I wrote this fic months ago after watching repeats of TIP and TSP, however I never got around to posting it and then being me managed to forget about it. This is a what if story. What if the events with the beast had gone differently? What if the Doctor and Rose hadn't got the TARDIS back?

TSP never happened and the gaps between now and TIP will be filled in as the fic proceeds. I will post a new chapter every three days (as long as I can get online), giving people time to review...hint hint ;)

Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who, I sold it on ebay for lots and lots of money and with all that money I bought every piece of Doctor Who merchandise under the sun and then I sold all of it on ebay for $1.50

Descending to Domestic

She could hear the water dripping from the roof of the tunnel and trickling down the walls and the scrape and crunch of her boots on the ground. They sounded too loud, but in the dark you had to hold on to sounds, hold on to them to stop yourself hearing what was behind them, where it was like the darkness was listening.

It was dark, so dark. If you looked at darkness too long you started seeing things in it, patterns, shapes, faces...

"It's just a dream, wake up"

The voice was almost mocking. You know this isn't real, that was what it was telling her. You know this isn't real and you can stop it.

"But I can't." Her voice echoed, reverberating of the walls of the tunnel.

"Yes you can, just wake up."

"I want to keep going, I want to see what is at the end."

"You don't have to." That was true, she didn't have to.

She wanted to. Too many times, she had experienced this same dream and too many times she hadn't been able to follow it through. Hadn't been able to walk the whole length of the tunnel.

"Wake or truly die, Rose Tyler!"

The voice was horrible. The voice of a nightmare creature. Full of malice, hate and oh so familiar to Rose. Suddenly a burning pain shot through her chest. Rose felt as though she were on fire. Hot tears pricking painfully at the corners of her eyes, she admitted defeat. Rose bowed her head closed her eyes. She felt her muscles become weak and she slumped to the ground.

Now came the part in the dream that she hated most. Even more than the voice and the burning pain. Punishment, she thought, for being to weak to finish.

She stopped feeling the hard rock pressing into her side, the drip, drip, drip of the water came to an abrupt stop. She was floating a few feet off the ground, except she wasn't. It was more her conscience, her mind, she tried but couldn't move her arms because she had none and all of her senses were dead apart from sight, and what a morbid sight it was.

Her body still lay on the ground, dressed in an orange space suit, minus the helmet. Before her the suit started to melt away. Then the clothing, jeans and a T-Shirt, also melted. She could just see the colours, pooled around her body, in the dark. Rose tried to prepare herself for this next part. Yet it came to quickly, she wanted it to stop, she wanted to cry, to shout for help, but she couldn't, it was too late.

This is the only way I can wake up.

Her hair turned grey and dry, skin and flesh rotted before her eyes, shrinking back until the white bone showed through. Wide, staring, dead eyes, bulged and rolled out of her sockets, landing with a sickly plop into the soupy mess that had once been clothes and flesh. Her bones became brittle and cracked. Soon they were so dry that they turned to dust. A sickly garnish on the dead soup. That too disappeared, evaporated into the air. Then there was nothing. Not a single hint that a person had once lain there.

Rose woke with a cry, sweat drenching her body and heart racing. She began to sob uncontrollably, always an after effect of the dream. She felt like such a baby for crying so much, but she couldn't help it, the dream terrified her.

Before she met the Doctor she wouldn't have thought the dream meant she was going insane, which in itself would have been a worry, but now, Rose Tyler knew a reoccurring dream like this one, she had been having it for a week and a half now, had to mean something, something important.

But what?

Within a few moments of waking up, her bedroom door was flung open to reveal a decidedly worried looking Doctor, illuminated by the light from the hall. Clothes crumpled and hair looking as though it hadn't been combed for a week he looked over at Rose, she sat up, hugging her pillow for comfort.

Rose felt slightly guilty, the poor Doctor, she thought as he walked over to her, sat on the edge of the bed and gathered her into his arms. He had been working none stop, fiddling with files and documents, making Rose Tyler and Doctor John Smith official residents of 32nd century Earth.

"The dream again?" He asked, stroking her back.

Rose sniffed and nodded, willing herself to stop crying. The Doctor's here now, your fine, nothing can hurt you.

"Was it exactly the same?"

"I..I nearly...nearly..got further."

"Okay." He didn't say anything else, just pressed a kiss to her forehead.

Rose knew his mind would be working a million miles an hour, trying to piece together what was happening, what it all meant. She hoped he would figure it out soon. Either that or she finished the dream and figured it out for herself. What a coward she though angrily to herself.

"I need to mail a file to the Torchwood database, this is the last one and we're all set. We can both get a job tomorrow, just think of that, me with a job! Anyway, will you be okay for a minute while I do that?"

"Yeah, course I will," she lied.

"I'll be right back."

With that he stood up and left the room, thankfully leaving the door open. Rose lay back down on her bed, fresh tears poured silently down her face. Not because of the dream, but because the Doctor was right. They would have to get a job, completely settle down. To tell the truth she didn't mind the idea of doing domestic with the Doctor, it was just, she could never go back. Never see her mum again. She could phone her of course, and she would, every day. But that wasn't the point. They had lost the TARDIS, no more adventures, no more time travel. They were trapped.

The Doctor sat on the sofa in the living area, typing furiously at the laptop, he was almost there. He had hacked into the Torchwood database and now all he needed to do was enter the coding for the document and delete a few interesting files that had existed since before the 21st century. He had already dealt with the goverment and UN files, but as Zach had said, Torchwood were separate from the government, outside the police and beyond the United Nations, so he had wanted to make sure they had a record of his and Rose's fake identifications.

There was also the fact that Torchwood, if he remembered right, was set up by Queen Victoria, almost in retaliation to his being in Torchwood house decades ago, or months, depending on whose timeline you wanted to follow. That had been one hell of a ride, a werewolf, a real live werewolf, not his first encounter with one, but still one heck of an experience. Fun too, he and Rose had had a good laugh.

His mind kept wandering back to Rose, he glanced at open doorway to her room, he hoped she was okay. These dreams really were an enigma.

Nearly two weeks ago they had landed on Earth and Zach had helped them to acquire this flat. Everything was going alright, despite their new situation when all of a sudden Rose had woken up screaming bloody murder during the night. He had run to her from his place by the laptop and he had sat with her for an entire hour while she cried into his coat. When she had calmed down she had told him about the dream. The horrible dream with the nightmare voice.

Sighing, he shook his head, I need to concentrate on the task at hand he told himself sternly. Fingers resuming the rhythmic tapping, the last of the code was entered. Finished. The Doctor closed down the laptop and stretched, he could smell cookies, they had cookies in the cupboard. He could do with a cookie.

Reveiws make me smile, constructive criticism is welcome but please no flames :)

Chibi Nightmare