The TARDIS lights were turning down low for the night, and no sound could be heard in the control room save for the hum of the engine and the occasional gentle from one of the many control units. It was so quiet and calm that the Doctor entered thinking he was alone, and did not notice Rose leaning against the console until he almost bumped into her.

"Hello there, Rose Tyler," he said, patting his jacket down to appear less startled than he felt. "I thought you'd gone to bed long ago."

"Didn't feel like sleeping," Rose replied, gazing absentmindedly up at the roof of the TARDIS.

The Doctor folded his arms and leaned next to her, staring up at the ceiling, wondering what his human friend saw. A long moment of comfortable silence passed between them.

"What's on your mind?" the Doctor finally asked. She shrugged.

"Not much, really. Just thinking about stars."

"What about them then?"

"Well, they're a bit...boring." The Doctor shifted slightly in surprise, glancing down at Rose with raised eyebrows.

"Boring? But you said you'd never had as much fun as at that carousel on Horologium! It was a star you could walk on!"

"Maybe boring's not the word, but that's just it, isn't it?" Rose said, looking at the Doctor then. Her round dark eyes, framed by smudged makeup from their long day at Horologium, held his. "There's a carnival on a star. They... they're not really what they're made out to be on Earth. Y'know," she added, catching his look of confusion. "All the songs. The myths and legends and the sheer fantasy we've crafted around them. The books and poetry and all the beauty to be had from them- and they have ring tosses. They're so, well, ordinary."

The Doctor nodded slowly. "Ye-es, well, it's a bit more than that. Y'see, the stars are made up of nothing less than the elements of creation." He spun around, punched a few dials, then grabbed Rose's hand and lead her to the TARDIS doors as the engine shifted, and the familiar screech of the brakes. He flung them both wide open, and they stood together, holding hands, looking on at the shifting prismatic lights of a nebula.

"Look at that, Rose Tyler," the Doctor breathed. "The birth of a star."

"It is beautiful," she agreed.

"Ah, yes, it's beautiful. It's magnificent, it's stunning, it's awe-inspiring, it's a statement of futility against death, the circle of life, beauty consolidated into this one, single act of the universe, this moment, this!" He looked Rose in the eyes. "And people built a ring toss on one." The Doctor shrugged then, and resumed staring at the universe unfolding before him. "Just goes to show, I suppose."

"Goes to show what?"

He glanced at her, and flashed that lopsided grin of his. "I dunno."

And with that, they stood again in silence, watching the birth of a star as beautiful as poetry and as full of life as a carnival.

A/N: This is my first fanfic guys, hope you enjoyed it!