Echoes of Summer - Chapter Thirty-Four: The Last Visit

[tasogareban]

Disclaimer: Neither Doctor Who nor any characters, items or materials of any kind pertaining to Doctor Who or the Whoniverse belong to me. I’m just looking for a good time. Hee. Trying them out for a bit, see how they fit.

Plot Summary: He was left with his lips against her jaw, her figure pressed to him as if she belonged there. One of many moments between the Tenth Doctor and Rose Tyler after he breaks his own rules to retrieve her from Bad Wolf Bay. The walls between worlds begin to fall, two different realities merging. And on the horizon a threat rises that threatens to destroy everything the Doctor holds dear.

Pairing: Ten/Rose

Beta: bratflorida

Rating: Starts at PG. Runs the gamut straight through to NC-17.

Spoilers: Oh yes. Series One through Series 4 Specials.

Timeline: AU after the end of Series 2. Spoilers up to, including and going past Series 4 though. I’ve seen all of Series 1 through 4, including the series 4 specials but am not very familiar with the Classic Who much. As such, if I happen to include anything that really touches upon Classic Who, other than it being unintentional, I’ll be surprised out of my head. Really. You’ll probably see a lot of familiar things in the fic that play into the series of DW. Bear with me, it all ties in together.


Chapter Thirty-Four - The Last Visit:

She had no idea where she was going and not a very good idea of where she currently was. All she knew was that she was in London, in the immediate past. Looking for one Rose Tyler before she swallowed the heart of the TARDIS once more. Looking about she turned in a full circle, her hearts beating painfully in her chest, her breathing raspy. “Where…am I?” she asked the air frantically.

The TARDIS had vanished almost the same moment it had deposited her out on the sidewalk. Wherever her father had gone, he was taking the fight away from London and away from that current time. But somewhere in this city Rose Tyler and the past Doctor were together, oblivious to everything that was happening further down their timeline.

She would have to leave her message with Rose, mind-locked, if she couldn’t find her father. He had always been against anyone going back and appearing to his past self as it was.

“Too many things can go wrong and I think I know everything already anyway.”

Her best bet was to appear to Rose Tyler’s past self. At least in her presence the Bad Wolf would not dare approach them for fear of rewriting her own past. To appear to her father with the information was not a guarantee of protection. If the Bad Wolf could do away with the future Doctor, there was an equally good chance if not a better one that she could do away with the past Doctor just to stop their attempts once and for all.

But not her own past self. Not if she wanted to chance writing herself out of existence.

She searched the area, racing down the small alleyway she’d been dropped into. Upon reaching the street she found that she recognized the area. She was not too far from the Powell Estates. It seemed so different in this current time. Several shops hadn’t been constructed, several homes hadn’t been torn down and others hadn’t been built yet. But she knew the area enough.

Having become acquainted with Rose Tyler when she’d still had her own mind, she found herself missing her, the way she had known her. As bright as day, her smile mischievous. A perfect match for her father’s own impish nature.  Almost like a perfect little family once she had found her way back to her father. Coming down the small path lining the Powell Estate she saw what she had hoped to find once having been kicked out of her father’s TARDIS.

The blue phone box waited silently in a corner of the path, up against a brick wall and tucked away in a corner. She slowly came down the alleyway, hesitant. This wasn’t her father’s TARDIS. She had felt the sluggishness of her father’s TARDIS, how tired she had seemed in the last days before the Bad Wolf had reemerged. She felt a certain weariness emanating from this TARDIS as well but easily recognized it as a strain from storing energy, not from having it siphoned away.

As she came closer the door opened and Rose Tyler emerged, in the middle of a full laugh, her head thrown back. Behind her, slipping on his coat, her father came out also, nodding at her as if he had fed her a story that he believed was very true no matter how silly it seemed.

“No way!” Rose’s voice rang down the alley.

“Why would I lie to you?” the Doctor demanded as he locked up the TARDIS behind himself.

