Chapter 3
Season 2, "The First Half"
New Earth
The Doctor smiled at Rose, who screamed from shock.
"Why didn't you warn me?" She ground out after the spray stopped.
He didn't reply, just grinned at her.
"Bad for you that I actually caught this lift…"
That wiped the smile off of his face.
--
Rose smiled as she and the Doctor walked up to the Face of Boe.
"Novice Hame, if you could please look after this gentleman and lady?"
"Of course." Novice replied. She turned to the Doctor and Rose, and quietly told them, "I'm afriad the Face of Boe is asleep, it's all he tends to do these days. Are you friends?"
"Oh, we met just the once, on Platform one. What's wrong with him?" The Doctor asked.
"I'm so sorry, I thought you knew... I'm afraid he's dying."
"Of what?" Rose asked quietly, as she stepped upto the glass. She felt something, but she didn't know what it was or meant.
"Old Age, the one thing we can't cure. He's… thousands of years old. Some people say millions, although that's impossible."
"Oh, no, I like impossible." The Doctor replied with a faint smile, before he stepped forward and bent down slightly. He spoke to the Face of Boe, "I'm here. I look a bit different, but it's me, it's the Doctor."
The only reaction to his presence that the Face made was to move about a little with low groans, as though he were dreaming.
"Hello again," Rose began, and she felt a smile crawl its way onto her face as the Face shifted and let a contented groan out, "I'm tempted to knock on here to wake you up, but if Novice Hame is right, you need rest."
Almost as if in response, the Face made another groan, and the Doctor smiled at her. "I think he agrees with you."
"Does no one else visit him?" Rose asked of Novice Hame.
"The rest of Boekind became extinct, long ago. He's the only one left. Legend says that, the Face of Boe has watched the Universe grow old." Rose glanced at the Doctor, who gave her a sad smile, "There's all sorts of superstitions around him. One story, says that just before his death, the Face of Boe will impart his great secret, but he will speak those words only to one like himself."
"What does that mean?" The Doctor asked.
"It's just a story…" Novice Hame replied.
"Tell me the rest." The Doctor asked, a strange expression on his face.
Rose looked at the Doctor with a sad smile, she guessed she knew what the Novice would mean without knowing.
"It's said he'll talk to a wanderer, someone without a home, the lonely deity."
The Doctor and Rose shared a look.
"You don't think…" she began.
"… Nah… can't be."
"Oh?"
"I'm not lonely, I got you."
Rose smiled sadly, as they both looked at the Face, wondering when he'd wake up.
--
Rose sighed, and asked the Doctor, "In almost 900 years of travelling, have you ever been somewhere and something not actually happen that puts you or your friends in peril?"
The Doctor chuckled quietly, but didn't answer, as they both returned to the Face of Boe's ward.
"What about friends that haven't been possessed."
"Oh, well, only a few got possessed."
"Lucky me."
"Lucky that Human biology had evolved over the many millions of years before Cassandra that your body rejected her mind without killing you, had you been nearer to her physiology - before she got rid of it that is - your body wouldn't have rejected her and your mind would have been erased, like installing a new operating system over the last one."
"Oh, like you can't install that Apple Mac on a Windows-based PC, but if you installed a fresh copy…"
"Exactly."
Rose shook her head. "Seriously, one of these days we're going to have a quiet trip where the excitement we get doesn't originate from being in a dangerous situation." With that said, Rose walked ahead, and found the Face was awake.
"Hello." She greeted warmly.
'Hello, Rose Tyler.' The Face greeted her.
She turned her head slightly, with a faint smile, "You speak through telepathy?"
The Face chuckled, both audibly and telepathically, before he replied, 'Always the quick one. Yes, as my vocal cords deteriorated millenia ago. Thankfully a century before I could no longer speak, I had developed projection telepathy.'
"How old are you? I mean, sorry but… I'm curious."
'No offence taken, Rose. I myself lost count, but know this. I have seen Earth as you saw it.'
Rose looked at the Doctor, whose' eyes widened also.
"You were on Earth - the original Earth, in the 20th Century? How did you manage that?"
The Face turned to him slightly, and replied, 'I was not always just a Face, Doctor. I used to be able to walk among the peoples of Earth with only my good looks to attract attention.'
Rose chuckled, "Pretentious are we?"
'Perhaps.' The Face joked back.
"So, I could have walked by you on the street and I wouldn't have known it?" Rose asked curiously.
The Face made a nodding motion, and replied, 'My past self will meet you again, Rose Tyler. You can not know it until my past self returned to his life on Earth, so in a way, yes.'
