(no subject)
Author's Notes: For Challenge 50. Based on juliet316 ’s prompt:
"Of course I know about every TV show that's ever been made. Even the alien ones."'
Also, the second attempt of mine at the first challenge. So it's a bit rough around the edges and the ending is a little too pat. (I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.) But I got to rehash Farscape (WARNING, MAJOR SPOILERS), so it was a good day.
***
“So where to next, Dame Rose?” The Doctor affects a bow, to which Rose laughs and then, trying to attempt composure, stands tall.
“I think, Sir Doctor,” she replies, voice proper, “we should-”
Before she can finish, Rose’s phone bleeps.
The Doctor sits back in his chair, kicking his feet up onto the console. “Jackie?”
“Isn’t it always?” Rose sighs. “Oh, lovely.”
“What?”
“Mum’s throwing a party.”
“Ooh. Birthday? New Year’s? Christmas? Secret Santa? I do love a good Secret Santa.”
Rose rolls her eyes. “No, it’s for X-Factor. You know, season premiere, everyone around the telly, no pee breaks. Apparently I can’t miss it.”
The Doctor crosses his arms. “I’ll do whatever I can to avoid being slapped by your mother, but is X-Factor really worth a party?”
Rose looks at him, slightly shocked. “You’ve seen X-Factor?”
“Of course I have. I know about every TV show that's ever been made. Even the alien ones.” At Rose’s speechless expression, the Doctor rattles on. “Trust me, there is more to life than reality TV. Well, more to life than bad reality TV.” He smiles fondly. “I do love A Million Adipose and Counting. They’re just adorable.”
Rose shakes her head. “Wait. Hold on. Do you know how this series of X-Factor is going to end?”
The Doctor opens his mouth and then closes it. “Ah, well...”
“So that’s a yes, then?” Rose grins widely. “Oh, you’ve gotta tell me how it ends so I can tell Mum. She’ll freak.”
“Now, Rose, don’t antagonize your mother,” the Doctor remarks mildly.
“Spoilsport,” Rose says, smiling. “But you’ll still show it to me, yeah?”
The Doctor tries to keep his face straight against Rose’s large brown eyes, but he can’t. “Oh, fine.”
He takes her to a back room, past the kitchen and the billiards and after two turns left and four turns right (and one corridor under the Olympic-sized fish tank) Rose finds herself facing the largest television screen she’s ever seen in her life. “Doctor. You’ve been holding out on me.”
“Have I?” he says, and his eyes gleam. “Well, then, I best make up for it.” He leaps over the couch and falls back into the cushions, arms splayed. He leans his head back against the back of the couch, eyeing her. “Are you going to join me?”
Rose grins and jumps over too, nestling into the crook of the Doctor’s arm.
“Ready?” he asks.
She nods. “Let’s do this.”
***
They marathon through the entire series and much to the Doctor’s chagrin, Rose’s enthusiasm is infectious. Soon they each have their own contestants and even though he knows how it’s going to end, they are both on the edge of their seats when the winner is announced.
“Yes!” Rose cries out, standing up victoriously. “Leona! I called it!” She turns and faces the Doctor. “Wait. You said you knew how this series would end. Why did you pick Ray?”
The Doctor throws his arms into the air indignantly. “He sang the classics! Sinatra! Martin! Presley! Your country is blind.”
Rose laughs and sits back down, propping herself up to face the Doctor. “Now what? Series Four?”
“Well, if you want something to watch, I’m sure I can find something better here.” He pulls up the menu and suddenly the whole screen is filled to the brim with pre-recorded series and made-for-TV movies.
Rose raises and eyebrow. “Doctor. I never suspected you’d be a couch potato.”
“Couch potato? No, not a couch potato. A connoisseur of all things wonderful and oh-so-very human.” He keeps clicking through. “Oh, I know! Cybers and Ciphers. Brilliant, just brilliant. Robots alive, lots of running, mysteries, and even the occasional dance number.”
“No,” Rose says and the Doctor looks at her, confused. “I don’t want to watch something you’ve seen already. I want to watch something new.”
