Every Rose Has Its Thorn

by Featherheart

First published March 21st, 2012 10:04

When the TARDIS's crash landing knocks out a pony, River fears that it is Rose Tyler, former companion and lover of the Doctor. But the mare has no memory of a human life, and the other ponies recognize her. Still, not all is as it seems, and River fears for her marriage.

Chapters

Rose: Revelations
River: Distractions
Rose: Diagnosis
River: Research

Rose: Revelations
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Every Rose Has Its Thorn

Rose: Revelations

“Run.”
I am.
“Run for your life!”
I am running. My legs hurt from all this running, but I know I have so much farther to go. So much farther to get to you.
No.
Away from you.
How can it be both?
“Run!”
I am. Can’t you see that? I will run forever with you. For you. Towards you. Away from you. Away from me.
Forever.
“Run!”
Forever.
“Rose, run!”
Forever.
“Rose!”
Forever…
“Rose...”
“Wake up, Rose.”
No. The dream is where he is.
“Rose.”
My eyes started to flutter open of their own accord, but I squeezed them shut tightly. Give me the dream. Give me him.
“How can this be happening, Doctor?”
Doctor? Something stirred in me. My eyes fluttered again. Doctor… why did that word carry so much weight in it? Why did it move my very soul?
“Come on, Rose.”
My head… it’s killing me.
“I don’t know how this is possible. Maybe it’s not.”
That voice. His voice. My eyes snapped open, completely out of my control. Bright sunlight hit my eyes, and I gasped.
And just like that the dream was gone.
“Rose!” The pony in front of me looked down with wide, frightened purple eyes.
I groaned in response. It’s all I could manage. I closed my eyes again. I had been having such a nice dream.
“Rose, don’t close your eyes again.” That voice… Obviously a man.
No, a stallion. A man? What was that?
My eyes opened again, slower this time. I saw the purple unicorn who had been watching me the first time. Where was the stallion?
In my head.
“We thought we lost you there!” The purple unicorn… Twilight… put her hoof on me comfortingly. As my eyes adjusted, I saw the ponies grouped around her. I recognized them. I knew them. Familiar faces.
But so unfamiliar.
“Rose?” a tentative voice from behind me asked. The stallion of my dreams. I struggled to turn around, but I couldn’t. My body wouldn’t move the way I wanted it to. I moaned again, still the only response I could muster. I hoped he would take the hint and move into my line of sight. I was met with only silence.
“Doctor, do you know Rose?” Twilight asked. No response. “She’s a pony from in town.”
A sigh of relief came from behind me, but not from the Doctor. From who? I stirred again, trying to see. This time I was relieved to hear soft hoofbeats move around me. My heart raced and my breathing almost stopped. Why?
Four brown hooves came into view, the legs covered by a pinstripe suit. My heart beat even faster when I saw the fabric. The stallion bent his head, meeting my eyes. My breath caught as I stared into them, their ancient depths. Something flashed in those depths of his blue eyes… Hope? Despair? Some combination of the two?
“Doctor.” I mumbled, the first word I could manage since… What? My head is killing me. I stretched a leg out to touch his hoof. His eyes glanced down at it and then back at me.
“Rose?” he whispered.
I smiled.
“Rose Tyler?” said a different, impatient voice from behind me.
I furrowed my brow in confusion. “Who is that?”
The Doctor smiled gently at me. “That’s River Song.”
With effort, I shook my head. “No, who’s Rose Tyler?”

