This is the Doctor comforting Donna. Well, really a bit both ways.

The Doctor was lying on his bed, listening to the sound of Donna shiver from the other side of the room. He couldn't do anything to get them out of this cell until morning, and he couldn't do anything about the cold that was coming in from the open window.

Apparently extreme cold kept the inmates from acting up. Probably because they were almost frozen. It wasn't so bad for him, but he wished that he could find the courage to go over to Donna. The bed was big enough for two if they were willing to be a bit entangled. He could warm his body up a bit, and he could give her the thin blanket on his bed.

He lay still though. He wasn't sure if she thought he was asleep or if she just didn't care. She never said she was mad at him but she had lain on her bed without a second glance.

He hadn't meant to land them in jail, not that he ever really did. Normally she was okay with it, they either escaped or talked their way out and that was that.

She might grumble, might make him do something nice to make it up to her, but it had never been like this before.

It hurt him.

It hadn't been that long since she had offered him a welcome into her bed if he needed her. Now he was there ever time he felt like sleeping, and even sometimes when he wasn't. There was something so warm and safe about Donnas embrace and even if it meant laying in the dark listening to her breath he enjoyed it.

Now he felt extra alone and she was only a few feet away. So close, but so far away.

He wanted to say sorry, he really did. While they didn't lay a hand on either of them the guards had hurled insults at her.

They didn't like off world women very well on this planet. Had he not been around they might have done something far worse than insult her but he had glared and they had settled for that small form of hurt.

He might have killed them if they had touched his Donna. His? That was a new development. She was his human certainly, they always were but this was different. Claiming led to dangerous things like jealousy and odd things like taking them places that were only for relaxation.

He chose to ignore the beach resort he had taken her to last week. That wasn't just for her...he needed the day off too.

He shook away the dangerous thoughts. They were mates, that was it.

Instead he listened to her sniffle in the dark. She was crying, trying not to let him know, but he heard.

It was enough to make him want to hurt those guards again. Just because she wasn't their idea of beauty didn't mean that she wasn't beautiful. Their women were very thin with pale hair and dark eyes.

That was what the standard for beauty was here. And they were also very meek.

Donna looked like women should, in the Doctor opinion. Curves were beautiful and she wasn't fat as the guards had told her. As far as light hair went it didn't matter as far as he was concerned and he loved Donna's hair.

It was probably the fact that she was fighting back that caused them to hurt her but the Doctor could only let her do it.

If he stopped her he would have been just as bad as those guards. He had no intention to stifle that flame.

He rose from his bed now, at another sniffle. He couldn't leave her to hurt like this. They were wrong. They were so wrong.

He laid the blanket over here, and it caused her to look at him. Her face was lit only by a sliver of moonlight but it made him feel a little weak.

"You're beautiful," he told her.

Well, that wasn't what he was going to say.

He was sure that she was going to slap him. He didn't presume to think that she wanted to hear that from him, but now it was out there. He had already told her that he loved her, and she hadn't hit him then. Granted she took it as a friendship kind of love but still. Maybe this would be okay. Friends could think their friends were beautiful, right?

She studied him for a long while, and then she lifted the cover and moved closer to the wall. It was all the invitation he needed. Pleased with the change of events, and that she didn't call him out about his comment, because if she had he might have confessed something far worse than beauty.

Instead he pulled her into his embrace, tucking her head underneath his. It was his turn to be enough to stop the darkness from touching her. She could take care of him, she did it well, and he longed to be the same for her.

That person that opened their arms and in them you didn't have to be alone.

There were no words, there didn't need to be. This was enough. He felt himself slipping under and made sure that he instructed his body to warm a little before he did.

DW

Donna laid in the darkness in the Doctor arms. She knew it was wrong but it felt wonderful. If you would have asked her years ago if she thought she would be lying in a jail cell on an alien planet with her head tucked under the last of the Time Lords head she would have laughed.

Yet here she was. And it couldn't have felt more right. She was almost happy. He was asleep; his gentle- somehow always fresh- breath was cascading down her hair and face.

He felt warmer than normal, but not so much that she worried he was sick. He mentioned something about being able to control his temperature to some extent in the past. It was such a small gesture but it brought tears to her eyes.

He wouldn't have been cold but he would make himself warmer just for her.

She shook it off. He would do that for any of his companions, she was just being silly.

She was nothing special.

That was what hurt her so much about those guards. Not that they had hurled insults at her. Those insults weren't even the worst things that she had been called. She knew she wasn't a twig, and her hair had been insulted plenty of times.

She didn't care what they thought. It wasn't them that she longed to think her beautiful. And though the Doctor had pulled the Oncoming Storm, and gone so far to stand in front of her, he hadn't denied it. Why would he though?

His idea of beauty probably was blond hair, and a thin body. He probably wanted someone who didn't challenge him, and did as they were told. Someone who didn't make him talk.

She was never going to be any of those things. And she was far from some little teenager who needed a man to feel good about herself. But she so longed for him to think she was worth looking at.

And then there he was…telling her that she was beautiful. He seemed like the words just slipped out, and she wondered if he meant them.

She couldn't make herself ask out of fear, and instead just opened her bed to him again.

He had taken her into his arms, making a point to gently tuck her head beneath his own.

It was an act of protection, speaking words through actions. He was telling her to relax, that he was there. That she was safe, and in whatever form he meant it, loved.

So here she lay, unable to sleep but comfortable.

At least until she felt the shift in his breathing. How his chest hit her own with growing frequency and at his whimper she took over.

She moved slowly, not wanting to wake him if she could help it. He would only fight his sleep and possibly withdrawal. Instead, in the short amount of time she had been doing this, she learned that waking was the last option.

Only if all else failed. Instead she tucked his head under hers now. She let him hold on tight, as if he was afraid she was leaving, and began to hum to him. It was just an Earth lullaby, though she had been trying to find some Gallifreyan ones in the library. That was still a work in progress, so for now this would have to do.

It seemed to be enough. At long last he settled. His breathing returned to normal and his hearts slowed to a normal pace.

Morning would come soon. He would work his magic and they would be back out into the universe. Running wild, and together.

She loved daylight, but she felt as so something was being born in these dark hours.

And she longed for more nights to learn what it might be.