Shaking her head, refusing to believe, Rose glanced down the alleyway, catching sight of her coming down toward them slowly and she did a double take but turned her attention away once she realized she did not recognize her. Beside her, the Doctor finished fiddling with the door and then turned toward Rose, holding out his hand to her with a smile.

She felt her heart break at the gesture. Even more so as Rose looked at his hand, made a small comment and then slipped her hand into his.

Bad Wolf.

Coming down the alleyway, looking at them, Jenny averted her gaze as they came close and then passed by her, the Doctor with a beaming smile and a cheerful, “Good morning!”

“G-good morning,” Jenny stuttered in surprise, glancing at them and then they were past her, the Doctor leaning into Rose and whispering against her ear comfortably. Tenderly. She followed them with her eyes, pausing in mid-step to look over her shoulder. The Bad Wolf and the Oncoming Storm. And yet, staring after them, there were no titles there. Merely a young woman and a young-looking man, holding hands, holding onto each other for all they were worth. A golden sun and moonbeams on the surface of this spinning planet. She watched as they floated down the alleyway, rounding the corner and disappearing.

Stopping and looking off the way they had gone, she had no idea how she was going to get Rose Tyler alone long enough to plant the message and lock it for the Doctor. If she followed them, wherever it was they were heading, perhaps she could spy on them a bit, see if her father left Rose’s side long enough for her to have a word with her. But even in her current time her father had never let Rose out of his sight once they’d emerged from the TARDIS. Only in London, really. Perhaps they had separate plans today. Could she dare to hope?

“I’ll just be a minute!” Rose’s voice floated back down the alley and a moment later she came racing back around, looking flustered and calling over her shoulder. “Go on ahead, I’ll catch you up!”

“They’re just chips-“ came the Doctor’s voice in exasperation from behind that corner and Jenny already saw the look he must have had on his face to accompany the tone.

“Order for me! I’ll be there in a bit!” Rose threw back as she ran.

Stepping back a bit, her hearts beginning to pound, Jenny glanced quickly toward the TARDIS and hesitated a small moment before darting for it and winding around it to hide.

Coming from around the front she heard Rose slide to a stop outside the phone box, insert the key and quickly let herself in.

Placing her ear to the blue wood of the box, Jenny strained to hear but as was with her own TARDIS there was no sound from it. Bigger on the inside but the wood muffled all sound. Sliding back around to the front, keeping to the sides, Jenny circled about and caught sight of the door of the TARDIS. Ajar with small sounds coming from inside. Glancing back toward the mouth of the alleyway, aware that her father had not followed after Rose, Jenny quickly slipped in through the front door and shut it loudly behind her.

Rose Tyler snapped up straight from the jump seat, a sweater in her hand.

Jenny returned her wordless stare, just as silent.

“I’m sorry…” Rose said to her slowly, swallowing faintly and recognizing her as the girl they has passed earlier by the expression that flashed across her face. “You can’t be…in here.” She slowly lowered the sweater back down to the jump seat, her gaze darting from the stranger in the TARDIS to the interior of the phone box itself uneasily. Jenny already knew what she was thinking.

“I just need to talk to you,” Jenny said to her quickly. “I know all about the TARDIS, don’t worry about that. Please. I just need to pass along a message.”

Rose stared at her, falling into silence. Then suddenly understanding, she began to wave her hands at her. “No. No, come on, no more. I can’t…” She shook her head, her brows turning up in misery. “I can’t keep seeing you lot! You can’t just…come to me and expect me to be able to fix anything! I haven’t done anything wrong!”

“Not yet,” Jenny agreed. “But actually, it’s all started already, Rose Tyler.”

Rose studied her, her eyes narrowing suspiciously as her hands dropped back at her sides once more.

Jenny came forward a step and then another, climbing up the ramp gingerly. “You don’t know me. And I firmly believe that you were never meant to know me. Which is ok,” she explained quickly before she paused thoughtfully. “Well,” she amended, “It makes me a bit sad because I liked you. I really did. And you made him so happy.”

