A/N: Last ever part of this crazy saga...
Part Two
Rose was back in that non-place again, standing in the eternal blackness right where she'd shot the Doctor. Only this time, he was holding her hand.
"Tardis!" he yelled boldly, and immediately she appeared right in front of them.
"Theta!" she cried, tears in her eyes. "You're here!"
"Only just," he replied. "We need to kill this thing now."
"I have the Bad Wolf fighting it, but without Rose the Bad Wolf isn't strong," the TARDIS told him. "The Bad Wolf is losing."
"Then we need to merge them together again, then," the Doctor said, running a hand through his hair.
"We can't, that might kill Rose."
"I know, I know," the Doctor murmured.
"Um, what's Bad Wolf?" Rose asked suddenly, interrupting his thought trail.
He looked at her, and point at the Tardis. "You can see her?"
"Yeah," Rose said. "I've been able to see her since I went into the Heart. What's Bad Wolf?"
"You didn't tell her!?" the TARDIS cried, surprised.
"... I was going to," the Doctor said lamely.
"What's Bad Wolf?" Rose repeated for the third time, beginning to get very annoyed now.
"It's you, well, a version of you. Do you remember Satellite Five?"
"What?"
"With the Controller and the Daleks and all that? With Jack?"
"Theta!" the TARDIS interrupted. "Bit of a time limit, here!"
"Yes, yes, sorry," the Doctor said quickly. "The Bad Wolf is you with all the power of the time vortex in you. The ultimate being."
"... That happened? How did I miss that?" she wondered seriously.
He dismissed it with a hand. "Never mind that. We need to find a way to use the Bad Wolf without hurting you... Tardis!"
The Tardis jumped in alarm. "Don't yell!"
"Sorry," he said seriously. "Can we make our own Bad Wolf?"
"Um... What?" the TARDIS wondered seriously.
"If you used Rose's mind yourself with all the power of the time vortex, couldn't that make a Bad Wolf?"
"Well, yes, but that would burn her inside out..."
"What if I shielded her? Use me to get to Rose? So she's protected, I take the brunt."
"But..."
"If you say 'that will kill you' I'm taking you for an MOT," the Doctor replied, utterly seriously. "I'm already dead, you know that. My priority is you two."
There was a brief pause as the TARDIS took this in, gazing at him unblinkingly.
"Oh, Theta," she whispered, dropping her gaze to the floor.
"I'm sorry," he said sincerely.
"You're always sorry," the TARDIS snapped back, quite clearly annoyed.
He offered a half-smile. "I'm going to miss you."
"I bloody well hope so," she responded, and then couldn't help her face cracking into a smile at her own words.
He smiled too. "We've had some good times though, haven't we?"
"Many, Time Lord."
"You're the only thing that's stayed with me throughout these years. It's been so, so mad... so amazing. I wouldn't have lasted a day without you – always nudging me in the right direction. Thank you. I'm glad we had this chance to talk."
She nodded, silent tears falling down her face. "Oh, my Time Lord..." she murmured, but didn't continue her sentence.
"Look after each other," the Doctor continued softly, looking at the TARDIS and Rose in turn. They both nodded before he turned to Rose, smiling. "You'll visit me, yes?"
"Yep."
"Tell me everything about your life and how brilliantly you're doing."
"Every day."
"And... do me proud."
"I will," she said.
"And I guess... Oh, I hate good byes," the Doctor moaned, running a hand through his hair.
"Yeah," Rose muttered.
"Hey," he said, raising her gaze to meet him again. "I don't want you to feel any guilt. This wasn't your fault."
"But I killed you," she whispered.
"Listen to me. A lot has happened to us over the past few years, and there were times when we were both very, very confused. But I want you to know... that I think you are one of the best things that has ever happened to me. You made me better. You gave me back my life. After the Time War I was so broken, filled with blood and anger and revenge, and then you arrived and... Well, look at me. When I regenerated, that wasn't just a physical change. My mindset changed. I changed from that dark, angry man to this complete happy idiot. I became me only because you, and only you, made it possible. Rose Tyler, you are amazing. You gave my life meaning and joy, and you will be a part of me forever."
