Fic: Heartless (Rose/Ten, PG, Future AU)
Heartless. PG, Rose/Ten, future AU. No real spoilers for season four. I imagine that if Rose ever returned, the Doctor would have some explaining to do.
She remembers the void, how it touched her as she passed it. How it touches her still, in the whorls and arches of his thumbprints, the silence of held-in breath.
The mirrors in this world won't stay still.
Rose brushes her hair with the lights glowing dimly from her room; the bathroom tile is like cold cream against her feet, smooth and pure white as the enamel of teeth. She tries the trick she's been thinking of; ever since she came back to her first world and discovered the mirrors move behind her and around her. She doesn't look straight at the mirror but past it, outside it, letting her eyes slip out of focus and letting the eyelids droop. A small and perfect hand slips around the edge of the door to her foot, so slight and slender that if she blinks, she'll miss it.
There.
"I see you," she says, still not looking straight into the glass. "Don't be afraid."
The girl in the mirror wavers slightly and forms into being, a bright balloon bobbing past her head. Rose doesn't quite see this but feels it, knows that if she could stay still long enough the girl would watch her forever, like a deer, caught and fascinated. "Don't be afraid," she repeats. "Can you... can you hear me ?"
The string of the ballon jerks, twice. "That's good. Are you- what are you ? Are you from the future?" Stillness. "The past ?" A half-hearted tug. "Are you somewhere else ? Are you stuck ?" Three sharp tugs, and the balloon dances above her head. "Oh. I'm sorry. I have a friend, you know. He helps people. He could even help you. He's called the Doc-"
The mirror shakes and she vanishes. For a terrifying instant, Rose imagines that her reflection will vanish, too. It doesn't. She stares at the glass for a long time, hair still caught in her brush, waiting for another glimpse.
Nothing comes to the surface.
"What did you do while I was away ?" Rose whispers, her face against the pillow. He rolls against her and she can hear him thinking. They call it that, away; like it wasn't a great chasm of darkness that ripped them apart, nearly apart forever, and that neither of them have quite recovered from. She remembers the void, how it touched her as she passed it. How it touches her still, in the whorls and arches of his thumbprints, the silence of held-in breath.
"Lots of things," he says. "I went to see Shakespeare. And New Earth again; but you know that, Martha told you that." He makes a comical grimace. "Girls. Women. The lot of you. Told you plenty of other things, too, I imagine." His arm around her waist tightens, reflexively.
Not enough, she wants to say. There are points in Martha's stories, just as in his, that seem to Rose to be flickering at the edges with a bright and startling pain; a pain that has erased detail and left them both without words to tell her. In Martha she accepts her privacy, but in him it's become something ugly and quiet and self-contained. Rose has needed his honesty for a long time, since France, more so since her return. The wolf stalks her in her sleep when he doesn't tell the truth. "I told you about my- about the Master. The year that wasn't. Or Jack did. I forget. There's not much more to say."
"You were human for a bit," she says, ruffling his hair and trying for lightness. He stiffens. "Oh, it couldn't have been that bad. One heart is good for a lot of things."
"Yes." He kisses the skin over her collarbone, relaxing. "You seem to do alright on just the one."
"That's me," she says. "The one-hearted wonder."
Rose Tyler dreams.
In the fields beneath her feet there are daisies and hay, daisies and hay. They're blades of grain, sharp against the soft undersides of her fingers; she runs through them like a fish, rippling the stalks. Everything is bright, bright gold.
Rose turns her head.
There's a man on the hill; walking closer, eddies of sunlight and rustling grass at her ankles, she sees it's not a man at all. A scarecrow, stuffed with straw and hung. A lopsided smile is painted on the bag. He seems to tilt at her, deferentially, a jester to her queen. Rose giggles, and gives a little bow herself.
A shadow falls over them- the field turns silver and blue, and the gold is gone. Rose shuts her eyes against the sudden wind. There's still a haze of light at the fringes of her eyes, where the lashes meet her cheeks- she sees the storm, coming, and it fills her with both familiarity and utter, naked fright.
I wanted you to know, the wolf says.
And the wind takes her away.
Rose wakes from her dream.
"Doctor ?" she asks, softly, rolling; his half of the bed is empty, beginning to cool.
She follows the lights in the hallway to the console room; they flitter and flicker as she passes, welcoming her, warming the soles of her feet and drawing her nearer to him. It's been like that since she returned: back and forth he seems to need her close and need her gone. When he can't bear to ask, through the ship he pulls her closer and closer, and with his body he pushes her away. He's on the jump seat, staring at the display, not moving. "Doctor ?" she repeats, and he skips to a standing salute.
