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fannishlisstitle: Bridging the Divide
author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fannishliss
pairing: Nine/Rose
Rating: nc17
genre: s1 and potw AU (complete!)
length: 12,000 words.
summary: The Doctor admits he's in love with Rose, but they're incompatible. Rose refuses to let that stop them! The Tardis helps. :)
=?=
"Doctor?" Rose asked, from the jump seat. She liked to sit and watch sometimes while he roamed around the console. It was soothing after a hard adventure, like the one they'd just had on Satellite Five, with the open-brain-headed people running things and messing up the destiny of the human race.
"Yes?" he answered, distractedly. He liked to tweak, and he was currently tweaking. Rose could feel the little shudders the Tardis made as she adjusted according to his minute rearrangements of her knobs, levers and dials.
"Why did you call Adam my boyfriend?" she said, looking down, and kicking her trainers against the rungs under the jumpseat. She knew she was being juvenile, but once in a while she had to air her grievances.
"Well, he was, wasn't he?" the Doctor muttered. He sounded perfectly casual, but she could see the nonchalant way his brow had lifted, the picture of perfectly unconcerned, which spelled out bothered in Time Lord.
"No," she said. "Look. You just stop accusing me of having him as a boyfriend, and we'll forget he was ever on board."
"Done," he said, but his brow had lowered, and that was even worse than bothered. That was annoyed.
"Doctor, why are you still annoyed?" Rose asked, a little more insistent than before.
"Oh, I don't know, Rose, maybe because you invited a stranger onto my Tardis because you were getting lonely?" The Doctor's tone was light, but it still stung. It got Rose's back up when the Doctor acted like this. Well, this time, she would call him out for it.
"I just thought you might want to show off," Rose answered, "be impressive? Weren't we in it together, taking him all the way into the future, giving him a little perspective?"
The Doctor lifted his head and she met his piercing stare. She had nothing to regret, no reason to back down. She looked back into the blue and congratulated herself on the staring contests she and Shireen used to play at.
He stared and stared at her. She calmed herself and breathed and stared back. She had nothing to hide. If she heated a little under his gaze, he was none the wiser. If she dreamed in her heart of hearts to be taken apart under that gaze, he'd never know, and no hearts would ever be broken.
Finally he huffed a sigh and turned away, back to the console. Rose gratefully blinked her watering eyes.
"You haven't answered me, Doctor," she heard herself say. Apparently she still hadn't learned to let well enough alone.
He didn't answer, just went back to making adjustments now so inconsequential that Rose couldn't feel the slightest tremor.
"Jealous much?" she murmured, but his head whipped around, blue eyes blazing. She'd gone too far.
Hand trailing knowingly along the controls he'd just finished calibrating, he came round the console as smooth as the Tardis humming through the Vortex. Rose didn't dare look away. He seated himself beside her and primly crossed one leg over the other, grasping his knee. Rose saw that his knuckles were white and the color had drained from his cheeks.
"I'm sorry, that was a stupid thing to say," she stammered.
"I'm not offended," he said lightly, looking up at the arched ceiling of the control room. His eyes traced the beams and maybe he could see lines of energy or the Arc of Time, Rose really had no idea.
"You seem offended," Rose stated, nervously. He was taking this way out of proportion, wasn't he?
"I don't fancy being misunderstood," he said, darting a look at her. Even a glancing blow from that brilliant eye made her shiver.
"I take it back," Rose said, wholeheartedly, full of contrition.
"You're missing the point, Rose," he said. "I'm not jealous of you. It's not fair to you, is it, healthy and young, nineteen years old and cooped up with a celibate? It isn't fair of me to expect that you wouldn't be attracted to such pretty young men, just because even a Dalek can tell across a viewscreen that I'm in love with you?"
Rose blinked. It was too much to take in at once. Celibate? Love? Which was it then? "I uh, I thought it, uh, just kind of got that from me."
"That I'm in love with you?" he asked.
Rose's heart lurched again, painfully, at the bitterness in the Doctor's tone.
"I mean, that's just a dream of mine, isn't it, that the Dalek thought because of me?" Rose offered, blushing. "I mean, yeah, it never even saw us together till the very end." She laughed a little, but the Doctor's face was quiet and dead serious.
"No," the Doctor stated, flatly, "it knew. Somehow, it knew. I'm in love with you, deeply, horribly, quite cursedly in love with you, and every time another man looks at you, I want to take you in my arms and prove to them who you belong to."
"Do it then," Rose breathed. Her pupils must've gone huge — it was like the whole room had gone dim and the Doctor shone with all the light of the Sun in its last dying glory.
"I want to," he said, and maybe he was just a little breathless.
"Don't wait for another man to look at me, Doctor," she said. "You look at me, now," and she reached a hand up to touch the side of his face, when he roughly pushed her hand away and sprang most of the way across the room.
"You mustn't do that," he said, panting now. He was so very beautiful in that instant, his almost feminine lips parted, his brilliant blue eyes wide open, his pale face flushed with color.
"Do what!" she exclaimed, shocked and a little frightened.
"Telepaths," he said, "touch telepaths — you can't just touch — especially when emotions are high!" he gasped.
"But Doctor," she said, "wouldn't that be wonderful? All the brilliant things you've seen, I could see! Everything I feel for you, you could feel," she whispered. She'd stood from the jumpseat and wanted to cross to him, but she could see that if she reached out, if she neared, he would flee.
"Rose, you silly, silly girl. Don't you realize yet what I am?" he said.
"Alien, yeah, I got that," Rose laughed, but he shook his head bitterly.
"Time Lord, Rose— last of the Time Lords. The universe winds and unwinds inside my head. No human being can look into that and survive!" he said, anguished now.
Suddenly Rose understood. "You mean... we're really not compatible. Really, really, not?" she whispered.
He shook his head again.
"That's why you're celibate?" she asked.
"Culturally, psychically, physiologically — we stopped mating millennia ago, reproduced artificially. Gallifreyans were too vulnerable to their mates— they had to lower every mental barrier to let their partner in. Nothing could be held back, or sex couldn't even happen."
"Couldn't? Haven't you ... ever?" Rose asked, embarrassed.
"I was married, in my first incarnation. I had a wife in the Backtime, before the artificial methods. She bore me a daughter..." The Doctor's eyes were ancient as he spoke.
"Don't you ..." Rose began, but the Doctor interrupted.
"It wasn't love, not the way I love you. She was my partner, mother of my offspring. Maybe it's easier without the love."
"Easier!" Rose said, aghast.
His blue eyes flew up, humor and pain mingled in his gaze. "I'm hungry for you, Rose — and it's a hunger that can't ever be satisfied."
Rose stared at him, and now his barriers had fallen, she could see that hunger, deep, clear, pure, and all-consuming. It was like looking down into a glacier-fed lake a mile deep.
"What," she asked, and cleared her throat. "What are we going to do about this?"
"What do you mean?" the Doctor frowned.
"Well, uh, you want me to leave?" she asked. "I mean if it hurts you so much for me to be around."
"No," he breathed. "It's too late for that. I can't live without you now."
"I thought you were going to live on for thousands of years," Rose said.
"Yeah... we used to be limited to twelve regenerations — twelve new bodies, fresh new lives — by the Council. Now they've gone, nothing's to stop me living forever."
Rose shuddered. She couldn't imagined the weariness of slogging on forever, no end in sight.
"You can't love me, but you don't want me to go," she said, frowning.
"I do love you," he said, eyes wide. "I think I did almost as soon as I met you. This life, this body, it's so raw. Everything's on the surface, and almost everything, it just hurts, all the time, till I think I'm gonna go mad. Except you. Even with the ache of wanting you, Rose — you make everything better."
"So what, then? What am I supposed to do?" Rose asked. She knew she could never leave him, not of her own accord.
"Nothing," he said. She looked at him like he'd gone barmy, but he shrugged. "Nothing to do. I'm a Time Lord, you're a human. Never the twain shall... you get the picture."
"You're giving up," she said. "Don't."
His eyes blazed at her again. "You're forgetting just how much I've lost. I'm not willing... I can't risk you on top of all of it. I won't."
"Don't I get a say?" Rose asked.
"I'm the Time Lord, I'm the danger, so I get the say. I don't even know why I told you all this," he moaned.
"Because you needed to," she insisted. "You drive yourself mad with all you put on your own shoulders. I can carry some of it, at least. And I tell you this much: you won't have to worry about seeing me with other men. I won't do that to you. And we're gonna figure this out. I won't let you rest until, until — until I make you the happiest man in the universe!"
