Back again with a new installment! Keep commenting the new thoughts or concerns!
Traveling Again
"Whoa," Mickey stammered out when he walked down the corridor and practically ran right into Rose sitting outside her bedroom door. "What's wrong?" he asked when he noticed the look on her face.
"I'm going back home," she announced without a flourish, barely looking up at him. "Maybe I will try to go back to school or something. I just don't want to work at a shop again."
Mickey grabbed her arm to stop her when she stood to go into her room, needing more of an explanation to her sudden change. "But…you love traveling with the Doctor," he said. "I mean, I thought the two of you were together now and you were happy."
"I thought that too," she choked out, mentally reminding herself not to cry. "But…not anymore," she admitted, glaring down at the floor. "Guess who I saw looking right at home in the kitchen?"
"Madame de pompous bitch?" Mickey asked, his mouth hanging open when Rose nodded. "You're kidding, right?" he continued when Rose didn't answer. "I mean, the Doctor isn't daft enough to think it is okay to bring a new girl into his time machine when you are still here, right?"
"I guess not," Rose just answered with a blank stare, knowing that if she showed any emotions right now she would go overboard. "I suppose things are different now. I'm going to pack now, okay?"
"I guess…" Mickey mumbled, stepping forwards as if to give Rose a hug and stopping a moment later. "I'm going to go back to Earth too," with that he turned around and went to the room the TARDIS had just designated for him.
Rose couldn't help but feel a bit guilty- just because she was leaving didn't mean he had to. Still though, she let him go, not wanting him to think she was trying to control him.
Waiting for a moment before turning around, Rose walked the rest of the way to her room not even caring at the moment that tears were running down her face. She paused at her doorway, wondering if she would ever see this door after she left. She knew she probably wouldn't. After all she had seen with Sarah Jane she knew that the Doctor never came back and visited after you left the TARDIS, whether they left of their own accord or not.
"This is going to take a while…" Rose whispered to herself. She had lived on the TARDIS for two years and it showed. She had never been the neatest and her room here was no exception. All of her clothes were thrown about the room and she hadn't done laundry in some time so it was worse than usual. Her bed wasn't even made and all of the knick knacks she had collected were lying about on the dressers. Worst of all was the fact that one of the Doctor's ties had made itself at home on her bed post as well as a few more of his things that just reminded her of his betrayal.
She sighed, deciding that she had to stay strong when she told the Doctor she was going to leave. Getting to it, she pulled out the old suitcase in the back of the closet as she began to throw anything she grabbed into it. Right before she finished she heard the sound of the Doctor's converse clad feet approaching.
"What are you doing?" the Doctor asked as he walked into her room, his eyes widening as he noticed what Rose was doing.
"Take me home," she demanded, throwing one more shirt into her stuffed suitcase before turning to the Time Lord with her hands on her hips. "It was always my choice to keep traveling with you and I've changed my mind. I don't want this anymore. I want to go home."
"No," the Doctor responded, his voice low and laced with despair. He walked forwards and taking the suitcase out of her hands. "I can't," he paused, swallowing heavily. "I can't let you leave now."
Rose raised an eyebrow, finally looking up and meeting his eyes. "Why?" she hissed. "You have Reinette to entertain you now," she spat out, vaguely wondering where the French woman was now.
"Rose, I promised her a trip," he responded uncomfortably, scratching the back of his neck as he spoke. "She waited her whole life for me to come back, it is the least I could do. We take people on trips, remember Adam?"
"And you always keep your promises, huh?" Rose asked sarcastically, turning to her closet and pulling out a few more things that she threw on the bed. "That is a load of bull shit, Doctor. And you know it."
The Doctor sighed loudly, clenching his fists before he spoke again. "Rose can you please just stop for a moment so I can explain and figure this out?"
