Author Note: I've seen quite a few (though not nearly enough in my opinion) season three rewrites with Rose. And I thought I would give one a go. I don't know how it's going to measure up. Whoson1st and Krazy Ky-Sta Hatter are both brilliant writers and if my version is half as good as theirs then I think I'm on the right track. I'd like to thank anyone willing to read what I've written; the first two chapters are going to be a little dry because none of the dialogue from Army of Ghosts and Doomsday is really going to change. But! If you'll just be patient with me, it'll get better. In the meantime, please keep your hands and feet inside the vehicle at all times and enjoy the ride!

"Planet Earth. This is where I was born. And this is where I died. For the first nineteen years of my life, nothing happened. Nothing at all. Not ever. And then I met a man called the Doctor – 'Run,' he said. And we did. – A man who could change his face. And he took me away from home in his magical machine. He showed me the whole of time and space. I thought it would never end... That's what I thought. But then came the army of ghosts. Then came Torchwood and the War. And that's when it all ended. This is the story of how I died."

Eighteen Hours Ago

In her peripheral vision she sees him. Of course she sees him. She can always see him. He's looking out at the landscape of a desolate orange planet with his face carefully blank; his voice is measured and unflinching. He doesn't turn to face her—he could very well be asking her something trivial, like whether she fancied Italian for dinner.

"How long are you gonna stay with me?"

"Forever."

He does turn his head then; her answer had been immediate and her voice, while not equally emotionless, had been equally unflinching. His umber eyes lock onto hers, his skillfully shielded thoughts would have been unreadable to anyone not fluent in his countenance.

Her eyes are glassy from the wind, her affection is unyielding and unconditional, written plainly in her expression if he should choose to take note of it—but even if he did he'd never say, and neither will she. He wants assurances that she'll stay even though his hand in hers and a post-disaster victory hug is the most he will ever be willing to offer her. ('That, and the universe,' she thinks.) Because she will die and he will live on. Because when it comes to saving the world and losing her she can never be his choice. She wouldn't want to be.

So when his dark eyes catch her lighter ocher ones she holds them there, determinedly—a challenge, an issue, a declaration, any number of words which describe the same end: Rose Tyler will not look away first.

After several long moments of silent battle something in his expression shifts, the two are no longer are Rose and the Doctor, twenty-year old chav stuck between adolescence and adulthood, and centuries old Time Lord, the lonely wanderer whose shoulders put Atlas to shame.

She is no longer the infatuated child she had been when she'd dumped Mickey and run toward the promise of adventure, and she looks at him silently, imploringly, because to say so out loud is forbidden. Beneath the exterior a teenage girl still shaking off the last of her "baby fat" is the teenage girl who through the hardship of travel, acquired insight and self-worth, transformed herself—became a woman.

She keeps her silence though, as she feels she ought, desperate as she is that he should understand; she is promising him, here on this earth with its oranges and reds so similar to – and also so glaringly different from the expansive orange sky, sprawling red hills and silver trees of the home to which the Doctor can never return, the rest of her forever.

He studies her for a moment before a small smile, close-lipped and as sad as it is happy, subtly transforms his face. Words uttered nearly a year in the past ring in both sets of ears. "You can spend the rest of your life with me," he once said. And if he wants her, she will.

He looks back to the landscape then and her gaze soon follows. In front of them an alien sun sets, strange winged sting rays shriek in the fading light before beginning to break away to find shelter from the rapidly dropping temperatures; the Doctor and Rose remain blanketed in a permeating, yet comfortable silence, until the last of the light leaves the horizon and the temperature has dropped too low for prolonged exposure to her human body.

"C'mon," he says, giving her arm a tug with their still entwined fingers and making an encompassing hand motion in the general direction of the waiting TARDIS in the distance. The right side of his mouth suddenly quirks up in a playful smirk and even as he breaks away from her, he whispers loudly, "Race you!"

