Wolf Moon: Chapter Forty-Five

[amberfocus]

Banner Courtesy of angelfireeast
A/N:  Not the last chapter but we are close.  Maybe two more to go, maybe one.  It depends on how it writes out.  One paragraph of drive-by smut but that's all in this chappie.  And I wanted to showcase another one of the banners angelfireeast made for me.  This one is slightly different than the one I've been using the majority of the time.  A different image of Nine and a slightly different background.  Thought I'd bring it out for an airing just so you could see all the hard work she did for me. *smiles*

Time War Tale Told

 

Rose rested with her head against his chest, sprawled sideways on the bed, her head tilted towards him so she could see his face as he talked.  The Doctor played idly with the fingers of her right hand and his left hand was buried in her hair, stroking it from time to time.  “Backwards and forwards in time,” he said in a low voice.  “So many times, so many places, trying to save what couldn’t be saved and watching it all go to hell and burn.  For thirty years I tried to stop each little breach in our defenses.  There were so few of us willing to fight.  Only the rebels, the outcasts and the renegades…and Romana, though she did most of her fighting in the senate.  The others refused to bestir themselves thinking Time Lord might and brain power had to win in the end.  It always had.  When they realized we were going to lose the war and finally decided to make the effort, it was too late.”

 

He sighed and she shifted enough to reach up and stroke his face with her free hand.  He kissed her palm.  “The breaches got larger every time and whole planets would disappear like they’d never existed.  Wiped from time and space and the memories of most of the universes.”

 

Emotion came thickly into his voice.  “Even the criminals were willing to try to save our planet and our people before the senate was,” he told her.  “I worked with old enemies and old friends.  Some who had been both.  The Master, I told you about him, my best friend as a young boy and as a young man, and I almost succeeded in stopping the Daleks cold, but something went wrong.  I still don’t know what.  I felt his mind when it winked out of existence.  I felt them all as they winked out of existence.  But his mind…oh, it was almost as brilliant as mine.  It should have shone more brightly than the others.  And I’d thought before the Time War started that he was dead.  Finding out he wasn’t, it was the strangest thing, but I should have known.  He’d kept his mind hidden in all the babble of Time Lord minds.”

 

He bit his lip and Rose stroked his face until he started talking again.  “I had hoped I was wrong when I felt him wink out.  He’d gone on a daredevil mission to the ends of the known universe, so far forwards in time.  He was almost successful, but then he was falling, falling, spinning so deeply into nothing.  He cried out for me.  I heard his death cry.  I felt him go…felt his TARDIS when she exploded.  Yet I still sought him.  And when most of the Time Lords were erased and the babble of minds was gone from my head, and there only remained a few to make the last stand, I knew for sure.  He couldn’t hide his mind in the thoughts of only the seven of us left alive.”

 

Rose felt moisture under her fingertips and realized the Doctor was leaking tears from his eyes.  “The last…”  He stopped, took in a deep breath, met her eyes and began again.  “The last plan involved using Gallifrey as bait.  The Daleks wanted our technology badly and we let down the protective barriers to let them through.  Many of them we were able to trap inside a temporal chamber that was sent hurtling into the heart of our sun.  From what you told me, it never made it there.  It was what you dealt with right before you lost the other me; the Genesis ark.  For the others, there was the Delta Wave.”

 

Rose hissed out a breath of air.  “Like in your first Doctor’s circumstances there was no time to refine it.  We knew it meant a death sentence for the last few survivors, but we were all willing to die if it meant wiping the Daleks from reality forever.  That’s when Romana came to me with her plan.  She told me one of us could survive and she’d picked me because she thought I’d have no qualms about mating with a human if it were necessary for survival of our race.  The others and even Romana, who had seen so much, were somewhat to completely xenophobic.  They’d rather die on the suicide mission than mate with a human.  It had to be me.”

 

He paused again and shuddered and Rose leaned up and kissed his jaw.  She felt his hand tighten in hers and his fingers, which had stilled in her hair, began to move again.  “Romana and I took the temporal/spacial force field that had protected Gallifrey and we installed it in her TARDIS.  Then we coupled her ship to mine and sent me to the edge of the battle space.  I used the Delta Wave just as the Daleks made rubble of Gallifrey.

 

“The force field was strong enough to protect me from most of the damage, but it forced my regeneration into this form and the power left in the field was enough to generate the disjunction.  When I woke up, my TARDIS was gone, and I was here in this universe with Romana’s TARDIS and no hope, because I couldn’t remember that I was waiting for you.  Couldn’t remember much of anything for a long time.  Some of it started coming back after meeting you.  Not sure all of it has, though I seem to remember more every day.  Seems like there is so much more still locked up in my brain waiting to come out.”

