A/N:

First up: Thanks for the great reception to this. Oh, but it's been a while, and it's nice to know I can still draw in a reader or two! I certainly hope what follows will keep you reading here and beyond.

This gender thing is fun ... and a lil confusing to write. Oh, so many times I mess up the gender when I'm writing it, but heh ... it's a unique challenge for me.

This may seem to swerve like a wee snake, but there is a reason behind the Doctor's muddled thoughts and topic changes throughout. Stick with it, please...

~~oooOOOooo~~

If the Doctor had expected Rose to accept her "hello" with a tongue-touched grin, a giggle of happiness, and maybe a bone crushing hug, she was sorely mistaken.

Instead of happiness and relief, Rose took a step back and exhaled a loud breath of disappointment and anger at the news.

"Don't touch me," he growled out along a quiet and eerily dangerous tone of voice. He made no move to shove the Doctor's hands from their delicate touch upon his cheek, but the Doctor jerked back sharply as though he had.

The Doctor practically curled in on herself under Rose's heated glare. Any love she had seen inside her eyes had vanished, only to be replaced by hatred … or was it heavy disappointment? The distinction between the two was fairly irrelevant as far as the Doctor was concerned, they were both as horrible as each other.

She stepped back and to the side with a lift in her shoulder to look down along it toward her former companion. "Why're you looking at me like that?"

Rose's entire frame was rigid and it seemed to take quite an effort for him to turn his head on his neck to look at her. "Looking at you like what?"

"Like that," the Doctor answered quietly. "Like you want that fissure to open back up and suck me into another world?"

A brow rose high on Rose's head and he snorted lightly in amusement. "That'd be lovely. And if you don't mind, could you please leave the TARDIS behind – my universal hopper doesn't seem configured correctly for this particular parallel."

Any offence she should have felt toward Rose's comment were immediately smothered by curiosity at the words Universal Hopper. The Doctor stuck her tongue into the corner of her lip and lifted her head to attempt to look over Rose's shoulder at the device in question. She slid her hands into the pockets of her jacket and moved toward Rose with a forced casual stride.

"Universal Hopper, you say," she breathed out through lips that pursed loosely outward. "Still haven't been able to put one together, myself. Care to share your secret?"

Rose's brows pinched tightly together in a perplexed expression. "I'm sorry, what?"

The Doctor smiled. She didn't pull her hands from her pockets. Instead she buried them deeper to push up her shoulders a little to attempt a more interesting and perhaps innocent façade. Rose didn't need to be alerted to the fact that she was ready to snatch the thing from his wrist, throw it to the ground, and then stomp on it.

Dangerous is what that thing was. Whole universes could collapse, all of reality destroyed…And all that jazz.

She had to keep it cool, though. No need to let on her intentions of thievery. She merely jutted her chin in a gesture toward the device.

"Your Universal Hopper," she clarified. "I'd like to hear more about it."

Rose rolled his eyes skyward and shook his head. "Typical."

The huff in his voice drew the Doctor's attention away from Rose's wrist. She focused on the skyward gaze and shake of his head. "What's typical?" she queried somewhat indignantly. "My interest in portable travel technology?" She shrugged and gave a snort of her own. "I'll wear that accusation with pride, actually. I like to be renowned for my interest in things like that."

Rose shook his head. "Deflect, deflect, deflect," he muttered. "Doesn't matter which you it is, when a subject comes up that you don't want to talk about, you find another topic and change the subject."

The Doctor huffed. "Well," she drawled with a look toward Rose's wrist. "You brought it up with your talk of me exiting this universe and leavin' you my TARDIS because your universal hopper isn't appropriately configured. It should be understandable that my interest would be piqued by something like that."

"Like a dog seein' a damn rabbit, you are."

"A more accurate description of me would be that of a concerned friend," She sniffed back petulantly. "Forgive me for wanting to lend a hand to you and configure it properly for this universe."

"That's rubbish, and you know it," Rose barked back with a curl in his lip. "First chance you get, you'd destroy it." He flipped his hand in a dismissive gesture. "Find some useless bleedin' excuse for it too. Destroy and collapse universes, fracture reality, erase time and bring in reapers or some other such nonsense."

The Doctor scoffed with affront. "I would do no such thing," she lied. She flicked her wrist to indicate the device. "That's a marvel of ingenuity; the device on your wrist." She pursed her lips hopefully. "Can I take a quick look at it?"

Rose shook his head. "No."

"Oh," she whined. "Please? Just a quick look. A Short assessment, really. Won't take much more than a second."