She takes off after him, laughing in exhilaration all the way, stumbling over her feet twice on the way because she's so happy she just can't seem to stop. She catches up to him while he pauses to unlock the TARDIS door and shoves him aside at the last second. When he comes to stop behind her, dragging his feet and pouting at her triumphant smile, she laughes all the more at the face he pulls.

He pilots them into the vortex while simultaneous grumbling under his breath about cheating companions, but he can't help closing his eyes and relaxing his mouth into a content smile of his own when he remembers how beautiful she looked with her windblown hair and nose and cheeks red from the cold, her head thrown back like a wolf laughing at the moon.

##############################################################################

Eight Hours Ago

They materialized in the playground next to the Powell estate, and Rose immediately went for the TARDIS door, grabbing her "dirty" clothes and veritably skipping toward the block of apartments in which her mum resided. The Doctor shook his head in fond exasperation and took three large steps to catch up with her, latching their hands together he began to criticize her playfully for the thirty-second time for bringing her washing to her mum's flat.

Rose laughed.

Her clothes were already clean; if she hadn't done them herself in the TARDIS her mum would be tasked with the job of getting Slyther saliva off Rose's jumpers or mending the acid burns on the hem of her jeans from their trip to Vortis two weeks ago. She shakes her head, laughs, and says it makes Jackie feel needed, then she opens the door to her mum's flat and turns around to look him in the eye. "Plus, it forces you to land us back on Earth every once in a while."

##############################################################################

"Mum, it's us; we're back!" Rose shouts from her spot under the threshold.

"Oh, I don't know why you bother with that phone! You never use it!" Rose's mum tuts, grabbing her daughter up quickly in a tight hug, they exchange "I love you's," stopping only because Jackie takes notice of the Doctor trying to edge his way around the couplet unnoticed; she cuts off his escape route, planting a large wet kiss right on his lips and enveloping him a long, drawn out hug, paying no mind to his feigned act of indignation.

Moments following their arrival and the Doctor's subsequent assault by the elder Tyler woman, he begins to sense a change in the air; unable to totally discount it as paranoia but with little in the way of a solution to an unease he hasn't yet unearthed the source of, starts flipping through magazines with an air of nonchalance, answering "Bezoolium," when Rose asks him a direct question about the name of the gift they'd picked out for her mum on the bazaar asteroid before he'd taken her to see the flying stingrays.

He had been growing increasingly panicked as the magazines flipped calmly through yielded no clues as to the source behind the storm that been grating with steadily increasing insistence against his time senses.

Noticing the look of distress in Rose's eyes as she stood watching her mother shuffle to the kitchen to prepare them all a cuppa, the Doctor sidles up to her side; if Rose takes note of his false cheer, she makes no comment on it.

"She's gone mad."

"Tell me something new," the Doctor jokes, not catching onto the genuine concern in her tone.

"Grandad Prentice. That's her dad, but he died like, ten years ago." Rose explains, panic mounting, her eyes roaming the Doctor's face as if hoping to find answers. "Oh my God. She's lost it… Mum? …What you just said about grandad..."

"Any second now. "

"But, he passed away. His heart gave out. Do you remember that?"

"'Course I do!"

"Then how can he come back?" Rose questions gently.

"Why don't you ask him yourself? Ten past. Here he comes."

Any half-hearted hopes the Doctor had had of taking Rose and running away from the storm clouds as fast as the TARDIS could carry them were put to a heart-wrenching stop; around him he felt a new event clicking into place as Rose was expertly folded into established events. He'd said to her a long time ago in a different voice, through a different face, that he could save the world but lose her. As he studies the eddies in time around him, resisting the urge to follow the time lines just a little ways into the future—just to make sure they continue to run parallel—the one thing keeping him in this place in time was not courage, or bravery, or honor, it was her: Rose Tyler. Time wrapped around him, cuffing him at the wrists, and then he too was intricately woven into the ensuing fray.

