You're What?: Chapter Twenty-Six

[amberfocus]

A/N:  Massive thanks to amy067 for the handholding and the idea bouncing and the necessary distractions so my subconscious mind could get busy while I wasn't thinking and figure stuff out.  And the betaing, of course.  (((HUGS)))  A tiny bit of a spoiler for something near the end of season four, but not the finale stuff.

A Rose by Name Not Quite the Same

 

“What do you mean it’s me?  I’m standing right here,” Rose protested.

 

“Take a look for yourself,” he said.  She came around the console to stand beside him and peered at the monitor.  The woman standing there was definitely her.  Thinner, quite a bit thinner, and there was no sign of grown in roots, and her makeup was an awful lot lighter and she was older.  Maybe four or five years older.

 

“Pretty jacket.  Like the blue leather.  Future me again?” she asked.

 

“Must be.  But why would she be here now?”  He sounded worried.  “I mean…you and me, we’re good now.”  Then hesitantly he added, “Right?”

 

Rose caught hold of his hand.  “Yeah, course we are,” she reassured him.

 

“And anyway, she doesn’t look the same.  The older you, she was... worn out.  Used up.  This woman’s younger than that, tired, but not…  I don’t think she’s the same.” 

 

 “Who is she then?” Rose asked.  “What do you think she wants?”

 

“One way to find out,” he said.  “You better stay back.  And don’t touch her.  You know what happened when you touched yourself as a baby,” he warned.

 

“Won’t forget that in a hurry,” Rose muttered looking hurt.

 

“Rose, I didn’t mean…just don’t touch her, okay?”

 

“I won’t.”

 

The pounding came again and he strode to the door, flinging it open.  The other Rose practically fell inside the door and her expression of surprise quickly turned to one of shock.  “You?” she said.  “But how?”  She threw her arms around the Doctor.  “Thought I’d never see you again, not this you, not ever.”

 

“What do you mean?” Rose asked telling herself she would not feel jealous that another version of herself was hugging her husband.  “Not this him?  And what are you doing here?  Who are you?  I mean, you’re me, obviously, but…who are you?”

 

“How old are you?” the woman asked Rose from inside the Doctor’s arms, ignoring her question.

 

“Nineteen.”

 

“And the year?”

 

“It’s 2005.  You can stop hugging him now,” Rose said slightly petulantly.

 

The older woman disentangled herself from the Doctor and turned to look at Rose, really look at her, and she gasped.  “You’re pregnant!”

 

Rose reached forward and grabbed the Doctor’s hand and tugged him backwards away from the other her.  “Yeah, we are,” she said in annoyance.  “Married, too.  Aren’t…aren’t you?”

 

“What?  What the hell is going on, Doctor?  I was never pregnant and we were never like that.  Not me and this you.  Lost you too soon,” she said.  She turned back to Rose.  “Married?”

 

“You keep saying that.  Not this him?”

 

The Doctor had gone very pale.  “She’s talking about regeneration, Rose.”

 

Rose froze.  He’d talked about that with her, they’d discussed it in case it ever happened to Charlie, and she knew regeneration meant he’d have to die.  “What is going on?” Rose demanded.  “Doctor?”  Her hand tightened on his and he squeezed back reassuringly.

 

The older woman turned back to the Doctor.  “I’ve been to so many places.  I was so sure I’d finally...  There are no zeppelins in the sky; you’d be surprised how many skies have zeppelins when your own never did.  This one didn’t, but this isn’t my world either.  Not my reality.  He said…he said there couldn’t be another you.  Said the Time Lords only existed once and they were erased from every reality when the Time War was locked.  But I don’t think there is any other explanation.  You’re not my Doctor.  You have to be another one.”  She looked like she was about to cry.  “I came so far…” 

 

Rose ached to reach out and comfort the older version of herself.  Her loss was written large upon her face.  She’d made a step when she felt the Doctor’s hand tugging her back.  He shook his head at her with a stern look.

 

“I wasn’t going to touch,” Rose said.

 

The woman looked up at her and then she frowned.  “So.  Wrong universe.  It has to be.  That’s the problem with parallel realities.”  She broke off, looked thoughtfully into space.  “Unless someone turned left.”  She stood up and came towards them.  “Turn around,” she ordered.

 

“Don’t touch Rose,” the Doctor warned.

 

“I wasn’t planning on it,” the woman said.  “Learned my lesson long ago, when you were still in this body.  Don’t want Reapers, even here.  Just let me see, both of you, if there is something on your backs.”  They turned.  “Nothing,” she said.  “So it’s not you.”

 

“Not us, what?” young Rose asked.

 

“It wasn’t your decision,” she said cryptically.

 

“Did you stay with me?” the Doctor asked ignoring pronouns.  “After I changed?”

 

“Yeah,” she told him.  “You were still you.  Same memories, same…lots of things.  Just a different face, different body.”

 

“But you’re not with me now.”

