Chapter Six — To Every Season, There's An End
Slight shortness of breath, aches that came and went, and general fatigue didn't keep Rose from going out with the Doctor on each and every stop in the days that came after the visit to her mum's. She trooped along, right beside him, grinning when he would give her questioningly worried looks; knowing that he wanted to ask about how she was feeling but didn't dare — not after that last time she'd told him, quite succinctly and sweetly that if he asked her again he'd be getting his sonic screwdriver up his arse. Sideways.
In those four days, she saw things she would never forget. The way that three suns could rise and four moons could glow over a completely alien landscape — at different times of day, of course — and look perfectly natural and beautiful. She saw the Imperial Revolution of the Twenty-Third Chinese Empire in the year forty-six thousand and three and then the crushing of that same revolution not even a year later by the Emperor. There was the founding of the Order of the Blue Monkey — which she hadn't believed involved a real monkey until the Doctor took her there to see it first hand. A real, blue monkey. She'd taken pictures for the Doctor to give her mum when he made that final visit back to the Powell Estates.
And through it all, she could 'see' the details of everything in her head, as they happened. No matter how much she tried to block it out, it was still there. Information, swarming around like gnats on a hot day. Blocking it out was sometimes more difficult than just going with it; so that was exactly what she had learned to do — just go with the flow of information inside of her.
But it was on Zircon Ten, under a cream-colored sky with fluffy blue clouds, that Rose finally admitted defeat to the breakdown of her body.
It was there, on that crystalline planet with natives that towered over the both of them and had twin rows of razor sharp teeth - that she almost got the Doctor killed.
x x x
She felt like crying.
Arms wrapped around her chest, struggling to catch a breath of air that was enough to ease the burning pain in her lungs, Rose felt like sobbing. Instead, she shook. Shook and hugged herself. Wished that this was another time, an alternate universe where she wasn't dying and the Doctor didn't have to patch himself up because her stupid body had decided that running wasn't the best way to spend its time.
It had all come down to muscle deterioration. That was what he had informed her, with a sad smile. Her legs had simply given out because the muscles were too weak to hold her up any longer after running as they had been. Unfortunately, this collapse had happened with the Zirconians hot on their heels.
And the Doctor had been forced to come back, to fend off the Zirconian in the lead, and pick her up. He had run with her in his arms, all the way back to the TARDIS.
It wasn't until he had lain her down on the bed in the medlab that she had noticed that the front of his suit was slashed and stained with red. Blood. His blood. A Zirconian — the one he had fought off, she supposed — had raked him good, right down his chest. Just a little deeper, and she was sure that he would have been seriously injured, or killed.
"Rose, it wasn't your fault."
Rose didn't bother looking at the Doctor; she couldn't stand to see him over there, delicately sewing stitches into his own flesh. It wouldn't scar, he told her, and the cuts would heal within a few days. Time Lords were just quirky like that.
Still, she couldn't look at what she had caused.
"It was, though, Doctor. I've been runnin' round like nothing's wrong. But something is wrong," she whispered between breaths. "I pushed on and ignored everything sayin' that I needed to rest. To just…rest. Because I wanted to see it all before…before…"
Metal clanked against metal, tweezers dropping into a tray, and then he was there, standing in front of her. Hard to ignore the gashes now, right there before her eyes. She reached out before she could stop herself, trailing a finger along the smooth skin just at the outside of the gash. The Doctor sucked in a breath and she yanked back her hand. "Sorry."
"You weren't hurting me."
Rose frowned and looked up into his eyes. There was something there that she didn't understand and she was too weary to try to puzzle through it, either. She shrugged.
The Doctor put a finger under her chin and lifted, forcing her to meet his gaze. "Listen to me carefully, Rose Tyler. This is not your fault. I knew what was happening to you. I knew that this was inevitable just as surely as I knew that the people of Zircon wouldn't take it lightly when you tried to smuggle one of their pebbles home to make a necklace for your mum." He smiled brightly, but even Rose could see that it was forced. "See — its my fault. All mine."
Sniffling, she shook her head and gave him a tight smile of her own. It did no good to argue with the Doctor. 'Specially when he was sure that he was right.
Which was all the time, come to think of it.
Still, she couldn't resist trying one more time.
"You're all cut up," she sighed. "Because you came back to save me."
"Oh, this?" the Doctor gestured at his slashed chest. "It's nothing. Heal in a couple days. Don't worry about me. You just sit there and rest."
Rest. Now that he mentioned it, resting sounded like a good plan. One of his more brilliant, at that.
