Author's note: Here it is y'alls, hope it doesn't disappoint. While I haven't been able to update in a while, I have still been working on this.
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters, themes, or items in this story. I receive no financial gain or benefit from it.
Wednesday afternoon Rose put the final touches on her letter of resignation and printed a copy. Shoulders back and head high, she carried it to Commander Davis' office as though it was a normal report. She hovered just inside the door as he finished a phone call.
"Tyler." He said as he finished the call, his eyes searching her face. "What can I do for you?"
"May I close the door, sir? I'd like to keep this private. At least until after I return from the Mursagi ball."
"By all means." He replied, curious as to what had his usually calm captain so worked up.
Rose took a deep breath and steeled herself. "I've come to give you notice of my intent to resign."
"You're joking." His voice was flat. Captain Tyler lived for her job.
"I'm afraid not, sir. I will be leaving Torchwood in two weeks time."
The commander was stunned. He'd expected something along the lines of alien infiltration in Torchwood. Not this. "Does... does..." He stuttered.
"Yes, my father knows." Rose hazarded a guess at his question.
Commander Davis nodded dumbly. "Is there any chance of you coming back on board?" After all, she'd left before and returned after attending uni.
"No, not this time."
"Ah. Well. You'll make an announcement next week?"
"Yes sir."
"Very well. Good day then, Captain Tyler."
"Good day, Commander." Rose left his office.
She left the door open in her wake and the few passing people were surprised by the blank, dumbfounded expression on the face of the commander as he sat at his desk, staring straight ahead at nothing at all.
Jackie Tyler wasn't a fool. She knew something was up the moment Pete told her that Rose, Mickey, and Jake were coming to dinner. She figured it had to do with everything going on with Rose and she figured right. But, she knew that at this point she was going to be told what was going on and therefore she didn't need to press her husband or her daughter to find out what was happening. So she kept the dinner topics light and casual. Mickey and Jake teased Rose about a few of the scrapes they'd gotten into with their teams, a surprisingly large number of which seemed to end with Rose covered in slime. Jackie reminded Mickey of the first alien he defeated, well, they defeated, and that he'd ended up covered in green, slimy, Slitheen guts. Rose added bits to the story as Jake listened in amusement.
"So they were in the kitchen, right?" Rose said, "And the Doctor says get vinegar and Mickey has no idea where to find vinegar in his own kitchen."
"Is that why you always make sure we have a bottle?" Jake asked.
"Can never be too careful." Mickey said gruffly.
"Anyway, Mum takes the phone and starts ransacking the cupboards, starts dumping all his pickles into a jug. Gherkins, pickled eggs, pickled onions, you name it. So there we are, trying to stop World War III, and what does the Doctor say?"
Mickey grinned wolfishly, "You kiss this man? Just goes to show though, he had it bad for you right from the start."
Rose turned to face him and stared at him with the big brown eyes that bewitched him in another life. Now though, they seemed a bit more golden than before. Mickey resisted the urge to shiver. Her eyes seemed more than they ever had before. He was used to them looking deep but now they looked more like endless. The look she gave him was odd. Definitely curious, but also doubtful, like she didn't quite believe him but didn't want to fight over it. Then she launched into a story of one of her adventures with the Doctor.
Mickey and Jackie had heard most of her stories before. Mickey had been there for quite a few. But since landing in Pete's World, Rose hadn't shared any of her stories. This one was new to both Jackie and Mickey though, so it happened after they'd left Mickey in Pete's world. With Tony at the table, Mickey knew Rose lightened the situation, but the way she described the television sucking people's faces off was enough to put Mickey off of telly for a bit. Tony giggled as she described it, but underneath his giggle was a bit of uncertainty and he was sure to avoid the telly for a bit too. They all laughed at Rose scolding the blustering Mr. Connelly about the flags and the Doctor's enthusiasm for edible ball bearings.
After dinner, Jackie put Tony to bed while the others sat in the sitting room quietly.
"Now then." Jackie said when she returned, "Why don't we start with what's really going on?" All eyes turned to Rose who focused on her hands in her lap.
"I'm leaving. Leavin' this universe." She said quietly, fighting to keep her voice even. Glancing up after she spoke, Jake was the only one who looked surprised. From what Pete said, Rose knew the other three had their suspicions for a while and compared notes.
