Author's Note: Erm...ok, I don't really know what happened here, all I know is that it's been a heck of a long time between updates, so I apologise sincerely for that. Hopefully you haven't all forgotten about the story :p Anyway, things have died down a bit now so hopefully updates should be more regular, but it's quite busy being back at university, so if I do disappear again that's why, though I'll try to make sure that that doesn't happen again. Many thanks to 10Whovian, who has been the most patient beta in the world and fantastic at putting me straight on all the science-y bits - I would never have even been able to get this far otherwise. Also, thanks to those who are still reading, and I hope you enjoy this belated chapter!
oOo
9. Meanwhile...
It had first happened three weeks ago on the bus…
Rose had just sat down and was beginning to drift into the realm of daydreams when a gentle whisper yanked her back to reality. She looked around in shock before her eyes fell on a young man in the seat behind her.
He was staring straight at her.
"Did you say something?"
He blinked at her, confused for a moment, before a gleam entered his eye. He leaned forward after a quick glance around him, and pointedly looked her in the eye. "Only that you're very beautiful," he murmured, his gaze gently coming to rest on her lips for the most fleeting of moments before they snapped back to her eyes. He smiled shyly, but kept eye contact.
Rose lifted an eyebrow. "Are you trying to chat me up…on a bus?" Her voice was teasing but not unfriendly.
The smile became slightly self-deprecating. "I admit I wish I'd seen you in a more romantic setting. But," he gestured their surroundings, "Fate didn't seems to want to give me a choice."
He was handsome, she noticed, looking him slowly up and down. He had messy black hair in dire need of a haircut, dark brown eyes and a charming smile. Perhaps he was a bit too pale and his shirt could have done with being ironed, but she had nothing against the scruffy look.
His hand rested on the back of her seat, balancing him against the swaying of the bus as he remained closer to her. His fingers were stained with oil, she noticed.
"I'm a mechanic," he informed her, having caught her staring.
She looked back into his eyes. Brown…
She swallowed and tried to beat her feelings into a cage in her mind, tempted to throw away the key. When would this stop? "A mechanic?" she repeated, her voice slightly unsteady. "You fix things."
For a moment the confusion returned. "…Yeah. But you know," he said, even more softly, so that she had to strain to hear him, "that's not all I do."
Brown eyes. He fixed things. He was scruffy… Suddenly, her heart wasn't really in this anymore. She didn't think it ever had been, at least, not completely.
"I also do dinner, films..." He must have noticed her lack of attention because he added, as though it were a question, "Dancing?"
She deliberately leaned back slightly, putting some distance between them. "I don't dance." Not anymore.
"We could do something else," the man continued, "whatever you feel like."
"I'm busy," she said distractedly, fighting to keep her mind in the present. "I'm sorry," she added, when guilt at his crestfallen expression joined the emotional rollercoaster she was currently stuck on. "It's nothing personal."
The man tried to smile, but failed. "Well," he said after a moment, "I can hardly blame you. Buses… Never ask on a bus," he muttered to himself, walking to the front.
Rose watched him stand there for ten minutes until at last the bus pulled over and he got off, not once glancing back in her direction. Sighing, she looked out the window and tried her hardest not to think about the Doctor.
oOo
After that, it had escalated gradually. What had once been a whisper became an audible cough, a mumble. Once, it had been in a language she hadn't even understood.
"Conducía muy lentamente, cuando…"
She had looked it up later, her brow furrowed as she read the translation. There was absolutely no reason for a Spanish phrase like that to pop into her thoughts, especially not in a voice that she had never even heard before.
Five minutes later, she had been searching for psychological conditions, wondering if it was all finally getting to her. She didn't want to think that anything else could happen…not with him away when she needed him.
After all, when she had realised that she was stuck here forever…when he had…
She closed her eyes. But the Doctor was gone now. Or rather, she was gone now. The only good thing out of this was that she had Mickey, her mother and, at last, a father – her alternate father, she reminded herself, though it was still better than she could ever have hoped for. It was as close to her life from before as she could ever get.
