Part 03 - Chapter 14 - Changes in Perspective
I have asked Verity how long until he wakes but she doesn’t want to give me a time frame. It has taken hours to heal all his injuries as best we were able and yet Jack has warned me it still won’t be enough to keep him from suffering when he wakes. How much he will hurt and to what extent he will be hampered by the nerve damage we won’t know until that point. I can’t help wondering how he will handle it. He tries so hard to hide how much he still suffers from the war.
I know from the time before Woman Wept how much he tries to hide. I know he was upset at me that I didn’t tell him what I had been feeling but I am thankful now for that time that he keeps me out most of the time because it helps me understand him better. I have seen his reactions to things and I have come to associate certain behaviors with the emotions he is feeling. The way when he feels anxious and frustrated he gets all speciesist and hunches in on himself. The way he gets real quiet when he is very mad and the kind of cute way he stuffs his hands in his pockets when he pouts and of course the wonderful lightning grins that light up his face when things are going well. I know I am going to need all the clues I can get when he wakes. I’m not sure how he’s going to react, but I would bet money he is going to try to withdraw, put distance between us, and I know without question that the last thing he needs right now is to be even more isolated. It’s been so hard to get him to open up to me. Even now that he knows how long I was aware of his feelings and fears he still tries to shelter me, protect me. In some ways it’s endearing in others frustrating beyond words.
I know in my heart it’s true what Verity had said, I watched as his vitals crashed and the panic and fury I felt from her about how the Essarrians had hurt him. Yet at the same time I don’t want to believe that he could be so upset about me dying that he would want to die himself. He is the most incredible person I have ever met and yet he tried to die because he thought he had hurt me, killed me? What am I in the big picture of things? Nothing. To use his very words I'm just a dumb ape, I don't even have my A-Levels. I'm not even a shop girl any more and he is the last of an incredibility powerful people, smart, intelligent, strong and influential. How can I reconcile that? How do I justify staying with him when the risk is his self-destruction if somehow, by no intentional action on his part, I die? As guilty as it makes me feel about my selfishness, I want to be nowhere else but at his side regardless of the risks because I know to try to live anywhere else would not be truly living. My whole existence before the day he took my hand and said run seems like a pale black and white child’s drawing in comparison to life with him. Life with him is a Technicolor wide screen; no, bigger than wide screen, three-dimensional fully interactive one hundred percent involving adventure. Nothing can compare to being with him, being able to travel with him, to see everything he wants to share with me. Even before he let me love him, let me be with him in that way, it was more than I could ever have even dreamed about in my most wild fantasies and now... I thought I was in love when I ran off with Jimmy Stone but that was barely the faintest flicker of light in comparison to the light he has brought into my life. Now to try to live without him would be like asking me to live without air, impossible. Based on his words at Downing street and Women Wept and his actions today it appears he no longer feels he wants to function apart either and that in its own way scares me. So, in spite of our guilt of staying when we shouldn't it looks like we’re both stuck with each other for the duration and part of me really wouldn’t want it any other way.
I watch him sleep for a time, it’s such a rare occasion that he does and even more rare that I am awake to see him doing so. For the first few months I was sure he didn’t sleep at all. Then came the rare bits of nightmares, I always woke immediately as if it was impossible for me to stay asleep and as time passed I finally realized it was not only I that wasn’t sleeping when they came. After the first few times of getting up and finding him looking a bit more disheveled than normal in the kitchen drinking tea with a long face, which he always quickly hid the moment I came in, I put together the pieces. Even so after the first few times he quit coming to the kitchen trying to hide from me, hide his distress, but by then the TARDIS and I had had started to come to an understanding with regard to him and when I felt her gentle nudge I would follow and invariably find him. I’m not really sure how much he knew about our interactions but it did seem he’d stopped hiding as much. I like to think I was a comfort to him in those times, though I know he would never admit it regardless if I was, that would mean admitting he was dependent and in need and that’s just not the way he works.
As I watch him sleep I can’t stop myself from wanting to touch him occasionally to reassure myself he is okay. The vision of how pale and broken he’d looked when we first found him haunts me and so I compromise and caress his arm, forcing myself to stay on his left side to reduce the chance of irritating the newly healed tissue and damaged nerves. I want to hold his hand but that is out of the question, at least until he can tell me it doesn’t hurt him. I think of the times I have hit my funny bone and pinched nerves and the times when I have had my foot go to sleep and the pins and needles sensation that comes with renewed circulation. I hope that it won’t be like that for him but I am afraid it will be exactly like that and I won’t risk hurting him more. He has already had to endure more pain than anyone should ever have to in the last 24 hours and I won’t risk being the cause of yet more. I’m not sure how long he will sleep and Verity can’t or won’t give me anything specific in terms of time frames because she says there are still too many variables that could affect him waking. So for now I sit, I watch and I wait.
