How did you find me here waiting for you? Across the multiverse we collide

[sexy_bluebox]

When Sexy opens her eyes (her eyes, she has eyes, oh dear), she experiences something just a little less than shock. She supposes it can't be full-on shock, at this point in her long and illustrious history and with a precedent to boot, but she is rather surprised to find herself out of her usual network. The sky above her is blue, that deep afternoon blue that's just begun to make way for the orange hues of the setting sun, and she can't help but smile as she marvels at it (the humanoids had the wonderful ability to appreciate the finer wonders of the universe in a way Sexy could never truly understand until she'd seen it for herself. Even then, she'd only gotten the smallest taste of it.)

She manages to sit up, skirts bunched up underneath her. She's not sure where she is beyond the nondescript alleyway around her, and when she tries to remember where she was last parked (space, stars, plotting a course around something...), her head feels a tad fuzzy. Sexy extends a hand, looking at her fingers (humans have so many of them, don't they?), flexing and quickly figuring out how to move each one. The first step towards figuring out just what exactly's going on would be to get up, but it's been a hot minute since she's piloted one of these things, so she'll need a moment.

Eventually, she manages to get a hand underneath her, wobbling up to her feet. Yes, she feels as though she's picking it up fairly quickly - quicker than she did the last time, though her head almost feels as though it's swimming just as much. Lingering side effects from being transplanted, she's sure.

Sexy spends a few minutes examining the brick on the building next to her (red, gritty, and the texture under her hand was incredibly fascinating), getting distracted as she tries to make her way out of the alley. Surely her thief wasn't terribly far. Or perhaps this was a dream! She'd heard of those, but had, of course, never managed to experience one. Honestly, she'd be far less surprised if it was a dream. The universe always did find a way to keep you on your toes, somehow.

Comments

[borntolove]

Time Lords don't get sick from silly things like being drenched in water or standing in freezing temperatures; if anything if it gets too cold, which about -200 below for someone; he'll regenerate.

Ten does notice how the other is touching the railing in a particular spot. A spot that only him and The Tardis know - about.

Is that who you are? Would explain opening the Tardis door properly.
None of him ever have and isn't going to start now.

Rather than answering the question; goes to careful feel the surface of her mind with his as he does so is looking more deeply into those brown eyes that match his own; maybe even more so.

"Sexy - is that you?"

[sexy_bluebox]

Of course not, but then, he's spent so long playing pretend. It's a bit of fun, isn't it, to step inside somebody else's shoes and see the universe as they see it? And humans - they were the most unique, in Sexy's opinion. Something...indomitable about them, wasn't there? People have tried to recreate it, but there's something about them - racing each other to touch the stars because no one thought they could, but a few tiny bacteria and a spat of cold weather could knock them out for the count. Incredible, you might say (or stupid, endlessly stupid - so many of the other Timelords thought so, certainly, children, yet they could do so much more).

He certainly hasn't, but if Sexy allowed herself to pick up all of the Doctor's bad habits, they'd never manage to get anywhere, would they?

"Got it in one." Sexy tilts her head as they stare at each other, wet ringlets clinging to the side of her face. She leans against the railing, testing out her arms as she presses her body weight against them. She feels him reach out, and stretches her consciousness out as far as it can go with this dreadfully small container; there's still so much, too much, stuffed inside her brain, but it should be enough to properly back up her identity. "You always were the quicker one. Paid more attention."

"Yes, it's me. Us, I suppose." Sexy glanced at the console, the green light and the gentle hum of her engine. "Is this really what I look like from the outside?"

[borntolove]

Ten manages a very faint smile for a moment and presses his forehead gently against hers and continues to indulge in their psychic connection, with a hand palm on her cheek feeling her and smelling her.

At the moment not concerned on how she's in the same space-time with herself.

"Would you have it any other way?"

She can feel it through that strong feeling of lost. Of someone or maybe it's someones.

[sexy_bluebox]

Sexy hums quietly to herself, closing her eyes when the Doctor presses their foreheads together. The two levels of touch are interesting - minds brushing, but also skin, and they feel both different and the same at the same time.

