The Doctor wriggled his skinny self out from under the grating at the sound of soft footfalls overhead. By the time he'd surfaced, Rose was curled up disconsolately on the jump seat.
"Hello," he said softly, smiling with the pleasure he always felt at her presence. "I'd have thought you'd be asleep by now, what with spending the day running from mad monks and a werewolf."
"I'd a bad dream," she confessed, hunching in on herself, as if to ward off a chill.
"Want to tell me about it?"
She shook her head.
"Want a cuddle?"
This time, Rose nodded, her lips trembling with mirth at the thought of what his former self would have to say about the word 'cuddle,' even though there were tears leaking from her eyes. He sat down beside her and wrapped both arms around her, drawing her in close. The Doctor's double heartbeat was a comforting rhythm against Rose's cheek, and his fingers slid soothingly through her hair.
"Better?" he asked, after a while.
"Yeah. Thanks," Rose replied with a smile that was definitely more genuine, if a bit sheepish.
"Think you can talk about it now? It might help."
Rose snuffled rather ungracefully against the damp spot she'd made on his shirt. "Didn't really make a whole lotta sense."
"Dreams are like that," the Doctor replied, gently stroking her hair. "You're so very brave that sometimes I forget how much harder it can be for the human mind to process the things we see. The monsters."
"S'not that," Rose mumbled.
"Then what?"
"It's…"
"What, Rose?" the Doctor prompted gently.
"I dreamed that you left me all alone, like them."
"Them who?" the Doctor asked, puzzled.
"Lady Isobel, and the Queen. They left them."
"You mean…Sir Robert? And Prince Albert?" he asked, now genuinely confused by her sleep-addled logic.
Rose nodded.
The Doctor pulled back, just enough to tuck his fingers under Rose's chin and lift it gently. "Rose, they didn't leave, either one of them. They died. Prince Albert died of typhoid, and Sir Robert gave his life trying to save all of us - Lady Isobel included - from the werewolf. Neither one of them chose to leave the woman they loved."
"I know," she replied in a small voice. "It's just…they loved each other so much - you could see it, so plain, an' then…"
"He loved her enough to commit treason to try and keep her safe."
"But she's all alone now."
"He died, Rose," the Doctor reminded her. "He didn't want to."
"But he chose to come with us and the queen! He could have just gone with Lady Isobel! I wouldn't have blamed him…would you?"
Would he? Could he find it in himself to blame a human man with one brief life for wanting to live on, with his love? "No. I honor his courage and his sacrifice, but no…I wouldn't have blamed him if he went with his wife."
"People are always writin' stuff about dying for true love, but I think if you really love someone, you live with them, through the good stuff and the bad stuff, but you do it together."
The Doctor was amazed at the depth of that sentiment, coming from a twenty year old girl. But then, his Rose always had been remarkable.
"If you love someone," she continued, "you don't leave them, and you don't send them away."
"If you love someone," he countered, "you do whatever is necessary to keep them safe."
"That works both ways, you know," said the girl who'd looked into the heart of the TARDIS to save him. "You wouldn't still be here if I hadn't come back. Don't ever do that to me again. Promise me."
"Rose, I can't! I didn't make that decision lightly. I knew, in that moment, that I was going to die, and I was OK with it, as long as I knew you were safe."
"But I wasn't OK with it! Back in Cardiff, you said we'd go down together, but on the Gamestation, you never gave me that choice. So you promise me you'll never do that again, 'cause if you do, I promise you this: I will never stop looking for a way back to you."
The Doctor would have very much liked to shrug that off as an excess of human emotions, or lingering effects of the bad dream, but Rose's eyes were clear and alert now, and something in the stubborn set of her jaw told him that she meant every word. So be it. Rose Tyler might be clever, and willful, and fiercely protective of the people she cared about, but so was he, and he had nine centuries of experience on her. He almost pitied the next whim of fate that tried to come between them.
Although, at the moment, anything wanting to come between them would first have to prise Rose's fingers loose from his lapel, and the Doctor knew full well who would win that contest.
"Fancy a nice cup of chamomile?" he asked after a long while.
Rose shook her head, settling herself a bit more comfortably against his chest. "Can we just…"
"What, Rose?"
"Can we just stay here, like this, for a while?"
"'Course we can," he replied affectionately. The Doctor's arms were wrapped securely around Rose, and his cheek nestled into her hair. The TARDIS dimmed the lights in the control room, mutely urging her passengers to rest.
"Thanks, old girl," he whispered. The Doctor let his mind drift as Rose grew heavier in his arms. He pondered the two, all too human love stories they'd witnessed. Prince Albert, with all his zeal and ingenuity, setting plans in motion, long before his own death, to protect his wife, and Sir Robert, rather inept, perhaps, but ever so earnest in his efforts to protect Lady Isobel. And he thought about Rose, conspiring with his own ship to fight her way back to his side.
"You and the TARDIS…you're all I've got. I need you safe," he muttered, "both of you." He didn't realize he'd said it aloud until he heard Rose's drowsy reply.
"An' we need you. You can't fight both of us, so don't even try."
The Doctor smiled, bemused, as the TARDIS softly chimed her agreement. Just for a moment, he allowed himself to bask in the comforting embrace of the two beings he loved best in all the universe. The notion that they might just love him in return was unworthy of consideration. He was too old, too scarred, inside. He didn't deserve them…but…he couldn't let them go, either.