Author's Note: The story continues... and I would like to add just a small request: Please don't skim/skip the end of this chapter, even if you're reading just for the smut (and it can't happen while Rose and the Doctor are apart...can it?). There's a romantic climax at this chapter's close that I think Rose/Ten shippers may enjoy. Reviews appreciated! Love and thanks to all of you.

Part Seven: Alien Love Song

"If you know what's good for you, you will leave right now," said Pete Tyler grimly to the security men before him. "And take him with you." He nudged the unconscious zoo director with his shoe. As soon as he saw the men following his suggestion, he turned to the Doctor. And the sight broke his heart.

The Doctor stood, looking down at the ground where Rose and the second creature had last been seen. The ground was broken grey rock and churned khaki earth. The Doctor seemed a man adrift without an anchor. Pain, anger and desperate self-control wrestled in his eyes and on his face, so much so that a twinge of fear and concern struck Pete as he approached the man cautiously.

"She's fine, you know," said Pete slowly. "She has to be. That—that was not the result typical of a shot gun. And there's no debris from the creature if it was destroyed." Pete's confidence came from two years of watching his daughter—this gift from another him in another universe—survive and thrive in all manner of difficult and dangerous circumstances. She had more wits, pluck and luck than the other agents at Torchwood, and that was saying something. Possibly, the only match she had in the universes was in the Doctor, and Pete Tyler found solace in that.

"You're a thinking man, Doctor. There's just no evidence that the shot harmed them."

There was no answer from the Doctor, but Pete thought he saw hope now fighting in the Doctor's expression as well. The Doctor drew a shaky breath and closed his eyes for a moment. "You're right," he said, his voice shaky and low. "You're right."

The hand phone in Pete's pocket buzzed and vibrated. Hope flared. Even the Doctor's eyes brightened as Pete reached for the phone and answered it as fast as his hands would let him. "Hello? Hello?" But the call had been abruptly cut.

"Who?" asked the Doctor.

Pete did not answer at first. He tried to return the call, but line and the number kept ringing and ringing. Finally, he gave up. Thoughtfully, Pete passed Doctor his hand phone so he could see the caller ID for himself.

"Rose," sighed the Doctor in relief. His body lost a bit of its tension, but it wasn't long before the Doctor looked up again, his eyes glittering, his jaw set.

"That second creature. It was wearing a ring like this one. And it was smart. Not as brilliant as me, of course, but smart. That's what we're up against."

Pete took his phone back from the Doctor, considering this as he watched the shadows around them deepen—the sun was finally setting on this long, long day. Not that tonight would bring them much rest.

"I think we'll be looking at a hostage trade soon enough," said Pete.

On the other side of the blinding light, Rose had also raised her hands to shield her eyes. Amidst the deafening noise, she had wondered if her time had come. That maybe now, that she had found the Doctor, her luck had run out and it was time to go. Time to die. Maybe the light was the light at the end of the tunnel. She'd see everyone she'd ever lost, and now would have to park her arse in multiverse heaven waiting for eons for the two Doctors to join her.

That thought actually made her a little mad. There was only so much waiting a girl could be expected to tolerate.

When she opened her eyes and lowered her arms, she did not expect to see the scene she'd just left. She was still in the restricted area in the London Zoo. Security men were still there, though the zoo director was unconscious on the ground; her father was furious, and the Doctor... the Doctor was standing still, shock on his face, his knuckles white, looking very small and alone.

Rose looked down at the ground, expecting to see her body in pieces. She'd seen the director's shot gun pointed at her when it had gone off. But she wasn't lying on the ground. She was standing, in a different position from before. And it seemed no one could see her.

"Hello?" She could still talk. "Hey! I'm here!" she called.

They cannot hear or see you. We're in an invisibility shield that dampens our voices to the world outside.

Rose whirled around toward, paradoxically, the voice in her head. And saw the black earth elemental towering over her. Its eyes and the ring on its finger glowed. They stood in a different place from before.

I'm sorry for the bright light and the din, The creature continued. It was to cover the earth shifting to get us out of harm's way. So yes, you are still alive.

That was a relief. Rose reached for her phone. Quickly, she dialled the first number at the top of her phone list—her father's. But as soon as she got a dial tone, sudden sparks from the phone burned her fingers and caused her to drop it. She looked up at the black elemental. The creature's eyes glittered.

No spoiling the illusion of our 'death', please. I would like to see how they act without our presence.

