Where Are You Roaming? (20/25)
Author: lorelaisquared
Titile: Where Are You Roaming?
Fandom: Doctor Who
Word Count: 1878
Characters: Rose, Donna, Ten, Viola (OC)
Pairings: Rose/Ten
Summary: Sequel to What’s To Come is Still Unsure. Rose and Viola struggle to adjust to being in Rose’s original universe while the Doctor deals with the ramifications of his actions at "Bowie Base One" on Mars.
Rating: PG
Beta(s): meremoon
Author’s Note: Sorry for the lateness of this posting. It’s been a long few days. Also, “Pottermore” is very distracting. Hope you find that this chapter was worth the wait!”
Special thanks to my beta, meremoon for her invaluable feedback. Also a huge thank you to rumpelsnorcack for her constant support and cheerleading. A quick shout out to earlgreytea68 for periodically letting me bounce ideas off of her.
Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | Chapter 18 | Chapter 19 |
Chapter 20
A short while later, after they had ensured that all further ramifications resulting from the Doctor’s actions had been rectified, Donna suggested she and Jack take Viola on an excursion.
“It’s been ages since I’ve travelled properly and I’m itching to revisit the moon of Spirionica.” She turned to Viola and added conspiratorially. “It’s populated by tiny butterfly people who bathe in chocolate and harvest sugar fields.”
Viola’s eyes widened and she looked at Rose hopefully. “Can we go Mum? Can we? That would be soooooo cool.”
Rose felt tension building within her at the thought of letting her daughter out of her sight so soon but a glance at the Doctor, who was leaning casually against a pillar as he watched the discussion brought her fury back to the surface. She decided that she would rather Viola weren’t around when she finally gave the Doctor a piece of her mind. “Okay,” she finally agreed. “But you have to promise you’ll send the Doctor a telepathic message immediately if there’s trouble.”
“I promise! I promise!” Viola was hopping excitedly on one leg and Rose winced as she nearly lost her balance.
Donna caught Rose’s eye and seemed to understand Rose’s concerns. “Don’t worry, we’ll take good care of her, won’t we, Jack?”
Jack frowned at her, looking perplexed. “What? Wait. Sorry, I was just thinking about something. What’s going on?”
“Spirionica?” Donna cleared her throat, nodding not so subtly toward Rose and the Doctor and causing Rose to nearly laugh aloud at the very obvious scheming Donna was doing to get her and the Doctor alone. Although, judging from the suggestive glances Donna kept shooting her, Rose suspected she and Donna had very different ideas about just what would be happening once they were alone.
Jack grinned, clearly understanding Donna immediately. “Oh, Spirionica is amazing. Viola should totally see it.”
“Right. That’s settled then.” The Doctor sprang to life and began to flick and twirl dials, whizzing them through time and space until they’d landed on Spirionica. He rubbed his hands excitedly, his eyes bright as he contemplated the adventure to come. “Let’s go see this planet then!”
He was already half way to the door when Rose caught his arm. “Oh, no. You’re not going.”
“I’m not?” The Doctor squeaked, and Rose knew he was completely aware of what was going on but trying to get out of it.
“No. You’re not.” Her words were firm yet calm, the way they often were when she was disciplining Viola.
Looking apprehensive, the Doctor bobbed his head in agreement and reluctantly stepped away from the door. “Have fun!” He called after Donna, Viola and Jack’s retreating forms.
“You too!” Donna responded.
Before the door had even closed fully, Rose turned toward the Doctor and released the careful hold she’d placed on her fury in the past few hours.
“How dare you?” she shouted.
Although she was pretty certain he’d been expecting this, the Doctor winced and took a step back instinctively.. “How dare I what, exactly?”
“Oh, don’t be coy with me. Where do I even start?”
“I’m sorry. For all of it, I’m sorry.”
“Now who’s the stupid ape?” She hissed walking closer to him . “You really think a blanket apology is enough? I nearly lost my only daughter because of what you did. How could you be so harebrained?”
