck to look up at him. Her own breathing hitches as she sees a maelstrom of emotions flash across his angular face in an instant—confusion, shock, anger, grief, pain, and something she cannot identify but might be deep affection cross his features in the span of a second. Then he grins brightly, that manic, desperate smile he gets when he's trying to hide something from her.
"Right then," he says, stepping one step back away from her and her body aches as his warmth disappears. "Better go shower then. Can't have you sitting about all day. Places to go, you know?"
"What disaster are we to avert today?" she asks, her inflection sounding as forcefully cheerful as his own.
He shakes his head. "No disasters today. No wars. The universe can get by without us for a moment. Today, we take a holiday!"
Never before has she found such relief in such mundane words. "A holiday?" How utterly normal of them. She slips off the table. "What for?"
He shrugs, "Dunno. Thought we could use a break. So what would you like? Hiking? Dog sledding? Swimming?"
Before she can stop her own reaction, Rose feels her eyebrows perk up at the word swimming. He sees her reaction before she can hide it and he smiles. "Right. New Polynesia it is then. A whole planet full of islands like in Earth's Pacific." He turns to leave, shouting over his shoulder, "I'll set the coordinates while you go get ready. And don't forget the sunscreen! Can't have you burning up in the sun. You humans, so delicate and susceptible to sunlight, you are. Course, you'd probably be a bit more resistant if you hadn't spent a century destroying your own ozone…."
His voice drifts off down the hallway and she cannot help but smile.
They spend the day swimming, sunning themselves and relaxing on New Fiji. Rather, she does most of the swimming, in a black halter bikini and slathered in sunscreen per his instructions, but she gets to see him out of the leather jacket and jumper and although she misses him in black and leather, the sight of him in trunks and a white cotton vest make her rejoice that they do as much running as they do—he is long and lithe, surprisingly muscular despite is lean appearance and Rose is suddenly struck with the hope that a massive wave comes and robs him of his clothing so that she may truly appreciate his physical form.
She eventually coaxes him into the water, only ankle deep at first, but soon she is splashing him and he gives chase but oh she is a runner too, and a strong swimmer and she dives beneath the water and surfaces yards away from him, forcing him to swim after her. Only when she turns her head minutely to one side to take breaths, her strokes long and perfect and she's glad Jackie made her take swim lessons all those years ago, does she see him, his long body quickly gaining on her smaller one. He is fast and sure in his swimming and soon she feels herself water-tackled. She takes a deep breath as he pulls her under and as they sink she turns in his arms and opens her eyes. The salt water stings but she works past it and they engage in an aquatic staring contest. Fish swim around them in perfect green-blue water but all she knows is him and her and now and he has her hands as they both tread several feet below the surface and she has no fear of drowning because she knows he will not let her sink any deeper than she already has. He will keep her here until she is ready, until she can stand it no longer, until she needs him to help her back into the sunlight and fresh air.
She wonders how long Time Lords can hold their breath under water.
It seems to her that they have been under for hours, days, weeks, looking at each other and existing here in the quiet space. She can feel her chest begin to tighten and knows she needs to go up. He seems to know this too, because he winks and wraps his strong arms around her waist and with a firm kick rockets them back to the surface. They emerge laughing and gasping for breath and she wraps her arms around his neck. The sun beats down on them as they tread water and inhale the fragrant air. They play for hours, racing, trying to dunk each other, engaging in splashing wars. One time, in slightly shallower water, he ducks under the surface and before she can stop him, he is between her legs and as he rises above the water she is sitting on his shoulders and he is holding her legs to keep her secure and by God they engage in a game of Chicken with some other swimmers. She laughs and shrieks until she is breathless and though they do not win, she stays above water longer than most of the women and when she finally pitches back off his shoulders and into the water, he has her by the wrist and hauls her back into the light before she even hits the sandy bottom.
They swim until their skin turns pruny and the sun begins to set. They clamber out of the ocean and collapse in a fit of giggles onto their towels, content to lie back and dry and watch the magnificent sunset. Somewhere nearby, a band begins to play and as the sky fills with fiery reds and oranges, brilliant pinks and deep purples, she lets the music and the scent of orchids wash over her and feels for the first time in a long time truly content. Lying side by side on their towels, she feels him take her hand, as he has done so many times, and he runs his thumb over her knuckles until long after the sun sets and the stars come out. A purple-skinned, horned waiter from a beach-front restaurant interrupts them, once, bringing them complementary drinks that taste of pineapple and peach and snacks of fruit and grilled meats. Famished after a long day, they eat in companionable silence and are delighted to learn there is a nightly fireworks display. The sky alights with bursts of red, pink, purple, green, orange, and white and she oohs and ahhs and every so often sneaks glances at him, only to find him looking not at the fireworks, but at her. She wonders, briefly, if the fire in the sky reminds him of other things, and that is why he isn't watching.
Once they are sufficiently dry, she joins him on his towel, sitting between his legs, her back against his chest as he points out constellations and tells her stories of all the stars and planets in the sky. He makes her laugh and enchants her and when she starts to yawn, he rocks her and pulls her to lie down with him. As he pillows her head on his chest, she can't help but ask, "Shouldn't we be getting back to the TARDIS?"
