Aftermath
Aftermath, Ten/Rose, R (major angst, violence)
Rose understands more of the Doctor when jumping universes forces her to make some of the same choices. Very, very dark. I don't know where this came from. (Also, user tag please :) )
It was then she understood why the Doctor would look to the ground and run, instead of face his congregation in worship. Who can meet the eyes of those still alive and not be a conduit for guilt? , 1034 words
09.
I love him to hell and back and heaven and back, and have and do and will.
13.
A line of fire communicates, but drop
your weapons and drop your line,
consider the shortest distance from x
to y, let x be me, let y be you.
Rose Tyler was not a warrior, or a guardian, or a killer. And then, one day, long long ago and far far away, she was.
This wasn't even the first time.
Fire, firing, BAM and sound deaf in one ear, running running runrunrun feet into the mud slipping have to stand can't fall duck, cover, weave, zig zag harder to target, protect the child, protect him and find the Doctor before---
Her feet crunched into the snow now called San Francisco, and she tried to remember his smell instead of the frozen scent of death. This was her third jump to land her in a nuclear winter, and if the shots for the radiation sickness back at Torchwood didn't make her ill, the inevitability of man did.
War. Time Lords and Daleks and Humans and Kraxians and Atlans.
Rose threw up into the acrid snow, the bile clinging to her throat as she watched ash making love to the air, a broken dance of a broken city. It must have been irradiated soot that burned her eyes, because she didn't have tears left; it had been one year, two months and six days since she had wept.
One year, two months and six days since she clicked the Dimension Cannon 'on.'
With a bitter smile, she remembered the Doctor's fondness for little red buttons.
Some parts of her had learned to believe again. That the fairy tale began with a shop girl who loved chips and an older man. She let down her pretty blonde hair, and he fell in love with her; he took her travelling, made love to her in his magical box that granted wishes, and gave her forever and ever. There was joy, and roses for her birthday (because he could never resist making a cliche something more incredible), and she had been happy. She had been home.
The first time Rose fired her gun, four months and twelve days after pushing a little red button, in a reality that was as snowy and cold and bone chillingly quiet as this one, she watched her target die so slowly he could still talk to her before the end. She saw his blood, brighter than in movies, stain the white ground. It crept slowly, and touched her boot like a lover.
She missed his heart. She meant to kill him quickly, before he could fire on her team. Her hand shook so violently, she'd missed his damned heart.
"I don't want to go," he'd said. Something inside him gurgled.
She wanted to weep, but couldn't. Her dry eyes burned into the dark morning, mocking the teenage girl who wept at love stories. Instead, she told him he would be warm soon. They both would, and it would be okay. Because it had to be. She pressed her lips to his forehead and rocked him in her arms until he slept, and then she let his body grow cold in a shattered world that threatened to take her with it.
She couldn't meet the eyes of her team, even though she had saved them.
It was then she understood why the Doctor would look to the ground and run, instead of face his congregation in worship. Who can meet the eyes of those still alive and not be a conduit for guilt? Stand on soil made of decaying bones and pretend the battle matters in the face of so much death, and nothingness?
Rose knew why he had never let himself love her. She knew that he only saw Gallifrey in her devoted gaze, and the first time she killed a man, Rose knew the way she watched the Doctor broke him. She said forever, and he heard his people screaming as they died.
When she found him (when not if, she told her pounding heart) she told herself she would love him a little less, so he could heal. She would be there to hold his hand and run through markets like children, and she would be his guide of the stars, she would teach him magical things and take him on a journey where he could be safe, safe and warm for the first time since he lit his world on fire.
She didn't know who she was kidding.
Poking her booted toe into the snow below her, she tried to gauge how much of its contents were ash and how much water. More ash meant a more recent nuclear fallout, and a higher dosage of meds for radiation sickness. No one, least of all she, knew how long her cells would survive such a degree of mutation.
As she knelt in the snow and stared hard into the timer on the Cannon, she was grateful this world had no people left to see her.
"I want you safe, my Doctor," she whispered. Blinking up into the whimsically drifting ash, Rose sucked in poison air and let out the most primal sound to be torn from the throat of one alive, a sound on the brink of death and birth and spiritual ecstasy.
The Wolf inside did not howl back, and the Doctor did not ask her what book she wanted read to her that night, and her Mum didn't run her fingers through her hair after Jimmy Stone left her. The TARDIS did not hum, and not a single soul heard Rose Tyler in her moment of breaking.
One year, two months, and six days. She cried. She screamed and shoved her fists into the broken earth. She mocked the muffled twilight with her sound and tore at her Torchwood uniform until her fingers were raw and her throat ached. She pulled her hair and punched her knuckles into the evidence of war, and vowed to find him. She swore to the multiverse she would find her Doctor, because she had to, because he made her world alive with holding hands and with kisses made of fire and with terrible Elvis impersonations. He read to her, and held her, and ran with her.
She wanted to do the same for him.
She pushed the button.