River: Distractions
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Every Rose Has Its Thorn

River: Distractions

“Doctor.”
“River, have you ever been to Las Neighas? Well, of course you haven’t, you’re new at this whole pony thing. But it’s brilliant. You’ll love it. It’s so great that Equestria is basically Earth. Makes navigation very simple.”
He was galloping around the TARDIS, fervently hitting the controls with a manic grin on his face. A lie. He was trying to hide; from me, from the others, from himself. It didn’t matter. He didn’t want to face it.
“Doctor” I calmly trotted over and pressed a few buttons. The TARDIS stopped shaking, but he didn’t. He simply galloped around me and flipped a few switches.
“Then again we could just go back to our Earth and visit Las Vegas. But where’s the fun in that? Then we won’t be ponies! I mean, imagine gambling with hooves! I’m not sure why, but that’s hilarious to me!”
“Doctor.”
“Or we could travel back and see the first Hearth’s Warming Eve. I’m sure they could use some help! They probably would make us heroes! They’d build a statue of us! A pony statue!”
“Doctor.” I kept my voice quiet. I knew that he’d calm down eventually.
I hoped that he would.
“Or! Or! We could go pick Luna up from the moon! A thousand years has to be boring. We can go on a few adventures, and drop her back off a few hours before her return!” He suddenly stopped short and bowed his head. I trotted over and nuzzled against him.
“Are you okay?”
He popped back up at this, taking off once again.“Sure! Of course I’m okay! I’m always okay.”
I groaned, prepared for a new rant. But before he started a spiel about some exotic location, he stopped short, his eyes on me.
“River.” He sounded so sad, so full of heaviness. He moved in closer, his nose against mine. “River,” he breathed, making my heart skip a beat. He pressed his mouth against mine, something that we had yet to try in these bodies. But, as always, we were perfect. Our breathing synchronized as our tongues interlaced. The urgency of our kiss made time seem to race by. When we drew apart, we were both short of breath and flushed.
“Doctor,” I breathed. With a slight laugh I added, “I wasn’t expecting that.”
“Me either!” he exclaimed, smiling widely at me; a real smile that reached into his eyes and made my heart dance. He kissed me, gently this time. I returned it, but pressed a little harder into it. My fervor knocked him off balance, and we toppled to the floor. I was acutely aware of my body on top of his as we continued to kiss. I was also acutely aware of the anatomical differences that I was still unused to. His awkward grinding into my stomach made it obvious that he was also unaccustomed to this idea.
We pulled apart for a moment, looking into each other’s eyes. A hint of sadness lay in his, but it mostly reflected the joy in my own. I glanced down, wondering what was to come next. He seemed to have the same thought, and laughed for a moment as we contemplated pony anatomy.
“I have an idea,” I muttered to him, giving him another swift kiss. I rose up on all fours and started towards the door.
“Oh?” He asked, starting to get up.
I laughed at him as he struggled to flip over. “Stay there, sweetie. I’m going to go pay a visit to the library.”
With a wink I left the TARDIS, along with a slightly speechless Time Lord.

Rose: Diagnosis
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Every Rose Has Its Thorn