They'd raced outside to see the "ghosts" walking along the streets in between the unafraid masses; they were world-wide – on the news, in Jackie's favorite soap. Running back to the TARDIS, still battling that urge to pilot them away before lightning strikes (not only because it means Rose is going to be vulnerable, but also because the air was pulsating and rippling toward a fixed point, an unchangeable event which any Time Lord mind would instinctually rebel against—demanding a hasty retreat, tail-between-legs if necessary – anything to get out of Dodge) but he had to remain calm. Find a solution. Play some theme music, make a Ghostbuster's joke. Bolstering his resolve once again, the old girl sending surges of reassurance through their bond, the Doctor steeled himself for a fight. But fight what, he did not know.

##############################################################################

'Oh, that is very… not good', he thinks, peering out though his 3D glasses while working in tandem with Rose to triangulate the ghost's point of origin.

Theory confirmed and origin triangulated the Doctor races back into the TARDIS to whisk them away toward danger, ceaselessly babbling even as his eyes and body twitch with nervous energy.

"I like that. Allons-y! I should say allons-y more often. Allons-y! Watch out, Rose Tyler! Allons-y! And then, it would be really brilliant if I met someone called Alonzo. Because then I could say, allons-y, Alonzo! Every time! You're staring at me…" he stops babbling and goes still when presented with the strange look on her face, his own face going slack with horror when, after a moment, she says to him gravely. "My mum's still on board."

The TARDIS landed without her usual jolt, the old girl had taken an ounce of pity on her driver and attempted to spare him one source of pain for the day—an almighty Tyler slap was all the saving she could manage.

Spotting the guns on the monitor almost immediately, the Doctor took a calculated step to his left, blocking the monitor from Rose's view. Then in half a dozen quick strides he'd reached the doors and turned back around, intent on offering a quick, explanatory good-bye before stepping out and activating the lock behind him before his troublesome companion had time to react. "Oh, well there goes the advantage of surprise. Still! Cuts to the chase. Stay in here, look after Jackie."

"I'm not looking after my mum!"

"Well, you brought her!"

"I was kidnapped!"

"Doctor, they've got guns." Rose interjects before he and her mum can start a bickering war; she rushes up to him and puts herself between him and the door, watches as his eyes gain back their lost focus.

Taking a half step toward her, so close he can feel the heat emanating from her just as she can feel his cool, heavy breath, he carefully places both hands on her waist, his long fingers curling around her delicately—accidently grazing her blazing skin with the cool tips of the pinky and ring finger on his right hand, where her sweater had ridden up slightly.

She's standing there in front of him—he's touching her, she's whole and here, but even with his superior Time Lord biology he cannot suppress the swelling of his hearts as they drum frantically against his chest. The sensation is physically painful, it comes with the knowledge that this really could be it. 'This could be the last time I touch her. It could be the last chance to tell her…everything.' It's a temporal tipping point. It could go either way with just a puff of air. And he's not ready to let her go.

But after a time just slightly too long to be deemed innocent, he does let her go; using his grip on her waist to move her gently to the side, he flashes her a toothy smile and remarks wittily, no indication of regret in his cheery voice. "And I haven't. Which makes me the better person, don't you think? They can shoot me dead, but the moral high-ground is mine."

Then he opens the door and steps out, closing it behind him and losing sight of her. 'At least in the TARDIS she's safe.' His thoughts are quickly diverted as confusion takes precedence when the armed people begin clapping at him (and clearly know who he is). His hackles rise visibly when the woman in charge levels him a veiled threat and requests he introduce his companion; reaching back into the TARDIS, tongue in his teeth to stop from lashing out at the woman, he makes a quick grab for Jackie instead.

Seeing no reason to let the opportunity go to waste the Doctor takes a couple of affectionate digs at the Tyler woman. "Hmm. She's notthe best I've ever had. Bit too blonde. Not too steady on her pins. A lot of that," he tells the room, uses his hand to mime gabbing. "And just last week, she stared into the heart of the Time Vortex and aged fifty-seven years. But she'll do."

"I'm 40!" Jackie screeches indignantly.

