A/N: Heyo, first interlude! The Wolf and John need to get back on track.
And if it wasn't too clear previously, the Wolf's appearance is now that of Rose, but imagine Journey's End Rose, not S2 Rose. Little tougher, little older, bit more capable. And the outfit is similar as well – top the same, bottom half a bit different.

Interlude: Same Page

The Brigadier and Doris had insisted they stay until morning, so the Wolf and John had spent the night in the TARDIS in the couple's front yard. The Wolf supercharged Kate's cell phone before they retired for the night, in case any other emergencies ever came up on Earth. Which, more than likely, would happen sooner rather than later.

John had wanted to talk to the Wolf, but seeing his exhaustion, she sent him off to bed as soon as they got back to the ship. John hadn't had a nightmare since their trip to his past and the Reapers, but that night, he relived the Wolf being shot by the Dalek on the Game Station. Only this time, she died in his arms.

He woke in a cold sweat and huddled in the middle of his bed, trying to slow down his breathing. He waited to see if the Wolf would show up, but when his bedroom door remained closed, John assumed that he had managed to stay quiet this time. Ruined for sleep, he got up and took a cold shower to get rid of the remnants of the dream before going off in search of the Wolf. Now was as good as time as any for them to talk.

Without him asking, the TARDIS lit up his room and the hallway outside for John. "Console room?" he asked the ship, pulling on a shirt. The lights flashed once. "Thanks."

When he got there, John found the Wolf nearly completely under the console, digging around in some wires, occasionally cursing as the ship shocked her in retaliation. "You alright down there?" he asked, smiling.

There was a loud thud, followed by angry words in an alien language that the TARDIS refused to translate. Wriggling, the Wolf scooted out from under the console and glared up at him from the floor. "What's the matter with you, John?" she asked, sounding annoyed. "Announce your presence when you enter the room. Don't go sneaking up on unsuspecting people like that." She looked at his feet. "Or at least wear shoes so I can hear you come in."

John looked down at his bare feet in surprise. He'd forgotten about shoes. "I wanted to talk," he said, now looking at the floor uncomfortably. This was the same person who had saved him from his nightmares, but also not. This wasn't the person that had run into his room when he screamed, who had held his hand, and who had given him the chance to say goodbye. But she also was.

"John, what are you doing up? It's the middle of the night, you were exhausted," the Wolf now said worriedly.

"Couldn't sleep." It wasn't a whole lie, it just wasn't the truth.

"Did you have another nightmare?"

"No," John answered quickly. That wasn't really a lie either. He hadn't had the nightmare she was thinking of. The Wolf would just feel guilty if she knew he was dreaming about her instead of the accident.

The Wolf gave him a look, unconvinced, but let it go. "What did you want to talk about, then?" she asked, hauling herself to her feet and collapsing onto the jump chair.

John sighed, leaning up against the console across from her. "This whole regeneration thing," he began. The Wolf stiffened. "Can you just – go over that a bit more?"

She gave him a scrutinizing look. "I thought we had," she said carefully. "What in particular did you want to know?"

"You're still the Wolf, I get that," John tried, causing the Wolf to relax a tiny fraction, "but how much? Everything we did before –" he hesitated, "do you remember it like it was you, or is it just like pictures?" John blew out a frustrated breath. "I'm not asking this right. Okay –"

"I remember everything, John," the Wolf interrupted. "Memories fade with time, as they always do, and I have nine hundred years of them to look back on, but you and I are crystal clear. Like I said, I may look different, but I'm still me. I'm always still me," she reassured him. "It's sort of like when I upgrade my sonic screwdriver. It's the same hardware. Just a different case. I'm still the Wolf. S'just a different case."

John nodded. "I knew that," he told her. "I did. It's just – you died. That Dalek shot you, and then I wasn't there, and then you died, and I just –" he stopped. The Wolf got up and wrapped her arms around him, holding him tightly.

"I know," she whispered. "I know." Taking John by the hand, she had him sit down next to her on the jump seat again, tucking her legs up beneath her as she leaned on him. "I should have told you sooner, and for that, I'm sorry," the Wolf apologized. "But who really wants to talk about dying, and a regeneration can last for over a century – my first lasted nearly a hundred and fifty years – so not many of my companions ever actually see me regenerate. I didn't think it would ever be necessary, and that was a mistake on my part."

"Your first?" John asked. "So how many have you had?"

"This is my ninth regeneration, so my tenth body," the Wolf told him, looking to see how he would take that.

John just nodded absently, absorbing all the new information flying at him. "And your hand?" he wanted to know. "That Sycorax guy sliced it clean off, how did you fix that?"

The Wolf chuckled. "That was just a lucky fluke," she admitted. "Time Lord's are vulnerable immediately after their regeneration, as you saw. We build up excess regeneration energy – that golden cloud I was expelling – that can repair damage incurred within the first fifteen hours after the change."

John frowned. "Why fifteen? You couldn't just make it a normal twenty-four hours?"

The Wolf gave him the look that made him feel like he'd just dribbled on his shirt. Something else that had carried over. John had sort of been hoping that one wouldn't make a reappearance. "Twenty-four hours is a human Earth day, John," she said slowly. "Fifteen hours is half of a Gallifreyan day."

"Oh," John muttered, feeling stupid.

