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The new girl liked to talk. She spoke about fairy tales-- stories with aliens attacking, a mad spaceman, trips around the galaxy in a flying blue box.
When the lies started, Kilgrave considered leaving her exactly where he had picked her up. He’d never bothered with the mad ones, but there was something about her that made her almost charming. It could have been the blonde hair, or the smile that overpowered every flaw on her delicate face. Against his better judgment, he took her home with him.
After he realized his mistake, he started with a very basic command.
“Shut up.”
Every twelve hours, he gave her variations of the same order: “No nonsense talk today.” “Enough about your Doctor. Good God, you’re a bloody parrot.” “If you say one more word about you-know-what, I will have you extract your own teeth.”
The last one had managed to keep her silent longest. Now, twelve hours later with this blonde girl still in his bed, her delusions started up again with tears, an ugly red nose, and incessant sobbing.
“Do you remember when we went to Dorfun?” She began, and Kilgrave could barely make out the words beneath her wailing. “The little planet with all the twinkling lights? It sounded like music everywhere we went. There was this little old man who kept calling you Moon Eyes and offering you a job. You were so kind to him. We ended up helping him sell his Star Specs…”
Kilgrave let out a groan and rolled over to face away from her. “Quiet.”
The girl shut up instantly, and Kilgrave assumed that would be the end of it. Then, even more alarmingly than her sudden tears, she had started to touch his hair.
There were times Kilgrave could exhibit patience. He’d learned to develop some of it when commands couldn’t get him everything he wanted. Now though, he had run out before the day had even begun.
He sat up quickly, catching her hand between his fingers. “Stop it,” he snapped. “I will give you five minutes to get this – all of this,” he gestured to the tears and red splotches covering her face. “Out. Then no more. No more. Do you agree?”
The girl hesitated, and then nodded slowly. Kilgrave let her go and glowered. “Good, yes, fine. Tell me why you won’t shut up about this man.”
“It’s you,” the girl said instantly, gasping as if she had just emerged from underwater. “I found the TARDIS. I watched the tapes you left for Martha. Doctor, I know you’re still in there. Even if you can’t hear me, you’re my Doctor and I’m never going to leave you. Look! Look into my eyes—“
“I’d rather not,” Kilgrave said, reaching to the nightstand and handing her a tissue.
“Look, Doctor. Can’t you see I’m telling the truth?” She gripped his hand again -- she was always doing that -- and brought it to her lips. “Please. Please look.”
It was becoming difficult to take her seriously. Kilgrave really did miss Jessica. For all of her mood swings and dark clothing, she had never cried once in the time they had been together.
Feeling overly generous, he leaned forward and stared at her. The girl stared back. He could count every heavily darkened eyelash on her; the streaks of ruined makeup running down her cheeks, the shaky breaths that slowly settled the longer he looked at her.
“Don’t you remember me?” she whispered, a breath away, “It’s Rose, Doctor. It’s me.”
Something strange seemed to settle into his gut. Kilgrave knew that name: Rose. In his memory, Jessica was in front of him suddenly, petting his face. Kilgrave smiled at her. She was always so soothing to him.
“You were talking in your sleep again.” Jessica had murmured, all purr and pleasure in her voice. Kilgrave hummed and closed his eyes lazily.
“Sorry, darling. You know I can’t help it.”
“I wondered—“ Jessica pulled her hand back, looking at him fondly. She watched him like a newlywed, the way he had instructed. “Where the woman is you said you lost.”
“I haven’t lost anyone,” Kilgrave mumbled, but Jessica tilted her head, and when Kilgrave peaked at her she looked insistent. “You call out to her. You keep asking for her.”
A chill passed through his bones as the memory faded away. When Kilgrave was able to focus again, Jessica was gone. Rose looked no different, but Kilgrave parted his lips in shock.
“You’re her,” he accused. Rose nodded, lips upturned into one of the many smiles Kilgrave had asked her to perfect. “I’ve dreamt about you. Running. Always running. It’s exhausting. Who are you?”
“Do you own a pocket watch?” Rose asked. Kilgrave stared, then remembered to close his mouth.
“What?”
“It will explain everything. I know you have one. Open it, Doctor! All your messages said that it would put you right again. I promise it will, and I’ll start making sense.”
Kilgrave blinked, then moved his hand to delicately brush the hair from her eyes. Rose smiled wide, excitable, hopeful. It almost felt wrong to play along with her, but he knew it would be worse for him to let her keep talking.
“I don’t think so,” Kilgrave decided, humming impatiently. “Time’s up, love. Don’t speak anymore.”
Her smile fell, mouth a straight line. Kilgrave grinned at her, and leaned in close to whisper softly against her lips.
“Molto bene.”