Rose hadn't thought it was permanent at first, hadn't let herself get attached, they were just travelling with them as they tried to reason with the TARDIS to bring them home after an engineering fault had stranded them with the time travellers in space. But now that they'd returned them to Sheffield after dealing with giant spiders, those same three humans they'd first met after crashing through the roof of a train post-regeneration - for the Doctor - were standing in the TARDIS again.
They hadn't agreed to bring companions along this time, Bill's death still too fresh. But Rose watched as her wife tried to dissuade them, warned them of the danger - the lack of security -, warned them of the uncertainty and as she warned them about the way they'd change, she watched that hesitance bleed away and knew what decision the Doctor had made. They were brilliant but they all were and that's what made it all that much more painful when they lost them. Faces flashed through Rose's mind unbidden of all those they'd lost, the Ponds, River, Clara, Bill and a dozen more, she tried to shake the grief ladened memories free.
"We know how it ends," The TARDIS whispered through their Bad Wolf bond in her mind. "We needn't worry when we know how it ends." She tried to coax her.
"No. We don't look at companions' timelines. Those are the rules." Rose shot back.
- x -
Rose was in the galley sorting through the many cupboards for Bill's possessions. She didn't want one of the new companions stumbling upon them and using them by mistake, it was the least she could do for the girl, and it was practically ritual by now. Ever since she'd emptied out her childhood flat and the TARDIS had created a replica onboard for Rose to store their things in. The TARDIS was practically a graveyard of forgotten bedrooms belonging to companions that had long since left, tucked away in storage. Bill's would be amongst them once Rose returned her belonging to it.
She knew the TARDIS could do it for her, but it didn't seem fair on the ship. The TARDIS had cared for Bill too, the time travellers weren't the only ones in mourning. And while the Doctor could push the memories aside and force a smile as though it didn't tear her up because it was easier than explaining what had happened to their new friends. It was easier than reliving every goodbye and every death that they'd endured.
The TARDIS didn't have that luxury. She bore the physical reminders within herself like scars. She could see all of time and space, she knew what would happen to their friends in all its variations the moment she met them. Every different timeline and all the possible ways they might be lost revealed to her the moment they met. The least Rose could do was help the old girl with her own grieving process and make it a little easier on the ship in the only way she could.
She quickly filled a box with a collection of Bill's mugs, her preferred morning tea, her favourite snacks and her novelty frog egg cup, trying not to linger on the memories of a girl who was shot in the chest and cyberised. She tried not to think about what might happen to the newest occupants of the TARDIS.
"We know how it ends. You can prepare for the end." Bad Wolf whispered once more.
Rose closed a cupboard door in response, stalking away from the galley with a box of their dead friend's things to be laid to rest in their old room.
- x -
At any one time, there were always more bedrooms on the TARDIS than were in use though not that many would know that, hidden away in the bowels of the ship as they were. Most would not be able to find them even if they knew they were there, the TARDIS twisting her internal matrix just so that the corridors would never lead to them. But Rose was part of the TARDIS thanks to Bad Wolf and as such if she so wished, she could walk the dark corridors of abandoned bedrooms of old companions.
Rose had met her fair share of old companions in her time and had made it her own personal mission to meet as many of them as she could, but there were some that she could never meet. Some who hadn't been as fortunate as others. Adric, Katarina, Peri, Susan the names filtered through her mind as she passed by their doors. She knew vaguely of their fates, picked up in bits and pieces over the centuries. There had been others too but none of their fates had been particularly pleasant.
It was becoming harder to let new people in after every loss, even the ones that didn't end in death like Martha and Donna's but were no less tragic, as all she could think about was what might befall them. The Doctor had warned her of this when they'd first realised she was immortal, how painful it would be as she became increasingly aware of a human's mortality with every scrape and close call, and how she would grow tired of losing people. She hadn't known truly what her future would be like then but now living it she wished she'd taken heed of his words. It wouldn't have changed her mortality but maybe she would have been better prepared for the grief.
She was so much older now, so far removed from the girl from the estates that it was difficult to know where to start with new companions. Was it even worth opening up to them if they were only going to lose them in the end? She didn't know. She didn't have the answer to that one. Just knew she didn't want to relive every tragedy in lieu of opening up. No use scaring them off prematurely.
"We know how it ends though."
No, Rose shook the thought free. She didn't want to know what possible futures they had in store; she'd had enough of that as it were.
- x -
Rose sat in one of the orchards clutching her head. The TARDIS had been kind enough to keep the room in a state of simulated nighttime after she'd stumbled from her bed to the room. The fam were still sleeping soundly nestled safely away in the burrows the TARDIS had made for them. The Doctor was sleeping for once and Rose hadn't wanted to disturb her, there was nothing that could be done except to wait it out anyway.
Ever since the TARDIS had intervened at Canary Wharf, Rose had been subjected to glimpses into alternate timelines of herself and all her parallel selves. Rose had once lamented to Rory one late night who was having the same problem trying to distinguish between his three sets of memories; the Rory whose fiance disappeared the night before their wedding, the centurion Rory and the Rory who hadn't travelled in the TARDIS until it appeared at his wedding. It was difficult at times to recall what had and what hadn't occurred to this version of herself, particularly on nights like tonight where she was assaulted with memories of another Rose.
