Stage one of the Doctor's plan: retrieve the magnaclamps that he had spotted in one of the Torchwood warehouses when he had been traveling around with Yvonne earlier in the day before everything started to fall apart. Easier said than done when a full-on war was being waged around them - two separate armies and four armed daleks all fighting to wipe each other out of existence.

However, his handy 3D glasses gave him hope as the Doctor covertly ducked his head back into the firefight and noticed the tiny floating particles of void stuff that seemed to track every movement that the daleks and cybermen made. Stage one of the Doctor's plan: successfully completed.

Stage two of the Doctor's plan: find out what was in the "genesis ark" that the Cult of Skaro was toting around like a trophy. To do that, he had to drag the entire Tyler family, Mickey, and Jake all up to the top floor of the tower. Back in Yvonne's office, they all watched in wide-eyed horror as the device floating above London slowly slid open and then began to spin, spewing out more daleks at every turn.

"It's bigger on the inside," the Doctor breathed in quiet disbelief. "It's a prison ship."

"How many daleks?" Rose asked warily, flashing him a concerned, sideways glance.

"Millions."

Stage two of the Doctor's plan: successfully completed, though the end result was far less than ideal.

Which brought them all to stage three of his plan: don't let Rose catch on to what was going to happen next.

"We're going home," Pete Tyler stated definitively, outfitting each of the humans in the room with one of the yellow button-pendants that would transport them back to his parallel world and out of harm's way. "Doctor?" he asked, casting the other man a pointed look to let him know that it was his turn to do his job and save them all.

The Doctor was only too happy to oblige, and he turned to face them all with a wide smile, making sure to keep his own doubts and fears buried deep within where no one would be able to see them. "Oh, I'm ready," he stated eagerly.

And then, he was off like a shot as he quickly and efficiently implemented stage three and explained to them all how he was going to pull every single last dalek and cyberman back into the abyss of nothing that awaited them in the void. But Rose - good, strong, beautiful, impossible, painfully clever Rose - instantly saw the gaping hole in his plan that he was fighting so desperately to conceal.

Stage three of the Doctor's plan: horrible disaster.

"But, it's ... like you said - we've all got void stuff. Me, too, cause we went to that parallel world," she muttered slowly. "We're all contaminated, we'll get pulled in."

The Doctor stepped closer as she examined her own hand curiously through his 3D glasses. When she finally took them off and looked up at him questioningly, he forced himself to meet her gaze as he replied simply, "That's why you've got to go."

This last leap of logic seemed to be the only one that his clever Rose couldn't force herself to make, and she watched him in wary confusion as the Doctor attempted to busy himself with the magnaclamps that he had nicked from the Torchwood warehouse. "I'm supposed to go ..." she murmured in disbelief.

"Yeah," he replied, pointedly not meeting her gaze.

"To another world, and then it gets sealed off ..."

"Yeah." The magnaclamps were out of his hands now, so the Doctor moved to the controls that operated the breach and busied his fidgeting hands with that instead.

"Forever." Her tone had taken on a sort of desperate helplessness, and the Doctor instantly felt all the rest of his words dry up and die on his tongue. Every other time she had spoken that word to him, it had been a promise, a sacred oath, a declaration of love and eternity. Now, it was a plea, a cry for help, and he had no answer for it.

"That's not going to happen," she insisted, breathing a small, disbelieving laugh as she shook her head at him in stubborn refusal.

"We haven't got time to argue," Pete reminded them all sternly. But he really should have known better - the Tyler women were not to be bossed, and emotions began to run high as the three members of the small, broken family argued about what to do next, as though any of them really had a choice.

But Pete and the Doctor both knew that the choice had already been made - it was say goodbye forever, or face eternity in a timeless, empty abyss. Rose's desperate, teary words still cut the Doctor to his hearts, though - and each step that he took closer to her was more painful than the last as he deftly slipped the chain of the dimension-hopping device around her neck, and then watched as Pete ejected them all back into safety.

The Doctor's last glimpse of the love of his lives was of her wide brown eyes as she turned on him in surprise, and then her precious voice was cut off mid-sentence as she shimmered out of view and out of his life forever. He supposed that he should have been grateful to Jake for taking him to the parallel world against his wishes earlier - with their bond already broken, the Doctor didn't have to suffer the pain of a severed connection again as Rose disappeared for the last time.

However, he still felt her loss from this universe like a punch in the gut and the Doctor stood frozen, staring blankly at the empty space that Rose had inhabited just a moment earlier.

Unfortunately (was it unfortunate? He still couldn't quite seem to decide between his traitorous hearts and his head), he wasn't left waiting for long before Rose was suddenly blinking back into existence in exactly the same spot where she had disappeared just moments before. She was murmuring to herself as she looked around in wide-eyed confusion, trying to get a grip on her bearings.

As soon as her whiskey-colored eyes landed on the Doctor once more, she frowned, narrowing her eyes in a look of frustration that he had (unfortunately - definitely unfortunately) grown accustomed to seeing over the years.

The Doctor immediately rushed to her side, intent on having a good row and then forcing her back to the parallel world where she belonged, but he didn't have the chance to get even a single word out before Rose had her hands around the back of his neck and she was pressing a hard, angry kiss to his lips.

Their bond snapped back into place immediately - the shields that the Doctor had attempted to construct against her instantly dissolving into ash as though they never were. He grunted against her mouth and Rose gasped at the quick stab of pain that shot through both of their minds as the open wound of their bond was seared shut and their connection was abruptly reestablished.

Rose's thoughts came rushing back to him like a whirlwind, filling the Doctor's head with her presence and immediately drowning out all else. How dare you? her mind demanded, her own hurt stinging him as he automatically embraced her. The Doctor welcomed her anger and chastisement without argument - it was nice to have a second voice in his head that wasn't his own confirming to him what an idiot he was. Besides, it wasn't as if he didn't deserve every last bit of it.

So the Doctor swallowed Rose's bitterness and echoed it with his own, kissing her back just as hard until the rush of their rejoined bond finally dimmed and he felt as though he could breathe normally again.

As soon as he was certain that they were securely linked together once more, the Doctor quickly removed his arms from around Rose's waist and grabbed her roughly by the shoulders instead as he stepped back to meet her eye with a heavy, severe look.

"Once the breach collapses, that's it," he snapped angrily, quickly reminding her of her poorly-made, rash decision. Why had she chosen him over her own family? Why did she always have to choose him? Didn't she know how useless he was? Hadn't she realized by now that he would only ever let her down? "You will never be able to see her again - your own mother!" he added bitterly.

"I made my choice a long time ago," Rose replied evenly, her voice low and serious as she stared him straight in the eye, not allowing any room for doubt or misinterpretation between them, "and I'm never gonna leave you."

The Doctor's hearts stuttered to a stop, and with their bond freshly renewed between them, there was no hiding from her his breathless awe as he stared down at the precious human girl who had saved his life so many times and in so many ways that he didn't even deserve.

"So what can I do to help?" she offered quietly.

The Doctor's fingers tightened around her arms as he glared down at her and silently begged Rose to rethink her decision and go back where it was safe. However, he knew from experience not to argue, and he couldn't deny the foolish, reckless part of him that was so, so satisfied to have her back within his reach again.

"Better with two," she had told him, back when she still hadn't even really known who he was. The Doctor hadn't been able to deny the wisdom of her words then, and he certainly couldn't deny them now. So he resigned himself to Rose's stubborn will and told himself that he was angry about it as he snapped out orders and told her what to do next, but he knew that he wasn't fooling anybody - least of all himself - as he flooded her mind with love and gratitude and silently begged her to stay.