Title: The Wolf Within
Author: Sparks
Rating: K
Notes: Set immediately post 'Tooth and Claw' and some small spoilers for 'School Reunion'.

"Doctor," Rose said, once they'd stopped laughing about the royal family, "there's something…something the werewolf said to me, before he became…"

"A wolf?" the Doctor suggested cheerily, pulling a lever and preparing the TARDIS for flight. "Not just the usual threatening to take over the world, then?"

"Well, that too," Rose said with a faint smile. Then her smile faded, and she hugged herself. "It said…it said that I was like a wolf. Or…" She tried to remember the actual words. "It said I had something of the wolf in me, only I burned like the sun and he only needed the moon."

The Doctor stilled, then very deliberately put his hands into his pockets and turned to face her. "Oh, did he say that?" he asked lightly. "Well, I wouldn't pay any attention to that. You know evil aliens trying to take over the Earth."

Rose rolled her eyes. "Doctor, c'mon. I'm not an idiot, I can tell when you're trying to pretend you don't know what's going on." She glanced down briefly, then met his eyes again. "It's about Bad Wolf, isn't it?"

He sighed and seemed to come to a decision. "Yes," he answered her. "I never told you what happened on the Games Station, did I?"

She shook her head and moved closer to him. "No, you said it wasn't important." She made a face. "Whatever happened made you regenerate, and you say it's not important. Yeah, right."

"It wasn't important then," the Doctor protested. "It probably isn't important now. Where shall we go next?"

"Doctor!" Rose said, exasperated. "What is Bad Wolf? Or who is Bad Wolf? It was everywhere, following us around like I said, wasn't it? You said it wasn't, but…"

"I hoped it wasn't," the Doctor said, and flopped down in the chair. "What do you remember about coming back to the Games Station?"

"Not much," Rose shrugged. She nudged at him with a knee, then squashed into the chair next to him and leaned against him. He shifted, putting his arm around her and pulling her closer. "Mickey and Mum helped me open the TARDIS, and then it's pretty much a blank until I woke up and you went and lit up like a candle." She sighed. "There was…this light. Really bright."

"That was the heart of the TARDIS," the Doctor said evenly. "You opened it and looked into it and took the time vortex into you." He tried to look down at her, but her head was resting against his collarbone, making it difficult. "Ten out of ten for style, but it was a bit stupid of you."

"So I got the TARDIS to bring me back to you, obviously," Rose murmured. "Then what happened? To all the Daleks? Did you finish that delta wave thing?"

"No, not even close," he said with a short laugh. "I didn't have time to sort it so that it would just destroy the Daleks – I would have wiped out life on Earth, as well."

"But you didn't," Rose said with certainty. "So what did you do?"

"It's what you did, actually," the Doctor said. He shifted his arm slightly so he could stroke Rose's hair. "With the vortex in you, you were…pretty much all-powerful. You could do anything. Be anything. And as it turned out, the thing you wanted to be was Bad Wolf."

"What?" Rose pulled away and looked at him, mouth open. "How could I be? I mean, Bad Wolf was everywhere we went, how could I have done that?"

"Time doesn't run in a straight line," he reminded her patiently. "You sent the words 'bad wolf' everywhere we'd been, so they were already there when we went. Pretty clever, actually. A message to yourself, you said."

"A message…for what?"

He took her hand, lacing their fingers together and bringing her hand close to him. "When you had the vortex in you, you destroyed the Daleks," he said simply. Rose stared at him, eyes wide. "You did!"

"But…but that's impossible," Rose said flatly. "I couldn't have."

"You did." He looked away now, his cheeks colouring slightly. "You, uh, said that you wanted me safe."

Rose frowned faintly, almost remembering something – the way she'd almost remembered something so many times since that day on the Games Station. "My Doctor," she murmured. The Doctor looked sharply at her, but a moment later she gave a shrug. "So that's what that alien…wolf…thing sensed, was it? That I'd had the time vortex in me?"

"Yes," the Doctor said, too quickly to be telling the truth. "Must have been. Some people are sensitive to that sort of thing, you know, they can tell if you've got any sort of temporal energy in you. But it's nothing important, don't worry about it."

"Right." Rose leaned against him again. "And what about Queen Victoria? I mean, her banning us. How can we be banned from England?"

"Oh, they'll forget about it within a couple of decades," the Doctor dismissed. "I helped them out a lot in the twentieth century, that's not going to change." He frowned. "Won't have changed. Will not be changed. Won't have might never change."

"Doctor!" Rose protested, half-laughing. "C'mon, where're we going now?"

"No idea," the Doctor said airily. "Although we never did get to Sheffield. Really good music. What do you say, shall we try again?"

Rose opened her mouth to answer, but then her phone rang. She fished it out of her pocket and barely glanced at the screen before answering. The Doctor rolled his eyes.

"Mickey! You'll never guess who we've just met!"

He stood up and went to the console, checking a couple of readings.

"A school?" Rose was saying. "Are you sure?" A pause. The Doctor glanced over his shoulder at her, eyebrows raised. She shook her head at him. "Right. I'll get him to bring us back there. See you soon, yeah?" She smiled faintly. "Love you too. Bye."

She put her phone back into her pocket and stood up. "There's something fishy going on at a school near the estate," she said. "Mickey thinks we should take a look."

"What, there's fish swimming around?" the Doctor teased. "Must be serious." He twisted a dial. "Powell estate, here we come."

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