Thanks for the reviews so far. I've uploaded three this time, because the chapters are so short. One more chapter to come after these. Enjoy! (I hope you do!)

"I think I've cried about a million tears, done a lot of living in a few short years."

"Are you bored?"

Rose looked up from where she'd been fiddling with the rings on her fingers, leaning back in her chair, her bare feet resting on the control panel. She made an odd sight really, a teenager in her pyjamas in the control room of a spaceship. She shook her head. "No. Why?"

"Yes you are. You're bored."

"No I'm not!" Rose protested, swinging her feet onto the floor. "Honestly!"

"Rose, it's okay if you're bored," the Doctor continued. "I mean, watching me pottering around, fiddling with this and that… not exactly five star entertainment is it?"

"I like watching you," Rose said firmly. "I like being around you."

The Doctor lifted his head up from where he was looking underneath the console and flashed her a quick grin. "I like you being around too. Now, what can we do to relieve your boredom? Where do you fancy going?"

She shrugged. It was strange; for the first time ever she wasn't sure she wanted to go anywhere. She was trying to convince herself that it was nothing to do with what the Doctor had said a few days ago, but she was lying to herself. Maybe if they just stayed here, wherever here was, then things wouldn't change and that storm would never come.

"Well that's helpful," the Doctor teased. "Forwards? Backwards? Across space? I know this really nice beach on one of the rings of Saturn… nasty sandstorms though. Or we could… Rose?"

Rose forced herself to pay attention to what he was saying. "That sounds nice."

"You could be a bit more enthusiastic! I don't take just anybody to the third ring of Saturn you know!"

Rose smiled. "I know. It's just… I don't really feel like going anywhere today."

The Doctor frowned. "Are you okay? You've been very quiet for the last few days. What's wrong?"

"Nothing!" Rose faked a bright grin. "I'm brilliant. Fantastic in fact." She slipped off the chair and stood up. "I just don't really want to go anywhere else but here."

The Doctor nodded slowly and a smile spread across his face. "Okay. We'll just have to find something to do here then. What do you fancy?"

Rose was unable to resist giggling as she attempted to ask the next question. "Right, okay… first girl you had a crush on." She dissolved into fits of laughter instantly.

"Oh, come on, Rose!" The Doctor frowned and sat up. "That's a silly question!"

"You said you wanted to play!" Rose reminded him, propping herself up on her elbows. "This is the kind of game I used to play back home." She bit her tongue. "So… got an answer?"

"No!" He replied crossly. "Seriously, these questions are childish."

"I'm only nineteen, Doctor," Rose reminded him. "I was pretty childish before..." She didn't finish her sentence and her eyes dropped to the floor. The Doctor waited a long time before speaking.

"What are you thinking?"

Rose sighed heavily and lay back down on the control room floor. It was surprisingly comfortable, despite being made of sturdy steel. She gazed up at the ceiling and at the strange patterns she saw there. Light from the vortex played upon the walls and made the room seem to change colour every few seconds. It was comforting, like being encased somewhere warm and relaxing.

After a long wait, she finally replied. "I was just thinking… Me and Mickey used to play games like this all the time. You know, to pass away the boring hours before… well, before you." She smiled. "I know you don't want to hear this, but he usually had good answers for all the questions I asked him."

The Doctor had his arms wrapped around his knees as he smiled at her words. "You still miss him, don't you?"

Rose sighed again. "I don't know, I… it's not like an everyday thing or anything. I don't walk around all day thinking, oh my god, Mickey's gone, it's… It's just sometimes, I sort of forget and then it's like, oh my god, Mickey's gone." She addressed the whole speech to the ceiling, her voice soft and sad. She sat up and shook herself. "It doesn't matter really. I mean, he wanted to stay, didn't he? And it's not like I never left him, is it?"

"Sort of different though," the Doctor said softly. "You always went back to him."

"Maybe." Rose shrugged. "Maybe in body I did." Her eyes met the Doctor's for a fleeting second and then she stood up. "But anyway. If you're not going to play the game, then maybe we should do something else. I'm going to go and get changed, and when I come back, you can take me somewhere. Yeah?"

The Doctor smiled. "Yeah. Any preferences?" he added as she sauntered off down the corridor.

She held her hand up, not even turning her head. "Nope, it's all up to you."

Life with the Doctor wasn't all fun and games. Quite apart from anything else, he despised most of the games Rose ever suggested, and the ones he liked he was an expert at. The amount of times Rose had been stupid enough to believe that this time, this time, she'd triumph at chess was heading into the region of hundreds. But aside from the parlour games they played to pass some of the time they had together, Rose was always aware of a nagging feeling in the pit of her stomach. A twinge below her right eye. She sometimes had to pinch herself to realise that this wasn't a dream, she really was with the Doctor, running from God alone knew what. And sometimes even He didn't have a clue.

She knew her mum thought that she was always of gallivanting somewhere with him.

"Having the time of your life while I'm just sitting here, waiting for that phone to ring!" she'd moaned on more than once occasion. "And then you just come home and dump all your washing on me! Does that thing not have a laundry?"

And life was fun in some ways. The Doctor had opened her eyes to so many things. He'd shown her how her life could be lived, that there was more to life than eating, sleeping and going to work. She'd never had great ambitions as a child; all Rose Tyler had expected to happen was that she'd do exactly what her mum had done. And then she'd met him, the man who had taken her life over. Life was better like this.

But life was worse too. She couldn't remember crying this much since she was tiny. She'd always been strong, always the gutsy hard girl in the school yard. Since she'd been with the Doctor, she'd seen so much, too much… she was hardly the same person anymore. She felt so much older than her years; who else could have crammed all she had into a few short months? She sometimes forgot she'd had a life before the Doctor, it all seemed so surreal to believe that she'd once been a normal human, unaware that there was anything else out there.

The Doctor was her best friend, her soulmate. She knew she couldn't survive without him. Even the thought of him not being by her side tore her apart. She'd never felt like that about Mickey. She'd been devastated to leave him behind, but she wondered how much that was because she didn't want him to have adventures without her. Mickey really was living the dangerous life, away from everything he'd ever known. Mickey Smith… boring Mickey who she'd left behind for a life in the stars with the Doctor. Mickey the one person she'd always trusted, always known was on her side. She'd cried for him so many times, silently, locked in her room at night. The Doctor was her soulmate but Mickey was her best friend. He was home, he was her childhood. He was part of her. And now he was gone, forever.

She was getting old.

Lyrics from "First Love" by... Billie Piper! Buy the albums, they rule!