Hello everyone! Sorry I haven't posted anything for so long but my mum found my fanfic collection and wasn't too pleased with some of the more explicit fluff, shall we say. Still, I'm back now :D

The sequel to Leave You Behind and Take You With Me is in the balance cos I dunno whether to post it or not. So I started this instead. Allow me to express a heartfelt thank you to anyone who read and/or reviewed those two stories - it means a lot to me.

Here is something unconnected - Nine/Rose, because I like Nine, and I haven't written him yet... It's not boring! Honest... at least, I hope it isn't...

MELTING

Having set the co-ordinates for Madrid – a planet towards the outer reaches of the solar system - the Doctor was under the Tardis, tinkering with the on-board fire alarm, a cup of steaming hot tea perched on a small shelf directly above his head. Humming softly to himself, he heard a thump from above him and a yell from Rose.

"Doctor! You PROMISED not to leave the Gallifreyan spanners lying around on the floor! When I get my hands on you…"

He winced. Gallifreyan spanners didn't take very kindly to someone other than their owner touching them, even by accident. They exploded if that happened, in fact. Rather alarmingly. And Rose probably didn't appreciate being thrown to the other side of the control room…

In his rush to get out of his alcove help her and avoid getting slapped, in that order, his head knocked upwards and hit the shelf above him. Rubbing his head, he didn't even notice his cup of tea slide noiselessly to the edge of the shelf and plummet downwards. The porcelain cup shattered and scalding hot tea spilt all over the temperature regulator at the core of the Tardis. The Doctor swore violently. Here was trouble.

Without a regulator, the temperature inside the Tardis quickly plummeted. The engines failed, leaving them stuck in deep space, which was almost infinitely cold. And Rose was on board! Within minutes the temperature was approaching -40, something he knew humans couldn't cope with.

He was right – as he scrambled out into the control room Rose had already turned blue and was unconscious, her primitive human homeostasis shutting down. He picked her up in alarm, as she fell soundlessly into a cold-induced sleep, and ran to the Tardis engine room, which he knew the Tardis would try to keep as warm as possible. He laid Rose down right on top of the cooling engines, and paced the engine room in agitation. The Tardis' auto-repair systems would fix the problem eventually… but it would take time. And until then, he had to keep Rose as warm as possible. And hope she pulled through.

Rose lay there for several minutes as he watched her with bated breath, on a knife-edge between consciousness and a fatal coma that spelt death. He was incredibly worried about her. Seeing her like this hurt so much it scared him. He thought of what would happen if she didn't recover – and blinked back uncharacteristic tears. Why was he going soft all of a sudden?

He'd promised her mother he'd keep her from danger – but she wasn't even safe in his own ship. She could have died – she could still die if her systems didn't recover from the temperature loss. He was a danger to her. And he should've dropped her back on Earth ages ago. He knew that. He kept telling himself that.

But he just couldn't bring himself to do it, damn it! He kicked the Tardis in his frustration and cursed at the pain. He looked at Rose, saw her skin tone was slowly beginning to return, and beamed in relief. She'd made it! But the pain still racked him of what could have been. Seeing her like this brought back all the old memories of the Time War, the ones Rose herself had made him forget.

Rose made him feel an emotion in abundance that Time Lords weren't supposed to feel. She was so sweet, so vulnerable that he couldn't help but feel possessive of her, paternal even. In loco parentis, he thought wryly. And he was so grateful to her for making him forget his memories. Without her, he would have to face his mind's own torture. Rose would stop that happening again...

The temperature in the Tardis dropped further. The Doctor saw that the warmth of the engines wouldn't be enough and with a shuddering sigh he upped his metabolism and raised his body temperature. In seconds his skin was reddened slightly and glowing. He enveloped the still unconscious Rose in his arms, pressing a kiss to her lips quickly before he could stop himself. Oh, he was so glad she was alright! The effort it took to heat his body soon left him weak and within seconds he had blacked out too.

Rose woke up several hours later, totally unaware of her narrow escape. She winced at the stiffness and burning sensation in her fingers and toes. What had happened? She was lying under a leather jacket… the Doctor's leather jacket, she realized. He was still asleep, curled up on top of her, and they were lying on the Tardis' engines! What on earth was going on?

She wriggled out from under the Doctor with difficulty and stretched before watching him as he slept. It occurred to her that she had never actually seen him asleep… it made him strangely vulnerable. Human in a way she hadn't seen him before.

As she watched, the Doctor suddenely began to cry out, arms flailing in mid-air. Rose froze and watched in alarm as his gestures began to get more violent, more frantic.

"NO! You… you can't! Please… please… "

Sobbing in terror, he reached out with both hands and tore at the air in front of him, fingers scrabbling over empty space for something only he could see.

Rose gasped in understanding. The Doctor was having a nightmare! It all made sense… the Time War had come back to haunt him again. It was his dragon. His monster under the bed…

"Don't take her away from me! Not Rose!"

She stared. Okay, so she was in his nightmare.

"Don't you dare hurt her! I…" He muttered something incomprehensible.

He screamed suddenly, shrank backwards slightly in his sleep. Rose watched him slowly. She didn't know what to do, was frightened almost to tears. In that moment, the Doctor was only a little boy, lost and alone again, watching the same suffering over again behind closed eyes, Gallifreyan Holocaust on a loop cycle.

The Doctor had suffered enough.

And on a sudden impulse, Rose bent over him, her lips moving down, down... so close she could hear his scared and ragged breathing. Her lips had almost touched the Doctor's when...

His eyes snapped open suddenly. Rose lifted her head as quick as lightening and backed away slighly, staring at him cautiously. He looked at her, in a daze, unsure whether he was still dreaming. There was one expression in his eyes at that moment and it was desperate, all-consuming need, so acute that it stunned her.

"Rose…"

With that, he hugged her hard, his layers of self-confidence completely peeled away. His mask was gone, and his vulnerability showed, his real fear and terror - something he never showed to anyone. She could see everything. And right then, he was too scared to care.

My faithful friend the chainsaw has returned... review review review! chainsaw growls menacingly