Here we go with the third and final chapter! Your feedback and favouriting has been overwhelming, I didn't expect so many people to read this and I'm so glad you have. I would LOVE to know what people thought of the last chapter/the story as a whole in a review. I don't know whether I'll be writing anything else soon but you never know, and there's nothing more motivating than comments :) Enjoy! Donna x

Chapter Three

"Ahhh, here they come!" Eleven jumped up from the bench in the middle of the gallery as his old TARDIS materialised between the two that already stood there. He kept his tone light, but truthfully had been willing them to arrive every second since he and Clara had, not being able to believe that Rose was really back until he saw it with his own eyes.

But there she was, stepping out of the TARDIS and smiling at him, and he couldn't help but grin back at her like a lovestruck idiot. As Ten emerged behind her, his grin grew wider, and he clapped his hands with a gleeful "I beat you here! My ship's faster than yours!"

"OI!" Ten sounded painfully like Donna, "Just because you've got yourself a swanky new desktop doesn't mean-"

"Oh, so childish." Their younger incarnation cut them off with a grumbling sigh, "I still refuse to believe that I've got years to come in your mad little bodies, but I guess I'd better embrace it." He had begun to walk slowly back towards his TARDIS, but stopped as he reached it, and turned back.

"I'm not going to remember this, am I?" He asked sadly, and the Eleventh Doctor shook his head.

"I'm afraid not." Rose's eyes widened, and she barely listened to the Doctor as he explained why.

"So…" She questioned, addressing Eleven once the War Doctor had left, "You don't remember this from last time?"

He pulled a face, "Hmmmm. Bits and bobs. I can't remember specifics, rather hazy little flashes… I remembered the fez – not that I could forget that - then this me falling in through the wormhole, and then I remember insulting Elizabeth… but after we followed him to where the Moment was, there aren't any concrete memories. No, don't look at me like that, now." The oldest Doctor had crossed the room in two strides to tip her chin gently up towards him and look seriously into her eyes. "Because I'll tell you one thing that I've never worked out until now. Until this point ," He gestured to his Tenth incarnation, "I had all but given up hope of seeing you again. Pushed it away to the back of my head in a little no-go zone… But after this day, my faith comes back. I'll never remember why, until now, but I'll know, deep down inside, that I'm waiting for you, and that you're coming back to be with me." Rose smiled up at him, and in a second, his face changed to one of worry.

"You… You are coming with me, aren't you?"

"Oooooh," Rose pretended to consider, "I dunno, Doctor. I have to tell you, I've never been a fan of bowties…" His face flooded with a grin of relief upon realising she was teasing him, and he let out a laugh as he lifted her off her feet and spun her around.

The Tenth Doctor couldn't put his finger on how he felt as he watched them. In some ways, he was happy, so, so happy that he had this ending waiting for him – but for now, he was like his dear Reinette, being forced to take the long road. Still, if the events that were to come would eventually lead him back here, then he couldn't question them. It was true, what he'd said to Rose: He'd wait forever for her if he had to.

"Well," he finally managed to speak, knowing that if he didn't leave now then he wouldn't ever be able to force himself to. "What a whirlwind. Rose, I'll see you in, what, four hundred years?" He asked his future self, who nodded.

"Give or take."

Ten smiled, "And I'll see you, well, be you, in… How long?"

"Nuh uh," Eleven shook his head, "Spoilers. It'll happen when it happens."

"Fair enough." The two Doctors moved in for a hug, and the younger man couldn't help himself, whispering in Eleven's ear:

"You hold on tight to her."

"You try and stop me."

They parted with a nod, and a knowing, friendly look at the important exchange that had just passed between them, before Ten turned to Rose one final time.

"Well, this is it, then!" He forced his voice to sound brave, and she nodded, her eyes wide with the effort of holding back tears as he pulled her in for a hug beside his TARDIS.

"You be good." She told him as he held her, and he let out a laugh.

"Oh, you know that I won't. You?"

