The Doctor had the TARDIS door open as soon as she landed, but he took a moment to scan their surroundings before he stepped outside. Davros' taunts still echoed in his mind, enough to urge caution where he might usually have raced headlong into danger.
The dark street was silent, however. Empty cars told the story of terrified humans fleeing from the Dalek invasion, but there were no Daleks here.
He left the TARDIS, peripherally aware that Donna was right behind him.
"Like a ghost town," she murmured.
"Sarah Jane said they were taking the people. What for?"
The Doctor raked a hand through his hair. The last time Daleks had taken humans hostage instead of killing them outright, they'd created a race of human-Dalek hybrids. But the theft of twenty-seven planets suggested there was even more at stake this time.
He wheeled around and peered down at Donna. "Think, Donna. When you met Rose in that parallel world, what did she say?"
"Just…" Donna squinted slightly, like she was trying to bring hazy memories into focus. "The darkness is coming," she concluded.
The vagueness of that comment was driving the Doctor spare. "Anything else?" he pressed, hoping for something more tangible, more… well, more helpful.
He expected Donna to snap at him, to push back against his frustration. To his surprise, a smile softened her face instead. "Why don't you ask her yourself?"
The words didn't make any sense to the Doctor, until he realised Donna wasn't looking at him anymore. Instead, her gaze was focused on something behind him.
His hearts stopped for a moment. Even after Donna had seen Rose, the Doctor hadn't dared to hope he would be so lucky. And when she hadn't appeared on the subwave network, he'd taken that as a sign that he was right. He'd told Rose she couldn't ever see him again, and apparently, the universe had decided that for once, it wouldn't prove him wrong.
But maybe…
The Doctor turned slowly, steeling himself for the inevitable disappointment when there was no Rose Tyler standing behind him.
All the air whooshed out of his body when he saw someone walking towards them from the other end of the street. She was still too far away to really make out her features in the dark, but the way she walked, the way she carried herself—he would have recognised Rose Tyler anywhere.
She stood still in the middle of the street, as if she couldn't believe this was actually happening any more than he could. Seeing her shock spurred him into motion, and the Doctor started moving with only one question on his mind: Rose was over there, so what was he doing over here?
Rose held her breath when the Doctor looked at her over his shoulder. After nine months of wrong landings and near-misses, she hadn't dared believe tonight would be the night she'd see him again.
And yet, here they were.
The Doctor turned fully towards her and took a step forward. Rose matched him, each step faster until they were both running, hurtling towards each other, ready for their painful separation to be over.
I'm home. The words repeated in her mind, the two-beat rhythm matching the pounding of her feet against the street.
But then the soft buzz of a Dalek gliding over the pavement caught her ear. Rose looked down a narrow side alley, and panic seized her when she spotted the tell-tale eyestalk.
The Doctor's eyes widened in terror. They both flailed, trying to stop, trying to stay out of the Dalek's line of fire, but their momentum was too great.
"Exterminate!"
Rose braced herself for the searing pain of a Dalek death ray, or to see the Doctor struck himself.
Instead, another flash of bright light flooded the street. "Exterminate this!" Jack growled as he teleported in. He hoisted a weapon larger than hers and shot the top of the Dalek off.
The Doctor and Rose skidded to a halt, mere feet apart. But instead of reaching for each other, they stared across the short distance with wide eyes.
Rose could see all her fears in his brown eyes. If Jack hadn't shown up… if they'd been running just a little bit faster… It could have gone so wrong, and she could hardly process that they'd had such a narrow escape.
Jack slung the weapon back over his shoulder. "Come on," he said brusquely. "If there's one, there are bound to be more. You know they're looking for the TARDIS. Let's get inside where it's safe."
The Doctor ran a shaky hand through his hair. "Yes, right. Of course. Inside the TARDIS." He dropped his hand to his side, and Rose could see his fingers twitching.
Then he held it out to her. "Rose?"
The secret fear Rose had buried deep in her heart unfurled at that simple gesture. He was still her Doctor.
The Doctor sighed in relief when Rose took his hand, lacing their fingers together as automatically as they'd always done. The simple pleasure of holding her hand seemed impossibly intimate after four years of not touching her at all, and he had to press his lips together to stifle a moan.
Palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.
A shy smile spread across Rose's face, and when she squeezed his hand, he knew she understood exactly how he felt.
"Well, come on you lot!" Donna had the TARDIS door open and was gesturing for them all to go inside. "Or do you want to stand around until we all get killed?" Jack followed her inside, leaving the Doctor and Rose to follow after them.
