A/N: Really didn't see that one coming...
Chapter 29
Rose closed the door to Romana's TARDIS behind her and leant against the wood for a moment. Then she wiped her eyes and went over to the console where Romana was programming her ship.
"I'll need your help for this," the Time Lady said. "To make controlling the portal easier for the Doctor I'll have to keep the TARDIS exactly on the brink to the Time Vortex. Can you press the three buttons in this row, one after another, exactly two seconds apart, when I give you the signal?"
"Sure. When?"
Romana pointed. "When I pull this lever, wait seven seconds, then press the first button."
"Okay."
"Then let's go home."
Romana started the dematerialisation sequence, and finally pulled the lever she had pointed out to Rose. Exactly seven seconds later, she yelled, "Now!"
Rose pressed the first button, then the second and the third. Romana turned a wheel on the console, then pulled another lever.
"This should keep us balanced for some time," she finally said. "And now, we can begin to establish a connection with the Doctor's TARDIS." She paused for a moment and considered Rose. "We should probably make ourselves comfortable on the floor. Telepathic contact can make you disoriented after some time, and we can't afford accidents."
They sat down cross-legged on a few cushions that had appeared on the floor, their knees maybe a foot apart.
"Close your eyes, Rose. I'm going to touch your temple now, so I can enter your mind. Just imagine it as me knocking at the door. You have to let me in, but remember, if there is something you don't want me to see, put it in a room and close the door. I won't pry," Romana told her calmly.
Rose nodded and closed her eyes. After a few seconds she felt cool fingers touching her temple, and then a warm presence brushed her mind.
May I come in?
Without really knowing what she was doing, Rose send a wave of assent and suddenly the presence wasn't merely touching her mind, Romana was inside.
Now think of the Doctor's TARDIS, how her presence felt to you, and imagine her song.
Rose not so much heard words, it was more like concepts Romana showed her and she did what the Time Lady said.
When she had come into this universe for the first time, the TARDIS had been one of the things she had missed most. When it had got too much, she had retreated to a quiet place and remembered, much like she did now. Ever since the Gamestation she had been able to feel the TARDIS in her mind. She hadn't really thought about it, just accepted it how it was. She hadn't even told the Doctor. Sometimes she had let the TARDIS sing her to sleep, to the point where she hadn't been able to fall asleep without the TARDIS caressing her mind.
Rose concentrated on the song of the TARDIS, remembering how it had sounded to her, years ago. Slowly she became aware of a soft tune, and she followed the sound into the deep recesses of her mind, until she reached a place that was protected by a wooden door, painted blue. When she touched the handle the door vanished, and she stepped through the doorway.
She found herself in the console room of the Doctor's TARDIS and realised only now how much she really had missed the ship. Three quick steps, and she was standing in front of the console. She stretched out her hand, and when she touched the surface, the console opened and engulfed her in golden light.
In the back of her mind she registered a wave of shock and astonishment coming from Romana, but she focused on her connection to the TARDIS. For some time Rose simply listened to her song, then she began to feel it, became part of it, let herself be consumed by it.
~o~o~o~
At first, entering Rose's mind had been everything Romana had expected, unorganised, like someone had just moved into a flat and not found the time to unpack all their boxes. Rose hadn't even bothered to hide anything, the doors to the corners of her mind were wide open. She had barriers, true, even surprisingly strong ones for a human, but apart from that her mind was fairly typical for her species. That is, until Romana discovered the room Rose had entered. It clearly represented the console room of a TARDIS, most likely the Doctor's, with a desktop scheme that looked as if the TARDIS had been reduced to the base coral at one time and someone hadn't bothered to change the scheme later on.
Rose was standing in front of the console, touching it lightly, her mouth forming soundless words. But what truly shocked Romana was the golden light that surrounded the other woman. Rose had told her that she had looked into the heart of the TARDIS, but seeing it was an entirely different matter.
Rose had said that the Doctor had pulled the Time Vortex out of her, but apparently he had missed something. The Doctor's TARDIS was still part of her, which explained not only that she had been able to feel the TARDIS afterwards, but it also was a likely reason for her not aging. Until now, the part that had been left with Rose had been buried deep in her mind, as she had never looked for it. But now Rose had made a connection with the power hidden within her, and it was beautiful.
Romana took a few steps towards the console that only existed in Rose's mind, until she stood next to the young woman.
"Rose."
The other woman turned around, her eyes glowing golden, a tiny smile playing around her lips. "I'm still the Bad Wolf," she said, her voice full of wonder. "I thought she was gone."
Romana shook her head. "Apparently not."
"Can you hear the TARDIS? She is singing."
The Time Lady understood what she meant, even if she couldn't perceive anything without reinforcing the link she had formed with Rose. Right now they had established superficial mental contact, but she needed a stronger connection to be able to hear the Doctor's TARDIS.
"Give me your hand."
Rose held out her hand and the Time Lady took it. As soon as their fingers touched, Romana could feel a faint buzz at the back of her mind. The more she concentrated on the feeling, the stronger it got, and finally she could hear the song of the TARDIS. It was slightly different from Romana's own TARDIS, but familiar nonetheless.
Listening closer, Romana realised that it had changed since she had last heard it. It sounded lonelier, like Rose had told her – had that only been yesterday? Then a wave of sadness and grief washed over her, and Romana almost gasped at the strength of the emotion that came from the time ship.
