country_who | Fic: I Can't Lose Him Too (10/10) COMPLETE (Reply)

Title: I Can't Lose Him Too (complete)

Series: Daddy's Girl

Characters: Ten2 and his daughter Sarah (OC), AU Donna, AU River, AU Jack, mentions of Rose

Genre: Character Study. Angst

Rating: PG

Summary: Sarah has an average day at school, but what happens when she gets a phone call.

Author's Note: This is the third in the "Daddy's Girl" Series.
Author's Note 2: This is the last chapter for this story, but it's carrying over to another story called "Bring Me Home." It's a bit darker and my attempt to test Sarah's ability to prove herself and to give the Doctor an opportunity to feel completely helpless in the face of danger to his daughter. She's 19 in that story, hmm...sound familiar? I uploaded the first two chapters of it to Teaspoon, and I'm working on editing Chapter 3, but I'm probably gonna upload at least one of the chapters tonight. :)
Author's Question 3: Also, is there a community y'all think this might fit into? A Ten2 or OC community that doesn't require Rose?

It ended there, the events that happened after that were too damaged to be regained. Part of me was glad of it as I drew from Dad’s mind. It took me a minute to register that I was sitting on the hospital bed next to Dad. His eyes were drooping sleepily, but he smiled at me contentedly at me for the first time since he had come here. I glanced at my watch to see that in the time it took over seventeen years of memories to pass in our minds, only five minutes had passed in reality.

“Soooo,” I drew out the word as I peered expectantly at Dad.

“What?” he asked sleepily.

“Did if work?”

His face broke into a wide grin, as he stretched his arms out wide and gathered me into his arms. Warmth enveloped me, and ran through my veins.

“It worked,” he promised, still holding onto me.

Tears of joy pricked my eyes and though I couldn’t see them, I knew that Dad’s eyes were misted over as well. I can’t even explain the kind of joy that I was feeling. He was there—all there—and being the best father he had always been, and always would be.

“You know something, Sarah?” he asked, as he drew back and looked at me with pride burning in his eyes. “You were wrong.”
Confusion passes over my face for a split second, but Dad laughs and makes it disappear.

“I mean, I do see Rose when I look at you, but I see someone else too.” That prideful look grew on his face. “I see one of the strongest young women I have ever met, and I am proud to call that woman, my daughter.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. One half of my brain wasn’t even registering his compliment as I pulled back from him and stood next to the bed, staring. I kept thinking that this was the sweetest dream that I had ever experienced and that I must still be curled up in a sleeping bag at Donna’s house.

“Let’s go home,” Dad said, as he tried to sit up, and I shook myself out of my reverie.

I held out my hands.

“Shouldn’t you, I dunno rest?” I asked. He looked absolutely exhausted from his drooping eyes to the paleness in his face.

Dad nodded.

“I can rest at home,” he told me, running his hand through this hair. “Besides, I don’t want to stay here any longer that I have too. modern medicine, Ha!” he exclaimed. “More like medieval.”

I laugh jovially, and through a long persuasion with several doctors and a couple Torchwood big-wigs, Dad and I were riding home in a black SUV driven by an enthusiastic Jake. Mom’s ring and TARDIS key stowed safely inside my backpack, while I sat in the backseat.

I watched the cars pass outside and glanced up at the sky through the window, while Dad dozed in the front passenger seat next to Jake. The stars were barely visible in the glare of the city lights, but as we neared the neighborhood they began to make themselves seen. I remember Dad telling me stories about each of the stars when I was younger, weaving tales right off the top of his head and almost never going by any true mythology or astrology that I had read about in books.

I assumed that he was just being Dad, making up stories for his amusement as much as mine, until I found out that he wasn’t. He told me once when I was fourteen that the stories were from Gallifrey. Stories of how the civilization of the Time Lords had come to rise and fall written in the stars.

‘Every one’s story is written up there,’ he had said, his eyes glittering with a magic light. ‘You just have to find yours.’

After that night, I kept searching looking to find myself. And now I realized where I went wrong. Dad had told me my story; he had shown it to me in the most subtle of ways. The history of the Time Lords written up there was not just a history lesson—like the endless ones he preached once I had reached his class—it was mine. That was the magic of history, everything led up to you and you became a part of it. The Time Lords were not only my history they were my destiny, there were even less in this universe than there were at Dad’s home planet—none. All of them dead, that is if they had ever existed in the first place.

When Dad was in the hospital, I realized that he was human, not the invincible father that I had thought him to be. One day, I would lose him (I pray to God that that day is not today), and I would be alone. It’s my job to carry on the Time lord mind, the responsibility—the pain. It would not die, it will never be forgotten.

“Here we are,” Jake said in a thick accent, as I unbuckled the seat belt and slid out of the SUV as Jake woke Dad and helped him out of the vehicle and up the steps, much to his groggy protests.

I opened the door and let Dad and Jake slip through. Jake let Dad stretch out on the couch, while Greyson snuggles his way up to the couch and grunts to be picked up.

“I never understood why you didn’t keep him in a cage,” Jake muttered, shaking his head and rubbing the small creature at his feet.

“He does have a cage, Sarah just seems to have forgotten,” Dad shot me a look from the couch and reached his hand down to scoop up the ferret and hold him fondly.

“I’ve had a lot on my mind,” I retort, moving to the back door, “and that reminds me, someone’s been really anxious to see you.”

Smiling, I open the door and let a large black lab barrel through the threshold and trot over to Dad. He sits obediently at his side and stares up at him. His long tail thwacked against the floor with a steady thud.

