A/N: Is it just me, or do cursors look fine the way they are? It must just be me. Thanks again to everyone who reviewed. After being crushed underneath a landslide, the Doctor and Rose have a heart to heart. Kind of. Cookies for everyone who reviews!

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It was hell.

The grey slope of the mountain quivered, rippled like the surface of a pond. Snow sloshed up in great waves, and pulled away from the slope, leaving the black rock bare and exposed.

Rose could see immediately what had happened. Sheet lightning danced across the boiling clouds, and one stray bolt had crashed into the mountain's high ridge. The booming blast that followed had badly shaken the rock, triggering a landslide.

And that, roaring as it stripped the mountain side, was headed for them now.

"Move it or lose it, Rose!" the Doctor bellowed.

With his hand still gripping her arm, he ran. Water surged to their waists, mud sucked at their feet. Unseen monsters snaked around their legs.

The landslide gained speed and size with devastating ferocity, devouring the mountain face in its wide, frothy mouth. The Doctor and Rose had only a handful of seconds before it slammed down on the lake, and consumed them.

They ran. The Doctor tried to calculate how far they would need to move to be out of harm's way. Fifty yards? Sixty? The numbers he came up with were impossible. They'd never make it.

"Run, dammit!" Rose screamed at him.

He glanced at her. Thunder detonated overhead. Icy air, blown out before the landslide, slashed at them. Running through the water was impossible. The Doctor was falling behind fast.

Rose hissed through her teeth, and half-turned towards him. She grabbed his jacket, and forced him to keep up with her.

Behind them, the landslide hit the water.

The white buttresses that formed its twenty foot high front cleaved the water from the lake bed, pushing it into a tidal wave. Weakened by the warm water, and severely slowed by its opposing force, the buttresses toppled over, sending out a second wave.

Thirty yards away, the first wave swept Rose and the Doctor of their feet.

Rose, clutching the Doctor's jacket tightly, rolled under water before struggling to the surface. Half a second later, he rose up beside her.

"Don't. Drink. The. Water." He gasped. Mud poured off him in dark rivulets.

Rose had an extremely brief, extremely superfluous moment where she wondered, in horror, if she looked as bad as he did.

She didn't have time to ask. The second wave hit, knocking them both off their feet again. Rose's head went under, and she gagged on the putrid water. It was foul, like-

"Come on!"

Rose's scalp burned with sudden agony, and she felt herself being dragged up, out of the water. The Doctor let go of her hair, and regarded her somberly.

"Rose," he said.

From the corner of her watering eye, Rose saw something that made her blood run cold. The crushing bulk of the landslide, the snow and rocks that had driven the front, were blasting into the lake.

A boulder slapped into the water, only yards away. The landslide didn't seem hindered in the least by the warm water. It thundered into the lake at eighty miles an hour, flicking ten ton rocks into the air like they were nothing more than pebbles.

It was going to hit them. Rose felt strangely numb, like she was watching it all from afar.

The Doctor's voice jerked her back to reality. "Don't let go. And don't drink the water."

Rose swallowed hard. So this was it, she thought. Almost gingerly, she reached out, and took the Doctor's hand.

"I lo-"

And then the landslide hit. Roe was driven down, under the water. The Doctor's hand was torn from her grip almost instantly.

Her vision flashed green, then blue. She was being torn apart. The water ripped at her, and Rose had the impression of something huge above her head. A roar like splitting continents filled her mind.

A tremendous force dragged her backwards, so her head tipped up into the fierce current. Water filled her mouth, poured up her nose. Rose's vision flashed pink. Then, alongside the strange sensation of flying, the world turned white.

xxx

"You are an inane old thing."

Everything hurt. Arms, legs, chest. Her head in particular throbbed with a dull ache.

Rose groaned.

"Are we on the TARDIS yet?" she whispered. Her throat burned to much to speak any louder.

"Open your eyes and see." The Doctor replied, sounding excited.

Tentatively, Rose opened her eyes. Above her, there was brown. Below her, there black. Pale snow flakes drifted lazily through the sky.

"We're still here." Rose said hoarsely. She glared at the Doctor, who was looming over her, his expression cheerful. "Why did you sound so excited?"

The Doctor grinned, "Oh, I thought it might cheer you up a little."

Rose groaned again.

