Title: Making the Effort
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose, Jackie
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 2: Food. Set during 'The Christmas Invasion'.
If the Doctor didn't know better, he'd think that Jackie Tyler was trying to win him over by appealing to his stomach. This was the second time she'd invited him for dinner. But considering that he'd delivered her daughter home twelve months too late and kept nearly getting Rose killed, he couldn't quite figure out why she was the one making the peace offerings.
He saw Rose's luminous smile across the table as she watched the Doctor and Jackie sharing a lame Christmas joke (who'd have thought), and he realised that Jackie's efforts might not be about him at all.
Title: Momentary Weakness
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose, Jackie, Mickey
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 9: Regeneration. Set during 'The Christmas Invasion', with references to 'Castrovalva'.
He remembers a time when companions lugged him across an alien planet in a capsule while he recovered from regeneration. This time he's being pulled up a seemingly endless flight of stairs in the Powell Estate. He's aware of it in a peripheral sense, despite being mostly asleep.
He's dead weight to them right now, and he's aware of that too. Just some strange man who took over Rose's Doctor's body and changed it beyond her recognition. She wants her Doctor back.
He might be physically unable right now, but he will prove himself to her again. He has to.
Title: Low-Species Humour
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 10: Jokes. Set during Season 2.
When he tells Rose an assortment of (admittedly not perfectly translated) Gallifreyen jokes and she laughs raucously at each, he's initially fairly pleased.
"Those've got to be the worst jokes ever," Rose chokes out, tears flowing down her cheeks from laughing so hard.
In his last body he might have called her a stupid ape for not understanding them. In this body he asks her to tell him some jokes instead.
He finds her contributions genuinely funny, actually. Sometimes, he realises, it doesn't hurt to lower himself to a human standard instead of expecting them to try to meet his.
Title: Seeking Out a Cure
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 17: Insect. Set during Season 2.
The Doctor told Rose not to go outside. Why does she always ignore the 'don't wander off' rule?
Now she's comatose from what would have been just a simple insect bite had she not been human. It's up to the Doctor to go outside, through a swarm, to retrieve the cure and save her life.
Of course, Time Lords are deathly allergic to this particular species of insect as well.
Oh well. He's died for her once. What's one more time?
He loves this new hair, and he would love to keep it, but he loves her much, much more.
Title: Weird Stopovers
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose, Firefly Crew
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 20: Crossover. Crossover with Firefly. Set during Season 2.
"A spaceship!" the Doctor exclaimed. "About 500 years in your future. Although, this isn't the best example. Not in particularly good nick, is it?"
"What're you doin' on my gorram ship?"
"I hate guns," the Doctor grumbled as half a dozen were trained on them.
"Run?" Rose suggested.
"Talk first," the Doctor said. "This lot look trigger-happy. And really, I'm very interested to find out why that girl over there is mumbling my name over and over when I haven't given it yet."
His curiosity would be the death of them, Rose thought. She settled in for another weird stopover.
Title: Dead To Him
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 31: Lost. Set during 'Doomsday'.
She's not dead, but to him the distinction is only technical. Her loss hit him just as hard as her death would have, even though she's probably off living a truly fantastic life. And it's just as irrevocable as a death. He'll never see her or speak to her again, so what's the difference?
When he finds a gap, he thinks for a moment that she's not so lost anymore. But it's just one chance to say goodbye, and then he loses her all over again.
The ache in his hearts is suddenly fresh, and he allows himself to cry.
Title: A Betting Man
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 32: Challenge. Somewhat AU, set during Season 2.
The Doctor never backed down from a challenge, even when he should.
"When I said that even you couldn't make her drop her knickers, I didn't mean you should go disprove that whole 'Virgin Queen' thing," Rose said, resting her hands on her hips.
"Yeah, less being critical and more cutting me down, eh?"
"She really wasn't joking when she said she'd hang you by your toes."
"And it hurts!" the Doctor complained. "Catch me trying to prove myself like that again."
Rose grinned, knowing he'd do it again in a second. He was just that sort of man now.
Title: Blowing Off Course
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: PG-13
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 40: Emerson. Set during Season 2.
'Welcome to Emerson, Iowa. Population 439'.
"That alien signal really led us here?" Rose asks sceptically. "There's probably more people livin' on my Estate than in this whole town. I'm expectin' tumbleweeds to blow past at any moment."
"Small town, late 20th century. Perfect hiding place," the Doctor assures. He's not keen to admit that his driving might have been off again.