“He’s missed you,” I told Dad, as leaned down and heard Jake slip out of the door.

“’Cause he’s a good boy,” he said fondly and ran his hand over to ruffle Sampson’s ears.

Dad shifted on the couch as he buried himself deeper under a blanket that we had always kept draped over it. His eyes slowly slid shut as I watched him and checked my watch. ‘8:57’ it read. I had to go to school tomorrow, knowing what kind of stress Dad put on my studies. He was insistent that I should take pride in them as well, and I did, but I couldn’t help the pang in my chest at the thought of Dad being alone tomorrow. At least in the hospital he was surrounded by doctor and nurses trained in some form of medicine.

“C’mon, guys,” I said picking up Greyson and signaling for Sampson to follow. “Let him get some sleep.”

***

Inside my room, I e-mailed Donna and told her that Dad was home, but he wouldn’t be back at school until later, depending on how well he recovered over the night. She rejoiced at the idea of Dad returning back to the school.

She even joked about how the substitute was going to probably play endless history clips for the next few days. Several of their classmates had just regained nap-time after years of deprivation. After a few more e-mails back and forth, I noticed that it was already ten o’clock and I was exhausted from the last two days. I signed off and began to get ready for bed.

I slid under my covers and was wrapped by their warmth. Sweet dreams quickly came as I began to drift away, but not before I felt to eyes staring at me. I looked up from my pillow and saw him standing there. He leaned against the door frame in a familiar posture, his hands shoved in his pockets, and a smile gracing across his lips.

“Night Dad,” I whispered to him in the silence.

“Sweet dreams, Sarah,” he replied before walking back down the hallway and into his own room. His door clicked shut and I pressed my ear hard against the wall next to his—a childish action I know, but I still need to hear his voice.

I imagine him sitting on his bed, cross-legged and holding a picture of Mum.

“Oh Rose,” he says. “I don’t know how in the world our Sarah turned out so well without you here. I certainly can’t be accountable for it, but she’s brilliant. You would be proud of everything she did today. I keep thinking you had something to do with it, and I haven’t been able to figure it out yet, and I’m not sure I ever will, but thank you, thank you for helping her. Thank you for saving me. And, most of all, thank you for loving me still. I promise to see you some day. You’ll be the first person I ever search for and you know it. I love you Rose...”

There’s a small thump, and I picture Dad setting the frame back on his night stand and turning off the lights. He sets he glasses down and falls into his own dreams.

***

Six days later, I groan as my alarm goes off and I slam my hand down on the snooze button.

“Five more minutes,” I mutter to myself and burrow in against the lamp that Dad flicks on next to me and drops my running shoes next to my bed. I try to remember what he told me a few days ago when he was ready to return to work. In the back of my mind, I remember him saying something about him driving into the woods and going on a whole day trek down to the pond hidden among the trees. It was so out of the way that it was almost perfect and untouched.

“Come on, lazy bones,” Dad chastised. “I made breakfast.”

“’M sleepy,” I told him, as I turned over and covered my head with my covers.

Don’t get me wrong, I was looking forward to this trek with Dad as much as I would any day, but I am under no circumstances a ‘morning person.’

“We have to get an early start,” he said, his voice rose slightly in excitement. “Besides, I’m tired of sitting around the house, I need to get out and do something, Sarah. Also, I’m in charge.”

I cracked open one eye to see him grinning, and I groaned. “Fine, but if I fall asleep while I running, your carrying me home, because I will not be woken up.”

“Deal, now come on, Pancakes won’t eat themselves. Well, accept on Tratier VI there the inhabitants practice cannibalism as a form of sacrifice one a year, and there cells are glucose and starch based instead of carbon, although, luckily, I didn’t cook them up for breakfast thought, that might have been a bit stranger.”

Grinning groggily, I pulled a pair of running shorts and a t-shirt out of my drawer and promised that I would meet him down stairs in a few minutes.

***

The ground was springy beneath my feet after the previous night’s rain. My legs were endlessly eating up the distance next to Dad. My heart pounded exhilaratingly in my chest and I broke into my rhythm. Dad’s stride’s matched mine, as he led slightly with his left leg. His right calf muscle had been pulled slightly in the explosion. I thought about slowing slightly, but after years of running with Dad, I knew that he wouldn’t slow down for a slight strain in his leg, so we kept pushing on.

My pony tail was bobbing up and down as we continued down the path, just as the rosy light of dawn came into being.

“It’s beautiful,” I said breathlessly.

“I know,” Dad said panting, as we came within the last hundred yards of the lake. “Race ya?”

“Aren’t you still recovering?” I challenged.

“Yeah, but I have to start living eventually,” he said.

“Yeah but…”

“One-two-three GO!”

Before I could react, Dad bolted away and I sprinted after him. I closed the distance easily and started to overtake him. Sweat pricked the back of my neck and I greedily sucked in more oxygen.

I turned around and finished the last few feet backwards. A grin stretched across my face almost painfully.

“I win,” I said, as dad pulled up next to me and we both collapsed on the back on the river. “You’re definitely getting old.”

“No, I’m still recovering, I had major surgery a few days ago!”

“Excuses, Excuses,” I tisked and tossed a granola bar in his direction and took one for myself.

“It’s true,” he protested.

I nodded and let my gaze shift to the lake in front of us. The clear water was calm almost like a mirror. I had heard Dad tell me time and time again that there was always a calm before the storm. Was this it? Something certainly didn’t feel right to me right now, and yet everything was.

‘Not today,’ I thought.