Jackie was, predictably, the first one to break the silence. "When?" She asked, her voice uncharacteristically quiet.
"Two or three weeks."
"Two weeks!" Jackie exploded, "That's not enough time! What are you thinking, Rose? Just up and running off without givin' us notice? You'll wait a proper month before you go hightailing off to the Doctor, another couple o' weeks won't kill neither of you."
"But they might, Mum. There's something happening in the other universe and I have to stop it."
"You don't know that. It could all be fine."
"I do, though. I know exactly what's happening. I've got no choice."
"And how's that then? All of a sudden you can see the future?" Jackie was indignant.
"No. I met someone from the future, from my future."
That wasn't what any of them (well, excepting Pete) were expecting and three jaws dropped.
"From the other world?" Mickey asked, "You're just hitching a lift back home?"
Rose winced, "Not exactly."
"Well where is this person? I want to meet him before you go swanning off." Jackie said.
"Her, actually. Her name is River Song, but you can't meet her."
"And why the bloody hell not?"
"She's not properly in this universe."
"So she did that projection thing like the Doctor? Did she only stay for two minutes too? Two minutes and you're packin' up to go?"
"Jacks, I think you need to calm down a bit." Pete interrupted. Jackie was now towering over her daughter, shouting her fury and Pete could see that Rose was about to hit her breaking point and start shouting back. They were too alike in some ways.
Instead, Jackie rounded on him. "And you! You're not surprised by all this. You knew what was going on and you left me worrying again, just like you promised not to."
Pete held up his hands in defense as he backed away. "I just thought that Rose should be the one to tell you and she was already planning to."
Jackie crossed her arms and gave him a glare that could have ignited water. Jake and Mickey decided not to risk their necks and stayed silent, letting Jackie do all the digging for them.
"Mum, it's not like the Doctor's projection at all. I can talk to her any time I want and she's been helping me for the past couple weeks."
"Oh, you can talk to her any time you want but I can't? What's all this about, then?"
"She's not in the other universe, she's not in any universe. Her world exists in a different dimension."
"Would you explain it in bleedin' English?"
"Um. So we've got length, depth, width, and time, right? A point is zero dimensions, stretch it into a line it becomes one, stretch the line sideways into a square and it's two, pull the square upwards into a cube and it has three dimensions, then suspend it through time and it has four. Time is the dimension we're least capable of understanding but those are the ones that we deal with. There are other ones though and River's sort of, stuck, in one of those. But it isn't tied to a universe because our universe as we perceive it is limited to those dimensions."
"But she can reach here" Or... you can reach there?" Jackie's forehead creased as she worked through what Rose said. She'd never cared much for maths and science.
"I can reach there." Rose confirmed.
"But why just you? Why not the rest of us too?" Jackie insisted.
Rose hesitated. Four years before Jackie said the words that broke a bit of Rose's heart and didn't realize how true they were. "I'm different, Mum. I'm- I'm not- I'm not human. Not any more."
"Well of course you are, sweetheart. Me and your dad, we're human an' so are you."
"Really?" She asked bitterly, "Tell me Mum, how many human's can do this?" And she hopped. Same as with Pete, five seconds forward and across the room.
Even Pete, who was expecting it, stared at her with a kind of horror mixed with shock. Rose hated it, hated how they stared at her like she was wrong. She turned away from their eyes and wrapped her arms around her shaking shoulders.
Mickey was the first one to recover. "It's alright, babe. You just let it out." He said as he wrapped his arms around her. She clung to him until her mum pushed him aside.
"Shh, shh, it's okay, sweetheart. You're okay."
Some things are the same right across the universe, the Doctor said, everyone needs a hand to hold. Rose was adding that everyone needed a shoulder to cry on too, and none would work better than her mum's.
"S'rry." Rose mumbled as her tears dried. "I've done an awful lot more crying in the past couple days than I have done for a while."
Jackie steered her back to the sofa and pulled her down, not letting go of her hands.
"But Rose, how?" Mickey asked after a few moments of quiet. Jake was still sitting silently, unsure whether he should be there for this.
"The big, yellow truck." Rose smiled at him. Jake was fond of telling people that Mickey once saved the universe with a big, yellow truck and watching their faces. No one had ever confirmed the story for him and he still wasn't sure whether or not to believe his friend.