"But my father and the Doctor... look, we were trying to help you!"

Yet you hold my beloved in an iron cage.

"We did that for its protection as much as ours. We meant no harm! Look, the men with guns are leaving. You've foiled them. Turn the shield off."

The creature looked at her impassively. Rose did not want to call it a stony look—that would be such an awful pun. Helplessly, she turned to watch her father and the Doctor. Each man was quiet—her father strong and resolute; the Doctor, jittery, casting his eyes in every direction for clues and signs. In his hands, the silver ring.

Rose had a sudden idea. She formed a thought in her head. A simple thought. A loud thought. One that would be easy for the Doctor to hear.

No, said the earth elemental.

"What?"

No thoughts of yours will reach him through this shield without my consent.

"Look," said Rose, a little gently. "You have a beloved? I have one too. It's that man, there. And we can help you."

The creature looked questioning. Can one such as you love a man with so much darkness in his heart?

The creature's words took a few seconds for Rose to process. She knew the Doctor had tragedy and violence in his past—she loved him nonetheless; they had made him what he was today. She didn't need to know every detail when she would forgive them all. So...

"One such as me?" she asked.

I have chosen you to communicate with. I trust none of your kind, as they have harmed... so many, so grievously in the past. And even now, your kind harms everything around them, and they harm their own as well. But you were willing to put yourself in danger to prevent harm to me.

"My kind... you mean us humans."

The creature nodded assent.

"And what are you?"

You called us earth elementals. That is not far from the truth, and will suffice.

"Well, it is a mouthful. What do you call yourselves? What is your name?"

We are also 'giants'.

Rose clapped her hand over her mouth in surprise and realisation. Of course! They'd found the first ring at the Giant's Causeway.

My name is –

Rose clapped her hands over her ears as they filled with the deafening avalanche sound of the giant's name. But it was no use. The creature was talking directly into her head, and somehow, it would seem his name was untranslatable. And very loud.

"Aurgh," said Rose, when the giant had finished speaking. "I'm sorry, but can I call you Al instead?" She was half joking.

I will think on this.

Rose returned her attention to the Doctor and Pete Tyler. The groundskeeper had returned with a key; he handed this to Pete after offering it to the Doctor, who had looked at it as if it was nothing he had seen before. The half-alien seemed in a daze. Pete laid a gentle hand on his shoulder, and whatever he said to the Doctor was too low for Rose to catch. Then Pete got on the phone, walking a distance away to give the Doctor a bit of privacy. Rose tried to contain her disappointment, knowing what was going to happen next: Pete would take the Doctor and the captive elemental back to Torchwood, possibly not to the Tower but to one of their "abandoned" warehouses in the outskirts of London, away from public eyes.

"We were about to set your beloved free," said Rose, not tearing her eyes away from her Doctor. "That's what you want, isn't it? Then that stupid man came with the guns. We didn't intend that to happen. You have to let me go. We'll do whatever you want, whatever you need us to do. You came for your beloved, didn't you?"

And the ring. It's what she wanted. What she had lost. What she came for.

"We were about to return it as well! You can see my mind, can't you? You must know I'm telling the truth."

"Rose." It was the Doctor speaking. His voice was low. It sent shivers down Rose's spine. She walked toward him, as close as she could get until there was a strong command from the earth elemental not to get any closer. The Doctor stood ten feet away.

"I'm here, Doctor," Rose whispered. "Even if you can't see or hear me."

"Stay safe," said the Doctor. "I won't lose you, not now." His shining eyes gazed straight at Rose. Straight through her.

"Okay," said Rose weakly.

Pete approached and put his hand gently on the Doctor's shoulder. "Time to go, lad."

Rose turned around to look at the black elemental. "Let me speak to them. I can find out where they're going!" she said urgently before turning around again to watch the Doctor nodding slowly.

"Did you just call me 'lad'?" asked the Doctor.

Pete looked a little sheepish. "It slipped out, Doctor. It could have been worse...I said it because the other word that was coming might have scared you off."

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. It was the last expression Rose saw on his face before the Doctor, Pete, and the caged elemental faded out of view and out of her hearing. The teleport from Torchwood One had kicked in.

Rose cursed under her breath and retrieved her hand phone off of the ground where she had dropped it. She tried to make a call, not caring what the black elemental would do. But the batteries on the phone were dead. The elemental had drained the batteries.

I am sorry.

