teleidoplex (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
teleidoplex) wrote2007-01-27 01:55 am
teleidoplex) wrote2007-01-27 01:55 am
Entry tags:
A Most Ingenious Pair of Docs
Title: A Most Ingenious Pair of Docs
Rating: NC17 and then some
Media: Doctor Who (Post Doomsday)
Characters: Nine/Rose/Ten
Summary: It takes more than one Time Lord to pierce the void. Lucky for Rose, there are two who are willing to take the risk.
Spoilers: Doctor Who, New Seasons 1 & 2
Archive: At A Teaspoon and an Open Mind. If you want it, check with me first.
Finished: YES!!! (hooray!)
Disclaimer: One of the nice things about fanfic is that my disclaimers can double as apologia. Sorry this took so long to get out. The original version of this chapter had angry against-the-console sex, and it felt completely contrived. So I rewrote it (and the characters decided to mock me during the rewrite). No smut, but a decent amount of fluff. Hope that works for everyone.
All that being said, I don't own these characters. If I did maybe they wouldn't mock me about my failed attempts to write console sex.
Part 10
It was closer to late afternoon before Rose was ready to leave. Exhausted by their very active night, she’d slept through the morning and the Doctors had let her. There was little for her to pack, and she came to the not-so-surprising realization that she had been biding her time in this reality, going through the motions of each day until the Doctor came for her. It was a little disconcerting when she considered how she might have ended up if he hadn’t come. As it was, it just meant that she hadn’t accumulated much in the way of things she wanted to bring with her. The duffel she packed with clothes and a few pictures and mementos of her family was barely stuffed.
Saying goodbye to her Mum and the rest of her family was harder. Her second Doctor accompanied her, much to the vindictive delight of her first Doctor, who left to ready the TARDIS with a definite smirk on his face. Her second Doctor got smacked by her mum for his troubles, which caused Rose to smirk a little herself.
Then they were back at the TARDIS. As she entered she was overcome by a wave of love for the curved amber walls with their strange roundels, the forked supports stretching gracefully above her, and the green glow of the console. A wide smile split her face as she sensed a welcoming hum in response. The startled look that her first Doctor shot her as he also sensed the hum confirmed her suspicion that her time as Bad Wolf had somehow created a closer bond between her and the ship than she’d previously had. Her second Doctor smiled smugly and patted his previous self’s shoulder.
“Told you she was special,” he said, moving to the console and beginning the dematerialization sequence.
“I always knew she was special,” he first Doctor muttered, moving to the other side of the console.
“Rose, you might want to hold on to something for this,” her second Doctor instructed as both men began to flip switches and pull levers. Rose braced herself in the captain’s chair, marveling at the sight of two Time Lords working in tandem. It was like a well-choreographed dance, the way they rapidly moved around the console, even as the TARDIS began shaking with increasing violence, and sparks erupted from the console and rained down from the ceiling above. They never spoke, never shouted impatient instructions or yelled at each other the way the Doctor used to when Jack would help him fly the TARDIS. They seemed to anticipate each other’s needs perfectly.
Then the shaking subsided and she knew they had arrived back in her original reality, and she had to face the hardest goodbye of all. She stood, suddenly nervous and dreading what was to come. The Doctors exchanged uncertain glances. Her second Doctor shifted, ruffling his brown hair apprehensively.
“I’ll just…I’ll just wait outside, then,” he said, moving down the ramp and opening the doors, “take your time.”
Rose watched as he slowly closed the doors, wanting to delay what had to come. She caught a glimpse of the space beyond the doors and unthinking turned to her first Doctor with surprise.
“We’re in the TARDIS!”
The Doctor glanced around the console room wryly, “Just twigged on to that, did you?”
“No,” her hands waved away his obtuseness, “This TARDIS is in your TARDIS. Outside those doors, that’s your TARDIS’ control room.”
“Yeah,” he conceded, “takes more than just two Time Lords to cross realities. Takes two TARDISes, too. The interior of a TARDIS exists in a state of multidimensional temporal grace. My TARDIS creates a buffer for his so that—” he cut himself off suddenly, his brow furrowing, “Do you really want to talk about this right now?”