When she heard a strangled sound, the Time Lady turned her attention back Rose. Tears were streaming down her face, and Romana realised that this had to be the result of the emotional onslaught of the time ship. Even if Rose had told her that the TARDIS had sometimes seemed sad, the woman had never before been part of a telepathic circuit between a Time Lord and a TARDIS, so she hadn't been prepared for the strength of the feelings she would experience, and couldn't control them.
"Look at me, Rose," Romana said in an attempt to gain her attention. "You have to concentrate on the feeling of the TARDIS, but you can't let her overwhelm you." She paused for a moment, sensing the other woman already understood that, but didn't know what to do, too much in distress to even communicate verbally. "Let me show you."
Romana could feel an almost overwhelming wave of trust radiating from the other woman, despite the distress she was in, and placed Rose's hands at her own temple. She could feel a presence entering her own mind, and almost gasped at the contact. She hadn't had someone in her mind for centuries, and it showed, but she recovered quickly and set about explaining what Rose should do.
"For a human, you already have impressive barriers, but for a telepathic circuit between a Time Lord and a TARDIS they are not strong enough. We have to reinforce them."
An image appeared in Romana's mind, a house that was replaced by a strong castle keep, along with what felt like a question.
The Time Lady was impressed that the other woman was still able to communicate in images, despite what the contact with the TARDIS was doing to her at the moment, but that was probably a side effect of her connection with the time ship. She smiled. "Yes, that's better. But what do you think about this?"
Romana added a few labourers to the picture, who began to build a wall and a moat around it, and sent the image back to Rose. The other woman seemed to understand what she should do, because after a few minutes she could feel the barriers in Rose's mind getting stronger, and slowly the waves of distress emanating from her tapered off. Even if her barriers still were no match for a skilled telepath trying to enter her mind without permission, they were strong enough to hold back the worst of the turmoil coming from the TARDIS.
Eventually Rose opened her eyes and smiled. "Thank you!"
"There is no need to thank me, Rose. I should have known that this might happen when I first connected to the TARDIS." Romana paused for a moment, searching for an explanation that would make sense to Rose, but the other woman beat her to it.
"It's like meeting a friend you haven't seen for years, after something terrible happened to someone you both new. Even if you have already grieved properly, meeting someone you knew from before, from the good times, when you were all together, is bound to open wounds you thought were already healing," Rose said, apparently having sensed what was going on.
Once again Romana noticed how very perceptive Rose was. She could literally read people, which had to have been one of the reasons the Doctor asked her to come with him in the first place.
She nodded. "Are you ready to try again, or do you need a moment?"
"I'm fine," Rose said determinedly. "Let's try again."
For the second time Romana took Rose's hand and followed her bond with the TARDIS until she could feel the ship singing. This time, both of them were prepared for the intensified contact with the ship, and after a few minutes, the ship seemed to calm down as well.
Then Romana reached out for the Doctor.
At first, nothing happened. She couldn't feel anything. She tried again, focussing on Rose's connection with the TARDIS, asking the ship for help.
The TARDIS agreed, and Romana suddenly felt anger, hurt, confusion, resignation, almost overwhelming desperation and self-loathing, before she was rudely rebuffed.
"What?" she said almost to herself, thoroughly confused.
"Something wrong?" Rose asked.
"I honestly don't know. It was almost as if he was pushing me back." She frowned. "Let me try again."
Once more Romana concentrated on the TARDIS and the connection to the Doctor, only to receive the same result.
"I don't understand," she said eventually. "This is unusual, even improbable, but he should recognise me as a fellow Time Lord and react accordingly. Something is wrong."
Rose paused for a moment. "I think this might be my fault," she said slowly.
"Why?"
"You told me to think about one of the Doctors I knew. And then the thing with the TARDIS happened, and she was so sad, and I thought about how the Doctor had been when I first met him. I think… I think you might have tried to contact the Doctor when he was fresh out of the Time War…"
And that wouldn't have gone well, Romana realised. A traumatised Doctor who had just ended the Time War, at the cost of his people and his planet, who was contacted by someone he didn't knew was still alive probably thought he was hallucinating and would suppress all attempts at telepathic communication, maybe even those of his ship.
The Time Lady considered their options. Rose could concentrate on the other version of the Doctor, and they could try to contact him, or they could continue with their attempts to reach this version of the Doctor. It was unlikely that they would hit a point in time that wouldn't interfere with anything, so the Doctor would most likely have to suppress his memories anyway.
"We have already made contact with the TARDIS, even if the Doctor is currently blocking us. We try again," she decided. "The TARDIS is probably the only being I know that is more stubborn than the Doctor, and she is trying to help."
Rose grinned. "Too bad you never met my mum. She's even more stubborn than the TARDIS. But I know what you mean."
Once again Romana concentrated on Rose's connection with the TARDIS, until she could hear the ship's song. For the second time, she reached out with her mind and asked the ship for help, but this time she lowered those of her mental shields that protected her innermost core.
When she had tried to contact the Doctor for the first time, she had proceeded like she would have done centuries ago, before she had decided to stay in E-space: she had revealed herself as a Time Lord, but without any further information. For the Doctor, who had just brought about the annihilation of his race, this was bound to feel like his mind was fooling him. But if she, to use a human metaphor, didn't make an anonymous call but submitted her caller ID, chances were that she would get him to realise that this was real, not just a figment of his imagination.
As always, time lost its meaning while she waited for a reaction. It could have been seconds, minutes or hours, but eventually the circuit closed and she made contact. The underlying feelings she received were the same she had experienced before, but this time, the most prominent emotion was shock.
