Chapter Two

The Doctor and Jack sat at the kitchen table drinking their respective cups of tea discussing the merits of quantifying the helmic regulator, while Rose who had emerged shortly after they got there clean and dressed in her pink pyjamas, pottered about the kitchen. The TARDIS who seemed to have recovered from the events in the console room earlier had taken it upon herself to prepare them something from her vast stores of alien delicacies and as her occupants were almost entirely human had a roast crackling away in the rotisserie and a collection of mostly Earth orientated accompaniments. Rose helped by pulling gravy from the equivalent of a microwave and plonked it down along with plates and things onto the table in front of them and slid in next to the Doctor.

He turned and smiled at her as she folded her legs up underneath her and sipped her tea, made perfectly for her by the Doctor before she'd even got to the kitchen. It was just the right temperature and she sighed as the hot liquid warmed her.

"Alright?" The Doctor whispered and she grinned back. "Oh yes." Jack smiled indulgently and sipped his tea quietly. The sound of their dinner finishing brought them out of their own little world and Rose brought their food to the table. With plates piled high the trio began their feast and the conversation flowed. They spoke of all the adventures they'd been on since they'd last seen each other, and Jack had spoken at length about his new team and their valiant efforts to keep Earth safe in the Doctors absence, obvious to both Rose and The Doctor just how proud he was of his team and all that he had accomplished without them but never without a thought of them, everything Jack did was for the both of them. They sat in companionable silence as they finished their meal. Rose gathered their plates and began washing up as thanks to the TARDIS for the meal and she hummed appreciatively making Rose giggle.

The Doctor was watching her intently as he felt Jack nudge the edges of his mind. The Doctor sighed and used his own ability to strengthen Jack's weak telepathy. "What?" The Doctor spoke into Jack's mind irritably, all the time his eyes never leaving the back of Rose. Jack looked slightly startled as the Doctor's voice echoed around his head. "Well this is new." Jack mentally smirked and the Doctor absently wondered if Jack was capable of anything that wasn't smothered in innuendo. "Oh stop it, besides, you were the one trying to poke your nose into my head Jack so out with it." Jack thought for a moment, and the Doctor could feel the impending question before Jack had even arranged it into a conscious thought. "To answer your question, which I might add could have been asked simply when we were alone and not in the privacy of my mind thank you very much Harkness, is no...not that it's any of your business Jack..." The Doctor mentally launched Jack out of his mind and out of his chair before Jack could even mount an argument, but the Doctor had seen it before he had know his reply and this was why he was now in the middle of the kitchen floor, slightly dazed.

Rose turned to look at Jack sprawled out on the floor and reached out a hand to help him up. "What the hell are you doin' on the floor, you been sneakin' hypervodka into ya tea again?" Jack laughed awkwardly and adjusted himself back into his chair.

"Perhaps what you need is a good night sleep Jack." The
Doctor suggested over the rim of his tea, all the while his eyes burning into the other man in a warning to not push the subject ever again. "Yea maybe I do." Jack agreed heeding the warning and sending a mental apology in the Doctors direction. The Doctor nodded slightly. "Goodnight Jack."

"Doctor, he nodded back, goodnight Rosie." He hugged her goodnight and disappeared into the corridor. They sat together for a while sipping the last remnants of their tea and knowing Jack was out of earshot Rose began giggling. The Doctor raised an eyebrow in her direction, the corners of his mouth turning up just slightly which made her giggle even harder.

"And what are you giggling about hmm?" He asked as she got up from the table to rinse her mug out and place it in the rack to dry.

"He must have asked the wrong question to get a shove like that." She laughed taking his mug and placing it next to hers. "I don't believe I have any idea what your implying Ms Tyler." She rolled her eyes and he stuffed his hands in his pockets as they headed for the door. "Yea right, you two were as quiet as mice, then he's on the floor, I know a mental shove when I see it Doctor."

"Yea well, he should have kept his mind to himself; I think about enough that I can do without the continuous streams of innuendo that emits from his thoughts. Talk about mind in the gutter." He sighed as she took his hand and she smiled. They walked through the corridors until Rose stopped at the doors to the library.

"Ah, a little hint eh, miss?" Rose's tongue was poking suspiciously through her teeth. "Pleeeeeeeease Doctor, I'm not even tired yet, just one, please." He rolled his eyes knowing he wouldn't be able to say no to those brown eyes that seemed to see right into his soul some days. "Oh alright," He conceded and she giggled excitedly as she pushed the big wooden doors open and practically skipped to the big brown chair in the corner "but just one." The Doctor shut the doors and moved to pull an old dusty book from a shelf several rows back on the right hand side. When he returned to the chair she was curled up with a pillow allowing only enough room for him to sit down if he pulled her half onto his lap. She grinned up at him and moved onto the arm of the chair while he sat down, adjusted the book on the opposite arm and pulled her in next to him, her head cradled in his shoulder while his arm wrapped protectively around her. He smiled down at her and began to read:

"A pleasing land of drowsy head it was, Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye; And of gay castles in the clouds that pass, Forever flushing round a summer sky."

Rose snuggled closer into his suit jacket and breathed him in as the sound of his voice reverberating through his chest and the gentle thrum of his double heart beats lulled her to sleep.

"In the bosom of one of those spacious coves which indent the eastern shore of the Hudson, at that broad expansion of the river denominated by the ancient Dutch navigators the Tappan Zee, and where they always prudently shortened sail and implored..."

Rose was dreaming happily when the Doctor gently lifted her from the chair in the library to the soft nest of pillows that was her bed. His bed coincidentally as upon her return to him the TARDIS had directed her not to her own room, but to his. He hadn't told her as yet but she seemed to sleep better in here than any other part of his great ship, and so he had continued to return her here when she fell asleep watching him fix the console or while they read in the library or even on those occasions when after an adventure she'd fall asleep at the kitchen table next to her tea. He gently moved a stray hair behind her ears and she sighed his name as she slept. He bent and gently whispered into her ear.

"Aion pitää sinua minua niin kauan kuin minä voin luvata." He chuckled as she frowned at the sound of his native tongue whisper through her mind. "I will keep you with me for as long as I can, I promise." He pressed a kiss to her temple, pulled the blankets up around her and left her to her dreams.