“Just…trying to delay the inevitable, I suppose,” she answered quietly, lowering her eyes to hide the tears that were gathering. He closed the space between them, his arms wrapping around her. He held her tightly, cheek pressed against the top of her head as she sobbed for their parting. Every breath she took brought the smells of leather and warm wool, which made her cry harder.
“Why,” she whispered after her tears had run out, “how come you can’t stay, just for a little longer.”
“It’s dangerous. More dangerous than just coming for you. You’ve traveled enough with me to know that things often…well, they don’t work out in the expected way. The longer I stay, the greater chance something’ll go wrong and we’ll end up creating an entry for reapers or worse. I have to go, Rose.”
“Yeah, thought it must be something like that,” she conceded, snuffling, “but I don’t have to like it.” She pulled back and gave him a watery smile. He met her with a soft smile of his own, cupping her cheeks and smudging the tears from her face with his thumbs.
“Careful. You’re going to hurt my future regeneration’s feelings.”
“Tough,” she continued to smile, “He gets around to telling me what those feelings are, and then he can have the moral high ground. Me not wanting this you to go doesn’t mean I love future you any less.”
Their eyes searched each other’s for several breaths, and she realized that neither of them wanted to initiate the closing of that distance. Sealing their goodbye with a kiss would make it real. With a sad quirk of his lips, the Doctor finally leaned towards her and his lips met hers. Softly, tentatively they explored the kiss. There was no passion to this goodbye, just sadness and wistfulness and infinite love that felt more real than any words. Reluctantly she pulled back. The Doctor was still framing her face with his hands.
“Rose Tyler,” his northern burr leant her name a depth and timbre that made her still with its intensity. His blue eyes held hers, as if to ensure she’d never forget his next words. His lips quirked into a brief smile. “Have a fantastic life.”
She nodded, unable to respond for fear she’d break down again. It was all he’d ever wanted for her. He kissed her once more, a rough goodbye, then turned and strode quickly down the ramp and out of her life.
She backed up until her legs nudged the edge of the captain’s bench. Collapsing heavily onto it, she huddled with her knees drawn up to her chest, awaiting her second Doctor’s return. Her only Doctor now, she supposed. Strangely, the sadness had all been cried out of her. She felt raw, wrung out, new. It had been right, being able to say goodbye to her first Doctor. It had helped, seeing them together, learning the similarities and differences. She could put away the little wistful moments when she wished her second Doctor would smell like leather, or look at her with blue eyes instead of brown, or even be just a little surly instead of eager and enthusiastic. She turned and laid back along the bench, staring up at the curved ceiling of the TARDIS. The ship’s presence was a soothing hum that enveloped her.
She didn’t stir when the Doctor returned. She waited as he quietly sent the TARDIS into the Time Vortex, knowing that they wouldn’t be truly done and things wouldn’t be truly safe until they’d left. It was an unusually smooth transition, as if neither the Doctor nor the TARDIS wanted to test the fragility of her state at that particular moment with a rollicking dematerialization. When the rotor had settled and the room had dimmed again, the Doctor leaned up against the console and watched her. She rolled her head to the side to meet his eyes.
She could see concern there – worry for how she was taking all this now that it was over. She could also see something she never thought she’d see in him. Hesitation. She blinked in surprise. Avoidance she had half-expected. He was the King of the purposely-obtuse. But he just stood there, propped against the console and looking as if he didn’t quite know how to proceed, as if he was reluctant to take his usual tack of jumping in with both feet in his mouth. It was up to her, she supposed.
“Hey,” she smiled shyly, reaching out a hand to him. Relief flooded his face with an answering smile.
“Hello,” he took her hand. She shifted up, pulling him down to sit on the long bench with her. Shoulders, hips and thighs nudged against each other as she twisted to look at him.
“I’m the same man, you know,” he said in a rush that reminded her of the days before she’d left, when it was always one or the other of them attempting to fill the silence of unspoken desires and emotions that lay between them. She steeled herself, determined not to fall back into that particular old habit even if she didn’t quite know how to stop it.