Rose narrows her eyes, "If there's not some seedy alien underbelly here, you owe me a shopping trip."
The Doctor resolves to arrange aliens himself if it'll get him out of lugging Rose's shopping bags around all day.
Title: A Beginning and an End in One
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose, Ten II
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 49: The End. Set during 'Journey's End'.
He was closing the gaps between universes, which alone should have been enough to keep them apart. But, as he'd found multiple times, the walls between them never quite seemed to stay closed. He probably could have gone back for her eventually if that was all that was keeping them apart.
No, the reason this was really the conclusion for him and Rose was that she had someone now. The Doctor could come back for her one day, maybe, but she wouldn't agree to come with him.
It was really the end, even if it was just beginning for her.
Title: Tattoo
Author: Queen of the Castle
Rating: PG-13
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 59: Tattoo. Set during Season 2.
"You do not have a tattoo," the Doctor snorted. "Rose Tyler, with pink hoodies and panda slippers, getting a tattoo?"
"It's true!" Rose insisted. "Shareen and I had a few too many and we went off and got it done. There should be breathalysers at those tattoo parlours to stop that, I reckon."
"Then they'd never make money erasing the bad ones. How bad's yours?"
"Shareen picked a rose for me. How original."
"And where is it?" the Doctor asked.
"Tellin' you that," Rose said coyly, "would require me to be even drunker than when I got the damn thing."
Title: A Word Too Often Used
Rating: G
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 66: Inconceivable. AU post-Season 2. While the Challenge makes me think of 'The Princess Bride' the book (love it to death), I daresay it's more likely Rose has only seen the movie.
Rose Tyler had watched a movie once where a man kept saying the word 'inconceivable' over and over, without seeming to know how to use the word correctly. The Doctor, who frequently uses 'impossible' to describe things that have already just happened right in front of him (which just proves they are possible) sometimes reminds her of that man.
So when the Doctor, upon seeing her back in his universe for the first time in years, breathes, "Impossible," there's really only one thing that Rose can possibly say in response.
"I don't think that means what you think it means."
Title: Knowledge as Power
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 68: Ghost. Set during 'Fear Her'.
"I was a Dad once," the Doctor says, and then immediately pretends it never happened.
Rose should be used to this sort of thing. She knows next to nothing about his past, no matter how many opportunities she gives him to talk. She doesn't even know the name of his lost planet. So she should be used to it when he shoves that lack of knowledge in her face, the ghosts of his past acting as a very successful barrier erected between them.
She should be used to it, and it shouldn't hurt when he does it, but it does.
Title: Noir
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 71: Hardboiled Detective Novel. Set during Season 2.
"She had endless nothingness stretching into her future. She was looking for escape in the worst places. I could tell from the desperate look in her eyes that she needed to be rescued. There I was, a complete stranger, and I was her only chance at really living. But when I took her hand, she shackled my wrist to hers. I'd never be rid of her now. How like a dame."
"Shut up," Rose said, laughing. "I was not like that. Anyway, that's terrible. What was that accent?"
The Doctor glared. "1930s American. And it's improvised noir. What'd you expect?"
Title: Jumping Into Bushes
Rating: G
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 72: Hidden. Set during Season 4
Through much practice, Rose Tyler had grown remarkably comfortable with jumping into bushes at a split-second's notice. It wasn't a talent she'd ever foreseen coming in handy. Recently, though, it had repeatedly saved her life and protected the fabric of time itself.
She hid in some thick fronds as soon as she caught a glimpse of brown and pinstripes.
She wished she could run up to him instead of hiding. He was right there. But Rose knew it wasn't time yet.
So she huddled behind a plant, waiting for the Dimension Cannon to reactivate, and watched him with longing eyes.
Title: Handicapped
Rating: PG
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 78: Wounded. Set during 'The Christmas Invasion'.
Time seems to stop for Rose with the slash of a blade.
She looks at this new man and can still hardly believe it's the Doctor. But that doesn't stop the thought running through her head now.
The Doctor's had his hand cut off.
He needs both hands. He can barely get out of trouble with both hands, both feet and a nose long enough to balance on. How's he going to survive with a handicap like that? It might as well be a mortal wound.
When he grows it back, she's happier than ever that he's a crazy alien.
Title: Necessary Binding of the Senses
Rating: PG
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 80: Sweet / Sour. Set during Season 2.
"Bondage, eh?"
He blushes a deep scarlet and pouts.
"You have to wear it or this won't work."
