Mirror Dancing
by Camilla Sandman

Diclaimer: BBC's characters, my words (and my mistakes, if you spot them. Sorry, BBC!).

Author's Note: Spoilers for the first series. Goes AU with the Tenth Doctor, and BBC will most likely make me unCanon with the airing of the next series. Ah well. For 50lyricsfanfic, prompt 008. Thanks to Saz for being Saz.

Rating: Mature, for naughtiness implied.

II

It starts with a voice.

"You could rewrite this, Rose Tyler," the voice says, and she always nods, because she knows it's true. History can be rewritten like *that*, he's told her. History is a script, and it has at least one editor, running around with a sonic screwdriver instead of a red pen. She knows. She's seen. And she knows she has some power too, power through him, because he looks at her a certain way and gives her what she wants even declaring it a bad idea all the while.

"No, no," the voice says, and it's her voice and his voice and it sings like the TARDIS too. "You could rewrite this."

"Into what?"

"Into whatever you want."

It begins with a voice, and she's listening.

II

The TARDIS hums and jolts as always, but she almost thinks she can hear a difference these days. Maybe it's just a fantasy. Maybe she's facing change by trying too hard, looking for changes where there are none so she can show him just how accepting she is.

His hand is different still. The skin has a slightly different texture, and sometimes when he takes her hand, she dares draw her thumb across it and feel. He always smiles, but she wonders what he thinks. She never did quite know, even before he changed, but she used to have an illusion that she did to cling to.

Style has changed too. He dresses differently, trench coat for leather jacket and suit for jumper. More a geek, less a rebel, still the Doctor. He moulds style into his as easily as he does time. Sometimes, she thinks he moulds her too, and sometimes, she thinks she is moulding him. And either way, they change.

Smaller ears and bigger hair he has has well, and the pitch and tilt of his voice feels different to her ears. Apparently, lots of planets have a London too.

He smiles less manically but more frequently, and she can feel her own smile change too. Into what, she doesn't know, and maybe she is still trying too hard. Because it matters to him that she still likes him, she knows, because he looks at her a certain way still.

Why, that might not have changed at all.

"So, where are we going?" she finally asks, and he smiles at her.

"Where'd you wanna go, Rose Tyler? Forwards? Sideways? Roundways? Backwards?"

"Backwards," she says, and time moves.

II

Backwards. Back up, back up, back up... Right to a Satellite Five, and an alien invasion.

A difference. The script according to her. The Daleks... The Daleks go away. The Daleks are nothing. A difference she'd want.

She wakes up in the TARDIS, and she knows things are different. She can feel it in the silence that isn't, the silence that are familiar noises of the TARDIS and not the dying screams of the slaughtered.

"What happened?" she asks.

"The Daleks went away," the Doctor says, and he smiles at her, strange joy masked by sadness. "You did it, Rose Tyler."

"Where's Jack?" she asks, getting up. Her skin feels different, a fading warmth clinging to it, almost as if it has burned.

"Staying behind. Helping to rebuild the Earth. We'll meet him again."

She nods, even as she doesn't understand. It doesn't seem to matter much, right now. There is life, they're alive, and she could sing with the joy of it. She is singing, it feels like, just not with sounds she can hear. She can just feel it, the notes tingling inside her.

He keeps looking at her. Returning the favour in a way, she supposes, since she keeps looking at him too. It is almost as if she's trying to memorize his features, as if she hasn't seen him in a long time, and she's afraid she won't see him again for a long time either.

He isn't classically handsome, she thinks. His ears are slightly too big, his face slightly too drawn. His close-cropped hair frames character more than it frames beauty. He looks old enough to be her dad, and is far, far older. And still... There's the charm and personality that radiates from him and clings to his skin and makes her want to cling to it too.

"We won?"

"You won," he says, and his jumper is warm as she leans her head against it and feels his arms encircle her. It feels right and wrong and life. "You did it, Rose Tyler."

She forgets to ask just what she did.

II

She forgets to consider her shoes. With the other Doctor, the former him, she could tell when to put on her running shoes from what he was hiding with his smile. This one, he goes from jokes to judgement in less than a heartbeat, darkness sliding out of like a claw, and then it's as if it never was. More pleasantries and less haunted, but no less capable of rage.

She tries to adapt, but she still ends up running for the TARDIS in all the wrong shoes.

Like high heels over muddy fields, escaping some very irate Austen family members.