He paused, brushing back her hair from her wet eyes. She didn't say a word, just drew him in a long, loving hug that seemed to last for hours.
When they finally parted, he was smiling at her.
"Ready?" he asked.
"Ready," she confirmed.
He looked at the TARDIS. "Do it."
"Good bye, Theta," the TARDIS croaked. Rose tightened her grip on the Doctor's hand and he responded in kind... Until the world around them faded away, and the grip was gone.
Rose woke up, and found herself lying back in that corridor where she'd fallen from the ladder. She couldn't open her left eye, and her entire body felt like it was on fire. But that didn't matter, because directly in front of her she could see him.
The Doctor.
She'd seen so much death and so much suffering in far-flung places – she'd seen a dead body or five. The first time had been horrible. It had been a human in the 58th century, shot by his comrades and left in the cell with her and the Doctor. They hadn't been able to escape the decomposition process. But the Doctor had been there to talk her through it. He told her word for word what was happening to the physical body, what was happening internally and what would happen next.
The stench had been the worst part. But she couldn't smell anything now. Probably a Time Lord thing, she assumed. Though right now she barely recognised him. His face didn't look right. It didn't look like him at all, though she knew perfectly well it was. His skin was so grey.
She reached forward to rest a hand on his wrist. He was utterly stiff with rigor mortis, and there was absolutely no throbbing beneath her fingertips. The Doctor was dead. When had she ever thought she'd feel a pulse?
No, he was dead, and she had made a promise.
She forced herself to her feet, barely able to walk. But she was determined to stay true to her word. She took his arm, and with willpower she didn't even know she had in her, she began to drag his dead body to the transmat.
"Theta."
The word seemed to come from nowhere. It hadn't been speech or telepathic – the words just seemed to be there. The Doctor didn't seem to be conscious, at least, he didn't seem to have a body of any kind. He knew this was just the last remnants of his mind, still bonded to the TARDIS, dying in the last embers of the metaphorical fire of life. Soon those embers would die, and the connection to her would be completely severed.
"Tardis," he said, though he had no mouth to speak or telepathic power in his mind the words seemed to come from somewhere. "Get her back home for me, would you?"
"Oh, I don't think that'll be necessary," the TARDIS said seriously, all of her indecisive and confused nature he'd been getting used to abruptly disappearing.
"What?" he asked, confused.
"You think I haven't been calculating, Theta?"
"... What?" he asked again, at loss for any other words.
"You really should have read that manual."
"It was long," the Doctor dismissed, still confused. "What are you talking about?"
"A way to save you, my Time Lord."
"... Really?"
"You know me."
"I really don't, do I?"
She sighed, a little annoyed. "You really have no idea how I work, do you?"
"Honestly? No," the Doctor admitted. "Enlighten me."
"You know the rumours of what happens to people in my Heart."
"Those are just rumours."
"But aren't you just slightly intrigued?"
"Of course I am, but..."
"Which one interests you the most right now?" she interrupted, persisting.
The Doctor winced. "You're not gonna make me say it out loud, are you?"
"Humour me."
"But it's ridiculous."
"Tell me."
He sighed. "Bringing the dead back to life," he mumbled, as if ashamed at even suggesting such a ludicrous idea.
"Think about it."
The Doctor did... for quite a while. He knew from the off what she was suggesting, but he couldn't quite bring himself to believe it. "You can, can't you?"
"In a manner of speaking," she said, smiling. "I can save you, Theta."
"So what... you're going to bring me back to life using some special glowing magical energy, I suppose?"
"Nobody can bring a four hour old corpse to life, idiot."
The Doctor couldn't help but laugh. "Okay. So how are you saving me?"
"Think about it. I can take you and your companions absolutely anywhere in time and space. You can stand hundreds of miles away from my Heart in the console room, and I can take you to the very edge and end of the Universe so long as you tap the right buttons. And now you're in my Heart... you don't need those buttons any more."
"Eh?"
"I can take you anywhere, anytime. You and your body."
"You're not suggesting..."
"Fragments of time, every single second of every single day of every single week, month, year, millenia – of every life. I can see it all, Theta Sigma. And I know exactly where to put your body four hours ago."
