for doctorsplusone: A What-if for RS Verse (AU)

[rude_not_ginger]

It had been twenty years.

Twenty years since they first landed in London with the communicators. Twenty years since he'd re-met his Rose. Twenty years since he'd entered this universe.

And no escape. Not yet. Oh, there was a brief reprise, five years earlier, when he'd taken one last trip back to France. But other than that, it was London. London all the time. Traveling to find clues to figure out how to save the universe, but the universe wasn't having any of that saving business.

And there he was. In London. In his silver-tree-shaped TARDIS. Alone.

Reinette had died. Five years earlier. Lived much longer than they'd expected, and as she started to wither, he and Louis took her back to France, to die in the palace. Where she wasn't supposed to die, of course. Being a non-noble. But she was loved by a King and a lonely God. That was enough of a title for them. Louis stayed in France to tend to her. To make sure her grave was not lost in their universe as it was in the one the Doctor returned to.

Suzie left far earlier. Found her own calling or some such nonsense. Or maybe she was simply tired of the domestics. Now, he was simply alone. He'd gotten used to it, by now. It had become the norm these last five years as dressing in French silks had become the norm in the three years he spent in France before coming here.

He sat in a chair outside the TARDIS, looking over new information. The neverending war against the cosmic apocalypse that seemed to never come. The sonic screwdriver twirled in one hand. A gift from Reinette to the Doctor many, many years earlier. Helped made by Ted. How long had he blamed Ted for Reinette's death? Too long, he decided.

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[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

"That shit will make you go blind," Rose gestured to the bottle. She picked it up and put it back into the cupboard, murmuring to the TARDIS to 'just lose it, there's a girl'. She was not one to really condemn another's vices, but really...

"Just a hair over five years," she told him, self-consciously tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. She'd not aged much, due to, she assumed, the TARDIS mucking about with her the last time she'd been here. Bad Wolf and all that.

She'd known coming home wouldn't be easy, but she'd really not expected to find him so dead inside that she didn't even warrant a hug.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"Timey-wimey, wibbly-wobbly," he murmured to himself, taking a sip of his tea. It burned a bit going down.

"Universe still isn't saved," he said. "Not quite sure what I haven't done or have done...but it's still not saved. Still getting new people in every week or so. Half this universe must be made up of people from other universes trying to help, by this rate."

He turned and looked at her. Really looked at her. Rose. She looked almost exactly how he remembered her. Oh, a touch different here and there, but still Rose.

"Never expected you to come back." That wasn't that he didn't expect to see her again (he knew he would, at some point), he just didn't expect her to return here willingly.

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

"Well, here I am." She didn't have a reply to that, only the reality of her presence -- she'd known she had to go back, to see him, to be there now that he had no one -- and a shrug.

"I'm all he's got," she'd said once, long long ago and now, all over again, it was sort of true.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

In one move, he stood and stepped over to her. He reached out a hand to touch her face. She felt real.

"Why did you come?"

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

Rose swallowed hard. There was still so much power to move her in that simple touch. No wonder she'd run...

"I came home, cos it was time. Because I thought --"

I thought you'd need me.

His hand on her face, close enough to almost connect. She knew he'd hear her thoughts. Because I couldn't stay away forever.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"Thought you had a life of your own," he replied. He didn't want her to hear what he was thinking. Too many years of getting older, getting meaner. He thought about pulling away. Instead, he pressed his forehead to hers.

"I missed you."

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

"Missed you, too." She stayed close, tucking a strand of his longish hair behind his ear. It felt good, to be this close to him, even after all this time. "And jus' 'cos I've got a life of my own, doesn't mean I can't be a part of yours, sometimes, too."

Rose brushed the faintest whisper of a kiss to his lips, an almost chaste acknowledgment of his presence.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

He swallowed and closed his eyes.

She felt really there. Even the brush of her lips against his felt exactly how he remembered. If it wasn't delirium---and the more they stood together, the less he believed it was---he was going to feel ridiculously embarrassed for his actions in front of her.

"I wish---"

He wished she hadn't gone in the first place. That he'd have had her with him during...but that was so very selfish.

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

"What do you wish, Doctor?" She gently tipped out the alcohol-laced tea while she had his entire attention, keeping him focused on her face , her presence and her closeness.
"I'm home now."

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

He opened his mouth to tell her. Tell her what he wanted, how he wished she'd stay---

He pulled back. It had been a long time since he'd been so close to anyone that being cold had become easy. He could just pull back.

What had happened to his tea? He must've drank it all.

"Five years for you and twenty for me. Heh, our whole lives are passing without each other, Rose. Need to stop doing that, I think."

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, we really should, shouldn't we?" Big, game grin and she sat back in her chair with a soft laugh. "Some things get to be bad habits, don't they?"

Nonetheless: twenty. It took her breath away.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"What happened to Jamie?" he asked.

He poured himself another cup of tea but abstained from the alcohol. The TARDIS in his mind blocked where he'd put it anyway. Bloody machine.