Also a way to learn about the classics, she reflects.

"I didn't think she would be this mad!" the Doctor calls out, and she's amazed he has the breath as she tries to catch hers, leaning against the console.

"You spilt wine on the first draft of 'Pride and Prejudice'!"

"It was rubbish, anyway," he says merrily. "Mr. Darcy realises his mad, passionate love for his aunt and Elizabeth marries his hereto unknown twin, Dirk Darcy."

"You're making that up," she laughs, trying to steady her breath and failing. Everything seems to fall and gravity is yanking at her and for a moment, it almost sounds like her name.

Rose.

"Maybe I am. The world will never know now, eh?"

"No," she gulps, and the room spins and spins and comes to rest on his worried face. He's caught her, she realises, and her legs feel burning.

"You all right? Bit out of shape?"

"I..." She steadies herself with a hand against his chest, forcing herself to smile. "Must be. My mum keeps pushing extra biscuit packs on me every time we visit. Must be those."

"Can't be those," he says, letting go of her with just a flicker of hesitance, and maybe she's just imagining that too. "I always eat those."

"Biscuit-hogger."

"Infamous for it through six galaxies and seven alternate timelines!" he declares proudly, and they both laugh again. It's almost enough to wash away the feeling of unease, even if she feels him looking at her when he thinks she isn't looking.

Rose.

Something is wrong, she thinks.

II

"Rose," he says. She looks up to meet his gaze over the console, the TARDIS jerking slightly as it lands. It's hard not to smile when she looks at him, and harder still when she can see he's fighting back one of his own.

It feels almost like a reunion high.

"Yes, Doctor?" she says primly.

"Are you sure about this?"

"I am. I was sure five minutes ago, I was sure ten minutes ago, I was sure when you first asked. Yes."

He makes a face. "I am not dressing up."

"You never dress up."

"I've done the whole theatre in my days, trust me."

She tilts her head, trying to imagine the Doctor in something other than leather jacket and jumper. Tank-tops, hats, frocks, oil, glittery jackets, feather boas... "What's the oddest thing you've dressed up as, then?"

"President," he says abruptly, inviting no further questions. "Why'd you wanna go to this time period for? Not to mention, 'hot men in tights' isn't really a time period."

"Thigh-envy?"

"I am very secure about my thighs. Now my ears..."

"I like your ears," she says, and feels it to be a truth.

II

"I like your hair," he says, and she whips around sharply, seeing him standing in the doorway. He's grinning, and his eyes are on her wet hair, the mud in it half washed-out.

"You like muddied hair?" she asks sceptically, trying not to mind the water slowly trickling down her back and soaking her shirt. If he's noticing, he's pretending not to. "And what happened to polite English knocking?"

"High fashion of 3458," he replies. "So is not knocking. Good time period. Little smelly, what with the tea-leaves and cabbage underwear."

"I predict you'll delight me by landing there some time soon," she says dryly, and he looks innocent. She never trusts innocent with him. He looked innocent before he nicked Lovecraft's dictionary and thesaurus too ('Doing the readers a favour, Rose. The adjective abuse!') and gave it to John Donne ('Doing the readers a favour, Rose. The spelling!') too.

"Thought you might like to pop back to your mum's," he says after a moment, pushing his hands into his pockets.

"Mum's? Are aliens invading Earth again or something?"

"I'm sure Harriet Jones has a plan to deal with that in her particular way," he says, and there's ice in his voice for a moment and melted the next. "No, thought you might like to put your feet up a bit. Relax."

"Relax?" she echoes, and stares at him. "Am I... Don't you want... Are you dumping me?"

"No, no," he says hurriedly, looking shocked at the mere implication. "Just thought you were a little tired. Bit off-colour, and I don't mean the mud."

"What's this, 'time travel, now with a vacation package'?"

"It always had one, if you wanted," he says softly.

"I'm fine," she assures him, and feels it to be a lie.

Judging by his look, he feels it too, but he says nothing and a moment later, he slips away quietly.

Only then does she feel cold.

II

"Has England always been this bloody cold?" she asks as another cold wind is ripping at her dress. The Doctor only grins.

"Yep. It's just not always had windbreakers. Not in the splendid thigh era, at least."

"What particular year of thigh era is this, then?"

"March 11th, 1794. Good day, at least it was in France."