As the time slowly creeps by I think of the orange being’s taunting of the Doctor with regard to his people and I get now why he has been so standoffish. I get a lot of things I didn't before. Why for one he has never said he loves me; his actions say it, but I realize now he may never say those words back to me, which makes me sad, but it is something I will just have to accept. I also understand just that much more what it means to lose your entire planet, your people and I can never understand or imagine how utterly alone he must feel. I understand enough and it breaks my heart for his loss.
As I smell Earl Grey tea I realize that someone has made a pot. Looking up from my introspection I notice that Jack has left the room, I wonder if it is he or Verity. Verity… how could I never have asked, never inquired whether or not the TARDIS had a name? I feel ashamed of myself for never asking and feel a wash of comfort from her and I hear her soft words, 'It's okay Rose you never asked because you didn't really see me as a person. I don't usually make his companion so aware of my presence. It usually makes it easier for both of us. Do you remember how you reacted on satellite one? You were scared; afraid I was taking over your mind. Some humans just cope with me as a person better than others.' I feel a flush of shame as I realize how badly I have slighted this wonderful being that has been a faithful friend, not just to the Doctor but to me as well. I didn’t miss the hint of sadness that Verity tried to cover and I resolved to be a better friend to this wonderful lady who had so loyally cared for us even in the face of prejudice. 'I'm so sorry Verity!' Her only response is that quiet indulgent hum I have come to expect when she refuses to comment any further on a topic.
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I watch as the two humans move about somewhat in a daze, both of them coming to terms with the events in their own way. I want to comfort them but am not sure how exactly. I am worried about Theta as well but not as much for his physical injuries which prey particularly on Rose's mind. I am concerned more with how he will handle the torture and public exposure, he is such a private person and so much of it is with very good reason. He has been hurt so many times but his worst hurts and humiliations have always been at the hands of those he has trusted and I am sure he will try to distance himself to minimize the potential rejection I am positive he will expect. In some ways he is so predictable which can be very handy yet at other times very, very frustrating.
Much as I appreciate Rose’s concern about her lack of asking about my name I know she is so very young and doesn’t come from a time where thinking of a place where you live as possibly being a person is normal. What I told her is true; very often I try to avoid letting his companions really realize how alive I am. Some of it originally was an attitude I had received from most Time Lords that they didn’t really want their ships to be so self-reliant so I hid from them how smart I was. But more it is easier to be able to ensure Theta’s safety if those traveling with us underestimate what I can do. It has been the downfall of more than one of his enemies, underestimating what I am capable of as they let themselves slip either verbally or mentally on what it was that they have planned. Adam was just one of the latest in the string. I knew from the time he entered that he didn’t deserve to be here, his attitude was so focused on what we could do for him that he had no clue what it meant to be willing to sacrifice for someone else, to give to someone else. It was that very selfishness that was the reason why he had done so well working for Van Statten. I just wish Rose had been more cautious but I can’t really blame her for that; it really isn’t in her nature to be suspicious of people and that loving nature is part of what makes her so dear to both Theta and I. Sometimes in the past Theta hasn’t understood why I would not speak or communicate around certain people but I know he has come to trust me to decide who I feel is an acceptable person for me to interact with and no longer gets upset.
I just hope he can let Rose and Jack help him; to some extent he won’t have much choice. As I scan over his person I can see how much nerve damage there is, and it worries me that he will try to pretend it is not nearly as bad as it is. Though with the amount of damage to his hands it will be at least a day before he will be really able to use them as he isn’t going to be able to feel most of his fingers, not that he won’t try. It will be three maybe four days before he will be able to use them without pain. Not that it will stop him, too darn stubborn for his own good.
It will take at least a week for his body to repair all the nerve damage and in the mean time I know already he is going to be a royal grouchy pain to deal with for all of us. I am so tempted to keep him asleep for the next twenty-four hours just to ensure he has the extra time to heal. Two things keep me from this course of action, though; one, Rose and Jack are worried enough about him without delaying his waking up and two, and more importantly, he will heal much faster if he can participate in the recovery. Now the trick will be in getting him to do so and not instead slow it down by doing stupid prideful things in his fear and insecurity about how his companions are going to react.