Rose looked at the elemental in hurt fashion. "I thought you said you trusted me."

I said I trusted none of your kind. I just mistrust you a little less.

"What now, then?"

You are my captive until my beloved is free and in possession of her own ring again.

"You'll find us willing to do that, I think. We were going to do that."

Perhaps so. We will see. And we will converse somewhere safer than this.

To Rose's surprise, the black elemental moved gracefully as it stretched out its arm and lowered its hand to the ground before her feet. It was an invitation to step into its massive grasp. Rose looked at it hesitantly.

Trust goes both ways, Rose, said the elemental. The way we are travelling would damage humans and any beings with soft flesh. I think your beloved would prefer you unharmed, am I correct?

Rose smiled as the thought occurred to her that this was the new way of taking the Underground. She stepped carefully onto the giant's palm, as large as an oversized armchair. The black glass was as smooth and hard up close as it looked from afar. For better purchase, she found herself sitting inside its palm and holding on to its fingers. She squealed as the giant lifted her through the air and in front of its chest and used its other hand to cup around her gently. This had to be what small animals felt like when they were being held by humans, Rose thought, except human hands were probably more comfortable.

I can't help that, said the elemental, reading her mind. But I can do this.

The world disappeared in a cacophony of grinding noises as the earth elemental took Rose into the ground.

"It slipped out, Doctor. It could have been worse...I said it because the other word that was coming might have scared you off," said Pete Tyler.

The world turned white then as Torchwood teleported them according to Pete's instructions. When the Doctor could see again, they were alone in the middle of a cavernous warehouse. Its interior was dimly lit. The huge cage that held the first earth elemental actually looked small in this space.

"Ah, here we are then," said Pete in relief.

"You were saying?" prompted the Doctor.

"Saying what?" Pete asked elusively. He walked to the side of the warehouse and found the panel of switches that controlled the lights. When he flicked some on, the bright lights only served to better illuminate the Doctor's questioning expression as Pete suddenly found himself face-to-face with the tall, and very thin, man. Damnit.

"You were going to call me something else before you said 'lad'. So what was it?"

Pete Tyler, head of Torchwood One, actually blushed. "'Son', okay?" he blurted to the Doctor. "I was going to call you 'son'. Go on, laugh, and tell me how many hundreds or millions of years old you are."

The Doctor actually looked stunned, then he smiled, then he look pained. It was better than the mocking reaction that Pete had expected, so he simply shrugged, and set to pulling off the canvases covering the furniture and equipment along the walls of the warehouse. Before long, he found a couple of office chairs that he rolled up next to the elemental's cage.

"Have a seat, Doctor."

The Doctor dropped into a chair like a puppet with its strings cut. Now that Pete could look at him under the bright lights of the warehouse, he supposed "son" had not been too inappropriate for his instincts. The Doctor's hair was mussed, his clothes too large, and his face and build did give him the air of someone young, even if his memories literally stretched over eons. He was gazing at the captured elemental, which had been surprisingly silent all this time since the gunshot at the zoo.

"You were right, you know," said the Doctor. "Back there. Saying that Rose is okay. I should have figured it out. Look at this—" he gestured at the earth elemental. "It didn't react at all when the shot hit. And it was fairly vocal while distressed before. Now this."

The elemental watched them, its eyes bright and alert. Pete had to agree. Its silence was not born of despair. It was waiting, watchful.

Pete sat down next to the Doctor. "Back there, before we were interrupted by the guy I punched out—"

"Good show, that."

"—Thanks, but, we were talking about giving this creature its ring back. Should we? Rose did mention she couldn't use it, which would seem to hint it doesn't respond to human commands."

"Well, human brains aren't built for it... or, well, I should say aren't trained for it; some talented individuals here and there claiming to have psychic ability might be able to wield it, but this would be useless in the hands of most humans." The Doctor leaned forward, considering. "But in the hands of these creatures, these rings could do more, much more." He looked at Pete. "You saw what happened back there. I think we were all victims of a glamour."

"A glamour?"

"And I don't mean your televised BAFTA ceremonies and your diamonds and your red carpet, I mean the older meaning of the word. A spell, an enchantment. An illusion that we believed."

"What illusion?"

The Doctor seemed to be figuring it out as he spoke. "Aurgh!" he suddenly grabbed his hair. "That was it! They were still there! The ring casts illusions. It can make things visible and invisible. All the other creature had to do when the shot was fired was hide itself using its ring! And it hid Rose as well. It moves fast, and I said it was smart."