Once the blindfold is firmly on, he pushes a small morsel of food into her mouth. It's an explosion of flavour, brilliantly sweet and sour all at once.
"What is that?" she asks, whipping the blindfold off before he can stop her.
She's never seen anything that looks so disgusting ever.
She thinks it over for a moment and places the blindfold back on. "I'm gonna pretend I didn't see that," she said, and opens her mouth to wait for another bite.
Title: If Wishes Were Cobblers, Then Outlaws Would Dance
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 81: Robin Hood. Set during Season 2. As for the title: don't worry, it's not just you. It really has little to do with the fic beyond the Robin Hood – Outlaws connection. Just thought I'd mix it up a bit. ;-)
"I am so like Robin Hood! I steal from the rich and help the poor all the time!"
"You steal from the rich to help yourself, and help the poor without using any money," Rose laughed. "You're so not Robin Hood."
"That legend was based on me, I'm telling you."
"So you have a band of outlaws lyin' around, then?"
"Not right now, no."
"Or, I dunno, some fair maiden waitin' for you to sweep her off her feet?"
"Well, Rose Marion Tyler, you tell me."
She gapes for a moment and then throws her pillow at him. "You wish!"
Title: Puffy Adorableness
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 82: Elvis. Set during 'The Idiot's Lantern'.
The Doctor has never before liked Elvis Presley as much as he does at this moment. Without even realising it, Elvis has given the Doctor an excuse to see Rose Tyler dressed up in a puffy 1950s outfit, speaking bad period-specific lingo. She's never seemed as completely adorable to him as she does right this second.
She settles behind him on the scooter, wrapping her arms around him, each hand seeming to instinctively find one of his hearts to rest over. Her front presses comfortably against his back.
The Doctor thinks he just might have discovered his new favourite musician.
Title: Red Capes and Sugar Handouts
Rating: G
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 90: Trick or Treat. Set during Season 2. Also, catch the reference I couldn't help throwing in. Could I be any more obvious?
"You can't be serious!" Rose laughed.
"Yeah!" he says, his voice squeaking with excitement. "Halloween, 2006! In Las Vegas, mind, so you can't go see your Mum."
"You're just afraid of her," she grins.
"Always."
"But you can't seriously want to see a 21st century Halloween. Your life is like that, only more realistic."
"Rose," the Doctor said seriously. "Any holiday that involves free handouts of sugar is the best holiday ever conceived. Now come on!"
She giggles and lets herself be pulled out the door, the red cape of her hastily-thrown-together Little Red Riding Hood costume billowing behind her.
Title: Overkill
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 92: Bonfire / Gunpowder. Set during Season 2.
"What, are you signallin' people fifty light-years away for help?"
"What?"
"The fire," Rose laughed. "It's huge!"
"It's a bonfire," the Doctor said defensively. "It's supposed to be big."
"It's a bit overkill."
"See the way the light catches those waves as they come in?" he asked.
Rose looked and nodded, seeming entranced for a moment by the rhythm of it. "Yeah. 'S beautiful."
"Couldn't see that with some little barbeque flame, could you?" he said triumphantly.
Rose looks at him askance and then grins. "You're a nutter."
If she hadn't said it with such affection, he might be offended.
Title: Passions Not Shared
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 93: Flowery. Set just prior to 'Tooth and Claw'. Written because of that comment Martha makes in 'Gridlock' about him taking her the same places he took Rose, and being on the rebound. Oh Doctor, you know it's true.
"You didn't like it," the Doctor said, looking downbeat.
"I did! But Shakespeare to me just means schoolwork. I'm sorry. It's all that Elizabethan language stuff. I just don't understand it. And it's so sort of ... flowery."
The Doctor pouted.
"But seein' it live was nice!" Rose offered. "Nothin' beats theatre, and that lot were all into it. Great atmosphere."
Rose knew the Doctor loved Shakespeare and was disappointed she didn't share that enthusiasm. But back in the TARDIS, he suggested a concert and let her choose.
Rose grinned, warmed by his efforts to find something they could enjoy together.
Title: Falling in Slow Motion
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 96: Frozen. Set during 'Doomsday'.
He sees Rose's lever go offline, and sees her determined look, and everything seems to freeze. Daleks moving at a hundred miles per hour through the air look like they're suspended in near stillness.
He's a Time Lord. He can slow time around him, just enough to give him the extra time he needs to perceive things and work out the answers.
But this time there is no answer. He can't let go of his magnaclamp without falling into the void, and that won't help her.