The words continued to pour forth from him, “I mean, the surface details are different. His ears, my mole, his taste for sardines on saltines,” he pulled a face at that particular preference, “but the stuff that matters is the same. Still love exploring time and space, still love meeting new people, still love running for my life from the latest threat, still love—” his throat caught on his words, what she was sure was the admission he’d never been able to make. His mouth worked, and he finally filled in the gap in subdued tones, “still love travelling with you.”
“I know” she squeezed his hand, “I know that. All of it.” And everything else, too, she thought, resigning herself to the fact that he’d probably never bring himself to say it.
“But you still miss me. The old me,” he pressed.
“Doctor. All that stuff, the stuff that stays the same? That’s what I—” she hesitated, but decided that one of them had to be emotionally mature about all this, “that’s what I love about you. So, yeah, I miss the little bits, the ‘sardines on saltines’ of you, but that’s not what matters, yeah? I’d love you even if you looked 70 years old or wore funny mutli-coloured, I dunno…hats or something.”
“Well, that’s just silly, Rose Tyler. Why would I wear funny multi-coloured hats?”
She shook her head with a chuckle, leaning into his shoulder to break away from his gaze. Maybe she wasn’t as ready for this as she thought.
“So,” she ventured, tracing the back of his hand with one nail, “you really don’t remember anything?”
“Well, I remember this me’s part in everything. I was there. Well, I mean, of course I was there. Twice. You knew that. Hard to miss it. As to the rest, I had to hide the memories pretty deep from myself. Lucky thing is, since I’m the one who hid them I know where to find them. All I have to do now is go in, pull them out, unpack them and…” His voice faded. She looked up in confusion as he stiffened next to her. His eyes were wide with incredulity, darting back and forth as if seeing something that wasn’t there.
“Doctor?” Rose asked with a feeling of unease. His gaze snapped to hers, but his eyes had gone dark and unreadable. One brow twitched up and he breathed in sharply. Her unease grew.
“You ditched me,” he said in a low, surprised tone.
“I…what? No,” she suddenly realized what he must have remembered, and struggled to find a way to make him see the rightness of what had passed between her and his former self, “I mean, yeah, but not really. We just went for a walk and then…we…,” as his brow arched further, she gave up trying to justify herself and became defensive, “It’s not like I cheated on you.”
“Rose Tyler, you ditched me. You and I…we went…and the park…and…oh. Oh!” His eyes widened momentarily, but then became even more enigmatic if that was possible, “You ditched me,” he repeated.
“Oh, you’re not seriously getting worked up about that, are you?” she demanded in exasperation. His enigmatic expression had begun working its way towards exaggerated outrage. She rolled her eyes and turned to face him, slinging one leg over his lap to straddle him. Reflexively he grabbed her hips. Let him try to perform outrage with a lap full of her. She draped her arms over his shoulders and fixed him with a sardonic look, “Honestly, Doctor. You were just saying that you’re the same man.
He arched an eyebrow in exasperation, “Rose, I’m trying to work myself into a self-righteous fury here, and you’re not helping with your complete lack of concern and your reasonable arguments.”
She shook her head, perplexed, “Why do you want to be in a self-righteous fury? Doesn’t sound too fun to me.”
“Oh no. Loads of fun to be had,” he settled her more firmly against him as he got into his explanation, “For instance, I’m not likely to take you up against the TARDIS console in a rough passion unless there’s something spurring it on.”
She looked askance over her shoulder at the console, covered with very breakable-looking knobs, levers and other protuberances, “Doesn’t really look like it’d be all that comfortable, for me or for her.”
“Well, no. Now that you mention it, probably not. See, that’s the usefulness of self-righteous fury. You don’t stop to consider things like that.”
“Doctor, why the sudden need to take me up against the console?”
“Well, it’s just that…after last night – and don’t think I’m not still a little irked about you lot ditching me, ‘cause I am – but I just started thinking that you might find this old life a little…” His voice faded out, as if he was realizing that whatever he had worried about was silly upon reflection.
“What? Dull? Boring? Domestic?” She laughed and stroked his hair, “Doctor, I figure that by this time tomorrow we’re going to be on some amazing adventure. Our lives are going to be in danger, and probably some world or another is going to be threatened with annihilation. And we’re going to be there, making a difference. That’s the life I want with you. That’s the thrill I want to share. This reunion’s been wonderful, but the truth is I can’t wait to get back to our same old life, yeah? I’ve never needed anything else.”
