Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who or any of its properties. If I did, Steven Moffat would not be in charge right now.
Notes: This was written forever ago and posted to Tumblr. In an attempt to update this account with some things, I decided to post it here.
Prison with a Fantastic View
For what had to be about the twentieth time, they were in prison on an alien planet.
The upside to this prison, Rose thought, had to be the view. Instead of locking their prisoners in dungeons beneath the earth, or in cages suspended above acid pits, or in dusty cells surrounded by tar pits, The Council of the Great and Everlasting (as the government of the planet of . . . of . . . Rose couldn't even begin to try and pronounce the planet's name on her own, and resolved to have the Doctor remind her of what it was later) decided that the best prison was the sort that left their prisoners longing for what they were missing. As a result, the cells were built onto the side of one of the highest mountains, overlooking the landscape. From her cell, positioned directly above the Doctor's, Rose could see the tops of the trees—a shade of vivid green she didn't think they had on Earth—and the evening light of the sun sparkling off the bright green oases in the red-orange desert. The sky, streaked with purples and oranges and golds in the dusk and peppered with bright blue clouds, made the entire thing look like a sort of surrealist painting, and Rose wondered if it would be possible to get some sort of picture of it as they made their way back to the TARDIS. (Which they would, Rose was sure. No matter how many times they were arrested, they always escaped; it wouldn't surprise her if the Doctor was only allowing this imprisonment because he, like her, appreciated the view.)
"Rose? Are you doing all right up there?"
Rose looked down at the sound of her name, peering through the bars to see a face with too-big ears and bright blue eyes staring up at her. The cells were small enough that Rose doubted the Doctor had enough room to stand up straight in his, and her "floor" was less his "ceiling" than it was a thin wafer of mountain rock stuck between them. She didn't feel like crawling onto her stomach to try, but with the way he was craning his neck through his own set of bars (his hands wrapped securely around one on either side), Rose was pretty sure she could bump her forehead against his if she wanted to.
"Yeah, of course I am. Jail's nothing new to us, is it?" He grinned, and she grinned back. "What about you? Got enough space?"
"I've always got enough space, me. Nothing to worry about down here." There was always something to worry about, as far as the Doctor was concerned, but Rose figured she'd keep that to herself. He jerked his head toward the landscape. "So, what do you think? Told you I'd take you to see a pretty planet today, didn't I?"
"That you did," Rose said, and she cast her eyes up at the horizon again. On the opposite side of her view from the desert she could see a small village, a cluster of houses built into trees with bark as red as a fire hydrant back home. "What's that village over there, then? Looks like they have tree houses, but the trees are a bit strange."
"Nah, there's nothing wrong with the trees over there," the Doctor said, looking over in the direction she pointed. "That's the Forest of Firanga, with trees of firebark."
"Firebark?"
"Yep. Exactly what it says on the tin. Unless you're a native, if you put your hand against one of those tree trunks, you're likely going to get a second-degree burn. First-degree if you're lucky."
"Remind me not to go tree climbing, then," Rose muttered, and the Doctor grinned up at her. "But if the trees burn you when you touch them, how are those people living there?"
"It's like I said. They won't hurt you if you're a native." Before Rose could ask, the Doctor explained, "The trees are alive, Rose. They know who belongs there and who doesn't. If you were born among their number, they let you climb them all day and night. Build houses from them, keep you safe from storms. But if you're not supposed to be there and you're not welcome, they make it known. The only forest fires that happen in that forest happen on purpose, and they never cause any lasting damage. At least, not to any and all who are supposed to be there."
"Mm." Rose ran her tongue along her teeth, drinking in every detail of the vivid red trees in the distance, before she moved her eyes to a large lake that glistened with violet water. "What about that lake, then? What's the story behind it?"
"Well, can you make out the little ridges around the lake edge from here? Those ridges lead down to canals between the lake's surface, which are linked to . . ."
