Fic: All About Martha Jones
Fic: All About Martha Jones
Series: These Words Between Us.
Characters: Rose Tyler, The Duplicate Tenth Doctor (Rose/TenII), Martha Jones.
Spoilers: Journey's End
Rating: G
A/N: The fourth tale from These Words Between Us. Unbeta'd, so all mistakes are my own. If you spot any, please feel free to call me a tit!
Summary: Martha Jones said something to her on the crucible and Rose Tyler can't stop thinking about it...
In the wake of being returned to this universe, Rose Tyler had concentrated on the Doctor: helping him adjust to this new world and convincing him that he really could have a life and home with her. She knew that he was internally punishing himself for what happened. The Genocide of the Daleks weighed heavily on his mind, and things hadn’t helped when both she and her mother had pledged to help him it again. She knew time would heal him and so she avoided the topic.
But all that left her with where her own unanswered questions. Questions that she feared he would not answer, despite the level of honesty he had shown up until now, she wondered if this would be crossing the line. He never really talked about his companions, each of their stories were a closed box that he would not open for any other.
Despite meeting Sarah Jane Smith on two occasions, she still didn’t really know much about the woman who had travelled with him almost centuries beforehand in the Doctor’s personal timeline. Still, it proved that he did not forget a single person that he shared his life with.
In a strange turn of events, this time it was Rose who had spent more time away from the Doctor; the universe they now lived in had ran at double the speed of her home universe, so what had been four years for her had transpired to only have been two for him. Still, he had assured her that it didn’t mean he had missed her any less than she had missed him.
She wondered how much he had missed her; it wasn’t that she didn’t believe him it was more to do with something Martha Jones had said when she was transmitting to the Dalek ship from the UNIT base.
‘Oh my God, he found you.’
She had wondered at the time what she had meant, but being trapped in the bowels of the Crucible hadn’t been the time to ask. But Rose couldn’t forget the way Martha Jones had looked on the screen or the soft tone she had used.
He found you.
Just as she was lost in the thought the front door opened; the Doctor had gone for a walk about half an hour earlier. He had told her that he wanted to clear his mind and get some air, but really she knew it was because his restless energy was getting the better of him. He really needed to find something to do with his time, still it had only been two weeks and he hadn’t said anything more about the dorky yet strangely sexy teacher idea.
She looked up and smiled at him before pushing herself off the sofa and into his waiting arms. The Doctor kissed her forehead, before looking into her eyes. ‘You look troubled,’ he remarked.
Her smile tightened. ‘It’s nothing, just a million miles away,’ she said.
The Doctor frowned. ‘It’s not about Mickey is it?’ He had to admit that he was concerned. Rose hadn’t spoken about the loss of her former best friend.
Rose felt her heart grow tight. She hadn’t really thought about Mickey at all, perhaps that’s why he left her again, because she never thought about him anymore - she always thought about her and the Doctor and she supposed that Mickey had finally snapped, leaving her to her forever after. ‘N’ah,’ she replied truthfully. ‘He did what was right for him; I bet he’ll have a brilliant life.’
‘So what were you thinking about?’ asked the Doctor as his frown deepened.
Rose bit her bottom lip. ‘I was thinking, well, about Martha Jones,’ she admitted hesitantly. She didn’t fail to notice how he moved uncomfortably when she said the name. She had thought he had been uncomfortable when they had met Sarah Jane in that school, but that was nothing compared to this. ‘What’s wrong?’ she asked him softly, ready for anything.
‘Martha was complicated,’ he said quietly, shifting off towards the kitchen.
She didn’t follow him, although the urge to was almost overpowering her. A few minutes later the Doctor had returned with two cups of tea which he set down on the coffee table before sinking heavily into the sofa. ‘Why were you thinking about her?’ the Doctor asked Rose.
‘She said something to me and well, it’s just been on my mind,’ Rose told him. ‘It was before you came back, you were in the TARDIS with Donna at the time.’
‘Ah,’ he said, ‘what did she say to you?’
She told him what Martha Jones had said, and Rose watched the Doctor as he smiled warmly and visibly relaxed.
Rose grabbed his hand. ‘Did she know much about me?’
‘She realised enough,’ he whispered. ‘Some of the things I said, did, she realised.’
Rose bit her lip before grabbing her tea and taking a sip.