Taken aback, the Doctor stared at Rose in surprise, then starting laughing delightedly. "Have a good opinion of yourself, do you?"
"Only what I've been told, by someone whose opinion I trust," Rose said modestly, stifling her grin.
Then she frowned once more. "Doctor," she asked, "can I still hold your hand?"
"Absolutely," he said, and whatever it was that ran through the link of their hands, it was real, and strong, and it couldn't be denied.
=====
Rose had no sooner promised that she wouldn't taunt the Doctor with other men, than Captain Jack Harkness literally plucked her out of the sky. He went on to flirt outrageously with Rose while simultaneously making knowing comments to the Doctor. Even Rose's impromptu dance with the Doctor had been interrupted, first by the Doctor's growing suspicions about the nanites and then by Jack teleporting them onto his ship.
Despite wanting not to annoy the Doctor, Rose found herself laughing and smiling when Jack was around. He was cheerful and funny and a great conversationalist, not to mention his disarmingly attentive gaze. He seemed like he was always sizing up what Rose would be like in bed.
Rose tried to be good. She wasn't seriously attracted to Jack — he was certainly pretty and charming, smooth in ways the Doctor wasn't — but at the same time, Rose wasn't in love with Jack. She'd already given her heart to the Time Lord.
Sadly, he didn't seem to realize it.
He grew quieter as Jack made himself at home in the Tardis. He was abrupt and even deliberately rude.
The last straw for Rose was in the galley. The Doctor didn't sleep much as far as Rose could tell, but he did need to eat, and she wandered in one morning to find him spreading some thick, delightful smelling jam on slices of toast. She was still in her jimjams— perfectly modest drawstring pants and a loose flannel top, pink, with little winged cats all over them.
The Doctor took one look at her and his lips tightened slightly, disapprovingly.
"Good morning, Doctor," Rose smiled brightly, pretending not to notice.
His eyes narrowed.
"Something the matter?" she said. How could he get her back up without even speaking? It was like they were bitter old miserably-marrieds already.
"Is any of that for me?" Jack said from the galley door, looking at the Doctor's plate, laden with toast. He then glanced over at Rose, smiling at her. "Rose," he said, his pleasant, perfectly modulated voice caressing her name.
The Doctor picked up his mound of toast and cup of tea and stalked out of the room without a single word.
"What slithered down his neck?" Jack wondered, busying himself at the breadboard, slicing more of the bread for toasting, while Rose prepared tea.
She was angry at the Doctor, embarrassed for him, guilty over nothing, and hollow, worn through, with wanting him. She just looked at Jack, her misery plain.
"Oh honey," he said, dropping the bread knife with a clatter and taking her into a hug. He just stood there, rocking her a little, and kissed her lightly on top of the head.
"What is it with you two?" he whispered. "You're nuts, that's all I can think."
"It's hopeless," Rose choked.
"It's never hopeless," Jack promised. He chucked her under the chin. "It's never hopeless. There's always a way. Sometimes, you gotta wait and it seems like forever. But if you dream hard enough you can make it happen."
"I thought you were a cynical old con man, only out for yourself," Rose sniffled.
"I am out for myself! God, the tension in this galley might curdle my breakfast! and this jam is famous across five star systems, so it shouldn't go to waste. And furthermore, no one dreams big like a con man — huh?"
"Too right," Rose sniffed.
"Go talk to him. The Tardis'll help you track him down." Rose could feel the little sense of some presence warm at the base of her neck. Jack felt it a little more strongly as a natural telepath, but once Rose had become aware of it, she nurtured her connection with the ship and concentrated on building it up.
The Tardis led her, unerringly, to the Doctor's private quarters. It wasn't that Rose hadn't seen his rooms — but she'd only seen them glancingly, in transit. She'd never gone there to seek him out, and certainly not to pull him out of one of his moods.
Gathering her courage, she knocked. "Doctor, may I come in?"
For a long moment there was no reply. Then finally she heard him gruffly reply, "Yeah, come in."
"Are you okay, Doctor?" Rose asked, easing the door open and stepping cautiously into the Doctor's room. It felt a little like breeching an inner sanctum, for all that it was decorated casually, rather plain for someone who called himself a Time Lord, and not at all alien. It reminded Rose of a mid-twentieth-century studio flat: bed, nightstand, bureau, two chairs, a tea table, and a standing desk and coatrack by the door.
He only snorted in reply. He was seated in one of the two easy chairs, the plate of toast on the tea table in front of him.
"Have I done something wrong?" Rose said.
He looked away, shaking his head ever so slightly, so she came closer, sitting down in the chair opposite, maybe nick a toast.
As he turned to look at her, his eyes suddenly blazed with intensity. His whole expression became fearsome as he leaned forward, breathing deeply.
"Rose—" he nearly hissed. "He's all over you! How could you come to me, here in my room, when you smell all over of him!"
"What?" Rose asked, shrinking back into the chair. "You can smell him?"
"Yes, I bloody well can!" he shouted.
"Well, how was I to know that!" Rose shouted back. "He hugged me, because he could see you were being an arse!"
"An arse!" the Doctor roared.
Rose just looked at him, eyebrows raised, lips pressed firmly together, letting him reflect on his own actions.
"Right! An arse!" He leapt to his feet, stomping to the far side of the room. Rose couldn't help admiring the lithe muscles of his back revealed by the form-fitting maroon jumper. It was so rare that she saw him without the coat.
"I'm sorry, Doctor," she said, trying to make it better. "I didn't know your sense of smell was that good."
The Doctor whirled, rounding on her. "You bathed last fourteen hours ago, after we got back from Cardiff. Used that mint foot rub Jackie gave you. Washed your hair with the lemon shampoo. Your toothpaste is spearmint," he spat. He strode nearer, his voice low and precise, eyes blazing. "You stroked yourself to climax last night before you fell asleep. I can smell your pleasure lingering on your fingers."
Rose felt pinned to the chair, a bolt of arousal sizzling through her at his words, the sheer intensity of his proximity.
"Is that why you were so cold to me this morning?" Rose asked. "Because you could tell--?"
He looked away again, the cords in his neck pulling.
"Could you tell what I was thinking?" she asked.
He swallowed, shaking his head as if to clear it — not a clear negative.
"That I was thinking of you?" she whispered.
"Ah, Rose, Rose," he groaned. He looked up and his eyes were crystalline blue, so wide, so helpless. "You've climaxed one hundred thirty-seven times on this ship, and I've felt the shock of it every time."
"The shock of it?" Rose whispered.
"Echoing through the Tardis, through the link you're building with her, you clever girl," he grinned mirthlessly, shaking an accusing finger in her direction.
She sat there, stunned, a little aghast.
"So yeah, I knew what you were thinking," he added. "Most of those times I could hear my name ringing through your pleasure. And by the way, who the hell is David Tennant?"
"First of all," Rose said hotly, "I'm a little upset you could hear my thoughts. You told me it was only the Tardis in my head. Second of all, he's a cute Scottish bloke on telly— safe enough for a fantasy, as long as no one's listening in!"
"i did warn you," the Doctor said haughtily.
"You did not!" Rose said.
"Did too!"
Rose just looked at him, mouth agape. "Really?" she said.
"I can't shut you out, Rose... this is what it's gonna be like, my mental barriers falling, one by one, till I'm bare before you, begging." He wiped at his face tiredly.
"And that's bad how?" Rose whispered, knocked back by the image of the Doctor helpless before her.
"I told you, Rose! Time Lord! Mind full of Vortex! You look in there, you're gonna burn, and there'd be nothing I could do to stop it!"
The Doctor's voice was threaded through with despair, almost an agony. Rose longed to comfort him. She had to figure this out.
"But wait. Can't the Tardis help?" she asked.
"How?" the Doctor said, weakly.
"She's full of Vortex too, and my link with her hasn't hurt me. If I'm linked up to her, and so are you, can't she be, like, a transmitter, but with a filter — just letting through as much as is safe?"
The Doctor stared. Rose waited.
He stared. She waited.
"Rose Marion Tyler, you are brilliant!" he shouted, a huge grin breaking out over his face. He grabbed her shoulders and kissed her right on the forehead. In the split second of that kiss, she could feel like a distant storm, the overwhelming joy flooding through him.
"But we've got to be sure. We've got to be safe. I can't let you get hurt, not for me, not for this." His desperation, his excitement, it was all mingled together on his face.
