Fic: Legacy 3/?
Characters: Ten/Rose
Genre: Angst/Grief
Rating: All ages
A/N: Special thanks to my beta
amberwind
Chapter Three
Jamie stopped, and he realised he was shaking. He couldn’t take his eyes off the Doctor. He looked exactly like he had in the photographs in the house; the Doctor hadn’t aged a day and was dressed in exactly the same clothes, right down the brown suit and coat. Jamie could feel his heart thumping in his chest and sweat beading up on the back of his neck in spite of the cold air of the garden. He knew he had to say something, so he took a step closer and opened his mouth.
“Hello, Dad.”
The Doctor wrinkled his brow and looked stunned.
“What?”
Jamie looked to his feet and smiled a wry smile. His dreams of this moment had never quite gone like this, but somehow it seemed appropriate. For all his father’s brilliance, his mother had always said that he seemed to be the last person to ‘get’ the personal side of things.
Jamie walked up to the TARDIS and ran his hand down the door. It didn’t seem quite real to be seeing it there in the garden of his home. He needed to touch it, and he was surprised that the TARDIS seemed to be slightly warm to his touch. He could feel a vibration under his hand and a gentle probe at the corners of his mind as the TARDIS recognised his heritage.
He turned back around to the Doctor and tentatively reached out to touch his arm, “I said, ‘Hello, Dad.’”
The Doctor seemed rooted to the spot for a moment. His mouth opened and closed as he tried to make sense of the implications of what the young man in front of him was saying. Finally he found his voice.
“Rose….?” He asked, his voice lifting in question.
“Is my mother,” Jamie replied, answering the Doctor’s question. He realised his father was rambling; his voice was breaking with emotion.
“I didn’t know….. When? Where is she?” He had so many questions written on his face, but Jamie knew they would have to wait. His mother needed to make her peace and after all these years she deserved that chance.
Jamie looked at his father with tears welling up in his eyes. There was so much he needed to say and so many questions that needed answering, but for now he had to get the Doctor into the house.
“I was born eight months after the battle of Canary Wharf. That was almost eighty one years ago. And I know what you are going to say; yes, she did know that day at Dårlig Ulv Stranden, but she couldn’t find a way to tell you.”
The Doctor looked stunned. Eighty years? A million thoughts ran through his mind; how Rose had suffered, what had happened since, his son. He felt rooted to the spot, hardly able to comprehend what the other man was saying. This man is my son? Rose had lied to him, he realised. He cast his mind back to that day on the beach in Norway; “Five us now,” she had said. Hearing those words had caused his hearts to soar and sink at the same time. A child, his child; his and Rose’s child had been the first wonderful, terrible thought that had slammed into his mind. Then she had crushed all his hope a second later by telling him that it was not her that was pregnant.
She’d seen the look written on his face as she had said those words; a look that said hope and regret at the same time. Over time the Doctor had had many occasions to reflect on that moment. He had never thought that he would ever have a family again, and to believe that Rose carried his child, just for that split second, had been so incredible, yet so horrifying; the thought that the universe could give and then take away the greatest gift that it could ever give him was too much to bear. She must have misinterpreted the emotion on his face and lied, thinking that a child would be the last thing that he would want.
Yet here he was, face to face with that lie. That child, this man before him, was his legacy and Rose’s gift. How much had he missed out on, and what more was there to know? He walked over to the man and tentatively reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder. He looked into the other man’s eyes, Rose’s eyes, and saw the truth. Then he felt the first hesitant brushes at the edge of his mind; another mind like his own was reaching out, cautious in its approach, undecided as to whether the action would cause offence. Then the Doctor did something that he had never done with any being before in his long life; he let down his walls and allowed the other man in.
And he knew him. As the man in front of him, his son, accepted the invitation to learn the Doctor’s mind, his too became open for the Doctor to step through. The Doctor gasped as he recognised the unmistakeable pattern of a man with Gallifreyan heritage. He saw and knew the aura that surrounded the other mans mind; it was like his own, just tinged with the deep reds and purples that signified his mother. Doctor drew Jamie into an embrace. Both men were openly weeping now. The Doctor kept repeating Jamie’s name over and over as his body shook, great sobs engulfed him.
“Jamie….. Jamie……. I am sorry, I am so sorry. I didn’t know.” The Doctor sobbed into his son’s shoulders. Jamie held on to the Doctor for a few more seconds and then pulled away to arms length.
“We have to go now, there isn’t much time left. We can talk later. There is so much we need to share but for now she is waiting, and she doesn’t have long.” Jamie said. The Doctor nodded. He understood, had already seen in Jamie’s mind and another wave of grief and emotion welled up inside him.
“She’s dying isn’t she? Rose… Your mother, she’s dying.” The Doctor’s face was etched with pain. Finally crossing the void to get here and realising that he and Rose had so little time left was almost enough to break him. Silently the Doctor railed against the unfairness of the universe in doing this, taking away the one who meant so much to him and then keeping him from her when she needed him most of all, only opening the doors when it was almost too late.
Jamie’s eyes told the Doctor what his lips couldn’t say. He nodded mutely, not wanting to say the words he knew his father didn’t want to hear. Instead, he turned and walked back to the house. The Doctor followed, his shoulders hunched over like a broken man.