‘I ruined her life, she was a medical student when I met her, and I turned her into a soldier,’ his voice was deeply regretful. ‘But she was the only one who could save us; she took up a terrible mission when I asked her to all because she was in love with me.’ He sighed and ran his hand though his hair. ‘I should have just let her be. She’d have made a good doctor.’
She didn’t know what to say; Rose had taken up her own stupid mission when she had been trapped here, all because she loved the man beside her, and without doubt she would do it again. ‘We’re very alike then,’ Rose said quietly.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Me and Martha, we both became soldiers,’ stated Rose, suddenly feeling very downcast. ‘I had to; I couldn’t have survived if I hadn’t.’ Then she smiled. ‘But all that can change now,’ she said, ‘I have you and I’ve quit Torchwood and maybe I can be Rose Tyler again.’
The Doctor smiled at her. ‘I’d like that.’
‘Why did you have to ask Martha to do something terrible?’ she asked, still curious about the other woman.
The Doctor sighed; his eyes grew dark, sad and angry. ‘There was another Time Lord, he had hid himself at the end of the universe as a human,’ he started as he launched into the story of when he, Martha and Jack had encountered the Master. He told her everything, meeting Professor Yana at the end of the universe. ‘The stars had long since died by then and all that was left where this handful of human trying to get to Utopia, but it was a trap, I don’t know what was there when they arrived, but it wasn’t a paradise.’ He continued, telling Rose about Martha discovering Yana’s fob watch and that she realised what it was.
‘How did she know?’ asked Rose, ‘what the fob watch was?’
The Doctor drew in a deep breath. ‘Because a little while before that, we were being chased by some aliens known as the Family, they were after my lifespan, so to throw them off the trail I hid as a Human in 1913 and the fob watch contained my essence.’
‘She protected you,’ said Rose, ‘in 1913? I bet that was hell for her.’
He nodded. ‘Bottom of the social ladder,’ the Doctor agreed, ‘she didn’t say much afterwards, but I know some of the pupils at the school we were at where less than kind to her.’ Not saying any more on the matter he continued, telling Rose how Yana had opened the watch and reverted back to the Master that he was shot by Yana’s assistant, only to regenerate and escaped with the TARDIS. ‘I was able to lock the co-ordinates so he could only travel between Earth and the end of the universe, but that’s how he set the trap for the future humans.’
The story continued and Rose listened intently; she was horrified when the Doctor told her of Francine’s betrayal. ‘If they’d have come knocking at mum’s door, she’d have sent them packing,’ Rose said confidently, to which the Doctor agreed with. She had gasped in horror as he told her about the Master butchering the TARDIS into a paradox machine and how the Master had managed to age him by a hundred years.
‘It’s little wonder she left,’ he said at the end, ‘after all she did, all she had seen.’ He looked back over at Rose. ‘All that time, I was just glad you weren’t with me, the things he did to all of us,’ he shook his head and ran his hand though his hair. ‘He’d have taken you and broken you, like he did to Martha. Like I did to Martha - I manipulated her into a weapon.’
‘You didn’t do anything to Martha,’ said Rose fiercely, ‘you didn’t chase her over the Earth destroying everything she touched. You didn’t manipulate her. Don’t you understand, you make us see the world so much better that we have to do the right thing - Martha could have just teleported to Earth and walked away, but she didn’t because you show us how to make things right.’ Rose could feel anger building up inside her, but reined it in. He might have been the most intelligent man she had ever met but sometimes he failed to see what was right in front of him. ‘You show us that we shouldn’t just stand by and let things happen. I would have done what Martha did and so would Jack and Donna.’
‘No, you wouldn’t.’
Rose raised her eyebrows. ‘I absorbed the Time Vortex to get back to you, and nearly killed myself in the process. The Donna Noble I met in the parallel universe hadn’t even met you but she was willing to die for you, so that we could make things better.’
They were glaring at each other, both their eyes fierce and angry. As Rose looked into the Doctor’s eyes she saw so much anger, so much darkness, and it scared her. She had always known it was in him, there were races across the distance stars that would shiver in fear just at the mention of his name. ‘Sorry,’ she finally muttered, not wanting to argue. ‘I can’t be helping much.’
The Doctor’s expression softened into a smile for a woman he loved. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, waving her off, ‘it’s just Martha had all her dreams and her life in front of her and I took that away.’
‘I don’t think you did,’ said Rose softly, ‘what did she do after she left you?’
