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He has never really liked going out on his own, never relished seeing the universe with only one pair of eyes but more and more he has felt the need to. His companions these days, they're friends, the very best of friends, but they are no longer… companions. Amy, Rory, Clara, they all have lives they insist on getting back to, people they must see and relationships they must maintain and a superphone is not enough for that, no. They must have a physical presence on Earth from time to time. He wonders, occasionally, what Sarah Jane would say if she saw the way he is now, if she would laugh or be furious that the rules which were once so unbreakable they made him leave her behind in the Scottish countryside without even bus fare to get home have been bent and twisted and stretched as to be nearly unrecognizable. Perhaps it would be a mixture of both; a furious roll of the eyes and a humorless laugh and then shrugged off because Sarah has always been extraordinary and why would a little more time change that?
He understands this need his new companions have, he really does, and so he allows it, dropping them off at home and promising to return in a few months, then setting off on his own. There are always planets to save and skies to see, traditions to take part in. Sometimes River appears to help and sometimes he gets bored and breaks her out of jail one last time — each time the last time, he promises himself, feeling the squeeze of a timeline stretched far too thin for safety — but most of the time he finds himself as he does now; at the top of a hill carpeted in brilliant turquoise grass, staring up into a vibrant tangerine sky, alone.
Instinctively he reaches a hand out, fingers seeking fingers, and finds nothing. It is a very cruel trick of the mind, the way sense memory is so much stronger than anything else. The way that now, hundreds of years since he said goodbye to her for the last time (didn't say goodbye, that traitorous mind taunts him, could never really say goodbye), he still reaches for her hand. She promised him forever once and he believed her, let himself believe her, hoped that belief would be enough to make wishes into truths. Several centuries and a body later and he still instinctively wants to hold her hand, as if the mere want alone is enough to make it happen.
The universe is apparently in a rather twisted mood because the moment he thinks that, she pops into existence not ten feet away.
The beam of light she's transported in on makes a strange wooshing noise, blowing hot air through his hair for a moment and knocking it into his eyes. She wobbles a bit as she lands, clutching a much smaller gun than the one he remembers. He does remember, he realizes suddenly, the outfit she is wearing: black pants with the faintest pinstripe, dark pink t-shirt, deep blue leather jacket. Like all his selves she knew rolled into one. He remembers her, at the end of a dark and war-torn street, in that same outfit, with this same haircut and a much bigger gun. He remembers the way her face spread into a huge smile at the sight of him. He remembers another woman, another companion who was so much more than a simple companion, who was a sister and a best friend and probably more besides, and the soft look in her eye and the words she spoke. Why don't you ask her yourself?
In another body it would have knocked the wind out of him, these memories of all the things he lost. It does still make him ache. But he surprised to find he also feels joy bubbling up inside of him, laughter and excitement and that unnamable feeling of witnessing something humans would call miraculous. Something special.
She has been gathering herself, her wits, and checking a device strapped to her wrist, but now she looks up and directly at him and freezes. The gun clatters to the ground at her feet.
He is 300 years older, looks 15 years younger, and she knows him immediately.
"Rose Tyler," he says and it feels the same on his tongue, the same as when he was Northern and when he was Rude, like comfort and knowing and home. Something far too complex to fully name washes over and through her face in the instant before he enfolds her into a hug.
He thinks perhaps he will never quite forget what it feels like to hug Rose Tyler, and that maybe he will never be able to describe it quite right to anyone else. It feels like relief and forgiveness and companionship, deeper and more loyal than any other. Better with two she'd said to him so many centuries ago and she meant it, really meant it. He squeezes without thinking, realizing only how much his arms have tightened when she squeaks, but when he begins to loosen his grip she only doubles hers.
They clutch at one another greedily, her face in his shoulder, his nose in her hair. For once he doesn't deny himself luxury and simply drinks it in. Then she shifts, moves, her face tilts up and towards his, and he has to let go.
"Doctor," she breathes as he puts a bit of distance between them and he sees now that she looks so very tired. Who knows how long she's been jumping; he sees years in the depths of her eyes but knows it can't actually have been that long. Well. Time is relative.