"Any other way and it wouldn't be you. My thief." Sexy lifts her hand and sets it on the Doctor's chest, letting her feel his hearts, thumping away. She'd always wondered...her heart was so different, in the TARDIS, but she'd wondered what it felt like to have blood pumping through veins, to feel alive. And The Doctor was more alive than anyone she'd ever known.

Who? She asks gently. She's seen the beginning and end of all of the Doctor's companions before, and this one - this Doctor loses so much. Has lost? Will lose? But it could be any of them or all of them.

[borntolove]

Ten is focusing on their heartbeats; her heartbeat that matches both of his and continues to softly press his forehead against hers and his hands finding her sides and slightly clinging to her on both sides.

As he feels his hearts ache and visions of Rose, Martha, Jack and Donna flash through their connection and there's a long silent tear on his left side.

[sexy_bluebox]

Oh dear. Sexy’s hand curls against the Doctor’s chest, nails curled against the fabric of his soaked suit. Her mind lingers on Rose and Donna - two definitive losses, chapters that were closed forever, and so absolutely, too. She feels his ache and lets it permeate, lets him share his grief - lets him know that he’s not the only one grieving, that she feels for them too. Perhaps it will help him feel not so alone.

You love them, Sexy’s mind roamed over each of them; Rose’s shiny blonde hair, Martha’s teasing smile, the Captain’s flirty smirk, and Donna’s boistrous laugh. And they love you, too. So very, very much. Nothing can erase that, not time nor distance.

[borntolove]

One of his tears stops for a moment, as his throat seems to clog and he shakes a bit and clunches, Sexy a bit more.

Why couldn't he tell Rose? Meta had her family and Mickey to watch him. Someone was just making excuses again, weren't they? Rose told him already she's made her choice. Her choice was with him.

Why - why can't he allow himself to have nice things with these feelings he's allowed himself to feel?

Now, he's not so sure he wants to keep feeling.

[sexy_bluebox]

“My beautiful, burning Time Lord.” Sexy whispers, letting her free hand come up to the Doctor’s cheek. Her thumb sweeps over his cheekbone, catching the salty droplet on the pad of her thumb. The rest of his face is wet, but this new track is evident on his skin.

You have grown so much and I am so proud of you. Sexy pulls back just enough to look into the Doctor’s face, to trace her fingers over the contours of his despair. He will become many things, over the rest of his years, but this is the closest he will ever come to human.

“Don’t do it,” Sexy whispers, staring into those fathomless brown eyes. Warm, fresh earth, the brown of life. “Don’t give in, my darling. There is so much waiting for you, out there.”

[borntolove]

There's a gentle face nudge and then stares back with his head tilted slightly. Giving a dreadful look with that face.

Why not? What's the point of loving again? Only to get hurt again? Trapped in an unending cycle of love and pain.
Was it the right choice - to make this choice for her? He didn't think it entirely through or maybe he did but didn't want to think the good times would end even if he knew they would.

How can he love any more than Rose? He can't. It's impossible.

And finds himself longling for Jack.

Though he's also not letting go of Sexy anytime soon - in her fleshy body.

One of his hands; he runs up her spine rather tenderly.

[sexy_bluebox]

Sexy only caught the tenor of his thoughts, but she shook her head and smiled anyway - she could make an educated guess as to the way they would skew. Travel 900+ years with the man, she’d have learned how to catch on rather quickly. I believe the phrase goes, ‘Love is pain’.

Whether it was right or wrong...what else could he do? Take her away from friends and family, to live a life - albeit an extraordinary one - among the stars with him, ever immortal? Rose made her choice, yes, but he had made the best one he could for her - letting her go, to be happy.

The good Captain...perhaps they’d cross paths again. He was hard for her to track through space and time, but he was out there, fixed, forever.

Sexy wraps her arms around his neck in return, dragging him in closer. They’re still drenched, but they’re alive, together, and she’ll give him all the comfort she possibly can.

[borntolove]

With 900 + years of denying to himself the 'love is pain'

She wasn't happy. She wanted to be with him. It was just him and he knows it. He knows the excuse is to make Rose happy but deep down - The Doctor knows that he was just scared of seeing her die.