"Deluded. Bless. I'll have to trade her in. Do you need anyone? She's very good at tea. Well… I say very good, I mean not bad… Well... I say not bad... anyway! Lead on—but not too fast! Her ankle's going."

"I'll show you where my ankle's going," Jackie hisses at him. Despite this however, they lock arms as they're lead away.

##############################################################################

The Doctor learns lots of things about Torchwood in the tour that follows:

If it's alien, it's Torchwood's. This includes but is not limited to the following subcategories:

His own imprisonment.

The right to knock innocent (and not so innocent) aliens passing through out of the sky, steal and adapt their technology (and do Rassilon-knows-what with their bodies) to assist in the creation of weapons like the one used to destroy the Sycorax ship on Christmas – the pride in his jailers voice had disgusted him, and prompted Jackie to shoot him an incredulous look of her own.

He's Great Britain's Most Wanted. He doesn't know why, finds it unfair even, since Rose is the one that ticked off her Majesty—but he keeps that to himself for now.

And C, or 3 or that little III that people use when doing roman numerals… If Yvonne didn't tread carefully, she would likely be on the end of a Tyler slap. The Doctor knew this because he too frequently found himself on the receiving end of that glare…he hasn't yet decided whether he's going to intervene…

His passing thoughts last just as long as it takes him to see Rose peek her head out of the TARDIS as it's led away. All he can do is glare at her and hope she understands what he's unable to say, but even if Rose had been able to understand his silent entreaty to stay where she is safe, Rose Tyler always went blundering in.

##############################################################################

Now poised with a sense of purpose, his determination to come out ahead being solidified by the fact that Rose was sure to abandon the safety of the TARDIS at any moment, the Doctor barely suppressed the urge to clap his hands at the conclusion of the tour (not that the conversation hadn't been scintillating – he'd especially loved reminiscing about his run in with Vicky), eager as he was for the next round of Yvonne's game.

The second he's seen what's behind door number one he recants his statement—he wishes the tour would recommence, in fact, he'd seen some rather well-shaped box hedges in a planter a short ways back that he'd love to look at more closely...—because somehow, impossibly, he knows what the sphere taking up the bulk the large room is, feels his jaw hanging useless in astonishment. He doesn't know how it got here but he knows what it is and after a quick peak through his 3D glasses he knows where it came here from. His eyes are glued to it, he cannot look away, as much as he desperately wants to.

Ignoring the scientist entirely and only answering Yvonne with a quick "This is a void ship," for the sake of Jackie, whom he's grown – unintentionally – close over the past two years and thus increasingly sensitive the feel of her mind (not nearly as sensitive as he was to Rose of course, but then he'd also taught Rose basic shielding techniques) and right now Jackie was terrified. He's glad to find Rose's mum isn't nearly as foolish as Torchwood obviously is.

"And what is that?" Yvonne asks.

Folding up his glasses, his face is the picture of concern. "Well, it's impossible for starters. I always thought it was just a theory, but... it's a vessel designed to exist outside time and space; travelling through the Void."

He takes a seat facing his audience, a prickling feeling running down his spine just with the knowledge that that thing is behind him.

"And what's 'the Void'?" The scientist in the lab coat questions.

"The space between dimensions. There's all sorts of realities around us, different dimensions. Billions of parallel universes all stacked up against each other. The Void is the space in-between. Containing absolutely nothing. Imagine that. Nothing. No light. No dark; no up; no down. No life. No time. Without end. My people called it the Void, the Eternals call it the Howling. But some people call it Hell."

"But someone built the sphere. What for? Why go there?"

"To explore. To escape. You could sit inside that thing and eternity would pass you by. The Big Bang, end of the universe, start of the next… wouldn't even touch the sides. You'd exist outside the whole of creation."

"You see, we were right. There is something inside it." Yvonne states, satisfaction lacing her voice. His terror is mounting, but if she won't listen, he can do nothing to help.

He looks her directly in the eye, feeling the futility in trying to reason with the woman bone-deep, but both his world and theirs were on the line. "Oh, yes!"

