Prologue

The corridors of the TARDIS were long and often winding depending on her mood but bright and with the promise of a new wonder instead of a new nightmare around the corners. They were on a long straight flight, flying what the Doctor had cheekily called "NoWhen". The reason for their journey was to restore the chronomitic particles in the Doctor's genetic make-up, and to completely replace them in the case of Nyssa who now slept under the influence of the delta wave inducer to allow them to build up faster. Tegan, for her part, was enjoying the sanity and quiet and the need to put off their next adventure. This trip would end on a nameless world where parrots and butterflies would compete to impress them. Tegan had wandered into the pool area of the TARDIS, then past the library, and past the garden but then turned around and went back into it, stretching out on the cool grass and looking up at a synthesized pink and lavender sky. For her it was an alien world somewhere that was steeped with a permanent sunset. Safe and still tired in spirit, Tegan slept, and… dreamed.

The walls and the floor around her seemed made of mist, drawing slowly and warmly over her bare legs, swirling in her wake as she walked as if on a cloud and the sunset still loomed above her. She hadn't felt this peaceful even as a child and it was a relief after the darkness and the madness and the fear of the past weeks, one that counterbalanced it completely. She would have to come here again after their next adventure. Smiling as she strolled through the gentle oblivion, she didn't seek it out when she heard a voice from nowhere, knowing it wasn't a threat and what she could hear were not words but impressions, fleeting glances and feelings and intent. Her name, the Doctor laying on the ground on Earth, a man with curly hair and massive scarf, and then her Doctor caught in the throes of regeneration trauma, the cliffs of Castrovalva, the Urbankans, a dead Cyberman at her feet, Adric, then the TARDIS on the streets of Amsterdam, as much a home as if she'd gone back to the farm. She got another sudden impression, one of apology, and then seven clear words that brought her awake. 'I wanted you here. He was right.'

Tegan lay on the ground for several minutes more, breathing loudly before she sat up. She looked down at her hand when something tickled it not consistent with the grass and saw the tiny cable being pulled back into the ground, and knew right away it was one of the telepathic circuits of the TARDIS. She grabbed it just before it disappeared and in the moment of connection gave the TARDIS six simple words back. 'Thank you. It's where I belonged.'

She found the Doctor where she always did on these long trips if he wasn't repairing something in the console room, stretched out in the library looking none the worse for wear, his spectacles on his nose as turned the pages in a long, heavy volume. A simulated fire burned for no reason but atmosphere in the fireplace close to where he sat. It gave off what felt like very real heat and a pleasant smoky scent, all of it perfectly real except it wasn't. Tegan watched the Time Lord for several moments, knowing he knew she was there before she spoke. "What are you reading?"

He didn't look up for a moment, then dropped in a book mark and clapped the tome shut. "If a dimension existed where such things did happen, I think I'd like to visit Hogwarts."

Tegan grinned and felt her red skirt hike as it rode up her legs when she sat down on the tan leather ottoman under his feet. "That boy gets in more trouble than you almost."

"Well, then perhaps we ought to change your name to Hermione."

Tegan laughed, they both did, but then shook her head. "No thanks, I don't have brains or the work ethic. I've run off to join the Galactic circus instead of hunting down another job and paying bills."

"Oh, you earn you keep, don't doubt that." The Doctor brought his legs down and sat forward, "I escaped to Hogwarts for my own reasons, Tegan. To not think for a while because I've been thinking too much."

"Nearly dying will do that to you. I guess when you were threatened with regeneration before you didn't have so much time to think about it."

"Well, I knew the stakes the last time, the likelihood but there was always a chance. The Time Lords allowed me to appear to my prior self to be of some reassurance of the potential survival of the Universe. I was quite the harbinger, wasn't I?"

Tegan shrugged slowly, "Well, with all I've seen, that's still the weirdest day of my life."

The Doctor leaned forward farther so that their legs were touching, "And the one where I saw what potential you would have if you stayed."

She started to give him a snappy answer back but then realized it wasn't the time. Instead she turned toward him and folded her arms on her knees. "That thinking that you were doing, is it thinking that you want to talk about?"

"No," he answered after a moment, his eyes hazel in the golden firelight. "Thinking that I want to act about actually; it's time to contemplate only the future for once, and not how it relies so much on the past."