"What is there that you can't wrap your big Time Lord brain around, Doctor?" she asked, cocking her head to the side and crossing her arms over her chest before she spoke again. "So, I mistakenly thought the fact that we were shagging meant something," she continued before the Doctor could interrupt. "Obviously it didn't because ever since we saw Sarah Jane you have scarcely even looked at me twice. I can feel you pushing me away, Doctor," she stopped again, closing her eyes. "So it really shouldn't have surprised me at all when you were so entranced by Reinette. I thought you were never going to come back and Mickey and I would be stuck on a spaceship with psychotic robots trying to cut out our hearts."
Finally interrupting, the Doctor spoke up again. "I was…I mean, I am," he corrected himself. "Scared. Scared of what I'm supposed to do next. I needed to be distracted."
"So that is what they call it now?" Rose huffed, rolling her eyes.
"Rose Tyler," the Doctor said, the name rolling out of his mouth with an odd undertone. "You are not going to leave the TARDIS when you are carrying my child."
It was those words that finally shut Rose up. The fact that the Doctor had finally acknowledged it most of all. He seemed more than willing to let it go before. Though, she wasn't threatening to leave before either. She hadn't even thrown that back at him yet, preferring to pretend it didn't exist as he had since she told him.
"I've had kids before," the Doctor explained, his voice softening as he realized that Rose was actually listening. "On Gallifrey with my wife…but it wasn't really the same kind of conventional relationship with my children as you are used to."
Rose finally spoke up, running a hand through her hair as she did. "You…really?" she asked, disbelief evident in her voice. She had never even thought to ask, not picturing him as anything else than a solo alien traveling alone with the TARDIS. Though, after Sarah Jane, she knew he was rarely alone.
"But I lost them with Gallifrey," he muttered, the tortured look her often wore in his ninth form reappearing on his face. "And I'm not letting that happen again. So you are going to stay here with me. Or," he paused, watching Rose's face to gauge her reaction. "Somehow I am going to be a part of my child's life. After I killed them, Rose, I can barely process the thought of having another child. But now that I am…I am not going to just give that up. I don't know how you're pregnant, shouldn't be possible, but the evidence is there and please just let us be happy about the baby once I process everything."
Her eyes filling with tears, Rose sat down on the edge of the bed, staring down at her hands. "But… " she explained, not looking up to see the Doctor's face. After he admitted something like that, something she knew was hard for him to talk about, she couldn't imagine the way he must look now. "Shouldn't you go back and check on Reinette?" Rose asked with a hint of malice as she sat down on her bed and looked at the Doctor waiting for an answer, trying to divert the conversation to their initial fight.
"Rose, can you please just forget that for one moment," the Doctor whispered, his hand reaching out and gripping hold of hers. As he did that he turned around and pulled out his sonic screwdriver and scanned her. It only took a moment, but it was the Doctor's expression that threw Rose off. He was looking at the results and he looked properly confused as his eyes flitted back to Rose for a moment.
"What are you doing?" Rose asked, confounded by the Doctor's mood change.
The Doctor ignored her, his eyebrows still furrowed as he looked at the results from his scan. Despite his confusion, he wasn't about to let Rose know that he wasn't quite sure what was going on. "And you feel…fine?" the Doctor asked, hesitantly reaching out and resting his hand on her stomach for the first time. It felt odd, that gesture. As someone who had always been self-conscious of her midsection she always managed to avoid calling attention to it, but right now, with the Doctor's cool hand against her, all hatred against her stomach vanished as she imagined how her appearance would change throughout the coming months.
"I guess," Rose answered, eyes turning away as the Doctor retracted his hand, spun around, and put the screwdriver back in his pocket. After a long moment of silence, Rose sat up, wondering what was going to happen now after their terse discussion. "Is something wrong?"
"No," the Doctor quickly asserted. "I don't think you should leave, Rose," the Doctor said, his voice going a bit desperate. "I mean, please don't jump to decisions like that because I was being rude."
"I can't deal with how complicated this is," Rose whispered. If she was being honest with herself, she didn't want to leave. She loved her life on the TARDIS. The excitement of traveling, not even the many accidents that they got into could detour how much she loved it. And that wasn't even mentioning the promise of a future baby.