Rose looked back down at her wrist and shook her head. "No means no. It doesn't mean ask again or push the request further. I said no and I mean it." He levered an annoyed look toward the Doctor. "This is mine. It took me nearly a decade to build it; almost double that to work out the kinks."

"Please let me look," the Doctor almost – but not quite – moaned. "Just one little peek."

Rose twisted her wrist to put the device on display, but didn't hand it over or mane any move to remove it for the Doctor to more closely inspect it. When the Doctor moved her hands forward to touch it, Rose quickly snapped her wrist back in toward himself. "Nuh-uh. You look with your eyes, not your hands."

"Well," the Doctor said with a snort that ended with her pursing her lips and slouching in a petulant manner. She waved her hand toward the device. "Thought your mother taught you to share your toys and play nice with others."

Rose's eyes flared with an emotion that the Doctor couldn't immediately decipher. The expression shifted quickly to neutral and the young man shrugged. "Guess I was always a brat."

"You don't have to be one…"

Rose looked toward him. "You're not playing with it, so stop asking."

The Doctor's nose crinkled with displeasure. "Well. You've certainly lost your sense of fun, haven't you?"

Rose snorted. "Playing dangerous – and not ever fully successful games of cat and mouse with a psychotic metacrisis version of a troublesome Time Lord will do that to a person."

The Doctor's face fell into a deep frown. "Every single part of that response scares me, Rose."

He snorted. "Yeah. Well try living it."

If was very tempting for the Doctor to outline each and every time he's been engaged in that very game throughout her many lives up against so many enemies time and time again. The Daleks immediately sprang to mind. However, she bit down on any such retort of that nature and let herself exhale a long breath before responding.

"What happened?"

Rose chuckled softly under her breath and shook her head. "Not really any of your concern," he answered with a slight waver in his tone.

"I beg to differ," the Doctor remarked back quickly. "Anything that involved you – and my Metacrisis self – has absolutely everything to do with me."

Rose threw his head back and barked out a long laugh of pure contempt. "Oh. Oh, that's really rich."

"I don't quite follow."

Rose lowered his head and looked toward the Doctor with eyes full of accusation. His voice was low and quiet, almost seething. "You gave up any entitlement to anything to do with John and myself when you left us alone on that beach and locked us away from everything we'd ever known."

The Doctor's brows rose high. "John? He called himself John?"

Rose's shoulders fell with exasperation. His jaw followed suit to gape with disbelief. "That is your response: to question his choice in his name rather than defend your actions?" He waited only a moment for a response before holding up a hand in a "stop" gesture and turned away from her. "You know what? Never mind. Forget it. Forget that you saw me. Forget everything." He looked down to fiddle with the crude controls on his device. "He's going to be here soon enough. That explosion only gives me about a half hour or so. Standing here talking to you is wasting time I could be using to get as far away from here as possible."

Rose looked at the space where the fissure had originally opened up and let out a very long breath. So focused on his own fear, he didn't react when he felt the soft grasp of the Doctor's hand on his arm.

"Too dangerous to be left on his own," Rose recited quietly. "That's what you said. Born in battle, full of blood and anger and revenge."

"Rose…"

"I don't know how you could have left us behind after saying all that and think that everything was going to go alright," Rose continued. "Typical guy. You sire a child – well with you a fully grown one – and then just dump it off for someone else to look after."

The Doctor's eyes narrowed with hurt. "That isn't how it was," she growled through her teeth.

"Oh no?" Rose snipped back as he twisted his head to glare down at her. "Then how about you tell me how it was? How it really was? And then, when you're done trying to justify your actions, let me fill you in on just what exactly you left behind on that beach, and how it affected not only me, but the entire universe you abandoned."

"Rose," the Doctor ventured quietly. "I'm so…"

Rose spun on her at that moment. "You didn't even say goodbye," he spat out. "After everything I did to get back to you, after everything we ever went through together – you couldn't even take a moment to say goodbye."

The Doctor's eyes quickly washed with tears and she shook her head. Her voice shifted to a tone of pleading and of desperate apology. "I couldn't say it," she half begged. "How could I say it?"

"Easy," Rose retorted snidely. "Goodbye, Rose. See how easy that is to say? Goodbye. So long. Farewell. Have a fantastic life." He strode forward and leaned down slightly to speak into the Doctor's face. "You're so good at walking away, aren't you? Walking away and never, ever looking back."

The Doctor let herself hold onto Rose's anger as her anchor to maintaining composure. It was true that in the past she always walked away and never looked back when a companion left the TARDIS. It was only in his Eleventh form that he started to flip in an out of her companion's lives rather than have them permanently on board.

"Not anymore," she breathed out finally as her mind wandered toward Amy, Rory, Clara, and how much of their lives he became a part of. Decades rather than months. "Not anymore."

