"Rose," her name floated to her in a whisper, discordant and sad. Why was it sad?
Rose blinked the fog from her vision, trying to see her surroundings. Her feet sucked sand, toes digging into the earth. The air was thick with the tang of salt and the bitter smell of seaweed.
She knew instantly where she was, yet struggled to place the name. It wasn't a kind place, but a painful one, full of hurt and goodbyes that shouldn't have been said.
But her focus on that dissipated when her eyes locked on something blue, standing desolate on the beach.
"I made my choice a long time ago," she heard herself say, in a detached voice filling the air around her, encasing her in a gust of cold. "And I'm never gonna leave you."
Pain blossomed across her chest and Rose started making her way to the Tardis, desperate to feel the old, familiar wood against her hands. Desperate to step inside. But the Tardis suddenly let out a whirr, a sound Rose was all too familiar with. She couldn't be on the receiving end of it. Not again.
"How long are you gonna stay with me?" The first voice chimed, deafeningly loud. Rose started walking faster, until she was running, kicking sand up in her wake.
"Forever," her own voice replied.
She pushed her legs harder, watching the Tardis fade in and out of existence. He wouldn't leave her again. He wouldn't he wouldn't he wouldn't.
"You just leave us behind," her voice said, the words assaulting her ears, her mind, targeting everything human. "Is that what you're gonna do to me?"
Wait, she tried screaming, but his voice was louder than hers. "No," He said. "Not to you."
Doctor! Rose begged, nearly there. Just a few more yards. Just a few more...
"Am I ever gonna see you again?"
Yes, Rose thought desperately. Im right here! Just open the door!
"You can't."
Rose stretched her fingers out, just as the Tardis gave one last hum, and her fingers enclosed over nothing.
No, Rose cried, staring at the empty space the Tardis had just occupied. Take me back, she begged. Take me back!
"Take me back!" Her voice screamed around her, cocooning her in her own beggings. An image surfaced, of her hanging on to the console, demanding the Tardis to return to the Doctor.
"Take me back!" Rose shoved her palms over her ears as this memory flooded her, of hands banging on a wall until they'd gone numb with the force of it.
"Take me back!" And now, standing on a barren beach, staring at a place where the Tardis had just stood a moment before. Too many goodbyes spoken in too many ways.
Take me back!
Rose pressed her hands to her head, as the voices blurred together, becoming a cacophony of unheard pleas that were no longer distinguishable from the next and were far from human.
She jolted up so quickly, she nearly toppled out of bed. Tears dampened her cheeks and clogged her throat, and Rose swiped at them pointlessly, trying to calm herself down. She glanced at her clock.
6:00am.
She'd barely been asleep for a couple hours but it had felt like eternity. Assured that closed eyes only held more nightmares, Rose got out of bed and headed downstairs, catching herself in the mirror she passed.
Oh. Dark bags underlined her eyes, making them appear sallow in her puffy tear-streaked face. Her hair was ratted from her constant thrashing, skin still glistening with sweat. All in all, she looked ghastly.
Better now than at breakfast, she told herself, as she wandered into the kitchen. Night still dominated the sky and she had to flick on one of the lights to see, and moved the kettle on to the stove.
She took a seat at the table, lost in a mental state of nothingness, where she imagined a canvas of white. Rose focused so hard on picturing it that she was unaware of the footsteps coming down or the figure that appeared in the doorway.
"Rose?"
She whipped her head around so fast, the glistening canvas shattered, into a million frosty pieces.
The Doctor stood in the doorway, the blue robe hanging around him instantly reminding her of that Christmas Day. His hands were still shoved in his pockets, hair unkempt as usual and the sight gave Rose the absurd desire to cry again.
And judging by the way his brows furrowed in concern, he saw it, too. Before she even really registered what he was doing, he was in front of her, hand raised to her forehead. "You sick?" He asked.
Guilt bloomed inside Rose, at the feeling of comfort that came with his touch. Whether he was the actual Doctor, that touch hadn't changed.
She shook her head. "Couldn't...couldn't sleep."
He stared at her, and Rose saw no hint of the humor usually etched in his features. Without it, he seemed older,gaining the years his body's youth contradicted. "How long?"
"What?" She asked.
"How long have you been having them?" He clarified.
Rose bit her lip, not wanting to reveal this to him. But a part of her wanted that, to accept this Doctor and what he was. To, at the very least, let him in.
She took a shaky breath as he sat down. "They started after Canary Wharf," she admitted. "Big surprise. Happened a lot, then. But when I started workin' on the cannon, they stopped some. That's the first one in over a month."
His expression turned sorrowful and Rose cut him off before he could say anything. "And don't go pinning the blame on yourself. Or I won't be telling you anything."
His lips pulled up in a ghost of a smile, but it fell from them almost instantly. "I don't know how to help with this," he confessed. "I never...saw you this way. If it's one thing I don't feel often, it's not knowing what to do. And I hate that feeling."
"This isn't something that can be soniced back together," she said, trying to sound as light as possible. "Grieving's what a human does. What anything does. My mum said that grief is proof, of how much you loved someone. How much you were willing to sacrifice for 'em."
She let that dangle between them, at the unspoken word tethered to that statement.
Everything. Rose had been willing to give up everything.
"If it's..." the Doctor began, hesitant. "If it's too much for you with me here, I can...leave. Stay somewhere else until you want. Or-"
"No!" Rose nearly shouted, catching both of them off-guard. She clamped her lips shut and shook her head. "No, I don't want you to leave. That's not what I meant. Please don't."
She couldn't lose him, too. Not after everything else. A part of her had expected to feel...resentment towards a man who seemed to be a Xerox copy of the alien she loved, but she didn't. The Doctor had left him to her, not as a chore to busy herself with, but as a chance. A chance to be with him at a human pace, a slow path they'd walk together. A path they could walk only once.
"I just..." to her frustration, her voice cracked. "I can't have you leavin', too."
The Doctor stared at her for a moment, eyes slightly widened in surprise. It quickly melted away, replaced by a mix of sadness an relief.
Rose had very little time to react before he was pulling her to him, in a tight embrace that threatened to break them both.
This. Yes, this was still the same.