Tegan didn't move when his hand slid forward to take her own, simply let him have it, his skin warmed by the fire to nearly the touch of her own. He twisted it so that their fingers interlaced and they each made the effort to join their other hands. Tegan kept hers from tightening carefully, letting him lead, and then realizing he was waiting for her. She lifted his right hand in her own and kissed it, a chaste and gentle effort that made him close his eyes and smile. A moment later she slid onto the sofa beside him, hoping she wasn't misreading the whole situation. She took the chance that she wasn't and let go of his hands so that she could reach for the hem of his sweater. It was gone in moments and with his help.

Certain now she knew what he wanted, Tegan raised to her knees and leaned forward to kiss him, only the Doctor's head was still down and she ended up kissing the bridge of his nose to tilt it upright. She heard the slow half–gasp as she did and moved down quickly enough that her mouth covered his as it hung just slightly open, using her own lips to spread his more. His hands went slowly to her shoulders and she let him move her closer. They continued back until she was fully on top of him and they struggled gently for a moment to remove their shoes, laughing for the first time.

Tegan lifted up when he reached for the clasp holding her bright red and white blouse, pushing up to straddle him as the skirt slid up her legs. "Oh, no, a couple of hundred years in the paper, I get to unwrap things first…" Her fingers fell onto the buttons he had so shyly protected on the exam table and this time she moved without interference, opening the buttons but not spreading the shirt. Tegan lifted her hips and pulled the rest of it from his trousers and only when every button was undone did she pull him upright and slide the cool fabric from his shoulders, glancing with a quick smile at the question marks on the collar as she tossed it to the floor. She was going to have a few questions answered tonight, that was certain. She caught his hands when he sat partially up, his long arms glistening gold as they reached for her. Tegan let him pull her down for one long, slow kiss, his lips cool against her own but soft.

The Doctor slid back and propped himself up against the pillows on the couch, a feeling far more comfortable than the smooth leathery surface of the sofa. Tegan followed him, still dressed and he reached for the snaps of her blouse and undid one before she stretched his hands out over his head. He left them there as she lightly traced her fingers on the insides of his arms, feeling his flesh tighten and looking down to see his eyes roll back toward the wall and the fire. "You're ticklish. Who'd've thought?"

He took a thin breath and looked up at her. "It's not so much that as being touched at all. It's been a considerable… well, two of your lifetimes. The mind can hold figures but the flesh forgets after so much deprivation."

"Is that a request for mercy or a clever way of saying you're a virgin again?"

The Doctor's eyes opened slightly and he looked up at the Human woman, "Actually, I think I was a bit more confident the first time." Tegan shook her head slowly then returned to where she'd been before pulling out his shirt, lowering herself onto his slender hips. She elicited a gasp from them both as she met the new swelling in his groin. He smiled and started lowering his arms, only to have Tegan restrain him again, gently and with a horribly innocent smile. She lifted her hips, still concealed in the loose but short red skirt and moved back. "No, no, a few centuries you've gone, you can wait a moment more. I'll do all the work. You just … relax."

"That sounds ambitious on your part, Tegan, and impossible on mine. I believe I've been tortured by people kinder than you." He ground his teeth but kept his hands where they were, folded above his head, a twinkle in his eyes that Tegan lost sight of as she lowered her head to kiss him again. He lay still and relaxed save where she touched him. She explored him gently, indulgently, awed by the knowledge that she was pleasuring a man who had been decades without intimacy. She tested his patience for several minutes and then let him grip her shoulders.

She teased him with the kisses as he held her, keeping him distracted until the hand that had been bracing her upright, one now fiercely hot, fell for the first time onto his abdomen. The muscles clenched beneath her hand and she had to fight to keep him from rising but her mouth was her first line of defense as she pushed him back and he broke contact after a moment, gasping. "That was unfair."

"Who's interested in being fair? How often does a woman have a man at her disposal who's waited this long? I could be terrible and you wouldn't know." She undid the first snap on his trousers to cut off his denial and his hips jerked. "Oh, touchy. Well, Doctor, in the past few days you've needed me as a scrub nurse and a heating pad, I think we'd better have a good look at you before you try anything fancy." He answered something that was lost in her mouth, against her exploring tongue, and grunted wordlessly as the second button of his trousers was opened and she released the rest of the closure.