"Look on the bright side, ducky. We survived. You don't appear to have anything broken beyond repair. Capital effort, ey?"

The sky, though still heavy with clouds, was peaceful. For the first time in what felt like years, there was no storms, no landslides, no monsters. The only sound, aside from the soft exhalation of breath, was a gentle lapping like water splashing again a pier.

Far above them, the halo of yellow fog was still visible. Intermittently, small orange flames raced around its circumference.

"Pretty, isn't it?" the Doctor said, turning to look up at the halo, "It's hydrogen sulphide. Through the day, it covers the surface of the lake. At night, it's hot enough to rise up a hundred feet. It's been burning ever since the storm."

Something about their situation struck Rose as odd. She sat up, and glanced around.

"Where are we?" she queried.

"We're on the lake." The Doctor grinned at her, "In a nest."

A nest? Rose checked the ground beneath her. It was hard, and appeared to be constructed entirely of reeds.

The nest, if that's what it was, was close to six foot in diametre, easily big enough for her to lay down. A short lip ran around the edge. Rose peered over it. Water lapped against the base of the nest, three foot down.

"What's it a nest for?" Rose frowned. She didn't recall seeing any birds since being on Beta.

"Frogs, I'd say. Big frogs. Notice how the bottom curves down in the middle? Like a giant bowl. It's probably full of water when the frog lays her eggs." The Doctor said happily.

Rose didn't quite share his enthusiasm. As much as she liked frogs, she didn't particularly want to crawl around in their slimy nests.

Noticing her disdain, the Doctor said, "It's really quite comfortable. And safe. You wouldn't believe the time I had trying to get you up here. I had to drag you up by the hair."

Well, that explained the pain in her scalp. Rose wondered how long she'd been unconscious. Long enough for the storm to pass, at least.

The Doctor hadn't stopped talking. "This really is an amazing planet. Technically, there shouldn't be any life here at all. But here it is, flourishing. Beautiful big monsters, swarms of giants moths." He sighed contentedly, "It's just lovely."

"Lovely?" Rose fumed.

She was about to get stuck into him, when he added, as an after note to his speech, "Watch out for leeches, mind. And mites. Helminthes. Frogs carry a lot of parasites. You wouldn't want to pick any up."

Rose decided to change the subject. She didn't want to hear anything else about frogs. Her view of them as cute, charming little creatures was already severely damaged. Leeches, ew.

"Doctor. Doctor. Stop talking for a minute, will you?"

"Huh? Oh, sorry." The Doctor turned to her, face flushed. He had to decency to look embarrassed.

Rose gave him a strange look, halfway between a smile and a frown. Maybe like she thought he was funny.

"Before, just before we got hit by that landslide, you started to say something to me. What were you going to say?" she asked. It bothered her slightly that she could only speak in whispers. She didn't want the Doctor worming his way out of anything by saying he couldn't hear her.

"I." He said.

And that was it.

For nearly a full minute, the Doctor stared at her. His ears and cheeks burned beet red. His shoulders were set, stiff. A slight grimace pulled at the corner of his mouth.

"I." He said again, then gulped. The action looked almost painful, and when he spoke again, his voice was high.

"I lo- lo- loathe, uh, I loathe landslides." He blurted, "Th-they're just awful. Really bad."

"You loathe landslides." Rose said, narrowing her eyes.

"Y- yes. Don't you? Yes, I should think you do. Well, that's that sorted. Where were we? Talking about frogs, wasn't it? Frogs." The Doctor grinned manically, his eyes wide, "Salientia, also called Anura. One of the most advanced orders of amphibians in the universe. They don't have ears, you know. Not like reptiles. Frogs have a dorso-lateral fold, which senses vibrations under water. They can actually determine the distance and size of the source of the vibrations. Really amazing."

"You are unbelievable. You're the one whose flippin' amazing!" Rose cried, forgetting her sore throat, "Forget frogs! Forget landslides!"

She turned on the Doctor, who shrunk away from the heat of her anger. His eyes were still wide, but now there was a sort of terror on his face.

"If you are not going to take me seriously," Rose hissed at him, "Which you are not, then you can at least do something useful and get us off this planet. It is not beautiful. It is not fascinating. It's horrible! Now, shut up about frogs and get us out of here!"