"Nah," he replies, his fingers working their way through her tangled, damp locks. "This planet is peaceful. Nothing here to go bump in the night." He smiles at this. "We can stay here a while longer."
She sighs and relaxes against him, listening to the waves and the double beating of his hearts. His fingers play expertly with her hair and blaze new trails on her skin and between his touch and the sounds that surround them, she feels herself beginning to doze.
"Ahm fallin asleep," she mumbles.
"S'ok," he assures her. "You rest now."
"'Ere? Izunt it illegal?" Her words are muffled by sleep she cannot fight and his skin.
"Nope," he replies quickly, cheekily. "We could sleep out here for a week."
"But—" she begins, struggling through drowsiness to sit up, to look at him. Her heart begins to pound as the thought of sleep brings her to the thought of nightmares. It was a lovely day and she hopes once they get back to the TARDIS, she dreams of it, or that the excursion has made her so bone tired that she is dreamless, but she knows that bad dreams are likely.
"Rose Tyler," he says gently, his voice so firm and yet so soothing. He moves her a bit, so that he can meet her eyes and the intensity in them, the affection and worry burn so bright that she can seem them even in the moonlight. Just like earlier, his fingertips trace the contours of her face, but this time his eyes stay open. She feels slightly abashed, wishing that she had more makeup on, or that she had bathed and didn't smell of sand and salt and sunscreen. But he looks at her with something she would classify as love if he was anyone else that she forgets her naked face and less-than clean body and knows only him and this and now.
"I can take them from you, you know," he says and in an instant she knows he knows. He knows. How does he know?
She furrows her brow. "Take them?"
He looks away for the first time in what seems like hours. "Take your memories. Wipe the bad things from your mind so that they can't haunt you anymore."
The notion is both tempting and terrifying and she wants to, oh how she is tempted. But then it occurs to her. "Wait. You mean you'd wipe my memory? So that I couldn't remember them at all."
He smiled and she knows it is only for her benefit. "Yup. Think of it as getting rid of things you don't need to hold on to."
She sits up now, awake. "Will I—will I forget anything else?"
He shrugs, as though they are talking about changing their preferred brand of dish soap. "Maybe. Not likely though. I'll be careful."
He's offering to take away her pain, purge her of the images of blood and death and give her nothing but a blissful sleep. But then, she thinks, he will still remember and he alone will carry those memories and how much more pain can he expect to bear silently?
"No." Her voice is full of resolve, so much so that it shocks them both.
He frowns, "Why not? I thought you'd jump at the chance." His hands slides up out of the darkness and cups her cheek and she cannot help but nuzzle it. Breathing deeply, she inhales his scent, salty and sandy like her, but so deeply masculine, musky and so purely him that it makes her dizzy, makes her high. "I know you haven't been sleeping," he says softly. "I'm sorry I couldn't keep you from seeing those things." He sighs. "I wish I'd thought to do something sooner. I wish you'd said something."
"I didn't," she says, lifting her eyes to his. "Because I knew you'd do this, take responsibility, take the blame." She sees his gaze falter, knows he is about to protest, to insist that he is to blame, but she lays a finger to his lips. "They only haunt me because I let them, because I'm still afraid of them. I forget that I survived. I lived. I made it because of you. We helped, sometimes, and the times we didn't, I know we tried and that's the best we can do. You do your best."
"It's not enough," he whispers.
"Yes it is," she insists. "It is more than enough. D'ya know why I don't want you to take my memories, the ones that keep me awake? Because I don't want you to be the only one who is forced to carry them. I'm stronger than that, than to let you bear the burden of them alone. Before I met you, I didn't think I was strong enough, but you've shown me that I am. You've shown me so many amazing things, taken me so many wonderful places." She sees some sand stuck in his short hair and brushes it out. "There have been bad times too, but that's life. You've shown me a better way of living and I wouldn't give up anything for that, not even a few bad memories."
He gathers her in his arms then, rocking her again and pulling her back down onto the towel. "My brave Rose," he murmurs, and she wraps an arm around his waist. She feels his cool lips press into her hair. "Alright then, I won't take your memories."
"Remind me that they can't hurt me anymore," she asks, and hopes it doesn't sound too much like begging. "Do that for me, and I'll be right as rain."
"That I can do." She hears the smile in his voice and once again his fingers do wonderful things in her hair and on her skin and the sound of crashing surf and two hearts surround her. She closes her eyes and hears him begin to talk to her. Instantly, she realizes she can't understand what he is saying, even though the TARDIS is supposed to translate everything, and knows, somehow, that he must be speaking in his native tongue. He could be rattling off the phone book in reverse alphabetical order, but it sounds so beautiful, and is so soothing, that he may as well be singing her a lullaby.
She dreams in soft colors, warm, rich, honey-golds. When she wakes, the sun is rising and she realizes she has not needed drugs or pills or distractions to sleep. Feeling rested for the first time in ages, she is greeted by the sight of him smiling. As they head back to the TARDIS, bickering over who gets the first shower, she decides that tonight, regardless of the demons that may haunt her, she will not let them best her. They cannot harm her, not unless she lets them. You can live with your memories, or you can be tortured by them. She has learned that from him.
She smiles and races him back to the TARDIS. "Last one in makes breakfast for a week!"