"So how do we get in there." It's stated more than asked; the Doctor has to look away from the scientist, to fight the urge to retch; in his peripheral vision, Jackie has gone pale.

"We don't!" the Doctor stands erect. "We send that thing back into Hell. How did it get here in the first place?"

"Well, that's how it all started." Yvonne says. "The sphere came through into this world, and the ghosts followed in its wake."

"Show me." He demands, walking off without her.

"No, Doctor." Yvonne says amusedly, he turns and walks the other way with not an ounce of urgency lost.

##############################################################################

Taking a long look through his 3D specs, he finds he was nowhere near urgent enough. The humans had been actively manipulating the weaknesses in the walls of the universe for months; it's only through a miracle that the membrane keeping this world closed off from the void hasn't begun disintegrating altogether – it will though, too soon. 'Canary Wharf', Jackie called this building, 'Who builds a bloody skyscraper to reach a spatial disturbance?!' The more he thinks about the activities that have taken place within this building the harder it is to control his ever-increasing rage.

"So – you find the breech, probe it, the sphere comes through. Six hundred feet above London, BAM, it leaves a hole in the fabric of reality. And that hole, you think, "oh, shall we leave it alone? Shall we back off? Shall we play it safe?" Nah, you think, "let's make it BIGGER!"

He listens to Yvonne's reasoning, he really does…energy source, power, Britain truly independent…"next Ghost Shift's in two minutes," she tell him, but the look the Doctor sends her has been enough to stop armies, in the past. He's furious at her ignorance. He's disgusted, beyond disgusted, really, and his Lewis isn't here to play good cop right now.

"Cancel it." He growls, every bit the Oncoming Storm the stories told on Skaro portrayed him as. Kings and Emperors had submitted to this man, wars ended by his hand, soldier's turned tail and fled under his gaze—Yvonne Hartman scoffed.

"I don't think so."

"I'm warning you, cancel it."

"Oh, exactly as the legends would have it. The Doctor, lording it over us. Assuming alien authority over the rights of Man."

He has to make her understand the danger in order to protect Rose and the rest of the planet and it's this objective which is keeping him as calm as he is. She had to listen because he had to stop this madness so he could get Rose and they could run far away from Yvonne Hartman. 'Maybe to Barcelona…maybe we'll even take Jackie.' Deciding that once this was all over he'd do just that, he refocuses all of his attention on the crazy woman in front of him, intent on giving her an explanation that even a particularly slow kindergartener would likely understand.

His eyes go to the glass partition and a smile almost pulls at his face; breaking away from the group, he stands himself on the opposite side of the glass, pulling out his sonic and maintaining constant eye contact with Miss Hartman, he speaks to her in what Rose has come to call his 'instructor voice.'

"Let me show you. Sphere comes through." He activates the sonic for a single second – just long enough for the sound waves to cause a small fracture in the glass.

Never once dropping faltering in his gaze, the Doctor watches Yvonne watch him as the glass splinters further out, waiting for some recognition of the danger they'd put the whole world in every day. "But when it made the hole, it cracked the world around it. The entire surface of this dimension splintered. And that's how the ghosts get through. That's how they get everywhere. They're bleeding through the fault lines. Walking from their world, across the Void, and into yours. With the Human Race hoping and wishing and helping them along! But too many ghosts, and..." and he touches the glass, it had been the barest graze of his fingertip, but it had been enough. The glass shattered, clattering to the floor at their feet in shards and dust and still their eyes remained locked onto each other.

"Well, in that case we'll have to be more careful." She says cheerfully, before turning to address her employees, "Positions! Ghost Shift in one minute. "

"Ms. Hartman, I am asking you - please, don't do it."

"We have done this a thousand times." She dismisses him.

Feeling panic as the storm continues to circle around him, his right hand had been twitching intermittently since he'd stepped out the TARDIS without his companions hand in it, and even now she'd be wandering around on her own somewhere 'And 'jeopardy friendly' is too kind a term, Rose is a bloody menace!' If there is trouble, she's found it so fast she's been at the front line of the queue for live minutes, waiting patiently for it to start.