"Timetravel show-off," she mutters, and tries not to step into puddles. The state of roads hasn't changed much, she reflects, and the parking spaces are still being fought over. Fashions change and technology changes and humans don't much.

She wonders if the Doctor loves or hates that aspect, or if he even understands it.

"I show, you ogle," he says lightly, and pulls her to him as a carriage thunders past. "Try not to pick up a pretty boy again, eh?"

"You didn't mind the last one," she says indignantly, trying not to think too hard of Jack. It's hard not to miss a whirlwind when you've grown attached to it, even if you're travelling with a tornado.

"He was Jack," the Doctor replies, and seems to think that answer enough. He looks up at the house in front of him, flickering firelight chasing shadows across his face. "Here we are, your dance as requested."

She can hear the faint tones of cheerful music, but she can hear the dismissive tone in his voice too. "Aren't you coming?"

"I'd just brood darkly in a corner and chase away all the pretty boys who wants to dance with you."

"Very fitting for the period," she replies, trying for light. "Quite Darcy."

"This isn't 'Pride and Prejudice', Rose."

"Can't we dance like it is? Just... Just this once?"

He sighs, but his hand has already found hers, and they're moving, probably with all the wrong steps and on all the wrong beats, but she doesn't care. She just remembers his face, so gentle as he looks at her, and his eyes, so alien as they mirror her own.

Her Doctor, she thinks. Rose's.

II

"Rose!" the Doctor says sharply, and she focuses on his face, so close to hers. She can almost see herself in the mirror of his eyes, and it's a pale, haggard version. She's stumbled, she realises, and he's caught her in a half-embrace, half dance pose. She can't even remember walking out to the console room, but she must have.

"Doctor," she mutters. Yes. Doctor. She has to remember... Change and different and what is. Yes. It's important because... Because... "Calling."

"Calling?"

She nods, even if it hurts. "You. Not you, but... I see..."

She trails off, trying to fight the urge to close her eyes. It feels almost like she has a fever, and maybe she's hallucinating too.

"Hang on, Rose," he mutters, and his kiss burns against her forehead almost as if he's branded her with hot iron. His. Or maybe hers, only her mark is invisible. Her Doctor.

Somehow, it feels important to remember that.

II

She's not sure how she's ended up kissing him, but it doesn't matter as long as he doesn't stop her. She knows he wants to, can feel it in his slight hesitance every time she tugs at his bottom lip, in his slight reluctance every time she parts her lips and gives him initiative. But still he doesn't stop, and still he laces his fingers in her hair and presses her so hard against the house wall she can feel the texture of each brick.

"We shouldn't," he whispers, and she knows he has a speech prepared for this moment, listing every logical reason and quite a few illogical ones too. She knows it because she's seen him rehash it in his head every time he looks at her.

"Why?" she replies, pressing a kiss against his collarbone. He sighs, and it sounds like a surrender. Still, he is a fighter, and rarely caves, and she prepares her list of counter-logic.

"Age," he manages to get out, eyes half closed. "Alien. Your mum. Experience."

"Don't care," she replies, letting out a breath as her fingers finds naked skin where his jumper has slid up slightly. "Don't care, don't care, don't care."

"Care," he says firmly, punctuating each word with a hard kiss. "Care, care vaguely, care."

It's good that he cares, she thinks. It means he's considered it. It means he's noble and selfless and a lot of things she really likes in him. Loves in him, in fact.

She just loves the way he draws his tongue across her teeth and let his hand rest at her hips a little better right now.

"TARDIS," she says, and it's her script now. "Now."

II

The TARDIS jerks, and she lays still, feeling the movements only vaguely, as if it's not happening to her at all. It's a dream, and the dreams are real and everything feels confused. Mirrors of mirrors, each distorting until the original image is blurred.

"Wrong," she says, and the Doctor is there instantly, glasses on and hair unkempt. He looks strangely attractive in his ruffled state, no eyes on his appearance and all eyes on her.

"What's wrong?" he asks, kneeling by her bed. They're in the medical area, she realises, and if she tries to think really hard, she can vaguely remember being carried here. Unless that too is a dream.

"Everything."

"Helpful," he says dryly, and he grins at her vague smile. "When did it start, Rose?"

"The voice."

"Whose voice?"

"Time's," she mutters, finding no other word for it. "Mine. His. Whichever voice I wanted. Doctor, what's happening?"

"I don't know," he says grimly, and lifts his hand to her cheek. "I'm going to find out."