"God, I definitely won't." They pulled apart, both with watery smiles, and she reached up to move a lock of hair from his forehead. Rose knew he didn't want to hear it, that this was only going to make it more difficult, but she had to.

"I love you."

"Quite right too."

"Doctor!"

"Okay, I'm sorry. Tasteless. Rose, you know that I… Ugh, I've already said that I can't…" He looked so torn. But, ultimately, this was his last chance for a very, very long time. The Doctor sighed.

"Alright, Rose. I know you already know it, and I know that he's going to be so much better at saying it, at showing it than I am… But it really is my last chance to say it, as me." He leaned in close, moving her hair aside to whisper.

The Eleventh Doctor looked on, a sad smile on his face. Although he couldn't remember this moment exactly, he knew exactly what was being said, and how much it needed to be. That mad old self of his had never let himself confront what Rose meant to him, or so he had thought, but knowing now that he had said it, just the once, meant the world to him.

And then, before he knew it, Rose had kissed the man in the suit one last time, and he had turned and saluted at his future self and received the same gesture back. And then he was back in his TARDIS, and he was gone. And the Doctor was alone with Rose once more.

"So!" The Doctor bounded into the TARDIS and up the stairs, "Clara's back at school, and I've promised her another adventure sometime soon, I've done all sorts of checks and the gap in the void is definitely repaired so we won't have to deal with any stray Daleks wandering through… Where next?" He looked around, puzzled as to where she was, "Rose?!"

"In the wardrobe!" Came a distant shout, and indeed, he found her in the room he called a wardrobe but was closer in size to a floor of the shop where Rose had once worked.

"It took me so long to find this room again, you've turned the TARDIS into a maze! What d'you think?" She surprised him, popping out from behind a pillar with a grin on her face wearing a fez, his square framed glasses, his old faded leather jacket and his ancient long, colourful scarf.

"God. All you're doing is reminding me that I've never been as fashionable as I am now!" He said, rifling around and finally emerging with his box of assorted bow-ties. "See! Can't go wrong." She muttered something that sounded remarkably like 'uncool' under her breath, and his mouth fell open.

"I'm going to choose to ignore that, Tyler, unless you want to be shipped back off to that parallel world of yours?"

"Oh, nonsense. You love me too much." As soon as the casual, flirty remark had left her mouth, Rose regretted it, and froze, wondering if she had pushed him way too far too soon.

But, this was the Doctor. Her new, new, new Doctor, no longer the man who was scared of his emerging feelings for her but the man who knew exactly what they were, and had waited centuries to be able to express them.

"Yeah, you're probably right." He said after pretending to consider, grabbing the two ends of his scarf and pulling her towards him. She took off his old self's glasses to look up at him, and shrugged out of the leather jacket as he watched.

"Do you miss them?" he asked quietly, looking not at her but at the clothes he used to wear, back on their shelves.

"Of course." Rose tilted her head to one side, sliding one arm around his waist, "But it's not painful to miss them. It can't be, not when they're all in here." She used her other hand to gently tap him on the head, "You're here, with me, all of you. I loved the last you, and the you before that, and… Well, not quite so much Grandad, but," He let out a small laugh, "The point is, Doctor, you all make up the amazing person you are now. And I'm sure one day you'll be asking me if I miss the gangly one with the love for fezzes and bow ties."

The Doctor raised his eyebrows, "And what will you say to that?"

"I'll say of course I do, because I love him to death just like the rest of them."

He didn't hesitate.

"I love you too." He leaned down, his face barely an inch from hers, before he caught himself. "I'm sorry," He muttered, "Is it too fast-?" But before he could finish his sentence, or start worrying, she had pulled him down into a kiss.

"Too fast?" She murmured, "I've been waiting years for this."

"Ha! I've waited longer."

"Oh, Grandad was right, you are childish, making everything into a competition-"

"Says the girl who was just playing dressy-up in her spare time? I think you'll find-"

"Oh, shush." She stopped him again with a kiss, both of them smiling from ear to ear.

And there it was. The Doctor, in the TARDIS, with Rose Tyler. Just as it should be.

The End