All his Time Lord talents do is make him watch her fall excruciatingly slowly.
Title: Wrapped Around Her Little Finger
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 98: Claws / Clause / Claus. Set during Season 2.
"I hate cats."
Rose gave the Doctor that pleading look, with just a hint of a smile, that never failed to make him cave. "Oh come on. You know we can't have a dog on the TARDIS. It'd chew on all the wires and we'd end up floating aimlessly in the Vortex for weeks."
"I don't remember saying yes to having any animal on board."
Rose kept up that little smile that both begged him and said she knew she'd already won.
"There'll be hair everywhere."
She smiled.
"It'll claw up my trousers," he whined.
She kept smiling.
Damn her.
Title: The Song and Dance He's Forced to Lead
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose, Mickey
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 113: The Rain in Spain. Set during 'The Girl in the Fireplace'.
The Doctor swept into the room, jubilantly (drunkenly, really) singing tunes from My Fair Lady. He nearly faltered upon seeing the weapons which were mere inches from dissecting Rose and Mickey. The danger his companions were in hadn't been obvious from he'd heard while he'd been listening from outside. The visual was much more instructive.
If the fireplace had failed to deliver him back on time, they'd have been turned into parts for the ship. Rose would be dead.
That thought made it even harder to jump through the glass. He didn't want to leave her again.
He had to.
Title: Being Left Behind
Rating: PG
Character/s: Rose, Reinette, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 121: Ooh Shiny. Set during 'The Girl in the Fireplace'.
Rose doesn't blame Madame de Pompadour for falling for the Doctor, or for properly capitalising on his interest in her. It's something Rose herself has never been able to do, because she isn't anywhere near as certain how the Doctor feels about her as Reinette seems to be.
And is it any wonder she's unsure whether her feelings are returned? The Doctor seems prepared to leave her behind just to chase the first new, shiny and interesting person he comes across, like a cat chasing a piece of tinfoil. Where does that leave her?
Heartbroken. Though she'll never admit it.
Title: A Pressing Need to Fly Among the Stars
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 131: Stargazing.
He knows every one, and he loves each of them. Now he might never see them up close again.
Somewhere out there amongst those stars, thousands of years into the future, there's a young woman who's probably thinking the exact same thing, and blaming him for it. He deserves it. It's his fault that he's stranded them all.
He's got to find a way back. No matter how appetising the slow path sounds theoretically, he couldn't stand for the closest he can get to the stars to be gazing out the window.
He couldn't stand never seeing Rose again, either.
Title: Pineapples
Rating: PG-13
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 135: Shameless / Shameful. Set during Season 2.
Ever since a bet distracts them slightly from the flesh being ripped from the bones of good men, it's become a competition. The initial intent was to lighten the mood when they needed it, but now it's always ongoing.
The latest bet is that she can't insert the word 'pineapple' into every sentence without someone commenting on it. She flirts shamelessly while she does it and is so charming that no one wants to insult her by asking.
He refuses to admit part of his ire at her winning might be down to the fact that she's made him jealous.
Title: Tainted Miracles
Rating: PG
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 144: Blood. Set during 'The Stolen Earth' and 'Journey's End'
There's no blood. Rose has seen Daleks kill loads of times before, but she's still somehow surprised by that. When she was young, her Mum had told her it wasn't serious if there was no blood. People shouldn't die if there isn't blood.
The Doctor shouldn't die at all.
Of course, he'll regenerate. That might even be all right in a few months. But she doesn't want him to change everything about him before they have a chance to get used to each other again. She wants this him to stay.
She prays for a miracle.
Oddly, she receives one.
Title: Urban Legends
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 148: Urban Legend. Set during 'The Idiot's Lantern'.
The Doctor had always laughed at the stories human parents told their children to keep them in line. No presents from Santa if you've been naughty. Your face will freeze like that if the wind changes. The television will suck out your brain if you watch it too long.
That was before the sheet was lifted and he saw the blank where Rose's face should have been.
Her beautiful face, and those electrical impulses that made up her brilliant, unique mind, gone. Just gone. All because of a television signal.
Perhaps those legends had some basis in reality after all.
Title: Laughing So That She Doesn't Scream
Rating: PG-13
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 156: Tooth and Claw. Set during 'Tooth and Claw'.
Rose watches a man be torn to shreds, blood and gore flicking away from his writhing body off the tips of sharp claws. She feels like whatever is left of her innocence is being ripped away as well.
She wants to avert her eyes, but it's somehow impossible just now.