The frustration whirls though him and their mental connection and loathing for himself and his cowardness and just the pain of her not being here anymore because this form - this form was always for her.

Which, Ten becomes weak in the knees and flops more of his weight on Sexy.

[sexy_bluebox]

Sexy knows, logically, that the Doctor gets up and carries on. She knows it, she's seen it, she's lived it...but it doesn't make the potency of his pain any less. Sexy closes her eyes, trying to radiate that contented calm across to him through the mental link - hoping, perhaps, it will give him some comfort as the frustration and loss clouds over everything, for him.

No, Rose wasn't happy - but she would be. That much was very true, excuse or not - her life would seem so very short to him. Seventy years, eighty? It was a blip on his lifespan. Wasn't it better, perhaps, to part ways before it ever reached that point? To love and remember her, as she should be remembered?

Rose had done so much for the Doctor - she'd saved him, in more ways than one. Sexy had been worried, so very worried, all those years he traveled alone - but she knew, at the end of the tunnel, that someone was waiting for him. Rose. "Don't you remember?" Sexy murmured, catching Ten's weight as he leaned against her. "Don't you remember the day I landed? You didn't want to come to London. You were so tired." But he had, and he'd crossed paths with Rose, just as Sexy had seen he would.

You have lived a long life, Sexy hums quietly, pressing a kiss to the Doctor's temple. But you have much more life to live, my dear.

[borntolove]

The radiated calmness helps a bit - to clear his mind a bit but doesn't take away the ache from his hearts.

So? It meant more time with them. More adventures and she'd age slightly slower because she was traveling with him.

This way - this way he feels like he pulled the CORE of his being out of him - simply because he couldn't tell Jack or Martha to stay but commanding them too isn't right.

And Rose - just scared. Just scared like he was blasted last time.

Which The Doctor pushes Sexy a bit hard away from him before going over and pounding with his fists in anger and teeth glaring against the Tardis wall.

Without turning around towards Sexy replies softly with sad choked tone; "Yes.... And that I didn't want to begin to care for her, either."

It's his fault - it's his fault for making the choice of wanting to regenerate for Rose and having fallen in love with her.

"....

....

I don't. I don't want to keep going. I don't see the point. And I don't see the point of doing this all over again with someone else. And I can't - I can't love anyone more than Rose."

Then falls to his knees; well outside of Sexy - obviously.

[sexy_bluebox]

Nothing can. Nothing can take away grief but time and tears; that's what they're for. She wouldn't, even if she could. It belongs to him, it wouldn't be right. If she could fix it...but she can't, and it's no use dwelling on it. She knows how this book ends, and it's not here, not now.

Sexy stumbles back at the push, still not entirely centered, but catches herself on the railing as the Doctor goes to rage against the wall. She's quiet for a moment, just watching. Reactions like this from him were rare, but not entirely unprecedented, and it was better to just let it happen.

"No, you didn't. But you needed to." It's not his fault. How is love a fault? Sexy moves slowly, crouching down next to where the Doctor has prostrated himself. Her hand hovers, unsure of whether or not she should offer comfort, or if he's going to explode again. She wouldn't blame him.

"The point is that there are so many good things waiting for you, and yes, bad things too. You will love and you will lose, and it will hurt. That is the cost of living, my darling thief, and I know it might not seem like it, but you will pay it gladly. I'm not saying you will ever find someone that you love as deeply as you love Rose - she has touched parts of you I haven't seen in centuries. But there are different kinds of love, and so much of it awaits you." Sexy inhales deeply, thinking of Amy and Rory. Where they've been and where they'll go, and how very much it will tear the Doctor apart; but in the end, he will be so thankful to have had them, all of them, every companion that's ever crossed her threshold.

"I can't bear to watch you throw it all away, and I know she wouldn't want you to either."

[borntolove]

Ten is quiet as he continues to kneel and huddling himself on the floor.

Part of him that is still sensible knows Sexy speaks the truth. He remembers how cold his leather jacket incarnation was with allowing Cassandra to die.

That face would have shot that Dalek that was found in the bunker as well - had Rose not been there.


All those people would have died in World War I; probably as well and goodness knows maybe how unforgiving he would have been with Jack.

