(AN) Wow, thanks to everyone viewing this. The story has a fairly decent following now, and it's exciting! Enjoy!
"Doctor," she repeated, stumbling forward. Image after image assaulted her mind. New New York. Slitheen. The TARDIS. Going out for fish and chips after witnessing the end of the world. Two different bodies, both of which having hands that fit perfectly in hers.
Bad wolf bay.
"Doctor, I-" she was cut off as she doubled over, clutching her head. Searing pain ripped through her skull. Memories, so many memories. It was just too much. Through her tear blurred eyes and roaring ears, she could barely bear witness to a thrashing, crashing sound, followed by numerous people gasping and yelling. Before she knew what was happening, she was half running, half being dragged down the hall, the stark bright lights blinding her. Disoriented, she couldn't force a single word out of her mouth, could hardly pull a breath into her lungs. She was roughly pulled around a corner, only briefly catching a glance of her face, red and strained, but very clearly returned to it's prior form. She stumbled heavilly, and was only kept from crashing to the slick tiles by an arm, tucked securely around her waist. At this contact, a scent hit her nose, a stench of blood and sweat. Rose tore away from this person, whoever it was, and collapsed to her knees, her eyes streaming from exertion. When she had bearings a few seconds later to force herself to look up, she sobbed, shaking her head as she tried to get to her feet.
The Doctor stood in front of her, still clad only in jeans, leaning heavily against the wall. He was sliding slowly to the floor, and he was struggling to breathe. Blood bubbled from his lips, and he was choking on it, coughing and clutching at his side.
"Doctor, what are you doing!?" Rose screamed, trying unsuccessfully to clamber to her feet. "Y-you're hurt!"
He stared at her with dark bloodshot eyes, clutching at the wall. "Your-mind," he spluttered. "You weren't supposed to-to remember this way. I-I have-" He stopped, giving a strangled cry as more blood dribbled from his lips.
Rose finally got herself to stand up, and she ran to him, hoisting the arm that wasn't broken over her shoulder. "Where do we need to go?!" She asked urgently.
"We don't need to go anywhere," he gasped, moving out from under her arm. In a second, he had her head clutched in his hands, and an abrupt sense of calm rushed through her body. Suddenly, the brightly lit hall seemed very dim, and the she could only feel the Doctor's shaking hands at her temples. The burning, searing pain in her forehead faded away, only to be replaced by a sense of coolness, of clarity. The words, names, and pictures were no longer just bits and things in her head. They were now experiences, moments that she had witnessed and been a part of. In another world, another universe all together, she had travelled with the Doctor. She had been the companion to a man who was infinitely ancient and dangerous and who had destroyed his whole species.
Despite this, however, she had loved him. And even though he didn't say anything, she had seen a look in his eyes whenever he saw her. He refused to say it, and she knew that he never would, but he loved her too.
The presence of his hands disappeared from her head, and Rose opened her eyes, not even noticing that she had shut them the whole time. She met the Doctor's dull dying eyes, and another realization penetrated her exhausted mind. This man, no matter how much he resembled him, wasn't her Doctor. And yet, somehow he managed to know who she was. Rose stepped back from him. There was a certain look on his face that told her that she wasn't his Rose either.
"Your mind," the Doctor finally said, albeit with some struggle, "was burning. It was tampered with by unrefined technology." The look had disappeared from his eyes, replaced by something darker. Before Rose had the chance to respond, he took a step in her direction, fists clenching.
"Now," he said dangerously. "Who the hell are you, and why do you look like my Rose?"
His words struck her sharply, and Rose blinked, her heartbeat accelerating. "I-" she stammered,"I thought you were injured."
He gave a short, humorless laugh, gritting his teeth a moment later as he clutched his side. "Superior Time Lord biology," he growled. "But that's not the point. Who. Are. You."
"Rose," she said firmly, confusion flaring in her mind. "Rose Tyler."
"No, you aren't," the Doctor said sharply. "There are things in your head, things that never happened, that weren't supposed to happen. Thoughts of a reality that isn't here, isn't now. And besides..." He paused here, and a look of horror came on to his face. He was staring at something that Rose couldn't see, over her shoulder.