 

Rose nodded against his chest.  “There could be,” she said.  “I think there’s more in my head that the Bad Wolf has not yet revealed.”

 

“I’m sure of it,” he told her.

 

“The temporal/spacial force field…is that what you used to generate the field that kept us safe from the drayguins when we spoke with them?” she asked.

 

“What’s left of it, yeah.  It’s not that powerful anymore.  It seems like I should be able to fix it, the knowledge is in my brain, but when I try to look at it head on it slips away.  Not that there’s a planet to put it around if I could fix it, anyway.  Gallifrey is gone forever.  No need for a temporal/spacial force field.”

 

“I’m sorry,” she said.  “I’m so sorry for everything that you’ve lost.  I’m sorry that you’ve had to live alone with the loss for the past ten years.  I’m so sorry.”

 

“I got used to living alone.  No companions on board for the thirty years of the Time War, only the occasional meet up with the few other soldier Time Lords like me.”

 

“Yeah, but these last ten years, living alone with no one else in your head.  That can’t have been easy,” she told him.

 

“I have you in there now. It helps make it easier.  And when our children come, they’ll help to fill the other empty spaces.”  His hand crept down to her belly.  “I wish we didn’t have to wait so long for your DNA to change.”

 

Rose sighed.  “I think it’s just as well, Doctor.  This Quest has a long way to go and it’s going to be dangerous sometimes, I’m sure.  I don’t want to risk the lives of any of our future children.  You’ve lost too much.  I can’t bear to see you lose a child.  Nor could I bear to lose your child.”

 

“Amazing what you can bear if you have to and still go on,” he told her.  “I did lose all of my children, all of their children, in the war.”  His voice broke on the last word and suddenly it was too much for the Doctor and he was quietly crying.

 

“I’m sorry,” Rose told him over and over again.  “I’m so sorry.”  His body shuddered and she moved around to hold him tightly and she didn’t know what else she could do to comfort him until he was rolling her onto her back desperately and with gentle understanding she opened her legs for him.  He pushed himself into her body, burying his grief within her and making love to her frantically as the tears fell from his eyes.   She clutched at him as he drove to completion and when he collapsed exhausted against her afterwards she held him tightly in her arms until he faded into sleep.

 

 

 

“I’m sorry,” he apologized to her when he woke to find her still holding him an hour later and calmly watching his face.  “I shouldn’t have used you like that.”

 

She smiled serenely up at him.  “Yes, you should have,” she said.  “And it wasn’t using.  It was seeking comfort and I wanted to give it to you.  Did it help?”

 

He nodded softly at her.  “Still should have asked.”

 

“I would have offered if I’d known it would help,” she told him with a soft smile. 

 

“And I didn’t even…I mean, you didn’t even get to…I just…took you for what I needed,” he said.

 

“It’s okay, Doctor.  Don’t beat yourself up over it.”

 

“Theta,” he said.

 

“What?”

 

“Theta,” he repeated.  “My name is Theta, Rose.  I prefer Doctor, but my name is Theta.  I want you to know it.”  He looked at her almost shyly.

 

“Theta?”

 

“My people weren’t the most imaginative lot, especially my house,” he told her.

 

“Theta?” she repeated, still stuck on the name.

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Is that all there is to it?  Just Theta?” she wanted to know.

 

“No.  It’s Theta Sigma…well…”

 

“Theta Sigma Well?” she asked.

 

“No.  Theta Sigma…Lungbarrow,” he admitted.

 

She sat up and stared at him.  “Thank you for telling me your name, Doctor.  It means a lot to me, honestly it does, but if it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll keep the name Tyler when we wed on Earth.”

 

He smiled.  “Would you mind terribly much if for use while on Earth, I took Tyler as well?” he asked.

 

She stared at him in wonder.  “You’re not mad?”

 

“Mad?  I hate my name.  Why do you think I don’t use it?  Wished my whole life I’d been born into Romana’s house.  Her name at least had some imagination to it.  Romanadvoratrelundar.  Rolls right off the tongue.  Not like…Lungbarrow.”

 

“Do you want me to call you Theta?” she asked him.

 

“No, nothing like that.  Just wanted you to know.  If you have to call me a name, and I’m assuming on Earth there will be times when you do, John is preferable.  I’ve always gone by John, usually Smith.  Suppose when we marry that’s what I’ll use and then I’ll be John Tyler.”

 

“Or John Tyler-Smith,” Rose suggested.  “John and Rose Tyler-Smith.  I do like the way that sounds.  Though people might think I went and married Mickey.”  She frowned.

 

“I’m not attached to Smith,” he told her.