"Look at you," he says with that boyish grin he knows does not match his eyes. "I wondered if I'd ever get to see this. Hoped."
"Then I–"
"Oh, let's not do that. You know we can't do that."
She nods, her face carefully blank and hard but there is hope blossoming in the depths of her gaze and he is glad of it. She has to keep going; heknows she keeps going because he is here, in this body. Slowly a smile begins to break over her face and oh, he's missed her smile, missed her. There are so many brilliant humans in their little world but she has always been special. He smiles back, one he thinks may hark a little too close to the one he used to give her after his regeneration because her smile suddenly wobbles, then cracks, and all at once she is sobbing in his arms.
"Oh Rose, oh, shhhh, shhhhh, there you go…"
He has seen Rose Tyler cry on many occasions for many different reasons but the only time he ever saw her like this was by her father's side on a street in a newly-saved universe with shards of broken vase under her denim-clad knees. Now, as he did then, he tucks her in close and rocks her slowly back and forth, his grip firm as her knees go weak. She clutches at his jacket just like she did back then, when her short nails left half moon impressions on black leather. He doubts tweed feels the same. Her whole body is shaking with the force of her sobs, muscles becoming dead weight and he sinks them both slowly to the ground, folding himself up all elbows and knees and settling her in his lap like a child. He keeps rocking her as she cries.
"I'm so tired," she chokes out between sobs. "I'm so tired, and I'm so lost. It feels like this is never going to end. I'm never going to find you, the rightyou."
"I can't," he murmurs into her hair, hair the smells like it did when he hugged her in the TARDIS after his almost-regeneration thanks to that bloody Dalek. It makes him wonder how close she is, how soon she will find him or Donna, in the Trickster's world, and how soon he will lose her, again, even as he gets to keep her. Well, sort of.
"I can't you know I can't," he says as her sobs finally begin to slow, "But you can. Oh, Rose, you can and you will. You are so strong. You are."
"I'm tired," she says again, barely crying at all now but boneless against him, as if every drop of energy she's ever had is simply gone. He hitches her up, shifts her to rest more comfortably on his chest and shoulder, and returns to rocking. He thinks, just for a second, of Craig and Alfie and things he hopes his other self and Rose are getting up to in Pete's World, then pushes those thoughts away.
"I know you are," he soothes. "Rose Tyler, defender of the Earth. It's not an easy job, is it?"
"Better with two," she replies and he can hear the smile in her voice and suddenly he is the one so very close to tears. They well up in him, sharp pressure behind his eyes, and even as he holds her he misses her again, the way he misses Gallifrey, and his people, misses home. Because when he lost Gallifrey that is what she became: home.
"Always," he agrees, trying to ignore how soft and rough his voice is. He squeezes her tightly again, feels some strength come back into her arms as she squeezes him back, and once he feels he's back under control he carefully untangles himself from her. She sits in the turquoise grass, their knees still touching, and takes him in through swollen eyes.
"You're young."
"I'm old," he corrects, "So very old. You're young, and beautiful."
"I'm all splotchy from crying." She makes a face and he smiles, reaches out and brushes his knuckles across her cheeks.
"You're always beautiful, even when you cry."
His words, unexpected and more forward than ever before, make her blush and look away. When she looks back there is a steely resolve in her gaze again.
"How long?"
"Centuries." He won't lie to her, not now, not while she's on this extraordinary journey. She deserves better. "It's been a very long time, Rose."
"On your own?"
Her voice cracks and he sees it on her face the same moment he feels it, the memory of a cold and windy beach and an empty TARDIS and a connection not quite made. It still hurts.
"No," he says softly, reassuringly, and is relieved to see her smile in return. "I had friends with me, but they left, had to leave, really. To be together. A couple, a married couple, lovely people."
"And now?"
"A new friend. A special, impossible girl. You know the type."
Rose rolls her eyes. "Don't I. You haven't changed much then."
"I look different."
"Not in your eyes. I could always tell by the eyes. When you changed, became all brown and rude, your eyes still looked the same. Old, and deep, and sad."
"Oi," he says softly, with an affectionate grin, "that's a bit rude yourself."
"Learned from the best." She looks around. "So where is she, this new companion of yours?"