"Crossing personal timelines? Now that's intriguing." The Doctor mumbled. "And what about me?"
The Face gave a sad sigh, 'I'm afraid, Doctor, that I can not tell you. All I can say is that I have heard of the laws of the Time Lords when they were around. Information pertaining to your own future must not be revealed unless vital to your own continued existence. Whether or not I have met you in your future, my past.'
The Doctor gave a sad sigh, before he noticed Novice Hame look at them confused, staring. "I'm sorry for staring… it's just, I have never seen anyone able to communicate so clearly." She sighed sadly, "I myself am unable to hear him clearly."
The Doctor looked at the Face in question, so he replied, 'In time, she will. For now, I have asked the local enforcement to entrust her to my custody.'
"That's…" The Doctor began, but couldn't find a word.
Airily, the Face commented, 'She is a good nurse, attentative and she hears my song well enough that I have high hopes for her.'
Rose' eyes widened, "That's what that sound is? I can barely hear it, but…"
The Face of Boe looked at her in shock, as did the Doctor. 'You can hear my song?'
"Yes."
'This is unexpected surprise, even for me, but not an unwelcome one. One day, maybe you will hear it clearly enough to recognise the tune.'
Rose shared a look with the Doctor, who grinned at her. "Well, I hope when you do, Rose, you tell me because, I can't hear it."
'Please, I'm afraid our time is shorter than we all would like. I have my vessel in orbit waiting.'
"But, you were supposed to be dying." The Doctor pointed out, but happy that it was not so.
'There are better things to do today, old friend. Dying can wait. I had grown tired of the universe, but you and Rose once again taught me to look at it anew.'
"There are legends, saying you are millions of years old. But if you know me, I can't help but wonder, if you had access to time travel and used it."
The deep reverberating chuckle of the Face of Boe came through to them all in their heads, and he replied, 'I have... now and then. But no, that would be impossible.'
"Wouldn't it just? I got the impression, there was something you wanted to tell me?"
'The Story of the wanderer.' The Face paused, and then smiled secretly, 'I wondered when you would bring it up. It can wait.'
"Oh, does it have to?"
Without being obvious of who he was talking to, he finished, 'I will meet you for the Third time with this name, for the last time. Then, the truth shall be told. Until then…' The Face of Boe took on an intense look, and while Rose didn't hear it, just as he dematerialised in a teleport, the Doctor heard, 'It is impossible for a human to absorb a time vortex and live, or so you thought.'
The Doctor was quiet for a moment, then replied, "Oh, that was enigmatic. Textbook enigmatic."
"I think he learned it from you then." Rose inserted. "You can be dictionary definition of enigmatic at times."
--
Tooth and Claw
Rose stepped forward, wary but strangely calm and confident, her eyes locked on the hooded figure in the cage.
"Who are you?" She asked.
"Don't enrage him." The groundskeeper warned.
"Where are you from? You're not from Earth. What planet are you from?"
"Oh… intelligence."
"Where were you born?"
"This body… 10 miles away. A weakling, heart-sick boy. Stolen away at night by the brethren for my… cultivation. I carved out his soul and sat in his, heart."
Rose shuddered slightly, but showed no other outward sign of how unsettled she was. She focussed on his eyes, staring directly into them, and he did the same. "So, the body's human, but what about you, the thing inside?"
"So far from home."
"If you wanna get back home, we can help." Rose told him. The others looked at her in confusion.
"Why would I leave this place? A world of industry, of workforce and warfare. I could turn it to such progress…"
"How would you do that?"
"I would migrate to the holy monarch."
"Queen Victoria?"
"With one bite. I would pass into her blood, and then it begins, the empire of the Wolf… You have many question."
Suddenly, the boy jumped forward in his cage. "You've seen it too…"
"Seen what?"
"There is something of the Wolf about you. You burn like the Sun…"
Rose stood up and moved as close as she could with the chain on her leg. One of the Brethren, who had remained inside, watched warily, unused to such bravery exibited by those outside of their brotherhood.
Rose then leaned forward, and spoke quietly, loud enough that the others could hear, but barely a whisper. "You're right. There is something of the Wolf about me. But I'm a different animal to you and your kind. You flourish in the moonlight, but not all places have moons. But every one has a Sun. You say I burn like the Sun? Well, you try anything and you'll find out just how true that statement is."
--
Rose flicked rapidly through the books, eyes scanning the pages and discarding them at a rate she didn't realise, but not as fast as the Doctor was doing, who flicked through several 500-odd paged books a minute. Between getting another batch, he shot odd looks at her, wondering if she was actually looking.
