A nine x rose fanfic (whump / angst / fluff / hurt-comfort)
On a Season 1 re-watch, I wondered what happened to Adam Mitchell after The Long Game.
The Ninth Doctor and Rose accidentally find him again on earth, but he's changed since they left him, suffering from a madness that threatens to consume Rose whole. When it does, it's up to the Doctor to save her from Adam's twisted game.
London, in February, was a miserable shithole at the best of times, but no time more so than at nearly 3 in the morning when it was drizzling.
Rose was freezing. She and the doctor had been tracking a signal all the way from Hequemiius-12 (a planet where it rained diamonds, which would have been beautiful if it hadn't also been, for a human, like standing in a rain of knives), but the frequency had faded in and out and driven the Doctor to distraction. Rose felt a strange sense of déjà vu, as though this street was somewhere they'd been before, but she couldn't place where.
'It's here, somewhere, I just know it is! Somewhere… near. Now then. Where could you hide an obnoxiously large, weird-looking piece of alien kit in the middle of London and operate it for days without the police noticing.' Nine grumbled, sweeping damp off his shoulders with a large hand. Rose shivered- she was only half-listening and mostly thinking about her cosy bedroom in the Tardis.
'Somewhere no one would ever go in their right mind', she said aloud, almost to herself. The Doctor looked at her as though she had handed him the keys to the proverbial kingdom. His face split into a cheshire cat smile.
'Fantastic! Yes, of course. Somewhere dangerous, somewhere awful.' Rose groaned internally, but offered up a smile to the Doctor anyway. Something about his frenzy to hunt this signal thing down had made her wary, made her nervous to discover whatever this was and just go. She turned in a half circle, made a rude gesture, and then stopped in her tracks.
'Somewhere like that?' She said loudly, eyes locked on the horizon. The Doctor spun round and came to stand next to her. 'What?'
'There.' Rose emphasised, staring at the house in the distance.
'What do you mean, there, it's completely-' He stopped as though she had slapped him. Following Rose's outstretched, pointing finger, he finally saw what she'd seen and almost wished he hadn't.
In the gap between two houses, a sliver of a black house was barely visible. It's bricks were charred as though burnt, the upstairs windows patched with wood like blind eyes. A rotting gate hung on a single hinge, and graffiti covered the walls. Rose had seen horror movies and knew nothing good happened in abandoned suburban London houses. Nine's face set grimly as he looked at the house, squeezing Rose's hand held in his.
'Yes, Rose.' His voice was dead. 'Somewhere almost exactly like that.'
Three years in earth-time previously;
Adam stood in his mum's living room with his brain exposed. His cheeks flamed in shame as he watched the expression of horror on his mum's face.
'Adam… oh, god, what… what have you done?' She gawped at his forehead. A shaking hand reached out and touched his face, fingers pressing into the gap where the pink flesh of his prefrontal cortex was exposed. Adam winced and yelled in pain as her fingernail dug in. Every nerve of his body lit with madness at the gentlest pressure until her probing hand snatched away, aghast. Adam hurriedly clicked and listened to the snick of the mechanism locking shut. Her eyes narrowed, regarding the thing in her living room. It was a creature, an abomination, a wretched frankenstein of her son. Her lips curled in disgust.
'Monster,' she spat, holding an accusing finger to his face. 'Monster.'
10 months later in Rose and the Doctor's timeline;
The sonic screwdriver cast eerie blue light over the front door of the house. The door had been reinforced, clearly to prevent anyone from ever getting in- panels of wood, sheet metal and hand-applied locks had all be nailed onto the front of the door, covering the hinges and barring the edges of the doorframe. 'Whoever did this,' mused the Doctor, 'was two things. Creative and determined.' Rose nodded and didn't say anything. She was too busy wondering what lay beyond the scarred, scorched walls.