He can still sound like doom coming with his voice, she thinks, and closes her eyes.

II

She closes her eyes when he sinks into her, almost afraid to look at his face. If he looks like he regrets it now, she may never forgive him, and if he looks like he never wants to let her go, she might not have the strength to either.

The sheets soft against her side, his thigh is hard under hers as she draws her leg over and locks him even closer. He kisses her neck, drawing his teeth across her skin as she clings to him, her nails digging into his back. She knows even in his skin he isn't naked, but this is as close as she can get and the illusion of intimacy is better than no intimacy at all. Walls upon walls upon walls, her Doctor, built by time and loss and will. She's not sure he knows himself how to crumble them all down anymore.

"Rose," he whispers, and she thinks maybe she's wrong after all.

This isn't real.

She doesn't care.

"Yes, Rose," the voice says, and she opens her eyes to see the Doctor looking at her, no regrets and all desire. What she wants.

"Yours," the voice says, and now it's triumphant. "All you have to do... is let me live. He need never know, never while you live. I'll hide in time, and you can have this. All of it."

Yes, she thinks.

Yes.

II



Act Two

II

It continues with a seduction.

"You want this, Rose Tyler," the voice says, and she nods, because it's true. Desire is not logic, and doesn't follow its rules. She knows. She feels it. He has too, she knows, because she feels the warmth in his skin when he takes her hand and hears the breath he lets out when she lets go.

Desire is not love either, but it sometimes dances tango with it still. And she thinks maybe, maybe that's the dance she's started.

She wants it to be. Oh, she really wants it to be.

"It can," the voice promises, and it is his voice and not his voice, because she knows it's not the Doctor speaking. "Very soon, Rose, it will be."

It continues with a seduction, and she's falling for it.

II

The TARDIS is silent, and she knows it's not right even before she opens her eyes. The room is darkened, and the only thing she can hear is her own breath, sounding very loud. Someone has wrapped a warm blanket around her, and her breath turning white as crosses her lips tells her why. It's cold, and she wears the blanket as a cape as she gets up. Her body feels sore, and her head feels almost hung over and she wonders if it's been partying without her.

The silence gets eerie as she walks through the halls, trusting her feet to know the way to the console room. She finds she tends to get more lost in the TARDIS when she tries to use logic to find what she's looking for. The Doctor would probably tell her that's because her human logic is inferior.

At least, the old Doctor would. This one might try to teach her Acolian logic or something similar instead.

Human logic is at least right on one thing. He is in the console room, jacket tossed aside and white shirt stained with grime. Some is even stuck in his hair, she notices, and wonders if that's fashion at some point in human history too.

"Repairs?" she asks, and the frown fades from his face as he turns to look at her.

"No, no, I thought maybe it was the TARDIS interfering with your head," he says sheepishly.

"Was it?"

"No," he says, and shakes his head. "Something's following us."

Not us, she thinks. Her. Following her.

"Is that the technical term?"

"Yes. Short for Sodding Obscure Mischief Edition of Thing Hitherto Incomprehensible to Navigating Gadgets," he proclaims, then seems to slide out of joking mode and right into worried. "You feeling okay?"

"I don't know," she answers honestly. "Better, I think."

He watches her intently, and she fights the desire to bury herself against his chest and make him promise it will be all right, it will be fine, everything can be sorted out, right as rain with a little tea. He will tell her, it's not that. It's just she doesn't want him to feel like he's broken a promise on top of everything else if everything can't be sorted out.

"It was almost like a part of me wasn't even there," she says haltingly, as a way of explanation. "I don't know where, or what, or... How do you know something's following us?"

"It's manipulating time. The TARDIS helped mask it. Bit loud, old girl, but she can't help it."

"Has it stopped? The... something, I mean, following us."

He shuffles slightly, running a hand through his hair. "Not as such, no."

"Great."

"Now don't you worry, Rose, a few adjustments to this timefilled wonder, and we'll soon track the source down! We'll follow it! It'll be fun."

When he smiles at her, she tries to feel comforted and fails.

II

When he smiles at her, she always feels lost. Lost in him, lost in an adventure, lost in a seduction, she doesn't know. But it has to be something, or she would know where the path went from here. She doesn't. The future with the Doctor can be the past tomorrow and was the future yesterday. She never knows. She doesn't know now, and all her guesses feel like fantasies.