"But it's still holding her captive."

"We have something it wants. Its friend here. Locked in a cage that hurts them to touch. And it seems this creature here won't go anywhere without its ring..."

The Doctor drew the silver band out of his pocket and gazed at it. When it was not glowing, it looked like an ordinary piece of silver. "A ring," he mused. "A ring of power. Dangerous in the wrong hands..." He looked at the elemental. "If I gave you this, you'd find a way to just escape and go back where you came from, won't you?" The elemental's eyes glittered. "But your friend now has something I want, too. I can't return this till I get her back."

The elemental moaned.

"And if your friend won't talk to me, I'll have to try something else. Perhaps we can fight illusion with illusion."

Pete Tyler could only watch as the Doctor closed his eyes and the ring started glowing in his hands.

Rose should have realised this earlier, but travelling underground was a lot darker than she had imagined. She was well-protected from soil and rocks while sitting inside the giant's cupped hands, but sand and small stones occasionally got through and pelted her. Dust was everywhere; she had to breathe through the cloth of her shirt. Sight was useless—travelling underground seemed all about darkness and grinding noises and abrasion. But they seemed to be moving fast. She just didn't know where they were going.

We're here.

She heard a last shattering of rocks before there was silence and cooler air hitting her skin. She felt the giant's hands unfolding and blinked her eyes, mindful of the dust particles on her lashes. She shook herself off and felt sand fall from her hair and clothing. The light where they were was dim—as her eyes adjusted, she saw they were in a huge, deep cavern, and had come through a tunnel in one side. Far above, there was a small hole open to the purple sky of late evening. A few stars twinkled above her. Somewhere in the darkness of the corners of the cavern, there was the faint sound of a stream.

After some coughing, Rose managed to ask: "Where are we?"

Somewhere safe.

All this cavern needed, Rose decided, was a few winged mammals and a Batmobile. Rose stepped carefully off the giant's hands and gratefully stretched her legs. But she had had a long day and it wasn't long before she sat down and leaned tiredly against a rock. She was exhausted and she missed her bed, and most of all she missed the Doctor. It all seemed so stupid. This had all resulted from misunderstandings and bad luck and bad timing.

"How long will you keep me here?" she asked, though she was approaching the point where she was too tired to care anymore.

As long as needed.

The cavern brightened just a little as the giant's ring started giving off a red light.

The Dark One is trying to find you, said the giant.

The Dark One? "You mean the Doctor?"

That is not his true name.

Rose was silent, trying to listen, both with her ears and in her head. But the only voice she heard was her own and the elemental's. "You're still blocking all contact for me, aren't you?" asked Rose finally.

He is using the ring. He will not return it to my beloved.

"He might if you let me talk to him," snapped Rose. "I'll find out where he is. We can go to him, sort everything out. I know this may sound old, but this is all just a huge misunderstanding."

The creature did not answer. Rose turned to look at it. When it was still, and seen against the wall of the cavern, it seemed part of its surroundings, part of the Earth. Its eyes appeared to be closed.

"You said before that trust goes both ways," said Rose.

The ways of Man are always deceitful.

"So did you lie to me too when you said that? Does that make you any better?"

Silence, child. I am thinking.

Rose sighed as she lay back on the floor of the cavern and tried to make herself comfortable. She was glad that at least the cavern was open to the stars, and she kept her eyes on the sky. If the Doctor was trying to reach her, he would hear nothing but silence. He would give up, and maybe then he would try something else... maybe return the ring and let the other elemental go free. Rose didn't know what would happen to her then, but somehow the Doctor would find her. He had to.

Oddly, the sky seemed to be snowing.

Rose blinked. It was summer, wasn't it? Well, late-spring-early-summer, but it still should not have been snowing, unless they were in Alaska or Australia. What time was it in Australia? Panic gripped Rose for a moment before it eased. There was nothing she could do about it right now.

She tried to relax again as she watched the snowflakes fall, swirling in the air and glittering in the faint starlight. And as they fell down to touch her, she felt nothing. Nothing at all. It was beautiful but strange. She raised a hand to catch a snowflake, and tried to swallow her surprise as it fell through her flesh. Suddenly the cavern was filled with glowing white crystals, all falling slowly, twinkling as they spiralled down. The snowflakes multiplied the precious light in the darkness, turning into small, shining white flowers as they touched the floor of the cavern.

