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preserved_ginger) wrote2008-07-26 11:33 am
And Nothing Is As Perfect As You Want It To Be
Character(s): Ten. Mentions throughout of Rose and Donna
Pairing: Ten I/Rose
Rating: 12 / PG
Disclaimer: Not mine
A/N: The Ten muse has been talkative lately. This is another post-Journey’s End introspective from his POV. Canon-compliant. The title is from the poem And nothing is ever as you want to be by Brian Patten.
Spoilers: Plot/dialogue for 4X13, including missing scene; dialogue and themes from 2X04, 2X09, 2X11, 2X12, 3X03 and 3X09.
Summary: You live and learn.
“How long are you going to stay with me?”
He was his own worst enemy, sometimes. Didn’t know when to keep his mouth shut.
“Time I moved on.”
He’d told her that he’d be all right – even if that wasn’t really true. But it had been the only way he could steel himself to let her go – keeping her safe, what could possibly be more important than that? – and what was a tiny little lie against keeping Rose safe, for ever?
“I’d hoped ... but my hopes aren’t important.”
Was it really the only reason? Probably not. He’d lied to Rose, said that he would have Donna with him, because he liked it – because just for a little while, he could pretend. Just for a bit. He could allow himself the luxury of a day-dream, letting himself imagine that maybe everything was going to be all right. After all, he was always ‘all right’, wasn’t he? It didn’t last, of course; it went pear-shaped in the end, like things tended to do around him.
“Now I am alone. I hate it. It’s not fair. And I hate it!”
He feels guilty about having to take Donna’s memories from her – even if it had been the only way to save her life; he’d not have her death on his conscience. Not her physical death, at any rate – although the fact that the Donna he’d travelled with, the Donna who had helped him deal with losing Rose, was ‘dead’ and by his hand would stay with him for a long, long time.
“The man who keeps running, never looking back because he dare not, out of shame.”
The time he spent with Donna's mother and grandfather explaining to them why Donna could remember nothing of what she'd seen and done with him shredded him inside, but it was the last thing he could do for Donna after she had done so much for everyone else. Himself included.
“I just want you to know, there are worlds out there, safe in the sky because of her. That there are people living in the light, and singing songs of Donna Noble. A thousand million light years away. They will never forget her, while she can never remember.”
And now he was alone. He couldn’t quite shake the idea that he deserved it in a way, for lying to Rose when all he needed to do was to tell her the truth and she’d have stayed with him. Part of him had been screaming against the idea in his head since he’d first thought of it; all of him had hated executing it. It had felt oddly like a betrayal, at the time.
“I’ve spent all that time trying to find you; I’m not going back now.”
He turned towards the console, half-heartedly punching in co-ordinates to take him away from here. Donna’s face and what he had done to her were part of him in a way that he knew meant he’d carry the guilt for ever, but it wasn’t Donna who he couldn’t get out of his mind. It was Rose.
“I said ‘Rose Tyler’.”
“Yeah?...and how was that sentence gonna end?”
“Does it need saying?”
He’d practically forced her to choose the other one of him. It had made sense, at the time, in a round-about sort of way. He needed her to remain safe, and he knew the best way to do that was to seal her away from his enemies for ever. But he couldn’t help but think that perhaps there might have been a better way. Still, too late now. He’d have to live with the guilt of it like everything else. Maybe he’d let it choke him, this time.
“But he’s not you.”
He’d thought that the abiding image he’d have of Rose would be of her kissing that other him – something that had hurt enough that he’d be able to get over her this time, like he’d tried and failed miserably to do after Canary Wharf. But that wasn’t how it turned out – then again, when did things ever turn out the way he wanted them to?
“Oh my God … he finally found you!”
No. The image he has of Rose is one of a girl on the cusp of womanhood, but who had not yet lost the whole of her childhood’s innocence. The Rose he fell in love with all that time ago.
“If you get back in touch... if you talk to Rose... just tell her... tell her I…”
And as he travelled, alone again, he had time in abundance and he found himself day-dreaming during the day and, when he slept, dreaming dreams he couldn’t forget if he tried. And those recurring dreams weren’t so much of Gallifrey, not any more. No, they were of a planet with pink and yellow skies and rocky landscape, with inhabitants that looked like fish but soared in the sky like eagles. And of the blonde-haired girl in a black jacket he’d been with there who’d promised him her heart. When he wakes from these dreams, it’s all he can do not to weep – for Donna Noble’s not the only one in this universe whose life was changed irrevocably for ever. He’ll never see Rose again, and to know that this time it was all his own doing makes the pain even harder to tolerate. It was a mistake; he knew that, now. And he’d have given anything to be able to go back and change it – but he knew he couldn’t. So the words of her promise would ring in his ears for ever, some kind of purgatory he’d never get out of:
“How long are you going to stay with me?”
“For ever.”
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Oh, this just breaks my heart.
I know; this one was difficult to write.
Really captured what he must be thinking, though.
Thank you! I’m glad that you thought so (I was a bit worried that it wasn’t hugely in-character for him, but then I’m a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to my own work!)
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Very nice!
Thank you!
That's what Timelords get for making everyone else's choices for them instead of letting life take its course
Yeah – I know, I know. But he doesn’t think he deserves any different, and that in its own way is even more desperately sad.
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Beautiful written and really heartbreaking at the same time :(
Thank you.
I feel so sorry for him.
Oh, me too. *shakes fist at RTD*
Hope he will find a new companion to cheer him up a bit.
*sighs*
I’d like to think that that would help – but going on what happened when he tried that with Martha (poor, poor Martha), I’m not hopeful.
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Or maybe a male companion this time. Would be interesting, I think ...