If he knows, he doesn't say, merely tracing a finger down her shoulder and stopping at the inside on her elbow. It tickles slightly, and she marvels at how real it feels.

"You're not real."

He looks a little annoyed. "Do you tell all the men you've shagged that? Not doing wonders for your chance of a repeat performance, I have to tell you."

"Too good to be real," she murmurs lazily.

"That on the other hand, does do wonders."

She kisses him lazily too, feeling sore and tired and a little sorry for the dress that probably is beyond repair. Perhaps there is a little comfort in knowing it went for a good cause.

"Rose," he says seriously, tucking stray hairs behind her ear. "You know this is problematic, don't you?"

"So was climbing a rampant Tromk beast, and I managed."

"You also broke your leg," he points out, lifting his hand to rest it on her knee. She remembers the pain of the break, and so does he, judging by the look in his eyes. It's never stopped amazing her how much pain he can carry. His, hers, past, present and all the future possibilities of it.

"It heals," she replies, and wills it to be true.

II

She's trying to will herself to feel normal, and it's not working to well.

Will herself to smile at the Doctor when he looks worried, no problem. Will herself to walk normally and not clutch her head every five seconds, slight problem but doable. Will herself to share his enthusiasm and energy at solving what's going on, bordering on problematic. Will herself to feel like it isn't all an act, all out impossible.

She thinks he knows too, but it's hard to tell. If she's an amateur theatre actor, he's the multiple-BAFTA winning star.

"So," he says, flicking his sonic screwdriver in a slightly distracted fashion. "Not a Kavakinan parasite. That narrows it down."

The TARDIS seems to hum in encouragement, or perhaps just in pleasure at being powered up again. It's hard to read the TARDIS when she doesn't have a dictionary to consult. She would ask the Doctor to write one, but judging by the number of rewrites she's seen in his edition of Troy ('But Rose, Homer's original is like the half-deaf, all-out-drunk version!''), she'd be wrinkled by the time he was done.

"Narrows it down to what?"

"A narrower field," he says evasively, which probably means he thinks the answer will worry her, or perhaps worry him and he would rather not voice it aloud.

Sometimes, he really is protective to the point of assholeness, she thinks.

As if he knows what she's thinking, he laces his fingers in hers, anchoring her to him and holding on.

She wonders if it's always felt this possessive.

II

She's bordering on possessive, she knows. Keeping close to him, almost as if she's his shadow, kissing him, almost as if he's her boyfriend, watching him, almost as if she is him and he is her now. She's afraid, she knows, and it's the only way she can think of to reassure herself.

She's afraid this will end. She's afraid it won't, too.

She knows she's no Helen of Troy, beautiful enough to launch a war, but she is Rose and he is the Doctor, and she wonders what he will do to keep her close. She wants him to burn the whole Universe if needed, and that scares her too.

But she says nothing, and he says nothing, and time feels almost still in his arms, lulled to sleep and lulled to waiting.

She's waiting for the price, and she knows it's coming.

II

She knows the blinding headache is coming a few seconds before it hits. Enough time to brace herself and think the bracing rather futile. Not much a rowboat can do to brace itself for the storm, after all.

She's running out of ways to describe pain. There is fire and there's cold too, a pulse beating in her with constant sensation, and little pauses where she thinks it isn't so after all. Then it is so bad, and she tries not to gasp.

As it finally leaves her, it almost feels like it takes a part of her with it.

"Rose," he says, and she realises he's clutching her shoulders so hard it's painful too.

"Yes, Doctor?" she quips, and it is enough to make him ease his hold and smile a little.

"I like an obedient patient."

"I like a hot Doctor."

"Only until you get the bill," he replies, and brush a few strands of hair from her face. They're slick with sweat, and she wonders. "Something's reaching out through time, even I could feel it. It's almost like a tickling sensation, if I am still ticklish, I don't know, but the TARDIS, oh, she is. Very good at spotting the ticklers she is, too. I've put a neutron-interfacing..."

He catches her look and quickly amends himself.

"I've put a piggy-tail on it. I'm waiting for the oink of pain to get back to me."

"Oink," she says, and pain comes.

II

He's hard to see sometimes, under all the pain, she thinks. It's almost as if he was born of it, and even when he seems happy, it's still there. She's always sensed it, she knows, but she's never challenged his denials. Don't argue with the designated driver, and all that.

Problem is, she's not sure who is driving anymore.