'These locks aren't any old hardware store lock.' The doctor was talking almost to himself. 'Someone made these. Made them out of basically nothing, and they're bloody good locks. If I wasn't incredibly clever, I probably couldn't get in here.' The doctor announced with a grin, twisting the door handle sharply and kicking the door hard. It gave a centimetre and no more. The Doctor shoved until the hinges relented, screaming. The door swung aside to reveal a chasm. Rose shivered, and it had nothing to do with the cold.
The light of the sonic screwdriver illuminated the ruined house. Rotting carpet. The walls thick with dust. Doors led off the hallway which snaked to the right, curving itself around the stairs. The Doctor looked at Rose, grasping both of her shoulders. 'Don't follow me until I tell you to.' His eyes, hollow in the dim light, glinted. 'Whoever created that signal… Whoever's hiding in here, I… they're dangerous, Rose.' She nodded. She knew it was for the best, that he go alone, that he could take care of himself, but watching him walk into the black mouth of the doorway and down the hall, sonic held aloft, was the hardest thing she'd ever had to do. The blue light disappeared as he rounded a corner, then slowly got brighter. He came back, his familiar silhouette cutting jagged shadows on the grey walls.
'C'mon.' She took his hand and stepped inside.
The house smelt damp and old, and was covered in a thick layer of grey. Everything she touched crumbled away, the bricks in the walls exposed, scratchy tendrils of insulation extending from the wall. The first door stood open. Squeezing his hand, she ducked inside, the Doctor close behind her.
'Oh god.' Rose stared at the black living room. That's what it probably once was, anyway, but now there was nothing left. The hull of a sofa returned to mold and dust in the corner. Broken glass littered the floor next to an empty plastic tv frame. An armchair disintegrated by the broken window. 'Doctor…' Rose stared at the carnage. 'Have we… have we been here before?'
The doctor used the light of the screwdriver to inspect the fireplace, a gaping hole low in one wall. 'Perhaps, but so many houses look like this. We could be anywhere in England.' He straightened to look at the mantelpiece. Rose stared hard at the decomposed furniture, a horrible sense of familiarity creeping over her like damp.
The doctor took a picture frame in one large hand and wiped the dust away with his sleeve. His blood went cold. His hearts thudded in his chest.
'Rose.' His mind raced. 'Do you remember the first Dalek you ever met, in Van Statten's basement?'
'I'm not likely to forget.' She shot back. 'Why, is it Daleks, are they here?'
'No, not Daleks. Come here.' Rose moved into the doctor's side, leaning into his shoulder. 'Look.'
It being the middle of the night, it was hard to see. The picture was a boy's school photo, a kid in a blue jumper and scruffy white shirt, a messy thatch of dark hair and braces on his teeth. He grinned at the camera. Something in his smile, in the wide open stare of his eyes, was slightly hysterical. Rose felt a shiver of recognition.
'I've met that kid before.' She looked up into the doctor's face. 'He, uhm, he was… he was…'
A mechanical voice, commanding her to obey.
'It's all real!'…''I want to come with you!'
Rose gasped, her hands flying to her mouth.
The photo frame fell to the floor, the glass shattering, and the noise reverberated in the cold, empty night air. They froze, listening for movement. A signal, a sign, anything- listening for danger.
A few tense, crystalline moments passed. Rose glanced at the Doctor. He nodded, grasped her hand tightly. 'Whoooo, Jesus.' Rose exhaled, whispering. The house was silent, and they were safe. Her muscles felt like lead, and she realised she'd been tense since the moment she saw the house. 'Can we just go?' Nine nodded.
'Okay. Let's go back to the Tardis, come back in the morning, figure out what to do. I don't fancy sleeping anywhere near here.' Rose grinned in relief. Finally! 'Shall we?'
'Back to the TARDIS.' Rose and Nine turned round, starting back to the door.
There was a man standing in front of them. The light from the sonic screwdriver guttered and went out.
'Hello, Adam,' said the Doctor.
