#the games peaked with Handsome Jack and just hit a ceiling

[fujimen]

I dont know about you guys but I pretend borderlands 3 doesn't exist

[hellostarlight20]

I Fall in Love with You Every Day 2/5

Title from the Frank Sinatra song of the same name Nine/Rose Ten/Rose Regeneration, fluff, angst—oh the angst! happy ending Recognizable dialogue from appropriate episodes

For @natural–blues who wanted Nine x Rose in a committed relationship with full on confession of their love (no oh, you know rubbish) when Nine regenerated into Ten. Also Rose remembers Bad Wolf and feels as if she killed her Doctor. The following story follows canon only in the loosest sense.

AO3 and TSP, on Tumblr part 1

I know it looks like this is dialog straight from ‘Born Again’ but trust me, it’s not. I did say loosely based…

 “Doctor?” Rose slowly blinked open her eyes. What was she doing on the TARDIS’s grating? The beautiful ship hummed in her head, a gentle, soothing sound of understanding and hope and determination.

The Doctor didn’t help her stand, which she found a bit odd considering, but Rose stumbled to her feet and leaned against the console for support. The Doctor stood just around from her, hands braced on a flat surface of the console, looking as sexily handsome as ever.

“My Rose.” He grinned, that small, smirking, half-smile and shook his head.

“What’s wrong, Doctor?” Her knees gave out and a dizzy spell washed over her. She tried to get to the Doctor, though she didn’t understand the urgency beating through her. “Something’s wrong—I can feel it. What happened? I don’t—” She pressed the heel of her hand to her forehead but it neither made her headache disappear nor did it make her memories clearer. “I don’t remember.”

“Rose Tyler.” His voice caressed her name as it usually did, but the inflection lacked the additional telepathic touch.

That lack worried her.

“I was going take you to so many places. Barcelona. Not the city Barcelona, the planet Barcelona. You’d love it!” And the way he said that, with his small smile and dancing eyes, told Rose exactly how much fun they’d have.

Not just exploring, but together. Getting lost in alleyways or long-abandoned secret tunnels. Running from the authorities or angry vendors. Kissing against the buildings or shagging in dark corners. Them. Always.

“Fantastic place,” he continued. “They’ve got dogs with no noses. Imagine how many times a day you end up telling that joke, and it’s still funny.”

She grinned at him but it felt off. Wrong. “Then, why can’t we go?”

The Doctor waved her off, but the movement was strained. “Maybe you will, and maybe I will. But not like this.”

“Doctor.” Her voice cracked. “What’s happening? Where’s Jack? What happened—the Daleks.” She remembered them, remembered—remembered him sending her away! “What happened with them? We were on the Game Station and then you locked me in the TARDIS.”

“I love you, my Rose. Remember that.” His blue-steel eyes met hers and Rose swore he saw clear to her soul. “I fall in love with you every day.”

Terrified, Rose stepped closer but stopped. He gave off keep away waves and though their telepathic connection only worked when they touched, Rose knew him. She knew him.

“You’re not making sense,” she whispered.

“I might never make sense again.” He tried to laugh but it was so strained her heart broke.

“Doctor—”

“I might have two heads or no head. Imagine me with no head! And don’t say that’s an improvement.”

“What are you—” she shook her head, torn between total confusion and chastising him for disparaging his looks (again)—“don’t say that about yourself.”

“But it’s a bit dodgy, this process. You never know what you’re going to end up with.”

“What process, Doctor what are you talking—”

He doubled over and his own terror, his fear for her, hit Rose so clearly tears blurred her vision. She stumbled to his side, gripping the console for support, legs barely holding her upright.

“No, Rose! Stay away!”

He pushed her back and she fell against one of the coral struts. The TARDIS hummed in her brain, but Rose didn’t understand any of it. His arms curled around himself and light danced beneath his skin. But he looked at her, looked directly at her, and tried to smile.

“Doctor.” The words rushed from her lips. “Tell me what’s going on. What happened? Did the Daleks do something to you? Where’s Jack?”

“No, my Rose.” He shook his head, grimacing. “I absorbed all the energy of the Time Vortex and no one’s meant to do that. Every cell in my body’s dying.”

All her questions about how he absorbed the Time Vortex, when the hell he had the chance to even do that, and if no one was meant to do so why he thought it’d be a brilliant idea to start now died on her lips.

“Dying?” She may not have said that aloud. “What do you mean, dying? What the hell happened? I—I saved…you.”

Had she? Rose thought she remembered, it was there, just out of reach. But then she heard the soothing thrum of the TARDIS and let those memories go. For now.

He smiled at her; at least she thought he did. It may have been one of those telepathic caresses that fooled her.