“New?”
“You can’t possibly know how every series ends. There must be something you haven’t seen yet.” She leans in, conspiratorially. “We’re going to watch it together. And you won’t know what’s going to happen. Can you handle that?”
The Doctor straightens, as if ruffling his feathers against insult. “Is that a challenge, Rose Tyler?”
“We’re going to have fun with this one,” Rose says, taking the remote from him. “I’ll pick.”
***
She settles on Farscape and the Doctor shrugs. “Haven’t seen it.”
“You swear?”
“Cross my heart, hope to die-well, not die. Promise my next regeneration on it.”
Rose nods, satisfied. “Good.”
The show is about John Crichton, an astronaut from earth who is thrown across the universe and ends up joining the crew of an alien ship named Moya. Rose was never very into science fiction, but after joining the Doctor she finds pleasure in how humans think the universe might work. Plus John is ruggedly handsome-“Not that handsome,” remarks the Doctor-and has some major sexual tension with Aeryn Sun, the serious soldier who is forced on the run from her military organization, the Peacekeepers, after defending John from certain death.
The nights in the television room become a Thing-something Rose looks forward to, sometimes even more so than adventures on other planets. It’s comforting to sit in front of a ridiculously large telly with a huge bowl of popcorn, snuggled against the Doctor. He’s a talker, especially when he feels the need to correct the exposition, but when things are funny his chest rattles with laughter and when they’re sad, he grows perfectly still, the beat of two hearts echoing. It’s so mundane, but not at the same time. She doesn’t just love traveling with the Doctor; she loves being with him. It’s a good thing to know.
The show has its crazy moments and the special effects are truly horrid compared to real life, but the adventures are wild and the characters are entertaining and most of all, John and Aeryn have the sort of epic love that myths draw into constellations.
At one point, John is twinned: one version of John starts a relationship with Aeryn and the other continues his quest to go home. After Aeryn’s John is killed, the other returns and Aeryn is icy toward him.
“Why is she being like that? He’s the same man,” the Doctor reasons.
“But, it’s not the same! He’s not the same! I mean, he is, but he isn’t.” Rose tries to explain, but she can’t even wrap her own mind around it. After all, she wants Aeryn and John together, no matter which version. But there’s just a bit of wrongness to it that she can’t put her finger on. “One is hers and the other isn't.”
The Doctor shrugs. “This one could be hers. She just needs to want him.”
Rose thinks about how she once loved a man in a leather jacket and, after a period of skepticism, found herself equally in love with a man in a pinstripe suit. She smiles. "I suppose you're right."
After nights of bad guys and good guys and insanity and friendship and love, they finally reach the series finale. Aeryn falls in love with her new John and John proposes to Aeryn and she says yes and Rose is so happy she can barely contain herself. But, of course, just as everything falls into place, they get shot at and splintered into a thousand pieces.
Rose can’t come up with any coherent thoughts. “But, they can’t die! They were going to get married! They-they didn’t-”
“I'm sure they didn't actually get disintegrated, Rose," the Doctor says. "After all, there's a whole miniseries left to watch."
"That's not the point! They went through so much together and now it's nothing. They lost so much and I thought--" She can't say the next part, but she knows she has to. "I thought they'd be together forever in the end. Just happy, not in little bits."
"It’s not about the ending, Rose. It’s about the journey.” The Doctor looks at her and his eyes are suddenly so serious and slightly sad. “It’s about the time they had together.”
Rose feels her stomach twist under his gaze. He’s been saying these sorts of things more and more since they were almost pulled into a black hole and Rose was told by the Devil that she was going to die in battle very soon.
She finds his hand and holds it firmly. “Yeah. But it's John and Aeryn. Epic love. And love like that will find a way. They might try to break them up, but they never ever will." She offers a grin. "After all, we still have the miniseries to watch.”
The Doctor smiles. The corners of his eyes aren’t quite right, but he squeezes her hand. “Yes, we do,” he affirms. “I’m sure they’ll get their happy ending.”