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

"I'm really not looking to get into that," Rose admitted, holding up her hands.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"That's all right, because I don't really care. It was either that or talking about you and Thete or maybe our feelings. Which I don't really want to get into."

He did care. It sounded better when he said he didn't. He cared because Jamie was the one that she left her life here for.

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

"Oh, still a recreational bastard, then?" She gave him a look over the rim of her cup. "Thete's doing well, I assume? 'Spect I'd have heard otherwise. And, fuck, god forbid we get into feelings. Complicates many a good relationship if you get into that feelings bollocks."

She was paraphrasing Jack and the devil-may-care grin she flashed was vintage Harkness. But she didn't expect him to notice.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"Well, I'm a widower, now. Not much else to do but take it into a full-time basis," the Doctor replied just as easily.

"He married. Bloody annoying ginger woman named Donna. Eventually died. Regenerated into a slightly less excitable version of my other self. And yes, feelings are rather irritating."

He failed to notice that the grin was Harkness-vintage, but instead noticed that it wasn't classic-Rose.

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

"As long as he's alright."

She'd met Donna, and found she wasn't shocked by their apparently deepened relationship. Good for Thete -- he'd always seemed the marrying type. She herself had shied away from the idea of being "Mrs. The Doctor" with an excuse of respecting Gallifreyan tradtion. Truth was, she'd have had no idea what to do with a Doctor as a bloody husband. The Doctor was sort of the opposite of a husband, really.

"Well," she said, looking around with a sigh. This really wasn't going to get any easier, was it?

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

He needed something to do. Even after all these years, he couldn't stay still in one place too long. He moved to his feet and snatched up his cane. Maybe he could tinker with the TARDIS while they half-talked...

She came back for him. The realization hit him like a slap. He stopped and turned to look at her. Back for him, and he'd managed to be a complete bastard to her the entire time. Well, at least he was the man she remembered.

"I have something for you," he said, and he offered her his hand.

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

"Do you?" An arched brow. Who knew what that could be?

Rose took his hand: as great a leap of faith as the first time she'd done so.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

He helped her up and led her down the hallways. The TARDIS's walls had changed since she'd last been in here, the decor was less black and more browns, following the Doctor's personality as opposed to the Rani's. In a century or so, it would be almost entirely his, only a remnant of the previous owner remaining.

Not the bedroom he lived in with Reinette, no, that one was left sterile and locked up. This one was large and paneled in wood with clocks along every wall. A fireplace sat unlit by his bed, and a small sidetable by the four-poster bed where he slept.

It sat on the sidetable, draped across the oak surface. The necklace he'd given to her years ago and had never been able to give back after she'd left. After nearly losing it to a Zygon many years ago, he kept it in the TARDIS, somewhere where he could easily see it.

He handed the necklace to her.

"I had the chain repaired."

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

She smiled then, tender and slow and took the necklace back from him. Loving words remembered: the original giving of the necklace. Cruelty, too: the taking back of the gift. Her own bitter tears. This, too, was what she was taking back by returning to him.

Rose turned her back and lifted her hair. "Put it on me," she told him.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

He nodded and put the cane down on the bed. The necklace felt delicate and small in his hands. So many years since he'd cruelly pulled it away from her. So many times he wished he could've given it back. He'd been trapped by Saxon when she left the first time, and he...he didn't even have a chance to say goodbye. She didn't give any of them a chance to say goodbye.

He unclasped the necklace and gently placed it around her neck. His fingers easily reclasped it, though he worked with extra gentleness. He'd broken it once before, he had no doubt he could do it again.

His fingers smoothed the chain against the back of her neck, then slid down to touch her shoulders.

"I'm sorry," he said. "For what I said to you that night." It was something he'd wanted to apologize for a long, long time.

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

She wasn't sure if he really meant it. If he was really sorry, if he even really remembered all that was said. She'd let the wound heal over and had long since forgotten the specific barbs and individual hurts -- but maybe he hadn't. Gallifreyans, it seemed, had long memories.

"Apology accepted." Rose lifted her hands to touch his on her shoulders. It was nice to touch him again, and she was trying to keep it uncomplicated. Truth was, now that she was back, she hadn't the foggiest what to do. She really should have thought this through more clearly. 'Track down the Doctor and take care of him' was not really a proper sort of plan by any stretch of the imagination, now, was it?

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

He wasn't sure what he was expecting when he finally apologized, finally gave her back her necklace. Something inside him to be fixed, maybe? A part he broke back then? He didn't know for sure.

Instead, she touched his hands and it felt all right. Which was something, for him. He hadn't even been 'all right' in a long time.

"I wish I hadn't chased you off. Probably could've saved the universe by now."

[doctorsplusone.livejournal.com]

She turned in his arms and held him tight and hard and didn't let go for a long time.

"Chased me off? Don't flatter yourself!" Huge, pure-Rose grin. "I did what I had to do and you should be proud of that instead of mourning it. Universe is always going to need saving, you know?"

She hadn't let go.

At her throat, the necklace felt simultaneously foreign and familiar, and she wasn't quite sure what its return truly meant. She'd take it a day at time, though. Step by step.