With Rose pointing out various bits of the landscape that caught her interest and the Doctor relaying stories or pieces of the planet's history to her, the time—which had seemed to trickle by with all the speed of an ink blot trailing down a piece of parchment—melted away, casting the darkness of night over their beautiful landscape. Of course, the landscape was no less beautiful in the dark; without light pollution given to them by cities, the stars and nebulae of space spread out above them, the three moons of the planet gleaming against the dark sky.
"S'beautiful," Rose said. By this point, she was laying on her stomach, her head poking out from between the bars just as the Doctor's was, her eyes trained on the sky. "You never see stars like this back home. Back in London, I mean. The city was always too bright."
"You humans were so scared of the dark, you forgot to utilize the light that was already there." The Doctor said, and Rose looked down, returning his smile with one of her own.
"And I suppose Time Lords never had a need for artificial light?"
"'Course we did. But ours didn't do such a good job of blacking out the stars." The Doctor looked back up at the sky, a shadow crossing his face that had nothing to do with the night. "Perhaps they should have."
Rose pulled her hair back, brushing it against the back of her neck and around her shoulder, to keep it from falling down onto his face. After a moment of consideration she scooted closer, her arms hooked around her bars, hanging halfway out of her cell.
"But only to give you more reason to go visit the stars yourself, yeah?" she said. "After all, if I could see stars this bright in London all the time, what would be the point in going to go see them with you?" The Doctor looked back up at her, and she grinned at him. "Speaking of which, after we get out of here tomorrow, we should go look at those." She lifted one hand to point at a cluster of stars next to the planet's second moon. "They're beautiful, don't you think? Bet they'll be even prettier up close."
"Rose," the Doctor said, tension in his voice. "You should move back. You could fall."
"What, are you saying you wouldn't catch me?" she teased, and he scoffed. "Some superior Time Lord reflexes you have."
"My reflexes are just fine, thanks," he retorted. "But no, if your simple little ape mind thinks it's a good idea to hang halfway out of a gap in a mountain wall hundreds of feet in the air, be my guest."
Any other person might have been offended at being accused of having a "simple little ape mind," and on any other day, Rose might have bothered thinking up a retort to fire back at him. But laying there with her arms hooked around the bars of her cell to keep herself from falling, with the Doctor looking up at her with a look caught halfway between amusement and wary concern, Rose ran her tongue along her teeth, a little grin gracing her lips as she dared herself to do it . . .
. . . and then pushed herself forward, bending downward just enough to press her lips quickly against his.
She pulled back before he could realize what happened and react, or before she could tumble all the way out of her cell and fall to her death. She licked her lips—the kiss had been long enough for her to get a good feel of his chapped lips against hers, enough to leave a lingering taste of the dinner he'd eaten on the tongue she'd swiped across his lips—and smiled at him. "Well, it's getting late," she said quickly, as he stared at her with a slightly open mouth. "I think I'd better be getting some sleep. We're gonna have to wake up early to escape, aren't we? 'Night, Doctor." With that, she pulled back completely and pushed herself to her feet, darting to the back of her cell to nestle with the blankets the guards had provided her with. With how hot her entire body felt, and with the fact that the Doctor could no longer see her, she didn't really need them; still, as her heart beat out a samba in her chest and her stomach did cartwheels, it helped to hide her burning, madly grinning face in one of them anyway.
Down below, the Doctor continued to stare numbly up at the bars of Rose's cell, before he slowly moved his own tongue across his lips. She had . . . kissed him. She had kissed him. Rose Tyler had kissed him.
He shook his head. Cleared his throat. Stalked to the back of his cell and sat down. He wouldn't think about it. He wouldn't. There was no point in thinking about it. It couldn't go farther than that and odds were neither one of them would bring it up again. He certainly wouldn't.
Still, as he fell asleep (and he didn't want to sleep, really, but it was the easiest way to stop thinking about what happened, which it was really imperative he do), it was with a little smile on his face. A completely unrelated smile, to be sure. Entirely unrelated. But a little smile nonetheless.