He stumbled through the doors of the TARDIS, blindly sticking his hand out to steady himself on the console. Romana had ordered him back here to get some sleep. How long had it been since he slept? Eight weeks? Nine? She had been furious with him when she'd learned and he was being no help.

The TARDIS hummed at him sympathetically, bringing his room right next to the console room. Her comforting music surrounded him. She had missed him, missed this, just the two of them not in battle, not fighting for their lives and for the universe. And so had he. But even with the TARDIS, he felt as though he were missing something, some important part of him that didn't seem to want to be found. He wandered in and collapsed on the bed, half heartedly pulling off his uniform until he was left solely in his tight black boxer-briefs.

He needed to sleep, he knew that, but it was impossible. Every time he closed his eyes he saw all the terrible things he'd done, all the terrible things they'd done playing over and over again in his mind. The stench of the fires, the burn of death all around him. How could anyone sleep with all of that? The other Time Lords seemed to be struggling some as well but none as desperate as him.

He heard their whispers about him. He felt too much, cared too much. Too much time around lesser beings, around those silly little emotional ape-creatures he seemed to love so much. He'd forgotten how to be a Time Lord, how to control himself. Of course, it was their policies, their inaction, that had led the universe to this dangerous precipice in the first place. Maybe they were right. Maybe he should be more like them.

But he couldn't. If he did that, if he let go, he would let go of all the things that kept him fighting, kept him toiling for the greater good. There was a great darkness in him, great fury, this he knew, the potential to be a vengeful god in his own right and he needed the humans, needed his past to keep him sane. He could feel the TARDIS in his mind, trying to calm him, trying to battle away the memories so he could sleep. Finally, he gave into her pleading and closed his eyes and suddenly he was no longer alone.

He scrambles to sit up in the bed, a yelp of surprise catching his lips as he eyes the newcomer. It is a girl, sitting crosslegged at the end of the bed, just shy of his outstretched feet. She smiles gently at him and he finds himself returning the expression, studying her with wonder. Her blonde, almost golden hair, frames a round, sincere face, hazel eyes twinkling at him and lips curved gracefully into that enchanting smile. She seems familiar, somehow, although he is certain he's never met her. Surely he would remember a smile like that.

As he watches, she tips her head to the side, her expression never changing. "Hello," she says, brightly.

"Hello," he answers, suddenly finding it strange that he feels completely comfortable sitting in bed in nothing but his pants to talking to this girl who, he realizes is merely clad in a pink dressing gown. His mind pushes that thought away. Doesn't matter.

"Trouble sleeping?" she asks, her eyes never straying from his face. He frowns, slightly. Does he want her eyes to stray somewhere other than his face?

"You could say that," he answered, watching carefully as she moves up the bed to sit beside him against the headboard.

"You've cut your hair," she says and again he thinks it odd that she say that, odd that she seems to know what his hair looked like before but he says nothing. Doesn't matter, again.

"Gallifreyan military procedure," he answers.

"Pompous arseholes," she answers and he snorts, despite himself, smiling at her once again. He thinks that all the time. "Still not ginger, though," she says, reaching her hand out for his cheek.

He holds his breath and closes his eyes until an unnaturally warm palm makes contact with his jawbone. He sighs and when he opens his eyes again, she is staring at him with that ineffably sweet smile on her face. Her hand runs back along his jaw to his ear, massaging behind it gently and his breath catches again. Those have been a sensitive spot since their rather large turn in his fourth body. How did she know that? Keeping his eye contact, she shifts until she is kneeling over his thighs, not touching, just hovering over contact, one leg on either side, raising her other hand to his face.

"You're so brave," she murmurs, searching his face.

"Not me," he replies, looking away from her sincere expression. "Always the coward. Running and running away," he says bitterly.

"You're not running this time," she answers.

"Can't. It's too important," he says sighing heavily. He is suddenly very aware that the rise and fall of his chest brings it achingly close to hers.

"See?" she says, gently turning his face in her hand until he's looking at her again. "Brave," she repeats, removing one hand to tap him lightly on the nose.

The gesture and the sincerity in her voice are too much for him and really, he must lean forward and kiss her. An odd reaction, his brain wants to say...it's not as though he ever normally wants to kiss anyone. He is a Time Lord, after all. Although, there are also not normally golden women in his bedroom that climb on top of him as though it is their right.

