Part I: The Doctor and Rose's Five (and only) Best Years
Title: Your Best Years are Yet to Come (1/2)
Part I: The Doctor and Rose's Five (and only) Best Years...
Characters/Pairings: Tentoo/Rose, Nine/Rose, Ten/Rose; Pete/Jackie, Tony Tyler
Rating: PG
Genre: Angst/Hurt/Comfort/Romance
Warning: ANGST. CHARACTER DEATH.
Words: 3,223
Summary: Just when they thought they'd get their forever... The universe has another plan for the Doctor and Rose, but eventually nothing will be able to come between them.
Author's Note: Obviously, I had issues when I wrote this. ELI DOES NOT DO ANGST, you say?? You’d be right. Except she does. Please don’t kill me! I only do my muse’s bidding... Thanks to the wonderful aaalaska, however, I shall have an epilogue with a relatively happy end up in the next couple of weeks, so...don't kill me until then yeah?
Many thanks to the brilliant callistawolf for beta-ing this at the last minute!
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Year 3
Rose estimated that she'd travelled with the Doctor in her original universe for approximately two years. She'd been separated from him for a little over a year (though it felt like eons) and miraculously, somehow, Rose Tyler had the Doctor in her spacious, if impersonal, flat. For once, the two danced awkwardly around each other whereas before they'd been so at ease with one another. Maybe a little too at ease. She wasn't quite sure what to think of this ‘two Doctors’ business, but it was something that could wait for tomorrow. After setting up the sofa-bed (Mickey and Jake had made use of it plenty of times when they'd stay long hours at Torchwood), Rose kissed the Doctor on the cheek - something that had become a bit of a custom between them after their fight with ‘Satan’, and went to bed.
When the Doctor woke up the next day, he was a bit dazed, wondering where he was. There were kinks in his back, but once he stretched a bit he was as good as new. Well, he was pretty new. He looked at the back of his manly, hairy hands and he could swear that he still felt the tingles of regeneration in each atom of his body. Heading to the kitchen, the Doctor opened the fridge and made a face at the nearly-empty contents. He wanted to make Rose breakfast as he sometimes had done in the TARDIS (okay, so the TARDIS did most of the work and maybe it was a good thing there wasn't much choice in what to make), but even he couldn't ruin an omelette and cereal. Sniffing at the milk to make sure it wasn't expired, he grabbed half a dozen eggs and got to work. He grated the cheese and made a couple of simple cheese omelettes.
Just as he was setting the table (him, setting the table! Was he turning domestic already?), he noticed a pile of...were those letter magnets? At first he wondered why Rose would have such flimsy magnets, but then he took notice of a few letters on the front of the fridge that spelled out ‘Rose’ and ‘Tony’. The Doctor got a funny, fluttering feeling in his chest as his now singular, blood-pumping organ picked up speed. Looking at the pile on the counter again, he smiled mischievously.
A few minutes later, he was at her bedroom door, doing one of the most dangerous things in the universe (well, two universes now): Waking up Rose Tyler up. The Doctor had learned a long time ago that this was very much Not A Good Idea, but now he didn't have a TARDIS kitchen to keep the food warm. To his surprise, he found her awake already, but that wasn't all she was...
"Uh, bre-breakfast, I made, omelette, ready..." Having stammered that, he closed the door and went back to the kitchen, the image of Rose's completely nude back seared into his mind.
When Rose came in five minutes later (fully dressed, the Doctor lamented), she couldn't help the smile that spread on her face when she saw her small table set up for breakfast. As she sat down, that smile turned into a full on grin, tongue peeking out and all, as she saw the letter magnets she'd bought for her little brother Tony to play with when he came to visit with their mum.
‘THIS IS GOING TO BE YOUR BEST YEAR YET’ was spelled out on the placemat. Rose looked up at the Doctor who was bringing her a cheese omelette and a bowl of cereal. She waited just long enough for him to set them down before standing back up and pinning him to the counter, snogging him breathless.