 

The older Rose’s eyes filled with overwhelming sorrow.  “I got lost.  You couldn’t get to me.  I’ve only just figured out how to get back, only…I’m still lost.  There’re so many, many realities and I can’t…I can’t find the right one.”

 

“Hey, Doctor, I heard the pounding,” Jack said entering the console room.  “What’s…Rose?” he asked.  Both women turned to look at him.  He smiled slowly.  “You do not want to know what I’m thinking right now,” he said.

 

“Stop thinking it,” snarled the Doctor.  “She’s my wife.”

 

“Well, that one is,” Jack said indicating the younger Rose, “but as shocked as the other one looks, I don’t think she ever was.”

 

“Hello, Jack,” the older Rose said her voice breaking as she said the man’s name.  “Turn around.”  He did so immediately unsettled by her tone.

 

“There’s nothing.  Nothing at all on any of you.  And I know there’s nothing on me, either.  So not a trickster.  And this universe is running behind, a good three to six years,” mused the woman.  She was lost in thought for a moment then shook her head in amazement.  “A baby.  A marriage.  You’ve domesticated him.”

 

“I have not!” Rose said indignantly.

 

At the same time the Doctor said, “She has not!”

 

Older Rose held up both hands and smiled, a true Rose smile, sparkle hitting her eyes for the first time since she’d walked through the TARDIS doors.  “Okay, okay!”  It was clear she didn’t believe either of them.  “How’d mum take it?” she asked the younger Rose.

 

“Haven’t told her yet.  We were on the way.  Gonna do it today,” muttered Rose.

 

“How pregnant are you?” she asked.

 

“Five months.”

 

“Five months!  And you haven’t told Mum?”

 

“It’s only the end of the first trimester.  She still has ten months to go,” the Doctor said.

 

Older Rose turned and gave him a dark look.  “Fifteen months of pregnancy?”  She turned back to Rose.  “Let me guess, he didn’t tell you that before knocking you up?”

 

The Doctor interrupted.  “Look, I need to know what’s going on.  It’s obvious you’re Rose Tyler, but from when?  From where?  Why are you looking at our backs?  And what the hell are you doing here?”

 

“That’s a very long story,” the woman said.

 

“Time Lord, me.  I’ve got time.  Tell.”

 

“Look, I’m starving.  Can we move this to the kitchen?  I need to eat something.  Then I promise, I’ll tell you what I know.  Well, some of it.”

 

“All of it,” said the Doctor.

 

The woman looked at him with narrowed eyes.  “I’ll tell you what you need to know.”

 

Rose looked herself in the eyes.  “Enough so I don’t lose him?” she asked.

 

Older Rose swallowed hard then glanced over at the Doctor.  “There are rules, Rose,” she told herself.

 

“I know them as well as you do,” Rose told the older woman.  “I also know,” she glanced over at the Doctor, “that if it’s important enough we’ll break them.  Tell us.”

 

The other woman was silent for a long time then finally gave a curt nod.  “Okay.”  She strode from the console room and found the kitchen with no difficulty.  The TARDIS was being cooperative today.  The older Rose rummaged around in the fridge and then made herself a sandwich.  She ate quickly as three sets of eyes watched her.  Then she began to talk.

 

 

 

 

Rose, young Rose, was reeling at the information that her older counterpart had revealed.  She had run from the room at the end, not being able to stand the other woman’s pain and thinking that all of those things still might happen to her.  She could lose him.  Her Doctor.  Lose everything they had, everything they’d managed to achieve in their relationship, to Daleks.  And her baby.  She could lose Charlie to Daleks.

 

Oh, no.  Was this why the other future Rose had never heard from him when she called when Charlie and Jack were hurt?  Because he’d gone to that game station alone and there’d been no Rose to come save him?  He couldn’t have come if he’d died.  And he would have from the results of an unrefined delta wave.  She pressed a hand to her aching heart.  The other Rose had ripped open the heart of the TARDIS with a rescue and recovery truck when she’d been sent away just to get back to the Doctor and nearly died for him, and then he had died for her, and they weren’t even married.  They weren’t even sexual partners.  Was she that brave?  Could she do that?  Would she?

 

Yes.  She knew she would.  But in the future the Doctor had already altered, she hadn’t been able to, because he’d sent her and Jack away before that happened.  She hadn’t…and her Doctor had died, fully died without regenerating, this man she loved so furiously.  Because she knew now with the way that he had proven he loved her so much it was the only reason he wouldn’t have come.

 

And Daleks?  She’d seen how the Doctor had reacted to that one lone survivor in Utah.  It hadn’t been…well, it had been the only time he’d ever scared her, made her afraid of him.  He’d been mad from his rage and fear and loathing.  The idea of more Daleks scared her.  Not because of what they were, but because of what they did to him.  The change had been so frightening.

 

She hadn’t acted scared at the time when she’d stood him down in that bunker.  She’d been afraid for herself as he had pointed a gun at her when she stood between him and the creature.  But she hadn’t shown it.  She’d talked him down, and he’d listened to her, truly listened to her and found a better way.  And they’d both thought as they watched the Dalek blow itself up, illuminated by that single shaft of sunlight, that it was over.