He caught her hand, curling his fingers around hers and bringing them to his lips. His eyes were shining bright, “Rose Tyler, you’re amazing.”
“And don’t think I’m gonna let you forget that,” they shared a smile.
“Right then,” he stood, forcing her to stand as well though he still held one of her hands against his chest, “If we’re going to do this, we’re going to do it right. Stay here.” He planted her where she was and walked away down the ramp.
“What—” she began to ask, but was cut off by a waving of hands and a series of tch-ing noises from him.
Bemused she watched as he made it to the TARDIS doors and turned around. Her breath caught from the intensity of the gaze he leveled on her. She couldn’t blink or look away as everything in the room except him faded from focus. He strode back up the ramp, his pace increasing as he neared her. She swallowed past the hitch in her throat. He swept her into his embrace and swung her in a wide arc. He was laughing madly and she couldn’t help but join in even though she didn’t quite know what they were laughing about. Then he kissed her, cutting her laughter short, swallowing it as his tongue delved deeply into her mouth and his body bent hers to him.
She clutched at him, overwhelmed in the moment by all that had occurred and all that was occurring. She was back. They were together. They had each other and the whole of time and space to explore. Wither and die seemed forever away. Loving him in this moment felt like touching eternity. He broke the kiss, grinning down at her with just a touch of the manic.
“What was that all about?” she gasped.
“A proper reunion, remember? Minus one important detail,” his grin softened and he stroked one finger down her cheek, “Rose Tyler, I love you.” She goggled for a moment, sure she must have misheard. The growing smugness of his smile allowed her to recover her voice and her wits.
“Quite right, too,” she responded with only a slight waver, “And I suppose, even though I’ve said it dozens of times at this point—”
“You sure you want to go there?” he interrupted, “Cause that was mostly in the park. You know…when you ditched me?”
“Shut it you,” she punched his shoulder none too lightly and he winced but quieted, “I was saying, Doctor, that I love you too.”
His lips quirked into a lopsided smile and he took both her hands in his, “Fantastic.”
Rating: NC17 and then some
Media: Doctor Who (Post Doomsday)
Characters: Nine/Rose/Ten
Summary: It takes more than one Time Lord to pierce the void. Lucky for Rose, there are two who are willing to take the risk.
Spoilers: Doctor Who, New Seasons 1 & 2
Archive: At A Teaspoon and an Open Mind. If you want it, check with me first.
Finished: YES!!! (hooray!)
Disclaimer: One of the nice things about fanfic is that my disclaimers can double as apologia. Sorry this took so long to get out. The original version of this chapter had angry against-the-console sex, and it felt completely contrived. So I rewrote it (and the characters decided to mock me during the rewrite). No smut, but a decent amount of fluff. Hope that works for everyone.
All that being said, I don't own these characters. If I did maybe they wouldn't mock me about my failed attempts to write console sex.
Part 10
It was closer to late afternoon before Rose was ready to leave. Exhausted by their very active night, she’d slept through the morning and the Doctors had let her. There was little for her to pack, and she came to the not-so-surprising realization that she had been biding her time in this reality, going through the motions of each day until the Doctor came for her. It was a little disconcerting when she considered how she might have ended up if he hadn’t come. As it was, it just meant that she hadn’t accumulated much in the way of things she wanted to bring with her. The duffel she packed with clothes and a few pictures and mementos of her family was barely stuffed.
Saying goodbye to her Mum and the rest of her family was harder. Her second Doctor accompanied her, much to the vindictive delight of her first Doctor, who left to ready the TARDIS with a definite smirk on his face. Her second Doctor got smacked by her mum for his troubles, which caused Rose to smirk a little herself.
Then they were back at the TARDIS. As she entered she was overcome by a wave of love for the curved amber walls with their strange roundels, the forked supports stretching gracefully above her, and the green glow of the console. A wide smile split her face as she sensed a welcoming hum in response. The startled look that her first Doctor shot her as he also sensed the hum confirmed her suspicion that her time as Bad Wolf had somehow created a closer bond between her and the ship than she’d previously had. Her second Doctor smiled smugly and patted his previous self’s shoulder.