Rose took a step back as Jenny reached the console, bumping into the jump seat. “Don’t take another step, I’m warning you, yeah?” she ordered, holding a hand out at her. “I know how to use…this.” And she motioned vaguely to the console.

Jenny smiled at her and at her attempt to scare her. “I know how to use it, too,” she let her know, leaning slightly to the TARDIS console. She lifted a hand and allowed it to drift across the face of the controls and the TARDIS seemed to hum for a moment. “She’s a bit temperamental but you know that already. And she loves you. The way I do. The way we do.”

Rose fell silent, her frame stiff against the jump seat.

“It wasn’t my intention to frighten you, it really wasn’t. And I’m sorry,” Jenny said to her, her light eyes sorrowful. “I’m so sorry.”

At her words, Rose’s eyes widened, her head tilting a bit as she searched the girl’s face. Perhaps searching for someone familiar in her features.

“And I’m very sorry for this, too,” Jenny said to her quietly. And without another word but with reflexes faster than a striking snake she lunged toward Rose and took hold of her.

Staggering at the sudden movement, a gasp of surprise broke from Rose as she stumbled to her knees. But it didn’t stop her from letting Jenny have it. “Get…off me!” She ordered her, her hands instantly flailing, fists glancing off Jenny’s arms and shoulders as she aimed wildly.

“I need you to give him-“ Jenny tried to bite out and she flinched as a wayward fist caught her in the jaw and staggered her momentarily. Shaking her head, refusing to let go of Rose, she attempted once more. “You have to give him a message for me!”

With an angry shriek, Rose took hold of one of her arms, attempting to shove her away. “Then why can’t you just tell me!” she demanded furiously, her grip on Jenny’s arm tightening and twisting.

“Because you can’t know what it is-“ Jenny hissed and with a sudden inhuman surge of strength she broke Rose’s grip on her arm and slapped her fingers down across Rose’s face, instantly initiating a mental link. Rose staggered backward under the sudden attack, inhaling deeply in terror at the assault.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“Stop saying that!” Rose cried aloud, the same words ringing inside mentally and deafening Jenny. “Stop…whatever you’re doing!”

“I can’t. I can’t stop this now. He needs to know. Only him.”

She projected several images at Rose at once, whispering and shouting at the same time in Rose’s head, not making a bit of sense but shoving forcefully, feeding her information that she couldn’t comprehend. Rose stared at the images with her mental eye but could not decipher a single one, her head overwhelmed by the sheer velocity that the visions sped by her.

And the sounds, the whispers of, “Bad Wolf…” The cries, the Doctor’s frantic voice hidden below all the screams, and the sounds of many people shouting at once, all of it being crammed into her head. She heaved physically, her eyes closing instinctively under the girl’s hands, her lips parted in terror. She could hear the Doctor so far away, in the back of her head almost. And she recognized different voices as well. Martha Jones’ voice, speaking rapidly, screaming. Donna Noble’s quick chatter, her snarky attitude and the horror in her once bored tone. Jack Harkness’ voice, desperate and disbelieving and then the blond girl’s own sharp cries as golden light encompassed the entire vision.

“Everyone who went before me…it wasn’t for nothing, what they did.”

That was the girl’s voice in the end. Rose reached for it mentally, even physically, her hand going so far as to lift against her own accord and search blindly. And just like that darkness suddenly came down before her eyes with a defining slam and all the images and voices vanished.

With another deep gasp, Rose snapped out of the mental connection, her eyes coming open and she breathed in air as if she had been suspended underwater. Before her, Jenny released her, her eyes losing focus for a moment. Then rearing back, the girl staggered on unsteady legs before crashing to the floor of the TARDIS loudly.

“W-what…” Rose heaved, her entire frame trembling. She blinked, swallowing, and dropped her eyes to search her hands and body. “What the hell did you do to me!?” she shouted fearfully.

