Author Notes: I own nothing, of course. This is almost literally the first thing I've written in 2 years, so forgive me if it's rusty at all. I believe all of my facts are correct but again, it's been a while so please bear with me! I ship 10Rose like there's no tomorrow, so if you don't then this might not be the fic for you. But other than that, please enjoy my first piece of work in years and please R&R. I would like to get back into writing again. :)

Burned with Time

He was in rare form tonight.

There was no running around, no hand holding, no lives or planets being saved. There were no paradoxes to be avoided, no sights to be seen, no secrets to be shared. No vacation, no adventure, no current threat hanging over his head. No plotting, no fast maneuvers, no reasons to make things up as he goes. No, not tonight.

Tonight, he was sleeping.

He hadn't exactly meant to. He hadn't meant to at all, actually, but he hadn't slept in three weeks, which meant in truth he was one week overdue for a good rest according to his usual routine. Well, if you could really call it a routine. But he had been so good at keeping himself busy, though. He was keeping his buzzing old mind preoccupied with trips and surprises and pit stops, all with a certain fiery redhead in tow to keep him in line. He liked it that way. He had made too many mistakes with the girl before this one, who had ultimately chosen to leave and go back home because he wasn't giving her the time or the attention she deserved as his friend. He had been too hung up, moping and living in the past yet again now because of someone he had lost. That wasn't fair. No. He didn't want to let that happen again, not to Donna. So distractions were the answer. Strange life forms and restricted areas and historic events had become the answer to distract his mind and his hearts from the emptiness he felt. And it worked. He had a good time. Donna enjoyed it. And that made him happy.

Well, as happy as he could manage.

But tonight didn't go according to plan like all the other nights for the past three weeks. He had meant to get right back into the groove as soon as they returned to the TARDIS. He had planned to plot out the next four days and fill them with more adventures while Donna excused herself to catch a few hours of rest (humans slept way too much, he believed). He had planned to tinker around the center console, maybe pop off a panel or two in order to toy around with the circuitry underneath and maybe see if he could make something awesome happen. But after returning from Pompeii – after recomposing from a bit of an emotional upheaval from both himself and his companion – as he took a quick seat in the well-worn captain's chair, his body simply shut down and he had no choice but to give in to the sleep that had been beckoning at the shores of his consciousness.

Somewhere in the back of his mind he was vaguely aware that he was dreaming. He should have had enough wits to wake himself up, to save himself from what he knew was manifesting in front of him, but the haunting familiarity drew him in, invited him in further, and he left his conscious mind behind.

His feet fell into silent footsteps. He walked everywhere and nowhere at the same time through places he both loathed and adored, his hands stuffed in his pockets as he wandered along. Hazily he passed through Cardiff in the twisting halls of his own TARDIS; he reached the edge of the universe while aboard Satellite 5; he was at the top of the Empire State Building and at the bottom of the Pit in that blasted Impossible Planet; he was in Martha's room while he was at the Powell Estate; there were Daleks and Cybermen and K-9 and Shakespeare and Madame de Pompadour and the Rani… and then there she was.

His breath caught in his throat. And that was when time seemed to stop.

Everything around him fell back to the edge of his perception as if he was standing on a beach in low tide, leaving him to focus solely on her in all her pink and yellow beauty as his feet brought him to an abrupt stop a good distance away from her. An icy chill blew teasingly around them, tossing the wild waves of her blonde hair all around her face as his long coat billowed behind him. She was wearing a strange combination of lace and boots and old torn stockings that nearly seemed familiar in perhaps another life, standing there like a statue, the wind pulling at the lopsided skirt hanging from her hips. She was looking at him, the hint of a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. Her gaze was glassy—yet piercing—like she was looking right through him. And she was silent.

He swallowed hard, his throat dry all of a sudden as he tried to find his voice to speak, the heaviness in his hearts grabbing hold once more, threatening to drown him.

