A/N: I just couldn't leave this scene alone. I had to explain why he reacted with "give me guilt" when faced with Rose and the fact that Rose was the immediate choice when he asked for someone he liked. My little shipper heart demanded it and who am I to deny my heart?

Disclaimer: I own nothing of Doctor Who. I am just playing with the characters because they play with my emotions.

"Give me someone I like."

That's what he'd told the TARDIS voice interface earlier that day. And of course the TARDIS had given him Rose. His ship knew him better than anyone, knew that her Bad Wolf still held the hearts of her Thief even though she was gone. The Doctor slumped against his headboard, fingers yanking at his bowtie to undo it. He needed to sleep tonight to let his body process all the excitement from the day (poison and regeneration energy were enough to do even him in) but he was dreading it. He knew she would be haunting him tonight.

The TARDIS hadn't meant to cause him pain. Rose had always been the one he could be weak in front of. He could show her the cracks in his armor without fear because she would always make him better. Every time he'd broken down under the weight of his guilt and the universe on his shoulders, she had been there to soothe and comfort and build him back up again. So when he lay dying on the floor of the TARDIS, it made perfect sense that Rose was his ship's first choice, but she couldn't have known that the hologram of Rose that she produced hit a little too close to home.

The wavering projection instantly transported him back to the first time they'd been separated by the void. The months he spent trying to find a way across the void before accepting that he could only send an image. No touch. The last time Rose's image had been in the console room was when he had burned up a sun just to see her one last time, to tell her goodbye. And he never even got the chance. He didn't get to tell her the words that he tried to get out, the ones she deserved to hear. Her image had flickered and disappeared while they were on the tip of his tongue. He'd run out of time and then he'd run out of chances. He had to let his other self finally give her the words and the life she deserved.

But seeing that projection today when he was already on edge brought everything back. So he'd sputtered out something about guilt because he'd lost control of what he was saying and the guilt was easier than the heartsbreak. Because he did feel guilty. He'd meant to get those words out, he really had. He feels so guilty that he had never told her once during their years together. He thought she knew, thought that it really wasn't necessary to say it but one look at her face during that aborted goodbye told him otherwise. She needed to hear it, needed to know because she was sure of her feelings, brave like she always was in being able to tell him, but her eyes were vulnerable. She didn't know for sure that he loved her (would always love her.) The guilt at making her wonder for years about the end of that sentence, at allowing there to be any doubt as to how he felt about her still ate at him. It felt like his hearts were being swallowed by the void when he thought about it so he had to ask the TARDIS for someone else. But now, here in his bedroom, free from imminent death by poison, he let himself think about her, let the guilt and longing and heartsbreak wash over him in waves as he sobbed into a pillow in a room she had never seen. New him, new room, same feelings.

But this time when he fell apart, Rose wasn't there to put the pieces back together.