The Doctor's arms suddenly grip her firmly. He pulls her out of the corridor. It's only when the graphic death scene is out of her line of sight that Rose can even blink.
Afterwards they speak jokingly of werewolves, but all she's doing is laughing so that she doesn't scream.
Title: Just One Smile
Rating: G
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 158: Intoxication. Set during 'The End of Time Part Two'.
Rose is freezing cold. Even though she's keen to get inside to the relative heat of the flat, she still stops in her tracks at the sound.
A tall, skinny sort of man is leaning heavily against the wall. He's clearly found the bottom of one bottle too many. Her Mum never quite managed to instil a sense of self-preservation strong enough to make Rose ignore that sort.
She stops to chat, and he wishes her a strange sort of happy New Year. She grins at him before leaving. He looks like she's made his night with just one smile.
Title: Worth More
Rating: G
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 187: Investigate. Set during 'School Reunion'.
The last day Rose spent inside a school, she scattered her shredded notes about the classroom like confetti, telling her biology teacher to go screw himself because she wasn't coming back.
She intends to saunter inside the school this time in a position of power. She'll be a health and safety inspector or something, putting them all on the back foot. She doesn't need A-Levels or her teachers' approval to make something of herself. She has psychic paper.
Instead, the Doctor sets her up as a dinner lady. Rose says nothing, suddenly unsure whether he thinks she's worth something more.
Title: When He Loses Her
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 212: Dudgeon. Set during 'The Idiot's Lantern'.
He'd gone somewhat insane with anger when he'd lost Rose. They'd stolen her face and her mind. He couldn't even begin to process that, and its potential permanence, beyond that initial feeling of absolute rage that anyone would hurt his Rose and then just leave her abandoned in the street.
It was later, with her back, that the Doctor realised that he couldn't keep pushing her away. He clearly couldn't afford to properly lose her. That anger should never be unleashed on the universe more long-term.
He tried to forget that one day he'd have no choice in the matter.
Title: The Differential For Two Hearts
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose, the House team.
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 214: Crossover. Set during Season 2. Crossover with 'House M.D.'.
"What's the differential for two hearts?"
"Genetic defect?"
"Oi!" Rose snapped. "He's not defective."
"I'm also right here," the Doctor said. "And not a patient."
"Two hearts," a young female doctor said incredulously. "There's no way he's healthy."
Rose rolled her eyes. "You had to tell them, didn't you?" she asked the Doctor. "'I have two hearts. Use your stethoscopes, I dare you'. Now we're stuck here."
The Doctor shrugged and pointed at the man whose name tag read 'Dr Gregory House'. "We're right where we need to be. He's the alien we're after. Can't believe no one's ever realised."
Title: Reforged
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 246: Genesis. Set during the 2005 Children in Need Special.
Fire burns through his veins and he opens his mouth as if to scream.
He's being rewritten. His whole body is changing, and his mind with it. Usually in this moment all he can think about is the pain. This time, though, he thinks about her.
The first time he looks at her with new eyes, he immediately loves her more than ever. That's how he knows he's been reforged to her specifications, without her even knowing it.
Apparently she likes him skinnier. And with big hair. And he'll just bet he's a pretty boy now.
Strangely, he doesn't mind.
Title: Pushing Each Other Away
Rating: PG-13
Character/s: Rose/Mickey, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 247: Frustration. Set during the beginning of Season 2.
First she meets Sarah Jane and the Doctor implies that Rose is just yet another of the many who've travelled with him. Then he invites Mickey on board the TARDIS. By the time he runs off to be with another woman, Rose has got the message.
He's pushing her away.
Two can play at that.
Rose knows that Mickey's well aware that when she takes his hand and draws him towards her bedroom, it's not really about him. She's frustrated, and he's there.
Still, she's sees the permission to use him in Mickey's eyes. He's just a man, after all.
Title: The Boy Who Never Grows Any Older
Rating: G
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 260: Pan. Set sometime during Season 2.
The Doctor reads to her. Rose can't help but identify with Wendy, because there's just no question that the Doctor is like Peter Pan. The boy who lives apart from the real world and never grows any older, but who becomes enthralled by a perfectly ordinary human girl and her family. The boy who doesn't want that human girl to ever leave him, but still refuses to act to prevent her from going. That's the Doctor all over.
The real divergence between Rose and Wendy is that Wendy makes the decision to leave. Rose can't see herself ever doing that.
Title: Empty Pockets
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 263: Pocket.