Chapter 15 - Revelations
Stories Index
I know from the time before Woman Wept how much he tries to hide. I know he was upset at me that I didn’t tell him what I had been feeling but I am thankful now for that time that he keeps me out most of the time because it helps me understand him better. I have seen his reactions to things and I have come to associate certain behaviors with the emotions he is feeling. The way when he feels anxious and frustrated he gets all speciesist and hunches in on himself. The way he gets real quiet when he is very mad and the kind of cute way he stuffs his hands in his pockets when he pouts and of course the wonderful lightning grins that light up his face when things are going well. I know I am going to need all the clues I can get when he wakes. I’m not sure how he’s going to react, but I would bet money he is going to try to withdraw, put distance between us, and I know without question that the last thing he needs right now is to be even more isolated. It’s been so hard to get him to open up to me. Even now that he knows how long I was aware of his feelings and fears he still tries to shelter me, protect me. In some ways it’s endearing in others frustrating beyond words.
I know in my heart it’s true what Verity had said, I watched as his vitals crashed and the panic and fury I felt from her about how the Essarrians had hurt him. Yet at the same time I don’t want to believe that he could be so upset about me dying that he would want to die himself. He is the most incredible person I have ever met and yet he tried to die because he thought he had hurt me, killed me? What am I in the big picture of things? Nothing. To use his very words I'm just a dumb ape, I don't even have my A-Levels. I'm not even a shop girl any more and he is the last of an incredibility powerful people, smart, intelligent, strong and influential. How can I reconcile that? How do I justify staying with him when the risk is his self-destruction if somehow, by no intentional action on his part, I die? As guilty as it makes me feel about my selfishness, I want to be nowhere else but at his side regardless of the risks because I know to try to live anywhere else would not be truly living. My whole existence before the day he took my hand and said run seems like a pale black and white child’s drawing in comparison to life with him. Life with him is a Technicolor wide screen; no, bigger than wide screen, three-dimensional fully interactive one hundred percent involving adventure. Nothing can compare to being with him, being able to travel with him, to see everything he wants to share with me. Even before he let me love him, let me be with him in that way, it was more than I could ever have even dreamed about in my most wild fantasies and now... I thought I was in love when I ran off with Jimmy Stone but that was barely the faintest flicker of light in comparison to the light he has brought into my life. Now to try to live without him would be like asking me to live without air, impossible. Based on his words at Downing street and Women Wept and his actions today it appears he no longer feels he wants to function apart either and that in its own way scares me. So, in spite of our guilt of staying when we shouldn't it looks like we’re both stuck with each other for the duration and part of me really wouldn’t want it any other way.
I watch him sleep for a time, it’s such a rare occasion that he does and even more rare that I am awake to see him doing so. For the first few months I was sure he didn’t sleep at all. Then came the rare bits of nightmares, I always woke immediately as if it was impossible for me to stay asleep and as time passed I finally realized it was not only I that wasn’t sleeping when they came. After the first few times of getting up and finding him looking a bit more disheveled than normal in the kitchen drinking tea with a long face, which he always quickly hid the moment I came in, I put together the pieces. Even so after the first few times he quit coming to the kitchen trying to hide from me, hide his distress, but by then the TARDIS and I had had started to come to an understanding with regard to him and when I felt her gentle nudge I would follow and invariably find him. I’m not really sure how much he knew about our interactions but it did seem he’d stopped hiding as much. I like to think I was a comfort to him in those times, though I know he would never admit it regardless if I was, that would mean admitting he was dependent and in need and that’s just not the way he works.
As I watch him sleep I can’t stop myself from wanting to touch him occasionally to reassure myself he is okay. The vision of how pale and broken he’d looked when we first found him haunts me and so I compromise and caress his arm, forcing myself to stay on his left side to reduce the chance of irritating the newly healed tissue and damaged nerves. I want to hold his hand but that is out of the question, at least until he can tell me it doesn’t hurt him. I think of the times I have hit my funny bone and pinched nerves and the times when I have had my foot go to sleep and the pins and needles sensation that comes with renewed circulation. I hope that it won’t be like that for him but I am afraid it will be exactly like that and I won’t risk hurting him more. He has already had to endure more pain than anyone should ever have to in the last 24 hours and I won’t risk being the cause of yet more. I’m not sure how long he will sleep and Verity can’t or won’t give me anything specific in terms of time frames because she says there are still too many variables that could affect him waking. So for now I sit, I watch and I wait.
