A.N. Thanks to everyone for the favorites and follows! And especially thank you for the reviews which are totally awesome to get!
When they arrived back at the TARDIS, the sky above was quickly fading to a bright purple as if night was falling on this obscure jungle they had landed in. Rose walked ahead of River, her anxiety carrying her faster than her companion's displeasure with the entire situation.
Rose wrenched open the door and shouted for the Doctor. There was a muffled shout in response to this along with a plume of smoke emitting from beneath the grating of the console. Rose fell to her knees, fanning off the smoke as she desperately tried to discern which Doctor was beneath the console.
"Doctor?" she asked, her eyes watering as the acrid smoke inflamed them.
A grease smudge face emerged, but it was not the one she had been hoping to see. "Did you find him?" the Doctor asked, removing the goggles from his deep set eyes.
Dejectedly, Rose stood up. "No." Reaching out one hand, she helped the Doctor out from beneath the grating. "What are you doing under there anyway? He's going to kill you if you bugger something up."
The Doctor gaped in horror. "It's the TARDIS, Rose! I've been with her longer than anything. I could in no way 'bugger her up.'"
Both Rose and River raised skeptical eyebrows. "Yes, of course, Sweetie," River said patronizingly, walking around him to look at the console. "This ones not like yours though."
"Actually –" the Doctor started to say but Rose interrupted.
"Yes, it is. It looked like this for the two years I was with the Doctor. I'd never seen the one I landed in with you lot."
River's gaze shot from Rose to her husband who was busy pretending to be preoccupied with fiddling with bits of the console. "Two years?"
"Mhm," Rose hummed. She hopped up onto the jump seat, hands clasped in her lap, looking impossibly young. It occurred to River that Rose couldn't be more than twenty-six years old. That put her a lot closer to what age the Doctor looked than River. And though surely that meant nothing, it left River with an uneasy feeling.
"Right then," Rose was saying, the gold having faded to a gentle tone in her eyes. "Thanks so much for getting me here, I really appreciate it and I'm sincerely sorry for having wrecked any havoc and disrupted, for apparently not the first time, Rio plans. It was lovely seeing you all, give my best to Rory, he seems particularly fantastic." She waved.
The Doctor stared at her. "What the hell are you talking about?"
Rose's felt shock shoot through her. The Doctor did not swear, not even gentle little swearing. Well, the ninth doctor often swore in a variety of different alien languages, but never anything she could understand. Really! And with a bow tie! You'd expect better manners. Maybe it was River's influence, what with the gun totting and the large hair. Not that there was anything wrong with either but –
"I'm talking about you leaving. And River too of course, since she's your ride," Rose said, cutting off her own inner ramble, obviously a bad habit she'd picked up from the Doctor.
"And what? Leave you here?" The Doctor frowned darkly, a look shared by both his previous selves that bespoke the fury of the Oncoming Storm. Rose's eyes shimmered golden in response. "Do you even know where you are, Rose?"
"Doesn't matter," she said with finality. "This is where the Doctor is and I'm not leaving until he's with me. So, you see, it doesn't matter where I am. We could be back on Krop Tor, but I'd stay there, with the Beast and Toby, I'd stay because he was there and I'm waiting for him."
Her golden gaze was boring into his hazel one, offering absolutely not compromise and challenging him not to remember exactly what she was talking about. Tell Rose I – Oh, she knows. Quite.
"Rose. You are not staying here. In case you haven't noticed, you are on the alien planet of Savoh which has a very hostile population of humanoids that are distinctly tribal, blend meticulously in with their surroundings, and have a passion for poison darts."
"Sounds like a fantastic time," she said brightly, overemphasizing the fantastic.
"You're not staying here." He glared at her, barely there eyebrows descending upon his scowling features.
"No, Doctor, you're not staying here." Her golden gaze narrowed in on him, she could feel Bad Wolf beginning to take over, and she fought it back as best she could; she didn't want Bad Wolf defending her, she wanted it to be her words that sent the Doctor on his way, where he belonged, in the other TARDIS.
"River," she looked over to the other woman for the first time since they'd re-entered the TARDIS, "would you please take your husband home?"
River looked from one party to the other. While a part of her wanted badly to abscond with her husband and leave all traces of this powerful blonde girl behind them, the other part of her, the part of her that was purely River, daughter of Amy and Rory Williams, knew that it was not the right thing to do.
"The Doctor's right, Rose. Savoh is dangerous. It's bad enough that your Doctor is out there on his own. You shouldn't be here alone either."