“Oh, Rose.” He shook his head. “Time Lords have this little trick; it’s sort of a way of cheating death. Except it means I’m going to change and I’m not going to see you again. Not like this. Not with this daft old face.”

“What did I tell you about that?” she snapped, tears clogging her throat. “I love your face.” The tears she tightly held back fell. She didn’t bother to check them.

“You said not to make fun of my face.” His face softened and she crept closer. “Rose, my Rose.” He stopped and she knew he didn’t want her near him but as always he drew her to his side. “Remember that. Please. Remember how much I love you.”

“I fall in love with you every day,” she whispered.

“Before this me goes—I want you to remember that. My Rose. Forever.”

Rose had no idea what he meant. She never had the chance to ask. Not that him. The Doctor burst into flames, brilliant golden flames that blinded her. If any sound accompanied the fire, Rose couldn’t hear it over the sound of her heart breaking.

“Doctor?” She called, half turned away. “Doctor!”

She covered her eyes with her hand and peaked through her fingers. When she could see enough, she was already moving forward before she realized what happened. Well, no, she had no freakin’ clue what happened.

“Hello,” a stranger said. “Okay. Ooo, new teeth. That’s weird. So, where was I? Oh, that’s right. Barcelona.”

“What?” The word fell like a brick between them. “Who the hell are you?”

The strange man, tall, skinny, wild brown hair, wide smile, met her gaze and Rose thought—felt—but no. Even if he wore the Doctor’s clothes. He was not the Doctor. Not her Doctor.

“What the hell just happened?” she demanded. “Who are you? Where’s the Doctor? What have you done with him?”

“Barcelona, yes.” The man grinned and nodded and she wanted to slap him but was frozen to the spot. “Six in the evening, Tuesday…October, I’d say. You’ll love the autumn there, well their version of it, Rose. How about 5006? Sure! On the way to Barcelona!”

He looked extremely pleased with himself. And he knew how to pilot the TARDIS. Who knew how to do that besides the Doctor? Well, besides him and Jack, and the little she knew about it. Rose wanted to ask him, but words died on her tongue, as dry as dust.

“Now then...what do I look like?” He waggled his eyebrows at her in a very non-Doctor way. She didn’t know what he meant or how to answer that.

“I don’t—” Rose shook her head. “You don’t know?”

She felt the tenuous connection she shared with the Doctor, it still burned brightly within her mind. She grasped it, held it tightly, but no matter how she tried, felt as if it slipped through her fingers

“No, no no, no no no no no no no. No. Don’t tell me.”

“I don’t…” She shook her head again, at a loss for words. Or common sense. “Tell you what? How’d you get here?” Rose looked up at the cathedral ceiling. “Did you let him in here?”

The TARDIS, dear old girl that She was, only mournfully echoed in her head.

He—this man, this stranger—rambled about arms and legs and something about a mole. Then he winked at her. “You’ll have to tell me about the mole, Rose Tyler. Claim it as your own.”

Rose opened her mouth. Closed it. Tried again but with the same results.

“Go on then, tell me.” He grinned and stood there clearly waiting. “What do you think?”

“Who the hell are you? Where’s my Doctor?” Her voice echoed in the console room but it felt as if she shouted into the abyss. “Send him back. I’m warning you; send the Doctor back right now!”

“Rose, it’s me.” He didn’t sound one damn bit like the Doctor but there was something there—the inflection, the way his voice caressed her name. And though his eyes were brown now, a beautiful deep brown, Rose swore she saw echoes of steel blue. “Honestly, it’s me.”

“Me?” She licked her lips and curled her fingers tighter on the console. “You? You can’t be…”

“I was dying. To save my own life I changed my body. Every single cell, but... I’m still me.”

“You said that. You said you were dying. How the hell can you change every cell in your body?”

He walked closer as if she were about to bolt—Rose didn’t know if she was or not, frozen to the grating in shock, she felt like running—and cautiously held out a hand. She didn’t take it. He frowned and dropped his hand to his side.

“Then how could I remember the very first word I ever said to you. Trapped in that cellar, surrounded by shop window dummies...oh…oh, such a long time ago. I took your hand and said Run.” He took her limp hand in his and squeezed.

She felt it then. Skin-on-skin contact opened their fledgling telepathic connection. Fledgling though it might be, feeling his hand in hers sent lightning through her. Rose gasped, her legs once more refusing to hold her weight.

He easily caught her, as if he knew she was about to fall. Or as if he sensed it. Held in his arms, one hand in hers, the other on the small of her back, she felt it. That warm, safe sensation of Doctor and love and home.

“My Rose. I fall in love with you every day.”