"Tell me, Doctor. What happens now?" she asked.
"Now, Rose," he said, "we see what the Tardis thinks of this naughty idea of yours. Oh, if they could see this, they'd have a fit — a type forty Tardis being used as a sex aid between a Gallifreyan and a human!"
"None of their business," Rose grumbled, not caring who he was talking about, but getting the idea it was his meddling, condescending people.
"Do you want some toast?" the Doctor said brightly. She'd never known anyone whose moods changed so rapidly. There was no way to know if it was because he was Gallifreyan or just that he was mad.
"Yes, thanks. I'm famished!" Just as Jack had said, the jam was incredible. The Doctor had come up with a transdimensional breadbox, so the bread was always perfectly fresh, but this jam was transcendent, dark purple in color, tangy with heady flavors of honey and citrus and a hint of spice.
Rose moaned in appreciation, licking the crumbs daintily from her fingers as she finished off the second piece of toast. "Doctor, that was heavenly!" she enthused.
"It certainly was," the Doctor responded, and then she saw that he was watching intently as she sucked on her finger. The hunger in his eyes had built again to a raging fire.
"Do you want some?" Rose said, picking up another piece and offering it to him.
He seized her wrist, and staring into her eyes, began to bite into the toast, until she was just holding a little piece of it between her fingers.
"It is good," he said, "but this is heavenly—" and then she felt his soft lips closed over her fingers. His tongue swept the toast away and he chewed it up and swallowed, somehow managing just to graze the sensitive skin of her fingers with his teeth. As he swallowed, he began to lave around her fingers, searching out the tiny traces of jam, and she blushingly realized, something more.
"Can you, can you taste—" she asked.
"Hint of soap, there, but yeah, of course I can, Rose. And you're just as delicious as you smell," he said.
"That's good," she said breathlessly, overwhelmed by his attentions, the feel of his tongue exploring her fingers.
"Can you feel me?" he said softly, taking her hand into his with a final kiss.
"Yeah! It feels wonderful!" she answered.
"No, Rose, I mean, in your head. Feel if the Tardis is shielding you," he explained.
The Tardis made herself known in Rose's mind as a collection of persuasive impulses. Warm, gentle, the Tardis would nudge Rose to take a certain action. Rarely, but more often as she worked at the connection, she would receive a full-sensory impression of where the Tardis wanted her to go (the dappled light, soft lapping, and humidity of the pool) or something she was meant to do (the feel of a lever, the satisfactory chunk of correctly adjusting it).
Right now, the Tardis in her mind felt warmer than usual, tense with the urgency of something with the potential to happen.
Then Rose heard, very faintly, the sound of music, like a distant set of tuned chimes shimmering the air.
"I hear music, Doctor — it's so beautiful! What is it?" She closed her eyes to focus on the celestial sound.
"That's Old High Gallifreyan, Rose — our old telepathic language. You're hearing my thoughts!" he said.
She opened her eyes to look at him. The emotional intensity of his face was startling — hope, terror, joy, all at once.
"It's gorgeous — like angels singing — but I can't understand," she said.
"Yeah you can. Listen again."
The sound seemed clearer as she focused again, a lovely ringing of chimes that seemed to float and expand, sweet harmonies and fruitful dissonances colliding.
"It's the design at the heart of things," Rose murmured as the language unfolded its meaning. "The expansive core of the universe, the birth of all things. Blimey, you think a lot of things at once!" she exclaimed. Then she gasped. "Oh. Oh, Doctor! Is it?"
"Yes — that's your name, Rose. Gallifreyan language is infinitely layered. What you're hearing isn't just the name of a flower, it's all that the idea of the flower implies."
"So I can hear you! The Tardis is linking us!" Rose exclaimed.
"Still doesn't do me any good if I have you and you don't survive it," he said, darkly.
"You could really, like, kill me with your brain?" Rose asked, flushing at the thought of the Doctor having her, but trying to pay attention.
"Rose, that was just one word I sent through to you. Imagine my thoughts going full tilt... not to mention the Vortex."
"Why do you have the Vortex running through your brain? Isn't that what the Tardis is for?"
"Gallifrey had a rift, so my people evolved to withstand anomalies in time and space. The very first Gallifreyan time travelers moved their entire ship through time and space using only the power of their linked minds."
"Amazing!" Rose said.
"Yeah— except it was a failure. They managed it, but not without crashing into me."
"You crashed into the first Gallifreyan time travelers!" Rose laughed, not exactly surprised.
"Always in the wrong place, wrong time, me," he smirked. "Turned my poor old girl inside out. Anyways, after they crashed, Rassilon went the technological route, growing ships with living intelligences. It's the link between a Gallifreyan and a Tardis that truly defines a Time Lord, the ability of the Time Lord to monitor and understand the Vortex as the Tardis moves through it."
"So the Vortex isn't in your head — it's the link to the Tardis that's in your head, and the Tardis is in the Vortex — so the Tardis is already protecting you from the Vortex," Rose said triumphantly, working it out.
"Fair enough," the Doctor conceded, smiling.
"So she should be able to do it then. If she can filter the Vortex for you, she ought to be able to filter you for me," Rose said.
"Maybe," the Doctor said cautiously.
"How do we test it?" she asked, softly.
"Touch telepaths, Rose," he said. "We just have to touch." He still had a hold of her hand, and he began stroking it more intently.
"I like the sound of that," she purred. "How much touching, do you think?"
"A good deal," he replied. "But we'll go slow," he added.
"Going slow means getting started," she said, trying for sultry. "This is just like trying to get you to dance."
"I'm a fantastic dancer!" he replied, indignantly.
"I agree!" Rose answered. "But it took you a while to warm up to it."
The Doctor sighed. "As much as I want you, I can't let go. I need to know you'll be safe."
"Okay, Doctor. I'm in your hands," she said, then gestured to the arm chairs they were sitting in. "Can't we get a little more comfy?"
Wordlessly the Doctor stood and led Rose by the hand to the bed. It was the one bright spot of color in the spare, coral room, with a heavy quilted coverlet made of what looked like silk, crimson and orange and embroidered in beautiful swirls. Rose fleetingly wondered if it were Gallifreyan in origin.
"It's beautiful," Rose said, admiring the quilt.
"You're beautiful," the Doctor said, staring at her intently.
"You mean, for a human," Rose said, ducking her head away.
"Nah," the Doctor said. "I was just being an arse, like you said. You are beautiful, Rose, one of the most beautiful beings I've ever had the pleasure of getting to know."
There was a smart riposte on the edge of her tongue, but she swallowed it back when she registered the sincerity in the Doctor's voice and in his unblinking blue gaze.
"Thank you," she said, as steadily as she was able.
"Aren't you going to return the compliment?" the Doctor teased, lightening the moment.
"Nothing I could say could measure up to you, Doctor," Rose returned.
"Too right," the Doctor smiled. His hand slowly rose to the side of her face, as if by its own accord. Because of his alien coolness, she couldn't detect any heat, but she could sense his hand hovering, as though it belonged to a ghost.
"If you want to touch me, go ahead," Rose challenged. "I want you to."
The Doctor shivered and blinked at her words. He pulled his hand away and Rose frowned, but then he said, "Lie back," which sounded much nicer.
"You early humans have had a few natural psychics," the Doctor said casually, going into what Rose thought of as lecture mode. His hands floated an inch or two above her body as he spoke, a strange sensation she seemed able to feel. "Even by the twenty-first century they'd done some amazing work on the human aura — the field of electrical impulses that extend beyond the body — so-called Kirlian photography for example, documenting the way the body's natural psychic field could extend to make contact with and learn about another body — be it animal, vegetable, or mineral."
"What if it's the size of a bread box?" Rose asked.
"Bigger on the inside?" the Doctor answered, "—it always is."
"Take a deep breath, Rose, and hold it," he ordered, and after a few seconds he said, "release." Rose felt the tension draining from her body as she breathed out. She imagined herself sinking down into the comfortably firm mattress of the Doctor's bed. She was lying on the Doctor's bed! The reality of her situation suddenly occurred to her and she felt her heart speed up its beat.
The Doctor's hand floated just above and to the left of her sternum. "So much life — so strong and young," he murmured. "So fucking beautiful," he said.
Rose was astonished — she'd never heard him curse before. She looked up and saw tears in his eyes.
"What's wrong?" she asked, concerned.
"I can't," he said, "I can't convince myself that it's okay, that it will be okay if I touch you. I want you safe, my Rose," he said, a tear breaking and rolling down his face.