The connection had drained her, Jenny realized. She wasn’t used to doing it, wasn’t used to maintaining it for as long as she had. Her father had taught her quick jaunts, a mental caress here and there, for anything more had been too much of a strain on her. And the mind lock at the end had done her in. Spinning, she rose unsteadily to her feet and tripped against the console, using it to hold herself up as she breathed deeply. She had to get a hold of herself. She’d done what she had come to do and hoped it was enough. Now she just had to wait.

Furiously, with anger coming off her in waves strong enough to knock Jenny back down had they been physical, Rose lunged to her feet, her face black with rage. “How dare you?!” she shouted at Jenny, pointing a wavering finger at her. “You had no right to…to just…enter my mind like that!” she yelled at her back. “No right!”

“I’m trying to save us,” Jenny said to her wearily, struggling to lift herself from the console. Her legs wobbled like jelly and even her arms felt limp.

“Oh, you’re definitely going to have to start saving someone,” Rose growled as she came up on the girl. “Who raised you? What kind of person are you to think that-“ And she came to a stop, staring at the blond girl for a moment. “How…how did you even do that? You’re not human, are you? Are you a Time Lord? Or Time…Lady? Like him?”

Jenny snapped her head up to look at her darkly, blond hair flying over her shoulder with the gesture. “If I did it right, you’ll probably never know who I am,” she said to her flatly. And without another word she released the console, falling away from it wearily. Regaining her balance she waited a long moment to make sure she had enough strength to hold herself up before staggering toward the ramp and then climbing down haltingly, her frame trembling.

“You…you can’t just leave!” Rose cried after her in disbelief. “I can’t believe people these days! You can’t just…just-“

In silence, Jenny went to the door of the TARDIS and let herself out into the sunlight.

“Wait!” Rose was left calling after her.

Coming out of the TARDIS and closing the doors behind herself, Jenny stumbled down the alleyway, exhausted. Such a small distance but it seemed to take her so long to cross it. And there was nothing left now. Her own TARDIS would not be coming back for her. And if she was still walking around now, in this daylight, after doing what she had been told to do, she could only hope the Bad Wolf entity had been averted. Or she would have to wait and see if the Bad Wolf would come in search of her.

Rounding the corner she caught sight of the lanky figure leaning against the wall silently, clothed in the familiar long coat.

“Hello again,” the Doctor said to her with another wide smile as he lifted his head to her and recognized her.

She gazed at him, coming to a heavy stop. “Hi,” she replied sadly.

He stared at her, his cheer dying away. “Are you all right there?” He asked her in a voice laced with gentlemanly concern.

And she suddenly wanted her own father. She wanted him almost desperately then, tears rising in her eyes, prickling painfully. She lifted a hand toward him, having taken a single step when she abruptly felt the sudden tingling along the back of her neck, her stomach growing cold. Lifting her eyes away from her father, her face paling, she looked about wearily. She knew this feeling, the golden icy heat that she had always felt when the Bad Wolf had shown herself. And if the Bad Wolf was here, in this place and this time, everything she had done had been for nothing. She gazed at the Doctor, at her father, and said softly, “I left her a message back there. Mind-locked.”

The Doctor stared at her, lips parted. And for a full moment he didn’t seem to understand her words, merely gazing at her. Then, finally realizing, a sudden darkness filled his face as he came to appreciate them. “Did you hurt her?” he asked her softly, coldly, as he rose off the wall and stood to his full height.

Jenny shook her head quickly, realizing that when he stood tall and rigid, he seemed a maleficent dark creature. Every bit the Oncoming Storm he had been reverently named by the Daleks, by any race he had come across and brought his wrath down upon. This was the being that all his enemies had ever come to fear, this tall, dark man with the eternally beautiful face and the scorched shadow over the opponents he’d defeated in Earth’s name. And he had shown himself to her because she had suddenly become a threat to a mere human girl.

A girl he loved, she finally allowed herself to believe.

“The message is for you. She can’t know what the message is and she can’t ever know what she will become,” she said to him, needing to explain it to him. And needing him to know that she was not the threat. That she was someone in passing, someone who might very well pass right out of their reality if she was found. She was nothing at this point. Nothing but a lost blond girl in an alley with the very genetic material of a Gallifreyan but none of the resolve. If she was found now, there was nothing she would be able to do to fight the might of the Bad Wolf. She would merely cease to exist.

