This was a scene that was with me all through this fic, because I find it impossible to write Romana without the glaring fact that she will some day die bouncing in the back of my head.
She tossed him the book, just a thin paperback, rather worn. He caught it, and it was only then that he realised his mistake. He'd ignored this yellowed book for years, buried it in the very depths of the library next to the textbooks that belonged to a certain young Alzariun he'd travelled with for a while. That was a section of his life he liked to block out — too many ghosts.
Everyone who travelled with Four past Sarah-Jane would be gone by this point, one way or another. Leela, Andred, that version of K-9, and Romana, and her version of K-9… they’ve all been blown up, or fob-watched, or something. And Adric, well, we all know what happened to Adric. From what I understand, Tegan didn’t meet an especially happy fate either in the spin-off media.
And, knowing the Doctor, he takes all of these deaths as his responsibility (and admittedly, some of them are more his fault than others)
"I choose it 'cause it was the first thing I opened that didn't have quantum math or physics or something in it. Where do you keep all of the book books on this ship anyway?"
He didn't answer. She shrugged.
Initially in this sequence Rose said something like “You’re always spouting off bits of poetry, so I thought I’d learn some to keep up”, but, as abbyromana pointed out in beta, Nine wasn’t really one for poetry. He’d exclaim over how much he like things – like Dickens that one time – and I can definitely see him shaking his head at Rose for missing a reference, but randomly quoting wasn’t his thing. Eight does that. Four to some extent does that. Six never stops doing that. And Ten is pretty quotastic as well, but Nine? Not so much.
"Nature's first green is gold," she began, and he sucked in a deep breath and tried to keep himself expressionless. It was a failed attempt.
I really like that poem. It’s one of the few poems I’ve got completely memorized and tucked into my head. I like Frost – well – I like some Frost, because he also has those big epic poems that bore me to death. This whole story is somewhat based around his poetry, and this one particular poem formed the backbone.
Rose's eyes were screwed up in concentration, oblivious to the effect her stumbling words were having on her audience.
So, so long ago… He had told her that he didn't remember a thing.
"Then leaf subsides to leaf," Rose went on, too cheerfully, getting the rhythm all wrong, and clashing tone with meaning, "So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay."
It’s been a theme in NuWho that the Doctor loses everyone, and so it seemed appropriate given the circumstances.
Instead he had badgered her about ruining his scarf. Never a thank you for his life. Only nagging, day after day, until she sat down and knitted him a new scarf, twice as long as the first. He couldn't complain after that.
One of the things I set out to explain right from the get-go with this fic was “where the heck did that burgundy scarf come from anyways?” Because “JNT had action figure schemes brewing” was not an acceptable in-universe answer.
Rose opened her eyes and looked at him.
"Blimey, I'm not that good," she said.
The Doctor quickly cuffed away a tear. When he spoke his voice rasped in his throat.
"No, proper poet you are, picked just my favourite one."
Nine crying makes me sad. He tries to be all gruff and bad ass, and he IS all gruff and bad ass, but he’s got layers, and not like an onion or a cake, because they’re all mixed up, like he’s all mixed up. He might be laughing and goofy one minute, then fly into a rage the next. He tries not to cry, tries to bate it back with jokes, or anger, but he never quite succeeds.
I think Eccleston did an excellent job playing him. The level of acting in some of those episodes is just staggering.
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momijizukamori
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Date: 2009-11-08 08:08 am (UTC)She tossed him the book, just a thin paperback, rather worn. He caught it, and it was only then that he realised his mistake. He'd ignored this yellowed book for years, buried it in the very depths of the library next to the textbooks that belonged to a certain young Alzariun he'd travelled with for a while. That was a section of his life he liked to block out — too many ghosts.
Everyone who travelled with Four past Sarah-Jane would be gone by this point, one way or another. Leela, Andred, that version of K-9, and Romana, and her version of K-9… they’ve all been blown up, or fob-watched, or something. And Adric, well, we all know what happened to Adric. From what I understand, Tegan didn’t meet an especially happy fate either in the spin-off media.
And, knowing the Doctor, he takes all of these deaths as his responsibility (and admittedly, some of them are more his fault than others)
"I choose it 'cause it was the first thing I opened that didn't have quantum math or physics or something in it. Where do you keep all of the book books on this ship anyway?"
He didn't answer. She shrugged.
Initially in this sequence Rose said something like “You’re always spouting off bits of poetry, so I thought I’d learn some to keep up”, but, as
"Nature's first green is gold," she began, and he sucked in a deep breath and tried to keep himself expressionless. It was a failed attempt.
I really like that poem. It’s one of the few poems I’ve got completely memorized and tucked into my head. I like Frost – well – I like some Frost, because he also has those big epic poems that bore me to death. This whole story is somewhat based around his poetry, and this one particular poem formed the backbone.
Rose's eyes were screwed up in concentration, oblivious to the effect her stumbling words were having on her audience.
So, so long ago… He had told her that he didn't remember a thing.
"Then leaf subsides to leaf," Rose went on, too cheerfully, getting the rhythm all wrong, and clashing tone with meaning, "So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay."
It’s been a theme in NuWho that the Doctor loses everyone, and so it seemed appropriate given the circumstances.
Instead he had badgered her about ruining his scarf. Never a thank you for his life. Only nagging, day after day, until she sat down and knitted him a new scarf, twice as long as the first. He couldn't complain after that.
One of the things I set out to explain right from the get-go with this fic was “where the heck did that burgundy scarf come from anyways?” Because “JNT had action figure schemes brewing” was not an acceptable in-universe answer.
Rose opened her eyes and looked at him.
"Blimey, I'm not that good," she said.
The Doctor quickly cuffed away a tear. When he spoke his voice rasped in his throat.
"No, proper poet you are, picked just my favourite one."
Nine crying makes me sad. He tries to be all gruff and bad ass, and he IS all gruff and bad ass, but he’s got layers, and not like an onion or a cake, because they’re all mixed up, like he’s all mixed up. He might be laughing and goofy one minute, then fly into a rage the next. He tries not to cry, tries to bate it back with jokes, or anger, but he never quite succeeds.
I think Eccleston did an excellent job playing him. The level of acting in some of those episodes is just staggering.