Popsicle Sticks

Summary: Vampires, 9, and silverware. Ignore the title, please, or bug Oralindie for an explanation—I can't be bothered. Takes place sometime in between The End of the World and the Unquiet Dead.

Disclaimer: Not mine. If it were, there would be far more Thwarted!kisses, so maybe it's actually a good thing…

Rose was scared. Bordering on terrified, actually, and that creeping in her stomach that was way too familiar and preceded certain doom was starting to crawl. God, dying a few hundred years before she was born was going to suck.

"It could be worse," the Doctor offered from their position squished against the pantry wall, eyes focused warily on the shaking door, and she gave him as much of a withering glare as she felt like making the effort to muster. "And how is that, exactly?"

He thought about it, then gave her an exhilarated, gleeful grin. "It could be raining," he offered, and she hit him.

This was all his fault, anyway. The TARDIS had been making a noise half a note off from her usual clamor, or something—note the sarcasm there—so naturally they had to land right away and check it out. And naturally, "right away" meant in a gloomy, decrepit castle in 1700s Transylvania. Which, naturally, meant that it was full of honest-to-God vampires that had decided they would make a delightful snack and were now pounding on the other side of the door.

"You didn't have to hit me," the Doctor pouted, which looked both adorable and, with his large-than-really-quite-normal ears, slightly disturbing, and Rose rolled her eyes. "It was only on the arm," she pointed out, and he shrugged, and then his large hand with calluses on the finger pads slid around her smaller one as the door almost bulged inward.

"Is this it, then? Bloodsucking snack food?"

His forehead furrowed, then cleared just a little as he turned to look at her. Which was sweet, but she would much rather not have him pretend it was all right. "Quite possibly."

Well, scratch that thought, then. "That's comforting," she muttered, and he gave her hand a squeeze, lacing their fingers together. Which actually helped with the little ball in her stomach, and she squeezed his back. "Glad I met you, anyway," Rose told him, and smiled when the Doctor's eyes lit up. "Me too," he said back, and grinned. "Although if we get out of this, your mum might kill me anyway."

She was about to say something back, to the effect of "that's true", or something, but then the door cracked ominously down the middle with a 'bang' and she and the Doctor both jumped.

"It's been fantastic, Rose Tyler," he told her without any humor in his voice, but instead an odd kind of sound that she couldn't quite place, and she swallowed as he started to lean forward, just a bit. They were already very close together, after all. And then, just before their lips touched, just before her eyes fluttered all the way shut, his spread open wide. "Fantastic!"

Two minutes later Rose's hands were filled with silverware—well, two knives, a spoon, and a serving fork—and she was both scared, still, and extremely pissed. Considering using one of the knives to stab him instead of save her ass, as he was claiming it would, actually. Of all the times to get his brilliant idea…

"Do you really think this is going to work?" she asked, making no effort to keep the skepticism out of her voice, and he nodded absently, reaching out a hand for his share of the cutlery. She gave him the spoon and the smallest knife in response, which made her feel slightly better. "'Course it will," he told her, eyes fixed on the door that was going fast, and that little knot of fear was curling up inside her stomach, and then the wood exploded in a shower of splinters and she held the silverware up like he had told her, and started to close her eyes. And then stopped.

They were cringing away, squealing with high-pitched voices that exposed their long, needle-sharp fangs. She stepped forward, testing them, and they fell backwards more—and Rose looked at the crude cross in her hands made from a knife and a big fork, and started to laugh.

The Doctor joined her after a moment, delightedly, and they shared a grin as they slowly advanced out the door and towards the hall that would lead them to the TARDIS. Getting there should have been terrifying, Rose was fully aware of that, but somehow she just couldn't dim the elation—they were alive, again, they had escaped from certain death with silverware, and even when the doors were safely closed behind them she couldn't stop giggling.

"Are you all right, then?" the Doctor asked her, looking up from where he was already spinning the police box's controls and raising his voice over the building whine, and Rose nodded. "Fine," she said back, shaking her head a little and wiping away very small tears of mirth from the corners of her eyes. "But really, silverware?"

"Welcome to my life," he told her, laughter in his face but something deeper and much more meaningful in his eyes, and Rose nodded a little. If it was anything like this, it would be fantastic.