“I -“
She poked his shoulder sharply as she spoke each word, “I’m not finished. I realize you didn’t know about her, or about me coming back, but that doesn’t change the fact that what you did was wrong. I don’t understand why you would do such a thing. The entire universe nearly ceased to exist because of what you did, nevermind what you did to our personal time lines. We didn’t deserve that and neither did Donna.I thought you were better than this. You’re supposed to be the smart one.”
“I did it because I wanted to fix past wrongs, to make things better.“
“Did it ever once occur to you that we didn’t need fixing? That we were happy with the way things turned out?” She paused, taking a deep breath to counteract her breathlessness before continuing her tirade. “No, of course it didn’t.” She spat bitterly. “Because that would be like giving us a choice and you don’t do that.”
The Doctor frowned. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“Exactly what it sounds like. You always think you know what’s best for people so you make the decisions for them, you don’t even give them a say.” The bitterness she’d felt that day on the beach returned and she continued, her voice cold and harsh. “Did you ever consider, even for a moment that I didn’t want you to leave me on that beach? Or that I wanted to be given the chance to make that choice on my own? You took that away from me, Doctor. It was my choice to make, NOT yours. You always do this, you think you know what’s best for people without ever once considering that maybe you don’t have the right to take their choice away. For all your talk of not wanting to be a god you sure act like one sometimes.”
The Doctor gaped at her. “I thought I was doing the right thing. I just wanted you to be happy.”
“And you didn’t think I could be happy with you?”
He opened his mouth wordlessly, his jaw dropping. After a moment he seemed to recover, clearing his throat as he finally shrugged. “I thought you would be happier with him, with a human life.”
“I didn’t want a human life, Doctor, neither did he.”
“But you married him, you had a child.”
“Yes. We managed to work out our issues and I fell in love with him for who he was. And we were very happy for a very long time, but that doesn’t change the fact that you never gave either of us a choice. He was miserable at first, Doctor. Miserable in that stationary life, not able to travel or communicate with even a TARDIS or anything. He was human physically, but in every other way he was a Time Lord. He needed more than that life, and if he hadn’t been able to grow another TARDIS I don’t think we would have made it. I don’t think we would have had the wonderful life together that we did. And we certainly wouldn’t have had Viola.”
“So, see? It all worked out.”
“Because we fought for it. It had nothing, NOTHING to do with you.”
Rose stopped shouting, her energy waning as she caught her breath. He was quiet for a long time before speaking.
“Most things have nothing to do with me in the end.”
Her eyebrow shot up questioningly and she studied him carefully for a long beat. Finally he met her gaze. “I only did it for you,” he whispered finally. ”Perhaps I should have given you a choice but I thought I was giving you a gift.”
“That’s your excuse?” Rose felt tears spring to her eyes. “It’s bad enough that your choices took you away from me, but Doctor, you nearly cost me my only daughter. If I lost her too…” Rose trailed off, unable to even conceive of what that would mean. She took a deep breath. She couldn’t fall apart. Not yet.
She turned away, discreetly drying her eyes so he wouldn’t see just how shattered she was. When she was finally calm enough to face him again, the expression on his face nearly caused her to start crying again, but for a completely different reason.
He had averted his eyes the entire time he was speaking, but he was looking directly at her now, and she could see what she hadn’t wanted to before. For the first time in all the years she’d known him, he looked old. Old and tired and completely lost. There were dark shadows beneath his eyes - an impressive feat for someone who claimed he didn’t need much sleep - and his cheeks were indrawn and gaunt. It was his eyes though that tugged at her reluctant heart with their dark pools of anguish and grief.
She tried to look away, wanting to cling to the comfort of her anger, but already she could feel herself slowly beginning to soften a little. He was different now than he’d been back then. Sadder, lonelier.
Is that what had driven him to be so reckless? she wondered. The Doctor she had known had always been so confident, so sure, so careful. But the man in front of her now was defeated and sad.