The wind howled, and she chose that moment to let a sad smile surface briefly, a faint golden glint in those distant brown eyes. Like a shifting mirage she was suddenly standing before him, her gaze trained on him so penetratingly that he felt like she could read his thoughts.

Because she could.

He felt her name rise up in his throat and it set his lips on fire as he fought desperately not to speak it out loud. It demanded escape, but he just couldn't do it. Not like this. He couldn't ever say her name when emotions were so raw and unbridled. It was just too much. He tried to put it away.

He swallowed again and braved meeting her eyes. "Why… why are you here?" he asked instead, wincing as his voice cracked.

She treated him to another one of those smiles he always adored so much. "Why am I here, Doctor?" she replied curiously. "Why are you here?" Her voice was soft like a faint melody that seemed to emanate from all around, though when she spoke her mouth didn't quite match her words just right.

He looked away from her and swallowed again, though he could still see her in the corner of his eye. He gave a faint shrug. "I dunno. Just wanted to, uh… to see you, I suppose. No other way to do that now, is there?" He forced a weak chuckle, but she didn't move. He sighed instead, taking a moment to maintain his composure. Or try to. "I just… keep thinking about how… I never told you… all these things…" He screwed his eyes shut and ran a hand over his face, but he could still see her. He realized his hearts were pounding. "I… I just miss… you. And… I…" His mouth kept moving but his voice trailed off.

Her gaze on him softened, and any sign of a smile was replaced by grave solemnity. "Still can't say it," came her gentle melody again. "You know why, Doctor. You already said so." There was no judgment in her voice, only sadness. Regret.

He scoffed in an attempt to ignore the deep pang in his chest, avoiding meeting her eyes. "No—" he started.

"'You can spend the rest of your life with me. But I can't spend the rest of mine with you. I have to live on, alone. That's the curse of the Timelords.'"

Oh, the clarity of memory.

To his ears it sounded as if she had sung those words he had spoken to her so long ago, the delicate notes wafting around him, but she may as well have shouted them from the way they cut into him so deeply. He couldn't look at her. It hurt.

"That was enough for you not to allow it, Doctor," she went on anyway. "You didn't want to invest so much into another person that you'd just end up outliving. So you closed it off."

He didn't remember falling to his knees, but the next thing he knew he found himself kneeling on the ground he couldn't see, pain so deep in his chest he was certain he couldn't breathe. "I'm sorry," he moaned bleakly, "I'm so, so sorry." Tears he didn't know he cried dripped off his nose as he bowed his head. "I'm sorry… I'm so sorry, Ro—"

"Shhh… no, Doctor…"

Blinking away tears, he glanced up to find her suddenly kneeling beside him, their faces only inches apart. She was reaching out a slender finger as if to press it against his lips to quiet him, and it was at that second he realized he wanted nothing more than to feel her warm touch on his skin. Desperately, he leaned forward to finally close the distance between them, but as he reached out she let her hand fall away from him with a pained expression, and as his hand gingerly cupped the back of her head to guide her lips towards his, he realized instead of feeling the soft locks of her blonde hair, he felt… nothing. Absolutely nothing.

He froze. And the wind swirled around them.

He blinked and then she was just beyond his reach without moving, her eyes cast to the ground they both knelt on, his hand still outstretched into now empty air.

"I'm sorry." It was her turn to apologize faintly.

"Please," he begged. "Please… I… I need you back. Please. Isn't there any other way?" He closed his eyes and cursed his own foolish words as he heard them with his own ears. Of course there was no other way. He knew that. He had lost track of how long he had spent trying to find some way to get her back in the dimension she truly belonged in… with him. He had lost so much time and sleep over exhausting every single possibility he could come up with. Because he had held onto hope that there was a way. But there wasn't. And he had known that long before he finally stopped trying and started running away, only to discover that her memory followed him wherever he went.