As he finished one batch, he saw her grab another batch with a curious look on her face. As though she recognised something. Instead of starting from the top, she picked a specific one. She had barely done started the same rate of flicking through she had used with the others when she stopped and plopped the book on the table, open halfway through.
"Look what your dad found." Rose said to Sir Robert.
The Doctor glanced at her, curious, but paid attention to it. It was a drawing, of a falling meteor.
"A, space ship or meteor, something, fell to earth. 'In the year of our lord, 1540, under the reign of King James the Fifth, an almighty fire did burn in the pit.'"
Sir Robert looked at her, "That's, the glen of Saint Cathrine, just by the monastery."
"But that was 300 years ago." The Doctor prodded, curious to see if Rose was going to surprise him again.
"Okay, I don't care what race you are, 300 years is a long time to wait… so maybe… it was hurt or… Doctor?"
"Only a single cell survived. Adapting slowly down the generations, it survived through the humans. Host after host after host."
"But why does it want the throne?" Sir Robert asked.
"It doesn't just want the throne itself. It wants an empire to command. And milady certainly has command of one." Rose looked at Queen Victoria, and turned back, "The Empire of the Wolf. Starships fuelled by coal and driven by steam."
"The Victorian age accelerated." The Doctor whispered. Sir Robert frowned at their words, but worried also.
--
Rose settled down from her amusement at learning the Royal Family was a bunch of werewolves as The Doctor took the TARDIS back into the time vortex, ready to go to any time any place at any moments notice.
"I can't believe you got us banished." Rose told him.
"Oh come on, it wasn't my fault." He complained.
"I know you get excited to learn new things even in the face of impending doom, but come on, you were going over the top a bit…"
He shook his head side to side and commented, "Okay, I'll give you that one, Dame Tyler. So. When to? Forward in time? Back in time?"
"Still got Sheffield to get to." Rose told him, amused.
"Oh yes. but we could go to that time any time we like."
"-And what better time than the time I suggested, delayed by a trip discovering the existence of werewolves?"
"Fair point. Off we go. 1979, and I damn well hope I get it right this time!"
--
"School Reunion"
Rose smiled as she realised Sarah Jane Smith was struggling with the Doctor's Sonic Screwdriver.
"Oh pass it here."
Sarah handed her the screwdriver, and within seconds, she got it working.
"Used to work first time back in my day."
"Well, things were different back then." Rose commented,
"Rose, can I give you a bit of advice?"
Rose got up and tried to bring the computer out of its' standby mode. "I get the feeling you're about to."
"I know how, intense, a relationship with the Doctor can be, I don't want you to feel like I'm intruding."
Rose looked up at her and assured her, "I don't feel threatened by you if that's what you're getting at."
"Right… Good… cuz I'm not interested in picking up where we left off."
Rose looked at the computer, and not really meaning it, she asked, "No? With the big sad eyes and the robot dog, what else were you doing last night?"
Sarah Jane took the bait, as she replied, "I was just saying how hard it was adjusting back to life back on Earth."
Rose stood up, and with a grin that wasn't visible to Sarah Jane, "Thing is, when you two met, they'd only just got rid of rationing. It's no wonder all that space stuff was a bit too much for you."
"I had no problem with space stuff!" Sarah Jane argued, and Rose turned, her grin hidden as she played up the 'jealous new girlfriend'. "I saw things you wouldn't believe."
"Try me." Rose spoke, curious.
"Mummies."
Rose didn't really react, after her first trip into the past, little that Sarah Jane had to say would shock her - she was doing it more to hear about Sarah Jane and her Doctor's travels. But she had to give a bit, since it was an 'argument'. "I've met ghosts."
"Robots, lots of Robots."
"Slitheen from Raxicorofalipatorious… in Downing Street."
"Daleks!"
Rose snorted, and with a very suggestive grin (one suggesting lots of gratutious violence) she countered, "Met the Emporer."
"Anti-Matter Monsters."
"Gas-Mask Zombies in World War Two."
"Real Living Dinosaurs"
"Real Living Werewolf - Queen Victoria that."
"What- The Loch Ness MONSTER!" Sarah Jane finished, having nearly lost her rag.
Rose had to ask, "Seriously?"
After a few seconds to calm down, Sarah Jane had to ask, "Queen Victoria's a Werewolf?"