“Told you she was special,” he said, moving to the console and beginning the dematerialization sequence.
“I always knew she was special,” he first Doctor muttered, moving to the other side of the console.
“Rose, you might want to hold on to something for this,” her second Doctor instructed as both men began to flip switches and pull levers. Rose braced herself in the captain’s chair, marveling at the sight of two Time Lords working in tandem. It was like a well-choreographed dance, the way they rapidly moved around the console, even as the TARDIS began shaking with increasing violence, and sparks erupted from the console and rained down from the ceiling above. They never spoke, never shouted impatient instructions or yelled at each other the way the Doctor used to when Jack would help him fly the TARDIS. They seemed to anticipate each other’s needs perfectly.
Then the shaking subsided and she knew they had arrived back in her original reality, and she had to face the hardest goodbye of all. She stood, suddenly nervous and dreading what was to come. The Doctors exchanged uncertain glances. Her second Doctor shifted, ruffling his brown hair apprehensively.
“I’ll just…I’ll just wait outside, then,” he said, moving down the ramp and opening the doors, “take your time.”
Rose watched as he slowly closed the doors, wanting to delay what had to come. She caught a glimpse of the space beyond the doors and unthinking turned to her first Doctor with surprise.
“We’re in the TARDIS!”
The Doctor glanced around the console room wryly, “Just twigged on to that, did you?”
“No,” her hands waved away his obtuseness, “This TARDIS is in your TARDIS. Outside those doors, that’s your TARDIS’ control room.”
“Yeah,” he conceded, “takes more than just two Time Lords to cross realities. Takes two TARDISes, too. The interior of a TARDIS exists in a state of multidimensional temporal grace. My TARDIS creates a buffer for his so that—” he cut himself off suddenly, his brow furrowing, “Do you really want to talk about this right now?”
“Just…trying to delay the inevitable, I suppose,” she answered quietly, lowering her eyes to hide the tears that were gathering. He closed the space between them, his arms wrapping around her. He held her tightly, cheek pressed against the top of her head as she sobbed for their parting. Every breath she took brought the smells of leather and warm wool, which made her cry harder.
“Why,” she whispered after her tears had run out, “how come you can’t stay, just for a little longer.”
“It’s dangerous. More dangerous than just coming for you. You’ve traveled enough with me to know that things often…well, they don’t work out in the expected way. The longer I stay, the greater chance something’ll go wrong and we’ll end up creating an entry for reapers or worse. I have to go, Rose.”
“Yeah, thought it must be something like that,” she conceded, snuffling, “but I don’t have to like it.” She pulled back and gave him a watery smile. He met her with a soft smile of his own, cupping her cheeks and smudging the tears from her face with his thumbs.
“Careful. You’re going to hurt my future regeneration’s feelings.”
“Tough,” she continued to smile, “He gets around to telling me what those feelings are, and then he can have the moral high ground. Me not wanting this you to go doesn’t mean I love future you any less.”
Their eyes searched each other’s for several breaths, and she realized that neither of them wanted to initiate the closing of that distance. Sealing their goodbye with a kiss would make it real. With a sad quirk of his lips, the Doctor finally leaned towards her and his lips met hers. Softly, tentatively they explored the kiss. There was no passion to this goodbye, just sadness and wistfulness and infinite love that felt more real than any words. Reluctantly she pulled back. The Doctor was still framing her face with his hands.
“Rose Tyler,” his northern burr leant her name a depth and timbre that made her still with its intensity. His blue eyes held hers, as if to ensure she’d never forget his next words. His lips quirked into a brief smile. “Have a fantastic life.”
She nodded, unable to respond for fear she’d break down again. It was all he’d ever wanted for her. He kissed her once more, a rough goodbye, then turned and strode quickly down the ramp and out of her life.