"Then stop at a thousand!" He yells.

"We are in control of the ghosts. The levers can open the breech, but equally they can closeit."

"Okay." He says after a moment. Clearly she'll never listen to his words, he takes a shot at silence. Stepping over the glass scattered like a mosaic across the floor, feeling the crunch beneath his feet as it breaks further, he sits himself down comfortably on a chair in her office, making a show of settling in.

"Sorry?!" Yvonne says, flabbergasted. The Doctor cringes and vows never to even think that word ever again.

"Never mind! As you were," he tells her.

"What, is that it?" She asks, like a child who told her father to stop doting on her then became petulant when he did.

"No! Fair enough. Said my bit. Don't mind me. Any chance of a cup of tea? "

"Ghost Shift in twenty seconds." A pretty black employee calls out from the floor.

"Mm! Can't WAITto see it!"

"You can't stop us, Doctor." Yvonne says in the same tone as before.

"No, absolutely not!" When he looks over to Jackie there is a real smile in his voice; even if his plan doesn't work, he's riled up the vile woman. "Pull up a chair, Rose! Come and watch the fireworks."

Coming to stand right behind him the moment he asks, fear still rolling off her in waves – but stronger than the fear was resolve and dedication. Jackie trusts him to save them; she places a comforting hand on his shoulder before turning to face off with Yvonne, nothing but steely contempt to be found in her eyes.

"Ghost Shift in ten seconds. Nine... eight..." Yvonne is looking less and less sure of herself as the seconds tick away. "Seven... six... five... four... three... two..."

"Stop the shift!" She breaks eye contact, and the Doctor slumps in his seat, so relieved she stopped the ghost shift he doesn't even get a rush of satisfaction for tipping the scales of power in someone else's game. "I said stop."

"Thank you." He sighs gratefully.

"I suppose it makes sense to get as much intelligence as possible. But the program will recommence, as soon as you've explained everything."

"I'm glad to be of help."

"And someone clear up this glass." She said to anyone listening before turning back to the Doctor. "They did warn me, Doctor. They said you like to make a mess."

He almost laughs out loud at that. 'Whoever 'they' are, they were right.'

##############################################################################

Rose, meanwhile, had been making her own way. After taking the psychic paper from the Doctor's coat pocket she vacated the TARDIS – whose doors had unlocked with a warning hum – and stolen a while lab coat. From there she had made her way back and forth the R and D department before following a hallway that led her to the Sphere room.

Cursing herself for wasting a very clever lie about "checking the lines of communication" only to have the scientist, Rajesh see right through her psychic paper (why bother being clever when it doesn't work anyway) she suddenly found herself alerted to the presence of Mickey Smith, who was for some reason not in the parallel universe, and was inexplicably going by the name Samuel; therefore when Rajesh offered her seat, she sat herself down thankfully.

While she attempted to settle herself in comfortably, Rajesh made a video to Ms. Hartman, the woman Rose immediately recognized as having been there to greet the Doctor upon their arrival.

"She one of yours?" She hears Yvonne ask from out of frame, after she'd panned the screen around to face the Doctor. Rose leans in and smiles disarmingly.

The Doctor shakes his head and acts unbothered but Rose is sure his jaw just clenched. "Never seen her before in my life."

"Good! Then we can have her shot." Yvonne smirks. Rose's eyes widen, Jackie gasps, and the Doctor sits up pin straight, stopping himself just short of threats of violence, because if Rose Tyler died here today the Doctor would see this building burnt to the ground. Opting instead for a sort of forced joviality, he waved a hand at the screen, saying "Oh all right then, it was worth a try. That's – that'sRose Tyler."

"Sorry," Rose says with a carefree smile and a finger wave. "Hello!"