The Doctor reluctantly let go of Rose's hand as they crossed the threshold, knowing the ramp wasn't quite wide enough to walk down side by side. It's just for a moment, he told his anxious mind.
When she reached the console, Rose turned and leaned back against it. His favourite smile stretched across her face, the one that teased him with the glimpse of her tongue between her teeth.
"You gonna stand in the doorway all day, or do you plan on coming inside?"
A frisson of excitement shivered down the Doctor's spine, but instead of hurrying to her side, he calmly closed the door and sauntered down the ramp, not stopping until he was only a foot away from her. He could hear her breathing speed up, and it took concentration to keep his even.
"Long time no see," he offered, as casually as if he were commenting on the weather.
Her gaze darted to his lips, just for a moment. "Well, been busy, you know."
The Doctor rocked back on his heels. He was ready to keep their flirtatious banter going, but Rose grabbed his tie and pulled him towards her. When he felt the first brush of her warm lips against his, he forgot why he'd wanted to tease her.
He reached for her hips to pull her close and hummed his approval when he felt Rose's hands slide over his shoulders to link behind his neck. Four years was far too long to go without kissing the love of his lives, and he intended to make up for lost time.
Rose's hands carded through his hair, drawing a shudder of pleasure from him. In reply, the Doctor let his fingers slip under her jacket and top to stroke the soft skin just above her waistband. His lips curved into a smile when Rose gasped and arched into his touch.
He stretched the kiss out as long as possible, only pulling back when he knew she needed oxygen. Rose stared up at him, her breaths coming in soft pants, and he asked her the first question that came to mind to distract himself long enough so she could breathe.
"How did you manage to come back?"
A delightful pink flush spread across her face, and the Doctor raised an eyebrow and waited for her to answer.
"Basically, we've been building this, uh… this travel machine, this, this er, dimension cannon, so I could…"
The Doctor leaned down and bumped his nose against hers. Rose's breath caught, but she forged on with her explanation.
"Well, so I could…"
This time, he interrupted her with a quick kiss. Rose blinked up at him when he pulled back, and he let his giddiness show. Rose had never given up on coming home to him, even though he'd said it was impossible.
"So you could what?" he prompted when she seemed to have forgotten what she was saying. He needed to hear her say it, needed to hear that she'd missed him as much as he'd missed her.
"So I could come back." She rolled her eyes when he giggled in delight. "Shut up," she muttered.
He briefly considered telling her he wasn't teasing her—he was honestly thrilled that she'd never forgotten him. Then she tugged him back down for another kiss and he decided he could explain later.
Rose's tongue swiped at his bottom lip, and the Doctor moaned a moment later when it swept into his mouth. His superior senses could taste her happiness in the cocktail of hormones and neurotransmitters she was producing, and it was intoxicating.
The Doctor had almost forgotten anyone else was in the room, but when he left her lips to trail kisses along her jawline, Jack's voice broke through the haze of pleasure wrapping around them.
"Well, this fulfils about five different fantasies and I can't believe I'm stopping you—but there is the little matter of Daleks that we need to resolve before you two continue getting reacquainted."
That was enough to ruin the mood, and they shared a wry smile after pulling out of the kiss. The Doctor looked over Rose's shoulder at Jack and shook his head.
"Jack…"
Jack smiled shamelessly. "If you didn't want to be teased, you shouldn't have started snogging right in front of me."
His teasing smile abruptly shifted to a look of more genuine happiness. "But it's good to have you back, Rosie."
"It's good to be back," she said without looking away from the Doctor.
The Doctor's hearts clenched, and despite Jack's reminder, he had to pull her close again, for a hug this time. He sighed when her arms wrapped around his shoulders, holding onto him just as tightly as he held onto her.
Rose nuzzled into his shoulder, and he turned his head and pressed a kiss to her temple. "Rose Tyler," he sighed.
She went completely still in his arms, which wasn't the reaction he'd expected her to have to her own name. Then he remembered the last time he'd spoken it, and he knew what to say next.
Placing his lips next to her ear, he whispered just loudly enough for her to hear. "I love you."
Rose sucked in a breath and whipped her head back to look at him with wide eyes. He nodded in answer to her unspoken question. She grinned, then opened her mouth to reply, and he waited eagerly to hear those words again.
But it was Rose's turn to be interrupted. The TARDIS power failed, and she shook so violently that Rose stumbled back against the console.
The Doctor felt the shudder in time as the Daleks transported them to the Crucible. "It's the Daleks," he told his companions. "They've got us wrapped in a chronon loop."
Rose smiled gamely and took his hand. "The old team?" she suggested.
He shook his head. "Better than that—the stuff of legend."