"There's a song for that, you know," Rose said. "It's the heart afraid of breaking that never learns to dance...." she sang softly.
"I'm not afraid of dying, not on my own account," the Doctor said. Of course, somehow, he knew that song.
"I know," Rose said. "But you can't choose for me — you can't pick and choose amongst the risks you think it's okay for me to take."
"I won't let you run into the line of fire," the Doctor said.
Rose thought of the Dalek that had extrapolated her DNA. "I make my own choices, Doctor. If it's risky getting closer to you, then, that's a risk I choose to take, and you've got no right to stop me — unless, you really don't want me, don't want to get closer with me."
"I think you already know the truth of that," he whispered, proud, but slightly embarrassed.
"You do want me, then," Rose gladly confirmed.
"So much, Rose, I can hardly think."
"Then have me, Doctor," Rose murmured. This time she wasn't trying to be sultry, but every muscle in her body was relaxing under his cool blue stare.
She reached up then, with her own hand, joining it to his. Their hands were long familiar by now. The long, elegant fingers, cool in hers, were strong, yet they trembled slightly. It was she, Rose Tyler, who was doing this to him. She couldn't help but feel triumphant.
She held her hand up to him and once again he kissed it reverently before starting to stroke farther up her arm.
His touch was so hungry yet so light and tentative that she hardly dared to breathe lest she frighten him away. His hand traveled up her arm, across her shoulder, and down along the buttons of her flannel top, between her breasts. She longed to arch up into his touch but she didn't dare. She had to let the Doctor set the pace, no matter how impatient she became.
His fingers trailed slowly down the center of her stomach. Would he? No, he'd said he was celibate. Yet he showed no signs of stopping.
The pyjama top gaped open a little at the bottom, below the last button. There, his fingers found the flesh of her belly. As his fingers lightly made contact, Rose felt an electric spark that made her jump. He snatched his hand away and his eyes flew up to hers.
"Did you feel that?" he asked, unnecessarily.
"Yeah," she admitted.
"The Tardis didn't mute it," he said.
"I don't think so," she said.
"Direct contact," he said. "Give me a bit." There was a long pause as his eyes drifted closed, his breathing evened, and his fingers hovered just slightly above her belly. The suspense was excruciating, but Rose kept silent.
His fingers neared, slowly, slowly, until finally they touched. Warmth pulsed into her like liquid fire, but muted this time.
"Ah," she sighed.
"That's better, isn't it," he said.
"It feels a little like when you hold my hand, that feeling of love that pours into me, safety, like nothing in the universe could touch me, cause you're there."
"You can feel all that?" he asked, wonderingly, as he lightly spiraled a pattern on her tum.
"Yeah, always have. Since that first day. What are you writing on my belly?" she asked with a smile.
He at least had the grace to blush, his ears burning red through his fair complexion. "My name," he said.
She knew it. Every man was the same, deep down. "Doctor?" she asked.
"No..." he admitted. "My old, secret name.... not the one the House of Lungbarrow gave and took away, but even older, the first one, the really secret one."
"Will you tell me some day?" she asked, wistfully.
"If this goes the way I plan, it'll be sooner rather than later," he said, eyes bright with hope.
As he traced the secret pattern onto her stomach, Rose felt blissfully claimed. "I wish it were now, right now," she said.
"Me too," he sighed. Slowly he leaned forward, and gently, his lips caressed the skin of her stomach. The fire his cool fingertips left in their wake was nothing compared to the icy kiss of his lips and tongue, which seemed to almost sear.
"Oh, oh, Doctor," she gasped, holding as still as she could. "It feels, it feels so good — but it burns!"
He pulled away at once with another deeper sigh. "This isn't working, Rose," he said. "The Tardis can't keep up as my barriers fall, as my aura tries to link into yours," he said.
"Please, Doctor," Rose begged. "Please don't stop now! Can't we, please, just try!"
"You promised not to torment me," the Doctor said. "I can at least return the favor."
He tugged gently at the tie of her pants. "Is this okay?" he asked.
"Oh, my god, yes!" Rose shouted. It was all she could do not to thrash on the bed with eagerness.
"Right, then," he said, and undid the ribbon and folded back the pants to reveal her sex.
She was already wet from anticipation. She saw him breathe in deliberately, and felt herself open even more as his eyes fluttered closed, as he enjoyed her heated aroma.
"It's even better up close," he said, savoring, "especially knowing it's me getting you hot like that."
"It is, Doctor — it has been for a long time," she said.
"No more of this David from on telly," he growled.
"Absolutely not," she swore, as his finger again began its slow but steady descent.
He seemed to be in two or three places at once, she thought. His face kept shifting from delight to detachment as his barriers fell and he fought to fit the Tardis in their place. The coolness of his touch was real, but the fire of what he called his aura rose and fell as he attempted to calibrate it.
"It's like you're at the console," she gasped, "like you're flying her."
"It is — a lot like— " he answered.
Finally his fingers lightly brushed over her sex.
"Oh! Oh, Doctor!" she cried. His touch did burn, but it was so good, so very good. "Please, please don't stop," she begged, shamelessly. She'd never wanted anything so much in her life, she thought.
He held himself still, his face a mask of concentration.
"I want you, Rose," he muttered. "I'm barely holding back, I want to plunge this hand deep inside you— the pulse of your energies just inside, calling to me, pulling me, singing your name so loudly I can hardly think of anything else!"
"Do it!" she urged.
"I can't!" he cried. "Breathe for me, Rose! Breathe!"
She took a deep breath and held it like she'd done before. The wait was longer this time as he struggled to find his equilibrium.
"Release," he sighed, and as she breathed out, he laid his fingers flat over her sex.
"Too much?" he gasped.
"No!" she cried. It was hot, like hot bath water, pins and needles into her flesh, but it was devilishly intense. "Oh, God, it's so good!" she screamed.
His hand was steady, but something inside her knew that he was nearing a breaking point.
"Just a little more, Doctor," she panted, "touch me just there, please!"
"Rose, Rose," he chanted. He seemed unable to move, and she held still, knowing how much was at stake for him. If this, this risky chance at lovemaking, went awry, who knew what he might do? His eyes were closed as he tried to calm himself, breathing, trembling all over. She longed to kiss him, pull him down, cradle him to her breasts, but she didn't dare. She just had to lie here, receptive, trying with all her might to be exactly what he needed.
Finally, his hand began to move, slowly, so very slowly, down to where she needed his touch. His hand was icy cold, betraying the incredible tension he was suffering, but his touch conveyed fire into her body, fire so hot it almost burned. Just one touch, right there.... she was so ready, she felt so hungry for him — if only she could take him inside where she needed him so badly... but this would be enough, one stroke of his beautiful, elegant fingers...
and then it happened. His long middle finger slotted into place. She was so ready, her hood had already pulled back, and his touch arced directly into her nervous system. Her back bowed off the bed into a convulsion she was powerless to resist. Images began to pour into her mind —
—the night sky of Gallifrey, the brilliant copper moon where the ancient sisters worshipped their eternal flame...
— the canyons outside the dome of the citadel, the red desert rocks, ancient and dry under a sherbet sky ...
— the mountains of the south... the red grass meadows, the singing of the tafelshrews, the melodies of the psychic trees recounting tales of all the lives they'd learned...
but beyond all that, she heard his name, the secret name, the name he'd won from Time itself... the expanse of it, the strength, the danger, the mad bravery of the Time Lord who'd fallen in love with a little ape...
and she heard her name, Rose, the design at the heart of the universe, pulsing in time with his, Guardian of Forever, Lonely Angel, warrior Doctor....
The symphony of their two names flooded through her brain in time with the pleasure of his simple touch to her sex, and her body seized wildly, blissing out.
Rose faded to white and knew no more.
===
go to part 2
author:
fannishlisspairing: Nine/Rose
Rating: nc17
genre: s1 and potw AU (complete!)
length: 12,000 words.
summary: The Doctor admits he's in love with Rose, but they're incompatible. Rose refuses to let that stop them! The Tardis helps. :)
=?=
"Doctor?" Rose asked, from the jump seat. She liked to sit and watch sometimes while he roamed around the console. It was soothing after a hard adventure, like the one they'd just had on Satellite Five, with the open-brain-headed people running things and messing up the destiny of the human race.
"Yes?" he answered, distractedly. He liked to tweak, and he was currently tweaking. Rose could feel the little shudders the Tardis made as she adjusted according to his minute rearrangements of her knobs, levers and dials.