Thirty two minutes after she found nothing but silence, Rose met Donna Noble.
Rose understands more of the Doctor when jumping universes forces her to make some of the same choices. Very, very dark. I don't know where this came from. (Also, user tag please :) )
It was then she understood why the Doctor would look to the ground and run, instead of face his congregation in worship. Who can meet the eyes of those still alive and not be a conduit for guilt? , 1034 words
09.
I love him to hell and back and heaven and back, and have and do and will.
13.
A line of fire communicates, but drop
your weapons and drop your line,
consider the shortest distance from x
to y, let x be me, let y be you.
Rose Tyler was not a warrior, or a guardian, or a killer. And then, one day, long long ago and far far away, she was.
This wasn't even the first time.
Fire, firing, BAM and sound deaf in one ear, running running runrunrun feet into the mud slipping have to stand can't fall duck, cover, weave, zig zag harder to target, protect the child, protect him and find the Doctor before---
Her feet crunched into the snow now called San Francisco, and she tried to remember his smell instead of the frozen scent of death. This was her third jump to land her in a nuclear winter, and if the shots for the radiation sickness back at Torchwood didn't make her ill, the inevitability of man did.
War. Time Lords and Daleks and Humans and Kraxians and Atlans.
Rose threw up into the acrid snow, the bile clinging to her throat as she watched ash making love to the air, a broken dance of a broken city. It must have been irradiated soot that burned her eyes, because she didn't have tears left; it had been one year, two months and six days since she had wept.
One year, two months and six days since she clicked the Dimension Cannon 'on.'
With a bitter smile, she remembered the Doctor's fondness for little red buttons.
Some parts of her had learned to believe again. That the fairy tale began with a shop girl who loved chips and an older man. She let down her pretty blonde hair, and he fell in love with her; he took her travelling, made love to her in his magical box that granted wishes, and gave her forever and ever. There was joy, and roses for her birthday (because he could never resist making a cliche something more incredible), and she had been happy. She had been home.
The first time Rose fired her gun, four months and twelve days after pushing a little red button, in a reality that was as snowy and cold and bone chillingly quiet as this one, she watched her target die so slowly he could still talk to her before the end. She saw his blood, brighter than in movies, stain the white ground. It crept slowly, and touched her boot like a lover.
She missed his heart. She meant to kill him quickly, before he could fire on her team. Her hand shook so violently, she'd missed his damned heart.
"I don't want to go," he'd said. Something inside him gurgled.
She wanted to weep, but couldn't. Her dry eyes burned into the dark morning, mocking the teenage girl who wept at love stories. Instead, she told him he would be warm soon. They both would, and it would be okay. Because it had to be. She pressed her lips to his forehead and rocked him in her arms until he slept, and then she let his body grow cold in a shattered world that threatened to take her with it.
She couldn't meet the eyes of her team, even though she had saved them.
It was then she understood why the Doctor would look to the ground and run, instead of face his congregation in worship. Who can meet the eyes of those still alive and not be a conduit for guilt? Stand on soil made of decaying bones and pretend the battle matters in the face of so much death, and nothingness?
Rose knew why he had never let himself love her. She knew that he only saw Gallifrey in her devoted gaze, and the first time she killed a man, Rose knew the way she watched the Doctor broke him. She said forever, and he heard his people screaming as they died.
When she found him (when not if, she told her pounding heart) she told herself she would love him a little less, so he could heal. She would be there to hold his hand and run through markets like children, and she would be his guide of the stars, she would teach him magical things and take him on a journey where he could be safe, safe and warm for the first time since he lit his world on fire.
She didn't know who she was kidding.
Poking her booted toe into the snow below her, she tried to gauge how much of its contents were ash and how much water. More ash meant a more recent nuclear fallout, and a higher dosage of meds for radiation sickness. No one, least of all she, knew how long her cells would survive such a degree of mutation.
As she knelt in the snow and stared hard into the timer on the Cannon, she was grateful this world had no people left to see her.
"I want you safe, my Doctor," she whispered. Blinking up into the whimsically drifting ash, Rose sucked in poison air and let out the most primal sound to be torn from the throat of one alive, a sound on the brink of death and birth and spiritual ecstasy.
The Wolf inside did not howl back, and the Doctor did not ask her what book she wanted read to her that night, and her Mum didn't run her fingers through her hair after Jimmy Stone left her. The TARDIS did not hum, and not a single soul heard Rose Tyler in her moment of breaking.
One year, two months, and six days. She cried. She screamed and shoved her fists into the broken earth. She mocked the muffled twilight with her sound and tore at her Torchwood uniform until her fingers were raw and her throat ached. She pulled her hair and punched her knuckles into the evidence of war, and vowed to find him. She swore to the multiverse she would find her Doctor, because she had to, because he made her world alive with holding hands and with kisses made of fire and with terrible Elvis impersonations. He read to her, and held her, and ran with her.
She wanted to do the same for him.
She pushed the button.
Thirty two minutes after she found nothing but silence, Rose met Donna Noble.