As soon as she said it, she felt bad. But it had been a long, long day, and she wasn't about to apologise.

"Okay," the Doctor sniffed, not looking at her, "I'll get us out of here."

"Right. Good." And then, because she really did feel guilty, Rose added, "Can I help?"

"You should rest. It's been a long day. I'll keep an eye on things." The Doctor still refused to look at her.

He wasn't sure what he felt; hurt that Rose had yelled at him, or relieved she stopped him rambling. Either way, he didn't want her to see his expression.

Rose shrugged. "Alright then. Good night."

She was cold and wet, and the nest floor was hard. The Doctor stretched his legs before him, crossed at the ankle, and leant back on his elbows. Both of them watched the halo of fog.

An hour might have passed in this way, before Rose fell asleep. Snow flakes gradually built up on her shoulder and hip. The Doctor brushed it off gently. It felt good to be lazy, to pretend to be a little normal, after such a trying day.

The Doctor smiled to himself. Although he didn't think anything would ever happen between them, it was still nice to pretend sometimes.

With a sigh, he laid down next to her.

Tomorrow, they would find the TARDIS. Then they would sleep all afternoon, and go to earth for the evening to eat. Everything would be back to normal, tomorrow…

The Doctor blinked.

Seconds ago, the sky had been dark, and rolling with clouds. Now it was pale pink, and perfectly clear, aside a few wispy cirrus clouds in the east. The moon was white, and hung despondently jut above the horizon.

With his eyes wide open for fear of what would happen if he blinked again, the Doctor sat up. In the direction of the cirrus clouds, the mountain tops glowed gold.

"Oh no." the Doctor groaned. He couldn't believe it. He'd fallen asleep.

"What is it?" Rose mumbled, rolling over.

The fog halo was lower now, much lower. Fifty feet, at the highest. All across the surface of the lake, ripples were forming. Things were stirring. The sun wasn't even in the sky, and Beta was waking up.

"I uh, think it's about time we left, Rose." The Doctor said slowly.

"What? Why?" Rose groaned, "I just woke up."

"You know the saying about Rome?" the Doctor asked, watching the ripples. Shadows moved under the surface of the lake.

Noticing the tension in his voice, Rose sat up. Her hair was matted, and in some places stuck up in tangled clumps. Her eyes were red, irritated by the lake water, and the constant wind. Mud streaked her face and clothes.

"When in Rome, do what the Romans do?" she guessed.

The Doctor shot her a glance, then jerked back. A look like fear passed over his face.

"What?" Rose frowned, touching a hand to her hair, "Is there something in my hair?"

The Doctor shook his head wordlessly. He tore his gaze away from her, and stared at the nest floor. Don't laugh, he told himself. You're injured, you can't defend yourself if she tries to kill you. Don't laugh.

"Are you laughing?" Rose demanded, raising her fist.

"No!"

"You are!" she accused.

"Rose, come on. Let's not do this now. We have a bigger problem. Let's focus on that." The Doctor said, hands raised to defend himself.

"What is it?" Rose asked, in a tone of voice that suggested the problem would want to be pretty damn urgent if he didn't want to be pulverized.

"Do as the Romans do, right? Well, right now, the Romans are all getting the hell out of Rome."

Rose frowned harder. "What're you talking about?"

Exasperatedly, the Doctor gestured at the lake. The ripples were all moving away from the centre of the swamp. On the shore, surges of white water poured up into the air, before tumbling back down again.

"Whatever lives in this swamp is leaving. Something is going to happen when the sun rises. We ought to get out of here." He said.

Rose sighed. The sun would be over the horizon in two, maybe three minutes. The lake shore seemed to be a long way away. It was unfair. She hadn't even had breakfast yet.

With a weary smile, she said, 'We better get moving, then."

Below them, the ripples were all headed for the shore.

xxx xxx

I am so sorry if this chapter is lame. The next one should make up for it. In the next chapter, the plot really gets kicking. I don't know if they'll survive it yet!
In case you're curious as to the time setting, it's after the Age of Steel. I haven't seen it yet (it's on this weekend), so if the story doesn't exactly fit in there (maybe Rose grows a second head in it or something. Certainly I didn't account for that), then you know why. It's shortly after Mickey leaves the TARDIS, anyway. Ugh. Blather blather blather.

Sax-Hog.