"What?" Jake asked, finally finding the evidence he needed.
"I did a bit more than just make contact with the Heart of the Tardis. I absorbed it and I saved the Doctor. I killed thousands of Daleks in the blink of an eye. It was too much though so the Doctor took it out of me. But it had already started changin' me. A little piece of it stayed inside me, hidden. I couldn't remember it. It killed the Doctor though, takin' it out of me. That's why he regenerated.
"As best River and I can tell, that bit was waiting and growing until it was enough to make the final changes. About two weeks ago. Then River helped me unlock it so now I remember and I can use it."
"But what did it do to you? Are you like himself now? Gonna go changin' your face? Two weeks ago, when you fell unconscious? Was that like his regeneration? Did you need tea?"
"Mum, calm down. Breathe. Slowly, there. That's better. River says it didn't so much change me as add. She calls it human plus. I'm not a Time Lord, I won't regenerate. I've just got a bit of Tardis added onto me."
"Hold on, you're part blue-box?" Jake asked, his voice cracking.
"The blue box thing is more of a disguise. The Tardis is so much more than that. She's alive."
"And that's how you get to see your friend?" Mickey asked.
"No... Where River is, it doesn't exist in the physical world. I can't take my body there, I can just send my consciousness."
"That's what happened when you blacked out." Mickey confirmed as the pieces fell into place.
"Yeah."
"So that's not the only time it's happened?" He accused.
Rose flushed. "No, I just timed them better."
"Rose, the Doctor said it was impossible to get back."
She grinned. "I think he needs a new dictionary."
"You can go back with your... disappearing?" Jackie asked.
"I'm calling it 'hopping'. But no, it isn't strong enough. River helped me design a device and I built it. Finished it yesterday."
"Now that you've found a way though, that means you can come back too? To visit?" Jackie pleaded.
Rose shook her head. "I can only get across because the universe is fracturing. Once the cracks close back up I'll be just as stuck there as I've been here. Until they split again. I will be back, but a long time from now and only for a few days."
"When?" Jackie asked, tears in her eyes.
"At least a year. When the darkness comes."
"Cracks in the universe. That means something bad's happening over there." Mickey said gruffly.
"Yeah, and I'm going to help fix it." Rose said, some of her confidence leaking back into her voice.
"Then I'm coming with you. It'll be dangerous. You'll need someone to have your back until you find the Doctor." Mickey said.
The corners of Rose's mouth twitched. "You can't Mickey. Not this time. The cannon only works for me."
"Not this time?" Mickey asked.
"I think... River was hinting at it at least... you come later. When the darkness comes, it affects every universe and all the walls will start to fail. Then you can come. The dimension hoppers will work then."
"Why come back at all?" Jackie was furious again. "You're gone for more than a year and you waltz back in for a couple of days. Oh, hello, good to see you, let me break your heart all over again!"
Rose gaped at her like a fish. Her voice was shaky when she got it working again. "If you don't want to see me then, Mum, I guess I understand. But if I stay there, I'd probably die."
"Well excuse me if I'm not too excited about my daughter leaving me again for that bloody alien. You have a life here, Rose."
"And what of that life when you all grow old and die and I still look twenty years old? What will I have in a hundred years? Two hundred? Or actually, I wouldn't live that long because without me going back, the multiverse would cease to exist in just a few years." Rose hit her breaking point and now she was yelling back at her mum.
"Oh all high and mighty. Can't himself do anything without you then? Needs you to fix all the problems?"
"He needs help, Mum. He's not perfect, he can't do everything."
"Fine. Go then!"
"Fine. I will."
The men glanced at one another nervously, none of them fancied getting in the middle of that fight, it was a battle they couldn't win.
Jackie and Rose stood, glaring at each other, arms crossed and faces set identically for a long minute. Then they flung themselves forward and hugged tightly, crying.
"That's it." Jake said, throwing his hands into the air. "I am never going to understand women."
"I'm with ya there, mate." Mickey added.
"Me too." Pete said. "And that doesn't bode well for your future, does it?"
Soon after, Jackie sent Rose home to pack for her trip with a promise that they'd talk more after she returned from Mursag.