He paused and let his thoughts trail off when he realized she never responded to his question. He knew what she was going to tell him. She was merely a product of this Timelord's dream. She could never know anything more than what he knew. Yet she did not answer. Was she gone? With a swipe of a coat sleeve to damp eyes he looked up, startled to meet fierce golden eyes in front of him instead of brown.

"Your hope has burned with time, Doctor," she affirmed, the melody of her voice still so soft, yet this time he picked up on an undertone of something more.

"Because there is no other way," he retorted bitterly. "That's the way it has to be."

"Return to it and let it grow."

His brow furrowed in confusion, quickly feeling like he didn't quite have all of this figured out after all. How could she possibly know something that he didn't? "…How?" was all he could think to ask.

"Oh my Doctor, if only you had asked earlier." And that was when she smiled her biggest, standing without motion in a flash.

His eyes searched her earnestly as he sat there from his place on the ground, wind howling as he tried to comprehend, but when she spoke her last words he realized he could no longer see.

"Bad Wolf."

The TARDIS was dark when he awoke with a start. She must have turned the lights down once he drifted off, he surmised. His skin was clammy and his body was complaining from the awkward ball he had curled up into there in the captain's chair. Gingerly, he unfolded himself and stretched, trying to gather his muddled thoughts and calm his racing hearts. Flashes of such a vivid dream were spinning in his mind like a slideshow as he tried to piece them all together, committing fervently not to forget those last words that he found were even hanging on his lips.

And then he realized he wasn't alone.

"I'm sorry, Doctor," came Donna's drowsy voice as she emerged from the shadows of the hallway. She crossed her arms tightly as if to seek further warmth in the fuzzy black robe she had tossed on over her nightwear. "I hope I didn't wake you."

"Uh… no," he cleared his throat, "no… you didn't."

Donna gave a faint nod, shuffling her feet as she drew closer to him. "Couldn't really go back to sleep," she murmured. She regarded him with a furrowed brow. "You all right? You seem like you had…" She paused, unsure whether to press on, but as he turned his eyes to her, the glistening tears lingering on his face coaxed the rest of her words out. "Bad dreams?"

He gave her a smile and started to shrug, and as his gaze drifted away from her she saw in the dim hue of the console just now tired he truly was—eyes so old even with a face so young, like a man who had seen and lost far too much in his life. And it was then when she saw just how sad his smile really was.

"Bad dreams happen to us all, unfortunately," he eventually replied, and just like that all of the hurt and the weariness was tucked snugly away behind a casual façade as he pushed himself out of his chair and turned his attention to the center console, poking at a few buttons and pulling at a lever.

Reluctantly, Donna decided not to pry. "Yeah," she agreed distractedly. "Same for me, too."

He glanced at her over his shoulder. "All right?" he returned her previous question with a concerned frown.

"Yeah, yeah," she answered quickly with a vague wave of her hand. "I'm fine now. Just kept dreaming about something on my back."

"Well," he exclaimed, shoving hands into his pockets and kicking at another lever with his trainer-clad foot. "If you wanna get a little more rest we can take on Tam'aki Ridge on the planet Melek. There's a great spot there for breakfast. Once you taste their crepes you'll never want one from anywhere else."

He grinned widely at her and it was infectious no matter her trepidation towards bad dreams or all the things she suddenly knew he was hiding. She found herself smiling in spite of herself and giving him a nod. "Sounds great," she replied. She waited a beat before finally turning back towards the hallway toward her room. "Good night, Doctor."

He leaned back against the console, hands still in his pockets as he watched her fade back into the darkness of his ship. "Good night, Donna," he returned as the mirth faded once more. He waited until he was certain she was gone before heaving a long, heavy sigh as he dropped back into his captain's chair. He stared blankly at the console before him but all he saw was wavy blonde hair and piercing gold eyes.

"Bad Wolf," he whispered, closing his eyes as he acknowledged at last the ache in his chest that had been there since he awoke. He shook his head as he leaned forward to bury his face in his hands. "I'm sorry, Rose, I've let my hope burn with Gallifrey."

Please R&R. :)