Coming out into the mouth of the alleyway the Doctor glared at her and then quickly looked toward the TARDIS, his hands clenching into fists. And upon doing so he hid his hands in the pockets of his coat. “You’re not the first to come to see her,” he stated flatly to her, his dark eyes returning to study her intently, scrutinizing her. Sizing her up, even. Perhaps trying to determine what kind of threat she posed.

She shook her head, her shoulders now limp in defeat. “No.”

“There’s something wrong,” he continued on, his jaw clenching as he advanced one more step and then came to a stop before her, looming over her with his indefinable height. He had never used his height on her. On their enemies, yes, but never on her. “With the timeline. With what I did. Since bringing her back.” And his voice fell away, his face contorting. In a quiet, pained voice, his shoulders stiffening, he whispered, “It was wrong to bring her back.”

Jenny gazed at him, feeling empty inside. There was more wrong here than right but she couldn’t even find it in herself to blame him for any of it. “I left the message in her head. Only for you. But I have to go now.”

The Doctor shook his head at her, not understanding. “I need more than that. I need you to explain. You can’t keep going to her. You can’t.” And suddenly, the Oncoming Storm was reduced to a mere man, his face sorrowful. “Why not me? Why can’t you come to me instead? Why can’t you leave her alone?”

“I’m coming to you now,” Jenny said to him, her eyes lifted to his. “And now I have to go. She’s coming for me, I feel her all around, in the air. Can’t you feel her?” she asked him, staring. She didn’t understand how he couldn’t feel the presence of the Bad Wolf. Shaking away the prickling on her skin, she said, “Rose Tyler can’t know what I will show you, what you will see behind the lock. Please.”

The Doctor hesitated at her words, his face uncertain. But then, even as he held silent, she reached out to him. Wrapping a hand around his wrist gently, tenderly, she drew his fist from his coat pocket and found it limp.

“I love you,” she whispered, her face lifted to his, her hearts breaking. And without another word, with the Doctor turning to look after her with a stunned stare, she wound around him, her hand leaving his wrist, and she began to run. Such simple words to say, words her father had never been able to say to anyone. Neither her nor Rose Tyler, no matter how much he had meant them. She had learned those words from the woman that was to become the Bad Wolf, when her heart had still been her own, her love resonating throughout the TARDIS. Rose Tyler had explained love to her, had giggled like a schoolgirl when she had told her of how she had felt toward her father, the one called The Doctor. Rose had explained to her gently that the feeling that rose from embers in her chest, that feeling was love. That overpowering, incandescent warmth. It was different, the types of love humans felt. There was the love of family, the love that Jenny felt for her father. He was her mentor, the one who would guard her and protect her, who would teach her the history of the Time Lords, with his quirky smile and silly jokes. That was the love between a father and a daughter.

And then there was the love between the two halves of one soul. The love of a man for his wife or vice versa. That was the love Rose Tyler felt for her father. She was his, unconditionally. And he was hers even if he never proclaimed it aloud. But upon explanation Jenny had seen that love, had been witness to it several times, moments when she had wandered throughout the TARDIS and had stumbled across the two of them without their knowledge. In silence, in an embrace, draped across one another, soft words, tinkling laughter. Such a powerful love that humans felt, that Rose had taught her and had attempted to explain more than once to the Doctor although he had shrugged away her attempts. Even as he had mirrored them for her.

How beautiful to be in love. To be loved.

Shaking herself from the memories, from all she had left behind, she ran, her breath coming in gasps. The Bad Wolf was closing in, she felt her in the air, in the way it sparked with some sort of electrical charge. And the sparking was golden in color in her head. The gold of Rose’s love. Of Rose’s confusion. That’s what the Bad Wolf had been in the end. Rose’s love, powerful, coupled with her confusion because she had been a mere human. No human could ever control the power of the time vortex, could even hope to ever understand it.

