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Chapter Three-Really Great Hair
[In which a commitment is made and immediately threatened]
After disembarking the zeppelin and retrieving the suitcase they'd agreed to check (the Doctor's case of gadgets had, of course, stayed with the couple), they picked up their rental car and left the airport. With Rose behind the wheel, they quickly left Salt Lake city limits and headed out into farmland, the Doctor muttering directions periodically from the passenger seat. After a while, Rose glanced at the Doctor, who seemed a little more himself than he had when they left the airport.
"So," she ventured, "Do you think it's Jack?"
The doctor sighed. "I'm not sure," he replied. "A person being a fixed point, well, it's just impossible. So for there to be another one? I can't wrap my brain around it. And my brain is quite impressive. I'm not sure how it fits in my head. Welll," he continued, "that's not actually true. I know how it fits in my head, but I also suspect that you'd interrupt me as soon as I tried to explain. And you call me rude!"
Relieved that he had recovered enough to joke around, Rose smiled. "Well," she said, "at least this makes it easier to track him down."
"It does," he affirmed. "And it happens to be the same way I wanted to go anyway."
"Doctor," said Rose, watching her surroundings as she continued to drive, "We're in the middle of nowhere. You wanted to go this way?"
"Yup!" he responded cheerfully. "And the presence is this way, too."
"Do we have a plan for if the fixed point isn't the person we're looking for? Or what if it's Jack? What do we do then?"
"Well," he replied, "You know I don't really do plans, Rose. Sometimes I have a thing, though. That's even better than a plan. I have a cacophony of ideas, Rose Tyler. I just need to apply the appropriate idea to the correct situation."
After all these years, Rose still got a little tingly at the way her Doctor said her full name, and she suspected he knew it. "Like when we were supposed to collect that artifact for Torchwood and you sealed the cave on a ten-year timer instead?"
"Well, yes. Or no. That could have been a harmful weapon. I was merely being appropriately cautious."
"It was a hair dryer. You just didn't want to share your great hair," Rose said teasingly.
"Oi! That isn't true at all. I thought it was a… Rose! Turn right here and park off the road."
Rose made the turn as he indicated and maneuvered the vehicle off the road.
"Here we are!" he said as he nearly leapt out of the car. As Rose joined him, he grinned and took her hand. "Run!" he said with excitement, making a happy sound as they ran into the large, empty field.
They ran for a couple minutes and then slowed to a walk, giggling and bumping shoulders as they continued through the field.
"So, where are we, Doctor?" Rose asked.
"We're here!" he replied as they strolled leisurely. "Did you know that by the time you can ask that, we've moved? Between the planet's rotation and its hurtling around the sun, it is very difficult to thoroughly answer that question. By the time the answer is finished, it's no longer accurate. Roughly speaking, though, I suppose we're in a field in Utah."
"Right," said Rose with just a touch of exasperation, "I noticed that."
"Then why ask? Honestly, Rose, sometimes I think you just like to hear me talk," the Doctor said with a wink.
Rose laughed again. "Seriously, Doctor. What should we be looking for? Is he close? Should we be quieter?"
"Ah. Well, possibly. He's nearby, but I don't think he's close enough to hear us yet. I'll let you know when we need to be on guard." He looked around intently. "Oh! Here we are."
Rose tried to find anything that distinguished their location and failed.
"And where is that again, Doctor? And I'm not talking location in space."
"Here, Rose, is nowhere important in this world. Yet." The Doctor looked both serious and nervous. "In this exact location, in another world, we visited in 2012. This was one of our first adventures together, and I wanted to bring you back here. This was where Henry van Statten hid his collection."
He took a breath and reached in a pocket, retrieving a ring. Rose gasped. They'd talked about marriage, but the Doctor had seemed uninterested, and Rose was content as they were, as long as she was with her Doctor. She stared in shock at the ring he held. The band was simple and delicate, the stone an unremarkable size, but it subtly changed colors as it moved, starting clear and then giving off flashes of blue, pink, and yellow. Rose took her eyes off the ring to look back at the Doctor. Was he really proposing? Or was he being dense again, mimicking the wrong human traditions without realising it, just trying to give her a piece of jewelry?
"Far underground in a parallel universe, there was a bunker." The Doctor continued after his brief pause to gauge Rose's reaction. "In that bunker, a Dalek was the first to speak the words I wouldn't admit to even myself for so long. Rose Tyler, you are the woman I love, and I'm planning to keep telling you that for as long as I live. Would you do me the honor of making our life together official?"
