#(mentions of tentoo's death after a long healthy life)

[ialwayscomewhenyoucall]

After All This Time (2/2)

twelve x rose - reunion!

~1.6k

“It took a bit of time to get used to the other London. At first it seemed like things were mostly the same, except for the airships, of course. But then I’d see a photo of Westminster Abbey, and all the glass would be blue. Or Shakespeare’s theatre wasn’t named the Globe, it was called the Rose. Which I quite liked, of course, but how weird is that?”

The Doctor and Rose walk under the glowing streetlamps, together but with a deliberate space between them. The Doctor can feel the emptiness in his hand where hers should be, and it sends a near constant ping of feedback to his hearts. Wrong, it buzzes. Wrong.

But he’s determined to let her have her way, at least to start, so he thrusts his hands into his pockets and lets her chatter wash over him. She’s filling the space between them with her words--not to mention her arms, the gestures just shy of frantic--as she fills up more and more time.

And isn’t time what this is all about?

“...notice the stars when we were there together? The constellations are different! There’s one called Zeus, it looks a bit like a bolt of lightning, and one called the Cat, although no matter how much I squint it just looks like squiggles to me. I never learned ‘em when I--well, it hurt to much too look at the stars back then, you know? And then they were going out anyway, so it didn’t matter. But after you--well, John and I learned together, something new for both of us. And we visited so many of the planets orbiting those stars…” She gazes upward, starlight from a billion miles away caressing her tear stained cheeks. She hugs her arms across her chest--not protection from cold, just a bit of comfort.

“Still, there was snow every Christmas, and I learned how to ski. Although that wasn’t on Earth, that was on Pixus 4. Where the snow is--”

“Pink” interrupts the Doctor. They both laugh and the tension lifts, if only a little.

“We even revisited some of the places you and I went together. We went to New New York and had a picnic in the apple grass, and we went to…”

He can hear the shift in her voice, so he finishes for her. “Woman Wept,” he says.

“Yeah.”

She takes his hand and pulls him to a bench under a tree. “I just want to be able to look at you properly,” she says. He doesn’t argue.

“It’s very confusing, loving the same man twice. It’s not like twins, who are genetically identical but fundamentally two very different people. You two, up to a point, were exactly the same. So when you left us on that beach--yes, I loved him, honestly I knew right away that I loved him, but I still had to mourn you. I knew you weren’t dead, but you were lost, and there was a hole in my heart John could never fill.” Something inside him leaps at this, knowing she’d held a place for him. He’d always held onto her, even knowing he’d never see her or touch her again. At this thought he brushes an errant hair back from her forehead and tucks it over her ear, just because he can. Because she’s here and he can touch her again.

“I had to mourn him too, Doctor.” Her voice is pleading. “He was you but not you; he was himself and I loved him and then I lost him, just like I lost you.”

“How long have you been back in this universe?” he asks. His voice is gentle; he doesn’t need to forgive her because there’s nothing to forgive.

She won’t meet his eyes. “About a hundred and ten years. Give or take. My TARDIS will know exactly.”

He holds himself in perfect stillness, doesn’t let any outward reaction show.

Inside, he lets himself cry out. All that time he could have been with her. He understands, but he can’t help but ache.

Rose takes his hands in hers. “At first my excuse was that I just couldn’t bear to find you wearing the same face. It would have hurt too much. And then I told myself I could ease into things, wander around a bit and then go back to right after you left me. I had a time machine, after all. I knew you had to take Donna home--John explained to me what was going to happen to her--and I could meet you on the street outside her house right after that. Because you’d probably need me then, and we could heal each other. But I kept on wanderin’, and helpin’ people, and I even invited a few to travel with me from time to time.”

A stab of jealousy goes through him, and he must not keep it from his face because Rose giggles. “Short trips only, Doctor. No one could ever take your place. Besides, I’m sure you had others with you.”

His grin is sheepish. “A few.”