She wished for so much more then, for things to somehow have come about differently. Perhaps in some other timeline she would meet her father again, having been created from him. And maybe in that timeline she was meant to stay with him, lost once then found. And maybe in that other timeline she was destined to meet Rose Tyler once more. Rose Tyler without the entity that was the Bad Wolf. Only one simple blond woman named Rose who would make her father content. And maybe there was another timeline in which Martha Jones had traveled with her father and had survived, had never encountered the Bad Wolf, had left her father when the time had been right and had fallen in love with another, a human. A timeline where Donna Noble had journeyed with her father, had been given a reason to be a better person and for one shining moment had been the most important woman in the whole of creation. Another timeline where Jack Harkness had continued on as an immortal, had not been cut down by the Bad Wolf. Had still formed his own organization and had members he believed in, loved. A timeline where he and the Doctor, along with Rose and Martha and Donna, had all once worked together to stop the end of the world. How lovely it was to dream up another reality, an alternate universe. A fairytale. One that was infinitely happier than the one she currently lived.

A last shiver ran down her spine and as she turned a corner, slowing in her run, she slid to a stop before the golden woman that waited before her silently.

With a breath, her shoulders falling wearily, Jenny saw all those memories and possibilities, saw all the could-bes and the what-ifs. And she ushered them away into a corner of her mind, her body already defeated. Inhaling deeply, she whispered, “Ok. Ok. I’m ready.”

And the Bad Wolf descended on her wordlessly.

When Rose emerged from the TARDIS, her sweater in hand, the Doctor waited for her still at the mouth of the alleyway, his face somber. She stared at him as she neared, silence between them, even as she paused before him. “I thought I told you to order me chips,” she said to him easily. And she was betrayed by the trembling undercurrent in her tone. Still forcing a smile for him nonetheless she asked, “What’s the matter?” upon seeing the expression on his face.

He returned the stare, his jaw clenched tightly. “Nothing. Everything fine by you?”

“Yeah,” she nodded quickly. She motioned to the hood of her sweater. “Got what I needed. We can go if you want.”

He continued to stare at her, wordlessly and she felt uncertainty set in at his silence. Did he know? Had he seen the blond girl? Was he waiting for her to let him in on what had happened? She had a message she had to give him even if she didn’t have the first idea on how to pass it on to him.

But no, she said inwardly with a mental shake of the head. She had done nothing wrong. There was nothing wrong with her, nothing wrong with her being here now. The Doctor had come back for her. He had taken her away from that other world, had brought her back home. She was here. She needed to be here. And she had every right to be here. She could put up with all the strange visions she received, all the people who were being sent back. Even if it was the Doctor sending them all back from a bleak future, she could change things now, veer off that wrong path. She could do this. What was done in the past was done. There was no going back to that moment on the beach, no way to turn down his offer to return with him. Which meant she was supposed to be here.

“Rose?” he asked her quietly.

She snapped her eyes up to look at him. “Sorry?”

His face was weary, his jaw hard. But without another word he merely held out his hand to her. And she accepted it without another thought, entwining her fingers with his because it was right. He felt right. They felt right together. And if they felt so right, they couldn’t be wrong.

The Doctor was silent for a long moment, his eyes caught by their joined fingers, his thumb running across her knuckles tenderly. “How about those chips?” he asked her quietly, a small cheerful smile finally breaking across his face.

She returned the smile, grasping his hand now with both of hers, her sweater tossed over her shoulder as she drew closer to him. “Sounds perfect right about now,” she murmured, her tongue sneaking out to poke at her teeth, beaming.

Next Chapter - Chapter Thirty-Five: Awakening

The tears rose, unbidden. Just like that, everything came down on her like a tidal wave, all the voices of the people who had come to see her, who had warned her. Something bad was coming. Something was almost here. And she was powerless to stop it, to stand up against it. The world was going to get swallowed up and there was nothing she could do. Nothing but-

I am the Bad Wolf.