A week late birthday present for my dear friend goingtothetardis. A big thanks to tenroseforeverandever for her help with my sentence structure and choosing the title ;-)

Tentoo x Rose ~ 650 words - My own little take on Bad Wolf Bay.

I was so cold. So damn cold! I'd never been this cold in my entire life; any regeneration!

I was still getting used to this new self, trying to find the switches inside that regulated the temperature, trying to figure out how I was supposed to stay warm in a body that was at a constant 37.6 degrees. What used to be an automatic physiological adjustment was apparently impossible with this new constitution.

The chilling wind bit at my skin and even managed to seep through the few layers of clothes I (rightfully) stole from my counterpart. And there was nothing I could do to prevent it anyway, so I focussed on the wonderful taste her tongue had left on mine and the lingering pressure of her lips against my own.

It had been two minutes and thirty-seven seconds since the whooshing sound that had filled the last 1000 odd years of my existence faded away; two minutes and thirty-seven seconds since the only things my half-human, half-Time Lord ears could perceive were the howling of the wind and the rushing blood that this single heart pumped frenetically through my veins.

I clung to her hand, searching her demeanour with beseeching eyes. She wasn't moving, and the shallow rise and fall of her chest were the only signs that she still drew breath.

I could have said something. I should have said something… anything. I should have found the words to make her forget all about this, bring her thoughts elsewhere. I should have asked her to run and pulled her away from this wretched beach.

Who was I kidding? I couldn't even speak, let alone was her pain, her moment, and I felt like an intruder, my presence an imposition to her emotional turmoil.

"Ouch…" I flinched and almost smiled at the honesty of her interjection: an opening; a way to share her pain with me. Her eyes flickered back to the ghost of a memory of my beloved TARDIS, an imprint in the sand.

Her pain was evident: an aura around her. Her whole body, tense like a bow ready to snap, was a contrast to her lax hand still warming mine. I wanted to soothe the tears that she refused to shed, but she lifted her free hand toward me. "Don't."

There I was, my brain bursting with millions of ideas all at once - at least that hadn't changed - ideas of dancing with Rose Tyler, settling into this domestic adventure, and a wedding, and kids, and a house with a white picket fence and windows and carpets.

But she stopped me.

"Don't", she repeated, and instantly my entire body went taut, just like hers. A few moments ago, this gray matter of mine was optimistically calculating the probability of all of this ending positively for me. Now I was left with the bleak realization that none of this was going to be easy.

The sound of her breath hitching was lost in the cold wind and she shivered.

"Whatever happens…" She swallowed once more, clearly hiding back the knot in her throat. "Whatever I might say or do… just don't take it against you."

Those were her final words before she closed herself off to me: a warning for my own protection before she unleashed the storm that thundered inside her. Her jaw clenched and she shut her eyes, insistently hiding the tears about to fall. Then she turned and walked away.

I shivered at the cold of her loss but held onto her last words as they echoed through my single heart, feeling their meaning. She was disassociating him from me, clearly telling me that she would need time to mourn the man who had just abandoned her yet again, but showing me that these feelings had nothing to do with me.

Whatever might come of that mourning, she just took all the guilt I might ever feel away. I stuffed my hands in my pockets and started walking in her wake, all my attention fixed on the slowly disappearing prints of her shoes in the sand, and I could only feel gratitude for what she'd just done and hoped that whatever our futures might hold, I would still have a chance to win her heart.