‘Finished her exams and joined UNIT, I, er, gave them a call, recommended her for the job,’ explained the Doctor. ‘I know Jack wanted to take her into Torchwood but she wouldn’t leave her family for Cardiff, not after what happened.’ He shook his head. ‘Oh, and she got engaged to another doctor she met.’
Rose smiled. ‘Seems she did a better job of moving on with her life that I did,’ she told him, leaning into his shoulder. ‘I sent most my time building the canon, and then trying to get it working. When it did, all I did was search for you.’ She looked up at him, as he looked down at her. ‘I missed you. I was afraid you were alone. But then, when I got to what I thought was the right universe, I found you dead.’ She sniffed and wiped her eyes.
‘Sorry,’ he whispered, pressing a kiss to her hair.
‘Not to mention, when I did find you, you were shot by that Dalek and I thought, oh god,’ she closed her eyes against the image. They were running, and then he was on the ground, dying.
The Doctor pulled Rose into a tighter hug, gently stroking her hair as she sobbed. She clung to him like he was the last thing left in the whole of the universe for a few minutes before the tears stopped flowing and all that remained where dry sobs. ‘Sorry,’ she whispered. ‘I couldn’t bear to lose you all over again.’
‘You’re not going to,’ he promised, ‘I am never going to leave you.’
‘Never say never,’ she reminded him, echoing words from an adventure so far away now. She picked up her tea again and put it to her mouth, realising that it had gone stone cold, so she picked up both mugs and went to put the kettle on again. She came back a few minutes later and placed the cups down before sitting back down and leaning into the Doctor. ‘How come you ended up telling Martha about me?’ she asked. ‘Because before we met her, I didn’t have a clue about Sarah Jane or anyone else, other than Jack, of course.’ Then she looked up at the Doctor. ‘And don’t think I haven’t forgotten that you owe me an answer or two about Jack.’
The Doctor nodded, hoping that Rose wouldn’t be too angry when he got on to explain about Jack after so blatantly lying to her about what happen to him after the Gamestation, but at the moment, she was far too interested in Martha. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘Martha had asked me if there was anybody else on board the TARDIS. That’s how you got mentioned,’ he leant forward and picked up his tea. ‘I think what I said even then had given her enough of a clue.’
‘What did you say to her?’
‘I can’t quite remember,’ he told her, knowing that he was lying. He also knew that she knew he was lying to her because she gave him a very doubtful look. ‘What?’ he exclaimed.
‘Nothing,’ replied Rose, shaking her head. ‘I believe you.’
‘I-said-we-were-together,’ he blurted out as if it was one word, and then realised that Rose had managed to play him. He narrowed his eyes at her while she smiled back at him. ‘Then I think I mentioned something to her when we met Shakespeare, because she got all upset about something. Oh, and then there was New Earth, she asked me if I had been here before with you and I said yes, that upset her as well.’
Rose was shaking her head in disbelief. ‘Oh. My. God. You are such a typical bloke!’ she said. ‘If Mickey was here he’d be doing his “I was right” dance right there on the coffee table.’ She shook her head again. ‘What else did you do? Oh, no, let me guess, you are a habitual flirter as well, oh the poor girl, she didn’t stand a chance did she?’
The Doctor was looking at Rose in confusion. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Look in a mirror would you?’ she said, her voice raising an octave. ‘It can’t have escaped your notice that you are a very sexy bloke, who is also very charming and saves various worlds on a regular basis. Then Martha Jones meets you, gets taken in by your charisma, I mean who wouldn’t, then you’re all flirty with her one moment and then going on about me the next,’ she shook her head again and glanced over to him, catching him playing with a few strands of hair. ‘And stop preening yourself,’ she added, batting his hand away from his hair.
The Doctor pouted at her. ‘It wasn’t like that,’ he told Rose. ‘I made it very clear that she was just coming for a ride or two.’
‘Clear as mud, no doubt,’ said Rose sarcastically, and then she cocked her head to the side. ‘Aw, the poor woman, I’d have hugged her even harder had I realised what an ass you’d been to her.’
‘I didn’t mean to, you know, lead her on,’ he told her, looking down at his shoes. ‘I missed you, and it hurt, Rose, you were everything and then you weren’t there.’ They looked at each other for a moment, before he looked down again. ‘Things would have been different if I had met her later on. But Donna said I should be alone, and Martha was clever and brave. I never meant for her to get hurt.’
Rose smiled warmly at the Doctor and leant back into him as he wrapped an arm around her shoulder. ‘I liked what I saw of her,’ Rose said.