"Why did you call Adam my boyfriend?" she said, looking down, and kicking her trainers against the rungs under the jumpseat. She knew she was being juvenile, but once in a while she had to air her grievances.
"Well, he was, wasn't he?" the Doctor muttered. He sounded perfectly casual, but she could see the nonchalant way his brow had lifted, the picture of perfectly unconcerned, which spelled out bothered in Time Lord.
"No," she said. "Look. You just stop accusing me of having him as a boyfriend, and we'll forget he was ever on board."
"Done," he said, but his brow had lowered, and that was even worse than bothered. That was annoyed.
"Doctor, why are you still annoyed?" Rose asked, a little more insistent than before.
"Oh, I don't know, Rose, maybe because you invited a stranger onto my Tardis because you were getting lonely?" The Doctor's tone was light, but it still stung. It got Rose's back up when the Doctor acted like this. Well, this time, she would call him out for it.
"I just thought you might want to show off," Rose answered, "be impressive? Weren't we in it together, taking him all the way into the future, giving him a little perspective?"
The Doctor lifted his head and she met his piercing stare. She had nothing to regret, no reason to back down. She looked back into the blue and congratulated herself on the staring contests she and Shireen used to play at.
He stared and stared at her. She calmed herself and breathed and stared back. She had nothing to hide. If she heated a little under his gaze, he was none the wiser. If she dreamed in her heart of hearts to be taken apart under that gaze, he'd never know, and no hearts would ever be broken.
Finally he huffed a sigh and turned away, back to the console. Rose gratefully blinked her watering eyes.
"You haven't answered me, Doctor," she heard herself say. Apparently she still hadn't learned to let well enough alone.
He didn't answer, just went back to making adjustments now so inconsequential that Rose couldn't feel the slightest tremor.
"Jealous much?" she murmured, but his head whipped around, blue eyes blazing. She'd gone too far.
Hand trailing knowingly along the controls he'd just finished calibrating, he came round the console as smooth as the Tardis humming through the Vortex. Rose didn't dare look away. He seated himself beside her and primly crossed one leg over the other, grasping his knee. Rose saw that his knuckles were white and the color had drained from his cheeks.
"I'm sorry, that was a stupid thing to say," she stammered.
"I'm not offended," he said lightly, looking up at the arched ceiling of the control room. His eyes traced the beams and maybe he could see lines of energy or the Arc of Time, Rose really had no idea.
"You seem offended," Rose stated, nervously. He was taking this way out of proportion, wasn't he?
"I don't fancy being misunderstood," he said, darting a look at her. Even a glancing blow from that brilliant eye made her shiver.
"I take it back," Rose said, wholeheartedly, full of contrition.
"You're missing the point, Rose," he said. "I'm not jealous of you. It's not fair to you, is it, healthy and young, nineteen years old and cooped up with a celibate? It isn't fair of me to expect that you wouldn't be attracted to such pretty young men, just because even a Dalek can tell across a viewscreen that I'm in love with you?"
Rose blinked. It was too much to take in at once. Celibate? Love? Which was it then? "I uh, I thought it, uh, just kind of got that from me."
"That I'm in love with you?" he asked.
Rose's heart lurched again, painfully, at the bitterness in the Doctor's tone.
"I mean, that's just a dream of mine, isn't it, that the Dalek thought because of me?" Rose offered, blushing. "I mean, yeah, it never even saw us together till the very end." She laughed a little, but the Doctor's face was quiet and dead serious.
"No," the Doctor stated, flatly, "it knew. Somehow, it knew. I'm in love with you, deeply, horribly, quite cursedly in love with you, and every time another man looks at you, I want to take you in my arms and prove to them who you belong to."
"Do it then," Rose breathed. Her pupils must've gone huge — it was like the whole room had gone dim and the Doctor shone with all the light of the Sun in its last dying glory.
"I want to," he said, and maybe he was just a little breathless.
"Don't wait for another man to look at me, Doctor," she said. "You look at me, now," and she reached a hand up to touch the side of his face, when he roughly pushed her hand away and sprang most of the way across the room.
"You mustn't do that," he said, panting now. He was so very beautiful in that instant, his almost feminine lips parted, his brilliant blue eyes wide open, his pale face flushed with color.
"Do what!" she exclaimed, shocked and a little frightened.
"Telepaths," he said, "touch telepaths — you can't just touch — especially when emotions are high!" he gasped.
"But Doctor," she said, "wouldn't that be wonderful? All the brilliant things you've seen, I could see! Everything I feel for you, you could feel," she whispered. She'd stood from the jumpseat and wanted to cross to him, but she could see that if she reached out, if she neared, he would flee.
"Rose, you silly, silly girl. Don't you realize yet what I am?" he said.
"Alien, yeah, I got that," Rose laughed, but he shook his head bitterly.
"Time Lord, Rose— last of the Time Lords. The universe winds and unwinds inside my head. No human being can look into that and survive!" he said, anguished now.
Suddenly Rose understood. "You mean... we're really not compatible. Really, really, not?" she whispered.
He shook his head again.
"That's why you're celibate?" she asked.
"Culturally, psychically, physiologically — we stopped mating millennia ago, reproduced artificially. Gallifreyans were too vulnerable to their mates— they had to lower every mental barrier to let their partner in. Nothing could be held back, or sex couldn't even happen."
"Couldn't? Haven't you ... ever?" Rose asked, embarrassed.
"I was married, in my first incarnation. I had a wife in the Backtime, before the artificial methods. She bore me a daughter..." The Doctor's eyes were ancient as he spoke.
"Don't you ..." Rose began, but the Doctor interrupted.
"It wasn't love, not the way I love you. She was my partner, mother of my offspring. Maybe it's easier without the love."
"Easier!" Rose said, aghast.
His blue eyes flew up, humor and pain mingled in his gaze. "I'm hungry for you, Rose — and it's a hunger that can't ever be satisfied."
Rose stared at him, and now his barriers had fallen, she could see that hunger, deep, clear, pure, and all-consuming. It was like looking down into a glacier-fed lake a mile deep.
"What," she asked, and cleared her throat. "What are we going to do about this?"
"What do you mean?" the Doctor frowned.
"Well, uh, you want me to leave?" she asked. "I mean if it hurts you so much for me to be around."
"No," he breathed. "It's too late for that. I can't live without you now."
"I thought you were going to live on for thousands of years," Rose said.
"Yeah... we used to be limited to twelve regenerations — twelve new bodies, fresh new lives — by the Council. Now they've gone, nothing's to stop me living forever."
Rose shuddered. She couldn't imagined the weariness of slogging on forever, no end in sight.
"You can't love me, but you don't want me to go," she said, frowning.
"I do love you," he said, eyes wide. "I think I did almost as soon as I met you. This life, this body, it's so raw. Everything's on the surface, and almost everything, it just hurts, all the time, till I think I'm gonna go mad. Except you. Even with the ache of wanting you, Rose — you make everything better."
"So what, then? What am I supposed to do?" Rose asked. She knew she could never leave him, not of her own accord.
"Nothing," he said. She looked at him like he'd gone barmy, but he shrugged. "Nothing to do. I'm a Time Lord, you're a human. Never the twain shall... you get the picture."
"You're giving up," she said. "Don't."
His eyes blazed at her again. "You're forgetting just how much I've lost. I'm not willing... I can't risk you on top of all of it. I won't."
"Don't I get a say?" Rose asked.
"I'm the Time Lord, I'm the danger, so I get the say. I don't even know why I told you all this," he moaned.
"Because you needed to," she insisted. "You drive yourself mad with all you put on your own shoulders. I can carry some of it, at least. And I tell you this much: you won't have to worry about seeing me with other men. I won't do that to you. And we're gonna figure this out. I won't let you rest until, until — until I make you the happiest man in the universe!"
Taken aback, the Doctor stared at Rose in surprise, then starting laughing delightedly. "Have a good opinion of yourself, do you?"
"Only what I've been told, by someone whose opinion I trust," Rose said modestly, stifling her grin.
Then she frowned once more. "Doctor," she asked, "can I still hold your hand?"
"Absolutely," he said, and whatever it was that ran through the link of their hands, it was real, and strong, and it couldn't be denied.
=====
Rose had no sooner promised that she wouldn't taunt the Doctor with other men, than Captain Jack Harkness literally plucked her out of the sky. He went on to flirt outrageously with Rose while simultaneously making knowing comments to the Doctor. Even Rose's impromptu dance with the Doctor had been interrupted, first by the Doctor's growing suspicions about the nanites and then by Jack teleporting them onto his ship.
