Proof

Author's Note: This is everything up to The Runaway Bride, including Doomsday.

"You are proof."
"Of what?"
"That emotions destroy you."
- Doomsday

("And I suppose, if it's my last chance to say it: Rose Tyler, I…")

Always too many words. I've certainly got a gob, he had said to her that Christmas. And he had talked so much, let slip so many things he hadn't before

("I was a dad once.")

They had become veterans. Hardened to the war around them. Foolhardy. Their eyes too often on each other to be on the ball. There was a moment when he thought their end had come with him buried leagues beneath the surface of a planet on the edge of a black hole. But they had survived even that – evil itself. And when she came back to him, she leapt into his arms wildly, her legs swinging around him. He held her tight, sure they had learnt their lesson. He believed her.

("How long are you going to stay with me?"
"Forever.")

Even though he shouldn't have. Sarah Jane ought to have taught him that he was not human. Stumbling on an old friend in such a way ought to have stayed with him. He should have remembered.

("You can spend the rest of your life with me, but I can't spend the rest of mine with you.")

Talking. Talking, all the time. Saying things that didn't even matter. When he should have made it clear at some point. And then she would have said it back, of that he is certain. How different things might have been then. But he has been a coward in this life.

("If they get back in contact - if you talk to Rose - just tell her... tell her... oh, she knows.")

He feels like he did after the Time War. Rose Tyler has become a wasteland. And yet he cannot think too much about his own grief because deep down there is something, a knowledge, a truth, twisting malevolently inside him – he knows he has destroyed her.

("Am I ever going to see you again?"
"You can't.")

She will never be the same girl again. She will always be lost. He scoured the length and breadth of the universe for things to show her. The frozen seas of Woman Wept, just for their beauty. The Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire, just to show her what her people would become. She will never see such things again, even though she wanted too.

("You're never gonna see her again – your own mother!"
"I made my choice a long time ago. I'm never leaving you.")

And the Universe is cruel because he is not allowed to mourn her. Instead he is lumbered with a loud, obnoxious redhead in a wedding dress. He delivers her home and is horrified to find that the world is shimmering before him when she asks his friend's name.

When Donna looks at him, he can tell by the look on her face that he is heartbroken.

("Her name was Rose.")

The End.