Rose: Diagnosis

There was a blinding light in my eyes, but I couldn’t look away. I stared defiantly into it as it tried its hardest to make me look away. Suddenly, it was removed.
“And you aren’t experiencing any pain?”
Yes, I thought, but my mouth said “No. Nothing more than a bump on the head should give.”
The pony doctor pulled back, a hoof to his mouth as he regarded me. I watched him in return, the spots in my eyes from his examination light dancing across his face. After a moment of this stare-off, he shrugged lightly.
“Well, Miss Roseluck, it looks as though you live up to your name. You’re pretty lucky to take a hit on the head like that and not have any sort of lasting damage…” He tilted his head slightly, still looking at me. “But then again, maybe Doc’s machine isn’t as heavy as it looks.”
I shrugged in return. After another strange second of gazing at me, he nodded his head and opened the door.
“Put some ice on that bump and you should be fine. If you have any sort of memory trouble or sudden feelings of tiredness, I want you to come back here immediately. Okay?”
As I left, I thanked him for his time, marveling at the way the word “doctor” rolled off my tongue, as though there was nothing important about it.
That’s because there isn’t, the normal part of my brain thought.
Before the part of my brain that thought otherwise could retort, I was caught in an embrace and my vision was filled with green. An overwhelming smell of flowers filled my nose.
“Oh Rosie! We were so worried!” an annoyingly pitched voice sounded in my ear and another, equally high voice made a sympathetic noise from beside me. The curly green mass was withdrawn to reveal the pink pony attached to it along with her blonde companion.
“Daisy… Lily,” my mouth said before I could think who they were. Lily grabbed me and pulled me into a hug as Daisy had done, and I felt my body relaxing of its own accord. These were my best friends; I was safe now. Safe from the thoughts that made no sense, safe from the confusion that had lurked in the back of my brain. I breathed in the scent of flowers and felt home.
We trotted back to the cottage together, the two of them flanking me and chatting happily. I smiled, feeling normal for the first time since that hit on the head. I was starting to worry that maybe I had brain damage or something... I shook my head to clear those thoughts out, turning my attention to Lily’s story about how she almost hurt Ditzy when she brought the news that I was in the hospital.
“I almost bucked that Derpy right in the face!”
“Maybe you would’ve fixed her eyes…” muttered Daisy.
“Daisy!” Lily cried.
“Oh, come on. You just called her Derpy; you know something’s not right with her.”
Lily feigned a look of innocence, but didn’t comment. Daisy looked pleased with herself for scandalizing her friend. I simply walked between them, happy for the distraction.
As Lily launched into talking about how she was afraid she would have to take over my flowers if I hadn’t have made it, we passed through town square. An oddly familiar strain of music caught my attention, despite Lily’s gabbing. I slowed down, looking for the source of the sound. A mint-colored unicorn sitting on a bench across the square seemed to be the culprit. Her eyes were closed and her face was peacefully happy as she used her magic to pluck at the strings of her instrument. But what caught my interest was how she was sitting; she was resting solely on her hindquarters, her forelegs swaying lightly to the music.
I wasn’t even aware that I had been moving towards her until I was right in front of her. As my shadow hit her face, she opened her eyes suddenly, looking directly at me. Her music never faltered, though, and she smiled faintly at me. I opened my mouth to ask her about her music, but instead surprised myself by beginning to sing:
“Stars shining bright above you,
Night breezes seem to whisper ‘I love you.’
Birds singing in a sycamore tree:
‘Dream a little dream of me.’”
The unicorn joined me on the last line, smiling widely at me. She played a few more chords as I gaped at her, then she stopped, still beaming. I couldn’t compose a thought, or remember what I wanted to ask her.
“What song was that?” Lily asked from beside me, startling me. I had forgotten about her and Daisy completely.
The unicorn kept her eyes on me as she answered. “It’s called ‘Dream a Little Dream of Me.’ I didn’t think anypony else knew it.”
Daisy beamed. “Well Rosie here is full of surprises. Just today she got hit in the head by Doc’s whatsit machine, and barely felt a thing. ‘Course I always knew she was hard-headed.” She ruffled my mane with a hoof, but I shrugged her off, intent to ask this unicorn how I could know this song.
But as I opened my mouth once again to ask, Lily interrupted me. “So did you learn that song in Canterlot, Lyra?”
Lyra, of course. The local eccentric artist, the one who never acted like a normal pony. I knew her a little; she bought flowers occasionally. Why had I not remembered her before?
Lyra shrugged delicately. “Just picked it up somewhere. Probably the same place ‘Rosie’ here did.” She looked at me knowingly, and I continued to gape back.
There is something weird about this pony, I thought, looking at her seating position, her instrument, her odd way of moving. Definitely weird.
She probably thinks the same thing of me. I closed my mouth, attempting to appear normal. Luckily, Daisy and Lily were completely oblivious, instead discussing Canterlot fashion with Lyra, who was laughing along with them. Maybe I’m wrong, she seems normal enough…
“Well, we really have to get back to the cottage. I left those… Cutie Mark girls in charge of the flower stand, and I can’t help but think that wasn’t the best idea.”
The three of them laughed, and I joined in half-heartedly. As my two friends turned away, I finally found it in myself to talk.
“Lyra, how did—”
The unicorn cut me off with a small laugh.
“You too, huh?”

