It's the first time in weeks that they've landed somewhere where some sort of trouble, usually of the deadly persuasion, hasn't almost immediately jumped out at them.

Rose looks around and thinks it's only a matter of time. There's no way that this place can be as perfect as it seems. In her experience since beginning her travels with the Doctor, it's the truly beautiful things that are usually the most deadly. She doubts that this place is any exception.

The span of green grass peppered with daisies only seems to end where it meets the mountains. The sun is out, even though in the distance there are some dark clouds and a spray of rain. There's even a rainbow. An honest to god well-defined arching rainbow, like she'd always drawn as a child. It's right there, seemingly almost within touching distance.

It's all a bit ridiculously idyllic. She can't quite buy it. Knowing their luck, she's just waiting for something to spring out and try to eat her.

Her eyes seek out the Doctor's in question, and he merely shrugs.

"I set the TARDIS to 'random'," he said. Usually that's clearly just his excuse when they end up somewhere he clearly didn't intend to send them, but Rose senses that this time it's nothing but the truth. He didn't bring them here. The TARDIS did.

Perhaps the ship is trying to give them a break. God knows that Rose needs it. She hasn't stopped running since Krop Tor. She does love this hectic life, sprinting from danger to danger with the Doctor at her side and her hand clasped tightly in his. Sometimes, though, she just wants a moment to be still. The only time she's been able to stop lately has been to sleep, and she doesn't actually remember that time well enough to actually enjoy it.

This, though, is just about perfection. The TARDIS gets in her head, Rose remembers, so maybe the ship has seen an image of what she thinks of as a perfect day stashed away in some optimistic corner of Rose's mind and has sought to give her that.

Rose still thinks that a sixty-foot tall lizard will probably jump out from behind the mountains to chase after them at any moment, just to ruin this. Rose wouldn't doubt it at all. But for now, she and the Doctor have been given this chance to just be together, and to breathe. Rose can't see any reason not to grab onto the opportunity with both hands, and maybe even also with a leg or two.

It's the Doctor who suggests a picnic. Rose gestures around pointedly, noting aloud that there's not exactly a market nearby where they can grab some food and a rug.

"Oh, Rose," the Doctor admonishes. "You know me better than that by now."

A picnic blanket, perfectly sized for two, is produced from his jacket pocket and flicked out with gusto, floating down to rest over the grass with barely a crinkle in it.

"How did you ..."

The Doctor raises an eyebrow at her. "Didn't I ever mention? My pockets are bigger on the inside."

Well. In retrospect, she can't believe she never picked up on that. It certainly explains a lot.

He proceeds to show her just how much bigger they are inside. Soft drinks, biscuits, crisps, other familiar nibbles, as well as a number of things that are clearly not from Earth and for which she has no name, are each produced in turn and scattered haphazardly across the blanket. Rose watches with her mouth gaping as the Doctor pulls a beach umbrella that is as long as he is tall from one of his pockets. It looks like just about the most impressive magic trick she's ever seen. He should start a show or something, she thinks with awe. Kids would love it.

All right. She'll admit it, if only silently. She's definitely impressed.

She's not sure why these strange things that he does still surprise her. She learned ages ago that the Doctor is insane. Insane in a good way, of course, but still. Just last week she caught him trying to blend a hairdryer and a microwave into some kind of essential equipment for the TARDIS console. There's no way that any man who'd try something like that isn't at least somewhat around the bend.

And he calls her Mum a nut. What a laugh.

He opens the umbrella and drives the bottom of it into the ground far enough that it stays upright. It provides them with a bit of shade, and perhaps it will even give them some weather cover if those clouds lurking in the distance decide to relocate to directly on top of them.

Then, with a grin, he plonks himself down on the blanket and starts digging into the food. Rose can already see an intense sugar rush looming in his future, which is really the last thing he needs. He's already as hyperactive as anyone in the whole universe could possibly handle, surely. She can't bring herself to point that out, though. He looks so happy, and she knows just how he feels. She doesn't want to do anything to take that away from either of them.

He lays back, a biscuit in one hand and some form of sweet in the other, and looks up at the one cloud in the sky that's fluffy and white rather than grey and foreboding. Rose follows suit, her head coming to rest mere inches from his. If she turns her face towards him now her forehead will end up resting against his temple. With the slightest tilt of her head, then, her lips will brush his cheek, or even his own lips if he turns his head as well to meet her.

She's tempted, but she knows that he'll retreat from her if she tries that. She doesn't want this to end just because she can't control herself.

She can remember the last time she'd been this unabashedly happy without it being immediately and unexpectedly interrupted. That had involved lying back and looking up at the sky as well.

Rose remembers New Earth so well, even though half of that trip had been spent with her being compressed into a small corner of her own mind. When they'd arrived, he'd spread his jacket out for the two of them to lie on. Her nose had been tickled by the scent of apple grass mingling with the barest traces of the Doctor's own personal scent that were wafting up from the jacket. She remembers how it was not quite the smell of leather and oil that she'd come to associate with him, but it had still somehow ineffably belonged to the Doctor. Even if she'd still doubted that they were the same man at that point, that would likely have convinced her.

Now that she's spent almost as long with this new version of him as she did with the last one, she can barely believe that she'd doubted him. He's absolutely the same man. If he's changed at all in any of the essential ways, it's only for the better. He seems a bit more carefree, most of the time. She can't regret that.

She also can't be sorry for the way the looks he sends her are a little more obvious than they ever were before. The hugs linger just a little bit more now, and somehow the way their hands grasp at each other seems just a tad more intimate. She couldn't explain the differences to anyone if asked, really, because they're so slight that a casual observer wouldn't be able to tell. She knows those tiny alterations are not just in her head, though. The differences in how he treats her now are slight, but they're very real.

Apparently, he's just different enough to be the type to not only suggest they have a picnic, but to have pre-prepared one for just such a purpose. It's odd trying to imagine the him that had close-cropped hair and big ears doing that. It isn't domestic, exactly, so much as it's a little bit too ... planned. Back then, he'd been all about living for now and only now. He'd had to be that way, Rose thinks. The Doctor has so much to move on from, and it was still far too fresh then.

The Doctor beams at nothing in particular, still looking up at the sky. He tells her a story that she doesn't quite understand but laughs along with anyway.

She loves that smile. She'd loved him before the regeneration, of course, but now ...

As long as she has a choice, she wouldn't have him any other way.

She hopes the day never comes again where that choice is taken out of her hands.

When he's done gorging himself on sugar, and when the rush of it all does indeed seem to be starting to set in, the Doctor gathers up the remnants of their dalliance off in this quiet little place and shoves them back into his jacket pockets.

"For next time," he says.

She loves the idea that there will be more days like this one in their future.

As he leads her back through the TARDIS door, bounding with energy, Rose reflects that nothing bad appeared out of the blue to threaten their good time after all.

Rose places a hand on one of the TARDIS' coral struts and strokes the warm surface of it.

"Thank you," she says.

She resolves never to mention that moment to Sarah Jane Smith when she sees her again. She's clearly gone just as insane as the Doctor.

At least that means they're a good match, she supposes.

~FIN~