Rose nodded. "Met her about 2 weeks ago, fought off the werewolf to stop a full possession. You know how it is I guess, go someplace, and something just absolutely has to happen to throw the timeline off if we don't fix things." Sarah Jane smiled slightly and nodded. "Well, This werewolf wanted to make Queen Victoria her host, and even though we beat it, Her Majesty got a cut, and we guessed that she at least got a cell or so. Nothing proven really, It's just that after that incident, the Doctor explained how the Queen really did suffer from a blood disorder that came out of nowhere, that her children suffered and so on down through the royal blood line. Hell it could be just a disease she got from the doorframe, but with his luck, it would have been up until he waltzed in."
Sarah Jane fought off her smile. "Gas Mask Zombies?" She asked.
Rose smiled at the reminder. "A Kid who got injured, he was out, wearing a gas mask at the time when this, alien battle-field type amublance with nano robots crashed, and the robots didn't know what humans where supposed to be like, so after 'fixing' the kid from death, giving him super powers to boot, it proceeded to do the same to anyone who came into contact with the boy, using it's only template it had: A being with a gasmask. they literally 'grew' a gasmask for a face. The Doctor fixed it when the boy's mother was recognised as such by the nanogenes."
"But in between there was fear for your lives and so forth?"
"Of course."
"So you met the Dalek Emporer?" Sarah Jane asked as they both got back to work on the computers.
"Oh, I not only met him, I killed him. It's the reason the Doctor had to regenerate."
Sarah Jane frowned, "But, as far as I know, Time Lords aren't immune to a Dalek death ray - a direct hit and they're dead, only glancing ones…"
Rose corrected her, "That's not what made him need to regenerate. He put me in the TARDIS and triggered this security protocol - one, I think - and sent me back to my mum here, about 6 few months back local time. Leaving himself stranded in the year 200,100."
"How did he get back? I've tried a few times to pilot the TARDIS and it didn't let me."
Rose frowned, but worked it up to the TARDIS being living and so chose to allow the times she did.
"Well, I kind of didn't try that. Afraid I would land too far into the future or something. So I opened up the Heart of the TARDIS and looked into her."
Sarah Jane was frozen.
"I told the TARDIS to take us back as I absorbed the Time Vortex, and by the time I had taken her in, I was there. Broke the bonds on the emporers' existence - and not just him, his whole fleet of daleks, thousands of ships with thousands of daleks on each. Once I was done, the Idiot, I mean, the Doctor absorbed it before putting it back in the TARDIS. I could have put it back myself."
"You had the Time Vortex-?"
"Yeah, can barely remember anything beyond whatever had been my main focus when i did that whole divide-his-existence, but I occassionally get a flash of things. God why won't this work?" Rose grumbled.
Trying to change the subject, Sarah Jane asked, "Does he still stroke bits of the TARDIS?"
Rose looked at her, and nodded but chided, "Don't laugh. I find myself doing that a bit too on occassion. We've been through a lot."
--
"Rise of the Cybermen"
Rose sighed, she really, really wanted to go see the Pete Tyler of this world, but she understood the Doctor's points all too well. The last time, she almost caused the universe to implode in a strange sort of grandfather paradox. While the danger in this parallel universe was different, less catastrophic in universal potential, or so she thought, she had to admit, it would make her upset. For all she knew, this worlds' Pete and Jackie hadn't adopted her, and got a dog as her mum had joked once.
She sat on a park bench, looking out over the Thames, and glancing at the Zeppellins. Flashes of the things she had seen ran through her mind.
Slowly, they began to come quicker, and quicker. She closed her eyes and willed them to stop, thinking that the time for those flashes of what could have been was for after they got back to their own universe.
Because she knew they would. That was one of the flashes she had seen through the time vortex and Heart of the TARDIS - their continued journey through Space and Time, meeting people of all sorts of races, fighting battles and learning - oh, all the learning she was still to do - all in her own universe. She hadn't seen anything of this universe, the time vortex didn't exist for this one, things were too different, which made her think that Pete and Jackie in this universe didn't adopt Rose - she had seen glimpses of other Rose Tyler's, travelling with other Doctors, in various forms in various parallel worlds. Not this one.
A cough interrupted her musings.
"Doctor?"
"I thought you'd have ran off to see this worlds Pete and Jackie by now." He told her.
"Nah, think it'd be weird for us all if I did. Forbidden fruit and all that."
"That's a mature way to put it." The Doctor teased.
"I don't even know if I exist in this universe." She added.
"What? Why wouldn't you exist here? Every universe could do with a Rose Tyler." The Doctor complimented, as he hopped over the back of the bench and sat beside her.