Rose's eyes flared golden the way they had when she had begun to speak as someone who distinctly did not sound like her. River hurried onward. "But it's your TARDIS and your rescue mission. The Doctor isn't going to be satisfied until he knows your safe, so let us set up camp beside you until we find your Doctor."
Pushing back Bad Wolf as it attempted to claw its way to the surface, Rose thought over River's proposition. It wasn't what she wanted, because she did want them to leave. Well, actually, she rather liked River even if she had married the Doctor. And there was the not so small part of her that was helplessly rejoicing at being with the Doctor again.
But there was also the part of her that wanted to find her husband on her own, who didn't want to deal with the pain of seeing the Doctor again, seeing him with these people, knowing how much time had passed since he'd left her on that beach again. Then, there was also the bigger, much more important, part of her that just desperately wanted the Doctor back and if these people were offering to help her, then no way could she say no. There was nothing she wouldn't do to get him back.
"Fine. But you make sure the Doctor stays on his ship and stops fiddling with mine." Rose leapt down from the seat and walked around the console to stare the Doctor down.
His scowl darkened. "Your TARDIS?"
Rose dipped her head to the side, arms fisted tightly over her chest. "Marriage, equal properties rights. Besides, Donna gave it to us both and you know it."
"Come on, Doctor," River said, pulling at his elbow before the pair could get in another squabble. "We need to get back to Rory and Amy before Amy panics and starts trying to fly the TARDIS."
His gaze stayed stuck on Rose. "You can get the TARDIS, River, you know how to fly her."
She froze. "What? You want me to fly the TARDIS without you?"
"Not the first time you've done it," he said, not looking at her.
Rose felt fury running down her limbs. Why couldn't he just leave her alone? Yes, she had barged in on him, but that didn't give him the right to stick around and try to control what was going on. He might be the Doctor but he wasn't, in the strictest sense, her Doctor.
Which is when it finally hit her. He wasn't strictly her Doctor, he was the Doctor and the Doctor had never taken well to fighting with her. Nothing got resolved by it and they could both be appallingly stubborn when it came to fighting. So maybe, yelling at him to leave wasn't the way to get things done.
Rose tucked her hair behind her ear. "Okay."
The Doctor's eyes brightened. "Okay?"
"Yeah," she nodded. As she spoke, the gold faded completely from her irises.
"Okay, what?" River asked, frustrated.
The Doctor finally turned to her. "You pilot the TARDIS here, I'll wait with Rose." He leaned towards her, his lips skirting across River's cheek bone.
River could feel Rose's gaze sharp on them, and she also knew that the Doctor had kissed her so innocently because of that. It was dangerous ground that the three of them were playing on. Whatever securities River had had about her relationship with the Doctor, like even though he sometimes acted as if he couldn't stand the sight of her she knew him better than anyone ever had and he had to love her because of that, were being very swiftly disintegrated.
So in a moment of anxiety, she reeled the Doctor to her, hands on the back of his head, and kissed him as passionately, territorially, and desperately as she could. River felt his arms flail at his sides before finding purchase on her hips. He was kissing her back, his lips smashed to hers, but then he was shoving her away, his eyes frantic as he looked not to her but to Rose.
Rose, who had watched the whole awkward exchange from little more than three feet away. Her lips pressed together, eyebrows sky high. It was awkward, really awkward. Because he was the Doctor and she loved him, but she certainly wasn't this one's wife and River certainly was, but the Doctor was looking to Rose as if he had betrayed her and the whole thing was just awkward.
"I'm – " Rose started, feeling she really should say something. A deep breath; focus on resolving the awkward. "River, lovely to meet you. I'm going to change."
And with that, Rose turned on her heel and hightailed it to her bedroom. Well, the bedroom she shared with the Doctor, which was positively wonderful, except that he wasn't here and everything was a mess and Bad Wolf was flaring up more than she ever had.
With these thoughts, Rose ran the last two hallways to the bedroom. She threw open the door, then fell back against it, sealing out the Doctor and River. Hopefully now they could properly sort out the mess between them without her standing there with her heart doing something that felt a lot like breaking but couldn't possibly be because she loved her Doctor and this wasn't really him.