Tegan straightened, moving to kneel between his legs and preventing him from following her, still in slight disbelief that after all these years this was happening. Her chaste and gentlemanly Doctor was lying before her, slightly flush and nearly erect, and she had been the one to break down the barriers that had held him for so long. Rassilon might be a lot of things but he hadn't been a match for a simple Earth woman.

Her awed stare lingered a few moments more than it should have. He reached for her again and she caught his hands and put them down at his sides. He understood what she needed when she took hold of his trousers and he braced his hands to lift his hips so that she could slide them off. She caught him unawares at the last moment, and one finger of each hand suddenly looped up to catch the band of his shorts as he pushed upward. With his buttocks flexed, his hips were even more compact and she relieved him of both his trousers and shorts in the same movement. Erect and twitching slightly, his penis stood up from the dark gold thatch of hair. Tegan lowered her mouth to his again so that he could have a moment where he knew she was keeping her eyes to herself. She slowly rested a hand on his chest and cocked her ear toward him. "Well, your hearts are beating a little fast for you, you're gasping for breath just a bit, and you seem to have a lot of tension and swelling."

"Oh really? I'm glad I'm in such good hands. Do you have treatment in mind?" The Doctor's head was thrown back against the stacked pillows and a fine sheen of moisture had appeared on his body. Tegan had never seen him actually sweat before and her mind danced with several possibilities as her hand traveled the trim line of his chest and lifted his hands to the snaps of her blouse. He undid them with equal slowness, admiring her as she hovered over him, warmth radiating from her equal to the fire.

Tegan straightened to shed the blouse and reached a hidden hand behind her still-present skirt that tickled against his clenched stomach. "Oh, I think I'll have to get much more personally involved in the cure, as long as you're up for it." Her concealed fingers stroked him unexpectedly on the underside of his penis and he bucked and gasped beneath her.

"Tegan, how could you? Oh dear, oh dear, not yet, not just from--." The thighs that had convulsed up against her buttocks slowly fell back onto the sofa as he regained control. Tegan looked down at him with a bit of sudden sympathy. She stood for a moment and divested herself of skirt and her panties, then sat down on the edge of the wide tan sofa, her eyes on the Doctor as his chest moved slowly and his body gleamed. He moved to take her hand when he became aware of her waiting beside him, the scent of her arousal driving his own. His eyes focused on her slowly after they opened. "Is something wrong?"

Tegan ran her hand down his bare face and this time her arousal nearly tripled as she came in contact with the sheen of moisture on his skin. She fought her way back from almost being dizzy with it then turned his face toward her. "Nothing's wrong. I just wanted to know… are you sure?"

His eyes locked onto the Human woman's with intensity that she hadn't felt when he'd entered her mind to fight the Mara. He pulled her into a kiss that left her little doubt and she slowly lifted her right leg over his waist and eased herself over him. His skin was cool and smooth but slick, his muscles tight but this time with healthy, normal tension. He was propped up against the thick pillows, waiting with incomprehensible patience, wincing and starting with every new touch, but smiling in between. All the while his eyes never left the Australian's as she reached down to stroke him gently and slowly, as if he were fine china. His legs tensed and spread as she leaned back and rested against them, letting him control her descent as she took him within her, welcoming the small sting of pain as he entered. The Doctor's eyes remained upon hers as she slowly descended. His hands twisted into the fabric of the pillows on either side of him to keep their inhuman strength from harming her as he vented the tension of her most intimate touch. A long moment passed before the Doctor called her name roughly and slowly then arched up into her arms as she began to move.

Tegan was aware of little else at first, only how large and strong he was within her, of his strangely cool yet familiar breath against her breasts, his gasps and thrusts, and her own heat. It took a moment to realize she was sensing something else, a presence, a small stream of contentment and passion that was not her own. She spared a bit of concentration and reached toward it as she had reached for the TARDIS in the tunnels of Ecosia Beta. When she did she was rewarded with the doubling of her own pleasure, for she felt not only her own but that of the Gallifreyan and the tears fell from her eyes as she felt his joy at being with and within her and shared her own in return. Their minds linked emotionally as tightly as their bodies were physically, they moved together in the firelight and knew the other as well as themselves.