Despite wanting not to annoy the Doctor, Rose found herself laughing and smiling when Jack was around. He was cheerful and funny and a great conversationalist, not to mention his disarmingly attentive gaze. He seemed like he was always sizing up what Rose would be like in bed.
Rose tried to be good. She wasn't seriously attracted to Jack — he was certainly pretty and charming, smooth in ways the Doctor wasn't — but at the same time, Rose wasn't in love with Jack. She'd already given her heart to the Time Lord.
Sadly, he didn't seem to realize it.
He grew quieter as Jack made himself at home in the Tardis. He was abrupt and even deliberately rude.
The last straw for Rose was in the galley. The Doctor didn't sleep much as far as Rose could tell, but he did need to eat, and she wandered in one morning to find him spreading some thick, delightful smelling jam on slices of toast. She was still in her jimjams— perfectly modest drawstring pants and a loose flannel top, pink, with little winged cats all over them.
The Doctor took one look at her and his lips tightened slightly, disapprovingly.
"Good morning, Doctor," Rose smiled brightly, pretending not to notice.
His eyes narrowed.
"Something the matter?" she said. How could he get her back up without even speaking? It was like they were bitter old miserably-marrieds already.
"Is any of that for me?" Jack said from the galley door, looking at the Doctor's plate, laden with toast. He then glanced over at Rose, smiling at her. "Rose," he said, his pleasant, perfectly modulated voice caressing her name.
The Doctor picked up his mound of toast and cup of tea and stalked out of the room without a single word.
"What slithered down his neck?" Jack wondered, busying himself at the breadboard, slicing more of the bread for toasting, while Rose prepared tea.
She was angry at the Doctor, embarrassed for him, guilty over nothing, and hollow, worn through, with wanting him. She just looked at Jack, her misery plain.
"Oh honey," he said, dropping the bread knife with a clatter and taking her into a hug. He just stood there, rocking her a little, and kissed her lightly on top of the head.
"What is it with you two?" he whispered. "You're nuts, that's all I can think."
"It's hopeless," Rose choked.
"It's never hopeless," Jack promised. He chucked her under the chin. "It's never hopeless. There's always a way. Sometimes, you gotta wait and it seems like forever. But if you dream hard enough you can make it happen."
"I thought you were a cynical old con man, only out for yourself," Rose sniffled.
"I am out for myself! God, the tension in this galley might curdle my breakfast! and this jam is famous across five star systems, so it shouldn't go to waste. And furthermore, no one dreams big like a con man — huh?"
"Too right," Rose sniffed.
"Go talk to him. The Tardis'll help you track him down." Rose could feel the little sense of some presence warm at the base of her neck. Jack felt it a little more strongly as a natural telepath, but once Rose had become aware of it, she nurtured her connection with the ship and concentrated on building it up.
The Tardis led her, unerringly, to the Doctor's private quarters. It wasn't that Rose hadn't seen his rooms — but she'd only seen them glancingly, in transit. She'd never gone there to seek him out, and certainly not to pull him out of one of his moods.
Gathering her courage, she knocked. "Doctor, may I come in?"
For a long moment there was no reply. Then finally she heard him gruffly reply, "Yeah, come in."
"Are you okay, Doctor?" Rose asked, easing the door open and stepping cautiously into the Doctor's room. It felt a little like breeching an inner sanctum, for all that it was decorated casually, rather plain for someone who called himself a Time Lord, and not at all alien. It reminded Rose of a mid-twentieth-century studio flat: bed, nightstand, bureau, two chairs, a tea table, and a standing desk and coatrack by the door.
He only snorted in reply. He was seated in one of the two easy chairs, the plate of toast on the tea table in front of him.
"Have I done something wrong?" Rose said.
He looked away, shaking his head ever so slightly, so she came closer, sitting down in the chair opposite, maybe nick a toast.
As he turned to look at her, his eyes suddenly blazed with intensity. His whole expression became fearsome as he leaned forward, breathing deeply.
"Rose—" he nearly hissed. "He's all over you! How could you come to me, here in my room, when you smell all over of him!"
"What?" Rose asked, shrinking back into the chair. "You can smell him?"
"Yes, I bloody well can!" he shouted.
"Well, how was I to know that!" Rose shouted back. "He hugged me, because he could see you were being an arse!"
"An arse!" the Doctor roared.
Rose just looked at him, eyebrows raised, lips pressed firmly together, letting him reflect on his own actions.
"Right! An arse!" He leapt to his feet, stomping to the far side of the room. Rose couldn't help admiring the lithe muscles of his back revealed by the form-fitting maroon jumper. It was so rare that she saw him without the coat.
"I'm sorry, Doctor," she said, trying to make it better. "I didn't know your sense of smell was that good."
The Doctor whirled, rounding on her. "You bathed last fourteen hours ago, after we got back from Cardiff. Used that mint foot rub Jackie gave you. Washed your hair with the lemon shampoo. Your toothpaste is spearmint," he spat. He strode nearer, his voice low and precise, eyes blazing. "You stroked yourself to climax last night before you fell asleep. I can smell your pleasure lingering on your fingers."
Rose felt pinned to the chair, a bolt of arousal sizzling through her at his words, the sheer intensity of his proximity.
"Is that why you were so cold to me this morning?" Rose asked. "Because you could tell--?"
He looked away again, the cords in his neck pulling.
"Could you tell what I was thinking?" she asked.
He swallowed, shaking his head as if to clear it — not a clear negative.
"That I was thinking of you?" she whispered.
"Ah, Rose, Rose," he groaned. He looked up and his eyes were crystalline blue, so wide, so helpless. "You've climaxed one hundred thirty-seven times on this ship, and I've felt the shock of it every time."
"The shock of it?" Rose whispered.
"Echoing through the Tardis, through the link you're building with her, you clever girl," he grinned mirthlessly, shaking an accusing finger in her direction.
She sat there, stunned, a little aghast.
"So yeah, I knew what you were thinking," he added. "Most of those times I could hear my name ringing through your pleasure. And by the way, who the hell is David Tennant?"
"First of all," Rose said hotly, "I'm a little upset you could hear my thoughts. You told me it was only the Tardis in my head. Second of all, he's a cute Scottish bloke on telly— safe enough for a fantasy, as long as no one's listening in!"
"i did warn you," the Doctor said haughtily.
"You did not!" Rose said.
"Did too!"
Rose just looked at him, mouth agape. "Really?" she said.
"I can't shut you out, Rose... this is what it's gonna be like, my mental barriers falling, one by one, till I'm bare before you, begging." He wiped at his face tiredly.
"And that's bad how?" Rose whispered, knocked back by the image of the Doctor helpless before her.
"I told you, Rose! Time Lord! Mind full of Vortex! You look in there, you're gonna burn, and there'd be nothing I could do to stop it!"
The Doctor's voice was threaded through with despair, almost an agony. Rose longed to comfort him. She had to figure this out.
"But wait. Can't the Tardis help?" she asked.
"How?" the Doctor said, weakly.
"She's full of Vortex too, and my link with her hasn't hurt me. If I'm linked up to her, and so are you, can't she be, like, a transmitter, but with a filter — just letting through as much as is safe?"
The Doctor stared. Rose waited.
He stared. She waited.
"Rose Marion Tyler, you are brilliant!" he shouted, a huge grin breaking out over his face. He grabbed her shoulders and kissed her right on the forehead. In the split second of that kiss, she could feel like a distant storm, the overwhelming joy flooding through him.
"But we've got to be sure. We've got to be safe. I can't let you get hurt, not for me, not for this." His desperation, his excitement, it was all mingled together on his face.
"Tell me, Doctor. What happens now?" she asked.
"Now, Rose," he said, "we see what the Tardis thinks of this naughty idea of yours. Oh, if they could see this, they'd have a fit — a type forty Tardis being used as a sex aid between a Gallifreyan and a human!"
"None of their business," Rose grumbled, not caring who he was talking about, but getting the idea it was his meddling, condescending people.
"Do you want some toast?" the Doctor said brightly. She'd never known anyone whose moods changed so rapidly. There was no way to know if it was because he was Gallifreyan or just that he was mad.
"Yes, thanks. I'm famished!" Just as Jack had said, the jam was incredible. The Doctor had come up with a transdimensional breadbox, so the bread was always perfectly fresh, but this jam was transcendent, dark purple in color, tangy with heady flavors of honey and citrus and a hint of spice.
