A/N: Just saw Doomsday. :Heavy sigh.: Not fair. I think I might just treat that episode the way I do Star Trek: Nemesis. I refuse to accept it!
Yeah. I know. I haven't any choice because the BBC owns it, not me.
Hold On To Life
By
Lariel Romeniel
Chapter Eight – After
Later, much later…
After that first kiss led to more kisses…
After he'd nibbled and licked at the nape of her neck and found that it was as delicious as it had looked….
After he had explored Rose with lips and hands and had been explored in return…
After he'd swept her up and carried her off to his bedroom, navigating by sheer instinct as he kept their mouths glued and their tongues tangled…
After she'd growled in frustration at the buttons and cufflinks on his clothing, making him grin in delight…
After she slipped her robe from her shoulders, making him gasp in wonder…
After the desperate, fierce passion of their first joining…
After the sweet, tender slowness of their second…
Much later, she reached up and brushed his hair back as he shifted his weight off of her and settled his lean body next to her. "All right there?" she asked in a whisper. He gave her the mad grin she loved so much and ducked his head down to kiss her. "Definitely all right," he said. She grinned back and pulled his head down for another kiss, running her hand down his body in a manner intended to rekindle his interest. He chuckled into her mouth and pulled back. "Rose, how much of that wine did you drink?"
She thought for a moment, then shook her head. "Don't know. I really liked it, so….I think a lot. You said it wouldn't hurt me. Wouldn't even give me a hangover."
He grasped her wandering hand and pulled it up to his lips, kissing it to ease her disappointment. "That explains it. You should be exhausted by now," she giggled at him, "but you're too loaded up on theobromine and caffeine. Those stimulants could keep you going for hours longer."
She arched an eyebrow at him. "Sounds good to me!"
His eyes danced with mirth. "And of course chocolate is an aphrodisiac. Particularly effective with one Rose Tyler. I'll have to remember that." He kissed her on the forehead and started to slide away from her warmth. She caught his hand. "Where are you off to?'
He smiled and turned her hand to lay a gentle kiss into the palm. "Be right back. I'm going to move the TARDIS back into the time vortex before some curious Trakenite discovers us."
He slid out of the bed. She followed, wrapping a sheet around herself. He went to the console and began pressing buttons. Rose was leaning against the corridor entry, watching him with a grin.
"What's that look for?" he asked with a raised eyebrow. She had started to giggle, and answered, "All this time we've been traveling together, I never, ever thought I'd see you flying the TARDIS naked!"
He quirked an eyebrow at her. "Told you before, Rose. Never say never ever." He reached a hand out to her. "C'mere."
She stepped into his arms, letting the sheet fall to the grating below. They quickly became too involved to notice the flashing of the TARDIS sensors, indicating the arrival of another timeship.
Not far away, in a place called the Grove, a statue suddenly appeared with a wheezing, grinding noise. Inside it, a crippled man smiled through cracked, blackened lips. "Found you. I have you at last, Doctor." He limped to the doors of his TARDIS, and found that he could not open them. His ship had calcified, the doors shut solidly.
The Master threw back his head and screamed in outrage. "DOCTOR!"
Inside a blue police box that wasn't really a police box, the Doctor tore his lips away from Rose's for a moment to push the lever that would send his TARDIS back into the vortex. When the time rotor started moving he looked back at her, framing her face with his hands and staring into her eyes. As she gazed back, Rose saw it again. What she had seen so fleetingly at the ball, now burning openly in his eyes.
It was love.
-End-
A/N: And so our visit to Traken is complete. I thought about an epilogue about Tremas and Larana, but I think we've all had enough sadness today.
I hope this story inspires you to check out "The Keeper of Traken" which is an excellent example of the Tom Baker era.
Just a couple of extra notes on where my ideas came from. The chocolate/berry wine is based on a chocolate port made by a winery here in my southern California town. And the Doctor's intense, loving gaze is based on something I saw at that winery once: the owner gazing at his wife so intensely and lovingly it gave me delightful chills. Every woman should be looked at that way.
Thank you to everyone who reviewed. I am truly, truly touched by all your kind words and enthusiasm for this little idea that popped into my head and insisted on being written.