Rose let up a laugh at that. "Oh, where have I heard sentiments like that from you before?"

"I've changed," the Doctor said quietly.

Rose looked her up and down with a smirk. "Yes. I would say so. Tell me, how are you enjoying your newfound femininity?"

She lifted her eyes in contemplation. "Well," she answered as though Rose wasn't playing at being a facetious little shit. "I'm enjoying the experience quite a lot. I'm able to much more embrace my emotions – for one." She paused and her brows knitted together in thought. "Although sometimes that can illustrate me in ways I've never been viewed before…"

"Been called needy, yet?"

The Doctor flicked her gaze to Rose. She bit at the edge of her lower lip and held herself from nodding. "I can't say that the accusation has been made by anyone in particular, but I have had moments where the need has been particularly pulling."

"Need for what," Rose asked softly, slight hope in his voice.

"Companionship," the Doctor answered simply, oblivious to what Rose was looking to hear. She slouched with a smile. "Oh, I love friends," she cooed. "I just want to be surrounded by people … as many people as I can." Her eyes widened and she grinned as she pointed toward Rose. "You can join us if you want. That'll be fun."

Rose's eyes flashed open wide. There was clear panic in her expression. "You mean you have companions? Here?"

"I have companions," the Doctor clarified carefully, with definite confusion in her tone. "But they're all at home now celebrating their Christmases and holidays with their families."

"You didn't stay with them to celebrate?"

She shook her head. "Nah. Not really into Christmas dinners and making nice with families. Too much festive spirit gives me a stomach ache and makes my head hurt."

Rose chuckled and shook her head. "You're full of it. You loved Christmas with Mum, Mickey and me."

"You're right," she admitted with a gentle smile.

There was silence for a moment as Rose waited for the Doctor to expend on that. When she didn't, Rose pressed for more. "Well?"

The Doctor cleared her throat and took her gaze away from the man standing in front of her. "Yes. Well. That was the last Christmas I spent with any of my companions." She pursed her lips and lifted a hand to tuck her hair behind her ear. "First and last Christmas I spent with a companion's family," she admitted. "After I lost you. Well. I…" She sighed. "Too much of a reminder, I suppose."

For a moment, Rose felt compassion and empathy toward the Doctor for that admission. It was quickly suffocated, however, when the Doctor's eyes lit up and she corrected that.

"Oh, no. That's not entirely accurate." She grinned a happy smile. "I did end up on Amy's doorstep one Christmas. Had dinner with her and Rory."

"I see," Rose breathed out. "Amy was…?"

"A companion," she said with longing in her eyes and voice. "You would have loved her, Rose. Rude and ginger!"

Rose rolled his eyes. "Yeah. I can see how you'd admire those qualities. Rude being your default setting as far as I can remember."

"Oi," she countered with hurt. "Not always. I've been known to be very pleasant when the occasion calls for it."

"I guess the occasion never arose while you and I were together then?"

The Doctor smiled. "So we were then? Not being at all familiar with the Human protocols for togetherness, I wasn't really very sure about that."

"Sure about what?"

"Whether or not we were together."

Rose's brow flicked high. "In what sense? If you mean travelling companions, then yeah. Totally did that together…."

The Doctor smiled and jumped in quickly to prevent an expansion on that thought that might not quite head in the direction that the Doctor had hoped. "Which is what I told Martha when I met her. You and me: together." She scratched at her hair and lengthened her face thoughtfully. "Didn't stop her from taking a fancy to me, though. Quite liked me, Martha."

"So did you in that incarnation."

The Doctor smirked. "I was rather dashing in that body, even I have to admit that." The smirk turned into a purse of the lips and a lift in her brows. "Wasn't ready to give it up when the time came, though. It was a very hard regeneration to go through. One of the scant few that I did alone. Near destroyed my TARDIS." She looked to Rose with wide eyes. "Would you like me to tell you about it? We could go back to the TARDIS, set ourselves in the Vortex and talk over tea in the library."

"Uh…"

"And then we can set down on Earth, and I can introduce you to my current companions." Her grin was wide and excited. "Oh, a full TARDIS, again! How that'll take me back to when I wore pinstripes and a full command deck. What an adventure that was!" Her excitement was palpable. "Let's take an adventure: All of us!"

"Why?" Rose snorted. "So when it's all done, you cantake me back to Bad Wolf Bay over in a desolate and now destroyed parallel universe? Perhaps recreate another psychotic version of you to torture me for another century? No, ta. Been there, done that, wore the T-Shirt."

That made the Doctor's brows come together and drop heavily over her eyes. "When you say torture…?"