Rose slowly drew a breath in, and found that she was crying.

It hadn't taken long for the Doctor to find Rose and the second elemental using the ring. Not that the black elemental hadn't made it difficult—all attempts at communicating with either the elemental or Rose yielded no answers. The Doctor's attempts at contact were being ignored or blocked—possibly both. But the second elemental had a second ring, and the Doctor found that using one ring to find another was no problem at all—even now, he felt a pull underground, to somewhere north and west of his current position. It was so simple it even took him by surprise.

"I know where they are," he murmured to Pete, while keeping his eyes closed. He considered what he could do. The pull was just a feeling, not specific enough for him to be able to pinpoint the source on a map, or to calculate its coordinates with his brilliant time lord mind. By the time he could find and travel to the other ring's exact location underground by feel, the elemental could move somewhere else, more quickly than the Doctor could follow. It would seem the earth was truly the creature's element.

Still, he concentrated on the pull of the other ring, letting his mind follow the thread of energy that linked them both. As he did, pieces of the rings' origins were revealed to him as well: They had been made at the same time, long ago, from the same metals, by the same creator—and they had also been bequeathed to the two earth elementals at the same time, as far as the Doctor could tell. There had been a ceremony where they had been presented, and the earth elementals had placed the rings on each other's fingers in the presence of the ring's maker and others...

"They're handfasting rings," said the Doctor aloud, speaking as much to himself as to Pete Tyler. No wonder the captive creature had been so eager to regain the ring—not just for the its powers but for its personal history as well. "I'm sorry," whispered the Doctor to the elemental in the cage before him. "I'm so sorry. But I need it to find Rose..."

The elemental moaned softly. The Doctor kept his eyes closed. Pete was silent, and the silence in the warehouse grew so complete that the Doctor found it easy to push it entirely into the background of his mind, and concentrate on the position of the other ring. It was underground, yes. It was no longer moving either. Its wearer's mind was behind a wall, stubbornly shutting the Doctor out. He had tried to shout at it and mentally blast it; he had begged before it but it had all come to naught... he got the feeling that the other elemental was adamantly averse to him for some reason, and would not allow any mental contact.

So the Doctor tried illusion. He used the pull of the other ring as an anchor, a target at which he would project the images he wanted Rose to see—it would be a one-way visual contact, but better than nothing. It was the only way he could think of for getting through. If mind-to-mind communication was not allowed, and he wanted to send Rose some kind of assurance, he could use the ring in his possession to cast illusion.

He started simply, making a guess that Rose, being underground, would miss seeing the sky. He smiled as he thought first of snow—the "snowfall" that he and Rose had watched that Christmas after defeating the Sycorax, the happy memory of elation and new energy running through his regenerated body after his recovery, and the knowledge that Rose accepted him and wanted to keep travelling with him. So he made the snow fall for her... a small sprinkle at first, tiny flakes that would twinkle for her. He wanted her to remember that Christmas, and also remember the ice flakes that had fallen down upon them on the Bohdin planet, and the time he had brought her to the double-planet in the Vydiren system to watch the annual flower fall, when the two planets that revolved around each other pulled closer to cause flowers from one to fall to the other...

Concentrating, the Doctor made the illusion grander, even though he had no idea if it would all fit the space that Rose and the other elemental occupied—for Rose, he would fill the whole sky with snowflakes that never made her feel cold, and fields with flowers that never aged or faded. For her, he painted galaxies of stars that he had wanted to show her but never got to; a world with trees that bore silver leaves that rang softly in the breeze, red-purple grass and burnt orange skies—the open fields of Gallifrey, the home to which he could never return. He had no home planet and no TARDIS now, but with this ring he projected his memories, and with a smile, he realised he could imagine and embellish as well. He might not be able to touch Rose but falling flowers would caress her. He made the purple grass bow to her beauty and imagined the gentle blades tangling their fingers in her hair. Silver leaves flying and tumbling and teasing her eyes with hidden messages. Golden light from multiple setting suns shining upon her skin. He imagined all this; and knew all the travelling, all the sights they'd seen before had all been for her. Moments and memories made more beautiful because of her being there with him. He'd been in love with her for so long... why had he ever tried to deny it? And if they could no longer travel as they once had, if he could not speak, then he could paint images now: Sights that they had seen, sights that he had seen, visions that he had always wanted to share with her. This was the way he loved her, had always loved her, would always love her, for ever.

He was using illusions to paint the truth.