"Good morning !" he says, brightly. Too brightly. She's not sure it can be healthy. He's trembling. "Hungry ? Thirsty ? Got that gummy morning-mouth ? We could stop by Tebbula and get some of those-"
"Why do the mirrors move here ?" she asks, abruptly. "In Pete's world they stayed still, like a mirror ought to. Why do I see a girl when I brush my hair ?"
He stares at her. He's still caught in mid-vowel, jaw hanging open, and she pities him. She crosses the grate and holds out her arms; he comes into them, dutifully, holds her against him like a man juggling glass. She holds him tighter. He's still trembling. "What's happened ?" she asks, and he melts into her at last, very tenderly. He's been holding this back, she knows. Keeping this in.
"I saw your dreams," he murmurs, dry lips moving against her throat too much like those blades of grass. "Forgive me for looking. I never meant- I never meant for you to see that. And now you have."
"What is it ?"
"It's-" he stops, hangs his head so low it brushes the flesh over her heart. "Oh, Rose. I punished them. They crossed me and I, I forgot myself."
"Show me," she says, steadily. "Show me everything."
He spins the dials.
Rose looks down the tunnel, like a well, so far below the center of her gravity that the depths seem to ripple and crash against the walls. She can't see him but she can feel eyes struggling to meet her own. The air's so cold her words make little flowers of steam.
"Martha didn't see this," she says. "You didn't let her see."
"No."
They hook his chains and start the machines to hauling, out of the pit; before he crests the surface the Doctor turns and retches in the hallway, staggering against the wall. Rose hangs gamely onto the lever until he collects himself. They bring him up. The father is rotting in his chains but oh, so alive, alive and staring. The Doctor puts him to sleep and plugs him into a stasis chamber, in a section of the TARDIS that hasn't seen footsteps in a century. "Which one's next ?" he asks, pointedly not looking at her, or the corner of his shoes that he got sick on.
"Mother, I should think."
They lose her in an endless field of darkness, where stars are being born; but they pull her out again, together. Difficult to do. That's kind of our thing, Rose thinks, watching his face over the controls. Difficult. But not impossible. "Now England's turn," she says. "Rule Britannia. I fancied a cuppa after all that space dust."
They take Baines' hood off, and it's so much like her dream that Rose cries out, afraid. She watches the sky for the lightning that must surely come, the endless storm that will blot them all out with glee, but it doesn't. The Doctor stands beside her, not shaking but still, nose to the wind like a foxhound. The grass ripples. "I dreamed a storm," she murmurs. "I dreamed a storm that could end the world."
"Could," he says, thoughtfully. "Almost did. But won't." His hands are warmer when he takes hers between them. "Won't ever. I promise you."
When the three are gathered, drawn and silent, he puts them in the mirror. It cracks from the strain and sets them all into funhouse shapes, ugly and sharp. The creatures, freed of body, go to the child and hold her just out of sight, huddled together in the shadow side. Rose watches them with unfocused eyes. The family, she thinks. The Doctor watches her. "Tell me what to do," he says at last.
"Let them die," she whispers. She strokes the back of his neck, feels the fine hairs rise against her, feels his hearts stir, pressed close with hers. Three- such an odd number of beats to share between them, but there it is. Their life. Which, one day, will end. "Let them die," she says again. "Let them die and have that quiet."
"Is it mercy ?" he asks.
"It's their right." She kisses his temples. "Maybe they can all be together, in another world. You can't hold them forever. You wouldn't do that."
"I did it."
"Maybe once," she says firmly. "But not today."
They watch, together, as the mirror breaks into a million pieces. The faces in the frame wear relief.
Somewhere, on a beach with a sky that overlooks the universe, the Doctor scatters glittering sand from a jar.
"It'll wash up here, again and again," Rose says, dipping her bare feet into a wave that rolls and smokes and feels like warm felt. "It'll wear everything away."
"That's the ocean's job," he replies. "Tireless fellow."
They walk hand-in-hand at the tideline, the jar forgotten, talking of nothing. Stars come out, slowly. "We were at school together," he tells her. She doesn't need to ask who. "We were friends. Friends, can you imagine ? We wanted to change the world together. And we did, just not- well. Not like we thought." He pauses for a moment to toss the stained trainers into the ocean.
"You're polluting," she says, with a smirk.
"I saved this planet from an invasion once- no, twice !" He puffs up with mock-outrage. "I could throw candy wrappers all the way from here to their moon, and I'd have earned the right." They stand and watch the shoes get tossed about before sinking. "Rose, what- what stops me ?" He looks around, wildly, past her. "We were so alike back then. Maybe we're still alike. What keeps me from falling over the edge ?"
"You fall," she says. "I've seen you fall. Everybody falls." She tilts her head to his hand, stroking her cheek. "You just remember to come back."