"Rose," he says, and shakes his head.

"Fine. I'll just ask Jack when we meet him again, except you won't tell me when that will happen either, so I guess I'm stuck a stupid ape."

"Even the wisest man in the Universe doesn't know this."

"I thought that was you."

"No. I'm just the fool with all the knowledge of the Universe," he says, and she wonders what the difference is. "Rose... You don't want to know about Gallifrey's burn."

"I do," she insists, and he's paces a little, looking an annoyed tiger in the very large cage of all of time and all of space. She does want to know. Maybe... Maybe there's a way to bring it back. Maybe there's a way she can make that as she wants it too.

"No," he says softly, and walks up to her, framing her head in his hands. "You'll learn and want to leave and I won't let you go."

"I'm here to stay," she whispers back, and his kiss is hard and possessive.

II

"Stay with me," he whispers, and it sounds like desperation.

That's the problem, she thinks. Does she want to?

He's holding her again, and she can feel something soft under her and something soft and cool over, and it feels strangely like a womb in the light of the TARDIS console room. She wonders what she'll be born into. Into whatever she wants, perhaps. Into...

"Rose," he says, her name a plea. "Rose, stay with me."

Rose.

"I'm sorry," she says, and because she doesn't know how else to comfort him, she kisses him. He tries to pull back, but she puts a hand on his neck, and he seems to think that a show of restraint enough. His hair falls against her forehead and tickles her as he kisses her back, her lips parting willingly to let him explore. She feels a mess, but she also feels that he doesn't feel that at all.

His tie is already half off from his various tinkering and running about, and he doesn't offer any protests when she yanks it all off. His shirt is grumbled and greasy, and that has to go too. She has to pull her top of herself, but his hands find her exposed skin eagerly enough.

"I'm here," she whispers, her head falling back slightly as his mouth is warm against her skin. It doesn't feel like a lie, not right now. She can feel her body, muscles sore and aching and none too thrilled to have to work as he eases her down. Not gently enough, and she winces when her head bangs into something hard.

He fumbles with her jeans, and she feels butterfingered and clumsy when she touches him, and she remembers fleetingly her first time, awkward and silly and so eager to make it right that it was a bit of a disaster.

Time moves and she learns, and when she lifts up and meet his thrust, he makes a sound that is half a whimper, half a gasp.

Yes. Oh, yes.

II

"Yes," he says, and she beams at him. "We'll go see Jack."

"Satellite Five?"

"Satellite Five."

II

"Satellite Five," he mutters under his breath, and she opens her eyes to see him leaning over the TARDIS console. He's half put on his clothes again, not seeming to mind his shirt is unbuttoned. Neither does she to tell the truth, but the look on his face does worry her.

It's nothing, as if he's keeping all options open still as to how he feels.

Satellite Five, she thinks. That's where it's coming from. That's where they're going. There's where it's waiting.

She closes her eyes again and tries not to dream.

II

"It's not a dream," the voice says, and it hums like a lullaby. "Its a choice, Rose Tyler."

"Between what?"

"What I offer, and what is. All you have to do... is let life be."

"That doesn't sound too bad."

"I knew you would understand it's not too bad at all," the voice says, and it doesn't sound like her anymore. It doesn't need to.

"You can rewrite this, Rose Tyler," the Emperor of the Daleks says, and she's still listening.

II



Act Three

II

It pauses at an argument.

"You know he will call this wrong, Rose Tyler," the voice says, and she nods, because it's true. There is right and wrong in his world, and he walks the abyss between them, sometimes falling down. He does trade death for life sometimes, and would it be so wrong if she did too?

Yes.

"No," the voice says. "This will make you even. He rewrites history. Why can't you?"

She knows what she wants, what she wants the script to be. All good and all life and all hers. Her Doctor, more than safe. A little Pride and Prejudice, a little Harry Potter, a little Around the World in Eighty Days ('Without me, Rose, it would've taken a hundred and eighty!'), and a little Rose and the Doctor. He'll forgive her. He always does.

Perhaps there is a little comfort in knowing you died for a good cause.

Is there?

Yes.

No.

"It is worth changing?" the voice asks, and it's her voice now, her question. The burn is paused and she's waiting for the answer.

No.

Yes.

It pauses at an argument, and she's it.