As the time slowly creeps by I think of the orange being’s taunting of the Doctor with regard to his people and I get now why he has been so standoffish. I get a lot of things I didn't before. Why for one he has never said he loves me; his actions say it, but I realize now he may never say those words back to me, which makes me sad, but it is something I will just have to accept. I also understand just that much more what it means to lose your entire planet, your people and I can never understand or imagine how utterly alone he must feel. I understand enough and it breaks my heart for his loss.
As I smell Earl Grey tea I realize that someone has made a pot. Looking up from my introspection I notice that Jack has left the room, I wonder if it is he or Verity. Verity… how could I never have asked, never inquired whether or not the TARDIS had a name? I feel ashamed of myself for never asking and feel a wash of comfort from her and I hear her soft words, 'It's okay Rose you never asked because you didn't really see me as a person. I don't usually make his companion so aware of my presence. It usually makes it easier for both of us. Do you remember how you reacted on satellite one? You were scared; afraid I was taking over your mind. Some humans just cope with me as a person better than others.' I feel a flush of shame as I realize how badly I have slighted this wonderful being that has been a faithful friend, not just to the Doctor but to me as well. I didn’t miss the hint of sadness that Verity tried to cover and I resolved to be a better friend to this wonderful lady who had so loyally cared for us even in the face of prejudice. 'I'm so sorry Verity!' Her only response is that quiet indulgent hum I have come to expect when she refuses to comment any further on a topic.
----------------------------
I watch as the two humans move about somewhat in a daze, both of them coming to terms with the events in their own way. I want to comfort them but am not sure how exactly. I am worried about Theta as well but not as much for his physical injuries which prey particularly on Rose's mind. I am concerned more with how he will handle the torture and public exposure, he is such a private person and so much of it is with very good reason. He has been hurt so many times but his worst hurts and humiliations have always been at the hands of those he has trusted and I am sure he will try to distance himself to minimize the potential rejection I am positive he will expect. In some ways he is so predictable which can be very handy yet at other times very, very frustrating.
Much as I appreciate Rose’s concern about her lack of asking about my name I know she is so very young and doesn’t come from a time where thinking of a place where you live as possibly being a person is normal. What I told her is true; very often I try to avoid letting his companions really realize how alive I am. Some of it originally was an attitude I had received from most Time Lords that they didn’t really want their ships to be so self-reliant so I hid from them how smart I was. But more it is easier to be able to ensure Theta’s safety if those traveling with us underestimate what I can do. It has been the downfall of more than one of his enemies, underestimating what I am capable of as they let themselves slip either verbally or mentally on what it was that they have planned. Adam was just one of the latest in the string. I knew from the time he entered that he didn’t deserve to be here, his attitude was so focused on what we could do for him that he had no clue what it meant to be willing to sacrifice for someone else, to give to someone else. It was that very selfishness that was the reason why he had done so well working for Van Statten. I just wish Rose had been more cautious but I can’t really blame her for that; it really isn’t in her nature to be suspicious of people and that loving nature is part of what makes her so dear to both Theta and I. Sometimes in the past Theta hasn’t understood why I would not speak or communicate around certain people but I know he has come to trust me to decide who I feel is an acceptable person for me to interact with and no longer gets upset.
I just hope he can let Rose and Jack help him; to some extent he won’t have much choice. As I scan over his person I can see how much nerve damage there is, and it worries me that he will try to pretend it is not nearly as bad as it is. Though with the amount of damage to his hands it will be at least a day before he will be really able to use them as he isn’t going to be able to feel most of his fingers, not that he won’t try. It will be three maybe four days before he will be able to use them without pain. Not that it will stop him, too darn stubborn for his own good.
It will take at least a week for his body to repair all the nerve damage and in the mean time I know already he is going to be a royal grouchy pain to deal with for all of us. I am so tempted to keep him asleep for the next twenty-four hours just to ensure he has the extra time to heal. Two things keep me from this course of action, though; one, Rose and Jack are worried enough about him without delaying his waking up and two, and more importantly, he will heal much faster if he can participate in the recovery. Now the trick will be in getting him to do so and not instead slow it down by doing stupid prideful things in his fear and insecurity about how his companions are going to react.
Chapter 15 - Revelations
Stories Index