"... I don't believe it."
"All it is is time travel, Time Lord. I thought you were good at that?"
"Wait," he suddenly said. "That will cause a major paradox. I can't let you."
"No it won't," she countered. "Because I'm taking you forward to your Eleventh life."
"What?"
"In your future you will collapse from only your right heart working, and err, 'leftie', will be restarted by a defibrillator used by your future companion."
It took a few moments for the Doctor really take that in, and what it meant...
"... But that's brilliant."
"Allons-y," the TARDIS replied in a whisper, and then there he was, lying on the floor of a corridor with people rushing around... There was a red-haired girl kneeling over him holding defibrillators, his shirt was open...
"CLEAR!" she yelled.
Zap!
The Doctor jolted in the air, yelling at the same time before his eyes snapped open and he found himself lying on the TARDIS grating, a very injured Rose standing over him, gaping in what he could only deem to be strange combination of happiness, shock and utter horror.
"Doctor!?" she yelped. "But you were..."
"Dead?" he asked between coughs, rolling onto his front and coughing some more, forging through his pains to hammer himself on the chest to try and get his right heart started.
"But..."
"Hit me on the chest," he interrupted in a gasp, struggling to his knees and gesturing to his right heart.
Far too confused to do anything but obey, Rose hit him hard exactly where he'd indicated with her good arm, the other pressed against her chest.
"On the back," he gasped next, falling onto all fours. She did again, and finally his right heart lurched into action, beating rapidly for a few seconds before settling back to a steady rhythm. "Phew!" he breathed, pushing himself to his knees again, mindful of his still absolutely wrecked leg.
"Doctor, you were dead!" Rose yelled, hardly caring she was being rude. "I was gonna bury you!"
"No need," the Doctor assured her, still slightly out of breath and cradling his broken wrist to his chest. "Nice and alive, now."
"What did you do!? What happened!?"
"The Tardis reached back in time, to the point just as my body died. Then she took my body forward to my Eleventh life, where she said a defibrillator would be used on me. She slotted me in for a second, merging me with my Eleventh self. The defibrillator kicked me back into life, and she took me out again immediately. No harm done to anyone. The time lines will rewrite so my body stays alive and everything should be okay."
"Okay," Rose muttered, barely able to understand him at the rate he was talking. "The Tardis saved you?"
"Yeah," he replied. "Bit of timey-wimey."
She sighed, dropping heavily to her knees beside him. "I'm just acceptin' that."
He flashed a grin at her. "Disappointed?"
She rolled her eyes, her face breaking into a smile as she leant forward to hug him lightly enough to not cause either of them any pain. "So what happens now?" she asked over his shoulder.
"Now... We forget."
"What?" She drew back. "How much?"
"Well, using Bad Wolf erases your memory, and messing around with my body in my own time line will stuff up mine. I'm guessing we'll lose all memory of going into the Heart of the Tardis. Time reverses back to some point before that."
"When?"
"God knows."
"But what about the weed?"
"I'm guessing it'll stay dead, and I'm hoping the Bad Wolf eradicated the poison from your system."
"You've got no idea, have you?" she realised.
"Nope," he admitted, groaning as he rocked a little, still holding his wrist.
She leant forward and kissed him on the cheek.
"I'm glad you're not dead," she said quietly.
"Me too," he agreed.
There was a brief pause.
"Are we just gonna ignore it, then?" Rose suddenly asked.
"Ignore what?"
"When you were in your weird mind world you said something to me. D'you remember?"
He looked at her sharply, his eyes suddenly very wide. "... I remember everything," he mumbled.
"You said you..."
"I know what I said," he interrupted, cutting off any continuation of her sentence as his head dropped to look at the floor.
"So we're just gonna ignore it," she surmised.
"Yep."
"Why do we ignore it?" she asked quietly.
"Because that's what we always do."
When Rose woke up, her head was throbbing as though a band with a disproportionate amount of drum players were parading inside her brain in a constant loop. She opened her one working eye and found the Doctor, covered in blood, leaning over her and checking her pulse. The moment he noticed her awake, he smiled, genuine relief flooding his face.
