"That … was … AMAZING!" Rose yelled breathlessly as she and the Doctor bundled themselves back into the TARDIS after another good run. She skipped over to the console and dumped an armful of strange-looking objects down before settling herself down to inspect them all properly, a look of intense awe and excitement on her flushed face. She grinned over at the Doctor, who was busy locking the TARDIS doors. "Those roller-coasters wiped the FLOOR with Alton Towers!"
"I told you, didn't I?" said the Doctor, smiling slightly as he shoved his hands into his coat pockets and leaned against the wall.
"And that last one," continued Rose, as if she hadn't heard the Doctor, "when it went upside down and stayed there for AGES before dropping everyone out of the cars –" She leapt up and started trying to recreate the effect for the Doctor, forgetting that he had been sitting in the roller-coaster car next to her. The Doctor merely smiled a little more widely.
"Didn't I tell you?"
"And then the anti-gravity thingy kicked in," she said, stopping her frantic running and attempting to imitate a zero-gravity environment to little success, "and we was just floating around –"
"What did I tell you?"
Exhausted, Rose flopped down on the floor at the Doctor's feet and grinned up at him breathlessly.
"That … was … AMAZING!"
The Doctor grinned down at her and stepped lightly over her before bounding over to the console to clear the various souvenirs off the console.
"That's the beauty of a custom-made theme park, y'see," he said as he threw a stuffed toy at Rose in an attempt at making her get up off the floor. It didn't work. "You can control anything you want to. In this case, gravity. Marvellous, what the Jianese can do. Fancy building a whole planet just for a theme park! It beggars belief." He paused thoughtfully. "Must generate a hell of a revenue for them."
"Yeah, s'pose, whatever," Rose said sleepily, clearly not listening. The stuffed toy was far more useful as a pillow for her head than the floor was. "Whatever they did, it was amazing." She yawned widely before a thought dawned on her and she immediately became full of energy again, her eyes twinkling with excitement. "Can we go again? I wanna check out that vertical drop one again …"
"Yes, yes, if we have to," the Doctor said dismissively, frowning slightly, "although I'm not sure that last ghost train agreed with me." He patted his stomach nervously and let out a slight burp. "Probably shouldn't have eaten that fifth stick of candy floss first, admittedly, but that's beside the point …"
Rose giggled as the Doctor cleared his throat and turned to look at her, his eyebrow raised mischievously.
"Anyway," he continued, "I thought you wanted to go back to Earth for a bit?"
Rose gaped.
"What – and go on the Colossus?" she said incredulously. "After going on THAT?" She pointed towards the TARDIS doors and scoffed as the Doctor grinned. "Colossus is a stroll in the park after THAT bad boy of a roller coaster."
"So Earth is back on the waiting list for a bit?" said the Doctor, fighting to keep a grin off his face. If he knew Rose – which of course he did, having shared a close encounter with the Time Vortex with her – a trip to Earth in another time was never on the waiting list. For Rose, it was all about the time travel. She could marvel at the many different planets and space stations that the Doctor had taken her to, but if there was one thing that Rose loved more than anything was seeing her own planet's future and history. He raised an eyebrow at her. "No more Earth time travel adventures?"
"Nah," said Rose, finally getting up and walking over to her pile of souvenirs. She picked up a plastic-looking object and began to examine it. She suddenly stopped and looked up at the Doctor with a mischievous look in her eyes. "Unless …" she began.
I KNEW it, thought the Doctor triumphantly. Fighting back a grin, he leaned forward and pushed a button on the plastic object Rose was holing, causing it to change colour and jump out of Rose hands to perform a tap-dance on the console.
"Unless?" he prompted her. Rose tried to sound nonchalant as she watched her souvenir finish its dance and revert back to its original shape and colour.
"I mean … I don't wanna impose anything …" She looked up at the Doctor and forced her request out quickly, almost as if she was worried the Doctor would refuse her request. She knew he wouldn't, but it had become a little game of theirs whenever she wanted to return to Earth – just to wind the Doctor up about his claim of 'not doing Domestic' all those adventures ago. "I don't s'pose could we go back to World War Two again?" The Doctor suppressed the urge to roll his eyes as Rose continued hastily. "I mean, without the scary kids in gas masks and nanogenes and air raids and stuff. I quite liked it last time apart from all that."
"Nothing to do with Captain Jack, I suppose?" the Doctor asked cheekily, smiling at Rose as she blushed slightly.
"No, no, of course not, no!" she said hurriedly, not looking at the Doctor. He grinned.
"Methinks the lady doth protest too much," he muttered. Rose hit him on the arm and giggled. He smiled warmly at her.
"Well, I can't guarantee that there won't be any nasty surprises," he admitted, "but I'm sure we can dispense with scary kids in gas masks and nanogenes and air raids … and … stuff."
"Nice one!" said Rose, grinning widely. She watched happily as the Doctor bounded around the console, pushing buttons and holding down levers.
"Flip on the dimensional stabiliser, would you?" he said, pumping the vortex loop. Rose obliged, thankful that this new Doctor was at least that bit more polite when he let her help fly the TARDIS. As the Doctor looked at Rose, they grinned at each other.
"Second World War, here we come," he said, flipping a row of switches and turning a handle. "Any preference as to where we end up?"
"Nah, I'm good," Rose said, turning up the vector tracker at a nod from the Doctor. "You choose."
"Human generosity," chuckled the Doctor sarcastically. "Never fails to surprise me." He flicked a few more switches and grinned widely as the engines ground into life. "Hold on to your souvenir hat."