He broke the gaze, and scrubbed his hands over his eyes. He shrugged, clearly not knowing what else to say and all but collapsed into the jumpseat, his shoulders sagging. He looked up at her again and as their gazes locked it was suddenly clear to her that he was already beating himself up for the mistakes he’d made. She remembered then how he had always internalized his pain. He was always hardest on himself and she realized now that his defensiveness earlier hadn’t been because he was defending his actions but because he was trying to hide the inner blame he was already placing upon himself. With that revelation, the last of her anger fled and she reached for him to offer comfort and be comforted.
They embraced properly for the first time in… well she couldn’t recall how long it had been. The tension of the last few weeks began to seep from her muscles as the Doctor wrapped his arms around her. She rested her head against his shoulders, the rise and fall of his chest calming and comforting her. She relaxed into the moment, allowing all her worries and confusion to fade into the background to be dealt with later. Instead she surrendered herself to the warmth of his embrace. For the time being, she was home.
*~*~*~*~*
They hugged for several minutes before an image flashed through her mind and Rose pulled away slightly. “There’s something I don’t understand,” she said, looking right into the Doctor’s eyes.
“What’s that?”
Rose pictured the massive dragon-like creature that was trying to erase all of humanity from the earth in an attempt to fix the damage she’d caused years earlier when she’d saved her father from the car accident.
“What about those creatures? The ones that came when I , you know, helped my Dad? Why haven’t they been here?”
The Doctor pursed his lips. After a long beat he said, “I have a theory,”
Rose rubbed her temples. “Do I want to know?”
“I think it’s because what happened is too big. There were literally hundreds of thousands of people and creatures out of their proper Temporal Schedules. So many that any attempt to fix the situation by the Reapers would most assuredly have resulted in their untimely death.”
“So what? They just stayed away?”
“Something like that.”
Suddenly, absurdly, Rose began to giggle.
“What?”
Rose had to struggle to regain her senses. “It’s nothing really, it’s just, that only you would create a catastrophe too big for reapers.”
TBC
Previous Chapter | Next Chapter
Titile: Where Are You Roaming?
Fandom: Doctor Who
Word Count: 1878
Characters: Rose, Donna, Ten, Viola (OC)
Pairings: Rose/Ten
Summary: Sequel to What’s To Come is Still Unsure. Rose and Viola struggle to adjust to being in Rose’s original universe while the Doctor deals with the ramifications of his actions at "Bowie Base One" on Mars.
Rating: PG
Beta(s): meremoon
Author’s Note: Sorry for the lateness of this posting. It’s been a long few days. Also, “Pottermore” is very distracting. Hope you find that this chapter was worth the wait!”
Special thanks to my beta, meremoon for her invaluable feedback. Also a huge thank you to rumpelsnorcack for her constant support and cheerleading. A quick shout out to earlgreytea68 for periodically letting me bounce ideas off of her.
Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | Chapter 18 | Chapter 19 |
Chapter 20
A short while later, after they had ensured that all further ramifications resulting from the Doctor’s actions had been rectified, Donna suggested she and Jack take Viola on an excursion.
“It’s been ages since I’ve travelled properly and I’m itching to revisit the moon of Spirionica.” She turned to Viola and added conspiratorially. “It’s populated by tiny butterfly people who bathe in chocolate and harvest sugar fields.”
Viola’s eyes widened and she looked at Rose hopefully. “Can we go Mum? Can we? That would be soooooo cool.”
Rose felt tension building within her at the thought of letting her daughter out of her sight so soon but a glance at the Doctor, who was leaning casually against a pillar as he watched the discussion brought her fury back to the surface. She decided that she would rather Viola weren’t around when she finally gave the Doctor a piece of her mind. “Okay,” she finally agreed. “But you have to promise you’ll send the Doctor a telepathic message immediately if there’s trouble.”
“I promise! I promise!” Viola was hopping excitedly on one leg and Rose winced as she nearly lost her balance.