She turned around, but the hall was empty. She looked at him, raising an eyebrow."What?"
"There's something on your..." He stopped once more, his eyes widening with a terror that now Rose could understand, for the sound of advancing footsteps had hit her ears. She didn't even have time to look behind her, due to the Doctor grabbing her hand, yanking her into motion.
"Run!" he said urgently. They set off, and he yanked her around the next corner. At the end of this hallway, there was a large door. They reached it quickly, but when they did, the Doctor swore loudly.
"It's locked!" he shouted. He drew his hand out of hers, fumbling with the lock. He then turned to her with a look of desperation. "And no sonic screwdriver!"
For a moment, this panicked Rose, but then she remembered. She reached into her pocket, drawing out the screwdriver that the Doctor had given her, pointing it at the door and pressing the button. After a few seconds, the lock clicked, and Rose was quick to shove the door open, running inside. When she looked back at the Doctor, however, he was just standing there with a stupefied look on his face.
"What?" she asked.
"You have my sonic screwdriver," he said slowly.
"Yes, you gave it to me!" Rose exclaimed.
"Why the hell would I give you my screwdriver?"
Rose blinked, realization smacking her in the face. The Doctor she had met, the one who had given her this stuff, had to be from the future.
"Because," she shouted. "You knew I would save you with it!" She clapped her hands excitedly. "A paradox!"
The Doctor stared at her blankly.
"It doesn't matter! Get in here!" Rose yelled, for the men had just turned the corner, and were approaching with a startling speed. The Doctor ducked into the room, and then snatched the screwdriver from her hands, slamming the door and sonicing it shut.
The room they now stood in was entirely pitch black. Rose started forward, but she hit her hip on the corner of a table. Wincing, she turned to where she thought the Doctor was. She took a step, but tripped over a stray cable. A hand shot out, grabbing her shoulder before she fell.
"Stay still," the Doctor hissed, almost too quiet for her to hear. Before she could speak, his hand clamped over her mouth.
"Don't. Say. A. Word," he whispered. "We aren't alone."
And then Rose realized something. The Doctor's arm was broken. And yet, he was holding her arm, and he had his hand over her mouth.
"Doctor," she mouthed. The hand came off of her mouth. But someone still gripped her shoulder.
"Doctor, you aren't holding my shoulder, are you?" Rose squeaked.
The lights came on. Rose blinked, raising her arm to shield her eyes. She tried to turn around, to see who was holding her shoulder, but quickly, an arm wrapped around her neck, restraining her. Quite suddenly, she felt the sensation of cold, hard metal being pressed to her head. It didn't take much deduction for her to realize it was a gun.
The Doctor stood in front of her, eyes cold and dark. "Let her go," he said. His voice was frighteningly quiet.
"Why?" a voice laughed, near her ear. "What will you do?"
That voice. It was horribly familiar, and the sound of it made her insides churn. Mickey Smith was gripping her against him, holding the gun to her head. He had betrayed her. He had lied to her for months and manipulated her and kept her away from the Doctor. She tried to scream, to writhe in his grasp. But the arm around her throat was slowly tightening, choking off her air supply.
There was something dark, something unknown written across the Doctor's face."You know exactly what I'll do."
Quite suddenly, the arm slackened around her neck. "How do I know that you won't do it anyways?" Mickey exclaimed.
The Doctor gave him a deadly stare. "You don't."
He then gave Rose a pointed look. It took a moment, but it reminded her of how loose Mickey's arm was around her at that moment. She abruptly jerked away from him, triggering a yell from him as he scrambled to grab her again. And then several things happened at once. The Doctor jerked her to his side, pulling her behind him as he pulled out the sonic screwdriver. He zapped it at Mickey, and then, much to Rose's alarm, he disappeared into thin air with a pop. There was no explosion, no sign that he had ever been there. With the blink of an eye, he had disappeared into thin air.
Rose turned to the Doctor, eyes wide. "What did you do to him?!"
The Doctor turned to her, ignoring her question. "That's not your boyfriend."