Rose nodded and he moved off to finish up the task of patching up his chest. He was chattering on about everything yet nothing at the same time. Some story about another time he'd gotten cut up. Not a companion's fault that time. She was the first to manage that much, she was sure of it. Jeopardy-friendly — hadn't he said that to her once upon a time ago? Least he'd remember her for something.
The TARDIS hum changed in tone, low and mourning. Sad with her. Sad at the situation, Rose couldn't tell which. But the Doctor heard it, too, and turned to look at her. "You all right?"
She gave him a look. "What'd I say about the sonic screwdriver and your more delicate areas, Doctor?"
The Doctor quirked a grin. "I think you've got a single-minded fascination with a certain part of my anatomy." He ran his hand over his hip in a way that reminded Rose so much of Cassandra in the Doctor's body that she laughed. It bubbled up past her lips as a giggle, turning into a full-out laugh before she could stop it. His grin grew and she knew, without asking, that he was remembering that little excursion, too. A little 'foxy', Cassandra had said. Yes, the Doctor certainly was that. Rose was sure that he knew it, too.
Shame she didn't have the energy to enjoy the fact that he was half-naked in front of her, or the fact that she had run a finger along his bare chest only minutes before. Too tired to even care that she should be hot and flushed thinking about him like that, but wasn't.
She yawned and laid down, stretching out on the bed as she watched the Doctor work. Long fingers, sewing the slashes shut. Expertly. He'd done this before. Sewed himself up. She wished she could do it for him, but she'd managed to avoid getting training for that sort of thing.
Her eyes fluttered shut and she yawned again. Just a quick nap, then, while he finished up. Then they'd decide together somewhere nice and quiet that they could visit. Somewhere warm, with no running.
x x x
Dreaming. Drifting. It was all the same. And here she was once again with that woman. The one that glowed like the sun.
The golden figure tilted its head to the side, as if contemplating something. Rose just stared, unsure of what to say or do; unsure if this was even still a dream. Quite odd, that - looking into the face of something that didn't really have a face. Just a general approximation of a head. No lips or eyes, not even a nose.
"Would you do it again?" The figure spoke. No, thought was the right word, Rose supposed.
"Do what?"
"Take all of this," the figure's arms moved to indicate the entire glowing landscape, before coming to rest over her chest, "into yourself."
Time. The time vortex. She understood now.
"Of course. Did it once, didn't I?"
"Why?"
"Because... he couldn't die. Not my Doctor."
"Yet he still left you."
Rose nodded, biting her lower lip and sucking it in as she thought. She sighed after a moment, shrugging. "Couldn't be helped, really. Still - he's the same. Still the Doctor."
"You love him."
A statement, not a question. Yet Rose answered immediately, automatically. "Yes. And if you tell him, I'll kick your glowing arse."
The figure shook, wavered, and Rose got the distinct impression that it was laughing at her. Amused, most definitely. "You would do it all over again? No regrets?"
This one Rose did not need to think about; because she had pondered it on many a night after the Doctor's regeneration. Did she regret anything? Would she do it all over again if times called for it? "Yes, I'd do it again. I've got no regrets. The world needs him. A lot of worlds need him, I s'pose."
Warmth and light and pure golden approval washed over and through Rose.
With a single word she was hurtled awake, her entire body burning from the inside as the vortex's voice echoed in her mind.
"Good."
x x x
Death. Dying. These were things that he had gotten used to in the over nine hundred years that he had lived this life. Humans were most especially fragile. They lasted such a short time before their bodies gave out. Always in the back of his head he had known that one day Rose would leave him; he had just assumed that it would be her choice. That she would choose to go back to a normal life, make a family for herself.
He had planned to mourn her as another companion lost at that time. To imagine that she lived on, happy and loved, but mourn her just the same because he would never again be in her life.
Yet, here she was. Her face was pale, even next to the crisp white sheets of the bed. Too pale. No spots of color on her cheeks. Even her lips were but dim imitations of their normal rosiness.
His hearts skipped along, but painfully. All the tests he had done, data he had poured through in these last days while she slept, was for naught. The only anomaly he had been able to find was a tight bundle of something resembling genetic code, locked onto her DNA. There was no way to remove it, as far as he could tell. For that matter, he had been unable to crack the outer 'wall' of the bundle to even take a look at the code. Whether it was what was causing Rose's deterioration or not — he couldn't say.
Days. That was all he had left with her. Such a short time, even when measured by human standards. Nothing more than a handful of hours and then… then she would be gone from his life for the rest of time. He would not go back and see her in the past. He knew that already. Couldn't risk changing things just because he'd done what shouldn't have been done in the first place and given his heart to her.