She backed up until her legs nudged the edge of the captain’s bench. Collapsing heavily onto it, she huddled with her knees drawn up to her chest, awaiting her second Doctor’s return. Her only Doctor now, she supposed. Strangely, the sadness had all been cried out of her. She felt raw, wrung out, new. It had been right, being able to say goodbye to her first Doctor. It had helped, seeing them together, learning the similarities and differences. She could put away the little wistful moments when she wished her second Doctor would smell like leather, or look at her with blue eyes instead of brown, or even be just a little surly instead of eager and enthusiastic. She turned and laid back along the bench, staring up at the curved ceiling of the TARDIS. The ship’s presence was a soothing hum that enveloped her.
She didn’t stir when the Doctor returned. She waited as he quietly sent the TARDIS into the Time Vortex, knowing that they wouldn’t be truly done and things wouldn’t be truly safe until they’d left. It was an unusually smooth transition, as if neither the Doctor nor the TARDIS wanted to test the fragility of her state at that particular moment with a rollicking dematerialization. When the rotor had settled and the room had dimmed again, the Doctor leaned up against the console and watched her. She rolled her head to the side to meet his eyes.
She could see concern there – worry for how she was taking all this now that it was over. She could also see something she never thought she’d see in him. Hesitation. She blinked in surprise. Avoidance she had half-expected. He was the King of the purposely-obtuse. But he just stood there, propped against the console and looking as if he didn’t quite know how to proceed, as if he was reluctant to take his usual tack of jumping in with both feet in his mouth. It was up to her, she supposed.
“Hey,” she smiled shyly, reaching out a hand to him. Relief flooded his face with an answering smile.
“Hello,” he took her hand. She shifted up, pulling him down to sit on the long bench with her. Shoulders, hips and thighs nudged against each other as she twisted to look at him.
“I’m the same man, you know,” he said in a rush that reminded her of the days before she’d left, when it was always one or the other of them attempting to fill the silence of unspoken desires and emotions that lay between them. She steeled herself, determined not to fall back into that particular old habit even if she didn’t quite know how to stop it.
The words continued to pour forth from him, “I mean, the surface details are different. His ears, my mole, his taste for sardines on saltines,” he pulled a face at that particular preference, “but the stuff that matters is the same. Still love exploring time and space, still love meeting new people, still love running for my life from the latest threat, still love—” his throat caught on his words, what she was sure was the admission he’d never been able to make. His mouth worked, and he finally filled in the gap in subdued tones, “still love travelling with you.”
“I know” she squeezed his hand, “I know that. All of it.” And everything else, too, she thought, resigning herself to the fact that he’d probably never bring himself to say it.
“But you still miss me. The old me,” he pressed.
“Doctor. All that stuff, the stuff that stays the same? That’s what I—” she hesitated, but decided that one of them had to be emotionally mature about all this, “that’s what I love about you. So, yeah, I miss the little bits, the ‘sardines on saltines’ of you, but that’s not what matters, yeah? I’d love you even if you looked 70 years old or wore funny mutli-coloured, I dunno…hats or something.”
“Well, that’s just silly, Rose Tyler. Why would I wear funny multi-coloured hats?”
She shook her head with a chuckle, leaning into his shoulder to break away from his gaze. Maybe she wasn’t as ready for this as she thought.
“So,” she ventured, tracing the back of his hand with one nail, “you really don’t remember anything?”
“Well, I remember this me’s part in everything. I was there. Well, I mean, of course I was there. Twice. You knew that. Hard to miss it. As to the rest, I had to hide the memories pretty deep from myself. Lucky thing is, since I’m the one who hid them I know where to find them. All I have to do now is go in, pull them out, unpack them and…” His voice faded. She looked up in confusion as he stiffened next to her. His eyes were wide with incredulity, darting back and forth as if seeing something that wasn’t there.
“Doctor?” Rose asked with a feeling of unease. His gaze snapped to hers, but his eyes had gone dark and unreadable. One brow twitched up and he breathed in sharply. Her unease grew.
“You ditched me,” he said in a low, surprised tone.
“I…what? No,” she suddenly realized what he must have remembered, and struggled to find a way to make him see the rightness of what had passed between her and his former self, “I mean, yeah, but not really. We just went for a walk and then…we…,” as his brow arched further, she gave up trying to justify herself and became defensive, “It’s not like I cheated on you.”