“And I still look the same. Just like I did all those years ago, when you first grabbed my hand…” Another tear slips down her cheek. “I look the same, but I’m so different now, Doctor. And I wasn’t sure...I just wasn’t sure if you’d want me.”

“Oh, Rose,” he says, squeezing her hands. “Oh, my Rose. I’ve been wanting you since that very first day. And I wouldn’t want you to be the same. I’m certainly not the same man I was back then. I’m still your Doctor--I’ll always be your Doctor--but I’ve been through joys and pains, too. Our lives are what make us who we are. Our experiences. How we grow and change and adapt. We’ve spent some time apart, but I think--if it’s what you want--that we could learn to grow together again.”

She leans forward, ever slowly, as if she’s giving him every opportunity to back away. But he doesn’t, he couldn’t, he belongs to her and she is getting closer and closer…

And then her lips are on his, soft as rose petals, at first barely touching him but then trying to tell him everything she can’t say with words. And he may not understand every bit, but he’s going to spend the rest of his lives trying, if she’ll let him.

*

“RUN!”

He grabs Rose’s grasping hand and they run, and first they’re just running but soon they’re laughing. “I think we lost ‘em,” Rose says.

“You know that’s my line, don’t you?” says the Doctor once they’ve slowed to a walk. He squeezes her hand, pulling her close.

“Haven’t you figured out that you’re not in charge anymore?”

He huffs. “As if I was ever in charge.”

Rising on her toes, she kisses his cheek. “Now you’re getting’ it.”

He can’t help but smile. Having Rose with him again has been a whirlwind--a happy, endorphin- and kiss-filled whirlwind. Today they’re on past Earth, running away from the January 1, 1601 premier of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Globe Theatre in London. Everything had been fine until the he’d started complaining that Puck got his final monologue wrong. People wanted to know how he knew, then others got involved...Rose had been right, better to get out of there. And there had been the added bonus of running with Rose, yellow-gold hair streaming out behind her, laughter echoing off the buildings.

They’d run for blocks and she’s barely even winded. It worries him sometimes, how much she’s been changed, how much she continues to change, but it means she gets to stay with him so he tries not to think about it too much. She says they’ve got ages to figure things out, and he always agrees with her. Out loud, at least.

But still he worries.

And every time she’s in any kind of danger his hearts still clench. He knows she’s not exactly in the “fragile human” category anymore, but she doesn’t have Time Lord physiology either. Although the latest scan she’d consented to (after much cajoling on his part) showed some anomalies in her blood that had raised his eyebrows a bit. Her blood type no longer conforms to the general human types--it showed that she’s shifting over time, becoming something entirely new. Entirely herself.

Which is, of course, as it should be.

“Do you have to make a disturbance wherever you go?” Rose asks, breaking into his thoughts.

“Well, if he’d only remembered his lines I wouldn’t have disturbed anything.” But he’s laughing, not being all that contrary.

“What are the chances you remembered it wrong?”

He stands up tall, straightening his jacket. “Less than zero. I know my Shakespeare.”

“Maybe you just heard the original ending for the very first time. Maybe Shakespeare changed it later. Maybe even because he heard some bloke in the audience ranting about how Puck got the ending wrong.”

“I...never thought of that.”

Rose laughs, and his heart sings. All those years without her...sometimes he thinks it was her laugh he missed the most. Her laugh and her smile. And her hand in his.

He’s turning into a sentimental idiot. (She tells him he’s been that way all along. He rolls his eyes, but she’s probably right. She usually is.)

“Back to the TARDIS, love?” he asks, squeezing her hand.

“Not yet,” she says, smiling up at him through her lashes. “It’s New Year’s Day, at least it is right now. Let’s enjoy London for a bit longer. Walk with me, Doctor?”

And how can he say no?

Later he’ll play for her, and kiss her, and lift her into their bed. But for this moment, right now, they walk through the past and into their shared future.

***

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@doctorroseprompts @btab66 @magicaltimelady44 @nakiju13 @sunniebelle