Summary: In Pete's World, the Metacrisis Doctor needs to chose a name for his paperwork. While resistant at first, a conversation with Rose outside Torchwood, yields a decision. It is one that unleashes a torrent of buried emotions and longing for the one person he misses more than words can say yet can never see again. Donna Noble.
Read it at: AO3 and Teaspoon (when approved)
"I don’t see what’s wrong with Doctor,” he pouted, kicking at an invisible rock on the ground and pouting outside of Torchwood. No seriously, he was pouting.
Rose shook her head, “I thought Time Lords were above such things as poutin’,” she chided him, reaching out to place a hand upon his arm in a gesture meant to both comfort and reassure him. She could tell this wasn’t easy, that he was suffering from some sort of identity crisis of sorts since settling into this dimension with her and her family.
For his part, the Meta Doctor smiled softly at the hand upon his arm before cocking his head at Rose, “I wasn’t pouting," he scoffed, "just pointing out the absurdity of the situation is all.” He shook his head at her, making a little face that was most definitely not a pout. “This dimension doesn’t have a version of me, doesn’t have a Doctor, so what do I have to go and change my name for? Why can’t everyone just accept me for who I am, including my name? I mean look at me,” the half Time Lord, half human Doctor straightened up and adjusted his tie before running his hand through his luscious mane, a move he knew sent shivers down Rose’s spine. He smirked at her, “I’m perfect just the way I am. Why would I want to change anything about me? Including my name?”
The blonde rolled her eyes at him. “This conversation is getting old, Doctor,” she sighed, withdrawing her hand from his arm, and ducking her head to try to hide her smile at his blatant cheekiness. “My dad says you need proper papers to navigate your way through this world yeah?” She nodded her head at him in affirmation. “Well, unless you are gonna start croonin’ ballads fer a livin’ one name isn’t gonna cut it, so yer gonna have to pick somethin’ and he said today is the last day! No more puttin' it off or he'll pick for ya'," she insisted, hands resting upon her hips.
“Oi!” he mumbled giving her a little look, “shades of Jackie there, yeah?” He shuffled his feet wisely looking down at his trainers.
“Very well then, names. Names, names, names… Blimey, I’ve used quite a bit of ‘em over the past, oh… nine hundred years or so,” he remarked rubbing the back of his neck in a gesture Rose had come to recognize as meaning he was clearly feeling uncomfortable.
As the Doctor paced a streak into the pavement, Rose gave him an appraising look, “I always thought you looked a bit like a James meself,” she said off-handedly.
The Doctor froze. He turned his chocolate brown eyes upon her, “James?” he ran a hand down the side of his face, stopping to cup his own chin. He seemed to be pondering the name, letting it roll around his tongue for a moment or two before beaming a grin at her. “Oi! Rose Tyler that’s it! James! Doctor James… Doctor James what though?” He groaned and flopped down upon a nearby rock.
“So close,” Rose hissed quietly before shrugging. “What’s wrong with Tyler?”
The Doctor’s eyebrow shot up at her in surprise. “But that’s your name,” he pointed out, “I should have one of my own, right? One that fits me, where I come from, who I am…”
Just then, his eyes went from playful, to so very sad and Rose found herself getting up and crossing the distance between them to cup the side of his face in her hand. Things were still a bit awkward between them as they learned to navigate their way within this world and with each other. However, things were rapidly improving and they had found themselves falling back into familiar patterns and comfortable routines. So seeing her Doctor so obviously in pain drew her to him like a magnet as she began searching for ways to comfort him and deliver him from it. “What is it Doctor? Are you all right? Should I get me mum? What is it?” she begged, her voice so full of love and concern that it touched his human heart in ways he didn’t think possible. He reached out and covered her hand with his own in a gesture as much to reassure her as to comfort himself, pressing her small hand against his cheek.
He turned his eyes upon her, his face serious and his voice both quiet and small. “No, that won’t be necessary, it’s just; it's just that I know what I want my name to be, what it should be,” he insisted.
Rose looked confused, but didn’t interrupt, she simply nodded, encouraging him to go on.
Taking a deep breath, he gripped her hand tightly, pulling it away from his face clinging to it like a lifeline. “Doctor James… Noble,” he whispered, as tears clouded his vision. "You know, for her,for my Donna.” He struggled to even say her name out loud. It came out in a choked sob, simply saying it broke the dam holding back all the emotions he had been trying so hard to bury. They overtook him and he dropped his head to Rose’s chest, trying to muffle the sobs that were forcing their way out. The ones he had held back since they landed here, the ones that threaten to spill from him every night long after Rose had drifted off to sleep and Donna haunted his memories.
Dismayed, Rose could only hold him close, stroking his hair as she whispered words of comfort and love as he wept for the loss of his best friend who she knew was oh so much more to him. So much more than just the woman who saved the entire universe at the cost of her very self. She was the woman who gave of herself so that her Doctor may live. So that he could hold her and love her, smile and laugh and go on. Her Doctor's singular human heart was breaking for the loss of his other half, for the woman who saved the other Doctor, and thus himself in turn, in every way possible. Whose friendship and loyalty to the Doctor, made his very existence possible. He wept for the connection to her that was severed and for the fact that he could never repay her for all she gave him, or for the fact that she would never even remember he existed, yet he would never, ever forget her. In his mind, the very least he could do was honour her, his brilliant Donna Noble, the most important woman in all of creation and his best mate, by taking her last name.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Torchwood
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler
Characters: Jack Harkness, Tenth Doctor, Rose Tyler
Additional Tags: Humor, Earworm, Telepathic Bond, Naked Jack, Tumblr Prompt, Implied Sexual Content, Angst, well a type of angst I suppose, rating changed because of BITS of typical Jack humor
Summary:
Rose Tyler is in torment. Why won't the song leave her head? Why?! Whose fault is this? How do they cure it? And why is the Doctor wearing a straw hat?!