‘She was a good friend,’ agreed the Doctor.
Series: These Words Between Us.
Characters: Rose Tyler, The Duplicate Tenth Doctor (Rose/TenII), Martha Jones.
Spoilers: Journey's End
Rating: G
A/N: The fourth tale from These Words Between Us. Unbeta'd, so all mistakes are my own. If you spot any, please feel free to call me a tit!
Summary: Martha Jones said something to her on the crucible and Rose Tyler can't stop thinking about it...
In the wake of being returned to this universe, Rose Tyler had concentrated on the Doctor: helping him adjust to this new world and convincing him that he really could have a life and home with her. She knew that he was internally punishing himself for what happened. The Genocide of the Daleks weighed heavily on his mind, and things hadn’t helped when both she and her mother had pledged to help him it again. She knew time would heal him and so she avoided the topic.
But all that left her with where her own unanswered questions. Questions that she feared he would not answer, despite the level of honesty he had shown up until now, she wondered if this would be crossing the line. He never really talked about his companions, each of their stories were a closed box that he would not open for any other.
Despite meeting Sarah Jane Smith on two occasions, she still didn’t really know much about the woman who had travelled with him almost centuries beforehand in the Doctor’s personal timeline. Still, it proved that he did not forget a single person that he shared his life with.
In a strange turn of events, this time it was Rose who had spent more time away from the Doctor; the universe they now lived in had ran at double the speed of her home universe, so what had been four years for her had transpired to only have been two for him. Still, he had assured her that it didn’t mean he had missed her any less than she had missed him.
She wondered how much he had missed her; it wasn’t that she didn’t believe him it was more to do with something Martha Jones had said when she was transmitting to the Dalek ship from the UNIT base.
‘Oh my God, he found you.’
She had wondered at the time what she had meant, but being trapped in the bowels of the Crucible hadn’t been the time to ask. But Rose couldn’t forget the way Martha Jones had looked on the screen or the soft tone she had used.
He found you.
Just as she was lost in the thought the front door opened; the Doctor had gone for a walk about half an hour earlier. He had told her that he wanted to clear his mind and get some air, but really she knew it was because his restless energy was getting the better of him. He really needed to find something to do with his time, still it had only been two weeks and he hadn’t said anything more about the dorky yet strangely sexy teacher idea.
She looked up and smiled at him before pushing herself off the sofa and into his waiting arms. The Doctor kissed her forehead, before looking into her eyes. ‘You look troubled,’ he remarked.
Her smile tightened. ‘It’s nothing, just a million miles away,’ she said.
The Doctor frowned. ‘It’s not about Mickey is it?’ He had to admit that he was concerned. Rose hadn’t spoken about the loss of her former best friend.
Rose felt her heart grow tight. She hadn’t really thought about Mickey at all, perhaps that’s why he left her again, because she never thought about him anymore - she always thought about her and the Doctor and she supposed that Mickey had finally snapped, leaving her to her forever after. ‘N’ah,’ she replied truthfully. ‘He did what was right for him; I bet he’ll have a brilliant life.’
‘So what were you thinking about?’ asked the Doctor as his frown deepened.
Rose bit her bottom lip. ‘I was thinking, well, about Martha Jones,’ she admitted hesitantly. She didn’t fail to notice how he moved uncomfortably when she said the name. She had thought he had been uncomfortable when they had met Sarah Jane in that school, but that was nothing compared to this. ‘What’s wrong?’ she asked him softly, ready for anything.
‘Martha was complicated,’ he said quietly, shifting off towards the kitchen.
She didn’t follow him, although the urge to was almost overpowering her. A few minutes later the Doctor had returned with two cups of tea which he set down on the coffee table before sinking heavily into the sofa. ‘Why were you thinking about her?’ the Doctor asked Rose.
‘She said something to me and well, it’s just been on my mind,’ Rose told him. ‘It was before you came back, you were in the TARDIS with Donna at the time.’
‘Ah,’ he said, ‘what did she say to you?’
She told him what Martha Jones had said, and Rose watched the Doctor as he smiled warmly and visibly relaxed.
Rose grabbed his hand. ‘Did she know much about me?’
‘She realised enough,’ he whispered. ‘Some of the things I said, did, she realised.’
Rose bit her lip before grabbing her tea and taking a sip.
‘I ruined her life, she was a medical student when I met her, and I turned her into a soldier,’ his voice was deeply regretful. ‘But she was the only one who could save us; she took up a terrible mission when I asked her to all because she was in love with me.’ He sighed and ran his hand though his hair. ‘I should have just let her be. She’d have made a good doctor.’