"Hello," he said softly, leaning over her and brushing back the hair from her face. "You had a fall. Can you remember your name?"
Rose frowned. "R-Rose."
"Yep. How about my name?"
"T-the D-Doctor," she stuttered out, barely able to speak through the pain in her head.
"Good. Remember where you are?"
"T-Tardis."
"Three out of three," he approved, nodding and grinning. "Bonus round... Remember what you were doing before you fell?"
"I w-was... k-killing the w-weed, l-left you in... in the in-infirmar-ry..."
"Correct!" he chimed, his grin morphing to a beaming smile. "I'm gonna take you back there and fix you up, okay? Trust me."
"Al-always," she breathed out, forcing a smile. It must have been the worst smile ever, but even if it was he didn't falter.
"Just relax, I'm taking care of you. This is gonna hurt," he said gently, moving into position as if to pick her up. "D'you want me to knock you out?"
"I'll d-do... th-that," she assured him, and quickly sank into oblivion.
Rose had woken up to find herself in the infirmary, in a bed, fully bandaged, with her vitals being monitored. Her left eye was working a little better – now offering a slit of a blurry image. She had the minimal of pain, but she still didn't want to risk moving a limb – just in case. The Doctor had been there immediately, checking she was okay before retreating to tend to his own wounds.
"The weed's gone," the Doctor was saying, sitting on the bed next to Rose's, putting his leg into a fresh cast. He'd managed to clean himself up a bit, and another bandage was wrapped around his head with his hair sticking out at erratic angles. "No idea what happened to it. It's just gone."
"But I was poisoned," Rose replied, confused.
"I cured you, remember?" the Doctor prompted.
"But the hallucination said..."
The Doctor grinned, interrupting her. "I told you – being so close to the Heart messes up reality a bit. Whatever you saw and heard was just a hallucination. I've checked and double-checked – there's no trace of the poison in your system."
"Oh," Rose muttered. "So the TARDIS is okay, yeah?"
"I haven't run any diagnostics yes, but she seems fine," he said, securing the last of the cast before grabbing a crutch and propelling himself over to her, sitting on her bed. "Keeps sniggering like the entire thing was hilarious."
"Nice," Rose muttered sarcastically, relaxing her head against the pillows.
He smiled lightly. "Just rest. And don't fall down any more hatches."
She smiled in return, her eyes lightly closed. "Hey, you did too."
"In a valiant effort to try and save you," he replied, a little lamely.
She giggled at that. "No runnin' for a while, though."
"No," he agreed.
"Won't you get bored? How long until I get better?"
"Human bodies are fragile, I'm not rushing this," the Doctor replied. "As long as it takes until you're a hundred percent. And I won't get bored. I have so many board games we can play!"
Rose opened her eyes again, stiffening slightly. "Board games?"
"Yeah!" he enthused, grinning. "I haven't had anyone to play them with for centuries. I've got everything, Jabinga, Find the Sqoola, Monopoly: Universe Edition, 50th Century Trivial Pursuit, Kaztzi..."
Rose couldn't help but laugh. "Yeah, board games."
"What's wrong with board games?"
She laughed again. "Nothin'."
"Are you hungry? Shall I get some snacks and a game? Can we play Jabinga? Please?"
"Actually, I'm just kinda tired."
"Oh!" the Doctor realised. "Sorry, yes. Go to sleep."
She readjusted herself on the bed to be more comfortable, before looking at him through sunken eyes. "Will you be here when I wake up?"
He smiled. "Of course I will."
Very quickly exhaustion took his little human, her eyes closed until the even, levelled breathing began and she was fast asleep.
The Doctor methodically got off of the bed so as not to disturb her. He limped over to a chair, pulling it in beside her bed and dropping into it, lifting his leg with his hands to rest on the bed. He then picked up the TARDIS manual from her bedside table, and settled himself in to read until she woke up.
The End
A/N: J'ai fini (I know French, me)! Anyway, we're all done here. Next on my agenda is the sequel to Echoes. Don't ask me when/who/what/why/how cos I have no idea. Currently in the process of looking for a new job so hopefully after that's sorted I'll have more time on my hands. Yee-haw!