The sound of fingers continuously tapping on the wooden table was resonating through Rose's skull giving her a headache. She resists the urge to snap at the perpetrator for the tedious racket.
"Mrs Tyler, you must understand that it would be best if we moved your husband to a medical facility he-"
"No. He's staying here. I have the money and resources to get him everything he needs and more. This is his home, I won't let you take him from it when that's the last thing he wanted." Rose interrupts smoothly, this isn't the first time she's had this conversation after all, not even the first time today.
"Mrs Tyler, your husband is very sick, he doesn't understand what he wants. He'd be much better off in a facility where we can monitor him."
Rose narrows her gaze at the woman. She works for Torchwood and thus believes she knows all about Rose and her husband. But no one really knows her and the Doctor. They believe her name to be Rose Marion Tyler nee Lewis and his to be Doctor John Tyler. But of course, those people don't really exist.
And she wasn't about to allow Torchwood full access to her vulnerable husband no matter what they said on the matter.
Which they know. This isn't the first time they've tried to persuade them otherwise.
"You don't know what sort of damage a move like that would do on his failing mind. He stays here where he knows and wants to be. You know this Andrea, so why must you continue to force the matter?"
"Your husband was a valued member of the organisation, he's done amazing things for us. We simply wish to repay him."
"Yes, which is why I accepted your referral of doctor Simmons for his care."
"After you vetted him yourself," Andrea mutters, flicking through the paperwork in front of her.
"Of course, I'm not about to put my husband's life into just anybody's hands." She picks at a piece of fluff from her jacket.
"And he's always under your watchful eye. I wonder, do you not trust us, Mrs Tyler?"
Rose smiles at her, a sweet and soft thing that draws your eye away from the venom in her gaze.
"If that were the case I would have left Torchwood many decades ago and would not have employed doctor Simmons at all. Now if we can please move on, I'd like to return to my husband."
Andrea sighs but raises her hands in surrender.
"Very well. There isn't much to go over. He's leaving everything to you, not that you'd find that surprising, you two have many friends yet keep to yourselves. And well, there's always your condition, isn't there?"
"Miss Wilkinson. Please focus and refrain from making time-consuming comments."
Andrea turns to appraise her with a critical eye.
"I've always wondered about you. You two are practically legends at Torchwood. And well, you don't age and yet you won't leave your dying husband's side. Will he thank you for it? I don't see it. The compassion you supposedly feel for him. You're so cold and detached, yet you clearly love him."
Rose stares blankly back, posture perfectly straight as she regards her.
"Do you know how old I am? I'm supposed to be lying in that bed beside my husband hooked up to a million monitors and instead, I'm sat here organising my husband's life in preparation for his death. The man I love is dying and there's nothing I can do about it. Wouldn't that make you cold too?" Rose chokes back the tears that threaten to fall.
It was perhaps her only regret. She'd promised the Doctor forever and now she couldn't die with her husband as they'd intended.
"As you have said, my husband has done a lot for Torchwood. I would hope they would have the respect to let him die as he wishes without prying."
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Decay (Hiatus)
Fanfiction'Humans decay. You wither and you die.' Once upon a time, Rose held the power of all of time and space in her hands and her only wish had been to protect the Doctor, to protect him from the daleks, himself and to protect him from his loneliness. In...