II

The TARDIS jerks violently as it lands, and she almost falls and realises her mind has been wandering again. The Doctor doesn't even seem to notice her, eyes already on the screen. She knows where they are, can feel it in her buzzing body. Satellite Five, and she's calling to herself, using the time vortex. Calling to herself as the Emperor Dalek calls to her first. Becoming seduced by fantasies and whispers. She knows it for what it is, but she can't stop listening.

I bring life.

"Bad idea, crossing my own timeline," he mutters darkly. "Let's hope the Daleks don't think to check a floor below again or we're seriously in trouble and paradox. Such a bad idea, this."

"So why are you?" she asks, and he finally notices her awareness of her surroundings.

"Because you need me to," he says simply. "This is killing you."

II

It's killing her. It's mirror dancing, fantasy reflecting life reflecting her. It's time, time calling to her with all its possibilities and all that can be rewritten. He's taught her that. In this moment, she is the editor and it's her script.

"Yes," the voice says. "I can teach you to survive it. Hide me with time. He will live, you will live and it will all be as you want."

"Rose?" the Doctor asks, looking at her oddly. "Are you here? You look distracted."

"I want you to live," she whispers, and clings to him.

II

"You're going to live," he says, determined and terrified and angry. She wants to agree, but she knows she can't. It more important he lives.

II

"I am alive," he reassures her, looking a little confused.

No, he's not, she thinks. He died for her and she didn't want him to. He died and everything changed and the familiar is more safe.

"Do you regret it?"

"What?"

"Me."

II

"I shouldn't have," he says, and she realises she's spoken the last out loud. "You were vulnerable."

You were you, she thinks, and that was enough for me.

"Selfish," he mutters, and she knows he's thinking of himself.

II

"Selfish," he mutters, and she thinks of herself. Yes. Herself.

II

She can see herself, feel herself. Rose and the time vortex. That's how she saved him. That's how she can change it all. Take the power. Use the power. Change. Carve a new timeline, carve it into whatever she wants.

"It is worth changing?" the other her asks, and she wants to nod.

Yes.

She just needs to convince herself.

II

"Convince me this is right," she whispers.

II

"This isn't right..."

II

"This is right."

II

No.

II

Yes.

"We're here."

II

You're here.

"It hurts," she whispers, and in a second he's by her side, steadying her.

"Rose, listen to me. It's the time vortex, do you understand?"

"It's me," she mutters, correcting him. "It's my voice."

"It's the Emperor of the Daleks using you, Rose. I'm going to stop him."

The voice laughs in her head, and she wants to laugh too.

II

Jack laughs and she flings herself into his arms, feeling so much joy it's painful.

"Easy there, or you'll wear me out before the Doctor gets a chance to," Jack laughs, and she laughs, and the Doctor laughs too.

This is life.

II

"I can make this life better," she says, and feels the time vortex beckon. She can master it. She just has to listen to the Dalek. She just has to bring life instead of death.

"No."

"Yes."

II

"No way!" Jack laughs.

"Way," she says, and grins. "I changed the world completely starkers..."

II

She's naked, but she can't feel cold, can only feel the burn in her own mind, calling out to her, and the burn beyond that, the burn in the Emperor's mind, pleading for his life with a fantasy.

Stop the burn, Rose Tyler. Stop the burn and all will change.

"Rose!" the Doctor pleads, and there is desperation and hurt and anger in his voice.

"You don't have to die," she says, and grins at him. He should be happy. He should be kissing her with joy. He should be hers and familiar and alive and smiling. Everything she wants.

"Rose... Don't."

"You don't have to be afraid," she goes on, and everything burns in her. She puts a hand to his cheek and feels the cold of his skin. She can make it burn. She can make everything burn. "You don't have to be selfless. I can save the world and save you."

"No," he says, shaking his head. "You save the world this way, you do lose me."

She hesitates for a moment, and she can feel the voice in her, urging her on, reassuring her, seducing her.

The Daleks go away. The Daleks are nothing.

"The Daleks go away. The Daleks are nothing," she repeats.

"The Daleks are death," the Doctor replies, the killer in him speaking. She doesn't want the killer. She wants the fantasy.

II

Fantasy... Kissing him, feeling his heartbeats as if they were hers, holding his heart in her hands as if it was hers. Yes, it's a fantasy. He's a fantasy, memories romanticised by time. It's not that she doesn't like the new him. It's just easier to form the old him, memories her only hindrance, and one time can tear away at.

He looks at her, and she wonders.

