Defender of the Earth

TITLE: One Night
AUTHOR: tainted_crimson @ crimson_stories
CROSSOVER: Doctor Who / Dollhouse
RATING: PG
SPOILERS: Series 2 of DW. Concept of DH.
DISCLAIMER: Just playing in sandboxes that belong to geniuses.

SUMMARY: An answer to the Rose Tyler Commentfic Ficathon challenge by juliet316: In order to curry favor with the Vitex Heiress, the Rossum Corporation, via the Dollhouse, sends Rose an active that looks hauntingly familiar.


ONE NIGHT

Who: Rose, Jareth
Where: Rose's room
When: After visiting the garage with Nine and Jack
What: Rose deals with having her fears confirmed.

( A broken rose. )

A letter from Rose to Jack... Slipped under his door.


To whom it may concern:

Jack Harkness is the most amazing human being I have ever met, and I do not say that lightly, because in my short lifetime, I have had the privilege of meeting a number of extraordinary people. But Jack shines brighter than all of them.

I met Jack when my life was going through a number of changes. Every day was a new adventure, and often I found myself stumbling around just looking for something to hold onto. When Jack came waltzing in with his coat billowing out behind him, we latched onto each other and didn't let go until circumstances demanded it of us. Jack was my rock, my best friend, and he never asked anything of me, even when perhaps he should have.

Our first parting was not a willing one, and I will always regret how things were left between us. He never knew how much I missed him, his laugh, his confidence, the way he could always turn the conversation toward something less than proper. He never realized how many times I would look at my door and hope that he would be the next to walk through it.

Even though he blames me now for not doing more to find him, that did not keep our friendship from surviving the rocky journey of our latest meeting. Regardless of the misunderstandings of the past, Jack has been there every step of the way for me as I grieved the loss of my fiance, and even more so when I was diagnosed with a fatal illness. He never stopped hoping and trying to keep me optimistic, and he never stopped looking for a cure. Even when I wasn't with him, I knew he worried for me, and there is simply no way I can ever repay the kindness he has shown me these past few months.




I got it into my head to try making this letter into something it wasn't, but when I got to that part, I just... I couldn't. It can't be something it isn't, just like I can't be something I'm not. This is a goodbye letter, Jack, and I'm dying.

The Doctor told me about the device. He apologized for it, but it isn't his fault. None of this is his fault. I brought this illness upon myself; I was told about the risks posed by the elevated levels of radiation, but I kept going, because I had to find the right universe.

I didn't do it just to save reality, though, Jack, and I didn't do it just to get back to him. I did it to get back to you as well. You probably won't believe it, because I know how bitter and hurt you still are about what happened, but I missed you. You meant every bit as much to me as he did, but I was so young and so naive that his brightness was all I could see.

After we left you behind... I thought so many times of asking him to take me to you. I never did because I didn't think he would have left you behind if you hadn't wanted it, that he wouldn't let you stay out there if you weren't happy. I'll never stop regretting that decision.

When my Doctor and I traveled together in our TARDIS, I looked for you. I knew it wouldn't be you, it wouldn't be my Jack, but I thought that just maybe if I found you in that universe, I could help you be happy. You were so happy with us, Jack, that I just wanted to see you smile like that again. I just wanted to know that somewhere, in some universe, you were happy. I didn't know about what I'd done to you, didn't know he'd left you behind on purpose. He never told me.

But I was wrong to never have asked. I am so sorry, Jack.

I'm dying. You can't hide from that fact; without the device, there isn't any hope for me. It's going to be slow, and it's going to be painful. But that doesn't mean you have to see it.

I don't want you to see it, Jack. I don't want you to remember me that way. You have a long life ahead of you, even if you never return to being immortal, and I don't want those images to haunt you like so many other things must.

I love you, Captain Jack Harkness. I never stopped loving you. Please don't be angry with me.