When she didn't immediately answer, her mouth still hanging open slightly as she stared, the Doctor continued: "Well, I mean, not that it wasn't official to us, but I mean official to other people. Not that I care what other people think, but I thought you might. Might want to, I mean. Not that you care about other people. Well, you care about everyone, even Daleks, but…"
"Doctor!" Rose interrupted, finding her voice finally. "Marrying you? I'd love it," she said with a smile.
The Doctor smiled in return, a smile as big as she'd ever seen, and he wrapped his arms around her and spun her around before kissing her soundly.
When they finally paused to breathe, the Doctor took a moment to slip the ring on her finger.
"This diamond," he explained, "Is like me. We may change in appearance, but we're still the same. You, Rose Tyler, are my rock, my anchor through the changes."
He winced slightly.
"That was just a bit sappier than I intended," he commented.
Rose smiled. "It's perfect," she said, leaning in for a kiss.
Suddenly, from behind her, Rose heard a sound she'd not expected to hear again, one that filled her with horror.
"EXTERMINATE!"
She spun around, pressing closely into the Doctor, and opened her eyes wide in shock.
Standing in the field with them wasn't a Dalek. Instead, holding a device that looked suspiciously like a music player of some sort, was Captain Jack Harkness.
"Hello, Rosie," he said with a wink as he came closer, putting the audio device away. The Doctor's hands wrapped protectively and possessively around Rose's waist as Jack came within reach.
"I'm Jack Harkness," said the handsome man with a smile that almost rivaled the Doctor's smile a few minutes earlier. He reached out to take Rose's hand. "Would you believe me if I told you you're the girl of my dreams?" he continued as he kissed the back of her hand gently, without breaking eye contact.
"Oi, stop that," said the Doctor testily, "And put that gun away."
"Oh, this?" asked Jack, taking a small step back and displaying the weapon he held in his left hand. "I always keep this out when I meet new people loitering over my current employer's hidden base. I don't know either of you, Doc. Therefore, my gun stays."
"I hate to argue," started the Doctor, "but you seem to know at least our names." The Doctor blinked. "Well, I suppose that isn't entirely accurate. I rather like to argue under the right circumstances. And I most definitely consider facing a mercenary with a gun to be justification for disagreeing with the situation." As he spoke, the Doctor slowly maneuvered Rose to his side and slightly behind him.
"Jack," Rose tried, "What's going on?"
"Well," Jack said, obviously confident he still had control over the situation, "Like I said, you're the girl of my dreams. Literally." He looked unsure for the first time. "I've had dreams about you for the past eight years or so, ever since I stopped staying dead." He looked at the Doctor. "So don't even think about killing me. It won't do you any good, but it hurts like hell."
Rose gasped. "Doctor, that's when our Jack…" she trailed off. "I'm so sorry, Jack."
"Care to explain what's going on, Doc?" asked Jack. "I've seen a bit. I know Rosie here made me this way but didn't mean to. I heard your explanation to the other me. The dreams got stronger and easier to remember about a year after they started. I assumed the dreams were just side-effects, not real, until I saw the two of you. My brain trying to make sense of things, maybe. But if everything I've seen in those dreams is real, how come I don't remember it?"
"Welll," said the Doctor, "If I had to guess-and I am brilliant at guessing-when my Rose made you immortal in a parallel world, it somehow affected you in this world, too. Further, since she used Bad Wolf's energy to do it and Bad Wolf seems to have linked her permanently with the version of me still in that world, at least when he's thinking of Rose, that link must be sending you the dreams through her. I doubt you have any sort of direct connection, but since Rose is now here in this world, it is amplifying the latent connection between…"
Rose took a few steps away to think as the Doctor continued to explain to Jack what he knew or could reasonably guess. She tried not to let guilt consume her. She had seen how hard immortality was on her Jack, and now she had done it to at least one other version of him. She was getting lost in these thoughts, pacing, when she heard a familiar noise and saw a bright flash of light engulf her.
When the light faded, Rose Tyler had disappeared, and nothing remained in her place but a small pile of dust.
A/N: I know, I know, that's a less-than-nice place to end the chapter. I've been writing about a chapter a day and have just six planned in total. I make no promises that I'll keep writing that quickly, but I do promise to try to get the next chapter up as quickly as I can. I can't stand cliffhangers, but the story was begging for it!
Thanks, all, for reading!
-Kita