Year 4
Rose eyed the kitchen suspiciously as she heard low whispers coming from them. She hoped Tony and the Doctor wouldn't burn the house down. She didn't think even Pete would forgive the Doctor for that one. She bit her lip and reached up to tug the end of her hair, but brought her hand back down when she realized she couldn't. Instead she rubbed the end of the delicate head scarf Jackie had bought her, following its intricate pattern with her finger.
---
It had been an unforgivable winter in London last year. The Doctor surmised that it was because the cracks in the universe hadn’t finished healing yet. The Doctor and Rose had been walking home from a night out and they were running through the thick snow, laughing and holding hands the whole way to their flat. The rush of emotions going through the two of them gave them a wonderful high.
The Doctor had just proposed an hour ago, right in the middle of a chippy and Rose could not have imagined a more perfect setting. It’d only been a few months since they’d been ‘dropped off’ in Pete’s World and he’d declared that it was time they stopped dancing around on the matter. Rose wouldn’t have minded if they married or not. To her, the fact that she had her Doctor here was more than enough. Just as they reached their block, Rose’s grip on the Doctor’s hand suddenly slackened as she stumbled and she would have fallen to the ground had the half-human not caught her on time.
He’d gone into a complete panic, but retained enough thought to call 999. As soon as the ambulance had come and the paramedics had loaded Rose up, the Doctor jumped in and tried to stay out of the way even when everything in him wanted to push the professionals aside and do it all himself. For once, he was stuck. He could do nothing but let his eyes wander and observe everything that was being done. Once they arrived at Royal Hope Hospital, the Doctor was ordered to stay in a waiting room. After remembering himself, he called Pete and Jackie, then set about pacing back and forth.
The next day, Rose was released from Royal Hope’s care but she could not escape her Doctor’s worry. Pete, Jackie, and him practically ganged up on her and convinced her to let Torchwood’s doctors have a look. What they found was not good. It wasn’t anything the Torchwood doctors would have found peculiar during a routine examination. In fact, they might have seen it when she and the Doctor had their physicals done after saving the multiverse, but no one had thought anything of it. The Doctor, joyous to be with Rose, hadn’t thought to have a look at their results himself.
This time around, when the Doctor had a look, he could swear his single heart stopped beating.
“What’s wrong?” Rose asked, coming up behind him. She looked at the charts, but couldn’t make heads or tails of them. Human biology and electric engineering were two totally different subject matters. When the Doctor didn’t respond for a good ten minutes, she gripped his bicep. Rose let out a small, surprised sound when he suddenly whirled around, let the papers fall to the floor, and held her tight.
“I’ll figure this out, I will. I’ll find a way.”
---
The Doctor, whenever he wasn’t spending time with Rose, worked long hours, trying to find a cure, a more useful treatment. He was grateful when Pete gave him full access to everything he had at Torchwood, both human and alien tech. The Doctor knew that the man was also suffering from guilt, though there was nothing Pete Tyler could have done to stop Rose from trying to find him. Maybe if the Doctor had tried harder, he would have found that the universe was cracking around him and Rose wouldn’t have had to go through the void so much.
Rose, on the other hand, had withdrawn. She had spent all that time trying to find the Doctor and was now stuck in a world that was so different from hers with a Doctor she still wasn't quite sure was hers. The Doctor, distracted as he was, was trying to figure out a way to help her and he didn’t quite notice when Rose would look at him with doubtful eyes. The fact that she was dying didn’t help either. The Time Lord had always been so adamant in making sure their relationship didn’t go any further than friendship and he’d always suggested that it was because of her short life span. She didn’t quite understand why this Doctor wasn’t running away. Everything had been going so well, maybe too well, too perfect. She hadn’t felt this lost or afraid in a long time.