River: Research
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Every Rose Has Its Thorn

River: Research

I was utterly lost in the smallest town I’d ever been in.
“How did I manage this?” I muttered to myself, trotting past the “Quills & Sofas” shop for the third time.
“Manage what?” asked a terrifyingly cheerful voice from behind.
I jumped around, reaching for my absent gun. Luckily, I wasn’t technically under attack.
“Ditzy…” I breathed at the grinning pegasus. She kicked a hoof bashfully.
“Sorry, I guess I’m sneakier than I thought. What did you manage, River?”
“What? Oh!” I laughed. “Ditzy, I am hopelessly lost.”
“Happens to me all the time.” She waved her hoof dismissively. “What are you looking for? We’ll find it together!”
I couldn’t help but smile at the mare. No wonder the Doctor likes having you around. Optimism is a rare thing, I thought. “I’m looking for the library.”
Ditzy smiled widely. “Oh, that’s easy!” She grabbed my forehoof with her own and turned me around. “Ta da!” She cried happily, pointing at the library not 30 feet from us.
I lightly hit myself in the face with my hoof. “I forgot the library was a tree…” I muttered, then fell off balance. “Right… I’m a quadruped,” I laughed as Ditzy released my other hoof.
“Well thank you for your help, Ditzy.” I smiled, turning away so I could continue to the library.
“Wait!” she cried, coming up to trot beside me. “I took Rose to the hospital and told her friends like you guys told me to.”
“Thanks for that...”
“So I figured that now we can all go off on an adventure together!” She said happily, wings flapping excitedly.
My eyes widened and a note of panic crept into my voice as I stammered, “Well… uh... the Doctor and I are discussing….” I trailed off. I had no idea what ponies knew about when it came to indelicate matters.
Ditzy tilted her head questioningly. “Discussing what?”
“Uh… human things….” I felt a blush creep to my cheeks. I was usually the last to be embarrassed, but the social constraints in this society were completely unknown to me.
“Oooohhh…” Ditzy breathed knowingly. “Why do you need books for?!”
I laughed, relieved that Ditzy seemed to have at least base knowledge of what was going on. “These bodies are much different, Ditzy. The Doctor and I are at a loss when it comes to these matters.”
Ditzy nodded, then opened the door of the library for me. Following me in, she called over my shoulder, “Twilight! River needs books about sex!” I shot her a look of horror. The last thing I needed was all of Ponyville knowing about my tribulations.
Luckily there weren’t any other ponies in the library. In fact, not even Twilight was present. A pattering of feet from upstairs was the only sign of life. The feet were soon on the stairs, and I was presented with the sight of a large, bipedal lizard.
“Hey Ditzy, Twilight’s not here,” it said in a young male voice. “Something about the princess needing her. What did you say you needed?”
I interrupted Ditzy before she could tell the obviously-underage lizard about my selection. “I was just wondering if you had any books on anatomy?”
“Sure thing. What was your name again?”
“River.” I smiled at him, following him back through the stacks.
“Nice to meet you. My name’s Spike.”
“Spike is a baby dragon!” Ditzy said happily. “And so cute!”
Spike blushed a little, and then pointed to a fairly sizable section. “That’s where the anatomy books are. Anything else you need?”
“She needs books about –” I quickly shoved a hoof in Ditzy’s mouth before she could continue.
“I think this will be fine, thanks.” I beamed at Spike until he disappeared past the shelves, then I glared at Ditzy, still with my hoof in her mouth. “He’s a baby! I don’t want to traumatize him.” I hissed. She nodded, and I removed my hoof.
“Let’s find some books on anatomy!” she cried happily.
After selecting two volumes on reproduction, and another more general one to attempt to disguise the others, Ditzy and I headed out the door. She lent me her saddlebags, showing me how to remove it with my mouth.
“Thanks for your help, Ditzy. I’m going back to the TARDIS, and we’ll drop by and get you when we’re ready.” I smiled at her, and then turned to walk away.
“Have fun having sex, River!” she yelled louder than necessary. I cringed, not daring to look around until I was safely back in the TARDIS.