She didn’t know what to say; Rose had taken up her own stupid mission when she had been trapped here, all because she loved the man beside her, and without doubt she would do it again. ‘We’re very alike then,’ Rose said quietly.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Me and Martha, we both became soldiers,’ stated Rose, suddenly feeling very downcast. ‘I had to; I couldn’t have survived if I hadn’t.’ Then she smiled. ‘But all that can change now,’ she said, ‘I have you and I’ve quit Torchwood and maybe I can be Rose Tyler again.’
The Doctor smiled at her. ‘I’d like that.’
‘Why did you have to ask Martha to do something terrible?’ she asked, still curious about the other woman.
The Doctor sighed; his eyes grew dark, sad and angry. ‘There was another Time Lord, he had hid himself at the end of the universe as a human,’ he started as he launched into the story of when he, Martha and Jack had encountered the Master. He told her everything, meeting Professor Yana at the end of the universe. ‘The stars had long since died by then and all that was left where this handful of human trying to get to Utopia, but it was a trap, I don’t know what was there when they arrived, but it wasn’t a paradise.’ He continued, telling Rose about Martha discovering Yana’s fob watch and that she realised what it was.
‘How did she know?’ asked Rose, ‘what the fob watch was?’
The Doctor drew in a deep breath. ‘Because a little while before that, we were being chased by some aliens known as the Family, they were after my lifespan, so to throw them off the trail I hid as a Human in 1913 and the fob watch contained my essence.’
‘She protected you,’ said Rose, ‘in 1913? I bet that was hell for her.’
He nodded. ‘Bottom of the social ladder,’ the Doctor agreed, ‘she didn’t say much afterwards, but I know some of the pupils at the school we were at where less than kind to her.’ Not saying any more on the matter he continued, telling Rose how Yana had opened the watch and reverted back to the Master that he was shot by Yana’s assistant, only to regenerate and escaped with the TARDIS. ‘I was able to lock the co-ordinates so he could only travel between Earth and the end of the universe, but that’s how he set the trap for the future humans.’
The story continued and Rose listened intently; she was horrified when the Doctor told her of Francine’s betrayal. ‘If they’d have come knocking at mum’s door, she’d have sent them packing,’ Rose said confidently, to which the Doctor agreed with. She had gasped in horror as he told her about the Master butchering the TARDIS into a paradox machine and how the Master had managed to age him by a hundred years.
‘It’s little wonder she left,’ he said at the end, ‘after all she did, all she had seen.’ He looked back over at Rose. ‘All that time, I was just glad you weren’t with me, the things he did to all of us,’ he shook his head and ran his hand though his hair. ‘He’d have taken you and broken you, like he did to Martha. Like I did to Martha - I manipulated her into a weapon.’
‘You didn’t do anything to Martha,’ said Rose fiercely, ‘you didn’t chase her over the Earth destroying everything she touched. You didn’t manipulate her. Don’t you understand, you make us see the world so much better that we have to do the right thing - Martha could have just teleported to Earth and walked away, but she didn’t because you show us how to make things right.’ Rose could feel anger building up inside her, but reined it in. He might have been the most intelligent man she had ever met but sometimes he failed to see what was right in front of him. ‘You show us that we shouldn’t just stand by and let things happen. I would have done what Martha did and so would Jack and Donna.’
‘No, you wouldn’t.’
Rose raised her eyebrows. ‘I absorbed the Time Vortex to get back to you, and nearly killed myself in the process. The Donna Noble I met in the parallel universe hadn’t even met you but she was willing to die for you, so that we could make things better.’
They were glaring at each other, both their eyes fierce and angry. As Rose looked into the Doctor’s eyes she saw so much anger, so much darkness, and it scared her. She had always known it was in him, there were races across the distance stars that would shiver in fear just at the mention of his name. ‘Sorry,’ she finally muttered, not wanting to argue. ‘I can’t be helping much.’
The Doctor’s expression softened into a smile for a woman he loved. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, waving her off, ‘it’s just Martha had all her dreams and her life in front of her and I took that away.’
‘I don’t think you did,’ said Rose softly, ‘what did she do after she left you?’
‘Finished her exams and joined UNIT, I, er, gave them a call, recommended her for the job,’ explained the Doctor. ‘I know Jack wanted to take her into Torchwood but she wouldn’t leave her family for Cardiff, not after what happened.’ He shook his head. ‘Oh, and she got engaged to another doctor she met.’
