Cuore Serrato Part Three
Right! Finally posting this. People seemd to be waiting for the Doctor's POV, so here you go! Enjoy.
Oh, yeah, and Cuore Serrato is Italian. It means "Locked heart". At leaset, according to my choir techer it does. Just in case anyone wanted to know.
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Story Title: Cuore Serrato
Chapter Title: Confrontation (3 of 4)
Author: SuperherogirlCat
Rating: PG-13 (for language)
Category: Drama/Angst
Characters: Ten/Rose, Mickey
Summary: Mickey confronts the Doctor. Doctor’s POV.
Spoilers: GitF
Disclaimer: Well, see, I was in Vegas at this really high-class casino playing Texas Hold-'em, and I was doing all right, then this BBC exec came in and he was really good likewoah, and then the rights to Doctor Who were in the pot, and it was down to him and me; everyone else had folded. I was pretty confident, what with my pair of aces and all, but he pulled my win right out from under me with a royal flush. And that's how come I don't own Doctor Who.
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The TARDIS’s humming has a different tone than usual. It sounds almost accusatory. Or maybe it’s just the Doctor’s imagination. In any case, he steadfastly ignores it, on his back under the TARDIS console, busily opening panels and replacing parts, keeping his mind off of…things.
He hears someone walk into the console room and knows who it is by the heavy sound of the footsteps.
“Now’s not the best time, Mickey.” He says shortly. “I’m a bit busy.”
“Tough.” Mickey’s voice is hard, clipped, and angry.
The Doctor peers out from beneath the console, frowning. Mickey is standing there, looking quite angry, angrier than the Doctor’s ever seen him, angry enough to face down the Doctor.
He has more of a spine than the Doctor gave him credit for.
“I said I’m busy.” He reiterated, grabbing the sonic screwdriver from a pile of tools next to him.
“I don’t give a damn if you’re busy.” Mickey spits out. “What the hell did you do to Rose?”
“I didn’t do anything to Rose!” The Doctor picks himself up and gives his companion his best glare. What happened between him and Rose was a) not his fault, and b) none of Mickey’s business. He’s a nine-hundred-year-old Time Lord, and he’ll be damned if he’s going to be browbeaten by the likes of Mickey Smith.
Mickey, however, doesn’t back down.
“Don’t give me that, Doctor. I just talked to her and she’s really upset!”
“That’s not my problem.” The Doctor turns coldly away. If Rose is upset, it’s no fault of his. She was the one who…hang on, Mickey was still talking.
“Of course it’s not your problem. It’s never your problem, is it, Doctor? ‘Cos you don’t really give a damn what happens to her, do you!?”
The Doctor swings around to face his Companion, eyes blazing. Mickey takes an involuntary step back.
“How dare you?” The Doctor hisses, furious. “How dare you say that? I died for her, Mickey!”
Mickey looks a little sorry he said that last part, but he’s apparently not ready to back down.
“Yeah, well you were real quick to leave her behind for some French aristocrat! How the hell d’you think that made her feel?”
“So I was supposed to let Reinette die? I was supposed to let those clockwork robots rewrite the timeline? I don’t know how good you are at history, Mickey, but Madame du Pompadour did not die when she was thirty-seven because a lot of clockwork robots invaded Versailles to steal her brain! She was just a bystander, involved in things she couldn’t begin to understand, and I wasn’t about to let her die.”
“Why not? You left me and Rose to die! What, did you think we’d just figure the TARDIS out eventually or something?”
“As much as I want to, Mickey, I can’t put you and Rose before everything!” He shouts. “I’m not some fairytale prince!”
“You were sure acting like one, with the white-horse stunt an’ all!” Mickey snarls.
“I was saving the timeline!” He snarls right back.
“Well you could have taken her with you!” Mickey shouts.
That stops him.
Mickey’s right. He could have grabbed Rose, taken her with him. But he hadn’t. Ogh, god, why hadn’t he?
“How could you do that, Doctor?” Mickey was saying. “Rose almost died for you! How could you leave her for a woman you’ve only known for a few hours?”
“Reinette saw into my mind.” He murmurs quietly, after a long pause. “She knew everything about me, what I’ve seen, what I’ve done…”
“So why can’t you show all that to Rose?” Mickey demands.
Because she’ll hate me, the Doctor thinks. She’ll know everything I am and everything I’ve done and she’ll hate me. She’ll leave me.
He’s tired of people he loves leaving him. And it’s easier to just leave first.
But he doesn’t say any of that, just stares past Mickey, completely silent.
Finally, Mickey gives up.
“Fine. Do whatever you want. You don’t deserve her anyway.
“And you do?” The barb slips out before the Doctor can stop it.
Mickey pauses, swallows hard.
“Rose deserves to be happy.” He says at last, and there’s something like defeat in his tone. “She deserves to be with someone she loves. She doesn’t love me. She loves you. And if you’re too stupid to love her back, if you can love someone else more than her…you really don’t deserve her.”
Then Mickey walks quietly off and the Doctor stands motionless for a long time, thinking.
Had he really loved Reinette? Yes. Yes, he thought, he had. She had looked into his mind and seen everything. Everything about him, and she’d accepted him. He had loved her for that.
But Rose…
Rose revived him when he thought he’d spend the rest of his life as a bitter shell of the man he used to be. Rose had risked her life for him even after she’d seen how ruthless, how cold-blooded he could be. She’d even healed him a little bit, and that’s something he thought would never happen.
Rose, who was his anchor, who kept him connected to the part of himself that was still capable of love. Rose kept the darkness from taking over.
And he had hurt her.
He had let her make love to him, thinking like an idiot that she’d been trying to make him feel better, when what she’d really been trying to do was feel needed, wanted. She was trying to keep him close because she was afraid he’d leave her again.
Oh god, he thinks, he really is thick.
“Damn it.” He mutters aloud, walking quickly out of the Console room. He’ll find her. He’ll find her, and he’ll make this right. He won’t let it end like this.
The TARDIS’s humming has changed again. Now it sounds encouraging.
Or maybe it’s just his imagination.
Part One
Part Two