The Doctor waves back but the tension coiling under the surface is obvious. She'd seen it the second the ghosts first appeared. She had seen him hide it behind exuberance and cheek and had allowed him to do so because it helped him cope with their lifestyle. What she saw in him now worried her though, because now his act was crumbling around him, and he was so tightly wound he didn't even realize he had long since stopped fooling anyone. 'This is really bad, then.'

"Well, if that's Rose Tyler, who's she?"

"I'm her mother."

"Oh, you travel with her mother?" Yvonne mocked, even as she voice raised an octave in surprise.

"He kidnapped me."

"Please, when Torchwood comes to write my complete history, don't tell people I travelled through time and space with her mother..."

"Charming." Jackie snorted.

"I've got a reputation to uphold!" He'd meant it to be a joke, but regretted his words immediately; the bemusement coloring his companions face on the monitor never faltered, he'd never even have known his joke had hit her so hard, except that for a moment so brief she probably hadn't known it'd happened at all, a crack had developed in the wall protecting her mind, and he'd been by the shockwave of her all-consuming hurt – the first time since they'd escaped Sanctuary Base One that she'd made a single mistake.

On more than one occasion he found he'd missed the pleasant sensation he'd come to associate with her buzzing thoughts, but his first brush with her mind in over ninety-three days and sixteen hours should not have been like this, especially since it might be the last… Had she always been so talented at hiding her feelings from him?

For the second time today he was brought up short by his own regret. He had so much of it, but he had it with Rose in triplicate. He should have done so many things differently. He should have been a braver man, and he never should have let her believe that he'd danced with Reinette. If Rose felt like Sarah Jane's replacement, or Reinette's inferior, it would be entirely his fault, he knew.

In some ways Rose had been empowered by knowing him. She had been able to help change the lives of entire civilizations—she had held time, it'd be malleable in her tiny human hands! In other ways, coming with him may have been a terrible decision; at home with her beans on toast, Rose's life may have been mundane, but her lack of freedom had come with independence. With him, he was beginning to see that he had made her pay a price for her freedom—she felt it was dependent upon him. She didn't need him to survive, but she did feel like she needed him to make the civilization-changing decisions that had led to her empowerment in the first place, therefore all of the times she'd saved the say, she attributed the credit to him.

She had been more than just hurt when he'd run off without her in the 51st century and he'd never realized it. Before then she may have felt she'd needed his help to save the day, but she'd likewise never questioned that he'd needed her in some capacity. Then suddenly, she'd had Sarah Jane thrust at her and she'd gone from being an important part of his life to being one in a long line of beautiful and intelligent women – simultaneously she'd had to deal with been ignored and blamed for the cattiness they'd both been guilty of in their initial dislike of each other. He had seen this as the first of the two opportunities he'd taken to gain some distance from her and he'd jumped at it.

But brave Rose Tyler wouldn't just submit quietly. No, he'd already showed her what he thought of her, but she needed to hear him say it before she'd believe, and that was something he could not do. He could not look Rose Marion Tyler in the eye, and lie to her. So he promised he wouldn't leave her behind and he'd meant it… and then he'd seen a second opportunity to push her away, and he'd taken that too.

And this time Rose did quietly submit, managed only a meek "Why her," at the end of the adventure, and hadn't even had the fight left to correct his willful misinterpretation of her question. He'd said early on, piercing blue eyes narrowed at Adam, 'he only took the best, and Rose is the best.' Then in the span of one Earth day he'd shown Rose that she wasn't the best anymore. He had left Rose behind, and he'd invited the uncrowned Queen to France along to take her place, never realizing how brightly Rose had shined until he'd watched her light burn out at his own hand. He should have kept her with him then, and he should've kept her by his side today. Because now instead of safe in the TARDIS, or with him where she should be, Rose is somewhere he can't reach her; like a bloodhound for danger she'd found herself prisoner in the same room with the Void ship and the thing trapped inside it.

He makes a promise to himself that if he gets them out of this he's going to tell her everything. He's going to stop being a coward, and stop running away, and he's going to use the rest of her life to never let her think she's anything less than fantastic to him – if she'll have him.