Jackie, as heartbroken as she was, noticed everyone so caught up in their own pain and doubts, and she couldn’t stand for it. She gathered the four of them up one day and firmly stated, “Alright, I know that this wasn’t what we had imagined when we finally found the Doctor and set the universes right, but this is our life now. Pete, you didn’t have to help Rose find the Doctor. You barely knew her, barely knew me really, and yet you trusted us enough to know that we were right and he was the only chance we had. Doctor, thank you for always taking care of my daughter, even now. I’ve always known you loved her, even as your big-eared, snarky self and I was always afraid you’d take her away from me and that I’d never see her again, but you brought her home to me time after time. You showed her that she was worth more than she ever knew, than I ever knew.”
That was hard for her to admit. Jackie had always wanted what was best for her daughter, of course, but the unknown dangers she faced with this alien man scared her. In the end, she knew that what Rose was doing was right. Now, she turned to face her daughter and told her this. “Rose, I am so proud of you. You have grown into such a strong woman. But it’s okay to be afraid. We're here for you.”
Rose cried and hugged her mum tight. After embracing Pete as well, the older pair left to give her and the Doctor some privacy. Wiping the leftover tears, Rose faced the man that had, by an accidental biological metacrisis, come into existence to spend the rest of his life with her. By unforeseen number of events, he would once again be unable to spend the rest of it with her. She wondered how much longer it would take for him to run away and was scared to ask, but ask she did. “How long are you gonna stay with me?”
The Doctor took both her hands in his and looked her straight in the eyes as he answered, “Forever,” before once again swearing to find a way for them to spend their lives together for as long as possible.
---
Unfortunately, even in Pete's World, no one had found the cure for cancer yet. Even if the Doctor had been able to jog his memory for a cure, it wouldn't have helped. What Rose had was something similar to cancer, but not quite.
“Basically, Rose traveled through the void without a capsule so much that her cells weren’t able to stabilize quickly enough after each jump. They’re deteriorating at rapid speed,” he’d explained to Jackie, Pete, and Rose when he’d had a look at the results.
Either way, they tried what treatments were currently available, including chemotherapy which the Doctor had always found just a bit barbaric, but it was the best treatment for whatever it was Rose had. Her body had gone through the void so many times that her cells weren't quite sure whether they were meant to stay or not, whether they existed or not, and were at war with one another. The chemo was supposed to stop the cells that were harming her more than helping, but it was no use. Rose wouldn't be able to hold out much longer.
Rose snapped out of her thoughts as she heard a knock on the door. She was about to stand to open it, but the Doctor was out the kitchen and in the hallway before she could put both feet on the floor. She eyed him when he came back in, her mum in tow, and he simply gave her his puppy-eyed look. Rose could never stay mad at him for long when he did that.
"Have a seat, Jackie; Tony and I are almost done."
The blonde woman looked around the flat. "I was surprised when I arrived and saw that the building was still standing." She raised a brow as the Doctor scowled at her.
A half an hour later, Jackie and Tony Tyler were out the door with a promise to visit again soon.
Once he locked the door, the Doctor made a beeline for Rose and helped her stand up to bring her into the kitchen to show her what he and Tony had been working on. Her eyes filled with unshed tears as she saw cookies cooling off on a cookie sheet on the table. They were molded into letters, coated in pink, yellow, and red icing, and spelled out ‘THIS IS GOING TO BE YOUR BEST YEAR YET’.
"Happy one year," the Doctor said.
She smiled, her eyes bright with unshed tears to match his own. The Doctor's fingers made their way to the knot of her scarf. Tugging it off, he placed gentle kisses on her head, a light fuzz just barely beginning to grow. They'd stopped treatment once the Doctor realized it wasn't doing anything to help; her cells were still deteriorating at way too fast a rate. Soon, Rose wouldn't need the scarf anymore. She'd decided she would keep her hair its natural brunette color once it'd grown a sufficient length - if she lasted long enough... Shaking her head to rid herself of negative thoughts, Rose grabbed the last ‘T’ and bit into it.