"Got something here on this side," he says.
"Too right, you do."
They walk.
She remembers the void, how it touched her as she passed it. How it touches her still, in the whorls and arches of his thumbprints, the silence of held-in breath.
The mirrors in this world won't stay still.
Rose brushes her hair with the lights glowing dimly from her room; the bathroom tile is like cold cream against her feet, smooth and pure white as the enamel of teeth. She tries the trick she's been thinking of; ever since she came back to her first world and discovered the mirrors move behind her and around her. She doesn't look straight at the mirror but past it, outside it, letting her eyes slip out of focus and letting the eyelids droop. A small and perfect hand slips around the edge of the door to her foot, so slight and slender that if she blinks, she'll miss it.
There.
"I see you," she says, still not looking straight into the glass. "Don't be afraid."
The girl in the mirror wavers slightly and forms into being, a bright balloon bobbing past her head. Rose doesn't quite see this but feels it, knows that if she could stay still long enough the girl would watch her forever, like a deer, caught and fascinated. "Don't be afraid," she repeats. "Can you... can you hear me ?"
The string of the ballon jerks, twice. "That's good. Are you- what are you ? Are you from the future?" Stillness. "The past ?" A half-hearted tug. "Are you somewhere else ? Are you stuck ?" Three sharp tugs, and the balloon dances above her head. "Oh. I'm sorry. I have a friend, you know. He helps people. He could even help you. He's called the Doc-"
The mirror shakes and she vanishes. For a terrifying instant, Rose imagines that her reflection will vanish, too. It doesn't. She stares at the glass for a long time, hair still caught in her brush, waiting for another glimpse.
Nothing comes to the surface.
"What did you do while I was away ?" Rose whispers, her face against the pillow. He rolls against her and she can hear him thinking. They call it that, away; like it wasn't a great chasm of darkness that ripped them apart, nearly apart forever, and that neither of them have quite recovered from. She remembers the void, how it touched her as she passed it. How it touches her still, in the whorls and arches of his thumbprints, the silence of held-in breath.
"Lots of things," he says. "I went to see Shakespeare. And New Earth again; but you know that, Martha told you that." He makes a comical grimace. "Girls. Women. The lot of you. Told you plenty of other things, too, I imagine." His arm around her waist tightens, reflexively.
Not enough, she wants to say. There are points in Martha's stories, just as in his, that seem to Rose to be flickering at the edges with a bright and startling pain; a pain that has erased detail and left them both without words to tell her. In Martha she accepts her privacy, but in him it's become something ugly and quiet and self-contained. Rose has needed his honesty for a long time, since France, more so since her return. The wolf stalks her in her sleep when he doesn't tell the truth. "I told you about my- about the Master. The year that wasn't. Or Jack did. I forget. There's not much more to say."
"You were human for a bit," she says, ruffling his hair and trying for lightness. He stiffens. "Oh, it couldn't have been that bad. One heart is good for a lot of things."
"Yes." He kisses the skin over her collarbone, relaxing. "You seem to do alright on just the one."
"That's me," she says. "The one-hearted wonder."
Rose Tyler dreams.
In the fields beneath her feet there are daisies and hay, daisies and hay. They're blades of grain, sharp against the soft undersides of her fingers; she runs through them like a fish, rippling the stalks. Everything is bright, bright gold.
Rose turns her head.
There's a man on the hill; walking closer, eddies of sunlight and rustling grass at her ankles, she sees it's not a man at all. A scarecrow, stuffed with straw and hung. A lopsided smile is painted on the bag. He seems to tilt at her, deferentially, a jester to her queen. Rose giggles, and gives a little bow herself.
A shadow falls over them- the field turns silver and blue, and the gold is gone. Rose shuts her eyes against the sudden wind. There's still a haze of light at the fringes of her eyes, where the lashes meet her cheeks- she sees the storm, coming, and it fills her with both familiarity and utter, naked fright.
I wanted you to know, the wolf says.
And the wind takes her away.
Rose wakes from her dream.
"Doctor ?" she asks, softly, rolling; his half of the bed is empty, beginning to cool.
She follows the lights in the hallway to the console room; they flitter and flicker as she passes, welcoming her, warming the soles of her feet and drawing her nearer to him. It's been like that since she returned: back and forth he seems to need her close and need her gone. When he can't bear to ask, through the ship he pulls her closer and closer, and with his body he pushes her away. He's on the jump seat, staring at the display, not moving. "Doctor ?" she repeats, and he skips to a standing salute.