Rose moaned in appreciation, licking the crumbs daintily from her fingers as she finished off the second piece of toast. "Doctor, that was heavenly!" she enthused.
"It certainly was," the Doctor responded, and then she saw that he was watching intently as she sucked on her finger. The hunger in his eyes had built again to a raging fire.
"Do you want some?" Rose said, picking up another piece and offering it to him.
He seized her wrist, and staring into her eyes, began to bite into the toast, until she was just holding a little piece of it between her fingers.
"It is good," he said, "but this is heavenly—" and then she felt his soft lips closed over her fingers. His tongue swept the toast away and he chewed it up and swallowed, somehow managing just to graze the sensitive skin of her fingers with his teeth. As he swallowed, he began to lave around her fingers, searching out the tiny traces of jam, and she blushingly realized, something more.
"Can you, can you taste—" she asked.
"Hint of soap, there, but yeah, of course I can, Rose. And you're just as delicious as you smell," he said.
"That's good," she said breathlessly, overwhelmed by his attentions, the feel of his tongue exploring her fingers.
"Can you feel me?" he said softly, taking her hand into his with a final kiss.
"Yeah! It feels wonderful!" she answered.
"No, Rose, I mean, in your head. Feel if the Tardis is shielding you," he explained.
The Tardis made herself known in Rose's mind as a collection of persuasive impulses. Warm, gentle, the Tardis would nudge Rose to take a certain action. Rarely, but more often as she worked at the connection, she would receive a full-sensory impression of where the Tardis wanted her to go (the dappled light, soft lapping, and humidity of the pool) or something she was meant to do (the feel of a lever, the satisfactory chunk of correctly adjusting it).
Right now, the Tardis in her mind felt warmer than usual, tense with the urgency of something with the potential to happen.
Then Rose heard, very faintly, the sound of music, like a distant set of tuned chimes shimmering the air.
"I hear music, Doctor — it's so beautiful! What is it?" She closed her eyes to focus on the celestial sound.
"That's Old High Gallifreyan, Rose — our old telepathic language. You're hearing my thoughts!" he said.
She opened her eyes to look at him. The emotional intensity of his face was startling — hope, terror, joy, all at once.
"It's gorgeous — like angels singing — but I can't understand," she said.
"Yeah you can. Listen again."
The sound seemed clearer as she focused again, a lovely ringing of chimes that seemed to float and expand, sweet harmonies and fruitful dissonances colliding.
"It's the design at the heart of things," Rose murmured as the language unfolded its meaning. "The expansive core of the universe, the birth of all things. Blimey, you think a lot of things at once!" she exclaimed. Then she gasped. "Oh. Oh, Doctor! Is it?"
"Yes — that's your name, Rose. Gallifreyan language is infinitely layered. What you're hearing isn't just the name of a flower, it's all that the idea of the flower implies."
"So I can hear you! The Tardis is linking us!" Rose exclaimed.
"Still doesn't do me any good if I have you and you don't survive it," he said, darkly.
"You could really, like, kill me with your brain?" Rose asked, flushing at the thought of the Doctor having her, but trying to pay attention.
"Rose, that was just one word I sent through to you. Imagine my thoughts going full tilt... not to mention the Vortex."
"Why do you have the Vortex running through your brain? Isn't that what the Tardis is for?"
"Gallifrey had a rift, so my people evolved to withstand anomalies in time and space. The very first Gallifreyan time travelers moved their entire ship through time and space using only the power of their linked minds."
"Amazing!" Rose said.
"Yeah— except it was a failure. They managed it, but not without crashing into me."
"You crashed into the first Gallifreyan time travelers!" Rose laughed, not exactly surprised.
"Always in the wrong place, wrong time, me," he smirked. "Turned my poor old girl inside out. Anyways, after they crashed, Rassilon went the technological route, growing ships with living intelligences. It's the link between a Gallifreyan and a Tardis that truly defines a Time Lord, the ability of the Time Lord to monitor and understand the Vortex as the Tardis moves through it."
"So the Vortex isn't in your head — it's the link to the Tardis that's in your head, and the Tardis is in the Vortex — so the Tardis is already protecting you from the Vortex," Rose said triumphantly, working it out.
"Fair enough," the Doctor conceded, smiling.
"So she should be able to do it then. If she can filter the Vortex for you, she ought to be able to filter you for me," Rose said.
"Maybe," the Doctor said cautiously.
"How do we test it?" she asked, softly.
"Touch telepaths, Rose," he said. "We just have to touch." He still had a hold of her hand, and he began stroking it more intently.
"I like the sound of that," she purred. "How much touching, do you think?"
"A good deal," he replied. "But we'll go slow," he added.
"Going slow means getting started," she said, trying for sultry. "This is just like trying to get you to dance."
"I'm a fantastic dancer!" he replied, indignantly.
"I agree!" Rose answered. "But it took you a while to warm up to it."
The Doctor sighed. "As much as I want you, I can't let go. I need to know you'll be safe."
"Okay, Doctor. I'm in your hands," she said, then gestured to the arm chairs they were sitting in. "Can't we get a little more comfy?"
Wordlessly the Doctor stood and led Rose by the hand to the bed. It was the one bright spot of color in the spare, coral room, with a heavy quilted coverlet made of what looked like silk, crimson and orange and embroidered in beautiful swirls. Rose fleetingly wondered if it were Gallifreyan in origin.
"It's beautiful," Rose said, admiring the quilt.
"You're beautiful," the Doctor said, staring at her intently.
"You mean, for a human," Rose said, ducking her head away.
"Nah," the Doctor said. "I was just being an arse, like you said. You are beautiful, Rose, one of the most beautiful beings I've ever had the pleasure of getting to know."
There was a smart riposte on the edge of her tongue, but she swallowed it back when she registered the sincerity in the Doctor's voice and in his unblinking blue gaze.
"Thank you," she said, as steadily as she was able.
"Aren't you going to return the compliment?" the Doctor teased, lightening the moment.
"Nothing I could say could measure up to you, Doctor," Rose returned.
"Too right," the Doctor smiled. His hand slowly rose to the side of her face, as if by its own accord. Because of his alien coolness, she couldn't detect any heat, but she could sense his hand hovering, as though it belonged to a ghost.
"If you want to touch me, go ahead," Rose challenged. "I want you to."
The Doctor shivered and blinked at her words. He pulled his hand away and Rose frowned, but then he said, "Lie back," which sounded much nicer.
"You early humans have had a few natural psychics," the Doctor said casually, going into what Rose thought of as lecture mode. His hands floated an inch or two above her body as he spoke, a strange sensation she seemed able to feel. "Even by the twenty-first century they'd done some amazing work on the human aura — the field of electrical impulses that extend beyond the body — so-called Kirlian photography for example, documenting the way the body's natural psychic field could extend to make contact with and learn about another body — be it animal, vegetable, or mineral."
"What if it's the size of a bread box?" Rose asked.
"Bigger on the inside?" the Doctor answered, "—it always is."
"Take a deep breath, Rose, and hold it," he ordered, and after a few seconds he said, "release." Rose felt the tension draining from her body as she breathed out. She imagined herself sinking down into the comfortably firm mattress of the Doctor's bed. She was lying on the Doctor's bed! The reality of her situation suddenly occurred to her and she felt her heart speed up its beat.
The Doctor's hand floated just above and to the left of her sternum. "So much life — so strong and young," he murmured. "So fucking beautiful," he said.
Rose was astonished — she'd never heard him curse before. She looked up and saw tears in his eyes.
"What's wrong?" she asked, concerned.
"I can't," he said, "I can't convince myself that it's okay, that it will be okay if I touch you. I want you safe, my Rose," he said, a tear breaking and rolling down his face.
"There's a song for that, you know," Rose said. "It's the heart afraid of breaking that never learns to dance...." she sang softly.
"I'm not afraid of dying, not on my own account," the Doctor said. Of course, somehow, he knew that song.
"I know," Rose said. "But you can't choose for me — you can't pick and choose amongst the risks you think it's okay for me to take."
"I won't let you run into the line of fire," the Doctor said.
Rose thought of the Dalek that had extrapolated her DNA. "I make my own choices, Doctor. If it's risky getting closer to you, then, that's a risk I choose to take, and you've got no right to stop me — unless, you really don't want me, don't want to get closer with me."