She smiled slightly then, remembering the risks her mother had taken when she had hidden aboard the TARDIS, just to see if she was safe. More impressively, though, she had managed to make it past the Doctor, who she knew would have forced her to stay behind if he'd ever known. But then she'd pushed even further beyond Rose's expectations by deciding to stay with Pete, Rose's alternate father, in the hopes of being happy with him, and he with her, after all they had both lost. They were even going to have a baby together.
While at the time she had been angry with her mother for taking such crazy risks, she was now immeasurably grateful; now, they were living together as a family. Granted, it had taken some getting used to, having never had a father, and he worked above her as head of Torchwood (a constantly painful reminder to her of the Doctor), but she was just glad to have an opportunity to finally get to know the man at all.
And she was…content. At least, she told everyone that she was, because she hated the idea of having to explain her feelings, in all their intricacies, to everyone else…especially when everyone else was just beginning to settle into this life together and the Doctor was gradually being forgotten. The very thought that he could ever be forgotten shook her to her core and, as always, she had to close her eyes to keep herself from crying.
Realising that her thoughts had run away on another tangent, she closed the page she was looking at and shut the computer down. Nothing seemed to fit, anyway. But she really didn't want to think about this anymore.
oOo
A week later, the murmuring became even louder. She had dropped the plate she was putting away, smashing it into pieces. Her eyes had darted around her kitchen wildly, though she knew that she would find nothing.
She looked at her watch. 8 pm. Half an hour late, but still consistent enough with the others that she frowned into space.
A sudden knocking sound drew her back to life and she opened the door, jumping when she saw that someone was actually stood there.
"Did I make you jump?" Mickey asked, shouldering his way into her flat without even waiting for a reply or really looking at her. "Of course I did," he continued, pacing around her sofa.
Rose closed the door and stared at him. "What are you talking about?"
"You're jumpy, Rose," Mickey said quickly, forcefully.
"You're not exactly relaxed either," she pointed out.
Mickey ignored her and continued pacing, gesturing every now and then. "I was waiting for it to happen, Rose. I wasn't sure until now, but it's obvious. I was sat in the hallway for half an hour –your neighbours thought I was drunk or-"
"Wait, what were you doing in the hallway for half an hour?"
This was odd.
Mickey stopped pacing. "You've been jumpy lately."
"What's that got to do with anything?"
"You're never jumpy. I'm never jumpy. We're both," he said, voice getting louder, gesturing between them, "jumpy."
"Mickey, people get-"
"How much have we been through together, Rose? Remember that time, when the Doctor was captured? I was hiding. I wanted us to run away. I was scared. But what did you do? You swung down to save him! You weren't paralysed with fear like I was!"
At the mention of the Doctor, Rose had flinched and looked down, staring helplessly at her feet. "Mickey, don't…"
"Rose."
She felt his hands on her, one on her shoulder, one lifting her head up so that she was looking at him.
"I know you. I know why you're terrified now when you weren't then. He's not here to give answers, and you're scared of doing it alone. But you can't ignore it anymore. You hear them too."
Rose's blood ran cold and her breath hitched in her throat.
"Something's happening, Rose, but you're just burying your head in the sand, and you never do that! Normally, you're the first one out the door looking for answers. And I know why. You're scared to do anything big without him there to-"
Rose took a step back, suddenly furious. "Leave him out of this, Mickey."
"Rose," Mickey said, dropping his hands back to his sides. "People are scared, something's happening, and you can't ignore it anymore! We need to get to the bottom of this - you can do this without him… We can do this."
Rose's mind was whirring, lost in the past, another life. "The ghosts… This happened before, in the other universe." She looked up at Mickey, to find a hopeful expression on his face. "We need to talk to my Dad, Mickey. The Doctor – we could-" she swallowed. "We could find him."
Mickey nodded, his eyes dropping to the floor in relief for the briefest of moments.
oOo
"You're saying it's those Cybermen again?" Jackie asked after Rose had explained everything to Pete. "But it can't be – the Doctor got rid of them, didn't he?"
Rose shook her head. "It might not be them again, Mum, but it's something similar, something that I've seen before. Pe – Dad," she corrected herself, still not used to calling him by that title, "someone's breaking down the walls of reality."
"Do you have any idea who it is?"
