"Rose! Rose, you gotta see this!"
The only thing Rose was seeing at the moment was her pillow which was buried in her face along with her covers. She barely opened an eye at the sound of the chipper part human-part Time Lord as she heard the quicker pace of his feet pounding against the floor in the hallway towards their room. He was one for waking up early despite his human half that made him feel more fatigued. But he was still half Time Lord, and the uncontrollable hyperactivity was branded and still expected.
His footsteps were louder and she barely acknowledged them and buried herself deeper in her fort, but his voice still rang through her ears.
"Rose!" he exclaimed as he came into the room. She felt the mattress dip when he began to bounce on the bed behind her, tapping her arm and gently shaking her body. "Rose, get up. I've gotta show you something, it's brilliant! More than that, it's amazing!"
"Can't it wait 'til morning?" Rose asked grumpily, her words muffled.
"Well…technically, it is morning."
She peeked an eye open to see the alarm clock placed on the nightstand, red blurry numbers that glowed on the screen coming to her vision. She saw the time it was and shut her eyes, groaning and burying herself further into her burrow. That wasn't morning. It wasn't declared to be morning unless she got out of bed. And she wasn't intending on it any time soon.
"No, it's not," she said stubbornly.
"Yes, it is," he insisted.
"Too early to wake up."
He tried to tug on her covers but to no avail. She kept a firm grip on the edge of her covers and held them close. He whined.
"Roooose, come on. You're gonna love this, I know you are."
"Doctor, it's half past two in the morning. It can wait about seven more hours."
He sighed. "Oh, you humans and your sleep."
"You're part human, too, you know. Shut up," she retorted. "Just let me sleep."
"Now Rose," he said, shifting to spoon her from behind so he could get his words through to her more. He placed his hand on her arm. "Don't you think that after all the years we've known each other I would learn to not wake you up at half past two in the morning—well, two sixteen in the morning now—unless it was very important and for good reason?"
Rose hummed in thought. "Can't really think of a good reason at the moment."
"Oh, Rose Tyler, you wound me," he groaned. "How can those moments slip your mind?"
"Dunno."
"What about on Christmas morning when Tony and I would come in and bring you your gifts? What about when we took that trip on the coast to see those fireflies dancing in the night sky?" He paused and she could feel a smirk spreading across his face when he pressed his lips to her ear. "How about all those times I did that little thing with my tongue that you love so much?"
Damn. He had her there, she had to admit it. "Those are the only exceptions," Rose told him as she snuggled into her blankets.
"Okay…but what if there was another one?" the Doctor asked softly, nuzzling her temple.
"If I let you say it are you gonna let me go back to sleep?"
He chuckled through his nose and eased himself back a bit to gently peel the blankets away from her. She allowed it knowing that there wouldn't be another reason for her to be up this early for something supposedly exciting and couldn't wait until later.
"After what I'm about to tell you, you'll find that it's a very good reason for you to wake up," the Doctor said, rubbing her shoulder. He leaned down and whispered something Rose couldn't wait to hear and wasn't expecting whatsoever and made her stomach flutter.
"The TARDIS coral's fully grown."
True to his word Rose sat up in a flash and dropped the blankets fully from her clutches to see the Doctor's wide and manic grin, watching one mirrored on her face. She threw her arms around his neck and pulled him in for a kiss and a hug.
Turns out there was another exception.