Survival instincts warred within him with compassion and caring; telling him to run as far and fast as he could, get away from the emotions that were threatening to break him. Get away from the source of those emotions, because watching her die would tear him apart like nothing other than the loss of his people and planet. If he had only two hearts to break, they would both be truly shattered after this.
And maybe… maybe this time he wouldn't take another companion. Save 'em and leave 'em. No more gathering them up and showing them things. If losing Rose was the cosmos' way of showing him that he was meant to be alone, then so be it. He would be alone.
Days…
He couldn't have been more wrong.
Three hours into her nap, Rose woke. The Doctor looked up from his notes, worried when she started moaning. Pain.
"Doctor," she muttered, voice cracking and breaking. Tears were on her cheeks.
He was up and out of his seat in a flash, diagnostic tools in hand.
Her organs were failing. The Doctor swallowed and fiddled with the dials on the tool, unable to look up and at the woman he was losing far, far quicker than he had thought. She was whimpering and waiting for an answer, trying to be brave. Still in pain, but not screaming. It had to hurt. Her body was dying.
"I'll get you something for the pain," he whispered, turning to one of the cabinets.
"What's wrong?" the words were broken, from between clenched teeth. The Doctor stiffened. He looked down again at the results of the body scan and shook his head.
"Just a second, Rose." She wouldn't be in pain. That much he could do for her. It took him a minute to find what he was looking for, but when he did and had injected Rose, the drug took effect immediately. Her face smoothed from its creases of pain, jaw unclenching.
"What's wrong with me?"
This time he couldn't avoid the question. Oh, he could lie. He could smile and tell her that it was just another symptom in her condition — then again, that wasn't really a lie. It would be unfair, though. And he couldn't do that. Not to her. All of time and space at his disposal and he couldn't save someone when it really, really mattered.
"Your organs are failing. Liver. Kidneys. I suspect your lungs will begin to labor soon."
Already were, to some extent, he conceded, watching the rise and fall of her chest, how quickly she was taking each subsequent breath. Straining, just to keep up with her body's needs.
"There are machines I can put you on, to help for a little while," he offered.
But he knew, even as he said the words, that his Rose wouldn't want that.
"No, Doctor. No extensions. Not when the end will still be the same," she said quietly. "Just — don't let it hurt, all right?"
Acceptance. She accepted so easily that she was dying. The tears no longer streamed along her cheeks and now… now she just looked peaceful. He wanted to attribute it to the drug he'd give her, but it did nothing more than relieve physical pain. He reached out, hand shaking just a bit, and brushed the hair from her forehead. She accepted this, yet he could not. Could not reconcile himself to the idea that Rose — his Rose — was dying.
"You'll go back and tell my mum?"
The Doctor nodded.
"Promise? I know you're 'fraid of her."
He cracked a smile. "I'll go Rose. Don't worry about that."
And there were things that he wanted to say, too. Things that he needed to tell her, needed her to know before —
But he how could he bring himself to begin? Starting that conversation was too close to admitting that this was it.
How had it come to this so quickly? There was supposed to have been more time. Time to think about everything that he should have told her sooner. Days left still to compose his thoughts, get it perfect. Didn't want her to … leave… without knowing what she had meant to him.
Like so many events in life, this was happening without warning.
The Doctor took hold of her hand, thumb tracing over the back. She was so very pale. Her fingers squeezed around his and he grinned. "I love you, Rose Tyler."
Like that, the words were said.
"I know," she returned his smile. "Love you, too, my Doctor."
Love, mutually shared and given; yet never acted upon. And all of those things that he had wanted to say to her just didn't seem important anymore. His eyes were wet, looking down at her frail body, growing frailer by the moment. The steady readout of the diagnostic telling him that soon she would fade away from him completely. Coma first, then death. Yes, that was how it would be. And all he could do was hold her hand and make sure she didn't feel the pain of her death.
"We never did go to Barcelona," she joked.
He laughed, caught off guard. "Oh," he drawled, "you wouldn't have liked it anyway. Dogs with no noses get boring after awhile. And you know how they say people look like their pets. Can you imagine a person without a nose?" he rambled and she listened, smiling even when her eyes shut. She laughed every now and then, rasping a bit when breathing began to get harder. Still he held her hand, still he talked about things she would never get to see for herself.
Still he died a little with every second that he watched her fade from this world. Her stats dropped lower and lower. The only blessing was that she wasn't feeling that decay.
The Doctor was still watching when her lips smoothed out into a straight line, his voice trailing off to nothing. He looked at the diagnostic; the readout of her brain waves. Comatose.
And as he leaned to kiss her forehead, Rose Tyler breathed her last breath.
END CHAPTER