She melts into his kiss and his hands move to her back, pressing her down against him. Her tongue runs along his bottom lip and he grants her access easily as if he knows how this dance goes, as though it is the most natural thing in the world for her to run her tongue oh, just there, and to run her hands over his scalp. She's human, she must be human, she is so warm, not to mention the fact that she really knows how to use that tongue.

All too soon, it pulls away from his mouth and he is about to complain, really he is, but it is suddenly working its way down his body and all complaints are forgotten. Across his collarbone, down his chest, that strong chest, he always did fancy this body and then working around his nipples. She's been so slow, so gentle, that when teeth suddenly connect he nearly jumps out of his skin and as it is, lets forth an embarrassing sound of deep appreciation. Or it would have been embarrassing had she not echoed it immediately with a similar sound.

She is down by his hipbones now, her hot breath on his pelvis and her hands massaging his thighs so close to where he apparently wants them to be. Her hair has fallen over her face and he reaches forward to sweep it back, to tuck it behind her ears and she looks up his torso at him with an expression so full of emotion he can barely stand it.

She pulls his pants down, off his legs and then she's, oh, no one's ever done that for him...have they? He's not sure, and surely he should remember a clever tongue like that, as it runs up the length of him and then back down, moving in time with his ripples, changing in time with his unintelligible sounds of encouragement. He wants to say her name, wants to praise her, thank her, Rassilon especially when she does THAT, but he doesn't know it, can only offer her these moans. He wants to let go but not now, not yet, he needs more.

Reaching down, he pulls her up by the shoulders, gasping at the change in temperature as her hot mouth leaves him, wet and wanting and he crashes his lips to hers then suddenly she's in his head. At first he panics, trying to push her out, oh, Rassilon it was a trap, she was a trap, he trusted her and she's, oh. Oh, wow, that's...Her mind wraps around his, deep and comforting, as warm as she is and it's not a trap, can't be, not with her loving him like that.

He flips them so she is underneath, pressed into the mattress and it is his turn to explore her mouth, to let his cool tongue excavate her secrets there and she is reaching down, guiding him and then he's home, he's inside her and he's home. It's like nothing he's ever felt...or is it? And didn't she have a robe on? When did he take that off her? He doesn't know. He doesn't care. She's all that matters in this moment and he's forgotten all that he is, all that he was, all that he's done, even for this brief moment. He slams his eyes shut and focuses merely on them, on their bodies and on her.

She is hot and wet and she'd driven him nearly to the edge before and it's not a surprise that he is coming almost immediately, long and hard, like he's been waiting for this moment for weeks and really, shouldn't he think he's been waiting for this moment for years? Decades, centuries even? And really, his brain should just shut it and let him enjoy this moment and then he opens his eyes...

And she is gone.

He found himself lying face down in his bed, alone and, uncomfortably, still in his now very damp pants with a stickiness on his stomach. A dream? It was all a dream, then. An incredible dream, one like he's never had before, one like he should never be having anyway but what does he care. He was wracked with disappointment. What did he expect? To be lying here, in his TARDIS, in his bed, in the middle of a war having just had intercourse - incredible, mind blowing intercouse - with a human? Maybe he's going crackers.

As he climbed from the bed to clean himself up and change pants, he let his thoughts wander. He should be ashamed, he thought, although at which part he's not sure. At having the non-Time Lord like dream at all? At letting his body have that release, especially unintentionally in his sleep? Or at how he really doesn't feel ashamed at all?

Instead, he felt only the disappointment that it wasn't real, the lingering feeling that somehow it was and most amazingly, the renewed resolve to fight another day. Climbing back into his bed and closing his eyes, letting sleep pull at him, he pulled the covers over himself this time and hoped that she would come again.

He rolls over and, to his utter astonishment, she is there.

"How -?" he begins to ask but she places a finger over his lips.

"I love you," she whispers and, impossibly, he believes her. Whether she said it in answer to his question or merely as a statement of fact, he's not sure. She then snuggles into his body, one arm thrown over his waist and one leg locked between his. His arms instantly wrap around her and he falls into a deep sleep with dreams of a better tomorrow.

When he finally awoke, hours later, to redress in his military uniform and go out to face the fire and the death once again, he felt much better. He won't put off sleeping so long anymore.

She'll come again.

She has to.