Their Dance.

I don't know where this came from... I'm just putting off working on the longer fics 'cause I'm stuck on them all. Sigh.

"You just assume I don't… dance…"

There are echoes throughout time and space. The Doctor hears them all, she knows; he is them all.

There are echoes through her, running round her head at a million miles an hour.

Oh, he dances all right. To his own slow tune with his own slow strange rhythms and she can never get to sleep at night. It's like she can feel his eyes on her even in the depths of the night when he's on the other side of a ship that seems to be endless.

Everything they do now seems to fling them together, a mass of confusion and learning and awkward light touches to the surface of feelings neither of them realise are there yet.

Sometimes, in her dreams, he's there just watching her. Darkly, he says nothing, just holds her still all night with his alien's gaze. Other times not just his eyes but his hands cover every inch of her body and they dance, and she wakes aching and trapped, feeling ghosts of his kisses along her skin, kisses that never were.

And she's tired, because this dance is never-ending and she's addicted to it. To that measured space between them that never closes and never grows, holding fast to them both with the light of the stars and the darkness that she knows he keeps within him. It scares her, because she wants that darkness. She wants to hold it and feel it, because then she could be his and she'd have no need for these fragile, flighty dreams...

xXx

Rose Tyler. Dancing with her is like holding the very sun in your arms, and somehow keeping enough distance so as not to get burnt.

He's known a lot of people in his time, but no one quite like Rose Tyler. Which is not to say that she's better than any of the others, because she's not. She's as flawed as they come and she's got so much to learn. But she's unique, like a rare jewel from a world that's extinct. Irreplaceable.

And dancing with her is all at once so comfortable and safe and shattering and urgent, like if he actually closed the distance and felt her body pressed up against his the whole of time would shift into place and he'd be home, and she'd burn him beyond all control, all safety.

It hurts more than anything he could imagine now, but he can't let it go. Letting it go, he knows, would only hurt more, easing the ache in his chest but replacing it with something sharper, something treacherous to him as he lost control. It's the fear of the unknown and it's trapping him in his own desire, and he can't see a way out.

He knows exactly how it would happen though, and how easy it would be to step over the edge and let time stop moving for them. To close the space between them and let their hearts break and rebuild in each other's image. If he closes his eyes he can see her, pale skin glowing, eyes dark and trusting and on fire. He can hear the sharp, jerky intake of breath he'd cause as he drew his fingers across her skin. He can feel her hands on him, gentle in their way and yet frantic with the search for something she will never understand. And the thought of it is ripping him apart.

Because it's all about control. Over himself, over her… If he let himself close that gap, if he held her tight to him, breathed her in, made her fall apart and let her break him down to dust at the same time, he'd never be able to go back. And it'd be too much for them both. He knows instinctively how she'd give herself to him, and it scares him to have that power. It terrifies him, because she'd get under his skin like that; she'd crawl into his body and beat in his hearts and run in his blood and he wants it so much, but he doesn't trust himself to reach out and take it. He doesn't trust himself not to infect her with the darkness that he carries...

So he'll keep dancing with her, and the dance will always, always, go unfinished.

Please review :D Thank you for reading.