Donna caught Rose’s eye and seemed to understand Rose’s concerns. “Don’t worry, we’ll take good care of her, won’t we, Jack?”
Jack frowned at her, looking perplexed. “What? Wait. Sorry, I was just thinking about something. What’s going on?”
“Spirionica?” Donna cleared her throat, nodding not so subtly toward Rose and the Doctor and causing Rose to nearly laugh aloud at the very obvious scheming Donna was doing to get her and the Doctor alone. Although, judging from the suggestive glances Donna kept shooting her, Rose suspected she and Donna had very different ideas about just what would be happening once they were alone.
Jack grinned, clearly understanding Donna immediately. “Oh, Spirionica is amazing. Viola should totally see it.”
“Right. That’s settled then.” The Doctor sprang to life and began to flick and twirl dials, whizzing them through time and space until they’d landed on Spirionica. He rubbed his hands excitedly, his eyes bright as he contemplated the adventure to come. “Let’s go see this planet then!”
He was already half way to the door when Rose caught his arm. “Oh, no. You’re not going.”
“I’m not?” The Doctor squeaked, and Rose knew he was completely aware of what was going on but trying to get out of it.
“No. You’re not.” Her words were firm yet calm, the way they often were when she was disciplining Viola.
Looking apprehensive, the Doctor bobbed his head in agreement and reluctantly stepped away from the door. “Have fun!” He called after Donna, Viola and Jack’s retreating forms.
“You too!” Donna responded.
Before the door had even closed fully, Rose turned toward the Doctor and released the careful hold she’d placed on her fury in the past few hours.
“How dare you?” she shouted.
Although she was pretty certain he’d been expecting this, the Doctor winced and took a step back instinctively.. “How dare I what, exactly?”
“Oh, don’t be coy with me. Where do I even start?”
“I’m sorry. For all of it, I’m sorry.”
“Now who’s the stupid ape?” She hissed walking closer to him . “You really think a blanket apology is enough? I nearly lost my only daughter because of what you did. How could you be so harebrained?”
“I -“
She poked his shoulder sharply as she spoke each word, “I’m not finished. I realize you didn’t know about her, or about me coming back, but that doesn’t change the fact that what you did was wrong. I don’t understand why you would do such a thing. The entire universe nearly ceased to exist because of what you did, nevermind what you did to our personal time lines. We didn’t deserve that and neither did Donna.I thought you were better than this. You’re supposed to be the smart one.”
“I did it because I wanted to fix past wrongs, to make things better.“
“Did it ever once occur to you that we didn’t need fixing? That we were happy with the way things turned out?” She paused, taking a deep breath to counteract her breathlessness before continuing her tirade. “No, of course it didn’t.” She spat bitterly. “Because that would be like giving us a choice and you don’t do that.”
The Doctor frowned. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“Exactly what it sounds like. You always think you know what’s best for people so you make the decisions for them, you don’t even give them a say.” The bitterness she’d felt that day on the beach returned and she continued, her voice cold and harsh. “Did you ever consider, even for a moment that I didn’t want you to leave me on that beach? Or that I wanted to be given the chance to make that choice on my own? You took that away from me, Doctor. It was my choice to make, NOT yours. You always do this, you think you know what’s best for people without ever once considering that maybe you don’t have the right to take their choice away. For all your talk of not wanting to be a god you sure act like one sometimes.”
The Doctor gaped at her. “I thought I was doing the right thing. I just wanted you to be happy.”
“And you didn’t think I could be happy with you?”
He opened his mouth wordlessly, his jaw dropping. After a moment he seemed to recover, clearing his throat as he finally shrugged. “I thought you would be happier with him, with a human life.”
“I didn’t want a human life, Doctor, neither did he.”
“But you married him, you had a child.”