Rose

Who: Rose Tyler, Jack Harkness
When: Afternoon, after Jack spends the morning with Martha
Where: Lounge
Summary: Rose is still irritated at Jack's attitude in the lobby and it turns out they have some issues to work out between them.

( Jack was the only one who really knew anything, the one she'd been close with so long ago. )

PLAYER INFO
Your name/Pseudonym: Amy
Your personal LJ: tainted_crimson
Your email: frostedfailure @ sbcglobal.net

CHARACTER INFO
Character's name: Rose Tyler
Character's canon: Doctor Who
What type of canon is your character from? TV series; appeared in Doctor Who (2005) Series 1-2, 4.


Brief history of your character (100-200 words):
Rose Tyler was your average girl, working as a shop assistant at a department store in London... until she met the Doctor. He saved her from living plastic mannequins and together they stopped the Nestene Consciousness, an alien entity. How could she resist when he asked her to join him and travel across space and time in his spaceship that looked like a 1950's police box and was called the TARDIS?

She's dealt with Daleks, Slitheen, and Cybermen, and lived to tell the tales. She nearly died when she took the Heart of the TARDIS into herself to save the Doctor and became the Bad Wolf, but he took the power of the Time Vortex into himself to save her, causing him to regenerate to his Tenth incarnation. Still they continued their adventures, meeting famous people throughout history, including Charles Dickens and Queen Victoria, and even traveling into a parallel universe. It is in this parallel universe that Rose is trapped after the Battle of Canary Wharf.

Years later, Rose made a name for herself in this parallel universe, gaining positions of authority with both Torchwood and UNIT. She appears throughout the Doctor's travels with Donna, breaking through the weakening boundaries between dimensions in order to warn the Doctor of the coming darkness. She fully enters the Doctor's universe after the Earth is stolen by the Daleks, and works with the Doctor and his many allies to save reality. Finally, she had to return to the parallel universe or risk creating a paradox, but she return alone. The Doctor left himself in her care -- the second Doctor who was created in a Meta-Crisis and was part Time Lord, part Human.

It took 13 months for their little chunk of TARDIS to grow big enough for them to travel the universe, but then travel they did. They had three wonderful years of traipsing about through time and space, and then, once again, Rose lost the Doctor in a tragic accident. She's spent the last year coping with her grief and traveling on her own, more of a sightseer than a wrongs-righter, but she still did her best to look after things, as her Doctor would have wanted.


Brief synopsis of your character's personality (100-300 words):
Rose easily fell into the role of the Doctor's companion, using her compassion and determination to tame the angry man into someone who no longer raged against the universe. She is quick-witted, inquisitive, and courageous, and above all else, she loves the Doctor. She gave no thought to her risking her own life to save his, opening the heart of the TARDIS to get back to him. Rose also has a jealous streak when it comes to the Doctor, which came out when she learned that she was just one in a long line of Companions. She has a hard edge to her now, after having seen so much of the universe, both the good and the bad, and losing the Doctor has only made it more apparent.


GAME SPECIFIC INFO
What is the point of your character's canon in which you are introducing your character?:
Five years after the Series 4 finale, Journey's End. Will be AU from any future series involving the parallel universe and Rose.

Is your character alive or dead at the point of entry to the game?:
Very much alive, though officially listed as "dead", but in an alternate universe (Pete's World).

What skills does your character have?:
Experience with weapons, leadership, and interstellar battle. Can use a sonic screwdriver and pilot a TARDIS. Calm in a crisis. Advanced knowledge of alien species, history throughout the universe, and the intricacies of time.

Inventory: Sonic screwdriver, photo album of her family (Mum, Dad, and baby brother, Tony), key to the TARDIS, framed photo of her and the Doctor standing beside a red phone booth with a blue rose painted on the side, psychic paper, 3D glasses (like for movies), specially designed gun, assortment of clothing and shoes, modified pink cellphone (Superphone), the Doctor's leather jacket

Voicemail: Here!

Entrance Post: Here!