"Back on Earth. She's a governess, for a family; had to get back home to watch the kids."
"Well. That's different." She raises her eyebrows, waits for him to explain. Knows he will, and he hates, a little, that she's right.
"I can't keep them anymore," he says with a sigh, "not like I used to be able to. Before, with you and–" he stops himself, bites back the names she can't know yet, "You wanted to run away and see the stars. Now they have… friends. Families. Obligations. They want to travel but they want to stop at home in between. I'm too old to say no anymore. Selfish enough to do whatever it takes to keep them around. I don't want to be alone."
"Doctor," she reaches out and takes his hand, threading their fingers together between them. It feels so right that he aches for it. "You are not alone. You could never be alone. You make friends when you blink."
"Maybe before. Not anymore."
"Don't," she squeezes his fingers, as if the pressure will staunch the flow of self-pity and guilt. "I don't regret a single thing about the time I spent with you. I don’t regret leaving Mum, and I don't regret hurting Mickey, and I don't regret losing Jack, or even falling into a bloody parallel universe because I had you. And that was worth it. And whoever it is you're traveling with now, I'm sure when they're home they're thinking about when you're coming back and where you're going to take them next, because it's not the universe, Doctor, it's you. And it's still you, it must be still you, because it was always you. Whoever these companions are, Doctor, they are traveling for you."
He opens his mouth, not knowing what he's going to say; to retort, perhaps, or argue with her. He is nothing special, just an old and embittered alien traveling on his own because there's no one left, and he didn't realize it before now but he feels closer to his Ninth self than he ever has before. Companions are balms for his soldier's calluses, but they are not friends he feels he has earned or deserved. How has he forgotten he is allowed to have friends? He thinks of the way Rose looked at his double in the Crucible, and then on the TARDIS, and finally on the beach, how she quickly, instantly accepted that they were both the Doctor, how she called them both by the same name without question. He closes his mouth, opens it again to tell her she's right, but is interrupted by a fluttering beep.
"Shit," says Rose, looking down at the contraption on her wrist. When she looks up again her eyes are shining with longing and regret. "Right universe, wrong timeline. I'm getting pulled back through."
"Rose Tyler," he says again and this time when he leans in he does kiss her, hard on the mouth with lips closed and his hands on her cheeks holding her head still. She freezes in surprise for only a second and then kisses him back, breathing in sharply through her nose as she struggles for a little bit of control. He almost falls into it, almost lets time stretch and strain to keep their lips together a moment longer, but he resists and pulls back, kissing her forehead before letting her go completely.
"Listen to me," he says as they both stand, their eyes locked and serious. "Do not give up, Rose Tyler. I have never known another person in all my lives as stubborn as you, and don't you let that change any time soon. Keep looking. Keep jumping. You will find what you need. I know it. I believe it. I believe in you."
She takes a step back as the contraption emits another beep, this one more alarmed than the last. She looks like she wants to reach out and touch him but if she does she will pull him through with her and that would be a catastrophe, so she clenches her hands by her sides.
"Doctor–"
"And find Donna Noble." It hurts to force the name out but he does it because he must, because things must happen as they did or else nothing he has ever done will be worth it. If time completes itself she will be happy and another him will be happy with her and that is worth it, all of it. "That's who you need, Donna Noble. She's got red hair and one hell of a mouth, you'll love her."
"Doctor," she says again, urgent as more beeps sound from her wrist. "You said to me once, you said 'Have a fantastic life.' Please, Doctor: Have a fantastic life. Do it for me, yeah? Don't be alone."
"Rose–"
"Promise."
He can't hold off the smile; she is so the same and he is still helpless to say no to her. "I promise."
"Good." She nods decisively and pushes a button on the contraption and the hot wooshing starts again, but in reverse. She gives him a grin, her tongue poking out from between her teeth and even though her face is still red and swollen from her tear her eyes are sparkling with hope and determination. "I'll see you later!"
She is gone in a second, just a little blip and poof. He stares at the empty space where she was, blinking dumbly at nothing for a few minutes before he can gather himself.
"Not if I see you first," he murmurs and heads back to the TARDIS to fetch Clara.