Before anything else was said, the Doctor pulled Rose in for a tight hug, much tighter than usual. "Come on, we've been through worse," the Doctor whispered into her hair, pressing a kiss to her forehead. "I understand you're upset, you have a reason to. But I'm ready now, I wasn't before. I'm ready to be there for you, to do this thing together."
Giving up her attitude, Rose allowed herself to relax against the Doctor, the words the balm she needed. "It's just that," Rose began, stopping when the lump in her throat prevented her from continuing. Unable to hold it in any longer, Rose allowed herself to cry. It was almost a relief when the Doctor pulled her even closer - just knowing that he wasn't leaving helped her.
Several minutes later, the Doctor spoke up. "I'm just going to take Reinette to modern day France for a few hours before I take her back to her time," he finished, realizing he had said the wrong thing yet again a moment later.
"There's no way in hell that I'm going to let you go romping around there with her," she argued, her expression tough as she stared the Doctor down, wiping her tears and any fondness she felt melt away.
"We kissed once, okay?" the Doctor announced, standing up and pacing back and forth in front of Rose. "I never slept with her! I'm sure she would've…" he paused, meeting Rose's eyes. "But, Rose, I don't have feelings for her. She was in love with me her entire life and she was the one who helped me come back for you," he paused and looked down at his trainers. "For you and the baby."
Rose closed her eyes for the moment, knowing how easy it would be to go to sleep right now and wake up pretending that Reinette had never been on the TARDIS. "No, let's go now," Rose argued. "Then after you drop her off where she belongs I'll sleep," she murmured, realizing just how tired she was. She supposed that after all the stress her body had been under these few days it was no surprise that she could barely keep her eyes open. "And then I will decide what I'm going to do."
Once she was done changing and preparing herself for seeing Reinette, she pushed open the door, surprised when the Doctor was still standing right outside of her bathroom. She had assumed he would have gone back to Reinette and now she wondered what she was up to. She must be exploring the TARDIS herself.
"Ready?" the Doctor asked, holding out his hand to Rose that she ignored. "It won't take long," he added on as Rose pushed past him and walked down the corridor.
Despite how she was really feeling, Rose couldn't help but find the scene in front of her amusing. Mickey had somehow wandered into the kitchen where Reinette was. He looked half terrified of her, for which Rose wasn't surprised one bit. She was currently looking at his cellphone, questioning him about what it was and all it could do.
The Doctor cleared his throat, stepping fully into the room. Upon his arrival, Mickey's expression changed and his eyes flitted right to Rose behind the Time Lord. She nodded, assuring him that everything was okay for the moment.
"So, that promised trip," the Doctor exclaimed, ignoring the way Reinette had repositioned herself when he walked into the room.
Without a word uttered from anyone, the odd mix of people followed the Doctor to the console room, where Reinette looked like she was in awe yet again.
"Is this really going to take us to another time, my angel?" Reinette asked, causing Rose to visibly wince at her words, then roll her eyes at the woman's waaayyy obvious attempt at flirting. "And you pilot the machine all by yourself?"
"Yep," the Doctor answered tersely. "And we are going to see France in Rose's time period."
"I assume you aren't royal?" Reinette asked, acknowledging Rose for the first time. "I don't think we are related."
"Nope, I'm English," Rose explained, leaning against the jump seat with the resolve that she wouldn't say another word to the French woman again.
Looking away, Rose was relieved when Mickey stood right next to her, mouthing a question at her, "Are we going to leave?"
Rose didn't know how to answer, so just shrugged in response. While that exchange was occurring the Doctor had begun to pilot the TARDIS towards his destination as Reinette hung onto a pillar.
"Here," the Doctor announced, his voice even showing the awkwardness of the situation. "You can have the honors," he said, motioning towards Reinette as she ran forwards towards the doors to see where they had landed.
"We are in my room," Reinette remarked, turning around with a confused look on her face.
At her words the Doctor darted forwards and stuck his head out the door, turning around a few moments later. "Oh, giver her one more try," he remarked, piloting the TARDIS once again towards future France.