The lights in the bedroom flickered on, courtesy of the TARDIS, exposing walls painted TARDIS blue with an oversized bed in the center of the room covered in the softest pillows and sheets. There were a cherry oak dresser and vanity against the opposite wall of the bed. A large closet on the left wall with a full length mirror beside it. The right wall had a loveseat that was modeled exactly after the one from her flat at the Powell Estate, next to it was a bookshelf that held all of the Doctor's favorite books along with hers and pictures of their friends and family.
The dresser was covered in more photos, these from their wedding, Rose looking resplendent in white and the Doctor handsomely filling out his tux, his ever present Chucks proudly on display as his wedding footwear. It was so clearly their room, Rose and the Doctor, as decorated by the one who knew them best, the TARDIS. And though it was a baby TARDIS, it was still their TARDIS, the one the Doctor had stolen centuries ago, because they were born of the same core and retained the same memories. This TARDIS was just as much the TARDIS as Ten and a Half was the Doctor.
Rose wandered over to the closet, pulling the doors open. Her fingertips trailed over the various suits inside, most of these sans pinstripes. It seemed Ten and a Half was into solids rather than stripes. Rose liked the distinctions between the Doctors, they were the same, but he was hers and he went out of his way to show her that.
Except for this, for running off without her, for leaving her behind once more, for breaking her heart. Rose stepped into the closet, folding herself down beneath the hanging suits and the other half of the clothes that were hers. She scrunched her knees up to her chest and rested her forehead on them.
"Where are you?" she asked, her words brittle. "Doctor, I need you."
The Doctor stared down the hallway where Rose had disappeared. Well, not really disappeared, run away from him was the more accurate term, the more accurate term which scared him to death. Wheeling around, he glared at River, standing there, not having moved an inch since the kiss. "River, I need to find Rose. There's a lot we need to sort out. I thought you would have gone back to the TARDIS already as I asked –"
"Right. That's what you want. Me to leave so you can be alone with Rose," River said coldly.
"Well, yes. I'm fairly sure that's what I said, River," the Doctor said in annoyance, one hand raking through his hair.
He couldn't understand why River was being so difficult. She usually did as he asked, even if she had to sass him before she actually did it. But now she wasn't, she was just standing here as if they had all the time in the world and not as if his half-self could show up at any moment and run off with Rose.
"You married me," River said quietly, her expression heartbreakingly sorrowful.
The Doctor's eyes darted over her, trying to figure out why exactly River was upset. Well, of course she was mad that he hadn't wanted to make a show of kissing her in front of Rose. But what was he supposed to do? He cared about Rose, he didn't want to hurt her feelings by kissing River, she might get the wrong idea and –
"I'm your wife, Doctor, not Rose."
"Actually –"
"No," River said sharply. "Your other self married Rose. You didn't marry Rose, you married me."
"In a timeline that never existed!" the Doctor burst out frustrated. He stalked around the console, his hands running over bits and bobs he hadn't seen in well over two transformations of the console room.
River clenched her eyes shut. It felt as if he had physically punched her and for a moment she was sure she wouldn't be able to breathe. "Is that what you truly believe?" It came out as barely more than a whisper.
The Doctor froze, mouth hanging open, as the implications of what he had said caught up with him. His eyes shot to River who was still as stone, her eyes shut tight against him. "Oh, River. No, no that's not –" He moved toward her, picking up her hands in his, holding them gently. "You know how I feel about you."
Her eyes opened slowly as she shook her head in negation. "I don't, though, Doctor. You've never said. You know I love you, more than anything, more than myself. But I haven't the faintest idea how you feel about me. And yet, I can tell quite clearly how you feel about Rose, not felt, but feel about her."
The Doctor's hearts hammered in his chest. This was not going well, not well at all. How could he answer River's question when he didn't know the answer himself? He depended on River, needed her desperately in a way he hadn't needed many people before. But that wasn't what she wanted to hear, that wasn't what she deserved.
And he did care about her, deeply, it was only that she wanted more from him than he was willing to give, than he was willing to say. It was true, they had been married in a time that didn't exist, had never existed. She had almost ended the universe to keep him alive, and she couldn't see that that scared him. The Doctor didn't want someone endangering the universe for him, he wanted someone who was willing to sacrifice him and her own life to save the universe.
"River, I . . ." He started another unfinished sentence with a very similar pretext to one he had uttered before. And that girl, that girl he had uttered that sentence for, she was on this ship, yards away at most and he needed to be with her, he had to.
"I'm sorry, River. I need to see Rose." The Doctor dropped River's hands, turning away from her and walking down the familiar but unknown hallways of this TARDIS that wasn't his.