Rose shook her head. "Look. It's nothing, okay."

The Doctor's eyes narrowed. "I very much think you're lying to me."

"So what if I am; it's not going to change anything, is it?" he asked with a shrug. Her concentration had shifted back to her universal hopper and an amber light that had begun to flicker on it. "Forty five minutes this time…"

The Doctor ignored the part of Rose's comment that included a time frame.

"If you don't tell me, then I'll fret," she stated as though it was the ultimate threat. "I'll stew over it and worry. My imagination – which is extremely vivid in this incarnation – will run rampant." She threw up her arms. "I'll create all sorts of scenarios in my mind about it."

"Uh-huh," Rose hummed out as he whipped a tiny little screwdriver from his jacket pocket. "Then write a book. I'm sure it'll be a best seller. Put my name in the dedications, ta."

The Doctor's mouth hung as Rose moved past her to walk back toward the clearing that had once held a fissure in reality. "I don't think you're fully understanding what I'm telling you here, Rose." She stalked toward him, noting the way that he held his wrist, and the device over the air where the fissure had been. That action quickly had the Doctor retrieving her own screwdriver from her bum-bag. "Are you listening to me?"

"Hard not to," Rose admitted as she brought her wrist back toward her and analysed the date displayed on a small Apple-Watch style face. "Because you keep talking."

"I keep talking because you're not," she growled in reply. She aimed the sonic at the space where the fissure once was and pressed the small button that activated it. "I'm trying – very hard – to remind you who we once were, to put you at ease so you'll tale to me." She snatched the sonic screwdriver from the air and brought it toward her to read her own data. "My hearts once beat for you, Rose Tyler…."

"Not the time for an admission like that, Doctor," Rose barker out urgently. "He's comin, and you need to get as far away from here as you can. Because if he senses the TARDIS nearby…"

The Doctor saw her own data and gave a firm nod. "You're right, there's a hairline fracture in reality right now, and it's growing." She grabbed hold of Rose's wrist firmly. "Come with me to the TARDIS."

Rose pulled her wrist from her hold. "No, Doctor. I Can't. You go, I have to stay and face him."

The Doctor blinked as a thin line of light appeared in mid-air. She reached for Rose's wrist once more. "You're don't have to face anyone. Come with me."

Rose shot her a glare. "If I don't, he'll destroy this reality like he has all of the others."

The Doctor gagged. "Hold on, what? … and let's not forget to add who to that question."

"Your metacrisis," he clarified. HE turned a frightened stare toward the Doctor. "This is a game to him. I escape, he follows. If he doesn't find me, then he destroys everything in his path until he does."

The sliver turned into a thick line of squelching blue and white. The Doctor looked on with worry and held up her sonic screwdriver as though it was capable of holding back one of the universes most formidable forces. "Why?"

"Because he's mad," Rose whispered. "Absolutely insane. Full of fire, vengeance and hatred." He spun toward the Doctor and looked at her with an urgent expression. "You have to leave. Now. You can't be here. IF he sees you…"

The Doctor shook her head. "I'm not leaving you."

"Why not," she growled. "You've done it before, what's one more time between friends?"

The Doctor anchored her stand and prepared to face whatever was about to emerge from the fissure. Her clone. The exact image of her in her tenth incarnation. "Never again."

Rose moved toward her and growled into her face. "You don't get it, Doctor. You have to take the TARDIS and leave here. Now!"

"I won't leave you," the Doctor vowed through her teeth.

She took Rose's hand in hers and braced as the fissure split open and revealed a grotesque image of his Tenth self. He was aged, leathered, and disfigured across the face. He strode with confidence and purpose, but with a gait that was unsteady and clumsy. This looked like a man who had walked through fire, hail and brimstone, had been trampled by the four horses of the Apocalypse, and lived to tell the tale.

How could this creature once have been the twin to his most attractive self?

She gasped as he strode across the short distance between the fissure and herself, clutching firmly at Rose's hand when it tightened in fear.

"Too late," Rose whispered. "I'm so sorry."

The Metacrisis strode past Rose and made a beeline directly toward the Doctor. His lips stretched into a smile that showed greyed and yellowed teeth.

"Darling," he cooed to the Doctor as he lifted his hand to her face and brushed the hair from her eyes with a tender touch from wrinkled fingertips. His brows lifted high to open his age narrowed eyes that chided her gently. "You're getting better at this. I almost lost you this time."

Beside her, Rose peeped and shuddered, but the Doctor was happy to play along. "John," she cooed lovingly. "You found me…"

"And I always will," he purred back in reply as he leaned down to press his lips against hers.