Then he vows to himself that he's going to get them out of this… Jackie too, he supposes.

His revelations about his Rose take the backburner to his mounting panic when the ghost shift begins again. It quickly becomes apparent that this time the operation has been sabotaged. He can't stop it.

Things become even bleaker when the Doctor spots the ear-pieces on the rogue Torchwood employees, the second to last piece of the puzzle. He knows now what is crossing the void into this world and he knows what world they've come from – but he doesn't know is how they built the Void ship and what they put inside.

With sincere apology to the already dead he deactivates the ear pieces, stopping the manipulation of their bodies and letting them sleep.

The ghost shift has begun, Torchwood lighting the runway for an easy landing. They haven't so much tapped the splintered glass holding this world together, as they have thrown a brick through it… and then another brick… just to be thorough.

Using his sonic screwdriver to scan for what he now knows are Cybermen, he sends a quick prayer that Rose stays safe. Odd, he thinks, that he should be praying when the only deity he believes in is downstairs in the eye of the storm. 'The Bad Wolf made Jack a fixed point in time, she better have been able to keep Rose safe for the twenty minutes it'll take for me to get to her!'

The Doctor finds the few Cybermen that came first across the Void, but there are still too many of them to fight; they find themselves surrounded and led back to the lever room where the ghost shift is increased to 100%, allowing the Cybermen to come through, millions of them, inciting worldwide panic.

"They're invading the whole planet!" Yvonne exhaled, staggered by the knowledge that she helped her own planet fall.

"It's not an invasion," The Doctor told her, before being distracted by Yvonne's laptop flashing the words 'SPHERE ACTIVATED.' "It's too late for that. It's a victory."

##############################################################################

Meanwhile in the eye of the storm, Rose and Mickey are standing side by side, facing the Void ship, which is now active. The former waits in unease, the latter in anticipation, watching as the sphere shakes and vibrates itself open.

Intent on shooting down whatever Cyberleader comes out of the ship before it can even get its bearings, Mickey retrieves his gun and allocates Rose to a spot just slightly behind him. "This is gonna blast them to Hell." He says, indicating his gun while Rose looks on, her eyes warring between trust and pride.

"Samuel, what areyoudoing?!"

"The name's Mickey. Mickey Smith." He cocks his gun and points it at the void ship, now almost fully open. "Defending the Earth."

##############################################################################

Something was still wrong with the Doctor's puzzle. It was like all the pieces fit but the picture was still skewed. "What I don't understand is Cybermen don't have the technology to build the Void Ship, that's WAY beyond you. How did you create that sphere?"

"The sphere is not ours."

"... What?" 'Oh. Oh. Oh, that is very, very, VERY, NOT GOOD!'

"The sphere broke down the barriers between worlds. We only followed. Its origin is unknown."

"Then what's inside it...?" He asked but the Cyberman had no an answer for him. His mind catalogued the thousands of species that could be inside, each more horrific than the last; all the while his mind blaring that Rose was down there and 'why can't she just stay out of trouble for ten bloody minutes!'

"Rose is down there." Jackie whispers to him, near tears – as if he hadn't already thought about every possible scenario before her tiny human brain even registered the possibility of her daughter being in renewed danger. But for now there was nothing he could do.

##############################################################################

"That's not Cybermen..." Mickey says in confusion as an alien he's never seen before begins to ascend from the open sphere. Beside him Rose goes rigid.

Rose does recognize the aliens. Unable to contain herself, a fearful "Oh, my God," escapes her lips. Several more cohesive things soon occur to her. First, she distinctly remembers herself and the TARDIS going to extremes to get rid of these guys. Second, those are Daleks. Third, there are also Cybermen. Fourth, the Doctor isn't here to save her right now, which means that it's up to her to save herself, Mickey, and Rajesh. Fifth, 'I should've just stayed in bed this morning.'

"LOCATION: EARTH. LIFE FORMS DETECTED. EXTERMINATE!"

"EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"