Tegan felt his rush of pleasure and her own at her first orgasm, and settled down from it breathing so hard that the fringe on the mantle cloth fluttered several feet away from them. She relaxed the internal muscles gripping him and stroked his gleaming shoulders as she continued to straddle him, a sudden touch of disappointment in her eyes as she realized his erection had not waned. "You didn't…? I thought you had."

The Doctor's head fell back for a moment as he followed her lead and slowed, "No, you were right. I did, but Gallifreyan's are different in that respect, Tegan. I can reach orgasm nearly as frequently as you." A flash of deviltry entered his eyes as he looked at the surprise and then what appeared to be… greed… appearing in her own. "So, in your estimate, have I made full recovery?"

She moved on him slowly and deliberately again, and looked at him down the bridge of her nose, "Mmmph… I'm still checking. For instance, right now I can feel your pulse in the strangest place."

He was still the Doctor; he had the grace to blush just barely, only long enough for her to laugh, and then she tightened down on him again, "And I think I'll have to give you a very prolonged stress test."

"It's been seventy-odd years; I think that's in order." He quickened in rhythm with her and they lost track of time as they moved, their minds linked to the extent of Tegan's newfound abilities. She laughingly pronounced him fit and recovered the fourth time they both came together, wondering if being a Time Lord allowed him to manipulate the moments, and pitying the rest of the women on Earth who would never have a Gallifreyan man.

They settled down before the fire hours later. Tegan reclined against the stack of pillows piled up by the sofa, the throw that had been on the back of it draped over them both. The Doctor had returned out of desire where need had placed him not long ago, stretched out along Tegan's warm, firm body, only this time their flesh met along their lengths. His penis lay spent and slightly warm against her thigh, his right leg rested across both of her own. He could hear her breath and her heartbeat as he recovered from exertions that were far more pleasant than fighting the toxin had been. He could have been fine in mere seconds in the healing trance from just this but instead he was more than satisfied to restore himself under the present circumstances.

Tegan drew his attention with a gentle stroke down length of his back, "I guess we'll have to deal with 'what now' eventually, but not tonight."

The Doctor smiled and sighed, "Well, it's the middle of the day as the TARDIS clock goes but I think she kept the lights down for a reason."

Tegan grinned slightly, "She's not the jealous type-40, is she? I'm not going to' be jettisoned or anything?"

The Doctor laughed into her collarbone as she brushed his hair, slick with her sweat, from his face, "No, I shouldn't think so. I don't believe her ambitions ever extended in this direction."

"All right, I'll take that worry off my list."

"Yes, well, it's not exactly short, I'll admit but I can't promise it'll be much shorter." He lifted his head and moved back to look her in the eye, controlling it as his erection began to stir again at the friction. He wasn't sure either of them would have the strength again. "And this certainly complicates things but no regrets. I couldn't get out of my mind one of the things you said, 'what was the point of living a millennium if no one gave a damn', only remembered what mess I'd made or cleaned up."

"And that's what I get out of the deal, a man who actually is going to remember me almost forever."

"And probably longer," he answered. The Doctor eased himself closer to her and drew her into a kiss almost as chaste as one he might have given her before Ecosia Beta. "I don't know that I'll be able to resist my training eventually, to stop thinking about the consequences of allowing myself to become involved. We're supposed to observe, and correct if we find a threat to the proper order of time. We can see too much, too many alternatives, too many choices that ruin lives and worlds---."

"And only one of you I know of has had the nerve to try and stop it…. and the only other one of your lot I've met has done nothing but spread death and chaos, tried to destroy the entire Universe. Life is chance, Doctor, whether it's pushing a button to escape the Big Bang, or making love with someone when you don't know the future. You can't escape chance even if you're a Time Lord. Let's take this one and when I'm a bit too gray, if I live that long, we'll have to take our chances about what to do then, too. And as far as the rest of the Gallifrey is concerned, are they really going to be all that surprised if they find another one in your family has taken up with one of those wretched Humans?"

Chastised and satisfied, the Doctor lay back down and Tegan stared over his head into the fire, feeling as if she held the stars themselves in her arms.