“Rose Tyler, you ditched me. You and I…we went…and the park…and…oh. Oh!” His eyes widened momentarily, but then became even more enigmatic if that was possible, “You ditched me,” he repeated.
“Oh, you’re not seriously getting worked up about that, are you?” she demanded in exasperation. His enigmatic expression had begun working its way towards exaggerated outrage. She rolled her eyes and turned to face him, slinging one leg over his lap to straddle him. Reflexively he grabbed her hips. Let him try to perform outrage with a lap full of her. She draped her arms over his shoulders and fixed him with a sardonic look, “Honestly, Doctor. You were just saying that you’re the same man.
He arched an eyebrow in exasperation, “Rose, I’m trying to work myself into a self-righteous fury here, and you’re not helping with your complete lack of concern and your reasonable arguments.”
She shook her head, perplexed, “Why do you want to be in a self-righteous fury? Doesn’t sound too fun to me.”
“Oh no. Loads of fun to be had,” he settled her more firmly against him as he got into his explanation, “For instance, I’m not likely to take you up against the TARDIS console in a rough passion unless there’s something spurring it on.”
She looked askance over her shoulder at the console, covered with very breakable-looking knobs, levers and other protuberances, “Doesn’t really look like it’d be all that comfortable, for me or for her.”
“Well, no. Now that you mention it, probably not. See, that’s the usefulness of self-righteous fury. You don’t stop to consider things like that.”
“Doctor, why the sudden need to take me up against the console?”
“Well, it’s just that…after last night – and don’t think I’m not still a little irked about you lot ditching me, ‘cause I am – but I just started thinking that you might find this old life a little…” His voice faded out, as if he was realizing that whatever he had worried about was silly upon reflection.
“What? Dull? Boring? Domestic?” She laughed and stroked his hair, “Doctor, I figure that by this time tomorrow we’re going to be on some amazing adventure. Our lives are going to be in danger, and probably some world or another is going to be threatened with annihilation. And we’re going to be there, making a difference. That’s the life I want with you. That’s the thrill I want to share. This reunion’s been wonderful, but the truth is I can’t wait to get back to our same old life, yeah? I’ve never needed anything else.”
He caught her hand, curling his fingers around hers and bringing them to his lips. His eyes were shining bright, “Rose Tyler, you’re amazing.”
“And don’t think I’m gonna let you forget that,” they shared a smile.
“Right then,” he stood, forcing her to stand as well though he still held one of her hands against his chest, “If we’re going to do this, we’re going to do it right. Stay here.” He planted her where she was and walked away down the ramp.
“What—” she began to ask, but was cut off by a waving of hands and a series of tch-ing noises from him.
Bemused she watched as he made it to the TARDIS doors and turned around. Her breath caught from the intensity of the gaze he leveled on her. She couldn’t blink or look away as everything in the room except him faded from focus. He strode back up the ramp, his pace increasing as he neared her. She swallowed past the hitch in her throat. He swept her into his embrace and swung her in a wide arc. He was laughing madly and she couldn’t help but join in even though she didn’t quite know what they were laughing about. Then he kissed her, cutting her laughter short, swallowing it as his tongue delved deeply into her mouth and his body bent hers to him.
She clutched at him, overwhelmed in the moment by all that had occurred and all that was occurring. She was back. They were together. They had each other and the whole of time and space to explore. Wither and die seemed forever away. Loving him in this moment felt like touching eternity. He broke the kiss, grinning down at her with just a touch of the manic.
“What was that all about?” she gasped.
“A proper reunion, remember? Minus one important detail,” his grin softened and he stroked one finger down her cheek, “Rose Tyler, I love you.” She goggled for a moment, sure she must have misheard. The growing smugness of his smile allowed her to recover her voice and her wits.
“Quite right, too,” she responded with only a slight waver, “And I suppose, even though I’ve said it dozens of times at this point—”
“You sure you want to go there?” he interrupted, “Cause that was mostly in the park. You know…when you ditched me?”
“Shut it you,” she punched his shoulder none too lightly and he winced but quieted, “I was saying, Doctor, that I love you too.”
His lips quirked into a lopsided smile and he took both her hands in his, “Fantastic.”