It took five more tries and a lot of suppressed laughter on Rose's part after Mickey left the room, annoyed with all the failed landings, as Reinette and the Doctor kept on running to the door to see the TARDIS had moved not more than an inch. Rose mentally thanked the time machine, knowing she was behind the reason the TARDIS wasn't moving. Apparently this was the stop Reinette was supposed to get off on.
"It is quite alright," Reinette exclaimed loud enough for Rose to hear, continuing speaking to the Doctor in a low tone as he nodded in response. From what she gathered, she had decided that she should just go home. After all, all of this was still a bit too much for her to grasp.
Surprisingly, as the Doctor ran to the kitchen to grab what Reinette had left in the kitchen before she could leave, the woman sauntered over to Rose.
"I saw you," Reinette explained to Rose who hadn't moved in her position in the slightest to acknowledge her presence. "In the Doctor's mind."
"What?" Rose asked, confused as to what Reinette was referring to right now.
"The two of you are expecting," she said, her voice soft as she met Rose's gaze.
It surprised her that Reinette had said it with no malice, but instead was acting sweet. "Why would you know that?" she asked, wondering just how much time she had spent with the Doctor.
"I saw it in the Doctor's mind," she repeated. "He's scared," she continued, laying a hand gently on Rose's shoulder.
"And now you're going to give me advice?" Rose asked, raising an eyebrow at the French woman. Personally, Rose didn't want to take any advice from the King's mistress. Clearly she didn't know much about stable relationships.
"Men don't understand," Reinette explained, ignoring what Rose had said. "They don't get how much a mother can automatically love her child the moment she finds out she is pregnant. The child does not become real to them until they hold the baby."
Rose felt her eyes begin to fill with tears, but wasn't about to tell Reinette that she agreed. "You have children?" she asked, not bothering to hide her aghast face.
"No," she answered abruptly, looking at the ground for a moment. "I lost several children though."
Biting her lip, Rose couldn't completely hate this woman any longer. During her time, it probably wasn't her choice to become the King's mistress. She had been happily married, but her family had most likely forced her into the affair in hopes of raising her family's social standing. Rose couldn't imagine how she would react in such a situation. "I'm sorry."
"I meant that he was thinking about you and that you are precious to him," Reinette finished, cocking her head as she waited for Rose's response. "And I never meant to come between the two of you. I just thought that…with the child and you having your lying in," she continued to speak, but Rose wasn't really wasn't listening. "In your time I suppose everything is all different. My life must seem so odd to you," she commented.
Rose stood still, unsure how to respond. Maybe Reinette wasn't as bad as she thought, but there was no way she would ever like her. "I'd like to think I was special," she managed to answer.
Thankfully the Doctor came back into the room then with Mickey, who had been scouring the kitchen fridge, right behind him. Without glancing at either Rose or Reinette he walked straight to the doors and stepped outside, obviously waiting for Reinette to follow him. She did a moment later, after giving Rose a slight smile and biding Mickey goodbye and thanking him for explaining his communication device to her.
Scarcely a minute had passed of silence before the Doctor walked back in, appearing confused as to what he should say.
"You got her back to the right year, right?" Rose asked, remembering how much had gone wrong when he had brought her back home a year later.
"Yeah, she wasn't missed," the Doctor explained in a quiet tone as he came up and piloted the TARDIS away, coming over to stand next to Rose a moment later.
The Doctor shifted his hand so that it was right next to hers and, without even thinking about it, Rose grabbed his hand. It felt so natural and right, holding hands with him. At the same time, something odd happened. The wall right in front of her that should look like corals, suddenly shifted. A small white hatch appeared that was quickly opened. A woman wearing an eye patch looked through the hole, cocking her head as she observed the blonde with a slight smile. Rose blinked and the woman was gone as quickly as she had appeared.
Rose had the good sense to be confused about it for a minute, looking at the spot thoughtfully. Then the Doctor squeezed her hand tightly and all thoughts of the woman in the wall were forgotten in favor or the Doctor's warm hand in her own.
Stuff is about to hit the fan, in not so fun of a way! Keep posted for more!
Gabrielle