"No…I mean, it could be the Master, but I don't even know if he's alive," she muttered. "It could be anyone. But whoever it is," she added, her voice growing stronger, "it won't be pretty. If you break down the walls of reality, you control everything, and we won't have the power to stop them. We need to team up with the Doctor, tell him what's going on, if he doesn't know already."
Pete reflected for a moment, and then nodded. "We need to send a message into that universe."
"No, a message will never be seen in time," Rose said. "You need to send a person."
Silence reigned for what felt like an impossibly long time before Jackie spoke quietly, almost as though she were afraid of what she was going to say. "You can't, Rose."
"Someone has to."
Jackie stood up then, looking vaguely panicked, but stopped short of approaching Rose, clearly unsure what to do. "It's too dangerous!"
"No, it'll be fine-"
"Oh no you don't!" Jackie said, suddenly raising her voice and pointing a finger into her daughter's face. "Don't you try to pull the wool over my eyes, not this time! I've heard enough from the Doctor and from Pete to know that this sort of thing could kill you!"
"Mum, I'll be fine! We'll do tests first, we'll make sure it's safe-"
"No, you won't!" Jackie said, before realising how much force she had put into her voice and dropping it slightly. "I know you, Rose. You'll go haring off into that other universe as soon as you can! You'd do anything to get the Doctor back, even if you killed yourself doing it, and I can't let you!"
"Mum, I know what I'm doing," Rose snapped, beginning to get annoyed and frustrated. "I'm not a child anymore."
"No, you're not, but that doesn't make me any less your Mum. What'll I do if you never come back?"
"You've got Pete, Mickey," Rose gestured the small bump that was her mother's belly, "Tony. You'll be fine."
Jackie opened her mouth to argue more, but Pete put a gentle hand on her arm, effectively silencing her. Jackie settled for glaring at Rose before sitting beside Pete, allowing him to take over.
"I'll make sure that she's safe, Jackie," Pete promised, before turning to Rose. "I'll send you to look for the Doctor," he said slowly, "under certain conditions. One – you must remain in contact with someone on this end at all times. I don't want anything to go wrong over there. Two – you'll allow someone to go with you, if we have the time and ability to send another person. Three – you won't leave before we've decided it's safe."
"But you're jumping between realities!" Rose exclaimed incredulously. "It's never going to be safe!"
Pete simply stared at her for a moment until she nodded. Satisfied, he turned to Jackie. "I'm going to head into the office now, if that's ok. We'll need to get started on this as soon as possible, now that the breakthroughs are becoming more frequent."
"Yeah, sure," Jackie allowed, leaning in to give him a brief kiss on the lips.
Rose stood and walked with Pete to the front door, not daring to glance back at her mother, knowing she would still be very annoyed with her.
oOo
Present day…
"I think we should send a message through, see if anyone answers," Mickey said, echoing what everyone else was thinking.
They had been measuring the energy around the reality leakages, working out what type of power was needed and just how much. All that remained now was to discover a way to make the transition between realities safe for a human subject.
"No," Rose said, causing everyone in the room to turn and stare at her. "A message is too small. We need to send something alive, to make sure we've got the power ratio right and that the jump isn't fatal."
"We can't send a person," Pete pointed out. "They could never come back."
"Then we should try and bring something into this universe," Rose suggested. "Something that would take the same sort of power that a person would. How's the Visualizer coming along?"
Everyone turned as one to stare at Tucker, a young but brilliant technician who had been working on creating a device to project what was on the other side of the wall to a screen in their reality. He called it the Multi-Dimensional Television, but everyone else insisted on calling it the Visualizer – it was just so much shorter and easier to say (and, in Rose's opinion, more catchy).
Tucker nodded. "It's still in black and white and it's quite grainy, but it'll work."
"Good," Pete said, nodding. "Then we'll try it later, when the walls are more broken down. Everyone keep an eye on the walls – we don't want to be caught out if they're early."
With that, the room burst into activity as everyone went to their assigned work stations. Machines beeped as they were activated and everyone settled in for several long hours of monitoring the most frequent breakthrough points.
Rose simply stood for a moment, thinking. She was so close to the Doctor, now. It was only a matter of time.