“Yes. We managed to work out our issues and I fell in love with him for who he was. And we were very happy for a very long time, but that doesn’t change the fact that you never gave either of us a choice. He was miserable at first, Doctor. Miserable in that stationary life, not able to travel or communicate with even a TARDIS or anything. He was human physically, but in every other way he was a Time Lord. He needed more than that life, and if he hadn’t been able to grow another TARDIS I don’t think we would have made it. I don’t think we would have had the wonderful life together that we did. And we certainly wouldn’t have had Viola.”
“So, see? It all worked out.”
“Because we fought for it. It had nothing, NOTHING to do with you.”
Rose stopped shouting, her energy waning as she caught her breath. He was quiet for a long time before speaking.
“Most things have nothing to do with me in the end.”
Her eyebrow shot up questioningly and she studied him carefully for a long beat. Finally he met her gaze. “I only did it for you,” he whispered finally. ”Perhaps I should have given you a choice but I thought I was giving you a gift.”
“That’s your excuse?” Rose felt tears spring to her eyes. “It’s bad enough that your choices took you away from me, but Doctor, you nearly cost me my only daughter. If I lost her too…” Rose trailed off, unable to even conceive of what that would mean. She took a deep breath. She couldn’t fall apart. Not yet.
She turned away, discreetly drying her eyes so he wouldn’t see just how shattered she was. When she was finally calm enough to face him again, the expression on his face nearly caused her to start crying again, but for a completely different reason.
He had averted his eyes the entire time he was speaking, but he was looking directly at her now, and she could see what she hadn’t wanted to before. For the first time in all the years she’d known him, he looked old. Old and tired and completely lost. There were dark shadows beneath his eyes - an impressive feat for someone who claimed he didn’t need much sleep - and his cheeks were indrawn and gaunt. It was his eyes though that tugged at her reluctant heart with their dark pools of anguish and grief.
She tried to look away, wanting to cling to the comfort of her anger, but already she could feel herself slowly beginning to soften a little. He was different now than he’d been back then. Sadder, lonelier.
Is that what had driven him to be so reckless? she wondered. The Doctor she had known had always been so confident, so sure, so careful. But the man in front of her now was defeated and sad.
He broke the gaze, and scrubbed his hands over his eyes. He shrugged, clearly not knowing what else to say and all but collapsed into the jumpseat, his shoulders sagging. He looked up at her again and as their gazes locked it was suddenly clear to her that he was already beating himself up for the mistakes he’d made. She remembered then how he had always internalized his pain. He was always hardest on himself and she realized now that his defensiveness earlier hadn’t been because he was defending his actions but because he was trying to hide the inner blame he was already placing upon himself. With that revelation, the last of her anger fled and she reached for him to offer comfort and be comforted.
They embraced properly for the first time in… well she couldn’t recall how long it had been. The tension of the last few weeks began to seep from her muscles as the Doctor wrapped his arms around her. She rested her head against his shoulders, the rise and fall of his chest calming and comforting her. She relaxed into the moment, allowing all her worries and confusion to fade into the background to be dealt with later. Instead she surrendered herself to the warmth of his embrace. For the time being, she was home.
*~*~*~*~*
They hugged for several minutes before an image flashed through her mind and Rose pulled away slightly. “There’s something I don’t understand,” she said, looking right into the Doctor’s eyes.
“What’s that?”
Rose pictured the massive dragon-like creature that was trying to erase all of humanity from the earth in an attempt to fix the damage she’d caused years earlier when she’d saved her father from the car accident.
“What about those creatures? The ones that came when I , you know, helped my Dad? Why haven’t they been here?”
The Doctor pursed his lips. After a long beat he said, “I have a theory,”
Rose rubbed her temples. “Do I want to know?”
“I think it’s because what happened is too big. There were literally hundreds of thousands of people and creatures out of their proper Temporal Schedules. So many that any attempt to fix the situation by the Reapers would most assuredly have resulted in their untimely death.”
“So what? They just stayed away?”
“Something like that.”
Suddenly, absurdly, Rose began to giggle.
“What?”
Rose had to struggle to regain her senses. “It’s nothing really, it’s just, that only you would create a catastrophe too big for reapers.”
TBC
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