This Rose had been trapped in Pete's world and had to watch as her loved ones - some the familiar faces of parallel selves - withered away all while she stayed young and immortal. It was difficult to remember at that moment if she truly had been at Martha's funeral, her and Tom Milligan's daughter sat in attendance as they mourned the doctor, her metacrisis husband beside her. Or if it had been 12 years since she'd seen Martha and Mickey with their 2 kids at Sarah-Jane's funeral with the metacrisis also amongst the mourners but as Jack's employee. She couldn't remember which version was correct as she was assaulted by even more varying realities.
It didn't really matter though, did it? Either way, one day she would attend the funerals of all the friends she'd once loved. And knowing them, that day would come sooner than Rose would like as they put their lives in danger saving their planet.
"We know how it ends."
She would lose them all and there was nothing she could do, it didn't matter how it would end, only that it would. She couldn't save them from the inevitable, no matter how much she might like to.
- x -
The Master had made a reappearance, once again rising from the supposed dead to taunt the Doctor. The Doctor - as a result - was even more closed off than normal and it was making the fam pushy for answers as they grew tired of the time travellers' evasion. Rose had been taking her wife's lead on this one, before she may have tried to explain the Doctor's quirks to unfamiliar companions, but they'd lost so many recently and with the weight of Gallifrey's second destruction preying on her wife's mind, Rose thought she was entitled to a little secrecy.
Their lives were so often marred by tragedy that even seemingly innocuous questions like 'where was the Doctor from?' were tainted by grief. And the experience with Madame Kovarian still weighed on them. The Ponds' baby had been abducted and experimented on because they'd become legendary figures that drove people to revolutionary actions.
They'd tried to keep their distance from the Ponds after that, particularly as they knew who Melody grew up to be and just how her story ended. But then they'd been named her godparents and they'd had no choice but to fall in love with the little girl that they couldn't save from death. Knowing didn't change anything. If anything, it was worse, she mused as she couldn't help but think about how reading ahead had doomed the Ponds and how every moment with Melody/River had been tainted with the knowledge of her death.
As much as the fam thought they wanted to know, they didn't really. They didn't want to know just how fraught this life was, how likely to die they really were as they pressed for details about past companions. They didn't want to know that the Master labelling them as fugitives in the news wasn't the first time he'd done that to the Doctor's friends, or what happened to them last time.
Rose didn't want to think about anything similar to before happening to their fam but the thought was inevitable with the way they kept pressing. A dozen possible endings flashed through her mind, things that had happened to those that came before and what would have happened if they hadn't survived those close calls.
"We know how it ends." Bad Wolf pleaded.
Rose squeezed her eyes shut trying to shut the words out as she was wracked with guilt. The TARDIS was doomed to know all their different possible endings from the beginning, she couldn't avoid it even if she wanted to. Just as Rose couldn't shut out her own alternate realities, the TARDIS couldn't shut out anyone else's timeline. But she couldn't lighten this burden for her, knowing put it at risk of happening, she wouldn't cause a paradox. She couldn't.
- x -
They taught Yaz how to fly the TARDIS after she'd been left stranded in another TARDIS while the Doctor was imprisoned. Rose felt how the TARDIS preened at the attention from the young woman, felt her exhilaration at having another pilot, closer to how she was supposed to be flown and at having a new telepathic bond. Even surface level as it was. She was getting attached, Rose knew. The TARDIS cared for all those that she referred to as the Doctor's strays, but she had favourites and her least. The TARDIS could feel Rose and the Doctor's own attachment to all their little strays through their bonds but now she could feel Yaz's too and it was getting to hurt the old girl when the police officer left.
The TARDIS would be left with another empty room to store along with Ryan and Graham's. She'd be left with all the trinkets and pieces of a life lived amongst her corridors. She'd have to deal with the pilot bond stretching to nothing or even snapping in a way that Yaz would never notice. All the while she echoed with the time travellers' own grief.
"We know how it ends."
"I can't," Rose pled back, "I can't risk making it happen. Please don't make me look."
"Looking won't change the ending, little Wolf." The TARDIS soothed, "Only acting will. Please share with me, I can't bear it alone."
Rose bit her lip as she tried to push out the words. The TARDIS had done it alone every time before and as it tore the two time travellers apart to bear that loss, they hadn't considered the ship that had housed all those they'd lost. The ship that had seen all the different endings, that heard all the distress calls of the universe throughout time and could do nothing about it personally. Could only take them where they needed and hope. And wasn't that why she'd made Bad Wolf? Because she couldn't save the Doctor on her own and needed Rose to act out her desires. So, who was Rose to deny her that now?
"Okay, let me see. I'm ready to know now."
A/N: This was inspired by a post I saw on tumblr about the TARDIS' reaction to companions. I the 'we know' perspective seems odd I'm imagining at as in this version Bad Wolf is culmination of Rose and the TARDIS so what Bad Wolf knows through the TARDIS Rose also knows but is a matter of opening herself up to the Bad Wolf bond to know. So its we for Bad Wolf then singular pronouns for Rose and the TARDIS themself speaking. Honestly, I was trying to work on Golden Girl but every time I try to work on a longer work I started a new story instead atm
Anyway, lemme know what you thought in the comments :)