A male companion (that isn’t Jack Harkness) would be a good idea, I think. Although it would produce a corresponding storm of slash fic from the usual sources, I’d imagine.
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You do his angst very well, though.
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Ten just loves making himself suffer, doesn't he?
Yes, he does. But that’s inferiority complexes for you, though; he doesn’t believe that he deserves not to suffer. Poor sod.
You do his angst very well, though.
Thank you!
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but he doesn't understand that she truly doesn't care about all the things he beats himself up over.
It’s possible that he daren’t let himself believe it, simply because everything he’s loved before has been taken from him.
(Seriously, all that man has left now is his TARDIS. I hope to God RTD hasn’t taken it into his head to deprive the Doctor of that too for the Specials. *shivers*)
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The thing is, I think Ten thinks this is what he deserves. Lots of what he says about Ten II is projection. It's what he actually thinks of himself, and it's not that he thinks Rose can "fix him" so much as he can't be fixed, and she deserves a clean slate.
I don't ship many couples (about four) and all of them have some horribly screwed up dynamic. What this says about me I don't know.
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I've rewatched "The Stolen Earth" several times since I first saw it, but I just cannot think about watching the last episode of the season. Just thinking about the final shot of poor Ten sitting in the TARDIS, all by himself, soaking wet, with a horrible look of despair on his face, sets me to tears.
Yes. I have pretty much the same problem you do, for (I suspect) pretty much the same reasons.
The thing is, I think Ten thinks this is what he deserves. Lots of what he says about Ten II is projection. It's what he actually thinks of himself, and it's not that he thinks Rose can "fix him" so much as he can't be fixed, and she deserves a clean slate.
I wonder if it’s partly that, but more his pushing her away now so that when she goes it’s on his terms (much good they did him, but I digress) and in theory the pain should be less that way.
Of course, the fact he didn’t appear to give her any say in the matter might bite him in the ass somewhere down the line.
*sighs*
I don’t know how to explain this, I just don’t. I’ve tried and it just isn’t working.
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Also, totally right that not letting her choose will bite him in the ass. (Although it does make me wonder if he knew that if she was given the choice she'd go with him...)
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I'm not sure it's that, because he seems to want to cause himself pain. I agree there is much I can't explain, but I still think his comments about Ten II are projection, at least in part.
Probably, especially since we’ve pretty much worked out that he doesn’t deserve her. (Although that doesn’t give the best message to Rose, either, now I come to think of it.)
Also, totally right that not letting her choose will bite him in the ass.
Which is the only thing which makes me wonder if we’ve actually not seen the last of Rose.
(Although it does make me wonder if he knew that if she was given the choice she'd go with him...)
He wouldn’t believe it even if she told him flat-out.
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I really think we have seen the last simply because I doubt RTD will let Moffat get his hands on the character.
While he wouldn't believe it, I still think he needs to hear it.
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This is exquisitely written and absolutely heartbreaking, and very true to how I believe the Doctor would be feeling after all that. Will the events of this episode ever not make me cry?
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Oh Doctor ... :(
I know! *huggles him*
This is exquisitely written and absolutely heartbreaking, and very true to how I believe the Doctor would be feeling after all that.
I’m trying to make sense of it in my head, pretty much like you are; his is the character I’ve always invested in the most and it’s his motivations – especially for what he did here – that interest me. He and I both have something of an inferiority complex going down, which might be why I can ‘see into his head’ so well.
Will the events of this episode ever not make me cry?
I don’t know; sometimes I think I am all right and then something else comes up and I am crying like a baby again at it all :(
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Right there with you hun :(
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Right there with you hun :(
Pretending that 4X13 just didn’t happen is helping me immensely just now. Try it, it might help you.
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To be honest, I can't not feel anything for Ten II
But if 4X13 never happened then Ten II didn’t exist ;)
(Yes, I know that isn’t what you mean; I am beyond ambivalent about Ten II right now, and am spending most of my time trying to shore up Ten I – who in my opinion needs it more desperately than ever.)
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I agree.
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Oh, ouch at the end. I've not read that sort of take it on it before.
I know ... it was a bit harsh of me, perhaps, but I see the Doctor as a very flawed man – and one with an enormous inferiority complex / case of survivor’s guilt – and it’s more than likely IMHO that he’ll have done what he did because he didn’t think he deserved the alternative.
I love the way you turned Rose's "forever" into some sort of mental "forever" and then into a punishment.
It’s not meant as punishment, honestly; it’s just that that is what his mind is likely to turn it into, poor soul.
I’m glad you like this.
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*sobs some more* As if I haven't cried enough.
*hugs*
Tears are therapeutic; that’s what I keep telling myself every time this episode makes me bawl.
I even started crying just watching the new preview for the Christmas episode.
*looks nervous*
Why’s this? There’s nothing bad in it, is there?
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I wouldn't know. As soon as I saw the Doctor, I had to stop the promo. I haven't even been able to watch episodes so I don't know what made me think I could watch the trailer.
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I haven't even been able to watch episodes so I don't know what made me think I could watch the trailer.
*HUGS*
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Lovely introspective piece. I think it's perfectly fitting.
Thank you!
*hugs the Doctor*
*joins in*
(I don’t care if he did it to himself, he needs all the hugs he can get right now. Poor, stupid, beloved man.)
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Make me cry all over again poor doctor no one to hold his hand
I know ...
*hugs and passes tissues*
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I think you need to write a fixit. These fics are too depressing to not have some kind of eventual resolution!
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I think you need to write a fixit. These fics are too depressing to not have some kind of eventual resolution!
There’s a fix-it!fic on the way, I promise.
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Thank you; I am glad you like it :)
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