And this form wouldn't exist - he'd look different in this life.

For a moment; Ten hears Davros's about turning ordinary into weapons.

Was that the true reason he that pushed Rose away and allowed Jack and Martha to walk?

None of them are certainly the same as he first met them.

Slowly, Ten looks over at Sexy with deep dark brown eyes and with a slight quiver in his voice remarks;

"Why do I havef to keep going?" A slight pause; "I don't want to change." Ending with a squeak, because that means he trutly lost her.

[sexy_bluebox]

She's right, but that does not make it easy. It was one thing for the companions to bring him back to life and love, but another entirely for him to pick himself up and carry on after they're gone.

No, none of them are the same - but none of them would ever want to be. It's true that the companions make the Doctor better - but vice versa, he makes them better. No, not even - they make themselves better, by awakening the courage and strength within themselves they didn't know they had. They are strong, and that display with Davros? It was kindness, it was a desire to be better than themselves. It wasn't violence they were offering, but sacrifice. Each of them were willing to sacrifice themselves so that others might live. Even Martha - ready to sacrifice herself and the entire planet - was so that the galaxy wouldn't burn. She may have been misguided, but the sincerity behind it was not born of evil.

"Would you really leave me out there in the universe, all on my own?" A small, sad smile quirks at the edges of her lips, and Sexy runs her hand through his hair calmly. "Because you are the Doctor, and there is no shortage of patients, my very old friend. You have to, my dear, because there is a very scared little girl with a crack in her wall, waiting for you to fall out of the sky, and I will not allow you to disappoint her. There are a thousand other reasons, waiting out there for you. Your story ends, and you will rest, but not today."

[borntolove]

Ten gives Sexy a look of - 'it's going to happen one day'. Almost happened with the Dalek Emperor in his leather jacket face. As Ten gently fingers with her fingers.

Which Ten then eyes Sexy; but those aren't cute puppy brown eyes; those are hard and feeling of having lived too long eyes.

Falling out of the sky you say - that means he'll have to regenerate doesn't it? There's a brief moment when Six was lasered down from The Rani in the Tardis and had to regenerate.

Which Ten, swallows hard and starts to cry silently and hides his head between his legs.

That means he really doesn't see Rose again.

[sexy_bluebox]

Of course it will happen one day. It does for everyone, at one point or another. There is no eternal creature, at leat, not in the known universe. Time and again it has almost happened, but as she said - not today.

Sexy just sighs softly and holds him, arms wrapping around the tight ball he's squeezed himself into. She won't say it never happens, because there's no way for her to know for sure - but she knows this grief isn't forever.

She starts humming, a light tune the words of which hadn't been spoken in quite some time - the kind that used to echo across brilliant fields and rolling plains, all the way to the capital of Gallifrey. She used to like listening to the singing - back, before she'd even been carted off to that museum, she always liked to land just as the singing started, in the sunset of the late afternoon.

[borntolove]

Ten would debate, Jack and he should have made Jack come with him. What was he thinking? Oh right - he wasn't. He was trying to make everyone happy or safe and didn't think Martha would come with him again.

Why did he push Jack away? Why? The excuse, of course, is the sight of the Captain but truth was - didn't want anyone to see their Doctor in any sort of emotional pain and wanted to believe that he didn't need anyone. Lying to himself that he would be just fine on his own. Truth is he does need someone.

It's just easier to push them all away. It's easier to harden his hearts to not care again so he doesn't hurt again.

Ten breathes Sexy in; and feels the singing and after a bit starts to hum along with her.

[sexy_bluebox]

Was Jack eternal? Perhaps (or was he? Hadn't they witnessed the end of the Face of Boe?), but then, his version of Jack was not. Jack would grow, would change, wouldn't be the same, in the end. Still, he'd never make anyone come with him; it just wasn't in his nature, no matter how lonely he truly was. Sexy believed that.

One day, he would learn. Perhaps today is that day, or perhaps not, but pushing people away forever would not be sustainable. He's right, and Donna at least said it straight - he absolutely needs someone. They both know what happens when he doesn't have one.

Sexy continues the song to it's end, one hand moving up to brush through his spiked locks soothingly.