The Wolf nudged him with her shoulder, and he looked up to see her grinning. "Stop sulking," she told him. "Now, do you feel better, or did you have anything else you wanted to talk about?"

John shook his head. "No, I'm good."

"Good, because I have a few questions of my own." The Wolf got serious. "How did you know how to fix me? I mean, tea of all things. I was in a coma, hours away from my brain shutting down entirely, and you somehow come up with the miracle cure. Anti-oxidants – tannin, more specifically. How did you do that?"

John shrugged. "The TARDIS helped me."

"She told you?" the Wolf asked in shock.

"No. No, nothing like that. Here, I'll show you." John pulled the Wolf off the jump seat and led her back to his bedroom.

"That's another thing," the Wolf said from behind him. "Why did I wake up in your room?"

John looked back at her, his face tinged with the slightest hint of red. "I carried you back into the TARDIS after you collapsed on the street, but she wouldn't let me into any room but my own. You were unconscious – I couldn't really put up a fight about it. I'm pretty sure your ship was laughing at me the whole time, though."

The Wolf snorted. "The old girl can be a bit of a troublemaker," she admitted. "Aren't you love?" she asked the ceiling. The ship hummed in agreement.

Always.

The two of them reached his room, and John pulled the history book off of his dresser, handing it to the Wolf. "The TARDIS took me to the library and practically shone a spotlight on the table over this book. I flipped through it, found a section about regeneration and potential problems, and read something about how it could cause a malfunction with free radicals. I knew anti-oxidants cleared free radicals, but it took me a while to come up with tannin." John shrugged. "I thought it didn't work. It took you a while to wake up."

"The damage to my head was pretty severe, the repair –" the Wolf trailed off when she saw the cover of the book. She gazed at it for a moment, lifted her head to stare at John, looked back down at the book, and back at him.

John fidgeted nervously. "What?" he asked. "Was I not supposed to read it? Sorry, but the TARDIS showed it to me, and it did help –"

"You can read this?" the Wolf interrupted.

"Yeeeaah?" John tried, unsure what the correct response was. "Is that alright?"

The Wolf looked back down at the book before putting the cover in his face. "What does that say?" she asked.

"A History. It's really not that complicated," John answered.

"Not complicated," the Wolf muttered derisively. She opened to a random page. "This doesn't look strange to you at all?" she wanted to know, shoving the book in his face again.

"Well, at first, it just looked like a bunch of circles and lines, but then the TARDIS translated for me, like she always does," John replied. "Is that strange?"

The Wolf hesitated for a long moment before shaking her head. "No, it's not. But that's beside the point. I happen to be very angry with you right now, Johnny boy."

John raised his eyebrows. "Me?" he asked, surprised. "What did I do?"

"That whole stunt back at the Game Station?" the Wolf reminded him.

"Oh." John suddenly remembered everything that had happened over the last seventy-two hours.

"'Oh', he says," the Wolf growled. "Come on," she ordered, pulling him out of the bedroom. "We're going to the Med Bay to check you over. What do you remember about the most boneheaded thing you will ever do in your entire life?"

"I remember how you tricked me into the TARDIS and sent me here against my will," John shot back. The Wolf had the decency to look a bit guilty. "After we got to Earth, I yelled at the TARDIS a bit –" The ship interrupted with an angry chime. "Okay, more than a bit," John amended. "I was a little pissed off."

"I won't apologize for that," the Wolf said firmly. "Go on."

John gave her a look. "I stormed out, ended up in some skate park near some estate complex. There, I saw the words 'Wolf Storm' graffiti-ed onto the concrete, and it got me thinking about how we kept seeing it everywhere."

"I was wondering if you'd noticed that," the Wolf muttered as they entered the Med Bay.

"I had," John informed her. "I went back to the TARDIS, and convinced her to open up her heart, like she did with the Slitheen." John rubbed the back of his neck uncomfortably. "After that, the details get a bit fuzzy. I remember being on the Game Station again, and a lot of Daleks and golden energy. Kind of like the stuff coming out of you," he realized. The Wolf just motioned for him to continue. "My head was hurting pretty bad, but then the Daleks were gone and –" the Wolf stiffened, " – were we talking?" he asked.

The Wolf relaxed and pushed him towards the bed. "Sit. And yes, we did speak. You remember what we said?"

John shook his head. "No. What was it?"

"Mostly me trying to convince you to release the damn power before you fried your brain," the Wolf answered vaguely. "Now, lie back," she instructed. "I want to see if you did any permanent damage with that little stunt of yours."

John frowned at her reticence but did as he was told. They were both silent for over half an hour as the Wolf checked him over with various machines to make sure that he was alright. John was content to simply watch the Wolf as she worked. She was frowning, but her hands were as gentle as they always were when she looked after him.

They were so soothing that he almost fell asleep on the examination bed, slipping into a doze until the Wolf quietly roused him. "Johnny, we're done." He slowly sat up, yawning. "Off to bed with you. You shouldn't spend the night in here."

John rubbed his eyes tiredly. "Everything alright?" he asked.

The Wolf gave him an affectionate smile. "Despite your best efforts, you are perfectly fine," she told him. "Now go." She gave him a gentle shove. "Get some sleep while you can. We'll talk more in the morning."

John nodded. "Night," he muttered, walking away.

The Wolf's smile slid off her face as soon as John left. She looked over his test results worriedly.

What am I going to do?