 

Rose arrived at her room and threw herself down on the bed, staring up at the ceiling.  Her mind moved on to what the other Rose had told her, about how the Doctor had changed, turned into some pretty boy that…well, she didn’t care how gorgeous the other Rose said he’d become, she liked the unconventional handsomeness of her Doctor, his dark, intense sexiness, his ruggedness, the lovely contrast of wool and leather and denim.  And he became a bouncy looker in a suit, a suit of all things, and a tie!  How could that ever be okay?

 

Oh, she’d love him if it happened to her Doctor.  He’d still be him, but…oh!  Her Doctor was what she wanted.  She loved him the way he was, thought he was just right.  More than all right.  And…and…she’d find a way to cope.  But she didn’t want to have to.

 

The story had only gotten worse from there.  The other Rose had told again of Daleks and of something called Cybermen.  She’d seen a helmet of one in that same underground extra-terrestrial museum bunker place in Utah where the Dalek had been.  But that empty mask did no justice to the tale the older Rose told of them.  And she’d told of the loss, the separation, the good-bye she’d gone through after that last war against the alien machines.  And how she’d fought like crazy to find a way back.  And how she nearly had.

 

Rose ached for the pain of her other self, for the possible future that might lie in store for herself as well.  But she ached even more for the idea that her Doctor could end up all alone again.  No Rose.  No Charlie.  No Jack.  And in the horror of everything she’d been told her Doctor, alone, still seemed like the worst possible outcome to her.

 

 

 

“I think I can help you,” the Doctor told the older Rose.  “I think I can give you the right coordinates for this dimension cannon of yours and help you get back to your rightful universe.”

 

“Isn’t that interfering?  Against all the rules?” Rose asked him.  There was a bit of bitterness in the woman’s voice.

 

“Rose, you don’t even know how many rules I’ve tossed aside to be with my Rose and create my unborn son.  I’ve already bent time once to keep the future from having a horrible outcome.  I’m not above doing it again.  For me or for you,” he said gruffly.  “I’m not your Doctor.  I’m a Doctor.  And I want…”  He stopped and looked down, blushing a little and too embarrassed to continue.

 

Her hand came out and settled on top of his.  “You want what, Doctor?” she asked softly, encouragingly.

 

“I want a happy ending.  Not just for me.  For you,” he said gruffly.

 

“I always knew you were a romantic at heart,” she said.

 

“Take that back,” he said, but his heart wasn’t in it.  His smile as he looked at her told her he didn’t really mean it.

 

“It’s so weird, seeing this face again,” she told him.  Her free hand reached out and touched him gently before withdrawing.  “I loved this face.  Loved this man.  Not you, of course, but mine.”

 

“I know,” he told her.  “And I’m sure he knew, too.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“You did okay, when he changed?  I mean, you still loved him?  I mean, I know you weren’t lovers, but…I just…Rose and me, my Rose…I want to know she’ll be okay if it happens to me,” he said.

 

“She’ll be okay.  It’ll take some time.  Just do me a favor.  Tell her there have been other companions before me, because if you don’t and she finds out, it’s gonna hurt her.  And don’t…don’t leave her behind on a 51^st century space ship to rescue Madame de Pompadour without letting her know that you’re coming back, that you’ll always find a way back,” Rose advised.

 

“What?”

 

“Long story.”  She shook her head.  “Hardly matters now, I suppose, but it did then, to a young me.” She sighed then met his eyes.  “And if you love her, say the words.”

 

“I always say the words.”

 

“Then she’s lucky.”

 

“I’m so sorry, Rose, for what he did to you and what he didn’t do.”  Why he felt the need to apologize he didn’t know, but it seemed to help the girl in front of him.  “I’ve no doubt from what you’ve said he loves you.”

 

“Oh, I know he does.  I wouldn’t have fought so hard to get back to him if he hadn’t.  But sometimes, well sometimes a girl just wants to hear the words,” Rose said.  She let go of his hand.  “Are you going to change your future?  The game station, I mean, if it comes here?” she asked.

 

“Yes,” he said.  “I’ll be prepared.  I know a way.”

 

“Good,” she said.  She smiled.  “Now about helping me.”

 

He nodded.  “Yes.”  He looked over at the uncharacteristically silent Jack.  “Let’s get to work.”

Ch. 27:  http://amberfocus.livejournal.com/116709.html

Comments

[skyblue-0608.livejournal.com]

I LOVED IT!!!!!! This is what I was thinking when I started reading the story, specially since based on the show, one small decision can change everything. I LOVED IT. In a parallel universe, Rose and the Doctor are together, well, that's true anyway xD. But, I mean, really together!!! I LOVE IT!!! I AM ecstatic !!!! (sorry xd).

[amberfocus.livejournal.com]

Thank you.