"All right," Rose said. "That's it. Empty out your pockets."
"What?" the Doctor asked incredulously. "What did I do?"
"You can't even find the sonic screwdriver anymore, there's so much junk in there."
"They're dimensionally transcendent," the Doctor pointed out.
"Just means there's more space for rubbish," Rose said stubbornly.
A stuffed pig, a wind-up toy soldier, sixty-two forms of non-Earth-based currency, a live mouse, six chocolate biscuits, tin foil shaped like a swan, and an opaque crystal ball later, the Doctor paused.
"Maybe I should clean them out this once."
Rose rolled her eyes. "Once? Yeah right. Try monthly."
Title: Digging Up a Grave
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose, Sam & Dean Winchester (sort of)
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 265: Dig. Set during Season 2. Vague crossover with Supernatural (you don't really need to be familiar with that, though).
"Why're those guys diggin' up a grave?" Rose asked, a disgusted look crossing her face. "Or don't I wanna know?"
The Doctor smiled indulgently. "There's a particular species, the Boros, that can pass themselves off as spectres after their host bodies die, because their psychic essence is still linked to the remains. Those boys over there are destroying the body before that Boros can do any more harm."
"Those guys know about aliens?" Rose asked.
"They think it's ghosts," the Doctor laughed. "Still, looks like this problem's taken care of. TARDIS?"
Rose took his hand and let herself be led.
Title: There's No 'Just' About Jackie Tyler
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 273: Laundry. Set just prior to 'Army of Ghosts'.
The Doctor glared at Rose. "We have a whole wardrobe room full of clothes. What's wrong with them?"
Rose picked some stray lint off her jumper, attempting to look innocent. "They're not my style."
"What, none of them? There are outfits suited to the whole of time and space in there, and not one is good enough for Rose Tyler?"
"Doctor," Rose admonished. "I just wanna do some laundry."
No, she wanted them to go to Jackie Tyler's flat to do laundry. There was no 'just' about that.
"Fine," he sighed.
When had she made him into a pushover, anyway?
Title: The Tube
Rating: G
Character/s: Ten, Rose, Jackie
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 285: Public Transport. Set during Season 2.
"But we have the TARDIS," the Doctor whined.
Rose grinned. "Honestly, Doctor, it's just the Tube."
The Doctor shook his head vehemently. "We're going out to dinner with your mother, who has that scary look that means she's either planning to slap me or planning to make us get married. It's not just the Tube. It's the long, long ride to hell. Dunno about you, but I don't want to draw the punishment out any."
"You just wanna use the TARDIS so's you can 'accidently' steer us off course and miss dinner."
Well. Damn her for knowing him so well.
Title: Like a Bad Copy
Rating: G
Character/s: Rose, Ten
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 289: Substitute. Set during the 2005 Children in Need Special (just prior to 'The Christmas Invasion').
It was difficult to believe, even after he'd verbally proven that he knew things only the Doctor could possibly be aware of, that this odd man bounding about wrecking everything could possibly be the Doctor. Her Doctor had disappeared, and now some man who didn't seem anything like him stood in his place, like a bad copy.
However much damage it did the TARDIS to get them there, Rose was glad they were headed back to the Powell Estates. With the one constant in her recent life just having up and left her, she really just wanted to go home.
Title: Too Stupid to Fall
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 299: Tremor. Set during 'The Impossible Planet'.
One earthquake, barely even a tremor compared to the devasting ground-shocks of the Grandite Cluster, signals his life's end. It just takes him a while to realise it's over.
He observes the gaping crevass where his TARDIS should be with numb shock. Losing the TARDIS is like losing Gallifrey all over again. No, worse, it's like losing one of his hearts. Or both, even.
No matter how Rose tries to make light, he won't recover from this. It's not just his home that's gone. It's himself. He's dead in every way that matters. His body's just too stupid to fall.
Title: Backing Down From a Dare
Rating: PG
Character/s: Ten, Rose
Author's Notes: Written for Challenge 312: Play. Set during Season 2.
"Oh, come on then. You said 'dare'. You can't back down now."
The Doctor can't believe he's playing an adolescent game with Rose. Well, yes he can. She makes him feel even younger than even she is. So though it should be surprising, it's not.
"There is no way I'm piloting us to Tudor England just so I can moon Henry VIII. I like this head."
It could only be worse if they'd chosen spin-the-bottle.
Well, no, with only the two of them that would've been much better. Maybe he could make her forget the dare by suggesting that instead.