Rose blinked. "No, it's not. He's been lying to me all these months, we're not really together."
The Doctor rolled his eyes, somewhat ruining the intensity of the moment. "That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that man there isn't Mickey Smith. He is an alien life form, and that wasn't even the man himself holding you just now. It was a semi-present atom materializer."
Rose stared at him confusedly. "A what?"
The Doctor sighed heavily, pinching the bridge of his nose. "A hologram. With physical presence. Made to imitate an actual life form. I just eliminated the signal with the sonic." He shoved said device into his pocket, giving her a look. "And that sort of technology is way beyond your time. Totally alien."
Rose's eyes widened, and she indignantly put her hands on her hips. "Are you telling me that I've been living with a hologram for the past few months?!" But then more pressing questions flooded her mind.
She gasped, covering her mouth. "My dad! My mum? Where does that leave them? And Mickey? The real Mickey, where is he?!" She looked up at the Doctor despairingly, but no answers lay in his eyes.
Suddenly, a crashing sound came from the door behind them, and the Doctor jumped on his feet, running past her to another door on the other side of the room.
"They're breaking in!" he shouted over his shoulder to her. He sonicked the door open, and then ran inside. Rose dashed after him, but before she entered, she heard a manic laugh of delight. She cautiously entered the room, and then felt a smile spread across her face despite everything.
The TARDIS. It stood there, in all of its beautiful blue glory, and the Doctor was running about it, happier than Rose had ever seen him. It sent an odd ache through her chest, and quite suddenly she realized how much she missed it. Traveling with the Doctor, living in that great big blue box.
"This is where I parked her originally," the Doctor said, breaking through her reverie. "I put a perception filter on, so only I could see it. Unless, of course, someone had travelled in here before, which is kinda rare..." he trailed off, his eyes glued on her face.
After a few moments of silence, he said, "You can see it, can't you."
Rose nodded. But before he could say another word, she expelled,"Doctor, how do you know me?"
The Doctor didn't meet her gaze. "What do you mean?"
"Doctor, you were right. I'm not from this reality. I'm not even from this universe! I am from a parallel universe, and I was stranded here when the rift became torn open. I travelled with you in another universe, and I came here before I became trapped. I have parents here, Doctor. They're here, but they never had a daughter. I don't exist! And then you come waltzing along. But you, you're different in my universe, you-" she paused, taking a deep breath, and forcing herself to make eye contact with this man, who both was and wasn't the Doctor in so many ways.
"You regenerated," she continued. "There was a situation, Daleks, I-"
"-you absorbed the Time Vortex into your body," he finished for her, a grim look on his face. Rose gaped at him, but he ignored this, continuing to speak calmly.
"We were on Satellite 9. I sent you home, but you came back, with the time vortex in your body. You said you were the bad wolf." He looked at her in silence.
"But then what?" Rose exclaimed. "And how do I even exist here in this world?"
"You killed all the Daleks," the Doctor said softly. The hard edge of his voice had disappeared, and quite suddenly he looked so old, with his bloodied and bruised body and wistful dark eyes.
Rose tentatively approached him, putting a hand on his good arm. "And then what Doctor?"
He jerked away from her, unlocking the TARDIS door and going inside. Rose ran after him, the turquoise glow of the room bathing her face. But the sheer familiarity of it, the towering, coral-like beams, the knob ridden console didn't faze her in the slightest. She still had unanswered questions.
The Doctor limped up to the console, pulling some of the switches. After a moment, his body was bathed in a dull orange light, and he flexed the fingers on both of his hands, groaning. The cuts on his torso gradually faded, and the bruises became a pale yellow color. After a few moments, he flipped the switches again, and the light disappeared. He turned to her, fully healed.
Rose didn't care. "What happened, Doctor? What then?"
The Doctor visibly swallowed, and turned away. He reached up and ran his hands through his short-cropped hair. However, he finally spoke.
"And then, Rose Tyler," he paused, his voice thick. He turned to her, and Rose had never seen such a look of agony on a mans face.
"Then, your mind burned." He took a step towards her, visibly shaking.
"That day, Rose Tyler, you died."