"Good morning !" he says, brightly. Too brightly. She's not sure it can be healthy. He's trembling. "Hungry ? Thirsty ? Got that gummy morning-mouth ? We could stop by Tebbula and get some of those-"
"Why do the mirrors move here ?" she asks, abruptly. "In Pete's world they stayed still, like a mirror ought to. Why do I see a girl when I brush my hair ?"
He stares at her. He's still caught in mid-vowel, jaw hanging open, and she pities him. She crosses the grate and holds out her arms; he comes into them, dutifully, holds her against him like a man juggling glass. She holds him tighter. He's still trembling. "What's happened ?" she asks, and he melts into her at last, very tenderly. He's been holding this back, she knows. Keeping this in.
"I saw your dreams," he murmurs, dry lips moving against her throat too much like those blades of grass. "Forgive me for looking. I never meant- I never meant for you to see that. And now you have."
"What is it ?"
"It's-" he stops, hangs his head so low it brushes the flesh over her heart. "Oh, Rose. I punished them. They crossed me and I, I forgot myself."
"Show me," she says, steadily. "Show me everything."
He spins the dials.
Rose looks down the tunnel, like a well, so far below the center of her gravity that the depths seem to ripple and crash against the walls. She can't see him but she can feel eyes struggling to meet her own. The air's so cold her words make little flowers of steam.
"Martha didn't see this," she says. "You didn't let her see."
"No."
They hook his chains and start the machines to hauling, out of the pit; before he crests the surface the Doctor turns and retches in the hallway, staggering against the wall. Rose hangs gamely onto the lever until he collects himself. They bring him up. The father is rotting in his chains but oh, so alive, alive and staring. The Doctor puts him to sleep and plugs him into a stasis chamber, in a section of the TARDIS that hasn't seen footsteps in a century. "Which one's next ?" he asks, pointedly not looking at her, or the corner of his shoes that he got sick on.
"Mother, I should think."
They lose her in an endless field of darkness, where stars are being born; but they pull her out again, together. Difficult to do. That's kind of our thing, Rose thinks, watching his face over the controls. Difficult. But not impossible. "Now England's turn," she says. "Rule Britannia. I fancied a cuppa after all that space dust."
They take Baines' hood off, and it's so much like her dream that Rose cries out, afraid. She watches the sky for the lightning that must surely come, the endless storm that will blot them all out with glee, but it doesn't. The Doctor stands beside her, not shaking but still, nose to the wind like a foxhound. The grass ripples. "I dreamed a storm," she murmurs. "I dreamed a storm that could end the world."
"Could," he says, thoughtfully. "Almost did. But won't." His hands are warmer when he takes hers between them. "Won't ever. I promise you."
When the three are gathered, drawn and silent, he puts them in the mirror. It cracks from the strain and sets them all into funhouse shapes, ugly and sharp. The creatures, freed of body, go to the child and hold her just out of sight, huddled together in the shadow side. Rose watches them with unfocused eyes. The family, she thinks. The Doctor watches her. "Tell me what to do," he says at last.
"Let them die," she whispers. She strokes the back of his neck, feels the fine hairs rise against her, feels his hearts stir, pressed close with hers. Three- such an odd number of beats to share between them, but there it is. Their life. Which, one day, will end. "Let them die," she says again. "Let them die and have that quiet."
"Is it mercy ?" he asks.
"It's their right." She kisses his temples. "Maybe they can all be together, in another world. You can't hold them forever. You wouldn't do that."
"I did it."
"Maybe once," she says firmly. "But not today."
They watch, together, as the mirror breaks into a million pieces. The faces in the frame wear relief.
Somewhere, on a beach with a sky that overlooks the universe, the Doctor scatters glittering sand from a jar.
"It'll wash up here, again and again," Rose says, dipping her bare feet into a wave that rolls and smokes and feels like warm felt. "It'll wear everything away."
"That's the ocean's job," he replies. "Tireless fellow."
They walk hand-in-hand at the tideline, the jar forgotten, talking of nothing. Stars come out, slowly. "We were at school together," he tells her. She doesn't need to ask who. "We were friends. Friends, can you imagine ? We wanted to change the world together. And we did, just not- well. Not like we thought." He pauses for a moment to toss the stained trainers into the ocean.
"You're polluting," she says, with a smirk.
"I saved this planet from an invasion once- no, twice !" He puffs up with mock-outrage. "I could throw candy wrappers all the way from here to their moon, and I'd have earned the right." They stand and watch the shoes get tossed about before sinking. "Rose, what- what stops me ?" He looks around, wildly, past her. "We were so alike back then. Maybe we're still alike. What keeps me from falling over the edge ?"
"You fall," she says. "I've seen you fall. Everybody falls." She tilts her head to his hand, stroking her cheek. "You just remember to come back."
"Got something here on this side," he says.
"Too right, you do."
They walk.