"I think you already know the truth of that," he whispered, proud, but slightly embarrassed.
"You do want me, then," Rose gladly confirmed.
"So much, Rose, I can hardly think."
"Then have me, Doctor," Rose murmured. This time she wasn't trying to be sultry, but every muscle in her body was relaxing under his cool blue stare.
She reached up then, with her own hand, joining it to his. Their hands were long familiar by now. The long, elegant fingers, cool in hers, were strong, yet they trembled slightly. It was she, Rose Tyler, who was doing this to him. She couldn't help but feel triumphant.
She held her hand up to him and once again he kissed it reverently before starting to stroke farther up her arm.
His touch was so hungry yet so light and tentative that she hardly dared to breathe lest she frighten him away. His hand traveled up her arm, across her shoulder, and down along the buttons of her flannel top, between her breasts. She longed to arch up into his touch but she didn't dare. She had to let the Doctor set the pace, no matter how impatient she became.
His fingers trailed slowly down the center of her stomach. Would he? No, he'd said he was celibate. Yet he showed no signs of stopping.
The pyjama top gaped open a little at the bottom, below the last button. There, his fingers found the flesh of her belly. As his fingers lightly made contact, Rose felt an electric spark that made her jump. He snatched his hand away and his eyes flew up to hers.
"Did you feel that?" he asked, unnecessarily.
"Yeah," she admitted.
"The Tardis didn't mute it," he said.
"I don't think so," she said.
"Direct contact," he said. "Give me a bit." There was a long pause as his eyes drifted closed, his breathing evened, and his fingers hovered just slightly above her belly. The suspense was excruciating, but Rose kept silent.
His fingers neared, slowly, slowly, until finally they touched. Warmth pulsed into her like liquid fire, but muted this time.
"Ah," she sighed.
"That's better, isn't it," he said.
"It feels a little like when you hold my hand, that feeling of love that pours into me, safety, like nothing in the universe could touch me, cause you're there."
"You can feel all that?" he asked, wonderingly, as he lightly spiraled a pattern on her tum.
"Yeah, always have. Since that first day. What are you writing on my belly?" she asked with a smile.
He at least had the grace to blush, his ears burning red through his fair complexion. "My name," he said.
She knew it. Every man was the same, deep down. "Doctor?" she asked.
"No..." he admitted. "My old, secret name.... not the one the House of Lungbarrow gave and took away, but even older, the first one, the really secret one."
"Will you tell me some day?" she asked, wistfully.
"If this goes the way I plan, it'll be sooner rather than later," he said, eyes bright with hope.
As he traced the secret pattern onto her stomach, Rose felt blissfully claimed. "I wish it were now, right now," she said.
"Me too," he sighed. Slowly he leaned forward, and gently, his lips caressed the skin of her stomach. The fire his cool fingertips left in their wake was nothing compared to the icy kiss of his lips and tongue, which seemed to almost sear.
"Oh, oh, Doctor," she gasped, holding as still as she could. "It feels, it feels so good — but it burns!"
He pulled away at once with another deeper sigh. "This isn't working, Rose," he said. "The Tardis can't keep up as my barriers fall, as my aura tries to link into yours," he said.
"Please, Doctor," Rose begged. "Please don't stop now! Can't we, please, just try!"
"You promised not to torment me," the Doctor said. "I can at least return the favor."
He tugged gently at the tie of her pants. "Is this okay?" he asked.
"Oh, my god, yes!" Rose shouted. It was all she could do not to thrash on the bed with eagerness.
"Right, then," he said, and undid the ribbon and folded back the pants to reveal her sex.
She was already wet from anticipation. She saw him breathe in deliberately, and felt herself open even more as his eyes fluttered closed, as he enjoyed her heated aroma.
"It's even better up close," he said, savoring, "especially knowing it's me getting you hot like that."
"It is, Doctor — it has been for a long time," she said.
"No more of this David from on telly," he growled.
"Absolutely not," she swore, as his finger again began its slow but steady descent.
He seemed to be in two or three places at once, she thought. His face kept shifting from delight to detachment as his barriers fell and he fought to fit the Tardis in their place. The coolness of his touch was real, but the fire of what he called his aura rose and fell as he attempted to calibrate it.
"It's like you're at the console," she gasped, "like you're flying her."
"It is — a lot like— " he answered.
Finally his fingers lightly brushed over her sex.
"Oh! Oh, Doctor!" she cried. His touch did burn, but it was so good, so very good. "Please, please don't stop," she begged, shamelessly. She'd never wanted anything so much in her life, she thought.
He held himself still, his face a mask of concentration.
"I want you, Rose," he muttered. "I'm barely holding back, I want to plunge this hand deep inside you— the pulse of your energies just inside, calling to me, pulling me, singing your name so loudly I can hardly think of anything else!"
"Do it!" she urged.
"I can't!" he cried. "Breathe for me, Rose! Breathe!"
She took a deep breath and held it like she'd done before. The wait was longer this time as he struggled to find his equilibrium.
"Release," he sighed, and as she breathed out, he laid his fingers flat over her sex.
"Too much?" he gasped.
"No!" she cried. It was hot, like hot bath water, pins and needles into her flesh, but it was devilishly intense. "Oh, God, it's so good!" she screamed.
His hand was steady, but something inside her knew that he was nearing a breaking point.
"Just a little more, Doctor," she panted, "touch me just there, please!"
"Rose, Rose," he chanted. He seemed unable to move, and she held still, knowing how much was at stake for him. If this, this risky chance at lovemaking, went awry, who knew what he might do? His eyes were closed as he tried to calm himself, breathing, trembling all over. She longed to kiss him, pull him down, cradle him to her breasts, but she didn't dare. She just had to lie here, receptive, trying with all her might to be exactly what he needed.
Finally, his hand began to move, slowly, so very slowly, down to where she needed his touch. His hand was icy cold, betraying the incredible tension he was suffering, but his touch conveyed fire into her body, fire so hot it almost burned. Just one touch, right there.... she was so ready, she felt so hungry for him — if only she could take him inside where she needed him so badly... but this would be enough, one stroke of his beautiful, elegant fingers...
and then it happened. His long middle finger slotted into place. She was so ready, her hood had already pulled back, and his touch arced directly into her nervous system. Her back bowed off the bed into a convulsion she was powerless to resist. Images began to pour into her mind —
—the night sky of Gallifrey, the brilliant copper moon where the ancient sisters worshipped their eternal flame...
— the canyons outside the dome of the citadel, the red desert rocks, ancient and dry under a sherbet sky ...
— the mountains of the south... the red grass meadows, the singing of the tafelshrews, the melodies of the psychic trees recounting tales of all the lives they'd learned...
but beyond all that, she heard his name, the secret name, the name he'd won from Time itself... the expanse of it, the strength, the danger, the mad bravery of the Time Lord who'd fallen in love with a little ape...
and she heard her name, Rose, the design at the heart of the universe, pulsing in time with his, Guardian of Forever, Lonely Angel, warrior Doctor....
The symphony of their two names flooded through her brain in time with the pleasure of his simple touch to her sex, and her body seized wildly, blissing out.
Rose faded to white and knew no more.
===
go to part 2
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-09-10 01:28 am (UTC)You capture essence of Nine's feelings for Rose here:
and Rose's for Nine here:
Okay, deep breath. I am off to read part 2...
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Date: 2011-09-10 01:28 pm (UTC)It was a long haul working on this story, wrestling with all the difficulties... so I'm glad you're enjoying it!
no subject
Date: 2011-09-10 05:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-10 01:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-10 05:24 pm (UTC)I have used that as science in several stories. Since I'm a pantheist of sorts, I might have used it (years ago) to explain the relationship of a sentient planet and the people and creatures. It was exciting seeing it in a DW story. ( Jumping up and down exciting. Weirdo nerd (geek?) here. And proud of it.)
Kolaimni sounds fascinating. Is etheric from ether?
no subject
Date: 2011-09-10 07:48 pm (UTC)I wonder if you have ever heard about the experiments with philodendrons reacting to things happening around them? it is another weird and wonderful study that has to do with living auras. :P http://www.theastralworld.com/psychic-powers/are-plants-psychic.php
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Date: 2011-09-10 11:27 pm (UTC)I have to finish two stories, including one I promised bloose a long time ago, and I am so far behind in reading all the lj writers I try to follow (and all the Nine writing), I have to do something. But THEN... I must read up on what you have given me.
no subject
Date: 2011-09-19 06:28 pm (UTC)