Rose smiled. ‘Seems she did a better job of moving on with her life that I did,’ she told him, leaning into his shoulder. ‘I sent most my time building the canon, and then trying to get it working. When it did, all I did was search for you.’ She looked up at him, as he looked down at her. ‘I missed you. I was afraid you were alone. But then, when I got to what I thought was the right universe, I found you dead.’ She sniffed and wiped her eyes.
‘Sorry,’ he whispered, pressing a kiss to her hair.
‘Not to mention, when I did find you, you were shot by that Dalek and I thought, oh god,’ she closed her eyes against the image. They were running, and then he was on the ground, dying.
The Doctor pulled Rose into a tighter hug, gently stroking her hair as she sobbed. She clung to him like he was the last thing left in the whole of the universe for a few minutes before the tears stopped flowing and all that remained where dry sobs. ‘Sorry,’ she whispered. ‘I couldn’t bear to lose you all over again.’
‘You’re not going to,’ he promised, ‘I am never going to leave you.’
‘Never say never,’ she reminded him, echoing words from an adventure so far away now. She picked up her tea again and put it to her mouth, realising that it had gone stone cold, so she picked up both mugs and went to put the kettle on again. She came back a few minutes later and placed the cups down before sitting back down and leaning into the Doctor. ‘How come you ended up telling Martha about me?’ she asked. ‘Because before we met her, I didn’t have a clue about Sarah Jane or anyone else, other than Jack, of course.’ Then she looked up at the Doctor. ‘And don’t think I haven’t forgotten that you owe me an answer or two about Jack.’
The Doctor nodded, hoping that Rose wouldn’t be too angry when he got on to explain about Jack after so blatantly lying to her about what happen to him after the Gamestation, but at the moment, she was far too interested in Martha. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘Martha had asked me if there was anybody else on board the TARDIS. That’s how you got mentioned,’ he leant forward and picked up his tea. ‘I think what I said even then had given her enough of a clue.’
‘What did you say to her?’
‘I can’t quite remember,’ he told her, knowing that he was lying. He also knew that she knew he was lying to her because she gave him a very doubtful look. ‘What?’ he exclaimed.
‘Nothing,’ replied Rose, shaking her head. ‘I believe you.’
‘I-said-we-were-together,’ he blurted out as if it was one word, and then realised that Rose had managed to play him. He narrowed his eyes at her while she smiled back at him. ‘Then I think I mentioned something to her when we met Shakespeare, because she got all upset about something. Oh, and then there was New Earth, she asked me if I had been here before with you and I said yes, that upset her as well.’
Rose was shaking her head in disbelief. ‘Oh. My. God. You are such a typical bloke!’ she said. ‘If Mickey was here he’d be doing his “I was right” dance right there on the coffee table.’ She shook her head again. ‘What else did you do? Oh, no, let me guess, you are a habitual flirter as well, oh the poor girl, she didn’t stand a chance did she?’
The Doctor was looking at Rose in confusion. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Look in a mirror would you?’ she said, her voice raising an octave. ‘It can’t have escaped your notice that you are a very sexy bloke, who is also very charming and saves various worlds on a regular basis. Then Martha Jones meets you, gets taken in by your charisma, I mean who wouldn’t, then you’re all flirty with her one moment and then going on about me the next,’ she shook her head again and glanced over to him, catching him playing with a few strands of hair. ‘And stop preening yourself,’ she added, batting his hand away from his hair.
The Doctor pouted at her. ‘It wasn’t like that,’ he told Rose. ‘I made it very clear that she was just coming for a ride or two.’
‘Clear as mud, no doubt,’ said Rose sarcastically, and then she cocked her head to the side. ‘Aw, the poor woman, I’d have hugged her even harder had I realised what an ass you’d been to her.’
‘I didn’t mean to, you know, lead her on,’ he told her, looking down at his shoes. ‘I missed you, and it hurt, Rose, you were everything and then you weren’t there.’ They looked at each other for a moment, before he looked down again. ‘Things would have been different if I had met her later on. But Donna said I should be alone, and Martha was clever and brave. I never meant for her to get hurt.’
Rose smiled warmly at the Doctor and leant back into him as he wrapped an arm around her shoulder. ‘I liked what I saw of her,’ Rose said.
‘She was a good friend,’ agreed the Doctor.