Year 5
The doctors didn't know how to explain the fact that Rose was still alive. She knew the Doctor, her Doctor, suspected something, but she wasn't sure what it was. All she knew was that it had something to do with the time she'd opened up the heart of the old TARDIS. After they'd decided to stop chemo last year, they were certain she wouldn't last very long, but when Rose demanded she help grow their new baby TARDIS as much as she could, he'd relented. The Doctor was astonished by how much brighter Rose became when she was simply around their seedling.
In the end, however, they had to admit that Rose couldn't hold out much longer. Just after they reached their second anniversary of being in Pete's World, she was put to twenty-four hour bed rest to wait for the inevitable to happen. It wasn't long before the dreaded day finally came. She'd refused to be wired up and so it was up to the Doctor to check her vitals every few hours and he hardly left her side anyways, so of course he was the first to notice when Rose's breathing altered significantly. He called for Jackie and Pete before joining Rose again.
When her parents arrived, the Doctor gave them a few moments with her. When Rose called for him, he was at her side in a flash. He didn't know what to say. Rose, on the other hand, did.
"Promise me, Doctor, promise me," Rose pleaded, holding his hand in a weak grip.
He shook his head, unable to make that promise. They'd discussed this a lot, late into the night when she couldn't sleep. Not once had he been able to agree with her. How could the Doctor live his life to the fullest without Rose Tyler in it? It was the one adventure he had never had, but one he had never wanted, had never considered, without her. "You can let go now," he whispered in her ear.
Rose looked up at him and knew she wouldn't have been able to extract the promise from him. All she wanted was his happiness, but how could she expect him to do what she herself would have been unable to do? Instead, she smiled at him and with her last breath, Rose uttered, "This is going to be your best year yet."
The Doctor didn't even bother to hide the tears that ran over his face. He heard Jackie let out a loud and painful sob as she realized her daughter, the woman she had raised all on her own, was gone.
The Doctor was alone.
Year 1
Rose Tyler gripped the Doctor's shoulders as they danced. Really, he was simply twirling her as she stood on his feet, but it was a sign of disrespect for a female's feet to touch the ground when dancing and so the Doctor simply spun around slowly so as not to throw them both off-kilter. It'd only been a few weeks since he'd proved to Rose he had the moves and he didn't want her attention...straying anywhere else.
Resting her head on his chest, something a stranger had once told her on New Year's of 2005 came to her mind; he'd said, "I bet you're going to have a really great year." Rose had no idea how the man had known, but it really had been.
"This has been my best year yet," Rose whispered into the Doctor's ear.
He stilled as he felt something in her timelines shift. Looking down at her confused expression, he shook his head and continued spinning them around. If the Doctor held her a little tighter, neither said a word and they simply basked in each other's presence.
Year 2
The Doctor found Rose in the library, lying down on ‘his’ couch. He stood at the end of it and watched her bring her feet up without looking up from her book. Sitting down, he ignored it as she brought her feet back down to lay on his lap and simply continued to look at her with his dark brown eyes.
Finally, Rose could take the staring no longer. Sighing, she put ‘Wuthering Heights’ down on her chest and gave him her full attention. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes when he brightened, but a small smirk made its way to her face. "Yes, Doctor?"
"Did you know it's been a year since you first began traveling with me?" the Doctor spoke slowly and carefully, as if speaking to a child.
Rose hadn't. Of course, she hardly knew how old she even was anymore. Shaking her head, her heart gave a little tug when his bright expression fell. Removing her feet from his lap, she placed a bookmark on the page she had left off in the book and stood up. "So, where are going?"
A full-blown grin spread across the Doctor's face. He grabbed her hand and dashed off to the console room. Pointing out at which buttons to press and what levers to flick, he turned back to her as they drove the TARDIS through the vortex and swore, "Just you wait, Rose Tyler; this is going to be your best year yet."