"Do you remember what you said to me, at number Ten? 'I could save the world, but lose you'?"

"Yes," he says quietly.

"What if... What if it'd been me, been... My choice?"

For a moment, there's only silence and his gaze, holding her, reading her. She knows he doesn't quite know what she's implying, but that he understands it all too well.

"You'd save the world," he says and breaks her heart. Because he's right, because he's selfless, because he's fucking noble and he's shaped all those things in her too and she knows what she has to do.

It's just...

"Rose," he whispers, and his breath brushes across her lips with agonizing tenderness as he leans in. "It won't work like this anyway. It can't be all that you want. It won't be me, just a placeholder for all your fantasies. If you love me... Let me go."

It's just that she does love him.

"I'll kill you..."

"No, you won't. I'm still there, waiting for you. Still me, Rose. You know that."

"I'm sorry," she whispers and closes her eyes. One more heartbeat, and he's kissing her, just the way she wants it, just the way it can't be.

"It is worth changing?" the voice asks, and this time, it's only hers, sounding childlike. A child with all of time in her head and so much still to learn.

Yes, she wants to say, but she can't. Not at that cost. Not at that thing's urging. Not at that loss. Not at... No.

"No."

The Emperor screams, and it is pain and despair both, the link between them fading. "I will not die! I cannot die!"

Everything dies, she thinks.

She lets go.

II

She lets go. Time screams as it leaves her, the Daleks scream as they die, and everything, everything is a roar. The Doctor dies.

The Doctor lives.

"Rose!"

He catches her and the silence is a dirge.

II

The sun is setting when he finds her outside the TARDIS, grass bending to the lazy wind. She can see he's still worried, but he's let her have space and time and a trip to some peaceful alien planet where she can just watch the unfamiliar sky. Given that the Doctor is here, she's sure there will be some trouble sooner or later, but for now, there's just the sun setting and the sky turning faintly green.

He flops down next to her rather unceremoniously, the wind giving his hair a good ruffle. She knows he won't mention that they've slept together. No, he's too selfless for that, probably ready to blame fever and Daleks and the reversed polarity of neutrons and anything that will save her embarrassing explanations. Maybe he's not sure she's ready. Maybe she isn't either.

"I knew it wasn't right," she says after a while, plucking apart a strand of grass. "Maybe that's why I was calling out to myself, looking for an argument."

"And the Emperor of the Dalek was looking for someone to use," he says softly. "He's always been good at that. They kill so easily, and are so unwilling to suffer the fate themselves."

He sounds bitter, but she doesn't ask. Not now. Maybe she will, one day.

"Maybe you just wanted to share the pain," he goes on.

"It's better with two?"

"Sometimes."

She nods, because it's true, and somewhere in her head, the memory of the past him nods too.

"You kept fighting me too, like the voice of my reason. The past you, I mean," she explains, and he looks a little flattered, and a little guarded.

"Did you prefer me as I was?" he asks lightly, but the question is anything but light.

"No... Yes... I don't know. You're both...."

Amazingly, he doesn't look hurt. He just looks understanding.

"There are times I remember what I was... And miss it," he says solemnly.

"Even if you were never ginger?"

He grins. "Even so."

She smiles briefly, fighting to voice the confused mess inside her. "Was it really you? The past you, I mean. Or was it... The time vortex? Me? My delusion? The Emperor's words?"

"What would you like it to be, Rose?"

She thinks, and he is silent beside her, waiting. It was what she wanted it to be, and perhaps that was the problem.

"It felt like... Just like you needed me more then," she says hesitantly.

"Maybe I did," he says earnestly, and she bites her lip, wanting to taste blood. "Maybe that wasn't all good."

She looks up sharply, and his gaze catches her, brown eyes with so much gentleness it almost hurts.

"You can need something too much, Rose," he says, and something in her that feels old and wise recognises it for truth.

"I know," she says quietly, and he takes her hand. A comforting gesture, but she wonders who needs it the most. Maybe what he does for her is also what he wants himself. Maybe he's a little bit selfish too. Maybe he's selfish enough.

She hopes so. Oh, she hopes so.

Maybe she would like it to be a goodbye, she thinks.

"Hello," she says, and he grins, as if he understands.

Yes.

II

It ends with a silence, and his hands in hers, the sky above them and time at their feet. It isn't as she would have written it, but it is what it is, him and her and life still to come.

She can live that play.

FIN