 

“No, didn’t figure you were, but I kind of like it.  I’ll just make it very clear to anyone who asks that I’m married to John Smith.  Besides, Tyler-Smith will differentiate me from my mum.  Don’t really want three Mrs. Tylers running around my family.  Mum and Pete’s mum are enough,” Rose said.  “Though I don’t suppose we’ll be spending much time on Earth anyway, what with the Quest and all.”

 

“We’ll need to go back for the wedding.”

 

“And for planning it,” Rose mused.  “Takes some time to plan a wedding.  Though all I really care about can be managed quickly.  Mum has gotten rather good at planning large events and I’m sure she’ll do just fine with the occasional look-in.”

 

“You’ll want to go back when the children are born, too, I imagine.  Let your mum see the babies as they grow up, as well,” he told her.

 

“You wouldn’t mind?”

 

“She’s your family, Rose.  Family, it’s so important.  You realize that when you don’t have any left and then suddenly,” he stroked her hair, “you do again.  You’re my family now, Rose.  Which makes your mum my family, too.”

 

“You may want to hold off on that thought until you meet her.”

 

“Why?”

 

“She slapped the daylights out of the first version of you she met,” she told him.

 

His eyes widened.  “What?  You didn’t mention that before.  Why’d she do that?”

 

“Well, he’d meant to bring me back after twelve hours to get some more of my things and for me to say good-bye to my mum,” Rose told him.  “He got the time a little off.”

 

“A little?  How far?” he asked furrowing his brow as he remembered just how inaccurate his old ship could be sometimes.

 

“Twelve months,” Rose admitted.

 

“Twelve months?  And he didn’t check before letting you out of the TARDIS?” the Doctor demanded.

 

“Nope,” Rose said with a weary smile.  “Didn’t think to question him at all.  Mum freaked when she saw me, didn’t care for his explanation of where we’d been, made some nasty accusations and then walloped him a good one.”

 

“I’d say if he sent you back to your mum off by a year than he probably deserved a good slap,” he said.

 

“Wait until you’re on the receiving end of it and then tell me that,” Rose said.

 

“You don’t think she would?” he asked.  “I mean, I’m not him and we’ll make that clear from the start.”

 

Rose frowned.  “Well…I don’t know.  If she thinks you’re him, it might be easier.  Telling her I just ran off with some version of him I didn’t even know and we’re…well, like we are, Gallifreyan married and Earth engaged and all, she’ll think I’ve gone off my nut.”

 

“Time machine,” he said.  “She doesn’t know how long we’ve been gone for.”

 

“But…she’ll still know I ran off with a perfect stranger,” she said.

 

“I’m hardly perfect, Rose,” he said with a silly grin.

 

She smiled at him and rolled her eyes.  “You know what I mean.  I don’t want my mother thinking I just threw myself into your bed first thing.”

 

“Even though you pretty much did?” he asked with a chuckle.

 

“Not helping, Doctor,” Rose said.  “I think it’d be easier to let her think you’re him and you’ve regenerated again and managed to retain your old form.”

 

“Rose, that’s going to make things mighty complicated.  How are you going to explain the TARDIS being different?” the Doctor asked.  “She’s not stuck in the shape of a police box, after all.”

 

“I could ask her to take on that form,” Rose mused.

 

“She’d probably do it, too, for you,” he said.  “But Rose, I don’t think lying to your mum is the best way to get off on the right foot with her.”

 

Rose bit her lip.  “We’ll have to see.  She came around to liking the second version of you, but I’m not sure she’ll respond too well to the first, unless she thinks you’re a better version of him.”

 

Further conversation was broken off by the sound of the materialization circuit engaging.  They felt a gentle thrum thump and then the TARDIS bumped lightly against the ground.  They had landed.  It was time to take the egg back to Ambigere.

Chapter 46:  http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/27225.html

Comments

[dragonmom64.livejournal.com]

So many good things in this chapter! The telling of the Time War...I don't know about anybody else, but I seem to learn a bit more about that every time I read about it...like the Genesis Ark...didn't really catch that in TPoTW. And...Theta! Squee! I must be an oddball, cause I DO like it...although I'll take a pass on Lungbarrow....
Not sure how the whole Jackie thing will play out...cause to her, how can Rose be with Nine again?
More, more!

[amberfocus.livejournal.com]

I don't think the Genesis Ark is mentioned in TPoTW. I'm just extrapololating based on Doomsday and filling in back story from there. Well, Jackie is Rose's mother. They share DNA. And Rose's DNA is seriously attracted to this Nine... *grins* There may be a bit of a biological problem...nowhere near the reaction Rose has...but still. I don't think lying is going to be the issue.