"Well, my Mum once told me about how my Dad's stupid get-rich-quick schemes never really worked because he hardly had time to work on them, what with a full-time job plus lots of overtime so he could afford to feed us. I can't help but wonder, if he never ad- I mean, if they never had me, he'd not need to go through so much overtime, and have the spare time to actually work on his schemes… maybe that's why this Pete Tyler seems to have gotten successful… he had the time to work on it."
The Doctor caught her little slip, and suspected what she was going to say. "You were adopted?"
She sighed, and shrugged. "Yeah. Said I was like a gift from god. They'd been trying to have a child but it wasn't working. At the time I didn't know what they meant by that, still thought that babies were brought in by stalk." She chuckled. "They told me when I was 10, because I found the adoption papers in a pile of Dad's old things. I asked about who my birth parents were when I was 16, but my Mum said she didn't know - my Dad did, and…"
"And he died." He mumbled. "Don't get me wrong, but, is that why you wanted to go see him? Find out who…?"
"One of the reasons, yeah; but not the main one. In all the… excitement, I forgot to even ask. I couldn't really anyway, what would I have said? 'Oh hi, I'm Rose from the future, I just saved your life so I could ask you who my birth parents were'?"
The Doctor had to agree, she had a point. "Yeah, good thing you didn't. Then again, he did realise who you were towards the end. You could have asked then, I'm sure he would have understood given that he also understood that you came back to save him, and that it was such a fixed point in history that he had to die…"
She shook her head. "My Mum did tell me that whoever it was, dropped me on their doorstep. Whoever they were, my Dad was told who they were, but promised to tell me - and my Mum - when I was older. All I had from them was a locket, that wouldn't open."
The Doctor nodded. "Did you bring it with you?"
She nodded, but sighed again, "I couldn't find it though, after the Gamestation… I guess I lost it on the station. Jack saw it before then, so I'm sure he'd recognise it when he comes, came? Across it in his bid to rebuild 200,100 Earth. When we get back, we should go visit him, see if he did come across it."
"Temporal Treasure hunt?" The Doctor asked amused at the idea, but sighed when she nodded. "We can't. The TARDIS is dead, Rose. There's no Vortex... no power to anything. Nothing. She's… Dead." He finished, distraught.
She hugged him, pulled him close to her, buried her head in his chest and heard the double drum of his hearts. "She's alive, Doctor, I'm sure of it. She can't just die, not like this."
"I hope so too." He mumbled, as he closed his eyes.
A sudden snap made them both jump in their seats.
"Oh wait, I forget to get you to say 'Cheese'." Mickey Joked. "Now come on Doctor, haven't you got a TARDIS to fix?"
The Doctor stood up and gave an apologetic smile to Rose.
"It's alright. Go on. I can resist the want to go see them." Her phone beeped, and within a few seconds she added, "I can just see if there's a parallel me here through this. Cybus network thing…" she mumbled, trailing off.
--
Rose froze in terror. It was too soon, too fast, too… well she wasn't sure what else, but she knew that she wasn't prepared. Nor was the Doctor, who recognised them personally.
She was about to make for the window when her route was blocked.
"DELETE" the Cyberman said in its monotone.
She dodged around, and barely felt the hand and a tickling sensation in her arm.
Then they, the Doctor, Pete of this world, Rickey - this worlds' Mickey - aswell as Mickey and someone else, were caught in the front yard. The Doctor tried to surrender but they declared that he would be deleted.
They were about to reach for him when she pulled him back. "NO!"
He shouted too, when the hand grabbed her. "ROSE!"
"RESIST AND YOU ARE INCOMPATIBLE FOR UPGRADE. MAXIMUM DELETION" the Cyberman declared regardless, and suddenly, Rose tensed and fell to the ground, arm still held by the Cyberman, as massive amounts of electricity flowed through her. For too long, the current held.
When it was over, the Doctor stared at her in shock, amazement, awe and worry.
"DELETION UNSUCCESSFUL." The Cyberman intoned, in it's version of shock.
Tendrils of electrical current passed through her, her body struggling to absorb all of that electricity. She put her hand on the chest plate, and the electricity found an outlet.
The Cyberman fell, moaning in pain. And moments later, they were all in a van.
"Rose…" The Doctor kept whispering to her over and over, hugging her close to make sure she was real, alive and relatively speaking, alright.
"Excuse me but, that charge of electricity should have killed you." Pete interrupted.
"So should the time vortex." Rose mumbled, and the Doctor nodded his head in agreement, but neither said anything else for a few minutes.
--