Written for the @timepetalsprompts Drabble Prompt: Obsession.
Rating: Everybody
Pairing: Um… well, it is Ten x Rose (and Nine x Rose) and Ten x Donna. It’s really introspective Ten. *shrug* Sorry!
Words: 258
Tags: Angst, Feels, Hurt, Introspection,Guilt, Loneliness… Sad, sad Time Lord, free verse, poetry.
Summary: It was all his fault. He lost them both. In the darkness, in the quiet, the Doctor can’t help but remember the two women that broke both of his hearts.
Read It At: AO3 and Teaspoon
Ensconced in the darkness.
Embraced by solitude.
He stares at the galaxies held within her eyes.
Her eyes of sapphire and emerald,
Flooded with desperate tears.
She is staring into the place his soul should be;
Trying to reach him, make him understand.
Donna Noble was going to stay with him forever.
And she does. She never leaves him.
His Earth Girl lingers through out the TARDIS, in his thoughts…
… And in both of his hearts.
His constant companion.
Always.
Swirls of gold. Space and time.
Power and innocence, reflected back in eyes of amber.
He sees them too.
When he is alone.
When a shroud of silence falls upon him.
He hears Rose Tyler promise to never leave.
And she doesn’t. Not really. His precious wolf.
Her spirit haunts him, hovering near enough for him to sense,
Yet too far away to be anything more than a lingering ache.
He knows he will never again feel the warmth of her body pressed against his.
Even the taste of her upon his lips… Gone.
He’s lost her.
Twice.
The Doctor’s head drops into his hands,
Tears wash away the smile he paints on for the universe.
Locked away in his room, his mask fades.
Alone with his memories there is no need of pretense.
Scrubbing at his streak marked face, his mantra spills from his lips.
Over and over again, in an obsessive cadence that does little to calm him,
The words flow along with the tears.
It’s all my fault.
I’m sorry.
I am so, so sorry.
Written for the @timepetalsprompts Drabble Prompt: Obsession.
Rating: Everybody
Pairing: Um… well, it is Ten x Rose (and Nine x Rose) and Ten x Donna. It’s really introspective Ten. *shrug* Sorry!
Words: 258
Tags: Angst, Feels, Hurt, Introspection,Guilt, Loneliness… Sad, sad Time Lord, free verse, poetry.
Summary: It was all his fault. He lost them both. In the darkness, in the quiet, the Doctor can’t help but remember the two women that broke both of his hearts.
Read It At: AO3 and Teaspoon
Ensconced in the darkness.
Embraced by solitude.
He stares at the galaxies held within her eyes.
Her eyes of sapphire and emerald,
Flooded with desperate tears.
She is staring into the place his soul should be;
Trying to reach him, make him understand.
Donna Noble was going to stay with him forever.
And she does. She never leaves him.
His Earth Girl lingers through out the TARDIS, in his thoughts…
… And in both of his hearts.
His constant companion.
Always.
Swirls of gold. Space and time.
Power and innocence, reflected back in eyes of amber.
He sees them too.
When he is alone.
When a shroud of silence falls upon him.
He hears Rose Tyler promise to never leave.
And she doesn’t. Not really. His precious wolf.
Her spirit haunts him, hovering near enough for him to sense,
Yet too far away to be anything more than a lingering ache.
He knows he will never again feel the warmth of her body pressed against his.
Even the taste of her upon his lips… Gone.
He’s lost her.
Twice.
The Doctor’s head drops into his hands,
Tears wash away the smile he paints on for the universe.
Locked away in his room, his mask fades.
Alone with his memories there is no need of pretense.
Scrubbing at his streak marked face, his mantra spills from his lips.
Over and over again, in an obsessive cadence that does little to calm him,
The words flow along with the tears.
It’s all my fault.
I’m sorry.
I am so, so sorry.
“When he gets back to the flat Rose is still asleep. He takes off his coat and toes off his trainers, setting the coffees and muffins on the stand and grabbing the box out of his sock drawer before climbing into bed with her.
“Morning,” he says, cuddling up behind her.
“Morning,” she says on a yawn, turning to face him. “You’re up early.”
“Went and got coffee.”
She smiles and kisses him and he hopes he doesn’t appear as nervous as he feels. His heart is pounding and he has to remind himself to breathe.
She sits up and he sits up with her, handing her her cup and muffin.
“Muffin, too? Is it my birthday?”
“It’s a good day,” he says.
“Yeah?”
He nods. Sips his own coffee. Waits.
“Donna make these?”
“No, I did. Went behind the counter. On my day off, too.”
She nods. Takes a bite of her muffin. He’s not, generally, a patient man, but he can be for Rose. So he sits, drinking his coffee, eating his banana nut muffin, waiting for her to notice—
“Did you write on here, or was that Donna?”
“That was me.”
Pause.
“We never did agree, did we, on what—um. On what we call each other. I mean, I know you’ve grown rather attached to beau, but I never quite—but I’d like to give this one a go. If you want.”
He pulls the ring box out of his pocket. Sets it on the bed next to her.
Waits.
Inwardly he starts to panic. Why hasn’t she said anything? There’s no way he’s read this wrong so what—
Suddenly he’s being yanked by his tie and her lips are on his and that will never not be his favorite thing and—
“So are you gonna ask me or what?”
He grins.
“Rose Tyler, will you marry me?”
“Yes.”
He kisses her again.”
–weezly14. A Place Where We Only Say Goodbye. Chapter 22. Time Loop AU. 2013.
